The lines formed on the hillside, they prepare to meet the monstrous horde on the other end of this soon to be blood-soaked hell. Artillery settles on the hill just behind the army, preparing to fire. The enemy begins moving forward, disturbingly coordinated for a monstrous horde.
The monstrous insects break ranks, however, turning frenzied in a charge that must be twice the speed of a galloping horse with thrice the ferocity and danger. Their abdomens turn a disturbing brown-green as they bulge ever further, swinging like sacks of flour on top of their otherwise rigid forms.
However, your artillery has no need to wait, its range is more than sufficient to engage immediately. Catapults drawback as cannons prepare to bark colossal shots into the enemy, your longest range pieces first.
Catapult and Cannon Barrage
Catapult Roll=1(HELL OF A ROLL TO COME BACK WITH)-10(Greek Fire)=-9
Cannon Roll=28
Vs
Skitterling Roll= 98 (Oh no)
Catapults have 11 degrees of success
Cannons have 8 degrees of success.
Ah.
The catapults swing their clay warheads over the line, sending them tumbling with the newest fuses just above and ahead of the enemy, detonating into a spray of fire and ruin. The cannons bark their shot into the enemy far more directly, driving gaping furrows through their line, splattering ichor and burning acid, flickering with fell power all across the ground and most importantly, forcing them to bunch together.
The flame sprays land into bunched hordes and burn them away in moments, setting off devastating chain reactions of hellish flame and acid. The Greek Fire turns purple in places as whatever acidic mixture is within these creatures is turning to fuel for the flame.
The monsters are more than decimated, they are nearly annihilated. The catapults manage more and more fire, an exceptional rhythm having entered the engineers manning them whilst the cannons manage their own orchestral staccato, pulverising the enemy initial engagement attempt.
Insectoid Morale
Roll=80
Target-65
Failure!
The monsters attempt to reorganize, but it seems baser instincts overcome them, forcing the entire formation to break apart, much to the probable chagrin of its commander, the insectoids shatter the earth, digging downwards to safety as their bulging sacks deflate, pumping out their lethal payload into the earth ahead of them, clearing the way for their escape.
Your artillery has broken their initial attempt completely, causing a reordering of the enemy battle plan, clear in the stagnancy of their formation. The initial effort to skirmish failing sends the ripple of rage up and down the line, finally punctuated with a warbling roar from Octavian, one that sends shuddering force all the way across the valley into the bones of your men.
The flying Manticores marshall into a vast climb, preparing to, most likely, dive into the midst of your men, whilst the Giants and their monstrous hordes darting away from tremendous footsteps charge forth, rumbling the earth with force and power.
Finally, the Dhampirs, lead by Octavian taking his own steed, begin their own charge, splitting into two groups, circling around the edges of the battlefield, rendering them smaller targets than their more obvious, large brethren.
And it does indeed work for your artillery, as it aims to focus on the Giants primarily, only the flame cannons and scorpions aiming for the monstrous infantry at their feet. A vicious barrage only made worse by the Pyrovolos unloading into the incoming line.
Stop Their Charge
Cannon Roll=95
Catapult Roll=7-10(Greek Fire)=-3
Flame Cannon Roll=82
Scorpion Roll=75-10 (Greek Fire)
Pyrovolos Roll=31
Vs
The Bane of Men
Monstrous Infantry Roll=86-10 (Monstrous Vigour)=76
Giants Roll=15- 20 (Titanic Vigour)-10 (Spells of Immortality)=-15
Giants were mildly harmed.
Monstrous Infantry takes casualties.
And the barrage is powerful indeed. Nearly a dozen shots and many more jars of greek fire are sent spiralling into the enemy, but more accurately, sent into the giants, hoping to stop such colossal monstrosities before they reach the vulnerable front line and wreak devastation.
