K'dath

If you're a Seeker you're in luck. There's a Seeker tribe at the Forgotten Springs in game that gives us a detailed look at Seeker tribal culture. It doesn't give us all the answers we'd like, but it's a lot more than nothing. Check it out when you can. I've been there, done all the quests there, and I was deeply disappointed with it. There's very little that distinguishes them from any other race or any other settlement in the game. The only 'tribal' thing they do is hunt, which is a fate that pops up now and again and a briefly mentioned affair in a quest that is half as long or prominent as the one where you have to chase away people oggling the bathing cat girls. Even the important NPCs could either just as easily be city folk of any race for all the cultural difference they show, there's nothing about them that makes them distinctly Miqo'te. Two rival Tia vying for dominance is all the 'detail' we get, and they both have all the personality and ambition of plaster. The same amount of factual information you can pry out of them is summed up in the 'naming conventions' article. And the nunh is a terrible, played up trope of 'lol cat people'. He rolls his R's and he's sassy! Groan. And on top of that the naming conventions article goes out of its way to mention that Nunh are NOT leaders of their tribes, but he is, for whatever reason. If the lore's self contradicting, you can't say either interpretation is definitively right. It all hardly amounts to more than nothing. The way the Miqo'te are handled as a race is a joke.

You should be proud! Your simple question gave birth to a brilliant conversation that has spanned several subjects that are at least within the same realm of your original post! That's quite an achievement! Heh. Maybe you're right. Thing is, the last RP-orientated forum I used to frequent had a strict policy against derailing threads, doubleposting, and necroing. I guess I just got used to the rules. We roleplayers can't be confined by such silly ideas like "staying on topic." I mean, geeze! This is now a funny gifs thread. Here, I'll start. ALL ABOARD THE BANDWAGON. Here's one I made. This is pretty much how I feel all the time.

There is also actually more than one or two outfits for men which tend towards the slightly more salacious side of design. Not that it has anything on the long running history of 'boob plate' objectifying women, but it's a nice change of pace. I, for one, welcome the impending age of objecting men to plate thongs.

I for one am extremely offended by the way Square has handled Miqo'te as a race. I felt like there was a lot of potential that was hand-waved and eye-rolled until tribal just meant "People who don't live in a major city." I've made way more trips to the mythical land of land of probable than I'm normally comfortable making with a character, but the lack of really deep lore sort of limits the number of objective facts I can tie myself to. We get a lot of general lore, oh yes they are tribes and they showed up around this era, with no details or insights into what they're like. So all I can do is make assumptions on many fronts and admit I can't justify any of it with facts. ICly, I at least have 'Well, he's from a reclusive and xenophobic tribe of a species who's culture is built around brutality and mating rights. His understanding of the world is very different than yours.' It's original given the context of the world where all the NPCs behave pretty consistently despite their race or heritage. Original concept though? Certainly Not.

It could be argued that Gridania is a very big exception to that. I mean us as humans. That is WAY beyond the scope of this topic, BUT the humanoids in the story mode certainly have their share of major malfunctions. Eorzea pretty much runs on the rule 'Everyone is selfish, so I've gotta get mine before they get theirs!' Or 'If I can't have it no one will'. The problem with the aetheric disturbances that 'will certainly destroy Eorzea' trace back to human aggression. In fact, pretty much everything that's ever gone wrong in history that we know of has been attributed to humans being idiots, not the primals. See the Eorzean Timeline for some great examples of how humanity in this game is exceedingly stupid.

Welcome to Fantasy as a genre.

I am a table top player, so I am all about the rolls. But my introduction to that system in an MMORPG setting was... unfavorable. I'd made a new character who'd been immediately co-opt'd into a friend's RP guild who was VERY strict about using rolls as the rule, something that blew my mind because I'd always just used, you know, common sense. But the GM was extremely anal retentive about 'I don't care if you're a good RPer, we all roll.' He was a player-run arena champion of the roll system and vouched for its vital necessity. He was ICly a combat master. ...and my level 12 Worgen Druid, who'd never held a weapon before that moment, ground him into human meat paste. Twice. And then that worgen was suplexed by a Gnome... So I have pretty mixed feelings about it. If you're building a system then I'd say go the full TRPG route and draft up some merit/flaw points that'll add or subtract from their roll total.

I am not sure what R&D is, but yes, most of my character relates to researching beast tribes and primals. Do I have a colleague now? Indeed! I have made understanding the nature of the beastmen and their craven gods my purpose! Sometimes to... less than ethical ends. But all in the name of research and understanding! And that's gotta count for something. Have you been sacrificing humans? -__- No way man. That's against my alignment!

