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 happygolucky wrote:

Troike wrote:

 happygolucky wrote:
I wouldn't mind seeing a unit of PA Angels with swords and shields or they can be exchanged for Flaming crossbows with a similar role to the Vanguard veteran..

Would work nicely with the Celestians. Current codex already gives them a melee related AoF, so letting them take swords and shields would just be giving them the tools they neeeded all along. Would make for a quite competetive melee unit, actually, which we could really use.

I was thinking more like mini-living saints like some Celestians who have made and honourable and selfless act but its not quite as much to scale as a living saint, I just though it could be a cool death star unit and it wouldn't transform the look of the Celestians, but that's just my opinion..

I'll admit, I'm just very eager for Celestians to be useful. Like I said, really want to paint them a certain way.

Anyway, I'm not sure about having "mini-living saints", seems like it would make the actual Living Saints less special. And Celestians do sorta fit with the "heroic" image you're going for, they are the Sisterhood's best, after all.

 Troike wrote:

 happygolucky wrote:

Troike wrote:

 happygolucky wrote:
I wouldn't mind seeing a unit of PA Angels with swords and shields or they can be exchanged for Flaming crossbows with a similar role to the Vanguard veteran..

Would work nicely with the Celestians. Current codex already gives them a melee related AoF, so letting them take swords and shields would just be giving them the tools they neeeded all along. Would make for a quite competetive melee unit, actually, which we could really use.

I was thinking more like mini-living saints like some Celestians who have made and honourable and selfless act but its not quite as much to scale as a living saint, I just though it could be a cool death star unit and it wouldn't transform the look of the Celestians, but that's just my opinion..

I'll admit, I'm just very eager for Celestians to be useful. Like I said, really want to paint them a certain way.

Anyway, I'm not sure about having "mini-living saints", seems like it would make the actual Living Saints less special. And Celestians do sorta fit with the "heroic" image you're going for, they are the Sisterhood's best, after all.

Well Im not saying anything's a bad Idea, after all my knowledge of SoB is very vague after all Its just I like the Idea of Angels and I think Angels would fit in perfectly in an army of the SoB..

 happygolucky wrote:
Its just I like the Idea of Angels and I think Angels would fit in perfectly in an army of the SoB..

Oh, we already have an angel-eque unit, the Seraphim. Their jump packs look sorta like wings, and the word "Seraphim" refers to a sort of Angel.

 Troike wrote:

 happygolucky wrote:
Its just I like the Idea of Angels and I think Angels would fit in perfectly in an army of the SoB..

Oh, we already have an angel-eque unit, the Seraphim. Their jump packs look sorta like wings, and the word "Seraphim" refers to a sort of Angel.

And they count as "holy looking" enough to get rerolls.

Sepraphim units with wings instead of a jump pack would visually look amazing. Also I would love to have a dune buggy transport for sisters maybe as an open top max capacity 6 have a pivot heavy flamer. And also instead of biker sisters how about 4 wheeler atv type fast attack sister of battle unit.

Ugh, keep those winged mutant freaks away from my army of holy purity.

happygolucky wrote:The focus mechanic is basically you get a certain amount of tokens (such as warp charges as an example) and you have a certain amount of "spells" which you can spend these tokens on, and these "spells" can range from offensive to boosting your own troops stat lines and rules as well as creating an area which has an effect on your own troops or the enemy's when they enter it. if we change the word "spell" to "acts of faith" it could be a refreshing and new playstyle for 40k adding new strategy's involved

Hmm, in part this sounds like the throwback to 3E WH rules. I kind of like the pool refreshing every round. On the other hand, the old system had its merit as well, promoting pre-planning rather than adaption.
Either way, that idea about "creating bonus zones" sounds nice. I'd probably tie it to some meaning, though, such as an objective ("holy ground") or the place where a unit was wiped out or an important character got killedmartyred.

happygolucky wrote:I was thinking more like mini-living saints like some Celestians who have made and honourable and selfless act but its not quite as much to scale as a living saint, I just though it could be a cool death star unit and it wouldn't transform the look of the Celestians, but that's just my opinion..

