Suggestions

[quote name="VeiledOverdose" date="2019-07-14 17:21:45" ] [quote name="Xela" date="2019-07-14 08:52:19" ] Oh here we go, told you this would happen if the wendigo got changed, I hope this isn't actually a serious suggestion. But NO SUPPORT anyway, the current name of the familiars and coliseum venue doesn't hurt anyone. [/quote] This. This is why I was iffy on the whole Wendigo thing to begin with. Because I just had a feeling people would try to get more names changed even if it is a different situation. No need to do that, there was a good reason for the Wendigo change it seems. [quote name="Greyjoy" date="2019-07-14 12:31:46" ] No support. None, at all. The word "golem" has been used in this context (to describe a creature made from a usually inanimate substance) for long enough, without complaint, that changing it now would be absurd. And I don't mean on FR, I mean on e v e r y t h i n g. Pokemon, Discworld are two that literally come to mind immediately. You know what it's called when we entirely separate all cultures and ban any form of inspiration..? Segregation. Let's not do that. Segregation is bad. Because honestly, where does that stop? Do the kitsunes go, too? The baku? You're allowed to be inspired by the folklore of cultures not your own. The world would be a very sad place if we weren't. For that matter, I'd like to see some stuff inspired by Irish folklore. Our cool creatures don't get repped nearly often enough. [/quote] [quote name="Trix" date="2019-07-14 09:38:09" ] I think folks are having difficulty understanding the difference between "this is part of __ culture" and "this is SACRED to ___ culture." [/quote] Sums up how I feel. No support for this suggestion. [/quote] Basically all of this, I was iffy over the Wendigo, but I can get over it But the golems??? Buddy, pal, bucko, friend, NO They aren't even exclusive to Jewish culture, they're everywhere... There's so many interpretations of the "golem" jews have their own, and so does fr No need to change anything

[quote name="MurkyDepths" date="2019-07-16 05:13:50" ] So how many people do we need for the change to take place? I can't find the old wendigo thread but I think there were only like three people who said they were actually natives and supported the change. [/quote] Suggestions are not implemented based on popular vote. Posts that only say Support or No Support are deleted for this reason. We discuss how changes will affect the community and the gameplay. People who don't interact with either of these things can't even begin to guess how this will play out.

I knew this was going to happen lmao.
Why don't we just delete familiars and the coliseum as a whole while we're at it, no?

In other words - no support from me, fam.

Seriously...where do we draw the line for what's an acceptable mythological figure and what's not? Even among the culture a particular creature is from there will be disagreement in whether it can be used out of context in other things

While I was ok with the wendigo name change, this was my worry and the only reason I would have said "no support" on that thread. Staff gave an inch with changing the name, and now people will demand a mile or 10. Now there's going to be controversy if they change creature names/remove the monsters of one culture, but not another.

Just...enough. I can believe staff may not have known about the importance of wendigos to Algonquian culture (I didn't till I read that thread), but we can't remove all mythos creatures from the game. Unless you'd like to have a game about breeding/battling basic lizards against all real world creatures. Sounds pretty boring to me.

I would like to point out one thing: Everyone is saying 'we can't remove all the creatures from the game' or 'why don't we just delete the game!'

However, no one is calling for the removal of ANY creatures. Simple name changes. Lets know blow things out of proportion and change the entire idea behind the suggeston.

While I don't think names need to be changed unless they ARE offensive to players, I do feel that if one name is changed, then others should at least be considered.

It is easy to say 'well a person from X religion said it is okay!' but many religions have various sects so X may be from a sect that doesn't have the same beliefs as Y.

We DO have one person who has said they were Jewish and would like the names changed, but didn't expect it.


Thinking about this, as I said in my first post, I feel that names of beings that are sacred or figure prominently in any religion should be at least considered. No, not all names would need to be changed. Dragons are not mono-cultural, as many cultures had dragons. I think the same can be said of unicorns.

Not only would it allow all players to voice their concerns about certain names they may have felt uncomfortable with, but didn't feel comfortable mentioning (do you know how scary it can be to say 'I am of X faith, and have been uncomfortable with Y items since they came out'?), but by changing the names to ones made up by the developers (or even suggested by the player base) it would give Sornieth a more unique feel than Earth 2.0 but with Dragons. (not that it feels like that to me, but...)

Words change meaning over time and that's what happened to "golem". It was originally a jewish term, but today it's become the catch-all term for pretty much "a being made of inanimate material that was given life by way of magic". It's simply not an exclusively jewish term anymore. Practically every fantasy setting from the last 30 or 40 years has a golem somewhere. We could start with DnD and other fantasy RPGs, go over to games like Warcraft, Diablo, Dragon Age, etc. and end at Minecraft. We should also include the multitude of books, movies, comics and TV series that have a golem/golems incorporated in some form. Golems are a staple of fantasy settings, from high to urban. Why would FR need to change the golems' names? Because it's smaller than big game producers? I can understand the now-pronghorn familiar, but golems? What would the names be changed to? I've seen automaton being suggested, but that doesn't quite describe something as well as "golem", because an automaton can be virtually anything that isn't a biological creature and moves autonomously according to a preset sequence.

