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Yes. Every transcendent ideology that forbids religion is atheist, we've heard it all before. Communism is atheist yadda yadda. Thing is, if you have FAITH in SOMETHING HIGHER, whether that is a personal power or not, you're doing religion. And EVERY religion ever has tried to ban OTHER religions. Goes with the territory. They are all for ecumenics, preaching it far and wide, until the day they have enough power to ban any alternative. Then the tune changes pretty drastically.
I'm saying that there are effectively monotheists in Golarion already; regardless of whether or not other gods exist, these people simply don't worship them.
But other than that quibble, yes, I agree.
Then we are quibbling about the meaning of the word.
Monotheism is defined by the Encyclopædia Britannica as belief in the existence of one godHard to do when the existence of many gods is incontrovertible.and the argument that thor exists as much as the abrahamic god does and with as much proof in the real world means the point returns to silverclaw in my opinion.
in so much as the existence of many gods in our world is incontrovertible.
???
In Golarion, gods provably exist. Plural.
In real life, the fact that the existence of the monotthist's God cannot be proved is taken as a positive thing, because Faith (defined as 'believing without proof') is seen as showing more devotion. Or something.
It's possible in our world to believe in only one God, safe in the knowledge that you cannot be proved wrong. This is not possible in Golarion, because a monotheist can be proved wrong.
actually a montheist can not be proven wrong in golarion for the same reason they can not be proven wrong on earth. namely it is based off belief, and they believe there is no other god. the other supposed gods are fakes and frauds.
the exact same reasoning used in our world still holds. if a christian can deny thor exists despite the evidence to the contrary so could a follower of asmodeus.
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Yes. Every transcendent ideology that forbids religion is atheist, we've heard it all before. Communism is atheist yadda yadda. Thing is, if you have FAITH in SOMETHING HIGHER, whether that is a personal power or not, you're doing religion. And EVERY religion ever has tried to ban OTHER religions. Goes with the territory. They are all for ecumenics, preaching it far and wide, until the day they have enough power to ban any alternative. Then the tune changes pretty drastically.
What exactly are you trying to argue? Atheism is just a religion, or that communism is not atheism, or that forbidding religion is not atheism?
If you had read what I wrote, Advocate, you would have known what I was arguing.
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Yes. Every transcendent ideology that forbids religion is atheist, we've heard it all before. Communism is atheist yadda yadda. Thing is, if you have FAITH in SOMETHING HIGHER, whether that is a personal power or not, you're doing religion. And EVERY religion ever has tried to ban OTHER religions. Goes with the territory. They are all for ecumenics, preaching it far and wide, until the day they have enough power to ban any alternative. Then the tune changes pretty drastically.
Ok, this is flat-out wrong. And also pretty far off-topic for this thread, so I suspect that both of our posts will be deleted, but:
Banning religious diversity is a specific feature of Abrahamic religions. In many parts of the world, multiple religions coexist in the same nation, and often in the same person, and have done so for centuries or millennia. It's a proverb in China that Chinese people are Confucian when they go to work, Christian when they get married, and Buddhist when they die. Likewise in Japan people often practice a syncretic combination of religions that mixes the symbols and practices of many. Hinduism, which is the world's most practiced religion after Christianity and Islam, is highly syncretic.
The most well-known ancient religions coexisted peacefully with others in their sphere of influence for a long time (notably, the Roman system, which didn't much care what religion you practiced as long as you sent your taxes back to Rome on time - Disputes over Christianity in Rome had less to do with Christianity being a foreign religion and more to do with the fact that Christians weren't very good about paying their damn taxes, and were actively trying to undermine other people's religions around them).
The idea that all religions are ecumenical until they have the power to ban other religions doesn't actually hold up when the rubber meets the road.
