Valerian Gunlancer

Origin

In an age of uncertainty shadowing High Prince Abel’s murder, local nobles of the Valerian Isle were not at all happy with their beloved regents passing. His death hung over the region as a thick cloud of both fear and rage.
In order to prevent such tragedies from ever happening again, Abel’s closest loyalists devised a plan of creating the perfect bodyguard. An immortal bulwark.
Taking direct inspiration from the Golden Legionnaires own shield and rifle infantry, the musket and bayonet got replaced by a far more exotic weapon while the armour and shield were upgraded from standard Imperial armour to a more robust and heavy juggernaut and knight hybrid full plate.
With a crescent craters on the sides of the shields, each pair of bulwarks form a gap in the wall which the lances glue together and stick out from. Either taking a mode of firearm or speartip depending on the iron lid being attached or hanging.
The intricacies and cost of these weapons rendered the first Gunlancers practically worthless though, as they could barely fight without tipping over.
Due to the vast amounts of monetary funding gone into the project, the nobles refused to give up. Instead, the original failure only spurred them on harder to a point where the most effective, detailed and expensive Gunlancers had the same status of large and pricey statues. Serving almost as a luxury to the nobles on how much coin they could sink into a unit of worthless personal guards which could barely move.
Eventually, this would change with the visit of a Westportian trader to one of the Valerian nobles parties. The man being a close friend to an esteemed weapons manufacturer and engineer would eventually see their entire fate changed.
Tuning both armour and lance to be lighter, the new Gunlance also changed the loading chamber from the central piece to the handle. Hollowing it out while also allowing a second pair of hands to reload the weapon from right behind the Gunlancer. Effectively turning them into stationary shotgun turrets.

Tactics and Logistics

Manpower

Each Phalanx of Gunlancers consists of fifty men, backed up by a squire. Generally they line up in rows of thirty with twenty reserves to relieve any tired or injured men. On average, no phalanx fights on its own and is generally backed up by two to four other formations.

Leadership

Every Phalanx is commandeered by the noblest blood of Valeria, being that of a lesser or higher noble. These men graced with a gift for strength and leadership are trained from childhood among veteran combatants loyal to the house as to make each and every gunlancer a trusted advisor of their leader. Making them all more deadly with the strict bonds they share and serve both to blood, region and empire.

Support

A Gunlancer never fights alone. Though their gear turns them into juggernauts in stationary combat, their lack of mobility makes them incredibly vulnerable from any types of ambushes from behind, artillery or attacks from above.
This should matter little to them, as the frontlines of the infantry. Ensuring they always have their backs against the flesh wall, while the true reckoning of Valerian wroth reigns above. Relying on the vast fleet of aeronautic ships to obliterate any vermin before they can become a true threat to the adamantine bastion.

Credits:

Created by Tonarus
Art generated with Midjourney

Weapon

Valerian Gunlance

While the first gunlances were large and ungainly, having the thick central part of the weapon as chambers to six cartridges that couldn’t be reloaded in combat, the new version completely revolutionises the idea. Within the hollow handle of the weapon, the cartridge chamber ejects the mechanisms from the pommel through harnessing the force of the recoil which reveals the loading breach of the weapon. Through utilising a second pair of hands, the squire hunkered down behind the bastion of steel can effortlessly reload the weapon at a rapid pace.
The long barrel of the lances fires the spread shrapnel munitions with incredible velocity. Piercing, penetrating and slicing through most foes but the most armoured. Turning it into an effective weapon against most but the most armoured enemies and siege weaponry, as the lances are effective on both short, medium and long ranges.

Armour

Valerian Pistonaut Armour

Forged by masterful smiths, assembled by perfectionist engineers and manufactured by professional scientists of the Westport Consortium. The Valerian Pistonaut Armour differs little from their original model with the key difference, besides the religiously devout attention to gold and white decorum, being the arm-attached shield.
Through a chain of pistons and cogs, brutal force against the shield activates large spring mechanisms that eject the plates into a large adamant tower shield. With the leverage of the internal pistons of the exo-skeletal armour, the impossible weight of the metal slabs become easily manageable for the wearer.
The downside of such a heavy suit is the lethal warmth that seeps in. Something countered by vents on the backside of the armour which are cooled by cold water tubes evaporating from these slots. Slots wide enough for a blade to pierce.

Famous Battle

The Siege of Fort Blánc

Valeria

Command: Dominus Flavius Claudius
Valerian Forces:
200 Manpower
50 Gunlances
150 Conscripts
Valerian Casualties:
21 Total
11 Injured
7 Dead

Brood of Cain

Command:
Wrathlord Sigurd Bloodmantle
Warlord Ogor Bloodhorn
Cainite Forces:
4.000 Manpower
1.000 Goreknights
2.000 Beastkin
500 Hellhounds
500 Wrathborne Warriors
Cainite Casualties:
~3.100 Total
~2.700 Dead
~400 Injured

Glorious Valerian Victory

The siege of Fort Blánc is the single historical event needed to showcase the efficiency of the Valerian Gunlances.
The event that transpired follows the incursion of a sudden Cainite insurgency from Bhaelnarok where a warband of Beastkin summoned a rift onto the Valerian isle and tried to pillage the local villages.
Having seen the attack coming, the Dominus Flavius Claudius had the local villages evacuated to the fort as he assembled his private Gunlance guards and armed who he could for combat. Though he sent a pigeon for aid, the help would arrive too late to join in the slaughter.
By placing the Gunlancers in front of the gate, he had the women and children dig trenches for the guards to bunker down, while the most able of them then had the honour of reloading the Gunlancers weapons during combat.
With the men placed on top of the walls with artillery pieces, cannons and rifles, they successfully held back the advance for two hours before the phalanx eventually threatened to crumble.
Evacuating the civilians into the main castle, Flavius ordered his men to obliterate the ground right in front of the Gunlancers until all explosives were gone. Successfully allowing the heavy shields to slowly back up into an open portcullis, as the shrapnels and blasts did ought to break their plate.
While the enemy desperately sought to press back the advance, half the Gunlancers scattered from the lines and hurried up onto the battlements. The closed ranged blunderbuss unleashed from their weapons ensuring that no ladders could be placed onto the walls, so the inexperienced conscripts remained out of arm’s reach.
The end of the battle would eventually see the exhausted Gunlancers, after an almost full day of holding the line, go into a full retreat out of the battlement and into the centre of the fort. There, as a final stand, the conscripts fired the last of their munitions into a killbox and went onto a full offensive with spears and bayonets. The mindless frontal assault had cost the Beastkin almost their entire force. Spurring them to retreat just as their hated foe was pressed to the wall.
An army of eight thousand arrived a mere couple of hours after the victory, who were commanded to clean up, secure the perimeter and ensure the civilians could safely return to their homes for rebuilding.