Steelhead Mortar Crew

Each piece of artillery employed by the Steelheads has a distinct role, directed by veteran gunners to exploit that artillery’s strengths. Mortars fire in high soaring arcs, directing explosive payloads onto the heads of distant targets, even those otherwise shielded from direct fire by intervening walls or warjacks. While such firing arcs make it difficult to aim with pinpoint accuracy, the size and impact of mortar blasts makes up for this. Mortar fire obliterates infantry and leaves the ground pocked with craters.

Basic Info

Mercenary - This unit will work for Template:Crucible Guard mercenary, Template:Cryx mercenary, Template:Cygnar mercenary, Template:Khador mercenary, and the Template:Protectorate mercenary.

Abilities

• Gunner
  • Template:Officer
  • Template:Man-Sized
  • Template:Mobile Artillery
  • Template:Take Up

• Grunts
  • None

Weapons

• Gunner
  • Mortar - 18" range, 4" AOE, POW 15 ranged attack
    • Template:Arcing Fire
    • Template:Crater
    • Template:High-Explosive
    • Template:Inaccurate
    • Template:Minimum Range
  • Sword - 0.5" reach, POW 3, P+S 9 melee attack

• Grunts
  • Sword

Theme Forces

• Mercenary
  • Template:Operating Theatre (Only if a Cephalyx Dominator is attached)
  • Template:Steelies
  • Template:The Kingmakers Army. This model/unit gains Feign Death in this theme.

• Other Factions
  • Infernal players can use this unit in the Template:Hearts of Darkness theme, but only if Crosse2 is leading the army.
  • Furthermore, Mercenaries can be hired by other Factions. Normally those Factions' themes will have a limit on how many models they can hire. Refer to #Other Theme Forces, below.

Thoughts on the Steelhead Mortar Crew

Steelhead Mortar Crew in a nutshell

The Mortar is intended to clear out infantry that could potentially jam up the Steelhead infantry lines. Thanks to High Explosive and Arcing Fire, mortars can fire past your own lines and decimate light infantry. Against heavier targets, it leaves behind rough terrain for some board control.

If your opponent has a lot of medium or small base infantry and no blast-immunity, this piece can do some work. If not, it might be dead weight, hence the lower price tag than the other pieces.

Combos & Synergies

• Played in the Steelhead theme with Mark Target on solos it gets more accurate. Not that RAT 3 is good - or even RAT 5 if aiming
• Captain Damiano's Money Shot makes its blast damage POW 12 and ups it to RAT 3.
• The Steelhead Gunner can grant an additional damage dice against huge bases though this is not the preferred use for this piece. He also adds Veteran Leader to help with the low RAT.
• The Steelhead Arcanist grants it magic weapon and deals with clouds.
• Durgen Madhammer appreciates this piece more than most thanks to his feat. Boosted attack rolls mean it can actually hit something, and boosted damage rolls on high explosive shots are surprisingly effective
• Knock something down with a Quake shot from the Steelhead Cannon Crew, then follow up with a direct hit from this (that will only miss on snakeeyes)

• Sergeant Nicolas Verendrye can bring back their grunts.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• It has very little value into armies with lots of high ARM and pathfinder.
• Even though it's pretty easy to engineer +5 RAT even without Damiano, Inaccurate still sucks.

Tricks & Tips

• Aim for the middle of the enemy - that pie plate has to land somewhere.

Other

Trivia

Released at Adepticon 2019.03

Other Theme Forces

Template:Cryx merc unit themes
Template:Cygnar merc unit themes	Template:Khador merc unit themes
Template:Menoth merc unit themes	Template:CG merc unit themes