Which villainous race(s) are next on the chopping block?

[Bohandas]

Obligatory OotS page

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https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0044.html

[MaxWilson]

To try to be on the positive side of things, "morally and culturally complex" doesn't mean "not evil". A lot of nuanced and understandable factors can contribute to the end result of an evil society. I don't think that adding layers of depth to a race means that said race can no longer serve as a villainous force. As a previous poster pointed out, Volo's Guide added lots of insight into why Orcs and Goblins are the way they are, without robbing them of their core of menace and antagonism. I hope that the guiding aim in future releases is to make all races well realized and rich in cultural detail, rather than the bland approach of assumed moral neutrality across the board.

In summary, a race can still be presented as evil and necessary to fight (a necessity conceit for the game) without resorting to categorical thinking and essentialist assumptions.

This I very much agree with. Every time I read a MM/Volo's entry about how a given monster race is violent, brutal, and quick to avenge insults I yawn. It's the most boring cliché imaginable and a complete waste of paragraph space.

Leave drow evil for all I care but make them detailed, plausible, and culturally interesting! Give me some unique facts about their culture that don't apply to most other cultures. Help me as a DM to make them feel non-generic. 2nd edition is fantastic at this, sometimes. 5E could learn a lot from Dark Sun, Spelljammer, etc.

P. S. There is definitely something to be said though for the occasional "inherently evil" monster type that must be slain at any cost for when you WANT black and white morality. The problem is that showing what those evil creatures do when allowed is... squicky. It can turn a campaign very dark very fast if the PCs ever fail in an objective.

They are mutually exclusive actually; one requires you to be a defiler and the other a preserver

Yes, that's what made it so difficult for this particular Avangion (Oronis). It took him decades or centuries to change IIRC.

This is from the original Dark Sun campaign setting (2nd edition) but not the original boxed set or Dragon Kings so feel free to ignore it if you like, but he's one of only two or maybe three Avangions in the whole setting (and the other one I remember

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gets murdered during Dragon's Crown, IIRC by the Order

).

Anyway, I find it amusing to have one of the Big Goods of the setting be a former Big Bad.

[kingcheesepants]

I see this focus cycling through every sentient race/species.

"Every one of X are evil"

DM/writer/player "I was to have an X that is an exception"

"Most of X are evil, with some notable exceptions"

DM/writer/player "I want to have moral complexity and misunderstood perspectives"

"Most of X's societal norms are seen as evil to outsiders"

DM/writer/player "This is a problem for them to be considered evil. They have a rich culture and anyone who defines them as evil is only doing so because of some type of -ism"

"X are no longer used as the stand-in for evil. Every one of Y are evil"

DM/writer/player "I was to have a Y that is an exception"

...

It makes you wonder if there's even any need to have a race working as a stand in for evil. It seems to me that no, you don't really need always evil races. Let actions speak for themselves. Greg the evil giant isn't evil because he's a giant he's evil because he loves eating babies. Grognor the conqueror isn't evil because he's an Orc, he's evil because he kills or enslaves everyone he meets. Is there any need for a race of hats?

[MaxWilson]

It makes you wonder if there's even any need to have a race working as a stand in for evil. It seems to me that no, you don't really need always evil races. Let actions speak for themselves. Greg the evil giant isn't evil because he's a giant he's evil because he loves eating babies. Grognor the conqueror isn't evil because he's an Orc, he's evil because he kills or enslaves everyone he meets. Is there any need for a race of hats?

It depends. If you want a nice hack and slash adventure without any angst over juveniles it's convenient to have wholly evil races.

E.g. Neogi hatchlings are in the MM (well, Volo's) as a CR 1/8 monster. If you don't want players angsting over whether or not it's right to kill hatchlings, make sure they're doing something horrific when first introduced onscreen, e.g. eating each other alive.

[False God]

It depends. If you want a nice hack and slash adventure without any angst over juveniles it's convenient to have wholly evil races.

E.g. Neogi hatchlings are in the MM (well, Volo's) as a CR 1/8 monster. If you don't want players angsting over whether or not it's right to kill hatchlings, make sure they're doing something horrific when first introduced onscreen, e.g. eating each other alive.

Even if we assume such action makes them evil, you've proved the exact reason why we don't need to identify them as inherently evil. You can just SHOW them doing evil things.

They're doing evil things. Nuff said.

But there's still a logical leap from "we went into this one cave this one time and saw this one group of one race doing evil stuff." to "We saw some of these things on the road a few days later and murdered them because the last guys we met of this race were doing evil stuff."

