Early on for me (3E)... it was very much gatekeeperish. But lately (5E) I have been seeing a much more open platform and a lot of acceptance through more groups. Don’t get me wrong... still a ton of bigots out there, but I definitely have seen the tide start to turn in inclusion.
Sexuality has not been an issue at all. D&D is played by so many people these days that it is difficult for me to see why I would need to put myself in a position to play with non accepting people. I play with friends that I already know are lgbtq+ or are allies or I only get involved in local groups that are already active in the community.
The D&D community is pretty much a microcosm of our culture at large in terms of its makeup. And just like in the larger world there are going to be groups that are accepting of certain things and others that will not be.
Find the people who are accepting and the experience will be all the better for it. :)
I have had only one bad experience with the D&D community since I started playing. Every other game I've played has been really inclusive and welcoming. Even this horror story has a happy ending.
This was a few years ago. I answered a LFG post on Reddit for a game. It was a Homebrew Seafaring campaign. I played a Lesbian Bloodhunter that was hunting the beast who had destroyed her home village. She had a crush on another PC who was Pirate Captain Rogue that had saved her from drowning. The Pirates player, "Blue", and I struck up a story line about the Bloodhunter and the Pirate falling in love. It was a great time until we actually showed this in the game with the DM's permission three sessions in.
One of the other players, The DM's friend "Red" who played a Barbarian, was a bigot. OOC he started insulting both of us, and said "Women can't love other women. Not even in fantasy! it's just not physically possible" which, A) is wrong on SO many levels and B) just outed him as a Bigot.
Upon hearing this, the DM stopped the game, and took Red into a private chat. When he came back, Red apologized angrily, but then his character started being antagonistic towards myself and Blues PC's.
Fast forward a month. Reds behavior continued for 2 or 3 sessions, until finally it came to a head. in combat against a rival Pirate Crew. Red decided that My PC and the Pirate PC should die. He started attacking us in game, screaming about unnaturalness and evil of our characters relationship. He very almost killed my character because but thanks to some bullshittery, i survived. Afterwards Blue and I were Pissed.
After the combat, we confronted Red. Red stated that his character is from a very conservative tribe, and that in his character he hates our characters. "It's what my Character would do" essentially. The DM stopped the session there. Stated we would continue next week.
Blue and I both talked with the DM, and told him if the behavior continued we would rather find another game. The other players were in agreement and told us that they were not happy with Red's behavior as well. The DM Messaged me 2 days later, and told me that Red would no longer be participating. He apologized for his friends behavior and advised that he had decided to remove him from the game because he was causing problems with not only blue and myself, but the other two players as well. Turns out the other two players were a gay man and a trans woman, and they were not happy with being in a group with a bigot. We all were going to leave if Red didn't. So the DM decided to kick out the problem player rather than us.
In the end, we finished the campaign, became the Pirate Queen's Crew. I killed the Giant Beast that had destroyed my home. We even found the Barbarian's petrified body, and the Pirate Queen turned him into a Figurehead at the front of her fleet's towing vessel and called the ship "The *******".
TL:DR Only had one bad experience with a homophobic player, and when it escalated to harassment, the DM Put their foot down and kicked out the problem player, and the group continued on better for it.
Full version - Despite being part of the settings of some of the campaigns, it's yet to come up. I've never bothered with thinking about it in-game - never assigning a preference to most of my characters and, only twice, merely having an auxiliary reference to someone important to the character. Now that I think about it, both of those character were straight even though I'm not, but again, their orientation never became a thing.
I've played with straight player whose characters were not straight orientation. Again, their character's orientation never came up. Most of the time, orientation isn't even mentioned or has any bearing on the game. So, there may have been more characters that were not straight oriented that I simply didn't know.
I don't play me in the games. (I think it's a bad idea for people to try to play themselves, but that's like just my opinion.) So, my IRL orientation has no effect upon the games. It will remain such as long as I don't make it a big deal. The groups I've played with never made it a big deal, either. I'm in the camp of, "If I don't want it to be a big deal, I won't make it a big deal when nobody else is."
