At the outset I should say I think the book’s not bad actually. It is good. I respect that they’re trying to do some nice setup around the battles.

To my surprise the Xenos don’t all end up dead by the end of it, though I guess that’s just cause they’ll end up dead in the next one since it still seems clear the Imperium will win the campaign, but at least that means this book isn’t do depressing.

If there is a meta-criticism to make of it, it would be that it is just very repetitive. This entire campaign basically reads like the cliff notes of 40k lore as a whole;

“Ruh-oh! Astra Militarum/Adeptus Sororitas/Imperial Knights/Adeptus Mechanicus need rescuing from [insert Xenos faction]. 

Luckily here come the brave Marines to turn the tide…BUT WAIT!

Chaos is now here! Truly this is the true battle.”

The narrative isn’t really even trying to disguise it. Actively calls the Chaos invasion more terrible than anything the Xenos can threaten and actively says Marneus is a genius for holding his forces back against the Xenos so he can send them at Chaos instead. Also actively credits the entire Third Phase swing of the War in the Imperium’s favour PURELY to the Space Marines. Doesn’t even play coy, just, BAM, says thanks to the Space Marines alone the Imperium began winning again.

But the book is okay. It is…I suppose it is just very standard. There is sadly an annoying lack of just actually saying the Space Marines outright loose, as if to say the words will cause the authors to break out in hives. But the Genestealer Cults acquit themselves well, they’re the only Xenos faction who actually accomplishes the conquest of an entire piece of territory, successfully claiming the entire Dirkden Hivesprawl and Fortwall from the Imperium. By the logic presented in the book this means they triumphed over 3 whole companies of the Crimson Fists, since those are assigned to Dirkden, but, of course, none of those battles are discussed or detailed at all sadly! 

One tidbit which is hilarious is that the book literally has all three the following passages in it;

“For all their cunning, however, they met their match in the Space Wolves of Ragnar Blackmane’s Great Company.” [about Genestealer Cults]

“There he was to meet his match against the Ultramarines of Marneus Calgar.” [about Asuryani]

“The coven had finally met its match in battle against Roboute Guilliman during the Indomitus Crusade,” [about Drukhari]

We get it GW! We get it! No-one can beat Space Marines! They are everyone’s match! Yeesh! You didn’t have to reuse the exact same expression three times. 

Haarken really does nothing. I…feel bad for the guy, he seems incredibly tacked on and pointless. Like in his own bio section the only achievements he gets is that he read a bunch of books by Konrad Cruze and Magnus, we literally don’t know a single fight he’s ever won and he does nothing in Vigilus Defiant itself. 

Still gotta love the book if only cause it lets a Stompa be a Warlord with a 5++ and a +1 to hit and wound in melee!

My head hurts right now so this is just disjointed rambling. If I feel better later I’ll do a more indepth look at the stuff. If anyone has questions they want answered feel free to ask. 

So an the Advent story today is about Xenos for once. I hate the story since its basically just ‘T’au suck compared to the Imperium’ but told from the T’au’s perspective hooray.

But I mean if this is the only stuff BL wants to make about Xenos I guess I gotta buy it. If you wanna support more T’au fluff I guess buy it but don’t read it I don’t know.

Shout out to 5 Reivers destroying a Gargant but Commander Bravestorm himself isn’t allowed to destroy a single Warlord Titan! Wooo! Luminary of the Fire Caste and one of the greatest warriors of all T’au history weaker than 5 random Reivers! Truly this lore is fun.