Reminds me of the Avenging Angels from Relic's Dawn of War PC game - supposedly the spirits of fallen Battle Sisters resurrected by an Act of Faith of the Canoness.

It always seemed as if GW themselves would aim for a more ambiguous nature of what AoF actually are (up to the point of writing they merely "appear miraculous to the unschooled" in Codex fluff), so this might run counter to that idea. Plus, as Troike mentioned, we already have the Seraphim - can't get much more angelic than that!

(agree about Celestians needing to become more useful, btw - I'd really love to see them turned into a sort of Crusader-style CC unit, a bit like this)

I like Celestians as a more generic Veteran - with the options for close combat weapons or ranged weapons. Let the whole squad take Armoury weapons, say. That way you can equip them to the role you want -whether with inferno pistols all round, or power swords and storm shields, or just every model with a storm bolter.

 Lynata wrote:

happygolucky wrote:The focus mechanic is basically you get a certain amount of tokens (such as warp charges as an example) and you have a certain amount of "spells" which you can spend these tokens on, and these "spells" can range from offensive to boosting your own troops stat lines and rules as well as creating an area which has an effect on your own troops or the enemy's when they enter it. if we change the word "spell" to "acts of faith" it could be a refreshing and new playstyle for 40k adding new strategy's involved

Hmm, in part this sounds like the throwback to 3E WH rules. I kind of like the pool refreshing every round. On the other hand, the old system had its merit as well, promoting pre-planning rather than adaption.
Either way, that idea about "creating bonus zones" sounds nice. I'd probably tie it to some meaning, though, such as an objective ("holy ground") or the place where a unit was wiped out or an important character got killedmartyred.

happygolucky wrote:I was thinking more like mini-living saints like some Celestians who have made and honourable and selfless act but its not quite as much to scale as a living saint, I just though it could be a cool death star unit and it wouldn't transform the look of the Celestians, but that's just my opinion..

Reminds me of the Avenging Angels from Relic's Dawn of War PC game - supposedly the spirits of fallen Battle Sisters resurrected by an Act of Faith of the Canoness.

It always seemed as if GW themselves would aim for a more ambiguous nature of what AoF actually are (up to the point of writing they merely "appear miraculous to the unschooled" in Codex fluff), so this might run counter to that idea. Plus, as Troike mentioned, we already have the Seraphim - can't get much more angelic than that!

(agree about Celestians needing to become more useful, btw - I'd really love to see them turned into a sort of Crusader-style CC unit, a bit like this)

Yeah that's what I was thinking about the Angel unit, it would be nice and it would give it more of a variety of Art direction than just the "PA nuns with guns" theme..

HQ: Yeah, we need a really solid customizable Canoness again with many of the interesting old Wargear bits. The Rites of Battle sound great, maybe wrap them up in the Canoness options? Maybe make it a function of the standard bearer like DA? Definitely another couple of Sororitas special characters. For my part, I think there should never be an army where you feel like you HAVE to take a Special Character. Also, the Hospitaler is s sweet model but FNP on a five or six-strong unit with T3 is a bad joke. Getting Palatines back would be nice. Priests need work, probably a points reduction.

Troops: Frateris or some such would be great, I probably wouldn't play them but a lot of people would. On the other hand, allies do this just fine so... yeah. Eviscerators back dang it! I think their exclusion is foolish and you shouldn't need to pay the priest tax and forego the rhino.

Elites: I agree with better CC Celestians. Shields and a couple PW would be cool, as would I4. Right now they are pretty meh. Or make them better at shooting. Arcos and Repentia need to have a way to make it across the field and do some damage again, Rhino obviously doesn't cut it. Arcos took a MASSIVE hit and Repentia, though better, are still not easy to use.

FA: Seraphim need I4 badly. Other than that I think they are mostly fine as they stand.

HVY: Would we like PE as monstrous creatures more than light vehicles? I haven't played them enough to decide how they play. I know that delivering them intact is very difficult and they are very expensive for a unit that does nothing for at least a couple of turns. Also, nearly every army has either grenades or something that kill them well before they strike, even if they get in combat. Exorcists would be better in my opinion with less potential shots but twin-linked to represent the massive salvos of missiles. This would also take on some anti-flyer duty. IT seems right now that they don't really work except in multiples.

