I consider it to be the first (and really only) truly 'mil-scifi' series in 40K. Oh sure, 40K is full of 'war' stories, but they're not actually milscifi as actually defined. I mean Gaunts Ghosts is more in line with Sharpe, Cain with Blackadder/Flashman, etc. And Space Marine novels.. less said the better there as far as I think. But its not really.. military feeling. I mean seeing the term 'picatinny rails' (which for me has become the symbolic 'term' for this seris) in reference to lazer guns is a bit weird. Something you'd see in a baen novel, but not what you'd really expect in a 40K novel.
The Bastion Wars novels DO feel military... or at least an attempt at military. Which can be good and bad for different reasons. Zou I believe has military training (and I think experience, although I have no knoweldge of his history.) and the book reflects that. One of the good things is alot of the passages dealing with the impact of war on the enviorment and the people involved in it. Not just the military people either, but the civilians. There's an atmosphere to the books - the horror at having a peaceful life demolished by conflict, the horror of the death and devastation. And the horror of those people who have to fight against it no matter the cost. On the flip side of the coin, there is also cooperation in the face of adversity - people banding together to resist or help or otherwise make order out of the chaos of war.
He's also very light on the 'grimdark' - that isn't to say his writing doesn't have dark tones to it - war always does - but he doesn't really have an urge to lay it on the way some authors do, and that (for me) is always refreshing and welcoming.
On the other hand... this book is chock full of numbers, datapoints, and all that other military stuff, which only reinforces the 'baen' feel of the books. I'm sure there's going to be a 'ZOMG THE GIGATONS GUY DOESNT LIKE THE STATS' but there's a limit to everything. At some point stats and data become a distraction or bloat. Consider David Weber. I actually like the Honorverse novels (shocking huh) even though they're notorious for cramming far more numbers and superfluous details than they need. And that DOES detract massively from the book. Weber has always needed someone to rein in his need to explain politics, military, and other elements in excrutiating detail, and keep him focused on plot, as well as to pare down his numbers (which tend to spelled out in excrutiating detail, as if the editor demanded he had to 'show work.') There's a bit of that in these books, and it can be equally distracting. As much as I like quantiative shit, you don't really need to know calibers or picatinny rails or shit like that every other page. Oh and then there's the real life 'analogues' in 40K to various firearms and such. We'll go over those as they come.
Zou is also pretty hit and miss with his characters. I liked many of the characters in Emperor's Mercy, for example - even the IG general who was opposing the Inquisition - but I also found the characters in 'Flesh and Iron' and 'Blood Gorgons' to be rather uninteresting.
The Bastion Wars novels are basically three novels (so far - whether or not we get more is up for debate given that Flesh and Iron seemed to have a bit of a plagarism scare involved with it.) One Inquistior, one IG, and one (Chaos) Space Marine novel. The first one was pretty good, the second was very bland and generally dull, and the third... its CSM crossed with Special Forces is how it feels. I cannot say Blood Gorgons or Flesh and Iron really captured me the way Emperor's Mercy did, which is kinda sad because I'd had hopes for Zou both on the basis of the first novel and the way Abnett (apparently) liked his writing. *shrugs* The approach of having a different 'kind' ot story with each novel was one of the more interesting things - it offered a 'point of view' approach that you don't always get with other IG series like Sabbat Worlds.
So I find myself of mixed feelings about the series. I see lots of potential, and Zou contributing some different (and worthwhile) concepts to fiction but.... 40K should not really be written like a baen novel as odd as that may seem, and that is how it feels Zou does to me. So I am part hopeful, part fearful that we may see another book in this series. For better or for worse.
And now, Emperor's Mercy in three parts:
Page 9
Its a drop ship/landing craft/drop pod of some kind.The first projectile thundered into the tenement bazaar.
...
..its fiftytonne bulk skipping with momentum.
Page 10
interesting tithes. I imagine their benefit mainly is it gives something the Administratum can trade to other worlds for what it needs. This would make the Administratum some sort of central exchange.Naga was a frontier world of the Medina Corridor, and the only
aeronautical vessels that frequented these ports were the Imperial ships that claimed their tithes of textiles, ceramics and spices.
Page 11
distance of the air defence units from the invasion force. They can't make out individual targets but they can see pink and purple lasfire.Less than two kilometres from the bazaar, high up on the garrison walls, the 22nd Naga Air Defence Squadron stood sentry. Even at extreme optical zoom with their sentry scopes, they could not see the killing in the markets. But the soldiers could see the pulsating lights of pink and purple las throbbing in the distance..
page 11
Basically a hydra like gun that isnt a Hydra. Seems to have a range of several km.. 'low" altitude is defined as somewhere between 1000-1200 m judging by this this and this, which meshes roughly with the 1500 meter range in Honour Guard. I'd assume this is a direct fire range (direct hits), since ww2 aa of that category could reach up many times that distance (3-5+ km) by HE. 2-2.5 km maybe if we go for a diagnol (range + height). 6000 RPM is 100 rounds a second, or 25 rounds per second per gun.The monstrous rigs of their quad-linked autocannons..
