27 minutes ago, Archlyte said:

Yeah you're absolutely right, and I really wasn't trying to be offensive, just trying to point out that their reasons were not something that I felt needed sensitivity or respect as part of their real life. So I apologize for that indelicate point I made if it offended anyone.

One thing I didn't talk about was the very anthropomorphic near humans (Twi'lek, Zeltron, Chiss, etc.) which basically allow you to play a human but with some exotic features. These are the exception as people seem to be able to fully relate to characters such as this in my experience.

I think some of the examples you pointed out are typical of the "everybody is a human" mindset, which is both very nice and also very much leads to the Human Re-Skinned play imo. Zeb is exactly what you said, and he can portray a certain slice of charcateristics, which is fine for a written character, but for a role-playing character he is a bit of a one-trick pony. That player will gravitate toward combat and coercion, and that will be about it save for 1 vice or pleasure they will identify (drinking Corellian Whiskey or something). Other than that, in my experience, that will be it for that character. His arc in the game will be purely mechanical (Trees) and the character will be the same as it was at creation. Meanwhile the humans (and near-humans) will demonstrate an arc, they will change and grow, will be actual characters.

Don't worry, I didn't think you were trying to be offensive.

I get what you're saying. Players aren't bringing anything that's unique about the species they're portraying to the table. I think that's a fair argument. What I would suggest is using the following question formula: "Your species is known for (x). How does (x) affect you as a character?" For example:

• Acronans are known to be addicted to salt. How do you deal with your salt addiction?
• Wookiees have a reputation for violent responses to personal offense. What do you find offensive?
• Twi'leks are often enslaved. Who are the Twi'leks you know who were taken by slavers?

Don't give players "yes/no" questions. Make a statement and make the player respond to it. Using that response, you can set up situations that directly challenge the player's non-Human background. Good acting/role-playing is less about speaking in accents or burbling hisses and more about responding to a situation in a way that is consistent and true to a character's motivation and background.

So I have a strange perspective on things I guess. I've only ran games in this RPG line and have had the most experience with it overall. I've run a total of 7 groups (I count that as playing more than one session). In all the groups, human is probably one of the least played species. I tend to let players pick a species they are going to be happy with playing (which I've found is chosen either based on the stats or based on the looks).

In all of this I have had 3 players that were male that chose to play a female. In one group, a player wanted the group to have slightly more female characters than male characters. I don't recall there being anything especially offensive or creepy about the roleplay of the character, it was just the choice the player made.

In another group a player chose to be female and made it cringey creepy. I had to ask the player to stop doing that because it was making the entire group (of all males, btw) uncomfortable. That player did not stay in that group for too long for various reasons, I later figured out it just wasn't the right group for that player, in another group he played just fine (but also played a male character).

In an ongoing group, a player chose a specific species that he liked, which in the lore happens to have more female than male members of the species. The lore also said it's rare but sometimes wayward males leave their home planet and become adventurers. In this case, the player chose to play a female character instead and designed the backstory of the character based on the culture of their species, this character being one of the lower-class warriors that protect the high-class females in the society who's been exiled for a crime she didn't commit. This has been the most thought-through of all the male-playing-female characters and has never once been cringey or creepy.

Now as far as playing aliens, Star Wars in film has a habit of only showing glimpses of aliens in the movies, never really focusing the spotlight on them enough to get a good picture of their culture or only putting the spotlight on a single member of their species for a few minutes, so you come away from the film going "are all toydarians like that?" It isn't until diving deeper into the lore, like in Clone Wars that you find out no, not all toydarians are like Watto. They don't all act the same or consider the same things valuable. There's a diversity to their culture that is only barely shown within the media.

Because of that and because I don't want to stifle the creativity of my players, they get to choose how they roleplay their character. If they make choices that are wildly different than the "cultural norm" of their species, it's likely because they created their character backstory to show that they aren't part of the cultural norm. For instance, there's a wookiee PC that cuts his hair shorter and walks around in an entire suit of armor, has insomnia and generally doesn't want anything to do with his species. He's suffered a lot of trauma in his life and very likely wasn't on his homeworld for very long. I'm cool with the player breaking the mold so-to-speak on the culture of wookiees because he's making a unique and interesting character.

