7:11 What is the moral imperative you ask? Listen here. 9:16 Yucky! 9:18 Moral Imperative Mechanic #1 - "The Choice" -- a binary choice -- offer a reward/easy path to do something wrong or a potential penalty/difficult path for doing good 16:40 Moral Imperative Mechanic #2 - "The Duty" -- a known thing you should do -- will you do your duty (what you should do) when it might not be so easy to do it, when the consequences of doing your duty (to right a wrong) are hugely bad. Or do they just walk away and pretend that nothing's to see here with no consequences. 24:24 A deep thought (or something) 24:40 Necro Disco 24:49 Moral Imperative #3 - "The Consequences" -- play into the human fear of outcomes or consequences of any given action -- sometimes you need to do what the local people understand as "wrong" in order to do the real right thing, which means they will pay the price for doing whatever it is they need to do in order to create a more just world. So maybe they go to prison for doing something that might be treasonous to the locals but the characters see as good. Are you willing to pay the consequences for your action? 31:31 Summary - Give your players hard choices, ones that ask them to do something that is good but with awful, awful consequences.
Well, that's just the opening proposition. I'm sure you could negotiate at the very least up to "1000 gp and anything we manage to steal out of the temple before you kick us out of town". Bonus points if you just knock the monk unconscious and let the gang kill him in public, get paid in full and rationalise that PCs hands are clean, because the blood of the monk is on the hands of the gang.
A Masterpiece, you could ask to be paid to instill such knowledge upon people. I come back to it time and time again, and I'm always surprised by how relevant it still is!
Man, I find myself coming back to these videos again and again, just periodicaly rewatching them when my inspiration juices are running a little low. I can't say how many times I've drawn inspiration from the mad genius Hankerin for my campaigns. Sometimes I've discarded some concepts that seemed a little too drastic, only to revisit the video months later to realize the genius of it. Keep doing what you do.
Hookin' it up with Immanuel Kant. "Live your life as though your every act were to become a universal law." Your videos and your stunning attention to player involvement is what keeps me going Hankerin! Exciting to see all these new videos springing up - always good to have your dialogue creating different rabbit holes for me and my players.
I’ve watched a lot of your videos over the years (and yes, this one has been around awhile, but I’ve just discovered it) but I think this one is my favorite. You effectively distilled the core of what makes a great set up or call to action. Bravo, sir!
I am aware that this video is now about three years old, but it has provoked a response in me that I feel the need to express. First, let me say how much I enjoyed this video. You demonstrate quite eloquently the hidden depths that lie in what on the surface can appear to be just "playing a game". RPG, if done right, can be a way to explore the questions we all have about morality, purpose, and choices. And you do a very good job of presenting this ! Which brings me to the response this video provoked within me: I am more and more convinced that we humans feel drawn to create stories and games that contain opportunities for the characters to examine what motivates them and the results and consequences that can arise from different motivations, because it is a reflection of how life really is! To state it simply, life , what we call "reality", is an RPG. We have a "character", a "class", a mixture of the conditions we are born into, how we see ourself, and how others see us. We have "cultures" and "traditions" that influence and make demands upon us. But we also have "moral imperatives" that challenge us in the same ways that you have presented here. I once had a Tibetan Buddhist teacher who acted as a guide for me to meditation and to exploring life questions. One of his favorite saying was: "the purpose of a human being is to perform actions and to experience the results of those actions". This implies learning and development. Because experience and consequences that have no ability to shape us are nihilist in nature. It also implies purpose. Because if there is no purpose to learning and development, this is also nihilist in nature. Life demonstrates that there is purpose and development through the very act of presenting us with moral choices that teach us about consequences. We don't really know the long-term purpose of life, but we do know that the choices we make on a daily basis as to how to live and interact with others has consequences. And some of those consequences involve principles that go far beyond just creating the most comfortable situation for us right now. Sometimes we know it is necessary to accept present uncomfortable situations in order to uphold higher ideals. Sometimes we even choose personal death in order to bring about what we see as something greater than ourselves, something that needs to keep living or that needs to be brought into being for the "greater good." When we bring these factors into our RPGs, as you demonstrate here, the game becomes larger, and all sorts of dimensions open up. Life works in the same way. But how it works, and what the results will be, are all in the hands of the players. The Great DM just presents the situations. And it implies to us that no life, no circumstances, no choices are meaningless.
My game uses the moral imperative as a core feature. It takes place in a post apocalyptic nation in the middle of a brutal civil war. The players find out that a massive invading army that is going overrun the nation in a year. Players are tasked with getting as many factions on their side to fight the invaders. The players have to play the dirty game of politics. Would they assassin someone to get a powerful baron on their side? Would they side with the ruthless dictator or the chaotic rebels? These are the types of decisions they would constantly need to make.
