Male Viera as a playable character! show your support

[Lauront]

Comparing the offering of predators and dangers a jungle offers to what forests offers is like night and day. In the winter the elves just hide in their caves/wooden homes and live in peace. Sure they'd have to have archer lookouts and bear traps but that's hardly comparable to snakes, spiders, big cats, insects, wild birds, piranhas, bats, crocodiles.

What's the worst that you'd run into in a forest? A deer?

No, more like a bear, wolf, big cat (they're not unique to jungles), or bird of prey, amongst other things.

You're also over-simplifying the challenges cold weather poses, namely in ensuring an adequate supply of combustible material for fires, clothing and similar items to keep warm and ensuring a ready food supply, since cold weather kills off most plants that bear food and also creates a dearth of animal food sources. The latter poses more of an issue for agrarian societies but it's no small challenge, especially in the days before modern commercial agriculture developed ways of circumventing these issues.

Again, the modern forests we're familiar with are fairly controlled environments and are not reflective of how dangerous an environment a forest can be if you have to survive in it as a home.

Also, if we're talking about climates more apt to give rise to bulky physiques, empirically it is colder climates that tend to favour these, for the reason that the surfeit bulk is a buffer against the leaner months of winter. Jungle climates simply don't - bulk isn't required to deal with venom or diseases.

It's further confounded when you throw in the fact that fantasy jungles and forests aren't the same environments as their real life analogues. That's why I consider Amazonian tribes that people like bringing up to be pretty weak as an argument as to how Viera should look, because they don't have the same protein availability nor do male Viera function like members of Amazonian tribes, being lone wolves.

[Amnmaat]

No, more like a bear, wolf, big cat (they're not unique to jungles), or bird of prey, amongst other things.

You're also over-simplifying the challenges cold weather poses, namely in ensuring an adequate supply of combustible material for fires, clothing and similar items to keep warm and ensuring a ready food supply, since cold weather kills off most plants that bear food and also creates a dearth of animal food sources. The latter poses more of an issue for agrarian societies but it's no small challenge, especially in the days before modern commercial agriculture developed ways of circumventing these issues.

Again, the modern forests we're familiar with are fairly controlled environments and are not reflective of how dangerous an environment a forest can be if you have to survive in it as a home.

Also, if we're talking about climates more apt to give rise to bulky physiques, empirically it is colder climates that tend to favour these, for the reason that the surfeit bulk is a buffer against the leaner months of winter. Jungle climates simply don't - bulk isn't required to deal with venom or diseases.

It's further confounded when you throw in the fact that fantasy jungles and forests aren't the same environments as their real life analogues. That's why I consider Amazonian tribes that people like bringing up to be pretty weak as an argument as to how Viera should look, because they don't have the same protein availability nor do male Viera function like members of Amazonian tribes, being lone wolves.

1. We're talking about elves. They're never represented as bulky.
2. Most forests in the past nor the present had cats. Unless you go back to the ice age and I don't think any elf lived in the ice age. General elves are portrayed to have "lived" in temperate forests like The Black Shroud.
3. Bears don't eat the "plants" and "trees" humans needed in the past during winter. Bears in general you just need a lookout and traps. You can't really fight off a bear.

Have...you seen what sort of monstrosities exist in this setting, even in 'normal' environments?

No, care to share? Bears and wolves are "pack" animals, they don't really take an entire territory for themselves like a swarm of jungle animals would. The entirety of a jungle could be occupied a family of snakes, reptiles, crocodiles, tigers, and even Elephants from top to bottom. Forests are just full of squirrels, bears, wolves, and other furry "pack" animals. Wolves and Bears you just have to make traps for and keep archer look outs.

What do Elezen in the black shroud do? Make traps and keep lookout. You can't keep look out and make traps in a jungle, you're literally living side by side poisonous frogs, poisonous plants, spiders and panthers.

The difference is huge, trust me on this.

[Lauront]

Bears are solitary predators to my knowledge, although I fail to see what material difference it makes. You can make traps to deal with big cats, too, and have archers be on the look out for them. They're not invisible, just stealthy.

I also find all that ironic regarding the Elezen, considering the Black Shroud includes (and is not limited to): poisonous fungi, giant insects, the undead, wisps, Voidsent of various descriptions, giant frogs, marlboros... and I can keep going on. The deer are not particularly friendly, either.

1. We're talking about elves. They're never represented as bulky.

Yeah, even though I mention Night Elves, who are, exceedingly so, and Stormchurro linked an example of bulky elves, the Aen Elle, not to mention many other games featuring such. Then you have Tolkien's elves, certainly much bigger than anything popularised by D&D. Another example is Warhammer's Wood Elves, e.g. here.

2. Most forests in the past nor the present had cats. Unless you go back to the ice age and I don't think any elf lived in the ice age. General elves are portrayed to have "lived" in temperate forests like The Black Shroud.

That's interesting. I guess Siberian tigers and mountain lions don't exist, then. I already pointed out how flawed this argument is in regards to the Black Shroud.

3. Bears don't eat the "plants" and "trees" humans needed in the past during winter. Bears in general you just need a lookout and traps. You can't really fight off a bear.

