A Comedy of Species
 

Am I the only one rather disgusted by everybody making up lots of additional mythology that has no place within Graal to make their character something special?

Yup.

I am proof that you are not.

Because Graal has such rich and vivid histories to draw from for a character!

Like the...no...well, how bout the...no, I don't suppose there's that either.

Gryffon's not "special". He lived in a monestary for two hundred years and has a personal "totem" animal, I suppose is what you'd call it.

He's a member of a race that doesn't appear to exist. Seems pretty special to me.

As opposed to Shawn, the fox-thingy? Why should we be limited to just Elf, Zormite, Dwarf, or Human? How did these races come to be in the first place?

People made them up.

I did not say that you were the only one.

Because those are the only creatures that have any presence in the world.

Why do you need your character to be a winged vultureperson? The most believable backstory is the one with greatest parsimony.

And why do they HAVE a presence? Because people MADE them have presence. Not that it matters. This is neither here nor there. This is a forum for official FOREST business in an official FOREST forum. If you wish to continue this debate, please do so in the general Kingdoms forum.

Is that your goal with the bird people? Seems unlikely!

Again: Why does he need to be a member of some newly invented species? Does it allow anything that wouldn't otherwise have been possible? Does it make sense that he's the only one of his kind in the world? Is it even feasible that his race could've evolved from vultures? Your character is not believable, and that's a pretty fatal flaw when roleplaying.

I'm hardly off topic. If we're asking people to propose backstories then it makes sense to have some discussion on what kinds are acceptable. Still, if you wish to move it to that forum then I guess I will comply. Just make the thread and I'll switch over.

By that same logic, why be anything other than human? Does being an Elf give me any more options? Only culturally, I suppose. Does being a Daveon give me any new options? Again, it allows me to make a character from a cultural perspective. Being a Daveon allowed me to juxtapose Gryffon's internal hatred of himself with his quest for serenity with Mytriism. THAT is why I created the Daveons.

As for their origin, they are vulture-like in appearance and tendancies, but I don't think I put that they were descended from vultures in so many words. A panda may look like a bear, but they're certainly not closely related enough that you'd call it a bear.

Because the other established races have certain traits that define a character - traits that are universally recognised. You don't need to explain your character's origins and traditions and tendencies every time you introduce him.

Again and again: Believability is closely linked to parsimony! Do you intend to let everybody invent their own species? To the point where there are no two members of the same race?

Well, not since you edited your post.

I edited it because you were right. It was an oversight, thank you. I meant only to ELUDE to the relationship.

Race is just one thing a character has to explain. Skills, ability, history. All of that is unique. All of it has to be EXPLAINED in character. My history just happens to include a unique race. What of it? And you see Daveons are unbeleivable: Games are a suspension of reality. I find desert-dwelling carrion-eaters about as likely as giant amphibious fish people or immortal Vulcans of the forest.

I think the point here is though, while there is nothing wrong with creativity, does your race really have any place at all on Graal?

If you were playing a Star Trek RPG, could you make your character into a Jedi Knight? Certainly not, as it would be completely out of place.

There is, in theory, nothing WRONG with your character, however to bring it into a world that already has defined races, is breaking basic rules of role playing.

Au contrare. Gryffon the Daveon first arrived on 2k1. I was accepted there, so it became a Graalian race by virtue of me playing it. 2K1 and 2K2 are interconnected. Bingo bango, connection. Regardlessly, it's really a frikkin moot point. Gryffon's not even a Daveon anymore, since he had a wee bit o' the sap.


Forest introduced Goblins for the first time to Graal's RP, because that's what a player wanted. Thusly, I say to ye, big whoop. Players define RP.

You edited my post? For what purpose?

No, not really. Most of it is inevitably revealed as time goes by, as in any good roleplaying. If your bird race has any presence in the world then most characters should already know a little about their tendencies. But they don't, because you just made them up. Either you leave them with a strange gap in their knowledge or you take time to explain. Both approaches are sub-optimal.

