Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Unleash 05-24-04, 02:09 AM	Campaign: Dragon Mountain, 2nd ed. Character : Deimos Vex, psywarr11, NE Concept: Played this guy as the ever-cornered jungle cat, bent on his survival above anything else. RP evolution: He died, lived as a lemure, came back, and sees a bigger, universel, Ao-like picture. No longer content with his selfish ways, he's feeling the need to balance everything: good, evil, laws, chaos, arcane magic (science), psionics (instincts), brawn, intellect etc. In short, he sees himself as an equalizer, balancing anyone, anything and everything out... :twitch: :looloo: Question 1: Is such a behavior really neutral ? Question 2: If not, what alignment would he be (I'm guessin' LN, since he's basing his decisions on his...particular view of things)? Ahem, FIRE AWAY ! :D [Edit: Just learned of the similarities between my char and Mordenkainen, argh. :banghead:]
Lina_Inverse 05-24-04, 02:32 AM	considering theres a planer species for active neutrality.who literally would kill LG heros to keep the balence.it most certinly is in the D&D universe and for good reason. if evil wins,the universe ends if good wins,the universe ends if law wins,the universe ends if chaos wins,the universe ends
Kilamar 05-24-04, 04:34 AM	One should note that Mordenkainen of Greyhawk has a similar concept of balance and acts accordingly. Kilamar
ThoughtfulOwl 05-24-04, 08:06 AM	Originally posted by Unleash Question 1: Is such a behavior really neutral ? Question 2: If not, what alignment would he be (I'm guessin' LN, since he's basing his decisions on his...particular view of things)? It might be neutral; an extreme (in 3rd edition) kind of neutral, but a neutral nonetheless. OTOH, one's own alignment doesn't always match one's goal. For example, a good character might pursue balance out of belief that the victory of Good would be ultimately self defeating; he would likely not oppose Good, however, just not support it when it is prevalent. A lawful character might pursue balance out of duty to a supposed cosmological order, or just pursue it with frightening methodicity. And so on...
Unleash 05-24-04, 12:39 PM	So based on your reasoning ThoughtfulOwl, an alignment most susceptible to zealously go out of it's way to maintain it's duty towards the universal balance is the Lawful Neutral type. Question 3: Any ideas how such a character would include/exclude is old time friends of the Evil alignement in his new conception of the world ? Question 4: How would you make him go about his duty, i.e. how would he manage to find out who's a felon, and where would he draw the line to act ? (not all Evil or Good is bad in otherwords.) My ideas: Pick Kensai lvls and come up with a strict oath to maintain universal balance whenever, wherever possible. Pick up Leadership to recrute and promote his views. Convert his current Evil party to his views to shield 'em from his wrath. Convince my DM to let me take Cosmopolitain from FRCS to make Diplomacy a Class skill (already comes from Amn). Invest Skill Pts in Sense Motive, Diplomacy and Intimidate as a Kensai. Religions with common views: Hoar, Tyr, Sylvanus, Grumbar, Tempus, Helm He has ranks in UMD so invest $$ in wands of Detect Good and such.
ThoughtfulOwl 05-24-04, 01:45 PM	Originally posted by Unleash an alignment most susceptible to zealously go out of it's way to maintain it's duty towards the universal balance is the Lawful Neutral type. My point is that one's own alignment may be just a matter of personal behavior and have little or nothing to do with where that person will side in the cosmological struggle. Somebody who promotes balance for the sake of it is probably neutral; people who do it so that the cosmos doesn't implode are probably good; people who approach the task with extreme discipline and methodicity are probably lawful... well, you get the idea. In other words, don't feel shoehorned into true neutral: choose a reason to promote balance and an approach to the task, then pick up the alignment that fits best. Or go the other way and choose the alignment first, then pick up reason ad approach accordingly. Question 3: Any ideas how such a character would include/exclude is old time friends of the Evil alignement in his new conception of the world ? I can't really help you here. :( It depends on the character, his former associates, the relationship that bounded him to them and how much he changed. Was it a matter of convenience or did he feel a genuine bond? Do they already know he has changed? Does he sees them as obstacles to be removed for the sake of his newfound goal? As potential tools to be used toward his ends? As one of the forces to balance? Might he try to convert them to the cause? Conversely, how will they react to him once his new outlook is exposed? Question 4: How would you make him go about his duty, i.e. how would he manage to find out who's a felon, and where would he draw the line to act ? (not all Evil or Good is bad in otherwords.) All good possibilities, but I would add Gather Information and the various Knowledge categories to the list of useful skills. Also, there are many ways in which he can "keep the balance". Will he oppose the forces that currently hold dominance? Will he support those that are being crushed? Will he try to proselitize as much as possible or will he see everybody else as a pawn or opponent? Will he oppose any extreme mindset in favor of a neutral one or will he favor variety, counting on opposites to counterweight each other?
