one tacticia to teach them ... one tacticia to rule them all

hey guys, there seems to be alot of interest in forming a thread/tacticia that includes all of the codex:grey knights units. I\'ve been browsing other forums about other codex's and i believe i have a good layout/way of screening the information and producing a solid thread that can be stickied.

We have a decent amount of great players on this forum and with the combined help of these blessed few we can put together a great article.

I have a brief example of the layout and ideas below. Feel free to c&c and give ideas.

Unit Type:
Unit name:
rating:

Brief Desciption:

Brief Tacticia:


As you can see the layout is pretty simple and effective. My example and first thought on how to rate each unit/character is simple... 1 to 5. 1 being... only take this unit/character for fluff reasons because its horribly over-cost/bad. 5 being... this is your bread and butter unit that has bang for its buck and you must take all the time to be competitive! with 3 being... situational.

Now keep in mind these are examples... and subject to change**

as for the information... we can get people to submit posts here about a unit... we then get feed back... from everyone else... and then we take the majority of the consensus.

This is a kinda nice idea.

But it should be in the tactica part of the forum.

So i'll just move it there with my mod powers.

Have a nice day.

Lol thanks.

For the H.Q. section I think that this tpic will ge you started " HQ's - and their impact on the game. "

Yeah. Good idea. I should perhaps write up the first few and give people an idea to work from. However what I write will also be up for debate and feed back. And first of all. We need a solid accurate scoring system. From 1 to 5 to always refer to.

So here is the rating system.

5 - Bread and butter unit. A must have in any army. Always worth the points. 90% of games this unit/Character is going to perform.
4 - Generally useful and worth the points. May sometimes require specific tactics/usage or proper support. 80% of games this unit?character will perform.
3 - Situational. Requires specific tactics and proper usage and support to be effective. 70% games this unit/character will perform (If used correctly).
2 - Very limited usefulness, at best. Over priced and should be avoided. 50% of games this unit/Character will perform (If used correctly).
1 - Useless and severely over-priced. Do not use! (fluff based purposes only)

NOTE: Ratings subject to change. The rating system is based on the majority of players personnel opinion and experience with said unit/Character and must be seen as such. Each rating also is subject to personal usage. And in no way are we responsible for your complete lack of skill.

And I started with Draigo so feel free to comment here and give feedback input. LINK here.

EVERYTHING is subject to change.

I'd like to submit a tactica for one of my favourite units:

Unit Type: Independent Character
Unit name: Inquisitor Coteaz
rating: 5

Brief Description: A Mastery 2 psyker, makes henchmen troops, allows his unit to shoot people coming in from reserves, can reroll the sieze the initiative/ force the opponent to. Comes equipped with artificer armour, master crafted damon hammer and a d6 shot str 4 gun, and he's cheap, really cheap.

Brief Tactica: For a measly 100pts Coteaz is the consumate support character, and should always be attached to a shooty unit. His ability to take 2 divination powers (especially the beloved Prescience) can turn any GK unit's shooting from good, to fantastic. Other powers such as ignoring cover or forcing your opponent to reroll saves are merely gravy. Remember prescience can be cast on any units within 12" not just his own, so if a friendly unit is about to get stuck in toss prescience on them and watch the carnage.

As a side note how are we going to handle tacticas for regular Inquisitors? Should we do one for each type( malleus/xenos/hereticus) and then mention builds in the article? or just do one for each build? I'm actually erring towards the second option since there are only really a few viable builds for Inquisitors imo.

Great little write up there bigbri! You really caught on to what I'm trying to achieve. I agree with all of what you said! He's absolutely brilliant. If you can squeeze the points take him! That second divination power can be so strong! For example, I've rolled forwarning past two game, so my purifiers have had a 4++ all game! As well as prescience.

Misfortune is another great power!

About the standard inquisitors, there are only a few builds, we should right up 1 for each and just mention the better builds. For example... I would rate the omi a 4 and a oxi a 4 but the hereticus maybe... A 1 or 2.. Reason being... Why would you ever take him??? Malleus have TDA and oxi has rad grenades and plasma syphon!

