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Captain Archimedes Solaris of the Dreadknights Ver. 2.0


Brother Archimedes is considered by many to be one of the finest Dreadknight pilots in the Chamber Militant. He has successfully completed more missions than almost any other dreadknight pilot. Many were the daemons that he has sent back to the Warp. But it is not just his physical prowess that has impressed his higher-ups. Archimedes is a born leader, and anyone who has ever done battle by his side has been in awe of both his charisma and his tactical acumen.

One of the reasons why he is held in such high reverence is because he is a very gifted psyker. He could have easily chosen the path of the Librarian, but there was just something about the dreadknight construct that fascinated him. His gift is that he has a natural affinity for all things mechanical and that is what drew him to choose the path of the dreadknight.

Because of his accomplishments, the Ordo Malleus has offered to promote him to the level of Brother-Captain. However, he declined as he wanted to continue serving the Imperium as a member of one of the Grey Knights most honorable institutions - the Dreadknight. To this day, he can be seen leading a company of dreadknights to stamp out locales seriously corrupted by the Warp.


Captain Archimedes Solaris . . . . . . . . 300pts

WS: 6, BS: 5, S: 6, T: 6, W: 5, I: 5, A: 4, Ld: 10, Sv: 2+


Unit Composition: Unique

Unit Type: Monstrous Creature (character)


Wargear:

Dreadknight Armor

Iron Halo

2 Nemesis Doomfists

Personal Teleporter


Options:

May replace 1 Nemesis Doomfist with:

Nemesis Greatsword . . . . . See Grey Knights codex

May take the following gun:

Gatling Psycannon: . . . . . +80pts

The Gatling Psycannon is a prototype weapon. Just like the heavy psycannon, it is designed primarily for use with the dreadknight or on a tank. It uses a double-barrelled approach involving gatling technology to increase the rate of fire. Also, it uses an extended barrel to increase the range of the gun.

Gatling Psycannon . . . . . Range: 24", S: 7, AP: 4, Heavy 8, Rending


Special Rules:

The Aegis

Company of Dread:

Archimedes normally lead units of dreadknights into battle.

Dreadknights count as troops in an army led by Archimedes.

Fearless

Preferred Enemy (Daemons)

Psyker (Mastery Level 2)


Psychic Powers:

Affinity of the Machine Spirit:

One of the main reasons why Archimedes has survived through countless battles with the daemonic forces is because of his awesome psychic gift. It is also because of this power which makes him so unique, as no other in the Imperium is known to have this power. Archimedes can amplify the electrical energies of any and all machinery close to him. In practical applications, that means he can strengthen the energy fields of nearby machinery, including other dreadknights.

All friendly dreadknights or vehicles with an Invulnerable save within 6" of Archimedes, including Archimedes himself, may re-roll failed invuln saves. The psychic power is cast at the beginning of the turn and lasts until the beginning of Archimedes next turn.

Dark Excommunication

Hammerhand

Heavy 8, Rending? Ouch, I like it!

I should not like heavy 8 but there is something about it that i like.

This is OP. Even at 400pts, OP. The Gatling Psycannon should have Gets Hot or something to represent its prototypeness, and make it fairer. Dreadknights as Troops? That is ten dead armies there. And clashes with Draigo and Crowe. Most other armies only have 1 character to do this, such as Logan and Wolf Guard, or Ghraz and Nobz.

Everyone always forgets Canis and his Fenrisian wolf-packs.

While Dreadknights as Troops seems gimmicky I wouldn't cuss myself over facing it, seems like fun. Plus I bet GW would love you if you give the more reasons to sell extra Dreadknights. Still wouldn't ever find me to buying one of them though.

Love the character name btw. Sounds like he could have been a great GK Librarian character too. The only change I'd suggest is limiting the Gatling Psycannon to 24" and/or reducing it to Heavy 6.

Deadshot wrote:This is OP. Even at 400pts, OP. The Gatling Psycannon should have Gets Hot or something to represent its prototypeness, and make it fairer. Dreadknights as Troops? That is ten dead armies there. And clashes with Draigo and Crowe. Most other armies only have 1 character to do this, such as Logan and Wolf Guard, or Ghraz and Nobz.

