Genders - What's the difference?

[RedTonic]

Not to knock Jameson's opinion, but on some level, I do find elements of male posturing to be threatening. It can make the females among you uncomfortable. It is a reminder of male on female violence, which is sadly prevalent in the real world and still remains a particular fixture of fantasy in occasionally unflattering ways which do no one credit. (Some episodes of Supernatural comes to mind.) Still, we cope--we ignore it, we move on--but I find saying 'no harm done' a little difficult. The posturing gets my back up, personally, but I'm also paranoid and more than a little aggressive.

I don't believe anyone should necessarily change minor behaviors to avoid any offense, awkwardness, or discomfort--but I do think people should be aware, and moreover, I think people should place finding a sympathetic understanding of others on par with critical analysis. Knowing, or trying to learn, where someone is coming from when they opine on a topic is at least as useful as skewering the holes in their argument.

But hey, maybe that's just the ovaries in me... I don't honestly think so, though. What I learned formally of sympathetic analysis, I learned from a man. Understanding others' positions helps you find common ground, and can help you bring them around to your position... Or may move you around to theirs. I believe most of us enjoy a certain level of harmony, trolls aside.

I play D&D to kick butt and take names (especially true names), not to be told that my female fighter will result in a suboptimal strength based build and that she'll never compare in a straight test of strength against a male fighter of equivalent level and resources. It's not the game I play. If others wish to play games that tinker with statistical templates for their characters, they may certain play those games. I don't get to make the call on who plays what games, nor do I wish to. (There's that noisome choice thing again.) I don't believe arguing about the relative physical strengths of men versus women is a worthy debate, either. It says little about either sex and more about the cognitive biases of those arguing. Hence, my opinion that RPGs shouldn't enforce these matters in mechanics. Let the gamers decide. Do what's fun, but be fair to the players and the DM.

 

[pawsplay]

So I polled my wife. I asked, "What do you think of the idea of giving men and women different ability scores in D&D?"

She said it didn't make much sense to her. She said that since you pick your Intelligence, Charisma, and so forth, you could simply pick a higher or lower Strength if you wanted.

I asked, "What about Strength specifically?"

She mentioned that she can pick up most of the same every day items that I do, and that she can carry two twenty pound children, one in each hand. She allowed that I could jump higher, but noted that she had been working on her jumping.

I asked, "So what if women received a Strength penalty in D&D?"

She said, "That would suck. No one would play a girl. I don't think it should matter. People should get to play the character they want."

"Do you see any useful purpose at all at assessing a penalty on female characters?"

"No."

 

[Crazy Jerome]

More to the point, even if they have high self-respect, they have a negative self-concept because their daily reality requires them to battle negative stereotypes.

See, I don't see that as the "honest discussion". That's the problem, not a real honest discussion.

Talking casually to other people about women's historical issues with mathematics in front of my daughter is a bad idea. After finding out that she is pretty darn good at it, but struggling with a few key things more than her brother? Now, a honest discussion is warranted. "Yeah, some of these things might be a little harder for you. But you can do it. And struggling with it might make you even better. You have other advantages."

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.

Minimizing differences too much is just as dishonest, for purposes of building real confidence, as maximizing them. Among other things, it discredits the teacher, because the student can see the differences with their own eyes. It is far more confidence building to say, "This difference is here, but it won't matter much if you don't let it." And then they get a little skill, and see that you are correct.

I've never met a good female fencer that thought the male size and speed wasn't an advantage. Part of their attitude is that the guy has an advantage--but they are still going to kick his butt.

I think I've said this before. It is the old quote about Ginger Rodgers did everything Fred Astaire did--backwards and in high heels. In fact Rodgers did not do everything Astaire did. She could not have. What she did was hold up her end completely--excel--backwards and in high heels. Pretty darn impressive.

In a fantasy, cinematic game, the quote is accurate. Barbarian Jane does everything that Barbarian Joe does, despite any incidental impediments due her gender. In a more realistic version, Barbarian Jane has some not so incidental impediments, but it doesn't stop her from kicking as much butt as Barbarian Joe. She is just that good.

 

[billd91]

I believe it is also one of those games which has a SIZ stat, which helps a lot with delineating the physical differences of men and women.

Does Pendragon actually give women a SIZ penalty or men a SIZ bonus? Call of Cthulhu also has that stat being based on BRP as well, but I don't believe there's a gender difference there. Both get 2d6+6.