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In any case, as long as we're on the subject of religion at the moment - obviously LGBTQ clerics exist (for example, Kyra). With that in mind, I wonder if there are any specific religious duties assigned to said clerics. I've occasionally toyed with the idea that trans clerics are the ones primarily tasked with officiating marriages, as they could be seen as embodying the Hieros Gamos, but as a trans woman and Witch myself I also grit my teeth at the idea being treated as partially male for religious purposes. On the other hand that's because so many attacks on trans women's civil rights are based on the false idea that we're really men. Given a world that doesn't put trans women under constant attack, who knows?
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I've occasionally toyed with the idea that trans clerics are the ones primarily tasked with officiating marriages, as they could be seen as embodying the Hieros Gamos, but as a trans woman and Witch myself I also grit my teeth at the idea being treated as partially male for religious purposes.
On the one hand, I could see the idea that one is a 'mixed soul' for having transitioned could be offensive, if one never felt like their birth gender was anything other than a mistake or a prison, but from a faith perspective, where everything has to have some sort of 'reason' or 'lesson' or whatever, I could see a faith preaching that the gender-switched person was born into the wrong body as some sort of 'teaching moment' to give them a deeper understanding of both genders, and the differences (and, perhaps more importantly, the similarities) between them, so that they might later serve to resolve gender-related conflicts, marital disputes, etc. between those who have only ever walked on one side of the fence and lack perspective.
Calistrian or Lamashtan doctrine might see it as a cruel sort of crucible. Desnan or Shelynite as a change to see the beauty in both sides, or to enter a 'spiritual coccoon' and transform and grow, from larva to butterfly. Zon-Kuthon, all about strengthening and purifying oneself by cutting away the parts that don't fit.
....I keep going back and forth over whether or not Merisiel is autistic in my head-canon...
Eh. We don't have a fat (or even 'ample') iconic. We don't have a married iconic (or even one in a long-term committed relationship). We don't have an iconic family person with kids (caveat, at least some iconics might have kids littering the countryside, but none of them are any sort of parentally responsible!). We don't have a deaf iconic, or a blind one, or a mute one, or one with a limp, or missing a limb, or a lazy / milky / missing eye, or dyslexia (granted, that one's probably harder than most for Wayne Reynolds to represent in a picture...) or a harelip, or really bad acne, or balding or with a webbed toe.
Are any of them twins? Who knows, except for Sajan, I'm not sure if any of them have siblings at all, and except for Seltyiel and Imrijka, I'm not sure if any of them have parents, or were delivered by stork to random strangers.
I suspect it's up to *us* to include types of people that we'd like to see in the game. It's possible that any of them could be color-blind or left-handed or have dysnumeria, and, IMO, defining them as such across the board probably limits them more than it adds to them. (To an extent, I kind of feel that way about gender-defining them as well. Not too terribly long ago, we were encouraged to think of *all* the iconics as 'effectively bisexual,' in that they would go whichever way we individually wanted them to go. Still, that's on us as well. If I want Lirianne or Feiya to be 'the gay one' and Kyra to have three husbands at home tending the family business while she's doing missionary work and spreading the faith, so be it.)
I think there's a point where it's good to try and be inclusive, but totally understandable that *everybody* isn't going to be included, or, if they are, it will take time, and perhaps the subject being brought up in a non-accusatory way. (For instance, just because there aren't any prominent NPCs with one arm smaller than the other, like several members of a family in my neighborhood, I don't think that anyone at Paizo is prejudiced against people with one arm smaller than the other, or that they 'fail' at being inclusive.)
Some appearance related traits tend to go with evil (fat, disease scarring, a milky eye) others show up more often on good NPCs (freckles, orange-y hair (evil peeps have *red* hair)). I expect that when we get our new crop of ten iconics, they'll follow the same standards.
It is quite possible for one person to consider themselves to follow several religions. It is also quite possible that other forces in a country make sure the religious powers that be are kept at a manageable level in a certain society. Even so, it generally holds true that if these religious organizations get enough power, they do aim for exclusivity. For example, finding such examples regarding conflicts between Buddhism and Confucianism weren't terribly difficult to find.
Thorri,
Interesting point of view. Something I haven't seen come up before. I'm not sure how much I agree.
