Divine Intervention... An idea of mine

The Epic burns my Eyes!!!

So, after looking over the Grey Knight codex I found one little trick no one else is talking about. What is it you say? Well, I was looking over the fluff and thought to myself,

"Aren't Grey Knights supposed to be specialized in teleporting in exactly where and when they are needed? Why doesnt the codex allow the army to be good at massive deep strikes?"

Then I read over the army list and said, "never mind" and built this...

HQ: Inquisitor w Force Weapon and Psychic Communion                                          55pts

HQ: Inquisitor w Force Weapon and Psychic Communion                                          55pts


Troops: 10 Terminators; 2 w hammer, 2 w psycannon and Halbred, 6 with Halberds 450pts

Troops: 10 Terminators; 2 w hammer, 2 w psycannon and Halbred, 6 with Halberds 450pts
Troops: 10 Terminators; 2 w hammer, 2 w psycannon and Halbred, 6 with Halberds 450pts
Fast Attack: 10 Interceptors with 2 psycannons, Justicar with hammer                       290pts

Total                                                                                                                        1750pts

See what I have here, If you know anything about reserves and how Communion works, well...

This is all about working the system.

Anybody remember Ninja tau? Ninja tau was about using some weird equiptment to make your entire army be locked in resereve untill the last turn in which they rush onto the board, kill the enemy, take the objectives and let the game end.

It wasnt good, It involved letting one unit out a turn and even then the Tau army functions by inter working unit's fire over turns. It was a gimmick, nothing more. I know, I was able to smack down these lists before.

So why am I bringing this up again?

Because Grey Knights have a way of playing the reserves denial game in a much more stable way.

I personally think this army should go second, aim for that. (explain it in a bit)

Think about it, turn one you hide both Inquisitors behind rocks or other terrain which on a fair board should exist. (if there isn't any put them in cover with the Interceptors and let them soak the wounds coming at them)







Then the enemy will either deploy in reserves or in a position to defend against you. then you think.


Turn two the enemy will either have an army waiting for you with popped smoke or half still in reserve, if smoked, you can wait till next turn all 4 of your reserves rolls only bring in a unit on a role of a 6 thanks to Communion

Turn three the enemy will have wasted his smoke, or will have even more units marching on, waiting for an army of terminators to just show up. You can either spring your trap, or play luck as your units now come in on 5+ depending on the army you can decide, its still 30 terminators, you should know by know what they can or cant take on.

In fact that determines the whole focus of the force: You have to know the right time to strike. This is a finesse army, not a sledgehammer like the DeathWing

Think the army looks small... look at how it looks when it combats squads and lands 13-24" away from you

Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds  
Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds  
Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds  

Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds 

Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds
Troops: 5 Terminators; 1 w hammer, 1 w psycannon and Halbred, 3 with Halberds  

5 Interceptors with psycannon

5 Interceptors with psycannon, Justicar with hammer

Its only 8 psycannons, but 6 are planted on relentless Terminators, thats 28 shots at 8 targets, enough to shake/stun big stuff and fry rhinos/chimeras. Its an alpha strike you control. Can the enemy reliably stop you their next turn which is turn four or five? Well, its one thing to have to kill 30 terminators in 6 turns, another in 3-2 all the while your shooting him dead.

This doesn't play like other Deep Strike armies because it has a huge advantage. It is durable and has long range guns. I'm not landing within 12" so I can melta you, I have the luxury to be 24 inches out, and still fry you. Bubble wrap isn't as much as a hassle as I just shoot over them. You wonder why Death Wing is so scary? This army gets the same alpha strike advantage except without the many of the disadvantages 

Being aware of when you strike is important too, remember how I said you want to go second, here's why:

TURN1   Top:
                Bottom:

TURN2   Top:

                Bottom:

TURN3   Top:

                Bottom:

TURN4   Top:

                Bottom:

TURN5   Top:

                Bottom:

TURN6   Top:

                Bottom:

TURN7   Top:

                Bottom:

Lets say you wait till the third turn to deep strike and you are on the bottom of the turns, how does that work?

TURN1   Top: waits

                Bottom: waits


TURN2   Top: waits

                Bottom: waits

TURN3   Top: waits

                Bottom: strikes and shoots

TURN4   Top: fires back

                Bottom: fires back

TURN5   Top: fires back

                Bottom: fires back

TURN6   Top: fires back

                Bottom: fires back

TURN7   Top: fires back

                Bottom: fires back

Notice how at most you are playing a five turn game and your opponent only has four of his turns to shoot at you while you have 5 to shoot, including the first shot. Imagine then if you waited till fourth turn... now you see what I mean.

Now I have to test play this. I need too work out nuances and so forth, such as weather to have ten man squads and then combat squad or 5 man squads and subtle nuances.

At 1850 I upgrade a unit of Terms to Paladins and add Thawn because he is one of the most annoying models in the game and he looks cool.

Have the Codex... much to get done

So I now have the codex in my hands (about time) and am going to start studying.

Will be writing articles soon.

Continuing on... Dreadknights

So... Looking over Dread Knights... what do I think?

