It wasn't hard to find a mini for my Sister of Battle in our Dark Heresy campaign. There are plenty of Sisters available. But for my Rogue Trader? Absolutely nothing. There is a notable lack of any decent female models for WH40K, let alone a female Rogue Trader captain. Or even a former Imperial Navy petty officer.

I spent several hours browsing through the online catalogs of other model collections. Ended up going with a Freebooter model. It would've been nice to have the option of buying a WH40K model, though. Games Workshop needs to get on that.

The trouble with making minis for an RPG is everyone will have a different idea of what their character should look like, unlike a wargame where a generic appearance is fine. What we really need is some kind of company that lets you construct a 3D model of your character, and then uses one of those laser prototyping machines to create it. Then you could have a wide enough variety of appearances to suit RPG gamers. I'm sure they'd cost a bundle though.

It's true, Ophilia, female miniatures are somewhat under-represented in the GW range. Here's a few thoughts:

1. The Escher gangs from Necromunda are all female. They're really nice miniatures, though arguably not formal enough to represent Rogue Traders.

2. There was an all female warband for Mordheim called the Sisters of Sigmar. Also nice miniatures, though not equipped for 40k, so you'd need to do some conversion work.

3. There's a really nice female Inquisitor model in the witch hunter range that would make an excellent Rogue Trader if you remove the Sororitas/Inquisitorial imagery.

4. There was a group of "Amazon Warriors" released as part of the Mordheim specialist games range, though they're all a bit scantily clad, and I don't personally think the miniatures are as good as the other options above.

5. There was a nice Warhammer Dogs of War special character, I think she was called Lucrezia Belladonna. Here's a link to an image of the miniature:- http://www.paintedfantasyminiatures.com/images/figurines/mercenaries/mercenaries-3.jpg A nice mini, but as you can see she's riding a horse, so you'd have to do some heavy conversion work.

6. There were some early female soldiers in the metal Imperial Army/Imperial Guard ranges, but that was circa 1988, so they might be a bit hard to get hold of now... I THINK there was also a female trooper in the Gaunt's Ghost range of minis, but I could be wrong...

7. There was a Necromunda special character called Mad Donna Ulanti, but the miniature isn't exactly the picture of restrained elegance one would expect to see from a ladylike Rogue Trader... http://www.gamehobby.net/images/photo_gallery/necromunda/gallery_necromunda_mad_donna_ulanti.jpg

8. You could try doing a conversion from some Eldar/Elf miniatures like the wardancers or high elf mages, there are some nice female miniatures there, as long as you don't mind pointy ears!

9. Er...

10. That's all I can think of for now! I'm sure there are more and I've probably missed a blindingly obvious one, but I hope that helps!

Unfortunately this has been echoed on these and many other boards since Dark Heresy first hit the shelves. Unfortunately GW barely acknowledges the existence of Dark Heresy or Rogue Trader (they just have an add in their books on occassion). I think that a single line of RPG related miniatures does not fit into the GW business model of everyone needs to have huge armies with hundreds of models. Personnally I think they are loosing out on expanding their market and filling the existing produced lines. They probably think that small run lines of a single model type are not within their budget and the business lost to other companies is acceptable. It is sad though, because whenever people start asking about miniatures for their games quite often they are sent to privateer press or another company. (Not talking down about PP, they make good minis). GW could probably expand its specialist line to include a line of dark heresy/rogue trader minis, then they could also start including 40K RPG content every other month or so in the White Dwarf with nicely painted GW figures and terrain. This would probably start bring 40K players into Dark Heresy/Rogue trader and 40K RPG players into the tabletop miniatures. Unfortunately I don't think games workshop really cares about supporting this beyond what they are doing, otherwise they would not have cancelled the line (through black library) after it sold out faster than almost any other RPG in history.

Salcor

Salcor said:

And 2 novels, with more meant to be on the way.

