If there is a nightmare common to soldiers across western Immoren, it is sure to involve the horror of trench warfare. Soldiers unlucky enough to find Torch descending upon their position can witness that nightmare come to life in the form of ten tons of flame-spitting death. Torch was created specifically to fight through blasted trenchworks and foxholes. It seeks out its targets with fearsome eagerness, moving through enemy positions like a great mechanical predator. Excess steam vents with a terrifying hiss as the warjack plows into the midst of its enemies, burning and cutting them down with brutal efficiency.[1]
Torch is the product of Kommander Oleg Strakhov’s exacting designs: a warjack capable of accompanying him on the most difficult missions behind enemy lines. The lumbering machine is perfectly equipped to deal with all the challenges of trench warfare. It tears apart obstacles and wreckage with its rip saw, and its powerful legs and internal stabilization system allow it to hurdle nearly impassable terrain in order to reach its targets. As it comes ever closer, its integral grenade launchers propel grenade flares into the air, illuminating the battlefield and all who would lurk in its shadows, revealing them and allowing them to be swiftly dispatched. Strakhov’s doctrine of war is fully expressed in Torch, his ideal weapon of pitiless destruction.[1]
Torch fought at Strakhov’s side in the attack on Point Bourne in 608 AR and was nearly lost there. Strakhov and Torch were among the first to be ambushed by Cryxian attackers, even as the Khadorans were concluding their successful invasion of that Cygnaran city. Torch valiantly intercepted the Cryxian helljacks sent by Wraith Witch Deneghra that otherwise would have set upon its master, but it was torn apart in the process.[1]
Other high-priority missions occupied Strakhov for some time, including his daring mission to rescue Kommander Karchev from the Thornwood necrofactorium. Thus, it wasn’t until nearly a year later—amid escalating fighting between Khador and Cygnar—that Strakhov had the opportunity to go recover Torch’s cortex, calling upon a handpicked team of veteran kommandos. They infiltrated a warehouse holding recovered military spoils in Point Bourne and retrieved what remained of the warjack. Returned to captured factories in Merywyn, Torch was soon rebuilt under Strakhov’s watchful eye. The warcaster insists the machine is even more clever and ferocious than it was before, having learned a degree of self-preservation from this setback.[1]