MISC: Immolators obviously need to move and flame again, either by Torrent or just let them fire like fast vehicles. Honestly, how did this get forgotten in WD exactly? Also, I loved Holy Promethium. Hey, give that to a couple of special units? What about an Elites slot with twin HF option and CCW? Sororitas Absolution Squad? I could see Incinerators, even (don't know or neccesarily care about fluffiness, just makes sense.).

Acts of Faith need help, as does their whole structure. There should be a list of a handful of AoF each squad can use, rather than a single one, that are fairly generic but situationally powerful and miraculous feeling. As it stands you are paying extra points for AoF that aren't even a sure thing. I liked the non-random Faith system and martyrdom, the random D6 makes it unreliable. Speaking of which, Imagifers should be either a lot cheaper or do something worth 20 points. What if each unit in the army gets the basic BSS options as they stand, and Imagifers let you pick another AoF for that unit? The thing that was nice about the set Acts was that you had to marshal your points carefully and they did work 'Miracles' when used. You were rewarded for playing aggressively but still needed to be careful about your usage.

Acts of Faith list should be something like:
Relentless
+1I and Fleet
Feel no Pain, or 4+ invul
Auto Regroup
Twin-Linked fire
Rending or AP boost

I like the idea of Battle Rites, though I don't know them. You could also just make these Warlord Traits. How about:

Suffer Not a Witch to Live: Army gets Preferred: Psykers, and gets Deny the Witch 5+.
Burn the Heretic: Flamers gain Relentless.
Light of the Emperor: 12" leadership bubble for Canoness, plus Stubborn?
Purge the Unclean: Army gains Hatred.
Fire From the Heavens: Celestians are scoring, or orbital strike?

Honestly I was overall happy with the 3E book, I wouldn't personally need a lot of new stuff.

Immolators getting their Fire Point back.

 Troike wrote:
Oh, we already have an angel-eque unit, the Seraphim. Their jump packs look sorta like wings, and the word "Seraphim" refers to a sort of Angel.

Don't forget Dominions.

On this note, I'd like the naming convention to continue and that we don't end up with something akin to Canoness Martyr of the Order of Martyrs riding her Martyr-Mobile holding a Martyr Gun and Martyr Blade.

 Kettu wrote:

 Troike wrote:
Oh, we already have an angel-eque unit, the Seraphim. Their jump packs look sorta like wings, and the word "Seraphim" refers to a sort of Angel.

Don't forget Dominions.

On this note, I'd like the naming convention to continue and that we don't end up with something akin to Canoness Martyr of the Order of Martyrs riding her Martyr-Mobile holding a Martyr Gun and Martyr Blade.

Well, GW just LOVES to write them as Martyrs and don't seem to realize that they can make the enemy die as well.

It seems to depend on who gets to write the text, actually... There is some rather badass SoB fluff in various GW sources.

Like Sister Martika infiltrating an Ork camp on her own in order to recover a stolen Rhino and the relic contained therein, then having a long chase with a bunch of pursueing Trukks, one of whom she simply knocks off the road before eventually making it to the spaceport.

Or Sister Anastasia, the exiled Repentia who is currently carving a bloody path through the Imperium, armed with an Imperial Saint's power sword and killing the corrupted agents of Abbadon's 13th Black Crusade as revealed to her in a series of visions, with an as-of-yet unidentified but important Chaos Space Marine in crimson armour being her eventual target.

And, of course, Canoness Praxedes, who went toe-to-toe with a Tyranid Hive Tyrant and smashed its head with her power maul in single combat before leading the rest of her troops directly into the advancing hordes in order to buy time for the evacuation shuttles.

Okay, I suppose the latter qualifies as martyrdom. Still badass.

Where are Martika and Anastasia actually from, Lyn?

 Lynata wrote:
It seems to depend on who gets to write the text, actually... There is some rather badass SoB fluff in various GW sources.

Like Sister Martika infiltrating an Ork camp on her own in order to recover a stolen Rhino and the relic contained therein, then having a long chase with a bunch of pursueing Trukks, one of whom she simply knocks off the road before eventually making it to the spaceport.

