Why did the siege of Terra fail ?

[battle captain corpus]

Meh...weve gone off topic, its something for another thread! ;)

[Vodunius]

Index Astartes says

"The Iron Warriors had rebelled and lost. Thier master was dead and the Emperor still ruled.

 

I think it means Horus rather than Perturabo.

 

Me too, especially since the very same paragraph ends with: "Guilliman had decided that Perturabo's destruction was not worth the loss of Rogal Dorn and had brought his Chapter to drive off the Iron Warriors." (plus the fact that Perturabo is a daemon prince who rules the world of Medrengard in the Eye of Terror has been around since RT)

 

And why on Terra would he want to whittle down his own men? Dorn wasnt won over by the whole Codex idea either, so he wouldnt commit mass suicides of his own men would he?

He didnt want to whittle down his men, when the Imperial Navy started shooting at Imperial Fist vessels he realised he had a choice: break up the legion, or start killing loyal servants of the Emperor. He had no choice but the former, but.. ""Dorn knew that many of his Battle Brothers did not wish to found new Chapters as the Ultramarines were eager to do."

 

He took the most hardened vets as he NEEDED them.

The IA doesnt say he took the hardened veterans, it says thats what were left:

"Dorn knew that many of his Battle Brothers did not wish to found new Chapters as the Ultramarines were eager to do. There would be far too many left for one of the new thousand strong Chapters. Leaving Phalanx, he led these die-hards against the Iron Warriors in their lair."

 

"After the carnage of the Iron Cage, what remained was a hardened, veteran force "

 

Meh...weve gone off topic, its something for another thread!

Too true, heres a recent thread on the topic: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.p...howtopic=134475

[ironloki]

Straying back on topic:

 

One question I always wondered is what would Horus have done even if the Emperor was killed? I mean it is not like a computer game where you get 'GAME OVER' pop up on the screen and Horus gets to put his initials on the scoreboard. Dorn most likely would have been killed by Horus (if he had just munched his way through Sanguinius and The Emperor, im sure he could easily take Dorn) But there were still three legions on Terra and even if they managed to clear up this resistance the Space Wolves, Dark Angels and Ultramarines were arriving. Not only were they fresh but im sure the Primarchs would have been incredibly angry (understatement of course ;) ) at the Emperor being killed. This would have spurred them onto reckless deeds making the traitors pay inch by inch. How would Horus with his exhausted legions then turn around and fight these new arrivals?

 

Perhaps that was Chaos' plan altogether. Have everyone wipe themselves out.

[Renik]

making a vain attempt to get this topic back into the right direction how do you think the battle for terra would have played out if horus didn't try the gambit of killing the emperor and the siege carried on

[Pulse]

making a vain attempt to get this topic back into the right direction how do you think the battle for terra would have played out if horus didn't try the gambit of killing the emperor and the siege carried on

Allowing another two full legions to deploy would have been a massive tactical error on Horus' part, just the sheer weight of fresh loyal warriors from two legions landing would have been enough to push the traitor legions back a long way, don't forget the attackers had been fighting for a long time and taking massive amounts of casualites trying to assault the walls and breaches.

 

Also the fresh loyal legions would have brought their full fleets to bare on Horus' fleets - potenitally crippling and destroying Horus' fleets would mean that all the ground troops would have been stuck on the surface with no way of retreat, they would have been crushed utterly.

 

Horus had the right idea in my opinion of luring the Emperor on board, from a tactical point of view it was the only way to try to cripple the Imperium.

[Renik]

is the same view i have but for me theres also the thing of would the arrival of the space wolves and dark angels then the ultra marines brought the emperors children into the fight. As they would also be fairly fresh since butchering civilians isnt the hardest of jobs

[Maeklos]

It Horus HAD killed the Emperor and remained intact, there would have been a massive release of Warp energy (think Highlander, but on a planetary scale). In the massive release, the Empyrean would have been able to bleed through full-force, probably turning Terra into a daemonworld....if not all of Segmentum Solar into a larger, more massive twin to the Eye of Terror. The remaining Loyalists on Terra would have been wiped out by literally trillions of daemons - and when (if!) the Dark Angels arrived, along with the Ultramarines and Space Wolves, they would have been annihilated, as well.

