Finally someone who understands cultists! It bothers me when they're portrayed as stupid and brainwashed. The reasons why people join cults in real life is complex and interesting, so there's plenty of material to use as a starting point.
Great insight. As a veteran and having volunteered at veteran homes, I'm most familiar with the way trauma can break a person without it being immediately obvious to others and when I run games that tends to be the flavor of mental illness I steer towards as it can almost always make a character feel tragic and warrant sympathy. A few examples are I had a rogue npc in one campaign who was meant to help the party find a secret route into a dungeon. The party was warned about trusting him because he got his last party killed but details were vague. Every time the rogue would check for a trap or open a lock he would whisper to himself and redo it multiple times to the point where the party considered abandoning him assuming he was wasting time on purpose to betray them. Turns out his last party died because he missed a trap and the trauma of watching that happen is why he can never trust that he has in fact cleared all the traps And whispers to himself "you have to be sure". Or when the party was sent to eliminate a necromancy cult trying to raise a lich defeated a century ago. After mindlessly mowing their way through half the cult members the party discovers they are not crazed zealots devoted to an evil god or even the lich. They are fathers, mothers, husbands and others grieving the sudden and tragic loss of a loved one who have banded together in a misguided plan to bring back those they lost, even if it means becoming servants of a lich. I think if your party laughs at a mentally ill character you introduce, you've done something wrong... or your players are monsters. But if they feel sympathetic towards them or feel like they want to help them in some way, you probably have a good handle on what you're doing. The real dangerous ground is when a player has a mentally ill character. Although I did have a player do a venerable human wizard and play him with Alzheimer's based on his grand father and that was indeed interesting, and while it's often played for laughs in most media he actually made it startling and a bit jarring for the other players. This was actually kind of accurate, but it did hinder the campaign at times so the we came to the agreement that the player would be very short lived. This had the side effect of the party having to deal with their wizard passing in his sleep at an inn on their way to an adventure. One of my players actually cried.
As usual you put out a quality video and covered the topic very well. It is sad that as adults we have to tell people not to mock someone about mental illness. We shouldn't be surprised when Mr. Diversity mocks diversity. That's his whole schtick. Kind of like the shock jocks when they were around. However, I am glad you pointed it out. I had a coworker that had run out of his medication for schizophrenia. I could tell something was going on with him. We would talk on breaks and honestly he just seemed like he was deep in thought about something bothering him. Once he got back on his medication he explained what was going on. He was having some very intense hallucinations. Many people would portray him as running around acting cartoonish instead of just an adult trying to cope with a problem while still trying to work at his job.
Thoughtful video as always. As a nearly lifelong mental health patient the nuance of being mentally ill is always overlooked. I can't tell you how many times I've been told at various times in my life that I don't look like I have anxiety and depression. That's why it's an invisible disability. Another great resource for learning about mental illness would be taking an Abnormal Psychology course. Just a general overview of this part of the study of the psyche is worth the time for NPC motivations.
And, as soon as doctors learn I have severe c-PTSD, they stop listening to me. It's frustrating how they then just assume your concerns are all just made up in your head. I hear you. Thanks.
GURPS has a number of disadvantages that fall under this category. In my games, if you are resurrected, you have a chance of developing PTSD or a phobia related to whatever killed you. It hasn't happened yet but I do feel feel some trepidation about this. On one hand, we run the risk of gaming mental illness, on the other, this is part of destigmatizing mental illness. Also, my GURPS game is low-magic gritty simulationist style. Ultimately, I will have to wait until the moment of truth to see how I and the player feel about this direction. * I have CPTSD.
