Fat acceptance in Project Eternity

[Darkpriest]

Well technically in medieval times fat people were considered "attractive", because usually that meant wealthy as well... See baroque art for that as an example. Same as the pale white skin was desired (In Europe for example France, etc), because tan meant you are from lower classes as you work in the sun, etc.

[TrashMan]

GENTELMEN!!!!

 

 

 

 

That is all.

[Thangorodrim]

Well technically in medieval times fat people were considered "attractive", because usually that meant wealthy as well... See baroque art for that as an example. Same as the pale white skin was desired (In Europe for example France, etc), because tan meant you are from lower classes as you work in the sun, etc.

 

Exactly ... and most of the wealthy classes weren't tramping all over creation adventuring either ... they tended to stay in their big castles eating and staying out of the sun ... maybe we could add a litter with bearers for the fat characters in the game ... or the Asics of Speed for the really thin ones

[Darkpriest]

Well technically in medieval times fat people were considered "attractive", because usually that meant wealthy as well... See baroque art for that as an example. Same as the pale white skin was desired (In Europe for example France, etc), because tan meant you are from lower classes as you work in the sun, etc.

 

Exactly ... and most of the wealthy classes weren't tramping all over creation adventuring either ... they tended to stay in their big castles eating and staying out of the sun ... maybe we could add a litter with bearers for the fat characters in the game ... or the Asics of Speed for the really thin ones

 

That's why most of the fat people were among nobility, clergy and later wealthy merchants/guild masters, hence I would not mind seeing such NPCs. As for adventurers I can certainly see a sort of mage/cipher/cleric or other class, who is not mainly a weapon master, as a heavier than average.

 

This reminds me of a great episode of Robin of Sherwood:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=R-I6UfJjttU

 

Seeing a "fat" king Richard I Lionheart still owning in wrestling The Little John

[TrashMan]

Also:

[Kai]

If I'm gonna have a fat NPC in my party, he needs to be as awesome as MMA fighter Roy Big Country Nelson who's not only fairly fat (although he's gotten slimmer lately), but also one hell of a fighter.

 

[Cultist]

PE definetely needs fat peoiple.

How else we will slow down slow-moving elf zombies?

[HeedlessHorseman]

GENTELMEN!!!!

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2mU6USTBRE

 

 

That is all.

 

That needs to be accompanied with this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcJjMnHoIBI

[Legbiter]

I agree with the OP and throw in dyslexic black lesbians as well. A sadly underrepresented cohort in modern cRPG's and we must raise awareness.

[Agremont]

Of course there should be fat npcs in the game in the form of merchants, chefs etc.

Edited November 4, 2012 by Agremont

[Azure79]

On second thought, please let me recreate Bombur in PE. That would be pretty awesome.

[SunBroSolaire]

Unless one of the countries in PE has a USA-style convenience culture with fantasy fast foods, over reliance on out-sourced manual labor, and some form of lazy magical transportation, it would be completely idiotic to model the body types of the NPCs after fat Americans.

 

I feel for fat people. I grew up with a father who smoked, older siblings who smoked, friends who smoked, and mostly adult role models who smoked, and at 14 I started smoking. I can understand being stuck in a self-destructive lifestyle that wasn't even really a choice in the first place. But it is self-destructive, and it is a choice now. Fat people don't deserve all the **** they get, but it is a bad lifestyle. It has a very high personal cost in years off your life, and a very high societal cost in medical funding. I blame the corn and beef subsidies, fast food corporations, and public schools that fail to educate and provide good nutrition. But that's like blaming the cigarette companies. They're complicit, but ultimately, it's a personal choice. Please, let's not try to normalize obesity in America. It's an epidemic; we need to fix it, not ignore it.

 

Unless Project Eternity is going to tackle the causes of obesity and the societal effects, like how it overwhelmingly falls on the poor and uneducated, it's probably best for them to leave the subject alone. I don't want to see fat people being ridiculed, but I also don't want to have a wood elf ranger companion who just happens to be morbidly obese because inclusiveness. This is not, despite what a lot of folks seem to think, the discussion forum for The Arkh Project.

