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Karol wrote:

What I said was that I don't want 'female' soldiers that are just Teela's head on He-Man's body.

Well the thing with war is, that the male body type is the better suited one for it. So a peak female soldier would be practicly impossible to recognise from a male one.

While I disagree that the current Cadian plastics wouldn't look like convincing females with a mere headswap (in my personal experience, they've looked just fine), I disagree that "the male body type is best suited". A female soldier is indistinguishable not because they "look more like a man", but because they are wearing the same thick, body covering armour.

Body type has nothing to do with this.

Not represented well in models though. That's what this thread is about, not the lore.

Would the models sell enough to make it worth GW time? They seem to be sure, after feed back, that SoB will. Other stuff seems questionable. I mean we could technicly assume that GW is stupid, and doesn't want to make more money and that is why they are not adding female models to their IG line. But I don't think it is the case.

If the models were mixed into an existing kit, or kits? Yes, they would, because if you wanted Cadians, you'd need to buy a pack of them, which would happen to have female heads on.

I have no doubts that if something like the Chapter upgrade packs sell (which they do), then an upgrade pack with female heads would too. Even if we assume that 10% of Guard players buy it, that's probably the same amount of people who buy Catachans, and they still stock them.

So yes, when they update the kits, it would make absolute sense for them to add female parts.

In terms of “representation,” what needs to be represented is the setting.

Why does it need to be represented? Most regiments seem to be made out of males. The cadians were recruiting everyone, but cadia blew up. There also don't seem to be many examples of IG regiments that have mixed gender troopers in the same units. There are probablly more female only regiments in fluff then regular mixed ones, after cadia blew up.

Because most regiments are mixed gender? Cadia wasn't just the most popular regiment IRL, but were also the "model army" for most of the IOM in-universe - including their mixed gender recruitment.

Using secondary resources, such as Only War (by FFG), we see that the majority of regiments are mixed. Sure, it's secondary, but I'm pretty sure that it's the only source we have on any kind of exact estimates, and it was approved by GW at the time.

What's your evidence that most regiments are mono-gender, or that Cadians were one of the few to have mixed regiments?

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:

In your opinion, which appears to be just as misogynistic as Clockwork's is. You're still just arguing that no human female minis are better than 'man-face' human female minis.

GW has produced hundreds of terrible sculpts and not one of them has ever, in my knowledge, been used to suggest that an entire range should not exist, or that they should just quit. Except now Sisters, the only exclusively female human faction, are accused of 'man-face' and killing GW's interest in sculpting human women.

Stripped to its core, you are arguing that women should be aesthetically pleasing to you or not exist. But no, there's no misogyny in that statement.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
You need to stop making your definition of misogyny happen, Karol. Use the one in the dictionary.

mi·sog·y·ny
/məˈsäjənē/Submit
noun
dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women.

Perhaps you need to stop making your own arguments to dispel, and use the ones that were actually said.

That's absolutely not at any point what I'm saying, as I personally want more female models, and I actually had to look up in the lore if my Genestealer Cults didn't infect women or something, based off their model line. I'm just saying that "not being something we can sculpt very well, our business is built around high quality sculpts, and this may not be a good business decision" is not an equivalent to "we dislike and hold contempt for women".

You are incredibly reactionary, and you need to stop calling everything you disagree with "misogyny". It's pretty darn insulting, and a mod literally just said not to, you are being beyond toxic at this point and aren't carrying an argument, just arguing strawman and declaring others as being of lower moral character.

 Manchu wrote:

Next, there’s a lot of political flavored commentary in this thread. That’s inevitable. Please note that while Dakka Dakka has a ban on off-topic political discussion, the ban does not include the political dimensions of on-topic content, i.e., miniatures gaming. All the same, please remember that Rule Number One is Be Polite. Calling each other SJWs, NPCs, misogynists, racists, etc is not acceptable (not that these words themselves are banned).

Finally, post in this thread at your own risk. If you ignore these points going forward, you stand a good chance of having your account suspended.


Thanks!

At no point have I alleged that any person is a misogynist. GIven your demonstrated comprehension issues, I can see how you might be confused between calling an opinion misogynistic and a person misogynistic, but that's your problem not mine.

Again, GW has produced hundreds of terrible sculpts. None of them were ever used as justification to stop an aspect of modelling. But for some reason, that applies to Sisters? Why? Why are terrible masculine sculpts ok, but supposedly ugly female sculpts are a reason to stop production and not really try again?

We both know the answer.

