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I either take a larger wolf star with a lord with claw, stormshield, wolf mount + some other goodies + 4 thunder kitties with thunderhammer/stormshield, stormshield, melta bomb, nothing as a death star that rolls most things but assault termies or a smaller unit of just a battle leader with claw, thunder kitty + 2 lil kitties and 1 other wolf with a claw or power weapon for rushing in and killing fire support or troops without fists. Both work great in the current field before Grey Knights came out. However now with Grey Knights and everyone having a force weapon makes the smaller unit almost useless and puts major hurt on even a larger unit with lord. Seems going all mech other then long fangs might be the better option vs Grey Knights? What are your opinions?

Specifically versus grey knights, obviously thunderwolf cavalry is going to have major bad things happening.

No matter how many storm shields you have, no matter how good your TWC is, its way to dangerous to send them against Halberds. Your striking after, so you cant wipe the unit early, and it doesnt take many attacks to get past your storm shields and into those juicy 3 wounds.

BUT! You could take a librarian with psychic hood? it will at least lessen your chances of dying to ID.


Metawise, TWC are still good. GK wont be super common, they are (in my eyes) tier 2, so I am saying still field them, have a laugh when you do run into a squad of GK terminators with a banner and 4 halberds


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(and anval thawn, allowing them to also cast hammerhand )

In the wise words of flava flav, "Don't believe the hype!"

Grey Knights are dangerous, but the fact of the matter is that they will never, ever get the charge on your TWC unless you play them poorly. That being said, use the TWC to go after non-halberd squads. If you are playing an all purifier army, prey on the weakened squads. Furthermore, a good SW list has a Rune Priest. Protect him and use him to get a 50% chance to shut down force weapons. Also, they cannot cast hammerhand and force weapons in the same turn without a character attached, so they will be hitting with max 20 attacks, average 10 hit, average ~3 wound. That is of course assuming a full strength squad that didnt take any psycannons.

You'll be fine.

For 35 pts, a GKGM can take psychotroke, rad, and blind grenades.

Your wolfstar is now T4, loses its charge attack, and has about a 2/3 chance of suffering a crippling debuff.

The big problem, though, is the shooting. If you've got a big Wolfstar, you can't afford much other stuff so all those psycannons are free to plonk away at your big expensive squad. Even individualized, it only takes a few wounds to start softening them up enough for S5 PWs to take a toll once you charge in.

Wolfstar is still 'okay' -- not fine, but okay -- against a mob of regular GKs or Terminators. If you run into a GK Deathstar, though, it's game over. GKGM + 10 Halberdnators just shuts you down in CC and can still tear you apart in shooting for ~650 points, which is very similar to what 5 TH/SS Twolves and Lord will cost.

Thank you for the comments. I do run a Rune Priest with chooser of the slain, living lightning and jaws of the warp wolf in all my lists.

What is the likely hood that I run into a Grey Knight deathstar? Most of the lists I see are Many Small Units or Shunt punch. Not many deathstars.

Dont forget the vindicare can remove the SS from wolf lords.

In my game playtesting wolfstar vs paladins, the fight was honestly 50/50 with my luck using the rune weapon to negate hammerhand a few times and critical force weapon casts. But I concluded that between 2-3 deamon hammers and hammerhand, that can really ruin a TWC's day.

Do people even take a Vindicare? Seems to me unless the GK player goes first he dies to a volley of missles or other str 8+ shots and poof goes 145 points.

IWhat I am worried about with Paladins is halberds making the strike first or falchions giving them 4 attacks. Should be able to soften them up a bit with las cannons and meltas before assaulting them since they so slow unless they taking a land raider.

Njal is too expensive to take in conjunction with a Wolfstar otherwise the 3+ negate would be a nice addition.

Saga of the bear laughs at your force weapons and then proceeds to pummel your face in.

And honestly any decent SW list should have some type of shooting in the form of grey hunters or long fangs which wouldn't have too much trouble hurting them.

