A moral question of murder. In a fantasy setting.

[JayDGee]

Crimes in fantasy games have always interested me. Due to the wonders and mechanics of the world some crimes cant really have as much impact as the real world.

For example how do you arrest someone for murder in D&D when a cleric has cast raise dead on the victim?

 

Now in project eternity it is generally accepted that souls exist and that reincarnation is possible.

 

So if death isn't a permanent thing spiritually speaking is murder less of a crime?

Is there a greater crime than murder? Perhaps the fracturing or the corruption of a soul.

Would some religions perhaps have no moral quandary with killing as long as it doesn't affect the soul?

Could a religion even condone murder on individuals with certain types of souls?

Racially motivated crimes get raised to a whole new level when your looking at different species. Do groups of thugs go hunting half elves as some affront to perceived blood purity?

Could there be species segregation in some areas, parts of whole cities cut off from dwarves because the ruling lords don't view them as sentient.

 

These are ideas that fascinate me. Can you think of some crimes that would be unique in this fantasy setting or just seen as completely different from the real world?

[UncleBourbon]

I imagine uncondoned mind control or magical compulsion would be relatively unique to the setting. Death varies by means of ressurection, as low fantasy settings might make it VERY hard to bring someone back, even in a weakened state. As far as I know, 3.5/pathfinder incorporate a sort of dual slider; different levels of physical destruction require different and more potent methods of ressurection. For instance, an arrow to the head and death might mean raise dead can bring you back, but if all you have is a hand or finger, you need ressurection or greater ressurection, though the latter works with even ashes, iirc. Of course, things like disintegrate or maze or somesuch makes it much harder. The thing is, the punishment should fit the crime in the setting, but in a medeival setting, it means a weight added to crimes committed against higher caste individuals, most likely.

 

Destruction of remains reservered for ressurection would probably be rather unique, at least until we can clone people from a few well preserved cells. I know Kelemvor in Fearun thought the defilement of one's death via necromancy or corporeal defilement was worse than murder. Maybe something like it will be in project eternity. After all, one god seems to have condoned the bombing of another god's followers, a mass murder incident (though this could just be radicalism). I think it is certainly an aspect I look forward to learning about this new world.

 

On another note: I imagine any method of containing a soul and preventing it from moving on would be seen as at least as much a crime as murder. I know the soul hunter in babylon 5 was treated as such.

[Technatorium]

I wonder if the concept of soul and "murdering" of the soul is going to be handled in Project Eternity. Is there something that happens that allows the player to alter or disfigure the soul of a person that is killed in the game? I do wonder what issues of soul and the concept of violence/murder/etc will be in the game.

[JayDGee]

Can a person exist without a soul, can people steal souls from the living creating a soulless individual?

 

What punishment could possibly fit that crime?

[UncleBourbon]

That is indeed an interesting question. I'm not sure there would be one, other than perhaps being locked away, both body and soul. How would the crime be proven? All three of these would largely depend upon the extent to which certain magics - like the ciphers' hinted psychic like ones - are developed and used. Interesting none the less, though.

[Coincidence]

Can you think of some crimes that would be unique in this fantasy setting or just seen as completely different from the real world?

 

Crimes worse than murder in a fantasy setting? You mentioned soul corrupting... What about soul trapping?

 

I'm assuming reincarnation requires the same soul to come back in a new body. Assuming you can't "kill" a soul, trapping it and preventing it from continuing the cycle of reincarnation is the closest you could get to wiping them from existence permanently. You aren't just murdering the person, but you're also denying them ability to come back to life again.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Coincidence

[Raithe]

"A Murderer? Trespasser? Tomb-Robber? Thief? No Milord. I'm just an Adventurer!"

[UncleBourbon]

Hrm, I can think of a couple of pen and paper single session games where the good or neutral party was tossed into what was essentially an evil and worse, corrupt town, where the town sheriff basically made the laws. There was a pyramid populace of a horde of slaves and a few who reaped the benefits, but these had been slaves for generations. In their minds, the party's attempts at upheavel or direct conflict was immoral because direct opposition was met with an increasing amount of slaves being put to death, usually via gruesome means. It was meant to be a morality twister (though I thought the DM had spent a bit too long constructing such a plot). The most "moral" thing we came up with was working our way through the hierarchy, up until we basically were the underlings of the sheriff, and then offing him. It was sort of "keep what you kill" mentality, and the weapons and such were tightly controlled.

[JayDGee]

Crimes worse than murder in a fantasy setting? You mentioned soul corrupting... What about soul trapping?

 

I'm assuming reincarnation requires the same soul to come back in a new body. Assuming you can't "kill" a soul, trapping it and preventing it from continuing the cycle of reincarnation is the closest you could get to wiping them from existence permanently. You aren't just murdering the person, but you're also denying them ability to come back to life again.

