Guild Wars 2

I’ve noticed that just about every second or third player-charr is either nearly or completely white-furred or “albino”. A lot of people seem to be fond of making their charr snowblind-white with no markings—or at least with a “white tiger” theme. Combine this with the three most popular male & female faces, and you have a ton of clones running around. I think everyone should make what they love, but I’m surprised at how popular the snow-white theme is. What are your thoughts?

I’m black with white stripes. What’s your excuse?

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I’m black with white stripes. What’s your excuse?

Got milk? and I guess as you said.. it’s probably the white tiger theme that appeals to them.

I blame the general lack of interesting color combinations. While very realistic, many of the color choices are somewhat dull.

I am red and black, but my second charr is a pale yellow and white but, the armor makes it appear as though they are nearly entirely white. I do no use the Tiger stripes, but I do believe the chosen face is one of the most commonly used ones.

I assume many charr are white for the same reason many humans are white. It’s likely that mostly white people play this game, and people like characters to look like them to a certain extent. I’ve only seen about 1 white charr that looks good, so I don’t like them on an aesthetic level. However, all the white charr make mine look more unique.

My Charr is grey with white tiger stripes, try to beat that.

This might seem to be non-intuitive, but snow-white colors are fairly exotic for your typical temperate setting like most of the GW2 areas. It’s entirely possible a lot of people picked those colors figuring that it wouldn’t actually be that common without thinking or knowing too much about how many other Charr were similar.

White is hardly unique, but I think there may be some bias in the observations. White just stands out much more in cities and in GW2s earthy environments, so people will tend to notice them more over others. It may just be that darker colors blend into the background better. It’s not like anyone’s going to notice how many pale-skinned, brown-haired humans there are in the population.

Also, at least from the character creation standpoint, a high color contrast makes details more visible. Dark base colors in general I found made it too difficult to actually see the details in the head. You can choose some unnatural-looking colors if you really want to be different, though I think most people find them a bit disagreeable. The white on black contrast looks good, and perhaps more importantly, works with just about any color combination in your armor.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I’m black with white stripes. What’s your excuse?

Haha nice one

Tei.1704:

However, all the white charr make mine look more unique.

True that. My brown-and-orange charr stands out like a sore thumb, but I initially picked those colors because I wanted a more subtle “generic charr” color combination XD

Torrad.1075:

works with just about any color combination in your armor.

That’s a good point, actually. My current main looks good in dark colors, reds, and golds but on account of her fur, some armor colors are meh

The only white my Charr has would be the armor , basically I love the Jaguar look and made mine Panther black with loud orange eyes . I do get what you mean as I see a lot of female spellcasters with white hair .

I have four Charr characters.

The first and my main has cheetah colors complete with a mohawk type hairstyle.
I also have a white tiger striped Guardian.
My third Charr is black with orange patch markings and orange eyes. She’s also bald.
My last Charr is brownish white. She’s white with brown markings.

Of the 8 Charr I have, only one is white:

Main color & Pattern color

[Main] gold & brown; light grey & dark grey; brown grey & dark brown; light grey & light brown; grey brown & dark brown; light grey & black; dark red-brown & black; pure white

And the choice of white coloring is actually related to an old guild in-joke rather than any particular aesthetic choice of my own.

All white seems to be a very popular color scheme in general. I’m more bothered by the plethora of all-white Sylvari (usually wearing white clothing as well) than white Charr, personally. Charr only really have a handful of color options anyway, but Sylvari have so many different color options and I dislike seeing that go to waste on white.

That said, while it may bug me personally, its not really any of my business what other people want to do with their characters. A lot of people really like white apparently, and far be it for me to hate on that.

My 2 Charr characters are orangish brown with light grey stripes, and very light grey with dark grey leopard pattern. I suppose the later could fall into the realm of this topic, since though she’s not technically white, its light enough that you could probably consider it white. I’m actually not sure I like her color scheme, thinking of possibly grabbing a makover kit and switching it up once I get some extra gold.

You seem to be confusing albino with just being white. Albinos lack picment in the body, meaning lack of color. This causes animals (and people) to be white skinned/furred, but not just that. An albino also have red eyes, as for some reason said lack of picment causes eyes to be red (think white bunny with red eyes = albino). Since I doubt that everyone also went down the red eyes road on their white charr, albino seems like an incorrect term. Being white alone does not equal albino.

