Armor designs for females?

[Zale]

She might be a princess captured and placed in a harem, for all you know. What more basic plot is there than men defending their women from "monsters"? It's hardly inapropos for a fantasy game dealing with archetypal monsters and magic to feature a damsel in distress.

I wasn't certain if I wanted to take part in this discussion, but I just wanted to highlight this post. Just to let it sink in that this is in fact a statement made by someone on this forum.

I may comb through the thread and make one of those bingo tables for "Women's Fantasy Armor Debates". That seems like a constructive use of my time.

[Max_Killjoy]

Sure, but silly doesn't make it bad. And when you're aiming for single still images to convey a sense of adventure and excitement, "dynamic and bold and visceral" seem like good ideas compared to "historical and referential accuracy"

That's part of the problem.

Don't try to "convey" something, show me what the character is supposed to look like. Especially for written fiction -- show me who and what I'm supposed to be picturing in my imagination as I read about the character.

Seriously, to hell with symbolism.

Donkeys and saddles my friend. You're even getting into fights in this thread with people who are generally on your side of the discussion.

Which really doesn't have anything to do with how badly you've misrepresented what I actually said.

She might be a princess captured and placed in a harem, for all you know. What more basic plot is there than men defending their women from "monsters"? It's hardly inapropos for a fantasy game dealing with archetypal monsters and magic to feature a damsel in distress.

I wasn't certain if I wanted to take part in this discussion, but I just wanted to highlight this post. Just to let it sink in that this is in fact a statement made by someone on this forum.

Indeed. Pretty ironic, given the context.

---

So here's a rather egregious example of "armor" worn by a female character. Setting aside the basic flaws in the anatomy... why would anyone ever wear that into combat?






(To be clear, there's nothing I've found in the context of this character or getup that justifies or lampshades the horrible design.)

[1337 b4k4]

That's part of the problem.

Don't try to "convey" something, show me what the character is supposed to look like. Especially for written fiction -- show me who and what I'm supposed to be picturing in my imagination as I read about the character.

Seriously, to hell with symbolism.

We're discussing art, and specifically art within the context of a TTRPG rule book. Why are you talking about written fiction?

Which really doesn't have anything to do with how badly you've misrepresented what I actually said.

Again, donkeys and saddles.

[1337 b4k4]

I wasn't certain if I wanted to take part in this discussion, but I just wanted to highlight this post. Just to let it sink in that this is in fact a statement made by someone on this forum.

I may comb through the thread and make one of those bingo tables for "Women's Fantasy Armor Debates". That seems like a constructive use of my time.

Within the initial confines of the discussion (that is, female adventurer armor in fantasy artwork) it's actually a valid defense. It's the equivalent of pointing out that of course none of the slaughtered men at the foot of the BBEGs throne are wearing useful armor, they were peasants/slaves/prisoners, not adventurers.

But given that the discussion has expanded to generally be about sexist portrayals of women in fantasy artwork, it is indeed a terrible defense of the image.

[Lord Raziere]

......I got a bingo on the rhetoric version. Entire Fourth row down.

what do I win? I want my prize Max.

She might be a princess captured and placed in a harem, for all you know. What more basic plot is there than men defending their women from "monsters"? It's hardly inapropos for a fantasy game dealing with archetypal monsters and magic to feature a damsel in distress.

@ Donnadogsoth:
REALLY?

JUST.

REALLY.

1. "their" women? as if they own them?

2. princesses? the medieval title literally meant to do nothing but make babies?

3. damsels in distress, the very problematic trope that got this whole vast conversation way before this thread or the threads before it ever existed, started in the first place?

Just no.

No.

I'm just a little ABSOLUTELY LIVID right now.

[Max_Killjoy]

We're discussing art, and specifically art within the context of a TTRPG rule book. Why are you talking about written fiction?

One, because there's a lot of overlap with these issues when it comes to cover art.

Two, because written fiction and RPGs are both largely works of written language, that is, books (despite some company's efforts to cram 1/3 of every page with full color artwork that the text has to wrap around strangely...)

Three, because one thing RPGs and written fiction actually do have in common is that the action takes place within the players' / readers' imagination. How they visualize what's going on is to some degree affected by the art. This is perhaps even more important in an RPG where the mental space has to in a way be shared and similar enough that there's not total disconnect between what the players are picturing.

If my GM shows me a picture of an NPC enemy and they have a big hole in their armor right over their chest or abdomen, where do you think I'm aiming/calling my shots? (Don't presume magic armor, here...)

