So it can be hard to pull off a decent CSM novel that isn't repetitive. The Word Bearer trilogy has some potential for that - it had a 'self contained' story element and a larger, over-arcing plot (invloving the Necrons and taking the war to the Imperium in true Crusade fashion) and it had infighting. It also has what I call the 'false hope' theme. Basically you have the usual 'Imperium vs Chaos' story, mostly from the Chaos POV.. and you don't really know whether or not the Imperial forces will ultimately win or lose. Sometimes they do win and sometimes they lose bad. Letting the CSM protagonists stay villains and the reader cheering for the 'good guys' can create that sense of false hope, and leave the reader wondering who will really win. That's all you can really hope for, although the inclusion of aliens (necrons here) does put a twist on that - they can 'win' against one side but end up losing to the other, or vice versa.
The Word Bearers series is a bit of a hit and miss. It makes its potential in some ways (really coming into its own in the third novel) but falls short in alot of other ways. It has the politicking and infighting (which is hit and miss) and it has that 'false hope' in a number of novels. It even has that 'showcase' aspect where you are introduced to various aspects of the 40K universe (Tyranids, Dark Eldar, etc.).. but those are the high points, and they tend to be interspersed with alot of boring, repetitive bits of just how killtatsic CSM can be. Dark Apostle is particularily plagued by this. AFter reading for the sixth time how the MIGHTY word bearers have slaughtered huge numbers of IG, you start to get bored, and it even starts to undermine that 'false hope' aspect. The book picks up towards the end, but the slogging through the battle tends to wear you down to the point you want it to be OVER and just move on.
Still as the start of the series it tends to be one of the weakest of the three. It's not a GREAT series, but its not horrible either. Might be something if you like CSM and can pick it up cheap.
The first book will be split into 3 parts, posted all at once.
Page 15-16
Minimum height of a Strike cruiser. This is just one chamber, but it suggests a minimum length of a kilometre. Minimum length of the Strike cruiser.The arena of worship, located deep within the heart of the strike cruiser Infidus Diabolus, was large enough to allow the recently swollen ranks of the entire Host to stand in attendance. Its curved ceiling stretched impossibly high, and immense skeletal ribbed supports met hundreds of metres above.
...
The processional corridor that ran down the middle of the nave remained clear as the cavaedium filled. Almost half a kilometre long and laid with black, immaculate carpet consecrated in the blood of thousand...
Page 17
Size of a Word Bearers Host.Almost two thousand warriors of the Word Bearers stood in absolute silence, and Kol Badar stalked back and forth along their ranks.
Two thousand was a particularly large number of warrior-brothers for a single Host. The ranks of the Host had swollen a century past, when the warriors of another
Dark Apostle had been amalgamated into its ranks after their holy leader had been slain in battle.
...
When, and if, the First Acolyte became worthy of the title of Dark Apostle, then Jarulek would split the Host once more into two.
Page 22
fist sized hole blown through a heavy lock via a shotgun. Probably a slug. Should be able to do easily the same to a human head.Lieutenant Varnus levelled and fired his combat issue shotgun at the heavy locking mechanism of the rusted door. The sound of the weapon echoed deafeningly, and a fist-sized hole was punched through the metal.
If we assumed a laser was doing this (remember lasgun have effect similar to a bullet or 'small shell' and a single pulse, we might be talking 100-150 kj. Powerful, but not very penetrative, and easily stopped by anything getting in the way (laser equivalent of a shotgun, in fact. Which is how some lasguns work)
Page 23
Autopistols stopped by Enforcer carapace, and shotgun blows head apart. Again lasgun could probably do similar damage (high single or low double digit kj?)The other raised an autopistol, face twisted in hatred, and raking fire spat from the end of the stub-nosed weapon. Varnus’s shotgun barked, even as the bullets from the pistol ripped across his chest, and the man’s head exploded in a splatter of gore.
Varnus fell back from the impact of the projectiles on his carapace armour.
Page 46
Looking up through the transparent dome-top, he could see the mighty walls of the bastion fortress, beyond which stood the palace proper. Those walls were
immensely thick, some fifteen metres worth of reinforced plascrete. He could see half a dozen massive turrets, huge batteries of heavy calibre cannon pointing towards theheavens.
Arbites fortress precinct.
Page 46
Plasma reactors powering the city.It was a city within a city. And built far beneath all of this were the giant plasma reactors that powered all of Shinar.