21 minutes ago, Archlyte said:

It's not that Humans are automatically interesting, it's that they are the easiest to relate to if you choose to do so. Your character with the addiction could be a flat character, or he/she could be someone who had great potential but is wasting it, or they may be someone who feels they had no better lot in life so they just used drugs: maybe they will find their strengths? There are a thousand things you can do with that character.

1 hour ago, Yaccarus said:

To be honest, it depends on who is playing them. A poor roleplayer will do as you describe if they're a nonhuman PC or be human and do as I described humans. A good roleplayer will do your description of a human if they're human, and my description of a nonhuman if they're nonhuman. Wow, that is confusing when I read it over.

11 minutes ago, GroggyGolem said:

In an ongoing group, a player chose a specific species that he liked, which in the lore happens to have more female than male members of the species. The lore also said it's rare but sometimes wayward males leave their home planet and become adventurers. In this case, the player chose to play a female character instead and designed the backstory of the character based on the culture of their species, this character being one of the lower-class warriors that protect the high-class females in the society who's been exiled for a crime she didn't commit. This has been the most thought-through of all the male-playing-female characters and has never once been cringey or creepy.

Now as far as playing aliens, Star Wars in film has a habit of only showing glimpses of aliens in the movies, never really focusing the spotlight on them enough to get a good picture of their culture or only putting the spotlight on a single member of their species for a few minutes, so you come away from the film going "are all toydarians like that?" It isn't until diving deeper into the lore, like in Clone Wars that you find out no, not all toydarians are like Watto. They don't all act the same or consider the same things valuable. There's a diversity to their culture that is only barely shown within the media.

Because of that and because I don't want to stifle the creativity of my players, they get to choose how they roleplay their character. If they make choices that are wildly different than the "cultural norm" of their species, it's likely because they created their character backstory to show that they aren't part of the cultural norm. For instance, there's a wookiee PC that cuts his hair shorter and walks around in an entire suit of armor, has insomnia and generally doesn't want anything to do with his species. He's suffered a lot of trauma in his life and very likely wasn't on his homeworld for very long. I'm cool with the player breaking the mold so-to-speak on the culture of wookiees because he's making a unique and interesting character.

What species is that character? I'm curious.

Also I am primarily motivated by the movies, though I have watched Rebels and a bit of the Clone Wars. It makes sense that the cultures would have some overlap and sameness in confluence given thousands of years of co-habiting the same planets.

I think the Insomnia thing is cool on that wook but the rest of it sounds like the player is just giving his wookiee human habits: cutting hair short, wearing armor. May seem different at the table but just from that description it sounds like he is trying to meld with his group at the expense of his species and culture. How would you make a wookiee fit in better with humans? Would you don armor and cut your hair? That one is suspicious to me.

Just now, Archlyte said:

1. What species is that character? I'm curious.

2. Also I am primarily motivated by the movies, though I have watched Rebels and a bit of the Clone Wars. It makes sense that the cultures would have some overlap and sameness in confluence given thousands of years of co-habiting the same planets.

3. I think the Insomnia thing is cool on that wook but the rest of it sounds like the player is just giving his wookiee human habits: cutting hair short, wearing armor. May seem different at the table but just from that description it sounds like he is trying to meld with his group at the expense of his species and culture. How would you make a wookiee fit in better with humans? Would you don armor and cut your hair? That one is suspicious to me.

1. The character is Selonian.

2. That I can understand, having only the movies to inform one of the species. I wasn't big into the lore beyond the movies until I got into Clone Wars, then Rebels, then started reading new canon mateials. I used to wonder if all Nemoidians and Gungans had racist accents but after learning a lot more about Star Wars and realizing I'm the GM, I set the rules, they don't have to always sound or act in a certain way.

3. The player is younger and goes for the "lone wolf rogue" both in class/career and in roleplay. There is very little that melds him in with the group, he generally is always straying away from them, not listening to them, etc... The player knows how wookiee culture is and knows he is making a decision that would likely ostracize him from his people. It seems he's created a character that is obsessed with finding his dad's killer and exacting his revenge. He's also set his character's age very young for a wookiee, so he's basically playing a teenager "going through a phase".

4 minutes ago, GroggyGolem said:

obsessed with finding his dad's killer and exacting his revenge

Always family business...

