That is a great idea, actually. An option for the player to tell someone he\she is transgendered.
But why?! Sexuality or gender is not a big deal in the FR. It never has been. If CHARNAME is RP'ed as "transgendered", that's fine. But why would such a thing be of enough note to actually be worth mention?
I would be cool for the player playing the character to be able to address it in a conversation in-game. And in a conversation with Mizhena, something like that could easily come up if it was the case. Natural part of the conversation, really. And it wouldn't be a big deal either.
Eh, I suppose.
It really seems like appeasement to me, adding that. Honestly, as I said earlier (and as @Purudaya mentioned), this whole situation feels like that. For some reason, a lot of folks feel as if their specific situations are more valid -- in a fantasy world setting, no less -- than the way that Mizhena presents transgenderism. Since transgenderism in FR isn't a big deal, there doesn't seem to me to be any reason to emphasize things to a greater degree than they already emphasized. It's just a "Whatever floats your boat, man" situation to me. I don't think Beamdog needs to cater any more or any less than they already had by simply creating Mizhena.
I agree with you Mate. But since Beamdog will rework on Mizhena and I have no voice in this choice, I try to imagine the goods things that can come from this. Beamdog have manage this whole mess way more better than a lot of other team before them untill now in my opinion. I don't blame them to do some appeasement because untill now they never throw the character or the writer under the bus. Not all company can say that.
(And maybe they discover the fact they also love this character and want expand her story, untill the rework came out I keep high spirit. I understand you concern in the same time)
Yeah tieflings get stick due to the demon blood. Demons are evil, so it is understandable. Drow elves too. they are pretty damn evil.
Imagine how it will be hard being a trans drow men (somehow it's a very good setting I my opinion).
That person would run into problems fast. The drow elves are very very bigoted. Especially the priestesses. A male saying he is a female in a male body or something. Not sure how they would react. Probably abuse the person like they do with any other non-cleric, I suppose.
If you say that being trans in the realms is not canonically controversial, why change the way Mizhena relates to the player?
Honestly, the problem to me with this statement is that, it's also not noteworthy. In other words, while I believe that being a trans person in FR is still probably rare (same as being a tiefling is rare)...it's also not a big deal. Some of the common folks may find a trans character weird (and your PC should have the option, imho, to react this way too, because your PC's roots may be "common"). But, really, the PC and other adventurers would most likely just be like, "Ok, whatever. Doesn't matter much to us." I mean, by the time you get to SoD, the idea is that CHARNAME has seen/heard/experienced a LOT. Also, cities like Baldur's Gate are cosmopolitan in every sense of the word. There's people of all kinds of backgrounds, races, creeds, etc., etc., etc. in the city. It bugs me that Mizhena is being made into a big deal. Really, it's not a big deal.
While I have faith that the new content will be sensitive to the myriad trans experiences posted in this forum, it does feel an awful lot like appeasement.
Yeah, to me, this is all of what it is. Imho, Mizhena should neither be emphasized or de-emphasized. And it feels like, in the name of appeasement, they're actually going to emphasize Mizhena. Mizhena should just be there, as-is. Maybe the dialog is a little abrupt, but so what? Maybe that's part of Mizhena's personality? Who knows? My question really is, why are we exploring the "roots" of a minor NPC in greater depth?
In fact people in FR are likely to have more problems or reactions to tieflings than any trans person (similar to drow for many people I imagine given their heritage, fair or not). Such as the rogue companion in NWN2 OC whose name escapes me for the moment. You have to rescue her from corrupt soldiers using her as a scapegoat and people are regularly suspicious of her and not to favourable that I remember.
Yeah, poor Neeshka. She bought an invisibility potion to stealth through the camp of guards but it wore off and they started bullying her and threatening to kill her. Your Charname and Khelgar the dwarf rescue her and even then Khelgar keeps making racist remarks about how you can't trust her kind.
In all fairness Khelgar is right. You can't really trust Neeshka.
You can, if you treat her right. She is actually pretty easy to get totally on your side, to where she fights with you in the final battle of NWN2 OC without requiring a whole lot on your part.
