The Great Crusade Phase 1 The Conquest of the Solar System
January 3 year 1
The Crusade fleets of the Dark Angels, Imperial Fists and Blood Angels break orbit heading for Mercury escorting the combined Troops transports loaded with the Dark Angels Legion. The Emperor had predicted that Mercury would put up one of the stiffer fights and it was expected that their fleet would be reinforced by the Despot of Venus. As the fleet departed the planetary defenses where placed on full alert in case of an attack by Mars or Titan upon Earth.
Planetary Sensor arrays tracked the Venusians fleet en route to Mercury. Shortly after the Crusade fleets departed all of the Mercurian fleet except for their strike cruiser launched on an intercept course. But halted about 30 million km from Mercury later analysis suggests that this was to bring the Imperial fleets into range of all of the Mercurian missiles at about the same time.
The approaching Imperial fleet reached missile range of the Mercurian fleet and ordered the Missile boats Broadsword, Longsword and Claymore to flush their Box launchers at the Mercurians and the Three Battleships each launched a salvo engaging 12 of the 13 Mercurian ships the missiles impact seemingly opposed only by point blank weapon fire. 2 destroyers and a cruiser explode, one of the Battlecruisers is streaming atmosphere as are 2 of the destroyers and the surviving cruiser.
The Missile boat Rapier is tasked to engage the cruiser and battlecruisers while the battleships target each of the surviving destroyers with 2 salvo’s. The Cruiser is destroyed , both battlecruisers stream atmosphere and slow, and two of the destroyers slow start streaming atmosphere and one of them shuts down its active sensors.
The Battleships target further missile salvo’s on the destroyers , it is becoming apparent that more of the Box launchers should have been fired at the start of the battle however no Mercurian return fire has been detected yet .
The missiles impact on the destroyers, leaving three intact with only 2 possessing active sensors.
Shortly after the missiles impact incoming missiles presumably from the surviving destroyers arrive in paired salvo’s of 7 size 4 missiles , antimissiles are launched .A small number of missiles manage to penetrate the antimissile fire roughly one every 2 salvo’s but there are easily destroyed by the massed Gauss cannon fire of the fleet. Post battle analysis indicates that these where actually missiles fired by the Venusian cruiser which had sneaked into missile range then fled before it was fired upon, as the last of these missiles arrives salvo’s of 7 size missiles from the one surviving destroyer with working fire control started to arrive. The Mercurians had not been able to synchronize the missiles of the destroyers with those from the strike cruiser as the destroyers had fired early in an attempt to get their missiles off before they where destroyed .None of the Venusian or Mercurian destroyer missiles score a hit upon the Crusade fleets although over 600 Dagger antimissiles where expended .
12 minutes later the missile salvo’s from the strike cruiser begin to arrive in salvo’s of fifteen. Again all are shot down with no hits by now the fleet has expended 1300 Dagger Antimissiles.
With the missile assault over and the 2 mercurian Battlecruisers still closing two of the imperial Battleships each launch 20 missiles at a battlecruiser both of them emerge from the explosions intact although slowed further. The third battleship puts a salvo of 10 into each. Finally causing both to explode.
The Surviving Mercurian destroyers in the path of the crusading fleet , crippled too much to outrun it and without any remaining missiles abandon ship and hope to be rescued. The Crusade fleet ignores the lifepods planning to pick them up after dropping the Dark Angels on Mercury.
At 31 Million km from Mercury the PDC’s missiles are detected these large salvo’s result in multiple leakers through the antimissile fire and busy work for the fleets Gauss cannon none of these missiles impact although 161 are shot down by Gauss cannon fire by this point the fleet averages about 60% of its counter missiles with several ships having fired all their missiles, survivors are picked up but nothing of value is learned from them.
By the 6th of January the Dark Angels Legion has begun its assault, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Chapters land outside of The People’s city and begin a conventional assault upon the fortifications demonstrating the advantages their enhanced Physique and power armour gives them against the less sophisticated defending militia. The first company of the 1st Chapter takes 33% losses breaking the center of the Mercurian Milita and drawing their attention upon themselves while the 4th Chapter combat drops onto the city behind the militia lines but the militia manage to withdraw in good order.
