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With the new rules for transports and objective claiming, I was wondering if anyone's given serious thought to using Grey Knight troops as allies?

A popular tactic right now is assault terms in a landraider. Has anyone given serious thought to loading in a full squad of greyknights with that land raider. It's more expensive, but has more wounds, and higher initiative and weapon skill.

The thought came up because I'm going to be playing a game tomorrow and my assault terms aren't in. So, I'm using demon hunters solely because I don't have enough points of space marines yet, but I'm definitely curious to see how well they do.

The only advantage GKTs have over regular assault terminators is a shooting attack that is of questionable usefulness. Once in the assault they perform worse against high toughness or high initiative targets with significantly less survivability at ~6 points more per model.

I'd say all the drawbacks of GK allies remain.

Now that many players use Chaos Daemons it is a good thing to have something anti-daemon. Grey Knight squad armed with psycannons could ruin any daemon infantry. And they are of course very good in close combat. I think I would simply take assault terms in a land raider because Null Zone is often enough.

I was thinking about actually just bringing Power Armor Grey Knights since they're a troop choice. They could claim an objective and still be a force in CC, though they lack a lot of the punch and survivability of the CC Terminators

Depending on who you're fighting, thats a bad idea sticking them in a land raider.

PAGKs are just mediocre in CC. Better than normal marines, but against any dedicated assault unit, they'll fold like paper, so they'd be much better off shooting, with their assault 2 24" dakka.

On the other hand, if you're fighting IG or Tau or some other army thats poor in CC, then the PAGK will mop up.

Either way, the PAGK are too expensive to sit in a land raider to make it score, better off allying in the 50 pt stormtrooper squad, spend 20 pts more and give'em two meltas is even better.

As for Termie vs GKTermie
GKT's also get fearless, which..well, sometimes handy, sometimes worse. BroCap Stern or the GKGM's auto-death forceweapon can also be very handy. Though these days, the storm shield 3+ invul is just so much better its hard to see why you'd want to go GKTerms if you're not going DH.

The new rules for dedicated transports make PAGKs more viable, but they still aren't great. I made good use of them in the 'Ard Boyz tournament by having them steal a tactical squad's rhino on turn one and using it as their own APC. Having 2 incinerators firing from the hatch is also pretty awesome on the few occasions when the situation is amenable.

Their best advantage for holding objectives is their Fearlessness. Unfortunately, that comes with a 25pt price tag, and you still have to buy regular troops out of your parent list first.

They are very viable and can help vs. most top tourney lists. The GK's don't have to be in the LR. They can walk up and shoot a hail of shots each turn. Psycannons can put a serious hurt on Daemon armies, espeically ones revolving around Fateweaver.

Their CC abilities are superior vs. all except the most extreme CC units. They will easily go through most everything in marine lists except assault terminators, but if your list can get the assault terminators out of their LR, then you can pummel them with shots as they walk up. They won't perfrom to well vs. Nob Bikers (but few can).

I like them.

I tihnk a small unit of PAGK with a psychic hood o nthe Justicar and maybe a psycannon or two is solid utility for most armies, and rather good against demons.

sourclams wrote:The only advantage GKTs have over regular assault terminators is a shooting attack that is of questionable usefulness. Once in the assault they perform worse against high toughness or high initiative targets with significantly less survivability at ~6 points more per model.

I'd say all the drawbacks of GK allies remain.

There are times when initiative can be more useful then +2S. Not saying it's always better, but it can be pretty damn useful at times.

Also, if you're going to take Grey Knights, I gotta recommend the Grand Master. He's a freaking monster, with an insta-kill that goes through everything(even Eternal Warrior, the GM's just that badass). Give him the first hit, and he'll take down any big scary monster in your way(against some enemies, how you get this first hit can be questionable... but I'm not here to talk about that).

Fafnir wrote:

sourclams wrote:The only advantage GKTs have over regular assault terminators is a shooting attack that is of questionable usefulness. Once in the assault they perform worse against high toughness or high initiative targets with significantly less survivability at ~6 points more per model.

I'd say all the drawbacks of GK allies remain.

There are times when initiative can be more useful then +2S. Not saying it's always better, but it can be pretty damn useful at times.

Also, if you're going to take Grey Knights, I gotta recommend the Grand Master. He's a freaking monster, with an insta-kill that goes through everything(even Eternal Warrior, the GM's just that badass). Give him the first hit, and he'll take down any big scary monster in your way(against some enemies, how you get this first hit can be questionable... but I'm not here to talk about that).

Yes he's a badass, but he's a 145 point badass. You're already spending 100+ points on HQ units for your SMs, why spend another 145 points for another one?

I've considered bringing GKTs into my army a few times. On the plus side, they get to do something that first turn they DS in. They may lose 2 strength, but they gain striking at initiative. However, +6 points per unit and a 60 point brother-captain make it a much more expensive unit, and with much less survivability than those 3++ save assault termies.