Honestly? I think it doesn't fit... but lets look this over and figure out why I feel that.

If you have your codex's on you take a second to look over this thing.

Its a four wound monstrous creature with a 2+/5++ for 170pts

I might want to add that he doesn't even have the cool teleporter that makes him work.

Its guns, while cool looking, arent worth a dime cause this is a close combat dude,

seriously, every model in my army has a storm bolter or psycannon and they want me to buy a Gattling Psilancer? I hope that's a joke ^_^. It isn't? Well...

He doesn't even have enough attacks to reliably kill a tactical squad in two turns. That's Bad, really bad. The usefulness of creatures like him are to charge squads, kill half, then sweep the squad in your opponent's battle phase and then charge something next turn. In my calculations he can kill squads by my next battle phase, leaving him in the open to be shot.

God forbid he gets caught in combat with gaunts, orks, or stubborn guard.

Now just to drive my point home lets see what I could use him for...

Alpha Striker: With a Grand Master I can push him into your face on turn one and assault you. Problem with this though any smart opponent will be ready for this and at most you will be smashing a rhino, then you will die. Honestly, Interceptors do this job better because they have 24" psycannons and str 8 or 10 deamon hammers. They can possibly shoot open transports and then charge. DreadKnights I don't see having that chance and then they are left out in the open, waiting to die.

Close Combat Monster: Its a Nurgle Deamon Prince, I'm pretty sure people are capable of stopping this thing. If this cant even beat thunder/shield terminators reliably...well I don't think it deserves the label of Assault Specialist. It can fight in assault, but for its cost it sure isn't a Mephiston or a Vect...That's for sure.

"Shoot ME" distraction unit: A friend of mine wants to use his as a distraction unit for his army and while he is playing a vehicle heavy army that sounds like a great idea, all the heavy weapons aiming at him instead of your dreadnoughts and vehicles...wait... this thing has no good long range guns, its only dangerouse up close. Of course the enemy wont fall for that. At most he might move some units around so your 200+pt monster can only smash small pointless units. Again, nobody's afraid of a deamon prince, even if he has a 2+ save. This guy even has to work hard to get a cover save If you want a good distraction unit and are already spending 200 pts pay up 25 more and get a Terminator squad with Psycannon. That's five 2+/5++ wounds with a real gun and great combat powers. Deep strike it turn two where the enemy doesn't want it, In cover as well, and now you have a scary target that the opponent wants to get rid of. You can even go to ground.

Objective guarder/seizer: Ok, so I'm going to take a 175pt HQ to make my 205pts Dreadknight, which is too big to get cover most of the time, to go babysit an objective instead of a 220pt unit of 10 Grey Knights with 2 psycannons. Someones going to try this and honestly I dont see it working out as they planned. People can be ready for this, I know I would be.

Last turn objective denial: Intercepters can do this better for half the cost, really, its not that hard. There is even a smaller foot print to help them get close to the objective. Try maneuvering the DreadKnights base around , yeah, not going to happen.

Now I don't want to poo poo my readers, this is my opinion and I personal believe that it isn't the best. Will I get one someday? Most likely, when I figure out how to make it not look like a kangaroo pouched terminator.

One Moment, Why aren't people talking about intercepters and Grand Masters?

After reading the codex last evening I don't see why people aren't taking advantage of this?

Heres my tarting list though for you to look at,

Grandmaster with Psycannon

5 Purifiers with 2 psycannons

10 man Strike Squad with 2 psycannons

10 man Strike Squad with 2 psycannons

5 Terminators, 1 Psycannon 1 Deamon Hammer, 4 Halberds

5 Terminators, 1 Psycannon 1 Deamon Hammer, 4 Halberds

10 man Interceptors, 2 Hammers, 2 Psycannons

10 man Interceptors, 2 Hammers, 2 Psycannons

Thats 55 marines, and people think Grey Knights are elite...

This is also an awesome Alpha Strike If you get first turn, but I will go over that later, surprised I don't see lists like this every where? What? People don't like str 10 hammers hitting them turn one?

Thoughts beget Heresy, Heresy begets brainstorm...

What the 41st Millennium has come to...

Now, I dont have the codex on me yet. I hope to rectify this soon, but for now, some brainstorming.

*Any Points values might be off my ten or so points but that doesn't matter at the moment*

I want to get the most out of this time though so I have taken the opportunity to review the interwebs and have combined it with the few hours of looking over the codex and army list and will do some Theory-hammering.

First lets see what we have to work with... And I don't want henchmen (see picture above)

GREY KNIGHT (POWER ARMOR)

Well, I guess one size fits all doesn't it? I can have my strike, purgy, intercepting, and purifying flavors. Right now though lets see what just 20pts can get you.

Its a simple marine, just with a storm bolter, a force weapon, and str 5 with Holocaust...

No big deal right? Wrong, This changes everything.

