Ok guys, I'll be the first to admit i'm new to WH40k as far as a setting, but one of the concepts i'm tackling with my home campaign is the idea of the founding of a chapter of space marines. In my case two of the characters in the game are from a newly founded and as yet unproven chapter of female* space marines. Of course this has made me put a lot of thought of what goes into a founding.

As far as I can read it the very structure of a codex approved chapter is based on marines progressing through the ranks gaining experience over a long period moving from scout to devastator and on up the new marines learning from the storied veterans surroundign them until they themselves are the veterans.. Likewise leadership positions are chosen on experience and merit over decades if not centuries. All of this is completely incompatable with a chapter founding of just implanting a bunch of neophytes and letting them loose.

So in my never ending quest to make the setting work I've come up with the folloowing workable theory. Just as planing for a chapter takes places perhaps centuries before it is actually founded so to must the process of building the chapter. Marine candidates are gathered impanted and given their units color scheme and heraldry but operationally are embedded in small groups with one or more chapters of similar mindset, Usually these chapters are the "parent" chapter or one of it's close successors so the Ultramarines and Imperial Fists would do this a lot. Ideally all of the "child" chapter are put in the same group so they can learn as much about fighting together as they can about fighting.

Over a process of several hundred years while a forge world somewhere readies their own gear and supplies these Space Marines fight as members of their parent chapters in all but name gaining experience and honor. Several more batches occur roughly fifty years apart to increase the chapters numbers. The whole process likely takes a good 300-400 years to complete. A chapter is considered to be "founded" when they are up to full strength and have a chapter master picked and sworn in by a representative of the high lords of terra advised closely by the chapter master and officers of the parent chapter(s). At this point the chapter is free to make it's own way within the parameters set up for it's founding, so in my case said chapter will be responsible for helping to protect, defend, and civilize the Jericho reach.

Does this make sense? Would it work? Is there already contradictory canon against it?

*I really don't want this thread about this and I mostly put it here for disclosure sake in case it come sup int he course of things. i know there have been lots of threads, I know and am very cool with what the core book says, but it happens that I've got players that want to play female space marines (i've also got one that wants to play a Sister of Battle, yes my female gamer quotient is quite high) so I'm accomodating and likewise coming up with in universe reasons for such a thing to exist. The PC's female space marine are essentially part of a pilot program.

I don't think there is much specific canon on foundings other than in the Dark Angel codex for Disciples of Caliban and an old Index Astartes article about the cursed founding. Apparently, the founding of a space marine chapter (or multiple ones) requires the approval of the High Lords of Terra before starting the process.

Ok thanks, I was making sure. The approval process has already happened and now i'm trying to do the nuts and bolts of starting and situating that chapter in the hopes iut will be a good series of plot points for my players.

Since you're not adhering to the Lore too closely anyway you might just have them come into existence in any matter you wish.

Lorewise the origin of the chapters goes back to just after the Horus Heresy - in order to keep chapters to a size that could be countered, the codex astartes was written and the thousands of Space Marines from the first 20 chapters (not even half remaining but still numbering several thousands) were put into chapters 1000 Marines in size. This is one of the reasons that most non-founding chapters stem from the Ultramarines who were left with the most forces due to having been half a galaxy away during Horus' uprising. There have been subsequent foundings, when new chapters were needed and existing chapters stood at 1000 Marine strength. Since they have to spawn from somewhere, as the technology to create new cygotes and geneseed has been lost for millenia, the parental chapter supplies the genetic material for the next generation - indicating only chapters that do very well at the moment can even consider spawning a new chapter. Every Space Marine gets implanted with 2 organs of reproduction, the Progenoids which can be harvested after the battle-brother reaches about 25/30 years of age. These get put in stasis if the company is at 1000 man and no new recruits are needed. One Marine can - theoretically - spawn 2 more, giving a potential of 2000 Marines - If indeed all Progenoids can be harvested, found to be taint/mutationfree, all the Marines survive, etc, etc.

