tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post7171527605767451824..comments2024-03-29T06:16:21.012+08:00Comments on Monsters and Manuals: The Nature of Evil, or "Maybe it's how you impress goblin chicks"Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-13084217855807588252011-09-14T17:34:51.982+08:002011-09-14T17:34:51.982+08:00Billy: Kind of. I think going into a dungeon shoul...<b>Billy</b>: Kind of. I think going into a dungeon should be fucking terrifying: it's pitch black and you don't know what's down there except that it's dangerous. You would have to be insane to want to be a dungeoneer!noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-86206913551035337702011-09-14T02:01:22.409+08:002011-09-14T02:01:22.409+08:00So is this really a post about how the DM can crea...So is this really a post about how the DM can create atmosphere: through fear of the unknown/unknowable?<br /><br />I'm remembering the Aurbach PBP you ran. You did this pretty well--we were all terrified of just setting foot inside the dungeon, with it's strange golems, limitless opportunities for being flanked, and the only means of egress being shimmying up a rope one-by-oneBillyhttp://billygoes.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-30535428060574045152011-09-13T18:14:20.836+08:002011-09-13T18:14:20.836+08:00Liza and Billy: There are no 'canon' D&...<b>Liza and Billy</b>: There are no 'canon' D&D monsters that spring to mind as being Evil 2, and that's because evil in D&D is really pretty mundane. Evil things either want to amass power, or they hate the living, or their sadistic and malicious because they enjoy it. Quite simple explanations, really.<br /><br /><b>SP and John</b>: I'm with John - CS Lewis' depiction of evil there just creeps me out on a whole other level. Give me a Balor any day.<br /><br />We shouldn't be surprised by this, but CS Lewis and Tolkien have a lot in common in their depiction of evil, it seems. Both of them viewed it not as something existing in opposition to good, but kind of an absence of anything. The paragraph John posted from Perelandra reminds me of what Tolkien writes about Ungoliant; she's not darkness, because darkness is a thing - she <i>destroys light</i>. And she doesn't even do it because she enjoys it. Her malice is totally pure and totally destructive.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-90905873510464202872011-09-13T17:30:51.407+08:002011-09-13T17:30:51.407+08:00@S.P. Lovecraft's entities are metaphors for a...@S.P. Lovecraft's entities are metaphors for a vast, incomprehensible and indifferent universe. That's horrible, but it's a different kind of horror.<br />I wouldn't take even cold comfort in being killed by Lewis' creature. I would so much rather face a frothing psychopath who personally hated my guts, than some quasi-moronic thing that tortures animals like a man picks at grass.<br />The bear doesn't mean to cause you suffering, it's just trying to make its way in the world. Azathoth doesn't mean to cause you suffering, it's just utterly indifferent to the speck of fly crap you call earth. In both cases, the suffering they cause is just an incidental by-product.<br /><br />Lewis' creature causes suffering intentionally, any way it can, as an end in itself, and <i>for no reason</i>. That gives me the willies.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07090296806321882601noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-45293615086088887472011-09-13T14:45:51.818+08:002011-09-13T14:45:51.818+08:00I like the referral to 'From Out of the Silent...I like the referral to 'From Out of the Silent Planet'.<br /><br />While I do understand the idea that certain evils can be so foreign and alien in the sense that we cannot discern their motives behind their actions or perceptions of things, but I would come to understand that evils seem as if 'innocent' would be neutral in the sense. It's like the wolf that mangles and slaughters its deer for food; it does it because it does, but even then, this ties back to your 'Evil 1': motive. Though, when it comes to D&D, this would be a more "looking out for myself" kind of deal, and therefore, neutrality.<br /><br />I like the grey areas. :DJoshuahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10009433185355976238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-85955942356893361102011-09-13T13:51:41.919+08:002011-09-13T13:51:41.919+08:00Could you flesh it out a bit with some example pos...Could you flesh it out a bit with some example posts evil 2 scenarios or monsters?Billyhttp://billygoes.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-60540382282669457722011-09-13T08:11:14.734+08:002011-09-13T08:11:14.734+08:00Devils deal with the human sins - greed, lust, vio...Devils deal with the human sins - greed, lust, violence, all of that.<br /><br />Demons are those that possess people to commit acts of perversity, not so much selfish as incomprehensible or sadistic.<br /><br />At least in my cosmos. A neat way to sum this up is that those possessed by devils kill in anger; those possessed by demons kill in joy.Roger G-Shttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08594440701279968693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-84507947890967293152011-09-13T06:15:22.122+08:002011-09-13T06:15:22.122+08:00I'm basically with John. For me, that's t...I'm basically with <b>John</b>. For me, that's the Cthulhu mythos in a nutshell: the entities encountered aren't evil as we understand it, they're just on a completely different morality scale. Cthulhu doesn't eat you because he hates you or he enjoys it, he eats you because that's <i>what he does</i>. We don't ascribe human morality to animals, for example, and while that's cold comfort to the man eaten by a bear, at least he can die knowing the bear wished him no deliberate harm.