Is death not really death in Lusternia? Has any character ever seen anyone die and not come back? Death in the real world is about ceasing to exist here on Earth in your present form. There seem to be a few ways in which characters cease to exist in the Basin.

1) Suicide: A voluntary choice open to anyone at anytime. Most of the time it is the player and not the character who wants to do this.

2) Sacrifice: Yes even gods like Isune can cease to exist. But it doesn't happen much. Generally saving everything from a souless is involved.

3) Shrubbery: More of a change of existance. Anyway, how many people have even been shrubbed for IC reasons. Usually OOC abuses or cheating is involved. It is not very common and isn't always permanent.

4) QQ: By far the most common and the most like real life death. A character ceases to exist in basin. Sometimes they come back; sometimes they don't. There is often no explanation provided. No one knows where the person has gone or when or if they will ever be back. Our characters blatantly acknowledge this event with goodbyes and farewells. So, what is the IC explanation for the danger of "resting our soul"? Why is this event not even a minor focal point in the culture of the Basin?

This is clearly a case of "pretend" and mixing up IC features with OOC neccesities. Obviously things like Shrubbing are entirely ooc, and even suicide is OOC to a certain degree. QQ is merely a neccesary evil since people can't stay online all the time, and if it wouldn't ruin the game for so many people, there would be no ressurection either, but as it is, you should treat death as something very real, remember, if the fates wouldn't save you, you would pass into the next world without a moment's notice.

Damn, I try to RP that sometimes, but pull that through if people are telling you left and right 'Oh, don't make such a fuss. You'll come back anyway.'

Note my sometimes, I generally only do it if I am in the mood, and this mood gets rarer and rarer.

I guess I am with Ashteru on this one. I would find it more believable if people showed worry or fear at someone's passing or treated it as anything more than a minor inconvenience.

Coming from someone who threw themselves at raiders about 15 times.. in defence of something like that, Conglutination -is- a sure thing, so, that right there lowers the fear factor some, however, my character views the situation somewhat differently.

I play Bet as experience being a -completely- IC thing. I mean, the idea of experience in Lusternia is absorbing energy from the things you kill, or the emotional energy of the things you influence, its not so much learning, which I always hear people try to equate it to. (though, it does lead to a sort of Soulless syndrome.. eating the energy of creatures to grow stronger. Hmm... perhaps it shouldn't be so surprising that Vernal Gods were able to defeat the Soulless.. they weren't all that dissimilar )

And that is sort of a conflict Bet even has when people are like "Ew, Taint, touch of Kethuru!! Eww!" because he views mortals themselves as miniature soulless.. which is why he prefers his wolf and horse.. he actually envies denizens.

Basically though, he doesn't fear death so long as he has energy stores. In fact, he doesn't even believe that the Fates COULD cut his strand, even if they wanted to... but then again, he IS from Glomdoring.. so a bit of insanity is needed

Anyway.. off track.. but, basically, I RP death as a minimal thing, and am quite fine with saying "He cost me 60% of a Circle", because, for my RP, they are completely real and tangible things, which his philosophy and psyche are actually based around.

Compared to most other people, my ideas are quite different, as are many people's ideas when compared. Death in Lusternia, as I see it, is open to interpretation, just like everything else.. and that's what makes it so fun :pets the Glomdoring:

Life after death is always a fun topic. I had questions about it and then pursued them in game and found out cool stuff. I recommend pestering someone.

I hate this answer. I really do. I've hated it since the very first MUD I ever played on.

Internal logic is the grease in the gears of MUD role-play.

The less you have of it, the more you're guaranteed to see the players constantly at each other's throats, arguing over who's spoiling who's RP, and who is more IC than thou.

Lusternia took a step in the right direction, acknowledging the facts of MUD life and explaining them away IC, by introducing the amnesia effects of the portal.

What would be so wrong about expanding on that and saying that this traumatic, risky trip through the portal grants those with the will to survive it virtual immortality?

It's not just the facts of death this would explain away, but why the mortal races are called mortals, and why whe have a wide-range of ages represented among the MOBs of the basin, despite the fact PCs always come back and never age a day.

What is the point of yelling, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" when you could be saying, "Oh, yeah. That's Frank. Frank runs the doodad thingy there for us, and a smashing good job he does of it. Shall we go have some tea?"

The quickest way to dispel any illusion is to try to deny the facts instead of incorporating them into the dream.

I don't really see your problem, you're "mortal" if the meaning of that word is unknown to you please take a look at dictionary.com for a good definition and try reading the story next time you perish, and you will see that it is an active choice on the fates' side that keeps you from passing into whatever worlds lie beyond.

