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Kai Tave posted:The way I've generally seen it put is that idealized male figures in nerd media are presented as a male fantasy, while idealized female figures in nerd media are also presented as a male fantasy. Yeah, I usually call it "who you want to be" vs "who you want to be with". I don't think there's anything wrong with having characters you want to "be with" in your fictional setting, both because it's a pretty normal element of fantasy/escapism, and because there's some crossover between the two; it's totally reasonable for some people to want to be the characters that others want to be with. The real issue is when this stuff is designed in a way that excludes large groups of people, especially in aggregate over an entire industry. I don't really have a problem with Sisters in isolation (aside from general "40k is kinda lame" complaints), but I do have a problem with the fact that they're the only female humans aside from a couple of out-of-print Guard (and the female non-humans aren't really all that great either). For the single most-popular wargame on the market with a ridiculously large range of models, the sheer lack of options here is pretty sad. Going back to the original topic though, my main argument was just that Sisters are sexualized. This isn't a moral judgment on its own; if we ignore the Repentia minis, the sexualization of Sisters doesn't bother me. As Leperflesh said, it's pretty PG-rated, and I don't think we should try to completely erase all traces of sexuality from our fiction; it's a normal, healthy part of our lives. It's more the contrast between Sisters and the rest of the game: the total lack of female Guard minis (despite them being mixed-gender in the fluff); and the fact that the most popular faction by far - Space Marines - is a no-girls-allowed club, etc. If 40k the game looked more like 40k fluff*, it wouldn't be too bad for the humans: the vast majority of minis would be (mixed-gender) Guard, plus two much-smaller single-gender factions mirroring monks and nuns. * In broad strokes; I'm ignoring poo poo like "Grey Knights bathe in Sister blood". El Estrago Bonito posted:There's a lot to be said for the marines (at least in the start of 40k lore and when handled by FFG) being a pretty on point satire of modern NATO military culture where we build billions of dollars in the worlds most advanced tanks, fighter jets and missiles in order to fight guys using stolen cold war munitions who live in caves. I never much liked this line of reasoning since the end result is, "The army you spent hundreds of dollars buying and dozens of hours painting is actually stupid." I suppose it's just a matter of taste, but I prefer my satire not to require such an investment.
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Oct 18, 2016 08:59
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HazCat posted:Pretty sure it was Rakish Heir? Yep, that's the one. I think someone in WotC's art division even wrote an article about it in the aftermath. I also remember a Dragon Magazine cover, back when Dragon Magazine existed, featuring a topless muscular fantasy man of some sort, but not in the Conan sort of way but more like a male underwear model sort of way, which received some similar letters to the editor in the next issue complaining about the same sort of thing. It turns out that a lot of guys don't care about all the topless, jacked men running around their fantasy tabletop games, hey fair's fair, sexism is over forever...unless those men happen to be drawn in a way that women and/or gay men might actually find sexy. Then they suddenly find themselves intensely uncomfortable, outraged, or both at once. I'll also go out on a limb and say that people would probably be more willing to overlook the whole boobplate thing with regard to Sisters if GW hadn't spent the last I don't know how many years writing the Sisters as the setting's perpetual victims and losers, up to and including having their own ostensible allies murder them and bathe in their blood because of their "purity." If Sisters of Battle really are supposed to be this incredible elite asskicking force on par with the giganto hulking symbols of uber-masculinity then not even Games Workshop actually does even a halfway decent job of presenting them as such, so instead they're just the token "grrl power!" army languishing around out of institutionalized inertia and a need to meet the tittay quota.
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Oct 18, 2016 09:10
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Yeah, not even just the Sisters' appearance, but their complete lack of rules and mini support makes it clear they're not given much weight by GW. I once tried researching some Sisters lore to play one in a Deathwatch game (this was a mistake) and there just...wasn't much. Like four orders total, all of whom had some variation of gray/silver, black and red as their colors, and all of which were described as 'exceptionally pure' in the way that all space marine chapters are described as 'exceptionally fanatical' but without even the extended histories that differentiate marines a bit more. They've never had their own codex (to my knowledge), being instead bundled into Witchhunters and Dark Heresy supplements and so on, and never had a plastic range--and they have silly boobplate. Meanwhile, the space marines specifically exclude girls from their magical man club because...uhm...being able to spit acid, eat through steel and go into suspended animation are well-known male human traits. Like many others I could ignore the boobplate if the rest of everything weren't stacked (so to speak) against them.
