Gender Aesthetics
Posted: Thursday, 9th June 2016, 22:23Sojobo- Crawl Tengu are quite birdlike, most notably in terms of their beaks. Now, anything with a beak will have a dashedly hard time breastfeeding, so I don't want to see any art giving Sojobo(F) breasts to distinguish her from Sojobo(M) because that will be patent nonsense.
Now, when it comes to hips, I admit we don't have conclusive evidence on whether tengu have opisthopubic pelvises. However, since they definitely have bird FEET, we should assume they are digitigrade, and as such are likely (but not certainly) to have a vertically-aligned synsacrum and as tengu are not based on the ostrich or the rhea, I strongly suspect the pubic bones in the pelvic girdle do not attach to each other, making egg laying easier.
As for the mystery of the thighs apparently concealed by the skirt, the proportions of the Tengu sprite lead me to believe that the scaly keratinization of the skin should extend AT LEAST to mid-thigh.Too much downy fluff and you'll end up drawing something akin to a kiwi bird.
Orc Priests and Urug- The off-the-shoulder, pectoral-revealing dress may be scandalous on a human female, but I believe that orcs have a lesser degree of sexual dimorphism than humans, and suckle their young from relatively small rows of teats on the lower abdomen. This is consistent with their piggish snouts, as opposed to the flat, easily smothered faces of human babies that require more space to avoid suffocation.
Vault Wardens- As they are in full armor, their aesthetics should remain unchanged, and excellent.
Aizul- Snakes have relatively little sexual dimorphism, but males tend to be more muscular, while females tend to be larger on the whole. Unless set in contrast to other Guardian Serpents, Aizul is unlikely to need any particular changes in her depictions, apart from the face of a female human.
As a curious note- while Naga are brown, the human portion of a Guardian Serpent is pale white. Given their similarity in scale coloration, with green and red seemingly an indication of subspecies differentiation, I am at a loss to explain this, except perhaps as a loss of pigmentation only incidentally related to other, more salient adaptations.
Grinder-practically nothing is known of demon physiology, other than that they are somehow able to produce Demonspawn with mortals and the greatest of the Pandemonium demons are gender-neutral.
Ijyb- Little is known about goblin and hobgoblin physiology, but as Ijyb is described as 'small and twisted,' and her sprite, relative to other goblins, seems to have slightly scrawnier limbs and a larger head, I think it reasonable to depict her as a regular goblin with features consistent with disproportionate dwarfism sometimes observed in humans.
Xtahua- Dragon physiology is somewhat akin to a hexapodal dinosaur, and given their carnivorous depictions I believe that they would possess a hip structure of the Saurischian style, as opposed to an opisthopubic hip structure that one might consider due to the wings and tail.
Snorg- troll physiology is highly varied from tale to tale, but in crawl they appear to have a red structure like an axolotl on their necks. Female axolotls tend to have a rounder, blunter appearance consistent with Snorg's corpulent sprite. Though not cold blooded, I question whether trolls are mammalian, and even if they were, the high metabolism of trolls seems to indicate that mothers would have little time to nurse offspring, and newborn trolls likely are capable of hunting for themselves soon after birth, as injury poses only a temporary threat to young, inexperienced trolls.
Now, when it comes to hips, I admit we don't have conclusive evidence on whether tengu have opisthopubic pelvises. However, since they definitely have bird FEET, we should assume they are digitigrade, and as such are likely (but not certainly) to have a vertically-aligned synsacrum and as tengu are not based on the ostrich or the rhea, I strongly suspect the pubic bones in the pelvic girdle do not attach to each other, making egg laying easier.
As for the mystery of the thighs apparently concealed by the skirt, the proportions of the Tengu sprite lead me to believe that the scaly keratinization of the skin should extend AT LEAST to mid-thigh.Too much downy fluff and you'll end up drawing something akin to a kiwi bird.
Orc Priests and Urug- The off-the-shoulder, pectoral-revealing dress may be scandalous on a human female, but I believe that orcs have a lesser degree of sexual dimorphism than humans, and suckle their young from relatively small rows of teats on the lower abdomen. This is consistent with their piggish snouts, as opposed to the flat, easily smothered faces of human babies that require more space to avoid suffocation.
Vault Wardens- As they are in full armor, their aesthetics should remain unchanged, and excellent.
Aizul- Snakes have relatively little sexual dimorphism, but males tend to be more muscular, while females tend to be larger on the whole. Unless set in contrast to other Guardian Serpents, Aizul is unlikely to need any particular changes in her depictions, apart from the face of a female human.
As a curious note- while Naga are brown, the human portion of a Guardian Serpent is pale white. Given their similarity in scale coloration, with green and red seemingly an indication of subspecies differentiation, I am at a loss to explain this, except perhaps as a loss of pigmentation only incidentally related to other, more salient adaptations.
Grinder-practically nothing is known of demon physiology, other than that they are somehow able to produce Demonspawn with mortals and the greatest of the Pandemonium demons are gender-neutral.
Ijyb- Little is known about goblin and hobgoblin physiology, but as Ijyb is described as 'small and twisted,' and her sprite, relative to other goblins, seems to have slightly scrawnier limbs and a larger head, I think it reasonable to depict her as a regular goblin with features consistent with disproportionate dwarfism sometimes observed in humans.
Xtahua- Dragon physiology is somewhat akin to a hexapodal dinosaur, and given their carnivorous depictions I believe that they would possess a hip structure of the Saurischian style, as opposed to an opisthopubic hip structure that one might consider due to the wings and tail.
Snorg- troll physiology is highly varied from tale to tale, but in crawl they appear to have a red structure like an axolotl on their necks. Female axolotls tend to have a rounder, blunter appearance consistent with Snorg's corpulent sprite. Though not cold blooded, I question whether trolls are mammalian, and even if they were, the high metabolism of trolls seems to indicate that mothers would have little time to nurse offspring, and newborn trolls likely are capable of hunting for themselves soon after birth, as injury poses only a temporary threat to young, inexperienced trolls.