Gauss Flayer & Gauss Blaster

Lore & history

When the silent, skeletal phalanxes of the Necron dynasties march out from their awakening Tomb Worlds, they carry no cartridge-fed firearms or crude chemical explosives. In the skeletal hands of every Necron Warrior gleams a Gauss Flayer: an ancient, axe-bladed rod of living metal and glowing emerald containment tubes whose technology dates back sixty million years to the War in Heaven. When the phalanx levels its rifles in eerie, mechanical unison, the battlefield is lit by a blinding storm of emerald lightning that leaves nothing of its victims behind save drifting motes of dissociated dust.

To Imperial guardsmen and Space Marines who have faced a Necron advance, the horror of the Gauss Flayer lies in the utter helplessness of conventional cover and armour. A warrior struck by a gauss beam is not knocked backward by kinetic force; instead, his ceramite breastplate, his skin, his muscles, and finally his skeleton are peeled away layer by layer from the outside in, their vaporised atoms pulled backward along the glowing green beam toward the muzzle of the Necron's gun.

Design, mechanism & battlefield effect

Described by Adeptus Mechanicus Xenologis magi as a linear asymmetric magnetic-field breakdown weapon, a Gauss Flayer projects a coherent, self-sustaining electromagnetic conduit wrapped in an emerald energetic sheath. Within this beam, the subatomic coulomb forces and molecular bonds holding solid matter together are systematically inverted.

Once the target's outer atomic layer is ionized, the weapon's reverse-polarity magnetic field draws the stripped matter back toward the emitter anode at relativistic speed, exposing the next layer of matter underneath to the same catastrophic flaying effect. Consequently, even the basic infantry Gauss Flayer can strip a hole straight through the front armour of a Leman Russ or Land Raider.

Patterns, variants & doctrine

While Necron Warriors carry the classic long-barrelled Gauss Flayer or the twin-tubed, short-range Gauss Reaper, the elite Necron Immortals wield the heavier, higher-output Gauss Blaster. Ghost Arks mount banks of five synchronized Gauss Flayer Arrays on each flank, while Lokhust Destroyers and Monoliths bring to bear the devastating Gauss Cannon and Heavy Gauss Cannon.

Notable patterns & relic examples

• Gauss Flayer & Gauss Reaper: The standard molecular-flaying rifles carried by the endless phalanxes of Necron Warriors.
• Gauss Blaster: A twin-chambered heavy assault rifle wielded by Necron Immortals and mounted on Tomb Blade skimmers.
• Gauss Flayer Array: Banks of five synchronized Gauss Flayers mounted along each rib-flank of Necron Ghost Arks and Doomsday Arks.
• Gauss Cannon & Heavy Gauss Cannon: High-output anti-tank gauss weapons carried by Lokhust Destroyers and Monolith fortresses.

Wielded & Fielded By

Characters (8)

• 
  Szarekh, the Silent King · Last of the Silent Kings
• 
  Imotekh the Stormlord · Phaeron of the Sautekh Dynasty
• 
  Trazyn the Infinite · Overlord of Solemnace, Archaeovist
• 
  Illuminor Szeras · Cryptek Technomancer
• 
  Anrakyr the Traveller · Overlord of Pyrrhia
• 
  Orikan the Diviner · Cryptek Chronomancer, Astromancer of the Triarch
• 
  Nemesor Zahndrekh · Overlord of Gidrim
• 
  Vargard Obyron · Vargard of Nemesor Zahndrekh

Units (7)

Necron WarriorsImmortalsDeathmarksTriarch PraetoriansLychguardFlayed OnesC'tan Shards

Related weapons & vehicles

LasgunFlamer & Heavy FlamerBolter & Bolt RifleMeltagun & Multi-MeltaPlasma Gun & Plasma IncineratorStorm BolterSonic Blaster & BlastmasterShuriken Catapult & Shuriken Pistol

Primary Faction

Necrons