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iproxtaco wrote:Possibly, but then there would be a whole lot more betrayal and distrust in the Imperium if everyone thought any Inquisitor or Space Marine they had never seen before was a traitor in disguise.

Given the circumstances, the Imperium would be a whole lot more non-existent if they didn't assume that in the middle of, say, daemon incursions.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:Ork blood is supposed to be red. GW has directly said so. Their blood is still iron based.

used to be green. back when Men were men, orks were orks, and squats rode bikes!

BaronIveagh wrote:Yeah, but, consider: it's a deamonic holocaust. Are you going to believe what your eyes see, particularly after most of your sisters have already been consumed, or are you going to assume it's an (Alpha Legion style) trick?

At this point, we're adding elements to the story rather than reading it for what it is. There are all manner of ways that we could make up that the GK could prove their identities to the SoB. But if I were to sit and think them out it'd just be fanfiction brought to you by Manchu. Any speculation as to whether the Sisters' willingly or unwillingly went to their martyrdom is fanfiction. All that we know for sure is that the GK killed them (i.e., they did not commit suicide).

We may not be able to state absolute fact, but we can debate which is the more likely. I think its more likely that the SoB saw an awesome force of holy warriors charged by The Emperor to whatever is necessary and then were willing to do anything, this time, sacrificing themselves to give a superior force a better chance of success.

But it's just as likely that they were simply cut down by all-business GK in a hurry to solve the more pressing problem of the Bloodtide. See, it's all fanfiction.

pretre wrote:

Manchu wrote:The real issue is that the character in question was made up by an author who has been the butt of a lame internet fad. And that author had the utter gall to say that his character, who he just made up for this new dex, beat up a more established character.

@Manchu: Nicely put. That pretty much covers it.

@The rest: Not like the GKs don't have a history of taking down Daemon Primarchs. Draigo just gave him a present on the way out. (And again, read the book, Draigo wasn't alone against Mort.)

To be fair p15 says "Alone and unaided, Draigo smashes his way through the Motarion's bodyguard, strikes the Primarch to the ground and carves Greonitan's name on the Daemons vile heart."

There were other Grey Knights present at the battle but they are either slain or apparently not able to take part in the fight which it seems is Draigo vs Motarion AND his bodyguards.

I can sort of live with it - not keen though - as the codex does make clear that all of his subsequent victories essentially mean nothing and are at the very best transiant - perhaps just something new to amuse the Chaos Powers.

The Blood Tide incident - I would have been perfectly happy with them killing the Sisters who know too much but less happy with the kill them to carry out a blood ritual. I have never seen them as "White Knights" - no idea where that came from but the whole sorcery thing is not to my taste - ah well though.............I think I'll ignore these bits when it suits me.

I'm very glad this thread exists.

Manchu wrote:But it's just as likely that they were simply cut down by all-business GK in a hurry to solve the more pressing problem of the Bloodtide. See, it's all fanfiction.

I'll concede the point, I guess it's mostly just opinion. Whilst I have no real problems with the Bloodtide story, a change to the first couple of sentences would make it better for everyone. Instead of saying 'the Grey Knights first act is to turn their blades upon the surviving Sisters of Battle' it would be better if it had said 'Knowing the Bloodtide to be particularly potent Daemonic force, the Grey Knights look for a means to protect themselves further from the corruption of the Goreflood. Recognising the Grey Knights to be the Emperors chosen, the Sisters offer themselves as willing sacrifices. The innocent blood thus......'. I'm certainly not going to start baying for Matt Wards blood over this story, as I have no problems with it, but I think a little bit more forethought should have gone into thinking about how certain parts of the community would take it.

Thought? In a GW product? SEIZE THE BLASPHEMER!!!!

iproxtaco wrote:

Manchu wrote:But it's just as likely that they were simply cut down by all-business GK in a hurry to solve the more pressing problem of the Bloodtide. See, it's all fanfiction.

I'll concede the point, I guess it's mostly just opinion. Whilst I have no real problems with the Bloodtide story, a change to the first couple of sentences would make it better for everyone. Instead of saying 'the Grey Knights first act is to turn their blades upon the surviving Sisters of Battle' it would be better if it had said 'Knowing the Bloodtide to be particularly potent Daemonic force, the Grey Knights look for a means to protect themselves further from the corruption of the Goreflood. Recognising the Grey Knights to be the Emperors chosen, the Sisters offer themselves as willing sacrifices. The innocent blood thus......'. I'm certainly not going to start baying for Matt Wards blood over this story, as I have no problems with it, but I think a little bit more forethought should have gone into thinking about how certain parts of the community would take it.

Man, that particular paragraph resumes mostly why Ward's fluff is awful : the lack of forethought and polishing in many of his stories. Every one of the pieces discuted and hated by people COULD have been improved and made mostly good or acceptable. But it wasn't done. So, they are awful and lacks distinction and polishing.

