Species & Character Creation

This species restriction based on professions is so stupid... Looks like devs got drugged too much :'(

I was thinking about this.... and I had to read - and re-read the Species update before I was happy...

I wouldn't panic about the 'restrictions' we've seen here, for a couple of reasons:

1. Look closely at the wording here:

SWTOR.com wrote:

So far we’ve only dropped hints about the range of playable species in Star Wars™: The Old Republic™. You may have heard about the Rattataki Bounty Hunter, Chiss Imperial Agent, or the Twi’lek Smuggler, but we can tell you now that all classes will include optional non-human species.

They're using the term 'species' in the plural sense, not the singular. At first the last part of reads like saying that each class will have one non-human race but if that were the case it would read like this:

"but we can tell you now that all classes will include an optional non-human species."

Because they've not written that it implies that each class will have humans + non-human species (plural) associated with it.


2. Right at the bottom is something very, very important:

SWTOR.com wrote:

As excited for these playable species as we hope you are, the list is not yet complete.

"

Why is that so important? well apart from the fact it means more speices are yet to be announced (yay!) It also means that the 'class/species restrictions' combination assumption that everyone is jumping to on SWTOR.com's forums could be very wrong indeed.

So far we know that:

Bounty Hunters can be Rattataki & Human
Imperial Agents can be Chiss & Human
Sith Inquisitors can be Zabrak & Human
Sith Warriors can be Sith & Human

Now, if 'the list is not yet complete' then it means that each class can be one of the races states above + Human AND something else. (if not then the list would be complete!)

With that thought in mind it means any Species to follow will will either follow the Human archetype of being available across all classes or, though more unlikely, each class will have Human plus a set of species specifically tied to that class.

I suspect you'll get cross species / class combos.

In fact although I've seen them show off a Chiss Imperial Agent before for example I don't remember reading / hearing anything saying Chiss could only be the Imperial Agent class, just that they can be.*

So yeah, as much as this (rather unexpected) update puts a big ol' grin on my face I'm personally not panicing about what BioWare is up to.




* If anyone can find definative word from BW that Chiss (or any other species) is tied to only one class, please let me know via pm

Yeah, I just hope it's a joke from them... there should be no species restriction for classes, this is the more stupid thing I ever saw in RPGs. Why don't they just do the species without any restriction as we got in SWG? That's much helpful for RPers.

We all have plenty examples in mind to proove that Zabrak (for example) aren't just Sith Inquisitors... Look at Bao-dur in Kotor II, Agen Kolar in AotC, Eeth Koth in tPM, Wolf Sazen in Legacy Comics...

I forgot about them being BH's, Rattataki are the Aurra Sings then, it looks like they're taking archetype characteres from starwars and aligning that species with classes.

ie, Maul = Zabrak =Sith I
Aurra sing = Unknown but Rattataki looking = BH
Thrawn etc etc
They dont all fit this but seriously its fricking dumb and shortsighted, I mean they may have more but im guessing this species restriction is for story progression purposes so maybe 3 for each class?
They are going to have tons of Maul clones, thrawn clones, and aurra sing clones running about and every person of a class will look very similar to the people from the same class

Personally I wouldn't mid if this wern't so dumb like the sith warrior species ie the Pureblood Sith makes complete sense but Zabrak were not a Sith species ever you even play a good one in previous games.
And LW chiss are IA only I read it somewhere no link though, :/

Yes! Sharho's in! Don't want him looking like Maul though, as in with all the tattoos. Aw well...

Well Harl you can choose yor tattos I bet, Although im still pissed off I probably wont be able to play Jylan I just realised something, I thought Twelik companions were there becuase they would compliment the fact you couldn't play them in game but you can.
In fact the companion class of Vette the twilek seems to be a smuggler, and who do the republic have as a bounty hunter companion? a trandoshan now I dont actually think this is good evidence espically the fact a trandoshan voice would be a pain to do for a whole game but if you listen to an interview they gave they specifically said you can customise you companions armour which means they have mapped different armours for them, so if they have mapped armours for a companion like a twelik or a trandoshan they could use them on a playable species which is true in the Tweliks case but could be just as true for the Trandosahns as well .......

