My Grey Knights at the Slaughter in Space

Well I played my first GT level event with my Grey Knights. I learned several things.

#1. Play test your army first. I was forgetting a lot of rules that I should have remembered. Like Draigo’s Flamer and I never used Holocaust once because I forget about it. I kept on forgetting The Grand Strategy too, so I just kept the Purifiers scoring.  Also what you learn is the strength and the weaknesses of your units and that is extremely important.

#2. You need scoring units. The SiS missions favored MSU armies because they did not have true Kill Point missions, but rather VP missions and Objective missions. Those missions also heavily favored troop heavy armies, and my 3 units total were at a disadvantage.

#3. Since Draigo makes Paladins scoring I should have taken 2 solo Paladins just to hang out in the Land Raiders to make them scoring. I can equip them with a demonhammers to help kill vehicles if need be.

#4. Out of my 5 opponents only 2 of them had psychic defense.  I faced a Tyranid player with Shadows in the Warp and a Blood Angels player with a Librarian Dreadnaught’s Psychic Hood  (The funny thing is that SitW barely slowed me down, and the Psychic Hood shut me down when it should have been the other way around).  Expect this to change with the rise of Grey Knights as more people play against them they will start to protect themselves. 

#5. Don't get too cocky. After Game #1 I thought that my Paladins were unstoppable. Then after I was tabled by Necrons in Game #2 I was cured of overconfidence. 

Batreps will be forthcoming shortly. 

So I played my Grey Knights in a 1250 point RTT this weekend….

I am still experimenting with the Grey Knights codex and still trying out units and just having fun with it. Next week is the Slaughter in Space III in LA and then I will see what they can really do. Darn, that reminds me, I still have a lot of painting to do

For this RTT there was a special rule that you had to take 3 heavy support choices (which is really odd when you factor in that it was a 1250 point tournament).

This is what I took:

HQ

Xenos Inquisitor w/Conversion Beamer

Elite

2 Servitors w/Heavy Bolters

1 Servitor w/Plasma Cannon

5 Warriors

Vindicare Assassin

Troops

10 Terminators w/2 Psycannons, Hammers, Halberds, Swords

5 Grey Knight Strike Squad w/Psycannon

 Heavy Support

Dreadnaught w/2 TL auto cannons, Psybolt ammo

Dreadnaught w/1 TL auto cannon, Psybolt ammo

Dreadnaught w/TL Lascannon

This Tournament was the return of my 3 Amigos! All during 3^rd and 4^th edition I played with 3 dreadnaughts as my heavy support choices since they were the only way I could get some anti-tank in it and land raiders sucked. All three of them had names: The metal dread was called Rusty, my old Space Wolf Dread was called Old Blue (and whenever he killed something I would shout “You my boy blue” like in the movie Old School), and the last one was lefty because he was a forge world dread that did not have a right arm for a long time.  

Game #1 vs. Tyranids in Annihilation

He had 3 trygons a tervigon and other stuff. I split my terminator squad which might have been a mistake so I could shoot at more stuff, in hindsight it would have been better if I kept them together. It was a tight game with his dice being on fire and he was making cover saves like crazy. Turn 3 though I had one good round of shooting where my dreads took out a zoenthrope, a venomthrope and his hive guard.  My low point in this game was charging a trygon prime with 5 terminators. Going in I could not cast hammerhand to get the extra strength because I needed the psychic test for the force weapons so I was fighting it at strength 4 vs. toughness 6. I only had one halberd though and I did end up rolling a “6” to wound but then shadows of the warp made me blow my test and I could not force weapon him, and he took everyone out but my thunder hammer, which he killed on his turn. Where I did get lucky in the game was when he shot the crap out if my dreadnaughts and he could not roll over a 5 on the damage table, so he was just maiming them and not killing them. The game ended with me only having 2 dreads left alive and running for their lives. After the dust settled I ended up winning 8 kill points to 7. The funny thing is that I have horrible luck with tervigons and they do nothing but crap out a ton of gants whenever I play against them. This time though it played in my favor because it gave me a bunch of extra kill points.

Game #2 against Tyranids seize ground (4 objectives)

This game was a bit different because the board was a lot more open than the last game and I had good fields of fire. All you need to know about this game was that he had a Doom of Malen’tai in a spore pod. So I am decimating him though my mid-ranged firepower and chewing him up. Turn #2. I have my troops close together and pass my Warp Quake roll to keep the Doom away, but he does not come in. Turn #3 I fail my psychic test when I roll a 10 and so I do not get Warp Quake off, and the Doom lands right next to my troops and after he does his attack I am left with 2 thunder hammer terminators as my only troops. It does not help that the tervigon is cranking out a ton of gants. In 4 turns he craps out 52 gants (which is like playing with 260 extra points in a 1250 point game). I had a shot at tying the game at the end, but he got a good run roll and was able to contest my objective. But the Doom and the million gants sealed my fate.

Game #3 vs. Space Marines Command and Control table quarters

He had a mech list that was interesting. Since I had a loss I was going to have some fun. I kept my terminators together and I was going to deep strike them near his objective, and was going to keep my strike squad in reserve so they would not get shot and run off the board and walk on later to hold my objective.  