Yeah, poor Neeshka. She bought an invisibility potion to stealth through the camp of guards but it wore off and they started bullying her and threatening to kill her. Your Charname and Khelgar the dwarf rescue her and even then Khelgar keeps making racist remarks about how you can't trust her kind.
That's fairly typical of Dwarves. They are ok with humans, gnomes, and halflings; but they seem to be annoyed by and/or hate other races/subraces. In general, they tolerate just about everyone. What amuses me is that, if your CHARNAME is tiefling, he's all cool with you. But he keeps hating on Neeshka the whole game. She could give him fellatio, and his response would be to call her a whore afterwards. lol
Ah Neeshka that was it . I image that yes, trans people in a traditional drow society would not have it good and might not survive long. With it's extreme structural sexism the idea of a male really being a female or a female being a lowly male would likely not be tolerated though I could be wrong. Among Elistreae (sp?) followers things would be different I imagine.
It does raise a side question of why drow males haven't just for survival and advancement reasons attempted (if they were mages of some skill anyway) to permanently transform themselves into females and assume a female identity and higher status, even a Matron Mother (though I guess if they become to visible Lloth will know and take vengeance).
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
@Fardragon: Look, I have nothing against the English as long as you keep it to yourselves and don't act all Englishy all the time. This is a forum about a game. It's not the place to be shoving your radical ideology down our throats. If it really needs to be communicated that you're English, fine. But you have to do it subtly and with a good reason. Like maybe make an excuse to go shopping together and then casually call this a biscuit. It's not that hard to do this right. No one has ever just run up to me and started screaming "I'm English!" because it's just not natural. I know you think I'm a bigot now, but that's not even what this is about, some of us are just sick of hearing about it. We get it, it's 2016 and you're English. Enough.
@Fardragon: Look, I have nothing against the English as long as you keep it to yourselves and don't act all Englishy all the time. This is a forum about a game. It's not the place to be shoving your radical ideology down our throats. If it really needs to be communicated that you're English, fine. But you have to do it subtly and with a good reason. Like maybe make an excuse to go shopping together and then casually call this a biscuit. It's not that hard to do this right. No one has ever just run up to me and started screaming "I'm English!" because it's just not natural. I know you think I'm a bigot now, but that's not even what this is about, some of us are just sick of hearing about it. We get it, it's 2016 and you're English. Enough.
After PLAYING THE GAME and interacting with Mizhena, I'll share some of my impressions and misgivings.
Mizhena is a somewhat powerful cleric of a war god and holds rank in the most influential mercenary army in Faerun. As a cleric we can probably assume she is self aware and resolute (Wisdom stat, D&D willpower, common sense etc). Being that the Flaming Fists are a successful mercenary company and she holds rank in it, we can therefore assume she is capable and displayed ability to get her job done.
In my opinion Mizhena is confident, self assured and living with integrity. Of course she'll tell you about herself. It's who she is. She is not afraid to be who she is. She knows who she is and if it offends you, SHE DOESN'T CARE. That's your issue, not hers!
I am more concerned about people who cannot accept that in a fantasy world setting a Transgender, magic wielding servant of a war god would be confident and self assured enough to describe themselves honestly and openly.
It really disturbs me that some people seem to think that in order to seem more realistic, Mizhena should be furtive and secretive about who she is, because that would help make their imaginary character more comfortable.
There's obviously some issues here, but they are not with the character, the game, the developers or the writers, rather the issue is with some of the people who find a confident, self assured transgender person offensive. Seriously, get over yourselves.
Hang ups, you got em and I really don't care!
@Jarrakul edited post, because you are correct and I was having trouble expressing myself about my thoughts on Wisdom based characters in a D&D setting. Especially how that it might pertain to Mizhena being bold and forthright.
As a cleric we can probably assume she has developed a wise and measured approach to life(Wisdom stat).
I agree with every other word you typed, but this sentence... did you not get in the threat-off with her towards the end of the game? "Wise and measured" is not how I would describe Mizhena. Which, really, only supports the rest of your argument.
If you're going to add dialogue to Mizhena it should relate to Tempus (I'm not saying take away the transgender stuff). She's a cleric of Tempus, when you bring her the candle you get into a very Klingon style insult contest with her... because she's a priestess of Tempus. Tempus man, Tempus.
