Had to build a city from scratch as a bulwark against Carthage's push across the Alps.
Tried this one again, with the big change being that I put an extra warehouse and the swordmaker's shop right next to the iron mines. This nearly tripled my recruiting rate. My previous mistake was the assumption that someone had to take the finished swords from the from the warehouse to the fort to train a soldier. I was wrong. Instead, every few seconds, a sword will magically disappear from the warehouse, and a fully trained Roman legionnaire will phase into existence at the fort(located wholly on the opposite side of the city), ready for battle. Not discipline and drilling, but
sorcery was the secret to Rome's military power, and has been quite an effective counter to Hannibal's hordes of
zombified elephants.
I haven't yet finished out the mission, but right now I've got a full legion and another getting ready. And while in the last attempt I was so broke I had to beg the Senate for a loan(if done twice, you fail), now I'm sitting on so much denarii that I don't really have a use for it.
Imperial Guard supporting a force of White Scars(or, judging by their weapon use and speed of attack, Imperial Fists dressed as White Scars), against an unholy union of Orks and Chaos(Emp's Children). I start on the NE side, White Scars are NW, Orks are SW, Chaos are SE. Map had two bridges on the east and west sides. I start by throwing out conscripts to capture the points around my base, then push to the east bridge. The Scars' scout marines get pushed off capturing a relic on the west bridge by some Gretchins, and I move in slap the Gretchins while taking the relic for myself. Dick move, but if those aspiring to be mighty Space Marines are so afraid of
Gretchins to abandon a holy relic of the Emperor, well then, screw that, it's mine.
Somehow, the Gretchins build several Waagh! banners just outside of LoS from the relic, but by the time it became a problem, I had Hellhounds to flatten them. In the meantime, I had fortified the east bridge with several proper Guardsmen and heavy weapon teams, but they were never challenged. Maybe because there were so many Guardsmen on the bridge that it broke pathfinding across. All the fighting took place on the west bridge. Shortly after pushing across, Chaos contrivances wiped out all the infantry, and all but one of the Hellhounds(reinforced by Leman Russes which survived). By that point, I had researched the upgrade that makes Conscript squads free(except reinforcing) and ups their max squad size to 30. I also built two HQs on the north end to pump out endless waves of conscripts.
Hundreds of conscripts, backed by several Leman Russ tanks and three Kasrkin squads, backed again by the White Scars who finally got off their asses to actually attack, charged forth. The Ork base, with every building lined with guns and not lacking for targets, fired wildly(only setting on an Ork gun), but could not hold back the charge. Their ramshackle structures caved as tank rounds and flashlight burns tore through them. The Emperor's Children legion was too busy looking at themselves in their mirrors to help, unable to realize they were next. Caught unawares, their horrid temples to Slaanesh were swiftly burned to the ground along with their worshipers. The day was won, the Imperial Guard held the line.
IG casualties: over 300.
White Scars casualties: 104. I really hope most of those were useless things like servitors. Otherwise, that is just sad.
Ork casualties: over 500. Mostly Gretchins.
Chaos casualties: over 200. Mostly cultists, but there were a lot of CSMs in there.
Dawn of War: Soulstorm, Ultimate Apocalypse mod.