Codex Imperial Knights - A Legacy of Honor

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**Arlen**

Question,
How would one with a Knight list fight against the following list?
A mate of mine wants to take this list to tournament with countering Knight in particular in mind.

Eldar Altatioc detachment.
2x Farseer Skyrunner
3x rangers
3x Hemlocks

Harlequins The Soaring Spite detachment
1 troupemaster
3x 6 skyweavers with haywire cannons.

I was unable to beat it with a pure Knight list as hard as I tried.
My list was:
House Hold krast
1 Gallant
2 Crusaders with Gatling and Battle Cannons. One with the icarus autocannon and one with the stormspear rocket pod.
(1 is my warlord with the endless fury relic and first knight trait)
1 valiant with two cannons on the shoulders and one set of missiles.
( has the 4++ warlord trait.

While this might not have been the most optimal list against his list it was one that took me quite high in a local tournament and what we agreed to use an example.

His list is able to consistently remove one knight per turn, even when losing complete squads of jetbikes. His farseers and Hemlocks having doom, jinx and restrain as powers.
Restrain proves to be extremely effective to stop my Gallant without needing to dedicate any fire on it.
Doom on the unfortunate knight that is targeted that turn pretty much ensures he is able to deal an absurd amount of mortal wounds on that knight which not even the strat. "benevolence of the machine god" can help to survive.
Additionally his army is extremely tough. Not in actual toughness, but with -1 to hit everywhere, some -2 and even and a 4++ invul makes that his army extremely hard to shift.

So as fellow Knight players, what kind of list would you build against this? Try to not be depended on allies as your main source of survival.

EDITED: Two Hemlocks had restrain, not the farseers.

**Ice_can**

Unfortunately Doom plus haywire is kinda rediculous when playing against knights.
Untill GW stop doom applying to all wounds instead of Aysurani yo wound rolls, this is going to be a go to of broken.

A blessed Gatling cannon would help by providing your own mortal would mechanic against the harlequins.
It also doesn't exactly help that they are cheesing the heck out of negative to hit modifiers and invulnerable saves.
Charging the skyweavers is the best strategy I can recommend.

Though I could be wrong, I don't believe a farseer can have restrain as a power that would have to be a hemlock.

**Arlen**

Ice_can wrote:

Though I could be wrong, I don't believe a farseer can have restrain as a power that would have to be a hemlock.

True, it was a Hemlock that had that power. Two of them had it actually.

**tneva82**

As it is with miniature games and 8th ed 40k in particular if opponent wants to tailor your list and you refuse to use tools you can re-tailor not much you CAN do.

**Arlen**

While I knew the game would be rigged from the start in his favour, because that is what we agreed on. I was more or less wondering if there is anything in our own codex that can proof to be a decent counter against such an anti-knight list or a way to minimalize defeat. Preferable by not getting not wiped out on turn 4.

At the moment I think having several Helverins would be a decent counter from our own codex. A single Helverin kills on average 1,5 bike per turn, with four of them you could kill off a single skyweaver bike squad per turn. Also with Helverins being grand in enough other match-ups it not that bad an idea to drop one crusader (or the valiant) and tweak a bit with the rest of the list to make room for them.

**Kdash**

So, vs that list (if you want to tailor) i'd look at running the following -

3 Crusaders with RFBCs and 1 with an Ironstorm pod.
1 x 3 Helverins

Essentially gives you 4 drops and a hell of a lot of fire power.

Household wise, you could do 1 of 2 things.
1 - everything goes house Mortan. The stratagem is totally worth it, and will give you a bit of help if he tries to charge you to lock you up.

2 - 2 Crusaders + 1 Helverin go Mortan, 1 Crusader and 2 Helverin go a Mechanicus house (maybe Raven). This then gives you the stratagem access to ignore mortal wounds for 1 CP.

Alternatively, you could run 2 Crusaders with Ironstorm, 2 Wardens and 2 Helverins.
This might actually be the better choice as it gives you a 4th "big" Knight threat and will just chew through his bikes.

**Aeri**

Can a Knight in a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment gain a household tradition? My understanding is yes, but a friend says no.

**JNAProductions**

Aeri wrote:
Can a Knight in a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment gain a household tradition? My understanding is yes, but a friend says no.

