Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Possibly, but not necessarily is my answer to that one.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Do you think the Custodes was a testing of the waters, to see what the response would be?

I doubt they called a meeting to discuss whether or not to give a custodes boobs and then hired a dedicated team to monitor the response. But they're probably aware enough to have kept an ear out for the response when they did drop some femstodes content.

"Quick note for today's meeting, guys. You know how we confirmed girls can be custodes the other day? Turns out a bunch of neckbeards are going berserk about it online."

EDIT: Or to put it another way, I don't think they introduced femstodes purely to test the waters, but I think they were aware that introducing femstodes would be a chance for them to gauge the response.

Trying to extrapolate Sisters being a poor selling army off of the most recent christmas battleforce not selling out is facile.

For one thing; it's not a good box ruleswise currently. It also has few actual Sisters of Battle in it. It has no big centrepiece model and duplicates a Rhino.

Not to mention Christmas Battleforces are chosen based on the selling power of the faction. It's this mix of "this faction sells well overall, but we made too much stock of [x] units, so we'll allocate at least half of the models in the box to them and include other models that consistently sell well in it." Sisters have had Christmas boxes in 2021, 2023 and now 2024 too. That's a level of consistency you don't see outside of Space Marines. It's why the last Drukhari box you saw was in like, what, 2018? 2017? Guess which christmas battleforce boxes sold out real fast in previous years, faster than Marines in 3 cases; Sisters of Battle.

A.T. wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Just so I'm understanding your point correctly, are you suggesting that, in 2018, GW wouldn't have released plastic Sisters of Battle, because they hadn't already?

Nope.

It was suggested that female space marines were not a risk. I disagreed and further stated that as marines were GWs big money maker they would likely be looking to sales from other lines to determine if they wanted to rock that particular boat rather than taking a punt and hoping for the best.

Right, I think I'm still not quite understanding then.

If Space Marines are GW's big money maker, and they're so risk adverse to it, why create Primaris? Or, perhaps, why bother redesigning and remaking Sisters in plastic, when they could just make more Space Marines?

Either way, it's hardly like Sisters *aren't* very well received right now, and there's little I've seen to indicate that they're less popular then any of the other non-Space Marine Christmas battleforces going on. The fact they have a battleforce in the first place is a pretty good indication that GW think they're doing well.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

A.T. wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Just so I'm understanding your point correctly, are you suggesting that, in 2018, GW wouldn't have released plastic Sisters of Battle, because they hadn't already?

Nope.

It was suggested that female space marines were not a risk. I disagreed and further stated that as marines were GWs big money maker they would likely be looking to sales from other lines to determine if they wanted to rock that particular boat rather than taking a punt and hoping for the best.

Right, I think I'm still not quite understanding then.

If Space Marines are GW's big money maker, and they're so risk adverse to it, why create Primaris? Or, perhaps, why bother redesigning and remaking Sisters in plastic, when they could just make more Space Marines?

Either way, it's hardly like Sisters *aren't* very well received right now, and there's little I've seen to indicate that they're less popular then any of the other non-Space Marine Christmas battleforces going on. The fact they have a battleforce in the first place is a pretty good indication that GW think they're doing well.

Primaris were a risk but may have been seen as
A.) Less at-risk of alienating the player base than femarines would be.
B.) A risk with a high potential reward. If primaris were accepted, then you'd have all these flashy new units you'd be able to convince people to buy, especially as you phase out their firstborn equivalents.

Sisters were a risk because they went so long with so little support, it was probably hard to measure how many people would be willing to buy them outside of the hardcore fanbase they already had.

I think the point being made is that femarines could be perceived as a greater risk than both primaris marines and sisters. And additionally, there isn't necessarily as big a payoff to incentivize taking that risk. As discussed ad nauseum, the difference between a boy marine and a girl marine in terms of models is just a head swap if that. So you're not going to have a bunch of players rushing to buy more plastic when femarines are announced, but you might convince some neckbeards not to buy that box of intercessors they were eyeing for fear of contracting cooties.

(To reiterate, I am in favor of femarines being a thing.)

I don’t agree Sisters were a risk.

I’m sad, old and indeed git enough to remember their debut, right at the very, very arse end of 2nd Ed. And from the off, their background was genuinely fascinating, and the models cool.

