Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus – Secutor – Rank Abilities

by Falagar / Articles, Warhammer / 28 Nov 2018

Rank 1 Ability – Servant Protocol

With this ability, you can use your Servo Skull on a troop unit to give them a +1 Damage, +4m Movement, and +15% Critical Chance. In the early game, it’s usually smart to save your Servo Skull for snatching Command Points (CP) from far away. But once you’ve leveled up a bit and have someone diving into Lexmechanic, you can start using it to give your troops a little boost. The +1 Damage isn’t a huge deal, but that +4 Movement really helps since troops can’t spend CP to get more movement and can often get left behind by TechPriests.

Rank 3 Ability – Command Fire

This ability is the bread and butter for the Secutor, and honestly, it’s a big reason to have one in your squad. When you use Command Fire, you need at least one troop unit within 8 meters of you. If you’ve got that, you can pick an enemy unit anywhere on the map, and if your troops can see it and are in range, they’ll all shoot at it. This means you can have multiple troops firing together, which adds up to a lot of damage really fast. Since they fire in order, it’s totally possible for one trooper to take out the target and the next one to finish it off, which means that target can’t use reanimation protocols. It’s a bit weird, but area damage from the Kastelan and Kataphron won’t hit anything else—even though they’re using a flamer and a torsion cannon, they’ll only hit the target you picked with Command Fire, with no splash damage or friendly fire. Command Fire has a 3-turn cooldown, so you’ll want to think ahead and not waste it in bad situations.

Rank 5 Ability – Command

This ability sounds a lot like the last one, but it’s a little different. It gives either a +2 bonus to the next attack that all your troops make or a +2 bonus to armor for all your troops until the end of the turn. If you can set up a nice line of Skitarii Rangers or Vanguards with clear shots, you can pop this right before using Command Fire to really crank up the damage.

Rank 7 Ability – Optimized Optimization

The name’s a bit of a mouthful, but this ability makes a backpack item even better. Cognitive Canisters can now give one trooper unit a boost to damage and critical chance. The normal cooldown is 3 turns, but this ability cuts it down to 2 turns, so you can use it every other turn for some extra damage. It’s a solid pick if you’re tackling a challenge focused on troops, but outside of that, it’s not the best since troops tend to fall behind TechPriests when it comes to damage scaling.

Rank 9 Ability – Reinforcements

This one lets you drop a single troop unit anywhere on the map without waiting for a new round. While it’s handy for a pure Secutor build, it feels a bit underwhelming as the final ability in the class and isn’t really useful unless you’re doing a troop-heavy challenge run. If this ability had come earlier, it might have been more impactful.

Armour Parts

Head: +2 HP, +1 Energy Armour

Torso: +4 HP

Legs: +3 HP, +1 Movement

Arms: +2 HP, +20% Critical Chance

Honestly, the Secutor parts aren’t all that great compared to what other classes bring to the table. The head armor is the same as the Dominus, but you get way more from the Dominus’ skills. The torso armor is identical to the Lexmechanic, but the Lexi’s skills are just better. The leg armor gives you 2 movement points less than the Dominus and 1 less than the Explorator, but otherwise, it’s pretty much the same. The arms are where it shines a bit with that +20% Critical Chance, giving you 1 more HP than the same part on the Tech-Auxilium. Still, there are other parts fighting for the arm slot (like Explorator, Dominus, and Lexmechanic) that usually take priority.

What the Secutor armor does have going for it is stacking HP higher than any other single class. In a troops-centric challenge, you’ll probably find yourself at the front, soaking up damage to keep your fragile troops alive (which kinda goes against the Skitarii theme of being expendable while TechPriests aren’t). All in all, the Secutor doesn’t offer much unless you’re into a specific playstyle that’s fun and adds a bit of challenge.

Falagar

He is the founder and editor of Magic Game World. He loved gaming from the moment he got a PlayStation 1 with Gran Turismo on his 7th birthday.
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