The gatling psycannon isn't really OP IMO. Basically, a 5-man paladin unit with 2 psycannons, costing only 315pts but with a lot more wounds and attacks, also has 8 rending psycannon shots as well as 6 stormbolter shots. The only advantage of the gatling psycannon is the range but I guess I can reduce it back to 24" if you feel that it is still OP.

Dreadknights as troops, while formidable to some, is not really all that groundbreaking. Any army with meltas, plasmas and lascannons should be able to take them on. The weakness of such an army - a dreadknight army - is the low volume of attacks. They don't do enough damage and can be tied up by tarpit units. Also, they will have problems against fully mech'd opponents as their ranged AT is almost non-existent. They have to rely on assault to bring down tanks or you need some psyfleman dreads in the army, which would then lower the number of dreadknights you can have. On top of that, you need to spend 400pts just to make them scoring. A dreadknight army could be fun, but I don't think it would be near as competitive as a Draigowing build or even assault terminator-Deathwing. Ghaz and PK Nobs will definitely do a number on the dreadknights and if not, then just tie them up with 30 fearless ork boyz.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Greyish wrote:Everyone always forgets Canis and his Fenrisian wolfpacks.

Or Big Meks and Deff Dreads, Pedro and sternguards, Haemonculi and wracks, Dante and Sang. Guards or Tervigon troops.

I could, instead of making dreadknights a troop choice, make them scoring units if you take Archimedes, but then people would probably complain about a GK army with 9 scoring units.

While Dreadknights as Troops seems gimmacky I wouldn't cuss myself over facing it, seems like fun. Plus I bet GW would love you if you give the more reasons to sell extra Dreadknights. Still wouldn't ever get me to buy one of them though.

Love the character name btw. Sounds like he could have been a great GK Librarian character too. The only change I'd suggest is limiting the Gatling Psycannon to 24" and/or reducing it to Heavy 6.

Yeah, I agree it would be fun. It wouldn't be a balanced army - it would do well against some armies and just get clobbered by others - but I think it would be fun to play for those who like an army of monstrous creatures.

Ok, I will reduce the gatling psycannon to 24", but I think the Heavy 8 rending is alright, considering a 220pt strike squad, 280pt interceptor squad or 315pt paladin unit gets Heavy 8 rending and a 280pt purifier unit gets Heavy 16 rending.

Is this character supposed to be apoc only? If he is than he is apoc only than his profile is fine otherwise he is OP and not suitable for standard play.

Firstly, for standard units, giving a high point cost is not a good balance mechanic to balance powerful abilities, considering high point games and cost effective units easily overcome the high cost of the unit. At most you should aim for in a SC is roughly 275-300pts. Negative drawbacks (like taking Crowe to get scoring purifiers) are a generally better balance mechanic to powerful abilities.

Secondly, I’m not digging the Gatling psycannon. It’s a little too much dakka for a character MC/walker. I would personally downgrade this to a normal dreadknight psycannon and lower his points accordingly.

Thirdly, Dreadknights as troops is probably a bit much considering Dreadknights are a high end heavy support choice and would be akin to having CSM Defilers or Vulnerable/Ironclad Dreadnaughts counts as troops. It’s also possible for someone to abuse this rule and create a fairly unbeatable “super mech/walker list”. Personally I would rewrite this rule to make Dreadknights counts as scoring instead of troops (and lower his points cost instead. )

jy2 wrote: Pedro and sternguards,

Not the same. These otjher oses have a box in the army list sasy "If you take a big Mek, a single deff Dred may be taken as troops.

Kantor has Chapter Tatics that give Stubborn, and all Sternies gain Hold The Line, which lets them hold objectives and still be elites.

candy.man wrote:Is this character supposed to be apoc only? If he is than he is apoc only than his profile is fine otherwise he is OP and not suitable for standard play.

Firstly, for standard units, giving a high point cost is not a good balance mechanic to balance powerful abilities, considering high point games and cost effective units easily overcome the high cost of the unit. At most you should aim for in a SC is roughly 275-300pts. Negative drawbacks (like taking Crowe to get scoring purifiers) are a generally better balance mechanic to powerful abilities.

Secondly, I’m not digging the Gatling psycannon. It’s a little too much dakka for a character MC/walker. I would personally downgrade this to a normal dreadknight psycannon and lower his points accordingly.