If my answer is really this traumatic to you, I would suggest you ignore it, wether or not you believe yourself to be "practically immortal" makes no difference whatsoever and if it makes you feel happy I am quite sure no one will actively complain against you doing so.

Shiro is undead, he doesn't have to worry about death

True Death is a real possibility in Lusternia, it just doesn't generally happen to those the Fates consider to have an important destiny and/or function in the world.

So I take it Fink63, Fink67, Gnome82, and all of those guys in newton caverns also have a destiny.

Sorry, I just couldn't resist...

Since numbers don't exist ICly, you could argue that gnomes and finks aren't kept from true death, and it's other gnomes and finks.

Or we can say that their destiny is to satisfy the bloodlust of our newbies who have an even greater destiny.

What a horrible existance that would be... to live just so you can die, and then repeat the process.

Isn't that what most Glomdoringers are doing, though?

You also have to remember that the culture in Lusternia is VERY different to Real Life cultures, especialy in the realm of death. The reason why death is tramatic and scary in RL is because no one comes back from it; it's a permanent change into the ultimate unknown. You can't turn back from it.

Now the people who have traveled through the Portal have been declared 'special' and, thus, can't simply be snipped off without Bad Things happening (remember the conversation the Fates have when you die). After seeing all post-portalers comming back time and time again the fear of 'what happens after you die' fades VERY QUICKLY, especialy after generations pass (find a child afraid of the internet ). True, you should have the occasional person still panic stricken over dying (just like how some people are DESPERATELY AFRAID to change jobs, even when they know a better one is available: some people fear any change) but overall, death is just not a big deal for folks like us.

As for Suicide, I always figured that it was more than just you dying; you actively choose to split yourself from the rebirth cycle. Either that belief gives the Fates the ability to cut your strand without Bad Things Happening or your will is strong enough to let you avoid Fate salvation.

Sidenote: some people are so important that they can never, ever escape the rebirth and, thus, cannot commit Suicide (read: people who buy credits).

Another sidenote: I think that means that the Lusternian definition of 'undead' is similar but not realy the same of typical RL definitions.. at least from the definition I've thought of (body who's soul/lifeforce/mind/whatever is gone but the body is still active). Lusternia's Undead seem to be more 'anti-dead/mutants' than 'soulless creatures'.

No.

Yes, the story is that the fates make an active decision. The same exact active decision a hundred times a day, always riding on the edge of a dime, yet always falling in the same direction. That's the story. Doen't make it make sense.

It's death, not life, that is the active decision, and every aspect of the game reflects that fact except when it conflicts with some convenience of storytelling.

And what do you mean by "good definition"?

All the definitions I see there, same as those I see on Meriam Webster, are either "human" (which most characters in the game aren't) or in some way related to death (which none of the named characters in the game ever do experience in any meaningful way).

Dictionary.com then goes on to offer no useful definition of death beyond "the termination of life". And it then defines "termination" as "The end of something in time; the conclusion."

The "death" of a name character in Lusternia in no way concludes his life. It's just a hiccup in the thread of it. Ergo, the named characters in Lusternia are decidedly NOT mortal.

Next time you want to try to make me look bad, please choose some topic like my ego or my temper. Trying to make me look ignorant or illogical is just a waste of keystrokes.

My dear Exarius, for all your banter, you appear to have completely missed the point of my post, allow me to try and explain. I wasn't arguing that you are going to permanently die next time have the dubious honour of gracing their hall again, but rather that if not for them saving you time and time again, you would have long ago passed from this world. (A very sad event I am sure you will agree)

Since you are having trouble understanding the format of dictionary.com, I'll just elaborate a bit on my earlier argument. Mortal, by definition means "capable of dying", in contrast to gods, who are "Immortal". Now, whether or not the fates save you time and time again is irrelevant, mortals are neither invincible nor immortal. To argue that you are is to ignore the fact that those who have not passed through the portal do permanently die. If your character believes that he is immortal then that is all very well of course, but that doesn't really change that from an IC perspective, as soon as the fates decide you're not important anymore you're going to bite the dust.

Now, I do not doubt you're going to follow this up with another post claiming you are right and I am wrong, and you should indeed feel free. However, as I am part of the administration team I should not have responded to your feedback in the way I did, and for that I apologise and I will refrain from adding more to this topic, as this is just going to end up in a circle discussion.

Zing!

And what about named mobs? Does that mean they get resurrected?

The Admins are the one with the access to the player data files. That is why there can be no argument, that our characters are mortal. Really, I knew when I posted this; that we were, in that sense, mortal.

My concern had more to do with our characters' perspectives on death. From Kidaen's last post, it seems it is perfectly sane for our characters to be fearless of death and expect a safe return everytime.

Though, we should all be motivated to make connections and have an impact on the Basin around us. It would seem our activities are what sustain us.