How to beat grey knights?

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**tamo71**

I play Spacewolves. I H.A.T.E. playing grey knights. Personally i find their codex broken and i get completely shot to gak by turn 3 and then the F-ing purifiers kill me. A good friend of mine uses riflemen dreadnoughts and purifiers and i cant win. I dont know what to do about the psy-cannons and halberds.

**Draigo**

What list are you using? Itd be easier to help if we know what your working with.

**serotol**

ill put this really simple, long fangs, rune priest, hammernators.
i play gk since they where deamonhunters, they suffer from long range shooting mostly

**jy2**

While grey knights are good all-around, nobody does shooting quite like the Space Wolves. If you go for shooty wolves, you can actually beat the GK's in the shooting department.

Or....grey hunters in squads max squads will beat 5-man GK squads. If you assault, double or even triple-team them.

I can give more specific advice if you can give us an idea of what you and your opponent runs.

**tamo71**

Ok, i run 3 squads of WG. in each squad there is one termie w/ CML and CF and 5 PA guys with BP/CS. I have one Ven dread with PC and CQC fist. i have one more squad of WG that consists of 4 termies, Logan, and a RP with JOTWW and living lightning. I also have a 3man squad of TWC and a drop pod for one squad, usually depends from day to day.

**Panzerboy26**

A Rune Priest will go for miles against them. Gives 50/50 shot of stopping all those Fortitudes, Hammerhands, Force Weaopn activations, and Cleansing Flames with 24" (the range that GKs need to be within to be killing you).

If you're going to assault them, Storm Shields are the order of the day. This means either Thunderwolves or Wolf Guard Termies. Both are capable of wading into most GK units, eating their hits, and then having enough of the unit alive to hit back and inflict real damage. If you're going to use Thunderwolves, I'd heavily suggest making sure they engage under the umbrella of a Rune Priest, as stopping Hammerhand/Force Weapon activations will REALLY help the survivability of the unit vs Purifiers and the like.

For shooting, it's already been said, but yes, Long Fangs. 140pts gets you a 6 man unit with 5 Missile Launchers. 420pts buys you 15 Missile Launchers. Put them near the back, and focus fire on whatever looks most offensive.

**Flavius Infernus**

To emphasize what others have said, a purifier is T4 with a 3+ armor save. Against shooting, purifiers die to exactly the same things that kill other space marines.

But they cost more, so you don't have to shoot down as many.

Shoot them.

**im2randomghgh**

LONG FANGS.

ML/Plasma cannon spam.

**-666-**

A Bear Lord mounted on a Thunderwolf with a stormshield and thunderhammer attached to a full squad of Thunderwolves with stormshields can be hard for GK to handle. Definitely a Rune Priest or two for the dispel on 4+ will give them fits. If you really want to mess with their psychic powers then take Njal for the 3+ to dispel.

**Joe Mama**

serotol wrote: hammernators.

Are extremely overpriced in the Space Wolves codex. There is no reason to ever take them.

**im2randomghgh**

Joe Mama wrote:
serotol wrote: hammernators.

Are extremely overpriced in the Space Wolves codex. There is no reason to ever take them.

...unless they're mounted on thunderwulf

**Joe Mama**

Panzerboy26 wrote:Storm Shields are the order of the day. This means either Thunderwolves or Wolf Guard Termies.

The Storm Shields on WG Terminators costs an arm and a leg and a torso and a head. I mean they are too expensive it is crazy to purchase them for terminators in this codex.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

im2randomghgh wrote:
Joe Mama wrote:
serotol wrote: hammernators.

Are extremely overpriced in the Space Wolves codex. There is no reason to ever take them.

...unless they're mounted on thunderwulf

That would be thunderwolf calvary, not a terminator then. since terminators can't ride on the wolves.

**im2randomghgh**

That would be thunderwolf calvary, not a terminator then. since terminators can't ride on the wolves.

oh, I thought you meant thunderhammers specifically, rather than the hammernators.

**-666-**

Basically why take Wolfguard terminators when you can take Thunderwolves? The Thunderwolves perform much better versus GK from what I've seen.

**Panzerboy26**

*Shrug* It's simply my experience that people in general are far more likely to own Terminator models than they are Thunderwolf models.

