A Skirmish on Calliope

BACKGROUND

Calliope is a relatively unsettled planet on the outer fringes of the empire. It features some truly obnoxious megafauna and much of the surface is covered in jungle. The tropical regions are so hot, that it is nearly impossible to live there, but the planet is rich in resources desired by the empire. As a result, many settlers were located there with expectations of a more hospitable new home.

Initially the settlements did well, focusing on getting themselves up and running. But as settlers began to mine the resources and got into a somewhat normal routine, unrest quickly spread throughout the settlements. Many felt betrayed by the empire once they found how unfriendly Calliope could be, and this feeling was aggravated by the Empire's inconsistent support of the settlers, often directing supplies and protective troops to other hotspots on the fringe.

The settlers went on strike, strike turned into rebellion, and rebellion turn into war. Planetary Defense Forces (PDF), mostly made up of Imperial troops were mostly on the side of the settlers (after all, they were in the same boat ), and independence was declared. Other newly settled and more important planets had done this and survived, why not Calliope. At least now, the settlers could use the resources they mined to build a better world for themselves.

Imperial forces move quickly, crushing the rebellion, and reduced most surviving settlers to jungle dwelling scavengers. The PDF was re-established with more loyal forces, and an Imperial garrison of Marines was landed. New settlers came to restart of the process.

Meanwhile, the rebellion lives on, with constant skirmishes flaring up, scavengers scavenging, disrupting, resisting. And Calliope is still too far out, and too unimportant to receive proper attention by the Empire. Its a hard life in the Emperor's service on Calliope.

 

THE SITUATION

Calliope is made up of small settlements separated by vast distances. Various automated outposts of many types are located across the planet. Supply depots, bunkers, monitoring posts, and communication towers are among the many unmanned facilities. A group of Scavengers stumbled into a comm tower, attempted to raid it for supplies, but could not gain entry, as it was heavily armored. So they decided to disable the tower, ambush the PDF responce team, and then raid the comm tower.

 

Sergeant Roarke's comm team was dropped at an LZ about 1 km from the comm tower and had to march to the tower to investigate and make repairs. The team found the tower, noted damage to the antenna mast, and reported to HQ that they would get the tower back online soon. Roarke posted a watch, and put his techs to work. The scavengers became aware of the PDF drop team later than they had hoped and were not able to ambush them in the jungle as planned.

Next best plan was to ambush them while repair work was underway.

The Scavs were made of of about half former settlers and half former Defence Force troopers. All scavs have some military type training and they are nearly a match for current PDF troops. Lexi's scavs scouted out the response team and set up their ambush. Two troopers were on the tower catwalk, one on top of the bunker, one inside, and two out watching (i.e. daydreaming) the perimiter.

The first scav shots killed one in the tower, another on the ground, and wounded the trooper on the bunker roof. Before the PDF troopers knew what happened, they were overrun, with yet another being killed and another wounded. This left the sergeant and two wounded troopers against the 20 scavs. Roarke managed to get a message off to HQ before being completely overrun.

Lexi had planned to capture the team in the jungle, take them alive, have them open the tower, take the goods, then trade the response team for more supplies. Nothing had worked out. And now, only three minutes after the distress call got out, a garrison patrol bird passed overhead.

By chance, a Heavy Marine Infantry team was already in the air and close by, doing a fly by while the scavs were trying to grab the goods. The Marines landed at the LZ and advanced. The Marines are seriously bad news, equipped with nano-armor, special sensors, weapons, and gentically optimized for soldiering, They can mess up your whole day.

The bunker was a goldmine of supplies, so much so, that Lexi decide they had to stay and fight. The scavs were sure they had numbers and since the topography would dictate close in fighting, the Marines would lose much of their advantage in range and armor (scav weapons could do some damage up close). The scavs would have to fight the marines in the jungle.

Lexi put two guards on the prisoners and had them stay in the comm bunker. Sergeant Roarke, veteran of 23 battles on nearly as many planets sat with his two wounded troopers, wondering how to get out of this. He shouldn't have been there; he should have been in charge of his own platoon of hardened troops, not five radio technicians. If only he had known that "she" was the Captain's wife...

The rest of the scavs quickly deployed in depth along the ridges north of the comm tower. They hoped to encircle the marines as they made their way through the maze of rocky formations south of the large hill. Time to wait.

Just as Chow's first section of Marines were cresting the big hill, they heard many shots ring out in the jungle below them. They couldn't see any of it, but there was lots of shooting going on. Chow took the first squad down into the weeds to kill what ever was making all the raucous. Second squad would provide overwatch from the crest.

Spike woke up to another day of hunger. It was too hard to stock up on food as the gang would just gorge themselves and still be in the same fix the next day. He got together with his buds, and decided to see what they could scrounge up for breakfast. While foraging along the usual trails he noticed a vaguely familiar smell. Berries! It had been quite awhile since he had berries, since before all of the shooting and war.