 

My guess is that instead of launching a counter-assault, the Space Wolves and Ultramarines would have pulled back to one of the furthest reaches to built their power (kind of a mirror of what the Traitor Legions did in the current timeline) while the Dark Angels, having seen who the ultimate victor was, would have joined Horus.

[Ju'kosian]

The space wolves and ultramarines were not so fresh I think, since the Wolves had the Alpha legion to deal with and the Ultra's had been a little busy at Calth with a part of the Word bearers..

 

Horus could also call in the rest of the traitor legions (alpha, nightlords, and the remaining parts of the IW and Word bearers..)

 

I wonder if the loyalists would begin with a siege or just bombard all traitors on terra ...

[ironloki]

The space wolves and ultramarines were not so fresh I think, since the Wolves had the Alpha legion to deal with and the Ultra's had been a little busy at Calth with a part of the Word bearers..

 

Horus could also call in the rest of the traitor legions (alpha, nightlords, and the remaining parts of the IW and Word bearers..)

 

I wonder if the loyalists would begin with a siege or just bombard all traitors on terra ...

 

True but the Ultra's had the largest legion left, as seen by their successor breakdown, so they would have been the most complete of the forces comming to Terra.

 

Calling in the Nightlords and Alpha Legion would be an interesting call to surround the incomming Loyalists but I wonder how receptive they would be to the command of Horus. Both of those legions are rather aloof when it comes to the calls of Chaos. They appear more interested in doing what they want, mainly terrorising. It would have been interesting to see the frustration of Horus' face to finally take Terra and watch as the Alpha Legion and Night Lords turned their back on him.

 

I think they would immediately jump into a seige. I cannot see them simply bombarding the planet from the Heavens as I believe they would want to be face to face with those who killed their father. At least...I can see Russ running straight onto the planet so he could swirl his weapon, which would not allow the others to bombard without hitting the wolves.

 

I've forgotten my timeline for a minute (Anyone able to refresh moi?) - Did the Dark Angels fight amongst their fallen after the seige of Terra or before. If it was before then that would give the Dark Angels a knock condition wise and may have affect the outcome, if Horus' plan had succeeded.

[Vodunius]

I've forgotten my timeline for a minute (Anyone able to refresh moi?) - Did the Dark Angels fight amongst their fallen after the seige of Terra or before. If it was before then that would give the Dark Angels a knock condition wise and may have affect the outcome, if Horus' plan had succeeded.

 

Unless its been retconned then it was quite some time after - the Dark Angels only discovered the Fallens treachery when they returned to Caliban at the close of the Great Scouring.

 

One question I always wondered is what would Horus have done even if the Emperor was killed?

Given the state Terra was in I doubt he'd have tried to hold it against the loyalist reinforcements, more likely he'd have fallen back to Mars to await their arrival, even with the Thousand Sons and Sons of Horus fleeing it took some time to liberate Mars (I seem to recall some old fluff about the Iron Warriors having to be dug out of Mars, but I may be wrong) if those two legions alone had stayed it would have made a considerable difference.

[Sons of Horus]

uhm... perturabo IS still alive. it was the imperial fists that were utterly decimated during the iron cage. even though Dorn knew what he was going to do he still somewhat fell for the trap because they didn't get anything from the attack worth of any value and they were nearly wiped out. the main thing that proves that the IW won and not the IF is that after Perturabo returned to the warp, the ascended to Daemonhood.

[battle captain corpus]

uhm... perturabo IS still alive. it was the imperial fists that were utterly decimated during the iron cage. even though Dorn knew what he was going to do he still somewhat fell for the trap because they didn't get anything from the attack worth of any value and they were nearly wiped out. the main thing that proves that the IW won and not the IF is that after Perturabo returned to the warp, the ascended to Daemonhood.

