Nunhship questions

[Y'uraq Tia]

Hello and salutations. I won't bore you guys with details, but I've recently been in a story arc that has had Y'uraq confront and defeat a nunh, unwittingly gaining his title and thus turning his life into a completely different direction. (for better AND worse) since that's dynamic RP for ya.

 

I learned and became aware IC and OOC'ly nunh's aren't allowed to leave their tribes once the title was gained and I've followed rp conventions and had myself stuck ic'ly in one place for alost a month, but my friends and i were able to RP a scene where Y'uraq made a deal that he could leave on condition he could provide the tribe with an aetheryte which his friends then DMED an event where had gone through the trouble of stealing from the Amal'jaa in the midst of an attempt to summon ifrit, which never came to pass.

 

So my question is: Now that Y'uraq is free to roam and travel again. He would know better than to even mention his title to anyone and simply introduce himself as "Y'uraq"

 

How are nunhs percieved by the general RP community? is it RP suicide? Does it matter that all of the females he'll be siring with are all NPCs or would people be turned off by the possibility of RP'ing any romantic prospect with a nunh because of the rep most of them seem to get?

[Edvyn]

I cannot speak for the whole community, but I know that people can be kinda wary of nunh players - the reason for this should be clear enough, and appears mired in OOC intent rather than opposition to nunhs as a playable concept. The title connotes status and sexual prowess, so the reasoning for that wariness should be simple enough - roleplayers like their power fantasies. We've all met that one guy who sees himself as a career casanova, the greasy pickup artist who sees chicks like pokemon he's gotta catch and boasts about how much of a stud he is (in his own mind). He'll separate other men into boxes of alpha and beta, viewing himself as the former. Nunhs are alpha males, and they appeal to a demographic that people often want to avoid.

 

So, what can you do about it?

 

You can show those people that's not your intent, and that you wish to explore a particular storyline rather than gratify your ego. Just be thorough with your characterization, consider both the good and bad aspects of the nunh role. The IC social implications, stuff like that. Having the females he's siring with be NPCs rather than a harem of PCs you've painstakingly gathered might actually be a step in the right direction. It's tricky to gauge how the community at large is going to treat your character, and I really don't believe that worrying yourself about poor reception which hasn't happened yet is the answer. Play what you like, play it honestly and be considerate of others. Do those three things, and your reputation should sort itself out. Everything will be fine. :thumbsup:

[V'aleera]

The central issue is that the singular purpose of a Nunh is breeding, something that is not very easy to do from a long distance. The onus falls on you to indulge in some creativity to determine a reason your Nunh may need or want to be separate from his tribe.

 

In my experience the vast majority of roleplayers ultimately prioritize fun over strict logic and rules. If your character is creative, interesting, and facilitates engaging RP people will be much more open to entertaining less orthodox ideas.

[Valence]

In my honest opinion, a Nunh will be seen as interesting (I think), if as already said, you play even more the duties and the chores that come with the role. It will then take precedence over the harem thing with alpha male power fantasies and all. 

 

Responsibilities include: being there at all times to breed (and potentially lead, even if Nunh are not always tribe chiefs, they certainly are people with important status, and probably combat leaders as well). It also includes a lot of 'tribe politics' as seen in the MSQ when the Nunh has constantly to deal with horny Tias that are after his title all the time. I don't think a Nunh will last long only for his combat skills to repell the challenges he always gets issued. 

 

A Nunh has an important social role, close to an alpha male, and needs to make impression, to be there for all the lower males as a role model, a leader, etc. A Nunh MUST impose respect. A Nunh will always lead through example, always being on the front for everything when it must be so. If he doesn't, or show lazyness, he will lose that respect, and probably his title at some point.

 

If your Nunh is not here to defend his title, how can Tias challenge him? He will just be replaced asap in my opinion, no matter what.

[Charity322]

There's a point in the MSQ where U'odh Nunh leaves his tribe to visit in Costa Del Sol, so Nunhs can't be forbidden to leave their tribes. I'd imagine that long journeys would not be appreciated, because yeah it's hard to breed long distance. But Nunhs don't breed 24/7. U'odh Nunh still had time to lead the tribe as well.

[Kilieit]

I think the main thing is that that a nunh has to have constructed some sort of method by which he will not lose his nunhship while he's away.

 

Like, a challenge from a tia can come at any time. If he's away when that happens, that could mean he loses his nunhship by way of absence; if the women are so fed up enough of him being away that they accept the former-tia as a new-nunh because it's better than having no one.