...
Like most military hardware on Naga, it was obsolete...
...
The weapons themselves were Onager-pattern anti-aircraft platforms. A primitive yet reliable indigenous design, each 50mm barrel was pneumatically driven. The combined rate of fire was typically six thousand rounds per minute of low-altitude air deterrence.
...
...it was a workhorse of the Naga Militia Combine squadrons against both ground and air targets.
RL 50mm guns seem to have a projectile mass between 1-2 kg depending on the type of gun and round, and velocities between 700-1000 m/s. So that's 700-2000 kg*m/s worth of momentum per shot and 245-1000 kj of ke per shot. call it 24-100 mj of KE per second.. which.. isn't bad. Although momentum, recoil, and ammo usage will be... interesting. (tends of thousands of rounds in a few minutes.) This thing probably wouldnt work at that performance level on a mobile platform (unless its a superheavy!) given you're talking at least 70,000-100,000 kg*m/s worth of momentum.
Page 13
confrimation that the guns can fire on something at least 2 km away. also firing protocols for PDF units.“Tell me again in exact words why we are to hold fire,”
...
“Sir, long-range signal instruments have failed to identify the incoming objects. Although they appear to be landers, preliminary defensive measures cannot commence until proper identification can be ascertained, sir,”
...
“Corporal, commence vox orders to fire,”
Page 14
Planetary librarian - possibly a majro one - 150 years old (near the end of his life.. rather elderly and frail, so possibly low grade rejuv).Meteadas was well into his one fifties and had been a keeper of the texts for almost all of those years. Some would consider him a polymath, a man with encyclopaedic depth of knowledge.
Page 15
Pretty much how all knowledge is handled. although here its in paper form :dThe labyrinthine libraries tightly woven beneath the surface of Naga
served as the central repository of the Medina Worlds. Although they archived everything from the war poetry of pre-Heresy to subsector trade outputs of last month...
Page 18
The Stratosphere on earth is at least 8-10 km range, so that sets a lower limit on autocannon ranges for HE rounds. May reach tens of km in height (50k max?) Hydra have been implied to have similar range, so its not impossible.Tracer fire hammered into the stratosphere, scuds of flak darkening the sky like ashy condensation.
Despite the florid resistance, the vessels continued their bombardment. Dozens were snared by screens of shrapnel, disintegrating in their burning, tumbling descent.
page 18
this may or may not imply small arms (or antipersonnel weapon at least) ranges of 1-2 km.. hard to say becuase we dont quite know how close the enemy got before firing or anything like that. but its interesting nonetheless.His primary gunner had been shot. They had been receiving enemy
fire from positions on the ground for some time now. The invaders had advanced into Central Naga, overrunning the Militia Combine ground units. The vox-links were dead.
Page 21
That's a long time to be at peace in the imperium (or what passes for peace in this galaxy)War, at least on an absolute scale, had not scarred the star cluster for four thousand years. Yet the earth-shaking ferocity of this assault bespoke of more than a cursory raid. This was war.
Page 23
The context makes it sounds like he came from out-system, which is odd because.. it can't be sublight. 3 Light weeks (even assuming they could instantl ymake near-c) wouldn't be anywhere close to another system. it might mean another planet in teh same system, but... *shrugs*The very fact that the message had been sourced from the Medina Corridor, three weeks of non-warp travel by frigate, attested to its importance.
Another possibility is this is one of those Inquisitorial "secrets' - some have reverse engineered or "borrowed" non warp FTL tech and have certian vessels that can make the trip (like Tau ether drive.. most likely source IMHO) - possible but probably not very common (it would be radicalism certianly lol)
Page 24
Again this implies a 3 week journey between two separate systems, not travelling within a system.By the time Roth embarked on his three-week journey from the Bastion Stars to the Medina Corridor, the invasion of Medina had been seething for five months.
Page 24
the current military situation. They're outnumbered by nearly 8 to 1, and probably more than twice that given the actual troop numbers mentioned later (and that isn't all for the enemy forces.)They were the Ironclad, corsairs of the Eastern Fringe that had plagued Medina shipping lanes with sporadic small-scale attacks for the past six centuries.
...
Conservative reconnaissance estimates placed enemy numbers at seven million.
The regiments of the Cantican Colonial, the primary Imperial Guard formation of the Medina Worlds, numbered no more than nine hundred thousand, including auxiliary support units and noncombat corps.
...
Far more troubling was the constant stream of intelligence that the Ironclad were only a vanguard force. Khorsabad Maw’s seven million Ironclad were the spear-tip of a Chaos armada en route from beyond the Fringe.
