I've drafted a Campaign that serves as a prequel to the Achilus Crusade, titled 'That Fateful Day'. Below you will find a timeline and a rough outline of missions and events. Please, if you have any feedback let me know. I would like this to be accurate, and if something doesn't gel, I can course correct now.

I have been pretty thorough in reading the book and the expansions/supplements, but maybe I missed something. Again, this is a prequel so some events are looser than others.

Many of the Primary Objectives for the Missions involve the Kill-Team serving as Advance Party for coming forces. The Brothers are special forces, ahead of the coming crusade, setting up, prepping/softening and performing recon.

The middle Act is about 50% complete, and I will wrap it up as we start to play the first, and adjust some events accordingly, but the gist is more Tau-based combat and assassination missions, with a little Chaos sprinkled in.

The Campaign will end with the players required to find Achilus in a Saving Private Ryan style mission, where he is planetside during a major conflict. The Players must bring the Eldar Assassin Syndilian to Achilus, then convince him to go with the Eldar, while the KT defends his position, then fakes his death by destroying his flagship in a 'massive Gellar Field failure'.

lmk what you think! In all it is 19 missions.

Timeline

====== M33 ========

744.M33 Events within the Reach are Prophesized

====== M37 ========

920.M37 - Extirminatus of the Blood Trinity. Imperial forces withdraw from the Reach.
Age of Apostasy - Civil War

====== M40 ========

325.M40 - Forge World of Samech Falls
656.M40 - Hadex Anomaly Appears

====== M41 ========

397.M41 - Jericho Reach Gate is activated***

444.M41 - First War for Armageddon. Angron Defeated.

696.M41 - Necron 'Angelis' awakens and vanishes.
696.M41 - Tau Probe discovered.

698-705.M41 - Corinthian Crusade (Ultramarines vs. Orks)

737.M41 - Valos Stripped of life.
740.M41 - Exorcists save Stonekraal from Stealer Infestation.
742.M41 - Damocles Crusade Launched (Novamarines/Tau)

745.M41 - First Tyrannic War. Hive Fleet Behemoth Defeated.

745.M41 - Ymgarl Purged by the Salamanders.
755.M41 - Jericho Maw Gate Discovered, exploration begins.
755.M41 - Sabbat Worlds Crusade (Iron Snakes, Raven Guard, Silver Guard, White Scars, IF)

756.M41 - Council of Ascension - 200 Deathwatch Battle Brothers assembled at Watch Fortress Erioch.

758.M41 - Cleansing of Carmyn

766.M41 - Imperial Listening Posts attacked by Eldar.

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766.M41 - TFD Act 1.
766-Mission 1.1 - Hector's Endeavor. Clear Nid Infestation.
768-Mission 1.2 - Soveriegn. Chaos Tainted World. Place a Kill Ship Marker.
770-Mission 1.3 - Nadeec. Meet and ally with natives.

772-Mission 1.4 - Intel Gathering - Find Sol Malus.
774-Mission 1.5 - Escort Person of Interest: Sol Malus to the Mechanicum Vessel aty the warp gate.
775-Mission 1.6 - The Gate. Alpha Legion, First Contact. Warp Gate Activated. Act Climax. == Basically it will fall to the Kill Team to assassinate their person of interest, and prevent him from shutting down the Warp Gate just as the first recon ships pass through the gate. I picture the team on the prow of the Mechanicum vessel fighting desperately to kill Sol.

775.M41 - Sabbat Worlds Crusade Ends (Iron Snakes, Raven Guard, Silver Guard, White Scars, IF)
775.M41 - 4th Quadrant Rebellion

777.M41 - Black Legion breaches Cadian Gate. IF Respond.

777.M41 - TFD Act 2. Achilus Crusade Begins.

777-Mission 2.1 - Tau 'Brightsword', First Contact
777-Mission 2.2 - Tau Combat
777-Mission 2.3 - Unknown - Probably a Chaos Mission vs. some Word Bearers.

778-Mission 2.4 -
778-Mission 2.5 - Tau 'Farsight' Rebel group.
778-Mission 2.6 -

780-Mission 2.7 -
780-Mission 2.8 - AL Contact.
780-Mission 2.9 - AL Contact. 'Brightsword' Combat.

780.M41 - Lycanthos Drift Campaign (Raptors)

782-Mission 2.10 - Act Climax

783.M41 - Eldrad foresees Necron Tomb World Awakening

784-Mission 3.1 - Eldar interference
784-Mission 3.2 - Syndilian
786-Mission 3.3 - Third Act Climax. Warmaster Tiber Achilus lost with all hands.

I've since detailed a few events and changed a couple others. The main change was after the 'Act 1' Missions, I let the players choose which Salient they wanted to tackle and in which order. My players elected to fight the Tau in the first leg of Act 2. They finished that and are on an Optional Mission before starting the second leg, either Nids/Eldar or Chaos.

Act 2 Missions are as follows:

'Discoverers of Secrets' - Tau
2.1 Hammerfall - Exfil Tau Shas 'Brightsword'
2.2 Farsights Wrath - Massive Apocalypse Scale Engagement. Allied Tau and Kill Team wipe out 'renegade' Tau forces at Wrath, securing it for the Imperium, and establishing the Eyes of Wrath.
2.3 Brightswords Swath - Smuggle Brightsword through the Gate and bring him to reps in the Calixis Sector. At the climax of the mission the Players KT was 'scooped' by Kill Team 1, a ‘rival’ group of pompous Deathwatch Terminators. =)

Optional Mission 1 - Operation Blackout
Warp-Walk to board a warp-marooned Blackship and dispose of the escaped psykers within. Recover a Liber Daemonica.

'Betrayers of Secrets' - Chaos
2.4 Khazants Killers - Disable key points prior to the Imperial attack. (Long range comms, orbital weapons, star ports)
2.5 Cleansing of Aurum - Gain the natives respect.
2.6 Quieting the Chorus - KT leads a massive Crusade force. The Rival KT1 is lost after Deep Striking and taking massive fire, effectively elevating the players KT to Squad1/Terminator Honor Status.

The players also work alongside fledgeling Deathwatch characters like Zadkiel and Kail Vibius.

'Guardians of Secrets' - Nids/Eldar
2.7 - Whispers in the Warp - Kill the Hive Tyrant, and rescue a Psy-Null 'device' that turns out to be a person. Hints at Sector Lord Helicos' betrayal.
2.8 - Return to Nadeec - Infiltrate the allied IG Hive and extract intel on Helicos. Any side quests from the Act1 Mission are still open.
2.9 - Thieves in the Night - Drop directly into the heart of a Nid infestation to instal the Psy-Null at Trypsin so that clear Astropathic Comm can be sent.

Optional 2 - The Hunt for Helicos
The Eldar have foreseen that things began to go awry in the Reach as far back as M37, when Dark Angels Iron Wing Master Baradiel defeats High Anarchist Potchek. Travel back in time through the gate with an Eldar force to right the wrongs, and aid Baradiel and the Deathwing in removing their Fallen Ex-Brother.

2.10 Climax - Wrath

Returning to Wrath after the Imperium has claimed it, the KT must instal a 'listening device' effectively turning the Eyes of Wrath into an Inquisitorial Asset.

Act 3 is still a ways off but the gist is still intact. The KT will use their Eldar leads and eventually rally a force to fake Achilus' death. I plan to leave them adrift aboard a damaged shuttle with only their Deathwatch Ruby available to them. The Ruby Eye of their =][= pauldron which doubles as a distress beacon.

EDIT: Formatting Fix