Queering the Die: Gender Identity, Expression, and Sexual Orientation in Tabletop Roleplaying Games “In a roleplaying game, who your character is can be as important, if not more so, than what your character can do.” - Jeremy Crawford, co-designer, D&D Fifth Edition With marriage equality across the United States nearing a reality and Caitlyn Jenner sitting down with Diane Sawyer to come out publicly as a transwoman, inclusivity is becoming a key term in the second decade of the 21st century. As the spirit of inclusivity permeates our reality, it is creating a push in popular culture to provide a space for people to question various gender identities, modes of expression, and sexual orientation in order to re-imagine communal and individual interactions. Within the last decade, tabletop roleplaying games (TRPGs) have responded to this push by creating worlds where players can explore the myriad of gender and orientation possibilities experienced by themselves and the people around them. This paper aims to examine four specific TRPGs— Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy, Monsterhearts, Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition, and Pathfinder Roleplaying Game— the worlds they create, and how they approach gender identity, expression and/or sexual orientation. Beginning with a short historical look at TRPGs, from the birth of Dungeons & Dragons, which borrowed heavily from heteronormative fantasy works of authors, as described in Daniel Mackay’s The Fantasy Role-Playing Game: A New Performance Art, like “J.R.R. Tolkien […] de Camp and Pratt, REH [Robert E. Howard], Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, HPL [Howard Philip Lovecraft], and A. Merritt” (15), the paper will then provide summative information on the four games. While heavily influenced by these works, TRPGs have since formed what David W. Marshall, in his essay “A World Unto Itself: Autopoietic Systems and Secondary Worlds in Dungeons Dragons,” refers to as an “autopoietic system” — a system that “reproduces itself in a close loop in order to maintain its own distinctive existence” while “responding to external stimuli” (172). With regards to this paper, the external stimulus is the increased visibility of gender and sexual diversity, which interactions with the informing fiction— namely, high, romantic, and urban fantasy— and the real-world to create what J.R.R. Tolkien, in his essay “On Fairy-Stories,” refers to as a “Secondary World,” a place where “your mind can enter” and suspend disbelief, (12) for the player, and subsequently the character, can explore. As the real world moves towards acceptance of queered genders and mutable, if not fluid, sexual orientations, TRPG writers and designers have worked to include queer experiences within their game worlds. Each of the four games explored in this paper have taken different paths by which their players can question gender expression and identity, as well as sexual orientation through their characters. These overtures on the part of TRPG writers and designers have been criticized by some, like gaming blogger Neal Litherland in his recent article “Diversity in Gaming: Will Gamers Slay the Serpent of Sexism,” who wrote, “The world is changing though, and demand is changing with it. The real reason that we’re seeing more efforts to be inclusive; because those people have money, and they will spend it just as freely as anyone else” (Litherland). Here, Litherland speaks to the commodification of inclusivity, through which companies, including TRPG publishers, can capitalize on the appearance of being inclusive through their products. I posit, however, that that these inclusive Secondary Worlds move the act of roleplaying beyond a simple hobby. By creating fictive spaces where players can question gender norms, these games allow participants use the game as a form of psychotherapy, specifically psychodrama as pioneered by psychoanalysis Jacob L. Moreno, which The Oxford Dictionary of Psychology defines as: “a form for group therapy in which people act out their own emotional problems and conflicts in front of audiences in order to gain objectivity and understanding of them” (Psychodrama). These games create spaces where players are free to create collaborative narratives that afford them the freedom to explore aspects of themselves, and others, that they may otherwise feel the need to conceal. As a gay man who is an avid player of TRPGs, I have longed for a time when game companies would recognize me, and players like me, by definitively and visibly recognizing our existence in the hobby. Before delving into the history of TRPGs and the way these four games handle queer content, a quick note of definition in regards to sex, gender, and sexual orientation is necessary. In their essay “The Epistemology of Gender Identity: Implication for Social Policy,” authors Maryann Ayim and Barbara Houston define the term “‘sex’ to have a strictly biological connotation. With very few exceptions there are two sexes, female and male,” defined by the “physical condition: chromosomes, external genitalia, internal genitalia (for example uterus, prostate), gonads (ovaries and testes), hormonal states, and secondary sex characteristics” (26). This is not necessarily the same as one’s gender, which Ayim and Houston define as “the social dimensions of one’s existence as female or a male […] and the corresponding terms designating gender are ‘masculine’ and feminine,” with gender “understood [as] the degree of conformity of the individual to the standards of femininity and masculinity prevalent in the culture” (26-7). The Oxford Dictionary of Psychology defines sexual orientation (or sexual preference) as “the predominant predilection or inclination that defines a person as heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual” and may also extend into inclinations based on the gender, and not the sex, of the person’s attractions. A Brief History of Roleplaying Games Dungeons and Dragons (henceforth referenced as D&D), as well as all TRPGs, owe their origins to Kriegspiel, a modified version of an earlier war-strategy game called War Chess, used “as an aid to educate young Prussian military officers” in 1811 (Mackay 13). Kriegspeil simulated battle scenarios, with two players attempting to out maneuver their opponent, “while an impartial umpire determine[s] the outcome of mock battles with a system of rules,” which simulates various obstacles and “chance factors” that might arise during real-life combat (Mackay 13). In time, war-games like Kriegspeil escaped the military training rooms and became a hobby that could be enjoyed by “the late-Victorian and early-modern bourgeoisie,” including an adaptation designed by H.G. Wells in 1915 (Mackay 13). Over time, war-gaming evolved from a two-player endeavor, where a clear winner or loser could be delineated, to multiplayer games, where armies had different goals or objectives that didn’t preclude other players from winning. Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, in his book Role-Playing Mastery, notes that: “One of these miniature games, actually a booklet of game rules called Chainmail, made its first commercial appears in 1971. While it was aimed at the re-creation of the warfare of medieval and early Renaissance period, Chainmail included a small section that instructed players on the addition of fantasy elements into the war game of the Middle Ages” (19). Chainmail also differed from previous war-games as it included information on playing a single character to engage in single combat with other players. Gygax, who co-authored Chainmail, also recognized that “although the fact may have been only vaguely perceived as such at the time, this set of rules allowing one figure to represent one “man” was the breakthrough that led to the creation of the first role-playing game,” (20) as it allowed a player to step into the role of the combatant. In 1974, Gygax and co-author Dave Arneson, produced the “first version of the D&D game, now generally known as the Collector’s Edition […] By a year later some 1,000 copies of the game had been sold. At the time, it was the only role-playing game available” (20). Over the last forty-one years, D&D has seen a variety of incarnations, from the D&D Basic Set, produced in 1977, to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (with two separate editions), and most recently, in 2014, to D&D Fifth Edition. Throughout all of its incarnations, the basics of the game have remained the same. At its heart, D&D and all roleplaying games are a game of pretend, like those engaged in by most children as they grow up. Unlike a simple game of pretend, which often lacks formalized structure or rules, roleplaying games follow a similar structure to Kreigspeil and other war games, with one person stepping into the role of umpire, in D&D referred to as the Dungeon Master while other games use various names such as Game Master, Master of Ceremony, whose job it is to act as umpire for and arbitrate the rules, while presenting the players with a narrative arc, or adventure, through which the players interact with one another and the Secondary World of the game. Like its forbearer Kriegspeil, most of these games use dice as a way to simulate the random chance encountered in the real world. In addition to the umpire, a group of players join together to take the role of some hero, usually created by the individual players using specified rules. The players in collaboration with the umpire create narratives in which the characters generally serve as protagonists. The stories themselves can vary in length from a single session, lasting a few hours, to multi-chapter/session adventures spanning years. The Secondary Worlds - Four Games and Their Queer Paths In 2005, Green Ronin Publishing created Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy, written and designed by Jeremy Crawford, Dawn Elliot, Steve Kenson, and John Snead. Whereas D&D and many other TRPGs borrowed heavily from the High Fantasy genre shaped by writers like Tolkien and Howard, Blue Rose was shaped by a new genre of fantasy that emerged in the mid-1980s from authors like Diane Duane, Mercedes Lackey, Tamora Pierce. Instead of placing the emphasis “on quests to obtain power and glory or to protect the world from some threat,” these authors focused on finding “a place in society, generally as members of some prominent group or official organization that goes on exciting adventures to protect ordinary people from danger” (6-7). As these stories focus on an individual’s interaction with society, the settings for this genre “are normally [sic] highly egalitarian societies, where people’s occupations and aspirations are not limited by fixed gender roles;” (7). As