Paingiver Beast Handlers

Beast handlers are a specially trained class of paingivers able to evoke tremendous effort from the beasts under their charge and enrage them to rampage forward with superlative strength and speed. A paingiver must know and be able to take full advantage of the exact temperament and limits of his beasts in order to unlock their most destructive instincts.

Basic Info

Abilities

• Template:Anatomical Precision
• Template:Condition
• Template:Enrage
• Template:Medicate
• Template:Prodding

Weapons

• Barbed Whip - 2" reach, POW 3, P+S 8 melee attack
  • Template:Inflict Pain

Theme Forces

• Template:Disciples of Agony. They gain Sacrificial Pawn [Minion warrior] in this theme.
• Template:Masters of War. They gain "Optional Take Down" in this theme.
• Template:The Exalted
• Template:Winds of Death

Thoughts on Paingiver Beast Handlers

Paingiver Beast Handlers in a nutshell

Paingiver Beast Handlers are Skorne's almost ubiqitous warbeast support, and most likely one of the best support options in the warmahordes games. Able to make Skorne beasts hit hard, able to keep them going, and able to clear Fury off them. Beast Handlers are found in most Skorne armies. If the opponent has a blast weapon or two to spare, he'll likely place them on these buggers. They are easily removed high priority targets, so dont place them too far up the board if you can avoid it.

Before 2019 Paingiver Beast Handlers were ubiquitous in Skorne armies to the point that there isn't a single Skorne player who placed in the top three at a major individual tournament (team tournament list building is its own thing) recorded on the Discount Games website that didn't have at least one unit of beast handlers in every list. In January 2019 the Extoller Novititate gave Exalted lists an alternative to shatter armour, and the Oblivion theme remix has allowed Paingiver Bloodrunners into the same theme as the Siege Animantarax, allowing them to hand out rage tokens.

Combos & Synergies

• Any warbeast. Every warbeast.*
• Siege Animantarax - a team of them can charge it up on turn 1, medicate it, and then turn back to the warbeasts from turn 2 onwards.
• Archdomina Makeda - in a pinch Carnage makes them credible melee models
• Zaadesh2 - gives them a turn of being great melee Models.
• Cheap models means cheap fodder for people who need souls!

Drawbacks & Downsides

• High priority target
• Die to blast damage.
• mediocre to poor stats

Tricks & Tips

• Condition shooting warbeasts after they have shot.
• You can medicate and enrage on the same turn - especially useful if your beasts are almost dead.
• If you're running too hot you can prod your warbeasts to fail charges for free rather than paying to run.
• Against other Hordes factions, you can whip fury points onto opponents battlegroup. This is very situational, but if the opponent is running hot you can sometimes force some threshold checks. The opposite is also true, and sometimes more useful. If the opponent has few beasts to begin with, you can whip off his fury supply, starving the enemy warlock. Remember that he can still get fury from dead warbeasts though.
• Remember that enemy warlocks cannot transfer to beasts with full fury. These guys whipping some fury onto enemy beasts can shut down damage transfers and allow for an assassination elsewhere on the table.

Other

Trivia

Released way back in Primal Mk1 (2006)