Quote Originally Posted by Samcaesar View Post
[Wall of Text 2: Electric Boogaloo]

I think you look fine! Though the lightening hair looks strange.
While "big and tough" certainly doesn't describe modern Japanese ideals of masculinity, it's important to remember that the time period the Raen Au Ra are based on is medieval Japan - which was a big warrior culture. Even in modern Japan, there's the concept of "a man's pride / honor." The male Au Ra certainly do look like the warrior types, don't they?

Can't comment on the Xaela being the "original" type of how Au Ra were, but if they were designed with the Raen in mind and the Raen are part of Hydaelyn!Japanese society, you're going to get what we got. Why they went with this direction I don't really know (short of Yoshi-P's comment on wanting a race whose females look "like someone you want to protect"), but as the Raen were clearly in mind over the Xaela...

Could they have delayed the Xaela and developed unique models for them? Absolutely. Then they would have invited a [kupo]storm though, because every other race had 2 clans available at the start (even if no females for Highlanders or Roegadyn or males for Miqo'te in 1.x), they already showed the Xaela being just like the Raen but with different horn / scale colors and some unique skin tones, etc etc. Plus, again, the Hyur are the exception when it comes to clan differences. Might be unfair, but that's what it is.

SE didn't drop the charade because they didn't have the designs or models finalized. Yugiri was using a custom Miqo'te model up through 2.5.5 (might still be using it; I'll know when I run into her again) and prior to the teaser at PAX East we didn't know what the general look of either tribe or the males was. If they had asked for player input on what the next race should be like then that complaint would have more ground, but they didn't, so they went with what they wanted to do (supposedly based on player demographics). It is what it is.

There's a significant difference in upscaling the entire character model and just boosting the height range. Armor and clothing will start to stretch and look off-model if you put it on a character whose height is abnormally great for their race, and there is only so much leeway that can be given depending on the race. It's not just a matter of "boost the height slider range lol."

The Xaela tribes aren't "special snowflake" material, they're mostly the same but with a quirky custom or two. The "unnamed / unknown clans" clause was to explain how names not on the List of 51 could pop up in the RNG, not carte blanche to redefine their biology to suit your wishes.

I don't think it's fair to say "Well, the Au Ra were another typical Huge Guy, Tiny Girl Sexually Dimorphic race, so that points to any future races being the same!" They wouldn't do that because that would be just copying the Au Ra. While there are race / sex combinations with builds similar to the Au Ra (males are less muscular Roegadyn with horns and scales, females are Miqo'te with scales and horns instead of cat ears and feline pupils) there was no race with the sexual dimorphism the Au Ra exhibit, which is part of what makes them unique. Doesn't mean it's a good kind of unique, but unique nonetheless.

DRK is fun and Fray is [kupo!] hardcore. I do wish the Darkside aura was more subdued (make it just a faint blue flame aura in combat, or leave more prominent energy trails from weapon swings), but it's a small complaint. Should ping 50 tomorrow especially with the Challenge reset to help glide me along. However I do not like tanking Dzmael Darkhold...

I only went with the Lightning haircut because I wanted to see if anything other than the "bang over eye" haircut worked for my design. Fortunately I haven't seen many people using that haircut, so I switched back to it.

Quote Originally Posted by Beckett View Post
I think it looks fine, but you should be getting a free Fantasia when the expansion officially comes out, right?
The free Fantasia only came with the CE... which I wuz not payin' fer. At least I think it did. Either way it's a small complaint; I'd like to bump up the skintone a shade or two, but it's not worth $10.