Personally, I recently made an ascended Sister of Battle to try and see if I could get them to be about the same amount of usefulness as a Space Marine. After finding out in one of my other threads that Deathwatch is going to be around the Ascension tier of power, is when I started this experiment. While some might argue that an Adepta Sororitas should not be able to, I thought about taking her along the path of a Death Cult Assassin. Now, this is not saying that I went the way of the normal DCA, more a slightly warped faith into a repenting Sister. That would end up giving the Sister unnatural agility, and if you wanted to do so you could give her best quality synthetic muscle grafts to give her unnatural strength. Which on top of power armor would give them near Space Marine strength. It would probably be harder to get her into the Deathwatch's group like that, but with all the ways you could spin things it can be done.

Even though I put this possibility forward, I ended up creating mine with the Inquisitor ascended career. Which, once 500 extra xp is gained, she would probably get Unnatural Willpower. With a secondary bionic heart, and bionic respiratory system, along with cybernetic senses or auger arrays starts to get near the kinds of implants that the Space Marines have. While I admit it is no where near that of a Space Marine, them having 20 different implants, it does start to get a Sister near that of a Marine's abilities. An Inquisitorial Sister would have a lot more reason to be around the Deathwatch squad, though you might have to spin it in a certain way for a longer confrontation, it is quite possible to do so.

I personally put my Sister in Best Quality Light Power armor, with bionic arms and locomotion. So, she might not be the size of the Space Marines, but I kind of see that as a bit of a good thing. I gave her a Crusader's Suppression Shield with the locks of the Arbite model to hold her Ryza-Pattern Storm Bolter, with a bolt pistol set into the other top corner of the shield using the MIU Weapons Interface.

So, just to make it readily apparent. I'm not saying, "This is the only way you can do it" or "Here's how you can" I am just saying that this is how I could see it being done.

I have never posted here before. I just like to read how other people see the 40K universe and see other DH/RT ideas. I started playing 40K TT in 90 and stopped around 94. It got boring when I could use a few Grey Knights and walk all IG, Chaos, orks., or use a Harliquen Troop and stomp IG all day. I have read a bunch of the novels, played the video games, etc. I do know a bit about 40K, although I don't claim to be the know-all end-all of the 40K world. Why would I want to? It's a friggin' game world. Yeah, I am a 40K fluff junkie, but jeez, it's a GAME! Who cares what it's like to be a female in modern combat? It has no bearing here at all. This is not modern combat! It's people running around in POWER ARMOR shooting rockets at each other. So the only way to kick in a door is to be a man on the modern battlefield, or a space marine? I think we need to get a bunch of people out there space marine blow up dolls so the rest of us can get back to using the game setting for fun. Since DW was announced and the whole "No female characters?" and "Nothing is, or can be, as cool as a space marine" thing started I'm getting bored again!

If ya don't like it, don't use it. If someone wants to use it, get over it. IT'S A GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Macho macho man! I want to be a Natcho man!

Natcho natcho man!

Another thing to think about is that Space marines alto super strong and all still are hard to miss in a crowd even outside the power armor. A sister may fill the Scout type role.

Yes a little less powerful but with different tools, adding a few horde rules to the basic Sister woudl also help in those longer horde figthing campaign.

Eponral said:

First of all, I started out rs 40K Rogue Trader gamer too, never made the jump to the following editions as GW after the sell-out simplified the game to appeal to a different audience. Secondly, I think the idea of making the SOB into female marines would distract from both the Sisters as well as the Marines. Men are physically stronger females and it's odd (and I am restraining my language here) that one would go to great length to give out different stats for different races but not only not do that for different genders (as is, admittedly, the standard for rpgs) but pretend that it does not exist.

Concerning what you said above, if females on average had 10 S pts less than men, SoB probably had Strength Bonus of about 8 with Unnatural S and Power Armour. So actually technology would widen the gap.

But that's just a stale game mechanics argument. The actual question is (and that's a matter of taste) how much one wants to make men and women more or less the same (female space marines?) as opposed to equal (female Acolyte with her own sets of specialization), making her just as useful/powerful/interesting(?) as a SM.

I want to play male Adeptus Sororita! Can't we change the background so that I can? And if I'm not allowed to, that's just sexism!

Just kidding here, of course. ;-)

My point is: my taste isn't to tweak the background to suit a particular player. (I guess that usually only happens if a girl hints a guy to do so to do her a favor anyway.) My taste is: the world is what it is; it's often quite unfair, in fact, but we'll find a niche that suits you, I'm sure.

