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 Niiai wrote:
Well I would like to keep the discussion away from how much the store I am working at is generating in income. I do not think I am allowed to discuss the income of the store. For me personaly I would probably pick up another game where I can paint models as I enjoy that part of the hobby a lot. As for the store I think we would survive the loss of GW finansialy, althought I would miss it. We are also selling fantasy/sci-fi books, comics, board games, card games, lego, roleplay games and other things. We would probably excnange that part of the store with another thing, porbably some sort of miniature game. Probably one of the many competative GW games that have a good representive of female models and is selling well, witch there are a few of.

As for the discussion in general. Why does this subject generate so much feelings? I do not net see people saying "not this AGAIN" when they discuss what primarc was the coolest or what not. What is it about this subject you object so much against being discussed on the forums?

I wasnt asking about that sort of thing dont worry, and people get sick of it because its a pain to hear about topics like this when nobody cares but a select few people who think its a problem. If I started a GW sucks thread id have people flocking to agree while a few say other wise. If I started a GW is sexist thread people will not flock there to agree but to state how its not a problem. It gives you a gauge on how much of a problem it really is at the end of the day.

Actualy I think it gives me a gauge of what people who play warhammer and attend these forums, while this would also reflect how much of a problem it is, it also says more about the people playing this game.

One thing is to not care about these topics any more than caring about the fluff and fan fiction based threads. This is fine.

But the times I have seen this come up some people acknowledge it but does not concern themselves with it. This is great. However the people who do not acknowledge and downright disagree and get agree for bringing it up bothers me. I am alarm for what demographic I am sharing my hobby with.

 Niiai wrote:
Actualy I think it gives me a gauge of what people who play warhammer and attend these forums, while this would also reflect how much of a problem it is, it also says more about the people playing this game.

One thing is to not care about these topics any more than caring about the fluff and fan fiction based threads. This is fine.

But the times I have seen this come up some people acknowledge it but does not concern themselves with it. This is great. However the people who do not acknowledge and downright disagree and get agree for bringing it up bothers me. I am alarm for what demographic I am sharing my hobby with.

Why though? I mean, I treat my fiance and all women just like anybody else. Im in no way sexist etc, I just dont see the point in changing models to be more inclusive of female physical form when it equates to nothing. When women start buying and getting into it things will change (much like video games has changed, even though its still male dominant, but the female audience is growing) just let it go on its due course and you will find after a few generations it'll get more female popular and things will go on like nothing happened.

So dont worry too much about it.

Saying that nobody cares but a select few is rather silly I find, there is a lot written about it and to think it doesn't effect girls and younger girls much more is nieve.
For myself, I never talk about it at a club or a store. It's simply far to threatening in such a male dominated hobby.

But for me, as a female a lack of female models does cost GW money.

At the topic at hand, as before I don't think 40k needs female space marines, it could show something interesting about them, but in the end it's just a male power fantasy.
Men get to be cool and awsome and the asumed default.
Women are second best.

Actualy the division between female and male players is 50%/50% in the audience department. (Although it does wary between induvidual games.) You say games are male dominated, only the representation is male dominated, not the actual players.

I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

 Niiai wrote:
Actualy the division between female and male players is 50%/50% in the audience department. (Although it does wary between induvidual games.) You say games are male dominated, only the representation is male dominated, not the actual players.

I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

So all the women are playing in basements together alone? (ignore my humour its not meant to be offensive) It does vary from game to game so see below.

And to apple fox women get the most powerful positions available to them (commissars, storm troopers, inquisitors and so forth) and there are models to represent them. And saying its a power fantasy is kinda weird, I have never heard anyone talk about space marines that way. I would also call you a minority (in my opinion based on the area I am in) and if you look at fantasy (where a lot of female players are) there are female models to represent this. You could argue this is proof that female models attract females but I think its more females on average prefer fantasy over sci fi and as a result many female models where added as a result. When women start to play 40k in numbers then female models will come just like in fantasy and especially in RPG models (which there are a lot of models that are female) because there are a lot of women who do role plays. Its all to do with target audiences and for 40k women arent large enough of a group to make box sets for specifically.

