Erm... Why Trollbabe?

[jburneko]

Okay, no doubt there is some really subtle point about natural human social interactions that I'm missing here but... Why Trollbabe?  Let me explain.  Since having now bought and read Trollbabe I no longer understand why the restriction to female trollish characters.  I thought that some how Troll-Human relations would be far more integral to the Setting or recommended Situations but it turns out that adventures can be just about anything that fits a fairly classic fantasy setting.  I also thought there would be a lot more mechanics wise or even Setting wise wrapped up in being female.

But as it stands it seems fairly easy to divorce the restriction of being a Trollbabe from everything else in the game.  In short, I don't see why the game "breaks" (either mechanically or thematically) if everyone simply chooses to be any kind of pulpy fantasy type character of any gender or social standing.  With the exception of one nuance of the magic system and the generally accepted stigma that women are more relationship/socially oriented than men, I don't see why Troll or Babe is so central to being a PC.

Thoughts?

Jesse

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Jesse,

Not seein' it, huh? That's all right. I shall deliver that aggravating sphinxy smile and remain silent.

Best,
Ron

[jburneko]

Not seein' it, huh? That's all right. I shall deliver that aggravating sphinxy smile and remain silent.

ARG!  Ron, somtimes.... Gah!  Alright, Alright.  I'll print it out and read it again.  Slower this time.

Sigh.

Jesse

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Ron,

Not that I'm one to tell you your business, but this thread where you basically explain what Sorcerer's "about" is the best thread in the Adept Press forum, in my opinion. I've been playing Sorcerer for a while, and still I didn't get this until you said it.

A "Trollbabe for the thick-headed" thread would serve us all well, I think.

[Ron Edwards]

Hey Clinton,

What would that thread/topic say, in your view? Or to put it differently, do you have any interest in playing Trollbabe as written? If so, why?

Best,
Ron

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Ron - this is a great way to explore Trollbabe, as I'm completely certain my answer will be different than years.

--

To me, Trollbabe is to high fantasy what Sorcerer and Sword is to pulp fantasy. I may disdain all that Eddings and Jordan tripe now, but I read it once. Whenever this sort of writing is good, it's about a character that's caught in between worlds: a character that must make a decision about who she is and what her purpose in the world is.

That's layer 1 of Trollbabe, and probably the most superficial.

As for layer 2, Trollbabe can be considered a metaphor for the struggles of a strong independent woman in the modern world. A woman who takes on the traditional roles of a man in this world often gets caught in between the genders, with both genders treating her badly. (A powerful woman executive, for example, might be hated by her male inferiors for her threat to their sexual power, and hated by their wives for her potency in a male's world. The two sides will react differently - men might call her stupid or accuse her of sleeping her way to the position, while the women might think she "doesn't know her place" - if you don't think women talk this way, hang around one - or call her a slut and think she'll steal their husbands.)

Balancing the traditional male roles and traditional female roles in the modern world is hard: I know few women who have successfully done it. Usually, they have to make a decision as to what world to live in.

Layer 3 to Trollbabe:
Some will disagree with this, but in Narrativist play, I say that the characters are the center of the story, no questions asked. (I've been reading Gamemastering Secrets, and it has a whole section on how the characters aren't the center of the world. If they aren't, I ask what the fun in playing them is.)

In Trollbabe, the characters quite literally can be the center of the world. The conflicts they resolve can change the world. I see that as an extremely potent affirmation of what Narrativist role-playing is about.

--

Strangely, I have an interest in running Trollbabe as written, not playing it.

[jburneko]

What would that thread/topic say, in your view? Or to put it differently, do you have any interest in playing Trollbabe as written? If so, why?

Ah, Ron's gone into professor mode. :)  Yes, I have an interest in playing Trollbabe as written but they're extremely personal reasons having largely to do with the actual individuals I game with.

You see, in my weekend group women out number the men.  Among the players there are 4 women and 2 men, not counting me.  At least two of the women are tall, heavyish and ultra independent and have personal issues with being so.  I'd like to see to see what they do with a game where basically the characters are faced with exagerated metaphorical versons of those issues.  

