I want to change some things about some chapters

[AutumnEffect]

 

7 hours ago, Indy Techwisp said:

 

Well... yeah?
They're not "East Asian" features, they're Chogorian features.

 

There are no humans who live on a planet called Chogoris in the real world. Therefore, we must use descriptors such as 'European', 'East Asian', etc. in order to describe what a person from a Chogoris or any fictional location looks like as a shorthand. 

Doing the literary equivalent of gesticulating and saying 'oh, they're Chogorian' describes nothing. It's only in relation to reality that we can draw meaning. You yourself even use those same descriptors of 'European' and 'East Asian' in describing them, not 'Chogorian', after this opening sentence. I don't understand what saying they are 'Chogorian features' in this opening is meant to accomplish.
 

7 hours ago, Indy Techwisp said:

They're primarily recruiting from the world of Chogoris which from the examples we've seen doesn't actually have particularly strong East Asian features, rather being more like Eastern European features but with a Mongolian/East Asian type of complexion.

 

I have to strongly disagree with this. The White Scars Supplement Codex had quite a few depictions of them with East Asian features. I've included several pictures for reference.

 

 

 

7 hours ago, Indy Techwisp said:

This is pretty consistent across most of the modelled White Scars faces we've seen on the tabletop, while the art varies between having more East Asian features to more Eastern European features but with a relatively consistent Mongolian/East Asian complexion.

 

 

For pre-Primaris Marines miniatures I would be inclined to agree with you, but in my opinion the features of the Primaris White Scars miniatures (The two heads from the upgrade pack and the Kor'Sarro Khan model) have East Asian features.
However, I'll be the first to acknowledge that this is strictly an opinion and it can be hard for subtle features to translate into a 28mm miniature, even without accounting for the subtleties of painting them, so I think that a differing opinion is equally valid.

My point is: with the current White Scars miniatures I don't think it can be definitively stated which features the current White Scars miniatures display.

 

7 hours ago, Indy Techwisp said:

This, of course, isn't helped by White Scars having next to no lore focus in 40k proper and mostly being popular because of the Horus Heresy (i.e. right after the influx of Terran Born marines from actual Mongolia).

 

Do you have a source for an influx of Terran marines from whatever what would pass for Mongolia during the crusade?
I remember Torghun Khan lamenting in Scars that there seemed to be a bias towards recruits of East Asian descent when he considered the era of the Great Crusade to be beyond that, but most of the named examples that we see have been individuals with non-East Asian features such as Toghun Khan himself and Tsolmon Khan.

 

 

My real opinion on the matter is that there's probably a hell of a lot of variation among the peoples of Chogoris. I know there's more than a dozen tribes and nations that have been mentioned, but just from a quick search on Lexicanum we have: Talskars, Khwarezmians, Kurayed, Khitan, Haelun, Szechijak, Huanjan, and Ulg-Zar which I know to just be a few.

I don't believe the people of Chogoris to be a single ethnic monolith which is why I disagreed with the idea of using them as a theoretical example of 'yellow face'.

Edited August 1 by AutumnEffect

[LSM]

On 7/31/2024 at 5:34 AM, Orange Knight said:

I'm sorry, but comparing a science fiction group of charcoal- skinned warriors that live on an ashen volcanic planet to "blackface" is actually offensive to my intelligence.

 

Are the White Scars "Yellowface" now? 

 

The way some of these terms are thrown around is ludicrous, and frankly I thought this forum was better than yet another place filled with racism baiting.

 

I suppose I should reply to this.

 

Firstly, I tried to go out of my way to give the background to this, and to note that it's a personal hang-up due to that background, and not an experience that I expect anyone else to share.

 

I briefly mentioned Raven Guard as what I consider to be a like example (and which I think fits much better than the White Scars). The Raven Guard were given a genetic quirk (in 3rd?) to have their skin become pale and their hair and eyes turn black, while Salamanders were changed (in 5th?) to genetically have "burning red eyes and jet-black skin" due to the radiation of their homeworld. 

