The Right Stuff (Woman's Perspective)
Posted 02-06-2008 at 01:05 PM by Caulle
I have a lot of free time at work, and I came across Cider's blog entry The Right Stuff (Women & Raiding). The entry had been locked, so I couldn't reply, but I did feel a need to reply.
First a bit of my background. I'm 27, I'm the lead inker with Udon Entertainment, and yes I'm a woman. I co-lead the 3rd most progressed guild on my server (currently working on Illidan). I am also the main tank. All my life I have generally gotten along much better with my male friends than my female friends. I guess this is mostly due to conflict of interest. It's not that I don't enjoy doing what my female friends do, it's just that I enjoy what the guys do more. Having said that, it's no surprise I'm instantly skeptical of all women in game.
But getting back to Cider's post, I will have to agree with his post pretty much all fronts.
I currently have 6 full time women in my raid, myself included. I actually had to sit there for a second and count the number of them, and I'm actually surprised I run with that many. Their personalities cover a pretty wide range, which generates different reactions from both myself and the rest of the guild.
Take me for starters. If people didn't know that I was a woman up front, they'd likely assume I was a guy. I'm extremely aggressive, though it's a pretty big running joke in the raid about how much my aggressiveness turns the guys on. They all know it's a worthless pursuit as I've been in a serious relationship for almost 2 years, with someone they all know because he was in the raid (work responsibilities crept up last spring and he had to quit). That aside, I get along pretty well with just about everyone.
Next take one of our rogues, who's probably one of the best rogues on the server PVE wise. She does the number crunching, she does the theorycrafting, she works her ass off, and it shows as she's consistently in the top 3 for DPS each night.
Our 3 holy priests are all women. One of them is an aggressive german who is incredibly smart, knows it, and uses it to her advantage. Another is a stay-at-home mother of two who has a thing for dominant men and women. The last one is a writer who is completely neurotic, has had numerous freak out sessions, but is probably one of closest friends both professionally in the raid, and personally outside of it.
Lastly there's a shadow priest, who doesn't talk much at all, and you almost forget she's there half the time.
What Women Face
Over the past 3 years worth of co-running this raid my gender has never been a issue for me, but it has been a major issue for a few others.
Women are often not taken as seriously as men.
This varies from woman to woman in the raid, and how they choose to play the game. I take the game very seriously in terms of my role as the main tank, my knowledge of my class, and the running of the guild/raid. There are other women we have had in the past who played the game to be social. They weren't very strong players, and often times ended up causing devastating mistakes in the raid because they were too busy carrying on a conversation in whispers. It's always been difficult to deal with those women because the guys who are getting attention on the side from them always want me to cut them some slack.
Women are often not considered as good as men.
It's true that some people feel this way. Some of the best players I know are women, and some of the worst are women. It goes the same for the guys too.
Women are often seen as sex objects, even in a cohesive guild.
I think this entirely depends on how the woman portrays herself within the guild. Am I seen as a sex object? Not really. I'm just one of the guys. Have others been viewed as sex objects? Oh yeah. But they generally go looking for the attention. They're the ones who speak in an overly bubbly flirtatious voice on vent. They're the ones who carry on the lewd conversations in whispers leading the guys on.
Women have to work harder than men to be accepted and viewed as equals.
Unfortunately whether anyone else feels that they need to, the women themselves typically feel a need to push harder to be viewed as equals. I know myself personally have constantly pushed myself as hard as I can. Point: In the early BWL days we had a problem with Vaelestraz. The first tank was constantly losing aggro. Finally I asked the raid leader if we could just try once with me tanking first, and we killed him that attempt. Maybe I didn't need to prove myself to anyone, but it felt pretty damn good to know I had gotten the job done.
Guild Leaders Perspective
It's a gamble bringing anyone into the raid to be perfectly honest. Men can create just as much drama as women. The only difference is, the drama caused by women is harder to deal with. It usually becomes drawn out, and irritating.
I had one priest once, who was too social for her own good. It caused her to be distracted most of the time, and put out poor performances. Despite numerous talks from the healing lead, she failed to improve. Finally I had a talk with her. The conversation last 3 hours and incident was drawn out over 5 days because her sister decided she needed to intervene. Within a week, she had quit the guild.
But the guys are just as guilty. We picked up a new warrior shortly after 2.1 hit. The guy was obsessed with me for being a girl. I found it all mostly amusing to get his corny pick up lines, but I told him from the get go I was unavailable. He slowly began to underperform over time, and when I finally had to play "raid leader" instead of "friend" to him, he went crazy. WIthin 24 hours he had quit the guild, and the day after that he was PM'ing me on the forums asking me why I had kicked him, and then day after that he was asking me to rejoin the guild.
So as a guild leader, I really don't care what gender you are. I care about you doing your job, and helping the raid make progression. If you can't do that, I'll find someone who can.
Couples in the guild have always been another issue for us as well... The drama involved with couples has never really gotten out of hand. But I completely agree about the promoting issue.
I was an officer in the guild before I started dating my boyfriend. Not once did he ever ask to be an officer. In fact, when we lost our healing lead and I decided to promote him to the role, I'm pretty sure he didn't even want it. Another officer we had was dating someone else in the guild as well. I promoted her, and not because he was in there, but because she was doing a ton of work for me to help run the guild. In fact, we had a bit of a restructure recently and she still has officer privileges where as he does not. Go figure.
I guess luckily for us, we've never had that much couple drama promotion wise. The worst of it was when one was a great player, and the other one was terribad. You hate dropping the bad player because you're afraid you'll lose the great player at the same time. We've come to realize you just need to cut your losses ASAP, move on, and find another replacement.
The Right Stuff
I think I covered this enough earlier when I pointed out the current women in the guild. They're all very very good, some of them ranking among the best I've ever seen.
Conclusion
So that's the POV from a female co-guild leader. I don't think Cider is wrong on any fronts at all. It was a good write up. It's not about the gender of the player, it's about the player themselves, and how they represent themselves. Yes, the women tend to have a bad rap sheet, but in my experience they usually created that sheet for themselves. And likewise, some of the guys have been just as bad.
First a bit of my background. I'm 27, I'm the lead inker with Udon Entertainment, and yes I'm a woman. I co-lead the 3rd most progressed guild on my server (currently working on Illidan). I am also the main tank. All my life I have generally gotten along much better with my male friends than my female friends. I guess this is mostly due to conflict of interest. It's not that I don't enjoy doing what my female friends do, it's just that I enjoy what the guys do more. Having said that, it's no surprise I'm instantly skeptical of all women in game.
But getting back to Cider's post, I will have to agree with his post pretty much all fronts.
I currently have 6 full time women in my raid, myself included. I actually had to sit there for a second and count the number of them, and I'm actually surprised I run with that many. Their personalities cover a pretty wide range, which generates different reactions from both myself and the rest of the guild.
Take me for starters. If people didn't know that I was a woman up front, they'd likely assume I was a guy. I'm extremely aggressive, though it's a pretty big running joke in the raid about how much my aggressiveness turns the guys on. They all know it's a worthless pursuit as I've been in a serious relationship for almost 2 years, with someone they all know because he was in the raid (work responsibilities crept up last spring and he had to quit). That aside, I get along pretty well with just about everyone.
Next take one of our rogues, who's probably one of the best rogues on the server PVE wise. She does the number crunching, she does the theorycrafting, she works her ass off, and it shows as she's consistently in the top 3 for DPS each night.
Our 3 holy priests are all women. One of them is an aggressive german who is incredibly smart, knows it, and uses it to her advantage. Another is a stay-at-home mother of two who has a thing for dominant men and women. The last one is a writer who is completely neurotic, has had numerous freak out sessions, but is probably one of closest friends both professionally in the raid, and personally outside of it.
Lastly there's a shadow priest, who doesn't talk much at all, and you almost forget she's there half the time.
What Women Face
|
Here are my premises: *Women are often not taken as seriously as men; *Women are often not considered as good as men; *Women are often seen as sex objects, even in a cohesive guild; *Women have to work harder than men to be accepted and viewed as equals. |
Women are often not taken as seriously as men.
This varies from woman to woman in the raid, and how they choose to play the game. I take the game very seriously in terms of my role as the main tank, my knowledge of my class, and the running of the guild/raid. There are other women we have had in the past who played the game to be social. They weren't very strong players, and often times ended up causing devastating mistakes in the raid because they were too busy carrying on a conversation in whispers. It's always been difficult to deal with those women because the guys who are getting attention on the side from them always want me to cut them some slack.
Women are often not considered as good as men.
It's true that some people feel this way. Some of the best players I know are women, and some of the worst are women. It goes the same for the guys too.
Women are often seen as sex objects, even in a cohesive guild.
I think this entirely depends on how the woman portrays herself within the guild. Am I seen as a sex object? Not really. I'm just one of the guys. Have others been viewed as sex objects? Oh yeah. But they generally go looking for the attention. They're the ones who speak in an overly bubbly flirtatious voice on vent. They're the ones who carry on the lewd conversations in whispers leading the guys on.
Women have to work harder than men to be accepted and viewed as equals.
Unfortunately whether anyone else feels that they need to, the women themselves typically feel a need to push harder to be viewed as equals. I know myself personally have constantly pushed myself as hard as I can. Point: In the early BWL days we had a problem with Vaelestraz. The first tank was constantly losing aggro. Finally I asked the raid leader if we could just try once with me tanking first, and we killed him that attempt. Maybe I didn't need to prove myself to anyone, but it felt pretty damn good to know I had gotten the job done.
Guild Leaders Perspective
|
Many women -- certainly not all -- either knowingly or unknowingly inject a large amount of drama into a guild. More often than not, bringing in a new, single female player is a gamble that winds up costing more than it gains. |
I had one priest once, who was too social for her own good. It caused her to be distracted most of the time, and put out poor performances. Despite numerous talks from the healing lead, she failed to improve. Finally I had a talk with her. The conversation last 3 hours and incident was drawn out over 5 days because her sister decided she needed to intervene. Within a week, she had quit the guild.
But the guys are just as guilty. We picked up a new warrior shortly after 2.1 hit. The guy was obsessed with me for being a girl. I found it all mostly amusing to get his corny pick up lines, but I told him from the get go I was unavailable. He slowly began to underperform over time, and when I finally had to play "raid leader" instead of "friend" to him, he went crazy. WIthin 24 hours he had quit the guild, and the day after that he was PM'ing me on the forums asking me why I had kicked him, and then day after that he was asking me to rejoin the guild.
So as a guild leader, I really don't care what gender you are. I care about you doing your job, and helping the raid make progression. If you can't do that, I'll find someone who can.
Couples in the guild have always been another issue for us as well... The drama involved with couples has never really gotten out of hand. But I completely agree about the promoting issue.
I was an officer in the guild before I started dating my boyfriend. Not once did he ever ask to be an officer. In fact, when we lost our healing lead and I decided to promote him to the role, I'm pretty sure he didn't even want it. Another officer we had was dating someone else in the guild as well. I promoted her, and not because he was in there, but because she was doing a ton of work for me to help run the guild. In fact, we had a bit of a restructure recently and she still has officer privileges where as he does not. Go figure.
I guess luckily for us, we've never had that much couple drama promotion wise. The worst of it was when one was a great player, and the other one was terribad. You hate dropping the bad player because you're afraid you'll lose the great player at the same time. We've come to realize you just need to cut your losses ASAP, move on, and find another replacement.
The Right Stuff
I think I covered this enough earlier when I pointed out the current women in the guild. They're all very very good, some of them ranking among the best I've ever seen.
Conclusion
So that's the POV from a female co-guild leader. I don't think Cider is wrong on any fronts at all. It was a good write up. It's not about the gender of the player, it's about the player themselves, and how they represent themselves. Yes, the women tend to have a bad rap sheet, but in my experience they usually created that sheet for themselves. And likewise, some of the guys have been just as bad.
Total Comments 6
Comments
 |  Well said, on all accounts. You're a woman after my own heart. My only criticism is that not all women who are as likeminded as you have nothing to deal with. A lot of my issues probably have to do with the fact that I've switched guilds a few times, but I take this game seriously, and never desire nor call for any attention. |
Posted 02-06-2008 at 02:51 PM by Criss  |
| |  A great read! Men and women both fall into many different catagories of players, many of which over lap, but some do not. While there are probably more women playing Wow than conventional wisdom would dictate, people tend to latch on to thier first impressions and tend to play the social role assigned to them. Its clear that you are your own person and have accomplished some great things in the context of the game. Good luck on your future endeavors. |
Posted 02-07-2008 at 08:18 AM by Horacio  |
| | Good read. [edit: HOLY CRAP this is a bit longer than I had planned... slow day at work, I guess... ] When I played competitive FPS' for years, this problem wasn't as pronounced. See, there was the occasional "starter's-girlfriend-on-the-roster-but-not-active" thing, but for the most part, you didn't have girls on the team. You're also talking about teams of 5 or 6 (sometimes 8, depending on the FPS) players. These people might have people on the roster as backups, but those backups are almost never used. For better or for worse, the only girls that started for top teams were girls that were on "girls only" teams. They had to separate the roster. That might have worked out for the better, since both the "guys only" and the "girls only" teams can focus on winning the game, instead of having the drama/distractions of having everyone else. I would have liked to see some mixed-gender teams, but considering how volatile an FPS team can be (many teams disband within a month of forming)... there are some challenges involved. Anyway, in my year or so playing WoW, I'm finding that I'm surrounded by a lot more girls, and it creates a different atmosphere. Being a guy (and, yeah, single...), I can honestly say that I try to treat everyone equally. That might not go the same way for everyone, though. Many people that I play with currently and in the past, say flat out "Girls can't play video games". I disagree with it, because people (especially guys) are more likely to notice a girl playing than a guy. The percentages probably come out equal (though this is a purely subjective measure...), from my experience. Based on their limited experience, though, they have some ammunition: 1.In my prior guild, there was a Druid Tank that had many issues. She was married to a Warlock in the guild, and they have been doing the MMO thing since EQ. She wasn't there when we killed Al'ar for the first time. When we were trying to kill him a second time, however, we kept wiping. Others were willing to make excuses for her, saying "people keep dying in flame patches". How many of those people were getting hit by adds that she didn't pick up? How many of those people were dazed, thus preventing them from moving the patches? The Assist Window told a different story: She's targeting Al'ar, still, 10 seconds after adds have spawned and are running amok on the raid. She was also unable to take criticism. One time, on Al'ar, she was tanking the adds in phase 1. We've typically had issues with druids tanking it, and the belief was the lack of "snap aggro". They figured they'd give it another go. The DPS ripped after giving her a few seconds. The DPS held back so much that we had a second add before the first one went down. When trying to figure out what we should do, a mild-mannered rogue responded "Well, whenever we have a warrior tank it, we typically have no issues. Maybe it's the snap aggro." She then yelled on vent at the raid, saying "This Druid is not sucking, and i'm tired of hearing about it!". She then went on about how the DPS kept ripping (remember, they did hold back). During the weekend (that was the last night of raids for the week), she kept bringing the subject up again, about how druids have snap aggro because she successfully tanked Vanndar Stormpike. Or something of the sort. For what it's worth, we started killing (and one-shotting) al'ar when we re-adjusted the phase 2 strat to accomodate her: She gathers up the adds, and the other bear tanks both adds. Voila! We had other issues with her on hydross and Tidewalker (where she MT'd). Poor awareness, Poor threat generation, and Poor attitude. I felt her unwillingness to take criticism (and her problems) majorly hurt the guild (because now nobody wants to give ANY criticism), and I let the guild leader know that. 2. My current guild had a Warrior Tank that they had to deal with, who was also female (and had a husband - enhancement shaman). While I don't have much direct experience with her, she apparently was unable to break fears from Sanguinar during the Kael'thas fight. They also said that they spent 12 hours trying to get her to tank a flame on Illidan, and she still couldn't do it. She came unprepared for fights. The only thing that somewhat bugged me about her was during a raid, when she said she had to "throw her baby on the floor to tank these mobs", because they pulled too soon. Bad parenting or looking for attention, I don't know. With that said, I have some examples to the contrary: 1. A girl in my old guild, a Hunter, was one of the best DPSers in the guild, and she had an excellent attitude. She was RL friends with the Guild Leader and his Wife, and her boyfriend is a druid in the guild. She was promoted to an officer, and despite being mocked when she threatened to call a raid that was going poorly (due to silly mistakes) she was openly mocked on vent - by other girls!, she handled her job pretty well. Disappointed with how poor the raids were being managed, and the lack of enforcement, applied to the guild I joined. While our decisions to join the guild are independent, we encouraged each other along the way. I consider her a good friend, and that's more because of who she is as a person, rather than her gender. 