I remember a game, might have been RuneQuest or Harn, where when a religious character died they were absorbed by their god, but when a character who wasn't a follower of a god died they became a wandering ghost. The ghost could try to possess someone,which was a struggle of wills a bit like Rick envisages here. They were at a disadvantage but if you had good mental attributes and picked a weak enemy you were definitely in with a chance. If you played it smart you might find the strongest and dumbest member of the enemy army you could find, possess him, and walk away with a character that had high mental *and* physical attributes, and hence dramatically better than the one that had died. I'm almost sad my character in that campaign - a puny wizard - never died.
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David