Guild Wars 2

@ Crimson

Thank you for your comment. It gave me alot of food for thought about which will answer later.
About the complains about the used pop culture references, I absolutely see no problem with that.
GW2 already has alot of different pop culoture references from other real world mythologies.
So I kind of find it really weird here, that all those people which complain here now about those pop culture references don’t find them ok suddenly, only because they come from mostly from the japare anese/chinese/korean whatever region (you get the idea), when there exists even a whole playable race, that is being named after a japanese pop culture referance name – namely the ASURA

If people really have that much personal problems with asian pop culture references beign used for names and so on, I’m sure, these kind of people are really unhappy about the existance of the Asura right???
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asura_%28Buddhism%29

All the other races also have tons of such references.
Caladbolg for example and the Sylvari are alot based on Celtic/Gaelic/Irish pop culture references and their race name also is a no brainer and in case of their personal story it has lots of links to the arthurian legends
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caladbolg

The Norn are from feet to nose referenced from old germanic/norse mythological history.
The Charr have alot of romanian pop culture references, thinks like Gladium for example, Tribune and so on …

So I really don’t get it, what for problems people have here with pop culture and mythological references being used to spice up a bit just a race concept with some terms, that they might know maybe (many won’t), other than maybe just personally don’t liking those references, but that is not my problem, its yours !

@ azrael: I didn’t want to overexaggerate it with pop culture and mythological references , because then it wouldn’t just be interesting anymore, if the race concept has no own terms and names that are free of such references.

From those Animal Gods has only Shinigami a pop culture reference, all the other ones have I thought out. And no, Leylafyell has no scandianvian reference at all. Try googling this name and you will get just only 1 single link to this thread now!

Its name should be just a little difference for death, thats why i decided to call that Animal God Shinigami, Ninetailed Fox of “Souls” as another little hint, that this is the incarnation that stands in the Path of Zen for Death, so that it could be linked basically for those palyers, that decide to play a Necromancer Nierr!

A Race Concept must be also so thought out, that all playable classes do fit in somewhere and have their references somehow.
Thats why I added also the NPC terms for the classes, to make sure, that they all have a fitting term that isn’t used yet by any other playable race.

Because a race concept, in which just 1 playable class doesn’t fit in, can be instantly thrown away, because then you have an indicator for a bad race concept, that just doesn’t fit.
If you can implement all playable classes into a race concept without any collisions with other races, then you know you are on the right path for a good basic concept, that could be used by Anet.
I repeat, that could be used, cause it would have at least a chance to be overlooked by the Devs.
——

About the complain about the Nierr being too similar with the Tengu, cause of their isolation. Both races are isolated due to two completely different reasons.

The Tengu have decided to isolate themself, due to the point that they didn’t want to have to do anything with all the other races and wanted to live just in peace in their isolation after being basically banned out of their old homelands in Cantha by the there living canthan humans under the leadership of their current racist emperor.

The Nierr on the other side lived just under isolation for a long time, because they live at a place, that has never been explored by any of the other races, especially not now, where Mordremoth has been awakened and the whole Maguuma Territory is full of Mordrem additionally to all the other threats that live in that area.

An isolation due to Self Protection from all outer Influences is a whole different thing, than an isolation due to just never been found so far by other races and hiding behind magical veils created by the nature ritual-seals based from the animal Gods, that the Nierr have made, to protect themself from the Krait mainly to be not found by them in the first place as they take them otherwise as slaves or kill them, like they do that in the krytan regions with the Quaggan, if theyd be able to invade Niarre, because the Krait have a much bigger population than the Nierr and could easily overwhelm their hometown, if those Seals should be ever break all, besides of losing their faithful connection to the Animal Gods and becoming able to be corrupted by Mordremoth then also too, if that should ever happen.
The loss of one of their Animal Gods is just a big warning for the Nierr, that they can’t live forever under the current situation and that they have to become active and do something against the Krait, their banned fifth tribe of the Nyarr and the bigger threat of the Elder Dragons together with the other races what leads then actually to the discovery of them by the other races after the events of the lost broken Seal of Daikaku, the seal that was bonded by Xionxess and made by Daikaku Kamen, the Ex-Zen Dailama of the Nyarr which got killed by the Krait in that Personal Story Event in which the players begin right after creating their Nierr.