I'd be very hesitant to include autistic people in a game I ran. And even less likely in something I published. Not because I'm prejudiced against them or because I think they don't belong, but because I wouldn't know how to run them accurately and not offensively. Nor, I suspect, would most other GMs.Homosexuals, even transsexuals, are easy. They have their one thing that's different and even that fits pretty easily into everyone's experience. But in everything else, they act and react just like straight people do.
Straight women are harder for me than gay guys. Different races would be harder, but who's to know if you get it wrong. :)The entire nature of autism (as I understand it and I'm not an expert by any means) is that you think and react differently. Without a lot of work, I don't think I could do that well. Not without descending into parody. I'm not all convinced it would be a good idea for Paizo to push people towards trying by including autistic characters in adventures.
I would have nothing against a player running an autistic character if he wanted to and knew enough to do a good/not offensive job.
As for atheists: The main groups of atheists in Golarion (primarily Rahadoum) are portrayed as dangerous and fanatical, persecuting believers and driving them from the country. Hardly what I would choose if I was really trying to cater to atheists. More like what I would expect a hardline believer to expect atheists to be like if given power.
OTOH, Ezren would be more of a role model atheist.
Rahadoum persecutes believers because religion nearly destroyed their country, not because they're atheists. It's also worth pointing out that Faiths and Philosophies implies that whats-her-name, the iconic Oracle, is also an atheist (so Ezren isn't along anymore!)
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actually a montheist can not be proven wrong in golarion for the same reason they can not be proven wrong on earth. namely it is based off belief, and they believe there is no other god. the other supposed gods are fakes and frauds.
You can deny that, say, Shelyn is a god, but you can't deny she exists. This quibbling about definition won't stop her turning up and breaking your church's ugly windows.
the exact same reasoning used in our world still holds. if a christian can deny thor exists despite the evidence to the contrary so could a follower of asmodeus.
It's very different in real life. In Golarion, Shelyn and the rest actually exist, whether you call them 'gods' or not. They provably exist.
In real life, you can have the same quibble about the definition of a 'god', but neither Thor nor Yahweh will turn up to break your windows.
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It's very different in real life. In Golarion, Shelyn and the rest actually exist, whether you call them 'gods' or not. They provably exist.
If you have plane shift, and can just pop in on Shelyn in the shower (because she forgot to dimension lock her bathroom), then yes, provable.
To 99.99999% of the people on Golarion, who will never actually see a god before they die and end up in front of Pharasma? Not so provable.
You can kill *hundreds* of Skinsaw cultists, entire cults of Urgathoans, whole Lamashtan gnoll (and goblin) tribes, Asmodean Hellknights and Signifers, and never once see one of these evil gods, or even the slightest hint that they even care that you've foiled their schemes, so why would Shelyn be able to come to Golarion so casually? A good number of APs have PCs messing with the followers (or entire sects) of one or more gods, and they do *nothing* to prove their existence.
Even their followers sometimes feel abandoned, as with the gnolls who turned to Rovagug in Legacy of Fire.
This isn't the Scarred Lands setting, were the gods, only a generation or two back, where all over the place, stalking the lands and murdering their Titan parents. Many of the gods last reported appearances on Golarion were *centuries* ago, making any Golarionite who claims to have 'proof' of their existence about as reliable as a teenager telling you about his experiences in 'Nam. Or, more accurately, the Crimean War.
A pretty story about the Twelve Tests of Iomedae doesn't prove her existence any more than the story of the Twelve Labors of Hercules proves he existed.
We do, in fact, have a blind iconic. Alharza, the iconic Oracle, has the Blind curse.
This thread's way off topic again.
1) As noted, just because one group is under-represented doesn't mean we shouldn't strive towards equality for another,
That's true. I'm being a little jealous.
I'd be very hesitant to include autistic people in a game I ran. And even less likely in something I published. Not because I'm prejudiced against them or because I think they don't belong, but because I wouldn't know how to run them accurately and not offensively. Nor, I suspect, would most other GMs.
Homosexuals, even transsexuals, are easy. They have their one thing that's different and even that fits pretty easily into everyone's experience. But in everything else, they act and react just like straight people do.
