No one in 40k talks about who their parents were or if they have children.

+++++But sex has to be a big deal to them still? Because they're somehow lesser without the need to **** every now and then?+++++

Well, like I say, would you want to be a Space Marine if it meant giving up your sexuality?

My default position is that Marines sole purpose is to be as attractive as possible to fourteen year old boys (and men trying to recapture the feeling of being fourteen year old boys).

Maybe characters who don't do that soppy stuff ARE most attractive to that kind of person. I remember at the time thinking it was odd that every book had to take time off from the action to insert a sex scene. But even then I'd have thought that the ideal is where it just doesn't come up, rather than characters who are nervous and confused about the subject.

--

And quite apart from anything else, I like seeing characters hook up. Even if 40k. I don't know about anyone else, but I am still kinda hoping Eisenhorn and Bequin can somehow make it work despite it all (yknow - her being Untouchable and, er, Brain Dead, and him being an Arch Radical).

AluminiumWolf said:

I wouldn't want to be if I got to keep it - a loss of humanity is worse than a loss of sexuality.

Anyhows, I saw this and felt I had to post it. It is barely relavent to the situation, but it seems oddly appropriate:

http://youtu.be/xfJUi4cB4oc

AluminiumWolf said:

AluminiumWolf said:

Because most probably don't know, or wish to forget. It's 40K, not Sesame Street.

AluminiumWolf said:

I doubt very much that most people would want to go through the hardships and trials to be a Space Marine anyway, only then to live only a life of Service to the carcass of a dying man kept alive by unknown and probably xenos technology powered by the very souls of other mortal beings. Beyond that, you give up everything else, family, friends, homeworld, etc. It seems to be par for the course.

Besides, the reason people like monks and the pope and knights (who were able to have sex physically, but expected to refrain from sullying a lady's honor, or their own) are widely expected not to be sexual creatures is they are held to a higher standard of virtue. They are expected to be a paragon of honor and virtue and duty to a cause higher than themself; they are expected to give their entire life and self to the cause they serve. It's certainly not a matter of castration or saltpeter or anything like that, it's the idea that they are expected to sacrifice everything "normal" to show others what it is like to live in such a pure and spiritual manner.

AluminiumWolf said:

I agree with the younger than that, but even at fourteen, blowing stuff up is way cooler than girls.

AluminiumWolf said:

That's just to give the appearance of a more complex story than what's really there.

AluminiumWolf said:

Who doesn't? Hooking up is awesome! No one here is denying that, and it's cool when human charachters hook up, but Astartes aren't human anymore. Seriously, they spit acid, have two hearts and three lungs and can remember other people's enemies just by taking a bite ot them. Not even their brain, like just a finger. That's not human, and it's not all of the crazy **** they're supposed to be able to do.

I don't know, I see your point that there are some cool story devices that can be used for sexually active Astartes, but they can be for any characther, making them not sexually active closes those doors, but opens an entire different set of interesting story devices that are unique to individuals in the position of Astartes.

But all that "who's sleeping with who" from Once and Future King applies more to a court setting than the battle hardened Deathwatch. Now we've been discussing if it works or not for 7 pages, so we can sorta agree that we all disagree a little?

I asked this question earlier, AluminiumWolf: what kind of woman do you think an Astartes would find attractive?

Lets sum up their characteristics (the Space Marines, not the women).

Transhuman psudo immortals with mental and physical attributes far beyond their mortal kindred, they are probably easily 50, 90 or 150 years old in your DW game, so would most mortal females not be viewed as children in their eyes (the Twilight conundrum)?

Then we have to take into account how they want to be viewed by t heir surroundings, again lets use the Templar and Hospitaler orders, monastic, acetic as I mentioned in another thread the Templars didn't even bathe out of fear of it leading to impure thoughts. These are ideals that most Astartes would want to live up to or at least be seen to live up to, it doesn't mean that they do all the time or that they are emotionless automatons. However their peers will ostracised them, maybe even censure. This of course leads to the hidden romance, the brother trying to get back to her, finding excuses ect. His vow's and oath's being compromised, his loyalty comes into question…

Do you take all of this into account or do you just want your marine to get some cus he's gung-ho?

+++++I asked this question earlier, AluminiumWolf: what kind of woman do you think an Astartes would find attractive?+++++

Used right, sure, but remember MONASTIC!

UncleArkie said:

SPACE WOLVES!!!!!!

:-)

Plus, like I say, even monks have enough sex for storytelling purposes. The Templars were accused of sex worship and homosexuality when they were brought down. Which presumably they weren't actually doing more than any other similar organisation <cough>Catholic Priests<cough>, but it shows what people were thinking.

