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Why are Zabrak colors different for Empire and Rebpulic?


Mantang

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On the Republic side Zabrak seems to be extremely underplayed and I have been telling people right along that they should create more and then I tried creating one myself.... What is the reasoning that the Empire gets to make Zabrak that are cool colors and have black tattoos and Republic is stuck with human skin tones with off-color facial markings? Why if you're not bound to be Dark Sided if you play Empire should only Empire get the "evil looking" character creation options?
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The black/red markings you see on the Zabrak are Sith tattoos. It makes perfect sense from my point of view.

 

What DOESN'T make sense is why Bounty Hunter Zabraks still bear Sith Tattoos if they've never been Sith. That's just weird and it would mean that at some point, those particular Zabrak Bounty Hunters would have been Sith.

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I'm actually fairly certain the the tatoos are more of an ethnic / traditional thing and have nothing to do with the Sith. Along those same lines, i think different 'tribes' of zabrak have aligned with each of the different factions, hence you see different skin tones for each side. Someone more versed in lore could probably answer better than I, but this seems to be what I can find on the subject.
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Good replies. I'm just crushed I don't have a better reason to promote Republic Zabrak creation... The only reason I could see a person rolling one is just because they have a love of the race regardless of aesthetics and how often do you see that happening.... :confused:
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Good replies. I'm just crushed I don't have a better reason to promote Republic Zabrak creation... The only reason I could see a person rolling one is just because they have a love of the race regardless of aesthetics and how often do you see that happening.... :confused:

 

Actually, one good reason to play one on the Republic side is you can look more or less Human (if you want to) and still get to play the "alien" responses in the conversations. Although the fact that Humans still refer to the other species as "aliens" in a Star Wars game kind of throws me, LOL.

 

I played Zabrak quite a bit for my Republic characters during beta.

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Good replies. I'm just crushed I don't have a better reason to promote Republic Zabrak creation... The only reason I could see a person rolling one is just because they have a love of the race regardless of aesthetics and how often do you see that happening.... :confused:

 

I play a Zabrak Trooper because I really liked the species as a whole.

 

What I'm wondering is how they put on helmets. :eek: That's gotta hurt! Or at least feel uncomfortable.

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Bioware justifies it in-game during character creation. When you select the Zabrak species, it states that "Zabrak's have two visually different cultural groups split almost perfectly between Republic and Imperial space."

That doesn't explain the stubby horns!

 

Wait, it kind of does.

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From what I've read, Zabrak tattoos are given to them after their rites of passage. Their tattoos are either chosen by their parents, or they're chosen by the kid with their parents. So depending on where/how the kid is raised, that's the type of tattoos they've got. The tattoos have meanings.

 

Therefore, if you've got Imperial Zabraks and Republic Zabraks and their culture is different, they're gonna have different symbols and different styles. A Republic Zabrak's tattoos might be meant to inspire trust while an Imperial's tattoos might be meant to inspire fear, especially if he or she is raised to become Sith.

 

But remember, not all Imperial Zabraks are Sith. So they might not have Sith tattoos, just Imperial Zabrak tattoos.

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The whole tons of races look like humans except for the head irks me in general. We're supposed to believe that on each of the respective home planets of these species that their evolution was directed by occurrences that lead to a perfectly human looking body (same number of digits, proportions, etc.) but something happened in their environment that made everything from the neck up (or in Zabrak case the forehead up) be radically different..... Sure there are some races that have a radically different body in the Star Wars universe but you don't see multiple races with say a body like a hutt but with tentacles for hair.
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The whole tons of races look like humans except for the head irks me in general. We're supposed to believe that on each of the respective home planets of these species that their evolution was directed by occurrences that lead to a perfectly human looking body (same number of digits, proportions, etc.) but something happened in their environment that made everything from the neck up (or in Zabrak case the forehead up) be radically different..... Sure there are some races that have a radically different body in the Star Wars universe but you don't see multiple races with say a body like a hutt but with tentacles for hair.

 

Actually thats not necessarily true at least about the Zabrak. Zabrak may look like humans on the out side but have internally different systems including a second heart. I'm not entirely sure about some of the others such as twi'leks though i know their lekku are more than just decorative danglies. As far as why the Miraluka look so much like human's is according to the lore, they were human at one point and because of their colony being where it was for so long and their isolation they lost the ability to see through evolution basically. Wookieepedia doesn't have enough information on it about the origins of the Mirialans for me to say anything about them. Sith pure blood on the other hand are technically just Sith/human hybrids that have enough of the original Sith dna in them to present with physical characteristics that show their heritage so inreality more or less aren't even a distinct species. Thats just a couple examples, Rattatki are listed as a near-human species as well, which (im not sure on their terminology with the phrase) may or may not mean that at once point were true humans as well, once again there isn't enough information on their history and origins.

 

What you do have to remember with the Star wars universe is that there is plenty of history that has not been talked about or even written up yet that could explain the origin of many of the species of the galaxy. For those of you that probably don't read the books, the Rakata aren't even the only species that have been come up with that have transplanted other species to planets that they didn't come from. The entire Corellian system was artificially created by an extremely technologically advanced species that no one in the Star Wars corporation has even begun to explain or flesh out with information. So in responce to the person's post that I have copied, it may well be that in the beginning these species were all the same thing till they were transplanted around the far reaches of space and then were subject to changes in morphology brought on by the environments that they lived in for millenia upon millenia.

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The whole tons of races look like humans except for the head irks me in general. We're supposed to believe that on each of the respective home planets of these species that their evolution was directed by occurrences that lead to a perfectly human looking body (same number of digits, proportions, etc.) but something happened in their environment that made everything from the neck up (or in Zabrak case the forehead up) be radically different..... Sure there are some races that have a radically different body in the Star Wars universe but you don't see multiple races with say a body like a hutt but with tentacles for hair.

That's because they are Near-Humans: almost all are evolved from a human ancestor, adapted to some random condition of their planet.

 

It's silly, but that's what happens when you base an entire mythos on a movie from the 1970's.

 

Alternatively, consider convergent evolution, the perfect handwavium for explaining humanoid aliens.

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First, about skin color : Zabrak subspecies, in the Star Wars universe, have different skin tones which included peachy white, pure white, yellow, red, tan, brown and black (Wookiepedia).

 

All Zabrak, Light or Dark, should be allowed these skin colors. A Light Jedi of the Zabrak race could be black (literally).

 

Red, though, would create confusion with the Pure Sith, but technically a Zabrak could be red. Mind you, as we are playing in the old galaxy, they could decide that red Zabraks originated from some who became too close to Siths (?). Otherwise said, way back then, maybe the only red Zabraks are those born under Sith control.

 

Second, tattoos : Zabrak can all have wicked looking tattoos in Star Wars (have not checked in SWTOR), but some tattoos in SWTOR, as mentioned, are the Sith ones (fair enough).

 

 

Anyhow, there are so many species missing for characters. :sul_frown::i_evil::w_frown::rod_frown_g::mon_frown:

Edited by Siriel
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The thing about all the popular aliens looking human is easily explainable, actually. Star Wars is made up and made to appeal to us, an audience comprised mainly of humans. Obviously humans naturally tend to find humanoids more visually appealing. There are tons of species in the Star Wars universe that are weird looking, but the most popular ones are the most popular at least in part because they do resemble us.

 

Also, as someone else said, the entire universe is based off a sci-fi movie from the 70s where all the main characters had to be played by human beings.

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