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View Full Version : Perception vs. Reality In-Universe



TeChameleon
2016-05-16, 04:29 AM
So I've been thinking about this on and off for a while; I've told stories about this character in a few places in the Playground; as I've been playing him fairly steadily for the better part of nine years now, he's had the chance to build up a bit of a history. The thing is, the (apparently nearly-universal) perception of him amongst the NPCs is so utterly divorced from the reality that he can wander around without much more of a disguise than a grouchy expression, despite a level of fame that would startle the Beatles.

I'm sort of wondering if my experience is unusual, or if there are others who have characters who are perceived (in-universe) in ways that are radically different from what they are actually like.

Oh. Maybe me explaining the what the two different views of my character are like would help >.>

The Reality:

Gavin Fireborne, my character, was the younger son of a minor noble house in one of the larger empires in the homebrew setting I usually play in. He had a predeliction for, that later became an outright fascination for the arcane arts. That would all be well and good, except for the fact that there was heavy prejudice against magic-users in this somewhat hypermacho, muscle-brained empire, thanks in large part to the actions of an historical wizard-king who was either painfully unlucky, shockingly incompetent, or some combination of both.

This, in turn, led to a rather... strained... relationship with his family after a somewhat less-than-happy adolescence, and an irascible, distinctly misanthropic personality. It also probably lent somewhat to his pyromania (as did growing up on the slopes of the still-active volcano his family gets its name from...), but that's neither here nor there.

Thanks to a long, convoluted string of PC antics (resulting, I suspect, at least in part by the DM being amused by my in-character responses to this sort of thing), the party saved the (known) world, drowned the avatar of a god, rewrote the map of the world on an absurd scale, and my character ended up owning a bunch of taverns and restaurants that he'd invested in and founding a gryphon-riding, militarily-oriented magic school.

Timeskip forwards roughly five centuries, with me deciding that I'd like to continue playing my character from the first campaign (an option the DM offered all the players), so he just vanished into the aether (or, more specifically, into a secluded corner of the Elemental Plane of Fire) after the climactic battle that involved the map-rewriting and god-drowning and popped back out at the start of the new campaign, to discover that the average height had increased by 25% in the intervening years, thanks to a hyperbaric atmosphere that he'd created when he raised the floating continent (long story, basically an artifact-based Wish) that the second campaign started out on, and his own legend had inflated miles beyond that (to the point that when the DM had me roll an Arcana skill check at the now-enormous school my character founded to establish bona fides, and I rolled a natural 20, the reaction was that Gavin must have been weakened by his long hibernation -_-;).

So... my character: a grouchy, reclusive pyromaniac, more than a foot shorter than expected, who is mostly out doing the adventuring thing because he has a strong sense of justice and (maybe) a good heart under everything else, and also because injustice and the strong hurting the weak etc. pisses him off, and he has made it his life's mission to set everything that annoys him on fire. But he still has all the social graces of a brain-damaged stoat, and usually considers magical theory and puzzles to be vastly more interesting than people.

The Perception:
Granted, this is me going on guesswork based on what the DM has said and whatnot, but the general perception of my character (who really is a bit of a jerk, if I'm being honest...) seems to be as a quasi-messianic figure, an archmage of beyond mythic proportions. To the point that if we were playing 3.5 instead of 4e, I'd be wondering why he wasn't getting divine ranks >.<

He's the founder of the greatest school of magic in the world, to the point that something like 40% of mages globally have attended the school he founded.

He's also apparently a titan of industry and a corporate mascot- the restaurants etc. he bought before the timeskip have apparently become one of the first franchises in the world (mid-range rib joints, if anyone's curious :smallconfused:), which later branched out into an energy company (lightning catchers..? The DM liked that bit from Stardust...), and limited shipping (airships again), which in turn spread out into airship-building thanks to the party wanting to trick out our airship (the thing is a frickin' TARDIS with laser cannons and forcefields now, and one of the fastest things in the sky... don't ask about the laser cannons), and my character trained others in (some of :smallamused:) the rituals that he performed to make our ship such a monster, so now people can pay his wagemages to power up their ships.

