When Bob wants to play a female PC

[Destan]

Those of you who disliked my stance may take some solace in the fact that EN World sent me 432 emails announcing new posts on this thread. If it takes me four hours to unsubscribe to a thread, how on earth can I be expected to deal with such weighty and mature issues as these?

Speaking of weighty and mature, let's review:

…GMs who won't let male players play female PCs (or players who won't play in a group where this occurs) really freak me out…it seems like they must have some huge psychological problems.

Huh?

Maybe this is unfair, but [your attitude] makes my skin crawl.

What?

…if something bad happened when you were 15, should that still determine your GMing when you're 35?

Um...no?

Sounds to me like playing house and someone has to be the daddy…LOL…no offense but seems incredibly juvenile to me.

Hmm.

I'm not your therapist.

I didn't know I needed one...

Am I wrong or has the premise of ROLE PLAYING been completely lost on you?

I hope you're wrong?

Next thing ya know, you'll have these kinda rules:
Fat players cannot play skinny PCs, and vice-versa.
Young players cannot play old PCs, and vice-versa.
Wanna play any kind of caster? Well better prove to me you know magic first.
Wanna be a rogue? OK go hide in the yard, and if I find you, sorry, you weren't meant to be a rogue.
LMAO

OK...

…in my experience [your attitude] does make you the weird one.

Finally something we agree upon.

…people that can't allow cross gender play are just plain silly.

No comment.

It does seem like a preposterous question to me…

Sorry.

I've come to the conclusion that [you] have really low expectations of your players.

You haven't met my players, or you might agree with me.

***

In all seriousness, it seems like a lot of people have a lot of axes to grind. On both sides of the issue. Hell, I didn't know this issue had sides.

For me, the implications and repercussions of cross-gender roleplaying just aren't all that interesting. I didn't expect this thread to go in this direction, but I've been around here long enough that I should have known better.

Anyway, for those who had something constructive to say - on both sides of the issue - thanks for posting! If I've learned nothing else from this, I've learned that some players take these types of issues very, very seriously. It'll make me a better GM - I hope! - if I keep this in mind.

D

 

[Particle_Man]

Hmmm...more thoughts.

A guy playing a woman is not the same as a guy playing a hot woman. I have played a female half-orc with chr 4. She was not a hot babe. And the reason I played her is that there was only one female player in the group, and she had the only female character, so I thought I would play one so she wouldn't feel outnumbered.

I often alternate male and female characters. I might play a female character (a lesbian) as my next character, but currently am having far too much fun with my male halfling warlock (and here, I would go male, because the warlock is all about the stylish goatee and the skull shoulder pads) I have never played a "ho" or "nympho". I have only forgotten what gender I was playing once. But I was 10 at the time.

I have never played in a campaign that is gritty enough to have rape, especially not "on camera" rape (nor would I wish to). Thus Destan's particular campaign could have reasons not to play women, *even if a player was a woman*, since it can have "on camera" rape (trust me on this Destan -- I doubt that any female player wants to play a rape victim, so if you get a female player in your grim campaign, I suggest that you either lighten it up or let her play a guy). On the other hand, real life male prisons show that some men can and do rape men (and sometimes the rapists don't self-identify as gay when doing so), so I guess it depends on just how grim and gritty we want to go here...

Mechanical reasons to play women:

In "Macho Women With Guns", female characters are the only playable ones.

But more seriously, in 3rd ed. D&D, height and weight is sex segregated, except for elves with height (but not weight). So if you want to play the "tallest/heaviest character", you will play a male half-orc/human (assume phb races). If you want to play the "shortest/lightest character" you will play a female halfling (or perhaps gnome, for the illusionist/bard (3.0/3.5) angle). If you don't weigh much, it is easier for others to pull you out of a pit via a rope, or carry you (in a backpack, even!) if you fall in combat, and easier for you to be affected by/included in certain spell effects by friendly casters (teleport, dimension door, etc.). You might not even trigger some traps. So there are some strictly mechanical reasons to play female characters.

