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Sure neutrons have similar durability to armiger and I need some backfield objective holders that can fire across the map ideally I need 3 units. One for each objective on a 6 objective map and I had 75 points left over so the ballistarii fitted the role as 3rd

(I have considered an alternate version swapping one onager downgrading the ballistarii weapon and a raider for a twin volkite moirax which still leaves 3)


As to the knights mechanicus custum stormstriders defiant fury.

Castigator landstrider armour of the sacred ion
Preceptor ravager ion bulwark

Basic idea is 15" move on the moirax/ castigator with +2 to charge gives a good shot of them getting into CC/rad flamer range on T1 if the enemy deploy back or go first the raiders form a screen protecting the knights from chargers and sniping any thunderhammer character

As to knight choices
As noted by others wardens are great and the castigator is a better warden faster more wounds more shots and a better cc weapon

The preceptor buffs the armigers it is currently very points efficient and with the high intensity buffing strat it outperforms an errant at vehicle destruction with the flexibility to its firepower to target non vehicles

The moiraxs the grav provides some extra anti vehicle firepower and at damage 4 vs meq is quite flexible in the meta. the rad flamer is strong vs infantry screens auto hit/wounds infantry on 2+. The claw is an odd beast great vs vehicle monsters but not great vs screens but I'm going to try to punch through the screens t1 (and can heroic intervene as a bonus) (warglaives are interchangeable and outperform in cc vs screens but are not as good cc vs vehicles with moiraxs outshoot meq while the armiger outshoots vs vehicles (its pretty similar and really the better choice is based on your opponent list)

(If I did the trade for a twin volkite (it provides great anti screen firepower vs meq (yes las locks are better VS 1w and arguably the better choice but I own the volkites from making the other two and the performance is similar vs other targets)

The melta change is generally threatening for Knights, but we have some too. It might be worth looking at Warglaives with a melta gun harder now. I suspect that even the Thermal Cannon will get the D6+2 damage, which will make Errants a little more competitive with Preceptors again.

I will adjust if/when rules change but if rules change its also possible points change at the moment its speculation

The base cost of Warglaives can't exceed 165 points or else the army can't play Combat Patrol missions. I seriously doubt they'll raise Knight prices at all given how badly the army is performing over-all. It's not like improving their anti-tank guns and some minor weapons slightly affects the core problems of the army.

 Ideasweasel wrote:
Evan Stump just got 2nd place at a GT with the below

Lucius outrider
Enginseer 35
27 raiders 432

Raven super heavy
Castellan with 2 missiles 635 pts
Warden with sword And Ironstorm missile pod - Sanctuary 445 pts
Warden with sword And Ironstorm missile pod - Cunning Commander 445 pts

Someone floated such a list a few weeks ago that was pretty much identical to this. Shall we discuss?

I love it but am amazed how he scored so highly. Kudos to him and it’s great to see knights represented and doing well

You guys did sell me on the Raven Castellan. I've also seen a significant shift away from anti-tank. The list is initially surprising, but makes more sense when you consider the meta.

I am surprised by a couple of things though. Cunning Commander is an extremely unusual pick. I suppose any anti-tank going into the Castellan is not being used to fight for midboard control, so it doesn't actually need Ion Bulwark. Sure the Castellan is CP hungry, but I'd still rather have a real upgrade on the Warden. Hell, I'd have gone down to 7 starting CP and gotten an extra Relic and Trait.

I'm not sold on 27 Raiders, it seems like you're hitting diminishing returns. They're not efficient offensively, and they don't have a lot of bodies or ObSec, and aren't infantry for scoring secondaries. I think a Patrol with 10-18 Raiders and a couple squads of Vanguard makes more sense. It's more CP efficient and flexible for scoring. I also think that Dunecrawlers are much better backfield objective holders, so fitting one or two in somewhere is a boon.

@darkhound

I forgot to type ion bulwark and Cawls wrath. He took those on the Castellan

What GW should do and actually do can be completely different especially when it comes to points

im surprised he's using sanctuary in that list. I see most using the relic avenger. I'm guessing he used him up close where he'd want the invul in cc?

The Endless Fury is pretty bad on Wardens since you want to spam the auto-hit strat anyway. If you're not rolling to hit, you can't proc exploding 6s. The Wardens should be wading into close combat on objectives, so Sanctuary makes sense. Plus, it's extremely useful to make that Knight a character so it can do heroic interventions.

Cunning Commander makes more sense as a second Warlord trait. If there's nothing else you want, then you can take it for "free" just to get one re-roll and make the Knight a character.

