3 questions (1 or all may be idiotic)

k so I have been thinking about the GE a lot more recently and I have come a cross 3 ideas that I cannot figure out how to impliment if anyone could tell me how I would greatly appreciate it. They appear in most if not all games so…

I ) capes…ok ok dont walk away. What I am trying to do is get the cape to move according to the player, so when the player rotates the cape flares our and trailes behind or when the player falls it trailes again. I tried to use Hooks, empties, and copy rotation/location constraints but realized that they would not return to their original alignment…

II ) fading/disappearing corpses. No test was done on this one or the next, but the way I see it is that this can be done with Logic blocks and the new Apricot builds. Im not sure.
a prop for alive / dead
another for timer
and a animated texture that goes to pure alpha

III ) Death from hieghts. Again logic blocks but I am not sure if I can set a plane as a ghost object and still have it interact with the character in the way I need it to.
I was thinking a plane that when hit would tell the object to display the falling anim but not stop the object.

I know Python is faster but I woulder rather prove the concepts before trying to create code.

I) I would just animate it with shape keys. Or maybe bake the animation from a cloth simulation. Take a look at the first couple Harry Potter games. Those capes were animated, but looked realistic enough.

II) Sounds good! Just make sure to end the object after it fades.

III) Ghost works just fine for your invisible plane.

Often, at least in my experience, a little bit of python code is a lot easier to read and more flexible than a lot of messy logic bricks.

ok thanks. I kinda sped this off so I forgot to add the end part of #2
So even though the plane is ghost it will activate a fall animation (if I animate it)

Yessir. It is still an actor, so Blender keeps it in her mind while she’s displaying a game for you