Book 2 – Page 11

[Welf von Ehrwald]

Could it be, that elves can't be decrypted. If we don't see a Altruist or Lofty elves now, there aren't any.

Or it could be that their position got a particularly heavy hit from the eruption, leaving them too badly roasted (like Bogroll).

Well, until he said that I was going to ponder if being allied with Marbits, Gobwins, and Hobgobwins prevented even decrypting Elves beyond just preventing allying with them.

Both Marbits and Elves can't ally with sides that ally with gobwins or hobgobwins. But Wanda could uncroak and decrypt Marbits without a problem. That all elves were destroid too much for decrypting would be much of a coincidence; especially, because they seemed to be distributed quite evenly on the battlefield, if page 126 is an indicator.

A high level chief-warlord with exceptional stats and knowledge of tactics (he must have been for promotion) wielding one of the most powerful weapons in the game commanding a squad of some of the most powerful units in the game and possibly many more warriors...Against a peaceful kingdom with presumably low-level "clerk" warlords. While their main defenders were away from the city (mercenaries).

Yeah, I'm not buying it. Wanda could not have been that stupid.

We don't know if Stanley was already chief warlord or high-level. He could have been just a level 4 or 5 warlord, who just got promoted. From Piker, a distinct ground based unit. And did Wanda know that he was attuned and what kind of effects the arkenhammer has? Also we don't know how GK's forces were structured before Stanley found the arkenhammer. Dwagons take a long time to produce, so they maybe had only 20 to 30 dwagons, and Wanda expected only 10-15. Also she expected her kingdom to be prepared; their predictamancer should warn them in advance. They had a master-class foolamacer that would help them in combat. And finally, Wands "knew" that they would win, because it was predicted that she would attune to an arkentool.

Edit: Forgot a "/quote"

[teratorn]

If I make the argument that all kids are disciplined by their parents, that does not give me the right to go smack someone else's kid around too.

I wish it did. Having just made it through an intercontinental flight behind a couple of little obnoxious brats, whose parents made no effort to discipline them, I truly truly felt tempted to smack the little monsters.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Or you can't be good.

Exactly.

Now I've got a wall of text to produce, sorry Infidel and crazyguy_co if I mangle your posts a little bit, hopefully the order of what I have to say gets a bit clearer this way.

But it IS. its forced mindcontroll. its not the same as popping a new unit. Its taking an old unti and subverting his mind to follow your will... ansom losing his royalty crusade for "toolism", for example.

Mind control is evil. Forced subversion is evil.

Now is decrypting ones own fallen allies evil? No, the act itself is not, its the use its being put to.

AND

Gratitude does not cover someone being willing to go kill their family for your benefit. The person brought back is not the same person. It's a doppelganger. ... And again, killing someone and then decrypting them changes them. This is hardly returning something in the same or better condition from their standpoint.

That killing of family thing is a nice way of putting it, precisely since we've seen that Ansom would find killing his relatives ... uncalled for. The big question remaining, and I've sketched in a previous post what would convince me of your view, is "Would Ansom have croaked Ossomer if ordered to do so, whereas a living Erfworlder in the same situation would have refused?"

This tails nicely to

I seem to have failed to capture the quote, but someone made the argument that the MC aspects of decrypting is moral because everyone is under MC to some point or another. To this I also say BUSHWAH! There is no equivalency to right and wrong. Something is not ok for me to do just because it is ok for someone else. If I make the argument that all kids are disciplined by their parents, that does not give me the right to go smack someone else's kid around too. In Erf, everyone is popped with loyalty to the one that popped them to varying degrees. True, but again, if you can't prove it is to the unit's ultimate benefit to be decrypted, then you can't make a moral argument.

It's me making that argument btw. And it goes that since everybody, or almost everybody, pops up mind-controlled anyway (AND unlike Earth, they're expected to stay mind-controlled and not wean off and develop autonomy), there is nothing to be LOST by an Erfworlder through decryption. I agree that you can't make a moral argument, this is exactly what I am saying and it goes both ways. I'm not arguing that decryption is GOOD, I argue that it is not EVIL.

