SR4 has lost all credibility with me.

[Josh_Kablack]

Sorry if this is a decade late, I've avoided the system and am just now having my first adventures in Chargen - which is all in all a clunky overcomplicated mess where you spend Build Points to buy other pools of resources which you then spend to get abilities - and remember to check advancement costs before chargen because half this stuff costs more to buy up after chargen and half doesn't for no goddamn reason.

But hey, I like Champs and D&D and even Rolemaster so I can overlook those sorts of holdovers of poor design from prior decades despite my now adult schedule which allows only minimal time to acquire system mastery.

No what gets my goat in a truly visceral way is this little gem:

Only human characters may take the Elf Poser quality.

Only humans and elves may take the Ork Poser quality.

Elves can be Ork posers.
Orks CANNOT be Elf posers.

I get that one of the themes of the game is racism, but you shouldn't have to hard-code that sort of thing into the mechanics.

I mean either the two races look enough alike that characters of one race with appropriate attributes, disguise skill, futuretech cosmetic surgery and/or illusion magic can convincingly pass for the other race - or they don't.


:angryorc:

[Crissa]

I'm not sure what benefit there would be to an orc being an elf poser. No one would mistake them for an elf.

It would be a purely mental disorder, which I don't think the poser attribute is supposed to be...

-Crissa

[CatharzGodfoot]

I'm not sure what benefit there would be to an orc being an elf poser. No one would mistake them for an elf.

It would be a purely mental disorder, which I don't think the poser attribute is supposed to be...

-Crissa

What makes it possible for elves to pose as orks but not for orks to pose as elves? Are tusks really that difficult to have removed? And doesn't an ork have a lot more to gain by being mistaken for an elf than vice-versa?

[Psychic Robot]

You're throwing a fit because orks can't look like elves? Maybe you need to reconsider how you evaluate games.

[Josh_Kablack]

I'm not sure what benefit there would be to an orc being an elf poser.

5 build points.

No one would mistake them for an elf.

Then how the hell does anyone ever mistake an elf for an Orc?

You're throwing a fit because orks can't look like elves? Maybe you need to reconsider how you evaluate games.

That's a fair criticism, but I still think four beers is a fair way to evaluate any game.

And it gets extra creepy when you go beyond the game world and look at the descriptions of Orks as having large "litters" and the 2070 fad of "Orksplotation" entertainment. Gee, any minorities here in Reagan's America that get criticized for breeding too much and had "-sploitation" appended to their name as a genre?

Really what these rules are saying is that you can get points for your blue-eyed WASP character going around in blackface, and people will sometimes buy it, but should a character of African-american descent try to pass themselves off as "Cuban" or "Turkish" or "Tanned" that's preposterous and nobody would ever buy it.


:angryorc:

[TheFlatline]

Orcs are biologically built really differently than elves. How do you slender up a short, stocky orc?

You can chunk up an elf though. Just put football pads on him and some muscle grafts.

Really though, there are PLENTY of reasons to hate on SR4. You picked one of the most nitpicky reasons I've ever heard.

[Psychic Robot]

That's a fair criticism, but I still think four beers is a fair way to evaluate any game.

And it gets extra creepy when you go beyond the game world and look at the descriptions of Orks as having large "litters" and the 2070 fad of "Orksplotation" entertainment. Gee, any minorities here in Reagan's America that get criticized for breeding too much and had "-sploitation" appended to their name as a genre?

So what you're saying is that SR4 has some well-done satirical writing that deliberately mirrors America's cultural movements in a tongue-in-cheek manner.

Really what these rules are saying is that you can get points for your blue-eyed WASP character going around in blackface, and people will sometimes buy it, but should a character of African-american descent try to pass themselves off as "Cuban" or "Turkish" or "Tanned" that's preposterous and nobody would ever buy it.

It's easier to black up a white person than it is to white up a black person. You might whine and call it racism, but it's true.

[Juton]

Or it could be a misprint that no one has ever really cared about fixing.

[Orion]

PR, really?

I mean, "passing" is like a phenomenon and everything. You hardly ever hear white people talk about people thinking they're black.

I mean, I used to be mistaken for Native American, but I have a tribal Mexican grandparent so that's almost correct.

