Okay so I know I'm usually asking for advice in posts like this, but I'm doing something a little different today.
See, I'm a transgender woman, and I kinda wanted to create a little thread where we can talk about trans stuff in our Pathfinder games.
I don't keep up with much of the lore for the iconics, but I know Paizo are super queer-positive and at least one iconic is trans.
I regularly incorporate trans themes into my games and characters not only cos I'm trans but also cos all of my friends are trans and it's fun for them too.
There are several canonical ways of transitioning in my campaign setting, including a feat that basically makes you able to gender swap at will. In addition, several major NPCs are trans women.
A lot of the characters I make with the intention of playing one day are also trans. My personal favorite is a Tiefling Alchemist who uses her alchemy knowledge to make her own HRT.
What about y'all?
Neat. I'm not trans or anything, but I think it's cool for you to incorporate it into your games. Alchemy seems like a perfect fit for replacing hormones. What happens to the character in the game? Other than changing gender on the character sheet, and the physical description on how the character now looks... is there any mechanical benefit or drawback associated with transitioning midgame? Does a character suffer negative side effects if they are kept from their HRT? I'm curious how you have incorporated such things into Pathfinder's ruleset and mechanics.
If I am not mistaken, there is a boon available through Deific Obedience that transforms the person into a female if they aren't one already... I can't remember which deity it is, though.
It's never come up in our setting, a 33-year old (mostly) homebrew, though I honestly don't think it would be a big deal. A former player would have likely taken issue with trans characters, even if they were only NPCs, but he hasn't played with us in a long time. He's largely cut ties with the rest of us over time, despite our all being friends since the 1980s. He is the absolute only one who identifies as a conservative politically and was sometimes genuinely uncomfortable and even angry about the fact that women have been a part of our setting since the very beginning (as players or NPCs).
A kitsune with realistic likeness can freely change genders.
I do wonder how much magic "cheapens" the experience though. With magic you can quickly and/or easily change your gender on a deep biological level. You could be fully capable to reproduce and fulfill all typical biological criteria as your chosen gender.
Regardless of magic, on Golarion you'd be instantly accepted for your gender by 99% of the population. It's just not a big deal there. So, your character can easily be trans, but it doesn't seem to be relatable to the experience of being trans in the real world. Really, it feels like being trans would be as meaningful as the color of your character's eyes or their height. A little tidbit on your character sheet that just shouldn't come up more than once.
Elixir of Sex Shifting would be a pretty cheap/easy way of permanently changing, or even swapping back and forth, and if you had Craft Wondrous Item and polymorph, it would only cost you 1,125gp each elixir.
If you play with 3pp content, Reverse Gender would be ideal for long-term. And it's 1hour/level duration makes it a perfect candidate for permanency.
Adjustable Disguise probably isn't ideal for a long-term solution, but could be useful in certain situations. Especially if you're a rogue-ish type transgender character and you need to infiltrate the party at the corrupt Governor's Mansion and you need a myriad of costumes, genders, and races to swap through. Get a wand so you have multiple castings, just in case the party goes longer than expected and you run out of disguises.
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Our games are about adventuring and defeating the big evil. in those kinds of games, relationships, sex, and gender just don't play a part. So we've never had to deal with it. It's cool that you have this in your game, but for our type of RPG, it's just not a factor.
I am not trans, but I have enough close friends and family members who are that I do give some thought to the presence of such characters in the games I run, and how to portray them in a sensitive way.
When one of my favorite recurring NPCs from PFS 1E (J. Dacilane) showed up again in an early 2E scenario, I made a point of running the 1E scenarios that featured him so I could share that backstory with more people. The character transitions over the course of those earlier adventures, so I sought some input from a trans gaming friend about how best to handle that. I settled on using pronouns matching how the character presents at the time of each adventure (female when first introduced as a child, but when you meet them again a few years later, you get the first clues that their identity is in flux; he's solidly male-identifying by the time of that 2E scenario).
My last Pathfinder 1E home game was a homebrew setting which I had been working on for years and finally got to use in a campaign. I have made some of my gods nonbinary or genderfluid, and the cultures who worship them reflect that in their attitudes towards gender. For example, the faerie gods represent the four seasons, but they change partners at the solstices and equinoxes, and two of them change genders twice a year as well. This has resulted in elves and gnomes having a far less rigidly binary concept of both gender and sexual orientation. Transitioning is not uncommon over the long elven lifespan, and adopting another gender's dress carries no stigma--and in fact, plays an essential part of the sacred rites to mark the changing seasons.
Another example is the halflings, who worship a male sun god and a female moon goddess. That couple's only child, the god of shadows, is variously depicted as male, female, both, or neither. Nonbinary and trans halflings are often drawn to revere the shadow god out of a sense of kinship, but they are never treated as inferior thanks to that god's status as a full member of the pantheon, and beloved child to the other two. Halflings are desert dwellers in my world, so many wear voluminous robes that serve to further blur distinctions between genders, and many default to nongendered forms of address.
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I'm also a trans woman, but for me... no I don't try to incorporate trans stuff into my characters... not all trans individuals want to flaunt the fact that we are trans, for some of us we just want to be recognized as and live as the gender we identify as and not have our birth gender constantly brought up... my pathfinder group all know I'm trans, since I'm still trying to actually start my transition... but with where I live and my nearly non-existent income that's a very difficult process to even start... they are all cool about it and they all accept me as female, and every character I play is female. Because of my experiences with where I've grown up, I simply can't make myself write a trans character... I'd prefer to avoid putting that part of my life into one of my characters and would rather they just have the fortune to be born the gender they identify as... Pathfinder is my escape from reality... and my heartache and suffering that I've had to deal with my whole life because of being a trans woman is no something I want to bring to my gaming table... especially since they all give me all the loving support I need to get through each day as it is...
My Hell's Rebels character was a Vigilante who was "clearly a man" (Alain Argento) in his vigilante identity and "clearly a woman" (Aurora Aulorian) in her social identity, and fully comfortable with both aspects of themself.
I figure that's got something to do with gender.
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A kitsune with realistic likeness can freely change genders.
I do wonder how much magic "cheapens" the experience though. With magic you can quickly and/or easily change your gender on a deep biological level. You could be fully capable to reproduce and fulfill all typical biological criteria as your chosen gender.
Regardless of magic, on Golarion you'd be instantly accepted for your gender by 99% of the population. It's just not a big deal there. So, your character can easily be trans, but it doesn't seem to be relatable to the experience of being trans in the real world. Really, it feels like being trans would be as meaningful as the color of your character's eyes or their height. A little tidbit on your character sheet that just shouldn't come up more than once.
I just want to address your question about whether magic cheapens it, I don't think it would.
Sure, in pathfinder magic is common for players but for the average peasant the issue with being the wrong gender would still be just as insurmountable as it is for many people in real life. Take that elixir of sex shifting Ryze say's is a cheap and easy way to change gender. It really isn't even if you're crafting it, you're looking at over a thousand gold, if you're buying it over 2,000. That means for a character you're looking at level 3 for wealth by level and it'll still take a large chunk of your starting gold. For an actual person living in this world, if you're using the living rules it's a yearly cost of 24 gold for subsistence living and 52 for comfortably. Laying aside the high earning professionals like sages and assuming a trained hireliing is the average peasant/farmer/etc. They earn 3 sp a day and 109 gold, 5 silver per year. Let’s assume they want to live a comfortable life that leaves them with 57 gold and 5 silver. Assuming they save that and spend it on nothing else you're looking at nearly FORTY years of scrimping and saving to afford that elixir. Need to pay for medical care, support a child, buy a new cow and that time frame gets even longer. Not to mention you have to find someone selling said elixir which can cost even more money.
Then you have things like sorcha's misfiring traps that can permanently and irreversibly turn a person into a clone of her trapping you in a new body that's not your own and is almost impossible to undo.
So, if you're someone who wants to play a character dealing with the issues of being the wrong gender rather than like Chell who enjoys using the world created to be who they want to be and escape the real world for a time (like many of us playing the game I suspect) then really, it’s to me a perfectly viable character motivation. Someone who desires to be the other gender and is risking their life in the hopes of being one of those lucky adventurers to amass a fortune and be able to buy the means of achieving their dream.
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Sorry, I should have been more explicit. There is a cheaper, though not quite as fast option. Still not truly cheap, but more affordable.
