3 -0600, Kenneth Gauck wrote:
>Let me reverse the question. What is positive energy if its not the
>opposite energy of undeath? It would seem to me that positive energy is
>specifically for combating undead. I know of no other characteristics of it.
Isn`t positive energy the same stuff that heals the living? Hence its
damaging effected on the nonliving undead in the same way that the negative
energy wielded by evil or otherwise negatively aligned clerics that damages
the living can heal the undead. By extension, isn`t turning a use of
positive energy and taking control of undead a use of negative energy?
>>I disagree. Incorporeal is a “no body” state, while gaseous form is a
>>“gaseous body” state, i.e. you still have a body but it`s been “changed”
to a different state (e.g. ice, water, steam).
That may or may not be a technical definition in the rules, I`m really not
>interested in that. There is the broader notion obviously represented in
>the original post that being without a body included both technical
>incorporality and other kinds of being without a body, like being a gas.
>You are too tied to the rules and it leaves you unable to consider
>situations not covered in the rules.
The earlier question did specifically mention gaseous form v.
incorporable. While this might not be terribly well spelled out in the
texts it is covered in the rules, and would seem to be pretty accurately
described by the descriptors used above. A character turned into "gaseous
form" is not incorporeal, and cannot therefore attack an incorporeal
creature–at least not any more effectively than s/he could when solid. He
couldn`t pass into an airtight container, while an incorporeal character
could. If a person in gaseous form could attack an incorporeal creature
than what about other energy/material states? Would water elementals be
effective against ghosts? That`s just a few degrees away from gaseous. A
gust of wind could knock over a ghost if the state of matter that was not
“massy” allowed one to “penetrate” into the realm of the incorporeal.
Probably a better way to think of an incorporeal object is to note that it
is shifted into another (usually “adjacent”) plane of existence in such a
way that its perceptions are on both, but it`s physical body is on the
alternate plane, and has very limited interaction with the material
plane. Gaseous characters are not plane shifted, and don`t interact any
more directly with the physical aspect of the incorporeal character than
any other material character. You could suck a gaseous creature up in a
giant bellows, but one wouldn`t want a set of rules that allowed one to
suck up a ghost. One needs a specifically designed Ghost Busters type
device for that…
It might even make sense to describe incorporeal creatures by noting the
plane their shifted to (assuming that in the BR cosmology there are
parallel planes from the MotP other than the
SW.) Incorporeal-shadow. Incorporeal-spirit. Incorporeal-ethereal. An
incorporeal-shadow character would not interact with an incorporeal-spirit
character any more than any material character.
First, our notions of undead start in folklore, not
in game rules, so my notions of what undead are like starts there. It may
be modified by a host of factors, but there is conception of a game world
without lashing yourself to the rules so an eagle can dine on your liver
24/7. Just because the rules don`t have seven pages on two gasseous
>entities grappling, why is it inconcievable that they could engage in such
>combats or entirely new forms of combat? Perhaps gaseaous entites do force
>damage. The penumbra of the rules may not serve to explain every
>possibility someone can imagine.
I suppose they could if a struggle between smoke character and steam
character occurred in a campaign at some point, but gaseous combatants
isnt whats being addressed here… unless we`re assuming that ghosts are
gaseous instead of incorporeal and I missed that someplace.
Gary