 

Or are there people in the tribe loyal to him for other reasons? Has he taken good care of them during his nunhship? Has he shown qualities that his tribe considers important during his nunhship? If so, the women might reject the tia making the challenge on the basis he's cowardly or weak to make a "real" challenge, allowing the current nunh to keep his title even while he's away.

 

U'odh Nunh seems respected by his tribe. He does good things for them, he keeps them in balance, he shows wise leadership and carries out their traditions without hesitation. If one of the tias who wanted to become nunh challenged the position while he was away, I think most of the U would scoff and ignore him rather than accept him - because they'd rather wait for U'odh to return than make a gamble on a tia who doesn't even want to stand up in a real fight.

 

Or that's my take on the situation anyway!

[Virella]

Personally? If I see a Nunh RPer, I will avoid them. Unless they are using it to shit over their tribal system, and merely call themselves this to riot against the established 'order' of things, and aren't in a tribe no longer, I'm sort of okay with it.

 

But a breedingmale outside his clan? Eh, I will just skip roleplaying with you. I don't think I know anyone who roleplays a Seeker nunh who is legit staying around his tribe. Perhaps if they are nomadic you could kinda get away with it? I'm not sure. I feel if you roleplay a nunh, you sort of need other roleplayers to back you up on this, if that makes any sense?

I'm not saying he should just gather a harem of female cats to sleep with, I'm more talking about tribal relationships, Tias wanting to challenge him ect. Else it just feels dull and easy to me.

 

I'd love to see a legit tribe of Miqo'te Seekers, but those are just... non existent. Can't blame them, it would require a lot of work, not to mention a lot of people would just see it as an opportunity for ERP. It would just end up in a weird ERP FC real quickly if not handled by the right people, and I can't blame people for not wanting to bother with this.

 

I'm just not a fan of them. But at the end of the day, it is your roleplay.

[K'nahli]

To me, it makes little sense other than IC arrogance to refer to oneself as 'Nunh' when you live apart from your tribe or go on these great travels and live a wonderful life of your own when they're supposed to be there looking after their tribe after proving themselves the most capable male hunter. Our one remaining Nunh has made a number of travels away from the tribe, but they were temporary by definition and only made in the greater interests of the tribe.

 

Nunh isn't really a part of your name from what I can tell. So for this particular situation, it not unlike like abandoning your city one day and still expecting people to call you "Mayor Whomever" from my perspective.

[Valence]

Wasn't there an Aldgoat Tribe or something? Seeker FC...

[Melkire]

"Nunh" is purely for identifying which males have been deemed fit for breeding, though. There's nothing in lore, as far as I recall, that assigns the title any other responsibilities... so any comparisons to leadership positions are flawed, IMO.

 

The U tribe's Nunh is a bit of a special case in that he also happens to lead his tribe.

 

I'd say, in this case, that so long as the new Nunh in question regularly and frequently visits his tribe to, ahem, fulfill his sole duty... should be fine to live elsewhere. It'd be an unusual and probably frowned upon arrangement though.

 

 

 

See: Miqo'te Naming Conventions.

 

Nunh status does not equate to leadership within a tribe, and in fact, very few nunh ever become leaders.

[Chompie]

Oh boy oh boy Seeker sociology is fascinating

 

A Nunh's job, pure and simple, is to make the strong children happen.

 

Everything else is up to the specific tribe. Some tribes might have a tradition that means a Nunh is basically captive in their own village and not allowed to leave. Some might give them some powers of leadership. Some might require things entirely different! Some might have a 'be gone this long and you lose it' clause, some might just have an implied one, some might have the whole tribe follow and set up base camp wherever the Nunh goes.

Maybe they treat him as the face of the tribe. Like a company spokesperson, he can't be away for very long, but he's certainly not stuck there.

There's tons of room for interpretation, so long as it still makes sense in the context of the society of that tribe, and his position as "The male who makes the babies happen".

 

However. Being a Nunh basically means that the RP community at large has a very specific idea of you that is probably completely wrong. I'm sorry. The general consensus image is some cat who is aggressive, testosterone-filled, and bangs everything in sight. So yeah, just for that OOC reason I'd agree with "just don't introduce yourself as one"

 

We need to work together to change that reputation. When people see the word "Nunh" I want their brains to automatically replace it with "A Dad"

[Charity322]

I don't know. Do Nunhs ever do dad stuff or is raising the kids entirely left to the females? I didn't get the impression that either Seeker or Keeper males were really involved in childrearing, just genetic donation lol.