Page 53
Important later, but sets an upper limit on timeframe..."Such a conjunction will occur in less than three months time."
Page 56
3 autopistol rounds explode skull. Laspistol could probably do the same, although the weapon was described as 'large'.The autopistol barked loudly. Three rounds punched through Flenske’s forehead and the back of his head exploded. His body was thrown backwards to the ground as his chair overturned beneath him.
Page 61
PDF troop and vehicle losses so farThe estimate was somewhere in the realm of fifteen thousand enemy troops slain, and around five hundred tanks, aircraft and support vehicles destroyed.
Page 62
Tens of thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks/armoured units. Also may imply the firing range is 'on the horizon' but its not definite.The night was lit up as thousands of weapons fired, and Kol Badar could see the immense enemy bulwark stretching from horizon to horizon. Tens of thousands of uniformed PDF troopers stood along the defensive line, and hundreds of tanks and armoured units added cannon fire to the barrage.
Page 73
Plasma reactors go dead. City without power, including air defenses. 'fifty block radius' implies the city is perhaps 10 km in radius (assuming a ~200 m block)The lights of the entire palace turned off as the potent plasma reactors beneath it went dead. A fifty-block radius around the palace went black instantly, swiftly followed by the rest of the city
Page 79
Laslock. Slow rof, but it carries alot of kinetic impact but little explosive effect (The marine still has a hand). The slow ROF makes them sort of bolt action rifles (again like Krieger guns), but it also suggests they are trading off rate of fire for increased firepower, which some lasweapons do in fact do.A blast from a lasrifle struck Marduk’s helmet, and his head was jerked to the side. Snarling, he turned to face the attacker that had dared to shoot him.
Varnus swore as he waited for the las-lock to re-power. Though they fired powerful single bursts of energy, the weapons were painfully slow between firing.
...
Varnus was in no way a small man, but he barely came halfway up the beast’s chest. With a hum, the las-lock re-powered and he fired again at the huge Chaos Space Marine. The shot was taken in haste and was not on target. Nevertheless, it struck the beast in his wrist, and his accursed bolt pistol dropped from his hands.
Page 82
Bolt pistol headsplosion.Marduk raised his bolt pistol and shot the man in the face. Pieces of skull, brain matter and blood splattered over the remaining kneeling cultists.
Page 91
Word Bearers artillery. We dont kno whow many vehicles it is.Varnus had watched as an area somewhere in the region of a hundred city blocks was levelled by heavy siege ordnance. In a short flurry of brutal devastation, hundreds of buildings had been demolished with ground shaking force. Dust had rushed across the landscape for hundreds of kilometres all around, Varnus guessed.
Page 91
Chaos medical care.His hands had bled, and chirurgeons moving through the lines of chained Imperials had sprayed them with a dark, synthetic coating, stemming the
bleeding, but not the pain.
Page 92
Scale and complexity of the Industry the Word Bearers are establishing.Monstrous, polluting factories, foundries and forges were constructed, vast, vile places filled with acrid black smoke, heat and the screams of those being “encouraged” by the overseers and their needle hands. Titanic vats of superheated, molten rock were fed with the rubble of the demolished buildings, and what looked like bricks, though bricks on an insanely large scale, were being created in gigantic, black, metal moulds.
...
Other worker teams were busy in the centre of the vast open space that had been cleared, working with smoke-belching machinery, drilling down into the earth, creating a vast hole over a kilometre wide that sank lower into the planet’s crust with every passing day.
Page 95
Weeks past since the initial engagement and the crushing of all significant resistance. Also measures the approximate time of response of the Elysian/Admech force.For the past weeks he had been engaged against various PDF armies far from the city, ensuring that there was no military power upon the planet with the strength to
launch a counter-attack against the Word Bearers
Page 97
At least a population of 1.5 million across the planet. Probably much more than that.“I bring with me near to five hundred thousand additional slaves to aid in the construction.”
..
“He brought in well over a million slaves from his attacks against the cities in the north, you know,”
Page 103
Elysian forces deploying on planet.Bleary images flickered across the viewer of massed bulk carriers sinking slowly through the atmosphere of Tanakreg, with escorts of gunships flying in figure-of-eight patterns around them. It was hard to make out, but Havorn had seen scores of similar landings, and he could see exactly what was occurring in his mind’s eye.
