Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Lady Astryd Bronzemaul, Geokineticist - Pathfinder

I apologize about the delay in posting, but needed a bit of a break after the semester finished. This weekend is MisCon and I have been thinking about gaming quite a bit the last few days. This character was one I rolled up after a character death in the the Giantslayer Adventure Path. I wanted to try out playing a kineticist from Occult Adventures.  Obviously, I had to fudge the random background, as there wasn't a good background generator for them when I made her. Because I intended her to be more warrior based, I opted to go with the Fighter class background.

My biggest regret with this character was that I wasn't able to play her. Shortly after I wrote her up, my class load became a bit unwieldy while trying to still meet a weekly gaming obligation. She is still one of my favorite characters. A few notes: It is clear that she differs a bit from Golarion dwarves. She was highly influenced by the research I had done for my paper on female dwarves and their beards. To this end, I wanted to create some background around dwarven beard culture. In Inner Sea Races, they make it plain that, "despite the claims of certain mischievous troublemakers, most dwarven women do not grow beards" (p 70). Especially after my research, I believe that any proper dwarf woman should have a beard, hence Astryd does.


Lady Astryd Bronzemaul, first daughter of Jarl Kalderrin of Five Kings Mountain

 Prior to her squiring, her parents and teachers found her to be a troublesome youth, filled with fiery passion and the same bullheadedness that had been the hallmark of the Bronzemaul line for nearly a thousand years. Her youthful tenacity often put her at odds with her elder brother, Niras, who by virtue of being born several years earlier was entitled to their father’s rank, title, and responsibilities. She was an apt pupil in her youth, but her often explosive temper at the slightest provocation meant she wore through many tutors.

On the day before her bearding, when she would be recognized as a full member of dwarven society, her father squired her to Sir Thorridr, hoping the grizzled knight would find a way to temper his daughter’s fury. Thorridr had been head of the Jarl’s personal retinue since before Kalderrin’s ascension and had proven himself time and again to the young Jarl as both a friend and a keen advisor. Astrryd found Thorridr to be as unrelenting as the mountain itself and in time taught her how to focus her tenacity and passion. Astrryd’s squiring lasted nearly twice as long as others, but what she learned during those years proved to be more valuable to her than any gold or precious stone. The Jarl knighted her and conferred on her the rank and title of Drengr, on her 54th birthday.

As Drengr, she was part of the Jarl’s personal retinue and saw to the defense of her royal family. For many years, this simply meant taking her turn as part of the watch, keeping her close to her parents and her younger siblings as her brother continued his fostering among another clan. The dwarves had grown complacent and were caught off guard when a mixed scouting party of orcs and goblins came from the bowels of their mines to strike against the Dwarven kingdom. Astrryd’s mother, Jarlkona Urdr, was one of the first to fall to the silent intruders. Astrryd heard Urdr’s garggled scream and rushed to her mother, seeing the Orc standing over the fallen body. The sight of the blood ignited in the knight and she rushed in and dispatched the Orcish thug without a thought. Holding her mother’s fallen form in her arms, Astrryd uttered a vow to the Great Mountain that she would avenge her mother.

What would have been a simple skirmish between the dwarves and the offending Orcs and their goblin mercenaries became a war. Astrryd and Thorridr, along with several other members of the Jarl’s retinue, were raised to the rank of Markgraf, defenders of the borders, and reaching out to the other Jarls and neighboring chiefs, Jarl Kelderrin set to remove the orcs from the mountain. The war took its toll and many dwarves fell to Orcish steel. Thorridr fell defending the Jarl, serving his friend to the last. His death gave the Jarl time to arm himself and face the attackers, proving himself by dispatching a room full of Orc and their forces.

In the final push, deep in the heart of the Mountain, Astrryd and her forces moved against the leadership of the Orc. The brutes had stretched themselves too thin, sending wave after wave against the dwarves and leaving few to defend their operation. Repeating her oath to the Mountain, Astrryd, Markgraf of the Jarlsland, struck in a swift and violent explosion of force. Two over her dwarves fell to arrow fire. Several arrows struck her as well, but she refused to fall. Three of her dwarves fought beside her against the Orc leader, a foul greenskin named Galogog. The Orc chief, scarred by years of turmoil and empowered by dark magic nearly overwhelmed the dwarves. Astrryd landed the fatal blow, unaware that at the same time the Orc’s ichor-ladden blade slipped through her armor and fatally wounded her. She collapsed beside Galogog, refusing to die until she heard the deathrattle of his last breath.

Astrryd had long believed she would be welcome in the Dwarven Halls of Torag, but there was only darkness. She expected to hear the loud, boisterous, tunes of bawdy dwarven tunes and the cheers of dwarven heroes, but there was only silence. It was like this for untold time. Then there was a sound, the slow determined shifting of earth and stone. Where there was darkness, there erupted blazing images molten metal. She could smell the damp reaches of the deepest caves. She felt the tremors and rhythmic beating of hammers and picks. The Mountain spoke to her, its words and spirit entering her. The mountain made her whole again and she would be its vessel—the living emissary of her mountain home.

She opened her eyes. The body of Galogog reduced to bones by age. The cave was deserted, forgotten. The leather of her armor had rotted away, as had her other garments. She could feel the cool mountain breath on her skin, but it did not chill her. She made her way back to the Halls of Bronzemaul, but when she arrived she found that her family was gone. A different Jarl, now called King sat on the throne. Everything she knew and had fought to defend was forgotten—  only a legend

Lady Astryd Bronzemaul's story was generated from the following random background events:

Dwarven Homeland: 62 – Underground
Dwarf Parents: 72 - Only Father is alive
Dwarven Siblings: 75 – 3 Siblings (Kin Guardian)
Brother: Older
Sister: Younger
Brother: Younger
Circumstance of Birth: Noble Birth: Duke (Influence Rich Parents)
Major Childhood Event: Died (Fearless Defiance Arisen)
Training: Fighter: 56 - Knighted (Influenced)
Influential Associates: 89 – Champion (Ambitious)





Friday, April 8, 2016

Creating a Safe Space

I really planned on working on my term papers that are due in t-minus three weeks. Yet I keep seeing things that pull my attention away from the papers. Sure, I probably didn’t need to watch RuPaul’s Drag Race this week, but it helps me unwind and switch gears. And I will admit that I should probably just turn off my FaceBook account when I am in crunch mode. The real distraction comes from various posts and articles I read where women continually get treated as outsiders in fandom.

