Genders - What's the difference?

[Crazy Jerome]

Sorry, no, the only 'incredible' penalty between women and men is that men, on average, have a longer reach. 'Speed' as a function of musculature doesn't scale like you seem to think that it does; at a certain very easy to reach point you will be moving your limbs as fast as muscles can make them move. Adding a few more pounds of muscle isn't going to make you faster or you'd see a hell of a lot more roided up fencers. But in modern fencing, which doesn't resemble actual combat in the slightest, reach is a pretty big advantage.

First, you'll note that I already said that fencing was not actual combat, and was more advantageous to females in the comparison than real combat. Accordingly, if men have a physical advantage in fencing, that advantage surely exists in real combat.

But on the facts of fencing, you have it backwards. Reach is only a big advantage in modern fencing when it is dramatic, and even then more in epee than in foil. In foil, it is practically non-existent. Movement and judging distance is so much more important. You don't get the guy to miss by 1 inch because he lacks reach. You get him to miss by 1 inch because you retreated just enough to make him miss with by that much with whatever reach he possesses, while still staying in your reach for a riposte or counter-attack.

Fencing is done with the whole body, and a lot of the speed is in the legs. Because how you move that lower body determine when and where you get in reach and out again. Speed matters right up until it doesn't--which is the point where skills trumps a given speed. That is, when the speed mismatch is severe enough, it is decisive. Then as skill mounts, it rapidly reaches a point where it is not only not decisive, but the least important element, compared to timing and skill. A highly competive match between two fencers of roughly equal skill and speed is almost always decided by superior timing, but occasionally decided by tactics, cool, and wits. (Again, it varies by the blades.) In contrast, you'll see high school and college kids, all really tall kids, sometimes fleche repeatedly, and use other such moves based on practically nothing but speed. (Hint, they are setting themselves up to play the "bad school' in a Karate Kid movie.)

Finally, have you actually observed the leg muscles of competitive fencers, females included? If you measured shoulder muscles, you'd fine similar though not as extreme development. It is just not as measurable to the naked eye.

 

[pawsplay]

My experience with young fencers mirrors your boffer experience. You just need to get people over the skill hump and build some confidence. The way to build confidence is to say, "Yeah, they are bigger and faster than you, but skill is more important. Develop the skill, and you can push those big guys around!" They love that.

The critical difference is that developing a skill is an action. It's something you can do, which makes it confidence building. Sex is a trait, and except in the rarest cases, immutable. If mentions of your sex repeatedly remind you of negative self-concepts, your self-efficacy decreases.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

The critical difference is that developing a skill is an action. It's something you can do, which makes it confidence building. Sex is a trait, and except in the rarest cases, immutable. If mentions of your sex repeatedly remind you of negative self-concepts, your self-efficacy decreases.

It's all attitude, though. I started fencing at 37. That is "too late" to ever be really good. You peak around 25, and it goes downhill from there. I'm busy with work. So you could say that I dwell on negative self-concepts about my age and circumstances, and my self-efficacy would decrease. Why try, why lose weight, why practice? Or, I could look at it objectivey. Fencing is something you can do your whole life. It's fun. I like teaching the young kids. I can do it with my kids. I'll get out of it as much as I put into it. You can't say that about everything.

The owner of the Salle D'Armes (school) likes to call me "the old guy" in front of the other students. This is usually to motivate the young kids. "If he can do it, you can do it." This motivate me rather than discouraging me (which he knows, and is why he doesn't mind doing it). My age is what it is. It isn't a negative self-concept. It's a natural physical negative to the activity I am doing. It doesn't define me. How I deal with it somewhat defines me.

The earlier anyone, female or male, learns that kind of attitude, the better, as far as I'm concerned. They'll have immutable traits to overcome their whole life.

 

[pawsplay]

First, you'll note that I already said that fencing was not actual combat, and was more advantageous to females in the comparison than real combat.

But is it? Reach is important, as is speed, as is strength. Assuming men have any advantages in these areas, I can only assume that in competitive fencing, they would would have an outsized statistical effect for very small real-world differences.