I've played against a SW wolfstar twice now with my GK and what did them in both times was being stung to death by stormbolter/psycannon shots. After getting hit by 2 units worth of firepower, I can assault the 1-2 reamining wolves and pretty easily finish them off.

Don't underestimate GK shooting, even with a unit as tough as your thunderwolves with lord, you will still take wounds. And if that unit is actually in a threatening position, you will take a lot of them.

Vindicare's are about 50/50 against SW, because you can so easily assign a long fang unit to take him on. Mind you if he rolls hot on his cover saves, it can take way more firepower than it should to drop him, but typically SW will have him down by turn 3 at the latest. He is a real threat though, and if allowed to shoot, will put the hurt on anything he points at.

Deathstars like thunderwolves are not actually terrible against GK like people claim, they are just reduced effectiveness. Your wolves can actually stomp all over small power armor units, shooting henchmen, dakka dreads, and dreadknights. Thats a big list of good targets and in fact a lot of GK lists run nothing but piles of those units, so you stand a good chance of making a difference right there.

Trouble is against your easy targets you will probably wipe them in 1 round of combat and be left swinging in the wind right next to a whole world of return firepower and counter assault. Without mistakes on your opponents part and smart positioning on yours, I don't see you taking more than a unit or 2 with the wolfstar before they go down. Also, those "weak" units can roll hot with their force weapons and start dropping wolves. Its statistically unlikely but as opposed to the non-combat units of every other codex, they are capable of doing it.

GK have next to no big or tough units that you can safely lock in combat for a few turns that won't also tear you apart in return. Combat henchmen, terminators and paladins will go toe to toe with your wolves, and their chances go up dramatically with an HQ attached.

Another issue is that GK deathstars are superior to thunderwolves. More expensive too but you really do get what you pay for. Even walking they are still deadly, as one of the recent batreps on dakka of Draigo paladins vs tau can attest. It took an entire tau army 7 turns (I believe) to kill 2 units of paladins.

I would pick the wolfstar over any power armor or shooting focused GK unit. But against cc units the wolves will go down hard and probably not even make back their points.

Avariel wrote:Do people even take a Vindicare? Seems to me unless the GK player goes first he dies to a volley of missles or other str 8+ shots and poof goes 145 points.

Which is why you make sure to place him somewhere safe. He does have infiltrate you know...

Avariel wrote:
What is the likely hood that I run into a Grey Knight deathstar? Most of the lists I see are Many Small Units or Shunt punch. Not many deathstars.

If it's any indication (which it isn't), Draigostar is the only army that I run with my Grey Knights. I absolutely love it when people try to assault me. It's half the work already done for me at that point.

Against TWC, I'm getting at least one turn of shooting, probably two. With a Librarian, I can force you to charge through difficult/dangerous terrain,which means that if I get really, really lucky, I can force you into a situation that lets me charge.

Even if I don't get the charge, my Paladins will generally be striking at S6-7 (Hammerhand from Drago/Librarian) with WS5. With Draigo and my main deathstar loadout, that's 4 dead thunderwolves before my hammer strikes, assuming every thunderwolf has a stormshield. The Wolves, assuming they all have frost blades, will end up inflicting about 7 wounds (I'm leaving out the warding stave for the sake of making this easier to mathhammer, otherwise, just subtract that by 1) at the same time (once again, for ease of use, we're ignoring the fact that Draigo strikes at I5, likely killing one of the thunderwolves before he even gets to attack), which is not enough to actually remove any bodies (although due to the way wound allocation works, it's likely to kill one or two Paladins).

Essentially, charging a unit of Paladins would be suicide.

