D&D 5E Roleplaying the opposite gender

[FormerlyHemlock]

My suggestion is: do not focus on the character gender, instead pick a known real-life person or existing character from a movie/book (without telling anybody), and think of her/him while roleplaying your character. Let's say you're playing a female Wizard, you could choose for example Lana Parrilla's "Evil Queen" from Once Upon a Time or Cate Blanchett's Galadriel*, and then just say what you think she would say in the way you think she would say that! You don't need to mimic the voice pitch at all, you can mimic the accent (but not necessarily), but just imagine you're seeing her on the screen and your roleplaying will be affected.

*But anyone can do really... you could pick Rachel from Friends, Judy Dench, or Piggy from Sesame Street and they will work for a Wizard just as well, only differently.

Well over a year ago I was using Donald Trump (complete with hand gestures) for a villainous orcish shaman trying a hostile takeover of an orcish village. I totally called that one.

 

[Bitbrain]

As far as the 18/50 part goes, the best way to explain it, if you aren't familiar, is that there was some space in between 18 and 19 (for strength, only) that was measured with a percentile. It was kinda wonky.

Certainly sounds like it.

 

[77IM]

Well over a year ago I was using Donald Trump (complete with hand gestures) for a villainous orcish shaman trying a hostile takeover of an orcish village. I totally called that one.

I once ran a zombie-apocalypse game in Savage Worlds where the players met a necrobiologist who was studying the zombies. I portrayed him as George W. Bush, really hamming up the folksy-yokel aspect of his speech. Because of the contrast (a scientist who sounded like a rural bumpkin) the character was really memorable.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Certainly sounds like it.

To elaborate:

If you rolled a natural 18 on Strength, and you were a warrior class (Fighter/Ranger/Paladin, in 2nd edition; in 1E I think there was also Barbarian but I didn't play 1E except in CRPGs), you got to roll percentile dice. A raw Str 18 wasn't worth much, only +1 to hit and +2 to damage, but an 18/50 was +1 to hit and +3 to damage and an 18/99 was +2 to hit and +5 to damage; 18/00 was +3 to hit and +6 to damage. Rolling the fabled 18/00 was practically like starting the game with a +5 magic weapon, and it would enable you to do all kinds of tricks like specialize in dart-throwing for up to five or six hugely-damaging attacks per round.

Of course, all the 18/00s I ever saw back then were made by cheating in one way or another (including with DM approval and assistance), because we were adolescent munchkins back then. An of course munchkins eventually got tired of "mere" 18/00s and started hungering for those 19s and 25s...

Anyway, that's what percentile Strength was, and that's why the hypothetical elven Delta Force would desire 18/00 so much, if all the elvish NPCs were cheating munchkins. Hence the joke.

 

[Mercule]

Of course, all the 18/00s I ever saw back then were made by cheating in one way or another (including with DM approval and assistance), because we were adolescent munchkins back then. An of course munchkins eventually got tired of "mere" 18/00s and started hungering for those 19s and 25s...

True story: The only legitimate 18/00 I rolled in 1E was for a higher-level Ranger entering an existing group. I was tickled. Then I found out that the Wizard/Thief had gauntlets of ogre power (which gave 18/00 strength) and was the weakest character. Everyone else had some flavor of girdle of giant strength or magical bath tubs.

Come to think of it, that's the only 18/00 I can actually say I'm sure was legit. And, it was for a total Monty Haul game where no one would have noticed or cared if I'd said I rolled a natural 20 for strength. Yeah. Not sad to see exceptional strength rules go away.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Putting someone down for swearing is elitism, whether done to a man or a woman.

Do you get it now or do I have to explain it in simpler fashion?

Wow. Just wow. No, elitism is what you're doing here: self-righteous condescension in the guise of erudite social criticism all with the world's biggest stick stuck up one's [EnWorld is too elitist for me to finish this sentence]

 

[TheCosmicKid]

I once ran a zombie-apocalypse game in Savage Worlds where the players met a necrobiologist who was studying the zombies. I portrayed him as George W. Bush, really hamming up the folksy-yokel aspect of his speech. Because of the contrast (a scientist who sounded like a rural bumpkin) the character was really memorable.

Most biologists I know sound like that. An awful lot of people got into biology via chasing snakes around the backwoods of various flyover states (I'm a Nebraskan, I can say it). For real contrast, I'd have used that persona on a social scientist of some sort. Not that they can't also come from rural backgrounds, but I've yet to meet one who has kept the accent.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Of course, all the 18/00s I ever saw back then were made by cheating in one way or another (including with DM approval and assistance), because we were adolescent munchkins back then. An of course munchkins eventually got tired of "mere" 18/00s and started hungering for those 19s and 25s...