Also, I honestly have to ask: WHY? Why would you want an "angst free" game that involves killing children? Like, I fundamentally don't understand the reasoning behind WANTING to play that.

[MaxWilson]

Even if we assume such action makes them evil, you've proved the exact reason why we don't need to identify them as inherently evil. You can just SHOW them doing evil things.

...because you're trying to persuade the players that Neogis are inherently evil, so that you can use them as monsters.

They're doing evil things. Nuff said.

What you don't want in this scenario is for the players to treat the neogi as individuals. "Sure, those hatchlings were evil, but I just opened this door and saw eleven hatchlings staring back at me. How do I know they deserve my Fireball as much as the other hatchlings did?" You're trying to get them to generalize neogis = monsters so that they don't get killed by the hatchlings and blame the DM for tricking them. You want the players kicking themselves.

But there's still a logical leap from "we went into this one cave this one time and saw this one group of one race doing evil stuff." to "We saw some of these things on the road a few days later and murdered them because the last guys we met of this race were doing evil stuff."

Also, I honestly have to ask: WHY? Why would you want an "angst free" game that involves killing children? Like, I fundamentally don't understand the reasoning behind WANTING to play that.

This is interesting. Do you think that WotC had some other reason for putting CR 1/8 Neogi Hatchlings in the game (Volo's) other than as deadly antagonists to the players? What do you think Neogi hatchlings are for? (And how familiar are you with Neogis anyway?)

[Lord Raziere]

It depends. If you want a nice hack and slash adventure without any angst over juveniles it's convenient to have wholly evil races.

Don't see how thats necessary for that.

[False God]

This is interesting. Do you think that WotC had some other reason for putting CR 1/8 Neogi Hatchlings in the game (Volo's) other than as deadly antagonists to the players? What do you think Neogi hatchlings are for? (And how familiar are you with Neogis anyway?)

I don't know, that wasn't what I asked, and none of your followup questions are relevant.

Why would you want to play a game that involved mass-child-killing? Why would you want to run that?

[OldTrees1]

It depends. If you want a nice hack and slash adventure without any angst over juveniles it's convenient to have wholly evil races.

E.g. Neogi hatchlings are in the MM (well, Volo's) as a CR 1/8 monster. If you don't want players angsting over whether or not it's right to kill hatchlings, make sure they're doing something horrific when first introduced onscreen, e.g. eating each other alive.

If I have a population of Neogi that are willing to eat other people, down to the hatchlings in that population, then do I really need all Neogi to be like that? Or can I make do with just that population being like that (especially if I use your suggestion and have a scene of some hatchlings eating each other)?

PS: I need to go double check the Neogi lore. I thought they were the slaver aberrations, not the people eater aberrations. Huh, I learned something new. They consider eating enemies, slaves, fallen companions as equivalent to eating food. The personhood of the food was deemed irrelevant.

[kingcheesepants]

It depends. If you want a nice hack and slash adventure without any angst over juveniles it's convenient to have wholly evil races.

E.g. Neogi hatchlings are in the MM (well, Volo's) as a CR 1/8 monster. If you don't want players angsting over whether or not it's right to kill hatchlings, make sure they're doing something horrific when first introduced onscreen, e.g. eating each other alive.

I get the desire to have a stress free hack and slash type game where you don't have to agonize over whether or not it's okay to kill those guys, but it is entirely unnecessary to have wholly evil races in order to facilitate this desire. Some bandits open fire on the group in an attempt to kill them and take their stuff, do we have to agonize over whether or not it's okay to defend ourselves with deadly force? No, self defense is a perfectly legitimate reason to fight. There's a group of goblins raiding that farmhouse, does it matter that there's a perfectly peaceful settlement of goblins just across the river? Not really. A crazed wizard has kidnapped the princess and brought her to his underground lair which he's stocked with a bunch of his monsters. Is it wrong for you to chop through those monsters in trying to free her? Of course not.

I'm not sure why you would want to include children in your stress free hack and slash type games. Just attack the players with groups of normal enemies or have them infiltrate a place controlled by bad guys. But if when I'm done killing the bad guys and then notice that there's a back room with a nursery full of kids, that angst free game just became a source of great angst. Even in your example of Neogi, they aren't bad because they're Neogi, they're bad because they're cannibals (though in this case that seems less evil and more like the kind of cannibalism that sharks practice in the womb). Also there are notable non evil Neogi NPCs in spelljammer. So I'd feel just a little weird to be killing hatchlings even if they were trying to kill me first (killing babies is a notable exception to the general rule of killing in self defense is fine).