Ill edit in when I get home to my computer, with credits going to you.

Have just finished reading the terminator tactica and would like to add some points.
Personaly I think that they should be a 4 unit
For around the same cost as a 10 man strike squad you get 5 terminators
Like all terminators you get a 2+ 5++ save, Deep strike and combat squad. They are relentless and they are Troops. We also get grenades, I cannot tell you how much this helps our terminators in assult. Force weapons and stormbolters.
Heavy weapons options include a psy cannon (can move and still get 4 shots) S7 A.P. 4 and it rends, or the incinerator, Flame template S6 A.P 4 , but remember these guys are not fast and most enemy units will want to keep away form you so the psycannon is a better choice in most situations.
They can handle themselvs in hand to hand with 2 atatcks each, Swords give a 4++ save, the warding stalf (get this guy into base to base contact and let the 2++ saves roll), a hammer (for taking down big beasties, vechiles, and other terminators), and halbards (for I6).
All their close combat weapons except the hammer are A.P. 3, (don't let anybody tell you different), the hammer is A.P.2.
Unlike strike squad you do not pay for the weapon upgrades (except the warding stalf but I can live with that), this is becaues of the 4++ save that the sword gives in hand to hand, so it is a choice between more survivability or harder or faster hitting.
Also available is the Bro Banner (+1 attacks for each man and activation of the force weapon option of the unit once the first W is scored, remember to keep a force point spare for this if needed) and Psy Bolts, both would be recomend for squads of 10 men.
Recomended build at 5 men is Justicar with Halbard (chalanges), 1 hammer, 1 warding stalf, 2 swords and a psy cannon on one sword guy.
At 10 men it would be 2 halbards (one on the justicar), 2 psy cannons (on sword guys), 2 hammers, 2 warding stalf, 1 Bro Banner and 3 swords with psy bolts. Remember you can combat squad.
Units they work well with.
Grand master. With termiantors in the army you will normaly need to make other units scoring so he is to be taken as these guys chew through points and do the same job as strike squads.
Interceptors, you are going to need some fast moving high firepower units and these guys do the job well.
Landraiders or stormraven. The only vehicles that these guys can ride in.
Tactics, either place them in a vechicle and get them into the enemy.
Or Get them into a ruin for a 4+ cover save, forrests are useless to them as they give the same protection as your inv save and just slow you down. As always shoot till you need to go into hand to hand. Move up the board if needed as unlike strike squads this will not reduce the fire you are putting out.
Or Deep Strike in and get stuck in.

I'm with terminators being a 4.

They're a good all-rounder unit apart from being massively outnumbered. But if you don't like being outnumbered why would you take a Grey Knight army? It's sort of their thing.

Besides, power armour is for space nuns.

Thanks heaps first strike, for that input. Ill be sure to modify the terminator section when I get home. However.... I have a few things to discuss.

The warding stave... For 25 points in a 5 man squad is far to expansive for a competitive build, and if, IF you were to use one, you would put it on the justicar, to tie up tough character. 2+ 2 ++ in close combat. You would not put it on a non character that can get shot to pieces.. At least the justicar has a 4+ LoS against precision shots.

At 10 man I wouldn't take the brotherhood banner if you intend to combat squad. To expansive. Again, same with the warding staves.

Also, since terminators are so expansive especially your tooled up unit above. I would never deep strike. A few obvious reasons are:
1. You may not come turn 2. That's obvious.
2. We are a small army anyway, deep striking only helps the opponent to focus his target priority and take out threats before the termies come and then he can focus on them. You need target threats and target saturation. Otherwise you will loose you heavy hitters. Most tournament opponents already know what are the first threats but giving him more options helps your cause. Deep striking does not.

Again, Stormraven = bad for reasons above. And it's a terrible assault vehicle for such an expansive unit.

