Erguras Fall escalates

Following the setbacks to the Tau and Necron objectives on Ergura's Fall, the next forces of chaos and the Imperium continued to pour more resources onto the world. The forces of chaos in particular committed more traitor astartes to the campaign, including elements from the Iron Warriors and Night Lords. The Iron Warriors had not arrived in force, but their scouting units encountered lead elements of the Imperium in the shape of Adeptus Mechanicus patrols in early 12.022M42 on the central plains of the planet.

The initial patrols clashed in no mans land, leading to an escalation by the Mechanicum following their defeat. Seeing a second patrol now coming their way, the Iron Warriors withdrew. This however was a trap, as the imperial force now ran straight into a small host of summoned daemons. The Adeptus Mechanicus agents had managed to take important objectives however, and despite taking heavy casualties in the second skirmish, defeated the daemons and prevented the forces of chaos gaining any further intelligence on the base now being constructed in the southern region of the continent.

Further north, the Night Lords moved in force against what they thought was a Tau formation, only to find yet another necron army trying to prevent the other races from despoiling yet more necron tombs. Their presence however actively engaged the Night Lords' curiosity, and the chaos force moved to attack the aliens in their path. The Night Lords attack was succesful, killing the necron overlord and only narrowly failing to to capture the necron cryptek Szeras, who was now apparently highly invested in protecting these necron tombs. Once again the necrons were unable to achieve their main goal and yet another tomb complex was ransacked by an enemy.

The reason the forces of chaos did not run into the Tau was because their main force was already engaged further south. The vast plains of Ergura's Fall turned the engagements into something more akin to naval battles, as armies roved across the surface trying to find one another to bring them to battle. Apart from tomb complexes and the occasional ruined settlement, Ergura's Fall had nothing in the way of cities or population, and the war on the world was defined by these shifting mobile battles.

The Tau were engaged further south because they had been attempting to bring the Imperium to battle. Having suffered a defeat in the preceding week, the Tau now sought to "deprecate" Imperial assets, which in actuality meant destroy the imperial armies wherever they were found. Eventually the two sides met on the equatorial plains and a large engagement took place involving Commander Stormwatch and Aun'Tso. Opposing their huntre cadre were the Novgorod Hussars, once again supported by heavy tanks and cavalry, ideal troops for the flat featureless terrain of the planet.

The battle took place over several hours as the two sides clashed. The result was indecisive, with neither force able to cripple the others. By the time evening came both sides withdrew closer to their fixed defences, although the Imperium did lose one super heavy tank.