Ohh, I like this.

40K rules hilarity

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pride-and-prejudice-and-zombies

And this

Why hand to hand combat is terrifying.

Reaching the Edge of the Xyphonica Conurbation.

XVIII Corps’ 28^th Infantry Division, under 1* General Jelan is composed of five regiments raised as one founding from the world of Ketzok.   The Ketzok 2^nd Light Infantry are the Divisional Recce formation.  This balmy summer evening finds 3/2KLI pushing through the commercial district of the town of Lealine[1].  At the Northern end of XVIII Corps’ TAOR, Lt Col Daaler is in no hurry, he knows that XVII Korps to the north are also sending recce elements into the conurbation. 

Lealine is thought likely to be occupied by the PLA and their new allies, the so called ‘Blood Pact’[2].  Lt Col Daaler picks ‘B’ Company and its OC selects his lead platoon and they shake out into their skirmish formation and push into the ruins with the aim of securing a line along Glassmill Way, the main north/south road through the town, by nightfall and allowing the rest of 3/2LI to reinforce them during the night.

Tound ducked as the stubber slugs thumped into the doorway around him, he threw himself backwards in a shower of stone chips and dust, landing on his arse and skidding across the broken glass and smashed door.   Stooler’s hand bit into his shoulder and pulled him further back as the smoky trail of the tread fether came through the ruined doorway and thumped into the now damp plaster. 

Tound and Stooler both flicked their eyes up to the tail sticking out of the wall barely more than arms reach away from them, spring loaded fins quivering as the rocket motor fizzed out.   Scrambling for his las carbine, barely catching the sling with his fingertips,  Tound found his feet again.  They ran pell mell back through the ruined kitchen show room, catching up with the rest of their squad, bunching, pushing.  Feet skidded on the debris.

Their Sergeant stood her ground and shouldered her squad members aside as they broke around her like waves around a rock.  Her right arm extended, flinging three grenades through the door opening back into the room Tound and Stooler had entered.   Pins and handles tumbled onto soldiers diving for cover.

Keilbach was the first out of the back of the shop complex, running low and headlong he was heading for the picture window of the shop opposite, half way across he seemed to stumble and crashed face first into the showroom, leaving pink mist and the smell of charred flesh in the air behind  him.  Ramiphilon was moving too fast to stop, he also caught half a dozen las-rounds and fell backwards, back into the kitchen shop.

They were trapped.  They had been the cutting edge of the battalion advance; the squad were a probing patrol moving deep into the urban area, combing through the commercial district.  There were other squads also probing like they were, but these were spaced widely to avoid friendly fire incidents.  They had taken a few targeted las shots and dived into a ruined shop to outflank the shooter, only to run into a better laid ambush; now their original way in was cut off.

If it was just another squad, they had a chance to fight it out. If it was a larger formation, their best hope was to dig in and wait for relief.   Tound as an experienced soldier of some eight years active service, knew this and was cursing their luck; Sergeant Hunebuck’s squad[3] were good at infiltrating through the urban battle field; they drilled for it extensively and had plenty of real life experience.  Which meant that the veterans they were facing were even better.

The grenades went off, setting off the RPG and sending a tongue of flame shooting across the ceiling of the small space the remains of the squad were in.   Sergeant Gelmaur barked orders to form up for a hasty attack and thumbed the activation rune on her chainsword.  She stepped back into the burning room and instantly crumpled under bursts of las and stubber fire.   Heavy bolter fire began to eat into the building from the back. 

As the stonework of the building was being eaten away, heavy bolter rounds penetrated the ruin and began exploding in the space the squad were sheltering in,  showering men with more stone flakes and killing three of them outright, including Josle the medic who was frantically trying to stem Ramphilion’s bleeding.

Brenus emptied his las rifle on full auto through the gap where Sergeant Gelmaur had fallen.  Stooler followed suit.   Tound threw his grenades through the doorway, past his two squad mates and then moved back again leaving the reloaded Brenus facing the outside world.   There were a series of explosions from outside of the building and fiz and crack of las cannon fire.  The three of them inched through the room, stepping over Sergeant Gelmaur and the three dirty red-brown soldiers who’d shot her and then been slain in turn.

Glancing outside they could see the hulking form of a Wolverine armoured car[4] repeatedly blasting away with its twin las-cannons at the positions from which the squad had been ambushed.   “Thank feth….” Began Tound, the sound of his voice being chocked off as a red covered arm wrapped itself around his neck, he felt himself being pulled over backwards onto the knife, a text book manoeuvre he’d used a few times himself.  He could smell the dried blood that the assailant’s arm had been died red with.  He felt the knife wielding hand wriggle and saw the knife as his own body weight was used to kill him.  The jagged blade had gone in through his arm pit and was now scraping the inside of his body armour.

Stooler spun around and put a sustained burst of eight las rounds through the leering mask of the man stabbing his best friend.   The second infiltrator flung his axe end over end, splitting Stooler’s helmet and buring itself in his head, almost but not quite bisecting it.

