One of my favorite things as a roleplayer is research. I know that it may sound
really strange to people, but I enjoy learning and I enjoy applying that knowledge in what I (and my characters!) do. So, when I rolled my human paladin, I spent some time researching the process by which an individual became a knight and what they did. When I rolled my troll priest (a jungle troll not a member of the Darkspear Tribe), I did a lot of research on tribal societies in different parts of the world, their mysticism, and the role that witch doctors and spirit men play in them. My Forsaken warlock suffers from what probably is persistent dissociative disorder; I have spent quite a bit of time learning more about what this is and also looking for first-hand accounts from real people who suffer from this.
In writing, many authors spend quite a bit of time doing research so that they can accurately portray what is in their books. This is true regardless of what genre they write. Now, we're not professionals nor are we expected to hold to the same standards, but I do find it beneficial to learn these kinds of things so that we can better portray our characters in roleplay. Even more important is the fact that this research can potentially lead to new twists in or opportunities for roleplay.
I'll be very honest, embarrassing as it may be. When our druids were training in various forms throughout the course of a week or two, I did have videos bookmarked on Firefox that portrayed similar types of animals fighting. Unfortunately, this also included stumbling across
this video, which resulted in moments of uncontrollable laughter when Krilari's character failed a roll (I think he rolled a natural 1) and was distracted because he was too busy watching an eagle in the sky.
Manufreak101 Wrote:But still, anyone with me for the telekinesis? sounds good If you ask me :P
I'm loathe to comment, but you have used this term a number of times in this discussion and I'm not sure if it's intentional. Telepathy is used to refer to communication that occurs beyond one of the five senses (typically mind-to-mind). Telekinesis is influencing the world with the mind alone (typically by moving objects).
I
think you mean the former and not the latter, but I'm not certain.
Regarding the use of telepathy, in general I believe that many people frown upon it during roleplay. This is because it does have a rather large potential for misuse -- which I'm sure many of us have encountered roleplaying on retail, where the standards are not as stringent. If I can communicate with you using my mind (and without a medium), the next logical step is that I can probably understand what you're trying to think back at me. If I can understand that, then it would also make sense that I can understand other minds who may not be communicating with me. In time, it often progresses to actually manipulating other people's thoughts or actions. Always a no-no.
It is also an ability that is reliant on the individuals that roleplay with a telepath. If I roleplay a character with telepathy, I need other people to be able to communicate with me. Their players also must be willing to do so. If they choose not to allow me to communicate mind-to-mind or understand other people's thoughts, my efforts to be a telepath are stunted.
I
did manage to inadvertently apply telepathy with one of my characters on retail. My perky priestess, Csilla Kovács, engaged in a lot of in-character world PvP. One of my favorite tactics to use (and one that, sadly, is very underutilized) is
Mind Vision. While attempting to search for infiltrators in various Alliance holdings, I'd essentially periodically stop what I was doing, do a quick
/tar name, and use Mind Vision. The interesting part of this was that one of my frequent targets ended up deciding that the two of us had built some kind of mental rapport as a result; an intangible bond that, while it didn't allow for communication, allowed us to be able to sense when we were in proximity with one another and also strong emotions.
It was
his idea, but I thought that it was pretty nifty and decided to collude with him. It also provided a fun twist to roleplaying my character; my perky human priestess was somehow tied to a tauren death knight, resulting in all sorts of unhappiness on her part. Not to mention the mocking she got from her friends about "dead cow babies".