Codex Sisters of Battle

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**J3f**

MWHistorian wrote:
J3f wrote:
SisterSydney wrote:
This is the Reverence? I know anti-air is crucial, but lasers aren't a Sisters thing: I'd be tempted just to give the Exorcist an alternative missile that had Skyfire.

I don't see missiles as being a Sisters thing either. If it wasn't for how cool the Organ Tank is you wouldn't be touting it so much. Besides I can see the Sisters shooting down planes with the Divine Light of the Emperor. Lascannons aren't totally barred off from the Sisters anyway, the Avenger Strike Fighter can take them.

The Avenger is an Imperial Navy fighter that the sisters use/borrow/steal?
Missiles are a sisters thing. Making the exorcist with an alternate skyfire missile or varient seems much more likely.

As for the tech-sister, in my short story and on the gaming table I just make tech priestesses. I explain it that the Order only allows female engine seers in. (much to the confusion of the mechanicum who don't see the purpose of distinguishing between sexes.)
If there is a tech sister, she can't be at all indoctrinated by the mechanicum.

Since when have missiles been a Sisters thing? No Sisters of Battle Infantry can take missile launchers and they're not part of the 'Holy Trinity'. For that matter should I also strip away plasma pistols? There are times when the Sisters of Battle need a weapon that falls outside of the Holy Trinity, otherwise you end up with a bunch of custom weapons that are "well it's a lascannon, but I made it a custom pattern heavy bolter that just so happens to have the profile of a Lascannon"

**AnomanderRake**

J3f wrote:
MWHistorian wrote:
J3f wrote:
SisterSydney wrote:
This is the Reverence? I know anti-air is crucial, but lasers aren't a Sisters thing: I'd be tempted just to give the Exorcist an alternative missile that had Skyfire.

I don't see missiles as being a Sisters thing either. If it wasn't for how cool the Organ Tank is you wouldn't be touting it so much. Besides I can see the Sisters shooting down planes with the Divine Light of the Emperor. Lascannons aren't totally barred off from the Sisters anyway, the Avenger Strike Fighter can take them.

The Avenger is an Imperial Navy fighter that the sisters use/borrow/steal?
Missiles are a sisters thing. Making the exorcist with an alternate skyfire missile or varient seems much more likely.

As for the tech-sister, in my short story and on the gaming table I just make tech priestesses. I explain it that the Order only allows female engine seers in. (much to the confusion of the mechanicum who don't see the purpose of distinguishing between sexes.)
If there is a tech sister, she can't be at all indoctrinated by the mechanicum.

Since when have missiles been a Sisters thing? No Sisters of Battle Infantry can take missile launchers and they're not part of the 'Holy Trinity'. For that matter should I also strip away plasma pistols? There are times when the Sisters of Battle need a weapon that falls outside of the Holy Trinity, otherwise you end up with a bunch of custom weapons that are "well it's a lascannon, but I made it a custom pattern heavy bolter that just so happens to have the profile of a Lascannon"

Not to mention the issue that thematically the Sisters are supposed to be a close-ranged in-your-face force, giving them standoff weapons doesn't really mesh with that idea. As to the issue of AA I'd advise giving them either an AA Exorcist variant or a Hydra autocannon stuck on the same chassis.

**J3f**

AnomanderRake wrote:

Not to mention the issue that thematically the Sisters are supposed to be a close-ranged in-your-face force, giving them standoff weapons doesn't really mesh with that idea. As to the issue of AA I'd advise giving them either an AA Exorcist variant or a Hydra autocannon stuck on the same chassis.

You want me to give them one of the best AA weapons in the game, 72" range, while not making them a standoff army. Currently the Reverence only has a range of 48". The Exorcist is a unique model, it loses some of that uniqueness if multiple units share the same model.

**Furyou Miko**

The other alternative is to give an infantry model an ugprade that lets them Laser Designate an enemy flier to let the regular Exorcist fire at it normally. Or you could give infantry an upgrade that's basically a one-shot flakk missile, but stingers are kinda Guardy.

**J3f**

Actually I gave Retributors Skyfire when they use Divine Guidance. So the Sisters do have a form of AA troops.

**Furyou Miko**

You did remember Interceptor as well, right? Otherwise D.G. means they can't target ground targets. ^^;

**J3f**

Of Course I did, Retributors are now a very solid Heavy Support Choice. No more Trip Exorcists.

**SisterSydney**

Giving Retributors a bit of Skyfire makes good sense. At one point I toyed with a bit of wargear called an "Auspex Ceolum" that the Ret squad could carry to allow it to Skyfire any turn you wanted. But wrapping it into Divine Guidance fits the army better, I think.

**aka_mythos**

Psienesis wrote:
The Adeptus Mechanicus is an interesting organization within the Imperium as a whole, because they view the Emperor as the Omnissiah, which is the supposed mortal incarnation of the Machine-God...

... which is in direct opposition to the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy, which teaches that the Emperor is a god, full stop. The Sisters, being the Sisters, go with the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy to the extreme. They, in fact, basically cut out any aspect of the Creed that talks about anything about having a good time, unless that good time is warfare, purging and killing. They're a penitent order, after all.

But a Sister with some kind of Mechanicus teachings would be something of an apostate to either the Machine Cult or to the Ecclesiarchy. She'd either be looking at the Machine Cult's teachings and saying, "Well, learning how to use an air-ratchet is cool, and I can dig these quantum mechanics principles... but you're full of gak if you think the Emperor is just the representation of some kind of 'Machine God'. The machines serve the God-Emperor, who is All. Burn, heretic!" or she'd be the odd-girl-out amongst the Sisterhood for her heretical veneration of a Machine God before her proper adoration and veneration of the God-Emperor.

I think the simple solution is to have Techpriest/Enginseers as an option. The last time this came up the idea I had was what I called Sister Attendants or Machine Maidens... Like all select groups of Sisters they see their service as a burden, in this case the burdens of impure machine thoughts... To lessen this burden each sister in the unit only learns a small piece of each machines inner workings. In this way they work like assembly line workers who piece the tech back together but without the understanding of how the pieces interact. Rules wise the unit starts off functioning as well as other repairing units but that ability degrades as they lose members.

**J3f**

aka_mythos wrote:
Psienesis wrote:
The Adeptus Mechanicus is an interesting organization within the Imperium as a whole, because they view the Emperor as the Omnissiah, which is the supposed mortal incarnation of the Machine-God...

... which is in direct opposition to the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy, which teaches that the Emperor is a god, full stop. The Sisters, being the Sisters, go with the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy to the extreme. They, in fact, basically cut out any aspect of the Creed that talks about anything about having a good time, unless that good time is warfare, purging and killing. They're a penitent order, after all.

But a Sister with some kind of Mechanicus teachings would be something of an apostate to either the Machine Cult or to the Ecclesiarchy. She'd either be looking at the Machine Cult's teachings and saying, "Well, learning how to use an air-ratchet is cool, and I can dig these quantum mechanics principles... but you're full of gak if you think the Emperor is just the representation of some kind of 'Machine God'. The machines serve the God-Emperor, who is All. Burn, heretic!" or she'd be the odd-girl-out amongst the Sisterhood for her heretical veneration of a Machine God before her proper adoration and veneration of the God-Emperor.
I think the simple solution is to have Techpriest/Enginseers as an option. The last time this came up the idea I had was what I called Sister Attendants or Machine Maidens... Like all select groups of Sisters they see their service as a burden, in this case the burdens of impure machine thoughts... To lessen this burden each sister in the unit only learns a small piece of each machines inner workings. In this way they work like assembly line workers who piece the tech back together but without the understanding of how the pieces interact. Rules wise the unit starts off functioning as well as other repairing units but that ability degrades as they lose members.

Forge World already gave decent fluff for Techno-Sisters. Machine Maidens sound like Tech-Sisters Repentia, they shouldn't have to work with one hand and flog themselves with the other. That's unproductive even by Ecclesiarchy standards. I rather like Techno-Sisters as a blend of Ecclesiarcy and Mechanicus teachings, which were retconned in universe to be compatible. They also serve as a hollow gesture to appease the Mechanicus. Also I don't see what everyone's obsession with making them the unpopular girl is. There is a good bit of official artwork with Sisters with Bionics, Techno-Sisters would just be the ones with a few more Implants than there other Sisters. They would be accepted just like any other Sister of Battle, because any misconduct is swiftly punished by the Ecclesiarchy.

**MWHistorian**

J3f wrote:
aka_mythos wrote:
Psienesis wrote:
The Adeptus Mechanicus is an interesting organization within the Imperium as a whole, because they view the Emperor as the Omnissiah, which is the supposed mortal incarnation of the Machine-God...

... which is in direct opposition to the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy, which teaches that the Emperor is a god, full stop. The Sisters, being the Sisters, go with the teachings of the Ecclesiarchy to the extreme. They, in fact, basically cut out any aspect of the Creed that talks about anything about having a good time, unless that good time is warfare, purging and killing. They're a penitent order, after all.

But a Sister with some kind of Mechanicus teachings would be something of an apostate to either the Machine Cult or to the Ecclesiarchy. She'd either be looking at the Machine Cult's teachings and saying, "Well, learning how to use an air-ratchet is cool, and I can dig these quantum mechanics principles... but you're full of gak if you think the Emperor is just the representation of some kind of 'Machine God'. The machines serve the God-Emperor, who is All. Burn, heretic!" or she'd be the odd-girl-out amongst the Sisterhood for her heretical veneration of a Machine God before her proper adoration and veneration of the God-Emperor.
I think the simple solution is to have Techpriest/Enginseers as an option. The last time this came up the idea I had was what I called Sister Attendants or Machine Maidens... Like all select groups of Sisters they see their service as a burden, in this case the burdens of impure machine thoughts... To lessen this burden each sister in the unit only learns a small piece of each machines inner workings. In this way they work like assembly line workers who piece the tech back together but without the understanding of how the pieces interact. Rules wise the unit starts off functioning as well as other repairing units but that ability degrades as they lose members.

Forge World already gave decent fluff for Techno-Sisters. Machine Maidens sound like Tech-Sisters Repentia, they shouldn't have to work with one hand and flog themselves with the other. That's unproductive even by Ecclesiarchy standards. I rather like Techno-Sisters as a blend of Ecclesiarcy and Mechanicus teachings, which were retconned in universe to be compatible. They also serve as a hollow gesture to appease the Mechanicus. Also I don't see what everyone's obsession with making them the unpopular girl is. There is a good bit of official artwork with Sisters with Bionics, Techno-Sisters would just be the ones with a few more Implants than there other Sisters. They would be accepted just like any other Sister of Battle, because any misconduct is swiftly punished by the Ecclesiarchy.

Its not the bionics that's the problem, its the split ideology and loyalty of a fanatical religion. SOB think the Mechanicum is heretical and would never tolerate one of their own believing in anything other than the strict orthodoxy that the rest believe in. There's no gray areas with SOB.

**J3f**

The Adeptus Mechanicus are a crucial part of the Ecclessiarchy. The Ambassadors sent from Mars to join the Ecclessiarchy would only be the Tech-priests that have the strongest faith in the Emperor. A Sister Technologus would only learn from these Tech-priests with heavy supervision by the Ministorum. These safe guards would produce the purest form of Imperial Tech-priest. A Sister of Battle that dare not speak the Word "Omnisiah". Her fellow Battle Sisters would be oblivious to her methods. Her Faith would be no less than any other fully trained Adepta Sororitas, in fact her Faith in the Emperor would exceed those of the other members of her convent because she believes the Emperor to be part of every machine spirit and for him to be working through her hands when she repairs the Vehicles of the Sisters of Battle, a miracle unto itself.

**Furyou Miko**

IT doesn't fit very well with the standard Sisters recruitment methods, but this is what I came up with when I attempted to create a Sororitas techpriest type character - an individual, in this case, with a unique story.

'Sister' Rayya Two-sixty was a junior adept in the Adeptus Mechanicum when she had a vision from the Emperor-Omnissiah, directing her to abandon her work and flee the Forge World with only that which she could carry. Interpreting this somewhat liberally, she actually fled with everything that she and her two Servitors, 'mother' and 'father' could carry - which turned out to be quite a lot. She alighted on the Shrine World of Hagia just in time to recieve news that her home had been subsumed by Orks mere days after she had left.
Lost and alone in a strange city on a strange world, her first instinct was to find fellow adepts. The Emperor-Omnissiah stepped in, however, and the only red robes she saw were those of a proselytising squad from the Order of our Martyred Lady. The young tech-adept stopped and listened. Their words set her quartz timekeepers quivering, made her augmentations tingle.
Following the Sisters to their convent, following the Emperor-Omnissiah's guidance, she sought sanctuary within. She shared her story with the Sisters that night, and they aided her with interpreting her visions. Rayya isn't quite a Living Saint - though a few more miracles and that may change - but she is certainly blessed by the Emperor, and the Sisters are certainly happy to fight by her side, treating and naming her as an honourary Sister.

**SisterSydney**

J3f wrote:
Forge World already gave decent fluff for Techno-Sisters...

Cool, I did not know that. Link please? Or source if it's not available online?

**J3f**

SisterSydney wrote:
J3f wrote:
Forge World already gave decent fluff for Techno-Sisters...

Cool, I did not know that. Link please? Or source if it's not available online?

Imperial Armour Volume 2 Second Edition. You can actually read it from the preview pic from the product page http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Imperial_Armour_Books/IMPERIAL_ARMOUR_VOLUME_TWO_SECOND_EDITION.html if you squint hard enough.

As the elite army of the Ecclesiarchy, the Sisters of Battle are equipped with the finest arms and equipment their masters can obtain. Given the staggering wealth of the Ecclesiarchy resources are not in any way short but gold is only one measure of power in the 41st Millenium. Of far more value are blood, honor, and status. The Adeptus Ministorum and the Adeptus Mechanicus have a long anf far from harmonious history, for the two vast institutions expouse entirely different beliefs and practices. To the Ecclesiarchy, the tech-Priests'veneration of the Omnisiah is problematic and easily confused by the ignorant for the worship of some higher being other than the Emperor. To the Adeptus Mechanicus, the servants of the Ecclesiarchy are hindered by an abiding distrust of anything they cannot directly control. These differing viewpoints make cooperation between the two fraught with disharmony and individual factors have in the past come to blows over matters of religous divergence.

Despite such differences, the imperium could not function without each, The Ministorum controls Mankind's soul whilst the Adeptus Mechanicus maintains the machines it needs to cross the stars and wage the Emperor's wars. Over the milennia the two have negotiated numerous treaties and pacts that have ensured a constant flow of arms and material from the Forge Worlds, in particular to equip the Battle Sisters have access to a range of vehicles that are rarely seen outside of the Adeptus Astartes, some of them entirely unique to their own forces, their STC imprints jealously guarded.

As with all imperial bodies, the Adeptus Sororitas relies upon the services of attached Tech-Priests to maintain and repair its vehicles. When called upon to go to war, they are crewed by specially trained Battle Sisters, assisted where needed by Servitors and Techno-mats provided by the Adeptus Mechanicus. In battle these fearsome warrior women sing the battle prayers of the Adeptus Sororitas even as they incite the spirits of the machine using the articles taught to them by the Tech-Priests, combining both in the eternal battle against the faithless.

**MWHistorian**

J3f wrote:
SisterSydney wrote:
J3f wrote:
Forge World already gave decent fluff for Techno-Sisters...

Cool, I did not know that. Link please? Or source if it's not available online?

Imperial Armour Volume 2 Second Edition. You can actually read it from the preview pic from the product page http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Imperial_Armour_Books/IMPERIAL_ARMOUR_VOLUME_TWO_SECOND_EDITION.html if you squint hard enough.

As the elite army of the Ecclesiarchy, the Sisters of Battle are equipped with the finest arms and equipment their masters can obtain. Given the staggering wealth of the Ecclesiarchy resources are not in any way short but gold is only one measure of power in the 41st Millenium. Of far more value are blood, honor, and status. The Adeptus Ministorum and the Adeptus Mechanicus have a long anf far from harmonious history, for the two vast institutions expouse entirely different beliefs and practices. To the Ecclesiarchy, the tech-Priests'veneration of the Omnisiah is problematic and easily confused by the ignorant for the worship of some higher being other than the Emperor. To the Adeptus Mechanicus, the servants of the Ecclesiarchy are hindered by an abiding distrust of anything they cannot directly control. These differing viewpoints make cooperation between the two fraught with disharmony and individual factors have in the past come to blows over matters of religous divergence.

Despite such differences, the imperium could not function each, The Ministorum controls Mankind's soul whilst the Adeptus Mechanicus maintains the machines it needs to cross the stars and wage the Emperor's wars. Over the milennia the two have negotiated numerous treaties and pacts that have ensured a constant flow of arms and material from the Forge Worlds, in particular to equip the Battle Sisters have access to a range of vehicles that are rarely seen outside of the Adeptus Astartes, some of them entirely unique to their own forces, their STC imprints jealously guarded.

As with all imperial bodies, the Adeptus Sororitas relies upon the services of attached Tech-Priests to maintain and repair its vehicles. When called upon to go to war, they are crewed by specially trained Battle Sisters, assisted where needed by Servitors and Techno-mats provided by the Adeptus Mechanicus. In battle these fearsome warrior women sing the battle prayers of the Adeptus Sororitas even as they incite the spirits of the machine using the articles taught to them by the Tech-Priests, combining both in the eternal battle against the faithless.

Very interesting! I've never read or heard anything about this before.

**Psienesis**

J3f wrote:
The Adeptus Mechanicus are a crucial part of the Ecclessiarchy. The Ambassadors sent from Mars to join the Ecclessiarchy would only be the Tech-priests that have the strongest faith in the Emperor. A Sister Technologus would only learn from these Tech-priests with heavy supervision by the Ministorum. These safe guards would produce the purest form of Imperial Tech-priest. A Sister of Battle that dare not speak the Word "Omnisiah". Her fellow Battle Sisters would be oblivious to her methods. Her Faith would be no less than any other fully trained Adepta Sororitas, in fact her Faith in the Emperor would exceed those of the other members of her convent because she believes the Emperor to be part of every machine spirit and for him to be working through her hands when she repairs the Vehicles of the Sisters of Battle, a miracle unto itself.

The Adeptus Mechanicus is 0% of the Ecclesiarchy. These are *rival* cults in the Imperium. A Tech-Priest that proclaims a belief in the Divinity of the Emperor, in the way the Ecclesiarchy believes, is an Apostate of the Machine Cult, and would be sent for "coercive reprogramming".

From what the fluff-bit implies, these Sisters aren't fixing squat, they're just operating various vehicles, and singing the basic Litanies of Maintenance and Operation. Otherwise, if the Exorcist breaks down, they need an actual Tech-Priest to come out and fix it. The Sisters can maybe change the oil and air filters, maybe change a tire or re-fit a track (which is basically a bunch of brute-force work) but if they throw a rod or the radiator starts leaking, it's time to call a Tech-Priest.

**SisterSydney**

It is very interesting. It does imply the kind of division of labor between Sisters and Tech-Priests, with Sisters doing the field maintenance and the Mechanicus doing "depot maintenance," that I speculated about in an earlier thread:

SisterSydney wrote:
We know that there's never been a tech priest(ess) in a Sisters army list, which makes them unique (as far as I know); they're also unique in not using missile launchers or lascannon, which are standard for the Guard, the Marines, and (in the case of lascannon) the Navy. We further know Ministorum-Mechanicum relations vary from "customer and supplier" to "open war." So how do the Ecclesiarchy in general and the Adepta Sororitas in particular maintain the somewhat narrow range of equipment the Mechanicum sells them?

[headcanon]
Unlike the Space Marinss, the Ecclesiarchy never sends personnel to Forge Worlds for training (what the clergy calls "Mechanicus brainwashing") and cyborgization ("mutilation of the sacred human form"). Instead, as with the Imperial Guard, the multi-generational contracts between various Cardinals and Forge Worlds specific that the Mechanicum provide not only equipment but a Techpriests and servitors -- in very small numbers, however, compared to a Departo Munitorum contract for the Guard.
The Ministorum prefers to keep its "loaner" Techpriests isolated from almost all its own personnel. Rather than letting the Techpriests perform most maintenance directly, the Ecclesiarchy prefers a "train the trainer" model, where it sends a few Deacons of proven faith and loyalty to the Techpriests to receive narrow technical training on specific systems; these Tech-Deacons are then thoroughly re-tested for ideological purity before being allowed to train large numbers of Ministorum personnel in even narrower skillsets.
In a typical Ordo Minoris of the Sisters of Battle, therefore, the Sisters themselves perform field maintenance on their gear, but anything seriously broken is sent back to an attached group of Ecclesiarchy support personnel supervised by a handful of Tech-Deacons; the arrangement is similar to Marine chapter serfs or a US Army battalion's maintenance company. Anything the Tech-Deacons can't handle -- and that's a lot -- is sent back to the quarantined Mechanicum tech-priests and their TechDeacons-in-training for what the Army would call "depot-level maintenance."
Between their limited and indirect access to Mechanicum expertise and the Decree Passive -- whose lesser-known provisions prohibit the Ecclesiarchy from even owning certain heavy weapons such as lascannon -- the Sisters' arsenal is lavishly equipped but somewhat narrow. The Ecclesiarchy spends a lot on wargear but gets less for each dollar (or whatever) than the Adepto Munitorum or the Astartes, if only because the frequent breakdowns in Ministorum-Mechanicum relations offer the Forge Worlds plenty of opportunities to renegotiate -- in some periods and places as often as once a century -- and jack up prices to take advantage of the Ecclesiarchy's wealth. What the Sisters do get, moreover, spends a lot more time transiting to and from specialized maintenance units than in Marine and Guard forces that bring their Tech-Priests with them in the field. As a result, the Sisters have a strong practical preference for reliable, rugged systems like Rhino-chassis vehicles and boltguns, which reinforces and in turn is reinforced by their traditions.
[/headcanon]

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Note that I still have to handwave "oh, the Decree Passive prohibits that" to explain why Sisters don't have lascannon, the standard anti-armor weapon of other Imperial forces. The fact that they don't have lasguns is relatively easily explained by the fact that lasguns suck.

**Furyou Miko**

The Sisterhood focus on bolter, melta and flamer for religious reasons, not because of their limitations.

That and because it helps define the Sisters as a unique army - they operate solely in the 2-24" range, with the sole exception of the Exorcist, which gets a bye on account of being a mobile shrine.

**SisterSydney**

As I said, headcanon. But even apparently irrational religious beliefs don't magically appear out of nowhere: Somebody had a reason, once.

My headcanon is that the Sisters are primarily an urban warfare force: defending shrines, cathedrals, pilgrimage sites, etc., or clearing out concentrations of heretics, which are all usually in built-up areas. Indeed, the larger buildings -- like Vandire's palace -- are basically cities in themselves. So, very rationally, they arm themselves so heavily with flamers and meltas because those are ideal for urban combat: flamers ignore cover and scour the enemy from all those hard-to-reach places, meltas breach building walls as well as vehicle armor. (Also bolter rounds are going to go right through a lot of walls, but the game doesn't depict that). In an urban area, you're rarely going to have long lines of sight, so it's not a big problem to have a maximum range of 24" (whatever the hell that is in 40K's inconsistent ground scale). The Exorcist is there to bust buildings from a (modest) distance. There's little point in blast templates because most of your targets are behind walls that you need something like S:8 AP:1 or Ignores Cover to get through.

Finally, while urban combat is a nightmare in general, hand-to-hand is even more of a nightmare than the rest of it -- at least for unaugmented humans -- because you can get (for example) trapped inside a sewer with fifty Chaos cultists where your superior training and wargear mean bugger-all. So you'd much rather find some good cover and shoot & burn the bastards to death across the alley/down the manhole/up the grand staircase of the burnt-out hotel. If you do have to charge something, you're not charging over any great distance. That's why the Codex has only two dedicated assault units -- the Repentia and the Penitent Engine -- and neither has the speed or armor to survive a long run towards the enemy over open ground. Seraphim aren't an assault unit, really (if they liked being in melee, they wouldn't have Hit & Run), but they're a great way to hop over buildings to shoot the enemy in the back of his fething heretic head.

By contrast, the Guard is more geared for open-field warfare: They're all about bombarding things from a distance and then sending in the waves of expendable infantry to seize the objective. (Yay, Red Army ca. 1943). The Marines are all about lightning strikes at the critical point to overpower the enemy with superior and superhuman force before they can react and use their superior numbers: That's why they've got Stormravens, Land Raiders, and Drop Pods up the wazoo, plus some nasty close-combat capabilities (by human standards) because we are the Emprah's Fureh and POP QUIZ SWEETHEART WE ARE IN YOUR FACE HITTING YOU WITH CHAINSWORDS NOW WHATCHA GONNA DO YEAH 'DIE' WORKS FOR US KTHXBAI.

**Sparkadia**

This is probably the best reasoning for the Sisters style of warfare I have ever read. Very well explained, SisterSydney!

**SisterSydney**

Thank you.

**Furyou Miko**

Yes, there is that too. Ehe. I never really put their preference for urban warfare together with their preferred choice of weapons, somehow, even though I always smile at city boards.

**SisterSydney**

All headcanon and justification after the fact, of course. My guess that when GW first invented the army, their thinking was simply "hot chicks with flamethrowers ROCK!"

Which is also true but not particularly solid world building.

**J3f**

Alright let's talk balance.

Starting with the first unit in the Codex.

Ephrael Stern.

Spoiler:

Daemonifuge: Ephrael Stern has Adamantium Will and Fearless. Ephrael Stern re-rolls failed Psychic tests.

Thrice-Born: Ephrael Stern has a 4+ invulnerable save, Feel No Pain (4+), and Eternal Warrior.

Blessed Sword
This is a Force Sword that ignores Invulnerable saves.

Stern Codex
Ephrael Stern has Preferred Enemy (Daemons of Slaanesh) and Hatred (models with the Mark of Slaanesh).

Ephrael Stern has gone through a lot of revisions and I think I finally got the balance down.

**Furyou Miko**

I'm not going to comment on Stern, since we are never going to agree on the nature of her powers. ^^;

**J3f**

Made a large update to the Codex. Also made Acts of Faith and Psychic Powers Cards for the Sisters of Battle. in first post.

Changed the Techno Sisters Special Rule to Canticle of Haste, which makes any vehicle they're driving into a fast vehicle.

Added a new Psychic Power, Purgatus, which lowers leadership by 5 and removes Fearless and ATSKNF, Warp Charge 2.

Ephrael Stern lost Hammerhand and gained Purgatus.

Redemptionists gained Shred and Furious Charge, now they should be worth taking enmasse in a Zealot unit.

**SisterSydney**

Cards are a handy thing, and Canticle of Haste sounds like a lot of fun.

Redemptionists basically have +1 Attack and 3 special rules (Righteous Rage, Shred, & Furious Charge) that regular Zealots don't, correct? An extra 10 points is probably fair for that. Ovion's guidelines -- which I know are controversial -- would strictly say +8 pts, though, if you wanted to drop the cost a little.

Also, I hadn't noticed this before, but your Repentia are troops? That allows some very interesting army builds but I'm not sure it fits fluffwise with them being a relatively small subset of Sisters and with them being crazed chargers rather than objective-holders.

**J3f**

SisterSydney wrote:
Cards are a handy thing, and Canticle of Haste sounds like a lot of fun.

Redemptionists basically have +1 Attack and 3 special rules (Righteous Rage, Shred, & Furious Charge) that regular Zealots don't, correct? An extra 10 points is probably fair for that. Ovion's guidelines -- which I know are controversial -- would strictly say +8 pts, though, if you wanted to drop the cost a little.

Also, I hadn't noticed this before, but your Repentia are troops? That allows some very interesting army builds but I'm not sure it fits fluffwise with them being a relatively small subset of Sisters and with them being crazed chargers rather than objective-holders.

Just updated the Redemptioinist with a new special rule instead of furious charge. They also get +1 to armour and +2 to leadership, so cutting points probably isn't an option. About Ovion's guide: Special Rules are not equal, take skyfire and preferred enemy for example. Skyfire is vastly superior and is often the crux of an entire unit.

Chainsword Expert: A Redemptionist armed with an Eviscerator adds +1 to their Strength characteristic and may exchange the bonus attack on a charge to gain the Furious charge Special Rule. A Redemptionist armed with a Chainsword gains the Furious Charge Special Rule.

Hopefully Eviscerators are worth taking at 25 points now.

Repentia have a Mistress to keep them in line, and I didn't want to make them like Death Company. They still have their wits about them and want to serve the Emperor as best possible even if that means not dying immediately.

**SisterSydney**

Absolutely, Ovion's guideline is a starting point, not a Bible.

The Redemptionist bonus is interesting -- but almost certainly undercosted now. +1 Strength is a big deal, especially when it really means +2 Strength counting the bonus from the Eviscerator.

Now, if you're finding the 25 pt cost of the Eviscerator unbearable, which it is for an infantry model, Ovion recommends a trick that I used in my Redemptionist-equivalents ("Frateris Champions"): Make the Eviscerator standard equipment and cost it at a discount, much as Crusaders and Death Cult Assassins carry power weapons and/or storm shields that if bought normally would double the cost of the model. Per Ovion, a weapon that costs an independent character 25 points should cost regular infantry 1/5 of that, i.e. 5 points.