Chapter 2 Kick-off Team Game: Genestealer Cults Attempt to Breakthrough into Mechanicus Levels

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Since the Fall of the Primary Armory
A week has passed since the psychic scream and the start of the revolution. The Imperium authorities have sent out their calls for aid, and the nearest Imperium forces are already on their way.

Many thousands have died in the initial fighting, and whole sections of the Primus Hive have been destroyed or are still in flames.

The Genestealer Cults took control of the most of the lower levels of the Hive, including several pieces of critical infrastructure such as the Primary Armory. The Slaanesh Cults have been fighting as well, but mostly on the outskirts of the Hive, and in the surrounding wastelands and archeo-digs.

With the lower levels of the Hive under Cult control, the PDF and Mechanicus forces have fallen back to the middle levels of the Hive, and defended the more limited number of access points into the Mechanicus levels. A large mostly open-air space inside the Hive separates the lower slum levels from the dedicated Mechanicus levels, forming a natural border between the lower and middle levels of the Hive.

Fearing a loss of momentum if they cannot continue their conquest up the Hive, the GSC leaders of different factions agree to a tense meeting in which they set aside their rivalry, marshal their best resources, and agree on a coordinated attack on one of giant pillars that link the lower and middle levels.

If the GSC forces can take this strongpoint, the rest of the Mechanicus levels may fall like dominoes...

Meanwhile, in the hive spire...
The Callidus Assassin, under deep cover as the Castellan and Facilitatrix to the Corrupt Governor, has spies and bugs everywhere, and learns that the coordinated attack is coming. She warns the Governor, who warns his Mechanicus allies, of the pending attack. The Imperium leaders know that their enemies are scrying and looking into the future, and that if they divert too many of their PDF or Mechanicus defenders, that the GSC will simply change the location of the coordinated attack to a different one of the transport and support Pillars between the levels. But the Corrupt Governor, who so far has only watched the revolution from his penthouse in the spire, and hoped his allies could restore his dominion to him, decides that the time has come to take action himself, and readies his praetorian guard of Tempestus-style elite plasma mercenaries to act as a reserve against the coordinated attack.

His old friend the retired Rogue Trader warns him of the danger and intemperance of joining the battle himself, but the Governor insists on "seeing action" himself, and his Castellan (the Callidus Assassin in disguise) says she'll come as his personal bodyguard, in case his praetorians are too busy with the battle to protect him.

Board Setup, deployment zones, objectives, and terrain:
Play on a Full Size 60x44 Strike-sized board.

Hammer and Anvil deployment: 24" neutral zone in the middle, Imperium players choose which short side of the table they want for their 18" deep deployment zone.

Imperium players choose three large ruin pieces, which they then place anywhere wholly within their chosen deployment zone.

Imperium players place the low-wall-ruin-zone such that it contains the exact center of the board.

Genestealer players choose two large ruin pieces, which they then place anywhere wholly within the other deployment zone.

GSC players place the four crater-like pieces of terrain, and one of the short wall sections, anywhere they like wholly within the neutral zone.

One objective goes exactly in the center (meaning it will be wholly within the low-wall-ruin-zone), and the Imperium players then place one objective anywhere on each of the three large ruin pieces in their deployment zone.

Forces:
1000 pts and 6 starting cp for each player, max 2 detachments, No LoWs, otherwise no limits on units or vehicles.

In this 2v2 game, both armies on each side are treated as a single army in terms of phases and stratagems, for examples:
 * Single Imperium movement phase, rather than separate Mechanicus and Tempestus movement phases.
 * Only one use of "Lying in Wait" (and "Fire Overwatch", and all other stratagems that both players on a team might want to use) during a singe phase.

Special Rules for the PDF Astra Militarum units
Imperium team also gets a 750 pt battalion of PDF Astra Militarum forces that begin on the table, which may be chosen freely to complement the Mechanicus and Tempestus armies, but should represent the defensive garrison that would hold a critical strongpoint a week or so into a bloody revolution.

Unlike the other game with PDF guard auxiliaries, these PDF are prepared and ready for action, so they do not begin fixed, and can begin deployed in transports if desired.

The PDF forces get no Regimental Doctrines, no relics, no warlord traits, but their officers can issue orders as normal, and their troops squads have the Objective Secured rule as normal.

