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The Genghis Khan and his Hordes were not the kind of people you should be using as an example of something good . . . .The Mongols enforced religious tolerance, instituted fair laws, and were generally pretty good rulers to the people they conquered.
There is of course the small matter of them killing entire cities and even countries who defied them, but they weren't quite as unambiguously awful as sometimes portrayed.
Don't forget that about 8% of the people living in the former mongol empire share a Y chromosome with Genghis. I'm surprised the guy had time to fight.
Although I guess the best thing to do if they attack you would be to surrender as quickly as possible so you could get those nice mongol empire perks.
What if you're a player not a GM? And, say, a rape survivor?
Now, that's not to say they should remove any references to anything that might be traumatic for anyone (and indeed I wouldn't remotely advocate removing all references to rape), but it's also not quite as simple as you're making it out to be.
Player : hey i am a rape survivor do you mind not including rape?
DM : oh sorry I didn't know I will remove it isUnless the DM is a dick but in that case you have another problem.
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Player : hey i am a rape survivor do you mind not including rape?
DM : oh sorry I didn't know I will remove it isUnless the DM is a dick but in that case you have another problem.
If you're okay talking about it? Sure.
But my point wasn't that this was an insoluble problem or anything, and making it clear that not all Half Orcs are the result of rape (which is what I've been advocating) makes avoiding the subject easier for a GM who is, in fact, trying to avoid that sort of thing.
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What if you're a player not a GM? And, say, a rape survivor?
Now, that's not to say they should remove any references to anything that might be traumatic for anyone (and indeed I wouldn't remotely advocate removing all references to rape), but it's also not quite as simple as you're making it out to be.
Player : hey i am a rape survivor do you mind not including rape?
DM : oh sorry I didn't know I will remove it isUnless the DM is a dick but in that case you have another problem.
Although really the DM should of asked if this was something people would be comfortable with in his game in the first place!
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Well, killing is also a bad thing so I suggest that we cancel every fightings parts of the game.
Moreover people are often rude when talking so maybe all characters could be hive-minded so that they will be in harmony.
Stealing disturbe me too so maybe there is a god that smite everyone that tries to steal and there are not theft left nowadays.
Or maybe if you are not confortable that bad people exist and do bad things in the canon universe you could just try "Disney RPG edition"
The fact you don't see the difference is disturbing.
The fact that someone doesn't want rape in their game (let me emphasize GAME!) bothers you that much makes me think you need to take a moment for some self-reflection.
Edit: Seriously you took a complete left turn wtf?
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I don't think we were talking about EVERY topic of controversy. were talking about on particular one. Also 99%? Did you make that number up? I'm gonna need to see the research on that one. Its a matter that some people (and rightly so) don't want that content in a game they play for fun. least of which because its really not a fun topic.
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Like I said if one people have a problem with it, the GM can houserule it.
But downscalling a universe to accomodate to EVERY topic subject to controversy leads to a Disney World.
...have you been to Disney World?
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Well, killing is also a bad thing so I suggest that we cancel every fightings parts of the game.I wish we could.
While we're at it, we'll solve world peace, world hunger, and every other problem in existence so that everyone and everything will live in perfect harmony with no conflict or anger!
Except nature, by design, doesn't work that way, making these idealistic concepts both unrealistic and also an abhorrent and boring thing to have in all of existence. Beings kill and fight other beings for survival. Beings reproduce, forcefully or consentually, to maintain their genetic diversity throughout the ages of existence, while those who fail to accomplish both die out, their inferior aspects no longer hindering the species' remainders.
Druids are prime reverents of nature, and seeing people attempt to purposefully perverse the aspects of Nature that were put in place on purpose will result in them rising up against the others to preserve the functionality of nature.
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I find personally one of the appeals of storytelling in a fantasy or science fiction setting is that through magic or mutually indistinguishable science we plausibly can have most of the small, personal, or structural problems already solved.
So with replicators we no longer need to worry about feeding the homeless, with magic that can literally tell when someone is lying we can limit the impact of terrestrial power and fame in the justice system, the poor and sick are cared for, people are less bigoted, structural systems of oppression never formed in the first place, etc.
In doing this, we can can focus on arch or world-ending threats or just on having adventures, which is kind of the appeal of this kind of game.
Sure, you can have parts of the world that are terrible in order to make a contrast to the places that don't, and in order to provide a reason for the characters to do something, but I don't really like to highlight problems in a "heroic fantasy" style of game that could not be solved by the player characters, and any complications where things don't go as planned exist in order to set up future adventures, not to remind people that the world is horrible.
