Warforged Gender change

[lytokk]

So, with the recent threads talking about a PC getting gender swapped, I was curious as to what happens when a warforged dons a belt of gender change. They have no real gender to speak of, even though they may identify as male or female. They are illustrated as being more masculine in appearance, broader shoulders and all that. Since the opposite of gender undefined would in my mind be an abundance of genders, do they suddenly become both? Or is there no change whatsoever? Or do we end up with a completely different effect? Tried googleing this to see if there had been a discussion about it but came up with nothing.

[Darrin]

Just a guess: the little "Windows" icon stamped on their keister changes into an "Apple" icon, or vice versa.

[Red Fel]

So, with the recent threads talking about a PC getting gender swapped, I was curious as to what happens when a warforged dons a belt of gender change. They have no real gender to speak of, even though they may identify as male or female. They are illustrated as being more masculine in appearance, broader shoulders and all that. Since the opposite of gender undefined would in my mind be an abundance of genders, do they suddenly become both? Or is there no change whatsoever? Or do we end up with a completely different effect? Tried googleing this to see if there had been a discussion about it but came up with nothing.

I would argue that it's like putting the belt on a golem, ooze, or similarly genderless creature - it does nothing.

Also, the idea of a hermaphroditic Warforged resulting from this particular scenario is uniquely horrifying. I think you can imagine why, if you're halfway as demented as I am.


Just a guess: the little "Windows" icon stamped on their keister changes into an "Apple" icon, or vice versa.

My Little Warforged?

[Spore]

If you take personality templates (I think Eberron mentions somewhere that the original creators used their own personality in an modified way to get smart warforged) into account females tend to be more creative, social and caring. I could imagine a protective reflex towards smaller weaker individuals ("children"). Male warforged should then be more straight forward, tactical and screw it. There's nothing I can say that won't upset anyone.

[Andezzar]

Just a guess: the little "Windows" icon stamped on their keister changes into an "Apple" Penguin icon, or vice versa.I fixed that for you.

[Brookshw]

Not much, I mean, if all the female and male ports on your computer suddenly swapped you'd have some issues but that's what adapters are for :smalltongue:

[lytokk]

Yes Red, my mind may have gone there too.

It was just a curiosity question. Since the body of a warforged is more masculine looking than feminine, would it reverse? Become more feminine than masculine? Or could it actually change their percieved gender, in which they identify themselves?

It probably would be like some are saying, no affect, like the only other transforming curse I can think of which is lycanthropy.

[Spore]

This
http://dungeonsmaster.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/warforged-01.jpg
turns into that
http://www.darrencalvert.com/femalewf.jpg

[John Longarrow]

They go from either being plug in to battery powered of vice versa.

[137beth]

Just a guess: the little "Windows" icon stamped on their keister changes into an "Apple" icon, or vice versa.

What does the House Cannith icon become? An aberrant dragonmark?

[Ruethgar]

I would go with hermaphrodite, the opposite of no gender is all genders. As far as what the children might be, construct is one of the two overriding types(undead being the other) so I assume the children would be warforged for the first few generations at least, but able to take heritage and bloodline abilities without being slapped for not having malleable lineage.

[Andezzar]

The type pyramid does not exist in 3.5

Also having gender(s) does not remove sterility.

[atemu1234]

Just a guess: the little "Windows" icon stamped on their keister changes into an "Apple" icon, or vice versa.

But... mine's Linux...

[Werephilosopher]

I would go with hermaphrodite, the opposite of no gender is all genders.

That's a little iffy. If the belt only affects the body and not the mind, it probably wouldn't have an effect- there is no gender hard-coded into the "flesh" of a warforged the way DNA is in humans, etc. Even if the warforged in question looked more masculine or feminine, it may have been designed to look like a masculine female or a feminine male- there's really no way for the belt to tell.

[JusticeZero]

They don't look particularly masculine to me. The only "masculine" thing I see is the lack of lumps on their chest, and that is a mysterious and unneeded trait that is unique to humans. If they can reproduce themselves, then if anything, they are all female by default. There are not many masculine or feminine behaviors by default; for instance, the only social science Nobel Prize was won by a woman for her research - which had been derided as being too feminine and womanly because it was full of mathematical statistical analysis, and maths was for girls. Different cultures shuffle most behaviors around differently.
Since they don't have a structural gender, which is what the item affects, the thing wouldn't even try to activate.

[lytokk]

I think they look pretty masculine. Broader shoulders, thicker waists and arms. Pretty masculine to me. Upon further research, it appears there were female bodied warforged built for specific purposes in some of the Eberron modules and maybe some of the novels, even featuring some art on Keith Baker's website. Slimmer, more streamlined. So, at least in that regard, feminine bodied warforged do exist. They are exceptionally rare, and built for specific purposes, but do exist.

[Jeff the Green]

Since the opposite of gender undefined would in my mind be an abundance of genders, do they suddenly become both?

I like this idea. Some fungi have thousands of mating types (which is somewhat different from sexes, which is really different from gender, but let's ignore that for now), so maybe now the warforged has thousands of different kinds of suspensors and ascogonia and antheridia, all swapping his DNA with each other and producing spores that grow into tiny mushrooms laced with metal and vaguely shaped like a human.

[Red Fel]

I like this idea. Some fungi have thousands of mating types (which is somewhat different from sexes, which is really different from gender, but let's ignore that for now), so maybe now the warforged has thousands of different kinds of suspensors and ascogonia and antheridia, all swapping his DNA with each other and producing spores that grow into tiny mushrooms laced with metal and vaguely shaped like a human.

Egads. They've done it. The fools, they've done it! Don't you see? Don't you realize?

The answer was staring us in the face all along. Take a being, living but lifeless, alive yet not alive, infertile yet given life, made from a thing that is unliving but lifegiving, and place a Belt of Gender Change upon it. Invert the polarities! What was infertile yet given life becomes lifeless yet lifebearing, what was mobile yet unliving becomes an immobile source of life...

You have discovered the secret to the Creation Forges!

[Urpriest]

The belt of gender-changing isn't a real item. If it was, it would have listed effects for genderless beings (or they would be added in errata anyway :smallwink:).

Edit: that said, some warforged identify as male, and some as female. Gender has to do with behaviors and how you self-identify, not physical characteristics, so it should flip male-identified warforged to female and vice versa. Note that this also implies that the belt didn't change Roy physically at all, the apparent physical changes would have been a result of costume changes he put together on the fly to feel comfortable in his temporarily altered gender. :smalltongue:

[lytokk]

Isn't there a card in the deck of many things that reverses gender? At least in second edition I remember my brother telling me a story of how he got gender bent after drawing from a deck

Edit by your logic red which came first the warforged or he forge?