Here's a quick list I got:

bite
blank
click
confused
crookedgrin
daydream/drift
dead?
dribble
excellent
eyecross
eyetwitch
fidget
fret
glomp
hidebehind
impgrin
lurch
mutter
nervous
nervouspace
nothing
paranoia
ramble
rant
stresscrack
temples
tense

Also consider: Idiots, Nomore, Voices, and Traipse

Oh man you know what insanity needs? A change.

Go play 'Eternal Darkness' for the game cube. It has a sanity meter, the lower it is, the more creepy and crazy the game gets. For example, at one point I had low sanity, walked into a room, and it looked like the volume on my TV dropped. Another time I walked into a room and there were zombies everything, I started fighting and then it started saying my control was unplugged. I freaked the heck out.

I think the emotes could go or stay, makes no difference, but it could certainly start messing with the player more. Instead of saying "Iasmos tells you 'go kiss the feet of the fae' why not "Iasmos tells you 'Greetings, do you have a moment to speak on the Fae?'

Or maybe a random attack line, like Thoros just pinlegged you. Or Akui whirls her sword above your head like she's about to decap ya.

Oh man, random commune/city chatter. I can see it now (Serenwilde): Sarrasri says, "Hey Kinson, we are watching you."

....I could go for days with this.

EDIT: I'm more then willing to think of plenty more too. And these would seriously make you look like a lunatic. Especially if I started trying to talk back to Iasmos or Sarrasri.

Personally, I've got no problem with insanity making someone eat boogers. It would be nice if insanity could reflect the person more -- an insane Lendren should probably do different things than an insane Shuyin -- but hey, we're not asking a mechanic to give us Oscar-winning performances here.

But things like "Let's get cHaOtic!!!" you exclaim. or You gaze about sadly, looking for someone to lurve. or You excitedly bounce on the tips of your toes as you wave furiously and squeal, "BAIIIIIIIIIIIIII!" (and its twin You excitedly bounce on the tips of your toes as you wave furiously and squeal, "HAIIIIIIIIIIIIII!") or You cock a snook. do not lend themselves to explanation by exposure to Kethuru so much as they suggest exposure to Britney Spears, and they do not encourage an interesting roleplay of the effects of insanity, rather they interrupt it or preclude it.

Random emotes isn't a great way to handle insanity (random selections from a list of appropriate ones might be better, but a pain to maintain), but it's a good enough one given the limitations of code. The problem is just the emotes we're stuck with. Insanity's only a problem because it forces us to confront the bits of the emote list that we would rather boycott.

(Incidentally, I love the straitjacket idea for an artifact. Even better: if there were a half-dozen varieties, each referencing a different kind of personality reflected in a different selection of emotes you get when insane in place of the whole list, so you choose the kind of insane person you become: paranoid, morose, overexcited, etc. Great dingbat-artifact idea.)

More RP with insanity....sure!

Top tier insanity levels ideas:
Messing with your 'says'

Example:
say Hello Newbie Mc.Nooberson, how are you doing?

what happens

His right eyelid twitching strangely, Kinson says 'Hello Newbie Mc.Nooberson, how are you doing?
or
Scratching himself furiously all over, Kinson says
or
Staring off into space, Kinson says

Eyes wide and not blinking, Kinson says

Shivering and shaking all over, Kinson says

Looking around the room frantically, Kinson says

I've got more ideas too,

you check QSC only to see your level is 0 at 5.6%
you check QSC and all your stats are 1
your health/mana/ego/wp/end is at 1
you check score, all your clans are 'I am watching you.'
you check stat, your enemied to twenty things, all of them CLOWNS
HONOURS'ing someone you get your own honours instead
QL gives you another room, one close by.

The straightjacket would be awesome. I would totally be way more into insanity if it was something more consistent, like all paranoid: as a Keph, I might unconsciously twitch and stare at every illithoid, or get random thoughts about my guild being out to get me. More atmospheric and definitely something I could roleplay through other than glomping and haiiiing.

Remove glomp, add Vendetta's and I would call it a good list.





I love these ideas! The other ones not so much, but the above... absolutely fantastic.

Not sure if anyone has said anything yet. but the "OOC" nature of the emotes, is exactly what "insanity" is Ig.

That is, if someone says something OOC we call that being insane.

Transversing beyond the astral plane is therefore akin to breaking the fourth wall. The player is what is truly trapped in Astral and we are all insane.

Astral Insanity actually making more sense in terms of insanity would be nice. The current working is like... less insanity, and more a severe case of Tourette syndrome. At least with all the emotes that are picked. There are decent ideas above which sound good, but the current insanity is so insane that it doesn't even look like insanity, heh.

Awww, Tervic, you just don't want your system freaking out if it sees you at 1 hp mana and ego


Which would be hilarious. And discourage bashing anymore.

More:

The lusternia startup/login screen appears again.
The message that someone wants to learn from you.


Auto replying to tells:

Tervic tells you, "Hey".
You see: Startled, you quickly reply with the first thing that comes to your mind.
Tervic sees:

Kinson tells you, "You're one of THEM! I knew it!"
or
"There's butter on my face!!"
"Have I ever told you I love you?"
"Potato."
"Haha hehe hoho! I am a chair!"

Your health on your prompt suddenly reads over 9000. (Or more)

Standing in a room with another person, random stuff seems to happen to them.
Like if I was bat-crazy and was standing at Mother with Akui.

Suddenly a crab pops out of Akui's ear, somehow clinging to her, it skuttles around her face before quickly diving into a nostril.

Akui's face begins to change, her head growing to a rather large size as her teeth become pointy and jagged.
Make-up appears, and covers her entire face, making her look rather clown like, before her nose pops into a red round shape. As you stare eyes wide, the face grins and opens wide as if about to devour you whole!

Playing on clown fears is fun.

Suddenly everything goes black, you hear music from some unknown source and before you sits a giant box, twice your size. A large crank sticks out to one side, slowly turning in time with the music. The music and crank halt suddenly. Akui POPS from the top of the box on a large spring, and you nearly lose bowel control.

Should I come up with more?

EDIT: I spells good, and grammar are for winners.

new insanity messages would be cool. Is there -any- insanity that would cause a person to stop bashing if they knew it was insanity? I would think they could code around it if they wanted.

Apparently Lokin thinks insanity = tripping the hell out on LCD.

LSD, Insanity, same thing.

As a fan of the Eternal Darkness insanity mechanic, I would be ALL for implementing this kind of stuff into Lusternia if the straitjacket ideas isn't approved.

Also, I was always under the impression that Astral "insanity" and OOC "madness" are completely different.

I like Lokin's take on insanity, some really interesting ideas in it. Especially the fake scores and paranoia inducing tells.

EDIT: Lendren also has some pretty cool ideas.

There are some good ideas, but I dislike the vast majority of them.

This is a common misconception.

If you look up Help Insanity, you get quite a different file then Help Madness.

OOCness is Madness. Not Insanity.

To be fair, it was help Insanity originally. Madness wasn't used till Astral Insanity came in during year 2. Daganev is merely outdated.

Insanity is also the catch-term in all the other IRE's for being OOC.

Too true... too true