Roleplaying mental illnesses is difficult without it becoming insulting, comedic, or playing up the chaos of a broken minded character to be wild for the sake of performing insane or depraved actions. I have not had the opportunity to play Call of Cthulhu yet, but the fledgling science of mental health at that time would be horrific especially since causing madness is the weapon of the eldritch entities in that game. My primary exposure to characters with mental illnesses comes from the Malkavian Clan in Vampire the Masquerade. If handled correctly a Malkavian can be roleplayed in truly great ways. The hardest part for people without mental illnesses is relating to what living with these conditions is like without falling into mockery or dismissal. Historically the medical field has been abhorrent in treatment and understanding of mental illness. In that way, shining a light on our lack of understanding is a great opportunity to draw attention to the plight of people suffering both historically and in the modern era. Great video, empathy is the first step to roleplaying a character with mental illness.
i don’t really think coc covers mental illness all that well. i think the right keeper can make it respectful and horrifying in the right measure but the rules don’t immediately lend themselves to it
I tend to agree, that CoC doesnt really cover it well, especially since it is such a major p[art of the game. I has it and we can read what it says but it's not that deep or accurate. However, I dont feel that was ever their intent. In most of the CoC stories mental illness just removes the character entirely from play.
You always ahve a better approach than just eliminating things that might be controversial. Now when do we get your Good and Evil in RPGs video? I'm still waiting.
I keep saying you do amazing videos, but this may be your best one ever, as a physician who had a special interest in psychiatry, I can say you handled this extremely well. As an aside this topic is handled very well in the Monte Cook Games theme book "We are all mad here" (about playing in fairy tale settings), some sort of mental illness becomes much of the drive for your character, as their escape into fairy tales is a defense against their mental illness. Again thank you for approaching a difficult and sensitive topic in a really well thought out matter (and if you ever need advice on how to approach real world medical topics in RPGs, feel free to ask me)
TY for uploading this video. Awareness of what we deal with, and how we can help others deal is an extremely important topic. TY from myself and everyone that is living with all levels of mental illness.
Excellent video. Thank you so much for this. I see my mother -in-law slowly lapsing into dementia, which of course is not a mental illness but follows similar aspects. It is heartbreaking to see her asking why and trying to come to grips with the situation yet two hours later she has literally forgotten that she has that affliction and seems really normal - until you discover that she has really no concept of time anymore. Being accused of "you never visit anymore" while you know you haven't slept last night because you drove to visit her, drove back to go to work and later call her really is taxing. My wife and I are being as understanding as we can be. It's the "she lives in a world of her own" moments. And there is no use arguing with her because she doesn't want to hurt our emotions. In her world she is the one being neglected. And she is quite convincing. This having a very different perspective on reality is the way I try to represent mental illnesses in games. In Vampire the Malkavians are insane. I play it by overemphasizing secondary matters. I'm trying to find a balance of being useful and being part of the group but letting the others deal with important stuff while I concentrate on the less important - but still try to find a reason why I follow them and be helpful. Is that disrespectful? I think not because for me it is important that I am not a living nightmare but a person, an individual that is still likable if just a little off in some situations. Insanity is not the screaming like a maniac blood thirsty berserker person so often depicted. They still have hope and dreams- but might not be able to reach those and try to find different ways - ways that seem strange and not always easy to understand. It is a fascinating and also sad topic. I love your sentence "they were once wonderful children with dreams". I try to remember exactly that whenever I think about people I don't understand, like or even dislike.
I really like how Ross Bryant roleplays Vaughn in Time for Chaos. Its a highly emotional, but, believable, spiral into madness as Nyarlathotep torments the group. That character had to be retired in season 2 since he became permanently insane and Ross took over an NPC that was clearly, in hindsight, introduced for this inevitability. (Ross rolled very low for Vaughn's power/sanity initially so it was kind of seen coming) Great video, as always!
