There are four smaller vehicles and two larger ones.
The smaller ones are two-wheeled, opened topped creations, emitting thick black fog out of their middle-part, partially enshrouding the Ork driving the thing. Crazy as Orks tends to be, you can make out several Orks clinging to each of the bikes, waving their weapons around, already firing for fun towards the imperial frontline.
The larger vehicles are ramshackle monstrosities made from heaps of scrap metal, one riding on 6 the other on 10 (!) wheels, a big turret on top of each and a large , armored compartment in the rear.
The time between two impacts is something around 20s .
Behind the trenchline, Doombringer's motor kicks in and it starts to circle the line to the north, seemingly about to reach the open grounds between the line and the hills.
The vox bellows again (for those that can still hear at least - ).
"You there! Hopping like a rabbit out of it's lair!
Have you brought your comm with you?!
Otherwise get back in there and get it out!
Seems like no one gave a damn about this one, as it was damaged in the last fight!
Get it out of there or we're done for!
"
Monia inhales and centers herself preparing to unleash her psychic powers should the Orks reach their lines quicker than anticipated.
Gritting her teeth, Ashora tries to get a bead on the driver of the leftmost small vehicle as it recklessly whips around craters and burnt-out chassis. "We're lucky to have lasguns, trying to lead these bastards with a bullet would be hellish," she mutters as an aside to Malchior, then squeezes the trigger. At least, she hopes she muttered--even her own voice is just a vague muffle, though she thinks it might be getting better...
7DoS
EDIT: whoops,
Celephix sticks with her original plan, stay down until someone else opens fire.
= 1DoS
After hopping into the second trenchline, Ashora takes careful aim at the rushing ork vehicles for long moments before softly pulling the trigger. The longlas roars and a bright red beam, followed by the high-pitched snapping sound races towards the rushing Xenos. Not awaiting an attack over that distance, the foremost Ork biker races straight into the shoot - maybe wondering what that flash of red light may be ... Before his head is superheated by the attack and explodes like a - burning - melon hit with a sledgehammer. The bike totally gets out of control and falls to the side, reducing the Orks clinging to its side to bloody pudding as they crash on the hard ground and are overrun by those vehicles behind them.
Another salvo
The bikers begin the crashed, all try to circle the crash side, without success, crashing the. Vehicle out of their way and overriding those orks riding on the first. This slows them down - a little. And much less than you would have hoped.
Just as to quelche the small flame of imperial resistance, another volley of artillery rains down on the trenchline....
One grenade lands far north of the bunker, doing no damage at all. The second one on the other hand ... Misses the bunker by more than thirty meter wide ... but lands near Doombringer!
The giant fireball totally consumes the APC for a few seconds, before it reappears, still driving but with a badly blasted left side, it's armor shredded from shrapnel's and blackened by the intense heat of the explosion.
The last one hits the ground several dozen meters before the southern trenches, removing a ten meter junk out of the razorwire.
After that last artillery attack, the southern trenchline erupt with fire from half a dozen guardsmen opening up on the closing thread over near maxrange of their weapons.
Nearly at the same time, the rushing ork vehicles open up with - somewhat - aimed fire from their heavy guns. At least one of them seams to be armed with rockets as well, as you can clearly see one of those things coming towards you on its crazy trajectory...
...Luckily the unstable explosive detonates mere meters after the start, but you cannot make out if it does any damage to the rushing orks. The wild fire from the imperial line misses to the last bullet and las-beam, same goes for most of the enemy fire. Some bullets clatter against the damaged bunker walls but lack the force to do further damage. A long line of bullet impacts wanders towards Ashoras new sniper position endangering her and her comrade.
Other than letting out a small whoop as the bike goes tumbling through the dirt, Ashora doesn't waste any time taking aim at the next bike in line. With a whispered prayer to the Emperor, she takes the shot.
5DoS
Subbing the 1 for a 5 that gives me 29E Pen2 to its head, +4 Critical
...y'all are on your own for the big trucks though, infantry is about all Ashora's pea-shooter can handle.
Round '1':
Leni keeps her head down since another shot should be about to fall
Round '2':
Bracing on the remnant of the wall again and firing on the onrushing bikers.
Totally going wide but that was expected honestly.
