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Old 11-21-2015, 07:16 PM   #21
Flyndaran
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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Originally Posted by Gold & Appel Inc View Post
...
Speaking as somebody with a pretty severe phobia, I view it as something legitimately threatening in the moment that I am failing my self control check, but I am self-aware that I was being crazy in retrospect.
While I recognize my anxiety attacks as absurd even when in the midst of them. I have literally laughed while my body and emotions tear me apart.

Fear and delusion, even of the temporary kind, don't always coincide. Perception and interpretation are fuzzy and exactly when they cross from overreaction into delusion is usually arguable, of course.
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Old 11-21-2015, 08:55 PM   #22
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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That example is a Phobia PLUS a Delusion.
Delusion is one example of a mental disad that you almost certainly don't know you have, because if you know it's not true, how is it still a delusion?

Speaking of, though, interesting disad combination: Paranoia, Nightmares, and Delusion ("I have precognitive dreams"). Works well for a villain, but could be very interesting for a hero, especially if the other players don't know he's delusional.
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Old 11-21-2015, 09:04 PM   #23
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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Delusion is one example of a mental disad that you almost certainly don't know you have, because if you know it's not true, how is it still a delusion.
Reaction penalties. Seriously you can perfectly well have Delusion, know perfectly well other people consider it crazy and that you are spending a lot of time trying and mostly failing to convince them - the two problems that make a belief a disadvantage - and still do it.

A common example: you know most door to door missionaries never actually convert anybody, but if you can save just *one* soul from damnation from their false beliefs all those hours of effort and all the mockery from the unbelievers will have been worth it.....
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Old 11-21-2015, 09:13 PM   #24
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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Reaction penalties. Seriously you can perfectly well have Delusion, know perfectly well other people consider it crazy and that you are spending a lot of time trying and mostly failing to convince them - the two problems that make a belief a disadvantage - and still do it.

A common example: you know most door to door missionaries never actually convert anybody, but if you can save just *one* soul from damnation from their false beliefs all those hours of effort and all the mockery from the unbelievers will have been worth it.....
... you might want to reread what you quoted. 'Knowing that other people think you're wrong' is not at all what I said.

EDIT: I hope the above does not come off as hostile. What I actually felt was 'surprised and puzzled'.
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Old 11-22-2015, 05:43 AM   #25
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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... you might want to reread what you quoted. 'Knowing that other people think you're wrong' is not at all what I said.

EDIT: I hope the above does not come off as hostile. What I actually felt was 'surprised and puzzled'.
I'm not sure what the distinction you are trying to draw is.

I suspect it's that you are missing that Delusions need not be false. The disadvantage content is that everybody thinks you are crazy, and it limits your actions in some way, including causing you to waste a lot of time for no actual gain. If you know the neighbors think you are crazy and you are wasting resources but do it anyway, you certainly know you have the disadvantage.

You may insist it isn't a Delusion, but then a lot of players will refuse to call things that absolutely qualify as Delusions one - like that sincere religious belief, or for that matter militant atheism. It does not matter which, if either, of those is true, they are both Delusions. It's one of those disadvantages where the game effect doesn't overlap the English definition all that well, like Honesty or for that matter Pyromania from this thread.
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Old 11-22-2015, 01:41 PM   #26
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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A common example: you know most door to door missionaries never actually convert anybody, but if you can save just *one* soul from damnation from their false beliefs all those hours of effort and all the mockery from the unbelievers will have been worth it.....
Where are you getting that fact? I know from personal experience that method works. You've got to put in a huge amount of time, but I'd say most male members of my extended family have found and baptized someone into the LDS church using that method -- actually, most of us have multiple and separate instances. It applies to most mormon missionaries -- at least half. Now, we serve intensive two year missions where we do little else, so you've got from 1 to 3 thousand hours of doing that, but it works. but I'm wondering where you got your statistics.
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Old 11-22-2015, 04:04 PM   #27
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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Where are you getting that fact? I know from personal experience that method works. You've got to put in a huge amount of time, but I'd say most male members of my extended family have found and baptized someone into the LDS church using that method.
I dunno where I learned that, but you should be able to convince yourself pretty easily. Look at growth rates. The LDS probably has the best success rates of anybody that does this, and even if you use the official membership numbers, it adds about 300,000 members a year. With around 90,000 essentially full time missionaries, that's no better than 1 convert per 4 months of full time effort even if all the new members were converted by missions (and presumably some of them are births, in-marriages, walk-ins and the like). If what's probably the most successful program in the world (and while it's maybe debatable if the LDS is really the world's fastest growing church as it sometimes claims, it certainly is in the top few) isn't getting any better results than that, and relatively few other door knockers put in solid months of full time work, well....
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Old 11-22-2015, 05:30 PM   #28
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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I'm not sure what the distinction you are trying to draw is.
By definition, a Delusion is something you believe to be true, that other people don't. Therefore, if you know it to be false (whether it actually is or not) you don't have a Delusion.
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Old 11-22-2015, 05:50 PM   #29
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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Reaction penalties.
Actually, if it's just annoying Odious Personal Habit covers that just fine. Delusion is for beliefs that are not true (e.g., limiting your behavior) AND cause people to think you are crazy for having them. The rules allow the GM to have a plot twist and make certain types of Delusions true, but that's really outside of the PCs control. For actual religious beliefs you have Disciplines of Faith, or Vow, which both limit your behavior.
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Old 11-22-2015, 08:40 PM   #30
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Default Re: Being self aware of mental disadvantages

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... Delusion is for beliefs that are not true ...
Not quite - it's more accurate to say that Delusion is for beliefs that other people think are not true. Usually, they think this because they have evidence, but it is possible by the RAW that they're wrong and the character with the Delusion is right.

Either way, of course, the character with the Delusion cannot be aware that it is a Delusion.
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