 

[JamesonCourage]

IMO, when you make that comparison, there absolutely should not be a difference. If the woman is more unusual for the sake of having an 18 Str, then she is more unusual. So be it. But I can't fathom how the game is made better by making the player accept a 16 Strength in order to play the character.

I can see an argument for role playing or immersion. If something pulls you away from immersion, it lessens the enjoyment for some people.

The problem really becomes, then, that if you allow a 5'1" 110 lb. woman to have a Strength of 18, versus a 5'10" 180 lb. man with a Strength of 14. The woman is far superior to the male in terms of Strength, and her size means nothing in that. To some, that would hurt their ability to feel immersed, and thus role play well. However, if you impose some sort of penalty, woman (or men) may very well feel drawn out of the game, and not feel like they can be immersed.

It just depends. If you really want to look at what good can come from it, I think it's best to weigh all the pros and cons (and assign them appropriate values) and see what comes out on top for the type of game you're trying to make.

As I said before, there is a difference, just not as huge a difference, I believe, as some may imagine. The simple likelihood of choosing to make a strong male fighter compared to a female one probably outpaces, by an order of magnitude, any mechanical penalties you could put in place to create a similar shift in behavior. In other words, any norming of men versus women is probably not only handled, but exaggerated, by the process of character creation itself.

That is currently the ongoing discussion. I'm not heavily invested in any debate, though, just understanding views in the thread.

It's something to work on. It's like the kid at the birthday party who keeps making a big deal about how their parents rented ponies for the party. Sure, they're not a bad kid; they probably don't even recognize how others will respond. But a mentally healthy individual can probably detect that this child's relationship with wealth is different than that of other children at the party. I think a mentally healthy person not only notices, but responds to, the sense that another person is trying to assert their superiority.

I guess I don't feel threatened or belittled when people do this. I usually just find it humorous or I find them irritating. But, I'm not prone to tolerate posturing very well internally. I almost always challenge people that I think are posturing. Huge personal character flaw of mine. Best way to get me to do something? Tell me I suck at something, that I can't do it, etc. Seriously, this is a huge flaw in my personality.

I think that makes it harder for me to grasp related issues. That is regretful, because I like understanding other views

When the message is, "You are weaker than a man. A man would destroy you in physical combat," the question becomes, why is this message being broadcast? I understand the words. What is the significance?

To flaunt, usually. To show your superiority over someone else in that area. Now, I don't usually find the display threatening, unless someone is literally trying to threaten me physically. Mentally, I shrug that person off. Like I said, I guess it's hard for me to connect to opposing mindsets on this matter, which is actually really starting to bug me. It seems like the point should have clicked for me by now, and it hasn't. Thanks for your patience.

I guess why I brought it up at all was that you seemed to imply (I'm guessing I'm wrong here, though) that even this discussion would make women feel violently threatened in the abstract. This seemed off, to me, as this conversation has not seemed to be "we're men, we're bigger and better than females, ha ha" so far.

What if you lived in a world where a couple of times a week, Brock Lesnar wolf-whistled at you on the way home from work?

Well, since girls rarely whistle or shout to me based on my looks (if they do, it's because of the long hair, I'm guessing), I can only compare it to that. I take it as a compliment. I guess I wouldn't feel physically threatened unless they somehow imposed their physical superiority on me.

If Brock Lesnar kept moving in my path, not letting me by, while trying to stroke my hair... yeah, I'd feel nervous and threatened. If he wanted to talk to me about how he was stronger than I was? I'd say I could do that pretty reasonably without feeling threatened.

As exhibits A and B, I present WWI and WWII.

I'm trying to be reasonable, but I can't really take this too seriously. I know that's not much to go on, but I don't see this part of the conversation going anywhere, and I like the feedback so far, and don't want to mess up a good thing.

Of course. Once you change the context, the meaning is different. We are talking about context.

True enough. I'll try to stay on your terms as much as possible. If I sway off those terms, or misrepresent them, forgive me. Just correct me.

More to the point, even if they have high self-respect, they have a negative self-concept because their daily reality requires them to battle negative stereotypes.

Okay, so I was on the right track.

How would you being a Mexican sitting in a room mostly full of white people, talking honestly and abstractly about the problem of illegal immigration? Would it make a difference if your mother had gotten her hands hit with a ruler when she was a child for speaking her native Spanish at school?

