Women In Gaming

Originally published at The RPG Times (www.rpgtimes.net) in August 2001.

In the final part of the Birth of an PBeM Game, planning for the future of the game and how to find players for the game once it’s ready to go are discussed.

In this fourth and final installment in which I am chronicling the decision-making process for the creation of a pbem game, it is almost time to get the ball rolling on getting the game started. The two topics covered in this portion of the creation process deal with the future of the game:

• Where will I find players for my game?
• How will I deal with things that happen in the future? Not to try and confuse you, but I will be dealing with the above questions in reverse order.

How will I deal with things that happen in the future?

A very important thing to remember is that you are not always going to be able to find players that meet all of your expectations and never cause any problems. It’s never going to happen. Things are always going to pop up. That’s the way life is. However, if you let your players know ahead of time what you expect, it will make for far fewer headaches in the future. One of the things I recommend is make up a list of rules for your game. No, not a game system, but a list of things that they need to know about how the game is run. For example, the GM’s word is law. If you think I’m wrong, and can show me in a civilized manner that I made a mistake (rather than flaming me), then do so and I may change my mind. This applies to rules decisions as well as the setting. Put up guidelines of what you expect from your players, from how to submit a character sheet, to what to do if they aren’t going to be able to play their character for a while.

You also ought to come up with guidelines for what will happen if the player screws up, such as they argue with you constantly, they harass and flame the other players, or if they simply disappear without a word for a length of time. All of the above will vary based upon your personality.

No matter what you decide, make sure you put it in writing and put it on your web page, or in the package of information that you send your potential players. That way they can’t whine “but I didn’t know that”, and you can use it as a reminder when you see things might be heading down the wrong path. Now, for the final step to creating a pbem game:

Where do I find players for my game?

If you currently run or play in a game, you already have a potential source for new players. Tell them about your game, and ask them to pass the word along to players that they think might be interested. This is an excellent way to find new players because it has a kind of built in safety net - you know the people who will be joining the game, and you will have a sort of prescreening for those people you don’t know. Just like when you ask a doctor for a recommendation of another doctor because you’re moving, he’s going to recommend someone he likes, and it’s often someone with a similar or complementary gaming style.

Here’s an example of what I might post if I was actually trying to get this game going:

The world is a dangerous place, far more dangerous than most of us know. Sure, we watch the television shows where there are vampires walking the streets at night, and movies where the heroes battle flesh eating zombies. It’s all fiction. Or is it?

There is a whole other world out there, hidden from sight. A world shrouded in shadows and half-known truths, where the Things That Man Were Not Meant To Know live. It is called the Eventide. A realm where the creatures from our myths, legends, folklore and nightmares live, it exists alongside our own. It is the source of all our dreams and inspires poets and writers. It is the source of all our nightmares and drives murders and lunatics.

“The Eventide” is a new pbem game looking for players. For more information, please visit (web page address), or email the GM at (email address).”

Some postings have more info, some have less, but this should be enough to get someone who is interested to go to your web site. This same information could be posted to a number of newsgroups, such as rec.games.frp.announce. There are other ways to find players, such as putting up notices at local gaming shops, but those are usually best for face to face games. If you are using an established game setting, or using a particular game system rules, try posting a message there saying that you’re looking for players (providing of course the rules of that list allow for people to post that kind of message).

Well, that’s about it. I have gone through the steps to create a new pbem game. I hope those of you who followed the articles found them useful, and please, if you have any questions, feel free to contact me!

Popularity: 74% [?]

Originally published July 2001, at The RPG Times Vol. 6, Iss. 7.

Last month I went through the first two steps for creating a pbem game -deciding who much time I’d be willing to spend on the game, and what setting I would be using. As a recap, here’s what decisions were made:

• I would probably need to spend three to four hours a week doing game-related stuff once the game was underway.
• the game would be a horror game and set in our world, but with a few changes.

This month I will be going through the results of the work on the background of the game, then move on to the next two items on the checklist (choosing a game system, and deciding what kind of pbem game to run).

Setting

Okay, I’ve settled upon a horror game, set in our world (with a few minor modifications). What I need to do know is find a way to describe it in a sentence or two, at most a paragraph. Here’s what I start out with:

The world is a dangerous place, far more dangerous than most of us know. Sure, we watch the television shows where there are vampires walking the streets at night, and movies where the heroes battle flesh eating zombies. It’s all fiction. Or is it?

There is a whole other world out there, hidden from sight. A world shrouded in shadows and half-known truths, where the Things That Man Were Not Meant To Know live. It is called?

Hmm? What am I going to call it? World of Darkness is taken, as are most of the similar titles. And those that aren’t taken sound really clichéd. So, what do I do? I pull out the thesaurus!

Not having my huge, large rodent-killer-sized thesaurus handy, I resort to the one that comes with Word. Let’s look up evil. Nothing there that’s inspiring. Let’s try darkness. Same again - nothing interesting. How about nighttime. Hmm? Eventide. That sounds promising.

Let’s try this again:

There is a whole other world out there, hidden from sight. A world shrouded in shadows and half-known truths, where the Things That Man Were Not Meant To Know live. It is called the Eventide. A realm where the creatures from our myths, legends, folklore and nightmares live, it exists alongside our own. It is the source of all our dreams and inspires poets and writers. It is the source of all our nightmares and drives murders and lunatics.

There, that’s a good start. Yeah, so it expanded to two paragraphs. Who cares. They’re good paragraphs.

