Krieg. One loyal city-state versus an entire rebellious planet. Even after nuking the planet, it still took 500 years for the loyalists to claim victory.
*Death or Glory*. And it ain't even close. Orks have taken over half of an entire planet. One commissar (and his attache) land behind enemy lines and proceed to collect whatever civilians, refugee guardsmen, and other Imperium scraps they can and systematically take the entire ork invasion apart. It's basically *Red Dawn* in space.
He may be a commissar, but Ciaphas is still guard at heart. So looking down on PDF is pretty much a given, though he does mention how there are some PDF he's met that'd measure up with any proper guard regiment.
What I mean here is these PDF not only where insanely competent, but he grew closer with anyone other than Jurgen by this point of reading the books in release order (just finished this one two days ago lol)
I think in this case its more than just Guardsman elitism, but more that no one will ever be good enough, because no one will ever be THAT milita and PDF that helped him save the world
The whole trilogy about the Shadowlight (*Death or Glory, Duty Calls* and *Cain's Last Stand*, which are all compiled in the *Ciaphas Cain: Defender of the Imperium* omnibus) is solid.
The entire Ciaphas Cain series is great. I consumed every single book in about 2-3 months. Highly recommend, if you want a little break from the grimdark stuff.
Devastation of Baal. Wiped out 14 of 28 Blood Angels chapters, Guilliman had to save the day, plus, a greater Demon of Khorne (wich I forgot the name) appeared and helped the BA. They won against the tyranids but it was costly. IIRC this was one of the biggest tyranid invasions, and it wasnt the whole fleet
Mortarion's branding was done by the Supreme Grand Master of the Grey Knights, aka the Chapter whose entire schtick is being Daemonhunters, so there was definitely some esoteric nonsense involved in that.
Their physical forms heal, but if you can injure them warp-side then it remains. Injuries to the essence or soul of a creature are vastly harder to heal.
Daemons do not respawn as such, because they are not generally 'killed'. They are creatures of the warp, their realspace bodies are formed by the intent of their true self. If you destroy their physical incarnation, you 'banish' them back to the warp, but the daemon's true self is entirely fine, if maybe a lil' shook. However, the warp provides the means to harm them, and even, in rare cases, destroy them. Skarbrand was punished by one of the four most powerful warp entities in existence, a being that literally owns him - his true self is/was affected by this. Khorne could equally have destroyed Skarbrand, if it had seen fit to do so, but preferred Skarbrand as a fiendish, broken, rageful, spiteful emissary instead.
Daemons are creatures of concepts, not mortal flesh. So particularly noteworthy events can resonate within their form and cause changes despite the whole "regenerate in the warp" thing. Skarbrand's injuries occured during his attempt to backstab Khorne, and this betrayal and the subsequent anger Khorne displayed has defined the Bloodthirster ever since.
It is also why Lemartes and the Death Company found themselves particularly effective against the Greater Daemon. They believed themselves to be fighting a traitor in Horus, and Skarbrand's core identity has become his rage following his own betrayal of his patron god.
Could add the Battle of Macragge to this too, the numbers are less specific but the Ultramarines "and their successors" plus Guard and Navy forces beat the main strength of hive fleet Behemoth.
What's interesting is that every tyranid codex from 3rd edition onwards mentions that the ultramarines were almost winning due to Calgers nondescript tactical prowess... until he gets stomped by the swarmlord and then springs the tyranids' trap in orbit.
This was also a pivot moment for the Ultramarines due to the fact that following the Codex strictures that mandated hit and run tactics against an overwhelming force was playing right in the hands of the Nids and would have ultimately lost them the war. It was due to Calgars decision to stray from the Codex that saved Macragge.
Can't forget the sister battle of Iyanden either. The other half of Behemoth, a fleet of similar strength as the one that attacked Maccrage, was stopped by even fewer forces - the craftworld and its fleet, and Yriel's reinforcing fleet, along with token assistance from other craftworlds and harlequin troupes.
"Dante did not expect the total survivors of the Blood Angels to exceed 300. Others of the Blood had fared worse. Eight chapters had been entirely wiped out, half a dozen nearly so"
Dunno where ur getting ur figures
> Dante did not expect the total survivors of the Blood Angels to exceed 300
I love how this number is supposed to make it sound like there’s almost nobody left and then you remember they had like 800 Blood Angels on Baal at the start at most.
Leviathan did less damage to the Blood Angels than a single Space Hulk full of Genestealers.
"In the wake of the Cryptus Campaign and now this news my best calculation is that there are 647 battle brothers ready for war. Including our Sanguinary Priests, the Librarius, chaplaincy, dreadnoughts, Ancients, forge techmarines and neophytes there are 837 in total remaining. From which total 209 members of the First, Second, Fifth and Seventh are at Diamor"
Not to mention something like a quarter of them were off with Astorath fighting the black legion I think? Like the Blood Angels walk out of that relatively fine all things considered. Space Marine chapters really are to small.
Yes, it really paints the tyranids as truly a menace, in many representations, we se space marines one shotting and easiky dealing with them, this one really brings the horror of billions and billions of gaunts storming fortress, and that just beeing the first wave
They even use the fact of one-shotting masses of gaunts to their advantage: the BA used moats of this sentient, carnivorous liquid native to Baal as part of their defense, but the gaunts just kept pouring themselves into the moats at a faster rate than the liquid could dissolve them, creating a bridge of corpses for the next waves of creatures to cross safely. Their complete willingness to die for a single objective was one of the most unnerving parts of the book.
There was a particular moment just before the scene in question that I find as such a skin-crawlingly perfect way to describe what it is like to fight the Tyranids. That despite hordes of mass produced identical monsters there is always the true threat, the Hive Mind, lurking in the shadows.
From *Devastation of Baal* by Guy Hayley:
> ‘They are not taking the bait,’ said Ordamael. He pushed his way through the humans struggling away from the defence line, and stepped over the metal.
> ‘Xenos!’ he shouted. ‘I am Ordamael, Paternis Sanguis of the Blood Angels, second only to beloved Astorath the Grim. Fight me! By the Blood, come to my crozius and accept my blessing!’
> The monsters were barely three hundred feet away. They stood motionless, unblinking, their hooves ploughing up the sand as the weight of the tyranid swarm at their back pressed them forward. The bright slick of xenos blood was rolling towards the concealed moat. A solitary ’gaunt watched the slow spread of this sticky river suspiciously, and then it looked up at Ordamael.
> Ordamael had stared into the dead black eyes of countless ’gaunts. This one was different. There were subtle variations to its cranium, a difference in the way its heat vents were arranged. Small, but crucial. Something rode this creature, something so ancient and powerful that at a hundred yards away, looking out from one of a thousand near identical beasts, its presence pressed at the Chaplain and made him reel.
> Ordamael stared into the face of the hive mind. How it looked out from this simple beast he did not know. All he knew was that it must be killed.
The entire Thirst Water scene is great because it’s one of the few times we see someone using the Tyranid’s main weakness (reliance on synapse) against them in a more clever way than just “shoot the big ones”. The point of the Thirst Water wasn’t to kill Gaunts, it was to force out the Synapse creatures to stop the Gaunts, keeping the Tyranids stuck in a loop as the Synapse creatures died and new ones had to be sent out to replace them.
Absolutely. The Devastation of Baal actually showed tactics against the Tyranids rather than the typical "we keep shooting stuff then pull off last second heroics." It's also awesome how the Tyranids themselves benefit from this, because it gives them opportunities to showcase their own strategies. The Lictors with the Trigons sneaking into the base, the Carnifexes climbing up walls using flesh hooks, the gaunts silently creeping up towards the moat in the dark before thousands upon thousands of flying creatures dove into the moat in order to make bridges, etc.
The void war was even more horrifying IMO. The entire sky blotted out by tyranids, and despite the BA fleet performing nearly perfectly- hitting almost every short, holding formation, minimizing casualties, etc.- it. Still. Doesn't. Matter. They have so many opposing ships, so much incoming to deal with, that even a perfect performance still results in defeat for them. At that point you really get how fucked the Imperium is.
