Bad Romance
My sincere thanks to KC Green for giving us the term magical realm. In addition to introducing us to that lovable scamp the Whizzard, KC’s lovely little asparagus-scented comic has given us a handy short-hand for talking about that most difficult of TRPG subjects: sexuality in gaming.
We touched on the idea way back in Fade to Black, but the advice remains the same. If you’re thinking about bringing your (very) personal preferences to the table, you should think long and hard indeed. Your ‘magical realm’ is in fact full of peril.
While researching for this post, I dared to crack open the pages of that running-gag of a source book, the infamous Book of Erotic Fantasy. As it turns out, the adage about books and covers was spot on. I was surprised to discover a fairly mature tome of titillating tabletoppery, including some rather pertinent advice in the intro:
Generally, there is no need to describe a sex act in detail anymore then there is a need to describe the swing of the sword and the angle at which it strikes the opponent… If you and your players have decided that spelling out sexual acts in the game is cool, then do so with as much or as little description as you want. (6-7)
It’s that second line that really struck me, mostly because I’ve heard the same sentiment repeated elsewhere. The question of mature subject matter in RPGs recently came up in my academic work, and I was fortunate enough to get former Paizo developer Liz Courts’s take on the subject:
The decision whether or not to include certain topics, (such as sexual violence, violence against children, bigotry, or racism) in their games is something that is best left in the hands of the GM and their group. *Every* group should cover what they are comfortable with at the table, before books are opened up, before character sheets are readied, before the dice are warmed up, and it should be approached without judgement or shame. (Courts)
What’s interesting to me about this sentiment is that it isn’t the job of the developer, the module writer, or anybody else outside of the room to decide what’s OK at the gaming table. That is the job of the group. It’s the job of the GM and the players. And even if it feels uncomfortable or unnecessary, it’s still a job worth doing.
In that sense, Wizard’s bout of TMI in today’s comic isn’t a bad thing in and of itself. However, he probably should have asked Cleric about his preferences before sitting down at the table. As The Book of Erotic Fantasy says, “Once the topic of sex comes up in a game, it can quickly, if left unchecked, turn into a sophomoric joke, with bawdy humor, crude references, and otherwise inappropriate behavior resulting.” However, says the book, “There’s nothing wrong with this.” In other words, it all depends on the comfort level of the table.
What a sage source of advice The Book of Erotic Fantasy turned out to be! Funny old world, innit?
Question of the day then: How far is “too far” at your table? Are you a strictly “fade to black” group, or does your table enjoy the occasional bout of “bawdy humor and crude references?” Let’s hear it in the comments!
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Depends on the group. Anything past kissing gets a fade to black at any of my tables or groups, but even what can be implied is different from group to group.
For example, a friend and I once played as characters who are sisters. At one point I had my character give her sister a kiss on the cheek, which was innocuous enough. However, jokes about them being “kissing sisters” started, which we played along with because it seemed amusing. However, that crossed a line for some other players, even though absolutely no sort of sexual act was described.
Being mature and reasonable adults, we spoke in private and promised not to imply such a thing again. My goal was fun, not to make my friends uncomfortable. However, I should have checked with the group before making a character that could be construed in such a way, not after. Lesson learned.
I think the “we’re all mature adults” thing is the problem underlying this whole issue. You naturally assume that, as good friends and mature adults, everyone at the table is fine with the same level of MATURE THEMES. It only becomes an issue when it becomes an issue. Bringing it up ahead of game time feels unnecessary (and usually is!). However, it’s also matter of good policy.
We had a character-character romance at one point, but for the vast majority of the time the players involved and the table stuck to the non-sexual parts.
The only time it was even mentioned was when one of the involved players got a hold of and tried to tame some owlbear… younglings (cubs? chicks?). We had a hilarious scene where the owlbear chicks barged into the bedroom and interrupted some together time. Even then, the actual acts were spoken of entirely in generalities. So I guess our group is relatively prudish to a point. Romance is a generally accepted thing and is easy to bring up in a game, and even make a key part of many plots, but any actual acts should be Boots-Off-Fade-To-Black.
My character’s turnoffs include: necromancy, excessive halfling foot hair, owlbear chicks…
We throw in some Charisma checks for the Swashbuckler every so often, and tease the paladin in character about the Aasimar he’s crushing on, and the Swashbuckler gives vague advice about how to score a hookup. Other than that, the current group is pretty adult about the roleplay. The main interparty concern is the Wizard being suspicious of the Slayer that came in to replace the dude we booted.