In Brief, The game begins for a Nierr outside of Niarre at the hidden living place of Xionxess. At that time, there exist no organized bonds of the tribes to just protect each their own animal god. At that time, the Nierr are alot more disorganized, what led to the Krait being able to find the hideout of Xionxess and attack it, to the point, that it got massively weakened, so thast Mordremoth was then able to corrupt it.
Means in other words – the first Boss of the Tutorial for the Nierr is the Corrupted Xionxess.

Ugh.

I suppose pandas would be worse. But with Cantha, I think ANet has enough faux-Asian headaches to work with already. Some aspects of this one would be unpublishable in China.

Crimson Clouds.4853:

~snip~

Some really good feedback there. You said what I wanted to but in far better a way than I could. Questions like that help to really paint a picture of this new race and help to make them seem more ‘human’ to be relateable. Also it helps to give a kind of guideline as you flesh them out since you can further see what sets them apart from other races and if changes could be made to make them more interesting.

Orpheal.8263:

@ Crimson

Thank you for your comment. It gave me alot of food for thought about which will answer later.
About the complains about the used pop culture references, I absolutely see no problem with that.
GW2 already has alot of different pop culoture references from other real world mythologies.
So I kind of find it really weird here, that all those people which complain here now about those pop culture references don’t find them ok suddenly, only because they come from mostly from the japare anese/chinese/korean whatever region (you get the idea), when there exists even a whole playable race, that is being named after a japanese pop culture referance name – namely the ASURA

I don’t think you have to segregate your idea from any culture references and I don’t think Crimson is saying that either. But, IMO, I think there’s a difference between ‘pop culture references’ and ‘memes’. To me, memes seem to mutate over time to incorporate more than just what it originally referenced while culture references are always referring to a subset of ideas. The trouble is though, that anything can become a meme it’s just a matter of if it has become one or not. I don’t think Asura has become a meme, it’s just a demon/demigod with multiple heads/arms/ect usually referring to a Buddhist religious background. It’s probably why it tends to be used a lot as a reference, because it’s pretty cool and flexible.

You just have to pick your references with a flare for taste in what you’re trying to accomplish. Want something serious, in-depth and less likely to be latched onto for negative criticism? Look deeper into more obscure and/or older references to draw from that’ll make those critics seem uneducated if they try to poke at it.

As far as the similarities with Charr or Tengu, I say don’t sweat it. Similarities will exist but it’s up to you to decide if those similarities are few enough to warrant the idea. In the end it’s up to whoever is in charge of the game to decide if he wants to take ideas like this from the forum, but in the absence of that, we’re just throwing ideas at the board and there’s no harm in that.

That being said, and after reading more of your idea, I’m getting more and more uneased with the idea of a set of Animal Gods. I could see them incorporating an animalistic lifestyle or maybe even a combat style, but why does it have to end up amounting to supernatural animal-manifestations that they worship? If they are more mindful of the world and its various interactions by means of reflection/meditation, a force doesn’t need to take a form. They could worship elements themselves or not even elements, but states of existence such as mind, body, spirit and void.

0% interest in cat girls and cutesy rainbow sparkles and unicorns and all other such stuff. Were it my choice I would remove it all. Having said that I would like to be able to one day play a Tengu character.

Q & A Session – Part 1

What are the relationships within the groups?
If this question was meant with the Family Tribes in mind as for “groups”, the relationship between the Family Tribes is, that they all follow their own different Path of Zen, which consists of the five Teachings of Souls, Agitation, Meditation, Voidness and Concentration. Each Tribe simply stands for one of those Teachinngs from the Path of Zen.

How to the Nierr organize themself in Terms of Hierachy?
The Nierr have a very simple Hierarchy System.
Originally they had five tribes living all in Niarre. Each Tribe is lead by a Head Leader, called the Zen Dailama, or also named Sage of the Path for strangers, which represents their Tribe. Under the Zen Dailama stands a group of assistants, the so called Zen Dairin. This group consiststs mostly out of five Nierr, which support the tasks of the Zen Dailama and also work as the advisers of the Zen Dailama. The Zen Dairin get voted by the Nierr, while the zen Dai Lama gets voted from the Zen Dairin.
To become Zen Dailama the chosen Zen Dairin has to perform a Nature Ritual.

Do they have monogamous live long relationships?
Yes, male and female Nierr stay together, until the end of their lives.
A pair, that has found together, has to undergo several Rituals together, until that bonding counts, unlike humans for example, which do a marriage as only tradition.
These several rituals done together, are needed to prove, that both Nierr mean it really serious with each other.