What do I mean? I belong to various gaming communities on FaceBook where we share ideas about the game, as well as problems we encounter when running/playing. Recently, a female player was discussing actions in a game that were forced on her. Now, similar discussions have been had by male players and they are generally met with comments like, “I would talk with the GM and tell him that it wasn’t cool to force your character to do something like that” or “You should probably just leave the group, it doesn’t sound like it is a very good space.” Yet, this time, voiced from a woman, she was met with comments like “You shouldn’t whine so much” and when she voiced that she would probably kill off her character and leave the group, she received responses like “Killing yourself and ragequitting a group isn’t attractive.” The fact is, this player was expressing the fact that her character had been impregnated against her will, which amounts to rape, and rape isn’t attractive. When the player attempted to point out that the people making these comments were being sexist, they attempted to again silence her using shame tactics.

When I have seen various posts about the terror of white males in gaming, I have generally cast them aside. I fell into the trap of “This hasn’t happened in my games and it must be really isolated.” The reality is that MY games are really isolated. The games I have run with female players have generally been pretty great and I didn’t think they had really had any situations like this. In retrospect, I realize that one of my games did have a female player that felt uncomfortable and she left, though it wasn’t because of something that had been done to her character and more about how over-the-top one of the players was in his playstyle. As a player, I have certainly been in games where things like pregnancy has been forced on female players and it made me genuinely uncomfortable in the moment (and still bugs me years later). Because of the group I play with, we don’t have many people that play across gender lines, so I have been trying to think if I had ever encountered a male GM doing the same to a female character run by a male player—I can’t think of any. Even if there had been, it would have been equally frustrating, unless this was something we had agreed when we began or with discussion between the player and the GM.

I can’t know what it is like for each female player out there. I can only come at it from my own experiences as a gay male. After I came out, I always set my characters as gay at creation. Most games, it wasn’t discussed because we weren’t really exploring romantic or sexual situations in our game. When it did come up, the GM would just default that all characters are heterosexual and assume that all of us would be beguiled by them (which in and of itself is a terrible trope to use, but not the point of this discussion). Once they started to realize that my character was gay, they slowly started figuring out that perhaps male prostitutes should be seen in taverns, but it generally stopped short of the GM having to act out male-on-male flirtation.

In the game that saw our female companion get raped, the GM was very tactful with my gay character. The game was set in the 20s and he had spent time researching what gay clubs were like at this time. When we would have dream sequences and such, he would discuss both the happiness of me dreaming about my partner as well as the agony of nightmares of losing him. Certainly, there were plenty opportunities for this character to experience horrific torture and sexual assault at the hands of the cultists, but that line was never crossed with me.

Now, the important thing to consider isn’t just the ways that we treat women inside the game, where all too often they are treated as objects to be played with in ways that we generally don’t with our male companions. We also need to consider how we treat them in our community. I have tried very hard, especially as an adult, to make the gaming environment and geek culture an inclusive place. I remember feeling like I was the only gay gamer at our local convention. But, at no point was my identity as a gamer/geek questioned. I acknowledge that other gay gamers and geeks may have had other experiences, but I have generally been accepted into the boy’s club. But, I have watched as women have had to prove their geek cred, by discussing at length how they got into fandom and being tested about various games. When you watch the body language of the questioners, you can see they are ready to pounce on anything that they could use to discredit her. Or they make assumptions that her geeky shirt, “must belong to her boyfriend.”

We are cultured to be dismissive, which is rather unfortunate. This comment shouldn’t be read as affirming of male behavior, through justification. Rather a simple statement of how we tend to react. Our parents, mothers and fathers, dismiss our playing pretend and sometimes dismiss the way we are feeling as ways of helping us grow up. I dismissed the various posts by removing them from my feed or ignoring them without a real thought. Others have verbally dismissed women by trying to silence their complaints. But these dismissive actions serve only to perpetuate the problem. If someone like me, or you, dismisses this type of behavior, we can’t stand up for our fellow games. This means that we aren’t actively working towards an inclusive environment. Maybe we justify our dismissiveness because we don’t want to but it or we don’t want the negative attention we know we will get. When we do that though, we are resting all of the burden on the woman who spoke up and the negative feedback towards them is meant to silence them and force them to put up and shut up or get out of fandom. If we really want to put an end to this type of behavior and work towards inclusion, then we need to be willing to step up and help shoulder some of the attitudes people will throw out there.

While there are those that will read this as me taking up the torch of social justice. And perhaps I am, but I want to be able to be in a fandom where we are all accepted— a place where we can just connect with one another and enjoy the company and the awesome discussions that are possible when we gather with people with similar interests. It shouldn’t matter what gender or race you are or what your background is. While our little playful tests to see how much we have in common can be great, they shouldn’t serve as some sort of sorting hat that determines who gets to be included and who gets to be excluded.

I want to belong to a community where mutual respect is central. This means that we aren’t purposefully trying to create situations where we can make one another uncomfortable just because we can. And if we have made someone uncomfortable, they are empowered to tell us and we are respectful enough to accept the criticism and apologize. I know this part can be difficult. Sometimes, it can feel like the criticism is targeted at us and telling us that we are bad people and that hurts. Getting called out as sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic, abelist, sizest, etc., can hurt. We may not realize that what we are doing or saying sounds like that because it isn’t our intention. Or maybe we don’t want other to think poorly of us. All of us ultimately want to be accepted. Labels that “Other” us hurt, which is precisely why we use them. That little face slap can be a good wakeup call. Too often, unfortunately, it can backfire and cause people to push harder against the issue and ignite bigger fires. However, another one our social methods of behavior correction can be beneficial when a person digs in their heels and refuses to change and escalates—avoidance. We don’t like to be cut off from things, but it can be better in the long run to cut someone off and isolate them than to give tacit approval of their behavior because we don’t want to lose friends or have difficult conversations.

Whether we want to accept it or not, white males (especially heterosexuals) have power in the community as a whole. For way too long, fandom has been a boys club. And certainly those of us that have been in it for a while have endured some knocks from people outside of fandom. They teased us and questioned our manliness for playing make belief. We have been torn down and Othered for this thing we are passionate about. Those of us who have experienced that, probably hated every minute of it. It sucks to be belittled. Some of us banded together even tighter because the community we created was a safe place for us to talk about fantasy, science fiction, and all of our favorite characters and games.

