Also, the author of this thread might not be aware of this, but your character's gender doesn't have to match their sex. You can have a female barbarian who is a man's man personality-wise, or you can have a male elven wizard who thinks she is the most beautiful girl at the ball.
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... Wait... the gender of your character actually affects gameplay? The heck you say? I've never experienced a difference.When i play male characters I pee standing up, still about as accurate as most guys. :)Wait, YOU pee standing up, or your character pees standing up?
One thing I make sure all my characters do, male or female, is make sure the seat is down when they are done...
yes.
Also, the author of this thread might not be aware of this, but your character's gender doesn't have to match their sex. You can have a female barbarian who is a man's man personality-wise, or you can have a male elven wizard who thinks she is the most beautiful girl at the ball.
Somewhere along the lines (At least here in Americaland) the terms gender and sex got turned into the same word. Some dictionaries even back up the lack of distinction.
Gender: Masculine or feminine social/mental traits. All that nonphysical stuff.
Sex: The physical stuff we hide under our clothes.
So by the common Drow depictions, men are expected to take on feminine gender roles, while still having the male sex. Likewise women have masculine gender while female sex.
English is a grand fiasco.
I have when playing three characters as the only player played a female character while playing two male characters.
Ever since I played Star Wars KOTOR for the first time, playing female characters became a closet interest to me. I always made a female character first in every RPG since then (Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Neverwinter Nights and others).
I'm the same way, but it's basically been this way my entire life. This post, DraconicBlessing, resonates deep with me, if only to know that I'm not the only one. I sincerely thank you for this post. Besides, female Shepard is awesome.
I didn't have the same issue with bringing in a female character with my first group, (or any group), but I get the occasional playful banter about it. Sorry to hear you had more of an issue with it.
Thanks to everyone for their comments and time - sorry it took so long for me to respond - busy weekend and all.
While I think I've made a decent variety of female characters with several personality types over the years, I've made far fewer deeper and well-thought out males. I prefer, almost exclusively, heroes who are virtually infallably good or a character who is more "mercenary" while on a personal mission who eventually will either rise to goodness or fall to evil (based on how the campaign, and more importantly, interactions with the other PCs have gone). Perhaps the one quality all of my characters share (female or male) is determination - they don't quit easy.
I think I know one main reason for this - the idea of "playing the hero" is probably the main reason I started playing in the first game. That escapism is something that is a big part of my life (whether through D&D, video games, or what have you), and, for now, it's something I want to continue. I also think I know the second reason I seem to prefer female characters, but I'm not talking about it here.
Thanks for all the comments and postings, and I intend to keep reading.
In any game I get to choose, I play male 95% of the time. Usually when I do actually play a female, it's a game I have played already, and I know I'm going to spend a lot of time watching the character run around, so I decide I might's'well look at a chick.
I think I might have actually roleplayed a girl once, and it was very downplayed. I could be wrong.
It's not really a sexist thing for me - at least, not with malicious intent. I just can build a male character in my head I find believable. When I try to build a female persona, I find myself second guessing my decisions, always wondering if the lens I'm trying to look through is constructed properly. I lose immersion.
On a completely related note, if I were to actually dedicate myself to roleplaying a female, she would totally be a lesbian.
@ Vendis
On the sexuality of the female part, I think that I do play that a bit differently between male and female characters. With males I usually establish at the get-go their orientation (I've played a homosexual kobold who had his fun and straight ones), but with females I feel that I would leave it open to explore throughout a campaign. Now, that can be interpreted as accurate, because women do seem to tend to be a little more open with their sexuality. I don't do that because I find it sexy, I do it because it feels right, and I am of a mind that exploring sexuality is healthy in real life too.
Very good point to bring up. xD
yes.... Wait... the gender of your character actually affects gameplay? The heck you say? I've never experienced a difference.When i play male characters I pee standing up, still about as accurate as most guys. :)Wait, YOU pee standing up, or your character pees standing up?
One thing I make sure all my characters do, male or female, is make sure the seat is down when they are done...