3) Part of the problem with representation is that Paizo doesn't just come out and say "Oh, <x> person is homosexual" or "<y> person is autistic". It is INCREDIBLY easy to imply the former ("She is married to <a woman>") but not so easy to imply the latter ("He tends to be incredibly focused, almost a genius, in certain areas of study; however he can sometimes misunderstand social borders" could mean pretty much any high-Int, low-Cha Wizard type)*.
That's true too. Although I'd be hesitant to run, say, a lesbian, for exactly the reasons thejeff's hesitant to include autistic people. As long as I'm never going to go into more detail than "this female character is married to that female character", that's fine, but I would get out of my depth fairly quickly after that. On the other hand, given how much background material Paizo gives DM's in excess of the amount that the players will probably ever learn, there's no reason that they couldn't say in the background material that the reason why a particular character "is incredibly focused... but..." is because the character is Asperger's.
I sometimes flirt with the idea of making the entire species of dwarves in a game world I'm running Asperger's. In most ways it would fit well, until you offered them alcohol and they're "??? Don't you know that dwarves don't drink?"
One stereotype that I don't like is "Gandalf the Gay". If, in our world, older single men are disproportionately likely to be gay, I think that's because it was illegal for them to get married when they were the ages that people typically get married at. I don't think that stereotype would have a reason to exist in a world that didn't have a history of homophobia. But autistic people will always be disproportionately single.
4) I don't think a movie is a good comparison. A movie is like a single adventure module. Golarion as a whole is supposed to represent an entire world, so let's say... the setting where all the Star Trek series are set. If you don't have a gay person (or an autistic person or whatever) in a singular episode (adventure), that's fair enough; but if you don't have a single one throughout the entire world? That's kind of odd, to me.
Yes, that's fair.
actually a montheist can not be proven wrong in golarion for the same reason they can not be proven wrong on earth. namely it is based off belief, and they believe there is no other god. the other supposed gods are fakes and frauds.You can deny that, say, Shelyn is a god, but you can't deny she exists. This quibbling about definition won't stop her turning up and breaking your church's ugly windows.
the exact same reasoning used in our world still holds. if a christian can deny thor exists despite the evidence to the contrary so could a follower of asmodeus.It's very different in real life. In Golarion, Shelyn and the rest actually exist, whether you call them 'gods' or not. They provably exist.
In real life, you can have the same quibble about the definition of a 'god', but neither Thor nor Yahweh will turn up to break your windows.
Actually it's not any different in real life -- each god in this world has exactly as much proof as any other god in this world... which is exactly the same as in Golarion.
And again who's to say that those other gods aren't false gods in Golarion too? I mean there are other creatures that are plainly NOT gods that give out powers too, so plainly godhood isn't the only way to give power to someone when you are an outsider.
We have the same amount of proof for each god in this world and they have the same amount of proof for each god in Golarion. It is not such a stretch to say they would have the same number of people that proclaim, "My god and religion is the only true god and religion and your god and religion are false." Especially considering we already see similar sectarian divides and such already in canon.
1) As noted, just because one group is under-represented doesn't mean we shouldn't strive towards equality for another,That's true. I'm being a little jealous.
I'd be very hesitant to include autistic people in a game I ran. And even less likely in something I published. Not because I'm prejudiced against them or because I think they don't belong, but because I wouldn't know how to run them accurately and not offensively. Nor, I suspect, would most other GMs.
Homosexuals, even transsexuals, are easy. They have their one thing that's different and even that fits pretty easily into everyone's experience. But in everything else, they act and react just like straight people do.