I guess most guys would find the idea odd to allow for a male Adeptus Sororita if a pal asked for that. But if a girl expresses a desire to play a SM... sigh. :-)

Alex

ak-73 said:

What would it change? Sororitas are women from a storyline point of view but they are still a military wing of a church (read here crusaders of the old that where only men... wait) so in theorie man and women could be Warriors of the church.

There where no women Marines back then, now things are different.

Some people look at the 40k universe as a religion (the crunch/fluff lawyers) that as been around for close to 40 years when women could not be part of fighting units. Now reality is quite different. Women are part of some special unit not because they have the same strength as other in their team but because they have something different to add to a given group of soldiers.

Personally I only allow very mature and good RP players to play cross genders. I my long years of RP I am kind of bored to see cheap RP or even worst of all man in women skin RP.

crisaron said:

I stand to my assertion: few GMs would consider allowing for a male Sororita if a male player would ask. If a gal hints at the desire to play a female Space Marine, guys start to worry how to enable that. A typical male reaction, if I may say that as a guy.

crisaron said:

To be fair, I haven't been arguing mainly on the basis of what the Canon is but mainly an observation on male GMs. :-) And on grounds of personal like and dislike.

crisaron said:

Macho Women With Guns can be fun though. :-) But then again that requires a taste for mindless pulp.

Alex

As for female Space Marines or Male Sisters, it comes down to 'Why?' Why does the player want to play that character.

[Male Sister] Do you want to play this because you want to be 'the exception', because you can't play a female and think sisters are awsome and can't think of anything else to be? or because you like the rules abilities on the SOB class list. If it's #2-3, then work with the player, is there any existing group they could be part of that would fill these reqirements? This is a perfered solution. Could we invent one? If honestly not (and not covering for reason 1) then i'd allow it.

[Female Marine] Do you want to play this because you want to be 'the exception', because you can't play a male and you think marines are awsome and can't think of anything else to be? or because you like being a Geneticaly altered super-solder .If it's #2-3, then work with the player, is there any existing group inserted original group they could be part of that would fill these reqirements? This is a perfered solution...

And right there is the problem. There are no other existing, cannon groups of Females with marine-awsomeness or that are geneticly altered super-soldiers. This means you have to a) invent a new group that is analagys to Space Marines, or b) allow female space marines. Both of these have issues, a) removes some of the 'unique awsomeness' from the marines, by making a second, equal group. The issues with b) have been discussed at length.

Personaly, I'd split the difference and reqire the female player to create a custom chapter so as to preserve the 'male marines' fluff without creating an entirely new group of Imperial Super Soldiers.

I hate to be crude, but really? This **** again? There has got to be a better use for this thread than yet another "you wouldn't allow male sororitas/female marines dont exist deal with it because i said so" slapfight.

ak-73 said >>>

If you make Marines less awesome, how is Mankind going to survive any longer? ;-)

Who says they need to. My favourite story about the Imperium is that it is failing in so many different ways, up to and including Marines whose genetic structure is gradually mutating and becoming weaker. Let the Imperium fall, I say, and let's tell a darned good story with it.

ak-73 said >>>

Men are physically stronger females and it's odd (and I am restraining my language here) that one would go to great length to give out different stats for different races but not only not do that for different genders (as is, admittedly, the standard for rpgs) but pretend that it does not exist.

Statting at gender differences is not so unusual in games, though. If you want to do it you can, e.g. "Social Stigma" for women in a medieval world, etc. If you feel that the strength discrepancy is sufficient to warrant a negative modifier to strength, then do it. It wouldn't take you too long to find some positives to throw in there. And then, after that, you begin to get into cultural variation. Perhaps not the complexity that most people want.

(I on the other hand love that kind of detail and complexity.)

ak-73 said >>>

So actually technology would widen the gap.

In the Dark Heresy engine you would be correct. It doesn't really matter that the facility and the elegance of the Unnatural Attribute mechanic has been debated quite a lot as to its ability to simulate "reality," (even 40k reality), but for sure you're right about the RAW.

With that said, I would question the relevance of being able to "carry the man out," even with the wonky lifting rules. YMMV, of course, but I was ultimately just pointing out that in the field the "awesomez" factor is going to figure less prominently. We can, of course, go back and forwards about this until the cows come home, especially outside of the contrivance of one system or another.

ak-73 said >>>

But that's just a stale game mechanics argument.

It is, however, another feather in the "argubate" and is as relevant as anything else.

ak-73 said >>>

The actual question is (and that's a matter of taste) how much one wants to make men and women more or less the same (female space marines?) as opposed to equal (female Acolyte with her own sets of specialization), making her just as useful/powerful/interesting(?) as a SM.

