Comfort withcross gender characters based on your gender

[Ogre Mage]

There is a lot of cross-gender roleplaying in the 5E groups I play in and I have always been comfortable with it. Female players often play male PCs and male players often play female PCs.

The 5E Player's Handbook says on Pg. 121:

You can play a male or female character ...

The core rules are comfortable with cross-gender roleplaying.

 

[Riley37]

What if its just a pretty girl that throws herself at one of the PCs as a form of hero worship as they did their heroic deeds? What if some PC decides to take the NPC up on her offer? The GM could either describe the encounter or simply describes the consequences of the encounter, such as the girl getting pregnant and having the PC's child, they later is easier to do without much embarrassment, the former is a lot harder to do. Would you do it?

That pretty girl was a lycanthrope; was there any biting or scratching?
If so, and the PC becomes a wolf under the next full moon, does she track him down, by scent, and how much influence does she have, when they're both in wolf form, over his actions during that full moon?

If the PCs are male and heterosexual, then yes, that NPC's pregnancy is a consequence to consider. In which case there's a now variety of possible follow-up storylines.

Maybe the girl's siblings now consider the PC a brother-in-law. Heck, maybe her sisters now ALL want hero-babies, and maybe the family endorses this idea. Especially if the PC is a Sorceror, his children have a chance of inheriting magical abilities, and the family wants its next generation to rule the tri-state area. Does her family worship Bane, and if so, what happens if the PC accepts the family's invitation to the child's baptism? Or instead of Bane, how about Silvanus; seemlngly innocent, except there's an estranged member of the family, who they didn't invite to the baptism, so she crashes the party, "Sleeping Beauty" style? or with a Golden Apple of Discord?

Maybe the BBEG kidnaps the child, to see the PC considers the child an important hostage. If the PC decides "Do as you will, I don't care what happens to the child", then other PCs might have emotional or alignment-related responses, which might lead to interesting conversations. If the PC responds otherwise, then the BBEG has a lever; if the PCs decide that their next adventure is a rescue mission, you can make that brutally difficult, if the BBEG has resources to thwart the rescue. If the PC followed the "sure, I'll impregnate all her sisters too!" storyline above, then the BBEG can take multiple hostages - or will the PCs guard the children, or use the children as bait for a trap? If this is a long-time-scale story, perhaps the BBEG will raise a few of the PC's chlidren with the BBEG's values and goals.

There was an episode of "Firefly" in which the PCs killed some bandits who'd been troubling a rural village, and the village held a celebration, and a pretty young woman danced with Captain Mal Reynolds; there were interesting complications, later in the episode.

There's an older story, the Aenead, in which a pretty woman throws herself at Aeneas, and he accepts, and that decision has consequences.

 

[Patrick McGill]

So, let me get this straight. We're five sessions in, about 20 hours of play (or thereabouts - the run time of an entire season of a TV show) and your portrayal of your character is so lacking in any indicators that no one at the table has realized that your character is a different gender than you and that's their fault?

Where did I say that it was lacking in any indicators other than gender?

There is no fault, because nothing wrong has happened. It's a non issue.

Again, and I keep repeating the question because no one seems to want to pony up here. Why are you playing a character that is a different gender from yourself if that choice in no way actually impacts how you play that character? To the point where no one at the table actually had any idea that your character was a different gender from yourself after 15 or 20 hours of play.

Because that is not a standard indicated by the rules? Because the rules allow me to play a different gendered character whether or not my role-playing lives up to your standard? Because the details, background, and ephemera I make for my character isn't just made for the benefit of the other folks around the table? Because no one would ask the same question about me playing a same gendered character?

And frankly if I played with anyone that would get mad that I was playing a different gendered character without them being aware before session 5 and would then question my motivations - I would do it constantly. I accept that this is needlessly spiteful.

Do we apply the same standard to everything else as well? Background is completely unimportant and never referenced? The fact that your character is a criminal, or a soldier or an acolyte has zero impact on how you portray this character? And it would be everyone else's fault for not knowing that your character was a criminal, soldier or an acolyte despite you never once actually bringing that to the table?

Actually, a character's background and history has a way bigger impact on a character than their gender, and should have a huge impact on how you play them, though to me this doesn't mean you need to telegraph them exactly to the party. My character wakes easily, downs her food quickly, and checks her equipment each morning because she is a soldier.

Gender doesn't, or shouldn't, impart such major attitude or habitual choices however, beyond learned cultural behavior as mentioned earlier.