And in that buddy cop game (that we may be returning to soon, crossin’ mah fingers) it’s too grim for any sort of foofah like that. We’re trying to stay alive and as uncorrupted as possible.
I do own the BoEF, though. For some characters like barbarians, rules for replacing items with piercings and such and such can be sort of fitting. It’s certainly not all bad, so long as it’s read with a grain of salt and context.
Lots of wordplay about sheaths and rapiers, eh? That is indeed what a swashbuckler is for.
I actually can’t speak to the BoEF’s mechanical quality. I haven’t delved too deeply into its slightly sticky pages. I was just surprised at the maturity of the intro material. Seemed to be a well-thought-out take on the subject matter.
Bawdy humor and references seems to go pretty well together with fade to black. As the humor is generally OOC. I have seen RPs go past the kissing barrier as seriously played out scenes, but never past second base. Mostly because it tends to get a bit weird. Unless you’re a pulp novelist, the average person isn’t the greatest at actually describing sexual acts in a way that isn’t either awkward or very silly sounding. Also importantly, past that second base line and so it’s also not actually informative of the characters at that point aside from maybe asking what sexual acts they chose to perform or not perform. But that’s more an OOC question than an in character roleplay when you say “this thing, this thing, and not those things, and also I’ve never heard of that last one so I don’t know?”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlD08Rh6xa8
So there’s a certain youtube video that I saw years ago. It’s about a tavern sex scene roleplay forum, where the actors are the furniture and the beer and they keep interrupting the one guy that wants to huddle mysteriously in his dark corner. I cannot find it and have been searching for it for some time.
I am reminded of it today, once again. Does anyone know how to snag ahold of it?
Well color me morbidly curious.
As regards to bringing personal preferences to the table does anybody other than me automatically suspect anybody who makes a halfling character or who includes halflings in an adventure of having a foot fetish. Halflings are totally the foot fetish race.
headcanon accepted
I recall there being a couple of discussions during the game I played in college about whether the spell “rainbow blast” was gay, whether Corellon Larethian was gay, and a sepeates discussion where “shemales” came up as a topic of conversation.
Gay pride sorcerer sounds hilarious. Color spray, rainbow blast, rainbow pattern, prismatic spray, prismatic sphere… Dude would be sassy AF.
For me, it varies a lot by the nature of the game, and who is playing, but the gold standard is the concept of the touchstone. Basically, when something makes someone uncomfortable, they invoke the touchstone, and we all drop it and move on. We try to remind everyone about it whenever things take a turn netherwards.
In your standard, serious sort of campaign play, we usually background romance and sex. It does come up, especially with flirtatious characters, but we usually just fade to black for anything that isn’t so much part of the story. Sometimes, though, it will be important, and we do roll with it, subject to the touchstone.
I was going to recount some of the anecdotes from where our crazy one-shots have sometimes ended up, but I realised that they don’t really bear repeating in anything approaching polite company.
Oh come on and dish! This isn’t polite company!
I’m guessing you’re referencing this sort of thing when you mention touchstones?
http://tinyurl.com/x-card-rpg
I‘ll leave it up to my co-players imagination what happens when my Catfolk Hunter goes out foraging with her Tiger companion.
Well there’s serendipity. I just saw a version of this joke while Googling around for geeky valentines today:
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/f4/3b/ba/f43bba6f717d77e364125284ffbcd36d–warcraft-funny-warcraft-.jpg
I imagine at some point Wizard gets tired of always having to play the shepherdess.
Our ranger managed to successfully woo a minor villain (drow lady who was working for the arc villain) despite having a charisma of 7. Technically, it was more the rest of the party offering to let her join them for heroics and being surprisingly effective at murdering her old superiors that swung it (she went along the wooing because she figured it might be an interesting change from sleeping with the villain, who was attractive but also constantly plotting to betray her because that’s what drow do).
Anyhoo, my group’s very much a “fade to black” group. I believe my exact words were “Let’s just say that she’s very good at what she does and leave it at that.” Of course, the reveal that she’s actually a doppelganger seems to have put a bit of a crimp in the relationship…
Yeah, the BoEF gets a bad rap, but there’s some good stuff in there. In particular, a lot of the races and monsters are actually really good. The Giantborn template is one of my all time favorites.
Fade to black. We’re here to kill monsters, defeat baddies and save the day: romance can take a backseat or a hike if someone complains.
Bad Romance -> Bromance Ad
Nice pun to it.