Horus Heresy 3e Review: Adamus Assassin

Warpstone Flux Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 3.5/5 stars, rounded down. Despite being a sword master, the launcher weapon is equally valuable.  

Background. 

These assassins are the tradition blade masters of the clades. They are sword masters supreme and have a bit of martial regality about them if I'm reading the background correctly. 

Strengths.

As with almost all assassins, they have 5's in WS, BS, and I, 4's in S and T, and 3 wounds coupled with 10's in leadership and cool. The 4+ in both kinds of saves will help keep them alive a little longer too. 

The Adamus comes with a needle spine blaster which can be shot like a bolt pistol, or like a launcher (one shot only). The launcher gives 3 shots at S=6 with a range of rules that are extremely valuable once the assassin closes in with their blades. These include phage on toughness, as well as breaching and precision to try to ensure that you cause some damage on the way in. 

The Nemesii Blade has had a glow up compared to the previous edition and is now natively AP=2 with critical hitting and shred. This should pose a threat even to terminators - doubly so if they have had their toughness reduced through phage. 

The Nemesii Grenades are a defensive measure to provide a disordered charge when the assassin is moved against. And if the charge move is completed, then count that charge as going over dangerous terrain too This is quite nice.

Death's Artisan gives access to the Mirror Form gambit (but why have 2 names for it!). The player MUST select this gambit though and anything that prevents this is over-ridden. This means always hitting on 4+ regardless of WS comparisons. The assassin can always strike back in the round they are reduced to 0 wounds even if they don't have the advantage. 

Weaknesses. 

Nice in one-on-ones with a good chance (well, at least 50% perhaps) of hitting, although wounding with S=4 may be a worse problem unless you used phage earlier. AP=2 will certainly help with them being deadly though. Infiltrate and shrouded will help you get to where you need to be early in the game too. But with T=4 and 3 wounds with a 4+ save, there is vulnerability to massed incoming fire (bit of a waste given the rules and reactions possible) and challenges against Praetors will certainly be entertaining and deadly quickly. 

Builds.

There are no builds to discuss.