The second DIY Chapter I created at the B&C was the Accusers. Actually, that might be an accurate way of describing it. The Accusers may have existed. Or maybe they didn't.

My goal with this chapter was to explore some of the preconceptions of the community. At one point, the size of the 2nd Founding was set in stone, as defined by the Apocrypha of Skaros. Though many hobbyists tried to shoehorn their DIY chapter into that founding, conventional wisdom was generally to avoid the 2nd Founding. As Games Workshop continued to develop the lore, however, it became apparent that the true size of the 2nd Founding was larger than we once thought. Still, some hobbyists persisted in advising others to avoid that founding. Given the plausibility of additional, and possibly unknown, 2nd Founding Chapters, I decided to experiment.

In addition, I wanted to use a presentation method that was very different. Often, hobbyists present their DIYs in as factual a manner as possible, with Index Astartes and similar articles providing a relatively objective description of the Chapter. Even when in-universe ambiguity is incorporated, the information is generally sufficient to develop an understanding of the chapter. What I wanted to present, then, was a series of events that portray how the supposed Accusers Chapter may or may not have existed. The story was presented in serial installments, inspired by the side story in The Anphelion Project. I got carried away at one point, tipping the scales in favor of the likelihood of the chapter's existence; but I'll leave it to you to figure where I did that (when I post that installment).

Of course, anyone that has read the original discussion has a good idea of what I was trying to achieve, as well as the evolution of the concept from inspiration to narration. Other members of the community provided a lot of very good feedback that helped me to significantly improve the quality of the work. As usual, however, there were those that tried to persuade me to follow their method for developing a DIY even when I was very clear on the front end that I didn't want to do that. One interesting development, however, was that another member of the community contacted me on the side and we worked our DIYs into a synergistic whole. We never revealed how we did this, however, and I won't tell you who that was or the name of their chapter.

I could see collecting a small force of this chapter, perhaps a kill team or combat patrol. If I ever dip my toes into the Horus Heresy setting, I may fudge that a little and present this chapter in the context of the Scouring (or perhaps later, but not in the state of being that you'll see here).

Overall, I found this to be a very challenging project - much more difficult than typical DIY chapter creation.

For your viewing pleasure, here's a picture of one of the original sources of inspiration for this project:

No, I'm not saying that image represents the Accusers Chapter. However, I did "borrow" the color scheme for my own project.

The various installments of the story I developed for the Accusers will be posted as subsequent blog entries. I won't post all of this as an article because I don't think that format works in this case.

The Mystery Begins

Forgery!

The Hidden Meaning?

False Interpretation of the Namis Arkaid

Homecoming

Echoes in the Warp