40k Reddy

Now we are on to the Lord of Death (cue evil dramatic drums), although for one of the supposed most powerful modern-day (41st millennium) space marines peoples say he dies to easy, well thats what they say..............



Mephiston has been a roller coaster in terms of rules, sometimes he looks viable, other times he seemed weak and sometimes he was awesome and fit the bill. In terms of the model/character well thats always been straight forward, loved the character but the model, well lets say a revamp is desperately required.

Well isnt this half the reason why you buy him? WS7, S6, T6, I7 and 5 Ws Wow! he has drawn comparisons to Monstrous Creatures and rightly so but as I will get on to later I dont think thats altogether fair.....

Wargear


This just reinforces the importance of those stats. Artificer armour, force weapon, plasma pistol and of course Psychic hood, thats it, no fancy weapons and why would he need them when you've got powers like he does.......

Special Rules


Fleet, has it obvious uses, coupled with Wings this guy can cover big distances. Transfixing gaze, pick an enemy IC, if they fail a Ld test on -4 then Mephiston can re-roll to hit and to wound ouch!
The most important of all his special rules has to be, Psyker, this allows him to cast 3 powers a turn and he can pick from, Wings, Rage and Sanguine sword! remember that means he can cast each one as many times he likes and that is very important.........

Uses


Well he is a one man monster, the size of a space marine with the ability to cause 6 S10 wound relativity easily, hes a beast in combat. The only major downside to Mephiston is the lack of a Invulnerable save and Eternal Warrior. To be honest though its the Inv save thats really worrying, the lack of EW is not to bad, remember hes T6, the only thing that will really hurt him are Force weapons, Boneswords and stuff like wraithcannons.  The invulnerable save only really matters in combat IMO, at range Mephiston is small enough to hid either completely or partially (4+cover save) from ranged shots, but in combat he has no where to hide! He must get nightmares about hidden fists, cause this will be the bane of his life literally. Admittedly most hidden fists are limited to 2/3 attacks, but without an invulnerable save he is going to lose wounds quick. With almost every unit now taking hidden fists if they can Mephiston can probably hit 2-3 units before dying. While saying that not all armies have hidden fists, infact only 5/12 races can have them and for 2 races (IG and Witch Hunters) they have S6 PFs which reduce effectiveness towards Mephistion.

Another element that makes Mephiston who he is is physic powers, he has 3 as ive mentioned before and can cast 3 a turn. Obviously if your opponent lacks physic defence then your ok, he can cast powers off merrily, but anything from a physic hood to Runes of Warding can be detrimental to Mephiston. The key here is the fact that mephiston can cast 3 a turn so that means you can cast wings, if that fails you can cast wings again. This is fine when facing the likes of a physic hood but without any protection from perils Runes of Warding can do more damage than the eldars shooting phase (RoW makes you take physic tests on 3D6 with a roll of 12 and above causing perils).

One thing that is undeniable is Mephistons ability to kill! and kill meta game, nob biker, thunderwolf cavalry etc. 6 S10 attacks rerolling to hit is awesome and on  top of that any IC that treads Mephistons path is surely dead, instead of casting rage (You have Transfixing Gaze!) then cast the force weapon, although against most ICs the S10 will do it already, but Tyranids be warned with no EW anymore they are perfect targets for Mephiston.

When we consider Mephiston for all round competitive armies, I would highly suggest a free transport, such as a Stormraven (which will be acting as a gunship otherwise) when facing physic defence and you need a way for Mephiston to get into combat when relying on Wings may not be an option.

One of one favourite ways to run him is with honour guard with JPs, this gives him FNP, 4+ cover (he can easily hide) and a unit that can support him! It reduces his weaknesses against horde and hidden fists (the honour guard can mow a 10 man marine squad before it hits back). Also lets not forget Furious Charge, which lets him win meph on meph! I like:

Honour Guard: JPs, 2 melta bombs, 1 power weapon, 1 blood champion: 210

Now of course you will face armies without Physic defence or with very weak defence and armies with few hidden fists but you still have to remember how much mephiston realises on powers and T6 before you pay his hefty price tag.........

Cost


To be honest it is very difficult to gauge if Mephistion is worth his points, certainly there is no other HQ to compare him to and there is no other model in the SM range that he can be compared to, indeed he does bring something to the BA army which is irreplaceable. Comparisons to a LR is where anyone might start but he plays entirely different roles in armies. One of my main problems with Mephiston is he is so 1 dimensional, your opponent knows what he is in your army for and more than likely what you plan to do with him. He will struggle against certain armies for sure, Orks, Eldar and IG off the top of my head but there are armies I think he is well suited to fight Nids, SM , Necron and Choas. But there is no denying his combat prowess, he can turn the tide of a battle and certainly be a major threat to your opponent, physic powers or not.  The real choice is not is he worth the points but are you willing to take the gamble......

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