The Mana World Forums

This is more of a question than a suggestion. I was just wondering if there had been discussions/plans about including races in The Mana World other than humans (as in orcs, elves, other generic fantasy races) if not as playable races then sentient races you could interact with. If not, then discuss!

We will certainly not have the tolkien standard races (human, elf, dwarf, orc) because that's what you see in every other run-off-the-mill fantasy game. Instead of that we will have humanoid races which represent different elements or combinations of elements:
http://wiki.themanaworld.org/index.php/Man

The Mana World Wiki wrote:Human
The latest derivative to have emerged from mankind's gene-pool is the Human race. Humans are comprised of two opposite elements: Water and Fire. I guess that makes them .. steam? .. whatever, we'll talk about it. They really started to pour out of Argaes at some point, though the first few Humans were probably born in Ancea and Tonori.

Makes more sense to me for humans to be a combination of all four elements, making them the ultimate neutral beings.

I do prefer this system to the Tokein-esque races though.

feline monstrosity wrote:Makes more sense to me for humans to be a combination of all four elements, making them the ultimate neutral beings.

I agree, but what would you do with water and fire?

When Humans and Demons were going to just be another two-element combination.. humans were to be water / fire .. demons would be earth / air. However, it's recently been made pretty clear that those combinations might not work very well. Because of this, Human and Demon are once again going to be based on all-four elements.

Though everyone will be capable of learning from any school of magic, each race will excel in their relative element while carrying an aversion toward their opposite element. (Tritan will be good with water magic and comparably sucky with fire magic)

If Humans are made from all four elements, it makes sense that they neither excel nor suck at any of the elemental magics. However, because it's likely that we're going to end up with non-elemental magic (healing, etc) .. I feel we have an obvious area of magical expertise for Humans to claim.

jaxad0127 wrote:I agree, but what would you do with water and fire?

I'd been trying to attribute an interesting physical form to water / fire.. the best I was able to come up with was steam. It's even more difficult to imagine the combination earth / air.. Since they are opposite energies, it's possible that under normal circumstances, they simply can't be combined.

Dave wrote:When Humans and Demons were going to just be another two-element combination.. humans were to be water / fire .. demons would be earth / air. However, it's recently been made pretty clear that those combinations might not work very well. Because of this, Human and Demon are once again going to be based on all-four elements.

Though everyone will be capable of learning from any school of magic, each race will excel in their relative element while carrying an aversion toward their opposite element. (Tritan will be good with water magic and comparably sucky with fire magic)

If Humans are made from all four elements, it makes sense that they neither excel nor suck at any of the elemental magics. However, because it's likely that we're going to end up with non-elemental magic (healing, etc) .. I feel we have an obvious area of magical expertise for Humans to claim.

jaxad0127 wrote:I agree, but what would you do with water and fire?

I'd been trying to attribute an interesting physical form to water / fire.. the best I was able to come up with was steam. It's even more difficult to imagine the combination earth / air.. Since they are opposite energies, it's possible that under normal circumstances, they simply can't be combined.

So, extending that (or clarifying it), humans and demons are equally all four. Humans excel in healing, demons in necromancy, and have an aversion to the other discipline.

Hm... If humans are humans, wouldn't it make more sense if they were earth and water? Maybe air too, because of the lungs and all that I mean, but fire? There's no fire in us, is there?

And why is it called "Man"? There must be a more equal name.

How should we generally refer to all of the races, instead of 'Man' ..? I don't think any women's rights are being violated here.

But just for humoring, here's a feminist friendly race listing:

Esper
Ifriton, Sparron, Talpan, Tritan

Sprite
Gaian, Glacean, Orelon, Raijen

People
Demon, Human

As for humans having no fire.. come on! What about some of our emotions?

Vink wrote:Hm... If humans are humans, wouldn't it make more sense if they were earth and water? Maybe air too, because of the lungs and all that I mean, but fire? There's no fire in us, is there?

And We are warm blooded

Dave wrote: As for humans having no fire.. come on! What about some of our emotions?

I have no emotion, I feel nothing; anger; glee; sadness...nothing.

And I know Platyna is the same...

Fireless == me

Ah. I thought that it was more "scientific" than "spiritual", so I didn't think of fire as connected to emotions. But I guess it's possible to see it that way, even though it's strange. Water is also emotions.

For the most part, I'm just trying to explain it any way possible.

Changing the topic slightly
I am in the process of changing part of the story in a way that makes it seem necessary (to me) to change the name of the Plant race. Currently, I have them listed as Gaian.

Does anyone have any suggestions for a new name for the Plant race?

Just for a frame of reference, these were the basic ideas behind the current names:
Glacean: obviously Glacier. Open to change.
Ifriton: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ifrit
Orelon: they're the metal race and they're covered in ore. Open to change.
Raijen: I'm not sure of the exact origin, but 'Rai' somehow relates to lightning or thunder, in japanese.
Sparron: obviously Sparrow.
Talpan: moles are in the family of animal called 'Talpidae'
Tritan: Triton was the son of Poseidon.. there are cartoon and game references not worth mentioning.


So be creative, but give people a chance to recognize the nature of the race by its name. Keep in mind that the plant race will probably be "vegetable-based"..

My first suggestion is Sprigen .. with a possible variation on the spelling.

Please do not break from the -on -an -en naming standard, unless you can suggest a complete set of new names for the races.

I like to see what words in Latin would be nice to create fanciful names.


Terra is Earth but of course Terran has been over used in Sci-Fi to mean Human.

Semperviren is Latin for evergreen
Sylvestris is Latin for "of the woodlands" it could be changed to Sylvestren

there are endless possibilities when looking at individual names

more English sounding names could be
Woodlan
Botany'en
or a more comical name could be Whitlen.
"Hey Bobby-jo watcha doing?"
"Whitlen."

but these are here to get the creative juices flowing, I would like to see what others could come up with.

Black Don wrote:"Hey Bobby-jo watcha doing?"
"Whitlen."

Another name came to me this morning, when I probably should've been focusing on work; Arboren

How about Fibran/Fibren?

From the word "fibre", if you hadn't guessed.