NinjaHedge 05-24-04, 02:05 PM	I would agree with a LN alignment. If all this person wanted to balance was good and evil, then he'd be N. However, sense he wants to balance everything, that's more like a strict personal ethical code he is living by, and that sounds like LN.
ck2001wendt 05-24-04, 03:05 PM	Off Topic, but whatever happened to your lvl 1 evil Cleric, Unleash? Did he survive the module or no?
Thorak 05-24-04, 03:31 PM	Here's my breakdown of the True Neutral alignment (which I use because the 2nd edition version was concerned with balance, while the generic 3rd edition Neutral does not necessarily do so) Balance is key to life. Good and Evil, Law and Chaos are polar opposites, and a world based in any extreme would be equally undesirable. Where a world dominated by Evil would be a horrible place to live, a world dominated by Good would become hopelessly naive and prone to abuse by a single Evil denizen (or extraplanar visitor). Similarly, a world of Chaos would have no limits or guidelines, and society would be impossible, while a world of Law would be hopelessly strict and limiting, innovation and art would be nonexistent. Since none of these extremes is desirable, then it must be the balance of these forces which creates the world in which we all live. Certainly, it isn't 'wrong' to strive for one cause or another; others will strive for opposite ones and balance the system once more. The only time one needs to step in is when some great force threatens to tip the balance in one direction or the other, and then only to correct the balance, not to tip it in the other direction.
Unleash 05-24-04, 03:59 PM	In response to Thorak: I prefer your 2nd Ed. view on neutrality and balance! My path is clear now: use your breakdown (with your permission of course! :) ) but encompass life/death, magic/psionics, brawn/intellect, nature/civilisation facets to make it a LN Kensai Oath, which I shall play with paladin-like fervor. Having a violent background, this char shall deal swiftly with matters, often resulting in vast piles of bodies when he goes on his crusades. His tactics might gain a little more finesse over the years : he might create diplomatic units specialised in Seeking out felons, combat units specialised in Solving Problems. He might even come up with department branches solely fighting 1 type of imbalance... or maybe he'll soften up, go solo, and take up a few levels of Justiciar. Maybe he'll develop an ardent taste for hemoglobin, and hide behind his "noble" ways to justify his lust for carnage, secretly offering his bloodsheds to the dark god Malar! That way he'd earn the enmity of any party of adventurers to cross his path, hehe. :smirk: In response to ck2001wendt: I successfully managed to get him in the party (as a hired miner no less, even though he has never picked up a shovel in his life hehe), but my DM veto'ed him out, on account that not because it was infeasible for him to survive, but on the account that we'd need a strong melee character just to make sure the rest of the party would survive this renowned-for-it's-TPKs-quest. I can't say that I blamed in, our last encounter in Dragon Mountain , we fought against 1 Devourer, 1 Fighter/ Vampire, 5-7 Morghs, some wights in the final boss room of a crypt. We were really lucky though: no party deaths, but I got a level drained, as our cleric, and our monk was dominated and caused little damaged. If my Deimos hadn't been there, we'd all have :b:. I'll grab the first opportunity I get to reinclude him, after all, my cleric 1 of Beshaba is just momentarily out of the picture ! By then, they'll be lvl 15 or so muahah :D ! I can already hear someone say: "That lowly follower with a shovel is gosh darn too cunning for his own good!" :schemes:
