# Tabletop Gaming News for Tuesday, 7 May, 2013 [Kobolds' Community Usage, Forbes on Pathfinder, Never



## Obryn (May 7, 2013)

I'm very happy Sarah Darkmagic wrote about the weird decision to include genders with the gods in the most recent Next playtest.  It's one of those little bits of baggage I'm hoping Next can leave behind.

-O


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## delericho (May 8, 2013)

Obryn said:


> I'm very happy Sarah Darkmagic wrote about the weird decision to include genders with the gods in the most recent Next playtest.  It's one of those little bits of baggage I'm hoping Next can leave behind.




There's an issue with pronoun usage - either they refer to a deity exclusively as 'he' or as 'she', and so have assigned genders (either explicitly or implicitly), or they alternate when referring to a single deity (which risks causing confusion). Because of that, explicitly assigning genders is probably the least-worst option.

Now, having said that, Sarah Darkmagic does have a point about stereotypical gender roles, especially in the case of the Protector (male when martial; female when community building). WotC could probably have handled that, at least, somewhat better.

(Of course, it's by no means certain that the archetypes will stick - the 5e PHB or equivalent might well replace those with a sample pantheon as in 3e & 4e. Though I do hope not.)


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