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
Because the character you are being open with could be a chaotic evil necromancer who murdered everyone in Nashkel and Beregost 2 weeks earlier. The player character can be a very evil person, you know.
Having now played the game for a bit, and having met Mizhena in the game, I'm quite baffled by this whole thing. From a European perspective, this whole thing looks like yet another example of two particularly nasty North American tendencies:
1) Incredible, downright incredible conservatism. Not quite the Dark Ages, but close. (Church, sexuality, abortion, what have you.) 2) A culture where a staggering amount of people walk around trying to get offended. By just about anything. And then venting their anger.
I fully agree that Mizhena is not a well-written character. But come on.
Having now played the game for a bit, and having met Mizhena in the game, I'm quite baffled by this whole thing. From a European perspective, this whole thing looks like yet another example of two particularly nasty North American tendencies:
1) Incredible, downright incredible conservatism. Not quite the Dark Ages, but close. (Church, sexuality, abortion, what have you.) 2) A culture where a staggering amount of people walk around trying to get offended. By just about anything. And then venting their anger.
I fully agree that Mizhena is not a well-written character. But come on.
Being offended on behalf of someone else scores you social points and Likes. Great way to paint a pretty picture of yourself.
Say, I'm at a game convention, and a game developper from a very famous game comes to me. "Hey, who are you?" he's like a really famous guy. "Hi, i'm Grim Thorik-Lefourbe, what an honor to meet you." "Grim Thorik-Lefourbe?? That's an unusual name, what's up with that?" "Well, Thorik's my father's name and Lefourbe is my mother's name so really it's just a mashup of both" "Ah, why would they need to mash up both names? Is that only in your country or something?" "No no, it's just because they divorced and it wasn't so smooth so I ended up having both names, no big deal though"
Famous guy replies, "wait, they named you Grim? I'm really sorry to hear that man. That must have been a rough childhood!:
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
Because the character you are being open with could be a chaotic evil necromancer who murdered everyone in Nashkel and Beregost 2 weeks earlier. The player character can be a very evil person, you know.
Irrelevent. In a culture where gender predudice does not exist, you would not expect to encounter it, no matter how evil the reputation of the person you where speaking too. The FR is not without it's predudices: species, diety, alignment and spellcasting ability are all things one might be wary of speaking about. Gender identity isn't.
Besides, a necromancer has to be intelligent. An intelligent evil person would evaluate each person they meet to see how best they could take advantage of them, irrespective of predudices. The most predudiced character you meet in Baldur's Gate is the paladin in the bar who attacks anyone who even associates with an evil person.
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
Because the character you are being open with could be a chaotic evil necromancer who murdered everyone in Nashkel and Beregost 2 weeks earlier. The player character can be a very evil person, you know.
Irrelevent. In a culture where gender predudice does not exist, you would not expect to encounter it, no matter how evil the reputation of the person you where speaking too. The FR is not without it's predudices: species, diety, alignment and spellcasting ability are all things one might be wary of speaking about. Gender identity isn't.
Besides, a necromancer has to be intelligent. An intelligent evil person would evaluate each person they meet to see how best they could take advantage of them, irrespective of predudices. The most predudiced character you meet in Baldur's Gate is the paladin in the bar who attacks anyone who even associates with an evil person.
It is about giving out information about yourself to a possible enemy. Not a gender thing.
How the character behaves, his goals, personality and motivation, is entirely up to the player. Just because your necromancer has a high Int score, doesn't mean he has to be played in one certain way. A low Wis score and a low Cha score would also be a factor, come to think of it.
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
Because the character you are being open with could be a chaotic evil necromancer who murdered everyone in Nashkel and Beregost 2 weeks earlier. The player character can be a very evil person, you know.
Irrelevent. In a culture where gender predudice does not exist, you would not expect to encounter it, no matter how evil the reputation of the person you where speaking too. The FR is not without it's predudices: species, diety, alignment and spellcasting ability are all things one might be wary of speaking about. Gender identity isn't.
Besides, a necromancer has to be intelligent. An intelligent evil person would evaluate each person they meet to see how best they could take advantage of them, irrespective of predudices. The most predudiced character you meet in Baldur's Gate is the paladin in the bar who attacks anyone who even associates with an evil person.