I purposefully didn't touch on the Primals themselves, because they could very easily be a subject/thread all to their own with the various factors they bring to the table. In fact, I could probably write a full length essay just off the top of my head. I won't, but I could. As far as tempering and worship go, I think that it is possible for non-Amalj'aa to revere Ifrit without tempering, but not probable. The primals 'feed' on the worship of their followers. Without the prayers and pleas of their followers they cannot maintain a tangible form. The more prayer, the more powerful. That is why they temper mortals, humanoids and beastmen alike, so that they will devote themselves to the Primal's being and no other cause. There are non-tempered humanoid pirates 'The Serpent Reavers' in service to Leviathan, and there are 'heretics' which serve the Dragons (though whether they are 'tempered' or not I don't believe was ever brought up, only that they were 'mad'). So you could, as far as lore elaborates on the matters, be a willing, non-beast servant to a primal, but these people are usually not the sort you would associate with and would most likely be publicly condemned as criminals, incarcerated, or flat out executed to prevent the unmaking of Eorzea any further. As for the nature of Odin, there's some quest text that elaborates on his nature a little more. I just grabbed this bit off the wiki: It seems like his major function is to simply be a wondering swordsman looking for the perfect battle, a very common fantasy trope, especially in Eastern culture where the samurai is still an honored symbol. His 'primalness' seems comparatively unimportant, though crowning him an 'Elder' Primal does make me curious as if there is even more to all the primals' history we don't know yet. I'm aware Bahamut is considered an 'elder' primal too, but I don't think what the distinction between primal/elder primal has been touched on or elaborated yet?

I am not sure what R&D is, but yes, most of my character relates to researching beast tribes and primals. Do I have a colleague now? Indeed! I have made understanding the nature of the beastmen and their craven gods my purpose! Sometimes to... less than ethical ends. But all in the name of research and understanding! And that's gotta count for something.

Did I hear Primal R&D RP? Because I think I heard Primal related RP...

I was Alliance for the most part and rarely ever went Horde. I can't really say why, to be honest. It just never clicked with me. I have heard many great and wonderful tales about Hordeside RP, though! I have fond memories and even greater screenshots of my Nelf pre-Moon Guard back when I played on Silver Hand during Vanilla and BC. Horde RP was pretty starkly divided into: Blood Elf RP and No Blood Elves Allowed RP. One was vastly better than the other, but included about, oh, 10% of the server. It was why I spent most of my closing days on my Druid rather than any of my geared/raid toons. Sweeping generalizations and sarcasm aside, Horde RP was alright. It had some really, REALLY good, inspired guilds that did some really cool things... And then there was the very prolific 'sex slave brothel' guild. /PTSD

Yup! But vanity slots are still not coming till 2.2! Priorities!

Oh god. Don't take me back to that place man. I've seen some things in my time.

