discussion Female model representation in Age of Sigmar

[Enoby]

2 minutes ago, Frowny said:

Warlock Bombadier: I am unsure of rats genders. Maybe a Skaven player can help me. I always assumed male but that is actually likely my own bias

I'm not a Skaven expect, but I think all skaven we see are male; female skaven are like brood rats. From what I remember, they're bloated and barely conscious, existing to constantly birth the skaven hordes. 

 Someone correct me if I'm wrong here

[Kramer]

1 minute ago, Frowny said:

Warlock Bombadier: I am unsure of rats genders. Maybe a Skaven player can help me. I always assumed male but that is actually likely my own bias.

 

In the old lore all the Skaven were male. Female skaven were hooked up onto warpstone drips and just used as rat baby factories. Which was pretty gross in the stories. So sadly not a shining beacon of equality there. But hey, if correctness has to come from the Skaven lore something is going wrong

 

3 minutes ago, Frowny said:

Chaos Lord on Karadrak: Neutral, armor plates are non-gendered

 

Lord is by definition male: 

From oxford languages: a man of noble rank or high office; a nobleman.

 

 

[Whitefang]

22 minutes ago, Beastmaster said:

Plus, elves are depicted to fight more with speed, agility and magic, and to rely less on strength and size. Which makes female fighters being at the same level as males more believable.

I believe in WHFB even elves’ strength is superior to human?

[michu]

1 minute ago, Whitefang said:

I believe in WHFB even elves’ strength is superior to human?

Yeah, they're stronger but not as resilient.

[Enoby]

7 minutes ago, Kramer said:

Lord is by definition male: 

From oxford languages: a man of noble rank or high office; a nobleman.

You're right there, but I think Chaos Lords and Daemon 'Princes' are an exception. We have female chaos lords (lore wise) with that title (I remember a Slaanesh short story with a female chaos lord who fought Seraphon), and female Daemon Princes (who are not called Princesses), such as the one in the Slaves to Darkness battletome.

 I think Prince and Lord are gender neutral terms in Chaos - more like generic titles. That said, I would love a distinctly female (as in, has a female head option) chaos lord model.

[Maddpainting]

45 minutes ago, EccentricCircle said:

While that is technically true, they are still coded as male, which is what was being counted in the original post.

 

 

Are they coded as males, or do they just dont have wasted extra appendages and more muscles b.c that is what is needed. If you were to made an asexual  bipedal humanoid built for war you would want thicker/bigger bones structure and muscles with no appendages wouldn't you? So wouldn't that look more male than female?

[Enoby]

5 minutes ago, Maddpainting said:

Are they coded as males, or do they just dont have wasted extra appendages and more muscles b.c that is what is needed. If you were to made an asexual  bipedal humanoid built for war you would want thicker/bigger bones structure and muscles with no appendages wouldn't you? So wouldn't that look more male than female?

I imagine they're sexless, but they're coded male in the sense that they're always called 'he' in the stories, as well as being referred to as boyz and ladz. The definition of he referring to a man, boy, or male animal (sounds silly to define but sometimes it's useful)

[Whitefang]

I think we don’t really need to find gender category for the beings that are too alien, too different or just beyond human sanity...

Edited September 7, 2020 by Whitefang

[Beastmaster]

I remember reading somewhere that Warhammer Orks and their accent and behavior were actually a caricature of British hooliganism. So of course they are male. 😎

[MitGas]

Personally I don't care much - if it feels shoehorned in, I'm against it, if it fits, cool. While I do enjoy looking more at women than men in RL 😂, I usually pick male characters in RPGs and the like as I prefer it that way (likely because I naturally identify more with my own gender). Then again I do enjoy female characters just as much in games or other media if they're done well too. I'm pretty ambivalent I guess although i do think that "bad-ass female hero" is in more danger to induce eye-rolling than "bad-ass dude #4498". Might be down to the women I know in life really not being anywhere near that archetype. Guys more often try hard to be bad-ass.

If I translate that to Warhammer, I simply go by my first sentence. A female Chaos Warrior or more historically-driven fighter (like minis from the old Imperium range) feels kinda strange to me (mostly because historically women were not soldiers and hulking brute usually doesn't go hand in hand with woman to me) but female Aelf warriors aren't "off" - might be down to aelven biology where men aren't that much bigger and more muscled than women though or because that is already part of the lore since a long time. Not sure i wanna see female Orruks, ogors and gitz though! 

I think they should take the safe route: Use women where it fits (there's ample opportunity still), don't add too many where it does not fit just because you could and personally I wouldn't enforce a 50/50 mix in general. All-female armies are fine, all-male armies are fine, mixed armies are fine just don't blend everything to a 50/50 quote thingy at which point it would probably annoy people. I also think adolescents wouldn't be happy about it but that might just be my personal opinion - I just think that when I was a teenager, I looked up to cool guys and would rather field said cool guys than "girls". But that might really just be me... Long post, short conclusion: make more female models for those who care, just don't force it.

