05 - Galrisian - Breakthrough on the 66, The first CDXXII imperial guard armoured regiments break into the city, heading into the sector 66, while the enemy gargants and titan legion stomp into the city.
<< There'z no fuckin' day in this fuckin' galaxy, which should not start with da' gloriouz roar of da' cannon. Surrender now, pink puppets, that da' great Napoleork haz come. At hiz feet crumble bonez, citiez and worldz. >> Zorba, da stinka. Goff Warboss, commander of Kepler invasion.
The city of Kepler Secundus is now cut in two. A black snake, of rubble and destruction, runs from east to west. The citizen militia, day after day, retreating has settled now on vital positions, waiting tactically the incoming reinforcements. For days, the imperial artillery bombed their own neighborhoods in an attempt to delay the enemy advance, devastating entire sectors, blowing up bridges, destroying their same city, inevitably, while the militia regiments fought district after district giving way. Finally, the ork's heavy artillery returned fire, and soon the one and the other have been decimated, creating a dead zone, a devastated line that cuts the city to the north, about two-thirds of the city still in the imperial hand; to the south, the remaining third, now fell. The evacuated people, gathered in the north inside underground bunkers, await their fate powerless, while on their heads immense war machines burst into the city, true tyrants and ruler of this war.
The CDXXII imperial guard armored regiments advance rapidly into the city from the west, at the dawn of a blood red morning, reaching the front line, while slowly behind them the titan legion battle groups advance compact. Like two snakes facing each other the armies are studying, a step away from the battle, but is in the sixty-six sector that the battle begins, reverberating across the entire kilometric front line. The sector sixty-six, central sector, key of the Imperial tactical maneuver: to break the front line and force the orcs for a frontal clash against the titan legion.
The skies over Kepler Secundus, blacks and dense by the smoke of the rising explosions and demolitions, are now theater of a violent battle between the imperial air force dropped from orbit and the horde of ork flyboyz on their rudimentary, as effective, fighters. The sky is stormy, while those few bombers who manage to escape the dogfight drop their deadly load on the opposing faction, in glorious and incandescent fireballs. The offensive has now taken on both sides torching the entire front line. It's war!
Those few hours of respite, fake silence, now seem a distant dream. Now the cannon thunders, now roars the howitzer, chainsaw of steel, arsonist fire, all the wonders of the machine of death today will have their toll.
Planet: Galrisian Sector: Kepler Secundus city. Sector 66. Relevance: Break through the sieged sector and open the way for the titan legion. Force: CDXXII imperial guard armoured regiments and citizen militia. Danger Level: High. Enemy reinforcement incoming.
DEPLOYED AS THE DEPOLY BATTLE SCHEME ON TURN 2 - 2.000 pt Speed Freaks reinforcements - Download
Battlefield: - field: 120 x 180 cm
Victory condition and campaign effect: - victory condition: no they will not pass. Primary objective give 2 points. Secondary 1 each. Victory sets to 2 VP. - turn lenght: 5 + extra 1
++ Pastorius, Princeps Hector Bezmenov on Ferrum Iratus reporting. I take the command of both the battlegroups, XI and IX Legio Metalica. The imperial regiments are engaging the entire front line, we're proceeding according to the plan: codex. X26-del6945662x maneuver of the Adeptus Titanicus. Data sent through the machine spirit. ++ ++ The Omnissiah will prevail. You know the risk of getting bogged down in a skirmish war with the orks, here. Give'em an epic defeat, and we'll put an end of this siege once and for all! I need you, warriors! For face and defeat Napoleork. ++
OST - Do you think I'm Saxon - Hans Zimmer (King Arthur OST) HDHQ
Along the southern industrial railway line, the T68-9 red line, and beyond, a black strip of land, death and destruction, divides the city in two. Days, weeks of furious battle have transformed the contact line in a moonscape, a black smoking stripe in flames, a cemetery of men, orks, tanks and warmachines: a no man's land. Until now.
The opposing forces, after being subtracted from the front for a few hours, reoccupy the front line, with their guns and riflemen. The arrival of the reinforcement, for both sides, is imminent, but only one will prevail.
The front line, for both sides, are three large residential complexes, devastated by bombing, which, however, have withstood the ferocious heavy bombardment that have battered the entire line by weeks, from the ground and from orbit.
