Chthonian Beserks

Cybernetics meets stimulant fueled rage

An early edition miniature of a Squat Berserker.

Chthonian Beserks or otherwise known as Squat Berserkers (Not to be confused with Khorne Berserkers, although they might as well be one) are close combat Squats whose rage and strength are matched nearly as much as games workshop's intentional spelling mistakes in recent new models. Their fantasy analogues would be the Slayers. Like the Squat Thunderers, Squat Berserkers only appeared in Epic. They excel at bonking heads on Orks and chopping up Gretchins if they get too close to Squat ranged units. They're often quite erratic and unhinged and maybe possibly pumped full with Drugs like an Eversor.

They are also deployed in Berserker Battlecars from Squat Land Trains.

Overview

Squat Berserkers are made up from attack squads of the most ferocious hand to hand fighters in the Stronghold. Attack squads are armed with bolt pistols, power axes or chainswords and a variety of grenades. They are expert tunnel fighters and excel at clearing buildings and fortifications ahead of the Brotherhood's advance.

All Squats are doughty fighters in close combat but Squat Berserker units are renowned for their tenacity and courage against the most impossible odds, battling fearlessly against even the mightiest of opponents without thought for their own losses. Because of this heroic determination Berserker units automatically pass any morale checks if they are in close combat.

Following the 9th edition reboot of the Squats as the Leagues of Votann, the berserks have been reimagined as heavily augmented close combat murder machines known as Cthonian Berserks, which is an alarming name. Cthonian means 'earth', but it also has meaning in both lovecraftian myth and it's also the name of the planet where Horus landed. These frontline fighters originally began as Kin from the Cthonian mining guilds who enhanced the physical capabilities of their cloneskeins with cybernetic upgrades and cyberstimms, all the better to extract precious minerals from rad-plagued nebulae, explosive asteroids, and fathomless ocean depths. Now tasked with dealing with their people’s enemies, they charge into battle with modified mining gear like mining charge launchers turned into mole mortars, heavy plasma axes, concussion mauls, and power fists all while wearing little or no armor besides that which their cyborg augmentations provide. Overall: They’re probably not going to be too good a troop choice unless those augmentations give them a bunch of re-rolls to avoid damage or a decent wounds buff, or their speed is higher than what you’d expect them to have with their short, squat legs, or the league gets a really good transport that can get them up close and personal with the enemy safely. For now, we’ll just have to wait and see what their stat line is before passing final judgment on them. Thanks to a codex leak their stat line has finally been revealed giving us a better idea of what they can do. As it turns out they are an elite choice with the core keyword that costs 22 pts each and comes with 5 to 10 models per unit. Their base stat line is : a 5 inch move speed, they hit on a roll of 3+, have a ballistic skill of 3+, strength 5, toughness 5, have 2 wounds, 3 attack, leadership 8 and a 6+ save. They also have a 5+ feel no pain special rule that transforms it into a 4+ feel no pain against Dam1 targets. For weapons, they have a base choice of a Plasma Axe, with 2 possible attacks: a strike with strength +1, AP-3, Damage of 2, or a sweeping attack with a strength of +5, AP-3, and Damage 1 double attacks. Alternatively, for base weapons, the unit can take a Concussion maul that has a strength X2, AP-3, and damage of 3 with a -1 to hit. For upgrades, there are two options: one per every 5 models can take twin concussion gauntlets for an extra 5 points, and a stat line of Strength +3 AP-2, Damage 2, and a +1 to their attack characteristic. Option 2 for upgrades is that one out of her 5 units can take a mole grenade launcher for an extra 10 points. This character is a bigger model with an Ironkin helper and has +1 wounds and +1 bonus to their attack characteristic, their mole mortar is HuNTR weapon with D6 shots has a 24-inch range, strength of 5, Ap-2, Dam1 and ignores line of sight, also it doesn't replace their melee gear which combined with the stat line bonus actually makes them BETTER at melee then the regular Berserk. As if all that wasn't good enough the units also come with the Cyberstimm special rule which allows them to reroll charges, plus it also makes them EVEN MORE DANGEROUS in melee as they can fight in death or in other words if somebody one hit kills them with a melee attack the Berserks can try and take them down with them via one last shank attack! All this combined with the fact the Hekaton Land Fortress can carry 12 of these guys while also having a railgun that would make the Tau of all people jealous means the Berserks have became a LOT more attractive as a troop choice, especially when paired with Judgment Tokens and the right League's buffs.