We also learn they are at or on the Eastern Fringe, which means we're in the far edge of Ultima Segmentum. Rather interesting they seemed to be getting detailed, reliable intel on enemy troop movements through space. Probes? psychic detection? Isn't specified.
Page 24
Medina corridor only seems to be part of the Subsector, and a relatively unimportant one at that. and yet it still has 16 billion people in it. Some of the sources seem to speak as if medina corridor is a system (or next ot the system) so this may be referencing the population of this particular system (which has a number of planets.) If so, then this is interesting considering how "unimportant" we are told this system is supposed to be (contrast with Dark Creed, where an important system had something like 400 billion or so.)...Imperial reinforcements amassed in the neighbouring systems of the Shoal Clusters and the Bastion Stars. Medina had little strategic value for the subsector. Despite a combined population of sixteen billion, the Medina Corridor was, for all intents and purposes, a sacrificial lamb.
Page 25
At best a subsector force, possibly even smaller than that. And 'five dozen' starships with at least cruisers and frigates, is not a "large one" We dont know if it includes nonmilitary ships or troop transports, but it may be. On the other hand this is the '9th Route Fleet" which suggets they are naval vessels alone. I guess it depends whether this is a temperory/ad hoc formation for the duration of the crisis or a routine detachment to cover this region of space (analogous to 'battlefleet koronus.') Given its composition and relatively peaceful nature, i'd assume its mostly escrots anyhow (good for patrol and piracy, and cheap and easy to maintain in numbers.)Amidst the elliptical crescent of the Medina Corridor, the Imperial 9th Route Fleet moored at high anchor.
They were five dozen ships submerged by pink sparks of starlight, floating like a trillion motes of dust. The barbed, knife-like frigates and ponderous spears of Imperial cruisers clustered in protective formations. As fleets went, this was by no means a large one.
Really it could go either way. At the very least it is only part of a sector battlefleet.
Page 25
flagship is a grand cruiser, 9 km long (longer than the 7-7.5 km grand cruisers in the BFK book anyhow.) It also has a 1x1x1 km docking bay... prboably has another on the other side (meaning the ship is at least 1 km tall and 2 km wide.) This would also hint at a carrier role for the ship.The Carthage, the nucleus of the 9th Route Fleet, was a grand cruiser over nine kilometres in length. It was an old ship, even by Imperial standards. From its gilded arrowhead prow to the fluted reactor banks of its warp drives...
...
On board the cubic kilometre expanse of the Carthage’s docking
hangar...
Page 26
Rubberised body armor.His two score bodyguards, flexing muscles beneath their
rubberised sheath armour...
Page 27
Roth's height.. and 'provost marhsals' with shields and shock mauls. Are they guard or navy? Hard to say. Probably the sam bodyguards discussed above tho.At two metres tall, the Inquisitor reared well above the shorter Khmer. The phalanx of provost marshals squared up and edged in. Their tower-length ballistic shields and shock mauls were held low but ready.
page 30
at least one Republic in the imperium.His spine had been broken and reinforced during the Fall of the Fifth Republic in the Corsican Subsector.
Page 30
At least 7 planets in the Medina Corridor. The map on the front implies up to twelve, if I am reading it right. nine named planets (or areas, at least) Again whether this is a systme or subsector is up for debate.. If its a system some of those might be moons or osmething./“Naga is conquered. Ninvevah, Baybel and Tarsis. All satellite planets taken by Chaos,” said Gurion as he indicated each planet on the map. “Imperial forces have retreated to a war of attrition on the core worlds of Medina — Cantica, Aridun and Kholpesh.”
Also, attrition warfare. If they are fighting that with only 400K troops (mentioned later) against 7 million they must be inflicting horrendous losses on the enemy even if they are losing. They've been fighting for five months now and are expected to last another three.
Page 34
Roth's body armor. Seems to be a kind of lightweight carapace.Inquisitor Roth had suited up in his Spathaen fighting-plate.
...
The chrome trauma-plates afforded him a degree of buoyancy...
Page 35
Roth's mentor's armour. Also interestingThe inquisitor rose slowly, looking imperious in a long cape of carbon-ceramic polyfibres. The loom-woven armour glowed brass under the light of
the hololith.
Page 36
Scope of the mining efforts by Chaos across the planets captured in 5 months, using captures slave labour (millions, billions perhaps.)“I have also come into possession of orbital reconnaissance photos detailing the mass excavations which have taken place across the surface of conquered worlds.”
He cued the grainy high-altitude reconnaissance pict. Roth squinted at the black and white hololith of excavaion quarries that, judging by the comparative size of nearby terrain features, were a kilometre deep.
...
