Is it time already for the yearly "tolerance vs racism" thread?
Holding stereotypes against monster races is most certainly not evil, no matter what kind of modern sjw arguments you try to attach to it. A character coming from a region which faces an orc horde every 2-3 years, and I mean a proper orc horde, can be good aligned and still hold deep-seated hatred and intolerance towards orcs. It is on the player who decided to play a non-typical member of a monster race to try and convince such a character that their fullblooded orc does not pose a threat, it is not on the other player to go out of their way to have their character accept an orc. Otherwise, judging by some posts in this thread, we may conclude that a good portion of active characters deserve alignment shifts. Since, you know, they have committed genocide on several monster races without trying to "understand" them. "Oh, are you using hips to get a jump on that poor goblin there, away from the road minding its own business? Why don't you try talking to him first, maybe he's not your typical goblin." Bending RP concepts to accommodate fellow players is acceptable, breaking them is not.
Both good and evil have many aspects, and how harpers conduct themselves is most certainly not something that good in general is defined by. It is just an aspect of good. Most paladins, for an example, would have much trouble even accepting Harper methods, let alone working by them. Yet aren't the paladins the epitome of goodness in any D&D setting? Most people would probably say so, though even paladins are simply one aspect of good.
The issue that we often oversee in such threads is the fact that by the time your character meets an orc PC, the orc might have earned the trust of half the sword coast by that point. At that point they don't really have the need to earn the trust of your PC as well, since they have a good number of other PC's who will vouch for them. Killing an orc while a crowd of people is convincing you that the orc isn't a threat is a completely different matter than killing an orc who didn't put any effort into proving they aren't like most of their kin somewhere in the wilderness. And while that may seem unfair to those RPing characters which hate orcs (and on some points, it truly is), that's simply how a persistent world works. Which is why orcs and other surface monster races should never be a playable PC race (on the surface). But, since they are, we have these "fun" 15 page threads once or twice every year
As a side-note, I do love seeing those super accepting non-racist good aligned characters who end up excommunicating other good-aligned or neutral characters just because they hate orcs, instead of trying to work out the differences and at least try and get to a common ground with such characters. Either by "educating" them, or finding ways to get along with them. Luckily, just like racism, hypocrisy doesn't necessarily grant you evil points
V'rass wrote:Fearknight try reading a book called The book of exalted deeds if you can find it in pdf form online. The book is the final authority on the nature of good and it makes clear that blind racism is not good.
The Book of Exalted Deeds is most certainly not the final authority on the nature of good in Forgotten Realms.
Champions of Valor p. 6 wrote:Book of Exalted Deeds addresses the concepts of good and evil in the D&D universe. This chapter examines those issues in the context of the FORGOTTEN REALMS campaign setting, providing advice for DMs and players who want more valor and heroics in their campaigns.
Champions of Valor p. 6 wrote:While the D&D game views good and evil in a more black-and-white sense than what exists in the real world, it is clear that in Faerûn, these concepts are not so cut-and-dried.