So, those two paragraphs should give everyone a very good idea of what to expect in the game, and is a jumping off point for you, the GM, to come up with the rest of the world.

Next, I need to decide what kinds of nasties there will be lurking in the shadows, just waiting for the unwary PC to turn down the wrong alley at night. From the descriptive paragraphs, I’ve already given myself a foundation for that, and given myself a very wide range. Also, I haven’t limited myself to one settings’ “rules” for what a vampire can or cannot do. I can base them on whatever I want, or even have hundreds of different types of vampires.

No, don’t start thinking that I’m crazy. There’s no way that I can detail each and every type of bogeyman that might appear in the game. That’s not my job. I’ll worry about them when the PC’s are getting close to encountering them (that will be part of the weekly work to be done while running the game).

Now that we have the setting defined, we need to decide where the actual game will be taking place. Since it is happening in our world, I could use an existing city. Alternately, I could create a town or city from whole cloth and use that. I think I will go for the latter option - a fictional town.

Let’s call it Gryffendell. Sounds occultish and mysterious. Where is the town located? To make my life easier (mainly because I know a lot more about Canada and the US than I do the UK), let’s make the town be somewhere in North America. Hmm. I think we need to be more specific. Let’s go with somewhere in the US. Massachusetts works. After all, that’s where the Salem witch trials happened. Gryffendell, MA. Sounds good.

There, I’ve set up the basic setting for the game, set the mood, and done the basic groundwork for the game.

Next I’ll need to come up with the basis of the first set of adventures. At this point, it can simply be a basic outline of what’s going to happen. One of my favorite things to do is to take a story from the genre and modify it to fit the game. For this pbem game I’d do a bit of research and find a horror story that can easily be modified to suit the player characters I will eventually be running a game for.

At this point I may need to decide if I want all the characters to be of a specific type (such as monster hunters, government agents investigating the supernatural) or a bunch of strangers drawn together by circumstance. That could really depend on the story that I choose, and will be addressed later, when I go to look for players.

I’m also going to have to decide if I want the game to go beyond this one adventure, or if I want it to be an ongoing game. If it’s to be an ongoing game, I’ll need to come up with a couple of adventure ideas. They don’t all have to be fleshed out now, as a lot of it will depend upon the PC’s that you get. The players are often the best source of adventure seeds a GM can find.

Also, if I want the game to continue, I probably ought to come up with at least a basic map and description of the town of Gryffendell. A basic rule of thumb is the longer you want the game to run, the more details you’re going to need. But don’t think you have to do it all now, before the game starts. Jot down a few notes, and then as the game progresses you can come up with stuff as you prepare your scenarios, or as you need it (when the PC’s say they want to go to the Puce Pagoda Chinese Restaurant and Laundromat).

Now, on to the next two questions.

What game system are you going to use?

Because of the setting, there are any number of game systems that I can use. At this point it really becomes whatever the GM is most comfortable with. For me, it’s the Hero System, so this pbem game will be done using Hero System mechanics.

What kind of game are you going to run?

I have found that the most successful games I have run and played in have been “rules transparent”. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the term, it means that “rulespeak” (that is, game mechanics) are rarely, if ever, mentioned during game play. The game really looks (and feels for the players) very much like a freeform game, but there are rules for how success and failure are determined.

In a rules transparent game, once the character sheets are created, the GM takes care of all the rules - all the dice rolling and so on. There are times, however, where rulespeak does happen, and it is usually done OOC (Out of Character). For example, when a player states a specific skill they are trying to use (i.e. Can Joe use his Electronics skill to figure out how that lock works?), or when it comes time to spend experience points (i.e. I’ll spend two xp’s to increase my knowledge skill of Things I Should Run and Hide From).

Since I have had good results with this kind of game, that is how I will run it.

I will also need to figure out how many turns per week I’d like to try and do. This is really based upon how much time you think you will have for the game. I know would probably be able to put out at least one move per week for the game. However, this can really slow a game down if only two or three players are posting. A way around that is to have me post a compiled move to the game list, then have the players email each other (and me) with their reactions. I will then (at least once a week), compile what the players have done, add in stuff, then put that move out and start the process again.

I am using this method with all my pbem games right now, and it seems to be working. Some of the games are still slow, but they could be a *lot* slower if we had to wait for me to do everything once a week.

Next month I will look at how I plan to get the information to my potential players, and how I will run the game?

Popularity: 74% [?]

by Lisa Hartjes

Originally published June 2001, at The RPG Times Vol. 6, Iss. 6.

Greetings! By the time you read this, another summer has arrived. University students are home from school and relaxing (or working at summer jobs so they can afford to go to school in the fall), high school students are getting ready for their summer holidays or work and/or play.

So, what does this have to do with pbem games? Not a heck of a lot, really, at least not for high school students. For university students, it can make the difference between playing during the summer with the group you game with during the school year, or living in a gameless wasteland until classes start up again.

This article may be a bit late to help anyone out who may be facing a summer without a regular gaming fix, but it could help you prepare for the coming year, and even next summer.

I recently joined a mailing list, started up by a friend of mine, for people who GM (or want to learn how to GM) play by email games. There have been some interesting discussions, and I asked if anyone would be interested in a series of articles where I went step by step through the creation of a pbem game, from the inception of the idea to where I put out a call for players.

