Imperial Knight question.

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**Alexi**

I may have missed the answers to these questions, if so sorry.

I am building a Space Marine chapter. For my homegrown chapter, I am planning on adding an . Imperial Knight "household" detcatchment of Freeblade knights. The fluff reason varies by Knight suit, but generally involves some sort of offer of mutual support, with the chapter providing tech and living support and the knights providing martial support.

Would this be too far off the "standard background" to work?

Also and most controversial... Could a female daughter of a house's lord be a pilot? Sort of the "last line of defense" for a house?

**SagesStone**

It hasn't mentioned anywhere that a female can be a knight pilot but it also hasn't mentioned that they have to be strictly male outside of cultural constructs. As for a loose band of freeblades, says they can group from time to time so you could come up with that if you want. But also it's not unknown for households to continue to lend aid to the same group over and over out of respect for past help.

I think it could work.

**Alexi**

The female knight pilot is a Freeblade because she is female. Her home planet was attacked by chaos forces and so many of the knights were wiped out before the Marines could respond, that they consolidated houses and the new house lord told her she couldn't be a pilot anymore. So she took her fathers titan and became a freeblade

**purplefood**

There's nothing I can find that says a knight pilot can't be female...
Or that a titan princeps can't be female either.

**Inkubas**

The imperial knights are typically male. The fluff does make sense though.

Spoiler:

Hope this helps.

**Psienesis**

In this particular case, I would say "feth the fluff" and make your Knight female if you like. Unlike the Space Marines, which have a pseudo-scientific reason for being a boys-only club, I see no real reason, even within the setting, that female pilots would be a no-go.

Certainly, there could be societal pressures or traditions or something of the like that makes them rare but, again unlike the Space Marines, I don't see a justification for making it a physical impossibility.

**poppa G**

Convert an SoB face onto one of them.

**purplefood**

Psienesis wrote:
In this particular case, I would say "feth the fluff" and make your Knight female if you like. Unlike the Space Marines, which have a pseudo-scientific reason for being a boys-only club, I see no real reason, even within the setting, that female pilots would be a no-go.

Certainly, there could be societal pressures or traditions or something of the like that makes them rare but, again unlike the Space Marines, I don't see a justification for making it a physical impossibility.

I don't even know if there would be societal pressures.
Feudal doesn't necessarily mean patriarchal...
I don't see any reason there couldn't be female titan pilots...

**YFNPsycho**

You do realize that there is precedence for female Titan Princeps. For Khorne's sake, read Helsreach.

**Grey Templar**

Well, there is a difference between Knight Households and Titan Legions.

Legions are part and parcel of the Mechanicus itself. Which is most certainly not prejudiced on your gender, they'll strip you of any relevant body parts and personality fairly quickly.

Knight Households are tied to the Mechanicus, but are their own independent organizations. They're basically exactly like Feudal Knights in the middle ages were. A powerful Warrior who owned land and defended it with his own personal martial might, along with a number of Men-at-arms who served as foot soldiers.

So there isn't going to be any reason to suspect the Knight Households go any particular way. I'd wager each Knight World would have its own customs and culture that would effect there being female Knights or not.

**Alexi**

I was thinking of modeling it with the hatch open and a female pilot on the ground holding a pistol or something. Just cause I think it could look really cool.

**BrianDavion**

Anyway the long and short answer is female pilots can exist, they just normally don't. it
d be as rare as a female knight in a medieval setting. certinly not normal. but stories such as Joan of Arc, Mulan etc indicate it happened

**TiamatRoar**

Knights are actually brainwashed by the throne-mechanicum into a specific cultural mindset, aren't they? Wouldn't be surprised if that's where the sexism of their culture comes from, in-universe (Out of universe, whoever decided on that is an idiot, IMHO)

...but yea, fluff explicitly states that female knight pilots are culturally frowned upon, and it seems to somehow be a galactic wide-belief (the only remotely plausible explanation for that being the throne-mechanicum device that I can see)

Titan princeps are another matter entirely. There's absolutely nothing barring a titan princeps from being female to my knowledge (as pointed out, one of the highest ranked princeps in Helsreach was female)

**MrBlackledge**

in mechanicum from what i gather none of the knight pilots are female all of house Terranis is male. but hey fluff is fluff. thats the beauty of having a setting with nothing saying you can or cant do it.

its a big galaxy anything could happen

**Psienesis**

purplefood wrote:
Psienesis wrote:
In this particular case, I would say "feth the fluff" and make your Knight female if you like. Unlike the Space Marines, which have a pseudo-scientific reason for being a boys-only club, I see no real reason, even within the setting, that female pilots would be a no-go.

Certainly, there could be societal pressures or traditions or something of the like that makes them rare but, again unlike the Space Marines, I don't see a justification for making it a physical impossibility.

I don't even know if there would be societal pressures.
Feudal doesn't necessarily mean patriarchal...
I don't see any reason there couldn't be female titan pilots...

Remember that "societal pressures" are going to be based on the culture of a single world or system of worlds. While Knight-World A might be all for having female pilots, Knight-World B might dictate that only the first-born sons of noble Lords can receive the honor, yadda yadda, and Knight-World C thinks that both of these people are nuts and think it should go to whoever shows the most skill at it from the Trials that all nobles go through.

**mad_eddy_13**

I see no reason that A. Imperial Knights wouldn't be connected to a space marine chapter for honorable reasons and B. female Knight pilots wouldn't exist. I actually really like the idea of a female pilot, and lord knows that there are enough feudal worlds out there for a matriarchal house to exist...