Does Your Heather Have Two Mommies?

[roguerouge]

But we're taking this way too seriously for any game I'd run. For me, I'd just pick whatever made for the most interesting (and palatable) story, and run with it, genetics bedamned.

Perhaps it is, although for me it makes for interesting possibilities in high magic games. You could come close to running a hermaphroditic society like the one seen Left Hand of Darkness. You could make a biologically viable Amazon country. You could have veeeerrrry interesting line of succession issues for royalty and nobility. You could mix modern day marriage politics into your high fantasy setting, if that's your thing.

I like these kinds of concepts because I think it's where the game gets closest to speculative fiction: if we change this one thing, what kind of society would result?

 

[roguerouge]

Does Alter Self have that caveat from most shapeshifting stuff that severed body parts revert to their natural form? Right off the bat, that would put a damper on women turning into men and impregnating other women, because the semen would turn into . . . eggs? I'm a bit fuzzy on thaumaturgical transgenderism.

It does have the body parts separated from the body return to original form statement. I'm not sure if that applies, however. Consider if someone polymorphed into a manticore. Would you rule that it could not fling tail spines as a ranged attack because the spines had separated from its body? I think this clearly falls into the realm of DM judgment call.

 

[Trickstergod]

Since rules seem to be popping up on this issue... consider the following:

"You retain all supernatural and spell-like special attacks and qualities of your normal form, except for those requiring a body part that the new form does not have..."

"You acquire the physical qualities of the new form while retaining your own mind. Physical qualities include natural size, mundane movement capabilities ..., natural armor bonus, natural weapons ..., racial skill bonuses, racial bonus feats, and any gross physical qualities (presence or absence of wings, number of extremities, and so forth)."

"The new form’s significant physical qualities (such as height, weight, and gender) are also under your control, but they must fall within the norms for the new form’s kind."

And it's a transmutation spell.

And it also doesn't grant you the visual or olfactory abilities of the new form, despite the fact that, by all rights, the new form's nose and eyes should all be exactly the same as an ordinary specimen of the assumed form.

Yeah, a case could be made that the spell turns you into a sexually viable member of the opposite sex, but it's not one I'd support.