Unleash 05-24-04, 05:02 PM	Originally posted by ThoughtfulOwl In other words, don't feel shoehorned into true neutral: choose a reason to promote balance and an approach to the task, then pick up the alignment that fits best. Or go the other way and choose the alignment first, then pick up reason ad approach accordingly. :bow: This simple passage shall help me with any character concept / creation / evolution where I stumble to prioritize what's important or not. In other words, we all sometimes find a PrC we'd like like to try out, or sometimes difficulties arise when our characters are evolving. Your way of reasoning can help anyone determine on what they want to focus and how to balance it : Concept or Numbers. I strive to remain true to the character but sometimes get lured by the pretty numbers instead of choosing what's important: remaining true to the character's essence. :thumbsup: Originally posted by ThoughtfulOwl I can't really help you here. :( It depends on the character, his former associates, the relationship that bounded him to them and how much he changed. Was it a matter of convenience or did he feel a genuine bond? Do they already know he has changed? Does he sees them as obstacles to be removed for the sake of his newfound goal? As potential tools to be used toward his ends? As one of the forces to balance? Might he try to convert them to the cause? Conversely, how will they react to him once his new outlook is exposed? All good possibilities, but I would add Gather Information and the various Knowledge categories to the list of useful skills. Also, there are many ways in which he can "keep the balance". Will he oppose the forces that currently hold dominance? Will he support those that are being crushed? Will he try to proselitize as much as possible or will he see everybody else as a pawn or opponent? Will he oppose any extreme mindset in favor of a neutral one or will he favor variety, counting on opposites to counterweight each other? All these changes have only slowly started to take effect but I'm already brainstorming how he might evolve. I hadn't posted much details in order to keep my posts small. True Friends : 1 The person he's most desperate to try to convert to his views, since he feels a genuine bond for her (unbeknownst to him, it's love, shhh) . If that fails, he'll try exempting her from his wrath for some time, but conflicted between his newfound principles and his love for her, it's likely that he'll have to high-tail it for both their sakes. Friends : 1 (dead) Allies: 3 These 3 are Zhentarim Banites. He holds little affection for them. They are all sensing a slow change in his actions, but nothing flagrant as of yet. He will use them as tools if conversion fails. It should work for some time, since they are mostly Lawful Evil, and have vowed fidelity to Bane, a dominant and predictable force of Evil. One of 'em has connections with the underworld, which might come really handy. Keepers of the Balance (secret society): His organisation will probably start small, both in numbers, and in ideals. If any of the former increase, he might change his views concerning his friend and allies. If the aforementionned True Friend joins his ranks, it's likely that they'll split ownership of the organisation, as together they personify both ends of the spectrum : magic /psionics, brain/brawn etc. He's already taking a keen interest in religion since he now understands its prevalence in the average Faerūnian's life. He shall also see the wisdom in founding alliances with other faiths , while proselytizing as much as possible. If he senses power, he'll try to convert it. Why ? Because that way, it can be kept under check, and it can also be a tool to further his cause. Recruiting shall be done through his lady-friend, since she's the one with all the right skills (she's a Mindbender :schemes: ) Like modern dictators of our time, manipulation, assassination, corruption, crusades will all be means to an end. But the founders of the orginisation will Really be doing all of this in the name of a principle greater than the common man: Universal Balance. Of course, when they'll be exposed, they'll have a whole new set of enemies. That's half the fun! The organization shall evaluate anyone it meets as friend, foe, ally or pawn. If a tribe of orc his getting wiped out, he'll fund it with arms and equipment. If a city his besieged by invaders, he shall assasinate key officers from the invaders. The idea is to act in the backgrounds, unoticed by the general public, whenever possible, and to target the leaders, those taking the big decisions, not those underneath them. Crusades would be the most direct and open approach to solving a problem, thus a last resort. Hit fast, hit hard, get out. Extremists shall be monitored, but not necessarily chastised, since they are easier to control, due to their predictability. Those are my thoughts as of now :) .
