Regarding women players in WFRP - Does FFG struggle to attract them to this game?

jh

Emirikol said:

I'm not sure that 'struggle to attract them' is really the right term, so much as 'try to attract them at all'. I haven't seen FFG make any effort to attract women to WFRP, though the same could be said of most RPGs.

Well, at least the women in my group were attracted by the female pictures on several career cards (the Agitator is a particularly nice example, while the Shallya priestess is a bit too stereotypical).

BUT, they were pretty put off or maybe just bored by the martial depictions on the box, on the covers, and on the GM screen. Not only for this reason would it be nice to have more art that is about mystery, social tensions, seduction etc. than have the zillionth picture of a dwarf trying to behead a greenskin…

What would/should FFG do differently to attract women to WFRP? Do they really need to try harder to attract women? I don't see anything particularly sexist in any of their materials. No prevalent chainmail bikinis like D&D, for example. <shrug> My wife loves WFRP, always has in fact because of a lot of reasons, including that thought.

I agree that Warhammer at least avoids the chainmail bikini issue the plagues D&D and other games "as represented". It does an "okay" job of using female imagery at times (e.g., the Roadwarden career image, could do that a bit more).

Beyond that, does it struggle more than the typical RPG?

As noted, it still does represent itself often as "fire and fury, orcs and chaos warriors" and at risk of wading into "what's the difference in tastes of the audiences by gende" that does seem to appeal a bit to the heritage of wargame crowd. The name itself "Warhammer" suggests something.

I think the game does a good job of allowing social and non-violent conflicts and losses to be reflected (stressful to have your love letters returned to you as a box of ashes don't you know, or find out you were adopted) but it doesn't pitch that much.

ozean said:

I find it ironic that this is the case for the women in your group. I have two girls (7,9) and when we play Talisman, they won't pick the cards with pix of guys on there. I had to download pictures off the internet, print them, and tape them over the top. Xena, Warrior Princess and Mrs. Shrek (for the troll) are the order of the day! Now that we're playing WFRP with the Talisman ruleset, they avoid the make imagery (and i can say the same for my boy).

Jay H

Hehe. The strange thing is, however, that they then both decided to go for pretty grumpy male PCs. But I still had the impression that the images of the Roadwarden and the Agitator helped to fuel their imaginations.

I think FFG is doing a better job than many other systems. One reason is deliberate: they've been careful to be inclusive when choosing artwork and pronouns in their materials. The women are fully clothed; they don't seem like they're just there to be objects of male fantasy. That's a big win! Further, the many heroic and non-heroic careers means that there's space for a wide variety of play styles within the system. Sociology has proven again and again that such inclusiveness matters hugelyif someone feels "represented and mirrored," s/he is more likely to participate.

The second reason, though, is more accidental, and not necessarily gendered. Let's face it: most systems are rehashes of other d10 or d100 systems. Those of us who have been RPGing for years can look at a new system and figure it out almost immediately. Since many women aren't as experienced at roleplaying AND think quite differently than men, they often have lots of questions, the answers to which "seem obvious" to those who have played for years. Sometimes men/experienced players accidentally end up showing their frustration with new players and turning them off of the hobby. Yet in 3e, the weird dice system and the stance meters and cards make for more of a level playing field with this game; since much of the system is new or feels new, it's much easier for a new players to fit in without feeling conspicuous.

If FFG "struggles" to bring in women, it's because of the problems with the hobby as a whole. Women aren't always made to feel welcome at their FLGSes. Demo events tend to assume base knowledge that many women don't have. When companies have speakers at events, they seldom include women. These aren't things that FFG can fix alone. It'd take a revolution in the hobby as a whole.

I find this topic very interesting, because I found out about WFRP at gencon (IE a week ago) and we have a game starting in 3 weeks run by a woman (gasp) and having several female players.

So far I've actually had a very positive experience from women. Most of them intuitively seem to pick up the 'how to read the dice for what happens' mechanic and really get into it, which has led to the group composition I mentioned earlier.

I think alot of people focus on 'art' and 'themes' as possible turn-ons and turn-offs. I'm not sure I agree. Having played with a sizeable portion of women in my time through various games, I can honestly say from experience that women don't seem to hit this stereotype very strongly. I watched '300' with a group that was half female, and they enjoyed it as much as the guys (if not more for the oggle-able quality). Most women I know don't flinch from the combat, or bloodshed, and the lack of chainmail bikini-babes definitely helps. But I think that this isn't what sells or kills most games...

