[X] He stays in command of the fleet
[X] They go to the surface.
While you send Bel and Yas to the surface with a contingent of marines, you stay aboard the
Merlin as you prepare to lead the Federal Navy into battle against the Dominion Navy. As useful as your talents would be on the surface against the marauding daemonic hosts, you feel that the Federal Navy needs your talents more than the Federal Army. Especially since the ground pounders will have your wives and brother to help them out.
The numbers may be firmly against you as you have the Federal Navy face off against the invaders, but they are also deceptive. Outnumbered as you are, each of your warships is two or three times better than their counterparts within the Dominion Navy. Not to mention that you are a pretty good admiral and easily the most experienced in this region of space. You have fought many seemingly hopeless battles and won all of them.
As the initial scouting goes poorly as while their superior speed and agility keeps you from losing any
Tiamats, they are unable to get close enough to get a proper look on the enemy formations. Nevertheless, the mass of enemy sensor contacts is more than enough to provide ample targets for your nova cannons.
Four enemy cruisers and a score of escorts break under the fury of your nova cannons before the enemy fleet finally gets within range. As escorts dart in and out of range on both sides while the capital ships lumber into position, the long ranged exchanges prove mostly ineffective apart from the destruction of a few more
Sword-class Frigates at the hands of your nova cannons.
"Admiral, we are detecting warp energies amongst the enemy capital ships," reports Victoria as you coordinate your warships closing to range where there will definitely be losses on both sides, "Comparison to existing records indicates that they bear the signature of the Tempter."
"Unpleasant, but not unsurprising," you reply as you mentally adjust your plans to account for this new information, "They had the aid of the Excessive last time they invaded us though this does put the timing of the most recent daemonic incursion into a new light."
It really does to the point that you wonder just what you will find at Chronus. Solas was free of any taint from the Four, but can the same be said of the Dominion's capital?
As the battle rolls on, you increasingly have the upper hand. Cruisers and escorts die on both sides, but far more Dominion warships die at the hands of Federal warships than vice versa. Your counterpart does their best, but in the end, they are simply unable to match your skill at ordering warships about and controlling an orbital battlefield.
The Excessive lends her aid to the invaders, the enemy cruisers and battleships emitting sounds of pleasure and pain that either mesmerise your crew or demoralise them. You do your best to push back with your own unknown powers, but you lack the skill and/or knowledge to extend it beyond your flagships. Nonetheless, the sailors of the Federal Navy are not to be cowed and the distance involved means that the blessings of Tempter are temporary and fleeting in their effects.
In the end, you lose half of your destroyers, but invaders lose more than two thirds of their frigates and while only two
Promethean-class Cruisers emerge from the battle intact, the Dominion Navy has lost three times as many cruisers as you have.
Even the battleship exchange favours you as while one of your
Emperor-class Battleships floats with a broken hull, the Dominion lost two of their
Apocalypse-class Battleships and their three remaining battleships were limping as they fled back to Chronus. Of the surviving Federal battleships, your own
Merlin got hit hardest with the Dominion Navy accurating guessing the sole
Gloriana was your flagship and correspondingly targeting it. The
Merlin survived of course, but she'll need a year or two of being repaired in a shipyard bay.
The fighting on the ground takes a bit longer, but just like in space, the Federation of Bladus emerges victorious. Arriving just in time, Bel and Yas were able to help keep the daemons from reaching any settlements, even taking some time to help Connor so he could rejoin the fight.
While the warpspawn were kept at bay, it wasn't a one-sided affair as the Federal Army and Marines saw both success and failure in their attempts to coral the invading hordes. Ultimately, time favoured the defenders as the daemons could only manifest in the real world for so long. Even as the daemon hordes were thinned by battle, they were also being thinned as many of their number found themselves running out of energy and running to the warp.
In the end, the daemon invasion just petered out. Servants of the Violent, Diseased and Tempter all fought with all their might until their lines just collapsed in a mere moment, having lost too many and rapidly losing more with every passing second. When you arrived and joined the fighting, there were only a few stubborn stragglers and holdouts and even without your aid, they would have been crushed with ease.
Despite both victories at Excalibur and the conquest of Solas, the ongoing invasion of the Chronus Dominion has been put on hold as both the Federal Army and Navy need time to regroup and recover their losses. And yet the invasion has only been put on hold rather than stopped entirely as the threat posed by the Dominion has become too great to ignore. Between their attacks and seeming consorting with the Four, the Federation of Bladus can no longer afford to ignore their old neighbour.
For better or worse, there will be a reckoning between these two mighty powers.
No plan voting except for the warship vote.
Which area has Drake been focusing upon improving? (Choose one)
[] Personal Combat.
[] Ground Combat.
[] Biomancy.
[] Telepathy.
[] Divination.
[] Governance.
[] Engineering.
[] Diplomacy.
[] Intrigue.
[] Anathematic. (40%)
[] Studying the Necrons.
What major event does Drake do beyond partaking in the invasion of the Chronus Dominion? (Choose one)
[] He is approached by Eldrad Ulthran.
[] He attempts to explore beyond the sub-sector.
[] He decides to join the Federation's official diplomatic expedition to Othion.
[] He makes another go at dealing with his mum's mutations with his abilities.
Choose what warships are built. (30 Points)
[]
Gloriana-class Battleship (15 Points)
[]
Promethean-class Cruiser (3 Points)
[]
Tiamat-class Destroyer (1 Points)
***
Alright, the space battles are getting big enough that I'm not going to be covering them in detail. If you start getting some small scale battles again, I'll return to more focused coverage of them, but when you have multiple battleships, dozens of cruisers and a few scores of escorts, that is too many ships for detailed coverage.
Anyway, the invasion of the Dominion is being put on hold as the Federation needs to take a breather. It will be continuing however as the potential connections between the Dominion and Chaos is too dangerous for the Federation to ignore.
Please point out any spelling or grammar mistakes that you spot. Please quote them in the thread and explain what you think is wrong so I know what you are referring to.