So important what you said about unhoused people. I live on the outskirts of a major US city and often deal with tourists (and too many locals locals) who equate seeing unhoused people or people suffering from a mental health crisis with having witnessed or been a victim of a crime. You'll often hear, "crime is really bad in that neighborhood," or "it's really dangerous to ride the train/bus," when in fact there is very little crime. There are just some people at very low points in their lives, trying to get by. Maybe someone in the park mutters to themselves, or there are some tents on a patch of grass, or someone on the train is passed out. But that's not crime. Or it shouldn't be. We have so many unhoused veterans, so many people who suffer from untreated or self-medicated mental illness, and so many people left behind by corporate greed. But too often we treat them as less than animals. We wouldn't treat dogs so poorly. But we, as a culture, equate homelessness, or poverty in general, with personal moral failing, and that's a pretty vile way to look at things. As far as mental illness in games, I've rarely used it. Mostly in Call of Cthulhu. And in that, I've generally had situations where someone "blacks out" and then discovers they've done something horrible. But I normally don't have a player "act" out being mentally ill. I also look at CofC's "madness" not so much as human mental illness, but as the human brain being physically altered by its understanding of deeper truths, thus detaching from Humanity's shared concept of "reality." Their madness is a too-firm grip on objective reality, which doesn't register with our monkey meat-brains. I remember finding folks who were really into Malkavian, much like folks today who are really into The Joker, Harley Quinn, or 90% of teenage girls in anime, to be pretty insufferable. And that was in the 90s, when I was far to busy trying to balance being a pseudo-Goth, an angry edgelord, a tortured Romantic artist, and a strait-edge punk to think too much about being all that respectful or tactful when it came to other people's feelings or lived lives.
"a pseudo-Goth, an angry edgelord, a tortured Romantic artist, and a strait-edge punk " you just described 99% of Seattle's entire current so called goth scene ... and they are adults in their 30s to 50s.
‘Extensive knowledge of mental illness’ I’m a paramedic married to a psychologist. I have extensive knowledge of mental illness too. I’m not going to ask how or where his knowledge comes from tho……
How did you "filter" thru the articles, (being written in 70s & 80s) that may not have taken the same approach to mental illness as it's handled today? 🤔
I didn't necessarily take anything useful from older articles but I can give you the stats for the AD&D version of Daffy Duck. D&D stuff didnt cover it well. Those older articles are part of what prompted me to make this video. Has any other RU-vidr made a video on this topic? A lot of what I did to prepare for my Castle Amber and horror one shot was read about real mental illnesses and how they were dealt with in the Victorian era. But unsurprisingly, Call of Cthulhu, MtM and WoD had better resources for gaming purposes.
You don't need to go full Joker to play an obsessive, antisocial personality. Unfortunately, that's what you'll get if you're not careful. Or the Rainman. It's why I groan when people try to play Malkavians. They become cliches. Every now and then I'd prefer a Poison Ivy or a Dr Freeze at least.
Lots of good comments, and a great video as always! Touchy topic, but you do very well with those (IMO). Personally, I try to keep mental illness to a minimum in my games, mainly to avoid stereotypes, cliche's and other similar embarrassments. In the rare cases when I do use it for NPCs, I typically make them over the top so the PCs know from the start they are dealing with an unstable person who has "seen some disturbing sh!t" ~ so as I think on it, I guess I typically only use madness in regards to horrors seen that "break one's sanity" rather than anything related to a true illness. As for the rare case of a PC becoming disturbed, I usually leave that to them how they wish to portray their character's illness. This typically starts with me passing notes meant to generate some paranoia (which then puts the Roleplay into the player's court), or in one case where a "sanity check" was failed which the player decided to essentially become catatonic (we then roleplayed via emails what was going on "behind the scenes" in the character's mind). None of these cases were taken lightly. More of "oh crap, our buddy / that NPC / my PC had their world turned upside down". Along those lines, I've never had a PC that started play as mentally ill. So it has always been a sudden occurrance and generally short-lived (except for the repurcussions / trust issues going forward).
