Remembering the 13th Crusade: The End of Time

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

Yeah I;ve heard the "supply" arguement...and its bunk. this is the warp man, the setting is FILLED with stories of chaos forces opening warp portals and traipsing out of them (and thats not to mention partial access to the webway), I dont see space lanes being a major issue for the 13th crusade.

 

 

And yet if it was so easy for large scale Chaos invasions to be deployed and kept in the field via warp portal, why is the Cadian Gate even an obstacle? Why even bother with ships, as the Navy can stop them before you reach the tasty planets. While I'm not denying small scale incursions and withdrawals via that method are possible, the fickle, unreliable nature of the warp seems to mean that for a deployment on the scale of a Black Crusade, a more 'conventional' space based deployment infrastructure is required. Without their fleet, the Chaos forces would be effectively cut off form resupply and reinforcement, how long they can continue in this way I don't know, but ultimately, Imperial numbers would tell in such a scenario.

 

Although in my original post I was more thinking victory in space = orbital support for Cadian ground forces, providing the aerial assets and heavy bombardments to shift the power balance in the defender's favour.

[Vesper]

Do you have a source for the Black Legion being so large? I find that claim somewhat dubious, not only are the strengths of Chaos warbands nebulously defined the majority of the time, I find it unlikely the Black Legion outnumber the Imperial Guard and Titan Legions in addition to the Astartes (as Traitor Guard, LatD and Traitor Titan Legions are thier own things, not part of the Legion), and we were only ever given a fragment of the orders of battle for both sides of that campaign, every list of forces ended in 'continued in file ref: XYZ'.

I don't have a source, I have multiple ones that imply they're so large that's insane.

According to Dark Creed, the Black Legion is known to have over ten times the numbers of astartes of the Word Bearers (who were by far the largest Legion to rally Horus). Which makes sense, for they have been integrating countless warbands for the past 10k years (it's everywhere in the BL supplement. P.55 for example). That means they're the largest coherent fighting force made up of astartes. And Abaddon knows it and used this advantage a numerous number of times (p. 113 BL supplement).

We know Abaddon made numerous pacts with daemon overlords the like of Doombreed. Those aren't really part of the Black Legion per se, but they sure are used in the interests of the Black Legion, making them part of its arsenal.

We know they have an absurd amount of human and mutant cults / armies. The supplement names some (page 52) : The Black Oculus cult, Twisted Talon. We had a sneak peak at those legions in a story about the Gothic War, IIRC.

The Black Legion also has a number of titans. That is suggested by the Apocalypse background of warmaster Davroth, who invades a world in order to be given two titans by Abaddon. And if Abaddon is willing to give them to a damn Word Bearer like Davroth, I suppose he has a number of said titans (see the Scouring of Makenna VII from the Apocalypse book released in 2007).

Then, we know the Black Legion rips faces seemingly effortlessly (probably because they're so large). They've been slaughtering the Blood Angels to extinction (allowing them to survive out of respect, it seems. See Mackan, during the Ghost War), they destroyed the Warhawks and the Venerators chapters in a single battle during the 5th Black Crusade, and yet another chapter is destroyed in the short short-story from the Black Library advent calendar thingy.

We know that when they go to war, they engulf entire sectors in flames, and they are so large that when they go out of the Eye as the entire Black Legion, everyone and its mother calls it a Black Crusade.

In the end, they're the only ones to actually keep the Long War alive. And that takes huge numbers to have enough impact to do so.

[Leif Bearclaw]

Does Dark Creed also give any indication of the strength of the Word Bearers? Because while they were the;largest of the Traitor Legions, that size probbaly hasn't been sustained over 10,000 years (Plus don't those Antony Reynolds books predate the new Heresy fluff that has the WB be so lareg?). But if you include things like Doombreed and the mutant cults, where does the Black Legion end? If the assertion is that the total Chaos forces match the Gate defenders, that's a far more reasonable claim, but if you set 'Black Legion' so loosely, why not include the likes of the Crimson Slaughter? They fight for Abaddon, yet aren't Black Legion.

 

If the Legion alone was enough to force the gate, there would be no need for Abby to unify the Traitor Legions and secure all those alliances, he could just use his own troops. Why bother getting the IW on side? Just send BL to Hydra Cordatus. Why bother with the Legio Mortis is the BL can field enopugh Titans to outnumber multiple full strength loyalist Titan Legions? Having the Legion be that large undermines one of the biggest points about Chaos, 99% of the time, they're fractious and at each other's throats. 

 

On a side note, almost every faction rips face seemingly effortlessly. In the Dominion of Fire Angron ripped enough face to rival any of Abby's escapades, just with a bunch of his berserkers. Te CS knock over a DA gene-seed store like its no big thing. Huron has gone from less than 200 Marines and some human slaves to the dominant warlord in the Maelstrom in less than a century. Lady Malys writes off an entire fortress world with some Orks. Lysander escapes an IW fortress on his own, starting off unarmed and unarmoured. Necrons destroyed the Angels Revenant before anyone else knew they were under attack. Maugen Ra can face down an entire tendril of Leviathan single handed and win. Kaldor Draigo. That the BL dex portrays Abby and his boys as the meanest SOBs since the Emperor was in nappies is pretty much par for the course.

[Slayer le Boucher]

 

 

If the Legion alone was enough to force the gate, there would be no need for Abby to unify the Traitor Legions and secure all those alliances, he could just use his own troops. Why bother getting the IW on side? Just send BL to Hydra Cordatus. Why bother with the Legio Mortis is the BL can field enopugh Titans to outnumber multiple full strength loyalist Titan Legions? Having the Legion be that large undermines one of the biggest points about Chaos, 99% of the time, they're fractious and at each other's throats. 

 

 

Simply because its easier to send in the others do the grunt work, underminning their combat capability if they survive, and assure your own dominion over them, if your Legion is pretty much undamaged.

 

Now its not like BL marines doesn't do anything and watch, but of what i can make of it, lets say 30% of the BL is involved, and is joined by other Warbands and stuffs to complete them.

 

even if this 30% of BL is destroyed with the 100% of each Warbands, the BL suffered a mild loss and is still at 70% full, while the others are dead.

 

Its calling playing the long run, not doing everything by yourself to keep your strengths for the big ass battle, and in the aftermath, still keeping in check those who worked with(under) you

[Leif Bearclaw]

Which sort of brings me back to the question, where does the Black Legion end? Do the mutant hordes count as BL? What about the CS, who fight at Abby's behest but retain their own colours?

 

While that whole 'bleed other not yourself' strategy is fine, if the Legion is of the scale Vesper claims, it isn't really necessary. 'Oh look Abby sent the equivalent of the entire Word Bearers Legion to divert the Imperium while his personal Titans annihilated the whole Legio Ignatum (which he also outnumbered by orders of magnitude), that means he only has 90% of Legion, probably a greater force than the rest of the Traitor Astartes combined to fight the rest of his war.'

 

I also found it rather irritating in codex:BL  where every setback and defeat was only damaging Abby's 'allies' while the 'real' Black Legion scarper declaring 'just as planned', and never seem to bleed their own blood. It overtones to me of 'No True Scotsman'. Defeat in the Gothic War?, doesn't count, it wasn't the actual Black Legion that got gutted, they ran away declaring victory because they achieved 1/3 of their objectives. Pandorax? BL run away declaring victory, and it isn't the Legion that are bled by the Imperial counter. It wasn't the BL that inexplicably aborted the assault on Medusa, they were laying the 'Heilca' Sector to waste (which doesn't exist, it's the Helican Sub-Sector, in the Scarus Sector grumblegrumblegrunmble) Yet it is the BL that spring the trap on the Warhawks and Venerators, it is the BL that storm the Citadle of Kromarch and the BL that defeat the BAs at Mackan.

 

A good example of BL interacting with other force is in Soul Hunter. Where Talos notices that the NL are being used as fodder, objects, and ultimately the alliance breaks down and conflcit breaks out between the BL and NL. This highlights the often self defeating nature of Chaos really well and is part of an awesome story. But if the BL are so massive as to outnumber the heavily reinforced defenders of the Cadian Gate on their own, alliances like that are unnecessary and counter productive to the efficient prosecution of The Long War. Only BL would also carry the benefit of greater cohesion and discipline amongst the Chaos forces, the breakdown of which is what led to defeat at Crythe.

[Hellios]

Aren't the Word Bearers supposed to be the second largest legion after the Black legion (in 40K)? I'm sure there was some talk about this when we were debating how many Space Marines the Blackheart has under his command.