Power armoured grey knights though, I'm not so sure about. GKTs at least can fill a slightly modified role that normal terminators would fill, but the PAGKs seem somewhat redundant. Ya they have stormbolters with good range and move-and-shoot capabilities, but how does that jive with the rest of your army? They're also flying rodent gak expensive. Maybe in an all deathwing army they could be cool, but in vanilla marines I think there's better uses of your points that would fit better within the scheme and role of the army.

For the coolness factor (all GKs look bad-fething-ass), I'd definitely find a way to work them in. Those NFWs are just too cool.

That's just my $.02 though, and fueled by a fair amount of booze at that

The Grand Master is the only unit in the Grey Knights worth his points cost. I've said it, there.

PAGKs are brilliant in the right situation (ie, that magic situation where 24" assault 2 is gold), but 10 points for +2 strength and a nice gun is getting a little much.

Really, PAGKs aren't really worth it. Their NFWs don't count as power weapons(except the Justicar), and that's what hurts them the most. If they were power weapons, then that could justify the low attack count, but as it stands, your paying way too much for way too little. Wounding on +2 is nice, but is 10 points worth that much when armour saves are still going to rape your ass?

The termies are great, even if they're overpriced. It would be nice if they could all have thunder hammers as an option, but they'll survive without them. More attacks would help make them worth it, but that's what I say about every GK unit.

But, you know, when you look this cool...

Fafnir wrote:The Grand Master is the only unit in the Grey Knights worth his points cost. I've said it, there.

PAGKs are brilliant in the right situation (ie, that magic situation where 24" assault 2 is gold), but 10 points for +2 strength and a nice gun is getting a little much.

Really, PAGKs aren't really worth it. Their NFWs don't count as power weapons(except the Justicar), and that's what hurts them the most. If they were power weapons, then that could justify the low attack count, but as it stands, your paying way too much for way too little. Wounding on +2 is nice, but is 10 points worth that much when armour saves are still going to rape your ass?

The termies are great, even if they're overpriced. It would be nice if they could all have thunder hammers as an option, but they'll survive without them. More attacks would help make them worth it, but that's what I say about every GK unit.

But, you know, when you look this cool...

He's only worth his points if he insta-gibs an MC. To do so, you have to put him in a retinue, then find a delivery option that isn't just going to get them charged by a tarpit unit or shot to death. This basically means you need to stick them in a land raider, sucking up another 250 points. Without it, you may have difficulty getting the GM into combat with the units where he'll pay his points back. Don't get me wrong the GM is an absolute beast in CC, he's just also beastly expensive. I'd take him against a nidzilla list, or a demonzilla list certainly, but beyond that he's just another CC beast that won't pay back his points.

The GKTs strong suit is versatility. They can dish out some hurt at 24", or even 36" with a BC+psycannon, and a regular termy with psycannon. Then should the enemy get close enough, they can do some hurt in CC as well with their s6 power weapons. Unlike regular terminators that tend to get shredded in CC (all those fists striking last, they tend to fail their saves before they hit anything), GKTs can stand up to a charge. They also have shrouding, which can save them those long-range AT weapons if you place them right.

I agree though that PAGKs are just not worth their points as allies. For 25 points there's much better options out there (<cough> sternguard <cough&gt. However, 2 shots at 24" moving is still nothing to sneeze at. There's just other things I would rather have for the amount that squad will cost me.

Well, against any Greater Daemon not Slaanesh, and with asacred incense, the Grand Master is able to kill each of the greater Daemons without any trouble, all alone. Against Slaanesh, Mathhammer says that he'll be taking about 2 wounds from him, leaving him with one wound left, and since he's only S6, that's not enough to instantly kill the Grand Master. He's able to retaliate and instantly kill him 8 out of 9 times.

Basicly, anything belonging to the forces of Chaos with I5 or less, the Grand Master beats(so long as he has a Sacred Incense, which should be standard, really). Anything with 16, he ties with. With that in mind, even guys like Abaddon will die against the Grand Master(although it will end badly for both sides).

Against anything not Chaos, the Grand Master wins against anything I4 or less, and ties against anything I5. Loses to anything I6 or more, assuming what he's going after is enough to kill him in one assault phase. In other words, if it can't inflict 3 wounds before he gets his turn to attack, then whatever he's fighting is in trouble.

You use him effectivly, and he's probably the best character killer out there(...when not against the eldar...), and even when he's not, he's beastly against the basic troopers too. I know mine has survived all alone against the assault of 20+ daemons at once for a full turn before going down. He went down the next turn, but the fact that he can take on so many at once is testament to the fact that he's beastly.

I love my Grand Master. He's like the only guy in my Grey Knights who ever seems to get good rolls. Maybe it's because of the badass cape I gave him...

the GK are good but are expensive and arnt effective againsed hord

only really useful againsed daemons

i have found that PAGKs murder orks.. 24" str 4, ap 5 assault 2 means that you can run away and shoot em down, when they close you charge them or get charged either way thouse WS5 str 6 attacks are going to hurt the orks like gak with their puny 6+ saves

Only true against footslogging green tide Orks, and the vast majority of Ork players are not playing that.

Grey Knights are like a freaky middle-ground to regular Marines to Sternguard; They can do both jobs decently but not as good as either of those units.