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Hellebore wrote:
In all honesty, I doubt GW will improve the wraithknight as it costs a lot less in dollars than Imperial knights. It is imo the same reason they downgraded the eldar titans so much.

Don't read too much into anything forgeworld has done recently. Superheavies in particular as it's all a mess and why I suggested using the imperial/chaos knight as a starting point rather than forgeworlds costs.

It's always tempting to just pile broadly applicable buffs onto a unit - more firepower, more toughness, etc, but you'll generally run into the problem of creating something that can't justify not having a hugely inflated cost. With the Deathshroud for instance you could choose one profile to buff rather than both making it either a powerful flamer with a lesser secondary long ranged shot OR a powerful battlecannon with a lesser flamer backup rather than the best of both worlds. Similarly the cost of the fixed invulnerable save against a more limited protection such as shooting only or the move-based eldar titan shields.

Hellebore wrote:
My goals here were twofold - make the eldar knights equal to or slightly superior than imperial ones as they 'should' be. But do so within the scope of the current unit options.

Which is fine, just don't walk the path of Matt Ward. The goal should be that the new eldar knights and imperial knights trade roughly evenly - be that because the eldar knights are better but more expensive, or vulnerable to something the imperial knights are not, or overspecialised in some limiting way, etc.

It's very easy to make something that is simply better. It's not so easy to make something that is fair - and honestly given how much better the imperial knights are than most other things in the game 'fair' is a relative term here.

A.T. wrote:

Hellebore wrote:
In all honesty, I doubt GW will improve the wraithknight as it costs a lot less in dollars than Imperial knights. It is imo the same reason they downgraded the eldar titans so much.

Don't read too much into anything forgeworld has done recently. Superheavies in particular as it's all a mess and why I suggested using the imperial/chaos knight as a starting point rather than forgeworlds costs.

It's always tempting to just pile broadly applicable buffs onto a unit - more firepower, more toughness, etc, but you'll generally run into the problem of creating something that can't justify not having a hugely inflated cost. With the Deathshroud for instance you could choose one profile to buff rather than both making it either a powerful flamer with a lesser secondary long ranged shot OR a powerful battlecannon with a lesser flamer backup rather than the best of both worlds. Similarly the cost of the fixed invulnerable save against a more limited protection such as shooting only or the move-based eldar titan shields.

Hellebore wrote:
My goals here were twofold - make the eldar knights equal to or slightly superior than imperial ones as they 'should' be. But do so within the scope of the current unit options.

Which is fine, just don't walk the path of Matt Ward. The goal should be that the new eldar knights and imperial knights trade roughly evenly - be that because the eldar knights are better but more expensive, or vulnerable to something the imperial knights are not, or overspecialised in some limiting way, etc.

It's very easy to make something that is simply better. It's not so easy to make something that is fair - and honestly given how much better the imperial knights are than most other things in the game 'fair' is a relative term here.

Most of what makes the Imperial Knights so horribly OP is the relics, warlord traits and stratagems, backed up by Imperial Soup giving them huge amounts of CP to work with. Thats not really a worry with Craftworlds, as I've already explained the only real support they have is limited to 3 or 4 psychic powers so there's far less of it.

Personally when it comes to writing rules or adjusting profiles I always think carefully about what the unit is supposed to be and what it's supposed to do and go from there, some quick maths along the way is also healpful in telling you what your new profiles are capable of. It's why I disagree with your attempts to limit Hellebores improvements, the Deathshroud Cannon is meant to be an anti infantry weapon but is also capable of doing damage to vehicles but with it's current profiles it doesn't do much damage in the slightest so both of them need a buff. Points are trickier to work out, but given the Wraithknight is meant to be a super heavy and there's only 4 other super heavies in the game thats remotely useful (Baneblade variants, Questoris Knights, Dominus Knights and the Stormsurge) then you at least have a starting point to work things out.

 Imateria wrote:
It's why I disagree with your attempts to limit Hellebores improvements, the Deathshroud Cannon is meant to be an anti infantry weapon but is also capable of doing damage to vehicles but with it's current profiles it doesn't do much damage in the slightest so both of them need a buff.

Buffing both profiles mean that you need to increase the points to account for both and you end up with a more expensive unit.

And that's fine - but the question has to be do you want a ~500 odd point unit with limitations or a ~600pt unit with all the bells and whistles, or somewhere in between. The only 'bad' outcome is when you have the low cost unit with the high cost benefits because <insert excuse here>

I still think the best minimum changes would be the following:
1) 14" movement
2) equipped with Spirit Stones as standard
3) drop points to 285 (so 295 after you add the Stones)
4) allow them to take up to 2 options from the Heavy Weapons list (so Lances & EMLs as well as Shuricannons, Scatters & Star cannons)

Those would be the changes I'd give them to put them on par with Imperial Knights.

After that, I'd add a few Stratagems.
For example, you could spend 1CP to add +1 to the rolls for Spirit Stones.
Same for the Shield save. 1CP to add +1 to the save, or give a 5++ to a WK without a Shield

-

A.T. wrote:

 Imateria wrote:
It's why I disagree with your attempts to limit Hellebores improvements, the Deathshroud Cannon is meant to be an anti infantry weapon but is also capable of doing damage to vehicles but with it's current profiles it doesn't do much damage in the slightest so both of them need a buff.

Buffing both profiles mean that you need to increase the points to account for both and you end up with a more expensive unit.

And that's fine - but the question has to be do you want a ~500 odd point unit with limitations or a ~600pt unit with all the bells and whistles, or somewhere in between. The only 'bad' outcome is when you have the low cost unit with the high cost benefits because <insert excuse here>

The original post had zero mention of points costs. I would assume the opening post would show the stats and points value of such a unit would be discussed later.

