Quote from: dragoner;747310If I was going to play a chainmail bikini type warrior, it would be an homage to Wendy O'Williams: a fierce rip your junk off type woman.

 This man knows his punk rock chicks.  :hatsoff::worship:

That excuse of a game where men rode side-saddle for some bullshit fertility taboo.

No. Millennia of recorded history says it's bullshit, so NOPE; that's the sort of retarded idea that comes form people who don't get how this sort of thing actually works.  That degree of stupidity shit-canned all hope of me (and my people) ever taking that game seriously.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;747367That excuse of a game where men rode side-saddle for some bullshit fertility taboo.

No. Millennia of recorded history says it's bullshit, so NOPE; that's the sort of retarded idea that comes form people who don't get how this sort of thing actually works.  That degree of stupidity shit-canned all hope of me (and my people) ever taking that game seriously.

That was the game where the worlds continents looked like giant people including body contours so gravity was really wonky, right? I thought the fertility issue was just how it actually worked in that setting?

Quote from: Nexus;747368That was the game where the worlds continents looked like giant people including body contours so gravity was really wonky, right? I thought the fertility issue was just how it actually worked in that setting?

Ah, now I remember: REIGN, and the physics (aside from magic being a thing) are as the real world despite weirdo lands to play on (and, quite frankly, that's some seriously useless shit in terms of world design; it has no impact on play at all, so it's fucking pointless), so no.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;747369Ah, now I remember: REIGN, and the physics (aside from magic being a thing) are as the real world despite weirdo lands to play on (and, quite frankly, that's some seriously useless shit in terms of world design; it has no impact on play at all, so it's fucking pointless), so no.

I like REIGN mechanically but the default setting? No, just no, Greg Stolze has done many great things but that was just pointless weirdness for the sake of weirdness. I think he eventually realised that people straight-up thought the geography of that world was too Goof Troop to take seriously and he put out a supplement with a "proper" world map where the continents work like actual continents.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;747369Ah, now I remember: REIGN, and the physics (aside from magic being a thing) are as the real world despite weirdo lands to play on (and, quite frankly, that's some seriously useless shit in terms of world design; it has no impact on play at all, so it's fucking pointless), so no.

I recall there was a big shitstorm about it on TBP where if you didn't like the fertility issue you were a sexist asshole and how using it to justify not having male cavalry was TOTALLY DIFFERENT than 40K not having female Space Marines or any other gender based class restrictions. I kind of tuned it out as the setting didn't interest me. Thanks for the info.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;747369Ah, now I remember: REIGN, and the physics (aside from magic being a thing) are as the real world despite weirdo lands to play on (and, quite frankly, that's some seriously useless shit in terms of world design; it has no impact on play at all, so it's fucking pointless), so no.

The world had shores where the ocean rises straight up towards the sky, so I wouldn't call it real-worldish, even. And since the sun doesn't move there's places that are in perpetual darkness.

Reign's setting really is the poster child for Trying Too Hard.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;747367That excuse of a game where men rode side-saddle for some bullshit fertility taboo.

I kinda liked REIGN, and found the cultures really interesting to look into; it's not Earth, they developed differently to us. When we played it though, we used a "flat planet" version.

My character got turned into a bear werehuman; but it was his own fault for picking the wrong fight and not conceding when he was given the opportunity.

Quote from: Ladybird;747410I kinda liked REIGN, and found the cultures really interesting to look into; it's not Earth, they developed differently to us. When we played it though, we used a "flat planet" version.

My character got turned into a bear werehuman; but it was his own fault for picking the wrong fight and not conceding when he was given the opportunity.

It did have some great bits; magic, in particular, recasting some monsters such as werewolves and centaurs into sorcerers who just went too far down the rabbit-hole was great. Also the jawless imperial guardsmen and eye-eating diviner-kings from the supplements. The cultures in general were really cool.

But the weird physics, far more so than the weird geography, was a major turn-off for me. And the whole sidesaddle-riding thing was a poorly thought-out, contrived justification for something that didn't need justification in the first place (gender-equal fantasy), but easy to ignore.

I don't think it's a bad game – great system, good setting with bits I don't like very easily changed or ignored – but I ended up never playing this one.

With all my current prostate problems, riding side-saddle sounds much more attractive...

Riding side saddle is a ridiculous cultural practice. I haven't read or played Reign, but I assumed that this was the point: not all customs make sense. I mean, in our world that custom (applied to women) makes even LESS sense, but we accept it as benignly old fashioned. Again, haven't read the game, but I thought that this one detail was sort of clever. Meh.

Quote from: Necrozius;747450Riding side saddle is a ridiculous cultural practice. I haven't read or played Reign, but I assumed that this was the point: not all customs make sense. I mean, in our world that custom (applied to women) makes even LESS sense, but we accept it as benignly old fashioned. Again, haven't read the game, but I thought that this one detail was sort of clever. Meh.

Quote from: Greg StolzeHorseback Riding
It is an article of absolute faith, everywhere in the world, that riding astride makes men impotent. Horses were first tamed on the plains of what would become the Heluso Confederacy, and the belief about damage to virility started there. As the use of the animals spread, so did the belief. Unless a man is castrated, he doesn't ride astride. Not horses, not other animals, not anything. It's completely beyond the pale, socially – about as bad as a man wearing lipstick and a bra and nothing else running down the street in our modern world. Furthermore, that business about impotence is true. From our superior 21st century vantage point we may dismiss it as psychology making a prophecy fulfill itself, but to the people of Heluso and Milonda this is as iron a fact as the immobility of the sky.
With the advent of the stirrup making mounted combat far more dangerous, the gender politics of horseback riding and military might have done much to make sexism on Heluso and Milonda a different matter than the gender biases of our own cultures. Well, that and politics and magic.

...so yeah, it's a bit vague as to whether it's an absolute fact or voodoo-esque self-fulfilling prophecy, but neither really matters because the characters in the setting believe that's how it works.

In any case, there's about as much actually stopping you as there is stopping you playing a female knight in, say, Pendragon. If you want to play with the social consequences, do it!

Quote from: 3rik;747409

Frodo, quit gargling Sam's fertility and just swallow already.