discussion Female model representation in Age of Sigmar

[Overread]

1 minute ago, Sartxac said:

Maybe we think similar.

If you read my messages i'm referring only in humans without powers.

Thing is that many races have access to powers. Meanwhile we should not forget that whilst the Realms are still mostly held by the Slaves to Darkness (which itself is fragmented into warring tribes all the way up to cities and nations); the Cities of Sigmar are far from underpopulated. They are vast cities that have huge populations backed up with a powerful farming enterprise. One issue with AoS is that we start the age and very quickly a few hundred years pass without much clear mention because GW hasn't been using a clear dating system. This means humanity has had many generations; even elves and dwaves have had generations grow up without knowing Chaos Blight when they are born and raised within the safe interior of reclaimed lands. 

If anything Cities of Sigmar might even be suffering the issue of overpopulation. If we consider that, through magic, herbs and such, they likely have a similar medical quality of life to what we have today - at least within developed cities. So they might well have issues with populations growing too large for their cities; putting pressure on expansionist programs and thus putting more pressure on the armed forces to take both genders to swell their ranks to provide more to take land from Chaos itself. 

[NJohansson]

18 hours ago, Cayce said:

Regarding representation I would say roughly 50/50 across the entire range, with individual armies having different mixes from all male to all female (including indeterminate).

Why do I think that’s the proper level of representation? Because half the world (roughly) is female, which means half of GWs potential customers are female.

Slightly more than half of all humans are female yes, half of GWs potential customers- probably not. This is a predominately male hobby (we could argue until the end of the world the reasons why but the absolute majority of players are male) and thus there is a clear advantage for GW to cater to the majority of their customers model preferences (big angry looking males with humongous weapons). If GW saw that female models sold better than their male counterparts there would be loads of more female models - they are a business, they produce what they believe their customers want to buy.

[Nos]

1 hour ago, Aeryenn said:

I just want to vote NO. AoS is perfect right now. Throughout human history women played only marginal role in warfare. It's only natural to our biology. It's cool to see armies like DoK from time to time, yet demanding parities for every group that is dissatisfied at a given moment is insanity. It's artificial, unnatural.  Go, create your own wargame and stop demanding people to obey your demands. Just accept their vision or leave.

Not one person has demanded anything in this thread. Not once.

[Overread]

9 minutes ago, NJohansson said:

This is a predominately male hobby (we could argue until the end of the world the reasons why but the absolute majority of players are male) 

Aye, but like I noted above, go back 20-30 years and DnD was predominantly male only. Today its a different landscape. 

Go back 100-200 years and women were excluded from a lot of hobbies and interests.

Attitudes change, hobbies can change their market and already within wargames we've seen women growing in number steadily; its not a night and day change. You won't wake up and suddenly its all different. It's a gradual change and a gradual increase. Its a sign that wargames are not inherently "male" but simply a hobby and passtime that can be enjoyed by both.

[Mattrulesok]

7 minutes ago, Nos said:

Not one person has demanded anything in this thread. Not once.

I wouldn't bother arguing with people like this mate, he called everyone who wants more female models terrorists. 

[Nos]

13 minutes ago, NJohansson said:

Slightly more than half of all humans are female yes, half of GWs potential customers- probably not. This is a predominately male hobby (we could argue until the end of the world the reasons why but the absolute majority of players are male) and thus there is a clear advantage for GW to cater to the majority of their customers model preferences (big angry looking males with humongous weapons). If GW saw that female models sold better than their male counterparts there would be loads of more female models - they are a business, they produce what they believe their customers want to buy.

The best Businesses dont cater for what their audience already buys, they make a product that increases that audience or something so good that *everyone* wants to buy it.  

GW already overwhelmingly caters for its existing audience, but the very existence of AOS itself demonstrates that GW has the savvy to do more than simply keep existing customers happy, or even to upset some of them if the return from new customers is greater. 

It can only go one of two ways:

1) GW continues to increase gender and racial diversity and representation in its releases in line with a more globally, less Euro-centric orientated franchise. If you haven't realised it by now GW have been watching what Disney have done with Marvel liscenses and they have learned very, very well how to apply that accessible  "something for everyone" quality to their existing lines and new products, not just in terms of models but in the broader fiction and associated products. I am almost certain that their intention depending post Covid circumstances will be to have the IP be able to sustain itself without model sales in the next decade.

2) The remaining reactionary elements who didnt leave GW when the Old World blew up but maintain an essentially White Males only attitude to the hobby will bog the community down in a culture war which if they win will see GW's strongest emerging markets abandoning it and leave GW vastly less wealthy or going broke altogether.

Edited September 12, 2020 by Nos

[Kramer]

1 hour ago, Aeryenn said:

I just want to vote NO. AoS is perfect right now. Throughout human history women played only marginal role in warfare. It's only natural to our biology. It's cool to see armies like DoK from time to time, yet demanding parities for every group that is dissatisfied at a given moment is insanity. It's artificial, unnatural.  Go, create your own wargame and stop demanding people to obey your demands. Just accept their vision or leave.

Will you do the same if the new freeguild range will turn out to be 50/50 male/female?  Just accept that vision or leave? 
or would you argue against it? (As you are doing now) 

I don’t agree with you, but apparently we do share a passion for this game. Evidently as we are both wasting/spending our time on this forum. 

I feel strongly about being more inclusive, in this hobbby, my work, in my sports (hockey/skateboarding) and will speak out when the conversation pops up. 
And you should do the same if you feel the other way. That’s what free speech is about. 

but just saying accept the status quo or leave... that means nothing will ever change. From inclusion in the models, in the player base, up to the balance of the game itself. Because it works there as well. Don’t like the points? Go, create your own wargame and stop demanding people to obey your demands. Just accept their vision or leave.

[Kramer]

On a separate note. It’s a shame that the conversation keeps sidetracked. 

the key question was would more female models be helpful in attracting more female players. 
not is it realistic, fit the lore etc. 

To get it back on track,  for me:

I would change the lore so fyreslayers would have female warriors, and bring out said female models. If that would help more female gamers get into the game.

what are your thoughts? 

Edited September 12, 2020 by Kramer

[Cayce]

Just now, NJohansson said:

Slightly more than half of all humans are female yes, half of GWs potential customers- probably not. This is a predominately male hobby (we could argue until the end of the world the reasons why but the absolute majority of players are male) and thus there is a clear advantage for GW to cater to the majority of their customers model preferences (big angry looking males with humongous weapons). If GW saw that female models sold better than their male counterparts there would be loads of more female models - they are a business, they produce what they believe their customers want to buy.

I’m well aware that the majority of existing customers are male, that’s why I referred to potential customers. Both son and daughter were interested in little figures after they saw mum and dad playing with them, but only my daughter was let down by army choice.  We ended up switching from 40k to AoS because Slannesh was literally her only ‘mostly female’ option. (This was back before plastic Sisters).

GW is almost certainly losing other young girls, potential customers who will be around long after the ‘old guard’ of male fans are gone. We all get old and die sometime.

More female representation in figures means more female players, including ones who ask why aren’t there more females figures?  And that will likely mean more female designers, painters, authors and sculptors, and then even more female representation in figures. In some way it’s a chicken and egg thing. The changes we have already seen are likely to lead to more changes, which will hopefully result in a greater diversity of models and creative new ideas. One of my personal favourites is the new inquisitor.

[BrownDog]

48 minutes ago, Kramer said:

On a separate note. It’s a shame that the conversation keeps sidetracked. 

the key question was would more female models be helpful in attracting more female players. 
not is it realistic, fit the lore etc. 

To get it back on track,  for me:

I would change the lore so fyreslayers would have female warriors, and bring out said female models. If that would help more female gamers get into the game.

what are your thoughts? 

Yes definatly. Fyreslayers need a revamp model wise anyway, they have good models but as units they blend way to easiliy into a bland mush. For me a faction that would be cool to have female characters is Seraphone, i've had this character of an old granny skink starpriest in my head for a while. But every seraphone character in the fiction (the few there are) seems to be male presenting and i'm hoping GW can change this.

[Sartxac]

1 hour ago, Kramer said:

On a separate note. It’s a shame that the conversation keeps sidetracked. 

the key question was would more female models be helpful in attracting more female players. 
not is it realistic, fit the lore etc. 

To get it back on track,  for me:

I would change the lore so fyreslayers would have female warriors, and bring out said female models. If that would help more female gamers get into the game.

what are your thoughts? 

I think that you need female armies, but not womens in every army for attract a huguer % of womans.

Furthermore, for the people that thinks that with need more etnic representation in the game, firstly GW need drop the prices because in south america, the major part of africa and Asia the prices of this game are extraourdinary expensive. GW offers the same prices for all the countries that is ridicolous. I undertand this because if in Argentina the prices would be the 50% all the clients of USA and UK will buy their miniatures from this countrys and pay the transport.

But GW must think in this real big problem. In Spain a lot of people buy the miniatures of Lost Kingdom that are better than GW (in appareance because in material are worst) and are much cheaper.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aEI0ZpFqZ8

Sorry because the video is in spanish but you could be the seraphon of Lost Kingdom

Edited September 12, 2020 by Sartxac

[Sartxac]

1 hour ago, Cayce said:

  And that will likely mean more female designers, painters, authors and sculptors, and then even more female representation in figures. In some way it’s a chicken and egg thing. The changes we have already seen are likely to lead to more changes, which will hopefully result in a greater diversity of models and creative new ideas. One of my personal favourites is the new inquisitor.

Could you explain the relation between make more female models and the contract of more female designers, sculptors, etc? Only womens could design fantasy womens? I think that males and females have the same brain cappacities, and i think that a lot of writers of both genders create interesting characters of both genders. 

Wonder woman was created by a male, Daenerys by a male, a lot of male famous manga characters were created by womans (for example the characters made by Rumiko Takashi)...

Edited September 12, 2020 by Sartxac

[Kramer]

10 minutes ago, Sartxac said:

Furthermore, for the people that thinks that with need more etnic representation in the game, firstly GW need drop the prices because in south america, the major part of africa and Asia the prices of this game are extraourdinary expensive. GW offers the same prices for all the countries that is ridicolous. I undertand this because if in Argentina the prices would be the 50% all the clients of USA and UK will buy their miniatures from this countrys and pay the transport.

 

Oh absolutely that's a big deal as well. In a more general sense you could argue that it happens in western societies as well. At least where wealth is not evenly distributed if you compare it to ethnic backgrounds. 

 

13 minutes ago, Sartxac said:

I think that you need female armies, but not womens in every army for attract a huguer % of womans.

 

That's fair as well. And I agree, that's why I picked Fyreslayers because I do like that some armies are just the 'ladz' and in my picture perfect world it would be mirrored by a roughly equal number of armies that are just the 'girls'. And every army in between mixed to a certain extend. So I like Fyreslayers as an example as I could argue it both ways. 

[Mattrulesok]

27 minutes ago, BrownDog said:

Yes definatly. Fyreslayers need a revamp model wise anyway, they have good models but as units they blend way to easiliy into a bland mush. For me a faction that would be cool to have female characters is Seraphone, i've had this character of an old granny skink starpriest in my head for a while. But every seraphone character in the fiction (the few there are) seems to be male presenting and i'm hoping GW can change this.

I'm interested in why you consider Seraphon male presenting? I don't really read much of the lore so I have no idea how they are presented in fiction however I do believe the models to be both asexual and agender as they have no sexual characteristics I can think of and are all just naked with a few bangles and the occasional headdress. 

 

Fyreslayers I completely agree with you and it would go a long way to adding some visual depth to the army. 

[BrownDog]

8 minutes ago, Mattrulesok said:

I'm interested in why you consider Seraphon male presenting? I don't really read much of the lore so I have no idea how they are presented in fiction however I do believe the models to be both asexual and agender as they have no sexual characteristics I can think of and are all just naked with a few bangles and the occasional headdress. 

 

Fyreslayers I completely agree with you and it would go a long way to adding some visual depth to the army. 

From the most recent Seraphon Battletome on one of the few named characters, Lord Kroak

"No Relic Priest is more powerful, or more mysterious, than Lord Kroak. Waves of Azyrite energy issue forth from this withered husk, and his mere presence is enough to slay the weakest amongst the damned. It is believed he is the oldest of the slann, perhaps one of the few who arrived from beyond the stars with the Old Ones at the dawn of history, and that despite having sacrificed himself in battle against the
Eternal Enemy time and again Kroak always returns to continue the great war of the Seraphon. Kroak appears at those moments of greatest need, when fate must be tipped one way or the other. With but a thought Kroak can pluck a comet from the vaults of Azyr and hurl it across realms, unleash blasts of coruscating lightning,
or materialise a host of Starborne warriors. With the battle won he will disappear in a shimmering aurora of starlight, only to re-emerge when fate necessitates it. Some
skinks believe Lord Kroak has ascended to sit at the right hand of the divine Old Ones in death, unwilling to rest until the final defeat of Chaos has come to pass."

Generally they are refered in stories as male. Another example, though not AOS but close, is Total War Warhammer 2 where all the lizardmen voice acters are all very obviously male. And thats fine for when they were lizardmen, but there Seraphon now, things can change.

[Mattrulesok]

17 minutes ago, BrownDog said:

From the most recent Seraphon Battletome on one of the few named characters, Lord Kroak

"No Relic Priest is more powerful, or more mysterious, than Lord Kroak. Waves of Azyrite energy issue forth from this withered husk, and his mere presence is enough to slay the weakest amongst the damned. It is believed he is the oldest of the slann, perhaps one of the few who arrived from beyond the stars with the Old Ones at the dawn of history, and that despite having sacrificed himself in battle against the
Eternal Enemy time and again Kroak always returns to continue the great war of the Seraphon. Kroak appears at those moments of greatest need, when fate must be tipped one way or the other. With but a thought Kroak can pluck a comet from the vaults of Azyr and hurl it across realms, unleash blasts of coruscating lightning,
or materialise a host of Starborne warriors. With the battle won he will disappear in a shimmering aurora of starlight, only to re-emerge when fate necessitates it. Some
skinks believe Lord Kroak has ascended to sit at the right hand of the divine Old Ones in death, unwilling to rest until the final defeat of Chaos has come to pass."

Generally they are refered in stories as male. Another example, though not AOS but close, is Total War Warhammer 2 where all the lizardmen voice acters are all very obviously male. And thats fine for when they were lizardmen, but there Seraphon now, things can change.

I had a feeling it was going to be a pronoun issue. That's disappointing, I do wonder if that is a weird holdover from the old Lizardmen faction. Either way it's bad writing, if your written lore is that these creatures are asexual then they should be written as such, it's basically the same as writing a story about vandus hammerhand (for example) and constantly using female pronouns. 

I do personally still feel that it is a lore issue that needs fixing rather than female seraphon models, as I feel if you code a female seraphon you are now implying all others are male (plus I'm a little worried they'd just stick b r e a s t s* on a lizard) but I respect where you're coming from. 

 

*I can't believe that word is banned by the filter

Edited September 12, 2020 by Mattrulesok

[BrownDog]

19 minutes ago, Mattrulesok said:

I had a feeling it was going to be a pronoun issue. That's disappointing, I do wonder if that is a weird holdover from the old Lizardmen faction. Either way it's bad writing, if your written lore is that these creatures are asexual then they should be written as such, it's basically the same as writing a story about vandus hammerhand (for example) and constantly using female pronouns. 

I do personally still feel that it is a lore issue that needs fixing rather than female seraphon models, as I feel if you code a female seraphon you are now implying all others are male (plus I'm a little worried they'd just stick ****** on a lizard) but I respect where you're coming from. 

Yeah, if they were portrayed as the asexual the point would be moot but here we are. Though I understand your reservation you can have gendered characters without focusing on supposed sexual organs, take Orks and Orruks for example. This all comes from the RPG that came out were when one of the players worked with the dm to homebrew a seraphone (hopefully they come out offically soon) and the question came up. They did end up referring the lizard character as a she.

Edited September 12, 2020 by BrownDog

[Cayce]

1 hour ago, Sartxac said:

Could you explain the relation between make more female models and the contract of more female designers, sculptors, etc? Only womens could design fantasy womens? I think that males and females have the same brain cappacities, and i think that a lot of writers of both genders create interesting characters of both genders. 

Wonder woman was created by a male, Daenerys by a male, a lot of male famous manga characters were created by womans (for example the characters made by Rumiko Takashi)...

More girls enjoying the hobby when young equals to more women aspiring to careers within the hobby.

Women are more likely to question the level of female representation, so their inclusion in creative teams is likely to lead to more female models, regardless of whether it’s a male or female that eventually ends up sculpting them.

Female creatives are also less likely to be limited by ideas regarding the ‘proper place’ of women.

[Mattrulesok]

47 minutes ago, BrownDog said:

Yeah, if they were portrayed as the asexual the point would be moot but here we are. Though I understand your reservation you can have gendered characters without focusing on supposed sexual organs, take Orks and Orruks for example. This all comes from the RPG that came out were when one of the players worked with the dm to homebrew a seraphone (hopefully they come out offically soon) and the question came up. They did end up referring the lizard character as a she.

This model lives in my nightmares

🤣

I do actually doubt GW would design a model this fetishised, for all my criticism of the company I still adore their model designs. 

I'm in a weird place here where my ignorance of the lore (I know basics like spawning pools and the slann dreaming the seraphon into reality) actually improves the experience as I always thought of the seraphon as being completely asexual and agendered hence my preference for just fixing the lore. Which is sad because knowing and investing more in the lore should improve the experience. 

