Decided to do some brainstorming on how the Vulkhari could fight a numerically superior foe like the Imperium or Orks,
@Mechanis Sorry if any information is inaccurate or cringe.
Also yeah I'm using Gael-Vad's name as a doctrine the future Vulkhari use, it sounds cool, bite me.
Gael-Vad: The Scorching Rain.
Named after one of the seven sons of Forgelord Aresh-Vul, the tactics of Gael-Vad share similarities to the blazing fast assaults of the Swordwind oft-used by the tempestuous Biel-Tan, though neither they, nor Vau-Vulkesh would admit to such an accusation.
The doctrine of Gael-Vad is - much like the Vulkhari themselves - brutal, fast and merciless in its execution, fleets of black and green voidships slink from webway portals in the deepest black of interplanetary space, leaving only the faintest shimmer (much akin to the lensing of light around a black hole) to announce their arrival from the webway network.
From there, enemy fleets are rapidly and mercilessly ambushed, their admirals singled out and destroyed in a hail of starlight and guided wraithbone spikes, with shoals of predatory strike craft harrying the survivors as the orbit of their targeted world is secured.
But unlike the Swordwind and it's defense of the Maiden Worlds, or the clumsy, grasping hands of primitives in search of new lands to conquer, the Vulkhari do not strike in the name of expansion, worlds mean nothing to them - save those of their Exodite charges and the Maiden Worlds they inhabit - and they are often miserly to spend their lives in battle with a numerically superior foe.
Thus, each voidship in orbit will turn their arsenal of weapons onto the planet itself, scorching the surface and shattering the strongest points of the defending world.
Oftentimes this will be the full extent of Gael-Vad, a continued and merciless bombardment of the surface until all resistance is shattered and the world reduced to molten glass, but on worlds that are either too fortified, or otherwise posess something that they seek, the next stage of Gael-Vad begins
On the surface, in still-cooling glasslands, in the midst of beleaguered fortifications and in the dark corners of the world, short-lived webway tunnels flare to life, as strike teams of Vulkhari step forth to complete their objectives, be it securing technology, sabotaging manufactorums or assasinating the surviving leadership of the planet, supported of course by the fleets in orbit and the vehicles they bring with them.
Whether they suffer a defeat or a victory, the Vulkhari slink back into their webway portals, leaving a wounded, bleeding and disoriented population to pick themselves back up from scratch, yet always remaining a shadow of their former selves.
But the greatest impact of the Scorching Rain is its preference for the soft, vulnerable underbelly of the foe, the agri-worlds, the forge-worlds, vast armories and dockyards of ships, the beating hearts that sustain such large superpowers are the preferred targets of the Vulkhari, for an army marches on its stomach and every soldier needs a weapon, and with this constant, debilitating attack on their supply lines, any offensives in the northern rim are smothered as Guardsmen starve, battleships exhaust their fuel supplies and ammunition becomes scarce.
An army marches on its stomach, and thus the Vulkhari intend to keep their enemy eternally hungry.
(AN: Or in other words, 'Scorched earth except we literally scorch the earth'.)