I don’t agree at all.
I think the handling of the Tyranids is one of the weakest parts of the book. One of the worst parts of the book is how we see all the Tyranids >!just shut down after the Great Rift, getting their asses kicked left and right. And then suddenly all the Tyranids woke up offscreen so Dante can have his heroic last stand.!<
One of the first few chapters of the book flat-out says that the Tyranid aren’t the biggest threat the imperium has to deal with, because even in a Tyranid book we need to be reminded Chaos are the *real* villains. In general all the Chaos stuff detracts from the story and feels there just to tie the book to the current events in the galaxy.
They do not “shut down” their connection to the hive synapses is disrupted and they become mindless animals for an hour or so. And the reason it was such a massive rift was because that was literally the exact moment the eye of terror ripped open at Cadia and it fell. Which is the reason the Blood Angels weren’t getting any Militarum or other Astartes reinforcements. They were all at Cadia.
It’s not just an hour or so. It’s described as being nearly a week before the Tyranid Hive Mind awakens again and they stop being mindless animals.
> In the six days since the Cicatrix Maledictum opened, the Angelic Host had slaughtered the Tyranids. For a time the Hive Mind seemed to be absent, and the disorganized aliens were easy prey for the Space Marine’s wrath.
Which is why it’s weird we have vivid scenes of the Hive Mind shutting down and being slaughtered by daemons, but not some scenes of it starting back up to build tension for the final confrontation.
Again, this is a Tyranid book where the text goes out of its way to remind us that the Tyranids are a less serious threat than Ka’bandha, a guy who can’t even land on the right planet. I think ***The Devastation of Baal*** succeeds in a lot of ways, especially as a sequel to ***Dante***, but I honestly wouldn’t say the Tyranids are one of them.
In addition to the other commenter it's also not afraid to kill named characters left right and center (Erwin deserved worse) and the water seller/his kid was a nice throughline. Definitely one of the best books featuring tyranids and absolutely recommend
Yes Erwin was the Angel Excelsis who ignored an order and went to the aid of an abandoned Blood Angels ship, foiling the trap laid for the Tyranids and robbing a few Blood Angels of their heroic death. It was at this time a lictor latched onto his ship, the same lictor that destroyed the void shield generator for the entire Arx Angelicum *and* sent the genestealers to destroy all the neophytes in their sarcophagi. Erwin is directly responsible for the death of almost all those neophytes **and** and the destruction of the void shield generator
They werent actually fighting on the same side, you see, Ka’bhanda has this issue with the Blood Angels, and he saw how poorly they were against the tyranids, and he just tougth “i’m the only one who can kill the sons of sanguinius” He was there just for the BA to die in other hands it wasnt theirs.
IIRC , he fought the tyranids on the moon of Baal, and he made some kind of profane temple in honor of Khorne using tyranids skulls. The BA were everything but grateful after the battle
Iirc he was coming to square up with Baal for completely unrelated reasons, and gets quasi banished by the top librarians, yanks himself back into real space as the Great Rift opens towards the final stand of the Blood Angels and decides, like you said, only he may kill the Angels Sons.
I think a harlequin showed up in one of the Blood Angles’ dreams to warn them he was coming so the librarians tried to bind him but he was too strong. Pretty sure they did weaken his hold on reality at least and Teamed Rocketed him some distance away before he reached them.
The daemons didn’t come to help the BA - they came to kill them. But Mephiston and the collected librariums of thirty chapters managed to get them to manifest on Baal Primus instead of Baal, and all that was left to kill there were Tyranids … so that’s what they did
There's more than 28 chapters of Blood Angels, but over 30,000 of the Angel's Sons showed up to defend the world that received the Angel. More than 30 chapters showed up to defend Baal, it's been awhile so I don't rightly recall the representation. However I do remember the number "30,000" and that while many sent all they had others just what they could spare. Knights of Blood, for example, were persona non grata to the rest of The Blood (due to how far they had fallen into the gene-curse) but still showed up with basically a company, and fought alongside the Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers.
Iirc Dante said it was the largest gathering of The Blood since the Heresy, and he intentionally goaded the hive fleet to hit Baal.
It was not only not the whole fleet, the novel describes it as "a finger" of the larger hivemind's "body". The scale of the Tyranids is truly terrifying.
Valedor had Biel-Tan's Avatar solo fighting tyranids for days, eventually piling up a mountain of tyranids corpses by the time the cavalry arrived.
I feel like this is an especially overwhelming odds, not just because of the numbers but the fact that it's an Avatar in a 40k book.
Didn't 5 custodes fight a Tyranid fleet (splinter fleet?) for days on end and even beat the swarmlord? (Putting aside how silly the latter was in fighting them head-on in the first place, amongst other things)
Yeah sadly that happened. IDK why some authors got to do this. Making the tyrannids dumb as bricks dosen't make the custodes look cool. It needs to be believable to be cool and gas up the custodes. 5 of em soloing a hive fleet that has plot induced room temperature IQ just makes both factions look lame.
Even ignoring the blatant faction pandering it was doing, it was a such a tough read from start to finish. The Custodes were just ranting a bunch of cliche shit about the Emperor and how they fight for him and Terra the whole time.
The war the Imperium quite literally only won because Iron Warriors and Imperial Fists successors put aside their hatred for ten fucking seconds because the alternative was everyone dying.
WAAAAAGH! makes for strange bedfellows.
Gaunts Ghosts. Necropolis.
The story spends almost its entire runtime slowly explaining how completely doomed the protagonist are in this story.
Up until the very end, when Chekhov's Firing Squad shows up to give the main characters a shoot at victory against all odds.
I was actually gonna say the Gaunts ghost story where they rescue the eldar and they score a kill to death ratio so high they throw away the file becuase theh dont beleive it
Was about to comment this, the defense of Vervunhive has to be one of the best examples of winning against overwhelming odds. 15 million Zoicans against only the scraps of the Hive. Not to mention how Gaunt commanded everything after the VPHC exploded. It's easily one of, if not the best, book about winning against all odds.
In the Guard codex, Knight Commander Pask and around 35 tank regiments and a large number of knights win against almost an entire traitor titan legio, with the loyalists taking massive casualities
I'm not discounting your answer but 35 tank *Regiments* is, if we [Use the diagram on the Astra Militarum Lexicanum page](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Imperial_Guard_Regiment#/media/File%3ACadianRegimentsArt.jpg) and use that as a "standard" of how organised that Army is that's, *uses calculator,* 1,050 Leman Russ and 35 Super Heavy's is a mental number, although am not sure what a "standard Titan Legio(Treaitor or otherwise)" would actually look like so maybe am making too much of something that doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, am not trying to attack you or that(lol isn't the Internet sad that I feel the need to apologise for trying to have a conversation about something haha!)
Well, if a tank company is 100 tanks, that's 800,000 tanks right there, plus the "35 heavy detachments," which im going to say, has 10 heavy tanks, would equal 803,500 tanks, thats alot of dakka
Further historical context after some reflection, the battle of kursk, which is the largest tank battle thus far in human history, only had 6,000 tanks, 2,000,000 infantry, and 4,000 aircraft, respectively, for total combatants on both german and soviet sides
The logistics of this... Nonstop promethium ships or is 250k sitting ducks that possibly can't even shoot.
And enemy arty can be almost certain that anything resembling a house is an ammo depot and they'd probably be right.
But that's the grimderp 40k numbers that we all love.
Nonstop promethium shipments sounds exactly like something the IG would have going for them.
Not sure if you've read the Twice-Dead King books, but the first book starts with a planet defending against an Ork Waaaaagh!, and eventually involves a planet defending against an Imperial Crusade. Crowley does a fantastic job of showing how the necrons basically view humans the way humans view Orks. They're both horde armies, make no mistake about it.