It is thus very unlikely as you noticed, that a high lord of terra says 'let's do a new chapter, get the geneseed stored by chapter xy and let's do this'. If a chapter however has a stock of about 1000 glands there might be a chance that a new chapter might be created - for this conjecture let's just assume about half of those, 500 in total are gifted to the next chapter. Of course you need a structure for such a new chapter - likely made up of men from the parental chapter. The parental chapter master (p-chapter) might heavy-heartedly part from the captain of his first company, and the veteran seargeants of say the third, fifth, sixt, eight and the experienced leader of the tenth. p-1st company captain gets the honor of being newfounded chapter's (f1-chapter) chapter master. He puts his veteran seargeants in charge of some companies and fills the rest of his cadre with other brothers brought with him from the p-chapter. (probably around 200). They get cracking, recruiting neophytes and teaching them - the first decades a newly found chapter will probably not see real combat and train some neophytes. Both chapters will take time to get back to strength but by giving some of the parent's 'live-blood' to the new chapter, they won't have to stumble around blindly and can be showed and taught in the spirit of their fathering chapter.

A bit like bees - two queens in one nest will have either bloody battle (not a fitting example xD) or one of them will take a retinue, leave the nest and build her own somewhere off. Of course she'd have to take eggs from the parental nest with her to make the simile kinda work...

In your case the problem becomes even more muddled up - mutation wouldn't explain enough Progenoids adapting to a female gene-structure, leaving willfull manipulation (unlikely current, since technologic knowledge has been on decline for tenthousand years). It might be possible that deep under the emperor's palace on terra a vault has been discovered, containing the experimental strain of a genseseed tailored for female genetics. Founding one or two chapters from these will pose a unique problem: Finding the Spacemarines willing to teach them. The high-command of terra might get a couple of techpriests from Mars (female Magos Biologis preferably) to learn and subsequently oversee the growth and implantation of organs for a female chapter (likely taking more than one generation; the geneseed would first have to be implanted into a testgeneration, in order to cultivate more geneseed and the organs planned for implantation. Then there'd be a need for some more Marspriests, that could create the armour - Space Marine Armour has been in their chapters for 10.000 years or even longer, going from battle-brother to battle-brother and besides the new MKVIII there have been no new models fabricated in ten millennia. Adeptus Sororitas wear Power Armour, albeit not as sophisticated as the ancient suits the Astartes field. Your new experimental chapter might get equipped with Sororitas armour, upgraded and possibly ciombined with parts of the MK8, integrating the neurological link that distinguishes the Astartes Power Armour from those everybody else carries. That would also mean a black carapace for your ladies, hopefully included in the recovered Progenoids. Let's say that after about 200 years the implantation-process can be carried out successfull, and you found some Astartes, willing to teach the girls, it is more likely that most of their structure and teachings come from the Sororitas, who might be less weary of the new battle-sisters. In this scenario there'd be a generation of battle-sisters that grow up being led by some Sororitas, and a handfull of Astartes, willing to teach them. They'd probably slowly get towards full strength then, so your estimate of 400 years I'd agree on, to find and train enough candidates to get the chapter up to strength.

Well this is me all over the place, thinking of one possibility to solve your problem. If you've read this far... you should probably go catch some fresh air now to think clearly xD
Anyways, all the best and hopefully you find a satisfying sollution ;3

Eh thanks but like i said I really didn't want to get into a thread about female space marines. I've decided it's happening or rather happened by the time the campaign takes place as two of the members are veteran enough to be selected for the deathwatch. My question is any of that stuff about members of one chapter seeding to another actually based on any of the literature/lore/canon?

I am working on the assumption that space marines can over the course of their lifespan produce several progenoids harvested every 40-50 years or so and one set that's only harvestable upon death without certain side effects. This for me strikes the right balance between Space Marines quickly dying out due to battle losses, mutation, and failure of the process to take in Neophytes and a dramatic/thematic need for the recovery of geneseeds to be a priority.

Secondly I chose the model I outlined in part because I can't wrap my head around Space Marines changing chapters, like ever.

Thirdly founding happened far after the Horus heresy, there have been at least 20 or so by my understanding. Occasionally the high lord's of Terra do authorize a new founding.