DuuuUUUde Videos like this are the kind of stuff that pumps my blood and remembers me why tabletop RPG is so cool and, especially, why it's SO FREAKING AWESOME TO BE A DM!! Thank you so much man, really.
always bringing the heavy life questions! I used your advice and made a throng of mind controlled commoners attack my players and had a NPC emphasize that it wouldn't be right to attack them. it was tense, it changed the whole encounter. Great advise meng
I like the idea of teasing out the players' moral imperatives, whatever they may be. But I'd also add that the DM needs to do the same thing with his bad guys. The most interesting bad guys are doing what they are doing for their own moral, philosophical imperatives. They are necromancers because their trying to defeat entropy or death for all mortals. They ruthlessly conquer territory because they believe only the strong and cunning, like them, are capable of leading and defending the land and its people. They raid the village because their people were the original inhabitants of the land and were driven out by the village's lord's family generations ago. Too often, the bad guys are just hand rubbing mwa haha! one dimensional sorts. And knowledge of the bad guy's motivations and moral imperatives could even make more of an interesting moral quandary for the players.
It also gives them the option to switch sides and work for the bad guys. Consider the game Tyranny for example. You work for the "big bad guy" and commit atrocities, BUT while the war lasts, entire geographical regions are suffering terrible curses AND the sooner the inevitable victory comes, the sooner the law and order return and it will be back to business as usual.
I like this, the moral imperative almost forces them to look for a third option. It almost forcibly 'extrudes' them to look for a better solution. Sooooo many hook ideas spring from that.
I'm glad you made a video about this. I try to always involve my players into taking action on their own rather than just make them react to stuff poping off
Hankerin!! BIG FAN. watched this video before my time warp mini campaign. Where a trickster gnome sends the players to a primitive time with dinos and primitive tribes. The moral imperative they faced was to steal the medicine from Herbalist because everyone in the Tribe was sick. But when they got there the herbalist was dead from the illness and only had one vial left. Here was the catch. The Herbalist had a son who was also sick but was too weak to move. The players decided to use the medicine on the child and try to bring back the herbalist from the dead. I let them and they healed the tribe members.To get back at them for completely destroying my plan to watch them lament over the right choice, the tribesmen learned of their necromancy and was out to kill them throughout the rest of the mini campaign.Great content and great videos man. keep on keepin on
again, great video. very informative. native German speaker here. I like how you said Kant's name different from the insult it might sound like in English. In German however we would say it exactly like "see you next tuesday", For it to be a long a in the middle it would have to be either spelled Kaant or more likely Kahnt. :)
I tend to play more than GM. Experiencing these things as a player is so much fun, I love them as an opportunity to roleplay and as a point of debate between characters (as long as you're given the time to). I think survival is paramount, the DM has a duty to give PCs a reality check if they think that by taking the moral high ground or 'good' choice they will succeed. Here's a choice I was faced with as a player... Level 1 party. Standard affair of hamlet besieged by the undead. During the investigation found 25 exhumed graves. Come nightfall we shelter in the inn with the villagers. Fog rolls in as well as a group of undead. My arcana check and light cantrip shows it is evil and thick. They proceed to ignore council and repel out the window and engage. I stay behind with my character being a coward and a first time adventurer. Predictably they get lost, battered and beat a fighting retreat. They retreat with the entire horde on their heels. Pinned against the door they beg for me to open it. SO do I: A) Open the door to fight so we all die and so do the villagers? B) Open the door and continue to run, they will most likely die and so will most of the villagers? C) Leave it closed so they all die, but myself and villagers survive? D) Leap out the window to distract/fight to save my pals? You can always have your cake and eat it, as dead men tell no tales.
I had a character recently experience "the consequence" of being strapped to a rack, upside down, naked in the market square over night, then made to apologize before the public and given ten lashes (with a tripple-headed hooked flail, which was left out of the negotiation...) the alternative was execution. Of course, it was a consequence of being drunk at the ruler's party and disrupting the festivities by crashing into and upending a table so....there wasn't much moral imperative.
I've presented my players with the choice of saving some women from... aggressors. My players were pretty riled up about the whole thing and did the right thing! I'm proud of them! And they're usually so... "Vulcan" about stuff. XP
another mechanic is space I threw 25 skeletons (4 of which were ogre skeletons and 1 wizard skeleton) but spread them out in a crumbling fort with a spiral staircase and it was tough but 6 lvl 4 characters got through it. same characters and 1 gelatinous cube and 2 oozes in a narrow hallway and 3 of them went down
great vid man, love these true, deep mechanics involving morality, in my opinion they take rpgs to a completely different level. Maybe that is the level Gary Gygax wanted us to play on. :)
Wonderful breakdown on moral imperative. Nothing drives me more nuts than players who have none and just do the murder hobo thing and a DM that allows it.
I'd agree with you up until challenging the moral fiber of the group. Given the how few psychopaths there actually are, I'd say it's on the DM for not creating a situation where the PCs are invested in the pieces of the moral imperative prior to it coming to a head. Love this video. The only high concept DnD channel on UA-cam and it's well needed.
Great vid Hankerin!! While I didn't realize that I do inject these, sometimes, looking back, it was usually on accident and not often enough, lol. But when I did, it definitely made the session very memorable. Thanks for the spotlight, inspiration and mechanics. Definitely will make these more consistent and better run.
This is a fantastic video! I just had trouble with my group, since they approach the sessions the way they would approach a video game, where there is no consequence for being completely immoral. Stomping over innocent just because they are ugly, or stealing important artifacts from people who sent them to fetch said artifacts in the first place, and then kill those very people when they are asked to return those artifacts. I have been surprised by the villainy in their actions, and honestly hit a low spot in the campaign, as a result of one of the characters dying . I think I should start trying something like you say, where the morality is at stake, where I can at least see if there is some humanity left in the characters... and hopefully in the players...