In Fantasy Fiction, I recommend people look at the portrayal of Delirium the Endless in Neil Geiman's Sandman graphic novel. It is both sympathetic and original
Wow. I got to say, NOBODY is really talking about the issues you are talking about in TTRPGs. I know to do so often invites invective comments but I TRULY appreciate that you are willing to find these kernels of opportunity to question what we do as players of a game. Many of us struggle with mental health. I can say there have been times others have characterized or summarized things that my personal experience with mental health was almost a source or bemusement to them and I remained silent. and while i was able hear it and to get through it ( I have no other choice but to deal with things all the time really), it's great to see you promoting forethought for others. We can't ever NOT ever touch upon subjects that someone might feel a trauma response to but it is positive that you are asking to simply give pause, prevent stereotypical representation, and be aware that mental health is a part of society and needs to be treated resopectfully in game,
@@welovettrpgs COMMUNITY FIRST is my feeling and I think what you are at least trying to do is be a good member of the community and its more important than ever as we become more social media/ RU-vid/digital oriented. Your voice matters
Always stoked to see a new video from you in my feed, and this no were no disappointment. When i star a group i have started giving the players a questionaire about what they like and dislike. My experience says some players are not confortable talking about yes's and no's in public, but just clicking a box is fine. And as with all difficult subjects it is always hard to know what to include or leave out. Had a female player ask for adult topics before campaign and turn around on it when it came to it, and another, also female, asking to tone down hurting, only to become the most violent character in the group and truly enjoying it.
In my world, something happened that let a rift open to the Dark Astral, the realm of malignant thoughts. This created the Arcane Dysphoria that has mutated magic. Nature wove a way to circumvent this with the birth of sorcerer bloodlines, while others sought patrons as warlocks. “Rose colored glasses” have been invented to aid wizards in avoiding the curse that has woven into written spells. And on and on. Yeah, I should fine tune this for publication. My interest in the subject of mental illness began with a script that I have contemplated about Death has amnesia. It too is a work in progress.
Great insights. I've run a couple of horror games and my fave is Esoterrorists, and in it's core book the author explains that their sanity system is clumsy and lacking both nuance and appropriate sensitivity for people with mental health issues. They try to get around it, but my dear friend who has schizophrenia dropped out of the game before it even started and told me to call him when I get the science fiction game started.
Thank you for this video! On a personal level, it means a lot to see this. Especially hearing someone say that if you give a character a mental illness, to not make that their defining feature. It’s an aspect, but it doesn’t have to be the only thing that’s ever mentioned about them or how they’re known. I also really liked that you pointed out if you have a character with a mental illness, to focus on role playing, not diagnosing, and to focus on how their mental health would affect their thoughts and actions. When it comes to cultists specifically, rather than use mental illness as the reason they’re cultists, it feels like a better idea would be to look at real world cults and how they trapped people. Some people in cults have mental illnesses, but a lot more don’t and they were able to be conned all the same. Definitely agree this is a topic to bring up with everyone at the table before anything happens rather than as a surprise. Anyways, awesome video. Really appreciated hearing your thoughts on this.
I allow some pretty loose playing with tropes, as we are often trying to replicate fiction more often than fact-based or deeply researched writing. I draw the line at being trite or mean-spirited. If you want to be like Samurai Jack and use the cartoon as your only reference, ok. If you're looking to make fun of a culture or group, you can find another table.
