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 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
Rape could come up in an RPG, as long as it is done with some of level of taste it would be fine.

Tasteful game rape?

Is that an oxymoron? I think that's an oxymoron.

I believe that's Manchu's point.

 Manchu wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
Rape could come up in an RPG, as long as it is done with some of level of taste it would be fine.

Tasteful game rape?

Yeah... wut?

 Platuan4th wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
Rape could come up in an RPG, as long as it is done with some of level of taste it would be fine.

Tasteful game rape?

Is that an oxymoron? I think that's an oxymoron.

I believe that's Manchu's point.

Yes, and I was acknowledging it

 Manchu wrote:

 daedalus wrote:
I have little interest in playing a game that involves me murdering things

I think you're being a bit precious with the word "murder" here. I mean, what kind of games do you play?

Depends on the DM. One of the DMs runs overly complicated intrigue games where some shadowy group has made an attempt to destabilize the current kingdom, and we try to keep them in check. The fear of compromising morality in the name of getting things done is a major theme of that game. Humans, daemons, and drow are a major opponent in that one.

Another one is one of the braindead "hack and slash" games. I don't care much for that one, but in that case, we do stuff like come upon a group of kobolds living in tunnels beneath the city, and rather than us fight them, I talked them down out of the fight, and we managed to secure peace for the time being. That REALLY surprised the DM the first time I tried it, but he let it work. Doesn't work every time, but I think it's reasonable.

I run a Ravenloft game every few months where players don't kill anything intelligent for any reason, shy of it having committed some terrible act of cruelty and being beyond punishment or hope for atonement otherwise.

The common theme here is that murdering orcs doesn't really happen without a reason beyond "we kick in the door and kill the orcs".

 Manchu wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
Rape could come up in an RPG, as long as it is done with some of level of taste it would be fine.

Tasteful game rape?

Easy, for example the PCs are out looking for information about a powerful warlord and his army out on the frontier. The GM has NCPs, mention that the warlord and his band has been pillaging towns and has captured villagers and committed horrible atrocities upon them, I guess including rape. The PCs hear about all these atrocities but never actually witness them raping anyone. I mean I remember watching con air the movie years ago, there is a character on the plane, johnny 23, that has raped 23 women (or claims to have). He tries to rape one of the main characters at one point but is stopped. The movie talks about, deals with rape in a way that doesn't make people want to ban it from being sold.

 Manchu wrote:
OTOH I am having a hell of a time getting anyone to really come right out and say it. So there's the reality, I think: people already know rape doesn't belong in games. There is a different issue at play here because I highly doubt any of these guys actually think playing a game where you kill orcs is the same as playing a game where you rape orcs or rape kids.

In the contrary, it does belong there. Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil. In this case, rape is the very same as him burning the local witch alive, slicing an innocent's throat in public, decapitating a character's SO etc. All of those are horrible acts (from a moral point of view) with the same intent.

It does not have to be the act. Imagine the group going into a village, finding a women crying in a hut, with tattered clothes, hushing away from any male PC trying to touch or speak to her.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

with the same intent.

No they're not. Why would someone chose to rape? The actions a character performs reveals who they are. Adding in things because they're 'evil' is lazy writing. Nothing more than a very dark form of cartoon villainy.

It's been a surprisingly common enough literary device though, you'd think people would regard it with a little less surprise.

Seems like we have a lot of people,

Who enjoy role playing as good people,


Who dont think people should be allowed to role play as evil people.


further muddled by the so called "good people" being 100% ok with murdering every ork they meet, cause hey you get imaginary loot right?

but imaginary rape is bad, despite it causing imaginary fear in the other characters, or furthering the storey, establishing evil characer and so on...

heck, to most of the people up in arms over DND "rape" its also rape to pay for sex, so you had better not role play a drunken whoring dwarf either...


murder is worse then rape, our laws punish muderers much much worse then rapists to relect this, just because some people feel its worse, does not grant them the moral high ground to force this view on others who view murder as a far worse crime.

