No this is not a shout out to the African American female audience on this forum.

I was curious to know if anyone has played or is currently playing a Adepta Sororita. We are starting a new campaign and our group of 6 got the green light from our GM to play a maximum of 3 from this career path.

Which would you prefer to play a Templar Calix of the Scholastia Psykana? Or a Sister?

And why?

Thanks

A Guardsman who has the Chaliced Commissariate path.

Its just cooler!

From a powergaming point of view, sisters are great. I'd never play one though, restrictive and not generally appealing. Also I'm not good at cross gender roleplaying.

The Sisters of Battle are the base career path; and very cool. The Templar Calix is an advanced, alternate career path; and very cool. It ultimately depends on ones taste and flair. Honestly, give me my Volgite Reclaimator any day of the week. Turned out quite the munchkin in his own way - do not ever get into a knife fight with the man. All I need now are a couple of lathe-forged combat knives, instead of my current ceramite mono-knives (our interpretation of Best Quality in this case).

Addendum; forgot to mention, Brotherhood of Thollos background package on top of everything.

-=Brother Praetus=-

I play two characters in Dark Heresy (a main and a secondary). Conveniently for you, they are a Templar Calix and a (militant) Sororitas.

Disclaimer: What follows is just my own personal preferences.

Quite frankly, I vastly prefer the psyker. She just has a lot more flexibility. She's a diviner, which has some wonderful story/roleplay/investigation options, but also pairs nicely with weapon weilding due to the several combat enhancing powers within the discipline. I also have a lot more flexibility to create an interesting character in terms of personality and background.

With a Sororitas, while the lack of an expensive stat line does allow a little flexibility, you will still have to choose at the end of the day between investigation/social, or combat focused (via the branching career paths).

My Sororitas is fun, but I would never be playing her as my main character. Part of the reason she makes a good secondary is it is always very obvious who is speaking, and I never have to think too hard about what her opinion on a contentious matter is (and can therefore focus on roleplaying my primary). The space marine/sororitas mentality type of character as a roleplaying character horse has been beat to death on these forums. But I fall on the side of the line that thinks you either end up being very boxed in as far as how your character thinks and behaves, or you end up playing a Sororitas who is an oddball and doesn't behave like Sororitas are depicted in the fluff, and it makes it seem like you picked the class because you wanted the mechanics and not the character.

Personally, I can not imagine playing in a group where three of the characters were all Sororitas. Talk about group think!

Great input from all…

To clarify, I'm defiantly looking for role-playing value as well as someone that could hold there own in a fight if need be..

Honestly role-playing a cross gender thing would be a challenge… I never created a female character before in any RPG that I have played. Sorry never saw the appeal… But to each his own…

aethel: You bring up some very interesting points. Especially the one about marine/soroitas, mentality. I imagine that playing these types of characters would be a lot like watching Arnold Schwarzenegger movies in the early to late nineties and imitating ole Arnold….

I’ll have to read up on the Brotherhood of Thollos career path.

Jonas_Leman said:

The Brotherhood of Thollos (which is a slight misnomer) is a background package for Scum originating from a Hive or Imperial World. Basicly a sector-wide criminal syndicate which mostly provides enforcers and toughs for others.

"Muscle for hire is not hard to come by, but few can lean on a reputation as polished as the Brotherhood of Thollos." Their benefits are pretty decent; slight boost to WS and Toughness, minor hit to Fellowship, and a couple of talents.

-=Brother Praetus=-

I have never really understood why people think crossgender roleplaying is so difficult. You have no problem playing a cybernetic priest who worships a Machine God 40,000 years in the future, but you can't put yourself in the place of somebody with a different chromosomal makeup?

I';m about to start playing a Sister (with GM permission, given the potentially overpowered nature of the career -- more on this below). She's Noble-born taking the Dialogous path and is constructed as a sort of spy and infiltrator in the ranks of high society, not the standard "kill the heretic!" role. Actually she has almost no combat skills whatsoever. I'm hoping that enough can be brought up from her own noble family's past (and her Vendetta trait) and role in politics etc. that the character will be further divorced from the stereotypical "hot nun with a chainsword" image.

I'm also not sure why people think Sisters are so overpowered. This view seems so universal that it is likely that I am wrong and will change my opinion after I actually begin playing the character. However, I'm not really seeing why people think this. Is it the Faith powers? Unless you're fighting daemons specifically, they're not that fantastic, and they do require a fate point -- which means another fate point not spent elsewhere. Is it the relatively cheap characteristic increases? True, there's no Basic increase that costs more than 250, but if you want a combat moster I think you'd be better off with Assassin or Guardsman, or even Arbitrator, especially since they get Sound Constitution for a lot cheaper and a lot more often.

Am I missing something?

The Sisters are not overpowered. They do have access to the Pure Faith talents, which are pretty powerful. However; and this is not an overly important point to how your GM wishes to run it, but Sisters only come from the Schola Progenium by the home world tables. Which is a point of contention I have with one of the character generators I have... That, and the fact that it neglects the fact that there are indeed Noble Imperial Psykers according to the home world tables as well. IHB, pg 20.

-=Brother Praetus=-

It states in the Sisters career description that the homeworld options are Schola Progenium, Noble, Feral, or Imperial World.

I remember in one of the earlier iterations of The Great Space Marine Debate where players discussed having Space Marine alts which are called in by the player for assault operations, while usually they play an investigator of sorts. Wasn't a bad idea. Playing a sister or marine is probably ridiculously fun, but for how long?

If you're playing a sister who doesn't purge heretics with fire and fury (or at least talk about it a lot) does it feel wrong?

Locque said:

Why should it? It's not like real nuns, no matter how zealous, go around talking theology and doctrine all day long. They have lives.

