Codex: Grey Knights. Unconfirmed stuff but oh so cool

Less than a month to go and from the leaks what can we conclude:

Paladin terminators are overpriced. Feel No Pain on terminators, (UNLESS Apothecary lets them re-roll inv saves or gives them furious charge) is a waste of points.

Draigo is uber expensive.

Kamarazov is AWESOME

Purifier squads could be great, but also since they're not terminators could be very fragile.

henchmen could now actually be useful...and rather colourful retinues could appear.

Storm Ravens will be a really big part of the army..

Blargh. I've played numerous games; and Brothers, I have become FURIOUSLY enraged with BS like Runes of Warding and Rune Priests; as if psychic hoods were not enough.

I'm serious; with roughly 20 or less models, some of which outflanking/deepstriking (scout from the Grandmaster) we NEED those powers like might of the ancients and hammerhand to break through vehicles and monstrous creatures.

A list I ran at 2000 was something like this with the playtest;

Draigo w/3 paladins, MC, apoc, Daemon hammers
Librarian lvl 3 with Might of Titan, The Summoning, and Quick Silver
-Inside of a Land Raider, extra armor, melta etc.

5 Paladins w/Daemon Hammers, MC, incinerator
10 man Grey Knight strike force, 2 incinerators 8 Halbreds, personal teleporters

Dreadknight w/personal teleporter.

Aside from the Land Raider with Draigo and his paladins, the other Paladins were meant to deepstrike/outflank, as was the Dreadknight, and possibly the strike squad. With the teleporters and shunt, and the summoning on the Librarian they were meant to support each other and make it quick and definite.

Sadly, I ended up playing Space Wolves who hid in rhinos (THE COWARDS!). Seriously; 4 rhino's with 10 man squads, a Librarian equvilant with that stupid Jaws of the World Wolf and ability to negate psychic powers within 24" on a 4+. Surrounded by some sort of jump packing body guard unit too, it hid behind the rhino's/Land Raider which just got into the middle of the map.

Draigo's landraider w/Dreadknight, 10 man Strike squad behind moves up over 3 turns, to get close so that we can deepstrike the termies (psychic communion helpful in controlling reserves) and strike a fateful blow. Well, story short, we weather most of the fire, but when we get close enough meltas blast the Land Raider apart, more melta fire and plasma fire reaps havoc on the Paladins, and the Librian gets hit with a melta and instantly dies. Ugh. 2++ of all the times to fail.

The Librian JOWW, killing the Dreadknight and two Paladins from the squad that deepstriked. Its utter and complete BULLSH**T that this reinforced Aegis and normal aegis don't -1 for powers that are used to MURDER them horribly just because its specific. Anyway, tons of bolter fire occurs, and the guy's still safe with his army of transports.

My turn, Strike Squad shunts and unloads all its firepower on the Space wolf librarian and squad...killing the bodyguard unit, but leaving the only one that mattered at all totally unharmed. Without the Libby, Draigo's squad has no PRAYER to crack the Land Raider what so ever, and the DreadKnight's dead too so there goes THAT. Even if we had the powers, the Rune priest or whatever would probably just screw us over anyway. So Draigo and the other Paladin squad managed to wreck a rhino with psybolt fire, and then he ate the squad inside.

My turn? All the squads and rhino's just shoot down the strike squad, save 2 guys who managed to make their leadership. The rest unloads at Draigo's squad, killing all but Draigo and the Apoc (with Draigo having a single wound, thanks to all the AP2 being shot all game) and then the Wolf Lord and his assault termies bust of of their LR and assault for kicks. Psychic powers go off, get nullified by the cheap rune priest dude thats still living. Draigo kills off 3 Assault termies; with good rolls felling the storm shields. Lightning claws come in and kill the apoc, Draigo makes his saves but dies horribly to the tons of other attacks.

I chock all this up of course to poor rolls early on, their only transport dead, and the fact that the SW's were GIANT FREAKING COWARDS....There was just too many transports we couldnt crack that blocked/cut off or points. The other paladin squad had to assault a squad of SW's, since the LR and rhino's blocked any attempt to get to the wolf lord. The remaining two Strike Knights chased the Libby, and murdered the bastard as some small consolidation. The other Paladins were quickly shot at with everything, and then assaulted and died.