Oh wow... Well... I am gonna try to give them another chance. ahhah we have been talking about it. maybe they understood that the videogame approach does not apply to D&D. Thank you for the video! Very insightful:)
Ive used the third option in my last campaign. The players had learned of mind flayers using intellect devourers to build a sleeper army in a city they were in. The players became desperate with how to gain the power to defeat this army, a few of them even considered sacrificing their own souls to Vecna to gain the power over an undead army, knowing they would now later have to deal with this army. Anyway the players that were going to sacrifice themselves got stopped by the others mid ritual in a church. It led to the destruction of the temple, later while the players were trying to leave they were stopped by the guards and were read their charges for the destruction of the temple, however they chose to flee the city, to attempt to free the player from vecna. Leaving the city to the sleeper army of mind flayers
Another way to handle the third case would perhaps be for the player to actually miss sessions? That way it's more of a meta (and XP) consequence than a stat punishment and the isolation becomes a real palpable thing. Then, when it's time to rejoin the party, reward the isolated player with a super cool one-on-one (or similar) which progresses the story and make it feel like a vip-event.
Hankerin, friend, I was a little offput by your usage of utilitarianism half-way through. At one point, you said utilitarians use morality only in so far as it is useful to the individual. You continued to say that it was a self-focused philosophy, where individuals strive to maximize self-utility. Utilitarianism, summarized, is acting in a way that achieves the greatest good for the greatest number of people. So, in fact, utilitarianism requires us to be actively self-disinterested. Every action we consider, we must be able to step out of the self and consider what will result in the greatest good for the most people, and if that involves self-sacrifice, we must willingly accept this for the benefit of the whole. Is there a certain branch of utilitarianism that you're referring to which asks individuals to be self-interested? From my understanding, Bentham and Kant's versions of utilitarianism demand individual utility be considered no more important than utility that would be gained by any other individual. This is why it is so difficult to behave in a truly utilitarian way.
A masterful critique! I imagine I was just crap-summarizing to make my point, which can be boiled down to "ew" on utilitarianism. I always found morality as practical to be reductive, and overly materialist. Thanks so much for the well thought, and clearly well read reply!
And thank you for the reply, sir badass. I took a minor in philosophy during my undergrad days, so it has a special place in my heart. Finding someone else out there who explores the intersection of DnD and philosophy regularly made me a fan right away. Looking forward to parsing through all of these vids.
kant wasnt a utilitarian, he was a deontologist. perhaps a better label of the philosophy described is pragmatism or even egoism? either way, i would say that utilitarianism is a chaotic-aligned philosophy because it is interested in the ends, not the means, and deontology is more lawful-aligned because it is interested in unbreakable principles
Im running a sci fi apocolypse campaign (modded d20 Modern) and I'm planning some situations where my players will meet poor and helpless people that try to rob them (like in "The Road") and ambushes by scared and desperate child raiders. Hopefully the we choices are interesting enough.
Re: the DUTY, you read my mind about running into Undead Marle if they don't get his body down. In addition, maybe the crazy Seer woman in town will call out to them next time they walk by, shouting for all to hear: "MARLE NEEDED YOU! Bring me down, bring me home! " On the flip side, if they DO bring him down, maybe Undead Marle will show up to HELP the party next time they're in dire straits.
Ive always had a hard time using a moral imperative situation with my players....I had an encounter set up where a man was being hung for using magic (Thank you Merlin) and the players knew that helping this stranger would incur the wrath of the kingdom itself, but they saved him anyway...Where just previously to entering town, they saw and walked by a trade wagon being looted and the drivers being slaughtered because those people had nothing to do with them. How do you fix a group like that, where their morality changes minute by minute?
TRANSLATION: In order to make the story extra-groovy, then what you hafta do is be Darth Vader and say to the characters: "I am your father...Join me and together we can rule the galaxy as father and son." The breath and wait: "HHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH HAAAAAAAAH HHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHH HAAAAAAAAAAAAH." You see if they will say "Let's do the dirt, yo" like a gangsta, or "I'll never join you" in some melodramatic voice like some studio gangsta, or maybe even better "How about I kill you and take it all?" Now who's the badass? I'm a captain, you're a lieutenant...Wait, that's not it.
Finally got around to playing Pillars of Eternity, and i'm pleasantly surprised by how many moral dilemma's they seem to throw at you. In the grand scheme of things i'm pretty sure most of them don't matter to the plot of the video game, but it is nice to be rewarded for doing the right thing even if it's just having NPCs take my word on things because my character developed a reputation as an honest guy.
I think the consequences are what keep me from being a better person. I really think that in an orderly society there is a lot of utilitarianism going on. I am often controlled out of fear of being punished for what I would rather do.
and just what would you rather do mate? Sounds like youre inclined to do dastardly dirty deeds. Dont go there bro. Society or at least those who think they own and control everything writhe their greedy little mitts at those who do those deeds. Its just like sacrificing babies to Molok so they get a bigger slab of beef at temple every tuesday. Do what is right regardless of consequences. Thats the truth of the world. Evil ones exsist. Theyre called democrats. Easy your mind. Fight the evil.
