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Black and Gray Morality: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
{{quote|''"'Let me give you some advice, Captain,' he said, 'It may help you to make sense of the world. I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are the good people and the bad people. You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides.'"''|'''Lord Vetinari''', ''[[Discworld/Guards! Guards!|Guards! Guards!]]''}}
{{quote|''"When will you fools learn that there are no battles fought by heroes?"''|'''Talpa''', ''[[Ronin Warriors]]''}}
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* Most Guy Ritchie crime films, especially as even the main characters/protagonists tend to also be crooks, usually matched up against other, worse ones. Not counting the mandatory [[Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain]]s, lets look at some characters from several of Ritchie's works:
** ''[[Snatch]]''. The most sympathetic characters are Turkish, Tommy, and the [[Irish Traveller]] clan. Turkish and Tommy are shady characters in the London underworld who run unlicensed boxing matches, gambling houses, etc. Turkish in particular is a rather cutting [[Deadpan Snarker]]. The Travellers participate in the sale of fake gold and jewels, rip off their business partners in transactions, then intimidate them with force, and at one point consider killing Tommy over a misunderstanding. The least sympathetic character is [[London Gangster|Brick Top]], who [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|routinely kills off his mooks]], brutalizes dogs and puts them into lethal dogfights, kills people and feeds them to pigs to dispose of the bodies, sets fire to the caravan of one of the gypsies, (burning her alive) and threatens to wipe out the rest of the clan if they don't cooperate with him.
** ''[[
** ''[[Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels]]''. The main characters are a group of street hustlers, con men, and gamblers. There are two groups of least sympathetic characters: the underworld bosses that cheat them in a card game, and whose entire purpose for this is to get the father of the character that they cheated to sell his pub so they can buy it cheap, and a group of brutal crooks who steal from, torment, and shoot the pot head marijuana growers who trust them.
* ''[[The Elite Squad]]'' has BOPE, a special forces team which employs cruelty in both [[Training
* ''[[The Element of Crime]]''. A more than questionable [[Anti-Hero]] pursuing a [[Serial Killer|child killer]], (un)assisted by [[Bad Cop, Incompetent Cop|the worst police force ever]] in the [[Crapsack World|crumbling ruins of dirt poor]] [[Wretched Hive|and morally corrupt]] [[After the End|post World War II Germany]]? If this isn't it, then…
* The [[Villain Protagonist]]s in ''[[The Final]]'' are a group of [[Teens Are Monsters|teen]] [[Loners Are Freaks|outcasts]] who [[Cold-Blooded Torture|torture]] and [[Beauty to Beast|mutilate]] their school's [[Alpha Bitch|popular]] [[Jerk Jock|kids]] as revenge for a lifetime of humiliation. As one can figure from the last sentence, neither side in the situation is all that nice. The only real "good" guy is Kurtis—and even that's pushing it, seeing as how he {{spoiler|kills Andy in cold blood}}.
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== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
* ''[[Warhammer
** On a general scale, you can't find any faction that is good by our standards, but some sub-factions and characters, like several [[Space Marine]] chapters, a few Imperial Guard regiments, the occasional Craftworld Eldar protagonist, [[Ravenor]] and [[Ciaphas Cain]] '''(HERO OF THE IMPERIUM!)''' or the Tau count as good. Unfortunately, they are far outnumbered by less moral groups, [[Bad Boss]]es, [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|people who go]] [[Knight Templar|too far]] for their cause, and the Dark Eldar, Necrons, Tyranids and the forces of Chaos.
** It is saying something about the setting when the "good" faction, the Tau Empire have a "join us or die" plan of galactic conquest.
* ''[[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]] Fantasy'' is almost as bad as [[Warhammer
* Most of the gamelines in [[Old World of Darkness|both]] [[New World of Darkness|incarnations]] of the World of Darkness present a system where the playable factions are some shade of Grey and are opposed by a faction who is Black. The majority of [[Vampire: The Requiem|vampires]] vs [[Exclusively Evil|Belial's Brood]], the Pentacle Orders vs the [[Ancient Conspiracy|Seers of the Throne]], the [[Changeling: The Lost|regular Changelings]] vs [[The Quisling|Loyalists]] to the [[The Fair Folk|True Fae]], and [[Artificial Human|Prometheans]] vs [[Body Horror|Pandorans and (most) Centimani]]. The exception would be the werewolves, with the main factions being the Tribes of the Moon vs the [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|Pure]], who are both Gray. The Black faction in that gameline (the Bale Hounds, worshipers of [[Cosmic Horror|the Maeljin Incarna]]) mostly sit on the sidelines. They are also one of the only things the other two can agree on [[Enemy Mine|fighting against]].
