Editing The 13th Black Crusade (section)

==Meta==

The 13th Black Crusade is literally where the "clock" stopped in the Warhammer 40,000 for more than two decades and several '''editions''', before a new management decided to move things forward ''finally'' for 8th Edition.

There have been two differing outcomes for this Black Crusade as far as lore goes -- one from the Eye of Terror Campaign, and the one for [[Gathering Storm]], the latter of which became the new status quo for the setting.

Humorously, the latter actually still treats many of the beats of the Eye of Terror campaign as canon, just as long as it doesn't contradict things outright.

===The Eye of Terror Campaign===

Back in Third Edition, GW ran the "Eye of Terror" worldwide campaign to determine the outcome of the war. Going by the numbers of the battles sent in (admittedly not a tamper-proof measure), the forces of Chaos actually won the ground war, and the Imperium won the space war, since this was before GW had the "fuck our customers" mindset, they actually did wrap up the 13th Black Crusade...

In the 18th issue of their Battlefleet Gothic Magazine.

Yep, the major event that the whole setting stops at was wrapped up in an issue nobody bought (so a lot of people thought it never ended). Abaddon's fleets (including the Planet Killer and a Blackstone Fortress) were crippled and he and his generals were stranded on a dozen worlds. They continued to win the ground war on most planets, including Cadia, but even if they did capture those they'd be left stuck without any way of proceeding whereas the Imperium could just virus bomb the captured worlds.

====Codex: Eye of Terror====
Also around this time was a codex supplement based on this war. While the lore was a pretty basic recap of the opening acts, it did offer some variant armies. While all of them lacked quite a bit compared to the official codices, they offered a nice little variant theme.
*'''13th Company Warband:''' A variant [[Space Wolves]] army focused around the rumored Wulfen. While you lack any of the vehicles aside from bikes, you get a hyper-mobile army that can wade through cover in order to approach the enemy and rip them to pieces with their claws.
*'''Cadian Shock Troops:''' A variant [[Imperial Guard]] army based on the Cadians. This introduces Sanctioned Psykers and Conscripts (here fluffed as the Youth Army corps used by the planet) as well as giving Kasrkin their time to shine. This would also be the first time Creed and Colour Sergeant Kell would be statted, being the biggest heroes of this war.
*'''Lost and the Damned:''' The forces of mutants and heretic guardsmen led by daemons and chaos marines, an army that wouldn't see any further support until [[Forge World]] made their crack at it. This gave a dizzying amount of possibilities merely by being the blend of two different armies, complete with extra markings, rather than just being a variation of an existing army with a few different rules.
*'''Ulthwé Strike Force:''' A variant [[Eldar]] army made for deep-striking by emerging from small rifts in the [[Webway]]. This meant that the army couldn't use any vehicles bigger than Vypers and War Walkers. That said, their guardians are a bit better than their common kin and their Seer Councils (which took the place of a typical Warlock bodyguard for both a Farseer AND the Avatar of [[Khaine]]) were required to keep at least a few of their number to protect their heroes. This also meant that you couldn't take Autarchs or Phoenix Lords as HQ choices.

===The [[Gathering Storm]]===

To herald the end of 7th Edition and welcome in 8th, Games Workshop did something unthinkable and decided that it was time to shake things up and '''finally''' [[Advancing the Storyline|move the plot forward]]. To do this, the company decided to return to Abaddon's 13th temper tantrum, and make it less fail than what happened during the Eye of Terror campaign (admittedly not that hard). To accomplish this, it did the following:

* Stress the fact that Cadia was not the ''goal'' of the Black Crusade, but merely step 1 in a much broader campaign of general nastiness for the Imperium.
* Tighten the narrative, focusing less on the entire battlefront, and instead on a select few but crucial battles that could decide the campaign.
* Make the conflict much more personal, and introduce characters who had actual stakes on the fate of Cadia.
* Blow up Cadia, just to show that Abby was '''not''' messing around anymore.

Suffice to say the end result was much more well received by the fanbase, and while Cadia eventually was destroyed in the end, the stagnation that had settled upon the setting for years was finally shaken off. While it hasn't been a hundred percent perfect (what big change is), the narrative figuratively hit the floor running, and ''hasn't stopped since then''.

{{40k-Timeline}}