This post is hella old, and this is my first post here, but as a WOC with a lot of tattoos and piercings, I feel compelled to answer in case someone else comes into this post looking for advice/information.
A lot of people confuse hypertrophic scarring with keloids. These types of scars are very, very different. Keloid scars extend past the area of injury, or in this case, piercing or tattoo. They are usually quite raised and the color of your skin. Hypertrophic scars are caused by inappropriate jewelry, bad placing of a piercing or excess trauma to a piercing while it is still in the healing phase. Removing the piercing, correcting the jewelry or simply some extra TLC can prevent or minimize the scarring (which is usually lightly colored and appears to be a bump/pimple on the fistula). You can also reduce hypertrophic scarring by treating the affected area (after it is healed) with emu oil, vitamin e oil or tea tree massages.
Keloids can be surgically removed, but may return even worse, or treated with pressure wraps or topical ointments that contain steroids.
To speak on pigments showing up on darker skin, you have a good chance of seeing a great deal of color in your tattoos unless your skin is as dark as Alek Wek's. My tattoo artist has been working on my mom's skin and mine for years and neither of us have problems seeing our brightly colored tattoos. As far as piercings go, I would say from personal exprerience that cartiledge piercings are the hardest to heal. They take the longest and usually experience the most trauma (wiping your nose, sleeping on your ears and such) and are usually the most prone to hypertrophic scarring.
I know that was a novel, but, I hope it helps you, OP and anyone else who stumbles across this post like I did.