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Oct 18, 2016 09:27
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Synthbuttrange posted:I got some wood for that vampire  And yeah, there's nothing inherently wrong with sexualisation. It can be a lot of fun to play around with but it's yet another things that our society's hosed up gender issues ruin.
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Oct 18, 2016 09:47
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Jeb Bush 2012 posted:woah, woah, let's not be too negative here. let's try and recommend some games that are better than GW games, so people know what to play instead!
NTRabbit fucked around with this message at 09:53 on Oct 18, 2016 |
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Oct 18, 2016 09:49
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In terms of female guard, all that's available is the catachan grenade launcher - not-vasquez - or the out of print female guard from the rogue trader era, which you can still find if you dig through ebay. Otherwise it's off to victoria lamb I guess. You can grab the escher minis as well, but they're expensive on ebay as it is. I can't really think of much else in terms of GW female guard. If GW fixed that it might help them. Didn't know they'd added female tau to the new fire warrior boxes though. That's... good, I guess? Interesting that they've decided Tau don't have quite the same degree of gender dimorphism, but in a sense it's also kind of nice. If only they'd apply that level of thought (or pleasant accident) to the imperial factions.
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Oct 18, 2016 09:50
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occamsnailfile posted:Yeah, not even just the Sisters' appearance, but their complete lack of rules and mini support makes it clear they're not given much weight by GW. I once tried researching some Sisters lore to play one in a Deathwatch game (this was a mistake) and there just...wasn't much. Like four orders total, all of whom had some variation of gray/silver, black and red as their colors, and all of which were described as 'exceptionally pure' in the way that all space marine chapters are described as 'exceptionally fanatical' but without even the extended histories that differentiate marines a bit more. They've never had their own codex (to my knowledge), being instead bundled into Witchhunters and Dark Heresy supplements and so on, and never had a plastic range--and they have silly boobplate. Meanwhile, the space marines specifically exclude girls from their magical man club because...uhm...being able to spit acid, eat through steel and go into suspended animation are well-known male human traits. As dumb as the hundred varieties of space marines get (double-werewolf marines, street shark marines, gay Jojo vampire marines, fuckin goofy-rear end marines in yellow armor because we needed something to sell all this yellow paint, etc.) it's still way more depth and variety than Sisters have ever gotten. There's like a million different marine chapters with their own twist and pages of exquisitely crafted lovely lore behind them, meanwhile are Sisters even a standalone army anymore? I vaguely recall them being rolled into some Inquisitorial witch hunter army, so yeah, I'm pretty sure you're right about that. I mean I get that this is because 40K is Space Marines: the Game as far as GW and a majority of their fans are concerned, like no poo poo they're gonna do all marines all the time because why would you ignore what side your bread is buttered on, but it kind of puts the lie to any attempts to claim "oh yeah no, we're totally inclusive because we have an ALL GIRLS ARMY WOAH" when they're spending most of their time in the basement alongside the Squats and Bretonnians.
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Oct 18, 2016 09:51
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Kai Tave posted:gay Jojo vampire marines
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Oct 18, 2016 09:58
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lenoon posted:The weird thing is that it is a very certain look of idealised 90s cyber-riot grrl meets Britain's small town goth scene. When they were sculpted I was living in the next city over from Nottingham, and that bob and corset look was really in, but not done particularly well. Add in guns and armour and you've turned ex-industrial town cargo cult goths into sisters. As somebody who has been in those scenes, that's a dead-on description. And of course, as they're provincial goth scenes where little ever changes, they still all dress like that.
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Oct 18, 2016 10:40
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Kai Tave posted:As dumb as the hundred varieties of space marines get (double-werewolf marines, street shark marines, gay Jojo vampire marines, fuckin goofy-rear end marines in yellow armor because we needed something to sell all this yellow paint, etc.) it's still way more depth and variety than Sisters have ever gotten. There's like a million different marine chapters with their own twist and pages of exquisitely crafted lovely lore behind them, meanwhile are Sisters even a standalone army anymore? I vaguely recall them being rolled into some Inquisitorial witch hunter army, so yeah, I'm pretty sure you're right about that. In all of this I agree with you. The Sisters have gotten jack. The most memorable thing a lot of posters can recall is that Grey Knights thing. And then they say 'oh we don't research /markets/' though of course that's a falsehood obviously. I mean 2000AD has acres more self-awareness than 40K. It also had shoulderpads first so trademarks, pff, what are those?
