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Elfland’s Ethics & World Building | World-Building: Causes & Consequences | World-Building: Geneses | World-Building: About Alignment

A couple of posts ago, I wrote about multiple creation stories explaining the existence of B/X D&D player character races. The geneses of dwarves, elves, and humans are all incorrect. The creator-deities worshiped by those races are not deities; they are creatures, albeit very powerful creatures known as Werdaz. The only true deity is Iesmi, knowledge of whom has been preserved by the halflings against the machinations of Deorcynsse, the first of the Werdaz, who disguised himself as Valsch Witan in order to seduce many away from the Way of Iesmi.

Iesmi created the Werdaz and appointed to them the task of regulating creation. The Werdaz were created as immaterial creatures. They are what medieval scholastics called intellectual beings, existing without any material form at all. I write about intellectual beings in this post from April 2012.

The First Lie

Deorcynnse, the first of the Werdaz, resented that Iesmi had created the halflings. He hated their weakness, and he coveted their favored status. That Iesmi permitted the Werdaz to partner with him to create other races did not quell Deorcynnse’s pride and envy.

Disguised as Valsch Witan, Deorcynnse convinced many Werdaz that they lacked necessary experiential knowledge. To better see Iesmi’s injustice in favoring the halflings over the other races, it was necessary to experience life encumbered by material form. Only by experiencing the limitations of Iesmi’s material creatures would the Werdaz be able to fully empathize with the travails of mortality.

Those Werdaz who accepted Valsch Witan’s words then took on material form and substance, believing that the limitations in activity and knowledge they would experience as material creatures would make them more compassionate. Thus Valsch Witan ensared innumerable Werdaz, locking them into a mode of existence by which it became all the easier to manipulate them.

The Second Lie

Those Werdaz who surrendered their immaterial nature found themselves locked in material substance. Their new bodies, although powerful, lacked an intellectual being’s apprehension of knowledge unmediated over time through physical senses. As a result, these fallen Werdaz became subject to further errors. They realized they had lost direct, immediate knowledge of Iesmi, and they despaired.

Valsch Witan comforted them with another lie. He told them to let conscience be their guide. As long as each Werdaz acted in accordance with conscience, nothing could be wrong. The Werdaz, still unfamiliar with the errors of judgment that material beings are subject to, took Valsch Witan’s words to heart. These Werdaz then took this new commandment to the races that they had formed (but to which Iesmi had given life). Each Werdaz, dedicated to their own race’s advancement, taught conscience-guided doctrines to the masses via their clerics.

And the errors multiplied. Every creature sought to follow its own conscience, often too uncritical of their misperceptions and misjudgments. Conflicts increased. Sophistry grew regnant. Elves had elvish truth, dwarves had dwarven truth, et cetera. That the multiplicity of truths contradicted each other was not seen as defect of judgment. Instead, each came to see the contradictions as proof of strength misused. So, for example, if elves insisted on pressing the claims of their truth over dwarven interests, then the dwarves would answer with force.

The Third Lie

The “doctrine of conscience” led to the widespread belief that contradictory propositions can be simultaneously true. Having destroyed the intellectual and moral order of so many of Iesmi’s creatures, Valsch Witan’s next target was the physical order. Magic, a force regulated by several Werdaz, many of whom fell into Deorcynnse’s clutches, became the means by which creatures need not be bound by the accidents of their birth. An individual could use magic to reorient their body to fit the form conscience deems best. Rulers could likewise make the same sorts of decisions about their subjects and, most especially, their enemies.

Among the first results of the Third Lie were the Gargoyles. Deorcynnse himself formed them deep in the earth, binding to them elemental spirits, lesser immaterial creatures responsible for the form and substance of the material world. Then came the Gargarizein, when the Gargoyles burst from the world-under, bringing an age of destruction to the Western Lands. The resulting Dark Age further fragmented societies, giving a firmer hold to Deorcynnse’s machinations over the hearts and minds of both fallen Werdaz and mortal creatures alike.