It may have felt like this special safe place was invaded when women and non-white men started to find their ways into fandom. But it wasn’t. We were gaining new friends that had the same things in common. Instead of recognizing kindred spirits, some of us recognized that we had the ability to turn the tables. The powerlessness we were made to feel by the “cool” kids was ours to inflict on these new folks. And in doing so, the much coveted sense of power and control was ours to take back. Somehow, in the moment, we forgot what it was like to be the Other--- we got drunk on the power and didn’t care. This was our domain and you needed to earn your way. But no one needed to. All of it could have been so much different. While we can’t change the past, we can damn well make the present a much better place.

It starts by speaking up. Now, speaking up doesn’t mean start a flame war and it doesn’t mean we need to troll everyone (my genuine apologize to any of my readers who identify as a troll). It does mean recognizing sexist/disrespectful behavior. Whether it is inside your game or in various real or virtual spaces where our community comes together, we need to speak up and help put an end to it. While most of this post has been directed at disrespectful behavior towards women, the same is true for speaking out against people being disrespectful towards people of color as well as all of the various diverse personas we find in our community.

Also, recognize that someone may interpret your action different than you intended and they may call you out for it. I know it can be difficult, but put aside your ego for a moment and try to figure out where the miscommunication came from and work together to create a safe space.

Be sensitive and recognize that sometimes folks just need someone to listen. Don’t try to justify what the other person did or said, but recognize and validate the experience. We may not understand where they are coming form, but we can probably find some sort of experience where we can relate. Clarify if the person needs back up or if they just needed to vent. Sometimes, once we get all of the emotions of frustration or anger (or other emotion) out, we recognize that we may have over reacted and just needed to get it out. But, other times we may need some back up to help us stand up for ourselves.

We may also need to recognize that folks who are feeling alienated need a safe space where it is just folks like them. So this may mean and all female-identifying group or a queer group. This gives them that same safe space that many of originally created in response to the experiences we had. Seeking or creating a group like this does not equate to sexist or racist or any other ist (including elitist). It just means that they want to have a safe space and they may not feel like they are getting that. Also, if your immediate reaction is that there needs to be a men’s only group, remember that we had it for a long time and there are groups within the community who are actively trying to make this a men’s only group. This one especially gets me as a gay man, because this mentality is the same as folks wanting straight pride celebrations or white pride marches. Support our friends who feel they need a safe space by empowering them to do what they need and that you are always willing to act as go between or work with them when the deal with the community as a whole.

We need to recognize that there is a problem. There is this pain in our community and we all need to work together to create an inclusive space. One where people of all agents, shapes, sizes, ethnicity, races, gender identity/expression, orientation, and really just all of the things that make us unique, can feel safe and enjoy the company of people who have the same passions in common. All of the things that make us unique mean that there are all of those great experiences that we can explore and play with in our games and all of the different backgrounds mean endless points of discussion. The problem isn't going to end over night. But together, we can make this right. 

Thursday, April 7, 2016

The Shaved Chin: Cultural Imperialism and Gender Norms in Dwarves

This is a cross post from my main blog. While this may not seem relevant to gaming, I think that it is important to consider the way we picture Dwarves in our gaming world. The Fifth Edition D&D Player's Handbook explores this for a moment in its discussion of non-binary notions of sex and gender: "You could also play a female character who presents herself as a man, a man who feels trapped in a female body, or a bearded female dwarf who hates being mistaken for a man" (121). While it is easy to picture all females as beardless versions of their male counterparts, it is important to understand how the beard becomes a symbol of identity for this race and consider the implications of removing it. 

William C. Riley
The International Conference on the Fantastic in Art
March 18, 2016