<br /><br />Likewise, the denizens of the underworld aren't evil — they just do things we, in our limited perspective, perceive as evil. Demons might want to overthrow creation, but it's not really a deliberate choice: if they didn't want that, they'd be something else. You can choose to destroy creation, if that appeals to you, but that doesn't make you a demon.S. P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-9999090102642789382011-09-13T05:09:05.012+08:002011-09-13T05:09:05.012+08:00(I hate being so predictable, but...) speaking of ...(I hate being so predictable, but...) speaking of alignments, maybe the Law-Chaos axis could be used to differentiate the two kinds of Evil? Like, "mundane" Evil 1 is constrained by the natural laws (Order) whereas the "unnatural" Evil 2 is more akin to Chos... in the sense of the unspeakable, alien Chaos of Cthulhu, Arioch, etc.<br /><br />Also, I wonder what exemples can you give of creatures belonging to one or another Evil type: Aboleths, Ilithid and such for Evil 2? Demons? Are undead Evil 1 folk?lizahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09786809318270279916noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-37904698072790497322011-09-13T04:28:22.661+08:002011-09-13T04:28:22.661+08:00zero_zero_one: Neutral is basically self-intereste...<b>zero_zero_one</b>: Neutral is basically self-interested. No malice, but no benevolence either.<br /><br /><b>Trey</b>: There could be a way of distinguishing them in game terms, but basically I'm just looking at it from a "D&D philosophy" perspective. That Machen thing is quite interesting - but yes, very Christian and kind of Tolkienesque.<br /><br /><b>Zak</b>: Since when have comments on my blog ever, <i>ever</i> resulted in that??<br /><br /><b>John</b>: That is seriously creepy. The only CS Lewis I've read is the Narnia books, which I do have a real soft spot for. But that description has a nice understated power to it.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-56751445140975714512011-09-13T03:52:19.620+08:002011-09-13T03:52:19.620+08:00CS Lewis' stories-cum-religious allegories don...CS Lewis' stories-cum-religious allegories don't appeal to me on the whole, but I very much liked his portrayal of evil in Perelandra. I thought it was the only really worthwhile part of the whole book.<br /><br />The main character is wandering in a Garden of Eden type place, and meets a man who is possessed by what is essentially a demon, who is currently torturing small animals to death for no particular reason. It's inferred that the creature is doing this not because it enjoys it, but with a blank natural simplicity as if it would never occur to it <i>not</i> to vivisect things.<br /><br />As the text puts it, <i>"The extremity of its evil had passed beyond all struggle into some state which bore a horrible similarity to innocence."</i><br /><br />Another quote:<br /><br /><i>"The face which he raised from torturing the frog had that terrible power which the face of a corpse sometimes has of simply rebuffing every conceivable human attitude one can adopt towards it. The expressionless mouth, the unwinking stare of the eyes, something heavy and inorganic in the very folds of the cheek, said clearly: ‘I have features as you have, but there is nothing in common between you and me.’"</i>Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07090296806321882601noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-64442310752829275022011-09-13T03:51:02.358+08:002011-09-13T03:51:02.358+08:00I sense a 39% chance of an insane meandering polit...I sense a 39% chance of an insane meandering political/philosophical or algnment-based discussion emerging in the comments here...Zak Sabbathhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08812410680077034917noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-37111427252901231482011-09-13T03:49:51.104+08:002011-09-13T03:49:51.104+08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07090296806321882601noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-26130724085705024282011-09-13T02:18:34.062+08:002011-09-13T02:18:34.062+08:00I wonder how we would distinguish the two types--a...I wonder how we would distinguish the two types--at least in gmae terms? When we present pure alien evil in the game it would seem that most of the time the explanation of "they just enjoy it" would fit if no other. I'm not disagreeing per se, just wondering how to operationalize it--though probably it doesn't matter on a pratical level.<br /><br />There's also Machen's definition of evil given in the frame story to "The White People." He distinguishes mundane "badness" like theft or murder done for regular everyday human reasons from evil which he views as the desire to overturn the order of the universe--to seize power(s) that were not granted to ones place in the natural order. It's interesting because I don't know that this would immediately register as evil at all to us early 21st century folk like it did to late 19th century MAchen.Treyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04647628467658839351noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-60339762001613056792011-09-13T01:58:11.475+08:002011-09-13T01:58:11.475+08:00A nicely philosophical post.
I've not played ...A nicely philosophical post.<br /><br />I've not played much D&D or similar, but was wondering where 'Neutral' rests in all of this talk. Do neutral beings exist and what do they do/how do they act?NathanRyderhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17963023116440525852noreply@blogger.com