I guess you can say the response w
as positive, because here is the first in that series of articles. I’m not sure exactly how many articles the series will be, but it will be at least four (two topics per article). To show you that I know what I’m talking about <grin>, I will be following the checklist that I presented to you in the March 2000 issue of my column. As a reminder, here is that checklist again:

The Starting PbeM GM’s List

1. How much time and effort are you willing to, or will be able to, put into the game?
2. What setting are you planning on using?
3. What game system are you going to use?
4. What type of game are you going to run?
5. How are you going to get the information to your players (potential or otherwise)?
6. How are you going to run the game?
7. How are you going to find players for your game?
8. How are you going to deal with problems in the future?

If you want to learn more about each of these items, please visit the RPG Times archives.

Now, on with the process of creating a pbem game!

How much time and effort are you willing to, or will be able to, put into the game?

Well, I’m not sure if this game will actually get off the ground, as it is being created as an exercise and example, but I would have to say I’d need at least three or four hours per week, once the game is running, to devote to the game.

This time would be spent doing things like answering questions from the players, posting the moves, doing web page updates, doing up character sheets for the NPC’s, and other general move related stuff, like maps for encounters, and so on.

The actual amount of time will, of course, vary. Weeks that I do the web page updates will take up more time, but there are things that can be done to make that easier, and those will be discussed in a later article.

But the most important thing is how much time will I have to put into creating the background for the game. The more that can be done ahead of time, the less will have to be done during actual game play. As I have said before, and will say again and again, the more effort you put into the start-up of the game, the better it will be for everyone.

What setting are you planning on using?

Let’s see. What setting to use. Let’s try something different this time. I am already running two superpowered games and a fantasy game, so what else is there. Hmmm? How about horror and/or the occult?

Now, what setting to use? It is this decision that can make a big difference on how much time I’ll have to spend doing background work for my campaign world.

White Wolf’s World of Darkness™ exists, but I don’t really like to use a “canned” world, so I think I will use a world of my own. How about a world just like our own, but with one difference - the monsters of myth, legend and our nightmares do exist.

Actually, when you really think about it, most of the game world settings out there now for horror games do use our world - with a few changes - as the basis for their games. It’s easier to create a feeling of horror when you present a world that the players know (or that their characters think they know), then hit them with the nasties.

So, now that I have chosen the setting, what will I need to do to get the setting ready for the game? Time for another checklist! <grin>

1. Create an outline of the game world.
2. Decide where the game is going to take place.
3. Do any research and/or creation required to get the world ready to be populated.

If I were using a published setting, like the World of Darkness™, a lot of the work that I’d be doing would be taken care of. All I would really need to do is decide on what books I would be using, and any changes that I would be making, if any, to the published info. Since I’m not, there is some work that I have to do.

For a bare-bones (if you’ll pardon the pun) description of the game world, we could describe it as I did above - our world where the monsters of our myths, legends and nightmares are real. Now there are some more questions we need to ask ourselves:

1. How did it come to be that way?
2. What kinds of monsters are out there?
3. Who knows about what’s going on, and what are they doing about it?

These three basic questions are very important, as it will provide the feel for the game. It will also provide your players with the ever so important background to create their characters. It will tell them where their characters fit in, provide them with motivations, and draw the players into the game. If the players don’t care, their characters won’t care, and the game will fail.

Next month, I will show you the results of the questions I have asked above, then discuss what game system might best be used, and the type of game that I would run (if I was going to run the game).

Popularity: 65% [?]

by Lise Mendel

It’s one of those ideas that kept coming back to me, for years, every time I wrote up a new PC, or one of my PCs had a sexual encounter. Wouldn’t it be interesting if she’s pregnant? Eventually, I went ahead and ran with it…

My own experience with a pregnant PC

First, some background. Matrix was a Champions character. I had introduced her to the group as a villain "plant" in Nightwatch, the DC based superhero team. She was secretly the lover of a powerful supervillain, but had psych lims that guaranteed she’d become a heroine once confronted with the heroes basic goodness. Unfortunately, she’d joined at a time when the group was distinctly "dark", so she helped foil the villain, but didn’t join up. She did turn herself in to the authorities, however.

Eventually she escaped from prison to avenge her sister’s death, one of the events which led to the formation of the Golden Gate Guard. That one worked much better from a character POV, but I quit the campaign because it wasn’t working for me as a player. She went into retirement.

The GM asked me to bring her back as an NPC for a one shot. We decided that she’d have a rapprochment with the supervillain, which did some odd things to the character development, but made a certain twisted sense. This was the run where she was really won over by the PCs, but, of course, they’d never trust her now, even though she broke them out of the death-trap…

At the same time, Saffyre, another PC in the campaign had retired some time before - she’d just left the team with a terse note about going home. Her player hadn’t liked the chemistry of that particular PC in the group, even though she really liked the character. The player told me she thought it made sense if Saffyre had gotten pregnant.

That conversation crystallized my feelings about what was going on with Matrix. She’d gone through a lot of changes, sort of wobbled back and forth, but now she was in a position where she had to grow up.

So we talked the GM into opening up yet another campaign. Saffyre was about six months pregnant when it started, and Matrix, who changed her hero persona to Rumor, had just confirmed her pregnancy. They had both done a lot of travelling and ended up in Montreal, Quebec and, with three other (non-pregnant) characters formed the Northern Lights.

This campaign worked very, very well. Saffyre and Rumor gave each other a lot of support throughout the pregnancies, and were both willing and able to overcome the objections of the rest of the team to pregnant women adventuring. They also helped each other set up day-care situations. The Northern Lights are one of the few superhero teams I’ve gamed that ended up acting like a warm and loving family, and I think the fact that the campaign was designed around two pregnant team members is one of the reasons why.