[Fairbanks]

9 minutes ago, Enoby said:

I imagine they're sexless, but they're coded male in the sense that they're always called 'he' in the stories, as well as being referred to as boyz and ladz. The definition of he referring to a man, boy, or male animal (sounds silly to define but sometimes it's useful)

Would you tell a butch looking ****** that she’s ‘coded male’ to her face?

Sorry, but if we’re gonna play a Game of Genders, asexual is asexual.

[Enoby]

14 minutes ago, Fairbanks said:

Would you tell a butch looking ****** that she’s ‘coded male’ to her face?

Sorry, but if we’re gonna play a Game of Genders, asexual is asexual.

Asexual isn't a gender, it's a lack of sexual characteristics (or a sexuality, though I can't imagine that's what you meant)  the exact definition is "(of reproduction) not involving the fusion of gametes." So Orks are asexual sex wise, but not gender wise (that would be agender)

I did explain why I would code them as male in the post you replied to, and it was not due to their looks. I said I code them as male as they are referred to as 'he' by GW, as well as boyz and ladz. 

To clarify:

The definition of he (pronoun) is "used to refer to a man, boy, or male animal previously mentioned or easily identified."

Orks are referred to as he by GW (look at Gordrakk's description). 

GW refers to Orks as a man, boy, or male animal. 

That is my reasoning.

[Harpo2]

Quote

why only elves and not humans and dwarfs is odd though. How many female Order hero models  in AOS aren’t aelves? 

Do we count Slyvaneth as Aelf?

If not there are 3 Stormcasts hero units, Knight Incantor from the starter set, Astreia Solbright, Neave Blacktalon, Knight-Zephyros there is also an event exclusive models that I can't remember was a fancy Liberator Prime or a Knight Questor who was female.

5 Sylvaneth heroes, Drycha Hamadreth, Branchwych, Branchwraith, Arch-Revenant and Alarielle the Everqueen however you can make it 6 by adding in Ylthari from Ylthari's Guardians from Underworlds (also as side note there are only 3 male heroes in the Slyvaneth line all coming from the Treelord kit).

Not going to count Seraphon because I think all there models could be gender neutral.

Then the only other armies who are not aelves in AoS are the 2 dwarfs Fyreslayers and Kharadron, (though Kharadron could also be a gender neutral army).

Which leaves Cities of Sigmar which have 0 non aelven female heroes, but that is more of how Fantasy characterized the Dwarfs (very traditional in everything they do) and Empire (based on historical all male armies but with a fantasy flair) than a AoS thing.

Fyreslayers could be easily expanded to include female hero units since the faction already has Runefathers and Runesons. Runemothers and Runedaughters would not be much of stretch and could keep to the family feel of Fyreslayers.

Cities of Sigmar are poster child of imagine the possibles of new AoS style sculpts.

 

[Whitefang]

7 minutes ago, Harpo2 said:

Fyreslayers could be easily expanded to include female hero units since the faction already has Runefathers and Runesons. Runemothers and Runedaughters would not be much of stretch and could keep to the family feel of Fyreslayers.

Well though I do want female fyreslayers but their society doesn’t work like that. Their worship of Grimnir makes their culture pretty patriarchal and the power pass from father to son. The female member in the family is called hearth wife or hearth mother, and most of them are not expected to engage in a war.
But there are indeed rumors about fyreslayer queen in the battletome .

[Cayce]

I agree that orks (or orruks) are coded male, both in appearance and in the Battle Tome (or at least the 40k version) which consistently uses male pronouns and unit names... with many variants of Boyz.

Also the the leaders are Nobz. Nob is British slang for the male genitals, hence the term nobhead. Gives a different perspective on the lore regarding the size of Nobz, with bigger being better (and makes me believe Beastmaster is absolutely correct when he says the original orks were based on British hooliganism).

It also reflects the fact that GW historically made some immature decisions, some of which are likely to have alienated female customers, which they are slowly unravelling, but cannot simply ditch or fix without considerable cost (in terms of model lines) and the risk of alienating their existing customer base. It’s a delicate balancing act and I am glad to see them making progress.

 

[Beliman]

2 minutes ago, Whitefang said:

Well though I do want female fyreslayers but their society doesn’t work like that. Their worship of Grimnir makes their culture pretty patriarchal and the power pass from father to son. The female member in the family is called hearth wife or hearth mother, and most of them are not expected to engage in a war.
But there are indeed rumors about fyreslayer queen in the battletome .

I would add that even if there are some arguments for fyreslayers to be only male, we have a female fyreslayer pic (Soulbound) and still they can do whatever they want (infinite realms, new cults,  expanded universe and ongoing narrative,... you get the point).

