Gypsy accents

i'm still of the opinion it'd be better to do away with the Barbarian and Gypsy "races" and recreate Humans into three groups: Homesteaders (humans); Wanderers (gypsies); and Hunters (barbarians). get rid of the racial disadvantage (double Scholarly), give "Resist Element" back to the Dwarves, let the +2 body dissolve away, and stop getting grumpy about clothing/accent/fur minutiae

wouldn't have to worry about Humans looking too Barbarian or too Gypsy, they're all the same race just different parts - like Wild Elves vs Imperial Elves. sure, you'd get some Gypsies with Resist Fear and some Humans with Gypsy Curse, but that could easily be explained through cultural cross-pollination and could be monitored game to game by IG forces if that plot team so wished. some Chapters would be highly segregated and the Farmers and the Cowpokes couldn't be friends; in others, there'd be smashing parties filled with Hooch and grumbling at the stars

so much of these three "races" is just cultural affectations, much more so that any other group. why not let individual chapters/characters choose their orientation and give up the ghost at this poorly defined pretense of a Gypsy/Human/Barbarian "racial" divide. we weed out one of the foremost logical discrepancies in the game, open up all kinds creative license, and let all the Humans play in the same sandbox
 
Mobius said:
i'm still of the opinion it'd be better to do away with the Barbarian and Gypsy "races" and recreate Humans into three groups: Homesteaders (humans); Wanderers (gypsies); and Hunters (barbarians). get rid of the racial disadvantage (double Scholarly), give "Resist Element" back to the Dwarves, let the +2 body dissolve away, and stop getting grumpy about clothing/accent/fur minutiae

wouldn't have to worry about Humans looking too Barbarian or too Gypsy, they're all the same race just different parts - like Wild Elves vs Imperial Elves. sure, you'd get some Gypsies with Resist Fear and some Humans with Gypsy Curse, but that could easily be explained through cultural cross-pollination and could be monitored game to game by IG forces if that plot team so wished. some Chapters would be highly segregated and the Farmers and the Cowpokes couldn't be friends; in others, there'd be smashing parties filled with Hooch and grumbling at the stars

so much of these three "races" is just cultural affectations, much more so that any other group. why not let individual chapters/characters choose their orientation and give up the ghost at this poorly defined pretense of a Gypsy/Human/Barbarian "racial" divide. we weed out one of the foremost logical discrepancies in the game, open up all kinds creative license, and let all the Humans play in the same sandbox
Click to expand...


I agree, but I think gypsies and barbarians would complain because they would lose their skills.
 
Mobius said:
i'm still of the opinion it'd be better to do away with the Barbarian and Gypsy "races" and recreate Humans into three groups: Homesteaders (humans); Wanderers (gypsies); and Hunters (barbarians).
Click to expand...
That's somewhat akin to saying "we should get rid of dwarves/hoblings", tbh. How are they distinct from humans?
 
jpariury said:
Mobius said:
i'm still of the opinion it'd be better to do away with the Barbarian and Gypsy "races" and recreate Humans into three groups: Homesteaders (humans); Wanderers (gypsies); and Hunters (barbarians).
Click to expand...
That's somewhat akin to saying "we should get rid of dwarves/hoblings", tbh. How are they distinct from humans?
Click to expand...
Fake side burns and fake beards? :lol:
 
John's argument was that barbarians and gypsies are "just human cultures" rather than a unique race. Tbh, dwarves look like humans with beards, and hoblings look like humans with sideburns, so, if we're arguing from a visual basis, we should get rid of dwarves and hoblings under the same argument. However, the way we distinguish their "otherness" is through prosthetics. Clearly, the intent in the rulebook is to make gypsies and barbarians a non-human race. Whether or not you call them barbarians or "oogy-boogy men", the goal is to create a non-human that looks pretty much human except for a special "otherness". John seemed to be objecting on the grounds that "Well, they look like humans with nice clothes or furs". (Or rather, I haven't seen him propose an argument that there simply shouldn't be any race with their current bennies.)

In that regard, it seems to me that the goal then should be to require some prosthetic that, although we may have such a body part irl, can be repped with some form of prosthetic. Ergo, earlobes and, oh, say, unibrows?

