OOTS #1208 - The Discussion Thread

[Dragonus45]

Their army consists of Hinjo, Kazumi, Daigo, nobles, and an army very much reduced in size (and consisted mainly of civilians). They're also thousands of miles away. I wouldn't bet on their chances.

Right now? Probably not. But give them some time to regroup, get in touch refugees, and rebuild their forces and I can easily see them taking the city back in the future. Rightfully I might add.

[The_Weirdo]

That's what I get for not reading the physical books, and that actually really sucks all around. Guess bloodthirsty conquest, mass slaughter, and slavery are still ok when the correct people do them.

I mean, that was exactly how it worked with non-goblins being "the correct people", to the tune of atrocities committed against Redcloak by Paladins back when Redcloak was perfectly innocent. So I guess the still applies, I suppose? But that aside, tell me something:

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the Azurites staged a decades-long genocide campaign. What did they think would happen?

Right now? Probably not. But give them some time to regroup, get in touch refugees, and rebuild their forces and I can easily see them taking the city back in the future. Rightfully I might add.

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Oh, and will they rightfully use a Wish spell to undo the attack on Redcloak's village?

[Dragonus45]

I mean, that was exactly how it worked with non-goblins being "the correct people", to the tune of atrocities committed against Redcloak by Paladins back when Redcloak was perfectly innocent. So I guess the still applies, I suppose? But that aside, tell me something:

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the Azurites staged a decades-long genocide campaign. What did they think would happen?

If you just want to make things up then go ahead?

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But last I checked Azure city wasn't conquering goblinoid lands willy-nilly. That was one secret society from them, who were operating way outside of their mandate and without the knowledge of AC's leadership.

And while they attack on the noncombatants of Red Cloak's village was deplorable, it was literally harboring a cleric of an evil god dedicated to a plan that would cause the death literally everyone on the material plain.

[Peelee]

They are already making plans to take it back, if they don't agree to this that fight will certainly happen and without Xykon or Red Cloak they could very will win.

Them and what army?

Seriously. They lost when they had 10,000 troops and all the defenses of the city. Currently they have tens of troops, possibly dozens, and would have to fight against those same defenses. The army was a massive threat even without Xykon and Reddie. Still is. Tens of thousands strong, entrenched, well defended. Hinjo ain't got jack.

[The_Weirdo]

If you just want to make things up then go ahead?

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But last I checked Azure city wasn't conquering goblinoid lands willy-nilly. That was one secret society from them, who were operating way outside of their mandate and without the knowledge of AC's leadership.

And while they attack on the noncombatants of Red Cloak's village was deplorable, it was literally harboring a cleric of an evil god dedicated to a plan that would cause the death literally everyone on the material plain.

A plan that would not have been needed if the gods hadn't set the goblins up to lead miserable, short and unequal lives.

[Dragonus45]

A plan that would not have been needed if the gods hadn't set the goblins up to lead miserable, short and unequal lives.

A statement dripping with unreliable narration from an Evil god that doesn't entirely make sense with more recent revelations from Thor.

[ebarde]

I mean, yeah they pretty much destroyed every village in their way until they found the bearer of the red mantle. The bearer being there doesn't justify anything, they had extremely lttle information to even go off of, they would have done what they did rather he was there or not.

[The_Weirdo]

A statement dripping with unreliable narration from an Evil god that doesn't entirely make sense with more recent revelations from Thor.

I'm sorry, could you kindly explain that assertion?

[Anansiil]

No I meant exactly what I said, context. Because sometimes when IÂ’m running a game that isnÂ’t about about complex issues like those, or like the ones brought in OOTS, the goblins a really are just all dumb evil creatures whoÂ’s lives bring no value to the world so my party can go do political intrigue or punch out mind flayers elsewhere. Not all fictional monstrous races or demihumans or goblinoids are created equal across all campaigns.

I understand your perspective: If I make goblins intelligent and able to bring value to the world, then they do. If I choose to make goblins dumb and evil, then they are dumb, evil, and bring no value to the world.

You are proving Red Cloak's entire point. He is saying, I'm a goblin and my life has value, and you're saying "only in the context that I desire does your life have value".
That's why I said perspective, because a goblin like Red Cloak has a perspective whether or not you you see him as equal or worthy of living because he contributes to the world in a way you find valuable.