Ah, so it is intentionally unique? How would you feel if others started using it, too?

I said unbelievable, not unrealistic. There is rather a large difference.

You didn't answer my question. Would you see anything wrong with a RPing environment where everybody has invented their own race for their character?

In order: A misclick, I thought I clicked "quote" when it was really edit.

If someone DOSENT know what a Zormite is, the same can be said.

It was a charecteristic I USED to make him unique, yes. I don't care if there are other Daveons. Feel free, anyone.

Realism begits believability

Not particularly. It sounds like a very interesting setting. Very unique, if nothing else.

And if somebody doesn't know English then he can't interact with my character. Does that somehow justify inventing my own language and expecting people to learn it?

It's reasonable to expect that a given roleplayer will know what a Zormite is. Furthermore, if you teach them, they can go ahead and use that knowledge elsewhere.

Why did you need to make him unique? And didn't you earlier say that he's not special? Within the context, the two words seem synonymous.

Of course. But that's utterly irrelevant. Something doesn't need to be realistic in order to be believable. And my criticisms of your character are unrelated to how realistic he is.

It's an unregulated setting. If you had a little more experience with RPing, you might realise how that's a bad thing.

Because I've got such horrible experience. Such horrible, horrible experience. Tell me, Kaimetsu, when was the last time you roleplayed? When was the last time YOU interacted with the roleplaying community, specifically on Graal Kingdoms. WAIT. I forsee a comeback! "You don't have to DO something to UNDERSTAND something." I disagree. When it comes to how a community you really have no part of runs itself, your say is equivalent to that crazy old lady that lives in apartment 9B with those cats and that lintball she calls 'fluffy'.

Graal RPing isn't about stringent rules. If there's one thing I loved about 2K1, and the early days of 2k2, it's that the enviornment was freeform. The RP was regulated independantly by the kings, and so what people did (when they accepted it) became part of Graal.

Being unique dosen't make you special. It makes you different, not more or less important.

You're failing to see a very basic fact here.

The purpose of having regulations in a role playing community is so that role playing can actually take place. If everyone comes to a role playing session with an elaborate backstory, a custom race, and a custom class, so much time would be spent on explainations, no actual roleplaying would take place. Imagine if 10 role players got together, and each had a backstory that required 10 minutes of explaination.

Then, every time a situation comes up which would require abilities from that race to be brought into play, MORE time would be used on explainations.

So now imagine a Kingdom on Graal with 20 members in it, each having their own custom race. It would be chaotic.

My point is, if you're allowed to make a custom race, what is stopping everyone else? If everyone has a custom race, the whole RPing community would be too chaotic to work.

I don't understand how you don't see this logic.

Within GK? Must be a couple of years at least.

Well, that is not quite what I would say. Rather, I would state that experience doesn't always lead to knowledge or skill - it depends on the person. Telling me that you have lots of experience doesn't mean much if you never learned from it.

Anyway, I don't think you have any basis to say that you have more experience with it than I. My comment was not specific to GK - I talked about your experience as a whole.

What a tiresome defense. You really intend to argue that none of my knowledge is transferable? That we can break roleplaying down into arbitrary divisions just so that we can exclude others and claim superiority?

"You never roleplay on Thursdays! You know nothing about roleplaying on Thursdays!!"

Aye, because it allowed you to build your unrealistic, cohesion-breaking characters. If roleplay is not regulated then all the clueless children will just engage in constant games of oneupmanship. "My character is specialer than yours! He was born in the FIRES OF HELL". "YEAH? Well MY character is the LORD OF HELL, HA". "OH NO YOU DON'T. MY CHARACTER IS GOD"

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=special

Zormites were created multiple years ago by collective discussion and agreement and have since become an integral part of Graal, roleplayed by dozens of players and featuring many structures throughout Graal Kingdoms and Graal2001.
If someone does not know what a zormite is, they are most likely new to Graal and will learn soon.

