As a player, do you have a preferred gender for your GM?

[Kzach]

I prefer my GM's to be competent. Unfortunately that quality doesn't seem to be prevalent in either of the sexes.

 

[DragonLancer]

I've only ever had one female DM and that was at a con in the early 90's. But it doesn't matter to me so long as they run a good game.

 

[billd91]

I haven't played with female GMs all that often, not enough to have a preference for them.

 

[Water Bob]

[MENTION=55066]Dice4Hire[/MENTION], who XPed: "But how many males like a game this dark? I am sure I would not."

A lot of guys--most I've met (haven't received any complaints over the years that I remember) enjoy this type of game.

Rated "G" games can be fun. I've played in them before. I just have a preference for more reality. For example, I didn't like in the Star Wars prequel that it wasn't shown that Anakin went into the Sand People village and killed them all. Or, with Princess Amidala protesting, "My people are dying Senator!"

In either scene, I didn't feel the weight that I should have felt in those situations. I needed more grit.

Now, take Saving Private Ryan. That one sold the grit in spades. Look at the medieval combat scenes in Centurion, Vahalla Rising, or Ironclad. That's what I'm talking about.

Or, read a book. My current game is set in Conan's Hyborian Age. Those stories, both the original Howard stuff and some of the pastiches, can get quite gritty.

For bad guys in my games, think The Sopranos or Goodfellas or Casino.

The ROME TV series that played on HBO for two seasons (FANTASTIC SHOW! HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!) is a good reprenstation of the grit that I usually have in my games.

Of course, a lot of heinous stuff happens in that show, too.

If you feel like that, then it is probably not respectful, period, and you usually just don't care.

Why ma'am, assuming you are a ma'am, I am a southern gentleman, and there are lots of things spoken in the presence of men that would not be repeated with a member of the fairer sex about.

And, if you're a dude, then should already know what I'm talking about.

In quite a few of my campaigns, the dreamscape and accordingly nightmarish stuff plays a considerable role, so for someone having issues with dreams and real nightmares this would probably not be the best set up.

See, that's sounds very cool and interesting to me.

I ran a Traveller game one time that had a focus on psionics. Similar to the concept in Dune, the some of the PCs learned that they could break the barrier and experience memories from their father and mother, prior family members, even their ancestors.

One memory went back to ancient earth when the pyramids were being built. The male PC (and player) was looking out of the eyes of a slave girl as a guard took her (raped her) in one of the store rooms.

The player was repulsed by the action yet intrigued by the concept all of the same time.

It was a pretty interesting game. It got very deep.

That campaign ended with the PCs evolving into the next stage of human evolution.

I don't run that many gritty games anymore, but I used to get negative comments a few times because obviously, a woman should be more sensitive and not go into detail about what exactly has happened on the battlefield or in a raided village, or even describe wounds in an ongoing battle. You don't just lost HP and die, you et your throat ripped out and your stomach cut open.

Yeah, it might be interesting hearing a woman describe the game thus. Hmm...now that you've put it that way, I don't know how I'd feel about a woman GM in that type of game. It just might color my perception of her.

I'd be willing to give it a try...but I'm not sure about the outcome.

As far as description goes, I much prefer a more graphic picture of what's happening in the game. As a player, I want to feel it, and as a GM, I do my best to ensure that the players are living and experiencing the game rather than just playing it.

The PCs in my Conan game are low level. They've just reached 3rd. We've played these characters since they were 11 years old. Now, they're 15. When the PCs made their first kills, I didn't just say, "OK, he went down. Next."

I made that first kill something memorable. I described how the enemy's face looked. How his eyes lost focus and became far seeing. They dying man's last breath the PC felt on his face. The warm blood on the character's hand....the horrible smell of the inside of the body.

The PCs knew that they had taken a life.

Then, again, they are barbarians, and life and death are cheap in the frozen mountains of Cimmeria.

OK, yes to the story game. But the fairies we saw ended up ripped apart.

OK, that sold me. I'd play in your game!

For instance, I'm a man and I quite often like to play female PCs, maybe a third of the time. I've learned to be reluctant to do that with male GMs, who often don't seem to take my character seriously, they may make negative comments about the disconnect between my appearance and that of my PC, etc. I don't experience that with female GMs, I think I can trust them to take my PC seriously regardless of her gender.

Out of curiosity, let's say you were playing a female character in my Conan game, and your character got captured by some real bad, bad guys. And then your character got raped. Some heinous things happen to the males that were captured with you.

This is a total curiosity question, nothing more. Would you deal with that, and maybe become a Red Sonja-esque type character (rape is part of her backstory), or would you become incensed as a person, leave the table, and go home?

I've never had a female PC raped in any of my games, but then again, I haven't had too many males play females in my games either. When it happens, it's been an NPC I established in the game given over to a player. I have had a few NPC women raped. It doesn't happen every game session--or even every campaign. But, if it's logical that it would occur in the rough and tumble world, it happens in the game.

I did have a male PC raped one time in a game. The player rolled with it, then made a superb character with a revenge motif out of the situation. It worked out well.

 

[Oryan77]

I just remembered that I came very close to having a female DM. I even made a PC for her game. Then she indirectly mentioned to me that she was going to show me how to DM the right way. I kid you not.

She was very argumentative as a player and I had to ask her a couple of times not to argue with me during the game. So when she decided to DM, she told me to argue with her whenever I had issues. Even when I said that I just don't do that to DMs, she called me a "yes man" as if I had a problem. We parted ways so that game never took off.

I know for a fact that her whole intention for DMing was to prove to me that I suck. The whole experience was weird.

 

[Oryan77]

The ROME TV series that played on HBO for two seasons is a good reprenstation of the grit that I usually have in my games.

If you think Rome was gritty then you must not be watching Spartacus.
Both shows are very good though.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

All of my recent GMs have been male.

All their GMs have been female, due to the fact that all their GMs have been me.

 

[gamerprinter]

While our group traditionally has male GMs, this is not so by preference, rather by performance - the females in the group have not volunteered to GM. Despite this fact, I have preferences for neither male nor female GMs, however any tertiary genders are probably not allowable in our game...

 

[SnowleopardVK]

...But, the reason I prefer males when we game is that not all female types can "take" the gritty realism of the games I typically run.

Uh... While I suppose that's technically true, in the sense that people exist with different thresholds of what they can stand, presumably not all male types could take it either.

I guess you meant that it's more likely for men to be able to take grit than women. Maybe. I suppose I can understand not wanting to go through potential hassle of new players not being able to stand your game. Most of my players, male, female, whatever, are tougher than me and can take the majority of what I dish out so it hasn't been a problem for me.

The only thing I've seen that the female players in my group can't take that the male players can is suicide, and that's due less to gender than it is to the fact that the female players and I have all had bad experiences with it whereas none of the male players have. I can't describe it in detail without getting really dizzy, and needless to say I wouldn't force them to hear it in detail either.

Gore on the other hand? Gore can be very fun, if done exceptionally well.

 

[Water Bob]

If you think Rome was gritty then you must not be watching Spartacus.
Both shows are very good though.

Yeah, I like Spartacus a lot, but it's grittyness seems over the top and not realistic. It kinda reminds me of the ultra-gore of Kill Bill. I like my grittyness a little more toned down.

All of my recent GMs have been male.

All their GMs have been female, due to the fact that all their GMs have been me.

And, my heroes have always been cowboys...