Things to Consider Before you Begin

Whether you’re the player or GM, introducing pregnancy into a campaign is going to change things, and should be carefully thought out.

If you’re the player, your GM may resist the idea, especially (but not only) if the GM is male. There are several reasons for this:

• First of all, men are typically less interested in pregnancy and childbirth/childcare/children than women are. He may be afraid that they will make the campaign unplayable.
• Second, most male GMs have heard of men using situations like this to make life difficult for female players, and may be really confused that you want to be "harassed".
• Third, he may be willing and interested, and not feel competant to run it with a campaign appropriate degree of realism.

If you’re the GM and you determine that a particular PC should be pregnant, consider the following:

• Long term playability - will a baby really fit into the continuing campaign? If your game world is one with adventures spaced widely apart in time, and the PCs have a rich and developed "life" when not adventuring then it’s a better bet than if they’re a bunch of inveterate dungeon crawlers. On the other hand, if the player wants to retire the PC it might be a good excuse.
• Is the player going to enjoy it? In real life, an unwanted (not necessarily the same thing as unplanned or surprise) pregnancy is one of the worst things that can happen to a woman. I’d really recommend talking it over with the player before springing it on the character. You may be surprised at how much of this response may spill over from the character to the player, whether that player is male or female.
• Can you give the pregnancy enough attention not to be silly, and not so much as to bore the other players?

Once you’ve decided you’re going through with it, and have a handle on some ongoing campaign questions, it’s time to look at some elements of pregnancy that may be of particular significance. Which ones you want to play up or down will depend on the game system and campaign tone.

Realism Level

I tried to write this with a fair degree of realism and accuracy, simply because it’s easier to gloss over technical details than to manufacture them from scratch. Use whatever seems useful for the game you’re in, and let me know what you find useful/interesting.

Technicalities - Getting Pregnant

The "average" woman has a 28 day cycle - that’s from the first day of her period to the first day of the next. When pregnancies are dated by the medical profession they date from "LMP" - that’s last menstrual period. Ovulation in the "typical" woman happens on day 14. The fertile period is on (I believe) days 11-14. This can vary a lot — I tend to conceive on about day 18 of a 31 day cycle.

Not every sexual act, even during the fertile period, results in a pregnancy. Women average one anovulatory cycle (period, but no ovulation) per year. Something like 1/3 of all conceptions simply fail to implant.

If in doubt, remember that medical professionals don’t consider fertility problems unless a couple has been trying to conceive for a year. On the other hand, it may only take one time. Let plot line, rather than calandar, define if the character gets pregnant.

"The Rabbit Died"

One of the potentially dramatic moments offered by the pregnant PC is the initial recognition of the fact that she’s pregnant. The discovery is likely to be very different for an interplanetary explorer, an elven mage and an intrepid reporter intent on exposing the minions of Cthulhu.

So what are the earliest signs of a pregnancy? Some of them are obvious, some might surprise the "uninitiated":

Your period is late:

Missing one is easy to spot, and an immediate attention getter if you’re one of those women who is "like clockwork". Many of us aren’t that regular. Other things can cause a skipped period, besides pregnancy - nervousness and stress come immediately to mind here. It’s not that unusual for a woman to miss her period after her first sexual encounter because she’s so worried about getting pregnant.

It’s also not unheard of for pregnant to have some bleeding when their period is due throughout the pregnancy. It’s generally a lighter flow than her normal period, but that’s not necessarily a big giveaway.

In other words, absence of the period is a clue, often a big one, but it’s not guaranteed to mean something either way. That’s one of the reasons women had such a hard time being sure before modern pregnancy testing - which can confirm pregnancy often as early as the day of the period.

You feel like you’re about to have a period:

I’m not kidding. It’s a classic description of early pregnancy symptoms. Body aches, uterine aches, tender nipples, mood swings… So early pregnancy is a lot like PMS.

It’s not all that surprising, really, when you consider that your body prepares for pregnancy every month. PMS typically takes place during the week before your period is due, when the ovum is implanted in the uterine lining. If it’s an embryo rather than an ovum, the body doesn’t shed the uterine lining, and and the prepatory hormones continue to be pumped into the body.

Vivid Dreams:

These might start vary early in the pregnancy, or perhaps not until later. Pregnant dreams tend to have a strange, very realistic quality to them, often they’re "lucid", and they sometimes seem to have a prophetic quality to them. They can be enchanting or disturbing, or a surreal combination thereof.

Faintness or weakness:

There was a time when the "classic" first pregnancy symptom was an unexplained fainting spell. It’s a really nice touch for a pulp campaign. Tiredness and fatigue are actually very common early on.

You have to make frequent rest stops:

Ignore this one unless your campaign occasionally makes mention of such things. I included it for completeness. It may be included for comic relief, as well.

Nausea and vomiting

These don’t usually start until around the time the second period are missed. They can be mild or severe, and some women never get them at all. Morning sickness has a somewhat distinctive quality in that it hits hardest if you’re hungry, and that once you empty your stomach you immediately feel better.

One interesting fact for the realist. There’s a strong statistical link between morning sickness and pregnancy loss — the more severe your morning sickness, the less likely you are to have a miscarriage. Presumably, if you have enough raging hormones to make you feel sick, you have enough to support a successful pregnancy.