Again, donkeys and saddles.

Purple monkey dishwater manatee north?

[Zale]

We're discussing art, and specifically art within the context of a TTRPG rule book. Why are you talking about written fiction?

Side note: Intent is still important in visual art. When making choices about how to dress a character in something, it shows what the artist is trying to convey about them.

Part of the problem is that women get place disproportionately in outfits that are designed just so the artist can convey that they are, in fact, hot babes.

Within the initial confines of the discussion (that is, female adventurer armor in fantasy artwork) it's actually a valid defense. It's the equivalent of pointing out that of course none of the slaughtered men at the foot of the BBEGs throne are wearing useful armor, they were peasants/slaves/prisoners, not adventurers.

But given that the discussion has expanded to generally be about sexist portrayals of women in fantasy artwork, it is indeed a terrible defense of the image.

Yes, but the slaughtered men are unlikely to be wearing thongs and be twisted into poses that show off their shapely behinds and nice abs. Women tend to be put in weirdly sexual poses in fantasy art and comics in a way that men aren't.

(The rebuttal to my statement is to point out things like Conan, but there's a difference between the rugged, shirtless barbarian and the women dangling off him in bikinis. It's about portrayal, position and focus as much as level of undress. It's very possible to draw a man being sexualized in the same manner, but just taking his shirt off isn't enough.)

[Mike_G]

OTOH, someone else linked the interior images from the AD&D (PHB maybe?) books, and the women were fully clothed. And IIRC, doesn't the DMG have a handful and vignettes of a party in various battles, and while the woman of the party is a sorceress in a dress, it is a fully clothed one to the best of my recollection. And I already went through the BECMI and B/X artwork from the same time period, showing that the majority of the women were fully clothed and in practical armor. So while yes, I can see calling this cover sexist, this doesn't meet the standard of a whole game where the balance is towards women portrayed as sexualized objects. In fact, you'd have a better argument that the artwork was sexist less for its portrayal of the women in it and more for how few women adventurers were portrayed at all.

I never said the whole game was defined by sexist art.

I pointed out an image that appears ON THE COVER of one of the most important core books --which is wicked sexist-- when you asked for examples of sexist art.

If I'm a woman thinking about playing D&D, and my first image on the cover of the books is two reasonably dressed male characters and a naked, captive, very sexually displayed woman, what do you think my first impression will be?

If you never get past the cover, the art inside really doesn't matter.

[Max_Killjoy]

Side note: Intent is still important in visual art. When making choices about how to dress a character in something, it shows what the artist is trying to convey about them.

Part of the problem is that women get place disproportionately in outfits that are designed just so the artist can convey that they are, in fact, hot babes.



Yes, but the slaughtered men are unlikely to be wearing thongs and be twisted into poses that show off their shapely behinds and nice abs. Women tend to be put in weirdly sexual poses in fantasy art and comics in a way that men aren't.

(The rebuttal to my statement is to point out things like Conan, but there's a difference between the rugged, shirtless barbarian and the women dangling off him in bikinis. It's about portrayal, position and focus as much as level of undress. It's very possible to draw a man being sexualized in the same manner, but just taking his shirt off isn't enough.)

The funny thing about this is, my core objections are about
1) armor and clothing as functional items -- and the disconnect between that functionality and how they're often presented in artwork for RPGs and the related "overgenre" of speculative fiction.
2) how that disconnect can rob the artwork of its ability to show an accurate depiction of the character and setting

Issues of gender, sex, sexuality, etc, enter into it for me largely because one of the first defenses offered up for much of the artwork I'm taking issue with, is that "sexy" is more important, that people want to look at "sexy" characters, etc. So there's a bit of irony there, in that immediately calling on that defense brings in the issue of whether the characters are being presented simply as objects, which might even be a deeper hole.

[1337 b4k4]

Side note: Intent is still important in visual art. When making choices about how to dress a character in something, it shows what the artist is trying to convey about them.

I'll be honest, I always figured the cover was aiming to be an homage to King Kong, so I'm not sure there was much intent other than aping (pun partially intended) imagery that everyone would know.

Yes, but the slaughtered men are unlikely to be wearing thongs and be twisted into poses that show off their shapely behinds and nice abs. Women tend to be put in weirdly sexual poses in fantasy art and comics in a way that men aren't.

