A Sugggestion...

[oDDity]

We're taking the vast majority of the world from Earth's past and augmenting it with fantasy elements. It's entirely arbitrary which parts we take from the real past and which parts we make up.

It's all a question of where you draw the line.

'We'll take this bit from RL, and this bit, but not that bot, we'll take this part but add this fantasy bit of our own'

I would like to take the female guards idea from real life (whihc means having none) and you want to add that as a fantasy part (having some)

[oDDity]

If you just say that we should first create basic models and then go on with the variety, that's ok with me.

No, the female guards are an added extra, and are not required. THe essential models need to be done first, and then all the 'added variety' models.

[Ishtvan]

So what you're saying is, a magic arrow that can spit out a magic rope and hold someone's weight, or an arrow that magically spits out enough water to put out a torch, etc, is more believable than the prospect of a society that sees women as equally employable for the position of "guard?"

 

It's true in Medieval Europe this was probably unheard of (altho I would bet some countries varied from the norm).

 

Some historians argue that very early societies were Matriarchal. While this seems to have been debunked, there is still a lot of evidence that in a lot of societies, women wielded a lot of political power because descent was determined thru the mother. To demonstrate that I have clearly done extensive research on the subject, here is a link to an Encyclopedia entry : http://www.answers.com/topic/matriarchy

 

Anyway my point is, if the political power / warrior status of women has flip-flopped [ed: throughout history] in our own society, why is it not believable that, at the time we are entering this fictional society, their cultural norms currenty allow for women warriors?

 

Yes it does imply different cultural values from Medieval Europe, but it is not that hard for me to believe that the cultural values of a place and time may slightly differ from a place and time on earth. Much more believable than say, the walking dead, or a man who can wave his fingers around and shoot a fireball at me.

Edited April 12, 2005 by Ishtvan

[oDDity]

What we choose to include in the world is not based on level of beleivablity, but is completely arbitrary.

Why don't we have aliens from the neigbouring planet of the one our gameworld is set on, running aroud with ray guns? THat's no more or less believable than ghosts or slowfall potions, but we're not having them because we don't want them.

Why aren't we having guns, when guns were in use over 500 years ago oin Earth?

Why are we having X and not having Y ?

There are no definitives here, Whatever we decide goes into the world, goes in, and what we don't want doesn't go in, and exacrtly the same was ture when LGS made Thief.

Some want to see female guards, I don't want to see any.

There is no right or wrong here.

[FishFace]

The point oDDity makes is absolutely correct, although I think he makes some oDD evidence to support it.

Basically, I'd like to see female guards for the flavour and variety. I'm not at all going to attempt to sway anything because a) it's not my place and it's not that important.

 

However, what was said about aliens I don't see as right. Female guards would not look out of place in the game. Potions and magic do not look out of place. Aliens with ray-guns, DO. They don't fit in the steampunk setting - the reason for not including aliens + ray guns is quite different to the reason for not including female guards!

Similarly with guns - they don't fit with the setting, IMHO. They don't add to the variety, if you ask me - they make the game something quite different.

[oDDity]

What does or doesn't fit with the setting is also completely subjective.

If LGS had included aliens in Thief, no one would deny they fit the setting. 'The Setting' is exactly what LGS decided it was going ot be. If aliens had always been in Thief, people would now bw complaining that we were going to leave them out)

[Ishtvan]

Do you guys remember the last panel in the T1 credits? They are among us!

[Nomad]

Well, I definately understand the added difficulty of adding another set of voices to accomidate female guards. I certainly wouldn't want the release of the Dark Mod to be delayed more than necessary, so if it is decided that there will not be female guards, then so be it. This doesn't mean that I don't want them, but it's not my decision. Would it be too much extra trouble to at least include attack barks and such in the female voices? If you could include those, I would have the freedom to create my own female guards if I so choose. And, of course, I don't mean for you to change any of the speech you already have planned for the females; just adding in the tags not used by non-combatants. Might be kind of wierd with having combatant and non-combatant barks mixed in the same character, but better than nothing.

 

Whatever you do, I appreciate all your work in giving us the Dark Mod!

[New Horizon]

I've been preparing to record female guards all along.

[Vadrosaul]

Please create some female guard models, as I would have use for them in the FM's I create. The skins really don't matter since I can make my own textures, but a few model varieties would be great.

 

What does or doesn't fit with the setting is also completely subjective.

If LGS had included aliens in Thief, no one would deny they fit the setting. 'The Setting' is exactly what LGS decided it was going ot be. If aliens had always been in Thief, people would now bw complaining that we were going to leave them out)

 

Thats right. The creator creates their work, and any radical changes from someone other than the creator are usually met with resistance from fans. Even changes from the creator are met with resistance sometimes (Lucas & the prequels).