 Daba wrote:
The original post had zero mention of points costs. I would assume the opening post would show the stats and points value of such a unit would be discussed later.

It always seems like a good question to open with, to ascertain if the goal is to create a more powerful but balanced unit or to just wishlist some game-ruining monstrosity. Things like a cc unit that can 1st turn charge through infantry screens are a red flag.

A.T. wrote:

 Daba wrote:
The original post had zero mention of points costs. I would assume the opening post would show the stats and points value of such a unit would be discussed later.

It always seems like a good question to open with, to ascertain if the goal is to create a more powerful but balanced unit or to just wishlist some game-ruining monstrosity. Things like a cc unit that can 1st turn charge through infantry screens are a red flag.

The concepts came from comparing current knight, imperial knight and FW titans - the revenant has a 32" move for example.

But as I've said previously, I'm not super fussed on the specific Movement value.

Conceptually I see the bright stallion like a shining spear knight.

Hellebore wrote:
The concepts came from comparing current knight, imperial knight and FW titans - the revenant has a 32" move for example.

It does, but it's also 2000 points.

Have you tried putting a few of these concepts on a game board and/or running through how you would expect them to play out? As I mentioned to another poster how would things look on the receiving end?

As a broad first look -
-Basic wraithknight - you've pumped it up to knight ++ with the changes but i'm not sure you'd ever take anything but the darkshroud. The ghostglave leadership rule seems superfluous.

-Brightstallion - first turn charge with 12 S10 attacks, ignoring screens. Pulsar lance and secondary means it has just as much firepower as the normal wraithknight rather than being a specialist unit

-Sentinel - can hit the back of the opponents deployment zone with a flamer on turn one, on foot. Not indicated to have any other weapons other than a whole lot of stomp attacks. Not sure how to feel about this one - the knights in general seem to be built to hit what they want when they want with nothing much else that can be said about them without a cost to compare their power against.

-Towering Sentinel - wraithknight +++. I could see it as a named-character type unit where you would expect odd rules, but as a generic unit it seems like extra rules for the sake of extra rules.

A.T. wrote:

Hellebore wrote:
The concepts came from comparing current knight, imperial knight and FW titans - the revenant has a 32" move for example.

It does, but it's also 2000 points.

Have you tried putting a few of these concepts on a game board and/or running through how you would expect them to play out? As I mentioned to another poster how would things look on the receiving end?

As a broad first look -
-Basic wraithknight - you've pumped it up to knight ++ with the changes but i'm not sure you'd ever take anything but the darkshroud. The ghostglave leadership rule seems superfluous.

-Brightstallion - first turn charge with 12 S10 attacks, ignoring screens. Pulsar lance and secondary means it has just as much firepower as the normal wraithknight rather than being a specialist unit

-Sentinel - can hit the back of the opponents deployment zone with a flamer on turn one, on foot. Not indicated to have any other weapons other than a whole lot of stomp attacks. Not sure how to feel about this one - the knights in general seem to be built to hit what they want when they want with nothing much else that can be said about them without a cost to compare their power against.

-Towering Sentinel - wraithknight +++. I could see it as a named-character type unit where you would expect odd rules, but as a generic unit it seems like extra rules for the sake of extra rules.

Basic Wraithknight doesn't have access to the Deathshroud Cannons, only the Skathach does, wich is a separate entry.

 Imateria wrote:
Basic Wraithknight doesn't have access to the Deathshroud Cannons, only the Skathach does, wich is a separate entry.

The GW one is, yes. But they are currently on the posted revised weapon list without that requirement.

Cap invulns vs wraith weapons at 5++.

Or better yet, make all distortion weapons (wraith guns, d-cannon etc) just straight up cause mortal wounds.

 Daba wrote:
Or better yet, make all distortion weapons (wraith guns, d-cannon etc) just straight up cause mortal wounds.

I'm sorta okay with a Wraith Knight doing mortals on-hit.

I am NOT okay with Wraithguard doing mortals on-hit.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Daba wrote:
Or better yet, make all distortion weapons (wraith guns, d-cannon etc) just straight up cause mortal wounds.

I'm sorta okay with a Wraith Knight doing mortals on-hit.

I am NOT okay with Wraithguard doing mortals on-hit.

I would probably lower the 'normal' wounds Wraithguard would do, and leave it off D-Scythes.

The original rules for wraith-cannon was just kill anything on a 4+. Doesn't matter if you were Abaddon, a grot, a bloodthirster or whatever so causing a mortal wound is a real tone down from it's true power.

D weapons are basically vortex grenade launchers.

The only real difference between them is their range, and area of effect/rate of fire.

Otherwise they're just shooting warp portals at things that cut bits out of them like the time travel sphere from the Terminator.

To kill at least a medium tank per turn, Wraithcannons need a 60% damage boost. It can be achieved by either making guns flat damage 6, or choosing between 2d6 best result/BS2+, or making every gun d6 shots instead which would more or less mean WK would be armed with a pair of better Thermal Lances.

As for protection, I'd vote Holofields - an invul against ranged which requires you to move particular distance, and maybe degrades as WK degrades. Scattershield could provide 5++ in melee.

The Suncannon should be like Assault 20 or something like that. And same range as Starcannon. The Wraithcannons I'd make Heavy and higher range - a titan hunter-like weapon. The Glaive, as it does for chaos knights, could give +1WS and +1A. I am not familiar with knight melee weapons much though, super chainswords and harpoons probably beat this anyway.

As for the wounds, I'd put WK between regular Knight and big Knight, at 26W and in-between price.