Imperial Navy attack craft, a variety of interceptors, fighters and assault boats, would have swarmed from their launch bays aboard the twin Dictator Cruisers, the Vigilance and the Fortitude, like a cloud of angry insects. As the first of the mass transports detached from the cruisers and began sinking slowly through the atmosphere, it was these Imperial Navy craft that were its first line of defence.
As the atmosphere was broken, vast bay doors on the descending transports would retract, and flights of Valkyries would emerge like circling buzzards, descending towards the surface of the planet in advance of the wallowing mass transport ship. Thunderbolts and Lightning fighters would scream from the stilldescending transport to ensure air superiority. The Valkyries would sweep low over the ground and the first Elysians to step foot on the world would rappel swiftly from the gunships to secure the landing zone.
...
More troops would rappel to the surface and smaller, breakaway transports would detach from the massive bulk of the main ships on the descent, dropping in heavier
support to bolster the perimeter defences: rapidly moving Sentinel walkers and Chimera infantry transports bearing cargos of specialist Elysians. Havorn had no doubt that the landing was proceeding smoothly and as planned, and a glance at the data-slates being updated every few seconds with fresh information confirmed this. The perimeter had been established well within the usual expected time-frame, and Sentinels were already scouting beyond the landing zone, seeking out possible threats invisible from the air.
Page 105
Astartes durability.The Space Marines, were the most elite warriors of the Imperium, each genetically modified to become giants among men, perfect machines of death with bodies created to withstand wounds that would kill a lesser man ten times over.
Page 106
Two regiments of Elysians being involvedIt was just that Havorn knew that this world must be of some hidden importance for the 133rd and the 72nd, in their entireties, to have been drawn off from the Ghandas Crusade to retake it: important, but not important enough, it seemed, to have drawn one of the loyalist Space Marine Chapters to the world.
PAge 106
PDF forces on Tanakreg.The Planetary Defence Forces had been overwhelmed contemptuously quickly, a fighting force of two hundred thousand soldiers, defeated within days by a force that could not have been more than three thousand.
Page 116-117
more evidence, if we needed it, that in 40K rituals and belief can have power.He drew the four intersecting lines that formed the Chaos star in its most basic form across the Coryphaus’s brow with his thumb. The huge warrior then closed his yellow, hate-filled eyes, and Marduk placed a bloody thumb mark on each eyelid.
...
Over the course of the next hour, Jarulek slashed the throats of hundreds of slaves, their sacrifice offered up to the glory of the gods of Chaos..
...
He walked towards Marduk, and the Dark Apostle raised the First Acolyte’s head with gentle pressure under his chin. Jarulek drew the lines of the Chaos star upon Marduk’s forehead and placed his bloody thumbprints against the skin of his eyelids.
His skin burned where the blood was smeared, pulsing with energy and potency.
Opening his eyes, he saw that colours appeared more vivid than before, and he could clearly see a shimmering aura, the power of Chaos, surrounding the Dark Apostle like a ghostly, gossamer shroud. That power could always be felt when in Jarulek’s presence, but it was rarely seen.
Page 118
Astartes healing from (minor) cuts. The interesting thing is how readily the graft was accepted (not rejected) and grew into the skin as part of that healing effect. Of course these are CSM so the warp cant be ruled out either.Biting claws gripped the skin, holding it taught as the black robed figure sliced through Jarulek’s pale flesh, cutting a neat strip from first one cheek, then the other. Blood ran freely from the wounds, before its flow was staunched by the tainted cells within its make up.
...
Already the red-raw rectangles on his cheeks were healing. Within a day the skin would be smooth and unmarked: two small patches of pale skin amidst a sea of scripture.
...
...the skin of his left cheek was cut away by the chirurgeon.
Speaking a blessing, Jarulek placed the scripture carved from his own skin upon the wound. There was a tingling, painful sensation as the flesh of the Dark Apostle knitted to his own.
Page 119
STride length of Sentinels. Implied range of lascannon of perhaps a kilometre or two (at least?) , based on esitmated Astartes vision range vs human vision range.Clearing over three metres with each step, the walkers were making good progress.
...
He had no concern about being spotted. A mere human eye would be unable to pick him out at such a distance, and the rocky terrain and gale force winds would
make the crude sensors of the sentinels almost completely ineffective.
“Shall we gun the fools down?” asked Burias. “The havocs of the VI Coterie have lascannons trained on them.”
