Customize a character to look like another race?

Tulima

Niküa has a Polynesian influence while Dunir seems to be more European/nordic. Should you be able to customize a Dunir character to look like a Nikuan with regards to skin, size, etc.

The same goes for the human races as they are based on European and middle eastern cultures.

Should there be a limit for how much you can customize a character? If yes then how far is too far?

ptitoine

I do think few thing should be tied to the said race. Otherwise you are not a dunir if you want all Nukua look but bigger size. Few stuff should be race neutral but some other should be for the said race only.

In my opinion

Merek

I believe characters have two categories they can take from, racial traits, such as skin tone, height and musculature, then cosmetic traits, such as hair, tattoos and piercings. By default, the Nikua are much darker and leaner than the Dunir, those are racial traits. A Dunir shouldn't be able to achieve the darkness of the Nikua, just as a Nikua shouldn't be able to be as wide and bulky as a Dunir. The reasons for that are in their individual lore, Nikua are freeman hunters, while the Dunir are mountain dwelling smiths.

For cosmetic choice, we have hair. Hair "type" may be influenced by your race, but you can cosmetically style it anyway you wish, that goes for tattoos, piercings and so on. These are all racially themed, but not racially bound. Even if I chose to play as a Dunir, I shouldn't have access to Nikua themed hair during character creation. If I were to find a barber, stylist or whatever in-game, within a Nikua styled node or similar, THEN I should be able to use their hairstyles.

TL;DR: To keep the races individual, certain things such as skin tone, height and musculature should be locked per race. Without clear racial differences, we'll have a sea of "Vault Dwellers", hell, we may still get that.

Songcaller

You might be able to make a half breed or mid point between each split. Of course, it wouldn't work for racial half breeds only the splits. I wouldn't expect a perfect match but surprises happen all the time. I'm not certain what the options will be but I did enjoy the thread.

JustVine

The only thing I really want as racial dividers are the races individual size range, and the ranges on body proportions/ratios. Everything else I feel like should be free game to all races.

If you have those things locked you can still get a general 'rule of look' in terms of silhouette, without cutting off customization options. This would mean indirectly that things like ear types and brow lines will tend to not be that alterable since they have smaller ratios they can be adjusted by relative to the rest of the face.

For example a Renkai and a Vek might be able to get pretty close in look between each other, but their nose ridge and brow line relative to the way their jaw rests will be hard to get just right. The Renkai's nose is simply too upturned relative to it's thick brow ridge and short nose bridge, that you'd really have to break outside Vek proportions to match since their brow line is more sloped and their nose bridge has way more realestate. Yeah there will probably be some overlap on any given characteristic, but it will look different enough in composite that you know they are different races even if it's just subtly so. You'd still have a stylized face for the race, but it's in a subtle way that still allows for a ton of freedom and wonkification.

I maintain this is the best way to achieve a distinction between the races while maximizing customization. If you really want a 'thicker line' between the races your going to have to make some serious cuts in possible customization.

234Graph

I think all that should be left to the tulnar race