SoulFire1200 wrote:Well I've been playing with Daemon Hunters for a few months now, and I love the army! My friends and I will be playing Apocalypse here in the coming months and I was trying to design a few custom characters for my army. This one being the most significant is the Grand Master I will be using. I'm not completely up to date on all the fluff when it comes to Grey Knights so I apologize if I happen to offend someone or if I am wrong in some area. This guy for me is called the Grand Master of the Ages; I consider him at the top and is unsurpassed in skill and knowledge in the warp. Please leave me some constructitive feed back on what you think of my idea, what could be improved upon, etc. Thanks!
Ah, the Grey Knights. I collected some of 'em a year or so back, used them for allies to my default
SM army. Liked them a good deal, but...eh. I learned rather swiftly that they're a bit too rich for my blood. They've got more dakka than Marines at range, and they've got CQC skills to put a lot of Elite assault troops to shame. Unfortunately, they cost roughly one-and-a-half times as much (both points and dollars) for a squad of ten compared to a Tactical squad, and they're no more durable than your average Marine. Add that to the horrifying lack of real long-rage capabilities in the hands of infantry (I recall facing a Predator with a
GK squad...and facepalming that I would need to roll a 7 on 1D6 if I wanted a glancing hit off its side armor) and the army just felt too situational to me.
Oh well. Sold my Knights to my friend who was going straight-Daemonhunters. I hope he'll have more success than I did, and I've similar hopes for you.
SoulFire1200 wrote:Grand Master of the Ages - 355
Grand Master Stat Line:
WS BS S T W I A Ld Sv
6 5 4(6) 4 4 5 6 10 +2/+3
Erm...right off the bat, I'm not sure him having six attacks is all that (I hate to use the word) realistic. Hell, look at Kharn the Betrayer. The man lives and breathes close combat. He's such a terror in close quarters that his own allies gak their pants if he's charging toward the same position that they are. He's also got a base of five attacks, and that
includes his Mark of Khorne, which gives him one more, so leaving him with an unmodified base of four attacks.
Similarly, you have weapons like a Khornate Daemon Weapon. It gives the user
2D6 attacks, but if
either of those rolls is a 1, all the attacks are negated and the user takes a wound.
All that said, with a baseline of six attacks, when this guy charges in, he gets eight attacks. With a
strength six force weapon. Considering that this guy is also made to eat Daemons and gak religious piety, he can single handedly butcher things like the 888 point An'Ggrath the Unbound in a single round of close combat (and he has seven attacks...at initiative five).
Most characters, generals, etc have a baseline of three attacks. Second-string
HQs might be stuck with only two, but they're also priced so low they belong at Wal Mart. With this guy, I'd say give him four attacks.
Maybe five. But Christ...six? This guy is a powerhouse, I understand that, but he's not a second-generation Primarch.
...how did he get a 3+ invulnerable save, by the way? An Icon of the Just, Iron Halo, or rosaries are the best invulnerable saves that
SM/
DH can get (to my recollection), and those are both 4+. The best semi-standard invulnerable save I've ever seen was on a Necron Wraith, and they only got that 3+ because they were
phasing in and out of reality.
SoulFire1200 wrote:-Any Daemonhunters army may take the Grand Master of the Ages as a single HQ choice of 1750 points or above.
-You may only take one Grand Master of the Ages.
-The Grand Master of the Ages must be fielded as shown and may not take any additional wargear.
Wargear: Master Crafted Nemesis Force Weapon (as wielded by a Grand Master), Terminator Armor, Psycannon, Holy Relic, Purity Seals, Sacred Incense, Frag Grenades, Melta Bombs.
I understand that a few of these aspects are meant to limit his power...but you're not fooling anyone here
He's a special character, no? As in, Master of Ages is his title and his alone? If so, then adding the contingency that you can only have one of him is kind of redundant. If I create a half-priced Titan with the 'drawback' that I can only field one of that type, then, as the skeptic said to the inventor of the feces-powered helicopter, "That gak will not fly."
Why does he need a Holy Relic, too? He's already got an armory strapped to him. Does he really need the True Cross mounted on his back?
SoulFire1200 wrote:Psychic Abilities: Sanctuary, Scourging
Psychic Juggernaut: The Grand Master has such powers over the warp, he gains the Eternal Warrior special rule against demons & the forces of Chaos ONLY, he may also use two psychic abilities per turn (this includes using the Force Weapon ability twice per turn as well). He also has such control psychically, that on the event of Perils of the Warp, he is subject to take only ONE invulnerable save.
