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I was reading Melissia's Thread about the codexes and noticed a debate starting about whether or not the Sisters of Battle depictions/miniatures were sexist fantasies or perhaps neccessary for fluff/Artistic reasons. I think there is room for a hearty debate on this subject. Discuss...

I don't find any of these sexy. The breastplate with actual breasts designed in is silly.



The Madonna "Vogue" video inspired pointies on the following is also silly.



A cosplayer wearing this would be Hot. If it's not a dude.



This is Aunt Bea from Mayberry. She is not hot.



Honestly, it's all in the eye of the beholder. Some people find certain things attractive, while others are repulsed by it. Also, certain things are unintentionally "sexy", for lack of a better term. Again, it takes all kinds, right?

The following is an example of unintentionally sexy armor:



The following is an example of intentionally sexy armor:

I think its a double edged sword. I agree with Kronk that the current SOB models look like anus. However, what would a hot model look like? How does one sculpt that? Additionally, I think when you NEED your models to be attractive, you need to take a step back and seriously look at your life.
So I would really like to see more "attractive" SOB models (seriously bobcuts and white hair?), however I don't know how to even begin to go about doing this, and don't know if I would enjoy the results.

In all honesty, if GW can make the models awesome without a 'sex sells' gimic, i see no reason why they need to be bikini babes with bolters . On the other hand making the models for the majority demographic (men, boys, what ever) would probably be a case of money in the bank, if female models did turn out to be so top heavy that the power armour was more for back support than protection.
Either way the lil kid inside me wants the Boobies..... lots and lots o Boobies. While the growup wants a good Codex, awesome sculpts, and cool kick arse rules that will lay waste to all comers.

GW need to make them...

Arrgh I dunno. They need to make them Female but not OMGTITTEHS Female.

Sadly, it will never happen. D:

For the record, I don't own any SOB's, nor would I. The booby breast plates are dumb, IMHO.

If it's possible to make something look sexy, then I'm all for it. And the sexier the better, imo.

That being said, I don't find the sisters models sexy at all. There's nothing sexy about the 40k universe either so that kind of adds to how unsexy the sisters models are too.

If the next generation of sisters models are made to look sexier (including the obvious revamp on their faces that would be needed to do this) then I will have no problem with that.

I bet the 40k fanbase is 99% male so whats the harm in trying to cater for their tastes?

Hmm it appears the mighty Melissia now has her own thread on the subject, oh dear.. Thanks for the contributions so far. In my eyes the Karl Kopinski SoB in the witchunters codex (She has the 'white bobcut') is the best example. She is very 'Pretty' but not sexualised. I am not sure if the SoB are gene stabilised or whatever but i think it is a good idea that as well as being the best fighters amongst women they also are amongst the most beautiful....

No, I believe they should look like actual paladins/knights.

The Knights Hospitalier, Knights of Santiago, Knights Templar, and so on to be precise-- the various orders of holy Christian knights from the medieval period off of whom the Sisters are based. Hell, an entire section of Sisters is named after the Knights Hospitalier.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

ColdSadHungry wrote:I bet the 40k fanbase is 99% male so whats the harm in trying to cater for their tastes?

People say the same thing about gaming, despite the fact that at least 40% of all gamers are female.

There's another thread covering, pretty much, this same topic, so I'm going to lock this one, feel free to C & P any relevant points across.

Sorry to overrule you, reds8n, but I have to stress examples of my own idiocy. I posted the other thread on this topic after this one so I'm the offender here. This thread should remain unlocked (or at least not be locked for beinga duplicate).

but this one has the better pics.....

Melissia wrote:

ColdSadHungry wrote:I bet the 40k fanbase is 99% male so whats the harm in trying to cater for their tastes?

People say the same thing about gaming, despite the fact that at least 40% of all gamers are female.

Peggle and Bejeweled don't count!

Gwar! wrote:

Melissia wrote:

ColdSadHungry wrote:I bet the 40k fanbase is 99% male so whats the harm in trying to cater for their tastes?

People say the same thing about gaming, despite the fact that at least 40% of all gamers are female.

Peggle and Bejeweled don't count!

I was actually referring to online gaming, not "casual" gaming.