He's renowned in academic circles as the re-discoverer of planar travel (amazing what you can find when you poke around in the right dungeon...), and is working to expand his corporation yet again to deal with interplanar trade.

Aaaand he's the last living mortal to have seen the gods manifest. Granted, what people don't know is that they were doing the divine equivalent of banging on the apartment ceiling with a broom handle to try and get the upstairs neighbours to turn their **** music down, but whatever.

Oh. And he could probably make a reasonably solid claim on the imperial throne thanks to his ancestry and the timeskip, although if anybody tried to make him do that, he'd most likely set the message (and possibly the messenger, depending on how badly rattled he was) on fire and run away. Babysitting that many imbeciles doesn't hold a lot of appeal for him :smalltongue:

So the general perception amongst the NPC populace seems to be of a paragon of wisdom, a god among wizards, a shrewd businessman, and... well, The Most Interesting Wizard in the World, I guess..?

There are times that I feel like I've accidentally created the magical equivalent of Caiphas Cain, HERO OF THE IMPERIUM!

So is my experience as weird as I myself tend to be, or are there other tales (hopefully a bit less long-winded than mine <.<) out there of PCs (or NPCs, for that matter) who, if you stood them next to someone who was what people thought they were like, there wouldn't exactly be a lot of resemblance?

hymer
2016-05-16, 04:40 AM
I'm sort of wondering if my experience is unusual, or if there are others who have characters who are perceived (in-universe) in ways that are radically different from what they are actually like.

I'm reminded of King Harry, who merely needs to lend borrow a cloak to be able to walk anonymously among his soldiers at night. In times before photos, this actually makes a lot of sense. All of Harry's soldiers know him more by what he wears, his horse, and how he uses rhetoric to a crowd. And Harry can, of course, call on his days as a rascal amongst the rabble, to blend in better.

TeChameleon
2016-05-16, 06:29 PM
Well, there's that, but even my character's looks are pretty well-known- apparently there were a crapton of statues put up shortly after he vanished, and thanks to the remaining PCs from the party, they're pretty accurate.

It's more... the general perception of him seems to be this insane mashup of Merlin, Ronald McDonald (yes, really), Ghandi, Moses, Stephen Hawking, and Dumbledore (yes, both Merlin and Dumbledore). While the reality is a short, grumpy guy without even a fraction of the power attributed to him who mostly just wants to be left alone to set things on fire in peace.

I was wondering if anybody else had experienced quite that radical a dichotomy between what NPCs thought their character were like, and what their character was actually like.

Kelb_Panthera
2016-05-16, 09:39 PM
Seems to me that what -probably- happened was that, after you disapeared, a number of people that looked passably similar impersonated you and built themselves up on your fame. This happened a number of times IRL history with certain figures.

With a half-millenium of absence. It's stranger to me that anyone would believe you are who you claim to be, regardless of the truth of the matter, than that they expect you to be different than you are. You did say you were human, right?

Straybow
2016-05-16, 11:16 PM
Errrr, you mean Ray Kroc?

Darth Ultron
2016-05-16, 11:43 PM
Most people would not know a famous person if they were right next to them. Even in the 21st century with out crazy 24-7 multimedia, people still don't know what everyone looks like. And most people are limited by small spheres of what they like and even more so that is in their culture.

And in, say the 12th century...well, no one knew what anyone really looked like unless they met and knew them.

And I'm sure most folks would think most of your characters stories are exaggerations or lies, no matter how ''true'' they are....

TeChameleon
2016-05-17, 02:18 AM
With a half-millenium of absence. It's stranger to me that anyone would believe you are who you claim to be, regardless of the truth of the matter, than that they expect you to be different than you are. You did say you were human, right?
Yup, Gavin was human. Thing is, it was fairly well known that my character didn't die, just kind of vanished, and apparently that's a thing in this world often enough that no-one was all that surprised when he popped back out, especially when his disappearance happened right after his performing of a world-shaking feat of magic (it happened on a high point in the middle of the largest city of one of the largest empires on the planet- a lot of people saw it, so there was no question about who did it, especially when the gods themselves started popping out and complaining at him about him doing it >.O Thankfully the party cleric was able to calm them down...). Heck, after the timeskip, he was able to re-claim his holdings, since they were apparently put in trust for him.