Some people come back from being raped and go on to lead normal happy lives,

no one comes back from murder to do the same... regardless of your opinion on severity, the facts prove one is more severe then the other.

You are entitled to your opinion, but your opinion that rape is worse then murder is no more/less valid then someone's opinion that being gay is worse then being straight, that vanilla is better then chocolate, and so on.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

with the same intent.

No they're not. Why would someone chose to rape? The actions a character performs reveals who they are. Adding in things because they're 'evil' is lazy writing. Nothing more than a very dark form of cartoon villainy.

So if I had a story where people went to a prison, I can have murderers, thieves, muggers, etc. in that prison but no rapists?

Easysause: The thing is, it has nothing to do with real life. Some people are trying to argue that it is. This is a game about combat. It is a major part of it. Rape is not. It i really not something you ant in a roleplaying game.

This conversation seems to be very fractured and people's comments about rape/killing/murder in one context are being used to make invalid points in a different contex.

Is there something wrong with off screen rape by NPCs? I have to say no. As examples above demonstrate it is part of the depiction of an evil foe to be defeated and/or innocents to be rescued. I think it would be odd if the group was fixating on this, but there isn't really anything wrong with that. Does anyone disagree?

I don't think that rape is really what is at issue here. The other concern is players wanting to do the raping or possibly the DM having the rape on screen in a graphic manner and dwelling on it rather then moving quickly past it. I don't think many here are argueing that is a good thing other than perhaps in a "whatever you and your friends want to do behind closed doors is none of my concern" type of thinking.

Somehow we drifted from saying that a GM using the hint that an out of line player may suffer the fate he imagined for another if he didn't move back into more acceptable territory got twisted into "you support a game about rape and think it is better than killing" which no one is arguing.

What some are saying is that the issue isn't as simple as rape is bad so it should never in any way be a part of the game. There is nuance and context to consider. These games have a host of disturbing imagery, ideas and actions taking place. A game about who can give out the most hugs and teddybears isn't really all that interesting. A fights against evil is, but it also means that evil stuff is happening.

 Blood Hawk wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

with the same intent.

No they're not. Why would someone chose to rape? The actions a character performs reveals who they are. Adding in things because they're 'evil' is lazy writing. Nothing more than a very dark form of cartoon villainy.

So if I had a story where people went to a prison, I can have murderers, thieves, muggers, etc. in that prison but no rapists?

That's being rather specific. Specific enough to have no real meaning. Picking and choosing is not how you argue well.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
OTOH I am having a hell of a time getting anyone to really come right out and say it. So there's the reality, I think: people already know rape doesn't belong in games. There is a different issue at play here because I highly doubt any of these guys actually think playing a game where you kill orcs is the same as playing a game where you rape orcs or rape kids.

In the contrary, it does belong there. Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil. In this case, rape is the very same as him burning the local witch alive, slicing an innocent's throat in public, decapitating a character's SO etc. All of those are horrible acts (from a moral point of view) with the same intent.

It does not have to be the act. Imagine the group going into a village, finding a women crying in a hut, with tattered clothes, hushing away from any male PC trying to touch or speak to her.

One big difference being that your likely not going to have players at your table who are worried about being burned as a witch. Something you learn after you look at it Sexual assault is more common then people think. Like there is a very real chance that one of your players could have been a victim or had someone close to them be one. Also you mentioned many other acts that can quite evil without the real life baggage. Don't use rape. Use something else.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

with the same intent.

No they're not. Why would someone chose to rape? The actions a character performs reveals who they are. Adding in things because they're 'evil' is lazy writing. Nothing more than a very dark form of cartoon villainy.

So if I had a story where people went to a prison, I can have murderers, thieves, muggers, etc. in that prison but no rapists?

That's being rather specific. Specific enough to have no real meaning. Picking and choosing is not how you argue well.

