skipping
> It's not entirely clear to me whether the key difference between a
> Dead Person, and Hero Harrowing Hell is. Is it how they got there?
The exact difference probably involves some hair-splitting arguments. Obviously, just going to Hell doesn't REQUIRE dying, or Humakti could never make the Terminus Quest, or visit Humakt's Hall of Heroes (also supposedly located in Hell) without it being a one-way trip (and thus a failure). Going to Hell while still embodied is probably NOT considered dying by most cults or other authorities. There is, of course, the tricky problem of a shaman visiting it from the Spirit Plane -- how deep can he go before he is ruled to have died and (hopefully) resurrected? And does it matter in his case, anyway?
My guess would be that going by Daka Fal and being Judged is definitely being dead. Losing your original body, or being Severed from it via the Divine spell is also fairly certain. After that, it is a case of what it would mean if the Heroquester really had died, and does he/she behave in that manner? Clearly, for some heroquesters the question of their being alive is like asking whether they have a lap, given that they are standing at the moment.
> > And as should be obvious, I think it can be an important distinction. For
> > one thing, you can't leave by the same path you entered when you're dead.
> Can you leave by the same path you entered (assuming it's the Western
> Gate, at least) even if you haven't been "killed"). (Serious question,
> not rhetorical.) Certainly that's not that the Lightbringers did.
Yes, but some early texts (RQ2, not early ST) implied that the Lightbringers
DID in fact die somewhere on the Quest, since they had to get by their own
ghosts. Since Orlanth worshippers can come back from the dead (either by
resurrection or reincarnation) it is not an impossible problem.
Contrawise, most heroquests don't allow one to exit via the same place as they started, as far as I have seen. This may be excessive LBQ-itis on our part, of course, and there could be scads of smaller Quests that are just in and out via the same portal. Anyone think of some?
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