The Eternal Stars – A Warhammer 40,000 Crusade Campaign

Hail Warlord and welcome to The Eternal Stars. Today heralds your first step towards
greatness as a Warlord of Renown!
But first I must ask some questions of you! What brings you to The Eternal Stars? Is it
duty and honour that draws you here? Perhaps you must prove yourself to your peers? Or
maybe you just thirst for plunder and blood? The reason you are here is yours to decide,
and perhaps it may change over time as alliances are made or rivals are met. It may change
the troops that follow you in ways you cannot yet foresee, some may leave your service as
new troops enter it.
Only time and the battles ahead will reveal this to us! But for now, read on and
prepare yourself, for in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war, the laughter of
thirsting gods, and perhaps the odd house rule or two!
~The Great Jim, Whisperer in the Warp and Master of The Eternal Stars

Campaign Overview

By now you should realise that your narrative and the tales of those you encounter
are the core of this Crusade. You will be the master of your story, and the interactions of
others will help develop it. Occasionally your tale may go along a path you do not expect,
but it will always be yours to tell. Over the next few pages, you will learn how to muster a
force for your first battle, and how to upgrade and adapt it for the battles that follow it.
This campaign focuses on narrative battles and not powerplays. You will not be well
rewarded for repeatedly destroying your enemies, but instead for how you show mercy
when it is deserved. This is not a place for fine tuning your force. You will need to support
your troops who suffer in battle if you wish to become a respected leader.
But enough chatter - let us begin recruiting your starting force!
The Muster

Let’s get this army started! First you must decide who you are. Pick a Codex to
choose your army from and select one HQ choice to be your Warlord. This cannot be a
Unique or Named Character - they have already earned enough glory and are busy fighting
their own wars!
We’ll write the details of our Warlord on a Crusade Card. Crusade Cards are used to
help us remember the extra details we’ll need for units as they progress. There’s a sample
Crusade Card at the end of this pack, but you can make your own or use any other style you
like so long as the same information can be stored.
So now fill in all the following boxes for you Warlord – Unit Name (Pick something
impressive!), Battlefield Role, Crusade Faction, Selectable Keywords and Unit Type.

You may purchase any upgrades you want for your Warlord but be careful not to
spend too many points on them - you have finite resources at your disposal! You may also
select one Warlord Trait and one Relic for your Warlord - your masters have trained you
well and have given you an item of worth to show their faith in you. Put all these selections
in the relevant boxes on the Crusade Card.
In the Power Rating box put their total Points cost and not their Power Rating – we
won’t be using Power Rating in this Crusade! In the Experience Points box put 0. In the
Crusade Points box put 2. (This is because they will have a Relic and Warlord Trait which
each count as 1 Crusade Point.)
Now onto the rest of your force. There are many restrictions on your new recruits.
They are often fresh, with new but basic equipment from the forges. As you add the new
Units to your roster, you’ll need to fill out Crusade Cards for them as well. Follow the same
steps to fill their Crusade Cards out as you did with your Warlord.
 Follow these steps when selecting the rest of your Crusade force:

 Players start with a crusade force of no more than 500 points (including the
Warlord) which must fit into a Patrol Detachment. (Exception for Imperial
Knights and Chaos Knights that must use Lord of War detachments – good
luck making it fit into 500 points though…)
 Players may not take more than 1 of any unit unless it is a Troop choice.
(Again, exception for Imperial Knights and Chaos Knights)
 Units all begin at minimum starting strength and can only have 0 Point cost
upgrades.
 No more than 150 points can be spent on each unit.
 No unique or named characters/units may be taken
Now you’ve got a Crusade Force mustered we need to fill out another sheet. (Yay
paperwork!) This next sheet is called a Crusade Sheet and gives a brief overview of your
force as well as some tallies of points.

Fill in your Crusade Force Name. I suggest something epic sounding but so long as it’s
safe for work do what you like. Fill in the Crusade Faction and Player Name too. For Supply
Limit put 500. That’s the maximum size of your Force. We’ll talk about that more post game
along with some other bits. Finally, we’re onto the units. In each of the lower boxes put the
units from your Crusade Force. All we need for them is their Name, Points Cost instead of
Power Rating and Crusade Points. (Your Warlord is the only one with any of those.)
That’s all the paperwork done for your first game. There are some samples
completed at the end of this document if you need to check you’ve filled it all in right, but
don’t be afraid to ask if you need help.
Your First Battle

So now you should have a force of no more than 500 points ready for action. Let’s
start talking about your first crusade battle. First you need to find an opponent. There
should be many willing Warlords in the campaign. All you need to do is ask who’s available
and book a day and time. The Games Bunker has a very active discord so that’s a great place
to start asking, otherwise Jim can hook you up with someone suitable for your first game.