On my own behalf, the comment was merely that the buffing that occurs to Marines is primarily systemic (with some dubious rules, but YMMV on that one), and one has to give serious consideration as the "modern" tactical facility of half of the stuff that makes them "awesomez."

At that point, though, I'm stopping. I really don't want to go back to the whole female Marines thing.

Kage

Artemasia is correct, I appologize for my continuation of the diviation from the OP's point. I'd add something useful if I could, but I don't know the original RT very well. On the other hand, I think I read in one of the RT threads that the original 1987 Marines weren't geneticaly/cyberneticaly enhanced, and therefore were far more physiologicaly simmilar to SOBs.

First of all,

@Artemesia There's just an exchange of views and not a slapfight, so don't make it into one. I didn't say: they don't exist, deal with it because I said so.

@Quicksilver We seem to disagree at a certain point here: as a GM I don't feel compelled to let players play whatever they want to play. There's limitations given by the setting and when I say that I mean by that the 40K as I imagine it to be as a GM. That's some room for negotiation but that has its limits. So there may not be much room to work with the player, depending on issue (I want my male SM to have an uterus?).

If a female player would by all means want to play something like a female SM, I would probably allow her to be part of an unknown and unauthorized self-created fangirl chapter. Over the millenia there must have been females who wanted to become SM but were never allowed to. So what do the girls do? Band together and form their own unauthorized chapater, salvaging armour parts after battles, studying the tek (heterics!) and fitting armour to their size and so on. They would of course need the help of some dissident males.

And in fact, depending on a mission and given a proper PA, a female could mix with the Deathwatch and not be recognized as a female, for as long as she stays in the PA all the time. :-)

Alex

That's not a bad idea eather Alex, I kind of like that one. It's unauthorized nature helps keep the rest of the fluff intact as well. My strongest fealing about Female "Space-Marineish-things" stems from the fact we're playing Deathwatch. Playing deathwatch and telling a player they can't play a space marine feels to me not unlike playing a Harry Potter game and telling one of your players they can't play a wizard. it just seems to defeat the point of playing that game. Being a Space Marine seems fundimental to the Deathwatch game, and I wouldn't want to deny any of my players that. (Especialy because there is a woman in my gaming group I know can't play a guy to save her life.)

I probably came off as rude and finger pointing when I was really just generalizing in my own way the direction I saw the thread going. I'm not here to cause trouble, but I tend to word things in a way that comes across as antagonizing or confrontational. I don't mean to, I'm just not great with words or at expressing myself.

I think the biggest problem with the gender issue as actually making it into an issue. Maybe it's just because I grew up on movies like Aliens, but I find the girls can kick just as much ass as the boys can, if not more. Strong willed, courageous, incredibly skilled female soldier types are far more appealing to me as an individual than yet another bald space marine saving the princess/day/world/universe. Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell, The Boss from Metal Gear Solid 3 and Ellen Ripley from the Alien series spring to mind.

If you want to stick to the established canon like it's gorilla glue, that's your choice but don't fault others for taking creative liberties with a setting designed around the freedom of creative expression if they find they enjoy it more. You don't have to deal with it. It's not at your table and nobody is trying to tell you it's official in any way. I'm sure if I told the story of my DH character, a ex Sororitas who has since lost her faith and gone on to simply fight for Man rather than The Emperor, I'd make more than a few gallons of blood boil with nerd rage. But our group enjoys her. We all(I hope...) find her character to be interesting and exciting even though we know she's practically an impossibility in the "real 40k", but nobody can tell us what we're not allowed to do in the little alternate dimension that has become "our 40k."

Stopping myself while I'm ahead and getting back to the point, you don't need to be a Marine to have a female character in Deathwatch, or even on the same power level as the Astartes to enjoy yourself. Many people have brought up the possibility of playing an Ascension level Sister, or a female Inquisitor, but I think there are many different possibilities for a woman to kick just as much ass as the Marines in her own way. The stats don't have to be high or unnatural, or even combat oriented for that matter, to make a character viable. Even in a game like Deathwatch.

Isn't the canon the whole point of playing Deathwatch? There are literally thousand of other RPGs out there.

To an extent. I suppose a better and simpler way to put it would have been to simply say that nothing I or anybody else who plays these games does will ever be considered official in any way, so why not just have some fun with it?

Howdy!

Didnt we already beat this horse to death...and make glue...and sniff the glue....

