| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
At least two iconics, to begin with.Well if you want ugly women, there are always Green Hags and other things like that.How many ugly women in Pathfinder aren't evil?
So that I don't have to go looking through every iconic's build page, could you remind us which ones? All the ones I remember seeing pictures of looked okay, apart from the one from Nidal introduced with Hell's Vengeance looking really scary (but some people are really into all those piercings, to an extent even in our world) (and then again, that one's explicitly and unashamedly evil anyway).
...and end with, since there ain't exactly any playable hag race. :PThe zombie lady from The Godsmouth Heresy.
Celeste (unless you're into snakes)
Alison Kindler
That's off the top of my head, I'll dig for more once I'm back home.
The zombie lady from Godsmouth was unattractive?
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
Imrijka and The Old Spiritualist Lady.
Imrijka has a boob window the size of her face, and her face isn't exactly hag-ugly either.
Old women and children are generally exempt from being oversexualized in western media, but that goes for males of those ages as well, so I don't think it's a valid argument.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm not sure why "charisma can mean a strong presence too" keeps being brought up when Lashunta are very clearly of the charisma means physically attractive persuasion. I mean, they could have a commanding presence too, but it's the physically attractive part that was showcased.This was what I've been responding to.
As for whether the rest of my initial post in this thread is irrelevant, I'd have to agree to disagree.
Charisma is both force of personality and appearance. That's from the core rulebook. Yes, there are creatures that are hideous but have a strong personality, thus they have a positive charisma score. Yes, Lashunta women are described as charismatic and commanding. They are also described as ideal and beautiful. Lashunta women are not an example of physically unattractive creatures that have high charisma because of their strong personalities. Bringing up the existence of charismatic physically unattractive creatures is irrelevant to criticism of Lashunta women because that is not what they are.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Alison Kindler
Small nitpick: the name's AILSON actually. I didn't notice that myself until very recently.
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I mean, the point of this thread is still about entire species that are described as being idealized humans or elves (for women) and ugly dwarves (for men). There's a huge gap between that and having e.g. sexualized elf iconics without any comment on the general attractiveness of elves to humans, just as there is a gap between a species where the women are all unattractive to humans and having a few unattractive women iconics of that species.
Which I agree with Oneris on - Imrijka is definitely sexualized. I think this gets better with recent releases (new hobgoblins look good) but there're a bunch of prior years of boner artists running rampant.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
We've taken some steps to correct problematic elements of the lashunta for Starfinder.
But please, not in the elven way...there are a lot to much of these dexterity races out there!
I like the male Lashunta cause they aren't dumb and don't look like typical models...| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"Are the Lashunta a sexist trope?"
Sure started out that way. Huzzah pulp Venusians!
But incremental progress has been made, and I can't wait to see what Starfinder does with them. Every piece of Starfinder character art to date has been more than fine.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Well if you want ugly women, there are always Green Hags and other things like that.If it's a trope, it's one I happen to really, really enjoy. The whole "race of beautiful women" concept has a special place in my heart, as I grew up reading early sci-fi magazines my dad had collected when he was young. I still keep them, old issues of Future Fiction, Planet Stories and Galaxy Science Fiction.
I hope they find a place in Starfinder.
Hell, even the Ecology of the Green Hag featured some female fanservice. They just can't help themselves.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Imrijka [is unattractive]
Is this ironic or something
is it modern art
I mean, yeah, there's tusks, but she's got a f+!*ing plate corset. And the tusks don't really detract that much—hell, they're probably part of the appeal for some.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Imrijka [is unattractive]Is this ironic or something
is it modern art
I mean, yeah, there's tusks, but she's got a f~+*ing plate corset. And the tusks don't really detract that much—hell, they're probably part of the appeal for some.
All I do is take the 90-60-90 blonde full lips Western supposed ideal of female beauty and notice the furthest deviations.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
How many ugly women in Pathfinder aren't evil?
Assuming we go with the game definition of 'evil' then it depends on your definition of 'ugly'... and/or 'women'.
Is a female bronze dragon a woman? Is she 'ugly'?