The point is that the context can matter, and in that context having rapists at a prison can be apporiate given the context. That is not a case of "lazy writing".

That said, don't anyone misunderstand what I have said, I don't think rape, or many other adult topics are appropriate for 99% of DND games out there. If I was a the DM of a game, and I was going in blind, I would probably not mention it alongside many other potential adult topics, or let it happen on screen. I just speaking generally here.

Edit: When I say "going in Blind" I mean I don't know some of the people I am playing with.

 easysauce wrote:
Seems like we have a lot of people,

Who enjoy role playing as good people,


Who dont think people should be allowed to role play as evil people.

No one's said that. AT ALL.

Most of my characters are lawful evil or neutral evil.

Just because I play evil characters I should think rape is a valid act for evil characters?

 Manchu wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
There has to be a very strange and specific series of circumstances in order to justify a scenario as odd and horrible as orc rape.

You know, whatever people do in their imaginary games is up to them.

All I am trying to show is, we all know that raping orcs in RPGs is creepy but killing orcs in RPGs is not. So the "murder is worse" angle is irrelevant.

Honestly I've been in a few rpgs where rape has occured. Granted it was the we know it's happening but we aren't playing characters that are doing it ourselves and kind of breeze over it type of thing. I dunno, I regard it much like death. It'd be creepy if somebody started to go on and on about how exactly they flayed their flesh before tearing into the _____ with a _____ making a sickening squelch noise before blah blah blah. Rape, torture, and killing are all horrid things. Some might be worse, some less but they are all horrific. Nobody needs to listen to every nitty bitty gritty on it. That's just my opinion though.

(just posting because of my own stand on this whole issue)

 Blood Hawk wrote:
So if I had a story where people went to a prison, I can have murderers, thieves, muggers, etc. in that prison but no rapists?

Reread the last sentence of my post.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 easysauce wrote:
Seems like we have a lot of people,

Who enjoy role playing as good people,


Who dont think people should be allowed to role play as evil people.

No one's said that. AT ALL.

Most of my characters are lawful evil or neutral evil.

Just because I play evil characters I should think rape is a valid act for evil characters?

It's because you aren't playing chaotic evil good sir! In all seriousness, the 3x3 system is flawed unless we want to start claiming that in wars the standard soldier that often raped/pillaged/etc were all evil

 LordofHats wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
So if I had a story where people went to a prison, I can have murderers, thieves, muggers, etc. in that prison but no rapists?

Reread the last sentence of my post.

So you would consider a story where some of inmates of a prison being rapists an example of dark cartoon villainy??

You seem to be missing the nuanced difference between "lets add rape so everyone knows rapists are evil" and "adding rape so everyone knows rapists are evil is lazy writing." (That and the intent between different types of crimes should never be equated to the being the same thing).

 LordofHats wrote:
You seem to be missing the nuanced difference between "lets add rape so everyone knows rapists are evil" and "adding rape so everyone knows rapists are evil is lazy writing." (That and the intent between different types of crimes should never be equated to the being the same thing).

Ok that makes more sense now sorry.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

I don't see how this is any worse or cheaper than the villain executing someone on a balcony in plain sight.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

I don't see how this is any worse or cheaper than the villain executing someone on a balcony in plain sight.

Really, if anything, the biggest problem I see is that it's cliched and tropey. But so is pretty much every game I've ever played. I'm not sure you can avoid that altogether.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 easysauce wrote:
Seems like we have a lot of people,

Who enjoy role playing as good people,


Who dont think people should be allowed to role play as evil people.

No one's said that. AT ALL.

Most of my characters are lawful evil or neutral evil.

Just because I play evil characters I should think rape is a valid act for evil characters?

yes... it makes sense that an evil character is capable of raping someone...

or that a good character could fall from grace and rape someone ...

or that a normal character could rape someone and that characters story arc is how he changes his ways and trys to make up for his/her sordid past with good deeds...