 

The difference - for me personally - is that I had no similar previous associations with the Raven Guard, and so my gut reaction is: "oh hey, emo/goth marines."

 

If I had no previous associations with the Salamanders, my gut would (likely) be what (I assume) was intended: "oh hey, these firey/volcanic marines have this neat lava flow effect going on."

 

But I did have a previous association, one which was outsized not just in regards to the hobby, but to media in general. I started painting models in the full breadth of humanity, but also visualising characters in novels as such as well. (For a recent example, Glen Powell is apparently circling a starring role in a Edgar Wright helmed adaptation of Richard Bachman's *cough* The Running Man. I love Edgar Wright, I love Glen Powell, and I rather liked The Running Man. When a friend mentioned it to me I replied "huh, when I read that book I had pictured the main character as black." I'm not triggered, I'm not launching into a rant about the travesty of casting Glen Powell - an actor I love - in the lead role of a book I also like. I just had a previous image of the character, which would have made me look at folks like Michael B. Jordan or John David Washington, if I had been casting. My previous associations effect my current thoughts.)

 

I am not railing against Salamanders having "burning red eyes and jet-black skin", nor am I saying that it is blackface.

 

Just that, due to my experience, the change had negative connotations. Knowing logically what they were going for doesn't take away from my initial experience (upon returning to the hobby) of seeing modern Salamanders painted up (absolutely beautifully) on reddit, and thinking: "wow, that's... not how black people's skin works. That's weird, the artist is so talented, but that looks more like blackface..." And then seeing it again, and again, until I realised: "oh, they changed the lore. That black black skin is on purpose."

 

Not accusing you of anything, this is my experience, I can't shake it, and I don't care for it.

 

(If I ever paint up some Salamanders, they are 100% getting the classic Simon Phoenix look with the bleach blond hair, though.)

 

Edited August 1 by LSM

[Orange Knight]

Blackface has a very particular definition and meaning in society. It was almost exclusively employed for mockery and ridicule. 

 

You've used this term which implies mockery and racism to describe the Salamanders, and directed these offenses at GW and the design of the Salamanders. 

 

I am refuting your take. And I am challenging you on the use of this language in this context.

[AutumnEffect]

1 hour ago, Orange Knight said:

Blackface has a very particular definition and meaning in society. It was almost exclusively employed for mockery and ridicule. 

 

You've used this term which implies mockery and racism to describe the Salamanders, and directed these offenses at GW and the design of the Salamanders. 

 

I am refuting your take. And I am challenging you on the use of this language in this context.

 

There is a simple but very big problem with this.
At no point did LSM say "it is blackface"

LSM said, in every instance (I checked) "This looks like blackface".
There is a very important distinction between saying something is something and saying it looks like or gives that impression.

 

LSM also made it very obvious that he was only applying this term to the depiction of Salamanders as men with European facial features that have black skin. The leap that he used this to 'describe the Salamanders' is entirely your own.

 

I am refuting your take. It reads as a bad faith interpretation of what LSM has said.  Your comments read as if you saw the word 'blackface' and leaped to the defense of an attack that was never there.

 

You stated earlier that you found the use of the term "offensive to your intelligence", which I think was a very poor turn of phase. I think that you should seek to train your intelligence to understand and appreciate nuance.

Edited August 1 by AutumnEffect

[The Praetorian of Inwit]

Imperial Fists are already perfect. 

[DemonGSides]

2 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

Blackface has a very particular definition and meaning in society. It was almost exclusively employed for mockery and ridicule. 

 

You've used this term which implies mockery and racism to describe the Salamanders, and directed these offenses at GW and the design of the Salamanders. 

 

I am refuting your take. And I am challenging you on the use of this language in this context.

 

I think you've quite honestly missed the entire point of what they wrote.
 

[Orange Knight]

No I got the point.

 

He looked at the Salamanders and the 1st thing that came to his mind was "Blackface"

 

[LSM]

3 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

No I got the point.

 

He looked at the Salamanders and the 1st thing that came to his mind was "Blackface"

 

Due to my unique experience. 