[Whitefang]

1 minute ago, Beliman said:

fyreslayers to be only male,

Oh well fyreslayers are still dwarves, dwarven females are rare but do exist.

[Beliman]

1 minute ago, Whitefang said:

Oh well fyreslayers are still dwarves, dwarven females are rare but do exist.

I was talking only about miniatures (Fyreslayers being only males).

[Dukeus]

I really like to paint female miniatures. 

But its absolutly not necassary to have female models in every faction. It has to fit the narrativ of the faction. 

I dont need a brother of battle either 

[Mattrulesok]

5 minutes ago, Beliman said:

 

If fyreslayers get some female models that look like that picture I'm pretty sure I'm getting a new army. 

[Beliman]

14 minutes ago, Dukeus said:

But its absolutly not necassary to have female models in every faction. It has to fit the narrativ of the faction. 

Imho, it should be the other way: all armies should have male and female representation unless the narrative fits. 
Btw, I don't have any problem with male-only/female-only factions, it's a nice touch to any setting to have this type of "exceptions".

[Overread]

2 hours ago, Enoby said:

I'm not a Skaven expect, but I think all skaven we see are male; female skaven are like brood rats. From what I remember, they're bloated and barely conscious, existing to constantly birth the skaven hordes. 

 Someone correct me if I'm wrong here

Indeed, they are basically huge brood mothers, warped in body and used to birth the masses of skaven. Breeding rights, for the males, are a high honour and the females are perhaps one of the most guarded places of any skaven dwelling large enough to have them. Indeed one means to killing off a rival clan is to kill all their brood mothers - no females, no more skaven. 

That said the AoS lore actually introduces a few short bits which suggest that some of the brood mothers might not be as dim as the males would think. That there is some quiet move by some to unite and attempt to exert their force over the skaven people. 

 

Basically with a small change in the current lore book the seed is sown to allow for the potential of a single clan perhaps arising under the command of a female or coven of females, even if she's in the shadows and might never have a model. It's a sign that the lore is malleable, but that it also has some limits. If you force too much change too quickly you can perhaps attract one market, but alienate another. A steady shift and also the acceptance that not everything will be equal within a purely fantasy setting. Some armies might achieve equality, many won't, but broadly over the whole game there will be niches for different players. 

 

 

I'd also note that when we read the story of Mulan, a powerful female role model in a wartime setting, part of what makes it an interesting story is her unique nature and bucking the trend. She doesn't need to found a company of women or lead an army of women or even ensure the army achieves equality. The power of her story is, in part, her defiance and her personal strength of character to rise above the challenges. 

So we could have a Mulan appear in a traditionally male dominated army (or a male equivalent in a female dominated army). I don't think a 50-50 or 60-50 or any numerical target should be part of the structure. Again I'd swing back to consider what is the greater role model - the model or the players/presenters. 

[Kramer]

38 minutes ago, Overread said:

Again I'd swing back to consider what is the greater role model - the model or the players/presenters. 

Irrelevant if you can’t get the players/presenters without the models   
 

 

38 minutes ago, Overread said:

also note that when we read the story of Mulan, a powerful female role model in a wartime setting, part of what makes it an interesting story is her unique nature and bucking the trend.

I agree. And in away it’s always been in warhammer fantasy as well. A few pages back someone asked about female dwarfs, this was a recurring theme in the dwarven stories and a plot line in the end times. The maiden who against the expectations became a warrior. 

[Grimrock]

1 hour ago, Dukeus said:

I really like to paint female miniatures. 

But its absolutly not necassary to have female models in every faction. It has to fit the narrativ of the faction. 

I dont need a brother of battle either 

Just a reminder for everyone on this line, GW is in total control of the narrative of every faction. They aren't bound by some external or historical force that tells them that there can't be female fireslayers or ogors or a group of orcs that present more feminine than masculine. They can and do write the lore however they want and can add new pieces whenever it's convenient. They could release three black library novels over the next few months that mention the inclusion of female warriors in the cities of sigmar and then bam, it's entrenched in the lore and when the models come out it's perfectly natural for the faction. They could encourage the next couple video games to have a female chaos villain and then make her a special character model and the focus of the next chaos narrative arc. The entire game can be shaped and molded however they see fit.

Personally, I'm all for more female representation if it means more people playing the game. 

Edited September 7, 2020 by Grimrock

[Beliman]

44 minutes ago, Overread said:

I'd also note that when we read the story of Mulan, a powerful female role model in a wartime setting, part of what makes it an interesting story is her unique nature and bucking the trend. She doesn't need to found a company of women or lead an army of women or even ensure the army achieves equality. The power of her story is, in part, her defiance and her personal strength of character to rise above the challenges. 

I wrote Mulan as an example. My point wasn't about what makes Mulan interesting, the point focused in a heroine leading a story.

Chose another one if you want and see what it happens. Even take a male-leading story and swap genders, the result will be similar.