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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 9858901" data-attributes="member: 4937">So, I think it is helpful to think about what we mean by "True Neutrality"Neutrality in general is indifference to all the other claims by all the other alignments.  Neither in weal no woe, creation or destruction, self nor in community, objectivity nor subjectivity do neutrals find any real and absolute value.  Instead, they find all value to be wholly circumstantial.  Nothing is good nor evil except that circumstances make it so.  They are pragmatists.  Life has no purpose, neither does the destruction of life.  Instead, everything is just about getting by and adapting to change.  Change is neither good nor bad, it just is.  Death is neither good nor bad, it just is.  We can easily imagine a being who has this perspective out of a lack of introspection or understanding about any deep philosophical matter.  They aren't contemplative, they are just trying to get by amidst the complexity of reality.  Carving out their little niche and trying not to get too involved in anything bigger themselves.  5e tends to call this brand of Neutrality - Unaligned.  What it is really is just indifferent by happenstance or nature.  You don't care enough to care.By "True Neutral" we mean someone is philosophical about this state of affair and while indifferent to the claims of other alignments they are not passive in their response to the winds of change.  They see the absolutism and extremism of all of the other alignments and their servants as being wrong and dangerous - even and including Good.  It's that last one that is I think a sticking point for people.  They try to rationalize it by saying, "Too much Good becomes Evil".  This nonsense shows up in for example Dragonlance.  A True Neutral person would not be convinced by this augment.  Rather the True Neutral person has to believe that some amount of evil is better than none of it.  That's a bit of an alien belief system, but it does show up both in the real world and in fiction.  That is to say the True Neutral is not only rebelling against evil's end goal of infinite pain, infinite loss, total destruction, and to make everything not, but also against literal paradise of no unhappiness, unending growth, unending health, endless bounty and joy - not because they believe those things were evil but in some sense they believed them wrong anyway.  The True Neutral has to honestly believe that paradise is made better if someone is unhappy in it, even if that someone is themselves.  They wouldn't see a point in knocking it all down.  But they would see a point in grief and loss being a part of existence, and something wrong with trying to end them.</blockquote>

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