Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Character poses seem a bit ridiculous - esp female

Every site should do this.

Once again I accept that it is humanly possible. And it appears that your example is not a contortionist, but someone who's pushing the limit of human flexibility.

It's close enough that I fully concede that point. Thank you for clarifying.

Though I am still against it contextually.

1. Even in the photo, the pose looks unnatural and uncomfortable. There's no practicality to it.
2. The character is a mage, not a "finesse" class where you could believe they have above average flexibility.
3. I'd like to know how people would feel if they gave the male inquisitor the same pose.

I would feel like it was there as a joke at the characters expense done to show how disempowered they by virtue of how absurd the pose is.

I respectfully disagree that the linked pose is out of character. People are rarely one-dimensional, which can lead to surprising decisions, even from people we thought to know better. I don't think that behaving a little silly at times and being sincere are mutually exclusive. In D:OS II, I've seen more realistic characters than in earlier games. They tend to have opinion on multiple things, and they often seem to make decisions based on multiple factors.

I think that everyone has done things they aren't proud of, or because they were just caught up in the moment. The reason for this irritation is that these decisions run contrary to our self-image. At the same time, this is also the reason why we are not one-dimensional. It is my sincere opinion that we should be more tolerable not only for others, but for ourselves as well.

Well It's a pose; the kind of thing you do in front of the camera or at a bodybuilding contest. It's not supposed to be practical, especially not when the person posing is a video game character.

It's outrageous and elegant which fits the art style. Combined with the levitating wands it gives the female Inquisitor a air of mysticism and style. The pose and the art-style of the entire game in general goes hand in hand as being "form over function", authenticity is not a consideration.

That's a trick proposition: the male inquisitor would most likely end up looking rather goofy in that pose which would go against the entire "elegance" part of the general art-style. However, I will bet you that if an artist could make the male inquisitor work that pose while looking just as elegant and stylish as the female inquisitor does then people would not care at all.

JoJo poses for everyone. Problem solved.

Out of character for what? It's a custom character. By definition, she has no personality until we provide input.

There's nothing about the act of choosing the inquisitor class that implies "sexy pose".

How is that a trick?

It would look goofy because you feel uncomfortable seeing a man in a sexy pose. Also, IcySteps tried to argue that "goofy" (in his words, "silly") was exactly the effect they were aiming for. I suggest you two work out what you want it to be.

If a university were trying to attract people to a dancing course, it makes sense that they'd put up posters of dancers looking a bit sexy.

Imagine a university tried to attract female students into medicine by putting up posters of female doctors in sexy poses. It's absurd.

The outfits? No problems that I can see - the elf aesthetic is literally 'covered in fig leaves' (except, inexplicably, for one cloth suit on a caster type).

The poses? Well, yeah, the inquisitor and battlemage poses of the female human leave me wondering whether they root out evil magic with the power of disco. But that falls under the header of 'absurd' rather than 'sexy'.

I don't know what sort of sex-negativity you are projecting here. Sexy men are sexy, not uncomfortable. Same goes for women. A man in that Inquisitor pose however would not be very sexy at all (unless he somehow managed to pull it off).

You do know that there is a difference between femininity and masculinity, right? Or are you the sort of person that thinks it's a problem that there are difference between "men routines" and "women routines" in dance? Or for that matter that there are differences between men and women in posing art.

It should also be further noted that the pose in question is not about looking sexy but about style and elegance, though the end result is the same: the man would probably not be able to pull it off using that pose and he would look goofy as a result (I'm still convinced it could be done if a good artist really tried, but it also depends on the character-model/art-style and not just gender; you would need a man that could look elegant/stylish in a feminine pose without ending up looking like a goof)

Why do you think that your poster parallel is accurate in this situation?
Please quote me where I've said that they wanted to make it look silly.

Also, what is your source that your example of a parallel is absurd?

