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It's not self-defense because they aren't inherently evil, and your belief that's true doesn't make it true. It's absolutely evil to kill them at random because you fear something bad will happen.
Also, your first response to intelligent life should be diplomacy, not murder. If it tries to attack you or innocent civilians, that's one thing, but not when someone's out having a drink at the bar or sitting by the campfire making s'mores.
That's all well and good for you and me to say as outsiders looking in, but it's empirically not the way people behave. Fear is one of, if not the biggest, motivating factors in how people behave. In human history, how often do you think perfectly normal people have killed total innocents out of fear? Witch trials anyone? And those didn't even have a legitimate basis.
Hell, even if it was an animal, you should only kill if it starts attacking you or you need food to survive/you produce food goods for markets/cities/etc.
That's actually a pretty modern idea. Historically people would hunt the hell out of any animal that might be a threat, because they couldn't afford to risk that it might eat their kid, or carry off their livestock.
So yes, you crash a Halloween party and stab some guy because he's wearing a pair of pointed horns, a tail, and carrying around a pitchfork, that's still murder, and the law won't look kindly to it.
In most current societies there aren't really many groups or creatures that it's just legal to kill. However, I think most courts will consider extenuating circumstances in the case of legitimate mistaken identity. Like if you're out deer hunting, and you shoot something that looks like a deer, only it turns out to be two dudes in a deer costume, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't get nearly the same punishment you would get for just shooting a dude. Probably involuntary manslaughter instead of murder 2.
Also this whole line of thought does raise the question of "Does intent matter for alignment?" I'm pretty sure it does, considering creatures not capable of making moral decisions can do things that would be evil if done by other creatures without shifting from True Neutral. So if intent matters, then the farmer who kills a goblin because he legitimately was afraid it might harm his kids is not committing an evil act. What I'm saying is, being wrong about something doesn't make you evil. It's only if you know that something is evil, and do it anyway, that you become evil.
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So what if the town has one goblin who is accepted because it is vouched for by the locals and it's useful to people to have that goblin around, but eventually there's more for the one trusted goblin to do than they can manage and the goblin everyone likes and trusts says "I've got a cousin who could help, I will vouch for him." So the town welcomes the other goblin with the understanding if Gob2 messes up it's Gob1 that's going to be held accountable, and it turns out Gob2 is fine too, because Gob1 is both trustworthy and a decent judge of character.
So now you have two goblins in town and a mechanism for admitting more that has been proven to work.
You're talking apples and oranges here. I'm talking about some random goblin walking up to town without someone to vouch: I'd expect it to be either killed or driven off.
I've already said, it's possible to have someone try to 'fix' a goblin [most likely some goodie two shoes paladin :P]. Most likely the people around will think the vouchies are controlling it somehow [they are known for being followers]
As to the locals... I seriously doubt that'd happen: by the time you'd overcome the stigma of being a goblin, they die of old age. [people STILL don't universally trust 1/2 orcs] At best, I see the goblin the same way I see an monstrous animal companion: fine as long as it's owner has it on a leash. So they work as followers and slaves but not so much as individuals unless it's a truly enlightened place or something truly extraordinary changes opinion like a literal divine intervention.
Most of the time the "random goblin" is going to be vouched for by the rest of the party. Much like how, for a while now, the rest of the party has been vouching how the tiger that hangs out with the druid is not dangerous.
Or how you're going to handle the first couple books of Carrion Crown if someone in the party insists on playing a half-orc.
Also, I'm pretty sure nobody is gonna be afraid of a single goblin. It would probably start with 'Hey, gob, what are you doing here? I don't want any trouble'.
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Most of the time the "random goblin" is going to be vouched for by the rest of the party. Much like how, for a while now, the rest of the party has been vouching how the tiger that hangs out with the druid is not dangerous.