Compared to 40k, online gaming is casual gaming. Note that I'm not talking about time investment alone here. But I seriously doubt 40% of 40k players are female.

I will post quickly here before it devolves into the standard SoB thread to voice my support for the existing SoB aesthetic.


I guess maybe I'm not as prudish as the rest; SoB aren't 'Sexy'. They are just female minis in a fantasy game. I guess people haven't seen the last 60-100 years of fantasy pictures if they think SoB are sexy or overly sexualized.

Do they have boob cups, corsets and high boots? Sure. Do they also have guns that shoot rockets and focused beams of radiation that melt metal? Yep. Are we overly concerned with how realistic the depiction of nuns who carry rocket guns and fight battles for the Space Emperor? Yeah, probably.

Most SoB models* were made back in the depths of 2nd edition and have stood up to the test of time. Do we need new plastics? Sure. Are the old metals a horrible offense to womyn kind? Not for me.


* I'm not defending repentia in any way.

Manchu wrote:Compared to 40k, online gaming is casual gaming. Note that I'm not talking about time investment alone here. But I seriously doubt 40% of 40k players are female.

Not that I think it should matter in the grand scheme of designing models for wargaming, but I also would have a hard time accepting that figure. No way.

Manchu wrote:Compared to 40k, online gaming is casual gaming. Note that I'm not talking about time investment alone here. But I seriously doubt 40% of 40k players are female.

agreed.

All my awesome points are in the awesome thread. I can't quote them 'cause the thread is locked. But go look over there for all of my irrefutable arguments that are irrefutable.

Also, this entire debate has exactly nothing to do with sexism - let that be clear. Nobody in the "SoB armor is stupid" camp is using the term "sexist" or anything related to or of it.

Knights Hospitaller with ginormous titties are stupid. 'Kay? Stupid. Not sexist. Not misogynistic (though arguments could be made for this one). Stupid.

The only problem I have is if ask any moderaly gifted young woman to go to battle in a corset, your going to get slapped in the face twice. First for being a pig, which most men are and lets face it, SOB are hot in their armor, and secondly because it's highly impractical. Now if the armor actually does have something akin to a sports bra underneath and the design is just that way to make them look appropriate at the "brides of the emperor" thats one thing, thinking it's a good idea to go battle like that, isn't.


and heres my real reason I hate the SOB being so Raunchy:
Form fitting the armor to the exact shape of the womans busom presents the need for exact fitting for each one adding needless complexity, even if it was a one size fits all it's a harder design to build and presents problems for women of different sizes. A much better design would be a slat armor design that can be made to accomodate everyone is cheaper and more simple to make and offers just as much if no more protection.

Right, boob-cup armor actually decreases the level of protection.

well it's not really THAT much less protection but it adds needless complexity, that's a negative design cost efficiency over a non "form fitting" design, which is an automatic no brainer for an engineer. I guess it just bothers me because it's my job to design weapons and armor. and as an engineer negative efficiency factors make me ill.

All my awesome points are in the awesome thread. I can't quote them 'cause the thread is locked. But go look over there for all of my irrefutable arguments that are irrefutable.

Also, this entire debate has exactly nothing to do with sexism - let that be clear. Nobody in the "SoB armor is stupid" camp is using the term "sexist" or anything related to or of it.

Knights Hospitaller with ginormous titties are stupid. 'Kay? Stupid. Not sexist. Not misogynistic (though arguments could be made for this one). Stupid.

well the thing that's sexist is that they only do that sort of thing for the females, you don't see many scantily clad men, but lets face facts, sex sells and most, not all, but most wargamers are men.

Maybe they should introduce practical female characters to online Shooters that way teenage male's attitudesd would slowly change.. I think the point made regarding BEWB ARMORR for SoB is valid as i am sure any 'support' could be internalised in a heavy duty ablative breastplate....

Absolutely not. The Sisters of Battle are supposed to be pure, righteous individuals. Chest armour needs to be as subtle as possible-having it look as though it is designed to accomodate their...umm.....womanly components is fine, but not outrageously bulbous chestplates.