If you are willing to entertain the idea that a character can save the world in the best possible way, it makes sense to also entertain the idea character you are saving the world from is evil in the most evil of ways, and the nuances in between.


NY" goes, there is literally no difference between role playing a dwarf who likes ale and whores, who pays for said whores, and a dark elf character who just goes around raping people because thats what DE's do....

you seem to be ok with "pay a silver to have sex with a wench" even though that is rape ... but not with other forms of imaginary rape.

you seem to be drawing a line between rape, and "RAPE-RAPE" when such a line doesnt exist...

I could just as easily dismiss your fantasy murders as you living out murder fantasies, as opposed to simply accepting that murder is part of the story (why you murder that ork matters just as little as why you rape that ork)

 easysauce wrote:
NY" goes, there is literally no difference between role playing a dwarf who likes ale and whores, who pays for said whores, and a dark elf character who just goes around raping people because thats what DE's do....

...

WTF? Are you seriously claiming that two consenting adults agreeing to exchange sex for money and raping people just for fun are equivalent? If you honestly believe this then you have some serious problems.

you seem to be ok with "pay a silver to have sex with a wench" even though that is rape

No, it really isn't. Perhaps you should go find a dictionary and look at the definition of rape before you say absurd and offensive things like this?

 Sigvatr wrote:


I don't see how this is any worse or cheaper than the villain executing someone on a balcony in plain sight.

I would give the same response (assuming the the act is just a stand in for a giant blinking sign reading "bad guy here").

Part of why rape is maybe a little more egregious though is that it's so often portrayed so poorly in fiction. Rapists are usually just that. Rapists. Imagine all the great serial killers of fiction and how they get complex and often charming characterizations (to the point that people like the bad guy more than the hero). There's a motivation there. A psychology behind their actions. Then there's how rape often effects the victims; Its almost universally portrayed as reducing them to a sobbing ball of emotion, or empowering them to take action. The fact that they were just violated in a terrible way is either overemphasized or completely written off. Rape is reduced in these cases to a contrived plot device.

As a result, I get more annoyed at "lets have Evil McEvilPerson rape someone to show how evil they are" than "lets have Evil McEvilPerson kill someone to show how evil they are." Both are lazy writing, but the former I think is lazy writing compounded with a degree of immaturity.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Rape is a legit story device to make the evil guy look more evil.

I find that a rather trite reason to throw rape into a story.

I don't see how this is any worse or cheaper than the villain executing someone on a balcony in plain sight.

Then do that. You don't have to include rape and you know there are reasons you shouldn't include it.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Easysause: The thing is, it has nothing to do with real life. Some people are trying to argue that it is. This is a game about combat. It is a major part of it. Rape is not. It i really not something you ant in a roleplaying game.

yeah, its fantasy, and shouldnt matter *at all* in real life,



at least not MY dnd, we always felt that playing the role was far more fun/important and the best sessions were ones where say,

I role play as a diplomat and try to talk my way through everything without killing anyone,

or a thief who just sneaks around doing things, never getting into combat,


some people would argue that murder, torture, suffering, black magic, and so on also have no place in a role playing game, heck, why should you be allowed to be an evil character at all?

its like someone arguing that person x is a pervert because they look at three some porn and they have crossed the line, but person y is totally fine because they only look at one-some porn.

all the while ignoring multitudes of people decrying that anyone that looks at ANY porn is a pervert...

you are just drawing your line between "acceptable" and not in a different, arbitrary place, and trying to get others to move their lines to where you think it should be,

in the real world, where you draw the line between acceptable actions, and unacceptable ones, matters, it matters a whole lot.

in non real worlds, it does not matter. *at all*

 easysauce wrote:
you seem to be ok with "pay a silver to have sex with a wench" even though that is rape ... but not with other forms of imaginary rape.

you seem to be drawing a line between rape, and "RAPE-RAPE" when such a line doesnt exist...

Show me where I said any of that.

It's ok, I'll wait for you to not find me saying that anywhere.