Dear Mr. Bunny, that looks … uncomfortable.
Liveblogging various video games.
Silly, pointless, spoilerific.
Silly, pointless, spoilerific.
Playing
Watching
The Witcher
2012-05-31
→
How big is that axe when not tucked safely on your back, you ask?
That axe is huge.
→
New outfit for Cebasten and I love every inch of it right down to the bows on the garters. Something other than default boyshorts! Not a dress! Still a little foolishly Victorian/frilly! Purple! Cebastan you are so sassy I love you to death.
→
The way that escortees snap back onto their prerouted path when done aggoing/being aggo’d is hilarious enough, but yesterday another player and I got to escort a pair of siamese twins.
2012-05-30
Guys this must be what my thrall of protection looks like under its ridiculous armor. I’ve sorta fallen in love with those things (if you’d had your party wipe on a BAM and had only the thrall to distract attention from you while you ran off to heal yourself and resurrect your party then you would too), so this tickles me.
→
elleon i love your hoodie
→
The fact that waterfalls which mean nothing—which are just scenery, an alcove of the world with no enemies, no plot, serving only as a backdrop to the path you’re taking—never fails to amaze me. I know this is what worldbuilding means (or should), but the level of aesthetic detail and sense-of-place completion still surprises me.
2012-05-29
Crisis: I ran an instance today just for fun, and as the only robe-wearer there (the frequent benefit of playing a healer) I got fantastic drops, including what’s basically the full set of the best possible armor for the next couple of levels.
And I hate them.
Let’s talk elin censorship: On the whole it hasn’t fussed me so far, because the increased skin coverage actually better suits my aesthetic preferences, I’m interested in playing with non-female-gendered elins and so the substitution of panties (panties everywhere!) for boyshorts benefits me, and I just like how the cut of the boyshorts looks. But it does infuriate me in its laziness.
There’s some good comparison images of some of clothing modifications here. The boyshorts are notorious for being shoddy and commonplace; where original outfits tend to have unique, detailed panties, the boyshorts all use the same mesh and (as you can see with the clipping above) it ain’t a great one.
What’s worse is that when covering up exposed torsos, they just threw on a skin-level texture—no mesh, detail or shading; often there’s no logical way for that undershirt to connect with the rest of the outfit. It also covers the small of the back, which defeats the purpose of the otherwise brilliant tailholes: usually when models have tails, no effort goes in to modifying their clothing to accommodate them; elin outfits, however, have holes for tails to thread through (example 1, 2), which is plagued by understandable clipping issues but remains a delightful attention to detail—but the pasted on undershirts go right under the holes (example), make no sense, and look horrendous.
I don’t want to clothe myself in super high sorcerer whoo whoo magic robes, regardless—I prefer tunics, something less formal and a bit more comfortable. But I could make an exception for the sake of fantastic stats, and these do have that—except that it’s not just an aesthetic I dislike, it’s an implementation which annoys me. I’m lucky in that I usually avoid getting hit in the first place, so I can upon occasion forgo fantastic stats without making too great a sacrifice. But yo, Tera, I shouldn’t have to.
→
I made a third character: an elin male berserker named Cebasten. (Also on Freeholds.)
For a while now I’ve wanted to make a male-identified elin. The lowest voice for elins is surprisingly low, especially the attack sounds—and an all “female” race intrigues me and begs contradiction. Elin reproduction seems to be a mystery even in Korean content for the game; I think the general impression is that elin and popuri both are non-sexually incarnated as infants or perhaps as babies, and goodness only knows what sexual organs they do or don’t have under their tunics. But honestly it doesn’t matter, because gender has little to do with reproduction or anatomy; furthermore, nothing defines elin as universally female save for word of god and gendered presentation, and both of those things are begging for someone to say “nopes don’t think so.”
Cebasten is stoic at best and poorly-tempered at worst, somewhat precocious (truth: he’s inspired a bit by Ciel Phantomhive; I invite you to judge me) and a bit offputting in that way that elin are like to be, and he identifies as male. He’ll tend towards less feminine armor as a result, when he can; I imagine he has a fondness for the purples and blues that accentuate his hair and eyes. He’s gone through two iterations, and I still have one lingering complaint about this one—but my game likes to crash in character creation so we shall call him good enough. I won’t play him much right now, because I want to keep my characters sufficiently staggered in level and therefore region, so that I never feel like I’m running an endless loop through repeating content. But he’ll be around.
And for what it’s worth, berserker is intriguing thus far. Active blocking forces me to be even more aware of enemy attack patterns (mystics get out of danger as soon as they get into it; my slayer tends to be focused on knockdown and flanking, and attack dodging occurs but often as a side-effect), and it is just as awesome to play a small creature with a huge axe as you would expect it to be.
Oh my god, I love him. That expression on his face in the top panel XD I can just imagine him saying ‘You are such an idiot’
I have always wanted to make a male identifying Elin but I was afraid it would be weird or something and then I wasn’t sure what class to pick because I know a lot of their outfits are really girly. But this gives me hope. He’s so adorable.
Leather and metal armor seems to be a lot more gender flexible, so pick a melee class and it’s doable. A lot of leather armor even has shorts! Heavy armor tends a bit more towards tunics or even frilly skirts, but I find the metal plates contradict that aesthetically and bend it towards gender neutral. However, I’m also in love with elin thighs and want to explore them as part of a male-identified body in the LEAST POSSIBLY SKEEVY WAY THAT SOUNDS, so your mileage may vary. On the whole, the Western censorship of the game actually helps in this respect: gone are skimpy panties and boyshorts are everywhere, so things are a bit more gender flexible. Cloth/robe armor often leans decidedly feminine, however.
Random searching turned up this site, where you can preview many of the armor sets: leather/light and heavy/metal—however, these are the uncensored armors, so what you actually get in game may vary.
I’m delighted with the positive response that Cebasten has received, and would love to see other male elin out there. It’s not easy but neither is it impossible, and it’s such a fertile ground for experimentation. Stick your hand in the tv do it do it do it.
2012-05-27
Words cannot even convey to you what a glorious idiot this guy is.
