@DragonCobolt
Can we get a rundown of what fleet assets we have with us please?
Can we get a rundown of what fleet assets we have with us please?
WARHAMMER 40,000: ROGUE TRADER: FALLEN SUNS (40k roleplaying on the farthest frontiers)
- Thread starter DragonCobolt
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Sir_Travelsalot
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Problem is, if we withdraw to Purgatorio, they'll be able to reconsolidate and, to a limited extent, repair their fighter wings, and whatever subsystems are currently damaged on their capital ships. Not to mention, there's always the chance that we jump into Warp and hit another temporal anomaly and arrive too late to defend there as well.
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You have, in total!
1) One Grand Cruiser (the Argent Scourge) which is a terrifying nightmare beast that can have, pretty regularly, 6 void shields.
2) Two Cruisers (the Colossus, which bears the majority of your fighters and bombers and the Tachyon's Demise, which is a lethal close ranged brawler/torpedo ship)
3) One Light Cruiser (the Revenge, your reliable and beloved former flag - not quite as lethal since it now lacks Em's nightmare boarding abilities, but it still is rolling at a +60 to board, so you don't NEED to be a genius to pull off turbo-effective hit and runs.)
4) four light carriers (your four pocket carriers, which are useless in a fight, but carry the rest of your fighters and bombers.)
You've got 28 squads of fighters and 28 squads of bombers.
You also, finally...
You MIGHT have, depending on your choices, an Avatar of Khaine, who does 2d10+10 Hull damage per turn he's on a vehicle, and has, effectively, 5 Hull Points of damage and a -60/+60 for enemies to hit and for him to dodge ship-scale effects. He lasts for 24 hours (48 turns.)
And the enemy has, for reference:
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The grand cruisers ARE, as a note, just carrier platforms!
What is the throw weight equivalence between a grand cruiser, a cruiser, a light cruiser, and a frigate?
Sir_Travelsalot
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Well, grand cruisers were the original middle ground between battleships and cruisers, combining the firepower of the former with (most of) the speed of the latter. And then, over the millennia, their numbers in Imperial service dwindled from battlefield losses or from being mothballed due to the technical knowledge and tooling needed to repair them being lost. Which lead the Imperium to try to make up the difference by essentially just up-gunning cruisers to create the new classification of 'battlecruiser'.
Of course, even tonnages aren't much of a guarantee of what sorts of firepower a ship might be packing. For example, there's the Dominator-class Cruiser, which has broadsides that can match those of a Retribution-class battleship in damage output, though at a much shorter range. This is without even counting in the Nova Cannon mounted under the prow. Just one of these things, in the defense of a Shrine World, came very close to destroying the Terminus Est, the single most reputedly unkillable battleship in the galaxy even before it got filled to the brim with Nurglite Warp magicks.
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@Sir_Travelsalot hit the basics...but this is also the Rogue Trader game, which leans more Napoleonic. You can absolutely take out a Grand Cruiser with a Frigate if you cut in behind her, board her, and then take the bridge and force her to strike. The trick is, like, try doing that 20 times in a pitched fleet battle.
On the whole, pound for pound, your ships will fight out of their weight class than the Chaos ships will - better crews, better leadership, and better components designed for weird tricks. But you're also seriously outnumbered and Lu'Nasad is there.
Em's evaluation, being brutally honest, is: "The Scourge fleet will likely die, but not before it cripples Vall, rendering his aim of conquering the Calixus Sector impossible."
Fayhem
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I really, really like this callback to the very start of this questchain. I just wanted you to know that I see and appreciate this detail.
Wait, then why wasn't that one of the options for who to Astropath? We could have told them to meet us at Port Wander. Granted, as it turned out that might not have gone great, but we didn't know that at the time.
It's good that Xoti has a realistic self-image.🤣
Well. FUCK.
RIP for the briefly-introduced Port Wander NPCs, too - I liked them, short though their screentime was. They deserved better, and they shall be avenged.
...What. How do you even fight that???
FUCK. The prick got there faster than we anticipated, even with our crazy speed.
Hm, considering how devastated their fliers are now, that IS good to know.
On balance though, I think we should go with withdrawing to Purgatorio.
Here's my semi-organized reasoning. One, I don't want to die here. Or at all, ideally. And even with their fliers being heavily depleted, we are still highly outgunned here even BEFORE factoring in Lu'Nusad herself. As the QM notes, by our fleet admiral's best assessment if we fight here it'll be a glorious sacrifice moreso than a victory per se.
And two, honestly, I don't even know what kind of answer we have to Lu'Nusad at all atm. I mean, I guess I have a couple ideas tbf, mostly centered around ideas like "figure out how to board then hit them with an Avatar of Khaine (assuming we can even bring ourselves to kill Desh), an Eversor, and Em's crazy boarding skills." But it would still be scrambling and we'd still be heavily outgunned even if we pulled it off. Some time to think about what we've seen now that we've gotten a direct eyes-on and to try to brainstorm counters with our allies would be very welcome.
Three, normally one of the big problems with withdrawing is that you're ceding the initiative to the enemy and you don't know where they're going to go next. In this case, we WOULD still be losing some initiative, BUT we know exactly where they're going next regardless, and we already have reinforcements and defenses built up there. And we might even be able to build them up further before they got there. While withdrawing would let them lick their wounds and reorganize to be fair, I think on balance regrouping benefits us more. And if they do pause to lick their wounds (field repairs, salvaging what fliers they can, etc.), it makes it even more likely we can make it to Purgatorio first.
So anyway yeah, we WILL fight them, but at this precise moment in time, I think discretion is the better part of valor.
