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Come to think of it, there's an even better idea.

Take the Dark Angels approach for what units are Troops v. what units are Elites.

Say you have Brother-Captain Stern leading your army...Grey Knight Terminators are now Troops, and PAGKs are now Elite choices--that count as Troops for purposes of scenario rules(deciding what deploys when, etc).

Allow for PAGKs to have Teleport Beacons available--fwabam. You've got an army that operates amazingly for both fluff--and even would give Daemons a run for their money in the "suddenly appearing army" avenue.

Oh... that would be good.... so different HQ units allow you to get new force organisation chart or count this unit as elite or something? I do like the idea of terminators as troops... would make the units much more elite!

I think eternal warrior should only be reserved for units that can actually survive things like an orbital bombardment. Things like greater deamons and really big orks.

Grand masters dont deserve it. I dont think calgar does either but cant do anything about that.

...Except Greater Daemons and "really big Orks" wouldn't survive an orbital bombardment, so the point is moot either way.

What do you all think about Rhinos/Razorbacks for PAGK?
I'd imagine they should have them. They can't teleport their Land Raiders, so it wouldn't break the fluff.

What do you all think about allowing Power Armored Brother Captains?
Personally I'd like them, if only so that they could fit into Rhinos/Razorbacks.

What do you all think is a good fix for the Daemonhunters lack of anti-tank?
I'd imagine that at the very least, the Daemonhunters need melta weapons. One idea I've had is to give Incinerators an alternative firing mode of a Meltagun (for balance purposes this prolly shouldn't ignore invuln). This would of course make Incinerators more expensive. I'd also be interested in seeing some real heavy weapons for Purgation squads; maybe some type of Psychic Missle Launcher?

For fast attack, would you be opposed to getting Grey Knight Land Speeders?
They'd add an easy anti-tank helper, and, being anti-grav, are rare enough for Grey Knights to warrant large numbers of them.

Well, see...thing is they do have Razorbacks/Rhinos--if you count Siege of Vraks, Volume 3.

Rhino, Razorbacks, and landspeeders... where does it stop? If they get all of this on top of Land Raider and Dreadnought variants, they end up looking more and more like a normal marine chapter and less like an elite strike force.

I think the way to deal with Eternal Warrior is to make it an ability tied to the Grandmaster through a selected psyker power. Where it is taken as one of his choices of psyker powers making it a bit of a trade off in addition to the point cost and is justified as part of his psyker mojo instead of an inherent physical ability.

What about Razorbacks armed for Daemonic Incursions makes them less an elite strike force?

I'd say, if nothing else, the Rhinos/Razorbacks work well given that they'd be relatively easier to 'drop' into combat than a Land Raider--and be able to provide some much needed heavier fire support.

I could see Grey Knights operating somewhat like Airborne forces did in WWII, to be honest.
Heavily armed, heavily trained, with very little support outside of air superiority or fire missions from outside sources.

Maybe something like
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M22_Locust could be brought in to replace Predators?

Hmmm, you could make the 'Eternal Warrior' psychic power something like the emperor willing them to live, a bit like how Abbadon has it due to the chaos gods having a 'plan' for him?

Also, I think giving them rarer tanks may be a good idea, to be honest we could just make up a new tank, made on the tracks of a rhino but with a heavier gun on the top? Something that fired psychic energy or some form of holy fire?

On eternal warrior... thats exactly what I mean.

The rarer tank I would be hessitant of. The idea of a locust or light dropable tank is already what space marines have. A rhino, like it real life counterpart, M113 is designed to be flown in a dropped. That mobility is the realistic explanation why Space Marines use a weaker transport than the Imperial Guard, sacrificing armament and armor for atmospheric drop capability.

I've pushed for in the past that the aspect of marine tanks being flown in on Thunderhawk transport and dropped be represented. Maybe rather than inventing whole new tanks, we allow Rhino and razorbacks... but for a number of additional points can be deepstriked... or maybe give it outflank if a deep strike tank is too much.

Hmmm.... I would think deepstrike but with a few additional rules, something like a unit cannot disembark when it's been dropped in and the tank cannot shoot next turn due to the jolt?

