Index Astartes - Brazen Bears

[Conn Eremon]

Lately, I seem to only have ideas for recreating my humorous attempt at a Space Wolves Great Company into a full-blown, less-joking Successor. Rather than resist, I'm giving into it.

 

Right now, I'm still at the conceptual/inspirational stage of developing it, which I normally work through before posting. Figured I'd change that today.

 

So! Here's what I'm thinking.

 

First of all, the real world elements I'm pulling inspiration from are the Stormcloaks of Skyrim (really just a shameless steal of their symbol), Native Californians, specifically the Miwok (Me-Wuk) and Yokuts people, Spanish/Viking colonization of the Americas, and bears.

 

So let's start with the biggest aspect of this Chapter I'm interested in, their world.

 

What I am imagining is a home world that has undergone a two-stage colonization/civilizing process.

 

The world itself is quite obviously based around California before European contact. The world will have always been a part of the Imperium, but contact will have been virtually nonexistent. There will be oral traditions tell the tale of the Imperium in the form of the First People from Miwok mythology. One of the First People is Ke-lok, a winged giant, and will be used to represent their understanding of Space Marines as the Angels of Death, both before and after full "colonization."

 

This will change in the decades prior to the Dark Founding, when Imperial scrutiny is placed on this world. The world will have been selected for the purpose of becoming the domain of a Space Marine Chapter. For this brief period of the world's history I will be using the Spanish colonization of the Alta California for inspiration. The Imperium not just sets to work proving the world's purity, they don't just get to work building the immense Fortress-Monastery that will soon become the home of the Brazen Bears, but they will also attempt to civilize and convert the indigenous peoples. There's a good reason for why they would do this, if the fact that this world will be used for a Space Wolf successor is already known. It could be a political move, an attempt perhaps by the Ecclesiarchy to influence the recruitment stock in such a way to later influence the Chapter itself.

 

The attempt will be, more or less, unsuccessful. Taking a page from the Spanish missions, the world's population will be relocated to Ecclesiarchal prefab-cities, where pre-Imperial cultures and identities will be buried through indoctrination. Names given at birth are replaced with those prominent within the Creed. I don't see this as a full-blown attempt to truly change the people of this world from one thing to another, but more like an afterthought. A local Cardinal using his political clout to give it a try. Most of the world will be unaffected directly, as much of the intent is to train the few to convert the rest.

 

The point of this is to give the people an antagonistic view of the Imperium, and to strengthen their hold onto their own culture whereas they may otherwise have allowed themselves to be more slowly, subtly changed had it not been so enforced. Basically, with the change being a demand, the people adopt a stubborn refusal to be so influenced. At this point, enter the Brazen Bears. The expectation may have been that the Chapter would continue the plans only begun, but the Chapter does not cooperate. The Bears don't really care. Or maybe they do, but it does not last. I can imagine the earliest days of this Chapter, their founding heroes, leaders and champions, bearing the names of their new home, the sagas of their distant forefathers, and of the endless list of Imperial saints. However, the growing influence the world will have on the Chapter has the efforts trickle away. 

 

One group of the Miwok people have it that the First People became the animals as they themselves were formed into being. While I'm not sure if this group included Ke-lok among their First People, it feels like a good fit to say that the Ke-lok, as in a group, a race, rather than one entity, became the bears of this world. They have lost their wings (Heresy reference?), and so must slumber beneath the earth. The Brazen Bears, then, are the bears back to human form. They are the Ke-lok remade, the First People returned.

 

The intent is not necessarily to have the changes forced upon the population simply unravel and become undone, just to not have it become total or widespread. The changes remain, isolated to where it most took root, those centers of civilization built by the Imperium alongside the Chapter's fortress-monastery. It adds some diversity to the Chapter's home world. While they may all be differing flavors of Miwok/Yokuts, it's not necessarily monotone. There will be those who have not changed from before the Imperium and the Chapter, there will be those who have fully embraced the God-Emperor and the All-Father, and there will be more besides that fall somewhere between the two.

 

As I'm basing it around California, it'll be geographically diverse as well. Heavy forestation will be common, though, with large, sequoia-like trees providing that surreal element a lot of 40k worlds have. But there'll also be arid, desert regions, separated from the river-laden valleys by long, tall mountain chains, surrounded by coastlines that can be cold and fog-heavy or tropical and sandy. Like Fenris, the world will be volatile, prone to earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. 