Another likely factor was that the various other party members went on to become tremendously influential on the world stage- of the five party members, three went on to found, re-found or re-unite a variety of kingdoms or empires, the fourth created... basically a thieves' guild/Illuminati hybrid, really. So it's not entirely unreasonable to think that they had set things up so that when Gavin turned up again, he'd be able to get access to whatever remained of his old life.

For that matter... I'd actually forgotten about it until just now, but it's pretty easy for him to prove who he is to anyone with magical talent, or even a halfway-decent arcana skill. Apparently the heirloom wand that he carts around is kind of the in-universe equivalent to Kusanagi no Tsurugi or Excalibur (in terms of lore, at least, not so much in terms of power- stat-wise it's exactly the same as any other +6 Cinder Wand). As to why and how he ended up with it, it was in his family, and given the political and social climate he grew up in, they weren't exactly eager to advertise their connection to the old wizard-kings.


Most people would not know a famous person if they were right next to them. Even in the 21st century with out crazy 24-7 multimedia, people still don't know what everyone looks like. And most people are limited by small spheres of what they like and even more so that is in their culture.

And in, say the 12th century...well, no one knew what anyone really looked like unless they met and knew them.

And I'm sure most folks would think most of your characters stories are exaggerations or lies, no matter how ''true'' they are....
That's the thing, though- the exaggerations are the things that gained traction, and it really seems like most NPCs would brush it off as him being modest if he tried to tell them what actually happened. It's like being Baron Munchausen in reverse >.<

I'm not complaining in any way about people not believing he did what he did in the campaign. I'm more baffled about him building up what amounts to an involuntary cult of personality based on what people think his personality must be like because of what he did in life rather than anything resembling his actual personality.

It's a weird situation.

Kelb_Panthera
2016-05-17, 03:16 AM
Yup, Gavin was human. Thing is, it was fairly well known that my character didn't die, just kind of vanished, and apparently that's a thing in this world often enough that no-one was all that surprised when he popped back out, especially when his disappearance happened right after his performing of a world-shaking feat of magic (it happened on a high point in the middle of the largest city of one of the largest empires on the planet- a lot of people saw it, so there was no question about who did it, especially when the gods themselves started popping out and complaining at him about him doing it >.O Thankfully the party cleric was able to calm them down...). Heck, after the timeskip, he was able to re-claim his holdings, since they were apparently put in trust for him.

Another likely factor was that the various other party members went on to become tremendously influential on the world stage- of the five party members, three went on to found, re-found or re-unite a variety of kingdoms or empires, the fourth created... basically a thieves' guild/Illuminati hybrid, really. So it's not entirely unreasonable to think that they had set things up so that when Gavin turned up again, he'd be able to get access to whatever remained of his old life.

For that matter... I'd actually forgotten about it until just now, but it's pretty easy for him to prove who he is to anyone with magical talent, or even a halfway-decent arcana skill. Apparently the heirloom wand that he carts around is kind of the in-universe equivalent to Kusanagi no Tsurugi or Excalibur (in terms of lore, at least, not so much in terms of power- stat-wise it's exactly the same as any other +6 Cinder Wand). As to why and how he ended up with it, it was in his family, and given the political and social climate he grew up in, they weren't exactly eager to advertise their connection to the old wizard-kings.

They knew he didn't die at the time. It's very strange that they wouldn't believe he died at some point in the intervening centuries and after a half-millenium of being nowhere (essentially) it'd be more believable for most to assume he, and the whole event, was a myth rather than historical fact unless they're particularly well edjucated. Even then, you'd expect scholars to take the whole thing with a grain of salt since it's so unbelievable and tellers of tales have an unfortunate habbit of exaggerating and embellishing.

Your DM has some funny ideas about historical record keeping and fame.