Why? Because a simple marine is used just to buy a razorback (sad but true) a Grey knight is there to pound some 24" hate into the enemy and then hit someone with his shiny beatstick. Now Games Workshop seems to finally understand something about codex design as Grey Knights come with the best heavy to support them, Psycannons. At 10 pts a pop these suckers are defiantly soul squishes. Str7 with rending is a beautiful piece of work and 2/4 shot if you move or not is just nice and flexible.

The best part, 5 dudes and one psycannon are 110pts. 10 are double at 220pts for just the basics. The ten man unit can pelt a target at 24inches with 16 storm bolter shots and 4/8 Psycannon rounds. Dear Goodness, what an awesome objective sitter. They are a huge Frak-Off unit and as I move along with my brainstorming you will defiantly see them all over the place.

A word about close combat though. Grey Knights are not a close combat army (I think the interwebs understands this now, I knew it just from my first glance). They ARE however a perfect bait and rush army. What does that mean? Well, in many ways the army is similar to a LoganWing. Logan wing armies have small squads that have a good moving heavy weapon (just like Grey Knights do) and while better in combat than most units tend to not want to go toe to toe with true close combat units. Instead, the loganwing (at least with my own experience) is all about shooting the enemy, limiting their mobility and isolating the close combat units, then throwing a number of small units into the enemy and tearing them down by weight of numbers.

Grey knights will be doing this as well, but have the advantage of being able to pound many shots into these scary units halfway across the board. And not only that but if you have a few units of 10 guys sitting around each other, well that gets pretty scary.

Some costs to put things in perspective,

5 Grey knights, one psycannon 110pts
5 wolf guard, one with Terminator armor, Cyclone missile launch, chain fist 150pts
10 Grey Knights, 2 psycannons 220pts
10 wolf guard, 2 in term armor w CML 270pts

Did I mention that Grey Knights can combat squad, think about how awesome they are as a foot army.

I feel right now that my first few Grey knight army ideas will begin to have a lot of my Logan wing feels to them, just one catch though. The Army works at 24" instead of 48" like a logan wing. What does that mean? well it means that the army has to aggressively push into midfield and then just pelt out shots, thank goodness we have a wonderful army book with units like Grey Knight Terminators and Interceptors to help seize the midfield and hold it for the strike squads.

I have work to get done so I will leave you with this but next I think I will get some ideas out of getting to the middle, creating an anchor there and holding out till the last turn when they grab and contest everything.

As usual thoughts are cool, I have 19 followers, at least one of them should have something to say ^_^

Grrr...ey knights?

So last Friday I went down to my local store for a fun time and got to talking about the new Grey Knights.

Suffice to say I do not particularly like their play style.

Well my friend is starting Dark Eldar and has challenged me to build Grey Knights as a chance to "learn a new way to play" with him as he was playing Death Guard.

After a night of much ranting and raving I will be playing Grey knights as my next army.

This will be a fun challenge.

And I still wont take Cortez,

List is coming soon...

I should post something...should'nt I

So it has been forever since I posted something, thats a shame I have to say.

But I hope to write more as I get started with my Summer project,

Here's the catch though, I was going to do the Pre Heresy Thousand Sons, I love there background and all that and I have a cool paint scheme for them and everything. Then I saw the codex and everything changed..

Grimnar Angband's Grey Knight Review:

While I think they can be rather competitive, I have a few problems:

1) The model rang is limited. The entire army is going to look very repetitive with little difference at the competitive level. The model range is not that varied and I dont see the flavor of them.

2) I dont like Cortez. When a vast majority of Grey Knight armies have more henchmen then Grey Knights I just sigh.

3) The army functions at rate that in my opinion doesn't fit the Thousand Sons. It's a lot of relying on Psycannon to kill stuff, not the psychic powers that I see in the Horus Heresy.

And finally the one reason I chose not to play them...

4) I don't like the play style. If you have had a chance to look at the codex you will realize how they play, I dont have the time to write an entire codexs strategies. Just know that I am not having fun with them on the board, so there out.

Sad...But I hold no regrets.

Now for a new project...

I will be building an army over the summer for my future years at college so I have been looking over the requirements for what I want and need.

The Army Must be relatively inexpensive

The army Must fit in 1 army case (so little to no vehicles)

Must be competitive to a good degree

Must have fun modeling aspects

Must be able to last long without any great change in models

Must be fun and challenging on the tabletop

Here are the two options I have whittled down to.

Taking Elite to a new Level

Deathwing
I always liked this army, I've always liked Thunder Hammer/Storm Shields (since 4th edition when they sucked), and from what I gathered they wont be changing for a while and can give anyone a run for their money. I can have fun making Belial and tricking out the army and will have the flavor of an old school army.


Second option is...

Space Vikings are angry

LoganWing
I have been using my World Eaters to represent this army and I love the way this army plays. I could finally build it using the real models to play an army I already love. The downside, the army has a weird color scheme and it will be a couple of years before playing Spacewolves doesn't get me nasty looks. (why cant people just move on)

So What do you guys think? If you want to recommend something else as well I'm all ears. Dark Eldar might be a possibility if I can swing a deal an pick up 8-9 old fashion raiders and ravagers (and old incubi, I like them better than the new ones for some reason)