Sort of. If you want to explore feminism in a medieval context, your game is doomed, I´d say.

I´d really want to highlight that women can play men with little bagagge in a medieval game. But if a man INSISTS on playing a female character in a medieval campaign, you are in for trouble.

Only if you have a GM who can't wrap his mind around the concept.

There is no worthwhile concept to explore. Especially not if one player insists on exploring it in a historical game.

To the OP - I play female characters semi-regularly, about 1/4 to 1/3 of the time.  I think I do a good job - I've played in lots of games of varying genders with no complaints and fair praise.  

Quote from: John Morrow;382702This.  I have no problem with a GM playing female characters and have played through romances both as a GM running a female NPC and as a player with the GM running a female NPC, but it just seems to make things a lot easier in terms of remembering pronouns and visualizing characters if the players are playing characters that match their own sex.

I'd agree that it makes things easier to visualize if the PCs are closer to their characters in whatever ways.  However, I think that requiring more effort and imagination isn't necessarily a bad thing.  

For me, one reason why I play fantasy games is precisely for the reason of having to use my imagination more.  In that way, I sometime find something like pronouns to be useful - it means that there's a hook that reminds me that I'm talking about the character, which may be quite distinct from the player.  Though I think that accents are generally a bad idea, I think other things like certain mannerisms or ways of speaking can be good hooks that remind everyone that it is the character talking.  

Quote from: Settembrini;382779The rotten part is exactly the part where the game itself is "about characterisation", or characterisation plays a major role. It´s an unhealthy element in the game best downplayed, ignored or de-emphasised.

In such an envioronment, playing female characters (because that´s what we REALLY are talking about) is okay for men.

As for what we're really talking about, I think it's really that your objections are to men playing women characters - or perhaps to there being female characters at all.  That's not the whole of the topic, though.  

I'd like to unpack the "unhealthy" aspect, though.  Given that I play and run lots of games that emphasize characterization, say, what do you think the negative effect on my health is?

Sure, I've played female characters. Very badly. But I'm a crap roleplayer, all my characters are roleplayed badly. So what? It's not auditions for the national drama academy, it's an rpg.

We get a bit of a clash when a big fatbeard middleaged gamer wants to play a slim pretty young woman, but we get the same clash when the guy wants to play an athletic male warrior. But if we're going to prohibit people from roleplaying characters very different to them, that's going to limit our adventures somewhat. So we'll always have that clash between the appearance and demeanour and capabilities of the player, and those of the character. That's gaming.

I don't care about fidelity to history. I'm not a railroading GM, so as soon as the PCs show up history is fucked anyway, they'll change it. We're not roleplaying a documentary. The campaign setting may vaguely resemble history, but that's just a coincidence.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;382939We get a bit of a clash when a big fatbeard middleaged gamer wants to play a slim pretty young woman, but we get the same clash when the guy wants to play an athletic male warrior.

For me, it's not really the same because it has to do with the voice and body language rather than the body type.  That said, it can help a great deal for me if the person playing a character of the opposite sex (be it player or GM) does an appropriate vocal shift and conveys the appropriate body language and the romances I've role-played through where the GM was playing a cross-sex character involved GMs willing to do appropriate voice and body language for the characters.

Quote from: jhkim;382931I'd agree that it makes things easier to visualize if the PCs are closer to their characters in whatever ways.  However, I think that requiring more effort and imagination isn't necessarily a bad thing.

It's not necessarily a bad thing, but in my experience, the negatives outweigh the positives and it's effort that could better be spent on other things.  And while it would be nice if everyone was always at 100% for every session, the reality is that people sometimes have bad days or get tired after playing for 10 hours (my group regularly did 10-12 hour session) and pronouns are one of those things that people inevitably trip up on and it's disruptive to immersion for me when people start getting them wrong.

Unhealthy for the game. In fact, most set-ups trying to be more about characterisation turn out to be less of everything except boredom.

The fact alone that Mr. Kim felt the need to tell us he regularly plays women and gets praise for that...oh man that´s fucked up game-wise right there. I got praise for repeatedly playing halflings with a swiss dialect. So what? Is the game about swiss dialect impersonations? Even though a lota people laughed? No!

And gender issues are not played for laughs, especially by the Mr. Kim kind of Alan Alda's. So you are not even adding humour while you force everyone to play characterisation-game instead of the REAL adventure game.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;382939Sure, I've played female characters. Very badly. But I'm a crap roleplayer, all my characters are roleplayed badly. So what? It's not auditions for the national drama academy, it's an rpg.