With the enemy forces out in the open the Troop transports begin a Plasma Lance bombardment of enemy troops to aid the Dark Angels assault combined with this support the outnumbered Dark Angels continue to force the enemy to retreat suffering light casualties in the process by the 11th of January the enemy forces are depleted but still outnumber the Dark Angels.
On the 11th Fleets from Titan, Venus and Mars are detected heading for Earth. The Crusade fleet is largely out of position but the Imperial Fists are detached to intercept the Venusian fleet.
The Martian and Titanian forces are engaged by the PDC’s on Earth the 5 destroyers from Mars are the first to come within range and are engaged by the Sepulcher class PDC’s. The 7 ships from Titan are next and the Partisan Missile bases target them with 7 salvo’s of 50 missiles holding back 50 missiles on one of the bases. The Heavy laser batteries of the Titanian ships allow the Flagship to survive and the last salvo of 50 missiles is launched against it , this time no warships survive.
The Dark Angels and Imperial Fist crusade fleets return to Earth load the Blood Angels chapter and then head for Venus. The fighting on Mercury continues despites suffering losses the Dark Angels overrun several Mercurian Battalions and destroy them leaving the defenders badly weakened. Over the following 5 days another 3 Mercurian Battalions are destroyed and their forces pull back to their last bastions.
On Venus the Blood Angels drop and begin their assault the going as slow with the Despots guards putting up a stubborn fight defending the palace against the Blood Angels. The fighting on both Mercury and Venus continues into Febuary although the situation on the ground seems sufficiently secure that all three crusade fleets and the troop transports are able to return to Earth to load the Imperial fists for an assault on Mars.
Unlike Venus and Mercury the Martian PDC’s are known to be armed with Meson cannon making them very dangerous to an assault landing as unlike the missile defenses of the other worlds they cannot be blocked by Gauss cannon fire, so reluctantly the Emperor has decreed that before the assault all 4 PDC’s must be neutralized by missile fire. The Three Battleships and the last Broadsword with a full missile load launch a total of 240 missiles at Mars , 210 of these impact on the 4 PDC’s destroying them utterly and raising the level of radiation in the atmosphere to unacceptable levels. The fleets return to Earth load the Imperial fists and return to Mars to drop them in an assault .
On Mercury the defenders are crumbling with the destruction of the planetary defense Divisional HQ and several other battalions although the defenders are also able to destroy the 1st company of the 1st Dark Angels chapter.
On Venus the stubborn defenders are being ground down.
On Mars despite initial losses the Imperial fists are gaining the upper hand on the Martians.
Fighting continues and the desperately outnumbered Venusians actually manage to destroy a company of the Blood Angels.
Finally the Venusians surrender on the 4th of April having destroyed 1 Company of Blood Angels(Marine Battalion). From them we have recovered improved Jump Engine technology proof that they had been dabbling with the warp, Superior lasers and a mobile terraforming unit.
On th 9th of April the Mercurian defenders are destroyed although passive resistance continues and the fleet starts to transport elements of the Imperial guard to join the garrison . Five companies of the Blood Angels where lost (2 Heavy assault Battalions, 2 Assault infantry Battalions and a Marine Battalion)
On the 20th April Mercury surrenders providing Railgun technology and Fighter engines which is what the Adeptus Mechanicus was currently researching.
The transport fleet picks up the 1st Chapter of the Blood Angels and some Imperial guard forces to reinforce the Imperial fists on Mars. The fighting there continues and the Imperial fists have suffered significant casualties but given the existing environmental damage Patriarch Dorn is unwilling to allow a lance bombardment of the defenders the reinforcements do the trick and the Martians surrender on the 22nd of May having destroyed 8 companies of the Imperial Fists from them we have gained Meson weapon technology, Sorium Harvesters Tokomak reactors and Internal confinement drives .