 

The secondary aspect is the approach to the Space Wolves' genetic curse and how to overcome it:

 

Which won't be overcome. No, the point of the Brazen Bears is not to fix the Wulfen curse but to accommodate it, work around it. There will be genetic manipulation, but in order to circumvent the Space Marine's prodigious biological tolerance. The big thing will be by way of one of the less talked about aspects of what it means to be a Space Marine, their heavy use of chemicals and hormones automatically injected through their own armor.

 

The Brazen Bears will rely on these chemicals far less than other Chapters, for the genetic manipulation will make them more susceptible to their effects. The full chemical/hormonal cocktail commonly used among other Chapters could cause potentially lasting harm to a Brazen Bear if used to the same extent. The purpose being a different, new concoction created specifically for this Chapter, their suits modified slightly to provide a specific aspect of its ability to diagnose the physical well-being of its occupant.

 

While suited up, a Brazen Bear that begins to exhibit signs of the curse, and the signs will be interpreted very liberally, their power armor puts them into a chemically-induced coma state, by way of triggering the sus-an membrane. These Marines are awakened only when returned to the home world, and only when analysis shows the curse's threat receding.

 

Is it feasible to have warriors suddenly collapse in the midst of battle? Most definitely not. It will cost the Chapter much. Is the process foolproof? Not at all. The deep caverns below the Fortress-Monastery are filled with those who should never be allowed to awaken, their bodies left emaciated and wasted, in effect buried alive. And those older Bears, who have lived for centuries, their bodies slowly rebuilding the tolerance those of their kind are normally awarded from the beginning? Not always do the cursed fall, but will charge and rage, necessitating different, often permanent means.

 

At the moment, this is it. The Chapter's home world and gene-seed. Hopefully I will turn this into a full article before the end of May. ^_^

 

And full disclosure: The Brazen Bears are a Space Wolves successor. Full stop.

[Olis]

And full disclosure: The Brazen Bears are a Space Wolves successor. Full stop.

Oho, braving taboo waters like the old Sons of Sköll, eh?

Then again, you've had this one on the back burner, so it's an old decision anyway.

[Conn Eremon]

Monday, June 27th, 2011, 8:24:08 PM

 

When I look at the properties for a folder named "02. Brazen Bears Chapter," that's when it says it was created. :lol:

[Grand Master Belial]

I guess that answered my question about why not make them a Great Company of old and skirt the taboo.

 

There is a lot of thought in this and it sounds like California weighs heavily as well since there is a bear on the flag.

 

Where do you plan to go from here?

[Olis]

Hmm. I wonder what the colour scheme will be?

[Grey Hunter Ydalir]

I was thinking a ruddy brown, Brazen always makes me think of brass and the colour I associate with bears is always brown, despite knowing perfectly well of black bears and polar bears, brown is a bear colour. Unless you're thinking Koalas, in which case don't. They're bad tempered but with only the ability to maul you and wail in your face. Not a good spirit animal for a Space Marine.

[Conn Eremon]

Been toying with the colors for a while now, and I'm still not settled.

 

Brown is involved, but I'm still not sure how prominent it will be. I haven't decided between a ruddy brown, as GHY guessed, or a dark, dark brown. The former I think of as a secondary color, the latter the dominant color.

 

Brass is involved as well, because brazen (right again, GHY). For the final color, I've been considering a blue-grey. Something closer to the 30k Wolves than 40k, but a clear carryover.

 

Here's the only image I currently have, which is not the final decision:

http://i.imgur.com/8Ks2m3q.jpg

 

As for what I plan to do from here, the Chapter cult and organization are next on my list to tackle and explore, which should help me fully wrap my head around this Chapter and lead to the full article.

[Conn Eremon]

Alright, time to get onto the next bit.

 

First off, the home world has been named. Going for something similar to the White Scars home world, there is an Imperial name and a native name. As far as Imperial cartography is concerned, the planet is called Altamont. It is said that the discoverer (undisclosed name of an unknown era) named it for the mighty mountain ranges reminded him or her of the mythological home of griffins. There are no griffins on Altamont, it's just the in-universe inspiration. I'm borrowing one of the more wild (as in mostly disregarded) theories behind California's name.

 

Those maps are the only real source of the name Altamont, though of course many outsiders who know of the world will think of it as Altamont. No "Altamonter" thinks of themselves as such, for instance. But unlike Choggoris, there's no unified name that all the peoples of Altamont have agreed upon. As an example, the Hokits Valley Halidom, one of the native groups to most embrace that brief period of Imperial indoctrination and, by virtue of the associated leap-frog technological and societal advancement (late medieval period), also one of the largest, populated group to share in a single, unified cultural identity, refer to the world as Hokit, from which they have derived the name for themselves and their Valley Halidom.

