Rogue Trader - The Inquisitor's Adventure Continues - Part II - The Second Battle

Welcome to the next installment in my ongoing Rogue Trader Campaign.

Following on from the initial opening mission last month (Mission 1 Battle Report) Inquisitor Athena has made the decision to travel to an isolated Adepta Sororitas Preceptory in order to acquire some more troops to combat the Genestealer incursion on the Imperial Planet of Logan's Bluff.

However for those of you who have already had a chance to read her mission handout and narrative (Mission Briefing) that I circulated earlier in the week you will be aware that things have already started to go wrong for the Inquisitor even before she has reached the monastery.

It is well known that Genestealers are insidious creatures; possessed of an innate cunning that makes them a truly terrifying foe and in this instance they have used that inherent intelligence to outmaneuver the Imperial Forces. The cult too have realised that this small outpost of the Battle Sisters poses the greatest threat to their plans for the planet and its unsuspecting populace and so have taken measures to eliminate this risk.

As Athena's shuttle ferries her to the Sororitas facility she receives a transmission from the warriors informing her that they are already under assault from the enemy and that they require immediate reinforcement. The Inquisitor curses her misfortune and then hastily briefs her Storm Trooper retinue to prepare for a contested deployment as they will now be dropping into a hot LZ.

Rogue Trader - The Inquisitor's Adventure Continues - Part I

Well after the initial battle in my Rogue Trader Campaign a couple of weeks back it was clear that Inquisitor Athena would need to get back into action quickly if she was to have any hope of curtailing the insidious threat of Genestealer infestation on the Imperial World. 

After the last game I gave my girlfriend (who has been commanding the Inquisitorial Forces) a number of options as to what the Inquisitor wanted to do next in relation to the Genestealer menace. After much deliberation she chose to move to an isolated Battle Sister's preceptory on the planet's northern most land mass in the hope of acquiring some bolter wielding, power armour wearing allies. With this information I scuttled off to prepare the following players brief for her to set the tone of the encounter to come:

Necromunda Orlocks; Genestealer Cultists; Imperial Army Militia

Greetings all,

These are the latest models off my workbench... Which makes them the first models I have managed to complete in 2016; hooray!! The models in question are five Orlocks from GW's Classic Necromunda range c.1995 (as opposed to the subsequent 2003 redesign of the models).

These miniatures will be used in a variety of guises for my assorted campaigns and games of 40k, they can easily be deployed as militia; gangers; Imperial Army Auxilia and more relevantly .... Genestealer cultists. Of course I'll obviously be playing a few games of Necromunda with them too!!

Scenery: Warhammer, Oldhammer, Frostgrave and 40k Gothic buildings...and a bit of MDF

Following last week's Rogue Trader game with my missus the campaign involving her alter-ago 'Inquisitor Athena' has begun in earnest. At the conclusion of this preliminary battle I gave her a brief narrative explaining the repercussions of the initial skirmish and giving her a series of deployment options designed to facilitate her next move within the campaign. Upon consideration of these options she decided that her character's best chance for victory was to try and make contact with a small enclave of isolated Battle Sisters established on the planet's northern most land mass.

With this strategic choice made it was clear that the next episode in this saga would have to take place at the aforementioned Battle Sisters Chapel-Barracks. Now I could have made do with my existing terrain in order to try and simulate this unique location... however one thing campaigns are great for is spurring on creativity whether in the form of generating new miniatures or scenery and so I took this opportunity to produce some bespoke buildings for the next battle.

Luckily I had possession of some model kits that I bought a while back that would perfectly fit with the overall Gothic style of a Sororitas Preceptory. Long term readers of this blog may remember that last year I painted up some rather excellent Gothic Ruins produced by Pegasus ( Gothic Ruin Post ), well I was so impressed by these robust and aesthetically gorgeous kits that I decided to get a few more to augment my terrain collection.

Look closely behind the lanterns for a very subtle source lighting effect caused by the flames...

Rogue Trader - Inquisitor Athena Rides Again - Part II -The Battle

Following on from Inquisitor Athena receiving her mission brief the other day (see here for the prelude and playsheet: Battle Report Part One ) the time rapidly arrived where it was time for us to do battle. For the game itself the noble Inquisitor commanded the forces I have listed in the previous post whilst I represented the emerging cult.

At the start of the game the nature of the cult was finally revealed as the many squads of cultists were invariably led by third generation Genestealer hybrids....whilst the overall force was commanded by a charismatic Genestealer Magus. It appears that the world of Logan's Bluff has been infested by a cabal of Xenos filth.....It's time for the Emperor's Inquisition to deal out appropriate retribution for the sin committed by these heretics.