 

Were trying to keep it back on topic. Its my fault we wandered first of all. :)

[Apemantus]

I think the Siege failed due to a number of reasons. Firstly Horus had banked on the White Scars joining him so it was a blow when they didn't, plus you had three legions that actually worked well together despite being under strength and vastly out numbered. You had Rogal Dorn who had fortified the Imperial Palace and the master of siege warfare with his legion defending the walls that alone was a headache Horus could have done without. Time was against Horus. With the Dark Angels and Space Wolves approaching he made a gamble which didn't pay off. With the chaos force as large as it was even Horus had problems controlling which showed when the EC decided to run off and do their own thing. Both sides needed a lot of luck but unfortunately some key moments didn't play at the way Horus wanted them to and the loyalist despite all the odds held out for long enough.

 

 

uhm... perturabo IS still alive. it was the imperial fists that were utterly decimated during the iron cage. even though Dorn knew what he was going to do he still somewhat fell for the trap because they didn't get anything from the attack worth of any value and they were nearly wiped out. the main thing that proves that the IW won and not the IF is that after Perturabo returned to the warp, the ascended to Daemonhood.

 

The account of the Iron Cage differs vastly depending on who's IA you read. According to the Iron Warriors Rogal Dorn was painted in a very bad light and they cained the Imperial Fists in the Iron Cage. According to the Imperial Fists Rogal Dorn was the exact opposite and they entered the Iron Cage to cleanse themselves and allow the Die Hard Imperial Fists to die in the glory of battle... They would symbolically enter the Pain Glove as a legion and emerge redeemed as a chapter that's why a lot of IF died. According to the IF the Iron Warriors could not finish them and lacked the faith to make the type of sacrifice the IF were making. Anyway both sides got what they were looking for and when you combine both sides of the story it's pretty clear that the battle was a stale mate which is what you'd expect from two sides that were experts in the same method of warfare.

[War Angel]

The horus heresy accompleshed exactly what it was planed to do. while all the forces of the empire are racing back to terra to defend the emperor, what happened to our borders. orks, eldar, Dark Eldar, and whoever eles exsisted at the time didnt stop attacking just cause we were busy. horus died, Whoopdeedoo, The chaos gods dont give a damn, they just wanted to crap over the emperor's relm, The fact that he's still alive and cant do more to help his realm is probly sweater to them then if horus had won. Better yet, whatever promiss they made him, they dont need to keep it any more.

 

damned chaos filth

[Sons of Horus]

sorry about my last post. i didn't read page 2 ;) . anyway if Horus did kill the emperor then all the loyalists would have been DEMORALIZED!! and they wouldn't be able to fight effectively. the traitors would push their advantage and destroy terra. all loyalists dead, happy Chaos Gods, all powerful Horus = GW bankrupt! without space marines GW's current market would go crash into the earth.

[Rain]

The problem with this kind of argument is that all of the fluff is completely fictional (obviously) and has been created by a large disparate group, making it very inconsistent. According to some accounts that I've read, Horus lowered the shields of his ship only be granted a better view of his final inevitable victory, and the Emperor simply used this as a chance to teleport onto the Vengeful Spirit. Other accounts say that he was afraid of being overwhelmed by Imperial reinforcements and therefore needed to end the battle decisively.

 

In any case, it's kind of a moot point discussing this as GW would never let their golden boys lose, and besides, Horus's defeat brings the Paradise Lost allusion to its logical conclusion. That said, Chaos was proceeding with the battle about as well as could be expected, and I think that from a purely military perspective Chaos outplayed the loyalists at practically every turn, and then Horus just had to go and die. :)

[Ju'kosian]

The space wolves and ultramarines were not so fresh I think, since the Wolves had the Alpha legion to deal with and the Ultra's had been a little busy at Calth with a part of the Word bearers..

 

Horus could also call in the rest of the traitor legions (alpha, nightlords, and the remaining parts of the IW and Word bearers..)

 

I wonder if the loyalists would begin with a siege or just bombard all traitors on terra ...

 

True but the Ultra's had the largest legion left, as seen by their successor breakdown, so they would have been the most complete of the forces comming to Terra.

 

Calling in the Nightlords and Alpha Legion would be an interesting call to surround the incomming Loyalists but I wonder how receptive they would be to the command of Horus. Both of those legions are rather aloof when it comes to the calls of Chaos. They appear more interested in doing what they want, mainly terrorising. It would have been interesting to see the frustration of Horus' face to finally take Terra and watch as the Alpha Legion and Night Lords turned their back on him.

