User blog:TheRedScorpion/Musings on The Codex

This is part general observation part invitation to introspection. I honestly haven't been here that long, but approaching the various individualy realised chapters from the various writers here (thanks for posting them by the way, I always enjoy seeing how other people interpret things), but one thing strikes me as standing out. Of all of the various chapters I've read about, none of them seem to follow the Codex template even remotely. Infact most of them ally themselves with aliens, fight wars with the inquisition and seem to buck the trend of being dutiful soldiers, little more than horribly competant and supremely complex weapons.

Now, let me explore this thought a bit...

If Everyone is Special...
What makes a concept appeal to you? It's worth thinking about, why do I like the red scorpions? Well, they've got a bad ass colour scheme, the Charcoal grey is set off realy well by the mustard yellow and red. Plus, forgeworld do some beautiful kits that I can sell kidneys for the privilage of owning. (Not my own kidney, stupid! - RS) But mostly, I read a short story in Beta Anphelion about them. The Scorpions arn't a terribly "fashionable" chapter in the in-universe sense of things, they arn't the Great and Glorious empire builders like the Ultramarines, they arn't the Long-lived master craftsman super models like blood anges, they arn't as angry as the Templars, not as furry as Wolves, not as Drizzt-Do'Urden-in-40k as the salamanders. (They have black skin, red eyes and white hair, as well as being horribly... nice... to everyone... think about it.. -RS) So, if they're not unstoppable badasses with twenty thousand battle brothers like the templars, or... killers like the Grey Knights or Wolves well... why bother with them?

The answer, as it so often is, is a bit complex. Part of the answer is that they have something that alot of the other chapters lack, heart. They're of an unknown founding, atleast six thousand years old and don't know the source of their geneseed. So far, pretty generic right? Well they follow the codex like fundamentalists, believe the emepror was a god, believe in the most puritanical monodominant view of the universe (The human form is perfect, to stray from it is unthinkable heresy -RS), they stoicly slog from battlefield to battlefield doing their duty without any of the bells and whistles... and... that made me fall in love with them. These guys are heroes, they are Astartes, weapons created by the emperor to conquer the universe, only now the emperor is out for the count, the universe is frothing with traitors, aliens and herestics and the scorpions are just one chapter among many. It's this very sense of dogged determination against odds that seem to heavily stacked that gives the Space Marines their soul. They arn't the billions strong Imperial Guard with more tanks than they know what to do with, they don't have the God Machines of the Legio Titanicus. They are the rifleman, alone with his courage against all the horrors of war, taken to it's logical extreme, and... it is an extreme. A space marine is a power armoured boltgun-weilding fearless, gene enhanced super soldier beyond anything ever concieved outside of this universe, pitting the greatest human against a galaxy of frothing madness is what makes them awesome!

There is an old expression in engineering that applies to creative writing as much as so anything else. You build your first draft, say what you want to say, how you want to say it. Then you read it, and strip out everything in there that you don't need. The same is true of creating Space Marine Chapters...

... Less is more. I think what first made me love the Scorpions was this idea of 300 of them, fighting for their survival day in, day out. This isn't a last stand for them, this is buisness as usual, those damn Xenos arnt going to kill themselves are they? I know they eventualy rebuild, but the rebuilding is incidental, they don't think their heroes, their just doing their job.

Thanks for reading.

-RS TheRedScorpion 23:44, July 27, 2011 (UTC)