I mean I'd settle for a Thressk if Jylan was off the cards,

Also Sith Purebreeds look awesome! and it looks like that species from episode 4 is in the game as well, the spy with the long snout that spies on luke on tatooine

Kubaz to precise what PJK's mentionning...

Because I'm rolling a human as my main, I'm not too fussed about -which- species we can get access to, or that all the species are pretty basic humanoid models, and species being restricted to class is a no-brainer, but there are two things I want to see:

a) I would like more than two choice per class (e.g Human + Chiss + something else for Imperial agent). I can see a lot of people picking aliens over human for a bit more variety, so it would be nice to have some choice there.

b) Also, I want to see some overlap between which class one particular species can be, with some exceptions. Obviously Chiss don't really fit in anywhere else, so I'm happy to see all Chiss be IAs. In terms of say, Twi'leks and Zabraks, however, they could probably fit most of the classes, so I would like to see them have at least two choices for some variety (so not ALL Twi'leks are smugglers).

I think anything less than that would be a bad move.

This is actually the main reason I haven't created my Bounty Hunter main yet. I had a feeling BioWare would pull some sort of stunt when it came to species, and I didn't want to jump ahead of myself and create a character that I couldn't use. Personally I think we'll probably get about a list of 3 species per class, but I still think it's a bad move on BW's part. Saying that I'm very happy that I'll be able to play as a Mirialan for my Jedi Consular alt.

I guess that's Vivaa as a Zabrak out the window then.

I can't say I'm too keen on Bioware's approach to species restriction. What's the reasoning behind it?

Reasoning? You expect reasoning? lol not flipping likely!

I don't even wanna know IF there is a reasoning behind this...

Just seen this on Darth Hater:

SeanD wrote:

There are combinations we haven't confirmed. James recently talked on this subject at Comic-Con International, though, and announced that there will be some restrictions. For the time being, the combinations we have announced you can count on. What other combinations will there be? That's an update for another day...

When questioned about the definition of the Zabrak's horns in the image above, BioWare's Sean Dahlberg responded with something interesting regarding character creation:

SeanD wrote:

While we haven't gotten into Character Creation yet (publicly), there are a variety of things you can adjust and customize for each of the species.

Well it's a relief there's actually going to be combinations at least.

Apparently swtor-station.com noticed the following at gamescom:

Quote :

We saw a Zabrak Trooper. It looks like this species will also be available for this class to choose.

depends was it an NPC or not?

Well I saw this one coming a mile away but Daniel Erickson has pretty much confirmed that all playable species will be near-humans:

Daniel Erickson wrote:

Hey Folks,

Sorry for the confusion. Booth chat is, let's be clear, not an official information release. What you got was one line of an extended conversation that was had between me and one of the players at the booth. We started talking about what made a hero in Star Wars and then, once that was clear, there were some jokes about what the romances would look like had we gone for the toybox approach of letting you play anything in the action figure line. That's the part of the conversation the quote came from.

The first part was merely a repetition of something we've said before. Namely that lead characters in an RPG must be something the player can relate to. There has never been a movie or major Star Wars series with a complete freak job as the lead and that's because dramatically it doesn't work. We don't understand what it means to be a giant lizard or a droid or a walking ball of jelly. We love the weird characters but they are always the sidekicks, not the emotional connection in the movie. To do an RPG that way every NPC you ran into would have to react to you depending on their own cultural bias and the entire "into the strange" adventure that is Star Wars would be lost as you would be the strangest thing in the room. People would constantly be asking you for information about your weird species and their emotional content that the vast majority of players simply wouldn't have and their ability to really BE this character would be nil.