Tags: B/X D&D, Catholic, world-building

Elfland’s Ethics & World Building | World-Building: Causes & Consequences | World-Building: Geneses

B/X D&D presents three alignments. These are “basic ways of life” that “guide the acts of both player characters and monsters.” The three alignments are Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic. Implicit in the rules are three important ideas:

1. Alignment guides a creature’s actions. Thus, a Lawful creature will behave in a Lawful behavior at least most of the time.
2. The cumulative moral weight of a creature’s actions determines that creature’s alignment. Thus, a Lawful creature who starts to behave less Lawful and more Chaotic may experience a shift in alignment at some point in time determined by the DM.
3. At no time does a creature’s alignment dictate that creature’s actions. Thus, a Lawful creature is free to act in a non-Lawful manner.

The fundamentals of moral philosophy/theology fit in well with alignments. These fundamentals, adapted to B/X D&D terminology, tell us that:

1. Actions have an objective moral quality. Every action is either Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic. The creature’s opinion about the action it performs do not change the action’s objective moral quality. Murder does not become a good act just because of the murderer’s opinion about murder.
2. The seriousness of an action’s objective moral quality falls into two categories: minor and major. Once again, the creature’s opinion about the action’s seriousness does not change the action’s seriousness. Murder does not become a minor action just because the murderer thinks murder is not seriously wrong.

All of this results from my son Christopher asking me about the alignments of the false deities who rebelled against Iesmi, the One and True. Let’s draw some conclusions from the previous world-building post.

Iesmi’s alignment is Lawful. Iesmi is the only actual deity; consequently, only Iesmi can justly demand worship from his creatures. Isarn Egni, the Forge Lord, claims to be the creator of the dwarves, and this claim is partially true, but Isarn Egni is not a deity. He is one of Iesmi’s creatures. Iesmi gave life to the lifeless dwarf form made by the Forge Lord. This means dwarves who worship Isarn Egni worship a false god. What’s more, Isarn Egni knows he was created by Iesmi. The same must be true of the other so-called deities.

So, Christopher reasoned, that means the false deities are Chaotic and those who worship them are also Chaotic? Not necessarily. We further complicate matters by addressing the issue of culpability. To be fully culpable for a seriously evil action requires both:

1. That the creature freely chooses to commit the act.
2. And that the creature understands the objective moral quality of the act.

Thus, someone who is forced to murder is not fully culpable for the act of murder. Someone who does not know murder is seriously evil is not fully culpable for the act of murder. In either case, however, the act of murder is still evil (or Chaotic, to return to B/X D&D terminology).

Since I am not interested in a campaign world where player characters who follow deities other than Iesmi are automatically Chaotic, that means I must expand on the two criteria used to determine culpability. In the process, we can find a way through the dilemma posed by Christopher’s question. So, in the next world-building post, I’ll take a closer look at Deorcynsse and his guise as Valsch Witan, the entity that the halflings understand is the False Light opposed to Way of Iesmi.

Tags: B/X D&D, Catholic, world-building

Elfland’s Ethics & World Building | World-Building: Causes & Consequences

At the end of the last post, I said that this post would look at the different B/X D&D player character races, focusing on those races’ patron deities and creation stories. I also said that none of those patron deities are really deities, and that none of the stories are fully true.

I’ve got to backpedal a bit here. Most the patron deities are not deities. Most of the stories are not fully true. One race, however, has maintained authentic worship of the Sole Creator. That race’s religious traditions preserve the Sole Creator’s truth insofar as mortal creatures can understand it.

Let’s start with the three races that get it wrong before looking at the one race that gets it right.

Dwarves, Elves, and Humans

Isarn Egni, the Forge Lord, mined iron from the depths of the First Mountain. He purified the metal with the heat of his gaze, and then hammered it on the Dread Anvil into the forms of Heled and Murgeda, the first dwarves. Isarn Egni gave his creatures life by plunging them into pure spring water untouched by sunlight. He then gave Heled and Murgeda dominion over all lightless places as well as the lands surrounding the entrances to the world-under.

