Here's an idea; how about Ronso as a playable Race?

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Originally Posted by LineageRazor

Well, Ronso are pretty much as inhuman-looking as Amal'ja and Ixali. So why do Amal'ja and Ixali qualify as "Beastmen" when this new race joins us as "non-Beastmen"?

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I think theyre called BeastMEN because theyre violent savages living in huts. Dont think it has anything to do with how they look but how they act

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Originally Posted by Kayo

I think theyre called BeastMEN because theyre violent savages living in huts. Dont think it has anything to do with how they look but how they act

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Sylphs are not violent savages, by nature, yet they are BEAST tribes....
not so much human-like, they are, but are still classified like every other non human-looking tribes in eorzea...

If the beast tribes ever become playable races, I'm SO becoming a Qiqirn! :o

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Originally Posted by Fendred

The live letters are great and all, but it feels like we're seeing greater and greater disconnection from players and developers as time goes on.

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Well, feedback is always taken into consideration, but at the end of the day it's their decision.


They have to balance the pros and cons for each addition, and taking into account the players feedback as well as their own experienced opinions.


It's terribly furstrating when you're on such a strict deadline of 3-6 months to design/test/fix/implement/test/fix/test/publish new content when you're so strapped for time.





They REALLY should have done another players poll AFTER 2.0 came out asking (in a more plain way) what beastmen race people wanted (seeing as they feel its needed most);


Then provided a provisional list of the races the development team felt like adding, EG;

Bangaa
Burmecian
Ronso
Moogles
Viera
Dragonkin
Lizard things

(etc.)


This is something player opinions should have been asked for, as a whole community.

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Originally Posted by LineageRazor

On the topic of a truly beastial new race... The big question becomes, then, WHY are they part of the player race collective? The current five races are all very similar in basic structure; they all have strong human-like traits. If we were to get a new race like the Ronso... Well, Ronso are pretty much as inhuman-looking as Amal'ja and Ixali. So why do Amal'ja and Ixali qualify as "Beastmen" when this new race joins us as "non-Beastmen"?

I think this is a can of worms that SE is likely to avoid opening. Whether bunny, lizard, or something completely unexpected, I'm pretty sure that the new race is going to be very humanlike in appearance, with only size/build/animal-bits to differentiate them from the other five races.

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The hope, or the idea is that the beastmen race would separate itself from the 'only humans' styled races that we currently have. As there are plenty of possibilities for them to go for now and in the future, expanding and going for something other than what we currently have is the best course of action. Another "humanoid" race isn't really needed at this stage, we have enough variety for that already.

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Originally Posted by Defteros

Sylphs are not violent savages, by nature, yet they are BEAST tribes....
not so much human-like, they are, but are still classified like every other non human-looking tribes in eorzea...

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I think it's based moreseo on their ability to adapt to, and live in a human-like civilization. While Sylphs are mostly friendly, the vast majority of them could not adapt to living in a place like Limsa or Gridania. It's not as much as their behavior that's considered beast-like, but their "culture" if you will. *thinks back to Pocahontas*

Here's a link to existing races from the ff series if people are curious.http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Races

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Originally Posted by Dark-Saviour

Whatever races we get, keep 'em pretty. :-3

For a 'beastial' race, I'd say something more like the transformation used by Beasts in PSU would be a good level to shoot for.

I'd honestly rather have something more like what I originally envisioned the Sylvari from GW2 as though; lanky, thin, sullen, solid-colour eyes, long, claw-like fingers, and partially bioluminescent (which was the only part we got). Sort of an unsettling sort of beauty like some type of Dark Faerie.

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Honestly, I couldn't disagree more; I'm sick of "pretty" races. Even the Roegadyn look way too "friendly".

I want something truly dangerous-looking, fierce and powerful, but also intelligent. A "Warrior-Barbarian race" of sorts. We already have four "pretty" or "cute" races, and the fifth looks like a stupid, lumbering oaf; I'd like something like looks truly monstrous!

I hope it isn't Viera I never liked that race.

I don't see why Viera is still being considered. I didn't know that much about them 'cept that they are a rabbit-type race and Yugiri has a scaled tail, so.... wha? Not to mention the "ears" are off as they should be higher up at the base of the head if it were Viera, even if the cloth was drooping the rest the ear down. Plus reading up on them on the wikia, "They generally wear stilettos, possibly due to the shape of their feet, although there have been exceptions." Of course Yugiri could be an 'exception' but considering they are giving us hints with Yugiri they probably would've done that.

