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The_Grim_Angel wrote:I must confess I don't understand why Games Workshop should create a female space marines chapter, if we already have the Sisters of Battle, which already are de facto the female equivalent of the Space Marines.
They're as much female Space Marines as Custodes are to regular Space Marines.
Their aesthetic is completely different, their gameplay is completely different, their background and methods of warfare are completely different, they're physically different, and the focus they get in the wider meta-narrative isn't anywhere near equal.
[…]
That is why I think it is an extremely boring option: it wouldn't add nothing to the lore and to the game
...uh, representation? The whole point of this endeavour?
especially if they were only space marines women in the existent space marines chapters.
Why is that a problem again? We can have men in those Chapters, why not women?
Representation of what? I don't understand.
We are talking about a game and in a game the only thing that actually matter is how much it is enjoyable and the fact that the miniatures have a female or male shape doesn't change anything about how much we can have fun with the game itself.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/06/05 20:33:52
Personally though, if they did release female space marines, I probably wouldn't stop playing the game altogether because I only play Orks anyways, but I would dread it becoming start of the slippery slope of what has happened to Star Wars, Star Trek and soon to be LoTR with Amazon's abomination of a TV show with how these franchises get their lore and underpinning stories changed willy nilly because everything has to be seen through the lens of a supposedly utopian ideal of representation.
I don't think diversity in those movies was the problem. It was how badly it was implemented. It kind of reminds me of how they did the Gray Knights and ultramarines codexes a while back with them being all Gary stu's. If Ray had a similar character arc and flaws to Luke then I think it would have been an absolutely fine character. Could be different skills as weaknesses and strengths and can be different character arc but the fact that the character arc had no growth and the character barely had any weaknesses was the main problem with that. If Games workshop just came out and said yeah there is now male and females Space Marines and added one sprue I don't see how that would result in the same unfortunate storyline that Star wars had. Her being a woman wasn't the problem.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/06/05 20:34:37
The Star Wars sequels failed due to a massive over commitment on Disney's part to being safe and uncontroversial. An unwillingness to commit to Kylo as an antagonist due to his popularity with teens had waaaay more to do with how much of a mess those movies were than anything Rey did.
The_Grim_Angel wrote:Representation of what? I don't understand.
...of women? You know, the topic of the thread?
We are talking about a game
A game that has a severe lack of women's representation.
and in a game the only thing that actually matter is how much it is enjoyable
Uh, no. Maybe that's the case for you, but that's not universal.
And again - representation tends to help people enjoy the hobby more. Because representation's good, yanno?
and the fact that the miniatures have a female or male shape doesn't change anything about how much we can have fun with the game itself.
Actually, it kinda does.
If all the most popular minis have a male shape, that is sending an implicit message that this is a hobby for males. Many men also use the lore to justify exclusionary behaviours. So, perhaps you are lucky enough that you don't notice that bias towards men in the hobby, and the implicit aversion towards women, due to a lack of women's representation, but it very much is there, and that lack of representation and inability for women to access Space Marines in any flavour other than "man" definitely isn't fun.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/05 21:18:13
It's important to note that there are different waves of feminism, and I would argue the latest one has veered significantly off on the origins of the first two waves of feminism, and in many cases I would say have regressed backwards.
I would caution pushing this too far past the original topic though since we are already borderline going into politics territory.
Personally though, if they did release female space marines, I probably wouldn't stop playing the game altogether because I only play Orks anyways, but I would dread it becoming start of the slippery slope of what has happened to Star Wars, Star Trek and soon to be LoTR with Amazon's abomination of a TV show with how these franchises get their lore and underpinning stories changed willy nilly because everything has to be seen through the lens of a supposedly utopian ideal of representation.
I would also hate that other factions get neglected yet again for another unnecessary SM update. I know people are arguing that "oh, it'll just be one upgrade sprue" but let's be real, if it's GW and their cash cow, they rarely half-ass model releases for them and they will have at least a full month of different chapter specific female upgrades that take up the slot of an army that needs actual loving/updating.
Star Wars got "ruined" because the sequels lacked a coherent story. Star Trek is a lefty fantasy land that famously tackles social issues constantly and had many minority main characters (Sulu, Uhura, Sisko, etc.) I haven't read anything about what's happening with Amazon's LotR so I can't comment.
Star Wars got ruined by several things, story included as I'm definitely not arguing against that, but you could definitely tell that it followed Hollywood's current narrative of their interpretation of what "strong female characters" are by how they basically get handed things they don't work for with how Rey was written to basically bypass the typical beats of a hero's journey and all the villains being white men of such incompetency that you can barely believe that they're the villains of the sequel trilogy. Nobody had the power and gravitas of Vader, nor the imposing ruthlessness of Tarkin, or the manipulative scheming of Palpatine, who basically went braindead in the last movie of the sequel trilogy.
I have nothing against Star Trek with regards to how they handled social issues before, it was done tastefully IMO compared to how it was done in the current movies, but that's my personal opinion.
@Sgt_Smudge
I do value lore more than representation because fundamentally good storytelling trumps hamfisted representation out of some maligned view that everything you engage with in life must reflect this kind of ideal. It feels like a kind of propaganda that you need this quota to be met and at that point you aren't looking at the characters as people but some checkbox to be ticked. Can you have a good story with a good amount of representation? Of course! And all the more for it! But what I'm seeing here isn't that. It's people who want to retroactively change something with little to no real addition to the lore other than, "Oh btw, there's women now, even though they'll effectively be men as far as their body and mentality goes". I don't see it providing anything of real substance than for the chance to appeal to people who want to have female space marines, who can already effectively have that because GW can't force you to not create your own female space marine chapter. There may be distasteful aspects of the community that crap on people who do this and I don't condone that, but I don't see that as GW's responsibility to address but rather the community's.
Also, when you say that it's not my call to say that a SM update is unnecessary, I'm fairly sure that a significant portion of the WH40K community is suffering from marine fatigue, so as far as majority goes, I think it's a pretty safe bet that a lot of people want their other factions fleshed out first, especially now.
With regards to your argument about GW still prioritizing SM, I think they still would, yes, but the fact that they released the update sprue for Cadians and the recent Necron revamp and SoB release shows me that GW are not only capable but willing to diversify factions that need it and they just need more of a push to balance it out like they are doing so for the releases in AoS at the moment. It's hard to break the inertia of SM all the time, every time, but if they keep up what they're doing now I think it's very possible for SoB and Guard to balance out the spotlight attention from SM. I'd also argue that SM women (particularly the incarnation that you are currently proposing) never existed to begin with soooooo there's no loving or updating to be had for something that doesn't have a presence to begin with. Unlike squats, poor guys.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/05 21:32:35
I do value lore more than representation because fundamentally good storytelling trumps hamfisted representation out of some maligned view that everything you engage with in life must reflect this kind of ideal.
What part of Space Marines being all male is fundamentally good though?
You say it's hamfisted to include women, I say that women make up 50% of the population, and not including them is even more artifical and hamfisted.
The reasons they don't exist in the lore are entirely arbitrary, and exist solely to justify a lack of models from decades ago. It's not been this cornerstone of lore, it's not "fundamentally good", and more importantly, made up fiction should not ever be used as an excuse to exclude real life people.
It feels like a kind of propaganda that you need this quota to be met
Women literally exist. The existence of women isn't a quota or political point, it's reality.
and at that point you aren't looking at the characters as people but some checkbox to be ticked.
Or, you know, perhaps women just want to see themselves represented? Have you considered that?
Can you have a good story with a good amount of representation? Of course! And all the more for it! But what I'm seeing here isn't that. It's people who want to retroactively change something with little to no real addition to the lore other than, "Oh btw, there's women now, even though they'll effectively be men as far as their body and mentality goes".
Yeah - but they're not men, because there's no reason for them to be only men. If all you see from this is "we don't need to feature women in our material because they're basically just men", that's exactly the problem I'm discussing. Women deserve to be represented by women, not just men, because women exist in the real world, and make up 50% of the population. Why on earth do we need to sweep them all aside because "they'll effectively be men"?
I don't see it providing anything of real substance than for the chance to appeal to people who want to have female space marines, who can already effectively have that because GW can't force you to not create your own female space marine chapter.
That's literally not how it works at all.
GW can't stop people inventing their own fanon Chapters, but that doesn't help representation in the wider community at all, and it doesn't stop the endless stream of chuds who complain when they see it.
The end point here is equal representation - without official endorsement, that's not representation.
There may be distasteful aspects of the community that crap on people who do this and I don't condone that, but I don't see that as GW's responsibility to address but rather the community's.
On the other hand, I see that those "distasteful aspects" are literally using GW's material to justify and excuse their exclusionary behaviour. If I found out that my setting was being used to do that, I would have a long, strong look at my work and figure out how to prevent that.
Also, when you say that it's not my call to say that a SM update is unnecessary, I'm fairly sure that a significant portion of the WH40K community is suffering from marine fatigue, so as far as majority goes, I think it's a pretty safe bet that a lot of people want their other factions fleshed out first, especially now.
I'm not saying that other updates and avoiding Marine fatigue isn't also necessary. But that doesn't mean that *adding a single sprue* is unnecessary either.
With regards to your argument about GW still prioritizing SM, I think they still would, yes, but the fact that they released the update sprue for Cadians and the recent Necron revamp and SoB release shows me that GW are not only capable but willing to diversify factions that need it and they just need more of a push to balance it out like they are doing so for the releases in AoS at the moment.
See, it's funny you bring up AoS, because their Marine equivalents *are* mixed gender. AoS gets balance much more right than 40k, both in representation, and in faction development.
It's hard to break the inertia of SM all the time, every time, but if they keep up what they're doing now I think it's very possible for SoB and Guard to balance out the spotlight attention from SM.
It's really not. Space Marines are still the main focus of 40k, and of GW as a whole - the presence that Space Marines hold in wider pop culture is staggering.
I'd also argue that SM women (particularly the incarnation that you are currently proposing) never existed to begin with soooooo there's no loving or updating to be had for something that doesn't have a presence to begin with.
They existed at the same time male Space Marines did. They were, unfortunately, left behind, but definitely did exist at one point, even if the concept of Space Marines changed - fundamentally, they were once part of that identity.
If you're going to talk about how the lore is important and shouldn't change, we should start there.
Andykp wrote: Why shouldn’t the emperor be a misogynist, he was a complete douche to everyone else, a massive racist, murderer and crushed all rival religions. Misogyny isn’t a big stretch.
The problem with this concept is that it normalizes that behavior. It's fine if it's a straight-up villain being this way because it demonizes that behavior. But fully half the factions and more than half the representation yells out "For the emperor!" And while someone steeped in the lore knows that yeah the emperor was a massive donkey cave and not really what you want to look up to and all the factions are massively flawed and there are no good guys in this setting, people looking to get into the hobby won't have that knowledge very accessible to them.
Besides we've seen when someone in charge, even if they are fictional, is misogynistic and racist it normalizes the behavior to players. I mean we have a fairly outspoken group that does just that and yes while most of it's centered around Arch Warhammer he still is fairly popular.
My female marine back story isn’t what I would suggest gw do. It’s just to trigger the angry sexists like in this thread. In reality GW should make female marines and say that you always could. Total retcon. No apologies, no explanation needed.
Argive wrote: If we get a whole new never ending set of kits/upgrades for marines I'm definitely dropping 40k.. I'm fed up with never ending marine releases while im stuck with failcrap models.
People have argued to no end that SOB and guard should be the poster child with new awesome female centric models, and we've yet to see any concession why that is not a viable solution and male only space marines must end...
Me bringing up hail ceasar has to do with 40k. This is because the main argument seems to be that male only space marines facilitate sexist gatekeeping boys-only group which is bad for women.
That argument also has nothing to do with 40k or lore.. But rather based on real world ideology and socio-political viewpoints
If we take it at face value and say there are indeed thousands of bigoted gatekeeper white men(which I certainly disagree with). And they really cant abide by female space marines; So if you eject those gatekeepers from 40k by introducing female space marines , they will go somewhere right?
Its been suggested these groups are somehow organised in some sort of collective way in grups/reddits whatever...
Lets say they go away from 40k and join a new Hail Caesar thing which then becomes wildly successful and other 40k people get attracted to it instead of 40k and it gains wide adoption, do you them to it?
I think its a very valid question.
Is there a representation issue with Hail Caesar?
ould there be an issue with Hail Cesar IF it overtakes 40k in terms of popularity, engagement and hobby uptake?
Including female marines isn’t sexism, it doesn’t oppress you. That’s just stupid. It is simply rebalancing representation. Slightly at that.
And your argument about hail Caesar makes as little sense. You assume that 40K is only the most popular wargame because misogynist bigots play it. Wrong. If they all leave due to female marines it would still be the biggest wargame out there. And saying people would demand representation in an historic wargame? It’s like comparing apples and oranges. We aren’t arguing for changing history. Just a fictional setting ever so slightly. Pretty much asking to change one paragraph first printed in 1989. 13 words in fact are all that need to be changed.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/06/06 13:16:42
Edit: as for orks... I don't know how you would feminize a faction fully built on poking fun at toxic masculinity.... I know originally they we soccer/football hooligans but it really fits Toxic Masculinity well.
Nothing is really stopping GW from changing that aspect of orks and 40k. As the IP matures and becomes more mainstream, it seems doubtful that most of the 'joke' aspects of older lore will remain.
Looking at the new and upcoming orruks from AoS, they as models don't seem based on a joke. They look dangerous, scary even. There's no reason GW couldn't over time shift orks from "oh, those wacky orks are at it again!" to "oh gak, orks!" And this being 40k, GW could make any sort of handwave to justify this, from Old One interference releasing new or mutating existing spores to Necron interference in an attempt to create more ork infighting, to the increased presence of chaos in the galaxy doing things to the orks, to Eldar shenanigans, etc. Heck if GW were worried about sales, they could just make them a subfaction to include in your Guard, Orks, or Tau armies as mercenaries.
The biggest hurdle would probably be the models since orks/orruks have different proportions than humans which may incline GW to sexualize or humanize them to the point of creating green women. Well, maybe second biggest hurdle, since this thread has demonstrated there's more than enough people who would screech like howler monkeys about more female representation in 40k.
Including female marines isn’t sexism, it doesn’t oppress you. That’s just stupid. It is simply rebalancing representation. Slightly at that.
And your argument about hail Caesar makes as little sense. You assume that 40K is only the most popular wargame because misogynist bigots play it. Wrong. If they all leave due to female marines it would still be the biggest wargame out there. And saying people would demand representation in an historic wargame? It’s like comparing apples and oranges. We aren’t arguing for changing history. Just a fictional setting ever so slightly. Pretty much asking to change one paragraph first printed in 1989. 13 words in fact are all that need to be changed.
Why? The 40k Sm are a problem because they are the most popular apparently.
So if hail Caesar was the most popular war game, would change not be required also?
Why is change only requirered if the thing is popular ? Is fiction not allowed to be reflective of history? Or is it only an issue if it becomes popular?
The internal logic to this train of thought doesn't work.
40k is popular because its customer base and hobbyist have made it popular over the last 30+ years across two generations and sunk untold hours and millions into the hobby...
That customer base is also almost exclusively male. Fact.
If you start calling people names just because they don't want the thing they grew up and enjoyed changed, I'm sure many will leave. This thing has been happening across pretty much all the media.
This type of "demand" never ends well when corporations do it not organically. It is always ham-fisted and serves no purposes in improving the experience or the product for the existing customer base pissing everyone on both sides of the fence off.
And just because 13 words don't matter to you or me doesn't mean they don't matter to someone else.
And if the only argument is "well feth their feellings and feth them" then quite farnkly the same can be said of the ones making demands..
Because it all boils down to "my feelings are more valid because..."
That is not how you convince people
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/06/06 13:18:46
AngryAngel80 wrote: I don't know, when I see awesome rules, I'm like " Baby, your rules looking so fine. Maybe I gotta add you to my first strike battalion eh ? "
Argive wrote: Why? The 40k Sm are a problem because they are the most popular apparently.
So if hail Caesar was the most popular war game, would change not be required also?
Why is change only requirered if the thing is popular ? Is fiction not allowed to be reflective of history? Or is it only an issue if it becomes popular?
The internal logic to this train of thought doesn't work.
That's because your 'logic' is a bit like saying 'Well, if I need oil to make mayonnaise, why don't I also need oil to make yoghurt?"
The answer is 'Because they're not the same thing'. Hail Caesar is based in a historical setting, while 40K is space fantasy. For a historical game to accurately represent women, they would include women wherever it was historically appropriate. A fantasy game however doesn't need to adhere to historical record, it can be whatever the creator wants it to be... but if the creator chooses to use that power to exclude a portion of their potential customer base, they're just leaving money on the table.
Sure, fiction is allowed to be reflective of history. But there is no particularly good reason for it to do so in the particular case under discussion, and it makes no sense for it to do so in the wider context of the rest of the setting.
Space Marines are a fantasy representation of a genetically modified super-soldier, created with made up science in a made up setting. There is absolutely no sensible reason for this fantasy to be limited purely to men, just because it was first created 30 years ago when nobody bothered to consider if it might be worth marketing to women at some point.
The_Grim_Angel wrote:Representation of what? I don't understand.
...of women? You know, the topic of the thread?
We are talking about a game
A game that has a severe lack of women's representation.
and in a game the only thing that actually matter is how much it is enjoyable
Uh, no. Maybe that's the case for you, but that's not universal.
And again - representation tends to help people enjoy the hobby more. Because representation's good, yanno?
and the fact that the miniatures have a female or male shape doesn't change anything about how much we can have fun with the game itself.
Actually, it kinda does.
If all the most popular minis have a male shape, that is sending an implicit message that this is a hobby for males. Many men also use the lore to justify exclusionary behaviours. So, perhaps you are lucky enough that you don't notice that bias towards men in the hobby, and the implicit aversion towards women, due to a lack of women's representation, but it very much is there, and that lack of representation and inability for women to access Space Marines in any flavour other than "man" definitely isn't fun.
Are you really playing the discriminatory card to support your point of view?
A game is a game and nobody chose to play or not a game due to his ideological believes, the people play a game only if they enjoy the experience and every time the editor of a game, a comics or whatever decided to shift the focus of its product from the costumer satisfaction to the ideological propaganda, he inevitably lost his costumers. It is what is happening with the US comic industry, in which the publishers decided to put more and more "political" contents in their books, loosing readers and blaming them to be homophobic (even if they are gays) misogynist (even if they are girls) white suprematists (even if they are blacks), only because the costumers want just have fun, while the publishers think to have the right to indoctrinate them.
If you want put some label on me only because I dare talk about game experience, while we are talking about a game, you can; but beware: you don't know me, you don't know my race, my sex, my sexuality, so doing that you run the risk to end like Areva Martin:
P.S. I'm sorry if I seem rude, but I'm really tired about a movie I'have seen too many times.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 10:09:01
Mk, so you're going for the "Go Woke, Get Broke" argument?
Yeah, that's utter bunk. You talk about Comics going political when they always have been.
Xmen - Allegory for the Civil Rights Movement.
Captain America - Literally the biggest Anti-Fascist of all time.
Wonder Woman - Feminist icon.
Black Panther - I really shouldn't have to spell this one out.
The 40k game and lore are intertwined because they have to be. You can't have one without the other.
People might get into 40k because of "Pewpew, Space Marines fighting Evil Robots" but the fact that the lore is so appealing to those with certain exclusionary leanings (read as the Fash), can turn the game sour when being a certain way means you're likely to get harassed by a sadly large group within the 40k community. Being able to take part in a hobby and feel safe while doing so isn't "politics". It's common decency.
JUST SO IT IS 100% CLEAR I am not saying everyone who doesn't want female SM is a fascist. What I AM saying is there is a depressingly large and loud group within the 40k community that continuously harasses those who are not white/straight/cis/male and IMO, having greater representation in the PRIMARY FACTION/MODEL LINE of 40k would do a lot to shut these people up.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 10:09:47
Andykp wrote: In reality GW should make female marines and say that you always could. Total retcon. No apologies, no explanation needed.
GW would never just completely redo an army from the ground up like that. Never. Not even space terminator robots that went from mindless automata to le quirky space Egyptians.
Anyway, marines aren't male, they're transhumans. They physically become better than men. QED they are all women
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 10:58:10
Andykp wrote: In reality GW should make female marines and say that you always could. Total retcon. No apologies, no explanation needed.
GW would never just completely redo an army from the ground up like that. Never. Not even space terminator robots that went from mindless automata to le quirky space Egyptians.
Anyway, marines aren't male, they're transhumans. They physically become better than men. QED they are all women
It wouldn’t be a redo, it would be a couple of female heads on the sprue of the next release, maybe a female pronoun in a bit of fluff. Job done. Say no more about it.
Argive wrote: Why? The 40k Sm are a problem because they are the most popular apparently.
So if hail Caesar was the most popular war game, would change not be required also?
Why is change only requirered if the thing is popular ? Is fiction not allowed to be reflective of history? Or is it only an issue if it becomes popular?
The internal logic to this train of thought doesn't work.
That's because your 'logic' is a bit like saying 'Well, if I need oil to make mayonnaise, why don't I also need oil to make yoghurt?"
The answer is 'Because they're not the same thing'. Hail Caesar is based in a historical setting, while 40K is space fantasy. For a historical game to accurately represent women, they would include women wherever it was historically appropriate. A fantasy game however doesn't need to adhere to historical record, it can be whatever the creator wants it to be... but if the creator chooses to use that power to exclude a portion of their potential customer base, they're just leaving money on the table.
Sure, fiction is allowed to be reflective of history. But there is no particularly good reason for it to do so in the particular case under discussion, and it makes no sense for it to do so in the wider context of the rest of the setting.
Space Marines are a fantasy representation of a genetically modified super-soldier, created with made up science in a made up setting. There is absolutely no sensible reason for this fantasy to be limited purely to men, just because it was first created 30 years ago when nobody bothered to consider if it might be worth marketing to women at some point.
What insaniak said, your whole argument is based on utterly flawed logic. The issue isn’t that it’s popular so must be representative. It’s that it’s popular and unnecessarily unrepresentative to the point of excluding people. It isn’t a representation of a historical setting. Don’t be absurd.
If those 13 words are so important to people then they need to have a long look at their priorities. It’s a pathetic state of affairs if they are. I took the time to re-read all the implants and procedures that were in the article I posted a bit of before. Zero mention of testosterone, zero (with even a limited understanding of biology) need for male hosts at all.
P.S.
I have an anatomy degree and am a medical professional so have a limited understanding of biology.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 11:20:15
Argive wrote:Why? The 40k Sm are a problem because they are the most popular apparently.
The most popular and visible 40k faction, yes. This is specifically important because we're discussing about 40k on a 40k subforum.
So if hail Caesar was the most popular war game, would change not be required also?
I'm not going to bother repeating Insaniak, but I'll instead say - can you read what forum this is? You might have noticed the words that say "40k Background". Last I checked, Hail Caesar isn't 40k Background, or really anything to do with 40k. Whatever happens to another game, I have no idea about, and isn't important when discussing an issue with 40k's lore, any more so than discussing D&D is.
Why is change only requirered if the thing is popular ?
That's not what anyone said. People are calling for *representation*, because it's popular. You're ignoring why people want the change in the first place. The goal is representation. The only way to get effective fair representation is to do so in the most visible ways. Space Marines are the most visible, and popular (or vice versa).
Is fiction not allowed to be reflective of history? Or is it only an issue if it becomes popular?
But 40k isn't a historical game, so the point is meaningless here. Not to mention your lack of understanding on why people are asking for change.
The internal logic to this train of thought doesn't work.
It doesn't work because you're shifting the goalposts, and don't recognise what people are asking for.
40k is popular because its customer base and hobbyist have made it popular over the last 30+ years across two generations and sunk untold hours and millions into the hobby...
And what part of Space Marines needing to be male has anything to do with that? Are you implying that 40k is only popular because of Space Marines only being men? Why would women Space Marines jeopardise the "untold hours and millions" invested in the hobby? Why would anyone feel threatened by that?
That customer base is also almost exclusively male. Fact.
Have you considered *why* that is? Perhaps, you know, because women's representation in 40k has been utterly abysmal for the majority of those 30+ years, and the implicit "boys club" mentality has driven many women away?
It's not that women don't like playing with little war dollies. AoS has a much more diverse audience and player base. But 40k - not so much.
If you start calling people names just because they don't want the thing they grew up and enjoyed changed, I'm sure many will leave. This thing has been happening across pretty much all the media.
The only thing being changed here is "women can be Space Marines". Did you enjoy that? Why?
Many may leave, but if they're leaving because they can't handle women Space Marines, is that really someone's opinion you should be listening to?
This type of "demand" never ends well when corporations do it not organically. It is always ham-fisted and serves no purposes in improving the experience or the product for the existing customer base pissing everyone on both sides of the fence off.
Hang on, why is *including* women hamfisted and inorganic, but making up fictional rules to say how women can't be super soldiers isn't?
"Improving the product" - adding women does improve the product, by providing representation and freedom. Do you think adding women Astartes would make it worse? "Existing customer base" - why would adding women Astartes annoy the current customer base? They're just women.
And just because 13 words don't matter to you or me doesn't mean they don't matter to someone else.
Why does women not being able to be Space Marines matter? Why do those 13 words mean more to you than women feeling excluded?
And if the only argument is "well feth their feellings and feth them" then quite farnkly the same can be said of the ones making demands.. Because it all boils down to "my feelings are more valid because..."
That is not how you convince people
You're right - so why are you telling women to "feth their feelings and feth them" because they want representation, and that your feelings about 13 words of lore are more valid than they are?
End of the day, one side here is asking for fair representation of real human beings. The other doesn't want to change some made up writing. I don't think it's hard to see why one is a little more important than the other.
The_Grim_Angel wrote:Are you really playing the discriminatory card to support your point of view?
I'm stating facts. Women, on the whole, are discriminated against in this hobby, and that's a fact.
A game is a game
So why are there complaints when people want representation in it? After all, it's "just a game", it shouldn't be a problem?
and nobody chose to play or not a game due to his ideological believes
Not quite true. A game that outright promotes hateful ideologies is a game I'm not touching.
the people play a game only if they enjoy the experience
You know what might help women enjoy their experience? Representation.
and every time the editor of a game, a comics or whatever decided to shift the focus of its product from the costumer satisfaction to the ideological propaganda, he inevitably lost his costumers. It is what is happening with the US comic industry, in which the publishers decided to put more and more "political" contents in their books, loosing readers and blaming them to be homophobic (even if they are gays) misogynist (even if they are girls) white suprematists (even if they are blacks), only because the costumers want just have fun, while the publishers think to have the right to indoctrinate them.
The "get woke, go broke" narrative simply isn't accurate though. Look at current edition D&D - arguably the most woke the game's ever been, especially with Tasha's Cauldron, and it's wildly wildly popular - between all manners of people, not just white men.
The US comic industry isn't failing because of "wokeness", it's failing because the medium itself is. The actual heroes and characters are flourishing just fine on the silver screen - was Endgame not the highest grossing film (can't remember if it still is or not)?
But this is irrelevant. Why? Because representing 50% of the population in your game isn't "political". Adding women to 40k would be a move towards exceptional normality, and if anything, excluding women for hamfisted reasons is the more political choice to make. Including women isn't "indoctrination". It's customer satisfaction - satisfaction of the women audience who want to feel represented.
What I'm having a problem understanding is why including women into a place where they have every right to be would possibly anger people or annoy existing consumers.
P.S. I'm sorry if I seem rude, but I'm really tired about a movie I'have seen too many times.
And I'm really tired in having to trot out that the existence of women isn't some political plot or issue. It's simple representation.
Why does anyone care so much about having to keep women out of their special power armoured club?
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/06/06 12:01:20
I feel like on the opposite side of the table here there is going to be two main camps. Those who just want to keep the boys club which I hope that would be a fairly small portion of this side. And the other half would be those who are worried about how it would be implemented and how it would affect the lore. We have seen how Hollywood can royally screwed up a beloved franchise storyline with terrible representation. Star wars being a good example of that. It also doesn't help that they moved all of the existing fiction to Legends other than the main movies.
But if they implement great characters like we've seen in the past with the aliens franchise and the older Star Trek stuff (I haven't seen the new stuff so I'm not sure) I think it could be done really well. It can do justice to the lower but also bring the representation that this setting sorely needs.
Star Wars wasn't "ruined" because they made Rey and Finn the main characters. Rey took exactly the same journey Luke did only she beat Kylo with a lightsaber instead of blowing up a Death Star. The sequels weren't good because Disney was too scared of making the old guard mad by making a new story, then they got mad anyway cos 7 was a repeat of 4, then 8 was a new story that people got mad about cos it wasn't 5, and 9 was just flat out awful.
Legends was never considered canon anyway and until Disney took a more public role in the franchise the only canon material was the movies.
What I'm saying here is this, you will always annoy someone with changes made to any game/story/setting/lore/thing. If the change allows more people to enjoy said thing and feel welcomed then that is a better option. If said thing is toy soldiers that you know people with disposable income will buy into time and time again, then upsetting some of the old guard is not a concern.
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Star Wars would've been just as horrible with literally using luke, leia and vader instead of rey, finn and kylo because the problem wasn't that the characters were female or black but because the plot was written by people whose only goal was to maximize profits and avoid any possible controversy (which they got anyway because they underestimated just how mad at women part of SW fandom is).
Gert wrote: Star Wars wasn't "ruined" because they made Rey and Finn the main characters. Rey took exactly the same journey Luke did only she beat Kylo with a lightsaber instead of blowing up a Death Star. The sequels weren't good because Disney was too scared of making the old guard mad by making a new story, then they got mad anyway cos 7 was a repeat of 4, then 8 was a new story that people got mad about cos it wasn't 5, and 9 was just flat out awful. Legends was never considered canon anyway and until Disney took a more public role in the franchise the only canon material was the movies.
What I'm saying here is this, you will always annoy someone with changes made to any game/story/setting/lore/thing. If the change allows more people to enjoy said thing and feel welcomed then that is a better option. If said thing is toy soldiers that you know people with disposable income will buy into time and time again, then upsetting some of the old guard is not a concern.
I think part of what makes the sequel trilogy so horrible is because it not only can't stand on its own as a trilogy given how disjointed it is from having multiple directors and lack of a cohesive planned narrative between the 3 movies, but that it fundamentally undermines the previous 2 trilogies message of redemption and Anakin's arc as the Chosen One. Anakin fulfills his purpose of balancing the force at the end of RotJ, but The Rise of Skywalker just comes in and undoes that with "LOL, Palpy Respawn go BRR". Luke becoming a bitter, jaded hermit also completely contradicts his character arc in the OG trilogy, where he sees the good in Vader, a literal mass murderer and right hand of the Empire who endangers his friend's lives on a daily basis, and chooses to basically put his trust in him at the very end that allows Anakin to re-emerge to stop Palpatine, whereas in TLJ, Luke seeing darkness in Ben, who hasn't even committed any actual crimes yet, he just instinctually goes "I gotta murder this boy!" It doesn't make any sense.
It pretty much took fan favourite characters and regressed them and included them as cameo characters because they wanted to draw in people with the nostalgia factor without respecting their character's development up until this point.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 17:20:31
Gert wrote: Star Wars wasn't "ruined" because they made Rey and Finn the main characters. Rey took exactly the same journey Luke did only she beat Kylo with a lightsaber instead of blowing up a Death Star. The sequels weren't good because Disney was too scared of making the old guard mad by making a new story, then they got mad anyway cos 7 was a repeat of 4, then 8 was a new story that people got mad about cos it wasn't 5, and 9 was just flat out awful.
Legends was never considered canon anyway and until Disney took a more public role in the franchise the only canon material was the movies.
What I'm saying here is this, you will always annoy someone with changes made to any game/story/setting/lore/thing. If the change allows more people to enjoy said thing and feel welcomed then that is a better option. If said thing is toy soldiers that you know people with disposable income will buy into time and time again, then upsetting some of the old guard is not a concern.
While I agree the seventh movie wasn't that bad of the trilogy. Ray was definitely better than Luke and a lot more ways. She was a decent pilot that was able to fly a broken down millennium falcon and later was able to repair part of it. Then she was able to tap in and use the force something Luke wasn't able to do until later in the trilogy. Then she was able to beat a very competent swordsman (granted he had just taken a bow caster to the stomach and that's kind of how I justified it). The only other useful thing Luke did was blow up one tie fighter out of three.
I think the characters of Finn and Ray could have been excellent. For Finn I believe they treated him too much like comic relief which is unfair, but a very Disney thing to do. And Rey didn't have anything to grow into. What is she really better at later on that she was wasn't decent that on her own. Luke was a trash sword fighter and couldn't use the force at all but later on he gained those skills. Rai seemed to have a decent amount of those skills to begin with.
Bringing it back to Warhammer I just hope the bring in competent female Space Marine characters with their own flaws and skills.
Luke blew up the Death Star using the Force to get the perfect timing to launch his proton bombs, it's one of the most famous lines in 4. Luke was also a good pilot despite only ever flying what was basically a speeder. Also, Kylo was only ever shown beating people with little to no saber training and struggling at that. That's the one thing 8 did well with him was berate him for being so useless despite his aspirations to be Vader. He destroyed the rebuilt Jedi order with the Knights (who were also a huge misstep) which is basically the same as Vader murdering the kids in 3.
As for GW, the entire concept of SM is based around them being unbeatable in literally every story they are in. Not sure how adding an option for female SM is going to change that.
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I never said it would. I'm on the side of female Space Marines I just really hope they implement it well and don't make another caldor Drago or what Calgar used to be. And that goes for all new characters or all existing characters for the Warhammer storyline.
One last thing and I'll leave the Star wars stuff alone. Earlier in that episode Obi-Wan Kenobi was teaching Luke to reach out with his feelings and to sense when to act. He then later uses that feeling to fire that one shot which is the one thing he did that was remotely Jedi like. The next episode even after having lightsaber training he still gets his butt handed to him by the big Baddy. Kylo never has any teeth other than peons he never beats anyone of significance. And it could be argued that Ray and Finn are not bad characters but kylo is which also hurts the franchise. A hero epic is only as strong as its villain. In this case I feel like the hero was a bit too strong and the villain was woefully too weak.
Rogue one is rarely ever criticized because even though it had a female lead she had flaws and strengths she was a compelling character, and the villain was strong and had flaws and had strength and he was a compelling character.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/06 18:06:13
Gert wrote: Luke blew up the Death Star using the Force to get the perfect timing to launch his proton bombs, it's one of the most famous lines in 4. Luke was also a good pilot despite only ever flying what was basically a speeder. Also, Kylo was only ever shown beating people with little to no saber training and struggling at that. That's the one thing 8 did well with him was berate him for being so useless despite his aspirations to be Vader. He destroyed the rebuilt Jedi order with the Knights (who were also a huge misstep) which is basically the same as Vader murdering the kids in 3.
As for GW, the entire concept of SM is based around them being unbeatable in literally every story they are in. Not sure how adding an option for female SM is going to change that.
Tbf, Luke blowing up the DS was definitely a fluke and a demonstration of his connection to the force to guide the shot and he was only able to get the opportunity to pull off that move because of Han saving his bacon from Vader shooting him down from behind. Hence the whole Obi-Wan ghost voice of "Use the Force Luke" prior to him taking the shot.
In terms of SM, I don't know anybody arguing that adding female SM would change GW's favouritism towards SM victories in their stories? I thought it was more the idea that people were against fem SM because it changes the lore based on perceived representation issues of the setting that could be addressed elsewhere but the fact that SM is popular means we get into a kind of circular conundrum of them being poster boys so they have to have females, since its believed that they would never raise other factions up enough to their level that people would be satisfied with the attention being brought towards women. I dunno, that's what I've managed to keep up with so far.
Honestly, after 24 pages of I don't know how many tangents, I don't blame you or anybody else for mixing up for what arguments are whose are anymore. I'm cool with just agreeing to disagree.
Argive wrote: Why? The 40k Sm are a problem because they are the most popular apparently.
So if hail Caesar was the most popular war game, would change not be required also?
Why is change only requirered if the thing is popular ? Is fiction not allowed to be reflective of history? Or is it only an issue if it becomes popular?
The internal logic to this train of thought doesn't work.
That's because your 'logic' is a bit like saying 'Well, if I need oil to make mayonnaise, why don't I also need oil to make yoghurt?"
The answer is 'Because they're not the same thing'. Hail Caesar is based in a historical setting, while 40K is space fantasy. For a historical game to accurately represent women, they would include women wherever it was historically appropriate. A fantasy game however doesn't need to adhere to historical record, it can be whatever the creator wants it to be... but if the creator chooses to use that power to exclude a portion of their potential customer base, they're just leaving money on the table.
Sure, fiction is allowed to be reflective of history. But there is no particularly good reason for it to do so in the particular case under discussion, and it makes no sense for it to do so in the wider context of the rest of the setting.
Space Marines are a fantasy representation of a genetically modified super-soldier, created with made up science in a made up setting. There is absolutely no sensible reason for this fantasy to be limited purely to men, just because it was first created 30 years ago when nobody bothered to consider if it might be worth marketing to women at some point.
That is a false equivalency of my point and you know it.
They are both war games.
They are not the same wargame, but they are both wargames involving miniatures and dice.
40k is a war game.
They are for all intents and purposes the same thing.
Its not apples and oranges. Its comparing golden delicious apples and granny smiths apples.
The only difference seem to be that one is set in the future and is vastly popular and one one is set in the past and is not so popular. That's it. But apparently because its in the future creators have to adhere to certain rules? That's crazy...
You admit creators can make whatever they want, but in the very same post say that unless there is a good reason they need to change what they create?
Reasons of biology/historical relevance are dismissed because it doesn't fit the inclusion narrative "and doesn't have to be that way". But it just is that way..
I don't think 40k creators did this to gate keep women out. I think they did this in order to maximise profits by selling plastic toy super soldier to young lads who are much more inclined towards toy soldiers and like the fantasy of fighting aliens. This has been discussed ad nauseum.. .
But lets say i agree with this notion.
I think the proposed change is very disingenuous and unrealistic.
Lets say they change the "13 words of lore" and make an upgrade sprue "just one sprue is all we want!"
And GW NEVER address this again. All publications & things continue as they are. Will people be happy ? How long will this status quo exist? Will it not be a case of "not enough representation" again within a year?
Will we not need a never ending stream of updated SM units and character models going through arbitrary gender swaps and narrative focusing even more on SM in order to kill off existing characters, and replace them with someone more palatable? We know how this ends. And all that to satisfy 4 people who want to play girl space marines? (which they can already do..)
The objective with changing SM does not appear to be inclusivity.
If it was, people would want to focus on Guard and SOB and Eldar and TAU and bring them to prominence and overshadow SM with new models featuring females.
Its a noble goal, and pretty much everyone seems in favour and its also good for the overall setting and game.
But: "Destroy notion of boy only SM because some socially awkward people looks at me funny when I make girl space marines and not follow lore" is not a worthy goal IMO.
Sorry.
AngryAngel80 wrote: I don't know, when I see awesome rules, I'm like " Baby, your rules looking so fine. Maybe I gotta add you to my first strike battalion eh ? "
That is a false equivalency of my point and you know it.
Don't use words you don't understand the meaning of my man, which is demonstrated thoroughly by the fact that you yourself are committing a false equivalency by comparing adding women to a made-up fantasy setting and adding them to a setting deliberately made to resemble real-life historical events.
If you can't recognize the difference between the two settings and why adding women in the latter is worse than the former than you are either being intellectually dishonest or are just something the mods at Dakka here won't let me call you.
Eldar- 4436 pts
decency.