ThoughtfulOwl 05-24-04, 05:50 PM	Originally posted by Unleash True Friends : 1 The person he's most desperate to try to convert to his views, since he feels a genuine bond for her (unbeknownst to him, it's love, shhh) . If that fails, he'll try exempting her from his wrath for some time, but conflicted between his newfound principles and his love for her, it's likely that he'll have to high-tail it for both their sakes. Should he fail to convert her, there is another possible choice: he might try to personally counterweight every unbalance from her part with an opposing force applied somewhere else, even without her knowledge; this might lead to an interesting development, as she might grow increasingly annoyed by the fact that whatever goal she pursues always seems to be misteriously nullified afterwards; or the continual effort needed to counterweight her might eventually expose his activities while he still hasn't enough of a power base to act in the open. But of course this will never happen, as she will surely fall in love...:D Anyway, good job overall; it's evident that you put much thought in it.
Unleash 05-24-04, 07:17 PM	I have to admit that most of what I've posted was burried in my thoughts, in a confusing jumble of facts. It's your insights and those of our other contributors that greatly helped to impose some order on that chaos of ideas :) It's a big roleplaying project, but if it's successfull, it's the kind of thing that can entertain us for years to come. Imagine what can grow out of this simple organisation : Other Players might want to join in. New PCs can be low ranking members, benefitting from the org's ressources, knowledge, training and equipment. The org might span a wide enough influence to merit all kinds of attentions: good-aligned PCs come to overthrow us, evil groups want to subdue us, deities might grow interested in us etc. Maybe the beliefs promoted by our org can satisfy persons not too found of religion yet seeking some kind of guidance or sense of purpose (I'm thinking about Erevis Cale from the Sembia Series, Shadow's Witness and such :) ) Like many MMORPGs, it can be a powerfull newbie starting ground, as they can gradually learn everything and anything about the Forgotten Realms. Ethical, philosophical and moral issues are bound to arise, since the org's destined to include many different alignements over the years. This shall all translate into endless hours of Roleplaying goodiness ! Thx for your help all :cloud9: :tiphat: !
Glak 05-25-04, 11:06 AM	Lawful evil for sure. Active neutrality is a form of insanity at best. Killing a good person is an evil act. That is nonnegotiable.
Thorak 05-25-04, 12:07 PM	Originally posted by Glak Lawful evil for sure. Active neutrality is a form of insanity at best. Killing a good person is an evil act. That is nonnegotiable. First point; characters can engage in acts contrary to their alignment. If it becomes a habit, their alignment will change. But it's possible for a True Neutral to 'balance out' his killing of a good guy (who needed to die for the balance for some reason) with saving a village from destruction. And the single killing wouldn't change the alignment to begin with. Second point: In most cases, it's Evil you gotta worry about. Good is too concerned with what other people think, and freedom of thought, and things like that to use the harsh measures that would be required to remove all forms of Evil. That would require Evil to do, and therefore is self-defeating. Even if you had a corps of Paladins walking the streets, and arresting and forcibly deporting anyone who Detects as Evil (not harming, and letting them take what they can and compensating them well for what they can't), that's still harmful to the balance without being Evil. The country where this is going on will, in 100 years if this continues, completely forget what Evil is. And so, when an heir to the throne is discovered to be evil by his father who gets an archmage to conceal the alignment because of his love (not knowing/believing what evil can do), the evil heir is going to have a freaking field day with the populace, if he's smart enough to work his changes slowly. And they won't suspect a thing, because their world is perfectly Good and they're all so confident and naive that they'd be blind to it, until it's far too late. Like I said, Good in the extreme is just as harmful in the long run as Evil is. Good needs Evil around to remind it why it's Good in the first place, and keep it ever-vigilant.
