How do you write/roleplay someone who is insane? When I say insanity...

How do you write/roleplay someone who is insane? When I say insanity, I mean either like modern day diagnosable paranoid schizophrenic or the more dramatic and sweepingly vague, 'He's mad, MAD I TELL YOU!' Working on something new and at kind of an impasse.

Method to the madness. Act rationally, but with a horribly croocked worldview.

Look up symptoms and cases, and write a character reacting to and along those lines? I do my best to follow real world examples with this kind of thing, romanticised just enough that I don't drag down the experience for everyone else, but not treated with anything less than respect.

Why do people feel the need to make Zelda morally grey?

The first thing you have to understand is most insane people don't act like the Joker or Deadpool. Those types always shine bright on peoples' radar and get thrown into a loony pen pretty quickly.

The really menacing, accomplished insane people are the ones who have incredibly crooked views on reality but manage to slip through the cracks. Eric Harris was a misanthropic sociopath who had a Darwinist approach to life. He hated the idea of a world where the strong didn't straight up kill the weak and he regularly fantasized and even wrote about dumping humanity into a giant Doom level to let them duke it out. But no one even knew something was wrong with the kid until he shot up his fucking school.

If you're gonna play an insane person, play someone who clearly does not have the same kinds of hang ups or morals a normal, mentally healthy person should have. But still make them functional in society, maybe even friendly. Those are the really menacing kinds of maniacs. Not the ones who laugh about how "normal is a setting on the washing machine" while bashing someone's tail lights out. The ones you can have a normal, human conversation with and never even realize they're about to get a bunch of people to kill themselves.

>Why do people feel the need to make Zelda morally grey?
because they have absolutely no idea how to mentally process anything morally black and white.

How is this "morally grey"? Yeah it's pretty melodramatic but Link does in fact shoulder massive responsibilities in just about every game.

Of all the Veeky Forums buzzwords, "moral grey" is one I really, really wish would die.

>How is this "morally grey"? Yeah it's pretty melodramatic but Link does in fact shoulder massive responsibilities in just about every game.

Point taken, maybe "overly dramatic" is a better fit in this case.

Still, waxing on about how "a sword brings death and does not give life" and "is a curse, not a gift" is implying a whole lot of "depth" that does not exist in the games and was never meant to.

>entire fryer bin is removable instead of basket
my McDonald's autism

user, I understand that growing up on the Internet has reduced your ability to comprehend real life, but consider this: which of these two manners of presentation do you think will cause more people to read the creator's webcomic:

1. A factual reproduction of the game's dialogue with no additions

2. An overly dramatic reproduction of the game's dialogue with artistic licenses

I always thought it was just the basket and they got lazy with the cross-hatching.

i have an aunt who is schizophrenic. she's mostly stable, but has ticks. at the end of saying something, she always says "fine, ok, no problem." ALWAYS. Has for years. She does odd things that, to an outsider, would be simply odd. Moving the coffee table an inch or two, changing what slots the silverware go in the tray. closing the curtains when she never does. My cousin had this exact scenario happen when i was over hanging with him. she didn't know i was there thankfully, but he went to grab a fork, caught a knife to the hand, ran to the bathroom to get a bandage, tripped over the coffee table that she had clearly moved, then she was going to hit him with a fire iron she had in her hand, but saw me behind him and stopped. she ended up in the loony bin for 6 months that time.
this user gets it.

Especially as Link has the triforce of courage, he's always going to jump to do the right thing, it's in his nature

>user, I understand that growing up on the Internet has reduced your ability to comprehend real life, but consider this: which of these two manners of presentation do you think will cause more people to read the creator's webcomic:
>1. A factual reproduction of the game's dialogue with no additions
>2. An overly dramatic reproduction of the game's dialogue with artistic licenses
Oh, I understand why the artist did it, my point was that it is fucking stupid.
And German internet wasn't really a thing when I was growing up.

>Oh, I understand why the artist did it, my point was that it is fucking stupid.
So you DON'T understand why the artist did it? Because it makes perfect sense why he would do it, which is the opposite of stupid.

>German
Oh, never mind

Nice day to you too, user.

OP, why is your character "insane"? What do they bring to the table? How does insanity influence their actions?

Just saying "they're crazy" doesn't give you a defined character. It gives you someone who thinks they're a turnip, or someone who's unable to feed and clean themselves.