(The rebuttal to my statement is to point out things like Conan, but there's a difference between the rugged, shirtless barbarian and the women dangling off him in bikinis. It's about portrayal, position and focus as much as level of undress. It's very possible to draw a man being sexualized in the same manner, but just taking his shirt off isn't enough.)

Sure, I'm not arguing that there isn't artwork out there that has issues, just pointing out that in the narrow confines of the original thread topic, the defense is valid if the character isn't supposed to be an adventurer, than their lack of armor is not an issue of female adventurer armor. And in the context of this particular image, I think any awkward posing of her character is due to the artist clearly being an amateur at art. The perspectives are all wrong, the characters are all posed awkwardly (like someone took figurines, made a "still life" and then drew it), and frankly it took me years to realize the ifrit was supposed to be alive and not a statue like on the PHB (which just made the whole situation even that much more bizarre for me because why would she be caught by a statue?)

I never said the whole game was defined by sexist art.

I pointed out an image that appears ON THE COVER of one of the most important core books --which is wicked sexist-- when you asked for examples of sexist art.

I asked for examples of games where the balance of the art was mostly women as sex objects and men as power fantasies. I know there are individual art pieces that meet the definition, that much was established in the first handful of pages of this thread (by myself even). I was objecting to the idea I'd seen multiple times that the games as a whole are doing this. Although looking back now I admit that your post that I quoted does talk about art individually (I had mentally grouped you with another poster talking about whole games) and that my own post on the same subject was not sufficiently clear, so my apologies on that.

If I'm a woman thinking about playing D&D, and my first image on the cover of the books is two reasonably dressed male characters and a naked, captive, very sexually displayed woman, what do you think my first impression will be?

If you never get past the cover, the art inside really doesn't matter.

If you're my wife, or any of the women I've had the fortune of gaming with over the years, it's a shrug and moving on. The same reaction that men give when their gender are used for mindless slaughter in fantasy imagery. It's a trope, and maybe a trope you want to (and that should be) changed, but tropes in and of themselves are not threatening things, and when you're immersed in them, you're less likely to find them immediately off putting, so I would not have expected most women in the late 1970's to early 1980's, especially those in the geek / fantasy hobby to have found the imagery particularly offensive (look up 1970's cosplay, just don't do it on a work computer). 30 years on, and tastes and social norms have changed, and yes, were that cover published today, I would expect it to cause some consternation, which might be why the reprints edited it out. Of course it's not true for everyone, but nothing ever is (except possibly that we all die)

[2D8HP]

(The rebuttal to my statement is to point out things like Conan, but there's a difference between the rugged, shirtless barbarian and the women dangling off him in bikinis. It's about portrayal, position and focus as much as level of undress. It's very possible to draw a man being sexualized in the same manner, but just taking his shirt off isn't enough.)

So, something like this?:

---

Yes, because your line for art that belongs in a good TTRPG book begins and ends at 100% realistic and no anachronisms as you've said time and again. In addition to those things, you would lump anyone not wearing a helmet in battle, anything with something that could be grabbed by an opponent (horns for example)...

Ah yes, helmet horns.

*shudder*

I told myself that "I already have all the D&D rules I need", and "Unearthed Arcana was awful, I don't want more like that!", but really it was the mid 1980's and later art that I didn't like (too bad too, as a recent peak shows me that up until '99 the rules didn't change much, but did become more clearly written, my loss).

Stuff like this:



The weird thing is I saw both Conan the Barbarian and Conan the Destroyer, and enjoyed them.

We all have lines.

Speaking of which, out of some art that @Ashiel posted:







The first two show more skin, but really don't seem sillier than the third picture (despite that he is going to fall, and she's in heels), because they're not in armor, but the "Knight", has both the "window", and ridiculous shoulder metal, but still not as silly as helmet horns.

I would assume that it was ceremonial armor. History does have armor made as much for style as for protection (and they're certainly been military uniforms that don't look as if they were made for combat).

A lot depends on tone. Seeing images from the Osprey books alongside WarHammer stuff feels off, but disparate treatment is noticeable.

If a man is pictured in "armor" with giant oversize spiky pauldrons, and a plunging v-neck collar, or something like this:
(which seems more "gladiator" than "soldier")



would make "armor" with bare midriffs worn by ladies less jarring.

But apparently for video games you need to go this far to balance:

Spoiler: if women got the same degree of fanservice men do

Show

.

[Ashiel]

She obviously didn't spend much time training falcons, otherwise she would know how to properly carry one on her fist.

Touche salesman.

[Satinavian]

Ok, let's discuss the examples. Comments in red :

In honor of "stupid" "idiot" adventurers everywhere, I give you a rogues snuff gallery of soon to be dead adventurers who are immersion breaking and ruin everyone's rightgoodfun.

Both people here are already dead.
The women does not wear armor but clothing. The man wears an armored vest, a morion and gloves, which is not a bad light armor combination. That is also a cover of an inner city intrigue based adventure module and both outfits would be utterly appropriate for the fights in there.

The mask won't save him from the gut-spilling.
padded coat over chain, greaves. That is pretty good armor even fit for a battlefield. You might want to add a helmet
She's actually undead. She died three times on the way to the ATM.
Yes, that is bad and doesn't offer protection. She should wear something else if any kind of fight is to be expected.
A leather jacket with a boob window. That's the last drink he'll ever have.
Looks like the boob window could actually be closed if the guy bothered to do so.

Silly drinking lady, padded armor is only 5% better than flesh, but you were 110% dead with flesh.
That is the reason why i actually bothered answering. Padded armor and other cloth based armor is actually pretty good armor It was used over millenia by the majority of fighters for a reason. Also that doesn't seem to be anywhere near a battle situation. Maybe some tavern brawl going out of hand.

It's a cool picture until you realize she's been cut in half and is just a torso.
Clothing, no armor
Cool cathedral, in the city, sword duelist. Totally dead.
Hard to see, but clothing, not armor i think.

She's mentally preparing herself for her death by being stabbed like a turnip.
Clothing, no armor

Did I mention she died? She was stabbed in the inner thigh and bled to death because it hit an artery. Pants aren't armor.
Clothing, no armor. And yes, she looks to be at a disadvantage there because while her opponents aren't armored either, they seem to wear more protective clothing. Not that much of a difference in a saber fight though. If the lighting didn't suggest absurd protagonist plot armor i would assume whe would be dead a couple seconds later.

She died. I don't know from what. I heard it might have been some accident with space pirate airlocks but armor would have helped.
Anachronism stew. Hard to discuss the protection value without knowing the kind of weapons. But i would go for "clothing, not armor" here. If that thin leather pirate west does have a boob window or not would not really matter to space age rifles.

Death by falling, actually. But the pidgeon pooped on his corpse through the boob window.
Clothing, not armor. Also the jacket can be closed easily.

She actually didn't die. She spent all of her time training falcons and looking fabulous doing it.
Clothing, not armor

Bored now, i'll skp the rest.

Soo far that have all been cases of either reasonable armor or no armor at all.

I hate to brake it to you, but people not actually wearing any armor are not unrealistic. Neither does anyone here argue that skipping armor for more comfortable clothing in contexts outside of battlefields is somehow suicidal.


Seriously, why are you linking lots of pictures with people in everyday clothing in a thread about unrealistic armor ? What is that supposed to be a proof for ? That not everyone all the time wears armor including people who actually own some ?

[Floret]

I truly am sorry that this seems to be your experience with TTRPGs. I consider myself fortunate that I've never encountered games where none (or even half) of the women were depicted as anything other than sex objects, while the men were all power objects. And even more fortunate that I've never been in a situation where I had to question the basic human decency of the people around me based on their possible reactions to the artwork present in the rule books for the game we've sat down to play. All of that said, I would suggest that if sitting down to play a TTRPG with a group finds you defensive and afraid of violence or sexual assault due to the artwork, might I suggest that the issue is less the artwork (and indeed changing it wouldn't solve anything) and more that we've allowed the standards of behavior in our community to devolve to that of a super-max prison. Because the reality is, you should be able to sit down at a table littered with playboy mags and never have to questions once in your head whether the men at that table are going to be inappropriate with you and more than I would fear the same of women sitting down at a table littered with playgirl. If the men you're playing with are predators, that's the problem that needs to be addressed first.

Alternatively. If the men you are playing with are insensitive idiots who fail to understand not only that rape jokes really aren't funny, but that men who find them funny trigger every single creep-alert in a woman's mind, that is also a problem that needs to be addressed. It's less of a problem, since your personal safety isn't at stake, but it's still incredibly unpleasant and creepy, and beyond uncomfortable to sit there and listen to that kind of talk.

Don't stay in that kind of environment. Spell out in great detail why you are leaving, and then leave, and stay gone. You have better things to do with your time.