I've seen women cheer and clap at big crits. I've seen them pull off devious political maneuvers. I've seen them really into their rogues, street samurai, vampires and space pilots as much as any guy. What I have noticed though is that women don't seem to get as involved in mechanics. When they want to stab someone, they want to stab someone hard - and not have to do vector calculus to do it. I'm not belittling their math skills or anything, but a universal truth amongst the women I have played with (and admittedly this sample size is smaller than 100 so take it with a grain of salt) is that they won't read the 16 side books looking for obscure class combos, and try to squeeze the last possible 'optimal' dps build even if it misses the spirit of the game. I also haven't had them stop a game to argue the letter of a rule as opposed to the spirit of it.

I think that WFRP speaks to alot of things that women do find excelent in an RPG. It has exactly what Llanwyre mentioned above (great post btw, very insightful) - a leveled playing field that doesn't incorporate base knowledge from years of rpg mechanic experience. It has a strong dice mechanic that ties directly into the roleplay, and allows for creative interpretation. It has alot more 'historical accuracy'. What I mean by this is that its closer to a medieval europe (admittedly with magic and steampunkish tech) with some strong european mythological and historical themes that allow knowledge of such things to shine.

I've had almost no trouble finding women interested in this game.

My biggest hurdle was overcoming the Warhammer name. Not exactly sure why (if I had to venture a guess, I'd say that of all the women I've known, they are attached to individuals and characters and not broad sweeping armies) but most ladies I do play with don't do minis. And the one big step I had to get across was convincing them that no, this isn't a minis game and no, you don't have to know the actual Warhammer rules. And if you'd just give me 15 minutes to show you what I mean with these dice I happen to carry onhand ... (hook, line, sinker).

Who are the prominant female forumites here?

Who are the prominant female members of fantasy flight? Are they active on the boards to any degree?

Because, of the top of my head, I cant name any of either.

Fantasy flight could be doing a lot more on this front, as could the community.

zombieneighbours said:

I can name a few.

Even in this topic, there is at least one (unless I'm mistaken... am I?).

And my history of playing contains at least 1-2 women in every group I played.

Sunatet said:

So do I, I can name few girls that play WFRP. In every group I played there was at least one woman.

My wife still plays Warhammer with me nad my firends. Now in my group there are 3 girls playing. So I think that WFRP is a very atractive system for them. And they love those cards, dice and all this. I think is interesting they did not like the previous editions becouse of the dice and mechanics but loved the setting. And now they love it all.

So the game attracts woman.

Like a friend of mine said to my wife (he's not very smart): "A roleplaying game is not a purse, so how would you understand it?"

Atleast she found it funny

But jokes aside, while I know many women don't shun from violence, they rarely play games for that purpose. The females I played with delved very deep into their character, the setting, and most of all the social interaction between PC's and NPC's. Then you pick up the Core rulebooks... 1st shows a battle between 2 steroid pumped warriors and one "fire guy"... 2nd book shows a monster with more teeth than a shark... 3rd shows the "fire guy" again... and finally 4th shows someone that looks like a mutant on steroids... WTF??? Even I as a man find this juvenile to a higher degree.

Take TEW books... only 1 shows combat (Kislev), 1 shows someone waiting for combat (Empire in Flames), the rest shows the setting and mood. One is a skull-cup filled with poison, giving impression of evil plots, one has a man who doesn't look very nice (but no huge muscles) and a demon in the mirror, is he being controlled by this or is he controlling it? Anyway it shows a setting that isn't about combat and pumped up Terminators.

They could have chosen so many different covers, but they chose 4 covers ALL showing something to do with battle/combat. And thus they cut of any chance of getting females to play it, unless said female had a male explain to them that this is NOT what it's about.

But yes, happy about the lack of chainmail bikinis.

ozean said:

I think this is important. The actual game itself is something I think a lot of women gamers would enjoy. There's plenty of social and investigative play. While I'm sure there are plenty of female gamers who like combat, amongst my friends it's the thing they like the least in any game.

And to appeal to them Warhammer has to overcome the impression that it is all about combat. Most of them have heard of the minis game, but that tends to give the impression that the game is all war all the time. The artwork on the covers of the boxex and books tends to confirm this impression, giving the final impression that the game is about being a psycho killer in a world full of monsters. Some more varied artwork would help overcome this, IMO.

There are some really interesting points here. I think Mac is right on the money regarding the lack of focus on investigative and social encounters, and this is definitely an area in which 3e sells itself short. I run a high percentage of investigative and social encounters, partly because of a background with 1e, Call of Cthulhu and Dark Heresy, partly because our group (with 2 girls) enjoys that kind of balance. The huge variety of actions and nuance of the dice mechanic work really work in these types of scenes and I think this needs to be made clearer to prospective and actual players.