They can't. It's pretty clearly stated in the Codex that you need a full SHV detachment, not just an Aux.

**tneva82**

Aeri wrote:
Can a Knight in a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment gain a household tradition? My understanding is yes, but a friend says no.

No tradition. You can use strategems for that house though which is why you see raven castellans so much but no tradition.

**Karhedron**

tneva82 wrote:
Aeri wrote:
Can a Knight in a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment gain a household tradition? My understanding is yes, but a friend says no.

No tradition. You can use strategems for that house though which is why you see raven castellans so much but no tradition.

You get the Household keyword (which unlocks access to stratagems and heirlooms) but not to the rules of the tradition itself. For that, you need a full lance of 3 Knights.

**Ordana**

Karhedron wrote:
tneva82 wrote:
Aeri wrote:
Can a Knight in a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment gain a household tradition? My understanding is yes, but a friend says no.

No tradition. You can use strategems for that house though which is why you see raven castellans so much but no tradition.

You get the Household keyword (which unlocks access to stratagems and heirlooms) but not to the rules of the tradition itself. For that, you need a full lance of 3 Knights.

You need a non-Auxiliary detachment. 3 Amigers would still get a House Tradition. You dont need Knights.

**Gordoape**

In putting together a close-combat oriented Knight list, I've acquired 4 Armiger Warglaives and a Gallant. I like the idea of just simply charging at the opponent's lines with Knights, and will mix in AM at various levels when things get more competitive.

I'd like to add a Cerastus Knight, and, my question is—which one? I'm leaning towards the Atrapos based on the stat sheet. Does anyone have any thoughts or experience with that or any of the other Cerastus frames?

**Eldarain**

Well that was annoying. The infinite CP Soup Castellan running rampant so ruin it for mono IK armies.

**Ice_can**

Eldarain wrote:
Well that was annoying. The infinite CP Soup Castellan running rampant so ruin it for mono IK armies.

The sad thing is I think this does exactly what GW intended which is to make the CP 32 now even more mandatory for anyone trying to play a knights list.

well mono knights were fun whike they lasted.

**Arlen**

Thats bollocks, mono-knights are still very good. Maybe it is now the right time to try out other houses rather the ones that where clearly the top.

**Ice_can**

Arlen wrote:
Thats bollocks, mono-knights are still very good. Maybe it is now the right time to try out other houses rather the ones that where clearly the top.

Competitively mono knights are trashed, anyone running a castellan mono now needs 6 CP just for oath breaker guidance strategums, kind hard when your getting 9 CP for a 2K list
Especially now that for 6 points more than a helverin you get a 100 % no charge line of guardsmen.

**tneva82**

Ice_can wrote:
Arlen wrote:
Thats bollocks, mono-knights are still very good. Maybe it is now the right time to try out other houses rather the ones that where clearly the top.

Competitively mono knights are trashed, anyone running a castellan mono now needs 6 CP just for oath breaker guidance strategums, kind hard when your getting 9 CP for a 2K list
Especially now that for 6 points more than a helverin you get a 100 % no charge line of guardsmen.

Good thing then you don't need oath breaker when using castellan? I rarely used it anyway. You only need that when trying to assasinate characters but ~25% chance to assasinate even weaker character is simply too unreliable. Only target it was actually worth it was ork weirdboy as 2 wounds in already basically cripples them and takes out of picture as reliable threat(and weirdboys are crucial for orks). As it is it was already hardly issue(which albeit makes the nerf bit weird). So basically rather than that I threw those missiles more toward vehicles or monsters.

**Volkmair**

Apologies if the answer to this is buried in the forum somewhere.

For mono Knights at 1750 is it worth trying to squeeze in a Castellan or Valiant? As you need 3 Questoris or Dominus knights for the extra command points taking a Dominus seems to either limit what Questoris ones you can take or force you to leave out any Armigers which then limits your numbers.

**Klowny**

Ive had great success with twin gallants and a castellan, albeit with guard mortar HWT spam, and hydra batteries (criminally undercosted and hyperefficient vs eldar).

Those hydra batteries, for 225 points and a single drop, have done more work against eldar than all of my stompy bois. This list I piloted to a definitive win at a local 42 person tournament. (3x 20-0 wins scoring 40+ points a game), and have been running for some time now.