Now, I can see the appeal to white fur. It stands out. It can be very pretty. It goes with everything. Personally I considered the dark fur with white markings, which is actually also semi popular. Ended up making a plain darkgrey, nearly black charr… another not too unique cause who doesn’t like.

Zeefa.3915:

You seem to be confusing albino with just being white. Albinos lack picment in the body, meaning lack of color. [….]

I’m not confusing it. I know what an albino is technically. But from a social perspective, albino implies a rare white creature in general—and that’s the context I’m using it in here. I get the impression that people pick white-furred charr because they think it’ll be “rare” and “unique”, like an albino—so the word’s just being used to imply that sense of uniqueness.

Electro.4173:

All white seems to be a very popular color scheme in general. I’m more bothered by the plethora of all-white Sylvari (usually wearing white clothing as well) than white Charr, personally. Charr only really have a handful of color options anyway, but Sylvari have so many different color options and I dislike seeing that go to waste on white.

What really bugs me about the sylvari that go this route is that I see their portrait in the party list and think I need to go rez them, even though they’re running around right in front of me.

My first Charr is grey like a wolf. My second Charr is almost blackish, like a wo-… a black bear.

And people just like white. I mean, look at how many Humans there are now with white hair.

My first charr I coloured like a snow leopard, which is my favourite cat. So I used the light grey with dark grey rosettes. (So nearly white, but not quite.)

My second is black with a lighter grey on throat/arms.

My third I went weird and made him a deep chocolate brown with topaz stripes. (The really thin ones, so he doesn’t look that tigery.)

I think it all comes down to preference, and as said, white does make many armour colours pop.

Tybalt’s base color is white fur. Tybalt = awesomeness. Therefore awesomeness = white fur.

I think it’s probably to do with the fact that some of the fur colours look odd and that white is essentially a blank canvas to add colour and stuff through your armour. My main is a grey and black engi, I have a black base, white striped warrior, and my two light armours are snow leopard style, because I like super bright armours.
I also have a ginger and white ranger, but the orange is causing many clashing issues.

My charr’s a tiger so…

Tei.1704:

I assume many charr are white for the same reason many humans are white. It’s likely that mostly white people play this game, and people like characters to look like them to a certain extent. I’ve only seen about 1 white charr that looks good, so I don’t like them on an aesthetic level. However, all the white charr make mine look more unique.

I’d figure that people who want their characters to look like them would play a human.

Ben K.6238:

Tei.1704:

I assume many charr are white for the same reason many humans are white. It’s likely that mostly white people play this game, and people like characters to look like them to a certain extent. I’ve only seen about 1 white charr that looks good, so I don’t like them on an aesthetic level. However, all the white charr make mine look more unique.

I’d figure that people who want their characters to look like them would play a human.

I said “to a certain extent” for a reason. Most people clearly don’t want a copy of themselves because many males play as females and various other things that they clearly aren’t. If 90% of gw2 players were black, most of the human females you saw would be black instead of white. If people want a character that isn’t going to look much or anything like them, giving it whatever features they can that more closely match their own should still be expected.

Besides, it is within the realm of possibility that people make their clone, but they still want different races and looks.

My Charr has dark brown fur with a few orange-y tufts on his chest and nose. I didn’t like making him TOO exotic in appearance, and now I love his colour combination because of how much it stands out from just about every other Charr PC out there. XD

My charr has white fur because he is a walking reference to the Marat of the Codex Alera series (his name is Doroga, he carries a gigantic club and he is sympathetic to the mole-like dredge) Other than him being a homage to a character from a series of books that I love, I don’t really have a reason for him being white furred.

My charr has white fur… well, actually it is light grey with a white pattern, but I guess that still counts. This has nothing to do with white tigers (my charr’s pattern is actually more hyena-compatible) or how I am a white male myself. It is rather a combination of the following:
- it just looks great
- it fits the necromancer theme (“ghostly white”, “bleached bones”, white as a color of mourning in some cultures etc.)
- it fits the “anime-villainesque” IC personality of my charr (white hair → badkitten, most likely villain)
- it has become some kind of “trademark” of many of my pen&paper or mmorpg main characters
- it just looks great

Tei.1704:

I said “to a certain extent” for a reason. Most people clearly don’t want a copy of themselves because many males play as females and various other things that they clearly aren’t. If 90% of gw2 players were black, most of the human females you saw would be black instead of white. If people want a character that isn’t going to look much or anything like them, giving it whatever features they can that more closely match their own should still be expected.