[Darkpriest]

Unless one of the countries in PE has a USA-style convenience culture with fantasy fast foods, over reliance on out-sourced manual labor, and some form of lazy magical transportation, it would be completely idiotic to model the body types of the NPCs after fat Americans.

 

I feel for fat people. I grew up with a father who smoked, older siblings who smoked, friends who smoked, and mostly adult role models who smoked, and at 14 I started smoking. I can understand being stuck in a self-destructive lifestyle that wasn't even really a choice in the first place. But it is self-destructive, and it is a choice now. Fat people don't deserve all the **** they get, but it is a bad lifestyle. It has a very high personal cost in years off your life, and a very high societal cost in medical funding. I blame the corn and beef subsidies, fast food corporations, and public schools that fail to educate and provide good nutrition. But that's like blaming the cigarette companies. They're complicit, but ultimately, it's a personal choice. Please, let's not try to normalize obesity in America. It's an epidemic; we need to fix it, not ignore it.

 

Unless Project Eternity is going to tackle the causes of obesity and the societal effects, like how it overwhelmingly falls on the poor and uneducated, it's probably best for them to leave the subject alone. I don't want to see fat people being ridiculed, but I also don't want to have a wood elf ranger companion who just happens to be morbidly obese because inclusiveness. This is not, despite what a lot of folks seem to think, the discussion forum for The Arkh Project.

 

Dude... you have a modern look at the fat people... Get into some medieval cultural aspects, which had a bit different view on this...

[argan]

Brilliant thread. Hats off to OP.

[SunBroSolaire]

Dude... you have a modern look at the fat people... Get into some medieval cultural aspects, which had a bit different view on this...

They had different views because then, a luxurious sedentary lifestyle was an all but unimaginable dream for the majority of people. Fat was a sign of being well off, and not having to work hard. Now, that's the norm, and having the time/money to buy healthy food and work out is a sign of success. So while some fat may have been considered attractive, that was exactly because it was not seen on the kind folks we're likely to be playing as in PE. Also, obesity was associated with gluttony and laziness practically since the beginning of time. When people say that fat was attractive, they're talking about slightly chubby sculptures and paintings, not what modern Americans consider "fat".

 

I get the sense the OP is a member of the anti chainmail bikini crowd. If "realism" is really at all important, characters who travel the country by foot and fight all day long should be pretty goddam fit.

[Thangorodrim]

Dude... you have a modern look at the fat people... Get into some medieval cultural aspects, which had a bit different view on this...

They had different views because then, a luxurious sedentary lifestyle was an all but unimaginable dream for the majority of people. Fat was a sign of being well off, and not having to work hard. Now, that's the norm, and having the time/money to buy healthy food and work out is a sign of success. So while some fat may have been considered attractive, that was exactly because it was not seen on the kind folks we're likely to be playing as in PE. Also, obesity was associated with gluttony and laziness practically since the beginning of time. When people say that fat was attractive, they're talking about slightly chubby sculptures and paintings, not what modern Americans consider "fat".

 

I get the sense the OP is a member of the anti chainmail bikini crowd. If "realism" is really at all important, characters who travel the country by foot and fight all day long should be pretty goddam fit.

 

I concur ... Besides, if you look at the inventories some folks carried around in BG and IWD you were traveling on foot, wearing lots of armor, carrying lots of weapons, AND carrying a pack with 50-200 pounds of stuff in it ... to be able to do that day after day I would think most adventuring parties would look more like Seal Team Six rather than Bombur from the Hobbit

Edited November 4, 2012 by Thangorodrim

[Darkpriest]

Dude... you have a modern look at the fat people... Get into some medieval cultural aspects, which had a bit different view on this...

They had different views because then, a luxurious sedentary lifestyle was an all but unimaginable dream for the majority of people. Fat was a sign of being well off, and not having to work hard. Now, that's the norm, and having the time/money to buy healthy food and work out is a sign of success. So while some fat may have been considered attractive, that was exactly because it was not seen on the kind folks we're likely to be playing as in PE. Also, obesity was associated with gluttony and laziness practically since the beginning of time. When people say that fat was attractive, they're talking about slightly chubby sculptures and paintings, not what modern Americans consider "fat".

