Is cruelty evil?

[cure]

Sadism is, I would, say, evil.

But what about cruelty?

I am tempted to say yes, it is also evil.

But I am less convinced.

Thoughts?

EDIT: <mistakenly deleted content restored by GonzoRon>

[HuManBing]

<content deleted on purpose, as Gonzoron has restored it below>

[ewancummins]

You have already said you aren't taking about whether it warrants a powers check. The only question left is whether you are asking whether cruelty meets the D&D version of evil, or some real-world definition.

Yep. Even then, various players and DMs have their own ideas about what 'evil-aligned' means in the game. Some things are pretty obvious and generally agreed upon, a lot of other stuff is debatable. I don't see much point in long arguments or deep discussions about this sort of vague rules question. The only answer that matters is what the DM running the game in question decides is correct.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Many apologies. In an attempt to move this topic, it was accidentally deleted.

Feel free to continue or restart the discussion here, rather than the General Forum.

We will endeavor not to make the same mistake again.

ETA: somehow some of the posts got spun off into new topics. I've merged them back into this one.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

OK, I contacted our hosting service and they showed me how to dig through the backups. I found everything from this thread as of 10/4. Unfortunately, that's when the last weekly backup happened, and the latest daily backup is too recent so it is missing the thread.

Here's what I could recover:

Sadism is, I would, say, evil.

But what about cruelty?

I am tempted to say yes, it is also evil.

But I am less convinced.

Thoughts?

Cruelty is different than sadism? You are cruel because you're sadist (and evil).

Cruelty means inflicting unnecessary suffering, which always requires a powers check.

I would say no. At least in reality and in ravenloft.

Do you mean 'is it a bad thing' or 'will it provoke a Power Check'?
These two things are not necessarily the same.

Linguistically, I draw no difference between sadism and cruelty, which I view as largely synonymous.

For the purposes of a DnD game, I would say yes - cruelty is evil... in some cases.

The further definitions would break down like this:

Cruelty - the intentional infliction of unjustified, unnecessary, and/or severe suffering. So killing a marauding vampire would be justified and necessary. But locking him inside a coffin to die of starvation when you have the means to stake him might not be. (Strahd's treatment of Leo Dilisnya.) And killing a bandit by a swift sword-strike might be okay, but tying him up to a tree and then sawing him in half while hanging him upside down so the blood pools in his brain, keeping him conscious throughout the whole procedure, might not be. (Drakov IMC does this.)

Evil - for the purposes of DnD, this is simplified to "harmful to life", and further simplified to "harmful to anthropomorphic life that humans generally care about". Thus, eating a cabbage (which is still harmful to life but which most humans don't particularly care about) is significantly less evil than eating a baby (which is both harmful to life and generally opposed by most humans). This means certain issues fall into a murky middle ground, like the perennial favorite "killed the mommy wolfwere, can we kill her young?" The simplified version of this question would be "yes, if they would grow up to do evil stuff, as the Monster Manual rules make highly likely".

Reduced this way, the answer effectively becomes "Cruelty is evil when it is the intentional infliction of unjustified, unnecessary, and/or severe suffering, done in a way that is harmful to anthropomorphic life that humans generally care about".

Sawing down a tree just because it's in the way of your view thus may be cruel to the tree but is not evil by DnD standards.

Do you mean 'is it a bad thing' or 'will it provoke a Power Check'?
These two things are not necessarily the same.

Agreed. We have a "clear" defintion of what provokes {ower Checks in the 3e books. I am interested rather whether it is evil, regardless of whether it excites or not the interest of the Dark Powers. For example, elsewhere we have pretty much established that cruelty to animals, at very least of the medical research variety and of the trapper variety, is of no interest to them.

Linguistically, I draw no difference between sadism and cruelty, which I view as largely synonymous.

For the purposes of a DnD game, I would say yes - cruelty is evil... in some cases.

The further definitions would break down like this:

Cruelty - the intentional infliction of unjustified, unnecessary, and/or severe suffering. So killing a marauding vampire would be justified and necessary. But locking him inside a coffin to die of starvation when you have the means to stake him might not be. (Strahd's treatment of Leo Dilisnya.) And killing a bandit by a swift sword-strike might be okay, but tying him up to a tree and then sawing him in half while hanging him upside down so the blood pools in his brain, keeping him conscious throughout the whole procedure, might not be. (Drakov IMC does this.)

Evil - for the purposes of DnD, this is simplified to "harmful to life", and further simplified to "harmful to anthropomorphic life that humans generally care about". Thus, eating a cabbage (which is still harmful to life but which most humans don't particularly care about) is significantly less evil than eating a baby (which is both harmful to life and generally opposed by most humans). This means certain issues fall into a murky middle ground, like the perennial favorite "We've killed the mommy wolfwere, can we kill her young?" The simplified version of this question would be "yes, if they would grow up to do evil stuff, as the Monster Manual rules make highly likely".

Reduced this way, the answer effectively becomes "Cruelty is evil when it is the intentional infliction of unjustified, unnecessary, and/or severe suffering, done in a way that is harmful to anthropomorphic life that humans generally care about".

Sawing down a tree just because it's in the way of your view thus may be cruel to the tree but is not evil by DnD standards.

I would say that the D&D definition of evil is more a complete lack of respect for life. So it's not so much "evil characters kill and good characters don't" that many people view it as, but more along the lines that a good character does not take killing lightly and will often regret it, while an evil character would hold no such compunctions, would not regret it, and may even enjoy it. So that ties in to your definition of cruelty in a less murky middle ground.

I'm not sure what the difference between sadism & cruelty (as specified by the OP) is.