 

I just thought of a scenario were someone would want to trap a soul.

A kingdom that's rulers is succeeded eternally by his reincarnated form. Once the king dies his loyal priests search for his soul and raise the infant to become king. Till the child comes of age the eldest child or highest ranking priest rules as regent. The regent however wants to job full time so locates the kings soul before the priests and imprisons it.

I'm sure there are other potential reasons to do it. Hatred and religious doctrine seem the 2 biggest though.

[UncleBourbon]

Crimes worse than murder in a fantasy setting? You mentioned soul corrupting... What about soul trapping?

 

I'm assuming reincarnation requires the same soul to come back in a new body. Assuming you can't "kill" a soul, trapping it and preventing it from continuing the cycle of reincarnation is the closest you could get to wiping them from existence permanently. You aren't just murdering the person, but you're also denying them ability to come back to life again.

 

I just thought of a scenario were someone would want to trap a soul.

A kingdom that's rulers is succeeded eternally by his reincarnated form. Once the king dies his loyal priests search for his soul and raise the infant to become king. Till the child comes of age the eldest child or highest ranking priest rules as regent. The regent however wants to job full time so locates the kings soul before the priests and imprisons it.

I'm sure there are other potential reasons to do it. Hatred and religious doctrine seem the 2 biggest though.

 

I could see that, or, if the setting permits, the use of souls in the creation of semi-sentient golemesque creatures. It would be a neat little diversion to run into some automatons through a town, praised for it's technological advances, only to find the "inventor" had been stealing the souls of travellers, somehow locking away some of their recollections and then animating constructs.

[septembervirgin]

Crimes worse than murder in a fantasy setting? You mentioned soul corrupting... What about soul trapping?

One might argue that a soul is trapped inside a body when it is reincarnated. Do not assume that nature is anything but a trap. There are real world texts about liberating a soul from the cycle of incarnation; perhaps the same possibility exists in this game, that souls can be liberated from the trap of reincarnation.

 

Of course one might argue the contrary, that a soul is saved from the trap of vacuity by being reincarnated. If a soul is compelled by merciful automation to become someone, why not permit it to. Of course I think it might be cool if somehow souls that are pressured towards non-existence suddenly generate afterlife turf as a result of their dissolution. Also there should be beings that devour souls because the title "Devourer of Souls" should not be exclusive to Melnibonean toys.

[JayDGee]

Hrm, I can think of a couple of pen and paper single session games where the good or neutral party was tossed into what was essentially an evil and worse, corrupt town, where the town sheriff basically made the laws. There was a pyramid populace of a horde of slaves and a few who reaped the benefits, but these had been slaves for generations. In their minds, the party's attempts at upheavel or direct conflict was immoral because direct opposition was met with an increasing amount of slaves being put to death, usually via gruesome means. It was meant to be a morality twister (though I thought the DM had spent a bit too long constructing such a plot). The most "moral" thing we came up with was working our way through the hierarchy, up until we basically were the underlings of the sheriff, and then offing him. It was sort of "keep what you kill" mentality, and the weapons and such were tightly controlled.

 

Slavery is always a hard issue especially when a religion is OK with it. What happens if the slaves are freed? There are very few instances in history where everything works out well in the short term. Someone wants revenge and someone else wants their property back.

The moral grey areas appear when you know that by freeing the slaves you will make things much worse in the immediate future, but hopefully in the long term things will be better.

If the church says slaves are allowed then potentially your seen as the villain for freeing the slaves, perhaps your considered by the faith as a thief for stealing a lords property. A God may even punish those who free slaves.

[Christliar]

Hrm, I can think of a couple of pen and paper single session games where the good or neutral party was tossed into what was essentially an evil and worse, corrupt town, where the town sheriff basically made the laws. There was a pyramid populace of a horde of slaves and a few who reaped the benefits, but these had been slaves for generations. In their minds, the party's attempts at upheavel or direct conflict was immoral because direct opposition was met with an increasing amount of slaves being put to death, usually via gruesome means. It was meant to be a morality twister (though I thought the DM had spent a bit too long constructing such a plot). The most "moral" thing we came up with was working our way through the hierarchy, up until we basically were the underlings of the sheriff, and then offing him. It was sort of "keep what you kill" mentality, and the weapons and such were tightly controlled.

 

Slavery is always a hard issue especially when a religion is OK with it. What happens if the slaves are freed? There are very few instances in history where everything works out well in the short term. Someone wants revenge and someone else wants their property back.

The moral grey areas appear when you know that by freeing the slaves you will make things much worse in the immediate future, but hopefully in the long term things will be better.