such, characters in this genre have an opportunity to demonstrate a variety of gender expressions and sexual identities. The primary setting for Blue Rose is the world of Aldea, specifically “Aldis, the Kingdom of Blue Rose, and its neighbors” (16). Like many High Fantasy worlds, Aldea is a world formed through its creation myths that center around four “Primordials,” or “The Gods of Twilight” – Selene, Braniel, Maurenna, and Anwaren – who “appear as either gender, or without gender,” (19) creating a divine place for diverse gender identities within the game world, given that their pantheon demonstrate a level of gender fluidity. After the cataclysmic events of The Shadow Wars, Aldis blossomed with “diversity and acceptance [as] the founding principles of the land” (25). Using Aldea, and specifically Aldis, as the primary setting, the rules for creating characters note, “just as you’re not required to play your own gender in Blue Rose, your hero doesn’t have to share your sexual orientation,” (70) making Blue Rose the first TRPG to use specific language to address the sexual orientation of the characters. In addition, within the kingdom of Aldis, “caria daunen (gay) and cepia luath (straight) people are considered equal members of society, and many people are bisexual, moving between the two roles” (70) – this description also marks Blue Rose as the first game to create specific in-game vernacular for sexual orientation and discuss its function within the fictional setting. While Aldis may see caria daunen as equal members of society, the game also provides some opposition to this concept in the kingdom of Jarzon, a theocracy whose focus on procreation marks gay characters as “deviants” who are “excluded from ‘proper’ society,” (70) providing first-hand experience for non-queer players to experience and understand the dehumanizing effects of homophobia in response to their queer. It took seven years before another game company included specific verbiage regarding queer content Monsterhearts is an story game created by Joe Mcdaldno and published by Buried Without Ceremony, an independent game publisher. Like Blue Rose, Monsterhearts focuses on romance and social interactions, but, whereas Blue Rose used romantic fantasy as its informing genre, Monsterhearts drew from the twin genre of teen romance and urban fantasy. In this game, players create teen characters that are a bit monstrous, allowing players to choose from iconic monsters like the vampire, werewolf, witch, demon, and others. Mcdaldno, however, states, “this isn’t really a game about monsters. It’s a game about the confusion that arises when your body and your social world start changing without your permission,” (42. As urban fantasy, Monsterhearts’ setting is primarily based on our very real world, with its social media and ubiquitous modes of communication, but sprinkled with the fantastic. It’s informing genres are books like the Twilight saga and television shows like Buffy the Vampire Hunter and Teen Wolf, filled with drama, action, and sexual tension. Because popular fiction and easily digestible media inform the foundational concepts of the game, Mcdaldno provides little in the way of additional background material. Being a game that focuses on the messiness of teen sexuality, one of the primary actions available to characters is the ability to “Turn On” another player or NPC— a move that allows a player to generate “emotional hold” over other people in the story, referred to as Strings. The “Turn On” mechanic is incredibly important to the queer content in the game, as it implies “something about sexuality, and particularly teen sexuality,” and emphasizes: “We don’t get to decide what turns us on.” (20). While the other games examined provide various ways by which a player can create a purposefully queer character, Monsterhearts suggests that, “your story will be more interesting and real if it includes queer content. It is another dimension of isolation and anxiety to explore through your character. It’s another way to keep the story feral, by breaking down our own expectations concerning ‘normal’ (i.e. heterosexual) relationships and desire,” (42) and also asks the players to question what is normal for their character, such as what might happen if a character that identifies as lesbian is turned on by a male character. This approach to sexuality within a game provides a glimpse at the nature of sexual fluidity and dramatizes natural fluctuations in desire. D&D has gone through a number of incarnations since its initial introduction in 1974. Its most recent version, D&D Fifth Edition, written and designed by Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford was released in August of 2014. Like previous versions of the game, D&D Fifth Edition is a “game about storytelling in worlds of swords and sorcery,” (2) and works within the genre of high fantasy. Instead of a single world, D&D Fifth Edition takes as its setting “a vast cosmos called the multiverse, connected in strange and mysterious ways to one another and to other planes of existence,” (2). The multiverse allows players to explore the worlds of “Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Dark Sun, Mystara, and Eberron” (3) published settings from previous iterations of the game, each creating its own unique Secondary World for players to explore. Each of these worlds is shaped by the histories presented in various supplements that have been released over the years, presenting players with a number of races and cultures to use as background and personal histories. While D&D Fifth Edition connects to previous editions of the game, it is also historic in the game’s discussion of gender identity, expression and sexual orientation. Like other TRPGs, players of D&D Fifth Edition are not required to create characters that share their own gender, but it takes it a step forward as discussed in “Chapter 4: Personality and Background” of the Basic Rules. Here, Mearl and Crawford clearly delineate: “You can play a male or female character without gaining any special benefits or hindrances. Think about how your character does or does not conform to the broader culture’s expectation of sex, gender, and sexual behavior,” and reminds players “you don’t need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender” (33). For the first time in a fantasy TRPG, D&D Fifth Edition was not just asking players to explore the sexual orientation of their character, like Crawford’s earlier work in Blue Rose, but instead asked players to consider that their characters may have been “made in [Corellon Larethian’s] image,” an elven god that is “often seen as androgynous or hermaphroditic,” or they may “play a female character who presents herself as a man, a man who feels trapped in a female body, or a bearded female dwarf who hates being mistaken for a male” (33). With this printed discussion, D&D Fifth Edition placed the game into the modern discourse on gender identity and expression. While the other games have specified through their rule system the acceptance of queer characters within their Secondary Worlds, Pathfinder Roleplaying Game’s writers and game designers opted to do so implicitly through inclusion of queer content in their published supplemental books, as well as through their blog. Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, published by Paizo Publishing, sprang from the Third Edition of Dungeons & Dragons, in 2009. Its Secondary World is the world of Golarion, which affords players the opportunity to play a variety of games from high-fantasy to high-tech. While it continues in its predecessor’s drive to create rich cultures for the various races that called Golarion home, no mention was made regarding gender or sexual orientation until Paizo published Jade Regent, one of the company’s Adventure Paths Adventure Paths are pre-written game scenarios that span multiple books and create a larger narrative. in 2011. One of the secondary goals of Jade Regent is the development of personal relationship with certain Non-Player Characters (NPCs) that they encounter during the story and provides an outline how these relationships are expressed, whereby authors James Jacob and Patrick Renie specify: “Note that gender isn’t an issue in the case of these three NPCs. Unless your [Game Master] says otherwise, all three of these NPCs are considered bisexual” (12). Two years later, James Jacob along with Robin D. Laws, Jason Nelson, Amber E. Scott, David Schwartz, and Jerome Virnich, presented players with two separate queer NPC couples to interact with in their Adventure Path Wrath of the Righteous. In its first installment, The Worldwound Incursion, players meet Anevia Tirabade, who was “born a man and originally named Anvenn,” but he “felt awkward in his skin,” and “increasingly found himself identifying with strong female figures rather than their male counterparts—and for most of his life Anvenn would carry the conviction that he had been born into the wrong body” (56). With the aid of her wife, the half-orc paladin Irabeth Tirabade, Anevia was able to secure an elixir that “would shift her physical gender to match the rest of her” (56). In the second installment, Sword of Valor, players meet Aron Kir, whose addiction and subsequent withdrawals eventually led him to the priest Sosiel Vaenic who eventually becomes Aron’s lover. Additionally, Pathfinder Roleplaying Game also published, through their blog, the story of Shardra Geltl, written by Crystal Frasier, as the company’s Iconic shaman. Shardra, a dwarf who learns she is a rivethun— a dwarf “who [draws] great power by embracing the disjunction between their bodies and souls,” providing a place in dwarven culture for those whose inner gender doesn’t match their outer sex (Frazier). Psychodrama and the Power of Spontaneity In addition to being the primary activity of TRPGs, roleplaying also has therapeutic applications, specifically in group therapy using psychodrama. Psychodrama, pioneered by Jacob L. Moreno who lived in Vienna while Sigmund Freud conducted his psychoanalytical work, was critical of Freud’s approach, as discussed in Moreno’s book Psychodrama, believing that its focus on “libido, trauma and early fixation, resistance and repression,” (7) only worked to serve the psychoanalytical model and Freud’s refusal “to transcend the boundaries of the individual organism” (8) made it an outmoded method of psychotherapy. Central to Moreno’s criticism of Freud’s work was that it focused on “the treatment of the individual in isolation” (10). Moreno felt that it was necessary to “treat the individual in groups,” through “action methods,” certain that “[psychodrama] has developed a theory of personality and a theory of the group which is [...] deeper, broader, and more economical that [psychoanalytics]” (10). The primary setting of Freud’s work was the private office, whereas Moreno’s was the “The Therapeutic Theater” (3), where he could treat groups of people, the cast, as they worked to achieve “individual and group catharsis” (10) through the use of spontaneous roleplaying The Encyclopedia of Social Work explains that psychodrama “aims towards exploring and resolving psychological and social problems. Postulating that humans learn by action and interaction in a given context, psychodrama works by having participants enact problems, issues, or concerns rather than merely talk about them” (Encyclopedia of Social Work). Important to Moreno’s work with psychodrama is the power of spontaneity: “It is spontaneity which produces spontaneity, not reflection of it. It is spontaneity which produces order, not the laws which are themselves artefacts of a spontaneous order. It is spontaneity which enhances creativity” (Moreno 9, emphasis original). Spontaneity is also the key to roleplaying, both in psychodramatic terms as wells as in TRPGs; while there are rules that might guide what is possible, a characters actions and reactions are up to the individual whim of the player. Moreno recognized that spontaneity: “is the demonstration of creational qualities which evolve in one continuous effort with the help of Impromptu techniques [...] for these creational qualities are what they become through the spontaneous confluence of subconscious, conscious, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual elements” (31). Even when working from published modules or Adventure Paths, the narrative created by a group is spontaneously generated by the individual players reactions to the plot structures, hooks, and NPCs they are presented with as the group collaboratively tells the stories of their characters. It is through the act of spontaneous narrative creation and group interaction that players can unlock subconscious or conscious problems, issues, or concerns they may have regarding gender identity, expression and the sexual orientation of themselves or others. All the Players Assemble The important aspect of both Moreno’s work and the various TRPGs is the act of roleplaying, which Gygax differentiates from role assumption: “Role assumption is […] the acceptance of a role that one might actually have in the future. It differs substantially from role-playing in that the latter deals with acting the part of a make-believe persona that cannon be fulfilled at the present or at any future time” (18). It is in this assumption of persona that players are able to create a character that is unlike themselves, both in terms of occupation or race, such as fireball-wielding wizard or stout dwarf, as well as sex, gender, and sexual orientation. This affords a player the opportunity to inhabit a different person and explore life, even if a make-believe life, and understand what it could be like for people different from themselves. Prior to the inclusion of queer content and discussions of gender identity and expression in games, it was not uncommon to find male players creating female characters. In her essay “Playing with Identity: Unconscious Desire and Role-Playing Games,” Michelle Nephew describes her first hand experience in a gaming group where “a male gamer created and played a female character [named] Ballistic, and she was described as a black Aeon Flex, shaved bald and loaded down with armor and weaponry.” As Nephew notes, “Ballistic is typical of one common method of cross-gender role-playing: that of the frigid, withdrawn, masculinized female character,” which she contrasts with the other “troubling female character sometimes created by male players,” the “vamp” who “lose[s] no time in attempting to seduce every male in sight, PC and NPC alike.” Nephew sees these character archetypes as misogynistic and driven by “scopophilic act [of] controlling;” they also provide the player an opportunity to explore these gender spaces. Especially with the “vamp” character, the player is also potentially challenging his or her own sexual orientation. The therapeutic value of TRPGs, through their connection with psychodrama, is not limited to the player themselves. The other players serve as an audience. As more female and other-gendered players join in these games, players are able to experience catharsis through their own actions as well as those of others, and also learn how to come to terms with various genders, sexes, and orientations. When discussing the Therapeutic Theater, Moreno states that “[t]he idea is to be free from restraint; from a predetermined place and a predetermined creative produce [as] both delimit the full, unrestrained emergence of spontaneity” (26). It is here the creation of Secondary Worlds is critical to the function of roleplaying as a method of reaching catharsis, as it frees the player from the restraints provided by the real world. During the game session, the player is free to leave the confines of their mundane life, the predetermined place of their physical self, and take actions that may take the character and the story in a different direction than originally intended, freeing them from the predetermined creative product. In fact, it has been my experience as both player and as Game Master that the stories become more intense and personal