AluminiumWolf said:

Don't worry about me, I'm the one that brought up that one of the wolf lords is a known womanizer .

Personally I think that it's up to how you want to play and to some extent how the chapters work, the Templars might not be too big one it, wolves will high five and make inappropriate comments ect.

Funny note, the last grand master of the templars, while being strapped to the pyre cursed the French king, the Pope and a few others. All of them were dead within a year.

AluminiumWolf said:

Who says the Marine is particularly sad about it? Maybe he still thinks girls are icky and have cooties, but there's a certain female Inquisitor that has the hots for him. Maybe he's so busy being the popular kid from school he doesn't notice all the girls trying to say hi to him in the hallways of the Watch Fortress, or that some of the female NPC's from the books are competing for his attention. Maybe he really doesn't give a **** because he's just an ******* and that's why they all love him. maybe he loves one of them and is frustrated by his sexless state, and would give anything to go back and undo the things that made him a Marine. You could do an entire campaign just on that one seed. Maybe He's fully capable of sex, but because of his vows to the Emperor he must remain celibite, and fight his desires for someone (male or female) even as he must be in close proximity to them for mission oriented reasons. Maybe he really just wants to be a manho and bang all kinds of strange, but would be ostracized and estranged from his chapter, doomed to be a blackshield or banished or worse. I don't know, ive just been spitballing for the last five minutes or so, but I'm sure if you were imaginitive enough, you could come up with hundreds more interesting things to do with sexless marines. Whether or not they're sexless by choice, by vow or just incapable physically.

That first picture: "It's terrible that my planet's burning and all, but this moment, this moment right now is the coolest thing that will ever happen to me EVER"

Captain Ventris said:

…until the landing, when the mortals skull is fractured due to the impact of the assault marine hitting the ground and her head impacting upon the unforgiving ceramite armor of her "savior".

I swear it's a kink…

We believe you, Wolf, we're just not sure if anyone else shares it

YES. Sanity by George!

Whoops, wasn't clear who I was talking to. Um, that was directed at Lionus' last post

+++++We believe you, Wolf, we're just not sure if anyone else shares it +++++

:-)

+++++Um, that was directed at Lionus' last post+++++

I dunno. Most of his suggestions rely on Marines not actually being sexless as opposed to just abstaining for whatever reason (because if they are genuinely sexless you again can't do anything with them beyond have a Marine reflect sadly on how they will never truly know love), and if you want to go on a quest to get your boner back you probably have to stop being an official Space Marine which isn't ideal if you want to tell stories about Space Marines being Space Marines.

AluminiumWolf said:

Sigh. Ok, well first off, I'm pretty sure I mentioned that that list took me about 5 or 8 minutes to do, and with your imagination, Wolf, I have no doubt you could think of tons more. I did have to go back and reread my last post because I had actually forgot what I wrote, but I remember making sure to make about half of the seeds with the idea they are physically incapable, and the second half was by choice. The reason for that is that is those are the two big theories on sexless Marines. Any of the ones where the SM doesn't really care, it could be for any number of reasons, from genuine disintristedness to a ceremolial snip snip that leaves the individual a few ounces lighter in the midsection. I personally think that with all the different chapters and all the different diversity in how much of the Codex many chapters simply choose to ignore, both occur, as well as other chapters that don't have any particular prohibitions on sexual activity.

One other point I want to make really quick is that sex and love are not necessarily equivilant. Some of the best love stories don't involve sex at all, so to say a Space Marine can't know love just because they either can't or won't have sex is a false equivilancy.

So, another 5-8 minutes of spitballing ideas that only pertain to SM's that can't have sex (or feel love, I guess) because they have been chemically or physically castrated: They are on a mission to protect a diplomat trying to bring an advanced society, newly rediscovered, back into the Imperium. The daugher of the king or president or prime minister or grand emperor or whatever is so impressed she decides she must 'have one'. Maybe this society places as high a value on semen and virility as you do, and it would be a faux pas to deny her, but the man in the black armor with the blue and white U on his shoulder can't get his purlpe headed yogurt slinger into the firing position. Being that Astartes are akin to rock stars, taking a hint from some of your very nice pictures, while on duty manning a station on a populated planet, there will be many normal humans around. Probably some curious female adolescants, who might find a way to sneak a look. When they get caught taking a glimpse at what is(not) beneath the armor, a potentially humiliating situation could arise when word gets out. But would a true Space Marine just kill an innocent child? A Space Marine is captured by Slaneshi agents, and sentenced to slow torture by overstimulation, but how? A particular Marine is known across the Fortress for being not only exceptionally skilled in battle, but also exceedingly handsome. He has a freindly dispostion towards ordinary people, and has become the talk of many sordid conversations and subject of many twinkling eyes amongst the female armsmen and servants. Sooner or later, someone will want to try to cross some lines with him, and how will he handle it? He must maintain his reputation and popularity, but cannot give her what she wants. Almost anything with a Kill Marine could have all kinds of potential. Especially with an attractive female Inquisitor or assassin that they must travel with incognito, or have a cover that they are married or something. Keeping feelings out might be difficult, and there is the pride of all Marines on the line to keep the secret. It has to be a secret, or else we would know it that's true or not.

