1. Women in the story frequently complained that men were stronger in the Power than they were. This wad not universally true, however the average man is stronger in the Power than the average woman. Women we only stronger, again on average, in Spirit and maybe air. This contrast is part of RJ's constant man vs. woman obsession.
2. When make channelers go crazy from the taint they tend to either wither away quickly or go out with a bang. Some examples from the series include destroying entire towns overnight.
3. Channeling is dangerous to learn alone or too quickly. The Black Tower suffered a large number of casualties because of the speed at which they pushed the recruits. Some went crazy and died, some were burnt out, and others were affected by the taint at an increased rate. The poisoning that was mentioned was considered a kinder way of dealing with these recruits than gentling.
I love that there is active interest in the series here and I would really enjoy playing along. However, I would really love to play in a taint-free world where men are not considered dangerous for being able to channel. I think this fits with the rest of the group's wishes given what I've read. I also think that it would be much easier to keep things in line with the series, but moldable (real word?) to the group's liking if we just make the setting x years after the series and make up or own rules for the stuff we want to change. Also, No worries about canon characters.
I'm glad that you have shown interest in this. Unfortunately, I do not have an idea yet of when it will be up and running,
but it is still advancing. There are a couple things I would like to address about what you said.
1. You are right about the average strength. I don't remember where, but I read a good comparison somewhere before. Like with muscles on people in real life, men are usually stronger than women. There are women that are stronger than men, but these individuals are pretty rare. This refers to natural strength, not that of weightlifters or anything like that. As for the elemental strengths you are mistaken. It has said repeatedly in the books that men were stronger in Fire and Earth, women stronger in Air and Water, with both of them being about equal with Spirit. Like the overall strength, there
are exceptions, but not often.
2. That is somewhat up for debate I'd say, especially in a roleplay group. I believe that like sicknesses and diseases it affects each person at a different rate. Here is a section from a wiki page about the Taint:
"A slow degradation of body and mind, the taint sets in some time after a man starts channeling. Those affected go mad and slowly rot away from the inside, often destroying their surroundings and loved ones in the process. Interestingly, this physical rotting and madness are not dissimilar from the effects of the True Power on Ishamael, its only known long-time user. This has led the remaining female Aes Sedai to hunt down and gentle all men who can channel, to prevent a second Breaking of the World.
In addition, some Aes Sedai and at least one of the Forsaken (Semirhage) believe that men will hear voices as they go mad, although it is still debated whether these are "actual" voices from past lives, or just symptoms of the madness' progression."And as for the "Taint free" world, I'm not sure what you mean. Like there never was a Taint, or that it has been cleansed? And I don't remember who said it right now, but someone pointed out that if we set it after the series then most of the shadowspawn and all that would be gone and there wouldn't be anyone to really fight except ourselves, not to mention that the politics would be changed as well as possible nations and all that. For the making up our own rules and no canons that is why we are using a Portal Stone World. Kind of the same as in the series, but we have complete freedom to make original content and characters.