In this case, the act of not doing what those expect youll do, trumps their belief in that youll do just that and im sure good caring people piss them off royally.
I just got finished DMing a session where the players followed a distressed man that was looking for his wife in a forest after an argument they had. The party went looking for her because the man thought his wife had gone out to clear her mind while he was at the tavern drinking. Everyone hears a faint but bloodcurdling scream outside of the town wall towards the forest, so the party gears up and goes to investigate in the dark around midnight. The come upon guts and blood, finding the dead body of the man's wife along with a werewolf that was eating her. The werewolf howls to summon more wolves and then gives a choice to the players to either give him the man as food or all die. My paladin steps in front of the man to protect him, and the usually peaceful but very frightened firekeeper (homebrew) shoves the paladin out of the way and shoves the man to the werewolf. Needless to say, everybody was amazed, and the werewolf still attacked the group (because who can trust a bloodthirsty lycanthrope out in the middle of the woods at night?). I haven't run the encouter yet though, should be fun.
Also Utilitarianism isn't solely about self advancement, it's also about societal advancement. IE Working societies function better to survive in than those that aren't working societies. Hey lets make this society work, maybe don't steal from each other, or kill each other... and so on.
The moral question is, should you go back in time and assassasssinateass Hegel? Yes, yes you should. When you fire the Blackmoor hand-cannon in his face say, 'Synthesis this baby!' So kill Hegel, and all wabbits! Duck season! Wabbit season! ... / Kierkegaard would have said you need God for true morality. Hume actually agreed with this, or half agreed, saying that the mystic is right in that you cannot actually prove, through empiricism, the Absolute. Kant was one of the worst writers in history and, after Hegel but not half as evil, also in the chain of trans-humanism coming to fruition today that says humans are fundamentally flawed and must be fixed by enlightened society. Opposed to the theist view that humans must be saved by the divine act. Enlightenment philosophy: corrupted and confused footnotes to Plato.
Also I may have misspelled assassasssinateass. Since you more than touched on Socrates with the last example, that I just now watched. The point I wanted to bring up is a possible plot as well. Appearing in Euthyphro (I think), Socrates argues that even the gods are obligated to the Good, and that each serves the Good within their own sphere of dominion but not when they step outside of their sphere. Well, since D&D gods are always meddling, you see where you can go with this. The goddess of the hearth, home, and healing is great, but when her compassion brings her out to care for the wounded on a battle field, she messes things up. Her healing and busomy comfort is so great, the wounded arise and continue slaughtering each other for her favor, in a war that would otherwise have ended as the war god thought he had orchestrated. But do not misunderstand me, bOObs are never wrong!
“What sense of hope or redemption do they hold in a nihlistic universe, none."
"Necro disco. Necro disco."
As a current PhD student in philosophy, and one that wishes they had more time for D&D, I have to say, this video is amazing. Thank you, sir.
7:11 What is the moral imperative you ask? Listen here.
9:16 Yucky!
9:18 Moral Imperative Mechanic #1 - "The Choice" -- a binary choice -- offer a reward/easy path to do something wrong or a potential penalty/difficult path for doing good
16:40 Moral Imperative Mechanic #2 - "The Duty" -- a known thing you should do -- will you do your duty (what you should do) when it might not be so easy to do it, when the consequences of doing your duty (to right a wrong) are hugely bad. Or do they just walk away and pretend that nothing's to see here with no consequences.
24:24 A deep thought (or something)
24:40 Necro Disco
24:49 Moral Imperative #3 - "The Consequences" -- play into the human fear of outcomes or consequences of any given action -- sometimes you need to do what the local people understand as "wrong" in order to do the real right thing, which means they will pay the price for doing whatever it is they need to do in order to create a more just world. So maybe they go to prison for doing something that might be treasonous to the locals but the characters see as good. Are you willing to pay the consequences for your action?
31:31 Summary - Give your players hard choices, ones that ask them to do something that is good but with awful, awful consequences.
I love how killing a sacred monk from a dying order is only worth 1000 gold, but killing a hamster is worth 5000.
Well, that's just the opening proposition. I'm sure you could negotiate at the very least up to "1000 gp and anything we manage to steal out of the temple before you kick us out of town". Bonus points if you just knock the monk unconscious and let the gang kill him in public, get paid in full and rationalise that PCs hands are clean, because the blood of the monk is on the hands of the gang.
Well that's because monks aren't bound to earthly possessions and vet bills are outrageous.
A Masterpiece, you could ask to be paid to instill such knowledge upon people.
I come back to it time and time again, and I'm always surprised by how relevant it still is!
Man, I find myself coming back to these videos again and again, just periodicaly rewatching them when my inspiration juices are running a little low. I can't say how many times I've drawn inspiration from the mad genius Hankerin for my campaigns. Sometimes I've discarded some concepts that seemed a little too drastic, only to revisit the video months later to realize the genius of it. Keep doing what you do.
Thanks a lot man!
Spot on, brother. The players almost always find an alternative means of seeking their own resolution--rarely do they opt for the canned solution.
Hookin' it up with Immanuel Kant. "Live your life as though your every act were to become a universal law."
