People hate Matt Ward for what he did. I agree. But we shouldn't try to alienate old fans by "correcting" his mistakes either. Ward made the Grey Knights his special snowflakes. We should move on with it instead of grounding this faction.

The Grey Knights are nothing special anymore. All of what originally made them cool like 100% psykers, the Dreadknights, Jakiro, no falling to Chaos, and secret origin don't matter anymore. They are a bunch of generic Space Marines doing a bunch of generic things. Blah blah blah. The fact they constantly ally with other Imperial forces including the questionable Space Wolves and the secretive Dark Angels rather than be the mysterious faction that favors the quick-in-and-out-leaving-no-witness approach is evident that they are being streamlined into just another Imperial faction.

The release of the Primaris Marines and the even more OP Adeptus Custodes have also contributed to the decline of the Grey Knight's power gap.

The need to sell more marines means cannibalising design space from everyone.. including other marines.

However I think GK are the least boring of all the space marines personally..

bibotot wrote:
People hate Matt Ward for what he did. I agree. But we shouldn't try to alienate old fans by "correcting" his mistakes either. Ward made the Grey Knights his special snowflakes. We should move on with it instead of grounding this faction.

The Grey Knights are nothing special anymore. All of what originally made them cool like 100% psykers, the Dreadknights, Jakiro, no falling to Chaos, and secret origin don't matter anymore. They are a bunch of generic Space Marines doing a bunch of generic things. Blah blah blah. The fact they constantly ally with other Imperial forces including the questionable Space Wolves and the secretive Dark Angels rather than be the mysterious faction that favors the quick-in-and-out-leaving-no-witness approach is evident that they are being streamlined into just another Imperial faction.

The release of the Primaris Marines and the even more OP Adeptus Custodes have also contributed to the decline of the Grey Knight's power gap.

wtf are you talking about, all the old fluff is still there.

I have no context for any of this.

I would argue the fact that they're one of the few marine factions that HAVEN'T received the Primaris treatment (yet) makes them stand out more at the moment. Barring the Wardian fluff, I don't see how anything has really changed. Their whole schtick was being all psykers and daemon hunter specialists. That hasn't changed. If anything, they should be more relevant now that the Great Rift has made things more daemon/chaos heavy.

Matt Ward broke Grey Knights by making several changes: a) "all units are literally psykers now!" + "all Nemesis weapons are literally force weapons!", which have made them impossible to price fairly for four editions, b) dumping the Veteran statline from standard GK in order to chop them up into six "different" units with almost identical equipment and roles, which has turned the internal balance of the Codex into poo (every edition one of the six units is slightly more cost-effective and needs to be spammed), and c) cutting just the melee units out of a well-rounded Codex and attempting to stretch them into a whole army, which has made them horribly inflexible and one-dimensional.

There's a long list of changes you could make to fix GK, but they'd require doing a deliberate and careful rethink of what "being a psyker" means rather people who don't remember GK/Tzeentch exist writing core psyker rules that break badly when applied to all-psyker armies. You'd probably also need to bring back Inquisitorial Stormtroopers, which GW doesn't seem interested in doing.

I have a 2500 point GK army that still does pretty decent especially after the PA book and the buffs they actually got but I’m really waiting for the new codex to come out I think they will get a big boost in the next book in order to bring them up to par with their non shiny (mostly) cousins. Also I’ve read a lot of the lore and books and it’s still there just GW has trained there attention on something else I think the GK will get love eventually it just comes in waves.

Well, I've put GK on hold since the new ed. came out. I'd like to see the new codex first.
Necrons are the flavor of the month - at least for me, since I dislike the power of SM.

I've got a GK army I just finished building and painting, primarily composed of 3E metal terminators. That's always been the archetypal Grey Knight army to me.

With regards to more recent Marine bloat, this is an issue with the game in general, GK's aren't the only faction facing this problem, marine statlines, wargear, unit variety, and subfaction options really crowd a whole lot of factions.

Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

I would give them the a similar treatment to Zoanthropes for their psychic ability.

Brotherhood of Titan: All units with this ability gain the psyker keyword and gain increased power the more models are in the unit. If you have 1-3 models remaining you cast power normally. If you have 4-7 models in the unit you cast at +1. If you have 8-10 models in the unit you cast at +2 and do not suffer perils of the warp on a double 6. Units that cast the smite psychic power always succeed on a 5, however they can never do more than 2 mortal wounds per cast.



Then i'd give them their own psychic tree that has stronger buff's if they exceed a 10 when they cast.

I always loved the look of the aegis terminator plate.

GKs really have not been themselves since the 3rd ed codex where they were designed specifically to counter the thematic rules in the 3.5 chaos codex(the best ever made for chaos).

In that edition they worked better as an allied force than a full stand alone army. we still use them that way with that codex in 5th edition. it is quite fun when you make raging khorne berzerkers smell your finger (sacred incense).



But yeah primaris........

Personally I converted 10 of the original metal terminators to represent Paladins, that way there is a physical difference between them and the troops terminators.

Still much better then what they were through out most of 8th.

It is kind of a strange to see all the gear and all the units that are gone from the codex, even if I don't really know how they would suppose to work sometimes.

A -1T grenade seems nice against vehicles and the servo skulls are like GK nurglings only cheaper, but weaker.

But who knows what GW is planning for GK in 9th. For all we know we may either never get an updated codex or get one in a year or so, assuming no other global pandemic or war in 2021. And after the first 2-3 books for 9th, GW is probably going to change their design philosophy again.

The inquisition is getting a codex right after this first batch. What will be in there?

GK should be.
Sisters should be.
Imperial agents / inquisitorial forces...

Might be the coolest codex ever released!

GKs are the only space marines I feel are acceptable as they operate how regular spaces should i.e rarely and fast Surgical strikes with only a few marines unless gak is REALLY dire.

The way GW writes fluff these days it feels like theres thousands of space marines just loitering about waiting for a fight to break out so they can go save the day.

Karol wrote:
Still much better then what they were through out most of 8th.

It is kind of a strange to see all the gear and all the units that are gone from the codex, even if I don't really know how they would suppose to work sometimes.

A -1T grenade seems nice against vehicles and the servo skulls are like GK nurglings only cheaper, but weaker.

But who knows what GW is planning for GK in 9th. For all we know we may either never get an updated codex or get one in a year or so, assuming no other global pandemic or war in 2021. And after the first 2-3 books for 9th, GW is probably going to change their design philosophy again.

What do you mean? There is nothing in the future that could go HORRIFICALLY WRONG <Removed> Nope.....Nothing will stop GW posting a new GK book.

Karol wrote:
Still much better then what they were through out most of 8th.

It is kind of a strange to see all the gear and all the units that are gone from the codex, even if I don't really know how they would suppose to work sometimes.

A -1T grenade seems nice against vehicles and the servo skulls are like GK nurglings only cheaper, but weaker.

But who knows what GW is planning for GK in 9th. For all we know we may either never get an updated codex or get one in a year or so, assuming no other global pandemic or war in 2021. And after the first 2-3 books for 9th, GW is probably going to change their design philosophy again.

1. Most of the codexes have already been written
2. Grey Knight primaris on the way....

 Xenomancers wrote:
The inquisition is getting a codex right after this first batch.

What's the source on this, Xeno?

@Umbros - As far as I recall, last time anyone had the chance to ask the question, the answer on GK Primaris was still a hard "no".

Mat Ward Grey Knights were tame child-play compared to the stuff today.

Both his fluff and his rules wouldn't even be a blip on the Internet compared to things like the second 8th Ed. Marines Codex and all that.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

Karol wrote:
Still much better then what they were through out most of 8th.

It is kind of a strange to see all the gear and all the units that are gone from the codex, even if I don't really know how they would suppose to work sometimes.

A -1T grenade seems nice against vehicles and the servo skulls are like GK nurglings only cheaper, but weaker.

But who knows what GW is planning for GK in 9th. For all we know we may either never get an updated codex or get one in a year or so, assuming no other global pandemic or war in 2021. And after the first 2-3 books for 9th, GW is probably going to change their design philosophy again.

What do you mean? There is nothing in the future that could go HORRIFICALLY WRONG <Removed> Nope.....Nothing will stop GW posting a new GK book.

Ok, lay off the crazy sauce there chief. Ain't the place for your insane rantings

 Grimskul wrote:
I would argue the fact that they're one of the few marine factions that HAVEN'T received the Primaris treatment (yet) makes them stand out more at the moment.

That was the selling point for me in 5th edition.
Their visual design has allways been different from firstborne marines. I hate, and still do today the visual look of the normal SM terminator, but GK termies, cant get enugh of them, or the regular troopers.
But i do not agree on the stormbolter design on the plastic marines, so im going full oop metalminis on thouse where i can.

Style over effectivness!
(and should they get primaris, my force will be made into full display only, or classic WH, i will never ever add any form of primaris)

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

HAHAHA, no. and also yes.

See it allowed Chaos marines to be well Chaos marines in all their individualistic customizable nature, but just as much as it was customizable it was abusive...
the book would've needed a propper recalibration allbeit the conceptual work is a goldstandard of what CSM should be.
then came 4th and i don't need to bring that disaster up....

This customizability was also what drew me later to R&H compared to CSM, which felt like barebones marines with spikes for the most part added to some genuinely slowed mechanics like lash..
even the csm dex now is meh at best out of a conceptual viewpoint...

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

Personally preferred deamonhunter/which hunter of the same ed. It was the only army that could soup at the time and allowed your opponent to summon deamons or make their heroes possessed/have demonic weapons. We had great fun with those rules. I’d agree though that chaos 3.5 was amazing.

On topic I don’t see why GK is any boring. I think they have a really cool shtick going on. IMO it’s only a matter of time before we get fallen primaris. I’ve always found GK to be an awesome concept and their core concept certainly hasn’t changed.

Yeah deamons and witch hunters were such master pieces. And now we have people asking why end how GK would fight orks or DE...
Good old times !

Not Online!!! wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

HAHAHA, no. and also yes.

See it allowed Chaos marines to be well Chaos marines in all their individualistic customizable nature, but just as much as it was customizable it was abusive...
the book would've needed a propper recalibration allbeit the conceptual work is a goldstandard of what CSM should be.
then came 4th and i don't need to bring that disaster up....

This customizability was also what drew me later to R&H compared to CSM, which felt like barebones marines with spikes for the most part added to some genuinely slowed mechanics like lash..
even the csm dex now is meh at best out of a conceptual viewpoint...

from what I ehar CSMs 3.5 was a lot like Marines 8.5 + supplements. it was a fantastic book in that each subfaction felt like a fleshed out subfaction with a solid version of it's own identity, but this meant it had some power issues. that about right?

BrianDavion wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

HAHAHA, no. and also yes.

See it allowed Chaos marines to be well Chaos marines in all their individualistic customizable nature, but just as much as it was customizable it was abusive...
the book would've needed a propper recalibration allbeit the conceptual work is a goldstandard of what CSM should be.
then came 4th and i don't need to bring that disaster up....

This customizability was also what drew me later to R&H compared to CSM, which felt like barebones marines with spikes for the most part added to some genuinely slowed mechanics like lash..
even the csm dex now is meh at best out of a conceptual viewpoint...

from what I ehar CSMs 3.5 was a lot like Marines 8.5 + supplements. it was a fantastic book in that each subfaction felt like a fleshed out subfaction with a solid version of it's own identity, but this meant it had some power issues. that about right?

Ehhh, that is pretty close, except it actually was even more customizable then the supplements, and had however a rather large power spread for the subfactions within it unlike the supplements which in general were with the 2.0 dex ludicrous. then again it had some stuff in there that would even today use most SM 2.0 armies even ih prenerf as sleighs comparatively.

The issue was mostly based upon prices and rules interactions so IT could've been fixed.

The sad part is what happened afterwards was even worse in a lot of ways, (lashprinces... Oblitspam and suicide termites...), ruleswise (in regards to beeing broken) but the rest of the army was so utterly gak and uncustomizable that it even held the named issues back..

That wasn't changed later on so when R&H came out well, yeah unsurprisingly alot jumped ship, myself included. That one was better balanced internally but 6th and 7th were... well. Let's just say i'd prefer index era 8th over that.

BrianDavion wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

HAHAHA, no. and also yes.

See it allowed Chaos marines to be well Chaos marines in all their individualistic customizable nature, but just as much as it was customizable it was abusive...
the book would've needed a propper recalibration allbeit the conceptual work is a goldstandard of what CSM should be.
then came 4th and i don't need to bring that disaster up....

This customizability was also what drew me later to R&H compared to CSM, which felt like barebones marines with spikes for the most part added to some genuinely slowed mechanics like lash..
even the csm dex now is meh at best out of a conceptual viewpoint...

from what I ehar CSMs 3.5 was a lot like Marines 8.5 + supplements. it was a fantastic book in that each subfaction felt like a fleshed out subfaction with a solid version of it's own identity, but this meant it had some power issues. that about right?

Broadly yes, but not in exactly the same way. It probably nailed the flavor even better without getting to the fanfic-level awful writing of the more recent books, but the balance was *real* wonky, with some stuff being insanely powerful while a lot of stuff was genuine competitive garbage, far moreso than just about any book we see today, some units and subfactions were the very worst of the meta of that era (e.g. Thousand Sons) while others were stupendously capable, and the stuff that could be done with characters was intense.

Not Online!!! wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

That is debatable--> just like E.g. 3.5 chaos dex, etc.

Chaos 3.5 codex was the best codex ever.

HAHAHA, no. and also yes.

See it allowed Chaos marines to be well Chaos marines in all their individualistic customizable nature, but just as much as it was customizable it was abusive...
the book would've needed a propper recalibration allbeit the conceptual work is a goldstandard of what CSM should be.
then came 4th and i don't need to bring that disaster up....

This customizability was also what drew me later to R&H compared to CSM, which felt like barebones marines with spikes for the most part added to some genuinely slowed mechanics like lash..
even the csm dex now is meh at best out of a conceptual viewpoint...

from what I ehar CSMs 3.5 was a lot like Marines 8.5 + supplements. it was a fantastic book in that each subfaction felt like a fleshed out subfaction with a solid version of it's own identity, but this meant it had some power issues. that about right?

Ehhh, that is pretty close, except it actually was even more customizable then the supplements, and had however a rather large power spread for the subfactions within it unlike the supplements which in general were with the 2.0 dex ludicrous. then again it had some stuff in there that would even today use most SM 2.0 armies even ih prenerf as sleighs comparatively.

The issue was mostly based upon prices and rules interactions so IT could've been fixed.

The sad part is what happened afterwards was even worse in a lot of ways, (lashprinces... Oblitspam and suicide termites...), ruleswise (in regards to beeing broken) but the rest of the army was so utterly gak and uncustomizable that it even held the named issues back..

That wasn't changed later on so when R&H came out well, yeah unsurprisingly alot jumped ship, myself included. That one was better balanced internally but 6th and 7th were... well. Let's just say i'd prefer index era 8th over that.

yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

BrianDavion wrote:


yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

As stated most of the stuff in 3.5 was, well , rubbish, some of the stuff was horribly broken but it still allowed the rubbish stuff to be atleast fitting rubbish to what it was supposed to be...

the 4th dex onwards was just lashprince lashprince, 3x3 obliterators, 3x3 suicide termites, 2 x 5 csm with rhino because feck csm but i must take 2 so put em in a metaw bawks ( or mobile trashcan because that is whhere 15 ppm CSM belonged in allready then, funnily they went even worse over the course of time to the new lowpoint that is right now...).

that list isn't even fun or fluffy for any legion or warband so it can't even claim beeing fitting and that was more or less what people had to play because the rest of the book was so underpowered that you crippled your own player agency just thinking about including them.


Edit:
The same though is true for later on for GK, go use baby carrier was the standard answer for a long time. X psy y unit and pray that you don't get fethed.
Or in other words GW's failure (permanent maybee added) at decent internal balance is a massive issue for many factions. GK are just another one.

Not Online!!! wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:


yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

As stated most of the stuff in 3.5 was, well , rubbish, some of the stuff was horribly broken but it still allowed the rubbish stuff to be atleast fitting rubbish to what it was supposed to be...

the 4th dex onwards was just lashprince lashprince, 3x3 obliterators, 3x3 suicide termites, 2 x 5 csm with rhino because feck csm but i must take 2 so put em in a metaw bawks ( or mobile trashcan because that is whhere 15 ppm CSM belonged in allready then, funnily they went even worse over the course of time to the new lowpoint that is right now...).

that list isn't even fun or fluffy for any legion or warband so it can't even claim beeing fitting and that was more or less what people had to play because the rest of the book was so underpowered that you crippled your own player agency just thinking about including them.


Edit:
The same though is true for later on for GK, go use baby carrier was the standard answer for a long time. X psy y unit and pray that you don't get fethed.
Or in other words GW's failure (permanent maybee added) at decent internal balance is a massive issue for many factions. GK are just another one.

ohh Agreed. I've often commented that the best codex I've ever seen from GW was the sisters of battle codex it had great internal balance in that everything was useful, and the army seemed strong without being over whelmingly so.

BrianDavion wrote:


ohh Agreed. I've often commented that the best codex I've ever seen from GW was the sisters of battle codex it had great internal balance in that everything was useful, and the army seemed strong without being over whelmingly so.

The current Adepta Sororitas codex is amazing, probably my favorite one so far.

Truth is, GW can balance one faction with 30ish datasheets and tons of units that have basically the same stateline (T3 1W 3+ or tanks with T7-T8 3+) but don't compete with each other for the same job because it's way easier than balancing factions with 2x or 3x datasheets plus much more variety in terms of statelines.

It's also one of the reasons why I'm against condensing standalone factions into the same codex. I think it would be way easier to have a well balanced SM army if it "only" had 40-50 datasheets. Otherwise there would always be dozens of units that never see the table because there are two or three other units that could do the same job but better. Great external balance can certainly still be achieved for a faction with 150ish datasheets, but some decent internal balance is flat out impossible to design.

I preferred when grey knights were pawns of the inquisition, honestly. A pet chapter that yes, is all psykers and given disproportionate gear, but at the same time are put through significantly more intense brainwashing and warding tattoos and such so that they don’t have the individuality to fall or to question any but the most blatantly radical inquisitor.

Muscle lackeys with shiny toys, not an independent force.

yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

One has to remember the time period were talking here. 40K just moved out of the RPG setting of 2nd edition and all the lore became solidified to what we know today. much of 3rd and 3.5 had rules and army restrictions directly locked into the lore. it made every faction unique in it's own way. but also useful while staying loyal to the lore. something you just cannot do with a resource mechanic like stratagems.

GKs for all intents and purposes were ONLY supposed to come out to fight chaos and demons just like in the books, which is why the 3rd ed codex for them was such a fine counter to the chaos dex of the same edition. as according to the lore they worked more as a strike force that could come to the aid of an imperial faction so making a full army out of them was an option but they worked better in the allied role. especially when a grand master and his 9 man terminator retinue was pushing over 650 points when the game was still standard at 1,750

I still have and use many of these old codexes when we play our hybrid 5th edition games.
for 3rd ed my favorites are
.white scars(index astartes)
.dark angels mini dex
.demon hunters
.witch hunters
.chaos (3.5)
.imperial fists-when it was still all about being siege masters (index astartes)

4th and 5th better represented many of the other factions while still maintaining quite a bit of the lore based rules.

changemod wrote:
I preferred when grey knights were pawns of the inquisition, honestly. A pet chapter that yes, is all psykers and given disproportionate gear, but at the same time are put through significantly more intense brainwashing and warding tattoos and such so that they don’t have the individuality to fall or to question any but the most blatantly radical inquisitor.

Muscle lackeys with shiny toys, not an independent force.

I like that interpretation too, but the post-5e GK fans probably don't.

 aphyon wrote:

yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

GKs for all intents and purposes were ONLY supposed to come out to fight chaos and demons just like in the books, which is why the 3rd ed codex for them was such a fine counter to the chaos dex of the same edition.

The problem of an army that specially tailored to counter another faction is that it becomes not fun to pay. Or you either play against this faction and have a game-winning advantage or you either not and you pay for a premium price for a skill that you won't use at all in this match.

The concept is nice but it only works if all the armies follow the same idea and therefore the whole game has a rock paper scissor balance. Just making an army like this when all the other factions are tailored to fight against anything is not really a good concept imao.

 Dysartes wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
The inquisition is getting a codex right after this first batch.

What's the source on this, Xeno?

@Umbros - As far as I recall, last time anyone had the chance to ask the question, the answer on GK Primaris was still a hard "no".

There is no source for this. If a book which functioned like an Inquisition dex existed, it would be an Imperial Agents dex that included Inquisition. It would not be an Inquisition dex. Personally, I do believe we will get an IA dex, but there has been nothing to suggest it, other than the fact that a) IA rules are currently spread all over the place, and COULD be consolidated and b) the was an IA pdf for Apocalypse (it was a) free and b) awesome).

Chambers Militant (GK, DW and Sisters) need not be in such a book, and likely would not be. There may be a resurrection of the Chamber Militant concept (ie. Inquisitors confer the quarry rule to any of Chamber Militant unit in their army), and there may be a new character or unit for each Chamber that can only be included in Chamber armies if other Inquisition units are also present. These are the only ways in which an IA dex could incorporate Chambers, and there is no guarantee that such a book would incorporate chambers at all.

Some have suggested "fixing" the Inquisition by recombining them with their original chambers all in one book. The types of folks who make this suggestion tend to be the types that prefer balance to flavour; these same people often suggest the removal of subfaction traits and mechanics from all dexes, and the absorption of all snowflake marines into a single Ubermarine dex. I recognize the validity of the concept from the point of view of balance, though I personally prefer Flavour to Balance, so all of these things are ideas that I personally HATE.

Now back to OP: I have the GK dex, and I bought their PA too. I don't have a lot of GK models, and I haven't played them- I bought those books because I love the Inquisition, and I still respect the Chamber Militant concept, even if GW has chosen to minimize it. But as I recall, all GK still are Psykers, and so are still different from all other marines; I further remember that upon release in 8th, being all psykers was awesome enough on the battlefield that GW felt the need to nerf them, and that after the nerf, they were among the weakest factions of the game. Then PA dropped, and they got some of their awesomeness back, and that while not OP, they were at least competitive once more.

I don't know what's changed since then to alter that. Did the new SM codex make any other marine army all psychic? Did it prevent GK from being all psychic? What are the specific changes in 9th that have made GK less unique?

 aphyon wrote:
GKs for all intents and purposes were ONLY supposed to come out to fight chaos and demons just like in the books, which is why the 3rd ed codex for them was such a fine counter to the chaos dex of the same edition. as according to the lore they worked more as a strike force that could come to the aid of an imperial faction so making a full army out of them was an option but they worked better in the allied role. especially when a grand master and his 9 man terminator retinue was pushing over 650 points when the game was still standard at 1,750.

Oddly enough, both the Daemonhunters and Witch Hunters books both gave reasons why they would be fighting Xenos as much as their usual suspects. The Avatar of Khaine and the Nightbringer sure look like Greater Daemons, and Eldar Farseers are definitely Wiches. That sort of thing.

Some of it, I feel, is the dulling-down of psychic powers. A bunch of different ways to say an enemy unit takes 2-4 MW just isn't inspiring, and losing the ability to cast the same power more than once further dilutes the impact.

psipso wrote:

 aphyon wrote:

yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

GKs for all intents and purposes were ONLY supposed to come out to fight chaos and demons just like in the books, which is why the 3rd ed codex for them was such a fine counter to the chaos dex of the same edition.

The problem of an army that specially tailored to counter another faction is that it becomes not fun to pay. Or you either play against this faction and have a game-winning advantage or you either not and you pay for a premium price for a skill that you won't use at all in this match.

The concept is nice but it only works if all the armies follow the same idea and therefore the whole game has a rock paper scissor balance. Just making an army like this when all the other factions are tailored to fight against anything is not really a good concept imao.

As noted by the other post that's not completely true for the 3rd ed setting. any psyker heavy force like eldar would also let the GKs shine as they passively ignore all effects of psychic abilities not directed specifically at them (the latter they can counter with their psychic hood), and having hammerhand give them strength 10 power weapons that still strike at initiative isn't a small thing either. it makes them good against vehicles including up to the max AV 14, monsterous creatures and massed infantry equally. they just really shine the most against forces aligned with chaos. considering all the toys that chaos codex took it was good to have a counter option since they could be allied with any imperial army like guard, sisters and various space marine chapters.

 aphyon wrote:

psipso wrote:

 aphyon wrote:

yeah, if an army's gotta be made up of over powered gak I'd much rather it function and look like the army is supposed to instead of spamming one or two weird niche broken things

GKs for all intents and purposes were ONLY supposed to come out to fight chaos and demons just like in the books, which is why the 3rd ed codex for them was such a fine counter to the chaos dex of the same edition.

The problem of an army that specially tailored to counter another faction is that it becomes not fun to pay. Or you either play against this faction and have a game-winning advantage or you either not and you pay for a premium price for a skill that you won't use at all in this match.

The concept is nice but it only works if all the armies follow the same idea and therefore the whole game has a rock paper scissor balance. Just making an army like this when all the other factions are tailored to fight against anything is not really a good concept imao.

As noted by the other post that's not completely true for the 3rd ed setting. any psyker heavy force like eldar would also let the GKs shine as they passively ignore all effects of psychic abilities not directed specifically at them (the latter they can counter with their psychic hood), and having hammerhand give them strength 10 power weapons that still strike at initiative isn't a small thing either. it makes them good against vehicles including up to the max AV 14, monsterous creatures and massed infantry equally. they just really shine the most against forces aligned with chaos. considering all the toys that chaos codex took it was good to have a counter option since they could be allied with any imperial army like guard, sisters and various space marine chapters.

I kind of forget, but wasn't there also some rules that when you fielded Grey Knights in your Daemonhunters army, your opponent could just take a bunch of daemons? Its been awhile since I broke out the old book to read through but I vaguely remember something about that to balance out a little bit at how good they were at killing specifically Daemons/Chaos.

Your probably thinking of daemonic infestation.

When GKs are on the table, a player that has lesser demons gain the sustained assault rule.

Yeah. The old rule for GKs were glorious - plus, Daemonhunters was a much more well-rounded book. Breaking GK out into their own faction was bleh, and I believe the same as deathwatch. Unlike Sisters, they were never conceived as independent factions originally.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Yeah. The old rule for GKs were glorious - plus, Daemonhunters was a much more well-rounded book. Breaking GK out into their own faction was bleh, and I believe the same as deathwatch. Unlike Sisters, they were never conceived as independent factions originally.

Yeah. At this point with a full-on sisters codex and Deathwatch becoming much closer/aligned to Codex: Space Marines, I'd say Grey Knights would really benefit from being Daemonhunters again. Plus you could do some fluff stuff citing their Inquisition allegiance as their reason for no primaris, etc.

The thing is, most people that likes and plays grey knights like the giant silver paladins on space killing demons, not for their army to be the lackeys of some bald guy with a cigar that has come straight out of a comic from the 78, and not one of the good ones. Inquisition has a much more niche appealing , even if on the internet and in forums specialized about this, they are the most vocal.

The same goes for Deathwatch, and the same goes for Sisters of Battle (Most People want to play sisters of battle, not some fat priests commanding woman with human rabble), no matter how many times Inquisitor lovers try to arguee otherwise.

Right but like, surely those people would find a way to play if GW /hadn't/ broken them out?

That's like saying Imperial Guard Infantry Squads should be their own army, because some players can't envision them as lackeys to an uncaring bureaucracy, lol.

(SOB were never fat priests commanding women with human rabble since their inception).

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Right but like, surely those people would find a way to play if GW /hadn't/ broken them out?

That's like saying Imperial Guard Infantry Squads should be their own army, because some players can't envision them as lackeys to an uncaring bureaucracy, lol.

(SOB were never fat priests commanding women with human rabble since their inception).

They are a chapter of space marines, that follow pre cognition seers direction where and when to attack. They don't just fight demons, they also purge populations that could feed or start a demon incrusion, and unlike bombing it from orbit they are more precise, don't destroy as much of the infrastructure or cause the opening of a small warp gate if too many people get killed too fast in one specific location.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Right but like, surely those people would find a way to play if GW /hadn't/ broken them out?

That's like saying Imperial Guard Infantry Squads should be their own army, because some players can't envision them as lackeys to an uncaring bureaucracy, lol.

(SOB were never fat priests commanding women with human rabble since their inception).

Thats nothing like that because the difference between both (gk and inquisiton) is much bigger than infantry squads. I mean, for example, we could arguee dark eldar would benefit from being splitted in three factions (wytches, wracks and covens) with proper rules and support to represent them as their own forces and then being able to be allied. Of course it could all be done in the same book, with excelent rules and sinergyes but normally it is not proposed like that, when people want unification in a book they always want for something to be taken of other armies.

I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

They should be Loyalist thousand sons. Leave anti demon stuff for narrative and their fluff, and just make them elite psyker space marines.

Karol wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Right but like, surely those people would find a way to play if GW /hadn't/ broken them out?

That's like saying Imperial Guard Infantry Squads should be their own army, because some players can't envision them as lackeys to an uncaring bureaucracy, lol.

(SOB were never fat priests commanding women with human rabble since their inception).

They are a chapter of space marines, that follow pre cognition seers direction where and when to attack. They don't just fight demons, they also purge populations that could feed or start a demon incrusion, and unlike bombing it from orbit they are more precise, don't destroy as much of the infrastructure or cause the opening of a small warp gate if too many people get killed too fast in one specific location.

Hrm, generally by the time the Grey Knights arrive somewhere, any concerns about saving infrastructure or whatnot are long gone, the GK's are the one's that show up when stuff has already hit the fan. I don't recall any fluff of them pre-emptively striking a world and purging its population or something themselves without something already being present, at least that I can recall or find from a casual reading of a couple codexes, there's always a powerful daemon that is manifesting or other shennanigans in progress, and inevitably ends with exterminatus or something (e.g. Raxos). The overwhelmingly vast majority of their fluff otherwise is the GK's reacting to events unfolding or being dispatched by the Inquisition. The Grey Knights also don't ever appear to concern themselves with destruction to infrastructure, readily sanctioning the annihilation of anything remotely touched by the Warp.

 Galas wrote:
The thing is, most people that likes and plays grey knights like the giant silver paladins on space killing demons, not for their army to be the lackeys of some bald guy with a cigar that has come straight out of a comic from the 78, and not one of the good ones. Inquisition has a much more niche appealing , even if on the internet and in forums specialized about this, they are the most vocal.

The same goes for Deathwatch, and the same goes for Sisters of Battle (Most People want to play sisters of battle, not some fat priests commanding woman with human rabble), no matter how many times Inquisitor lovers try to arguee otherwise.

Being lackeys was part of what made them potentially interesting though, without that they’re just Bettermarines with a drab paint job.

Upsides without downsides makes a chapter less interesting, not more.

 Vaktathi wrote:
I don't recall any fluff of them pre-emptively striking a world and purging its population or something themselves without something already being present, at least that I can recall or find from a casual reading of a couple codexes, there's always a powerful daemon that is manifesting or other shennanigans in progress, and inevitably ends with exterminatus or something (e.g. Raxos).

It's worth noting that there is previous fluff (I think 5th ed Codex?) that points to them using scrying and other methods to determine where stuff is soon going to hit the fan, and that's what allows them to actually be in the right place at the right time (as opposed to potentially being waaaay too late to respond by the time they get the no-doubt-interrupted Astropath call for help).
So I'm sure there are instances where they've turned up and purged somewhere to stop that threat from even appearing, Minority Report style - it's just that those instances don't make for as exciting fluff as daemon battles.

changemod wrote:
Being lackeys was part of what made them potentially interesting though, without that they’re just Bettermarines with a drab paint job.
Upsides without downsides makes a chapter less interesting, not more.

For me I always saw them as an extension of the Inquisition, rather than being lackeys to it. Like, if the Grey Knights suddenly turned up on a particular Inquisitor's doorstep with the 41st millennium's equivalent of a warrant, other Inquisitors would take their accusations seriously.
But for me what really makes the Chapter interesting - and this isn't something that they've lost over time - is their use of mystical magic in applied, measured ways that you would usually associate with scientific methods.
Far from magic and psychic power being this strange, hocus-pocus, foolishly-wielded dangerous weapon, that threatens to consume the Knights almost as much as their enemies... which is often the case with pretty much all other Imperial psykers, including many Inquisitors... it's used pragmatically, and specifically because it works. They're not beholden to using it just because they think they should, like the Mechanicus with all their sacred unguents and whatnot.

changemod wrote:

 Galas wrote:
The thing is, most people that likes and plays grey knights like the giant silver paladins on space killing demons, not for their army to be the lackeys of some bald guy with a cigar that has come straight out of a comic from the 78, and not one of the good ones. Inquisition has a much more niche appealing , even if on the internet and in forums specialized about this, they are the most vocal.

The same goes for Deathwatch, and the same goes for Sisters of Battle (Most People want to play sisters of battle, not some fat priests commanding woman with human rabble), no matter how many times Inquisitor lovers try to arguee otherwise.

Being lackeys was part of what made them potentially interesting though, without that they’re just Bettermarines with a drab paint job.

Upsides without downsides makes a chapter less interesting, not more.

Maybe for some people more invested in the narrative. Personally I prefer the more mundane and flawed design for anything I enjoy, thats why I prefer the flawed Dark Angels that are following a fault tradition without even knowing if they are in the right than the new HH version of "they are totally correct the fallen are 100% caos worshipers". So I actually agree with you about my personal tastes.

But for most players, I will make something that is severly punished on the internet. A generalization!

Most players that want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch, and Grey Knights... want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch and Grey Knights. Not inquisition. Not the eclesiarchy.

 Super Ready wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
I don't recall any fluff of them pre-emptively striking a world and purging its population or something themselves without something already being present, at least that I can recall or find from a casual reading of a couple codexes, there's always a powerful daemon that is manifesting or other shennanigans in progress, and inevitably ends with exterminatus or something (e.g. Raxos).

It's worth noting that there is previous fluff (I think 5th ed Codex?) that points to them using scrying and other methods to determine where stuff is soon going to hit the fan, and that's what allows them to actually be in the right place at the right time (as opposed to potentially being waaaay too late to respond by the time they get the no-doubt-interrupted Astropath call for help).
So I'm sure there are instances where they've turned up and purged somewhere to stop that threat from even appearing, Minority Report style - it's just that those instances don't make for as exciting fluff as daemon battles.

changemod wrote:
Being lackeys was part of what made them potentially interesting though, without that they’re just Bettermarines with a drab paint job.
Upsides without downsides makes a chapter less interesting, not more.

For me I always saw them as an extension of the Inquisition, rather than being lackeys to it. Like, if the Grey Knights suddenly turned up on a particular Inquisitor's doorstep with the 41st millennium's equivalent of a warrant, other Inquisitors would take their accusations seriously.
But for me what really makes the Chapter interesting - and this isn't something that they've lost over time - is their use of mystical magic in applied, measured ways that you would usually associate with scientific methods.
Far from magic and psychic power being this strange, hocus-pocus, foolishly-wielded dangerous weapon, that threatens to consume the Knights almost as much as their enemies... which is often the case with pretty much all other Imperial psykers, including many Inquisitors... it's used pragmatically, and specifically because it works. They're not beholden to using it just because they think they should, like the Mechanicus with all their sacred unguents and whatnot.

That's a take I hadn't heard before. I always understood the GK to be religious nutters, whose prayers to the Emperor happen to work, so more or less exactly like Ad Mech.
But then, my understanding of the GK is based on RT, not the various Retcons from later editions... and that they were a terribly minor faction that shouldn't have ever gotten the amount of book space they've received.
Amusing background, but terrible to have on the battlefield, much like the various (bad) attempts at Inquisition armies.

 Galas wrote:
...Most players that want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch, and Grey Knights... want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch and Grey Knights. Not inquisition. Not the eclesiarchy.

Great. Yay. Woo.

Point of order: You could play pure GK in the 3e Codex. You didn't have as many options as you have now, but there was nothing stopping you. If you want to play an Inquisition army now you need four army books (Inquisition, Guard, Assassins, plus whichever Order Militant) and so much detachment tax that there's really no point. "But I don't want to play the Inquisition!" is a great argument for you playing pure GK instead of the Inquisition, it isn't a great argument for not letting anyone else play the Inquisition.

aphyon wrote:Your probably thinking of daemonic infestation.

When GKs are on the table, a player that has lesser demons gain the sustained assault rule.

That is exactly what I was thinking of. Also after a quick glance in the book opponents of Daemonhunters could take generic lesser and greater daemons in their army with a stat block and point cost provided in the book.

AnomanderRake wrote:

 Galas wrote:
...Most players that want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch, and Grey Knights... want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch and Grey Knights. Not inquisition. Not the eclesiarchy.

Great. Yay. Woo.

Point of order: You could play pure GK in the 3e Codex. You didn't have as many options as you have now, but there was nothing stopping you. If you want to play an Inquisition army now you need four army books (Inquisition, Guard, Assassins, plus whichever Order Militant) and so much detachment tax that there's really no point. "But I don't want to play the Inquisition!" is a great argument for you playing pure GK instead of the Inquisition, it isn't a great argument for not letting anyone else play the Inquisition.

Funny story, first time I got into 40k (group kind of died off shortly so I only had a few models and a couple of games in using borrowed models), I specifically picked Daemonhunters because I loved how much variety it had. I remember having big plans for an Inquisitor, like 1 or 2 squads of Grey Knights, and then a bunch of inducted Imperial Guard. When I got back into the game back in 7th at the behest of my girlfriend, on glancing around I ended up just going straight Guard because I wasn't interested in a codex of only Grey Knights and did not want to buy several codices to take advantage of allies.

I have since obtained some Inquisition level models, but still have not grabbed any Grey Knights simply because of how starved for detachments they are. Fitting an Inquisitor alone is fairly easy, but say Acolytes or a Daemonhost, suddenly you need a full detachment. And inducted Guard? That is a detachment right there. Oh you wanted Stormtroopers with actual doctrines to go with your inducted Guard? Another detachment. Finally Grey Knights? Yup! Another detachment!

I still sometimes think of picking up a box of Grey Knights to throw onto the pile of shame for "later", but really at this point it would be for if I do some Oldhammer type game using 3rd or 4th.

a_typical_hero wrote:
Had to check the date of OP just to make sure this isn't Necromancy

Seriously though, 3rd edition had the best lore/feeling of the army, 5th had the best rules. Everything afterwards felt lacklustre (=unfun) to me.

I still got my fully painted army, but I'm going to sell it soon.

I mean it wouldn't be GK necromancy unless I was in the thread...

Galas wrote:

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

They should be Loyalist thousand sons. Leave anti demon stuff for narrative and their fluff, and just make them elite psyker space marines.

That attitude right there is what is wrong with 40K now. I want to play my toy soldiers IN the 40K universe...not in a a somewhat generic MTG esc resource management system to buff and debuff damage. It is the reason why things like the 3.5 chaos codex is STILL the best codex ever made for chaos, because it actually made your army viable while still feeling like you were playing chaos in 40K. the same applies to these 3rd ed codexes like GKs. the GK baby carrier was a cool bit of bling but that codex lost much of the lore based rules that MADE THEM GKs.

kurhanik wrote:



Funny story, first time I got into 40k (group kind of died off shortly so I only had a few models and a couple of games in using borrowed models), I specifically picked Daemonhunters because I loved how much variety it had. I remember having big plans for an Inquisitor, like 1 or 2 squads of Grey Knights, and then a bunch of inducted Imperial Guard. When I got back into the game back in 7th at the behest of my girlfriend, on glancing around I ended up just going straight Guard because I wasn't interested in a codex of only Grey Knights and did not want to buy several codices to take advantage of allies.

I have since obtained some Inquisition level models, but still have not grabbed any Grey Knights simply because of how starved for detachments they are. Fitting an Inquisitor alone is fairly easy, but say Acolytes or a Daemonhost, suddenly you need a full detachment. And inducted Guard? That is a detachment right there. Oh you wanted Stormtroopers with actual doctrines to go with your inducted Guard? Another detachment. Finally Grey Knights? Yup! Another detachment!

I still sometimes think of picking up a box of Grey Knights to throw onto the pile of shame for "later", but really at this point it would be for if I do some Oldhammer type game using 3rd or 4th.

To bad you don't live near our group we would be more than happy to have a 3rd ed demon hunter inquisitorial player to throw down with (well maybe not our khorne player that uses the 3.5 dex ) since we have players using whichever compatible dex they like best in our 5th edition games.

 aphyon wrote:

Galas wrote:

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

They should be Loyalist thousand sons. Leave anti demon stuff for narrative and their fluff, and just make them elite psyker space marines.

That attitude right there is what is wrong with 40K now. I want to play my toy soldiers IN the 40K universe...not in a a somewhat generic MTG esc resource management system to buff and debuff damage. It is the reason why things like the 3.5 chaos codex is STILL the best codex ever made for chaos, because it actually made your army viable while still feeling like you were playing chaos in 40K. the same applies to these 3rd ed codexes like GKs. the GK baby carrier was a cool bit of bling but that codex lost much of the lore based rules that MADE THEM GKs.
.

I'm not convinced on this. I feel like more than ever there are lots of fluff based rules in the game, particularly via stratagems. Speaking as someone who played Daemonhunters.

Umbros wrote:

 aphyon wrote:

Galas wrote:

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

They should be Loyalist thousand sons. Leave anti demon stuff for narrative and their fluff, and just make them elite psyker space marines.

That attitude right there is what is wrong with 40K now. I want to play my toy soldiers IN the 40K universe...not in a a somewhat generic MTG esc resource management system to buff and debuff damage. It is the reason why things like the 3.5 chaos codex is STILL the best codex ever made for chaos, because it actually made your army viable while still feeling like you were playing chaos in 40K. the same applies to these 3rd ed codexes like GKs. the GK baby carrier was a cool bit of bling but that codex lost much of the lore based rules that MADE THEM GKs.
.

I'm not convinced on this. I feel like more than ever there are lots of fluff based rules in the game, particularly via stratagems. Speaking as someone who played Daemonhunters.

Stratagems are garbage to represent fluff based rules though.
Sincerly probably any CSM player that did run out of CP and now has only AL coloured inferior SM in the game.

I like the idea that the Inquisition is a corrupt, villainous organization - so it breathing down the neck of factions like Grey Knights and (mostly) treating them as lackeys is on point for them. The machinations, influence, and sometimes outright orders of Inquisitors has mobilized entire Astartes chapters before, and chapter 666 has a special relationship to them.

I liked the way it was handled in 3e, where You *could* make an entirely GK army, but you could also mix and match between henchmen, auxiliary forces, and GK's.

 aphyon wrote:

Galas wrote:

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I'm fairly ignorant on imperial factions, but couldn't the GK mechanically be custodes+psykers? Both seem to have a few parallels between them.

They should be Loyalist thousand sons. Leave anti demon stuff for narrative and their fluff, and just make them elite psyker space marines.

That attitude right there is what is wrong with 40K now. I want to play my toy soldiers IN the 40K universe...not in a a somewhat generic MTG esc resource management system to buff and debuff damage. It is the reason why things like the 3.5 chaos codex is STILL the best codex ever made for chaos, because it actually made your army viable while still feeling like you were playing chaos in 40K. the same applies to these 3rd ed codexes like GKs. the GK baby carrier was a cool bit of bling but that codex lost much of the lore based rules that MADE THEM GKs.

I mean, you can absolutely give them an edge over demons by how they are designed (Weapons without ap but high damage and strenght, etc...) but if you want to have them balanced agaisnt everything in the game you can't make them an autowin agaisnt demons to be able to fight the rest of factions, and you can't make them balance agaisnt demons and garbage agaisnt everything else.

You dont need an anti demon faction have ALL the +10 to wound <daemon> units to feel like they are specialized in fighting demons.
I'm a narrative player at heart and I will always love more narrative stuff than pure edge competitive bland. But theres a middle point where you can have armies being balanced for the whole game and also feel how they need to feel. If my grey knights are elite psiker space marines specialized in fast deployment in danger zones, is good enough. I don't need a +1 attack vs demons to know they are specialized agaisnt demons. Of course you need better rules writters that what GW has.

In this last months I have really missing some aspects of old warhammer, thats why I have been organizing fantasy 6th edition games with a couple of friends, and I'm actually looking to play 5th 40k , I just need to find repositories of the rules.

Yeah, good game design would have grey knights have abilities that happen to cater well to daemon slaying but still work the same on everyone, rather than an imbalance where a bunch of their abilities are completely nonexistent against most armies.

The latter leads to them either being underpowered on average, or correctly balanced on average then getting a bunch of overpowered buffs against a single faction.

The former leads to them being good at dealing with hordes and large monsters, which can be balanced around.

Alternatively, you can make the GKs good against everyone and overpowered against Daemons, and then make the Daemons good against everyone and overpowered against GK.

That way, every game is balanced.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Alternatively, you can make the GKs good against everyone and overpowered against Daemons, and then make the Daemons good against everyone and overpowered against GK.

That way, every game is balanced.

GW has tried that in the past and even in the present with the stratagem for demons to respawn but... normally they can't make it work. It also makes it harder to do, because basically you have to make both armies as "Normal" armies costed like that and then give both a bunch of free stuff that only works agaisnt each other.

 Galas wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Alternatively, you can make the GKs good against everyone and overpowered against Daemons, and then make the Daemons good against everyone and overpowered against GK.

That way, every game is balanced.

GW has tried that in the past and even in the present with the stratagem for demons to respawn but... normally they can't make it work. It also makes it harder to do, because basically you have to make both armies as "Normal" armies costed like that and then give both a bunch of free stuff that only works agaisnt each other.

Time and again, I find myself saying that "GW's incompetence in applying a concept doesn't invalidate the concept wholesale." But yes, it is harder; I hope they didn't sign up for game design thinking it'd be the easiest job they could find.

Of course you need better rules writters that what GW has.

In this last months I have really missing some aspects of old warhammer, thats why I have been organizing fantasy 6th edition games with a couple of friends, and I'm actually looking to play 5th 40k , I just need to find repositories of the rules.

Loads of players have started doing this because they find current 40K/AOS rather lackluster. i know many players have either gone back to WHFB or switched over to kings of war to get a proper fantasy battle setting just like many players have switched backed to playing older editions of 40K they prefer. while GW has never had a "perfect" edition (they were never trying for that with their sales model) they did have some great rules writers in the past. rather it's our hybrid 5th edition games using pre-existing rules form various editions or the pro-hammer project that uses some self created fan rules. the core rules and codexes are pretty easy to come by. i still owned all my core rulesbooks from 3rd-7th and i have been slowly building up my collection of my favorite codexes for each faction where the rules best represented the lore of the force.

I think this is all dancing around the fundamental problem that GW's concept of "armies" is basically anything capable of organized violence that exists within the universe, and a lot of these things get weird quickly.

It's like making a modern combat game and where Brazilian street gangs, Russian Spetznaz, US 1st Armored Division, the Royal Navy, the FBI, Syrian Rebels, specifically the LAPD SWAT, and the entirety of the PLA are your armies.

I reckon one way to do it would be to mess with invulnerable saves more. We know GW isn't averse to tweaking them, as it's pretty much Tzeentch's thing - and while it would hurt Daemons the most, every army in the game has some form of invulnerable save somewhere.
The tricky part would be balancing the Knights' normal AP so that they can still contend against ordinary armour saves, without being so good at that too that absolutely nothing can stand against them.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 Galas wrote:
...Most players that want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch, and Grey Knights... want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch and Grey Knights. Not inquisition. Not the eclesiarchy.

Great. Yay. Woo.

Point of order: You could play pure GK in the 3e Codex. You didn't have as many options as you have now, but there was nothing stopping you. If you want to play an Inquisition army now you need four army books (Inquisition, Guard, Assassins, plus whichever Order Militant) and so much detachment tax that there's really no point. "But I don't want to play the Inquisition!" is a great argument for you playing pure GK instead of the Inquisition, it isn't a great argument for not letting anyone else play the Inquisition.

If it means playing GK is suppose to be gimped in favour of something that hasn't been an army in more then a decade and I happen to play GK it is very much an argument against it for me. If GW ever decides to make Inquisition a real army with real units and rules, that is awesome, but don't try to hijack other people codex or make other armies unfun to play. But you can play X is not an argument, if the X is made bad. I doubt a lot of BA players were happy about the fact that the 17 models in a BA army were 2 heroes and 15 scouts, and the rest of hte army was a mix of IG and Castellans.

Karol wrote:
If it means playing GK is suppose to be gimped in favour of something that hasn't been an army in more then a decade and I happen to play GK it is very much an argument against it for me. If GW ever decides to make Inquisition a real army with real units and rules, that is awesome, but don't try to hijack other people codex or make other armies unfun to play. But you can play X is not an argument, if the X is made bad. I doubt a lot of BA players were happy about the fact that the 17 models in a BA army were 2 heroes and 15 scouts, and the rest of hte army was a mix of IG and Castellans.

To a large extent Grey Knights hijacked the Inquisition codex.

Where does it say that. you said both things were in the codex. clearly GW decided that they don't want people to play inquisition armies, because if they did, then inqusition would still have models and rules. They did leave GK, and gave them rules since 5th ed, at least 3 times. No such thing for inquisition.

This may as well mean they never wanted people to play the army to begin with, and just wanted to sell models. And to make it even more true, they did not bring inquisition back with codex DW or codex SoB.

Karol wrote:
Where does it say that. you said both things were in the codex. clearly GW decided that they don't want people to play inquisition armies, because if they did, then inqusition would still have models and rules. They did leave GK, and gave them rules since 5th ed, at least 3 times. No such thing for inquisition.

This may as well mean they never wanted people to play the army to begin with, and just wanted to sell models. And to make it even more true, they did not bring inquisition back with codex DW or codex SoB.

Are you responding to me?

Hecaton wrote:

Karol wrote:
If it means playing GK is suppose to be gimped in favour of something that hasn't been an army in more then a decade and I happen to play GK it is very much an argument against it for me. If GW ever decides to make Inquisition a real army with real units and rules, that is awesome, but don't try to hijack other people codex or make other armies unfun to play. But you can play X is not an argument, if the X is made bad. I doubt a lot of BA players were happy about the fact that the 17 models in a BA army were 2 heroes and 15 scouts, and the rest of hte army was a mix of IG and Castellans.

To a large extent Grey Knights hijacked the Inquisition codex.

not really. GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own. nothing was more soul destroying then reading 5th edition GK lists that consisted of 2 grey kmight units and a buncha henchmen

BrianDavion wrote:
GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own.

That's saying the same thing as they hijacked the codex. It left people who liked the "Inquisition" aspect of the faction out in the cold.

BrianDavion wrote:
not really. GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own. nothing was more soul destroying then reading 5th edition GK lists that consisted of 2 grey kmight units and a buncha henchmen

And still, 5th GK codex was so much fun. My Coteaz henchmen list played totally different from my all the Terminators list played different from my Paladin bomb list played different from my a bit of everything list.

Hecaton wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own.

That's saying the same thing as they hijacked the codex. It left people who liked the "Inquisition" aspect of the faction out in the cold.

You know how Xena was first a character in Hercules tv series but then had her own show that became even more popular? Yeah.

I actually agree with Karol. I have no problem with Inquisition becoming their own thing and even with special rules for alling with the "chamber militants" (A thing that from the past 6-7 years has become more and more... eeh... difusse and irrelevant) but with how GW makes codex, should they all be rolled it would basically become mandatory to run them together, in detriment of SoB, Deathwatch and GK players.

 Galas wrote:
You know how Xena was first a character in Hercules tv series but then had her own show that became even more popular? Yeah.

I actually agree with Karol. I have no problem with Inquisition becoming their own thing and even with special rules for alling with the "chamber militants" (A thing that from the past 6-7 years has become more and more... eeh... difusse and irrelevant) but with how GW makes codex, should they all be rolled it would basically become mandatory to run them together, in detriment of SoB, Deathwatch and GK players.

Considering how GK popularity has dropped off dramatically, it wasn't so much that they were popular, they were just powerful. But you can structure the faction like Dark Eldar, that would be fine.

Hecaton wrote:

 Galas wrote:
You know how Xena was first a character in Hercules tv series but then had her own show that became even more popular? Yeah.

I actually agree with Karol. I have no problem with Inquisition becoming their own thing and even with special rules for alling with the "chamber militants" (A thing that from the past 6-7 years has become more and more... eeh... difusse and irrelevant) but with how GW makes codex, should they all be rolled it would basically become mandatory to run them together, in detriment of SoB, Deathwatch and GK players.

Considering how GK popularity has dropped off dramatically, it wasn't so much that they were popular, they were just powerful. But you can structure the faction like Dark Eldar, that would be fine.

Lets be honest, with the exception of space marines and orks, most factions fluctuate in player base around their power (I know the numbers are fuzzy, theres a ton of people that buy and dont play or just play garagehammer). Just look at the number of tau players that became imperial guard players since RT the moment 8th dropped.

Grey Knights in general were originally just an arm of the Inqusition their flavor and character has been cannibalized by every other chapter in existence. What made the grey knights cool was that they were the 'last gift' of the Emperor. Which is what many of their books center on which is what the grey knights do best which is fighting chaos, but more often than not they are worfed, or turned into memes by their opponents or players.

The Grey Knights have no real characters apart from Draigo and maybe Stern neither of whom have recieved any interesting lore in at least half a decade. Grey Knights also don't have much in terms of unique character kits or unit kits, they have two kits for their infantry and thats it really.

Their dreadknights are goofy, and much of their range is ancient or just utterly pointless when compared to primaris. Not only that but all their new lore has been given to other factions. Their direct competitor faction... The Exorcists are far more fleshed out in their character than the Grey Knights ever were.

On the tabletop Grey Knights have been bad for two editions, and are the worst list to collect as well. Grey Knights are just boring there is no flavor to them. What made the original grey knights interesting is they were a supplementary force to inqusition forces. So you took a small squad of grey knights with tons of inqusition infantry. Now you can't do that at all. Grey Knights themselves should be a bit more interesting, they shouldn't just be 'a space marine chapter with pyskers' but the monastic spiritual pysker nobility to the space marines. Akin to Sorcecers and are the most read of space marines, you can do that by building their range to focus on psychic powers, which they do but fail to make interesting.

Something that was done with the lumineth is that every squad leader was a mage, so every group of lumineth can cast magic to enhance their abilities or make them that more effective. Right now grey knights have no interesting abilities that buff themselves, or make themselves stronger. Grey knights have no interesting units as they use the same 2 modelling kits.

You can hate the primaris as much as you want but at least they have variety in their uses and kits. Its not just the same thing over and over again repeated across all the kits. Even the custodes have more variety across their very small lists compared to grey knights.

If anything Grey Knights top my list of "Factions that need a redo." Along with Eldar, Tyranids, and Guard.

Its a sad state but they are just boring to build, boring to read, and there are only good part about them is the ben counter series, Emperor's gift, and the Cursed Blade Series.

BrianDavion wrote:

Hecaton wrote:

Karol wrote:
If it means playing GK is suppose to be gimped in favour of something that hasn't been an army in more then a decade and I happen to play GK it is very much an argument against it for me. If GW ever decides to make Inquisition a real army with real units and rules, that is awesome, but don't try to hijack other people codex or make other armies unfun to play. But you can play X is not an argument, if the X is made bad. I doubt a lot of BA players were happy about the fact that the 17 models in a BA army were 2 heroes and 15 scouts, and the rest of hte army was a mix of IG and Castellans.

To a large extent Grey Knights hijacked the Inquisition codex.

not really. GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own. nothing was more soul destroying then reading 5th edition GK lists that consisted of 2 grey kmight units and a buncha henchmen

What’s soul destroying about an accurate inquisitorial task force consisting of the inquisitor, their usual assets and some requisitioned heavies?

 Asherian Command wrote:
Grey Knights in general were originally just an arm of the Inqusition their flavor and character has been cannibalized by every other chapter in existence. What made the grey knights cool was that they were the 'last gift' of the Emperor. Which is what many of their books center on which is what the grey knights do best which is fighting chaos, but more often than not they are worfed, or turned into memes by their opponents or players.

The Grey Knights have no real characters apart from Draigo and maybe Stern neither of whom have recieved any interesting lore in at least half a decade. Grey Knights also don't have much in terms of unique character kits or unit kits, they have two kits for their infantry and thats it really.

Their dreadknights are goofy, and much of their range is ancient or just utterly pointless when compared to primaris. Not only that but all their new lore has been given to other factions. Their direct competitor faction... The Exorcists are far more fleshed out in their character than the Grey Knights ever were.

On the tabletop Grey Knights have been bad for two editions, and are the worst list to collect as well. Grey Knights are just boring there is no flavor to them. What made the original grey knights interesting is they were a supplementary force to inqusition forces. So you took a small squad of grey knights with tons of inqusition infantry. Now you can't do that at all. Grey Knights themselves should be a bit more interesting, they shouldn't just be 'a space marine chapter with pyskers' but the monastic spiritual pysker nobility to the space marines. Akin to Sorcecers and are the most read of space marines, you can do that by building their range to focus on psychic powers, which they do but fail to make interesting.

Something that was done with the lumineth is that every squad leader was a mage, so every group of lumineth can cast magic to enhance their abilities or make them that more effective. Right now grey knights have no interesting abilities that buff themselves, or make themselves stronger. Grey knights have no interesting units as they use the same 2 modelling kits.

You can hate the primaris as much as you want but at least they have variety in their uses and kits. Its not just the same thing over and over again repeated across all the kits. Even the custodes have more variety across their very small lists compared to grey knights.

If anything Grey Knights top my list of "Factions that need a redo." Along with Eldar, Tyranids, and Guard.

Its a sad state but they are just boring to build, boring to read, and there are only good part about them is the ben counter series, Emperor's gift, and the Cursed Blade Series.

what grey knights need is for GW to take a look at codex chaos deamons (another army that proably need a revision so I'd honestly do them together) and make the codex a natural counter to the strengths of deamons.

a good first step would be COMPLETELY revising how Nemisis force weapons work.

step one, REMOVE AP from MOST Nemisis force weapons (keep it on nemisis deamon hammers perhaps so GKs have something for anti-armor) step two: create a new rule for the weapon called "nemisis" that is basicly "AP for invul saves" the end result should be an army for whom your best protection is armor, and for whom invul saves are less effective. this works as anti-deamon and IMHO would make for an intreasting mechanic to add to the meta

Yah, ... its the same effect as what happened to the old 2nd ed. (metal) terminators, having been rendered (visually) obsolete when the Primaris SM appeared.
And I am just talking about the visual perspective , not the codex changes.

 Asherian Command wrote:
The Grey Knights have no real characters apart from Draigo and maybe Stern neither of whom have recieved any interesting lore in at least half a decade. Grey Knights also don't have much in terms of unique character kits or unit kits, they have two kits for their infantry and thats it really.

It makes me sad that Master Mordrak never got a model - he (and his retinue) was easily their most interesting character.

BrianDavion wrote:

a good first step would be COMPLETELY revising how Nemisis force weapons work.

step one, REMOVE AP from MOST Nemisis force weapons (keep it on nemisis deamon hammers perhaps so GKs have something for anti-armor) step two: create a new rule for the weapon called "nemisis" that is basicly "AP for invul saves" the end result should be an army for whom your best protection is armor, and for whom invul saves are less effective. this works as anti-deamon and IMHO would make for an intreasting mechanic to add to the meta

All this would do is make them bad.

AP is arguably the single most powerful stat in the entire game, a single point against a 2+ save literally doubling the amount of successful wounds against the unit in question on average. For the same reason, lowering or even negating a fairly weak 5++ is frankly not even particularly strong given that all Daemons have at least a 6+ armour save. The difference between a 5+ and a 6+ is not so great. This would also, funnily enough, make Bloodthirsters and Bloodcrushers more durable against Grey Knights because they have armour saves greater than their invulnerables.

No, as someone who plays both armies the best course of action is to just not have stupid gimmicky rules that feth Daemons for Grey Knights.

aphyon wrote:

kurhanik wrote:
Funny story, first time I got into 40k (group kind of died off shortly so I only had a few models and a couple of games in using borrowed models), I specifically picked Daemonhunters because I loved how much variety it had. I remember having big plans for an Inquisitor, like 1 or 2 squads of Grey Knights, and then a bunch of inducted Imperial Guard. When I got back into the game back in 7th at the behest of my girlfriend, on glancing around I ended up just going straight Guard because I wasn't interested in a codex of only Grey Knights and did not want to buy several codices to take advantage of allies.

I have since obtained some Inquisition level models, but still have not grabbed any Grey Knights simply because of how starved for detachments they are. Fitting an Inquisitor alone is fairly easy, but say Acolytes or a Daemonhost, suddenly you need a full detachment. And inducted Guard? That is a detachment right there. Oh you wanted Stormtroopers with actual doctrines to go with your inducted Guard? Another detachment. Finally Grey Knights? Yup! Another detachment!

I still sometimes think of picking up a box of Grey Knights to throw onto the pile of shame for "later", but really at this point it would be for if I do some Oldhammer type game using 3rd or 4th.

To bad you don't live near our group we would be more than happy to have a 3rd ed demon hunter inquisitorial player to throw down with (well maybe not our khorne player that uses the 3.5 dex ) since we have players using whichever compatible dex they like best in our 5th edition games.

He I'll keep that in mind in the unlikely event I end up moving.

Karol wrote:

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 Galas wrote:
...Most players that want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch, and Grey Knights... want and like to play Sisters of Battle, Deathwatch and Grey Knights. Not inquisition. Not the eclesiarchy.

Great. Yay. Woo.

Point of order: You could play pure GK in the 3e Codex. You didn't have as many options as you have now, but there was nothing stopping you. If you want to play an Inquisition army now you need four army books (Inquisition, Guard, Assassins, plus whichever Order Militant) and so much detachment tax that there's really no point. "But I don't want to play the Inquisition!" is a great argument for you playing pure GK instead of the Inquisition, it isn't a great argument for not letting anyone else play the Inquisition.

If it means playing GK is suppose to be gimped in favour of something that hasn't been an army in more then a decade and I happen to play GK it is very much an argument against it for me. If GW ever decides to make Inquisition a real army with real units and rules, that is awesome, but don't try to hijack other people codex or make other armies unfun to play. But you can play X is not an argument, if the X is made bad. I doubt a lot of BA players were happy about the fact that the 17 models in a BA army were 2 heroes and 15 scouts, and the rest of hte army was a mix of IG and Castellans.

How is putting the old options that were in the Grey Knight book gimping their options? If anything they'd gain stuff like access to cheaper units and variety. The old book let you go full Inquisitor and retinue + their Stormtroopers, or all in Grey Knights, or you could take a few squads of Imperial Guardsmen, or even regular Space Marines (though I think specifically with them you could not take Grey Knights) all in the same book. In the modern 9th edition outlook, with the general standard of 3 detachments and each detachment costing cp.

Galas wrote:

Hecaton wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
GW just decided they wanted the chamber millitants to stand on their own.

That's saying the same thing as they hijacked the codex. It left people who liked the "Inquisition" aspect of the faction out in the cold.

You know how Xena was first a character in Hercules tv series but then had her own show that became even more popular? Yeah.

I actually agree with Karol. I have no problem with Inquisition becoming their own thing and even with special rules for alling with the "chamber militants" (A thing that from the past 6-7 years has become more and more... eeh... difusse and irrelevant) but with how GW makes codex, should they all be rolled it would basically become mandatory to run them together, in detriment of SoB, Deathwatch and GK players.

Really Inquisition just needs...a lot. Like some of their options back, actual troops, etc. Even a quick fix of letting them bring their Elites into an allied detachment without breaking things would help. Right now you can throw a single Inquisitor in without breaking stuff, but any other Inquisition units cannot be brought in this way. Using up a full detachment just so you can take one or two Acolytes and a Daemonhost is rough.

I really don't mind if Inquisition keeps itself as its own set of rules, I just dislike that with each edition more and more is either taken or removed from them and they gain basically nothing in return.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

a good first step would be COMPLETELY revising how Nemisis force weapons work.

step one, REMOVE AP from MOST Nemisis force weapons (keep it on nemisis deamon hammers perhaps so GKs have something for anti-armor) step two: create a new rule for the weapon called "nemisis" that is basicly "AP for invul saves" the end result should be an army for whom your best protection is armor, and for whom invul saves are less effective. this works as anti-deamon and IMHO would make for an intreasting mechanic to add to the meta

All this would do is make them bad.

AP is arguably the single most powerful stat in the entire game, a single point against a 2+ save literally doubling the amount of successful wounds against the unit in question on average. For the same reason, lowering or even negating a fairly weak 5++ is frankly not even particularly strong given that all Daemons have at least a 6+ armour save. The difference between a 5+ and a 6+ is not so great. This would also, funnily enough, make Bloodthirsters and Bloodcrushers more durable against Grey Knights because they have armour saves greater than their invulnerables.

No, as someone who plays both armies the best course of action is to just not have stupid gimmicky rules that feth Daemons for Grey Knights.

As someone that used to play Daemons, I do like the concept of "AP for Invulnerable Saves" as a replacement for rules that only work against daemons and nothing else, but not as full replacement for their actual AP. That would just make them suck even more than they have previously against everything else.
Of course if they have both regular AP and ++AP (IP?), it's need to be carefully balanced so that Daemons still get some saves. Probably -1 for most Nemesis weapons, with -2 for the Hammer and Dreadknight weapons (and maybe the Halberd could also be IP-2). Maybe Psi weapons could even mess with ++ saves?

If IP would come at the cost of anything other than extra points, I'd say it should be damage on certain weapons.

0CP stratagem Psi-Bolt ammunition.
The enemy must re-roll successfull invul saves against attacks from this unit.

Would fit well with the current design paradigm.

a_typical_hero wrote:
0CP stratagem Psi-Bolt ammunition.
The enemy must re-roll successfull invul saves against attacks from this unit.

Would fit well with the current design paradigm.

Wouldn't a quasi specific AP against invuls be better?

As invul saves are specifically described as saves that never get modified to be worse, I would not like to go that route. Feels too much like breaking a core rule.

a_typical_hero wrote:
As invul saves are specifically described as saves that never get modified to be worse, I would not like to go that route. Feels too much like breaking a core rule.

Core rules get gaked on by GW all the time, especially for special rules cue transports not beeing able to be left except the primaris one etc.

The issue i see with your suggestion is that as soon as that hits a blob of say letters that will get a whole lot more rerolling and is frankly against low invul save targets overly effective, against good invul models underperforming.

10 Grey Knights in rapid fire range would cause 4,44 dice to be rerolled on average. I don't think that is too much.

In %, yes. Re-rolls are hitting weak saves harder than good ones. Same can be said about up to -2AP though.

a_typical_hero wrote:
As invul saves are specifically described as saves that never get modified to be worse, I would not like to go that route. Feels too much like breaking a core rule.

I completely understand this, which is why I'd want only Grey Knights to have it. Much like Tzeentch being the only ones allowed to boost invulnerable saves (which they can already do, so it's not like it's without precedent).
It's also likely this would be implemented by being a modifier to the dice roll, rather than the save itself, which helps.

Imperial Guard can also boost invulnerable saves, and Eldar can lower them. Neither mechanic are unique to begin with lol.

Well the original 3rd ed GK psycannon/incinerator thing it was basically all S6 AP4 and specifically ignored invulnerable save. it murdered demons in droves (except bloodletters who had brass armor of khorne 3+ save ) but as noted in a previous post to counter that they got sustained assault for fighting the GKs.