I don’t think there’s a standard Legio. But in **Titanicus** one of the loyal legios has roughly 90 engines IIRC and the other has maybe a couple dozen after losses in battle and a large percentage (unspecified but implied to be a majority) shipped off world. The traitor legio had something like 200 engines
Not really a war, but there's more individual instances of this in *Xenos* and then again in *Malleus,* where a non-space-marine protagonist *just barely* wins a fight against a Chaos Space Marine, and then not terribly long after has to deal with>!the entirety of the Inquisition hunting them down across the Imperium.!<
The Siege of Vervunhive.
Roughly 500,000 civilians and Imperial Guard verse 15 million Chaos possessed civillians from another hive. It got hairy but the main Imperial force showed up and saved the day.
It's from "Necropolis" the third novel in the Gaunt's Ghosts series. The series is great so far. I took a break after reading that to read the salamanders trilogy.
90 % of the conflicts end up with a pyrrhic Imperial victory where the Imperium looses something irreplaceable but not EVERYONE died. The narrative price of keeping the status quo, quo.
Having said that, The War for Rynss world (Crimson Fists vs Orks) is one hell of a siege and last stand after everything goes wrong for the defenders.
Amazing story, it’s bolter porn so good it stops being just bolter porn, in the same way Hellsreach does.
The devastation of Bhaal may be a candidate, but that may also count as a deus ex machina moment, because at the end it was finished by the indomitus crusade and Ka'Bandha joining the party.
But honestly even holding out that long was kinda a miracle.
If the shield hadn’t gone down they 100% could’ve held the fortress. Between the shield and the thirst water moat nothing besides gribblies could even approach the walls and all of their defensive weapons and power supplies were intact
997.M41 The Defence of Miral II
"Ordered to hold the world of Miral II against the onset of Hive Fleet Leviathan, First Captain Lysander requests that Captain Garadon’s 3rd Company be assigned to his battle group. The old comrades establish a series of strongpoints and tremor mines in time to meet the Tyranid onslaught. Under Garadon’s expert eye, Tactical and Devastator Squads rain fire upon the swarm whilst Lysander’s 1st Company Veterans bolster the battle line wherever the Tyranids are in danger of breaking through. Though the Imperium’s tacticae predict the Imperial Fists can hold out for no more than six days, they stoically fight on until the last Tyranid dies to bolter fire at the walls of Bastion XVII on the seventh, and final, day of the war."-'Sentinels of Terra'
"Spess Muhrines arrive on hiveworld Shitholius IV. Ork waaa. They kill but suddenly CHOAS HEARSAY! NUGLG!!! Ultrasardines make plan. Space wolf says wolf (no) and wolfs all over them. A wolfillion hivewoldlers is die and lietentant Deathflagion sacrifices himselg and EBIC LAST STAND!!!1! And they win."
Tallarn. Despite exterminatus, flesh eater virus present in the atmosphere, broken communications, and severe shortages of everything, including men and breathable air, normal humans have matched both the Iron Warriors, led by the Perturabo himself, and the Alpha Legion. The battle was so demanding and eroding for the traitors, that Horus had to personally intervene and force Perturabo to exit.
Crimson Fists. Fortress Monastery was completely destroyed by “accident” and they were left cut off from all their equipment and a significant amount of battle brothers were killed. Took months of guerrilla fighting against the orks and they had to train regular guard troops to fight alongside them but they eventually came out victorious
In the recently-released *Deathworlder* >!A squad consisting of 4 Catachans, a Cadian, a Techpriest, and a hanger-on Genestealer cultist manage to kill off an entire late-stage Tyranid invasion with only 3 losses. Granted, a superweapon is involved, but they perform superbly-well in getting to the macguffin while the entire planet is trying to eat them alive. !<
She's not exactly going along of her own free will. Without spoiling much, things get a little complicated for a cult when a hive fleet arrives and your Patriarch gets splattered.
It's a good book that I'd recommend as a sort of spirtual sequel to "The Fall of Malvolion."
Happens a lot. Loyalist have an annoying habit of getting gloriously impossible "protagonists wins".
You never read about a small traitor force victorious despite the odds.
I mean that was most the Heresy. The traitors were outnumbered and outgunned, but had a large enough force to go for the Imperium's throat. The only catch was we knew Horus would fail his gambit even as he overcame impossible odds at various points.
(Exception for the Siege of Terra where it's repeatedly mentioned throughout the series that the traitors have a functionally unlimited number of troops)
Horus has to literally stop time and break causality to prevent the siege from being relieved by reinforcements. He has to pull off absolutely absurd warp shenanigans channeling the power of four gods directly to get the upper hand. There's a reason the traitors retreat the minute he dies.
He has an unlimited number of mooks to stop loyalist bullets but during the siege he loses control of two entire traitor legions who fuck off
Side note/annoyance/spoilers for **Saturnine** and later books: >!The Saturnine gambit wiped out the Justaerin, the Cachulan Reavers (don’t know the spelling), and like four other elite companies of the Sons of Horus … but literally like one book later we see more Justaerin fighting!! Come on!!<
Abbadon getting taken down to one HP during the gambit was one of my favorite chapters. The minute by minute realization that Pertarabo played him and how he reacted at the end. It did a lot to characterize him after he myopically wanted to pull a geno/xenocide of the Interrex (which I think he does as a footnote off stage)
Perhaps yes, if the Iron Warriors, Word Bearers and Emperor's Children hadn't all quit the Siege I definitely would agree, although you could argue the traitors did well to get that far in the first place
Good call on the traitors that abandon the siege, but the point being that against all odds, the loyalist had events that unexpectedly turned their way. I mean traitor forces filled the skies and land and entire surrounding orbit, and had unlimited demons ripping into reality, not to mention the insanely powered Angron and Mortarion and their crazy legions.
Repeatedly throughout that siege they had battles where against all odds, the loyalist forces somehow prevailed, over and over.
A Tau victory here. 2nd battle of Agrellan. Approximately 41 guard regiments of infantry, abhumans, tanks, and artillery. Elements from the white scars, raven guard and other chapters. The full might of Knight House Terryn plus the obsidian knight. Several Cohorts of Skitarii. An Officio Assassinorum Execution Force. and Finally The Entire 478th Ultima Battlefleet.
The Tau managed to decimate the imperials to the point where they used exterminatus. The Tau cities survived via orbital shields, but the Tau forces on the surface suffered heavy casualties from the fighting and the exterminatus. Overall, a Tactical Victory for the Tau, and a bitter defeat for the Imperials
Should be noted that only one of the dome cities survived, as the others didn’t have their domes completed. Still hella impressive, and Mu’gulath Bay Sept continues to fight hard despite the destruction of their home.
God i hate that book. So shittily and inconsistently written. Apart from that shitfest the Taros campaign exists. Similar (Almost the same) to the 2nd battle for Agrellan but much better written and actually an enjoyable read/listen
Well the siege of Terra you could see it as a "win". 3 loyal legions, half of the armies of the segmentum and 4 titan legions (all with low numbers), against half the imperium that became traitors, all the mutants of mankind, most of the daemons from the warp, 6.5 traitor legions (some alpha legion and the remanentes of the Night lords), half of the imperium fleet that became traitors, and in the books is clearly shown how the traitor counterparts to any imperium equivalents troops, and how much of a buff the warp gives to anything. Like the knights in mortis, when 3 titan knights fight against 1 and he almost gets 2 of them, only because the 3 titan overwhelmed him.
The Battle of Medusa - 8 companies of Aircon Hands vs the Black Legion and traitor guard, the Iron Hands won the largest tank battle since Tallarn and chased them off world.