Anderos salve and mulibrous tincture are two very different alchemical concoctions with contrary but similar goals: refining the mortal body and quieting mental stresses. Anderos salve is a gray paste applied to the arms or chest that helps restore youthful vigor, while mulibrous tincture is a bitter, minty tea that eases pain and softens skin. If a dose of anderos salve is applied at least twice per week over a period of months, the user’s feminine secondary sex characteristics are gradually reduced and masculine ones develop; imbibing mulibrous tincture in this way reduces the drinker’s masculine secondary sex characteristics and feminine ones develop. Taking a dose of each concoction every week instead softens all secondary sex characteristics, causing the user to take on an androgynous appearance. After a period of 6 months, the transformation is permanent, with no further doses required to maintain the new form.
While these alchemical solutions do not cause as swift or extensive a change as magical alternatives, they are far more affordable, especially among the Rivethun, who often teach the process of their creation to their disciples.
Each dose costs 5 gold. There are roughly 26 weeks in 6 months. 10 gold per week in doses, so a total of 260 gold.
I did misremember how effective the final effect was. A bit unclear as to how far it goes.
It's never come up in our setting, a 33-year old (mostly) homebrew, though I honestly don't think it would be a big deal. A former player would have likely taken issue with trans characters, even if they were only NPCs, but he hasn't played with us in a long time. He's largely cut ties with the rest of us over time, despite our all being friends since the 1980s. He is the absolute only one who identifies as a conservative politically and was sometimes genuinely uncomfortable and even angry about the fact that women have been a part of our setting since the very beginning (as players or NPCs).
I said "women have been a part of our setting since the very beginning" when what I meant was women have been a part of our group of players since the very beginning. Hell, my ex-wife was the co-designer of the earliest version of our setting.
Anyway, here's "Wonderwall".
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Sorry, I should have been more explicit. There is a cheaper, though not quite as fast option. Still not truly cheap, but more affordable.
Anderos salve and mulibrous tincture are two very different alchemical concoctions with contrary but similar goals: refining the mortal body and quieting mental stresses. Anderos salve is a gray paste applied to the arms or chest that helps restore youthful vigor, while mulibrous tincture is a bitter, minty tea that eases pain and softens skin. If a dose of anderos salve is applied at least twice per week over a period of months, the user’s feminine secondary sex characteristics are gradually reduced and masculine ones develop; imbibing mulibrous tincture in this way reduces the drinker’s masculine secondary sex characteristics and feminine ones develop. Taking a dose of each concoction every week instead softens all secondary sex characteristics, causing the user to take on an androgynous appearance. After a period of 6 months, the transformation is permanent, with no further doses required to maintain the new form.
While these alchemical solutions do not cause as swift or extensive a change as magical alternatives, they are far more affordable, especially among the Rivethun, who often teach the process of their creation to their disciples.
Each dose costs 5 gold. There are roughly 26 weeks in 6 months. 10 gold per week in doses, so a total of 260 gold.
I did misremember how effective the final effect was. A bit unclear as to how far it goes.
Interesting that it specifies secondary not primary so basically what changes over the course of puberty but not affecting the primary ones you're born with.
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Our games are about adventuring and defeating the big evil. in those kinds of games, relationships, sex, and gender just don't play a part. So we've never had to deal with it. It's cool that you have this in your game, but for our type of RPG, it's just not a factor.
Came here to say the same. My group usually doesn't allow any individual character that much spot light time to explore any of those kind of themes of sexuality, gender, relationships, etc. We have limited play time and focus on the plot of the game and especially on combat (because it tends to take the most time) and that's just how things go. No one player get's more than a few minutes of screen time at any given time, and usually just to make some quippy jokes or observations about the situation they're currently in.
For my characters, gender, race, sex, relationships, etc just don't get brought up because I don't think anyone else at the table is interested in those things for my character.
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Found it! Mestama's 2nd Sentinel boon, called Widow's Cruelty, is the one that changes you into a female.
I really like the idea of the Vigilante exploring different genders with their different identities. I am probably going to use that for an NPC. Aren't all Changelings female? Maybe not all of them want to be, or identity as, female...
I think the changeling thing got retconned, but I'm not 100% on that.
I think the changeling thing got retconned, but I'm not 100% on that.
From the 2e Ancestry Guide
Old tales describe changelings as exclusively women, but changelings of other genders are simply less common. Some might never learn of their nature as changelings since the Call disproportionately targets women. Nonetheless, changelings of any gender can undergo the covenant ritual and become hags. Perhaps because of this malleability, it’s somewhat more common for changelings to feel drawn to a gender expression other than that which they were assigned.
My personal headcanon is that most of the time when a hag gives birth to a boy child, they end up in the stew pot since it's harder to make those into hags. So boy changelings are simply rarer.