Which leads to

There is no moral ambiguity. Every single system, be it philosophical or religious, that seeks to define morality has a rule that states, in one way or another, "Don't do to some other what you would not like done to you." Thus, to argue that decrypting is moral, you first have to adopt the platform that you would like to be decrypted against your will. This isn't the obvious paradox that it first appears. After all, when you were a kid you were probably disciplined against your will, but at least in some cases you now probably glad you were. So it could be argued, but you would have to base the argument on someone one day being glad to be decrypted rather than being saved, if there were no MC component or after the MC wears off.

That's a good standard to follow, but here's another, also from philosophy. Don't assume that your way of exsiting is the only one. Why should I put myself in an Erfworlder's shoes, as far as I can tell we are not equivalent. The onus is on you to prove that, despite all the bits of info that we know of Erfworlders, they are or can become through usual, normal-in-Erfworld means, autonomous agents {EDIT: so that they stand to lose something by decryption}.

Admittedly this makes thinking in comparisons with our world dangerous. One such comparison, mine, is that even in our world of supposedly autonomous agents, we find that harm is inflicted for some greater purpose, and there are justifying factors involved, one example being consent, another being intention. So moving on-

Redeeming a deed does not exempt the deed. If I resolve to steal something with the intent of returning it later, that doesn't change the fact that I willfully took something away from someone else, to my personal gain. {...} we have no idea what the ultimate ramifications our actions can have on another person's future.

We never understand EVERY implication, but that does not stop us to try risky new procedures once we have sufficient evidence to convince us that, reasonably, they have a good chance to work. In the surgery example, consent and intent to do good mitigate the harm done inevitably by the surgery itself (let alone, hopefully, the succesful outcome; but a surgeon is still not guilty of anything even if they can't cure the patient, as long as malpraxis doesn't occur).

In the case we are discussing now, Wanda actually asked for consent, and the intention is clear, and the outcome will be ~100% reliable. There may be practical reasons for which she suggested decryption (with the healing scrolls being rare and needed by her, the one un-decryptable); and her gain is also GK's. It's far from clear that Wanda is evil for asking.

In summary,

1) I do not think Erfworlders are, or usually become, autonomous agents, regardless of whether or not they are decrypted.
2) Any flash of autonomy displayed by living Erfworlders appears to have a correspondent in what the Decrypted are learning they can do.
3) So there is nothing lost by Erfworlders through decryption (except that they will on next death be dusted and lose need of upkeep; but I don;t think you can make a moral case from those)
4) So whatever it may be, decryption is not evil.

Finally, don't worry, I think we're having a very interesting discussion. Also, it would, hopefully, be a while until it becomes as annoying to the rest of the population as those "Deus Ex Machina" or "That Hex" debates

[AllPurposeNerd]

Both Marbits and Elves can't ally with sides that ally with gobwins or hobgobwins.

Okay this is very important. Do not, may not, or cannot ally with (hob)gobwins?

[dirocyn]

On a totally unrelated note, it's interesting to see the extent to which natural signamancy has affected Parson. Compare what he looked like in his first few appearances to the current page.

He's noticed that he's lost weight, which he attributed to exercise, but it's much more than that. He has well-developed muscles in his exposed forearms, now, for example. That'd make sense if he'd been practicing with a sword or something, but he hasn't--we've seen that in the text updates.

When he first arrived on Erfworld, Parson was a badly overweight man in a sedentary job. He's now extremely fit--enough so that Maggie can't resist asking probing questions. If you interpret that as natural signamancy, it makes perfect sense--he's a heavy unit warlord for major power.