 

Also, Aren't the Iron Warriors fairly large, as they have been replenishing their numbers? Do we have a rough size for the Iron Warriors? If so, we could work out a minimum size for the Black Legion... 

 

Assuming all of these details/'facts' are correct.

[Lucien Eilam]

Every codex focuses more on the successes than the failures and presents its subject as the greatest ever, and the Black Legion needed it more than any after years of being perceived as a bunch of incompetent chumps. You don't read codexes for subtlety or nuance.

[incinerator950]

No, I read them for rules. Mostly.

[Leif Bearclaw]

Aren't the Word Bearers supposed to be the second largest legion after the Black legion (in 40K)? I'm sure there was some talk about this when we were debating how many Space Marines the Blackheart has under his command.

 

Also, Aren't the Iron Warriors fairly large, as they have been replenishing their numbers? Do we have a rough size for the Iron Warriors? If so, we could work out a minimum size for the Black Legion... 

 

Assuming all of these details/'facts' are correct.

I'm unaware of any firm figures for the Traitor Legions circa m41, which is unsurprising really given how fragmented they became. I also would expect their numbers would fluctuate a lot more than the Loyalists, or their Legiones Astartes predecessors, thanks to the amount of internal conflict and inter-warband war that occurs amongst Chaos warbands.

[Vesper]

Does Dark Creed also give any indication of the strength of the Word Bearers? Because while they were the;largest of the Traitor Legions, that size probbaly hasn't been sustained over 10,000 years (Plus don't those Antony Reynolds books predate the new Heresy fluff that has the WB be so lareg?). But if you include things like Doombreed and the mutant cults, where does the Black Legion end? If the assertion is that the total Chaos forces match the Gate defenders, that's a far more reasonable claim, but if you set 'Black Legion' so loosely, why not include the likes of the Crimson Slaughter? They fight for Abaddon, yet aren't Black Legion.

 

If the Legion alone was enough to force the gate, there would be no need for Abby to unify the Traitor Legions and secure all those alliances, he could just use his own troops. Why bother getting the IW on side? Just send BL to Hydra Cordatus. Why bother with the Legio Mortis is the BL can field enopugh Titans to outnumber multiple full strength loyalist Titan Legions? Having the Legion be that large undermines one of the biggest points about Chaos, 99% of the time, they're fractious and at each other's throats. 

 

On a side note, almost every faction rips face seemingly effortlessly. In the Dominion of Fire Angron ripped enough face to rival any of Abby's escapades, just with a bunch of his berserkers. Te CS knock over a DA gene-seed store like its no big thing. Huron has gone from less than 200 Marines and some human slaves to the dominant warlord in the Maelstrom in less than a century. Lady Malys writes off an entire fortress world with some Orks. Lysander escapes an IW fortress on his own, starting off unarmed and unarmoured. Necrons destroyed the Angels Revenant before anyone else knew they were under attack. Maugen Ra can face down an entire tendril of Leviathan single handed and win. Kaldor Draigo. That the BL dex portrays Abby and his boys as the meanest SOBs since the Emperor was in nappies is pretty much par for the course.

Abaddon needs to unite the legions (warbands) because he doesn't want to force the gate. He wants to burn Terra. That's another thing. Even if the Black Legion can rip the gate open, it doesn't mean they can surf their way to Terra as per the Crimson Path.

The thing with the Black Legion is that they're the only thing in the Eye that is united (in a weird way). They are a Legion. Something trully different, more organic, than anything we've ever seen.

I'd add that cultists and mutants sure can be part of the Black Legion. The cultists on Calth were part of the Word Bearer forces. That's pretty much the same, except they're part of warbands that are part of the Black Legion.

[Leif Bearclaw]

But then, on what scale does that put the rest of the Traitors? If the BL have been so expanded in scale, have the rest as well? I see three outcomes here.

 

If they haven't, and the BL contain the vast majority of all the Traitor Astartes and mutant/heretic support troops, then why do any other warbands still exist? Given that the 13th Crusade has apparently been the goal since the Bl was founded, it would make more sense to absorb (almost) all traitors under Abaddon's Black, then use this unified and cohesive force to break the gate and march on Terra. Thus limiting the factionalism that tend to impair Chaos campaigns (like at Crythe).