 Niiai wrote:
I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

I would only like to see it if it doesn't come across as forced PCness.

Personally, what I'd like to see, if women get in to table top gaming more, I'd like to see more women getting in to the design phase of games and create what THEY want to see rather than trying to force someone to come up with what they think someone else wants to see. That's what I think of the videogame industry and I think the same is true of the table top scene as well.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Niiai wrote:
I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

I would only like to see it if it doesn't come across as forced PCness.

Personally, what I'd like to see, if women get in to table top gaming more, I'd like to see more women getting in to the design phase of games and create what THEY want to see rather than trying to force someone to come up with what they think someone else wants to see. That's what I think of the videogame industry and I think the same is true of the table top scene as well.

That actually is a much more reasonable way of doing it. I would be all for that as it makes sense and doesnt feel crammed in as a desperate attempt to include people sorta thing. Sums it up well and I dont think people would complain if they did that.

EXCEPT that they dont do that to their main target audience so id be annoyed at the exception made but it would be a start.

 Swastakowey wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Niiai wrote:
I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

I would only like to see it if it doesn't come across as forced PCness.

Personally, what I'd like to see, if women get in to table top gaming more, I'd like to see more women getting in to the design phase of games and create what THEY want to see rather than trying to force someone to come up with what they think someone else wants to see. That's what I think of the videogame industry and I think the same is true of the table top scene as well.

That actually is a much more reasonable way of doing it. I would be all for that as it makes sense and doesnt feel crammed in as a desperate attempt to include people sorta thing. Sums it up well and I dont think people would complain if they did that.

EXCEPT that they dont do that to their main target audience so id be annoyed at the exception made but it would be a start.

Yeah, I was going to mention that GW already have issues with a skewed vision but didn't want to get in to that discussion, LOL.

I think the best thing is when people create what they want to create, what is their own vision, and then like minded people can enjoy it. It's often obvious (and not in a good way) when someone is trying to create a product they obviously don't have vision for but are trying to concoct a vision to appeal to someone else.

 Swastakowey wrote:

 Niiai wrote:
Actualy the division between female and male players is 50%/50% in the audience department. (Although it does wary between induvidual games.) You say games are male dominated, only the representation is male dominated, not the actual players.

I never expet Gw to do anything about this, but I would like to see it.

So all the women are playing in basements together alone? (ignore my humour its not meant to be offensive) It does vary from game to game so see below.

And to apple fox women get the most powerful positions available to them (commissars, storm troopers, inquisitors and so forth) and there are models to represent them. And saying its a power fantasy is kinda weird, I have never heard anyone talk about space marines that way. I would also call you a minority (in my opinion based on the area I am in) and if you look at fantasy (where a lot of female players are) there are female models to represent this. You could argue this is proof that female models attract females but I think its more females on average prefer fantasy over sci fi and as a result many female models where added as a result. When women start to play 40k in numbers then female models will come just like in fantasy and especially in RPG models (which there are a lot of models that are female) because there are a lot of women who do role plays. Its all to do with target audiences and for 40k women arent large enough of a group to make box sets for specifically.

There is still far to little female representation in 40k, fantasy also has issues with this. And I do think it makes a difference with other games.
GW is just behind the times. And I think it's getting less likly that girls will get into GW now, in a sense they may have lost that market :p
When other games are providing gender diversity in such a great way comparatively now.
No other major system played here has ever made me go, which faction can I play so I can get a single female model in it.
Realy both eldar and IG needs more diversity, and it couldn't hurt GW to put some females in none form fitting armor. As far as I can off my head. There is a single one D:
Representation means meaningfull representation on the table.

Many people are missing the point- it's toy soldiers. It's dolls playing at war. It's pure fantasy, there is 0% science in any of this, so any argument that mentions genetics or technology is more than a bit pointless. If they release a toy soldier with a female head, cool beans. I think there'd be a market for it, personally, and that it would widen participation. If female heads aren't to your taste in toy soldiers, well cool beans too, fortunately for you no one is forced to use particular toy soldiers if they don't like them.

That's not true.

It is.

That I occasionally fail does not make it less true.

 Troike wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:


Mind you, I did not talk about rules or equipment.

I talked about personal skill in fluff.

SoF and AoFs are fluff too.

...And?

That is a mental thing. I was talking about combat skill.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and arguing genetics to prove why Femarines would work is a moot point. Marines are created using science that we don't understand. For all we know, that Y chromosome might be very important indeed, even if it is rather unimportant to us.

 Swastakowey wrote:
Then why not promote the idea of pig marines or monkey marines while you are at it.

Of course we arent too different genetically, we still need to mate, we still have 2 legs, 10 fingers, hair and so forth. We are all mostly the same with enough minor differences to be hugely noticeable. That does not mean that a "minor difference" is nothing in terms of genetics. Its huge, thats why assuming (and you are assuming, by the way) that women and men react to hormones in the same manner is a huge flaw in the argument. Because we dont. A girl wanted to be a boy when I was kid, from age 13 she took pills to make her more "boy like", guess what, she didnt naturally grow buff like the boys did, her voice only wen slightly deeper after she spent years practicing yo lower it and so on, but more importantly he physical make up didnt change. If she stopped taking the pills shed very quickly turn back to a typical everyday girl.
We share hormones yes but we react differently and one of the hormones is more prominent in each gender.

Genders are different, thats fine, and yes they could probably find a way to make female marines, but as it stands currently it is not possible as women lack the basics to become one before any change happens.

Boys do not naturally 'grow buff', they have to work at it. So do girls. The same equally applies to transboys and cisboys equally.

If this boy you knew when you were younger was not a transperson, he would never have been given access to hormone pills. Referring to him as a girl despite his evident diagnosis is not only disrespectful, it's downright insulting to people who have to go through the horror that is gender dysphoria.

You're basically saying he's not a real boy, he's just pretending. How would you like it if someone told you that you weren't really straight, you were just pretending to like girls? (or whatever variant actually applies to you. I don't know you, so I went with the default assumptions).

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

Oh, and arguing genetics to prove why Femarines would work is a moot point. Marines are created using science that we don't understand. For all we know, that Y chromosome might be very important indeed, even if it is rather unimportant to us.

One of the few actually intelligent posts in this horrible thread.
The fluff is (thankfully) not specific enough to allow us to discuss whether female Space Marines would be possible or not. Most of the arguments I've read here are based on nothing more than personal opinion/bias.
Now there are some good RL reasons why GW does not have female SM. If we really have to discuss this issue, let us focus on those instead of the fluff.

I especially think that making actual female Space Marine models (totally ignoring the fluff issue for this point) is more work than reward, unless you want them to be oversexed. Which works against female players even worse, I think.

Look at the female Guardian models for Eldar. If you use the female torsos (which are very tastefully proportioned, I think) with the helmeted heads, you literally have to search through the squad to find the ones that have breasts. Which really strikes me as the perfect representation of female figures in that army. Other than if possible less-armored figures like Warlocks gained female models, it is very hard for a layman to pick out the female models at tabletop inspection distance. Even Howling Banshees are the same way unless you over-emphasize the breasts.

Space Marines would be the same way. Unless you give them "huge bewbs" on their armor, they would really be nothing more than throwing a bone in the fluff to a very small minority of players of that faction, with little to no payoff on the side of the miniatures for those players to be proud of.

It would be far and above better served to make more female models for the Imperial Guard, where the effect could actually be seen and appreciated when looking at the models.

To you it's more work than reward. Obviously, it's not to other people.

Just because you don't want something doesn't mean it's unwanted.

Honestly some people, it's like you don't understand that other people have different priorities than you.

Totaly agree , no idea why people think that female space marines would have to look like some sort of roid monsters. There is more then enough very fit females , that could be scaled up .

Furyou Miko wrote:Boys do not naturally 'grow buff', they have to work at it. So do girls. The same equally applies to transboys and cisboys equally.

Well they kind of do. I have 3 older sisters, as a teenager I had health problems and ended up doing almost no exercise, sports, etc. My sisters weren't body builders or anything, but they all played sports and went to the gym regularly. I could still beat them in an arm wrestle or move heavier furniture or punch a bag harder (though they were a million times fitter and could just run away if they wanted ).

God In Action wrote:Many people are missing the point- it's toy soldiers. It's dolls playing at war. It's pure fantasy, there is 0% science in any of this, so any argument that mentions genetics or technology is more than a bit pointless.

Yeah, it's science fiction, they can do whatever they want. But that doesn't mean they have to. It swings both ways. It's a universe created in someone's (or a group's) mind, if they don't want to include female marines because they either don't want to change the aesthetic, don't want to have uber-buff-dude-like-females or simply prefer the idea of a bit group of guys fighting side by side, that's up to them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Makumba wrote:
Totaly agree , no idea why people think that female space marines would have to look like some sort of roid monsters. There is more then enough very fit females , that could be scaled up .

Personally I don't want feminine looking marines. I like the big buff aesthetic. You could have big buff females... that looked exactly like the male ones, that wouldn't really bother me... it also wouldn't require any new models, just call the current marines girly names, lol. Just don't particularly want slender feminine looking marines.

Now, if someone else wants them, sure, go for it, I'm not going to refuse to play against you because of it, if you come in to my club with such and army I won't spend any time what so ever arguing that they shouldn't exist. Your own army is your own fantasy world as far as I'm concerned and if they look cool, I will compliment you on it to.

But since I personally don't want them, I can't say I want them mixed in to a box of my big buff marines. If they were a separate box, ok, whatever, but again, since I personally don't want them, there's a heap of things I'd rather see GW do first. If GW made plastic DKoK I'd wet myself with excitement, I want that approximately a million times more than femarines.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
...And?

That is a mental thing. I was talking about combat skill.

You don't think that temporarily enchanted performance or heightened endurance are useful combat skills? Both are a result of Sororitas training.

The thread has moved on a bit, but I feel compelled to explain some things about the way sex and gender (which is a physical part of the brain with social convention attached, rather than purely a social construct) actually work, as most people in here seem to have no idea.

The Y chromosome's input into developing as a man is contained almost entirely within the SRY gene, which, when expressed properly causes the gonads to develop as testes. After that the Y chromosome is pretty much done. Sometimes someone with 2 X chromosomes will have an SRY gene that expresses itself on one of the X's. These people grow up male, and unless they get checked, may never know that they have 2 x chromosomes.

After the testes develop, they pretty much take over the job of masculinizing, the rest of the body. (Note: default is female, and without intervention, both genitals and brain will develop as female.) Assuming things go right, the testosterone created by the body will cause the labia to fuse and clitoris to develop into a penis (everyone starts off with female genitals) after the genitals differentiate, the brain goes through a similar process. The wrong hormones levels or hormone sensitivity at the wrong place at the wrong time can either leave someone with an Intersex condition (which happens about 1% of the time) or someone with a brain that doesn't match their body either partially or completely switched (about 0.5% of the time) people with intersex brains are typically known as trans people.

Caught early, trans men (male brain, appear female) can take testosterone which overrides estrogen and have an entirely male puberty, never developing breasts or starting periods. The reverse is true for trans women (not starting periods, but rest of the development is identical). It should be noted that in today's society many pre-transition trans women join the military in an attempt to 'man up' and suppress their urge to be female and/or feminine.

Why is this relevant? A few reasons. The first is that it means that hormone therapy, especially early, can entirely override the body's inherent biology, two it shows that the presence of an x chromosome doesn't interfere with masculine development on several levels. This essentially means that barring women from the Marines because of hormones of genetics is not only nonsense, but has no basis in reality (which is evidence of the 'no-gurls allowed' mentality so prevalent in much of gaming culture). It has larger implications though, in that it suggests that ~5000 space marines are already female (as gender trumps sex), in spite of what they look like.

The process of turning someone into a Space Marine probably lacks the massive levels of testosterone that most people assume, some space steroid is more likely, as testosterone isn't powerful enough to do the things needed for even a fraction of what marines are capable of. As it's a magical space steroid, there is no reason that it should have the masculinizing effects of testosterone, and female recruits could continue to appear feminine, never developing male bone structures in the face, or growing a beard, or developing a deep voice. Or the space steroid could be just as masculinizing, and then no new models would have to be created.

Do I think female Space Marines should be created? Not necessarily. Do I think that the lack of decent female models in the 40k product line hurts GW? Almost certainly. By fluff 50% of Cadians should be female. There are zero Cadian females. IG is the perfect place for female models, as they are supposed to be humanity holding the line. Instead female IG are super rare and scantily clad.

Weight lifter Samantha Wright could be what a feminine Space Marine might look like:

 Troike wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
...And?

That is a mental thing. I was talking about combat skill.

You don't think that temporarily enchanted performance or heightened endurance are useful combat skills? Both are a result of Sororitas training.

And who is best at stealth, or leaping off a speeding Valkyrie without ending up face down in the mud?

In order to gain something, you need to lose something.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paimon wrote:

Weight lifter Samantha Wright could be what a feminine Space Marine might look like:

Spoiler:

The rest of your post seemed reasonable, but I feel the need to repeat that Marines are based on science we do not understand. What pitiful knowledge we have today is irrelevant in the context of 40K genetics.

Also, I doubt that your picture is accurate. A female Marine would be far more bulky and muscular.

 Paimon wrote:
The thread has moved on a bit, but I feel compelled to explain some things about the way sex and gender (which is a physical part of the brain with social convention attached, rather than purely a social construct) actually work, as most people in here seem to have no idea.

The Y chromosome's input into developing as a man is contained almost entirely within the SRY gene, which, when expressed properly causes the gonads to develop as testes. After that the Y chromosome is pretty much done. Sometimes someone with 2 X chromosomes will have an SRY gene that expresses itself on one of the X's. These people grow up male, and unless they get checked, may never know that they have 2 x chromosomes.

After the testes develop, they pretty much take over the job of masculinizing, the rest of the body. (Note: default is female, and without intervention, both genitals and brain will develop as female.) Assuming things go right, the testosterone created by the body will cause the labia to fuse and clitoris to develop into a penis (everyone starts off with female genitals) after the genitals differentiate, the brain goes through a similar process. The wrong hormones levels or hormone sensitivity at the wrong place at the wrong time can either leave someone with an Intersex condition (which happens about 1% of the time) or someone with a brain that doesn't match their body either partially or completely switched (about 0.5% of the time) people with intersex brains are typically known as trans people.

Caught early, trans men (male brain, appear female) can take testosterone which overrides estrogen and have an entirely male puberty, never developing breasts or starting periods. The reverse is true for trans women (not starting periods, but rest of the development is identical). It should be noted that in today's society many pre-transition trans women join the military in an attempt to 'man up' and suppress their urge to be female and/or feminine.

Why is this relevant? A few reasons. The first is that it means that hormone therapy, especially early, can entirely override the body's inherent biology, two it shows that the presence of an x chromosome doesn't interfere with masculine development on several levels. This essentially means that barring women from the Marines because of hormones of genetics is not only nonsense, but has no basis in reality (which is evidence of the 'no-gurls allowed' mentality so prevalent in much of gaming culture). It has larger implications though, in that it suggests that ~5000 space marines are already female (as gender trumps sex), in spite of what they look like.

The process of turning someone into a Space Marine probably lacks the massive levels of testosterone that most people assume, some space steroid is more likely, as testosterone isn't powerful enough to do the things needed for even a fraction of what marines are capable of. As it's a magical space steroid, there is no reason that it should have the masculinizing effects of testosterone, and female recruits could continue to appear feminine, never developing male bone structures in the face, or growing a beard, or developing a deep voice. Or the space steroid could be just as masculinizing, and then no new models would have to be created.

Do I think female Space Marines should be created? Not necessarily. Do I think that the lack of decent female models in the 40k product line hurts GW? Almost certainly. By fluff 50% of Cadians should be female. There are zero Cadian females. IG is the perfect place for female models, as they are supposed to be humanity holding the line. Instead female IG are super rare and scantily clad.

Weight lifter Samantha Wright could be what a feminine Space Marine might look like:

Spoiler:

I don't think you really changed the discussion other than adding some more technical reasons for things. That is, you could...