Food aversions often come along with nausea. You may find yourself steering away from sweet foods, alcohol, or other (usually unhealthy) foods. They just taste wrong, even if they used to be favorites.

Strange Cravings:

These usually start a day or two after the nausea. They begin as an image of a food you think you can get down or keep down. You try it and your nausea vanishes like magic; pretty soon you want it all the time. Often it’s a food you haven’t had in a long time.

I’ve never run into anyone who needed the proverbial "pickles and icecream". Women I’ve talked to usually want a specific vegetable - baked potato, broccoli, leek, and fried zuccini all come to mind. The strangest one I’ve actually encountered was my needing spicy food during my second pregnancy. It’s pretty strange when you’re feeling sick and a bowl of hot and sour soup settles your stomach.

Of course, cravings for really strange and rare things make much better plot hooks. Keep your eyes open and be creative.

Movement:

By about halfway through the pregnancy you start to feel some little fluttery movements and tummy squiggles. Even in the most medically limited society, by this point the pregnancy will be recognized

Living with Pregnancy

The above symptoms continue past the original discovery of pregnancy, eventually many fade and are replaced by others, but some continue throughout the pregnancy. In addition, by about 4 months in a first pregnancy, earlier in subsequent ones, the physical changes will start to become obvious, clothes will have to be altered, etc.

Now that the character knows she’s pregnant, how will she, the adventuring party, and the game world deal with it? Will she try to hide it or flaunt it? Will her party try to force her to retire, make every effort to protect and coddle her, or ignore her condition and act like nothing’s changed? Will she be shunned in society or sought out by other pregnant women and mothers? Obviously, this is one of those things that’s going to be different from world to world and game to game, and depend a lot on the status of the character herself. The only constant being that she won’t be able to ignore or forget it.

Adventuring while pregnant

There are lots of pregnancy inspired plotlines to play around with. For example, take a look at the early pregnancy symptoms above and ask yourself "what if the Call of Cthulhu girl-reporter…" — would she realize she was pregnant, or be afraid of some sort of supernatural attack? What about the rest of the party? And how about the telepath? At what point will she be able to ‘talk’ to the baby, and what will it say?

Effects of Adventuring on Pregnancy

Sorry, no real personal experience to chip in, here. But I know that it takes serious damage to the mother in order to endanger the fetus — I was assured after a winter of ice sheets and frequent falls that I’d have to be injured enough to be hospitalized in order to damage the baby.

A lot of pregnant women continue to excercise throughout pregnancy. I worked with a woman who continued her twice weekly aerobics, and another who swum for an hour each day. I’ve heard of women who continue to ride horses, hike, and do just about everything except jogging. I’ve even heard mention of a woman in the SCA who continued to fight while pregnant, but that’s a third or fourth hand story and I can’t confirm it (anyone out there know?)

So, if your character has a compelling reason to adventure, pregnancy in and of itself isn’t necessarily going to make her stop….

Effects of Pregnancy on Adventuring

There are lots of ways that being pregnant can affect adventuring. Here are a few off the top of my head, remember that they will vary in extent — each pregnancy is different:

Balance:

Obviously, when your center of gravity shifts, your balance is going to change. The baby growing is going to shift your c.o.g., and the baby moving around is going to make it doubly hard to compensate for. Yes, the baby can move that much. This can be a real problem for the more acrobatic characters.

Stamina:

It decreases, in part because sleep tends to decrease. It’s better in the second trimester than the first, but decreases again in the third. This can affect everybody.

Memory & Concentration:

Not an old wives tale, rather, it’s a midwives tale. Also known a "placenta brain". It’s probably due to a combination of a lack of sleep and hormones. It’s not necessarily worst for the spell users or technically minded, you’re more likely to forget where you hung your hat than the components of your spell, but it’s a potential embarrasment to everyone.

Contractions:

Braxton Hicks, or "practice" contractions begin very early in the pregnancy, but are often too weak to feel until the fourth or fifth month. They start off as painless "tightenings" of the uterine wall, but by the third trimester they can pack a real surprise "ouchie". They’re a nuisance more than anything else, but can be a dangerous distraction at times (that’s why some doctors tell women not to drive a car in the third trimester.)

Mood Swings:

As mentioned above, being pregnant can be like having nine months of PMS. Yhis one is a problem for everyone. You go from feeling sentimental to vulnerable to euphoric to tears in a matter of minutes. And, of course, you might get very upset if people attribute all your emotional swings to the pregnancy; it starts to feel like no-one acknowledges you as a person aside from the condition….

Her Time Draws Near

The process, from last menstrual period to "due date" lasts 40 weeks. But the due date, in our current era, is a pretty vague time period. Anything from 2-3 weeks before to 2-3 weeks after the due date is considered "full term" and normal. The last weeks are full typically full of anxiousness and impatience, both from the mother and from all of her acquaintences… "Haven’t you had that baby yet?" is a frequent question to hear.

Add to this the fact that the Braxton Hicks are getting stronger and stronger, late term pregnancy is a constant expectancy that you’re going to "pop" any second now. Typically, the fatigue grows unbearable, and you just want the baby to get here.

And that’s about it for now. Watch for the a future article: Generic Birthing Tables!

updated November 22, 1996

Popularity: 68% [?]

Inspiration for this page came from a comment on rec.games.frp.misc about "what to do if you’re gaming and get a contraction". It occured to me that I have the experience to answer that one…

My first instinct was to say that it’s a non-issue. My knee jerk reaction is that being pregnant doesn’t mean an end to gaming, the idea is ridiculous! Inflammatory! Pregnant women can do everything! Isn’t this kind of thinking the beginnings of all sexism?! Yadda…yadda…yadda….