            Before delving into the heavy topics of cultural imperialism and gender norms, I would like to reflect a moment on J.R.R. Tolkien’s essay “On Fairy-Stories,” where he shares that he discusses the nature of Fairy-Stories and Secondary Worlds— “Inside it, what [the story-maker] relates is ‘true’” (Tolkien, The Tolkien Reader 60). And it is this truth, within his Secondary World, that we should situate ourselves as we consider Tolkien’s Dwarves and their beards.
            From the Poetic and Prose Edda to Snow White, Dwarves have labored deep in the earth, carving their way into European folk traditions.  Tolkien pulled from these old stories when shaping Middle-Earth and crafted the prototype for Dwarves that continues to permeate fantasy literature. Instead of constituting them as simply humans of smaller stature, Tolkien created a unique race devoid of sexual dimorphism so common among various creatures in our primary, earthly, world. In “Durin’s Folk,” Tolkien describes Dwarf-women as “in voice and appearance, and in garb if they must go on journey, so like Dwarf-men that the eyes and ears of other people cannot tell them apart” (Tolkien, Lord of the Rings 360). This lack of sexual dimorphism produces a culture that challenges our semiotic understanding of beards and presents fantasy authors rich source material through which they can interrogate Western gender construction.
            Many fantasy works, unfortunately, have eschewed the opportunities presented by Tolkien’s prototype, and subordinated Dwarves by framing them into Western notions of gender. In doing so, Dwarven women in fantasy literature have been both literally, as seen in the comic Rat Queens, and metaphorically, in various other works, “shaved” of their beards. Often, this “shaving” is framed as an act of feminine liberation when, in fact, it is an example of cultural imperialism, whereby we, as authors and readers, impose our own understanding and ideals of femininity on this foreign culture.
            Under the auspices of Tolkien’s belief that fairy-stories should be presented as true, I will contrast the semiotic understanding of beards in EuroAmerican and Dwarven cultures. Through the use of ethnographic comparison on the effects of cultural imperialism on gender construction among non-European, I will also demonstrate the act of “shaving” the Dwarf-woman’s beard is an attempt to control and subjugate a race that outwardly appears queer, due to their lack of phenotypic difference between genders. By critiquing the beardless presentation of Dwarven women, I am also challenging future works to consider alternative ways non-hegemonic gender construction might appear in fantasy literature and to explore the meaning of gender in this unique race.
            As readers and writers, we need to consider our own, human, semiotic understanding of facial hair and consider how it shapes our reading of beards. As a secondary sex characteristic, androgenic hair is common in both men and women after puberty, though its placement will vary between sexes. In considering the history of beards, physician Allan D. Peterkin points out in his book One Thousand Beards: A Cultural History of Facial Hair, that the growth of a beard, along with the first shaving of the face, has been a rite of passage facilitating the transformation from boyhood to manhood since antiquity (Peterkin 63). At various times in history Peterkin notes the presence, and absence has been “a much required, enduring religious, political, and masculine symbol” (130) allowing us to clearly signal to others our allegiances and even our class standing. The shaving of someone else’s beard has been a declaration of war (19), as well as a sign of ownership (21) or defeat (20).
            Unlike men, however, Peterkin notes there has been “no historic edicts, laws, or papal decrees” governing the growth of female beards (98). Egyptian queens, like Hatshepsut, would wear “lavish fake beards of gold and silver” (17) during rituals and celebrations, and our myths and legends contain a select few women whose beard growth symbolizes “piety, sexual purity, or fidelity” (99). Despite the lack of formal laws, EuroAmerican culture, shaped by patriarchal influences, has suggested that female facial hair is unwanted and essentially non-feminine. Professor Elizabeth Grosz, in her paper “Freaks” points out that hirsute women have been categorized as freaks and relegated to sideshows to be ridiculed and mocked for the entertainment of others as a “problematized” intersection between sexes (Grosz 25).
            Unlike humans, Tolkien, in The War of Jewels, describes Dwarves as having “beards from the beginning of their lives, male and female alike” which changes the nature of their connection to their beards. Instead of being a sign of one biological sex or another, the Dwarven beard becomes a symbol of their innate Dwarf-ness and a cultural marker that sets them apart from Man or Elf. In fact, “this strangeness they have that no Man or Elf has ever seen a beardless Dwarf— unless he were shaven in mockery and would then be more likely to die of shame than of many hurts that to us would seem more deadly” (205). While shaving a human may function as an act of symbolic castration, the removal of a Dwarven beard is an act of hewing their spirit from their bodies.
            It is difficult, then, to believe that any Dwarf would visit such injury on themselves willingly. Yet, in the pages of the comic Rat Queens, we find Violet, the beardless Dwarf. When first encountered, (Rat Queens Vol 1, 12) it is difficult discern her race. Even when standing upright (14/1) she could easily pass for a young human female in comparison to her teammates, who are obviously elven and human, though the illusion of youth passes quickly as she points out, “We can sit around and bitch or we can make some monsters bleed. And my sword is hungry for blood” (16/2). Violet’s racial identity is finally disclosed in passing as the narration “[skips] past the part where Violet sang a Dwarven forest adventuring song of old” (22/1).
            In a flashback, Wiebe connects Violet to Tolkien’s prototype by providing a full image of a bearded Violet (Rat Queens Volume Two 57). In this flashback, after being consigned to model her father’s armor line instead of being allowed to fight in a tournament, due to the dictates of tradition (63/3), Violet meets a fellow Dwarf-woman who is shaved and permitted to fight (66/8 - 68/4), Violet decides to “fuck tradition” and shears off her beard (74) with her mother’s help (76).
            Violet’s shorn beard works, on terms that follow Dick Hebdige’s work with subculture, as a “construction of style, in a gesture of defiance or contempt” (Hebdige 3), but only within the confines of human cultural behavior. Acts of rebellion work within cultural codes set out by the culture being rebelled against, by creating norms and permissible avenues of defiance against them. While human males, whose interest in their beards may wax and wane depending on its cultural importance in time and place, Dwarven beards are a salient part of their cultural and racial identity, much like an Elf’s pointed ears. While Wiebe’s Dwarves may not “die of shame” should their beard be shorn, it is clearly a cultural marker, as noted by Violet’s mother during the shaving: “I remember when you first started to grow your beard. It was my proudest moment. The little girl becoming a woman” (75/5). Its removal is not just a refusal of tradition; it is also a denial of her racial identification and a rejection of her transition from girl to womanhood.
            Because of the stigma that would be generated from the act of shaving, it is difficult to believe Violet would readily remove her beard, much less get assistance from her mother. By ignoring the social stigma and treating it as no different than a contemporary adolescent human shaving their head or getting a tattoo, Wiebe is demonstrating the very EuroAmerican tendency toward cultural imperialism. Here the author, as representative of the dominant culture, is enforcing his own cultural norms and deviations on the subordinated, fictive, culture. Among human women, their choice to shave or leave their androgenic hair is a means by which they can claim authority over their own bodies, but they do so based on human cultural norms and expectations. Overlaying this action on a character from a different culture, albeit a literary one, and ignoring the implication of the action from their perspective is deeply problematic, as it carries with it implications that human norms are universal while utterly disregarding those of Dwarves.
            When examining ethnographic data collect regarding non-EuroAmerican cultures in post-colonial contact, a similar pattern is seen regarding gender construction and norms. Prior to first contact, many Native American tribes held cultural norms regarding both male-bodied and female bodied cross-gender people. In her book Gender Diversity: Crosscultural Variations, anthropologist Serena Nanda explains that at contact, Europeans “were filled with contempt and outrage when they recorded the presence” of cross-gender member, labeling them as berdache, “a term originally meaning male prostitute.” (11) By linguistically othering, these Europeans were expressing their disgust with actions they felt were abominable based on their own culture.
            In truth, cross-gender members of these tribes were not viewed negatively prior to contact. Nanda explains that “the association between spiritual power and gender variance occurred in most, if not all, Native American societies,” and highlights that “recruitment to the role was occasioned by a child’s interest in occupational activities of the opposite sex, supernatural sanctions, frequently appearing as visions or dreams, was also involved” (19). European cultural imperialism and the pressure on Native Americans to assimilate re-branded cross-gender members as repugnant, though contemporarily Native Americans are reclaiming their cultural respect towards gender variance and non-heterosexual members, using the term two spirit to describe them (Nanda 12-3).
            With our expanding exploration on the performative aspects of gender, it is time to use literature, regardless of genre, to explore its various methods of construction and interpretation. Tolkien provides fantasy literature and its derivatives with a unique race by which to do this, though this may not have been his original intention. Regardless of his intention, however, the lack of sexual dimorphism in Dwarves allows fantasy authors and readers to reconsider our expectations that gender and sex are directly linked to secondary sexual characteristics.
            An example of this exploration is presented in the Discworld books written by Terry Pratchett. In The Fifth Elephant, Pratchett explains “It wasn’t that Dwarfs weren’t interested in sex [...] it was simply that they also saw no point in distinguishing between the sexes anywhere but in private. There was no such thing as a Dwarfish female pronoun or, once the children were on solids, any such thing as women’s work” (42). Deriving from Tolkien’s prototype, Pratchett explores the nature of Dwarven gender norms through the character Cheery, or Cheri, Littlebottom and allows her to explore and establish how she will perform her gender outside of her Dwarven home. She was the “first Dwarf in Ankh-Morpork to wear a skirt” and she “retained her beard and round iron helmet, of course. It was one thing to declare that you were female, but quite unthinkable to declare that you weren’t a Dwarf” (43).
            While outwardly, Dwarves may appear queer given their lack of sexual dimorphism, they present a wonderful opportunity to explore the ways gender may be constructed and performed. Perhaps, like Pratchett’s, fantasy Dwarves don’t make any clear distinctions between the sexes in public. Or, perhaps their beards may act as a symbol of both their race and their gender, presenting authors the ability to create distinct methods by which different genders might shape, groom, style, perfume, and decorate their beards. Doing so would allow authors to pay homage to Tolkien’s prototype while also providing a space to interrogate our understanding of gender.