Brenus emptied his rifle into the second infiltrator and then dropped it and snatched up Stooler’s carbine.   Through the back door, their original point of entry, he could see a Warthog nosing through the rubble, it’s autocannon slowly traversing, already spent brass tinkling on to the road off of the rear platform as the vehicle rolled forward, large low pressure tyres rolling purposefully and slowly over broken glass, smashed brick and Guardsman Ramphilion's las carbine without further damaging any of it. 

Guardsman Brenus, suffering from a mild sweat, a coating of stone dust and the promise of downstream PTSD, is the last man standing.   It’s another six minutes before he feels safe enough to quit covering the threat points and begin triage and first aid on his squad mates.  

3/2KLI established itself along the western boundary of Glassmill Way, but not until after midnight and only after taking many more casualties than anticipated.  72AG had met the Blood Pact for the first time and found the skirmishes unexpectedly tough. 

The rest of the Regiment formed up on the positions established by 3/2KLI.  28 Inf Div intended to form up and prosecute an assault on the inner districts of Lealine after 24hours of rest, re-organisation and preparation[5].  In the event, Blood Pact counter attacks, under cover of the ruined buildings, continued, sometimes in strength, throughout the day, only ceasing when the Divisional attack was launched.

---

[1] Pop 13,000.  Lealine is a western suburb of Xyphonica.  Securing a foothold in the metropolis will give 72AG access to routes into the city proper; the main roads, highway access and disused rail network.  Plus as each Corps rotates its divisions through their daily objectives, it gives them practice in operational FIBUA.

[2] At this time, the Blood Pact have not been in contact with any part of 72AG.  The Only person in 72AG who has operational experience of fighting against them is 3* Gen Romos, who served in the Sabbat Crusades as a junior officer ~200 years ago.

[3] Sergeant Hunebuck had been their Sergeant for six years, being replaced by Sergeant Gelmaur four months ago as Sergeant Huneback finds himself as an RSM in a locally raised battalion.

[4] Wolverine armoured cars were used by Cadian 144^th LRRR when they were first deployed to Devos IV.  With a number of parts in common with both the Leman Russ MBT and the Chimera family, these vehicles soon found their way into most of 72AGs recce units.  These ones, like the Warthog, were probably 17 Korps assets.

[5] This 36hr period had seen the fiercest fighting that 28 Inf Div had been involved in.  2KLI took more casualties than anticipated and 3^rd Bn paid the lion’s share of the Butcher’s Bill.  But the objectives were achieved and XVIII Corps had it’s foothold in Xyphonica. 

It's no Joke

A Valhallan, a Necromundan and a Cadian walk into a bunker…

Not the beginning of a joke, but three fugitives fleeing westwards meet the Kado 540^th Infantry coming the other way.  Fortunately the Valhallan manages to convince his world-brothers not to shoot them and they are escorted to C Company HQ, at that time, a log and earth bunker no longer required by it’s previous owners.

The three fugitives are given and hot drink and the Valhallan, Serjeant Lik, is questioned by   Comrade Major Gogebic.  Kommissar Tora is sat at the back of the bunker, allowing himself to be mostly obscured by the stores and equipment therein.  Pte Yoshida, the Necromundan, has noticed him and signed to his Cadian comrade that the Commissar is there, but cannot get Serjeant Lik’s attention.  He just hopes Lik doesn’t say anything too dumb.  

"So how did you all get away ?"

Sergeant Lik licked his lips and began his account "Well, I understand that it was the Cadian Master Sergeant; apparently he’d been in the Interior Guard at some point.   We were kept in a series of pens and he was in one of the others with some Death Korps.   Turns out that he was hardest bastard in that pen, which is a turn up for the books, eh ?"

Comrade Major Gogebic nodded encouragingly "Well, what did he do ?"

"We all got taken out once a day for interrogation, which was really just intimidation and brutalisation to soften us up, there was no real intent to get meaningful information out of any of us.  The Cadian had apparently been whispering to each of them that he was psychic and that one of them, the guards, was weak and that he was going to make the weak one kill the rest of them."

"What ?" the word came out of Comrade Major Gogebic's mouth perhaps little fast, he hoped he hadn't spooked Sergeant Lik.  But the man just shrugged and delivered his explanation.

"It was a bluff, apparently, something he’d dreamt up whilst he was in the Interior Guard.  But the odd whispers had set the guards on edge and watching each other, we could see that in the other pens.   Over eleven days we reacted to their edginess, they became even more jumpy.   Now I imagine that the Cadian, on one of his interrogation trips, just made eye contact with one guard and nodded towards another and one of the guards had become so freaked out he just shot the other.  The Master Sergeant then took down the other one and sprung the rest of us.

The Master Sergeant and about half a dozen Cadians and all of the Krieg boys stayed in the pens.  We could still hear the gunfire and explosions as we crossed the outer perimeter." 