Page 124
Quik-E mass summoning of some sort of lesser flying daemonic creatures. Baiscally Marduk puts his hands on the guys head, speaks some daemon words or rituals (to probably draw the attention of a particular spirit to this mortal host and his soul connection to the warp) and the summoning appears. The daemon then summons his brethern, presumably in a similar manner. And voila 100 daemons.He could feel the power of the warp opening up, its strength pulsing through his hands into the boiling brain of the man beneath him, but Karalos made not a sound, silently welcoming the beast that was emerging within his flesh.
...
“Karalos is no more,” spoke Marduk. “He gave up his mortal vessel selflessly that this katharte might come into existence.”
...
“Well,” said Marduk to the daemon clawing at the floor in front of him, licking itself with a long, barbed tongue, “call the flock.” The men in the room fell to the ground as one, blood running from their eyes and ears, and they began to convulse.
Page 125-126
Discussion of Elysian tactics and leadership.“It’s the job of the other regiments to grind mindlessly up the centre. We are the elite, fast in and fast out.”
...
“But you know what I mean, sir. We don’t have the sheer number of men or tanks to fight a conventional frontal assault, not against this enemy.”
“Who said we would be fighting a conventional frontal assault? The brigadier general is not a damn fool.”
“I know that he is not, sir, but… I still don’t know why we didn’t just drop on Shinar and have this whole thing over with as soon as possible.”
“We do that and the entire damn regiment would be slaughtered. The air defences of Shinar are strong. Don’t be thickheaded, Elias.”
...
"We must secure those highlands. The brigadier-general says the enemy may be up there already. If that’s the case, then without artillery support to make the bastards keep their heads down, we will be weathering the storm trying to land. If they are up there, it is not going to be easy to take it off them.”
Page 127-128
From others came more of the pale fleshed tech-guard soldiers, marching in perfect, rectangular phalanx blocks, ten deep and a hundred wide.
From a distance, they might have been mistaken for regular Imperial Guard infantry platoons, though an observant onlooker would see that they were far too still to be completely human. They stood in serried ranks with lasguns held motionless over their chests, and many of their faces were all but obscured by deep visored helmets.
On closer inspection, many of the tech-guard soldiers looked less like Imperial Guardsmen and more like semi-mechanical servitors.
Servitors existed in every facet of Imperial life, fulfilling all manner of menial, dangerous tasks, but to see so many of them gathered together in one place for the sole purpose of war was highly disturbing to the Elysians. Servitors were neither truly alive nor truly dead. They had been human once, but all vestiges of that humanity had been long lost. Their frontal lobes had been surgically removed and their weak flesh improved upon with the addition of mechanics. These varied depending on the task that they were required to perform. They might have had their arms removed and replaced with power lifters or diamond-tipped drills the size of a man’s leg to work in one of the millions of manufactorums across the Imperium, or
be hard-wired into the logic engines of battle cruisers to maintain the ships’ support functions.
The tech-guard soldiers arrayed upon the plains were created specifically for the arena of war. Amputated arms had been replaced with heavy weaponry, and targeting sensors and arrays filled the sockets where fleshy eyeballs had been plucked. Power generators were built onto the shoulders of some, and they stood immobile beside gun-servitors, cables and wiring trailing between the pair. Others had single, large servo-arms replacing one or more of their removed limbs, giving them an ungainly, limping gait as servos straggled under the weight. These mechanical arms were as easily capable of ripping a man’s head from his shoulders as lifting heavy equipment, and some bore oversized rotary blades or power drills that could cut or punch through the heaviest of armour.
Tech guard. We've seen a wide vareity and definition of 'tech guard' - level of augmentation and armament. Some are little more than partly cyborged humans while some are little more than battle servitors. These seem to be a bit of both perhaps.
Also note of the usage of servitors in the Imperium, including in industry and aboard starship.
Page 128-129
Support troops. I imagine these are the TEch Gaurd heavy weapons troopsAmongst the phalanxes were smaller contingents of heavier, tracked servitor units. The lower bodies of these servitors had been removed so that they had become one with their means of conveyance. These bore heavier payloads of ammunition that spooled into the large, multiple barrelled cannons that replaced the organic right arms of the servitors.