 

I think they would immediately jump into a seige. I cannot see them simply bombarding the planet from the Heavens as I believe they would want to be face to face with those who killed their father. At least...I can see Russ running straight onto the planet so he could swirl his weapon, which would not allow the others to bombard without hitting the wolves.

 

I've forgotten my timeline for a minute (Anyone able to refresh moi?) - Did the Dark Angels fight amongst their fallen after the seige of Terra or before. If it was before then that would give the Dark Angels a knock condition wise and may have affect the outcome, if Horus' plan had succeeded.

 

I can imagine that Alpharius would be very happy to join in the fray so he can kick Roboute's as..

As for Night Haunter, he did attack Dorn once, so why not come after him again..

 

The dark angels fight amongst themselves after heresy, upon their return to Caliban they were being shot from the surface..

 

If the Emperor would have been defeated, would there be any other of the 'loyalist' legions be more tempted to join with Horus ?

[Ubermensch Commander]

The problem with this kind of argument is that all of the fluff is completely fictional (obviously) and has been created by a large disparate group, making it very inconsistent. According to some accounts that I've read, Horus lowered the shields of his ship only be granted a better view of his final inevitable victory, and the Emperor simply used this as a chance to teleport onto the Vengeful Spirit. Other accounts say that he was afraid of being overwhelmed by Imperial reinforcements and therefore needed to end the battle decisively.

 

In any case, it's kind of a moot point discussing this as GW would never let their golden boys lose, and besides, Horus's defeat brings the Paradise Lost allusion to its logical conclusion. That said, Chaos was proceeding with the battle about as well as could be expected, and I think that from a purely military perspective Chaos outplayed the loyalists at practically every turn, and then Horus just had to go and die. :)

[/quote name/]

 

I think i would have to disagree with the "traitors out playing the loyalists at every turn" assessment. After all, one of the main reasons they were initally so successful is because they had advantage of surprise, like at the Dropsite Massacres.

 

Meanwhile, the Ultramarines fended off the Word Bearers and were coming home with their might forces still more or less intact.

The defenders at Terra held off the Chaos forces and even managed to take back Space Ports. I mean being outnumbered and outgunned and still taking a space port in a sortie? Nice!

The Alpha Legion had not stopped the Space Wolves(as i believe was their intent?) from coming back to catch the Traitor's from behind.

yeah, Horus did a wonderful job of manipulating people and traitor's rocked the galaxy with their actions, but i fail to see how the Chaos "outplayed" the loyalsits. The traitor's just had the sucker punch advantage(galaxy wide sucker punch!) and blitzed Terra. The loyalists held out, broke the traitors and hurled them back into the Eye of Terror.

[Renik]

i would agree the chaos forces didnt out do the loyalists at every turn on the siege of terra you had the white scars break out then taking the spaceport rogal dorn using the sky fortress to get last of his troops in. Chaos forces main aim was to take the palace at speed. If it became a bogged down affair the imperium would eventually have won.

[Sons of Horus]

the advantage of surprise was the last thing the traitors had after :P garro squeeled like a -_- . and the traitors did out do the loyalists. Khan was the one who had surprised the traitors by taking the space port. the forces of Chaos would have won.

[Rain]

First of all the loyalists were not really outnumbered since only about half of the traitor forces were actually committed to much of anything consequential. The Iron Warriors were attacking the wall, the World Eaters were trying to overrun it, and the Death Guard were holding Lion's Gate, that's about it. The Sons were "in reserve" and the Emperor's Children were randomly killing civilians. Furthermore, once the outer wall was breached, the Iron Warriors also disengaged and went after the Imperial Fists fortress monastery, essentially leaving the World Eaters to fight the Blood Angels within the palace. As to the siege itself, Iron Warriors, World Eaters, Death Guard, vs. Imperial Fists, Blood Angels, White Scars does not strike me as awfully bad odds for the loyalists especially since they were defending a massive fortification and could therefore use their position to their advantage. If anything, it's a testament to the traitors abilities to have broken through the wall at all.

