Viskeons

Krashrak the Stalker, the only named Viskeon in the lore, as well as the only model

The galaxy of Warhammer 40,000 is a big place, home to uncountable Xenos races, though that number has slightly thinned out recently thanks to the actions of one in particular. Some races're big players on the main stage, like Humans, Aeldari, Q'Orl, Orks, Necrons, and Tyranids. Others're more supporting acts, such as the T'au. And then there're the little guys who never even get invited to the party, like the Viskeons.

Overview

The Viskeons were a cold-blooded race, native to a harsh but beautiful Deathworld of desert, plain, and jungle, and their unforgiving homeworld had bred a people of strength and pride. They valued martial honour above all else, adhering to a strict warrior code that viewed ranged combat as an insult to your opponent, denying them the chance to test their mettle against you in melee, like a coward and a fewl. A favoured traditional weapon of theirs was their signature Shockthrottle, a unique-looking hand weapon with four main blades sprouting from a single head, and a chain wrapping it around the wrist to prevent disarmament.

In appearance, Viskeons were humanoid, as most Xenos are in this franchise, distinguished from the actual Humans by their blue skin and a fin on the back of their head ... Wait a minute... They were also naturally ambidextrous, and had a large white tongue which contained their saliva gland, with a pore at its tip to eject the acidic spit. Some of them instead had green skin, no head fin, and Davy Jones' face but with a beak and stubby tusks instead of tentacles, though since their races' extinction it's now impossible to know the reason for this diversity. Because of their ectothermic metabolism, their physical condition varied considerably throughout a given day, being drowsy and sluggish when in the path of strong direct sunlight or equivalent, and alert and active when enveloped in shadow or during the night.

According to Xenology, Viskeons, like starfish, can multiply by having limbs cut off. If you cut off a Viskeon's arm, the Viskeon will grow a new arm, and the arm will grow a new Viskeon.

Code of the Stalker

Viskeon warriors wore a Carapace Armour Breastplate with a single horned Pauldron on one side, leaving their arms and legs mostly exposed to display their well-defined musculature, and the strings of white spurs that ran down their limbs. A relatively large Backpack unit was incorporated into the Armour, though not as bulky as those of Astartes Power Armour, and this housed an advanced sensor suite that could even rival a Psi-Tracker in detection capability, giving them an unparalleled track record in manhunting. And a pair of Neurogauntlets on the wrists rounded out their equipment, built-in Drug Injectors commonly filled with doses of stimulants such as Reflex, or sedatives like Chlorintone.

Chlorintone in particular was preferred, as when combined with Viskeon biology and sufficient training, it enabled them to reduce their body temperature and vitals to a point where their body could be examined by a Magos Biologis and declared dead, letting them sneak past even the most advanced sensor grids to catch their prey.

Extinction with Honour

The Viskeons met their untimely end thanks to the actions of one Mr. Ulthran, who manipulated an Ork Waaagh into gatecrashing a Splinter Fleet of Tyranid Hive Fleet Kraken that had broken off at Ichar IV, redirecting it away from some Maiden Worlds but toward the Viskeons. Without ranged weapons of any kind, they were unable to hold back the uncountable tide as the skies turned purple with swarms of Mycetic Spores, and their entire race was wiped out in a single night, their world and its stark beauty stripped clean in little over ninety days. The aloof Farseers of Ulthwe considered this a sacrifice worth making, as Aeldari lives had been saved and that was all that mattered. And with no way of knowing of the Aeldaris' involvement in the whole affair, those few Viskeons who were offworld at the time had nobody to blame but the Tyranids.

On the Tabletop

The Viskeons made their debut in White Dwarf 263, with a single individual represented in the Inquisitor specialist game, Krashrak the Stalker. He had a base profile with WS79, BS11, S81, T73, I70, Wp56, Sg68, Nv93, and Ld23, but this could be modified depending on if it was high noon or midnight. If it was the heat of the day, he lost -2d6 WS, -2d6 S, -1d6 T, and -2d6 I, whilst if it was the cool of the night, he gained +2d10 WS, +2d10 S, +1d10 T, and +2d10 I. If the time of day hadn't been determined by the GM already, you had to roll 1d10 to figure it out yourself, with 1 to 3 being high noon, 8 to 0 being midnight, and everything inbetween being just normal. Skills included Subdue, Nerves of Steel, Furious Assault, Spit Acid, and Ambidextrous.

Krashrak was equipped with chest Carapace Armour, a Runic Talisman that counted as a Hexagrammic Ward, a Backpack that counted as a Psi-Tracker, and a pair of Neurogauntlets that counted as Drug Injectors with four doses of Reflex and unlimited does of Chlorintone. He was armed with a Knife, which was just a Knife, but he also had a Shockthrottle, which was Reach 2 Damage 1d6+4 Parry Penalty -10%, on a Critical Hit couldn't be dodged, and injects the target with Chlorintone if the Damage roll exceeds the hit Location's Armour. At normal dosage levels, an affected target loses one point of Speed at once, and another every subsequent turn until incapacitated, but the dose can be upped to lethal levels. This adds +1d10 Damage to further Crits that penetrate Armour.

Outside of Inquisitor, there's potentially a more sinister representation of them in the main game. What with their distinctive head fin and acidic spit, it could very much be the case that the Hive Mind decided to retain these traits in the genepool, and used them to spawn one of its most numerous and successful strains, Gargoyles...

Famous Viskeons

• Krashrak - An infamous bounty hunter who once worked for Inquisitor Lichtenstein. He wasn't on his homeworld when the Tyranids attacked, and only learnt of its destruction a year after the fact, raising a glass to their souls at one of the seedy bars he frequented. And that he frequented any bars says a lot about alien life in the Imperium.

Gallery

• 
• 
•