Are Silent Sisters physically augmented?

[b1soul]

How can they take on CSM 1 on 1 in close combat?

 

My reading indicates that they are just really well-trained mortal women...like some deathcult assassins.

[Corswain]

Wargear. I haven’t got the 30K rules with me but aren’t they still S3 T3? It’s the blades and power armour that let them go toe-to-toe with Marines. Same goes for the fluff, I think.

 

I do think there has to be some augmentation but it obviously isn’t as significant as Astartes or Custodes. There are lots of citizens with augmentations so you have to imagine the Emperor did some tinkering. He wouldn’t leave such important soldiers at a disadvantage.

[Kizzdougs]

I'm pretty sure most of the Imperium's elite forces are physically enhanced to some degree, so I imagine that the Sisters would be the same. Maybe not to the same degree as Assassins, but still pretty jacked.

[Charlo]

Yeah I think they have slowed aging and the like at least, the 40k book about them and Custodes seems to imply that some have been around since the Heresy/ Scouring/ Not "long" after.

 

They are S/T3 but they can fight/ shoot as well as a marine with WS4, T4, I4.

 

S3, but the giant swords make them S4 with AP3 or 2 with good rolls.

 

The Higher level ones (such as Jenetia Krole) are monsters too, her especially, she's personally murdered the following for me:

• 2 Thousand Sons Preators + Sehkmet body guards
• Zardu Lyac + Gal Vorbak body guard
• Blood Crushers
• Many Word Bearer Marines
• etc

[Tyrannicide]

Their current models portray them to be like 7 feet tall.

[b1soul]

I could've sworn that in one of the recent BL novels...perhaps MoM...it says they're just very skilled unaugmented women

[Supe robot gangster #1]

I’m sure the aura of uneasiness they would give off due to being blanks would also help to even out any fight the are in. Now wether this affects astartes or not, and if so to what degree, is another question we could be asking.

[Commander Dawnstar]

I’m sure the aura of uneasiness they would give off due to being blanks would also help to even out any fight the are in. Now wether this affects astartes or not, and if so to what degree, is another question we could be asking.

 

Well we know from The Master of Mankind that even the Custodes had difficulty tolerating the presence of exceptional untouchables like Jenetia Krole, and Valerian of The Emperor's Legion certainly noticed their presence in battle, although he found the distraction of combat made their presence more bearable than it was in the quiet between battle. Astartes undoubtedly would've been affected by the presence of the Sisterhood to some degree, but it's obviously difficult to make any kind of blanket statement about whether that aura would be a mere annoyance or something that might put a non-psyker opponent at a genuine disadvantage.

 

While it reflects a desperate situation and less glorious age, one suggestion I can throw out from The Emperor's Legion is that the Null Maidens' overlapping auras and smaller stature left them somewhat well equipped to take down Space Marines like pack hunters rather than looking to face them as equals. They could use numbers to disorientate their enemies and pick them apart, particularly in confined spaces where the Astartes' size was a disadvantage. Those like Krole who were preternaturally skilled or gifted enough to be able to meet Space Marines on even ground and triumph should probably be thought of more as the exception than the rule, with most Null Maidens simply being well equipped and well trained humans with an unreliable ace up their sleeve.

Edited November 8, 2017 by Commander Dawnstar

[b1soul]

I just read Emperor's Legion and I don't think the pariahs affected the Custodes whatsoever in combat. They did moderately affect the GK because they were psykers. 

[Commander Dawnstar]

Mhm, I would agree there. Valerian merely says of their aura that he had "noticed it less during the heat of battle" than when walking through their newly-occupied fortress, but even he says it is "hard to be around them" when in the proximity of a sizeable contingent of Sisters.

Edited November 8, 2017 by Commander Dawnstar

[Corswain]

Emperor may have taken that into account when he designed the Custodes. Not much good throwing into battle together otherwise.

[b1soul]

Apparently, Custodes and SoS are like two peas in a pod

 

They're like Jackie Chan and a female ally, using each other's bodies as shields/weapons and doing acrobatic, choreographed killy moves

[ShadowSwordmaster]

Apparently, Custodes and SoS are like two peas in a pod

 

They're like Jackie Chan and a female ally, using each other's bodies as shields/weapons and doing acrobatic, choreographed killy moves

That is one way of describing it. 

[Marshal Rohr]

Uh, so Custodes have gone from lions fighting on their own, to Jedi mind melded with the psychically blank girls that make people sick by being near them

[Charlo]

Uh, so Custodes have gone from lions fighting on their own, to Jedi mind melded with the psychically blank girls that make people sick by being near them

 

Not quite.

 

Their fighting style is that of the warrior, as opposed to the soldier of the Astartes.

 

However Sisters of Silence and Custodes are/ were the only organisations with free reign of the imperial palace and as such were made to compliment eachother in the fight against the great enemy; Chaos.

 

They of course can work & fight together very well, but weren't explicitly designed with a 1:1 relationship in mind.

[b1soul]

I know it's not that over the top...but when I pictured Valerian and Aleya fighting, I had flashes of this:

 

 

EDIT: I realise the clip shows Jet Li, not Jackie Chan

Edited November 14, 2017 by b1soul

[bluntblade]

Also MoM's synchronicity comes after years of frequent side-by-side combat.