If the church says slaves are allowed then potentially your seen as the villain for freeing the slaves, perhaps your considered by the faith as a thief for stealing a lords property. A God may even punish those who free slaves.

 

I don't think other gods would allow someone else to punish their followers. If they did, nobody would worship them. Also it doesn't matter if their "culture" or "religion" deems slavery OK, because the same logic could be applied to murder, rape etc; It's still wrong, no matter who says what.

 

On-Topic: They said that no known magic can bring a person back, but souls reincarnate into other bodies. Soooo, it rests entirely on the philosophical reasoning of the people/culture. If they don't value a person's corporeal form and only souls are given any significance then I suppose murder won't be such a crime, but on the other hand it still causes a person to cease to exist, even if their souls go to other bodies and I don't think they would have the same personality. We need more info to make even the vaguest speculations.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Christliar

[JayDGee]

On-Topic: They said that no known magic can bring a person back, but souls reincarnate into other bodies. Soooo, it rests entirely on the philosophical reasoning of the people/culture. If they don't value a person's corporeal form and only souls are given any significance then I suppose murder won't be such a crime, but on the other hand it still causes a person to cease to exist, even if their souls go to other bodies and I don't think they would have the same personality. We need more info to make even the vaguest speculations.

The idea that murder isn't seen as being that bad as souls return is interesting, It certainly creates situations of morality

[Christliar]

The idea that murder isn't seen as being that bad as souls return is interesting, It certainly creates situations of morality

 

It also occured to me just now that, if souls reincarnate wouldn't the moral thing to do to insane/catatonic/very disabled people is to kill them? Why not take it a step further? Kill all homeless/old/anyone not contributing to society etc. This in no way represents my real life philosophy, just a hypothetical one for the situation.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Christliar

[HangedMan]

How about the morality of suicide/assisted suicide? Suppose I have the equivalent of terminal cancer in this world, and nothing can be done to save me. Is it so wrong to liberate my soul from the shackles of my body, so that I can hurry back into the Great Queuing Line? Is it wrong to ask for help, or to be helped, to do that?

 

Edit: Also, mourning. How do we mourn the people that have passed on, when we know they'll be coming back in one way or another?

 

Also, what about soul mates? Take the real world concept, and put it into the game...

Edited October 19, 2012 by HangedMan

[Mr Moonlight]

The soul may live on but that soul's current identity is destroyed (which the rare case of fractured souls remembering past lives, but even then that's not truly a reverseal of the crime). The victim's family will not see the victim ever gain, the victim's friends will not see their friend ever again, and all the victim's dreams and hopes die with them. So even if the incorporeal element of life is not destroyed something is still lost through murder and that's what the crime is in a setting like this.

[Merin]

Death in games and fantasy settings that have gods and resurrection spells is about as final as death of comic book super-heroes for the big two.

 

As for crimes - others have mentioned it, but I'll add my voice to it: soul abuse. Tainting, damaging, capturing or destroying another's soul is probably one of the biggest crimes in PE's world.

[JayDGee]

I believe murder will be very much frowned upon in eternity, I just am not sure it would be the worst of crimes.

Loss of life is traumatic for those connected to the life even when the individual is at peace and spiritually fulfilled.

I am certain taking of life will be considered morally wrong by many in the game. Although some cultures may thrive on slaughter.

 

Would there be some great cardinal sin that no-one commits? The fear of punishment too great to even consider committing.

 

What could be so bad as to cause the gods to take note?

[Christliar]

I believe murder will be very much frowned upon in eternity, I just am not sure it would be the worst of crimes.

Loss of life is traumatic for those connected to the life even when the individual is at peace and spiritually fulfilled.

I am certain taking of life will be considered morally wrong by many in the game. Although some cultures may thrive on slaughter.

 

Would there be some great cardinal sin that no-one commits? The fear of punishment too great to even consider committing.

 

What could be so bad as to cause the gods to take note?

 

I suppose it would be frowned upon or people will just be killing each other for the slightest reasons and every insult, perceived or otherwise. That would also be boring ;d "The harshest criticism an artist could receive is to be told his work is boring."

 

About cardinal sins - I really have no idea; I was thinking maybe of someone trying to stop the cycle of reincarnation as a whole, but that's too obvious and it's practically the same as trapping of souls.

[HangedMan]

I believe murder will be very much frowned upon in eternity, I just am not sure it would be the worst of crimes.

Loss of life is traumatic for those connected to the life even when the individual is at peace and spiritually fulfilled.

I am certain taking of life will be considered morally wrong by many in the game. Although some cultures may thrive on slaughter.

 

Would there be some great cardinal sin that no-one commits? The fear of punishment too great to even consider committing.