As others have commented, reflecting this in the art rather than every boxed set cover depicting a scene of desperate battle would be a start. I really like the Edge of Night cover in this respect. Come to think of it, have any women been shown on the covers of sets? I seem to remember a female wizard on WoM, and the Bright Wizard on the core was kind of androgynous, but otherwise?

I think some people are assuming that female gamers will always want to play female characters (as in the comments on female standups etc), which is not necessarily the case in my experience. That said, I do think the fact that Warhammer (at least in its roleplay incarnation) has a dark, complex setting with an extremely grey moral spectrum helps it appeal to women, or at least the women I am friends with. Our games tend to be full of xenophobia, bigotry fuelled by political machinations, and frank misogny, and my players always have a lot of fun riffing off of these themes and trying to make them 'true to life' and immersive within a fantasy setting. Whether they enjoy those themes because they are women, or because they are emotionally and intellectually intelligent people, regardless of gender isn't really for me to say, although I suspect the latter is the case.

All that said, is there anything as enjoyable as a female player inhabiting a male character, and subjecting a female character played by a man to sustained and ribald misogny? All good clean fun.. well, maybe not.

zombieneighbours said:

I dunno if I'm prominent, but I'm female. And I GM.

(I feel like I'm at some weird parody of a twelve-step meeting: "Hi, my name is Llanwyre, and I'm a girl.")

But as for female staff members of FFG, I can't name a single one, which is unfortunate. It'd be nice if Jay brought a female developer along with him to present info at the next GenCon. But again, that tends not to happen at any kind of nerd hobby convention; I noticed it particularly at PaxEast last year. There were certainly lots of women in attendance, but none of the headliner speakers were female. (And we won't even get into the number of speakers who felt it was fine to throw in the occasional casual jab at women during their speeches.) It was kind of a drag, really.

It's great to hear that there are so many groups with multiple women, though. My own is about to achieve gender balance starting next sessionhalf women and half men! Yay!

And I totally agree that if anything, the outside packaging might be the one place where FFG falls short. "Warhammer" doesn't sound too much like a game that will have politics, intrigue, and social nuance, even though it is. They could play that up a bit more for ALL of their players.

One other quick thought: one of the things that makes marketing nerd hobbies to women difficult is that many women who are already attracted to these hobbies are looking to get AWAY from traditional gender roles and interests. That makes things tricky. If there were a "women only intro to roleplaying" session at a convention, for instance, I'm not sure I'd go. On the one hand, I'd want to support the sisterhood and would be delighted to meet some more female players; on the other hand, I'd be worried that the session might be filled with wives and girlfriends who were only there because they'd been pushed and who would, given their druthers, rather talk about more traditional female interests. (Not that there's anything wrong with stuff like babies/scrapbooking/knitting, but I one of the reasons I love this hobby is that I'm unlikely to have to think about those things.) And if the convention session successfully used babies/scrapbooking/knitting as an "in" to roleplaying to get some of those women interested, women like me would want to carve our eyes out with spoons. So it's hard to figure out when and how to use more typical marketing demographic information to bridge the gap without alienating some of your hardcore self-selecting female players.

The only woman from FFG that I know that is directly involved with WFRP is Zoe Robinson, who is the Art Director for WFRP. So, she's ultimately responsible for those box cover art.

My wife says she likes the cards and the dice especially, over the traditional RPG percentile and charts/rulebooks.

Hi Llanwyre, glad to see you posting on this topic. I told my wife about it and I hope she posts something. When I watched the videos on FFG at Gencon I remember seeing a few women working for FFG, I do not remember their titles, but I found it very refreshing. Somebody posted previously that women ask a lot of questions and tend to frustrate some male gamers...I agree with this to some extent, because this is how I got to know my wife. She was brought over to join our Vampire game by my friend (her then boyfriend), and when it came to making her character she was getting very frustrated with him because he wasn't handling her questions well at all. I interjected and well she has been gaming ever since. Neither of us are sure how I did this, as it was years ago, but it had something to do with giving her the freedom of making up her own mind while giving her certain parameters to work within. This gave her a foundation and she could then expand from there. Also, before anyone jumps in, by doing this I did not steal her away, although it was the beginning of our friendship. They broke up naturally a while after this and stayed friends and she still gamed with us. Me and her began our short courtship before marriage almost a year after this event.

Llanwyre said:

You are prominent, since I recognize your name and icon when I see it.

As for gamers, the only female I gamed with regularly was married to another player in the group and was more blood thirsty than any other player I played with. She was the first into battle and the last to leave. She always played male dwarves and they were always of the fighting classes. I don't think you can pigeon-hole female play styles. Women have tastes and styles of play that are as varied as those of the men they play with. I have seen with women that there is less a likelyhood of munchkin-ism and min/maxing, but that's the only real difference I've noticed.

