My wife is most definitely not interested in X Wing. She does like to play board games like castles of burgundy, catan and ticket to ride though. She is not much of a star wars fan and she doesn't enjoy miniatures games.

Luckily she tolerates me playing it though. (Especially when it's soo much cheaper than Warhammer 40,000)

Now, she feels that I spend too much time with X-Wing and not enough with her. It's not really fair of me to tell her "well, let's play X-Wing together, if she really doesn't enjoy the game - which it is clear she doesn't.

You just have to find what you both enjoy, and find a good balance between that and xwing.

Quite so.

I did not create this thread to lament my situation. My situations is pretty **** good. The problem, I think, is that our hobby isn't inclusive enough. But, maybe I'm wrong. I think that the question of non-playing wives might be the best way to figure the problem out. In my case, it's because it's not the kind of game my wife wants to play, which has nothing to do with gender exclusion (I think). But, the sheer gender imbalance in the overall hobby is something that gnaws at me.

Hey, you're right. I agree bigtime there- and I think one of the biggest problems is a lot of people like us have the nerve to look at female gamers with suspicion and ask, "Is she a real gamer?"

And this does apply to tabletop stuff- not just screens and pixels. A lot of guys are so used to the concept of it being a primarily male demographic- even though in the last ten years (at least in videogaming in particular) the gap has lessened significantly. I do not know if it has for tabletop things, but I am certain the disparity is not as big as it once was.

As a result I firmly believe that an unspoken code of, "Don't suspect or treat differently, those who are new or not like you" needs to be pushed and reaffirmed into our minds, so that we do not so easily shy away those who want to join in on the fun.

One other thought - I think a lot of guys (myself included) sort of try to force their girlfriends into playing, and that's not how it ought to be. If she wants to play, great. If she doesn't, she can do whatever it is she likes to do with her friends while you're throwing down with your bros.

So I just talked to my wife about this actually after reading this thread. Again she isn't really into this game. But she just said she would like to play if there was a scenario where Han Solo has to rescue Princess Leia. I told her we can put a small Leia action figure on the cardboard senator's shuttle and play that scenario from the rule book. Her squad can consist of Han Solo in the Falcon protecting his true love Princess Leia from the evil Empire. She said she really wants to try that and she thinks she could get more into it if there was scenarios like that in the game haha. Well I think we just figured out how we can BOTH enjoy X-wing . Gonna try it tonight!

So, picking up from this thread and this thread, I'd like to talk about our wives. (At least, the wives of those of us who have them.)

For starters, my personal: I came into this game from a rampant SW enthusiasm that had its outlet in online narrative roleplaying. My wife loves Star Wars, but wants no part of that. I saw X-Wing at the FLGS, and thought it might be a way to play SW with her. She gave it a shot at the quick-start game level, but the complexity turned her off. She's just not a gamer. She will agree to play with me (quick-start game only) and even then I can tell she's just doing it to appease me - which entirely fails because 1) quick-start game only, and 2) if she's just doing to appease me and not having fun, then the whole thing falls flat.

At my FLGS, I've seen one wife play with a much more understanding and skill - she was authentically beating her husband - but with a similar bemusedness, and no real urge to play independently with another opponent when her husband squared off against me.

From the other threads, I do read that other members here have had more success integrating their wives into the game. While my experiences above might just be functions of these two particular women, I do think that there's something structural in what keeps more women from joining the game. I'd be interested to learn your experiences in this regard, so that I can understand this a bit better than just my sample of 2.

My story's similar to yours. My wife is a huge SW fan, but still comes nowhere near my level of interest (which is likely pathological). She played one or two games but it didn't catch, though she has indicated some regret over that. She generally enjoys games for the social aspect, and myself for the cinematic aspect.

So I end up playing exclusively solo, the only other person interested nearby is my brother-in-law, but his natrual talent for gaming and extreme competitiveness have long-since ruined that experience for me.

The good news is my wife sees me blissed out with spaceships like Benny from The Lego Movie; collecting, organizing, painting, playing—and she's incredibly supportive. It's not outside the realm of possibility that she'll play again in the future.

My wife's not a gamer, although she's played Carcassonne and Zombies!!!, and enjoyed them. Just waiting for my daughter and son to get a little older before introducing them.

Until then, we've got the 65" TV, 5.1 Surround, PS3, and Star Wars on Blu-Ray to tide them over.

You've crushed me.

LOL. But you've got the blackout curtains .

