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abstract pls!

Ha, I guess we differ here. I do enjoy plumbing / deconstructing the "monsters represent the feared Other" thing too much! Or, rather: I appreciate evil, but I like that evil to have a texture. A specific code adhered to, that is simply orthogonal to one we know?

This line of discussion is immediately suggesting the possibility of a companion game to Deathbringer, where you play as orcs battling alway-evil human heroes. "Those humans eat babies on skewers! You can't reason with them!"

(Or, as the case may be, American military-industrial imperialism.) (Sorry, just felt prompted to include that)

And the shutting-down that the "alway-evil pig orc" represents is a closure of a whole wing of problem-solving! Also: somebody else elsewhere points out that even in LOTR a hero's relation to the always-evil orc is not textureless: bsky.app/profile/mrsp...

I guess---and perhaps it is naivete or my cultural unfamiliarity talking, but---I don't understand where that urge, that kind of player comes from! Because *even if* it is just about problem-solving and tactics---isn't understanding the culture and psychology of your foe a legit tactical front?

The need to be absolved for murderous acts in-games, to be assured it isn't murder ... that feels newer

This is a good point. Because I too like some ultra-violence in my TTRPGs---but it is usually with the tacit understanding that this violence is a form of destructiveness (and often self-destruction) that's *pretty bad actually*.

Sure. In the case of combat TTRPGs, surprise comes from players drawing on unexpected texture somewhere in the imagined world: stuff / situations around that can have meaningful reality, otherwise dismissed as "clutter" in videogames. The culture of one's foes is one of these elements, no?

(I should've been more precise and pointed to "hegemon cultures", instead. Because while all cultures want an us-them dynamic, I do think it's only cultures sitting at the top of power pyramids that get to warp reality to the point their desire has no real rebuttal.)

Like: the point is the *active dismissal* of the possibility, not a case of: "we are focusing on other things"

If this is the case: then the desire for an always-evil pig-faced orc isn't an orthogonal concern to adding texture and narrative to foes, but specifically a reaction against it? That's ... darker than I'd considered

Thinking about courtroom scenes because we just had one in a game, and one of the players is an IRL lawyer, so: shenanigans!

But, great as they are, the arguments and investigation points and ways the scenes can go are predetermined by the parameters of coded outcomes, ya? Bounded choice. Whereas a courtroom drama in a TTRPG? GM might have an idea, players may have a plan---bug it genuinely can go *anywhere*

And what that difference is (to answer your first comment), is not really combat per se, but the capacity for surprise. Take a courtroom drama in RPGs. Videogames also do this well. Phoenix Wright. Neverwinter Nights 2 had a big courtroom thing as a climax for one of its acts, IIRC?

I will admit that it is often a go-to, personally, because I play so much videogames---so when I sit down with friends for a tabletop roleplaying game I do want a different play experience ...

If you aren't going to engage with the play "Doom clone in pen and paper" would be good at, which is adding narrative / emotional texture! I genuinely don't see the point of always-evil pig-faced orcs! Why would this be fun to roleplay against??? 6/6

Which leads me to: Why do ethics-free monster killing in TTRPGs, specifically? That desire is better served in videogames. Digital media allows for more complex combat calculations quicker, and more sensory gore-candy in Unreal Engine ... Why play a Doom clone in pen and paper? 5/

(Btw: no judgment right? I'm a nerd who sometimes needs that particular release, of viewing the world as a problem to solve. I go to an FPS or a Paradox map-painting game for that.) 4/

What drives this? Anglo-American audiences wanting to retvrn to a time when they could sort reality into Good Guys and Bad Guys? Nerds who wish to treat the world as a series of number and strategy problems they can Jenga away, and not feel like bad for doing so? 3/