I've NEVER been talking about the goblin PC but NPC's. The random goblin vender and such. I don't mind the party having a goblin pet: have a blast. I'm having an issue with the background goblins. [core vs non-core]
Also, I'm pretty sure nobody is gonna be afraid of a single goblin. It would probably start with 'Hey, gob, what are you doing here? I don't want any trouble'.
They generally come in gangs of 7-9 minimum, so if you aren't looking for the other 6-8 you're most likely going to be in for a surprise.
Second, exceptional ones have class level. A color spray can make shiving you MUCH, MUCH easier. Or a few die of sneak attack from the 'weak' goblin. If YOU go around with a 'it's JUST a goblin and they can't do anything alone', eventually the town is going to need a new guard... :P
Well, if the GM wants to have a background goblin, the GM can justify that with any series of circumstances imaginable so long as it doesn't involve the PCs in any way, because the GM controls literally everybody else in existence.
So if pressed, I guess I'll just make a folder of "different stories for how this goblin became accepted by the locals"? It's not like the whole game isn't about coming up with stories, so this shouldn't be a stretch.
Like "Random Background Goblins" can't be harder to work in than the random background Cacaelias, Localaths, Changelings, and Astomoi I already want to include.
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Well, if the GM wants to have a background goblin
AP's. Unless the Dm is going out of his way to sanitize it. I REALLY don't see the new AP's not having the new poster child added all over the place. So my worry isn't 'work in' but that the Dm isn't going to have the time or energy to remove them. I'd rather not add 'do you use goblin NPC's' to my list of questions then I join an online game.
Well, what if the AP author makes a point of explaining how the Goblin Fishmonger, or whoever, became a local fixture? Presumably the author will have an idea of who this person is, what they are like, how they interact with the rest of the community, personal history, etc.
Plus, I mean how many APs even have a gnome in them?
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Well, what if the AP author makes a point of explaining how the Goblin Fishmonger, or whoever, became a local fixture? Presumably the author will have an idea of who this person is, what they are like, how they interact with the rest of the community, personal history, etc.
Plus, I mean how many APs even have a gnome in them?
While I find the off goblin NPC irksome, I can manage. What I fear is that we'll see an infestation in an effort to promote the new mascot race. So the Goblin Fishmonger, ok I can deal. But when I see him and then a merchant, and then a barber and then a farmer and then a butcher and then... One was pushing it for me.
I find that most cities that get written up in APs don't really bother to flesh out people unless the PCs actually have to interact with them.
Like in Strange Aeons book 2 (set in Thrushmoor in Ustalav) we get 3 people who work in the Sleepless building, a fisherman who gives a plot hook, an Artist who is a newcomer with a plot hook, the Innkeeper, a Doomsayer, and a stevedore with a plot hook. Everybody else is part of a faceless crowd or in a dungeon. Gazetteer in the back mentions about 6 other people by name. So if we're introducing only like a dozen people in a wholly Urban adventure path book, I don't think we're going to run into problems with "5 goblins in every book".
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Well, if the GM wants to have a background goblin, the GM can justify that with any series of circumstances imaginable so long as it doesn't involve the PCs in any way, because the GM controls literally everybody else in existence.
So if pressed, I guess I'll just make a folder of "different stories for how this goblin became accepted by the locals"? It's not like the whole game isn't about coming up with stories, so this shouldn't be a stretch.
Like "Random Background Goblins" can't be harder to work in than the random background Cacaelias, Localaths, Changelings, and Astomoi I already want to include.
I would assume terrain, location and climate might have something to do with why some of those random background creatures aren't around and could be jarring as to Why they are in city X or tavern Y. Also the heck is Astomoi..... Really Paizo?
Gah anyway, at least to me, Goblins breed fast enough if left alone and can eat enough ....varying nutrients to survive most climates that can also support humans.
Seriously they're like the rats or raccoons of Pathfinder. If Humans can survive X, Goblins can also probably survive it too unless high level silly magic is involved.
It does occur to me that at various points throughout history and culture, human beings were considered to be "Always Chaotic Evil" by nature.
