Saturday, April 9, 2016

Horus Heresy Review: Xiphon Pattern Interceptor

Background.
The Xiphon is a beautiful model and exactly what I imagine a mid to late crusade era Astartes aircraft should look like: sleek, elegant and rather deadly.

To be clear, I think that the Xiphon is probably one of those entries in the army list that leads people to think that Forge World models might be too powerful. But overall, I think the price (in terms of points) is actually about right.

Strengths.
Coming armed with a pair of twin linked lascannons at its base level is outstanding. But its even better than that. The missile launchers come with the ability to force a jink or cover save re-roll as well as being at AP2 and force d3 rolls on the vehicle damage table (pick the highest). This means that the Xiphon is a flying tank killer - plain and simple (and a flyer killer too, understandably). It will do the job and do it very well - and fast too.

With armoured ceramite and the agile special rule (3+ jink), it also has at least some defences as well.

Weaknesses.
Two Hull Point. Armour like a rhino. Points near a land raider. If I were playing against one, this would be the first thing shot out of the skies on turn one. Therefore its absolutely critical to place the Xiphon well or it will be going away very quickly.

Builds.
There are not many options here. But here's some concepts to build around.

Xiphon with ground tracking auguries (215 points).
Something of a baseline build. I could also see the Xiphon being played "naked" as well.

Xiphon, ground tracking auguries, chaff launchers, armoured cockpit (225 points).
The maximum upgrade. Got to wonder at this point if a land raider might be more plausible.

2 comments:

Siph_Horridus said...

I run this in 40k and love it, it is such a cool model and was easy to build as FW kits go too. Check it out:

http://www.weemen.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/relictors-forgeworld-xiphon-pattern.html

jabberjabber said...

Thanks for the link -- I'd forgotten you had a Relictors Xiphon! Looks awesome mate!

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