1. have big buff females that look like dudes anyway

2. have some magic space juju that makes them strong without making them big and man-like.

3. You could also just say Power Armour, being powered and all, could do all the heavy lifting so the physique of the wearer is irrelevant (though there's rules-based reasons for not doing that, some Space Marines are S5 due to their size and strength).

I personally don't like options 2 and 3, but I'm not going to hang someone who does.

Also, Samantha Wright, I'm sure she's very strong for her height, weight and being female, but googling what she can lift, I think that's still only average or slightly above average for a 6' male. So you need plenty of that Space Juju to defy physics, I guess you could say that in females it makes their bones and muscles super dense so they are equally strong without being as large... personally I don't like that solution. But hey, if you do like that solution, I won't stop you from rolling with it.... still won't make me want GW to make femarines though

 Paimon wrote:

Weight lifter Samantha Wright could be what a feminine Space Marine might look like:

Spoiler:

A cute athlete for sure, and easily outdoes a lazy old man like me. But she's a light-weight compared to the big girls in that sport. When you see the top female weight classes competing it's a lot harder to decide if it's a woman you're looking at.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

 AegisGrimm wrote:

Also, given that 40k is a universe wherein the most capable human soldiers are women, this is a silly suggestion.

What does that come from?

I suspect it is not true. Melissia is probably looking at the SoB as the pinnacle of human soldiery but I'd argue that, say, Stormtroopers equal them.

Also... I just got this epic idea.

Ogryn Space Marines.

14' tall Ogryns in PA running around with Battle Cannons or something in their fists, because why the hell not.

Now give them a terminator equivalent.

*googles*

No, it isn't hard to figure out.

Well, maybe if you're not used to seeing women...

The whole point of my post was that femarines clearly don't exist because GW doesn't want them to exist, and no amount of pseudo-sciencey hand waving can prove otherwise. The current fan base is fine with that in spite of the unfortunate implications. Female Guard would go a long way to assuaging the sting of obvious sexism, but that's a whole different thread.

 Paimon wrote:
The whole point of my post was that femarines clearly don't exist because GW doesn't want them to exist, and no amount of pseudo-sciencey hand waving can prove otherwise. The current fan base is fine with that in spite of the unfortunate implications. Female Guard would go a long way to assuaging the sting of obvious sexism, but that's a whole different thread.

Some one actually answered the original question! Thank you!

It's been answered numerous times. Not our fault you haven't paid attention.
For example:

 Melissia wrote:
In the end, it really just comes down to it being an aesthetic choice by Games Workshop.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
And who is best at stealth, or leaping off a speeding Valkyrie without ending up face down in the mud?

In order to gain something, you need to lose something.

A difference I see here is that Sisters could also do those things, just perhaps not as well as a Stormtrooper, as its not a focus of their training. But AoFs and the SoF are things unique to the Sisters, and quite potent skills to apply on the battlefield

 Melissia wrote:
It's been answered numerous times. Not our fault you haven't paid attention.
For example:

 Melissia wrote:
In the end, it really just comes down to it being an aesthetic choice by Games Workshop.

You aren't helping him to find it when you bury that sentence in between all other kinds of stuff, though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Troike wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
And who is best at stealth, or leaping off a speeding Valkyrie without ending up face down in the mud?

In order to gain something, you need to lose something.

A difference I see here is that Sisters could also do those things, just perhaps not as well as a Stormtrooper, as its not a focus of their training. But AoFs and the SoF are things unique to the Sisters, and quite potent skills to apply on the battlefield

Well, I'd imagine Sisters could barely sneak at all. They likely recieve 0 training in it (What's the point when you have Laud Hailers and stuff?), PA is supposedly noisy unless you are specialists like Raven Guard, and all this assumes SoB would ever want to sneak in the first place.

If a Battle Sister squad reach a squadron of renegade Armoured Sentinels with Plasma Cannons, for example (Or Autocannons, or whatever) Stormtroopers would more likely do the job better.

AoF and SoF are useful but does not make them 'pinnacle of human soldiery', the Imperium is too large has too much variety to make such a blanket assumption.