 

If all the Traitors have been expanded, and the Imperial defences haven't been, then the Cadian Gate has failed before the first chaos ship leaves the Eye, as the Imperium's forces are far too outnumbered to have a chance of holding. This turns breaking the gate into a curbstomp for chaos, which, not only is a poorer story, it isn't what is happening. In the snippets of fluff we've got before the clock stops, we see a major confrontation, with the advantage going to whoever's codex it is (so C:CSM makes Abby's victory seem inevitable, whereas C:IG's slant is that Creed is holding the line, and inflicting massive losses on the Traitors).

 

Lastly, all factions have been increased in scale. In which case, there is little point of the expansion, as the force comparison's remain approximately the same. All it does is further muddy the numbers, which are nebulous to nonsenical at best in 40k. On the other hand, making 40k numbers more 'realistic' for interplanetary war wouldn't be bad per se (other than showing how little sense the Codex Astartes Chapter Size makes...)

[Vesper]

If all the Traitors have been expanded, and the Imperial defences haven't been, then the Cadian Gate has failed before the first chaos ship leaves the Eye, as the Imperium's forces are far too outnumbered to have a chance of holding. This turns breaking the gate into a curbstomp for chaos, which, not only is a poorer story, it isn't what is happening. In the snippets of fluff we've got before the clock stops, we see a major confrontation, with the advantage going to whoever's codex it is (so C:CSM makes Abby's victory seem inevitable, whereas C:IG's slant is that Creed is holding the line, and inflicting massive losses on the Traitors).

I think it's a bit more complicated.

GW has had a weird view of the Chaos forces. Sometimes calling legions chapters. Or talking into account the truth of warbands or not.

What is the Black Legion ? Countless warbands. Some are your regular CSM warband, made up from 50 astartes, for example. Some might have 10k astartes, though. Some are daemon engine packs led by a warpsmith. Some have titans, knights and all that jazz. Some are mostly mutant hordes or renegade guard. Some are dedicated to a Chaos god, some aren't.

That's the Black Legion.

Yet, when we were told stuff about the Black Legion, the way it was done made us feel like we were talking about the Ultramarine chapter, or the Blood Angels.

The order of battle is guilty of that sin. I could even argue that the other legions appear in that order of battle when the reality of the everyday life of their legionnaires is one built around the warband, far from the legion it used to be.

It's not about being 'expanded' (my use of that word was kinda abusive... Hey, not my mother tongue ) it's about putting the right words on each concept. And now that we've done it, I feel that the background for the campaign made the war look quite small. Surely not as awesome and apocalyptic as it should be.

And about the imperials losing, well, it's pretty much the thing of 40k. It is sometimes diluted by codex background like Draigocrap and Calgar defeating an army of Avatars of Khaine on his own, but 40k is the story of the time of the ending. As readers, as people out of the universe, we understand that the Imperium is doomed, that Abaddon will succeed (even though he isn't the only enemy of the imperium that will succeed. Tyranids have a fair chance at eating everything pretty soon). We know Cadia will fall. We know the imperials will fight back to back until they get slaughtered. We know Terra will end up falling and we know the Emperor will die. It's hardly something new.

[Leif Bearclaw]

And the time of ending is my least favourite thing the last 3 editions of 40k have been burdened with, and I think the fluff suffers for it. The tag line is 'there is only war' not 'there is only imperial defeat'. We regularly see an Imperium of such staggering incompetence they shouldn't have survived 100 years, let alone 10,000. Too rarely we see an emphatic Imperial win, even the victories they do get tend toward the pyrrhic. Nobody (apart from the Avatar) is as likely to lose and/or get massacred in their own codex fluff than the Imperial factions (though this is slanted somewhat by the Guard). One of the things I like about the Night Lords trilogy was that is managed to present the Imperium as a deadly, behemoth entity, still with plenty of strength left in it, and that the conclusion of The Long War isn't a certain victory for Chaos. One of may favourite sequences in Black Library fiction is the rant Talos has at Abaddon about how much further the Traitors have fallen than the Loyalists, partly because it's a perspective we see so rarely.

 

To bring it back on topic, that's part of what made EoT so awesome, neither side's victory was inevitable. The promise of change was epic; you could've had Abby braking the gate wide open and starting toward Terra, or the Imperium could have weathered the storm and emerged triumphant, buoyed by their success and stronger for their victory, or the messy stalemate that we got. All of which had plenty of potential for innovations, new exciting stories and new heroes and villain to complement, surpass or replace the setting's veterans. But instead we got this retcon ridden stasis where now the conclusions (though we'll never see them) apparently aren't even in doubt.

