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I guess one could tally up a list of things that ignore Feel No Pain and imagine what effects it'd have on a sister hit by it and surviving. ...poor sister.

Oh, right. Shield of Faith also works with the sisters' TANKS. That doesn't seem like it'd fit in with that official description at all.

I always got the impression that the acts of faith and the shield of faith were kind of like the most devote believers of the emperor being able to tap into a minute portion of his immense psychic might, and thus get some strength or protection from it. Literally the emperor protects, if you believe strongly enough.

The 'nature' of the Sister's special abilities has always had a bit of comic-book-style "writer-dependant-canon" involved. I tend to gravitate to them being so faithful that they either pull of amazing tricks,w ith the top end being the Emperor possibly helping out... Which fits into the general 40k Is Crazy paradigm, in that it's impressive that the Sisters get Close Personal Friend favors from the Emperor, and the Space Marines don't (although they get ATSKNF and other bennies).

I like that the setting has some ugly conflicts like this that intentionally aren't explained... The idea that there's a 'new' military force in the Imperium (only 4-6,000 years old, right? Practically infants!) that has a closer connection to the Emperor than his super-soldier almost-grandchildren who go fight things in his name perfectly fits the feelings of despair and paranoia that make up the setting.

But that's just me, and what do I know?

TiamatRoar wrote:
I guess one could tally up a list of things that ignore Feel No Pain and imagine what effects it'd have on a sister hit by it and surviving. ...poor sister.

Oh, right. Shield of Faith also works with the sisters' TANKS. That doesn't seem like it'd fit in with that official description at all.

The tanks have crews. Are you saying the crew can't be hurt?

Also I expect the Sisters push their equipment harder than most others do. I imagine them driving a Rhino that's missing half the front armor and is on fire into the thick of battle because of FAITH and ZEAL.

Well, faith by nature is supposed to be ambiguous. My issue with that official description is that it seems to miss that point, going into way too much detail for something that's supposed to have the explanation up in the air (...far as I can tell). And again, it doesn't quite match what happens on the tabletop since it works for tanks (far as I can tell).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

The tanks have crews. Are you saying the crew can't be hurt?

Doesn't it protect from hull point damage, etc? That has nothing to directly do with the crew. The crew's physical health only comes into being when taking into account secondary effects like "Crew Shaken", etc.

TiamatRoar wrote:
Well, faith by nature is supposed to be ambiguous. My issue with that official description is that it seems to miss that point, going into way too much detail for something that's supposed to have the explanation up in the air (...far as I can tell). And again, it doesn't quite match what happens on the tabletop since it works for tanks (far as I can tell).

Tabletop is also an abstraction of the fluff. Don't stress it so much.

Also see my amended post.

I like the idea that they are (mostly) parasitically tapping into the Emperors psychic power spill over as he's not quite alive/not quite dead and stuck in the golden throne

Their very thought patterns shaped by the repetition of prayer and devotion come to mirror parts of those of the emperor mind which it how it works (sisters that get the fit better than others tend to survive longer and so shape what future sisters do through their eample, the exact rhythm of the prayer, the timing of the rituals before battle etc)

A few may actually make closer contact with the emperors conscious/subconscious probably through their own natural talents and those (if he deems them suitable for his purposes) become the living saints

If he was fully alive/aware the sisters would probably find their acts of faith no longer worked

You know... The subject of how faith works would be a great topic for a separate thread in the 40k background sub-forum.

Hull points could well be considered to be partially to do with the crew, like them bailing out of the horribly mangled but still technically functional bullet magnet APC with holes all through it.

But Sisters keep driving the thing, while it's on fire, because they're JUST THAT MENTAL.

They're almost orks, in that way.

 Shandara wrote:
They're almost orks, in that way.

Except they dress better and their stuff doesn't fall apart if you remove large bolt from it.

Graphite wrote:
Hull points could well be considered to be partially to do with the crew, like them bailing out of the horribly mangled but still technically functional bullet magnet APC with holes all through it.

But Sisters keep driving the thing, while it's on fire, because they're JUST THAT METAL.

Fixed that for you

Here's hoping that they release more sneak peeks on Friday!

 Balance wrote:
The 'nature' of the Sister's special abilities has always had a bit of comic-book-style "writer-dependant-canon" involved.

Apologies for carrying this on (I'll only make this one point, promise) but studio fluff has consistently leaned towards it being a matter of belief rather than magic. It's the third-party contributors who usually take it into the "holy magic" route.

 AdeptSister wrote:

Graphite wrote:
Hull points could well be considered to be partially to do with the crew, like them bailing out of the horribly mangled but still technically functional bullet magnet APC with holes all through it.

But Sisters keep driving the thing, while it's on fire, because they're JUST THAT METAL.

Fixed that for you

Exactly! That's been my point the whole time!

