(04-15-2015, 05:54 PM)Faye Wrote:(04-15-2015, 05:40 PM)Tiergan Wrote:(04-15-2015, 05:26 PM)Faye Wrote: <snip because super long>
Faye, I heart you, but I have to admit that when I read "Ultimately it's just folks choosing self-gratification over believability which as the OP stated isn't inherently bad and doesn't mean I won't RP with anyone, I just may not always think it's the best decision, so I try to shy away from it myself." it was a little off-putting.
You may not have meant it that way, but for those of us that are being labeled as 'inauthentic' because we're not playing Isghardian Elezen or Ala Mhigan Highlanders, it sort of reads like:
"Ultimately, these people want to make characters that please themselves over making characters that are believable and lore-abiding. I'm not saying this is inherently bad or anything and I'll still RP with someone whose character is more about satisfying the player's wants over being a realistic character -- I just don't think it's a good idea."
If that's how you actually feel, that's okay. But I also don't think it's unreasonable to expect people might be sore about how they were labeled.
Maybe it's worthwhile to say I don't think self-gratification is a bad thing. In the end that's why we all RP, even why we all chat and debate here on the RPC. This is how we spend our time, it's for our own enjoyment. "Self-gratification" was probably not the best term in retrospect given the negative connotation. But I don't believe there's anything wrong with choosing a character you want to play over the lore or anything else. I'm certainly no lore nazi myself--while I try to never "break" it I do frequently "bend," and while it may not be my own practice, if someone wants to RP even something as extreme as a Garlean Miqo'te princess who can shoot lazer beams, screw the lore and let 'em if that's what they have fun with! We're here to have fun, and how lore fits into that "fun" is different for every individual.
I also don't believe playing an exception, say a Miqo'te dragoon, is "inauthentic"--it just can be a bit harder to accept and need some extra reasoning behind it to explain it away if it's going to make sense given the game's lore. It's certainly not lore-breaking or "wrong," just harder to believe at face value without full context given.
Thank you for elaborating.
I will admit that while I'd accept an Elezen Ishgardian pretty instantly, I would probably want to hear more about the Miqo'te Ishgardian's backstory to learn about how they got there and why - considering the racial diversity with Ishgardians is pretty stacked in one direction.
I suppose feel that people place a lot of emphasis and frustration with "What the hell is with all of these miqo'te players and why do they play as [x]?!" It was the core example the OP brought up and "why is it always Miqo'te?" was a question that the OP asked. To me it's pretty clear it's because there's a metric buttton of miqo'te players. The higher the population, the more likely you're going to run into a whole lot of different concepts. Some will be right up people's alley and some won't -- but it's the same with pretty much anything we RP.
I've endured a lot of random aggression or unpleasant assumptions made about me purely because I'm roleplaying a cat (though weirdly, most of that aggression comes from male players who hate my mancat, but are totally willing to hit on my ladycat :V) I've had people tell me to my face that a certain group likely won't take my RP seriously because I'm RPing a miqo'te. I've had some RPers warn me that I'd have to work twice as hard to prove that I was a decent roleplayer. I've had people straight up ask me, openly in a linkshell, whether I was ERPing with someone just for standing in place with another cat somewhere public RPing things that had nothing to do with sex in /say.
I understand this happens because there's a larger pool of unpleasant miqo'te roleplayers to sift through due to the larger pool of players, but it still really sucks. I don't enjoy playing as one of the most popular races in the game. I'm honestly hoping that when the Au Ra will come out, half the miqo'te will become dragon people just so that it'll be less of a problem - especially when some folks will fixate on miqo'te for months. There have been multiple times where I've considered just rerolling and fantasia'ing my characters into something else because of it, but I've spent way too much time on Tiergan and have built up too many different relationships with him now to do it.
At the end of the day, people will like what they like and hate what they hate, but man does it bum me out dealing with it so often.
