Cultures (Charachter Creation)

[C2B]

From the VGRevolution Interview

 

Yes, although I should start by saying we won’t have alignment in Project Eternity. Instead of a morality meter, you will have reputations with various factions in the world that you interact with over time.

We want to allow players to select few more elements during character creation to define their background a bit. One of those elements is the character’s Culture, which is where he or she was raised. In our setting, race and culture are not intrinsically linked, so you can have people of various races growing up all over the place. We can then use the character’s Culture to unlock different dialogue options with and reactions from NPCs as well as open up character options in a manner similar to 3E Forgotten Realms’ Regional Feats.

So, for example, you might make a boreal dwarf (like Sagani, the female ranger we’ve shown) and decide that he was raised in the remote southern island of Naasitaq, where many other boreal dwarves share the rocky tundra and snow-covered forests with far-roaming caravan elves who drift near the shoreline. Alternately, your boreal dwarf may have been raised in the cramped, humid, towering cities of Aedyr, among the aggressive explorers who crossed an ocean to colonize the Dyrwood. Ideally, we want your race and culture to help inform both how you role-play your character as well as how you mechanically play your character.

[FlintlockJazz]

Oh hell yes! Not only does the idea of picking your culture sound great but I've always hated the monolithic cultures used for non humans (as in all dwarves share the same culture everywhere and all speak in a Scottish accent), so I love this!

[Vargr]

Very much like! Yes, yes, very yes!

 

 

Wanted something like that for aaaaages. Here's to hoping they'll have a nice and varied range of cultural backgrounds.

[Amentep]

Sounds good to me.

[eimatshya]

Yeah, the promise of being able to choose different cultural backgrounds is one of the things that sold me on P:E. It's nice to hear a little more about it.

[Ausir]

It appears that e.g. Aedyr elves feel more of a kinship towards Aedyr humans than towards e.g. Glanfathan elves.

[AGX-17]

It would go a decent way to trashing the old tropes of "elves are woodland rangers" and "humans are paladin zealots espousing a thinly veiled imitation of christianity at the point of a sword." Not that racial stereotypes shouldn't exist to some degree, because they sure still do in reality.

[Karranthain]

I love it, the more character options, the better.

[HumanFlesh+5]

i hope there will also be the option to create your own background and write your own biography like you could in NWN, BG, IWD etc.

[C2B]

i hope there will also be the option to create your own background and write your own biography like you could in NWN, BG, IWD etc.

 

Yes, IIRC it will also be an option for the adventure's hall companions.

[HumanFlesh+5]

i hope there will also be the option to create your own background and write your own biography like you could in NWN, BG, IWD etc.

 

Yes, IIRC it will also be an option for the adventure's hall companions.

 

i hope you are right! otherwise you couldn't be really creative

[Korlathar]

This is good; I'm just wondering how it'll affect reactions. Will the kinsmanship with Aedyr elves and humans affect their relations with Glanfathan elves? Will there be distrust, even hatred of the Glanfathan elves? What about Boreal dwarves? I'd love to see more info about this, because it presents some interesting and great situations to behold. Plus, the more personal things are, the more I like it.

 

I do hope culture affects a lot of reactions and not just the first few in the first few hours of the game or anything; I'd love it if it was a persistant thing, so it doesn't feel just tacked on or anything and has a real meaning to the world.

[Hormalakh]

Edit: So I actually thought a little bit more about this and I think I'm over-reacting. There were plenty of ways to customize my players. I'm being silly. Don't mind me.

 

 

I am not a white person. In fact, I am quite brown. I've always hated the fact that I could never place myself in the characters shoes because of all the portraits and moddings that I'm able to do, I can't really pick anyone who isn't white with blue eyes and blonde hair. Even in a medieval/high renaissance style Fantasy game that is based very loosely on human history, there were many more people in the world than Europeans!

 

In all the previous IE games, if I wanted to play an Asiatic monk or a Middle Eastern Prince of Persia type character or Saladin or Aladdin or even a Assassin's Creed-type Altair whatever, I couldn't. Why? Well first of all, because dude is so out of place in DnD and secondly none of the portraits match him nor do the sounds. Except in the middle ages, there were those guys running around in Europe. I know DnD isn't human history, but it does reflect parts of human history and I think there's a lot more that can go into games like this without resorting to played out caricatures of cultures when it comes to creating new and awesome worlds.

 

Please please please Obsidian, make it possible for those of us who love DnD but are not of European descent to make a character that we want. Afterall, an RPG should allow you to make ANY type of character that you want. Be s/he Asian, Middle Eastern, Indian, Polynesian, African, European, etc. The world your making is supposed to be huge. I find it hard to beelieve (as in all these DnD games) that everyone is white and speaks with a British/Scottish/European accent, unless of course, they're supposed to be this overplayed trope.

Edited October 12, 2012 by Hormalakh

[Tale]

I've always hated the fact that I could never place myself in the characters shoes because of all the portraits and moddings that I'm able to do, I can't really pick anyone who isn't white with blue eyes and blonde hair.

What games have you been playing?

[Hormalakh]

Err I

I've always hated the fact that I could never place myself in the characters shoes because of all the portraits and moddings that I'm able to do, I can't really pick anyone who isn't white with blue eyes and blonde hair.

What games have you been playing?

 

The same ones you have. I'm dumb and wasn't thinking. Edited previous comment. Carry along.

[Lysen]

Those Vailians, I think, can pass for non-Europeans:

 

Ethnic Vailians (humans and a small number of dwarves) have dark brown skin and tightly spiraled, dark brown hair. They most commonly have brown or black eyes, but occasionally have green, hazel, or grey eyes

 

There are also Orlans:

 

A race of people found mostly in northern, temperate climates but also as far south as the Dyrwood. Physically, they are notable for their small stature, two-toned skin, and exceptionally large, hair-covered ears