Your videos and your stunning attention to player involvement is what keeps me going Hankerin! Exciting to see all these new videos springing up - always good to have your dialogue creating different rabbit holes for me and my players.
"... that ghostly wet-willie spell..."
"You mean Finger of Death?"
"Well that's the layman's term, but yes."
wow this drunk dude is extremely well spoken and well read that's honestly my favorite type of person, like down to party, down to debate
17:00 - 17:25 is Hankerin in a nutshell. Deep philosphy + belching + juvenile humor. You're my role model.
I’ve watched a lot of your videos over the years (and yes, this one has been around awhile, but I’ve just discovered it) but I think this one is my favorite. You effectively distilled the core of what makes a great set up or call to action. Bravo, sir!
I am aware that this video is now about three years old, but it has provoked a response in me that I feel the need to express.
First, let me say how much I enjoyed this video. You demonstrate quite eloquently the hidden depths that lie in what on the surface can appear to be just "playing a game". RPG, if done right, can be a way to explore the questions we all have about morality, purpose, and choices. And you do a very good job of presenting this !
Which brings me to the response this video provoked within me:
I am more and more convinced that we humans feel drawn to create stories and games that contain opportunities for the characters to examine what motivates them and the results and consequences that can arise from different motivations, because it is a reflection of how life really is!
To state it simply, life , what we call "reality", is an RPG.
We have a "character", a "class", a mixture of the conditions we are born into, how we see ourself, and how others see us. We have "cultures" and "traditions" that influence and make demands upon us.
But we also have "moral imperatives" that challenge us in the same ways that you have presented here.
I once had a Tibetan Buddhist teacher who acted as a guide for me to meditation and to exploring life questions. One of his favorite saying was: "the purpose of a human being is to perform actions and to experience the results of those actions".
This implies learning and development. Because experience and consequences that have no ability to shape us are nihilist in nature.
It also implies purpose. Because if there is no purpose to learning and development, this is also nihilist in nature.
Life demonstrates that there is purpose and development through the very act of presenting us with moral choices that teach us about consequences.
We don't really know the long-term purpose of life, but we do know that the choices we make on a daily basis as to how to live and interact with others has consequences. And some of those consequences involve principles that go far beyond just creating the most comfortable situation for us right now. Sometimes we know it is necessary to accept present uncomfortable situations in order to uphold higher ideals.
Sometimes we even choose personal death in order to bring about what we see as something greater than ourselves, something that needs to keep living or that needs to be brought into being for the "greater good."
When we bring these factors into our RPGs, as you demonstrate here, the game becomes larger, and all sorts of dimensions open up.
Life works in the same way. But how it works, and what the results will be, are all in the hands of the players. The Great DM just presents the situations.
And it implies to us that no life, no circumstances, no choices are meaningless.
My game uses the moral imperative as a core feature.
It takes place in a post apocalyptic nation in the middle of a brutal civil war.
The players find out that a massive invading army that is going overrun the nation in a year.
Players are tasked with getting as many factions on their side to fight the invaders.
The players have to play the dirty game of politics. Would they assassin someone to get a powerful baron on their side? Would they side with the ruthless dictator or the chaotic rebels? These are the types of decisions they would constantly need to make.
DuuuUUUde
Videos like this are the kind of stuff that pumps my blood and remembers me why tabletop RPG is so cool and, especially, why it's SO FREAKING AWESOME TO BE A DM!!
Thank you so much man, really.
My players would not care about leaving the dude on the spike xD I would of course bring him back to torment them though...
Great presentation...You are right...this is what makes the game fun.
Fun people like you make the game fun DM Scotty!
Why thank you =)
Yo! Scotty!
Do I see a chance for a Scotty and Hank Collaboration! Mind Blown!
@@danbuccini5659 Would love to. Hope to meet Hank in person someday.
re-watching this vid. it's so good :')
Wow, a dnd video that discusses Kant and the Moral Imperative.
always bringing the heavy life questions! I used your advice and made a throng of mind controlled commoners attack my players and had a NPC emphasize that it wouldn't be right to attack them. it was tense, it changed the whole encounter. Great advise meng
I like the idea of teasing out the players' moral imperatives, whatever they may be. But I'd also add that the DM needs to do the same thing with his bad guys. The most interesting bad guys are doing what they are doing for their own moral, philosophical imperatives. They are necromancers because their trying to defeat entropy or death for all mortals. They ruthlessly conquer territory because they believe only the strong and cunning, like them, are capable of leading and defending the land and its people. They raid the village because their people were the original inhabitants of the land and were driven out by the village's lord's family generations ago. Too often, the bad guys are just hand rubbing mwa haha! one dimensional sorts.
And knowledge of the bad guy's motivations and moral imperatives could even make more of an interesting moral quandary for the players.
It also gives them the option to switch sides and work for the bad guys. Consider the game Tyranny for example. You work for the "big bad guy" and commit atrocities, BUT while the war lasts, entire geographical regions are suffering terrible curses AND the sooner the inevitable victory comes, the sooner the law and order return and it will be back to business as usual.
I like this, the moral imperative almost forces them to look for a third option.
It almost forcibly 'extrudes' them to look for a better solution. Sooooo many hook ideas spring from that.
