Ears!

[Glyn]

A couple of other players shared with me recently that they found the ear-posing that some Wolves do a little confusing. Glyn's poses are all about the ears, of course, which might make him the most enigmatic character on the MUCK!

I'm curious what other players think about ear-posing, and conveying emotion with Beast characters more generally. Some Beasts are quite restricted in their facial expressions, and so we've all used various tricks to bridge that gap. Are there techniques that you find work better than others?

Would anyone be interested in seeing Glyn's ear legend, just for giggles? YMMV, I cannot guarantee any other Wolf uses their ears like Glyn does.

[Petraverd]

Being extremely well versed in Wolfish and the Glynese dialect in particular, any interest I may show in seeing such a legend would be purely for kicks and giggles. (Translation: Yeah, you only /wish/ you were that enigmatic, Glyn, /some/ of us can read you like a book. )

But anyway, body language is an important method of communication, no matter what species you are - the trick is trying to figure out the best ways with what you have to work with! Petra mostly uses his ears, tail, and the tilt of his head to convey one thing or another, and sometimes a toss of his mane or the scuff of a hoof will mean something, too. He'll snort and stamp when he's sufficiently agitated, and even kick things - I felt sorry for a poor tree after Petra gave it a good whack, and desperately hoped there wasn't a dryad trying to sleep in there. That's half the fun I have with my alts, trying to find new ways to convey what it is they're thinking without resorting to standard human body language.

[Glyn]

>>> Petraverd's subtext gores Glyn. Glyn cries out as he is left bleeding!

Definitely, unicorns have limited options for facial expression, and so I'm attentive to the sort of body language you use. Another species that really strikes me for this problem are the Eagles, and I see some of them get really creative about trying to convey emotion, sometimes by writing the subtext into the gesture. (e.g. "a shine in the eyes that might be a smile")

A related question in all of this is: have any of you had trouble reading another character's attempts at body language? Are there certain kinds of Beast pose that you find easier to interpret than others? Could be an opportunity for us to refine our RP skills!

[Skarlieth]

I think part of the Eagles' problem is that they don't have ears or a very expressive tail either. And there's only so much head-bobbing can do. It's our one downside
I have to agree with Petraverd, any sort of translation thing would more be for the laughs for me. Also, at least for cross-species, doesn't it kind of fit that sometimes another Beast might not understand the body-language? I don't think I've ever seen it come up in a RP, but it seems that, say, a Cat and a Deer might not always pick up on each other's subtext. So maybe some of the confusion is fitting.

[Petraverd]

Yeah, it often depends on how familiar they are with each other and how much they care about noticing that sort of thing. Petra's knowledge of Wolf Body Language [TM] was pretty much nil when he first came to the Waste, and I remember having a couple RPs where his misinterpretation of such got him into a wee spot of trouble. Of course, now that he's been around wolves as long as he has and has made a conscious effort to 'get' it (albeit for a rather shorter time), it happens less often - but I think misreading cues still happens on occasion.

[Indra]

I've misunderstood other Wolves before. I think sometimes, as people have been saying, the ambiguity is good. We can misread people in real life. Other times, though, it might be helped with just a bit more thoughtful writing. I'm thinking of a human example, for instance. If I frown in real life, you can usually tell whether it's an unhappy frown or a thoughtful frown. Maybe you could tell from context that "(human) Indra frowns" is thoughtful, but I think the immediate textual implication is that she is unhappy. Adding "in thought" would help and put less pressure on the other player. There's all kinds of expressions like that. Miscommunication can be fun and is important, and many expressions may be ambiguous, but animals usually pick up on each other signals pretty well, and I wouldn't want to make another player feel like s/he was always scrambling. Some help for the human players of the animal characters is nice.

[Peridot]

Somewhere, there's a "I'm all ears" joke waiting to be launched on this topic...