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 Kanluwen wrote:
Try meeting actual police officers rather than just watching TV shows? As much as I feel like police here in the US are woefully underqualified--it isn't from their exercise regimens.

I have. Actual police officers are precisely what I am basing my opinion on.

And security guards are hardly much better.

Andykp wrote:
This is painful to read. So much misogynistic pseudoscience it’s crazy. Please re-read all of sgt smudges posts and they eloquently and concisely layout why your arguments are so weak.

Ah yes, back to head in the sand management.

What I wrote is just reality. If reality is "misogynistic pseudoscience", you better think about making a device that will transport you to My Little Pony or something.

 Tyran wrote:
I'm not even sure what are the positions to be honest.

I mean we know for a fact female guardsmen are a thing and all female IG Regiment are a thing.

Are female guardsmen less common than male ones? Probably, but less common when dealing with the IoM likely still means trillions upon trillions of female guardsmen.

And when it comes to famous IG worlds in which their whole thing is producing guardsmen regiments then I expect a pretty even 50/50 split.

OP was asking why we rarely see female-majority IG regiments in the books.

I explained that the reason is because books are largely inspired by real life, and in real life female soldiers are a rarity because of physical differences between men and women. And for elite units - which IG is, or at least is *supposed to be* - women will be even rarer.

Then a crowd appeared which hates that I don't agree with their pseudoscience of absolute equality and it snowballed from there.

They of course completely ignored the part where I said that I have no problem with things being different in the Imperium so long as there is a proper explanation as to why. If you want, give IG troops mandatory genetic enhancement - I don't care what, but the explanation has to exist. Right now however we see no indication of such being used en masse by Imperium, not even the power armor.

Andykp wrote:
This is a good point, the whole boys are stronger/faster etc than girls argument becomes completely irrelevant in the 41st millennium. Even other human foes are juiced up on chaos devotion, most stuff you’ll fight is the stuff of nightmares. Even the strongest fittest humans is outmatched.

The thing with this discussion where it becomes toxic is the fact that people are happy to use real world justifications, which are clouded by real world prejudice but will ignore the in setting reality that flies against their argument altogether.

In universe mass conscription of both male and female population makes complete sense due to the total war of the setting. To ignore that only adds to the toxic feel of the community. The fact that the creators and owners of the setting are actively trying to increase inclusion in the background and models should be a clear signal the direction we are going. Female guard aren’t new, they are only recently getting models but have been around for ages in the fluff.

We should be encouraging as many people as possible to get involved with the hobby, gate keeping and and trying to discourage inclusion is not acceptable. I know the mods have received complaints from both “sides” but I feel it is a duty of anyone to call out and challenge gate keeping and the kind of misogyny we’ve seen in this thread. If we don’t then the community will never improve.

I showed this thread to my 12 year old daughter and she was appalled at the arguments in here. We really need to do better.

No, it is not irrelevant. You want to close the gap as much as possible - and as I said, main issue isn't even fighting. It is the other stuff - digging trenches, carrying wounded, and so on.

Mass conscription male and female makes sense for emergency PDF conscription in extremis. In reality however a society cannot sustain much more than 10-15% of population under arms for any prolonged period of time - and this percentage was true for Ancient Rome and is true today. So "mass conscription of both male and female population" still makes little sense, unless physically reasonably fit humans are rare overall. But I have seen no evidence that 85% of Imperial civilian population are starvation victims and/or McDonalds enjoyers.

I don't buy the "inclusion" argument. How many twelve-feet-tall greenskins do you see walking around in real life?

And if your reasoning is that of a 12 year old...

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Do you have sources for ANY of this, or are you just making up numbers?

Numbers are illustrative of the point. But I have already shown scientific sources which explain difference in physical performance between men and women. Do try and read them.

Congratulations, you realised why all this posturing about male bodies being strong is completely unnecessary.

Come on, if you are going to "debate" me, at least try and read what I am writing. Men have a multitude of advantages over women in combat, even in modern warfare, that have absolutely nothing to do with raw physical strength.

I'm sure all those bones will protect you from flesh-burrowing parasites, supercharged lasers, rocket propelled grenades, and weapons that atomise you. /s

The differences are frankly MINISCULE and wouldn't even be considered by recruitment. And we know this, because 1. We see women in the guard. 2. We see conscripts in the guard, literally used as cannon fodder. 3. There's plenty of regiments which recruit from pretty slight populations - Salvar-Chem Dogs and Tanith, etc.

You do understand that there are still things like shrapnel, blunt force impacts (e.g. weapons fire striking armor) and so on? And that armor cannot protect you from e.g. mobility injuries?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8966186/#:~:text=Female%20soldiers%20have%20been%20found,have%20been%20observed%20to%20have

Female soldiers have been found to experience injuries at a higher rate, both in training [9, 10] and during operations [11, 12] when compared to their male colleagues, although this sex-based difference does not hold true across all military contexts and in some contexts male personnel have been observed to have higher injury rates than female personnel [13, 14]. There is also evidence that female soldiers may sustain injuries to different body sites when compared to male soldiers [15–17] and exhibit some differences in risk factors for injury, due to anthropometric, biomechanical, and anatomical differences. In basic training contexts where male and female recruits train together, despite males experiencing greater external training loads as measured by total distance covered, female soldiers tended to have a greater internal training load as measured by heart rate and ratings of perceived exertion and report more muscle soreness and fatigue [18].

Overall, for PDF it may make sense to aim for equal inclusion of men and women - when Orks are on the planet, you just need as many warm bodies as possible. But Imperial Guard? No.

I am extremely cautious about interpreting scientific publications for a politically-charged topic on an amateur discussion forum focussed on a fictional futuristic setting. I am not an expert in that area, and I have enough scientific literacy to know I shouldn't touch it with a 10-foot bargepole except in the most general way.

I think it is incontrovertible that sexual dimorphism exists in the real world, and has an impact of the endurance, strength, and fitness for certain tasks associated with modern military activity. However, I think to go into more detail than that is a fool's errand, especially on a forum that forbids political discussion. Any research discussing the impact of psychology or societal structure/culture on current recruiting practices is going to be heavily subject to political biases and even physical attributes can fall prey to this, although probably to a lesser degree. I do not have the toolset to correctly parse that. Stastically, I doubt anyone in this thread is a researcher into sexual dimorphism who does have that toolset, and a single such user is still subject to personal biases and is not in a situation where what they are saying is subject to peer review, although I could be persuaded if such a person was effectively calling out the limitations in the evidence they were presenting.

This is actually a pretty complex topic. Stating this is simply reality is reductive for an area with a lot of scientific debate.

Edit: this study is actually a perfect example of the pitfalls:

 AldarionTelcontar wrote:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8966186/#:~:text=Female%20soldiers%20have%20been%20found,have%20been%20observed%20to%20have

Female soldiers have been found to experience injuries at a higher rate, both in training [9, 10] and during operations [11, 12] when compared to their male colleagues, although this sex-based difference does not hold true across all military contexts and in some contexts male personnel have been observed to have higher injury rates than female personnel [13, 14]. There is also evidence that female soldiers may sustain injuries to different body sites when compared to male soldiers [15–17] and exhibit some differences in risk factors for injury, due to anthropometric, biomechanical, and anatomical differences. In basic training contexts where male and female recruits train together, despite males experiencing greater external training loads as measured by total distance covered, female soldiers tended to have a greater internal training load as measured by heart rate and ratings of perceived exertion and report more muscle soreness and fatigue [18].

Overall, for PDF it may make sense to aim for equal inclusion of men and women - when Orks are on the planet, you just need as many warm bodies as possible. But Imperial Guard? No.

Aldarion selectively quotes from the study background section, because it directly relates to their point- female soldiers experience injuries at a greater rate than male soldiers. But that isn't what the review is about- the review is looking at risk factors for female injuries. It points out, for multiple variables, that these risk factors differ noticeably from injury risk factors for male soldiers. So is the increased injury rate because women are inherently less suited to military service, or is it because the risk factors for injuries in female soldiers are less well understood and not mitigated as well by training regimens, selection criteria etc.?

I certainly don't know the answer to that, but it is clearly the case (at the time that article was written/published in 2022) that there is reasonable doubt over why the injury rate is greater. Hence why talking in only the vaguest terms is sensible.

 AldarionTelcontar wrote:


OP was asking why we rarely see female-majority IG regiments in the books.

I explained that the reason is because books are largely inspired by real life, and in real life female soldiers are a rarity because of physical differences between men and women. And for elite units - which IG is, or at least is *supposed to be* - women will be even rarer.

Most 40k books focus on Space Marines that are literally one in a trillion as far as demographics are concerned. So no, this whole debate of demographic ratios have nothing to do with narrative focus.

Moreover some of the regimes everyone loves to write about like Cadians and Catachans pretty much the tell biology to feth off by having planets and societies in which everyone is a soldier (and an 80s walking meme in the case of Catachan), which you know probably wouldn't work in real life but it never really stopped them.

I think Cadia works if you treat the entire population as reservists that are part-time soldiers. 1/10th of the population is tithed off, so they must have a fairly high birth rate.

Grey Templar wrote:The argument is that the biological situation with women means that women are less likely to end up in the IG then men. Both because of women choosing not to enter the IG due to family obligations(IRL a man with a family is more likely to volunteer than a women with a family. There is zero reason to think the reasons for that are different in 40k) and also taking advantage of exceptions when people are getting drafted.

Yet again, an argument that stems primarily from CULTURAL issues and imposing our own cultural norms onto a society that is so removed from our own to frankly be alien.

Who cares if men IRL with families are more likely to volunteer? We don't live in the same society as a human in 40k. There is absolutely no reason why our cultural norms would remain, and frankly, you're showing a massive blind spot in your understanding of cultural studies and sociology.

For these reasons, it is entirely logical that the Imperium would still allow for exceptions to draft notices(requiring proof of course). These exceptions would logically include having children/being pregnant, etc... This would generate a few exceptions that men couldn't benefit from/would be less able to benefit from. IE: if a family has both parents get drafted, one of them can get out of it. The women is more likely to be the one to get out of it, be it because the man volunteers to be the one who goes or if its simply policy that if a women gets drafted she is ineligible if there are kids.

Actually, we have examples of women and men with children who are STILL drafted into the Guard, and the children are raised by the regiment (Tona and Caffran raising children in the Tanith 1st, for example). Again your comments regarding "the man is more likely to volunteer" is a CULTURAL argument, not a neutral condition

Yes, this assumes that most of the Imperium still has a culture where it is primarily women who take care of the children. Unless we have direct evidence that says its not the case however this should be our default since that is what the past and present tells us happens.

Counterpoint - you're claiming it exists. Prove that it does. Again, I repeat that GW's depiction of 40k tells us that all-women regiments and mixed-sex regiments are common enough, that women aren't prevented from joining most of the Imperium's institutions, and that *we don't see an indication of a homogenous stay-at-home-women culture across the Imperium*.

So, please - instead of continuing to claim that things must be congruent to the culture we happen to have right now, show me that this is the case. Your claim - your proof.

Finally, when we only consider people voluntarily joining the IG, again based on the real world, women are just less likely to volunteer.

Yes - a CULTURAL construct. A culture that we have no indication exists in 40k.

Why this is the case is not entirely clear and we could go on forever trying to find out, but it is a clear trend in the real world among all volunteer militaries. Women just so rarely volunteer for the army compared to men. They just don't want or feel compelled to join.

Sociologist and cultural scientists already HAVE hypothesised this - that it's primarily a result of cultural forces and factors, of what women are historically expected to do and be, the media consumed and who are depicted as soldiers, the language used, the forms of entertainment directed at people in their formative years, etc etc

Aka - CULTURE.

And again, we have no reason to believe that this has changed in 40k. You could come up with specific worlds where this isn't the case, but they'd be an exception.

Alternatively, we also have no reason to believe that it has stayed the same, and plenty of reason to believe it's changed - such as, yanno, 38,000 years passing, and the Imperium being DISPLAYED as different in many many ways.

It just means there aren't as many women in the armed forces, and by logical extrapolation the IG. This isn't a good or a bad thing. Its just a thing. Nobody should get offended by this.

The only thing that's offensive is your unwillingness to accept that 40k doesn't use the same logic as real life, and it makes all your points, which fundamentally rely on the belief that 40k shares IRL logic, unapplicable.

AldarionTelcontar wrote:What I wrote is just reality.

And we're in the 40k Background subforum. You can leave reality at the door.