(Millions of people feel that way about other humans today, word for word: "They don't contribute anything to the world."
{scrubbed})

I honestly didn't understand why WoTC wanted to alter DnD to avoid racism, though now I'm starting to get maybe why they felt that way. Though it's a game, I took it for granted that people didn't 'actually' see fictional races as evil. I assumed it was pragmatism since they weren't allies and were at odds... So interesting.

Sure sometimes, but more often then not in my experience it's framed as the "You don't know what its like to suffer X, and even if you did you still probably had an easier time of it then I did." kind of deal totally erasing who I am as a person.

I've never seen anyone say "even if you did", because these conversations are reserved for people who are different, and thus not capable of having that same experience (Goblin vs Dwarf, man vs woman, rich vs poor etc)...

What is your intention? Do you want to say you've suffered in other ways and CAN relate to suffering in general or compete on who has suffered more?
That's a tricky position to be in. Bringing up how you have suffered in response to their suffering is often an attempt of Person B to downplay Person A's suffering, erasing what Person A just told Person B.

If Person A is mentioning how they suffered in a way that Person B could not have suffered, and Person B is offended because they have suffered in other ways, Person B is changing the subject to their own experience and moving past Person A's feelings/experience.

If you would like to have a conversation/relationship with them then it's on you (unfortunately) to steer it in a better direction like Durkon is trying to do. If you don't care to try that, you can ignore the fact that the Person A is hurting and misguided and then try to win the suffering competition.
(I've never had it go wrong by saying I've suffered differently and they are not the same. Those aren't fighting words.)

The way what I was alluding to is normally thrown around the implication is, just as with Red Cloak, that Person B has never suffered. Saying "I suffered thus" is a good way to build your pathos. Saying "you [member of outgroup] haven't suffered" only undermines their pathos. Or is it ethos? The sides of the rhetorical triangle elude me.

The "you" does appear accusative... Except, word for word, was that ever stated or was that what you think is implied? Taking specific statements like "I wouldn't expect a dwarf who grew surrounded by gold and gems to understand what its like to struggle or do without. The fact is the goblins have been at a material disadvantage compared to the humans, dwarves, elves [...] We've been forced to live on terrible barren land with infertile soil and few natural resources."

Think of how Durkon's mom gave away all of those diamonds. Goblins didn't have diamonds (wealth) to give away. It's like comparing a rich country vs a poor country. Of course people can be poor in a rich country. It's also usually true that a poor person in that rich country owns more wealth than people in poor country. She could have restored her arm, but her emotional reasons and pension were enough to sustain her. (I'll assume injured goblins might not have a good pension system).

Assuming that Red Cloak's statements mean that Durkon could not have personally suffered is changing what Red Cloak is talking about. (I hope that makes sense).

Redcloak makes an assumption that Durkon hasn't gone through struggle and hardship at all. While it's true Redcloak has gone through more then Durkon, it was an unneeded attack on his character that doesn't really help explain anything. But...Durkon, and by extension the comic, doesn't treat that as something that invalidates the argument, he takes it and doesn't even comment, and goes on to listen and understand.

Durkon is doing a great job, honestly. Durkon asked if they actually were unequal. The fact that Durkon even had to ask meant that Red Cloak needed to explain differences between how goblins were perceived and how PC races are seen. The goblins that attack a village are monsters but 'demi/humans' attack a goblin village and they are heroes is a great point, ESPECIALLY when Durkon brings up Azure city since conquest isn't an unheard of concept for humans.

Red Cloak is speaking about Dwarves in general and not Durkon in the specific. Red Cloak doesn't know Durkon from that statue. Taking a general statement as a personal attack is why it's so hard to discuss racism

The Lack of Conflict Is Not Peace. Redcloak could absolutely just go start up a village somewhere like the comic often purports he should and wouldn't resolve the fact that the gods themselves have condemned him, his family, his children, his entire community to the face of non-human cannon fodder, grist for the lives of the people who the gods decided were actually important.

Painting Redcloak as ignorant of the struggles that Durkon has gone through is also frankly meaningless within the larger context of the conflict they're embroiled in. Yes, Durkon grew up poor. Durkon also grew up safe and loved in a community that wasn't threatened by every other nation under the sun. Durkon is poor because of his mother's decision to be moral-give Redcloak's mom could be given the same sack of diamonds and y'know what that would give her? A more favorable roll on the treasure table when some fighter is looting her corpse. Durkon has a ****ing racial bonus to attack Redcloak's entire race for {scrubbed} sake. Redcloak assumptions that Durkon grew up in a safer, richer environment then his entire village is correct and the fact that this comic tries to paint that as Redcloak "not understanding Durkon" is hilarious. It's a false equivalency of massive proportions and in the time that this comic is being written it's frankly inexcusable.

*high five*
They live in a world where you can wipe out a clan of goblins living in an dungeon... What if that abandoned dungeon is their home? I couldn't attack some people under a freeway overpass and proudly show off my new tent... I'd rightly be seen as a monster.

You can still run a campaign where the party fights and kills goblins without holding a tribunal first. Just make it clear that it's not because they're goblins - just like you would with any other evil humanoid enemy. (And given the historical ease with which we've been allowed to slaughter them en masse, maybe we should all give the goblins and orcs a break for awhile even if we have the perfect justification for killing this set of them.

That's all the difference in the world. Kill them for their creed, not their existence...

[Dragonus45]

I'm sorry, could you kindly explain that assertion?

The idea that the “inexperienced” gods accidentally created a world where there just too many cool high level monsters and and not enough cheap fodder to get adventurers to a good level to fight them, doesn’t fit all with the reality that they have created a number of worlds almost literally uncountable by mortal minds. But even if that part was partly true literally everything about TDO and his history seems fairly suspect. As a side note I consider everything in crayon unreliable narration.

[ebarde]

The whole being made to be killed by PCs not being true thing makes very little sense, I mean it's certainly not hard to see what Rich's motivations with adding that in to the comic were. It's a clear commentary on the design philosophy of DnD, if that isn't true then the story would be saying exactly the opposite of what Rich quite explicitedly wants the story to say about it's themes. If it's just a lie and goblins have equal standing to every other race in a cosmological sense, what would Rich even be trying to comment on with that?

[The_Weirdo]

The idea that the “inexperienced” gods accidentally created a world where there just too many cool high level monsters and and not enough cheap fodder to get adventurers to a good level to fight them, doesn’t fit all with the reality that they have created a number of worlds almost literally uncountable by mortal minds. But even if that part was partly true literally everything about TDO and his history seems fairly suspect. As a side note I consider everything in crayon unreliable narration.

Okay, that's a lot to unpack.

First off, experience doesn't mean mistakes can't be made. Heck, it doesn't mean that's not the first time the gods did that exact sort of thing to entire races, either.

Second, really, you'll have to back "seems fairly suspect" up.

Third, if it's only by chance that Paladins can slaughter villages full of innocent sentients and these Paladins do not Fall, then it's a weeeeeeird chance you got there.

[Snails]

Azure City fell because of Xykon and Redcloak. Redcloak made a massive breach in the wall. Redcloak & Xykon made some powerful undead beasties that were difficult for someteenth level PCs to defeat. Xykon smashed dozens of paladins at the throne room -- while few were high level, they qualified as a elite force that could have slain a thousand goblins when defending from an unbreached wall.

IMO there is no real reason to expect Gobbotopia to survive if Redcloak is not around to assist. Jirix is not high enough level to deal with even simple hit and run raids by high single digit parties softening up the defenses. We know of no goblin except Redcloak and Jirix that could even make the attempt.

[Peelee]

Azure City fell because of Xykon and Redcloak. Redcloak made a massive breach in the wall. Redcloak & Xykon made some powerful undead beasties that were difficult for someteenth level PCs to defeat. Xykon smashed dozens of paladins at the throne room -- while few were high level, they qualified as a elite force that could have slain a thousand goblins when defending from an unbreached wall.

The Azurite generals themselves called it an even fight without even factoring in Xykon and Redcloak.

IMO there is no real reason to expect Gobbotopia to survive if Redcloak is not around to assist. Jirix is not high enough level to deal with even simple hit and run raids by high single digit parties softening up the defenses. We know of no goblin except Redcloak and Jirix that could even make the attempt.

Except for the massively successful goblin settlement which managed to have a standing army three times the size of Azure City's, you mean? Imean, if we want to call that a "real" reason.

[Dragonus45]

You are proving Red Cloak's entire point. He is saying, I'm a goblin and my life has value, and you're saying "only in the context that I desire does your life have value".
That's why I said perspective, because a goblin like Red Cloak has a perspective whether or not you you see him as equal or worthy of living because he contributes to the world in a way you find valuable.

Red Cloak is a fictional character. He can have whatever perspective he wants, he only does so because he is a goblin in the context of a story where goblins are people.

I honestly didn't understand why WoTC wanted to alter DnD to avoid racism, though now I'm starting to get maybe why they felt that way. Though it's a game, I took it for granted that people didn't 'actually' see fictional races as evil. I assumed it was pragmatism since they weren't allies and were at odds... So interesting.

I mean, most people just see fictional races in the context of D&D as tools. For OOTS they are tools to tell a story of racial allegory. Sometimes they are generic enemies. Sometimes they basically don’t exist because they don’t show up for an entire campaign centered around other problems.

I've never seen anyone say "even if you did", because these conversations are reserved for people who are different, and thus not capable of having that same experience (Goblin vs Dwarf, man vs woman, rich vs poor etc)...

Oh, I have. I’ve literally had people tell me directly to face “I mean, a mans experience with an abusive girlfriend could never be as bad as a woman’s.” And also “Your being homeless would have been so much worse if you were woman.” It’s not even occasional, it’s almost constant. I could say more examples but that gets into politics.

[Squire Doodad]

IMO there is no real reason to expect Gobbotopia to survive if Redcloak is not around to assist. Jirix is not high enough level to deal with even simple hit and run raids by high single digit parties softening up the defenses. We know of no goblin except Redcloak and Jirix that could even make the attempt.

Fortunately for them, the Resistance was a group that didn't have 3rd level mages, and they were already crushed by Redcloak. Given the Elves probably don't plan on waging war on a very far away nation if everyone they sent as well as who they were fighting for is dead, there are very few people who will attack an established nation with plans to put down their leaders and wipe out the constituents instead of to, say, free the slaves. One may involve the other, actually, but that's neither here nor there. Given that this is also a low-level world, Gobbotopia sure wouldn't have been founded if it wasn't for Redcloak, but it will be able to persist without him given what he has done thus far.

[ebarde]

They called it an even fight without counting the undeads too. Also keep in mind that this is with all the fortifications and also only considering the incomplete information they had due to anti-divination spells.

[Peelee]

They called it an even fight without counting the undeads too. Also keep in mind that this is with all the fortifications and also only considering the incomplete information they had due to anti-divination spells.

Indeed. And those fortifications are now in the hands of the goblins. So, if you count the fortifications as making an army three times as strong when defending (or worth an extra 20,000 troops when defending), you're looking at an army of 40,000-60,000 to make an even fight to take it back. Four to six times what the Azurites had when they ruled their own empire.

[Squire Doodad]

They called it an even fight without counting the undeads too. Also keep in mind that this is with all the fortifications and also only considering the incomplete information they had due to anti-divination spells.

TL;DR:

What at least was 26,400 battle-ready Hobgoblins (and is now apparently at least 15k), along with their families, plus a swelling clergy and additional undead horde, are a very powerful force which can fend off attackers.

Given they're now trading with up to 16 countries if not more, they can really stick around.

[understatement]

Azure City had three main assets in the war:

1) the walls. Some parts are broken, but it's the hobgoblins' now.

2) the Sapphire Guard + Soon Kim. This makes the castle unseizable...but doesn't matter anymore. They're gone.

3) the Order.

Azure City has nowhere the 10,000 trained army, nor their strike team of paladins or higher level wizards and clerics. They have no catapults.

Is it unfair to the Azurite citizens to be driven from their homeland by people they've never even met before? Yes. But retaking the city from the hobgoblins will not make things better in the long run, and it pretty much guarantees another war like it would happen.

[Dragonus45]

Okay, that's a lot to unpack.

First off, experience doesn't mean mistakes can't be made. Heck, it doesn't mean that's not the first time the gods did that exact sort of thing to entire races, either

Second, really, you'll have to back "seems fairly suspect" up.

Third, if it's only by chance that Paladins can slaughter villages full of innocent sentients and these Paladins do not Fall, then it's a weeeeeeird chance you got there.

1. I’ll believe the gods probably still tossed goblins in as something an afterthought into their self aware stick figure parody universe. I’m beginning to doubt they did it to deliberately oppress the entire race.
2. The major crux of that, written in crayon backstory, is that everyone would rather betray the Dark One and murder him rather then deal a goblin under any circumstances. Now the argument is that capture Azure City will probably stand because no one actually wants to destroy it. That entire plot point is depressing but apparently it’s word of god. This raises an interesting thought, if people are willing to just let the goblins claim the city and it’s lands and treat them like a nation now, AFTER the death of TDO and apparent mass slaughter that lead to the message you can never let goblinoids build a society, then why did they assassinate the dark one before that. Is it possible the Evil deity lied to his cleric when telling him backstory? Well, when he let the cloak deliver the backstory. He never actually bothered to talk to red cloak directly.

Third, several of those paladins almost certainly did fall. https://forums.giantitp.com/showsing...6&postcount=21

[ebarde]

I feel that wizard's decision to change up how the monstrous races works have a lot of different motivations, but mainly idk...the previous interpretations of them they all had pretty much no personality or flair? If I want to have my party fight enemies that they don't need to feel bad about it, have the necromancer raise a horde of an undead, at least then there isn't any pretense that the antagonists will be anything other than walking hit points that do damage. Cause as it stood it's like...orcs, goblins and everything else mostly just served the same purpose and kinda were fairly inconsistently written, cause them being objectively evil never really made a whole lot of sense and was contradictory to how most DnD settings worked.

Even if we don't wanna tackle with any of the moral implications of those depictions, I kinda just keep coming back to just always finding those enemies to be the most uninteresting parts of my sessions cause they were basically all the same. I can think of memorable encounters with bandits, dragons and a lot of other different creatures, but all encounters I had with Goblins or orcs all just blend themselves together cause the set-up is always the same. "Goblins are attacking a village, go there kill them and earn gold".

[Jasdoif]

Red Cloak is speaking about Dwarves in general and not Durkon in the specific. Red Cloak doesn't know Durkon from that statue.

You really think pointing at Durkon and going directly from "your people" to "a dwarf" doesn't indicate a comment directed at Durkon? Do you think he was talking about Kraagor?

[Peelee]

Kraagor?

That was rife for a joke before you changed it. What joke I do not know, but rife, I tells ya!

[Jasdoif]

That was rife for a joke before you changed it. What joke I do not know, but rife, I tells ya!

A kragoor is, of course, a crag with abundant ore. Possibly what Kraagor's name was inspired by; but, you know, basic courtesy in the attempt to get names right.

[Anansiil]

A lot of people are saying that Redcloak erred when he said "I wouldn't expect a dwarf who grew up surrounded by gold and gems to understand" and...I'm not seeing it.
Durkon's in more danger than most because he's an exile and an adventurer, but most dwarves live much safer lives than most goblins. Not that mining and troll-fighting is necessarily safe, but it's a completely different danger than roving packs of mounted warriors with magical powers (i.e. Paladins). And it's important for Redcloak to establish that Durkon doesn't know his experiences so they can come to the point of understanding each other's worldview. Knowledge starts by acknowledging a lack of knowledge.



With rare exception, if you make a sapient people that's sapient in such a way that it must be killed on sight and can't be negotiated with in any way, you're mimicking and propagating racial propaganda. Most bigotry in the history of the human race, whether on basis of race, religion, sex or gender, has always been centered on this one basic concept: "They're all like this". [...] Going 'all ogres are dumb because that's the natural order of things' or 'all gnolls are brutal hunters because that's how they're evolved' is an over-simplification that lessens the nonhumans in a lot of settings. Basing conflicts between sentient beings on factors other than who was born to whom is both less reminiscent of racial stereotyping and allows for more stories to be told with those beings.

Also, hyenas are pack hunters and are therefore incredibly social animals who are known to navigate complex social hierarchies. Your gnolls would probably be better at navigating enlightened society than most humans.

