Warforged and Gender

[pawsplay]

I'm particularly baffled by the indication in RoE that the choice of gender, once made, cannot be changed. First of all, that assumes they have an "actual" gender, which I find questionable. In fact, it seems to posit that there is an essential masculine and an essential feminine, which I find a little sexist. Second, gender is not that immutable even in humans; a small but measurable number of humans decide they are the "wrong" gender or go through periods of gender confusion. Third, there are no biological drives that require the warforged to take on a particular reproductive role; to a warforged, a choice of gender would be explicitly nothing more than a personal choice. I used to be a long-haired metalhead, now I'm a short-haired post-punk; I imagine a warforged could change gender as easily if not moreso.

I would really like to ask the person who wrote that sentence, "Why?"

Is there some secret history, where it turns out the warforged are stolen souls of humanoids or something?

 

[werk]

I would probably expalin it as House K warforged are 'sexed', expecially the later models.

Warforged were originally created to be hosts for quori, which are sexless, so I'd assume those early models to be sexless as well.

House K just made some mods that they felt helped the warforged assimilate more easily as the war ended and they tried to reimagine their product and make the shift from war to peace. Let's not forget that house K warforged were made to be soldiers, and later, laborers. Some roles are performed predominantly by women, especially in a medieval or fantasy setting...like bikini waxer.

IMC it would greatly depend on the make and model of warforged, as well as the date of manufacture.

 

[Thunderfoot]

<SNIP>
By contrast, consider the probe droid, or IG-88, or any number of other villainous droids in the movies ... all genderless, as far as we know. (I'm not familiar with the novels and such.)
<SNIP>

IG-88, and General Grevious are both referred to as he. The probe droid was an it (low class non-thinking type, similar to the interrogation droid in A New Hope) So, still an invalid-ish statement, though I see where you are going with your statement.

 

[Scarbonac]

But my first one has a keg of beer built in and the second is just plain hot.

Mine turns into a hot naked German chick.

 

[Scarbonac]

IG-88, and General Grevious are both referred to as he. The probe droid was an it (low class non-thinking type, similar to the interrogation droid in A New Hope) So, still an invalid-ish statement, though I see where you are going with your statement.

I could have sworn that Grevious was actually a cyborg, a precursor to Vader.

 

[DarkKestral]

I could have sworn that Grevious was actually a cyborg, a precursor to Vader.

And you'd be right.

 

[Grymar]

In my campaign, Warforged are asexual. I believe the male/female personality drivel to be an attempt by WotC to be politically correct or to enable the race to gain further traction by helping women identify with it.

If a pc wants to play a 'forged and investigate this aspect, I'm fine with it, but up to that point I'm not going to bother to assign genders. They are warforged.

 

[Dagredhel]

I'm surprised that no one mentioned the theory/speculation that Warforged contain the souls of fallen soldiers. I read this idea on these boards as a proposed explanation for their inate combat prowess (or at least their ability to quickly assimilate the basics of warrior training)... echoes of past lives. If a Warforged's soul was formally housed in an engendered body, then perhaps the old habits of thought, biases, and masculine or feminine traits persist to some degree?

 

[Dire Bare]

In my campaign, Warforged are asexual. I believe the male/female personality drivel to be an attempt by WotC to be politically correct or to enable the race to gain further traction by helping women identify with it.

Huh? How does the option for warforged adopting a gendered personality promote "political correctness"?!?! Do you think WotC is afraid of offending someone with asexual robots? That just makes no sense.

In the real world, there is very little reason for the average robot to be programmed with a gender. But in sci fi, and now fantasy, robots with gendered personalities goes back a lot further than the Eberron Campaign Setting, and is fact the norm in fiction.

 

[Nifft]

Mommy Mommy Make B088y Stop Showing Me His Piston