The citizen militia forces, with they remaining mortars and heavy weapons, is perched on the buildings, now again in line of fire with the damned orks, on the opposite side of the no man's land. citizens in arms, whose only courage is that to fall, means open the main street at the ork for the conquest of the whole city. The tension is palpable, the nerves trembling, oblivious to the fact that here, in the sector 66, converges the heart of the main offensive.
Just behind, in an adiacent street, a police squad on motorcycle patrol the south front, while a buggies platoon of the imperial guard does the same on the north side.
The only imperial guard regiment on the battlefield, a regiment of the city security forces, is perched on an Administratum quarter, the primary objective of the imperial forces. In the street below, a baneblade super heavy tank company is ready to move.
On the opposite side, the orks moved their forces forward, occupying the ruined buildings on the front line and preparing their next assault.
A massive concentration of big gunz, fortunately their heavy weapons have fallen weeks ago during fierce battles, emerge from the broken windows, from the chasms and the breaches that disfigure the buildings, a hornet's nest however of fearsome cannons, ready to wipe out anyone who dares to cross the no man's land.
Behind the central building a stompa mob is ready to unleash its rage and stomp to the conquest.
The ork army is ruled by Gursduk da raida', the deathskull warboss that lead the ork invasion in this sector, whose name will be cursed for decades, or throw into oblivion.
The wait, like a silent blanket, wraps the no man's land, the stripe of black destruction. Fingers tremble on the triggers, the howitzers are loaded, the guns, the lascannons, the machine guns. An expectation, an unnatural silence, which is broken at the first shot. The war thunders on sector 66.
<< The brigade commander Paulus Falkland reached the Administratum building in the sector sixty-six, so taking the operative control on the battlefield. The strategic move is agreed, Princeps Bezmenov. We'll break in the sector and we go to a frontal confrontation with all our strength. An irresistible attraction for the orks. The God Emperor protects. >> << Of course, Lord Field Marshal Tanaiser, but on our terms! For the Omnissiah. >>
OST - Motörhead - Emergency
Easy to talk to, if you are a lord field marshal on a flagship, or a princeps at the head of one of the most frightening war machines in the galaxy, think a conscript on the citizen militia, entrenched on the north palace, while looks with dismay at the horde of big gunz a half mile in front of his platoon. He was born with the war, and if it ends today, they would call it the "Thirty Years War". But for him and three other the war ends suddenly at the first cannon shot, the exact moment in which a crude explosive ball breaks through the wall next to his window, devastating everything in the room.
From the north front to the south one, as two eighteenth-century Man-of-war ships facing each other with their endless row of cannons: all guns blazing. From the orks north stronghold a firestorm strikes on the building ahead, while the imperial soldiers prepare an overwatch fire. The two infantry citizen militia regiments perched inside the center and south strongholds focus their fire on the ork big gunz in the central sector, forced to regroup to avoid to be obliterated by the barrage, while on the south the orks gunz bomb the building directly in front of them, killing a dozen soldiers. After a long quarter of fierce shelling from both sides, fires and columns of smoke rise from the no man's land, creating a fog of war that hides from view for a few minutes both factions.
When the hail of shots begins to wane, from the west neighborhood Warboss Gursduk advances with all his battlewagons, approaching the southern front line. A dozen battlewagons, loads of orks with painted blue faces. Raiders, greedy for glory and booty, fearsome predators.
In response, the HQ mechanized infantry regiment of Commander Paulus Falkland try to redeploy from the Administratum building, but the maneuver ends only with an advance on the ruins below, on the street.
The initiative is in imperial hands, and procedes with the advance of the imperial baneblade super heavy tanks, that move on the near street and unleash their three battlecannons against the battered ork artillery mob perched on the central building, destroying another one enemy artillery piece.
The stompas mob, behind the orks central stronghold, stops and prepares an overwatch fire.
The maneuvers, for both sides, translate into a cautious approach to the front, with the advance of the imperial humvees behind the infantry citizen militia to the north, and the approach of the police squad mounted on bikes behind the infantry to the south. Respectively, a warhorde of the bad moon clan perched on a building to the north prepares an overwatch fire, while in the south an ork Kommandos squad moves on a building just behind their artillery.
Behind Commander Paulus Falkland, as expected, the roar of the vultures and valkiries reactors announces the arrival of the vital reinforcements. From the north advance compact two squadrons: one of valkiries and one of vultures; to their right, gloriously, an imperial cavalry regiment, while to their left, follow them at low altitude a police squad of the city on jump packs. To the right of the cavalry finally comes another police squad of the city on jump packs. An imperial assault army, somehow assembled, whose task will be to break through and beyond the ork lines, or perish.