Such a physical requirement would eliminate any question of whether or not an accent is the method by which you identify a gypsy. Much like you can be a human who abstains from wearing or touching metal, you could play a human in bright clothing with a funny accent, or a human in furs with silly superstitions, and still be visibly identifiable as a human, vs a gypsy or barbarian.
 
i have to disagree about the ARB specifically creating Barbarians and Gypsies as non-Humans sub-species. most of the Race packets i have read only giving a passing nod to the differences in species, if at all. they are separate races merely to sate the logistical system that is our character structure, nothing more. it's like the difference between Monstrous and High Ogres or Orcs, respectively. they're called different races, but the only real difference is that PCs play the one and not the other. if Barbarians were meant to be demi-Giants and Gypsies, Fae-Kin, it would have been spelled out as such, but there are myriad people who designed the game who have signed off on the fact that both were intended as Humans sub-group and were divided as different races in order to create clear rule division

now, i would heartily accept your suggestion that there be further divide created between Barbarians, Gypsies, and Humans, and prostheses would be an excellent way. make Barbarians even more hulking, make them akin to Neanderthals: sloping foreheads, massive jaw-lines, barrel-ribcages, hunched shoulders and distended limbs, etc. make Gypsies even more colorful: flourescent patches of skin; wildly coloured hair, spots, glowing tattoos. if these three groups are to be three different races, make them so without question, don't dabble around with "accents" and "clothing"

on the other hand, if they are all Humans, drop the pretense. combine them all into an uber-group and be done with it. your commentary about Dwarves and Hoblings is superficially accurate, but in truth there is as much confusion between Hoblings and Humans as there is between Elves and Humans, or Mystics and Humans. ALL the "simple prosthetic" races are very easy to confuse for eachother. if that's a problem, more racial characteristics can be defined to further distinguish the non-makeup races, but such simple distinctions are hardly a reason to discount grouping Humans and the human subgroups into a single race

in the end, though it's necessary at times for Game Logistics to define In Game Culture (eg. Anti-Chaos Laws) such decisions often lead to more issues than fewer. so, anytime we can find a way to cut out rules entanglements, i think it should be pursued
 
Fearless Leader said:
Mobius said:
i'm still of the opinion it'd be better to do away with the Barbarian and Gypsy "races" and recreate Humans into three groups: Homesteaders (humans); Wanderers (gypsies); and Hunters (barbarians). get rid of the racial disadvantage (double Scholarly), give "Resist Element" back to the Dwarves, let the +2 body dissolve away, and stop getting grumpy about clothing/accent/fur minutiae

wouldn't have to worry about Humans looking too Barbarian or too Gypsy, they're all the same race just different parts - like Wild Elves vs Imperial Elves. sure, you'd get some Gypsies with Resist Fear and some Humans with Gypsy Curse, but that could easily be explained through cultural cross-pollination and could be monitored game to game by IG forces if that plot team so wished. some Chapters would be highly segregated and the Farmers and the Cowpokes couldn't be friends; in others, there'd be smashing parties filled with Hooch and grumbling at the stars

so much of these three "races" is just cultural affectations, much more so that any other group. why not let individual chapters/characters choose their orientation and give up the ghost at this poorly defined pretense of a Gypsy/Human/Barbarian "racial" divide. we weed out one of the foremost logical discrepancies in the game, open up all kinds creative license, and let all the Humans play in the same sandbox
Click to expand...


I agree, but I think gypsies and barbarians would complain because they would lose their skills.
Click to expand...

I had an idea. Why not make it that humans CAN buy gypsy curse, but doing so then makes you a Gypsy? Same for humans to barbarians, but you have to be able to afford the increased costs to read/write and read magic.

Just a thought.
 
Deadlands said:
I had an idea. Why not make it that humans CAN buy gypsy curse, but doing so then makes you a Gypsy? Same for humans to barbarians, but you have to be able to afford the increased costs to read/write and read magic.

Just a thought.
Click to expand...

the only issues (i say issue, not problem) i see with this, is that a long time human character could then choose to become a gypsy or barbarian (or both?) at any time... which is actually kind of cool if you ask me (not becoming both, that's silly, we'd proly want to limit that).
 
jpariury said:
I disagree with it being a tattoo. It should be a physical characteristic that is oog distinctive and can be used to require a fake version of it be worn, even if you naturally have one. Much like even if your beard overflows and can be knitted to wear as a scarf you need to wear a fake beard to be a dwarf, it should be distinctive enough to be endemic and falsifiable. Maybe long earlobes?
Click to expand...

Wait, with the new rule book it states that if you have a beard that you can braid then, you dont need to wear a fake one....did this get changed again and I missed it??
 
MKing said:
Wait, with the new rule book it states that if you have a beard that you can braid then, you dont need to wear a fake one....did this get changed again and I missed it??
Click to expand...

I believe you're correct.