I think that in the cultures that most of us grew up in, concepts like Natural Evil and Original Sin and so on are largely considered superstition, and human beings have come to be regarded as far more complicated beings than that, but, for a role-playing game like this, we're dealing with a game setting in which all sorts of superstitions, myths, fantasies, and pseudo-sciences are real.
So, perhaps Goblins SHOULD be left with the CE stamp, but Humans, Dwarves, Elves, etc. should ALSO be assumed to be corrupted by Original Sin with evil by default, and similarly stamped with an Evil alignment. There is, after all, something to this.
Let each game table decide for itself, then, whether or not to allow Dwarves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Greed, and Elves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Pride, or Humans, tainted by every conceivable Deadly Sin into games at their tables as playable races.
I really think that we are in danger of watering down and diluting the power of the likes of Charlie Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, Ed Gein as human monsters by trying to assume that humans are not irredeemably evil monsters by default, and cluttering the game up with too many good humans.
I would assume terrain, location and climate might have something to do with why some of those random background creatures aren't around and could be jarring as to Why they are in city X or tavern Y. Also the heck is Astomoi..... Really Paizo?
I feel though the thing it's good to model in your fantasy world is that people are going to travel. Whether it's for trade, seeking opportunity, running away from something, or just a whim we find archeological evidence of people traveling a really long way from where they were born.
So just because a snowy mountain climate far from the ocean is not at all suited for Cecaelias, it doesn't mean that one isn't going to visit- both because they are by nature curious, friendly, and gregarious but probably also to trade for things one can't get when one lives in the ocean.
If everyone in a given town or city is someone who's was born there and will most likely die there, that place doesn't feel real to me. Or at least, the only places I know of like that are dying communities rather than vibrant ones. So I always make a point of "who's not from here-who is just recently in town, and who is an outsider who has been there a while."
I always figure that I need to figure out why is this town here and not somewhere else, since there is likely something akin to a river, a major trade route, some exploitable natural resource, or some cultural artifact that is of interest. Even backwater places are going to want to build near sources of water.
So if people are living there because the river connects to other places, or because this is a trade hub, or because there are opportunities or points of interest then some people are going to want to come here. I'm not talking about "busloads of tourists" but I expect a handful of non-locals for verisimilitude.
I mean, there's historical evidence for traders traveling from the Arabian Peninsula to Scandinavia and vice versa. So if people can manage that in a world without magic, then people can get from Qadira to Varisia.
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It does occur to me that at various points throughout history and culture, human beings were considered to be "Always Chaotic Evil" by nature.
I think that in the cultures that most of us grew up in, concepts like Natural Evil and Original Sin and so on are largely considered superstition, and human beings have come to be regarded as far more complicated beings than that, but, for a role-playing game like this, we're dealing with a game setting in which all sorts of superstitions, myths, fantasies, and pseudo-sciences are real.
So, perhaps Goblins SHOULD be left with the CE stamp, but Humans, Dwarves, Elves, etc. should ALSO be assumed to be corrupted by Original Sin with evil by default, and similarly stamped with an Evil alignment. There is, after all, something to this.
Let each game table decide for itself, then, whether or not to allow Dwarves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Greed, and Elves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Pride, or Humans, tainted by every conceivable Deadly Sin into games at their tables as playable races.
Interestingly, though humans are usually considered one of "the goodly races" in most fantasy settings, they actually tend towards neutral alignments or an "any" listing, as in the D&D 2e Monster Manual. In contrast elves are listed as chaotic good, and dwarves as lawful good. PF didn't include them, or any core race in the Bestiary. Though the NPC listing shows the standard human 2nd level commoner as true neutral.