Or Sister Anastasia, the exiled Repentia who is currently carving a bloody path through the Imperium, armed with an Imperial Saint's power sword and killing the corrupted agents of Abbadon's 13th Black Crusade as revealed to her in a series of visions, with an as-of-yet unidentified but important Chaos Space Marine in crimson armour being her eventual target.

And, of course, Canoness Praxedes, who went toe-to-toe with a Tyranid Hive Tyrant and smashed its head with her power maul in single combat before leading the rest of her troops directly into the advancing hordes in order to buy time for the evacuation shuttles.

Okay, I suppose the latter qualifies as martyrdom. Still badass.

I must know where these stories are. Well, the first two at any rate.

'Nother idea. Apologies if this has been said already, but a special Canoness character might be nice. At the moment all of the special characters are either preachers or a supernatural being. An actual, "normal" Sororitas character would be nice to see. Would also presumably come with some badass fluff.

 MWHistorian wrote:
Well, GW just LOVES to write them as Martyrs and don't seem to realize that they can make the enemy die as well.

I've got to say, after learning a lot more SoB fluff in the past months, I'm honestly not sure it's as bad as the internet makes it out to be. I think it's mostly a case of some of positive fluff about them is somewhat obscure, and events being distorted (e.g, some people think that the SW "massacred" three Sororitas Orders when in fact they just fought for a while before the Ecclesiarchy decided that they weren't getting anywhere and withdrew).

If one were to gather every piece of SoB fluff written, and catagorise it into something like "positive", "neutral" and "negative", then I reckon that the negative column would be outweighed by the positive one. Granted sorting fluff into strict catagories like that probably isn't too straightforward, but you ge the idea.

Hmmm...maybe we should make a tally of negative fluff vs positive and see if the reputation is deserved or not.

Bad (taken from 1d4 chan) It doesn't say where these examples came from so I apologize, but these are supposedly from canonical texts.
Some of a Dialogus Order turned to Chaos by one Slaaneshi Keeper of Secrets.
A whole Order Mind Controlled by one chaos Psyker. fething Goto.
Another whole Order Mind Controlled by one chaos Psyker. Why, Sandy, why? To be fair, it wasn't just them; the guy mind-controlled even commmissar cadets, entire planets of guardsmen and PDF troopers...
A strike force of Celestians and an Inquisitor being killed, cannibalized, and sacrificed by the Sons of Malice Astartes chapter for disturbing their victory rites and falsely accusing the chapter of heresy. (Imperium does nothing... Apart from declaring the Sons of Malice to be heretics anyway.)
99% of sisters in the galaxy vanishing due to to a retcon in the two whole paragraphs of fluff given them by the 5e rulebook. Considered by most to be proof of what was to come, considering the clown-car that is the current Sisters of Battle army on tabletop.
A whole shrine-world of Sisters killed by Chaos Dreadnought. Said dread shrugs off meltas, meltabombs and multiple Exorcist volleys, a Living Saint even gives up her divinity to stop it, and fails. It's destroyed instantly when a Marine throws a hammer at it. We are not making this crap up.- ++Hell Brute, not a dreadnought++
An entire Order of Sisters of the Order of the Sacred Rose dying and ultimately destroying their base and everyone in it, who were sent to the Kaurava Campaign and killed by Vance Stubbs after they refused to go away. Unlike the majority of the entries on this list, the Sisters led a valiant defense action, crippling the Imperial Guard forces for weeks and hamstringing the Imperium's campaign to reclaim the worlds of the Kaurava system. Also, unlike the others on this list, the Sisters were the aggressors. So this doesn't really count as much.
An entire convent of Sisters killed by Grey Knights, their bodies violated and their blood applied to the Grey Knights' armor, so the Grey Knights can be immune to demonic corruption, even though they were already immune to all forms of demonic corruption, due to the fact that they are the Imperium's daemon killers. See also: Khornate Knights.
Necron Phaeron Trazyn the Infinite keeps the head of Sebastian Thor mounted on his wall like a Deer Trophy.

Good
Faith and Fire
Hammer and Anvil


So, let's let the tally begin. Please be specific with examples. None of the "Oh, I read a story once on the internet a few years back, but don't remember where..." stuff.