DC, random brainstorm idea that may not work at all - do our Farseers think there's any chance that if we took out Vall and his Chaos fuckery on Lu'Nusad that we could suborn Lu'Nusad's guns to our side? I'm assuming that would probably require some kind of ritual preparations if there's even any theoretical way it could work at all, but if there was a chance to pull it off then it'd give us an actual plan for a fleet battle IMO. Namely, coordinate with our allies to get the best goddamn boarding party we can muster between all our allies onto Lu'Nusad, fight until we can make that happen, then turn the tide by using the enemy's own trump weapon against them. Which should be absolutely devastating to their morale even on top of the actual material destruction it can wreak, especially considering we'd presumably also be killing their warlord into the bargain.
Also, retreating here might be rough on fleet morale (and seeing how powerful Vall is can't be great for that either), so here's my shot at an RP-appropriate speech to go with that option:
[X] Withdraw to Purgatorio.
-[X] Open a channel to our whole fleet before departing. "Look at what lies before you. Witness the horror of it. See the evil that Vall and his monsters carry with them, and burn it into your minds. We know where the monster will go next, and we know that the wickedness that was done here is still not the tenth part of what he will bring there. To our own homes. Look at the horrors done here, and then swear as I am swearing, to the Emperor, to the martyred dead before us who died proving the monsters can bleed, and in your own hearts that this will be the last atrocity Vall will ever wreak. We will meet him with our full strength and that of our allies above our homes, and we will break him for what he has done. With faith in our hearts and friends by our sides, no enemy shall be beyond us, and no wickedness will be left unpunished. I, Emil Vendigroth Scourge, swear it shall be so. Will you swear with me?"
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To be fair, being more maneuverable than a stationary, crippled, unshielded space station will help.
Two reasons!
1) My brain is very tiny
2) See 1.
The original plan was to use Anaris' soul stone on the shrine - with that removed, there is no guarantee that they can take control of the infinity circuity - but the theory that the Farseers are currently operating on is that they grew a brain into the wraithbone and are directly goading that brain with psyker powers. Which is, like, both crude and inelegant and vile on a scale that is hard to believe. BUt since it is designed so that any psyker can direct it, it'd mean you could do so, if you were willing to touch minds with the fell beast.
Fayhem
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That does make sense. Though IIRC it's not quite stationary, is it? Didn't we hear it's supposed to be able to move under its own power about as fast as a mass conveyor or something, back when? Or was that the "supposed to be able to" assessment given before witnessing the ungainliness of Vall's Chaos MacGuyver approach to operating it, and that's giving him significantly suboptimal performance?
Hmm I see, I see. Should I take it they don't think it would be viable to grow a wraithbone, idk, lectern or something that we could slot Anaris' soulstone into that we could stick on there after scraping Vall's brain off?
I absolutely approve of this if we can do it relatively safely. Even if it just means knocking out a couple of the cruisers or a handful of escorts and then rabbiting it could be worthwhile.
And even if we can't do that, can we just cold-launch a bunch of torpedoes to sow random chaos and hopefully destruction as we leave?
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I always thought that Port Wander got towed into position by other ships...
you could suggest that, but it'd take a few hours to prepare. Which, I mean, actually IS viable in 40k ship combat...
8 hours is just 16 turns.
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Fayhem
Definitely not an escaped SCP
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OH
Yeah, when you said "it'd help to not be an etc." I thought you meant in contrast to Lu'Nusad, not in contrast to Port Wander. I'm clear now, ty.
I'd rather prep it on the way to Purgatorio, then. As we've seen in ship combats past, a lot can happen in 16 turns.
To return to what @Elero was asking, @DragonCobolt can you comment on how spread out the enemy fleet looks to Em? Specifically in terms of the potential viability of picking some of them off before scarpering.
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The current formation would allow for a cutting out attack - if you're willing to be a bit dicy with the fighters and bombers. Like, you can sortie them, then withdraw them after they do some damage (in effect, they get the 4 rounds it will take to prepare to drop into the warp)
But the danger is if they don't get back in time, they'll be abandoned. Now, that's not a HUGE risk, since you have a massive superiority, but it is a risk if you're want to play extra cautious.
But the danger is if they don't get back in time, they'll be abandoned. Now, that's not a HUGE risk, since you have a massive superiority, but it is a risk if you're want to play extra cautious.
Sir_Travelsalot
Never wakes up tired.
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[X] Cut off the most remote part of the enemy force and try to inflict as much damage as possible, then retreat to Purgatorio before the enemy main force can make contact.
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Yay, Ryia gets some SPOTLIGHT TIME
CHAPTER FOUR: The Storm (1.3)
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Em spoke calmly. "Mr. Khanne, if you would rig us out for translation to warp."
"Very good sir," Mr. Khanne said, inclining his head, then turning to some of the terrified looking mids. "Well, what are you gawping at? The Captain gave the word!"
"We're not just running are we?" Ryia asked.
"No, my love, we are not," Em said, pointing. "There are six iconoclasts there, within a hundred and twenty thousand kilometers. They will be among us before we cast into the warp." He looked at her, and his eyes flashed and she gave him the most feral grin that she had in her entire life. "I want them out of my skies."
"Aye aye, sir," she said, turning - before the doors to the bridge exploded open and Ensign Noceda came sprinting in, gasping.
"Sir! The Eldar!" she exclaimed. "They're going to kill Desh!" She pointed at Desh - who froze, his eyes flashing with fury, while Serradon snapped his head around to glare at Callie, who wilted under his glare.
"Luz!" Callie said.
"You told her?" Serradon growled.
Em breathed in, then let out a slow, slow, slow breath through his nose - it sounded rather like a growling of a dragon. "Tine," he barked, his voice edged. "Take the Ensign and our Guests to the manor and smooth this over at once." She nodded, then he turned and pointed at Lt. Desna. "Give me telemetronic scrying on those destroyers, Desna! I want our fighters to know where their paint is newest."
Tine swept Noceda against her, then gestured the Eldar out of the bridge as Ryia looked them over.
Clicked her tongue.
Shrugged.
And focused on the infinitely easier problem of an entire Chaos battlefleet to deal with.