I'm glad you made a video about this. I try to always involve my players into taking action on their own rather than just make them react to stuff poping off
Hankerin!! BIG FAN. watched this video before my time warp mini campaign. Where a trickster gnome sends the players to a primitive time with dinos and primitive tribes. The moral imperative they faced was to steal the medicine from Herbalist because everyone in the Tribe was sick. But when they got there the herbalist was dead from the illness and only had one vial left. Here was the catch. The Herbalist had a son who was also sick but was too weak to move. The players decided to use the medicine on the child and try to bring back the herbalist from the dead. I let them and they healed the tribe members.To get back at them for completely destroying my plan to watch them lament over the right choice, the tribesmen learned of their necromancy and was out to kill them throughout the rest of the mini campaign.Great content and great videos man. keep on keepin on
again, great video. very informative.
native German speaker here. I like how you said Kant's name different from the insult it might sound like in English. In German however we would say it exactly like "see you next tuesday", For it to be a long a in the middle it would have to be either spelled Kaant or more likely Kahnt. :)
I tend to play more than GM. Experiencing these things as a player is so much fun, I love them as an opportunity to roleplay and as a point of debate between characters (as long as you're given the time to). I think survival is paramount, the DM has a duty to give PCs a reality check if they think that by taking the moral high ground or 'good' choice they will succeed.
Here's a choice I was faced with as a player... Level 1 party. Standard affair of hamlet besieged by the undead. During the investigation found 25 exhumed graves. Come nightfall we shelter in the inn with the villagers. Fog rolls in as well as a group of undead. My arcana check and light cantrip shows it is evil and thick. They proceed to ignore council and repel out the window and engage. I stay behind with my character being a coward and a first time adventurer. Predictably they get lost, battered and beat a fighting retreat. They retreat with the entire horde on their heels. Pinned against the door they beg for me to open it.
SO do I: A) Open the door to fight so we all die and so do the villagers?
B) Open the door and continue to run, they will most likely die and so will most of the villagers?
C) Leave it closed so they all die, but myself and villagers survive?
D) Leap out the window to distract/fight to save my pals?
You can always have your cake and eat it, as dead men tell no tales.
Definitely a tip in the tip jar! Thanks for helping me with my game, and thanks for helping me not to feel guilty about being passionate for D&D
who needs philosophy class when we got Hankerin!! Great vid brother!
I had a character recently experience "the consequence" of being strapped to a rack, upside down, naked in the market square over night, then made to apologize before the public and given ten lashes (with a tripple-headed hooked flail, which was left out of the negotiation...) the alternative was execution.
Of course, it was a consequence of being drunk at the ruler's party and disrupting the festivities by crashing into and upending a table so....there wasn't much moral imperative.
I've presented my players with the choice of saving some women from... aggressors. My players were pretty riled up about the whole thing and did the right thing! I'm proud of them! And they're usually so... "Vulcan" about stuff. XP
Been following your vids for a year and have upped my DM game to a whole new level! keep it up and I look forward to the next vid!
Awesome entry; always appreciate your thoughts on how to make a DnD game better. Awesome content as always!
I'm super impressed by the quality of your content. Keep it up!
another mechanic is space I threw 25 skeletons (4 of which were ogre skeletons and 1 wizard skeleton) but spread them out in a crumbling fort with a spiral staircase and it was tough but 6 lvl 4 characters got through it. same characters and 1 gelatinous cube and 2 oozes in a narrow hallway and 3 of them went down
great vid man, love these true, deep mechanics involving morality, in my opinion they take rpgs to a completely different level. Maybe that is the level Gary Gygax wanted us to play on. :)
Wonderful breakdown on moral imperative. Nothing drives me more nuts than players who have none and just do the murder hobo thing and a DM that allows it.
glad to see you back. loved the video, I'm always happy when your videos get me thinking about how to DM more better. 😃
You make me happy Hankerin.
I wish I could like this video more than once. I've watched this video more than any other of H.F.'s. Bravo!
I'd agree with you up until challenging the moral fiber of the group. Given the how few psychopaths there actually are, I'd say it's on the DM for not creating a situation where the PCs are invested in the pieces of the moral imperative prior to it coming to a head. Love this video. The only high concept DnD channel on UA-cam and it's well needed.
Great vid Hankerin!! While I didn't realize that I do inject these, sometimes, looking back, it was usually on accident and not often enough, lol. But when I did, it definitely made the session very memorable. Thanks for the spotlight, inspiration and mechanics. Definitely will make these more consistent and better run.
This is a fantastic video! I just had trouble with my group, since they approach the sessions the way they would approach a video game, where there is no consequence for being completely immoral. Stomping over innocent just because they are ugly, or stealing important artifacts from people who sent them to fetch said artifacts in the first place, and then kill those very people when they are asked to return those artifacts. I have been surprised by the villainy in their actions, and honestly hit a low spot in the campaign, as a result of one of the characters dying . I think I should start trying something like you say, where the morality is at stake, where I can at least see if there is some humanity left in the characters... and hopefully in the players...
I would simply say: you guys are just miserable evil sods. this campaign is over.
Oh wow... Well... I am gonna try to give them another chance. ahhah we have been talking about it. maybe they understood that the videogame approach does not apply to D&D.
Thank you for the video! Very insightful:)
:]
Amazing guide sir!