I think "extremely fit" is really overstating the case. Parson is still pudgy, perhaps merely overweight instead of morbidly obese. The fat is coming off, exposing muscles that were there all along--which is not unusual, lots of big people have big muscles. I'm 6'2" and 220 lbs--overweight but not a lump of lard. I guesstimate Parson to be about my height and still significantly heavier--like 260. He looked like 6'2" and 350-380 at his first appearance, he's definitely lost a lot of weight. Likely from a combination of exercise, proper nutrition (his rations pop, no overeating) and signamancy. He's been in Erfworld for a very short time to lose that much weight, and he hasn't mentioned being hungry even once. Must be nice, sign me up for a 3-week vacation there.

I predict Parson will continue to trim up until he's "fit," but that he will never develop bulging muscles or 6-pack abs. I applaud the artists for making this process fairly slow, because weight loss is always slow.

[Trotsky]

We never understand EVERY implication, but that does not stop us to try risky new procedures once we have sufficient evidence to convince us that, reasonably, they have a good chance to work. In the surgery example, consent and intent to do good mitigate the harm done inevitably by the surgery itself (let alone, hopefully, the succesful outcome; but a surgeon is still not guilty of anything even if they can't cure the patient, as long as malpraxis doesn't occur).

In the case we are discussing now, Wanda actually asked for consent, and the intention is clear, and the outcome will be ~100% reliable. There may be practical reasons for which she suggested decryption (with the healing scrolls being rare and needed by her, the one un-decryptable); and her gain is also GK's. It's far from clear that Wanda is evil for asking.

I don't think the argument is whether Wanda is evil, but whether the act itself is. Yes we try new and risky surgeries and that does not make the doctor evil even if they discover negative consequences. However, we only try these when there isn't another way available, or if we have some reason to believe the new technique will work better than the available existing techniques, aka the healomancy scrolls.

To put it another way, you wouldn't be happy about a surgery that saved your life if you discovered that there was a pill that would do the same thing but the hospital (or your insurance or your family or whatever) felt it was too expensive. Especially since the surgery can only be performed once while you can take the pills as often as needed, supply permitting. Also, we don't know that it is 100% reliable as even the characters seemed concerned about whether decrypted casters can still cast.

[Fangthane]

Boy, is the fit ever gonna hit the shan when she does it anyhow, eh?

[BLANDCorporatio]

I don't think the argument is whether Wanda is evil, but whether the act itself is.

There's two parallel arguments here. "Is decryption evil?" (my take- no), "is Wanda asking to decrypt Jack evil?" (also no; yes it's an argument, many people are yelling Wanda-monster because of that question).

Also, we don't know that it is 100% reliable as even the characters seemed concerned about whether decrypted casters can still cast.

Good call. So ok, the procedure is not quite 100% reliable. There may be other reasons why Wanda suggested it, chief among them being rarity of scrolls, difficulty in getting scrolls, a dangerous future where scrolls will be needed, coupled with the fact that Wanda can't be decrypted. It's possible these things factored in the calculation, which led to Wanda making a suggestion. She's not a monster for asking, she'll be a monster when she'll (try to) go with it anyway in spite of the "no".

[theseus2x]

Both Marbits and Elves can't ally with sides that ally with gobwins or hobgobwins.

Okay this is very important. Do not, may not, or cannot ally with (hob)gobwins?

Nice. You're thinking like Charlie.

At the moment? "Cannot" seems to be the answer. Could someone like Charlie (or Parson...) do something to change that? Hmmmm.....

[haviel]

Hello everyone, new user here.

The notions of Good and Evil in Erfworld are drastically different then the real world. If you’re trying to determine if Wanda’s actions were Evil by our standards, then you’d have to condemn most of Erfworld as well. Duty and other magical compulsions directly interfere and sometimes even remove the troop’s right to choose in situations that endanger their lives. It’s totally normal in Erfworld, but in the real world it would almost roundly be considered as evil.

It seems to me, from Signamancy and other factors, that casters seem to fill out the stereotypes that fit their Casting discipline. Maybe their personality fits a certain discipline and it influences them when they start learning their field of choice.

Croakamancy is aligned with the fate axis. So Wanda is likely to run over the concept of free will even more then other people in Erfworld. You can argue that fate fulfills choice, or choice fulfills fate. But in either case, Wanda’s actions are consistent within those parameters. One thing is for sure, Wanda’s actions usually have far reaching consequences.