I'm presuming that Space Marine's being the perfect warrior knights will be a lot less concerned about the candidates gender vs the viability of the process that creates them and whether or not something goes haywire in the first few hundred years of life.

Likewise I'm presuming the chapters of space marines will train who their told to train.

However since I should elaborate the whole backstory for the Chapter basically hinges on a Inquisitor woman coming to the conclusion that female space marines might have merit, the exact details I havn't actually decided but it's something she was able to prove enough on paper in order to convince the High Lords to authorize a founding which helped as she'd already got the Ultramarines chapter master on board with the plan. There was plenty of back room dealings and other twists invovled but that's for my players to learn. It's now just over a hundred years later and the PC's are the first of that chapter to be galavanting out into the wider empire outside of the main group attached to the Ultramarines. Of course some secrets refuse to remain buried.

Why do you care about minor details like the inner works of a founding when you have female Space Marines? -.-

lurkeroutthere said:

I've found the best way to incorporate female Space Marines without too much fuss is to just assume that they have always been there. In most Legions (later Chapters) roughly 10% of the Astartes were female. Some Legions/Chapters have a higher percentage (we run the Blood Angels as having almost 20% females), while some have less (we have the Imperial Fists at less thant 5% females and the Black Templars are even more unusual in that they do not recruit females at all). Within the Chapters, their gender is largely ignored, and they are still referred to as "brothers" when the familiar terms are used. This is easy enough to edit into the setting whereas creating special circumstances that focus on the uniqueness of a "new" group of female Space Marines seems more jarring.

As regards training up of the new Chapter, it's possibly unlikely that Chapters as busy and vaunted as first founding ones are involved in that part of the creation. Instead, I see that as more likely to fall to 'lesser' Chapters and/or the Mentor Legion.

Siranui said:

Yes, good point. The mentor legion writeup in the original WD article doesn't explicitly mention that they engage in chapter formation, (they were more military consultants and weapons testers) but it absolutely makes sense that this would be their prime duty.

(Unless of course you prefer the recent retcon, in which the Mentor Legion are an aloof and distant chapter who steer clear of other marines. Which is totally at odds with the (very good) original concept for them. I prefer the original concept.)

LockLock said:

Because I'm running a campaign where a founding is in the process of happening, the fact that it happens to be a founding of female space marines chapter is the largest deviation i'm making. However as far as a change it's a plot point, not a huge galaxy shaking matter. I thought about and just discussed doing an handwave retcon to have female space marine's always have been in but decided against it for various reasons.

@Siranu: I wasn't even aware of the Mentor Legion, from what I've now read ont he Lexicanum they sound about exactly what I was looking for, thanks!

There doesn´t seem to be any definitive canon regarding the nuts & bolts of raising a new chapter. Merely snippets in several codex, books, magazines and internet articles. So this is my take.

A chapter is not raised in isolation but as part of a founding of several chapters. These new chapters are either meant to replace lost chapters (destroyed in battle, lost in the warp, gone rogue, turned traitor, suffered a geneseed degeneration or any other chapter ending disaster…) or to place a Space Marine presence in a particular region.

Founding a chapter is a huge endeavour. Several organizations and departments are involved as the necessary equipment has to be built, a suitable home world or chapter space station has to be found, a fortress monastary established, a chapter fleet built etc. etc. etc.

If the new chapter has mutated geneseed, it will require a cadre from a similar chapter (e.g. Blood Angels geneseed would require a Blood Angels cadre to teach the new chapter how to cope). If it is to be a specialist chapter it will require a cadre from a similar specialist chapter (e.g. a new close combat chapter will receive a cadre from a similar minded chapter). If the new chapter is a generic codex chapter, any other codex chapter can provide a cadre but most likely there will be some connection (e.g. a chapter with ultramarine geneseed with receive a cadre from another ultramarine geneseed chapter). And unlike existing chapters who need to rely upon geneseed recovered from dead marines or handouts from the Adeptus Terra to rebuild numbers, the new chapter will have its full allotment of geneseed. It only needs time to grow its Space Marines.