 

As for general traitor vs loyalist strategy let's go blow by blow:

1.)Istvaan III: Horus fails in killing loyalists with virus bombs and Angron forces Horus's hand with a planetary strike, eventually killing all loyalists but losing valuable time outcome:basically a draw, Horus killed the loyalists but the loyalists bought time

2.) Tallarn: Similar circumstances, Iron Warriors virus bomb the planet but run out of time in trying to attack the planet and eventually have to withdraw after losing a tank battle. outcome:Imperial Victory

3.) Istvaan V Chaos massacres three loyalist legions. outcome: Chaos victory

4.) Iron Warriors ambush Imperial Fists in the Phall system and cripple about half of the expeditionary force. outcome: Chaos victory

5.) Ultramarines defend the Ultramar system from the Word Bearers, but a large amount of planets are razed in the process and Calth becomes a blasted and inhospitable wasteland following the Ultramarines' "liberation" of the planet. outcome: Imperial victory

6.) Chaos lands on Terra and eventually breaches the Imperial Palace outcome: Chaos victory

7.) The White Scars take Lions Gate. outcome: Imperial Victory

8.) Horus killed. outcome: Imperial Victory

9.) Battle of the Iron Cage, Imperial Fists are decimated but somehow claim victory because not all of them managed to die before Gulliman saved them. outcome: Chaos victory

 

So yes, although the Imperials did have several victories, not only were they small in number, but they tended to be extremely Pyhrric as whatever they "saved" ended up completely destroyed and worthless, and they lost both time and personnel winning battles fought over what became deserts and rocks.

[Ubermensch Commander]

First of all the loyalists were not really outnumbered since only about half of the traitor forces were actually committed to much of anything consequential. The Iron Warriors were attacking the wall, the World Eaters were trying to overrun it, and the Death Guard were holding Lion's Gate, that's about it. The Sons were "in reserve" and the Emperor's Children were randomly killing civilians. Furthermore, once the outer wall was breached, the Iron Warriors also disengaged and went after the Imperial Fists fortress monastery, essentially leaving the World Eaters to fight the Blood Angels within the palace. As to the siege itself, Iron Warriors, World Eaters, Death Guard, vs. Imperial Fists, Blood Angels, White Scars does not strike me as awfully bad odds for the loyalists especially since they were defending a massive fortification and could therefore use their position to their advantage. If anything, it's a testament to the traitors abilities to have broken through the wall at all.

 

As for general traitor vs loyalist strategy let's go blow by blow:

1.)Istvaan III: Horus fails in killing loyalists with virus bombs and Angron forces Horus's hand with a planetary strike, eventually killing all loyalists but losing valuable time outcome:basically a draw, Horus killed the loyalists but the loyalists bought time

2.) Tallarn: Similar circumstances, Iron Warriors virus bomb the planet but run out of time in trying to attack the planet and eventually have to withdraw after losing a tank battle. outcome:Imperial Victory

3.) Istvaan V Chaos massacres three loyalist legions. outcome: Chaos victory

4.) Iron Warriors ambush Imperial Fists in the Phall system and cripple about half of the expeditionary force. outcome: Chaos victory

5.) Ultramarines defend the Ultramar system from the Word Bearers, but a large amount of planets are razed in the process and Calth becomes a blasted and inhospitable wasteland following the Ultramarines' "liberation" of the planet. outcome: Imperial victory

6.) Chaos lands on Terra and eventually breaches the Imperial Palace outcome: Chaos victory

7.) The White Scars take Lions Gate. outcome: Imperial Victory

8.) Horus killed. outcome: Imperial Victory

9.) Battle of the Iron Cage, Imperial Fists are decimated but somehow claim victory because not all of them managed to die before Gulliman saved them. outcome: Chaos victory

 

So yes, although the Imperials did have several victories, not only were they small in number, but they tended to be extremely Pyhrric as whatever they "saved" ended up completely destroyed and worthless, and they lost both time and personnel winning battles fought over what became deserts and rocks.

 

huh, yet it was Chaos that was driven back into the Eye of Terror. So wouldnt all those "chaos victories", several of which I dispute as being considered victories, be phyrric for the Traitors?