If we limit it to 'humanoids' you've still got countless members of races which don't conform to normal human standards of 'beauty' (e.g. half-orcs, Strix, Svirfneblin, Trox, etc)... yet might be considered lovely by their own species.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
The old 'noble adventurer romances beautiful foreign princess from an otherwise brutish race' is a pretty old racist trope, too.A lot of the closer planets and their alien life seemed to be based off of early fantasy authors interpretations of the planets in our solar system. Many of these authors were, to put it bluntly, really racist. It doesn't make the history any better, but it doesn't necessarily have to ruin the trope itself so long as it doesn't propagate the same stereotypes. The themes of Lovecraft's works were very often condescending in their portrayal of woman and race, yet the creatures he created have made their way into the pathfinder Mythos. I have my disagreements on how the Lashunta should have been originally portrayed, but I think that building off of such a trope while still paying homage to its creators can be a difficult task.
Lashunta males now dress in flannel shirts and have tastefully trimmed beards.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
Lashunta males now dress in flannel shirts and have tastefully trimmed beards.The old 'noble adventurer romances beautiful foreign princess from an otherwise brutish race' is a pretty old racist trope, too.A lot of the closer planets and their alien life seemed to be based off of early fantasy authors interpretations of the planets in our solar system. Many of these authors were, to put it bluntly, really racist. It doesn't make the history any better, but it doesn't necessarily have to ruin the trope itself so long as it doesn't propagate the same stereotypes. The themes of Lovecraft's works were very often condescending in their portrayal of woman and race, yet the creatures he created have made their way into the pathfinder Mythos. I have my disagreements on how the Lashunta should have been originally portrayed, but I think that building off of such a trope while still paying homage to its creators can be a difficult task.
The males of the Lashunta species are all compelled to sit in coffee shops working on their novels. It's not finished yet, but it's going to be a big seller once he decides on a plot.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
The old 'noble adventurer romances beautiful foreign princess from an otherwise brutish race' is a pretty old racist trope, too.Subverting that, by emphasizing that the "beautiful alien women" actually find their "brutish" looking males far more attractive than the conventionally handsome noble adventurer.
This is actually one of the reasons I enjoy the PF lashunta: as a man who does not conform to typical male beauty standards, but who has a wife that does, I actually feel a connection to the race (though my wife and I are the same height, and I'm not super hairy, so the parallels break down).
The point is, however, that I like it, because it reminds me (in vague and probably not-very-deep ways) of how I view my own relationship to an extent, and it reminds me, "Hey, different people have different tastes." and that's pretty cool.
I do understand why many don't like it, and it makes sense, but it is always kind of painful for people to just assume it is always for the purpose of the outsiders exuding the pretty foreign exotic women.
Though I do have a fondness for playing half-elves, aasimar, and other hybrids so I suppose there is something to that...? (I don't know, maybe that's a thing related to that trope or something? I don't know.)
Sure. It just doesn't hold in my use of the things (at least not automatically). Mostly I was building on your "subversion" with "that's normal for us." :)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
The old 'noble adventurer romances beautiful foreign princess from an otherwise brutish race' is a pretty old racist trope, too.Subverting that, by emphasizing that the "beautiful alien women" actually find their "brutish" looking males far more attractive than the conventionally handsome noble adventurer.
This is actually one of the reasons I enjoy the PF lashunta: as a man who does not conform to typical male beauty standards, but who has a wife that does, I actually feel a connection to the race (though my wife and I are the same height, and I'm not super hairy, so the parallels break down).
The point is, however, that I like it, because it reminds me (in vague and probably not-very-deep ways) of how I view my own relationship to an extent, and it reminds me, "Hey, different people have different tastes." and that's pretty cool.
I do understand why many don't like it, and it makes sense, but it is always kind of painful for people to just assume it is always for the purpose of the outsiders exuding the pretty foreign exotic women.
Though I do have a fondness for playing half-elves, aasimar, and other hybrids so I suppose there is something to that...? (I don't know, maybe that's a thing related to that trope or something? I don't know.)
Dude! My wife is slightly taller than me, and I am super hairy. :-)
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
The old 'noble adventurer romances beautiful foreign princess from an otherwise brutish race' is a pretty old racist trope, too.Subverting that, by emphasizing that the "beautiful alien women" actually find their "brutish" looking males far more attractive than the conventionally handsome noble adventurer.
This, very much this. (Heh. Though a female Lashunta might find dwarves to be kind of hot).