On the southern front, from east, seven chimera tanks move into the battlefield, pointing on the way of Commander Paulus Falkland...
...but the enthusiasm for the arrival of the reinforcements is still strangled before anyone has breath to cheer. In the distance, thick columns of black smoke, and the rumble of wagons and dozens of buggies, one rattling intoxicant cacophony announces the looming of a kult of speed army, a red and angry wave thrown on the battlefield, fast and lethal.
From the western front, to north arrives a speed freaks warband, and another one, more huge and with two battlefortress breaks on the south road.
In the middle, from north to south, a mekboy speedstas mob, five of their strange as lethal fast tanks, protected by their power fields, advances, followed by a warbike outriders, ruled by a crazy speedboyz big boss, mounted on a warbike so fast to defy the laws of physics.
At his side, a kult of speed composed by ten buggies and six schorcers, follow the warbikes mob in support, while ten meters above their heads four deff koptas patrol their massive advance.
Before the eyes of the imperial reinforcements, the no man's land stands out, as they are approaching, like a blasted black crater, an horrible tomb, a black destiny from which they can't escape, if not in glory and victorious, while the orks are lured there by their monstrous attitude to conquest and victory.
The laughter of Gork and Mork echo at the rhythm of the cannons thunder over the whole city, over the entire planet, crushed under the fierce boot of their champion Napoleork and his infamous minions.
TURN 1. End turn. ORKS WAAAGH: 1 (defend the flag) IMPERIAL GUARD: 1 (defend the flag)
'The truth is terrible to bear.' -Imperial Proverb
<< Damn! If I had one, even only one regiment of leman russ available! We will have to do with what we have left, citizen militia, police guards and the few imperial guard came in reinforcements. To all the regimental commanders, advance according to the plan R-Dreifus X57. An army of Kult of speed entered in the sector. >> Commander Paulus Falkland. Supreme commander on sector 66.
OST - Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War Soundtrack - "Ork Theme"
Along with the armies of Napoleork advancing and conquering within the city of Kepler Secundus, at the hordes and the mobs projected forward at the conquest, a galaxy of small, medium bands of pirates throw themselves on the abundant booty left by the imperial forces in retreat. Hundreds of scattered bands of freebooterz, arrived with the promise of loot and plunder, teem in length and breadth in the entire planet, mainly in the wake of the armies behind the front line. A shrewd move, that show the tactical ability of Napoleork, as long as his armies are pushed forward on the front, the dirty work of enslaving and hold off the prisoners, unfortunate, left behind during the imperial retreat, is given to bands that willingly are ready to swell their pockets spreading terror in the conquered districts.
The fumes that rise from the crater, from the flames of the explosions, from the fires out of control seethe and rise to the sky, they were about to vanish when in sector 66, on Kepler Secundus, the no man's land thunders again, and again, and again.
From north to south the guns begin to fire in unison creating such an uproar, and roaring flames of such magnitude, that seem to see the anger and battlecries of Gork and Mork echoing on the battlefield. The orks artillery of the north open fire without success against the infantry regiment ahead, firmly in overwatch, while in the center and south the fires are concentrated respectively against the southern imperial building and the central ork building. A dozen militiamen fall trapped in the building in flames, while the few ork artillery pieces abandon their building, decimated.
Over the heads of the approaching Orks hordes in the rear three black trails, dense and load of death whizzing straight towards the southern front, passing the ork entrenched artillery. A quick sortie swoops on the citizen militia regiment already beaten. The hydra flak tank tries to shoot them down, but it's reached by a missile and destroyed, while some militiamen fall under the fire of the twin machine guns.
OST - StuKa Ju-87 siren (Jericho trumpet)
The impetus of the orcs doesn't stop, the attack was carried out with a bold move that discovered the southern front from the anti-aircraft coverage. The militias perched on the building to the south are now under a hail of blows, when two ork gunfortresses burst into the no man's land, with a fast advance move.
The Tactic of Commander Paulus Falkland is more cautious, moving a police detachment on jump pack forward on the northern front, on their secondary objective and advancing the detachment of vulture in front of the Administratum building, without firing their precious long range missiles. The two formations of thunderbolts prepare an aerial patrol, just enough to cover and to dissuade the second ork fightas squadron from bombing on the bombed.
