Rhinodon

"I'd feel safer staring down a Caspian steam engine than a charging rhinodon. Probably be more left of me to scrape off the ground, too." - Alten Ashley

"The formidable Rhinodon rivals the Titan in size with massive plates of natural armour covering its hide. Boasting tremendous natural weaponry, a Rhinodon will demolish buildings, crash through obstacles,and slay anything in its path when unleashed. The Army of the Western Reaches finds these powerful beasts difficult to control but perfect for their offensive into the west.

Basic Info

Abilities

• None

Weapons

• Tail - 2" reach, P+S 15 melee weapon
  • Template:Thresher
  • Template:Critical Knockdown

• Claws (x2) - 1" range, P+S 14 melee weapons
  • Template:Open Fist

Animus

{{Category: Template:Spiny Growth }}[[Category: Template:Spiny Growth ]]

Theme Forces

• Template:Disciples of Agony
• Template:Masters of War
• Template:The Exalted
• Template:Winds of Death

Thoughts on the Rhinodon

Rhinodon in a nutshell

The Rhinodon is a very cheap heavy for the amount of attacks it brings to the table. In another faction, it would only really be able to bully smaller, less armoured targets, but Skorne are the faction with Paingiver Beast Handlers, this allows its melee attacks to be buffed to respectable levels even without help from your casters. Its animus is cheap and will let the Rhinodon survive on the way in as much as in combat.

The Tail is the stand out feature, with a P+S on the low end for a heavy but gives it an excellent threat range and it's enough to shred infantry with thresher.

It's Animus is also very useful, either to give the Rhinodon more arm than a titan or on a caster with fury to spare and a good ARM value.

Combos & Synergies

Fundamentally, to do the work of a heavy, the Rhinodon needs a caster that will buff its hitting power as well as the Beast Handlers. Also with the cheapened Spiny Growth animus higher ARM warlocks like it so they can stack their ARM up.

• Paingiver Beast Handlers - Necessary to make the Rhinodon's pillow fists kill anything other than infantry.
• Supreme Aptimus Zaal & Kovaas - can let the Rhinodon cast Spiny Growth for free, which actually solves a great many of the Rhinodon's problems. Zaal likes cheap beasts with lots of initials, too.
• Master Ascetic Naaresh - Has a feat that likes a lot of beasts in his battlegroup, so the Rhinodon's cheap cost helps here. Also, the feat skews the Rhinodon's Arm skewing nature even more, and solves his pillow fistedness for a turn. Further if you want to build up with Painmonger and Paingiver Beast Handlers Spiny Growth can work wonders.
• Lord Tyrant Hexeris - Parasite is what the doctor ordered.
• Master Tormentor Morghoul - an Enraged, Abused Rhinodon has a threat range of 12". It's a cheap cruise missile, although Morghoul needs to be careful to not let it out of his control area.
• Lord Assassin Morghoul - Mortality's great
• Xerxis, Fury of Halaak - he's ARM 19 before Spiny Growth and either a Krea or an Agonizer
• Makeda & the Exalted Court hit ARM 20 before other warbeasts.
• Lord Tyrant Zaadesh likes the ARM buff - and also really likes models with Reach and Critical Knockdown for his feat and counter charge.
• Agonizer - The Rhinodon is a cheap beast with emphasis on Arm. Agonizer pushes their effective Arm even higher. Our several beasts with a shield all sport better Arm, though, and have many other advantages besides - but are more expensive.
• Basilisk Krea - ARM 22 against shooting is no joke.
• Disciples of Agony has two beasts with the animus to turn the Rhinodon into a model with the hitting power of a "real" heavy.
  • Blackhide Wrastler - +3 STR is the safe choice and combines well with 12 points for 6 attacks.
  • Battle Boar - Primal is as much about accuracy as damage. But Thresher likes accuracy and Mat 7 P+S 18 and free charges is getting pretty decent.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• Unless you have a specific plan for it, the upgrade to either a Titan Gladiator or an Aradus Sentinel is extremely tempting. And the Archidon hits as hard and threats further while being cheaper.
• You have a warbeast that is ‘ok’ in almost every way and that needs to spend 1 fury to gain respectable armour. Cheapness is its greatest strength and it’s output is very dependent on beast handlers and casters.

Tricks & Tips

• You get a boostable reach thresher- send it wherever things are bunched up.
• Higher Defense enemies - It's probably wiser to refrain from boosting against these. Just use your initials and keep the transfer open. At least the enemy is tied up.
• Throw away anything it can't kill

Other

Trivia

• Rhinodon means "nose-tooth" in Greek... I assume that accounts for the stumpy horn on his snout. Which used to be its big thing as it had an armour piercing attack when first released.
• Loosely resembles an extinct glyptodont, ancient ice age herbivores.
• Released in Hordes: Evolution (2007)