Durgama Takeover

Pre-Game:
*Communication established*
*Hexahedron officer Epsilon-7 reporting*
*Varuna Immediate Reaction Division 31st Special Assault Group reporting*
Epsilon-7: Cpt. Vernion, I’m commandeering your unit.
Cpt. Vernion: Happy to be of service, Epsilon. What are our orders?
Epsilon-7: My usual Military Order task force is occupied at this moment. You are being deployed in their place. Standard salvage operation, secure the Panopolies and destroy the enemy consoles. You will be fighting Yu Jing operatives in the area.
Cpt. Vernion: We know what we’re up against, Epsilon. We’ll see how Invincible their army really is after we hit them. Bushmaster out.
*Cpt. Vernion disconnects*
Delta-9: System, disengage identity cover up.
Kappa-3: So you really just sent them to their deaths while impersonating a rival Hexahedron officer?
Delta-9: It’s a dog eat dog world, Kappa. I’ve got to do what I’ve got to do to advance.
*Communications system offline*

Captain Vernion and his men sat in the dropship, anxious for their mission. The 31st Special Assault Group of the Varuna Immediate Reaction Division was being commanded by the leader of the 21st Rescue and Recovery Unit. Captain Vernion had never seen a field of battle outside an occasional Libertos insurrection, and those men he was closer with hadn’t either. Luckily, most of his usual men were not accompanying him on this mission. Outside of the teams Echo-Bravo, and the remote TAG pilot, Vernion had never worked with any of them. Fer-De-Lance, the callsign of the EB paramedic, took their seat next to them, checking the chamber of their Combi-rifle.
“Ready, captain?” they asked, clearly as anxious as he was to get into the fray.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Vernion responded, standing in his Kamau armor and grabbing his rifle. “You’ll be staying back on this one, Lance, but be ready to deploy for any rescue ops we might need.”
“Sure thing, Bushmaster,” the paramedic answered, moving back to the front of the dropship. Their callsigns were both snakes of old Earth, fitting for the Snake Eaters of Varuna. Inside the dropship were three fusiliers, two helots, an orc, kamau, and machinist and their palbot companion, and a specialist operative from high command.
“Listen up, men. I’ve never worked with any of you before, but I can already tell this is a room filled with well trained men and women. I’ll keep this brief. Let’s show those Jade bastards how the Hyperpower does it!”He encouraged his men, who responded with cheers as the dropship made contact with the ground, opening to allow the men to disembark at the ready. The captain muttered to himself “Let us get on with it, then,” before following his men into what would turn out to be a bloody massacre of a mission.
Deployment:
Unbeknownst to the men, the Combined Army had already deployed assets to the field due to a traitor in the Hexahedron(My opponent won lieutenant role, chose initiative, and I chose to deploy second). A mixed unit of Shasvastti and other Ur forces had already encamped themselves in the facility the 31st were being deployed to. A missile drone sat behind a bus, while two shrouded had set up under and inside two large buildings. A Sphinx TAG hid itself in a small walled compound, with a Morat berserker nearby. Bit and Kiss, traitors to the sphere, were also deployed by the CA. Finally, some Taighas had been put on the field, and were spread about the opposing deployment zone.

The men spread out. The specialist operative(represented by Patsy Garnett) took position in the rear, along with Cpt. Vernion(represented by a Kamau, who was the lieutenant). The Squalo and Pal bot took position in the front left, preparing to move down a small alleyway, with the palbots machinist taking cover inside a small forested compound. The fusilier paramedic took position behind some crates, near the Orc who kept close to the A2C. One Helot deployed their decoy near the back, and took position behind some crates, while the other stood ready behind a large wall. The fusiliers took position around the field, and the sniper laying prone behind a bench.

My opponent kept some units in reserve, and so he deployed some cloaked units and Bit and Kiss to the field at this point. I kept none in reserve besides my parachutist, who would in theory enter later, but would never see the opportunity.