On squad load out: we have some great NFW's. personally I would go for a mix of halberd and hammers, that's it really. You want enough halberd to effectively kill 10 man PA units at I6 before they get to strike, then the rest with hammers. And/or if you feel insecure about you psycannons equip the swords, but I wouldn't worry.

So that's why I have them a 3.5, I personally don't
Like termies this edition, even though they got a buff against power weapons, with the amount of plasma if aint worth it.

Just some thoughts, lets know what you think.

The banner or ammo on a 5 man unit would be a waste. It a heavy weapon you'd be paying 5 points per man for the ammo alone.

As far as deepstriking is concerned it is an alternative strategy that might be worth pulling out the bag now and again. Between psychic communion and a comm relay they arrive on a 2+ with a reroll. The Grey Knight turn one would certainly be over quickly though.

I think one of the important things to remember with the terminators is that they don't work alone: the power armoured knights are the to support them.
The terminators have all sorts of weaknesses such as not being able to use sweeping advance. Power armoured knights can charge at the same time to overcome this to a degree.

10 terminators with 10 strike squadders isn't all that much weaker than 20 terminators but at 75% of the cost of the 20. You keep the strength of the terminators but also a good number of stormbolters.

+1 w/ Sai

Another thing to remember is a unit being assaulted can only fire Overwatch once per turn. So, you can assault w/ the GKT first, soaking up the overwatch shooting and follow up w/ the GKSS unit. Correct?

You are correct rivan. But I think you guys are missing some things. Bodies on the table. Lets look at this.

20 termies = 800 pts already(if all had stormbolters=40 shots)
Potentially , 2 to 4 scoring units.
800pts = 40 PAGK's(if all had stormbolters=80 shots)
Potentially, 4 to 8 scoring units.

Bodies on the table. Both will die to pie plates just as quick.
Your PAGK's will have either a 4+ or 5+ cover save in area terrain, usually.

That's sort of what I'm saying. 10 terminators and 20 PAGK is a better choice than 40 PAGK or 20 terminators. At least for the way I play.

It's the Buddhist side of me I guess.

Also, I see more AP3 pie plates than AP2 around here, but that might just be my area.

Sai wrote:That's sort of what I'm saying. 10 terminators and 20 PAGK is a better choice than 40 PAGK or 20 terminators. At least for the way I play.

It's the Buddhist side of me I guess.

Also, I see more AP3 pie plates than AP2 around here, but that might just be my area.

Concur. The way I play, I actually prefer 10 GKT, 10 GKSS and 10 GKIS. The GKIS is around 70pts more expensive than a GKSS squad (the way I gear them up) but it's totally worth the mobility and speed (4 psycannon and 16 S5 stormbolter shots on the move giving me a 36" fire zone bubble ).

I use the interceptors to replace one of the strike squads as well, but they have the ridiculously expensive incinerators. The ability to use a shunt to place them exactly where they need to be to cause the maximum number of hits makes they invaluable though which is why they pay a premium I guess.

I would have to disagree about the warding stalf, if you run into AP 2 close combat armed units and there are some out there, and it is not always easy to stay away form them, the stalf on a justicar will be chalanged out of the combat and I6 should him the advantage, on a normal guy it will be giving out a 2++ save until you fail. Terminators realy steped up in 6th ed with the nerf to power weapons (only ap 3 now). As for loseing him to shooting then this comes down to bad placement in the unit or bad luck.
Banner, how many times have I run into a tyrinad army or a eldar and had the banner shine, and the +1 attack is always handy to all the guys in the unit, so even him loseing his force weapon is not that big of a deal.
Rember Terminators are not strike squads and if taken then you may need to take other units to fill their roll so that is why I included the grand master.

I'm so confused, as there's 3 parts of this discussion and Im struggling to follow all 3. So I will try to answer each one of you.

Firstly. In terms of fire power > cost efficiency > target saturation. 10 terminators and 20 PAGK are not better then 40 PAGK.