If there's any other playable race in the future, you know it's going to be as close to human as possible so that the gear team won't cry trying to design armor for a race with different appendages or body structures.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

If there's any other playable race in the future, you know it's going to be as close to human as possible so that the gear team won't cry trying to design armor for a race with different appendages or body structures.

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Well, there's not much point in adding new Races if they're virtually indistinguishable from one another. Something like the Ronso, for example, the only thing they would really even need to customize specifically to suit their race would be their boots.

Even if it's not Ronso specifically, I just want something along those lines. Something powerful and domineering, maybe even a bit warmongering, and not "pretty".

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Originally Posted by TouchandFeel

@Shioban

My guess is the lizard race is this games interpretation of Bangaa or possibly a whole new race.

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This is what I'm hoping for. When FFXIV was first announced, I was really hoping it'd take place in Ivalice and use its many races...boy was I disappointed when it turned out the races were basically a copy/paste of the FFXI ones.

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Originally Posted by Shioban

Yup, that's pretty much the given at the moment.

The only reason I say Dragonkin is because of Yoshi's original comments and the 1.0 players poll;

http://static.finalfantasyxiv.com/to...cf/4724_13.jpg



They fact that they've chosen to go for the least popular option seems a bit odd really.

A dragon/lizard beastmen race won't go down nearly as well as some of the others choices (Viera/Ronso/Burmecians)

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If I see a Lalafell - Miqote I will die.
They will probably be so friggin' cute. xD! But eh...I dunno
Can you imagine Roe + Lala...Oh dear sweet Jesus....just please.

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Originally Posted by Terin

Well, there's not much point in adding new Races if they're virtually indistinguishable from one another. Something like the Ronso, for example, the only thing they would really even need to customize specifically to suit their race would be their boots.

Even if it's not Ronso specifically, I just want something along those lines. Something powerful and domineering, maybe even a bit warmongering, and not "pretty".

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http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...almReborn4.png
Join the elite, though I guess you're out of luck because we are pretty.

Going off that poll that was posted, it's interesting they did go with the second-least popular choice of the players. Although I'm not that disappointed if the next race is a lizard or dragon inspired race. I think it'd add some nice diversity among the humans with different builds and ears.

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Originally Posted by HeroSamson

The race I want to see in FFXIV

Esper's have a starting nation where only espers are allowed in the town unless you quest a pendant to allow you to enter the esper's land.

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http://mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/...rdfacepalm.gif

This is FFXIV not FFVI-2.

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Originally Posted by Kayo

By that logic then the supposed Viera we're getting/expecting are Mi'qote crossed with Elezen. Yeah its bunnies instead of cats but honestly its the same difference. Id honestly just like a new race. One that isnt as much smooth-skin humanoid as pretty much everything else we already got. Something liken to Worgen (WoW), Charr (GW2), Draken (Wildstar), etc.

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I'm not going to disagree with you about the problems with the straight inclusion of the Viera. Heck in FF12 and FFTA they were basically bunny-girls as elves. I was just pointing out one of the major problems introducing a race such as the Ronso to the game has for the design team.

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Originally Posted by Tam_Hawkins

I told one of my fc friends that she will probably have horns and fangs and maybe even scales, his protests about not wanting a horrible race were great (he wants lizard human similiar to the cat
human we have already).
Well i really hope at least one or two of my prdictions are right...

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It'd be similar to a palette swap in my mind, which is kinda shart since it should be something more unique.
It better not be another boring humanesque race, I don't necessarily want a Ronso race, but something a bit more bestial would be nice.(Cat ears don't freakin' count.)

The way that Cultures work in Eorzea, Ronso would be most likely to just be categorized as "Beastmen", and therefore be hated by the five races. They would not fit in well as playable races. The best they could hope to be are "merchants" that are tolerated within city walls.

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Originally Posted by Defteros

Goblin is not a new race, they are already in game.
I think your FC mate was just trolling.

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She also don't speak like a goblin

Not necessarily. The only issue the main races have against "Beastmen" seems to be a simple case of being so closed-minded that they refuse to work together with the other races. As long as the Ronso -- or rather, FFXIV's interpretation of a Ronso-like race -- agreed to having some kind of peaceful ties, I don't think it matters how "primitive" their culture might seem.

In fact, it's their culture that really sells me on the race! I love the "Honorable Savage" type of character, and perhaps they would look to the other races for gathering resources, and offer their services as peerless hunters and warriors in exchange. It would give them a sense of racial diversity from the other races, much as Roegadyn are generally kind of "the Pirate/seafaring race".

I mean, like I said; it doesn't need to be Ronso specifically, but just something kind of *similar*, at least in body-style. Make it draconic or reptilian, if you want! :P

Aren't the Amalj'aa and Ronso a bit similar in what they value and whatnot?

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

Aren't the Amalj'aa and Ronso a bit similar in what they value and whatnot?

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True, they could totally go that route, as well. I'd maybe like to have their bodies toned-down just a tiny little bit, so they aren't quite so top-heavy, but they could explain it away as "This is a different Amal'jaa tribe, so their proportions are a little more balanced". I definitely dig the Amal'jaa's culture, too; very much the kind of Race I'd like! :D

I like the Amalj'aa as is. Do have to lol at their weakness of water.

There's definitely two issues at play here:

1. Too bestial in appearance means only a few would play it. As others have said, the vast majority prefer something more.. humanlike and 'pretty'. So whatever it is, it'd have to be something with 4-5 digits per extremity and a regular foot and arm structure. Basically any flavor will be in eye shape, ear shape, and 'appendages' such as tail or horns if anything. It isn't to say they shouldn't consider it. But they do have to weight the benefits with the effort. If only 5% or less of the playerbase will play it, is it worth making new models for every piece of gear for the two genders? Even if they skip a gender and make it androgynous then you still have alot of work ahead of you.

2. Lorewise I'd imagine it would be related to humans. Hyur, Roe, Mi'quote, Elezen, and Lala's as well as Garleans are all 'human' in lore or at the very least are referred to as mankind. This is also why I don't see half breeds coming about. Just like in RL your race is determined normally by the dominate gene causing it in the case of multiple ethnicities. Very rarely do they go half and half. So if you have a Hyur and Roe parent you are either Hyur or Roe, rather than half of each. This is of course easier to fudge by retconning or making up new lore. So its not as hard as the first issue to deal with.

BEAST-KIN OR RIOT!

@Kaethra:

Variety is king, though. Take World of Warcraft, for example; sure, Humans and Blood Elves are the most popular races, but even together, they make up less than half of the total population. Worgen have proven to be exceptionally popular, for example.

"Pretty", Human-looking races will always be the most popular races, but if you're someone who wants to play that, then you're already got three different races that cater specifically to you, and Yugiri's race will probably make four. Frankly, the game *NEEDS* a bestial, inhuman Race if they want it to expand, so that no matter what your particular tastes are, there is (most likely) going to be a race that appeals to you. If all you have are pretty, human-looking races, then you're not going to attract anyone that isn't already playing the game.

It might not be the most popular race in the game, but having variety is important.

Seeing as you have two threads up (for whatever reason).

I'll post this here too on why it's going to be a particularly annoying thing to implement.

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Originally Posted by Shioban

That's /slightly/ part of the issue. Creating separate 3D mesh variations for to suit would only be a portion of the issues they'd face.

On top of providing separate gear components to compensate for the leg structure, is the games skeleton.


Currently, every race in the game uses the same skeleton, featuring the same number of joints/bones for each animation, this makes it very easy and streamlined to "add in" new animations for pretty much anything.

Certain occasions such as the Lalafell Arcanist animations or Roegadyn Warrior/Dragoon animations are different as a result of their body shape, (but this is simply a specific animation they've decided to use for them, not a separate skeleton).

http://people.eku.edu/ritchisong/plantigrade.jpg

As someone who's had to rig/weigh and animate these damned things in the past, digi-grade legs sometimes require more joints, this is where problems occur.

http://www.somastruct.com/wp-content...ntigrade11.jpg


As you can clearly see, the human joins simply rely on three main connection points; Hips, Knees, Ankles. (This is all that's needed for basic human leg animation).

As the profile view of the logs leg shows, it relies on four main connection points; Hips, Knees, and Two Ankle joints.


This creates a problem already. The original plantigrade skeleton will have let's say 42 bones in it, the digigrade one now has 44 bones.
The computer is now confused and can no-longer apply the weights or their influences to the correct joints on the skeleton as two new joints have been added.

(There are some ways around this, but as I said before, FFXIV has a huge focus on animation quality, therefore they'd be likely to fuss over such details)



In terms of animating characters, there are ways into tricking a normal planti-grade skeleton into the form of a digi-grade one with a little bit of trickery.

However in terms of the quality of animating FFXIV, and the attention to detail they like to go to, they'd essentially have to provide unique animations for this new race, simply based on the leg structure (hence why the new race screenshots have plantigrade legs instead of digigrade.




"Why does this matter?"

It matters because, they're going to sit down in their various teams involved in the creation of this new race, someone is going to say "How about Ronso".

Both the animators and the modelers are immediately going to go "But here's a list of issues that are going to be caused as a result of using that race"
"Do we have the time to compensate for that?" "Will we be able to find a solution?" "If not, whats the best course of action".

In the end, I couldn't really fault them for sticking with a race that'll suit and fit a human shape/skeleton, to reduce the effort and work-load of the various sub-set teams.

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Originally Posted by Terin

@Kaethra:

Variety is king, though. Take World of Warcraft, for example; sure, Humans and Blood Elves are the most popular races, but even together, they make up less than half of the total population. Worgen have proven to be exceptionally popular, for example.

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Believe me, I'm in total agreement. WoW is actually not as good of an example, Everquest has Lizards, Cats, Gnomes, Dwarves, Faeries, Vampires, Dragon People (humanish, human-hybrid, and total dragonish), Ogres, Trolls, ect as all playable races across two of their titles. And from my experience, its a good mix of people playing all of them. Granted the largest demographic is humans (barbarians, erudites, humans), and their variety of elves.. but they don't hold a clear majority when added up.

My concern here is FFXIV didn't start with the bizarre races like EQ and WoW did. So the prospect is people rerolling or fantasiaing to the new race. Its gotta be 'cool', 'pretty', and popular to be worth the effort. I mean if they wish to go through with it. Then more power to it. Its really going to be up to the designers to decide if they wish to put in the effort.

My personal opinion? I hope they do with the idea of variety. My analysis suggests maybe not so much.

I would just like to add way back when when the vote wasn't defined and it was forum posts in the dev made threat Ronso idea was represented I know I voted for them by name so I think when the initial numberical vote came down they rolled the idea into mammal demi human but Viera was by far the more popular if you put in the same class which isn't suprising if they had to choose a flag ship race it is an easy decision.

@Kaethra:

Agreed, it needs to be "cool", but also, "different". Realistically, though, I just wonder how many people are going to pay to change from a "human with a cat tail" to "human with a lizard tail"? I mean, I'm sure there are some people who will, but they're all going to be people already playing the game. A Ronso-type race, on the other hands, might draw gamers from other MMO's, because we're so used to having a "tough-looking race", that it's hard to take some of the FFXIV races seriously.

@Shioban:

I actually made this topic first, but as other pointed out, the Ronso *specifically* probably wouldn't fit in the game. So, I refined the idea a bit and started the other thread. They've just both had conversations worth responding to :)

Patch notes
Q: Is there anything you can tell us about the new race?
A: The animations have just about been completed, and we've finished checks on skin patterns. Currently, we are working on the mass production of face variations. We'll be announcing the new race when a certain NPC finally reveals their face.


That screams reptilian

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Originally Posted by Black91CRX

Patch notes
Q: Is there anything you can tell us about the new race?
A: The animations have just about been completed, and we've finished checks on skin patterns. Currently, we are working on the mass production of face variations. We'll be announcing the new race when a certain NPC finally reveals their face.


That screams reptilian

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So does the reptilian tail.

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Originally Posted by Terin

@Shioban:

I actually made this topic first, but as other pointed out, the Ronso *specifically* probably wouldn't fit in the game. So, I refined the idea a bit and started the other thread. They've just both had conversations worth responding to :)

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Ah, I wondered.

It's something I would really love to see added, I always prefer a non-human race simply for the fantasy setting and bizarre nature of it.

But the few development issues will likely put them off unless they want to put the effort in (which I really hope they consider doing in the future).

I can't believe no one mentioned Bangaa. They have been big in final fantasy and it is likely they could do an iteration on the Bangaa lizard race that is more humanoid to fit armors.

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Originally Posted by Shioban

Then provided a provisional list of the races the development team felt like adding, EG;

Bangaa
Burmecian
Ronso
Moogles
Viera
Dragonkin
Lizard things

(etc.)

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I didn't see this comment earlier but yes I personally think they could have just made a bit more humanoid Bangaa which could explain the lizard tail. Just my opinion. Though if they add a moogle race, something similar to the moogles from tactics / ff12, I would definitely be happy.