You say below that skill tends to be the trump. Is it safe to assume there are more male than female fencers?

Accordingly, if men have a physical advantage in fencing, that advantage surely exists in real combat.

At some level, sure. But how much of an advantage? What sort of combat?

But on the facts of fencing, you have it backwards. Reach is only a big advantage in modern fencing when it is dramatic, and even then more in epee than in foil. In foil, it is practically non-existent. Movement and judging distance is so much more important. You don't get the guy to miss by 1 inch because he lacks reach. You get him to miss by 1 inch because you retreated just enough to make him miss with by that much with whatever reach he possesses, while still staying in your reach for a riposte or counter-attack.

Fencing is done with the whole body, and a lot of the speed is in the legs. Because how you move that lower body determine when and where you get in reach and out again. Speed matters right up until it doesn't--which is the point where skills trumps a given speed. That is, when the speed mismatch is severe enough, it is decisive. Then as skill mounts, it rapidly reaches a point where it is not only not decisive, but the least important element, compared to timing and skill. A highly competive match between two fencers of roughly equal skill and speed is almost always decided by superior timing, but occasionally decided by tactics, cool, and wits. (Again, it varies by the blades.) In contrast, you'll see high school and college kids, all really tall kids, sometimes fleche repeatedly, and use other such moves based on practically nothing but speed. (Hint, they are setting themselves up to play the "bad school' in a Karate Kid movie.)

Finally, have you actually observed the leg muscles of competitive fencers, females included? If you measured shoulder muscles, you'd fine similar though not as extreme development. It is just not as measurable to the naked eye.

So much for the smaller PC not having a high Strength score concept.

What I'm hearing is that men tend to be more powerful fencers, and that in many cases, they would have a considerable reach advantage over (smaller) women. To me that says,

1) D&D strength doesn't seem to be a strong construct in this case to explain the disparity; AC and initiative are Dex-based, and
2) Sex differences in fencing could very well be greater than in real life combat, depending on how you define real life combat, considering the differences seem to favor men or be neutral in each case, and
3) men tend to be higher level fencers

Where does D&D Strength enter into this equation?

Isn't it simpler to assume that there simply are more male fencers, that they take their first "level" of fencer sooner and are likely to train harder throughouth their lives? Just as a for instance, I'm betting pregnancy and childbirth could slow down a fencer a bit at the competitive level....

 

[pawsplay]

It's all attitude, though. I started fencing at 37. That is "too late" to ever be really good. You peak around 25, and it goes downhill from there. I'm busy with work. So you could say that I dwell on negative self-concepts about my age and circumstances, and my self-efficacy would decrease. Why try, why lose weight, why practice? Or, I could look at it objectivey. Fencing is something you can do your whole life. It's fun. I like teaching the young kids. I can do it with my kids. I'll get out of it as much as I put into it. You can't say that about everything.

The owner of the Salle D'Armes (school) likes to call me "the old guy" in front of the other students. This is usually to motivate the young kids. "If he can do it, you can do it." This motivate me rather than discouraging me (which he knows, and is why he doesn't mind doing it). My age is what it is. It isn't a negative self-concept. It's a natural physical negative to the activity I am doing. It doesn't define me. How I deal with it somewhat defines me.

The earlier anyone, female or male, learns that kind of attitude, the better, as far as I'm concerned. They'll have immutable traits to overcome their whole life.

Actually, it is imperturbability that is learned. Children, naturally, are sensitive to negative evaluations of all kinds. See Carl Rogers, Albert Ellis, et al., for details. And no one ever achieves invulnerability.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

But is it? Reach is important, as is speed, as is strength. Assuming men have any advantages in these areas, I can only assume that in competitive fencing, they would would have an outsized statistical effect for very small real-world differences.

You say below that skill tends to be the trump. Is it safe to assume there are more male than female fencers?

At some level, sure. But how much of an advantage? What sort of combat?