I would actually love to see a psuedo-alignment system in PF like the one used in World of Darkness. Every character chooses a Vice and a Virtue. Maybe races that are good by default can pick an extra Virtue, and evil by default pick an extra Vice. Dwarves for example, would tend towards Fortitude and Faith, while also possessing an excess of Greed. Elves might have Prudence and Temperance, while possessing an excess of Pride. A goblin might have Hope, while also having to deal with the dual vices of Envy and Gluttony. I think it would be far more interesting than our current alignment system, and it would mean that while goblins are far more likely to fall afoul of their vices, there would still be goblins that overcame them, and it would make goblin heroes special because they were able to overcome themselves. It also wouldn't interfere with free will.I really think that we are in danger of watering down and diluting the power of the likes of Charlie Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, Ed Gein as human monsters by trying to assume that humans are not irredeemably evil monsters by default, and cluttering the game up with too many good humans.
I'm guessing you're being sarcastic, but at the same time this is kind of true. We like to pretend that people like that are aberrations, but every human has or had the potential to become a monster, which is part of why serial killers are both terrifying and fascinating. But that doesn't change the fact that most humans don't become monsters, thus justifying them being an any or neutral alignment by default.
I don't think most of the people arguing against goblins have a problem with goblins being an available PC race, except the few who are arguing that it's more fun to have always evil races available as punching bags, nor do we have a problem with goblins not always being evil. Our problem is that what they're talking about is a fundamental shift in the way people in-setting view goblins happening in a very short amount of in-game time. And as we've just discussed, people are awful, so why would we think they'd be accepting of a newly semi-reformed race?| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Orcs/goblins in Tolkien were inherently evil because of their creation and creator. He warped their minds and bodies on purpose to produce them so. He did the same with other races it was his way to corrupt. This left them forever inherently evil. He was effectively a god and I suppose that is enough to explain it.
Half orcs were made by well a less powerful being and frankly did not last long since he got them all killed quickly. Maybe a few escaped but in Tolkien magic was still used to make them so you can argue either way with them I suppose.
Half orcs in d&d were never made that same way per the phbs. In ad&d the playable half orcs were only the 10 % that looked human and could pass as so. (Also the orcs in ad&d were LE not CE, so more able to be negotiated with and even trusted). Those half orcs now had free will in that they were not directly created by a being of godlike power directly to be evil.
You can define the races how you want, and can certainly create a world were certainly races are inherently evil. Its been done before obviously. And in the tradition this game follows it certainly exists.
I personally think goblins do not belong in the core books, they should not be part of what defines the base game as it will make them too common and they will loose their flavor in the change. Putting them in a splat book later allows players determined to play them to do so while additionally keeping the races flavor and even making that pc more special for it.
Trade hubs or river ports will definitely see more.
Most people though, lived in small rural farming villages. Such places have no attraction for travellers from distant lands. Less so for settlers .
I guess the question is - why are the PCs there?
Since all the parts of the world where the PCs never visit are not places I need to worry about or describe. But if the PCs go to a place, it stands to reason they are going there and not somewhere else. If it's not something like "the PCs are tracking down an evil cult they need to put a stop to" then the reason the PCs want to be in a place might well relate to a reason someone else might want to be there.
Like I genuinely do not want to send my players to uninteresting places, and interesting really comes in two flavors- interesting to other people in the game world too; and mad, bad, and dangerous.
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It does occur to me that at various points throughout history and culture, human beings were considered to be "Always Chaotic Evil" by nature.
I think that in the cultures that most of us grew up in, concepts like Natural Evil and Original Sin and so on are largely considered superstition, and human beings have come to be regarded as far more complicated beings than that, but, for a role-playing game like this, we're dealing with a game setting in which all sorts of superstitions, myths, fantasies, and pseudo-sciences are real.
So, perhaps Goblins SHOULD be left with the CE stamp, but Humans, Dwarves, Elves, etc. should ALSO be assumed to be corrupted by Original Sin with evil by default, and similarly stamped with an Evil alignment. There is, after all, something to this.