Page 129
The Ordinatus Minoris.In between the ranks of Martian foot soldiers were tracked crawlers, one for every phalanx. They were Ordinatus Minoris crawlers, and each was the length of three Leman Russ battle tanks. They had two, wide track units, one at the front and one at the rear, and between these was supported the mass of the war machine. Heavy girders and steel struts supported huge weapons, and each crawler had dozens of redrobed adepts and servitors as crew. Steel ladders rose to the control cabins that were offset from the main guns. Laron did not recognise the weapons that these behemoths of steel and bronze bore, but the massive, steaming couplings and humming generators upon their backs spoke of immense contained power.
Page 129-130
An Ordinatus platform.It rolled forward on what must have been sixteen tracked crawler units, led by a stream of tech-priests. The size of the smaller tracked crawlers were rendered insignificant next to the immense vastness of the Ordinatus machine.
It was the size of a city block and was protected with thick layers of armoured plating. More than ten storeys of platforms rose up around the massive central
weapon that the Ordinatus supported, a weapon the size of a small cruiser that ran down the entire length of the immense machine. Criss-crossing lattice works of steel supported gantries running around the circumference of the weapon, and a pair of quad-barrelled anti-aircraft guns rotated atop the control cabin above the highest deck level. Giant, claw-like, spiked arms were held aloft on either side of the Ordinatus, and Laron guessed that the huge piston engines behind them would drive them into the ground when the Ordinatus was readying to fire, to give the machine additional stability. That a thing that size needed stabilising legs was testament to the awesome power that it could unleash.
Page 135-136
Daemonic AAA defense.The night was lit up with hundreds of lancing beams of lascannons and super-heated streams of plasma. Flames coughed from the barrels of autocannons, and fast burning missiles hissed across the sky, leaving spirals of smoke in their wake.
...
Massive, eight-legged daemon engines strained at the chained restraints locking them in place, each infernal machine overseen by a dozen attendants. They roared
into the night sky, metallic tendons bulging, and blazing comets of deep red fire burst from the daemonic hell-cannons built into their carapaces, screaming up towards the Imperial aircraft as they strafed in once more.
...
Lascannons speared up through the darkness. Flames burst over one of the lowflying Imperial fighters as a wing was shorn off...
...
The cover of night did nothing to hamper the warriorbrothers of the Legion, nor the daemons that infused their deadly war machines. The darkness was pierced equally well, whether it was due to genetic modification and acute auto-senses or daemonic witch sight.
Page 136
Power armour targeters and zoom function. also the Elysians deploying.While the enemy occupied Marduk’s forces, holding the high ground with strafing runs and bombing attacks, other aircraft had hovered briefly beyond the range of the Word Bearer’s fire and disgorged their human cargoes. With his targeters at full zoom, Marduk had seen the Guardsmen rappel from these hovering aircraft, disembarking onto the rough ground.
Page 136
Scope of the Elysian deployment. Might imply many thousands, tens of thousands of troops.Doubtless, hundreds of similar aircraft had dropped their cargoes of Guardsmen all along the rough ground behind the ridges occupied by his warriors, and were even now climbing up.
Page 139-140
Marauder bomber. Covers ~3 km in a matter of seconds (duration of conversations) and the fact you can use nav screens to navigate by instead of human eyesight, especially at night.Bryant merely laughed. “Thirteen five to target.”
The navigatius operator leant up against the side window of the cockpit and whistled in awe. “Damn, I’m glad I’m not down there in that mess. I haven’t seen a firefight like this since Khavoris IV, and the Guard units there suffered something like eighty percent casualties. The whole mountain range is lit up.”
“It happens in times of war, Bryant,” said Pyrshank. “I can’t see a damned thing out here.”
“Just use the nav-screens. You don’t need to see a damn thing. Ten five to target.”
Page 141
Laspistol drills finger-wide hole in Marauder cockpit window. This confirms the diameter lasguns inflict on targets, but assuming half an inch to an inch thick of something anallgous to transparent aluminum armour (and assuming it has properties on the order of regular aluminum) we might figure at least ~5 kj per shot, going by Luke Campbell's Laser Deathray calculator (and assuming a lasweapon is an actual laser..)He saw motion behind him and turned his head to see Bryant, a laspistol in his hand. Before he could shout, the navigatius operator fired, and a neat hole was seared through the window and into the creature.
...
..Pyrshank saw that the horrifying creature had inserted a long, bloody talon into the neat hole.
Page 142
Marduk fires on free-falling Storm troopersHe looked up into the heavens to see hundreds of dark shapes dropping like stones. He raised his bolt pistol and began to fire.
Page 142
Number of drops the commander of the 72nd REgiment has made. I've heard osme argue that this is impossible or an exaggerated number (in trying to discount the whole scene), but no definition of waht a 'drop' qualifies as (practice included) Assuming 5-6 drops a day over a 20-25 year Guard career (not impossible for a long-career officer in charge of a regiment) they could easily cover that, especially if one factors in practice and training. Remember only 300 of those are actually 'in action'Forty-two thousand, nine hundred and twenty-seven drops, and over three hundred combat drops, the most of any Guardsman within the 72nd.
PAge 142-144
40 km drop assault. Valkyries have that altitude (or at least some designs do) given that Imperial armour 1 lists it as having a 13 km altitude. More than that, Boerl seems to think Marauders can't operate at that altitude even though IA1 says they have a ceiling of ~41 km. Perhaps they don't bomb at that altitude, but they can reach it. Moreover, space-capable Marauders can enter and exit the atmosphere at will, so they technically HAVE to altitude limit. Likely this reflects some difference in designs (engine types,e tc.)Colonel Boerl held his arms clasped tightly to his side as he plummeted through the darkness out of the storm clouds towards the flashes of gunfire marking the target
ridge below.
...
He and the other drop-troopers had launched themselves from their Valkyries at extreme high atmosphere, around forty kilometres above the ground, higher even than Marauder bombers operated when unleashing their deadly payloads. It was necessary to jump from such a height in order to avoid detection. Breathing through respirators, their bodies enclosed in tight-fitting jumpsuits beneath their reinforced carapace armour, the storm troopers had been free-falling for well over five minutes, reaching terminal velocity within the first thirty seconds of the drop, and leaving the cracking sounds of sonic booms in their wake as they hurtled towards the ground at phenomenal speed.
The ground was rising up with astounding swiftness and Boerl made ready. The arms of the grav-chute were automatically timed to unfold and engage at the last possible moment, and he watched the click counter in his visor drop as he neared the ground.
Pulling his arms out and splaying his legs suddenly, he slowed his descent fractionally and spun himself expertly in the air. The grav-chute engaged, barely five metres above the ground, and his descent dropped in an instant to a safe speed.
Also, grav chute operation. I don't put much stock in 'sonic booms' given that they mention free fall and reaching terminal velocity shortly. For a human plunging straight down with arms pulled to the side they can reach over a hundred m/s to 133 m/s or so. That fits with 40 km in ~5 minutes.
Technically the first link suggests faster speeds are possible, but we're still not reaching supersonic. Likely what is described is some sort of air displacement from a large mass passing through the air at great speeds (cars and trains can exhibit something to that effect without neccesarily breaking the sound barrier.)
Also within the last 5 metres (so within 1/20th of a second or so) the velocity of the chute reaches a managable speed (say a few m/s) to lose over over 100 m/s in under a second requires many tens or even hundreds of gravities of deceleration, which gives us an indicator of what suspensor/jump chutes can achieve (at least in extreme circumstances.) I would assume this is not routine, because they don't always drop this way (they didn't in Taros, for example.)
It does also show us what Imperial inertial damping/AG effects can achieve.
Page 144
As Imperial armour indicates, all Elysians seem to have micro-beads. Officer is wearing carapace and his respirator retracts automatically.The micro-bead in his ear confirmed this expectation and he made his commands, short and clipped, as he ordered the platoons to converge.
..
Tearing the respirator mask from his face, it retracted automatically into the chest unit of his carapace armour.
Page 145-146
hellgun shot penetrates weak point in joint of leg/knee armour and cripples marine. Marine bolt penetrates armour and kills stormie.A blast of las-fire struck his knee joint and Boerl heard a deep, rambling growl of anger as the Chaos Marine’s leg gave out beneath him. Swinging his bolt pistol around, the traitor fired and a storm trooper was killed instantly as the bolt-round exploded in his chest cavity.
...
..he surged forwards, slashing his shimmering blade across the warrior’s chest, cutting through ceramite easily and scoring a deep wound.
...
Frantically, he thrust with his power sword, the blade entering the warrior’s gut, sliding easily through his body and emerging from his back. Still the warrior continued to fight, and Boerl began to see stars before his eyes. He managed to raise his hellpistol, pushing it into the Chaos Marine’s neck, slipping it between armour plates, and he fired once, twice. Hot blood spurted from the wound, spraying Boerl’s face, his skin burning.
...