Sure, part of the cool was them being all women. But what was really cool is they were new, in sculpt and background, and both were really solid.

As 40K transitioned to 3rd Ed, and with it the move to ever more plastics? The demand for plastic Sisters was there.

Because frankly, the aesthetic is genuinely cool.

Yet for what, 20 or so years? They only got hybrid models. Which, if anything, only drove demand for plastics.

TLDR? Sisters have always struck a chord. Not because they’re women, but because they’re just, y’know, really cool.

Fully agree sisters are cool. But if you're a GW money guy presented with whether or not to invest a bunch of money into gambling on what is *almost* a new plastic faction? I can see where that might be perceived as a risk.

They were probably aware of the existence of a die hard player base for sisters, but that player base simply hadn't had much chance to vote with their dollars up to that point because of the lack of kits being put out in support. They probably didn't have a huge number of sisters sales as evidence that they'd sell well because the company hadn't put anything out for them in forever, and what was available was extra expensive because it was all metal. Like, when GW decided to do the lates wave of kroot support, they were presumably able to look at kroot and tau sales for the last few years and get a rough idea of how willing people are to put money into similar products with similar prices.

You're a music producer. You know that this obscure borderline indie band has a small die-hard fanbase. You *hope* that if you spend some money supporting them and paying to produce a new album that it will have broad appeal and translate to lots of sales, but you can't be sure. And instead of putting your money into the indie band, you could always just ask one of your big name pop artists to crank out another album that sounds like the last one that sold well.

I mean, with sisters we know they were surprised by that one survey where everyone and their mother asked for plastic SoB. That's what made them start that project.

I still believe going the Chaos route is the way to go. Releasing female CSM first opens up the floodgates, introducing new models, a cool idea. And shows how backwards the Imperium is.

Oh you sweet Chaos child with tentacles instead of hair!

For the Sad Git brigade, making female Astartes debut the result of mutation is…wait, there’s a bunch of words, terms, and insinuations I’m not meant to use on Dakka.

Ahem.

No.

Let’s not make female Astartes the result of something, in-universe, inherently negative, yeah?

GW has had a long history of Ivory Tower decision making as their entire operation has been incredibly counter intuitive to what makes a business successful and also very much behind the times on just about everything. Brick and mortar stores that only sell their products, years of draconian policies regarding how retail stores can advertise and transact their products online, extremely slow to have any official merchandising, draconian policy about fan sites posting game rule quotes, antagonistic stance towards fan content, etc.The statements in the past about not doing market research makes it believable that GW didn't understand how popular plastic sisters would be.

I'd prefer the CSM route as well but it would need, for once, GW to write good Chaos lore. It would be far easier to introduce female CSM, in fact the main problem right now is: what took you so long? If female marines are only a problem of emperor's decree Chaos should have invented them 9500 years ago.
But yeah, make Bile's first stable marines female marines. Make a rebellious female cultist leader successfully transform into a Marine. Whatever. But it would need Chaos Lore that's deeper than: these are our cartoon villains, everything they do is so evil or stupid that some people mistake the Imperium for the good guys.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Yet for what, 20 or so years? They only got hybrid models. Which, if anything, only drove demand for plastics.

First release July 1997, last release July 2004. Codex out of print 2011 and models from the shelf before that. Celestine 2017. Plastic sisters November 2019.

When GW went through their big culling phase taking out all of the specialist games there was genuine surprise that the sisters didn't go with them. From all three remaining sisters players, as the meme would go.

With sisters, it really did not help that their old models were also more expensive than most brand new releases. It was a case where the army got drastically cheaper to collect with the release of the plastics. I forget the exact specifics as they delisted the metals 5 years ago now, but I'm pretty sure it was 80 or 90$ for a single 10 person squad.

Compare that to say Cadians, who at that same time were I think 29$, or the tactical marines who were I think 50$ then and a relatively new kit. Hell, even after 5 years of price hikes in a row, it is likely STILL cheaper to collect SIsters than it was 10 years ago.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Oh you sweet Chaos child with tentacles instead of hair!

For the Sad Git brigade, making female Astartes debut the result of mutation is…wait, there’s a bunch of words, terms, and insinuations I’m not meant to use on Dakka.