Har Marei, the Queen of Waves, created the elves from coral and seafoam. She brought to life Indóar and Lona, the first elves, through an infusion of her own blood, and she blessed them with the dolphin’s playful heart and the shark’s predatory instincts. She made their forms changeable and cyclical, like the tides and the phases of her lunar abode. Har Marei gave Indóar and Lona dominion over the seas and all coastal places.

Drit Watar, the Father of Morning, formed Kras and Aefen, the first humans, from the dust of the ground. Drit Watar then implanted in each a mote of light, bringing his creations to life. Kras and Aefen received from Drit Watar dominion over all lands, including the plants and beasts of those lands.

Halflings

In the beginning, Iesmi, the One and True, created the Werdaz, immaterial beings of immense power. Iesmi then created the cosmos: time, the stars, the worlds, and all the plants and beasts living on those worlds. He assigned the Werdaz to watch over the myriad aspects of his creation, commanding the Werdaz to benevolently care for their charges. On one world, Iesmi created the halflings, shepherds and farmers, material creatures limited by their bodies and senses. Iesmi gave the halflings dominion over that entire world.

At first, the Werdaz marveled at Iesmi’s newest creatures. They desired to imitate the One and True. Iesmi gave the Werdaz permission to take the material of that world and form new creatures. Iesmi then gave these forms life, and a multiplicity of mortal creatures came to be. But Deorcynsse, the first of the Werdaz, resented the halflings. He hated their weakness, and he coveted their favored status.

So, Deorcynsse plotted treason, seducing many other Werdaz to his cause. These rebels sowed discord among the other races, asking why the halflings should have dominion. In the guise of Valsch Witan, Deorcynsse claimed to be Iesmi’s messenger. His false light led many astray from the Iesmi’s Way. The seduced Werdaz corrupted their charges, bringing disorder and violence to the world.

Tags: B/X D&D, Catholic, world-building

Elfland’s Ethics & World Building

Let’s continue some speculative world-building, picking up sort of where I left off with the post linked above. Having gleaned from G. K. Chesterton four foundational premises, it’s time to turn to metaphysics proper and identify two first principles. Or, if one prefers, one first principle and one second principle.

All Being Has One Source

Everything that is exists does so because the Sole Creator wills it to exist. The Sole Creator stands above and outside everything, including time, which itself is one of the Sole Creator’s creatures. The Sole Creator is changeless, eternal, good, immaterial, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, and simple (in the sense of having no parts or divisions). The Sole Creator is perfect and transcends all creatures by an infinite degree. Nevertheless, despite the Sole Creator’s absolute transcendence, the Sole Creator freely chooses to reveal its existence and attributes through its creatures to its creatures, all of which in their original state were created good in their very nature.

Evil Is No Thing

Evil is not a thing. Evil has no existence of its own. It is not possible for anything to be perfectly evil because perfection is a quality related to completeness, and evil is a defect. Evil negates or reduces a creature; it never adds, but instead always subtracts.

Consequences

These two principles lead to certain necessary conclusions that are not typical of most fantasy campaign worlds. Here are some of them:

1. Any other deities are not really deities. They are creatures who exist only because the Sole Creator wills them to exist.
2. Only the Sole Creator can truly create. Other creatures, no matter how powerful, can only take what already is and modify it.
3. No creature, no matter how evil, can be completely evil. Existence per se is good because existence is willed by the Sole Creator, who cannot commit any evil act since doing so would diminish the changeless Sole Creator’s perfection.
4. Since there is evil that diminishes the Sole Creator’s creatures, and since this evil cannot be the will of the Sole Creator, at least some of the Sole Creator’s creatures must have the capacity to freely choose to inflict harm.
5. Any claim that contradicts any of the four preceding consequences is false, either partially or completely.

In the Beginning…

With first principles decided and consequences accounted for, I can plan the next stage of world-building: the origin of the setting’s cosmos. Regardless of the specifics, this cosmos and all it encompasses exist because the Sole Creator wills it to exist. The Sole Creator’s act of creation is not a story. It’s not a myth. It is a fact.