From the back, the ork hordes and the imperial regiments and platoon advancing taking place on sector 66. On the north, the mekboy speedstas mob moves forward through the maze of streets, but keep away from the overwatch fire of the imperial regiment perched in front of them.
In the center, the second police detachment on jump pack moves inside a building, near the baneblades company, while in front of them, a mile forward, well hidden behind the front line a speedfreaks warhorde advance fast and furios on the central ruins where the ork artillery found shelter.
On the south front the orks are amassing vehicles and Boyz where the imperial front was hit hard. The ork deathskull warboss is sly, and while the imperial mechanized infantry regiment on the rear fail to redeploy, unable to bring reinforcements exactly where needed, the only chance for Commander Paulus to handle the situation is to move his own regiment to the front. A bold as desperate move. The infantry occupies a residential complex just behind the South burning building, now occupied by a handful of militiamen in panic, while the chimera and hellhounds tanks open fire on the ork gunfortresses, without even scratch them.
From the central supply route of the orks a stompa mob comes out, moving rapidly into the no man's land in front of the south building. The mighty cannons of the Stompers, along with the light, medium artillery of the killacans and the dreadnoughts, demolish the building, killing and injuring two dozen militamen, now forced to retreat on their secondary objective on the southern front.
The arrival of the enemy hummie commander, within range of his claw, doesn't go unnoticed for Warboss Gursduk da' raida that screaming the Waaagh mounts with his huge mob on their battlewagons and throws himself forward. The crude as fast battlewagons cross the entire no man's land, crushing the razor wires prepared to stop the infantry, but certainly not the armored vehicles. The horde stops a few meters from the H.Q. Imperial Regiment. The first orks already penetrate into the building where the guards are perched, a few, few meters now separate them. Axes, spears, crude swords, the orks unsheathe their melee weapons and prepare for the impending massacre! Five Ogryns fall under the blows of their machine guns, while a chimera tank is destroyed by the battlewagons fire.
Suddenly, the south front has become crucial. The two commanders face each other ignorantly, here and now, to snatch a quick victory to the opponent. Paulus calls to himself immediately the cavalry regiment, which come with a march behind the baneblades super heavy tanks, on charge range to the ork Boss mob; and the stormtroopers on valkyries too, which are perched on the ruins of a communication tower, ready to give support fire to the imminent clash, if the initiative will be on the ork hands. The speed and depth of the ork attack has exacerbated the situation. Paulus and Gursduk can now hear each other's their curses and anathemas.
Orks, damned orks, think Commander Falkland. three decades of war, more or less fierce, which has now disfigured half Galrisian planet and reduced to a hellish life the other half. Every single meter of this planet is now a symbol of the open defiance between the belligerent warrior race of the orks and the imperium of men; and sector 66, one among thousands of battlefields on the planet. Yet, much of this war will be decided here. Kepler Secudus will fall? Or will be liberated, opening the north front for the ork horde? Questions, nightmares, dark thoughts overlap in the methodical minds of the Imperial commander, obscuring for some instants the wild screams of the orks just few meters away now, ready to slay him.
TURN 2. End turn. ORKS WAAAGH: 1 (defend the flag) IMPERIAL GUARD: 1 (defend the flag)
Above Kepler Secundus, at hundreds of kilometers, the cold battle of the sidereal deep proceeds with skirmishes and sorties. Small fleet battle group study each other, in the shadow of their few, mighty and immense battlebarges and ork space hulks that hover above Galrisian, straining ambushes and sorties among the numerous debris of their respective destroyed ships. The imperial fleet, now exhausted, can not help but use its efforts to hold off the orks, preventing as much as possible their landings on the planet, but this situation can not stand, and not last long. The fate of the war will have to be decided before, weeks, maybe a month or two, then it will be the end, and the planet lost: the fearsome evacuation, in the best cases, or the prospect to leave the ground forces, and planetary people, to their destiny, aimed to total annihilation and slavery.
