Warhammer 40k Story Idea

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SketchyFK

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Mar 14, 2010
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I play Orks and I don't know too much about Space Marine lore, just bits and pieces. I suggested the idea of a female (just a little girl) being born into the Space Marines (from one of their leaders) and developing a story from her point of view because, from what I gather there aren't any/many females in their mainly male only armies.

In reaction to this, I was told the idea was "impossible and unrealistic. It shouldn't be done and will just get ridiculed by forums. There are NO females in the Space Marine armies and there never will be, just no and no if."

Is this true? I completely understand that it hasn't been done before but would i get ridiculed for writing it?
 

Rottweiler

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Jan 20, 2008
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Honestly, yes. I'm a long-time Games Workshop player, and the 'why are Space Marines men-only?' question has been around a really long time. GW has been very firm on the subject, and the reason is as follows:

The Adeptus Astartes, or Space Marines, are basically genetically modified supersoldiers who gain their abilities partly due to gene therapies, partly due to special implants grown from material taken from the Primarchs (the original Space Marine leaders created by the Emperor) and in part from intense training and hypno-indoctrination.

From the genetic standpoint, the implants were all created using the bodies and organs of the Primarchs as a template, and in addition those were watered-down versions of the Emperor's own body. All of it came from male templates and was designed for use with males and males only.

Now, of course much of this is a reflection of the time period in which the game was created, and many people over the years have complained- but in a move I respect, Games Workshop has stood firm on the matter over the years.

Mind, almost all the other Warhammer 40K armies have females- and in many armies the females are in charge- so I honestly don't think having one Army being 'men only' should be an issue. Indeed, there is an army which is basically 'women only' (the Adeptus Sororitas, or Battle Sisters) so I'd say the scales are balanced on some level.

As to why your idea, as stated, is unworkable:

Space Marines, in general, do not Breed. The Canon has never come right out and said whether an Astartes has working reproductive organs, but the implantation procedures, training, and the implants themselves tend to indicate that while the body is reinforced and supported for War, non-essential organs (cough cough) were not enhanced or supported at all.

The entire Space Marine creation process is formed around implantation, none of which would be passed on via insemination, so at best if a Space Marine *did* impregnate a human woman the child would be genetically based on whatever the Space Marine was before being chosen to become an Adeptus Astartes. At worst, the sheer amount of physical changes that have taken place in the Space Marine would at the very least render them either sterile or screw up their 'normal' genetics so badly that they probably would not produce a living child.

Now, your story *is* viable in certain ways. Many Space Marine Chapters, if not most of them, have normal humans who work for the Chapter, from Archivists and Clerks to workers in the Chapter Monasteries. Many Chapters choose those servants from the planets they recruit from, and it's also not unheard of for higher-ranked Marines to have proteges or take normal humans under their wing to a certain extent. The thing to remember, though, is that the unifying factor of any Space Marine Chapter is that, at heart, they are Marines. Marines are chosen from a young age, put through horrific training regimens that most don't survive, and when they are finally chosen it's a huge honor. I won't even get into the fact that the implantation processes themselves have been buried in so much tradition that a lot of neophytes die in the process due to unneeded rituals that actually hurt the survival rate of the process.

However, in the end- if you have survived the process and become a Space Marine, that's all that needs to be said. Space Marines all share that beginning, from Scouts to Chapter Masters, and that puts them so far apart from normal humanity that there is a huge rift in understanding between them.

Sketchy, the basic issue you're facing is that honestly, this issue has been tried many times. I am not judging your particular idea, but many...many...previous attempts at this type of story have been, basically, an author trying to change basic Canon in an effort to be unique or tell the story of 'that one, messiah-like exception'. The problem is that once that exception is made, it is an exception that can be used by others, to the point where the exception becomes the rule. And that hurts far worse than it helps.
 

Terminal Blue

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Feb 18, 2010
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Whenever this idea comes out, I always tell people to think of it in narrative terms.

Right.. you have these people who are physiologically altered beyond recognition. They can eat bricks and crush bones with their bare hands, not because they have superhero powers but because they have massive enormous muscles caused by hugely overstimulated hormonal development.

Even if a female version is possible, in what ways is such a character going to be physiologically distinct from a male? They won't have fabulous tits because extreme muscle growth will have distorted the shape beyond recognition, they won't have long luscious hair because it's a liability in combat. They won't have pretty faces because they're going to end up with hundreds of years of battle scars. They won't have babies because they will be locked away in a mono-gendered environment where all they do is train and meditate.

Now, back to the narrative. What does femininity mean to such a creature? What makes such a character in any way 'female' in body or perspective? I'm sure there could be ways of tackling that which would be really interesting and possibly even quite poignant, but in all the time I've been reading other people's 40k fiction I've never once seen it done in a satisfactory manner, because what people want is not 'female space marines', but 'superpowered girls with guns'.

Make of that what you will.
 

Aurgelmir

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Nov 11, 2009
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Another reason:

You are not "Born Into" the Space Marines, you are recruited from the chapters recruitment planet. And then go through all the gene therapy and such.

I think this is why GW created the Sisters of Battle, to have "Female Space Marines"