He zoomed out to show a high orbital shot of the several subjugated worlds. The Archenemy had been so voracious in their digging that they had gouged into the equator lines of the planets, like a series of zagging claw marks. Most of the excavation quarries seemed to navigate the entire circumference of a planet.
Page 39
What kind of cannon we don't know... perhaps an autocannon (suggesting anywhere from double to triple digit kj at least to single digit MJ?) It seems a rather compact weapon too for a shoulder rig.The parts of his Mk III Sunfury were laid out neatly at the foot of Gurion’s bed. Barrel, cocking cam, trigger assembly, bolt assembly. The weapon was a monster, a gas-operated cyclical pistol...
...
...It was a gentleman’s Parabellum with the bark of a military-grade cannon. He bolstered it in a shoulder rig..
Page 39
Roth's body armor. Carapace like, seems designed for mobility and evasion as well as for ballistic protection.He limbered up, checking the smoothness of his Spathaen fighting-plate. The fluid interlocking plates of chromatic silver were fitted in such a way as to allow complete fluidity of movement.
Everything from the shoulder domes to the sleek shin greaves were designed to slip and turn the ballistic properties of an attack.
Page 39
Psychic protection. Alot like a vitriian glass body armor, only against psychic attack....Roth then donned a knee-length tabard of tiny tessellating obsidian
scales. As he moved, the tiny panes of psi-reactive glass clinked like the scales of a sea serpent.
Page 39
compact power fist too.. seems not to be so unique, but not common either.His right hand hummed with a low magnetic drone. The weapon was a Tang War-pattern power fist, a slim-fitting silver gauntlet. Lighter and smaller than the standard designs issued amongst Imperial officers, this elegantly slender power fist had been seized from the armoury of a narco-baron on Sans Gaviria during Roth’s tenure as an interrogator.
Page 40
Roth's assistant, Silverstein - gears up. He only sticks with the scoped autorifle though, which seems bolt action.Repeating crossbows, hunting autos, long-las, needle pistols...
...
..the huntsman selected a bullpup autogun, slender and spidery in frame.
..
...took out a scoped autorifle. This one was much longer, its stock painted in dashes of greens and greys. Silverstein tested the trigger with a click, toggled the safety and racked the bolt.
...
..he grudgingly struggled into a flak vest, a basic piece of Guard kit that Silverstein had hand-painted a woodland camouflage onto.
...
Strapping on a utility belt, the huntsman began to stuff items into the various pouches — composite-polymer cord, auspex, tranquillisers, bolos and a large serrated skinning knife.
Page 42
Plasma pistol power source. Again his weapon must be very compact if it can load up in the grip.Roth spared Gurion a look as he counted out fusion canisters for his pistol.
...
Roth unholstered his Sunfury and loaded a fusion canister into the pistol grip.
Page 42-43
Astorpathic comm protocol. Intersting that a non-astropath can receive (at least with training.) - although she is also an inquisitior.“I will contact you during the Cantican dawn on the fifth day, by astropath. Have Celemine prepare herself for conveyance. In the event I am not able to reach you, I will repeat the conveyance once every second day, for a week."
Page 45
Cantica, which seems to be the primary hub of military power for the Medina Corridor... and it is garrisone dby light infantry. It's also the biggest core world.Although Cantica was the defensive buttress of the Medina Corridor, its military had collapsed under the invasion. Within the subsector, Cantica was strategically insignificant, yet within Medina the planet was a lone sentry.
...
...a heavy blitzing attack that had allowed the Cantican Colonial Regiments no time to formulate a cohesive defence. The CantiCol, a formation of light infantry spread thin over the entire star system, had not been enough to even temporarily slow the Archenemy momentum.
Page 45
harrier class raiders (new class) as well as pickets stationed around the systme separate from the aforementioned fleet, perhaps.It had started four months previously with an aerial deployment of Archenemy Harrier-class raiders that perforated the Imperial Naval pickets.
Page 46
Amphibious warfare.. in the 40th millenium...the Ironclad, raiders well versed in the art of amphibious warfare
— stormed the beachheads of the Cantican Gulf. An enemy force, primarily infantry numbering some one hundred and fifty thousand.
Page 47
modified 60 ton naval aircraft, stealthed out for close insertion. Useful capabilities. Also capable of low level subsonic flight (20 m) and has a servitor pilot (another useful capability.)The stratocraft swept in on an arcing descent. It hurtled low, hugging the ocean surface of the Cantican Gulf to reduce its radar signature. The servitor pilot skimmed so close, its turbine burners hollowed out a tail of steam and boiling water in its wake.
...
The craft was a modified Naval sixty-tonner, its armaments stripped to carry exhaust dampeners, counter-stealth radars and extended fuel capacity. Had it been spotted from the ground, the craft would have appeared as a dart, its needle-like cockpit perched on massive quad-engines.