How do they choose out each other for a relationship?
They see each other, they learn to love each other, as simple as like humans.
However, there is also a older tradition that the parents among the Nierr to arrange relationships between Nierr of other Tribes, if a Nierr hasn’t found someone to get in relationship with, before of its 25th year of life.
Once coupled, a female Nierr of a different tribe has to change over to the tribe of the male Nierr. Thats the only law among the Nierr in regard of relationships, if a marrage has been arranged between different tribes.

What do Nierr find attractive?
Good Hygiene, Nierr have a real strong sense for cleanliness. So if a Nierr smells really good to them, has very good manicured claws and clean fur, thats what they find attractive of each other. Their Tails and Ears are also something, what they find attractive and nice to look at.

How do Nierr raise their childs?
Nierr Childs get completely raised by their parents and their Family Tribe, if that Child should somehow lose its parents. Nierr have no Schools, Academys and such things .
Nierr give their experience and wisdom further from generation to the next generation.
Besides of their parents, Nierr childs get teached the Family Tribes Path of Zen by mentoring monks of their Family Tribes Shrine of Silence which teach them either the Teachings of Agitation, Voidness, Souls or Meditation based on which decision the player does at Character Creation choosing out a tribe.

What are the Traditions of a Nierr
Besides of changing the tribe as a female Nierr to the tribe of the married male Nierr, the Nierr have the tradition to mediate each day once at the morning and once before going to sleep to stay in touch with the nature around them and to see, if everythign is ok with them, seeing if their chakra flow is normal.
Other traditions of the Nierr are based on various Nature Rituals as like also Nierr special festivities like for example their Fruit Days, in which they eat absolutely no meat, fish or milk related things, but just only fruits and vegetables. There are various different season based Fruit Days over the year that they celebrate as tradition.
Also there is the tradition for them in times of peace to hold winter sleeps normally every like 3-4 years for three months. In that time they hold a deep trance and have a much stronger connection to the nature, as usually and it helps them to cure illnesses and other injures alot quicker, than normal in that time.

Looks good Orpheal keep up the good work. I think it is a really nice idea, you put a ton of thought into it! Wouldn’t mind seeing some other ideas of yours.

@ Leo G

I know what you want to say, but about the Animal Gods, that just what a flesh out here under my concept.
I leave here naturally alot also open for ANet. Should they think, that the concept about the Animal gods shouldn’t fit so much, Anet is free to cut them out of the concept and replace them with som,ething, like what you suggested there with worshipping the states of existance, which sounds to me like a good alternative.

However, as I said earlier, this concept should work only as a kind of basic frame, because we all know, that Anet wouldn’t copy just anything of this here in a 1:1 way.

PS. this also naturally means, that ANet is anytime free to change any kinds of names and references i used here to something completely different .

Q & A Session Part 2

How do they believe their Animal Gods affect them?
Nierr think of those mystical beasts as being the incarnations of their faith about the Path of Zen, where each of those beasts stands for a different direction of that Path.
They think of them as manifestations of their beliefs born into the these beasts.
Those mystical beasts are friendly towards the Nierr and due to their telepathy, the Nierr are in a deep connection with them, beign able to understand them also and those things that they do understand from them, do they take as their faith for the teachings of their direction from the Path of Zen.
As a sign of deep connection, those mystical beasts grant the Nierr also the ability to feel natural chakra flowing through their bodies, what otherwise a Nierr would be able to do nomrally first after decade long meditation, the powers of these beasts speed up that process letting Nierr become able to perform Nature Magic and draw energy from the natural environment if they meditate for long enough.

Can Nierr be blessed or cursed?
Same like all other Races

How long does a Nierr live?
Nierr do live longer than Humans, a Nierr does live up to around 150 years long.

What do Nierr eat?
Basically everything, what humans would also eat. But they prefer alot more fruits and vegetables over meat, but they do know, that they can’t live without eating meat also every now and then. When they eat meat, they prefer to eat various fish sorts and chicken.

What are the Jobs of a Nierr?
You have among the Nierr naturally Farmers, Hunters/Anglers/Herbalists and so on that ensure, that there is enough food for them. But you also naturally have also too all the crafting jobs that we know of so far.
But you could naturally work also as a patroling scout to ensure the safety of Nierra
Or you could be a builder and help building up things or a tree feller helping to get other ressources that are needed for the daily life.
Brief said, you see amogn the Nierr similar to same Jobs, that you’d have also among the other races, except the Asura, which would let work their golems for them

Do have Nierr any Technologies?
No

What are their Buildings like?
Nierr buildings mostly consist out of wood, clay, straw and stone in regard also of what kind of building it is and how much time, effort and ressources went into it.