But is she Evil? Probably not, it’s Erfworld that’s evil. We don’t really know enough to argue that she’s fighting for, or against Erfworld’s nature. So we can’t call her Evil yet.

[fractal]

I don't think the argument is whether Wanda is evil, but whether the act itself is.

There's two parallel arguments here. "Is decryption evil?" (my take- no), "is Wanda asking to decrypt Jack evil?" (also no; yes it's an argument, many people are yelling Wanda-monster because of that question).

Is decryption evil? Based upon the information we have so far, no. It is, as Ansom says, similar to being popped again, and popping units in Erfworld is not evil.

Is killing an enemy and decrypting them evil? No more so than killing them in the first place, and probably less. At least some part of the individual survives. Compared to torturing them and turning them, it's probably less evil.

Is killing an ally and decrypting them evil? Yes, I think it is. You are destroying the person who existed before, and although you may bring most of them back, some part of them (the part that believed in their old ideals) is gone forever. The fact that the old ideals were just as involuntary as the new ideals is irrelevant - that was who they were.

[Coriat]

1) I do not think Erfworlders are, or usually become, autonomous agents, regardless of whether or not they are decrypted.
2) Any flash of autonomy displayed by living Erfworlders appears to have a correspondent in what the Decrypted are learning they can do.
3) So there is nothing lost by Erfworlders through decryption (except that they will on next death be dusted and lose need of upkeep; but I don;t think you can make a moral case from those)
4) So whatever it may be, decryption is not evil.

It does not seem to me that a normal unit's loyalty robs them of freedom of thought, merely of freedom of action to a certain extent. Sizemore would be the example. He goes into combat, but he hates it. This isn't against loyalty. Rewire his mind so that he loves it, and you're taking something from him.

Decryption very clearly impinges on freedom of thought to the tune of rewiring the subjects brain and making his thoughts more amenable to his controller. This is a form of slavery above and beyond normal Erfworld loyalty.

Whether this mental rewiring is permanent or not is not yet clear, but not really relevant. It still violates point 3 of yours in either case.

The notions of Good and Evil in Erfworld are drastically different then the real world. If you’re trying to determine if Wanda’s actions were Evil by our standards, then you’d have to condemn most of Erfworld as well. Duty and other magical compulsions directly interfere and sometimes even remove the troop’s right to choose in situations that endanger their lives. It’s totally normal in Erfworld, but in the real world it would almost roundly be considered as evil.

It's a crapsack world, yeah. Why drastically different, though? To my mind something being common doesn't make it morally acceptable by default.

Why can't such common acts still be considered Evil and Erfworld in general be considered a shitty place to be? And why wouldn't Wanda be evil just because such acts as she does are common?

[crazyguy_co]

Well, actually BlandCorp I'm no longer even convinced Ansom woulda croaked Ossimer IN his state... I'm beginning to think even this control is limited. But i do think it clear ansom would not have Croaked ossimer, or any other warlord, in an ambush style attack. He proved time and again he believed in the honor and crap... and we know from the way the Queen of UR had her daughter croaked that such ambush tactics were considered dirty. So yes, I do believe we have strong evidence to support Ansom would have acted differently before being decrypted.




I just don't like the argument that all moral questions are excused by the nature of the world. Carrying morals clearly is possible, as Sizemore clearly demonstrates for us. You're really not making that argument like some are, but your bordering on it at times


In the end the question of good or evil is- Does this action hurt others in order to benefit myself, or even convenience myself? Degrees of evil go from there, and again, the look is at the intent. Does wanda want to kill jack because she believes its for the greater good? Or because its more convenient and an excuse to perform an expirement with decrypting and casters?

[Evil Jedi]

Hello Forums, this is my first post! I noticed all the discussion about Wanda's actions and her morality. I'll have to get in on that later but right now I was just wondering about one of the basic principles in Erfworld, specifically healing.

