Armies 'for girls'

[FramFramson]

Similar to the above, the wife and I both play Magic and have for twenty years and for many years it was our primary hobby, though we've slowed down quite a lot now and we're wargaming more than we're playing cards (by the way, I don't mean to keep playing some sort of brag card where I'm saying "Look! My wife plays games!", just that we get both perspectives in my home).

Female players there are on the rise too, albeit gradually. For a long time, women made up no more than 10% of the population of the game and now it's probably closer to 20% of the playing population. But female representation at tournaments - which are the real big events - is vastly lower, maybe around two percent. So while it is a male-dominated game, it appears to be far more so than it really is.

[The Gray Ghost]

My niece used to play zombie games

[Zaheer]

There probably aren't any armies 'for girls', and if there aren't any, then I don't think that's really the problem.

This too! i have already told my story regarding my girlfriend coming into my flgs with me in another thread

What's the story/where's the thread Nic-e?

My other half enjoys playing games, looking at miniatures, wants to learn to paint and really enjoys playing Discworld boardgames, but I'm fairly certain she would not enjoy most of the gaming groups I've been to, or game shops. Can't say that I have really to be honest, they tend to be pretty forbidding places, and if you're one of only a couple of women (or the only one) It can only be more so.

And there's a rather vociferous vote here against the chainmail bikini brigade...

[Ahistorian]

We have two girls in our regular gaming group, and while they both prefer roleplaying games, they will murder with a vengeance once they get the hang of a character in any wargame they're placed in.

If anything, they might be said to play "better" than us lads, because they take the part of the person in the game (and personally!) which leads to less metagaming and more KILL THEM! FOR CROM! FOR ODIN! FOR THE SHEER SATISFACTION!

[nic-e]

There probably aren't any armies 'for girls', and if there aren't any, then I don't think that's really the problem.
What's the story/where's the thread Nic-e?

My other half enjoys playing games, looking at miniatures, wants to learn to paint and really enjoys playing Discworld boardgames, but I'm fairly certain she would not enjoy most of the gaming groups I've been to, or game shops. Can't say that I have really to be honest, they tend to be pretty forbidding places, and if you're one of only a couple of women (or the only one) It can only be more so.

And there's a rather vociferous vote here against the chainmail bikini brigade...

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=68770.15

I would recount it here for you, but it would be cross thread double posting, and would be no fun for anyone

[Hatemonger]

I agree with everything said thusfar, which is to say, it's all true... at least to some degree.

Boys and girls are biologically different... but probably not enough to matter.
The different things society teaches girls impacts their interests... except when it doesn't.
Girls don't like to play the same way boys do... except the ones that do.

The most relevant thing, I think, is that in the end it comes down to the individual, and therefore: yes, you are asking the wrong question. Instead of asking about good armies "for girls", you need to find good armies "for Sarah and Danielle". Even moreso, you need to think about how they want to play; that means figuring out which game(s) might interest them, not just which factions. Think about the diversity of interests here on LAF. You're not going to sell me on 54mm Napoleonics, and it's not because I have anything against Prussians. There are plenty of people who hate silly-kiddie-Warhammer, and lots of others that would never touch stuffy-boring-WRG. (You can continue on here, with your own preferences and prejudices.) My point is this: will an army of Amazons and ponies will make the difference in whether or not they like playing Hail Caesar? Maybe, but maybe not.

A while ago, I wanted to diversify my gaming a bit, so I went through the LAF forums and thought about which bits interested me. I had a buddy of mine do the same thing, and then narrowed down the things that overlapped. There's a very good cross-section of wargaming represented here, even if it's not all equally popular, so if there's anything they'd possibly like in the wide world of wargames, you should be able to find it mentioned here somewhere.

So, maybe that's a good place to start?

- H8

[Germy]

It's hard work but I'm slowly corrupting my girls  


But I agree with some of what has been said. I spend most of my time fighting against the stereotypes imposed on them at every turn.
My girls like Steam Trains, Knights, Castles, Dragons and Stompy Robots. But they also like pretty dresses and being princesses.

I read something recently saying if their role models break the gender stereotypes they grow up with a more open approach to what they themselves are into.  
They refer to my wargaming as Daddy's nerdy stuff and love to see what I'm up to. Long may it continue 

[Ray Rivers]

My wife refers to my minis as "your little monsters." 

[audrey]

I think others have covered the topic rather well. I will chime in with my own view, which I think does echo some previous statements.

For myself the question isn't what army appeals to me, it is what game or better yet, how the game is presented. A straight up engagement battle of two armies doesn't usually interest me. But a story/reason/objective to it and the game can be that much more interesting. My favorite type of game is what I call adventure gaming. Think IHMN, Inquisitor, Super System, Fantastic Worlds, etc. Typically skirmish so you can get more personal with your force. Also there usually is an objective beside wiping out the opposing force(s) and the game is it's own story. Men are drawn to the visual, women like to have a connection .

Granted I have been working on a 6mm 30k heresy era army. Which seems to go against what I mentioned above. But what even drew me to the project was reading the first four Horus Heresy novels. What was going on in the background with the main characters, what led to Horus' fall. How everything lined up leading to the battle of Istvaan III. How Saul Tarvitz, Garviel Loken and Tarik Torgaddon defied the traitors, not willing to sacrifice their beliefs and willing to die to delay Horus so word could reach the Emperor.

Other factors related but I won't go into are how guys act in groups, gaming stores, cheese cake female figures. Granted over all things have gotten a lot better with the embracing of geek culture.

