Editing Alignment (section)

====Obstructive bureaucrat====
{{Topquote|Justice is not blind, for I am her eyes.|Vhailor ''Planescape Torment''}}

Think Paladins without the morality. Lawful Neutral characters are essentially the law-made-manifest. They uncompromisingly enforce the law down to the letter and do not give any unofficial leeway regardless of the circumstances. Stole some food to feed your starving family? One year, isocubes. Stole a car to save the lives of hundreds? '''Five years.''' Robbed the bank to buy a cure for your dying sister? '''TWENTY YEARS!''' And code thirty six thirteen, the first degree murder of a street judge... Death. Court's adjourned.

If they aren't actively enforcing the law, they are instead following it to the letter and will insist that other people must do the same. The reasoning varies, but it usually boils down to them respecting and upholding order, which the law represents. Upholding order isn't always simple or easy, sometimes you have to make the hard call and have morality take a back seat a few times for the bigger picture (what the "bigger picture" actually is will vary from character from character, of course).

At best, they're obstructive bureaucrats who will get through almost anything by ruthlessly exploiting every legal avenue and loophole they can find (they probably legally ruined a few lives along the way, but the law's the law, not their problem). At worst, they're insufferable [[Rules Lawyer]]s given the license of roleplay, and will bitch even more about the rules than the lawful goods. They're going to turn on you the second you jaywalk across the street to stop a mugger, so as soon as you get out of town, leave them in a shallow grave. Beware even harder of [[Lawful Stupid]].

That being said, there are settings where they're justified. Judge Dredd, the Adeptus Arbites,... Chicago or California on a weekend... Whatever it may say about human nature, it's pretty easy to worldbuild a scenario where hard-nosed lawgivers are the last bastion of morality and justice. On non-[[grimdark]] settings, though, they could end up being the actual villains of the story in the absence of an outright [[BBEG]].

One risk over with this alignment is how easily it can quickly seep over into Lawful Evil and a lot of this seems to come from the (likely accidental) enabling of evil deeds. At times, it makes them come off over as a sort of of passive Lawful Evil rather than actually Lawful Neutral. Then again, this may speak more to the nature of morality on a systemic level vs individual level.