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 Vaktathi wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

w1zard wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
It's not moving the goal posts if I'm not arguing Perty beats Dorn. I'm argueing that the Traitors lost the siege and Perty may not have even been directing that siege anyway

Except that we have lore that directly states that the Iron Warriors (and by extension Perturabo, who was present at the siege and would obviously be commanding his legion) tore down the walls of the Imperial Palace with glee. Horus was probably in overall command of the siege but Perturabo was most certainly given the task of reducing the fortifications.

Dorn had made previous boasts about how no army in the entire galaxy could breach Terra's defenses because he designed them himself. He also stated that he could construct defenses that Perturabo would not be able to beat. He was wrong on both counts.

and Pertuabo was unable to beat them.

Seriously, I'm thinking you might not understand how a properly constructed fortress works. properly constructed a good fortress will have several layers of defences. you'll not be able to stop any and all breaches from being made (eventually someone will build a big eneugh canon) what you can do is build your walls in such a way that you are able to defend those breaches and then fall back to second, third, forth etc lines of defences. The Traitors did break through some of the walls (the Iron warriors may have been key but we know the palace gates where opened by the Imperator Titan Dies Ires)

the traitors likely penatrated through several layers of defences but apparently couldn't seem to finish the job. hence a failure.

In all fairness, the battle came down to the incoming reinforcements. Terra was falling, everyone knew it, and the palace was breached and in the process of being overrun, though admittedly first by the World Eaters.

It was the incoming loyalist reinforcements that made the difference, forcing Horus to make his gamble and the Emperor took him up on it, setting the stage for the rest of the setting when they both failed in their goals.

I don't think anything definitive can be drawn from the siege of terra really, there's a lot of weirdness (e.g. webway battles, EC basically abandoning the fight to party, etc), and nobody really "wins", rather they all lose

That is every siege ever though- eventually, supplies will run out for the defenders. It is only possible to hold out for so long. I think it is telling that the longest siege in recorded history is just 4 years long, and featured a significant amount of smuggling basic supplies past the cordon (Siege of Sarajevo). A fortress can only hold out so long as its defenders have provisions and ammunition. This is why the prospect of relief is vital to the very concept of defending in siege warfare, and why so many sieges have ended in the defenders surrendering after their prospects of being relieved have been dashed.

As such, every statement about the impregnability of a fortress has the phrase "until supplies run out" implicitly tacked on.

 Haighus wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

w1zard wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
It's not moving the goal posts if I'm not arguing Perty beats Dorn. I'm argueing that the Traitors lost the siege and Perty may not have even been directing that siege anyway

Except that we have lore that directly states that the Iron Warriors (and by extension Perturabo, who was present at the siege and would obviously be commanding his legion) tore down the walls of the Imperial Palace with glee. Horus was probably in overall command of the siege but Perturabo was most certainly given the task of reducing the fortifications.

Dorn had made previous boasts about how no army in the entire galaxy could breach Terra's defenses because he designed them himself. He also stated that he could construct defenses that Perturabo would not be able to beat. He was wrong on both counts.

and Pertuabo was unable to beat them.

Seriously, I'm thinking you might not understand how a properly constructed fortress works. properly constructed a good fortress will have several layers of defences. you'll not be able to stop any and all breaches from being made (eventually someone will build a big eneugh canon) what you can do is build your walls in such a way that you are able to defend those breaches and then fall back to second, third, forth etc lines of defences. The Traitors did break through some of the walls (the Iron warriors may have been key but we know the palace gates where opened by the Imperator Titan Dies Ires)

the traitors likely penatrated through several layers of defences but apparently couldn't seem to finish the job. hence a failure.

In all fairness, the battle came down to the incoming reinforcements. Terra was falling, everyone knew it, and the palace was breached and in the process of being overrun, though admittedly first by the World Eaters.

It was the incoming loyalist reinforcements that made the difference, forcing Horus to make his gamble and the Emperor took him up on it, setting the stage for the rest of the setting when they both failed in their goals.

I don't think anything definitive can be drawn from the siege of terra really, there's a lot of weirdness (e.g. webway battles, EC basically abandoning the fight to party, etc), and nobody really "wins", rather they all lose

That is every siege ever though- eventually, supplies will run out for the defenders. It is only possible to hold out for so long. I think it is telling that the longest siege in recorded history is just 4 years long, and featured a significant amount of smuggling basic supplies past the cordon (Siege of Sarajevo). A fortress can only hold out so long as its defenders have provisions and ammunition. This is why the prospect of relief is vital to the very concept of defending in siege warfare, and why so many sieges have ended in the defenders surrendering after their prospects of being relieved have been dashed.

As such, every statement about the impregnability of a fortress has the phrase "until supplies run out" implicitly tacked on.

Somebody else gets it!

While in large part true, it's only part of the equation, and a lot of that applies to both sides. The attackers are often just as resource bound (many sieges have been lifted through history as the beseigers ran out of food for example). Many succeasful sieges never breach the walls, many breached fortresses are never overrun, etc.