Thirdly, Dreadknights as troops is probably a bit much considering Dreadknights are a high end heavy support choice and would be akin to having CSM Defilers or Vulnerable/Ironclad Dreadnaughts counts as troops. It’s also possible for someone to abuse this rule and create a fairly unbeatable “super mech/walker list”. Personally I would rewrite this rule to make Dreadknights counts as scoring instead of troops (and lower his points cost instead. )

He is a need-permission-from-your-opponent type of character. Whether apoc or regular, I believe that all new units require the consent of your opponent in order for you to use them. Thus, show it to your opponent before the game. If he is ok with it, then you get to use him. If not, then use him as just a regular dreadknight. Or you could say, "I want to test out this new character that I made. Want to play-test against it with me?"

I know the norm for a character is 275-300pts, but there are always exceptions, especially if the character is a monstrous creature. However, if I wanted to fit him into the sub-300 range, most likely I would have to remove his "Brother-Captain" status. Thus, I would have to create an entirely new character from scratch as well as new fluff. I may just do that...but I'd much rather do it in an entirely new thread.

But IMO, I think his high costs balances out his special rules. He is, after all, a monstrous creature that is vulnerable to lascannons, meltas and plasmas and he isn't an Eternal Warrior (most people creating special characters seem to think that all new creations must be Eternal Warriors). He is vulnerable to force weapons, the Swarmlord, Skulltaker and other characters/units/weapons that causes Instant Death.

The Gatling Psycannon is nowhere near OP considering he is a 400pt unit. For only 20pts more, you can get 15 purifiers with 6 psycannons. That's 24 rending shots! I priced it (the gatling psycannon) at around 50pts, so by reducing it to a regular heavy psycannon won't cut down much on it's cost. Frankly, I think the gatling psycannon is alright. It is actually what I envision the original heavy psycannon to be.

Having the dreadknight as a troop choice is no different than having paladins or purifiers as troops. IMO purifiers should be the rarest of them all, yet almost every 3rd GK army is a Crowe army with all purifier troops. Having dreadknights as troops honestly won't break the game, no more than having paladins as troops will. However, I can change Company of Dread to make them scoring rather than troop choices:

Company of Dread: Archimedes normally lead units of dreadknights into battle. Dreadknights count as scoring in an army led by Archimedes.

I must say, though, that I feel that this may make the army even stronger on the whole, as now you can have 9 scoring units (15 if you combat-squad), and that is even before Grand Strategy.

I must petition to dropping the points cost as well...combining a kitted out Dreadknight with the cost of a Brother Captain is far less than what you have proposed here. I would say that at most, this character should be ~350 points, probably less...you could say that as is without the Gatling Psycannon he would be 300 points and with the Gatling Psycannon he would be 350 points.

All in all, a very flavorful Character and something I wouldn't mind tossing on the field. Keep up the good work.

My concern is that if the cost is low, people may complain about him being OP. If I'm going to reduce his cost, I feel that I need to reduce some of his abilities as well. Don't forget, not only is he a combination of a brother-captain (150pts) and a dreadknight (130pts), but he's got a personal teleporter (70pts) and Nemesis Greatsword (25pts) as well as the Gatling Psycannon (50pts). Thus far, he is about 425pts, and that's not including the fact that he is a Level 2 Psyker and has the Affinity of the Machine Spirit and Company of Dread special rules. Heck, I'd give the Company of Dread special rule for free, as a lot of HQ's give such a boon to their army without seeming to add to their cost.

I guess I'll just re-do him in this thread. The only way I see of reducing his cost is to remove some of his Brother-Captain abilities.


This is the original character:

jy2 wrote:

Brother-Captain Archimeded Solaris . . . . . . . . 400pts

WS: 6, BS: 5, S: 6, T: 6, W: 5, I: 5, A: 4, Ld: 10, Sv: 2+


Unit Composition: 1 Dreadknight Brother-Captain

Unit Type: Monstrous Creature (character)


Wargear:

Dreadknight Armor

Gatling Psycannon:

The Gatling Psycannon is a prototype weapon. Just like the heavy psycannon, it is designed primarily for use with the dreadknight or on a tank. It uses a double-barrelled approach involving gatling technology to increase the rate of fire. Also, it uses an extended barrel to increase the range of the gun.