Then I remembered my own pregnancies, and how they really did influence my social life, gaming included. Here are some of the things I learned. This is not a definitive guide, just a few thoughts:

Throughout Pregnancy

You’re hormones are going nuts, in an absolute uproar. You’re going to be going through nine months of PMS. You’ve got to make sure you get enough rest, and eat enough nutritious food, both for your baby and for yourself. You’re going to have to re-think a lot of your priorities, both now and when your (first) baby comes.

For me, dropping gaming was never a good option. It’s too major a part of my social life, and too much of a creative outlet, to ever give it up. But I did have to cut back during parts of my pregnancies, just because of energy level considerations.

When you’re pregnant, it becomes an all-encompassing fact of life, and sometimes it’s hard to realize that other people aren’t totally possessed by your pregnancy the way you are. Gaming is one of those social situations where you’re likely to deal with individuals (mostly men) who are very uncomfortable with your pregnancy. It may seem to you that some gamers in your group are acting a little squirrelly around you. Odds are, they’re a little nervous about your condition, and, at the same time, afraid that some innocent remark of theirs may make you uncomfortable. Having pointed this out, all I can say is, you game with your friends, you should know the best way to defuse a situation like this.

Early Pregnancy

Don’t overschedule. Especially in the first and third trimesters you’re likely to be tired. I did a fair amount of gaming lying down on a sofa, and having my husband roll dice for me. You may not have time or energy for game planning, so be prepared to let other people run games for a while.

If you’re gaming in a group of mostly non-parents, they will have to be reminded that YOU get the seat closest to the bathroom. It’s your right, even if you’re lucky enough to avoid morning sickness, your kidneys will still be working overtime.

On a similar note, nobody but you is going to know how food affects you. If you always have pizza at games and now you can’t stand to look at it, suggest a switch. Bring along snacks you can eat — if you’ve got cravings, supply them. The first rule of pregnancy is _never_ let yourself get hungry. If that means gnoshing on leaks while everyone else is wolfing down chips and salsa, fine. Go for it!

Middle pregnancy

This is the fun part, at least it was for me. Energy levels go back up, nausea subsides, and you start to feel kicks! This is when people are probably going to start telling you you’ve got the "glow".

You’re likely to be showing, so fellow gamers are more likely to treat you as fragile, even though you’re feeling ready to take on the world. Try not to be offended when they seem over solicitous, remember, they’ve just put up with the first trimester. Just smile and offer to run a mini-campaign.

Late Pregnancy

You get tired again. Braxton Hicks Contractions get strong enough to hurt once in a while, as do the baby’s kicks.

Again, you may need to educate your fellow gamers. If you start to have BH contractions they may have panicked facts of having to deliver the baby then and there. I used to keep track of the contractions well before my due-date, and I’m sure that many of my fellow gamers found it distracting, I know my husband did…:->

Once again, you’re likely to be tired a lot. The difference is that now everyone who sees you expects you to be wiped — you’re carrying around a lot of extra weight and it’s completely visible.

What if you go into labor during a game

Hey! What a great story! "No shit, there we were…."

Seriously, avoiding games because you’re 38 weeks along and things might start any day now is pretty silly. Just make sure you keep your birthing bag packed and in the car, and you’re set.

Pre-labor cramps are intense enough to be distracting, but infrequent enough to give you a breather in between. In themselves they won’t prevent you from gaming (or doing almost anything else you want to do), but knowing that you’re getting close to giving birth may be way too distracting to get any gaming done, for you, your spouse, and the other gamers. If everyone’s willing to give it a try, there’s no harm in it

Thoughts about Pregnancy Complications

I was reasonably lucky - I was on bedrest for about 5 days throughout the two pregnancies due to premature contractions. It’s very, very hard to do, because you’re healthy, but you’re restricted to bed. Any mental activity is helpful as a sanity saver. This might be a good time to work on world design, or, if you’re up to it invite a few people to come over and game with you - just remember, you’re supposed to stay prone so don’t get up to play hostess.

Comments

White Crow suggests:

Make sure to only game at houses with AC. I didn’t have this problem quite as much as another gamer, but she overheated really easy. Never game in evenings, since you tend to get spacey. One problem I found was I couldn’t sit in soft backed chairs/couches without my back hurting, so I had to make sure that the gaming area had an appropriately stiff backed chair.

References

There’s really nothing special about pregnancy and gaming - you just have to realize that pregnancy affects every aspect of your life, your gaming included. For more information on how, you might want to check out misc.kids.pregnancy on usenet or some other pregnancy information.

And now… the pregnant player-character.

Popularity: 68% [?]

Stat Adjustments during Pregnancy

By Irina Rempt

Stats are on a scale from 3 to 12 (3D4). 12 is the *absolute* maximum; if raising a stat takes it higher than that, it stays at 12. When Constitution or Mental Fitness reaches 0 you’re dead, meaning that if you start with either stat irrecoverably at 2 (only possible if you’ve sustained *permanent* damage already) pregnancy is likely to kill you.

Adjustments are not cumulative (so your will-power doesn’t go up one more point each trimester; it goes up and stays up).