If anything needs making sexier, it's the Daemons of Slaanesh. The Daemonettes look too much like frustrated teenage girls (and exactly why are Daemonettes, the embodiments of excess and secret desire, the only Lesser Daemons to keep themselves modest?) and as for the Keeper of Secrets......ARGH> You get 2 head choices: "Squidhead" which seems to be going "BLEGHBLEGHBLEGHBLEGH!" and the "Bewildered Chaos Cow" which appears to be making a confused "Moo?".

The heads/helmets (especially the helmets) do nothing for me. I actively hate the helmets. Its like someone took the Fleur de Lis and stapled it to a bucket, a bucket of FAIL. Plus they missed the opportunity to make them different-hold the bolters in an actual combat fashion, kneely in a good firing stance that sort of thing.

EDIT: Inversely, I really like the leg and arm armor as being much more size appropriate. Marine leg armor is just stupid.

SaintHazard wrote:All my awesome points are in the awesome thread.

link

@Melissia: While I fully understany and respect your position of thinking what the SoB should look like...how can you be so sure that your interpretation is necessarily the "right" one that GW obviously had in mind, but that was screwed up by the sculptors? I mean, I could start demanding a resculpt of the basic Marine armor, because those 70-style flarepants boots are a TOTALLY useless accumulation of mass far away from the center of body mass, making much more energy necessary to move those legs. I could say I THINK the Marines should look totally different, because they are the Emperor's finest soldiers and not disco pogo partygoers.

But obivously GW has decided to make and keep SM looking like they do - and there might even fluff reasons behind it. Who knows what kind of tech they store in those flarepants! And if the SoB are wearing "sexy" armor, GW probably wants them to look like this, maybe even for fluff reasons.

One example for an argument FOR sexy armour was already mentioned, the holyness of the human form to the Imperial Cult. Another thing could be that the Imperium, being big on propaganda and manipulation anyway, wants its Sisters to look beautiful and like perfect (warrior-)women to impress and inspire the civilian populace. I guess there could be a few more exotic fluff reasons.

As a personal statement, I, too, think the boob armor is over-exaggerated. Especially the pointy boob armor on some models, that just looks ridiculous (like SM flarepants armor ). However, I'd be fine if the next range of SoB minis keep some of this feminine, sexy design - just make it more reasonable, like it happened with the Dark Eldar.

SaintHazard wrote:All my awesome points are in the awesome thread. I can't quote them 'cause the thread is locked. But go look over there for all of my irrefutable arguments that are irrefutable.

Here you go:

Saint Hazard wrote:I'll just go ahead and get my posts in the other thread in here via quote, so I don't have to retype anything.

SaintHazard wrote:

Melissia wrote:Given that, when they DID make an all-female army (which was supposed to be an army of pure and saintly religious warriors to boot), they just HAD to toss in garter belts and corsets over the armor, because Emperor forbid female models not show their underwear.

I had the exact same thought when I saw Sisters for the first time. Years ago, in Dawn of War (before I played the tabletop game). Couldn't help but think, "These are basically militant nuns, right? So what's with the boob-armor?"

I'd personally envision space battle nuns as more Joan d'Arc and less Pinup Girl.

Hopefully, given the excellent job they did with Lelith Hesperax, the Sisters' next model line will rectify this - though, obviously more modestly clothed than Lelith.

SaintHazard wrote:

Manchu wrote:When you're only dealing with a 28mm canvas, some exageration becomes necesary to convey and distinguish character.

Lelith Hesperax, with her taped-down breasts, begs to differ.

SaintHazard wrote:But it IS both unrealistic and unnecessary. Nuns do not look like that. Warrior nuns who spend every minute of their free time practicing killing people, even less so. They'd be thoroughly ripped, scarred up and rather ugly, and have fairly small breasts, like most fit, muscular women. What they DID have would likely be taped down, and would be even less apparent. The booby armor just smacks of the ridiculous Fantasy Breasts that every single female character in every single science fiction and fantasy setting has suffered from for the last fifty years.

But again, Lelith Hesperax's new model is a spectacular example of a departure from the need for pubescent boys to fondle their miniatures while "fondling their miniatures." I hope the new Sisters models emulate a similar attitude.