Gatling Psycannon . . . . . Range: 24", S: 7, AP: 4, Heavy 8, Rending

-- Edit --

Reduced the range of the Gatling Psycannon from 36" to 24".

Iron Halo

Nemesis Greatsword

Personal Teleporter


Special Rules:

The Aegis

Company of Dread:

Archimedes normally lead units of dreadknights into battle.

Dreadknights count as scoring in an army led by Archimedes.

This is the revised version:

Captain Archimedes Solaris of the Dreadknights Ver. 2.0


Brother Archimedes is considered by many to be one of the finest Dreadknight pilots in the Chamber Militant. He has successfully completed more missions than almost any other dreadknight pilot. Many were the daemons that he has sent back to the Warp. But it is not just his physical prowess that has impressed his higher-ups. Archimedes is a born leader, and anyone who has ever done battle by his side has been in awe of both his charisma and his tactical acumen.

One of the reasons why he is held in such high reverence is because he is a very gifted psyker. He could have easily chosen the path of the Librarian, but there was just something about the dreadknight construct that fascinated him. His gift is that he has a natural affinity for all things mechanical and that is what drew him to choose the path of the dreadknight.

Because of his accomplishments, the Ordo Malleus has offered to promote him to the level of Brother-Captain. However, he declined as he wanted to continue serving the Imperium as a member of one of the Grey Knights most honorable institutions - the Dreadknight. To this day, he can be seen leading a company of dreadknights to stamp out locales seriously corrupted by the Warp.


Captain Archimedes Solaris . . . . . . . . 300pts

WS: 6, BS: 5, S: 6, T: 6, W: 5, I: 5, A: 4, Ld: 10, Sv: 2+


Unit Composition: Unique

Unit Type: Monstrous Creature (character)


Wargear:

Dreadknight Armor

Iron Halo

2 Nemesis Doomfists

Personal Teleporter


Options:

May replace 1 Nemesis Doomfist with:

Nemesis Greatsword . . . . . See Grey Knights codex

May take the following gun:

Gatling Psycannon: . . . . . +80pts

The Gatling Psycannon is a prototype weapon. Just like the heavy psycannon, it is designed primarily for use with the dreadknight or on a tank. It uses a double-barrelled approach involving gatling technology to increase the rate of fire. Also, it uses an extended barrel to increase the range of the gun.

Gatling Psycannon . . . . . Range: 24", S: 7, AP: 4, Heavy 8, Rending


Special Rules:

The Aegis

Company of Dread:

Archimedes normally lead units of dreadknights into battle.

Dreadknights count as troops in an army led by Archimedes.

Fearless

Preferred Enemy (Daemons)

Psyker (Mastery Level 2)


Psychic Powers:

Affinity of the Machine Spirit:

One of the main reasons why Archimedes has survived through countless battles with the daemonic forces is because of his awesome psychic gift. It is also because of this power which makes him so unique, as no other in the Imperium is known to have this power. Archimedes can amplify the electrical energies of any and all machinery close to him. In practical applications, that means he can strengthen the energy fields of nearby machinery, including other dreadknights.

All friendly dreadknights or vehicles with an Invulnerable save within 6" of Archimedes, including Archimedes himself, may re-roll failed invuln saves. The psychic power is cast at the beginning of the turn and lasts until the beginning of Archimedes next turn.

Dark Excommunication

Hammerhand

Dont post the upgrade cost of REAL upgrades. This forum is not suppossed to be a substitute for a codex, but posting

Nemisis Greatsword...Xpts

does this.

It is ok to give him a Greartsword. The Gatling is nopt as OP as I thought. I thought it wwas blast, to keep it in line with Heavy Psycannons.


He works great now. 275 would keep Draigo the most expensive Character, which he was suppossed to be by a long shot, in the same manner as Logan and Calagr are 50-75pts more expensive tahn any other character, minimum.

I like the revisions made to his profile and the fact that his base profile is 300, with the upgrades being optional (the average person will only take 1 or 2 upgrades under the new profile). He’s kind of like a hybrid between Bjorn and a 6th edition C’Tan.

My only recommendation at this point is perhaps lower his wounds to 4 and his cost to 275 points. 5 wounds is a bit much for an Astartes, even if they are an SC Dreadknight ( It makes him a little too durable).

Psyker, dreadknight, captain HQ...

I love it!

