Ghost's Origin?

Just ask one.

Ghosts in general are 'natural' in this game, like aliens. In the First Ward arc, NPCs express surprised when they find out Apparitions aren't natural.

For once I actually agree with Venture.

...Damnit. I feel so filthy now.

Now, just to be contrary and piss off Venture: GHOSTS CAN BE SCIENCE TOO!
You heard me!
That's right! Ghosts have been studied to 'scientific' degrees in the modern era for awhile now, and I can only imagine it being bigger in the City of universe. In fact, Night Widow Velveeta's (actually it's something else I can't be bothered to look up) arc deals with Arachnos scientifically investigating ghosts and creating spirit soldiers!

Scientifically, ghosts can be seen as residual energies that make up the body manifesting, or as some might call it "psychic activity".

Hah! THIS THREAD IS NOW TROLLED!

Edit: now to be serious, I do agree with another poster in that it depends on HOW the person came back to life. Natural makes sense for one who came back through force of will, magic for one returned by magical phenomenon or ritual, and science works if some manner of experiment or energy distortion helped manifest them back into the living world.

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

It happens, sometimes. Sometimes the Strawman has a point.

And sometimes he's got the lore exactly right. Say what you will about Venture's opinions of the game, he's usually spot-on when it comes to the lore.

Indulge me as to why natural origin is out. We see in night ward that the souls of perfectly mundane people are walking around there as spectral representations of their living selves, so the property of having a "ghost" is reinforced as a particularly mundane thing, the only unusual thing is them not being in the spirit world, a natural area in close dimensional proximity to the regular world. I'm not seeing something unnatural there outside of locations, and as mentioned, particularly strong connections and forces of will could explain that without use of rituals or external magic.

now, keep in mind, i have not finished night ward, if im missing official lore(not lore that you just dont like so you ignore it) please bring it to the table.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

This.

Origin in this game is the origin of the character's powers, not the character's life (or lack thereof). What a ghost is doesn't matter; what powers they're using, and how/why they manifest...that's what matters.

A ghost using innate abilities to all ghosts would be Natural (you, the player, gets to decide what powers your ghost has naturally; the game never restricts powers of ghosts). A ghost using a magic charm or spell or something would be Magic. A ghost possessing a high-tech suit would be Technology. Science could have been used to give the ghost powers, so I guess that would work there. I don't really know how to make Mutation work with ghosts. Ghosts don't evolve, spontaneously or over time, so Mutation seems to be out.

Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

Dead Girl

that really gets at whether a character's origin refers to the origin of their powers or the origin of their overall circumstance. natural doesnt mean "normal" because there i little normal in the game, we fly, we throw fire balls, natural just means that you dont have powers that are unusual for one of your type. kheldians are natural but they are energy beings that turn into creatures that "naturally" are not found on or near earth. If you are a ghost that also has some neat tech or has learned magic rituals that grant you abilities above and beyond your capacities as a ghost, then sure, but i would read a natural ghost as a ghost who has powers consistent with being a ghost. how they became a ghost is more for the bios. maybe they just beat up a clumsy patrolman and snuck out of the night ward, or were collateral from the cabal stopping taking spirits as hostages post katie hannon(i think, its ben years since i did that tf). Really the patrolman's bios indicate that lots of souls dont transition of their own accord.

And "natural" ghosts in this game don't have powers, because natural ghosts don't linger in this world. For a ghost to linger, something unnatural has to have happened to empower the ghost with the ability to stay in the world of the living and interact with it. Those aren't powers the dead normally possess.

Peacebringers are. Warshades are not. The former operate as their species is designed, the latter used unnatural means to empower themselves, and thus they're Science.

And again - a ghost in this game doesn't have powers. A ghost passes on to the afterlife and leaves this world. The creation of a poltergeist is an unusual, unnatural event that can't be predicted, as evidenced by different ghosts coming up differently. Saying that's Natural is like saying Spider-Man is natural because he has the same powers anyone else who was bitten by a genetically-modified radio-active spider would.

