Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Another Forge World update along the lines of the Castellax-Achean Automaton, since these guys are really cool and I assume they should be fully compatible with modern Thousand Sons kits. The weaker Blades were struck down by the Rubric, and bonded forever to the more powerful Blademaster of the squad in a deadly hive-mind bound to guarding the salvaged lore and relics of the Thousand Sons. Also, they're called Jackal Occult rather than Khenetai Occult, to fit with the Scarab Occult naming scheme and avoid Forge World's habit of unnecessarily fancy names. On the table, the Jackal Occult should be pretty deadly anti-elites; All Is Dust and makes them into pseudo-Assault Terminators for the Thousand Sons. A whole unit of force swords gives them high AP and two damage per wound, so they'll rip anything with multiple wounds to shreds. It's a similar kind of output to the Deathwing Knights, who have higher Strength/Damage, but one less Attack (and have a "true" 2+/3+ save with an extra wound and teleportation, but that's why they're more expensive...). Their Sorcerer buffs their lackluster Strength by providing an Exalted Champion-style wound re-roll whenever he successfully casts, and he gets a bonus to Smiting enemy units in melee; get stuck in and smack people with your Smite-sword, my child. Though I do wonder if, instead of a bonus to cast, it should just be a straight Smite upgrade - as in, he casts Smite normally (D3/D6) in melee range. Hm.

Jackal Occult Blades (Elites, Power Rating 7)

Jackal Occult Blades: M 5", WS 3+, BS 3+, S4, T4, W1, A2, Ld8, Sv3+
Jackal Occult Sorcerer: M 6", WS 3+, BS 3+, S4, T4, W1, A2, Ld9, Sv3+

This unit contains 1 Jackal Occult Sorcerer and 4 Jackal Occult Blades. It can include up to 5 additional Jackal Occult Blades (Power Rating +7), up to 10 additional Jackal Occult Blades (Power Rating +14) or up to 15 additional Jackal Occult Blades (Power Rating +20). Each model is armed with two force blades.

Weapons

Inferno bolt pistol: Range 12", Pistol 1, S4, AP-2, D1

Plasma pistol: When attacking with this weapon, choose one of the profiles below.

-Standard: Range 12", Pistol 1, S7, AP-3, D1

-Supercharge: Range 12", Pistol 1, S8, AP-3, D2, Abilities: On a hit roll of 1, the bearer is slain.

Warpflame pistol: Range 6", Pistol D6, S3, AP-2, D1, Abilities: This weapon automatically hits its target.

Force blade: Melee, S User, AP -3, D2, Abilities: You can re-roll failed wound rolls for this weapon if a PSYKER in the bearer's unit successfully manifested a psychic power this turn.

Force stave: Melee, S+2, AP -1, Dd3

Wargear Options

The Jackal Occult Sorcerer may replace one force blade with an inferno bolt pistol, plasma pistol, or warpflame pistol.

The Jackal Occult Sorcerer may replace one force blade with a force stave.

One Jackal Occult Blade may take an Icon of Flame.

Abilities

All is Dust: Add 1 to saving throws for Jackal Occult Blades if the attack has a Damage characteristic of 1. In addition, the -1 modifier to hit rolls for moving and shooting with a Heavy weapon does not apply to Jackal Occult Blades.

Death to the False Emperor: Each time you make a hit roll of 6+ for a model with this ability in the Fight phase, it can, if it was targeting an IMPERIUM unit, immediately make an extra attack against the same unit using the same weapon. These extra attacks cannot themselves generate any further attacks.

Favoured of Tzeentch: All models in this unit have a 5+ invulnerable save.

Icon of Flame: At the start of your Psychic phase, roll a D6 for each unit with an Icon of Flame. On a roll of 6 inflict 1 mortal wound on the closest enemy unit within 12" of the model carrying the Icon of Flame.

Mindsong of Blades: When a Jackal Occult Sorcerer attempts to manifest the Smite power, you can add 2 to the Psychic test if his target is within 1". If his unit includes 9 or more models, you can add 3 instead.

Relic Guardians: Add 1 to the Attacks characteristic of a model in this unit if it is equipped with two melee weapons.

Psyker
A Jackal Occult Sorcerer can attempt to manifest one psychic power in each friendly Psychic phase, and attempt to deny one psychic power in each enemy Psychic phase. He knows the Smite psychic power and one psychic power from the Discipline of Change. When a Jackal Occult Sorcerer manifests the Smite psychic power, he inflicts 1 mortal wound instead of D3, or D3 mortal wounds instead of D6 if the Psychic test is more than 10.

Keywords

Faction: CHAOS, TZEENTCH, HERETIC ASTARTES, THOUSAND SONS

Keywords: INFANTRY, PSYKER, JACKAL OCCULT BLADES

Points Costs

Jackal Occult Blade: 16pts

Jackal Occult Sorcerer: 16pts

Inferno bolt pistol: 0pts

Plasma pistol: 5pts

Warpflame pistol: 3pts

Force blade: 8pts (0pts for second force blade)

Force stave: 8pts

Icon of Flame: 5pts

Designer's Note: Any abilities, Stratagems, or other rules that apply to Aspiring Sorcerers and Scarab Occult Sorcerers also apply to Jackal Occult Sorcerers.

Seems pretty reasonable to me. They should be able to hit hard, but they'll have to target multi-wound or otherwise expensive units to be worth the investment. They're expensive enough to not be an auto-take. They're reasonably durable.

I could see someone either deepstriking these guys to assassinate a key target or sticking them in a rhino to serve as a dedicated countercharge unit.

I'd let you use them. On a side note, you might consider putting all of these Thousand Sons units into a single thread in the future rather than making a bunch of smaller threads. Though I can appreciate that the size of the posts discourages that.

Wyldhunt wrote:
Seems pretty reasonable to me. They should be able to hit hard, but they'll have to target multi-wound or otherwise expensive units to be worth the investment. They're expensive enough to not be an auto-take. They're reasonably durable.

I could see someone either deepstriking these guys to assassinate a key target or sticking them in a rhino to serve as a dedicated countercharge unit.

Yeah! That's pretty much the only niche I could find for a whole unit armed with force swords, outside of making them into some kind of hideous all-sorcerer death star. They're definitely not worth using as general purpose anti-horde melee, not at 24pts a pop, but that's what Tzaangor are good for. Hopefully these guys can fill a hard-hitting specialist counter-attack role that doesn't otherwise exist in the Thousand Sons. ...hell, with the re-roll active I'm pretty sure it'd only take six of them to wreck a Rhino in a single Fight phase, on average. I think it would take Khorne Berzerkers about four times as many models to pull that off: the Jackals are real can-openers. Then again, a 10-man squad of Jackals will kill 10 Ork Boyz in a phase... or 15 with their re-roll. A 10-man squad of Berzerkers would cost 70 points less and chew through 25 Boyz in that same phase.

Wyldhunt wrote:
On a side note, you might consider putting all of these Thousand Sons units into a single thread in the future rather than making a bunch of smaller threads. Though I can appreciate that the size of the posts discourages that.

I mostly didn't do this because I was writing-as-I-went, but I decided to leave it afterwards for just that reason. Each post is quite long, none of the datasheets are directly reliant on each other for commentary, and I feel like I'm more likely to get useful/specific feedback if they're each in separate threads. I'll try to avoid creating lots of threads in quick succession, however.