The majority of WoW nobility I ever saw were humans or Blood Elves. Blood Elves sort of kind of make sense of you take in the Convocation of Silvermoon-- as at least five of the houses were unnamed so far as I've ever found. One large effort on Ravenholdt was to re-establish seven houses (not including Sunstrider or Drathir) in place of the seven that had fallen in RP. It was done entirely through roleplay and for a while it worked out really nicely, consolidating smaller houses into larger one and generally using political marriage and manipulation to get things combed out. I never played on Ravenholdt, so I can't speak for that, but we had dozens of Sin'Dorei 'noble houses' on Moon Guard... and they were all awful. The idea itself isn't bad, in theory. But you're taking a major lore component into the hands of players at that point. Especially if you're going to present your house with having any sort of merit that's to be respected or acknowledged ICly. I think it can be done, I think it can be done well, again in theory. But you have to have the drive, the ambition, the organization, and perhaps most importantly the lore knowledge to pull it off and run a respectable establishment. Standing in bars all day playing spin-the-bottle is not what nobles do, and organizing whole houses around that perception is even worse. And that's what they all were. In fact, that's all any 'noble' type RP I've ever seen, really bad played up 'Victorian Playboy' types. Thus, my long running apprehension. I completely understand your point and I've heard horror stories of MG's hack at 'nobility'. I saw the same thing happen on Wyrmrest Accord and honestly when Ravenholdt began to deteriorate, it happened there too. I'll list my issues with poorly-done noble houses in a moment but on Ravenholdt there was organization. The cornerstone to the whole thing was two large Sin'dorei houses run by an OOCly married couple. One ran one house and his spouse led the other. Their conflict and their openness to bring other houses into the 'fray' provided the building blocks. More, and here's my stance of noble houses, they fulfilled what I consider to be one of the most IMPORTANT parts of running a house-- GIVING YOUR MEMBERS SOME STORY. Too often do I see a clique of people who are all ICly connected or related expecting all their roster to simply support their story. They commonly walk around with their posses who exist, seemingly, only to credit their 'power' or 'status'. In our house at least, each person who was brought into the fold was given plenty of attention. Our officers turned us, trained us, and stayed with us. Our guards actually did their jobs and spent much time talking and training amongst themselves. Our diplomats lived endangered lives, we had spies, infiltrators, scape goats-- no one was simply a servant with no other purpose except to add one more to the roster. We had goals, rivals, and conflict. Nothing was swept under the rug simply because a member who got involved with an issue was 'too low rank to notice'. I mean when it really boils down to it, it's RP. For the nobles, you should have some sway and notoriety. You're not going to get that by trying to accumulate as many RPers as possible then neglecting them or focusing solely on your own story. The revival of the Convocation of Silvermoon made no real efforts to try to twist the actual lore. No one was trying to dethrone Lor'themar, no one was trying to usurp the Horde or pretended that the united 'power' of the group could accomplish such a feat on behalf of the whole of their people. What they did was fill their niche-- whatever job they did that made them a noble house, they continued to do. The conflicts that arose were often two wealthy houses having an issue over territory or jobs that they wanted to fill that some other group wanted as well. The IC decisions they made and topics they discussed affected the united houses as a whole, and perhaps the 'retainer-houses' that were allied with them, but they didn't try and control NPCs. If, say, a war broke out on their doorstep (there were huge non-Elf groups like the Shadowtusk Clan which was a giant Troll guild who hated belfs and loved to start issues that could turn into full scale blood-sport, or evil guilds such as the Knights of the Icy Blade who readied themselves to attack the living houses eventually), they'd use that Convocation to persuade the other houses to aid the effort, throwing whatever accumulated weight they had around and pulling all the ties they'd forged. Another fun part of it was the 'Shadow War'-- all members of all houses and even non-Elf houses were held to the single important rule 'No fighting in the cities'. The NPC guards would no doubt take you and put you away. Rather than testing that rule and saying 'Oh well that Sentinel just ran by me and didn't do anything' people honored it and took it a step further to the Shadow War. They worked in manipulation, kidnapping, subterfuge, and there were people in the houses whose sole purpose was to do the dirty work and keep the reputation of the house pristine. It's almost unfathomable now-- people not being called on their guild tags simply because they're floating over their head or recognized because of their name. I don't know. All the memories and the work and how well things went for quite some time still leaves a nice big place in my heart for nobles and noble houses that are done well. I always feel a little sad for an aspiring crime-lord or a noble who doesn't have anyone to beef up their reputation but I feel it's something that can be accomplished in character. I certainly don't want to see nobility demonized OOCly by people who assume everyone who RPs nobility is going to do so poorly and they don't -deserve- to RP a noble character-- but I know the vast majority if not the entirety of the RPC doesn't feel that way because of the general open-mindedness I find here. Someday I'd be happy to have Siobhain swear her loyalty to some noble or another if their views were in line with her own. But chances are, just because of the character type, it'd be far more likely to see her connected to some type of militia or school. *On another note, I yearn to see some large scale criminal coalition in Ul'dah filling different niches that are connected and work together. Similarly, I'd enjoy, I think, seeing a few nobles grouped up and doing noble things together. I'd like to see the dynamic of different nobles and how they interact with each other despite their different origins as well as non-nobles interacting with them. *dreamy sigh* To clarify, I would never assume to tell someone they don't deserve to play anything. You don't need my permission to play whatever you want, however you want. But if I can dissuade someone from making their character some sort of noble for no reason other than 'eh I feel like it' and doing it poorly, in favor of say, something different and interesting involving some unelaborated part of lore, I personally feel like I've done a good deed. I don't mean to outright condemn the subject matter as a whole or tell anyone what to do... in fact earlier in this very thread... Truth be told, the one thing that irked me more than anything was the games of 'noble swap' they various house guilds played. Like they were noble houses who... collected other nobles. Not retainers, not servants... not anything that would make sense. And they didn't marry them off or make political alliances. Nope, noooo. Way too much effort. They just hoarded them. Plucked them off the street and said "Hey, you wanna join my house, you stallion?" ...and then, you know, they'd meander off to screw. Just tons and tons of unassociated, unconnected noble families but they are all under one 'house'. Which prompts my 'Do you even know what nobility ARE?' point of contention any time I see someone bring it up. Even worse was the ratio of retainers to nobility was abysmal. In fact, there were several hundred players in some of the larger guilds... and I knew... 3 people in one that were not in and of themselves nobility. Three. One, two, three. Out of around two-hundred... Nothing about either of those things is good. It's just blatantly pontificating your own character and their importance. I'm not saying all nobility are this way, I'm not saying the concept is inherently this way, but if it's not handled with a bit of common sense it's much easier to overblow it into all out 'mary-sue' territory than, say, your garden variety warrior. Nobility aren't the only ones to suffer from their either. Warlocks are the other major culprit of 'Mary Sue by Design'. Everything in lore denies that they should be allowed to exist alongside the rest of society, but, you know mechanics get in the way of that... Anything can be a bad character, a bad design, or a bad concept. It's execution that's going to determine whether it is or not. But some require a bit more forethought to conduct in a meaningful way. That's my point more than 'You shouldn't do it ever because it is bad and you're bad if you do it'. No, it's not. But you should think about it, contextualize it, justify it, and bring it into alignment with the lore, the world, and most importantly the player base. Doing things just because you can IS bad design. So I do apologize if I seem overly hostile on the matter. I don't mean to discourage or berate people that do aspire to such levels of competency as you described. It sounds absolutely lovely and I'd adore to see nobility being treated like, you know, goddamn nobility instead of conductors of orgies. I paint a grim picture because it's all I know, it's all I've seen, and I point to it and go 'Don't do that' out of love and a desire NOT to see the community go the way of Moon Guard, rather than to upset anyone who has well intentioned aspirations.