 SHUPPET wrote:
That's absolutely not at any point what I'm saying, as I personally want more female models, and I actually had to look up in the lore if my Genestealer Cults didn't infect women or something, based off their model line.

I actually thought that was really weird, too. Given the themes of the army, if anything it should be the opposite case with the leader Genestealer being called a Matriarch and a majority of female models in the line.

 Excommunicatus wrote:


At no point have I alleged that any person is a misogynist. GIven your demonstrated comprehension issues, I can see how you might be confused between calling an opinion misogynistic and a person misogynistic, but that's your problem not mine.

And while I may feel your opinions display the critical thinking equivalent to of a bowl of porridge, expressing that, or that every opinion that disagrees with you is made in dislike or contempt of women, is not how we rationally debate a topic, OR FOLLOW RULE #1, now is it?

 Excommunicatus wrote:

Again, GW has produced hundreds of terrible sculpts. None of them were ever used as justification to stop an aspect of modelling. But for some reason, that applies to Sisters? Why? Why are terrible masculine sculpts ok, but supposedly ugly female sculpts are a reason to stop production and not really try again?

How do you know which models they chose to stop producing based on difficulty? Plenty of things that were modeled terribly ARE STILL STUCK WITH THOSE TERRIBLE MODELS, and we don't have access to information on scrapped projects. Female faces were consistently done poorly and they may just feel it's not something. Why are you disingenuously and deliberately acting like I'm arguing against getting new improved sculpts here? I literally just said I'd love more female models. At no point did either I, nor Clockwork say anything against that (in fact he ALSO said it would just be a matter of time to fix this) just that there is an explanation for the current range that isn't "we hate women!". and that it's much more likely to be "we like money, and know where our talents lie!". For some who is taking shots at others comprehension, maybe you should let the outrage simmer down a little for long enough to read what you are actually getting so worked up about.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
We both know the answer.

I genuinely don't know what you are trying to imply what the answer is, but based on the rest of your argument it's clearly not the actual answer.

I've called two opinions misogynist in a thread of over 300 responses, not 'everyone'. In reality, only one opinion since yours is prima facie identical to Clockwork's and you both refuse to clarify.

Raise your game.

I don't know what considerations go into what gets sculpted and what doesn't. However, I don't need to because I am not the person making naked assertions about that process in a transparent attempt to bolster a nakedly illogical, demonstrably false, opinion.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:
That's absolutely not at any point what I'm saying, as I personally want more female models, and I actually had to look up in the lore if my Genestealer Cults didn't infect women or something, based off their model line.

I actually thought that was really weird, too. Given the themes of the army, if anything it should be the opposite case with the leader Genestealer being called a Matriarch and a majority of female models in the line.

Right? I don't know the decision behind Patriarch / Matriarch decision (Purestrain Stealers are genderless and reproduce by implanting their genetic material into a host species like a virus, creating genestealer hybrids), but I have actually put some thought into some aspects of this decision while reading up, and realising that in the lore, on many industrial worlds, the men are simply the ones who work in the mining / industry roles, and being that the entire GSC range seems to just reflect the "infected miners" aspect of GSC lore, the decision makes a little more sense. Also, the infection makes them sort of androgynous, affecting their body and causing them to be bald etc so this would be an extra difficult sculpt to capture accurately, and being that 2/3's of the range wears masks or helmets or disguises themselves in some way, this may even be reflected. There's also accounts of females being deliberately given non-battlefield, gender specific roles in the Cult, including as sex workers to spread the virus, etc. Also, and I think above all, the army's MAIN weapon is reproduction, and it makes sense that women are much more likely to be protected to allow this to happen, as it takes 5 reproductive cycles on average for Purestrains to be born, for this reason alone making the line purely male may make sense for the battlefield. It may be all of these reasons, it may be none, at the very least, it's more understandable then no female Guard. We need models for our honorable Guardswomen like, yesterday!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
I've called two opinions misogynist in a thread of over 300 responses, not 'everyone'. In reality, only one opinion since yours is prima facie identical to Clockwork's and you both refuse to clarify.

You've had it clarified for you multiple times, you just refuse to listen. That's okay though, because calling his opinion misognystic is easier than reading.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
I am not the person making naked assertions about that process in a transparent attempt to bolster a nakedly illogical, demonstrably false, opinion.

I actually lol'd. The lack of self-awareness shown here to actually say this line with a straight face after the declarations you made prior

Some of them were. Some of them weren't. You're ok with them, but not female humans. Why?

Why are so many of you so, so keen on drawing a distinction without providing a difference?