Well, honestly that was longer that i planned. Closer to 20 minutes. Not being 'gelded' myself, it is kinda difficult to look at the world that way. Challenging isn't something we sould shy away from in our stories though, they will be better if we confront difficult topics and think logically and thoroughly. A parting note, all of these scenario's deal with women. Space Marines won't often deal with women for many reasons, most obvious. If we are really interested in telling stories of Marines being Marines, why do women need to be involved at all? There's been 25 years of Space Marines, with very few mentions of their romantic lives. I suggest, therefore, that stories of Marines being marines really have nothing to do with sex at all, or relationships or most things that we 'normal' humans might take for granted.

Wolf, you're seriously on the verge of being That Guy , when it comes to this (and frankly, I'm being generous, I'm sure others have already gone to that already).

As far as I'm concerned, I really don't care one **** bit about my Space Marine and his entirely non-existent sex life. Because instead of thinking about "how can I get my Astartes laid?" I think about more important things…

Like, "Can my White Scar stand up on the saddle of his bike, manuever his way through this tyranid swarm, and execute a leaping charge from his vehicle at the Hive Tyrant one of his Battle-Brothers is currently having a hard time fighting?" And (more importantly), "how can I properly describe this so that it sounds totally awesome as it does in my head!?"

I, like most people, have no interest in playing out angsty romance dramas between my Space Marine and random mortal women. I have more important things to do. Like saving the ******* Galaxy.

+++++When they get caught taking a glimpse at what is (not) beneath the armor, a potentially humiliating situation could arise when word gets out. But would a true Space Marine just kill an innocent child?+++++

+++++He must maintain his reputation and popularity, but cannot give her what she wants+++++

+++++Keeping feelings out might be difficult, and there is the pride of all Marines on the line to keep the secret. It has to be a secret, or else we would know it that's true or not.+++++

Well, if you will permit me to shift the goalposts again, how does our Marine come out of these situations looking cool ? Running ops and killing people to protect the dark secret that Marines don't have penises is funny , but it doesn't exactly make them look good.

+++++A parting note, all of these scenario's deal with women. Space Marines won't often deal with women for many reasons, most obvious. If we are really interested in telling stories of Marines being Marines, why do women need to be involved at all? There's been 25 years of Space Marines, with very few mentions of their romantic lives. I suggest, therefore, that stories of Marines being marines really have nothing to do with sex at all, or relationships or most things that we 'normal' humans might take for granted.+++++

Like I say, until recently it wasn't really an issue because love stories were not really a thing in 40k.

But here is a post from (someone who is at least claiming to be) Aaron Dembski-Bowden on RPG.net:-

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?615263-Official-Black-Library-discussion-thread&p=15639066#post15639066

(ADB is in bold, quotes he is replying to in italics)

+++++ But I always felt that the Black Library was sorely lacking in material about the greater Imperium as opposed to just the war zones. I absolutely leap on anything they release which is more about the civilian side of life, as it is that part of the setting which fascinates me the most. I've always wondered why they don't release more material of this kind as stuff like Abnett's Inquisition stories are some of the absolute best-sellers.
"Inquisition stuff" is actually seen much the same as "Space Marine stuff" in terms of sales and ease of pitching. Things about those topics tend to run much easier through the process, because they appeal to such wide spreads of the fanbase.

But the lack of civilian stuff really comes down to a few factors: 1) Space Marines/Inquisition are easy sales, which the publisher cares about - because if you only have room for X books each year, it makes sense to maximise sales, same as the way video games, movies, other publishers, work; 2) If you're a full-time writer, you can likely afford to live off Space Marine/Inquisition sales (and much, much earlier than most Sci-Fi and Fantasy authors can make the leap to full-time) but you'd struggle to do that with civilian stuff; and 3) I guess most writers are choosing to write more about Space Marines and the Inquisition because they like that stuff the most? I dunno on that score. My Navigator House love story has been shot down so many times (or rather, subtly suggested as a side-arc in another book instead) that I'm slowly getting a feel for how the pitching process goes. You do reach a point where you say "Actually, I'll do this" and they tend to bend over backwards for you, unless it's sincerely crazy (like "Romeo & Juliet but with Navigator Houses…").