It is about giving out information about yourself to a possible enemy. Not a gender thing.
Giving out information which is of no possible use to an enemy, because society doesn't care.
Jan Jansen telling you he is an illusionist when he lives in Amn is giving out information that could be used against him by an enemy.
How the character behaves, his goals, personality and motivation, is entirely up to the player. Just because your necromancer has a high Int score, doesn't mean he has to be played in one certain way. A low Wis score and a low Cha score would also be a factor, come to think of it.
If you don't have a human DM, then you can play an intelligent character as an idiot, or an unintelligent character as a genius.
But prejudice of any kind is based around placing people into groups, then making assumptions about them based upon that group. An intelligent or wise person of any alignment would know that that is an ineffective method of evaluating someone.
Thus your chaotic evil necromancer (who must have a high int and a high wis in BG) might murder someone because they are in the way, or they have a use for the body, or just for fun, but it is the Int 3 LG Paladin who is most likely to strike someone down out of prejudice.
She doesn't walk up to you, she's the cleric in the camp, you need to ask her about her name, she says she made it herself, and then if you ask her about what was wrong with her previous name, she'll tell you she was born a male and realised later she was a woman so she chose a new name.
Not "Walking up to complete strangers and explaining her "situation" right away." at all.
And not odd behaviour at all when her gender is no big deal, as I've said on other posts, I've had the same kind of dialogs happen to me about my family name and I had no problem at all saying what it was about because having divorced parents is no big deal in the 21st century (in my country at least).
No she doesn't actually do the walking herself. But she is still being frightfully open to someone she doesn't know at all.
It felt very very rushed. Hence why the developers are adding to the character in an upcoming patch.
Why would you not be open in a society where gender identity is a non-issue? It's like me being open about being English.
Because the character you are being open with could be a chaotic evil necromancer who murdered everyone in Nashkel and Beregost 2 weeks earlier. The player character can be a very evil person, you know.
Irrelevent. In a culture where gender predudice does not exist, you would not expect to encounter it, no matter how evil the reputation of the person you where speaking too. The FR is not without it's predudices: species, diety, alignment and spellcasting ability are all things one might be wary of speaking about. Gender identity isn't.
Besides, a necromancer has to be intelligent. An intelligent evil person would evaluate each person they meet to see how best they could take advantage of them, irrespective of predudices. The most predudiced character you meet in Baldur's Gate is the paladin in the bar who attacks anyone who even associates with an evil person.
It is about giving out information about yourself to a possible enemy. Not a gender thing.
Giving out information which is of no possible use to an enemy, because society doesn't care.
Jan Jansen telling you he is an illusionist when he lives in Amn is giving out information that could be used against him by an enemy.
How the character behaves, his goals, personality and motivation, is entirely up to the player. Just because your necromancer has a high Int score, doesn't mean he has to be played in one certain way. A low Wis score and a low Cha score would also be a factor, come to think of it.
If you don't have a human DM, then you can play an intelligent character as an idiot, or an unintelligent character as a genius.
But prejudice of any kind is based around placing people into groups, then making assumptions about them based upon that group. An intelligent or wise person of any alignment would know that that is an ineffective method of evaluating someone.
Thus your chaotic evil necromancer (who must have a high int and a high wis in BG) might murder someone because they are in the way, or they have a use for the body, or just for fun, but it is the Int 3 LG Paladin who is most likely to strike someone down out of prejudice.
Doesn't matter if it of use. People do tend to be a bit more reserved around mass murderers or whatever.
A computer game can't convey half as many dialog options as a table top game can, sure. But a rude reply to the Mizhena for evil characters isn't that much to ask. The game basically turns you into a kind and understanding character with no other options available.
I didn't mention a thing about placing Mizhena in any group. Stop trying to play the bigot card.
A paladin would strike down someone evil, most of the time, yes.
Comments
(And maybe they discover the fact they also love this character and want expand her story, untill the rework came out I keep high spirit. I understand you concern in the same time)
Yeah, poor Neeshka. She bought an invisibility potion to stealth through the camp of guards but it wore off and they started bullying her and threatening to kill her. Your Charname and Khelgar the dwarf rescue her and even then Khelgar keeps making racist remarks about how you can't trust her kind.