Do you want a savant with empathy problems? Look up symptoms of autism for ideas on how to play it.

Play someone with anxiety disorders or selective mutism or such if you want a character who will have difficulty associating with the party.

You can go Hannibal Lecter route if you want psychopath. A reasonable, charming, intelligent person who just has fucked up ways of handling their problems (i.e, eating them).

You could also go full Machiavellian sociopath, somebody who has learned to fake all emotion and social interaction, and who enjoys torturing people psychologically without them noticing.

If you don't want to go the harming people route of crazy, there's all sorts of anxiety, schizophrenic, and other disorders that you can apply. Or just pick a personality disorder and turn it up to 11. You want Borderline PD? I'll give you so many borders you'll be post colonialism Africa.

Personally, I think most characters who take on the role of PCs have some kind of mental dysfunction or another.

I like to introduce insane characters in a safe, but unfamiliar, environment. If players are seeking information or aid, they'll be receptive to whatever advice they're given, which is the perfect opportunity to drop a big load of crazy on them. Only later will they have that "Ohhhhh" moment, when they realize they've been eating up a big load of bullshit.

Or if you want the players to catch on right away, have them go off on some big ol' diatribe about his theroies about an event the PC's had actually participated in (like an earlier adventure of theirs) but have everything that follows be just an endless line of bullshit. Since the PC's were there and know those events personally, they should see this for what it is.

But life, especially animal one, is all about murdering things and stealing life from someone's else.

cruise control deepness by taking something happy and making it shades of grey.

OP here to address this pleasant side conversation:

Zelda is morally gray. short answer:
Or do you say that you wish to join the dead?

:) ; Long answer:
Regardless of that this aside is pleasant. Zelda is morally gray, because it's a complex story (or if you're really into it, cycle of stories) in which our 'protagonist' has his role thrust upon him and his actions are often odd, strange even to conform with the prophecies, or what have you.

Figure out what type of insanity they have.
Typically insane people still have internal logic, there is just a slip in the gears. Knowing Where and how that slip happens let's you get into there head.

The character is profoundly seperated from reality, but is mostly functional within it. He has a stable living situation, but does not always participate in it. His interactions with others (especially the main ones) are odd and stilted, and he would like to maintain his isolation but the story is rapidly careening towards his home being a safe place for the other characters, and I'm having trouble writing him in a way that I find believable.

I appreciate the assistance! Please keep the suggestions coming.

ugh look we don't need all this boring nerd shit, he's just crazy

Link is a good guy that uses a good sword to defeat bad foes and weird stuff. Getting that good sword was the goodest thing that ever happened to the good link, because it helped him to save Zelda in a goodly way.

Transfusing the sword scene into a "THIS SWORD WILL MAKE YOU DO BAD THINGS, HOPE YOU WILL FORGIVE ME FOR HARMING YOUR SOuul" scene is LEAPING into the FORCED 'morally gray' zone.

>implying the NPC will get five words out before he gets murdered and looted

I think you're just seeing what you want to see in it because Veeky Forums's forced you to think anything not noblebright is the purview of this nebulous concept of "moral grey".

Yeah, it's overly dramatic and I don't like it much. But the point of the comic is Link is taking up this sword because he, a boy, is now becoming a hero. Instead of playing stick ball and catching fireflies he's fighting evil. And this is his role for all eternity; every reincarnation, every ancestor important enough to wind up with the Triforce of Courage is gonna do this. Just because what Link does is Good doesn't mean it's easy, or doesn't require sacrifice.

I hate this "moral grey" bullshit Veeky Forums always gets so mad about. It always amounts to "but whhyyyy can't I go rescue my pure princess waifu from the evil dragon man Game of Thrones ruined fantasy fuck normies".

I don't know about you, but to me "morally grey" means no obvious good/evil sides in a conflict. Zelda certainly isn't morally grey, but that does not mean it's simple and doesn't feature some heavier themes of sacrifice and the like.

Your defintion is basically mine. But a lot of folks on Veeky Forums use "morally grey" as a pejorative for a fake trend of 2deep4u "why'd you kill the bad guy he just wants bread for his kids" schlock they think is prevalent in fantasy nowadays. It basically gets applied to anything which doesn't read like one of those Medieval Times-style cartoon point and click vidya games we all played when we were kids.

