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Nov 19, 2011 -- 9:32PM, Salla wrote:

Because the Satyr was previewed first.  Had the Hamadryad been previewed first, the results would be the same.  Both of them are bad design decisions.

I think that might also be because of Satyrs being far more iconic than Hamadryads. When you ask someone about a Satyr, almost everyone will have a certain image in his mind. Hamadryads... most people will catch the "dryad" part and think "that's some kind of nymph, right?". Still the "dryad" part invokes a certain gender in your mind, but sounds less iconic than a Satyr.

I too don't support the gender overruling in HotFW. It's like the kind of things 4e was meant to get rid of: unnecessary fluff that doesn't change your gameplay and just limits your choices. It baffles me why they went with it now.

Nov 19, 2011 -- 10:50AM, TheBringer wrote:

"gender doesn't matter" or "my character would be the same as a male or female"

Neither of those things is true. Even if they are true within the game world, we players are still the products of societies in which those are not true, so how we view characters is at least partially determined by their sex or gender or what we perceive their sex or gender to be. Lara Croft would not be viewed the same way if she were male instead. Kratos would not be viewed the same way if he were female instead. If that weren't true, then we wouldn't need characters like Samus, for instance.

Nov 19, 2011 -- 10:58AM, Rhovanion wrote:

4. It's a game. Please don't try to use it as a platform for your social statements and agendas.

All entertainment media is a legitimate platform for social statements and agendas. Games are no exception.

Nov 19, 2011 -- 12:01PM, Chiba_Monkey wrote:

But didn't you say earlier that group consensus needs to be respected?

It needs to be respected more than just the DM alone. If the group concensus is not one worthy of respect, however, then no, it does not need to be respected. It just means I'm going to go find another game sooner than if it's just the DM's view that I don't respect.

I know from talking with you over the years C_C where you personally stand on this matter, but I would think that if your group politely asked you to stick with at least a character of the same gender as yourself that you would respect it.

I most certainly would not. I see no good reason to respect such a request, and I would only consider cointinuing playing anyway if I was already planning on playing a character of the same gender as myself (or, if I had yet to decide on a character, if such a character were on my list of possibilities; my characters are about 50/50). If, however, another player did not want to play a character of their own gender in that game, then you can bet that I'd be right behind them and would most likely leave the group as well if they were asked to leave. Fortunately, I've never met a group so immature as to flat out disallow such characters, and my own group certainly knows better than that.

No reason to assume that this request comes from someone going "Ewwww....creepy!".  But rather, if the other players said "Hey, look.  We all like you for who you are, and we're cool, but playing an opposite gender character is sort of uncomfortable for some of us, and/or is disruptive to our suspension of disbelief for roleplaying" (or some other similar argument, but still politely and respectfully posed), I would think that should have some weight in your decision.

That doesn't sound polite or respectful to me at all. That just sounds like a more eloquent wording of the first one. This person is clearly not as cool as they claim. Saying "we're cool" doesn't make you cool.

Why not?  After all, some of my best friends earlier in life were gay or lesbian, but I've also been around one particular individual who had a "everyone is gay, no disputing it" attitude, and would not let up harassing me (and I'm not exaggerating, it was no-s**t sexual harassment), insisting I was gay.  That made me very uncomfortable.  But I would assume it is no different from a staright woman being sexually harassed by straight men.

Exactly, it had nothing at all to do with his sexual orientation. If you're going to leap from "this one gay guy was harassing me" to "gay guys make me uncomfortable", then I hate to break it to you, but you're not as cool as you think that you are.

Yes, it would be absurd, but that's not really a good example.

It's a perfect example. You're taking a character that made you feel uncomfortable and misidentifying the reason that it made you uncomfortable. The jerk dwarf fighter didn't make you uncomfortable because the character was a dwarf or a fighter; it made you uncomfortable because the player was being inappropriate. The cross-gender character didn't make you uncomfortable because it was a gender different than its players; it made you uncomfortable because the player was immature. Being therefore uncomfortable with cross-gender character is exactly as absurd as being therefore uncomfortable as being uncomfortable with dwarves or fighters.

No, it's my responsibility as a DM to be a fair and objective arbiter and ensure that all the players at the table are having fun.  My responsibility is to the game and the group of players as a whole, and the needs and desires of the many outweigh those of any individual.

If you take your responsibilities as a DM more seriously as you take your responsibilities as a friend, then I think that you need to straighten out your priorities... Poor word choice, but it was funny, so I'm not gonna change it.
Point being, maybe that's why you keep referring to your LGBT friends in the past and not present tense.

As gamers, we face a lot of negative stigma and ridicule from the larger population.  This applies at any age group, even well after high school, when these unfortunate stereotypes persist.  LBGT community members likewise face negative social issues in their everyday life.  Groups shunned by mainstream society should stick together, and people who fall into both categories should not be made to feel uncomfortable in either, but rather bridge the gap betweeen the two and welcomed by both.

Completely agree!

Gamers are hard to come by in my area (military base in WA), and I would not want to lose any players I found.  If the issue of cross-gendered roleplaying was SO important to a LBGT player at my table, I would gather the group together as a whole to try and discuss this and find a solution that appeases everybody.

Does that make more sense C_C?

That sounds far more reasonable than the rest of you've been saying sounded, yes.

Nov 19, 2011 -- 8:33PM, crzyhawk wrote:

Legendary satyrs were all male... Also, why aren't people crying about no male hamadryads?

You clearly have not read this thread or any of the others on this topic or else you would know that:
A) No, not all legends have placed satyrs as only male.
B) People are also upset about Hamadryads. It's just that we knew about Satyrs first, so by the time the Dryads came around there was little to say on the matter that hadn't already been said about the Satyr.

Nov 20, 2011 -- 1:00PM, crzyhawk wrote:

Either way, someone was going to be up in arms.

Not true at all. If they'd left it out of the crunch entirely but still kept it in the fluff, this wouldn't be nearly as big of an issue as it is for anybody.