Kamalia of the Earthen Ring, and other thoughts on character identity (TYI 3: representing you, part 1)

Both this topic from Saz’s Through Your Interface,

3. Representing You
Show us an image that represents who you are, either in Azeroth/Outland or in real life.

and the topic of the week at Blog Azeroth, suggested by Akabeko,

How does your character define themself? What part of their identity is most important to their personality and self-presentation?

In meatspace, we have so many affiliations, it’s anyone’s guess whether we consider ourselves a tuba player first, or a student, a Gators fan, a New Yorker, a mother, a nerd, a liberal. Our identities are comprised of so many different aspects of life that it’s hard to tell which parts different people will choose to define themselves.

In game, there are less game-related ways to identify.
You can identify as:

your class – your spec
your race – a particular subgroup (Mag’har, Wildhammer)
your faction – a faction other than Horde/Alliance

deal with the intersection between character identity and personal identity.

One of the things that most severely disappoints me about Cataclysm is that there is no “of the Earthen Ring” title. Given the focus on the elements — and the relationship of Shaman with them — in this expansion, I was really hoping that there would be. If there already was an Earthen Ring title, then I would have had two entries, instead of one, for topics 4 and 5 of Through Your Interface. I still hope that an Earthen Ring title will be introduced in a future 4.x content patch, and if there is, Kamalia will hurry out to do whatever it takes to get it.

To me, Kamalia is a Shaman first and a Tauren second — though it is very important to me that she is Tauren and not one of the other Shaman races. Furthermore, she is not just a Shaman, she is a Shaman whose greatest affinity and skill are with the healing power of Water. She can competently fuse Fire and Air or Fire and Earth to combat foes, but she would rather be mending and soothing than rending and destroying.

Kamalia herself would say that she is Tauren first, Shaman second, or that both aspects are equally important to her sense of who she is. Before she became Loremaster, the title she was most proud of and wore continually was “of Thunder Bluff”. She hasn’t taken off her Thunder Bluff doublet since it first became available at the Argent Tournament.

Kamalia does not consider herself to be “of the Horde”. She appreciates and respects the alliances with the Orcs and the Trolls, and generally likes most individuals of those races. She disapproves of the alliances with the Goblins and the Forsaken, though she is willing to give individuals of those races the benefit of the doubt. Other Tauren think she’s a little odd because she actually likes the Blood Elves; she’s fascinated by them, and she thinks they are amusing and cute in the manner that one might think of a feisty kitten. She was bothered by the way the Orcs at Agmar’s Hammer pressured the Taunka into swearing fealty to the Warchief of the Horde; she’s afraid they may swiftly come to regret having taken such an oath.

Similarly, my other characters’ senses of identity are centered on their races and classes, their chosen specs within their classes, and any class-specific faction associations. They may have quarrels with individuals or groups from the other faction, but not, in general, with the other faction as a pseudo-monolithic whole. Thus, most of them don’t have a lot of Horde/Alliance factional partisanship.

Appearance is also an important component of my characters’ identities. No two of my characters are 100% exactly alike in appearance. Back before the Barbershop, when Kamalia and her sisters all had the same skin tone, they still had distinct hairstyles and differently shaped horns. The Dwarf twins Karolynne and Koralynne have different hairstyles, and one has the warm black hair color while the other has the cool black hair color. For some characters, their appearance is so important to their identity that I am reluctant to change their hair color by more than a shade, or to change their hair style for very long, even though there may be other colors and styles for their race that I like a great deal. When I make changes to a character’s hair color or style for a fashion post, I usually change it right back to her standard appearance as soon as I’ve taken all the screenshots I want. My characters also assert their individuality from others of their same race by the mounts, companion pets, and colors and styles of clothing that they prefer.

Through Your Interface

1. Favorite Hangout
2. Player Housing
3. Representing You
4. Greatest Accomplishment
5. Title of Choice
6. Favorite Line of Poetry/Lyric
7. Screenshot of the Year
8. Vacation Spot
9. Your Character’s Hometown
10. Your WoW Crew
11. Profession of Choice
12. Inspiring Imagery
13. A Fond Memory
14. Place Swap
15. A Fairy-Tale Image