My two cents.

iproxtaco wrote:Whilst I have no real problems with the Bloodtide story, a change to the first couple of sentences would make it better for everyone. Instead of saying 'the Grey Knights first act is to turn their blades upon the surviving Sisters of Battle' it would be better if it had said 'Knowing the Bloodtide to be particularly potent Daemonic force, the Grey Knights look for a means to protect themselves further from the corruption of the Goreflood. Recognising the Grey Knights to be the Emperors chosen, the Sisters offer themselves as willing sacrifices. The innocent blood thus......'. I'm certainly not going to start baying for Matt Wards blood over this story, as I have no problems with it, but I think a little bit more forethought should have gone into thinking about how certain parts of the community would take it.

Thanks for posting this, as it sums up my feelings exactly. I don't have a problem with the GKs using blood, I have a problem with HOW they did it.
And people can call me a nerdrager, but when I see poorly written fluff, I call it bad fluff.
And it's not as if Ward is alone in this. I think the quality of fluff in general has declined. Goto, Lightner and others have consistently published, in my opinion, very bad fluff.
Abnett, "Sandy Mitchell" and others, OTOH, have published very good fluff. So it's not all bad.
It's not as if there has'nt been bad fluff before. Eye of Terror may have been the worst 40k novel ever published. Although the ending with the fallen dark angel is pretty good, it does'nt save the rest of the book.

grmpf wrote:why Ward's fluff is awful : the lack of forethought and polishing in many of his stories. Every one of the pieces discuted and hated by people COULD have been improved and made mostly good or acceptable. But it wasn't done. So, they are awful and lacks distinction and polishing

Echo this as well, and I will now step off my

We need to get Abnett and 'Sandy' writing codecies

BaronIveagh wrote:We need to get Abnett and 'Sandy' writing codecies

Or at least the fluff, because I for one am not okay with Matt Wards fluff.

Sandy Mitchell's stories are entertaining. Wait, I mean Sandy's one story that he pretty well stole from George MacDonald Fraser and Rowan Atkinson and that he's re-written six or seven times now is interesting.

There's a great difference between writing fluff in a rulebook and writing a novel. Think of Andy Hoare and his White Scars book, for example. Man's got some very interesting ideas but he has a long way to go before he's writing a good novel.

Moving along . . .

Does anyone know if the Bloodtide mentioned here is the same one or type unleashed by Voldorious (ha, speaking of White Scars!).

Well Manchu, I really do appreciate your arguments in the OP, and to an extent I am in agreement.

However, the suspension of disbelief only goes so far, yes, even in an o'er the top fantasy environment like 40k.

I draw the line at the Mortarion business. Sorry, dude's a demon prince and a primarch. Also, there's no reason why a Grey Knight GM, whose only duty is to destroy demons, wouldn't do it if he had one of the toughest ones in the galaxy at his mercy. It's also beyond the pale fluffwise for a primarch to be merked by a non-primarch who doesn't want to die *cough(Callidus)* (I'm willing to be corrected if there's a precedent somewhere)The SoB butchery and blood rituals etc, well, there's really no precedent for Loyalists behaving that way towards other loyalists, but I'm willing to be corrected here too.

Manchu wrote:Sandy Mitchell's stories are entertaining. Wait, I mean Sandy's one story that he pretty well stole from George MacDonald Fraser and Rowan Atkinson and that he's re-written six or seven times now is interesting.

Well he does also write the Dark Herersy tie in novels - which I enjoyed immensely, and whilst he himself notes he was inspired by both Flashman and Blackadder I think ithe series has its own life and I certainly prefer Cain as the lead player to Flashman........

His Warhammer trilogy is also very good - IMO of course.

and of course extracts from novels do appear in codexes so its not without prescendant..............

BaronIveagh wrote:

reds8n wrote:
Is there not a long standing tradition in this sort of genre with regards to the power of virgin blood ?

If SoB were all virgins, perhaps, but remember that they do not, in fact, take a vow of chastity. It might have made more sense if, say, they had been mentioned to be nulls or something.

I would suggest even if they don't take any such vow, the vast majority of them will indeed still be virgins however.

And the esential trope/stereotype : virgins/nuns blood, still stands in the example given.

That bit about the Sisters from the Cain novel always struck me as a poor joke.

I can't imagine Sisters having much to do with anyone outside of their order except in the line of duty. Playing poker and sleeping around -- when would they have time for it in a cloistered life of strict prayer and martial training?

I understood alot of religious orders actually seemed to have a surprising amount of sex and alcohol?

Having once entered the religious life, the virgin, the ascetic, and the monk felt a certain obligation to persevere. Marriage or return to the world would be such inconstancy as to merit the reproach of Christ, "No man putting his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God" (Luke 9:62). Still we have no evidence to prove that there was a strict obligation, and there were no vows properly so called: even for virgins, the passages from Tertullian and St. Cyprian, on which some persons rely, are capable of another interpretation.

