I was wondering how we should fill out the infobox for Fae. From what I've seen Fae is used as race and Winter/Summer as faction. But, by analogy to the Alfar, we could have winter/summer fae as race. this would help with certain fae who belong to one of the houses, since then their faction is whatever house they're in. if fae is race and house is fation we lose the winter/summer information, or is that not needed since it can be inferred from house? Or should the house not be included at all?
Just want to get it straight as I'll try to create at least basic stubs (infobox, pic, location) for the npcs I encounter in alabastra.
Gyumaou 16:22, April 11, 2012 (UTC)
According to my understanding regarding lore, we have to take Fae as a race. -- Snfonseka (Talk) 05:04, April 13, 2012 (UTC)
Right, I wrote a whole treatise here on what my take on races is, but then I realized I had some semantic issues so it was all invalid at some level. Here's my second, corrected (and somewhat shorter), take on this:
What exactly is a "race"? We currently use it as a replacement for a lot of different terms. Going by real-world notions, we've got White, Black, Hispanic, Asian, et cetera as races, but we're all part of the same species - Human. So, by this analogy, Almain and Varani and (Bassawin, Corthian, and Durek too[1]) are different Human races (though it might be more appropriate to call them ethnicities or tribes/nations). Dokkalfar and Ljosalfar (and Hironar) are all races of the Alfar (elven) species (after all they all used to be just Alfar before the schism). Similarly for Fae (again, a species), the races are Summer and Winter (don't know how to include the wild fae - the "monsters" and beasts - since they're further divided and quite distinct from the "civilized" fae), while Tuatha is just a faction - otherwise we'd be facing a "race change" when a Winter Fae converts to Gadflow's religion and is thereafter branded as Tuatha. Gnomes and are pretty easy since they don't seem to have any further sub-classifications (at least for now), while Dverga seem to be a race of Dwarves.
Thus, we should think of how we want to present all the information while describing characters. We'll all probably agree that using the word "species" in the box will look stupid and is not necessary. We've got race and faction fields, so I'm for using Dokkalfar/ljosalfar/hironar/almain/varani(/etc)/summer/winter as races, and tuatha as faction (with winter fae as race for such individuals). That would create a neater situation with regards to factions - the term faction implies a more political/purpose-based group, so things like Alfar military, any of the fae Houses, Warsworn, Tuatha, etc are definitely factions, but Winter fae or Summer fae do not really fit with the others (being a more biological/natural division).
Sorry for the huge wall of text, didn't mean to, it just came out like that. The above was prompted by my dilemma when describing Fae NPCs and a quick look at Category:Races.
Gyumaou 21:29, April 13, 2012 (UTC)
So what are we going to use within the "info-box" for Fae? -- Snfonseka (Talk) 04:10, April 17, 2012 (UTC)
I'll just weigh in, Fea is the race, Winter/Summer are racial factions. So technically speaking, it's not wrong to list a Fae who is a Winter Fae's race as "Winter Fae" and vice versa a Fae who's a "Summer Fae" as his/her race. That would apply to the Alfar, Humans, and the races out there. Turkeysocks 16:35, April 17, 2012 (UTC)
This is the Wikipedia description regarding "Race": "Races are distinct genetically divergent populations within the same species with relatively small morphological and genetic differences." -- Snfonseka (Talk) 07:23, April 18, 2012 (UTC)
This is basically what I wanted to say, but I used way too many words...
| Races: | Almain, Varani, Bassawin, Corthian, Durek, Dokkalfar, Ljosalfar, Hironar, Summer Fae, Winter Fae, Gnome, Dverga |
|---|---|
| Factions: | Tuatha, Alfar Military, House of Ballads, House of Vengeance, House of Pride, House of Sorrows |
the above should be clearer on what I meant (does not include info from Teeth of Naros, didn't have time to play yet). It agrees with wiki def and what Turkeysocks said., though as you can see I'm against using Human and Fae in the race field as it leaves out too much info. What do you two (or any other interested users) think?
We'd need to update Category:Races, Races, and lots of individual pages. I've only got a few minutes left today and might have no net access from tomorrow for a week. Fine with updating all at a later time if no one else wants to do it. Gyumaou 20:30, April 18, 2012 (UTC)
If we are going to remove both "Human" and "Fae" from races category, I am OK with this. -- Snfonseka (Talk) 09:32, April 20, 2012 (UTC)