How will the Dominion and the Ascendancy react to outsider races?

Monkey_Lord

It's established that both the Dominion and the Ascendancy were formed by alliances between certain races. I'm wondering, how do you envision they'll treat other races? Would a Tukkav in the Dominion be discriminated against due his race's historical allegiance with the Ascendancy? Would a Dacheeran in the Ascendancy be looked upon with disdain? Thoughts?

Rkansas

In my opinion, at least at the starting point of the game, I think they should be, till at some point down the line, they can prove themselves, and even then, should have some still looking down on those who have a historical allegiances with Dominion or Ascendancy, but that might end up being to much work, but still would add more to the RP stand point.

Kestrel

Racial discrimination was attempted in Midkemia Online and didn't really work.

Over there you had Elvandar populated by Eledhel, Krondor populated mainly by humans (but also by dwarves) and Sar-Sargoth, which was ruled by Moredhel and had goblins and trolls as second-class citizens. (They also accepted humans and eledhel as second class citizens, but this was harder to do.)

For starters you have to factor in that people migrate between orgs over time. Org-hoppers are always looked down on, in any IRE game (with good reason IMO) but for various reasons it's inevitable. People get bored, fall into Romeo & Juliet relationships, get into trouble with leadership, etc. And after losing their first org, it sucks for those people to be treated like dirt even in their new one.

Secondly even though some hardcore roleplayers choose certain races/storylines because they want all the story baggage that comes with it, a lot don't. Some just picked goblins in Sar-Sargoth because they had a reputation for being funny, but didn't necessarily want to be griefed by other players, nor did they anticipate they'd be locked out of leadership positions.

Third, people just like being nice way too much. Even if you set a standard that x race will be treated as a second-class citizen, lots of people playing the ruling class won't actually abide by that, and make a point of treating everyone equally, even people who deliberately chose a second-class citizen race because they were looking forward to the RP that comes with that. Which just ends up being immersion breaking.

I say learn from MKO's mistakes and avoid repeating them. But if you wanna play a human supremacist in Scatterhome, let that be on you rather than a standard.

Khargal

Well, I am pretty sure that w'hoorns and ry'nari shouldn't accept each other in opposite org, due to blood feud between this two races. Speaking about MKO, I don't remember this second-grade races to have any political rights. Also a rather simple punishment system will stop this xeno-collaborati

Aurelius

That'll be up to players and whatever player cultures develop. The orgs will accept any race though, as far as the code goes.

BadPenguin

To add to this. We also need to remember that people want AGENCY when they play. The ability to affect their characters story. Racism/Classim does not belong in a game about being extraordinary people.

Devina

Considering it's historically accurate to have these racist/classist views, I don't think removing them from gameplay is reasonable. In Song, we've already had someone throw a hissy fit because their (largely Ry'nari) peers dislike w'hoorn -- except it's in Song, and the only W'hoorn in the Song planet are the player-character W'hoorn, so I don't think it should be unreasonable to expect some conflict in that manner.

I, personally, think it creates some RP.

Arsentar

I very much agree with @devina as well, because even if we agreed that our characters are extraordinary in their abilities, it doesnt follow that they are extraordinary in their personality.

Personally, I am down for some fantastical racism, and always make a point to play characters that are at least mildly racist against some of the more out-there races.

Azure

My character is a racist in the 'make exceptions' sort of way. She may think all R'ynari are terrible horrible miscreant slime... except for those couple she knows that have proven to be alright/better. Let roleplay decide !

Joscelin

I think it's far easier to set the tone for RP from the NPCs then to try to enforce it on players. If you have racist NPCs, slaves of a particular race, etc., it goes a long way to setting the atmosphere, while still being something people can ignore if they want. Things like room descriptions can give people a lot of fodder for RP while at the same time being out of the way for people who are going to be oblivious regardless. I'd much prefer someone being able to go, "Look, you hate racism, cool, but if you really pay attention, that's just the way it is, deal with it" instead of saying, "I know nothing shows it, but if you've gone outside of the game and read through the histories and such, it really makes sense to be like this."

Cubey

Individual races have their dislikes and rivals but there's nothing that suggests civ-level racial discrimination. Both in the game and in lore. On the other hand there's plenty of support for how open minded and tolerant of diversities the ingame cultures supposedly are.

So yeah, my view is that if you play a racist then you want an excuse to be a prick and have a get-out-of-consequences-free-because-it's-rp card. Except here's one of them roleplaying rules: if you RP a prick, don't be surprised people treat you like a prick.

EDIT: Just making it clear, Starmourn is no everyone loves each other hippy utopia. It still got plenty of discrimination going around: Classism, faction-ism, how useful to Song or rich in Celestine you are, etc. But it evolved past basic hatred of people who look different than you. Instead we have even more basic tribalism.

Balthazar

Hard to say, because while the ry'nari on Ostari obviously have a huge bone to pick with w'hoorn, the Song Dominion doesn't necessarily have to follow that blood feud. Ultimately the player can choose whether their character puts allegiance to the Song above all else, because the Song does accept w'hoorn indiscriminately (something that will remain a fact afaik), or choose to be anti-w'hoorn despite their affiliation with Song. Also, racism can be considered a spectrum, ranging from mild teasing to character assassination based on race.

Selador

Be Elgan! Everybody likes Elgan so if everyone's Elgan, everyone will get along in a dance party utopia.

 <11> CLEANSE THE NON-DANCING RACES. </11>

Xiru

The Ascendancy is about to elect a council of entirely outsider races and the Lord Commander of Song is a W'hoorn so!

Eiphy

Selador said:

Be Elgan! Everybody likes Elgan so if everyone's Elgan, everyone will get along in a dance party utopia.

 <11> CLEANSE THE NON-DANCING RACES. </11>

They better like us Elgans! We host FABULOUS dance contests!