I like the cannot disembark, but I think maybe replace the second part with a modified version of the vehicle damage chart. Roll 1d6, 6+ Bad Landing (Immobilized), 5-4 Crew Shaken, 3-2 Crew Stunned, 1 Safe Landing (no effect). If landing on terrain +1, impassible terrain +2.

aka_mythos wrote:On eternal warrior... thats exactly what I mean.

The rarer tank I would be hessitant of. The idea of a locust or light dropable tank is already what space marines have. A rhino, like it real life counterpart, M113 is designed to be flown in a dropped. That mobility is the realistic explanation why Space Marines use a weaker transport than the Imperial Guard, sacrificing armament and armor for atmospheric drop capability.

I've pushed for in the past that the aspect of marine tanks being flown in on Thunderhawk transport and dropped be represented. Maybe rather than inventing whole new tanks, we allow Rhino and razorbacks... but for a number of additional points can be deepstriked... or maybe give it outflank if a deep strike tank is too much.

See, I don't think "inventing" whole new tanks would be too far out.

How about a Predator variant with a psycannon that can be airdropped via Thunderhawk?
Or maybe a drop podded Razorback that's uparmored--or even a teleported Razorback?

The possibilities are endless!

I agree, I think having the tanks dropped in with some new rules for what happens when they get dropped, but I think having alternative weapons based on psycannons would be better suited to the army....

Daemonhunters do need work - i have played them for years and in 5th they are just not that good.

I think eternal warrior is overused. Rather than giving the grandmaster ew, continue to allow his nfw to instagib ew models. Fixed.

Terminators should get the option of nf hammer and stormshield with 3+ inv. 1 per squad.

Assassins should not take up an foc - they should come as an option with the inquisitor.

Footslogging is so 4th - the gk need dedicated transports of some sort. GK Valk/Vendetta seems fluffy and reasonable. Psycannons rather than heavy bolters... ...drop pods would be good as well.

If teleporting is the way to go for GK, then they need help - either a form of heroic intervention to allow them to assault the turn they drop, or beefed shrouding to protect them until they can.

As they are a very elite and powerful group, rather than reducing their cost, beef them up and make them worth the points. T5 for all grey knights?

No bikes or rhinos/chimeras - that is not how they roll.

Dreadnought - nfw ccw, inferno replaces flamer, psycannon replaces stormbolter.
Ironclad and venerable options.

Better options vs the 5th edition daemons.

I am cautiously optimistic...

I do like the idea of a plane used to drop them in.... we could make it so that they have some form of thruster in their boots that allow them to slightly hover when they get close to the ground or if they get dropped off by a belt clip attached to a rail, so when they have dropped down enough they can automatically drop themselves on the ground and get into action?

Negative on Valkyries/Vendettas. They're the exclusive domain of 'normal' Imperial agencies, which any form of Astartes based ones don't fit with the idea of it.

Plus, that's why they have Thunderhawks.

I was thinking of something more elite than that, something like an inquisitorial strike cruiser or something a bit bigger than a thunderhawk or something, not actually using it as a model to battle with but as a reason/explanation for how they deep strike as accurately and are able to assault....

If that's the case, Grey Knight Strike Cruisers fit the bill perfectly.

Indeed, we just use those then, we can say that they swoop in on the battlefield and use ropes/belays to lower themselves down combined with small thrusters in the boots to allow for stability so they can go into combat as soon as they touch down?

Wait what?

Strike Cruisers are ships that would have to be anchored in low/high orbit. They're *huge*.

We could say they use something like the Mobile Infantry from the Starship Troopers novel, however, with a kind of 'fire control' system that launches drop pods with precision accuracy.

I think Valkyries are appropriate for the inquisitor or any other inquistor tied units we allow in. Which are Inquisitors, Storm Troopers (maybe), Assassins (don't need transp.), demonhost and that's kinda it...

For the Inquisitor and his personal contingent of Stormtroopers? Sure.

For Grey Knights? Heck no. They maintain a working fleet of Thunderhawks for that purpose.

Grey Knights would work better with thunderhawks or some form of 'quick action' drop pod.... maybe springloaded or some form of cross hare teleportation that allows them to teleport onto the battlefield very accurately?

A friend suggested it might be an idea to add some new rules to the existing Grey Knight weapons, rather than loading them down with standard Marine gear. An Anti-Tank firing mode for the Psycannon or the melta rule added to the Incinerator would give them all the anti tank they needed.

Of course, they'd need a price hike. And I'm not sure the idea of a flamer with melta is terribly sensible. Too mutli-purpose, too much of a no brainer, and it auto hits. But the Psycannon one could work. It would certainly make Terminators quite lethal.

Seeing how everything this edition is getting cheaper for everyone, if you make it better just keep the cost the same.

I think for deepstrike/drop pods give them the night fighting rule. so it allows them to arrive 'unharmed'.

On the subject of points... It's a must that either grey knights get cheaper or they get better stats for their points e.g. +1 T because of how their trainings so hard 'n' stuff.

And maybe a Lone wolf kind of option like the space wolves have would make a good elite choice for GK

if you ask me, aside from upgrading all the stuff regarding instability, and the +1 WS to BC/GM and +1W to BC (you know, the basic stuff), one thing id REALLY like to see is the ability that lets the grey knights (maybe just PAGK, maybe all of them) shoot mid movement, so you can run between cover while shooting, showing the grey knights greater skill in their powerarmor and greater marksmanship while moving. Maybe to offset this possibly being a bit broken, they get lower BS while shooting during their movement phase.

dunno, just my thoughts. ive always played greyknights as a move shoot move shoot army, staying on the move, cause thats the way ive always envisioned grey knights fighting, it just gets annoying that i have to run out of cover to shoot, and if i end my movement in cover, i cant shoot that turn (btw, when i use the term cover, i mean LOS cover, not cover save terrain).

just my thoughts, but i like grey knights alot as they are (aside from the obvious outdated stuff)

edit: oh and plastic models XD

Sorry if this is a massive post guys. I was reading through this, was about to post, and realised I had no Dakka dakka forum profile (oops!). I signed up for one, but had to wait a day for it to go through, and in the mean time, kept collecting ideas... Oh so by the way, hi everybody, first post, yay, etc
I'll try to keep it formatted so that its not painful to read

aka_mythos wrote:Rhino, Razorbacks, and landspeeders... where does it stop? If they get all of this on top of Land Raider and Dreadnought variants, they end up looking more and more like a normal marine chapter and less like an elite strike force.

I think the way to deal with Eternal Warrior is to make it an ability tied to the Grandmaster through a selected psyker power. Where it is taken as one of his choices of psyker powers making it a bit of a trade off in addition to the point cost and is justified as part of his psyker mojo instead of an inherent physical ability.

Transports:
I certainly agree. Although rhinos, razorbacks and drop-pods are all useful tools, and in character they would probably make use of them if they had them, I think for the meta-game purpose of setting Grey Knights apart from normal marines, they should not have them. In addition, though, I feel that any use of a transport (especially drop pods) really undercuts the emphasis on they GK's mastery of teleportation. I don't even like land raiders (though, of all the vehicles, I suppose at least they have the super elite, stuff of legends, transport)

Grandmaster and EW:
I also agree that >if< the Grand Master had Eternal Warrior, it would be more appropriate to make it a reflection of his psykic prowess, rather than how superbadass of a fighter he is. There was discussion of a Grandmaster being better than Calgar, since he can slay the mightiest daemons of the warp, and therefore he should get EW. I disagree - I feel Calgar should be able to lay flat the Grandmaster with his powerfists with no problems. Calgar is a warrior - Grandmaster is a Daemonhunter. Calgar spent his life fighting and pursuing physical perfection - Grandmaster spent his life reading the Grimoire of True Names, developing his anti-daemon psykic powers, and otherwise becoming highly specialist. Calgar is good at killing people, but would probably get killed by a daemon. Daemonhunter excels at banishing daemons, but would have less experience vs normal material world troops.
Calgar > Grandmaster > Daemon (and Daemon would go back to trumping Calgar, like a rock-scissors-paper).