[Wesley Street]

Or it could be a misprint that no one has ever really cared about fixing.

That Negative Quality has been there since the first printing of SR4 and carried over to the 20th Anniversary edition. Though I'm puzzled as to why no one has mentioned the "Human Looking" Positive Quality.

SR4 blurs the lines between fluff and crunch. For example, in Runner's Companion the BP cost to play the oni (a rarer Japanese ork metatype variant according to in-game logic) is more than a baseline ork though it grants no mechanical advantages.

The comparison of orks to the African-American experience is a valid one. But they're also considered to be much larger in stature than the average human. In the game world it's pretty much accepted that trying to pass one off as a twiggy elf would be impossible without a very large sum of cash for total body surgery and genetic reprogramming. More than what 5 BP can get you.

[Wesley Street]

It's easier to black up a white person than it is to white up a black person. You might whine and call it racism, but it's true.

Get your head out of your ass. In India looking like the colonial oppressor is considered to be the ideal of beauty and there's an entire industry set up to cater to this mentality.

[mean_liar]

There are better ways of scoring Build Points.

I'm fond of the combo:

Bad Luck
SINner Criminal
Incompetent (unarmed)

[Starmaker]

Get your head out of your ass. In India looking like the colonial oppressor is considered to be the ideal of beauty and there's an entire industry set up to cater to this mentality.

That's horrible. Not whitening itself (let people do what they want with their skin, hair and eye color) but the message and its public acceptance.

[Lago PARANOIA]

It's easier to black up a white person than it is to white up a black person. You might whine and call it racism, but it's true.

I'm just repeating this quote to let it sink in for awhile.

In addition to what WS said, I wonder if PR knows how close he is to a 'they all look alike', because only someone who thought that would hold this astonishingly ignorant opinion.

[Username17]

Elf Posing is socially analogous to Jews who pass themselves off as White or something. Orksploitation is a different social movement entirely and is more akin to being a White Rapper.

The weird thing is not that Elves can be Ork Posers, it is that Dwarves can't.

-Username17

[Lokathor]

But aren't Orks over twice as tall as a Dwarf?

[CatharzGodfoot]

But aren't Orks over twice as tall as a Dwarf?

I think that orks are normal human height. At the very least, a made-up dwarf could pass as an ork with achodroplasia.

[Psychic Robot]

Black features cannot pass on white skin. They look completely foreign. White features on black skin work well, but the reverse is not true. Now you're going to shit yourselves about racism because I've dared to violate the sacrosanct "color blindness" politically correct bullshit you've all readily gobbled up.

White skin, black features.





Black skin, white features.

Yeah, one works, and the other doesn't. It's just how it is. Deal with it.

[shau]

PR, I have learned so much from you showing us that a supermodel is more pleasing to look at than some weird guy with no eyebrows. What other wisdom can you impart?

[Username17]

Wait, we're getting "information" from metapedia now?

-Username17

[Orion]

Frank, not sure what you're saying. That the picture is from Metapedia? If so, how did you find out?

PR,

Obviously nobody is going to mistake an African from Africa for a blue-eyed Scandinavian. But Sicilians are white and the "black irish" are white and Slavs are white. An African-American is "black" even if they have some rapist slaveholder ancestors, and plenty of them could be mistaken for one of the above.

Not to mention that, while your "white on black" models are indeed *attractive* to me, since like most white people I tend to find white features attractive, their beauty is an entirely *unnatural* one--there's something really obviously amiss with those pictures.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

The second picture that PR posted looks a lot like most of the white women from this area, except they tend to be rougher-looking and hairier while that woman is kind of pretty. The second picture would pass for a white woman pretty easily.

The third and fourth look like white douche-ettes with too much spray tan. They don't look like black women to me at all. (Again, as this is a college town, about 50% of the women here from out of town look like that, as well as a lot of guys. During school years, the douchebags converge and outnumber the native hicks).

I will agree that the first guy looks pretty laughable as a honky.

[Psychic Robot]

Maybe it's just me, then. But I generally have difficulty telling Hispanics and Asians apart unless, so...yeah, they all kind of do look alike, heh.

[CatharzGodfoot]

The first guy could be albino.

[Psychic Robot]

The first guy is an albino. As is the second.