Still the warrior was not dead, and he raised his bolt pistol. Gathering as much strength as he could muster, Boerl swung his power sword into the warrior’s armoured head, the humming blade embedding deep in his skull. At last the warrior fell, the power sword slipping easily from the wound, blood spitting as it boiled on the superheated blade.
Also effort needed to kill a single Word bearer, even with a hellpistol and power sword. Note power sword is a distinctly thermal effect weapon.
Page 147
More word bearer durability.. despite losing leg it can still kill troops. Also note a storm trooper actually manages not to have his limb blown off by a bolt round. I guess they can mitigate Astartes fire even if only a bit.Boerl carved his power sword through the warrior’s leg as he barrelled past, neatly severing the limb at the thigh. Still the warrior did not drop its weapons,
despite the horrendous wound, and it fired as it fell, bolt-rounds thudding into the storm trooper beside Boerl, exploding his chest.
A shot smacked into Langer’s leg and he screamed in pain as he fell, his leg shattered.
Page 149
Kill ratio for Elysians vs Word bearers. with dozens of shots to drop one traitor with lasguns.. and 10:1.. that's actually damn impressive and makes some sense. (figure 2-4 shots per trooper to down the Bearer roughly.)Colonel Boerl was spared this fate as a platoon of Elysians swept into the area, las-fire pounding into the Chaos Marines. It took dozens of shots before any of the traitors fell, and they exacted a heavy toll on the Guardsmen, killing more than ten for each one of their own that succumbed to the weight of fire.
On the other hand if these are like IA elysians they have semi-automatic lasguns rather than fully automatic or burst fire, meaning they have a slower ROF. a squad with a higher ROF lasguns (or hell, storm troopers with hellguns) would probably do better. And hot shotted powerpacks should be able to do better.
Of course this depends on how many 'dozens'. at least 24 but probably fewer than 100. Of course if that's a squad's worth of fire it might also suggest these Elysians do in fact have burst/automatic fire on their weapons.
Also, if luck were on their side (HAH not likely when this is a Word Bearers novel) and if that rate of attrition could have been kept up, the Elysians could have demolished the Bearers on their own. Nevermind the Admech forces. Sadly, this won't be the case.
Page 149
5 km range on Elysian Microbeads.“Facing heavy resistance,” came Captain Laron’s voice through Boerl’s microbead.
The captain had led one of the other assaults, targeting an area some five kilometres away.
Page 154
Bad luck, and perhaps rather unusual - armoured marines usualyl don't have that kind of fine control and I've rarely if ever heard of powerclaws having it. Then again fi the melta charge's shaped blast had detonated sooner it might not have happened either.Gritting his teeth, he flicked the activation switch of the deadly melta-bomb and hurled it onto the armoured bulk of the machine. It struck a pitted and inscribed armoured shoulder plate above the heavy bolters that continued to roar, flames spitting from the barrels. It clanked loudly as it stuck fast, the powerful electro-magnets stuck fast to the metal.
...
..his heart sank as the Dreadnought picked the grenade off its armoured bulk and flicked it away with its surprisingly dextrous power claw.
Page 154-155
Implied ROF of dreadnought heavy bolter ' dozens' of bolts in a matter of seconds, and the barrage is neough to tear the carapace armoured colonel in half. Doesn't seem especially powerful in this caes.Boerl scrambled to his feet just as the Dreadnought swung its heavy bolters around to bear, and dozens of shots ripped through his armour. The Dreadnought continued to pump shot after shot into the colonel long after he was dead, keeping his body dancing in the air for a moment. Colonel Boerl’s body was finally torn completely in half, and it fell to the ground, bloody and unrecognizable.
Page 160-161
Wow a decent Commissar who seems to have a good working relationship with the general he's in charge of watching. I also can't help but think this is partly show to put some backbone into the officers.“I ought to have the lot of you executed on the spot, care of Commissar Kheler here,” he said gesturing to a black-clad officer behind him. Laron flicked a glance towards the commissar. The man returned his stare coldly.
“But I will not, as I find the 72nd has a sudden lack of officers,” said Havorn.
...
“I am assigning Commissar Kheler to keep watch over you. He has been a trusted advisor of mine for over a decade. His grasp of tactics and morale is strong. If there is ever a moment when it looks as if your arrogance or your pride are going to make you do something stupid that will get good men killed, the good commissar here will take steps to rectify the situation, with a bullet through your head."
At least he's not blamming the troops as if it were their fault.