The trick here is that "ghost" in the sense of "the soul of a dead person" doesn't have its own species or its own set of powers. Yes, there IS a society of ghosts - those of the Oranbegans - but they're a very specific type of ghosts who were cursed into being what they are by demonic magic. Both their reason for existing is magical and the powers they wield as sorcerers are magical as well. But that's not a "race," because these were human sorcerers who were cursed and as far as I know, they don't have the power to reproduce. Despite having MoT just consume them, I don't even think they're technically dead, because they had their bodies stolen, rather than being killed.

But it doesn't imply they stay in the world of the living, either, because the Patrolmen don't operate in the world of the living. All of the Drudges exist in the world of the dead, and the only reason we can interact with them is because the two worlds are mingling and the living and the dead are forced together. But if you want to use the Drudges as an example, then the souls of the dead have NO powers whatsoever. They never fight back, they never demonstrate sort of abnormal ability, or indeed any ability whatsoever. All they do is stand around and wait to be trained off. Basically, the souls of the dead in First Ward don't have any more powers than the souls used as currency in Darksiders or God of War.

In order for a character to be Natural, there must exist a species of creatures that is or at least has once been capable of reproduction, to which these powers were natural across a significant portion of the population. Ghosts both lack the ability to be called a species since they're the souls of many different species already, and they lack a singular unifying set of powers to say is natural to them. Some control minds, some use dark powers, some fight with swords. And no, "has powers" isn't a unifying super power. At best that's Mutation.

My point here is that each ghost that actually has powers is a unique creature which came into being in its own unique way. They can be grouped together by some of their characteristics, yes, but they aren't at all related to each other in any way that would call them a species.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

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SUPPORT - IT'S NOT JUST A GROUPING OF ATs
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More Than a Game
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Everything you say is your opinion on how YOU THINK the game lore operates. The game doesn't actually ever say that ghosts do or do not have a natural set of powers. You are attempting to force IRL "rules" (opinion) on a game with teleportation and shooting fireballs. IRL "rules" don't have very firm standing here.

If the player decides their ghost gets their powers from 'being a ghost' (e.g. Natural), then THE PLAYER gets to decide what powers their ghost has, naturally, as a part of being a ghost. (Sonic and Dark powers seem to be a common theme, even in ghost NPCs in the game.)

Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

Well of course. I'm not about to tell a person his character concept is wrong. That's the cool thing about origins not meaning anything - they can be anything you can explain them as being. There's no wrong way to go here.

However, by the same token, a question is asked and an answer must be given. And I don't know about you, but "do whatever" just doesn't seem like it would help someone asking for help picking an origin. I do my best to put logic and reason to my arguments. If you or the OP disagree with them, that's fine. It's all RP, at the end of the day. But again - the point of asking the question, I think, is to get a reasoned answer which can convince.

You're right that the game doesn't specify, but we've seen instances of restless ghosts in this game and their powers are not entirely consistent with each other, nor is what makes them ghosts. Ghost Widow is never explicitly given a reason for why she stayed behind, she just is. The Ghost Pirates of Port Oakes are, as far as I'm aware, cursed to be ghosts via some kind of magic. The Oranbegans, as I mentioned, never died at all, but instead had their bodies stolen. The angry spirits of the world your hero's alternate dimension self destroyed don't seem to have been enchanted at all, they just stuck around being angry. If you can make an argument for how these are consistent with each other and derive a "species" from them, then go right ahead. There's nothing wrong with it. I simply don't see it.

And I really don't see "unfinished business" as being a good "natural" explanation. It is in the Casper movie, I'll grant you that, but it just doesn't seem to be the case in City of Heroes. None of the ghosts we've seen have had this as a reason to linger, hence why I wouldn't call it a natural depiction of ghosts.

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Here's the thing - "Natural" as an origin for non-human characters typically works best if you define your own species that doesn't have a parallel in the actual game. Then you control all the variables and no-one can argue one way or the other. If Natural is to be the goal, then my suggestion is to explicitly define a special case of ghost for whom what you're designing IS natural. Ghosts as a "thing" in this game are far too diverse for anything to be natural among them, but defining your own fictional subset puts the power of claim in your hands and ends arguments like mine.