Having said that I'm totally on board with the idea raised way earlier in this thread suggesting gendered seraphon. Skinks are male, sauras are female. would be really cool to make a different type of sexual dimorphism from human, giving the faction a different feel

Edited September 12, 2020 by Mattrulesok

[Azamar]

1 hour ago, Mattrulesok said:

I had a feeling it was going to be a pronoun issue. That's disappointing, I do wonder if that is a weird holdover from the old Lizardmen faction. Either way it's bad writing, if your written lore is that these creatures are asexual then they should be written as such, it's basically the same as writing a story about vandus hammerhand (for example) and constantly using female pronouns. 

I do personally still feel that it is a lore issue that needs fixing rather than female seraphon models, as I feel if you code a female seraphon you are now implying all others are male (plus I'm a little worried they'd just stick b r e a s t s* on a lizard) but I respect where you're coming from. 

 

*I can't believe that word is banned by the filter

I don’t think they’re asexual now that coalesced seraphon are a thing- they have spawning pools which likely needs males and females to work.
 

In my mind though, if you saw a lizard or frog in real life you’re probably not going to be able to say whether it was male if female at a glance unless you had specialist knowledge. Much of the time any difference between male and female is something subtle like the length of the head or the shape of the tail after the cloaca. 

Seraphon aren’t real world lizards, but I’m not aware of any reason why they would be different in this regard. There probably won’t be obvious differences in their shape or their voice. So regarding that Saurus oldblood over there, you’ll most likely need expertise, specialist equipment and a suicidal death wish to determine its gender.

As far as lore goes, it sounds like they typically default to using male pronouns, which is problematic but perhaps not surprising. A mammalian observer probably can’t tell the difference anyway,  in this case considering them male until proven otherwise, and the lizard is too busy trying to eat said mammal to care whether it has been misgendered or not. 

To try and tie this in with the OP- how could Seraphon help with a better representation for female models? The differences don’t translate across particularly well, and giving them typical recognisable (by human standards) female characteristics I fully agree would be terrible. Perhaps something like a different crest shape or size (or colour) might work. 

[shinros]

32 minutes ago, Cayce said:

More girls enjoying the hobby when young equals to more women aspiring to careers within the hobby.

Women are more likely to question the level of female representation, so their inclusion in creative teams is likely to lead to more female models, regardless of whether it’s a male or female that eventually ends up sculpting them.

Female creatives are also less likely to be limited by ideas regarding the ‘proper place’ of women.

Right, so since I am black person shouldn't write white people because I have limited ideas about white people?

Edited September 12, 2020 by shinros

[Mattrulesok]

Just now, shinros said:

Right, so as a black person I shouldn't write white people because I have limited ideas about white people?

No but a room full of straight white men are probably going to write less diverse characters than a room with mixed race, gender etc. 

[Overread]

Mod notice

Ok lets leave out the debate on what different creative people can and cannot create. There is nowhere productive to go there. Leave it that more variety in creative people will result in more creative content for us. 

[Cayce]

21 minutes ago, shinros said:

Right, so as a black person I shouldn't write white people because I have limited ideas about white people?

OK.

I didn’t suggest that males should never create female characters, and I think you know that.

I’m also pretty sure you know that the portrayal (or lack of portrayal) of Black people, by White people, in arts and the media is often criticised on similar grounds?

But, hey, I think you should write about whatever inspires you.

I also think that GW is slowly increasing the ethnic diversity of their models, that this is good and should continue, and that more non-White staff would encourage this, and all for pretty much exactly the same reasons that apply to gender.

 

Sorry, missed the Mod notice while typing. I will stop.

 

Edited September 12, 2020 by Cayce

[shinros]

7 minutes ago, Cayce said:

OK.

I didn’t suggest that males should never create female characters, and I think you know that.

I’m also pretty sure you know that the portrayal (or lack of portrayal) of Black people, by White people, in arts and the media is often criticised on similar grounds?

But, hey, I think you should write about whatever inspires you.

I also think that GW is slowly increasing the ethnic diversity of their models, that this is good and should continue, and that more non-White staff would encourage this, and all for pretty much exactly the same reasons that apply to gender.

 

Sorry, missed the Mod notice while typing. I will stop.

 

You're trying to divert from your point. My point stands. Because you got caught out. Merit should decide, talent should decide. Denzel Washington(who is black) said this, a host of white writers pushed me to write. 

There are other reasons why you don't see more minorties. I won't say why due to the mod notice.