Toothless, sharp, its profile had a minimal radar cross-section and its dampeners reduced its infrared footprint, rendering it almost invisible to Archenemy surveillance.
Page 49
Silverstein's augmetic eyes and their capabilities.The xenos game-hunter reared up, the yellow lenses of his pupil augmentations narrowed to targeting reticules as they homed in on distant targets. A tabulation of data began to scroll down the periphery of his vision, analysing the distance, climate and movement signatures.
+++ Buraghand, Upper city state —
Cantica: 7255 metres distant
Visibility Spectrums: Noon Visible
Heat/Wind: High/High
Movement Signatures: 41% +++
Page 51
The Canticol forces in system. And yes it seems to reference the Medina Corridor as encompassing the whole system. it must be part of a network of warp routes or something or a linking point i a single route. Rather odd that a native-raised Guard force is still allowed to serve in and defend the same system. I mean maybe not on the same planet...Inquisitor Roth had researched the Cantican Colonials prior to entering the star system.
...
Although a little-known regiment, the CantiCol were the Medina
Corridor’s primary troop formation. According to census, four hundred thousand Guardsmen were garrisoned thinly across the Medina system alongside indigenous PDF elements.
...
The regiments had been raised six thousand years ago from the Cantican loyalists of the Reclamation Wars. They had been the few warring dust tribes to aid the Imperium during the Reclamation and were thus the only regiment granted the right to defend the entire region.
Also assuming that they tithe from the PDF that might suggest some 4 million PDF. which with the IG forces would explain "war of attirtion" a tad better. It also means that of the 900,000 or so troops mentioned before, 400,000 were soldiers and the rest were the support and other elements.
This also provides an interesting "bookmark" to Dark Creed, which was an important system (and gave us population and military numbers as ewll). We might potentially infer a single system has between 19 billion and 400 billion (the population in Dark Creed) and a garrison might be between 400 thousand and 5 billion.
It depends on if its a single system or a series of planets. assuming a million system Imperium we're talking some 19 quadrillion people (or 400 quadrillion going by Dark Creed figures) at least. That also means some 400 billion to 5 quadrillion garrison troops. I'm tending to lean more towards the lower limit than the upper limit in this caes, but it does provide interesting numbers as far as garrisons and such go. If Its a series of planets.. well divide by how many per planet or whatever..
page 52
rather odd that a lasgun power cell is discarded when 'spent' - since they are supposed to be (as a rule) rechargable. I guess some might be non-rechagable too! more power per shot perhaps, but it would greatly increase logistical concerns.Spent casings and power cells littered the area.
Page 55
He was an impressive head and shoulders taller than all the Canticans.
I take this to mean Roth is maybe 30 cm or so shorter.. which means the Canticans are some 1.7 M or so, give or take 10 cm either way.
Page 57
underlevels or ruins of the city extend for over 4-5 km below the surface. Which gives you an idea of how deep an Exterminatus would have to reach to exterminate those people. Small wonder some deep level bombardments leave the crust molten, eh?Over the centuries, these cities were eroded by the seething dust storms and
relentless suns until new cities were raised over the skeletons of the old. This natural cycle of construction had continued over the course of millennia, strata upon strata of ossified structures, growing as vertically as it did laterally, forming a mantle of architectural under-ruins, a labyrinth of archaeology that went five kilometres deep.
It was here, driven four kilometres underneath Upper Buraghand, that Inquisitor Roth came upon the isolated pockets of Imperial resistance. Down through an arterial maze they descended, groping their way through structures so old that natural rock growth and man-made construction had fused into one organic cavern.
Page 61
Also mentioned are "chemical fires' which i gather is like the chemical bricks from the Ghosts series used for heat and light.Hooded sodium lamps powered by a ballast generator kept the perpetual night at bay.
Ballast generator is interesting as it may give us an idea of what sort of recharging system the Guard might use in the field. Although they wouldnt neccesarily draw the full power of the generator
page 62-63
There weren't just troops. IT was armour and mechanised forces too. These are some well equipped cultists we can say that. This was also 'conventional warfare"“But a month ago hundreds of thousands more came from the skies, deploying column after column of armour and mechanised infantry. The depleted garrisons didn’t last out for more than two days.”
...
...the revelation that Cantica had been subjugated by conventional warfare...
Page 64-65
122 m is "within firing range" - which I assume also means Roth and his plasma pistol.The figures stood atop the mound and peered directly down at him,
well within shooting distance.
...
"I’ve targeted seven of them, one hundred and twentytwo metres away up on the ridge, and I don’t think they’ve got a scent."
Page 68
Inquisitorial signet ring. handy lil device.As he spoke, his words were crystallised into data and conducted along microscopic veins of quartz within the signet. The current of information flowed through the circuit and was encrypted, transforming sound waves into
codified symbols.