[Lord Raziere]

I'm not sure why you would want to include children in your stress free hack and slash type games. Just attack the players with groups of normal enemies or have them infiltrate a place controlled by bad guys. But if when I'm done killing the bad guys and then notice that there's a back room with a nursery full of kids, that angst free game just became a source of great angst. Even in your example of Neogi, they aren't bad because they're Neogi, they're bad because they're cannibals (though in this case that seems less evil and more like the kind of cannibalism that sharks practice in the womb). Also there are notable non evil Neogi NPCs in spelljammer. So I'd feel just a little weird to be killing hatchlings even if they were trying to kill me first (killing babies is a notable exception to the general rule of killing in self defense is fine).

yeah you don't want to kill children, just don't have children in the dungeon, don't assume the dungeon full of traps and danger is a home to a settlement of goblins. would you want to raise a child in that? No. So why would an orc or whatever want to put them in there? makes no sense. assume they're not apart of the "normal society" and they are bunch of adults doing evil adult things. its not as if your there to figure out where the orcs came from.

[pothocboots]

PS: I need to go double check the Neogi lore. I thought they were the slaver aberrations, not the people eater aberrations.

They are the slaver aberrations, part of their life cycle is establishing control over a pet Umber Hulk.

With how they view their slaves it wouldn't surprise me if they ate some of the less likely to be profitable. This doesn't carry the same weight in their society as their first act is to eat their way out of an old drugged Neogi sacrificed by their parents.

[MaxWilson]

I don't know, that wasn't what I asked, and none of your followup questions are relevant.

Why would you want to play a game that involved mass-child-killing? Why would you want to run that?

I think we're just going in circles here.

If I have a population of Neogi that are willing to eat other people, down to the hatchlings in that population, then do I really need all Neogi to be like that? Or can I make do with just that population being like that (especially if I use your suggestion and have a scene of some hatchlings eating each other)?

PS: I need to go double check the Neogi lore. I thought they were the slaver aberrations, not the people eater aberrations. Huh, I learned something new. They consider eating enemies, slaves, fallen companions as equivalent to eating food. The personhood of the food was deemed irrelevant.

Their role is basically to be filthy vile evil personified in a cosmopolitan setting where even mind flayers and beholders can get along in polite society. They're modeled after stereotypical BEMs (bug-eyed monsters) and the designers went out of their way to get them all kinds of horrific traits.

I get the desire to have a stress free hack and slash type game where you don't have to agonize over whether or not it's okay to kill those guys, but it is entirely unnecessary to have wholly evil races in order to facilitate this desire. Some bandits open fire on the group in an attempt to kill them and take their stuff, do we have to agonize over whether or not it's okay to defend ourselves with deadly force? No, self defense is a perfectly legitimate reason to fight. There's a group of goblins raiding that farmhouse, does it matter that there's a perfectly peaceful settlement of goblins just across the river? Not really. A crazed wizard has kidnapped the princess and brought her to his underground lair which he's stocked with a bunch of his monsters. Is it wrong for you to chop through those monsters in trying to free her? Of course not.

Eh. In my experience, interactions with bandits, maybe-peaceful goblins, maybe-peaceful monsters, etc. turn morally complex a non-negligible percentage of the time, especially with a certain type of player. Like, what gives you the right to kill all of these monsters just because a crazed wizard kidnapped them and stuck them in his maze? Are the monsters really different from the princess? If you want the adventure to be simple, there's a certain advantage to being able to say, "These monsters are known to always be bad."

I usually don't want the adventure to be simple but if I do the burden is on me to make it so.

[Bohandas]

It makes you wonder if there's even any need to have a race working as a stand in for evil. It seems to me that no, you don't really need always evil races. Let actions speak for themselves. Greg the evil giant isn't evil because he's a giant he's evil because he loves eating babies. Grognor the conqueror isn't evil because he's an Orc, he's evil because he kills or enslaves everyone he meets. Is there any need for a race of hats?

Some plots require the villain to be more than just one person, or indeed more than just a simple majority of a particular nation

[False God]

I think we're just going in circles here.

I suppose it would aid the discussion in moving forward if you answered the question.

But otherwise sure, circles.

[Lord Raziere]

Some plots require the villain to be more than just one person, or indeed more than just a simple majority of a particular nation

And those plots are?

I'm pretty sure an orc parent has better things to do than stand around in an old dungeon or dank cavern and wait for some adventurer to kill them for some BBEG. and that any orc willing to do that, probably isn't a parent.

[Tanarii]

I think we're just going in circles here.

Does seem that way. Although you did kind of walk into the trap by bring up the young. Whelps are most likely to cause a table issue with "usually evil" or "always evil" races, especially humanoids.

I've run afoul of it myself when directly converting a Gygaxian Naturalism dungeon to 5e. Nothing kills the table mood like an carelessly Fireballed cave that turned out to have a bunch of humanoid whelps hiding behind the adults.

For thoroughly alien races like Mind Flayers or Neogi or Chromatic Dragons it's generally not an issue unless someone forces it to be one. But it's probably one reason why Warhammer 40k went with fungus-Orks.

[MaxWilson]

I suppose it would aid the discussion in moving forward if you answered the question.

Your question is built on false assumptions. It's the equivalent of "have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

<<Also, I honestly have to ask: WHY? Why would you want an "angst free" game that involves killing children? Like, I fundamentally don't understand the reasoning behind WANTING to play that.>>

The whole point is to avoid any angst over killing children. As far as their role in the game is concerned, Neogi hatchlings aren't children, they're monsters. They exist to pose a threat.

Now will you answer my question? What do you think CR 1/8 Neogi hatchlings are in Volo's for?

======================================

Does seem that way. Although you did kind of walk into the trap by bring up the young. Whelps are most likely to cause a table issue with "usually evil" or "always evil" races, especially humanoids.

I've run afoul of it myself when directly converting a Gygaxian Naturalism dungeon to 5e. Nothing kills the table mood like an carelessly Fireballed cave that turned out to have a bunch of humanoid whelps hiding behind the adults..

Yes, this exactly. Assuming you've put any thought at all into the monster's ecology (Gygaxian Naturalism as you call it), there's potential for thorny moral issues that can derail the adventure. Sometimes they are fun to deal with, but if you don't want to it's convenient to just make them straight-up always evil.

In 6E it will be gauche to assume that a zombie shambling towards you is coming to eat your brain and not to shake your hand.

[Naanomi]

The Great Wheel Cosmology has cosmological capital-E Evil... despite the examples of ascended and ascending Fiends (and the number is fairly low in established lore, despite one being a character in a popular video game, who is herself Lawful Neutral not Good); any Fiend who isn't Evil isn't a Fiend for very long (albeit this is on an immortal time scale I suppose...) by the mechanisms of how Outsider races work. Any non-Evil Fiend is by definition a temporary exception (or the result of alignment altering magic)

In past edition lore, most of the examples of Good fiends are the direct result of Magic, or the influence of Celestials (often both)... and for some reason are almost all succubus... the prominent exception I can find being Felthis ap Jerran; who is explicitly transforming into a celestial

[Rater202]

And those plots are?

I'm pretty sure an orc parent has better things to do than stand around in an old dungeon or dank cavern and wait for some adventurer to kill them for some BBEG. and that any orc willing to do that, probably isn't a parent.

I mean, there are parents enlisted in the military or employed as PMCs when they still have dependant children.

Devil's advocate, an Orc parent could be hypothetically guarding a dungeon for a dark wizard because fighting is his only skill and the job pays well enough that he could afford to send his son to an academy that will teach him to be a functional member of society instead of a brute whose only skill is fighting.

"Grognack want son have opportunities Grognack not have. Grognack miss loving wife and young son, but Grognack not want son end up doing this kind of work when son Grognack's age. Grognack also want son know how speak unbroken common, not be stereotype like Grognack."

But yeah, in general, if you don't want moral quandaries then just don't present them and don't let people overthink things.

Orcs and Drow don't need to be always chaotic evil for "all the orcs in this particular dungeon are adults who are here committing/aiding in the commission of evil acts of their own will" to be a true statement.

[Lord Raziere]

Your question is built on false assumptions. It's the equivalent of "have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

<<Also, I honestly have to ask: WHY? Why would you want an "angst free" game that involves killing children? Like, I fundamentally don't understand the reasoning behind WANTING to play that.>>

The whole point is to avoid any angst over killing children. Neogi hatchlings aren't children, they're monsters.

Now will you answer my question? What do you think neogi hatchlings are for?

Living beings are not "for" anything. They are life, and life has no particular purpose other than its own self-perpetuation.

And my point is that....you can avoid it a different way. just don't think about it, or answer that they are somewhere else. Gygaxian Naturalism/Ecology is unneeded. its not important to hack and slash, and only invites questions you don't want, so why even use it? its your foot your shooting here. your literally making more work for yourself by answering questions you don't want or need to, when not needing to answer a question, to not consider a detail is a practically a GM godsend: one more detail you don't have to plan so you can focus on whats important: making the game fun.

[MaxWilson]

And my point is that....you can avoid it a different way. just don't think about it, or answer that they are somewhere else.

In my experience this approach does not work. You just run the risk of players angsting about something else like the morality of capital punishment for banditry. Isn't killing bandits murder if you overmatch them as much as PCs tend to do? A simple bandit encounter (say, eight bandits against four 5th level PCs) runs the risk of derailing the game session into POW-management if the players are insufficiently bloodthirsty, but if you make them some kind of Always Bad monster (Skeletons! Perytons? Chimeras) you don't have that problem, as long as the players buy into the Always Bad thing.

[Lord Raziere]

In my experience this approach does not work. You just run the risk of players angsting about something else like the morality of capital punishment for banditry. Isn't killing bandits murder if you overmatch them as much as PCs tend to do? A simple bandit encounter (say, eight bandits against four 5th level PCs) runs the risk of derailing the game session into POW-management if the players are insufficiently bloodthirsty, but if you make them some kind of Always Bad monster (Skeletons! Perytons? Chimeras) you don't have that problem, as long as the players buy into the Always Bad thing.

Really?

Dude, I think you just game with people who want to explore moral quandaries when you don't.

[MaxWilson]

Really?

Dude, I think you just game with people who want to explore moral quandaries when you don't.

Nope. I'm this way too. If you want me to cut throats and "not worry about it" I need a reason to be confident that it's actually necessary, not just murder for convenience. That doesn't mean doing the right thing isn't a huge hassle sometimes. If you avoid putting Maybe-Not-So-Bad guys in my path and stick to Always-Bad guys you are doing me a favor by letting me relax!

[kingcheesepants]

Eh. In my experience, interactions with bandits, maybe-peaceful goblins, maybe-peaceful monsters, etc. turn morally complex a non-negligible percentage of the time, especially with a certain type of player. Like, what gives you the right to kill all of these monsters just because a crazed wizard kidnapped them and stuck them in his maze? Are the monsters really different from the princess? If you want the adventure to be simple, there's a certain advantage to being able to say, "These monsters are known to always be bad."

I usually don't want the adventure to be simple but if I do the burden is on me to make it so.

Hmm, yes I can certainly see that. I feel like that's partly our fault as DMs. We run so many complex monsters with backstories and motives and what have you that the players become suspicious if the adventure is just go here and kill this thing. Once early on I was having trouble with one of my players being a bit murder hoboish and I had him loot a homemade child's doll with a note saying happy birthday Anna, off of someone he killed. After that he was waay less inclined to just stab things. To the point that it was a little bit of overcorrection and basically anything that wasn't a construct or some sort of illusion gets a non lethal strike.

However even with that I stand by saying though that races of evil aren't really necessary. We can have groups of mind flayers or giants or goblins or whatever who are clearly antagonistic and need to be put down. And if the players want to go out of their way to negotiate and make a peaceful solution, well maybe it's not the game I planned for but it still sounds like a good game to me.

[Lord Raziere]

Nope. I'm this way too. If you want me to cut throats and "not worry about it" I need a reason to be confident that it's actually necessary, not just murder for convenience. That doesn't mean doing the right thing isn't a huge hassle sometimes. If you avoid putting Maybe-Not-So-Bad guys in my path and stick to Always-Bad guys you are doing me a favor by letting me relax!

How is killing bandits murder for convenience? they're bandits. they're objectively evil and chose to do so unlike orcs who have no choice. I'd be much more comfortable with killing bandits than what your talking about.

[loki_ragnarock]

I suspect it's mostly an issue of humans in hats.

Orcs are just humans in hats. Elves are just humans in hats. Drow are just humans in hats. Halflings are just humans in hats.

Gnolls, for some reason in 5e, are the incidental creations of a passing demon lord, an unhappy little accident that will try to eat your face not because it's hungry but because its nature is the byproduct of where the Abyss meets the Prime. Which is to say, Gnolls are metal AF. And also much more interesting, precisely because they aren't humans in hats. They are a force of nature, a gale in a world where sometimes the wind blows South by SouthEvil. And that's freaking radical.