Also keep in mind (1) that the pretty alien princesses are the ones in charge and (2) the "brutish" males still have Int bonuses. The Lashunta as a whole are a race of natural scholars, even if the males might be a bit, uh, reckless.
"Hey y'all, watch this" is totally a thing with male Lashunta. (I've been playing a male Lashunta magus for a couple years now; it's been fun.)
Edit: Random thought on just how many things in the Pathfinder universe look human -
Saranrae, Asmodeus, and the like are way, way older than most mortal life.
It's not that lots of races look human; it's that lots of races (including humans) look like wingless angels.
(Dragons, serpentfolk, Elder Things, Star-spawn, etc. must've been pretty weirded out when those angel-look-alike races started cropping up.)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
This is actually one of the reasons I enjoy the PF lashunta: as a man who does not conform to typical male beauty standards, but who has a wife that does
I'm, uh... I'm good at communication, you guys.
>.>
(Also past the hour edit limit and just noticed my mistake. :I)
Dude! My wife is slightly taller than me, and I am super hairy. :-)
You're ripped enough and skilled enough at hard labor (and craftsmanship) that you could probably pull off the leather-and-hard look of a classic lashuntan male...
... but that would probably just remind you of Toys-R-Us too much on your days off. Either that or you'd be mob-and-pitchforked for imitating Eddie Vedder or perhaps white Jesus in leather.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, I really, really want there to be a trans lashunta iconic. Is that bad? Am I being gimmicky? I just think it would be a great subversion of expectations.I've got to say I don't want a trans lashunta. I don't even really want to think about it.
With the dimorphism that extreme, the dysphoria would have to be far far worse then for human trans people. Your body is that much farther from what it should be.
Especially if it's used as suggested by someone who wants to play a male psychic who isn't strong and hairy. A trans male lashunta would likely be wanting hair transplants.
Wouldn't be so bad if they can just get some magic (or uber-tech) full sex transformation, but then they're not playing the non-strong/hairy psychic.
That's a good point, but I'm pretty sure not all trans people deal with dysphoria?
Since when has a pretty woman become sexist? Should women try to look "fat and dumpy" in order to be politically correct? It is fantasy after all isn't it? They are all fictional characters so you can make them as pretty or as ugly as you like. Maybe some jealous women don't like the artwork because it depicts women who are prettier than they are, the old "Snow White/Evil Queen" troupe isn't it?
It's all fantasy. I used to think that Red Sonja was sexist, then I grew up and decided that it's all just a fantasy.
| 11 people marked this as a favorite. |
Fantasy is art. Art is political. Saying, "It's just a fantasy," is equivalent to saying, "It's just a story. It's just fiction." By that logic, not even Birth of a Nation could be called racist.
Since when has a pretty woman become sexist? Should women try to look "fat and dumpy" in order to be politically correct? It is fantasy after all isn't it? They are all fictional characters so you can make them as pretty or as ugly as you like. Maybe some jealous women don't like the artwork because it depicts women who are prettier than they are, the old "Snow White/Evil Queen" troupe isn't it?
Ironically, in the same post insisting that there is no sexism at play, you made a sexist remark about feminists. Well done.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Here are my sources. Trans people who don't deal with dysphoria tend to be erased.
From the first link:
It’s weird that some trans people are totally on-board with making a rulebook for transness, instead of encouraging people to self-identify and declare their gender identities for themselves.
When we allow other people to make the rules, we strip away the rights of trans people to self-identify. If we tell trans people that their identities don’t belong to them, we uphold a culture where the naming of gender identities belongs to outsiders instead of ourselves.
When I started to doubt Kai’s transness, what I was saying to them was, “You say that you’re transgender, but I don’t recognize that or believe that.” I was saying that I knew Kai’s gender better than they did. Yikes.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to exist in a world where I have to follow a set of prescribed rules before I can claim my own identity.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Isn't one of the better things about sciencefiction/fantasy stories is that you can use things like this as an allegory for the story you want to tell?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Here are my sources. Trans people who don't deal with dysphoria tend to be erased.
From the first link:
It’s weird that some trans people are totally on-board with making a rulebook for transness, instead of encouraging people to self-identify and declare their gender identities for themselves.
