Great Beards of Westeros - Episode 4

Wait . . . your description mentions a welcoming community. For people with beards? I sure hope so. I haven't listened to this yet but I don't intend to spend my valuable time listening to anything short of beard coverage. I can get that crap elsewhere.

Wait . . . your description mentions a welcoming community. For people with beards? I sure hope so. I haven't listened to this yet but I don't intend to spend my valuable time listening to anything short of beard coverage. I can get that crap elsewhere.

I try to see it this way: if you have an awesome, luxurious beard, there's is more than enough room for everyone. In there. It's almost like a beard apartment, so to speak.

Thanks for at raising the issue of women in the AGoT LCG community.

I think its pretty safe to say that the GoT world can be VERY inclusive of women. I run a Game of Thrones LARP at GenCon each year and female participation was at almost 50%. 

The show itself has a 42% female viewership with 50% of social media about the show generated by women.

http://www.wired.com...rones-chart.jpg

So the lack of women in the LCG community does have something to do with the game itself and the community.

I think the community could be more inclusive to women, but the fact that these conversations are happening points to the fact that many within the game want to make the community more inclusive, so I'm not convinced that this gaming sub-community is very different than many other gaming sub-communities.

I think much of it is the game itself. And its not just that the game has a women problem, the game has a new player problem.

This game is very hard to get into. It requires huge investments of time and mental energy. In addition, at it's core, the game is 1v1 bloodsport in which matches end with a victor and a vanquished, often with all or most of your beloved characters murdered.

Emotionally this is tough. As a new player coming into this community you need to resign yourself to weeks of getting your teeth kicked in before you have banked the number of reps with the cards to become even mildly competitive. The skill gap that a new player has to overcome is severe because this game is a very high skill game. 

What the community needs and what the game itself really doesn't provide is a soft landing for new players where they can play casually and often without being destroyed over and over again. The game itself doesn't really lend itself to that.

The tournament structure does funnel the least experienced players toward each other eventually, but finishing a tournament 0-5 or even 1-4 does not make you want to subject yourself to that again. Throw in a "Sansa prize" so that your ineptitude is recognized by all and you have a recipe for few new players failing to bridge the gap to sustained skilled play.

Now generalizing what women want from gaming is, of course, problematic, but I do know that female participation in boardgames is very high, particularly games that allow cooperative play or allow for demonstrable progress even if such progress doesn't result in victory. Modern boardgames rarely have player elimination for example. Victory is not achieved by destroying your opponents' board position. Chess and Monopoly aren't modern.

I'm not sure the GoT LCG is really modern either, other than its an LCG not a CCG. It's arguably just a "better" version of Magic the Gathering.

Which is fine. That's my verdict. This is a hardcore game for hardcore gamers. Yes, I think some increased effort should be spent making sure new players and women feel welcome to the community but ultimately the game has a problematic "new player experience." But it's one this newer player is planning on overcoming... (of course a beard would be key).

Which is fine. That's my verdict. This is a hardcore game for hardcore gamers. Yes, I think some increased effort should be spent making sure new players and women feel welcome to the community but ultimately the game has a problematic "new player experience." But it's one this newer player is planning on overcoming... (of course a beard would be key).

We have new players all the time in our meta. But we don't have a single female player nor any female newcomers that try out the game. And while I agree it's a hard game to get in to, I don't really see what it has to do with women? Do you have any ideas as to solve this problem of inclusiveness? How do we get more women to check out the game?

I think my answer is probably a little sexist since I just don't think this game appeals to what women gamers, generally, like. Of course there are exceptions, which is great, but I think its some of the same reasons that women make up a small population of chess players. This has nothing to do with ability and everything to do with what different people consider "fun."

Few women choose chess. Those that do choose chess perform as well as men. I think a similar dynamic operates here.

I created a bit of a s-storm when I suggested in the Facebook group that many of the promotional materials from the tournaments are not making women feel welcome. Many people were extremely hostile to that suggestion. But yes I think images like (https://scontent-lax...18a&oe=57C0B69F) are going to convince some women that this is not a community they want to be a part of. Here its not just the images, its that the assumption of the award is that the player is male. Why is this the "Khaleesi's Bloodrider" award, instead of the "Khaaleesi" award? 

So yeah, eliminating the assumption that AGoT players are male is a starting point. Thanks again for raising the issue of inclusiveness in the community. 

The power of the beard is demonstrated with your Tournament win! Congrats Andreas!