3) Part of the problem with representation is that Paizo doesn't just come out and say "Oh, <x> person is homosexual" or "<y> person is autistic". It is INCREDIBLY easy to imply the former ("She is married to <a woman>") but not so easy to imply the latter ("He tends to be incredibly focused, almost a genius, in certain areas of study; however he can sometimes misunderstand social borders" could mean pretty much any high-Int, low-Cha Wizard type)*.That's true too. Although I'd be hesitant to run, say, a lesbian, for exactly the reasons thejeff's hesitant to include autistic people. As long as I'm never going to go into more detail than "this female character is married to that female character", that's fine, but I would get out of my depth fairly quickly after that. On the other hand, given how much background material Paizo gives DM's in excess of the amount that the players will probably ever learn, there's no reason that they couldn't say in the background material that the reason why a particular character "is incredibly focused... but..." is because the character is Asperger's.
I sometimes flirt with the idea of making the entire species of dwarves in a game world I'm running Asperger's. In most ways it would fit well, until you...
There are people with aspergers that drink.
You can have someone at a tavern keep shaking their leg.
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It's very different in real life. In Golarion, Shelyn and the rest actually exist, whether you call them 'gods' or not. They provably exist.If you have plane shift, and can just pop in on Shelyn in the shower (because she forgot to dimension lock her bathroom), then yes, provable.
To 99.99999% of the people on Golarion, who will never actually see a god before they die and end up in front of Pharasma? Not so provable.
You can kill *hundreds* of Skinsaw cultists, entire cults of Urgathoans, whole Lamashtan gnoll (and goblin) tribes, Asmodean Hellknights and Signifers, and never once see one of these evil gods, or even the slightest hint that they even care that you've foiled their schemes, so why would Shelyn be able to come to Golarion so casually? A good number of APs have PCs messing with the followers (or entire sects) of one or more gods, and they do *nothing* to prove their existence.
Even their followers sometimes feel abandoned, as with the gnolls who turned to Rovagug in Legacy of Fire.
This isn't the Scarred Lands setting, were the gods, only a generation or two back, where all over the place, stalking the lands and murdering their Titan parents. Many of the gods last reported appearances on Golarion were *centuries* ago, making any Golarionite who claims to have 'proof' of their existence about as reliable as a teenager telling you about his experiences in 'Nam. Or, more accurately, the Crimean War.
A pretty story about the Twelve Tests of Iomedae doesn't prove her existence any more than the story of the Twelve Labors of Hercules proves he existed.
The proof of the existence of Golarion's gods is not limited to eye witness accounts.
Many classes gain power from divine sources. Imagine a person in real life with divine class levels doing exactly what PF clerics, paladins and the rest do. These real phenomena could be objectively tested in ways that real-world religious claims can't.
'Why does God hate amputees?' The so-called faith healers in real life have no provable supernatural powers; if they did they'd be $1 million richer from the James Randi prize! But a cleric casting a regenerate, heal or resurrection would have demonstrable, provable, reproducible abilities, all granted from a divine source. Extra-planar entities can appear and tell you (on film) about the last conversation they had with Shelyn. People who'd been (provably) raised could tell you what Shelyn was like.
This is just not the same as our world. Proof exists in Golarion, and it would take a level of insanity to seriously disbelieve in the existence of beings that grant divine power. Quibbling about the exact parameters of the definition of 'god' in Golarion is a very different conversation than the equivalent in real life.
But a cleric casting a regenerate, heal or resurrection would have demonstrable, provable, reproducible abilities, all granted from a divine source.Or possibly a witch, from an arcane source.
Or a Druid from no god at all. Or an oracle (also not tied to any god).
A gay otyugh??? How does that even... I mean, do they even have boy otyughs and girl otyughs?
While not Golarion-canon, I tend to think of dwarves as represented by the game Dwarf Fortress as being the embodiment of (Hollywood? Caricatured? Stereotypical?) Autistic-if-not-outright-Aspergers-ish inclination, with a touch of other unspecified madness (and a heaping helping of OCD taken to potentially homicidal, if not GENOCIDAL levels). I have actually playeed about with some concepts from this, at one point in one game resulting in it being among that race a supplemental cause for the lower fecundity amongst their kind - people spend so much time fixating on their craft of choice that the baby-making keeps falling further and further down the priority list. There's also "We live long enough we'll get to it eventually" procrastination. One time this led to an almost sitcom-esque level of externally-apparent male-dominance being actually a farce with the women running everything because first they were 'stuck' with the role, and then the racial OCD kicked in and those roles became their new obsessions.
