Tegaea Alcori
Back to Square One
(One of the Tempest Cannon emplacements)
Name: The Citadels of the Sun (Jointly), The Citadel of Dawn & Citadel of Dusk (individually).
Image Source: By ‘BlueRogueVyse’ on Deviantart http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs33/f/2008/239/c/5/Orbital_Cannon_by_BlueRogueVyse.jpg
Intent: To create a pair of formidable defence for Kaeshana. These two Citadels, combined with Ashira’s Crown form a network capable of defending the planet from all but the most concerted attacks. They will provide both firepower and protection and use an energy shield to defend themselves
Classification: Planetary Defence
Location: 2 bases in the mountains of Kaeshana. One is in the far west, in the arid coastal mountains far from central civilisation, and one only 400km from the capital Santaissa.
Map Location:
Map by Myself
Affiliation: Kaeshana Confederation, Omega Protectorate (by extension).
Population: Each of the two bases are roughly equal in size and compliment. Each of them has:
- One Captain General commanding.
- Four High Captains as subordinates.
- 50 other officers and NCOs.
- 25 Angelii.
- 350 gunners and maintenance personnel.
- 100 soldiers.
- 50 technical/support personnel (medics, cooks etc)
Defenses: Each of the two Citadels are well provisioned with weaponry. Each of them has:
- 3 x Tempest Cannons
- 10 x Ballista Weapon Emplacements
- 10 x Javelin Weapon Emplacements
- 5 x Keraunos Missile Turrets
- 8 x ARGH Shattergun Rotary Cannon Heavy Emplacements
- 8 x ARGH Mobile Barricades for protecting the above.
- 1 x Shield Projector
- Military grade bunker construction, blast doors and underground hardening
- Blast doors surrounding reactor and command centre augmented with ARGH Graphite Reinforced Durasteel
Points of Interest: In addition to the above defences, each fortress contains the following:
- Concealed hanger and dock area for a squadron of fighters, separated from the main fortress by underground tunnels.
- Single access road from the plains, well covered by defences above.
- Supplies, stores and provisions to resist a siege of half a year or longer.
- Internal tramways, turbolifts and access ports to allow rapid movement inside the base.
- Extensive garrison living areas, recreation centres and commercial areas.
Description:
The two Citadels are as close in details with each other that a description of one suffices to describe the other.
The Citadels are sufficiently unlike Ashira’s Crown to make a simplistic comparison unworkable. Whilst it is true they have triple the Tempest Cannons, the Citadels are far more independent defences, able to stand on their own than the three bastions in the Crown are.
The defence shield of the Citadels is focussed entirely on protecting them, allowing it to be concentrated more powerfully. Indeed, this shield, as the one at Hoth used by the Rebels, is practically immune to orbital bombardment. Indeed, if all power is diverted to the shield rather than weapons it is doubtful that any bombardment short of an entire fleet could overcome it. Dug into the hard rock of the mountain the Citadels are extremely difficult to destroy from the air or orbit.
Each Citadel possesses three of the mighty Tempest Cannons, able to fire once every twenty seconds, which provides a formidable defence against orbital or sub orbital large ships. The cannons are slightly separated in the high mountains so the destruction of one does not necessarily mean the others are disabled.
Access to the Citadels is done via a road leading up from the plains below, or by landing at the hanger or landing pad. The hanger contains space for a full squadron of fighters, this is set off to one side and dug into the mountainside. There is also a larger, exposed landing pad able to carry ships of up to 100 metres in length, closely watched by numerous missile and cannon turrets.
The road from the plains, as an obvious weak-point, twists and turns much and is narrow, with steep cliffs and steep drops compressing movement. Near the arrival point durasteel bollards can be raised to impede the progress of walkers and vehicles, whilst not providing cover for infantry. This area is overwatched by rotary shattercannons, Ballista and Javelin emplacements and regular infantry.
Three reactors, dug nearly a kilometre into the rock, provide power for each Citadel. Normally, one of these powers the shield, one the Tempests, the other everything else, though power can be reallocated between them if needed.
As they are much more isolated than Ashira’s Crown, the Citadels each feature extensive living quarters, recreation areas and commercial outlets. The Citadels are full-time garrisons, and thus are quite extensive and comfortable in areas. Supplies of various sorts to last a long siege are also stockpiled.
The weaknesses of these Citadels are few but potentially severe. As they are indeed separated from other Eldorai concentrations, especially the Citadel of Dusk, they can be attacked and overwhelmed individually.
Likewise, whilst they form a deterrent, they simply cannot cover most of Kaeshana’s surface against anything other than large ships. Thus, an invasion of smaller ships bypassing them could render them at least partly negated.
History:
The names of the Citadel (Dawn and Dusk) have two origins, one historical and one mythological.
Historically, the great Queen Anais II constructed two fortresses named the Citadels of Dawn and Dusk on the eastern and western shores of the Inner Sea to bastion her control over the area and to repel Kar’zun invasions. These impressive ruins still stand on cliffs overlooking the sea, though badly ruined now.
Mythologically, the Goddess Ashira is said to have brought light to Kaeshana with two giant lamps which channelled the light of the sun down upon the planet. Ardent Ashirans, believing the description in the scriptures searched long and fruitlessly for these Citadels before finally concluding they were manifested in the sky.
Leaving aside the past, the origins of the modern Citadels are more concrete. Kaeshana and the Eldorai in general has had a lot of ground to make up into the fully formed galaxy. The self-strengthening movements undertaken by the current Queen, with assistance from trusted outsiders, has gone a long way to modernising Kaeshana and protecting it. However, overall Kaeshana lacked the significant defences and bastions to protect against a modern assault.
With this in mind Ashira’s Crown was built to protect the capital of Santaissa, but the rest of the planet was unguarded.
Two powerful defences were thus devised to help protect the planet. Their placement requires some explanation as its logic is not immediately obvious. As a side note, this creates three defences, between them harnessing 9 Tempest Cannons, yet another manifestation of the Eldorai love of 3 and 9.
As a large percentage of the Eldorai people, including all of their major industrial areas, live in the regions within 500km of Santaissa, one of the Citadels had to be placed to cover this area. This would give it the ability to supplement Ashira’s Crown, but would also be in a position far enough from major population centres for attacks to yield little collateral damage.
Thus, the first Citadel’s location is understandable, but the placement of the Citadel of Dusk so far away, in an area with no major populations of Eldorai within hundreds of kilometres might seem puzzling. However, there are two points to keep in mind; the relative closeness of the two Citadels, and the closeness of major Kar’zun settlements.
First, although on opposite ends of the continental land mass from each other, the two Citadels are actually much closer across the sea to each other than across the land. Therefore the two can support each other quite easily, also from any invader coming from the sea. Second, though attitudes have softened, the Kar’zun are (rightly or wrongly) seen as a potential threat which might one day rise once more and join an invader. Thus, the placement of a Citadel in the area of the greatest ‘reservations’ of Kar’zun provides a powerful base in case this does happen.
Overall the cost and efforts to build the two Citadels have been huge. Kaeshana cannot afford (for some years anyway) to construct any more. Thus, however powerful they are, the Citadels of the Sun are not the start of a series of bastions, but twin defences which can help protect Kaeshana, but cannot guarantee its liberty.
Links:
