Your PC's sexual preference

[Oracle_Hunter]

Depends on the game

In most of 'em, I default to "Straight" because that's what I am -- whether I'm playing a Male or Female PC. It doesn't usually come up, but if it does that's how I'd go.

Now, in Bliss Stage I also usually play "Straight" but the incentive to play bisexual is rather large.

[FistsFullofDice]

For my characters...

Haha, sorry about that x.x

[some guy]

As a player most of my pc's aren't very sexual active. A rogue I once played was interested in the other sex, and this was in a mostly city game, so that... came along nicely. But descriptions were minimal at most.
I once played a lizardfolky/dragonborny character whos gender could switch based on the amount of males/females in the vicinity. That campaign died out before the other players found out I'd written "?" as sex on my character sheet, though.

As a DM, which I'm is the thing I am more than a player, most of the time sexual preferences don't come up, but there is variation.

[mathewt]

My last several gaming groups have had a large percentage (sometimes 100%) of gay guys. So it's generally fairly obvious in what kind of "bar maids" they flirt with....more often the bartenders/innkeepers than the barmaids ;)

It's come up occasionally when I've played LFR. There's enough RP/skill challenge stuff that involves flirting that it does sometimes affect things. Not to mention the time that I argued with the DM that the succubus's seduction power shouldn't have any affect on my gay male PC...

[FistsFullofDice]

I once had a character who blatantly told a succubus that he really wasn't into ladies, and when she tried to turn into a guy, he just waved her off, saying that it wasn't the same. The succubus felt very incompetent after that, and didn't bug our party again.

Not to mention the time that I argued with the DM that the succubus's seduction power shouldn't have any affect on my gay male PC...

I love this common theme It seems that I am proved wrong and this can be used in a utility manner. I applaud you both for turning something intended to be flavor into a defensive barricade

[North_Ranger]

When playing Changeling: The Lost, I considered making my character - a Mirrorskin shapeshifter belonging to the hopeful and hedonistic Spring Court - bisexual. And no, I was playing a male character. But since we were pretty far along in the campaign, I thought it just might seem like tacking on something for the sake of being different instead of actually building the character. Plus, I wasn't quite sure how our GM would take it, considering he had pretty much made two of my previous characters suffer for no good reason.

I did have the character try out changing into a member of the opposite sex, which led to these exchanges between him and the Ogress whose shape he had adopted when practising:



Lisa (the NPC Ogre): "I know I'm not the prettiest girl around, so I don't mind if you want to use someone else's face..."
Jonah (my Mirrorskin): "Darling, I would never say that. But I'd never use your appearance for my own gain. There isn't room in this world for two Lisas."

He said that with every good intention, BTW. Lisa was one of the few folks he respected without question, mostly because she was honestly a good person.

***

Jonah (shapeshifted into Lisa's figure - which is much more formidable than his own): "Well, this is strange..."
Lisa: "How so?"
Jonah: "Well, don't take this the wrong way, but I think these might distract me." (points at the new, very prominent bosom)
Lisa: "Well, you could always talk to Joy or Mary, they have figures that are more... um..."
Jonah: "Oh, you mean...?"
Lisa: "Flat-chested, yeah."
Jonah: "Well, I was going for nymph-like, but that works, too."

***

Good times, good times...

[Craft (Cheese)]

but just like a good diplomat and a good tactician can there be a good panty hound who can drive a campaign by there focus on such.

I'd like to see this done in a way that's actually constructive: My experience is the only way a sex maniac can be said to "drive a campaign" is if they get the party driven out of town or thrown into prison or something else like that.

[Ravens_cry]

It depends on the PC, though I generally play heterosexual characters.

[Jay R]

It comes up in any game with high-ranking characters in a medieval setting. In our current 2E game, my character is Ornrandir, a male elven mage/thief, recently given the title of the Earl of Devon by the king. He is an outcast orphan who has only recently formed any attachments to anybody. I've played him as emotionally undeveloped but brilliant. My wife is playing Rowena, a female human wizard, a lady-in-waiting to the queen. She has been in an ivory tower (literally) studying magic since she was a child. She has played her as an extreme nerd. The royalty had started leaning on us to make political marriages, which is to say that the DM wanted to do so political intrigue. We decided to trump the whole romantic process and sent the following email to the entire gaming group.

