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MIssile

A Cyclone Missile Launcher system

Terminator--Cyclone

A Star Phantoms Terminator equipped with a Cyclone Missile Launcher

The Cyclone Missile Launcher is a specially designed Missile Launcher system used by Space Marines in Terminator Armour to provide heavy fire support. Since Terminator Squads are an elite force, they are often called upon to undertake the toughest and most dangerous missions in the most hazardous conditions or to serve on the most dangerous battlefields. Therefore, Terminator Squads need a range of fire support weapons in order for them to successfully achieve their objectives in any tactical situation. To provide the additional firepower without affecting mobility or compromising accuracy, various weapons have been created by the Tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus.

The Cyclone Missile Launcher is ideally suited to this purpose. Developed as a salvo-firing long-range killer, the Cyclone Missile Launcher is essentially a rack of missiles mounted upon the shoulders of a Terminator, due to the weapon system's great size and weight. In this way a Terminator is still able to carry a Storm Bolter into combat as well as the Cyclone Missile Launcher. This weapon enables the Terminator to engage both heavily armoured vehicles and lightly armoured infantry. Like a standard Missile Launcher, the Cyclone Missile Launcher has two varieties of missile, the powerful Krak Missile used for penetrating heavy armour and vehicles and the explosive anti-personnel Frag Missile designed to kill multiple, lightly-armoured foes. The advantage of the Cyclone Missile Launcher when compared to a standard Space Marine Missile Launcher is the Cyclone's much greater rate of fire. With this deadly weapon, a Terminator is capable of firing devastating salvos of up to a dozen laser-guided missiles. Also, the Cyclone Missile Launcher's bulk provides the Astartes warrior with a large magazine for the storage and hands-free firing of additional missiles. This is an operational necessity, since the bulk of the Terminator Armour would make reloading it after each volley extremely awkward, if not impossible.

Sources[]

  • Codex: Space Marines (7th Edition) (Digital Edition), "Armoury of the Space Marines - Ranged Weapons - Cyclone Missile Launcher"
  • Codex Space Marines (5th Edition), pg. 64
  • Codex Space Marines (4th Edition), pg. 23
  • Warhammer 40,000 Wargear (2nd Edition), pg. 46
  • Warhammer 40,000 Compilation (1st Edition), pg. 9
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