1 minute ago, GroggyGolem said:

1. The character is Selonian.

2. That I can understand, having only the movies to inform one of the species. I wasn't big into the lore beyond the movies until I got into Clone Wars, then Rebels, then started reading new canon mateials. I used to wonder if all Nemoidians and Gungans had racist accents but after learning a lot more about Star Wars and realizing I'm the GM, I set the rules, they don't have to always sound or act in a certain way.

3. The player is younger and goes for the "lone wolf rogue" both in class/career and in roleplay. There is very little that melds him in with the group, he generally is always straying away from them, not listening to them, etc... The player knows how wookiee culture is and knows he is making a decision that would likely ostracize him from his people. It seems he's created a character that is obsessed with finding his dad's killer and exacting his revenge. He's also set his character's age very young for a wookiee, so he's basically playing a teenager "going through a phase".

That's very cool.

Yeah and stereotyping isn't ok for real life (although it is natural to classify our world around us), but for alien species its the rule.

I see what you mean, and I guess he is sincere, I'm just leery of covert attempts by players. One minute it seems like they are going for something specific and the next they are just executing Order 66 on my game lol.

2 minutes ago, Archlyte said:

That's very cool.

Yeah and stereotyping isn't ok for real life (although it is natural to classify our world around us), but for alien species its the rule.

I see what you mean, and I guess he is sincere, I'm just leery of covert attempts by players. One minute it seems like they are going for something specific and the next they are just executing Order 66 on my game lol.

It's not stereotyping if it's true. Nonhumans are different than humans, and that is a fact.

3 minutes ago, Yaccarus said:

It's not stereotyping if it's true. Nonhumans are different than humans, and that is a fact.

So it is perfectly normal to stereotype, and it is something that we evolved to use to recognize danger. Like me is safe, not like me is not automatically safe. Socially, stereotyping in our world is not being culturally competent. You shouldn't interact with a person using ethnic stereotypes as this is likely to be offensive to them and is a use of generalization. But the impulse to do it is perfectly normal.

In Star Wars the species have lived together for thousands of years. How does an Ithorian (Herbivore) parent safely send their child to school with Shistavanen Cubs? The answer would have to be early indoctrination in multiculturalism, or for species who can't really do that, isolation from other species until they are safe to be around others. This would mean that you would have to have some sort of anti-stereotyping teaching going on, otherwise you would have the All Shistavanens will kill you sort of thing as the prevailing wisdom.

2 hours ago, themensch said:

Hm, addressing gender issues in a roleplaying game seems like a great use for the X card.

It depends. If everyone's mature about it and on the same page, you can get something like the Campaign podcast. It often focuses on the romantic lives of its heroes and their personal hang-ups about love, sex, and gender roles, and does it in a very inclusive and organic way. There's no soap-boxing, it's just who the characters are.

1 hour ago, Archlyte said:

So it is perfectly normal to stereotype, and it is something that we evolved to use to recognize danger. Like me is safe, not like me is not automatically safe. Socially, stereotyping in our world is not being culturally competent. You shouldn't interact with a person using ethnic stereotypes as this is likely to be offensive to them and is a use of generalization. But the impulse to do it is perfectly normal.

In Star Wars the species have lived together for thousands of years. How does an Ithorian (Herbivore) parent safely send their child to school with Shistavanen Cubs? The answer would have to be early indoctrination in multiculturalism, or for species who can't really do that, isolation from other species until they are safe to be around others. This would mean that you would have to have some sort of anti-stereotyping teaching going on, otherwise you would have the All Shistavanens will kill you sort of thing as the prevailing wisdom.

Most nonhumans are raised on their species's homeworld, where their species is a large majority.

Genetics are also likely to play a factor.

Most sentients also tend to be stubborn and set in their ways. Obviously, some aliens are more this way than others. (Quarren)

11 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

It depends. If everyone's mature about it and on the same page, you can get something like the Campaign podcast. It often focuses on the romantic lives of its heroes and their personal hang-ups about love, sex, and gender roles, and does it in a very inclusive and organic way. There's no soap-boxing, it's just who the characters are.

I've seen players that get disturbed with even off-screen sex. In one case, it was a Sullustan male PC talking about all of his "brother-husbands" that shared the same female back on Sullust. In the other, it was a Cerean (gay) male PC that was complaining about all of the traditional breeding he was culturally required to do when he returned home. Hey, at least they read the species descriptions and went with them.