All of this is incredibly true, and this is indeed a problem of the people, not the art... But. One thing I feel should be added to this is that if there is anything that might encourage these people to seek out roleplaying communities, and to make them think their views are in any way acceptable there, that is an issue that might deserve a look.
And if the art we use for our games does, in the eyes of those creeps and predators, reinforce their worldviews, by stating sexy as an important aspect of quite a lot of female characters, going so far as to impede on logic/versimilitude for a lot of people, in a way that the male counterparts don't do nearly so frequent - then changing the artwork won't make these guys any less creepy or predatorial (Nor keeping the artwork perfectly nice guys into creeps). But the change might just make it so that they don't feel like "this is the community for me".
Creeps getting the wrong message about their behaviour is a sideeffect of cheesecake pictures, not the main intention, obviously. Not a very strong one, probably. You can try to argue that the benefit of cheesecake pics is larger than the negative sideeffects (Probably would need studies that don't exist to corroborate either side. Or a way to weigh the two against each other). I will side-eye you if you do that, but that is rooted in the way I weigh these things.

And, yes, TTRPGs do have quite a lot of good counterexamples. The problem is not one exclusive to them, nor the most pronounced there - CRPGs, especially MMOs are often far worse offenders. But many women who game aren't just confronted exclusively with the ones from TRPG books.
Now imagine: For someone with the drive to play these games, it being stronger than the turnoff of the armor. The armor maybe slightly lessening the enjoyment, but hey, what can you do. Now turning to a medium of more freedom, more imagination - only to find in the examples, the ones supposed to stoke you imagination and to tell you how this, strange, different world is... have the same problems of design, if not as bad, still... not good.
Then I think a certain frustration might be acceptable. And they probably aren't gonna see this as an issue of TRPG art exclusively. Trying to argue that it is, seems... dishonest. All of this is part of the same culture, and of quite intervowen subcultures that grew from each other no less.

(Another thing is, a handful of examples of Armor more suited to a catwalk than a fight might just be enough to make a person that wants realistic armor roll their eyes, groan, and be turned off. A handful of examples of functional, realistic armor are, I think, very unlikely to have the same effect on people that enjoy the sexy ones.
With the forseeable result that, no, people who want functional armor do not have all of the opportunity to look at their stuff, when even the stuff that is generally good about these things insists on throwing in a handful of cheesecake pictures. RPG illustrations generally don't come in packs of one inside the books.)

[ImNotTrevor]

This thread is an excellent example of the fallout caused by stating opinion as objective fact, especially when doing so condescendingly or rudely.

Turns out that people become defensive when you call their preference objectively bad and imply they are bad people for enjoying it. Shocker.

Turns out people respond to snark and condescension with snark and condescension. Shocker.

So maybe, maybe, state preferences as preferences and don't expect the reader to dig for your real meaning due to laziness. Just say you opinion is an opinion. There are many ways to do so. Allow me to demonstrate:
"I feel that...."
"In my opinion...."
"I think that...."
"In my personal experience, I have found that...."
"It seems to me...."

I swear, part of me want to stalk this discussion and translate opinions stated as truths back into opinions. But that would be maximum snark and I might get in trouble.

Long story short,
Responsibility lies with the SPEAKER/WRITER to communicate clearly, NOT on the LISTENER to interpret correctly.

[2D8HP]

This thread is an excellent example of...
....So maybe, maybe, state preferences as preferences and don't expect the reader to dig for your real meaning due to laziness. Just say you opinion is an opinion. There are many ways to do so. Allow me to demonstrate:
"I feel that...."
"In my opinion...."
"I think that...."
"In my personal experience, I have found that...."
"It seems to me...."

Where's the sport in that?



NEVER!

Doing what you suggest would lead to tolerance, mutual respect, courtesy, and common sense.

AND THAT WOULD BE WRONG!!!

(also takes longer to type).

:

[Deophaun]

I wasn't certain if I wanted to take part in this discussion, but I just wanted to highlight this post. Just to let it sink in that this is in fact a statement made by someone on this forum.

Quick! To the fainting couch!

[Lord Raziere]

Quick! To the fainting couch!

That is a serious concern and your not helping. Not cool.

[Max_Killjoy]

Ok, let's discuss the examples. Comments in red :

Bored now, i'll skp the rest.

Soo far that have all been cases of either reasonable armor or no armor at all.

I hate to brake it to you, but people not actually wearing any armor are not unrealistic. Neither does anyone here argue that skipping armor for more comfortable clothing in contexts outside of battlefields is somehow suicidal.