Ferrum Turn 1: The CA move in
The CA first had to use their Impetuous orders. The enemy Daturazi advanced first, putting it into the line of fire of my sniper. Luckily for it, the sniper was prone, so its silhouette didn’t actually see the sniper, allowing it to throw a smoke grenade up into the alleyway. Next, one of the enemy Taigha advances to the panoply under the buildings ledge, which already was secured by a camouflage Shrouded. Another Taigha moves up through the central building, and continues advancing through it.

After the impetuous phase is over, the Daturazi advances up through the smoke. The Taigha by the panoply successfully makes a WIP role, recovering a regeneration module. This is the only panoply item secured throughout the game, giving the CA one objective point. The Taigha in the central building advances once again, through the central building, taking cover between the doors. Another Taigha advances to the other panoply, but is spotted by the Fusilier with a combi rifle. They take their ARO shot, and the Taigha dodges. The face to face role results in a tie, meaning that neither the dodge nor the shot work.
Next, Bit and Kiss begin their advance. Both of them spend orders to move forward, getting on top of(in Bit’s case) and inside of(in Kiss’ case) the central building. Bit throws a repeater onto a stack of crates, and Kiss throws two repeaters, one onto a van and one on the balcony of the other building(the one that houses the panoply). Bit uses Oblivion on the Orc, successfully isolating it from the order pool after they fail their reset.

The combi fusilier gets spotlighted by the Shrouded hiding at the panoply through the repeater, causing the shrouded to leave camo. The shrouded inside the building attempts to spotlight the missile fusilier, succeeding. The shrouded at the panoply reenters camo.

Snake Turn 1: The 31st respond to an unexpected enemy(well, not really, but for narrative purposes they were)
First, my Squalo moves forward, accidentally going through the repeater and getting hacked for oblivion by Kiss. Although Kiss’ Oblivion doesn’t work, the Shrouded gets to use an ARO to hack with total control, which is successful. The Squalo gets hacked and taken over by enemy forces, booting the remote pilot from control.

Patsy Garnett moves up into the forest region from behind the building, attempting to slink along the side to get to the A2C and rig her D-charges.

The Kamau with a sniper leaves prone, and uses an order to advance up to attempt to gain line of fire over Bit. However, they are unable to, and further advances would put them too close to some Taighas. They successfully resist a spotlight attempt by the repeater hidden in the crates.

The Fusilier with a missile launcher successfully resets, escaping the spotlight and the watchful eye of the missile drone hidden at the back of the CA’s field. The Fusilier with a combi rifle doesn’t attempt a reset, instead fleeing backwards to get out of the range of the other men. Cpt. Vernion, or the Kamau lieutenant, is told by the fusilier to flee to the right to make sure they are not in the blast radius, which they reluctantly do. The Helot who deployed the decoy moves forward, attempting to gain line of fire on the shrouded inside the central building. However, the shrouded is prone, so they are unable to hit them.

The Pal-bot successfully moves to the Orc, and although they are spotlighted by an ARO, they successfully escape it. Unfortunately, they are unable to reconnect the Orc to the rest of the network.

Turn 2 Ferrum: The CA goes for an early killing blow.
Daturazi and Taigha move forward through the alleyway, up to the hijacked Squalo. The Taigha in the central building advances on the Helot who had the decoy. The fusilier paramedic takes an ARO, and misses their shot, while the Helot hits their ARO shot, but the wound is shrugged off by the Taigha. The Taigha melees the Helot, killing them.

The Kamau sniper is charged by the other Taigha on the far right(my right) of the field. They respond with their burst pistol, which hits, but is shrugged off. The Taigha melee attacks twice, but the Kamau ignores both, and dodges backwards. However, the Taigha pursues, ignoring the burst pistol shot once again as they render the kamau unconscious.

The helot with camo is shot at by the hacked squalo, shooting back with their light rocket. The helot ignores the shot, but hits the Squalo, who doesn’t take any damage. Patsy engages with her SMG, but misses her shots. Squalo moves forward, is hit again by the Helot, but survives once again. The paramedic fusilier and missile launcher fusilier now have line of sight, and ARO with their weapons. Although the Squalo is missed by the paramedic, the Missile hits, knocking the Squalo down to one armor point. The orc uses their now irregular order to shoot at the Squalo, hits them, rendering the TAG unconscious.