The only reason I can figure for the exceptional strength rules to exist in the first place was that people were cheating so regularly they had to start distinguishing one 18 from another.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

True story: The only legitimate 18/00 I rolled in 1E was for a higher-level Ranger entering an existing group. I was tickled. Then I found out that the Wizard/Thief had gauntlets of ogre power (which gave 18/00 strength) and was the weakest character. Everyone else had some flavor of girdle of giant strength or magical bath tubs.

Come to think of it, that's the only 18/00 I can actually say I'm sure was legit. And, it was for a total Monty Haul game where no one would have noticed or cared if I'd said I rolled a natural 20 for strength. Yeah. Not sad to see exceptional strength rules go away.

Me neither. The flatter stat curve in 5E makes it much, much easier to not worry so much about what stats you roll, and I feel that lowers the stat-rolling stakes and enhances enjoyment. In 5E you don't have to feel bad if your highest roll is a 14 instead of an 18--you just make a character who's a little less MAD, and you're still about 75-95% as effective (depending) as the all-18s guy. High rolls still make a difference, but not nearly as much of a difference as they used to with the AD&D stat tables.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

The only reason I can figure for the exceptional strength rules to exist in the first place was that people were cheating so regularly they had to start distinguishing one 18 from another.

I figured it was to model heroically strong extreme-outlier characters and to reward players for choosing to play warriors (Fighters, Rangers, Paladins). Similar to how only warriors could get extra HP bonuses for Constitution over 16. "Extreme stat bonuses" were kind of the warrior's thing.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

I figured it was to model heroically strong extreme-outlier characters and to reward players for choosing to play warriors (Fighters, Rangers, Paladins). Similar to how only warriors could get extra HP bonuses for Constitution over 16. "Extreme stat bonuses" were kind of the warrior's thing.

Yeah, but it's weird when there's a whole extra ruleset that only matters for 1/216th of rolled characters. Unless the proportion is actually a lot higher than 1/216.

 

[Mercule]

Most biologists I know sound like that. An awful lot of people got into biology via chasing snakes around the backwoods of various flyover states (I'm a Nebraskan, I can say it). For real contrast, I'd have used that persona on a social scientist of some sort. Not that they can't also come from rural backgrounds, but I've yet to meet one who has kept the accent.

Yeah. I went to Iowa State University, which is known for 1) Ag Science and 2) Engineering. Now, most Iowans don't have much of an accent (aside from pronouncing "wash" as "wursh"), but there was a plurality of both groups that sounded like they were about to say, "Here, hold my beer and watch this, y'all." Many of them were brilliant, though.

To your second point, I ended up with with a degree in Political Science (started in chem engineering and did well, just didn't like it). I worked really, really hard to "standardize" my English. I never had much of an accent, but I purged what little I had. Killed the "um..." and "so..." type fillers, too. I imagine it isn't universally true for social sciences, but political science often goes with an interest in debate and public speaking. At the very least, you have to be able to have an "argument" with folks who aren't going to give you a bye on sounding like a hick. I can still add in an accent, even one I wasn't born with, and often do so unconsciously when around others who speak idiomatically. In some cases, I had to work to "dirty up" my language after graduation, because the real world isn't filled with academics.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Yeah, but it's weird when there's a whole extra ruleset that only matters for 1/216th of rolled characters. Unless the proportion is actually a lot higher than 1/216.

(1) AD&D was not designed purely with gamism in mind. Some rules were invented to increase realism for the sake of realism, not strictly just for PCs. Consider the AC adjustments by weapon type tables.

(2) 3d6-in-order was not AD&D 1E's only stat generation method, or even its default stat generation method. Per http://home.earthlink.net/~duanevp/dnd/stat_generation.htm 1E's stat generation Method I was the same as 5E: 4d6 drop lowest, arrange to taste. That makes the chance of a warrior getting an 18 the same as 5E, 9.34%. (See http://anydice.com/articles/4d6-drop-lowest/). It's very reasonable to have rules for something that affects 9.34% of all PCs.

 

[Mercule]

Yeah, but it's weird when there's a whole extra ruleset that only matters for 1/216th of rolled characters. Unless the proportion is actually a lot higher than 1/216.

