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Hello all. I was browsing through the impressive array of arcane wargear that Haemonculi can take, and I was just wondering which of the 'one-shot' items you've had successes with. (Including the 'non-weapon' ones, such as Crucible of Malediction, etc.)

I'll go first.

I usually pack a single Ancient Haemonculus for the increased BS and have him carry a hexrifle (For pesky Monstrous Creature support) and a Casket of Flensing. I know that the Casket is very random in its effectiveness, but it is that very randomness that I love. It can either be the worst weapon in the game or an unbelievably potent infantry killer. I've used it to great effect while pairing up the Haemonculus with a group of warriors in a raider. All that shooting in one turn can reliable whittle down even an ork boy squad to VERY manageable numbers.

Anyway, your thoughts?

Contrary to what people believe I've had pretty good use with the dark gate, blown up a few tanks for me and sent squads running from the table, I kind of like it Also I love using the shatter shard on a Guardsman blob squad

I don't see why anyone would dislike the dark gate terribly, apart from its admittedly steep point cost. I think that for that kind of price you should at least be able to penetrate a save of 5+, but it's still not a bad piece of equipment. I tried a few games with it and have had a decent amount of luck slaughtering hordes of gaunts and boyz, although in the end I prefer the casket for its cheaper cost and potential for armor piercing.

Shattershard is godly in its current broken form that can snipe independent characters. Even without that its a fun and effective particularly against aspect warriors and terminators.

The casket of fleshining is fun, I always include it and find its a bit annoying to roll all those dice but it rarely takes longer to roll it out than it does for your opponent to read through what you are doing.

The dark gate can be fun in some circumstances. If it had even AP6 it would be useful against tanks but otherwise I think its too many points to take randomly.

The archangel of pain is only useful against low LD armies and even then you usually have higher WS and I anyway soooo it isnt that good.

The crucible of malediction is also too situational. It does make for soemthing fun to take against a friend who loves them psykers.

Orb of despair is too expensive for what it does. It cant be used against vehicles and thus AP1 is no good. At best its a plasma cannon blast that doesnt get hot but is one shot only and has a really short range.

My Haemonculi packs a Shattershard and a Crucible of Malediction.

The crucible is cheap enough that it serves as a potential anti-psyker weapon in a take-all-comers list - especially potent against Eldar and Tyranids.

And my Shattershard has destroyed Eldrad, Ezekial, the Dark Angel Chapter Master (Can't remember his name), Ghazghkull, and plenty of terminators, marines, genestealers, banshees - I nuked half a diversified nob squad with it once...

Ha, yes, the shattershard is pretty handy for removing just about any scary infantry model.

However, Dash, I'm a little leery about the Crucible of Malediction... It just seems to me that it's not that great a buy for 20 pts. I mean, it has the potential to kill psykers like mad (and I DO regularly face down a heavy brood of zoanthropes), but passing a leadership test just isn't that difficult. Have you actually managed to kill all that many psykers with it, or is there a nifty trick you use to make it more useful?

I suppose you could park some raiders with some torment launchers around it... Seems like it would be a wee bit hard to arrange, though, seeing as you have to move only 6" with the haemonculus raider in order to actually unleash the crucible. (It's fired instead of shooting, meaning you would have to be in a situation that allows you to shoot at all, correct?)