Seto
2016-05-17, 06:38 AM
Actually, I think it makes sense: famous people's public image is often inflated to the point that it has little in common with the actual person behind it.

What I've seen in game is rather the opposite: PCs who have accomplished great deeds, are among the most powerful people around, and still get treated by every NPC bartender like when they were 1st level. That would be a result of the DM not adapting his rp to make the world respond to the PCs' actions. I think it's cool that your DM did that.

TeChameleon
2016-05-17, 06:51 AM
*shrug*

I dunno- he's wearing a magic item right now that makes him immune to the effects of normal aging, and I think it's something like a level 12 item- it's not like it's all that hard for a wizard to live for a very, very long time, assuming he doesn't do anything to get himself killed.

... oh. And apparently there's a minor detail that I've neglected to mention in this round of babbling about my character.

The method of drowning Orcus and rewriting the map?

The main macguffin of the campaign (if you'll pardon me using the term colloquially and incorrectly) was an artifact storing nearly three thousand years' worth of magical power; basically it was a Wish spell writ large. The DM had made this clear to me, and informed me that, functionally speaking, I was going to have a single shot to do whatever it was that I wanted to do to stop Orcus and his legions of undead. If memory serves, teleporting him into deep space was mentioned as a suggestion, as was raising a colossal wall between the oncoming undead horde and the good-aligned kingdoms.

I went for option C)- rip most of the known world out of the ground and suspend it in the sky as a floating continent. So I guess it was less 'drown Orcus' and more like 'slap Orcus with a dozen or so mile-high tidal waves'.

Over the course of the skill check to yank Orcus' target out of reach, I managed to roll ludicrously well (I think the only roll I made below 17 was the check to make sure that the Dwarven tunnels running through the new flying continent stayed stable, and even there, the worst that happened was the Dwarven kingdoms lost a bit of crockery), ending up with a tropical paradise with a hyperbaric atmosphere, extending the lifespans of everyone in the new 'upper world' and making everything born there grow friggin' huge (the DM decided it was at around 25% larger than the previous average for people, and something ridiculous like 300% plus for plants).

So his primary achievement is one that's a bit tough to argue, given that there's still a few trillion tons of rock floating in the sky with a tropical paradise sitting on top of it.

... that and this is D&D- 500 years is easily within living memory for quite a few races, and the Upper World is actually fairly well integrated as far as races intermingling, so... not sure that what's been going on is all that out of line as far as versimilitude goes.

Max_Killjoy
2016-05-17, 08:31 AM
I'm reminded of King Harry, who merely needs to lend a cloak to be able to walk anonymously among his soldiers at night. In times before photos, this actually makes a lot of sense. All of Harry's soldiers know him more by what he wears, his horse, and how he uses rhetoric to a crowd. And Harry can, of course, call on his days as a rascal amongst the rabble, to blend in better.

So by giving someone else his cloak, he becomes anonymous?

goto124
2016-05-17, 08:48 AM
I think 'borrow' is the word.

hymer
2016-05-17, 09:16 AM
I think 'borrow' is the word.

Right. My bad. The line is 'lend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas' IIRC, which tripped me up.

goto124
2016-05-17, 09:44 AM
I shall now imagine you tripping on a cloak (http://i.imgur.com/fJuQ81l.png).

hymer
2016-05-17, 09:52 AM
I shall now imagine you tripping on a cloak (http://i.imgur.com/fJuQ81l.png).

I can't get back to speed in this thread, can I? :smallredface:

Eisirt
2016-05-17, 10:10 AM
Your DM has some funny ideas about historical record keeping and fame.

This.... in spades, with bells on.

TeChameleon
2016-05-17, 07:37 PM
I can't get back to speed in this thread, can I? :smallredface:

Well, not if you're tripping over your cloak, you can't...

And I am now officially confused for a completely different reason: that the sticking point for some readers of this thread is not that my character single-handedly created a paradisical flying continent, killed a god and his armies, and saved the world, but that people 500 years later still remember that :smallconfused:

Darth Ultron
2016-05-17, 08:22 PM
I'm more baffled about him building up what amounts to an involuntary cult of personality based on what people think his personality must be like because of what he did in life rather than anything resembling his actual personality.