 

The Brazen Bears Chapter will have their own name for their home world as well, different from Altamont but no differently determined. The Brazen Bears called the world Skograud, struck as they were most of all by dense forests filled with trees of such heights as to hide an entire Titan Legio beneath their canopies. The Skraelingi, the people of Skograud, were initially seen as weak. Their lives were not filled with the same level of hardships as where they had come from, and the peoples were not as warlike as they wanted. This first impression was quickly proven false, when their imported Chapter serf-settlements received strong resistance from the Skraelingi. Those settlements that survived did so only because of their technological superiority, and at times because of Space Marine intervention. Out of respect, and an already growing native influence within the Chapter, full-scale serf colonization is abandoned and existing settlements are relocated and restricted to predetermined locales.

 

However, this won't mean that the Brazen Bears Chapter home world is Skograud either. Over time, rather quickly, the planetary diversity will spread to the Chapter just as thoroughly as overall home world influence tends to. They may call the world Skograud. They may call the people Skraelingi. They may speak with one tongue. But at some early point, those things become nothing more than code-words and battle-cant, a shell that covers almost as many different place-names and languages as there are Marines of the Chapter. The content of the article will try and make this clear, but for the purpose of classification "Altamont/Skograud" will serve the same purpose as "Mundus Planus/Choggoris."

 

I still have more to talk about with Chapter beliefs and organization, but it will have to wait. For now, I have a civil war to watch. :wink:

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good work thus far. Don't forget to explain WHY Space Wolves gene-seed is used, and HOW this Chapter managed to avoid alerting the the Administratum to the fact it's descended from the Space Wolves. Did the pre-Heresy Wolves establish a recruiting center on this planet? Did the Wolfbrothers found it before the High Lords ordered the Chapter dissolved? Is it the cliche "Cursed Founding Chapter"?

[Conn Eremon]

I won't be putting exhaustive explanations forward, those questions will largely remain unanswered. It's not really a case of them being too hard to answer, or not wanting to, I just think the finished article will stand stronger if it doesn't spend too much time rationalizing.

 

There are openings in the lore however, that at the very least blur the hardline typically given on Space Wolf successors. Officially, the Space Wolves Legion has only been divided once. The Brazen Bears are not a division of the Space Wolves Legion. In Black Library works, the Wolf Brothers were the first and only attempt at creating the Space Wolf Successor force that would encircle the Eye of Terror. The Brazen Bears have no affiliation with that plan. The Wolf Brothers were officially disbanded by the Inquisition for the same genetic defects the Brazen Bears will suffer. The Inquisition is not a singular, monolithic organization that responds to all things the same way. No knowledge is available on any potential canon later Successors for the Space Wolves. The majority of canon later Successors are of unknown descent. There is no reason to use such risky gene-seed. There have been Foundings that focused upon experimentation.

 

And so on and so forth. Some rationalizing will be put forth, but by and large the article will take a lot simply as a given.

 

As far as their home world and founding:

 

Altamont/Skograud will have no known prior contact with this gene-line. It will have been part of the Imperium for a long time, but as a sidenote planet. Part if the Imperium solely because at some point someone said "this is ours," and from then on a single name was added to the ever growing list of domains.

 

The world is selected because of its suitability and because it is a blank slate. It allows the Imperium to insert an additional level of manipulation, through the very societies from which the Chapter will eventually recruit from.

 

For their Founding, it will not be the Cursed. But I may still go with the cliché and pick the Dark Founding. What I do know is that the Bears lie in the middle of a path that begins with the Wolf Brothers and ends with the Sons of Sköll. A path that begins with a failed pure creation and ends with full genetic experimentation. The center of that path, cultural manipulation coupled with minor experimentation with pre-existing genetic markers, will produce the Brazen Bears.

 

And while I won't spoil the ending, I fully understand that both ends of that path were failures in the eyes of the Imperium. The Bears won't be the exception.

[NightHowler]

I like fresh ideas for ways around the canis helix, and the suit idea is great! It's the kind of one-off thing that makes a chapter unique. I also love the amount of thought you put into the planet and the people they recruit from. The level of detail is great. Can't wait to see it develop. I'll probably have more in the way of constructive Cristian as it gets fleshed out.