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I'm writing a historical scenario (Cthulhu) set in the 16th century. Major characters include Kit Marlowe, Lord Strange's Men, and Shakespeare. PCs are spies, actors, mountebanks, and book agents.
I obviously have no problem with queer representation. But I don't want to write a complete sausage fest.
What I am troubled by is female roles. There are some interesting female figures on the periphery of this circle, but they're there because they're married to people (except, perhaps, the Countess of Pembroke and Emilia Lanier), or don't have freedom of agency. The trouble is, the story heads into the continent and I am following the fragments of history we do have to frame it and give it a sense of possibility, and these women are stuck in England.
There are some contemporary wandering adventurers of the female persuasion in history in the form of Catherine de Medici's Squadron Voyant, but I can't place them in late 16th century Germany. Does anyone hereabouts have some feminist history cred and can place some interesting figures there, or at least someone suitable with an intriguing gap in what we know of their life? I know a bit more about England, France, and Italy than Germany.
I do have sedentary NPCs who are all sorts of genders and persuasions, but they are more people to find and interact with rather than PC analogues or foils.
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Contributor
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http://www.localhistories.org/women16thfam.html
Thanks. Note how many of these women are aristocrats, French, or Italian. Italian humanism may have been more accepting of assertive women than the cultures north of the Alps, but I can't say for sure (it's a sense I have rather than something I could cite evidence for).
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You could just do what Chaosium did for "Cthulhu Dark Ages":
In order to enrich the playing experience however, we decided to stretch historical correctness and open most occupations to female player characters (avoid cleric, priest, guard, and warrior). The keeper must decide whether to consider audacious women as exceptions in a hostile male society, or to bend medieval mentality toward gentle integration.
Cthulhu Invictus had a similar passage concerning female investigators.
Just a thought...
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Contributor
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You could just do what Chaosium did for "Cthulhu Dark Ages":
In order to enrich the playing experience however, we decided to stretch historical correctness and open most occupations to female player characters (avoid cleric, priest, guard, and warrior). The keeper must decide whether to consider audacious women as exceptions in a hostile male society, or to bend medieval mentality toward gentle integration.Cthulhu Invictus had a similar passage concerning female investigators.
Just a thought...
I am planning on allowing female PCs and people of colour. But NPCs are more likely to be historical. This is pretty much how those games handle it.
Ultimately you can do whatever you want with the world. Cthulu is already adding a major alteration to history as it is. Historical games keep things grounded in a fully-fleshed out world, but the power is in your hands for creating the best experience for your players.
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Contributor
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Ultimately you can do whatever you want with the world. Cthulu is already adding a major alteration to history as it is. Historical games keep things grounded in a fully-fleshed out world, but the power is in your hands for creating the best experience for your players.
Yeah, I want to make playing a female character worthwhile and interesting. Now, many of the NPCs are pretty enlightened for the 16th century, that's a bit different from today. Then again, maybe Queen Elizabeth has some pull in who works for her; I can make her slightly more feminist than she was, and give the game some space for fully independent female PCs.
The trouble, to be frank, is 16th century Germany is a pretty awful place for women. Not Game of Thrones bad, but still, the hotbed of the witch trials.
The flaming was because I pretty much stated that major female NPCs/encounters are probably aristocrats or rich, to give them the autonomy to act as they see fit. This is also true, however, of male NPCs. Literacy, personal autonomy, and minions/henchmen, and all that. One of the commentators said I was a classist because of this. I was looking for interesting women that fit.