Let each game table decide for itself, then, whether or not to allow Dwarves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Greed, and Elves, tainted e.g. by the Deadly Sin of Pride, or Humans, tainted by every conceivable Deadly Sin into games at their tables as playable races.
Interestingly, though humans are usually considered one of "the goodly races" in most fantasy settings, they actually tend towards neutral alignments or an "any" listing, as in the D&D 2e Monster Manual. In contrast elves are listed as chaotic good, and dwarves as lawful good. PF didn't include them, or any core race in the Bestiary. Though the NPC listing shows the standard human 2nd level commoner as true neutral.
I would actually love to see a psuedo-alignment system in PF like the one used in World of Darkness. Every character chooses a Vice and a Virtue. Maybe races that are good by default can pick an extra Virtue, and evil by default pick an extra Vice. Dwarves for example, would tend towards Fortitude and Faith, while also possessing an excess of Greed. Elves might have Prudence and Temperance, while possessing an excess of Pride. A goblin might have Hope, while also having to deal with the dual vices of Envy and Gluttony. I think it would be far more interesting than our current alignment system, and it would mean that while goblins are far more likely to fall afoul of their vices, there would still be goblins that overcame them, and it would make goblin heroes special because they were able to overcome themselves. It also wouldn't interfere with free will.
I do tend to like variant alignment systems a lot better than the default D&D system. The WoD vices and virtues you just mentioned is a particularly good one. Another one is an Allegiance system, where people can certainly take "Law" or "Good" as allegiances but the vast majority will take the trio of "Family, Nation, Deity."
Still, there can be interesting things to do with the contrast of the buried evil stirring near the sleepy little village. Or a PC could be from one of those towns - the first of his family in generations off the farm.
I do find a pretty good way to put players on edge is when they come into the sleepy little town, and even though it's surprisingly populated, absolutely everyone as far as the eye can see is an adult blonde Ulfen man with brown eyes. It might be nothing at all (Maybe there are some events going on occupying all the women, children, young adults, and old people so this is not a normal day), but it *could* be an evil cult situation because that's pretty unnatural.
Trade hubs or river ports will definitely see more.
Most people though, lived in small rural farming villages. Such places have no attraction for travellers from distant lands. Less so for settlers .
I guess the question is - why are the PCs there?
Since all the parts of the world where the PCs never visit are not places I need to worry about or describe. But if the PCs go to a place, it stands to reason they are going there and not somewhere else. If it's not something like "the PCs are tracking down an evil cult they need to put a stop to" then the reason the PCs want to be in a place might well relate to a reason someone else might want to be there.
Like I genuinely do not want to send my players to uninterestng places, and interesting really comes in two flavors- interesting to other people in the game world too; and mad, bad, and dangerous.
Its essentially the problem of a lot of RPG cities being imagined as "late-medieval/Early renaissance" Constantinople/Marseilles/Seville/Paris/(Velikij) Novgorod/etc. simply scale up or down in size. These places were often rather rare, even at times unique for the regions, countries or even "counties" they were in. Thus making them representative of how a particular regions ethnic, cultural and even at times religious composition was, can be rather misleading.
Then again, some creative liberties have to made to make things a bit more dynamic and exciting. These creative liberties, together with a dash of exaggerations, small misrepresentations and fabrications are simply the easiest (and currently most effective) way of doing this and it can have the added benefit of making things more recognizable and, for the lack of a better term, more open.Also while people of the didn't travel far from their home counties, there were still instances of people moving en masse (essentially colonizing). A good historical example of this would be the 'Ostsiedlung' which lasted for hundred of year and created the large pockets of ethnic Germans that would cause a lot of trouble in the 20th century.
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I don't think we're going to run into problems with "5 goblins in every book".
It wouldn't surprise me to have the starter AP to push goblins HARD. Like in your face hard. Partially to showcase the race and partially to also showcase while they are now 'cool' and 'totally not evil bastards'. If they don't, great.
I guess the question is - why are the PCs there?Trade hubs or river ports will definitely see more.