 

Which I expect no one else to share. Including the designers. I noted that logically I understand what they were going for, and how someone who didn't have my (very positive) experience wouldn't then make that association. I was not, explicitly, accusing anyone of purposefully portraying the Salamanders as "blackface marines", in the way that Raven Guard are "emo/goth marines".

 

Like... I walk by a Buddhist temple every once and awhile, and there are swastikas in the architecture. I know that the symbol was appropriated by others, and that it has a long and positive history outside of that appropriation. Logically, I know that, and I in no way begrudge Buddhists for continuing to use it in the manner they have spent thousands of years using it. It still brings to my mind other (negative) things, though (as my primary association is not Buddhism, or Sanskrit) and I'd be bewildered if you were likewise offended by me saying that.

 

//

 

To get back on track, thinking about the Raven Guard brought to mind another thing I'd change... or, well, change back.

 

When I was a kid (oof, this is getting me in trouble) the story that I read was of a Corax who, desperate to rebuild his forces as quickly as possible after the Drop Site Massacre, independently tried to hot-house the genetic manipulation of the Raven Guard. Though he knew the risks involved, he knowingly plunged his Legion down that path, and... it did not pay off. The Raven Guard were not able to regain the numbers necessary to do more than small, covert actions, and few of the manipulated initiates progressed into Space Marines. The vast majority were twisted, ferocious monsters, unleashed in secret by the Raven Guard upon their enemies. The gene-seed at large became irrevocably unstable, and the bowels of The Ravenspire howled with tortured screams. At the end of the Heresy, Corax personally put all of these abominations at peace, and then locked himself in his tower, seeking absolution for the horror he had done. When he emerged he was haggard and wild eyed, and left with but one word: "Nevermore." 

 

Now, since getting back into the hobby I've been working my way through (amongst other things) the Horus Heresy book series. I've just finished Legion (having skipped Descent of Angels) and am decidedly in the pick-and-choose part of the series. So I probably won't read whichever books this lore comes from, but from my understanding the Raven Guard's story was updated a bit.

 

Presently, in the lore (I believe), Corax demanded of the Emperor (and received) the tech to speedily make super-marines in order to rebuild the Raven Guard, which worked for a bit, until the dastardly Alpha Legion sabotaged it. Corax would then go on to leave his Legion in favour of a one-man crusade of vengeance in the Eye of Terror, specifically trying to hunt down Lorgar, and becoming some sort of shadow daemon.

 

Maybe the summaries I've read of the newer lore does it a great injustice, but... as someone who holds strong associations of the Raven Guard playing into emo/goth stereotypes, the original story works a lot better for me. The act of the Alpha Legion sabotaging the hot-housing, rather than it being a self-inflicted wound, changes the dynamic a lot. In general, attempting a knowingly monstrous path out of noble intentions, screwing it up to some little benefit and a great deal of hurt to those you care about, and... well, frankly, I always assumed that Corax (in the original tale) had gone off to (try to) commit suicide in the Eye. 

 

I find that more compelling. Though, admittedly, not as much potential for galaxy-wide battle.

 

(As an aside, I loved the one Raven Guard army that WarCom showed off last year, with the Phobos LT having the "running mascara" look.)

 

 

[jaxom]

2 hours ago, LSM said:

Maybe the summaries I've read of the newer lore does it a great injustice, but... as someone who holds strong associations of the Raven Guard playing into emo/goth stereotypes, the original story works a lot better for me. The act of the Alpha Legion sabotaging the hot-housing, rather than it being a self-inflicted wound, changes the dynamic a lot. In general, attempting a knowingly monstrous path out of noble intentions, screwing it up to some little benefit and a great deal of hurt to those you care about, and... well, frankly, I always assumed that Corax (in the original tale) had gone off to (try to) commit suicide in the Eye.

I think a major thing is that Corax doesn’t/didn’t know about the sabotage. Your description fits how he sees events occurring.

 

I’d like to make a new thread to talk more about the mucranoid and its impact on skin tone and painting; but that will be in a fresh thread once I’m home from work.

[AutumnEffect]

On 8/2/2024 at 4:35 AM, Orange Knight said:

No I got the point.