OP was asking why we rarely see female-majority IG regiments in the books.

I explained that the reason is because books are largely inspired by real life, and in real life female soldiers are a rarity because of physical differences between men and women. And for elite units - which IG is, or at least is *supposed to be* - women will be even rarer.

Then a crowd appeared which hates that I don't agree with their pseudoscience of absolute equality and it snowballed from there.

They of course completely ignored the part where I said that I have no problem with things being different in the Imperium so long as there is a proper explanation as to why. If you want, give IG troops mandatory genetic enhancement - I don't care what, but the explanation has to exist. Right now however we see no indication of such being used en masse by Imperium, not even the power armor.

The explanation is "the Imperium doesn't care". I don't know why you can't wrap your head around that.

Again, I go again to your suggestion that "books are largely inspired by real life" - lolwut?? How? Why? Where? What part of 40k has given you that impression??

main issue isn't even fighting. It is the other stuff - digging trenches, carrying wounded, and so on.

So, explain soldiers like Larkin, Dorden, Domor or many of the Tanith. Explain the Salvar Chem-Dogs. Or the explicit mention of all-female and mixed sex regiments.

Mass conscription male and female makes sense for emergency PDF conscription in extremis. In reality however a society cannot sustain much more than 10-15% of population under arms for any prolonged period of time - and this percentage was true for Ancient Rome and is true today. So "mass conscription of both male and female population" still makes little sense, unless physically reasonably fit humans are rare overall. But I have seen no evidence that 85% of Imperial civilian population are starvation victims and/or McDonalds enjoyers.

"In reality" - yes, there's your problem. In reality, we don't have 12 foot tall greenskins, we don't warp powers, and we don't have Space Marines. So, drop it.
(oh, but your comment about 85% of the Imperium being starvation victims - have you SEEN the state of the Hive Cities? Not 85%, but it certainly ain't a small amount)

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Do you have sources for ANY of this, or are you just making up numbers?

Numbers are illustrative of the point.

As illustrative and accurate as a 5-year old's scribblings. They're not any sort of meaningful argument. They're numbers you pulled out of thin air. If you want anyone to take them seriously, use *actual* numbers, not arbitrary scales.

But I have already shown scientific sources which explain difference in physical performance between men and women. Do try and read them.

The ones that you've just been called out as misreading and misinterpreting the data in?

Second, if *you've* actually read those papers, then you'd actually be using non-arbitrary numbers instead of "women are under a 5, men are a 6" or whatever nonsense you made up.

Congratulations, you realised why all this posturing about male bodies being strong is completely unnecessary.

Come on, if you are going to "debate" me, at least try and read what I am writing. Men have a multitude of advantages over women in combat, even in modern warfare, that have absolutely nothing to do with raw physical strength.

And what advantages do those mean in the 41st millennium?

If this really is a debate, as you put it, explain to me why any real world logic is important in this discussion.

I'm sure all those bones will protect you from flesh-burrowing parasites, supercharged lasers, rocket propelled grenades, and weapons that atomise you. /s

The differences are frankly MINISCULE and wouldn't even be considered by recruitment. And we know this, because 1. We see women in the guard. 2. We see conscripts in the guard, literally used as cannon fodder. 3. There's plenty of regiments which recruit from pretty slight populations - Salvar-Chem Dogs and Tanith, etc.

You do understand that there are still things like shrapnel, blunt force impacts (e.g. weapons fire striking armor) and so on? And that armor cannot protect you from e.g. mobility injuries?

Ah, I'm sure the Catachans with their sleeveless flak vests are quaking about those concerns.

If these factors really were so meaningful, then explain the disparity between Tanith Guardsmen, Cadian Guardsmen, and Catachan Guardsmen, and how they're all rolled under the same banner.

Again, all I'm saying is that *GW doesn't recognise any distinction, and includes plenty of women in their regiments, both mono-sex and mixed.* For all your talk of the real world, neither GW or I care. If you can't discuss 40k without relying on IRL logic, and without acknowledging that 40k frequently abandons IRL logic, this discussion is not going to go anywhere.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:The argument is that the biological situation with women means that women are less likely to end up in the IG then men. Both because of women choosing not to enter the IG due to family obligations(IRL a man with a family is more likely to volunteer than a women with a family. There is zero reason to think the reasons for that are different in 40k) and also taking advantage of exceptions when people are getting drafted.

Yet again, an argument that stems primarily from CULTURAL issues and imposing our own cultural norms onto a society that is so removed from our own to frankly be alien.

Who cares if men IRL with families are more likely to volunteer? We don't live in the same society as a human in 40k. There is absolutely no reason why our cultural norms would remain, and frankly, you're showing a massive blind spot in your understanding of cultural studies and sociology.

The impetus is on YOU to show that the Imperium's culture has drifted from what exists in the modern day. The modern day and the past is the baseline, the default assumption for human culture. It is the baseline because Warhammer 40k is our universe in the future.

For these reasons, it is entirely logical that the Imperium would still allow for exceptions to draft notices(requiring proof of course). These exceptions would logically include having children/being pregnant, etc... This would generate a few exceptions that men couldn't benefit from/would be less able to benefit from. IE: if a family has both parents get drafted, one of them can get out of it. The women is more likely to be the one to get out of it, be it because the man volunteers to be the one who goes or if its simply policy that if a women gets drafted she is ineligible if there are kids.

Actually, we have examples of women and men with children who are STILL drafted into the Guard, and the children are raised by the regiment (Tona and Caffran raising children in the Tanith 1st, for example). Again your comments regarding "the man is more likely to volunteer" is a CULTURAL argument, not a neutral condition

Yes, this assumes that most of the Imperium still has a culture where it is primarily women who take care of the children. Unless we have direct evidence that says its not the case however this should be our default since that is what the past and present tells us happens.

Counterpoint - you're claiming it exists. Prove that it does. Again, I repeat that GW's depiction of 40k tells us that all-women regiments and mixed-sex regiments are common enough, that women aren't prevented from joining most of the Imperium's institutions, and that *we don't see an indication of a homogenous stay-at-home-women culture across the Imperium*.

So, please - instead of continuing to claim that things must be congruent to the culture we happen to have right now, show me that this is the case. Your claim - your proof.

The proof for my claim is the real world. Again, 40k is meant to be our world in the far future. You are counter-claiming that things have changed "just because". The burden is on you, not me, to show that is the case.

Finally, when we only consider people voluntarily joining the IG, again based on the real world, women are just less likely to volunteer.

Yes - a CULTURAL construct. A culture that we have no indication exists in 40k.

Why this is the case is not entirely clear and we could go on forever trying to find out, but it is a clear trend in the real world among all volunteer militaries. Women just so rarely volunteer for the army compared to men. They just don't want or feel compelled to join.

Sociologist and cultural scientists already HAVE hypothesised this - that it's primarily a result of cultural forces and factors, of what women are historically expected to do and be, the media consumed and who are depicted as soldiers, the language used, the forms of entertainment directed at people in their formative years, etc etc

Aka - CULTURE.

And again, we have no reason to believe that this has changed in 40k. You could come up with specific worlds where this isn't the case, but they'd be an exception.

Alternatively, we also have no reason to believe that it has stayed the same, and plenty of reason to believe it's changed - such as, yanno, 38,000 years passing, and the Imperium being DISPLAYED as different in many many ways.

You seem of the delusion that culture exists in a vacuum separate from biology. It does not. It would constantly reinforce itself on culture, and culture would then reinforce its own norms.

If it had no effect on cultural practices, then why does the trend of male vs female behavior tend to be shockingly similar across cultures that have had no contact for thousand or even hundreds of thousands of years. Why are traditionally male vs female roles remarkably similar in the Andes mountains as they are in most African societies? The only possible explanation is that humans are predisposed towards male/female role distribution, and even in societies which have minimal/no barriers to the free choice of individuals there are still trends in decision making which follow this pattern.

Given that more time has passed in the separation of many societies on Earth than has passed between today and the time of Warhammer 40k I am confidant in these norms have the ability to survive the millennia.

It just means there aren't as many women in the armed forces, and by logical extrapolation the IG. This isn't a good or a bad thing. Its just a thing. Nobody should get offended by this.

The only thing that's offensive is your unwillingness to accept that 40k doesn't use the same logic as real life, and it makes all your points, which fundamentally rely on the belief that 40k shares IRL logic, unapplicable.

AldarionTelcontar wrote:What I wrote is just reality.

And we're in the 40k Background subforum. You can leave reality at the door.

Then what even is the point of a discussion? Since we can't use anything from reality here. How about you leave your obsession with strict equality at the door? 40k is a nightmare realm of chaos and torment, equality can feth right off.

No, reality is a perfectly acceptable reference point. Otherwise there are no reference points for anything and even talking would be pointless without it. Saying leave reality at the door doesn't help your case, it just makes you sound crazy.

Again, all I'm saying is that *GW doesn't recognise any distinction, and includes plenty of women in their regiments, both mono-sex and mixed.* For all your talk of the real world, neither GW or I care. If you can't discuss 40k without relying on IRL logic, and without acknowledging that 40k frequently abandons IRL logic, this discussion is not going to go anywhere.

Just because 40k is not always internally consistent doesn't mean we can never use logic ever.

And I think you do care, otherwise you wouldn't be screaming that we must abandon all logic when talking about 40k and can never reference the real world ever. 40k is just a gritty grimdark sci-fi, not a Lewis Carrol acid trip. The latter is devoid of logic, the former can still have logic and deductive reasoning applied to figure out how it might work if it was IRL. If you can't do that, then there is no fun to be had with trying to find out how the setting works. What makes it tick. Because we can't use logic, that would be insane!!!





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Pyroalchi wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
[...]
Finally, when we only consider people voluntarily joining the IG, again based on the real world, women are just less likely to volunteer. [...]

One interesting question here is, as someone mentioned earlier: life in the imperium oftentimes REAALLLLY sucks. And while there are several regions on todays earth where volunteering is rare, there are others were it is more common, especially when being in the military means you at least get some food and water. Then one has to consider that some of those regions, where serving in the military is a possible escape from poverty, don't allow or at least heavily restrict women serving in the military. Even before any performance tests are made.

My point basically is: if we would live in a grimdark dystopia and the option to join the guard is there for both sexes, it might be a lot more desirable for women then we see on todays earth. Tona Creed in the Gaunts Ghosts Novels come to mind, as do the Vergastine militia women. They were in a battle zone against an enemy that did not care that they are women. So one might as well have a gun than just lay down and die.

Regarding standards and conscription: as someone who was amongst the last cohorts being conscripted around here: the entry bar for that was really low in Germany at least. Sure there was some stuff that got you disqualified, mostly old injuries or preconditions that might turn worse when serving, forcing the state to pay for the former conscript which is not really an issue in WH40k. But on the whole I saw several young men being conscripted that... well lets just say that the system wasn't particularly picky. You could be short, fat, have bad eysight, bad hearing, allergic... Would they have had a general draft of both sexes back then, they would definitly have taken at least some women.

An actually good counterpoint. I would expect that the volunteer rates would be high and more evenly distributed on worlds where life sucks especially hard. I would expect that hive worlds in general would have a much higher and even ratio of women than regiments from standard Imperial worlds or more rural places.

However, I am skeptical of how often conditions in a hive world would be absolutely horrendous. I would guess that most of the time, assuming that food shipments from offworld haven't been interrupted, hives are at least decent-ish places to live for the bulk of people. Water and food are available at least enough to get by, and work is probably not hard to find either.

My head-canon is that hives go through boom and bust cycles covering periods of a few centuries where their population grows, outstrips the food supply, has a period of famine where the population thins down, and then once its stabilized it recovers again. Life in a hive would suck during the famine and then be pretty good once its recovered. So really it would depend on at what point in such a cycle a hive world is at. A smart governor would recruit people during those famine periods, but I would expect the Imperium to be too inept to properly manage these cycles.

I think the biggest source for cultures being different is the lore stating the Imperium consists of a patchwork of myriad cultures,and the specific examples we have of weird cultures. Necromunda is a bizarre place by our cultural standards. Cadia is an insanely militarised culture of extreme military dedication and service that makes Sparta look tame. There are more examples.

 Grey Templar wrote:
[
An actually good counterpoint. I would expect that the volunteer rates would be high and more evenly distributed on worlds where life sucks especially hard. I would expect that hive worlds in general would have a much higher and even ratio of women than regiments from standard Imperial worlds or more rural places.

However, I am skeptical of how often conditions in a hive world would be absolutely horrendous. I would guess that most of the time, assuming that food shipments from offworld haven't been interrupted, hives are at least decent-ish places to live for the bulk of people. Water and food are available at least enough to get by, and work is probably not hard to find either.

My head-canon is that hives go through boom and bust cycles covering periods of a few centuries where their population grows, outstrips the food supply, has a period of famine where the population thins down, and then once its stabilized it recovers again. Life in a hive would suck during the famine and then be pretty good once its recovered. So really it would depend on at what point in such a cycle a hive world is at. A smart governor would recruit people during those famine periods, but I would expect the Imperium to be too inept to properly manage these cycles.

It seems the typical approach on hive worlds is to use the tithe as a pressure valve to remove malcontents and dissidents from the world- basically underhive scum. Helpfully these gangs typically already have combat experience. The majority of the hive living in... livable to reasonable conditions are the productive workers and not the pool you want to recruit from.

Tithes often seem to be stated in annual terms (presumably Terran standard years), but don't seem to necessarily be collected on an annual basis. A large tithe "saved up" and collected every few decades or even centuries is plausible.

You know what I’d love as a background nerd?

Some kind of Munitorum Manual to cover the tithe and explain it a bit more.

By all means fill it with contradictions, errors and omissions. But I’d love to read something like that.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
You know what I’d love as a background nerd?

Some kind of Munitorum Manual to cover the tithe and explain it a bit more.

By all means fill it with contradictions, errors and omissions. But I’d love to read something like that.

It be especially hilarious if they added a differrent "typo" to each new edition, like adding a zero to the number tithed from an example or something that makes no sense, rather than doing straight reprints.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:The argument is that the biological situation with women means that women are less likely to end up in the IG then men. Both because of women choosing not to enter the IG due to family obligations(IRL a man with a family is more likely to volunteer than a women with a family. There is zero reason to think the reasons for that are different in 40k) and also taking advantage of exceptions when people are getting drafted.

Yet again, an argument that stems primarily from CULTURAL issues and imposing our own cultural norms onto a society that is so removed from our own to frankly be alien.

Who cares if men IRL with families are more likely to volunteer? We don't live in the same society as a human in 40k. There is absolutely no reason why our cultural norms would remain, and frankly, you're showing a massive blind spot in your understanding of cultural studies and sociology.

The impetus is on YOU to show that the Imperium's culture has drifted from what exists in the modern day. The modern day and the past is the baseline, the default assumption for human culture. It is the baseline because Warhammer 40k is our universe in the future

We also see worlds where nothing goes to waste.

Necromunda is essentially a recycling world. Scraping up the leavings of previous generations, including their bodies, and making something new from the abundant decay.

The citizens also face a harsh lifestyle, and have done for untold millennia. And that’s before we head into the Underhive. That’s naturally going to toughen the citizens up.

Now, it’s entirely possible a largely Modern Earth type world or worlds exist out there. But it’s still going to be subject to a Dictatorship, under the Imperial Governor. That’s just part and parcel of being in The Imperium.

Cultural differences can and will exist on such a world. Again we can look to Necromunda as a well documented in-universe planet to confirm that. The Clan Houses all demonstrate that is a thing.

Some worlds may have a taboo about women serving in the military, and only accept male recruits.

But of the worlds I’m familiar with in the background? I can’t immediately think of any. Right of Succession among the nobility isn’t First Born Male. Or even First Born. And it’s only very rarely any kind of democratic process (closest would be a council of Nobles putting forward a candidate for Imperial approval).

And that is the great joy of 40K. Very little is confirmed. Very little is expressly forbidden. Even the constants are wonderfully inconsistent.

So if you want your Guard Regiment to only recruit men or women? Go for it.

But when you bring up real world stuff as justification? I completely reserve the right to laugh at you. It’s entirely unnecessary to do justify your own background for your own army.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


The citizens also face a harsh lifestyle, and have done for untold millennia. And that’s before we head into the Underhive. That’s naturally going to toughen the citizens up.

Actually if we consider what the Underhive is, it should have the opposite effect. Generations of radiation, pollution, poor living standards and all would likely result in a very weak population that would be short lived and likely experience great pains and suffering. They wouldn't be a semi-thriving civilization who's only barrier to being uplifted is basically internal gang fighting and politics.

The concept of "suffering breeds strength" is an extreme exaggeration of some real world examples; taken to 11 (as most things are in 40K). Very much the same as how we saw the same with the Fremen and Emperor's army in Dune. It's the extreme take of "that which does not kill me, makes me stronger"; in a very blunt muscle and physical aspect.

Which feeds into the hypothetical that between right now and 40K? Well, 30k…the Golden Age of Man saw significant genetic tinkering to strengthen and fine tune a given population to the environment it faced.

This is exactly what was done with the Kin - to the point they can be interpreted as an entirely artificial species, originally created and cloned by the STC’s that would become the Votann, from genetic information and like….genesoup loaded in at the point of departure.


Now that itself is an extreme interpretation, and I’m not suggesting “therefore all extant human or Abhuman populations”. I’m just using Kin as a clear and visible example of such genetic tinkering.

The result there is due to the very extreme environment they were inhabiting. But when you’re off to worlds unknown? Basic genetic tinkering to close the dimorphism in “entirely naturally made “ humans really isn’t a bad idea at all, and you might as well make that tweak whilst ensuring the future generations are well adapted to the exact mix of air, gravity, nutrition sources etc. After all, setting a new colony is going to be an All Hands On Deck affair.

Given what we know the STC could, (and in the case of the Kin, still) do? Those do not seem terribly extreme, and wouldn’t necessarily result in externally visible differences.

Can I prove that was definitely done? No. Because as above, the background is rarely anything like that definitive. But it seems a suitably pragmatic approach. Why wait for your nascent colony to adapt to local environs, when you can tailor those changes pretty rapidly, and so far as we know, every STC was perfectly capable of doing just that.

 Overread wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


The citizens also face a harsh lifestyle, and have done for untold millennia. And that’s before we head into the Underhive. That’s naturally going to toughen the citizens up.

Actually if we consider what the Underhive is, it should have the opposite effect. Generations of radiation, pollution, poor living standards and all would likely result in a very weak population that would be short lived and likely experience great pains and suffering. They wouldn't be a semi-thriving civilization who's only barrier to being uplifted is basically internal gang fighting and politics.

The concept of "suffering breeds strength" is an extreme exaggeration of some real world examples; taken to 11 (as most things are in 40K). Very much the same as how we saw the same with the Fremen and Emperor's army in Dune. It's the extreme take of "that which does not kill me, makes me stronger"; in a very blunt muscle and physical aspect.

Yes, but as this is fiction then what is thematically cool matters more than what would realistically happen. So if we think that a harsh planet producing a bunch of badasses is cool, then that happens regardless of what is realistic.

And that goes for the whole topic. Arguing about (dubious) realism is rather besides the point. In 40K rule of cool triumphs over realism with laughable ease. So if we think female IG is cool (and why wouldn't we?) then that's all we need to know.

 Crimson wrote:

 Overread wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


The citizens also face a harsh lifestyle, and have done for untold millennia. And that’s before we head into the Underhive. That’s naturally going to toughen the citizens up.

Actually if we consider what the Underhive is, it should have the opposite effect. Generations of radiation, pollution, poor living standards and all would likely result in a very weak population that would be short lived and likely experience great pains and suffering. They wouldn't be a semi-thriving civilization who's only barrier to being uplifted is basically internal gang fighting and politics.

The concept of "suffering breeds strength" is an extreme exaggeration of some real world examples; taken to 11 (as most things are in 40K). Very much the same as how we saw the same with the Fremen and Emperor's army in Dune. It's the extreme take of "that which does not kill me, makes me stronger"; in a very blunt muscle and physical aspect.

Yes, but as this is fiction then what is thematically cool matters more than what would realistically happen. So if we think that a harsh planet producing a bunch of badasses is cool, then that happens regardless of what is realistic.

And that goes for the whole topic. Arguing about (dubious) realism is rather besides the point. In 40K rule of cool triumphs over realism with laughable ease. So if we think female IG is cool (and why wouldn't we?) then that's all we need to know.

Indeed, but fiction that grounds itself on some elements of reality is even better. Hence Mad Doc's proposal that humanity of the 40K era has had is genetics "tinkered" with on some level to allow them to thrive in hostile environments that would kill regular humans of our age.

Of course we also have things like the Warp mucking up stuff too. Who's to say what genetic and physiological changes that has created on humanity at large which might not be realised. There's certainly ample scope in the setting for the people to be physically more capable than humanity is today.

 Crimson wrote:

 Overread wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


The citizens also face a harsh lifestyle, and have done for untold millennia. And that’s before we head into the Underhive. That’s naturally going to toughen the citizens up.

Actually if we consider what the Underhive is, it should have the opposite effect. Generations of radiation, pollution, poor living standards and all would likely result in a very weak population that would be short lived and likely experience great pains and suffering. They wouldn't be a semi-thriving civilization who's only barrier to being uplifted is basically internal gang fighting and politics.

The concept of "suffering breeds strength" is an extreme exaggeration of some real world examples; taken to 11 (as most things are in 40K). Very much the same as how we saw the same with the Fremen and Emperor's army in Dune. It's the extreme take of "that which does not kill me, makes me stronger"; in a very blunt muscle and physical aspect.

Yes, but as this is fiction then what is thematically cool matters more than what would realistically happen. So if we think that a harsh planet producing a bunch of badasses is cool, then that happens regardless of what is realistic.

And that goes for the whole topic. Arguing about (dubious) realism is rather besides the point. In 40K rule of cool triumphs over realism with laughable ease. So if we think female IG is cool (and why wouldn't we?) then that's all we need to know.

Having acknowledged that basis of 40k though, I personally enjoy trying to figure out how such lunacies could work within what we know of 40k lore, and what extant in-universe technologies/warp shananigans could explain the reality-breaking features. For example, MDGs plausible musings on DAoT genetic tinkering leading to humanity thriving where it should be barely surviving. Very plausible considering the Emperor's fear that baseline humanity no longer still existed by the Great Crusade, and that basically all human populations may be tinkered with.

Edit: looks like Overread ninja'd me with almost the same point

 AldarionTelcontar wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
Try meeting actual police officers rather than just watching TV shows? As much as I feel like police here in the US are woefully underqualified--it isn't from their exercise regimens.

I have. Actual police officers are precisely what I am basing my opinion on.

And security guards are hardly much better.

Andykp wrote:
This is painful to read. So much misogynistic pseudoscience it’s crazy. Please re-read all of sgt smudges posts and they eloquently and concisely layout why your arguments are so weak.

Ah yes, back to head in the sand management.

What I wrote is just reality. If reality is "misogynistic pseudoscience", you better think about making a device that will transport you to My Little Pony or something.

 Tyran wrote:
I'm not even sure what are the positions to be honest.

I mean we know for a fact female guardsmen are a thing and all female IG Regiment are a thing.

Are female guardsmen less common than male ones? Probably, but less common when dealing with the IoM likely still means trillions upon trillions of female guardsmen.

And when it comes to famous IG worlds in which their whole thing is producing guardsmen regiments then I expect a pretty even 50/50 split.

OP was asking why we rarely see female-majority IG regiments in the books.

I explained that the reason is because books are largely inspired by real life, and in real life female soldiers are a rarity because of physical differences between men and women. And for elite units - which IG is, or at least is *supposed to be* - women will be even rarer.

Then a crowd appeared which hates that I don't agree with their pseudoscience of absolute equality and it snowballed from there.

They of course completely ignored the part where I said that I have no problem with things being different in the Imperium so long as there is a proper explanation as to why. If you want, give IG troops mandatory genetic enhancement - I don't care what, but the explanation has to exist. Right now however we see no indication of such being used en masse by Imperium, not even the power armor.

Andykp wrote:
This is a good point, the whole boys are stronger/faster etc than girls argument becomes completely irrelevant in the 41st millennium. Even other human foes are juiced up on chaos devotion, most stuff you’ll fight is the stuff of nightmares. Even the strongest fittest humans is outmatched.

The thing with this discussion where it becomes toxic is the fact that people are happy to use real world justifications, which are clouded by real world prejudice but will ignore the in setting reality that flies against their argument altogether.

In universe mass conscription of both male and female population makes complete sense due to the total war of the setting. To ignore that only adds to the toxic feel of the community. The fact that the creators and owners of the setting are actively trying to increase inclusion in the background and models should be a clear signal the direction we are going. Female guard aren’t new, they are only recently getting models but have been around for ages in the fluff.

We should be encouraging as many people as possible to get involved with the hobby, gate keeping and and trying to discourage inclusion is not acceptable. I know the mods have received complaints from both “sides” but I feel it is a duty of anyone to call out and challenge gate keeping and the kind of misogyny we’ve seen in this thread. If we don’t then the community will never improve.

I showed this thread to my 12 year old daughter and she was appalled at the arguments in here. We really need to do better.

No, it is not irrelevant. You want to close the gap as much as possible - and as I said, main issue isn't even fighting. It is the other stuff - digging trenches, carrying wounded, and so on.

Mass conscription male and female makes sense for emergency PDF conscription in extremis. In reality however a society cannot sustain much more than 10-15% of population under arms for any prolonged period of time - and this percentage was true for Ancient Rome and is true today. So "mass conscription of both male and female population" still makes little sense, unless physically reasonably fit humans are rare overall. But I have seen no evidence that 85% of Imperial civilian population are starvation victims and/or McDonalds enjoyers.

I don't buy the "inclusion" argument. How many twelve-feet-tall greenskins do you see walking around in real life?

And if your reasoning is that of a 12 year old...

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Do you have sources for ANY of this, or are you just making up numbers?

Numbers are illustrative of the point. But I have already shown scientific sources which explain difference in physical performance between men and women. Do try and read them.

Congratulations, you realised why all this posturing about male bodies being strong is completely unnecessary.

Come on, if you are going to "debate" me, at least try and read what I am writing. Men have a multitude of advantages over women in combat, even in modern warfare, that have absolutely nothing to do with raw physical strength.

I'm sure all those bones will protect you from flesh-burrowing parasites, supercharged lasers, rocket propelled grenades, and weapons that atomise you. /s

The differences are frankly MINISCULE and wouldn't even be considered by recruitment. And we know this, because 1. We see women in the guard. 2. We see conscripts in the guard, literally used as cannon fodder. 3. There's plenty of regiments which recruit from pretty slight populations - Salvar-Chem Dogs and Tanith, etc.

You do understand that there are still things like shrapnel, blunt force impacts (e.g. weapons fire striking armor) and so on? And that armor cannot protect you from e.g. mobility injuries?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8966186/#:~:text=Female%20soldiers%20have%20been%20found,have%20been%20observed%20to%20have

Female soldiers have been found to experience injuries at a higher rate, both in training [9, 10] and during operations [11, 12] when compared to their male colleagues, although this sex-based difference does not hold true across all military contexts and in some contexts male personnel have been observed to have higher injury rates than female personnel [13, 14]. There is also evidence that female soldiers may sustain injuries to different body sites when compared to male soldiers [15–17] and exhibit some differences in risk factors for injury, due to anthropometric, biomechanical, and anatomical differences. In basic training contexts where male and female recruits train together, despite males experiencing greater external training loads as measured by total distance covered, female soldiers tended to have a greater internal training load as measured by heart rate and ratings of perceived exertion and report more muscle soreness and fatigue [18].

Overall, for PDF it may make sense to aim for equal inclusion of men and women - when Orks are on the planet, you just need as many warm bodies as possible. But Imperial Guard? No.

Mate, if a 12 year old can see how dumb your argument is and can see the misogyny in what your saying they it doesn’t look good for you.

The guard relies on numbers, it always has, it’s not a solute fighting force. It’s mass mobilisation of the people to swamp and grind down the enemy.

And regardless of what real life bias you want to apply to the hobby the company that makes it clearly is going in a different direction. All NEW guard releases, be they models, books or art contain a high proportion of female frontline soldiers. And guess what, they perform as well as the male ones.

And your comment about inclusion and Greenskins, clearly demonstrates you have no idea how inclusion actually works outside the horror stories you’ve heard on Fox News.

EDIT IN RED

Andykp wrote:
And regardless of what real life bias you want to apply to the hobby the company that makes it clearly is going in a different direction. All guard releases, be they models, books or art contain a high proportion of female frontline soldiers.

What are we classing as a 'high proportion' here?

Because looking at the models range(s), for example:

2nd ed. Cadians - all dudes
3rd ed. Cadians - all dudes
new Cadians - ~30% (?) female if you max out on the heads
Tallarn - all dudes
Vostroyans - all dudes
Steel Legion - all dudes
Valhallans - all dudes
Mordians - all dudes
Praetorians - all dudes
Forge World Death Korps - all dudes
new Death Korps - all dudes
Elysians - all dudes
Catachans - 1 female (metal grenade launcher)
Other/Misc - 4 (?) female (Warrior Woman, Raine, recent BL Cadian officer, metal Tanith lasgun)

I'm not sure about the most recent Codex: Astra Militarum, but across all prior editions, you could probably count the number of female soldiers depicted in artwork on one hand (I can think of two...)


It seems to be more that the most recent batch of Cadians specifically has a relatively high proportion of females; but that's probably to be expected given the proportion of the population of the world under arms.

 Haighus wrote:


IIRC, historically this has pretty consistently capped out at about 50kg for maximum sustainable human-carried load incl. clothes, armour, weapons, survival gear etc...

Pounds, not kg. Historically, soldiers have carried 36 kg or less. General rule of thumb is a soldier can carry about 1/3 to 1/2 of his bodyweight on an approach march and still be able to do something when he gets to the fight. Above that and you start breaking them down and reducing their ability to fight. It's not a new problem.

See A Soldier's Load

Out of curiosity as I have none of their models: could you tell if a Krieger was female? Gasmask + Greatcoat might cover up a lot...

But, my question on that?

Where is that weight actually coming from? What is in the kit that is creating that weight?

How does a modern armies logistical considerations compare to that of the Imperium?

For instance, a Mechanised Regiment of Imperial Guard are going to have their Chimeras and support vehicles for carting their kit about. Specialist Regiments in the vein of Catachan’s seem expected to live off the land. A Drop Regiment is intended to be kept mobile, going in and out via their Valkyries or equivalent. A planetary or orbital Garrison is…well…a Garrison.

Those are all going to change what is physically demanded of a given member of the Imperial Guard.