I agree quite strongly!
I love this kind of out of the box thinking. Hyenas are social, so imagine what kind of societies they would naturally have? I love having my mind opened to new ideas while I'm having fun.
My favorite stories have always had 'motivation vs motivation' rather than Good vs Evil.
Funny enough, my escapism still has the complexities of life... but with super powers :P
(probably because people ignoring the complexities has caused me more issues that having to deal with complexities lol)

Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis (game), Malazan Book of the Fallen (book), The Broken Earth Trilogy (book) are all good examples of complex stories being told that can keep you guessing, as opposed to the simple 'will evil be stopped?' :D

Oh, I have. I’ve literally had people tell me directly to face “I mean, a mans experience with an abusive girlfriend could never be as bad as a woman’s.” And also “Your being homeless would have been so much worse if you were woman.” It’s not even occasional, it’s almost constant. I could say more examples but that gets into politics.

You are right in that competition is bad and totally misguided. My question is why are you trying to say that they are the same?
I'm strongly positing that trying to say the experiences are the same is what is driving the argument.
"You have factor A and I have factor B so our experiences were different".
'No, our experiences were the same.' vs 'Our experiences were different and both were bad'.

You don't have to agree with their assertion. Saying the experiences are the same or basically the same negates their individual life experiences.
We can all agree that the hypothetical abuse/homelessness is bad, but it's so helpful to try and understand how it impacts people differently. (I'm a researcher in medical and public health :P and the best plans try and reasonably account for different circumstances).
(your two examples makes me think we have seen documentaries on the same guy.)

An exiled Goblin (kill on sight!) and an Exiled Dwarf (possibly an ally?) will not have the same experience. If we want to stay friends, arguing who had it worst probably won't go well... but it could be possible to objectively list and count considerations that each does and does not have to worry about.
Avoid competing and promote understanding :)

[The MunchKING]

A lot of people take Redcloak at his word on that despite neither him nor anyone he knows being present for the act - I am a bit more dubious.

If you mean the 'D&D kitchen-sink fantasy world' bit then Thor kindof says it here (panel 7).

If you want another Holy Book's take on it, you can kind of get the "there are people that do the killing, and those that fight back but exist to be killed" from the Book of Odad, where it talks about how they warred on others without purpose for purpose hadn't been invented yet. Granted that was thousands of worlds ago, but I forgot that she put that detail in at the end. *shrug*

Indeed, the Southern continent also contain the Realm of the Dragon, the Ghostlands, the Raja Kingdom, and the Peripheral Frontier. None of them seemed terribly invested in helping the Azurites.

Indeed the Dark One thinks that Jirix's battles will be "trade and logistics, diplomacy and intrigue". Which suggests to me, that at least as far as the Dark One can see, it's more about securing those alliances and political capital to survive than worrying about an Azurite counter-invasion.

Them and what army?

Seriously. They lost when they had 10,000 troops and all the defenses of the city. Currently they have tens of troops, possibly dozens, and would have to fight against those same defenses. The army was a massive threat even without Xykon and Reddie. Still is. Tens of thousands strong, entrenched, well defended. Hinjo ain't got jack.

Hinjo WAS leveling up clearing monsters the last time we saw him. If he could get really high level he could take out a bunch of hobgoblins himself. Same idea for Ochul and Lien. (assuming they survive this mission)

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Oh, and will they rightfully use a Wish spell to undo the attack on Redcloak's village?

Wish can't actually do that you know. Even high-powered artifacts can only go back a couple rounds. D&D is pretty clear that time travel is not possible in the standard rules.

[Lycan999]

With rare exception, if you make a sapient people that's sapient in such a way that it must be killed on sight and can't be negotiated with in any way, you're mimicking and propagating racial propaganda. Most bigotry in the history of the human race, whether on basis of race, religion, sex or gender, has always been centered on this one basic concept: "They're all like this". Monolithic cultures don't just happen naturally. There has to be some sort of artificial factor in place to keep everyone acting the same for so long (to use 40K as an example, the Orks were genetically programmed by the Old Ones to be rowdy football fans for all eternity). Going 'all ogres are dumb because that's the natural order of things' or 'all gnolls are brutal hunters because that's how they're evolved' is an over-simplification that lessens the nonhumans in a lot of settings. Basing conflicts between sentient beings on factors other than who was born to whom is both less reminiscent of racial stereotyping and allows for more stories to be told with those beings.

Also, hyenas are pack hunters and are therefore incredibly social animals who are known to navigate complex social hierarchies. Your gnolls would probably be better at navigating enlightened society than most humans.