----------------------

A situation has occurred. It will affect the party to some extent, so I guess you should all hear about it. The two of us decided to explain it to you in character, so here it is.

(You may ignore which account this email came from; it was written by the two of us together.)
-----------------------

Rowena has been traveling to Devon Manor regularly to do magical research stuff and help set up the schools there, make scrolls, etc. The next time she visits after a Certain Conversation with the Queen, once she and Ornrandir are alone in the study where they work together on magic, she initiates the following conversation:

Rowena: The Queen tells me I really ought to give some thought to perpetuating magical bloodlines and recommends I consider marrying you.

Ornrandir: I’ve heard similar rumblings. Countess Elanor told me I have to find someone to marry, too. Something about an heir for the county.

Rowena: It is a rational idea. It is just that I have never really considered it before. I have been rather busy learning magic; all that physical stuff seemed so…worldly.

Ornrandir: I certainly know little about it. I’ve never had any family, and I've been an outcast all my life, except for those occasions when the only female I’ve traveled with was Lorelei, the paladin.

Rowena: The gaggle of giggling girls I must spend time with these days seems so focused on the idea.

Ornrandir: I know. Everyone but you is so stupid.

Rowena: I am already spending a lot of time here anyway.

Ornrandir: My servants wouldn’t have to prepare separate rooms for you each time. That would be convenient. And we seem able to get along.

Rowena: After all, we worked well together blasting hundreds of goblins with lightning bolts.

Ornrandir: I enjoyed casting coordinated lightning bolts with you. I’ve never felt so connected to another person before.

Rowena: After that, how difficult could this marriage thing be?

Ornrandir: Love is one of the strongest and most mysterious forces of the universe. Of course, controlling arcane cosmic forces is what wizards do. Maybe we should research a spell for it?

Rowena: As a mage, I will not age as quickly as normals; being elven, you of course will not age at all, so I really do not see why we need to be in a big hurry. And why should I care about being considered – how did she put it? Oh, yes – an "old maid".

Ornrandir: That seems like a meaningless phrase. Everybody becomes old, and an unmarried woman is of course a maid.

Rowena: On the other hand, your life expectancy, given your penchant for getting into trouble, isn’t exactly eternal. [looks him up and down appraisingly] At least if I marry you, you won’t keep getting ripped off by the tailors. You paid far too much for that rag you’re wearing.

Ornrandir: Fine by me. I’d be happy not to have to think about clothes any more.

Rowena: You thought about … that?

Ornrandir: Of course. It has a fleece collar, so I always have the material component for Phantasmal Force, feathers as decorations so I can fly, and several pockets worked into it here for other components. It has two internal pockets for scrolls, this hidden pocket for a dagger, and Lorelei will never figure out where the thieves’ tools are. It's green, for easy concealment in the trees. See? I carefully considered every relevant sartorial issue.

Rowena: I see. Yes, I believe I should take over those decisions. [Pause.] I would prefer to avoid that spectacle that Aduphus went through to marry Lady Stanley. The collective intelligence of her Majesty’s ladies dropped like a stone the instant someone said, “wedding”, and all they could talk about for weeks was fripperies and lace. Why do you think I spent so much time here writing out scrolls?

Ornrandir: Believe me, I understand. Since I developed the gold and mithril mines, all the nobles have been throwing their daughters at me. A year earlier they were offended that I was allowed to carry a weapon, and now they want me to sheathe one in their daughters.

Rowena: So how quickly can we get this over with?

Ornrandir: Well, when they assigned us to go fetch the Prince, we started out on the task immediately. Is the priest available today?

Rowena: I suppose we need to tell the Queen first. She might have an opinion about how it is done. So we are fully agreed about the marriage?

Ornrandir: It does seem like the logical thing to do [says the pointy-eared member of the couple].

Rowena: I’m glad we were able to work this out rationally, without the usual tawdry, emotional mess.

