I’ve found four homoromantic sylvari so far (all female). Quite obviously so too: Caithe, Faolain, The Festivalgoer south of the mystic forge in lion’s arch, & her lover. I can’t recall ever seeing a heteroromantic sylvari. It seems like they’re either aromantic or homoromantic….What’s the deal with that? Anybody know of some heteroromantic sylvari so my guild stops poking fun of me being a lesbian? And is this just a coincidence on the game designers’ parts or is this supposed to imply something about lore pertaining to sylvari?
Slyvaries cannot reproduce with the same method as any other races, they don’t have sex. They are born from the Pale Tree. Actually, for them it doesn’t matter if your are from the opposite gender or not, what’s between them is a simple sympathy and decide that way they will want to stay together. That’s all.
There are equal amount of straight sylvaries i think.
Captain Deutschland, Ozzy The Insane, Hanz Limbchewer – r40+ mes/nec/engi Desolation
Fear The Crazy [Huns]
I know they don’t do the sex thing. I’ll fix that post mentioning “asexual” when really I meant “aromantic” sorry. But still, I find it odd that there’s a plethora of homoromanticism in Sylvari we can find in game but an absolute lack of heteroromanticism. Probably means nothing…but what if it does? I mean I can think of a few good reasons it might actually be preferable for sylvari to be homoromantic: namely a sylvari of the same gender as you will likely have more things in common. Without breeding to worry about, what’s stopping you from shacking up with the most similar person you can find?
As Gandarel said, Sylvari don’t really have genders. Sure, they LOOK like they do but they don’t reproduce in the same fashion as mammals. In fact, they may not have reproductive organs at all or even the ability to reproduce by combining the DNA of two individuals. I believe they refer to themselves as “male” and “female” only because they’ve picked up such convenient concepts from other races and “it” is considered rude, even though it’s the most logical pronoun to address them with.
In short, technically, they can’t be homosexual or even heterosexual because they don’t have genders.
There is one “heterosexual” sylvari couple that I know of. It’s in the sylvari personal story where the male was trying to talk the female out of being with the nightmare court.
There are plenty of them, the aforementioned couple in the shield of the moon sylvari quest line, the green knight questline has the male knight trying to woo a female (after killing her male lover.) There’s a sylvari near the North of the honeycomb shaped farms in Caledon that talks about a male who thinks they should be together after she told him that she heard his name in her dream; although she finds him annoying (but is constantly keeping track of him so as to avoid him) and says she wants to one day “knock him to the ground and wrestle.”
There is also a male couple at the beginning of the Green Knight storyline isn’t there?
I’m not too sure about anymore couples, other than the ones already pointed out, though I’m sure there are more. They like to hide all sorts of little things like that in the random npc dialogue.
Most of the romantic dialogues throughout the Grove are between a male and a female. The misconception comes of ANet very rarely drawing attention to romantic relationships, and Caithe/Faolain is a very high-profile exception.
R.I.P., Old Man of Auld Red Wharf. Gone but never forgotten.
Shield of the Moon storyline focuses upon male and female sylvari lovers. The Green Knight storyline also has male/female lovers (including a second male trying to woo the first female, though the first male is never actually seen as he’s dead before the storyline began), as well as male/male.
As for why there’s so many more homosexual sylvari than heterosexual sylvari when relationships are shown, ArenaNet wanted to emphasize that sylvari just love to love, no care for the physical act. But there are indeed heterosexual sylvari, and it’s highly likely that there are sylvari who fall in love with other races (be they of the same gender or not).
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
It’s not even that there are MORE homosexual relationships. It’s quite simply that it is more noticeable since it isn’t something you usually come across in games. As Konig said Anet wanted to emphasise that they aren’t particular about the perceived gender of who they love.
I have a tendency to miss a lot of the random NPC dialogue despite trying my very best to hear as much of it as I can, and my personal story didn’t have anything to do with sylvari couples, so I literally had never met a straight sylvari. Glad to know they exist. Thanks for the replies.
About the sex part, I don’t remember where, but I’m pretty sure it was stated before game launch that while they don’t reproduce, they have gender specific atributes and can use them to have sex with each other. Their bodies imitate human anatomy with vegetal components, and that includes imitating genitalia even if they won’t use it to reproduce.
Also, statistically, for species that reproduce sexually, it’s logical there is a disproportionate amount of heterosexual relationships to homosexual relationships partly for the sake of propagation.
For the Sylvari, there just might be a more equal ratio of hetero and homosexual relationships since they do not reproduce.
But yeah, I think the lesbian relationships get more attention than the male/male ones because it’s somehow viewed as more acceptable and interesting? I think the gay and hetero relationships are there but not the focus of attention.
Most of the romantic dialogues throughout the Grove are between a male and a female. The misconception comes of ANet very rarely drawing attention to romantic relationships, and Caithe/Faolain is a very high-profile exception.
Very true. On top of that, many people still aren’t used to non-straight people or even have a problem with them, so even the most casual mention will be seen in a completely different and often very negative light than if it was a hetero couple/interaction. Hell, simple affection between two men or two women still often draws more negative attention than male-on-female harassment and assault. We still have a long way to go as a society.
so my guild stops poking fun of me being a lesbian?