Thank you Aten. So sad and heartwarming at the same time. My mother used to work in a soup-kitchen for homeless people. This video is a huge help for me when running Kult D L. Sadly, I could not get the subtitles to work. I wish you health and happiness. Sincerely, Alicia
With the standard morality of "Don't be a jerk." in mind, here are my thoughts: Some of us don't have to imagine what mental illness is like, unfortunately. One additional thought, this is a game, and perfect portrayal gets you no Oscars and can derail the game, so you don't just slap the other players with it every scene, don't be an attention hog. It's a feature of the character, not their whole personality. For things outside my experience I consider what in the illness makes them scared or angry or aroused, and imagine they have that come up whenever the situation goes above normal stressors, or when something similar to their bad experiences occurs, and then add their particular stress reaction, like anxiety/panic attack, disassociation, or other. This also works to an extent for epilepsy, having a petit mal when they get overwhelmed. Gran Mal is fully disabling and may kill the character, so it may not be appropriate for game play. For some characters you can just pursue some particular thing they want without any self control, shame, filter, or sense of appropriate time and place. While they can be reasoned with, they cannot regulate themselves towards this particular stimulus and must be distracted or restrained until they become less aroused toward the stimulus. Like removing clothing, or pursuing and petting every cat they see. Sometimes things can be funny and sad, the sad part is they don't have any choice, and get increasingly stressed when kept from doing the thing. For hallucinatory illness just add another feature, plant, animal, or person, or add some features that don't belong to an existing object or person in the scene whenever it is described and just have your character interact with it as much as they normally would anything else they descibed. Depression is more like lack of response to stimuli, like inability to mentally keep running from the critter, or treat wounds or eat much or change clothes and leave the house(or the bed). Depression is like powerlifting with your brain to initiate action or thought. You gas out fast and get gun-shy of the effort. Remember, you are still a human being with hopes and fears and desires, you just have a different set of obstacles, not as accurate a perception of the situation, and less mental energy or ability to self regulate. In real life we have discovered how to reduce the intensity of their stress, reduce the frequency of agitation, and give them some brain chemicals they aren't making. When there is lucidity enough for conversation, it's sometimes possible to teach them ways of regulating themselves that don't rely on what they lack. It's fascinating and broadens your horizons(and possibly your compassion for other humans) to find out how people and their loved ones experience their mental illness. Take some time to find out more, and find a few key things about their experience to portray and challenge your character with.
Your videos are so good. And you have some them so well, and provide appropriate warnings and clarifications regarding best viewing and use of them. I appreciate you so much. ❤
Love the idea of your horror one shot but common GM parlance is that you never take anything away from you players as there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth. How did they handle no weapons. armour, powers or skills and ability scores all reduced to average?
Youre correct about not taking things away. They awoke in entirely new bodies of normal mundane people using Ultramodern 5. The more they tried to bring forth their D&D character the more psychic damage they received. Actually it is way more complicated and I'll make a video addressing the entire arch eventually.
Thanks! I wish I had already finished it but I have this idea that I want to put all my notes into a free pdf for others to use. That task has kept me from finishing it. But it'll be worth it because I dug through Clark Ashton Smith's works and included a lot of real historical events to give it a strong foundation. However if I just gave the notes I have now without making them understandable they would confuse more than help.
In Vampire: the Masquerade communities there has long been a word describing stereotypically “insane” characters, though the term primarily applied to Malkavians. Fishmalks. There was, and possibly still is I haven’t checked in a while, a level of disdain towards Fishmalks in the community. And before anyone brings it up yes I am aware that there are a number of things within World of Darkness that have aged terribly. The Ravnos for one, the heavy inclusion noble savage stereotype for another, that book with a slur for a name that was so bad it got backlash at the time of release and was finally pulled from drivethrurpg a few years back, and the list goes on.
Havent heard the word fishmalk before, but do not like the over the top prankster malkavian. Always do npc malks as serious. Not only are they vampires seductive strong apex predators, they also have mental illnesses - making them even more terrifying. And when a player insists on playing a malk, i will play mind games with them. Have skitzofrenic character do stuff while blacked out, black vans following the paranoid and strange things happen if the ocd sufferer does not follow their rules.
@@andersand6576 The term comes from an old illustration from one of the books released in the 90s in which a stereotypically insane Malkavian was kissing a fish.