Page 69
Out of body psychic search for fellow Inquisitor. implies that Chaos may have psykers ready to detect and attakc suhc searches.They had taken turns to disembody themselves, soaring their psychic entities
high above the minarets of Buraghand.The threat of being ambushed by other psychic entities, especially on a world subjugated by the Archenemy was all too imminent.
...
Roth had ingested three tablets of melatonin, but even that did not kept his mind fresh.
Page 69
psychic level of the Inquisitor in quesiton.Celemine’s raw psychic potential could be eta-level but she was still young, and at best she currently skimmed a very potent kappalevel.
Page 70
Lower limit on range of out of body search, as well as indication of the toll it can take when prolonged.Four kilometres below the surface, Roth’s physical body tremored
momentarily and his left lung fibrillated.
Page 71
Roth's psi level, as well as comment on training vs talent/potential when it comes to psychic power. I suspect the 'training" has more to do with improving efficiency and the ability to use one's potential more efficiently, rather than just boosting raw power.Compared to Celemine, Roth was not a powerful psyker by any
means, but what he lacked in raw potency, he made up for with a singular will to focus. Like the body, the mind could be vigorously trained. Meditation, psychic sparring and even the simple puzzle book could all be tools for psychic prowess, as much as weights, callisthenics and nutrition could build the body. Roth regularly honed himself, and was considered omicron-level by his peers.
Page 74 - mention of "guard issue' tea.
Page 80
Assuming a 5-10 kg mass for the breastplate, we're talking 6-12 MJ at least. Probably accurate to within an Order of magnitude either way.Roth opened fire with his plasma pistol. The mini-nova of energy pulverised an Ironclad as he was dismounting, liquefying his breastplate into molten metal and fusing him to the truck chassis.
Page 80
Silverstein's augmetics have night vision capacity. Or more probably thermal, since they can observe life signs and vitals.He had moved next to Roth, his vision unfazed by the night.
Page 83
Medina passage sesems to be only one system in the subsector, not the whole subsector itself, which suggests it is in fact the medina system alone concerning this battle.“Our men have fought bravely and beyond reprove. But we cannot deny the fact that our strategy of attrition will lose us this war.
...
"..I declare we withdraw and consolidate with gathering Imperial reinforcements in the inner subsector.”
Also a Imperial commander deciding.. attrition won't solve anything. I'm pretty sure by some that would be heresy
Page 85
Officio Assassinorum agent/representative.Gloved in a cameleoline bodyglove that shifted with every spectrum of grey and black, the man appeared like a deathly spectre.
Page 90
Autogun round. Interesting that first it penetrates, then expands/fragments inside... and is considered a hollowpoint. Go figure.A single slug impacted into his shoulder pauldron, piercing the fighting-plate and mushrooming within the armour. Spinning shrapnel bounced around, lacerating his shoulder. Hollow points for tissue rending, was the only thought that ran through Roth’s mind.
Page 90
Yet another gorup or eugenically created, wariror cast mercs used in the Imperium. note the gun. Zou seems fond of "modifying' names of real life weapons for use in 40K liek that..Orphratean Purebred. Eugenically bred humans with their long lean frames poured into snakeskin bodygloves...
...
Each mercenary shouldered an EN-Scar autogun. The matt-black carbines...
Page 91
According to the map at the beginning of the novel, these troops are from a planet within the same system/area (cluster of systems?).. and the Imperium is employing them to bolster their own forces. Makes you wonder why they don't just conscript them.Genetically superior men of the warrior caste in
Orphrates, the Orphratean Purebred had seen limited action since the beginning of the Medina Campaign. Utilised by Imperial forces to augment special operations capacity that the Cantican Colonials so severely lacked, these mercenaries had been and still were, as far as Roth was aware, under the employ of Imperial High Command.
Page 92
Inquisitor Celemine's visual trick.She immediately threw up an illusory wall at her enemy,
hazing the darkness into a formless, nauseating depth of vertigo. It was her favourite trick, and in the low visibility of night it was enough to throw off aim and destabilise equilibrium.
page 92
Single burst from a hand flamer kills 5 Purebred. 25% of body area for 3rd degree and 30% for second degree is needed to kil (in theory) which means that 2500-3400 sq cm needs to be burned (minimum) 25 j/sq cm for 2nd and up to 50 j sq cm for third maybe.. 80-125 kJ at least per blast. 400 kj to 625 kj for the entire flame blast minimum Assuming full obdy 3rd degree burns? something like half a megajoule per body.. 2.5 MJ. It's still conservative as not all the flamer fuel will touch the bodies. According to DH we might figure between .15 and .1 kg of fuel is used for a single shot, suggesting a flame thrower might do 4-25 MJ per kg of fuel with each shot.She announced her presence with a hand-flamer. The jet of liquid fire roared into the shadows, flushing the Purebred from their cover. She killed five before the flames lost pressure and licked back into the muzzle.
