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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rystil Arden" data-source="post: 3342121" data-attributes="member: 29014">Rowaini females are the archetypical Witch.  In fact, check out the following random socio-political-gender note that I posted in a game and never got included in the doc (there are a bunch of these drifting in the phlogiston of the Internet, though the crash killed many).[SBLOCK=Long note on Rowaini women]A random socio-political-gender note for the Rowaini culture: There's a good reason that the overwhelming majority of the female members of the very highest strata of the social elite are remarkably gorgeous and have similar builds--it's a case of selective breeding and a bit of eugenics. Basically, Rowaini women are considered to have intrinsic value only as sex objects and mothers. Because the men find busty gorgeous women to be attractive, they consider them to have more value as a sex-object wife, and they have also been found to be more likely to have healthy strapping sons and busty gorgeous daughters (that's genetics for you). Therefore, due to arranged marriages that dominate Rowaini society, a social order began to slowly impose itself where that particular standard of beauty was used as a bargaining chip to seal alliances and bargains. Since there is genetic variation, every daughter will be different, of course, and when a noble couple has a particularly beautiful daughter, because she is more attractive as a wife and more likely to produce better children, she can be married off to a more powerful family to gain alliances and connections and raise their own social status somewhat. This trend causes beauty to migrate upward on the social ladder, genetically. Meanwhile, if a daughter is slightly below-par (not too much, just a bit, and she's probably still quite beautiful at most of the higher ranks), she can still be married off to someone of equal or slightly lower rank who is willing to accept her because she is closer to the typical wife in his social stratus and also because she brings with her ties to the more powerful family. In this way, the slightly less busty, less drop-dead-gorgeous traits migrate down the social ladder. If a daughter is too much below-par, she is considered a waste of resources (and possibly a bastard child), so she is often either killed or given to a peasant family who can't have children of their own (could be an interesting character hook, actually), depending on the father's demeanour. What about the opposite case--a peasant girl possessed of incredible beauty? They are rare, and very special, so each has a different story to tell. Some of them are married off to very minor nobles or gentry, bringing the peasant family financial support and the noble family possible bargaining chips for upwards mobility in the form of daughters. Others become criminal con artists who masquerade as noblewomen, often successfully. Many become mistresses of powerful nobles, living a life of luxury and hedonism. Occasionally if her patron is very powerful (like a king), such a mistress can even be granted an honourary title, or even a real title for her sons, and thus enter the nobility, and the cycle of speculation on beauty continues. As a consequence of all this, most Rowaini stereotype and make the assumption that beautiful ladies have status roughly proportional to their beauty and bust. It isn't always right, and this is what lets those con artists get away with a lot, but it's a good rule of thumb to remember. It also leads to a general cultural attitude where the most beautiful ladies should always be treated like royalty--often they actually are, and even when they are dealing with other cultures where they know this isn't the case, the custom is strong, and it has just become customary.[/SBLOCK]</blockquote>

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