I think I would not go into any indepth roleplaying of mental illness with my players, as I do not trust them to handle it professionally. Not that they are silly and would make fun of it - they could evcen use humor as a coping mechanism - but primarily I will not do it because I see how they have used autism as a catch-all term to dismiss any annoying behaviour in the local gaming groups. People make social faux pas? Autism. People do not read what others are saying correctly? Autism. I cannot say how much of it is from a sense of "goodness" they are trying to show by being understanding, but it both minimize what the condition actually is, and insults everyone because mistakes are pointed to being on an undiagnosed autism spectrum (and conveniently reduces their own need to work harder to make themselves understood or understand someone else's point of view). ... this could however be a problem with the local groups and the culture that has been fostered (or festered), but I simply do not trust my players to bring in their shallow understanding of these complex topics. Instead I would prefer to either let the GM set the tone and level of realism in the game, ranging from the "insane" anime villain to a deep character were an educated player may be able to actually diagnose the disorder they are suffering from that is influencing their motivations and perceptions of the world.
A few years ago I was studying a serial killer in Florida and at trial a psychologist testified that they don't like using labels like "anti-social" because to some degree every single person exhibits anti-social behavior. Autism is another over used label ... so is "celiac disease."
@@welovettrpgs It is very gratifying to have friends that studied psychology so I can spit-ball these ideas with, and I can say I agree with you. Funny thing about celiac disease, I mentioned a few years ago to a friend of a friend that I have a history in my family of gluten allergy - and their immediate response was "Oh, they're probably making it up". Which is funny, because one relative has definitely been allergic since the 1950's lol It becomes a hassle when something is over-exposed to such a degree that the push-back against it becomes exaggerated.
Thank you for covering this. I had a character I had to dial back from their mental illness because the other players at the table couldn't treat it respectfully and would do things to antagonize them. Including the GM who also treated her "visions" (their term) as spiritual distress, rather than the intended psychosis it was supposed to be.
I avoid insanity in my games. That’s reserved for the grown-up games and I don’t have a group capable of playing it without it becoming cartoonish at the moment. I once played a Habbalah of Andrealphas in an In Nomine game years ago that could best be described as insane. It was a demon so traumatized by their fall that their mind cracked. It was absolutely convinced that it was an angel policing the clergy as it tempted priests to molest it regularly and killed the priests that did it. All of the angelic players in that game went out of their way to maintain the delusion, out of a fear of what could happen if a Habbalah, who can influence emotions, ever lost the delusions that kept it from being truly evil. Even their superiors would address me as if I was just another angel, because a Habbalah in a crowd of people can turn it into a murderous riot with a thought. Mental illness is a difficult one to roleplay. I recommend against it. It requires a level of maturity that, sadly, even the most mature of group may not entirely possess.
What is your opinion on the insight mechanic from Bloodborn - in this game you don't accumulate madness points or loose insanity. You gain insight witch enables you to talk to inanimate things and to see things or entities that are invisible to other. That would be "crazy" in real life but it is absolute reality in the world of Bloodborn. Is it ok or disrespectful to use something like this in my ttrpg? Thank you for the insight you gave with this video 🤗
You've made me interested in learning more about it. In my real life professional work I'm a paranormal investigator / debunker. I despise the amount of fraud there is among so called psychics taking advantage of vulnerable people. But that doesnt mean somebody who believes in ghosts is mentally ill. There has to be some way to measure what is or is not "craxy" and it usually comes down to ensuring a person's beliefs in such things does not interfere with their ability to have a happy and productive life.
@@welovettrpgs Thank you for sharing. Wouldn't it be better for me to not lable anything in my world as crazy at all? This is a serious question. I try to deliver a family friendly experience, even if no underaged players are at the table - sometimes there are though. That means I describe no graphic violence, gore or morbid too stuff anyway. We have an open conversation about these topics but I wanted to take the chance to get in informed opinion from you. Thanks a lot. I know this was kind of covered by the video and the tips and information was very good but I question if it's worth the trouble or if I just should skip the topic entirely.
@@Frederic_S My advice is to not go looking for trouble. If you find an adventure that has "insane" NPCs, use this video advice. If a player asks to play an insane character, use this video advice. Otherwise, dont invite trouble where none needs to exist.