Your videos are the fertilizer of the creative mind. This is an excellent video grounded in real philosophical ideas. Thanks Hankerin!
Ive used the third option in my last campaign. The players had learned of mind flayers using intellect devourers to build a sleeper army in a city they were in. The players became desperate with how to gain the power to defeat this army, a few of them even considered sacrificing their own souls to Vecna to gain the power over an undead army, knowing they would now later have to deal with this army.
Anyway the players that were going to sacrifice themselves got stopped by the others mid ritual in a church. It led to the destruction of the temple, later while the players were trying to leave they were stopped by the guards and were read their charges for the destruction of the temple, however they chose to flee the city, to attempt to free the player from vecna. Leaving the city to the sleeper army of mind flayers
Best philosophy lesson ever. More proof of the educational value of D&D. This adds more realism and depth to campaign. Awesome video. 😎
Another way to handle the third case would perhaps be for the player to actually miss sessions? That way it's more of a meta (and XP) consequence than a stat punishment and the isolation becomes a real palpable thing. Then, when it's time to rejoin the party, reward the isolated player with a super cool one-on-one (or similar) which progresses the story and make it feel like a vip-event.
Can you do a Dungeon DJ called Moral Imperative?
I got a C- in philosophy. This video gave me flashbacks.
Hankerin, friend, I was a little offput by your usage of utilitarianism half-way through. At one point, you said utilitarians use morality only in so far as it is useful to the individual. You continued to say that it was a self-focused philosophy, where individuals strive to maximize self-utility. Utilitarianism, summarized, is acting in a way that achieves the greatest good for the greatest number of people. So, in fact, utilitarianism requires us to be actively self-disinterested. Every action we consider, we must be able to step out of the self and consider what will result in the greatest good for the most people, and if that involves self-sacrifice, we must willingly accept this for the benefit of the whole. Is there a certain branch of utilitarianism that you're referring to which asks individuals to be self-interested? From my understanding, Bentham and Kant's versions of utilitarianism demand individual utility be considered no more important than utility that would be gained by any other individual. This is why it is so difficult to behave in a truly utilitarian way.
A masterful critique! I imagine I was just crap-summarizing to make my point, which can be boiled down to "ew" on utilitarianism. I always found morality as practical to be reductive, and overly materialist. Thanks so much for the well thought, and clearly well read reply!
And thank you for the reply, sir badass. I took a minor in philosophy during my undergrad days, so it has a special place in my heart. Finding someone else out there who explores the intersection of DnD and philosophy regularly made me a fan right away. Looking forward to parsing through all of these vids.
kant wasnt a utilitarian, he was a deontologist. perhaps a better label of the philosophy described is pragmatism or even egoism? either way, i would say that utilitarianism is a chaotic-aligned philosophy because it is interested in the ends, not the means, and deontology is more lawful-aligned because it is interested in unbreakable principles
Keep these coming. My players are thanking you!
I loved that Taylor Swift album.
Heyyy UA-cam brought me a good video. Nice. **edit** Also, I do enjoy the galaxy brain goodness.
Good is hard. Evil is easier. Cool!! Well said!!
This is really good content you deserve more subs
Thanks Javier! help spread the word...
Im running a sci fi apocolypse campaign (modded d20 Modern) and I'm planning some situations where my players will meet poor and helpless people that try to rob them (like in "The Road") and ambushes by scared and desperate child raiders. Hopefully the we choices are interesting enough.
Re: the DUTY, you read my mind about running into Undead Marle if they don't get his body down. In addition, maybe the crazy Seer woman in town will call out to them next time they walk by, shouting for all to hear: "MARLE NEEDED YOU! Bring me down, bring me home! "
On the flip side, if they DO bring him down, maybe Undead Marle will show up to HELP the party next time they're in dire straits.
Ive always had a hard time using a moral imperative situation with my players....I had an encounter set up where a man was being hung for using magic (Thank you Merlin) and the players knew that helping this stranger would incur the wrath of the kingdom itself, but they saved him anyway...Where just previously to entering town, they saw and walked by a trade wagon being looted and the drivers being slaughtered because those people had nothing to do with them. How do you fix a group like that, where their morality changes minute by minute?
That Taylor swift joke got you a sub. Oh and the great video of course.
Oh man! I'm having a hard time following the video after you made the doody reference. I'm so base.
I love your storytelling technique bro
Great vid Hank. Thanks for the hard work.
Gave me some great ideas while listening. I look forward to watching the players squirm.
Banana beer? Never had it. Might be good if it exists.
I dig the long talk format. Keep it up!
Absolutely brilliant.
thumbs up before I even finish the intro for pokemon pinball
Is that pokemon pinball. If it is wow, I'm super impressed someone actually owns that still. You earned a sub. Good stuff man.