Thunderwolves are certainly the better way to go, but Wolf Guard Termies can still have Storm Shields, and they can work for the express purpose beating down some Grey Knights.

**Joe Mama**

But Wolf Guard Terminators with Storm shields cost ALOT of points. A hammer and a shield pushes them over 60 points each I think. 50% more than a space marine hammernator dude.

Thunderwolf calvary are easy to make anyways, i fyou have no standards like I do. Just put a marine on some suitably sized farm animal from a toddler's toy set. Done!

**Draigo**

I have yet to see a fully kitted twc vs a draigo unit. Kinda interesting espeacially if the twc are rocking 2 lords.

**Roboute**

tamo71 wrote:Ok, i run 3 squads of WG. in each squad there is one termie w/ CML and CF and 5 PA guys with BP/CS. I have one Ven dread with PC and CQC fist. i have one more squad of WG that consists of 4 termies, Logan, and a RP with JOTWW and living lightning. I also have a 3man squad of TWC and a drop pod for one squad, usually depends from day to day.

Based on this list, I can see why you're having trouble against a Purifer/Psyfleman spam.

The Good:
- You have a Rune Priest. This should go a long way against GK, but you need to run him in a squad that isn't going to end up in CC. If the Purifiers punk him (which they can do fairly easily) his protection goes away.
- You have TWC. A larger squad would probably be better, but TWC are TWC.

The Bad:
- No transports. Your Wolf Guard set up kind of makes using them impossible, because Terminators can't ride in Rhinos or Razors. This causes two more problems:
- Lack of armor means his Psyflemen can focus on the Ven Dread, and I'm assuming it doesn't live very long in the games you play.
- Lack of mobility means he can outmaneuver you.
- Too many toys, not enough boys. Wolf guard are great and all, and it looks like you've got a great theme running, but Wolf Guard just aren't cost effective enough to base an army around. They have a ton of flexibility, but they pay for that flexibility out the rear end. And in this list, you aren't even using their flexibility, they're just Assault Marines with an extra attack and no mobility! (Read: not super effective). You're also running Logan and a RP, which add up to a bunch of points.

Overall:
This list just doesn't have the tools to take on Purifiers/Psyflemen and win. If you were able to shoot everyone you wanted to shoot and charge everyone you wanted to charge it might work, but the 6" movement of the army ensures that this will not happen. I think I get where you're trying to go with the list (a bunch of tough veterans under the command of Logan), but if you want to be able to fight Purifiers the list is unworkable as-is.

As a side note, this is why I get it when people say GK are overpowered. Once you get to tournament-level competition, other lists are just as hardcore as GK, but in casual gameplay, a fluffy list like this doesn't have much chance against even a poorly built Purifier list.

Suggestions:
It seems like you're playing at around 1500 points. I'm going to try to give some suggestions that will work at this point level and keep the theme of your army intact while letting you compete against Purifier spam. Your options against this list is to either outshoot it or outassault it, and you won't be able to outassault it without more TWC or a lot more bodies, and it seems like you wouldn't want to turn this list into Grey Hunter spam, so you're left with outshooting it. If you're dead set on Logan, you can work him into a counterassault unit and use it to plug the gap when he tries to curb your torrent of firepower.

- Long Fangs w/ 5 ML. As others have already mentioned, there an extremely cost-effective and competitive unit that works against both Dreads and Purifiers. Also, they're hard-bitten veterans that are some of the most experienced members of the Space Wolf chapter, so they definitely fit with a veteran Logan army. Since you already have Wolf Guard with Cyclones, you could attach them to the Long Fangs for even more ranged killyness. I would suggest 2 squads of Long Fangs in a 1500 point army, 3 would be more effective but also spammy.
- I don't have any personal experience against it, but I've heard people talk about a Loganstar - Logan and a Long Fang squad with multi-meltas in a Drop Pod that comes down and has Logan make them Relentless. I don't know how effective it is, but it sure sounds cool.
- Transports. Get the Terminators out of your PA Wolf Guard squads and mount them up.
- If you don't already, put the Ven Dread in the drop pod. If you have a MM, use it. He can drop down and threaten the enemy immediately, giving the opponent less time to deal with him and taking some heat off your other vehicles.
- If you want to keep your core as Wolf Guard squads, they'll need a major overhaul to become worth taking. 5 dudes with BP/CCW just doesn't cut it. If you're looking to maximize your shooting, go for combi-weapons (meltas for tanks, plasma for Purifiers), and throw in a few fists, because you'll be striking last anyways and wont' get an extra CC attack anyways. The squad will still be overcosted for what it does, but at least it will be able to do something.