6 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

I've seen players that get disturbed with even off-screen sex. In one case, it was a Sullustan male PC talking about all of his "brother-husbands" that shared the same female back on Sullust. In the other, it was a Cerean (gay) male PC that was complaining about all of the traditional breeding he was culturally required to do when he returned home. Hey, at least they read the species descriptions and went with them.

Who was the disturbed party in those?

10 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

I've seen players that get disturbed with even off-screen sex. In one case, it was a Sullustan male PC talking about all of his "brother-husbands" that shared the same female back on Sullust. In the other, it was a Cerean (gay) male PC that was complaining about all of the traditional breeding he was culturally required to do when he returned home. Hey, at least they read the species descriptions and went with them.

For a species that is mostly female, we sure see A LOT of Cerean males.

4 minutes ago, Yaccarus said:

For a species that is mostly female, we sure see A LOT of Cerean males.

They're likely more common in most of the setting than Chiss of any gender.

8 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

Who was the disturbed party in those?

Another player in the group. Sorry, I'm not sure what you're asking.

10 hours ago, Archlyte said:

Boo! Hiss! Imperial!! Human Supremacist! Why are you even playing Star Wars?

I love you and want to have your babies.

10 hours ago, Archlyte said:

Their characters are always basically sidekick material. They don't try to engage in anything relevant

That pretty much happens in the media too. Films and books and the like always seem to have a human, or at least very human-like protagonists. Even the cool aliens like wookiees are essentially sidekicks (or background decoration). Mostly a human audience relates better to human-like protagonists.

I totally understand why some people love them and why some players might wish to play them. I'm glad they're included, even if they're not allowed at my table.

(On a related note, our render artist can't do non-humanoid species and our regular artist refuses to draw them, so that limits us to the 'pretty' species.)

(And on that note, we got Pantorans, Arkanians and now Tholothians? Wow, F&D really is the home of the pretty species, huh?)

10 hours ago, Archlyte said:

On a related note but not having to do with aliens: I also seem to have a glut of guys wanting to play girls

Um, did you take over my group or something when I wasn't looking??

(though in all honesty, we have some girls, some gays, some gay gals, and a Trans guy. We even have a Black Guy, though he hates being teased about that, as he feels his nerdiness is what defines him rather the colour of his skin).

But yeah, that other half of my group is guys playing gals. However, I'm lucky to have a great group and they know they have to put some effort into being 'girly' and not play some exaggerated parody character. I actually give lessons in that, and the gal players help the guys out too.

10 hours ago, Archlyte said:

I have had my fill of sexy lesbian star wars characters

???

<Marcy gets her coat and slinks off, lip trembling>

(oh, and the babies thing is off now, okay?)

I really hate that Hondo is popular and makes people want to play Weequay when he's a Weequay that acts entirely like a human and nothing like the descriptions we have for Weequay.

10 hours ago, Archlyte said:

This is of course a thread concerning my game, and I don't expect anyone else will even share my point of view, but maybe you can tell me how you make aliens and non-type characters work in your games. What do you most enjoy about Star Wars multiculturalism?

To a certain extent I can agree with what some others have mentioned here; that aliens in StarWars (also StarTrek) can often be a "planet of hats"( http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PlanetOfHats ) or rather they are monocultured (all Trandoshan's are hunters) and unfortunately that often leaves players with not much to go on to create an alien that truly feels unique. In those cases I find its generally up to the player to just fill in any extra details and add their own interpretation.

However I think it really depends on your group. My current group has no humans at all, but I feel each player does a pretty good job of role-playing their alien uniqueness. The bothan regularly describes communication with his fur even when dealing with non bothans, and stresses the importance of gathering intel. The Gand primarily drinks sugar water (bug), calls other individuals by their species rather than by name (as Gands do until they have earned their name), and in general is somewhat xenophobic to non-insect species. The chiss sticks to the "never be the first to strike", and is okay with constantly getting called out for being "the only chiss" this side of the galaxy.

Overall I really appreciate that in general they role-play these traits even when it does not give them an advantage and often to their detriment (examples chiss refusing to shoot until shot, Gand being disrespectful to nobles by not acknowledging their titles). To me this is the mark of good role-playing, carrying out your characters personality all the time and not just when it is convenient; and ultimately that's what I care about, regardless of Human or alien-ness,

2 hours ago, GroggyGolem said:

so you come away from the film going "are all toydarians like that?