I highly doubt Paladin deathstars are going to be common. Noobs will run them, but you wont see them played competitively. The problem is they are too slow and far too vulnerable to high str, low ap shooting. Instadeath to lascannons? melta? lol. Also, if the TWC are set up right, they shouldn't be enduring much storm bolter or psycannon fire. Remember the 20-24" charge radius. Furthermore, you guys are operating in a vaccuum. Don't forget the 15 missile launchers shooting at your Purifiers, etc. Also don't forget how many of your psychic abilities are being shut down.

canthatenuff wrote:I highly doubt Paladin deathstars are going to be common. Noobs will run them, but you wont see them played competitively. The problem is they are too slow and far too vulnerable to high str, low ap shooting. Instadeath to lascannons? melta? lol. Also, if the TWC are set up right, they shouldn't be enduring much storm bolter or psycannon fire. Remember the 20-24" charge radius. Furthermore, you guys are operating in a vaccuum. Don't forget the 15 missile launchers shooting at your Purifiers, etc. Also don't forget how many of your psychic abilities are being shut down.

Also remember the Interceptors zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers, the dreadnoughts ripping transports to pieces, the dreadknights zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers etc. Operating outside of a vacuum goes both ways.

Or better yet, just outflanking a deathstar of Paladins... tasty...

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

canthatenuff wrote:I highly doubt Paladin deathstars are going to be common. Noobs will run them, but you wont see them played competitively. The problem is they are too slow and far too vulnerable to high str, low ap shooting. Instadeath to lascannons? melta? lol. Also, if the TWC are set up right, they shouldn't be enduring much storm bolter or psycannon fire. Remember the 20-24" charge radius. Furthermore, you guys are operating in a vaccuum. Don't forget the 15 missile launchers shooting at your Purifiers, etc. Also don't forget how many of your psychic abilities are being shut down.

Also remember the Interceptors zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers, the dreadnoughts ripping transports to pieces, the dreadknights zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers etc. Operating outside of a vacuum goes both ways.

Ahh yes and how many points are we playing? A Paladin deathstar, Interceptors, Dreadnoughts and Dreadknights? Buddy, you can't have everything. The competitive builds, which are what we will consider, are going to run mostly the same units (Purifiers, Strike Squads, Dreadnoughts). Those units don't heavily threaten TWC. It may not be the ideal charge target, but they certainly don't spell doom for TWC. Furthermore, only scrubs will be playing shunting Dreadknights. If you want to spent over 200 points on a Dreadknights, go ahead. Your list isn't going to be any better for it. Interceptors won't do too well out in the open considering the SW-staple Long Fangs. Are GK competitive, yes? Will they fold to TWC? No. Are they auto-win against TWC? No.

@ whoever said that a Paladin deathstar is better than TWC deathstar.... I would say the TWC deathstar is far superior. 1) It can split into multiple pieces fairly well (the deathstar tends to have 2 lords, 1 squad). 2) The deathstar doesnt need a transport in order to quickly reach its targets. 3) True toughness 5, full wound allocation.

Paladins insta-die to a large number of VERY common weapons, TWC do not. Furthermore, Paladins will rarely be able to footslog the whole game to their targets. Want a transport? Sure, take a Storm-Raven or Land Raider. That's only an extra 250 PTs that can easily be dealt with by any competent army.

Instead of considering absurd things, such as Paladin deathstars, consider realistic and competitive GK choices.

Out of 12 games, at 1500 points, using two paladin squads, draigo, a librarian,10 purifiers and a strike squad, I've lost 1 game to guard and won the rest. I think people drastically underestimate how competitive paladins can be. If they're played properly that is. So it would be wise to consider how your TWC would fair if you did come up against a gk deathstar.

bedeporter wrote:Out of 12 games, at 1500 points, using two paladin squads, draigo, a librarian,10 purifiers and a strike squad, I've lost 1 game to guard and won the rest. I think people drastically underestimate how competitive paladins can be. If they're played properly that is. So it would be wise to consider how your TWC would fair if you did come up against a gk deathstar.

When you test for tournaments and what not, you test for what is common. Not outlier lists. Hit me up when you place high at a tournament with your Paladin list. Then tell me it is good. In fact, show me a recent army list where a footslogging infantry deathstar has placed high. I'd like to see some results.