Note that in 3.0, jump distance was related to height, so that being taller (and thus, gender) had a mechanical effect on your maximum jumping distance (barring monks, etc.). So that would be a minor reason to play male characters, whether a player was male or female. they have fixed that slightly in 3.5, depending on how one interprets the rules.

 

[Abraxas]

Always late to the party.

I don't allow cross gender characters in games I DM any more for convenience - it gets old switching she for he or he for she. [I also don't allow silly names, and I am the ultimate arbiter of what is or is not silly, because they are even more distracting.] In my entire gaming experience I have only ever seen 1 character concept (that wasn't dictated by the setting) that absolutely required a specific gender, and it's a concept I don't want in any game I run.

I'm curious how many of the "don't restrict gender" crowd do restrict alignment choices for characters?

 

[Destan]

I have to wonder if the original post was inspired by this recently posted KODT comic. If so, he didn't even bother to change the player's name.

Didn't know what KODT was until I followed that link. I changed the guy's name from Bill to Bob for this scenario simply because I'm wily.

I have never played in a campaign that is gritty enough to have rape, especially not "on camera" rape (nor would I wish to).

You and me both.

D

 

[tarchon]

When the reductio ad absurdum is applied to a straw man, when it begs the question, or when it's used as a crude appeal to consequences, it can be. When the "ad absurdum" is either (A) built on top of a straw man or (B) ignores distinctions that differentiate the absurd conclusion from the initial argument, it's essentially a hollow argument.

It's not a "straw man" if that's what the actual position is. If someone says "I am overwhelmed by the yellowness of the sky," I'm not constructing a straw man if I construe that to be a statement that the sky is yellow. Just because someone can show that an argument is weak, that's not that same as making it into a straw man. That's not how the fallacy works. I don't know if this is the argument you personally support since you've been leaping from argument to argument a lot, but many people on this thread are very much saying that the main problems with cross-gender roleplaying are that it's (1) hard to accept and (2) too difficult to do well, and both of those are wide open to Lasher's criticism. More difficult and unbelievable than playing a Chaotic Evil half-dragon centaur alchemist? The only element to that that seems even vaguely buyable is the idea that sometimes female players might be offended.

One cites confusion that wasn't pronoun-based (3); he couldn't remember which of his players was female. You cited pronoun-based confusion and a couple other people said that that could be a problem, but that it wasn't enough to rule out cross-gendering.

(1) Disquieting/Disturbing
Destan
Oryan77

(2) Too difficult for player to do right
Crothian:
"And it is less then 25% that actually do a good job with it, though most play it like number one and you'd have no idea what the gender is. So, I'll discourage it just like I discourage from women playing males unless they have a really good compelling reason to do so."
Old One:
"That said, I have banned certain players from going cross-gender because they suck at it so bad !"
Ace:
"I banned cross gender roleplaying in my campaign for reasons of fairness -- we have had otherwise good players play the opposite gender in ways that offend the group"

(3) Confusing
SJMiller:
"The reason for this is simple. When starting a campaign, especially with a group this size, the DM needs as few confusing bits as possible. Knowing that I can associate the character gender with the player gender allows me to quickly work in certain elements of a campaign without constantly having to check things."

(4) No Reason
Brennin Magalus:
"I have not allowed "cross-gendered" role-playing in the past. Whether I enforce that rule for my next game remains to be seen."

You're mainly saying that pronouns are the fundamental problem.
On top of my previous observations on that, clearly when the DM is playing a party of orcs, no one has trouble keeping track of whether to call the orcs "they" or the DM "they." If the DM is playing a talking lamp referred to as "it", no one has trouble remembering whether the DM is a he, she, or it. When a male DM is playing a female NPC, no one has trouble remembering whether to call the DM "he" or "she." Many PCs have familiars, henchmen, followers etc., who they run simulataneously. Is that less confusing somehow? Why is it that with this one particular case, it's a big enough issue that the practice should be banned? It just seems pretty strange that DMs can juggle 5 players with 10 characters, NPCs, and a whole world, but remembering whether Bob is playing an elf maiden just blows all the circuits. It's harder than remembering he's A 6'3" Flan with red hair and a beard?

