Are the Legions Imperialis campaign books worth it for the lore?

[Calibanite Knight Angel]

Hey there,

 

I'm a big Horus Heresy fan and love collecting the campaign books - I have almost all the books for second edition, and have a couple of the third edition ones (the Isstvan V one and the one about Saturnine armour) even though I don't have the rules for that edition yet (I will get these one day, but I love a good campaign book from a lore perspective, and the inspiration it gives me for armies).

 

My question is: I don't really have plans to play Legions Imperialis (it looks great, but I just don't want to get started on ANOTHER wargame), but is the lore in the campaign books still decent? E.g. there was one about Tallarn - this is a campaign that has long interested me and I read the Black Library stories about it when they came out. Would the lore and formations in this still be detailed enough that it could reasonably be used to fuel ideas for depicting Tallarn in the main 30k game, and would there be enough value just from this to justify getting it?

Thanks in advance :)

[Lord Marshal]

In my opinion the fluff in the LI books has been better than most of second edition HH (jury's still out on 3rd). Maybe it's just a personal taste thing, but the style is closer to those in the 1st edition Black Books in that it largely takes a gods-eye-view of the broader strokes, rather than getting directly in the trenches the way 28mm campaigns leaned into with 2nd.

 

By virtue of the more limited page count they can't be quite as detailed as those giant tomes, but I came away from them happy with my purchase. They're worth picking up I think, as they're certainly the strongest fluff writing from SGS in recent years.

 

Considering the rules content in the campaign supplements is now out of date because of Liber Strategia you can probably find them second hand for quite cheap, or just grab them from clearances at a decent discount.

 

Edited March 13 by Lord Marshal

[Calibanite Knight Angel]

14 minutes ago, Lord Marshal said:

In my opinion the fluff in the LI books has been better than most of second edition HH (jury's still out on 3rd). Maybe it's just a personal taste thing, but the style is closer to those in the 1st edition Black Books in that it largely takes a gods-eye-view of the broader strokes, rather than getting directly in the trenches the way 28mm campaigns leaned into with 2nd.

 

By virtue of the more limited page count they can't be quite as detailed as those giant tomes, but I came away from them happy with my purchase. They're worth picking up I think, as they're certainly the strongest fluff writing from SGS in recent years.

 

Considering the rules content in the campaign supplements is now out of date because of Liber Strategia you can probably find them second hand for quite cheap, or just grab them from clearances at a decent discount.

 

Thanks @Lord Marshal!

Which of the campaign books did you like the lore of the most? I might check out EBay and see what I can find :)

[Lord Marshal]

1 hour ago, Calibanite Knight Angel said:

Thanks @Lord Marshal!

Which of the campaign books did you like the lore of the most? I might check out EBay and see what I can find :)

 

I think it depends what you're after, as they're all a bit different.

 

The Great Slaughter benefits from not having been covered elsewhere before (or at least the Second Battle of Nyrcon City).

 

The Devastation of Tallarn makes for a good companion piece to the novel/short stories in the BL series.

 

Rise of the Dark Mechanicum is entirely about the Mechanicum/Knights/Titans, and very much what people wanted out of Martian Civil War at 28mm. That said, the Battle for Magma City is already covered by the novel Mechanicum, so while this is a good companion piece to that it hedges more on "do you like reading about the Mechanicum?" in a way the others don't.

 

I'd probably say I enjoyed Tallarn the most, but Great Slaughter is very, very, close at it's heels and if you enjoy one, you'd certainly enjoy the other. RotDM I'd put in third for no other reason than me never been all that interested in them, but your mileage may vary - however what's there is still good!

[Pacific81]

Sorry to be Mr Negative but I am going to open with both barrels here.. I honestly think they are expensive paper-weights. They are some of the most utterly soul-less, drab, dirgeful books I have ever seen produced within the industry. Almost no artwork to speak of, the presentation is turgid and the writing constipated. 

There is absolutely none of the vigour or excitement of the 1st ed. Bligh books or Imperial Armour series, which were wonderfully designed and written and dragged you into the setting.

 

I generally take my old edition army and rulebooks to charity shops as I think someone's grandma or grandpa will get them for a kid somewhere that will get pulled into this evocative game universe we all love. I wouldn't have done it with these books because I think no-one reading them would want anything more to do with Warhammer.

 

I am not mincing my words here sorry, I think all of the new Heresy and LI books are just absolute crap 

[Lord Marshal]

I went back and read both Vraks and Badab recently, and I was actually pretty surprised at how the almost deified they've gotten contrasts with the contents. They're certainly excellent, but I think the mythos surrounding them has really warped the pedastool they sit upon to almost absurd degrees.

 

Is the presentation in terms of visuals better? Sure, there's less artwork and graphics in newer stuff, but when it comes to the actual meat and potatos in terms of writing I really don't think the gulf is anywhere near as wide as people often make it out to be - IA books had a much higher page count to get into the nitty-gritty, but taken into account the limited page count of newer supplements and Journals, again, I don't think the writing quality gulf is really that huge.

 

I genuinely believe if Vraks and Badab released today instead, people would still be levying the same "soulless modern grimderp crap designed to sell Death Korp slop" comments against it by virtue of being new.

 

Edited March 28 by Lord Marshal

[Pacific81]

I disagree on that score I'm afraid. I love the Kinrade IA books, there is a good reason those books were so popular as they revolutionised how 40k fiction could be written and presented. He has gone on to do the same with the WW2 Battlegroup books which have the same great level of detail and capture the setting. They really draw you into it.

Bligh obviously did the same with the first HH edition; I think it did probably help a lot that they were being expanded on in that detail properly for the first time (building on the Index Astartes articles & other material) and 90% of the new books are just re-retreading old ground. But, whoever is writing it (they? them? for we do not know) just hasn't got the same writing ability in my view and I have had to force myself with coffee in hand to read through them, the cheaply produced and soul-less presentation of these books helping to make it a chore.

 

The IA & original Heresy books are now selling for £100 and are treated as treasures. These books are destined for £5 on eBay and the pulping machine if any stocks remain, which I think is the final word about their quality. 

[Stitch5000]

On 3/30/2026 at 9:41 AM, Pacific81 said:

The IA & original Heresy books are now selling for £100 and are treated as treasures. These books are destined for £5 on eBay and the pulping machine if any stocks remain, which I think is the final word about their quality. 

Give it a decade and they will be similarly venerated as relics. 

[Pacific81]

3 hours ago, Stitch5000 said:

Give it a decade and they will be similarly venerated as relics. 

 

Sorry mate but that is absolute bollocks. 

 

I will wager you one Heresy Saturnine campaign book ;)