I really like the second profile. It make's for a very unique SC that I really wish to field, now I gotta get some dreadknights...thanks :/

I love this idea, cool name too!
If only I thought of this idea... Jokes

Thanks everyone for your compliments, comments and criticisms as well.

Deadshot wrote:Dont post the upgrade cost of REAL upgrades. This forum is not suppossed to be a substitute for a codex, but posting

Nemisis Greatsword...Xpts

does this.

It is ok to give him a Greartsword. The Gatling is nopt as OP as I thought. I thought it wwas blast, to keep it in line with Heavy Psycannons.


He works great now. 275 would keep Draigo the most expensive Character, which he was suppossed to be by a long shot, in the same manner as Logan and Calagr are 50-75pts more expensive tahn any other character, minimum.

Ok, I'll go back and X out some of the upgrades.

I feel that the greatsword should be mandatory, but as some people want him to be sub-300pts, I've decided to make his wargear as options.

I feel that a dreadknight character should be more expensive than a regular character, just like a named Greater Daemon character (Fateweaver, Skarbrand, etc.) is more expensive than a regular daemon character. Because while unique MEQ characters are based off of a normal marine, the dreadknight character is based off of a dreadknight. Inherently, he has much better stats and abilities to start off with.

candy.man wrote:I like the revisions made to his profile and the fact that his base profile is 300, with the upgrades being optional (the average person will only take 1 or 2 upgrades under the new profile). He’s kind of like a hybrid between Bjorn and a 6th edition C’Tan.

My only recommendation at this point is perhaps lower his wounds to 4 and his cost to 275 points. 5 wounds is a bit much for an Astartes, even if they are an SC Dreadknight ( It makes him a little too durable).

For those who want to play him at 4W and 275pts, feel free to. I am of the opinion that special characters can and should have more wounds than normal. For example, Swarmlord has 1 more wound than a tyrant, Crowe 1 more wound than a regular Brotherhood Champion, Draigo and Mordrak 1 more wound than a grandmaster. While this is not a requirement for all named characters, the fact that Archimedes is not an IC and cannot join another squad for protection means that he could sure use the extra wound for survivability, especially considering his cost.

You could make the company of dreads rule that you can take dreadknights in squads of up to three and the Archimedes can join these squads.

On the whole, I’d drop the gatling psycannon idea as I think it’s a bit much really. Boost his cost to 450 and have him make dreadknights troops. The idea of an all dreadknight army is just too good. Or make it that not only does he make dreadknights troops, but that an army containing Archimedes may only take dreadknights (as troops) and paladins (as elites), stormravens (as FA) and landraiders (as HS).

Blood Angel 17 wrote:You could make the company of dreads rule that you can take dreadknights in squads of up to three and the Archimedes can join these squads.

I think people will complain more if I let the army take more dreadknights. People are already complaining about making them troops so that you can take 6 of them.

Besides, making Archimedes sort of like an IC may make him a little too hard to kill.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Artemo wrote:On the whole, I’d drop the gatling psycannon idea as I think it’s a bit much really. Boost his cost to 450 and have him make dreadknights troops. The idea of an all dreadknight army is just too good. Or make it that not only does he make dreadknights troops, but that an army containing Archimedes may only take dreadknights (as troops) and paladins (as elites), stormravens (as FA) and landraiders (as HS).

Not sure if you saw it, but there's actually a v2.0 of this character already. Seems like more people want him cheaper so that I left most of his wargear as options instead. I will go ahead and change the very first post to reflect the changes.

IMO, the gatling psycannon isn't OP at all. Think about it. 5x Paladins can take 2 psycannons for the same number of shots. They only cost 315pts. How about 5 purifiers with 2 psycannons at 140pts or 10 purifiers with 4 psycannons for 280pts? Other units can put out the same number of shots at a lot cheaper price tag. The only advantage is that Archimedes can move 12" while doing so. In addition, all those units have stormbolter shots for support. As Archimedes is currently (with gatling psycannon), his cost is 350pts. What I can probably do is raise the price of the gatling psycannon (currently 50pts) to maybe 80pts (2x the heavy psycannon).

