5 réponses à ce sujet

[CptPatch]

We know from the Romance cutscenes that the various that the three main races can, indeed, have sex with one another.  In fact "men" and "women" can apply to _any_ race, rather than putting an emphasis on "Elvish men" or "Dwarven women".  It seems obvious that the genetic stock is at least close enough to yield viable offspring between mixed matches.  They're at least as close to one another as lions and tigers (= liger), or horses and donkeys (= mules).

So, where are the half-breeds?  (No derogatory intent.)

I can understand that adding half-breeds to the available character selection would have added a LOT more programming to the initial product, so understandably they were left out.  That's cool; I can cope with that.  But why aren't there any half-breeds to be encountered in Ferelden?  If the party members are freely jumping into each others' beds regardless of disparate racial backgrounds, then it should be happening pretty much everywhere.

If we occasionally encountered half-breeds in this game, it might be hoped that in future sequels the half-breed category would open up to character creation.  But now, having traversed the length and breadth of Ferelden, if we _do_ encounter a half-breed anything in DLC content or a sequel, it will come across as a shocking new development.

[David Gaider]

Without getting into the "why" behind the elves-and-humans-produce-humans thing (which I've talked about before), I will talk about why we didn't deal with it in the game. Primarily it's because we didn't have room. There's a lot of things that exist in the Thedas world that we weren't able to get into in Origins -- part of it is due to limited resources, but part of it is also because to properly address it we'd need to do it justice. We were already introducing the races and their situations, and adding on the complexity of explaining something that does need explanation would... get us what, exactly? You can't play one of the "elf-blooded" (this is what humans with mixed parentage are generally referred to, though I imagine "half-elf" could also be used in a slanderous fashion), and trying to explain the presence of a small number of humans in the alienage (as a for-instance) would have diluted the story we were already going for. Trying to fit everything that exists into the world in one story, after all, isn't really feasible.

I'd like to get into it. I think it's a possibility that has the potential for good drama, and even allowing the player to be elf-blooded might be cool in the future. But like I said, I'd want to do it justice. If your view on it is that you wanted half-elves to be there, and their omission is a fault -- then so be it. I can't really argue with that except to say that we don't think they're required. As some people have mentioned, it's not a widespread thing. Many elves resist having human children for cultural reasons, and many elf-blooded children will live amongst humans as full humans simply because they can get away with it and hiding their heritage means not having to suffer for it -- from humans as well as elves. Some few might be public about their identity, and unwilling to leave their parents behind, but like I said that belongs in another story.

Incidentally, for half-dwarves the situation is a bit different. Dwarves aren't a very fertile race to begin with, and far less so when it comes to mating with humans and elves. In fact, it would be considered rare... rare enough that it's considered more of an oddity than a group of its own. The result is also less stigmatized... primarily because it's also less noticeable. You end up with what would appear to be a tall dwarf or a short human. That calls for a new model -- which we weren't going to get, even if we wanted to address such a rare case. Again, it's certainly something we could do in the future, though such a character would still be considered unusual.

I imagine for those who really like their half-elves that's not a very satisfactory answer, but I hope it offers some light on the why's and wherefore's.

[David Gaider]

Nuclear_Pony wrote...
Can you imagine how a dwarf with part something else would be treated in Dwarven society ? I shudder to think of it. However a tree hugging dwarf would be funny (mind you, I love elves).

One thing to consider is that humans and elves don't often go to Orzammar. The dwarven city is very restrictive on who it allows to enter. So finding a half-dwarf in Orzammar would be exceptional almost beyond belief -- and when I said that a half-dwarf is less noticeable, that's only on the surface. Mainly half-dwarves would be the result of a union between a surface dwarf and a human. In Orzammar a half-dwarf would indeed stand out in a crowd (literally). I imagine that it would be sufficient cause for the half-dwarf, or even their entire family, to go to the surface rather than suffer the stigma.

Dwarves mating with elves, meanwhile, result in dwarves -- just the same as with humans. That's kind of an odd picture, especially if the mother is elven, but I imagine such a union takes place even less than it does with humans.

[David Gaider]

CptPatch wrote...
NOT to be argumentative, but rather just to point out something you may have overlooked:  There IS a fairly substantial population of "surface dwarves".  Even in this game they are viewed as being so ubiquitous that the stereotype of the Dwarven merchant is, in fact a stereotype.

Been traveling, always traveling all these years with Ma and Da.  What's a lonely Dwarven boy or girl supposed to do for, you know, release?

Err... I *did* mention that a mating between a surface dwarf and a human was the more likely scenario, did I not? The fact that dwarves on the surface are more common means that there's a better chance of them finding each other rather than needing to resort to a human or an elf -- something that is only rarely going to result in a child even when it happens.

As for your previous post, thank you. Those are good suggestions, many of which we've already considered.

[David Gaider]

Eudaemonium wrote...
This might've been mentioned, but Slim Couldry (who gives you the Crime Wave quest line) mentions that he was brought up in the Alienage. It surprised me at the time. Is Slim elf-blooded, or is he just one of a small number of humans who happens/happened to live there?

The only humans that would live in the Alienage are elf-blooded humans -- so it seems likely he is, even if he didn't make a point of saying so.

[David Gaider]

Brass_Buckles wrote...
Do the descendants of elf-blooded humans who have repeatedly bred back to elves eventually become indistinguishable from normal elves?  And if so, could this, rather than any other reason, explain why elves no longer live such long lives?  Could it be that they're all a little bit human?

The child of elf-blooded humans and an elf is another elf-blooded human. Whether or not such a line would eventually become more "elven" is unknown -- the elf-blooded don't tend to distinguish themselves as a group for cultural reasons, and more often then not find themselves living amongst humans rather than elves. Saying that elves have recessive genes obviously isn't the answer -- I said a long time ago on the forums that elven genetics were "adaptive", but that's just an attempt to explain the phenomenon since people were insisting on talking about genetics. The elves don't know why it happens, and there's no understanding of genetics in the world to explain it... if that would even be the reason. More likely it has a supernatural origin relating to the nature of the elves themselves, though what that might be and whether or not the elves were truly once the immortals they claim simply isn't known.

Modifié par David Gaider, 30 janvier 2010 - 09:46 .