Back in the old EU days, the answer was invariably 'yes'.

- Chewie had a bad temper, so all Wookiees have bad tempers.

- Jabba was a crime lord, so all of Hutt society is built around criminal enterprises.

- Bosssk was a bounty hunter, so Trandoshan religion is based on hunting.

- Those Bothans mentioned in one sentence were spies, so all of Bothan space is built on a huge spy network.

Etc, etc. etc.

3 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

It depends. If everyone's mature about it and on the same page, you can get something like the Campaign podcast. It often focuses on the romantic lives of its heroes and their personal hang-ups about love, sex, and gender roles, and does it in a very inclusive and organic way. There's no soap-boxing, it's just who the characters are.

I totally agree. If everyone at the table is comfortable with it, play on! However, given some of the tales listed in this thread and with my own experience, the X card will get tapped more often than not. I can count on one hand the number of tables I've played with that had players with sufficient maturity to handle this subject matter. I like to present the X card as an easy "nope" for anyone who is not interested in pursuing that subject, and remind my fellow gamers that it exists.

3 hours ago, Vorzakk said:

Back in the old EU days, the answer was invariably 'yes'.

- Chewie had a bad temper, so all Wookiees have bad tempers.

- Jabba was a crime lord, so all of Hutt society is built around criminal enterprises.

- Bosssk was a bounty hunter, so Trandoshan religion is based on hunting.

- Those Bothans mentioned in one sentence were spies, so all of Bothan space is built on a huge spy network.

Etc, etc. etc.

Boy am I glad to have skipped a lot of the EU then. My knowledge of EU is fuzzy memories of reading the young Boba Fett books, the Clone Wars novel Shatterpoint and Shadow of the Empire.

I've played a few aliens in my time, though those I do prefer to play tend to be near-human (like the Chiss and Zeltrons ), for instance. I've even played a few Wookiees on occasion. Yes, aliens are more tricky to play, but not too hard, if you really try to immerse yourself in the character.

I am a staunchly, and religiously heterosexual guy, but I have played a number of female characters in my time. usually to balance out the party more, or, as a GM, to provide a love interest to one of the PCs. One thing of note though is when playing a female character I always play her as a heterosexual woman. I have never, and will never play a lesbian female character.

4 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

They're likely more common in most of the setting than Chiss of any gender.

Anyone have a really serious demographics break down for species? Ooh how I would love that.

4 hours ago, Maelora said:

I love you and want to have your babies.

That pretty much happens in the media too. Films and books and the like always seem to have a human, or at least very human-like protagonists. Even the cool aliens like wookiees are essentially sidekicks (or background decoration). Mostly a human audience relates better to human-like protagonists.

I totally understand why some people love them and why some players might wish to play them. I'm glad they're included, even if they're not allowed at my table.

(On a related note, our render artist can't do non-humanoid species and our regular artist refuses to draw them, so that limits us to the 'pretty' species.)

(And on that note, we got Pantorans, Arkanians and now Tholothians? Wow, F&D really is the home of the pretty species, huh?)

Um, did you take over my group or something when I wasn't looking??

(though in all honesty, we have some girls, some gays, some gay gals, and a Trans guy. We even have a Black Guy, though he hates being teased about that, as he feels his nerdiness is what defines him rather the colour of his skin).

But yeah, that other half of my group is guys playing gals. However, I'm lucky to have a great group and they know they have to put some effort into being 'girly' and not play some exaggerated parody character. I actually give lessons in that, and the gal players help the guys out too.

???

<Marcy gets her coat and slinks off, lip trembling>

(oh, and the babies thing is off now, okay?)

Oh no Does it help if I say that it's just from the guys at my table that I don't want this? They are kind of making pin-ups for their mind, and while I understand that completely, I get tired of the same character coming across the transom. Especially when they are played by guys with little experience with real women. I would rather they play a wookiee or a droid or something because they seem to understand that better. So are you saying that you actually share my opinion on much of this topic? Wow, that's just amazing to me. I was sure I was never gonna get a thumbs up. I wish there was a Super-Like button for your post.