[Manolis]

The culexus assassin is underestimated. He's not just an anti-psyker assassin. His ability to force enemy units within 12" to make their Leadership checks as if they were guardmens (leadership 7) can be potentially destructive when used in combination with Divine Pronouncement and the Immolator's Holy Promethium upgrade!

Think of a culexus assassin closing near space marines tactical squads or even better, veteran squads. If kept behind some cover an Inquisitor Lord with a Ld value of 10 will have a very good chance to get his Divine Pr. ability to work on them. Because the difference between their scores is now 3 (thnx to the culexus' abilities), the marines will have to roll 4 or less to pass the check. Rolling very low (as well as very high (10+)) on* two rolls of a six sided dice is very difficult exactely because of the fact you get to roll twice (which tends to lead to average results instead). Thus the sm will most likely fall back. Even if they dont the culexus assassin is relatively safe from their fire (since they need to pass a morale check to shot him)!

I know sm always rally on their next turn, but this tactical trick is still viable versus armies like the eldar or chaos space marines. Imagine coupling this with an immolator equiped with holy promethium. Am I wrong to think that more than 75% (approximately) of the time it will make a even a strong enemy unit fall back? When used properly and in combination with each other, this tactic can make melee armies like orcs (but not nids) to fall back before they reach within 6" of any of your units! Definitely a creative player could turn a difficult battle with a close combat army into an easy victory- you can lead them easily into traps and you can buy your Sisters of Battle another turn for proper bolter shooting.


I will get back to you after i try this one out. For now its just theory.*

[Manolis]

This is an excellent post concerning Leadership rolls:

http://forums.tauonline.org/index.php?topic=4979.0

A must-see!

[MalVeauX]

The Culexus assassin is indeed a fun assassin. Her only downfall that she effects -all- models, not just the enemy. Also, she's slow, and cannot join units for cover. She is not an independent character and can be picked out in the shooting phase without any limitations other than target priority checks.

Keeping that in mind, you may be attempting to use Divine Pronouncement with a Ld7 Inquisitor Lord - Not cool!

You would have to effectively make sure you are 12 inches away from the Assassin and that she is still alive and within 12 inches of the enemy in question - and then you have to be within 24 inches to use the power. This requires -a lot- of manipulation and is generally never going to happen for you unfortunately because both the Assassin and the Inquisitor are high-priority targets and will be gunned down. The assassin will be shot down with haste by an opponent knowing what she does.

One way you could attempt to do this, is with an Inquisitor in a Rhino. That way he's inside armor and the assassin can use the Rhino for cover. Then possibly you could try it out. But really, this is a lot of points to attempt a moral check on a squad. But it is indeed a fun thing to do!

As with many things, this ability would be most effective against specific enemies (Orks, Eldar, Tau) who have average or low leaderships. A Holy Promethium attack and a chasing "escort" Immolator would run a squad off the board since they cannot rally with the tank too close to them and would be broken via the massive moral test that they'd fail.

Good luck with your trials though!

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@Manolis:

Please try and edit posts where possible Thanks!