Originally Posted by
Amaril
But it seems to me that if you're making a world where people are meant to consider the moral implications of things like killing orcs because they're orcs, you're also asking people to consider the moral implications of killing bandits because they're bandits. Most bandits don't follow that path just because they're greedy and sadistic--they do it because they have no other way to survive. In a world taking cues from medieval Earth, as most fantasy does, can you really blame them? Their society probably has little to no safety net in place for people who lose their livelihoods--how else are they supposed to go on?
I'm not suggesting all adventurers should be total pacifists who never commit violence even when it could save lives. That would be silly. But in the kind of world that prompts these discussions about fantasy races, I would think it appropriate to have some reflection after a battle with a group of bandits on whether the group did the right thing in cutting them down, and whether they really deserved such a fate. Which isn't really conducive to the kind of game some people want always-evil races for, the sort of beer-and-pretzels game where you get to kick in doors and kill monsters without having to think about whether it might be wrong. Now, I myself will pretty much always prefer the former type of game over the latter, and I'm willing to consider that if the latter always relies on racist assumptions, then it might be wrong to indulge in it in any form; I just want to really make sure that assertion is based on sound logic before I start making it.