The Sister in the novels does seem to be unusual in many ways and Cain, quite a man of the world is caught off guard. She does come accross more as a world wise veteran - I don't recall if the novel states when and how old she joined the sisterhood. There might be, as in historical case, the opportunity for nobel women to "retire" later in life into the Sisterhood, or as a former soldier she could have felt a calling............

Had a long discussion about this on FFG forum with a person who was very knowledgable about the Sisters. There is indeed a good argument that the former "brides" of the Emperor after being abused by the High Lord whose name I forget may well be celebate but it might be such a part of their culture it was never actually enshrined in law. They were obviously not subject to rules of celabcy when the High Lord subverted the Daughters of the Emperor cult originally (or at the least had it changed?)

re the bloodtide - well it does say the return.

What might have been interesting if the Sisterhood were planted tX hundred / thousand years ago here to provide the required sacrifce to stop the tide?

The italicized text you posted seems to reflect on the late antique Church rather than the medieval Church that inspires 40k -- and the orders of the medieval Church most certainly had strict vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

About Vandire: what makes you think that the Sisters "were obviously not subject to rules of celibacy when the High Lord subverted them"? There's no evidence whatsoever that the "Brides" were not celibate. In fact, the only point about the Sisters at large to the contrary is that one low-brow joke by Sandy Mitchell.

About "retiring" into the Adepta: No, Sisters "take the cloth" at a young age, straight out of the Schola Progenium. This seems is the most current fluff, out of the DH book Blood of Martyrs. I'm sure Codex: Sisters of Battle will give a lot more detail, if not necessarily clarity. The SoB have not been blessed with a paucity of fluff contradictions.

I'll have a look back through the various codexes when I am back from work however I am fairly sure that Vandire used them as concubines as well as bodguards. You are right there is not a huge amount of info - I think the 2nd ed Sisters codex is best - I'll have a read when I get back..

This I recall being one of the very many reasons for their outrage and the revertion of their name back from Brides to Daughters.

There is equally no evidence they were celibate - its likely but not confirmed...........

Again I would have to look at the source material but is there anything that precludes someone taking the cloth at a later age? It would fit nicely with histroical precedance

I don't know enough about medieval churches to comment on the veracirty of the quote I grabbed from Google but a quick search did seem to suggest that the vow was about as well enforced as it was for male members of the clergy at the time. Didn't bishops etc have mistresses and concubines..........

Manchu wrote:The italicized text you posted seems to reflect on the late antique Church rather than the medieval Church that inspires 40k -- and the orders of the medieval Church most certainly had strict vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

Achem: you're confusing the Benedictine Rule with monasticism in general around this period. Most militant orders did not have vows of Chastity, indeed, many of them allowed married members and the ownership of property.

And, indeed, even if there were a vow of Chastity, if they were really based off religious orders of the period, then people not bothering to follow those vows would be a endemic problem even in the strictest orders.

Whether or not medieval monks and nuns all lived up to the vows they took really has little to do with the Adepta Sororitas. We know that the SoB are modeled after some combination of cloistered Christian nuns and the crusading martial orders. Taking vows -- particularly of chastity, poverty, and obedience -- was a fundamental part of that lifestyle.

As to the concubinage: It's hard to imagine Alicia Dominica as Goge Vandire's concubine.


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BaronIveagh wrote:Achem: you're confusing the Benedictine Rule with monasticism in general around this period. Most militant orders did not have vows of Chastity, indeed, many of them allowed married members and the ownership of property.

There is a big difference between a secular military order and a religious military order -- namely, the vows. THe religious military orders were monastic. Romantic liaisons have no licit place in any monastic lifestyle. That's my original point about the Sisters: let's say they don't take vows of chastity, like the crusading monks did -- it doesn't matter. They're still a religious order devoted to prayer and combat. There is no time in a Sister's day for screwing around, metaphorically or otherwise.

And, indeed, even if there were a vow of Chastity, if they were really based off religious orders of the period, then people not bothering to follow those vows would be a endemic problem even in the strictest orders.

Not really. That's like saying an Exorcist tank must be made out of brass since the organ pipes that inspired it were brass. The inspiration taken from (a modern view of) medieval culture by fluff authors in 40k is religious fanaticism and zealotry -- not the human failure to live up to those values. Once again, "realism" is not an important feature of 40k.

Alicia as a concubine: Given the usual imagery for SOB she was probably quite hot....and given Vandire's nature her submitting to him would likely appeal?

As Vandire was, in her mind, the direct emmisary of Emperor - she is hardly likely to hesitate to obey his commands in this if she did not quesiton anything else he did?