Furyou Miko wrote:Where are Martika and Anastasia actually from, Lyn?

MWHistorian wrote:I must know where these stories are. Well, the first two at any rate.

Sit and rejoice, faithful servants of the Emperor, for I shall share from the annals of the Sisterhood!

The first one is from White Dwarf #269:

The second one is from GW's Inquisitor RPG:
Archived Version, scroll down to the story



As a sidenote to the "Blade of St. Joachim" - it is perhaps interesting to note that the name "Joachim" appeared once before, in a White Dwarf accompanying the 13th Black Crusade global campaign, where an event card reported a wave of renewed faith as one of the Ministorum envoys, a cleric named Joachim, was said to have suddenly developed the power to calm a Warp Storm, thus allowing Imperial forces to proceed with reinforcing the besieged sector. This ability was also said to have been displayed by only a single person before, the blessed Sebastian Thor.
It could be mere coincidence, but I like to believe that GW was dropping these names there intentionally. I only noticed it because I read both sources within only a few days of time difference, otherwise I'd probably have forgotten that detail.

MWHistorian wrote:(taken from 1d4 chan)

This right here is your first mistake.

I've actually addressed that very list and its many mistakes before. Ties in perfectly with what Troike said about "the internet" and how it twists the facts, though.
The only thing that saddens me is that my efforts in correcting such things, as well as continuously pointing out that as per its very writers, 40k does not have a uniform canon, remain largely fruitless as I cannot compete with much more established opinions, let alone popular websites such as /tg/ and its wiki (I could rewrite the article, but that would likely only trigger an edit war ).

Anyways ... I could probably help in gathering a list, or make one myself, but I'd focus entirely on GW fluff and dismiss any and all non-studio sources as they are (a) largely contradictory and thus incompatible, and (b) do not always accurately represent the GW studio's own views on the Sisterhood. So, I'm not sure how "accepted" it would end up to be.

Oh? I've been hearing these stories for a long time. If they're wrong I'd love to correct it.
Right then. Let's find correct versions of cannon fluff and see if they really are as beat upon by GW as I believed them to be.

Eh... Not really sure about using 1d4chan as a source. It's not really unbiased or particularly factual in places A few things from that list:

99% of sisters in the galaxy vanishing due to to a retcon in the two whole paragraphs of fluff given them by the 5e rulebook. Considered by most to be proof of what was to come, considering the clown-car that is the current Sisters of Battle army on tabletop.

Really not sure about this one. It sounds a lot like an exageration. Anybody know what actually happened?

A whole shrine-world of Sisters killed by Chaos Dreadnought. Said dread shrugs off meltas, meltabombs and multiple Exorcist volleys, a Living Saint even gives up her divinity to stop it, and fails. It's destroyed instantly when a Marine throws a hammer at it. We are not making this crap up.- ++Hell Brute, not a dreadnought++

Apparently this isn't quite what happened, and the Living Saint giving up her divinity did contribute to stopping it. Again, not sure since I haven't seen the source myself. Though I'll still count it as bad for now.

An entire Order of Sisters of the Order of the Sacred Rose dying and ultimately destroying their base and everyone in it, who were sent to the Kaurava Campaign and killed by Vance Stubbs after they refused to go away. Unlike the majority of the entries on this list, the Sisters led a valiant defense action, crippling the Imperial Guard forces for weeks and hamstringing the Imperium's campaign to reclaim the worlds of the Kaurava system. Also, unlike the others on this list, the Sisters were the aggressors. So this doesn't really count as much.

I'd call this neutral at worst. As a game, the exact details of how it played out are going to be ambigous. Like the text itself says, the Sisters likely put up a good fight.

Necron Phaeron Trazyn the Infinite keeps the head of Sebastian Thor mounted on his wall like a Deer Trophy.

Thor was not a Battle Sister.