When we allow other people to make the rules, we strip away the rights of trans people to self-identify. If we tell trans people that their identities don’t belong to them, we uphold a culture where the naming of gender identities belongs to outsiders instead of ourselves.
When I started to doubt Kai’s transness, what I was saying to them was, “You say that you’re transgender, but I don’t recognize that or believe that.” I was saying that I knew Kai’s gender better than they did. Yikes.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to exist in a world where I have to follow a set of prescribed rules before I can claim my own identity.
Well since gender is a spectrum it would be kind of counter-intuitive to try to ascribe rules for what defines an individual gender. It'd be like trying to count all the numbers, including every single decimal number, from zero to one. You simply can't do it. You can assign common traits that are shared, (i.e. 0.1234567 is closer to 0 than it is to one, or an individual's identity is closer to the societal view of masculinity) but it's still it's own number out of an infinite quantity of variations, and to make assumptions of what that individual will be like only using definition they give themselves simply doesn't make sense.
That said, on the topic of transgender characters in science fantasy. I'd assume that transitional medicine and procedures (and possibly magic) would make it far easier for an individual to transition, with the technological and magical advances of that species playing a large role on the ease of such transitions.
Isn't one of the better things about sciencefiction/fantasy stories is that you can use things like this as an allegory for the story you want to tell?
Or you can use it for blatant female objectification. Depends on the story you want to tell.
Sci-Fi and Fantasy as genres are littered with the bones of authors who used the genre for self-gratification, or to push racist or sexist ideas about people. H.P. Lovecraft is only the most well-agreed-upon example.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Fair enough. Something I hadn't run into.
I'm still not really clear how it works, since the dysphoria's been pretty central to the experiences I've heard about.
According to a friend of mine:
usually people who don't experience gender dysphoria will still have gender euphoria
but afaik there's also some people who have neither
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Random thought on just how many things in the Pathfinder universe look human -
Saranrae, Asmodeus, and the like are way, way older than most mortal life.
It's not that lots of races look human; it's that lots of races (including humans) look like wingless angels.
(Dragons, serpentfolk, Elder Things, Star-spawn, etc. must've been pretty weirded out when those angel-look-alike races started cropping up.)
This gets into another interesting topic that is likely more to do with narrative driving the setting than an internal set of physical/biological rules but remember that multiple versions of the same species appear to have independently developed across multiple planets in multiple galaxies and by and large, humanoids are all compatible and able to produce viable offspring with each other. The best i can come up with is that there are a few templates of intelligent life that the gods use to make the majority of species and then they just make tweaks before implementation to better suit the planet or random whims leaving them all part of the same incredibly diverse species at a basic level.
Such a basic template would also help explain how aasimars (and, by extension, tieflings) come into being - the template functions well enough, even if the prevailing biology shouldn't, because the mortal form was crafted off the basics of the higher one.
Further, such (relatively simple) shortcuts would () also helps to explain the prevalence of your basic gravity balls like planets and suns, when advanced construction techniques would hypothetically be "better" - basic templates to perform for standardized creation-engine type things.
That said, to bring this back to lashunta, specifically, one of the concepts I've been toying around with is the idea that the advanced craftsman-dwarf peoples and the advanced beautiful-elf peoples are both offshoots of the lashuntan race, based off of hard divergence in the sexual dimorphism.
While I could see thejeff's point above, and it makes a lot of sense, I could actually see transgender individuals (especially with the current most-popular "method" available in PF right now) actually being a catapult to such a full biological split.
If a substantial subgroup of lashuntan males, for example, were transgender, but had no interest in the taller, sleeker femininity that was prevalent among their race, they could lead a great exodus, perhaps with sympathetic and similarly-inclined individuals, to find a method of transformation, especially if the basic ingredients weren't readily available. This could easily fit in with the, "Watch this!" mentality of the typical male lashuntans, and eventually lead to the Dwarven tendency for exodus/quests for a better place. Eventually, they find that place, and create a stable population (perhaps because their travel methods, being primitive, and/or newly-created by the unwise but really smart males, happened to be one-way; or persecution from the homeland; or they also found other problems they didn't want to allow to go back - more on this last one in a second* - and so were forced to be among their own kind and/or preferences... which, fortunately they just happened to be among) and thus entirely divorced themselves of their forebears.