Round 1 and Round 2
Considering how far they are Simmins decides to aim his shots a little better this time around. He aims for a less armored target if at all possible
Impact, Pen 3
Round 3
With them now closer Simmins unloads the way he did initially
Seeing as everyone else has started shooting, Monia mentally shrugs to herself an shoots:
But, despite her relative patience, her shot goes wide due to the ranges at which they were shooting their incoming foes.
Inhaling sharply and taking aim once again, he shot goes low but clips an ork in the leg.
The razing bikes crosses a third of the distance in between the two artillery salvos and now are only a bit over 200m from the trenches. The trucks, a little bit slower, are about 70m behind them.
Ashora dodges the long straight of bullets sent into her direction by rolling around, before taking aim again, scoring another sweat shoot, although the Orks are now warned. The hit Ork tried an evasive action, which totally went out of control as the searing pain of half-head removal went through him. The bike and all its inhabitants flips head over end as it 'leaves' the street, exploding moments later upon impact.
The rest of the squad score some glancing hits on the rushing vehicles, together with the rest of the imperials, ducking the returned fire which slowly intensifies, but no additional rockets are seen. Multiple salvos ricochet off Doombringer, which returns fire - badly out of target. The previous damage received from the artillery shells obviously have damages some internal targeting devices.
Vox:
The shouting voice of the commissar is cut out by another artillery volley, two are badly missing the line, but one directly hits the southern trench right beside the tunnel entrance. A giant cloud of dust, earth and fire erupts, shaking the trenchline like an earthquake. The commbeads fills with inhuman screaming and rumbling for a moment, then its over. No more screaming, no shouting, no commands, only the ever razing Orks in front of you, and the comrade at your side.
- 2 DoS
Thud isn't phased. Not even a little. The sights and sounds of the southern trench getting blown to pieces - again - only tells him that it's time to be an Ogryn.
Usually weapons designed for Ogryn have built in limiters for how long the weapon can go full auto. This heavy stubber is not one of those weapons.
Thud roars a defiant challenge to match the rumble of the trucks and jams the trigger back. The stubber starts spewing ammo at an absurd rate. Notch can only hit Thuds elbows to help direct the firestorm.
Thanks for gettin' rid of the damn parade dress poser ya green skin bastards. Pvt Olyways mutters Come and get yer reward he unleashes the stubber at the closer bikes.
0 DOF
0 DOS
Leni listens to the sound of the psychopath in black biting the dust.
"Yeah... not going to go out of my way for that one. That m&!&~!#**$%# had it coming. Oh hey, I can hear again! So lets get this show on the road."
Tapping her combead she activates the squad vox.
"Okay guys you heard the guy in the coat get blown up for his fine heroic charge towards kingdom ork melee. So everyone skilled at shouting is gone - again. So let's just do this logicaly: Ashora, take the bikers from back to front. Phix and Spook, you're firing with me at the front biker. Heavy weapon guy, you see what you can do about those larger vehicles. Everyone: Don't save up on the 'nades if they get close to us."
Once more Lenis shot goes wide. It's not her primary role in the field but she does feel a pang of disappointment at her marksmanship
Having witnessed the horrors of the warp during her training, Monia isn't all that perturbed with seeing and hearing a Commissar die.
"As glad as I am to no longer have a Commissar breathing down my neck, wouldn't it be a good idea to do as he ordered and call in an Artillery strike?" she asks.
Either way, she continues shooting, mentally smiling at her seeming acceptance into the squad via nickname by the medicae; a thing that is surprisingly hard when you can set people on fire with your mind.
1 DoS or miss if the speed malus is still in effect.
Damage, Pen 0 to the Body if the above hit works out.
Thud isn't aiming. He's throwing lead
When the vehicles approach the 18 yard mark (that's 54 feet), Thud will pop the pin on one of his three remaining Krak grenades and toss it.
- 1 DoS
Then, if that vehicle isn't a truck, he'll toss another at the first truck to come in range
- edit: Crap. Please let the first one in range be a truck so this doesn't happen...
Celephix remains calm as she opens fire on the bike as directed.
"I support Leni's bid as acting sergeant, she has most experience in keeping us alive after all."
Of course, it's a dud.
Yay!
For half my original damage.
Sad face.