On page 10 in the new book in the second panel, it looks like Jack is being tended to by some types of medics and we can see the bandage on the dwagon. Then later in this page Parson is asking about Healomancy scrolls to get him back on his feet. So my question is: Does Erfworld have paramedics or First Aid of some kind? Besides Healomancers, can anyone else help someone heal (if they don't have a scroll). I mean, if they survive until their next turn they heal instantly, so having people trained in First Aid does not seem to make a lot of sense. On the other hand, maybe it could be some kind of Natural Healomancy?

Just wondering what everyone else thought.

[Sinrus]

I think that only healomancers and units like altruist elves with natural healomancy abilities can heal. Since in erfworld (at least that we've seen) a unit can't take damage over time. If you are shot in the stomach it won't instantly kill you, but unless you get medical aid you're dead. Thus, basic first aid would have very little purpose in erfworld.

On the question of marbits and elves allying, it is only stated that they will not ally with sides that use gobwins, hobgobwins, witches, or daemons. I take this to mean that they could be forced to work with them, esp. if they were decrypted.

As for decryption's and Wanda's evilness, I have to go with Not Applicable. I believe that the ends justify the means. That usually is taken as a bad thing to say, but look at it like this:
Any action is neutral in its base state. 'Joey stole the food' is neither good nor evil. 'Joey stole the food because he liked the feeling of power' is evil, because it was committed for the wrong reasons. 'Joey stole the food so that he could feed it to the starving homeless children' is good, because it was committed with good intentions.

Similarly, we can look at decryption in several ways:
'Wanda decrypted the piker' is neutral. But if we look at it from Wanda's point of view, it changes. She could be thinking (I'm not saying that this is how she thinks, it's just an example): 'I decrypted this piker so that I could conquer the world' which would be evil. But from Ansom's point of view it changes again: 'My mistress decrypted that piker so that she could unite the world' is good. They are the same action, but when committed with different intentions their morality changes.

[jabbersocky]

The foolish royals are brainwashed into following a superior race just like the Nazis, and Her Holiness Wanda is merely freeing them from the chains of the evil cult, *and* saving their lives.

It is not surprising that decrypted adore her for saving both their minds and bodies from the evil royal crusade. It is obvious they have freewill, eg Ansom openly says when he doesn't agree with her because he doesn't yet understand the needs of the Greater Good.

Further proof, the queen of the love hippies backs Wanda's side!

I just wanted to say... royals have better stats for a reason.

[GobwinPie]

Both Marbits and Elves can't ally with sides that ally with gobwins or hobgobwins.

Okay this is very important. Do not, may not, or cannot ally with (hob)gobwins?

Nice. You're thinking like Charlie.

At the moment? "Cannot" seems to be the answer. Could someone like Charlie (or Parson...) do something to change that? Hmmmm.....

That's my take too. Until we see GK-allied elves or marbits*, we may have to admit that "cannot" is a possibility, and that incompatibility may extend as far as decryption as well.

(* Yeah, I got which side marbits were on crossed up earlier.)

[Infidel]

If I make the argument that all kids are disciplined by their parents, that does not give me the right to go smack someone else's kid around too.

I wish it did. Having just made it through an intercontinental flight behind a couple of little obnoxious brats, whose parents made no effort to discipline them, I truly truly felt tempted to smack the little monsters.

Rofl. We all do at some point or another.

[Infidel]

That killing of family thing is a nice way of putting it, precisely since we've seen that Ansom would find killing his relatives ... uncalled for. The big question remaining, and I've sketched in a previous post what would convince me of your view, is "Would Ansom have croaked Ossomer if ordered to do so, whereas a living Erfworlder in the same situation would have refused?"

I'm having trouble wrapping my mind around this. Do you mean, if say, Ansom had turned the normal way and been ordered to kill his brother? I do believe that Ansom would have killed Ossomer, he would have objected obviously, but would have still done it in the end. But the same could be said if he had been turned and under MC.