flyingmoose 05-25-04, 11:12 PM	Passive Neutrality - The abscense of alignment. You're true neutral because you feel no particular pull in any direction, morally or ethically. The lazy alignment. Active Neutrality - The sum of all alignments. You're true neutral because you exhibit all alignments equally. You side with good, you side with evil, you side with order, you side with chaos. Your morals and ethics vary widely from time to time, but averages out to neutrality. One evil act does not make you evil. Multiple evil acts without remorse makes you evil. One good act does not make you good. Multiple good acts with little (if any) desire for reward and no ulterior motive makes you good. I'd leave your guy neutral until you can come up with something better. I hate the whole active balance version of TN, like the characters are aware of the alignment elements. There's only two things a real person has to worry about: right and wrong. Your views on those two things determine your alignment.
gRuDzZiE 05-26-04, 12:18 AM	(This is Unleash, I'm at my gf's computer and didn't log her off :D) I agree with Thorak and most of what flyingmoose said: it bugs me too to think that my character his aware of alignments. But, where do we draw the line between what a character knows ("Hmm, he looks like a combat capable fella, I'd better be carefull!" and mere game mechanics invisible in the game world ?(ex. fighter lvl 10, Neutral Evil, 2d6 dmg greatsword) I guess that's also why they pulled Active Neutrality from the 3rd versions, because it's requires your character knows of such forces. Yet,there must be a way for me to roleplay an Active Neutral character. Passive Neutral can be viewed as the alignment of a lowly squirrel, who's unaware that he's part of a larger balance, the Food Chain. While Active Neutral can be viewed as someone who's aware of the Food Chain, and wants to protect the ecosystems...like Sylvanus. Thus, I justify my character's superficial knowledge of alignements by the epiphany he recently lived: his death and his ressurection. His days on the fugue plane, his witness of benevolent souls and doomed souls respective fates all showed him that he's a small cog in the Universal Machine. He doesn't know that he's NE, and has always been. All he knows is that he hasn't contributed to that balance, and that he doesn't wanna end up as a lowly lemure again.
Lina_Inverse 05-26-04, 12:21 AM	Originally posted by gRuDzZiE (This is Unleash, I'm at my gf's computer and didn't log her off :D) I agree with Thorak and most of what flyingmoose said: it bugs me too to think that my character his aware of alignments. But, where do we draw the line between what a character knows ("Hmm, he looks like a combat capable fella, I'd better be carefull!" and mere game mechanics invisible in the game world ?(ex. fighter lvl 10, Neutral Evil, 2d6 dmg greatsword) I guess that's also why they pulled Active Neutrality from the 3rd versions, because it's requires your character knows of such forces. Yet,there must be a way for me to roleplay an Active Neutral character. Passive Neutral can be viewed as the alignment of a lowly squirrel, who's unaware that he's part of a larger balance, the Food Chain. While Active Neutral can be viewed as someone who's aware of the Food Chain, and wants to protect the ecosystems...like Sylvanus. Thus, I justify my character's superficial knowledge of alignements by the epiphany he recently lived: his death and his ressurection. His days on the fugue plane, his witness of benevolent souls and doomed souls respective fates all showed him that he's a small cog in the Universal Machine. He doesn't know that he's NE, and has always been. All he knows is that he hasn't contributed to that balance, and that he doesn't wanna end up as a lowly lemure again. but D&D charecters DO know of alingment.note the spells detect evil holy smite dispel evil holy word a charecter might not know there currently NE,but they can certinly realize that good is a tangible force
Falstaff the Fighter 05-26-04, 12:33 AM	No, it is possible to actively pursue a "balance" in D&D, trying to make sure no alignment force gets the upperhand on another. D&D characters do know of their alignments, and they know the general ethos of each, so it is possible that they would choose to try and support "neiter" by being true neutral.
thalious 05-26-04, 03:05 AM	IMO there two kinds of Neutral. The balancing type and apathetic type.