The other two women in the group have empowerment issues.  One constantly feels out of place and socially inadequate having some what to do with gender identity.  The other other one has what I can only percieve as supressed anger issues.  She is most famous in our group for this exchange.

Her: "I want to kill everyone."
Someone Else: "Why does your character want to kill everyone?"
Her: "No, me, the player.  It has nothing to do with the character."

So I'd like to see what these two do when handed all the personal empowerment they want on a platter not only in terms of the character but the game itself.

At least one of the women in this group when told about Trollbabe said, "I'm not sure I'd enjoy that.  It would be too much like playing myself."

As for the males, well they have issues too but nothing that I feel Trollbabe would help them explore.  I'm more interested in seeing how the female players react to THEIR take on the tall empowered female.

Jesse

[jburneko]

Clinton,

We cross posted.  As for your points I agree to an extent and I saw all of that before I started this thread but there seemed to be something missing.

Point 3 I agree with in totallity.

Point 1 is what I *thought* Trollbabe was about before I even started reading it.  When I first heard of it I thought, "Ah, Ron does Werewolf, one better" but when I read it and saw that Trolls were just a tiny subset of the world and not even all that central.  I.E. the setting isn't composed of a central human/troll conflict then I thought well, there goes the stuck between two worlds idea.  So in my opinion the setting leaves a big hole for that angle.

As for Point 2, I would agree with you except that's where the SYSTEM falls apart and some of the setting.  Other than the VERBAL constraint that you can only be these female troll like beings what about the game makes it about empowered women?  What I'm looking for here is that if I took a total newbie put them in a room and told them to make any fantasy character they like and then played Trollbabe with them otherwise as written, what makes the game at that point either fall apart or at least have this newbie going, "You know, this game is cool and all but I wish I'd made a female troll character instead of this human male thief.  I think it work better that way."

With my cursory reading I go, "Wow, great Narrativist Fantasy Game.  But why this limit to Trollbabes?"

Edited Note: This is like saying, I want a gamist fantasy game that lets me address stealth and subtrafuge tactics.  Oh, I know, I'll just play D&D and restrict everyone to the Rogue Class.

I'm probably being overly stubborn and thick-headed.  But that's just what went through my head.

Jesse

[Jared A. Sorensen]

Games are created by setting up constraints.

In the realm of RPG's, where Character is Sacred, taking away the false-freedom of "you can play anything" is liberating and intriguing (to me).

I think in its most raw form, the constraint of "Thou shalt playeth nothing but a Babe who is also a Troll>" is a totally arbitrary decision on Ron's part. The fact that it's brilliant color (atypical fantasy character with a stron 70's aesthetic that matches Ron's psychdelic-colored Californian upbringing?) just sweetens the deal. You don't MIND having no say in what your character is because Trollbabes are cool.

I still don't dig playing chicks, but at least in Trollbabe, I have no choice.

[Yasha]

In his review of the original Star Wars movie, Samuel Delaney commented on the fact that the Rebel pilots who fly off to destroy the Death Star all seem to be white Midwestern farm boys.  He thought it was a shame, because it was just default American film casting.  It doesn't show anything interesting about the setting, because the viewer doesn't say: "How fascinating that in a far-off galaxy populated by all sorts of beings, all the Rebel fighter pilots are white American males!"  On the other hand, if all the pilots were Chinese women... this actually would present a fact about the setting and would make the audience curious.

In Trollbabe, the player character casting runs counter to the lazy defaults in our culture's action media: every last damn PC is a big, rough-and-tumble woman.  (With horns!)  We immediately notice the gender of the characters, much more than if the game was Trolldude, about big, horned warrior guys.  The game then becomes in part a game about gender, if only because our society makes it be about gender, and because Ron knows that our society makes it be about gender.  (I won't really know what Ron is saying in Trollbabe until I buy a copy.)