If you go beyond the game: this is a real life thing.

Every music performer, actor, writer, and all other famous people are not what they ''pretend'' to be in their fiction or even in public. So, you can read up on some real life stuff about this.

Quertus
2016-05-17, 09:18 PM
Well, not if you're tripping over your cloak, you can't...

And I am now officially confused for a completely different reason: that the sticking point for some readers of this thread is not that my character single-handedly created a paradisical flying continent, killed a god and his armies, and saved the world, but that people 500 years later still remember that :smallconfused:

Yeah, people are weird. :smallconfused: So, if your DM is playing the NPCs in a way that seems weird, he's probably doing it right. :smallamused: Because if they weigh the same as a duck... they'll float... so...

Anyway, to answer your original question, yes, several of my characters have underserved reputations - and that's without a 500-year absence from the campaign world.

People keep coming to my signature character for help, and he'd really rather not care - especially since his clothes will start burning if he cares to much. Although, despite the fact that he has saved the world many times saved so many, many worlds, people usually don't expect him to be as powerful as he actually is (even after they adventure with him).

One of my characters... had the DM convinced he was powerful (due to some lucky rolls in an ideal encounter early on), and so proceeded to bluff and intimidate his way through the campaign.

I love magic, and usually play mages who use magic, because magic is cool, but one of my Mage characters apparently had the storyteller convinced that he was addicted to magic. I'd pull out an apple to eat, and the storyteller would ask, "you want to roll for that?" I'd just answer, "no, not really", because I wasn't doing magic - I actually had an apple. When this kind of thing happened a great many times, I realized my character apparently had the most epic Blatancy stat ever - even the storyteller couldn't tell the difference between my magic and my mundane actions. :smallcool:

Kid Jake
2016-05-18, 03:01 AM
It wasn't me personally, but a player in my old Pathfinder game had a character like that. Everybody in town, including himself, saw him as a dashing and handsome knight in shining armor, swooping in to save the day at the last minute and keeping the peace (in his role as sheriff) for the entire region, pretty much singlehandedly.

In reality he was a delusional ghoul (who slew the previous Sheriff to take his place) that cut off his own hands so that he could sew razors in their place and was more often than not the CAUSE of the town's misfortune; as his hunger for flesh (not to mention his devil worshiping partner) often drove him to do less than respectable things. But he'd always slip on a hat of disguise, flash his trademarked winning smile and ride off into the sunset before anyone had a chance to realize what he really was.

He was awesome.

Kelb_Panthera
2016-05-18, 03:48 AM
Well, not if you're tripping over your cloak, you can't...

And I am now officially confused for a completely different reason: that the sticking point for some readers of this thread is not that my character single-handedly created a paradisical flying continent, killed a god and his armies, and saved the world, but that people 500 years later still remember that :smallconfused:

Hey, I'm used to wizards being able to create their own mini-realities and bending the laws of physics over and spanking them until they do what they're told. There's even precedent for flying cities in some settings. Blowing that up to small-ish continents floating in the sky isn't a big deal. (Drowning Orcus is a new twist, especially given that the version I'm familiar with can teleport at will.)

Here's the thing; that's an extraordinary act by an exceptional, unique individual. Such things are why you pick up a fantasty game in the first place. One thing you can reasonably count on, even in a fantasy setting, however is that large groups of people, especially humans, will have their behavior trend in fairly predictable ways.

You cannot predict what one person will do but you can make fairly accurate predictions of what people will do if you're at all familiar with sociology, anthropology, or politics (much less, all of the above). That's why it strikes me, at least, as much stranger that you're still easily recognized and believed to be who you claim than it is that you did those things in the distant past.

What was the question again?

Blue Lantern
2016-05-18, 04:03 AM
I think it perfectly plausible for this discrepancy between perception and reality to exists. I mean most people tend to unconsciously rewrite history for things that happened a few day before. Plus I don't think there is a single public person existing today that whose real personality reflect 100% the image the public has of them, and that with the modern technology.