Also, much of the problem is a simple self-reinforcing mechanism. With fewer women around, women feel less comfortable and sexists feel more comfortable. There are often few people willing to call someone out on a sexist comment if there are no women around, which only encourages the behavior. It also makes misogynists feel more welcome, and speaking for myself they are NOT welcome. Personally I would prefer to encourage them to go to someone's house, preferably where the other misogynist/racist/bigots are also gathered, so as to spare the rest of us their company.

I know my wife is very encouraged by the rare sighting of another female playing X-Wing, even though she is made welcome by the guys in our league.

My wife describes herself as a "different kind of geek" and while we share many things in common, I'm afraid that playing X-Wing miniatures is not one of them. However, I did win the wife lottery because of two reactions she had**:

A) When she saw me unwrapping my wave 3 ships with a boyish, enthuisiastic grin, her reaction was: "You look so cute when you're passionnate!"

B) She made me a custom 3' by 3' playmat for my birthday using different frabrics, including a star pattern and such. I have the one and only model of that type!

** Note: these are not the only 2 things that imply that I won the wife lottery, but they are the most important ones that are X-Wing Miniatures related

A) When she saw me unwrapping my wave 3 ships with a boyish, enthuisiastic grin, her reaction was: "You look so cute when you're passionnate!"

My girlfriend is like this too. In my opinion, having a significant other who can be excited for you when you're pursuing your own passions is just as important (if not more so) than having a significant other who actually shares those passions with you.

Which is not to say that having shared interests/passions isn't important and desirable, but I think a lot of guys have the mindset that "If I can just find a girl who likes X-Wing as much as me, I'll be set." I think that's flawed.

I think it definitely varies, but I also think that reality is far less important than perception. Geeks are increasingly perceived as sexist, socially inept weirdos who have no idea how to talk to or behave around other people, let alone members of the opposite sex.

And this does apply to tabletop stuff- not just screens and pixels. A lot of guys are so used to the concept of it being a primarily male demographic- even though in the last ten years (at least in videogaming in particular) the gap has lessened significantly. I do not know if it has for tabletop things, but I am certain the disparity is not as big as it once was.

Hm, so the two of you seem* to be observing opposite tendencies. Is inclusivity growing or diminishing?

(* Seeming might belie reality - e.g. sexual assault in India. Stats are going up, which is a perverse sign of improvement, because it means that now there's more of a record, when before such things happened more frequently, but went unreported. In our case, the highlight of sexism in geek culture might be good, because it'll be more likely to be addressed. Before, the sexism might have been worse, but just went unobserved by a wider audience than those being excluded.)

I failed to get my wife into X-wing.

Two years earlier she tried to expressly forbid me from taking up SW the Old Republic MMORPG. A fair amount of arguing resulted that we won't discuss here which resulted in me playing anyway and her hating it.

With X-wing because it is local people I meet and hang out with she is ok with it, especially because it often over laps with her book club meetings.

So my wife doesn't play, but my father-in-law plays with me when we get together.

My wife describes herself as a "different kind of geek" and while we share many things in common, I'm afraid that playing X-Wing miniatures is not one of them. However, I did win the wife lottery because of two reactions she had**:

A) When she saw me unwrapping my wave 3 ships with a boyish, enthuisiastic grin, her reaction was: "You look so cute when you're passionnate!"

B) She made me a custom 3' by 3' playmat for my birthday using different frabrics, including a star pattern and such. I have the one and only model of that type!

** Note: these are not the only 2 things that imply that I won the wife lottery, but they are the most important ones that are X-Wing Miniatures related

That's awesome. My wife bought me three of each ship from Wave 4 for my birthday, I was blown away. It came in a big box in the mail, and she sat with me as I opened everything and we looked over all the new pilots and cards together. It was great! She knows I'm a geek, and she loves me for it even though she is far from a geek. She was one of the cool kids in high school, and I was the one probably no one remembers now haha.

So I just talked to my wife about this actually after reading this thread. Again she isn't really into this game. But she just said she would like to play if there was a scenario where Han Solo has to rescue Princess Leia. I told her we can put a small Leia action figure on the cardboard senator's shuttle and play that scenario from the rule book. Her squad can consist of Han Solo in the Falcon protecting his true love Princess Leia from the evil Empire. She said she really wants to try that and she thinks she could get more into it if there was scenarios like that in the game haha. Well I think we just figured out how we can BOTH enjoy X-wing . Gonna try it tonight!

That's awesome!