Millennium 05-26-04, 09:15 AM	It depends. Active neutrality slips dangerously close to LN in nature, but it's still possible to be "nastily neutral" and actually stay neutral. Perhaps the biggest difference is that an ATN (Active-True-Neutral) will generally only work to correct balance which has already gone out of whack (and may ignore lesser imbalances if there's something more pressing), while a LMN (Lawful Militant Neutral) will work even there there is already balance to ensure that it never goes out of whack in the first place.
von Szass 05-26-04, 08:25 PM	Originally posted by Glak Lawful evil for sure. Active neutrality is a form of insanity at best. Killing a good person is an evil act. That is nonnegotiable. Killing an evil person as well. I guess inquisitors should be considered LG, since they try to cleanse the world of evil in their own (evil) ways. That's one of my most mayor grudges against paladins. Alignment is a tool for having a char, with them it's a requirement, according to the rules. (But the introduction to the core books sais they are guidelines, so I ignored this rule and played a LN paladin once.) I'm considering creating a character as well which tries to balance stuff... with words. Someone (mad enough) who tries to interrupt a fight between two opposite aligned characters/monsters and talking into the chars involved to look from the point of view from their enemy. *Hugs a tree, throws some blossoms in the air, and dances away.* Somehow I think this will become quite an annoying character. Maybe I should adapt Unleash's idea (do I see a PrC evolving here? :) ).
Thorak 05-26-04, 10:29 PM	Someone's food-chain comment got me thinking on a new way to look at active neutrality. Look at the animal kingdom. There are predators, and there are prey. Without balance between both, both will die out, either from the predators killing off their prey entirely, or the prey outbreeding the available food resources and dying of starvation, and after either the predators in their turn starve. Just as predator/prey is something that requires balance, so is Good/Evil and Law/Chaos. Too much of either makes everything worse. The right amounts of both makes the world just right. And just as we can't see the predators of the world as 'wrong' just because they kill other creatures, we can't see any other extreme as 'wrong', they fill a necessary place in the cosmos, balancing another force. Of course, this doesn't prevent the prey from hating and fearing the predator, and thinking that it is 'wrong' in what it does. But to the Active Neutral, they aren't taking the position of a predator or prey, they're taking the position of the human park warden. They're making sure neither predator nor prey grow too numerous to be a problem to the other. So, basically, an Active Neutral is morally required to stop either Good or Evil causes that threaten to tip the balance. Say, if a party is trying to stop an evil God before his scheme blocks all other deities from affecting the world. The Active Neutral eagerly joins in, preventing the Evil deity from tipping the balance. Then, when the party has the Evil deity beaten and is about to kill him forevermore, the Active Neutral does his best to stop them. Killing the Evil god, while perhaps a perfectly valid reaction to the Good party members, would tip the balance too far in the opposite direction. Yes, it seems like betrayal to the Good party members. But it's no different than a park warden who, after accidentally killing too many wolves the previous year, has to go out the next year and thin out the deer herds a bit before they outstrip the park's resources and starve themselves. If you were a deer, it's going to seem like a horrible betrayal, last year he killed your enemies and saved many of your people, but now he's slaughtering you. But the moment you take the step back into the warden's morality, it again is a perfectly moral and 'right' action. It's all perspective.
crazysamaritan 05-26-04, 11:41 PM	Originally posted by Thorak And so, when an heir to the throne is discovered to be evil by his father who gets an archmage to conceal the alignment because of his love (not knowing/believing what evil can do), the evil heir is going to have a freaking field day with the populace, if he's smart enough to work his changes slowly. And they won't suspect a thing, because their world is perfectly Good and they're all so confident and naive that they'd be blind to it, until it's far too late. YOU STOLE MY IDEA!! :sad: cheater :pouts: On topic: My pref. for exploring alignments is using the 2ed. Thorak's preditor/prey model is also a good example of how your character will interact with the world.
Zelphi 05-27-04, 09:49 AM	Basically, don't let either go too far and don't let one win too many victories, jump to the side of the other if it looks like it's being persecuted.