"My lord, they appear to be launching strike craft," the sibilant voice of The Moment's head sorcerer echoed through the vast chambers of bone and sorrow. "Shall we-"
The Moment spoke. IT WILL ALWAYS IS had a voice that could cause lesser minds to shatter, simply by hearing it and even the wizened mind of the sorcerer cringed at the reality shredding tonality of it.
"NO. THE TRAITOR'S HAND STRIKES WITH THE FORCE OF LEGION. WE SHALL NOT PLAY IT UNTIL IT WILL BE A KILLING BLOW. REDIRECT VOIDHEART. LET HIM HUNT."
"Yes, my lord..." The sorcerer said, bowing low.
The Moment placed IT WILL ALWAYS IS hand upon the edge of the throne. Blood ran in rivulets between IT WILL ALWAYS IS fingers and behind a mask of masks of masks of masks, lips curled in what might have been a smile.
Softly.
"Let us see what you will do, oh Fated One..."
Ryia pulled a cigarillo from her pocket, unsnipped and unlit, and stuck it into her mouth. "I love a flight deck before a fight," she said, walking forward towards her ship. Her lovely...lovely little ship. She was a Fury interceptor, painted midnight black with red highlights and the name INFAMY on the side. Ryia slapped it with a metal clang, her augmetic fingers dragging along as she ducked low and moved under the nose to the gangway leading into the Interceptor proper. It was just high enough in the main belly corridor of the Fury for her to stand. If she went forward, she'd be at the enigne where Engineseer Yotta was already looking nervously back at her.
"Hey Yots," Ryia siad, casually, sliding her jacket off. "The afterburner ready?"
"No! The afterburner is never ready, you psychopath!" Yotta said, her voice breaking into an electric squeal as Ryia swung herself around to sit in the cockpit seat. Ryia frowned as she examined the copilot seat. It had a girl snoozing in it - a slender, pink haired mutant with three eyes, all of them closed.
Her co-pilot, Briggs, came aboard at that moment, tugging his goggles on as he did so. He moved to slip into his seat, only for Ryia to stop him.
"Kid," she said.
There was a soft mumble from the stranger.
Ryia prodded her head with her finger.
"Kid!"
The triclops opened her eyes and jerked her head up.
"Launch in T minus sixty," the voice came over the vox that Ryia still hadn't put on. She picked it up, sliding it on, while Briggs dragged the mutant out of the seat.
"Sorry, sorry, I just, I was tired-" the mutant said as Ryia tapped at her vox.
"This is medicae, Alpharus Squad Lead, your bow gunner's here, fractured left arm-"
Ryia tapped at her vox again, then looked at the mutant. "What's your name, Kid?" she asked.
"Uh..." the mutant froze. "Berrin?"
"All right, Berrin, you're promoted from ammo carrier to ball turret gunner, get up the hatch," Ryia said, pointing up and the girl gaped at her, then scrambled up the ladder as Ryia began to activate the thrusters on her Fury. The low whine of the engines filled her ears as she nodded, then tapped her vox.
"Alpharus lead, we're a go. Report in."
"This is A2, we're good."
"A3, reporting good to go."
"A4, we're hot."
"A5-"
The trickle of call ins came as she ducted her fans and then feathered the throttle, bringing the nose of her Fury to face towards the shimmering void-shield that blocked off the bay. The flight bay was more full than she'd ever seen it before. Below her were ranks of Starhawk bombers, all of the heavy, rectangular ships looking laden with bombs, their turrets already sweeping around to keep themselves orientated.
"All right boys and girls, lets go show these spike-fuckers what an Imperial combat void wing can do!"
The entire wing roared at once - with voice and engine alike as they leaped into the void. Their engines flared and the void shield whipped past them as Briggs muttered under his breath about how they were all going to die. Ryia tapped at her vox, feathering through the links and heard the most comforting sound in the world: A direct-feed from the Argent Scourge's bridge, with target acquisition and escort orders being handed down by a staggering collection of different officers...but the order and the feel of the orders, in their gestalt, felt like the guiding hand of Em, on her shoulder. Without saying a single word, she knew that he was watching over her and her fighters.
"Uh...those ships look...pretty big," Berrin said, her voice nervous over the crackling vox line.
"You think those are big, kid?" Briggs muttered.
The destroyers ahead of them swelled by the second. Six Iconoclasts, each of them peppers with heavy duty macrocannons - flat barreled ones that were on swivel mounts. But what really worried Ryia was the glint of point defense weapons scattered among them. She could also see the distant gutter and glitter of red contrails. The Chaos forces were coming in, and she estimated there were at least four hundred of them. But they weren't really her main focus at the moment.
"Okay, kid, if you see a small turret, shoot it. Ignore the big ones."
"Y-You sure about that?"
"If you ask me that again, you can walk home," Ryia said, then gripped her throttle, threw it to max, and swept her Infamy straight down and right at one of the destroyers. Flak and tracer fire ripped through the void as she banked left and right, evading the worst of it, as her forward laser lances came to bear on what looked like a tri-barreled scrap built bolter, manned by four men in equally scrappy suits. She pulled back on the trigger, twirling her wings as she corkscrewed past the macrocannon to their left and swept by, leaving the point defense turret a smoldering red crater. She pulled up, swept her belly past a macro-cannon, narrowly evaded a spire of skulls, and then brought the ball turret to bear on a trio of flak guns.
"AHHHHHHHHH!" Berrin screamed and the entire Fury shuddered as the ball mounted bolters hammered. Shells clattered and clanked down the ladder, smoking, to be swept up by Yotta's free mechadendrite before they could go flying around. Ryia spared a glance before she banked away from the destroyer. The flak guns were mostly in disarray, with one destroyed completely. She nodded.
"Your clear, Inferno Wing!"
Behind Ryia's craft, seventy Starhawk bombers swept down like their namesakes. Their contrails cut through space as the bullets and flak and las-bursts that the destroyer sent up tried to lance them. A few of them got pinged - their armor sparking and flashing - but none of them were disabled or forced to turn away as their bomb bays opened and their wing mounted las-cannons started to sutter. Armor plating crumpled, rippled, turned to glowing red ruin.
