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Inquisitor Jex wrote:

zbg97 wrote:
Though I have to ask, that GM who stated a man couldn't act or think as a woman... did he let humans play other races?

Yup, Dwarves, Elves, Half-Orcs even..Satyrs. I never asked and he never went into details, but I suspect it was to stop players to sleeping your way into where ever or trying to seduce every/any thing the party comes across, or merely not to turn into the party whore and having to service every other party members when camping.

I don't see how having to use gay sex instead of straight would stop players who were really in to the powergaming from seducing their way from everything in front of them.

I've roleplayed a few male characters (most notably Orks; insert "but they're not male" argument here if you want, but let's face it, they are the epitome of a certain definition of masculinity) myself, but I never felt the need to have them feth everything that moved.

 Alfndrate wrote:


Though my DM was slightly immature and tried to make my character a concubine of the pirate while we were press-ganged on his ship... I got up from my seat at the table, say on the DM's lap, tickled his chin, and then slapped him and said, "If you ever think I'm willing to anything like that, you've got another thing coming." I then got up walked back to my seat and sat down. The captain locked me in the sweatbox for a few days. Totally worth it

I'm sorry Alf but that is beautiful, take my exalt for the laugh

 Melissia wrote:

Inquisitor Jex wrote:

zbg97 wrote:
Though I have to ask, that GM who stated a man couldn't act or think as a woman... did he let humans play other races?

Yup, Dwarves, Elves, Half-Orcs even..Satyrs. I never asked and he never went into details, but I suspect it was to stop players to sleeping your way into where ever or trying to seduce every/any thing the party comes across, or merely not to turn into the party whore and having to service every other party members when camping.

I don't see how having to use gay sex instead of straight would stop players who were really in to the powergaming from seducing their way from everything in front of them.

I've roleplayed a few male characters (most notably Orks; insert "but they're not male" argument here if you want, but let's face it, they are the epitome of a certain definition of masculinity) myself, but I never felt the need to have them feth everything that moved.

Well, like I said, wasn't the best of groups...

The manliest, mightiest, most magnetic-to-women character I ever encountered was played by a middle-aged mother who likes to knit. I was GM'ing a fantasy setting (usingClinton Nixon's Shadow of Yesterday rules) and this player wanted to be a sexy Noble Savage type inspired by the original Conan the CImmerian. (Not the musclebound idiot played by Ahnuld: Robert Howard's smart, sardonic Celt who frequently wears a shirt). It was AWESOME. I kept roleplaying one female NPC after another, each of whom hurled herself at him in various ways, from the werewolf princess (he went "meh") to the naive paladin (married her!) to the evil sorceress (killed her anyway). The poor player character who had a crush on him never had a chance. Also it was a man playing the female PC who had the crush on the male PC played by a woman.

[Edit: Gender was a big deal in the setting, with a rigidly divided society when men and women had access to different kinds of magic, different career options (paladins and sacred assassins were both all female), and of course different legal rights -- e.g. one character's backstory was she was falsely accused of being raped and cast out by her father...."rape" in this society being defined as sexual intercourse to which the woman's father does not consent.]

And if you go by my avatar and username, then I'm playing cross-gender right now, since I'm a man. [Edit for clarity: biological male, self-identify as male, wear men's clothes, only ever had sexual relationships with women, the whole heteronormative package.] My first name really is Sydney, though (pity me). Normally on forums I just use my real first and last names, but apparently that's not a thing here, so I figured I'd pay tribute to my which are in tribute to my favorite 40K faction, the Sisters of Battle, and to female soldiers everywhere.

In actually face-to-face desktop RPGs, I play female characters way, way more often than men, and for a long time, when I tried to play men, I didn't have much fun doing it. Years of therapy later, I realized that had something to do with internalizing familial expectations that men weren't allowed to display strong emotion but women could, and now I can roleplay as my own gender and have fun.... but my default's still gonna be female.

I have a mate who exclusively plays female characters. It's sort of odd, but that's just how he does it.

We have a female player who always likes to play children. Because that's how she does it.

We have another player who only ever plays a Thief derivative and steals everything that isn't nailed down regardless of the time or place. Because that's just how he do.

My group is weird.

Honestly, having dabbled a bit in Changeling: The Dreaming, I find adults who roleplay as children - especially in a mixed group - generally creepy as feth.

Does anyone else think that the title of this thread is egregiously inappropriate?

A cross gendered character is a character that thinks it's a sister of battle while it's clearly a space marine. This is just a nerd wanting to play a female character for the sake of boobs or, the slight chance that something will be slightly better.

For what it's worth, the name of the thread is spot-on...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-gender_acting

That refers to acting. This refers to playing a boardga me where most pieces are so removed from reality you have to be told that they have a gender.