Heart pounding wildly, how can they still be rushing us so fast, they're insane!, Ashora wipes a fleck of dirt from her scope's lens before laying her cheek against the stock. Blinking in belated recognition that she can hear what her microbead is saying, she clicks it on. "As our resident expert on actually hitting things, Leni, I'll pick my own targets." Still, she follows the medic's suggestion and takes aim at the rearmost biker.
Replacing the 1 with a 5 = 22E Pen2 (Head)
EDIT, SORRY!
As the commissar's ravings are abruptly cut short by a xenos artillery shell, Malchior shrieks involuntarily and flinches. As the dirt clods rain down on them he uncurls and clears his throat, trying to act casual. "Sheesh, all that time spent clearing our uniforms, for this?"
Ashora too flinches at the explosion, but doesn't let it break her focus as she lays the crosshairs over the ork driver's forehead.
Round 1
See post above
Round 2
"I trust you do, actually, Ashora. The thing is, the rest of us does not need to be firing wildly in the general direction of YOUR target since you're going to kill it anyway. Might waste that random stray hit we sometimes like to do. And you're actually going to hit the ones further back. Also I hate to keep you from killing but I'll need a range on the artillery on the hills, command might artillery them back if we ask nicely."
Switching to trench-wide vox. Grabbing the big vox unit for it if necessary.
"Alright everyone the screaming guy in black seems to be gone but don't fool yourselves - there are plenty more where he came from and they will be coming for you if we do anyting but our orders right here. So if you want to live - and I for my part kinda like living - our ONLY choice is to stop the raving lunatics we're actually allowed to shoot. So make it count."
-> 3DoF
Round 3
Comming up in the next post
Round 3
Leni robs towards the big vox unit and tries to get command on the line while keeping her head down and if possible with the rubble from the wall acting as a shield towards the blasted open front.
Your call is immediately answered by a highly stressed voice.
Lots of background noise, including explosions and the high-pitched roaring of a vehicle motor on overdrive partly overrides the voice of the com-officer on the other side.
"krrrr 'plete sector is krrrrrr artillery fire.
Command post krrrr.
Try reach local artillery for im' krrrrrrrrrr 'ort.
Aircraft inbound. ETA krrrrrrrr.
Mark krrrrr 'sition with krrrrr 'moke.
Emperor prot' krrrrr"
With that, the connection is cut and you only receive static.
Again the orkish driver tries to jink his vehicle around as the perfectly aimed shoot races towards his face, and again the brutish nature of the Orks fool his attempt. His eyes burned away, the driver looses track of the route, another Ork tries to overtake control, but in the enfolding struggle, the bike suddenly jinks over its side and crashes and ends in a big fireball, right beside the road.
While Leni's attempt in commanding isn't exactly helping, at least it IS something to help the soldiers focusing. The northern part of the trench keeps on pouring lasfire in the closing enemy, two hitting one of the Orks clinging to the last bike, the impacts strong enough to push him overboard. Still the creature steps back up and starts to run behind it's rushing vehicle...until a burst from Doombringer - which misses the bike by mere centimeters - reduces him to a burning heap of Xeno-mess. Another blast from the Chimera strikes the front of the foremost Truck, making it's frontarmor glow white-red for some moments, but does not stop it's razing advance.
The fire coming from the southern trench has mostly stopped by his point. As no one has direct view you cannot exactly know why this is.
Celephix flicks her lasgun up to Overload, better make shots count against Orks.
2 rounds of shooting
, 1 hit
Thud keeps up the full auto on his heavy stubber until they're in range.
BS 36
Companion +5
Bike size +10
Bike Speed -20
Full auto -10
Braced +10
Thud pours fire in their direction, but the speed is just to much for him to reliably compensate.
shot goes wild.
Despite the Orks getting closer and closer, their wild, freakish and unruly driving coupled with their speed make for extremely hard targets and is unable to get a proper bead.
Much better suited for mowing down greenskins rather than their trucks ma'am. But I'll use my kraks on 'em when they get in range.
Seeing only glancing hits from his hail of lead and no unarmored targets Simmins decides to stop wasting as much ammo as he had and wait until the coming vehicls are in range of his krak grenades.