Then the plasma bombs activated their mag-engines and slammed down as if they were being dropped in a ten G field.
The explosions bloomed beneath the skin of the ship. Windows exploded outwards, spinal supports buckled, and secondary detonations - bright red against the blue-white flare of plasma - ripped outwards and the destroyer heeled as if she had been beaten about the head with a stick. The whole wing broke away and Ryia pumped her fist - watching as three other destroyers were smote just as fiercely. The bombers stooped, escorted by fighters, and dropped death, death, and more death. A destroyer was cracked entirely in half, her magazine going off and immolating the space around her - and sending the bombers sweeping away from them, several of them smoking.
The destroyers that survived heeled as if they had been struck as well. Their thrusters burned and their noses turned away from the Scourge fleet.
"HA! HAH! SEE THEM FUCKING RUN!" Berrin screamed as Ryia tapped her vox.
"Inferno wing, break back. Hephaestus wing, you're with them. I want you docked. Giddon and Yetten Wings, form up on my six, arrowhead five formation."
She twisted them around, bringing their nose to bear - not on the last two destroyers, which were trying to burn away from the bombers that stooped on them as hard as they could. The only problem was, even turning as hard as they could, they ate up most of their immense speed in that curved arc. The bombers simply had to go in a straight line to where they would be - catching up with utter ease. If it was a straight line fight, those destroyers would have been able to pull ahead of the bombers.
But life was rarely straight on straight on.
"What are we doing? Why aren't we going after- oh." Berrin went still and quiet.
The wings that Ryia had called up were moving into her flanks, forming a set of nested arrowhead deltas, all of them streaking towards the wild chaos that was the enemy formation. Berrin quailed in her ball turret, gripping the controls of her bolter.
"That's...an awful lot of bad guys..." Berrin whispered.
"Come on, kid, get cocky," Ryia said, grinning. "We can take them."
"According to CIC, we're facing eighteen squads," Briggs said, tapping at his controls. "A fighter for every day of the year. Give n' take a Calibration or two."
"No one celebrates Calibration but you, you old pagan," Ryia said. She had two hundred and forty fighters on her wings - they were outnumbered by nearly two to one. Close enough for Administratum work at least. She adjusted her vox, then spoke into it. "So...those fuckers think that they got it easy. But they've been bleeding out against Imperial fighters all day...those Wanderers gutted them. You can just see it - they have two fuckin' full ass carriers and this is all that's fucking left?" She shook her head. "Lets finish the job."
The growl of assent that came over the line was animal, feral. Vicious.
Silence held, but for the whine of the engines as the two waves of fighters rushed towards one another. Then, within a hundred meters, the entirety of the void around them exploded at once. Missiles dropped. Bolt shells detonated. Las-Cannons roared. And formations dissolved into a wild flurry - wings breaking into squads and squads bringing into wingmate pairs as fighter hunted fighter. Ryia let her instincts guide her, bringing herself behind crescent shaped Swiftdeath fighter and opening up with her forward guns and cannon. The enemy fighter shuddered, then ripped to pieces and she shot through the burning wreckage, as the ball turret roared away, bolt-tracers racing after another Swiftdeath.
"WE HAVE A LOCK!" Yotta screamed - almost as loud as the squealing of a missile lock over the servitor controls.
"Yeah, I know," Ryia grumbled, throwing herself into a corkscrew that made her vision turn red, the void around her spinning and spinning and spinning. The missiles behind her twirled, rushing towards her, and then slammed into one another with a roar of flame and smoke. She cut the spin, cut engines, flipped herself entirely around, and had a grim little smile on her lips as the Swiftdeath behind her didn't realize she was going to do what she did...until it was far too late.
The whole Infamy shuddered, then. Alerts squealed and Briggs snarled. "Fuck!"
"To the port! Port!" Berrin shouted and Ryia snapped her head around. Through the cockpit, she could see another fighter - as black as hers, but with eye aching pink highlights, shooting past her, las-cannons still smoking. They had grazed her wing and her cockpit, despite her evasive manuvering. She tried to drop in behind the enemy - but as she watched, he flipped away and shot down one of the other Furies, exploding Alpharus-9 in a single instant. Ryia realized, with a flash, that she was facing someone almost as good as her.
Almost.
"Welcome to your death, Corpse-Lover!" A gurgling voice spoke over her vox, beamed straight to the Infamy.
"Yotta, I want us to get some afterburners!" Ryia said.
"After-"
"Do it!" Ryia said, then focused on weaving past a chunk of ship debris, floating from the destroyed Iconoclast that had become the centerpiece of the battlefield. She darted around it while Yotta whimpered and tapped away at the controls - and then she saw the enemy ace, coming around and straight at her. "NOW!"
THe afterburner's roared.
Spluttered.
Died.
The Infamy spun, wildly, out of control, as Ryia casually flicked the lumenswitch on and off, humming as she did so. "Berrin, don't move your turret," she said, while Briggs started to lean back in his seat and Yotta started to pray. Berrin jerked her hands off her controls, her three eyes blinking in a corkscrew pattern.
"What is going-"
"She's doing afterburner," Briggs muttered.
Yotta's prayers were getting louder now. "Oh Omnisiah, who art in the code, watch over this vessel of your knowledge-"
The tumbling Infamy began to slow in her spinning - drag created by the slowly dying pulses of her gravi-plates. It came to a relative half - and showed through the forward panes the sight of the enemy ace, sweeping in, slowing, coming to a stop, bringing his las-cannons to bear. The vox crackled and a gloating voice came over the line as Ryia continued to flick the lumens on and off, on and off, on and off, in a pattern too fast and irregular to be mistaken for anything but a completely shorted out ship.
"Yeah," Ryia said. "Surprise."
She pulled back on the triggers of her las-cannons as they came to bear and cut the enemy ace in half.
