Category talk:Ghost

are all incorporeal undead considered ghosts? can someone check the VRG? -- Gonzoron 20:24, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

As I read it, the VRG mentions only ethereal creatures, not shadow creatures, and not the rare incorporeal-but-not extraplanar creatures, like those starving guys in the Guide to Walking Dead. DeepShadow 20:32, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, is there a way to distinguish them? For example: Banshee, seems like it should be a ghost, but the 3e Monster Manual II entry doesn't mention the ethereal plane at all. -- Gonzoron 21:32, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

As I recall, a ghost is nailed to the ethereal plane but can manifest. Spectres, wraiths and shadows do not have to manifest as they are not on the ethereal plane. As for banshees and as I again recall, the banshee that we inhereted from D&D is not on the ethereal plane either. But the scream attack of the banshee was added as a possible special attack of ghosts and treating all banshee's as ghosts might well make sense from the point of view of giving the monster a history and a reason for doing what it does. For that matter the special attack of Jolly Roger's was added to one of the varients of the Walking Dead. Do we want to classify all the walking dead. It would be extra work, but it might be useful. Or we might discover exceptions galore, that would make it more frustrating, and more work, than it merits.Cure 00:53, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Would it be more or less complicating to recall that RL has different ethereal rules--i.e. Near Ethereal and Resonance? Thus, I'd rule that "ethereal" in this case applies to all "spirits" that are not specifically shadow-creatures. The edge-of-sight dudes from WD can be their own thing entirely. DeepShadow 04:42, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

The Bony Hands are not actually ethereal or incorporeal. They are just mostly invisible. VRGtG seems mostly silent on non-ghost incorporeals. There's a tiny bit in the last sidebar talking about how you can use stats for a shadow, wraith, spectre, etc as a starting point for a unique ghost, and as Cure said, VR lumps banshees in as ghosts in the salient abilities section. Given the lack of a clear guideline, I think we should only lump creatures in the Ghost category if thay have the word "Ghost" in their name (e.g. Animal Ghost) or there is a clear canon cite saying that they are a type of ghost. (e.g. "...a geist is a rank one ghost that lacks the manifestation special attack..." -- DoDread p. 81) Gonzoron 15:14, 22 October 2010 (UTC)