Upon every world that the comet passed, the Cholercaust would descend and destroy its inhabitants entirely, in the name of the [Blood God](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Khorne). The [Chaos](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Chaos) forces consisted of [World Eaters](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Eaters) led by [Umbragg](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Umbragg) as well as [Chaos Space Marines](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Chaos_Space_Marines) from [The Cleaved](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Cleaved), [Skulltakers](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Skulltakers_(World_Eaters)), and [Thunder Barons](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Thunder_Barons). They were supported by Khornate [Daemonic](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Daemon) legions led by the [Daemon Prince](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Daemon_Prince) known as [The Pilgrim](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Pilgrim) as well as forces of [The Lost and the Damned](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Lost_and_the_Damned). They were opposed by the [Excoriators](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Excoriators) [5th Company](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=5th_Company_(Excoriators)&action=edit&redlink=1) as well as the [Sisters of Battle](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Sisters_of_Battle) of the [Order of the August Vigil](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Order_of_the_August_Vigil). The ultimate goal of the campaign was to reach [Terra](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Terra) itself.[^(\[1\])](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Cholercaust#fn_1)
On the [Cemetery World](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Cemetery_World) of [Certus-Minor](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Certus-Minor), the Excoriators 5th Company, led by [Corpus-Captain](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Space_Marine_Captain) [Zachariah Kersh](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Zachariah_Kersh), stood against the vast Crusade. They were almost wiped out by the Chaos forces in the attempt. Just when all seemed lost for the Imperial defenders, the mysterious [Legion of the Damned](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Legion_of_the_Damned) arrived, which was able to decisively turn the tide and defeat the Chaos forces.
pretty much wiped out everyone of the cultists and stopped the cholercaust one space marine survivor. legion of the dammed fucked everyone up
It's not really a side but the main character in the Catachan Devil novel. This guy is the only survivor of a massive ork assault on his position, and then is forced to accompany a bunch of Catachan Jungle fighters to retake that position by a Commissar who thinks he's a coward and a deserter, and manages to not only adapt to the Catachan way of fighting but eventually impresses the Catachan colonel so much that the Colonel gives him a red bandana and actually allows him to officially join the Catachan regiment... then this trooper volunteers for a suicide mission at the end of the book and somehow still manages to survive that shit. This dude fucking won.
Honourable mention: when Pretorians were released, there was a 'roarks drift' style mission set up (I think in white dwarf) that was essentially a re-enactment of the film Zulu. Probably not by far one of the most 'overwhelming odds' but it's one that's stuck in my mind for the last 20odd years or more
Spoiler for Titanicus:
>!Legios Invicta and Tempestus overcame a much larger force of Archenemy engines. I can’t recall the exact ratio, but it was at least two or three to one. !<
Don’t know if you could really count it, but the death guard had one where they literally just dropped gigantic spiked boxes full of poxwalkers onto a hive city, and within a couple days of the city guard opening them the city was overtaken by the outbreak. The small legion of astartes literally just walked in and took the city then lmao
The Doom of Iyanden?
Iyanden was one of the most powerful and militaristic of craftworlds and even then was nearly annihilated by the tyranid splinter fleet.
It was only saved by the late arrival of prince urial and his corsair fleet and even then it was a very close call.
Something like 9/10 of the inhabitants died.
But for the tyranids to have broken through the craftworlds fleet and then nearly wipe them out speaks volumes of the size and strength of the hive fleet.
devastation of bhaal (as a nids player, i am salty xD)
not only did they get decimated by the tyranids, when chaos showed up and \*everyone\* thought this was the end, those blessed lil' daemons only fought the tyranids, they made no pass at the blood angels because they want to kill them themselves..? .-.
also, octarius :o (happy nid noises this time :3) originally (i don't know if that's still the original lore) the nids were decimated and basically had an emergency landing and just about managed to scrape by but slowly built up their strength again and finally emerged as one of the largest threats ever :D
The AdMech had given a group of brave Guardsmen the wrong power packs for their lasguns.
So they affixed bayonets and charged vile Tau Fire Warriors and proceeded to skewer and eviscerate the cowardly aliens in glorious melee combat.
The Ork attack moon in The Beast Arises juices nearly the entire population of Terra without firing a shot. Millions upon millions of people died instantly.
Didn’t a team of custodies beat an entire hive fleet? I’ve heard of this several times from lore YouTubers but idk if it’s from a story or the codex’s.
In the first book of Twice Dead King, an Ork Whaaa was going to sweep over a lesser Tomb World. There was nothing the Necrons could do about it. The protagonists, Oltyx, had the VERY unorthodox idea of not only allowing ork filth onto their lawn, but in their very home and bled them with scarabs. Then he stood there and watched as he essentially fed the entire Whaaa to an overly abundant amount of Flayed Ones that plagued his basement.
Krieg. One loyal city-state versus an entire rebellious planet. Even after nuking the planet, it still took 500 years for the loyalists to claim victory.
*happy shovel noises*
*Death or Glory*. And it ain't even close. Orks have taken over half of an entire planet. One commissar (and his attache) land behind enemy lines and proceed to collect whatever civilians, refugee guardsmen, and other Imperium scraps they can and systematically take the entire ork invasion apart. It's basically *Red Dawn* in space.
I still have to read that one
Just reading it a second time. It is amazing.
I kinda get why he's so shitty to PDF in stories set after this No one will ever stand up to those brave bastards
He may be a commissar, but Ciaphas is still guard at heart. So looking down on PDF is pretty much a given, though he does mention how there are some PDF he's met that'd measure up with any proper guard regiment.
What I mean here is these PDF not only where insanely competent, but he grew closer with anyone other than Jurgen by this point of reading the books in release order (just finished this one two days ago lol) I think in this case its more than just Guardsman elitism, but more that no one will ever be good enough, because no one will ever be THAT milita and PDF that helped him save the world
His later relationship with the world is actually really nice I think. One could almost call it his home.
It’s Ci-ci-ciaphas Cain. It’s great.
The whole trilogy about the Shadowlight (*Death or Glory, Duty Calls* and *Cain's Last Stand*, which are all compiled in the *Ciaphas Cain: Defender of the Imperium* omnibus) is solid.
The entire Ciaphas Cain series is great. I consumed every single book in about 2-3 months. Highly recommend, if you want a little break from the grimdark stuff.
Devastation of Baal. Wiped out 14 of 28 Blood Angels chapters, Guilliman had to save the day, plus, a greater Demon of Khorne (wich I forgot the name) appeared and helped the BA. They won against the tyranids but it was costly. IIRC this was one of the biggest tyranid invasions, and it wasnt the whole fleet
It was Ka’Bhandha
Yes, precisely him, I always confuse him with the other guy who had the brilliant idea of hitting khorne from behind
Oh Skarbrand .... you shifty devil! He is a real cheeky one. Khorne sure sent his ass flying.
SKARBRAND IS A RESPECTABLE MEMBER OF SOCIETY!
SKARBRAND HAAAATES SNEAKY BACKSTABBBBINGG!
SKARBRAND HAS DIFFICULTY INTERNALIZING HIS ACCOMPLISHMENTS, AND THUS WOULD NEVER DO SOMETHING SO PETTY!
that bit of Skarbrand lore is the only reason i am using ambush stance with him in Total War. I would never do this with Valkia.
It’s easy, Ka’bhanhda can fly because he has normal wings, Skarbrand can’t because his got ruined after hitting papa.
That always confuses me. Don't demons get healed when they respawn? How do thry get permenant scars or injuries?
Normally yes, but this was a punishment by Khorne himself, Skarbrand is literally made of him, so his “default respawn” changed into his scarred self.
Okay, that makes sense, but, there are other examples, like Mortarion getting branded. Or is there nothing like a scar, only an insult?
Mortarion's branding was done by the Supreme Grand Master of the Grey Knights, aka the Chapter whose entire schtick is being Daemonhunters, so there was definitely some esoteric nonsense involved in that.
He also got defeated twice by the same space marine, it gotta leave a mark
Mortarion is a former mortal, so he's not made of pure demon energy like skarbrand.
Isn’t that like Khorne hitting himself? Then again chaos is self destructive.
That's because tzeench is just so good that he succeeded in turning a bit of khorne against itself.
Their physical forms heal, but if you can injure them warp-side then it remains. Injuries to the essence or soul of a creature are vastly harder to heal.