Your race was created because you wanted to be more special than others. It is not supported, to my knowledge, by anything but your character background. It is not featured anywhere.

Please do not get me wrong, I am all for creativity and expanding the roleplay, but imagine what roleplaying would be like if everybody had their own race that only they were a member of. I think it is a far more interesting challenge to create your character to fit within the existing framework of Graal, and then making it unique through its attitude and your style of playing.

That is why you are not supposed to roleplay with clueless children.

In GK, you don't have much of a choice. You can just hope that the kingdom leaders and suchlike will set a good example.

Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be happening.

You both are arguing like women. Who cares eh...

How do women typically argue?

For as far as I know, like this:
Woman: "why do boys always behave so much different than girls lol?"
Me: "Because they are different."

Well, I am quite sure that I am not doing that.

I am not - because I haven't read the thread.

Just stop bickering about something so stupid. Gryffon is a vulture type thingey, and you don't think he should be able to make a character other then a elf, human, dwarf or something else. Who cares man?

Do you ever get tired of issuing such impotent commands?

Look through the thread. You'll find your answer.

I don't get tired of of telling women to stop arguing, no.

I looked through the thread, seems only you care.

Well, that is okay. I don't get tired of watching you do your self-righteous brat thing.

How sad. They never taught you to count.

I really don't see a problem with it because this is his history... I don't see Gryffon going on Graal shouting, "I'm a vulture like creature who got his wings cut off! You can't touch me!" Hey atleast Gryff is trying here... which isn't the case on GK nowadays.

Well, that is not in dispute. But it also defines the history of the world, which has to be shared.

Je suis fatigue.

This is idiotic. The reality is, Graal Kingdoms has no central RP Enforcement besides the Kings. Big whoop, my character is special by an academic definition. Let's all JUMP DOWN EACH OTHERS THROATS OVER SEMANTICS.

I don't apply my race to my roleplaying accept with those who already know it. To most, I simply say that I'm a very old half-elf, which is technically true. But when I roleplay with Gryffon's close friends, such as Shawn or Padren, I often talk about my brother, other Daveons, and Obsydyon. Wow, my character is a FOREIGNER. All it does is add depth, which I only use by dolling out information to friends one spoonful at a time.

This technique seems VERY believable, realistic, and up to par. Does being a Daveon give me an advantage over other characters? No, Daveons eat dead things raw and have immortality without immortal youth. Sounds like a less powerful elf that eats sushi, to me.

I see no problem with it as long as it's balanced.

No one is arguing that your character is unbalanced.

As I asked before, if you're making your own custom race within a RP environment with already defined races, what is stopping everyone else from doing so?

Which just means that the kings should regulate the roleplaying of their subjects.

What, because you say so?

The fact that they want to RP as an already defined race, rather than a loner? They can right now, but dont.

Is it the fact that they want to play as that race, or is it that they conform to the RPing environment they are in, as you're supposed to?

What if after reading your post, everyone else has now decided to make their own race? Would it not completely destroy RPing on GK?

The Kingdoms would become near meaningless. Time would be spent arguing whos race is better and for what reasons, until it got to the situation like Kai made an example of, where each person had to have an attibute that made them better than the rest.

While you yourself claim your race is in no way superior to another, what if I was to make a race that, inherently, is no better than any other race, however "Daveons" are allergic to the breath of my race, and it kills them instantly upon inhalation. This, mind you, is in no way a "power". It's a normally useless attibute to my race, until I happen to breathe on you.

Can you tell me this killer breath does not exist? How do you know it doesnt exist? Where is it written that it does not exist? I don't see anywhere in GK rules, history, or practice, where having Daveon killing breath is not possible. I'm just customizing my own race, which normally is magically and physically weaker than other races. This is its only special attribute, so obviously, my race is not overpowered in any way.

Am I to be allowed to create this character?

What is there to destroy? :rolleyes:

If everyone is playing by standards like this, presumably nothing.