Culexus

"That which is unknown and unseen commands the greatest fear."

--Motto of the Culexus Temple.

You done fucked up

Culexus (Games Workshop-Latin of "Culex," meaning "Mosquito", sucking warp power instead of blood) is an Assassin temple of the Officio Assassinorum in Warhammer 40,000. They are all psychic blanks (aka Pariahs or nulls), meaning they have no signature in the Warp and generally mess with psykers.

To regular humans, their aura is filled with some degree of sickness both figuratively and literally which makes them rare as most of the time they are killed during childhood. Those who survive become some of the deadliest assassins in the Imperium. A blank is the worst thing a psyker could encounter, as their mere presence is enough to cause considerable pain and even death to weak-minded psykers. The Eldar harbor a particular hate and fear of blanks, what with every Eldar being a psyker and whatnot. Furthermore, blanks are totally invisible to daemons due to their lack of warp signature. The Culexus assassins therefore target exclusively psykers, as most psykers would rather chew their own arteries out and slowly bleed to death than face one.

And not only psykers, like that time a full Execution force (4 assassins, one of each kind) was sent to kill Tau VIPs...and the only one to succeed was the Culexus. And Tau don't even have psykers! Still, even against non-psychic targets, the Culexus has the advantages of a maddening aura of distilled fear and pseudo-invisibility, their Pariah gene allowing them to be ignored so hard by both the living, the machines and the neverborn that this one "sneaked" inside a transport by merely not bumping into the passengers, like a fa/tg/guy in a disco.

Because they're pretty much forced outcasts of society they really don't have much of a social life outside the Officio Assassinorum.

Culexuses Culexii These guys also somehow manage to have no soul so hard (nah, they just have a weird sort of anti-soul, and psyker's reaction to them is kinda like an anti-matter and matter reaction) that they're able to fire beams of not-soul (anti-soul) out of the gun attached to their heads and assuming there's enough psykers around, this beam can become arguably one of the best anti-infantry guns in the game.

On the tabletop these guys are absolute death, given that they have pseudo-invisibility (all attacks are WS/BS1, even after Markerlights). In addition, all psykers get -3 leadership, cannot get warp charges, manifest on a 6, and all malediction or blessings are cancelled within 12'. These guys ignore armor and have instant death vs psykers, so eldar, GK, and Daemons will cry.

They may have been part of the Deceiver's plans to fuck with the Old Ones, but maybe not. Who knows.

On the Tabletop

Given the fact that there's a new psychic phase, many opponents have begun taking psykers to try it out, some to bolster their gunlines with divination, others to cause massive amounts of rage with Telepathy. If you want to put a stop to these psychic shenanigans, then the Culexus Assassin is the pick for you, my friend!

Its stats are as awesome as all the other Assassins:

	Pts	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Sv
Culexus Assassin	140	8	8	4	4	3	7	4	10	4++

Special Rules/Equipment

Standard Assassin

• Fearless
• Fleet
• Infiltrate
• Hit & Run
• Move Through Cover
• Precision Strikes
• Lightning Reflexes
  • A model with this special rule has a 4+ invulnerable save. In addition, they do not suffer the penalty to their Initiative for charging enemies through difficult terrain.
• No Escape
  • Enemy characters suffer a -2 penalty to their Look Out, Sir tests against any Wounds inflicted by a model with this special rule.
• Independent Operative
  • Cannot join or be joined, cannot generate Warlord Traits if made warlord.

Culexus

• Fear
  • Largely unhelpful fluffy, but almost completely useless given anyone attacking the Culexus is reduced to WS1 anyway, but could be marginally useful if allied units are also involved in the combat
• Preferred Enemy (Psykers)
• Life Drain
  • All attacks made by the Culexus in close combat ignore armor saves, and if you roll a 6 to wound his attacks have Instant Death, and all wounds on a Psyker, Brotherhood of Psykers, or Sorcerer is instant-death.
• Psychic Abomination
  • All psykers within 12" can harness warp charges only on a 6 , and all blessings and maledictions on any unit (friend or foe) cease within 12" of the Culexus. All enemy psykers within 12" do not add their mastery level to their warp charge pool in their Psychic phase and drop their Ld by 3.
    • Add all these abilities up, and you've just successfully created a bubble with a 12" radius that no smart player using psykers will enter. Even if his psyker-resistant bubble doesn't directly come into play, you can always exploit the fact that psykers won't do anything in this guy's vicinity. Also, the FAQ confirmed his "Harness on 6s only" will affect the benefits from a Seer Council or Librarius Conclaves everyone seems to be taking given the new Space Marine Psychic powers.

Equipment

• Animus Speculum
  • A shooting attack at 18" fired in the psychic phase, Strength 5 AP1 Assault X, where X is how many Mastery Levels there are within 12" him...Friend or Foe. You can also elect to use three warp charges to add three shots to the speculum's attack. Using this also doesn't count as shooting (due to it being in the psychic phase), meaning you can still toss a 'nade or run in the following phases.
• Psyk-Out Grenades
  • Defensive grenades against Psykers, or as a thrown grenade with S2 AP- Assault 1, Blast, and Psi-shock
    • Psi-Shock:
      • One random Psyker in the unit hit suffers Perils of the Warp.
• Etherium
  • All units targeting the Culexus Assassin, in close combat or range, have to shoot or hit at BS and WS 1. Psykers hate Culexi by default, but this is why everyone hates him. Be wary of stuff that can ignore this like Kharn hitting on 2+ in CC (why you would try to fight Kharn in assault with a Culexus is beyond us).

Summary

All in all, the Culexus is for killing Psykers, and he is horrifyingly good at it. Unless you charge them into the Daemon Primarch Magnus, in which case you deserve the results you'll get.

Gallery

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  Culexus assassins are psyker's worst nightmare, though they are very friendly.

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  Culexus-kun has no friends.

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  Culexus will bring LOLWUT to the enemy.

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  Nobody likes you.