Hrm, I'm trying to think of an easy way to explain this to someone.... If you record you and your friend saying the word "hello" and look at the sound wave, they'll be similar, but they won't be the same. In fact, I"m sure if you compared them, you'd find there considerable differences.

Its those difference the sasquatch would hear, and would be unable to realize is the same overall sound, because they can mimic each one individually and as such see them as seperate sounds.

I'm gonna add little something to the fire.

Shadowrun is not one of those games where anything is possible - but the limits of the possible do stretch rather farther than comparison with real life would suggest. Thus, while it is the very obvious intent that sasquatches, for whatever reason, don't speak metahuman languages - and there are a couple reasonable and unreasonable justifications for that, from following shitty continuity to giving the big lugs a reason to use commlinks - don't take this to mean that it is impossible for a sasquatch to never learn a metahuman language, at least in your home games.

It may be, after all, that sasquatches do have all the metahuman language-centers in their brain to learn a spoken language and they're just too damn lazy to bother with it. Or some extremely suspect Jane Goodall type will invent an English-to-sasquatch training 'soft that will allow thousands of eight-foot hairy bipeds speak like scrawny, fifty-year-old women with a predisposition for apes. Perhaps Rex has been giving the Council of Princes the silent treatment all these years when he could actually understand every word those fucking elves were saying in Sperethiel that they thought he couldn't understand, when he's really a sasquatch genius who figured out the riddle of human speech.

should also make it damned hard for any human to figure out that the furry being in front of him is actually talking to him in beings own language...

*Throws buckets of HANDWAVIUM labeled ALIEN at Ancient History*

Now lets digress as to how a creature like the Naga, with no known vocal cords has no issues with learning or speaking human languages.

WMS

Who said the naga didn't have the necessary vocal apparatus?

*OK Intelligent response*

Where it say they do?

And where does it say Free Sprites, Free Spirits, and AI's have vocal cords/brains to have defective speech areas etc?

WMS

Are we now going to assume that the sky in SR is not the color of a dead television, simply because a weather forecast hasn't been made yet?

"My Thing is Bent"

WMS

There is no eveidence that sasquatch hearing is any better than human hearing, and this whole argument of 'their hearing is too good to understand the coarse differences of the spoken word' falls apart unless they have superior hearing of some form.

RC, p. 64.


The latter would be a hint that, even though their tongues and vocal cords are human-like, their lips are less flexible, making it difficult to pronounce sounds that require a sudden labial shutoff, like b and p.

Finally, SR is, to my knowledge, the first RPG that at least goes in the basic direction of what i have believed to be the only sensible way to adress sapient reptilian speech in a fantasy setting since i took my first linguistics class.
Although other percussives are not formed at the lips, but the teeth (d and t) or the velum (g and k).

To expand on that, the main excuse being given in this thread is that Sasquatches are so "alien" from metahumanity that they can't learn the languages. DESPITE specifically having a power that allows them to speak fluently. If this argument is to hold any water, other similar beings should have a similar restriction especially if they lack a power like Mimicry. Also keep in mind that Sasquatches are specifically related to metahumanity, unlike Naga. It's the very first sentence of their description on page 65 of Runner's Companion.

In other words, why is an alien creature like a Naga able to speak a language with ease (ie, no significant restrictions or issues whatsoever) while a Sasquatch isn't?

To be honest, if anything, Sasquatches should be the masters of all vocal methods of communication. An entire subsection could have been worked in explaining how more corporations and research bodies seek them out in order to help lead the way in interspecies communications. But instead of that, we get an entirely implausible and unbelievable bit about "oh, they can't speak languages even though they can and do" and that's that. No real place to take it other than "ooh, they're so original cause they can't talk. That makes them, uhm, interesting. For serious. Okay, moving on..."

At least Naga are unable to use a lot of gear because they physically have no hands.

Darn it, I was hoping no one would point that out to AH, ruined my entire senseless tirade.

WMS

*Digs around in slummy barracks room*

Ah here we go.

I have no idea where the conversation has gone in the last 4 pages but here's some fuel for the fire:

A Brief Tour of Human Consciousness: From Impostor Poodles to Purple Numbers

Phantoms in the Brain (Side Note: This book is half of the reason I'm in medicine in the first place)

Short Answer: The human brain is a terrifying and complex structure that's probably pretty goddamn specific to our species. The fact that another creature, a MAGICAL creature, evolved in a manner that boggles our understanding is probably par for the course.

Whatever your opinion, those books are pure gold if you have any interest in why your brain works the way it does, what's it capable of, and how well built structured it is. The first book is heavy on the "popular" science end of the spectrum and the last goes into a great deal more depth on the topics covered.

The author gets further win points for pioneering (I'm fairly certain) a simple technique help people with phantom limb pain, something near and dear to my heart given my current employer/occupation. It's a pity they started working at the Naval Hospital and San Diego after I left.