As for the human/gypsy/barbarian thing - what is wrong with making them 'cultural traits' instead of 'racial traits' - other than the fact that you'll get the cheezers to say "Hey, my elf was raised in a barbarian culture, why can't he get both his racials and the barbarian cultural traits" at which point, IMO, staff should smack him.

That way, it is about where you were born and grew up - a human couldn't decide to suddenly become a gypsy or barbarian.
 
i think because this has to do with IG skills you buy with build. i mean... will there be a "culture change" ritual scroll out there so you can get those abilities?
 
or just race change human and choose those skills. or a spirit forge if you are one of the types already.

I think nix the "requirements" altogather make them all humans and have the racials available as choices like a wylderkin does, (except chooising from only the barb gypsy ones). If you choose none you get the extra body. People who wanna dress gypsy or connan can if they want to do it.
 
markusdark said:
It's been interesting as many players played their old characters and there were perhaps only 20% of native born PC's - which wound up screwing up the social ways of the land. For example, Parna (the SF country) basically never had heard nor seen an undead as the populace venerate their dead and are all cremated. Along comes the adventurers killing everyone and leaving bodies behind in the woods and BLAMMO! suddenly there was an undead infestation and the local populace had no idea how to deal with them.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you silly outsiders and your body-littering ways.

The only main issue my PC had, was when the outsiders came up and started pushing us around, saying, "I've lived in 2 lands that have gotten blown up! I know what I'm doing." Call me crazy, but that's a big reason *not* to listen to you.
 
Actually, I believe only my character Nigel is the one touting the fact that he has lived in two lands that have gone boom. Hence why he never stays in any one place for long.
 
I have been playing a character off and on for about 14 years who has been living/travelling with gypsies the whole time. He is human and speaks with a "gypsy" accent. He wears a white shirt and black pants/boots. He has a black belt with silver bits and a couple of brown leather pouches. He has one sash thing given to him by the tribe he is "family" with that hangs off his belt.

He really wants to be a gypsy, but would never consider collecting the ritual and getting it cast on him because he respects the gypsy race so much that to do so would be offensive to him. He has been considered gypsy friend for at least 13 of those 14 years.

At the last event I played him at, some people got confused and thought he was a gypsy. Despite his almost complete lack of color. They were confused purely because of his accent. Even though when asked I ALWAYS said "human as I appear".

Honestly if the goal of racial requirements is to allow someone to know what race you are on sight, then accent shouldn't be included in my opinion. Of course I'm also of the opinion that my character should have been dragged off by either gypsies or humans and either race changed to gypsy or beat up and told that I'm hanging out with gypsies too much.

A long time ago (when my character was made) it was pretty clear to me that if a character seems to belong to a race other than the one they were born as, they would at some point likely get dragged into a circle and forcibly changed to the race they "should" be. This has obviously never happened to my character and I'm not aware of it ever happening to anyone else either. Every race change I've been aware of was either handled "off screen" or was the result of a convenient backlash.

In my opinion it would be best if the accent requirement were lifted, and gypsies were given some kind of prosthetic requirement, but for now the bright gaudy clothes requirement will have to do. As far as being able to tell what race someone is in the dark... can you tell what race a dark elf is in the dark? No... how about a biata? nope... If you can't see someone, you can't see someone. What if you have a person dressed on the borderline between gyspy and human, but they don't talk and their accent is what kicks it over the edge. There was a "gypsy" who came into town at one event who didn't appear to be dressed as a gypsy and he was inside a building on the other side of a window... we just couldn't tell. I went in and asked and was promptly told "as he appears", which I just thought was rude, but whatevah.

If humans, gypsies and barbarians were to be conglomerated (which I wouldn't object to) then you could pair disadvantages with advantages and when an advantage is purchased the disadvantage is also added to the character.

I've always thought that gypsy and barbarian should be culture packets added to a characters race, such that wild elves are just elves with the barbarian culture.

The biggest problem I see with all of this is that humans still are the red-headed step child of the races. I've been told many times that the penalty for not playing your race properly is being forcibly race changed to human. So is the penalty for not playing human properly that you are forcibly race changed to human? Or being asked to leave the game? or what...?
 
I want to get my first official yellow card this upcoming CT event for playing a human wrong. :lol:
 
meltedwing said:
If humans, gypsies and barbarians were to be conglomerated (which I wouldn't object to) then you could pair disadvantages with advantages and when an advantage is purchased the disadvantage is also added to the character.

I've always thought that gypsy and barbarian should be culture packets added to a characters race, such that wild elves are just elves with the barbarian culture.
Click to expand...

Barbarians and Gypsies USED to be human cultures, but in order to allow build-based racial skills, they had to be separated out into their own races.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top