** In ''[[Genius: The Transgression]]'', the Peerage deliberately chose to be Grey because if you have a Genius go off on his own he'll often become [[Complete Monster|Illum]][[The Unfettered|inated]], and if the choice is between accepting jerks or have them wander off and turn into Mengele, you'd better get used to putting up with jerks. The Storyteller is advised to keep the players wondering whether the [[Ancient Conspiracy]] Lemuria is really that bad compared to the barely human nutbars in high-up positions in the Peerage. (The "black" role here is played not so much by modern Lemuria, which is just going through the motions, but by [[Empty Shell|Clockstoppers]], the Illuminated, and the occasional Hollow Earth Nazi or Phantom Slaver Yeti.)
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** Granted, the 'one man' he wanted revenge on was the leader of ''another'' Successor State, who very nearly managed to actually replace Hanse with a brainwashed doppelganger who'd have acted as his willing puppet. All events laid out in the (very early and thus possibly now somewhat obscure) ''[[BattleTech]]'' novel ''The Sword and the Dagger''. Wars ''have'' historically been fought for less...
** Or ComStar, who are shown to be a manipulative and secretive organization, that can easily bring a state to its knees just by shutting off all communications between planets, and which is not above intriguing to keep its own interests secure—there are a few hints that the Succession Wars may well be a [[Xanatos Gambit]] by ComStar intended to preserve its own autonomy and power within the Inner Sphere. At the same time, it is the last holdout for many destroyed technologies that humanity would need to survive and thrive.
* The ''[[Dungeons
** So does ''[[Dark Sun]]''. A [[Death World]] reduced to a scorched, mostly lifeless desert of rocks and dust (the ocean has been renamed the Sea of Silt... [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|take a wild guess why they call it that]]), where there isn't one creature (or plant) that isn't dangerous in some way (a sandcrawler looks like an adorable, fluffy, foot-long black furry caterpillar... it uses its cutesy appearance to get close to people, waits until the poor fool falls asleep, then implants its parasitic larvae in their flesh), one of the facts emphasized is that people will do terrible things merely to survive. That this is a [[Justified Trope]] for the setting goes some way towards explaining why it's a [[Crapsack World]].
** [[Forgotten Realms|The city of Neverwinter]], which has its own campaign book as of 4th Edition. Sure, you have the standard [[Obviously Evil]] factions such as the [[Eldritch Abomination|Abolethic Sovereignty]], [[The Necrocracy|Thay]], the [[Religion of Evil|Ashmadai]], and a [[Our Werebeasts Are Different|criminal empire of wererats]], but even the "good" factions don't come off particularly well. [[The Usurper|Lord Dagult Neverember]] is unquestionably helping the city recover after being ravaged by an erupting volcano, but he's a bit of a sleazeball and his reasons for devoting resources and money to the city aren't entirely altruistic. And [[Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters|the Sons of Alagondar]], while certainly well-intentioned in their desire to see Neverwinter back in the hands of its people, are willing to murder, riot and hop into bed with the Dead Rats and Thay in order to see their goals achieved.
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*** It should be noted that neither Janos nor Moebius realized that the Elder God was just a hungry Eldritch Abomination. He even manages to fool Kain once. The Elder God is [[The Omniscient]] [[Magnificent Bastard]], and pretty much made everyone his [[Unwitting Pawn]]s till Raziel purified Kain and allowed him to see the Elder God. [[spoiler: Moebius himself is forced to see it, [[My God, What Have I Done?|and is quite horrified]]. Janos even admits that to pass on the curse was horrible, but it was necessary to keep the Hylden at bay. Also, while Raziel's main motivation is vengeance, he comes as more sympathetic and troubled guy as the story goes by. He REALIZES he's an [[Unwitting Pawn]] to everyone, especially the guy who created and burned him, Kain, and in the end is {{spoiler|willing to make a sacrifice of the same vein Kain wasn't willing to(sacrifice yourself to save the world), though in Kain's case, killing himself wouldn't have solved anything}}. The plot is complicated, so it's safe to say everyone's got their Freudian Excuse or has been fooled into being what they are.
