Torborg said:
Don't spoil this selection by adding fantasy stuff, that has never existed anytime anywhere on earth expect in the minds of people!!!
A good point. I'd forgotten that much of the fantasy and role-playing examples of women in armor exaggerates their femininity and thus we get women warriors in armor that looks like the smith forged an iron brassiere.
I'd like to continue avoiding fantasy elements like that except in mods and optional settings. That women would be hard to distinguish from men once they wear armor - well, that's realistic but as we've noted it tends to reduce the visual differences and therefore the feeling of variety. I've created male and female heroes and gender doesn't seem to matter to them much at all.
However, female armor - getting back to the point - need not be over-the-top feminine. It need not even be specifically female. The Sword Sisters seem to be wearing standard gear but you
know at a glance in combat they're women from their hair and Sword Sisters from their custom of riding white horses. That's a good quick
visual cue.
If a player could outfit a female character with distinctive armor and accoutrements it would at least keep these
visual cues. Examples: capes, engraved armor, helms,small banners and shield emblems. One wouldn't have to use them and they needn't be comic exaggerations.
Majestic7 said:
From what I've read, the few women who did fight in the old times usually done their best to look male.
I understand that and agree with the point. However, in this
mythological world where one can in days rise from a raw recruit to a highly skilled fighter, we need not be bound too strictly to too many real-world practicalities. If we did, our heroes would mostly be dead, wounded, maimed within days and what fun is that?
Majestic7 said:
I think all the armor you buy from shops should be for males. It might be uncomfortable for a female to wear, but then she might actually wish to look like a man on the battlefield. After all, another rule on the battlefield is "don't stick out of the crowd". If you do, everyone will be firing at you and otherwise concertrating their efforts to bring you down, thinking you must be somehow important..
In general, I heartily agree. That's real world thinking though.That's what I would do - as a 21st century man. In a game set in a fictional world where one can become a hero mostly by choosing to be a hero, then it wouldn't be so unlikely that one would have armor or weapons that would make one "stick out of the crowd." Our heros and elite troops aren't government-issued boot camp trained uniformed soldiers of mass armies, fighting similar enemies at a great distance away.
They're warriors determined to win merit in combat through one-on-one battles and it wouldn't be uncommon for the more elite to be outfitted with more distinctive gear.
Oh, hell. All I was thinking was of shield emblems with say trees or doves, a sash for my female hero, maybe a helm with some engraved wings, that sort of thing.
I didn't think it was a big deal. I wasn't asking for a magical red capes or "boots of speed."
Maybe every Caladrian just wear a standard-issue chainmail hauberk so they won't stand out, get sexually harassed, etc.