BS 43, Full Auto -10, Brace +10, Comrade +5, Full Aim +20, Target 68
After missing several rounds on the razing Ork vehicles, the new heavy gunner of the team takes a deep breath,takes careful aim at the front truck and then unleashes a well aimed burst from the thundering stubber, showering the front of the truck with half a dozen impacts (). After the first joy of hitting the target with such a well placed burst, the feeling quickly turns to frustration as the truck simply continues his way without showing any signs of immediate damage.
Celephix scores a glancing hit on the front of the remaining biker, but her shot is ignored as well.
As if waiting for a secret signal, all Orkish vehicles open fire at once, bathing the imperial line in solid projectiles and a rocket or two. The fire outburst coincidently - or maybe not so coincidently? - meets with another artillery barrage, enough to make even the bravest soldier to keep his head low.
One of the orkish rockets pass mere meters overhead the trench to finally finds its mark on the already damaged Doombringer. In a feeble effort to turn away the doom of Doombringer, Ren'Shaw feverishly turns around the vehicle in an attempt to dodge the incoming rocket in the last moment... ... but the damaged vehicle instead turns to the wrong side, offering the weaking side armor to the red-painted warhead of the rocket! x, Pen:8
The rocket slams into the vehicle, blasting open a junk of it's already damaged side, and you can see a tight string of steam leaking out of the hull - something has broken inside for sure. Whether it will disable the vehicle or not ... only time can tell.
For those inside the bunker, things are getting worse by the minute, as the second rocket slams into the remainder of the bunker, blasting everyone not able to dodge the blasting area with red-hot shrapnel's. X, Pen:8, Blast (5).
With horror you notice that the long-range vox was hit by a shrapnel as well, and has stopped working. You can pull out the shrapnel, reveling a few cut cables and stuff. It does not look like it cannot be repaired, but it has stopped working properly - which is bad enough, given the current situation...
The positions along the trench were the heaviest fire is coming from are under direct assault from multiple heavy guns and a multitude of ork small arms fire... and both Simmins and Ashora are in immediate danger of getting hit!
I, Pen:2, body,
I, Pen:2, head
The earth shakes under the impact of three rounds hitting the immediate surrounding of the trenches, one hit the line just north of the tunnel entrance, killing anyone within 10 meters outright . Two other shells hit the southern part of the trenchline, were you cannot even begin to guess what carnage they inflict there.
-----------------------------------
---- THREE ROUND META ROUND OVER.
---- NORMAL COMBAT STARTS NOW.
-----------------------------------
1st: Monia, Ashora, Leni -->Will be rotated to the bottom after the first round, for easier combat
2nd: Orks
3rd: Celephix, Simmins, Thud'dr
Leni does a quick recap on what was said on the command net before deciding what to do:
2DoS
Imperial doctrines states, that supply drops will only ever issued if the receiver is ether totally surrounded and supplying them is of utmost strategic importance or if the dropzone is secured without hostile forced in the immediate surrounding.
Recalling that, you are quite certain that it will be no supply drop or anything, but a strafing run, that is already called by the command against the enemy artillery.
More problematic is the thing about marking the enemy position versus marking the own one. Given the circumstances you are rather certain that they would expect you to mark your own position, as marking the enemy position is rather out of scope, while being shelled. At least you would hope so.
Also marking the own position is kind of a "We're still alive down here, so don't bomb us, please" signal.
4 DOS!
4 Dof :(
Leni keeps her head down and thanks the emperor for his invention of cover and starts cursing as she notices the broken vox.
1DoF
Squad Net: "Phix, the long range vox broke. I'll need you in the bunker to fix it as soon as we have some breathing room. Until then: We have an aircraft incoming, presumably for a strafing run. We need to mark our position so they don't blow us up too. Prefereably with Smoke but I'm open for anything."
2 DoS.
Steeling her resove against the oncoming orkoid fusilade, Monia holds strong but curses the Orks for being ever so slightly too far out for her empyric abilites, sighs and inhales shaply before aiming down the sights of her lasgun.
for 3 DoS...odd that I'd roll the same number twice 0_o
Damage, Pen 0
" If we have some highly smoke-producing flammables lying around, I could create a signal fire with barely a thought!" she stated over the vox
- 2 DoS
Thud stands his ground with this stubber firing in one hand and a readied krack in the other. Some greenies were about to have a very bad day...
There is a moment's pause as Thud guages the distance and lobs his krak grenade an absurd distance without much effort.