Page 94
Power fist eviscerates a human. If it melts tank armor and can scoop out a "handful" of molten steel... Assume a 10x10cm, 3 cm "thick" handful.. we might talk about 1-2 Kg.. which assuming iron woudl be worth a megajoule or two easily.Power fists, Roth knew, were primarily developed as anti-armour devices. From experience, a power fist could rend the flank armour of a battle-tank, scooping out great handfuls of molten steel.
Against human flesh, the results did not bear thinking about. Roth was literally covered in Orphratean Purebred within a matter of seconds.
He heaved the eviscerated body off him...
Page 94
Another en SCAR round. this time they call it an autocarbine, and it doesn't penetrate. This may suggest Roth's armour has varying thicknesses at differnet points, or the rounds being fired are just barely able to reach the threshold for penetration (V50 in body armor terms i believe.. where 50% would be stopped and 50% would penetrate.) If it were like a real life FN SCAR we might be dealing with 5.56 NATO or 7.62MM NATO, or even 7.62x39mm.A round slammed into the segmented trauma plates of his abdomen. The ballistic apron tensed on impact, absorbing the kinetic force. Although the deep tissue bruising would be severe, the round did not penetrate.
Page 97
Effect of (probable) autoround.The round entered his forehead. With an explosive spray it exited out the back of his skull, his iron headpiece opening up like a flower in bloom.
Page 102-103
guard rations.“I’ve brought you some soup to share,”
...
“It’s only dehyd but it’s cold tonight.”
...
The soup, despite being Guard ration, was not bad
either. Thick and salty, it just reminded him of a rich cattle consommé. But only just.
Page 105
Portable vox set of some kind had 20 km range."Captain Pradal riskedraising vox contact on an Imperial frequency."
...
"There is a battalion of Cantican Guardsmen, fighting hard about twenty
kilometres north-west of Buraghand city.”
Page 105
Chaos troops using Fighting Patrol Vehicles. I'll guess its something like the IMperial Guard Tauros Venator or military light vehicles (like armed dune buggy things)The FPVs were squat, hog-nosed four-wheelers with an open passenger side chassis. A side-mounted heavy stubber panned out from the exposed opening, the gunner hunched down behind a mantlet.
Page 106
Door breaching tool.A piston ram, thirty kilograms of solid metal..
page 107
Two "grenades" release 60K antipersonnel ball bearings.A thread of wire fastened to the door had been hooked up to an
overhead cinch, which in turn pulled taut on a brace of grenades.
...
The grenades exploded with the sound of clapping concrete. Sixty thousand anti-personnel ball bearings shredded the boiler room. In an instant the plastered walls eroded into a perforated sponge.
Of the Archenemy who had stormed the room, most were caught in a solid curtain of expanding shrapnel. The after-shock blew out every window of the tenement block that had not already been broken, and the windows of tenements several streets way.
For a comparative example see the Claymore Mine 700 10.5 grain (.68 gram)
ball bearings at 1200 m/s. The latter link incidentally says it is the same size as #4 buckshot, which is about 1.35 grams. You get about 450 - 972 J per shot. Which means that those two grenades had potentially 27 to 58 MJ at least amongst them. Sufficed to say that is.. alot. and it makes me think that maybe the shot was alot smaller. Assuming equivalent to #9 buckshot and say a velocity of only 1000 m/s (per this site, although this suggests 1500 m/s velocity.. you might get 15 j per 'pellet'. Thats 'only 900 kj which suits better, I suppose, but that's birdshot and birdshot is, I think, not terribly effective at killing people.
Assuming an arbitrary 50-100 J per shot we get between 3-6 MJ of Ke, which is still alot but not quite as insane as the earlier calc. Either way I'm thinking these are some damn powerful and effective grenades, and it owuld be considerably more efficient than a claymore, which tells you something about the power and efficiency of imperial chemical explosives, methinks.
Another possibility is its some kind of "microshrapnel" grenade.. which we know have existed (remember the coin sized super grenades.. another example of the insanely effective chemical explosives and fragmentation devices they can create.)
Page 108-109
- Lugos "hi-power" pistol. Yet another real life stand in, I suppose. And a Merc economy. and human eugenics....Fure had the bronze skin and pale olive-green eyes that marked him as Purebred, a product of human eugenics.
...
..a Lugos Hi-Power autopistol...
...
Now the entire economy of Orphrates relied
on the capital inflows of its famed mercenaries.
Page 113
Artillery "battalion" 1200 men, some of whom can fight, at least.. and also has heavy weaponry.The last battalion of the 26th Colonial Artillery...
...