 DarkHound wrote:
The Endless Fury is pretty bad on Wardens since you want to spam the auto-hit strat anyway. If you're not rolling to hit, you can't proc exploding 6s. The Wardens should be wading into close combat on objectives, so Sanctuary makes sense. Plus, it's extremely useful to make that Knight a character so it can do heroic interventions.

Cunning Commander makes more sense as a second Warlord trait. If there's nothing else you want, then you can take it for "free" just to get one re-roll and make the Knight a character.

yeah I see the reasoning but you can only auto hit one of the two. But rotate to get a 4++ in cc with sanctuary makes sense when fighting for objectives. I'll have to give it a shot

I love the idea of his list but I would definitely play it wrong.

Also local opposition would just see me lose most of the dogs and I’d struggle to complete my secondaries.

It’s all about the anti tank amongst my group. Mostly to shaft me as the resident knights player

Obviously the solution is to swing the opposite direction and force them to change. Just get a Goff horde and ruin them.

Mix boxes of AoS Savage Orruks with Ork Boyz 1:1, adding in sluggas and shootas to the Savages. The Savages are cheaper and much easier to batch paint. Prime black, use a white rattlecan to highlight, green contrast for the skin, bone colors on the teeth and details (3 colors minimum), technical paint the base, and wash the whole thing with black.

Convert one pack of Nobz into a couple of Pain Boyz, a Big Mek, a Weirdboy, and a Waaagh! Banner. Lastly, get an AoS Megaboss as Ghazzy. Whole thing should run you ~$350 for a 1500pt army and take an afternoon to assemble and paint. It'd be pretty competitive too...


...huh.

Well, I'm going to go finish that horde I started with the Assault on Blackreach set from when I was 14.

 DarkHound wrote:
Obviously the solution is to swing the opposite direction and force them to change. Just get a Goff horde and ruin them.

Mix boxes of AoS Savage Orruks with Ork Boyz 1:1, adding in sluggas and shootas to the Savages. The Savages are cheaper and much easier to batch paint. Prime black, use a white rattlecan to highlight, green contrast for the skin, bone colors on the teeth and details (3 colors minimum), technical paint the base, and wash the whole thing with black.

Convert one pack of Nobz into a couple of Pain Boyz, a Big Mek, a Weirdboy, and a Waaagh! Banner. Lastly, get an AoS Megaboss as Ghazzy. Whole thing should run you ~$350 for a 1500pt army and take an afternoon to assemble and paint. It'd be pretty competitive too...


...huh.

Well, I'm going to go finish that horde I started with the Assault on Blackreach set from when I was 14.

with the buff to eradicators this seems like a good call.

I’ve been spamming armigers and it feels less painful. More things to sit on objectives. Less of a feels bad when they die.

I still prefer 8th edition though. I suspect I’m on the minority but as much as everyone raves about 9th I think something is missing for me

 Ideasweasel wrote:
I’ve been spamming armigers and it feels less painful. More things to sit on objectives. Less of a feels bad when they die.

I still prefer 8th edition though. I suspect I’m on the minority but as much as everyone raves about 9th I think something is missing for me

Yeah 9th edition rules for the army, and points costs that arn't already punishing you ontop of giving away an incidental max points secondary.

Goonhammer did an artical on which factions are doing well and why others don't work in 9th and frankly the poorly balanced secondarys look very much like a big part of the problem.

9th has fantastic game balance over-all, and damn near every army has gotten a top placement at a GT. The points costs for all the Knight units are very good. One bad secondary is not the core issue. The problem is that Knights are a one-dimensional army. This edition is emphasizing objective control, and pure Knights are awful at it.

Like I said earlier, Knights either shouldn't be a solo faction, or should have additional support units. Narratively, pure Knights don't quite make sense. Knight Houses have men-at-arms to support the Knights in battle. Knights don't go out on their own crusades, they get tithed or requisitioned to other armies or conflicts. The closest thing is getting garrisoned with a Titan legion, but even then they're working in concert with the Secutarii.

I think for some of those reasons I haven’t been enjoying the edition as much as I probably should

I think the increased reliance on standing on objectives is a bit meh. I don’t actually have a good alternative and recognise a straight shoot out is just as boring

I just for some reason preferred 8th ITC. In time I’ll eventually come round. I didn’t like 7th edition And the game changed for the better so I’m sure it’s fine

 DarkHound wrote:
9th has fantastic game balance over-all, and damn near every army has gotten a top placement at a GT. The points costs for all the Knight units are very good. One bad secondary is not the core issue. The problem is that Knights are a one-dimensional army. This edition is emphasizing objective control, and pure Knights are awful at it.