[incinerator950]

I have a hard time imagining the Imperium losing a lot. Or not being the poster child for 40k, or having terrible rules through most of its line. Yet when Chaos gets a solid victory, people lose their minds, like bizzaro wasn't supposed to win.

[Vesper]

I used to be childishly upset about the retcon. But I now side with AD-B. I don't feel it was worthy of the scale of the setting. It was an absolute blast to play. As I said previously, I still have some nods to what my Black Legion did back then, in my current background. And I'd be super pleased if GW decided to publish some damn background in their WD and start a global campaign. But that's not their thing anymore.

 

One of the things I like about the Night Lords trilogy was that is managed to present the Imperium as a deadly, behemoth entity, still with plenty of strength left in it, and that the conclusion of The Long War isn't a certain victory for Chaos. One of may favourite sequences in Black Library fiction is the rant Talos has at Abaddon about how much further the Traitors have fallen than the Loyalists, partly because it's a perspective we see so rarely.

I think I remember that Talos has a change of heart about the Long War and Abaddon's goal at some point. And he finally values the Long War. Which is a perspective we see rarely too. Failbaddon meme and all that jazz.

[incinerator950]

Losing my models shunted my perspectove. A lot.

[Leif Bearclaw]

I have a hard time imagining the Imperium losing a lot. Or not being the poster child for 40k, or having terrible rules through most of its line. Yet when Chaos gets a solid victory, people lose their minds, like bizzaro wasn't supposed to win.

Thing is, the setting is more than just Imperium vs Chaos, but the majority of conflicts portrayed are the Imperium vs other faction, and more often than not the Imperium seems to lose. So we see the Tau kicking the Imperium's ass in their fluff (which is a rant for another time and place), the Necron's are cropping up all over the place and taking names in theirs, the Nids being the worst thing since before Horus and 'the old enemy' of Chaos.

 

Just look at the IA series, Tau beat Imperium, Imperium underestimates Nids and get eaten, years long siege ending in pyrrhic Imperial victory, Orks beat the Imperium, Imperial Civil War leaving sectors in flames and a new Chaos warlord, Imperium and Eldar can both claim technical victory and Necrons kick the Imperium's teeth in.

 

Then you have the codex fluff. In recent Imperial dexes we haven't even got detailed victorious campaign reports. There's  no equivalent to stuff like Muggalath Bay and the Abyssal Crusade in the current SM and IG dexes.

 

Now I'm not saying all this fluff is bad (dex fluff tends to be worse than FW imo), but I hope it illustrates my perception that the Imperium tends to get the short end of the stick.

[Vesper]

That defenitely is a matter of perspective.

For instance, the three wars for Armaggedon were imperial victories.

But if the imperium doesn't lose, then it's not the time of the ending anymore. The imperium isn't crumbling anymore. Its enemies aren't getting stronger.

Picture that in the Heresy : if the traitors don't lose, they simply end up wining the Heresy. 40k isn't the story of the Imperium emerging victorious. It's the story of its death.

[incinerator950]

I barely glimpsed at the FW books. They have the largest territory, so it's almost natural to use them. When you encompass everything though, they have a good portion of favoritist authors. Occasionally you get someone who makes a good villain, or someone decides to embellish Tau or Black Legion a little more.

 

The Imperium has millions of wars. A vital forgeworld gets lost and you have a lot more waiting to be written. A hive fleet gets destroyed or a Chaos warband gets slaughtered, that's only slightly more difficult to replace. Of course this is a static universe in a vacuum. Angron could lead a Red Crusade with a new 50k strong Berzerker force with demons and it will just happen, get atalled, and then someone will stop him, die, and get replaced.

[Leif Bearclaw]

That defenitely is a matter of perspective.

For instance, the three wars for Armaggedon were imperial victories.

But if the imperium doesn't lose, then it's not the time of the ending anymore. The imperium isn't crumbling anymore. Its enemies aren't getting stronger.

Picture that in the Heresy : if the traitors don't lose, they simply end up wining the Heresy.