Ornrandir: Of course. We may be the two most intelligent people on the planet. We won’t let maudlin sentimentality distract us from rational analysis.

Rowena: Well, I am glad that that is settled. Now back to important matters - about that scroll we were discussing…

[FistsFullofDice]

I'd like to see this done in a way that's actually constructive: My experience is the only way a sex maniac can be said to "drive a campaign" is if they get the party driven out of town or thrown into prison or something else like that.

Yes, I remember playing a vampires: requiem game where our wildcard player tried seducing the prince of the city (female, prince is a generic term) short story really short it ended in a blood hunt where we were gunned down in the streets >.>

[Exediron]

I give it as much thought as any other equally important trait of a character's personality makeup, which is to say that I know the general orientation of all my characters and a lot more for the ones who are more developed. As of right now among my living, sheeted characters I have 17 heterosexual characters, 8 bisexual characters, 3 asexual characters and 2 homosexual characters spread out over two currently running games (D&D/D20 Modern and MERP).

A character's sexual orientation, in a broad sense at least ('He is attracted only to females', 'She has a specific type of person that she likes and doesn't care if that person happens to be male or female'), is one of those things which usually springs into my mind along with the other basic traits of a personality I'm developing, such as combat tactics, goals, demeanor, etc.

From a dedicated role-player's perspective, I don't really think you can justify leaving out what is in all likelihood a very significant preference for the character in question. Admittedly, the sort of game your group favors determines how important the sexual orientation of a character is; it's unlikely to be particularly important in combat (although it can be), but in social situations it will often at least influence a character's behavior.

It all comes down to gaming philosophy, in the end. I don't believe in what is commonly referred to as flavor; for me, the entire point of the game is the characters and their interactions with each other and their world. Even combat is an extension of this principle, as the personality of a character - their motivations and way of thinking - determines their actions in combat.

Now as far as playing any actual sexual encounters which occur, I prefer to deal with the 'soft' bits - talking, flirting, certainly no further than foreplay - and leave the rest to a fade to black, with a short summary by the dungeon master or the player of one of the characters ('They do it like bunnies for the next three hours', although probably not that). Of course, the fact that in real life I'm both almost entirely asexual and possessed of a healthy dose of sexual aversion disorder may have something to do with that.

I do believe that a character's sexual preference, like any element of their personality, is capable of moving the game forward. I've had a number of romances/relationships between my characters and those of other players, or even between two of my own (or more!), and on a number of occasions these have led to actual plot development. Most recently, one of my characters who had been deeply in love with another lost that character in battle and has been changed quite a lot by the loss - she now leads our party in that game on a vengeance and remorse inspired quest. Meanwhile, a third character is clearly attracted to her and possibly about to be given the sack because of obnoxious comments he made.

As to the OPs player: I think it is an odd choice for a character's primary motivation, but there are people like that. If the GM didn't want that sort of interaction in their game, or one of the players wasn't comfortable with it, I think that should be made clear to the player in question. Otherwise, the only problem I see is one player stealing the focus of the entire game for their character, which is often a problem unless everyone else is fine with it.

As a side note, I would say that due to a Succubus' power being magical in nature, it would be capable of working even on a character who is not usually attracted to females. I would give the receiving character a bonus to their save, however, possibly quite a large one for certain combinations.

[FistsFullofDice]

We decided to trump the whole romantic process and sent the following email to the entire gaming group.

Wow, a beautiful play of character -claps- Some day I hope to find a group up to that caliber.

[Lord Tyger]

Also, because no one else has yet-

Annie and the Elf Maiden.

[FistsFullofDice]

I give it as much thought as any other equally important trait of a character's personality makeup

I can't argue with anything in there, fine show.

[Terraoblivion]

Whether I define character sexuality in advance or not tends to vary depending on whether I consider it central to the character in question. So when making an F/SN servant of a rather prominently bisexual woman, I naturally went with that, just like I did outright define that my ancient Chinese concubine was quite gay, but also quite closeted. Most of my characters, however, I decide as I go along, which tends to mean that they end up gay enough to be a main character in a Fujieda manga.