Like I said earlier, Knights either shouldn't be a solo faction, or should have additional support units. Narratively, pure Knights don't quite make sense. Knight Houses have men-at-arms to support the Knights in battle. Knights don't go out on their own crusades, they get tithed or requisitioned to other armies or conflicts. The closest thing is getting garrisoned with a Titan legion, but even then they're working in concert with the Secutarii.

Did you look at the article I referred to, also I'd really question the assertion that every codex has gotten a top placement at a GT.

Also as for fluff, you clearly haven't read some of the knights novels as the Knights do infact fight alone, they outpace guard tanks, infantry would get squished as the knights manoeuvre.

Yes they don't fight entire crusades or campaigns alone, but they fight their battles primarily as Pure knight lances.
When your talking about 1 knight fighting with other forces yeah that is also in the lore and they are freeblades not entire households at war.

I want to play with household lances, not some hodge podge of 1 knight plus guard/admech if I want to play guard I would still own my pretorians/and I aint interested in playing ca'tan worshiping robomen.

The Codex should be playable alone and with eradicators and weapons damage being buffed right now I hope the new codex sees ion shields become a -3 damage effect or such.

TBF, if they gave an option for Armigers to become ObSec I would be very tempted to bring a pure Knight list... it's just easier to transport and they're fun to fly.

Ideasweasel wrote:I think for some of those reasons I haven’t been enjoying the edition as much as I probably should

I think the increased reliance on standing on objectives is a bit meh. I don’t actually have a good alternative and recognise a straight shoot out is just as boring

I just for some reason preferred 8th ITC. In time I’ll eventually come round. I didn’t like 7th edition And the game changed for the better so I’m sure it’s fine

Yeah, and you're in for a rough time since Dreadnoughts got a lot better. That Iron Hands player must be thrilled. Still, Knights themselves are great from a combat perspective, so you can adapt. You just need to find something you enjoy that covers their weaknesses.

Ice_can wrote:Did you look at the article I referred to, also I'd really question the assertion that every codex has gotten a top placement at a GT.

Also as for fluff, you clearly haven't read some of the knights novels as the Knights do infact fight alone, they outpace guard tanks, infantry would get squished as the knights manoeuvre.

The Codex should be playable alone and with eradicators and weapons damage being buffed right now I hope the new codex sees ion shields become a -3 damage effect or such.

You referred vaguely to an article, but didn't link to it. I've read most of their articles, though. Every army except GSC, Tau, and old Necrons have had a top placement. Tyranids have, Guard have. Obviously some armies are better than others, but it seems like everyone's got something to offer. Pure Knights haven't placed, but 75% Knights with AdMech Raiders got 2nd.

The novels that I've read have Knights fighting alone on their own world or in their system out of necessity (typically against native orks or invaders).

You're allowed to want to play pure Knights, and you're allowed to play them. My point is that skew armies are bad for the health of the game, so pure Knights shouldn't ever be great. They (re)introduced blast to hamper horde armies. They don't have such an easy out for pure vehicle without some contrivances. It's just not fun when 50% of your army can't do anything to your opponent. At least against hordes you get the satisfaction of removing models.

And set aside Eradicators, they're an aberration and shouldn't be the standard against which everything else is judged. If they give Knights resilience to Eradicators, then Knights will be invulnerable to any other weapon.

 DarkHound wrote:
You referred vaguely to an article, but didn't link to it. I've read most of their articles, though. Every army except GSC, Tau, and old Necrons have had a top placement. Tyranids have, Guard have. Obviously some armies are better than others, but it seems like everyone's got something to offer. Pure Knights haven't placed, but 75% Knights with AdMech Raiders got 2nd.

The novels that I've read have Knights fighting alone on their own world or in their system out of necessity (typically against native orks or invaders).

You're allowed to want to play pure Knights, and you're allowed to play them. My point is that skew armies are bad for the health of the game, so pure Knights shouldn't ever be great. They (re)introduced blast to hamper horde armies. They don't have such an easy out for pure vehicle without some contrivances. It's just not fun when 50% of your army can't do anything to your opponent. At least against hordes you get the satisfaction of removing models.

And set aside Eradicators, they're an aberration and shouldn't be the standard against which everything else is judged. If they give Knights resilience to Eradicators, then Knights will be invulnerable to any other weapon.

https://www.goonhammer.com/the-october-2020-40k-meta-review/

Sorry think I let my frustration about how junky GW's current balance is get the better of me.
Not helped when marine players are making out the world has ended because agressors dont get to shoot twice for free and claim eradicators are needed in their codex so they can fight hordes

I'm not worried about being able to win events easily but I'd like to feel a 3-2 or 4-1 result was possible with atleast one of my armies.

