The Battle of Beckenthorpe – part 2 – a prelude battle report –

No one really knows what will happen or how they’ll behave or react in battle. When blood starts to flow even the toughest of warriors can shake in their skins…

For those of you that read the Battle report I post a couple of weeks ago you may remember that  the four warbands had fought wildly. They had been successful in ridding the village of undead but had then turned on each other. One Warband, The Scrappers, had been totally annihilated and others had been seriously depleted in numbers. A stalemate had been reached.

Little did the warbands know that, only a few clicks away, another battle was taking place simultaneously. This battle would determine the fate of all the surviving warbands.

An encampment of three Cadian squads (white, blue and yellow) from the Mighty 77th bustled around preparing for their advance on Beckenthorpe the next day. Their orders were to “cleanse” the village of all life for re-habitation. The atmosphere was positive as it always was before battle. With two tanks and a troop carrier with them they felt confident. Maybe that’s why their guard was down. They weren’t expecting an attack to come at them at all.

The Sniper, a well respected hero of the company, spotted a Blood warrior scout watching the camp. He took a shot and winged the lone  warrior.

Then an assault came swift and hard from the camps eastern flank. A guttural, animalistic, roar went up from behind some hillocks. Then eight fearsome blood drenched World Eaters, including the scout, jetttisoned over the hills to land at the Cadians defences. The well trained guardsmen reacted quickly taking up their battle positions.

A few nervous shots from the Cadians went well over the worlds eaters heads before they swung hard and savagely with their chainaxes and chainswords. They tore flesh from bone with ease and extinguished several of the guard grunts. Other blood warriors tried to attack one of the tanks but they failed to inflict any damage at all. The Cadian grunts made a “tactical retreat” as their army issue underwear filled with their digested army issue rations. The world eaters laughed menacingly.

Then the Cadian tanks canon started to fire and the Eaters Champion, Rake, and a blood Rampager went down. Killed off so easily. The sudden death of Rake was a shock as he certainly talked the talk and looked so cool.

More fire came from the same tank and the fearless, iconic Kharn took a direct hit to the chest that three him a good ten metres back where he crumpled to his death. Needless to say this was even more shocking than when the champion fell. Kharn hadn’t inflicted anything on anyone and here he was dead in a pool of his own blood.

The only good that came from his death was a determination from  his followers that they would spill blood in his honour.

The world eaters pushed forward and took out more Cadians who had cornered themselves up against a ruined wall. The attack went well including inflicting significant damage on one of the tanks but then all but one of the attackers with jet packs were slaughtered by guardsmen and their bayonettes.

Another chaos champion had leapt into the troop carrier truck and cut down all three Cadians with ease with his axe and short sword. He laughed like a wild man the whole time and then bathed in their blood. The Cadian tank took aim on the truck and the first shot destroyed the vehicle but the blood Champion was still standing. A second shot blew him to smitherines!!

The world eaters Warband had already lost so many. Their swift assault had turned into a bloodbath on their side.

A ramapager made a slow advance on the camp along with Chaplain Viktus. The second tank saw their approach and fired a volley of shells at them but all missed or were deflected by the Rampagers shield. Other blood warriors slowly started to advance too. They knew they would not win this fight but they would do their best to make a dent in the 77th or die trying.

Shots from, the now quietly confident guardsmen, rang out and more chaos warriors fell, including the Chaplain. The Rampagers by his side attacked a tanks and tore it open with his chainsword then sliced the crew into little bits.

He then bounded into a group of guardsmen. His confidence was high and he knew there would be blood but alas he was cut down by a single guardsman and his bayonette.

Three Rampagers went after the other tank and inflicted a lot of damage before the tank pulled away and fired at them. After half a dozen misses the tank finally took out all three warriors.

The last couple of Rampagers charged forward and one managed to take out the last tank with his chainaxe. It wasn’t long though before all the warriors were shot dead.

The surviving guardsmen regrouped with Commander Jefferson.

“We learnt something today men. We learnt that we should never ever let our guard down. Even with the might and power of tanks at our side we must never be too confident. Death is around every corner so we must always, always be ready to fight it head on. Private Goldsmith, contact HQ, we will need reinforcements before we take the town of Beckenthorpe.”