Running a morally gray game

[Sword of Spirit]

Battlestar Gallactica is great inspiration for a morally ambiguous game. In D&D 3e terms, there are some evil character, perhaps 1-2 actually "good" characters, and a whole slew of neutral and lawful neutral (it is military) characters. But it's all very intense, lots of causes people are fighting for etc. I have no exposure to Game of Thrones, but I get the idea it's probably similar.

 

[haakon1]

Sometimes choosing "morally gray" might be choosing good or evil, but not wanting to say so.

For example, Mal (no coincidence that it's Latin for evil) Reynolds in "Firefly" is a criminal and a smuggler . . . but he's actually a strongly moral guy, probably CG alignment, as we learn well in Season 1, Episode 1 ("The Train Job").

Han Solo is another example of a cutthroat rogue who is actually a hero in disguise.

Given that our culture doesn't like do-goody-good heroes but "dark & complex" heroes, saying you want "morally gray" could mean you want a good character, but you're afraid to admit it.

It could also be that you want to play an outright evil character, e.g., Darth Vader, but you don't want to be judged about it, so you pretend there's ambiguity.