Using the more common 4d6, drop low method, the odds are 1.62% (vs. 0.46%) -- pretty much exactly 3.5 times as likely. If you get six stats and arrange as you please, the odds of an 18 prime stat go up to 9.34%

That sounds like a lot: 934 out of every 10,000 characters -- almost one in ten. But, let's assume that the "big four" classes and their sub-types are evenly distributed. Maybe not strictly true, but close enough for rounding errors. That means 243 characters out of every 10,000 (2.43%). If each group played AD&D for 15 years and rolled 25 characters per year (which is high for my experience, but whatever), that's 375 characters over the span of the edition. Each table should have seen roughly 9 characters with exceptional strength. Probably not absurd to have the rules, but not worth a lot of space/effort, either. Best to have dropped it.

Yeah. I like statistics.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Yeah. I went to Iowa State University, which is known for 1) Ag Science and 2) Engineering. Now, most Iowans don't have much of an accent (aside from pronouncing "wash" as "wursh"), but there was a plurality of both groups that sounded like they were about to say, "Here, hold my beer and watch this, y'all." Many of them were brilliant, though.

Fun fact: Everybody thinks they don't have an accent. But there's a little dialect band in Nebraska-Iowa-Illinois (I've seen other maps that basically put it just from Ames to Omaha) which linguists have identified as the speech most closely resembling Standard American English. So it was weird to learn that when I thought I didn't have an accent, I was actually right.

...and then I took higher-level Ling courses and started to identify distinctive features of the accent I "didn't have".

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Using the more common 4d6, drop low method, the odds are 1.62% (vs. 0.46%) -- pretty much exactly 3.5 times as likely. If you get six stats and arrange as you please, the odds of an 18 prime stat go up to 9.34%

That sounds like a lot: 934 out of every 10,000 characters -- almost one in ten. But, let's assume that the "big four" classes and their sub-types are evenly distributed. Maybe not strictly true, but close enough for rounding errors. That means 243 characters out of every 10,000 (2.43%). If each group played AD&D for 15 years and rolled 25 characters per year (which is high for my experience, but whatever), that's 375 characters over the span of the edition. Each table should have seen roughly 9 characters with exceptional strength. Probably not absurd to have the rules, but not worth a lot of space/effort, either. Best to have dropped it.

Yeah. I like statistics.

I'll concede the math, but I maintain, as you say, "not worth a lot of space/effort".

Anyway: dudes playing ladies and ladies playing dudes. How 'bout that?

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Anyway: dudes playing ladies and ladies playing dudes. How 'bout that?

Okay. Here's a thought: is that easier or harder than dudes playing Cthuloid horrors and ladies playing insectoid abominations? (Seeing as how this thread is about DMing, we can't just consider (N)PC classes, we have to think about everything the DM roleplays.)

I think the gender gap is easier in theory but more likely to cause difficulties in practice, because players don't seem to expect much characterization out of alien creatures, and wouldn't recognize it if they saw it. For an alien creature you just give it a gimmick ("never uses second-person pronouns, like Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs") and call it good.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Using the more common 4d6, drop low method, the odds are 1.62% (vs. 0.46%) -- pretty much exactly 3.5 times as likely. If you get six stats and arrange as you please, the odds of an 18 prime stat go up to 9.34%

That sounds like a lot: 934 out of every 10,000 characters -- almost one in ten. But, let's assume that the "big four" classes and their sub-types are evenly distributed. Maybe not strictly true, but close enough for rounding errors. That means 243 characters out of every 10,000 (2.43%). If each group played AD&D for 15 years and rolled 25 characters per year (which is high for my experience, but whatever), that's 375 characters over the span of the edition. Each table should have seen roughly 9 characters with exceptional strength. Probably not absurd to have the rules, but not worth a lot of space/effort, either. Best to have dropped it.

Yeah. I like statistics.

I'd argue that the other 691 PCs who roll 18s are also affected by the exceptional strength rules, because they have the option of playing warriors with exceptional strength. It's a temptation, and potentially a strong one, because if you have another high ability score (Int 17?) you can always dual-class to get the best of both worlds. Fighter 9/Wizard X FTW!

And then there's multiclassing to consider too. It could be the case that 75% of all characters created at a given table have Fighter as one of their classes.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Okay. Here's a thought: is that easier or harder than dudes playing Cthuloid horrors and ladies playing insectoid abominations?

You're right: Chthuloid horrors are much more feminine.

 

[Mercule]

You're right: Chthuloid horrors are much more feminine.

We may have passed the point of rational discourse on the matter.