Yasha "James" Cunningham

[Eric]

In his review of the original Star Wars movie, Samuel Delaney commented on the fact that the Rebel pilots who fly off to destroy the Death Star all seem to be white Midwestern farm boys.  He thought it was a shame, because it was just default American film casting.  It doesn't show anything interesting about the setting, because the viewer doesn't say: "How fascinating that in a far-off galaxy populated by all sorts of beings, all the Rebel fighter pilots are white American males!"  On the other hand, if all the pilots were Chinese women... this actually would present a fact about the setting and would make the audience curious.
Yasha "James" Cunningham

Delany is good at that sort of insight.  At a con one time he pointed out that the most shocking movie you could have made in the 60s and 70s was one where a mixed race couple gets married, moves to the suburbs, and lives happily ever after.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

There's my answer (see all of the above posts).

Best,
Ron

[jburneko]

Hmmm... I think I was a bit cranky yesterday and didn't word what I was trying to say well enough.  I've understood from the beginning WHY playing a Trollbabe is cool and interesting.  The whole metaphore for the modern empowered woman walking between two "worlds" was never lost on me.

What WAS lost on me is the connection between that cool metaphore and EVERYTHING else in the game.  That is, if I tried to play the Trollbabe GAME without the constraint of the metaphore would I notice something was missing, even if I couldn't tell what that something was?

So, here's my attempt to answer my own question after a second reading and thinking about it more: Yes, I would notice something was missing and here's why.

Trollbabe is a Narrativist game right?  Okay, well that means it has to have a Premise.  The constraint (something I wasn't objecting to) of being a Trollbabe is the only thing that provides a Premise in the game.  Otherwise, it's just a set of interesting narrative but not Narrativist mechanics.  

Without the constraint of being a Trollbabe there is nothing to provide any meaning or relevance between characters.  It would just be a bunch of people wandering around the settting establishing (or failing to establish) to themselves among the people building up a network of what would amount to meaningless relationships.  At least meaningless BETWEEN players.  The game doesn't "break" exactly but it really would be a set of a disconnected unrelated stories being run simultaneously at one table.

In Sorcerer the cohesion I'm talking about is provided by the Humanity definition.  Sure you have all these diverse characters (in Sorcerer & Sword some might not even be "Sorcerers" per se) but they're all being judged in the same light: The Humanity definition.  

It's how I'm always explaining to people that one doesn't NEED an adventuring party for an RPG to work.  There are other things that can bind the group together other than location within the game world.  In Sorcerer that something is the Humanity definition.  In Trollbabe, it's well, it's the Trollbabes.

What *I* was looking for was simply an extention of that metaphore of the Trollbabe a little deeper into the mechanics or even the setting.  Such that the game really does malfunction and cease to make any sense AT ALL if the characters aren't Trollbabes.  I don't know, I think I was expecting something like seperate mechanics for whether a relationship was formed with a Troll or Human or whether that relationship was with a male or female.  Something like that.

But, perhaps that isn't necessary.

Jesse

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Jesse,

I don't think that kind of specificity is necessary, but I do think you might be underestimating the interactions of NPC humans and trolls in the setting. At least in my experience of play, if the differences and details among these "races" are injected into a play-situation (and bearing in mind that exceptional behavior exists among both), then the players will run with them with great enthusiasm, applying them to the "exceptional" role of the trollbabe characters.

In other words, think about the adventure-prep material recommends some element of troll-human conflict or cooperation. Then think about adventure to adventure, if Scale increases, how the outcomes of previous adventures may start to affect the setup of new ones.

Can you imagine a continent-spanning war with the sides representing different approaches to large-scale troll-human relations? Can you imagine the trollbabes playing pivotal rolls at the army/realm Scale of conflicts?

I can.

Best,
Ron

[Bankuei]

Funny enough, I've been doing a ton of personal reading into multi-ethnic upbringing, so the simple part of Trollbabes being seen as either friends/enemies of both sides, never being able to fit in totally clicked with me.  On the less serious level, it totally sets up the "I'm so outcast" thing that appeals to adolescents everywhere :P

Chris