Usually when someone's arguing an RP point that gets in the way of your character, the best course of action isn't to lash out at them, but rather to define subsets of circumstances which you control directly and which canon cannot be used to contradict or even affect. Even if you manage to convince me that your ghost really is Natural, you'll never convince Venture or someone else that comes along. All you'll accomplish is get mired into endless arguments over it. The best solution is to control the circumstances, which gives you the power to define your own concept, as opposed to drawing on what the game has precedent for.

I'll give you an example, and it's a simple one. Saying that it's natural for people who die with unfinished business to come back as poltergeists is wrong. You're arguing against the game's precedent. Saying that SOMETIMES, people who die with unfinished business will come back as poltergeists and that's just how things work is entirely different. You can take precedent in the game which shows people with unfinished business dying and never coming back (say, Agent Arthur Bell killed in the middle of exposing Kelly Uqua as a Rikti spy who never becomes a ghost) and say that... Yes, those people with unfinished business didn't come back because not everyone with unfinished business comes back. We don't know what decides who comes back and who doesn't, but those are just examples of people who didn't. YOUR character, on the other hand, is an example of someone who does and there's really no precedent in the game to claim this DOESN'T happen.

All I'm saying is you need to work with other people rather than against them whenever possible. No-one ever benefits from "Well, that's just YOUR opinion!" argument. You won't change anyone's opinion by saying that, and if you believe it, then you solve nothing by saying it. But it's possible, in nearly ever instance, to simply work around someone else's opinion without needing to alter your concept one iota.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Also, ghosts in this world tend to be limited in origin because of dissonance that might arise with the players vs the lore. But since our characters backstories don't directly affect the lore and therefore the gameplay of others directly, we have room to explore other options.

Spirits can also be linked to religion and while some may have 'mystical' properties, what makes a religion a religion is faith and faith is not unnatural. There are plenty of stories of spirits of saints or deceased loved ones coming back in a time of need as a guardian overlooking their loved ones. What makes this natural isn't where the ghost is coming from but the faith the people they're protecting has.

Having the people of Paragon City having so much belief and faith in a fallen hero who put their life on the line to save them countless times isn't considered a magic ritual. If that heroes spirit continues to protect like a guardian angle because of that faith, IMO, is not magical or arcane.

There's also power in promise, not wishing to give up on business that was unfinished at death. If one was adamant enough in their word as to continue on even after death, the only think unnatural is how much faith they put in their words.


Personally, I would probably say a ghost or spirit would retain their preferences even after death, that is, if a mutant that used cold or fire powers would manifest cold or fire as a ghost as well as gain whatever properties a being of that type would have such as flight, translucency, maybe the ability to pass through solid objects...anything else like shooting 'ghost bolts' and draining life might lean the entity's origin elsewhere but I agree with your earlier statement that it's more about the origin of their 'powers' and not so much their 'body'.

So, I don't care all that much about what ghosts are -- to me, like aliens, they should have their own origin. For any individual player, they can decide whatever they like. But I do care a great deal about language and clarity.

In the CoH world, magic occurs naturally as part of the world (well, now). Mutations occur naturally as part of the world. "Natural," in other words, can mean "naturally-occurring," which is how it has frequently been used in this thread, or Natural Origin. Natural Origin means having the powers and abilities available to an exceptional but "normal" of your species and type. Broadly interpreted, this means that the Animus Arcana have a claim to the Natural origin; perhaps their progenitors were Magic origin, like the progenitors of humanity must have been Mutants, but they are now part of a type.

Now, like I said, I don't much care about the origin of ghosts. Sam's argument, clarified, is that ghosts, like suits of power armor or summoned demons, don't just occur; something has to make them happen. The counter-argument is that ghosts do just happen; maybe not everyone becomes a ghost, but then again, not everyone becomes an Olympic athlete, either. It's an exceptional condition, one created by focus and past trauma (sound familiar, Batman?) but not an abberant one.

The problem here is obvious and well-argued in City of Heroes' history. It's purely academic. I find the Natural origin as a whole to be ridiculous (many olympic-class athletes and elite soldiers are demonstrably mutants even now; the claim of a Kheldian to Natural origin is no better than a Fir Bolg or Tuatha De Danan's), but it serves just fine as a catch-all for "I'm good because I'm special and I work hard at staying that way."

Do as you will.