Works Cited
Grosz, Elizabeth. "Freaks." Social Semiotics 1.2 (1991): 22-38. Print.
Hebdige, Dick. Subculture: The Meaning of Style. London; New York: London; New York : Routledge, 1991. Print.
Nanda, Serena. Gender Diversity: Crosscultural Variations. Second edition.. ed. Long Grove, Illinois: Waveland Press, 2014. Print.
Peterkin, Allan D. One Thousand Beards: A Cultural History of Facial Hair. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2001. Print.
Pratchett, Terry. The Fifth Elephant: A Novel of Discworld. Mass Market Paperback Harper, 2014. Print.
Tolkien, J. R. R. The Return of the King: Being the Third Part of the Lord of the Rings. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001. Print.
--- The Tolkien Reader, 9th ed. New York: Del Ray Books, 1979. Print.
--- The War of the Jewels: The Later Silmarillion, Part Two, the Legends of Beleriand. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. Boston: Boston : Houghton Mifflin, 1994. Print.
Weibe, Kurtis, J., Roc Upchurch, and Ed Brisson. Rat Queens Volume One: Sorcery and Sass. Ed. Laura Tavishati. Berkeley, CA: Image Comics, 2014. Print.
Wiebe, Kurtis J., and Roc J. Upchurch. Rat Queens Volume Two: The Far Reaching Tentacles of N'Rygoth. Berkeley, CA: Image Comics, 2015. Print.


Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Tech at the Table: Hi or Low?

I will admit that I was a slow adapter to the use of computers at the game table. In high school, I was the primary owner of “The Library”—our group’s collection of gaming books. Each time we got together for game, I brought the bulk of them to each game. Once I moved out and had my own place, I could host the games there and the library could grow beyond what would be feasible for me to pack up and carry on a weekly basis.

The most frustrating part of a physical book was trying to track down specific rules. You could guarantee the game would come to a screeching halt, as players were trying to remember which book the rule came from. Admittedly, if you are only using the core books for any particular game, this might be easy enough. Still, there is nothing worse than stopping the game to find a specific rule.

The thing that really changed gaming for me was the laptop and my external hard drive. Between the two of them, I have been able to radically cut down on the number of books that are cluttering the table (or that I need to carry with me). I have invested a pretty good chunk of money changing out my hard copy game books for digital versions, thanks to sites like DriveThruRPG. Most companies make their PDFs searchable, which means a simple CTRL+F and you can search the whole document and have it in no time.

Beyond the digital library, I also like the laptop for a number of other reasons. I can keep all of my game notes in one place. I usually have my digital notes set up through OneNote, with individual “notebooks” for each game and sections for each player/character. This lets me quickly make notes of how they are reacting to individual storylines, short-term and long-term goals, enemies they acquire, as well as any other little tidbits that might be usable in future chapters.

Another useful tool I use is a simple Excel spreadsheet.  I usually have one tab set up to handle combat, keeping track of initiative and quick reference information for NPCs, and a running tabulation of XP earned for the session. When I do my initial prep work for the campaign, I will also set up a tab t
hat has a set of random names, and a few random generators for race, class, gender for NPCs and another tab to let me keep track of any NPCs I had to generate and which PC they are attached to for ease of reference. Especially given the number of times my players like to go off the beaten path of an adventure, this lets me quickly provide them some defined people within the game world they can interact with and gives the game a bit more life.

I also use instant messaging with my players. This has eliminated note passing and allows me to copy and paste their notes and ideas directly to their notebook pages. Between game sessions, I also use instant messaging to conduct one-on-one sessions with my players and plan for any activities they might be interested in doing if they will be absent from a game. I can keep annotated transcripts of these with the rest of their character information as well and try to weave pieces of these side stories into the main narrative when the opportunity arises.

With sites like Roll20, we have also been able to use the computer to connect with players that would otherwise be unable to join. Additionally, we have also made use of Roll20 even with all of the players in the same room, using a projector to put the game map up on a wall, instead of drawing it on a map pad. The one drawback I found with Roll20 is making sure that all of the players are familiar with how to use the built in character sheets and the various macros the system supports for dice rolling and use of special powers. I imagine, however, once everyone is comfortable with the controls, this platform will meet many needs for groups.

I will be the first to admit, though, that the game can suffer with so much tech at the table. With access to instant messenger, you might lose a player to social media. Or another might disappear into a book. I know I have been guilty during sessions as a player of doing my homework during the game if I am not getting engaged by what is happening. Even if you limit access to computers, the ubiquitous cellphone presents many of the same problems.

Like most of my recommendations, I would talk it over with your players to see how much, or how little, tech you really need to have to make the game work for everyone. While it can be great to be able to have some ambiance-enhancing music playing from your machine, there is nothing more distracting than hearing the constant PING of an instant messaging program going off. And as wonderful as it is to have a library of hundreds of books accessible at any time, it can also lead to player disconnect. Plus, there is the making sure you have enough space for any maps, minis, props, food and drink, etc. on the table.