We get a bit of a clash when a big fatbeard middleaged gamer wants to play a slim pretty young woman, but we get the same clash when the guy wants to play an athletic male warrior. But if we're going to prohibit people from roleplaying characters very different to them, that's going to limit our adventures somewhat. So we'll always have that clash between the appearance and demeanour and capabilities of the player, and those of the character. That's gaming.

I don't care about fidelity to history. I'm not a railroading GM, so as soon as the PCs show up history is fucked anyway, they'll change it. We're not roleplaying a documentary. The campaign setting may vaguely resemble history, but that's just a coincidence.

Hear, hear! :-)

In my games, usually, the men play male characters and the women play female characters. There have been a handful of exceptions over the years.

RPGPundit

I've run very few games over the years that didn't have a female player in the group. While women have played men on occasion, and have done it OK, I tended to feel that they didn't have the same sense of engagement they have when playing a female character. And the men have tended to play men.

My wife really can't get into playing male characters - aside from one memorable insane English West Country pirate. However, she's fine running male NPCs as a GM.

I think my female NPCs are OK, but I don't feel the need to have a female PC.

Perhaps we're too unadventurous?

Just to be clear - it's also my experience that most of the time people (including myself) play their own gender.  I do know a few women who most often play male characters, and a few men who most often play women - but they're the exceptions.  

Generally, though, cross-gender play isn't an issue.  Appropriateness of behavior is an issue - which has to do with the situation.  For example, if we're playing a James Bond 007 game, then there are going to be sexy foils with suggestive names, and it's totally reasonable for your character to be a sexy hunk or babe.  We're not going to dwell on it, but it's a fun part of the game.  On the other hand, there are plenty of games where that isn't appropriate regardless of what gender the player is.  

Quote from: Settembrini;382961Unhealthy for the game. In fact, most set-ups trying to be more about characterisation turn out to be less of everything except boredom.

The fact alone that Mr. Kim felt the need to tell us he regularly plays women and gets praise for that...oh man that´s fucked up game-wise right there. I got praise for repeatedly playing halflings with a swiss dialect. So what? Is the game about swiss dialect impersonations? Even though a lota people laughed? No!

And gender issues are not played for laughs, especially by the Mr. Kim kind of Alan Alda's. So you are not even adding humour while you force everyone to play characterisation-game instead of the REAL adventure game.

I don't even understand this.  What the fuck does Alan Alda have to do with anything?  And how are you concluding about lack of humor in my games?

Quote from: Settembrini;382804If you want to explore feminism in a medieval context, your game is doomed, I´d say.

I'm not sure what you consider to be "exploring feminism" in a gaming context, but playing adventurous women in a historical setting is quite reasonable.

As a writer, an occasional actor, and a hopefully soon to be future filmmaker, I make characters for RPGs the way I'd make characters for any other creative work.  I have a concept in mind, and whatever sex the character is comes from whatever feels right for the character.  Since I'm not playing it for an audience, the gender mismatch is seldom an issue, so I just go with what makes sense.

Sometimes this means a male, sometimes a female, it's all about the image that sits in my mind.  I don't worry about any other consideration, I especially don't worry about sexual attitudes because sex has no place in any of my games, nor do I worry about whether this or that character will fit in with anyone else's ideas of what a gender "is like" or what's an appropriate portrayal in light of modern feminism.

I just make characters and try to make them feel believable to me, because at the end of the day, everything I create is first for my own entertainment because I'm the only judge I can rely on, and I find if one is true to oneself the rest will follow.

Quote from: John Morrow;382951For me, it's not really the same because it has to do with the voice and body language rather than the body type.  

The variance between individuals in voice and body language is much greater than the variance between genders. Just consider Kevin Spacey doing impersonations of Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and so on. You don't realise just how distinctive those individuals are until you see one person trying to do several of them.

Good acting is hard. Most of us are bad at it, and it doesn't matter whether we're Bloodaxe the Skull-Cleaver who happens to be a boy like us, or Sima McBeard, who is a dwarf but a woman - usually we're just playing ourselves with a few key differences, like having decent agility.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;383484The variance between individuals in voice and body language is much greater than the variance between genders. Just consider Kevin Spacey doing impersonations of Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and so on. You don't realise just how distinctive those individuals are until you see one person trying to do several of them.

Good acting is hard. Most of us are bad at it, and it doesn't matter whether we're Bloodaxe the Skull-Cleaver who happens to be a boy like us, or Sima McBeard, who is a dwarf but a woman - usually we're just playing ourselves with a few key differences, like having decent agility.

I think you've got a point there. I remember seeing an episode of the old batman series where frank gorshin did an impression of charlie chaplin, and since chaplin was a silent movie star mostly the riddle gorshin was playing did him as a silent character, and it really came down to the body language and motions that made his brief chaplin impression memorable.