Anyone else notice how paizo and pathfinder says 'she' a lot?

No.  They just alternate between using He and She in examples, whereas earlier editions of many roleplaying games only used He, so it seems like there are a lot more Shes than there are.  Now it's just equal.

In reply to Shinoskay (msg # 1):

Actually, WoTC started this with the D&D 3.0 book specifically because of the gender bias in writing for the past several thousand years. Ok, for all the years. :D

I'm not a dude feminist or anything, but that's the reason they did it. The masculine pronoun 'he' has almost always been used to describe both genders. So WoTC did that in 2000 as a way to challenge the status quoe.

That's the reason Paizo does it too I bet.

Yes, this.  I distinctly remember one or another of the earliest 3E splatbooks going with She exclusively; it was jarring at first, but only because it was really eye-opening to just how much I expected my own gender to be the default represenation.

I'm glad more books now are moving away from "male pronouns as default/only", nowadays.

Some books use "she" as the GM and "he" as the players. I've always found that a bit unsatisfying as far as equality is concerned, since most books reference PCs a whole lot more often than the GM.

As I recall, the Pathfinder books try hard to use the pronoun of the iconic character of each class, when applicable. I find it kind of satisfying.

I thought White Wolf did that as well.

That's true. I like it. And, after reading a lot of WW books, I started to find it grating whenever I read some other RPG book and noticed that the book was written using only the "he" pronoun...

Personally I would prefer more descriptive words like "the player" or "the GM" instead of "He can approve this" or "She then rolls the dice".

Personalized pronouns don't really belong in text books like this unless you're referring to a specific player. For example in a lot of "example play" they have a cast of players playing a cast of players so that makes sense.

Using that throughout the whole book like GM Max or Player Gwen throughout the entire book would also solve that problem as its no longer a "choice" per se but you're using a character as an example throughout the whole book which sidesteps people upset about inclusiveness and people upset about non-inclusiveness.

It comes down to avoiding repetition of nouns. "The player must roll to determine if the player succeeds on the action the player is undertaking" is awkward.

I personally use the singular they in everything I write. It's inclusive to everyone, regardless of whether or not they fit into a binary gender, and it's generic, so I don't have to worry about accidentally using the wrong pronoun when I can't remember if "Player" or "GM" was the one using She/Her.

It helps that I play with a diverse group, so inclusivity has always been an important element, gender and otherwise.

In reply to NowhereMan (msg # 10):

English lacks a good, generic descriptive word other than "they." One of the things I typically use is "beings" instead of "people" since in a fantasy setting people usually means humans. But when you're talking about a room full of a bunch of fantasy races (elves, dwarves, halfings, half-orcs, and more...) "beings" is the only word I've come up with that I like.

In reply to byzantinex (msg # 11):

"folk".

I actually haver a lot on applying words typically applied to humans to other sentients, and tie myself in knots to avoid the question...it feels kind of disrespectful to call, say, a female elf or kobold a "woman", like calling all animals dogs, yet equally disrespectful to use Earth terms for non-sapient animals, even if the term "she-orc" does sound mildly epic.

Totally in agreement with using the old-fashioned indefinite "they" in manuals unless referring to specific example characters, though. Inclusive, apolitical, and less likely to draw a big red arrow pointing out the author's subconscious prejudices.

In reply to tibiotarsus (msg # 12):

Folk seems so "country bumpkin" haha

I do always try to simply use male/female instead of woman/man unless I am specifically referring to a human.

Ha! That's the first time I've been called a bumpkin. Still, appropriate for premodern settings, especially if you have Randomly Scottish Dwarves, which seems to be a thing now.

See, that feels far too "animal" to me as well, like you wouldn't say "There's a male at the bar asking to see you" or "she's a nice female," it sounds like you're going to try and breed them like guinea pigs. Plus a whole load of assumptions/meta reveals when it comes to races that aren't particularly sexually dimorphic (or don't have reproductive capacity, but might have picked a gender, like constructs).

I do tend to have elves refer to humans like that, though, just to show how species-centric referring to your race with people terminology and others with generic animal terminology is. I don't mind practicing ways to get out of that kind of jam, though. Referring to folk by profession/perception and then slipping a pronoun in generally works for description (e.g. "the stranger pulled her hatbrim a little lower, leaning on the bar to wait), and if any situation comes up where gender matters more than species in a mixed group there's always catchall generics, e.g. "guys, these are your baths, ladies, down the hall..."