 

He looked at the Salamanders and the 1st thing that came to his mind was "Blackface"

 

 

I have to wonder if you realize just how dishonest you have been in your attacks in this topic. 

 

Everything from missreprenting the points of view of the person you are attacking, to misrepresenting the forum itself as some kind of racist den because of one tame opinion.

 

You won't even do them the courtesy of responding to the long, detailed response they gave.

 

Your behavior in this thread portrays you as equal parts dishonest and cowardly and I believe has done far, far more to shred whatever stock anyone who views it would put in your opinion than what mud you have tried to fling at LSM.

[Beta galactosidase]

 

 

 

On 8/2/2024 at 8:16 AM, LSM said:

 

Corax who tried to hot-house the genetic manipulation of the Raven Guard. Though he knew the risks involved, he knowingly plunged his Legion down that path. The vast majority were twisted, ferocious monsters, unleashed in secret by the Raven Guard upon their enemies. The gene-seed at large became irrevocably unstable, and the bowels of The Ravenspire howled with tortured screams. At the end of the Heresy, Corax personally put all of these abominations at peace

 

 In general, attempting a knowingly monstrous path out of noble intentions, screwing it up to some little benefit and a great deal of hurt to those you care about

 

 

Yeah, Corax makes a decision and then has to face the consequences of his own actions.  This is what I was taught as the rudiment of drama, I think.

 

The other version is that he falls victim to an event beyond his control and we feel sad about it, and that is called melodrama.  I think, maybe it's a different set of terms. the general definition for these on the internet seems a lot less structured.

 

 That's what I'd change about a chapter. A character like corax should be generalizable to ourselves or people we know IRL, or more likely to other gw characters and player characters in the setting.  Primarch Corax would be the space marine who founded one single chapter, the Raven Guard, no separate status of legion, and the events would be contemporary or recent to the setting that games are played in.  That way Guilliman and Sanguinius, also founders of one chapter each, can think "that could have been me" or "I'd never."  More importantly, all homebrew characters could also think it could have or never would have been them.

[Orange Knight]

On 8/4/2024 at 10:48 PM, AutumnEffect said:

 

I have to wonder if you realize just how dishonest you have been in your attacks in this topic. 

 

Everything from missreprenting the points of view of the person you are attacking, to misrepresenting the forum itself as some kind of racist den because of one tame opinion.

 

You won't even do them the courtesy of responding to the long, detailed response they gave.

 

Your behavior in this thread portrays you as equal parts dishonest and cowardly and I believe has done far, far more to shred whatever stock anyone who views it would put in your opinion than what mud you have tried to fling at LSM.

 

Nothing dishonest about not wanting to see aspects of this fictional setting associated with things like "blackface"

 

And I'm not slinging mud at the forum.

 

[Brother Tyler]

We don't need to debate the blackface issue any more ( and subsequent posts that bring it up will be removed in their entirety ). If the nature of the Salamander's skin reminds someone of blackface, that's fair. If others disagree, that's also fair. No one has said that it is literal blackface, so debating the issue is both pointless and non-constructive. Agree to disagree and move on.

 

Speaking of agreeing to disagree, the initial post is an excellent example of subjectivity. @Dark Apostle Thirst presents a range of opinions on various Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes, and my agreement or disagreement with various elements of his post range across the spectrum. I was immediately reminded of an old discussion about the Blood Angels and their vampire theme. Unfortunately, I couldn't find it, but there were a lot of very interesting viewpoints presented therein (I'm in the camp that wants to see the vampirism aspect diminished, focusing on it more as cannibalistic and less as vampiric).

 

I think DAT and I are in agreement on the Space Wolves, the poster children for what I consider to be over-theming. Of course, there are those players that love the wolfiness of Russ's sons, and that's fine, too.

 

DAT and I disagree about the Salamanders, however. While I appreciate the symbolism of the "dragons" (firedrakes) and wouldn't change that angle, I prefer to focus on the Salamanders and the Promethean Cult - workmanship, fire, strength, blacksmithing, hammers. 