After thinking it over, while I agree that it's highly unusual that a Sasquatch could never learn a spoken language, I have to agree that it's at least possible.

Current psychological research indicates that there's a "critical period" in human development of language. If you don't develop a language by puberty, it's going to be nearly impossible to learn one later. It's also well known that children pick up languages far quicker than adults do. So, the theory is that certain structures in the brain develop and then "crystalize", hindering the further development of language. Yes, there are some people who can learn languages easily, well into adulthood; I've even known a few, but they're not common.

Now, language does a lot of things; but not the least of which, it changes the way you think. For example, education in the metric system was rare when I was a kid. As a result, I can't think in metric lengths. I can use the metric system; but whenever I think of a meter, I think of a "yard plus a few inches". I can picture a mile in my head, but I can't picture a kilometer.

Other people here have pointed out that they know people who can't seem to ever grasp a second language. That's because the first one was ingrained in them so deeply, they can't make the leap to the new concepts in the new language. There's some human languages that are so difficult, based on such different principles, that it's very hard to grasp them. For me, Chinese always throws me for a loop; I'm just not accustomed to listening to the tones, so it's very hard for me to grasp. And that was after six weeks immersion in a Chinese village. I had an easier time learning a little Hopi; but right there is another example. Apparently, a lot of people cannot learn Navaho and Hopi, despite a lot of effort.

So, for an adult sasquatch, it's not hard to conceive of the idea that the way humans use vocalizations is totally different from they way the communicate among themselves. Given that they have a "critical period" as well, once they've passed a certain point, it may be biologically impossible for them to fully internalize another language. There may be exceptions, of course; but in general, it's certainly possible that their brains cannot assimilate a spoken language based on human speech.

You realize I wrote the entire section and was enjoying pulling your chain, nicht wahr?

But by your own words you have written everything, how can of us tell? Sand Crab!!

WMS

Not everything. Certainly not AIs, free spirits, changelings, or metavariants.

Feral children are plagued by this problem. You take a kid and lock them in the basement from birth and the child that develops is, as far as we can tell, incapable of learning language beyond a few words or phrases. MRI's (fMRI's? I can't remember) show that the extreme sensory deprivations they suffered in their early childhood actually causes/allows their brain to atrophy. As far as I'm aware similar effects don't happen to adults that are subjected to similar treatment.

Some sasquatch have had 20+ years of contact with metahumanity, and some rare sasquatch - some now adults - may have been born into a metahuman community in Awakened lands. We don't have evidence of lifespan, but unless we are talking elf-like lifespans and all exisiting sasquatch being several decades old before they are first 'discovered' in the Awakening, limiting linguistic ability by age is no more reasonable than it is with metahuman characters.

So what happens if you make some of these more exotic metaraces into Technomancers??? I cannot find anything about that they are not allowed to be one...

Then you're not looking hard enough.

Am i looking at the wrong place?

Runner companion sheds no information about a no-no to have Resonance for sasquatches. Cant find it in their description or in creating a non-metahuman sapient.

All sapient critters have a Magic rating by default, Magic and Resonance are mutually exclusive.

welcome to magic, each time you think you have it nailed down, it throws you for a loop...

Well, the attributes are not mutually exclusive from my POW, the only reference is about Infected Characters and nothing is written in stone in the books that they actually LOOSE the magic rating...



The qualities that stops you from being a technomancer is not the magic attribute itself but rather abilities that arent "natural" for the metatype in question.

A human is not born a mage/adept or with astral sight or spell knack - they develop in puberty and in RARE cases earlier. Nor is the infected a natural state.

For regular characters I would agree with you but these beings are BORN with a magic attribute and not as a quality and furthermore many of these creatures dont even have any of the qualities that stops you from being a technomancer.

A Pixie for example have no Adept/Magician/Mystic Adept/Spell Knack/Astral Sight Quality that they describe in the books.

Unless they get these abilities and/or are dual natured they can be technomancers.

It would not be gamebreaking nor inprobable as the magic attribute is only there to represent their connection to magic to have their powers working.

The only reference to the mutually exclusive is for infected characters who cannot buy the quality or loose it when they are infected.

Sapient Critters are neither infected or follows the criteria for magic using characters (Possibility of INFECTED Sapient Critters on the other hand...)

Considering the cost for Technomancers BP vice i cant se a problem.

"A character can only possess either Magic or Resonance—never both." - p.73, SR4

DO'H

I stand corrected.

Still, Why was such a ruling made?

Considering what heavy hit BP/Karma vice both parts are it would hardly be Munchkin material...

Hmm Mystic Technomancer...Buy one attribute split it between magic use and resonance...

Possible Sprite+Spell "Analyze Device" could be a problem but other than that...