*** And let's not forget the Hylden. When you hear their story, you surely pity and root for them. Problem is, after so many eons trapped in the Demon Realm, they've become as genocidal and monstrous as the Ancient Vampires and Sarafans. They engineered Ariel's murder and the Corruption of the Pillars, and it's hinted they would have done it again and succeeded if Kain had sacrificed himself in the first game. In Blood Omen 2, they are revealed to have created a [[Doomsday Device|massive bio-organic superweapon]] [[The Final Solution|to kill every non-Hylden thing on Nosgoth]]. Plus, as {{spoiler|they are secretly controlling the Sarafans}}, their rule is quite the inquisitorial, fascist one.
* The protagonists of ''[[Grand Theft Auto III]]'' and ''[[Grand Theft Auto Vice City|Grand Theft Auto: Vice City]]'' can only be said to be heroes in the sense that they fight against people who are even worse than they are. CJ, from ''[[
** CJ {{spoiler|murders the entire staff of a construction site and buries the foreman alive}} because someone whistled at his sister. And in an earlier mission, he breaks into a mansion and injures a rap star and all of his bodyguards, kidnapped the star's manager and trapped him in a car and ran it into the sea, all so his friend (who he doesn't even like) can steal his music or something. He's pretty vile.
* The ''[[God of War (series)|God of War]]'' series, although really it's more of a Black and Even More Black Morality. The Greeks had a [[Badass|somewhat different definition]] of "hero" than we do.
* If you ever play ''[[Tactics Ogre]]'' past the first chapter, then you'll see this trope in spades: everyone (including yourself, possibly) commits truly horrific atrocities, yet your home team still somehow ends up gray...
* In ''[[Baldur's Gate|Baldur's Gate 2]]'', only two options are open to the player concerning allies who can help locate your kidnapped childhood friend: One option is to side with a guild of thieves. The other is to side with a guild of vampires. Vampire thieves. And just in case you were wondering: No, these are ''not'' thieves with a heart of gold. Inside their guild-hall you'll witness [[Training
* The ''Tiberium'' series of ''[[Command & Conquer]]'' gives you a choice between playing several factions. One is the Brotherhood of Nod, a fanatical army of terrorists who have no problem with killing civilians, torturing prisoners, and conducting horrific experiments with [[Green Rocks]] on the same. The second, "grayer" faction is the Global Defense Initiative, which is selfish, corrupt, and bound by countless rivers of red tape, and is focused entirely on improving the wealth and life of its own population at the expense of the majority of the world, which is rapidly falling apart into worldwide civil strife and poverty. Later games introduce a third faction named the Scrin, who are [[Kill All Humans|homicidal]] [[Scary Dogmatic Aliens]].
** ''[[Command & Conquer: Generals]]'' has this in spades. While the GLA are pretty much hypocritical assholes exploiting their "just cause," the "good guys" aren't ''entirely'' altruistic on their part either. The Americans can come across as obnoxious and self-righteous patriots, while China is not above using napalm-based or even nuclear weapons if it means securing victory.
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* Believe it or not, [[Mario]]'s world was like this in his debut game. In the arcade ''[[Donkey Kong]]'', Mario had captured the eponymous ape and wasn't very nice to him, leading to DK escaping and abducting Mario's girlfriend as revenge by proxy. Nintendo of America workers even named Mario after their landlord as a result of being mad at him, [[Springtime for Hitler|which backfired in a truly epic fashion.]]
* ''[[Darkstalkers]]'' can tend towards this. Even most of the "good guys" are morally questionable... but the villains are incredibly nasty embodiments of pure malevolence. Oh, and the sweet, innocent-looking little blonde girl resembling Little Red Riding Hood? She's one of the latter.