Besides, it is within the realm of possibility that people make their clone, but they still want different races and looks.

That’s a whole other cup of tea :P

If most of the players were black, you may find a lot of the female humans looking Hispanic with tanner skin maybe :P

But I made my charr a white tiger with gold hair because his name describes him as such. Why’d I choose that? Dunno. I just did. But if I were to remake his look, I think I might try something else. Rytlock’s look reminds me of red velvet cake…probably because I hate cream cheese so use dark chocolate frosting. If no one has a name for that type of cake, they should name it after Rytlock :P

I was thinking about a white tiger look for my warrior, but then I realized just this phenomenon.

Instead, I now have a tawny-brown engineer, a golden-orangeyellow thief, and a panther-black warrior.

Locce.8405:

My charr has white fur… well, actually it is light grey with a white pattern, but I guess that still counts. This has nothing to do with white tigers (my charr’s pattern is actually more hyena-compatible) or how I am a white male myself. It is rather a combination of the following:
- it just looks great
- it fits the necromancer theme (“ghostly white”, “bleached bones”, white as a color of mourning in some cultures etc.)
- it fits the “anime-villainesque” IC personality of my charr (white hair -> badkitten, most likely villain)
- it has become some kind of “trademark” of many of my pen&paper or mmorpg main characters
- it just looks great

I do like the “bleached bones” concept for a necromancer. I’ll be honest, I was planning a white side-character at one point, but their frequency scared me off. Play what you love

I honestly don’t think I’ve run into a white Charr on my server. Ever. And Crystal Desert is full of Charr.

I myself am brown with grey stripes and a blond mane.

Tei.1704:

I assume many charr are white for the same reason many humans are white. It’s likely that mostly white people play this game, and people like characters to look like them to a certain extent. I’ve only seen about 1 white charr that looks good, so I don’t like them on an aesthetic level. However, all the white charr make mine look more unique.

white people are beige… and light skin color(lack of UV blocking melanin) is an adaptation to Vitamin D deficient areas (Where sunlight would be the most efficient source of vitamin D) which might have come form the neanderthals (adapted to forested areas) which interbreed with kitten sapiens everywhere except central Africa.

Cat people are a different story and only insane people would try to mimic their own traits into a Cat man. White fur has no real use in most predators or prey outside of snowy environments so a white furred charr is probobally no different than a white tiger, which normally can’t survive long outside of captivity due to being too visible in their natural habitat(but since the charr are sapient and sentient this no longer matters in their species)

The most popular coloring of char I’ve witnessed is Black and White contrast designs, generally the tiger stripes or clouded leopard designs. This is likely because the Contrast makes the charr pop out and look more menacing than the natural coloring selections.

I did the same and made a very draconian looking char (Black and White stripes with the Deathwing style dragon horns and red eyes) named Tagar Bloodwell. But then I realized my design was way too common (also didn’t like Iron Legion) So I deleted him and made a Charr Warrior (Dubbed Volkhan the Onyx) with black and grey clouded leopard designs and the blunted horns(The only horns that don’t contrast with black fur). I’d say this design was superior.

I normally like to have one character who’s a bit of a self insert, and then do a unique, different thing with each of my others. (My self insert isn’t even my main this time around; he’s my second alt!)

I don’t really consider my charr to be ME per se, but more like a cool cat dude I go adventuring with. So of course I based him on my actual, real life cat! Picked him up and tried to actually match his fur patterns and eye color and everything. I don’t know why tons more people don’t do this.

DaMunky.6302:

So of course I based him on my actual, real life cat! Picked him up and tried to actually match his fur patterns and eye color and everything. I don’t know why tons more people don’t do this.

You’re not alone, DaMunky! I tried this as well with my own RL kitty, namesake included. The screenshot below is as close as I could manage to her in the character creator. ^^

But I’m also totally guilty of having a white tiger charr, as well as a black and orange calico one.

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

I’m black with orange stripes. So I don’t see a problem.

albino charr female

Kromulous.4291:

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

I like that one in the very top right. Is that male?

Also, I take back my previous post. I don’t have a white tiger. I thought he was when I first made him (my first character but I had been playing Asura and 1 Sylvari). My Charr is actually a pale yellow with orange/brownish tiger stripes and a blond mane.

I guess I’m not in the club then

mellonkitty.6027:

You’re not alone, DaMunky! I tried this as well with my own RL kitty, namesake included.