So even from a world with a strict 50/50 mix? It’s not out of the question that’s factored in to how a Regiment is expected/intended to operate.

And again? We have no reason at all to believe any dimorphism isn’t addressed through training, drugs, genetic tinkering in ages past etc.

Because if your sole argument remains “but in the modern world”? You better forget your Lasguns, your Warp Travel, your Valkyrie’s, your Sentinels, your Ogryns, your Rough Riders, your Ratlings and so on.

 Lord Damocles wrote:

new Cadians - ~30% (?) female if you max out on the heads

It seems to be more that the most recent batch of Cadians specifically has a relatively high proportion of females; but that's probably to be expected given the proportion of the population of the world under arms.

And conveniently matches up exactly with what I've been saying. ~30% women is about what you would expect if you applied what we see in the real world if the Imperium is overall an egalitarian society.

GW model options confirm roughly 30% women in the IG.

I'm not sure the models are a great reference. Pretty sure the new and old eldar guardian kits lean towards more men than women even though their lore is pretty explicit that eldar expect every citizen regardless of sex to be able to serve as guardians.

Unless there's a thus far unmentioned massive gender gap in the eldar population.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
.
Unless there's a thus far unmentioned massive gender gap in the eldar population.

I'm actually thinking about making a thread on that and how it might differ from say Biel-tan to Iybraesil.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But, my question on that?

Where is that weight actually coming from? What is in the kit that is creating that weight?

How does a modern armies logistical considerations compare to that of the Imperium?

For instance, a Mechanised Regiment of Imperial Guard are going to have their Chimeras and support vehicles for carting their kit about. Specialist Regiments in the vein of Catachan’s seem expected to live off the land. A Drop Regiment is intended to be kept mobile, going in and out via their Valkyries or equivalent. A planetary or orbital Garrison is…well…a Garrison.

Those are all going to change what is physically demanded of a given member of the Imperial Guard.

So even from a world with a strict 50/50 mix? It’s not out of the question that’s factored in to how a Regiment is expected/intended to operate.

And again? We have no reason at all to believe any dimorphism isn’t addressed through training, drugs, genetic tinkering in ages past etc.

Because if your sole argument remains “but in the modern world”? You better forget your Lasguns, your Warp Travel, your Valkyrie’s, your Sentinels, your Ogryns, your Rough Riders, your Ratlings and so on.

Lasgun (plus spare packs), body armour, helmet, water, entrenching tools, comms equipment, ammunition for any special weapons (e.g. the flamers have pretty hefty fuel tanks).

Not to mention that both the new Cadians and the plastic Kriegers have some pretty hefty backpacks. It all adds up.

Modern armies have vehicles and go for a manoeuvrist approach as well and yet they still carry around a ton of heavy stuff. Heck western forces are probably better supported than guard in that regard as we actually care for our personnel’s lives and welfare.

WRT dimorphism - women feature prominently in plenty of BL novels and the descriptions generally imply the dimorphism is broadly similar to irl (though with more and greater outliers).
If you’re using drugs to counteract it, why not just use the same drugs to make already strong people stronger? The Imperium has no overall driver* to artificially skew things one way or the other.

There’s clearly lots of women in the guard. There’s clearly both all female and mixed sex regiments. The impression GW gives in models, lore and art (even now when they’re trying hard to appeal more to women) though is that there are less women than men. How much by we can’t really tell, though if the new Cadians are at 30%, that’s probably roughly what GW are thinking. (Fwiw, I probably would have guesstimated somewhere in the 30-40% region. Enough that they don’t seem at all rare, but still a significant skew).

*obviously varies world to world.

On weight?

Been doing a bit of digging online.

The M-G Short Pattern Lasgun, featured in the Imperial Infantryman’s Uplifting Primer is 2.3kg. And Wikipedia suggest the USA M4 Carbine is 2.9kg as is, or 3.52kg with 30 rounds and a sling. The XM7 is apparently heftier, coming in at 3.8kg

Even if we assume the M-G’s proffered weight is without a power pack installed, we can start to see a genuine disparity in the weight.

Whilst sources vary, you can get between 40 to 150 and more shots for a Lasgun power pack. So two soldiers, with broadly similar battlefield role, equipment and overall ammo? The Guardsman has the lighter combat load right there.

How much lighter overall? Hard to say exactly. But I can off some thoughts you may wish to factor in.

In the modern day, materials are being made ever lighter. This includes clothing. What advances might’ve been made in the future, and what might the Imperium retain from man’s technological zenith.

How much do you reckon a Lasgun power pack weighs? So far as we can tell, it’s just a battery, and not necessarily a particularly fancy one, as it’s not containing gas, just bottle electrickery to power the weapon. Personally, I can’t see it weighing more than a modern 30 round clip.

Rations! As our understanding of nutrition and food preservation has grown, it seems army rations have become lighter and lighter. So again, what Future Advances have occurred and been maintained within the Imperium?

Lord Zarkov wrote:

If you’re using drugs to counteract it, why not just use the same drugs to make already strong people stronger? The Imperium has no overall driver* to artificially skew things one way or the other.

Diminishing returns. There is a point in which simply having stronger soldiers no longer provides significant benefits. Moreover each additional increase of strength is usually harder to achieve.

Mind you I agree with the overall point that there are more male guardsmen than female (outside of outliers like Cadia or Catachan in which everyone is a soldier). But technology (drugs, genetic engineering, power armor, etc) is inherently an equalizer. Once upon a time being physically stronger had very direct benefits in warfare. Nowadays it still provides circumstancial benefits but a bullet is as deadly as ever regardless of the gender of the firer.

As technology advances gender becomes less and less relevant.

Why would the Guardsman carry less ammo than he can? No reason to have him carry less packs.

Edit: The body armor of the IG is also about 2 KG heavier than the US one, and roughly half a KG more than the Canadian Forces' one, though it includes forearm and lower leg protection. Only War does not have individual pieces for Guardsmen-issued kit so it's a bit hard to draw a comparision if the modern soldier had those pieces too, but I'd wager it would at best match it in term of weight for the US's kit, and go over for the CF's

 Bobthehero wrote:
Why would the Guardsman carry less ammo than he can? No reason to have him carry less packs.

Because there is a limited number of ammo and the ammunition officer isn't giving ammo based on individual physical strength.

Why are we imposing a limit on the IG in this scenario?