This is turning into a flame war of SW vs GK which it shouldn't be. SW are incredibly competitive against GK and I would say it is as close to an even match as currently exists in 40k. The topic is TWC vs GK and I still argue that they are severely less effective against this army than anyone else. If you see a lot of GK lists in your local gaming scene, you will be better off dropping the TWC for another unit.

1) Draigo paladin armies aren't going to be common in tournaments its true, but 5-10 man paladin units will be. These guys are astoundingly tough and deadly and their biggest claim to fame is that they smack other deathstar units (like TWC) around like no one's business, while still being good at taking on hordes, MCs, tanks or whoever else you care to point them at. You can outflank them with a GKGM, summon with a librarian, or just deep strike in, on top of the usual transport options. Even walking will be effective with a shrouding librarian, as I can tell you myself after more than a dozen games using this tactic on terminators. A fully buffed paladin unit will beat a fully buffed TWC unit and it only gets worse if you throw in HQ support. Runepriest hoods will only go so far with about a 50% chance of stopping the psychic powers. If the paladins reach him, they eat him for breakfast so can't use him in combat to support the wolves.

2) The real nail in the coffin for TWC against GK (and this applies to any deathstars really) is that even the 'weak' 5 man squads can put serious hurt on your expensive monsters with just a little better than average rolling. They drop wounds off of you in shooting, and can do the same or worse in assault. You will win, its true, but taking wounds or losing models consistently from each combat you face is just unacceptable for units like TWC. These guys are built to stomp through entire armies with impunity, which just won't be the case with GK. As I mentioned above, its very unlikely that the TWC will be in fighting shape after their second combat, and might even be below 50% after the first, depending on what they have to fight.

If you think killing 1 or 2 low point cost units that the enemy has 5-6 copies of is worth it, then I guess TWC are going to work out fine for you. But I doubt that is what most SW players have in mind when they run these guys.

Edit: to give a better idea of just how lopsided the fight between GK and TWC can get, read the entries on rad and psychotroke grenades in the GK codex. These are 15 point upgrades on grand masters, brother captains, and xeno inquisitors. For those without the codex, the short story is that this 30 point combination can cause the wolves to defeat themselves in combat, without a single attack from the GK unit.

canthatenuff wrote:

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

canthatenuff wrote:I highly doubt Paladin deathstars are going to be common. Noobs will run them, but you wont see them played competitively. The problem is they are too slow and far too vulnerable to high str, low ap shooting. Instadeath to lascannons? melta? lol. Also, if the TWC are set up right, they shouldn't be enduring much storm bolter or psycannon fire. Remember the 20-24" charge radius. Furthermore, you guys are operating in a vaccuum. Don't forget the 15 missile launchers shooting at your Purifiers, etc. Also don't forget how many of your psychic abilities are being shut down.

Also remember the Interceptors zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers, the dreadnoughts ripping transports to pieces, the dreadknights zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers etc. Operating outside of a vacuum goes both ways.

Ahh yes and how many points are we playing? A Paladin deathstar, Interceptors, Dreadnoughts and Dreadknights? Buddy, you can't have everything. The competitive builds, which are what we will consider, are going to run mostly the same units (Purifiers, Strike Squads, Dreadnoughts). Those units don't heavily threaten TWC. It may not be the ideal charge target, but they certainly don't spell doom for TWC. Furthermore, only scrubs will be playing shunting Dreadknights. If you want to spent over 200 points on a Dreadknights, go ahead. Your list isn't going to be any better for it. Interceptors won't do too well out in the open considering the SW-staple Long Fangs. Are GK competitive, yes? Will they fold to TWC? No. Are they auto-win against TWC? No.

@ whoever said that a Paladin deathstar is better than TWC deathstar.... I would say the TWC deathstar is far superior. 1) It can split into multiple pieces fairly well (the deathstar tends to have 2 lords, 1 squad). 2) The deathstar doesnt need a transport in order to quickly reach its targets. 3) True toughness 5, full wound allocation.

Paladins insta-die to a large number of VERY common weapons, TWC do not. Furthermore, Paladins will rarely be able to footslog the whole game to their targets. Want a transport? Sure, take a Storm-Raven or Land Raider. That's only an extra 250 PTs that can easily be dealt with by any competent army.

Instead of considering absurd things, such as Paladin deathstars, consider realistic and competitive GK choices.

I can fit all of that into a 2k GK list. It is not hard to find people throwing that much you powerful units at you when talking GK.

My advice?
Missile-fangs are better for you.

Too many issues with assaulting GK units.
The idea of your wolfstar is to remove any main threats, that isnt really possible when the main threat has much more impact than your star.

TKC, or TWK for Avariel, will not be beaten in CC. They will be beaten by psycannons. The GK cc abilities are just icing.

Its the same as with any deathstar the TWC find themselves up against. The TWC are great units, but are not deathstars. Equal points of assault termies beat them, Mephiston should beat them, khorne berserkers charging should beat them, ect ect. Where TWC/TWK shine is beating EVERYTHING else.

Sure, those berserkers can beat me on the charge, but watch what I do to your Oblits. Sure that THSS termie unit can beat me, but look what I did to your tactical squads. Sure your paladin unit can beat me, but see how this hammerwolf feels about your psyriflemen dreadnoughts.

If the space wolves had efficient THSS termies, then I think there would be 1 army in the game. Fortunately they dont have THSS termies on the cheap, but TWC are not a half bad cc unit substitute.

AlmightyWalrus
The chooser of the slain will be helping to determine where the Vindicare infiltrates and with 3 units of long fangs you can have a volley of missles going at the vindicare where ever he deploys since he only has a range of 36.

Bruteboss.
Paladin armies have a mobility problem with either walking or costing way too much when you include their raider. Its true you can outflank with a grandmaster but that grandmaster costs a large amount of points also.

I been leaning towards a lean thundekitty squad with just a battle leader and one other for killing troops and support units for awhile which would be nearly useless against grey knights. A larger wolfstar just doesn't seem to be worth it if Grey Knights become prevalent.

DevianID
You have it right about how you use thunder wolves you kill troops and support units with them. A mini wolf star like I been running is nearly useless against Grey Knights is my issue.

We have to wait and see how big the grey knight band wagon will be. Hoping to get some test games against grey knights on vassal this week.

It's worth noting that even though Paladin death stars are slow, they also have some really great shooting, so they're still dangerous at range.

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

Avariel wrote:Do people even take a Vindicare? Seems to me unless the GK player goes first he dies to a volley of missles or other str 8+ shots and poof goes 145 points.

Which is why you make sure to place him somewhere safe. He does have infiltrate you know...

I can see him being in a safer place, but for him to be moderately useful he has to have LOS to some targets. If he has LOS to them they probably have LOS to him. You can shroud and bolster up ruins but those things are not guaranteed. Even if you do have a 2+ cover save, I would still launch Krak Missiles at him or try to Dakka him to death. T4 2W only last so long, even with a 2++. Ork players know this, one of them told me.

Avariel, I think when you have a Marine with a Hello Kitty helmet riding a robo lion its so cool its always worth it having a unit of them to have them in your army. Who cares if they die to Grey Knights they get you major coolness points. Even if you take a single 1 for 50 points just for the coolness points.

The small unit you were running vs me on vassal actually isn't terrible in close combat against 5 man gkss. 10 attacks on the charge with rerolls to hit should wipe the gkss on average while only taking 3 force weapon attacks in return since the psycannon dude doesn't have one and the hammer doesn't swing if you wipe the squad its just that you die to storm bolters and psycannons.

Dunno if Grey Knights are really gonna be that big. 2 people I know already fell off the bandwagon and myself and another are waiting on the Grey Knight FAQ.