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I don’t really have much experience with the D&D community at large, except, for example, on these forums, where personal details are mostly irrelevant and only come up in passing. I don’t use community spaces to find or play games.
90% of the people I do play with are also queer, but that’s an obviously self-selecting kind of group. We’re all either affirmatively here to play a game that’s really gay or we have no problem with such a game.
I’m sure if I were more open in these public spaces, someone would occasionally be a dick about it, but I’ve not gotten the sense that there’s any more of an xyz-phobia issue among D&D folks than there is in the general population.
In my time playing and DMing TTrpgs, no one has had a problem with playing with LGBTQ+ people or with LGBTQ+ characters or NPCs. I've had players that were bigots out of character, but IC nothing has ever been done (probably because they realize most DMs won't tolerate that). If you want to make sure a group is okay with LGBTQ+ themes the best thing to do is ask if the group is LGBTQ+ friendly if you find a group that isn't just realize that they are the minority in this community.
I am gender fluid, asexual and panromantic (thanks @StormKnight for the term - I didn't know it, but it works), and from what I have seen LGTBQ+ rights are rather respected in D&D (5e at least - never played any earlier edition). I am part of a table that has between 2 and 8 LGBTQ+ players (and to be totally honest we're not an LGBTQ+ group, it just formed randomly)...
I am also part of a group that has conservative Christians and they are not happy with my choice of gender (they don't know my sexuality) but as I am DM and one of only two who has the Players Handbook, DMG and a good store of Monsters and time to throw into adventure making (the other one is my pen pal who is, as far as I know, pro-LGBTQ+), they have to either pipe down or leave, so they don't take too much issue.
However, there is a problem with racism and homophobia and transphobia - definitely. But that's normally in real life too. There are racists and all that everywhere you look.
The world has come far, but it is not far enough just yet.
- Yamana_Eajji
Ah well, while you lot discuss problems further I'll be watching Star Trek: Discovery Season 3 and listening to Anthony Rapp's D&D Campaign updates with Detmer, Adira, Gray and Tilly.
I'm lucky that my husband and I are both LGBTQ, and have had expirance with erasure. We try to make our games as open and inclusive as possible, though I still tend to find myself building NPC relationships in a heteronormative way (Something I'm working on personally fixing in my campaign in the future).
However in the DnD spheres outside of the groups my husband and I run there is animosity against inclusion. The previous thread was a good example: Cisheteronomative players stating that sexuality did not come up in their games despite there being classic cases of Kings, Queens, and situations where the quest was to rescue a spouse of an NPC (which were typically heteronormative). Erasure is not inclusion. Saying 'Sexuality has no place in Dnd' and then ignoring the fact that you have people in relationships as a general rule of life (character's families include relationships.) That simply causes erasure.
I personally find knowing my character's identity intrinsic to role playing them. I played a nonbinary character who freaked out about becoming a parent. This was a huge part to the small development they had (died in a TPK in Tomb. RIP).
I just want to say that in my games, gender and sexuality do not matter. Either of the character or the player. When I DM, I welcome everyone into my games, no matter their sexuality, or how they identify, and I don’t tolerate discrimination or bullying of any kind.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
A caffeinated nerd who has played TTRPGs or a number of years and is very much a fantasy adventure geek.
Hi panromantic pansexual transgender person here. I've had um, incidents in older games where I (my character) was raped and stuff. Thankfully since I joined an LGBTQ+ group of 5e that hasn't been the case anymore and I've had a grand old time playing and being myself.
I have had just one awful involvement in the D&D people group since I began playing. Each and every other game I've played has been truly comprehensive and inviting. Indeed, even this harrowing tale has an upbeat closure. 192.168.100.1192.168.1.1jpg to pdf
This was a couple of years prior. I addressed a LFG post on Reddit for a game. It was a Homebrew Seafaring effort. I played a Lesbian Bloodhunter that was chasing the monster who had wrecked her home town. She really liked another PC who was Pirate Captain Rogue that had spared her from suffocating. The Pirates player, "Blue", and I struck up a story line about the Bloodhunter and the Pirate beginning to look all starry eyed at. It was an incredible time until we really indicated this in the game with the DM's authorization three meetings in.
... from what I have seen LGTBQ+ rights are rather respected in D&D (5e at least - never played any earlier edition).
D&D doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Every new edition has been more inclusive than the last, simply because society became more inclusive over time. The late ‘70s and the ‘80s were a lot more heteronormative than the past decade - heteronormative wasn’t even a word back then. The DNC didn’t have a gay support platform until 1980. Massachusetts was the first state to legalize gay marriage in the US, and that was in 2004. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was instituted in ‘93 (and was considered progress!) and repealed in 2010. For reference, 3rd edition was released in 2000 and 4th in 2007. D&D as a subculture has arguably always been a little more accepting than most (certainly more than say, sports or corporate culture), but D&D players are still simply human beings in the first place so on average they follow a similar evolution to the one the world they live in does.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
My experiences playing D&D since the 90s have been that the cishet people I've gamed with have fallen into three categories: People who accept LGBT!+ people (rare), people who are intolerant bigots (far too common), and people who think that they're being supportive when they ask you rude, personal questions or talk about how much they love negative stereotypes of trans or gay people because they think that shows respect (far, far too common).
Thanks to the internet, I've been able to find actual LGBTQ+ groups to play with that has made things much better. It's so much nicer when I can just play a character the way I want to without having to explain to someone why Cyberpunk 2077 is not an example of positive trans representation again.
A reminder that this thread is primarily for lgbtq+ voices, and that this thread is NOT for debates or nsfw topics!!
Early on for me (3E)... it was very much gatekeeperish. But lately (5E) I have been seeing a much more open platform and a lot of acceptance through more groups. Don’t get me wrong... still a ton of bigots out there, but I definitely have seen the tide start to turn in inclusion.
Sexuality has not been an issue at all. D&D is played by so many people these days that it is difficult for me to see why I would need to put myself in a position to play with non accepting people. I play with friends that I already know are lgbtq+ or are allies or I only get involved in local groups that are already active in the community.
The D&D community is pretty much a microcosm of our culture at large in terms of its makeup. And just like in the larger world there are going to be groups that are accepting of certain things and others that will not be.
Find the people who are accepting and the experience will be all the better for it. :)
Hello Bisexual Gender Fluid here.
I have had only one bad experience with the D&D community since I started playing. Every other game I've played has been really inclusive and welcoming. Even this horror story has a happy ending.
This was a few years ago. I answered a LFG post on Reddit for a game. It was a Homebrew Seafaring campaign. I played a Lesbian Bloodhunter that was hunting the beast who had destroyed her home village. She had a crush on another PC who was Pirate Captain Rogue that had saved her from drowning. The Pirates player, "Blue", and I struck up a story line about the Bloodhunter and the Pirate falling in love. It was a great time until we actually showed this in the game with the DM's permission three sessions in.
One of the other players, The DM's friend "Red" who played a Barbarian, was a bigot. OOC he started insulting both of us, and said "Women can't love other women. Not even in fantasy! it's just not physically possible" which, A) is wrong on SO many levels and B) just outed him as a Bigot.
Upon hearing this, the DM stopped the game, and took Red into a private chat. When he came back, Red apologized angrily, but then his character started being antagonistic towards myself and Blues PC's.
Fast forward a month. Reds behavior continued for 2 or 3 sessions, until finally it came to a head. in combat against a rival Pirate Crew. Red decided that My PC and the Pirate PC should die. He started attacking us in game, screaming about unnaturalness and evil of our characters relationship. He very almost killed my character because but thanks to some bullshittery, i survived. Afterwards Blue and I were Pissed.