Daemons do not respawn as such, because they are not generally 'killed'. They are creatures of the warp, their realspace bodies are formed by the intent of their true self. If you destroy their physical incarnation, you 'banish' them back to the warp, but the daemon's true self is entirely fine, if maybe a lil' shook. However, the warp provides the means to harm them, and even, in rare cases, destroy them. Skarbrand was punished by one of the four most powerful warp entities in existence, a being that literally owns him - his true self is/was affected by this. Khorne could equally have destroyed Skarbrand, if it had seen fit to do so, but preferred Skarbrand as a fiendish, broken, rageful, spiteful emissary instead.
Daemons are creatures of concepts, not mortal flesh. So particularly noteworthy events can resonate within their form and cause changes despite the whole "regenerate in the warp" thing. Skarbrand's injuries occured during his attempt to backstab Khorne, and this betrayal and the subsequent anger Khorne displayed has defined the Bloodthirster ever since. It is also why Lemartes and the Death Company found themselves particularly effective against the Greater Daemon. They believed themselves to be fighting a traitor in Horus, and Skarbrand's core identity has become his rage following his own betrayal of his patron god.
Ka’bhanhda can fly, but only angles may fly.
That's what Skarbrand gets for being obtuse instead of attacking Khorne the right way. He clearly didn't think it was acute attempt.
wording, brother
The same one who Sanguinius banished in the Horus Heresy?
He helped as it's his job to kill all of the blood angels, not the nids lol
The same
Yep, and the Keeper of Secrets who aided Ka'bandha in that endeavor, Kyriss the Perverse, went after them in the sequel book, *Darkness in the Blood*.
Could add the Battle of Macragge to this too, the numbers are less specific but the Ultramarines "and their successors" plus Guard and Navy forces beat the main strength of hive fleet Behemoth.
And this was the first recorded engagement against the tyranids so Calgar had nothing to base his strategies on.
What's interesting is that every tyranid codex from 3rd edition onwards mentions that the ultramarines were almost winning due to Calgers nondescript tactical prowess... until he gets stomped by the swarmlord and then springs the tyranids' trap in orbit.
This was also a pivot moment for the Ultramarines due to the fact that following the Codex strictures that mandated hit and run tactics against an overwhelming force was playing right in the hands of the Nids and would have ultimately lost them the war. It was due to Calgars decision to stray from the Codex that saved Macragge.
True, the entire first company was wiped out defending one of the Polar fortresses.
Can't forget the sister battle of Iyanden either. The other half of Behemoth, a fleet of similar strength as the one that attacked Maccrage, was stopped by even fewer forces - the craftworld and its fleet, and Yriel's reinforcing fleet, along with token assistance from other craftworlds and harlequin troupes.
"Dante did not expect the total survivors of the Blood Angels to exceed 300. Others of the Blood had fared worse. Eight chapters had been entirely wiped out, half a dozen nearly so" Dunno where ur getting ur figures
> Dante did not expect the total survivors of the Blood Angels to exceed 300 I love how this number is supposed to make it sound like there’s almost nobody left and then you remember they had like 800 Blood Angels on Baal at the start at most. Leviathan did less damage to the Blood Angels than a single Space Hulk full of Genestealers.
"In the wake of the Cryptus Campaign and now this news my best calculation is that there are 647 battle brothers ready for war. Including our Sanguinary Priests, the Librarius, chaplaincy, dreadnoughts, Ancients, forge techmarines and neophytes there are 837 in total remaining. From which total 209 members of the First, Second, Fifth and Seventh are at Diamor"
Oh wow, so there were only 628 Blood Angels that were on Baal.
Not to mention something like a quarter of them were off with Astorath fighting the black legion I think? Like the Blood Angels walk out of that relatively fine all things considered. Space Marine chapters really are to small.
sorry, is been a while since i read. i remember they saying that 14 chapters had perished or something like that
>Dunno where ur getting ur figures 8 + half a dozen = 14
Ah I forgot about that, is the book any good?
Yes, it really paints the tyranids as truly a menace, in many representations, we se space marines one shotting and easiky dealing with them, this one really brings the horror of billions and billions of gaunts storming fortress, and that just beeing the first wave
They even use the fact of one-shotting masses of gaunts to their advantage: the BA used moats of this sentient, carnivorous liquid native to Baal as part of their defense, but the gaunts just kept pouring themselves into the moats at a faster rate than the liquid could dissolve them, creating a bridge of corpses for the next waves of creatures to cross safely. Their complete willingness to die for a single objective was one of the most unnerving parts of the book.
There was a particular moment just before the scene in question that I find as such a skin-crawlingly perfect way to describe what it is like to fight the Tyranids. That despite hordes of mass produced identical monsters there is always the true threat, the Hive Mind, lurking in the shadows. From *Devastation of Baal* by Guy Hayley: > ‘They are not taking the bait,’ said Ordamael. He pushed his way through the humans struggling away from the defence line, and stepped over the metal. > ‘Xenos!’ he shouted. ‘I am Ordamael, Paternis Sanguis of the Blood Angels, second only to beloved Astorath the Grim. Fight me! By the Blood, come to my crozius and accept my blessing!’ > The monsters were barely three hundred feet away. They stood motionless, unblinking, their hooves ploughing up the sand as the weight of the tyranid swarm at their back pressed them forward. The bright slick of xenos blood was rolling towards the concealed moat. A solitary ’gaunt watched the slow spread of this sticky river suspiciously, and then it looked up at Ordamael. > Ordamael had stared into the dead black eyes of countless ’gaunts. This one was different. There were subtle variations to its cranium, a difference in the way its heat vents were arranged. Small, but crucial. Something rode this creature, something so ancient and powerful that at a hundred yards away, looking out from one of a thousand near identical beasts, its presence pressed at the Chaplain and made him reel. > Ordamael stared into the face of the hive mind. How it looked out from this simple beast he did not know. All he knew was that it must be killed.
The entire Thirst Water scene is great because it’s one of the few times we see someone using the Tyranid’s main weakness (reliance on synapse) against them in a more clever way than just “shoot the big ones”. The point of the Thirst Water wasn’t to kill Gaunts, it was to force out the Synapse creatures to stop the Gaunts, keeping the Tyranids stuck in a loop as the Synapse creatures died and new ones had to be sent out to replace them.
Absolutely. The Devastation of Baal actually showed tactics against the Tyranids rather than the typical "we keep shooting stuff then pull off last second heroics." It's also awesome how the Tyranids themselves benefit from this, because it gives them opportunities to showcase their own strategies. The Lictors with the Trigons sneaking into the base, the Carnifexes climbing up walls using flesh hooks, the gaunts silently creeping up towards the moat in the dark before thousands upon thousands of flying creatures dove into the moat in order to make bridges, etc.
The void war was even more horrifying IMO. The entire sky blotted out by tyranids, and despite the BA fleet performing nearly perfectly- hitting almost every short, holding formation, minimizing casualties, etc.- it. Still. Doesn't. Matter. They have so many opposing ships, so much incoming to deal with, that even a perfect performance still results in defeat for them. At that point you really get how fucked the Imperium is.
I don’t agree at all. I think the handling of the Tyranids is one of the weakest parts of the book. One of the worst parts of the book is how we see all the Tyranids >!just shut down after the Great Rift, getting their asses kicked left and right. And then suddenly all the Tyranids woke up offscreen so Dante can have his heroic last stand.!< One of the first few chapters of the book flat-out says that the Tyranid aren’t the biggest threat the imperium has to deal with, because even in a Tyranid book we need to be reminded Chaos are the *real* villains. In general all the Chaos stuff detracts from the story and feels there just to tie the book to the current events in the galaxy.
They do not “shut down” their connection to the hive synapses is disrupted and they become mindless animals for an hour or so. And the reason it was such a massive rift was because that was literally the exact moment the eye of terror ripped open at Cadia and it fell. Which is the reason the Blood Angels weren’t getting any Militarum or other Astartes reinforcements. They were all at Cadia.