 

1) I'd call that a Chaos victory. A hard fought victory, harder than it needed to be. After reading the Horus Heresy books i blame angron for most of that. Horus: Im gonna bomb 'em! wait, what is that.....ANGRON? Get outta the way! oh Gods durn it.

The loyalists there really impressed me with their tenacity though.

 

2) so.....Choas lost the tank battle and virus bombed the planet. Yet the Tallarns still remain as one of the most respected Imperial Guard Regiments out there. Not so phyrric as they continued to support the Imperium, rather like the Valhallans when their planet got turned into an Ice World by being knocked farther back in orbit. In typical fashion, the Iron Warriors lost and spitefully gave a virus bomb of F*** YOU! to the Tallarns. Imperial victory, i fail to see what was phyrric about it. Nasty out come to be sure. But Phyrric? They got a badass Imp guard regiment(s) out of it.

 

3) *snort* Probably the saddest and most pathetic showing of the Chaos traitors in my opinion. "YEAH WE WON!" after firing on their battle weary brothers as they walked back to what should have been a fortified friendly base to resupply and rearm. wow.....yeah...bragging rights! :) Whats the encore, kicking puppies with a Titan or sending a Grand Company to attack an agriworld and proclaiming yourselves "mightier than the mightiest bull"? Was it a brutal blow? No doubt. Salamanders basically out of the fight, Raven Guard forced to horrible cloning to stay in the fight, and Iron Hands...well...they got really really pissy after that. Not disputing the Chaos victory aspect, mind you. Just rolling my eyes when Chaos players pump their fists in air(figurativly or literally) at it.

 

4) huh never heard about that one. Whered ya hear it? What were the forces invovled? what did it accomplish?

 

5) Oh no. A world lost. Say it isn't so! Imperial victory with completly acceptable losses, considering the scale of the Heresy.

 

6) I would NOT call the siege of the Imperial Palance a Chaos victory. The chaos legions did not kill the Emperor(crippled yes but niether Horus nor any of the other Chaos Primarchs became Emperor, the Imperium still stands, the Astronomicon still burns through the warp therby styming the Chaos gods

 

9) This was not a Chaos Victory, nor an Imperial victory. I am sick unto death of both sides (Fists and Iron Warriors enthusiasts both) Perturabo did not kill Dorn, Dorn did not kill Peturabo. Both failed at their respective goals and the Ultramarines arrival forced the two to disengage. All they managed to do was blast each other to itty bitty scraps. Draw.

 

8) on this we can agree. Actually one of the major turning points of the Heresy. Figurehead gone, Legions fall back from Terra and eventually forced back into Eye of Terror where they wage intercine conflict until Abaddon manages to rally them for Black Crusades.

 

As for the siege itself and the forces invovled we have varying accounts on the forces. Address that in a later post. for now....sleep calls.

[Apemantus]

4.) Iron Warriors ambush Imperial Fists in the Phall system and cripple about half of the expeditionary force. outcome: Chaos victory

 

That's actually not correct, The IW launch a surprise attack but due to the IF maintaining battle readiness the attack wasn't as effective as it should have been, the Imperial Fists managed to come to terms with the attack and soon it was them launching a counter attack on the IW. They then received word from Rogal Dorn to return to Terra will all haste and not be distracted. A testament to the Fists that they resisted the urge to cripple the IW further. As the IF fleet withdrew the IW began to attack again. Four (I think it was four) IF ships distracted the fleet while the rest of the fist's ships got to the warp jump point.... The account is in the HH artbooks.

 

 

9.) Battle of the Iron Cage, Imperial Fists are decimated but somehow claim victory because not all of them managed to die before Gulliman saved them. outcome: Chaos victory

I agree with Ubermensch. The account of the Iron Cage differs vastly depending on who's IA you read. According to the Iron Warriors Rogal Dorn was painted in a very bad light and they cained the Imperial Fists in the Iron Cage. According to the Imperial Fists Rogal Dorn was the exact opposite and they entered the Iron Cage to cleanse themselves and allow the Die Hard Imperial Fists to die in the glory of battle... They would symbolically enter the Pain Glove as a legion and emerge redeemed as a chapter that's why a lot of IF died. According to the IF the Iron Warriors could not finish them and lacked the faith to make the type of sacrifice the IF were making. Anyway both sides got what they were looking for and when you combine both sides of the story it's pretty clear that the battle was a stale mate which is what you'd expect from two sides that were experts in the same method of warfare.