I think it's the attitudes of guys at the table that can influence women more than the game itself does. If the guys show up with an attitude that a female is invading their territory, or treat the female player as a less capable player that needs direction from them on how to play, it won't go well. I can also imagine if the players have their characters constantly hitting on the female player's character that could be a turn off too, although some women I've heard enjoy the attention. It really depends on the female and the maturity level of the people she plays with.

Anyway, that was just a few thoughts I had on the issue.

FYI: My wife has no interest in pen and paper RPG's but she does like to write in Forum RPGs for the TV shows she watches regularly.

This is a fantastic topic, and many people have made informed and intelligent comments. I apologize in advance....

Lay off the chainmail bikini, already. What did it ever do to you guys/gals!?! I kid.

On a serious note, I'm not sure what sort of cover art would attract women. I'm not sure that the art on the current box would speak to the women I know, for good or ill. Blue Rose was targeted, I think, at women as the RPG of romance. I have no idea if that worked or not, but that cold fall into the category of female gamers avoiding traditional gender roles (as aforementioned).

My wife, who never gamed before she met me, would probably name WFRP (2E) as her first gaming interest. She sat and watched us play (I ran), and to my delighted surprise, later told me it looked like fun! Since then she's played in almost every game one of us in the group has run.

You would never think that my wife, if she were into gaming at all, would like WFRP as much as she did. This is a woman who can't watch scary movies, and prefers to go to bed before me so that I'm still awake while she's trying to go to sleep. On the other hand, she's a high school history teacher, and the historical similarities appealed to her. In her specific instance, that's probably the biggest factor of her enjoying it, followed closely the easy to swallow rules. Since then she's enjoyed a lot of different games.

Hey, Amani! Glad to see you. I hope your wife does come and post!

And LeBlanc, I agree completely that there's no one "single" style of RP for women. In my own experience, I have noticed that the more women you add to the table, the more likely the entire table (men included) is to consider nonviolent modes of problem solving, but that's an unscientific observation and may just have more to do with the people I know than anything else.

I'll just say that I think that the seriousness of this conversation bodes well for women in RPGs. It's not just up to the gaming companies, of courseit's up to the GMs and the players that sit at local tables, the workers in FLGSes, and the people who run and staff conventions to make sure that women feel included and welcomed, and there seems to be a lot of genuine desire in this forum for new players (both women and younger players!) to get involved. That's awesome.

huh? women playing warhammer frp? I thought that was just a myth. (just kidding).

Sorry to say, but most roleplayers are male. If you disagree, the next time you go to a Con take a long and hard look around you and count the females than count the males, no don`t count all the males just the one that has turned 30 or so, with pale complexion, with a beard and are somewhat overweight. even so that male group alone will be huge in comparinson to female players. (pun intended).

In a sad way I prefer it like that, let boys be boys and girls be girls. let us have our hobbies to ourselves. So when I look at the career cards that pictures women I dislike it. Because in my group we are 100% males, and will be 100% male to the end of times. And 95% of the times they playe males, so I want male pictures on my career cards. (one guy in our group ruins our 100% playing male statistics, by sometimes playing a female. We mostly pretend that his caracter is a male).

I have nothing against women, but they stay outside our gaming circle, even those who ask nicely. We have a no women policy in our gaming group. Because for us its a place to get away from spouses, girlfriends, and be just us. like a gentleman`s club if you like. And it works perfectly. we have 1500 square feet to ourselves, (we play at an huge office complex, wich currently only rents out to one company, ours), enough toilets that you never have to visit the same once in a session (8 hour game), and enough rooms to host 2 or 3 Cons, if we wanted. And its totally woman-free.

So where Im getting at? just that having seperate hobbies can be good for your relationship. And that spending some time apart can be good.

FFG don`t make wfrp too woman friendly.

heck I`m so political uncorrect this evening

The reaction from my group (males only) was ´why is it a girl pic on the career I want to play´. So I experienced the opposite, FFG dectrating men, with too many girl career versions.

Emirikol said:

My girlfriend, who is into writing, theatre and fantasy, had never heard of tabletop roleplaying before she met me but when I introduced her to it, she was interested. She has joined our Star Wars group (only as a temporary guest character she says, but she seems to warm to the campaign enough to stick until the end) and she's had a lot of fun. She's going to try out WFRP3 too now and she's said before that this game seems to appeal to her more, both because of the setting and the mechanics, which are a bit more accessible than the d20 system.