Could a certain Skypirate be another half-elezen?

[myahele]

The devs did say that their seeking to introduce more mixed-raced npcs and they've delivered with Hilda. But I can't help but wonder if Leofard is also another elezen-hyur npc?

Based on his features, he's quite tall and lean like an elezen. His face seems like a mixture of elezen and hyur to me, but his ears are covered up by his hair so it's hard to tell if their pointed or not. He has a unique model, but even then he still looks different compared to the pure-blooded elezens we see with unique face models..




I wish I have taken more pictures, but I thought that we'd be able to go to his HQ after Void Ark to talk to him and all his members ... oh well.

Then there's that picture of a Elezen lady, who seems to be a noble based on her attire. His dead lover? Or maybe (most likely) his Elezen mother?

Of course, this is all just pure speculation

[DragonSlayer45]

I actually thought he was Elezen when I saw him in the trailers. I was surprised when he turned out to be a Highlander.

[Theodric]

He could just be a Highlander - albeit one with a unique face. Quite a few NPC's have been given unique faces lately - there's a few elderly hyur/elezen NPC's found in the new zones with faces that can't be used by players.

With that said...I do think he could be a half-elf. My concern is that they're meant to be rare and shunned - but we don't see a whole lot of in-game racism. Sure, we get it from antagonists but we don't see it from protagonists (which would be pretty awesome as it'd fit how the game world is meant to be and serves as a nifty character flaw).

Unless, of course, he became a Sky Pirate because of how he was shunned for his heritage? That'd be a good twist.

[PArcher]

With that said...I do think he could be a half-elf. My concern is that they're meant to be rare and shunned - but we don't see a whole lot of in-game racism. Sure, we get it from antagonists but we don't see it from protagonists.

Unless, of course, he became a Sky Pirate because of how he was shunned for his heritage? That'd be a good twist.

From what I understand (I could be very wrong on this, so take it with a grain of salt), half-breed are more rare because its hard for different races to conceive (or they miscarry a lot...either way babies are not born) rather than a bias against being mixed race...or at least until we got Wanderer's Palace HM, where the two adventurers were shunned not because they were gay, but because they were different races. At the same time, there are places where different races can be lovers (or, at least, are more accepted as such), so location probably plays a big factor in this.

Ishgard is definitely racist, though. Elezen, even lowborn, are better than the Hyur that live there (with individual exceptions. And of course even the Hyur are better than foreigners), and with that, half-Elezen, half-Huyr are generally hated (so much so I wouldn't be surprised to find out most don't live long, murdered by self-righteous Elezen after they're found out), which would make any that survive either become like Hilda, or flee the city.


As for why we don't see it much? Look at who the good guys are; Ameryic is a bastard, Lucia is a Garlean-turned-Ishgardian Knight, the Count loved his bastard son more than his "true" sons, and the rest of us are foreigners who don't care what you are as long as you're on our side. For them to be accepting of half-breeds...not an impossibility at all



Also, one more possibility for Leofard: what race do we know of that has an Elezen build but is Hyur? We can't see his forehead, after all...(though, since we have Lucia already doing this, it would just feel...tired...for him to be Garlean)

[Cilia]

Pretty sure Leofard isn't Garlean; he lacks the pale complexion they typically sport. Every Garlean we've seen has white or very pale blonde hair and a fair skin tone (hell, Varis is practically chalk white). Leofard... doesn't. His skin and hair tone fits what you'd expect out of a Highlander Hyur, or by my guess a Xaela Au Ra. He's obviously not Au Ra, so Highlander seems the most likely case, or perhaps a mix between Highlander and Midlander. Elezen is also possible, but they made sure we knew Hilda was half-Elezen.

Don't quote me on it.

The painting in the back of his Den could be someone significant, but then again, it could just be a treasure Leofard boosted in his adventures. He is a Sky Pirate, y'know...

As for the rest, baseless conjecture is baseless conjecture, so I'm just gonna leave this here...

[Kaiser-Ace]

I'm far more interested in who that is in the painting behind him.

I'm thinking it's alot more important than "some random loot" considering how it seems to be possible that he's a half blood. Possibly a mother or sibbling? Maybe a lover? Who knows, see Cilia's Meme.

[Cilia]

Not everything is significant. Sometimes a painting is just a painting, like all those paintings of fruit old people seem to have.

[CyrilLucifer]

Not everything is significant. Sometimes a painting is just a painting, like all those paintings of fruit old people seem to have.

I'm fond of the idea that he has a painting of a beautiful woman because he's a pirate. And, in fiction, charismatic pirates tend to be ladykillers. This is especially true for every Sky Pirate in fiction I've seen, Skies of Arcadia being absolutely one of the worst offenders.

[Fenral]

Not everything is significant. Sometimes a painting is just a painting, like all those paintings of fruit old people seem to have.

But when it's a portrait seen precisely nowhere else in the entire game that is carefully framed into most of the shots in that room... It's probably important. Or they wouldn't have wasted budget on it. Wouldn't be the first time a noticeable but initially unacknowledged detail became extremely important later on.

While it is true that we have next to nothing to go on right now, dismissing it as entirely insignificant just because they haven't brought it up in dialogue yet is ignoring numerous precedents.

[Cilia]

But when it's a portrait seen precisely nowhere else in the entire game that is carefully framed into most of the shots in that room... It's probably important. Or they wouldn't have wasted budget on it. Wouldn't be the first time a noticeable but initially unacknowledged detail became extremely important later on.

While it is true that we have next to nothing to go on right now, dismissing it as entirely insignificant just because they haven't brought it up in dialogue yet is ignoring numerous precedents.

And yet they "wasted" budget on the treasures that litter Leofard's Den. I'm not saying it's insignificant, just that it's not necessarily significant. We don't know anything about the painting beyond that it's there, so any guess is just a shot in the dark.

Apropos of nothing, when I logged in right quick to go run my Vanu dailies I found Leofard and his second-in-command on the upper level in the Forgotten Knight talking about rumors. Couldn't get a close look at his ears, though, and they were gone when I returned.