If you have enough space, I would recommend the GM have a computer. There are generally more Pros to this decision than Cons. From there, I would really consider what do your players need to have access to in order to facilitate easy game play? Now that most folks have smartphones, instant messaging apps are easy enough to come by, as are a number of apps for various games. This can help eliminate the clutter and help your players stay engaged in the game.

I have also been in period games where GMs have banned players from having anything other than their dice, character sheet, and a pencil with them. Having been a player in this style set up, make sure that you are watching your players for signs of boredom. I know that I was emoting pretty heavily, by repeatedly building towers with my dice, and my GM was oblivious of it. The benefit to not having any tech in front of your players is that it should make it very easy to watch their body language. In order for this to be a benefit, though, you have to be willing to look up from your screen and engage with your players.


What type of tech set up do you use in your home games? Have you run into any disasters in game because of too much, or too little, tech available? Share your experiences in the comments below. 

Monday, March 14, 2016

Skeggbitr Víðirsen, Besmaran Priest - Pathfinder

With this blog, I hope to offer some example characters I have made at times. For the last several years, I have been playing quite a bit of Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. The following character was made to play in the Skull & Shackles Adventure Path and used the Background Generator found in Ultimate Campaign (and replicated in the official Pathfinder Reference Document and D20 PFSRD).

When I make a character I typically start with a pretty rough idea of the character, establishing the race and class I am interested in playing. From there, I will roll up a random background and see if there are any events in it that suggest certain stats or skills and make note of those. When I write up my background story, I try to integrate as much of the generated information as possible. If I get stuck on any items, I will make a note of them and come back and see if those missed pieces work in naturally once the story is generated.

This particular character is a little out of the box, as I had recently gotten the book, Bastards of Golarion and wanted to use some of the information there to create a dwarven character that had a bit of the sea in him. In order to achieve this, I used the rules presented for Undine and swapped out a couple of traits that gave him a more dwarven feel. Another thing to note is that when working with dwarves, I tend to borrow heavily for Norse names or Norse words and weave bits of real mythologies into the stories as well. Some folks might notice a similarity between Skegg's father's name and Manannán mac Lir, which is intentional. 


This character background is the type I mention in a previous post. If your players are struggling with generating a background story for their character, I generally recommend looking to heroic myths and legends from various world cultures for inspiration. They can be wonderful source material and no one is going to mind borrowing heavily from them. 
After arranging for his parents to be well cared for, Skegg arranged travel to The Shackles, where his heart called to him. He was certain that Besmara would provide the next clue to finding his father. He came to a tavern in port in search of his fate. He’s not sure how many drinks he had, but they quickly went to his head and he passed out on the table before he found his destiny—unless it lay in the bottom of a bottle. Then again, maybe he found his destiny after all...


Skeggbitr Víðirsen

Shortly after his mother, Helga Hjordisdóttir, was betrothed to Rénar Særúlfsen, she was visited by Mannan Víðirgott, a noble marid, who seduced the dwarven woman. When she grew heavy with child, months before taking her wedding vows to Rénar, the settlement was aghast and her betrothed accused her of infidelity. According to laws and traditions, she was to take the trial of water and was bound in metal shackles and cast into the sea. Mannann would not let the sea claim her, so he rusted away her bindings and washed her ashore along with many treasures from the deep. Those assembled blamed shoddy craftmenship and again bound her, this time with sturdier chains and again cast her into the sea. As before, Mannann corroded away her bindings and cast her gently on the beach, again with various treasures. Outraged, Rénar bound her in heavy rope and tied many stones to her and personally cast Helga into the sea. However, this time Mannann appeared from the waves with Helga in his arms.

“Twice have I tried to pay for the maiden hood I took and return this woman, unharmed. I know well your laws, and should one pass a trial alive, they are unguilty of their crime and so it is with this woman. But you, Rénar, son of Særúlf, son of Krellrað, son of Vetrsvinnr Banahǫgg, first of your line to come to this land with my help and guidance, put your pride above the laws of your people. From this day forward, you will find the sea no friend of yours. No fish will come to your net, no current will bear your weight, no wind will fill your sail. Any boat that carries you will be like doomed, as will any man or woman who harbors you.  You will be Vetnóvnir and yours will be a hard life.

“To the rest of you, your nets will remain barren for a year and a day. Fogs will swallow your boats and lead them astray and no ship, from near or far, shall find your port. You are thusly cursed for allowing your laws to be bent.

“As for the woman, her way will be made clear, and, as you wished, the waves will carry her far from you. She will bear forth a son and she will know love and happiness all the days of her life.”

With that, he crashed, like a mighty wave, into the ocean, washing Helga and the treasures away. The ships that were moored at the harbor were dashed upon the shore. By Mannann’s will, Helga was carried safely to the shores of Cassomir – Mannann’s treasures were tucked away within her clothes, his gift to her. A young brewer, also recently arrived in Cassomir, saw her body wash upon the shores and went down to see if she was well. Enkí Beorrbar fell in love the moment he saw her upon the beach and would eventually take her as his wife.

Four months after being washed ashore, Helga gave birth to Mannann’s son, giving him the name Vilífjor. The nursemaid was terrified of the child – his blueish-green coloring was an ill omen and the plumb body resembled that of a drowned corpse. His ears looked like fins and he had webbing between his fingers and toes. The babe was still and the nurse feared he was dead. However, he gasped for air and let out a terrible cry and the nurse nearly dropped the child.

Helga never shared with Vilífjor who his father was or that her people had attempted to kill her, preferring to tell him that her ship had sunk after colliding with a reef. When she washed ashore, she was full with child.

The treasures Mannann provided took care of the three of them for quite some time, during which time Enkí opened a small brewery, making his family ales and spirits. Unfortunately, he took to gambling and eventually, in order to clear his debts, he was forced to give over the secrets of his brew. He and Helga had the first of their children, a son named Atferðþol. Vilífjor was on the cusp of manhood and felt obligated to help take care of his younger brother. The sea often called to him, and Vilífjor found that his natural talents made him useful on the docks of Cassomir. It wasn’t long until he found himself hired as a seaman on the Merchant Vessel The Lady Amstone. He kept enough to make a meager living for himself and gave the rest to Enkí and his mother.

This was the first of many ships Vilífjor worked on. But, where ever the sea took him during the nearly twenty years, he would always come back to Cassomir. While he was at sea, his sister Sjórsilfra, was born.  While on the Elven ship, Loraquistriel¸ his last post, he was unable to keep his promise to his family. The ship was attacked by orcen brigands. It was not the first attack he had been part of, but it was also his introduction to personal firearms. He took a fatal shot to his chest and was tossed overboard with the rest of his crew.

Mannann felt his son call out with the last bit of energy he had, but it was too late. Vilífjor was dead, sinking to the bottom of the sea. While Mannann possessed a great deal of power, he could do nothing to restore his son to life. He appealed to the Gods, but only Besmara, the Pirate Queen, answered him. In return for Vilífjor’s life, Besmara demanded that Mannann bind himself to her, serving as her First Mate. She also insisted that the boy’s soul belonged to her. Mannann had lived the first part of his existence as a slave and cherished his freedom, but his only son meant more to him. He agreed.

A week later, Vilífjor washed on the shore of a small-uninhabited island. He woke to a small monkey knocking on his head, as if it were a coconut or gourd. Vilífjor snapped open his eyes and shot out his hand, meaning to grab the beast by the scruff of its neck. Instead, the monkey bit him and fled, laughing. Vilífjor pushed himself from the beach, seeing his flesh for the first time since his death. His skin had darkened, and looked like the sea itself, no longer did he look like a drowned corpse. He found a small inlet where he could gaze at his reflection. His copper hair was matted and tangled and looked like seaweed. Salt rimed the three short braids of his beard.

Again, he heard the laughing of the monkey. Vilífjor spun around and charged after the creature, travelling farther and farther into the wilds of the island until he finally came to a crudely constructed hut. In it, he found the recently dead remains of a human male. Among the corpse’s possessions were his journal, a book titled The Sea Queen’s Plunder which detailed the faith of Besmara, and a wooden holy symbol.  By the light of the fading sun, Vilífjor read the book. His soul was like the sea itself, and Besmara held a tidal pull on it. As night came, the monkey, who Vilífjor had taken to calling Erfiðr, a word meaning troublesome in his native tongue, tugged at his sleeves, urging the dwarf to leave the hut. Vilífjor gathered up the possessions and ran back to the beach. While he set about to make a fire, Erfiðr went and gathered food for the two of them.

Vilífjor slept, his belly filled, listening to the sounds of the waves. His mind was troubled and he dreamt of the depths, remembering what he could not remember – he was a dead man walking. Something in him grew sick and he woke to Erfiðr trying to pry open his eyelids. The dwarf snapped awake and was aware of a shuffling coming from the wilds. He had no weapon with which to defend himself and prayed Besmara might aid him with whatever it was that was coming.

The firelight caused the corpse’s skin to shine with a sickly orange light. It was the body of the old cleric. Like Vilífjor he too had animated and the dwarf knew well it was drawn by the life inside himself. With only Besmara’s holy symbol and his faith in the Pirate Queen, Vilífjor called on her holy might and was amazed when the undead creature jerked forward and halted, struck by some unseen force. But it continued forward. The dwarf tried again, but nothing happened.

“Surrender yourself to me, and only to me,” a woman’s voice whispered among the winds.

Vilífjor closed his eyes.

“Commit yourself to me, as your father did,” she called again.

The dwarf took a deep breath, dug deep within. “I commit myself to you, Besmara. My Queen!” He opened his eyes to find the undead priest nearly upon him. He brandished the wooden Jolly Roger at the walking Corpse and the creature froze in place. Vilífjor gestured with his left and a great wave rose up, controlled by his will. “You failed her, Tryphon. You are unworthy of her blessings.” He swung his arm, as if he meant to strike the creature with his fist. The wave followed through and slammed into the body of the dead priest, shattering the body and driving its animating force out of the body. The exertion was great and he collapsed to the ground.

In the morning, he found Erfiðr cleaning the skull of the dead priest. All the flesh and soft tissues were gone, leaving only bone behind. Using rocks, Vilífjor fashioned some rudimentary tools and weapons from Tryphon’s bones. Using a length of leather cord, he fashioned a mask from the skeletal face of the former priest. No bone went unused. From the knuckles and small bones, He also fashioned a set of casting dice. Back in Cassomir, he often bedded the elven seer, Seregruthion, who taught him how to cast dice and read their meanings.

The island served as Vilífjor’s home for several years. Armed with only a few bone tools and Erfiðr, he hunted the greater beasts of the island and subdued them. He fashioned an axe, similar to the one he carried with him as a seaman, from the shoulder of a great cat. He studied Besmara’s holy text and resolved that he was following in his father’s footsteps. He was certain that his father was foreign pirate and that it would be on the seas that he would finally learn his fate. He took the name Skeggbitr Ví∂irsen, meaning Bravebeard Son of the Sea, not realizing how close to his own father’s surname he had gotten.

Fashioning a simple boat from timbers he collected and a small sail that washed on the shore a few weeks ago, Skegg set sail from the island. Erfiðr was his second mate, and from their small vessel, they were able to loot a small pleasure boat. He used that to make his way back to Cossamir. Long had he been gone, and he wished to look in on his family. Enkí had again had a run in with owing money, but this time it was due to a slump in business. Skegg sold the small barge and had a courier bring the money to his family, fearful to return to them.

While in Cossamir, Skegg seduced the treasurer, a married man named Emin Sankar. Emin had been the man who had forced Enkí to sell his family brewing secrets. Aided by the seer— the only one Skegg revealed himself to— they arranged for Emin’s assistant find the treasurer with Seregruthion. The dwarf then blackmailed Emin, ensuring that his family would be well cared for in exchange for making those that caught Emin would never speak of it. Skegg arranged to have the assistant killed tragically.

This story was generated from the following set of random background events:

Homeland: Non-Dwarf Town or Village
Parents: Both parents are alive (Helga Hjordisdóttir and Enkí Beorrbar)
Siblings: Two Siblings
                        Sibling One: Younger Brother (Atferðþol Enkísen)
                        Sibling Two: Younger Sister (Sjórsilfra Enkídóttir)
Circumstance of Birth: Bastard Born (Father is a shahzada, or noble marid, named Mannann Ví∂irgott)
Parent’s Profession: Tradespeople  (Enkí is a brewer by trade and Helga is a clothier)
Major Event: Died
Training: Revelation
Influential Associates: The Seer (The elven seer Seregruthion, a former lover of Skegg)
Conflict: Seducer
            Subject: Civic or Military Official (Emin Sarkan, Cassomir Treasurer)
            Motivation: Revenge
            Resolution: Enjoyed it

Romantic Relationship: Several Inconsequential Relationships

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Reward and Response

For many of us, gaming is a pastime, something we can do to escape the humdrum quagmire of our rather mundane existence. For a few hours, we can sit down at a table—virtually or in real-life—and we can create fictive worlds and relationships with others. The idea is that everyone is doing this because they are having fun, but as GMs, how can you tell if your players are having fun? And if they aren’t, how can you fix that?

The answer to these questions may seem obvious. “I know my players are having fun because they are laughing and joking and smiling,” answered one DM friend of mine. The problem is that through these signs your players are not always telling the truth. Certainly, in that moment, they may well have been having fun, but for others this can be a social camouflage they use to avoid attention.

“I can ask them if they are having fun,” said another friend, who went on to say, “I have a good rapport with my players and they would let me know if they weren’t having fun.” Great rapport definitely goes a long way, but remember that most people do not want to hurt their friends either. I know for me, I have blatantly exaggerated the amount of fun I was having because I wanted to save my friend and myself the embarrassment of having to say, “Dude, I hate your game.”

Some of you may be asking, then, “ok, if I can’t trust what I am seeing or what they are saying, how can I tell if they are having fun?” The answer to this question starts before the game even begins. It starts with a pre-game Q&A that you do with the individual players.

This is something that I have been experimenting with for a little bit now. When I first started running games, it was all about me. I had a story that I wanted to tell and I wanted my friends to provide the characters. The problem for this was there would be times, and they were a plenty when I first started, when the characters would want to go one direction inside the story and I needed them to go a different way. Of course, as a GM I would force their decisions to still take them where I needed them to go. The harder they pushed, though, the less fun I could tell they were having and I know the frustrations were detracting from mine as well.

The answer to my quandary came about from my own academic interests in cognitive theory and roleplaying. One of the things that we know about aesthetics and the study of why we read fiction, it is that our brain likes response and reward systems. We even use it as a way to socially pattern ourselves, providing kudos and positive rewards for good work, and admonishing not so good behavior with criticism and negative responses. If we, as GMs, work smarter, by using a similar system, we can produce hours of fun for everyone involved alongside memories that will outlive the game itself.

The first thing we want to understand is what constitutes positive rewards for our players? We want to know what their wants, interests, and needs are. I generally hate this terminology, as it is also what many folks use to determine sales pitches, but the fact is that it works. A few things to consider are:

  • What does the player want to get out of the gaming experience?
  • What are they interested in exploring during the game?
  • What do they need in order to have a fun experience?
Understanding what the player wants to get out of the gaming experience helps us put in perspective what the game means for them. For me, when I have the opportunity to game, it means that I am taking a break from work/school/personal life to get away and relax. This means that I don’t want my time wasted with unnecessary distractions that aren’t related to the experience. My frustration triggers are excessive out of character discussions during designated game time or when the story isn’t moving forward.

Taking a moment to understand what the player wants to explore recognizes one of the historic uses of roleplaying—a safe place to question and consider things that might be bugging me in the real world. Lately, I have been interested in exploring other genders and making sure that gender or race are actually important within the game. This does not mean that I need the games I play in to be filled with gender rhetoric or racism, but rather I want the choices I make about my character to matter within the story. If I am playing a bearded dwarven female, I am ok with being mistaken for a man and consider how that might affect me.

Balancing what people need in order to have fun helps to make sure that you are giving each player a little something that is just for them. One group I have been with does this by giving them some sort of in-game item on (or around) their real-world birthday. It is recognition that they are important. But also understanding what kind of situations are rewarding and fun for the player is useful too. I have friends that love riddles and puzzles, not something they can simply roll a dice and figure out, but something engages them as players to figure out. For others, they like role-playing scenarios where their choice of words can have direct impact on the game. For me, I want to feel like my character is real and my decisions matter.

A way to help figure these things out is working with each player during character creation. I enjoy writing character backstories, as they help set the stage for my character and help me figure out how they fit into the world. I recognize that not every player is going to want to do that, but if it is something you want your players to consider, look at giving them some kind of reward for doing it. An example can be an heirloom item—something they start the game with that comes from their background. The more information given about the backstory and how the character came to possess it, the more the heirloom can be worth.  Remember, rewards can encourage players. If you do this though, make sure to recognize that players are going to come from different comfort levels with writing. You might get someone like me, who details their character from birth to the beginning of the game, or a player that might only provide a list of events.

While they are generating their character, ask them about questions about what they, as players, want to get from the game. Remember if you ask make it relevant in the game. The worst thing you can do is ask questions and feign interest in the answers and then do nothing with them. I would also recommend asking what the character wants to get out of the story too. What sort of short-term and long-term goals do the players have for their character? Because I like to work with pre-generated adventures, these short and long term goals provides ways I can reward the players and provide experiences they will have that is different from what someone else running that game will have.

Keep notes about the characters and what they are working on. I have found that keeping a GM document for each player is useful. I can use this to create side events, vignettes, and long-term story arches for each player and keep them separate. I can also use those to keep track of how they react when they get to interact with their storylines. If I throw out an NPC name that they interacted with during a one-on-one event and they light up, I can make note of that. If there is no reaction or clearly negative reaction, such as body language shut down or aggravation, I can make note to adjust how I am presenting information. Be sure that you are sharing the attention across all the players—everyone wants some time in the light.

As discussed in a previous post, be sure to set aside time are regular intervals to take the pulse of the group. This is a great time to talk about what the character is doing inside the game. Have they met their short-term goals? Based on what has been happening in the game, are their new goals they would like to start working towards and are there some that they want to abandon? Because it can be easier to talk in terms of the character, versus the player, you can also ask if there are different things the characters might like to see happen in the story? This can be especially useful if you have players that can be non-confrontational, who might not speak up about what they need or want. Be prepared to adapt to the information you get and experiment with new approaches.

Most importantly, as the GM, you need to do these things for yourself too. Why are you running the game and what do you want to get out of it? Take some time after the game to reflect on what happened, what went well, what didn’t go well, and review the in-game notes you made. Find a balance that works for you and your players and you will find that each of you are getting the rewards that makes the game engaging and fun and driving you to look forward to the next game.