when the players are free to take actions that were not anticipated. This level of spontaneity allows two groups to experience the same pre-written scenarios in vastly different ways while they work through their own concerns. Conclusion and Final Thoughts While previous versions of D&D, as well as many other TRPGs, have not engaged the topic of character gender identity, expression and sexual orientation to the extent the games examined in this paper have, the autopoietic system these games have with the real-world does not preclude players from creating queer characters. In a recent interview published on the blog The Mary Sue, D&D Fifth Edition authors Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford discussed their decision to include sexuality and gender diversity in the game. When asked to explain the wording for the “Sex” entry, discussed earlier in this paper, Crawford remarked, “We knew early on that we wanted the new edition to be inclusive: inclusive of beloved material from previous editions, inclusive of different play styles, and inclusive of a varied cast of characters,” and went on to say, “We also wanted to be welcoming to as many D&D players as possible, to look at the wonderfully diverse group of people who play the game and say, ‘There’s a place for each of you at the game table.” As the world at large becomes more welcoming to gender diversity and sexuality, so too are the games we play. Just as the Blue Rose, Monsterhearts, D&D Fifth Edition, and Pathfinder Roleplaying Game have included queer content within their game worlds, video roleplaying games, such as Fable III, Fallout: New Vegas, Dragon Age II, and many others are beginning to include queer content for players to explore. While each of these could be seen as commodifying inclusivity, seeking to capitalize on their games’ inclusion of LGBT-content, it is also opening the queer world to what has been predominantly a heteronormative hobby. Daniel Mackay points out that “[D&D] maintains a reciprocal relationship with fantasy literature. Not only is it influenced by the genre’s work, but also it influences the development and direction of new fantasy novels” (18). Through the inclusion of queer gender identities, expression and sexual orientation in TRPGs, hopefully this reciprocal relationship will ensure the inclusion of gender diversity in the informing literature, whether it by high, romantic, or urban fantasy as well as the other various genres that have spawned different TRPGs. Works Cited Ayim, Maryann, and Barbara Houston. "The Epistemology of Gender Identity: Implications for Social Policy." Social Theory and Practice 11.1 (1985): 25-59. Print. Gygax, Gary. Role-playing Mastery. New York, NY: Perigee, 1987. Print. Litherland, Neal. "Diversity in Gaming: Will Gamers Slay The Serpent of Sexism?" Crit Confirm. Crit Confirm Entertainment, 23 Apr. 2015. Web. 25 Apr. 2015. Mackay, Daniel. The Fantasy Role-playing Game: A New Performing Art. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2001. Print. Marshall, David W. "A World Unto Itself: Autopoietic Systems and Secondary Worlds in Dungeons Dragons." Mass Market Medieval: Essays on the Middle Ages in Popular Culture. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2007. 171-185. Print. Moreno, Jacob L. Psychodrama. Beacon, NY: Beacon House, 1946. Print. Nephew, Michelle. "Playing With Identity: Unconscious Desire and Role-Playing Games." Gaming as Culture: Essays on Reality, Identity and Experience in Fantasy Games. Ed. J. Patrick Williams, Sean Q. Hendricks, and W. Keith Winkler. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2006. Kindle. "Psychodrama." Encyclopedia of Social Work. Ed. Terry Mizrahi and Larry E. Davis. Oxford University Press. Web. 9 May 2015. "Psychodrama." Oxford Dictionary of Psychology. Ed. Andrew M. Colman. Oxford University Press, 2014. Web. 9 May 2015. “Sexual Preference.” Oxford Dictionary of Psychology. Ed. Andrew M. Colman. Oxford University Press, 2014. Web. 9 May 2015. Tabletop Roleplaying Games - - - Crawford, Jeremy, Dawn Elliot, Steve Kenson, and John Snead. Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy. Renton: Green Ronin, 2005. Print. - - - Fraizer, Crystal. "Meet the Iconics: Shardra Geltl." Paizo / Paizo Blog. Paizo Publishing, LLC, 31 July 2014. Web. 8 Apr. 2015. - - - Jacobs, James, and Patrick Renie. Jade Regent Player's Guide. Redmond: Paizo, LLC, 2011. Print. - - - Jacobs, James, Robin D. Laws, Jason Nelson, Amber E. Scott, David Schwartz, and Jerome Virnich. "NPC Gallery." Wrath of the Righteous: Sword of Valor. Redmond: Paizo, LLC, 2013. 54-60. Print. - - - Jacobs, James, Robin D. Laws, Jason Nelson, Amber E. Scott, David Schwartz, and Jerome Virnich. "NPC Gallery." Wrath of the Righteous: The Worldwound Incursion. Redmond: Paizo, LLC, 2013. 56-63. Print. - - - Mearls, Mike, and Jeremy Crawford. Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules: Player's Basic Rules. Renton: Wizards of the Coast, LLC, 2014. 33-43. Print. - - - Mcdaldno, Joe. Monsterhearts. Buried Without Ceremony, 2012. Print. Tolkien, J. R. R. "On Fairy-Stories." The Metamorphosis. Brainstorm-service.com. Web. 4 Apr. 2015. Trice, Michael. "The Mary Sue Exclusive Interview: Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford on Acknowledging Sexuality and Gender Diversity In D&D." The Mary Sue, 24 July 2014. Web. 28 Apr. 2015. Riley 17