[shandy]

Sorry for being late to this interesting discussion - the topic is dear to my heart as my girlfriend is a war gamer. And a very good one, she beats me regularly, she plays much more aggressively than me. Also, she likes SAGA 'because of the brutality', as she said, so I don't think girls are per se more peaceful. However, she does like to have figures she can relate to, and that brings me to a question I have been thinking about a lot recently:

Why do historical figure manufacturers produce so little female warriors? There have been quite a lot of them in history, but 1. they are not covered by most mainstream military history and 2. they are not done as wargaming figures. You might find a figure of Joan of Arc or Boudica, but what about the female elite archers used by the Moors in 11th century Spain? How many SAGA Viking warbands contain female warriors? There were some very fascinating articles on this subject in one of the last issues of Medieval Warfare, and since than I have done some research on others.

Anyway, I think it would be great if figure manufacturers would acknowledge the role of women (leaders as well as rank-and-file) on historical battlefields (and also produce female figures that have realistic proportions and armor, my girlfriend has no interest in all those half naked 'Amazon' or whatever figures around).

Cheers,
Shandy

[Conquistador]

<snip>

Why do historical figure manufacturers produce so little female warriors? There have been quite a lot of them in history, but 1. they are not covered by most mainstream military history and 2. they are not done as wargaming figures. You might find a figure of Joan of Arc or Boudica, but what about the female elite archers used by the Moors in 11th century Spain? How many SAGA Viking warbands contain female warriors? There were some very fascinating articles on this subject in one of the last issues of Medieval Warfare, and since than I have done some research on others.

Anyway, I think it would be great if figure manufacturers would acknowledge the role of women (leaders as well as rank-and-file) on historical battlefields (and also produce female figures that have realistic proportions and armor, my girlfriend has no interest in all those half naked 'Amazon' or whatever figures around).

Cheers,
Shandy

I think it depends on the historical army and even more so on the perception of the historical army.  Some armies lend themselves to inclusion of female warriors where other executed women who infiltrated disguised as men.

Many armies quietly ignored individual women disguised as men if they were perceived as 'contributing' to the battle either fighting or supplying soldiers with "non-essentials" like alcohol, tobacco, food, or first aid (or a officer's... 'favorite',) but I would like to know how most table top armies bigger than squads/platoons would represent units of women in battle as opposed to disguised or openly female individual warriors.  at a 1:10 or more ratio how many armies seriously had significantly larger than bodyguards units of women warriors historically?  Some yes, but how common was it?

This would be especially important for battle scenarios rather than skirmish level forces.

And disguised females should look like men since they are in disguise, right?

Cantinières and Vivandières of the French Army and others - see above - are a completely different situation and would be single figure stands/bases.

Gracias,

Glenn

[Bravo Six]

although she seldom plays, she frequently buys and paints tyranids, eldar, Necrons, Lizardmen and keeps trying to filch my Quar.

Xander, you lucky bugger.

Maybe we should ask THIS girl what she thinks: http://www.youtube.com/user/thatterigirl

-Todd

[6milPhil]

I think the sticking point is rules and style of games over girls don't want to wargame.

I agree, my domestic goddess plays and would rather play sci-fi or fantasy than historical.

[shandy]

I think it depends on the historical army and even more so on the perception of the historical army.  Some armies lend themselves to inclusion of female warriors where other executed women who infiltrated disguised as men.

[...]

This would be especially important for battle scenarios rather than skirmish level forces.

And disguised females should look like men since they are in disguise, right?

I don't want to hijack the thread, so just a short answer: You are right, it depends whom you want to portrait and at what level. I think there are three principal possibilities: 1. Leaders (Joan of Arc, Boudicca, Joanne the Flame etc.) - those are the easiest, just include them in the command stand. 2. Individual fighters or units. That depends, as you say, on the scale. I'm not saying that every army should include a female contingent, just that it would be interesting to explore the historical possibilities, e.g. the Dahomey women in colonial warfare. For skirmish, it depends: I think one female viking warrior in a SAGA warband would be plausible (at least as plausible as a berserker unit from a historical point of view  ). For SCW or WW2, female soldiers (in the international Brigades) or partisans would be plausible on a skirmish level and could be included in stands. The third possibility, the women in disguise as men, don't have to get special figures - you can just declare them 

Your argument is a good one because it raises the question what we want to represent with our figures - there is a similar discussion about Wars of the Roses army composition in the medievals board. Basically, I think that apart from 1:1 skirmish games, our figures are always abstractions and tend to show what we would like to see on our table - e.g. units of mounted knights even if they probably played a very small role in historical battles. After all, the visual component is integral to miniature wargaming, otherwise we would use cardboard counters!
So I think there is an argument to be made for including women warriors in those representations - they have, after all, played an important part in some historical conflicts. Of course, I'm not arguing for including them for their own sake, but I'm really interested in giving the historical evidence space on our tables.

Cheers,
Shandy

P.S.: Sorry, the answer got longer than I intended. But I'm working on a project that addresses this topic, so I get easily carried away 

[Cubs]

Other factors related but I won't go into are how guys act in groups, gaming stores, cheese cake female figures.

I always remember an AD&D character my brother once had, twenty odd years ago. She was a female warrior, big, sturdy and ugly, called Brunhild. He had a hell of a time finding a suitable model for her since all the female figures you could buy were right out of a booby calendar and apparently bought their armour so it could double as naughty swimwear.

Eventually after a long search he found a model of an operatic-style Valkyrie type dressed in a normal mail shirt, but it did open our eyes to the fact that a lot of the sculptors were indulging strange fantasies at the time (or perhaps responding to the buying public's wants ... who can tell).

Of course, that opens up another question altogether. Is this a sexist thing or simply the desire to produce figures that aspire to a physical 'ideal' (and display it) in the same way that most male barbarian models are gym-bunnies wearing fur underpants. It may well be a unisex phenomenon. I mean, how many girls like Buffy because she is able to be hard as nails, 'spunky' (something we haven't quite got a word for in Britain) and also physically appealing?