Case in note - I could easily predict that this year's BL bestseller will be 'Pariah', overtaking all the space marines stories by miles…

God, no. It'll sell like a motherfucker, but Horus Heresy novels will always eclipse it by a matter of magnitude. And not that it's a contest (as I love Dan, and sales aren't something I really worry about) but I suspect The Emperor's Gift will come close to Pariah. My name has nothing to do with it, of course. I could be anyone at all. It's just that it has a Grey Knight on the cover. (A cover I'm not a massive fan of, incidentally. Grrr.)

Black Library are going to want their books to be exciting, their target market is probably the same teenagers who are their target 40k market…

Soooorrrrt of. I mean, there are definitely a few writers that I'd consider writing more simplistic stuff, like Young Adult fiction, just from going by their prose. And they're immensely popular. But not all of us set our sights there; it's about writing fiction in the coolest universe there is, not about aiming for a specific age group. Unfortunately, BL will always remove all but the vaguest allusions to sex and leave in all the violence ("THINK OF THE CHILDREN") with the worry that some kid's parents will pick up a book one day and freak out in a courtroom, but it's not as one-sided as that.

F'rex, my Facebook page that I started a few months back has 3,000ish Likes. About 4% of them are in the 13-17 age group. The other 96% are all 17+, with the 25-34 bracket having 45% of the share. All of this is just subject jazz based on my personal perception, but even at GW store book signings and gaming conventions, only about 1 in 15 or 20 people coming up to me is a kid, and most are in their late teens and twenties.

Their marketing department is very, very good at its job, trust me. I think they're well aware of who actually reads their books, but it comes down to Western World caution. Think of the shitstorm if it went public that, say, there were graphic sex scenes or Slaaneshi details in a book sold in a shop that attracts so many 10-14-year-olds. It doesn't matter that it's not written for them at all.

This is one of those things that grinds my gears like nothing else in life.

You know, it feels like Black Library is a cut above other franchise series publishers because some of their books are actually pretty smart and complex, but they're stuck on this "Oh it always has to be in a war zone" thing that holds them back. One of my favourite Horus Heresy books is Outcast Dead, and I liked how the main character was a frail Astropath whose main character arc is dealing with survivor's guilt after being the only survivor on the ship he was assigned to. The entire book isn't set on a war-zone at all, and the best parts are set in freaking Terra of all places.

"Holds them back" is a difficult thing to argue convincingly. Like you, I prefer to stay away from There Is Only War because the setting has much more to offer than that, and the best stuff is off the battlefield. I tend to have far fewer battle scenes in my books than many other authors, f'rex. But… "holds them back" in what way? Sales? Nope. 40K novels make a killing by comparison to most SF&F. Reviews? Well, The Outcast Dead has actually reviewed as one of the worst in the series (which I agree is ridiculous, as it's freaking sublime). Respectability? It'll always suffer from that, because it's fiction in a license, tarred by the foul brush of "Ugh, tie-in fiction." +++++

And, I dunno, if people might want to read Romeo and Juliet with Navigators (

+++++"Can my White Scar stand up on the saddle of his bike, manuever his way through this tyranid swarm, and execute a leaping charge from his vehicle at the Hive Tyrant one of his Battle-Brothers is currently having a hard time fighting?"+++++

Like I say, would you trade your **** for the ability to do that? And if you wouldn't, does that make the fact that Marines have make them Awesome or a little bit sad?

+++++Wolf, you're seriously on the verge of being That Guy , when it comes to this+++++

I dunno. I think someone has to be That Guy on this or people will sleepwalk in to making Marines profoundly uncool and then wonder why everyone is taking the piss.

And if ADB wants to write about romance between Navigators what is wrong with wanting the same for Space Marines? The dude is pretty clearly inserting as many hints to sex as he can get past Black Library in to his books, so why can't some of them imply that Marines are not dead below the waist ?

AluminiumWolf said:

Sure, but compare it to Helsreach, where pretty much every human character with significant screen time pairs off with someone and the Marines are shown to be actively uncomfortable with the whole thing.

(Maybe I am reading to much in to it, but Mr. Dembski-Bowdem's comment on playing SWTOR is

+++++I really like how the girls are playing gunslinging badasses… and the guys are sexually-repressed space monks.+++++

If he thinks the defining characteristic of Jedi is being sexually repressed (and he isn't wrong), I am pretty sure he thinks that being neutered is the defining characteristic of Space Marines.)

--

In closing, the TV tropes page for Rated M for Manly begins with the quote:-

AluminiumWolf said: