Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

A friend of mine has been playing with a Knight army and is having trouble vs Nids (mine and other peoples). His list is approx:

3 Knights (1 Melta, 2 Battle Cannon)
Punisher Pask, 2 Additional Punishers (all with Las canons and Multi Melta Sponsons)
30 man blob with a Lascannon

He's having issues with FMCs, mainly, and Exocrines. I play Skyblight, plus 2 extra Flyrants and a pair of Exocrines. Another opponent is using 2 CADs with 4 Flyrants and 2 Crones.

I was wondering if anyone could give some advice on tactics for him to use against us. I don't play Knights (or guard) so I don't really have a clue.

His problem seems to be when facing glances from all sides his Ion shield doesn't help and he can't hurt the nids much in the air. The FMCs can take down 2/3-1 Knight a turn and the Punishers don't fair better. This just goes up when you roll Warp Blast on your Flyrants, which isn't exactly a rare occurrence.

Games seem to go: FMCs pull down knights (with help form ground troops tying things up for a bit), then just land everything that has survived in front of the punishers and assault on the following turn.

He's discovered the Knight Codex's major weakness. Getting flanked from multiple angles and/or flyers.

The only way to deal with flyers as knights is to get some of the Forge World Knights who have weapons capable of firing snap shots at flyers. The Castigator is also death to hordes of gaunts.

As he's taking IG allies, has he considered taking some Hydras?

I'll suggest the Hydras. And the Forgeworld Knight and see what he says. I don't really play hordes of gaunts (although I suppose 30 respawning goyles and 20 guants is hordish), but our other friend does so that is also useful to have.

Partial protection would be using the Adamantine Lance formation from one of the Apoc supplements. It allows knights to reroll missed invulnerable saves as long as they're within 3" of each other. You put the knights in a spearhead formation; have the front night with shields forward and the two flanking knights with shields to either side. I have 4 knights so I generally have him in the back with a shield facing back. With your warlord up front, you get a rerollable 3++ vs. shooting...

Bit of an obvious one, but spreading his fire around to force as many grounding tests as possible would help. If he has take one on each FMC then one should fail, you can then charge it

Agnosto, is there anything to stop me just shooting the un-shielded sides? You increase your odds of a cover save from 25% cover I guess, which is handy is that the advantage?

I can't remember ever shooting at the ion shielded side, whichever MC he chooses to box off just shoots his blob instead while the others pound on the knight.

Getting cover saves would help though, I think. I'll pass it along.

As to spreading his fire, he rarely wounds more than 1 FMC as he needs a 6 then a 6 with the heavy stubbers so he normally just injures something with punisher fire which then only has a 1/3 to fall. That's the way I Tend to lose FMCs though, when I fail that an he charges in with a knight. I'll usually lose 2-3 befor ethen end of the game, but thats only a 1/3 to 1/2, not counting ground stuff.

But you'll want the Forge World knights for forcing grounding tests. Stubbers aren't going to cause a wound to a Flyrant but once in a blue moon.

Drager wrote:
Agnosto, is there anything to stop me just shooting the un-shielded sides? You increase your odds of a cover save from 25% cover I guess, which is handy is that the advantage?

I can't remember ever shooting at the ion shielded side, whichever MC he chooses to box off just shoots his blob instead while the others pound on the knight.

Getting cover saves would help though, I think. I'll pass it along.

As to spreading his fire, he rarely wounds more than 1 FMC as he needs a 6 then a 6 with the heavy stubbers so he normally just injures something with punisher fire which then only has a 1/3 to fall. That's the way I Tend to lose FMCs though, when I fail that an he charges in with a knight. I'll usually lose 2-3 befor ethen end of the game, but thats only a 1/3 to 1/2, not counting ground stuff.

Well, it's situational; obviously you'll focus all of your shields forward if there are no threats from the sides...

You aren't going to kill anything with the stubber but a hit will cause a grounding test, you don't need to wound with it. The odds of hitting with the stubber and grounding the FMC, followed by a charge are probably higher than using all the stubbers on 1 FMC to try and kill it

Terror, that's 6th Ed rules. You need to wound to cause a test now and its only at the end of the phase. (Unless I have seriously confused the new rules)

Drager wrote:
Terror, that's 6th Ed rules. You need to wound to cause a test now and its only at the end of the phase. (Unless I have seriously confused the new rules)

my bad, how have I overlooked that for this long!!!