 

Where does it say that very few Nunhs become leaders? I know it says it on the wiki, but where are they getting it from? Because someone didn't give U'odh Nunh the message.

 

[N'khai]

While playing a Nunh outside a traditional tribe structure is odd by what we know of lore it is not completely implausible. Just as the Xaela have their own quirks and oddities sprinkled throughout their tribes it is safe to assume the culture of each unique Seeker tribe (And their offshoots) is just as varied. With enough creativity anything is possible, within reason of course.

 

As for the meat of the question I don't think its RP suicide to RP a character with the title. There will be people who knee jerk and shy away from a Nunh RPer but there are many others who will likely find it interesting or at the very worst not care about the Nunh status. Unquestionably there have been people who have soured the title and treated it as a fetish tool or just thought it out poorly but it has the potential to be so much more than people may give it credit for.

 

My character as an example is far from how one would consider a traditional Nunh to be. Similar to yours he also more stumbled into the role than sought it out, and takes care not to introduce himself as a Nunh in most cases. In his eyes the title only has meaning to him and the people within his tribe, he does not want to lord around in public like its something to be in awe of. He treats his responsibility to his tribe with the utmost seriousness, which usually leads into bouts of paranoia of not being all he should be for them or that he may be leading them incorrectly. It's been an interesting dynamic for me having to balance N'khai's desire to be a "good" person/Nunh alongside what he sees as a distorted moral compass and upbringing.

 

Rambling aside: I wouldn't shy away from tackling the challenge of RPing a Nunh. There will be people who will think the worst immediately but that shouldn't stop you from telling interesting stories and promoting a better image for Nunh RPers as you do so.

[N'khai]

 

 

We need to work together to change that reputation. When people see the word "Nunh" I want their brains to automatically replace it with "A Dad"

 

^^^^^This^^^^

 

There was a joke tossed around IC when Khai's first kids were born that when they were old enough he would carry them on his shoulder and have them cast spells, effectively making the three a walking death machine. The very tired, unimpressed mate who had just given birth was not pleased with the thought. Terrible Dad times are best times.

[Teadrinker]

I'm of the mind that this whole thing has been poorly handled by SE honestly. The U tribe is presented one way, official descriptions go in another direction and then the community really didn't help matters when they fetishized it.

 

I tend to avoid Tribe RP as well. Any experience I've had with it in game has been negative or fetishized.

 

I'm gonna be brutally honest with you OP. If I ran into a player playing a Nunh that had a storehouse of NPC women back home he was 'breeding' I would eject from the RP  immediately. I'm not saying you wouldn't do it differently, I'm not saying you wouldn't do it well. But at this point, in a lot of people's minds, I don't know if there is any saving the concept.

 

And, for your sake, I'll warn you and say I don't know if there is anyway to avoid the fetishizers. ((

[BumblingSeaBiscuit]

I will say that I do see Nunh RPers get consistent RP, and I have seen Nunh, "Done well." I will also say that, "Done well," is completely a matter of opinion, perspective, and what you expect to get out of your RP. Will being a Nunh make you never get RP ever? Nah. Could it attract RP you may or may not want? Sure. Ultimately, if you do your research, and put thought into your character you're going to find a group of people that want to associate with you. ♥

[Valence]

Honestly, I could expect logically to see one of the possible reasonable portrayals of a Nunh to be an arrogant sexualized male with a harem behind him... Yeah, I'm not kidding. That's a possibility. I would expect some Nunh to act like that, like you would see many people IRL acting like that if they were afforded the occasion. You have many assholes in positions of power and sometimes they deserve them due to their skills. Which doesn't mean they can't be assholes.

 

As long as they fulfill their obligations and duties to their tribe, and that's where you pull it right or wrong. 

 

It always boils down into a good fleshing out of the character and a 3 dimensional portrayal where you actually show that your character isn't a sexual power fantasy.

 

 

Also, on the males raising Seeker children, I would have to find confirmation but out of my memory, no, females raise their children before anything else. Especially when the nunh probably have dozens and dozen of them. Not saying that the Nunh will not teach them stuff, hunting lessons, etc, but I don't see him doing that more than anyone else (esp considering the sheer number of children), but women seemed to educate the children in their everyday life. Especially since female Seekers seem also to be as capable as hunting and doing 'male' stuff than their male counterparts.

 

Maybe I don't remember correctly though.

 

 

We need to work together to change that reputation. When people see the word "Nunh" I want their brains to automatically replace it with "A Dad"

 

 

Yeah well, maybe that's just me, but I really, really can't see a breeding Nunh as a dad...