Seriously, why are you linking lots of pictures with people in everyday clothing in a thread about unrealistic armor ? What is that supposed to be a proof for ? That not everyone all the time wears armor including people who actually own some ?

It would appear that he/she is spamming the thread with that stuff because I made some disparaging remarks about artwork showing characters going into combat (or similar) in useless armor... and he/she strawmanned that position into "anyone not in armor is committing suicide". So now he/she is trying to sell the claim that all these pictures are a rebuttal.

The ignore function is a blessing when that sort of thing goes on.

[Max_Killjoy]

Where's the sport in that?



NEVER!

Doing what you suggest would lead to tolerance, mutual respect, courtesy, and common sense.

AND THAT WOULD BE WRONG!!!

(also takes longer to type).

:

And more seriously, it gives free reign to the reader, if they're so inclined, to deliberately or out of convenience to their argument, misread and misrepresent the writer's words, and then shift blame if called out on it.

[CharonsHelper]

That is a serious concern and your not helping. Not cool.

I'm sorry - but arguing about the artwork of armor in fantasy RPG games being too revealing and/or unrealistic on a forum based on a stick figure webcomic is a serious concern? I think you might be taking it TOO seriously.

[Mike_G]

I'll be honest, I always figured the cover was aiming to be an homage to King Kong, so I'm not sure there was much intent other than aping (pun partially intended) imagery that everyone would know.




Sure, I'm not arguing that there isn't artwork out there that has issues, just pointing out that in the narrow confines of the original thread topic, the defense is valid if the character isn't supposed to be an adventurer, than their lack of armor is not an issue of female adventurer armor. And in the context of this particular image, I think any awkward posing of her character is due to the artist clearly being an amateur at art. The perspectives are all wrong, the characters are all posed awkwardly (like someone took figurines, made a "still life" and then drew it), and frankly it took me years to realize the ifrit was supposed to be alive and not a statue like on the PHB (which just made the whole situation even that much more bizarre for me because why would she be caught by a statue?)



I asked for examples of games where the balance of the art was mostly women as sex objects and men as power fantasies. I know there are individual art pieces that meet the definition, that much was established in the first handful of pages of this thread (by myself even). I was objecting to the idea I'd seen multiple times that the games as a whole are doing this. Although looking back now I admit that your post that I quoted does talk about art individually (I had mentally grouped you with another poster talking about whole games) and that my own post on the same subject was not sufficiently clear, so my apologies on that.



If you're my wife, or any of the women I've had the fortune of gaming with over the years, it's a shrug and moving on. The same reaction that men give when their gender are used for mindless slaughter in fantasy imagery. It's a trope, and maybe a trope you want to (and that should be) changed, but tropes in and of themselves are not threatening things, and when you're immersed in them, you're less likely to find them immediately off putting, so I would not have expected most women in the late 1970's to early 1980's, especially those in the geek / fantasy hobby to have found the imagery particularly offensive (look up 1970's cosplay, just don't do it on a work computer). 30 years on, and tastes and social norms have changed, and yes, were that cover published today, I would expect it to cause some consternation, which might be why the reprints edited it out. Of course it's not true for everyone, but nothing ever is (except possibly that we all die)

OK, now I'm annoyed.

I think I've been a voice of moderation in this increasingly heated thread. My point has been "Art is subjective. Like what you want, but understand some people think the unrealistic armor is silly, breaks immersion and can be sexist."

So then I was asked, where, pray tell, is this sexist art? Like it was hard to find.

So I presented the COVER of the first edition CORE RULEBOOK of the MOST POULAR fantasy RPG. I didn't find a picture scribbled in the margin of a third party supplement for FATAL. I figured this was a prominent example which was both silly and impractical and sexist.

Now, I never said that means you shouldn't like it. Just that it's a good example of what I don't like, and what people seem to be denying exists.

Liking it is fine. That's a matter of preference. But the defense of it is ridiculous.

I don't care if you "like the picture." Art is subjective. But the whole. "OK, sure, it's the cover, but that's not all the art in the edition. Jeeze." or 'Maybe it's not an example of impractical adventuring gear. Maybe it's one of these much more sexist stereotypes" like that makes it OK, or "this woman I know is OK with it" which is the "I'm not a racist; some of my best friends are black" defense.

I will repeat:

Art is subjective. Like what you want. But impractical clothing or armor can look silly, break immersion and can be sexist.

And if you can't see that the freaking cover of the most important book of the most popular RPG of it's day did all those things, I don't think there's much I can say that would help.

[ImNotTrevor]

And more seriously, it gives free reign to the reader, if they're so inclined, to deliberately or out of convenience to their argument, misread and misrepresent the writer's words, and then shift blame if called out on it.

That someone can twist/misunderstand words is no excuse to not speak clearly and divide between opinion and fact in your words.

In fact, I'm surprised that you're arguing that the possibility of someone misusing your words is reason to speak LESS clearly. This seems as obviously not helpful as using a flamethrower to put out a housefire.

[Donnadogsoth]

@ Donnadogsoth:
REALLY?

JUST.

REALLY.

1. "their" women? as if they own them?

2. princesses? the medieval title literally meant to do nothing but make babies?

3. damsels in distress, the very problematic trope that got this whole vast conversation way before this thread or the threads before it ever existed, started in the first place?

Just no.

No.

I'm just a little ABSOLUTELY LIVID right now.

If I say “my father” does that mean I own my father? You're being too touchy.

Saying all princesses do is make babies is like saying all princes do is wage war. I know which I'd rather be doing.

I wish I could not believe that culture has degenerated this far, that the wonderful, perennial “damsels in distress” is a controversial, nigh taboo trope. It's like we want our women to be ravished by monsters now, unless they can defend themselves because they are Super Duper Warriors. My point is friendly male energy has from the beginning of time been dedicated towards defending women from hostile male energy. In our rush to make war seem fun and "equal" in our gaming lives we have lost sight of that basic truth. That we live in a time when it has been perverted in the name of equality is unfortunate, and, for gamers, all the worse that it has bled into gaming as well. It's a war on men and the male libido and aforementioned natural role is what it is.

A caveat: I'm happy to be inclusive of women players and women characters. I even mostly prefer women warriors dressed like they're serious rather than sex-pots (Frank Frazetta aside). Women in serious armour/uniforms can be just as sexy--in some cases moreso, because they convey an attitude of reality to them whereas most cheesecake fantasy art conveys a "Wha? What world does that make sense in?" And of course women (someone mentioned the Scythians a few threads back) have and can participate in war and fighting. So it's not women I take an issue with as such, it's the assumption that because we've reached the modern state of secular enlightenment, that all bets are off and women as a class (not as a tiny subset of women warriors) don't need protecting by men--even in anachronistic fantasy!

[Deophaun]

That is a serious concern and your not helping. Not cool.

Sorry. Next time I'll say it with my sunglasses on.

[Dragonexx]

You are very terrible at arguing a point. To the point where I'm not really sure what it is your arguing.

For the record I'm on the side of doing whatever makes you and your play group have fun. If that involves realism or selective realism, whatever. (I prefer to go for a more JRPG feel in my games).

Also, for the record, sexualization ≠ objectification.

[Ashiel]

Ok, let's discuss the examples. Comments in red :

Bored now, i'll skp the rest.

Soo far that have all been cases of either reasonable armor or no armor at all.

I hate to brake it to you, but people not actually wearing any armor are not unrealistic. Neither does anyone here argue that skipping armor for more comfortable clothing in contexts outside of battlefields is somehow suicidal.


Seriously, why are you linking lots of pictures with people in everyday clothing in a thread about unrealistic armor ? What is that supposed to be a proof for ? That not everyone all the time wears armor including people who actually own some ?

Point is, these look like typical adventuring, swashbuckling, D&D-appropriate pictures. They're either wearing little armor or no armor at all. By the large they are no more or no less likely to die than the woman in this picture right here, or this woman right here.

Which simply put means what's good for the goose is good for the gander (or perhaps the other way around in this case). I'm just asking for some honesty through consistency. See, it all comes down to this right here...

Someone claimed that wearing little armor and/or impractical armor in a fantasy setting where they would be expected to do battle meant they were going to die, and that the artists and authors were ignorant, and those who liked it, stupid. However, if that were true, then these individuals would be more or less assumed to be dead as well, since we can clearly see in the images they are prepared for battle, some actively engaging in battle, or otherwise armed and wearing little else beyond a thick coat.

If these individuals aren't assured to be pushing up daisies, neither are those barbarian ladies I linked a couple paragraphs ago. If anything, slaughtering your enemies with little regard for your personal safety is a trope unto itself. This is especially true in the context of fantasy, where your flesh can withstand blades (to the point that there are even some game mechanics that specialize in this fact).

[Ashiel]

If I say “my father” does that mean I own my father? You're being too touchy.