The operative difference here, I think, Is that Ansom took the initiative to plan the assault on Jetstone himself, which endangers his family, and due to the MC, just ignored or blew off in his mind the most likely results thereof. Namely, his family being slaughtered and converted by sword. If he had been turned the normal way, then I don't see him taking the initiative to plan assaults on his family, I think he would have to have been ordered to do so first.

It's me making that argument btw. And it goes that since everybody, or almost everybody, pops up mind-controlled anyway (AND unlike Earth, they're expected to stay mind-controlled and not wean off and develop autonomy), there is nothing to be LOST by an Erfworlder through decryption. I agree that you can't make a moral argument, this is exactly what I am saying and it goes both ways. I'm not arguing that decryption is GOOD, I argue that it is not EVIL.

My issue is that however clumsily it is expressed in different religions/philosophies, "do unto others..etc.." fundamentally, the concept of "good" is based on empathy. Even if nothing is lost, asserting MC on a unit is not something an empathetic person would do.

If, for example, I inherited 100 slaves. And if, I freed them, they would just be captured and sold to masters that would not treat their slaves with the same empathy I would, then we could make an argument for keeping those slaves. We could also make a moral argument in favor of buying more slaves if my goal was saving abused slaves from abusive masters. But what we cannot do is argue that It's ok to steal a slave because they were already slaves and had no control of their lives anyway. Because then you're treating the slaves as property, and that is not an empathetic thing to do.

That's a good standard to follow, but here's another, also from philosophy. Don't assume that your way of exsiting is the only one. Why should I put myself in an Erfworlder's shoes, as far as I can tell we are not equivalent. The onus is on you to prove that, despite all the bits of info that we know of Erfworlders, they are or can become through usual, normal-in-Erfworld means, autonomous agents {EDIT: so that they stand to lose something by decryption}.

Actually, it's the opposite. If you argue that there is more than one valid method of existence, then you are arguing in favor of empathy as well. If you argue in favor of empathy, then you have to put yourself in an Erfworlder's shoes to acknowledge that other existence. Refusing to look at things from the other's perspective is a refusal to acknowledge the validity of that point of view and undermines your own argument.

In the case we are discussing now, Wanda actually asked for consent, and the intention is clear, and the outcome will be ~100% reliable. There may be practical reasons for which she suggested decryption (with the healing scrolls being rare and needed by her, the one un-decryptable); and her gain is also GK's. It's far from clear that Wanda is evil for asking.

She didn't ask Jack for consent at all. She asked Stanley. It is Jack's consent that matters as he's the one being decrypted.

You're a good person to argue with.

If I make the argument that all kids are disciplined by their parents, that does not give me the right to go smack someone else's kid around too.

I wish it did. Having just made it through an intercontinental flight behind a couple of little obnoxious brats, whose parents made no effort to discipline them, I truly truly felt tempted to smack the little monsters.

Rofl. We all do at some point or another.

Duty and other magical compulsions directly interfere and sometimes even remove the troop’s right to choose in situations that endanger their lives. It’s totally normal in Erfworld, but in the real world it would almost roundly be considered as evil.

Actually, the real world already has the concept of "fate" in which you don't have any control over your actions, you are basically a puppet on a string doing what the god's decided you will do before you were even born. That you don't have any right of choice, your choices were already made for you. But the concept of morality still exists within those cultures that believe in fate. It all comes down to intentions.

[Infidel]

On page 10 in the new book in the second panel, it looks like Jack is being tended to by some types of medics and we can see the bandage on the dwagon. Then later in this page Parson is asking about Healomancy scrolls to get him back on his feet. So my question is: Does Erfworld have paramedics or First Aid of some kind? Besides Healomancers, can anyone else help someone heal (if they don't have a scroll). I mean, if they survive until their next turn they heal instantly, so having people trained in First Aid does not seem to make a lot of sense. On the other hand, maybe it could be some kind of Natural Healomancy?

I don't think they have even a concept of first aid. Caeser had two arrows sticking out of him, and it apparently didn't even occur to him to pull the arrows out. He just suffered the pain and waited for dawn.