Anyway after rounding up the good fluff, from my POV it stand at something like this:

Bad:
- Part of the Dialogus Order in Daemonifuge being corrupted.
- A whole Order Mind Controlled by one chaos Psyker. Goto book.
- Sons of Malice background
- whole shrine-world of Sisters killed by Chaos Dreadnought. (though I doubt it was a "whole Shrine world". Probably just more hyperbole).
- The Bloodtide.
- Duty Calls (Mitchell writes Sisters as fanatical idiots, charging alone into a Tyranid swarm and being easily duped by a radical Inquisitor. Very much an example of where Lynata's view on handling fluff becomes quite appealing...)
- Cain's Last Stand
- Nurgle Orks defeat a shrine world. From a recent Chaos codex, IIRC.

Good:
- Faith and Fire
- Hammer and Anvil
- Red and Black (James Sawllow audiobook, prequel to Faith and Fire)
- Their history (hold off four SM chapters with Tech Guard support, slay one of the Imperium's greatest tyrants after seeing through his deception)
- The San Leor Massacre (annihilate Red Corsair attack)
- The War of Piety (successfully raid a Daemon world for holy artifacts)
- The Defense of Dimmamar (syccessfully defend Sebastian Thor's homeworld against an Eldar attack)
- The Promethean War (fight alongside Salamanders againsr Chaos, Celestine slays a Deamon Prince)
- The Martyrdom of Praxedes (Canoness kills a Hive Tyrant while she is dying, turns the tide of the battle for the Sisters)
- The Death of Antagonis (Canoness Setheno is badass as feth)
- The Legion of the Damned (Space Marines Battles book) (Sisters kill a Confessor who is trying to bypass the Decree Passive)
- Blood of Asaheim (I've been told the the Sisters in this are portrayed well, being tough soldiers making the best of their situation against a strong enemy force)
- Grey Knights (Ben Counter Novel) (Sisters put up a fight against GKs before realising they've been tricked and teaming up with the GKs to kill the big bad)
- Daemonifuge (Ephrael Stern!)
- The Avignor Uprising (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Avignor_Uprising#.UflVHm3BzAw)
- Sister Martika (see Lynata's post)
- Sister Anastasia (ditto)

And I'm sure there's even more that I don't know about. But anyway, as it stands it's looking good for the Sisters. Fantasy Flight's SoB expansion probably has lots of good stuff to say about them, but I'm not at all familiar with the material, so I won't count it here.

 Lynata wrote:
(I could rewrite the article, but that would likely only trigger an edit war ).

Well... Somebody may have been making small edits to that list recently to make it more factual, and has yet to have any edits reverted...

Troike wrote:Really not sure about this one. It sounds a lot like an exageration. Anybody know what actually happened?

I've addressed those points in the post I linked in my last reply here. On this specific example, it would seem to refer to the 5E rulebook having made the mistake of only mentioning three of the Major Orders Militant instead of six. Which isn't even 50%, keeping in mind that there are still the Minor Orders as well. And as I pointed out in the linked post, this was a one-off mistake not repeated in any of the succeeding sources.

Alternatively, it's just someone who assumes there must be gazillions of Battle Sisters because that's how it comes across in the licensed material such as various novels, computer games or FFG's RPG (or even just their own mind, because only SPESS MEHREENS are allowed to be rare and elite), and then being shocked when GW itself sticks to the much lower numbers they have published again and again for more than a decade.

Unfortunately, it just seems as if the average fan is much more acquainted with various novels and other outsourced origins of fluff rather than what the codices and rulebooks from the GW main studio are propagating. As in, they don't even notice the contradictions, and then go crazy when a new major GW release apparently "retcons" something they've read in some freelance author's novel.

Troike wrote:Well... Somebody may have been making small edits to that list recently to make it more factual, and has yet to have any edits reverted...

I may just have to check it out again one of these days.

[edit] As I said, I'd only make a list of GW fluff, but if you want to include Black Library material too, it might be worth checking out the "At Gaius Point" short story from ADB.
I've not read it myself yet, but it supposedly features a couple Battle Sisters tracking down a Fleshtearer after the Gaius Point massacre, and the book's author seems less biased than most as far as non-SM factions as well as female characters are concerned. I enjoyed the short conversations I had with him here on dakka (in a thread titled Sisters of Battle in BL fiction no less).

Now that I've just seen the story is also available as an individual e-book short, I may just end up buying it. So far, I've resisted because I didn't want to buy a whole anthology just for a single tale.

