Post by revamp on Apr 26, 2007 10:22:20 GMT
[blue]Part I - The Carecies Canyon
There have been numerous combats staged with the local Orkoid population and the Planetary Defence Force but mainly they have been a one-sided affair unworthy of note. This is less true when it comes to the jungles where a seemingly endless series of skirmishes are fought but they tend to be on a small scale and, again, unworthy of much detail being lavished upon them.
There have, however, been occasions when the orkoid menace came close to causing major damage to the planet's security, the closest being the battle for the Carecies Canyon. As aforementioned the jungle-dwelling Orkoids tend to pose little threat and there numbers have been kept down efficiently by the local tribes since time immemorial , of greater threat however are the plain-dwellers, who seem to have a tendency towards strong and brutal leadership although thankfully also a bent towards infighting. This tends to lead to them fracturing and squabbling amongst themselves, a state of affairs which tends to have the effect of them culling themselves of with minimal effort required upon the PDF’s part.
Therefore it is perhaps unfortunate that these agreeable state of affairs ended at precisely the same point as the arrival of Warlord Gharyag’s 4th Waaargh. This occurred around a month after a jungle Warlord, Thragaz, tired of conquering rival jungle tribes, both of his own species and ours, and decided to make himself overlord of the plains. Within a fortnight he had taken the divide and conquer approach to claim the plains, killing each of his rivals and killing those who would not follow his lead {of which there were few, the plain-dwellers having become fully accustomed to powerful leaders and bloody coups}.
This was seen as a concern and of course matters were worsened by the arrival of Gharyag’s space-hulk. It was initially hoped that it was a heavily disguised miracle from the Emperor, that the two groups would start conflicts amongst each other and thus spare the nearby capital of St. Martius’ Cove. However the Orkoids instead sent each others emissaries which agreed that they would merge to launch an assault upon the city and then once it was claimed there would be a traditional scrap to decide upon who would claim it.
This was a severe threat and it fell down to a General Arthius to prevent its fall. His response was to divide his forces between a unit of hellhounds and the rest of his army, the former of which was to remain within the city and the latter was to strike out South and destroy Gharyag’s forces before they had properly prepared for the offensive. Arthius’ hope was that Thragaz would seize the opportunity presented by the seemingly weaker forces and march upon the city, at which point his horde would be partially immolating and then wiped out by the city’s turrets.
However Arthius had underestimated the canny nature of his foe in addition to the pace at which Gharyag could ready himself for battle. When his forces were passing through the causeway of Carecies Canyon towards the spacehulk they were confronted with a vast array of artillery but before either force could get into range they were then blocked into the fault by the forces of Thragaz, with the intention being to swarm the taskforce and use the combined numbers and pincer approach to slaughter them all before assaulting the city.
Arthius’ response is widely considered to be a stroke of tactical genius that more than compensates for his earlier foolishness; personally I consider it a fairly obvious move made by a rather cretinous man but then, I’m hardly a historian. No matter, he divided his forces once again: this time into all of the tanks and armoured vehicles under his command as one unit and all of his infantry and cavalry as another. The former was sent to deal with the foe which had least means of dealing with it and the latter to make a direct charge of the Orkoid guns.
The cavalry was wiped out almost entirely before it reached its target, the infantry faring little better and finding close combat with the Orkoids claimed almost as many casualties. It is a testament to the skill of the Commissars in command that this part of the force did not flee immediately, they suffered immense losses for little apparent gain but of course there intention was not to achieve much on there own but instead to buy, at quite a considerable cost, time for those that could.
Which brings us to the armoured squadron. They fanned out until they were abreast of each other and were spread across the canyon’s passage in a double-rank. Rather than fire ordinance they instead first used lascannon fire to pick off the Orkoid leadership {distinctive and easy targets owing to their prominent size, a universal flaw of the species} and then rammed the force full while raking the mid-ranks with heavy bolter fire. This was not an approach that their foes could cope with, their generally devastating charges simply resulting in their swiftest warriors being ploughed down and crushed. Although they seemed initially keen on continuing the conflict as it became apparent that all that awaited them was a swift and fatal collision, and as the amount of dead began to rise steeply {one Leman Russ crew who had been equipped with a pair of heavy flamers instead of the standard bolters reported an estimate of six hundred kills in this stage of the battle alone} the savages finally decided to flee.
It was at this point that the ordinance was deployed; only a handful of the fleeing creatures managing to survive the barrage and the native populace not posing a serious threat for another century such was the thorough nature of the carnage.
But the day was not yet one: the tanks then reversed over the crushed carcasses to fire swiftly upon the new arrivals, who were occupied fully in combat and unable to recalibrate their guns as was required to make a proper shot before their artillery was torn to pieces by a combination of shell fire and chain reactions from their own ammunition.
Although this tactic was successful in obliterating the Orkoid forces it also resulted in a scanty survival rate amongst the infantry, who were caught between the counter-assault of their targets and the heavy fire of their own side. However their sacrifice was rarely mentioned in the triumph that had followed: although his initial gamble had failed to secure the safety of the planet a second one had allowed the two greatest threats to be crushed within a single battle. Arthius received honours for the event and his skills as a tactician were lauded throughout the sector.
Thankfully it also meant that all of the fighting happened inside some sparse pointless wasteland instead of ruining the city or involving burning down vast swathes of the jungle.
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There have been numerous combats staged with the local Orkoid population and the Planetary Defence Force but mainly they have been a one-sided affair unworthy of note. This is less true when it comes to the jungles where a seemingly endless series of skirmishes are fought but they tend to be on a small scale and, again, unworthy of much detail being lavished upon them.
There have, however, been occasions when the orkoid menace came close to causing major damage to the planet's security, the closest being the battle for the Carecies Canyon. As aforementioned the jungle-dwelling Orkoids tend to pose little threat and there numbers have been kept down efficiently by the local tribes since time immemorial , of greater threat however are the plain-dwellers, who seem to have a tendency towards strong and brutal leadership although thankfully also a bent towards infighting. This tends to lead to them fracturing and squabbling amongst themselves, a state of affairs which tends to have the effect of them culling themselves of with minimal effort required upon the PDF’s part.
Therefore it is perhaps unfortunate that these agreeable state of affairs ended at precisely the same point as the arrival of Warlord Gharyag’s 4th Waaargh. This occurred around a month after a jungle Warlord, Thragaz, tired of conquering rival jungle tribes, both of his own species and ours, and decided to make himself overlord of the plains. Within a fortnight he had taken the divide and conquer approach to claim the plains, killing each of his rivals and killing those who would not follow his lead {of which there were few, the plain-dwellers having become fully accustomed to powerful leaders and bloody coups}.
This was seen as a concern and of course matters were worsened by the arrival of Gharyag’s space-hulk. It was initially hoped that it was a heavily disguised miracle from the Emperor, that the two groups would start conflicts amongst each other and thus spare the nearby capital of St. Martius’ Cove. However the Orkoids instead sent each others emissaries which agreed that they would merge to launch an assault upon the city and then once it was claimed there would be a traditional scrap to decide upon who would claim it.
This was a severe threat and it fell down to a General Arthius to prevent its fall. His response was to divide his forces between a unit of hellhounds and the rest of his army, the former of which was to remain within the city and the latter was to strike out South and destroy Gharyag’s forces before they had properly prepared for the offensive. Arthius’ hope was that Thragaz would seize the opportunity presented by the seemingly weaker forces and march upon the city, at which point his horde would be partially immolating and then wiped out by the city’s turrets.
However Arthius had underestimated the canny nature of his foe in addition to the pace at which Gharyag could ready himself for battle. When his forces were passing through the causeway of Carecies Canyon towards the spacehulk they were confronted with a vast array of artillery but before either force could get into range they were then blocked into the fault by the forces of Thragaz, with the intention being to swarm the taskforce and use the combined numbers and pincer approach to slaughter them all before assaulting the city.
Arthius’ response is widely considered to be a stroke of tactical genius that more than compensates for his earlier foolishness; personally I consider it a fairly obvious move made by a rather cretinous man but then, I’m hardly a historian. No matter, he divided his forces once again: this time into all of the tanks and armoured vehicles under his command as one unit and all of his infantry and cavalry as another. The former was sent to deal with the foe which had least means of dealing with it and the latter to make a direct charge of the Orkoid guns.
The cavalry was wiped out almost entirely before it reached its target, the infantry faring little better and finding close combat with the Orkoids claimed almost as many casualties. It is a testament to the skill of the Commissars in command that this part of the force did not flee immediately, they suffered immense losses for little apparent gain but of course there intention was not to achieve much on there own but instead to buy, at quite a considerable cost, time for those that could.
Which brings us to the armoured squadron. They fanned out until they were abreast of each other and were spread across the canyon’s passage in a double-rank. Rather than fire ordinance they instead first used lascannon fire to pick off the Orkoid leadership {distinctive and easy targets owing to their prominent size, a universal flaw of the species} and then rammed the force full while raking the mid-ranks with heavy bolter fire. This was not an approach that their foes could cope with, their generally devastating charges simply resulting in their swiftest warriors being ploughed down and crushed. Although they seemed initially keen on continuing the conflict as it became apparent that all that awaited them was a swift and fatal collision, and as the amount of dead began to rise steeply {one Leman Russ crew who had been equipped with a pair of heavy flamers instead of the standard bolters reported an estimate of six hundred kills in this stage of the battle alone} the savages finally decided to flee.
It was at this point that the ordinance was deployed; only a handful of the fleeing creatures managing to survive the barrage and the native populace not posing a serious threat for another century such was the thorough nature of the carnage.
But the day was not yet one: the tanks then reversed over the crushed carcasses to fire swiftly upon the new arrivals, who were occupied fully in combat and unable to recalibrate their guns as was required to make a proper shot before their artillery was torn to pieces by a combination of shell fire and chain reactions from their own ammunition.
Although this tactic was successful in obliterating the Orkoid forces it also resulted in a scanty survival rate amongst the infantry, who were caught between the counter-assault of their targets and the heavy fire of their own side. However their sacrifice was rarely mentioned in the triumph that had followed: although his initial gamble had failed to secure the safety of the planet a second one had allowed the two greatest threats to be crushed within a single battle. Arthius received honours for the event and his skills as a tactician were lauded throughout the sector.
Thankfully it also meant that all of the fighting happened inside some sparse pointless wasteland instead of ruining the city or involving burning down vast swathes of the jungle.
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