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<blockquote data-quote="MadWand" data-source="post: 3314894" data-attributes="member: 4540">I have tried to take the lessons learned from psychology into account when I roleplay. When I play a sane character that is exposed to near-constant battles or often participates in exceptionally dangerous fights (or worse, both!) with little downtime, that character tends to get depressed and morose at the loss of hope and the constant deaths of close friends. Sometimes it's not fun to roleplay a depressed character. &quot;Insane&quot; or psychopathic characters (by modern standards, although they are usually completely well-adjusted by RPG standards) have other ways of adapting, such as just not caring about the lives of the other PC's, or their own life for that matter. That's even more depressing, and one of the reasons I'm a little disillusioned about Shadowrun.I prefer campaigns with downtime, and the chance to roleplay the occasional social event so my characters can stay sane and content. Still, my sane characters have to find some way of distancing themselves from the deaths they cause in battles or suffer for it. Many of my characters use ranged weapons, which helps a little. Merciful weapons help a lot. Blasting away with ranged spells like fireball, or even better, battlefield control spells helps the process of internal justification. &quot;The magic killed them, not me.&quot; Dehumanizing the enemy always helps, which is why almost all of my characters have been very focused on slaying evil as a motivation for adventuring. The worse the evil, the easier it is to justify killing it. This may be the primary reason for D&amp;D's alignment system in the first place.Those few characters of mine who have played up-front fighter types have tended to be somewhat psychopathic, or at least very philosophic about their role. I always have to come up with some reason to explain why my character is willing to kill, and it is always reflected in the characters psychology and in the way I roleplay that character.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="MadWand, post: 3314894, member: 4540"] I have tried to take the lessons learned from psychology into account when I roleplay. When I play a sane character that is exposed to near-constant battles or often participates in exceptionally dangerous fights (or worse, both!) with little downtime, that character tends to get depressed and morose at the loss of hope and the constant deaths of close friends. Sometimes it's not fun to roleplay a depressed character. "Insane" or psychopathic characters (by modern standards, although they are usually completely well-adjusted by RPG standards) have other ways of adapting, such as just not caring about the lives of the other PC's, or their own life for that matter. That's even more depressing, and one of the reasons I'm a little disillusioned about Shadowrun. I prefer campaigns with downtime, and the chance to roleplay the occasional social event so my characters can stay sane and content. Still, my sane characters have to find some way of distancing themselves from the deaths they cause in battles or suffer for it. Many of my characters use ranged weapons, which helps a little. Merciful weapons help a lot. Blasting away with ranged spells like fireball, or even better, battlefield control spells helps the process of internal justification. "The magic killed them, not me." Dehumanizing the enemy always helps, which is why almost all of my characters have been very focused on slaying evil as a motivation for adventuring. The worse the evil, the easier it is to justify killing it. This may be the primary reason for D&D's alignment system in the first place. Those few characters of mine who have played up-front fighter types have tended to be somewhat psychopathic, or at least very philosophic about their role. I always have to come up with some reason to explain why my character is willing to kill, and it is always reflected in the characters psychology and in the way I roleplay that character. [/QUOTE]

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