 Lynata wrote:
Unfortunately, it just seems as if the average fan is much more acquainted with various novels and other outsourced origins of fluff rather than what the codices and rulebooks from the GW main studio are propagating. As in, they don't even notice the contradictions, and then go crazy when a new major GW release apparently "retcons" something they've read in some freelance author's novel.

Yeah, this really is a big problem with the public image of the Sisters. How many 40K fans have read about the Sisters in something like a Cain book or an incorrect internet source, and not a proper Codex material? This sort of thing is why a wealth of fluff really is an essential for a new SoB codex.

 Lynata wrote:
I may just have to check it out again one of these days.

Dunno what it as like when you last looked, but it's actually not too bad these days. Mostly, it expresses upset at their treatment as an army. And more recently, myself and others have been making positive edits to improve and add to it.

Watch the intro for the 'soulstorm' video game. The video of sisters showing up to relieve the guard against the tau is fairly impressive. I'm sure they gained a lot of support from that game alone

Contrary to what others may think, I believe dropping their links to the Ordo Hereticus was bad. It's jarring if before the Grey Knights Codex, you were used to the idea of the Ordo Hereticus monitoring the Ecclesiarchy and utilising the Sororitas. Especially jarring if you played an Inquisitor with the Sisters and then found all Inquisitors are now in the GK Codex (although let's have some pity for the Ordo Xenos fans who only have Xenos Inquisitors and have to work with conversions).

Something else that would make the holy-trinity so to speak: Adeptus Arbites. I believe in a past Codex, you could give Storm Troopers shotguns and field them as Arbiters. It would be nice to bring the Arbites back and have them working with the Inquisition and the Sororitas.

An entire convent of Sisters killed by Grey Knights, their bodies violated and their blood applied to the Grey Knights' armor, so the Grey Knights can be immune to demonic corruption, even though they were already immune to all forms of demonic corruption, due to the fact that they are the Imperium's daemon killers. See also: Khornate Knights

Didn't happen like this, and the GK are immune to the corruption of Chaos because they know (and are willing to perform) the rites and rituals that make them so.

The scene in which this event takes place could, obviously, have been written *much* better, and portrayed the Sisters as willing martyrs, giving their life's blood so that the GK could triumph, grandsons of the God-Emperor that they are, but the core concepts behind the event are not that bad.

Sturmtruppen wrote:Contrary to what others may think, I believe dropping their links to the Ordo Hereticus was bad.

Nothing in the fluff has changed - only the focus has shifted back to the Sisters' original representation as holy crusaders and defenders of the faith.

I believe this to be a good thing, for the Inquisition parts simply "stole" room that could have otherwise been used for more SoB background and rules/units.
At the same time, however, I believe and continue to point out that Inquisitors and their troops - including ISTs and Deathwatch - should become their own "mini armylist" that may reinforce any Imperial army as an add-on, because that's quite simply how they operate in the fluff.

That being said, nothing prevents someone attached to the old Witch Hunter lists from running an SoB army with GK allies, using the latter to field an Inquisitor and ISTs/Arbites (by using Henchmen).

Troike wrote:Dunno what it as like when you last looked, but it's actually not too bad these days.

Ah, it was pretty much dominated by a LOL -4 STR and GB2KITCHEN attitude. Not a pretty sight. And I say that whilst having spent a lot of time on /tg/ back then as that place spawned a lot of funny stuff. The comics from Mr.Culexus, to name just one example.
It's pretty much unavoidable that such a place also attracts people with rather hostile opinions - but then again, dakka is no different, so I guess it's just a trait of the hobby, representing one of the many issues of modern society and magnified by the internet's power to grant anonymity.

 Psienesis wrote:
Didn't happen like this, and the GK are immune to the corruption of Chaos because they know (and are willing to perform) the rites and rituals that make them so.

The scene in which this event takes place could, obviously, have been written *much* better, and portrayed the Sisters as willing martyrs, giving their life's blood so that the GK could triumph, grandsons of the God-Emperor that they are, but the core concepts behind the event are not that bad.

