The ever dastardly Graham and I play many different games set in the world of Warhammer 40k, and for someone as tactically challenged as myself, simply keeping a tally of wins and losses holds little interest.
Instead, we combine the multitude of different games into a flowing narrative campaign. This stops things from getting stale and lets me concentrate on being creative, rather than cursing my ill luck and general lack of tactical nous.
A Brief History of Time
There was a time long ago, when space marines were space marines and demons were just a figment of the imagination, so don’t worry your pretty little head about it. Known as the Golden Age of the Imperium, it was a time when the mighty Emperor of mankind was less ‘throne-bound’, and got out and about the galaxy a little more, leading His demigod sons the Primarchs, in their quest of inter-galactic genocide.
However, it all started to come undone the day the Emperor realised that He had left the oven on, and had to rush back to Terra to attend to it, leaving His favourite son Horus in charge until He got back. Horus was brought low by an envenomed blade and started to hear voices from the Warp. The daemonic susurrations told him that the Emperor didn’t even posses an oven! And was actually going back home to the adoring fans, gaining all the glory while His sons did all the hard work.
Horus did what any right-minded son would in such a situation. He plunged the whole Imperium into civil war, sending it into a catastrophic downward spiral from which it would never truly recover.
In the wake of what become known a the Horus Heresy, the space marine legions were disbanded and sub-divided into smaller chapters, so that no-one would be able to wield such power ever again. One such space marine chapter was the Iron Eagles, formerly of the Raven Guard legion, which is the subject of our story.
Betrayal at Ardera IV
In the aftermath of the Horus Heresy, mankind was still plagued by the myriad hostile aliens (no rest for the wicked and all that!) On the agri-world of Ardera IV, an Ork Waarghhh! was gaining impetus and simply had to be stopped before the green tide scoured the planet clean of all humankind.
Ardera IV was a planet within a sector of Imperial space simply chock full of agri-worlds, exporting a plethora of produce to feed the Imperium. Ardera’s main export being that of oils and chemicals derived from triffidicus plants. These six-foot tall carnivorous plants, were not only able to walk, but could fire a stinger out around seven to eight feet, allowing them to incapacitate their prey. On the plus side however, they contained an oil which could be refined to create many useful fuels and chemicals. It was said that a quarter of a billion lho sticks were lit every minute thanks to triffidican oil.
Triffidicus plants were by no means the only indigenous species upon Ardera IV which was inimicable to life. When man first set foot upon her, the planet was simply teeming with strangler-vines, exploding spore frogs, spine-shooting cacti and much more besides. After a century of cultivation however, the flora and fauna become manageable enough to sustain a colony of thousands of triffidicus ranches.
With the ork incursion, came much upheaval. Vast swathes of land fell into the greenskin hands which were left un-managed, allowing the triffidicus plants to break free from their ranches, to seek food (of which in the aftermath of the fighting, there was plenty to spare!) In their wake the death forests started to reclaim the planet. The orks had to be stopped and to this end a vast imperial crusade was sent to Ardera, including a battle group of the Iron Eagle space marines.
Framing the Conflict
I’ve laid out some battle dioramas on my BattleCry game board (complete with new frame to stop it moving around) This creates a pictorial story which will give you an idea of how we combine different games to forge a narrative and push the story along…









So what in the name of Terra were the Iron Eagles doing conferring with the enemy?! Will the recon troops bring word of this treachery to the Imperial defenders? Only time will tell…
I love this kind of narrative framing! Nice dioramas!
Thank you, I’m glad you found it of interest 🙂
Your compact back story should be made official immediately. 😀
Ha! thank you, I’m glad you enjoyed it. I’m very much trying to add a little comedy to my 40k gaming, I feel GW are getting a little too serious about their mythology these days.
Fun! I think having a little story and linking games together sometimes makes the whole experience more fun.
It certainly does when your as tactically-challenged as myself!!? I’m definitely not playing wargames for the win! 😛
I find playing to win is the path to madness. Not that you shouldn’t live by the maxim, ‘In Victory Malice, in defeat Revenge!’ but that goes without saying.
I also like to create characters so I lame the blame squarely at their door! 🙂
That is an excellent plan and one I’ve adopted as well: If I’m victorious it is due to my expert leadership. If my forces fail then it is the fault of my worthless forces and bumbling sub-commanders.
Loving the Epic stuff mate.. looking forward to the New Adepts Titanic us. Great pics
Thanks man, I’d be very interested to see what they get up to with the new rules myself.