Ability and skill modifiers by gender

[Umbran]

In the past (recent past, even), this has been a contentious issue that caused acrimonious argument. Given that, I'm giving a preemptive warning - we expect anyone posting in this thread to behave like a mature individual, on your best behavior. Leave the snark, sarcasm, hyperbole, and accusational tones at the door, ladies and gentlemen.

That's the only warning you are apt to get. If any of the mods feel you are going off the rails here, we'll boot you out of the thread without bothering to stop for discussion. If you aren't interested in discussing under those terms, please just walk away from this one. Thanks, all.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Why not just give them a -1 to Int and Wis for being illogical and driven by emotions?

Try again. The person with the highest IQ in the world is a woman.

As for the OP, I disagree that there would be such differences on that scale if one takes our overall species into account. Stroll through a typical American Wal-Mart for instance and you'll find some rather sad but amusing people that definitely show there's no way to universally say men have an advantage over men or vice versa.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I believe Dandu was using his infamous sarcasm to make a point, namely that for a lot of human history, women were believed to be inherently less capable of rational thought than men, and more ruled by emotion.

Basically, many games have tried gender-specific mods to attributes (1Ed had caps on things like Str) or other mechanical aspects (the 2Ed Amazon Kit).

For the most part, the mods- statistically accurate or not- were generally seen as unneeded (or even unacceptable). After all, regardless of gender, the PCs tend to be unusual in some or even MANY ways.

 

[Aus_Snow]

It can be done. It can also be done well.

The latter just doesn't happen very often. To put it mildly.

Some female gamers are just as cool with this kind of idea, by the way. DMs, players, other kinds of gamers... even one avowed feminist I know IRL!

But, by and large, what you'll see is stuff like the post that just got deleted. Utterly clueless, offensive, waaaaay out there knee-jerk reactions to some sloppily crafted bogeyman, or indeed, bogeywoman, that does not - in the form being... "theorised" - exist. Which is now rather difficult to reference, but I'm sure you get the idea...

 

[Jimlock]

*snip quote* --Darkness

LOL.... Someone has to do something about this guy's posts....

 

[Darkness]

Hyperbolic, accusatory threadcrap deleted. User threadbanned.

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Anti-feminist nonsense deleted. Another user threadbanned.

 

[Jon_Dahl]

Personally I like to mix things a bit... To have options in game-mechanic sense. Like for instance I like that half-elves and half-orcs are different from humans, even though some half-elves and half-orcs could be different, taking more dominant traits from either parents. And why does all the dwarves have to have penalty to charisma, couldn't some just be lovable?

If men and women would be different in D&D, we could effectively double the amount races without making things overly complicated. That sounds nice and I won't even bother to look it any deeper than that. For me the whole idea sounds great! More "races" for me thank you!

Also not to degrade women, I could make the adjustment as something that would favour women, such as giving them -2 STR and +2 Wis. Now all the best fighters would be male and all the best clerics would be female. In this case women would "win".

However I think this wouldn't work because many people would get upset with me. And since it's a cooperative game, I'd rather not have my fellow players and DMs upset with me. Only if I would have excessive number of players, most of them male... maybe then I could pull something like this.

Also, you know what's funny?
I like Game of Thrones. It's fantasy and the whole thing is very male dominated (but it's not the reason why I like it). If they would make a game that would be LOYAL to the series (or the book Song of Ice and Fire), there would have to be something in the game-mechanics to restrict women from certain roles. It could be something about the campaign world and/or character generation... I really don't care how it would be done, but if in Game of Thrones RPG half or even a quarter of the combat-cabable heroes would be females, it would be a travesty.

Yet no one complains about the series, everybody seems to love it. Both men and women.

 

[kitcik]

Also, you know what's funny?
I like Game of Thrones. It's fantasy and the whole thing is very male dominated (but it's not the reason why I like it). If they would make a game that would be LOYAL to the series (or the book Song of Ice and Fire), there would have to be something in the game-mechanics to restrict women from certain roles. It could be something about the campaign world and/or character generation... I really don't care how it would be done, but if in Game of Thrones RPG half or even a quarter of the combat-cabable heroes would be females, it would be a travesty.

Yet no one complains about the series, everybody seems to love it. Both men and women.

First, I love Game of Thrones (book & series).

Second, I would argue there are several strong female characters in GoT. I didn't see any men walk into a burning pyre and emerge with three dragons...

Third, it is a fantasy setting where warriors are mostly men. Just because people enjoy watching the setting doesn't mean that is the setting they want to play in. It is very easy to enjoy GoT and still want to play in a setting where women warriors are just as capable as male warriors. Heck, that describes me to a T. I mean, people like Xena too, don't they?

 

[Elf Witch]

There are some who say that men are naturally more strong-willed than women. That a man who is dependent is pitiful but a woman who depends on a man is not pitiful but gains dignity, and that a woman's beauty comes from her submissiveness which a strong will destroys. So perhaps a penalty on will saves?

That view is a society based view and not true of all societies. A lot of people value a strong independent woman. Just look at movies and TV shows. Buffy is beautiful, strong and kicks demon butt better than anyone.

Samantha Carter is smart, can fight as well as the rest of her team.

Let say for argument sake that a society has woman being submissive what does this have to do with how wise a woman is? Just because she is dependent on a man does not mean that she can't resist spell effects as well as a man.

 

[Celebrim]

I think we just did this. And we actually managed to hold to a fairly high maturity level longer on that thread than this one seems likely to.

If you are really interested in this topic, its discussed at length here and note that the first response on that thread wasn't sarcastic snark.

IMO, there is just no chance that this can be discussed maturely in an open forum. I invite everyone to look at the thread I linked to, because its as close as we are probably ever going to get to a good discussion of this topic @ EnWorld, but there is a whole lot of absolutism and emotion associated with this and both sides will accuse the other of sexism. Sterotyping will abound on both sides, both of men and women and of the posters in the thread personally (as you can see, this has already started).

Now, strictly without judging the fairness of your suggestions, let me say that I think the biggest problem with them is that they are too fiddly of a game mechanic. The various adjustments you suggest are too small to make for much interest, and don't seem to me to be worth the extra overhead of tracking them. I'd also suggest that while I'm on the side of 'real and large measurable differences exist between the two sexes in the real world', many of the suggestions you make seem tied to a particular time and place - that is to say social and cultural expectations - and not to anything I recognize as a biological difference. I would strongly suggest therefore that you tie this sort of minor thing to an optional 'cultural' template, where you can pick up various modifiers by being a man from Foo or a woman from Bar, or whatever.

(Now, that isn't to say that I agree with the statement 'all differences between sexes are purely cultural and social leftovers'.. However, this thread is so touchy I can't even explain why I think what I think.)