A value of 0 means no change. (obviously)

Stat	Trimester 1	Trimester 2	Trimester 3	Comments
Physical:
Strength	0	0	-1
Dexterity	-1	-2	3
Constitution	-1	0	-1 / -2	doubles as hit points; damage is carried over to Str, Dex and Spd, which can actually go below zero.
Speed	0	-1	-2
Size	0	+1	+2	if you’re a size 12 nobody is going to notice you’re pregnant anyway - Roseanne Barr is about size 11. Size is a combination of height and mass.
Comeliness	0	+1	+1	my husband says this ought to be +1/+2/+3 but he’s biased!
Mental:
Willpower	+1	+1	+1
Intelligence	N/A	N/A	N/A
Mental Fitness	-1	-2	-3	nerves getting more and more frazzled; doubles as mental hitpoints/power points/spell points
Speed	N/A	N/A	N/A
Education	N/A	N/A	N/A

As spell casting partly depends on Dex and causes damage to MF, it’s clear that it becomes more and more difficult over the months for pregnant mages to cast spells. That’s why Liessa is taking time off

You’re welcome to use this any way you like (in a game for instance, I’m curious to see how it works out).

Comments? Let Irina know.

Written May 31, 1996

Popularity: 62% [?]

!Letter Games Written by Lisa Tomihiro

Introduction

The Letter Game (also called Persona Letters or Ghost Letters) has been around a long time. Some writers use it to increase their ability to create realistic characters. Caroline Stevermer believes that it originated as an acting exercise, one character writting a letter “in persona” to another. I first discovered Letter Games when I read “Sorcery and Cecelia” by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer. The book was baised on a letter game they had played over the course of a summer. In the afterword they explained how the game worked and the rules. I was facinated and immediatly tried one with a close friend. We utilized regular mail, and e-mail. I discovered that having e-mail made the game go much faster (especially since we lived in seperate states). So the Letter Game transformed from actual letters to e-mails (sometimes written more than once a day), a sort of two person PBeM with no GM or with two GMs depending on how you looked at it. The letters tended to be long on characters and background and have much less of an overall plot. That’s actually how the game tends to work out. Read “How to Play” and you’ll se why.

How to Play

First you need two players (you can do more but two really works best). Either you can decide between the two of you what you want the setting/background to be or the person who writes the first letter can decide. It usually helps if both of you at least agree on a genra (fantasy, space, science fiction, spy stories, whatever). The person who writes the first letter is responsible for 4 things:

* They must begin to define the setting
* They must define their own character
* They must say/imply why the two characters must write letters rather than meet in person (or phone or whatever).
* They must say something about the interaction between the two characters (ie they can claim the other player as a sister, or they can just be sending mail to an unknown pen pal but some relationship needs to be defined).

The person who recieves the first letter is responsible for:

* Building on the setting
* Defining their own character

Both of you must develop an idea of what the plot is but you must never tell the other person your idea about the plot. This is why the letters can get long on gossip and short on plot. The fun part of not knowing what the other person is doing is that you can accidently help their plot along (or distroy it) with one of your letters.

Continuation

As the letter game progresses you both add more things about your character, the background, and the plot(s). Watching the background get built up and seeing the characters change (or just learning new things about them) is exciting. If your characters know each other you may discover your partner regailing you with things you did as a child that you didn’t even know about. This game requires two people who are very adaptable (both about the background, and their characters and especially the plot). It is very easy to throw something at someone and completely confuse them. In fact that’s part of the fun. It’s intresting to see how the other person will react, when you turn their fiancee into a dragon for example (I did that to my partner in the first game) or send six knights to rescue them from the war (that was my partners retaliation). It helps if one person has played before but it’s not necessary.

If anyone had additional questions or wants to ask how to write a good starting letter write to me at Tomihiro@aol.com. I’ve played in eight now (only four of them really got going) so at least I have experiance! (Originally posted June 1997)

Popularity: 100% [?]

Home

by Erol K. Bayburt

SETTING

Home is one of those backwater planets discovered (and named) by a bored survey scout. Neither especially rich nor particularly hostile, it is a typical example of those planets settled by splinter groups wishing to build their own version of the "perfect society".

In this case, the society is feminist. Janice Windsown, the First Matriarch, had seen several attempts to found feminist colonies go awry for one reason or another, and was determined to "see it done right". Three centuries ago, she landed on Home with a group of a thousand followers-all women. A year later, she wangled a shipment of 1500 male convicts and convinced the sector authorities to look the other way as they were made docile with a combination of neurosurgery and implants.

Over the next three hundred years, Windsown and her followers created one of the few successful human matriarchies. They developed the Home philosophy: Men are naturally stronger than women, but also naturally stupid and clumsy. They need to be kept under feminine supervision. Feminine traits such as gentleness, cooperation, subtlety, and verbal fluency are virtues. Masculine traits such as aggressiveness, competitiveness, and brute force were vices. Women, of course, are the higher form of human life. A division of labor between the sexes was established: women did the comfortable, high-status work requiring brains, and men did the dirty, low-status work requiring brawn. Medical technicians devised "contraceptive implants" for men that reduced their aggressiveness and sex drive as well as their fertility. They also developed fertility drugs that increased the natural surplus of male infants, and for the last few years women have been discreetly buying and selling the excess males, forming a "gigolo trading network".

To outsiders, the women of Home seem gentle, reasonable, sweet, and very feminine. The men seem given to bodybuilding, primping, and macho posturing. This often confuses those who expected an Amazon society. However, the women also have enormous self-confidence and are not at all submissive while the men are deferential toward women and generally convinced of feminine superiority. This confuses outsiders even more.