And frankly if I didn't know the party paladin grew up as a blacksmith until session 5, I still wouldn't give a flying stirge's ass. There is no failure to role play unless one simply isn't role playing. Whether or not you know their gender, or background, or skin color is unimportant and meaningless unless the person portraying decide they are not.

Again, just so everyone's on the same page here. It's NOT about being "female" enough. It's about portraying your character at all.

As others have said, not telegraphing their character's gender to your liking isn't the same thing as not portraying the character at all. And I somehow doubt you bring the same level skepticism to someone's decision to play a same gendered character. You keep asking why they are choosing to play a character of a different gender if it's not being telegraphed, which tells me that you don't ask people why they're playing the same gendered character without doing the same. Excuse me if I'm wrong, but I can imagine having such an attitude to other people's role playing choices would be very exhausting.

 

[Eltab]

If you are proposing more frequent use of dictionaries as a primary method for change in this dynamic

Necessary but not sufficient.

Are you familiar with the Alice in Wonderland conversation "Words mean what I want them to mean, no more and no less" where Alice concludes 'you cannot have a meaningful conversation unless both participants are trying to communicate shared concepts' with shared words? Many social change discussions (not just EnWorld) have that problem.

 

[Eltab]

Common folks using plain common language and good common sense, accessible to and understandable by all, would be my preference. No loopholes, no technicalities, etc.

Hey, I can dream, can't I?

Churchill's History of the English-Speaking Peoples has several comments about this scattered through the text, especially when some event demonstrating one of the great underlying principles of Common Law is up for discussion.

If you've got about a month to spare (because Churchill's best 'books' are 5 volumes thick) in your reading list...

 

[TheSword]

If I may ask, what about playing female characters makes them fun for you? What, specifically related to the gender of your character, makes it fun?

Because I’m recreating a fictional character I like and getting to play that character... because it’s different and novel... because I like a piece of art and picture that portrait coming to life... because it really doesn’t matter to me where a character or NPC is male or female.

You seem to think it is natural to default to your own gender without a compelling reason. I don’t really think about it, I default to whatever concept seems cool.

 

[Lanefan]

As others have said, not telegraphing their character's gender to your liking isn't the same thing as not portraying the character at all. And I somehow doubt you bring the same level skepticism to someone's decision to play a same gendered character. You keep asking why they are choosing to play a character of a different gender if it's not being telegraphed, which tells me that you don't ask people why they're playing the same gendered character without doing the same. Excuse me if I'm wrong, but I can imagine having such an attitude to other people's role playing choices would be very exhausting.

Perhaps - and this is just a guess - it's coming from a baseline assumption that you're by and large playing yourself unless noted otherwise.

Species: I'm a Human but I'm playing an Elf. Difference obvious on first introduction.
Class: I'm a commoner but I'm playing a Wizard. Difference obvious during first adventure. (hidden classes notwithstanding)
Stats: Differences not often so obvious, and often - particularly with Int-Wis-Cha - need role-playing to reveal any non-extreme nuances.
Gender: I'm male but I'm playing a female. Difference sometimes obvious on introduction, other times needs role-playing to reveal.

I'll also guess, having never done it, that there's a difference with online play in that you can't just look at someone's character sheet or see the body language or whatever and thus the spoken/written roleplay would have to be more precise and clear. I'm used to at-the-table play.

Lanefan

 

[redrick]

Perhaps - and this is just a guess - it's coming from a baseline assumption that you're by and large playing yourself unless noted otherwise.

Species: I'm a Human but I'm playing an Elf. Difference obvious on first introduction.
Class: I'm a commoner but I'm playing a Wizard. Difference obvious during first adventure. (hidden classes notwithstanding)
Stats: Differences not often so obvious, and often - particularly with Int-Wis-Cha - need role-playing to reveal any non-extreme nuances.
Gender: I'm male but I'm playing a female. Difference sometimes obvious on introduction, other times needs role-playing to reveal.

I'll also guess, having never done it, that there's a difference with online play in that you can't just look at someone's character sheet or see the body language or whatever and thus the spoken/written roleplay would have to be more precise and clear. I'm used to at-the-table play.

Lanefan

I understand why a player would make this assumption, but it's not supported by the game rules, and one of my goals with groups I play with is to get away from these normative assumptions. RPGs often have "default" assumptions, but I've never for character appearance and gender, and, as far as D&D 5e is concerned, race and class. It's not, "Assume you are a human unless you want to play something else," but, "Choose from one of these races." If I have not learned a PC's gender yet, I should assume that I do not know that PC's gender.