Ryia throttled up as Berrin squeaked. "It was a TRICK!?" She sounded shocked. "That...you faked him into thinking our ship had shorted out!?"
"It works every time!" Ryia said.
"I hate afterburner..." Yotta whimpered.
Em nodded, grimly.
"We've bloodied their noses!" Mr. Khanne growled.
The doors to the bridge opened and Tine strode in. She took her husband by the arm, whispering.
"Em," she said. "The Eldar can summon a god."
The sounds of the chattering bridge faded as Em and her looked at one another. He waited, and Tine continued.
"Desh...sacrifices himself. He becomes an Avatar of their god. The Farseers say he can be teleported from the Shrine Ship onto the enemy ships and...start to destroy them from within." She shook her head. "But...but..."
Em put his hand on her shoulder.
---
What say you, Rogue Trader?
[ ] Leave that question for Purgatorio.
[ ] Considering your triumph so far, maybe...press the attack against the rest of the fleet?
[ ] Write in
If you do...
[ ] Sacrifice Desh - it is your most desperate hour.
[ ] No. We will not be butchers of our allies.
[ ] Write in
"Very good sir," Mr. Khanne said, inclining his head, then turning to some of the terrified looking mids. "Well, what are you gawping at? The Captain gave the word!"
"We're not just running are we?" Ryia asked.
"No, my love, we are not," Em said, pointing. "There are six iconoclasts there, within a hundred and twenty thousand kilometers. They will be among us before we cast into the warp." He looked at her, and his eyes flashed and she gave him the most feral grin that she had in her entire life. "I want them out of my skies."
"Aye aye, sir," she said, turning - before the doors to the bridge exploded open and Ensign Noceda came sprinting in, gasping.
"Sir! The Eldar!" she exclaimed. "They're going to kill Desh!" She pointed at Desh - who froze, his eyes flashing with fury, while Serradon snapped his head around to glare at Callie, who wilted under his glare.
"Luz!" Callie said.
"You told her?" Serradon growled.
Em breathed in, then let out a slow, slow, slow breath through his nose - it sounded rather like a growling of a dragon. "Tine," he barked, his voice edged. "Take the Ensign and our Guests to the manor and smooth this over at once." She nodded, then he turned and pointed at Lt. Desna. "Give me telemetronic scrying on those destroyers, Desna! I want our fighters to know where their paint is newest."
Tine swept Noceda against her, then gestured the Eldar out of the bridge as Ryia looked them over.
Clicked her tongue.
Shrugged.
And focused on the infinitely easier problem of an entire Chaos battlefleet to deal with.
***
Upon a mountain of skulls, on a throne of blood, in a castle of pure agony and pulsing flesh, The Moment sat and regarded the view before IT WILL BE ALWAYS IS as the forces of the Corpse Emperor scrambled to flee from them.
"My lord, they appear to be launching strike craft," the sibilant voice of The Moment's head sorcerer echoed through the vast chambers of bone and sorrow. "Shall we-"
The Moment spoke. IT WILL ALWAYS IS had a voice that could cause lesser minds to shatter, simply by hearing it and even the wizened mind of the sorcerer cringed at the reality shredding tonality of it.
"NO. THE TRAITOR'S HAND STRIKES WITH THE FORCE OF LEGION. WE SHALL NOT PLAY IT UNTIL IT WILL BE A KILLING BLOW. REDIRECT VOIDHEART. LET HIM HUNT."
"Yes, my lord..." The sorcerer said, bowing low.
The Moment placed IT WILL ALWAYS IS hand upon the edge of the throne. Blood ran in rivulets between IT WILL ALWAYS IS fingers and behind a mask of masks of masks of masks, lips curled in what might have been a smile.
Softly.
"Let us see what you will do, oh Fated One..."
***
Ryia stepped through the doors into the flight deck of the Colossus to find utter pandemonium raging. Men and women were sprinting to their fighters and their bombers. Plasma bombs were being heaved across the deck in rattling lorries. Everyone from the oldest crone to the youngest child was at work. The elderly and the young worked at the fine work that didn't take strength. The mighty men and the tough women threw themselves into chain gangs and heaving groups, moving promethium tanks into position for fueling, socketed fusion cells into their housings, and did the hasty prayers it took to waken the restive, furious machine spirits of their fighting craft to life.
Ryia pulled a cigarillo from her pocket, unsnipped and unlit, and stuck it into her mouth. "I love a flight deck before a fight," she said, walking forward towards her ship. Her lovely...lovely little ship. She was a Fury interceptor, painted midnight black with red highlights and the name INFAMY on the side. Ryia slapped it with a metal clang, her augmetic fingers dragging along as she ducked low and moved under the nose to the gangway leading into the Interceptor proper. It was just high enough in the main belly corridor of the Fury for her to stand. If she went forward, she'd be at the enigne where Engineseer Yotta was already looking nervously back at her.
"Hey Yots," Ryia siad, casually, sliding her jacket off. "The afterburner ready?"
"No! The afterburner is never ready, you psychopath!" Yotta said, her voice breaking into an electric squeal as Ryia swung herself around to sit in the cockpit seat. Ryia frowned as she examined the copilot seat. It had a girl snoozing in it - a slender, pink haired mutant with three eyes, all of them closed.
Her co-pilot, Briggs, came aboard at that moment, tugging his goggles on as he did so. He moved to slip into his seat, only for Ryia to stop him.
"Kid," she said.
There was a soft mumble from the stranger.
Ryia prodded her head with her finger.
"Kid!"
The triclops opened her eyes and jerked her head up.
"Launch in T minus sixty," the voice came over the vox that Ryia still hadn't put on. She picked it up, sliding it on, while Briggs dragged the mutant out of the seat.
"Sorry, sorry, I just, I was tired-" the mutant said as Ryia tapped at her vox.