**Panzerboy26**

Joe Mama wrote:But Wolf Guard Terminators with Storm shields cost ALOT of points. A hammer and a shield pushes them over 60 points each I think. 50% more than a space marine hammernator dude.

Thunderwolf calvary are easy to make anyways, i fyou have no standards like I do. Just put a marine on some suitably sized farm animal from a toddler's toy set. Done!

Well I wouldn't give them Thunder Hammers, prolly either Power Weapons or Wolf Claws. The OP said he was having issues with Purifiers, not Paladins. Still expensive, but not as much so as with Thunder Hammers, and still workable with the models he's stated to have.

**im2randomghgh**

Panzerboy26 wrote:
Joe Mama wrote:But Wolf Guard Terminators with Storm shields cost ALOT of points. A hammer and a shield pushes them over 60 points each I think. 50% more than a space marine hammernator dude.

Thunderwolf calvary are easy to make anyways, i fyou have no standards like I do. Just put a marine on some suitably sized farm animal from a toddler's toy set. Done!

Well I wouldn't give them Thunder Hammers, prolly either Power Weapons or Wolf Claws. The OP said he was having issues with Purifiers, not Paladins. Still expensive, but not as much so as with Thunder Hammers, and still workable with the models he's stated to have.

Well the Int won't won't help him against GK so he may have to rely on wounding 2+

**Panzerboy26**

im2randomghgh wrote:
Panzerboy26 wrote:
Joe Mama wrote:But Wolf Guard Terminators with Storm shields cost ALOT of points. A hammer and a shield pushes them over 60 points each I think. 50% more than a space marine hammernator dude.

Thunderwolf calvary are easy to make anyways, i fyou have no standards like I do. Just put a marine on some suitably sized farm animal from a toddler's toy set. Done!

Well I wouldn't give them Thunder Hammers, prolly either Power Weapons or Wolf Claws. The OP said he was having issues with Purifiers, not Paladins. Still expensive, but not as much so as with Thunder Hammers, and still workable with the models he's stated to have.

Well the Int won't won't help him against GK so he may have to rely on wounding 2+

True, but the weapons are significantly cheaper and still ignore saves. 10pts less per model, and only wounding on a 4+ with a re-roll is a pretty good trade-off for not wounding on a 2+, I think.

**Zalmout**

They lack long range fire power, stack up on dem long fangs, hammernators and runepriests. They will shut them down, especially with the mix of psykers and med range fire power. Although a plethora of low AP weapons can be quite effective as well.

**Hyd**

Quality post by Roboute. Can't add much after that.

**Illumini**

Draigo wrote:I have yet to see a fully kitted twc vs a draigo unit. Kinda interesting espeacially if the twc are rocking 2 lords.

It looses horribly, even if it doesn't get completely shafted by the psych grenades. As I said in another thread, there is NOTHING in the game that can take down a full-sized draigostar in close combat

**labmouse42**

This is from the 11th company blog, and I think gives you a good summary of how to approach the horde approach.
http://11thcompany.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2012-01-12T06:11:00-08:00&max-results=7

For your horde, I would bring 60 grey hunters, each squad with 2 PG, or 2 MG.
You might also want to bring 10-20 wolf guard, and 15 long fangs.
I was listening to one SW player on a podcast talk about how he is using wolf guard cyclones instead of long fangs as you can hide them in squads and they can move and shoot. That's something to consider.

The Horde Approach

This will be the last article in the series and covers the final approach that I think works very well when considering how to defeat Grey Knights. In a lot of ways, this final approach actually works very well with a lot of other armies as well. The Horde Approach is really an extension of the Sustained Durability approach. I’m singling it out as a special type because I think it warrants further discussion.

The Horde Approach is probably NOT the first thing that comes to your mind. When I say Horde, most people go directly to Orks and Tyranids. Both of these armies can execute some portions of the Horde approach, but honestly, they don’t fit every aspect of what makes the most effective Horde Approach. When thinking about the Horde Approach, you should be thinking about the combination of a ton of durable bodies, the sustained durability portion, and some withering style firepower or assault. This was all touched on in the Sustained Durability approach as well, and probably refreshing yourself on that article will help as this article moves forward.