-------------------------------------------

Also, FWIW, I was born in Harrogate and lived most of my life near Leeds so I know full well that the weekend does not begin at 3am on a friday morning in the U.K., whoever it was that ttried to sneak that one past.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
Also, FWIW, I was born in Harrogate and lived most of my life near Leeds so I know full well that the weekend does not begin at 3am on a friday morning in the U.K., whoever it was that ttried to sneak that one past.

Remember, we English invented time, so we get to decide when things start!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:

dkoz wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
Without retcons you wouldn't have Tau, Necrons, Custodes, Knights, Flyers, Forge World, Primaris, Grav-Cannons, Baal Predators, Maulerfiends, Forgefiends, Primarchs or any of a whole list of other stuff.

Clearly adding females via retcon is a step too far, though.

See this is a bs argument those were originally additions not full on rewriting software established lore. Adding in female Marines would be like GW going and changing Necrons to a sentient race of pig people instead of killer T1000s. Also it's not step to far it's just unnecessary there are SoB which is a viable equivalent especially once they get a new release.

I don't think female marines would be that bad of an addition. In an age where Cawl is making new, crazy advancements with tech, Fabius is cloning Primarch's, and magical powers being used to imbue other human/astartes warriors with super powers, you'd think the next logical step would be someone focusing on finding a way for the other half of the population to be recruited into power armor to fight for their emperor. If done well, it would be fine, imo.

Even if it were done, Female Space Marines would look LITERALLY the exact same as male ones, by design because that's simply how the human body works.

It actually would be sexist imho if they made Female Marines look in any way feminine.

Dammit, the user alerts mean I have to READ this thread.

SOMEone's gonna get yelled at for giving me soul cancer.

From the brief snippets I've seen, you all need to TONE IT DOWN. These people aren't your enemies. They may never, ever agree with you. As far as I've seen, shouting at someone over the internet has a 0% chance of winning them over.

Now to dig deeper. Sigh.

 Lorek wrote:
Dammit, the user alerts mean I have to READ this thread.

SOMEone's gonna get yelled at for giving me soul cancer.

From the brief snippets I've seen, you all need to TONE IT DOWN. These people aren't your enemies. They may never, ever agree with you. As far as I've seen, shouting at someone over the internet has a 0% chance of winning them over.

Now to dig deeper. Sigh.

Why dig deeper, the bottle is right there.

Man, you are going to love reading this thread. It devolved real fast, like, immediately after the official warnerating.

I particularly enjoyed watching needless accusations get all blown out of proportion. I think if I read the word misogyny or its derivatives one more time I might just agree with someone. If only it could be repeated like, 20 more times I bet the internet would be a better place.

Excommunicatus, you're walking a REALLY fine line about misogyny and your labeling of things. If you use that term again without giving VERY clear and blatant evidence, you're getting dinged for it. You can't expect to use a term like that, even if it's about opinions, and not expect to start a flamestorm. It's a loaded word, we all know it, and it's basically the nuclear option in discussions like this.

As a generalization of this, please DON'T use terms that you know are inflammatory (like misogynist) unless you have SOLID evidence to back it up. It's a nasty word, and not to be used casually (like I'm seeing here).

Also, quite a few people are getting emotionally involved in this discussion, and it's starting to wobble off the rails. I'm not seeing much that DIRECTLY relates to the poll, which is indeed about GW releasing more female miniatures. Instead, I see bickering, haranguing, and squabbling for the most part.

If you want a baseline for female human IG-equivalent miniatures, check out Victoria Lamb's miniatures. No, they're not GW, but they are actual miniatures you can use as an example.

Now I'm taking my soul chemo. I mean, scotch.

txaggieof08 wrote:
From a long time female player, do not start modifying lore to release females into units that have always been male.

There are places, like guard, where female have been in the lore from early on, but do not retcon lore for the purpose.

I agree with this wholeheartedly. There are so many existing gaps that should be filled - where there should be female models to accurately represent the lore we already have ... and yet we don’t have the figures. That’s where the work needs to be done. People have mentioned quite a few specific examples, already. And choosing a female Rogue Trader was brilliant. Of course, there are plenty of male rogue Traders but making a figure of a female one, to me, makes this particular presentation of the concept more ... not sure what the right word is. Compelling? GW is demonstrably on the right track.

Regarding genestealers, I think “Patriarch” makes sense because, following the Alien (1978) concept, the human host is the receptacle being “impregnated.”

That said, some female GCultists would be great, demonstrating how the xenos blight infects human society at large. I’d like to see for example a female Imperial noble who is a GCultist.