It was also a silly game with a substantial amount of gay dwarves. Mainly because with the women being so busy running the homefront, and males going off to become adventurers to find rare materials for their clan craftings and/or to practice the family business of death-dealing or similar, and eventually turning to each other for companionship, humanity thought that all dwarves had beards when happening upon one particularly amorous couple. It's part of the completely non-serious campaign that was more or less the Humans Are Stupid variant of the tabletop version of Munchkin d2...er, OGL.
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I have Aspergers, I also drink on occasion...why does one prevent the other? I have met other Aspies who do the same. Heck I am told I am more entertaining when I drink because I tend to ramble off a series of completely unrelated facts...sometimes in different accents.
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From a thematic point of view, there are several ways you can approach LGBT identities in gaming - I wrote a paper this summer on resistance, transformation, and family as themes directly (though this was on fiction as a wider area), and the rejection-reconciliation cycle, cultural continuity, and identity would also be really good themes to play with for an LGBTQ character or an LGBTQ-themed campaign.
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I was thinking about team sports while watching American football; they are separated by gender.
How does a sporty trans* person cope with all that? If you wanted to play in the NFL, and had the talent and athletic ability, how would that work?
Whether M to F or F to M, how would a trans* person play in the NFL?
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I was thinking about team sports while watching American football; they are separated by gender.
How does a sporty trans* person cope with all that? If you wanted to play in the NFL, and had the talent and athletic ability, how would that work?
Whether M to F or F to M, how would a trans* person play in the NFL?
Not well, I do not believe a MtF would be allowed to play if it was known. FtM would have less problems other than the aversion some people have to folks with gender issues
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I was thinking about team sports while watching American football; they are separated by gender.
How does a sporty trans* person cope with all that? If you wanted to play in the NFL, and had the talent and athletic ability, how would that work?
Whether M to F or F to M, how would a trans* person play in the NFL?
To my knowledge, a trans woman has never come out while playing one a major professional sport (American football, baseball, basketball, and stock car racing). Terri O'Connell is a former NASCAR auto racer who transitioned after leaving NASCAR.
There are several out trans women playing roller derby.
Fallon Fox, an out trans woman, is in MMA. She has a 3-0 record (2 knockouts and a submission). All three wins coming from fights with women bigger, heavier, younger, and more muscular than she.
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Renee Richards won the right to play professional tennis as a woman in 1977.
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Renee Richards won the right to play professional tennis as a woman in 1977.
True, I forgot about her because she hasn't been competing at the top professional level of her sport in a long time.
Pip Wherrett (a former Formula One driver) transitioned two years before her death from cancer in 2009.
(I also forgot about ice hockey as a major professional sport - to my knowledge, no NHL player has ever come out as a trans woman, also. But ice hockey has struggled with having major-sport penetration outside of the frozen north).
Fallon Fox, an out trans woman, is in MMA. She has a 3-0 record (2 knockouts and a submission). All three wins coming from fights with women bigger, heavier, younger, and more muscular than she.
Outside the US, and not a major sport, I guess, but there's Parinya Charoenphol, better known as Nong Toom, a Thai transwoman who is a Muay Thai champion.
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I don't buy works that have the female seductress using her evil wiles in them...
...I just don't. It's boring, it's been done, and it's...it tends to be lazy. Is that the only way the writer is able to write women? By using a tired old stereotype? These are inflammatory words, but I don't mean them to be so much as they're honest. There are so many more possibilities for interesting female characters, or villains. When this trope turns into a lesbian, it turns offensive. It also makes me wonder if the author ever met any lesbians? If they did, they get to know them beyond a superficial level?
Not trying to be offensive...this is intended to be, well, honest.
On a side note, I was actually fairly disappointed in a recent purchase--I believe it was the Mythic book, in hardback. In the bestiary part of it, there were a number of busty female humanoid monsters, but really, few male ones. So many of the former made me twitch. If we were going to have the one...then that there wasn't much balance made me sad.
Why is there no Old Spice Man for Paizo? Yes, yes, there's a handsome NPC here and there, but...
Come on, Jacobs!
Hello, ladies, look at your iconic male NPC, now back to me, now back at your NPC, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped using gnome-scented body wash and switched to Old Dragon, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re on a boat with the iconic your NPC could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s a greataxe which I crafted for you with my own hands. Look again, the greataxe is anow an all-expenses paid adventure for dragon-slaying. For you. Anything is possible when your man smells like Old Dragon and not a gnome. I’m on a griffon.
You can make him a Twitter account.
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I don't buy works that have the female seductress using her evil wiles in them...
...I just don't. It's boring, it's been done, and it's...it tends to be lazy. Is that the only way the writer is able to write women? By using a tired old stereotype? These are inflammatory words, but I don't mean them to be so much as they're honest. There are so many more possibilities for interesting female characters, or villains. When this trope turns into a lesbian, it turns offensive. It also makes me wonder if the author ever met any lesbians? If they did, they get to know them beyond a superficial level?
A depressing number of monsters in classic Greek and Roman Myth are embodiments of male insecurities about female sexuality, so there's that...
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I don't buy works that have the female seductress using her evil wiles in them...
...I just don't. It's boring, it's been done, and it's...it tends to be lazy. Is that the only way the writer is able to write women? By using a tired old stereotype? These are inflammatory words, but I don't mean them to be so much as they're honest. There are so many more possibilities for interesting female characters, or villains. When this trope turns into a lesbian, it turns offensive. It also makes me wonder if the author ever met any lesbians? If they did, they get to know them beyond a superficial level?
Not trying to be offensive...this is intended to be, well, honest.
On a side note, I was actually fairly disappointed in a recent purchase--I believe it was the Mythic book, in hardback. In the bestiary part of it, there were a number of busty female humanoid monsters, but really, few male ones. So many of the former made me twitch. If we were going to have the one...then that there wasn't much balance made me sad.
Why is there no Old Spice Man for Paizo? Yes, yes, there's a handsome NPC here and there, but...
Come on, Jacobs!
Hello, ladies, look at your iconic male NPC, now back to me, now back at your NPC, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped using gnome-scented body wash and switched to Old Dragon, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re on a boat with the iconic your NPC could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s a greataxe which I crafted for you with my own hands. Look again, the greataxe is anow an all-expenses paid adventure for dragon-slaying. For you. Anything is possible when your man smells like Old Dragon and not a gnome. I’m on a griffon.
You can make him a Twitter account.
Thing is, they were going to do that, but Alain was a stupendous douchebag so he turned out more like the Fabio replacement than the original.
As it stands, Valeros is more of an Axe Bodywash sort of guy, Lem is too busy being cute to get that sort of play, Harsk is not interested in the role, Seltyiel is Mr. Hurt-Comfort-Fic and token evil character (to say nothing of being frequently 'slashed' with Alain), Sajan is busy trying to track down his sister (and speculated to be her under gender swap), and people are busy Dumbledore-ing Ezren instead of making him into a role I think he could pull off better if done right (i.e., NOT Elminster) - the Most Interesting Man in the World.
Damiel is looking more and more Ben Afflek-y by the minute with only the need of a moment of 'Here comes the Alchemy!' to complete the effect, Hayato would be close if we saw him without armor and maybe a touch of 'Battle Without Honor or Humanity' playing in the background (but that would come across as more of a Gillette shaving product commercial feel), and as far as most people are concerned, "Balazar? Who's Balazar?"
Frankly, I want the upcoming Swashbuckler to be the Pathfinder Obligatory Isaiah Mustafa clone. I want him to be suave, swanky, stylish, and perhaps more than a little silly. I want him to bring the pain and rock the ladies...AND gentlemen, in an almost 'Hello, I'm secretly the spirit of a Faun in a Likely Standard Pathfinder Core Race," way. I want him and Merisiel to be foils for each other of the most shamelessly flirtatious variety.