 

I would venture a guess that if the Dark Mod made a Thief campaign with aliens and ray guns, you wouldn't be taken seriously in the Thief community.

[Renzatic]

I would venture a guess that if the Dark Mod made a Thief campaign with aliens and ray guns, you wouldn't be taken seriously in the Thief community.

Well hell...back to the drawing board I guess.

[Ishtvan]

Damn, and their one weakness was "water," it would have worked out so well with the water arrows!

[Domarius]

oDDity, my argument "it's fantasy" only sucked as much as the argument it was meant to counter, which was your "it's unrealistic".

 

Females would be made more worthwhile if we implement the differences that I raised as a feature suggestion which has been shelved for after the first milestone.

 

Don't worry Nomad, you didn't spark this debate, it is one of may on-going ones

[Nomad]

Originally posted by Domarius

Don't worry Nomad, you didn't spark this debate, it is one of may on-going ones

 

I thought it must have come up before, but I was quite surprised by the activity in this thread since I brought it up!

 

Announcement:

Dark Mod Project Abandoned After Debate Over Female Guards!

Sources say Nomad is to blame!

 

Originally posted by New Horizon

I've been preparing to record female guards all along.

 

Great! How about the voices for the lap dancers? They'll work great in my strip-bar FM!

 

Too much? Aw, well. Worth a try.

[oDDity]

I'm more worried about al the estra models, textures and animatons than the voice sets )

Consideing I'm the onny one actually doing any of that stuff ATM, it's a legitimate concern. We're looking at 50 charcater models already, and that's witout any females or added eatra body shapes of sizes or new heads for variety.

I'm sure one of NH's actresses could do the female guard vocie sets in a session, not so with a completed in-game charcater - more like a weeks solid wor - or 2 or 3 weeks for most people.

[Hylix Ulyx]

Returning to the threads original intent.....

 

Are we gonna see some polygonal pixel shaded poon or what?

 

Hylix.

[Entropy]

I'd suggest that you make a few of the initial models fairly interchangeable, so that texture work, maybe a head switch, and recording the vocals is all that will be needed to bring females in. A female guard could quite easily have a very masculine physique, especially under armour, robes, cloaks, and so on, and it's not unreasonable to assume that a female warrior would strap their chest down as flat as possible for combat, or that uniforms and armour are of the one-size-fits-all category that tends to minimize anyone's differences. The final details, such as new or tweaked versions of models and different animations could then follow if time allowed.

 

E

[Nomad]

You wouldn't need to make any more models than needed for whatever story line you're going to make, either. As long as a few basic models are included, the FM writers will have the freedom to modify them any way they want. Eventually, the community will be populated with all the variety of AI that we want. We just need a starting point. Lack of female fighter voices in T:DS is limiting my creativity already! If I want a violent female, she has to sound like a thug. (I wasn't even making a fighter, just a female sevant with a broom with a serious attitude toward the cook!)

 

Fifty? FIFTY character models?!?

 

Cool!

 

I mean.. Man! I really feel for you!

[New Horizon]

Our time limits are self imposed, so I'm hoping that we will be able to offer the community a full toolset. Female guards are well established in the Thief community and I think we would be shooting ourselves in the foot if we didn't include the resources to include them in Fan Missions. At any rate, there will be female guard voice sets..so no worries on that end.

[Nomad]

Thanks NH! That will be enough to get me going if nothing else pans out.

[FishFace]

From what I hear, there are more modellers "out in the wild" than there are voice actors. I believe I'm able to do both, although my modelling ability is not very good compared to much of the stuff I see here. This is limited by the fact that I am abysmal at texturing, so any model I make here at home (with blender! woo!) generally looks rubbish even if the modelling is great.

[Renzatic]

If you're fairly good at modelling you could try your hand at making normalmaps. You can throw as much detail as you want on them considering that you'll just be exporting it to a flat TGA image.

[Nomad]

I agree. Texturing is the hardest part for me, too. I was able to put my family's faces on the T2 models, though. They enjoied that emensely, but that was just for fun. I usually don't make new models, but I'm pretty good at reshaping existing ones to add variety. I expect the state-of-the-art models will be quite a bit trickier than the T2 blocky ones.

 

Still, voice is still my major shortcoming. No matter how hard I try to do the womens voices, it still sounds baritone! :lol:

[Domarius]

Just quickly, back on the females - I wouldn't mind not seeing them for a long time, since if they're just going to be extra aesthetics, like oDDity says, it's justifiable to not do them.

But I would like to see them available in the dark mod one day.

(Ideally I'd like to see them with my alternate female AI settings idea...)

[Nomad]

Good point! I sure wouldn't want Dark Mod to be delayed for this, as long as I know the models will be there eventually. Tool kit first, bells and whistles later is fine. Just don't leave me with no toot and ding!