As stated earlier, the silver lining of the waning multipose era is that GW can put female sculpts on the sprue since there is less and less interchangeability of parts generally.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
Given the themes of the army, if anything it should be the opposite case with the leader Genestealer being called a Matriarch and a majority of female models in the line.

As a rule of thumb the top tyranid positions are female (norn queen, dominatrix, etc) while the lesser command positions have masculine terms (patriarch, lord) - so the term matriarch would be for a larger and more powerful organism like a super-swarmlord rather than a drone position.

The cultists and hybrids should be mixed, but then again when you are a bald, heavily mutated physical labourer wearing heavy armour... who is to say they aren't already.

Female guard, knights, admech all exist in the fluff. The only ones that need new models to be represented are guard. And their minis need updating too. Simple job. That’s from a fluff and sales perspective no harm done.

It doesn’t change the problem in the community.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Age of Sigmar manages this much better because it isn’t bogged down in years of stagnant fluff written in a more male orientated time. They manage there to have strong female leads without overt sexualisation and still produce classic fantasy and horror style female tropes. The mix is great. If the 40k fans who shout about how men are stronger so make better soldiers and all this would let GW get on with it we could have female models in all the ranges that need them and classic things like SoB in harmony and the hobby would only be better for it.

The argument that GW just don't have people who can sculpt women strikes me as overall weird. Like, what, are they bad sculptors? Does GW hire only people who are incapable of depicting half of the species? There's a lot of art that seems to contradict that notion. Why would a woman be more difficult to sculpt than a man? Unless you had preconceived notions of what a "woman" was that clashed with the other concepts you wanted to imbue a model with...

And do the miniature designers never train? Do they never tackle new things?

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Getting away from the SJW and Femarine crap that Manchu specifically said not to do, what about "cultural" stuff?

For example, GW once did a range of Pygmies:


It's been a while, but is that what people are hoping for?

... I'm pretty sure people want Tallarns or things based on historical and mythical China, not the revival of racist charicatures. WHFB mentioned Cathay and Araby, and Warmaster even had an army for the latter, but they never really showed up. It wouldn't have been hard to hire some decent history nerds, figure out what the Empire equivalent would have been and what you wanted the army lists to do.


You could easily have put in human tribes living in the shadow of the Lizardmen, the peoples of the eastern steppes, Cathay as a great power, Ind to get into what was up with their gods apparently being terrifying to the followers of Chaos, the kingdoms of Araby and their dealings with the resurgent tomb kings, and that's just the obvious stuff for WHFB. With AoS they can change the scope as they pelase.

What language is Kharn for betrayer? I heard it was some form of Arabic but I'm unsure. Arabic themed WE would be cool

 SHUPPET wrote:
What language is Kharn for betrayer? I heard it was some form of Arabic but I'm unsure. Arabic themed WE would be cool

Not Arabic (1D4 chan has it wrong there) but Farsi (Persian), at least that is what Google Translate is telling me.

noun: خائن
traitor, renegade, betrayer, ratter, quisling, recreant

Google doesn't provide a transliteration, so I used the Farsi transliteration here gives "kha'en".

It might also be the Nepali खर्न (Kharna) but that translates to "Food" so I doubt that is it.

Edit: I just found that "Betray" can indeed be translated into something close in Arabic, خان which transliterates as "khan".

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:
What language is Kharn for betrayer? I heard it was some form of Arabic but I'm unsure. Arabic themed WE would be cool

Not Arabic (1D4 chan has it wrong there) but Farsi (Persian), at least that is what Google Translate is telling me.

noun: خائن
traitor, renegade, betrayer, ratter, quisling, recreant

Google doesn't provide a transliteration, so I used the Farsi transliteration here gives "kha'en".

It might also be the Nepali खर्न (Kharna) but that translates to "Food" so I doubt that is it.

Edit: I just found that "Betray" can indeed be translated into something close in Arabic, خان which transliterates as "khan".

p
Thanks. I don't have much World Eater knowledge, is there any other cultural references in there? Like what many other legions have/had?

Hi all, the Moderators would appreciate it greatly if this thread could be a discussion of the original topic, and not become a fighting ground for people to argue with each other about whether they are misogynists or not.

Thank you.

I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

read: Thousand Sons, White Scars, Space Wolves, Tallarn, Ultramarines, etc

 SHUPPET wrote:

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

read: Thousand Sons, White Scars, Space Wolves, Tallarn, Ultramarines, etc

See also: Tallarn Desert Raiders, Valhallan Ice Warriors, Vostroyan Firstborn, Tanith first and only, and other such regiments based around more militaristic aspects of 1800+ armies.

