Turning defeat into victory

[Lord Kallozar]

I’ve read many cases of fluff where it would just simply state that <insert chaos warband here> was defeated by a force of <insert space marine chapter here>

 

No other fluff about the battle/engagement would be given, so how could you turn the chaos defeat into a victorious defeat?

 

Thanks.

[Wargamer]

Mutually exclusive goals.

[Panzer]

Well, by them achieving something the loyalists didn't think about. Distrction, killing a specific person that would mean trouble in the near future (the warp and especially Tzeentch are plausible explanations why they'd know about something like that), getting their hands on some artefact, destroying some artefact ... lots of possibilities.

[DuskRaider]

Even a small scale raid on an Imperial planet where you make yourself and your Warp taint known to the population is a victory to Chaos since it requires at the minimum a mind wipe of the population, at worst extermination of the Imperial citizens (and any Astra Militarum tasked with defending against said Chaos incursion with very few exceptions). Just look at the First War of Armageddon which caused a rift between the VIth & Inquisition that exists to this day. 

[Brother Captain Achilles]

I think a great example of this is the Battle of Calth. The Word Bearers true goal was to drop Erebus on the planets north pole to perform the ritual necessary to bring forth the Ruin Strom which was instrumental in keeping the Ultramarines, Space Wolves, and Dark Angels from getting to Terra in time for the seige of the Imperial palace. 

 

Its secondary goal was to revenge the Word Bearers against the Ultramarines by destroying the legion in an ambush for their role in punishing the legion for their worship of the Emperor during the razing of Monarchia.

 

While they failed in the secondary goal (arguable as they did cripple the UItramarines for a time after the Battle of Calth) The summoning of the Ruin Storm (and a number of Greater Daemons) went off without even being noticed that Erebus was performing the ritual at all. Wargamer has it right when he says;

 

 

Mutually exclusive goals.

 

 

Sometimes the whole purpose behind a battle is to simply create a sideshow for your real goals that looks real enough that your foe can't afford to ignore it.

[Mileposter]

There's the possibility that targets of opportunity were not known before the battle was engaged, and became exploitable as the battle progressed. The battle might be a loss, but the value of that opportunity target large enough that they can claim a gain in the larger scheme.

 

Note also the possibility of propaganda - on either side of the fight. Changing a defeat into a victory is possible to happen post-battle. If the victors don't have a chance to tell the story until after the other side gets their version in - or worse, falls victim to some other battle or ploy, then history may never hear the truth of it.