Dwarves with No Spirits

[Mister E]

I need some discussion on spirits & souls.

If you "unpack" material from old game books, you will find that there are arbitrary metaphysical differences between humans & demi-humans.

1) Humans & halflings have both souls & spirits.
2) Elves & gnomes only have spirits (& are soulless).
3) Dwarves only have souls (& are spiritless).

The one major way that these metaphysical differences play out in game can be seen in how certain spells (e.g., reincarnations & resurrections) relate to certain player races.

1) Human & halflings can be both reincarnated & resurrected.
2) Elves & gnomes can only be reincarnated.
3) Dwarves can only be resurrected.

[Mister E]

What is the difference between souls & spirits?

In my game, dwarves buy down their END to zero, and both their STR & all their powers cost zero END. This can be looked at in 2 ways:

1) Dwarves are stoic beings. To them, physical existence is secondary to the psychic. "All is mind. Matter is nothing." Dwarves are thus beings of virtually limitless energy, and can sustain phenomenal activity far past what is logical. They are fundamentally fortified by will power. Endurance is no object.

2) Dwarves cannot Push. They are spiritless (no END).

In a like fashion, elves & gnomes buy down their EGO to zero, and get to use their INT for psychology rolls (like Computers). I don't have this completely worked out anymore, but basically... elves & gnomes cannot push either, because they do not have souls (no EGOs).

Thus, only humans & halflings have both spirits & souls (ENDs & EGOs), and can Push. This makes them more vital as races.

[Mister E]

In this high-fantasy, supernaturally, belief itself (& faith) has the power to effect the real world. What the real world is may be debatable. There is more to existence than the prime material plane. In so far as inner & outer planar beings can have actual corporeal avatars (tangible bodies) so to can the inner & outer planes be actual corporeal "places" (& not merely abstract symbolic metaphorical allusions that exist in speech or "in the mind" alone).

[Mister E]

If a body dies, for instance, it takes time for souls/spirits to travel about to their final destinations. These bizarre journeys are not beyond the scope of the game. Likewise, if one employs necromancy (to contact the dead) the success & difficulty of the task is largely determined by the length of time the being has been dead (how close they are to their final destinations).

[Mister E]

So what are spirits & what are souls?

[Captain Obvious]

If I'm not mistaken, historically speaking, your soul is what makes you you. It's what carries all your psychology (so connecting it to EGO is right on target). The spirit is what makes your body live (so tying it to END is pretty appropriate as well). It's not really intelligent, but can form habits. When a person dies, their soul goes on their final reward/punishment, but it's possible their spirit could still roam the earth as a ghost. This also explains ghosts of (dogmatically soulless) animals. Somewhere along the line, this metaphysical hairsplitting disappeared.

It seems to me that, aside from being full sociopaths, elves, gnomes, and other soulless beings wouldn't have psychological limitations, having no real psychology to limit. If they have anything resembling a psych lim, it's a learned behavior more than a true obsession/phobia, and should be easily bought off when they learn other behavior. For example, if a soulless critter has a "fear" of fire, it's because it learned that fire is dangerous, but as they learn the proper handling of fire, the fear should fall away quickly.

There used to be an RPG called Arrowstorm or something, that made some kind of soul/spirit connection to corporeal/non-corporeal undead, but I don't recall exactly how anymore...

[CrosshairCollie]

So what are spirits & what are souls?

In my games? Spirits are alcoholic beverages and souls are nonexistent.

[Escafarc]

Remember that Gingers also have no souls

[Mister E]

If I'm not mistaken, historically speaking, your soul is what makes you you. It's what carries all your psychology (so connecting it to EGO is right on target). The spirit is what makes your body live (so tying it to END is pretty appropriate as well). It's not really intelligent, but can form habits.

I'm glad you like the soul/EGO & spirit/END relation I made.

Socrates' soul/psyche (from the Republic) has 3 parts: logos (reason...deduction...); pathos (emotion... attitude...); & spirit/thymos (blood... fire... breath... "chi").

When a person dies, their soul goes on their final reward/punishment, but it's possible their spirit could still roam the earth as a ghost. This also explains ghosts of (dogmatically soulless) animals. Somewhere along the line, this metaphysical hairsplitting disappeared.

This is good.

