[civ2buf]

The Cleansing War
Battle of Praetorian Homeworld
Battle of Praetorian Stations

This date is of such epic importance to the new Cryslonite collective that is forms the basis of an entirely new Cryslonite Calendar that has this as day 0.

The intensity of the thought waves on this day were so tiring as to require a complete stand down of the emergence worlds' production, research and construction for an entire Teracycle.

The desperation on the part of the Cryslonite reflected the fact that weakness in war would be devestating to the collective. The determination and overwhelming will to power of the Cryslonite led to stories of a crystal race that echoed across the galaxy, to places where no one knew the real Cryslonite, but they knew the legends of the Crystal Empire.

The lesson to remember when thinking of the Cryslonite is, victory at any cost. The collective has no thoughtwave for a victory that was too costly.

Missile ships were entirely irrelevant at this point in history for both sides.

First, Fighters from the Praetorian Homeworld overwhelmed the point defenses of the fleet, which was a first sign of difficulty.

The call was made to charge in, losses no object. In retrospect, it is easy to see that if the Cryslonite ships were as weak on defense as the collective thought, it would have been no contest.

The Supremacy ships were placed in position to destroy the planetary defenses. But a barrage of missiles destroyed one, and crippled a second.

The third Supremacy finally got into range for a single barrage, and was taken down by meson fire.

It was around this time that the collective began to panic, but then something happened. The collective had several ships facing an entire armada of planetary munitions, firing off weapons that were pathetically weak, with a Last wounded Supremacy trying to get into range. The shields were lowered with only one barrage of napalms, and a series of shard cannon shots. Two smaller ships were destroyed, but a single Superiority Battleship withstood 40 meson bLasts, and 10 missiles, and remained operational.

While the Superiority BS 0001 faced off that fire, the lowered shields of the planet took on plague. This was when the collective felt they had at least hurt the Praetorians critically.

But the Superiority class vessels continued to draw fire away from the vital and almost destroyed Supremacy.

All point defense ships of the Cryslonite were destroyed. That meant 80 missiles struck targets for every couple of shots by the collectives' fleet. The only chance was to take out the weapon platforms before the rest of the fleet was destroyed.

The collectives' intelligience reports during the battle discovered the homeworld carried mines that could have stopped the fleet had they been launched. Demining ships were still insufficiently deployed to the fleet. Three thousand praetorian infantry were also on planet, helpless to do much of anything. Six satellites remained in docks.

It seems the Praetorian did not expect such a sudden attack, they expected the Cryslonite to feel outclassed against such a force and hold off on any attack.

But the Cryslonite once more proved they are comfortable and unbeatable when orbitting a planet... an infestation planet.

Missile strikes continued, but the crippled Supremacy was untargetted by the Praetorians, and began destroying the weapon platforms. The military doctrine of the Cryslonite matches the goals of avoiding the military and striking the infastructure of other military organizations. Aggression is the only way to win a war, and the only way to win aggression is to destroy or conquer the enemies production basis, the planet. Never again will the value of planetary weapons technologies be questioned by the collective, for they have learned that what losses they did take were due to not enough Supremacy ships.

After the weapon platforms fell, it was time to lessen the danger of the bases. This was a more risky mission for those ships left of the fleet.

Fighters and a single enemy ship also had to be dealt with.

There was a large network of bases with supporting fire on any approach to any of them. But long range fire was too unreliable when you need to get through as much armor as the battleships of the collective have.

Again, a "wise" commander may have decided to back off, but under fire again the fleet cleared the military bases with the battleships bearing the brunt of the fire rather well.

All Supremacy class ships were destroyed. The homeworld was under severe plague warning.

A battle station remained, armed to the teeth, it was the Last great threat to the collective's fleet.

Satellite missile launchers damaged more fleet ships, but it was insignificant, and they came under lethal fire, ending that threat.

Beyond the Last Battle Station was the Last armed resistance of the Praetorian, it was a second Yarkand class space station with meson bLasters. The fourth Superiority battleship was destroyed, Superiority battlecruisers 1, 2 and 3 remained with little damage. Superiority Battleship 1 was very damaged from the battle stations' fire. Superiority Battleship 2 was slightly damaged, and 3 was destroyed.

The poorly named Equalization, built during the Soluk war but upgraded in engine and weapon quality, was modestly damaged and a DeInfester was undamaged, with the plague weapon that gave the fleet the greatest chance to prevent any resistance from the Praetorians.

But away from the homeworld, there were still dozens of ships of the Praetorian, and a counterattack on the collective emergence world was a possibility.

The Cleansing War would still need many years to reach its conclusion, but the battle of Praetorian Homeworld had a great effect on both sides, representing a victory as great as the loss of two thirds of the Cryslonite fleet to mines was to the Praetorian forces.

Later it was determined that armor was an issue on both sides of the battle. The space station and battle stations were heavily armored, as heavily as the Cryslonite fleet, but the shard cannon weaponry of the fleet tore right through the armor, destroying weaponry with ease.