[brother Hastatus]

Most things have been said, but I'll just say one or two things.

 

@ironloki - it was after the siege that the DA fought the fallen. They were returning to Caliban to recover and greive, and were fired upon as they entered orbit. Then they had even more to greive about.

 

I think there were several very important reasons as to why the siege failed. But first I would just like to point out how close it came to succeding. The traitors had got into the palace itself, and only the inner sanctum (or something like that) remained to be taken. It was getting pretty desperate for the loyalists.

 

But the most important reasons (in my opinion) are:

 

1. The diversity of the traitors. By this time they had all been 'gifted' by the chaos gods, and were each very different. This meant they each had to use their own method, otherwise their god would be displeased. So for Horus to coordinate all these varying strengths and weaknesses was no small task, and ultimately he didn't manage. The EC madly slaughtered the population of Terra. The WE assualted the as-yet-unfallen and heavily defended walls madly, not caring about the defenders that shot gaping wholes in the legion. The WB that were there tried to summon demons all the time. So only the SoH, the DG and the IW were actually concentrating on the siege as a whole, rather than just their own plan of how to do it. This evened out the numbers a bit, as some of the traitors attacks and tactics (eg the WE mad assaults) were easy to defeat/hold off.

 

2. The strength of the defences. They were incredibly strong, built by the people defending them, one of the two best siege and fortification legions in the galaxy. No one would have an easy time assaulting them.

 

3. The WS taking the Space Port. This slowed down the flood of reinforcements, relieving some of the pressure from the defenders.

 

4. Time. Sieges take time. The traitors were close to the end, whittling down the defenders slowly, having pushed them back into the corridors of the palace itself. But they did not have enough time to get them out. It was still well defended and the UMs, the Space Wolves and the Dark Angels, three of the strongest, most successful legions were bearing down on Terra. If they arrived the traitors would be trapped on Terra, probably marginally outnumbered, tired, and spread out across the planet. They would have been completely and utterly destroyed. So Horus did the one thing he could do - make a last, desperate gamble to kill the Emperor. And ultimately that didn't work. Which leads on the the fifth reason.

 

5. The lack of a clear command chain in the traitors. After Horus, who's in command? So when Horus dies, they can't work together. The loyalist reinforcements are getting close, so they do the one thing they can think of. Run. And the siege has failed.

 

Sorry for the rather long post - these are just my views on the siege of Terra and what went wrong.

[Rain]

2) so.....Choas lost the tank battle and virus bombed the planet. Yet the Tallarns still remain as one of the most respected Imperial Guard Regiments out there. Not so phyrric as they continued to support the Imperium, rather like the Valhallans when their planet got turned into an Ice World by being knocked farther back in orbit. In typical fashion, the Iron Warriors lost and spitefully gave a virus bomb of F*** YOU! to the Tallarns. Imperial victory, i fail to see what was phyrric about it. Nasty out come to be sure. But Phyrric? They got a badass Imp guard regiment(s) out of it.

 

Except that that's not really the way it happened. The Iron Warriors arrived at Tallarn and immediately virus bombed the planet so as to destroy any opposition. The Tallarn PDF hid in underground bunkers and therefore most managed to survive. The Iron Warriors then landed a massive armored force that clashed with the Tallarn tanks and fought to more or less a standstill except that the Iron Warriors had less tanks to commit to the battle and therefore their losses were disastrous when taken as a percent of their standing army and not simply a gross number.

 

Furthermore, the remaining chaos forces were needed to attack Terra and therefore had to withdraw. Yeah, we lost, I admitted that in my initial post, but the victory is plenty phyrric as the planet went from a verdant paradise to a poisonous desert. Another Imperial victory like that and the planet will become completely inhospitable and covered in demonic Bob Saget clones.