2. A shaman in my current guild is a pretty good healer, and is pretty smart about her job. She tends to be a little over-sensitive at times, but I've seen guys act like that. She is, for the most part, a very nice person and I honestly don't have a problem raiding with her. Anyway, long story short (maybe I should start a blog...), I don't care if you're male, female, transgender, or whatever. If I have faith in the other 24 people in the raid to do their job very well, then I'm comfortable playing with you. Outside the raids, I talk to everyone with a similar approach, but different people do different things... so obviously the conversation will be different. But I agree with what you wrote. You'll find people from all walks of life, and on the internet - where you can say things to people you normally wouldn't - there are plenty of extremes to deal with. However, I've seen similar stereotypes occur in real life... so maybe it's just mirroring what society tells us... |
| Posted 02-07-2008 at 12:50 PM by ttocs |
| |  It's not always bad{disclaimer: I'm a guy} I know this is probably blog necromancy, but I wanted to add something here. I think these negative perceptions of women might be somewhat age related. Given the nature of this beast (WoW) there are a large number of very young, very immature players. Back when I played Alliance (don't shoot me! I've since changed my ways!) I remember one day in Gchat someone asking me "a/s/l?". I had no idea what that meant. When I asked them, pretty much everyone in Gchat gave me a "lol". When I responded with my "a", it became "rofl". Another day in Gchat when I was talking about my time in the Army, I got what could only be described as vitriolic responses from a number of my supposed guild"mates". There was a lot of "eFlirting" going on as well, and even some "eDating", which I found odd as it wasn't an RP server. So... long story even longer... I switched factions, mostly because I really like Orcs for some reason. In the process, I found a new guild. We're a casual guild; we have Kara and ZA on farm and have downed maybe 3 or 4 25-man bosses total. The main thing here though is that we are an older guild. We have an age requirement, and it isn't 18. In fact, the absolute youngest person in the guild was born when Reagan was still in office. I've been there a year now, and have not seen even 1 of the negative items towards women that you mentioned. In my previous, younger guild, I'd seen them all, plus a a lot more unrelated stuff (homophobia, racism, etc.). I'm not really sure what my point is by now... just that I know your feelings are valid. They don't always have to be realized, however. |
| Posted 04-24-2008 at 06:50 PM by tobarstep |
| | Excellently written. I have to admit, even I fall victim to this fallacy from time to time. I'm the main tank of my guild, and my girlfriend is one of our best priest healers, but she does have trouble taking criticism from time to time, as she's very self-conscious irl and she likes to use the game as a way of expressing herself more aggressively. I recently started looking for partners for a 2v2 arena team, and she jumped at the chance. I, in my overprotective tanky way, said, "Are you sure you wanna dedicate yourself to this? It's a lot of work." I think I just heard one giant hiss as every female reading this just gasped at me...lol. It was a conflict of interest for me, because I've learned to treat my gf as just another raid member when it's a raid scenario, but in all other aspects of the game, I tend to baby her. In BG's, I find myself intervening to her and assisting her a lot, even when she doesn't need the help. She notices, and she deeply resents it. From a male perspective, I feel it's a little rough to walk that razor's edge where I feel like I'm being understanding without being patronizing. But the bottom line is: Girls can do it. We have 5 active female players in my guild atm, and the majority of them are awesome. Sadly, a couple of them are just plain bad. But it's hard to tell them they're bad without them playing the gender card, claiming I'm just saying that because they're female. *whispering* I think my damage meters must be sexist.  Also, strange side note: Seems to be a lot easier to get my girlfriend to accept that I respect her abilities when I get her to fist-bump me before and after a match...lol |
| Posted 09-03-2008 at 12:19 PM by Orkchops Updated 09-03-2008 at 09:21 PM by Orkchops |
| |  @Orkchops: p_O Wow, I can totally relate to your girlfriend because I think my boyfriend has done all the exact same things to me. Granted, he quit the game forever and a day ago. But yeah, there is a razor's edge you walk, which I hate to admit. I've definitely flown off the handle at him a few times, and of course as soon as I over-reacted all I could think of was "Wait, why am I acting like this?" |
| Posted 09-29-2008 at 11:23 AM by Caulle |
Recent Blog Entries by Caulle
- The Death Knight Experience Is Over (11-19-2008)
- The Main Game (11-11-2008)
- I'm about to be in ur base... (11-04-2008)
- Wrath Plans (10-31-2008)
- Phenomenal (10-18-2008)