Most people though, lived in small rural farming villages. Such places have no attraction for travellers from distant lands. Less so for settlers .
You've got to get from here to there, and camping in the wilderness sucks.
An encounter ends up trashing your wagon and the closest town is right over there.The party doesn't go where you expect and point to the map and says 'lets got there'.
You never know when things in a game will go.
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One of the problems I have with racial alignment is well, how is it a race of sociopathic lunatics that are one step away from knifing each other survive as a threat? Neutral and Chaotic evil groups should have a hard time surviving as a group of bandits, much less running a society.
Mind you, I'm not saying that they can't dislike and act that way to outside groups, but internally, they really need a more stable platform.
This is sort of the problem with defining *everything* by a single racial Alignment. Sapient beings are more complex than that by far.
Depends on the set up and how much you want to describe it.
The race might have been bent to something's will. Drow tend to keep to themselves with raiding parties for materials or to clear out some room for themselves, and do their acts for whatever Dark god they follow at the time. Duergar also do their work for the sake of their own ends or for Droskar, the god that saved them. Minotaurs are also in this camp, working for Baphomet or Lamashtu to name two.
Others are more biology issues. Derro are chaotically insane and desire to take over the overworld, stopped only due to their numbers, sunlight, and their own madness. As such they use anything that isn't Derro as test subjects, only for their madness to leave poor records or not working with other groups of Derro so they might need to do the same test over and over again. Vampires and Weres(Race or Affliction) tend to need other races as food and with such impressive powers could see those races as beneath them on the food chain. Or in the case of Weres, just berserker beasts while in animal form.
Still others can be terrain or culture based. Gnolls fit into this to me, as one could argue it's easier to buy and sell slaves of any race than it is to try and grow food or mine resources in their more arid areas. At the very least, it's easier for them if they can get the slaves to do the work. And the Serpentfolk at least to my knowledge, still hold onto that bitterness and hatred of what they lost and the races that came up after them, though the more common Serpentfolk tend to maybe little more than troglodytes just in marshes instead of caves.
You can make a race of evil but you have to make a clear example as to WHY they are. Or at the very least why the majority of their race/culture is evil.
That or just luck into making them so iconic or foul that defending said race seems.... nuts? Hey Forum, what's the opinion on Ropers these days?
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One of the problems I have with racial alignment is well, how is it a race of sociopathic lunatics that are one step away from knifing each other survive as a threat? Neutral and Chaotic evil groups should have a hard time surviving as a group of bandits, much less running a society.
Mind you, I'm not saying that they can't dislike and act that way to outside groups, but internally, they really need a more stable platform.
This is sort of the problem with defining *everything* by a single racial Alignment. Sapient beings are more complex than that by far.
Mostly I figure, pecking order, selfishness and fear. If you take for example Demon Lords, they keep their people in line with violence. There's no real loyalty, but they know if they try anything stupid the boss will stamp on 'em hard. So they bide their time, do what the Boss says, indulge within the limits that are allowed, and strike only when they're sure the Boss will lose.
Or, like Orcs (now Orruks) from Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar. By any indication they're CE. They fight everything, eat mostly everything, take slaves, the whole thing. Most of the time they're too busy fighting each other, but once in a blue moon, some Warboss starts cracking skulls, putting the fear into the others and promising them loads of flashy bits and fighting the 'umies. So they go along, because if they don't they're gonna get krumped, and hey, they get to fight anyway, what do they care it's under the orders of the Warboss and his flunkies.
Of course if the Warboss gets killed, they devolve into internal wars until they decide the new Warboss. And then the cycle continues.
It helps that most of these kinds of races breed incredibly fast and reach maturity very fast too.
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One of the problems I have with racial alignment is well, how is it a race of sociopathic lunatics that are one step away from knifing each other survive as a threat? Neutral and Chaotic evil groups should have a hard time surviving as a group of bandits, much less running a society.
