System Uruq

It turns out that Uruq was an Agri-world. They produced food that was transported to two systems that had Hive worlds. The interruption supplies from Uruq would have had a devastating effect on theses two systems, we were talking about billions starving to death.

Space battle

As we were making our way in system we started seeing a lot of chatter on the comms. It took us a while to get relevant information but we were now able to make sense of what was happening. IOM fleet was contesting the planet against Dark Eldar. Both the Fleets were manoeuvring while taking pot shots at each other. There was already quite a few of the Dark Eldar that had already landed on the planet as we could hear calls for reinforcement coming from the planet. Currently the Imperial Navy was out numbered and out classed as the Fleet configuration was:

Imperial Fleet

4 Light Cruisers

12 Escort Ships

4 Transport Ships

Dark Eldar

1 Battle Ship

6 Cruisers Ship

14 Escort Ship

There was no the Imperial Navy was going to be able to win if they fought. We would have to intervene quickly if we hoped to win otherwise we would have to retreat. If we were to fight at all I wanted to make sure the Imperial Navy would follow my command. Making sure our communication is not picked up by the Dark Eldars would be crucial. We started speaking to the Imperial navy High Senior officers. It took a while to hammer out a Plan and get them to agree to follow it under my command.

The plan was for a battle to be fought near the asteroid belts. The Imperial Navy would make a fighting retreat towards this position. It would take them 2-3 days to carry this out. While they did so we would prepare the coming battle space. We would heavily mine the area and leave stealth weapon platforms among the asteroids. There would be heavy use of ECM to try and confuse/ delay their response(fog of war). We would also deploy the Sun Spears via boarding torpedo's and Thunderhawk's that will be pre deployed.

Once the Dark Eldar ships were in the kill zone we would open up with Heavy fire concentrated on the Escort Ships and Cruisers. We wanted to destroy or heavily damage them so that the Xenos had to retreat. Hitting the Battle ship might first was ruled out as in order to achieve heavy damage with the weapons we had it would take too long.

After the initial volley the Fleet would concentrate on the Battle ship while the deployed weapons platform focused on the rest of the enemy Ships. We would also try and board the cruisers where possible. Mainly the goal was to heavily damage the enemy fleet and make them retreat.

1 Hour Before the Battle

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We have deployed all the weapon platforms and mines. 6 squads (60) of Sun spears are deployed in 12 Thunder hawks (5 Sun spears on each) waiting for any opening to board the enemy ships. the rest of the 10 squads will be deployed via boarding torpedo's. I and the rest will be overseeing the fighting on the ship and prepare to counter any enemy boarders.

We have also planted bombs in the asteroids so that we can use them as scatter cannons by blowing up the asteroids in pre arranged cones. Everything that could be done has been done and so far the Dark Eldars have not detected us or the ambush. During the fighting retreat 3 of the Imperial Escort ships have been blown up and there is heavy/medium damage on most of the other ships.

Fleet Battle

As the Imperial fleet passed the mined zone and the Dark Eldars had entered the kill zones the mines and weapon platforms were activated. All the ships lying in ambush also realised their weapons in a single burst. The Imperial Navy also rolled around to face the enemy and started trading weapon fire.

The initial volley fire had total surprise and we manged to break 5 Escort ships and 2 cruisers. These ships were considered dead as the engine was dead and no weapon were firing. The other enemy ships did not come out unscathed they all had various damages. After the initial volley the ECM weapons were starting to make themselves know. Heavy jamming was occurring all over this space. This was the perfect time to blast the asteroids. The space the fighting was taking place in suddenly changed drastically right when the enemy ships were being jammed. The enemy ships were again getting damaged by either ramming into the rocks or being rammed by these rocks while they tried to avoid them.

The 12 thunder hawks were assigned to 2 enemy cruisers while the Boarding torpedo's were aimed at 5 of the enemy escort ships. That left the surviving weapon platform and the mines to be aimed towards 2 enemy Cruisers and 4 escort ships.

While this was ongoing the rest of our ships started pounding on the Battle ship. The Imperial Ships had turned around and had joined us in firing on the Battle Ship. We could see the Battle ships shiels flickering but were not going out. In return when ever the Battle ship fired one of our ships would burn. The escort ships were acting like shield for the cruisers just so that the cruisers could counter attack. From our fleet we had already lost 6 more escort (4 Imperial and 2 Sun Spear Frigates) ship and 1 Cruiser (Imperial).

As the ships duked it out finally the boarded enemy ships started going silent or blowing up. Now the Dark Eldar only had 1 Battle Ship, 2 Cruiser and 4 Escort left. There were still 9 thunder hawk that were boarding the 1 of the remaining cruiser and 2 of the Escorts.

The enemy fleet had started retreating with the Battle ship acting as the rear, blocking us from causing further damage while also attacking our fleet and causing further damage. we manged to take out a few more ships due to the boarding action by the Sun Spears. The Enemy fleet that left was 1 Battle Ship, 1 Cruiser and 3 Escort.

Aftermath

The Battle had been won if that could be said. Currently our fleet looked like

Imperial Fleet

2 Light Cruisers left both heavily damaged

4 Escort Ships left all heavily damaged

4 Transport Ships (did not take part in the battle)

Sun Spears

1 Cruiser Medium damage

5 Frigates Heavy damage

Space Mariner (Sun Spears chapter): 2 Company= 154 active, 26 Dead (23 Sun Spears dead in this battle).

Guards Men: 24,000 active (15,000 dead)

Dark Eldar Salvaged

2 cruisers Heavy damage

6 Escort Ship Heavy damage

Now we had to clear out the left over mines/weapon platforms and collect all the escape pods. I have tasked 4 escort ships to carry this out while the rest of the ships move toward the planet. We are also making sure we keep an eye on the enemy fleet as they retreat just in case they try something. This battle has seen the most damage and also the most gain. If we are able to repair the salvaged ships and requisition additional ships from the Imperial navy, our fleet was going to double in size.

It took us a few days to get near the planet while carrying out repairs. The next Phase would be the land Battle.