There's never any harm in asking somebody for their pronouns, and doubly so with a player character.

 

[Bagpuss]

Yikes, Conan as turn-on? No, I've never seen anyone who played their barbarian like a sexy walking stick. Usually, these characters are played as power/competence fantasies by male players.

Lets not get into the whole muscular male is a power fantasy, while attractive female is sexist, debate. There are enough Fabio like romance book covers to show there is a female desire for it.

There is this third-person narrative kind of play ("She does XYZ") besides the fully immersive first-person play ("I do XYZ") where players play their characters, but not *as* their characters. It is far more common than you'd think.

Ah I get you writing their own mental erotic fanfic as it were. Okay I can see that can be an issue, but I guess the GM also has a lot of control over things, it takes too to tango as it were. They can always fade to black or rebuff any advances if appropriate.

If you cannot see the connection, then fine. You'll certainly create no such character in your RPGing carreer then

The in the majority of games I've played the sexuality of a character rarely comes up, be the character male or female. This is especially true in D&D too busy kicking ass and taking names, crawling round dungeons does not present the greatest opportunities for romantic involvement.You might think the sex of a character doesn't matter in this case but I think when I'm designing a character it often speaks to a particular sex.

Of course there are so many ways of playing D&D that sure it does come up in some plots. On the occasions it does come up it is handled off camera, character has a love interest but who he/she might spend downtime with, but it isn't roleplayed out most of the time. When it does occur in game, things usually fade to black.

Except on one memorable occasion where the GM had ninjas storm the inn room while my character and another PC were naked in the act. Looking back I wonder if it was anything to do with it being his IRL girlfriend's character... Nah, couldn't have been. To be fair we'd been playing together for years, and so we were more comfortable handling relationship stuff in game, than I would be with other groups.

____________________________________________________

Most recently where the sex of a character mattered, we are playing Curse of the Crimson Throne, my character is the only female character in the group, a gutter rat rogue, named Little Robin', she's like the minimum age and height for a human, basically looks like almost like a child. The adventure calls for one of the NPCs to basically act as a female romance interest and ally and the GM played them like that. Being overly charming to my character because it is female... (I think he forgot that although my character is female, how young and immature she looked).

As soon as he was out of earshot the group were like, "Wow, he's a bit 'creepy uncle' isn't he? Was he really flirting with you?" look of disgust on my face, "Yeah, he's like what twice my age?" then mocking the NPCs voice "Come to my fencing school we should spar together." laughing "I won't be playing with his sword in a hurry."

What should have been an ally, has just become seen as a potential threat, because of a simple slip of not recalling the characters appearance.

_____________________________________________________

There are games I've played where relationships tend to come up more often. Cyberpunk seemed to come up a lot (I suspect due to the Lifepath mechanic). Monsterhearts it is a key part, but like other games even then it is a case of fade to black or just handled off camera.

Does make me wonder how often the libido of a character comes up in play for most characters/groups?

 

[Hussar]

Because I’m recreating a fictional character I like and getting to play that character... because it’s different and novel... because I like a piece of art and picture that portrait coming to life... because it really doesn’t matter to me where a character or NPC is male or female.

You seem to think it is natural to default to your own gender without a compelling reason. I don’t really think about it, I default to whatever concept seems cool.

Thank you for this. Ok, now, you are saying that it's "different and novel" to play a cross gender character. Ok, I'll buy that.

But, everyone else is saying that gender doesn't matter at all. That your female or male character (not you specifically, but you generally) should play exactly the same and no one should know or care what gender the character is.

Would you agree?

Again, a picture is all it takes AFAIC. Presumably the other players can see that picture. Fantastic. Everyone's on the same page.

Now, this rather bizarre argument that "Well, the rules don't SAY that I should role play my character, so, I don't bother" is flat out baffling to me. So what if the rules don't say that you should portray elements of your character to the point where other people actually know what your character is? That's just role-play 101.

If your female character has a male name like Dexter, and the rest of the group is given no other indications and no other information, can we really blame them for assuming that the character is male? Months of role play and not one NPC or PC has commented on the fact that your female character has a traditionally male name?

Look, at the end of the day, this is 100% my own opinion, so, take it or leave it. But, for me, I would consider that a complete failure to role play on my part if, at any time, another player turned to me and said, "You're a ____? Really?" You can put it off on the other person all you like. I don't. I figure that if my portrayal of this character is so lacking in indicators that revealing something so basic as gender is a surprise to the table, then I've failed to role play.

That's the standard I hold myself to.