What amuses me is that, if your CHARNAME is tiefling, he's all cool with you. But he keeps hating on Neeshka the whole game. She could give him fellatio, and his response would be to call her a whore afterwards. lol
It does raise a side question of why drow males haven't just for survival and advancement reasons attempted (if they were mages of some skill anyway) to permanently transform themselves into females and assume a female identity and higher status, even a Matron Mother (though I guess if they become to visible Lloth will know and take vengeance).
(Using mod to be fair not really her fault)
Mizhena is a somewhat powerful cleric of a war god and holds rank in the most influential mercenary army in Faerun. As a cleric we can probably assume she is self aware and resolute (Wisdom stat, D&D willpower, common sense etc). Being that the Flaming Fists are a successful mercenary company and she holds rank in it, we can therefore assume she is capable and displayed ability to get her job done.
In my opinion Mizhena is confident, self assured and living with integrity. Of course she'll tell you about herself. It's who she is. She is not afraid to be who she is. She knows who she is and if it offends you, SHE DOESN'T CARE. That's your issue, not hers!
I am more concerned about people who cannot accept that in a fantasy world setting a Transgender, magic wielding servant of a war god would be confident and self assured enough to describe themselves honestly and openly.
It really disturbs me that some people seem to think that in order to seem more realistic, Mizhena should be furtive and secretive about who she is, because that would help make their imaginary character more comfortable.
There's obviously some issues here, but they are not with the character, the game, the developers or the writers, rather the issue is with some of the people who find a confident, self assured transgender person offensive. Seriously, get over yourselves.
Hang ups, you got em and I really don't care!
@Jarrakul edited post, because you are correct and I was having trouble expressing myself about my thoughts on Wisdom based characters in a D&D setting. Especially how that it might pertain to Mizhena being bold and forthright.
Overall negative reception? Since when do a minority of people equal an overall reaction? Did I wake up in bizarro world again today?
1) Incredible, downright incredible conservatism. Not quite the Dark Ages, but close. (Church, sexuality, abortion, what have you.)
2) A culture where a staggering amount of people walk around trying to get offended. By just about anything. And then venting their anger.
I fully agree that Mizhena is not a well-written character. But come on.
Besides, a necromancer has to be intelligent. An intelligent evil person would evaluate each person they meet to see how best they could take advantage of them, irrespective of predudices. The most predudiced character you meet in Baldur's Gate is the paladin in the bar who attacks anyone who even associates with an evil person.
How the character behaves, his goals, personality and motivation, is entirely up to the player. Just because your necromancer has a high Int score, doesn't mean he has to be played in one certain way. A low Wis score and a low Cha score would also be a factor, come to think of it.
More seriously she's a Tempus Priestest. I think she's not afraid about that.
Jan Jansen telling you he is an illusionist when he lives in Amn is giving out information that could be used against him by an enemy.
If you don't have a human DM, then you can play an intelligent character as an idiot, or an unintelligent character as a genius.
But prejudice of any kind is based around placing people into groups, then making assumptions about them based upon that group. An intelligent or wise person of any alignment would know that that is an ineffective method of evaluating someone.
Thus your chaotic evil necromancer (who must have a high int and a high wis in BG) might murder someone because they are in the way, or they have a use for the body, or just for fun, but it is the Int 3 LG Paladin who is most likely to strike someone down out of prejudice.
But prejudice of any kind is based around placing people into groups, then making assumptions about them based upon that group. An intelligent or wise person of any alignment would know that that is an ineffective method of evaluating someone.
Thus your chaotic evil necromancer (who must have a high int and a high wis in BG) might murder someone because they are in the way, or they have a use for the body, or just for fun, but it is the Int 3 LG Paladin who is most likely to strike someone down out of prejudice.
Doesn't matter if it of use. People do tend to be a bit more reserved around mass murderers or whatever.
A computer game can't convey half as many dialog options as a table top game can, sure. But a rude reply to the Mizhena for evil characters isn't that much to ask. The game basically turns you into a kind and understanding character with no other options available.
I didn't mention a thing about placing Mizhena in any group. Stop trying to play the bigot card.
A paladin would strike down someone evil, most of the time, yes.