How come the Detect Life effect also appears on undead? (skeletons, zombies, etc) ((at least it does for me on Oblivion)).

Gameplay reasons. Not lore.

...

Next!

"...our world was born from magicka, the creative force that informs and sustains all life." (http://www.imperial-library.info/pge3/arena_supermundus.shtml)

The skeletons are held together by animating magic, making them somewhat magically sentient, but they are not the same entities that contained a "spirit". That spirit returns to the Dreamsleeve upon mortal death (outside of some few "incalculable effort" exceptions).

Magic + will = "life". (See http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/5th_era_loveletter.shtml where it states that "the marriages of the Aether describe the birth of all magic. ...the Aurbis exploded with its surplus. Will formed and, with it, the Potential to Action.")
So why are they called "the undead" then, you might ask?

Answer: because it is the will of either the conjurer or necromancer PLUS the animating magic that give it the similarity to life to the point that "Detect Life" detects it as well.

Hope this helps.


___The Word Merchant of Julianos

So how come you can't detect bound items without using a different effect in mysticism, huh?

Bound items are infused with a daedric "soul".

"Soul" does not equal "Life" because a "soul", by itself, does not contain the necessary "potential to action" requirement.

Souls alone do not have the animating magic needed to be "alive" in the Aurbis, which is why they are separated from "the living" once the living becomes a "dead" entity. The soul exists even though something is no longer "alive".


___TWM

Oh right, so what are you saying now? That if a bound item is being used, then you can detect it? Seriously?!

I'd just like to acknowledge the growing desperation of the Lore forum.

No, man. Just that bound items are not "lifeforms". They are just shaped souls.

Skeletons have physical forms and a will driving them (albeit the caster). They qualify as a "lifeform" for the purposes of Detect Magic.

There's a difference.


___TWM

edit: I may have been unclear on the "potential to action" thing. The phrase "potential to action" is pretty much synonymous with free will. The skeletons are controlled by free will, it is just the caster's free will that is being detected. Does that clear up my admittedly muddy water post a bit? :shrug:

They have the will of its user. It now has potential to action. How is that any different from a necromancer who uses his own will to provide "life"?

I get what you're saying. It's elaborate puppetry. Magicka is the strings, the necromancer the master. Is that what you're saying? And it makes it life-like?

Hmmm. I think that the will of the caster operates in a different manner in conjuring skeletons than it does in summoning bound items.

In summoning skeletons, caster will + magical body = [something detectable].

In summoning bound items, the soul (which is undetectable by itself) is shaped into a certain form, but the caster's will is not inserted into it. On the contrary, the caster's will only applies in that situation in commanding the caster's own extremities to physically (not mentally) move the shaped soul, i.e., via swinging, chopping, etc.

Knight Mariel, we both know that there is no official lore that states the hypothesis above verbatim, therefore we must concede that we are extrapolating from what we do have available. The question now becomes whether such extrapolation is something that you will consider and take seriously?

I find myself subscribing to the latter, and I hope that you do as well.

May JHUNAL bless and guide your continued searches and endeavors, for I remain...


___The Word Merchant of Julianos

Sorry, I won't. I admit though I like your idea, but its application I find not appropriate. However, because discussing this matter is really ridic, I'm leaving this thread...for now.

TWM: But some enchanted items have both soul and will (see A'tor and other examples), so why we can not detect enchanted items with detect life?

Probebly because the Guild of Mages gets paid per spell effect they teach you, so rather then making one spell that detects everything, they hobble it so that you have to pay them for a Detect Life and Detect Enchantment spell.

In the end it's just gameplay but the idea that any thing which is naturally imbued with a soul can be detected by detect life is sufficient enough. So that it doesn't detect enchantments could be taken as a suggestion that enchantments are different from the way things are normally alive.

You see un-, in the english language is a prefix which connotes "not." So an undead is something that is not dead is thus, alive.

Your welcome.

Such insight. Such glorious, illuminating insight.

Thank you, sir.

The "S" in Brian S' name stands for "semantics"....obviously. :grad:

Pft, lawyers.

...you bet I just went there.

. o O (We do what we can.)

Umm... what about the grey fuzzy area where the soul has fled but the body is alive? Like, vegetable.

"You can't prove a negative." I heard that from somewhere... So, you can't say that if is something is not-dead that it is alive. Could could be not-dead and not-alive. :blink:

:ahhh: I need to stop confusing myself.