Romance is romance; sounds like your guild is a bunch of jerks if they mean this seriously in any way.
More seriously:
There are a few male-male sylvari couples, too, I believe, though at present I don’t recall their names in particular. There are also straight couples, of course! Lore-wise, they are probably the race where it might seem to be most prominent ’cause they’re not biased by a long-standing culture that tries to paint homosexuality as morally corrupt or against nature. Instead, they embrace what they feel openly and directly and have no hangups about for whom or why they have those feelings.
In some ways, they’re far more enlightened as a result.
@synk I’m not a lesbian. That snippet makes it sound like I am, I’m not, lol. Hence the guild teasing me about it for being a Sylvari and asking them this question first. Tbh, they don’t care much about the lore.
You did bring up an interesting point though; how do the other races view homosexuality? We know Sylvari are like “whatever.” Do we have any information on what the other races think? Is humanity in game just as prejudiced as humanity in real life?
From what we can see the other races don’t have a problem with it. I can’t see any logical reason for them to have any issues with same-gender couples anyway.
From what we can see the other races don’t have a problem with it. I can’t see any logical reason for them to have any issues with same-gender couples anyway.
Ree: Other races of the world see the sylvari as odd for many more reasons than simply their sexuality – the issue of same-gender love among the sylvari is no more strange to, say, a norn than the fact that sylvari bleed a type of sap and not blood. Other races have a history of same-sex relationships, but those relationships tend to be downplayed and not lauded within the culture. This is not to say that the races of Tyria are naturally homophobic; they’re absolutely not. It’s simply not particularly common.
Boom. Great find PetboyJoshua. Seems homeosexuality isn’t discriminated against. It just isn’t as prevalent as it is in non-sylvari culture. Sylvari culture being so prevalent because the gender isn’t an issue when forming relationships.
There is a male Sylvari talking with a friend beneath the tree vista by the ascent/descent between levels that is lamenting the loss of his female love. You can hear the dialog when you are completing the vista point.
Even if they don’t reproduce, which means they see it for relationships/pleasure/curiosity/experiencing and consequently the sex of each one doesn’t matter as much, I think as they’re based on human anatomy, there probably are more hetero relationships due to Sylvari probably observing that’s how other races do it and it being more ingrained in the dream and their “memories”, so yeah it’s not like they’re 100% kitten , all those cases of male and female relationships you’re saying are probably even the most common scenario (to add another case: Bercilak is trying to get the interest of a female Sylvari that was in love to another male Sylvari killed by the Green Knight).
I doubt the “sex” of the partner is taken into account, at all. So a female involved with a male may easily be involved with another female once the previous relationship ends.
A-net has described the Dream as being incomplete and fragmented. They also described what you learn in a Dream as being akin to reading about something. I doubt reading about completely heterosexual or completely homosexual people are going to change your opinion of an individual when you live in a society that has no social barriers seperating the two “sexes”.
I think there is a bit too much focus in this thread on what the sylvari believe compared to other races and whatnot. The point OP made is that she is aware of all of that, but in her personal experience she had not witnessed any opposite sex sylvari couples and wanted to know where she could find some. There have been some good examples here but any non-personal story examples would be really good as well (Like the guy lamenting his lost love mentioned further up)
A person has to think outside the box when it comes to a Sylvari’s romantic life/desires. Since we (us as people) are humans and are sexually driven as a species it’s hard not to place our beliefs on another species (especially a fantasy species that walks/talks, and is intelligent).
With that said and from what others/devs have stated, that sylvari do not consider “gender” relevant to love/romantic desires, but rather the person themselves. Pretty much it’s as if gender doesn’t exist in their culture. It creates a uniqueness about them that has been striking conversation ever since the Caithe and Faolin romantic discovery.
On a lore subject though, I wonder if Charr are romantic? Do Asurans have the same standards of creating offspring as mammals?
On a lore subject though, I wonder if Charr are romantic?
There is a Charr female NPC near the mystic forge. She is a merchant I believe. I walked past her yesterday and she said something along the lines of, “I hear Rytlock Brimstone has yet to choose a mate, I wonder if I could be the one” (Badly paraphrased).
As far as heteroromantic sylvari go, if you do the Green Knight story line, you’ll notice the female sylvari that the Green Knight is after was in a heteroromantic relationship. However, when that storyline begins, a male sylvari rushes in and tells you that the Green Knight just killed his lover, another male sylvari. In addition, the Shield of the Moon story line features Ysvelta and Tiachren, another heteroromantic couple. If anything I would say the sylvari are panromantic in a sense. They don’t really have genders but they identify themselves with genders. Therefore, they just fall in love with the person themselves.
sylvari got it right! even we real life human do most of the sex because we enjoy it than because we can reproduce… though we have centuries of culture who make us forget that we do sex because we like it and we like/love the person we do sex with.
Looking for a gay friendly guild?
Join the Rainbow Pride