[b1soul]

Has there been any clarification regarding whether SoS are physically augmented

 

As of Saturnine, Jenetia Krole is over two hundred years old (I suppose that could be down to high-quality rejuvenat treatments)

 

But in Watchers of the Throne II, Aleya is dancing through las fire...and in Consequences, an SoS is giving the Primaris captain a hard time with her blade

 

I find it exceedingly odd that these women haven't underdone any augmentation

[Darkwrath121]

Has there been any clarification regarding whether SoS are physically augmented

 

As of Saturnine, Jenetia Krole is over two hundred years old (I suppose that could be down to high-quality rejuvenat treatments)

 

But in Watchers of the Throne II, Aleya is dancing through las fire...and in Consequences, an SoS is giving the Primaris captain a hard time with her blade

 

I find it exceedingly odd that these women haven't underdone any augmentation

Still not mentioned as being augmented in the typical 40k sense, but they're heavily chem-therapied and indoctrinated beyond even Crusade-era marines (according to Inferno). That and their Vratine armour being designed to further enhance their reflexes (however that's meant to work) means that their real 'augmentation' is speed and skill more than anything else.

 

When in their Vratine plate they seem absurdly fast (reflex wise) at any rate. Enough to keep up with or even exceed space marines.

Edited April 25, 2020 by Darkwrath121

[Brother-Captain Gilead]

I think this is just a case of terminology here, I mean as an example I am sure that all of them have had their immune system boosted and none of them have issues with bad eyesight, something we can already do today (vaccines and laser eye surgery). That is already augmenting a normal human, but I doubt we all think of it like that. Now consider that we live in a future with a somewhat lost technological base, but that still had over 20 000 years of technological advancement to build that base which was subsequently lost. It is not really all that difficult to believe that to them an unaugmented human would still be unrecognizable from our point of view because so many of the things they take for granted are things that we haven't even invented yet. A gene-therapy cocktail given to every sister that corrects their eyesight, enhances their reflexes and boosts their immunosystem to a degree that we couldn't comprehend could be like getting a vaccine against mumps is to us. To them eating a hormone-laced pill that enhances their muscle growth and enables their bodies to process oxygen faster to enable longer periods of heightened activity would be like what a gym enthusiast does when adding some protein powder to his drink.

[b1soul]

Imperial Army/Guard troopers are the baseline military humans in 30K/40K...so the question is: Are the Sisters substantially augmented beyond that baseline? 

 

When they cross blades with SM/CSM, it appears that SoS clearly are augmented. Also, consider the fact that SoS keep up with Custodes as their partners in close combat. I can't imagine unaugmented women (or men) keeping up with Custodes in the fury of melee. Makes very little sense. 

 

So I guess the explanation is hardcore chem-therapy and Vratine plate which must somehow speed up the Sisters both mentally and physically. Though I'm not sure whether Aleya was wearing Vrating plate when she operated in the first Watchers of the Throne 

[Darkwrath121]

Though I'm not sure whether Aleya was wearing Vrating plate when she operated in the first Watchers of the Throne

She is, as she notes how her plate was able to soak up most punishment, and she could smell scorched auramite as she used her flamer, so they presumably maintained their traditional plate as best they could over the years.

[MARK0SIAN]

I’ve also wanted to know the answer to this for a long time. It’s not like GW/FW/BL to not give details about how things have been augmented, even if it’s in a vague/esoteric way. But they haven’t gone into much details in the sisters.

 

On the other hand, they’re seen performing feats that rival the custodes, the absolute pinnacle of the Emperor’s gene craft.

 

One that always struck me was not just their skill/speed in battle but their endurance. In MoM particularly they take part in the fighting retreat which goes on for so long that even the muscles of the Custodes are aching and burning.

 

I think we have to assume they’re augmented to at least a similar level as astartes, just in very different ways.

[Brother-Captain Gilead]

Imperial Army/Guard troopers are the baseline military humans in 30K/40K...so the question is: Are the Sisters substantially augmented beyond that baseline?

 

See I agree, but even there that definition has substantial differences. A guardsman drafted from a world that has a relatively high technological base would probably have a better vaccination program compared to a guardsman drafted from a feral world, just because of the fact that one of them was born on a world that has a vaccination program for everyone and the other was born on a world where they might have regressed so that they don't even use iron tools.

 

As to whether the Sisters have even more augmentations than a guardsman from a relatively high-tech world, I would have to say yes. Kind of like the Sisters of Battle, the organization they serve either has a ton of resources or had a ton of resources back in the past and this would be reflected in the different gene and chemical therapies that their members can access. If the Sisters of Battle can be augmented to a degree where their repentia can wield eviscerators effectively in combat without undertaking the complex surgigal procedures that the Astartes and Custodes are subjected to at an early age, surely the Sisters of Silence could have gone through similar proceedings (again, probably more to do with needles and infusions rather than full-on implanting new organs like the do with Astartes in surgical procedures).

[Stix]

Ok, no point to start new thread. Can sister go rogue? Would it be fluffy to have some sisters in blackshields warband? I know they cannot fall to chaos but going "loyal in a less convencional way"?