I've gotten the impression from the kids that many of them are in a place where they can't respect the contributions of those people who aren't combatants. Which makes perfect sense for teenagers in a horrible warzone, you know?
But almost all of the face characters are at some level a warrior, which also makes sense for the narrative? I think it also skews the read narrative; there's Siz and Evelyn and Linus off in the tower doing Essential Nerd Things, but Essential Nerd Things don't get points and aren't flashy.
There's Arista for our view into the younger set, and nobody expects her to be a fighter at least, so nobody snarks on her for not.
Who else? Pansy, who has been hugely, hugely absent from the public face of game since it turned to 'we're doing the final war' because she was on logistics and support; she has basically been absent from the plot for ages. Jeremy too. Never mind that basically Pansy took responsibility for making sure there was something after the war was over, and thus is probably one of the most actually important current members of the Order.
Basically, the non-fighters are marginalised voices. (Including, I feel, Sally-Anne.)
FWIW, as Sally-Anne's player, I have not felt like she's been marginalized. I want to just note a couple of things, because there are factors in the storytelling here that aren't visible to readers.
1. I play multiple characters. One is Sally-Anne; another is Rachel. I was posting a lot as Rachel this summer, and there are only so many hours in a day to post.
2. Especially as I spent five weeks on an extended trip to France this summer. (Yay! It was awesome! But also meant that I was out of synch with everyone else! If you ever noticed a Rachel post that inexplicably was time stamped 11 p.m. even though it was afternoon for you...now you know why.) Player availability does some weird things to how characters are perceived. Sometimes we come up with a plot to explain an absence, other times we just hope no one notices.
3. When I sit down to play, I post in part based on who's got something going on that makes for interesting reading.
Sally-Anne totally did stuff this summer. She worked in the hospital wing, providing the secure Order alternative to St Mungo's, treating both the people living at Hogwarts for everyday problems (some of which are pretty chronic when you're a rebel base full of the recently traumatized) and emergency care for people injured in the field. However, during earlier parts of the story, she was sometimes the only available Healer-ish person other than Poppy. But then the Order had an influx of people that included a lot of healers, at which point she had a senior person to report to and fewer exciting stories like the time she had to impersonate Poppy and treat Acton's menopausal symptoms...
Rachel, on the other hand, was running Albion MLE. So there were an endless number of interesting things for her to talk about.
4. I also pick characters to post as based on who else is online and able to play with me. That got way weirder when I was 7 time zones away from all the other players.
So. Now you know. I felt that the characters respected Sally-Anne's contributions, and I always felt like she has interesting things to do during the big battles / other enormous turning points of the game. Not too bad for someone who has exactly one line of existence in canon!
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But almost all of the face characters are at some level a warrior, which also makes sense for the narrative? I think it also skews the read narrative; there's Siz and Evelyn and Linus off in the tower doing Essential Nerd Things, but Essential Nerd Things don't get points and aren't flashy.
There's Arista for our view into the younger set, and nobody expects her to be a fighter at least, so nobody snarks on her for not.
Who else? Pansy, who has been hugely, hugely absent from the public face of game since it turned to 'we're doing the final war' because she was on logistics and support; she has basically been absent from the plot for ages. Jeremy too. Never mind that basically Pansy took responsibility for making sure there was something after the war was over, and thus is probably one of the most actually important current members of the Order.
Basically, the non-fighters are marginalised voices. (Including, I feel, Sally-Anne.)
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1. I play multiple characters. One is Sally-Anne; another is Rachel. I was posting a lot as Rachel this summer, and there are only so many hours in a day to post.
2. Especially as I spent five weeks on an extended trip to France this summer. (Yay! It was awesome! But also meant that I was out of synch with everyone else! If you ever noticed a Rachel post that inexplicably was time stamped 11 p.m. even though it was afternoon for you...now you know why.) Player availability does some weird things to how characters are perceived. Sometimes we come up with a plot to explain an absence, other times we just hope no one notices.
3. When I sit down to play, I post in part based on who's got something going on that makes for interesting reading.
Sally-Anne totally did stuff this summer. She worked in the hospital wing, providing the secure Order alternative to St Mungo's, treating both the people living at Hogwarts for everyday problems (some of which are pretty chronic when you're a rebel base full of the recently traumatized) and emergency care for people injured in the field. However, during earlier parts of the story, she was sometimes the only available Healer-ish person other than Poppy. But then the Order had an influx of people that included a lot of healers, at which point she had a senior person to report to and fewer exciting stories like the time she had to impersonate Poppy and treat Acton's menopausal symptoms...
Rachel, on the other hand, was running Albion MLE. So there were an endless number of interesting things for her to talk about.
4. I also pick characters to post as based on who else is online and able to play with me. That got way weirder when I was 7 time zones away from all the other players.
So. Now you know. I felt that the characters respected Sally-Anne's contributions, and I always felt like she has interesting things to do during the big battles / other enormous turning points of the game. Not too bad for someone who has exactly one line of existence in canon!
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I'm glad you had an awesome trip though. :)