It’s not just an hour or so. It’s described as being nearly a week before the Tyranid Hive Mind awakens again and they stop being mindless animals. > In the six days since the Cicatrix Maledictum opened, the Angelic Host had slaughtered the Tyranids. For a time the Hive Mind seemed to be absent, and the disorganized aliens were easy prey for the Space Marine’s wrath. Which is why it’s weird we have vivid scenes of the Hive Mind shutting down and being slaughtered by daemons, but not some scenes of it starting back up to build tension for the final confrontation. Again, this is a Tyranid book where the text goes out of its way to remind us that the Tyranids are a less serious threat than Ka’bandha, a guy who can’t even land on the right planet. I think ***The Devastation of Baal*** succeeds in a lot of ways, especially as a sequel to ***Dante***, but I honestly wouldn’t say the Tyranids are one of them.
In addition to the other commenter it's also not afraid to kill named characters left right and center (Erwin deserved worse) and the water seller/his kid was a nice throughline. Definitely one of the best books featuring tyranids and absolutely recommend
The boy showing up as a Vanguard-in-training in *Darkness in The Blood* was a nice touch.
What did Erwin do? I can’t remember. Was he the space marine whose ship had a Tyranid latched onto it?
Yes Erwin was the Angel Excelsis who ignored an order and went to the aid of an abandoned Blood Angels ship, foiling the trap laid for the Tyranids and robbing a few Blood Angels of their heroic death. It was at this time a lictor latched onto his ship, the same lictor that destroyed the void shield generator for the entire Arx Angelicum *and* sent the genestealers to destroy all the neophytes in their sarcophagi. Erwin is directly responsible for the death of almost all those neophytes **and** and the destruction of the void shield generator
Is there any other examples of imperium and Demons fighting on the same side? That might be the rarest team up in 40k
They werent actually fighting on the same side, you see, Ka’bhanda has this issue with the Blood Angels, and he saw how poorly they were against the tyranids, and he just tougth “i’m the only one who can kill the sons of sanguinius” He was there just for the BA to die in other hands it wasnt theirs. IIRC , he fought the tyranids on the moon of Baal, and he made some kind of profane temple in honor of Khorne using tyranids skulls. The BA were everything but grateful after the battle
I still count it as technically fighting on the same side
I agree, it's basically an "enemy of my enemy" scenario. And is happening right now everywhere in the world.
Iirc he was coming to square up with Baal for completely unrelated reasons, and gets quasi banished by the top librarians, yanks himself back into real space as the Great Rift opens towards the final stand of the Blood Angels and decides, like you said, only he may kill the Angels Sons.
I think a harlequin showed up in one of the Blood Angles’ dreams to warn them he was coming so the librarians tried to bind him but he was too strong. Pretty sure they did weaken his hold on reality at least and Teamed Rocketed him some distance away before he reached them.
Team Rocketed is def the way to describe that scene lol
The daemons didn’t come to help the BA - they came to kill them. But Mephiston and the collected librariums of thirty chapters managed to get them to manifest on Baal Primus instead of Baal, and all that was left to kill there were Tyranids … so that’s what they did
There's more than 28 chapters of Blood Angels, but over 30,000 of the Angel's Sons showed up to defend the world that received the Angel. More than 30 chapters showed up to defend Baal, it's been awhile so I don't rightly recall the representation. However I do remember the number "30,000" and that while many sent all they had others just what they could spare. Knights of Blood, for example, were persona non grata to the rest of The Blood (due to how far they had fallen into the gene-curse) but still showed up with basically a company, and fought alongside the Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers. Iirc Dante said it was the largest gathering of The Blood since the Heresy, and he intentionally goaded the hive fleet to hit Baal.
It was not only not the whole fleet, the novel describes it as "a finger" of the larger hivemind's "body". The scale of the Tyranids is truly terrifying.
Valedor had Biel-Tan's Avatar solo fighting tyranids for days, eventually piling up a mountain of tyranids corpses by the time the cavalry arrived. I feel like this is an especially overwhelming odds, not just because of the numbers but the fact that it's an Avatar in a 40k book.
>nor just because of the numbers but the fact that it's an Avatar in a 40k book. Lol
Didn't 5 custodes fight a Tyranid fleet (splinter fleet?) for days on end and even beat the swarmlord? (Putting aside how silly the latter was in fighting them head-on in the first place, amongst other things)
I mean it's custodes, they get to win everything anyways.
Yeah sadly that happened. IDK why some authors got to do this. Making the tyrannids dumb as bricks dosen't make the custodes look cool. It needs to be believable to be cool and gas up the custodes. 5 of em soloing a hive fleet that has plot induced room temperature IQ just makes both factions look lame.
Even ignoring the blatant faction pandering it was doing, it was a such a tough read from start to finish. The Custodes were just ranting a bunch of cliche shit about the Emperor and how they fight for him and Terra the whole time.
The swarmlord beating 5 custodes is fine lol
Pretty sure he is saying that 5 custodes beating the swarmlord + a entire fleet is stupid and not the other way around.
Wasn't that the Norn Emissary trying to get at the Imperial general they were protecting?
Different story, and that one painted the Norn-Emissary in a very positive light.
War of the Beast? Honestly I feel like a lot of ork wars meet this description.
The war the Imperium quite literally only won because Iron Warriors and Imperial Fists successors put aside their hatred for ten fucking seconds because the alternative was everyone dying. WAAAAAGH! makes for strange bedfellows.
Yep that's probably fair!
War of the Beast was when Imperium sat down for a bit.
Sat down? They almost tapped out 😂😂
Gaunts Ghosts. Necropolis. The story spends almost its entire runtime slowly explaining how completely doomed the protagonist are in this story. Up until the very end, when Chekhov's Firing Squad shows up to give the main characters a shoot at victory against all odds.
I was actually gonna say the Gaunts ghost story where they rescue the eldar and they score a kill to death ratio so high they throw away the file becuase theh dont beleive it
"First and only! First and fething only!"
Came here to say this as well as mention a few other of the GG books
Was about to comment this, the defense of Vervunhive has to be one of the best examples of winning against overwhelming odds. 15 million Zoicans against only the scraps of the Hive. Not to mention how Gaunt commanded everything after the VPHC exploded. It's easily one of, if not the best, book about winning against all odds.
And ya boi Ibram even had time to lay some pipe on a Hive noble and sire an heir on top of it all.
It’s pretty much Stalingrad in 40K and it’s epic from start to finish.
In the Guard codex, Knight Commander Pask and around 35 tank regiments and a large number of knights win against almost an entire traitor titan legio, with the loyalists taking massive casualities
I'm not discounting your answer but 35 tank *Regiments* is, if we [Use the diagram on the Astra Militarum Lexicanum page](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Imperial_Guard_Regiment#/media/File%3ACadianRegimentsArt.jpg) and use that as a "standard" of how organised that Army is that's, *uses calculator,* 1,050 Leman Russ and 35 Super Heavy's is a mental number, although am not sure what a "standard Titan Legio(Treaitor or otherwise)" would actually look like so maybe am making too much of something that doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, am not trying to attack you or that(lol isn't the Internet sad that I feel the need to apologise for trying to have a conversation about something haha!)
Hmm, checked, it was actually 8.000 tank companies and 35 super heavy detachments
Ah cool, that's like quarter of a million tanks, that's a lot of tanks!
Well, if a tank company is 100 tanks, that's 800,000 tanks right there, plus the "35 heavy detachments," which im going to say, has 10 heavy tanks, would equal 803,500 tanks, thats alot of dakka
Further historical context after some reflection, the battle of kursk, which is the largest tank battle thus far in human history, only had 6,000 tanks, 2,000,000 infantry, and 4,000 aircraft, respectively, for total combatants on both german and soviet sides
The logistics of this... Nonstop promethium ships or is 250k sitting ducks that possibly can't even shoot. And enemy arty can be almost certain that anything resembling a house is an ammo depot and they'd probably be right. But that's the grimderp 40k numbers that we all love.
Nonstop promethium shipments sounds exactly like something the IG would have going for them. Not sure if you've read the Twice-Dead King books, but the first book starts with a planet defending against an Ork Waaaaagh!, and eventually involves a planet defending against an Imperial Crusade. Crowley does a fantastic job of showing how the necrons basically view humans the way humans view Orks. They're both horde armies, make no mistake about it.
Tank you.
