If campaign settings should include imperatives and restrictions in order to reflect a moral view, what agenda should they offer?
“Morality” here doesn’t mean one particular moral agenda. I don’t say every RPG should advocate, for instance, trade surpluses or Zoroastrianism or safe use of strawberry ice cream. “Morality,” in this case, means any reasonably coherent viewpoint about behavior, a sense that some actions are right and others are wrong, and a willingness to assert that view. So the designer should have an agenda. Its details are a matter of choice, and open to discussion by the players. I have moral beliefs of my own, but I see no reason to foist them on the players. The morality of the setting need not be the designer’s own code of behavior — quite the contrary. The point is, the designer should convey ideas of right and wrong appropriate to the setting and its adventures. Sounds like Dwight Eisenhower’s assertion that everyone should have a religion, and he didn’t care what it is. What specific RPGs express a morality, then? What kinds of games are immoral? Among moral games, Chaosium’s superb P