However, this was not the only heavy armor the CA had on their side. Their Sphinx, still hidden, advanced up the table, where Patsy and the Machinist discovered it successfully. The missile fusilier and helot delay their ARO, so that they can shoot their heavy weapons at the TAG. The Helot and Missile fusilier engage, hit the TAG, and cause it to take one wound. Patsy and the machinist shoot with their weapons, which results in Patsy’s shot being shrugged off, and the Machinist missing. The Sphinx responds with its heavy flamer, killing Patsy and knocking the machinist unconscious. The Sphinx then shoots at the helot and fusilier with its spitfire. The shots are successful, knocking the missile fusilier unconscious and killing the helot.

The Sphinx advances to the crates with the Paramedic, palbot, and orc. They use their flamer, knocking down the paramedic before advancing again and, once again, flaming the enemy, killing the already knocked down fusilier and the orc and pal-bot. The Sphinx then advances to the A2C, shoots at the standard fusilier, and kills them. They hit the A2C for two structure points.

Turn 2 Snake: Retreat!
The only units left alive on the field are the sniper, the machinist, the missile fusilier, and Cpt. Vernion. And of them, only Cpt. Vernion is conscious. Although the Echo-bravo is still alive, they are not an active unit on the field. It doesn’t matter, as the army is forced to Retreat!, as it is under 25% strength. As it is my turn, the Kamau doesn’t need to do anything to retreat. Cpt. Vernion extracts with the unconscious bodies of the sniper, fusilier, and machinist, with the aid of the Echo-bravo. Total victory for the Combined Army.

The Aftermath(Narrative again):
Captain Vernion was screaming into his comm set “Everyone who’s left standing, call in now! We have to get this mission done!”
“That’s a negative, sir, high command is calling for a retreat. Get prepped for extraction,” Lance responded from the incoming drop-ship.
“I have three men still alive on this field, and I am NOT leaving them!” he responded, angered at the prospect of leaving someone behind. The dropship hovered nearby, opening fire on the Combined Army forces, allowing the Echo-Bravo to deploy to help Vernion extract the three survivors’ unconscious bodies. However, it wasn’t long before the Combined Army began shooting back, forcing the dropship to evacuate, with Lance laying down suppressive fire for Vernion to lift the Machinists body on to the dropship. The door quickly sealed, and the dropship was off, as CA missiles began to engage the ship.
“What…the hell…WAS THAT,” the captain exclaimed, his helmet lifting his mask from his face, revealing a young, relatively inexperienced officer. He was covered in sweat, distraught about the slaughter that had just taken place.
“Hell if I know, sir, but I can tell you one thing, those WEREN’T Yu Jing. If my implants didn’t tell me better, I’d say we were set up,” Lance responded, sitting down on the side of the dropship, offering his hand to the captain. He took it, standing up, sitting down on the seat next to the parachutist.
“The Hexahedron has never led us astray before. But what does it matter, every single one of those men who died down there’s blood is on my hands,” the captain lamented as he covered his face with his hands.
“They died doing what they loved, fighting for PanOceania. Don’t let it stop you from doing the same, if nothing more, to avenge them,” the parachutist consoled the captain stoically.
“So I hope, Lance, so I hope. Pilot, take us to PanO Basecamp. I’ve got a chat to have with our Hexahedron handlers, and these people need some medical help, more than Lance can give, ASAP,” the captain ordered the pilot.
The pilot slightly turned his head, before acknowledging “Already on it, sir. Basecamp’s been radioed about what happened. They’ll debrief you on what’s coming next.”
Vernion laid back, sighed, and closed his eyes, hoping to get some rest before the nightmares of the faces he just fought with come back to haunt him.

It was a really fun first match ever! It was late at night, and I was really tired, so I only grabbed a couple screenshots. Sorry. 🙁