<< Commander Falkland they're coming! They're coming! the chimera tanks are surrounded and the ogryns have already been overwhelmed! >> << Sergeant Ramos! Let no one leave his positions! Bayonet assault! The orks will pay dearly for every single meter of Kepler Secundus! Chaaaaarge!! >>
The wild cry of Gursduk unleashes the assault. The battlewagons lightning advance ramming the chimera tanks, while twenty nobz rampant among them, everything destroying and devastating. Can do little the overwatch fire of the police guard bikes, a hundred boyz breaks inside the building, overwhelming the fierce ogryns, while the entire imperial regiment awaits them, bayonets in hand. Room by room, stair by stair to above the roof the melee is bestial and cruel. Massacre after massacre, some rooms look like a slaughterhouse, others appear slashed by explosive grenade. The assault spares no one, not even the commander, and every man is called to fight or succumb. Yet, against all odds, and also thanks to the support fire of the stormtroopers and the police mounted on bikes, the regiment is defeated, but not overwhelmed. The orks, victorious but prostrate by the numerous losses, occupy disorderly the conquered position while the few imperial survivors have time to board inside the few tanks remained and flee, to stop in a building behind the big Administratum palace. The ork have moved to the conquest!
While the orks occupy the building just conquered, the stormtroopers platoon and the four valkyries open a sustained fire against them. A storm of explosive missiles, sniper rifles and anti-tank weapons befall on the battered green horde. The battlewagons are all destroyed, and twenty orks dies inside the building, now a tomb of orks and men. Gursduk screams the retreat, and the boyz, without their vehicles, are forced to jump back into the no man's land, at the mercy of fate.
The orks assault doesn't stop, and the stompa mob from the no man's land advances rapidly to cover the retreat of their Warboss, unleashing their cannons storm against the stormtroopers, now reached by three swooping ork Figthers. The firestorm is massive, but the cover has its effect and only five stormtroopers and two valkyries are shattered.
The ork assault has begun from the southern front of the no man's land, black and disfigured scar, unrecognizable piece of land, where among fire and craters, ruins and scrap, can be seen to emerge blackened skeletons of men and orcs, dead in the previous weeks, which now seem months, if not years.
<< Commander Falkland to vulture Squadron III° Beta-Centauri. Immediate barrage fire required, stop those battlefortresses! >>
From behind the order arrives fast. Commander Falkland, reorganized his command center among the few survivors in disarray, regained control of the situation, for the moment. The Vultures squadron gets up quickly from the road below to above the roof of the Administratum palace, only three of the four, and unleashes its precious cargo of missiles against the ork battlefortresses on the no man's land. The missiles, precise and lethal, fall on the first battlefortress, which hit in its gunpowder, explodes spectacularly damaging the second and forcing it, badly damaged, to retreat to the ork rear.
From the sky of Kepler Secundus one second squadron of ork fightas rushes on sector sixty-six, challenging the flak at the center of the field. The regiment of cavalry, miraculously, manages to escape the rain of bullets that sow confusion among its ranks and finally hold off its restive horses.
The skies of Kepler Secundus open again, but this time are two thunderbolt fighters that try to stop the advance of the stompers, which, however, hold out the impact of their air-ground missiles.
By now, all over the sector resounds the thunder of the explosions. On the northern front, the ork artillery perched on their building opens fire on the respective enemy formation, killing a dozen soldiers of the citizen militia.
The battered regiment, defeated and dislodged an hour before from its northern "trench", under order of Commander Falkland moves fast and occupies the building in front of them, theatre of the terrible clash of the two supreme commanders companies, opening fire at the retreating mob of warboss Gursduk. A lucky fire, that makes great slaughter of the enemy.
After the defeat of the first orks assault the Imperial forces attempted a cautious re-conquest of the area, but the green wave is coming, and this Commander Falkland knows very well. At his order, the Baneblade company and the infantry regiment in center field have prepared an overwatch fire, ready to withstand the impact of the inevitable invasion. A few minutes later, the speedstas mob breaks into the no man's land, a dozen meters and well covered near their artillery mobs perched on the huge buildings, shelling with their extravagant as terrible "Kustom weaponz" the Baneblade super heavy tanks. Yet the star of fortune seems to shine above the imperial army, and the Baneblade, repeatedly hit, emerges unscathed from the catastrophic fire.
++ Legate Pastorius, Princeps Hector Bezmenov on Ferrum Iratus reporting. We're moving with the support of the cult mechanicus to the sector sixty-six. Lupus Igneus Warhound titan in patrol. We adhere to the codex. X25-del6938Alfa2x maneuver of the Adeptus Titanicus... or just, I'll try! Incendiarius! For the eight arms of the Omnissiah!! Where the fuck are you going! Follow the codex titanicus plan! And shut down this fuckin' music! Now! ++ ++ I'm the burning voice of Lupus Igneus! Bezmy! Ha! Ha! Fuck! Its will is burning of rampant, bold anger! I can't hold it forevà! Ha! Hahahhahah!!! ++ ++ Moving the army to the position. Battlezone in progress, indefinite, cautious approach. Data sent through the machine spirit. ++
<< The good fortune will not last forever! Requested immediate intervention of the second thunderbolts fighter group! Bomb the fleeing Warboss retinue! >>
The order of commander Falkland anticipates few minutes the second imperial air intervention, this time directed against the horde of Gursduk in retreat. The hordes, massive one hour ago, after the pyrrhic victory against Falkland himself, are now a handful of orcs trapped into the no man's land.
Time, now, as in a macabre dance, is the real Keystone. Gursduk, at the forefront, has now lost control of the assault, at the mercy of events with his few faithful remaining, while behind him the army of speed freaks is going to break and cross the no man's land, led by a Warboss on a warbike so fast to challenge the laws of the materium.
Time, time, is never enough and from the back on the northern front an imperial humvees platoon defies the death bursting into the no man's land to hold the Orcish advance before it's too late, but from center field, with a pop up attack four death koptas fire against the humvees, destroying one, while from the north the bad moon warhorde mounted on a battlefortress advances quickly and destroy the second humvee, forcing the two survived light tanks to stay in place, in disarray, bust still holding the ground.
<< Now or never! >> ...Thunders the order of the trusted man of Field Marshal Tanaiser, assigned to lead an improbable imperial army, a jumble of militiamen and regular regiments, thrown into a battle with an uncertain outcome. << Now or Never, Commissar Sergeant Deville! >>
The second in command, arrived two hours ago as reinforcements, in command of a mechanized infantry regiment, is finally able to coordinate his movement and finally moves directly on the front line, so close to the stompers mob to think almost to a suicidal attack. However, the massive fire of the regiment settles the decisive blow against the Warbands of Gursduk, destroying it permanently and forcing the Warboss to a rambling escape.
Strength, sacrifice, value, or the courage of those who fight for their lives and those of their loved ones. The imperial hope now resides in the cunning tactics of their commander, who came from a distant world with the imperial reinforcements to guide them to victory, or death. The thirty policemen with jump packs perched not so far from the southern frontline fly and land in front of the stompers, assaulting them. An attack that in another context would have been insane, an unthinkable move, now, with the support of Deville's regiment, now it can be possible! Those thirty policemen gloriously assault with their rifles, pistols and grenades the best orkish armoured vehicles on the battlefield, thrown to the reconquest of the southern sector. More than half of the police officers falls to the ground, defeated, but the entire Stompa mob is annihilated, defeated under the massive shelling. still Bright shines the star of the good fortune upon the heads of the brave imperial soldiers, in a day with no sun, nor moon.
The Gursduk's assault was stopped, but the roar of the engines of the speed freaks army is now imminent. The second and last platoon of policemen with jump packs flows into the no man's land, reaching the humvees in disarray; but still in the air, and immediately after landing, they are welcomed by the terrifying cannons storm of the southern gunz mob, in overwatch. The patrol operation is aborted, and just under half of them escape the massacre, forced to retreat from where they started.
Furious pistons, angry potholes, shod tracks, bined combo-machineguns, missile launchers and all sorts of weirdness mounted on two or more wheels emerges from the fog and smoke of the battle, taking now hard-nosed an exhausted imperial army, with no more possibility of reaction: a vast horde of speed freaks emerges on the southern front, trampling along the ruins of the stompers, dreadnoughts and killa cans. The infantry regiment in center field breaks its overwatch fire, but now nothing can stop them. Five, six warbikes are destroyed, but the advance of the rattling army is unstoppable.
While the horde approaches, a fleeting Warboss of the Deathskull runs defeated and angry, orphaned of his chance of glory and victory. A horde of warbike outriders led by their Warboss, followed shortly after by a kult of speed of buggies and schorcers, followed again by Gursduk's Kommandos and a speed freak Warband. The immense raiders army advances in front of Deville's regiment, shelling and setting fire to the building where his infantry are perched. Twenty soldiers are incinerated by the ork flamethrowers, while a chimera tank is destroyed. Now it's his turn for the imperial second in command. Hold the last, terrifying shock, or perish.
While the bulk of the speed freaks army raided the southern front, in center field a second, massive speed freak Warband, staying away from the overwatch fire of the baneblade super heavy tanks, opens fire on the infantry regiment on the central building, killing a dozen militiamen. They have come too, and they're ready for assault!
The no man's land rumbles now of the deafening din of dozens and dozens engines. A monstrous roar, almost the same battlecry of Gork, that shakes bones and the foundations of the sector sixty-six. A terrifying roar, which still excites more and more the warrior spirit of the orks, ready to do anything to conquer the battlefield.
<< Commander Paulus Falkland to Field Marshal Tanaiser. Now our task is to resist. Resist, with our will, with our rifles, or with our dead bodies. >>
TURN 3. End turn. ORKS WAAAGH: 1 (defend the flag) IMPERIAL GUARD: 2 (defend the flag, break the spirit)
<< War is the Hell on Earth, and we're living in Hell by thirty years. For goodness sake! God Emperor! Save us! >> Anonymous citizen militiaman. Kepler Secundus. Galrisian. Sector Ultima - 287MK41
<< The war is all a nuisance, Field Marshal Tanaiser, please don't talk to me about margins, or losses! If my beloved and only planet had been in the best thoughts of our High Lords of TERRA, there would not took thirty years to nuts up! Hundreds of millions, whole generations have been wiped out, swallowed in this infernal war that bisects the planet. The Greater Western Powers of the Holy TERRA will have to understand that sooner or later we are the only bulwark against the barbarian ork hordes from the eastern segment. Our capitulation, will one day be their, capitulation. >> Lord Doge of the twelve Gabriel Wojciech Dardaiko of the house of Istanor VII°, also known as Duke Sibelius of Galrisian.
Baltimas is the city elected as capital of Galrisian, after the fall of Sigismunda, renamed Gargarus now in the hands of the orks. In the depths of Baltimas, in an underground fortress, Duke Sibelius and his staff coordinate and support the ground operations of the imperial guard regiments of Field Marshal Tanaiser, also coordinated with the Legio Metalica titan legion. In a dark room, obscure, two dozen generals, including many nobles of Dardaiko family stand behind their sovereign, mostly parents and relatives of the monarch-governor, observing silently the green and vacuous holographic images projected in the large device in front of them. A succession of faces, names: Now The Legate of the Legion Metalica Pastorius, now the Field Marshal, then again generals and graduated of lesser order. The dispatches and information comes frantic, engaging the center of ground command: thousands of men and servitors wired as data processing machines, espionage centers, radar and surveillance systems. In the heart of the complex, Sibelius voice pours out hoarse and unpleasant, spread from a reverb device attached to his throat, badly damaged both by the age, that prolonged exposure to radiation during this thirty years of war. A man not so old, collapsed on himself, in which, however, shines a wisdom and cunning tactics not indifferent. When the head of his father rolled into the palace of Sigismunda by ork hands, thirty years ago, he was little more than a boy. Then, a life spent in the shadows, in fear of the capitulation, in the vain hope of reinforcements, now come in the ultimate hour.
Along all the front line the battle rages, sector by sector. Where the orks seem to break through, in another sector the imperial forces counterattack, rebalancing the situation. Fierce shelling along the entire no man's land actually prevent a real breakthrough, and the imperial strategic maneuver to bring the bulk of their assault forces, including of course the titan legion, to the sixty-six sector doesn't go unnoticed. The orks armored forces from the sidelines are converging, accepting the challenge.
++ Commander Deville reporting. Commander Falkland, my regiment is ready to fire! Commissar Mombata, let order at... Damn, we lost the connection with the lower floors ...Merd! Merd! Merd... Alarm! ...Kommandos!! ++Connection lost.
Without being seen, silently the Kommandos mob had vanished near the ruins in the no man's land, and in the chaos of the battle sergeant Deville thought that they had withdrawn, and instead, with horror, going through the sewers the Kommandos broke into the building, already tomb of the epic clash of Falkland's regiment against Warboss Gursduk. Floor by floor, the Kommandos are thrown into the fray surprising the imperial regiment, while in the street the chimera tanks are annihilated by the terrifying support fire of the immense approaching speed freaks army. A few minutes of battle, and Deville's regiment is entirely destroyed, while the Kommandos retreat into the no man's land, to regroup by the huge losses.