On further inspection, the prize for 'huh?' poses goes to the male dwarf, specifically the fighter and cleric (who apparently think that shields are wielded with a foot), and the knight (with a 'heroically examining my fingernails' pose), with honorable mention to the female dwarf knight (who can apparently lean against a freestanding sword).

This kind of pose certainly would not be odd or goofy in the context of a male ballet dancer or a male gymnast. But of course, these men often catch flak for being "too feminine".

But the analogue ends there. It's not strange for a dancer to be a bit sexualised -- that's part of the art of dance. It is, however, awkward to sexualise a doctor just for being a doctor.


Your whole post was justifying the "silly" pose by arguing that it's just part of how Larian wanted to make the characters more than one-dimensional.


A university wouldn't advertise the career of a doctor with a sexy (or elegant) pose for a range of obvious reasons. Primary among those is that women don't choose to be doctors so that they can be sexy or elegant. Likewise, these poses are Larian's way of marketing these classes to new players. Let's imagine, for a moment, that Larian wants women to play D:OS2, and a woman (or man) chooses this class because she wants to play the role of an inquisitor, not a ballerina.


No one's arguing that this is the only silly pose. The subject of this thread makes the point that there are a lot of silly poses that can be improved on, but there are special problems with some of the female poses.

Ayvah, I did not say anything about Larian's intentions, only about my perspective on the topic. This is why there are no quotes.

I hate to say it, but you make some unfounded assumptions. If these assumptions are justified, you have not cited them. Can you provide statistical evidence that if such a poster was used as an advertisement by a medical school, it would discourage women students from enrolling, or that they generally don't want to be both doctors and elegant? This is not an argument whether there would be women who would not enroll due to the poster.

My understanding is that this pose paints an unattractive image of the female inquisitor for you, and very possibly, for many others. Personally, I would be on board if Larian decided to change it. I'm not fond of the thought of reducing someone... in any manner, really. I am, however, not sure why someone would never, under any circumstance, perform a pose like that.

May I ask what your personal motivation is against this pose?


Also, I wanted to react to your earlier post. I don't see how it is possible to create a truly custom character, given that the player can only choose from some premade options. Larian has a big say in the possible character permutations. That pose, in my opinion, is not out of character for someone so heavily influenced by Larian, and for most people.

You are setting up a huge double standard here by refusing to see the other side of the same coin.

Just like male dancers/gymnasts/teen-pop-stars/etc get flak for being too feminine so does male bodybuilders/wrestlers/action-heroes/etc get flak for being too masculine. And the problem is the same for women, maybe worse even as some people tend to be hilariously obsessed over how women should look or behave or be portrayed.

See the only issue here is that a certain percentage of people behave like idiots, imposing themselves and their subjective preferences on others instead of accepting things for what they are or try to be (hint hint). And they try to shame it down with some righteous speech of cultural superiority instead of admitting that the thing in question is just not what they are into. We have seen this over and over again with everything from rap music and metal to male ballet dancers to female football players to stylish character models in video games.

And as I said earlier this pose could certainly work for a male. If it was done right and he actually ended up looking as stylish and elegant as the female instead of just a goof. The pose draws on the strengths of femininity so a female body will have an inherent advantage with it, but that does not mean its impossible for a male to do the pose just as good. But the fact that it could work does not mean it has to be like that. The female pulls of her pose with style and so does the male with the pose he is given and that should be the end of the argument right there.


So what? This is a pose, it's purpose is to be stylish and elegant. Everything has a degree of being sexy or not sexy. If you find stylish and elegant to be sexy then good for you, but that does not mean it was main the purpose of the pose. Not that it would make any difference if the purpose of the pose was to be sexy.

If you meant to say female bodybuilders and other athletes. Absolutely. These are athletes. They are there to excel at their profession, not to meet our stereotypical concepts of masculinity or femininity.

Larian didn't seem to get the memo on this and decided to pose the inquisitor like a ballerina in order to emphasise her femininity.


First of all, my question was how you'd feel if a man had exactly the same pose. If you have to fix it then you have to admit there's something wrong with it. And there is something wrong with it. There's a reason why it's funny to do a model swap like this and this. (I think Quiet looks completely natural acting like Ocelot as long as you can ignore Quiet's irrationally skimpy clothing, but the inverse does not apply.)

But anyway, are there any examples of elegant poses that have actually been used for males in D:OS2 (elves need not apply)? Where are the ballerinos? It's certainly not the male inquisitor.

Don't know what is wrong with people, I like girls in chainmail bikinis since DnD and I enjoyed playing a muscular power fantasy berserker in nearly all crpgs. It's not like only females have unrealistic attributes to them in most games. It's just normal anthrophomized beauty standards turned into a pleasing aesthetic that male and female can enjoy.

Especially in our modern times that kind of stuff shouldn't be a problem anyway. Still heres an advice;
"Deal with it."

Your linked image has the inquisitor standing hipshot, contrapposto with his weight resting mostly on one leg. It's a pretty classical stance. See: David, Hermes and Dionysus.

That is a very stylistic pose.

Classically, posing reflects the strengths of the form. For male, this tends to be the solidity of the body - facing forward, emphasizing the hip/shoulder ratio, the musculature, broadness of the chest. Head can be facing forward or away, sometimes facing to the side allows for examination of the neck and shoulder musculature and emphasis there. For female, this is generally the curvature of the form. The thinness of the waist, broadening of the hip and bust, and greater flexibility of the body.

A simple google image search for 'male statue' and 'female statue' gives a decent contrast between the two. In general most male statues tend to follow a similar pattern of front-oriented facing, legs parallel, arms at the sides or perhaps one raised to chin height or pointing forward. In general most female statues tend to follow a pattern of legs close, one before the other, arm or arms raised high, torso turned or bent in such a way as to emphasize curves.

We are a sexually dimorphic species. To rigorously hold both sexes to the same standard of posture and capabilities is to ignore biology at best, or ignore thousands of years of cultural and artistic expression at worst. Art is a celebration of what makes the subject unique, of their strengths and their abilities. Physical, most predominantly, as we are visual creatures.

Let me just review some of the comments in this thread:

This is simply unacceptable on a basic level. Here's a basic introduction. If that's not already intuitive, then I can only assume you've never worked in a company where more than half of the leadership roles are filled by women.


Modern times? You don't think sexism is a contemporary issue? See the above article. Or try any Google search to refresh yourself with the latest research on these issues.


How many statues are there of female philosophers, or female heroes from Ancient Greece for us to emulate here?

Haha my last post apparently went straight over your head but nevermind, I can take your bait.

Your assumption that if the male took exactly the same pose as the female and it didn't look good on him then that means there is something wrong with the pose, is of course a huge fallacy. Anyone with even a decent knowledge of posing will know that the pose and the body must work together, if you change the body then you must change the pose. I can't just smile like Morgan Freeman and expect to look as good as him, I must find my own smile.

Anyway that's beside your challenge isn't it? It's not what you're fishing for. Okay then. You asked me how I would feel if the male had exactly her pose. Shockingly enough the pose, the gender and the model is irrelevant here, it's the result that matters. So my feelings about it depends entirely on how he would end up looking with that pose. If he is just as elegant, cool and stylish with that pose as the female is then great, I love it! If on the other hand he ends up looking like a try-hard with no style then it's a bad pose for him. Or it's a bad model for the pose, whatever way you'd like to see it.

But all this is is kinda beside the point, which is that you have a problem with the female pose drawing strength from femininity to look stylish while the man draws from masculinity. And you try to paint this as a cultural problem that needs to be dealt with rather than just acknowledging it as something that is just not for you. It's like the 90s conservative right all over again.

I enjoy hyperbole so I will leave you with a iconic, almost religious, image from the rather good movie Children of Men, and ask you how a male could pull that pose off without looking goofy*: Youtube link HERE(fair warning, semi-nsfw)

*yes I know I'm being unfair but that's kinda the point