The cadre will consist of officers, sergeants and veterans. Their task will be the train the new chapter, provide its initial leadership and establish the chapter’s character and first traditions. And yes, Space Marines do contribute cadres to new chapters. Much like modern and historical army units do. Perhaps Napoleon’s Imperial Guard is a good example. The (Old) Guard Grenadiers often would provide a cadre of experienced officers and NCO’s for newly raised regiments of Middle and Young Guard regiments. These would be ambitious and capable officers who were blocked in their career progression in their parent regiment as there are only few senior positions and therefore are willing to transfer as it meant an immediate promotion and the chance to shape their own regiment.

As it has often been stated that a depleted chapter needs centuries to rebuild, it seems more than likely that a new chapter will also need a few centuries to reach full strength. I’d say that such a new chapter will have several ‘scout’ companies at first, to train the influx of neophyte space marines and to expose them to light combat so they can gain experience without suffering crippling losses. As the number of fully fledged Space Marines increase, these additional scout companies will be transformed in line companies until eventually the new chapter reaches its authorized strength.

As to your female Space Marine chapter, I’d go with a different setup entirely. As GW categorically states there are no female Space Marines and you have circumvented this for your game with a pilot project, I’d run with that as the central theme. Your female Space Marines could be a test case, a small experimental company to determine the viability of the female geneseed rather than a fully fledged chapter. This is also in character for the WH40K background where mutation of geneseed is a great concern. I am sure the High Lords and the Inquisition would first want confirmation that female Space Marines are as loyal and genetically stable as their male counterparts before creating a full chapter.

Thus it is up to these female Space Marines to prove themselves worthy. And because they are few in number, they have been attached to the Deathwatch to operate as kill teams (this would involve some handwaving to explain their lack of experience typical to Deathwatch teams, perhaps you should lower their stats and provide them with less formidable opponents at first).

This allows your players to create the traditions their chapter will eventually hold dear and to be personally responsible for the creation of a female chapter or the failure of the entire pilot project. Add a few crotchety veteran male Space Marines training them whilst grumbling about the end of all civilization with armed women running around, some Sisters of Battle to provide their own experience and rival organizations to oppose them all and you have a dynamic game setting. And if you initially dress them entirely in black like black shields, they can even design their own future heraldry and chapter colours…

Yea, telling the girls they need to play weaker characters because don't you know their less experienced would totally go over well. But then again we're getting into exactly what I didn't want to get into, Thanks for the inputs all, I'll be going with the mentor legion idea and just kind of press forward with the rest of the stuff as needed. Ideally the kill team player characters will have a hand in selecting a new homeworld in the Jericho reach and be involved in other itnriguees relating to the inquisition and other bits.

Actually, you could go with a hybrid of Ranocles' and Siranui's ideas on who would actually be assisting in the founding of the new Chapter. You could have a core of senior Mentor Legion officers and veterans, assisted by Apothecaries and veteran sergeants from a Chapter which bears the same first founding legion geneseed as the new Chapter.

And just to further extrapolate on the Mentor Legion's role in all this, if the true purpose of that chapter is to oversee Space Marine Foundings, it does explain both their name and their Commander's Auditore Imperator status. Cammander Ran-Thrawll is described in the original White Dwarf article as having travelled to Terra for a personal audience with the Emperor on more than one occasion, making him one of only two characters in the entire 40k canon to have officially done so (excluding Custodes and unofficial visitors like Jaq Draco.) Even Marneus Calgar and Dante haven't met with Emperor personally...yet Ran-Thrawll has. This suggests he is a figure of great importance in the setting.

It follows logically that if the Mentor Legion are responsible for setting up new Chapters, they would need to be a completely loyal Chapter themselves, with extremely close links to the Terran hierarchy...perhaps even more so than "enforcer" chapters like the Minotaurs.

And to follow this chain of reasoning further, one imagines that in the "downtime" between overseeing Space Marine foundings, the Mentor Legion carry out alternative roles as military consultants and weapons testers.

Page 13-14 of RoB is basically dedicated to describing a founding in general.