> Not that
> Vingans would be picked on or anything, but they might be seen as a
little
> odd ("Why would you want to be a man when you can be a powerful
woman?").
>
A perfectly reasonable point of view. I based my comments on three
things:
1- The Esrolian homeland write up in HQ lists one of the Esrolian
occupations as infantry soldier, and explicitly gives Vinga as the
goddess for women in that profession. This at least suggests that
tehy are not rare.
2- Heroquest voices for Esrolia mentions that if things come to war, the men first lie with their wife, then go to war "he goes to the muster, led in our defense by the daughters of Vinga and the wisdom of the Queen." This suggests that the normal practice in Esrolia is for the officers to be Vingans in most forces.
3- Heroqust voices for Esrolia says of Vinga "Vinga is the warrior goddess who took the secrets of war from men, and made them into the skills of protection." This implies to me that a woman joining Vinga is not seen as being "like a man." Mind you, I doubt that a military career is generally all that highly respected in Esrolia, and that soldiers and warriors of all types are seen more as a necessary and expensive evil rather than as anything to glorify. But I expect that many Vingans don't see themselves so much as warriors but as protectors and peace keepers. "Men, and people ruled by men, will always think they can take things by force," they might say "so we are here to show them a type of strength that they can understand. Only then can they be brought to the peace rug, and the true strength of Esrolia brought to bear on them."
At the very least Vingans are well known in Esrolia, and there are a smattering of them throughout the land. Possibly they are quite common. I doubt there is particular reason that exact numbers would ever need to be officially defined, it seems like one of those areas well left to be defined however you like your game world.
--Bryan
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