Page 166
Some Skitarii are 'almost human'.Some amongst them were almost human, though even these were hard-wired into the weapon systems they bore, their brain stems augmented with mechanics and sensors.
Page 169-170
A white beam of unknown nature fires from the Mechanicum ranks, burning many human-sized slaves to ash in a microsecond (hundreds to thousands of megajoules easily, meaning hundreds of gigawatts to several terawatts total power.) and the Mechanicus tech guard open fire with all their weapons.A thick beam of white energy surged out of the gloom, cutting through the ranks of slaves. Their bodies burst into blue and white flames that rose fiercely, melting the chains binding the wretches to dripping liquid. A millisecond later, the flames all but died away, leaving piles of white ash in the shapes of the victims. A second later the morbid statues crumbled as they were trampled by the press of bodies that filled the sudden gap in the ranks.
As if the shot was the clarion call announcing the commencement of battle, the gloom was suddenly ripped apart as the guns of the Adeptus Mechanicus spoke. Blasts of plasma screamed through the air, massive rotating assault cannons upon the back of tracked units roared as they began to spin, and salvoes of hellfire missiles were launched.
The slaves surged through the inferno of death, hundreds of them slaughtered within the first second of the barrage.
...
A barking roar was unleashed as the Skitarii fired. Heavy bolters tore through the flesh of the slaves, and flashes from thousands of lasguns streaked through the rain...
Page 171-172
Shield servitors - the vanguard forces of the Skitarii army, designed to provide protection with some sort of large storm-shield like device (shield plus forcefield enhancement) to the troops behind. Which actually makes sense if you're going to be assaulting an enemy directly like this.The front rank of the foe consisted of heavily augmented servitor warriors with massive shields built into their mechanical arms. These shields shimmered with power as they deflected bolter shots, protecting them and those in the ranks behind. They advanced slowly step by lumbering step, a walking barricade, firing their lasguns through the slaves and into the advancing Word Bearers. The top right corner of each shield was cut down to allow the larger guns of those behind to fire.
...
The shield-servitors were slow and lumbering, though they took a lot of punishment before they stopped moving. Kol Badar saw several of them fighting on, even with limbs hacked off and bolt having removed parts of their skulls.
Page 172
Skitarii behind the shield servitors. the 'softer' and more human ones probably. Even though these 'soft' troops are vastly tougher and more heavily armed than a human they're still no match for Astartes. At least, these Skitarii aren't.These were softer targets. They had been augmented in lesser ways, not taking them fully down the path to becoming mindless servitors. Targeting sensors had replaced their left eyes, and the left halves of their heads were a mass of wiring and mechanics, but their bodies were easily torn apart by the bolter fire of the advancing Word Bearers.
...
At a distance, they would be dangerous foes, for many of them carried heavier armaments than a humble Guardsman would be able to bear, but up close they were slaughtered by the brute force and speed of the Word Bearers.
...
It mattered not to these elite killers that the enemy fought on after having sustained wounds that would drop a regular human.
Page 173
Oh dear.. chainsaw bayonets....punching the whirling chainblade that served as a bayonet upon his combi-bolter...
Page 173
HEavier combat servitors.. superior to the skitarrii guards.Heavily armoured servitors moved to the fore, stalking forwards between the ordered ranks of the lesser warriors...
...
Around the height of a regular Chaos Space Marine, these were heavily armoured in thick, dark, metal armour. The mechanics of their left arms ended in spinning cannons that roared as they pumped fire from their multiple barrels. Ammo-feeds smoked as fresh bullets were fed to the guns from heavy integrated backpacks.
Concentrated bursts from the weapons were carving through power armour...
...
He fired his combi-bolter, blasting the gun-arm from a warrior in a shower of sparks, but it kept coming at him swinging its other arm towards him in a murderous thrust as the drill-arm began to spin. Metallic tentacles attached to the Skitarii’s spinal column reached forwards to ensnare him....
Page 178
[/quote]Pilots and technicians hard-wired into the control room were built into the walls, their forms almost hidden amongst the mass of coiling pipes that engulfed them. Insulated wiring entered the fused hemispheres of their brains through eye sockets, nostrils and ears. They manipulated controls through cables that plugged into the remnants of flesh that remained of their mortal bodies, and from each fingertip spread a spider web of intricate cables, attaching them directly into the holy machine that they were a part of.
Darioq's flagship's crew. Not quite servitors, but not really human either.