Originally, I had him making dreadknights as troops, but people started to complain about that. So then I've changed it to make them scoring instead (so you can only take 3 instead of 6) and people seemed to like that better. So now it's more like Grand Strategy except it always make 3 units (in this case, dreadknights only) scoring. I think I may leave it like this unless someone else suggests otherwise. So far, it's 2 for scoring and 2 (me and you) for troops.

An army with, for the most part, dreadknights, paladins, LR's and SR's may be near unplayable, especially at lower points levels. These units just get to be too expensive. I think I'm going to keep it simple and not make any more changes that may complicate the army.

As it is now, I don't think it's overpowered at all. In fact, since it costs 400 points, I would never field it - it's hard enough to fit Draigo in at 275, let alone a 400 point HQ which would pretty much guarantee no other HQ choices would be taken. That said, in the context of building an army, i would say it is well balanced or perhaps even not good enough for it's points.

As for this guy making Dreadknights into troops, I also don't see why that is OP, either. Lets say that a DK, on average is 200 points depending on wargear. That means that to filed 6 of them plus this HQ, you'd need to spend in the region of 1600 points just to get 7 models on the table.

Now, I invested in a DK and after some use have discovered to my dismay that it simply isn't good enough in any one department to make it a viable counter to anything - an opponent could take it out with a unit that costs far less points. These things also do not have good enough invulnerable saves and because of their size find it very difficult to get any cover saves either. Also, force weapons eat these guys for breakfast. In fact, anything that is AP2 or better will have an easy time taking wounds off these guys. Due to their lack of attacks, they can get tarpitted easily, too. There is no way that DK as troops is OP.

The only way that this army would stand a chance of doing well would be using psychic communion for reserves to time late arrivals onto the board and/or last minute 30" jumps to grab objectives. Very one sided strategy and due to the number of points you'd have to spend to field this kind of army, your opponent would be able to field way more models that you. In fact, the cheapest units yielding the largest number of bodies would be the best bet against these guys so you could easily fight for objectives.

So, I think that it's an interesting and well balanced idea for an HQ. I just wouldn't use it because I don't think it's worth 400 points, even if able to make other DKs into troops and especially not if they're only scoring because then I'd have to spend even more points getting actual troops.

Bah, looks like you changed him whilst I was typing...

There's not too many named characters with options nowadays though - so far as I can tell all the new codices have named characters with fixed wargear or a choice between two fixed sets, occasionally one upgrade. So I'd prefer him with fixed wargear.

Although I'm not really (or indeed at all) a 'background geek', I think the idea of a prototype enhanced psycannon rather conflicts with the idea that the Imperium creates nothing new, rather just preserves and scavenges from the past. And while I agree that the effect is similar to 2 psycannon, I think GW probably made the heavy psycannon large blast rather than 4 or 6 Heavy for a reason.

Running (say) 6 dreadknights as troops plus Archie might be quite nasty, but would be (if they all have incinerator or heavy psycannon plus swords and a teleporter) c.1600 points + Archie. So at 2000 you'd probably be running 6 plus Archie. That's only 24 wounds plus 4 or 5 for Archie. Sure, they're all 2+/5++, but it's comparable with what Deathwing would bring to the party and they'll find it quite hard to get cover saves from low AP.

I just like the idea of a six model army... I'm not sure it would actually be horribly overpowered (a biot overpowered, maybe, but not as ridiculous as it might at first seem).

If you make Dreadknights troops, then that is 660pts minmium to just get the 2 troops and him, and that is with Bare Bones.

Ok, so now its dreadknight troops:4, scoring heavy support dreadknights:2. Troop dreadknights for the win! Back to the original rules for the Company of Dread special rule.

@ColdSadHungry:

I agree. I don't think Archimedes making dreadknights into troops is OP virtually because of the high costs of the units.

Artemo wrote:There's not too many named characters with options nowadays though - so far as I can tell all the new codices have named characters with fixed wargear or a choice between two fixed sets, occasionally one upgrade. So I'd prefer him with fixed wargear.

I agree. Originally I had him with fixed wargear, but because people wanted him cheaper, I decided to make them (the wargear) optional. This is the equipment as intended originally: iron halo, gatling psycannon, personal teleporter and nemesis greatsword. Cost would have been (calulated using the revised rules) 405pts.

There are a few characters with options, but these options are usually limited: Marneus Calgar, Bjorn, Njal. Perhaps I will drop some of the other options (heavy incinerator and nemesis daemonhammer) to limit his options as well.

