RangerWickett
Legend
Fantasy art almost always has beautiful people, especially beautiful women. Monsters are fierce, men are mighty, and women are stunning. Sure, a lot of us try to get away from these rather trite stereotypes of fantasy, but from time to time it's fun to embrace the cliches and see how silly we can be without becoming offensive.
In my fantasy setting, I have beauty pageants. "Adventurers" as a group are those people who are professionally employed by governments, merchants, nobles, or warlords for the purposes of small-group missions of varying degrees of combat risk. More commonly, adventurers are referred to as "Persons of uncanny combat prowess."
For mercenary bands and farming villages who need help, any old hero will do, as long as he's tough. But for those who are in the public spotlight, only the most appealing heroes will work, and unattractive adventurers are as good as unemployed.
So nobles sometimes host adventuring beauty pageants, to see who is the most attractive while being the most skilled. Usually an adventuring party will include one handsome guy who's okay with a sword, one beautiful woman who's good at healing, and then two other people who aren't ugly, but are bad-asses. The spokesperson of the group is usually the guy, and preferably the guy and the woman fall in love, so you can entertain the common folk with stories of romance in addition to tales of epic combat against monsters from tombs that were meant to remain hidden for eternity.
People who don't know any better usually assume that beautiful people are more important (read: higher level), and that the normal-looking folks are henchmen, nevermind the fact that they're bedecked in spiked fullplate.
How do you handle beauty in your games? Do you just tie it to charisma? Do you ignore it? Do you play to the classic images of gorgeous sorceresses and muscle-bound barbarians? Would you ever allow a chainmail bikini in your game?
Who's the prettiest PC in the party?
In my fantasy setting, I have beauty pageants. "Adventurers" as a group are those people who are professionally employed by governments, merchants, nobles, or warlords for the purposes of small-group missions of varying degrees of combat risk. More commonly, adventurers are referred to as "Persons of uncanny combat prowess."
For mercenary bands and farming villages who need help, any old hero will do, as long as he's tough. But for those who are in the public spotlight, only the most appealing heroes will work, and unattractive adventurers are as good as unemployed.
So nobles sometimes host adventuring beauty pageants, to see who is the most attractive while being the most skilled. Usually an adventuring party will include one handsome guy who's okay with a sword, one beautiful woman who's good at healing, and then two other people who aren't ugly, but are bad-asses. The spokesperson of the group is usually the guy, and preferably the guy and the woman fall in love, so you can entertain the common folk with stories of romance in addition to tales of epic combat against monsters from tombs that were meant to remain hidden for eternity.
People who don't know any better usually assume that beautiful people are more important (read: higher level), and that the normal-looking folks are henchmen, nevermind the fact that they're bedecked in spiked fullplate.
How do you handle beauty in your games? Do you just tie it to charisma? Do you ignore it? Do you play to the classic images of gorgeous sorceresses and muscle-bound barbarians? Would you ever allow a chainmail bikini in your game?
Who's the prettiest PC in the party?