So... if dwarves do not have spirits, then it stands to reason that they do not have spiritual ghosts that haunt the prime material plane (spirits separated from their souls). Dwarven corpses can be re-animated into mindless automatons, but no intelligent undead are dwarven. So we have:

1) Soulless & spiritless corporeal undead dwarves (skeletons & zombies).
2) Merely a new form of spiritless soul (truly dead dwarf off to its final destination).

Humans, halflings, elves, & gnomes... do have spiritual ghosts and are thus prone to haunting the prime material plane as intelligent ghosts:

1) Spirits separated from their souls in the case of humans & halflings.
2) Merely a new form of soulless spirit in the case of elves & gnomes.

There is something fundamentally different between different forms of death/undeath.

It seems to me that, aside from being full sociopaths, elves, gnomes, and other soulless beings wouldn't have psychological limitations, having no real psychology to limit. If they have anything resembling a psych lim, it's a learned behavior more than a true obsession/phobia, and should be easily bought off when they learn other behavior. For example, if a soulless critter has a "fear" of fire, it's because it learned that fire is dangerous, but as they learn the proper handling of fire, the fear should fall away quickly.

I like this a lot, too. Also, it simplifies the game (no psychology).

So... maybe they are like Computer Programs? Elves & gnomes in this sense are beings of supreme equanimity... if that is their way. "Faerie" class of minds? Prone to logic-traps (some fantastic version/expansion of Computer Programming)?

Goblins & vampires (also soulless spirits) can be fully psychopathic.

There used to be an RPG called Arrowstorm or something, that made some kind of soul/spirit connection to corporeal/non-corporeal undead, but I don't recall exactly how anymore...

Thanks.

[Mister E]

In my games? Spirits are alcoholic beverages and souls are nonexistent.

Non-metaphysically speculative pragmatic Buddhism? In your game, does the non-existence of souls pre-suppose the non-existence of god-heads? Is there a cocktail called, "The Elven Vampire?"

[Mister E]

Remember that Gingers also have no souls

Does a Ginger have a Buddha-nature?

[CrosshairCollie]

Non-metaphysically speculative pragmatic Buddhism? In your game, does the non-existence of souls pre-suppose the non-existence of god-heads? Is there a cocktail called, "The Elven Vampire?"

I'm not quite sure what you're asking. If you're asking 'does my game world have gods', the answer is no (though this doesn't mean there's no religion).

[Lucius]

I need some discussion on spirits & souls.

If you "unpack" material from old game books, you will find that there are arbitrary metaphysical differences between humans & demi-humans.

1) Humans & halflings have both souls & spirits.
2) Elves & gnomes only have spirits (& are soulless).
3) Dwarves only have souls (& are spiritless).

The one major way that these metaphysical differences play out in game can be seen in how certain spells (e.g., reincarnations & resurrections) relate to certain player races.

1) Human & halflings can be both reincarnated & resurrected.
2) Elves & gnomes can only be reincarnated.
3) Dwarves can only be resurrected.

The way I recall it, in 1st Edition AD&D, a sentient being had either a soul or a spirit, never both, and always one or the other.

Elves, Half-Orcs, and the so-called "humanoids" such as Orcs, Goblins, Ogres, Trolls, etc, have spirits.

Humans, Halflings, Half-Elves, Dwarves, and I'm pretty sure Gnomes, have souls.

The major actual game consequence was that Elves and Half-Orcs could not be ressurrected.

Lucius Alexander

The palindromedary still thinks the best commentary on the subject is from Magician Humphrey in Piers Anthony's A Spell for Chameleon: Only beings that have souls, are concerned about them.

[Mister E]

Socrates' soul/psyche (from the Republic) has 3 parts: logos (reason...deduction...); pathos (emotion... attitude...); & spirit/thymos (blood... fire... breath... "chi").

It is from this sense of thymos that the word 'dysthymia' comes from. Among other things, dysthymia is literally the imbalance of alchemical (fire, wind, air, & earth) humours in the body.

Accordingly, dwarves w/o spirits ought to be immune to attacks of dysthymia as they have no balance of humours.

[Mister E]

I'm not quite sure what you're asking. If you're asking 'does my game world have gods', the answer is no (though this doesn't mean there's no religion).

Very cool.