5 interceptors cost 130 base. 5 purifiers are 120.
1 special weapon slot and 1 less attack pp. for 10 points I get the teleport packs? But I don't get the second special weapon, I don't get 5 attacks. I don't get incinerators for free. That's gay. In all sense of the word. Both don't score. I know what is more cost efficient. Both units however fill different roles so I can't really argue. Just thought I'd add that in there.

First strike. I agree termies did get a boost in 6th... Coz no tournament player took them in 5th. Power weapons at ap2 no thankyou! So they buffed em to sell em. But they die just as quick to pie plates. Again... In close combat... They are termies... They already get atleast a save against hammers... U want better? Equip the sword. Save 25 points. Don't take the warding stave.

If. If I was to take 10 termies the banner is worth it. Not having to roll 3d6 dice against some armies is gold! Eldar, nids and so forth. I agree with you there.

Ill reply more later. And I'll definitely add some of these great posts to the tactica.

Grandmaster Arratak wrote:
5 interceptors cost 130 base. 5 purifiers are 120.
1 special weapon slot and 1 less attack pp. for 10 points I get the teleport packs? But I don't get the second special weapon, I don't get 5 attacks. I don't get incinerators for free. That's gay. In all sense of the word. Both don't score. I know what is more cost efficient. Both units however fill different roles so I can't really argue. Just thought I'd add that in there.

Purifiers and Interceptors are my two favourite units in the codex. As for which is better - IMO it's the interceptors. Despite all the reasons you just mentioned.

You dont win games by having better stats but by scoring more points. My 10 Interceptors score linebreaker every game, normally contest or hold an objective (depending if i'm running a GM / FA choices are scoring mission) and sometimes have had a tilt at slay the warlord / first blood.

Interceptors = winning. Tactica score 5

i gotta agree with brother domin4trix. there are many games in wich my 10 man interceptor squad with psybolt ammunition and 2 incinerators won me the game

its not only the stats. having a unit that can safely move 30" is hard for a enemy to predict compared to purifiers who are pretty slow and outmaneuverable if they are on foot/their transport is gone. they still pose a threat with their shooting and hand to hand stats but yeah slow.

interceptors can contest or with grand strategy even hold objectives late in the game. the shunt move gives them such a high edge on the battlefield.

on the offensive aswell. there have been a lot of games in wich my interceptors shunted close to the enemy HQ and his unit and fire at them. the positioning with shunting is perfect. letting you easily snipe out characters if you position yourself right. he cant save all those incinerator + stombolter wounds. scoring yourself a pretty easy claimed secondary objective.

this is especially awesome against armys like orks, eldar, dark eldar. guard, tyranids (most still use a prime as warlord hidden in a unit so the tyrant can go crazy) daemons and to some extend even necrons.

Souba wrote: 10 man interceptor squad with psybolt ammunition and 2 incinerators

That's pretty pimped out but very effective. Do you run a hammer too or not bother?

Both you and Rivan run psybolts - I'd have to agree and say that's optimal though I try to not exceed 300 points for the unit.

i run a hammer but not on the justicar. its a expensive squad, yes but it does make up its points in every game so far.

DOMIN4TRIX wrote:

Souba wrote: 10 man interceptor squad with psybolt ammunition and 2 incinerators

That's pretty pimped out but very effective. Do you run a hammer too or not bother?

Both you and Rivan run psybolts - I'd have to agree and say that's optimal though I try to not exceed 300 points for the unit.

Yes, I love psybolts on my Interceptors--that's equivalent to 16 heavy bolters shots on the move. I would use incinerators as well if I had the points but I usually run dual psycannons as well to snipe rear or side armor. I usually use them as a mobile shoot and run unit and only close in on targets of opportunity. I round it up with 1 hammer on a regular dude and usually a halberd for the justicar. This comes to a 315 pt unit that's really served me well in a lot of games

Interceptors are great, don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the shunt. That is such a power play option over your opponent.

I totally agree with what your saying, with shunt> positioning and line breaker/ objective denial. I think it's great.

So with that in mind..... Who wants to write up a post for the interceptors?