So no support. With this we're starting wars over what words belong to who and that's a can of worms that really shouldn't be opened.

Yup. Knew this would happen. I am part Native and never supported the Wendigo name change, but FR opened up the Controversy door, and now all that's left to do is watch Pandora's Box spill out.

Anyways, I'm neutral on this. I don't like name changes unless it's super early on like a day or so after release, a week at the latest like how they changed Jupiter and Saturn incredibly quick after it was released.

PLEASE do not ping, quote, or subtly call out my post. I do not wish to debate or start a discussion for stating my opinion. Thank you.

might as well stop using the word dragon too since they are sacred in cultures all around the globe.

it's a fantasy game, it obviously takes aspects from multiple cultures and fairy tale creatures and they are not mocking or disrespecting them, they are taking inspiration.
No support.

still unsure if OP is trolling or maybe just trying to start a debate (ngl this would be about the worst way to do it.) Currently doing some research into the golem (mean I'm not Jewish myself but I can least do research) because why not, also because I like reading about various mythological beings, there are loads of cool beings that I'd love to see as familiarsXD I do agree FR really...shouldn't have done it because now we're going to get this sorta thing... The only familiar I really think needs a name change would be the rainbow sprite. [quote]While I don't think names need to be changed unless they ARE offensive to players, I do feel that if one name is changed, then others should at least be considered.[/quote] Also this the reason I didn't support the wendigo name change was also due to the fact the wendigo has already been in mainstream media for various decades, hell the only reason I even learned about their existence was because of a Lost Tapes episode. On a side note I don't really think we should demand OP to tell us if they themselves are Jewish or not, I mean seems pretty invasive to ask in the first place, I do understand why people would like to know, but yeah remember OP is a person too and we shouldn't force them to give us info if they don't want to

This seems to have turned more into a "got'cha" thread than anything else. Although it's nice to see some actual discussion starting to pick up.

On the topic of name changes in general -

I'll echo myself from the previous discussion on the topic and say that the Proghorn wasn't the first familiar to have it's name changed based (if even partially) on an outcry from the userbase.

As many in this thread are probably familiar with (since it's been brought up in the Wendigo renaming thread, the discussion thread that followed, this thread, off-site, etc) the Serthis series were originally named after the Naga and then changed briefly to Lamia and then finally to Serthis. This was done in 2013 and the reasoning on staffs part was that the Naga/Lamia mythologies didn't match up to their planned execution of the familiars - however, looking at the thread that was said in - it seems that there was some off-site (tumblr) posts about the familiar and it's name that many believe caused the actual change - perhaps along with the reasons staff ended up giving.

I bring this up because this means that any precedent that people believe the Proghorn name change presented - was here already.

The general rebuttal is that "well 2013 was a long time ago - no one knows about it so it doesn't count"

To which I have to reply that you know about it now. Many users know about it now thanks to all these discussions. So I don't see why that matters really. While the userbase has changed over the years, based on the Serthis name change thread, many users had similar worries that it would create a slippery slope or an unfortunate dynamic between staff/the site and religion/culture. Looking at the results though - the literal empty search results for similar changes - means that either the worry was unfounded or that those threads were otherwise removed.

The only other argument is that it was from a time where FR was still basically in its infancy. No open registration, smaller userbase, more staff interaction, etc.

Which yes, I can agree that does present a different environment between that change and the Proghorn one. FR has seen its fair share of spam posts, trolls, etc - and that number has only grown since 2013. So it isn't surprising that the reaction to change would be different - a more widespread userbase, more thoughts, more people willing to take actions (good or bad) revolving around the subject, etc. However, the FR staff is still the same. They still operate mostly the same way. There stance hasn't really shifted on this topic that I can see. So more users discussing, suggesting, etc probably wont do much in terms of 'forcing' a change. It just means that there are more perspectives to take in and potentially more trolls to deal with.

While they don't exist in the search anymore (that I can find anyway) sometime between 2014 (my join year) and now there were at least two separate threads asking about the removal or change to the Unicorn series of familiars. At least one of them was a serious call for change. Which, obviously wasn't successful or at the time, taken seriously. So while other things could potentially start some sort of change ball rolling, it doesn't really seem to work like that.

To sum up, I'll quote my post from the discussion thread

On the topic of Golems specifically, I do not have any specific connections with the Golem or with the Jewish culture/faith. So giving my opinion on that wouldn't be too terribly useful. Which is why most of this post is discussing the general idea and not the familiar specifically.

If this is something that the affected people do feel needs to change/be looked into then I would, of course, welcome their input! Although, I feel perhaps a more... well put together thread would be a better place for it since the OP here is rather lacking and the actual discussion pretty thin.