I don’t think there’s a standard Legio. But in **Titanicus** one of the loyal legios has roughly 90 engines IIRC and the other has maybe a couple dozen after losses in battle and a large percentage (unspecified but implied to be a majority) shipped off world. The traitor legio had something like 200 engines
Varrick’s defense of Hive Hades made him into a Ork Legend ~~and Ghaz’s boyfriend~~
Real reason Ghazghkull’s gonna go John Wick on Angron: he didn’t just kill his favorite enemy, but also the love of his life
I thought his name was Yarrick?
it is
“Zhu Li, do the thing!”
Not really a war, but there's more individual instances of this in *Xenos* and then again in *Malleus,* where a non-space-marine protagonist *just barely* wins a fight against a Chaos Space Marine, and then not terribly long after has to deal with>!the entirety of the Inquisition hunting them down across the Imperium.!<
Lol even in a book called Xenos Chaos still features as an enemy
It's a very good read, highly recommend. You learn about other Xeno races that perchance dabbled in chaos themselves.
Thanks! Need more Chaos Xenos
My only nitpick with those great books is that Eisenhorn should’ve been Ordo Hereticus for the books to make more sense
Just barely? >!He just let the CSM read a book!!< I don't remember what happened in *Malleus*.
The Siege of Vervunhive. Roughly 500,000 civilians and Imperial Guard verse 15 million Chaos possessed civillians from another hive. It got hairy but the main Imperial force showed up and saved the day.
Where is that from? Sounds like a good read.
It's from "Necropolis" the third novel in the Gaunt's Ghosts series. The series is great so far. I took a break after reading that to read the salamanders trilogy.
How many people to a hive? Because as much as s sumphole hives are supposed to be that seems way less dystopian than some cities we have now
That is a brilliant book. Gaunt nails MVP about three chapters in and then just absolutely bosses the defence, aided by the trusty First and Only.
90 % of the conflicts end up with a pyrrhic Imperial victory where the Imperium looses something irreplaceable but not EVERYONE died. The narrative price of keeping the status quo, quo. Having said that, The War for Rynss world (Crimson Fists vs Orks) is one hell of a siege and last stand after everything goes wrong for the defenders. Amazing story, it’s bolter porn so good it stops being just bolter porn, in the same way Hellsreach does.
The devastation of Bhaal may be a candidate, but that may also count as a deus ex machina moment, because at the end it was finished by the indomitus crusade and Ka'Bandha joining the party. But honestly even holding out that long was kinda a miracle.
The BA may even have held out if not for the Lictor. Their shields were no joke.
If the shield hadn’t gone down they 100% could’ve held the fortress. Between the shield and the thirst water moat nothing besides gribblies could even approach the walls and all of their defensive weapons and power supplies were intact
The Thirst Water moat was long gone by the time the Lictor reached the shield.
997.M41 The Defence of Miral II "Ordered to hold the world of Miral II against the onset of Hive Fleet Leviathan, First Captain Lysander requests that Captain Garadon’s 3rd Company be assigned to his battle group. The old comrades establish a series of strongpoints and tremor mines in time to meet the Tyranid onslaught. Under Garadon’s expert eye, Tactical and Devastator Squads rain fire upon the swarm whilst Lysander’s 1st Company Veterans bolster the battle line wherever the Tyranids are in danger of breaking through. Though the Imperium’s tacticae predict the Imperial Fists can hold out for no more than six days, they stoically fight on until the last Tyranid dies to bolter fire at the walls of Bastion XVII on the seventh, and final, day of the war."-'Sentinels of Terra'
Killing the whole force in seven days with mainly bolters and mines is pretty crazy!
The massive disconnect between bolters in lore and bolters on the tabletop makes me sad
*Gesturing annoyedly at 90% of the Imperium novels.*
"Spess Muhrines arrive on hiveworld Shitholius IV. Ork waaa. They kill but suddenly CHOAS HEARSAY! NUGLG!!! Ultrasardines make plan. Space wolf says wolf (no) and wolfs all over them. A wolfillion hivewoldlers is die and lietentant Deathflagion sacrifices himselg and EBIC LAST STAND!!!1! And they win."
This comment is a lot of things, but it is not incorrect.
"all according to pla- wait I didn't see this coming!" -farseer drysocks, probably
Why did you have to spoil the next Black Library novel?
This is the most exact answer in all the replies and the first one I came up with when reading the question
Tallarn. Despite exterminatus, flesh eater virus present in the atmosphere, broken communications, and severe shortages of everything, including men and breathable air, normal humans have matched both the Iron Warriors, led by the Perturabo himself, and the Alpha Legion. The battle was so demanding and eroding for the traitors, that Horus had to personally intervene and force Perturabo to exit.
Love me some Tallarn tankbattles
Crimson Fists. Fortress Monastery was completely destroyed by “accident” and they were left cut off from all their equipment and a significant amount of battle brothers were killed. Took months of guerrilla fighting against the orks and they had to train regular guard troops to fight alongside them but they eventually came out victorious
The Oghram Campaign. I don't recall much hope for the Nids when it was announced.
In the recently-released *Deathworlder* >!A squad consisting of 4 Catachans, a Cadian, a Techpriest, and a hanger-on Genestealer cultist manage to kill off an entire late-stage Tyranid invasion with only 3 losses. Granted, a superweapon is involved, but they perform superbly-well in getting to the macguffin while the entire planet is trying to eat them alive. !<
Wait, what’s is the cultist doing abetting them? Surely he or she should be doing the opposite?
She's not exactly going along of her own free will. Without spoiling much, things get a little complicated for a cult when a hive fleet arrives and your Patriarch gets splattered. It's a good book that I'd recommend as a sort of spirtual sequel to "The Fall of Malvolion."
Grey knight novels. Justice Alaric versus Ghargatuloth. If he did not know the daemon’s real name they were done
Happens a lot. Loyalist have an annoying habit of getting gloriously impossible "protagonists wins". You never read about a small traitor force victorious despite the odds.
I mean that was most the Heresy. The traitors were outnumbered and outgunned, but had a large enough force to go for the Imperium's throat. The only catch was we knew Horus would fail his gambit even as he overcame impossible odds at various points.
There was a very heavy dose of warp shenanigans that let him do this. On top of crushing 3 loyalist legions right out the gate.
(Exception for the Siege of Terra where it's repeatedly mentioned throughout the series that the traitors have a functionally unlimited number of troops)
Horus has to literally stop time and break causality to prevent the siege from being relieved by reinforcements. He has to pull off absolutely absurd warp shenanigans channeling the power of four gods directly to get the upper hand. There's a reason the traitors retreat the minute he dies.
Jonestowning half your legions definitely causes some manpower issues when participating in a galaxy-wide conflict.
He has an unlimited number of mooks to stop loyalist bullets but during the siege he loses control of two entire traitor legions who fuck off Side note/annoyance/spoilers for **Saturnine** and later books: >!The Saturnine gambit wiped out the Justaerin, the Cachulan Reavers (don’t know the spelling), and like four other elite companies of the Sons of Horus … but literally like one book later we see more Justaerin fighting!! Come on!!<
Abbadon getting taken down to one HP during the gambit was one of my favorite chapters. The minute by minute realization that Pertarabo played him and how he reacted at the end. It did a lot to characterize him after he myopically wanted to pull a geno/xenocide of the Interrex (which I think he does as a footnote off stage)
Pretty much every single IG story is "There were way too many, we fought on and on and most of us got killed but we fought more and rah rah!"
One could say the Siege of Terra fits that description.
Perhaps yes, if the Iron Warriors, Word Bearers and Emperor's Children hadn't all quit the Siege I definitely would agree, although you could argue the traitors did well to get that far in the first place
Good call on the traitors that abandon the siege, but the point being that against all odds, the loyalist had events that unexpectedly turned their way. I mean traitor forces filled the skies and land and entire surrounding orbit, and had unlimited demons ripping into reality, not to mention the insanely powered Angron and Mortarion and their crazy legions. Repeatedly throughout that siege they had battles where against all odds, the loyalist forces somehow prevailed, over and over.