One thing I quite like about it is that it, probably unintentionally, says that Sisters are the best in the Imperium at resisting Daemonic corruption, bar blanks. Some of the Sisters in it were pure enough to be simply immune, after all, while the Knights needed to use their blood to get that same protection.

But yes, I would accept it were the Sisters willing martyrs. As is the Knights just march in a slaughter potential allies for a blood ritual without so much as a word.

 Lynata wrote:
Ah, it was pretty much dominated by a LOL -4 STR and GB2KITCHEN attitude. Not a pretty sight.

It's not so bad these days. While there's definetely some immaturity present, mostly it's respectful to the army and actively bemoans their current state. Hell, one part even pokes fun at the way some internet people sexualise them. And obviously there's the smut in the gallery, but it's a chan wiki, so I guess that's to be expected.

Here, judge for yourself. http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sisters_of_Battle

I wouldn't consider ANY of the Age of Apostasy events "good" for the Sisters- if anything it portrayed them in the worst possible light- ignorant, mindlessly faithful fools.

First you have them being duped into becoming Vandire's slaves, because they're collectively too stupid to know what a force field is. Following this stupidity, they slaughter innocent billions in Vandire's name, never once questioning that maybe he was an insane megalomaniac who was tearing the Imperium apart. Once the Space Marines get involved, they put up a defense of said megalomaniac which, at least going off of the description of events from Blood of Martyrs, was failing, and Dominica only ends up seeing Vandire for who he was because she got some sense slapped into her by the Adeptus Custodes, and then the Emperor himself.

They spent a hundred years being a madman's sheep, then basically got saved by Space Marines. Yeah, not the Sisters' best moment.

edit- Also, I notice that the fluff where Mortarion and his army of Nurgle-Orks overwhelms and eats an entire Shrine world's worth of Sororitas in 20 hours, is missing from those lists above. Trololo

 BlaxicanX wrote:
I wouldn't consider ANY of the Age of Apostasy events "good" for the Sisters- if anything it portrayed them in the worst possible light- ignorant, mindlessly faithful fools.

True, but only to the point where they believed that Vandire was a prophet. Once thet stopped believing that, they were all too happy to gun him down.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
First you have them being duped into becoming Vandire's slaves, because they're collectively too stupid to know what a force field is.

Not stupid, primitive. They were from a world where that technology was not known of. If anything, this only casts Vandire in a bad light for exploiting their ignorance. Of course a bunch or deeply religious people from a primitive world would see a forcefield as a miracle.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Following this stupidity, they slaughter innocent billions in Vandire's name, never once questioning that maybe he was an insane megalomaniac who was tearing the Imperium apart.

What Imperial faction hasn't slaughtered "innocent" civilians without caring? That's standard stuff in this setting, really.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Once the Space Marines get involved, they put up a defense of said megalomaniac which, at least going off of the description of events from Blood of Martyrs, was failing,

That's just what Blood of Martyrs says, and I recall Lynata saying that it has some issues in adhering to GW fluff. GW fluff has them putting up a strong defence, losing many soldiers but nonetheless denying a supposedly much superior force.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
and Dominica only ends up seeing Vandire for who he was because she got some sense slapped into her by the Adeptus Custodes, and then the Emperor himself.

Uh, nobody "slapped" any sense into her. What happened is that the Custodes came to them, dropped their weapons and made an "impassioned plea" to the Sisters to give up on Vandire. When they refused, the lead Custode actually left his men as hostages and escorted Dominica and her five Sisters to the Emperor's throne room. It doesn't actually say what happened in there, so we can't really comment on it properly. Certainly it says nothing about the Emperor "slapping" sense into her.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
They spent a hundred years being a madman's sheep, then basically got saved by Space Marines. Yeah, not the Sisters' best moment.

What? Space Marines didn't save them. They held off four chapters of Space Marines, got the Custodes themselves to try to talk them down and were the ones to kill Vandire. I'm not seeing how anybody "saved" them.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
edit- Also, I notice that the fluff where Mortarion and his army of Nurgle-Orks overwhelms and eats an entire Shrine world's worth of Sororitas in 20 hours, is missing from those lists above. Trololo

I did not know about that. But still, the list so far seems mostly in favour of the Sisters.