That...uhh...sounds kinda Chaotic to me. Most people who have such unbound power over the Warp only have such because of traits that the Imperium doesn't really like. Bear in mind that the Gray Knights only adopt psychic powers as widely as they do because it's so damn important when they spend most of their time fighting daemons and warpspawn. Hell, the Emperor himself showed how much liking he had for hardcore psykers when Magnus the Red contacted him directly to warn him of Horus' treachery...and the Emperor sent
Leman fething Russ and the Space Wolves to "arrest" Magnus. In the same sense that one sends a deep-south lynch mob to "arrest" a black man.
SoulFire1200 wrote:Symbol of the Emperor: The Grand Master may NOT take a transport as it would be considered unbefitting to take a transport as he is the Symbol of Faith!
...what? Ignoring the bizarre logic that by doing anything less than sprinting from destination to destination you may as well be taking a dump on the Golden Throne, this is the same thing as the earlier "Limit 0-1" point I made: It's a false drawback, the same way that Iron Warriors used to be able to "sacrifice" two Fast Attack choices for a fourth Heavy Support. That's like "sacrificing" a Ford Pinto for a Lambo.
SoulFire1200 wrote:Masterful Fist of Peril: The Grand Master of the Ages is THE greatest daemon fighter alive in the Imperium! As such has the preferred enemy & counter-attack trait against any Daemons & forces of Chaos.
Just as far as fluff goes, it wouldn't hurt to downgrade his status as the best thing since sliced bread, if only by a little. Captain Tycho of the Blood Angels has Preferred Enemy against the Orks, but he isn't
the greatest Ork fighter in the Imperium!
SoulFire1200 wrote:The Master Approaches:”The master Approaches, know your place!” The Grand Master is infamous to ALL of Chaos & Daemons across the galaxy; to the extreme that ANY daemon or force of Chaos MUST take a leadership test when trying to assault the Grand Master. If failed, they are paralyzed by his power in the presence of The Master and forfeit any other actions that turn.
...bleh. Again, I'm not fan of absolutisms. Like, at all. Justify the rule itself by saying that he radiates such a powerful aura of faith that he's anathema to anything even remotely Chaos, from unmarked troopers up to Greater Daemons.
That, and summoned daemons are Fearless. You're effectively overriding one of their few remaining characteristics, especially when they're universally close-combat only and therefore
forced to assault if they want to kill him. Then again, you've not included any sort of negative modifier to leadership, so I guess being forced to take a Ld10 test before an assault is alright.
SoulFire1200 wrote:The Unthinkable: In the event he falls in battle, ALL daemonic units that have been destroyed by the Grand Master or his retinue may roll for Deep Strike (+4 DS) as the warp has been shattered and demons vanquished now spill back into reality thirsting for vengeance!
How useful is this to 1) non-Chaos players 2) Chaos players who don't field anything more than a squad or two of daemons or 3) Chaos players who don't field
any daemons? Or, worse yet, 4) any player with now-slain daemons that were killed by the rest of your legion of daemon-killers and not by the four-man squad that features this rule?
If you want to keep a rule like this, make it something different, like hordes of daemons being summoned
because of his death, sensing weakness in Imperial forces and whatnot. Because as it stands, daemons don't leap back into reality once they're banished simply because the one who summoned them died...and
especially not "for vengeance," seeing as the guy's already dead. That sounds a lot more like "for spite."
SoulFire1200 wrote:Bodyguards Stat Line:
WS BS S T W I A Ld Sv
5 4 4(6) 4 2 4 4 10 +2/+4
Deep Strike: Grey Knights often teleport directly into the heart of the opposing force in an attempt to rip the heart out of the enemy army. If no dedicated transport is selected,the Grand Master and his bodyguards may use the deep strike rules found in the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook even in missions that do not normally allow it.
I smell copy/pasta. Either that, or you forgot about your "Transports are for ninnies" rule while you were writing the "you can deep strike as long as you don't have a transport" bit.
SoulFire1200 wrote:Total points w/ Retinue: 595
Wait...what's the point value for Psycannon bolts, icons of the just, etc? Basically, the items you've given the Brother-Captains. Because I've a feeling (don't have my codex on me right now) that if you add it all up, it'll come out to be more than eighty points for each of them.
Phew. That was a bit of a long one. Hope that I contributed something at least semi-useful.
Automatically Appended Next Post: TyraelVladinhurst wrote:wrong, it even says in the apco rule book ANYTHING goes in those sort of battles meaning in you wanted a 30 man GK squad you could
Yes, but standard
Apoc is 1) a number of additional units, like the Imperial Armor lineup, 2) no force organization chart, 3) the ability to mix armies, and 4) some additional optional rules to balance point differences. That's about it.
Everything else, specifically the custom units, is 100% up to your opponent, or if you're up against a few people, a consensus opinion by them. This is why having at least a cordial relationship with opponents is important,
especially if you don't know them. Otherwise, if you want to use literally
any custom units, you're up the creek without a paddle. And that paddle has been replaced
by an angry bear.
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