His shooting did not do much in turn #1 and then I unloaded into him crippling him. 3 dreads+conversion beamer+vindicare=2 dead razorbacks, a predator and stunned his vindicator. His shooting was then really feeble in the next turn and did not do much (In his defense he had a lot of las/plas razorbacks and he was rolling a lot of 1s and 2s to hit). I got my 10 terminators on and deep striked them near his objective and there was nothing he could do about them. They shot at the one threat that they had still on the board and 2 psycannons in the rear killed the vindicator. Then it was just a cleanup action.

What I learned

The Vindicare is not that good. Where it shines is a vehicle killer. Otherwise with people getting cover saves it just does not cut it.  Shooting at tyranids it was underwhelming, and it was ok vs. marines.

In the Demonhunters codex one of my favorite units was an Inquisitor with a psycannon and the gun servitors with a plasma cannon and 2 heavy bolters. I thought I would try to duplicate it and I did not like the results. The first thing is BS 4/3 is very different than the old BS5/4. Also the squad is missing the sages that would give you a re-roll and that made a big difference rolling the scatter on the plasma cannon. Also I was not impressed with the conversion beamer. It is hard to get over 42” away, and I was shooting at close objects to maximize the units fire-power. The new unit though is cheap as chips, but it eats one of your HQ choices. I think it could be improved by a space monkey, but he is still BS 3 too, and I do not know if his lascannon/multimelta compliments the anti-infantry role. 

Terminators are not all-that. Use power weapons on them and they drop like flies. Ironically a librarian really juices them up to be a good combat unit. I still hate that all of the terminators in the GK codex are not fearless. You have Paladins that will run when they lose combat which is very dangerous when you have a very expensive unit. If you are playing that many points on a small army they have to be reliable (see deathwing). That is why the best GK armies right now are Purifier Spam lists or the MSU armies that can lose units and not severely hamper their effectiveness.

A sign you have to much Warhammer 40k!

I made a post on Dakka Dakka a year ago about 10 signs that you have too much Warhammer found here. I was inspired to write it  after it took me 3 hours to find my Yriel figure.

Now here is my new entry:

I was wondering what a conversion beamer looks like (I had no idea) and after Googling it I came across this image on the inter-webs:

When I saw it I said “Hey, I think I have one of those!"

After doing some rummaging around through my bitz I found this:

 

It is funny that I have had this piece for about 20 years and I always wondered what it was.  I always thought it was a purestrain genestealer weapon bit. It is nice to know that I have something that is very rare, and something that I need!

Edit: I found out where it came from. I looked it up in the Stuff of Legends website (it is where they list all of the old GW minis) and I found it is from the 1991 GW catalog:  The Chaos Heavy Weapon Sprue

Why people are wrong about some of the new Grey Knights rules.

There are a lot of new rules that are confusing people (Shunt move in the scouting phase, Dreadknights in a Storm Raven, etc.).

But what is surprising is that there are a lot of people who think that there are errors in the new rules that the Demonhunters had all along.

To give you a couple of examples:

#1. Everyone is surprised that you can fit Terminators in Chimeras. Well, that has always been the case, and it is nothing new to Demonhunters players.

#2 . Strike Squads Deep Striking. Here is a news flash: Grey Knights in power armor could deep strike in the old codex. So everyone freaking out about it being a misprint are wrong.

There are other rules that I have read and heard, but that is enough to show my point.  

My 2000 point Grey Knight list

So I have a 2 5-game Tournament coming up in the next 2 weekends. The first one is in Mesa next weekend, and then the 5 game So Cal Slaughter GT in LA.

Here is the list that I am going to bring:

Total Roster Cost: 2000

HQ: Lord Kaldor Draigo

HQ: Librarian (1#, 220 pts)
   1 Librarian, 220 pts = (base cost 150 + Servo-skulls x2 10 + Nemesis Warding Stave 35 + Might of Titan 5 + Quicksilver 5 + Sanctuary 5 + The Shrouding 5 + Warp Rift 5)

Elite: Purifier Squad (7#, 224 pts)
   1 Purifier Squad, 20 pts + Psybolt Ammunition 20
      1 Knight of the Flame, 34 pts = (base cost 24 + Master-craft Nemesis Weapon(s) 5 + MC Nemesis Daemonhammer 5)
      3 Purifier, 78 pts = 3 * 26 (base cost 24 + Nemesis Force Halberd 2)
      2 Purifier, 68 pts = 2 * 34 (base cost 24 + Psycannon 10)
      1 Purifier, 24 pts

Troops: Paladin Squad (10#, 660 pts)
   1 Paladin Squad, 0 pts
      1 Paladin, 75 pts = (base cost 55 + Psycannon 20)
      1 Paladin, 75 pts = (base cost 55 + Psycannon 20)
      1 Paladin, 75 pts = (base cost 55 + Psycannon 20)
      1 Paladin, 75 pts = (base cost 55 + Psycannon 20)
      1 Paladin, 55 pts
      1 Paladin, 55 pts
      1 Paladin, 55 pts
      1 Paladin, 60 pts = (base cost 55 + Nemesis Falchions 5)
      1 Paladin, 80 pts = (base cost 55 + Brotherhood Banner 25)
      1 Paladin, 55 pts

Troops: Grey Knight Strike Squad (5#, 110 pts)
   1 Grey Knight Strike Squad, 0 pts
      1 Justicar, 20 pts
      3 Grey Knights, 60 pts = 3 * 20
      1 Grey Knight, 30 pts = (base cost 20 + Psycannon 10)

Heavy Support: Land Raider (1#, 256 pts)
   1 Land Raider, 256 pts = (base cost 255 + Searchlight 1)

Heavy Support: Land Raider (1#, 255 pts)
   1 Land Raider, 255 pts

Paladins, Psycanons and you!

So I decided to build my Grey Knight army around Paladins. Why did I do that? It is not because I like buying Draigo to make them all troops. He is more of a 100 point Grandmaster upgrade to make Paladins troops, and he makes an already expensive unit even more expensive. It is not because I like 2-wound terminators...well that might be true. I am a long time Thousand Sons player from back-in-the-day when they had 2 wound terminators. These days though they have the same problem that non-storm shield terminators have and that is a crappy 5+ inv save. What made terminators survivable is that 3+ inv save, and that is the reason why Deathwing armies overnight went from a crappy bottom tier list to a very good list. Paladins can take some damage, but to the right weapons, they go down rapidly. Just for some examples, Dark Eldar with all of their Dark Lances, IG with a lot of Vendettas, Space Wolves with Grey Hunters with a lot of Melta weapons. Then your pricey, durable terminators go down like $5 hooker.

So why Paladins?

So far in my tournament games I have trouble with Psycannons. They have shut the range down on them so much, that I can’t sit back with them anymore and shoot. I liked the old rules where they can shoot 36” and had shrouding protecting them. Now they are 24” and not only that, but their rate of fire is severely diminished by movement. So when I went to play Strike Squads and Purifiers I was underwhelmed by their firepower. They have to move a lot to shoot, and then when they get there they need to stand still for a round to get their maximum rate of fire. To overcome this I started to play with Terminators. Here is the problem with them…they not only pay a premium for their Psycannons, but they only can only have one. It was nice to have them walking around and firing to full effect, but one Psycannon did not cut it. You need a pretty good volume of fire to take down a vehicle, and also to do some damage to anything with a decent armor save.

So what do you do?

The next step is Paladins. They can move and shoot like a terminator but unlike terminators they get 2 heavy weapons for each 5 models. So with 5 of them properly kitted out that is going to be 8 shots at strength 7 rending. That is a good amount of firepower in a reasonably durable container (but you sure do pay for it). 

Dividing up the goods

What I also like about them is their ability to combat squad when you take 10 of them. It gives you some options like:

10 Paladins w/4 Psycannons

2 Squads: 5 Paladins w/2 Psycannons each

2 Squads: One with 4 Psycannons and one with 5 Paladins set up for close assault!

So at the end of the month I have 2 tournaments and I will get to see how they do!

Blackmoor’s take on Purifiers

I see a lot of lists these days that are spamming purifiers. Sure you need to pay the Purifier tax of Crowe for 150 points and an HQ slot to make the troops, but they do not make for a well balanced force.

I am really starting to like them myself. They remind me of the old Grey Knights. They both have 2 attacks, power weapons, and most importantly fearless. I hate making morale rolls and this is one of the few units that can avoid them. What you do lose is 1 point of WS, and strength 6 and shrouding. Here is another difference: I had to pay 250 points for 7 Grey Knights with 2 Pscannons and 10 Purifiers with 2 psycannons are 260 points.  

But everything in moderation. I will take one 10-man unit of purifiers so my Grand Master can make them troops in objective based missions, but that will be it. They are good, but not what you want to build your army around.

My upcoming events in May!

So I have a busy month with a lot of 40k tournaments. I do not know what it is, but maybe Arizona is finally warming up to 40k tournaments. I have played in more tournaments in the last 2 months here than I have in the last 2 years.

May 7^th 1500 point RTT at Empire Games in Mesa AZ.

May 21^st-22^nd Blood on the Sand is a 2000 point 5-round GT style tournament at Gamers Inn in Mesa, AZ.

May 28^th-29^th So Cal Slaughter in Los Angeles is a 2000 point 5-round GT style tournament at The Sheraton Hotel at LAX in Los Angeles Ca.

Blood is the Sand is a first time event so I do not know what I will be getting, but it should be a good tune-up for the Slaughter in Space.

I was also thinking about going to the Alamo GT in Austin on my one free weekend (May 14th-15th) but it is too far of a drive. I am not to far away from El Paso Texas, but Texas is so huge that it would be a 13 hours of driving. I am going to Wargamescon in July and I might drive to that (if it's not to hot), but if I do I will take a week off and see some of the sights rather than just driving there and back. I do not mind driving 6 hours to LA (it helps that I have friends and a place to stay) but that is about it for a GT. 

 I am waiting for army builder to update the Grey Knights. I want to play with some lists, and Excel is just not cutting it for me.  I want to know what models I need to paint to get ready.