Gallants are almost as good as a castellan, as they usually end up unmolested as they spend an entire armies worth of shooting trying to down a knight.

Being T8, 28w with a 2+/3++/6+++ that can get back up and operate at top teir again is disgusting.

For reference, while house raven was good for a single castellan, if your running mono knights I feel house taranis is head and shoulders above the rest. It is expensive but getting a knight back up is insanely powerful, far more worth than rerolling 1's in a phase.

Coupled with the fact that you don't need shooting the second twin gallants crash into their lines (the second they get there youre almost guaranteed a win), add in full tilt and landstrider your looking at t1 charges, t2 both are stomping to victory.

Mono knights I dont feel are top teir, they do not score well in missions, you need cheap bodies. Now that CP farming has been nerfed, I suggest looking into mechanicum, as you can still get rerolls of 1's to hit on a knight, but can also give one a cover save, or reroll to hit in combat. Granted it costs a CP a turn but it is very powerful in the right conditions.

**Ordana**

I want to like AdMech as an alternative to Guard allies but Guard bring double the amount of bodies and there is nothing that replaces Mortas HWT's.

**slobulous**

tneva82 wrote:

Good thing then you don't need oath breaker when using castellan? I rarely used it anyway. You only need that when trying to assasinate characters but ~25% chance to assasinate even weaker character is simply too unreliable. Only target it was actually worth it was ork weirdboy as 2 wounds in already basically cripples them and takes out of picture as reliable threat(and weirdboys are crucial for orks). As it is it was already hardly issue(which albeit makes the nerf bit weird). So basically rather than that I threw those missiles more toward vehicles or monsters.

I'm gonna go ahead and strongly refute what you have stated here. The increase in CP on Oathbreaker was definitely warranted because the odds of one-shotting characters is much, much higher than 25%.

Oathbreaker was used in conjunction with 3 other things that you have not factored in : Order of Companions, Grand Strategist, and a Command Reroll.

Combining all this resulted in almost a 50% chance to one-shot FIVE WOUND characters which are often key linchpin units of the enemy army such as Yvraine/Farseer, Smash Captains, Azrael, Colonel Straken, etc.

The odds of one-shotting get drastically better if the character has less than 5 wounds.
A 4-wound character, such as a Company Commander, dies 65% of the time, and 3-wound characters 77% of the time.

It is certainly a fair nerf considering it can just remove key characters with little to no reprisal.

**JNAProductions**

Hit on a 3, rerolling 1s. Odds are 77.78% of hitting.

Wounding on a 2, rerolling 1s. 97.22% chance of that going through.

No saves unless you have a 2+, which a lot of characters don't, so we'll assume no save. 100% chance.

And then, the damage roll, which is d6, rerollable with a CP if you don't roll high enough. 75% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character, 55.56% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

Total odds:

56.71% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character.
42.01% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

**slobulous**

JNAProductions wrote:
Hit on a 3, rerolling 1s. Odds are 77.78% of hitting.

Wounding on a 2, rerolling 1s. 97.22% chance of that going through.

No saves unless you have a 2+, which a lot of characters don't, so we'll assume no save. 100% chance.

And then, the damage roll, which is d6, rerollable with a CP if you don't roll high enough. 75% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character, 55.56% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

Total odds:

56.71% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character.
42.01% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

The odds are even higher than this. You are not factoring in Grand Strategist.

It makes the chance of hitting 88.888%. (3+ rerollable)

**U02dah4**

Although hes not factoring a save and even a Company commander would have a 5++ and marine based characters a 4++ thats a big chunk of nothing not factored in and lets face it a skilled opponent will know its coming and save the reroll so that space marine saves 75% of the time that Company commander 55%

**slobulous**

U02dah4 wrote:
Although hes not factoring a save and even a Company commander would have a 5++ and marine based characters a 4++ thats a big chunk of nothing not factored in and lets face it a skilled opponent will no its coming and save the reroll so that space marine saves 75% of the time that Company commander 55%

Since you are not aware, I will inform you. The biggest strength of Shieldbreaker Missiles is that they ignore invulnerable saves.

**U02dah4**

Oh well in that case I stand corrected

**Xenomancers**

Arlen wrote:
Question,
How would one with a Knight list fight against the following list?
A mate of mine wants to take this list to tournament with countering Knight in particular in mind.

Eldar Altatioc detachment.
2x Farseer Skyrunner
3x rangers
3x Hemlocks

Harlequins The Soaring Spite detachment
1 troupemaster
3x 6 skyweavers with haywire cannons.

I was unable to beat it with a pure Knight list as hard as I tried.
My list was:
House Hold krast
1 Gallant
2 Crusaders with Gatling and Battle Cannons. One with the icarus autocannon and one with the stormspear rocket pod.
(1 is my warlord with the endless fury relic and first knight trait)
1 valiant with two cannons on the shoulders and one set of missiles.
( has the 4++ warlord trait.

While this might not have been the most optimal list against his list it was one that took me quite high in a local tournament and what we agreed to use an example.

His list is able to consistently remove one knight per turn, even when losing complete squads of jetbikes. His farseers and Hemlocks having doom, jinx and restrain as powers.
Restrain proves to be extremely effective to stop my Gallant without needing to dedicate any fire on it.
Doom on the unfortunate knight that is targeted that turn pretty much ensures he is able to deal an absurd amount of mortal wounds on that knight which not even the strat. "benevolence of the machine god" can help to survive.
Additionally his army is extremely tough. Not in actual toughness, but with -1 to hit everywhere, some -2 and even and a 4++ invul makes that his army extremely hard to shift.

So as fellow Knight players, what kind of list would you build against this? Try to not be depended on allies as your main source of survival.

EDITED: Two Hemlocks had restrain, not the farseers.

Hes specifically tailoring against you so you can do the same. Go house tyranis with a preceptor and 3-4 helverins - the rest of your points take gallants house raven with auto cannon carrapace. Ignore the hemlocks at first - kill the Harlie bikes - (hemlocks actaully aren't that great vs knights). Should be a fair match then.

**SirWeeble**

I'm happy to lose some CP if it means the game overall becomes less CP focused. This CP focus makes the game more like a trading card game with casting spells than a tactical wargame.

CP seems as if it started out as a way to encourage people to use brigades and a minimum number of troops - which itself was an attempt at balance through unit selection. Now it's become its own bloated monster.

**Ice_can**

slobulous wrote:
JNAProductions wrote:
Hit on a 3, rerolling 1s. Odds are 77.78% of hitting.

Wounding on a 2, rerolling 1s. 97.22% chance of that going through.

No saves unless you have a 2+, which a lot of characters don't, so we'll assume no save. 100% chance.

And then, the damage roll, which is d6, rerollable with a CP if you don't roll high enough. 75% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character, 55.56% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

Total odds:

56.71% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character.
42.01% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

The odds are even higher than this. You are not factoring in Grand Strategist.

It makes the chance of hitting 88.888%. (3+ rerollable)

No your factoring in a non Knights re roll into a comment on the price increases being uncalled for in mono knights.
Without your guard reroll and CP oathbreaker was the correct number of CP, mono knights just got aucker punched because of abuses only IG soup could pull of.

**Xenomancers**

Ice_can wrote:
slobulous wrote:
JNAProductions wrote:
Hit on a 3, rerolling 1s. Odds are 77.78% of hitting.

Wounding on a 2, rerolling 1s. 97.22% chance of that going through.

No saves unless you have a 2+, which a lot of characters don't, so we'll assume no save. 100% chance.

And then, the damage roll, which is d6, rerollable with a CP if you don't roll high enough. 75% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character, 55.56% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

Total odds:

56.71% chance of one-shotting a 4 wound character.
42.01% chance of one-shotting a 5 wound character.

The odds are even higher than this. You are not factoring in Grand Strategist.

It makes the chance of hitting 88.888%. (3+ rerollable)

No your factoring in a non Knights re roll into a comment on the price increases being uncalled for in mono knights.
Without your guard reroll and CP oathbreaker was the correct number of CP, mono knights just got aucker punched because of abuses only IG soup could pull of.

I mean...really the only stratagem that should have gone up in cost was the taranis knight resurrection strat IMO and the Castellan needs to go up in points. The others are unfounded. Order of companions is basically unplayable now for knights players.