Dreadnoughts:
I also disagree with the whole Dreadnought stuff; they are awesome models, but they're not appropriate by the fluff. Right next to the dreadnought entry it actually states that the Knights would rather die and rest happy-face on Titan, rather than be wired into dreadnought armour. Though, since since that same paragraph does say that occasionally some will choose to live on as man-machine, I think it'd be more appropriate, and flavourful, if there was maybe a special GK character, along the lines of a Radical Daemonhunter (who tends to break the rules, and live unconventionally) that was interred in Dreadnought armour.

Jetbikes:
I actually love the idea of Jetbikes for Grey Knights. Nothing is more heroic and inspiring than a knight in shining order, borne upon a mighty steed. Since Grey Knights already have the baroque armour, swords, and appearance of medieval knights (more so than standard marines, at least), I think its not too far of a stretch to imagine them with jetbike cavalry, wielding nemesis force lances.

Inquisitors:
As some have mentioned, I really feel the best way to represent an Inquisitor, is to do him like the IG command squad. The inquisitor should, with the right wargear, be able to take on certain enemies, but otherwise he should just be a regular S3 T3 human. I strongly feel that an Inquisitor's real power lies in his experience, knowledge and resources, rather than his combat prowess. This would best be represented by giving special qualities or weapons to units he joins, such as giving them preferred enemy (his experience and knowledge), or letting them reroll shooting wounds (fluffwise, giving them hellfire rounds, or something - a representation of his resources), or by keeping his retinue of henchmen (another representation of his vast resources), but giving them cool army wide tactical abilities, like the Master of Ordnance, Officer of the Fleet, and Astropath, have.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And a few more thoughts

Deep Strike
I'd enjoy seeing a CSM Chaos Icon type of item, that allows units deep-striking onto it to move-shoot-assault on the turn they come in. I think it'd really increase the effectiveness of the Grey Knights when they land, and also add a lot of tactical planning with your Icon bearing units - either your Terminators land as normal, and scatter, or they come in on a well positioned scouting type squad, and launch an immediate and devastating attack from there.

Psychic Effigy
Just a thought I had for a psykic power, or at least squad upgrade thats explained using psykic powers. I'll assume squad upgrade in this example:
Psykic effigy would add an additional model to your squad. Its a defensive model that would provide each member in the unit with either an invulnerable save (just a cheap one, like +5), feel no pain, or some other defensive quality (maybe T5).
Whenever wounds are allocated in the squad, wounds must always be allocated first to the effigy (i.e. effigy gets a wound, then you can put wounds on other models). When the effigy dies, the defensive bonus it gave disappears.

I think it would be useful, and a unique addition to a Grey Knights unit. unit It provides a basic amount of protection to a unit, early in the game (especially when they deepstrike), without just going overboard and ALWAYS giving them an invulnerable save, or some other increase.

An "effigy is burned as a sign of the participants' shared intent to banish the represented element from their lives."
The effigy might even be a bound daemon, locked in a temporary psykic shell, forced into a brief and painful existence as a meatshield. The whole "burning the effigy" thing, but using a bound daemon, really gives my radical Daemonhunters side a spark of excitement


Orbital fleep support
I love the idea of Orbital Bombardment. What I think would be an interesting Heavy Support choice would be something like "Orbital Fleet" - a swiss army knife choice that represents the additional firepower and resources that a ship orbiting the planet can offer to its ground forces
Options to upgrade it, though, could include a multitude of things such as
Orbital Bombardment: <as normal, with various types>
Teleport Ambush: A scouting unit is teleported into enemy ships or behind enemy lines, to disrupt plans and stall reinforcements. Enemies arriving from reserves have a chance to take some number of wounds, and/or, enemy reserve rolls are taken at a penalty, successful ones rerolled, etc (just some upgrade to interferre with reserves)
Communication Jammers: The ship has filled the airwaves and psykic channels with static interferrences. After deployment, you may reposition some number of enemy units, due to enemy orders being misinterpreted by the troops.
Beam-me-up: You may remove models from the field, as they are teleported back up to the capital ships. This could deny your opponent kill points, or let you regroup the scattered remains of several units, back into one complete unit, and re-deepstrike it at a later point.

Granted, there would be no model for this, I do recall one poster saying they didn't feel satisfied spending points, but not putting a model on the table. Fair point, though personally I like the fact that I have a force organization slot filled up with something hovering in space.