Ahem.

No.

Let’s not make female Astartes the result of something, in-universe, inherently negative, yeah?

They don't need to be mutants or horrible monsters.

They can be a champion of chaos who has fought her way through the ranks and been blessed by the Gods.

She won't need to be a child of Fabius Bile, but the living will of the gods.

Having a female Chaos Marine be the work of the Chaos gods doesn't solve the problem of introducing them to Loyalist Chapters.

 BorderCountess wrote:
Having a female Chaos Marine be the work of the Chaos gods doesn't solve the problem of introducing them to Loyalist Chapters.

Yeah, I know. But, I'm honestly trying to overcome the "but it's canon" crowd.

I'll go back and work on some ideas on integration.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:

 BorderCountess wrote:
Having a female Chaos Marine be the work of the Chaos gods doesn't solve the problem of introducing them to Loyalist Chapters.

Yeah, I know. But, I'm honestly trying to overcome the "but it's canon" crowd.

I'll go back and work on some ideas on integration.

"Cawl did it" really is the best way, but even then there are some... fierce dissenters who will never accept it.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

A.T. wrote:As I said a number of pages back if they are going to take a punt on female marines it is going to be off the back of red hot sales of things like sisters of battle, which none of you lot that responded are buying.

Obviously, it's unprovable and just one person, but I would like to just say that I *did* start Sisters when they went into plastic, and I've bought into them as much as I did all my other non-Space Marine projects.

Did I buy the new box? No, but I didn't buy any of the others either (and, to be completely honest, had I not already bought an Exorcist and Zephyrim squad closer to when they first came out, I'd have been all over this new box because it's everything I love in the Sisters army).

I've played since Rogue Trader, but I quit during 6th because of the poor treatment sisters were receiving. At the time, my Witch Hunter/ Sisters metal army was the largest army I owned- 1500 Hereticus + 1500 SoB. Toward the tag end of 7th, I was walking by a GW and saw a GSC Codex in the window, and impulse bought for a curiousity/ nostalgia read, without any intention of playing.

And then they announced plastic Sisters for 8th, and I went hard down that rabbit hole. Not only did I go pedal to the metal on sisters, I bought into factions to ally with them and play against them. My Sisters army in plastic is my biggest army now- absolutely dwarfing the classic metal army.

These days, I can't buy boxes unless I 100% need/want everything in them. The Sisters box with the Exorcist, Seraphim and Jump Canoness actually fit that bill- I only have the 5 Seraphim from the 8th ed launch box, and my Exorcist is classic metal. I am kicking myself in the ass for not getting it, and depending upon what happens over the holidays, I might have one last shot... And I won't miss again.

Wish I had shelled out for the Battle Sanctum when it was still available, but that's another story.

The Hereticus box was also tempting; I do need a second unit of both Arbites and Inquisitorial Hench, and you can never have too many BSS or Immolators...

But what stopped me? I already have both Taddeus and Greyfax. Knowing both Krieg, Eldar Aspects and Emperor's Children are on the way? It made way more sense to pass. Honestly? I already have so many Sisters it might be smart to skip the Exorcist/ Seraphim box... But if I did get it, my army would almost be complete.

 BorderCountess wrote:

 Lathe Biosas wrote:

 BorderCountess wrote:
Having a female Chaos Marine be the work of the Chaos gods doesn't solve the problem of introducing them to Loyalist Chapters.

Yeah, I know. But, I'm honestly trying to overcome the "but it's canon" crowd.

I'll go back and work on some ideas on integration.

"Cawl did it" really is the best way, but even then there are some... fierce dissenters who will never accept it.

There are still dissenters over the Primaris Marines... but I see your point.

Dissent about Primaris is different than FSM, because FSM doesn't necessitate any model replacements, whereas Real/TrueMarines lost support over the years. FSM is pure lore, the effect of Primaris is very material.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Dissent about Primaris is different than FSM, because FSM doesn't necessitate any model replacements, whereas Real/TrueMarines lost support over the years. FSM is pure lore, the effect of Primaris is very material.

I see your point too. I've never been a real big space marine player...