 

I get the sense the OP is a member of the anti chainmail bikini crowd. If "realism" is really at all important, characters who travel the country by foot and fight all day long should be pretty goddam fit.

 

Are we talking about fat or clinically obese people? That said, I do not see why some NPCs or even one of companions, like a cleric/mage/cipher or similar should not be chubby/fat?

[Thangorodrim]

Dude... you have a modern look at the fat people... Get into some medieval cultural aspects, which had a bit different view on this...

They had different views because then, a luxurious sedentary lifestyle was an all but unimaginable dream for the majority of people. Fat was a sign of being well off, and not having to work hard. Now, that's the norm, and having the time/money to buy healthy food and work out is a sign of success. So while some fat may have been considered attractive, that was exactly because it was not seen on the kind folks we're likely to be playing as in PE. Also, obesity was associated with gluttony and laziness practically since the beginning of time. When people say that fat was attractive, they're talking about slightly chubby sculptures and paintings, not what modern Americans consider "fat".

 

I get the sense the OP is a member of the anti chainmail bikini crowd. If "realism" is really at all important, characters who travel the country by foot and fight all day long should be pretty goddam fit.

 

Are we talking about fat or clinically obese people? That said, I do not see why some NPCs or even one of companions, like a cleric/mage/cipher or similar should not be chubby/fat?

 

I am all for some NPCs in the privileged and wealthy classes being obese, if that is what the developers want, but an obese beggar or obese peasant or obese companion would be far less likely ... I wouldn't mind an obese companion if they were realistically constrained by that handicap (and in an adventuring environment it would be a handicap ) ... if the companion couldn't carry hardly any weight before they become encumbered and couldn't move, and if they had a slow movement rate so they were always falling behind and the rest of the party had to wait for them to catch up then I would support that ... but let's be realistic about our parties ... we don't have horses so we are hiking 20-30+ miles a day with full packs in armor ... we are also engaging in physically stressful activities like combat, exploring dangerous dungeons, and looting corpses ... a corpulent party member wouldn't last long in those situations or would cease to be corpulent very quickly ... if someone wants a full figured portrait then make that an option but leave the adventurer and companion avatars in a more "realistic" state of lean mean dungeon exploring machines

[Sacred_Path]

When people say that fat was attractive, they're talking about slightly chubby sculptures and paintings, not what modern Americans consider "fat".

 

Stone Age figurines depict obviously clinically obese women. Sometimes they are interpreted to be godesses, and hey, if my fat priest/ chanter walks in on a covenant of malnutritioned Orlans, they should probably be awestruck/ worship him XD

[HansKrSG]

In the olden days, fat was a mark of the rich, today fat is a mark of the poor. (Go McDonalds!) What being fat means in PE? Who knows, maybe they'll surprise us.

[Monte Carlo]

Fat people should also get a HP bonus for their extra bulk, and be extra resistant to critical hits.

 

Fact.

[Marceror]

Fat people should also get a HP bonus for their extra bulk, and be extra resistant to critical hits.

 

Fact.

 

And should the party get stuck in the depths of Od Nua with no food, the larger folk should be able to survive the longest off their fat stores (surely roleplaying a slow death by starvation will be included in the game). On the other hand, the rest of the party may feel compelled to resort to cannibalism and turn Billy Big-Boy into a tasty snack. Hmm, I wonder if PE will include cannibalism, for those extreme circumstances where it makes sense.

[Thangorodrim]

Fat people should also get a HP bonus for their extra bulk, and be extra resistant to critical hits.

 

Fact.

 

What if you run into a dungeon with a really narrow door ... the other characters might have to kick and push him to get him inside ... either that or he might get stuck in the only entrance and the characters who rushed in ahead of him will slowly starve to death

[Jasede]

Wizards would make a killing selling Tenser's Floating Discs, AKA mobility scooters.

[kenup]

Fat people should also get a HP bonus for their extra bulk, and be extra resistant to critical hits.

 

Fact.

They should also get a penalty in agility/dexterity and constitution.

 

Wizards would be perfect for it, since they sit around all day casting spells.