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I'm wondering, do the forces of Chaos ever use the large maws that sometimes develop on them as weapons in and of themselves? There aren't any rules about it for the game as far as I know, but it seems like these growths would be deadly effective in some instances. One prime example is the Death Guard, where certain soldiers have big mouths on bodies, particularly their stomachs:



Other Traitor Legions have this as well to some degree, like the mouths on the armor and firearms of Berzerkers, Havocs, and even on some Chaos tanks and Titans, as well as the beaks on some TS Exalted Sorcerers. Is there any evidence of these being used in combat? I could see a Plague Marine's stomach mouth pulling any enemy in with its long tongue and grinding them to pieces, or a Sorcerer cracking open someone's open skull like a parrot cracks open a nut. Is there any evidence of this happening, and if so, how exactly has it gone down?

Good question, if i remember right these things on them like there bad chemical stench and other nasty things contribute to some sort of ability that is used in the battlefield.

Just a guess from memory, don't really know at all. Good question.

 Stormatious wrote:
Good question, if i remember right these things on them like there bad chemical stench and other nasty things contribute to some sort of ability that is used in the battlefield.

Just a guess from memory, don't really know at all. Good question.

Interesting, I didn't know that, but since they serve Nurgle, it makes sense. Also, some Plaguebearers have the large mouths on their stomachs though we never hear of them using them.

Depends if they’re actually functional. Being a daemonic mutation, I wouldn’t say that’s a given.

There’s old fluff (I don’t think RoC old though) which explained, or at least postulated that being insane, the Gods consider all their gifts useful, with the line between Daemonhood and Spawn being as much luck as dedication. So a mutation may look fearsome, but simply get in the way,

The old original Realms of Chaos books did have rules for many various mutations, such as tentacles, claws, etc... However that was the era when it was more a warband vs warband game so the number of models was low, making it more feasible to track which model had which mutations.

Later as the scale of the battles increased in WHFB, 40k, and Epic, GW tried to represent mutations with cards and the like, representing that the effective use of a mutation that was there all along (instead of having to track each model and their own set of mutations).

Ultimately though mutations are gained by exposure to the warp and Chaos gods not really caring whether a mutation is useful or not. Many of the old Realms of Chaos mutations were either cosmetic, or even negative.

I would say it's wrapped into their close combat attacks. Even if the main weapon is something else there is tremendous use to means that distract/inconvenience foes. Also fluff mentions for mouths screaming/whispering/talking in general 'drive them insanse' sense.

There are two types of mutation chaos mortals have to deal with, your run of the mill warp corruption from being exposed to the warp and gifts of the chaos gods, I doubt that the occupants of the eye know one from the other and just assign all to the whims of the gods, that being said your just as likely to receive good gifts as bad gifts from the gods, being chaotic by their very nature they likely just see it as a good thing, so one day you could receive a mutation that bonds your weapons to your arms, another could be a third eye popping up on your bum, hardly useful.

The run of the mill warp exposure likely corrupts DNA and produces mutants from generation to generation, some of these could end up being fairly stable and able to reproduce having similar results as time goes on, like the tzaangors, others could be totally insane inbred monstrosities.

Either way most must be stable in some manner otherwise there would be no farmers, artisans etc. Within the eye that handle the day to day affairs of feeding the vast populations and arming the soldiers.

The maw on the picture does not seems to be able to have any joints. It reminds me more of a coral polyp. Also are thos tentacles or more like prolapses? I very much doubt it is like the sarlack pit in SW. Are they even under the persons controll?

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I'm wondering, do the forces of Chaos ever use the large maws that sometimes develop on them as weapons in and of themselves?

I would say yes.

 Niiai wrote:
The maw on the picture does not seems to be able to have any joints. It reminds me more of a coral polyp. Also are thos tentacles or more like prolapses? I very much doubt it is like the sarlack pit in SW. Are they even under the persons controll?

Well when it comes to Nurgle they could be parasites.

Andersp90 wrote:

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I'm wondering, do the forces of Chaos ever use the large maws that sometimes develop on them as weapons in and of themselves?

I would say yes.

Interesting, I didn't know about this. Are any of these rules still around? I'm checking the Death Guard Codex and I'm sadly not seeing anything.

Niiai wrote:The maw on the picture does not seems to be able to have any joints. It reminds me more of a coral polyp. Also are thos tentacles or more like prolapses? I very much doubt it is like the sarlack pit in SW. Are they even under the persons controll?

Good point, it's not a traditional mouth. What I was more thinking of was something along the lines of this:



Plaguebearer equivalent:

 ArcaneHorror wrote:

Andersp90 wrote:

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I'm wondering, do the forces of Chaos ever use the large maws that sometimes develop on them as weapons in and of themselves?

I would say yes.

Interesting, I didn't know about this. Are any of these rules still around? I'm checking the Death Guard Codex and I'm sadly not seeing anything.

Its from the 3rd edition chaos space marine codex. I would think that it is still valid, from a fluff point of view. Just look at the possessed marines.

In "The Thing" a stomach like that bites someone his hands of. Since I saw that scene I wanted to model one of my Plague marines with a maw like that. GW apparently had the same idea and sculpted them on every nurgle unit they created during the last years .

In Dawn of War 2 the Great Unclean one can fire its intestines at the enemy and pull him in close combat. I believe it also damaged the enemy.

For anybody who has a failure of imagination regarding benefitial (or unbefisial) mutations I would recomend John Carpenters The Thing from 1982. The special effects are horrid in all the right ways.

Not recomended for younger people, depending on the country you are in.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JjIXwkX1e48