Excuse the amount of text, but this is just a key example of how the dex currently is. Its terrible; when you have something that negates your psychic powers, which you rely on, and you have so few units that they can just be focus fired on. And God Emperor help you if you have poor luck.

I'd love to hear other's play test lists, and ideas as to combos, as this got just horribly rocked by SW rhino spam and plasma/meltas/psychic nullification.

Not really knowing all of what can be done with the book is still gonna screw with us. I've tried my hand at making a list, and it's all right from what I can tell in theory for the point level that it'll work at.

Take a look and give some thoughts:

HQ - Brotherhood Champion w/o any niffty stuff (Don't know what they do)
Troops - GKT Squad - 1x Psycannon, all halberds, 1 master-crafted halberd
Troops - 2x Strike Squads (6 man) - 1x Psycannon, Personal Teleporters, 1x Master-crafted halberd
Heavy - Land Raider Crusader - Multimelta

I have roughly 13 points remaining out of 1000. Why a generic Brotherhood Champ over Crowe? Because despite being a single wound model, its solid. I tried making a Purifier list, but I couldn't bring myself to do it due to cost of models at this level and I REALLY don't care for Crowe. Sure he RENDS on 4+ like Skulltaker, but granting Furious Charge to whatever unit assaults him really puts me off. Even then, the Anointed Blade of a Champ is better (Force Weapon that can re-roll failed wounds).

I would place the champ with the GKT's in the Crusader and wreck whatever they charge. Re-rolling those WS4 attacks on the charge will be so much better then not. Even then, he's there to support the GKT with his stances, if an IC I know that will wreck them, I'll take him on with the one stance that lets him strike at I10, which will no doubt see the character dead from the following psychic test (Even better when you have the GKTs cast Hammerhands for the unit since it buffs IC that have joined the unit as well).

The Strike Squads would follow up as act like Assault Marines but with a pimped out Assault/Auto Cannon.

This is what I've come up with at 1000 Points. I started with 500 Points, and built up from there, the Champion is really a cost effective unit for what it does when the rest of your army is looking to be at least 200 Points per unit to at lease be partial effective. If I could take a Champ with a Personal Teleporter, I would so do that and take full 10 man Strike Squads.

I haven't tested this yet, because I'm not sure how others would care to try and playtest it, even when I'm not really keen on printing the playtest.

Brothers, I don't mean to sound abrasive or anything like that but you can run lists all you want with a "play test" codex and it won't really mean much. Main reason being we have a ton of stuff we don't even know about yet (psilencers, different grenades, banner, etc). Secondly, we don't what changes were done with regards to point costs, wordings, powers, etc. these two reasons alone make a world of a difference in how a list is put together.

I guess its nice to be able to try it out and see how it works but I don't think anyone can accurately judge how the final codex will be based on these test games

Pretty much the main reason why I haven't gone out and tested it out yet. Still, it is nice to see what we could try out.

DarkRonin wrote:Pretty much the main reason why I haven't gone out and tested it out yet. Still, it is nice to see what we could try out.

Me too I did make lists for the fun of it and even with the new point costs in the "leaked" codex, a 2000 pt list didn't amount to a lot of models. We are definitely still going to be a rather small "elite" army. I also think that it will really take skill and tactics to effectively use our units and develop the necessary synergy to make the army devastating as a force.

This makes me really excited since I rather enjoy the tactical challenge. IMO, this would be better than getting a point and shoot army like the SW. Nothing against the SW, but generally, SW in the hands of any decent player will always be tough to play against. As long as we have up to date rules that can make us competitive, I'll be happy

Of course, with the list I posted, I tried making sure that everything was covered. Though when I first started at looking Combat Patrol level, Strike Squads get REALLY expensive when buffed up to 10 man squads where each has a halberd.

It's gonna be a challenge over the next couple of months. Hopefully each of us will enjoy the new book.

Its terrible; when you have something that negates your psychic powers, which you rely on, and you have so few units that they can just be focus fired on.

That's pretty much what I figured was going to happen in the fratricide thread: the playtest dex is far too reliant on psychic powers. With luck psilencers fire arbite executioner rounds filled with negative psychic energy that lock onto the power signature of a force hood and explode whatever is inside it in a suitably messy fashion. On a 2+.

*Nods* Wise words from my brothers...it just fills me with utter rage to watch the smile on my opponents face as his dirty, smelling cheap space wolfs just shoot me off the table.

*Laughs* We can only hope and be optimistic Sai; but something that seeks out and brutally murders cowardly anti-psykers would be a blessing

DarkRonnin, I do like how compact your list is. The Brotherhood Champ seems very cost effective, but I can't bear not using a Grandmaster or Brother captain. Gotta have them wounds! And granting units some of those nifty powers (like scout/scoring/counter attack) alone is almost too much to resist the fatty point cost that comes with the GM.

I am trying SO hard to run a Terminator troops list! Brothers, any ideas? The playdex is a fun exercise, and if it is only 5 months old, the final version promises to be very similar.

Nausaden, I know perfectly how you feel about having to take a Grand Master, I feel the same way, but with how the list is built, with two strike squads running around as Jump Infantry at that point level, I needed a vehicle at least to speed my GKT's up into position, and with their current status with being WS4 (I hope that they've decided to change that by the time it goes on pre-order) the added ability to re-roll failed attacks is nice, and even then, the Brotherhood Champion allows them to re-roll failed saving throws in CC with his stances. For what I was looking at, with the added increase to the cost of a GM, I was just not looking at how I was going to pull it off. Maybe drop the Land Raider, and Champ, and add him in with a Psycannon with a MC-NFW, and see about bulking my troops a bit, but it just didn't look like it'd work out that way.

As far as a pure GKT List, I would run those GKT's with no less then as 10 Man units with two psycannons each. If need be, you can easily break them into Combat Squads. Other then that, I'd look at taking one or two Librarians just to get Shrouding, but I would build it around them running around on the table. As GKT's they can Deep Strike so no need for Raiders or Storm Ravens really unless those Psycannons aren't as tricked out as we're currently led to believe with the rumor mill.

DarkRonin wrote:Nausaden, I know perfectly how you feel about having to take a Grand Master, I feel the same way, but with how the list is built, with two strike squads running around as Jump Infantry at that point level, I needed a vehicle at least to speed my GKT's up into position, and with their current status with being WS4 (I hope that they've decided to change that by the time it goes on pre-order) the added ability to re-roll failed attacks is nice, and even then, the Brotherhood Champion allows them to re-roll failed saving throws in CC with his stances. For what I was looking at, with the added increase to the cost of a GM, I was just not looking at how I was going to pull it off. Maybe drop the Land Raider, and Champ, and add him in with a Psycannon with a MC-NFW, and see about bulking my troops a bit, but it just didn't look like it'd work out that way.

As far as a pure GKT List, I would run those GKT's with no less then as 10 Man units with two psycannons each. If need be, you can easily break them into Combat Squads. Other then that, I'd look at taking one or two Librarians just to get Shrouding, but I would build it around them running around on the table. As GKT's they can Deep Strike so no need for Raiders or Storm Ravens really unless those Psycannons aren't as tricked out as we're currently led to believe with the rumor mill.

Maybe I misread, but it seems that the Brotherhood Champion only allows he himself to reroll failed wounds. Am I reading it wrong, perhaps?

As the flavor of the text says, he doesn't attack, but re-rolls failed saving throws. I could be wrong, but he cannot attack that turn, so why would that not benefit the rest of the unit. As I see it, he's working defensively to protect his brothers.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see how it comes out in the end.

*Nods* I hope it is as you've said DarkRonin; it'd make that ability much much better. I thought the same as Brother Xethik, but it'd be sweet if he was protecting his brothers.

Hm, 2 squads of 10 GKT's that can split into 4 squad's of 5....that deepstrike, perhaps? Librarian with the Summoning and teleport homer to bring anyone who goes to far to him? Attached to a Grandmaster with Paladin retinue inside of a LR variant..hmm..its rather difficult to build a good list currently like this. How can we make our troop termies the most effective?

The main issue is the lose of both WS5 and S6 Power Weapons, so we'll have to rely on new trinkets to see us through. The play test doesn't have entries about what does what. If you wanted through, you could give them the hammers to have S5 instead, but I would prefer to see about beating them before anything could attack, so the halberds are nice. We really have to wait and see before how they can be made more effective when we finally do have our eyes on the full book.

I'd be giving them hammers; fairly cheap and it gives them the potential (with Hammerhand and Might of Titan) to kill anything. It's just a matter of getting the Librarian in and having all their powers go off