Also, I want the Bloodrager iconic to be a damned-near Terry Crews batguano-insane force of CRAZY AWESOME. Sexual orientation is irrelevant in this case...save maybe that his appeal should not hinge on appealing to the ladies, necessarily, if one does make him gay. Periphery demographics are okay, but the Bloodrager, if anything, should be very much Not Amri (nothing against her at all, simply contrast is needed).
I decline comment on assumptions regarding the Hunter and Shaman on grounds of only implied gender in the descriptions, and on the Slayer and Warpriest due to those two classes not really 'registering' in my head.
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Yes please on the iconic swashbuckler being Isaiah Mustafa D:
I mean, we got Val Kilmer to play Valeros, so it could happen!
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I support more Isaiah Mustafa in everything. :-)
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I support more Isaiah Mustafa in everything. :-)
Yes plz. Also Idris Elba.
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The class isn't even out yet, and yet in my head THE BLOODRAGER HAS SO MUCH POWER that it can sell itself in books that it's not even been referenced in yet.
That's right.
I support more Isaiah Mustafa in everything. :-)
Yes, yes! We have one buy-in...
<dons Isaia Mustafa for Paizo tee shirt>
MARCH ON!
Ladies and gentlemen. Be still your hearts.*
You're on a griffon.
*And buy Old Dragon product brand.
This thread has reached a new peak of awesome.
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Frankly, I want the upcoming Swashbuckler to be the Pathfinder Obligatory Isaiah Mustafa clone. I want him to be suave, swanky, stylish, and perhaps more than a little silly. I want him to bring the pain and rock the ladies...AND gentlemen, in an almost 'Hello, I'm secretly the spirit of a Faun in a Likely Standard Pathfinder Core Race," way. I want him and Merisiel to be foils for each other of the most shamelessly flirtatious variety.
I support more Isaiah Mustafa in everything. :-)Yes plz. Also Idris Elba.
I would be very happy with either a Mr. Mustafa or Mr. Elba, and I'd like to nominate Chiwetel Ejiofor (aka, The Operative). Unfortunately, I've also misplaced my ENCOM digitizer, so someone else must digitize them into The Game.
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Getting back on topic, would it be cliché to want the Shaman to be the trangender iconic based on two-spirit tradition? On the one hand, it would not be the worst way to bring in an almost Amerind-motiff if done well and respectfully the way that Sajan is the Vudrani iconic in a way that was tasteful and not at all caricatured. On the other, it IS a sort of real-world transplanting without suitable adaptation to make sure enough of the serial numbers were filed off.
Also, I must derail again purely because I have still want an Isaiah Mustafa-esque Swashbuckler and a Terry Crews-like BloodRager, but in light of remembering that The Once and Future Doogie-Barney-HowserStinson himself, Neil Patrick Harris, once made a turn in the advert series as well, I have been secretly projecting him onto Balazar, and this may have consequences down the line if Erik Mona should find out, up to and including having me purged from the boards and/or universe.
Also, I've been trying to find a way to redeem Alain as a character, but not even loaning him The Chin's mighty pipes works.
Also, I've been trying to find a way to redeem Alain as a character, but not even loaning him The Chin's mighty pipes works.
Haha, Bruce Campbell as Alain is awesome.
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Bruce Campbell is already busy being the Iconic Bruce Campbell.
Anything else would probably be a demotion.
I suspect that a transgendered Iconic will be one of the batch that already exists (although there's nothing saying there can't be two of them...). That being said, an Iconic Swashbuckler who is pretty obviously (based on build) a woman, and yet has a pencil thin moustache and dresses as (and is named as / presents as) a man, could be fun.
"Miss Reginald..."
<Slap!>
"That's *Sir* Reginald, thank you very much! Mind your insolence, sirrah, or I'll answer it with steel!"
"But, some say it's bad luck to have a woman on a pirate ship..."
"Well, thank Besmara's salty teats that we're all men here, and nobody cares what you think anyway!"