TRANSLATION: In order to make the story extra-groovy, then what you hafta do is be Darth Vader and say to the characters: "I am your father...Join me and together we can rule the galaxy as father and son." The breath and wait: "HHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH HAAAAAAAAH HHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHH HAAAAAAAAAAAAH." You see if they will say "Let's do the dirt, yo" like a gangsta, or "I'll never join you" in some melodramatic voice like some studio gangsta, or maybe even better "How about I kill you and take it all?" Now who's the badass? I'm a captain, you're a lieutenant...Wait, that's not it.
holy damn. you take that shit to a whole new level
This video makes me want to create a spherical puzzle world for my players, because the info contained in it was A-MAZE-BALLS
Finally got around to playing Pillars of Eternity, and i'm pleasantly surprised by how many moral dilemma's they seem to throw at you. In the grand scheme of things i'm pretty sure most of them don't matter to the plot of the video game, but it is nice to be rewarded for doing the right thing even if it's just having NPCs take my word on things because my character developed a reputation as an honest guy.
this is such an important topic! thanks for the video señor!
Yeah, the body of merl is not spiritually viscerally important, saving these necromancers from their wicked ways..? That is compelling.
if i offered this choice to my players, two of them would want to take the hit lol. Those bastards just dont care sometimes haha
I think the consequences are what keep me from being a better person. I really think that in an orderly society there is a lot of utilitarianism going on. I am often controlled out of fear of being punished for what I would rather do.
and just what would you rather do mate? Sounds like youre inclined to do dastardly dirty deeds. Dont go there bro. Society or at least those who think they own and control everything writhe their greedy little mitts at those who do those deeds. Its just like sacrificing babies to Molok so they get a bigger slab of beef at temple every tuesday. Do what is right regardless of consequences. Thats the truth of the world. Evil ones exsist. Theyre called democrats. Easy your mind. Fight the evil.
In this case, the act of not doing what those expect youll do, trumps their belief in that youll do just that and im sure good caring people piss them off royally.
i can't find your tip jar. I'll keep looking
The Duty
do you upload your campaign sessions to UA-cam? if so where do I go to watch it
nope! i find that the camera changes people...
Drunkens & Dragons: Play D&D Like a Badass ok that's understandable keep up the good work
Fantastic video! Thanks Hank.
intro outro hilarity. DNDPHIL101 ... actually, more likely, a graduate dissertation Hank. well done Sir.
I just got finished DMing a session where the players followed a distressed man that was looking for his wife in a forest after an argument they had. The party went looking for her because the man thought his wife had gone out to clear her mind while he was at the tavern drinking. Everyone hears a faint but bloodcurdling scream outside of the town wall towards the forest, so the party gears up and goes to investigate in the dark around midnight. The come upon guts and blood, finding the dead body of the man's wife along with a werewolf that was eating her.
The werewolf howls to summon more wolves and then gives a choice to the players to either give him the man as food or all die. My paladin steps in front of the man to protect him, and the usually peaceful but very frightened firekeeper (homebrew) shoves the paladin out of the way and shoves the man to the werewolf. Needless to say, everybody was amazed, and the werewolf still attacked the group (because who can trust a bloodthirsty lycanthrope out in the middle of the woods at night?). I haven't run the encouter yet though, should be fun.
If you run a game for murder hobos you probably should tap into Hobbes more than into Kant and Hume I think.
Great video!
You could say the players Kant do it
Excellent video.
The Marl Imperative, huhuh. Geddit.
And that is a great video!
Oooo Drugens and Dragons. My favorite XD this dude is crazy lol
I'm curious to know what kind of experiences DMs have with this.
"It's a necro disco baby!"
we need more necro disco!
OMG so damn funny, love this channel
I like this setup.
Pokémon Pinball
So cool bro. You ever listen to Terrence McKenna. Guys a genius. Was and still is.
Good to see you back, brother! Have you ever played Shadowrun? Thoughts on the system?
2e rocked! fun game as long as you control dice quantity
Also Utilitarianism isn't solely about self advancement, it's also about societal advancement. IE Working societies function better to survive in than those that aren't working societies.
Hey lets make this society work, maybe don't steal from each other, or kill each other... and so on.
Where did you get these beautiful sets from?
made 'em
The moral question is, should you go back in time and assassasssinateass Hegel? Yes, yes you should. When you fire the Blackmoor hand-cannon in his face say, 'Synthesis this baby!' So kill Hegel, and all wabbits! Duck season! Wabbit season! ... / Kierkegaard would have said you need God for true morality. Hume actually agreed with this, or half agreed, saying that the mystic is right in that you cannot actually prove, through empiricism, the Absolute. Kant was one of the worst writers in history and, after Hegel but not half as evil, also in the chain of trans-humanism coming to fruition today that says humans are fundamentally flawed and must be fixed by enlightened society. Opposed to the theist view that humans must be saved by the divine act. Enlightenment philosophy: corrupted and confused footnotes to Plato.
whoah
Also I may have misspelled assassasssinateass. Since you more than touched on Socrates with the last example, that I just now watched. The point I wanted to bring up is a possible plot as well. Appearing in Euthyphro (I think), Socrates argues that even the gods are obligated to the Good, and that each serves the Good within their own sphere of dominion but not when they step outside of their sphere. Well, since D&D gods are always meddling, you see where you can go with this. The goddess of the hearth, home, and healing is great, but when her compassion brings her out to care for the wounded on a battle field, she messes things up. Her healing and busomy comfort is so great, the wounded arise and continue slaughtering each other for her favor, in a war that would otherwise have ended as the war god thought he had orchestrated. But do not misunderstand me, bOObs are never wrong!
Frank are you a Veteran?
Click on the support button to buy Hankerin a beer! Do it now.