I would prefer to also hold the line for a male changeling becoming a hag has to be wholly consensual and is much harder to coerce because while hags are demonstrably evil, I want to avoid stories adjacent to "the powerful evil being wants to make you trans." It's possible a specific table might be into that kind of story, but that's a conversation you have beforehand.
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Personally, I haven't used any transgender characters in my campaigns. Pleasure demons are probably the closest I've come to a transgender char, but I wouldn't count that tbh because they're not playable races. But I have used gay and lesbian NPCs before. I've used asexual or androgynous races as well, and they're kinda like non-binary.
As for personal experience, I've used kitsune with realistic likeness to do gender fluid. They enjoyed taking the form of whoever they found pretty. Unfortunately, that campaign didn't last long enough to get into it.
And while not "trans", I have had female PCs though I identify as male.
Personally, I haven't used any transgender characters in my campaigns. Pleasure demons are probably the closest I've come to a transgender char, but I wouldn't count that tbh because they're not playable races. But I have used gay and lesbian NPCs before. I've used asexual or androgynous races as well, and they're kinda like non-binary.
I assume by asexual you mean races that do not procreate via sexual means, is that correct?
An ancestry could be asexual (ghorans don't reproduce like that) or agender (a conrasu doesn't need to have a concept of gender if they don't want).
I'm pretty sure there is an android NPC in some adventure who identifies as asexual.
I'm pretty sure there is an android NPC in some adventure who identifies as asexual.
But to be clear, asexual generally refers to your sexuality and who you are attracted to and your interest in sex. Asexual people are typified by not having feelings or desires of sex. If someone were to say they "identify as asexual" it would mean the above (typically).
When talking about the reproduction of a species you can refer to it as being asexual, but I think it might be confusing within the context of this discussion.
Personally, I haven't used any transgender characters in my campaigns. Pleasure demons are probably the closest I've come to a transgender char, but I wouldn't count that tbh because they're not playable races. But I have used gay and lesbian NPCs before. I've used asexual or androgynous races as well, and they're kinda like non-binary.I assume by asexual you mean races that do not procreate via sexual means, is that correct?
Yeah, I have some plant-like and "born of the cosmos"-like races in my homebrew world who don't reproduce via sex, and they don't have a gender.
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I think android sexuality is similar to human. An asexual android is about the same as an asexual human. While androids don't have the capability to reproduce, they do generally have all external sexual characteristics of human male or female, along with comparative desires to be with other people. Basically, androids were intended to emulate humans as much as possible, with sexuality not being excluded.
A small number of androids were made to be different though. For instance, some were designed to emulate children or other races. Some may have been intended to have no gender/sex at all.
Indeed, and it's important to remember (from what I recall) Androids are intended to be close to replicant's from Blade Runner. The are artificially constructed, but have biological analogs for a lot of "normal" human components. They're not exactly the same, but they're a stark contrast or SROs which are more close to your T800 Terminator (with the skin gone).
People who don't come pre-loaded with a gender identity (because they're plants, for example) are going to be sufficiently rare in the wide world that most of the people they encounter are going to be humans, elves, dwarves, etc. many of whom have been pretty firm in their understanding of gender because. So if you're some sort of automaton or plant or weird thing you might decide to "try on" various gender presentations both because it makes it easier for other people to interact with you (I mean, pronouns are linguistically useful) and you might find one or more of them "fits you" so that you start doing it for yourself instead of for others.
The topic of genderless races did remind me… I am currently playing a Gathlain in one game… and well… Gathlain are genderless plant based fey… the lore I read on them said that many Gathlain choose to express themselves as a specific gender, and often even adapt physical characteristics of their chosen gender… this might be the closest any of my characters have ever been to being Transgender, she identifies as Female like me.
Sexuality is something I have no problem adding to my characters, though expressing sexuality tends to be a bit awkward… we have a few players who couples IRL and they tend to have romantic relationships between their characters in many of our games… so our group is no stranger to sexuality… but its still a bit awkward for me… I’m a trans woman and a lesbian, I’ve never felt attracted to men ever in my life and I feel uncomfortable any time a male character hits on one of my characters… so of course, all of my characters are either asexual or lesbians… my group is accepting, but things still get awkward when I try to RP any of my characters sexualities…
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I'm pretty sure there is an android NPC in some adventure who identifies as asexual.
If you mean agender, you may be thinking of Iseph, the android iconic operative from Starfinder.