The character I'm going to start is built as an investigator. Her job isn't burning the heretic personally. That's the job of the Arbites or Sisters Militant.

If personally have never once seen a 40k sister doing anything but spouting dogma and purging. I will admit straight off that my consumption of 40k material involving sisters has been quite low, but i was under the impression that, as presented to us thus far, they've been pretty one dimensional. Now, I know that dark heresy allows for less combat oriented sisters, but then you're more or less winging it right? Making it up as you go along?

Because playing a nun would be pretty **** restrictive.

Locque said:

With very few exceptions, 40K material is 1) focussed toward combat and blowing stuff up and 2) badly written.

Let me ask you this: would it be restrictive to play the Pope? Sure, from the viewpoint that you have to be a fervent Catholic. But that does not complete determine my 30th Level Cleric Benedict's behavior. Religious people, even fanatics, are only cardboard cutouts in fiction.

That said, I haven't actually started playing the character yet. Maybe I'll change my mind.

bogi_khaosa said:

Its why I base my SoB's NPC's off the Missionaria Protectiva than the 40k material to give them a little more adult oriented depth of character and alternative motivations than just being zealot space girls with guns burning their way across the galaxy written simply to appeal to teenage boys. Sure, the militants can haul out and wreck things in the name of the god emperor of mankind when they have to and don't for a second ever think they're all not backed up with an iron core of belief.

But they're definately not nuns

(course getting the blinkered 40k community of hardliners to actually consider it as an alternative is ultimately pointless so I dont volunteer any house ruled material)

bogi_khaosa said:

I agree, but I've meet so many immature players who assume all female characters, PC or NPC, are whores to be used. As a GM, I've set them straight...quickly. I think the possibility of seeming "gay" is the reason, especially if romance is involved. It's funny that people are OK with extreme violence and wholesale murder, but possible being a "girl in love" is a stretch. Of course, the Sisters might be different and I'm speaking of other games. As a GM I've had to learn to portray women as realistically as possible, so it's not a stretch to imagine playing as one.

Brother Praetus said:

I agree. After having played one for a bit, in a game where the GM gives everyone good gear (neutralizing the whole power armor thing which is its own debate) she's not any more powerful than the other characters.

Nearly every benefit of the pure faith talents requires spending (if not burning!) a fate point. Well, the ability to re-roll a failed roll is also pretty powerful, so given that every time you spend a FP to activate pure faith, you are giving up a re-roll you could have made... you're still constrained by how many fate points you have.

MKX said:

I've always thought that the 40K universe is rich and deep enough, with enough adult themes ("adult" in the sense of "emotionally and intellectually sophisticated," not "sex and violence") that you could easily have really, really good stories set in it, if only the target audience was different, Mitchell and Abnet are reasonably good writers, but they're pulp -- not that I don't find them entertaining. My mouth waters at the idea of what somebody like Simmons or Mieville could pull off in the 40k universe if given free reign.

bogi_khaosa said:

We're both right... As far as random determination as listed on the table, the only possible origin is from the Schola Progenium. Then in the Adepta Sororitas details it states that they are by GM permission only; recommends only experienced players be permitted to play one; and states they are NOT even a possible result on the random tables. I've always just disregarded that result on the table, anyway. Have to confess, I've not really read the stuff for the Sisters since the IHB came out. Not suitable to the types of games I run.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Never understood why they even got their own career path. I think they would have been better served as 2 or 3 alternate career ranks for the Cleric. One at rank 1, one at rank 3 and another at 5 or 6.

bogi_khaosa said:

Simply put on that... Yeah. There's a reason the Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus books are so popular, I couldn't honestly RP as a female character and do it any justice. Good on you if you can manage that.

Zarkhovian_Rhythm said:

I used to enjoy playing a male character every now and then for variety. But in my current group they're all men who don't like to play female characters, so I pretty much always end up playing a girl because otherwise we wouldn't have any.

To be honest, I have yet to notice, in all my life, any real general difference between male and female thought processes and personalities. I've noticed a heck of a lot of difference between individuals, but sex seems to be mostly irrelevant. I've known effeminate women, effeminate men, masculine men, and masculine women. Any psychological difference stemming from a pure physiology that is true across and entire sex would have to be pretty darn subtle and, as such, would probably never ever come up in a game taking place in the far far future where heretics get chopped up with chainsaws.

I only have one player who has yet to play an opposite gender character, but I think he approaches the games more as self insertion exercises then role switching.

I myself ban cross gender PCs except with specific permision from me and only if I thgink the gender will actualy enhance the character or will be an important part of the character (i.e. a Sister).

since invoking this rule I have only twice lifted it and then only for players I trusted to play them properly. Once for a Female Halfing Cleric in WFRP 1st ed and once for a Black Fury Bounty Hunter who rode a motercycle and secretly read trashy Mills & Boons books in Werewolf: the Apocalypse.

Every other game I've been a player in and watched other guys play women they have done so awfully horendesly badly. Either playing them as sluts or or men with boobs. (The former realy disturbs me and I make a point of never ever letting those guys meet my female friends as it makes me question their attitude towards the fairer sex!) thats said most of the games I've seen dudes play chicks is D&D and gender is totaly irelevent in most cases these days.

Also I have never gamed with a girl who wanted to play a dude, even in sexist medival settings! Go figure!

Lord_Boofhead said:

It seems you guys might be stuck in stereotype land. What are "men with boobs" and how do they differ from women with boobs? I'm just really curious here as, again, I haven't really noticed any earth shacking differences between how men and women act and think beyond them being different from one another as individuals (at least in regards to the ones who role-play or are otherwise engaged in geek culture).