P.S.: back in my days I worked in daycare for people with disabilities instead of going to the German military. So I have experience to a degree that people with mental disabilities can live a happy life and I would not describe them as crazy. As I think more about the topic, I tend to think it's ok to describe a fictional character as insane or mad or crazy. Is it, if it's part of a fictional world. Isn't there a difference between me saying a thing or a character (or npc) saying a thing. Our Characters and nps do wrong things all the time. Using deadly violence against living, feeling creatures for instance. It's complicated.
Roleplaying mental illness ist easy... I just stop roleplaying, let my tics take over and my character washes hands a lot. Seriously: real illness is a no go for me, just like sexual themes (aside from occasional flirting and the traditional 'I want to do them shout' once in a while). Not judging people that like or can do this; whatever rocks ones boat.
I've got my sex video coming soon too. I'm going to make all of you watch while I talk about the inner most secret and graphic detail of my sex life ! :p Thanks buddy!
I always give my characters a couple minor issues: mania, phobia, delusion, or disorder. I made up a detailed table to randomly generate insanity for my Cthulhu game. I thought this was going to be an insight in to roleplaying rather than a lecture on how to treat other people.
I have roleplayed mental illnesses a lot over the years, not all players can deal with it well and it's definitely best to talk to your players about the possibility of it coming up first before it comes up in your game. Personally I prefer utilizing a Scarab of Insanity as the reason that the character is insane, now role-playing mental illnesses can work well in a game, but.... Like you have pointed out, it is something that should be approached respectfully. Now as far as it goes, my favorite alignment is chaotic neutral with evil tendencies. I mean yes, I did just rob that bank and set fire to the guard houses, but I donated my gold to that orphanage so it balanced out right? lol
This has some comparison to my eventual plans for adding in rules (and guidelines) for mental illness to my WIP system. Rather than prescribing a conventional label or diagnosis (and thus pre-biasing roleplay towards a shallow stereotype of a mental illness label), it incurs a particular mental/psychological problem and leaves the player to figure out how the character integrates-or fails to integrate-that problem. A major problem with traditional mental illness effects in ttrpgs is that they presuppose how a character reacts to certain stressors (or how stressed a character is to a specific stimulus) and thus can not only violate player agency but easily violate the character concept by imposing personality features contradictory to what the player intended or agreed to. By instead setting it to the specific malfunction of the psyche, it leaves it open for the player to choose appropriately to their character fantasy how the character deals with it. While there still needs to be some level of recognition that not everyone will develop mental illness from the same stimulus in the first place, it is a starting point, and a GM could certainly work with a player to select an appropriate illness rather than an arbitrarily imposed one (unless the player is fine with that, such as may be the case in lower agency games such as CoC). While kind of an adjacent topic, back when I was method acting a self-insert as a self-study project, my character was cursed to completely lose their sense of humor. As in, they could not experience the emotions or thought processes we identify as the experience of humor. People drastically underestimate how much of conventional human interaction and communication is contingent on humor. Hello Future Me has a really nice introductory video on the subject of writing including mental illness.
I’m sorry, but you make roll playing games sound like hard work. I’m not going to be doing any ‘research’ just to roleplay my NPCs. I already spend more than enough time preparing my games And I don’t need an additional workload.
In my opinion, the difference between a good GM and a great GM is the hard work and if the cliché is to be believed, 10,000 hours at least. Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton were not born as the greatest guitarists, it required years of practice and dedication. What he is saying is that roleplaying someone with mental illness is difficult, but rather than allowing you to use trial and error mixed with frustration, to get it right, here is a suggested path with tools to use and pitfalls to avoid, that he has hard learned from his 30 year plus GM experience.
Don't be discouraged. Everything is relative. As with most things you get out of it what you put in. The work I do today preparing for a game is far different than what I did in the 80s. My games are extremely complex with multiple layers. I'm positive Matt Mercer does the same amount of game prep but everyone can have a great time at any skill level they wish to play at. Neither Matt Mercer nor my own games are typical. I think this video will help you because it addresses your concern: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-gf1qh9GocxQ.html Thanks and have fun!