The Sisters of Battle Codex (1987) p11 states:

"The brides not only served as Vandire's bodyguard, but also as servants and companions..........they entertained him with singing, dancing and other, more exotic skills......"

and slightly less conclusively but I feel telling "Burning with shame and anger they renounced the name of Brides and once again became the Daughters of the Emperor" Repeated in Witchhunters Codex.

Brides was a very symbolical name no?

But surely you recognize a difference between sexually servicing the "direct emissary of the Emperor" and having no vows of chastity/engaging in physical romantic relationships?

Manchu wrote:But surely you recognize a difference between sexually servicing the "direct emissary of the Emperor" and having no vows of chastity/engaging in physical romantic relationships?

yep of course I was really answering your querry about Alicia and Vandire. I think the evidence clearly suggests that she and the other Brides served as concubines?

As I said its likely that given the Daughters originally "Worshipped the Emperor through Inner purity...........used a taxing learning process to clear their minds of all wordly considerations." they were celebate - but not automatic. Sex and romance are not the same - they may have seen sex as a biological function - not good or bad but something that was merely a distraction on the path to union with the Emperors light (or some such). They were a small Cult as this point and could have had all sorts of origins and inspirations. I agree that its likely that they discourage or even outlaw sex but I don't think in any "official" material other than Last Stand is the subject broached - and as you say earlier in the thread - anything else is fan fiction?

then again I have not yet got the new DH book so it might have changed....

I still don't find anything that stops someone entering the Sisterhood later in life (Unless it specifically says in the above book?)

"realism" is not an important feature of 40k.

Say it ain't so, Joe...

As regards the possible sexual antics of the lovely space nuns, while I freely confess that my own suspicion is that the SoB are a hotbed of depravity behind closed doors (much like in that terrible Oliver Reed film about the nuns, the name of which escapes me), I'm inclined to say the body of evidence, such as there is and as I recollect it, does indeedat least imply a 'currently' celibate order.

Mr Morden wrote: I think the evidence clearly suggests that she and the other Brides served as concubines?

Yes, the implication of "more exotic skills" is pretty much conclusory. Personally, I'd like to see that retconned in the new book as it's not really necessary to the story in my opinion and is pure titillation (un-GrimDark).

Blood of Martyrs doesn't address romantic relationships of SoB. I don't think it's fan fiction to conclude, as a roleplayer or just as a fluff junky, that all the established facets of life in the Adepta Sororitas don't leave any logical place for romantic much less sexual involvement. The information we have from Last Stand is that they don't take vows of chastity. Even so, Sandy Mitchell's depiction of a Sister who's "just one of the boys" so to speak is ridiculous. That's a great example of an author not getting 40k as opposed to being over the top, like Mr. Ward. Mr. Mitchell also constantly refers to TechPriests being dressed in white robes, by the way. I don't think we can say that TechPriests wear white robes just because Mr. Mitchell is under the mistaken impression that they do.

Any way, what is clearly established about the Sisters of Battle doesn't contradict Ward's Bloodtide story.


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Mr Morden wrote:I still don't find anything that stops someone entering the Sisterhood later in life (Unless it specifically says in the above book?)

Luthor of the Dark Angels was made a Space Marine late in life. Now, that's a clear exception. I'm sure there are exceptions regarding Sororitas but we know for certain that Sisters come directly from the Schola Progenium as young women. I'm not sure how anyone could possibly retire into an order that requires a lifetime of combat expertise. I suppose that it'd be a simpler thing to retire into one of the minor orders, like Dialogous. Even then, I've never heard of it and I believe Blood of Martyrs is silent on the issue but I will definitely check it again.

Manchu wrote:

Mr Morden wrote: I think the evidence clearly suggests that she and the other Brides served as concubines?

Yes, the implication of "more exotic skills" is pretty much conclusory. Personally, I'd like to see that retconned in the new book as it's not really necessary to the story in my opinion and is pure titillation (un-GrimDark).

I would have thought the opposite - isn't it extemely unpleasant / Grim-Dark to inflict himself upon them in this fashion =- entirely in fitting with both the Medieval inspiration and making sense given his character. This peversion(Alicias words) of her sacred order is IMO VERY Grim-Dark.

I didn't expect Blood of Martyrs to go into sexual / romantic - it was more the retiring into the Sisterhood thing that I was interested in.

re titillation not being Grimdark - er given the depcition of any and all females in 40K - are you kidding ?? (and long may it continue)

re the story in the present GK codex - I have no problem with the Sisters as depcited, no problem with the GK killing them - I personally am not comfortable with the annoiting in blood aspect for reasons others have outlined before.

I am less bothered by much of Driagos exploits - but the assualt on the Primarch and his bodyguard "Alone and unaided (according to the codex) is a little much for me.

I quite like the book. The Draigo stuff is a bit dumb, but the rest of it is cool.