Quote:
Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker
Questions of Disguise, and different applications of Sex Appeal (Which seems to keep getting defended as useful to things other than seduction, when I do not believe anyone called that into question) are great subjects for another thread, but are getting off track of the OP actually is asking, which is...
What trait can they take to be able to say they are...
"a man who even the men want"
and
"the character could use Sex Appeal on/against others regardless of gender."
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The fact that Sex Appeal can be used for purposes other than getting someone into bed, and that other things than sex appeal can be used to get someone into bed, means that "the character could use Sex Appeal" is not limited to using it to get people into bed. Therefore it is not equivalent to "a man who even the men want," at least not if that is about seduction. Those two can be discussed separately.
Consider, for example, a man who is a committed monogamist and who is genuinely passionate about his wife. He meets a beautiful woman. His reactions to her in general are at +4 (not +2, as they would be for a handsome man). And if she attempts to gain his help using Sex Appeal, it's not impossible that she might succeed, and in any case she would get +4 to her Sex Appeal roll if she got to attempt one at all. And all of this is even though he is not going to go to bed with her and she may not even be offering that.
Now, if she were a man, he would get +2 to reaction rolls, but he would not even be able to attempt Sex Appeal rolls against this monogamist, not because he's monogamous, but because he's not even abstractly or potentially interested in a male partner.
But what if he's an Androgynous man? The reaction bonus is +3, not +2. That extra +1 must come from the fact that he looks a bit femme. It's not because he's mistaken for a woman, because the rules say nothing about "passing" in this case. And it's not because there's sexual intent, because the monogamist is still heterosexual and knows that the androgyne is a man. It's purely an aesthetic response to appearance.
So does that extra +1 apply to Sex Appeal rolls, and does the androgyne get to MAKE Sex Appeal rolls to straight men? I agree that that's debatable and any answer must be speculative. But I might allow it, to represent a specific response: the perception of physical beauty and in particular the perception of the beautiful woman this man might be were he a woman. That bonus wouldn't be usable to get a straight man, or an exclusively gay woman, or a monogamist of any orientation into bed, or perhaps into any physical contact; but it might be usable to get them to do other things that the androgyne wanted.