Turnabout Is Fair Play - Female Gamers

[Arrgh! Mark!]

My geeky girlfriend got to watch us play one day.

Three odd years later, she makes jokes like "Arrgh! Will save!" and is putting together her first game for a group of other girls. (I'm so proud! She's even telling me to bugger off when I try to create her game for her!)

While few, the girls that have been in my group have added to rather than taken away from the sessions, in terms of both fun and table manners.

 

[dpetroc]

My wife got into RP-ing first through helping me paint miniatures, then through a solo Oriental adventures game. Right now she plays a 13th level Hexblade, and a 9th level Pirate (Conan RPG). While not completely bloodthirsty -- she's not one to be messed with.

 

[Piratecat]

Yeah I totally agree (not!)

Heh. My biggest hack-and-slashers have both been women.

 

[WhatGravitas]

My Girlfiend is the most evil GM I ever met

Ditto. But she only GMs Call of Cthulhu, and she's good.
In D&D, she totally goes Hack-n'-Slash... but is not that keen on long in-character conversations.

 

[Kafkonia]

The group I play with regularly: 3 men, 3 women (and a male DM.)

The group I DMed: 5 women, one man (different man each session, mind) and me.

I'm more comfortable around women, to the point where I don't know if I could game in an all-male group. But I have had one (and only one) problem that is directly attributable to the gender of the players -- the game I was DM'ing has gone on hold because one player just had a baby.

 

[Voadam]

Hmm, the two groups I was in during college both had women.

One was a husband and wife team, both experienced players. I don't know who was into D&D first between them.

In the one I ran one of my room-mates asked if a co-worker of his could join our game, though she had never played before. I said sure and we taught her. She wasn't dating anyone in the game, just a friend of my room-mate's who he met at his work.

In my current game I invited spouses to join, but my wife has no interest, my friend's wife only has an interest in painting miniatures, and my brother's wife had an interest but unfortunately felt intimidated about joining in our games (she had heard the stories from him about the 20 plus years of our games and found it too much to jump into as a newbie despite our assurances that it would be fine), and other spouses and SOs preferred to do other things while we gamed.

There are a number of women who I game with online, but I don't really know them outside of the games.

 

[Hjorimir]

Over the years (damn, I'm feeling old), I've only had the pleasure of playing D&D with ten different women. All of them were players. Not a one of them were strong with the rules, but that is perfectly okay as long as they were having fun.

That said, I think it would be neat to play in a campaign run by a woman and it is something I hope I get the opportunity to do one day.

 

[Dragonbait]

I'm not sure gender is a function of interest in D&D. Some males get hooked; others don't. Some females get hooked; others don't.

Nevertheless, there are apparently more males than females playing D&D. So I might be totally wrong.

I think it has more to do with the players already in the group, public perception, and the subject matter rather than gaming itself.

I've gamed with many female players, and I was actually caught off guard when I encountered a group of players who were shocked that girls played in my games.

I had one experience of the boyfriend/girlfriend team that went through a breakup. Both played, but the boyfriend had been playing for years before their relationship. After the breakup, the guy stopped playing (moved away to college) and the girl continued. She was the best damn miniature painter, great drawer, and a good roleplayer (er, at times..)

I still think that gaming group was from a bizarro world where football players, metrosexuals, cops, lawyers, and hawt people all played D&D instead of your typical nerds. I was the (not so)proud representative of the stereotypical nerd/dork community... Yeah, I felt a bit out of place at times..

 

[Dragonbait]

That said, I think it would be neat to play in a campaign run by a woman and it is something I hope I get the opportunity to do one day.

I have several times and I didn't see any difference than any other good or bad GM. One was a real GM vs. Players type who would throw a fit if the players won, the other was a very story-oriented, visual GM.

 

[Goldmoon]

In 18+ years of gaming I have only been in one or two groups where I wasnt the only female gamer. I have always loved old cars ans my first experience with an RPG was Car wars. I got into D&D about a year after that and have been hooked every since. I have strayed occasionally into RIFTS, Shadowrun and CoC once or twice but I always come back to D&D.