 AdeptSister wrote:
Here's hoping that they release more sneak peeks on Friday!

Friday nothing! I want more sneak peeks today!

Well Technically it's been Friday here for 3 hours they didn't say Friday where gimme stuff to drool over GW

 marcus.iscariat wrote:
Well Technically it's been Friday here for 3 hours they didn't say Friday where gimme stuff to drool over GW

It's only about a quarter-to-6 pm on Thursday in the UK right now (when I posted this) if I remember the time difference from me correctly.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 marcus.iscariat wrote:
Well Technically it's been Friday here for 3 hours they didn't say Friday where gimme stuff to drool over GW

It's only about a quarter-to-6 pm on Thursday in the UK right now (when I posted this) if I remember the time difference from me correctly.

Yup, pretty much bang on.

Man the 19th cant come quick enough. I wonder what's in store for the Seraphim, one of my personal favourite units.

D

 evildrcheese wrote:
Man the 19th cant come quick enough. I wonder what's in store for the Seraphim, one of my personal favourite units.

D

I'm guessing not much other than the ability to buy wargear for the superior. They are pretty well costed right now.

The big thing for them is if they give us jump packs back for canoness (i'm giving it about a 60% chance right now). In which case, the Celestine/Canoness/Seraphim unit will be very nice.

The canoness faith act is actually really good in that unit. (+1 Init and Preferred Enemy in assault). Allows for reroll wounds from Seraph in the shooting, then charge at Init 4 and actually hit/wound some stuff. Throw in Celestine with Preferred enemy and the Canoness with Evis and PE and you have a choppy unit.

Yeah a JP for the canonnes would be nice, my jp canoness has been gathering alot of dust these few years.

D

 evildrcheese wrote:
Yeah a JP for the canonnes would be nice, my jp canoness has been gathering alot of dust these few years.

D

I've just been using her as a Seraphim superior.

 Kroothawk wrote:
I am still not convinced that this digital release will contain more or better background that the 2nd edition Codex and this 144 pages (that is real DINA4 pages, not flimsy digital pages) 40k RPG book:


I will be the last to complain about a great Sororitas Codex, but I really don't expect it.

Oh god, don't remind me of that trainwreck.

It was neat, but it had so many bad ideas, horrible internal balance, just plain weird or convoluted rules, and contradicted so much lore.

I had fun with it. But I wouldn't use it as a background source except MAYBe piecemeal.

Dang it GW, you had ONE JOB to do today: give us more Sisters teasers!

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Dang it GW, you had ONE JOB to do today: give us more Sisters teasers!

Now now, all things considered, I think they've been more than generous with us these past days. Frankly, I'm surprised they were allowed to show us as much as they have.

But hey, an actual preview is imminent, so I'm not bothered. Just another night's sleep and another day at college until I can download it, myself.

Oh I know, but they slipped us some Sentinels of Terra stuff instead and I was so hoping for more Sisters stuff. Like some of that new art they keep talking about.

Oh well. A day and a wake up.

 Troike wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Dang it GW, you had ONE JOB to do today: give us more Sisters teasers!

Now now, all things considered, I think they've been more than generous with us these past days. Frankly, I'm surprised they were allowed to show us as much as they have.

But hey, an actual preview is imminent, so I'm not bothered. Just another night's sleep and another day at college until I can download it, myself.

I thought it was order on Saturday, download in a weeks time?

Oh gak, you're right, preorder+preview is on Saturday. The 12th. My mistake.

Obviously my excitement clouded my perception of time.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Troike wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Dang it GW, you had ONE JOB to do today: give us more Sisters teasers!

Now now, all things considered, I think they've been more than generous with us these past days. Frankly, I'm surprised they were allowed to show us as much as they have.

But hey, an actual preview is imminent, so I'm not bothered. Just another night's sleep and another day at college until I can download it, myself.

I thought it was order on Saturday, download in a weeks time?

The full codex yes, but previews come out the same day as the pre-order.

 pretre wrote:
You know... The subject of how faith works would be a great topic for a separate thread in the 40k background sub-forum.

Damn, I was just going to say Midichlorians.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
A few may actually make closer contact with the emperors conscious/subconscious probably through their own natural talents and those (if he deems them suitable for his purposes) become the living saints

This would make a nice fluffy mechanic actually: Each unit get it's own 'Faithful' value, that affects shield of faith and also acts of faith.

ex. Battle sisters get [Faithful 6] meaning they get a 6++ save and no inherent modifier to their acts of faith. whereas say, Seraphim get [Faithful 5] 5++save and +1 to AoF, Celestians (and HQ's) get [Faithful 4] 4++ save and +2 to AoF, etc.... I'm sure that could be written out better :S

Would be a nice way to power up certain units and tie the mechanics of the army together.