SaintHazard wrote:

Perkustin wrote:The 'fondling miniatures' comment was pretty ROFL, bon mot sir! I put it to you that the sisters may well be scarred unfeminine lumps underneath their armour, but their aforementioned stigma of being the Brides of the Emperor and the intention of beguiling their foes means their armour depicts a raunchy (i think i may have created this forum's buzzword haha) exaggerated form.

And that's a fair point, but I'd rather see boobless battle-scarred Sisters than buxom pinup-girl Sisters. The former just feels more 40k to me.

SaintHazard wrote:

Manchu wrote:Furthermore, the argument that "real nuns don't dress like that" is absurd.

You're right, these ladies are dressed like total sluts.

Manchu wrote:Reading this, it's hard to believe that you've ever seen licensed SoB artwork or the actuals minis.

How is this not the very definition of form-fitting?

Allow me to spoil it for you: "form-fitting" means it fits her form. Oh look, there's the armor, doing exactly that.

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Manchu wrote:What do IRL nuns have to do with Sisters of Battle? I'll save you some time: NOTHING AT ALL. And here's another spoiler for you: form-fitting does not mean sexually explicit.

They have everything to do with Sisters, in that Sisters are effectively the Ecclesiarchy's version of modern nuns. "Convent," "Order," "Sororitas." All terms used by or referring to the Sisters - they're obviously designed as a parallel to modern convents militant. They have the same attitude towards martyrdom, the same unfaltering religious zealotry that makes them so dangerous, and they even have the other orders devoted to healing and such, for those Sisters whose place is not on the battlefield.

Basically, the Sisters are nuns in space. With guns. Space gun nuns. Spuns. Spuguns. Spugununs.

Squigsquasher wrote:Absolutely not. The Sisters of Battle are supposed to be pure, righteous individuals. Chest armour needs to be as subtle as possible-having it look as though it is designed to accomodate their...umm.....womanly components is fine, but not outrageously bulbous chestplates.

If anything needs making sexier, it's the Daemons of Slaanesh. The Daemonettes look too much like frustrated teenage girls (and exactly why are Daemonettes, the embodiments of excess and secret desire, the only Lesser Daemons to keep themselves modest?) and as for the Keeper of Secrets......ARGH> You get 2 head choices: "Squidhead" which seems to be going "BLEGHBLEGHBLEGHBLEGH!" and the "Bewildered Chaos Cow" which appears to be making a confused "Moo?".

yeah, if scantily clad women belong anywhere in 40k its in slannesh, and even slannesh doesn't have much in the way of looks like he COULD and get away with. the FW keeper of secrets is what most slanneshi stuff should be like.

@Saint Hazard: Oh, and what are "modern convents militant"?

gendoikari87 wrote:The only problem I have is if ask any moderaly gifted young woman to go to battle in a corset, your going to get slapped in the face twice. First for being a pig, which most men are and lets face it, SOB are hot in their armor, and secondly because it's highly impractical. Now if the armor actually does have something akin to a sports bra underneath and the design is just that way to make them look appropriate at the "brides of the emperor" thats one thing, thinking it's a good idea to go battle like that, isn't.


and heres my real reason I hate the SOB being so Raunchy:
Form fitting the armor to the exact shape of the womans busom presents the need for exact fitting for each one adding needless complexity, even if it was a one size fits all it's a harder design to build and presents problems for women of different sizes. A much better design would be a slat armor design that can be made to accomodate everyone is cheaper and more simple to make and offers just as much if no more protection.

ummm there all pretty much the same to the point of being cloned or so gene fed that there arent any real differences in measurements...., one size fits all i dont think would be a problem.....
cousre there is always the mini of a SOB out of armoour to compare to from that character model/barge from the old DarkEldar....

Perkustin wrote:Maybe they should introduce practical female characters to online Shooters that way teenage male's attitudesd would slowly change.. I think the point made regarding BEWB ARMORR for SoB is valid as i am sure any 'support' could be internalised in a heavy duty ablative breastplate....

Or just, like any woman participating in strenuous physical activity (no, that doesn't count), using wrapping or a sports bra to keep the breasts flat to the chest. Having breasts loose while doing activities such as running, boxing, fencing, etc, actually invites injuries such as torn ligaments.

It is quite painful. This potential for injury is reduced to the point of nonexistence by a properly fitted sports bra or by proper chest wrapping.