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So I was thinking of picking up a small force of Grey Knights and turn them into a playable (2500 pt) force over the next year or so, and I wanted to know what units would be the most competitive, what is an auto-include and what style the fit best. I can generally adapt to play any style (I like to change things up and I get bored with the gunline then rush to claim objectives last minute games, plus I don't care if I win or lose as long as i make it a good game) so don't be afeared to throw lists you've seen/played before

EDIT:thought I was in general discussions may a mod please move this?

Purifier spam is pretty competitive.

If you want to run your power armored grey knights instead of henchmen armies then you are going to not be able to play until about 2500 points. it is just so easy to counter a 1k point army because there are far too many units to counter them. And henchmen armies are just an annoying and silly.

Well I'm open to ideas. I play enough apoc (which is what I planned on using this for-my main apoc opponent has either tau or CSM with Daemon allies) that if I need to have 2,500 points to play a good list than that's what I'll get. The only henchmen I really like are crusaders or the Death Cult Assassins, but Like I said I'm open to new ideas and left-field army lists. that said anyone know when 6th GK is gonna drop yet?

6th edition gk not for a few years at least. Here are you main lists you could run:

Purifier spam: Crowe as your HQ, then max out on purifiers, 5 man squads in rhinos works the best, with 2 psycannons to shoot out the firepoint. Back this up with ravens and psyfleman. This list was good in 5th, but I dont rate it anymore. Crowe is a terrible HQ and with victory points for slay the warlord, hes just a tax to take purifiers. In my mind it would be better to take 2 squads as elites, and a grandmaster to make them scoring.

Draigowing: The man himself and paladins, very low model count. I play this but but its an average list at best, with some bad match ups. You have to supoort it well, ravens, psyfleman, dreadknights, interceptors all work well. Im going to start trying 4 squads of 3 henchman in psybacks to add scoring and support and see how it goes.

Strike spam: Probably the best gk build outside of henchman. The name of the game, field as much power armour as possible. 40-50 stirke marines, maube a squad of 10 purifiers on foor, psyfleman dreads. And psybolt ammo on everything. S5 stormbolters over 50 or so guys is a lot of damage output.

I guess the question is what sort of list do you want? and we can go from there.

Well I'd like something fluffy, that won't make people table flip turn 4, will have its golden moments and at least hold it's own. Crowe seemed like a good HQ on paper, is he truly that bad on the table? If so, what HQ would be a good choice? And I'm looking at strike spam; I'm obsessive about having enough troops to hold all the objectives. I try to take at least 3 every 1k points so I don't fall short. Besides, s8 rending psycannons backed up with psyfleman and running down the board can't hurt anyone, right?

Hes not an IC, so cant join purifiers, so will always be singled out for shooting etc, has no power weapon/force weapon, gives enemy that combats him furious charge and re-rolls to hit.

Some good points are 2+, 4++ save. 4+ rending and heroic sacrifice. But tbh the cons far outweigh the pros.

I would go Coteaz as he is a great force multiplier, and then a grandmaster or another Inquisitor.

I always liked the inquisitors, Hereticus, malleus, or xenos?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
and also, does the grandmasters Grand Strategy stack? like can I have 2 of them and roll 2d3 to see how many units I give scoring?

GS doesn't stack, you get 1D3 if you have a GM.
I'll second Crowe being terrible in 6th. The way pile ins work now he can never combat a small unit properly. He's good and killing horde units with his cleansing flame and high initiative. He's also good at killing MCs with heroic sacrifice. But getting him into those situations without him being shot to bits is hard. I suppose you could stuff him into a support storm raven and pop out when the time presents itself.

I'll also second power armor GKs is a great list. And Dreadknights are a must for any GK player.

I have had crazy fun and success with my all 2+ Draigo Wing list. at 1750 and 2k

Draigo
10 Paladins (4 Psycannons, 8 Halberds, 2 Hammers) (combat squad as needed)
Solodin with halberd or hammer
2x DK with Heavy incinerator and PT (both made scoring by GS)
Storm Raven (Psyammo, MM, Assault Cannon, Hurricane Bolters)

Just add 4 more paladins with 2 psycannons and a warding stave to rack it up to 2k.