Do you mean 'is it a bad thing' or 'will it provoke a Power Check'?
These two things are not necessarily the same.

Agreed. We have a "clear" defintion of what provokes {ower Checks in the 3e books. I am interested rather whether it is evil, regardless of whether it excites or not the interest of the Dark Powers. For example, elsewhere we have pretty much established that cruelty to animals, at very least of the medical research variety and of the trapper variety, is of no interest to them.

If you mean 'is it an evil-aligned action', that's a matter for the DM. He decides what constitutes evil-aligned behaviour or intentions in his game, period. Rule Zero. One DM might decide that all 'cruelty' is evil, another may judge such things by severity of the act of cruelty or on the basis of intentions. Some may considering mitigating circumstances, and others may not.

If you mean 'is it considered evil in-game, by NPCs or PCs', that would obviously vary based on the NPCs or PCs in question.

a matter for the DM. He decides what constitutes evil-aligned behaviour or intentions in his game, period. Rule Zero.

^ I second this. Also, Rule Zero applies in response to pretty much any question about a game, regardless of whether it's about the crunch or the fluff.

Sadism is, I would, say, evil.

But what about cruelty?

I am tempted to say yes, it is also evil.

But I am less convinced.

Thoughts?

Isn't this more of a philosophical question? I think this should be moved to another forum.

Sadism is, I would, say, evil.

But what about cruelty?

I am tempted to say yes, it is also evil.

But I am less convinced.

Thoughts?

Isn't this more of a philosophical question? I think this should be moved to another forum.

?

You have already said you aren't taking about whether it warrants a powers check. The only question left is whether you are asking whether cruelty meets the D&D version of evil, or some real-world definition.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Regrettably, that's all I'm going to be able to restore. Bluehost confirms that the daily backup overwrites the previous one each day, so the 10/9 backup overwrote the 10/8 backup. Thus, the most recent backup with this thread in it is the 10/4 weekly one, and that's all we've got. I know there were a few more posts, but I'm sorry, they seem gone for good.

[HuManBing]

Thanks for putting in the work to recover what you already could, Gonzoron. It's good to see a forum moderator who makes an effort to fix problems!

I think the only other thing that I wrote was that in some English uses, "cruel" could describe an action without actually plumbing the intent. So if I turn away somebody who comes to talk to me, but it turns out they were on the verge of suicide and needed to talk to me, that would be a "cruel rejection" even though I was completely unaware of that condition and certainly had no intent to cause harm. Here, I guess it's Fate or Chance that is cruel, rather than the actor.

Whereas semantically "sadistic" or "sadism" is almost never used to describe something stemming from chance or fate. It specifically comes from an actor's conscious intent to cause harm and suffering.

Thus, between the two, I'd be tempted to say in some very narrow readings, a cruel act may not necessarily be evil, whereas a sadistic one is almost certainly evil.

[cure]

Thanks for putting in the work to recover what you already could, Gonzoron. It's good to see a forum moderator who makes an effort to fix problems!

I think the only other thing that I wrote was that in some English uses, "cruel" could describe an action without actually plumbing the intent. So if I turn away somebody who comes to talk to me, but it turns out they were on the verge of suicide and needed to talk to me, that would be a "cruel rejection" even though I was completely unaware of that condition and certainly had no intent to cause harm. Here, I guess it's Fate or Chance that is cruel, rather than the actor.

Whereas semantically "sadistic" or "sadism" is almost never used to describe something stemming from chance or fate. It specifically comes from an actor's conscious intent to cause harm and suffering.

Thus, between the two, I'd be tempted to say in some very narrow readings, a cruel act may not necessarily be evil, whereas a sadistic one is almost certainly evil.

Yes, an excellent point about intentionality.

And yes also, our moderator deserves many thanks for his retrieval work.

[HuManBing]

I vote that we make a backup of Gonzoron himself, in case something goes wrong with the forum and the mod as well.

Is he a dad? If so then we have our Backupron right there.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Is he a dad? If so then we have our Backupron right there.

Something tells me you don't want a forum administered by 3 and 5 year old girls... Unless you like your Ravenloft forum to be decorated with Strawberry Shortcake, Disney Princesses, flowers, ponies, and rainbows.

Also, they don't know their way around linux, html, and perl... yet.

[HuManBing]

Failed horror check. Right there. That'll do nicely. Good night.

I'm that disjointed sobbing you hear emanating from the padded room next to Dru's.

[Zilfer]

LINUX!!!! RUN!!!!

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

LINUX!!!! RUN!!!!

Running from Linux on this forum is kind of like running from the Mists in Ravenloft. You can't escape, because your world exists only within the thing you're trying to escape.

[cure]

I vote that we make a backup of Gonzoron himself, in case something goes wrong with the forum and the mod as well.

A clone would be a good idea ...

I will raise the matter with Meredoth.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

I think the only other thing that I wrote was that in some English uses, "cruel" could describe an action without actually plumbing the intent. So if I turn away somebody who comes to talk to me, but it turns out they were on the verge of suicide and needed to talk to me, that would be a "cruel rejection" even though I was completely unaware of that condition and certainly had no intent to cause harm. Here, I guess it's Fate or Chance that is cruel, rather than the acto.

Yes, an excellent point about intentionality.

Motivation may also be a factor, even with intentional acts of cruelty. If an action-movie hero is about to venture into a dangerous situation, but he's being stubbornly followed around by a tagalong kid he'd previously rescued, then he might have to say something cruel that'll make the kid depart in tears, rather than doggedly follow the hero into danger. That's technically cruelty -- the kid's feelings are genuinely hurt, and there might have been an alternative solution the hero simply didn't think of -- but cruelty inflicted for the best of reasons, and neutral rather than evil IMO.