The key with the siege of Terra is that the walls were broken and overrun, it was the endgame barring the reinforcements, hence why the Emperor took Horus up on his gamble, otherwise there would have been no need. The whole thing has always been presented as having been decided very closely and ending as a result of leadership decapitation as opposed to any other factor.

To imply that Dorn is a more skillful commander than Perturabo because incoming reinforcements saved him from a loss is a little puzzling. Especially when the Imperial Fists held a superbly defensible position and were still losing.

The strategic outcome of the battle doesn't matter anyway. Dorn's defenses were torn down, his life's work destroyed, his mission to defend Terra a failure, and his rival whom he constantly mocked for decades bested him. Dorn lost... and lost far more than just a battle. It directly contributed towards his behavior in the Iron Cage incident.

w1zard wrote:
To imply that Dorn is a more skillful commander than Perturabo because incoming reinforcements saved him from a loss is a little puzzling. Especially when the Imperial Fists held a superbly defensible position and were still losing.

The strategic outcome of the battle doesn't matter anyway. Dorn's defenses were torn down, his life's work destroyed, his mission to defend Terra a failure, and his rival whom he constantly mocked for decades bested him. Dorn lost... and lost far more than just a battle. It directly contributed towards his behavior in the Iron Cage incident.

except that, yet again, no fortress exists that is perfect. Dorn's entire battle plan was undoubtedly "hold out until the arrival of reinforcements" he had to defend Terra, the Imperial Fists, the White Scars and the Blood Angels. meanwhile all nine traitor legions where present at Terra. end of the dfay, the Traitors ran out of time for their siege, the defences held.

Ultimately both sides had run out of time. There's a reason Big E took up Horus's unstated offer, and it came down to a battle between Horus and The Emperor and not Dorn & Perturabo. The Traitor forces did not break from the engagement until Horus died, the battle had not been decided until that point. Loyalist reinforcements were on the way, but the Inner Palace had been breached from without and the Big E could only spend a tiny amount of time away from the Golden Throne or face daemonic invasion from within. It's hard to judge either the IF or IW legions directly or their Primarchs on the results of the Siege of Terra, both forces were only a fraction of those involved and neither ultimately were the chief battle commanders.

The reinforcements also were not entirely expected, Terra was largely cut off and not in direct communication with those forces (IIRC) and the arriving Legions were fortuitously arriving largely together at a critical moment, operations by other Traitor Legions elsewhere in the galaxy having failed to accomplish their objectives.

 Vaktathi wrote:


The reinforcements also were not entirely expected, Terra was largely cut off and not in direct communication with those forces (IIRC) and the arriving Legions were fortuitously arriving largely together at a critical moment, operations by other Traitor Legions elsewhere in the galaxy having failed to accomplish their objectives.

I belvie the HH novels may have retconned that.

BrianDavion wrote:
except that, yet again, no fortress exists that is perfect. Dorn's entire battle plan was undoubtedly "hold out until the arrival of reinforcements" he had to defend Terra, the Imperial Fists, the White Scars and the Blood Angels. meanwhile all nine traitor legions where present at Terra. end of the dfay, the Traitors ran out of time for their siege, the defences held.

I'm not debating that the loyalists ultimately won. That much is obvious. But Dorn stated outright that he could make defenses that Perturbo couldn't crack, and that Terra could withstand any attack no matter how large because he designed the defenses himself. Both statements were ultimately proven incorrect. We don't know for certain if Dorn and Perturabo ever directly commanded forces in battle against each other on Terra, but we do know FACTUALLY that Perturabo dismantled Dorn's defense network, which was his life's work. It was ultimately vindication/revenge for Perturabo for all of those years of Dorn claiming how much better he was than Perturabo as a siege commander. The loyalists won, but DORN lost.

Claiming that Dorn's defenses worked and he was a genius because ultimately the loyalists won is really reaching. Especially since as stated, the palace had already been breached and the loyalists would have lost had the emperor not confronted Horus himself. The outcome of the battle was decided by the duel between Horus and the emperor, not on the strength of Dorn's defenses.

As far as I am aware, the only time that the Iron Warriors fought the Imperial Fists directly with the respective primarchs as commanders was the Iron Cage incident, in which the Imperial Fists were nearly wiped out. That is what I am basing my statement that Perturabo was a better siege commander than Dorn on. If you have other examples of the lore where Dorn and Perturabo engaged directly and Dorn came out on top I would be happy to hear them. It also makes sense from a lore perspective... Perturabo and his legion had an enormous amount of battlefield experience from being constantly put into meatgrinder battles and given the toughest assignments, whereas the Imperial Fists were no pushovers but tended to serve in a more rear-eschelon role and most of the legion was on permanent garrison duty on and around Terra.

ok first of all Terra was hardly his LIFE'S work,

Dorn was found by the emperor reasonably early, estimated around 830 oro so M30.
Ullanor was at about 000 M31
Istavan was 006 M31
the end of terra was 9 years ,ater.

Dorn and the Fists where tasked with fortifying the palace following the Ullanor Triumph. So Dorn only spent 15 of his roughly 2 centuries on the palace fortifications... Most important work of his life? Absolutely. Life's work? not really

BrianDavion wrote:
Most important work of his life? Absolutely. Life's work? not really

Semantics.