What is their surrounding environment like?
They do live in a deep and very exotic Jungle.
Compare it to the Amazon Rain Forest in Brazil, or the Montecristo Cloud Forest in El Salvador. Imagine also something exotic and wild, like that Forest in Avatar at night with lots of fluorescent plants that glow from the stored sun energy.
Many large trees, long vines and tons of tropic exotic flowers, pkants and nowhere else seen animals everywhere in an eco system, thats completely different than that of the rest of Tyria. A dangerous jungle, in which not everything is on first sight, what it seems to be in reality. Meat eating plants aren’t unnormal here also too. Mordremoths influence here also does its rest in the corrupted parts of the Maguuma Jungle.

Do the Nierr have problems with famine, drought, floods, disease, hot cold?
Basically no, just only with diseases and when it should get too hot for them, but then they do take baths to cool off in nearby water locations like waterfalls and little ponds in the jungle.

Like many have said, I like the enthusiasm and work put into this suggestion, but that’s where it mainly ends.

As others have already talked about most of my own gripes, I’ll throw this one out there – Telepathy. Get rid of it. Scrap it. All of it.

There’s a reason that you don’t see PCs in MMOs (or games in general) with the ability to read minds at will, and it’s a valid one. Having telepathy (one of the top most overpowered abilities one can imagine) being innate in a race just makes certain situations trivial. I know GW2 is mostly about hack’n’slash gameplay-wise, but think of how life in Tyria would be realistically with mind-readers: zero deception possible, so betrayals are seen miles ahead of time while criminals/soon-to-be-criminals are discovered immediately with a simple question.

Cat-girl/boy: “Sir, have you been involved in any illegal activities?”
Man: “No, I haven’t” (mind says: Well there -was- that time I got away with selling some human slaves to the centaurs…)
Cat-girl/boy: “AHA!!! You’re under arrest, criminal scum!”
Man: “What?!?! What are you talking about?!”
Cat-girl/boy: “You sold off human slaves to centaurs, you evil man!”
Man: “You have no evidence of such a thing!”
Cat-girl/boy: “Sure I do! I easily read your evil mind! Now we go to find others of my race who will confirm my readings to prove that I myself am not lying.”
Man: “Well… huh… this blows.”

Do you now see how these situations will go? And this could extend into even more areas, like reading an enemy’s mind mid-battle to know their next attack so that you couldn’t lose. Or even reading an enemy commander’s thoughts to know their next move in a war. Possibly reading the mind of a beautiful spacefaring princess to find the location of a hidden rebel base.

What I’m getting at here is that a new race, with such a powerful ability that certainly trumps every other race’s abilities, will never make it past the drawing board.

Orpheal.8263:

Q & A Session – Part 1
If this question was meant with the Family Tribes in mind as for “groups”, the relationship between the Family Tribes is, that they all follow their own different Path of Zen, which consists of the five Teachings of Souls, Agitation, Meditation, Voidness and Concentration. Each Tribe simply stands for one of those Teachinngs from the Path of Zen.

IMO, that should be their religion. Nix the animal gods thing (I’m probably the only one who thinks there are too many ‘gods’ in this game’s lore, most of whom do practically nothing…I mean, yeah, way back, they did some cool kitten but now? Nowhere to be seen, at most just an ideal to believe in at their time of need) and have the race focus on the power of self, what an individual can accomplish and contribute to the betterment of their selves, family and their community. These paths sound more intriguing than something that feels copied from the Norn.

Orpheal.8263:

How to the Nierr organize themself in Terms of Hierachy?

This seems like a very typical approach. Nothing wrong with that but boring. I say look at that as a possible point to alter to spice these guys up.

Orpheal.8263:

Do they have monogamous live long relationships?

This is another very typical answer. Why not make their tradition and rituals be something they follow to a fault? To the point they have arranged marriages from birth? So it’s rare that the Nierr find their own true love or that youths feel defiant because of their old traditions?

Or why not make them polyamorous? They live decently long lives naturally and if they have a strong nod to Buddhist-like teachings, they’d see love as something great that should be shared or perhaps feelings of love cloud the path to true zen.

Orpheal.8263:

What do Nierr find attractive?

Another kinda typical answer :P

Orpheal.8263:

How do Nierr raise their childs?

