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Every Single Tanya/Primarch Fic, Ranked and Reviewed
🕑 Added 2025-09-27 01:50:30 +0000 UTCWarning: This list is currently not complete. I have yet to finish reading several stories. I will update/repost this when I've had a chance to finish more stories and plan out my thoughts.
Saga of Tanya The Runt [Link]
I have mixed feelings on this one, partially because this story was what inspired me to write my own fic. It is also, however, not exactly perfect to say the least. Now, don't get me wrong, it's mostly competently written, and its early chapters have some interesting worldbuilding as well as some fun characters. However, when we hit the midway point of the great crusade, it really felt like things were falling into a bit of a formula.
Meet a new brother, have a slightly strained but mostly on the level meeting/discussion, then they do a thing together. Additionally, the antagonists introduced were okay, but they didn't have a ton of sticking power or charisma. Which kinda left the story a bit aimless, and this wasn't helped by the floaty, ethereal feel that permeated the larger battles. The smaller-scale struggles were better written and very well grounded, with the fight against the wolf beast in the first arc being a particularly fond memory of mine. I was also thrown off the story at about this point, with one of the writer's OC missing primarchs being so cringe-inducing that I couldn't finish the chapter and dropped the story right there.
Perhaps eventually I’ll finish reading this one, if for no other reason than completionist’s sake, but I am unsure if the problems I’ve pointed out will end up getting addressed. Either way, this one is fairly easy to recommend, and I’d say it is one of the better ones on this list.
Recommend: Yes
Rating: ?/?
A Young Primarch's Cold Rage [Link]
This story is the clear frontrunner for the number one spot on this list. It's also (at the time of writing) at a pivotal point in its story, with Tangron just now meeting Big E. Provided this is handled well, I think this story has a bright and interesting future ahead of it.
But let's get into specifics, shall we?
The fighting is heavy, brutal, and personal. It's got limited characters, but those that are present are good and feel three-dimensional. Nuceria feels like a lived-in world, though I wish we’d had the chance to see more of it before the conquest was complete. The lore choices made so far are also very good. [Spoilers ahead] She doesn't get the nails, keeps her magic, keeps the powers Angron was ‘supposed’ to have. All this combines to hint at a future that will diverge significantly from canon and have some fairly wide-reaching consequences for the crusade/heresy.
Recommend: Yes
Rating: 1/?
The Queen Of Shadows [Link]
This story, perhaps more than any other on this list, feels like a young author’s first attempt at writing a semi-serious story. As such, it comes with all the usual issues that inexperience brings. Overly memey dialogue, simple descriptions, a pace that ranges from a mile a minute to just plain rushed. The plot is also a bit on the sillier side, and unfortunately, not in a good way. Its also one of the first stories so far that I wouldn't actually recommend, mostly out of quality issues but if you wanna stick it out and cheer on a young/new author, then please go give this one a look. Just keep your expectations low.
Recommend: No
Rating: ?/?
The Crimson CEO [Link]
Much like A Young Primarch’s Cold Rage, this one is well written, its pace is quick but unhurried, and its world-building is excellent. Almost everything I’ve said about that other story applies here, only with the changes to canon being different, obviously. [Minor Spoilers] This Magnus takes no Faustian bargain, accepts no lopsided deals, and is perfectly calculating. It is a very well written story, and much like the previously mentioned story, can significantly divert from cannon should the author want, given the foundations they’ve already laid.
Recommend: Yes
Rating: 2/?
A Young Woman's Wings of War [Link]
I’ve only just started this one, but it already has some incredibly crippling pacing issues. Additionally, although it is a decent story told fairly well, it doesn't seem to really excel in any particular aspect. At its worst moments, it feels a bit like watching a YouTube lore video where it's very obvious that the YouTuber is just reading the wiki verbatim. This bad habit is exemplified by dry, threadbare descriptions connecting long-winded series of "this happened, then this happened, then this happened". I dropped this story once after a chapter described everything from how a bolter worked to what a psyker was without any connective tissue. Just an endless direct narrator to reader description of basic fandom-specific topics and subjects. It got to the point where it felt like I was reading the Lexicanum article for Terminator armor and couldn't take any more.
With that being said, some stories take a bit to get going, and I 100% admit that my gripes are purely due to my own biases and personal tastes. So with that in mind, I'm going to give this one a few more chapters before I decide whether or not to drop it.
Recommend: Maybe
Rating: ?/?
Feel free to post your own thoughts, and link to other tanya/primarch stories that I may have missed.
Comments
Ellusive
Oh yeah once im done this list I will probably do one all about non primarch tanya fics as there are some good ones out there. Also some good takes on the missing primarchs too.
Sigismund Discord
There’s some other Tanya 30/40k fics but I don’t think I’ve read any other primarch!Tanya fics besides those you listed here. They’re not Tanya, but as far as other OC primarch fics go I’m personally a big fan of This Won’t End Well, and I’ve been enjoying The Forgotten Son though it’s only got ten chapters at the moment.
Ellusive
That's just the thing, I don't like the story so far because its pace is too fast. I think that any story covering the Great Crusade should have a pace that is best described as 'Glacial'. There is simply too much to cover, and you need to focus on the pacing of the interior arcs of the overarching story rather than the entire thing. I don't like Wings of War because so much is delivered through direct narration. Characters that would have been interesting to meet, to see, to talk to, never actually get a chance to say a word since they've had their entire existence summarized and then spat out through narration. The phrase "Show, don't tell" is a very good rule to live by, and I think this story exemplifies that. That being said, there are things I like, and the story is competently written. I also admit that my problems with the story are almost entirely due to my own personal tastes, and I won't pretend that my complaints are objective.
Amerdism
suprised you ranked A Young Woman's Wings of War a maybe to recommend, failninja's a very good writer, especially for youjo senki fics. That said, I do agree the pacing in their stories can be very slow but you can also say that for things like Saga of the Runt primarily because both authors are set on writing the full great crusade, before their primarchs are found and then later the heresy, and maybe after it. Pacing with 40k Primarch stories just sucks in general because of how long the stories will inevitably have to be.