Also with the new marine codex it's not just melta that got buffed lots of damage output just got cranked up with a lot of stuff at the s5/6 jumping to D2.
Plasma is now S8/9, strateguns to do 2d3 MW auto wounding on 6's. Lethality from that codex and even necrons looks to be Marines 2.0 levels maybe -10% tops.

Dreadnaughts just got a -1 to all damage to a minimum of one on 130 points models is wanting -2/-3 to all damage that unreasonable for 400+ point models that can never get cover.

@darkhound

Haha he’s delighted. Just about dancing I would say. My current list is all melta anyway so I say bring it on. I can handle -1 damage (*whimper*, I’m not scared...)

I should be scared right?

On the balance discussion just give knights obsec. Allow for troops from say Admech or guard to be thrown into a detachment as a special knight rule. No -CP

Give us a way to be a bit more survivable and tbh I would of said turning the lethality down to balance.....but a bog standard crusader already feels pretty weak comparatively these days in damage output. Anyone else feel that? A crusader just seems a bit meh. -1 damage and ignore AP1/2 makes the Gatling Cannon a bit lacklustre and when you get 1-2 number of shots on a thermal or miss/have them bounce off an invulnerable save....well your wonder what your 475 pts was worth

https://www.warhammer-community.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Qk5VMhKkshNiajqY.pdf

Who’s excited for warglaive with melta spam? I know I am

I’ve been having fun running 6-8 even before this change

 Ideasweasel wrote:
https://www.warhammer-community.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Qk5VMhKkshNiajqY.pdf

Who’s excited for warglaive with melta spam? I know I am

I’ve been having fun running 6-8 even before this change

i cant understand why thermal spears and thermal cannons didnt get the new melta rule. Stuck waiting for the new codex for it while we get melted by it instead

1. They forgot

2. They want us to wait 8 months etc for something to look forward to in a codex

3. They never got round to writing new stats in time

I’d wager it’s one or more of the above

I really want to think it's mostly the third, in so far "writing" means checking the ramifications of the change. I want to think they're erring on the side of caution by not fixing what isn't broken.

However, they also didn't change things like the Fire Dragon's Fusion Gun, which is identical to a Meltagun. They did change their flamers and Dragon's Breath Flamer, however. That makes me think they have a big Excel table of the weapons and they did name search. It's just such an odd half measure, I genuinely don't know what to make of it.

 DarkHound wrote:
I really want to think it's mostly the third, in so far "writing" means checking the ramifications of the change. I want to think they're erring on the side of caution by not fixing what isn't broken.

However, they also didn't change things like the Fire Dragon's Fusion Gun, which is identical to a Meltagun. They did change their flamers and Dragon's Breath Flamer, however. That makes me think they have a big Excel table of the weapons and they did name search. It's just such an odd half measure, I genuinely don't know what to make of it.

Its half assed and lazy is what it is. They took the time to update every factions plasma but not the meltas? Tau ion doesnt have the same name as marines plasma but that changed but fusion rifles didnt? They updated cognis flamers but not grav or cognis stubbers. It makes zero sense

Hopefully it changes one day.

It’s the biggest issue holding back 40k from being a competitive game.

I would love all the rules front ended or batch released and properly tested cutting down on faqs.

Lock in stuff for a period of time or season and then adjust factions collectively for the next time phase. The piecemeal spin the wheel approach to balance is maddening.

Every dog has his day you just have to wait a few years....woof

This thread is very quiet

I presume because we are all winning all of our games and have no losses to report?

Kinda, yeah. It's mostly the case that I haven't been able to play, but in the games that I have played I've figured out my army and done well. All my games have been on the simulator. I've only been back in the hobby since March, so I'm building my collection to match my experience instead of playing more games.

I think in general the thread is quiet because Knights are small, specialized faction that isn't good. There's not much left to talk about for pure Knights. You either run 3 big Knights and 3/4 Armigers, or 9 Armigers and a couple big 'uns.

If people had more experience with different allied strategies, that'd be useful to share. I keep hearing Scions are strong and dynamic, but I don't know enough to know how.

Mono knights doesn't function at the moment due to missions

So mostly your running soup

probably 1-2 big and 1-3 small.

I would advocate a castigator and preceptor with moirax or Warglaives

But others will consider warden crusader or castellan

When your choice is swap 1 for 1 its not much to say

As to soup components I am favouring either admech spamming raiders or guard vehicles (hellhounds manticore cyclops tank commander) but I have not had enough games to really evidence what functions