Soul Grinder

*CLANG*

Soul Grinders are Daemon Engines that are essentially the mascots of the Warp Forge, equal parts daemon and machine with the weaknesses of neither (no, that doesn't sound like something from another intellectual property at all), meaning that they can last forever in the material world. They're also one of the few units you can use for a Daemons army that has ranged attacks.

So, if any daemon wants to get to be one of these babies, they have to duke it out with other aspirants near the Forge of Souls in the Warp and prove themselves worthy of becoming a Cyberdemon. The winners get merged to machinery by the Forge's daemonic smiths and must take three oaths before getting let loose:

1. All the souls harvested by the Soul Grinder will be used to fuel the Forge. Okay, that's reasonable. They're Daemons, after all.
2. The wrecked remains of any war machines destroyed by the Soul Grinder will be offered to the Forge. Well, that's fair considering the gift of near-unstoppability they have.
3. Should any of the Chaos Gods attack the Forge of Souls and try to rule it, the Soul Grinder must discard all of their previous loyalties and fight in its defense. Here's where some daemons might cross lines, as this effectively makes them Undivided Daemons. Badass Undivided Daemons unlike those pansy-ass Furies, but still. However, they still have to buy a Mark dedicate themselves to a Chaos God. Presumably that's their day job when the forge is not under attack by a chaos god. Who runs the forge? Nobody knows and there is no official answer perhaps by Malal to convert chaos daemons of other gods. Be'lakor is a possibility as he is one of the most powerful entities of chaos not loyal to a single patron god.

On 40K Tabletop

It's baseline stats are pretty neat, with F/SA13, a Power Fist (or as they call it in the Codex, an "Iron Claw") and a Harvester Cannon (an autocannon with an extra shot) .With the coming of Fliers, the Grinder has gotten some new use, as its Harvester Cannon can Skyfire, but doing so disallows the use of it's other guns. It no longer has a Mawcannon, which means you have to buy any ranged weaponry aside from its harvester; the upside is that losing a Mawcannon no longer removes all purchased weapon profiles, so there's that. The old Vomit profile is now called 'Baleful Torrent' and is identical save for gaining torrent, Phlegm Bombardment is Ordnance as opposed to heavy and the Tongue profile is now called 'Warp Gaze.' Additionally, you can give it a Warp sword, striking at the model's basic strength with AP3, but it also grants the grinder another attack, plus a back-up CC weapon. Since 6th Ed, it has to be dedicated as a Daemon to one of the Gods, which comes with specific benefits as listed in the Codex. Being a Daemon of Khorne gives it Furious Charge, Tzeentch lets it re-roll 1s on its 5++ save, Nurgle grants it Shrouded as well and Slaanesh gives it fleet, +3" to running distances and rending.

Tactically speaking, most players prefer to roll with a Nurgle Grinder equipping Phlegm Bombardment with the occasional Torrent and rarely Warp Gaze; the reasoning here is that this shores up the Daemons' lack of ranged support by providing a camping artillery walker with slow and purposeful. Others have found it useful as a close combat walker in dedication to Slaanesh; this build is done with Baleful Torrent and a Warp Sword and is ideal as a support unit in an allied daemons detachment. Let's put it this way, not much can stand up against 6 S10 AP2 rending attacks on the charge, especially not after a scorching from Baleful Torrent; additionally, the Grinder's armour allows it to survive a jog across a battlefield mostly intact. Khorne Grinders have the cheapest point cost (that of the old Soul Grinder cost), making it ideal for players that favor swarm tactics. For the distant few that want a vanilla Soul Grinder for fun, homebrew logic suggests using Khorne Grinder rules while subtracting Mark of Khorne and Furious Charge.

On WFB Tabletop

It's one of the only artillery weapons Daemons get, and for that, it works pretty well.