November 23, 2009

Question of the Week #10

The idea for this came from me finding out about Google Wave, and how some people are already using it to run table top RPGs online.

Do you think that it's easier to have player gender matter less when one plays a table top game online rather than in person?

I know many of you haven't had experiences where you gender did matter at the table, but please discuss what experiences or opinions you do have.

3 comments:

  1. I think this question may be a bit difficult to answer, as when people play RPGs online they think MMO, playing actual RPGs online like DnD is very difficult and almost never done as far as I know.

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  2. Absolutely! I haven't seen gender come up a lot as an actual issue at the table or behind the computer screen, BUT i see almost 100% more gender cross-play online as opposed to at a real table. My husband fully admits he wouldn't be comfortable playing a female character (except NPCs) with a face-to-face group, but he does it often through chat.

    That being said, i happen to have a google wave invite on its way, and i'm really excited to try it for gaming. We've been using OpenRPG for years, and it gets the job done, but it's ultimitely just a chat room with extra toys, and it doesn't save offline messages if you need to reboot--which, having a crappy internet connection, i have to do often!

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  3. From my experience, people seem to be more comfortable playing a character of a different sex then them through the remove of a computer. Not that my local RPG group has any problems with it either but I know some do and it does remove the main (visual) disconnect to such play.

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