"This is medicae, Alpharus Squad Lead, your bow gunner's here, fractured left arm-"
Ryia tapped at her vox again, then looked at the mutant. "What's your name, Kid?" she asked.
"Uh..." the mutant froze. "Berrin?"
"All right, Berrin, you're promoted from ammo carrier to ball turret gunner, get up the hatch," Ryia said, pointing up and the girl gaped at her, then scrambled up the ladder as Ryia began to activate the thrusters on her Fury. The low whine of the engines filled her ears as she nodded, then tapped her vox.
"Alpharus lead, we're a go. Report in."
"This is A2, we're good."
"A3, reporting good to go."
"A4, we're hot."
"A5-"
The trickle of call ins came as she ducted her fans and then feathered the throttle, bringing the nose of her Fury to face towards the shimmering void-shield that blocked off the bay. The flight bay was more full than she'd ever seen it before. Below her were ranks of Starhawk bombers, all of the heavy, rectangular ships looking laden with bombs, their turrets already sweeping around to keep themselves orientated.
"All right boys and girls, lets go show these spike-fuckers what an Imperial combat void wing can do!"
The entire wing roared at once - with voice and engine alike as they leaped into the void. Their engines flared and the void shield whipped past them as Briggs muttered under his breath about how they were all going to die. Ryia tapped at her vox, feathering through the links and heard the most comforting sound in the world: A direct-feed from the Argent Scourge's bridge, with target acquisition and escort orders being handed down by a staggering collection of different officers...but the order and the feel of the orders, in their gestalt, felt like the guiding hand of Em, on her shoulder. Without saying a single word, she knew that he was watching over her and her fighters.
"Uh...those ships look...pretty big," Berrin said, her voice nervous over the crackling vox line.
"You think those are big, kid?" Briggs muttered.
The destroyers ahead of them swelled by the second. Six Iconoclasts, each of them peppers with heavy duty macrocannons - flat barreled ones that were on swivel mounts. But what really worried Ryia was the glint of point defense weapons scattered among them. She could also see the distant gutter and glitter of red contrails. The Chaos forces were coming in, and she estimated there were at least four hundred of them. But they weren't really her main focus at the moment.
"Okay, kid, if you see a small turret, shoot it. Ignore the big ones."
"Y-You sure about that?"
"If you ask me that again, you can walk home," Ryia said, then gripped her throttle, threw it to max, and swept her Infamy straight down and right at one of the destroyers. Flak and tracer fire ripped through the void as she banked left and right, evading the worst of it, as her forward laser lances came to bear on what looked like a tri-barreled scrap built bolter, manned by four men in equally scrappy suits. She pulled back on the trigger, twirling her wings as she corkscrewed past the macrocannon to their left and swept by, leaving the point defense turret a smoldering red crater. She pulled up, swept her belly past a macro-cannon, narrowly evaded a spire of skulls, and then brought the ball turret to bear on a trio of flak guns.
"AHHHHHHHHH!" Berrin screamed and the entire Fury shuddered as the ball mounted bolters hammered. Shells clattered and clanked down the ladder, smoking, to be swept up by Yotta's free mechadendrite before they could go flying around. Ryia spared a glance before she banked away from the destroyer. The flak guns were mostly in disarray, with one destroyed completely. She nodded.
"Your clear, Inferno Wing!"
Behind Ryia's craft, seventy Starhawk bombers swept down like their namesakes. Their contrails cut through space as the bullets and flak and las-bursts that the destroyer sent up tried to lance them. A few of them got pinged - their armor sparking and flashing - but none of them were disabled or forced to turn away as their bomb bays opened and their wing mounted las-cannons started to sutter. Armor plating crumpled, rippled, turned to glowing red ruin.
Then the plasma bombs activated their mag-engines and slammed down as if they were being dropped in a ten G field.
The explosions bloomed beneath the skin of the ship. Windows exploded outwards, spinal supports buckled, and secondary detonations - bright red against the blue-white flare of plasma - ripped outwards and the destroyer heeled as if she had been beaten about the head with a stick. The whole wing broke away and Ryia pumped her fist - watching as three other destroyers were smote just as fiercely. The bombers stooped, escorted by fighters, and dropped death, death, and more death. A destroyer was cracked entirely in half, her magazine going off and immolating the space around her - and sending the bombers sweeping away from them, several of them smoking.
The destroyers that survived heeled as if they had been struck as well. Their thrusters burned and their noses turned away from the Scourge fleet.
"HA! HAH! SEE THEM FUCKING RUN!" Berrin screamed as Ryia tapped her vox.
"Inferno wing, break back. Hephaestus wing, you're with them. I want you docked. Giddon and Yetten Wings, form up on my six, arrowhead five formation."
She twisted them around, bringing their nose to bear - not on the last two destroyers, which were trying to burn away from the bombers that stooped on them as hard as they could. The only problem was, even turning as hard as they could, they ate up most of their immense speed in that curved arc. The bombers simply had to go in a straight line to where they would be - catching up with utter ease. If it was a straight line fight, those destroyers would have been able to pull ahead of the bombers.
But life was rarely straight on straight on.
"What are we doing? Why aren't we going after- oh." Berrin went still and quiet.
The wings that Ryia had called up were moving into her flanks, forming a set of nested arrowhead deltas, all of them streaking towards the wild chaos that was the enemy formation. Berrin quailed in her ball turret, gripping the controls of her bolter.
"That's...an awful lot of bad guys..." Berrin whispered.
"Come on, kid, get cocky," Ryia said, grinning. "We can take them."
"According to CIC, we're facing eighteen squads," Briggs said, tapping at his controls. "A fighter for every day of the year. Give n' take a Calibration or two."
"No one celebrates Calibration but you, you old pagan," Ryia said. She had two hundred and forty fighters on her wings - they were outnumbered by nearly two to one. Close enough for Administratum work at least. She adjusted her vox, then spoke into it. "So...those fuckers think that they got it easy. But they've been bleeding out against Imperial fighters all day...those Wanderers gutted them. You can just see it - they have two fuckin' full ass carriers and this is all that's fucking left?" She shook her head. "Lets finish the job."
The growl of assent that came over the line was animal, feral. Vicious.
Silence held, but for the whine of the engines as the two waves of fighters rushed towards one another. Then, within a hundred meters, the entirety of the void around them exploded at once. Missiles dropped. Bolt shells detonated. Las-Cannons roared. And formations dissolved into a wild flurry - wings breaking into squads and squads bringing into wingmate pairs as fighter hunted fighter. Ryia let her instincts guide her, bringing herself behind crescent shaped Swiftdeath fighter and opening up with her forward guns and cannon. The enemy fighter shuddered, then ripped to pieces and she shot through the burning wreckage, as the ball turret roared away, bolt-tracers racing after another Swiftdeath.
"WE HAVE A LOCK!" Yotta screamed - almost as loud as the squealing of a missile lock over the servitor controls.
"Yeah, I know," Ryia grumbled, throwing herself into a corkscrew that made her vision turn red, the void around her spinning and spinning and spinning. The missiles behind her twirled, rushing towards her, and then slammed into one another with a roar of flame and smoke. She cut the spin, cut engines, flipped herself entirely around, and had a grim little smile on her lips as the Swiftdeath behind her didn't realize she was going to do what she did...until it was far too late.
The whole Infamy shuddered, then. Alerts squealed and Briggs snarled. "Fuck!"
"To the port! Port!" Berrin shouted and Ryia snapped her head around. Through the cockpit, she could see another fighter - as black as hers, but with eye aching pink highlights, shooting past her, las-cannons still smoking. They had grazed her wing and her cockpit, despite her evasive manuvering. She tried to drop in behind the enemy - but as she watched, he flipped away and shot down one of the other Furies, exploding Alpharus-9 in a single instant. Ryia realized, with a flash, that she was facing someone almost as good as her.
Almost.
"Welcome to your death, Corpse-Lover!" A gurgling voice spoke over her vox, beamed straight to the Infamy.
"Yotta, I want us to get some afterburners!" Ryia said.
"After-"
"Do it!" Ryia said, then focused on weaving past a chunk of ship debris, floating from the destroyed Iconoclast that had become the centerpiece of the battlefield. She darted around it while Yotta whimpered and tapped away at the controls - and then she saw the enemy ace, coming around and straight at her. "NOW!"
THe afterburner's roared.
Spluttered.
Died.
The Infamy spun, wildly, out of control, as Ryia casually flicked the lumenswitch on and off, humming as she did so. "Berrin, don't move your turret," she said, while Briggs started to lean back in his seat and Yotta started to pray. Berrin jerked her hands off her controls, her three eyes blinking in a corkscrew pattern.
"What is going-"
"She's doing afterburner," Briggs muttered.
Yotta's prayers were getting louder now. "Oh Omnisiah, who art in the code, watch over this vessel of your knowledge-"
The tumbling Infamy began to slow in her spinning - drag created by the slowly dying pulses of her gravi-plates. It came to a relative half - and showed through the forward panes the sight of the enemy ace, sweeping in, slowing, coming to a stop, bringing his las-cannons to bear. The vox crackled and a gloating voice came over the line as Ryia continued to flick the lumens on and off, on and off, on and off, in a pattern too fast and irregular to be mistaken for anything but a completely shorted out ship.
"Yeah," Ryia said. "Surprise."
She pulled back on the triggers of her las-cannons as they came to bear and cut the enemy ace in half.
Ryia throttled up as Berrin squeaked. "It was a TRICK!?" She sounded shocked. "That...you faked him into thinking our ship had shorted out!?"
"It works every time!" Ryia said.
"I hate afterburner..." Yotta whimpered.
***
"Report from the Colossus, they have every wing back - they'll have them docked in thirty minutes," Lt. Desna said, looking up from her auspex. "Five hulks, one burned to the voidline. The Chaos wings are in disarray - I believe they have at minimum fifty percent casualties, possibly more."
Em nodded, grimly.
"We've bloodied their noses!" Mr. Khanne growled.
The doors to the bridge opened and Tine strode in. She took her husband by the arm, whispering.
"Em," she said. "The Eldar can summon a god."
The sounds of the chattering bridge faded as Em and her looked at one another. He waited, and Tine continued.
"Desh...sacrifices himself. He becomes an Avatar of their god. The Farseers say he can be teleported from the Shrine Ship onto the enemy ships and...start to destroy them from within." She shook her head. "But...but..."
Em put his hand on her shoulder.
---
What say you, Rogue Trader?
[ ] Leave that question for Purgatorio.
[ ] Considering your triumph so far, maybe...press the attack against the rest of the fleet?
[ ] Write in
If you do...
[ ] Sacrifice Desh - it is your most desperate hour.
[ ] No. We will not be butchers of our allies.
[ ] Write in
There are six destroyers within 12 VU, moving along a perpendicular course. They roll to make new sail in your direction: 28, 29, 96, 28, 49 and 32. This means that all but one of them are turning 2 or 1 VU's early. This means that it will take them an hour to come around. That means that the squadrons will get 2 full rounds of attacking before they have to break off.
ROUND ONE
Ryia gets a 36 (with an FP) against the first destroyer's 56. They have 1 TR, meaning this is a fail for them. She has 55+20 for foresight +10 for craft rating for 85%, giving her 5 DOS. This gives +15 to the bombing run AND she blows up two turrets, personally. The 14 squads supporting her swoop in. The 7 fighters give -70 to their turret rating (hah) and count as 3 squads for bonus purposes, giving htem, effectively, 9 support squads. That's +45. So, they're rolling Em's 92% command, +70%, for a total of 162%!
The ship got 68 to shoot them down at a total score of -20%, failing. They got a 16, for 15 DOS, doing 1 crit and 7d10+28 damage. Well, to be fair, it is modded down by 2, so it's ONLY 7d10+14. ONLY.
The first Iconoclast takes 58 hull damage out of 28 hull and is hulked.
The second Iconoclast takes it on the nose too: 59 to shoot down at a -20% versus Em's 65 roll, for a total of 10 DOS, doing...well, 7d10+14 damage!
The third iconoclast takes a 93 to shoot down, 53 for the bombers: 58 damage!
The fourth rolls a 39 to shoot them down (nothing) and 19 for the bombers: 39 damage!
Hulked! hulked!
...DETONATED! The detonation is 3 VU, which fortunately leaves the other 42 squads untouched. The squads in the area make their checks to evade at a -20: 61 and 87. They're both caught up in the backwash and must make upkeep tests! It's a -40 check for both due to their cost, so you have a 10% chance at failing! You pass both times, so the squads (while they took losses) have reinforcements waiting back on the ships being brought from storage. Light casualties.
ROUND TWO
The two remaining destroyers are in range, but have realized their mistake. They both succeed on coming to a new heading, turning tail and retreating back 5 VU. The remaining fighters from Vall's fleet arrives - 18 fighter squadrons. Ryia breaks her squad and takes 13 escorts with her, orders the unescorted bombers home, and directs hte other two groups of 7/7 to take out the last two of the Destroyers.
The FURBALL first! The enemy are led by an ACE PILOT - Kyaktu Voidheart - and that means the aces D-D-D-D-DUEL! Kyaktu got a 83, which he fatepoints into an...83. Fucking lol. Ryia gets a 21! She gets 3 DOS, he gets 2 DOF (50 base skill +10 for a Swiftdeath fighter's bonus) for a total of 5 DOS. She downs him gives her squad +15 5o their opposed roll!
12 versus 18. The Chaos Forces are rolling against a 50+10 (craft rating) + 85 for bonus fighters, for a total of 145%. The Imperials are rolling at 92+10 (craft rating) + 55 (bonus fighters) +15 (Ryia's leadership) for a total of 172%.
The Chaos forces roll a 28. That's 11 DOS. The Imperials get a 19. That's 15 DOS. Normally, this would mean that 11 Imperial Squads are wiped and 15 Chaos Squads are wiped. But since you rolled 4+ DOS above them, the field is WIPED. You drive off 11 Chaos Squads, putting them ALL at half strength.
Meanwhile, yes: a 12 and 34 against the destroyers does 47 and 46 damage, which hulks both.
ROUND ONE
Ryia gets a 36 (with an FP) against the first destroyer's 56. They have 1 TR, meaning this is a fail for them. She has 55+20 for foresight +10 for craft rating for 85%, giving her 5 DOS. This gives +15 to the bombing run AND she blows up two turrets, personally. The 14 squads supporting her swoop in. The 7 fighters give -70 to their turret rating (hah) and count as 3 squads for bonus purposes, giving htem, effectively, 9 support squads. That's +45. So, they're rolling Em's 92% command, +70%, for a total of 162%!
The ship got 68 to shoot them down at a total score of -20%, failing. They got a 16, for 15 DOS, doing 1 crit and 7d10+28 damage. Well, to be fair, it is modded down by 2, so it's ONLY 7d10+14. ONLY.
The first Iconoclast takes 58 hull damage out of 28 hull and is hulked.
The second Iconoclast takes it on the nose too: 59 to shoot down at a -20% versus Em's 65 roll, for a total of 10 DOS, doing...well, 7d10+14 damage!
The third iconoclast takes a 93 to shoot down, 53 for the bombers: 58 damage!
The fourth rolls a 39 to shoot them down (nothing) and 19 for the bombers: 39 damage!
Hulked! hulked!
...DETONATED! The detonation is 3 VU, which fortunately leaves the other 42 squads untouched. The squads in the area make their checks to evade at a -20: 61 and 87. They're both caught up in the backwash and must make upkeep tests! It's a -40 check for both due to their cost, so you have a 10% chance at failing! You pass both times, so the squads (while they took losses) have reinforcements waiting back on the ships being brought from storage. Light casualties.
ROUND TWO
The two remaining destroyers are in range, but have realized their mistake. They both succeed on coming to a new heading, turning tail and retreating back 5 VU. The remaining fighters from Vall's fleet arrives - 18 fighter squadrons. Ryia breaks her squad and takes 13 escorts with her, orders the unescorted bombers home, and directs hte other two groups of 7/7 to take out the last two of the Destroyers.
The FURBALL first! The enemy are led by an ACE PILOT - Kyaktu Voidheart - and that means the aces D-D-D-D-DUEL! Kyaktu got a 83, which he fatepoints into an...83. Fucking lol. Ryia gets a 21! She gets 3 DOS, he gets 2 DOF (50 base skill +10 for a Swiftdeath fighter's bonus) for a total of 5 DOS. She downs him gives her squad +15 5o their opposed roll!
12 versus 18. The Chaos Forces are rolling against a 50+10 (craft rating) + 85 for bonus fighters, for a total of 145%. The Imperials are rolling at 92+10 (craft rating) + 55 (bonus fighters) +15 (Ryia's leadership) for a total of 172%.
The Chaos forces roll a 28. That's 11 DOS. The Imperials get a 19. That's 15 DOS. Normally, this would mean that 11 Imperial Squads are wiped and 15 Chaos Squads are wiped. But since you rolled 4+ DOS above them, the field is WIPED. You drive off 11 Chaos Squads, putting them ALL at half strength.
Meanwhile, yes: a 12 and 34 against the destroyers does 47 and 46 damage, which hulks both.
- Location
- USA
[x] Leave that question for Purgatorio.
[x] No. We will not be butchers of our allies.
[x] No. We will not be butchers of our allies.
Sir_Travelsalot
Never wakes up tired.
- Location
- At Home
I think the Desh sacrifice is only in play if we stick around now to take more shots at Vall's fleet. Speaking of, damn I wish we still had that Nova Cannon on the Colossus...