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Oct 18, 2016 10:43
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occamsnailfile posted:including having their own ostensible allies murder them and bathe in their blood because of their "purity."
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Oct 18, 2016 10:53
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Flipswitch posted:errr, what? I haven't read anything to do with 40k for years but what the actual gently caress. Grey Knights. Matt Ward wrote that bit
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Oct 18, 2016 10:54
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Flipswitch posted:errr, what? I haven't read anything to do with 40k for years but what the actual gently caress. For those who are unaware, Matt Ward's Grey Knights codex has a vignette about some Grey Knights who go to investigate/purge some heinous heretical whatever somewhere and it's totally overrunning this entire planet except for the Sisters of Battle ultra-nunnery. So they put two and two together and realize that its the Sisters' innate purity that's keeping this corruption at bay. So the Grey Knights, and remember that Grey Knights and Sisters are both on Team Imperium here, murder the Sisters so they can anoint their power armor with holy space nun blood and so protected they go on to purge the evil etc. etc. This is actually a thing that happened, I'm not even exaggerating a little bit, you can go look it up if you don't believe me. In a way this particular example really serves to highlight why representation in media is generally best when it goes beyond just including a token X in there and calling it a day. As dumb as many of the posters here think 40K is (and as steeped in an increasingly unironic brand of nerd-trendy fascism as it is) there are plenty of dudes out there who think that space marines are no-poo poo cool. Losing the ability to bone notwithstanding, space marines are a pretty clear-cut power fantasy...big, strong, they get the best gear and best training and cool narration about how awesome they are, all that good stuff. However I feel pretty confident that for most women out there, their idea of a power fantasy doesn't involve being juiced like a loving lemon in order to give Pious McLargehuge a +1 to saving throws versus Chaos. "But there are strong women in 40K!" is an argument that's severely undercut by the fact that the strong woman army is frequently stuck on the receiving end of the slaughter du jour whenever some author needs a jobber to show how grim and dark and deadly the 41st millennium is, and that's without their own allies killing them off as well. Kai Tave fucked around with this message at 11:13 on Oct 18, 2016 |
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Oct 18, 2016 11:10
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Why didn't they just take the sisters with them? like a really rad first date.
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Oct 18, 2016 11:22
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Flipswitch posted:Why didn't they just take the sisters with them? like a really rad first date. Because horrible nerds write horrible fiction, even if they got paid money for it.
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Oct 18, 2016 11:25
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hover hands and awkward glances while shooting heretics
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Oct 18, 2016 11:28
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When your entire faction gimmick is 'they're the women faction' and your defining aspect is 'purity', nothing good is going to come of this.
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Oct 18, 2016 11:32
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Synthbuttrange posted:I got some wood for that vampire
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Oct 18, 2016 11:59
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Ilor posted:I dunno, I can't look past the teeny-tiny hands of the guy in the background. excuse me, they're dainty
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Oct 18, 2016 12:01
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glitchkrieg posted:As somebody who has been in those scenes, that's a dead-on description. I dated into that scene repeatedly because I was really into it when I was an even more pretentious quasi goth teen. And my god, I go home and I swear the same people are squeezed into the same ill fitting clothes, and they looked bad then - add in another fifteen years and holy poo poo the Nottinghamshire-Derbyshire goth scene is terrible.
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Oct 18, 2016 12:06
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the grey knights thing is amazing Grey Knights, supposed to be totally immune to corruption, had to cover themselves in the blood of super pure lovely ladies so they wouldnt be corrupted Also apparently the Sisters were so pure and incorruptible, but they couldn't defeat the big evil thing on their own, the big strong men had to come along and do it for them it's like poetry
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Oct 18, 2016 12:07
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Avenging Dentist posted:Yeah, I usually call it "who you want to be" vs "who you want to be with". I don't think there's anything wrong with having characters you want to "be with" in your fictional setting, both because it's a pretty normal element of fantasy/escapism, and because there's some crossover between the two; it's totally reasonable for some people to want to be the characters that others want to be with. The real issue is when this stuff is designed in a way that excludes large groups of people, especially in aggregate over an entire industry. Space Marines are Hulk, not Thor.