The government is a matriarchal representative democracy - only women can vote or hold office. The executive has the title of Matriarch and presides over a legislative council of twelve members known as the Coven. There is also a judicial branch - all female, of course.

Police forces use non-lethal weapons - mostly tanglers. Lethal long arms are reserved for extreme emergencies and for shooting dinosaurs. Lethal handguns are almost completely unknown (except in the startown). Men are allowed to use guns only under the supervision of women, and there is some debate as to whether men are capable of using guns with any degree of success. The overall Control Rating for Home is CR 2 if you’re a woman, and CR 4 if you’re a man.

Home has a population of 2,494,000 (PR 6) spread over three of the five continents. Kitchen has 80% of the population, including First Base (the starport) and Land-by-the-Sea (the capital). Den and Bedroom each have about 10% of the population, and the continents of Attic and Pantry are essentially uninhabited. There is also a mining colony on Treefort (population 6000; PR 3) which follows a milder version of the feminist Home philosophy. Finally, there are a number of miners in the asteroid belt who are officially under Home rule but who have as little to do with the matriarchy as possible.

Home has an agricultural economy, and is largely - but not entirely - self-sufficient. Metals are imported from the Treehouse colony and the asteroid belt, and specialty goods are imported from further away. Exports consist mostly of wineapple brandy and various perfumes and "aphrodisiacs" which sell more on the basis of Home’s reputation than on t heir intrinsic quality.

Native life on Home include various small and medium sized dinosaurs, and a lush variety of plant life, including the wineapple tree (actually a bush) and a number of plants used to produce the famous Home perfumes. The colonists, of course, brought a number of different domestic plants and animals.

Home has one moon: Doghouse, a large chunk of rock having negligible economic value. It does produce nice tides, however.

ADVENTURES ON HOME

Culture Shock: Just visiting the starport can provide interesting times for characters who don’t know what to expect. Male characters won’t be taken seriously, and tend to be laughed at if they act like they have any brains. If they get mad, they could quickly find themselves in trouble, even in the startown. Female characters can be kept busy getting their male colleagues out of trouble. Or a bright male PC could get the idea of disguising himself as a woman…

The Dryad: A male character with a high physical attractiveness accepts an invitation to a remote estate-and disappears. The estate’s owner may have decided to keep him, or he may have been sold into the gigolo network. Male PC’s who investigate will have to be careful, or they may suffer the same fate.

Safari: The characters are invited to a dinosaur hunt. Female characters are given rifles, but male characters are given knives and spears and told to make like Tarzan. Depending on the GM, this can either be played for laughs or as a serious test of the characters’ primitive weapons and survival skills.

Comments? Let Erol know.
Written January 1, 1997

Popularity: 64% [?]

*Cyjqim’s Manual (yes *man*-ual, it’s for you males) to Playing Female Characters*

by Lesslie Gibson

© 1997 by Lesslie Gibson. Originally posted on the champs-L mailing list, uploaded by permission.

Ok guys, I feel sorry for you, I’ll break the unofficial code of silence and explain:

Rule One: This is the "two out of three aint bad" rule. If you are totally clueless how a real woman functions, (and trust me unless you grew up with at least four sisters and/or are married you’re clueless) then play your character for, well, character. Concentrate on her nature as a human -pain, love, hate and taxes, are all pretty much universal. Focus on her career, a ‘Senior Sanitation Engineer’ faces much the same proffessional challenges whatever his/her/its gender. After you’ve mastered these elements of your character’s life if you foul up her nature as a woman at least you have a 2/3 valid person -which isn’t anything to sniff at.

Rule two: Don’t obsess on the female anatomy. A super powered woman would not say "keep leering at my breast that way and I’ll clean your clock". She’d clean his clock, and exlain why afterwords -if she felt like it (Admit it girls if we could we would.) We don’t stand around discussing breast, bras, or PMS unless we’re in groups of four or more and we’ve been consuming perception-altering substances like Beer or Pizza.

Rule Three: Don’t obsess on the *Male* characters either. I realize you may be playing with a bunch of self -designed and designated love gods, but trust me you’re character won’t think so. (Unless she’s been mind wiped and taken over by an invading alien).

Rule Four: If your worried about authentic female character play then. . . *Recruit *Recruit *Recruit!!* Having an actual female around will do more to improve the quality of your female character’s play than any book could. Move the frequency of your showers from seasonal to once a week, :), and start looking for female members to join your gaming group. Hang out in book stores and watch for women buying -oh say, Bradley, McCaffery, or (heaven help you) Cherryh. When you find one, strike up a conversation as a fellow reader (and you better be or she’ll see through you in a nanosecond). When she figures out you’re trying to invite her to gaming if she does’t start to walk away -you’re golden. If she does walk, falling on your knees and begging will probably work at least once. It might even help if you tell her I sent you . . . there *is* a conspiracy you know.

-Cyjqim

Comments? Let Lesslie know.
Written January 1, 1997

Popularity: 60% [?]

Having children changes a lot of our life, including our gaming activities. Since starting W.I.G. I’ve gotten a lot of e-mail which says, in effect, "I used to game a lot, but then the kids came along…"

On the other hand, many members of W.I.G. have children and manage (one way or the other) to continue to game. We have decided it’s one part of our social life we don’t wish to give up.

Here are some of our solutions to the problem, with pros and cons.

What to Do with the Kids While Gaming

Updated May 7, 1997

Popularity: 57% [?]