Pre-Battle Sequence

Before battle begins, you’ll need to check a few things, this will be the case for all
future battles in the campaign, but for your first game some of the choices will be fixed.
Also, if neither player has played a game yet there will be less to check. This is mostly the
same as regular matched play game, but we’ll go through it anyway.
Firstly, you’ll usually need to decide on a Mission to play. For your first game you
must play the Survey and Secure Mission from pg.22 of the Beyond the Veil Crusade book.
This book is no longer in print so there are paper copies of the Missions from the book
available for use in the campaign. Have a good read of the Mission to familiarise yourself
with the Objectives.
Unlike further games from the Beyond the Veil book you will not use the Strategic
Setbacks or Afflictions in this game so don’t worry about those rules yet. (Normally the first
step in starting a game is Select Battle Size, but in this game both players are limited to 500
points.)
Once you’ve read the Mission Briefing, you’ll need to select an Agenda. For this size
of battle, you’ll get one each. (In larger games you’ll get more.) Unlike Secondary Objectives
in Matched Play, Agendas are ways of scoring bonus experience points for your units, so
make sure you pick wisely. Agendas are found in the Warhammer 40,000 Core Book as well
as your chosen Codex.
The next step is to create the battlefield. Combat Patrol and Incursion games are
normally played on a 44”x30” board. We recommend using a couple of line of sight blocking
buildings and a mixture of other terrain. If you want a board set up for you just ask
beforehand and we’ll get one ready for you.
Now we’re nearly ready to battle! Roll off to determine the Attacker/Defender and
place the objectives. Then determine deployment zones. Finally declare your reserves and
transports. Players will then deploy their armies following the core rules.
Now your game is almost ready to begin! There’s just one more step – compare
Crusade Points. As it’s your first game you will have 2 Crusade points – one for your Warlord
Trait and one for the Relic. Your opponent may be the same, or perhaps they have played
more games than you and have gained some mighty upgrades! For every 2 points your
opponent has more than you you’ll gain a Command Point to use in the battle. (Round up!)
If you have more than your opponent, then you gain nothing – you should be powerful
enough already!
That all the pre-battle stuff we need to worry about for now. Play the battle and
keep track of the Mission scoring, your Agenda tally, also make a note if any of your units
destroy any enemy units and if any of your units are themselves destroyed – there’s some
post battle bits we’ll need that information for. This battle will last 5 Battle Rounds, though
some armies may not make it through the whole battle of course!

Post Battle Sequence

Onto the Post Battle Sequence. This is where you will develop your force so is the
most exciting part of a Crusade. Do you remember those things you were meant to keep
track of? Now we’ll see why you did!
Firstly, we add up the Victory Points from the battle to determine a Victor. The Victor
gains an extra marked for greatness for the battle. This is described below so work through
the steps to find out what that means. Remember though that this is an additional unit so
can’t be applied to the same unit twice!
Any of your units that were destroyed in the battle need to test to see if they have
any lasting effects. Roll a d6. On a 2+ they made it through without any lasting injuries. On a
1 they are in some trouble! You must choose one of the following:

 Devastating Blow – the unit loses d6 Experience Points and cannot gain any
from this battle for Agendas achieved, Battle Experience or for being Marked
for greatness.
 Battle Scar – the unit gains a permanent effect that can only be removed
through spending Requisition Points – we’ll talk about those soon. There is a
chart for Battle Scars in the Core Rules as well as many of the Codexes. You
MUST roll on the appropriate chart – no choosing allowed in this Crusade!
Next, we update Experience Points for the units that took part in the battle. Follow
this list to calculate your gains. (Unless your unit has had a Devastating Blow of course!)

 Battle Experience - Each unit that was part of your army for the battle gains 1
Experience Point.
 Marked for Greatness - Select one unit that was part of your army for the
battle; that unit gains an additional 3 Experience Points.
  Dealers of Death - A unit gains 1 Experience Point for every third enemy unit
it has destroyed in total. (This is cumulative over multiple battles, which is
why it’s important to have good bookkeeping for your Crusade Force.)
 Agenda Achieved - Any units that achieved Agendas during the battle gain
Experience Points as described by those Agendas.
Some of your units may have achieved enough experience points to have gained a
Battle Honour. Perhaps a Character has found a Relic on their exploration, maybe an
individual has learned how to improve one of their weapons. These are explained more later
so for now just make a note that it needs to be sorted out.
We now update the tallies on your units’ Crusade Cards. These are Battles Played,
Battles Survived and the appropriate Combat Tallies. Finally, we update your forces Crusade
Sheet by adding 1 to your Battle Tally (and your Battles Won if you did) and 4 to your
Requisition Points. Normally you gain just 1 Requisition Point for a game, but these are
bonus points for a new force.

The End

You’ve now finished your first battle and should have a good idea of the pre and post
battle steps. Before your next game you’ll need to determine any Battle Scars you might
have, as well as any upgrade your units might have from Battle Honours. The full lists for
these are in the Warhammer 40,000 Core Book as well as your Force’s Codex, but we’ll also
have a quick play sheet to guide you through it.
If you’re still unsure on a few things just ask! There’s probably a few rules that clash
from the Codices that will make some interesting interactions. Talk to Jim and we will come
to a solution and update this document accordingly.