Its a RPG, the WH40K world is amazing, but each gamemaster can re-engineer the world and the game as they see fit. In my game Space marines are boys and Sisters are girls. Not because i am a girl hating bigot, but because that is the story. I have 4 females that play in my DH/RT/DW games and two of them are my amazing daughters. My games have opportunities for female characters...Sisters, assasins, inquisitors, etc and for male characters as well, they cant be Sisters. So can we please move on to quessing when the rulebook is going to be out. So either run a canon WH40K or dont, but have fun!

Darq said >>>

Isn't the canon the whole point of playing Deathwatch? There are literally thousand of other RPGs out there.

On the face of things, I would imagine not. As far as I have been able to tell, one of the predominant reasons for people to be using the 40k RPG franchise systems was that they allowed you to play in the 40k universe without really having to turn to one of those "other RPGs out there." After that loyalty followed and, well, there you have it.

The franchise seems to be another component of the "canon" and subject to the same strengths... and limitations.

Artemesia said >>>

To an extent. I suppose a better and simpler way to put it would have been to simply say that nothing I or anybody else who plays these games does will ever be considered official in any way, so why not just have some fun with it?

This is the same argument that, if you will forgive me, dogs just general discussion. I take another stance. Rather than making me powerless, the structure that GW seems to have put into play empowers me to create the universe that I want out of the crumbs that they from the table of their creativity. This means it is my universe and that GW has to live up to my standards.

major shultz >>>

So can we please move on to quessing when the rulebook is going to be out.

I believe that there's another thread for that kind of pointless speculation and posts of "I've got my copy!"

( ^ Tongue-in-cheek. Whatever twiddles your biscuit as to what is interesting, but at the same time I believe that's why we're allowed to have different threads for different topics of conversation/debate. )

Kage

Artemesia said:

Some people's stuff is. The FFG teams characters from their RPG games pop up in the background that's written in the books all the time, and they always seem willing to read up on the game logs/write-ups that I've run, if not other playtesters, for ideas and the like. ****, N0-1_H3r3 started out writing fan-supplements (such as his Tyranid one), and now he's a full-on freelancer writing fairly large chunks of the books I get to playtest.

So... yea, I wouldn't say that "nothing I or anybody else who plays these games does will ever be considered official in any way" is entirely accurate Just post your session write-ups, creature stats, etc, up on the forums (either here, on your own site, or one of the fan sites like Dark Reign), and you might end up getting an e-mail your way from Ross, Sam or Mack

@Kage

Fluff wise a SM's strength and speed would be more than a match for several SoB's in CC. In fact I finished reading a book a little bit back that where 10 give or take Grey Knights take on over a hundred sisters and a regiment of IG. The sisters were nearly wiped out while they Grey Knights only had one seriously wounded. Granted, GK are superior to most SM's but you get the idea.

Sorry double post.

I think it would be pretty cool to write in SoB's into Deathwatch as an attachment or something on a mission.

Quicksilver said:

Lol, hereby I grant anyone the permission to use the idea without giving me credit.

It might be fun if the female player at first would have to pass of as a male and start to develop friendship with the guys and start to earn their respect in battle. The two or three scenarios would have to be of the kind where the female marine wouldn't have to take off her PA, she just shows up at a meeting point on the respective planet, just in time for the investigation/combat. Initially the other players don't even have to be aware that she's a female.

After 2 or 3 scenarios, the female player might reveal her identity to the Brother she feels she can trust the most. Over the course of the next 2 or 3 scenarios he helps her to prepare the rest of the kill-team for one of the most traiterous of secrets. ;-) The players of course have to find some excuse for not reporting this incident - out of respect for the female player.

Anyway, if a female player was bent on playing Space Marines, there is still the option of playing a male Space Marine. Deathwatch is ultimately a man's game, I think. Female players should be aware of that.

Alex

PS I find this taking matters into their own hands -irrespective of what the Imperium might say or think- quite realistic too, given some of the females I know. ;-)

ak-73 said:

Like this is not going to start any trouble...

Ziek

Kage2020 said:

LOL but the 40k universe IS the canon. In the 40k universe Space Marines are men, Adeptus Soritas are women. Space Marines are enhanced 8 foot tall super soldiers, Soritas are elite trained devoute soldiers of the Ecclesiarch. Soritas are not Space Marines, which was the OP's question (I believe).

Now I agree completly that any GM can run his or her game any way they like, but I believe the point of the thread was to determine if Old School Soritas were equivilant of Space Marines.

one may consider the missing 2 chapters - perhaps it was the emperor's attempt with female primarchs (though I also believe it was so fans could create their own legions in the initial release of 40K) which failed - or perhaps it didn't fail and he kept it secret from everyone for his own private use.

Whatever as far as GW (and fanbois say) SM > SoB on all levels (though some may argue skill/training).

It's your game universe so it's up to you.