Hellmouth

Few of the dragon Everblight’s creations invoke as much fear as the blighted nightmare that is the hellmouth. Erupting from beneath the ground to unleash terror and consume flesh, this horrific subterrestrial beast uses its spiked tentacles to drag its hapless victims into its waiting maw. Template:TOCbox

Basic Info

Hellmouth

Abilities

• Template:Officer
• Template:Soulless
• Template:Buried
• Template:Circular Vision
• Template:Distant Deployment
• Template:Impervious Flesh
• Template:Inscrutable
• Template:Tendrils

Weapons

Maw
File:Sword icon.jpg		RNG				POW				P+S
		2				5				15
Template:Consume Template:Back Attack

Tentacles

Tentacles
SPD	5
MAT	6
DEF	10
ARM	15
HP	1

Abilities

• Template:Pathfinder
• Impervious Flesh - As above.
• Distant Deployment - As above.
• Inscrutable - As above.
• Soulless - As above.

Tentacle Strike
File:Sword icon.jpg		RNG				POW				P+S
		2				4				10
Template:Grip

Theme Forces

• Template:Primal Terrors
• Template:Ravens of War

Thoughts on Hellmouth

Hellmouth in a nutshell

The Hellmouth is an incredibly useful piece in the Legion's arsenal for warlock-independent threat range extension, area denial and scenario manipulation. Though its combat output can also be put to good use (especially against small based models thanks to Consume), its main schlick is pulling enemy models closer to your main battle-lines by sacrificing a tentacle, or continuously contesting scenario elements. Skilled opponents can evade the former by staying out of the Grip range of the Tentacles or using various anti-push techniques, while the latter can only be neutralized by bringing down the Hellmouth for good - which usually requires way more resource than its 6 points thanks to its Impervious Flesh rule.

The Hellmouth is only allowed in 2 themes but is a great deterrent againat enemies who could alpha-strike your slow, SPD5 troops in the Primal Terrors and in Ravens of War you get a re-roll on starting rolls which increases your chance for a favorable deployment.

The important takeaways of the Hellmouth:

• They are living, soulless warrior models, meaning that a whole lot of abilities work with and against them (Bightbringer aura, Murderous, etc).
• The Tentacles cannot leave the command range of the Hellmouth for any reason.

Combos & Synergies

• Blighted Ogrun Warmongers are slow, even with Vengeance from the theme force. Hellmouths can drag their prey closer.
• Blighted Rotwings - The Hellmouth's MAT isn't awful, but if you want to hit more evasive targets, some extra accuracy can't hurt. Rotwings are designed to be fast, jamming units, and the difference they provide between MAT6 and an effective MAT7 is huge.
• Vayl1 - Incite and Frost Field make them effectively MAT10. Also, due to Impervious Flesh, there's no chance to kill a tentacle with unboosted shots.
• Vayl2 - Beside Icy Grip, forward running Tentacles can be valuable arc nodes for the Oraculi. Just watch out not to leave the CMD range of the Maw.
• Saeryn1 - Now that Breath Stealer is no longer a 1/turn spell, you can threaten quite a few targets, while under her feat the Hellmouth is all but immune to small arms fire.
• Rhyas1 - Rhyas loves drags and pulls in order to set up assassinations, so the Hellmouth is great for her. On her feat the maw also gains an extra attack, even if it cannot be placed by it.
• Seraphs - While adding another substantial movement buff to your list, the flare on its gun can shore up your chances against elusive targets.
• If you want to hit hard beside dragging models out of formation, consider STR buffs too. Thagrosh1 would rather throw their STR buffs on other, more impressive models, but Bethayne, or Kryssa have damage buffs that benefit more than one model at a time.
• Proteus - With his own drag and movement shenanigans, a canny strategist can play pingpong with an opponent's key models with near impunity.
• Sources of stealth and concealment can really help keep the Hellmouth safe against strong gunlines. Just make sure you don't have another model that may benefit more.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• Poor placing of the Hellmouth can allow your opponent to evade them completely, as the Hellmouth can't move and the tentacles must stay in formation. Aggressive deployment is mandatory.
• Terrain can mess with dragging, as obstacles, obstructions and the like will counter dragging altogether.
• Despite Impervious Flesh the Hellmouth is not unkillable. Tentacles are particularly vulnerable to Snipers and models with Puncture, while models with Deadly Shot (especially super solos like Kell Bailoch) can make short work of the Hellmouth itself.
• Tendrils are RFP'd if they move out of CMD at any time for any reason, even if they have enough movement to get back into CMD range. So this can make it hard to move tendrils around obstacles and/or other models.
• Despite being all tentacles and a maw, Hellmouths have no Eyeless Sight, making them susceptible to smoke clouds and other LOS blockers of that kind.
  • Enemies can also make the Maw Stationary so it cannot issue orders or or attack.

Tips & Tricks

• Having them in your list means you virtually cannot lose on scenario because you always have a tentacle to contest with and they are so hard to kill most opponents won't bother. This is very relevant in low model count (read: Beast Heavy) armies.
• Know which models resist pushes and can form an impenetrable wall against the Tentacles. Refer Category: Anti-Push.
• Watch out for opponents with push or place effects (ie Telekinesis). They can put your tentacles out of formation and insta-kill them.
• The Hellmouth and its tentacley minions are warrior models, despite their beastly appearance. This is generally a great thing, for instance they are affected by things like the Blightbringer.
• The Hellmouth only gets one tentacle back a turn, but you can remove all three in a single activation if you go crazy. Target priority is tantamount to success with the Hellmouth, don't waste tentacles attacking low-value models this turn if you need more tentacles next turn.
• Tentacles respawn after Frenzy checks. If you have one of your own beasts running hot it can be worth running a tentacle up beside it as a sacrificial frenzy target for next turn; then respawn the tentacle where you actually want it.
• If you give the unit the Press Forward order:
  • The Hellmouth won't get its normal attack even if it started the turn with something in range.

  Reason is: it must run or charge (as required by the order) but doing that requires Normal Movement, and it has none (as per the Buried rule). Since it must run/charge but it can't run/charge, it ends up forfeiting its Combat Action and thus loses its initial melee attack.

  • The Tentacles can charge, attack something, use the Grip rule, and then the Hellmouth can attack gripped things (despite having no Combat Action this turn).
• The "danger zone" ot the Tentacles are 11,57" from the Hellmouth's base edge (8" CMD area, 2" reach + 40 mm base size).
• Unlike most the recursion mechanisms, you only have to place the added tentacle within formation which means a sizeable 8" circle (+base size) from the Hellmouth's base edge. Use it to trigger back strike bonus. Also, the Tentacle can activate normally in the turn it's been put into play.
• Unless your enemy can bring in some ARM debuff or fire damage buff (Fuel the Flames, Oil, etc.), it is impossible to damage the Hellmouth with continuous fire (the tentacles still die on 4+ though). Keep it in mind if deploying into a burning forest/cloud could be advantageous to you.

Other

Trivia

Originally released 2016.06