* ''[[
** On the side of the villains, we have the [[Organization Index|Novis Orbus Librarium, (NOL, the "Library" for short)]], [[The Empire|an oppressive, all-powerful organization]] ruled by the menacing, unseen Imperator. Although the institution itself is gray when it comes to morality (in fact, it's a neccessary case of [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]]), and there are good people in it, its enforcers include; [[Big Bad|Hazama/Yuuki Terumi]], a [[Complete Monster]] [[Troll]] who has [[Magnificent Bastard|meticiously planned]], [[The Chessmaster|manitulated others into]], [[Moral Event Horizon|outright caused]], or is in some other way related to almost every single bad thing that has happened in the [[
** On the side of the heroes, we have the aforementioned [[Anti-Hero|Ragna]] [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|the Bloodedge]], a ruthless [[One-Man Army]] who's on a quest to take down the NOL and all its personell, [[Complete Monster]]s and [[Punch Clock Villain]]s alike, by any means necessary. And not because of any greater, idealistic purposes, like peace or freedom, either, but simply because Hazama royally fucked up his life. Believe it or not, he's one of the ''less'' ambiguously [[Good Is Not Nice|heroic people in this game]]. Also on the supposed good side, we have Sector Seven, who are also opposed to the NOL, but only as far as '[[Somebody Else's Problem|We're not listening to you]]', and have [[Kick the Dog|kicked many dogs]] in whatever they do. Of particular note are the actions of Kokonoe, who is so crazed in her pursuit of revenge against Terumi, she is fully prepared to {{spoiler|[[Nuke'Em|nuke Kagutsuchi]]}} should her plan to use [[The Woobie|Lambda]] as a vehicle for her revenge go awry. Also helping Ragna is the vampire Rachel Alucard and her butler Valkenhayn R. Hellsing. She had the best intention, but not only she is a bit lazy to take actions (she's not allowed to, but lately, she got better), she's just very haughty and full of disdains, and seemingly no better than Terumi in making nearly everyone pawns for her speed chess with Terumi. Valkenhayn used to be one of the world-saving Heroes, but his utter loyalty to Rachel made him look like a [[Yes-Man]] to her. To note: They're not exactly united greatly.
** So, um, in that case how about [[Taking a Third Option]]? Maybe there's some unaligned people who CAN be accounted to be good. Well, first off there's the bounty hunter Carl Clover, who, deep down is a sweet boy, but thanks to Relius' (his father) atrocity, he has no qualms of murdering you while still acting polite if he wants any information from you. Hakumen is an unflappable [[Badass]] who is damn effective at leaving a trail of pain in his wake, and one of the few who can force ''Relius'' to bail from his mere presence... except he believes the only way to save the world from destruction is to mow down both Ragna and Terumi, and then go burn this world for he thinks it's been too corrupted and the only way is to restart the world anew, [[Knight Templar|and he is not open to alternatives whatsoever]]. Moving on from that, there's Litchi Faye-Ling. She's motherly, caring and compassionate and at least cares for the normal townspeople. But then, this is a case where her [[Love Martyr]]-ism is cruelly manipulated by Hazama to the point that she's right now siding the NOL to save her 'beloved' and herself. Said 'beloved'? Arakune, your resident [[Eldritch Abomination]] who'll eat you if he finds you tasty. And what of his human self that Litchi loved? Lotte Carmine, a glory-seeker, fame-hunting scientist who's just in Sector Seven for his own glory, not helped with his inferiority complex against Kokonoe. There's also Makoto, who is roughly Litchi's equal in terms of [[
* In ''[[Warcraft III]]'' the factions ranged from genocidal (Undead) all the way to willing to let everyone die out of sheer prickishness (Night Elves). [[World of Warcraft]] turns around and averts this with Tirion Fordring. Despite the questlines in Northrend which appear to be arguing that good people must sometimes do bad things, the only man who keeps his hands clean [[Curb Stomp Battle|melts the face off the Lich King]] every time they meet.
* ''[[Prototype (video game)|Prototype]]'' doesn't really have any heroes. Correction, it ''really'' doesn't have any heroes. Take your pick: zombie mutants controlled by a psychotic girl, soldiers who are more concerned with destroying evidence than protecting anybody, or a main character who is out for revenge, is a self-proclaimed terrorist, and has absolutely no qualms with tearing innocent people to shreds and eating their insides to heal? (He gets a conscience later on, but still.) Sure, there's the Marines [[Punch Clock Villain|who only want to save people and destroy the main character and zombie mutant side because they're eating people]], Dr. Ragland and Dana Mercer, but it doesn't change the fact that the fate of the city lies in the hands of a man-eating mutant monstrosity.
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