V's Gender Debate IV [Official]

[paddyfool]

First impression: male
Reason: do not recall, but again, it may have been the "-us".

[Elder Tsofu]

I think V is male, it was first impression - and due to his body-shape. It was quite late we got to see an elf with the more androgynous female body.
It also looked to me like he got a square body type behind the dragon tail after transforming back to elf.
his personality seemed male to me too.

That were my impressions, and I've yet to see anything that would make me reconsider.

[CaptainIreland]

Originally Posted by ThePhantasm

Please expound.

I'm afraid that could ruin the experiment. I will do so at the end.

Not sure what discussion you are referring to. I made a simple request, one that isn't hard to follow. I notice that your requests for people to quit "arguing" in the thread weren't sent by PM.

Mainly the last one, since it is not about the topic but about posting style. Those requests were not sent via PM, since they are a request to not argue. Some posters have received PMs to follow up on other discussions. Again, please take up personal conversations with me via PM. Please?

[Threeshades]

Vaarsuvius never even once struck me as particularly androgynous, he always was a male elf with a stupid haircut to me.

I read the comic initially without having seen the forums before, and i didn't even think anyone would get the impression that he might be a girl, even when the characters started to join in on the confusion, i thought it was just a joke on him being an elf since he's clearly male.

[CaptainIreland]

Well, so much for that. Thanks a lot for ruining the thread, whomever it was.

[Holy_Knight]

Originally Posted by CaptainIreland

Since Rich just destroyed the only evidence of V's gender either way, I got curious about the thought process of everyone.

Originally Posted by FujinAkari

There was a pretty good theory that V started out as male and the 'confusion' which gave Rich the idea to make the gender ambiguous occured with the 'V-man' reference in Strip 9.

Rich debunked that theory here

Thus, there is now absolutely no evidence towards V's gender at all.

You guys are exaggerating this a bit. Rich destroyed one particular argument, but that doesn't mean that there's no evidence for which sex V is, nor that one isn't still more likely than the other.

Anyway, as for me... well, I won't list everything for fear of sounding like I'm trying to debate it, and this isn't a debate thread. But the initial impression was a combination of at least the following:

1 -- The common stereotype for D&D is that there's exactly 1 female in the party, and that was clearly Haley.

2 -- Long-winded explanations and domineering intellectual arrogance are traditionally masculine traits, not feminine.

3 -- He looks male--or, more precisely, does not at all look female, unlike Haley, the female member of the party.

4 -- His interactions with Haley seemed to be those of a guy friend, not another girl. (I never understood why some people thought the thing with the boots of speed sounded like girl talk and not a sarcastic remark.)

Like I said, there are other reasons, but I've always seen V as clearly male. Until Belkar specifically called him androgynous here it never even occurred to me that anyone might think otherwise, and even that seemed like just a dig on elves until I did some poking around on the forums.

EDIT: Huh. Well, I was trying to post to the "Why" thread, but I guess it's been merged with this one. :/

[FujinAkari]

Originally Posted by Holy_Knight

You guys are exaggerating this a bit. Rich destroyed one particular argument, but that doesn't mean that there's no evidence for which sex V is, nor that one isn't still more likely than the other.

At this point there is no conclusive argument, just speculation which one side will find more compelling than the other. The other argument was actually fairly well-researched, compact, and without much opinion, its only flaw was that it assumed Rich to be an amazing writer, which he has since said he wasn't back when the strip began :P

Originally Posted by CaptainIreland

Well, so much for that. Thanks a lot for ruining the thread, whomever it was.

It may have actually been you that did it, slapping an [Official] tag without being told to probably made the moderator go "Bwuh? I don't remember that..."

[CaptainIreland]

Originally Posted by FujinAkari

It may have actually been you that did it, slapping an [Official] tag without being told to probably made the moderator go "Bwuh? I don't remember that..."

I blame the guy who said the other thread was "official" because it said so. He probably reported it or whatever.

And I don't see any rule that says I can't name a thread "official."

[FujinAkari]

Originally Posted by CaptainIreland

I blame the guy who said the other thread was "official" because it said so. He probably reported it or whatever.

And I don't see any rule that says I can't name a thread "official."

I don't really know the rules for it, but I assumed a thread doesn't just become official because you include [Official] in the name *shrug*

[ThePhantasm]

Originally Posted by CaptainIreland

I blame the guy who said the other thread was "official" because it said so. He probably reported it or whatever.

And I don't see any rule that says I can't name a thread "official."

The reason the other thread (this thread) is Official is because at one point, if I recall correctly, there was a ton of V Gender threads and they were all merged together into one thread, designated as "Official," by the mods.

The first post alludes to this:

Originally Posted by Nerd-o-rama

And why is it [official]? Because it's the first after Giant closed the other threads for being competitive, duplicative, and spammy, and ordered us to move on.

[CaptainIreland]

Originally Posted by FujinAkari

I don't really know the rules for it, but I assumed a thread doesn't just become official because you include [Official] in the name *shrug*

Probably not, which is the point I was illustrating. Besides, this is clearly thread number 4 anyway. I have no desire to be involved in a massive thread where nothing new is being said, so I probably won't come over here anymore (Phantasm, I won't be responding to your post).

[ThePhantasm]

Originally Posted by CaptainIreland

(Phantasm, I won't be responding to your post).

. . . I wasn't expecting you to. My post was for clarification purposes, to be helpful and explain why this thread has "Official" in its title. There was clearly some confusion on that matter. Did you think I was trying to debate with you?

I don't know who reported your thread or even which mod merged it with this one, but if it is bothering you, you should PM one of them instead of slamming this thread. I do think they made the right move though.

[Typewriter]

Just for the sake of clarification I'm the one who marked the thread, and the comment I made was "Official?", not seeing any point in identifying that it was a duplicate of another thread that's even linked in the "Important/Reoccuring/FAQ Threads or Notices" thread.

I don't know if anyone else marked it or not, but since you guys are discussing it I figured I would let you know.

[chelonianmobile]

I'm pegging V as "male-identified with a uterus" just to be contrary.

[Holy_Knight]

Originally Posted by FujinAkari

At this point there is no conclusive argument, just speculation which one side will find more compelling than the other. The other argument was actually fairly well-researched, compact, and without much opinion, its only flaw was that it assumed Rich to be an amazing writer, which he has since said he wasn't back when the strip began :P

I didn't say it was conclusive. Rather, that despite the failure of the argument you're referring to, there's still a higher probability of one sex as opposed to the other having been the original intention.

[Mark Hall]

The Mod Wonder: This thread has exceeded 50 pages; it is locked per the board rules. It may be restarted without problem. Multiple threads will be merged.