Recent Heresy Thursday articles have been following a theme, with a parade of characters from the Legiones Astartes gracing our pages. Some have carried standards for the Loyalist or Traitor forces, one had a truly massive hammer, and another was definitely not a psyker – and he’d prefer you not press the matter further, thanks.
Today we’re taking a break from Space Marines and switching to the Machine Cults of Mars by showing off the imperious Secutarii Axiarch.
When the Titan Legions go to war they bring with them death and destruction on an unimaginable scale, obliterating fortifications and columns of tanks in the blink of an eye. But while these towering God Engines are duking it out with their opposite numbers, they remain uniquely vulnerable to being mobbed by infantry, especially those equipped to exploit their unique weaknesses.
This is where the Secutarii step in – honour guard and protectors of the Titan Legions, led by a Secutarii Axiarch. These individuals are selected through a series of arcane criteria that require them to have both displayed impressive battlefield acumen and to have been involved in the defence or retrieval of a God Engine.
As part of their promotion they are given further cybernetic augments and twisted into a new form that fits the Cult Mechanicum’s strict schematics. Their upgraded bodies are then fitted with Titanshard armor, nigh-impervious plate that has been crafted from the fallen Titan the Secutarii saved.
Axiarchs are experienced leaders who are used to getting stuck in as a frontline commander of the Secutarii, and they wield a mag-inverter shield whose relic inversion generator unleashes coruscating arcs of energy from their arc lance.
The Securtarii Axiarch has rules in the Liber Mechanicum - Forces of the Omnissiah Army Book and will be cast in Forge World resin. All that remains is to pick up that Titan you’ve been thinking about lately…