Given that the OP has been discussing Vampire: The Masquerade, Pendragon, PCs in general, and RPGs in general, I've felt pretty secure assuming that the L5R mentioned is the RPG, not the board game... though I may be mistaken. Gender in the board game seems like it wouldn't be worth this debate.. Though even if it's the board game (or the ccg, for that matter) "egregiously inappropriate" still seems fairly hyperbolic.

Yup. This is about pen and paper RPGs. Which is acting. But better, because there rules.

I have had a lot of fun playing a female Dwarf in MERP for the last few years, especially when any dwarf that we meet acts strange around me( the other PCs aren't sure why, they think its because I have lost my beard )

Sorry I wasn't clear, Scipio.

We're discussing the pen-and-paper RPG, rather than a computer game, card game, or board game. (Never even heard of an L5R board game...have to check that out.)

It's called "roleplaying" for a reason. Yeah, it gets weird, thanks Alfndrate.

I remember a episode of Max Headroom from like 1987 where all these virtual reality addicted people were selling their dreams to what was really "reality TV producers." There was one producer who was shocked when a "guy" was dreaming that he was a "woman."

Funny how that show could get so many things right and completely miss the whole transgender/gay thing we see now.

- J

 Scipio Africanus wrote:
This is just a nerd wanting to play a female character for the sake of boobs or, the slight chance that something will be slightly better.

Mighty big brush you've got there sunshine. Careful not to paint everyone at once with it...

Well, I'm sure there are players like that. I just haven't ever met any of them myself.

Unfortunately, it seems like every gaming group I've ever seen has at least one of those people.

There are just some gamers who, even if they are totally good players otherwise, just lack the maturity or self-control to play a cross-gender character without getting silly, offensive, or distracting to the rest of the group.

For my games, I don't allow cross-gender characters. While I could choose to allow some players to do it and other not to, depending on who is capable of enriching the game experience and who isn't, it doesn't seem worth it to tell people 'you aren't a good enough role-player for me to let you do this' and risk causing hurt feelings. The experience of allowing cross-gender roleplay doesn't add enough to the game that I think it's worth that. That's just my personal feelings on it.

Still, I'm not opposed to it on principle. (Clearly, since I'm going to play a female character!) It's just always been my experience that it is more detrimental to the game than helpful.

Frankly, if the only role that a guy can (or will) imagine for a woman is that she goes around fething all the guys, then he is a poor roleplayer with no imagination.

That goes for a woman who can't imagine a guy without making him a casanova as well. It's just a different form of mary sue-style character, the wish fulfillment. Wish fulfillment fiction isn't bad on its own, but it's VERY frequently poorly written and frequently rather disturbing and tasteless when one takes a step back to think about it.

There can be a place for the stereotypical male and female characters, just as there can be a place for the stereotypical roles of each class. Those roles can be played well or poorly depending on the player.

If you folks all haven't seen the Community episode, "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons", you're missing out.

 Jimsolo wrote:
Unfortunately, it seems like every gaming group I've ever seen has at least one of those people.

There are just some gamers who, even if they are totally good players otherwise, just lack the maturity or self-control to play a cross-gender character without getting silly, offensive, or distracting to the rest of the group.

For my games, I don't allow cross-gender characters. While I could choose to allow some players to do it and other not to, depending on who is capable of enriching the game experience and who isn't, it doesn't seem worth it to tell people 'you aren't a good enough role-player for me to let you do this' and risk causing hurt feelings. The experience of allowing cross-gender roleplay doesn't add enough to the game that I think it's worth that. That's just my personal feelings on it.

Still, I'm not opposed to it on principle. (Clearly, since I'm going to play a female character!) It's just always been my experience that it is more detrimental to the game than helpful.

Huh. Couldn't you quietly take somebody aside and say, "Dude, you want to play a female character again? Really? After pissing off the whole group last time? Why don't you do something like your Orc barbarian, that was awesome. Play to your strengths, man."

This is easier with the group I played with (before taking grad school classes in the evening ate my life) because we didn't just show up and make characters, we talked about it a lot first, and it was expected, indeed encouraged, for other people to suggest ideas for your character.

 SisterSydney wrote:


Huh. Couldn't you quietly take somebody aside and say, "Dude, you want to play a female character again? Really? After pissing off the whole group last time? Why don't you do something like your Orc barbarian, that was awesome. Play to your strengths, man."

This is easier with the group I played with (before taking grad school classes in the evening ate my life) because we didn't just show up and make characters, we talked about it a lot first, and it was expected, indeed encouraged, for other people to suggest ideas for your character.

It doesn't always work, but I do like showing someone a clearly-lit path to the high road.

Some groups seem to have a tradition of suffering in silence -- you endure the jerk's obnoxious sexist character, you endure the GM's railroad plot, you endure the two people who get in character and chat, in character, for 20 minutes about what to have for tea -- and nobody ever says directly, "hey, this thing you're doing, it makes my game less fun."

This social dynamic, in my thoroughly considered and intensely felt opinion, sucks.