Sustained Assault for GSC
In compensation, GSC get a modified Sustained Assault rule (representing the seemingly-endless horde of cultists trying to force their way up into the Mechanicus levels of the Hive):
 * At the end of any GSC turn, player can remove ANY of their units from the table, placing them in the "Sustained Assault" pool. Destroyed GSC units also go immediately into the "Sustained Assaut" pool.
 * At the end of each GSC movement phase, player may roll a dice for each unit in the "Sustained Assault" pool.
 * On a 4+ (2+ for Troops units) that unit can be set up anywhere wholly within the GSC deployment zone. Alternatively, if the unit has rules or stratagems that allow it to be set up somewhere other than the table during deployment, it can exercise/pay-cp-for those rules at this time instead of being set in the deployment zone.  If a unit goes into the teleportarium or shadows or equivalent, it can then exercise that alternative setup rule immediately (for example if terminators are destroyed, go in the "SA" pool, and then roll a 4+ at the end your movement phase, they can be deployed into the teleportarium and then immediately teleport onto the board, all during that same end-of-movement phase.)

Deployment and Turns:
First, GSC deploys all their units wholly within the GSC deployment zone, or using other sneaky GSC deployment rules.

Second, Mechanicus, Tempestus, and PDF deploy all their units wholly within the Imperium deployment zone, or using any other usual deployment rules.

GSC takes the first turn, no seize attempt allowed.

Game runs for the usual 5 rounds. So far all three of our campaign games have ended on round 3, so I think 5 rounds should feel like plenty. Perhaps if I've balanced it well enough, and Imperium plays and rolls well enough, we'll have a game whose outcome is still uncertain on turn 4 or even 5!

Victory Conditions
To make the game move faster, there is no progressive scoring. Assuming neither side resigns, the game ends at the end of round 5, and victory is determined accordingly:


 * If either side controls 3 or 4 of the 4 objectives on the table, that side wins a Major Victory.
 * If both sides control 2 of the 4 objectives, the battle is a Draw.

Stalemate and Carnage!
The battle began with a very successful round of shooting across the no-man's-land from the GSC's concealed positions in the ruins around the support pillar. Their heavy mining lasers destroyed a Chimera and disabled the Governor's Valkyrie, which thankfully crashed in friendly territory around the base of the support pillar. The Governor, his retired rogue trader friend, and his personal bodyguard spent most of the rest of the battle hiding in the ruins and watching his PDF conscripts and Mechanicus allies die to defend his rule.

A pair of mechanicus Castellan robots launched a very successful spoiling counterattack, taking the fight across the battlefield directly to the GSC trenches, and attracting an ever-growing swarm of cultists trying to destroy them. Eventually the robots were brought down, but only after being totally surrounded by cultists with numerous heavy mining weapons....and even then they did glory to the Omnissiah by exploding and taking even more cultists with them!

The other Valkyrie carrying the Callidus tried to sally as well, and deployed it's passengers by grav chute, allowing them to swiftly vaporize and slay several platoons of cultists and their leaders, including a psyker. But with their limited numbers, they couldn't hold ground in the face of the endless GSC assault, and they were eventually engaged and swarmed by many-armed acolytes with mining weapons, forcing them to retreat into their Valkyrie, which then came under heavy fire and withdrew, and was forced down in friendly territory, allowing her and the surviving Plasma Praetorians to join the Governor's defense of the ruins at the base of the support pillar.

There were numerous stories of heroism and sacrifice on both sides, with one fulgurite electro-priest particularly distinguishing himself by single-handedly holding a critical ruin even as cultists swarmed around it's base and it appeared lost.

The opening phase of the battle ended in a draw, with the many-armed cultists having secured a foothold in the ruins at the base of the support pillar, but being unable to exploit it or progress further.

***

Fearing being overrun, the Governor (whose plasma praetorians at that time comprised most of the remaining Imperium defenders on the front line) chose to withdraw himself and his personal guard, leaving the beleaguered Dominus and his remaining Mechanicus forces in an untenable position, without enough men and machines to hold the line.

Both sides continued to rush reinforcements to the battle for the support pillar, but the the cultists numbers seemed endless, with their new arrivals simply picking up the fallen weapons of the previous waves...and the Mechanicus forces began a slow fighting retreat up the support pillar. They disconnected the cables on the heavy freight elevators, and built roadblocks in the spiral hallway that ran up through the pillar, but the heavy mining gear of the genestealer cultists would always eventually cut through the obstacles, often with horrendous casualties on both sides.

From their Situation Room high up in the Spire, the Imperium rulers of Astheneia exchanged grim looks, knowing that their attempt to confine the rebellion to the lower levels had failed, and that while they had bought time, the fighting would eventually burn through the middle Mechanicus levels as well...

***

As the cultists used bulldozers and napalm to clear paths through the mounds of dead bodies and wrecked mechanicus war machines, something else in the Warp began to take notice of the Astheneia system...both because of the vast quantities of blood and skulls of the fallen on both sides, but also because of the busy activity of Slaanesh awakening in the system...