Vegas tends to be mostly male, but every store I've been to has had a good crowd, the occasional basement troll but mostly highly educated, clean and friendly.

My girlfriend plays in our league every weekend. Currently, she's in first place. Another guy usually brings his wife.

We have a pretty big X-wing group in my town that was started by a married couple and we usually had 1-2 active female members and the rest male and I think the medium age is around 33-34. We have some kids and people like myself around 20-25 as well. We have a few female members but it's still around 5-7% and they don't show up often. The stereotype exist for a reason but most players here are actually men over 30 with wife/girlfriend and possible kids.

At tournaments female players are rare even at the bigger ones with 40-50 players attending. While I have heard from friends that the "smelly" gamestores crowded by almost only guys is a bit of a turn off and this is coming from my male non gamer friends. I don't think this is the biggest reason to women not playing x-wing and other minatures game.

I remember when I was little when me, my brother and friend would play with star wars toys and army men later translating into warhammer and other games. In middle school the majority of boys in my class played warhammer at one point. yet my sister was never interested nor was the girls in my school, nor did they play video games and things like that.

So it's not suprise that very few girls are playing now and the ones that want to start now will often be singled out and/or misstaken for someones girlfriend and that can be a turn off as well.

There is often a little easier to ease people into boardgames and rpg's so in the groups I play with there usually are some girls but never more than 1/3rd. This is a topic that is often discussed and there are always some macho men blaming the "neck beard" stereotype and well willing people saying that sure we want to be inclusive to women and expects them to show up from nowhere.

I think gaming groups have to leave the local store/basment and go to places where girls are and show them the fun you can have with minatures games and break some of these stereotypes. Will see.

The fact that you call them gaming chicks and think it's okay because you are joking is part of the problem. I know plenty of girls that game but I would never call any of them a chick. It's the 21st century.

I'll have to ask the wife, but I believe the socially acceptable term is "dice skanks."

Aaand, redthirst gets the prize for being the first one to actively attempt to alienate women. And men. And pretty much everyone else over the age of 13.

Other than folks like him, I think the main reason there are so few women is far less sinister than it appears at first glance. People tend to gravitate towards other people who are similar to them. Whether by race, by economic status, by interests, or by gender, people self-segregate whenever they have the opportunity to do so. Women are few in number, because there aren't a lot of other women there. This has been changing over time, and will accelerate as "critical mass" is reached.

Interesting note. In video games, women are now the MAJORITY.

Aaand, redthirst gets the prize for being the first one to actively attempt to alienate women. And men. And pretty much everyone else over the age of 13.

Other than folks like him, I think the main reason there are so few women is far less sinister than it appears at first glance. People tend to gravitate towards other people who are similar to them. Whether by race, by economic status, by interests, or by gender, people self-segregate whenever they have the opportunity to do so. Women are few in number, because there aren't a lot of other women there. This has been changing over time, and will accelerate as "critical mass" is reached.

Interesting note. In video games, women are now the MAJORITY.

I think the main reason there aren't as many women in the nerdy hobbies is peer pressure from other women. Though that is changing since nerdy hobbies have become more mainstream.

Hyper-competitive Non-athletic Gaming (overall;) has the same male-heavy distributions as any given game. Chess, Go, you-name-it. The "problem" of skew isn't as much environment (mold stank and/or B.O. @ your FLGS) as it is the abstract notion of risk/reward. Historically, woman have played significantly less Chess/Go than men. It's simply a matter of analyzing the risk/reward differently than men.

** Male Star Wars fans risk it all to become these famed pilots--if only for a couple of hours in a moldy room on a rainy Wednesday.

** Female Star Wars fans don't need to pretend-blowup-tiny-plastic-spaceships to become "Leia, Padme, Rey" in escapist fashion.

TL;DR
Your lady friends and/or wives will never enjoy X-Wing:TMG. As you were.

Eh, I think it's more a case of game-y stuff just being coded as a male thing (and still is to a large degree), it's just not considered a thing that women really do so not many women get into it. (Also see how entertainment is targetted at a young age and such, and tabletop gaming is considered less of an acceptable pass-time to keep doing as a woman, not that it's always super-dandy for men of course. Also women tend to be socialized to take other's opinions more in account, so we're less likely to do somtehing that's not considered completely kosher.)

My girlfriend plays in our league every weekend. Currently, she's in first place. Another guy usually brings his wife.

How did he get the chain from the cooker to extend that far? Did it involve a portal gun.

i think there may also be some genetic differences. men and women are equal, but are not the same, they are different.

for example, our brains are different. it's possible this makes table top games more attractive to men.

but I think a significant reason is that if a girl enters a tabletop store there will be mostly guys. a shy guy may still go play, but a shy girl may not, because a girl surrounded by a lot of guys can get hit on or put in uncomfortable situations at least in theory. the very possibility might prevent girls from trying to go to a store in the first place.

i think there may also be some genetic differences. men and women are equal, but are not the same, they are different...

This wins the internet hands down.

I'm so glad there're differences.

Cheers

Baaa

My local group has a fair number of female players, montly in the card games. More and more are taking an interest (my wife included) in Dust, a few AoS. So far no X wing, but you never know.

Not true at all. I know wives that do play and do well.

Women make things better.

Women are human beings. They don't "Make things better". Individual people make things better, by being cool people.

this is not entirely untrue. Back in the day, I used to play a lot of paint ball. a sport that is mostly male. lots of foul language and stuff. whenever gals showed up to hang out or even play, the regulars spoke less profain and in general acted much more civil. the field owners would say that they absoluetly loved it when they had females playing. So in this setting and probably in the gameing scene, women may make things better. At least their presence can make dudes want to behave better. But no, its not a sure thing.

