Arcane Tempest Rifleman Tactica

Today we take a look at Arcane Tempest Rifleman, a field allowance 2 solo available in Cygnar's Son's of the Tempest theme force.

Stats

Speed: 6 Average speed for infantry in Cygnar.

Strength: 4 Fairly irrelevant except in cases which allow a model to use your models strength such as Satyxis blood witches or Tharn Bloodweavers. So in this case having a low strength is a good thing!

Mat: 5 Pretty low but they will only ever use it in rare occasions when they can't shoot such as during certain feats or when in the range of abilities which prevent ranged attacks. Having the sword is a nice back up which some dedicated ranged units lack.

Rat: 7 Decent accuracy especially if you take into account their high range which will often allow them to aim.

Defence: 14 This is on the higher end of defence stats for infantry.

Armour: 11 Low arm which means they will automatically die if hit by most attacks in the game, only the lowest pow blast damage weapons will fail to kill them.

Command: 7 This stat doesn't currently have any effect in game.

Cost

They cost 4 points each and are FA 2.

Weapons

Sword

With a melee range of 0.5", a pow of 7 and a MAT of 5 they aren't going to be wowing anyone with their melee skills, but that's not what they are meant to be doing... It is worth remembering that they have the sword however if they ever end up in a situation where they can't make ranged attacks.
This is more important for them than other Gunmages as they are the only Gunmage models without the Gunfighter special rule

Magelock Rifle

With Range 14" they have the longest base range of any Gunmages, its Pow 10 is consistent with nearly all other Gunmage weapons.

The shot types

Deadly Shot
Instead of making a damage roll you can choose to have the model hit take 3 damage, a model disabled by this attack cannot make a tough check.

Snipe
This attack gains +4 Range

Ward Breaker
The weapon gains the Blessed special rule.

Special rules

Riflemen have the following special rules

Arcane Precision: If they aim they ignore Stealth that activation.

Marksman: When damaging a Warjack/Warbeast they pick which Column/Branch takes damage.

Reposition 3": At the end of an activation in which they don't run or fail a charge they can advance 3"

Caster synergies

Kraye: With their very long range using the Snipe shot type they can help apply his feat.

Haley1: Getting to shoot twice during her feat turn is amazing. With two Riflemen they can do 12 guaranteed damage to high armour targets like Warjacks this is enough to cripple a system on any heavy with "traditional" system layouts. (Except the Movement system of CoC Warjacks)

Tips and Tricks

Arcane tempest riflemen are an interesting scalpel piece, they are a precise tool and should be used accordingly.

In scenario play the reposition 3” ability is great allowing them to move 9” while still contributing (rather than just having to run for example) I often position them exactly 9” back from a flag the turn before scoring starts to keep them as safe as possible while ensuring that they are able to score when I need them to. 

I like to use them as the scoring solos as I find they are the least essential of the solos available within the SoT theme. 

I do tend to hold them back from scoring until after the turn which I get the most “work” done (often after or on my feat turn) unless they don’t have ideal targets in the opponents list in which case I will score as soon as possible even if it costs me the rifleman.

I find they work incredibly well in pairs, using deadly shot to cripple systems on Warjacks. (as the theme lacks grievous wounds outside of merc solos I don’t find it as valuable to try overly to cripple Warbeasts)

When aiming to cripple systems of Warjacks its important to see what mechanics are within walk and repair range of the jack in question. If there are some I will prioritise killing them even over killing a combat trooper model which has a chance to kill a Gunmage next turn for example. Because if crippling an arc node or removing the movement or cortex from a heavy is vital to protect important assets or my scenario goals I will do everything I can to ensure it stays crippled.

If the mechanic in question is not within range to walk and repair and the jack would have to activate first and move backwards to be repaired I typically will not over extend my forces to kill the mechanic in that case, I would rather look towards simply crippling the jack again the next turn and killing the mechanic then.

Deadly shot- this allows the attack to automatically do 3 damage and ignore tough

This will get around abilities like Severius2's Oracular vision ability which allows them to spend a focus point to avoid all damage from “a damage roll” as this shot type doesn’t make a damage roll.

Another important example is the Hermit's Mad visions ability, this is especially important when you consider how good Riflemen are at killing the Hermit due to deadly shot helping to ignore his Ancient shroud ability as well.

If a targets armour is higher than 14-15 then I find you are likely to do more damage using deadly shot rather than a shot type which requires a damage roll

(unless you have also applied damage buffs like Rune Marked from Falk as deadly shot can not benefit from this buff)

I find they are especially good at taking out arc nodes, (remember to take out the shields first when dealing with Ret ones) two shots typically takes out the arc node of most Warjacks.

4 shots will take out a system of most “normally” arranged Warjacks (Convergence, some Mercs and some Cryx are tougher)

This shot type is also quicker on clock as it only requires the attack roll. Something to bare in mind should time start running low.

Ward breaker is a shot type I often don’t tend to use, unless I have no decent targets for deadly shot and want to remove a buffed trooper model (the pow 10 will often struggle to remove a

 solo or CA) Its worth keeping in mind for times when blessed would swing the maths in your favour.

The snipe shot is amazing at allowing the rifleman to really dig deeper into the enemy lines, they have a 24” threat range without any assistance.

Often I will use this when aiming (to ignore stealth) to try to remove an important stealth model such as (gremlin swarms or Gorman)

Its also great to remove backline support models like choir or pain givers

I typically deploy them more centrally to give them a wider target selection, but later on in the game they move further towards the flanks using their reposition and long range to keep them safe into the late game, allowing them to be a handy late game contesting model as giving up 1 shot to have to run to contest is an easier sacrifice than running a unit.

With my articles I like to include some examples of how members of the community have painted theirs. Here they are with the painters name or social media handle under each.

Ben Pohl

BrotherScott

Colin Sankey

Glenn Connot

Hajdics Norbert

Matthew Stone

Richard Olson

Will Ozark

And these are mine

I hope you found this article interesting and informative. If you spotted anything I got wrong or missed out let me know in a comment below and I will get it changed.

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