Thorak 05-27-04, 09:58 AM	Originally posted by Zelphi Basically, don't let either go too far and don't let one win too many victories, jump to the side of the other if it looks like it's being persecuted. Just a comment; one of the idiocies in 2nd edition was people playing true neutral as "I fight for whoever's losing". The moment the Red Dragon was losing the fight, they attacked the PCs. This is ridiculous. And not necessarily what Zelphi meant, but it could be implied by that last phrase. My point was that the TN should be only fighting in causes that balance the world to begin with. Using my 'evil god' scenario I mentioned last time; defeating the God is worthwhile. Killing him was too unbalancing, so the TN should try to prevent the party from doing so. And not just when they're about to; he should be trying to convince them to stop, not kill, from day one. And he doesn't have to resort to killing the PCs if they disagree with him. Though he'll probably leave the group since they obviously could care less about his goals, and he might even help the forces of Evil balance the books by killing a Good deity. Switching sides mid-fight, though, is both incredibly Chaotic and a massive betrayal. It's as ridiculous as a park warden, to again further that analogy, trying to get a 3:7 ratio between his wolves and deer. So when he's got 10 wolves and 20 deer, he kills wolves until he's below that, at 8:20. And then kills deer down a bit, then wolves, and maybe balances out at 6 and 14. He could've got away with killing just one wolf, though, as opposed to 1/3 of each species.
Unleash 05-27-04, 12:36 PM	I was the one first mentioning the food chain ;), glad it came to fruition through your reasoning, has it now as become the cornerstone of mine also :thumbsup: . I chose that analogy since it seemed the most objective one and was at the same time an example we can all relate to. The way my org , the Keepers, are going to go on about their universal duties, is taking care at first of the biggest conflicts around them that they can reasonably deal with, proportionnaly to their manpower and ressources. They don't wanna burn out too fast on some mad cleansing crusade, they're in it for the long run, and they favor a low-profile anyday, over a flamboyant display of violence. So, like the park warden from Thorak's reasoning, they'll get bigger territories and bigger responsabilities, when they're good and ready. A gradual evolution is vital, since they'll need to learn about cultures, idealogies, ideas, religions, customs etc. in order to act objectively and efficiently. I can see small secret cells of Keepers, like the Valraks (Eyes) of the Kir-Lanan, acting as field agents in the every day lives of Faźrunians, trained to observe, learn, and archive information. (Note to self: make friends with Oghman Priests). As the org grows, they'll be able to move on to a much bigger goal: managing all of faźrun. And who knows, if they become knowledgeable enough and powerfull enough, they might even extend their influence to other planes or other worlds !
Shemeska the Marauder 05-27-04, 06:49 PM	One word answer for this: Rilmani Active neutrality as a concept taken flesh at the base of the Infinite Spire in the Outlands. The art and flavor was better in 2e Planescape, but at least some of them have been converted over. Subtle manipulation of the planes on the grandest of scales. Though I do have a bit of a liking for their precursors on the planes, the Kamarel. The Kamarel were true neutral as well but personified that alignments aspects as xenophobic seclusion and uninvolvement.
ZebRaderJedi 05-27-04, 10:37 PM	I have always like Active Neutrality, and its cousings Active LN and CN. As someone who has not bothered shelling out money for the BOED or the BOVD, I *would* probably buy a mature book on neutrality... call it the Book of Neutral Dogmas (BOND, hehe). For PCs, I have come to liking LN the most - but L in the adheres to internal code - disciplined within his/her belief system, not necessarily L as in Law & Order. ATN would be the close 2nd. My take on neutrality is that it is the most personal of alignments - not indifference or balance-fiends necessarily . In a world of absolute Good and Evil, where some (most?) creatures of like alignments band together the neutrals are the wild cards. In DL terms, Red Robes have fought for the Solamnics, but also for the Dark Queen. When I say (type) "personal" I mean a neutral is the most likely -as described - to consider all sides of an issue, and really get involved if it affects him personally (self, home, family, allies, nation, what have you). Whereas a do-gooder might get involved "just because it's the right thing to do" and an evil-doer would butt in for mayhem. [Stereotypes yes, but alignments in general are set up to reinforce certain stereotypes, at least from a BOED & BOVD POV (based on perusing copies @ the store).] Have the Rilmani made it into any official 3.x products yet? I sure hope so, 'cause they got it goin' on - THAT'd be a cool race to throw into any game. All IMHO 'natch. Comments welcome. Cheers, Zeb