Aaand, redthirst gets the prize for being the first one to actively attempt to alienate women. And men. And pretty much everyone else over the age of 13.

Yeah, this thread is going to quickly devolve.

Let's just say that there are many, many reasons why. Nerd/geek culture has some very, very nasty undersides.

I play wing and enjoy it and Star Wars quite a bit (cosplay etc). But I do know females are rare in gaming stores and I have noticed I have a hard time finding gaming groups just due to awkwardness of player bases in shops. We're just people too, if you want us to play a game with you be welcoming and treat us like anyone else.

I cringed seeing the title alone...can we please move past A)"only men are gamers" and B) "chicks".

Women make things better.

Women are human beings. They don't "Make things better". Individual people make things better, by being cool people.

this is not entirely untrue. Back in the day, I used to play a lot of paint ball. a sport that is mostly male. lots of foul language and stuff. whenever gals showed up to hang out or even play, the regulars spoke less profain and in general acted much more civil. the field owners would say that they absoluetly loved it when they had females playing. So in this setting and probably in the gameing scene, women may make things better. At least their presence can make dudes want to behave better. But no, its not a sure thing.

Ah, I didn't say the presence of women doesn't influence men's behavior at all.

If a person enjoys getting a little rowdy and profane, to blow off steam and indulge in some **** talking, then that situation (guys toning things down for the ladies present) has a negative impact on the experience for them.

And it's a little sexist to expect men to behave themselves because the dainty women-folk might faint if they hear some crude language. What if one of the women wants to join in the **** talking? There are women like that out there. I have known quite a few.

I keep hearing there is such as thing as women who play nerdy games, but I've yet to see any. My wife plays Imperial Assault, but that's only because she loves me.

When I mentioned playing X-Wing at my local game store (no one plays Imperial Assault or I'd be all over that), she gasped in horror. "No, you can't do that. That's too much! You'll be like THEM!"

Unfortunately, she has a point. When I go to my gaming store and attempt to communicate with the large men hunched over the tables, they usually look at me and then quickly look away several times or mutter indecipherable things while taping the toes of their shoes together. Not only are there no normal men, there's certainly no gamer chicks.

Is this how it is everywhere?

Anyone who will call other gamers gaming chicks, will simply course his existence. So no wonder you do not know female hardcore gamers

My Age of Rebellion group's GM is a hema and light saber fencer. Hmm ,that group is my first group in about 5 year with more than 1 male player

I play wing and enjoy it and Star Wars quite a bit (cosplay etc). But I do know females are rare in gaming stores and I have noticed I have a hard time finding gaming groups just due to awkwardness of player bases in shops. We're just people too, if you want us to play a game with you be welcoming and treat us like anyone else.

See this is my experience women don't want to be on a pedestal they just want to be treated like people.

That means you can joke with them swear around them etc.

Hell in retail when I was younger the older female staff were always trying to embarrass me I didn't get bent out of shape I just gave as good as I got and we got along fine, one girl my age Helen was a great laugh on slow days we'd hang out in the stockroom avoiding the small jobs that we could of been doing just messing around.

But here's the thing it's okay for women not to be into gaming, I'm not into shopping I hate spending hours going into every shop, different people like different things don't try and force things that only makes everyone miserable.

You can't demand a male environment change to suit you, if a woman wants to go gaming it's up to her to go in and play, same applies to a man entering a female majority setting.

Give and take is the key.

Maybe it has something to do with the setting?

Most game shops tend to have this hierarchy of nerd wisdom or some such nonsense. GW fans are the worst. If you can't accurately make fun of Mat Ward for specific infractions in specific editions you have no hope of joining them. Or if you have an opinion on AoS (either way someone from the GW camp will hate you with the passion of a thousand Hiroshima aftermath photos) or if you are a new player.

"Dude, seriously? Why are you footslogging those troops? Loser, pffft!"

Maybe because new players can't afford $45 for a single toy that when used adroitly on the tabletop explodes under a weak chinned stare and kills it's occupants? Maybe that's why the new player is footslogging his troops? Better field a Banelord just to show him how grimdark we are.

Let's pretend we are girls in that situation. Now we aren't eating Banelord ordnance, we're being wooed. Or worse yet the slovenly male realizes his zero chance of getting with us and is a total derriere chapeau. Either way, women are treated so radically different and it must be very annoying. You'd think a game store would be the one place where people could just not worry about sex.

If I were a woman I certainly wouldn't want to put myself in any sort of situation like that. As a self respecting man I try to be courteous to all women, even the awful skaggs. When I encounter a female at the game store I go to (not a GW store) I treat her just like I would my kid sister. Regardless of age. I don't know why I just try to keep that in mind. You like hanging out with your sister and you'd never disrespect her or make her feel bad right? So try to do the same for the women you do meet in a game shop. Treat them like a normal person and things should go pretty well. Try to be comfortable around them maybe?

They're just girls, guys. Chill out.

Also, I had a joke about Cornish Game Hen, but the thread was so serious I thought it would be foul play...

Also, I had a joke about Cornish Game Hen, but the thread was so serious I thought it would be foul play...

Though the bird is called a "hen", it can be either male or female

And that is all the magic it needs, people are people, not chicks nor unicorns.

Guys are unicorns. He he.

I clicked hoping to find a conversation about this: