And i have some plans for some delightfully incompitant Imperial Generalship for your chaos-worshipping pleasure How do snare drums and las-lock rifles sound?
That is a good point, but the threat wasn't as much in the numbers you are bringing, so much as what the occupation presents. I'd originally thought that the PCs heading into the Hulk would be the extent of the Imperial's forces within, and had mostly planned a more aggressive, even "Alien-esque" method of operation. However, with the implementation of a full FOB, it makes any sustained activity on the hulk much more difficult, because, as you said, a larger deployment zone, the Imperials are going to be able to maintain a much large "net" to throw out into the halls. Basically, if I stumbled upon a single group going through the hulk, as previously thought, I could harry, hamper and try to bleed you guys out, knowing that reinforcements might come, but dropping your vox operator affords me alot more wiggle room. The base makes it so that if any of those servo-skulls or patrols get whiff of the forces of Chaos aboard, then the element of surprise is lost, and we now need to worry about teams that can perform co-ordinated hunts against us. It definitely means that I'm going to need to change tactics if I want to pursue my goals without attracting to much attention.
You could still start out ambushing the teams and luring them out of the FOB one by one. it wouldn't take the rest of the base long to find out something's hunting them and change tactics. from there it would be a guessing game between tou and them over a very large and very dangerous area. think of the space hulk as navigating a junkyard full of rabid dogs. just because one area on the outer perimiter is fenced in doesn't mean the area outside that cordon is any safer and the fuether in we go the thinner we'll have to spread ourselves and it's a whole lot easier for you to find us than vice versa.
Las locks are fun, they're featured in Gaunts Ghosts during the novel where Gaunt gets captured and loses his *SPOILERS* Spoiler: DO NOT CLICK HERE IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE SERIES IN FULL eyes *SPOILERS* Honestly, I'm expecting a complete and utter fuck up from the get go whenever the Guard make an appearance and I've been 90% expecting them to get possessed or something akin to that. Basically these are the scenarios I am planning for and anticipate to be most likely: Daemonic Incursion - Due to unnatural history regarding space hulks and their chance of being subsumed with daemon energies, the chance of the veil of reality being thin enough to allow daemons to enter the mortal plane is undoubtedly high the deeper we insert. Imperial Guard get posses and act as hosts leading to a wide variety of possible fuck ups. Plant charges and pulse beacons and Ctrl+Alt+Del space hulk. Jean Stealers - Tyranid infestation is found, immediate mission abort. Regardless of the technology found, destroy the hulk to prevent a Tyranid fleet from being led to it and reduce additional casualties which will undoubtedly mount the longer we remain engaged. Ork Warhost - It only takes a single Ork to let out spores to eventually create an army. Purge with fire, if resistance is light, secure the hulk and strip it of anything useful we can grab. If resistance is deemed too high, destroy the space hulk or strategically fracture off the areas we cannot hold through controlled internal explosions and external bombardment. Imperial Guard Power Ploy - The chance of recovering archaeotech that would in the right hands make men richer beyond their imagination might be enough to make them betray the strike force. After having marked all potential traitorous forces, eliminate the command hierarchy to cause confusion. Exterminate all soldiers who do not immediately surrender and hand over to the Naval arm of the Commissariat for interrogation and disposal. Xenos Fleet Incursion - In the unlikely event an enemy war fleet enters the AO, immediately disengage and fallback from the space hulk. Destruction of the hulk will be deemed necessary and a full saturation bombardment will commence to deny any assets to the enemy. Or this event happens: Imperial Strengths have reached critical levels, unable to retreat or mission compromised. Activate deep strike pulse beacons for immediate bombardment. Let the cleansing fires of retribution burn away the treacherous and xenos filth. Commander Mortwich is killed, initiate CLASSIFIED. Highly unlikely. The rules of engagement which I will not disclose will make it very hard to lure or provoke my forces into an engagement without an overwhelming show of force. The mission directive is to hold the line, any attempts to sortie out are foolhardy until reinforcements arrive as their numbers are limited and every loss is a decisive blow to both morale and operational capacity. In any military operation, once a unit reaches 60% casualties it is considered a combat loss meaning that my forces will do their utmost to fight on their own terms. Now the forces initially listed for the escort are a different matter altogether because they're heading deeper into the hulk if we get that far. Also just as an FYI: the deployment will consist of pre-fabbed defensive walls, sentry gun emplacements, manned turret emplacements, and razor wire/minefield entrapment. Before anyone asks, yes minefields on a space borne vessel is a legitimate tactic and is normally used with the application of snare mines, flare mines, concussive, and flash explosives to make as much noise as possible to alert any defenders as to an intrusion.
Well now I'm just curious. Should be an interesting time regardless. Also find it hilarious that we could be triggering three of your scenarios already. I can't imagine how long this is going to last, once a single genestealer stumbles upon the FOB.
"Indefatigable, this is Kilo Actual adjust fire over." "Kilo Actual this is Indefatigable, adjust fire, out.""Grid Alpha-Niner-One-One-Niner, over." "Grid Alpha-Niner-One-One-Niner, out.""Saturation coverage, friendlies in the open, DPICM in effect, over." "Saturation coverage, friendlies in the open, DPICM in effect, out.""Charlie, two hundred rounds, over." "Charlie, two hundred rounds, out.""Bearing, 1880, deflection 44, displacement 17855, over." "Bearing, 1880, deflection 44, displacement 17855, out.""Fire for effect, over." "Hard copy, fire for effect, out."
Waiting on @GoreWrencha @Veneriah @H1veTyrant (with compliments from @Starcaller to represent his character as he is but a lowly Corporal from the IG representatives) before we can commence landings. If no such responses arrive by vox dispatch within 2400 hours, the operation will commence. Also for IC actions, a background action taken by the Fleet is to have constant interceptor sweeps across the hulk to pinpoint additional insertion points and continue scanning for any readings inside. I will also go as far to say that a few servo skulls are being dropped before insertion to begin scouting the immediate vicinity of the landing zone but since those are "outside" of the actions of my character I send them as requests to @Starcaller to perform.
I can take care of both interceptor flights and servo skulls as well as limited scout marine deployments to perform recon. what spaceborn fighters does the navy usually use? i'm only familliar with lightnings, thunderbolts and valkerye variants and those are all atmospheric craft.
Faustus and Fury Interceptors, Starhawk and Marauder Bombers. Interceptors are in combat wings of 3-5 vessels surrounding a flight lieutenant with the bombers normally only being sortied if there is a target. Marauders though are a special case as one normally acts as an aerial command center and oversees the flight deployment of multiple squadrons inside of the combat operations when an actual vessel is too risky to get close or in the event the chance command might be eliminated. Faustus Interceptors are long range reconnaissance fighters with an astropath attached to them.
I'll have to look those up. i always thougjt marauders were cool even though they sucked in Soulstorm.