 

What could be so bad as to cause the gods to take note?

If someone quite literally devours another's soul?

[JayDGee]

If someone quite literally devours another's soul?

 

What would be the consequences of such an act? Would the person still be alive without a soul? Would they still be considered human(or insert fantasy race here)?

What of the individual who devoured it, would they become powerful? Would the gods take note? How would you punish someone who could rip out your very soul?

 

a lot of questions I know but I love this stuff.

[Mr Moonlight]

If someone quite literally devours another's soul?

 

What would be the consequences of such an act? Would the person still be alive without a soul? Would they still be considered human(or insert fantasy race here)?

What of the individual who devoured it, would they become powerful? Would the gods take note? How would you punish someone who could rip out your very soul?

 

a lot of questions I know but I love this stuff.

 

Indigestion, obviously.

[Coincidence]

If someone quite literally devours another's soul?

 

What would be the consequences of such an act? Would the person still be alive without a soul? Would they still be considered human(or insert fantasy race here)?

What of the individual who devoured it, would they become powerful? Would the gods take note? How would you punish someone who could rip out your very soul?

 

a lot of questions I know but I love this stuff.

 

Let's see...

 

Well if you devoured someone's soul I'd imagine their body will biologically die or they become a kind of zombieish thing. Since messing around with souls is probably only going to be done by priests or necromancers, and only necromancers would do something like eat a soul, they'd probably turn the body into some sort of servant. A human without a soul would probably be considered just a shell with nothing inside of it, and so killing it probably wouldn't be a bad thing, and may even be encouraged. As for what happens if you devour a soul that varies greatly from universe to universe so there's absolutely no way to say how it'd happen in PE yet. My guess would be that since (I'm assuming) people cannot remember their past lives easily, if at all, then eating a soul probably won't give you knowledge of their past lives. Would they gain power? That depends if power is tied to a soul. If a very powerful sorcerer dies, will his next incarnation also have an affinity for spellcasting because of his past life? As for gods, I'm sure they'd notice but would probably only pay attention or care if it was a follower who had their soul eaten. How to punish a soul eater?... Death, obviously.

 

What I wonder is how will soul absorption/devouring will be handled if it is put in the game. If you devour/absorb a soul do you gain some sort of benefit and that's it, does the soul "vanish" in the process, or does their soul literally combine with yours? If that is the case, does that mean the next life of that soul will be the next life of two different people at once? For example, if Soul A absorbs Soul B, will this then form a Soul C, or will the souls go their separate ways after death? Could an evil baddie use that logic to absorb the souls of everything into him, creating one giant oversoul made up of every other soul?

 

Who knows.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Coincidence

[JayDGee]

Let's see...

 

Well if you devoured someone's soul I'd imagine their body will biologically die or they become a kind of zombieish thing. Since messing around with souls is probably only going to be done by priests or necromancers, and only necromancers would do something like eat a soul, they'd probably turn the body into some sort of servant. A human without a soul would probably be considered just a shell with nothing inside of it, and so killing it probably wouldn't be a bad thing, and may even be encouraged. As for what happens if you devour a soul that varies greatly from universe to universe so there's absolutely no way to say how it'd happen in PE yet. My guess would be that since (I'm assuming) people cannot remember their past lives easily, if at all, then eating a soul probably won't give you knowledge of their past lives. Would they gain power? That depends if power is tied to a soul. If a very powerful sorcerer dies, will his next incarnation also have an affinity for spellcasting because of his past life? As for gods, I'm sure they'd notice but would probably only pay attention or care if it was a follower who had their soul eaten. How to punish a soul eater?... Death, obviously.

 

What I wonder is how will soul absorption/devouring will be handled if it is put in the game. If you devour/absorb a soul do you gain some sort of benefit and that's it, does the soul "vanish" in the process, or does their soul literally combine with yours? If that is the case, does that mean the next life of that soul will be the next life of two different people at once? For example, if Soul A absorbs Soul B, will this then form a Soul C, or will the souls go their separate ways after death? Could an evil baddie use that logic to absorb the souls of everything into him, creating one giant oversoul made up of every other soul?

 

Who knows.

 

Oversoul is my word of the day.

 

I like the idea that removing a soul creates a necromantic puppet.

 

I think the power of a soul would always go forward although a powerful mage could in their next life be a highly disciplined monk, no knowledge of previous life but the power of the soul itself allows them to rise to greatness in this life as well. it is an interesting concept.

 

Draining a soul to empower another, this I see working 2 ways. First is a short term massive gain in power once used its gone along with the stolen soul. Secondly is a permanent increase and changing of the soul, this would create a form of corrupted soul, powerful but with its disadvantages. People would know.