BS:36
Size+speed=0
Companion +5
Half aim +10
Singe +10
Distance -10
Of they are still at long range then I still succeed with no DoS
- 2 DoS
Via team-vox, Ren'Shaw replies to that last exchange between Leni and Monia. You can barely understand him over the sound of hissing steam in the background.
"I'll come over fffffffft some fuel from her.
We ffiiiii leackage and severe damage.
Cannot take ano-fiiiiiiiiiit"
Doombringer slowly turns around and slowly rumbles towards the second trenchline. It will take the vehicle at least half a minute to reach it, if it does not speed up though.
As another volley of shells rains down on the trenches the sniper jerks in surprise--and the moment likely saves her life, as a heavy slug screams through the space her head had occupied just a moment before. The fear has all bled away by now, a luxury the adrenaline-saturated soldier cannot afford. Partially rising from her foxhole she takes a bead on the furthest biker. "F%+! you!" she screams hoarsely.
5 DoS 21E Pen2 (Head)
+++++ Ork Round 1 +++++
With an absurd reaction, the last remaining biker, twitches his vehicle around, as Ashora takes her shot, causing her carefully aimed shot to miss by not more than an inch. With fury she notices the Ork laughing wildly and one of his comrades padding - that is hitting - him on the shoulder through her scope. The Ork returns the padding, then refocuses on the street before him, and obviously pulling out the last from whatever Xeno machine is driving his bike, as it suddenly speeds up even more - razing along the road with absurd speed. Within the few seconds you need to react, it crosses nearly half the distance towards the trenchline in one rush.
The Trucks follow the lead of the bike - a bit slower bit still with neck-breaking speed, adding their fire two that coming from the bike.
Fortunately for you, Orks are still Orks. And Orks are not known for their aiming skills, so despite the sheer amount of ammunition they throw at you - they manage to hit nobody. One or two shoots from the 'small' arms of the orkish passengers clatter against your cover, but that's about all they manage to hit ... this time.
A shower of Lasgun fire proves that you are not - yet - alone and your comrades return fire. A few shots find their mark and manage to knock off another Ork from the razing bike. This Xeno gets up as well and starts to run behind his previous ride, wildly firing and shouting angrily it seems.
Doombringers turret sluggishly tries to follow the zipping bike, missing it by a couple of meters.
Then you hear a sound like snapping cabling, feared for something broke - but it is just Thud'dr who throws a grenade at the closing bike - over the distance of nearly 60m that is. And not only that far, but also just in front of the vehicle, such that the explosion will hit its wheels ... Despite that perfect throw, the explosion is weaker than you would have liked - maybe that one was sup-optimal crafted? Whatever the reason is, the grenade seems not to inflict major damage, but slows down the speed of the vehicle considerably ...
Celephix attempts to steady her breathing. So many bullets firing through the air, and they seem to know whenever she tries to peek her head above the line. She whispers to the mantra of Enginseers to steady her nerves and moves along the trenchline to get nearer the bunker and chimera, readying a grenade as she does so... maybe if she can listen she could just hurl it blind if they got close?
Don't got any smoke 'nades on me, just things to blow up things. Maybe anyone who can't fire back can just lasfire up in the air to let 'em know that we ain't dead yet! Olways voxes back to the medic commander on his commbead.
Crouching deep behind the cover that protected him from the last massive blast Simmins acts on his own initiative and leaves his stubber braced over the trench to unsling his M36 lasgun and fires up in the air in the Imperial Guard code spelling out A... O... K (I'm thinking something like Morse Code if that makes sense with Common Lore:Imperial Guard)
Still not daring to peek out she gets to work to tape together her 2 krak grenades and her 2 frag grenades and their pins into a nade package each and starts looking through her stuff for a cable or string
Not being able to see him from her position in the bunker she answers on the vox
"Good idea. Gonna assign that role when we hear the plane coming into range. We should hear it from some klicks away"
Thud had no intention of ducking for cover, so a bullet does it for him. It ricochets off his thick skull and knocks him off his stubber. He growls and pulls out all his nades. Four frags and two kraks left. He pulls out tape and lashes two frags to each of the kraks. Those trucks were not getting away with this next time. As an after thought, he takes every spare lasgun power pack he has and lashes them to the improvised grenades too. It's not lone he was going to use them...