Even without using it as a meme term, I don't count Zelda as an example of moral greyness in storytelling. I don't count that comic as an example of it either.

Friend:
Can we have a villain Link? What does villain link do?

To me, Link is a cipher. He's a blank canvas. From what's been shown to us, he's largely good, or at least....good enough.

He doesn't have to be, and I would argue in reality, he is mostly good in his present games. In future games it would be very intersting if he weren't 'good'. IN fact, I'd argue 'goodness' isn't something most 'Link's' do....

>pic

>one of those Medieval Times-style cartoon point and click vidya games we all played when we were kids.

wow what kind of trash were you playing lmao

To be fair i wouldn't mind playing a spinoff when we play an evil Link, good Ganon or not getting kidnapped Zelda

> not getting kidnapped Zelda

Some drawfag on Tumblr actually came up with a concept revolving around just that.

I only get upset about morally grey shit when it's being all "no matter what you do you are a shithead" kind of thing and that's a real hard sell when I just want to have fun.

Though I do agree that the comic is definitely not "morally grey".

Use UA
The Madness Meter gives you a precise readout of the effect several dimensions of trauma have on a character as well as how they appear to others as a result. You can use it in any system with a little work, like the free Nemesis.

Use CoC7
What first seems like a countdown is in fact a detailed box of keeper tricks to involve character background, narration, blackouts, and all kinds of mechanics to illustrate a character's decay in story dimensions.

If you want to tackle actual disorders for more than a running gag then start reading some medical literature.

That's not realiral greyness though. That's just shitty writing Veeky Forums decided was moral grey because a bunch of anyone have seen too many GoT memes.

Moral grey at its base just means not every bad guy is an unfeeling killbot and not every good guy is a nice person.

Link is already a kleptomaniac vandal with a seething hatred of pottery, and the new game appears to be adding pyromania to that list.

Kind of a murderhobo, actually.

If not for that fucking retarded tumblr nose this picture would actually look pretty badass.

>triforce of courage

Amusingly, Link may have the easiest time doing evil of most major good protagonists, since courage is the ability to do something despite fear. It really depends how the individual Links view the world, with a younger/more naive Link being the most susceptible to this. Maybe, perhaps especially, if guided by some kind of well intentioned extremist Zelda.

That's just a reality of most art you'll find on tumblr. Even the good stuff has it.

Personally I don't mind it all that much. I'll take it over noodle arms.

I make them act like crazy people I've met. Theres this one person I met through granpa, she thinks she's being watched by the govornment at all times, says goodbye to both the person she's talking to AND Obama at the end of all phone calls, every time. Sometimes swearing.

So, you have this paranoid Wizard who invests more than he really needs to into anti-scrying items and spells, and might even practice them just to watch the people watching him to see if they are, but of course they aren't, because they are watching when he looks at the others, so they know when HE's about to scry. Or they just have other people to do that so they can look innocent, but he doesn't know who.

Bonus points for the people he's worrying about actually having rooms warded against scrying, they're obviously going to talk about HIM in there, otherwise why would they have entered while he was scrying?

Have another one convinced the dragons run the world similarly to the jewish conspiracy, and any evidence to the contrary is just planted there by them, or an act, because they live for centuries longer than he will and can afford to play the long game.

This isn't hard.

>Still, waxing on about how "a sword brings death and does not give life" and "is a curse, not a gift" is implying a whole lot of "depth" that does not exist in the games and was never meant to.
Because it's adapting the story and concept to a different medium. On an 8 bit NES game you'd show a man to be wise by saying 'DODONGO DISLIKES SMOKE'. That doesn't cut it in a comic adaptation.

zelda, as played by gadget from rescue rangers

>zelda, as played by gadget from rescue rangers
derp, forgot pic

I feel like when people say their characters are insane, they really mean neurotic.

Mine are usually delusional. Sometimes they work off of an illogical or irrational conclusion and go from there.

Nah I've seen that in other stories story.

It's one of the reasons I can't get into Witcher 3 and have no interest in Dragon Age.

I unironically like the idea of a magic-wielding, puzzle-centric Zelda game about overthrowing an already-victorious Ganon who circumvented the prophecy by capturing Link and holding him prisoner somewhere.