I completely disagree with your assertion that it's mimicking and propagating racial propaganda just from talking about species in absolute terms, because there are absolute constraints that determine how individual species act. Racists are wrong because those constraints are the same for all varieties of humans, all humans are acting under the same mental and moral constraints. But it is valid to look at the different the absolute constraints of an inhuman species that would have had an alien evolutionary path. And I guess I should explain better what I meant with "kill on sight" since I was being a bit hyperbolic (except Tyranids, good luck negotiating there).

Effectively there are conceivably species that would simply be completely incompatible with humans on a societal level. They may be negotiated with individually in the short term since they are rational creatures (though even that might not be a given, logical thinking might not be a prerequisite for sentience, that's an interesting question) but on a larger scale they may not be willing to or even capable of doing so. If they are a purely solitary species they may be completely incapable of comprehending social concepts in the same way we find it disturbing when eusocial animals casually use each other as building material. Large portions of the human brain is dedicated to things such as facial and body language recognition, language comprehension, and general human empathy in being able to understand other people experiences. A species with different brain structure could conceivably lack those areas and thus have no concept of empathy, or possibly even no self awareness as we would understand it.

I think the other area you misunderstood me is I'm not saying these species are "monolithic" like you described. I'm saying that every species has built in parameters that define the possible decisions it is capable of making according to that specie's understanding of the world and that it is different for each species. Specific individuals may have a slightly different set of parameters, like a human with extreme antisocial personality disorder, but the disorder part there is key. An ant with empathy would be a similar anomaly.

And you are probably right about hyenas, I really don't know much about them. But I think my arguments still stand if you hold my assumptions to be true, and that was really the point. Also I'll let the ogre thing pass because yes, all ogres being dumb can be the order of things. The average intelligence of a species can just be low, not sure what point you were trying to make there.

[Alex Warlorn]

Redcloak has it backwards.

There are so many human-orc hybrids BECAUSE they're tolerated more than the goblins! (Who wouldn't pay good money for a scary group of orc mercenaries?)

[Psyren]

Why do I have to make it clear in my campaign that you can't kill goblins because they are goblins? In OOTSverse goblins are rational creatures and moral actors capable of making ethical decisions with the same degree of freedom that humans are. The Giant has essentially made it clear that "racial alignments" in his world are due to wide reaching cultural factors and it is possible for individuals to go against the grain. But it is perfectly possible for other worlds/campaign settings to have species, even humanoid ones, that do not have the same degree of moral freedom that humans have.

Of course other settings can do this, and have done so. As can yours.

The question the Giant is asking (and now 5e and PF2 as well) is should they. If you want monsters that are kill on sight with few to no moral quandaries, there are so many others to choose from besides humanoids. Some are mindless hazards (like oozes and vermin), some are malevolent and intentional (fiends and aberrations) and some are both (undead). What is emphasized with all of them though is lacking the same capacity for morality/ethics that humans possess - to say nothing of any physiological or cultural parallels that could prove problematic on close examination. Orcs, goblins, gnolls, and even drow are not the same.

I see your point, but I don't think that judging PRESENT TENSE goblin society is fair, since Redcloak's speech is all about "we've been that way from the start, because this is what was forced upon us".
I'm not saying Goblins would doom themselves, nor am I saying they are incompent, flawed or anything, but they have been shaped by their society that way for GENERATIONS. They've developed a whole new set of skills to survive, skills that Redcloak got from his cape, but the others haven't.
A lot of goblins and hobgoblins on Gobbotopia simply aren't aware of the whole thing Redcloak is doing. It is not their fault if Gobbotopia has a lot of problems. It is just how they were shaped by their world's society since day one.

I don't think this would prove that the Gods Racism is correct, it only proves Redcloak's point: that if they weren't hunted that way from the start, they would have a whole different society on this day, one that is able to be equal to the other (in Redcloak's perception of equality).
I just think that Redcloak ignores that fact and will, eventually, be confronted by it.

I'm genuinely not seeing anything about Gobbotopia society that indicates any bigger problems than any other nation has. They had a resistance problem for a while, but beyond that, things ran pretty smoothly. Hell, it looks like a much better place for a goblin to live than, say, a human living in a pile like Greysky.