Remember that despite the rules being similair, Technomancers are not "Awakened" and Resonance is NOT Magic, thank God.

Generally to prevent what I call "Ascendant Masters" - individuals with Magic and Resonance.

[/edit]Totally aside, there were various reasons technmancer qualities were specifically disqualified for Infected characters, including a brief but unlamented debate about the utility of "resonant ghouls," but mostly because a) Magic and Resonance are incompatible, and b) trying to pull the same trick as above with a vampire and your character will have an especially short lifespan - a couple sessions at most.

Hey, in the first draft when Magic hit 0 they all died...at least, until it was pointed out that Mana Static essentially became Genocide ParaCritters.

Could word it that if magic hit 0 permanently instead of temporarily, they'd die. Keeping mana static just the giant neutering tool that it is.

A professor of mine has written extensively on grammar education, with one of the main arguments he makes being that study of English grammar, on which he focuses, being an American, and because of the lack of grammar education in American schools, makes it much easier to study any foreign language. Assuming that you're American and went to public elementary and high school, chances are that learning a foreign language is the first time that you had any significant introduction to the grammatical concepts which are common to most languages, including English.

EDIT:
For anybody interested in the subject, here is one of his essays.

I keep telling myself that the fact Shadowrun fans are more intelligent than other roleplayers and not only willing but eager to debate the semantics of language use in fantasy primates is a good thing. I really do.

Length of time immersed in another language doesn't matter; once you're past the critical period, you cannot fully gain language *at all*. The most famous case is "Genie", a girl found in 1970, who had been locked into a room until she was discovered at age 13. It's been an awful long time since then, but she still hasn't developed much in the way of language skills.

We don't know how long the critical period is for sasquatches, so it's possible that they have a shorter one than humans do. As far as them being raised in a metahuman community, that would depend on the individual character's backstory. But I suspect that sasquatches who were raised with humans would be a distinct minority.

I'm not saying fully - that 'Native' rating that cannot be learned - but rather the levels 1-6 that are typically learned.


So what? Sasquatch that take up shadowrunning for a career are going to be in the minority too. If the rules stated that only a minority of sasquatch grow up speaking I wouldn't have the same problems as I do with the silly rules that they can never learn to use spoken language.

The way I see it, its a simple matter of this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8Fsl2xFkCM...feature=related

Koko the Gorilla, who uses sign language, is cool. Gorilla Grod, who can actually speak, is just silly.

My area of expertise is linguistics, Anglo-Saxon studies, with a degree in teaching English as a Foreign Language (K-12). Currently working at the Language Centre here (on and off since 2003) at the University of Oulu Finland and continuing on in with my pedagogical studies.

Language acquisition is a passion of mine.

I hold the exact opposite view (Grodd is cool and Koko is lame), and it seems that you want to equate sasquatch with gorillas - which is not necessarily correct in any way.

Its more correct than equating them with people. Take their magic away and they lose their sapience.

*sigh* No, they do not.

You're right, I was going off memory and thought they lost all powers. Seems they get to keep sapience, natural weapons, and armor. And just to throw fuel on the fire...
RC, 66, Sidebar, "Frumious
Shield Wall’s legendary musician and backing vocalist vanished from the scene shortly after the band’s first major hit."

Emphasis mine. If he was their backing vocalist, doesn't he need to know what words to sing?

Nope.

Then I guess he shouldn't be considered a vocalist and instead an imposter. Since, obviously, he must be mimicking something he heard exactly due to a complete and total inability to understand and learn spoken languages.

As a side note, maybe you guys shouldn't have made Sapience a "critter power" let alone emphasize it at every turn as one.

So does the sasquatch have the ability to selectively Mimic, or must it be total? That is, can he just imitate one sound or does it pick up the background sounds and everything else too? Can he mimic multiple people speaking/singing at once if that's what he heard? The latter possiblities seem silly, but since some believe that they are incapable of discerning speech from other sounds, it might be possible.

No, it just means his vocalizations aren't necessarily sung.


Let me clue you in on a little something Doc: the people that wrote SR4? Most of them are not the ones writing things now. The ones who are writing SR right now like to be consistent, which means not forgetting about rules from the main book just because we might personally have gone a different way. M'kay? So saying things like "you guys" is a bit insulting, because most of the gals and guys writing now had zero input on SR4 to begin with, and we're not looking to do another edition anytime in the foreseeable future in which to try out our own ideas as regards basic rules for y'all to grill us on. So if you're unhappy that Sapience is currently classified as a critter power, I and the current crop of freelancers are most definitely not the ones to voice your complaint to.

The acappella sasquatch?

You know I just realised something. Sasquatch have the adept power Voice Control as their racial power. Page 189 in your hymnal.

The a lingua sasquatch.