That... still isn't really a change in gameplay. That's a change in roleplay, which is acceptable to a degree. That's practically like saying "whenever all of my character's gear is destroyed I cover two parts of my body when I'm a female, but one part when I'm a male".... it's just something that really shouldn't come up that often.
I removed some 'popcorn' type posts. Really folks, it helps nothing to post that kind of thing.
I also removed what I'm pretty sure was a deliberate attempt to stir up a flame war, and the replies to it. Flag it and move on, folks.
I have played two female characters in a group. The first was a telepath in a 3.0 game a few years ago. The current one is a witch in an AP. I don't have a problem playing a female, it is the other players who can't get past it and really is their issue.
To the OP I have to ask this question in response.
When you GM, Are all the NPC's in your world male? How do you run your female NPC's if you run them at all?
Playing a cross-gender PC isn't really that much different than doing so as a DM.
Not at all. It's a mixed world that's probably pretty close to real-world standards. One time a friend of mine even made a joke about an hour into the adventure; "Well, we haven't met a major female character yet, so either one of the males is actually a girl, or the villain we haven't met yet is a chick."
I run my female NPCs much the same as my male ones - follow their motivations and personality and act it out as best I can.
While you may have a point that playing the NPC is the same as a PC, I think that the time difference between a given NPC and a PC is great enough that it makes a noticeable difference. Further, I think less about NPCs' backgrounds than I do my characters, so there's more to play on with PCs than NPCs.
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Not at all. It's a mixed world that's probably pretty close to real-world standards. One time a friend of mine even made a joke about an hour into the adventure; "Well, we haven't met a major female character yet, so either one of the males is actually a girl, or the villain we haven't met yet is a chick."
Heh. Seen similar jokes made before in games I've been in... at least once, I was playing the cross-dressed female character that everyone else still thought was male.
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Heh. Seen similar jokes made before in games I've been in... at least once, I was playing the cross-dressed female character that everyone else still thought was male.
Not at all. It's a mixed world that's probably pretty close to real-world standards. One time a friend of mine even made a joke about an hour into the adventure; "Well, we haven't met a major female character yet, so either one of the males is actually a girl, or the villain we haven't met yet is a chick."
Ha! One time, when I made my most recent Paladin, I mentioned he would be male, and the same friend I mentioned above said "WHAT!? You're playing a Paladin male? The idea of the heroic female warrior flying around kicking peoples' asses is so cool! Paladin is the only class I would play a female in, and you're gonna play a male?! YOU!?!"
Really made me think hard about it, and I bounced back and forth for several days. He's right though - particularly for me, the idea of the angelic warrior, her eyes shining brilliantly, sword in hand, ready to strike down evil-doers - is something that deeply appeals to me.
Like right here. Don't care for the skimpy outfit, though. Never liked that.
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...resonates deep with me, if only to know that I'm not the only one.
Draconic Blessing and you aren't the only ones.
Don't care for the skimpy outfit, though. Never liked that.
At least it's not a chainmail bikini. But, yeah-- it'd be nice if we had more good art of heroines dressed sensibly instead of scantily when it's a situation where armor is called for. Another reflection I am now coming to-- my female characters have had amongst them my darkest characters and my most brightly shining characters (and have still included plenty who were in-between). My male characters have simply been 'soldiers'-- Heroes, yes (though not always)-- but never particularly dark nor especially paragons of virtue.
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I only play characters that are my own sex. I feel there aren't enough female characters, in general, as it is, and I'd rather explore characters of my own sex than try to play a male character.
As a GM I, of course, have many male antagonists and NPCs, but when I'm going to be concentrating on a single character for an extended period of time I just stick with female characters.
The only times someone playing a character of another sex has bothered me is when the character seems to be a vehicle for the player to make commentary about that sex, and what they hate/despise about it. When the character is nothing but a negative caricature, it gets old real fast. I suppose a simple posiitve caricature would get old quickly too, but I haven't seen that done. :)
...resonates deep with me, if only to know that I'm not the only one.Draconic Blessing and you aren't the only ones.