I occasionally play females in video games, but I've only played one female in a Pen and Paper - a gun nun in Deadlands. She was boss, but her gender didn't really factor in much considering her religious views.

 SisterSydney wrote:
Some groups seem to have a tradition of suffering in silence -- you endure the jerk's obnoxious sexist character, you endure the GM's railroad plot, you endure the two people who get in character and chat, in character, for 20 minutes about what to have for tea -- and nobody ever says directly, "hey, this thing you're doing, it makes my game less fun."

This social dynamic, in my thoroughly considered and intensely felt opinion, sucks.

Indeed, I hate it when groups are so quiet. communication is key to a good rpg.

I wish it were so simple as all of that.

Sometimes we have to put up with an obnoxious spouse, say, in order to have one of our friends in a game. Or we have to tolerate gamers that we wouldn't prefer in our ideal group, simply because without them we wouldn't have enough people for a legitimate game. Or there are players with actual cognitive or mental disabilities, which inhibit their social behavior, and need to be penned in.

I think that, in the future, I'm going to allow cross-gender characters, but only with an approved character concept and background, based on the large number of times it has gone wrong in the past. Since the players most likely to cause a problem here are the ones who are least likely to research a character or come up with a well fleshed out concept beforehand, that should nip the issue in the bud. And should anyone go through the trouble, I can at least screen their concept just to make sure they aren't playing 'ridiculous lothario' or 'nagging shrew' stereotypes. That seems like a reasonable compromise.

My female characters are generally better than my male characters, despite being a guy myself. In one case* it is because the character concept genuinely works better for a woman, but generally it's just because I find it easier to be inspired by a female character than a male, and that inspiration is how I flesh out my characters.

* A highborn Drow who was denied a place in court because of her own incompetence, not just because she was born a boy like Drizzt Do'Urden.

Split half right about now, my Rogue Trader and Shadowrun characters were both male and more or less the standard way of how I played my characters: Fixers, do-ers, the kind who organize and plan stuff for others, trying to be the moral compass. Or just be there in case of Rogue Trader.

My Cyberpunk and Only War characters were both female. I played the Cyberpunk character as a flake and wrote up a slew of noodle incidents in an attempt to make the character more interesting and not just another Molly the Razorgirl or Motoko clone, but those sessions never really went anywhere thankfully. In Only War I was the commissar in an all-female Catachan regiment, using the Free RPG day adventure characters. Aside from the way one other PC played her character in a very antagonistic "I didn't know they had girl hangmen, watch your back bitch, I eat commissars for breakfast" sort of way, nothing weird there, though I mostly just played it as a commissar trying to motivate the squad and survive a hellish eleven hours. I probably should've made a "Ever been mistaken for a man?" joke as a retort the constant threats from that one guardswoman.

 Jimsolo wrote:
I wish it were so simple as all of that.

Sometimes we have to put up with an obnoxious spouse, say, in order to have one of our friends in a game. Or we have to tolerate gamers that we wouldn't prefer in our ideal group, simply because without them we wouldn't have enough people for a legitimate game. Or there are players with actual cognitive or mental disabilities, which inhibit their social behavior, and need to be penned in.

I think that, in the future, I'm going to allow cross-gender characters, but only with an approved character concept and background, based on the large number of times it has gone wrong in the past. Since the players most likely to cause a problem here are the ones who are least likely to research a character or come up with a well fleshed out concept beforehand, that should nip the issue in the bud. And should anyone go through the trouble, I can at least screen their concept just to make sure they aren't playing 'ridiculous lothario' or 'nagging shrew' stereotypes. That seems like a reasonable compromise.

Sounds smart. Requiring people to talk and think about character concepts well before play starts helps not only to prevent bad characters but also to make good characters better.

Even so, I find you really need to keep giving people feedback throughout the game. If their character does something cool, tell them (many games explicitly let the GM or even other players to give bonuses in such cases). If someone does something obnoxious, you need to tell them, politely but also then and there.

In one game I played where winning a conflict let you narrate all sorts of consequences without restriction, I got a little too Empire Strikes Back and said my character cut off another player character's hand. The other player looked at me dourly and said "You just lost me" -- and I immediately took it back, not because of anything in the rules but because the other players were not only my friends but also my audience, and the only way to "lose" a face-to-face RPG is to fail to amuse and engage them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
PS: The game in question was Tony Lower-Basch's superhero RPG Capes, [url=http://www.museoffire.com/Games/]
available here[/url], though we were using it to play time traveling super scientists and psychics instead.

Yeah I should note (just because of the direction of the conversation in the thread) that the Lothario character Aura is playing at the moment, doesn't come off in the slightest as a wish fulfilment character.

Its quite scary really, the 'family' that is around him, is now politically one of the strongest groups in the region he is within and fates help anyone who tries to mess with them.

Although trying to maintain that many personalties and relationships, twists and turns under a lone roof, albiet a large castle can be quite draining as the ST/DM even if a lot of fun.