 

Would love to see the reputation of the title improve though, but that would need more players pulling it right, like any position of power really.

[Arc]

As someone who plays a lot of Miqo'te characters strict to lore, I think you'll be perfectly fine playing a Nunh. There's a lot of unfounded bias towards the Nunh of a tribe because there are a lot of RPers out there who play displaced Seekers, and usually a lot of the blame is assigned to an abusive Nunh. I hate this stereotype. While my Miqo'te is a Tia, I did a lot of fleshing out for the history and current state of his tribe. Playing a Nunh doesn't lock you out of any RP and definitely shouldn't stop you from finding any either

Hells, I'd love to introduce Amra to some Seeker Nuhns.

If you find yourself being accused of playing a Nunh character wrong, I'd just point the accuser to SE's lore page. The number one concern I can imagine you might get is the fact that your character is away from his tribe, but most Nunh's don't become tribal chiefs or leaders. Personality, well, that's entirely up to you as a Roleplayer. If you do end up creating a Nunh, feel free to poke me sometime for RP. ^^ And good luck!

[Arc]

Honestly, I could expect logically to see one of the possible reasonable portrayals of a Nunh to be an arrogant sexualized male with a harem behind him... Yeah, I'm not kidding. That's a possibility. I would expect some Nunh to act like that, like you would see many people IRL acting like that if they were afforded the occasion. You have many assholes in positions of power and sometimes they deserve them due to their skills. Which doesn't mean they can't be assholes.

 

As long as they fulfill their obligations and duties to their tribe, and that's where you pull it right or wrong. 

 

It always boils down into a good fleshing out of the character and a 3 dimensional portrayal where you actually show that your character isn't a sexual power fantasy.

 

 

Also, on the males raising Seeker children, I would have to find confirmation but out of my memory, no, females raise their children before anything else. Especially when the nunh probably have dozens and dozen of them. Not saying that the Nunh will not teach them stuff, hunting lessons, etc, but I don't see him doing that more than anyone else (esp considering the sheer number of children), but women seemed to educate the children in their everyday life. Especially since female Seekers seem also to be as capable as hunting and doing 'male' stuff than their male counterparts.

 

Maybe I don't remember correctly though.

 

 

We need to work together to change that reputation. When people see the word "Nunh" I want their brains to automatically replace it with "A Dad"

 

 

Yeah well, maybe that's just me, but I really, really can't see a breeding Nunh as a dad...

 

Would love to see the reputation of the title improve though, but that would need more players pulling it right, like any position of power really.

I disagree with this one, Valence ^^ They're just a dad of many! And even then, it might not be all that many depending on how long said Nunh remained the Nunh. As for males raising Seeker children, well, I agree with what you say there. ^^ Though I'd also point out that the ratio of Seeker birth is 10:1 female to male. So it's be pretty unlikely for a male to be the primary raiser of Miqo'te kids.

[Kilieit]

I don't know. Do Nunhs ever do dad stuff or is raising the kids entirely left to the females? I didn't get the impression that either Seeker or Keeper males were really involved in childrearing, just genetic donation lol.

 

Where does it say that very few Nunhs become leaders? I know it says it on the wiki, but where are they getting it from? Because someone didn't give U'odh Nunh the message.

 

 

It says it right here, in the very same instance where the developers tell us what Nunh means in the first place:

 

Nunh status does not equate to leadership within a tribe' date=' and in fact, [i']very few nunh ever become leaders[/i].

 

U'odh is telling you that's the way the U tribe works, not the way that Seeker tribes in general work.

[FreelanceWizard]

U'odh is telling you that's the way the U tribe works, not the way that Seeker tribes in general work.

 

I'm going to make the possibly provocative claim that the U tribe is, indeed, representative of Seeker tribes. If you do the side quest lines out there, you find that the tia basically run the tribe. The FATEs suggest that some of the women have combat or spiritual leadership positions, but it's the tia who give the orders and handle the day to day leadership. U'odh can make pronouncements as he wishes, but ultimately, the true power lies with the tia who actually manage the tribe. While nunh clearly have a fair bit of soft power, and some (like U'odh) probably have a lot of it due to their history, they're so occupied with their, uh, "life of leisure" that the tia hold formal positions of leadership.

 

Now, sure, if U'odh really wanted to get his way, he could certainly go beat up those who oppose him (thus the quote in the screenshot). After all, one gets to be nunh by defeating the current one and surviving challenges from other tia. Other concepts of "challenge" aside, in Eorzea, that's bound to mean combat. However, being able to clobber people into agreeing with you is not holding a position of leadership or, really, being a leader. Nominally speaking, U'odh is about as in charge as a head of state -- which is to say, not that much at all.