[Callista]

In most of the games I've been in, it comes up occasionally. If an NPC is unusually good-looking, or if the character's backstory includes a romantic relationship, the character's sexual preference will usually be mentioned. Romance and sex are present mostly because they are a part of life and a part of many stories--we don't feel the need to describe anything more than "You go upstairs with the barmaid, fade-to-black."

Occasionally, sexual orientation has been a larger part of a character's story--an extremely charismatic pansexual bard, for example; the sort of guy who starts orgies because he's just that good-looking. (Yes. Epic levels. Instant fanatics.)

Currently, I am playing a character whose backstory includes a teenage romance with another girl, tragically cut short when her girlfriend was basically driven to suicide by an evil deity. My character is a paladin whose personality focuses very much on hope and compassion; she grew up under the thumb of said evil deity, and people who really care about each other are new and wonderful to her. She is instinctively attracted not to a specific gender, but to love and trust itself. She is probably capable of falling in love with any sentient, Good-aligned creature, with whom she had a deep friendship and shared trust. Which, I suppose, would make her "demi-sexual panromantic"... a long name for a sixteen-year-old who's just learning that it's even possible for people to truly trust each other. At the moment, what she's learning about most is just plain friendship. Romance--or at least romance beyond puppy love--is still a good way down the road for her. I've never had her involved in any romance, except for some flirting on one occasion with another PC (that never came to anything--their personalities conflicted too much; she finds the other PC too flighty and unreliable--i.e., is strongly chaotic).

Another character I played is an older woman, divorced from her husband, who had left her for another man (the gender and orientation of her ex was rolled randomly, leading to that curious set-up, which I then ran with). She never re-married and instead dedicated herself to the well-being of her home village. She feels betrayed by her ex, not because he turned out to be gay, but because he knew he wasn't attracted to women and married her anyway. However, despite her lack of desire to try another romance herself, she doesn't begrudge other couples their happiness.

I can't think of any other characters who have had their orientation make up significant parts of their backstory or gameplay. In fact, much of the time I don't bother to determine what their orientation is, or just roll for it randomly. For the most part, I tend to consider my characters to be bisexual by default and until proven otherwise. That way, if it matters, I can just roll randomly (10% gay, 20% bi, 70% straight, usually) and decide if my character is attracted to the flirtatious barmaid or the handsome young officer. Or, I can just decide, hey, this story would be cool/funny/interesting if my character thought that NPC is hot, and then declare their orientation whichever way is most convenient. That's probably why I gravitate toward bi; you double your pool of potential love interests that way!

One trend I've noticed is that almost every group I play in has steadfastly refused to include realistic prejudice against GLBT characters. We all know it happens in the real world, and we know it happened in the past; but I think we're all just too tired of seeing it in our everyday lives to reproduce it in our games. It seems to be an unspoken agreement--the break from realism is something we infinitely prefer to having to role-play prejudice of that sort. We're there to have fun, and being reminded of that isn't fun.

[Devils_Advocate]

"ARE THERE ANY GIRLS THERE?"

This is more of a discussion about the inclusion of sexuality in general than sexual preference in particular. As is inevitable, as it's not really possible to include the latter without the former. Oh, the title is still far more indicative of the thread's content than those of the "I have a question" / "Has anyone ever noticed..." / etc. variety, so props there. Just a little terminological note because I am pedantic like that.

It does matter, at least to me, but only in certain cases. I once had a character who blatantly told a succubus that he really wasn't into ladies, and when she tried to turn into a guy, he just waved her off, saying that it wasn't the same. The succubus felt very incompetent after that, and didn't bug our party again.

I guess that a succubus who can't seduce a dude deserves to feel pretty incompetent. I can only imagine how that might have gone.

"No, you idiot, you don't get it. I'm not 'really a woman', I'm not even really a person. I'm depraved lust given flesh, okay?"
"Oh, well, gee. In that case I'm totally turned on. :-P"
":("

I've always found romantic love to be a classic motivation for a character, so even with my less developed peeps, I assume straight unless otherwise specified.

Wait, how does the former imply the latter?