Slightly typical answer. It makes sense, but then sometimes you gotta make unorthodox things seem typical for them despite what a society like ours would normally adopt. What if, from a very young age, a child can take an interest in something/someone’s work and choose to ‘follow’ them as an apprentice. If the child simply stays with the family, they’ll likely be taught the family’s profession but at any time they might be inspired to take up something new from a guide, be it from another tribe, another species or a path they guide themselves along with the right inspiration.

Orpheal.8263:

Do the Nierr have problems with famine, drought, floods, disease, hot cold?

What do the Nierr have problems with then? It’s logical though that famine or drought would be an issue for them in a heavily forested area. And when I ask about problems, I mean culturally, biologically, religiously, politically, psychologically….

Orpheal.8263:

@ Crimson

Thank you for your comment. It gave me alot of food for thought about which will answer later.
About the complains about the used pop culture references, I absolutely see no problem with that.
GW2 already has alot of different pop culoture references from other real world mythologies.
So I kind of find it really weird here, that all those people which complain here now about those pop culture references don’t find them ok suddenly, only because they come from mostly from the japare anese/chinese/korean whatever region (you get the idea), when there exists even a whole playable race, that is being named after a japanese pop culture referance name – namely the ASURA

If people really have that much personal problems with asian pop culture references beign used for names and so on, I’m sure, these kind of people are really unhappy about the existance of the Asura right???
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asura_%28Buddhism%29

All the other races also have tons of such references.
Caladbolg for example and the Sylvari are alot based on Celtic/Gaelic/Irish pop culture references and their race name also is a no brainer and in case of their personal story it has lots of links to the arthurian legends
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caladbolg

The Norn are from feet to nose referenced from old germanic/norse mythological history.
The Charr have alot of romanian pop culture references, thinks like Gladium for example, Tribune and so on …

So I really don’t get it, what for problems people have here with pop culture and mythological references being used to spice up a bit just a race concept with some terms, that they might know maybe (many won’t), other than maybe just personally don’t liking those references, but that is not my problem, its yours !

A couple of minor corrections:

Asura is originally a Hindu/Indian reference. Even the link you provide indicates that the Japanese version is a derivation of the much older Hindu.

The Charr are Roman influenced not Romanian.

I would actually really love this. I find their appearance to be adorable & interesting and personally I would spend hours customizing them. I wish it made it into the game, even if some people find it “too anime-like”.

Okay, I read this mostly.

Problems:
1. No point suggesting anything as Anet ignores players right now.
2. Zen? Don’t think so, sorry.
3. Animal Gods. Norn have the angle on this right now.
4. Nature themes in their society/faith. Sylvari have this covered.
5. Krait as mortal enemies? Krait are mostly underwater dwellers, they would easily dominate any ‘battle’ underwater, and hold their own on land.
6. Martial Arts. There are no fistfighting/martial artist classes in GW2. This would require completely new mechanics which Anet has neither the desire nor ability to create.
7. Catgirls. KEEP THEM AWAY. There are games for anime style stuff, GW2 is not one of them. And I say this as an anime fan. No. Nyet. Nein. Nada. Non.

Orpheal.8263:

when there exists even a whole playable race, that is being named after a japanese pop culture referance name – namely the ASURA

There’s a difference between borrowing words and concepts from various world cultures and languages and rebranding tropes and/or stereotypes with no original creativity and hardly any deviation.

For example the Norn borrow from multiple real-world cultural concepts without explicitly being any one of them. Conversely, Kaineng City in GW1:Factions was just one big shanty town rip-off.

GW1:Factions was such a joke being the introduction into the East Asian game market. “Hey East Asia, ya’ll got shanty-towns and katanas, amirite? So does Guild Wars! Buy it!”

What if Blade and Soul’s North American release coincided with the release of a cowboy themed expansion called ‘Blade N Soul: Yeehaw!’? O.o

There’s even some thread around here detailing the history of Divinity’s Reach previously having Canthan and Elonan districts before NCSoft stopped in and pointed out that having Segregation City as the human hub center was a bit problematic.

Point being, your race’s backstory is less culturally inspired and more a cultural rip-off.

Mo Mo.1947:

What if Blade and Soul’s North American release coincided with the release of a cowboy themed expansion called ‘Blade N Soul: Yeehaw!’? O.o

Me being from and currently stationed in Texas, I’d be offended…and the next second buying it and rolling me a Lyn because animal feetsies….