After the combat, we confronted Red. Red stated that his character is from a very conservative tribe, and that in his character he hates our characters. "It's what my Character would do" essentially. The DM stopped the session there. Stated we would continue next week.
Blue and I both talked with the DM, and told him if the behavior continued we would rather find another game. The other players were in agreement and told us that they were not happy with Red's behavior as well. The DM Messaged me 2 days later, and told me that Red would no longer be participating. He apologized for his friends behavior and advised that he had decided to remove him from the game because he was causing problems with not only blue and myself, but the other two players as well. Turns out the other two players were a gay man and a trans woman, and they were not happy with being in a group with a bigot. We all were going to leave if Red didn't. So the DM decided to kick out the problem player rather than us.
In the end, we finished the campaign, became the Pirate Queen's Crew. I killed the Giant Beast that had destroyed my home. We even found the Barbarian's petrified body, and the Pirate Queen turned him into a Figurehead at the front of her fleet's towing vessel and called the ship "The *******".
TL:DR Only had one bad experience with a homophobic player, and when it escalated to harassment, the DM Put their foot down and kicked out the problem player, and the group continued on better for it.
tl;dr version - Not a problem at all.
Full version -
Despite being part of the settings of some of the campaigns, it's yet to come up. I've never bothered with thinking about it in-game - never assigning a preference to most of my characters and, only twice, merely having an auxiliary reference to someone important to the character. Now that I think about it, both of those character were straight even though I'm not, but again, their orientation never became a thing.
I've played with straight player whose characters were not straight orientation. Again, their character's orientation never came up. Most of the time, orientation isn't even mentioned or has any bearing on the game. So, there may have been more characters that were not straight oriented that I simply didn't know.
I don't play me in the games. (I think it's a bad idea for people to try to play themselves, but that's like just my opinion.) So, my IRL orientation has no effect upon the games. It will remain such as long as I don't make it a big deal. The groups I've played with never made it a big deal, either. I'm in the camp of, "If I don't want it to be a big deal, I won't make it a big deal when nobody else is."
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
Same as I expressed in the other thread.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I don’t really have much experience with the D&D community at large, except, for example, on these forums, where personal details are mostly irrelevant and only come up in passing. I don’t use community spaces to find or play games.
90% of the people I do play with are also queer, but that’s an obviously self-selecting kind of group. We’re all either affirmatively here to play a game that’s really gay or we have no problem with such a game.
I’m sure if I were more open in these public spaces, someone would occasionally be a dick about it, but I’ve not gotten the sense that there’s any more of an xyz-phobia issue among D&D folks than there is in the general population.
In my time playing and DMing TTrpgs, no one has had a problem with playing with LGBTQ+ people or with LGBTQ+ characters or NPCs. I've had players that were bigots out of character, but IC nothing has ever been done (probably because they realize most DMs won't tolerate that). If you want to make sure a group is okay with LGBTQ+ themes the best thing to do is ask if the group is LGBTQ+ friendly if you find a group that isn't just realize that they are the minority in this community.
call me Anna or Kerns, (she/her), usually a DM, lgbtq+ friendly
I am gender fluid, asexual and panromantic (thanks @StormKnight for the term - I didn't know it, but it works), and from what I have seen LGTBQ+ rights are rather respected in D&D (5e at least - never played any earlier edition). I am part of a table that has between 2 and 8 LGBTQ+ players (and to be totally honest we're not an LGBTQ+ group, it just formed randomly)...
I am also part of a group that has conservative Christians and they are not happy with my choice of gender (they don't know my sexuality) but as I am DM and one of only two who has the Players Handbook, DMG and a good store of Monsters and time to throw into adventure making (the other one is my pen pal who is, as far as I know, pro-LGBTQ+), they have to either pipe down or leave, so they don't take too much issue.
However, there is a problem with racism and homophobia and transphobia - definitely. But that's normally in real life too. There are racists and all that everywhere you look.
