How do you roleplay ghosting

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Procrastinator
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How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Procrastinator »

I know you can have permanent death, but both players need to agree. I want to ask, how do you roleplay getting ghosted? Is the island a magical place where you get second chances, or is ghosting just being wounded? How can you take death seriously when you can just go to a cross. Also, how does the VBU change this?
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Katharina Brightrim
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Katharina Brightrim »

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Estralis Seborian
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Estralis Seborian »

Katharina Ross wrote:I think you are only badly wounded, when you get ghosted.
Clearly: No. You should roleplay exactly what you see: After receiving a lot of painful hits, your character turns into a ghost like thing and gets restored to its original, yet weakened form at a "holy place". Ghosts aren't just wounded characters. I never understood who brought this up.

The VBU will clarify all this, the method of resurrection was changed and you'll be told clearly what just happened.
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Katharina Brightrim
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Katharina Brightrim »

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Grokk
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Grokk »

Procrastinator wrote:How can you take death seriously when you can just go to a cross.
Because the character doesn't know this.

As a player, sure, you know that you can continue to resurrect your character indefinitely. Unless you want them to, they will never stay dead. Death in Illarion just isn't a big deal to the person behind the screen. But this isn't an excuse or reason for roleplaying it poorly.

To an inhabitant of Gobaith, I imagine that death seems like something of a lottery. They see and hear of people returning from their deathbeds all the time. They might have even personally experienced such a rebirth. However, they also see people who do enter the afterlife. They know that everyone dies for good, eventually. They know that it is the gods who determine whether or not a given death is final, and they know that it is a futile exercise to try and predict a god's actions. Permanent death would appear, for all intents and purposes, an entirely random occurrence. The characters know they'll die, they just don't know which 'death' it will be that finally takes them.

Many players treat a specific trip to the cross as a fairly minor event in their character's life, which is simply nonsense. The character has just died. That is an unavoidable fact. Whether or not the circumstances of their death were traumatic in nature, the event is going to have a significant impact on the character. They are not going to be the same person that they were before. They are likely to experience a particularly strong emotional response to the person or thing involved in their demise. There will generally also be some serious physical scars that remain. These might affect the way in which other people see the character, or how the character sees himself.

Beyond the particular death event itself, the circumstances surrounding the resurrection will have their own impact upon the character. They have to deal with the fact that they have just been denied entry into the afterlife. To some, this would be devastating. Others would see the second chance as a blessing. Others still would take it as a sign that their work upon Illarion was incomplete. Whatever the effect, it will probably be a major one; a god has just directly intervened in the course of their life. Other characters might also react to them in a different manner. Although people know that resurrection occurs, that doesn't mean that they aren't suspicious of it. How are they to know that there wasn't any black magic at work.

Death isn't something that a character is going to get used to. No one is building up some sort of tolerance to it. People aren't dying and being resurrected 30+ times. Deaths in Illarion are generally violent and painful. Even if a character manages to overcome that, the process of resurrection is arguably an even more life-changing experience. After being constantly reborn on Illarion, any character is going to interpret this as something meaningful.
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Djironnyma
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Djironnyma »

I think we have do separate why a char dies - if he dies in a dungeon killed by an npc mostly in reason of Disconnect or lag you shouldn't make a drama out of it. If a other char kills your char or he die during a quest you should indeed play this more serious.

edit:
@grokk:
I agree that any roleplayer should think about how his character handle a situation in which he died and how he change maybe afterwards. Anyway i don't agree that it have to change anyone. In reason of my job i know many people were reanimated in reason of a heart attack or similar event. Some of them have afterwards a total changeover of their life but the most of them stay more or less the same.
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Achae Eanstray
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Achae Eanstray »

I personally think there are as many ways to RP ghosting as their are players and have seen a lot of different theories some proclaiming they are the only right ones. I simply go along with most in game except the perma. You don't need two players to approve.. only one player can say what happens to their own char, well that player and/or a GM.
Grokk
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Grokk »

Djironnyma wrote:@grokk:
I agree that any roleplayer should think about how his character handle a situation in which he died and how he change maybe afterwards. Anyway i don't agree that it have to change anyone. In reason of my job i know many people were reanimated in reason of a heart attack or similar event. Some of them have afterwards a total changeover of their life but the most of them stay more or less the same.
I don't think you can really compare one of these feats of medical science which occur in the real world with the type of resurrection that takes place in Illarion. But in any case, everyone who experiences such an event in real life would be changed by it. Whether the effects are obvious to a third party or not, they are still there. Even the person himself need not recognise the change.
Thargon
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Thargon »

I always thought it was that the spirit gets knocked from the body and has to make it's way back to the cross in order to rejoin with its somewhat reincarnated physical form. otherwise Cherga takes the soul to the underworld ((death)). how to roleplay this........ I have no idea. I just go on with whatever goes for the Ghosted person. yesterday I had to carry someone out from the depths of a dungeon and return that person to the cross for them to wake. ((example))

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Logrin Parr
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Logrin Parr »

Well, it seems pretty clear cut that the official position is death and reincarnation. Though I have to say it's always been one of those small things that's never sat well with me. A wounded/limping graphic, rather than a ghost would seem more versatile--as I'd be more willing to accept a character escaping from a dangerous monster than rising from the dead for the umpteenth time.
Procrastinator
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Procrastinator »

Yeah, it's the biggest flaw I percieve in Illarion. I understand the need to avoid constant perma death, but I'd much rather have it be severely wounded. Either that, or make the consequences for death much greater so as to replicate the real life fear people have of dying.
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Alexander Knight
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Alexander Knight »

Bring back clouding!
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Re: How do you roleplay ghosting

Post by Flux »

Procrastinator wrote:Yeah, it's the biggest flaw I percieve in Illarion. I understand the need to avoid constant perma death, but I'd much rather have it be severely wounded. Either that, or make the consequences for death much greater so as to replicate the real life fear people have of dying.
Right now you lose your items, skill and for hours your character is useless and vulnerable, and the inconvenience of walking to the cross. Obviously, to the character who has nothing, this isn't motivation, but to a long term character who's skill points take hours and hours to get back, and losing expensive equipment, and being in a state where a novice could beat your character up, is surely enough of an engine-wise motivation not to get killed.

But more importantly, from a roleplaying perspective: your character feels pain.

People saying, "Why should our characters fear death when you can get resurrected?"

Okay, cool story there, why don't you go jump into a nettle bush? It won't kill you, so what's to fear, right? Jump off a third story building, you might break your legs but they'll heal.

Imagine the pain associated with DYING. You don't think that's enough motivation not to get killed?
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