Imperial Guard offers lots of opportunità.

Rosebuddy wrote:
The argument that GW just don't have people who can sculpt women strikes me as overall weird. Like, what, are they bad sculptors? Does GW hire only people who are incapable of depicting half of the species? There's a lot of art that seems to contradict that notion. Why would a woman be more difficult to sculpt than a man? Unless you had preconceived notions of what a "woman" was that clashed with the other concepts you wanted to imbue a model with...

To be fair, GW often struggles to sculpt men too. A lot of their miniatures only look like men because we have a default assumption that a vaguely face-shaped blob of screaming on a body with military gear is probably a man.

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

That’s just not true. As in it’s wrong. Bone structure varies a great deal.

Andykp wrote:

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

That’s just not true. As in it’s wrong. Bone structure varies a great deal.

Same as lenght of muscles and ligments attachment to the bones. Fat storage and rib cages are differnt as is the pelvis section. In fact if human females pelvis were 1cm wider they wouldn't be able to run.

Karol wrote:

Andykp wrote:

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

That’s just not true. As in it’s wrong. Bone structure varies a great deal.

Same as lenght of muscles and ligments attachment to the bones. Fat storage and rib cages are differnt as is the pelvis section. In fact if human females pelvis were 1cm wider they wouldn't be able to run.

That is some glorious r/badwomensanatomy right there.

I know it's somewhat off topic, but I have to respond, because that last statement is just beyond hilarious. Just re-read it, and say aloud what you typed there, while keeping in mind that we live on a planet where there exists simultaneously women who are under 5' tall and women who are over 6' tall.

Do you really, REALLY think there are not women whose pelvic bones are over 1cm wider than other womens' pelvic bones who can run just fine?

 Peregrine wrote:

Rosebuddy wrote:
The argument that GW just don't have people who can sculpt women strikes me as overall weird. Like, what, are they bad sculptors? Does GW hire only people who are incapable of depicting half of the species? There's a lot of art that seems to contradict that notion. Why would a woman be more difficult to sculpt than a man? Unless you had preconceived notions of what a "woman" was that clashed with the other concepts you wanted to imbue a model with...

To be fair, GW often struggles to sculpt men too. A lot of their miniatures only look like men because we have a default assumption that a vaguely face-shaped blob of screaming on a body with military gear is probably a man.

Yikes, that's a mean burn on GW sculpts of humans, but actually fairly true. The Vanguard and Ranger Skitarii models look more human to my eyes than Cadians or Scions. As for more gender representation, the guards really need an update so that we can make a roughly 50/50 ratio of men and women in a guard squad (or Scion for that matter). Eldars and Dark Eldars could also use some more female models in supplement to their current ones. It could easily be done by updating old kits and adding torso and heads appropriate for women (and by torso I don't necessarily mean the infamous boob plate, a slightly more slender one would be just fine and even better in my opinion). As for model from other cultures, That's mostly something that can be done via a good paint job.

DudleyGrim wrote:
I really don't understand how you can make "cultural" models without resorting to ridiculous stereotypes. Most human bone structure is pretty much the same, I'd rather not have caricatures of RL earth races and ethnicities in a miniature game.

This is basically spot on honestly. Miniatures are very small, and in order to have any personality they frequently need to be exaggerated. This is why models are doing over the top poses to stand out, and also why "dynamic" poses are a growing trend- at least from Games Workshop in the Age of Sigmar line, and in other lines such as Wyrd Miniatures Malifaux line.

This is inherently a problem with a "cultural" model, because in order to be identifiable as "cultural" the model needs to be exaggerated, and a hugely exaggerated cultural model has a high risk of coming off as very very racist. For a very good example, Warlord Miniatures made a huge cultural misstep when they first released the their IJA miniatures. In order to make the models stand out and look distinctly Japanese they ended up famously giving them really big teeth and making them look absolutely ridiculous. There was a big outcry after this, and people noted that they gave their Wehrmacht miniatures respect and didn't caricature them, and the USMC or Soviet models were treated with respect as well. They took a lot of flack for that and eventually redid the entire line.

It is possible to not have horribly racist cultural miniatures. For instance, i don't think there is any outcry over Wyrd Miniatures' Ten Thunders (aka Steampunk Chinese Mafia), and there is no outcry over Wyrd's arguably offensive but also hilarious hillbilly caricature Gremlins. But Malifaux is such a conglomeration of styles nothing actually looks out of place there. 40K by contrast needs to tread much lighter in establishing different races.