I'll just leave a couple of quotes that sum up this pretty well.

"History became legend. Legend became myth"

"Memories become legend. Legend fades to myth"

TeChameleon
2016-05-18, 06:55 PM
Hey, I'm used to wizards being able to create their own mini-realities and bending the laws of physics over and spanking them until they do what they're told. There's even precedent for flying cities in some settings. Blowing that up to small-ish continents floating in the sky isn't a big deal. (Drowning Orcus is a new twist, especially given that the version I'm familiar with can teleport at will.)
Well, a quick glance at the 4e compendium says Orcus has teleport 6 as an at-will. Which is an impressively handy power, no argument there. But that's really not enough to get out of the way when there are multiple tidal waves that are a good 50 km across on their narrowest point, and somewhere on the order of one or two kilometres tall coming at you.


You cannot predict what one person will do but you can make fairly accurate predictions of what people will do if you're at all familiar with sociology, anthropology, or politics (much less, all of the above). That's why it strikes me, at least, as much stranger that you're still easily recognized and believed to be who you claim than it is that you did those things in the distant past.
My masterful communications skills strike again >.O

I skipped another step in there- 'easily' recognized is not really the term. However, he was able to prove his identity to those that had reason to care (... and now I'm tempted to make part of the reason for his wealth that there was an imposter a couple of centuries back who had just planned to live like a king for a few years, found that he had a taste for being a business shark, and more than tripled Gavin's wealth before being found out :smalltongue:).

Now that he's back and active (and generally doing the insane crap that PCs tend to get into as a matter of course...), however, rumour of his return is beginning to spread, and he's being recognized a little more often, although thankfully not in the streets so much yet.


What was the question again?
Whether or not my experience as the anti-Rodney Dangerfield was anything strange :smallwink:


I think it perfectly plausible for this discrepancy between perception and reality to exists. I mean most people tend to unconsciously rewrite history for things that happened a few day before. Plus I don't think there is a single public person existing today that whose real personality reflect 100% the image the public has of them, and that with the modern technology.

I'll just leave a couple of quotes that sum up this pretty well.

"History became legend. Legend became myth"

"Memories become legend. Legend fades to myth"
Fair enough, I guess. It's just really weird to be on the receiving end of it...

And I'm loving the stories, keep 'em coming!

Kelb_Panthera
2016-05-18, 07:13 PM
Well, a quick glance at the 4e compendium says Orcus has teleport 6 as an at-will. Which is an impressively handy power, no argument there. But that's really not enough to get out of the way when there are multiple tidal waves that are a good 50 km across on their narrowest point, and somewhere on the order of one or two kilometres tall coming at you.

I play 3e. Orcus can be anywhere he's familiar with on the entire plane as a standard action. So can most demons and devils. Unless that tidal wave represents a transplanar boundary, it's not a threat.



My masterful communications skills strike again >.O

I skipped another step in there- 'easily' recognized is not really the term. However, he was able to prove his identity to those that had reason to care (... and now I'm tempted to make part of the reason for his wealth that there was an imposter a couple of centuries back who had just planned to live like a king for a few years, found that he had a taste for being a business shark, and more than tripled Gavin's wealth before being found out :smalltongue:).

Now that he's back and active (and generally doing the insane crap that PCs tend to get into as a matter of course...), however, rumour of his return is beginning to spread, and he's being recognized a little more often, although thankfully not in the streets so much yet.

Most peculiar. That, at least, makes a little more sense. It still strikes me as much more likely that most of those that are interacting with you are humoring the identity thing with either a healthy skepticism or indifference to an irrelevant detail of your character. Whoever you claim to be, what you're doing now is what matters. Whether they're comparing you to your legend to see if you measure up to expectation or making catty jibes at you for failing to do so is mostly irrelevant unless you or the DM decide to make it a plot point.



Whether or not my experience as the anti-Rodney Dangerfield was anything strange :smallwink:

"Unbeleivable. What's a guy gotta do to get a little less respect around here?" :smalltongue: Yeah, it's a bit strange.