 

The propositions about the White Scars (and to a lesser extent, the Raven Guard) are interesting.

 

I disagree with focusing almost solely on the "First Founding" Chapters. In my mind, it's unrealistic to think that the preeminent Chapters are those that date back to the dawn of the Imperium (I'm counting the First and Second Founding Chapters in this). To me, it's silly to think that some later founding Chapters, even some founded in the last millennia, haven't achieved a level of prestige that equals or even eclipses some of the older Chapters (and I don't count the Imperial Fists being replaced by the Fists Exemplar since both were created directly from the VIIth Legion).

 

I also disagree with the notion of changing lore for Chapters. While GW has constantly changed lore over the years, and the lore for many of the Chapters didn't really appear until the 3rd edition of the game, that lore has been around for over twenty years now. I can see it being refined, but outright changing it would disenfranchise some players who might be committed to it (even when other players might think it's silly).

 

Overall, though, this discussion started as Dark Apostle Thirst's presentation of things he would change about certain Chapters. It's bound to be contentious, especially when he "attacks" some aspect that another player really likes about a Chapter. Realistically, we all have our own viewpoint on things and, were we given the chance to re-write things to appeal to our own sensibilities, we would upset a lot of people. While some players might largely agree with DAT's propositions, many others won't. If any of us were to apply our own revisions, however, we would similarly upset a large swathe of people (different people for different reasons). Ultimately, each of us finds different things appealing/unappealing; and each of us prefers different levels of theming (I'm in the camp that prefers more subtle theming). Issues with official Chapters, all of which are only perceived since they are subjective, mirror those that might be found with unofficial/homegrown Chapters, so I'll link to this post, this editorial (about IA articles for non-First Founding Chapters), and this editorial since the points I made in each are wholly relevant here (that and this post is already long enough with me re-typing opinions that I have presented multiple times over the years ).

 

One of the great strengths of this game is the ability that players have to make it their own. The game is deliberately over the top, dripping with atmosphere and attitude. We each see different things that we like and dislike. We all focus on specific elements of Chapters and other organizations, downplaying other aspects that we dislike. That's okay.

[Evil Eye]

Honestly there's not a lot I'd change about any of the existing "major" chapters, especially as most of the really crap fluff and accompanying minis were from mid-to-late 5th and written by Mat Ward (I still find it astonishing he was the guy who assailed us with airdropped landraiders and the entire Grey Knights book considering IIRC he did the writing for Vermintide 1 and 2, which have fantastic dialogue and stories). If anything the big issue I have with modern Marines is that the era of Primaris has gone too far the other way, with formerly bespoke yet infinitely cross-compatible chapter-specific kits being reduced to upgrade sprues for monopose base models (try making a modern Space Wolf kit as customizable as the current Firstborn one!).

 

That said, if I were put in charge of GW (and were able to launch the "line must go up" investors into the sun where they belong) I'd actually be tempted to reduce the emphasis on "canon" chapters. Not to say I'd squat them or make them unplayable or anything silly like that, of course, but I'd shift the focus very much to the older philosophy of encouraging "your dudes". The Space Marine Codex would be a hefty tome that would allow you to make the Space Marine Chapter of your dreams (within the limits of reason and a freshly re-introduced FOC) with rules that would allow you to represent either the FF Chapters or your own homebrew one using the same basic toolkit. There would be sections for playing codex-deviant Chapters and their successors of course, but even these would be very much Your Dudes focused (so more encouraging "this is Captain Marco Santino and his Assault Company" rather than "I have to take Lemartes to get the Death Company datasheets unlocked..."). I'd also be tempted to give the dedicated rules for certain special characters the chop without actually squatting them altogether, or even killing them off at all. Case in point, Tor Garadon, Iron Father Feirros and Adrax Agatone are cool models but probably don't need to be special characters; keep them in the fluff but just have their models useable as builds for existing HQ choices- Tor could be built as a Space Marine Captain in artificer armour with power fist and grav pistol. Generally speaking I don't like the overemphasis on named characters, and one of the few things I think GW is doing well recently is actually giving character kits options.