I'm sure there's a feminist cringing somewhere that she is putting the woman in the to-be-rescued position (that feminist might be me), but ultimately it's not about what she should want, but what she really does want to play.

I did not create this thread to lament my situation. My situations is pretty **** good. The problem, I think, is that our hobby isn't inclusive enough. But, maybe I'm wrong. I think that the question of non-playing wives might be the best way to figure the problem out. In my case, it's because it's not the kind of game my wife wants to play, which has nothing to do with gender exclusion (I think). But, the sheer gender imbalance in the overall hobby is something that gnaws at me.

When most ladies think of Miniature gaming some stereotypes come to mind. Guys locker room, Big Bang Theory, Sexist dumb asses. None of which sound appealing to hang out with. Now most of us have played at the FLGS and know that most of the guys are alright with the occasional player that keeps the stereotype going full speed.

Thats where us dads of daughters come in. We have to show them that these games are fun to play. That we can go to the FLGS and play against the Sheldon's and have fun laughing about them on the way back home. That way these posts become more along the lines of I need help with my list cause my wife keeps crushing me.

If your wife is willing to play the keep playing, even starter. Then mix up the ships some. Fudge your tactics some to were you don't always have a great shot. Don't throw the game but give her a better chance of winning. Hopefully winning and finding that ship that she likes gets her a bit more enthused in playing.

My girlfriend likes to play the game occasionally (even requests it). I usually try to find a goofy list I want to play (usually involves a shuttle, since I'm not good with it right now) and I give her a good/fun/simple to play list that has a good edge over what I have. It's fun and all, but I think it doesn't let her improve as much, since I always prepare the lists. Maybe I should take her to the FLGS...

Hey, that's awesome!

It's equally awesome if it's her interest in X-Wing that's driving that, or her interest in spending time with you. I think there's also no problem whatsoever that she just wants to play it at the extreme casual non-competitive level, if that's just her speed.

It would be interesting if you would take her to the FLGS and see what she makes of it - and how the FLGS denizens receive her. Please let us know how that works out if you make that happen. Inquiring minds want to know.

I consider myself lucky, because we share many activities. And I enjoy playing with her, even if it's more casual. She's at around 20 games played so it's understandable. Maybe if she plays with more people at the FLGS she'll like it more and move towards the normal/competitive side.

If your wife is willing to play the keep playing, even starter. Then mix up the ships some. Fudge your tactics some to were you don't always have a great shot. Don't throw the game but give her a better chance of winning. Hopefully winning and finding that ship that she likes gets her a bit more enthused in playing.

In my wife's case, I do think the 'ability to win' is part of the dynamic. However, I think pushing the envelope of playing X-Wing at this point is a lost cause. This topic is not one that I wrote in order to lament my situation. It's one in which I'm trying to understand how the gender ratio can be balanced out a bit more.

If your wife is willing to play the keep playing, even starter. Then mix up the ships some. Fudge your tactics some to were you don't always have a great shot. Don't throw the game but give her a better chance of winning. Hopefully winning and finding that ship that she likes gets her a bit more enthused in playing.

In my wife's case, I do think the 'ability to win' is part of the dynamic. However, I think pushing the envelope of playing X-Wing at this point is a lost cause. This topic is not one that I wrote in order to lament my situation. It's one in which I'm trying to understand how the gender ratio can be balanced out a bit more.

I will note that gender ratios in appreciation of board games are vastly dependent of culture. I'm not from the US, where I'm from euro-style boardgames (as you call them ) can easily find 50-50 audiences. Warhammer, Magic and X-Wing on the other hand are more male dominated (granted, X-Wing is still small over here).

A) When she saw me unwrapping my wave 3 ships with a boyish, enthuisiastic grin, her reaction was: "You look so cute when you're passionnate!"

My girlfriend is like this too. In my opinion, having a significant other who can be excited for you when you're pursuing your own passions is just as important (if not more so) than having a significant other who actually shares those passions with you.

Which is not to say that having shared interests/passions isn't important and desirable, but I think a lot of guys have the mindset that "If I can just find a girl who likes X-Wing as much as me, I'll be set." I think that's flawed.

Agreed!

I got my wife to play a few times. Like with all things that are new, you have to start slowly and be gentle. Ease it in. Talk to her, see what she doesnt like, find another way to do it.

All innuendo aside, we really started off small. Just the core box. I gave her Luke and took two Ties. Made the game fun. Not about winning but about including her in the game. I threw a few games her way, hopefully subtly enough that she didn't realize, but even if she did, she has a competitive streak in her and likes to win.