I dunno how well the Orbital Fleet would work, or how well it would be received, but I, like I said, enjoy the idea of using my space cruisers to affect the battle down below

aka_mythos wrote:

BeRzErKeR wrote:I think this is, well, waaaaaay OP.

-Shield Bearers; for 10 points you get a 24" assault 2 RENDING weapon, and a rending S4 CCW? Sign me up for six squads, please! Oh, and lets not forget the option for four meltaguns, which also count as power weapons! That's truly ridiculous.

-The fact that every single unit in the army ignores invulnerable saves as standard means that Daemons will be completely unplayable against them, and most other armies will have a significant disadvantage.

-What points cost are you envisioning for Cataphracts and Null Pillars? They'll have to be hellishly expensive to be balanced at all.

I realize its extreme. I figure starting overpowered and backing down would be simpler than going at it from the other way.
I think its more realistic to make it Range 12 or Assault 1, or both. Whatever is necessary to get to meet the 10pt mark I set.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Horst wrote:I had been thinking about a pure GK 5th edition force for a while... here's a few of my thoughts on the matter:

HQ's -

Grandmaster - give eternal warrior, +1 WS. fixed.
Brother-Captain - give 2 wounds, +1 WS, 90 pts base cost. fixed.
Chaplain - Same stats as brother captain, with re-rolls to hit. set cost at 130 pts.
Acting Brother Captain (Justicar) - same stats as brother captain, in power armor - 70 pts. boom, done.

Retinues - keep current rules, let the retinue take 2 special weapons instead of just 1.

****************

Elite-
Grey Knight Terminators... give them nemesis hammers + stormshields. (nemesis hammer is str10 i1, 3+ invl from shield).
Purgation squad... should be moved to elite status

Troops-
Grey Knights in power armor (they can deep strike)
Inquisitorial stormtroopers - given new stormtrooper IG stats.

Fast-
Grey Knights with jump packs - same stats as PAGK, with jump packs...

Heavy-
Venerable Dreadnoughts
Land Raiders
Orbital Bombardments
Predators (baal style, with psycannon + incinerators)

I don't think you need three tiers of commanders, no other army has three tiers, why should Grey Knights?

Orbital Bombardment, taking an FOC is stupid and a complaint I have with the current codex. I don't believe intangible assets without a model representing it should be in any army.

The new stormtroopers wouldn't fit in a Grey Knights army, what is that Hotshot lasgun going to do to a daemon? What do they bring to the army? I mean they are the primary deepstrike unit of the IG, but almost every GK can out do them in that regard.

Next, why no Dreadnought? Venerables don't just come out of nowhere, they're suppose to be very old dreadnoughts. If you have no dreadnoughts, then on a fluff basis, GK will never have replacement venerable dreadnoughts.

I'm all for reinventing aspects of the Grey Knights, but giving them "nemesis hammers" and stormshields is just a round about way of making them into normal marines on steroids as opposed to being something more unique.

Why should the purgation team be an elite? If just carrying extra guns make a unit elite, there are alot of misclassified armies.

My only issue with the predator is that it doesn't fit the rapid deployment nature of the Grey Knights. I realize land raiders don't either but GK have Land Raiders as opposed to other vehicles because they are that elite.

Jump packs? For an army that can teleport any of its troops, why would you need jump packs?

Eternal warrior, I understand special characters having it, but why would the grandmaster?

I agree with most of this, that the shield bearers weapons should have the range knocked down to 12", but still assualt 2, I don't at all agree on the melta weapon, get rid. Just keep the weapon options now but add shotguns. BTW do they get an extra attack from las-glaive, shield combo?

I agree with most of the rest, but keep psy bolts as an option, I like all the dreads but not the Acting Bro Cap. Up the ws to 7 on Grand Master and 6 on Bro Cap as they are supposed to be better at combat than SM. No eternal warrior.

I don't like the Nemesis hammers + shields at all, lets keep what they have. I like the psychic powers however.

Keep GK bikes.

No predators or orbital bombardment but update allies rules and have them.

I think I have said it all Out of breath