Like there is literally no reason to include transphobia in my Pathfinder games both because there are, in universe, no less than three magical/alchemical effective transition solutions (some of which are quite affordable), and because it's easy enough to get more transphobia than any sensible person could want just by logging into twitter.
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Personally one of the things I like about RPGs is for the same kinds of problems to exist, but in a medium where I feel more able to do something about them. In real life, if someone tells me "hey, ew, you're [sexuality/race/religion/etc] I don't like!" I don't have a whole lot of options, besides maybe swaying onlookers with a witty comeback. If that comes up in Pathfinder then the witty comeback can be "Yeah, I am. I'm also a level 14 wizard, and you're now a mouse."
The existence of rapists bothers me a lot less when I get to kill them with swords.
there is literally no reason to include transphobia in my Pathfinder games
The existence of rapists bothers me a lot less when I get to kill them with swords.
I get both of these arguments. The first is, "it is a fantasy game so lets make it a fantasy game that everyone enjoys. Sure there is death, pain, suffering, etc that we, the players put an end to. However, those that many of us experience on a daily basis should not be included. The game doesn't include the soul crushing numbness of a day job, relatives that disagree with our life decisions or life style voice it in painful ways, family physical and mental abuse, a loved one turning their back on a person because their religion disagrees with some aspect of the person's life, etc. Why must rape be the exception to this?"
The second is, "I can't do anything about someone a rape that happened in our world, but I can kill those that cause rape in a fantasy world, and that is a fantasy I want to have."
Who is right? I can't say one is more right than the other. However, I can say that I would personally not like to cause someone that has been raped any additional pain by including it when it otherwise does not have to be. Including it should be a discussion between the GM and the players.
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with magic that can literally tell when someone is lying we can limit the impact of terrestrial power and fame in the justice system, the poor and sick are cared for, people are less bigoted, structural systems of oppression never formed in the first place, etc.....I don't really like to highlight problems in a "heroic fantasy" style of game that could not be solved by the player characters
This right here, more than anything else, demonstrates we play objectively completely different games.
It probably explains why we don't see eye to eye so often.
I don't see a tight link between a) half-orcs existing in the setting/default player options and b) the game having much talk of rape in it.
This. We have, in the real world, people walking around who wouldn't have been born without a rape occurring. I don't think I've ever met someone who fits that description. But if I did I would not feel compelled to suddenly start talking about rape. I don't understand why half-orcs make rape become a major theme of the game.
That said, there is an easy fix. Simply add this line to half-orcs "orcish blood is particularly strong. Anyone whose ancestry includes an orc are born as a half-orc." You can now have the default half-orc if you so desire. Or you can say half-orcs breed true. I don't think the game is lessened by such a line.
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This. We have, in the real world, people walking around who wouldn't have been born without a rape occurring. I don't think I've ever met someone who fits that description. But if I did I would not feel compelled to suddenly start talking about rape. I don't understand why half-orcs make rape become a major theme of the game.
This is very true.
That said, there is an easy fix. Simply add this line to half-orcs "orcish blood is particularly strong. Anyone whose ancestry includes an orc are born as a half-orc." You can now have the default half-orc if you so desire. Or you can say half-orcs breed true. I don't think the game is lessened by such a line.
The latter is already canonically true. As is, I believe, Half Orcs being born to a Half Orc and either an Orc or Human. Really, we don't know the exact ratio of Orc/Human blood that makes someone a Half Orc rather than a Human or Orc, but one grandparent is pretty clearly sufficient in either direction.
All that's necessary is to mention some of this.
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There is of course the small matter of them killing entire cities and even countries who defied them, but they weren't quite as unambiguously awful as sometimes portrayed.
That's pretty normal behavior for Good PCs, as long as the citizens of said defying city has green skin or other defining racial trait :P
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There is of course the small matter of them killing entire cities and even countries who defied them, but they weren't quite as unambiguously awful as sometimes portrayed.That's pretty normal behavior for Good PCs, as long as the citizens of said defying city has green skin or other defining racial trait :P
Not in Paizo APs or any game I've run or played. Not a single one has involved Good characters doing anything of the kind.
I mean, I did have a PC help commit genocide once, but he was Evil.
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I have seen a lot of encounters start with rolling initiative because the party encountered was a bunch of orcs, while if the same party encounter a group of gnomes, they ask for parley. Against the green skinned ones, they don't stop to ask if they are one of those saerenrae followers or whatever.
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I have seen a lot of encounters start with rolling initiative because the party encountered was a bunch of orcs, while if the same party encounter a group of gnomes, they ask for parley. Against the green skinned ones, they don't stop to ask if they are one of those saerenrae followers or whatever.