How It Works

The best mindset for making the Horde Approach work is to NOT think of it in terms of overwhelming your opponent. Instead, you should be thinking about FRUSTRATING your opponent’s effort to defeat you. The concept of overwhelming your opponent comes from that Ork mentality where I put 180 boyz on the board and execute ORK WAVE ATTACK to wash over my opponent like an unstoppable tsunami. Although this type of approach will work against some GK lists, against Purifier spam, probably the most common type, it will fail due to cleansing flame.

What we want is to cause our Grey Knight opponent to become frustrated. The Horde Approach excels at this tactic because while you maintain a Horde, it is very difficult for your opponent to shift you, by that meaning force you to move any given direction or to “kill you” off a certain portion of the board. You’ll constantly be contesting objectives as you add more fodder to the fight. You’ll constantly be occupying portions of the board and making yourself as annoying as possible to kill.

Let’s run a thought experiment on what I would consider a good Horde list. The Blood Angels infantry horde would consist of a ballpark of 70-80 MEQ bodies backed up by a few points of Feel No Pain. Further, a sprinkling of heavy weapons will allow the Horde to apply a withering firepower to the enemy over many turns.

Take this example army and deploy it widely across the field. Against Grey Knights, recognize that their main threat range is 24 inches. Past that, the majority of GK lists only bring two types of long range firepower, Psybolt Dreads and Psybacks. If I stay out of potential 30 inch threat range (30 because they can move 6 and fire) during deployment, this will force them to be more aggressive or lose a turn of shooting. That loss of a turn plays into my hands because it’s yet another turn that he isn’t taking down models. The bottom line will be, as you see, that the less models he takes down, the more you win.

He can fire his long range guns, but Psybolt Dreads will only average about 1 Dead MEQ a turn. That’s not even going to be a dent in the Horde. Psybacks will most likely be blown off in droves due to the 3+/FnP. Now, let’s further frustrate him by putting lots of our models out of line of site, in reserve, or against the back table edge. Each turn I go where he isn’t killing a substantial number of models frustrates his ability to win the game.

Further, and this is why this approach really works versus GKs, once he steps into that 24 inch kill zone, he is also in your primary kill zone. As a Blood Angel Horde, you also have a lot of Bolters. They aren’t very good, but 70-80 of them will kill Purifiers, very slowly. And the beauty of this is, you will take infantry losses a lot slower than he does.

Finally, your withering long range fire power will be slowly bleeding him. The goal is to outlast and frustrate. The last tactic will be in a Kill Point game, when a squad gets near death, hide it. Since you don’t have any easy to claim KPs and HE DOES (because of vehicles), you can seriously deny his ability to claim them.

The Assault

A Grey Knight player forced into this predicament really only has two tactical options. (One of the greatest things about this approach is that it really controls how your opponent will end up playing.) Your opponent will either attempt to claim mid-field objectives and keep you at bay, or he will be forced to assault you. The reason is that assault is generally the easiest way to kill off multiple models. Before I address the claiming of mid-field, let’s talk about his assault options.

Most GK lists that you will find dedicate one or two assault units. The rest are general MSU squads. The thing is, a 5 man Purifier Squad is no threat to the horde in assault. Only 3 of the guys have real weapons, and against a 10 man squad, they are going to be toast so long as you brought a fist or power weapon of your own.

The goal when dealing with the dedicated assault units is to forego all shooting at other targets and fire everything into the assault units. You will have the ability to do this effectively because you aren’t concerned about shutting down other targets to prevent losses. You are already very sturdy thanks to the Horde. Whittle them down, and then swarm them when they finally get there. Coincidentally, use the “swarm” assault to allow for consolidation moves to help slingshot you into mid-field for late game objective grabbing.

The Mid-Field Objectives

Here, the name of the game is that hopefully your withering firepower has disabled a lot of his long range guns. It’s not time to execute the “Human Wave” attack that you have been purposefully holding back for this long. The tactic in this case should be to overload one objective so that you can clear it and otherwise to simply contest the others. Contesting might be moving one squad up to contest. The game doesn’t end? No sweat, that squad dies and then another steps up. Use the squads which have been depleted for this kind of task.