Yeah, do you have any idea how fast it gets old referring to my siblings as "the brother who happens to be born to the same mother and father as I, and I sharing a similar kinship. Also the woman, who in sharing a mother and father with us both," as opposed to "my brother and sister"? Yeesh.

Frankly, if the damsel in distress trope ever goes the way of the dodo, it'll be a sad day indeed. It will be the moment when people no longer care. It won't matter if some lady was kidnapped by the dragon, the brigand, the troll. Nobody cares enough about her to go save her anymore. Maybe it'll just be the dude in distress trope from that point forward. The only characters worth saving will be male. Just Mario and Cloud Strife. Screw Princess Peach and the cloud she flew in on.

Because when you get right down to it, the core of the damsel in distress trope is caring. Someone or something took someone you loved and you're driven to dive into the depths of hell itself to rescue them. You do not undertake the hero's journey because some orc kidnapped your mule. You do not fight off dragons and demons to protect your baseball card collection. You do not risk death itself because someone stole your favorite chocolate bar. No, you face the wrath of the satan by putting your life on the line for someone that means so much to you that they are irreplaceable. In other words, someone like your wife, daughter, etc.

"Hunt them down? Find them? Kill them? Pfft, heavens no. My daughter's a modern woman. She'd never want to perpetuate those tired old tropes," said no one ever.

[SaurOps]

I wish I could not believe that culture has degenerated this far, that the wonderful, perennial “damsels in distress” is a controversial, nigh taboo trope.

The trope in question gets tired easily, and now occupies a space akin to 4chan.

As in, remember when 4chan was good? Trick question, it was never good. The benefits of hindsight. Centuries of hindsight.

It's like we want our women to be ravished by monsters now, unless they can defend themselves because they are Super Duper Warriors.

That doesn't even follow at all, unless you started from the assumption that they weren't capable of it on a wide scale, on the basis of sex and gender, and worked your way back from there.

My point is friendly male energy has from the beginning of time been dedicated towards defending women from hostile male energy.

You can imagine anything, unbound by history or bias, and you imagine more of the same?

In our rush to make war seem fun and "equal" in our gaming lives we have lost sight of that basic truth. That we live in a time when it has been perverted in the name of equality is unfortunate, and, for gamers, all the worse that it has bled into gaming as well. It's a war on men and the male libido and aforementioned natural role is what it is.

You're whining about not being on the top of the heap or having your wants systematically placed above others'. It's not particularly dignified.

A caveat: I'm happy to be inclusive of women players and women characters. I even mostly prefer women warriors dressed like they're serious rather than sex-pots (Frank Frazetta aside). Women in serious armour/uniforms can be just as sexy--in some cases moreso, because they convey an attitude of reality to them whereas most cheesecake fantasy art conveys a "Wha? What world does that make sense in?" And of course women (someone mentioned the Scythians a few threads back) have and can participate in war and fighting. So it's not women I take an issue with as such, it's the assumption that because we've reached the modern state of secular enlightenment, that all bets are off and women as a class (not as a tiny subset of women warriors) don't need protecting by men--even in anachronistic fantasy!

Why do other people have to deal with your baggage at the table, cluttering up where they could sit down?

[Ashiel]

That doesn't even follow at all, unless you started from the assumption that they weren't capable of it on a wide scale, on the basis of sex and gender, and worked your way back from there.

Part of that's ingrained in our biology, because while there's no mechanical limitation to our games, there are certain facts concerning the physical strength and power of men and women on the average. In fantasy it largely doesn't matter since you can have female barbarians suplexing ogres, or throwing fireballs, and so forth. However, it's very ingrained in the collective consciousness of humanity that women are both worth protecting and more likely to need protecting.

And before anyone flips out, the same is true for men who are venturing further into feminine biology. Male to female transexuals regularly have to deal with the loss of muscle and physical strength as the amount of testosterone in their bodies declines and estrogen escalates. EDIT: The reverse is also true. FtM transexuals who get more testosterone tend to have an easier time building physical strength as well.

So no, they weren't capable of it on a wide scale. Sometimes you find women who are really strong and are ready to kick all manner of ass and might not have gotten kidnapped to begin with, but not only are those women a minority among women but it's largely irrelevant to story telling since the characters in the stories are of some importance outside of being heroes. They're loved ones, or are of some higher purpose than the hero themselves (such as the classic saving the princess, since the princess is traditionally more important than the hero rescuing them, hence putting oneself into danger for the greater good).

EDIT: Also, have some art.