[Kilieit]

That's at odds with the statement,

 

"very few nunh ever become leaders",

 

which... like... that's a pretty clear statement, haha. I stand strongly by the belief that U'odh is an exception, not the rule, because that's exactly what the lore text is - at this moment in time - telling us.

 

If the lore book comes out and says otherwise, I'll change my stance, but for now I'm staying by what makes sense with the lore we already have: which is a sample size of 1 tribe, and a Word-of-God statement which says they don't fit the norm.

[Charity322]

U'odh is telling you that's the way the U tribe works, not the way that Seeker tribes in general work.

 

I'm going to make the possibly provocative claim that the U tribe is, indeed, representative of Seeker tribes. If you do the side quest lines out there, you find that the tia basically run the tribe. The FATEs suggest that some of the women have combat or spiritual leadership positions, but it's the tia who give the orders and handle the day to day leadership. U'odh can make pronouncements as he wishes, but ultimately, the true power lies with the tia who actually manage the tribe. While nunh clearly have a fair bit of soft power, and some (like U'odh) probably have a lot of it due to their history, they're so occupied with their, uh, "life of leisure" that the tia hold formal positions of leadership.

 

Now, sure, if U'odh really wanted to get his way, he could certainly go beat up those who oppose him (thus the quote in the screenshot). After all, one gets to be nunh by defeating the current one and surviving challenges from other tia. Other concepts of "challenge" aside, in Eorzea, that's bound to mean combat. However, being able to clobber people into agreeing with you is not holding a position of leadership or, really, being a leader. Nominally speaking, U'odh is about as in charge as a head of state -- which is to say, not that much at all.

 

A lot of the quests you do for the Tia in Forgotten Springs show that it is U'odh Nunh who makes the decisions. Like the one where you have to canvas foreigners and a lot complain about the Nunh's decision to not allow this or that and the Tia say that they would run it differently if they were Nunh, implying that they do not have the power to do that now. They seem to just have general housekeeping duties. U'odh Nunh is the one running the show.

[Valence]

Remember also that what we are shown by NPCs ingame has always been qualified by SE as "probably biased in some way or another, depending on character's beliefs and particular inclinations, as well as the context, since nobody is a well omniscient knowledge".

 

I disagree with this one, Valence ^^ They're just a dad of many! And even then, it might not be all that many depending on how long said Nunh remained the Nunh. As for males raising Seeker children, well, I agree with what you say there. ^^ Though I'd also point out that the ratio of Seeker birth is 10:1 female to male. So it's be pretty unlikely for a male to be the primary raiser of Miqo'te kids.

 

Uh, yeah well... There is always wiggle room for pretty much everything here. I'm pretty sure a young Nunh being the father of a few at first might be willing genuinely to act as a real dad or something, why not. It can make sense. I just doubt that after many years of service if it's the case, with so many offspring, he still have just the human means to do so.

 

All in all I tend to speak mostly in terms of mainstream lore. What people could call lore bending (like here), is in my opinion certainly not that, but going into... specifities, oddities, and the likes.

[K'nahli]

You see, the thing is that they culturally involve themselves with selective breeding all for the purpose of producing strong offspring. To me, that tells me that they are a society that highly values strength and prowess. Regardless of how strong a Nunh(a.k.a the strongest male) is next to the best huntress in the tribe, he is still a highly valuable asset to them. This, to me, would tell me that they would offer respect to his position and expect him to take his role seriously. I can't relate to the idea of supposing that any tribe would be content with some person having the audacity to not bother affiliating with them for the most part and only returning when he feels like it when he not only has a duty, but extreme worth to the tribe at home. And while I think that it's not like breeding is something that needs to happen regularly; post-Calamity, it might even be the opposite for many, but that doesn't erase the importance of his presence, and the simple rarity of males in general can potentially give him a far greater sense of worth than even an equally capable huntress or better.

 

Wandering off from your tribe in general would likely not be seen as a very faithful thing to be doing to your family, let alone when it comes to someone of such extreme importance. Most tribes probably aren't THAT large. So if you have a total number of say 50 people, then you're looking at about 5 males in your tribe at best... and that's not including age, disfigurement or anything else that might disqualify one from the eligibility for the role. Unless you're in a massive, massive tribe then having a male of all people wandering off should be a rather serious issue, let alone an actual Nunh.