..twelve hundred men of the 26th
Page 113
Height of the cave networks/temples being defended by the artillery battalion. The "Barbican" also estimated enemy dead.Every day the Archenemy had assaulted that pale, coarse-grained
intrusion of igneous tusk over three hundred metres in height. Every day the warren of caves within the batholith had repelled them with guns and artillery.
...
Ever since the Guard had been stationed at the cave temples they
had coined it the “Barbican”. The three thousand Archenemy dead that littered the dry prairie attested to that.
Page 114
sixty pounder.. aobut the calibre of a basilisk (132mm.. close enough.) Range of at least 5 km. 27 kg shell...sixty-pounders had bombarded the Archenemy positions, harassing them and taunting them into suicidal charges. The great guns vibrated the caverns with their recoil, lobbing shells beyond the Erbus canal five kilometres out.
Although sustained enemy assaults had inflicted five hundred and ninety-two casualties, the battalion kept fighting.
Also battalion losses. 592 for 3000 so far A bit over 5 Cultists for every one guardsmen.
Page 115
The Barbican again. I'm not sure if the plateau bit is meant to describe the top of the barbican or not. Probably. which suggests they are close to the top.Shuffling over to the cave mouth he peered down at the Barbican, which sprawled out beneath him.
...
The slope was broken by almost vertical cliffs in some places — rocky,
bare, precipitous and irregular. At its plateau, batteries of field artillery bristled like a roc’s nest, heavy Earthshaker barrels saluting the horizon.
Page 117
Example of high tech gear on the planet for the battalion. :When Roth had requested a military-grade cryptographer, he had forgotten that military-grade often stood for obsolete, un-serviced and possibly broken.
The cipher machine was a heavy-duty cogitator set up in the sand-bagged belly of the Barbican.
Its porcelain casing was furred with dust, the spindles and keystrokes cracked and faded. Several hundred rusty cables spooled out from underneath its skirting like the tentacles of an undersea leviathan. Roth had never in all his years of service seen a cogitator like it.
...
.tapping on the loom pedals as she adjusted the bristle of cogs and dials. The
machine purred, and a flower of ivory set above the mantle of the machine began to gyrate, signalling the decoder’s activation. Roth tried to busy himself with the cables, trying to look useful.
...
Celemine plugged Delahunt’s signet into the cipher’s central
feed, winking data pulses into the machine’s logic engines. Her other hand began to spool paper out from the mouth of a porcelain cherub’s face set into the machine’s side casing.
Page 117-118
Inquisitorial encryption, i guess."This signet is magenta-level encryption and this decoder is garbage-level decryption. Its logic engines have to penetrate the data’s enigma coding and polyalphabetic substitution."
Page 119-120
Range of a flak rocket.. possibly rifle range too. at least a close in heavy weapons range. Heavy bolter masses 40 kg, with heavy recoil even though rocket propelled ammo, May be firing on the vehicles too (which are futher away.. maybe half a km or so given what is stated shortly....sentry in one of the forward observation caves overlooking the northern approach when he saw them — Archenemy foot scouts silently scouring up the steep scree slope no more than two hundred metres away.
...
The Archenemy fired first. A flak rocket, most likely from a shoulder launcher, screamed overhead, trailing a ragged spine of smoke.
It spiralled wildly before exploding forty metres uphill in a scatter of rock fragments.
...
They thundered up the slope in a staggered line, closing the two hundred metre distance fast.
...
But beyond the infantry screen, kicking up a curtain of dust, mechanised columns rolled across the Erbus canal in support.
...
All at once, the three perimeter positions, two cave bunkers and a concrete pillbox opened fire. Captain Pradal had bellied down behind the gunpit’s lone heavy bolter. The forty kilogram gun bucked like an industrial drill, even when Pradal threw his weight behind it. Fat
Page 120
Fyceline (propellant/) seems to have a methane component to it.He smelt the methane stink of fyceline as his weapon ejected
steaming-hot cartridges.
Page 120
Heavy bolter round.The shell’s mass-reactive payload ruptured its target, throwing up a fan of blood and dry brown grass.
Page 121
Battalion support weapons.Bolters, autocannons and heavy stubbers
Page 121
Enemy armour 'now a km off' - the infantry is less than 50 m away. That tends to suggest that if the line of advance was constant, the tanks had started out some 600-700 m away. Scavenger tanks - something tells me they're IMPERIUM STRYKERS or somethingNow half a kilometre off, the mechanised assault was only just closing in. Growling, fuming, howling — no less than fifty fighting patrol vehicles, gun-trucks and Chimeras supported by a full lance of KL5 Scavenger-pattern light tanks. The eight-wheeled tanks....
km cruiser could exist alongside each other, but they are not neccesarily equal in terms of capability. Hell its possible even the bigger ship is not 'better'. But a smaller battleship can also be built faster than an 8 (or 10) km battleship, which means there can be more of them.