My Grey Knight lists don't have any Paladin death stars as it is unknown if falchions give +2 attacks but purifiers are bad news for thunderwolves with halberds swinging first.

Dunno about Vindicares every time I try to put a Vindicare in a Grey Knight list I realize that he needs a transport if he wants to live and 5 purifiers with 2 psy cannon hammer and 2 halberds cost 149 pts and don't get instantly vaped by 1 strength 8+ shot if they fail a cover save.

Wolfstars are definitely competitive still. The only difference will be that against GK in a tournament, which won't be that common since they are definitely a tier 2 army, you'll have to play smart with it. Don't go throwing them away against a unit full of Halberds, have them chew through other units and kill the Halberd totting Purifiers etc. with your Grey Hunters in the shooting phase and charge them after they've been thinned down. TWC can take out 5 Purifiers no problem 10 will be rough.

OverwatchCNC wrote:The only difference will be that against GK in a tournament, which won't be that common since they are definitely a tier 2 army, you'll have to play smart with it.

Experienced tourney goers such as Hulksmash disagree with you.

And the real threat to Wolfstar isn't in CC (although they can still get royally messed up in CC); it's mass S5-8 shooting between psybolt stormbolters on terminators/interceptors, psybacks, psycannons, and psyflemen. You've got 12 wounds of 3+ saves getting tagged consistently by buckets of dice at 24".

sourclams wrote:

OverwatchCNC wrote:The only difference will be that against GK in a tournament, which won't be that common since they are definitely a tier 2 army, you'll have to play smart with it.

Experienced tourney goers such as Hulksmash disagree with you.

And the real threat to Wolfstar isn't in CC (although they can still get royally messed up in CC); it's mass S5-8 shooting between psybolt stormbolters on terminators/interceptors, psybacks, psycannons, and psyflemen. You've got 12 wounds of 3+ saves getting tagged consistently by buckets of dice at 24".

While I respect Hulks opinion, having played against him in several tournaments, I wasn't saying TWC would do well against GK. What I said was they are still a viable choice for a SW tournament list but GK will be a tough match up, hence my mentioning the need to play smart against GK with TWC. Perhaps I wasn't clear. As a SW player I am more than happy having my GK opponents sink their entire armies shooting into my Wolfstar, leaving all my Rhinos full of GH alone. I've played several games against different GK opponents and builds so far and I am still not that impressed. I don't think GK change the meta so drastically that TWC are suddenly unplayable, less playable and powerful than before, but not unplayable.

Run Wolfstars if you want.


just accept that, if you draw GKs(in my mind, all PAGK squads should be given halberds unless you just can't afford them or you throw a DH or Falchions on a guy instead. so you should always be striking last.) your puppies will get shafted and the best you can do is stop the bleeding.

have the wolves attack vehicles/Dreadknights instead of squads.

canthatenuff wrote:

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

canthatenuff wrote:I highly doubt Paladin deathstars are going to be common. Noobs will run them, but you wont see them played competitively. The problem is they are too slow and far too vulnerable to high str, low ap shooting. Instadeath to lascannons? melta? lol. Also, if the TWC are set up right, they shouldn't be enduring much storm bolter or psycannon fire. Remember the 20-24" charge radius. Furthermore, you guys are operating in a vaccuum. Don't forget the 15 missile launchers shooting at your Purifiers, etc. Also don't forget how many of your psychic abilities are being shut down.

Also remember the Interceptors zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers, the dreadnoughts ripping transports to pieces, the dreadknights zooming across the board smashing Rune Priests in the face with Daemonhammers etc. Operating outside of a vacuum goes both ways.

Ahh yes and how many points are we playing? A Paladin deathstar, Interceptors, Dreadnoughts and Dreadknights? Buddy, you can't have everything.

And yet somehow the Space Wolves can afford 2 lords, a full unit of Thunderfire Cavalry, 3 units of Long Fangs, Rune Priests and troop choices in Gork knows how many transports? Good to see that the "not in a vacuum" still only affects the Grey Knights...