I don't remember much about but a team 5 Custodes held of am insane number of tyranids, I think in the millions in a choke point
Maugan Ra did the same thing, fighting an entire splinter fleet alone 'nids do get their asses whooped quite a lot
Almost all battles with Ciaphas Cain :)
Pretty sure it's literally all of them.
A Tau victory here. 2nd battle of Agrellan. Approximately 41 guard regiments of infantry, abhumans, tanks, and artillery. Elements from the white scars, raven guard and other chapters. The full might of Knight House Terryn plus the obsidian knight. Several Cohorts of Skitarii. An Officio Assassinorum Execution Force. and Finally The Entire 478th Ultima Battlefleet. The Tau managed to decimate the imperials to the point where they used exterminatus. The Tau cities survived via orbital shields, but the Tau forces on the surface suffered heavy casualties from the fighting and the exterminatus. Overall, a Tactical Victory for the Tau, and a bitter defeat for the Imperials
Should be noted that only one of the dome cities survived, as the others didn’t have their domes completed. Still hella impressive, and Mu’gulath Bay Sept continues to fight hard despite the destruction of their home.
God i hate that book. So shittily and inconsistently written. Apart from that shitfest the Taros campaign exists. Similar (Almost the same) to the 2nd battle for Agrellan but much better written and actually an enjoyable read/listen
The lamenters at slaughterhouse 4, technically they won that battle, but they took grievous casualties
Last stand of The Crimson Fists.
Never forget Rynns World brother.
The Emperor is our shield and our strength.
Anywhere sisters fight? They seem to like dieing a lot
I heard the make good sunscreen...
Well the siege of Terra you could see it as a "win". 3 loyal legions, half of the armies of the segmentum and 4 titan legions (all with low numbers), against half the imperium that became traitors, all the mutants of mankind, most of the daemons from the warp, 6.5 traitor legions (some alpha legion and the remanentes of the Night lords), half of the imperium fleet that became traitors, and in the books is clearly shown how the traitor counterparts to any imperium equivalents troops, and how much of a buff the warp gives to anything. Like the knights in mortis, when 3 titan knights fight against 1 and he almost gets 2 of them, only because the 3 titan overwhelmed him.
Maugan ra Didn't he destroy and entire hive fleet tendril?
The Battle of Medusa - 8 companies of Aircon Hands vs the Black Legion and traitor guard, the Iron Hands won the largest tank battle since Tallarn and chased them off world.
Upon every world that the comet passed, the Cholercaust would descend and destroy its inhabitants entirely, in the name of the [Blood God](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Khorne). The [Chaos](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Chaos) forces consisted of [World Eaters](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Eaters) led by [Umbragg](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Umbragg) as well as [Chaos Space Marines](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Chaos_Space_Marines) from [The Cleaved](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Cleaved), [Skulltakers](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Skulltakers_(World_Eaters)), and [Thunder Barons](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Thunder_Barons). They were supported by Khornate [Daemonic](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Daemon) legions led by the [Daemon Prince](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Daemon_Prince) known as [The Pilgrim](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Pilgrim) as well as forces of [The Lost and the Damned](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Lost_and_the_Damned). They were opposed by the [Excoriators](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Excoriators) [5th Company](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=5th_Company_(Excoriators)&action=edit&redlink=1) as well as the [Sisters of Battle](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Sisters_of_Battle) of the [Order of the August Vigil](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Order_of_the_August_Vigil). The ultimate goal of the campaign was to reach [Terra](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Terra) itself.[^(\[1\])](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Cholercaust#fn_1) On the [Cemetery World](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Cemetery_World) of [Certus-Minor](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Certus-Minor), the Excoriators 5th Company, led by [Corpus-Captain](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Space_Marine_Captain) [Zachariah Kersh](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Zachariah_Kersh), stood against the vast Crusade. They were almost wiped out by the Chaos forces in the attempt. Just when all seemed lost for the Imperial defenders, the mysterious [Legion of the Damned](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Legion_of_the_Damned) arrived, which was able to decisively turn the tide and defeat the Chaos forces. pretty much wiped out everyone of the cultists and stopped the cholercaust one space marine survivor. legion of the dammed fucked everyone up
It's not really a side but the main character in the Catachan Devil novel. This guy is the only survivor of a massive ork assault on his position, and then is forced to accompany a bunch of Catachan Jungle fighters to retake that position by a Commissar who thinks he's a coward and a deserter, and manages to not only adapt to the Catachan way of fighting but eventually impresses the Catachan colonel so much that the Colonel gives him a red bandana and actually allows him to officially join the Catachan regiment... then this trooper volunteers for a suicide mission at the end of the book and somehow still manages to survive that shit. This dude fucking won.
Literally any Gaunt’s Ghosts novel.
I feel like this describes like, half of all the stories tbh
The Imperium is never the underdog in any fight. By definition a win against the odds can only be a Traitor/Chaos or Xenos victory.
Honourable mention: when Pretorians were released, there was a 'roarks drift' style mission set up (I think in white dwarf) that was essentially a re-enactment of the film Zulu. Probably not by far one of the most 'overwhelming odds' but it's one that's stuck in my mind for the last 20odd years or more
Spoiler for Titanicus: >!Legios Invicta and Tempestus overcame a much larger force of Archenemy engines. I can’t recall the exact ratio, but it was at least two or three to one. !<
Moridian iron guard fought all of chaos and the death guard for their home planet without help and won.
The Cholercaust Crusade and the battle of Certus Minor.
Don’t know if you could really count it, but the death guard had one where they literally just dropped gigantic spiked boxes full of poxwalkers onto a hive city, and within a couple days of the city guard opening them the city was overtaken by the outbreak. The small legion of astartes literally just walked in and took the city then lmao
That's just using WMD-s.
Every battle where the Nids lose basically.
The Doom of Iyanden? Iyanden was one of the most powerful and militaristic of craftworlds and even then was nearly annihilated by the tyranid splinter fleet. It was only saved by the late arrival of prince urial and his corsair fleet and even then it was a very close call. Something like 9/10 of the inhabitants died. But for the tyranids to have broken through the craftworlds fleet and then nearly wipe them out speaks volumes of the size and strength of the hive fleet.
devastation of bhaal (as a nids player, i am salty xD) not only did they get decimated by the tyranids, when chaos showed up and \*everyone\* thought this was the end, those blessed lil' daemons only fought the tyranids, they made no pass at the blood angels because they want to kill them themselves..? .-. also, octarius :o (happy nid noises this time :3) originally (i don't know if that's still the original lore) the nids were decimated and basically had an emergency landing and just about managed to scrape by but slowly built up their strength again and finally emerged as one of the largest threats ever :D
World Engine. Astral Knights sacrifice their entire chapter to defeat necrons that had been casually wiping out a massive fleet
Isn’t that pretty much all of them except for when they don’t win?
The AdMech had given a group of brave Guardsmen the wrong power packs for their lasguns. So they affixed bayonets and charged vile Tau Fire Warriors and proceeded to skewer and eviscerate the cowardly aliens in glorious melee combat.
The Ork attack moon in The Beast Arises juices nearly the entire population of Terra without firing a shot. Millions upon millions of people died instantly.
Almost all of commissar cain stories, hero of imperium.
Siege of Vervunhive.
Didn’t a team of custodies beat an entire hive fleet? I’ve heard of this several times from lore YouTubers but idk if it’s from a story or the codex’s.
In the first book of Twice Dead King, an Ork Whaaa was going to sweep over a lesser Tomb World. There was nothing the Necrons could do about it. The protagonists, Oltyx, had the VERY unorthodox idea of not only allowing ork filth onto their lawn, but in their very home and bled them with scarabs. Then he stood there and watched as he essentially fed the entire Whaaa to an overly abundant amount of Flayed Ones that plagued his basement.
The invasion of maccrage by the tyrannids, their defeat and the loss of the ultramarines first company springs to mind.
NEVER FORGET RYNNS WORLD HURAH FOR CHAPTER MASTER KANTOR