Don't care for the skimpy outfit, though. Never liked that.At least it's not a chainmail bikini. But, yeah-- it'd be nice if we had more good art of heroines dressed sensibly instead of scantily when it's a situation where armor is called for. Another reflection I am now coming to-- my female characters have had amongst them my darkest characters and my most brightly shining characters (and have still included plenty who were in-between). My male characters have simply been 'soldiers'-- Heroes, yes (though not always)-- but never particularly dark nor especially paragons of virtue.
Good to know on the first part, Finn.
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I'll be using 'sex' in this post to mean 'what bits someone has' and 'gender' to mean 'how one perceives oneself'. Hopefully the gender definition won't offend; I tried to make it as generic as possible while still being separate from the biological. With that out of the way, a disclaimer: I am male (sex and gender) and in the US. Posting as a female because she's the character I'm playing in a PbP and if I don't set her as my default alias I will constantly have to edit my posts immediately after posting to stay in character. (No, I'm not speaking from repeated experience, I don't know what you're talking about...)
I've played male and female characters. This is a female (sex and gender) Cleric I created for a PbP game, a character I really want to learn more about. I've played a female (sex and gender) druid before, as well. And a major NPC in a game I was running was a female (sex and gender) Rogue. Besides that, my characters have been male (sex and gender). I don't really see a character's sex or gender as the basis for their behavior: rather, it's a sort of emergent property of their personality, surroundings, and life experience.
For me, differences in gender are largely the influence of society on someone and how they react to it. How the character chooses to respond to those implied roles is the start of how I conceive of how to roleplay the character's gender. Where the character grew up has some influence, as well as life experience. Tiann is a bit clingy to her parents, something you can understand if you look at her backstory. As an atheist playing a game where religion has a serious impact, I also consider the religion of the character as possibly influencing their assumed gender role. And there's a dozen other factors.
But all that said, the most important thing I can say is that there's a necessary lesson of empathy when roleplaying (and living, really): I'm a person. You're a person. Everything else is details.
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Gender does indeed affect gameplay.
Even though gender affects how you play a character, given societal conditioning, there is a biological aspect one must consider too. Male brains and female brains aren't exactly the same. Endocrine systems spit out different levels of hormones based on gender and chronological age, among other factors. That being said...
Personal example:
I started playing a campaign as a human female rogue. She died, and was reincarnated by the party. She ended up a half-orc, teenaged male.
Suddenly, the slightly irritable but fiercely focused old-enough-to-know-better rogue was gone, replaced by a ravenous, more irritable, more risk-taking rogue. One whose raging teenage hormones had him falling all over himself when the attractive but evil cleric lady was around, and makes him slightly more prone to brooding.
He's still kind of uncertain about whether he should be called "sir".
I'm bumping this because I didn't want to start a new thread. There is an excellent thread going about home-brew rules. One rule suggested was that a character has to be the same gender as the player. This kind of reasoning baffled me.
Our group is all men, and while we tend to play more men, about 30% of our characters are women. I like to think we do them justice, too. They aren't all healers, sluts or b****es. We don't do their voices absurdly falsetto. That's not to say we haven't had sexist moments before (In middle school playing AD&D 2E we had our share of gratuitous nymph encounters and hot Elf women with their "dirty pillows" hanging out and what have you.) But we generally tried to play them pretty realistically.
I think it's important to try to put a good mix of characters and NPC's in a game. It adds flavor, for one. The entire dynamic of an all male adventuring group changes when a woman is involved. I think when the case is made that those of one sex cannot play the other because they cannot totally understand what it would like to be the other sex, I would argue that no one will ever be able to understand what it is like be a Red-robed wizard in the world of Dragonlance or whatever because it doesn't even exist.
So if you want to play a different gender, try it. One great trick is at character creation, flesh out your character. Put in all the skills and feats and everything. Then ask yourself, if this character was a different sex, would I change some things? Would those changes I'd want to make be my own personal biases, or would there be some degree of logic to them? It's fun way to evaluate your world view and a great opportunity to try some different types of characters.