Drow at one point had a bit of lore associated with them that they were all conceived as twins, but only one of them emerged alive because the one would strangle the other in the womb. The first rite of passage of a people wholly and jealously controlled by a demonic pseudo-deity that took a direct interest in the shaping of every individual soul. Holy shirt-balls. That's also metal as hell, and totally inhuman. But if you want to make them human, you've got to walk that kinda thing back. It has to be a hat - something to be donned or doffed at whim - if you want to make them human.
People were talking about how Drizzt was problematic from a "they're all evil perspective." Surely he is; the lore associated with drow is so shocking, so vile, so divinely totalitarian that the prospect of there being a Drizzt at all... doesn't make any sense. It wasn't just a cultural thing; it was a cultural thing set in place by a malign, godlike power beyond mortal ken. Drizzt sort of fouls that whole dynamic right up; he's the first drow that's just a human in a hat. He manages to somehow foil the cultural and supernatural elements that would otherwise forge his character; for him, they're just a hat. And because of him, you can't take any of it seriously. Lolth isn't actually that big a deal. Spiritual totalitarianism that exists from the womb to the tomb... doesn't.
He made drow less metal. Less transcendentally tragic and terrifying. And more human.
So yeah, drow used to be depicted as universally evil. But they pretty plainly *didn't* have meaningful free will. The option had been stripped from them utterly, and that made them something distinct from humans. A tragedy. A metaphor. A stark warning about what could happen to your own societies if you let the demons win, when you let Evil take control. The "killing them on sight because they're evil" thing was incidental; what they were was an elf robbed of the capacity for moral choice. They were distinct even from their human in hats kin, because of that robbery.

But Drizzt comes along and undermines that by showing that all the fouled up stuff about drow? They just choose to be that way. And that's ultimately more damning than what they were before him. And less metal, for sure.


If you're going to go with a purely fictional species, just making them human seems like a waste. Drow used to be alien. And the story they used to tell was pretty brutal, but it was also interesting. They showed the tragic consequences of letting supernatural big-e Evil win. And if they can just take off that hat... it's a different, less compelling story.

So, if I had to guess:
They are coming for the gnolls next. They are far, far too metal as they are depicted now.

EDIT
Oh, I appear to have walked into an actual argument. I will start reading all those posts now.

[Tanarii]

However even with that I stand by saying though that races of evil aren't really necessary. We can have groups of mind flayers or giants or goblins or whatever who are clearly antagonistic and need to be put down. And if the players want to go out of their way to negotiate and make a peaceful solution, well maybe it's not the game I planned for but it still sounds like a good game to me.

A race being usually evil or always evil hasn't stopped quite a few groups I've run games for from negotiating, temporary truces in return for something the evil wants, or outright hiring them. Not always peaceful in the longer run, but frequently no immediate combat. But it certainly makes them feel less guilty about raiding their home and taking their stuff.

That said, it does lends itself to the inclination of many people to turn Us vs Them into Good vs Evil, especially in entertainment.

Edit:

EDIT
Oh, I appear to have walked into an actual argument. I will start reading all those posts now.

Hahahaha

[kingcheesepants]

How is killing bandits murder for convenience? they're bandits. they're objectively evil and chose to do so unlike orcs who have no choice. I'd be much more comfortable with killing bandits than what your talking about.

Did the bandits choose to do something wrong? Yes certainly. However is that wrong thing worthy of an on the spot death penalty? Well, if they attacked an innocent with lethal force, yes probably. But still we don't know what their motives are. Maybe these were peasants who had a bad harvest and need money to buy food and medicine for their kids. You have the power to take them out without killing them, is it right to just execute them on the spot? I can certainly see why having a random monster that you know without a doubt is evil can be less stressful than having a person.

Although if you're playing a hack n slash where you don't want to think at all you could always have them be unambiguously evil. The bandits pop out shooting at you and declaring that while murdering you is fun it was more fun when they killed that grandma and then ate a baby the other day. Just ridiculously over the top villainy.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I see this focus cycling through every sentient race/species.

"Every one of X are evil"

DM/writer/player "I was to have an X that is an exception"

"Most of X are evil, with some notable exceptions"

DM/writer/player "I want to have moral complexity and misunderstood perspectives"

"Most of X's societal norms are seen as evil to outsiders"

DM/writer/player "This is a problem for them to be considered evil. They have a rich culture and anyone who defines them as evil is only doing so because of some type of -ism"

"X are no longer used as the stand-in for evil. Every one of Y are evil"

DM/writer/player "I was to have a Y that is an exception"

...

This is a fabulous description of it. The more playable 'races' they give us the more baddies are off the list. And I still for the life of me can't figure out why they haven't started using the word species.