So whether it’s Dragon Age, Mass Effect or The Old Republic, PCs are near enough to humans for us to crawl into their skin. They have generally understandable facial expressions, they don't look ludicrous speaking the basic language, they can interact with the rest of the galaxy without a constant "what the heck?" reaction from the NPCs. The freaks, the droids, the weird that we get to know and learn about--that's where our companions come in.

It's okay to turn to your companions and say "What are you supposed to be?" It's not okay to look in the mirror and say that.

In the future I can see a day where we would do a Trandoshan or Wookiee type story but it would have to be just that. Not a simple graphic swap where now your smuggler is a giant lizard man and nobody notices but a full class story where you learn what it means to be this strange alien and deal with the rest of the galaxy and their reactions. For the present, however, our heroes are our projections of self, headed into a galaxy of wonders and adventures.

I know that this isn't what some people want but I hope it helps them understand that game design isn't simply throwing random features into a game because they seem cool. You have to have a goal, a final holistic ideal that you're trying to hit. The Old Republic is, and always has been, about starring in your own version of a Star Wars movie. Not playing a background character from scene 5, not about living a humdrum day to day existence in the Star Wars worlds (there are no refreshers--sorry!) and not about pulling out the extended action figure line and getting to use it as virtual costume party. None of these are, by themselves, bad goals and could absolutely be fun in a very different sort of game. But in TOR they would work directly against what we were trying to achieve.

So did we limit species choice for romances? No. Did we limit them for our goal of bringing cinematic storytelling and the dream of living the Star Wars movies to the MMO space? Absolutely.

Hope that helps!

Daniel

[SOURCE]

I dunno sucks for people who really wanted those species but at least its sound reasoning. Seemed to me like he was eluding that it would be a possibility in the future and if it did happen would make their stories really cool.

Yeah, it's not WoW where gnome warlock,human warrior,dwarf paladin,
night elf druid and draenei mage generally share the same quests over and over again. Each class have it's own storyline, maybe there will be some special species quests.

IT can be the Achilles heel of the SWTOR however. It will take much more time and effort to make an expansion pack. They will have to extend each of the 8 story lines. If they add new class they have to fully voice another one. Mix it with the other ones. And all of this only as a bonus to normal expansion pack stuff.

But hey! It's BioWare, they like to push limits further and further

For me, I'll consider and alien character after game release. I always play most cruel and sinister race: human ;p

This is definitely where BW are going to get the majority of their negative comments, which is probably why they are being so tight-lipped about it all.

It makes sense that they want to "big up" all the new stuff they're doing before they hold their hands up and go "OK, fine - you can't play Wookies."

If they had said this at the beginning, the Gaming mags and the internet would have been awash with "Its BioWare, but is it really Star Wars? Even SWG allowed you to play the iconic races so really, is this a step forward?" or something else as short-sighted and contrived as that.

Now they have released all this info they can turn round and say "Sure, you can't play Wookies, or Trandoshan....yet. But here *holds up one of the loads of new features* is why, and instead you'll be getting this *holds up another new feature*, and this *and another*, and this *waves a fourth one about*. Plus we're not saying you'll never get to play them..."

I all fairness it could have been worse. I mean look at some of their other big titles: KOTOR, Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2. You get to play "Humans Only". Even some of their games where you get to play 'non-humans' (Neverwinter Nights, Dragon Age), they're still pretty 'near human' (Dwarves, Elves etc) - so its safe to say they're not deviating from their winning formula.

And without being devil's advocat... 80% of the people that played SWG, play a human, a zabrak or a b****y twilek... Not that you found plenty of sullustean, ithorian or mon cal.

Found these over the webz...

Spoiler:

Intresing, seems you can apply facial paints to your characters

Looks a lot like the Dragon Age character creator wearing a SWTOR themed-skin

The inclusion of a 'Background' is veeeerry interesting....

Old pics for intrepid beta leak hunters like myself, but cool nonetheless

Aye looks pretty nice and very dragon age-ish. Poor leaker he gonna have his account bloked before he validated the character creation