Mind you, I'm not saying that they can't dislike and act that way to outside groups, but internally, they really need a more stable platform.
This is sort of the problem with defining *everything* by a single racial Alignment. Sapient beings are more complex than that by far.
Mostly I figure, pecking order, selfishness and fear. If you take for example Demon Lords, they keep their people in line with violence. There's no real loyalty, but they know if they try anything stupid the boss will stamp on 'em hard. So they bide their time, do what the Boss says, indulge within the limits that are allowed, and strike only when they're sure the Boss will lose.
Or, like Orcs (now Orruks) from Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar. By any indication they're CE. They fight everything, eat mostly everything, take slaves, the whole thing. Most of the time they're too busy fighting each other, but once in a blue moon, some Warboss starts cracking skulls, putting the fear into the others and promising them loads of flashy bits and fighting the 'umies. So they go along, because if they don't they're gonna get krumped, and hey, they get to fight anyway, what do they care it's under the orders of the Warboss and his flunkies.
Of course if the Warboss gets killed, they devolve into internal wars until they decide the new Warboss. And then the cycle continues.
It helps that most of these kinds of races breed incredibly fast and reach maturity very fast too.
Follow up, Orks in Warhammer 40k were made by an ancient powerful race to be nothing more than fighting machines that could keep coming back unless a planet was basically burnt out fully. But said race forgot to make an OFF Switch to the Orks so they've just keep fighting EVERYTHING including themselves.
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Follow up, Orks in Warhammer 40k were made by an ancient powerful race to be nothing more than fighting machines that could keep coming back unless a planet was basically burnt out fully. But said race forgot to make an...One of the problems I have with racial alignment is well, how is it a race of sociopathic lunatics that are one step away from knifing each other survive as a threat? Neutral and Chaotic evil groups should have a hard time surviving as a group of bandits, much less running a society.
Mind you, I'm not saying that they can't dislike and act that way to outside groups, but internally, they really need a more stable platform.
This is sort of the problem with defining *everything* by a single racial Alignment. Sapient beings are more complex than that by far.
Mostly I figure, pecking order, selfishness and fear. If you take for example Demon Lords, they keep their people in line with violence. There's no real loyalty, but they know if they try anything stupid the boss will stamp on 'em hard. So they bide their time, do what the Boss says, indulge within the limits that are allowed, and strike only when they're sure the Boss will lose.
Or, like Orcs (now Orruks) from Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar. By any indication they're CE. They fight everything, eat mostly everything, take slaves, the whole thing. Most of the time they're too busy fighting each other, but once in a blue moon, some Warboss starts cracking skulls, putting the fear into the others and promising them loads of flashy bits and fighting the 'umies. So they go along, because if they don't they're gonna get krumped, and hey, they get to fight anyway, what do they care it's under the orders of the Warboss and his flunkies.
Of course if the Warboss gets killed, they devolve into internal wars until they decide the new Warboss. And then the cycle continues.
It helps that most of these kinds of races breed incredibly fast and reach maturity very fast too.
Quite. It's a similar theme in a lot of these CE races: they breed fast, grow fast and mostly fight each other. Occassionally they get riled up enough or manipulated into assembling into some form of cohesive force, and then they rampage until they're stopped, suffer immense casualties, and are driven back. Then the cycle continues.
Grimgor Ironhide in WHFB. Warboss Ghazghkull in 40k. The Goblinblood wars in Golarion.
Usually after a big defeat they're not pursued because the winners aren't doing so good themselves. And by the time other nations are in a position to retaliate, the CE race has grown in numbers again and poking them is a bad idea because a surefire way to stop their infighting is to give them something else to fight, like you.
This post is pretty much a teal deer all the way through, but to add another point:
In a world of absolute morality as a divine mandate defined alignments make sense. Much in the same way Animate Dead the spell can be used benignly but still has the evil descriptor, it is always an evil act.
Same goes for Infernal Healing no matter how its used btw.