She looks great, mellon.
I’ll try and remember to post a picture of mine when I get home!
BECAUSE THE INTERNET LOVES CATS.

Kromulous.4291:

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

Hahaha I have been considering doing this! Bet I could come up with a ton of them in just a day XD. One day the albino-female-charr army is going to take over the world simply from sheer numbers…
You ought to blot out their usernames though—unless you got permission to use them.

Sandy With Chocolate Stripes and Big Purple Eyes. Really i just blame the all white color on game of thrones.

My Charr warrior’s fur is blue/grayish with red patern on it. But you don’t see it really since he is always in full T3 cultural. What is a bit more unique about him is that most charr go for the bulky one and I took the tall/slim combination. The shoulder armor are smaller but it give him more a werewolf/Eva from evangelion shape. (Tier 3 cultural helm look like a eva head)

I bough a kit to change feature the other day and I was contemplating the option to put him more bulky and white. I changed my mind and decided to keep him as he is.

This thread has convinced me to change my charr’s fur color. I didn’t realize how wide spread this was until I made a concious effort to pay attention to this phenomenon. In the span of a week I’ve seen no less than 15 individual charr all white or white tiger.

My charr is now using the Payne’s Grey color.

Mine is a mix of brown and whitish grey, mostly grey. Which pretty much makes her look like another albino charr :\

mine is sorta black with gold stripes besides the nice look i personally would make a white charr simply because its a neutral color that would seem ok with any color of armor think about a black charr with black armor how noticeable would he/she be.

Kromulous.4291:

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

Hehe, my warrior is already on that collage. I have 4 white charr already and planning to make another one, mesmer this time. Why? Because i can (and really love this skin type).
Seriously, there are too many of uguu kawaiii human females, ctrl-c norn males and other highly overused stuff, so rare charr females do not look like something annoying anyway, regardless of fur color.

Rednik.3809:

Hehe, my warrior is already on that collage. I have 4 white charr already and planning to make another one, mesmer this time. Why? Because i can (and really love this skin type).
Seriously, there are too many of uguu kawaiii human females, ctrl-c norn males and other highly overused stuff, so rare charr females do not look like something annoying anyway, regardless of fur color.

lol this is a good point! A charr is a charr—it’s always going to look good, no matter what color it is. Albino charr look good. The human females get barf-worthy way too easily.

Just think though… the rarest race (charr), and the rarest gender (fem), with the rarest profession (necro, I think), with the rarest fur color (idk lol), with the rarest face/body/pattern/horn option…..
That’s not just rare… it’s SUPER DUPER rare! XDD

Weindrasi.3805:

Just think though… the rarest race (charr), and the rarest gender (fem), with the rarest profession (necro, I think), with the rarest fur color (idk lol), with the rarest face/body/pattern/horn option…..
That’s not just rare… it’s SUPER DUPER rare! XDD

Well, three out of five ain’t bad… Grizabella, my main character, is a sweet-faced, white-tiger, female, charr necromancer. According to Wikipedia, Grizabella means “Grey or Grizzled Beauty”, so her coloration was meant to be! ^^

mellonkitty.6027:

Weindrasi.3805:

Just think though… the rarest race (charr), and the rarest gender (fem), with the rarest profession (necro, I think), with the rarest fur color (idk lol), with the rarest face/body/pattern/horn option…..
That’s not just rare… it’s SUPER DUPER rare! XDD

Well, three out of five ain’t bad… Grizabella, my main character, is a sweet-faced, white-tiger, female, charr necromancer. According to Wikipedia, Grizabella means “Grey or Grizzled Beauty”, so her coloration was meant to be! ^^

She looks awesome! And the armor makes her look almost ghostly—very fitting for a necromancer!

Kromulous.4291:

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

Very nice collage, although I immediately noticed a distinctly non-Charr anatomical feature tucked away in there.

Spoilered for those who haven’t taken a look at the full image yet. Because I-don’t-know-why-not

DrGravitas.3527:

Kromulous.4291:

Still in the process of collecting, very few have been added from outside sources (people other than me) :

Very nice collage, although I immediately noticed a distinctly non-Charr anatomical feature tucked away in there.

Spoilered for those who haven’t taken a look at the full image yet. Because I-don’t-know-why-not

I had to look at it again to know what you meant.

Actually, I see 6. 3 are asura, a sylvari, a guy in pink and of course the boobs.