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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 6747890" data-attributes="member: 6775031">As they say, an author must be greater than his or her characters, in the same way that an actor must contain a role to be portrayed. Maybe I'm throwing everyone off by referring to player and character as distinct and unrelated entities, when the reality would better be represented by saying that the character is a distinct way for the player to think. Each of us possesses the capability of representing multitudes of different characters, but when we're playing one of them, we're not playing any of the others, or playing ourselves.When I'm operating under the sub-set of my knowledge and capabilities which represent my character, I don't have access to my mechanical engineering ability (or persuasive talent, supposing I had some). If I tried to access that, then I wouldn't be in-character anymore. Moreover, the other players at the table would probably notice if I was acting out-of-character, and it would start to pull them out of character, until the whole thing collapses in a feedback loop and none of us are in-character and we're all just sitting around a table rolling dice.Personally, as a player, killing a dragon just isn't that exciting to me. I've killed hundreds of dragons. It is extremely exciting to my character, though, who has never fought a dragon before and whose actual life is on the line. When I'm in-character, my brain is undergoing processes similar to what the character's brain would be undergoing if the whole thing was actually happening; as far as the character is concerned - and as far as I am concerned, while I remain in-character - all of that actually is happening.Which isn't to say that you can't have fun if you're just sitting around a table and talking about some sort of abstract fictional characters who slay a dragon. It's just saying that it's a lot more fun to imagine that you're actually there, as the character slaying the dragon. That is, as they say, the "magic" of role-playing.</blockquote>

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