Crazy fun small elite army, you can pick up a lot of stuff cheap on Ebay (Think i got the whole army for around £150).
Really solid defense, surprisingly good shooting, excellent combat capabilities. It can get a little tough in missions with more than 4 objectives but its a fun challenge, Helldrakes mean nothing to this list with other flyers having minimal impact. Takes some practice to use, one of my favorite strategies is to keep the DK's hidden in back field and the Solodin hidden on a back field objective (sometimes with Draigo so i can use Psychic communion). Then deepstrike the Pallystar and shunt the 2 DK up to join them all concentrating on a small part of the enemy force and wipe it out from mass shooting (Usually anything that can kill the DKs or instant kill paladins). That leave your enemy with a lot of multiwound 2+ armor in charge range for the next turn and giving really good target saturation. Usually they will try and kill a DK which is almost always a mistake.

But I have to say, I try not to use this list much in friendly play, it doesn't make you many friends.

I'm one of the few people you will see advocating an all TDA Ghostwing. My core army list is:

Mordrak+3Ghosts+banner

Librarian+staff+homer

10man GKT w/ 2psycannons, 4hammers, 5halberds, staff

10man GKT w/ 2psycannons, 4hammers, 6halberds

1500pts with room to grow, very flexible army to play due to Grand Strategy, TDA reserve rules, and Combat Squading. In addition, Psybolt ammo can be add to any unit except Mordrak's, while Mordrak can add up to 2 more more Ghosts. The Libby can add Psybolts, Brain Mine, codex powers, Skulls, and even ML3 as the desire takes you. In addition to that core, I can field:

10man Strikers w/ 2psycannons, 2hammers

10man Interceptors w/ 2psycannons, 2hammers

Stormraven (magnetized, all weapon options available)

Currently working on:

Techmarine

ADL

2x "Psyflemen" Dreadnoughts

People will tell you how poorly TDA do in the current meta game, due to their 40pt per model price tag versus only 1 wound per model (and everything dies to torrents of gun fire). Yet, the challenge for me has been playing aggressively enough and smart anough to set the pace of the game and dominate my opponent from turn 1 on. My win-loss record with army is modest, nothing special, yet my worst loss to date has been a total of 5 models (no actual units lost) while not being able to hold a single objective (I'm easily outnumber most of the time). Coming from being a long time Daemonhunter player, where being able to turn a loss into a drawn was considered a 'win' by most GK players, the Ghostwing has been both enjoyable and challenging to play.

SJ

I actually like that 1500 list as a basis, termie spam would be a good bonus to my Imperial forces (currently don't own a single termie... no idea how that happened mind you, 7 years in the hobby) and it would also be fairly cheap to produce. Right up my alley!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
By staff do you mean stave?

I am having success with 10 man strike squads w 2 psycannons/psybolt ammo. They do add a great amount of tactical flexiblity when you have psyrifle dreads on the back with a defence line, so you can deep strike within 24" and provide fire support for a close combat specialist unit.

In my case those are a 10 man purifier unit with an ordo xenos inquisitor (grenades,plasma syphon and psyker) charging from a stormraven.

So my 1850 comes up to

Inquisitor
(grenades,plasma syphon and psyker)

Purifiers
10 man 4 hammers,5 halberds, staff ,psybolt

3x Strike Squad
10 man 2 psycannon, hammer, psybolt

Stormraven

3 Psyrifle Dreads

ADL

Although i agree with jeffersonian, TDA lists can work, although i just couldnt make them work so far.

Coteaz lists make me happy

Death Cult assassins (sword/maul) + Crusaders in assault vehicles (stormravens)

and

Warriors with bolts + Jokaero + 3 PC servitors and inquisitor

These two troop setups are very effective and form the backbone of a inquisitor list. Toss in 1-2 strike squads for midfield firepower and you got a 6 troop well rounded army.

 Goat wrote:
GS doesn't stack, you get 1D3 if you have a GM.

Not true IIRC. Each Grandmaster gets his own D3, but you can't give the same unit a different thing from each Grandmaster. As GW's site is down I can't pull up the FAQ to double check.

They've had a lot of downtime this month. I wonder if its all the people or if they are reworking the site?

I havn't been able to pull the site up since early march.

Have you tried to google it and get into the website from there? worked for me last time.

 prophet102 wrote:
Purifier spam is pretty competitive.

not really...

not a bad unit, actually is a very good unit if you can get it mobile, but not a effectively spammable unit really

normally if you dont have them mobile in a flyer or somethign they just get shot, they die as seasy as normal MEQ's but cost more.

that being said, interceptors, strike squads, purifiers,

all use the same kit, so OP buy the kit and make sure you save the interceptor back packs, then you can move them areound as units.

personally,
competitively, in most tournament TAC lists your troops are either terminators, or henchmen (usuing coteaz)

I am finding that the auto takes are:
coteaz, dread knights, dreadnoughts with two twinlinked autocannons and pysbolts are also pretty auto takeable.

personally, acolytes with bolters at 5pts each are IMO one of the best troops out there, cheap bolters at ld8 is really good for the pts. This is a big change from when I used to take terminators or strike squads as troops, a much better, cheaper, more efficient change.

I found when I spammed purifiers/strike squads, the lack of mobility really hurt me,
I have since started taking 3 interceptor squads in stead, they almost always get me 1st blood, they really scare the opponent into focusing on them (and not my troops, dread night, dread noughs ect) and they are in combat 2nd turn (shunt move is game changing, esp when they can capture in certain missions)

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Goat wrote:
GS doesn't stack, you get 1D3 if you have a GM.

Not true IIRC. Each Grandmaster gets his own D3, but you can't give the same unit a different thing from each Grandmaster. As GW's site is down I can't pull up the FAQ to double check.

You could be correct, but I think it says an army containing a model with GS, or along those lines. Not able to look at my dex atm.

However if you are correct. Each GM could give different powers. You can't give different powers within one D3 role. But you could roll a "1" from first GM and make something reroll wounds of 1, and a"3" from the other guy and make three units scoring. But, the guy with the "3" can't choose 1 to have scout and 2 be scoring units.

But I'm pretty sure you're only ever allowed 1D3 roll.

It doesn't say "an army with a grandmaster in it" or anything to that effect. it just says roll a D3 and give that many units one of the listed special rules.

As I recall from the FAQ, they simply said that a single unit couldn't be effected by 2 different grandstrategy rolls.

And that you had to give units from the same roll the same rule. You couldn't roll a 6 on the D3 and give 3 different units 3 different roles. All had to have the same role.

Q: Can one unit be given two different roles by two different Grand
Master’s Grand Strategy special rules? (p22)
A: No.

Wow, thats nice to know! Even if it's a minimum of 350 for 2 GSs haha

Thas the FAQ, which implies you can indeed have multiple GS rolls.

Yeah, its expensive and I probably would prefer a Librarian as a second HQ but at larger points with a Libby and 2 GMs its an option.

I am enjoying my list. Coteaz w/ 3 PC serv and 3 Jokaeros.

Inquisitor w/ 3 PC serv and 3 Jokaeros.

2 or 3 Tech marines w/ Conv Beamers w/ 2 or 3 Astral Aim Squads.

I have a fortress I use w/ this list - if allowed it is sooo good.

Then you can fill in as you like. I have been taking henchmen w/ bolters for their cost they are really good.

So usually I get atleast 1 ignores cover and if I do I will pull a techmarine from the purg sqaud and put him w/ the ignores cover squad.

The people I don't utterly smash with that list are people who hide from me. They totally just stay of of sight. There are so many re-rollable templates going off you can usually kill 1 or 2 units a turn.