That would be incredibly uncomfortable. I think it can be done reasonably and logically though, without feeling personally oppressed mentally or attacked. I can see how it'd be a very personal issue, though. Interesting comparison.

It's a potentially very interesting and worthwhile journey. The first thing to realize is that many of the things that are most relevant to women, are invisible to men.

That's a starting place, I guess. As far as emotional awareness goes, I'm pretty keen. I have very good and close relationships with a few women. To be able to role play one accurately, however... beyond my hope, I think. It's why I'm kind of stingy on the female NPCs in my game. I really dislike misrepresenting any being, whether they're elves, dragons, or women.

Who knows, maybe this discussion will shed some insight on how I can improve those NPC interactions. I'm not too worried about interactions with the women I know in real life, since we're on very good terms, but any insight helps when it comes to empathizing (which is something I think a lot more people should try to do).

Thanks for the discussion thus far.

Not to knock Jameson's opinion, but on some level, I do find elements of male posturing to be threatening. It can make the females among you uncomfortable. It is a reminder of male on female violence, which is sadly prevalent in the real world and still remains a particular fixture of fantasy in occasionally unflattering ways which do no one credit. (Some episodes of Supernatural comes to mind.) Still, we cope--we ignore it, we move on--but I find saying 'no harm done' a little difficult. The posturing gets my back up, personally, but I'm also paranoid and more than a little aggressive.

Oh, no worries on knocking my opinion. I can definitely handle disagreement, especially in areas I'm nowhere near an expert in. Thanks for your insight on this.

I don't believe anyone should necessarily change minor behaviors to avoid any offense, awkwardness, or discomfort--but I do think people should be aware, and moreover, I think people should place finding a sympathetic understanding of others on par with critical analysis. Knowing, or trying to learn, where someone is coming from when they opine on a topic is at least as useful as skewering the holes in their argument.

I think empathy is extremely good for a person to pursue, but sympathy is a good start, too. I am trying to understand your side to this discussion.

But hey, maybe that's just the ovaries in me... I don't honestly think so, though. What I learned formally of sympathetic analysis, I learned from a man. Understanding others' positions helps you find common ground, and can help you bring them around to your position... Or may move you around to theirs. I believe most of us enjoy a certain level of harmony, trolls aside.

I play D&D to kick butt and take names (especially true names), not to be told that my female fighter will result in a suboptimal strength based build and that she'll never compare in a straight test of strength against a male fighter of equivalent level and resources. It's not the game I play. If others wish to play games that tinker with statistical templates for their characters, they may certain play those games. I don't get to make the call on who plays what games, nor do I wish to. (There's that noisome choice thing again.) I don't believe arguing about the relative physical strengths of men versus women is a worthy debate, either. It says little about either sex and more about the cognitive biases of those arguing. Hence, my opinion that RPGs shouldn't enforce these matters in mechanics. Let the gamers decide. Do what's fun, but be fair to the players and the DM.

Well, I think it is a discussion (not argument) worth having, if those involved wanted to use it as a tool. I think it'd be very interesting to have a game with, say, two female players and two male players, where the females picked "realistic" adjustments for one sex, and the males did for the other. I think it'd say a lot in terms of perception of either your own sex or the other sex. Also, trying to make a character and role play that character under those restrictions would be interesting, too.

But, I agree, it's all preference. Don't play it (or try it) if you don't want to. I mean, I'll almost certainly never try the experiment above, but I think a healthy discussion on the topic can be enlightening. Just like role playing games can be. I think it shows us bits of pieces of our mind, or of the world in general, that we wouldn't think of without the game. And that's pretty invaluable.

As always, play what you like

 

[billd91]

I can see an argument for role playing or immersion. If something pulls you away from immersion, it lessens the enjoyment for some people.

The problem really becomes, then, that if you allow a 5'1" 110 lb. woman to have a Strength of 18, versus a 5'10" 180 lb. man with a Strength of 14. The woman is fall superior to the male in terms of Strength, and her size means nothing in that. To some, that would hurt their ability to feel immersed, and thus role play well. However, if you impose some sort of penalty, woman (or men) may very well feel drawn out of the game, and not feel like they can be immersed.