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Oct 18, 2016 13:28
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No they really aren't - they're the purer than pure heroes of the setting. They're gods among men, they're this and that and the other and all of it insanely positive. They're not uncontrollably angry (except when they are and it's seen as a good thing). The cryptofascist wh40k is a bad place filled with bad people elements have gone. Whatever the body proportions they lack any element of loss of control, mostly lack any darker or negative characteristics at all that might make them more hulky.
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Oct 18, 2016 13:49
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Lol at the guy who's writing multi paragraph posts about how sisters are problematic Like it might be a problem, but you're probably the only person who's thought that long about it
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Oct 18, 2016 15:19
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HazCat posted:Pretty sure it was Rakish Heir? Yeah it was this. I have a bunch of them, including foil, I was going to turn into 3D cards for use as tokens at one point.
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Oct 18, 2016 15:26
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NTRabbit posted:
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Oct 18, 2016 15:30
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Oct 18, 2016 15:38
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Business Gorillas posted:Lol at the guy who's writing multi paragraph posts about how sisters are problematic Well excuse me but I'm also going to think about the sisters
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Oct 18, 2016 16:06
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All this is reminding me that Sisters never got more than two cards in Conquest  Also Diskwars is fun if you want WHFB but not GW
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Oct 18, 2016 16:15
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Xarbala posted:Well excuse me but I'm also going to think about the sisters Just don't make dissertations about gender politics in 15 year old warhammer dollies
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Oct 18, 2016 16:20
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IDK, I think it's pretty telling how many people get uppity when anyone suggests analyzing the media we consume. I mean, there was that famous kickstarter that got the creator a whole bunch of death threats for talking about 101-level stuff.
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Oct 18, 2016 16:24
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All this talk about female imperial guard troops made me wonder what they would look like if GW actually made them. Oh... Wait... miniskirts
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Oct 18, 2016 16:26
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Wait, I didn't know The Last Chancers were still available. Wait $35 for 12 metal minis, is that a wayback machine link or something?
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Oct 18, 2016 16:32
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No, its a current link. GW has a bunch of random old stuff still floating around, like the Last Chancers, Steel Legion, and Vostroyans, all at that same price level. I have no idea why.
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Oct 18, 2016 16:36
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Of course, you can't actually find them by looking through the astra militarum range. You have to specifically search for them. Also I'm the Indian. So that's either Hero, Animal, Brains, Fingers, or Shiv. Or maybe Grease Monkey or Demolition Man since he does have a huge pack on his side.
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Oct 18, 2016 16:45
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Business Gorillas posted:Lol at the guy who's writing multi paragraph posts about how sisters are problematic Get with the times, gramps. Not caring doesn't make you cool anymore.
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Oct 18, 2016 16:59
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Chill la Chill posted:Of course, you can't actually find them by looking through the astra militarum range. You have to specifically search for them. If I recall correctly the Native American is Shiv, the close combat specialist. Back in 3rd when they came out they had rules for taking them as your army in a 500 point game. Each one was an independent character with their own rules. Macdeo Lurjtux fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Oct 18, 2016 |
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Oct 18, 2016 17:23
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Business Gorillas posted:Just don't make dissertations about gender politics in 15 year old warhammer dollies Why not? It's interesting and educational! Anyway, Sister of Battle should be all about cool music and making really sarcastic bitchy comments. Have them be the don't-give-a-poo poo-what-you-think faction on the "good guy" side.
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Oct 18, 2016 17:23
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Bistromatic posted:No armour except shoulder pads and hip piece. I'm on board with this. Pillarmarines. Chill la Chill posted:IDK, I think it's pretty telling how many people get uppity when anyone suggests analyzing the media we consume. I mean, there was that famous kickstarter that got the creator a whole bunch of death threats for talking about 101-level stuff. People on the internet have weird double-standards. People fighting the evil of AAA video game publishers while constantly falling for overambitious nostalgiabait Kickstarters. Internet reviewers becoming very thin-skinned very quickly when someone critizes them. Nerds being okay with all kinds of fanservice as long as it is their kind of fanservice.
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Oct 18, 2016 17:33
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Which kind of marines are Jojo's Pillar Men?
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Oct 18, 2016 17:47
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