Thing is, the Heresy series has had plenty of back an forth and variation. Pyrrhic victories for the traitors (Istvaan III), glimmers of Hope for the loyalists (Eisenstein), emphatic traitor victories (Istvaan V), effective draws (Phall), solid loyalist victories (Prospero, SIgnus), costlier loyalist victories (Calth) and the same for the traitors (Paramar, Mars, Molech (I assume about the last one)). Whereas codex fluff especially seems to be going only one way. As for Armageddon, you're right, but the fluff for those wars predates the Time of Ending idea, the third especially, as it hails from that time of dynamic fluff we're lamenting the passage of in this thread.

 

But you're right about it being a matter of perspective, and I hope I've explained my viewpoint that the Time of Ending and the eternal stasis of the setting are overall bad things. But then I might be overly influenced by the poor codex fluff, as my Black Library consumption has fallen drastically in recent years.

[Vesper]

But you're right about it being a matter of perspective, and I hope I've explained my viewpoint that the Time of Ending and the eternal stasis of the setting are overall bad things. But then I might be overly influenced by the poor codex fluff, as my Black Library consumption has fallen drastically in recent years.

I can understand, even though I disagree.

FW books offer some really neat background. Codex stuff is codex stuff.

[Lucien Eilam]

Thing is, the setting is more than just Imperium vs Chaos, but the majority of conflicts portrayed are the Imperium vs other faction

 

Fundamentally, it isn't even that. As I understand it, GW's Head of IP describes Warhammer 40,000 as being about Space Marines, things Space Marines fight, and sometimes the Space Marines' allies. The entire setting exists to give people something to do with the Space Marines they've bought.

 

That might not be what motivates you personally to collect and play 40k, of course, but everything makes much more sense when you understand how Games Workshop see the setting.

[Clone]

Sort of off topic question: are there any bl books that are based in the 42 millennium?

[Leif Bearclaw]

Closest I'm aware of is the Cain series, which are the in universe writings of the titular character collected by an Inquisitor sometime around 100m42, but all the actual events on the stories are still m41.

[RapatoR]

 

 

But if I get it right then it has been changed to show victory of bad guys more clearly. Previously they just took Cadia and crusade was over. Now they took Cadia and crusade continues with final goal not being Cadia but Terra.

 

Except that Cadia certainly hasn't been taken in the new, paused fluff, the fight has barely begun. Terra is just now the stated objective.

 

And even after the EoT campaign, claims about fudging the results notwithstanding (don't want to comment on that), Cadia didn't fall. Although it was claimed to be a minor Chaos victory, the Imperium secured most of the key systems and sectors, with only the Cadian system looking dicey, and even then Chaos had not conquered Cadia (they had the advantage, but hadn't won yet), and the Imperium had dominated the void war. Reading the published campaign results, the gate held.

 

Thirteen times shall the Traitor King go forth. In the End Times the iron fortress shall be cast down. Its walls breached and its Gate forced open. Those that dwell beyond shall spill through it. The air shall burn and the ground shall melt, The Daemon shall lie down with the machine, Brother shall slay brother with fire and sword. And the sky-wound shall pour its malice forth. The Eye shall stare unblinking at its prize, and the Traitor King shall cross the bridge of stars. He shall return to finish the Warmonger's red work, Upon holy soil shall the fate of man be decided.

The Liber Malefact

 

Abaddon is confident that he can eventually smash open the Cadian system and flood into Segmentum Solar with an unprecedented number of warships, but driving his invasion across the stars to Terra is another matter.

There are tons of quotes like this around and they heavily suggest that the final decisive moments of the Thirteenth Black Crusade will happen on Terra not Cadia. Also we know that Abaddon doesn't desire taking Cadia, but causing enough slaughter for Eye to expand. There is little you can do to counter this when he just throws bodies at you.

 

Again, it is setting which (more or less) ends at 999.M41. Stasis of the setting is an oxymoron. Is World War 2 static? The story is already told. And every story has to start as wall as the end. This is not about time magically freezing at 999.M41, it is just the events past this point don't matter for the setting, much like the events after Germany's capitulation don't matter for the WW2. Time doesn't stop at that point, it is just another story not important to the setting.

 

Concerning The End of Times, setting just doesn't end for no reason. End of setting usually means that a lot of things is going to change (start and/or end). And there usually is a period which heralds the ending of the setting. For WW2 it can be time after Normandy, for the Imperium it is The End of Times.

 

If you don't like this period, you can simply set background of your army sooner, into some of the periods where Imperium was expanding.