How to Make a Good DIY Chapter

[Canew]

It's also important to consider how you will be playing your army. For example, you CAN write fluff that puts, say, a techmarine and other admechs in charge of the army, but if you go to build your force and decide, "Well, I don't like tanks," it's going to be odd.

Don't get me wrong. Sometimes your fluff and your army will not mesh perfectly, but a little forethought will work wonders. For example, if you've already playtested a list full of scouts, deepstriking terminators and assault squads, you might consider fluff that describes your army as a behind-the-lines "sneaky" crew. On the other hand, if you like heavy weapons, you could make them an army of linebreakers or something.

My chapter is on a penitent crusade after losing half its number to a chapter master who had fallen to chaos (he was later killed by the chapter's current master). When the new codex came out, I found I liked the Sternguard rules, and I always thought drop pods were fun. I also liked scouts, so I built a bunch of squads of them. Right now, my list has nothing but scouts, vets, and one squad of assault marines. It contains units I'll like playing with, but the fluff makes sense, too: loads of new recruits to replenish numbers, supported by a couple of squads of veterans, who were with the chapter from the start, and survived the chaos incursion. I'm doing a "counts as" Pedro Kantor to lead them.

Point is, my fluff evolved to fit my army, and vice versa. Don't forget the relationship between the two.

[Mr. Biscuits]

like others have said fluff wise no chapter is perfect even forspace marines every few victories means some defeats or flaws within your chapter. this can help make your chapter that much more interesting, the dark angels have the fallen, blood angels have the red thirst, crimson fists have rynns world and my own DIY chapter the sons of dorn lost an entire two full battle companies in a crusade to the eye of terror when they completely dissapeared and were spit back out two and a half thousand years later as vile servants to the chaos gods ahead a new dark crusade ahead a massive force of daemons. these little fluff divets add so much flavour and character to your army even on smaller levels.

[daelrog]

Thanks to everyohas responded so far. All advice given has been put up o the first page.

I think I'll add my own input into it now, in regards to a chapter theme.


First of all, there is no one good source to theme a chapter from. Also, keep in mind that a chapter can draw themes from multiple places. For example, you may like Ninjas and you may also like Death-Cult Assassins. Therefore, your Chapter could be themed to fit both Japanese ninjas (THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A CHINESE NINJA!) and also on the 40K Universe's Death Cult. [Warning: Ninjas, as cool as they are, is something used quite a lot. That's why I used it as an example]

Here seem to be the most popular/useful places to draw references...

World Cultures - Though warrior cultures seem to fit Space Marines quite well, there arealso other time periods and ages not known for their wars that could make good chapters too. I won't go listing all the great kingdoms of the past, or all the famed warrior elites of our time, simply so you can find them for yourselves. Space WOlves are a prime example of this.

Animals - Several chapters take on aspect of different animals, mostly predatory. This may affect their appearance, fighting style, and more often than not, color scheme. Salamanders fall under this category.

Strategy - Othe chapters focus around their traits on the battlefield. The Raven Guard for example focus primarily on their stealth and 'lightning fast assaults'. (This phrase is overused). When composing you army, consider whether you plan on using a lot of tanks, a lot of assault marines, no heavy weapons, etc.

Color - Although color is hardly the mmost important theme to use, sometimes a simple noun paired with a color can work, and a unifying paint scheme can really make you Chapters shine.

40k Aspects - As the example used with Death-Cult, the are other factions of the Imperium out there, some with very, very close ties to certain Space Marine Chapters. Iron Hands have close ties to Mars for example.

Other - There are several other things one can use. Don't let these be the only ones. Weapons, mythology, geography are but a few other things in an endless source for inspiration.

[Deadstar_MRC]

Well... I don't know how much help I will really be, but I have some advice that I've found very useful because it can be applied to any army, and helps with one problem I see quite a bit; writers block, or just a general lack of inspiration.

Feel free to cut this down, Daelrog, because I am often long and rambling in my posts without much useful content. It is just general advice, too, not specific to a Marine army, so if it's not what you're looking for I don't mind you ignoring it. Anyway, to business...

Why?
In all seriousness, I find this is the best possible question you can ask yourself when developing fluff for an army. It just helps you generate ideas.

For instance; you've just finished an awesome conversion job on your space marine commander. He looks like he could take on the galaxy all by himself with his heroic pose and massive arsenal. But at the moment he's just a miniature, and you really want him to have a story!

So start asking yourself; Why?

Why does he have that awesome powersword? A gift from a chapter master? A symbol of office? Did he take it from a sworn enemy? Or is it forged from the scales of some ritual beast he has slain to prove himself in some ancient rite-of-passage?

And you can do that for everything he wears. Why does he have his armour? Why is he standing atop a Tyrannid Corpse or Imperial Guard helmet? I'm sure you've gotten the idea by now.

But it works for other aspects. Why is the armour a certain colour? Why does the army feature a lot of vehicles, or lots of heavy weapons? In reality it may just be that you like the models, but try and think of a reason in the 40K world. Perhaps the colour is an imprtant reminder of a duty, a past battle (maybe one of those losses you should be working in!) or a hero of their chapter.

If you're ever stuck working on your fluff, just ask Why? Hopefuly by questioning your army like this you can find the inspiration to develop them into a suitably characteristic force.

Try it and see! Hopefully it helps!

[Demon in White]

Could a mod sticky this? It will hopefully prevent all these 40K newbies coming on and making threads about ridiculously overpowered and unrealistic chapters.

~ DiW

[Canew]

Originally Posted by Demon in White

Could a mod sticky this? It will hopefully prevent all these 40K newbies coming on and making threads about ridiculously overpowered and unrealistic chapters.

~ DiW

Good idea. We'll see how this works for a while.

Stickied.

[Imperialis_Dominatus]

The creation of a Space Marine Chapter is no easy feat. In lieu of my own opinion, I'll simply add a few links from the esteemed Bolter and Chainsword forum. These are absolutely invaluable, and I absolutely encourage anyone who is serious about making their own Space Marine Chapter (or interested in Space Marines at all) to at least read these, if not join the site itself.

First, the penultimate guide.

And a companion article on Organization.

Here's an article on allies and servants and the like, the mortals who aid in the success of the Astartes.

And an article on the numbers of Space Marines in a Chapter, which also goes into great depth on the organization of a Chapter.

A great example of a 'completed' DIY article, Commissar Molotov's own Castigators.

And a God-Emperor awful one (though on purpose and to serve a valuable lesson).

And if I may be so bold, a compilation thread of my own works (though, as the next poster notes, perhaps ill-advised, since a blog would work better... perhaps).

Hope this helps.

[VAMPiRiC MiST]

i would just like to say that this thread and especially those links have helped me greatly