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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aenghus" data-source="post: 6758339" data-attributes="member: 2656">I think the style and genre of the intended game using alignment necessarily influence interpretations of alignment in that game and vice versa.In an action adventure genre with typical "goodish" PCs, they use fairly straighforward tactics including violence to solve their problems, and do so effectively. There's an implicit imperative on the referee in such a game to allow appropriate successful endeavours to be successful in the game without major sabotage or takebacks. In such a game, A True Neutral(TN) attitude that major change is impossible or detrimental isn't a useful one, it's the attitude of an obstacle NPC or antagonist. This is because major change is in fact possible and the TN is wrong in this game world in this context - maybe only the heroes are effective in this way, but they are, and they can aspire to make big changes in the world. The heroic path is to carry on despite naysayers, obstructive superiors, corrupt politicians etc etc.Conversely, a more serious game placing more importance on "realistic consequences" requires the players to constantly do their homework and seek good intelligence, as their actions could well be pointless or counterproductive.  The TN attitude of preferring balance, or barring that small, tentative steps makes more sense in such a context.In a dark and gritty gameworld way out of balance to the dark side, the TN may feel obliged to assist "good" allies to restore balance, despite their concern that major change can produce unintented consequences. If the current situation is bad enough, they may feel obliged to try. My personal problem with TN is that I prefer straightforward action adventure, and "don't bother" TN is a poor fit for such a game style. YMMV.</blockquote>

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