Male Viera as a playable character! show your support

[LisSquid]

Not them, but I assume it's this one:



Don't want to spam the thread with pictures but if you Google "Au Ra concept art" a lot more show up, Au Ra went on quite a journey before they ended up as they are.

What an absolute shame, too. The early concepts were gorgeous.

I mean, nothing terribly wrong with au ra as we have them, but they are just cat girls with scales now.

[SturmChurro]

I don't know I think au ra as is look pretty good. What we got actually looks much like this art, just less feral. Claws like that would have meant no handgear, a head with scales to that extent would mean no headgear, and that large tail would have had massive clipping issues. The tails au ra have right now are pretty good, in comparison to miqo'te. I do think males should get larger tails though.

[Styrmwyda]

I don't know I think au ra as is look pretty good. What we got actually looks much like this art, just less feral. Claws like that would have meant no handgear, a head with scales to that extent would mean no headgear, and that large tail would have had massive clipping issues. The tails au ra have right now are pretty good, in comparison to miqo'te. I do think males should get larger tails though.

The main problem is the extreme sexual dimorphism in Au Ra.

[Halivel]

I understand where they are coming from, but to me that's like saying 'Adding hairs to male hrotgars would upset the players of said race' which I see as incredibly unlikely.

You're comparing an existing race with existing established for many years features that players, who play the race, are happy with to adding new non-existing-yet hairstyles that won't affect race's features in any way but expanding self-expressing options. Neck =/= hairstyle. Head size and shape =/= hairstyle. Animations =/= hairstyle.

If you want to compare "Elezens should be reworked" to something, it should be "Au Ra shouldn't have such a sexual dimorphism". Ques what? A lot of people will be against such a reword because they chose their options for what they are in terms of overall appearance.
People may memeing about Elezens as much as they want but no, the race shouldn't be "reworked" over it - because it was never wrong to begin with. It's designed the way it is and there's a playerbase that enjoys them they way they are. Same goes to pretty much every existing race in the game, even to 70cm height difference Auri. Adding new options and expanding CC? Nice. "Rework"? Hardly depends on what you imply by such "rework".

[Styrmwyda]

You're comparing an existing race with existing established for many years features that players, who play the race, are happy with to adding new non-existing-yet hairstyles that won't affect race's features in any way but expanding self-expressing options. Neck =/= hairstyle. Head size and shape =/= hairstyle. Animations =/= hairstyle.

If you want to compare "Elezens should be reworked" to something, it should be "Au Ra shouldn't have such a sexual dimorphism". Ques what? A lot of people will be against such a reword because they chose their options for what they are in terms of overall appearance.
People may memeing about Elezens as much as they want but no, the race shouldn't be "reworked" over it - because it was never wrong to begin with. It's designed the way it is and there's a playerbase that enjoys them they way they are. Same goes to pretty much every existing race in the game, even to 70cm height difference Auri. Adding new options and expanding CC? Nice. "Rework"? Hardly depends on what you imply by such "rework".

I sincerely doubt people chose Au Ra because of the size difference.

[Halivel]

I sincerely doubt people chose Au Ra because of the size difference.

People likely didn't, of course, but let's say DevTeam goes "okay it was a bad decision after all" and either makes girls 50 cm higher or guys 50 cm lower. Can you imagine the reaction? Yes, people usually care for appearance overall more than for the height, but I know plenty of people who isn't a big fan of tall characters or vise versa, to the point of it affecting their choice of race to play with. Even the initial posts "Why Viera are so tall" during 5.0 launch showed that there certainly would have been some blacklash if DevTeam were to change something in already existing race established appearance.

[Anvaire]

I sincerely doubt people chose Au Ra because of the size difference.

Perhaps not, but I know a lot of players who chose female Aura because of the height. A solution would be to keep the minimum where it is and then move the max to somewhere more appropriate to male aura size, but then we have an issue in that it really would make the short females seem younger than they should be.

[LisSquid]

I won't lie, I was playing elezen so long that I thought Au Ra ladies were freakishly small. Then I actually saw the number and I was humbled into the ground for seeing my height there..

I'd love for them to increase the height cap (Take my money, SE. I love splurging on the lizard alt). That being said, I do think it would be neat for male viera to be slightly smaller than female ones.

but then we have an issue in that it really would make the short females seem younger than they should be.

I'm 5'2" and no one thinks I'm younger than my 5'8" teenage cousin. I don't think that would be a problem, tbh.

[Anvaire]

I won't lie, I was playing elezen so long that I thought Au Ra ladies were freakishly small. Then I actually saw the number and I was humbled into the ground for seeing my height there..

I'd love for them to increase the height cap (Take my money, SE. I love splurging on the lizard alt). That being said, I do think it would be neat for male viera to be slightly smaller than female ones.



I'm 5'2" and no one thinks I'm younger than my 5'8" teenage cousin. I don't think that would be a problem, tbh.

In IRL it wouldn't be, but the design of Female Aura is very young looking, and people erroneously conflate height and age, so in a situation where you have a female Aura that are the same as they currently are, next to a female Aura that is the height of a male or slightly smaller, then the smaller would inevitably look like a child, even though they are not. Also the difference between 5'2 and 5'8 is minuscule, while the difference in height between current female Aura and Male Aura is massive, this is what would make the shorter ones look younger than they are meant to be and there are certain... parts of the community that would take this... to extremes. That is why it would be problematic. It is why overly young characters won't ever be a thing.

[SturmChurro]

I sincerely doubt people chose Au Ra because of the size difference.

No, I'm pretty sure they did. It's an extremely popular race despite what is supposedly a problem. There is a reason most of the au ra you see, aren't max height slider. Same with miqo'te.