I think this Reaper mini would make a pretty good female rogue trader.

http://www.reapermini.com/Minatures/Chronoscope/latest/50001

There are plenty of mini manufacturers out there who produce excellent lines of female minis. Just not GW. Try Reaper, Hasselfree, some fo the Warmachine ones might be good...

There are some suggestions in this discussion in the Gamesmaster's section:

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=159&efcid=3&efidt=274214

I ended up going with this FreeBooter mini:

http://www.frpgames.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=43898

Got her in the mail today. I told my husband that the only thing she's missing is a hat. Because apparently I'm under the same impression as Captain Jack Sparrow... a good captain needs a good hat.

Ophilia Midkiff said:

Either a hat, like Captain. Jack. Sparrow., or a cool WW2 style trenchcoat like Captain Jack Harkness.

One of my players is playing a female Imperial Navy Intelligensariat officer. I got the female Imperial Commissar model to represent the character, seemed a perfect fit. I think it would work for any female officer.

http://www.blackmoor.ca/gwimpfcommissar1.htm

macd21 said:

In the grim dark future of the 41st millenium, even the frighting commissars have to hike those puppies up and show off their assets!

Graver said:

LOL. It does seem a little... impractical for a commissar to have half her chest exposed. An enemy sniper could pick her off with a shot to the heart and not even have to worry about armor penetration.

Graver said:

It's not just morale she'd be keeping up with those things!

Ophilia Midkiff said:

And that's why the Omnissiah invented Refractor Fields...

Ophilia Midkiff said:

Hey, if Space Marine seargants can run around without their helmets on...

Let's not discuss the impractical absurdities of the grimdark future. Figuring out how the Imperium not only managed to come into existance at all, never mind survive five years, let alone 10k, is enough to give you an embolism. This universe is made of Chuck Norris.

macd21 said:

Well, duh , they're space marines : they wear their helmets on the inside. That other thing is just part of the uniform.

BTW, I offer one cookie for the person who can find an appropriately (or at least not wildly inappropriately) dressed and geared female with a third eye in the middle of her forehead. That is to say, a 28 mm miniature model matching that description.

Romadeus said:

Something tells me you are going to have tocarv in the third eye on your own.

http://www.reapermini.com/Miniatures/Sci-Fi/latest/50115

Cyclops lady with a sci-fi gun.

Carve the normal eyes yourself.

I will be using this Captain mini on the top of page here from Freebooters for my Rogue Trader:

http://www.freebooterminiatures.de/indexeng.html

Edith The Hutt said:

Hmmm... making one or two extra eyes... tough one. I just might have to get some otherwise appropriate model and let the player herself or her boyfriend do the modding. I suspect he's way better at it than me, though I'm no slouch myself. I'm leaning towards the vampire lady from Mordheim, but there were lots of other good looking ones, especially the dazzling Lady Aiyana model from Warmachine. Notice how her hair conveniently sidesteps the entire "third eye" issue. I just might go for that one instead.

Romadeus said:

Master Holt there would make a good mini too... Wonder if he'd be better as an Arch-Militant or Seneschal. Melee attachments on his pistols; how very customized of him.

-=Brother Praetus=-

I really agree that there is a lack of good minis for Rogue Trader .

It really bothers me.

However I did go over to the GW site to fish around for a bit and, low and behold there are some nice figures over there. Hmm who wooda thought Anyhow there are some good one over there.

For example the Missionary @

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat1020005&prodId=prod1140076

or at

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat1020005&prodId=prod1140075

are very nice. In fact, I love them. But ... at $11.500 each... Wow.

In fact there are a lot of nice figures over at...

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/armySubUnitCats.jsp?catId=cat1020005&rootCatGameStyle=

But they are pricey.

While I would like to have those and I do think they might improve my game ... I think for now... I will just have to break out the "green stuff" and modify my reaper minis.

Actually, the complimentary figures from Adepticon this year (abiout 1/3 of the way down the page) would be quite appropriate for Rogue Trader.