As for my subjective observations, you can accept them or not, but I think if you get past the Sapir-Worfish position you've staked out, you would see that many guys just don't like to have their guy friends playing hot chicks because it makes them feel ooky, and they come up with all sorts of stretched reasons to justify their feeling of ookiness. That's an appeal to the obvious, if you want to look it up on your fallacy page. I mean, how many people on this thread have prefaced their remarks with "I'm not gay but..." or "I don't hate homosexuals but..."? That ought to tell you something right there. "Oh, it has nothing to do with homosexuality, but I thought I'd point out that I'm not gay." This may be the least gay thread in the history of ENWorld. OK, whatever, but maybe people would understand this a little better if they stopped worrying about whether what they feel about is socially acceptable or not and actually looked at what they feel about it.

 

[Elrik_DarkFury]

Finally something we agree upon

Destan,

I've only played a couple of female character for one-shots and i would discourage my players playing cross gender characters (although this situation is not likely to arise with my group)
because i just don't like the feeling of the game when this happens.

Many people feel like that so no big deal.
You'll have to find something more gross to earn the title of the weird guy.
(maybe start calling total strangers weird, just because what they like/deslike is different than you do).



_____________________
The Wizard

 

[Particle_Man]

I'm the "Bob" in this case.

A 'female' character does, within our campaign pose certain issues, we play a "R" campaign. (I say an "R" not out of sexually explicit or anything like that, but in the grittiness of it.) The evil guys are not above kidnapping and raping to punish various people.

Bill

Destan, your player in question (Bill=Bob) said that. So in your campaign, do the evil guys sometimes rape females or not? If they do, then that is a reason not to play a female character in your campaign, whether one is a male or female player. (Also, if the evil guys do sometimes rape, do they also sometimes "punish various people" by raping men? children? dogs?) If they do not rape female characters (or other characters), why did your player say that they sometimes do?

 

[apesamongus]

1) Playing the character no different from any other so asside from the female gender on the character sheet one would never know

You admit that this is the most common and I fail to see why it would be a problem. Most people play Fred the barbarian just like Fred the accountant just like Fred the martian - why should gender be any different?

 

[der_kluge]

I'm just curious. Of those GMs who flat out say that won't allow cross-gender role-playing in their game, would they allow guys to play girls in an online game that they ran?

 

[Destan]

Destan, your player in question (Bill=Bob) said that. So in your campaign, do the evil guys sometimes rape females or not?

Sorry - I was referring to the "on camera" caveat you had mentioned. Yes, bad things happen to people within the campaign setting we're playing. Villages get looted and burned and innocent folks sometimes kick the bucket. I hate the world 'realism' in this context, but the world is 'realistic' in that it models (insofar as my capabilities allow) historical situations. We have racial tension and an insufferable caste system and disease and all those other things that may not be suited for many of the high fantasy settings on the market.

Please realize I'm spinning that type of yarn because (I think) the players enjoy it. If they didn't like that sort of stuff, I'd try to drop it - or take a break from the DM'ing duties.

Just by way of reference, I have five players. All of us are married with kids. We're old. Too old, probably, to be rolling dice as often as we do. I don't think some of the themes I present would be appropriate to certain groups, and I'm not trying to defend them to the community of roleplayers as a whole.

I'm just curious. Of those GMs who flat out say that won't allow cross-gender role-playing in their game, would they allow guys to play girls in an online game that they ran?

That's a great question. And I say it's great because I find myself saying, "Yah, I'd have no problems with a guy running a girl in an online game." In fact, I run a game on Fantasy Grounds and I'd be completely fine with that.

Now...don't ask me why - because I have no idea. But it is what it is.

Again, I'm not anti-cross-gender gaming. I simply asked a guy if he'd switch to a male PC, and since I rarely try to change PC's choices when it comes to their characters (balance concerns aside), I thought it odd. That 'oddness' was the whole reason I posted on the boards in the first place.

Anyway, good question.

G'nite,
D