Artemo wrote:
Although I'm not really (or indeed at all) a 'background geek', I think the idea of a prototype enhanced psycannon rather conflicts with the idea that the Imperium creates nothing new, rather just preserves and scavenges from the past. And while I agree that the effect is similar to 2 psycannon, I think GW probably made the heavy psycannon large blast rather than 4 or 6 Heavy for a reason.

The reason I'm changing the heavy psycannon is because I think it stinks. I don't know what GW was originally thinking. They basically gave the dreadknight 3 anti-infantry guns. WTF?!? These guys were probably inhaling too much paint fumes when writing the rules for the dreadknight. What makes more sense is a gun for anti-infantry and a gun for anti-tank. I'm just trying to rectify what I think is poor design on GW's part. Whatever ther reason GW had for making the heavy psycannon a large blast, I think it's kinda stupid.

Give him a daemon hammer/great sword

s re-roll every think
10

I think Affinity of the Machine Spirit is too much on him. With 4+ and Affinity I have no idea how can you claim he is 'vulnerable to lascannons'. In fact he is one of the most lacannon-proof MCs in the game. He is more durable than Avatar and he has built in semi-Fortune. Better yet, it's area fortune. I think it's too much for a whole potential army of MC.
Small arms fire is close to useless against T6 2+ models and Affinity is also giving them a bit too much protection against heavy weapons.

Macok wrote:I think Affinity of the Machine Spirit is too much on him. With 4+ and Affinity I have no idea how can you claim he is 'vulnerable to lascannons'. In fact he is one of the most lacannon-proof MCs in the game. He is more durable than Avatar and he has built in semi-Fortune. Better yet, it's area fortune. I think it's too much for a whole potential army of MC.
Small arms fire is close to useless against T6 2+ models and Affinity is also giving them a bit too much protection against heavy weapons.

He's not a Dreadknight or a vehicle thought, so affinity doesn't work on himself RAW.

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

Macok wrote:I think Affinity of the Machine Spirit is too much on him. With 4+ and Affinity I have no idea how can you claim he is 'vulnerable to lascannons'. In fact he is one of the most lacannon-proof MCs in the game. He is more durable than Avatar and he has built in semi-Fortune. Better yet, it's area fortune. I think it's too much for a whole potential army of MC.
Small arms fire is close to useless against T6 2+ models and Affinity is also giving them a bit too much protection against heavy weapons.

He's not a Dreadknight or a vehicle thought, so affinity doesn't work on himself RAW.

Check again. Unit: 1 Dreadknight.

He's a Dreadknight so it does work on him.

Still, RAW he isn't a Dreadknight, so by saying the unit composes of 1 DREADKNIGHT, he can't be fielded, cause his unit is actually a regular Dreadknight.

@All:

The intent is that Affinity does work on him (Archimedes). I will go back and edit the RAW as such. If anyone else doesn't think that Archimedes should be able to re-roll his own Inv, please let me know and I will take it into consideration.

IMO, while Affinity does make him strong, he is in no ways OP if the opponent takes a balanced list. Basically, a re-rollable 4++ is equal to a 3++ and that is if the psychic power doesn't get nullified. Just think of him as the Grey Knight version of Fateweaver, only not as good (i.e. Fateweaver has a re-rollable 3++ save, allows daemons within 6" to re-roll all saves and cannot be canceled). He is no more impervious to small-arms fire than Mephiston or a normal dreadknight is.

And dreadknights around him only get to re-roll their Inv saves. Basically, a re-rollable 5++ is like a 4+ cover save against shooting.

One of the main weaknesses of an army of dreadknights is their resilience. Although T6 2+ is highly survivable against small-arms fire, dreadknights have little staying power against low-AP weaponry and power weapons (fists). Affinity was designed to address this issue and give them a fighting chance against such armies. Otherwise, they just fall apart like a house of cards against any army that even has a modicum of these guns (and many good armies spam them). BTW, given the size of these guys, it is practically impossible to give them cover unless they're hiding behind each other (and then you can pick off the knight in the front) or a land raider.

nurglerulesslaneshdrools wrote:Give him a daemon hammer/great sword

s re-roll every think
10

Unfortunately, that does not work. When you have 2 special weapons, you can only choose to use 1 or the other, but not both.