Ah well, while you lot discuss problems further I'll be watching Star Trek: Discovery Season 3 and listening to Anthony Rapp's D&D Campaign updates with Detmer, Adira, Gray and Tilly.
Frequent Eladrin || They/Them, but accept all pronouns
Luz Noceda would like to remind you that you're worth loving!
I'm lucky that my husband and I are both LGBTQ, and have had expirance with erasure. We try to make our games as open and inclusive as possible, though I still tend to find myself building NPC relationships in a heteronormative way (Something I'm working on personally fixing in my campaign in the future).
However in the DnD spheres outside of the groups my husband and I run there is animosity against inclusion. The previous thread was a good example: Cisheteronomative players stating that sexuality did not come up in their games despite there being classic cases of Kings, Queens, and situations where the quest was to rescue a spouse of an NPC (which were typically heteronormative). Erasure is not inclusion. Saying 'Sexuality has no place in Dnd' and then ignoring the fact that you have people in relationships as a general rule of life (character's families include relationships.) That simply causes erasure.
I personally find knowing my character's identity intrinsic to role playing them. I played a nonbinary character who freaked out about becoming a parent. This was a huge part to the small development they had (died in a TPK in Tomb. RIP).
I had a non-binary character once. People ignored their gender 100%, then abandoned them and left them to die. Why do the good ones die young???
Frequent Eladrin || They/Them, but accept all pronouns
Luz Noceda would like to remind you that you're worth loving!
I just want to say that in my games, gender and sexuality do not matter. Either of the character or the player. When I DM, I welcome everyone into my games, no matter their sexuality, or how they identify, and I don’t tolerate discrimination or bullying of any kind.
A caffeinated nerd who has played TTRPGs or a number of years and is very much a fantasy adventure geek.
TW: Sexual Assault
Hi panromantic pansexual transgender person here. I've had um, incidents in older games where I (my character) was raped and stuff. Thankfully since I joined an LGBTQ+ group of 5e that hasn't been the case anymore and I've had a grand old time playing and being myself.
I have had just one awful involvement in the D&D people group since I began playing. Each and every other game I've played has been truly comprehensive and inviting. Indeed, even this harrowing tale has an upbeat closure. 192.168.100.1192.168.1.1 jpg to pdf
This was a couple of years prior. I addressed a LFG post on Reddit for a game. It was a Homebrew Seafaring effort. I played a Lesbian Bloodhunter that was chasing the monster who had wrecked her home town. She really liked another PC who was Pirate Captain Rogue that had spared her from suffocating. The Pirates player, "Blue", and I struck up a story line about the Bloodhunter and the Pirate beginning to look all starry eyed at. It was an incredible time until we really indicated this in the game with the DM's authorization three meetings in.
D&D doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Every new edition has been more inclusive than the last, simply because society became more inclusive over time. The late ‘70s and the ‘80s were a lot more heteronormative than the past decade - heteronormative wasn’t even a word back then. The DNC didn’t have a gay support platform until 1980. Massachusetts was the first state to legalize gay marriage in the US, and that was in 2004. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was instituted in ‘93 (and was considered progress!) and repealed in 2010. For reference, 3rd edition was released in 2000 and 4th in 2007. D&D as a subculture has arguably always been a little more accepting than most (certainly more than say, sports or corporate culture), but D&D players are still simply human beings in the first place so on average they follow a similar evolution to the one the world they live in does.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
My experiences playing D&D since the 90s have been that the cishet people I've gamed with have fallen into three categories: People who accept LGBT!+ people (rare), people who are intolerant bigots (far too common), and people who think that they're being supportive when they ask you rude, personal questions or talk about how much they love negative stereotypes of trans or gay people because they think that shows respect (far, far too common).
Thanks to the internet, I've been able to find actual LGBTQ+ groups to play with that has made things much better. It's so much nicer when I can just play a character the way I want to without having to explain to someone why Cyberpunk 2077 is not an example of positive trans representation again.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.