Quote Originally Posted by lio45 View Post
Why would that be a problem? As an author, Rich wants to craft a world that will feel as natural as possible to his readers. For genetic reasons, it's far more likely that a given ruthless Evil human general out there is male, so that's what most authors will likely pick, even after thinking about it. (If you want us to embark on a biology debate, no problem with me, let's go ahead. Or you can just accept what I'm saying.)

In a story world where what generally happens (in front of the camera) is that people are adventuring and hitting each other with shiny metal sticks, a 50-50 gender balance would feel forced and generally detract from the quality/believability of the story. Kudos to Rich for the (IMO) pretty ideal gender balance in OotS for the type of story.
I could accept what you're saying, but I'm not a fan of declaring biology as the overarching reason for human behaviour. It's heartless, shallow, and honestly kind of nauseating. Biological theories of behaviour are just... unpleasant.

And hey, there's magic. And nonhumans. And gender has no mechanical impact. So saying reinforcement of gender stereotypes and biases is a good thing because it's believable... is kind of ridiculous. If that would be enough to ruin your suspension of disbelief...