*
Any similar split with females of the same conceit could well have been an opposed ideology. The less-brash females may well have chosen to stay behind, isolating themselves from a society that found them weird, but maintaining intricate and advanced social systems... albeit ones in which any barriers between those who identified as male and female were more-or-less dispensed with. Either through trade with their soon-to-be dwarven counterparts, influence from dream-spirits, some unique element found on-planet, or just some sort of weird morphic pressure - heck, even just heavy use of polymorph effects - this secondary species could well have created their own offshoot. It may well have been a branch researching longevity instead, or a group fascinated with the ability to alter the individual. Either way, such a discovery could well have driven a rift between the new elvenkind and the original lashuntan people; especially if they did not share the discovery (perhaps because it was a unique event and they couldn't share it, maybe they literally used up all of the resources to do so before they realized it, perhaps because at the time lashuntan society was unread for the impact, or perhaps because the elves were elitist jerks early on), the discovery had exacting side-effects (such as developing male traits - a loss of charisma and increase intelligence - but also weakening the health; or a general weakening of the health, but a slow erasure of certain male/female traits while blending others), or other such elements (such as maybe making it really difficult to sleep at night or something).
Of course, when combined with the dwarven narrative above, it could help explain and develop the traditional divide between the elves and the dwarves, not supplanting their ethical divide, but enhancing it. Heck, Calistrian lust/trickery could well have been a part of this experimentation process, and may well be one of the reasons she is an elven goddess in the first place - she is (at least partially) responsible for the development of elves as elves, instead of as-female-lashunta.
Then again, lose the antenna and you could partially "average the traits" of male and female lashunta... or dwarves/elves... to generate humanity...
... ooooorrrrrrrrr this whole process could have happened in reverse to generate lashunta...
... or I'm just generating random nonsense from story block basics. Maybe it's that one.
EDIT: But basically, transgender people, in this instance, actually save and/or create two different races in two very different, unique ways, due to their own unique strengths.
(Also, I added ^ this sentence, because I'd forgotten it, before.)
| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
*Sees scroll wheel shrink slightly* Oh hey, Tacticslion posted.
Imrijka and The Old Spiritualist Lady.
Merisel is ugly too, like most of pathfinder elves.
*Sees scroll wheel shrink slightly* Oh hey, Tacticslion posted.
Hey! Just because it's super-true...
>.>
Yeah, I got nothin', so I'll just let it hang on that ellipses for no reason.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, y'know, allegories can be sexist. "It's sexist" and "it's an allegory for the story I want to tell" aren't remotely mutually exclusive.
Merisel is ugly too, like most of pathfinder elves.
Insectile eyes are beautiful and I will bring out my fly swatter on anyone who tells me otherwise.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Here are my sources. Trans people who don't deal with dysphoria tend to be erased.
From the first link:
It’s weird that some trans people are totally on-board with making a rulebook for transness, instead of encouraging people to self-identify and declare their gender identities for themselves.
When we allow other people to make the rules, we strip away the rights of trans people to self-identify. If we tell trans people that their identities don’t belong to them, we uphold a culture where the naming of gender identities belongs to outsiders instead of ourselves.
When I started to doubt Kai’s transness, what I was saying to them was, “You say that you’re transgender, but I don’t recognize that or believe that.” I was saying that I knew Kai’s gender better than they did. Yikes.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to exist in a world where I have to follow a set of prescribed rules before I can claim my own identity.
Fair enough. Something I hadn't run into.
I'm still not really clear how it works, since the dysphoria's been pretty central to the experiences I've heard about.
Dysphoria is basically just a state of unease or generalized dissatisfaction with something, in this case one's gender. It's often confused as a mental disorder, as the original name was "gender identity disorder". The treatment of gender dysphoria is basically like every other form of dysphoria for the most part, talk to a therapist about how you're feeling in order to work on the sources of discomfort. The only difference is that if the individual wishes, they can transition, which may also ease the dysphoria (although with other sources of stress within the individuals live this wouldn't be a total fix). Not everyone who is trangender experiences gender dysphoria, although due to the current environment of our society which has a tendency to depict transgender individuals as being sexual deviants, it likely happens fairly often (I'm too lazy to look up a scientific poll right now).