The bugs took the scavs by surprise. They hadn't seen any bugs for some time, and thought that they had been killed off in this region. WRONG! Bugs are big strong, and hungry. And they seem to enjoy popping humans like a berry.

Lexi was shocked to see the bugs so close, three of them were on her position before any of the scav's could even fire. It normally takes about three hits to kill a bug, but Lexi had a 12mm squad support weapon, and this bug was going to be cut in half. Click! Misfire! The last thing to go through Lexi's mind was her target's left front claw. The scavs were overrun immediately, shooting, retreating, dying. Forget the marines, the supplies, retreat to the bunker, at least the bugs can't get in there.

The Marines finally advanced enough to see what was happening. Chow thought "This will be easy", and ordered everyone to fire at will. The bugs were doing a fine job of rounding up and eating the scavs, and it was too easy picking off those that exposed themselves, whether bug or scav.

Just as the the tide of bugs was stemmed, the scavs realized that they were taking fire. But with Lexi dead, and Bongo, second in command, playing hide and seek with a Marine, there was no leadership, no plan, no hope. Nothing went right. Marines to the north of them, bugs to the south, it wasn't supposed to be like this.

 

Meanwhile, back in the comm bunker....

Sergeant Roarke didn't know what was going on out there, but one scav was going to the hatch to see, and the other looked away for just a second. He saw his chance, knocked the gun away from the scav guard, and knocked her half senseless. For several moments he successfully fought off both scavs, before the second girl decided "screw this" and managed to put six rounds into him from her reaquired smg. As Roarke lay there dying, he found it humorous that after all of the combat he had seen, he was killed by a 102 plaything while defending an unmanned radio station. Bev checked her comrade scav to make sure that she hadn't been hit by the smg, and then went to back to the hatch to see what was going on outside. the The two wounded DF troopers weren't going anywhere.

Just as a lull in the fighting came, a survey bird orbited over the scene and took a pic of the carnage. North is to the left in this pic, and a few marines can be seen closing to the perimiter of the comtower. Dead bug and scavs lay all about.

As the Bev started up the ladder, she was surprised to see the helmeted face of a Heavy Marine look down at her. She unloaded her clip into his visor and he fell backwards away from the hatch. Chow was inputing the entry code into the keypad when Donaldson's head exploded. Chow never saw the two bugs come up behind him. He was filled with rage and savoring the idea of killing the scavs inside slowly, when the bugs began slicing him up for breakfast.

Slowly, the remaining marines realized that there were a lot more bugs than originally thought; they called for some fire support, and tried to withdraw. Unfortunately, the withdraw took them into more bugs. Bugs and marines traded numbers until only one of each remained.

Alexander bounded onto a boulder, almost surprising the semi-mindless thing and cut it down just before it did the same to him. He stood for a moment, realizing that it was all over. Everyone was dead. A shame, such good soldiers wasted on such unworthy opponents, but at least he would be promoted. Alexander as always, finding the good in the bad.

 

Bev climbed out of the hatch just in time to see the last marine blast the last of the bugs. There he stood, surveying the carnage. Quietly, slowly, she took aim, squeezed the trigger, "Got em."

 

THE GAME

The game was played on a 4' by 6' table using my homebrew rules and lots of bumpy terrain and foliage. The LZ was off of the north end (with the high hill) and the comm bunker located at the extreme southeast of the table.

THE FORCES

 Planetary Defense Forces

5 x Troopers/technicians with Laser Rifles, basic body armor, and standard repair equiment. Green

1x Sergeant with Laser Rifle and standard armor. Hardened veteran.

 Scavengers

2x 10man squads, rifles, and SMGs, and standard body armor. Each squad has a squadleader and one heavy weapon, Experienced troops.

 Marine Heavy Infantry

2x 5 man squads, rifles, nano-armor, standard combat loadout. Each squad has a leader (one overall in command) and a heavy weapon. Veteran

 MegaFauna

18 hungry bugs, hungry.

The PDF forces are human volunteers with relatively common equipment, Marine Heavy Infantry are basically engineered soldiers that are interfaced with their custom made equipment; they are proof against standard firarms at anything but short range due to their nanoarmor. Energy weapons are a little more effective. Scavengers are tough humans; survivors with basic firearms, and after the war, most surviving scavs happened to have military training and practical experience. The Bugs were the result of the dice, as were their numbers (2D10 in this case) and point of entry (most unlucky for the scavs). Scav point of entry onto the table was from the southwest, D10+4 turns after the PDF techs entered from the north.

This was originally just going to be a quick pick up game one night, but got postponed a couple nights. By the time I ran it, I had worked out a background history, and a bunch of factions and characters. Lexi was expected to live as was Roarke, and I had big plans for both, but fate (i.e. the dice) chose differently. But there are still many characters and adventures left in my silly little world, so it looks like this will be a mini campaign afterall, with more stories of Calliope posted here in the future.

 

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