And I'm saying I've never seen players do that and that no AP relies on them doing so.
I'm not arguing that people don't do that in some games, but it's not inevitable, required for the game to work, or morally acceptable in my games (and is pretty morally dubious in most published Pathfinder products as well).
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That's Orcs as their flavor text is currently written. But this is Pathfinder 2 -- we can update the lore!
It'd be nice to have Orcs aren't 100% pure evil traditional tropes. Sure, have some Orcish tribes reminiscent of Tolkien's Uruk-hai, Games Workshop's Orks, and AD&D Chaotic-Evil experience point containers...
Umm... Orcs were LE in AD&D. They only became CE from 3rd Ed onwards.
Right?
Just saying...
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Why would anyone want to play a Half-Orc if the Orc Orc was on offer? I don't understand why this is such a big issue. It wouldn't even be a big shock to the Golarion lore as we have a big ass place called Belkzen that has been developed fairly well with a campaign book and an AP. If the Half-Orc comes off as rapey, which the core material implies, get rid of it. If you still want your semi-monstrous PC,just go with Orc as the OP suggests.
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I have seen a lot of encounters start with rolling initiative because the party encountered was a bunch of orcs, while if the same party encounter a group of gnomes, they ask for parley. Against the green skinned ones, they don't stop to ask if they are one of those saerenrae followers or whatever.And I'm saying I've never seen players do that and that no AP relies on them doing so.
I'm not arguing that people don't do that in some games, but it's not inevitable, required for the game to work, or morally acceptable in my games (and is pretty morally dubious in most published Pathfinder products as well).
Even if it does not happen in your games, it is a staple of the genre. Faramir did not stop to ask the orcs what are they up to, he ambushed them. Was going to do the same with Gollum if not because I'd Frodo.
In a genre where you can safely know enemy from foe just based on race, genocide is a given. If every orc is an evil monster, killing them is no different than killing ghouls or demons.
Which is why not every orc should be an evil monster
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People certainly play games very differently of how i GM and often get to play.
Rape, torture, gruesome death of innocent folk like kids... All normal stuff for evil NPCs to do. Thus happen. Actually it is harder for it not to happen during long games, since given time, chances are some evil guy will get to do these evil things. Evil doesnt hold punches.
Same goes for evil races. It isnt uncommon there to be some gnolls, orcs... who arent evil, but they are the exception and are called out multiple times before they appear to avoid the PC jumping on them and heads rolling. If the book point to a alignemnt, then one can assume a vast, vast majority of any given race will follow it and often act on it instead of imagining this one will be the 0,001%.
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Why would anyone want to play a Half-Orc if the Orc Orc was on offer? I don't understand why this is such a big issue. It wouldn't even be a big shock to the Golarion lore as we have a big ass place called Belkzen that has been developed fairly well with a campaign book and an AP. If the Half-Orc comes off as rapey, which the core material implies, get rid of it. If you still want your semi-monstrous PC,just go with Orc as the OP suggests.
I don't know about you or anyone else, but I don't play half-orcs to play orc lite. For characters like Oloch or Thog, that could maybe work. For Therkla or Imrijka, not as much.
Unless the Golarion canon of orcs is drastically changed to make them a race of misunderstood Drizzt wannabes, which I very much hope isn't done to orcs as well as goblins, a heroic orc PC should be an extreme outlier. That's not the kind of thing I want to play all the time. A character who's close enough to human but isn't treated as such makes for a more interesting and less contrived story, to me.
Faramir was at war with the Orcs who served a known greater evil.
But that's a staple for the genre. You can safely kill every gnoll, because yeenoghu is a Demon.
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Even if it does not happen in your games, it is a staple of the genre. Faramir did not stop to ask the orcs what are they up to, he ambushed them. Was going to do the same with Gollum if not because I'd Frodo.
Two things here:
#1: Faramir is in a country at war with the Orcs and the Orcs are in his territory. He would've ambushed Haradrim or Easterlings just as quickly, and would've had every reason to do so. Armed groups dressed as enemy soldiers being attacked in times of war is not the same as attacking people based on their race.
#2: In Middle Earth, orcs aren't a species in the conventional sense, and really are pretty much entirely Evil. Which is unfortunate, but also specific to that setting, not the genre as a whole.
In a genre where you can safely know enemy from foe just based on race, genocide is a given. If every orc is an evil monster, killing them is no different than killing ghouls or demons.
Which is why not every orc should be an evil monster
And conveniently, in Golarion, they are not.
But that's a staple for the genre. You can safely kill every gnoll, because yeenoghu is a Demon.
Again, not really relevant in Golarion.