But I never really got it to click. Then I learned about the Ottawa / Gatineau Xwing Group and started attending their meetings. My wife would come with me, as we live far from down-town and commute together. At the meetings we met the fiancée of one of the players (now his wife) and she actually played in a few tournaments.

That was the catalyst for my wife to begin enjoying the game. There was another woman playing who was cute, had her ship together, wasnt weird like the rest of us. They must have gone to the bathroom together, talked about the game, and concluded it was actually fun and not weird at all. All stereotypes aside, this is literally the process.

Now my wife has her own list: 2x Daggers with Advanced Sensors, 2x Reds. She hasnt reached the step of designing her lists, but she more or less flies this one well, and has taken it to tournaments, where she did pretty well for a noob. This has added some encouragement.

Plus she was the only woman at the tournament so it became a bit of fem power (we can do it too), and appreciating the attention that boobs have in a gamer environment. She has come out to a few game nights and is planning to play in the tournament this Thursday.

But I am lucky. She will do things to humour me, and then like them. (Like the time I convinced her to play DnD 4th ed, and we made her a bear shaman, but the only little miniature we had that fit on a 1 inch square and was sort of bear like (not really) was a pug! It became the Pug of Doom, that thing had more kill steals than everyone else in the party, and she grew to love DnD because of it. After 3 years, she was the only one left with an original character.

So ya it take luck and patience. Dont force it on too quickly. Be gentle. Talk. Communicate. If all else fails, find another couple that does and let the other girlfriend/wife explain it.

And that raises another point. Women explain games to other women completely differently to the way men explain games.

She gives it her all, and tries her best (and she wins 90% of the time), but if I never asked her to play again, then we probably would never play together. It's just not her thing. Not sure if it's the complexity or what, but it's just not clicking for her. She totally supports me in my hobby though, she wanted to come to Imdaar Alpha to watch me play, and she's always encouraging of me to go to the league at our LGS, but I don't know it's just not for her personally. Which is totally fine, I look forward to playing this game with my son when we start having kids.

Mine is the same way. She sticks to pretty simple Falcon builds, but she's able to beat me most of the times we play. She doesn't have an interest in it on her own, but she enjoys playing with me. Yesterday she invited me to go to a local X-Wing meetup with her, but we couldn't make it because my mom couldn't watch the baby.

My wife does play in the Edge of the Empire game that I run, and she seems to enjoy that quite a bit.

This thread just reinforced how lonely I am...

On a serious note, I've always tried to treat women with the respect that they deserve yet they still avoid me like the plague (sexism isn't cool ya'll). I have never understood why women choose the wrong man for them (I see it all the time, I do social work for a living). Who cares if a guy pushes ships around a mat, it isn't like he is smoking crack or something else detrimental. I guess some of my frustrations come from trying to do right and it never working out.

I will note that gender ratios in appreciation of board games are vastly dependent of culture. I'm not from the US, where I'm from euro-style boardgames (as you call them ) can easily find 50-50 audiences. Warhammer, Magic and X-Wing on the other hand are more male dominated (granted, X-Wing is still small over here).

Traditional board games I've seen a lot more ladies play. I have gone to friends homes numerous times and played games where 3 couples participate. Think it might be due to board games are more social 3+ players and Miniature games are normally 1v1.

I don't have a wife, but I have a 50" TV,XBox One, Doulby 5.1 surround system and black out curtains.

Who's the real winner here?

I have a fiancée (why waste 10 000-20 000$ for a wedding when you can buy all kind of games with it instead?) that play games, a 60'' TV, PS3-PS4-WiiU, Dolby Suround 7.1 in my pitch black basement....

What did I won?

This thread just reinforced how lonely I am...

On a serious note, I've always tried to treat women with the respect that they deserve yet they still avoid me like the plague (sexism isn't cool ya'll). I have never understood why women choose the wrong man for them (I see it all the time, I do social work for a living). Who cares if a guy pushes ships around a mat, it isn't like he is smoking crack or something else detrimental. I guess some of my frustrations come from trying to do right and it never working out.

Careful man, treading dangerously close to, "I'm a nice guy" territory.

I don't have a wife, but I have a 50" TV,XBox One, Doulby 5.1 surround system and black out curtains.

Who's the real winner here?

I have a fiancée (why waste 10 000-20 000$ for a wedding when you can buy all kind of games with it instead?) that play games, a 60'' TV, PS3-PS4-WiiU, Dolby Suround 7.1 in my pitch black basement....

What did I won?

The Internet.