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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bad Paper" data-source="post: 3690250" data-attributes="member: 24674">...and Good is not inherently good or bad, and Evil is not inherently good or bad.  Seriously.The game tends to equate Good with selflessness, and Evil with selfishness.  Thus, Good does not mean good.Example:Dan and Ari are very hungry.  Dan is holding a loaf of bread.  The 100% Good thing for Dan to do is to hand the loaf to Ari.  The 100% Evil thing for Dan to do is to eat the whole thing.  Note that the Evil choice does not include melting the skin from Ari's face, or doing any harm to him whatsoever, and that the Good choice does not necessarily minimize the total amount of hunger, or solve any long-term problems at all.The Lawful choice is for Dan to establish an agreement whereby Ari and Dan somehow share the resource of bread, establishing a resource-sharing agreement to mutual benefit (though each can make an intelligence check to tilt the long-term odds in each's favor, with Dan getting a hefty circumstance bonus for owning the resource at the time).  The Chaotic choice is...unclear.  I don't think I can state "the" Chaotic choice, since that implies a uniformity to Chaotic behavior.  These choices could be a) dropping the loaf on the ground and saying, "let's wrestle," or b) throwing the loaf in the air and punching Ari in the stomach, or c) handing half of the loaf to Ari, or d) setting the loaf on fire, ....Thus, Mouseferatu, all your post really does is argue against excess, that is, for balance.  You would make an excellent druid.Law/Chaos is a different spectrum for a reason, and yes, too much of either can be just as bad as too much Good or Evil.There is, always has been, and always will be, a continuum of behavior across as many dimensions as legislators can invent.  Laws are weapons used to demarcate criminal behavior: "this is acceptable, and that over there is not."  But the line where the law is placed is arbitrary, and it also shifts over time.Laws are not oppressive based on how many there are, or what they say, but because of whom they exclude.  Since the spectrum of all behavior is continuous, the discrete placement of a law is going to unnaturally affect people's continuous, non-discrete behavior.  An excessive network of laws can easily criminalize the entire populace, giving rise to selective enforcement, and all the issues (Evil/Good) that come with that, e.g. selectively busting someone because of race is generally Evil, but selectively busting Al Capone for tax evasion was generally seen as Good.The problem of "too much law" will harry citizens into a state of constant fear and worry, just as bad as "too much chaos" or "too much good" or "too much evil."  A government that steals your second-born and gives it to a childless couple is still Lawful Good, and a society that flat-out leaves you alone is still Chaotic Evil.  It's all in the flavor.</blockquote>

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