Male Viera as a playable character! show your support

[Madiera]

This is just my opinion. Concerning the lore reasoning. I mean first and foremost they 'make' the lore so they could change/retcon it on a whim anyways. No offense to Yoshi and his team, but I find the whole "Here's the lore reason why..." for there being no male veira particularly flimsy when they then respond with "Because it wouldn't be fair to the veira." when asked why there's only male hrothgar/ronso.

It's bonkers, right up there with the whole "We need to balance tanks, so we added another. We couldn't add a new healer because we need to balance them." explanation, which it too, sounds like an excuse.

But to refocus on the current topic, I personally felt a little betrayed when the races were announced. Yoshi, in the past, was SO against the gender locking in 1.0 and basically made it seem like one of the things he would never allow back into this game. So it was both a little shocking and disheartening to hear at FF. For me anyways.

[Coszette]

Just showing my support here for playable male Viera and female Hrothgar.

I can't believe they are pulling this genderlocking nonsense once again.

It's giving me flashbacks of when male Miqo'te, female Roegadyn and female Highlanders were left out from 1.0. Clearly a large portion of the players were unhappy with the genderlocking back then - the community voiced their feedback loud and clear and Yoshida finally got them added in 2.0 as a result of the huge outcry. So of course they aren't going to be happy with genderlocking this time around either! You would think they would have expected this same reaction...

Please ditch the gender stereotypes (it's 2019!) and create a complete race. Lore is just a convenient way to cover it up, and they used the same lore with male Miqo'te years ago calling them "rare". Sigh. C'mon Square Enix, you can do better than that.

[Kasayume]

[BillyKaplan]

There is a thing that actually crossed my mind though. All races, every clan - in this case Miqo'te males - while Moon keepers are rare, Sun Keepers are not. You actually meet a tribe in Gyr Abania.

There's also the U tribe in Southern Thanalan. And in both cases you get to see the Tias, and how they interact with the Nuhns.

While we have lore about Rava and Veena Viera, we do not have any more details about both clans in detail. What Im trying to say is, both clans could still have different values and traditions. I find it very harsh to put both clans into one pot, with the little lore we got. And in my opinion, its just generalizing them way to much.
Maybe Veena Viera (males and females) interact different than Rava Viera (female+male). I think, this option gives more freedom to expand on the lore in future. Then again, Im not sure how much more lore other races got... so just an idea.

That's a very good point, for sure. I should hope that the more obvious differences will be explored in ShB, as to an outsider, I can see how the only differences would be "only" the color of their skin. But that does raise the question of what about the males of both clans, and if they're identical, what's even the point of splitting them? The Miqo'te example is really good, especially since it's our closest parallel to what we do know about Viera males.
And then there's how we were given a lot of lore about the Viera so far in-game, but when it came to the finer details like clan differences, it fell flat... it's odd when you think about it.

[Lauront]

I'm not too acquainted with miqo'te lore - so are the Seeker of the Sun males a lot more common?

[BlackPanda]

Please add Male Viera!

[WhiteArchmage]

I'm not too acquainted with miqo'te lore - so are the Seeker of the Sun males a lot more common?

They have the same (I believe) birthrate as Keepers (1 in 10), but socially they're more likely to wander outside their designated territories. Since Seekers are divided into Nuhn (Breeding male) or Tia (Everyone else), if a Tia wishes to gain more power in the tribe they can duel the current Nuhn (or one of, in the case of bigger tribes). Tias who fail or are not interested in the first place leave the tribe to form their own harem, or just to wander aimlessly (i.e. best excuse to be adventurers).

Keepers are closer to Viera, males are incredibly solitary and reclusive. It's why most miqo'te you see in-game is a Tia, I think there's only two or 3 Nuhns in-game (the U tribe and M tribe)

[Gogomi]

I made this account just to show support! It's really important to me, thank you!

[JmiAltoholic]

This is actually the outcome I was sincerely hoping for when the Viera were first announced in Paris; to get a race where the sexual dimorphism we saw when the Au'ra were released would be reversed; taller females and shorter, slender males. I was extremely disappointed when it was announced that a genderlock would be in place. I knew it was as possibility, but given the previous genderlocks in the game were removed with A Realm Reborn, I didn't truly believe they would be reintroduced. This disappointment on my part, however, in no way impacts my subscription, my pre-order, or plans to play Shadowbringers as soon as early access is live.

On the matter of genderlocks, I'm late to the posting party as I wanted to gather my thoughts. Given that, I would wager others have made the argument that lore seems a thin cover where Viera are concerned. Viera lore seems very similar in a sense, to me, of the lore surrounding Keeper of the Moon Miqo'te culture. I'm going to guess that the Viera have a much closer connection to the wood, so perhaps the males consider it a sacred charge of sorts to watch over the forest. However, to those players who appreciate lore and roleplay their characters, there are always reasons to drive someone away from where they normally should be in game; for example, numerous players about in the world with the surname "Nunh". The player's creativity will find a way to explain it. On servers where roleplay is not active, I know that my choices of character races/genders falls to what I find aesthetically pleasing. After all, I'm investing some hours, months, etc staring at this little adventurer as they move through the MSQ.

My hope is that this is more honestly, an issue of time and resources. This close to the launch of a major expansion I'm sure removing the genderlock is too much to add to the plate. However, I hope that the community's feedback will be heard and the situation can be revisited down the road.

Thank you for giving us a game that we all love, no matter our opinions on this issue. See you on the dark side.

[M2099]

Made this account to also show my support for the implementation of both genders for the new Shadowbringers races. Personally do not agree with the genderlocking, and can confirm as a fantasia addict I was looking forward to switching it up on all my characters. I will hold out on it for now should an official response be made.