Last time on
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A Matter of Honour – Act 1 – Reconnaissance
05. AN INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. SIGNS OF RECENT FIGHTING ARE EVIDENT BUT ALL IS CURRENTLY QUIET. URSA MINER TROOPS PATROL THE AREA. CRATES AND BARRELS HAVE BEEN MADE INTO IMPROVISED BARRICADES IN AMONG THE INDUSTRIAL VEHICLES AND BUILDINGS. INQUISITOR VERHOEVEN AND A HAND PICKED SELECTION FROM HIS RETINUE OBSERVE THE SCENE FROM CONCEALMENT.
INQUISITOR VERHOEVEN
These are the facts: Battlefleet Obscurus plasma warheads will obliterate everything on this continent within three planetary rotations. We must prevent this. Security in the sub-sector will be impossible to maintain if the Imperium engages fully with the Brotherhood. The intel to be gathered here is the only means of averting system wide conflict. It must be acquired no matter the cost.
ASTROPATH
The psi-crypted signals are close, they are somewhere in that compound. I cannot be more specific. The Miners jamming equipment is effective.
ROSA “GRAVEDIGGER” STONE
Ursa Miner tech is as impressive as any in the sector. Only by the Emperors grace have we been lucky enough to make it this far undetec…
A SMALL REMOTE DRONE HOVERS INTO VIEW BEHIND THE RETINUE. STONE BLASTS THE UNIT WITH A HIP SHOT FROM HER PAIR OF HEAVILY CUSTOMISED PISTOLS. THE RETINUE MEMBERS EXCHANGE GLANCES.
EFFECT: A klaxon sounds in the compound. Ursa Miner troopers rapidly redeploy.
VERHOEVEN adjusts settings on side arm and power glove.
EFFECT: An escalating whine of power build up emanates from Verhoevens sidearm.
EFFECT:A throbbing glow pulsates from Verhoevens power glove
VERHOEVEN
We do this the hard way…
(Go to commercial break)
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PB commanded Inquisitor Verhoeven, gunslinger Rosa “Gravedigger” Stone and Pat the Astropath (a non-com who had been brought along as a sort of psychic divining rod to help trace the psi-encrypted data).
I commanded traitor (or are they…?) Ursa Miner Steel Warriors led by an unknown Squat engineer.
The terrain that we used needs some work to bring it to a standard that I am happy with, but it was passable, The urban barricades that I put together in 2001 are perfectly fine and the urban Zuzzy mat (in its first proper outing) looks good with terrain on it. The old black buildings were originally made in 1990 and have seen a lot of action, so they are a bit rough around the edges, literally and figuratively. They do have sentimental value though and many toy soldiers have been lead to their miniature deaths by both PB and myself in and around those buildings, so I cant bring my self to retire them just yet, possibly ever.
The large, green, silos really need to get a little bit of weathering or other detailing before they hit the table again, but for our purposes they were acceptable as industrial storage scenery. The table remains the least visually attractive of those played over during the campaign though. A few more buildings and vehicles will sort that out at a later stage. Urban sci-fi terrain is going to be a 2014 (2015 maybe?) project but for now, this stuff will do.
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The (rather spartan) industrial battlefield.
Verhoeven, Digger and (Astro) Pat deploy in the South West.
The Ursa Miner engineer deploys in the North East alongside a UM trooper. The remaining troopers are responding to the alarm that has sounded and have yet to arrive.
The Imperials head toward the sources of the psi-encryption…
…while the UM troopers deploy to counter the threat.
A firefight erupts while Rosa searches the building (bottom right).
Psychic dominance.
In a display of bravery usually reserved for those with more robust constitutions the Astropath crept off on a solo mission to the North West. A David Blaine level of power – a pocket watch and repetition of “You are getting very sleepy…” – should not be enough to counter a highly trained, mentally disciplined squat armed with a hailstorm rifle…but it is.
With the Ursa Miner firmly believing that his enemies are his friends and vice versa he slaps Pat on the back and wanders off to kill his buddies, leaving the Astropath to investigate the other psy-encryption source.
“Im investigatin’!”
Verhoeven pulls back from the increasing volume of firepower, taking cover near a red barrel…
Spotting an opportunity too good to miss the UM Engineer detonates the barrel with a blast from his hi-tech energy weapon, badly wounding Verhoeven.
A UM reinforcement trooper enters the battlefield only to immediately and unexpectedly (for him anyway) sent straight to astro-Valhalla by his hypnotised colleague.
A still smouldering Verhoeven returns to the firefight. Rosa takes out the approaching melta-weapon equipped UM trooper only to be shot and wounded by the UM engineer. The engineer then activates arcane technology built into his armour and disappears in a crackle of electricity…
…rematerialising behind the astropath and braining him with his power axe. The conflict hangs in the balance.
But the engineers impressive display of synchronised hi-tech brutality comes too late. Digger locates the source of the vital data – a data crystal held in the auto-collar of an Ursa Miner cyber-mastiff – and flees with Verhoeven.
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This game generated a lot of laughs, from unexpectedly efficient hypnosis to exploding barrels to teleporting close combat attacks: exactly the sort of Saturday night shenanigans that I expect to feature on an Inquisitors calendar. The scenarios also progressed the narrative arc a bit: Verhoeven now has information smuggled via cyber-mastiff from behind enemy lines to help him to come to grips with the strange behaviour of the normally honourable Ursa Miners.
Good fun all round with the card play generating amusing circumstances and sub-plots of their own.
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Next time on =][=nquisitor…
GRIPPING shanty town gunfights!
Filed under: Miniatures | Tagged: 2013, 40K, 40K Skirmish, 7TV, A Matter of Honour, Inquisition, Sci-fi |
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