I don't really see the strength differences in this case as a problem. The players chose to put those stats in those places because they fit the PCs they want to play (or have rolled the stats to play). That will drive their conceptions stronger than picking/rolling a weight value that's off-kilter. I won't even get into the 16 strength 40 lb halfling that could come up in comparison to that male human example...

As a DM, I might encourage the woman PC's player to up the weight a little bit to reflect her strength and create a more believable PC, but ultimately, it's not going to be that big an issue.

 

[Darwinism]

I think you are doing your own, otherwise excellent, point a disservice with that paragraph. It is true that there is a point at which muscle mass equates to more weight and less flexibility, but this point is very high compared to the range. Melee combat is wits, speed, accuracy--and if it goes on for a bit, endurance. Speed is directly related to muscle mass, and also relates to the power delivered. Past a certain point, speed complicates technique when defending against, too.

Especially in anything resembling medieval combat there are diminishing returns to strength, and past an easy to reach point your own contribution to a weapon's speed is negligible. Doing a Hulk impression provides no tangible improvement except maybe you could throw more weight into a swing but also be far more open to any attack because you're incapable of recovering quickly.

That's the misconception I'm trying to point out; the idea of every man warrior ever having to look like He-Man is stupidly flawed. Ability scores are abstract definitions of how good your character is in some areas; just like charisma isn't how good you look, strength isn't how roided out you are. Trying to say that it is and then using that as justification for why wimmins shouldn't be fighting is pretty horrible.

In melee combat, in reality, women suffer an incredible speed penalty compared to men, on average. This penalty will be most felt when the combatants are at their peak physical conditioning. As they age, the men will lose some of this edge (though it will always be an edge), and will have to compensate with better technique, as the women have already been doing. Of course, some men will know this, and will have already sought every edge to use against men with comparable speed.

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.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I played back when the game first game out and sexism at the table was often a thing female gamers dealt with. As a matter of fact it was why I stopped playing DnD for 14 years.

Take the strength argument one DM I had put a strength cap of 12 on female characters. Which meant when I rolled a fantastic character that screamed paladin. I was told no sorry there is no way a female could ever be a paladin. If you want to play one you have to play a male.

A good way to summarize my position is that mechanical gender differences might have a place in a game. If they do, they ought to hang together, be reasonable, and fit into other such modifiers. Age is a great example. Mechanical human gender differences for strength have no business being in a game that doesn't penalize characters physically for getting older. If I'm going to play the cards I'm dealt in the story, I want several cards to play with.

OTOH, if the person writing such rules or house rules is so dense about both games, models, and even real life that they think a female 12 Str cap in a 3-18 range is a good choice ... and isn't clued in that there might be a problem with this by some rather obvious character choices excluded ... then I think sexism is rather the least of his problems. You can't fix that kind of stupid.

 

[JamesonCourage]

I don't really see the strength differences in this case as a problem. The players chose to put those stats in those places because they fit the PCs they want to play (or have rolled the stats to play). That will drive their conceptions stronger than picking/rolling a weight value that's off-kilter. I won't even get into the 16 strength 40 lb halfling that could come up in comparison to that male human example...

Well, in my game, you don't pick stats entirely. You roll in order, than can swap in two, and reroll any one. Because of that, you can always have your highest roll in any stat you want (including Strength). So, you could make it your highest, yes. But you might also have a high Strength as a by-product of character generation. I know that my game is not standard, but even with assigned stats, that can be the case. With point-buy, not so much.

As a DM, I might encourage the woman PC's player to up the weight a little bit to reflect her strength and create a more believable PC, but ultimately, it's not going to be that big an issue.

Our group picks height and weight after stats for this very reason. I agree, though, that it's not a big issue for us. It's a very small issue.

 

[pawsplay]

I don't really see the strength differences in this case as a problem. The players chose to put those stats in those places because they fit the PCs they want to play (or have rolled the stats to play). That will drive their conceptions stronger than picking/rolling a weight value that's off-kilter. I won't even get into the 16 strength 40 lb halfling that could come up in comparison to that male human example...

As a DM, I might encourage the woman PC's player to up the weight a little bit to reflect her strength and create a more believable PC, but ultimately, it's not going to be that big an issue.

It's like that (IMO) undesirable thing that happens when someone plays a minotaur barbarian. Minotaurs are strong, barbarians are stronger... so the barbarian minotaur is super-strong, even for a minotaur! ... But isn't a minotaur already strong enough to be a hugely strong PC barbarian?