You certainly can fight off a bear, and you do. Newsflash: it's a fantasy setting.

[Gwenorai]

If I remember correctly the jungle where they're from - at least in the 'source' - is heavily infested with coerls, panthers, great wyrms, giant morbols and dinosaurs. It was also haunted and had hellhounds and skeletons shambling around at night etc. If it's the same sort of environment then yeah, the males have it extremely rough. The Jungle is extremely dangerous.

Oh, it also had weird voidsent and treants, how homey.

[Amnmaat]

If I remember correctly the jungle where they're from - at least in the 'source' - is heavily infested with coerls, panthers, great wyrms, giant morbols and dinosaurs. It was also haunted and had hellhounds and skeletons shambling around at night etc. If it's the same sort of environment then yeah, the males have it extremely rough. The Jungle is extremely dangerous.

That's definitely a jungle environement. Not the furry dwellers Elezen/elves deal with.

Bears are solitary predators to my knowledge, although I fail to see what material difference it makes. You can make traps to deal with big cats, too, and have archers be on the look out for them. They're not invisible, just stealthy.

I also find all that ironic regarding the Elezen, considering the Black Shroud includes (and is not limited to): poisonous fungi, giant insects, the undead, wisps, Voidsent of various descriptions, giant frogs, marlboros... and I can keep going on. The deer are not particularly friendly, either.

You're reaching at straws now, the molbols and all the dangerous animals in FFXIV the mmorpg are game design necessities. The point remains that in the history of the world an elf would never be found in a jungle. The challenges a jungle people face are incredibly different and more physically intensive that what you'd find in a temperate elf forest. You can't compare deers and squirrels with the occasional bear you can have lookouts for with what you deal with in a forest, this isn't subjective, this is purely objective. Moreover, you don't live perpetually in winter on forests, you stock up on food before winter, hide in a cave for 3 months and come back out.

Therefore, since elf and jungle are contradictions I expect male Viera to look nothing like an elf and more like jungle person, like female Viera.

[SturmChurro]

No, care to share? Bears and wolves are "pack" animals, they don't really take an entire territory for themselves like a swarm of jungle animals would. The entirety of a forest could be occupied a family of snakes, reptiles, crocodiles, tigers, and even Elephants from top to bottom. Forests are just full of squirrels, bears, wolves, and other furry "pack" animals. Wolves and Bears you just have to make traps for and keep archer look outs.

What do Elezen in the black shroud do? Make traps and keep lookout. You can't keep look out and make traps in a jungle, you're literally living side by side poisonous frogs, poisonous plants, spiders and panthers.

The difference is huge, trust me on this.

Are you taking real life for an example or the fantasy setting of the game for example? Gridania for example, there are giant insects, large venomous animals, giant man-eating plants (morbol), poisonous plants, killer tree monsters (treant), giant toads, hostile (Sentient) beast tribes, bandits, demons, possessed giant walking armor, undead, primals, hostile elements, and more.

Therefore, since elf and jungle are contradictions I expect male Viera to look nothing like an elf and more like jungle person, like female Viera.

https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Bosmer https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Valenwood

[Lauront]

You're reaching at straws now

No, it's more you who is reaching at straws at this point. The Shroud certainly cannot be summed up by your caricature.

the molbols and all the dangerous animals in FFXIV the mmorpg are game design necessities.

And yet they exist there lorewise, rendering this entire argument moot.

The point remains that in the history of the world an elf would never be found in a jungle.

I see no reason why. They have conjury to assist them in dealing with venoms and diseases, which are the primary differentiator.

[Amnmaat]

No, it's more you who is reaching at straws at this point. The Shroud certainly cannot be summed up by your caricature.

The irony, you couldn't win your argument using real life squirrels so you had to resort to the game's fauna/animals, keep reaching. What's next, jungle dwarfs?

And yet they exist there lorewise, rendering this entire argument moot.

My point was that jungle elves don't exist and they never will. The fact that you have to keep grasping as straws is really is amusing.

I see no reason why. They have conjury to assist them in dealing with venoms and diseases, which are the primary differentiator.

They won't, just like female Viera isn't an elf, they're jungle warriors and look as such. Wider hips, meatier legs, and a head completely different from Elezen. Precedence is on my side.

[SturmChurro]

The irony, you couldn't win your argument using real life squirrels so you had to resort to the game's fauna/animals, keep reaching. What's next, jungle dwarfs?


My point was that jungle elves don't exist and they never will. The fact that you have to keep grasping as straws is really is amusing.


They won't, just like female Viera isn't an elf, they're jungle warriors and look as such. Wider hips, meatier legs, and a head completely different from Elezen. Precedence is on my side.

The problem is you seem to be trying to base your interpretation of what viera may look like on a real life forest. You do realize that bunny people do not actually exist in real life? Viera is fantasy, Eorzea is fantasy, the fantasy setting - and dangers - should be taken into account.

[Theodric]

Elves aren't inherently slim. They're often portrayed as being quite tall and well-built in a number of settings. Which, incidentally, is where a lot of people are presenting suggestions from.