I keep forgetting the Primaris issue cost people money as their first gen armies are being cast either into legends or being forcibly pushed into HH30k if you want to use them.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Dissent about Primaris is different than FSM, because FSM doesn't necessitate any model replacements, whereas Real/TrueMarines lost support over the years. FSM is pure lore, the effect of Primaris is very material.

Right. GW made marine players to basically rebuy their armies and that did not drive away the customers. So I really don't think FSM would drive away the customers either.

 Crimson wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Dissent about Primaris is different than FSM, because FSM doesn't necessitate any model replacements, whereas Real/TrueMarines lost support over the years. FSM is pure lore, the effect of Primaris is very material.

Right. GW made marine players to basically rebuy their armies and that did not drive away the customers. So I really don't think FSM would drive away the customers either.

Two things

1: Personally, FSM is less of an issue to me, lore wise, than Primaris. That may not (clearly isn't) true for other people. Others are invariably going to be the type that love Primaris but hate the idea of FSM. Also, lots of people I've met through the years have multiple Marine armies. For those types it may have been just yet another Marine offering.

2: The Primaris release had a whole bunch of new models that a lot of people really liked, especially compared to the classic line. Also, gamewise they were "roidier", for lack of a better term. Tougher, Stronger, better gun. Lots of people were likely to buy into Primaris just for models+roids ("they feel more like marines should feel, huur!"). FSM wouldn't do that. The ideal for representation is that they wouldn't look any different besides some faces.

Lol. Now if GW decided to introduce FSM with a brand new line of MkVII I'd be pretty happy I probably wouldn't buy any though, as my Marine arny is done, aside from finishing off the painting. I wouldn't hold my breath for that occurence anyways.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Two things

1: Personally, FSM is less of an issue to me, lore wise, than Primaris. That may not (clearly isn't) true for other people. Others are invariably going to be the type that love Primaris but hate the idea of FSM. Also, lots of people I've met through the years have multiple Marine armies. For those types it may have been just yet another Marine offering.

2: The Primaris release had a whole bunch of new models that a lot of people really liked, especially compared to the classic line. Also, gamewise they were "roidier", for lack of a better term. Tougher, Stronger, better gun. Lots of people were likely to buy into Primaris just for models+roids ("they feel more like marines should feel, huur!"). FSM wouldn't do that. The ideal for representation is that they wouldn't look any different besides some faces.

Lol. Now if GW decided to introduce FSM with a brand new line of MkVII I'd be pretty happy I probably wouldn't buy any though, as my Marine arny is done, aside from finishing off the painting. I wouldn't hold my breath for that occurence anyways.

I think female marines should come alongside with some new cool kits. Not specific female marine kits, but just new interesting marine kits that have option to use female heads. I think that would help it go down smoothly. People like nice new marine kits, and if lore gets mangled a bit in the process, new shiny toys are more important!

And this is not sarcasm or anything. I'm really not a huge fan of the primaris lore, but the models are great so I bought a ton of them.

My take on new Marine kits is. . . .

The last thing the game needs is more Marine players or more Marine support.

 Insectum7 wrote:
My take on new Marine kits is. . . .

The last thing the game needs is more Marine players or more Marine support.

There will always be new marine kits. So might as well use some of them to introduce some optional female heads.

 Crimson wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
My take on new Marine kits is. . . .

The last thing the game needs is more Marine players or more Marine support.

There will always be new marine kits. So might as well use some of them to introduce some optional female heads.

Well if lore wasn't an issue for you buying Primais, lore shouldn't be holding you back from sticking female heads on your models either, right? And we've seen that you're already doing that.

We can get pretty circular at this point.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
My take on new Marine kits is. . . .

The last thing the game needs is more Marine players or more Marine support.

There will always be new marine kits. So might as well use some of them to introduce some optional female heads.

Well if lore wasn't an issue for you buying Primais, lore shouldn't be holding you back from sticking female heads on your models either, right? And we've seen that you're already doing that.

We can get pretty circular at this point.

It won't stop someone from making female Marines.
But the current lore DOES enable people to be jerks about said Marines. And far too many people use that permission.

Don't play/interact with those people. I can't use my Marines if Legends aren't allowed or people are sticklers for base sizes. I don't enjoy games with people complaining about my stuff either. Your FSM Primaris are at least allowed in tournaments.