And lastly note that if you can simply overwhelm most GK units, especially if they are MSU units or have been properly “withered” by your fire power.

Playing the Mission not the Game

The real reason why the Horde approach works is because you are playing the mission and not the opponent. You have the luxury of doing this because your army is so sturdy. The Grey Knight player will generally not have such a luxury, especially in a Kill Point game. Deny him kill points. Claim a few of his and run. Don’t play friendly on this one.

For Roll Dice and Tie, play for the Tie. That’s the best advice I can give with the Horde approach, and playing for the tie should be easy. Buffer your objective with all of your troops, and he’ll never chop his way to it.

For objectives, overload to claim and other wise contest as described above.

Example Armies

So, here are some example armies to help you see where I am going with this.

Horde Blood Angels:
HQ:
Librarian – 100 (Shield for extra cover saves, Unleash for a swarm attack)

Elites:
3 x Sang Priests – 150 (to be distributed around effectively for FnP bubbles)
2 x 5 x Sternguard + 2 x Lascannons (simply there to add withering fire at vehicles, easy to get KPs)

Troops:
10 x Assault Marines + Power Fist – (for a counter-assault if you need one)
10 x Tactical Marines + Lascannon + Plasma + Fist – 210 (more withering fire)
10 x Tactical Marines + Lascannon + Plasma + Fist – 210 (more withering fire)
10 x Tactical Marines + Lascannon + Plasma + Fist – 210 (more withering fire)

Heavy:
10 x Dev Squads + 4 x Missile – 210 (see a pattern yet?)
10 x Dev Squads + 4 x Missile – 210
10 x Dev Squads + 4 x Missile – 210

Total: 1985 # of Bodies: 84 (don’t forget you can combat squad against other kinds of opponents)

Conclusion

There are more lists of course, and you can always go with Orks and Tyranids who can do this very well. Orks especially as they have more shooting capacity than Tyranids. The point is to follow the concept. This will play 40K a lot differently than what most people are used to. It can work though if played properly.

Finally, as on the podcast we are briefly discussing certain armies and how they would be played against Grey Knights in different ways. Although our podcast will cover this last article, on the final installment of RALPH (RALPH 10), we will cover the remaining armies which is not done here on the BLOG.

Posted by Neil Gilstrap

**Shivan Reaper**

Illumini wrote:
Draigo wrote:I have yet to see a fully kitted twc vs a draigo unit. Kinda interesting espeacially if the twc are rocking 2 lords.

It looses horribly, even if it doesn't get completely shafted by the psych grenades. As I said in another thread, there is NOTHING in the game that can take down a full-sized draigostar in close combat

Have to agree here, ran a full squad of diversified Paladins w/ Draigo and a Libby just for fun in a small local tournament. First game against deathwing, ate the bike squad he sent in too close, then spent the rest of the game picking off his Termies with psycannons cause he was too scared to engage. 2nd game saw Nids try to swarm them, no better luck. As long as you can keep stuff like plasma and demo charges away from them, a Draigostar will eat most anything.

**im2randomghgh**

Panzerboy26 wrote:
im2randomghgh wrote:
Panzerboy26 wrote:
Joe Mama wrote:But Wolf Guard Terminators with Storm shields cost ALOT of points. A hammer and a shield pushes them over 60 points each I think. 50% more than a space marine hammernator dude.

Thunderwolf calvary are easy to make anyways, i fyou have no standards like I do. Just put a marine on some suitably sized farm animal from a toddler's toy set. Done!

Well I wouldn't give them Thunder Hammers, prolly either Power Weapons or Wolf Claws. The OP said he was having issues with Purifiers, not Paladins. Still expensive, but not as much so as with Thunder Hammers, and still workable with the models he's stated to have.

Well the Int won't won't help him against GK so he may have to rely on wounding 2+

True, but the weapons are significantly cheaper and still ignore saves. 10pts less per model, and only wounding on a 4+ with a re-roll is a pretty good trade-off for not wounding on a 2+, I think.

I guess it depends on how much he is WILLING to spend on them, because he is 14% more likely to wound with the thunderhammers and they also make him able to kill targets of opportunity with an AV.