So much for the smaller PC not having a high Strength score concept.

What I'm hearing is that men tend to be more powerful fencers, and that in many cases, they would have a considerable reach advantage over (smaller) women. To me that says,

1) D&D strength doesn't seem to be a strong construct in this case to explain the disparity; AC and initiative are Dex-based, and
2) Sex differences in fencing could very well be greater than in real life combat, depending on how you define real life combat, considering the differences seem to favor men or be neutral in each case, and
3) men tend to be higher level fencers

Where does D&D Strength enter into this equation?

Isn't it simpler to assume that there simply are more male fencers, that they take their first "level" of fencer sooner and are likely to train harder throughouth their lives? Just as a for instance, I'm betting pregnancy and childbirth could slow down a fencer a bit at the competitive level....

Reach is a minor consideration, and is primarily handled via strength in the legs, speed and correctness of movement, and so forth. Only three major things matter in fencing--speed, technique, and timing. Everything else is secondary. Wits matter far more than reach, even being secondary. Heck, attitude and psychology matter far more than reach.

I suspect that reach matters a lot more, relatively, in real melee combat, but I can't say how much. But then in real combat, you won't bring a long knife to a halberd fight. If they let me have a spear on the fencing strip, I think I could reverse that 15-4 decision where I lost to a B fencer in one of my better performances. But then, maybe not, since he was in the air force.

There are probably more male fencers than female fencers. I'm not sure, since I let my USFA subscription lapse last year. It gets closer every year. But good fencers? I doubt there is much of a gap in numbers. Anyway, fencers are an odd bunch, anyway. The self-selection factors for the sport are numerous. It isn't called "high speed chess with a blade" for nothing.

1. To the extent that Dex measures muscle development in D&D (and I agree, it probably does to a great extent), then yes.

2. Sex differences in fencing are definitely less than real world combat. There are numerous reason why, but a big one is that you only need to exert a tiny amount of pressure on a tip to get a touch. Most fencing touches wouldn't even count as a "hit" in D&D, and a lot of the dirty tricks that you could readily do using strength are prohibited by rule.

This is why I tell my daughter that if she is ever in a position where she must defend herself and cannot run, the first thing she should do is break every "red card" and "black card" option that occurs to her. Even at her age, she could really hurt someone doing that. She isn't much bigger than a halfling, and without the chimpanzee body type.

3. "Higher level fencer" could be taken several ways. But taking the way I think you mean it ... If you put 32 male "A-fencers" in a tournament with 32 female "A-fencers", the males will do better. The chances that a female will win the whole thing is very slight. I wouldn't take 100-1 odds on it, unless I had some inside information on one of the females.

But this is misleading. The guys got their "A" ratings competing mostly against other guys. The ladies, against ladies. The ladies who place the highest in that tournament will beat several of the guys (and probably frequently enter mixed tournaments for the practice, so that they can beat the women.) Guys don't have this option to practice against such groups. So the "A" ratings don't mean exactly the same thing.

D&D Strength enters into this because of the middle position I've been taking--or rather, that is precisely where it doesn't enter into it. My position is that there are real-world differences to men and women in regard to physical capabilities, fencing being an example of which I'm very conversant and find relevant, but that D&D has no business modeling these, as the system does not take into account the things that matter when considering real-world gender physical differences.

Generally speaking, women are much easier to train in fencing, and learn more rapidly. Child birth can be a set back, of course, as with anything that takes a lot of "time off", but fencing is relatively forgiving of such, once you come back. All of fencing is unnatural, and thus difficult to do correctly, but once you learn it, you don't really forget.

Teenage boys have a terrible time because their body development tends to occur later, and right at the time they are starting to get it. So they start to learn, grow a lot, get all uncoordinated and incapable of doing any physical movement correctly, and then have to learn again with effectively new bodies. A girl that grew rapidly at age 14 or 15 would have the same problem. You can't fence when you can't even walk to the strip without tripping over your own feet.