The explanations used by creatures to explain the origins of the cosmos are stories and/or myths. These stories/myths use language (itself a creature that exists because the Sole Creator wills it) to express that which ultimately transcends every language. The most accurate of these stories/myths falls short because the fullness of the Sole Creator can never been expressed by even most exalted tongue.

Next Post? An overview of the player character races from B/X D&D, starting with each race’s patron deity (none of which are truly deities) and their respective creation stories (none of which are completely true).

Nota Bene: The above link is an affiliate link. If you click and buy, DriveThruRPG tosses me a few pennies.

Tags: Catholic, world-building

Every roleplaying game is in some way didactic. How explicitly didactic varies considerably, of course. Some publishers are more subtle. Others wave high the flags of their biases. Still, the lessons about intended types of experiences seen proper to the game are there, spelled out or not. The same is at least just as true about campaign worlds.

Lately I’ve mused anew about the task of world creation, and so I asked myself, “What will the choices about what I included and exclude say about the world I intend?” This question necessarily shifts my focus to the metaphysical, at least implying questions about first principles. From metaphysics come consequences related to ethics. For example, a world created by two equal but diameterically opposed Deities says something about the way the creatures of that world ought to behave.

Needing to start somewhere, I did what I often do. I turned to G. K. Chesterton, specifically chapter four of Orthodoxy. From this chapter, I derive a few core principles for my world’s metaphysics. All quotes quote Chesterton.

1. Tradition Is Democratic. Democracy is “a consensus of common human voices”. Consensus has its Latin roots in the idea of a shared feeling, and common does not relate to social class but rather expresses what belongs to all. Thus, consensus is the common sense about things which are “universal human functions”, and this includes government.

Chesterton’s most amusing example of such a function is that of blowing one’s own nose. Forcibly expelling excess mucus from nasal passages is a thing that I ought to do for myself even if I’m not good at it. I shouldn’t trust the blowing of my nose to a class of expert nose-blowers. Tradition results from the cumulative weight of consensus. Tradition is “democracy extended through time”, and the person who wants tradition overturned appeals not to consensus but to aristocracy. The appeal is not to what is common, but to what is exclusive. As Chesteron famously puts it:

“Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who mere happen to be walking about.”

2. Fairy Tales Are True. “Fairyland is nothing but the sunny country of common sense.” Fairy tales transcend the natural and address the supernatural, which are those things that cannot be reasonably attributed to nothing but material causes. It is good that Jack kills the giant because the giant represents gigantic pride. Cinderella shows us that the humble shall be exalted, and that the exalted shall be humbled. Beauty teaches the Beast that he has to be loved before he can be loveable.

The natural world is rational and logical, but the brute fact of imagination shows that rationality and logic are not all there are. Rationality and logic discover cause and effect, and then posit laws regarding the relationship of one to the other. Imagination works this way as well, sort of. There are caused effects in fairy tales, but the relationship is strange. It is magic. Cinderella complaining that it makes no sense that her horses turn back to mice at midnight does not alter the timetable.

3. Conditional Joy Is a Doctrine. Tradition and magic impose limitations on actions, but those limitations are not shackles. If one is willing to forfeit the reward, one is free to transgress. Cinderella did not have to leave the party before midnight. She could have chosen to stay late, but the gifts she received from her fairy godmother will have left her at midnight regardless.

Liberty exists, but lawlessness is a fiction. Those who transgress against tradition and magic decrease joy and increase despair, even if the transgressor is not always the one who pays the price.

4. Materialism Is False. This fourth principle is a consequence of the first three (or, perhaps, the first three are a consequence of this one). If materialism is true, everything that is is just atoms, and everything that happens is just the unwilled interaction of atoms. Materialism proposes a dogma from which there can be no possible dissent. Even if I appear to dissent from materialist dogma, I do not, because my dissent itself is an unwilled effect brought about by an unwilled cause.

Materialism assumes too much by assuming that rationality and logic explain everything. This reduces everything to nothing more than cause and effect. Tradition becomes coincidence, and magic becomes absurd.

Tags: Catholic, world-building