And effect they do seem to have, blasting chunks out of the Giants, blazing them with flame and hellish heat, but no matter how much skin is peeled off, hearts blasted out and blood sprayed over the field, a fell energy overtakes them, forcing their colossal bodies forward even with no right to do so.
The monsters around their feet are not so lucky, the bursting shards of wood, superheated by the glories of greek fire act as loving shrapnel to the poor creatures, embedding and pushing in with deep rivulets of burning liquid, injecting it into their putrid bodies. As they get closer, the staccato of musketry responds as well, sending lead balls pounding into them.
The entire front rank of the creatures falls dead, overwhelmed by sheer firepower, but the ranks behind them drag over the dead, thirsting for blood and violence, uncaring of morale. But the dream of making it to your line with only a few casualties is struck dead with the bursting of flame cannons.
They smash off from the top of the hill, sending sprays of superheated pottery towards the enemy, accompanies by the jets of greek fire that have become iconic of their discharge. They penetrate entire ranks through and through, shatter formations by leaving spillage of fire all over the field where they strike, along with the boiling blood and torn apart bodies by the ceramic jets.
With all that taking place in the centre line, the skirmish is where more carnage is taking place. The Koursores having ridden out to meet the Dhampir's as they advanced along the sides with their orders of skirmishing.
Koursores Skirmishing Attempt
Roll=48-10(Skirmish Specialists)=38
Vs
Dhampir Butchering Attempt
Roll=69-30 (Born of Cursed Blood)-25 (Trained from Birth)-10 (Blood Forged Arms)=4
Dhampirs win by 4 degrees of success.
And as they move forward, sending forth arrows from their bows at a full gallop. The Dhampirs kick their horses into gear, achieving speeds thought impossible for horses, driving down their lances. Your Koursores attempt to match their charge, seeing escape become an impossibility, but it is rapidly shown that they are simply not enough.
The cavalry formations clash, blood spilling in rivers as Roman steel is shown to be insufficient against the Dhampirs and their infernal arms. Men are dragged off their horses and smashed into their fellows by brute strength even after the initial charge detonated into a shower of blood, bone and steel.
It's a rapid, chaotic battle, but your lightest cavalry is not a match for their most devastating, rendering you down an entire formation of Koursores, but have stopped the advance of their Dhampirs for minutes, allowing the rest of the battle to proceed unabated.
Then, the sky opens up, from clouds rain the Manticores, diving as fast as they can towards your artillery formations. A strange whistling surrounds them as they go faster and faster, seemingly uncaring if they live or die.
At the very last moment, they open their wings, flapping torn, leathery limbs to drag themselves to a survivable velocity directly atop your artillery.
Manticore Divebomb
Roll=85-20(Divebomb)-15 (Cursed Abominations)=50
Vs
Artillery Crew Scattering
Roll=43
Artillery Crew succeeds by 1 degree of success
They slam into your artillery, committing a horrendous butchery of the arms and equipment, but the learned engineers themselves scatter away at the roars of Eutropius, moving to behind the protective arms of the Athanatopouloi and Varangians, who bring to bear great shattering axes and cleaving swords towards the Manticores. The monsters themselves react with bared fangs and dripping poison tails.
The Greatest Heroes
Athanatopouloi Roll=46-10 (Roman Discipline)-40 (Warrior-Born)=-4
Varangian Roll=95-REROLL FORCED
Varangian Roll=53-25 (Einherjar)-10 (Emperor At Our Backs)=17
Vs
Monsters Most Foul
Manticore Roll=42-15 (Cursed Abominations)=27
H e h
The greatest heroes your Empire has march, and then charge. Athanatopouloi and Varangians side by side, bringing to bear force upon these Manticores, unlike anything they have ever experienced. It is wholesale butchery.
Working together, the Varangians seem to adapt to circumstances with preternatural skill, battling the monsters as if they all know every move the others will make. Manticores are assaulted from a dozen different directions each, harried by axes nipping at extremities, allowing openings for Athanatopouloi to do their grizzly executioners work.
A tale that repeats all throughout this small rear-guard battle, shedding blood in rivers, yet none of it human. The monsters are chopped, butchered and torn apart, their stingers pinned by axes and hacked by executioners blades, their heads smashed by duos of maddened Northmen or simply wrenched off by angered Athanatopouloi.
Eventually, returning to their position in the line spattered with blood, not a single one of them is lost, and the Manticores are pulverised into blood, guts and venom puddles behind your army. The engineers begin to return to their weaponry, finding it shattered beyond use in all cases.
And then, whilst this rear action was taking place, the mainline crush is taking place. Maddened giants roar as their charges takes on a distinctly more vicious aspect, lowering their bodies as if ready to tackle the infantry lines, mouths opening wide with intent to swallow men whole.
Monsters follow, pulling over the ruined corpses of their comrades
The Skoutatoi hold their ground as best they can with fear trembling through them but the Emperor at their backs driving them to bravery beyond normal men. Toxotai retreat behind the line, trying to get to higher ground to rain fire upon the enemy before their brethren are demolished.
An Unholy Hunger
Giants Roll=69-30 (Colossal Monsters)-10 (Spells of Immortality)-20 (Unstoppable Charge)=9
Monstrous Infantry Roll=85-25 (Monstrous Power)=60
Vs
The Bravery Of Men
Skoutatoi Roll=45-10 (Roman Discipline)-10 (Emperor At Our Backs)=25
The base monsters are halted, pike tips turning from gleaming points to blood and organ covered effigies as they pierce over and over again into the enemy, driving them back with sheer, frenzied violence and refusal to give in.
Yet the strength of men is no match for the power of monsters. And whilst their resistance to the baser creatures is admirable, the Giants churn them underfoot. The formation shatters as those same monsters pour through the holes made by the tread of their larger kin, turning the hundreds dead from each Giants rampage into thousands torn apart in an orgiastic frenzy of blood and brains, carving apart front cohesion and stacking bodies higher than thought possible.
The Varangians and Athanatopouloi once again are the ones to respond as the Kataphraktoi prepare to meet the Dhampirs in the field of battle on their own terms. The vast majority of them move to shatter the monstrous infantry, but a chosen few madmen, no more than a hundred mixed Athanatopouloi and Varangians come up with a novel plan to meet the Giants head-on.
The Greatest of Heroes
Monster Killing Athanatopouloi Roll=24-10 (Roman Discipline)-40 (Warrior-Born)=-26
Monster Killing Varangian Roll=19-25 (Einherjar)-10 (Emperor At Our Backs)=-16
Giant Killing Novel Idea Roll=6-25 (Einherjar)-40 (Warrior-Born)=-59
Vs
Vile Rage and Monstrous Hunger
Giants Roll=5-30 (Colossal Monsters)-10 (Spells of Immortality)=-35
Monstrous Infantry Roll=99-25 (Monstrous Power)=74
And the heroes do indeed do battle. Ripping through the weaker monsters like chaff, they split dog-headed monsters in twain, turn things that seem to resemble goats on two legs, bulging with far more muscle than is reasonable into proverbial wishbones with their bare hands and other such abominations put to various grizzly fates.
The grand heroes do battle and force the monsters back with rivers of their own blood, screaming and roaring orders for the Skoutatoi to reform to Fight against the damned hordes and win this, for God above and the Emperor at their backs.
The mortals around them do their part, stabbing at the dead, protecting the flanks of their rescuing angels and pushing forth over the corpses of their comrades to win this battle. But the Giants seem unstoppable, sending even the Athanatopouloi flying with the mere force of their motions.
This is why, further back in the line, crazed Varangians had been explaining a plan to much more sane Athanatopouloi, and eventually convincing them of its virtues. The Varangians then prepare themselves with pikes picked off the dead, axes holstered on their backs.
They are then lifted by duos of Athanatopouloi, hefted back and thrown with tremendous force towards the incoming Giants, the men soar across the sky, by all accounts laughing uproariously until they make hard impact with the targets of their ire, the Giants themselves, embedding the pike to the hilt in the monsters bellies, chests, backs and wherever else these madmen could manage before proceeding to climb the monster.
Many are thrown off it, landing hard on the ground, to be found wounded after the battle, but many more clamber up the things bodies, swinging axes at vitals, sending sprays of blood in quantities more fit for whales than walking creatures.
One by one the Giants fall, brought down by the Northmen, crashing with severe force into your line and killing many men, but bringing their rampage to a halt. As this is happening, the Skoutatoi on your flanks, so far untouched by the vagaries of war are preparing to take an incoming charge by the Dhampirs, who have kicked their mounts into motion once again and are nearly upon them.
Dhampir Assault
Roll=44-30 (Born of Cursed Blood)-25 (Trained from Birth)-10 (Blood Forged Arms)=-21
Vs
Skoutatoi Defence
Roll=58-10(Roman Discipline)=48
Dhampirs Win by 7 degrees of success.
The charge is violent, the Dhampirs tear through your men with practically no resistance, knifing through the formation in an orgiastic shower of blood and carnage, eyes alit with delight through their enclosed helms as men fall like chaff before them.
Their lances pick up half a dozen bodies each before they have to be discarded, their blades pick three dozen more, slashing through plate armour as if it's not there, spilling blood and organ equally. Men die in thousands, butchered by these bastard savages.
Which is why the Kataphraktoi chose this moment to charge, coldly calculating the best moment as they are still embroiled in combat with those surrounding them, not watching for assault, especially not by those truly capable of besting them.
Kataphraktoi Vengeance Charge
Roll=4-40 (Kataphraktoi)-10 (Emperor At Their Backs)=-46
Vs
Dhampir Defense
Roll=80-30 (Born of Cursed Blood)-25 (Trained from Birth)-10 (Blood Forged Arms)+10 (Distracted)=25
Kataphraktoi win with 8 degrees of success.
And vengeance they acquire, smashing into the line and, though with great regret, killing a few of their own with their charge, they slam into the unprepared Dhampirs with unparalleled ferocity, bringing to bear burning lances and vicious intent to harm these godless creatures.
The treatment they have all acquired evens the odds, even turning it in their favour, alchemical strength proving equal to, and sometimes superior to Dhampir hell-born power, letting lances spear through their armour and maces smash in their skulls in a grizzly display more fit for an executioners block than a battlefield.
Many Kataphraktoi are injured, but injuries that would have felled them before their new state now merely further enrage them, driving them to greater acts of righteous war. The Dhampirs fight back hard but are pushed back, being killed quickly and gently compared to the treatment they gave to the Skoutatoi, but eventually even their morale breaks, causing a rout to start in their ranks.
Whilst that is happening, a strange sound resounds all across the field of battle, one that veteran's of the first engagement with Vampires know to be a sign of incoming carnage. The crack of a vampire kicking off the ground with as much force as it can manage, intending to commit horrific violence.
Yet the shape of Octavian darting across the sky moves unnaturally, it does not follow an arc, yet speeds up as it moves, overcoming your line and going straight for the Emperor himself. It rockets down faster than most men can blink, and the Emperor's guards respond, along with the two generals that had moved here with the march, or destruction of their own detachments.
Octavian
Roll=35-140 (Unstoppable Killer, Gorged With Blood.)=-105
Vs
The Guard
Roll=3-10 (Roman Discipline)-40 (Warrior-Born)-10 (Emperor At Our Backs)=-57
Octavian Wins by 6 degrees of success.
