Meat Thresher

Meat Thresher Minion Farrow Battle Engine

Prime This model is available in one Prime Army, The Thornfall Alliance. It can also be used in the Unlimited game mode. You can view the other Mk3 models that made it into a Legacy Army at this page. Note that the rest of this page is about the model's Mark III rules.

The Meat Thresher is a rolling death machine conceived of twisted farrow ingenuity and built of plunder. A scorching-hot steel cylinder holding panicked razor boars provides locomotion and is also the meat thresher’s primary weaponry, flattening foes under its crushing weight. Those that escape being ground to pulp are mowed down by heavy-caliber rounds from the hailer mounted atop this surprisingly effective contraption.

Basic Info

Meat Thresher
Missing Info
	COST {{{cacost}}} UNIT SIZE {{{casize}}} FA {{{cafa}}} Warcaster 0 BASE Huge SPD 6 STR MAT 6 RAT 5 M.A. N/A DEF 10 ARM 19 CMD N/A ESSENCE {{{essence}}} FOCUS N/A FURY N/A THRS N/A HP 36 F. Field N/A WJP {{{wjp}}} WBP {{{wbp}}} IHP {{{ihp}}} FA 2 UNIT SIZE N/A COST 16 N/A N/A N/A Warcaster 1 COST N/A N/A Understanding the Statblock

• Minion - Works for Circle, Legion, Skorne, and Trollbloods.

Abilities

• Battle Engine - All battle engines share the same special rules, most notably being immune to a bunch of stuff. Click here for the long version.
• Construct
• Pathfinder
• Bulldoze - When this model is B2B with an enemy model during its Normal Movement, it can push that model up to 2" directly away from it. A model can be pushed by Bulldoze only once per turn. Bulldoze has no effect when this model makes a trample power attack.
• Dual Attack - This model can make melee and ranged attacks in the same activation. When this model makes its initial melee attacks or a power attack, it can also make its initial ranged attacks. This model can make ranged attacks even while in melee.
• Exhaust Fumes - When this model advances during its Normal Movement, for one round other friendly Faction models gain concealment while within 3" of this model.
• Turn up the Heat - This model can use Turn Up the Heat at the start of its activation. This activation, this model gains +2 SPD. At the end of the activation, this model suffers d3 damage points. Turn Up the Heat can be used only once per activation.

Weapons

Hailer
		RNG			ROF			AOE			POW
		12			d3+1			-			13
Volume Fire - Gain +1 to attack and damage rolls with this weapon against medium-based models and +2 to attack and damage rolls against large- and huge-based models.
Crusher
		RNG				POW				P+S
		1								16
Grinding Wheel - This weapon gains an additional die on attack rolls against small- and medium-based models. High-Impact - When this model makes its initial melee attack with this weapon during each of its Combat Actions, it makes one melee attack with this weapon against each model in its LOS that is in this weapon's melee range. These attacks are simultaneous. Knockdown - When a model is hit by an attack with this weapon, it becomes knocked down. Trash - Gain an additional die on damage rolls with this weapon against knocked down targets.

Theme Forces

• Minions
  • The Thornfall Alliance
  • Vengeance of Dhunia
  • Will Work for Food

• Other Factions
  • Unlike units and solos, battle engines cannot normally be hired in other Factions themes. The exceptions are:
  • Circle players can use it in Secret Masters. It stays a Minion model.
  • Legion players can use it in Oracles of Annihilation. It becomes a Blighted model, but stays a Minion model.
  • Trollblood players can use it in Vengeance of Dhunia. It becomes a Minion/Trollblood model

Thoughts on Meat Thresher

Meat Thresher in a nutshell

This thing is pretty scary for a Battle engine, running down its foes and laughing maniacally as it does so. Or maybe that's just the Minion player. At 16 points for an effectively SPD 8 model (using Turn Up the Heat) it can do really impressive work.

Combos & Synergies

• Swamp Horror - it really likes the 2" reach from Swamp Horrors animus. (Wrong Eye & Snapjaw and Underchief Mire can also bring a Swamp Horror to any minion army.)
• Farrow Commandos, Lanyssa and Croak Trappers gain stealth while standing in the exhaust fumes.
• It's only MAT 6, RAT 5, so anything that ups it's chances to hit (like knock down effects) really help, especially since one bad roll can stop its rampage dead in its tracks.
• Helga on Wheels makes the Thresher cavalry giving it nice things like impact attacks and a boosted to hit roll on the charge. She also grants reposition(3) and is probably the best reason to play 1 or more Meat Threshers.
• Vengeance of Dhunia has the Krielstone to grant +2 armour this really helps the meat thresher pay back its value but it is competing with the War Wagon

Drawbacks & Downsides

• Skorne will almost certainly get more out of their BE, the Animantarax, at only one point more. The Animantarax isn't as maniacally fun, however.
• Exhaust Fumes can be a huge trap if the enemy brough any blasts, e-leaps, eruptions of spines, or similar things, since the Threasher is the perfect place for your enemy to use as a starting point for these things.

Tricks & Tips

• It knocks down models before the damage roll, so it applies the Trash buff to anything and everything that can be knocked down.
• Knock down the enemy then pour fire into them with Dual Attack.
• You are mostly there to mulch infantry; any damage you do to heavies is extra.

Other

Trivia

Released in Hordes: Exigence (2014.09)

Rules Clarifications

Rules Clarification : Burst Fire and/or Volume Fire - None yet. (Edit)
Rules Clarification : Grinding Wheel - None yet. (Edit)

Rules Clarification : High-Impact      (Edit) High-Impact occurs every time you make an initial attack during your Combat Action (but not on additional attacks). High-Impact is not optional. All attacks generated are Basic Attacks. High-Impact will hit friendly models. Simultaneous melee attack (Edit) There are several abilities/spells that allow a model to make simultaneous melee attacks vs everything in range (Blood Reaper, Cyclone, Flashing Blade, High-Impact, Thresher)       Some have Infernal Rulings that pertain only to themselves, but the clarifications below are applicable to all of these abilities:   [Show/Hide] Targeting/Timing To make a multi-melee-attack (MMA) you have to make individual melee attacks vs every model, and this means you need to target every model with a melee attack. If a model "may not be targeted by melee attacks" (such as Una2's feat) then you have to 'skip' it when you resolve the attack. (Infernal Ruling) The attacks are effectively multiple separate attacks. If you have a buff to your "next attack" (such as Tune Up) then it only works vs the first model you roll dice against, not vs every enemy. (Infernal Ruling). The attacks are simultaneous. If a model is out of LOS when you start the MMA, then you may not attack it during the MMA (even if the MMA kills what is blocking your LOS). You need to target everything, then resolve all effects that trigger on "target" before starting any attack rolls. Then complete all attack rolls and do everything that triggers on "hit" before starting any damage rolls, and etc. In practice and to save time though, if neither player has effects that trigger on "being targetted, hit, damaged, etc" then they'll normally do the hit and damage rolls on a model-by-model basis. If a model collects tokens from destroyed models (for instance the Cryx Harrower that collects souls), it cannot collect any tokens until all MMA are resolved. Charging If you charge and cast a spell to generate MMA, then none of those MMA count as a charge attack. You've "paused" your charge. If the charge target survives the spell, then you get to make a normal charge attack vs it. If your MMA is simply tied to your weapon, then only the damage roll against your charge target is automatically boosted - other models caught in the MMA suffer an unboosted damage roll (although you can spend focus/fury to boost it) Triggering other abilities Most abilities that give the attacker a bonus move/attack tend to use the phrase "destroy one or more enemy models with a melee attack" and as such you'll only trigger this ability once. For example Berserk, Quick Work, Black Spot, etc Other abilities, that trigger on "hit" or "damage", can be triggered from every attack in the MMA. Many abilities only trigger off a basic melee attack, so don't work with special MMA (like Thresher). But if your MMA is basic (like High-Impact), things might get a bit complicated. In particular: If you have Beat Back on the attacker, it is resolved after the attack. Every model that survives the MMA is eligible to be Beat Back-ed, and the attacker chooses the order. Pick one, push it and follow it, then decide if you want to Beat Back another survivor. Each push will recenter the directly away / directly toward part of the push. (Infernal Ruling) If you have Electro-Leap on the attack, it is resolved after all attack rolls but before any damage rolls. The models that you just attacked will have electo-leaps bounce between them (as they will generally be the closest to each other). After the Electro damage is resolved, you can roll melee damage vs any models that survived the electric damage. (Infernal Ruling)

Rules Clarification : Knockdown      (Edit) Knockdown (Edit) - Remember, knockdown only prevents what it says it does. Refer to the Knockdown page for a recap of what a model can/can't do.

Rules Clarification : Trash - None yet. (Edit)

Rules Clarification : Battle Engine      (Edit) The main differences between battle engines and the other huge bases are: They can be placed, and they can move outside their Normal Movement (such as Dodge). They can benefit from Advance Deployment, Incorporeal, and Stealth. They can't make ranged attacks while in melee. At least not by default; but many battle engines have Gun Platform, Dual Attack, or similar. Unlike Colossals and Gargantuans, your opponent can take control of your battle engine. There are very few such abilities that work on this model type, though. Being a huge-based model, a Battle Engine can never gain the DEF bonus from concealment ... but it can still have concealment and thereby trigger Prowl. Huge Base (Edit) You can draw LOS from your Left arc to a target in your Right arc (and vice versa). See also this diagram Huge-based models get bonus distance if they do a Power Attack: Slam or Power Attack: Power Strike. But this bonus doesn't apply to slams triggered by normal attacks (such as Critical Smite or the Hurricane's Thunder Charge ability). Also, simply being on a huge base triggers a bunch of rules scattered throughout the rulebook, click to read them.   [Show/Hide] From the 2020.02 edition of the core rules (Edit) Fields of Fire Page 37 A huge-based model’s front arc is marked on its base. Its front arc is further divided into two 90° fields of fire. These fields of fire determine which models a huge-based model can target with its weapons, depending on the location of those weapons. Weapons located on a huge-based model’s left side (L) can be used to target only models in its left field of fire, and weapons located on its right side (R) can be used to target only models in its right field of fire. Weapons with locations “S,” “H,” or “—” can be used to target models in either field of fire. If any part of a model’s base is on the line separating the left and right fields of fire, the model is considered to be in both fields of fire. Concealment, Cover, LOS Page 49 Concealment & Cover - Huge-based models never gain the DEF bonuses from concealment or cover. Page 60 Clouds - Cloud effects do not block line of sight to huge-based models. Page 87 Forests - Forests do not block line of sight to huge-based models. Huge-Based models in melee Page 54 - Huge-based models never gain the Target in Melee DEF bonus. Page 65 - Combined Ranged Attacks cannot target a model in melee unless it has a huge base.

Rules Clarification : Construct - None yet. (Edit)

Rules Clarification : Pathfinder      (Edit) Pathfinder (Edit) - Pathfinder does not apply to involuntary movement (pushes & slams). (Infernal Ruling)

Rules Clarification:  : Bulldoze      (Edit) (Click Expand to read)

(A) People think Bulldoze works like a bowling ball hitting tenpins. But this is wrong because the models haven't been moved DIRECTLY away. (B) Whereas if you move models DIRECTLY away, you bulldoze the first guy okay, but then the next one's path is blocked (shown in red), and you get stuck. Bulldoze - General Models are pushed directly away from you at the point of contact. Some players do this incorrectly, refer to the section on moving models, below. You cannot cast spells or use any other "any time" abilities when you 'stop' to resolve the Bulldoze movement. It's just a pause, not a stop. The size of the Bulldozer vs the Bulldozed does not matter. A small model bulldozes a large model just fine. (Just don't expect to move a Colossal etc.) Bulldoze only works during your Normal Movement. This includes full advances, runs, charges, and slams, but doesn't include stuff like Reposition or Energizer. You can't make free strikes against models you Bulldoze (because for them it is involuntary movement). Enemy models with 2" melee range will still engage you after being bulldozed. Because they will be exactly 2" away and thus still within 2". An enemy model can only be pushed once by the Bulldozer, but if you have multiple Bulldozer models then you could push the same enemy multiple times. If you contact a model you want to Bulldoze while overlapping another model or an obstacle, then you can "pause" on top of that other model/obstacle while resolving the Bulldoze, then continue your movement off the other model/obstacle. (Locked thread) Bulldoze - Charges / Slams If you attempt to Bulldoze a model out of your charge lane but it does not move far enough, you can't Bulldoze again. You will continue your charge, contact it again, and stop. You can use Bulldoze to get the charge bonus against models between 1 and 3" away. Simply move into B2B, bulldoze them 2" to make some more room, then you can move 2" further forward to get to the "moved at least 3 inches" requirement. Similarly for Slams vs models within 1-3". If you Bulldoze your charge target out of your melee range, this doesn't break the "once in your melee range the target must stay in your melee range" rule. Bulldoze is an exception. (Infernal Ruling) Bulldoze - Moving the models A lot of people think they can bulldoze straight through the enemy lines, like shown on Image A. But what actually happens is more like Image B. This is due to 3 important factors you need to apply: Bulldoze pushes models directly away from your base. Not at an angle. Directly. Away. If there is a model behind the bulldozed model, the model will STOP. And in this situation, a model beside the pushed model is effectively behind it unless you're pushing at a perfect tangent. A model can be pushed only one time via Bulldoze. Push - General     (Edit)   [Show/Hide] Pushed models do not change their facing. Pushed models move at half rate through difficult terrain. Also, Pathfinder doesn't apply during pushes. Pushed models stop if they contact anything - a model of any size, or any obstacles or obstructions. You don't get free strikes against pushed models, because it is "involuntary movement" and therefore does not count as an advance. Pushed models suffer the effects of anything they move through (such as acid clouds). If you use a Push vs a charging model (via a free strike for example), this will stop the charge movement (refer core rulebook). However, if the pushed model is in melee range of its charge target after the push, then it is considered a successful charge. (Infernal Ruling) In that scenario, you measure whether the charging model moved 3" or less excluding the push distance. (Infernal Ruling) If you push a model to a position where it regains Incorporeal (for instance you push it out of range of an Exorcist) then what happens is (Being Checked by Infernals)

Rules Clarification:  : Dual Attack      (Edit) (Click Expand to read)

* If you fail a charge, then you do not get to make ranged attacks. If you have multiple ranged attacks and/or melee attacks, you can intermingle them in any order. (Infernal Ruling) You can charge, make a ranged attack, then make your charge melee attack. Even though you made a ranged attack, that doesn't change the fact that your first melee attack is the charge attack. (Infernal Ruling) You must complete all initial attacks before buying attacks. You can't go: Make an initial melee attack, then buy a melee attack, then make an initial ranged attack. (Locked Thread) Dual Attack doesn't let you mix initial attacks with a (★) attack. Dual Attack only lets you make either: Initial melee attacks and initial ranged attacks. Power attack and initial ranged attacks. Any other combination of (★ Attack) and initials is disallowed. See this thread for full explanation and links to relevant Infernal Rulings. You could theoretically make a special melee attack and then buy additional ranged attacks (or vice versa) ... but the core rules say "The rules for these special attacks indicate the nature of any additional attacks that can be made afterward, if any" so the special attack would have to explicitly allow a swap - and I'm unaware of any that do so. There is no penalty for shooting an enemy you are in melee with. Your ranged attack(s) can target a model you are not in melee with. (Infernal Ruling) Dual Attack & Drag ( Edit ) This is pretty-much limited to just the Prime Axiom under Syntherion, or the Swabber, Galleon or Prime Axiom under Aurora2 If you charge model A then utilise Dual Attack to make a ranged attack vs the same model, then you would get the free melee attack from Drag. The Drag attack is a charge attack. (Infernal Ruling) If you charge model A then utilise Dual Attack to make a ranged attack vs a different model, then you would lose the free melee attack from Drag. Your first melee attack must be versus the charge target, and you cannot save the Drag attack for later. (Infernal Ruling) If you didn't charge then ... just go nuts. There's no restrictions that I know of. Dual Attack & Slam/Trample ( Edit ) Power Attack Slam and Trample combine your Normal Movement and Combat Action, and how this works with Dual Attack is: Slam: You must resolve the movement, the attack, and moving the slammed model. Only then can you make initial ranged attacks. Trample: You must resolve the movement, the attacks, and the free strikes. Only then can you make initial ranged attacks. (Infernal Ruling)

Rules Clarification : Exhaust Fumes - None yet. (Edit)
Rules Clarification : Turn up the Heat - None yet. (Edit)