Standard Roles

So, I've just come back from a gaming convention. I didn't actually get to do much tabletop, but one game I did stuck out to me and my crazy liberal feminist goggles.

That being a game that was sort of a crossover between Firefly and Aliens 4, using the characters from the movie as the crew of a ship in the Firefly universe.

It was notable to me because not only were there two female PCs in the party - despite not having two female players, and I wasn't even playing one of the girls - but that there were female NPCs out there doing things. Doing things other than shopping, whoring, and being rescued.

Most people writing/running these con games aren't professionals. They're just making up a story (sometimes as they go along). And for these reasons, they tend to fall into defaults. Quite often, all the pregen PCs being handed out are male - I don't think I've EVER seen an all-female party, and I bet it would be the entire focus of the plot if there were. If the town has a leader, it's a guy. If someone needs rescuing, it's a girl. If there's a barmaid, she has killer cleavage and negotiable virtue.

It was refreshing to see a PC being picked up in a bar by a woman who was 'ugly' - a short burly scarred muscular gun-nut, hitting on a character of exactly the same type. They arm-wrestled, shared drinks, and went off together.