The guards do their damndest, charging to destroy the threat to the Emperor, but it only buys time. The first man buys two seconds, his attempt at parrying the Vampire's blade ending with his own blade shattering, superhuman vigour letting him rocket a fist towards the vampire at the moment between heartbeats that such monsters act at, only succeeding in getting the limb sliced off by a lightning-quick slash, taking his upper body off in the same motion.
The next few have a similar experience, no amount of potion letting them even the odds, it is much too great a difference between them. The carving blades of the Vampire tears through them, providing precious extra seconds for something to happen.
However, no amount of superhuman might can provide the time needed to defend the Emperor properly.
It falls to the men near him, your two Generals to manage the herculean task put forth ahead of them. Both of them walk ahead of the Emperor, tossing nary a glance at each other before settling, Eutropius with a single sword held in front of him, a clear classical duelists style, whilst Priscianus draws a shorter blade and a pistol, something newer and less predictable, but untested.
The vampire tilts its head, glaring with baleful green eyes and mouth still leaking blood from the feast it had before this. Raising a single sword, it prepares to eviscerate the two generals.
Octavian Barbulescu, Butcher of Armies
Roll=99-140(Unstoppable Killer, Gorged With Blood.)+20 (Potion Infused Blood)=-21
Vs
The Generals Two
Eutropius Roll=1-10 (Roman Discipline)-15 (Monster Fighting Experience)-10 (Working Together)=-34
Priscianus Roll=1-10 (Roman Discipline)-15 (Armed With The Best Money Can Buy)-10 (Working Together)=-34
And as the monster darts forward, blurring into motion, Priscianus's finger pressed down on the trigger, sending a spray of silver dust all across the monster. It stops pulling a hand to clear an injured face, sizzling with silver.
At that moment, as Priscianus is dropping his pistol to reach for a second on his hip, Eutropius charges. His blade is knocked aside almost haphazardly by the vampire, but the hidden knife in his sleeve finds purchase, coated in silver as it is, it pierces the hell-forged mailed wrist joint of his opponent with, forcing one blade to clatter to the ground.
Eutropius is thrown by that same hand, flying a dozen feet away whilst Priscianus pulls another pistol, Octavian, hearing the click of the pistol, rushes forth to Priscianus and forces his hand upwards, nearly crushing his hand, but the man grits his teeth, pushing his opposite arm forth and into the vampires face, another pistol barks, one built into the underside of his armour.
The silvered projectile lands hard into his chest, driving him backwards with blood spilling from his mouth and a cry of pain resounding, only to stop stumbling as a new, silvered blade pushes through his chest, coming out the other side, in between the cracks in his armour.
Octavian's eyes hollow for a moment, stunned in pain for the precious second needed for Priscianus to administer the killing blow. The pistol barks, a spray of Greek Fire coming from its barrel to administer directly to the monsters face.
The fire burrows into Octavian's skull, drawing another scream from him as from behind, Eutropius swings hard to his neck and severs the head with a vicious strike, felling the monster as a blue glow starts to emanate from him.
Both men rush over and tackle down the Emperor as the Vampire detonates into force, concussing both men even as the Emperor twists them beneath him instead, taking the brunt of the impact to his back.
As the army settles, victory is had, the remaining Dhampir routing and being much too fast to catch whilst the monsters are gunned down by Pyrovolo's and torn apart by the enraged heroes amongst them.
The dead are to be counted and victory is to be savoured
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Remaining Troops.
4000 Skoutatoi
7000 Pyrovolo Toxotai
200 Polemistés Kataphraktoi
100 Athanatopouloi
The Varangian Guard
The Emperor
Eutropius
Priscianus
110 Skilled Manpower Recovered from remains of artillery.
[X] Retreat back to your borders, this has proven devastating. (Start Turn)
[X] Hold here, keep your territorial gains. (Start Turn barring sudden enemy assault)
[X] Push forth? (Get into another brawl)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Congratulations, you pulled a victory out of the jaws of defeat, take the lessons learnt from this and apply it to the future!
Also, kept you waiting huh?
