This is a hard thing to deal with, though! Different people define “sexy” based on different things. It turns out the concept, “just put a dude in a loincloth and it’s equal” isn’t attractive to all women, and I’ve seen it argued it’s more appealing to male power fantasies than general female tastes.
Examples of characters people get thirsty for but aren’t ever portrayed as “sexy” in media include Disney’s Robin Hood, Gadget Hackwrench, Mr. Clean, Han Solo, and the Queen Alien xenomorph. The rules of attraction don’t really follow a lot of guidelines.
So I don’t like the scale you propose. I don’t think GoW has to be either “no skin” or “all skin”. There’s a lot of room between those extremes, characters can still be very attractive in clothing, and even when a character’s in something skimpy whether it’s “a horny image” has a lot to do with framing, pose, and composition. For example, the Olympics don’t have to ban swimsuits to “protect” children or their image.
I feel like this one would be easier to answer if we had more troop lore. NB isn’t always something expressed through clothing.
I’m sorry I did not answer your question specifically. I was speaking more to the point that I do not like labels, and the damage they may cause.
Case in point:
I am neither an Anti-vaxxer nor a Republican. Why should I care if this individual refers to them as animals? Because I feel labels are wrong, here of all places.
“oh, but it was a joke”. He already railed against jokes in the April Fools thread. But now it’s ok. Here, of all places.
You can’t discuss the OP’s topic without gender being part of that discussion. This is supposed to be a civil discussion about game art. I think most of us are mature enough to handle gender “labels” as it pertains to diversity in art.
On the whole pose, framing, composition etc. and some people liking loin cloths and others not, I feel like this picture is relevant. Same guy, all the ladies (and most the men) are swooning for one of these characters and no one is for the other.
Yeah I’m not against a particular kind of art or suggesting one should be promoted over the other, just that saying everything should be “equally sexy” is a very difficult thing to define. I think that target’s hit better if the art is varied and showcases numerous body types/clothing styles/poses/etc.
edit
Actually I’m wrong, I’m against the Frost Archer and Arctic Fox kind of art. Everything else is probably fine.
I agree with this in principle, but I will add that I think it’s pretty difficult to discuss gender as it pertains to the art simply because it can be dangerous to assume things by appearances alone.
Our moth friend, for instance—we the playerbase really have no idea how the mage identifies, whether s/he (it? Some other pronoun?) would like being called “twink” or be offended by the same.
So I think that’s at least one legitimate reason for being label-avoidant. I get the slippery slope—avoiding the use of “labels” (and adding quotation marks) can lead to a dismissal of same, and this is bad because it is not good to not take people’s identities seriously—but slippery slopes are also a fallacy for a reason. Best not to give in to them, probably.
All that said: Moar bewbs plz. All kinds. Big, small (especially small! Some of us like them that way), dark-skinned, appropriate to species (the Umenath post above really had me goin’!), etc… I like most of the art in the game, and I wouldn’t mind more of the same. But I’d also appreciate more diversity—so long as that doesn’t lead to some Puritanical standard(s) where no one gets to have fun ogling what they like.
Let’s talk a bit about navels. Why some characters have navels? Merfolk Mermaid and Scylla? Divine Mercy? Fey Puka and Queen Mab? Stryx Harpy Mage? Naga/Construct Treachery??? To name just a few.
I, for one, am envious of Irongut’s ability to eat Paladin after Paladin and not gain an ounce. Makes me feel bad … I can’t even eat a box of donuts without getting sick
Appologies for not reading all of the nested replies here/if this is redundant…
I think there is a lot of diversity in troop portraits but they don’t always fit with @Kafka & @Saltypatra enforcement of peeegeee, similarly (not to be a puritanical edge lord) what part of plays well with udders et al is peegee?