Serjeant Lik took a mouthful of recaf and paused a moment, savouring it before continuing.

"We’d been heading West for two days; we lost about half of the men actually breaking out of the heretic camp, but were all arming ourselves from their bodies on the way out; once we’d made it about an hour we split down into small groups, mostly on unit lines, but some of the more veteran guardsmen made sure that their groups were mixed, I started out with three other Valhallans, one from my own Battalion, but when we saw others splitting down and mixing up. I saw the sense and so I left them.  They wanted to stay together, they could not see how having men from different worlds improved the chances of the small groups.  We've made it."

Comrade Major Gogebic nodded; “Go and see Corporal Jenkski, he’ll have breakfast on, you three look as if you could use a good meal.”

The three men drew themselves up to attention.  Sergeant Lik saluted and the three of them ducked out of the bunker and went in search of the promised hot meal. 

“Well ?”

Kommissar Tora exhaled through his nose as he pursed his lips.  He’d had instruction from his own chain of command; not to be delinquent in his own duties, but to ensure that such men were not drawn to the attention of the Inquisition.  Not hidden, but not fed to godless torturers for no good reason. 

“Assign them to me.  I can watch them and you can release Jenkski and Serich back to their Platoon.  We’ll keep them until we roule back to the rear.  There’s no point in trying to pass them back when we’re going forward, you can’t spare the escort or the transport.

Is it snowing yet ?"

Splash another bandit

Another separatist T-65 is bounced by Imperial Thunderbolts before it can get away.   Given the law of averages, every time a T-65 launches on a mission the number of Thunderbolts lurking above it does not diminish, whereas the number of separatist airframes does, meaning that as the campaign progresses, the separatist is exponentially less likely to make it home.

The scar in the ground can clearly be seen where it has crash landed. The picts were taken by the other Thunderbolt.  The pair are quite likely to continue to circle until ground forces arrive to secure the crash site, assuming they don't go 'bingo' during the meantime.

In this instance, it looks like the T-65 is not too badly damaged; assuming that the pilot doesn't manage to destroy it, it may well become a trophy on a plinth at some Imperial base after the war, perhaps. 

Blood Pact 4

Blood Pact SWS: three GLs and three with liberated Kantreal Mk IX Lasrifles.

Curious Construct swedes, WGF bodies and Cadian arms and arms and maxmini arms and Cadian arms.  All variously armed with small arms. (Yes, Drax, I know, I did it for you.....)

Ready to indirectly bombard my position.  'stewards.

Showing their CESFAW nature.

Vox Ops.  They don't wear helmets to better hear the words of their Archon ("Whose voice drowns out all others....")

Their Melta gun toting buddy.

That's all for now.

Project Progress Update

Nice Pict to symbolise progress:

Ok, sort of in response to the 6MMMRC, here's the latest news:

DKK Salamanders - need finishing off.
ASL Crassus - Done
Valhallans - now so old they need touching up. 
3rd Thunderer Conversion.  
Additional Officers Nearly all done (but I keep adding more....)
"Word Bearers" er, um, tbc. 
Leviathan Mortis' - Despatched to the Dark Mechanicus
DKK Grenadiers Done
Full Size ATAT fleet Test Mega Bolter Done
DKK Hydrae Built & Painted Done
Thunderbolts - WIP Done
Clone wars Vendetta conversions  WIP
World Eaters Land Raider  Despatched to the Dark Mechanicus
Meridian Infantry
Inquisitorial Gun Cutter WIP
Isenkearn APC Test Model Done
Isenkearn Command Squad Done
Imperial Basillica
Elsyian Army  Done
TGG Kickstarter girls Delivered late May

• Jailbirds        WIP  Includes 60ish Catachans....
• Iron Empire   WIP
• Kurnigova      WIP  Includes repainting my existing Cadians....

And then a trawl of whats in the boxes
Trawling:  

• Shoulder Launched AA ML Platoon for the Iggies.  WIP
• Arco-eviscorators   WIP
• Crusader               WIP
• 3 Armoured Sentinels        WIP
• Blood Pact Tranche 1        Done
• Blood Pact Tranche 2        WIP

Broken rules:

Two chaos Knights.

Blood Pact 3

So here are more of the 'thousands' of the Blood Pact.  What has happened is that the small people have ruined our lives and Mrs Z and I only get a couple of hours to ourselves in the evening and now do things like actually converse.  Anyway, I also have spent some time building Blood Pact-ers, so Children are progressing the project along, but only by displacing my hobby activity from weekends to scattered hours in the week.  

Damogaur (roughly 'Major') gazes lovingly at his Bloodthirster Sword.  The mind boggles as to what he did to be gifted one of those by Khorne.

High Sirdar (roughly 'Captain') prepares to draw his more normal sword.

And the obligatory nutter with flaming sword and skull on a chain around his neck. Possibly a 'Blood Mage', whatever one of those is...