Once this is straightened out, however, males rapidly enter their peak fencing period, where they are in a race to develop considerable skill before the physical peak is crested. Females have some of the same dynamics, but their changes lead to a slower but steadier development. It is not uncommon for the 20-40 age bracket to be contested by women on the upper end of the range. (And true of any age bracket, really.) With men, it doesn't work that way. A 35 year old male fencer is fighting the good fight, and developing skills to enjoy the 41-60 bracket.

It is all relative, of course. The owner of the school, now in his 70s, was a lad in New Jersey, learning to fence in the Italian schools common in NJ at the time. There was this old guy with a bad hip and slow as Christmas who used to make all the cocky teenage boys cry. He couldn't even lunge, but if you can put the blade where you need to, moving it a tiny fraction where they can't hit you, it doesn't matter.

Sufficient skill differences trumps everything.

 

[RedTonic]

I've lost the thread. I'm also sad that Celebrim hasn't replied to my parry. I don't think anyone's necessarily contesting women's skills... I would always advise when entering into another group's traditional arena for the outsider to utilize lateral tactics to push the opponent outside of the comfort zone and press the attack while the opponent is off balance. Whether male or female--that particular style has little bearing on whether a game should mechanically ensconce sex differences. I will always be an inferior knife-fighter to the gentlemen whom I practiced against in kickboxing while preparing to learn unarmed defense against knife-wielders. I could still "win" (in other words, not be batted around by skilled fighters with twice my reach and strength) by "breaking the rules" and doing something unexpected, which was the point my large, burly male instructor was forcing us to demonstrate. (My general theory in life is that if it's not forbidden, it's allowed until after you do it.) That says little of my physical strength or abilities. If we're all to concede that combat is in essence a mind-game, then attribute mechanics are obstacles to be overcome rather than "bonuses."

 

[pawsplay]

I suspect that reach matters a lot more, relatively, in real melee combat, but I can't say how much.

I imagine it usually matters less. My experience with boffer combat suggests there is a big difference between tournament fighting versus grand melee. In a tournament, you usually want as much reach as you can get, up to a point of diminishing returns.

In combat in an open field, though, I think alertness and commitment to attack matter much more than pure speed. I personally use a fairly short blade, generally no more than 30", as my primary weapon.

In fact, if you look at the history of warfare, firearms have diminished the importance of melee combat, to the point where a melee weapon is not a credible primary weapon. Yet some kind of hand weapon remains an important part of the arsenal. First there was the saber and bayonet, then the trench blade. Modern warfare has pretty much settled, since, on the long knife, where it remains. Something around a foot in length provides just the right amount of heft to provide good cutting and pentration, while using no more reach than is needed.

This has relevance to our discussion because I'm confident a trained woman can present a credible threat with a knife. The important factors are mainly psychological. Reach means little if you leave yourself open to a counter-thrust, and at best, a mutual death. Power means little, since the strength required to pierce something important with a dagger is not tremendous, and women have been demonstrating their capabilities at butchering animals with blades for millenia.

But then in real combat, you won't bring a long knife to a halberd fight.

Well, actually, you might. That's the thing about real combat; you never know what you'll have to deal with.

 

[Nightson]

The solution to this debate is really pretty simple.

If the D&D world in question has a long entrenched history of sexism like ours does, then gender differences would exist.

If the D&D world had simply never come up with sexism (there are orcs to discriminate against after all!) then there probably wouldn't be gender differences.

In our world, males have been sexually selected for size and athleticism while females have been sexually selected in the exact opposite direction while our society imposes strong cultural linking of athleticism with maleness. Every weightlifting, jumping and swimming record is made in that context, if the D&D world doesn't have that same context then it could be entirely different.

On a personal note, I do dump that real world context at the door. Someone suggesting females females shouldn't serve in armies would get the same reaction as someone saying blue eyed people shouldn't serve would get in our world.

 

[Fifth Element]

On a personal note, I do dump that real world context at the door.

Agreed. If someone wants to play an Amazon warrior are you going to tell them the character takes a Strength penalty?