<< Deville! Sergeant ... shit! If Deville was overwhelmed, then it means... >> << Means that the speed freaks armies have free rein to break into the southern front. Commander Falkland. >> << Commissar Trump! Open a secure channel with the Sergeant Leonid Gasparius, great knight of the rough riders. And order the charge! Now! Now or never! Soon ... and nimble! >> << Order received! Sir! >>
From the imperial rear, suddenly, the ground shakes by the trampling of dozen horses, heavily harnessed. An image outside of time, like escaped from a picture of lost times a rough riders regiment rushes to charge, ringing high their battle cry, followed by the policemen mounted on bike and by the stormtroopers with their last two remaining valkyries. A charge of glory, toward a confrontation far from obvious.
The rough riders, elusive, spread with their deadly laser spears firmly in hand among the dozens of wartracks, buggies, schorchers, trucks and variously assorted ork wagons, ready to fight between the wreckage of the stompers.
The no man's land, cemetery on fire, explodes in a roar of flames, screams, grenades, machine guns, flame throwers, missiles, guns, rifles, feral nitrites, grunts, curses, blasphemies, explosions and bright flashes.
The wreckage of the ork light vehicles piling on each other, creating a hellish inextricable traffic jam of metal sheet and carcasses of horses, preventing any other movement. These metal barriers, sometime, rip open by the explosion of a rocket or a grenade, falling back on the shapeless mass of vehicles and riders, adding slaughter to the slaughter. The rough riders, now, wander decimated in the street, mutilated, slaughtered.
The southern side of the no man's land is a hellish landscape. The wreckage of the stompers, of the battlewagons, ork light vehicles and the rough riders formed a bumpy hill of rubble and death, a mixture of indistinguishable and unrecognizable rubble, and in the midst of these the few brave rough riders remained hound the speed freaks army. Few, endless moments, and deafening the engines start, defeated, while the three orks formations retreat behind their lines, in disarray, leaving on the battlefield more than half of theiir own.
The policemen and the stormtroopers regroup on the street, to patrol and guard the southern front, now finally reconquered!
Of the more than one hundred knights, eight returned.
While the south front, at the sacrifice of the entire Devielle's regiment and the chivalry regiment, has held up, in center field the second massive speed freaks Warband rushes forward, to the entrenched militias in the center building. The mekboy speedstas open a substained fire with their deadly as strange weapons against the baneblades, irreversibly damaging two of them, and only two manage to break their overwatch and bombard the incoming horde, destroying few buggies.
The horde pounced on the central front, driven by the incomparable thirst for conquest of the orks. The trucks are thrown together with the buggies and four nobz on warbikes on the baneblades, while forty orks flows inside the building, axes in hand, spreading death and terror among the militiamen, crushed exceedingly back by the flamethrowers of the schorchers on the street.
A baneblade is destroyed, and the other two fall back to the street, among the few survivors of the militia escaped from the massacre.
While the souther fron held up, the central front collapsed.
the sky tears and three ork fighta bombers rush to the ground intent on destroying the vultures squadron before they can move, to consolidate the ork's conquest, but two fighters thunderbolts hunt them in the slipstream, and cut down one of the three fighta, making vain their ground attack.
When courage and luck move together, a man is invincible. Commander Paulus Falkland has no doubts, and with the determination shown throughout the entire battle orders at the infantry regiment in the south, a handful of men left, to open fire, and quickly moves his own, or what remains of it, passing the palace of the Administratum, and reaching directly "face to face" the speed freak warband. A storm of fire, lucky shots, and in the street the orks are under a firestorm. The buggies and the trucks are almost all destroyed, and what remains of the mob is forced to flee behind the lines of their big gunz, also defeated. The entire imperial front has been liberated!
From north to south, the orks are retreating, while the bad moon mob on the north doesn't advance, and slowly, while the deafening cacophony of the cannons in the no man's land goes by thinning, the orks begin a slow, and undisturbed, retreat, moving their big gunz mobs building by building further and further back, up to leave the sector sixty-six.
<< The southern front is secure. Roger. >> Sergeant Gasparius. VII° Rough riders regiment.
<< The center front is secure. Roger. >> Commander Paulus Falklands. XXI° Mechanized infantry regiment.
<< The northern front is secure. Roger. >> Commissar Wright. CXXXIV° citizen militia infantry regiment.
<< For the Emperor mercy... we won this battle. Field Marshal Tanaiser. >> << I knew it, ha, ha! I knew that I've put the right man in the right place! You have a career ahead, Commander Falkland! And now, predispose for the passage of the Legio Metalica titan legion and the bulk of our forces. Your task now is to provide adequate support, logistic and supply to the front line. You are in charge of defense and supply routes. >>