As for your actual question, I think character sexuality should really only be used as a dimension through which that character conflicts with their society. Humans tend to be very cruel, sometimes even violent, toward those who violate their sexual norms (though "sexual norms" obviously deviate significantly from culture to culture). A misfit outcast searching for people who will accept them for what they are is a classic character archetype, especially in roleplaying games, and having an abnormal sexuality is a great way to get there.

If, however, the sexuality is considered "normal" then there's really no good reason to bring it up.

Um, really? You're saying that a non-angsty romance subplot can't add to a game's story? Not everything has to be about pathos, you know.

Honestly? It's never come up, in either sense of the phrase. Sexytimes are for sexytimes, games are for games. Cross-contamination leads to weirdness, and not the lovecraftian kind that D&D is ok with.

It depends on the game. Dungeons & Dragons generally tends to ignore sexuality, at least in part because it tends to ignore stuff unrelated to killing things and taking their stuff. So if it's given more than tangential focus, it seems forced and kinda breaking genre.

Whereas Exalted is like "Yeah, people have sex all the time. Let us tell you about it." In part because it has rather broader themes than killing things and taking their stuff.

And someone is currently starting up a Homestuck-inspired game on the PbP forums, in which romance will be essentially obligatory, despite being completely unnecessary to the main plot. Because troll romance is four times as interesting as our pathetic one-dimensional human romance, obviously (and also four times as hard avoid).

[Roguenewb]

I played a changeling factotum/chameleon once (loosely based off Aunn from James Wyatt's excellent Storm Dragon series), who was in base biologically female (the opposite of me), but was one thousand percent into impersonation and manipulation. I spent almost as much time on each persona as each player did on character backstories. Each persona had an orientation, because is an excellent lever for manipulation. Many were Bi-, so that Tora could use that as much as possible.

[Tengu_temp]

From the most commonly found gender/sexuality combinations (male, female, straight, bi, gay, asexual), I only haven't played a bisexual male character yet. Unless someone whose reaction to a trap is "I'd still hit that" counts.

It doesn't come up in every game and not every group is comfortable with that, but when it appears, romance and sexuality can add a lot to the game, making the bonds between PCs or PCs and NPCs deeper, making the stakes higher, and just creating funny and/or heartwarming scenes on its own. Do note that sexuality is not the same thing as roleplaying sex scenes, I've never played with people who did that and I wouldn't really want to have that in my game either.

[Dimers]

We don't go into too much detail, though, there's not a whole lot of value in blow-by-blow sex roleplay. Just a brief description of the general mood or any notable, character-revealing bits.

Ditto that. Gender and sexuality is a huge part of the human experience, and it breaks verisimilitude for me if it's left out entirely. But my groups don't focus on it in any detail.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Um, really? You're saying that a non-angsty romance subplot can't add to a game's story? Not everything has to be about pathos, you know.

I took "sexual preferences" literally. Of course a romantic subplot can add a lot to a game, angsty or not. What I was talking about is going into details like whether they prefer to be on top or bottom (or neither), how much time they prefer to spend in foreplay, their libido, or how sensitive their nipples are. Barring extraordinary circumstances that kind of stuff should never, ever come up in-game.

[kamikasei]

As most people are not asexual, so most of my characters have some sexuality. What it is varies by character, and how much it comes up depends on the tone of the game - sometimes it's just something I know like any other detail that informs how I play the character, sometimes there's a degree of ship teasing with NPCs or other PCs, sometimes actual romances are part of the game. Anything past the point of clothing coming off calls for a fade to black, at least in my games to date, in general because that's the cutoff for "justifiably character-relevant aside which excludes the rest of the PCs".

I confess I'm curious as to the details of the scenario the OP mentions...

[Lord.Sorasen]

I took "sexual preferences" literally. Of course a romantic subplot can add a lot to a game, angsty or not. What I was talking about is going into details like whether they prefer to be on top or bottom (or neither), how much time they prefer to spend in foreplay, their libido, or how sensitive their nipples are. Barring extraordinary circumstances that kind of stuff should never, ever come up in-game.

While some of these are very extreme and I agree should never come up in game, I do want to mention that there's a point where sexuality and romance will end up being very connected. A lot of the time, to really detail a character, I'll end up knowing these specifics, as unnecesary and inapropriate as they may be, simply because I feel that many of our human(oid) traits are connected to one another. One never knows when the knowledge might come in handy, even if you never actually say the information to anyone in your group.

An example (and a clean example): I have a paladin character by the name of Aang-Karsk, from a very isolated nomadic family, who was sort of forced to abandon his home in order to answer the call of justice and order. Now, Aang-Karsk lived in a community where marriage was less about romantic love and more about keeping alliances between peoples. It led me to realize that he would have gone through puberty while on the difficult journey to the west, and as such wouldn't have ever been told about romantic love. As such his sexual preferences would be entirely unexplored, his interest in the opposite sex something that scared him more than excited him. I'd never tell my group this because it's unimportant and probably uncomfortable to them, but it did make me think about the character more, which is always good. It also led to the fact that Aang-Karsk would appear completely asexual, because he would shy away and refuse to acknowledge such emotions as anything other than distractions on the road to justice. It also meant that I figured if he was in any sort of relationship, he'd feel very emotionally invested, and might even let this emotion interfere with his dedication to the paladin code. The idea of my character meeting a beautiful CN woman on his journeys is one of my favorites for the character so far, and I don't think it would have come up if I hadn't thought about it at least a little bit.

I had a gay character too once, but it was a side note and nothing ever happened with that.

[Devils_Advocate]

I took "sexual preferences" literally.

Oh, okay. But you said "character sexuality", which I took to mean "characters being sexual at all". If you'd said "sexual preference", I'd probably have understood you better.

Because I am pedantic like that.

On that note, and at the risk of getting a bit tangential, I guess I should acknowledge that romance need not be sexual.

[Janus]

Wait, how does the former imply the latter?

It doesn't, though I could have worded things better.
The first part is in response to people saying that since they don't worry about romance/sex in their campaigns, they don't worry about their characters' preferences. I like having a romantic element present, so I do consider sexual preference, and in my case, they're heterosexual unless stated otherwise.

[Urslingen]

It's kind of interesting that there are such differences between WoD and non-WoD players. WoD-players find the whole sexual aspect more importnat than your avarage D&D:er, but that's not very unexpected I guess.

I've had a bit of a bother with a Werewolf: The Apocalypse - Campaign I am running. Most things are going swell, but when sexual themes are in the picture some players tend to get a bit... on edge.

In one scene, taking place in an abandoned nuclear bunker in New England, one of the characters went toe-to-toe with Black Spiral Chief Rapes-the-Wind. Things got rather nasty (and graphic) rather quickly, and I noticed I had to tone it down a bit - the player in question were a bit out of his own turf (alltough he quickly snapped out of it).

I think this is the major reason some players do not like to play these themes. They fall outside their comfort-zone, which is to say they are taken a bit by surprise when things actually goes down. IMO the best way to counter this is to make sure everybody knows, from the start, how graphic the game is going to be and what themes will be handled.

I think most people have got no problem with role-playing most things, as long as they have been told beforehand.

Peace Out. Interesting Thread!

- Urslingen

[Craft (Cheese)]

An example (and a clean example): I have a paladin character by the name of Aang-Karsk, ...

I just wanted to say, I think this is absolutely adorable.

[Hiro Protagonest]

It's kind of interesting that there are such differences between WoD and non-WoD players. WoD-players find the whole sexual aspect more importnat than your avarage D&D:er, but that's not very unexpected I guess.

It's not WoD. It's White Wolf games in general.

[Drascin]

On that note, and at the risk of getting a bit tangential, I guess I should acknowledge that romance need not be sexual.

Don't be silly, now. Everyone knows that all romance must be about jumping each ohers bones, and that asexual people cannot feel love .

Anyway, me, I never really give it a huge amount of importance. With some characters I think it up when making them, with some I don't, either way it's rarely much of a matter of concern. It's just one more bit among the many bits that make a character.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Don't be silly, now. Everyone knows that all romance must be about jumping each ohers bones, and that asexual people cannot feel love .

Or, for that matter, that asexuals can only have relationships with other asexuals. It's hard sometimes, but it works.