Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I largely agree with your post, and even with most of this statement, but Paladins look like garbage relative to other options. Yeah, if your opponent does nothing but spray you with bolter fire, Paladins are money, and they do perform better than GKTs against plasma as well. But today's meta heavily features S8+ shooting and Pallies just cost too much for the return you get. I could see some modest inclusion at 2500, possibly, but anything lower and they're just a white elephant.

Oops, I meant Purifiers not Paladins. My bad.

Fetterkey wrote:
Is that a joke? What if they just shoot you with a Manticore? What if they have Vendettas? What if they drive up and melta you? The venerable psyfleman is probably the most overblown unit since SM Vanguard Veterans were first leaked and everyone started freaking out about the prospect of models assaulting out of deepstrike. It is not effective for its points cost, at all-- not only does it waste the stat upgrades provided by the 60 point Venerable upgrade, which are dubiously worth it to begin with, but it uses a more competitive slot than its non-venerable counterpart to boot! I would take 3 normal psyflemen over 2 venerable psyflemen any day, and for a mere 15 point premium I honestly don't know why people would field the Venerable variant.

You're totally underestimating the Ven Dread in a Grey Knight list. What you've posted here would be true, if it was any other list that features Venerables.

You say nothing of the "Venerable" rule here though. Which isnt generally worth much in regular marine lists. Psychic Pilots make Venerables totally worth it in Grey Knight lists. Venerables will generally reduce hits to shaken/stunned. Odds are good that you can keep firing anytime your Armour is compromised.

That's were your extra points come in.

Worth it? Some will say no, some will say yes. I personally think, yes.

Fetterkey wrote:

Therion wrote:I'm with Deadshane on this one. It's way too early to tell but my instinct is that if one codex had to be put up for the pedestal then GK would be the best army in the game now. The army can be built to shoot as hard or nearly as hard as IG while still retaining an incredible amount of special abilities and viable counter-assault capability which the IG doesn't possess.

I couldn't disagree more, Therion-- Coteaz seems almost like a complete red herring for competitive play to me. When BS 3 Henchmen in Chimerae with Psyfleman support go up against BS 4 Veterans in Chimerae with Hydra/Manticore/Vendetta support, it isn't too hard to figure out what will happen.

Dreadnoughts are point by point even better firepower than Hydras, the previous kings of that role. Hydras are still awesome though because they bring the most tanks per point meaning they're quite resilient. Fortitude lessens this difference a bit. In the troops choices however there isn't a competition. 97 points for 3 Meltaguns in a Chimera is always more desirable than 155 points for Veterans with 3 Meltaguns in a Chimera. Why? Because naturally it'll leave more points for additional tanks and units.

Just for numbers comparison, my GK at 1750 points has a combined 50 heavy/special weapons. Many of them are BS4 and/or twin-linked. Some are BS3. My favorite Mech IG list has 57 heavy/special weapons in the same points limit. It has much fewer meltas, no crazy guns like S8 autocannons or psycannons, absolutely zero counter-charge, no power weapons, doesn't block scouts and infiltrates, cannot shoot at deep strikers, doesn't have any psychic defence like the Reinforced Aegis bubbles, and overall only edges out in the amount of tanks department. My GK has 12 vehicles at this limit while my IG has 15. Like I said previously, marginals are small but the GK are simply better overall. Perhaps they're completely equal heads up but against all comers in random terrains and missions? It's not even a hard one to figure out. GK have it.

I'm just going to quote Deadshane who posted after me and also stress the fact that 40K in my opinion is in a state of good enough balance. This means every army can be beaten, but if we're analysing tournament army lists on their own it's impossible for me to agree that IG would be better than the new GK. There's a number of quite problematic opponent/mission/terrain combinations for IG that won't be nearly as challenging for the mech GK.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:
I said it's too early to say the sky is falling, but just because you don't want to believe your next project is over the top don't try and convince people it isn't full of unheard of and overly powerful options.

If you want to beleive that the Codex is completely OTT then that's cool. (people say this before the release of EVERY new codex)

If that's what you beleive then all you can do is DEAL WITH IT. People are going to play the codex, there's nothing you can do about it 'cept step your game up.

Me personally, I'm not worried. I'm building the army, that doesnt mean I wont have to face it with my sisters, dark eldar, Orks or whatever army I decide to play.

Step your game up if you're worried...the codex is here, Adapt or Quit playing.

Deadshane1 wrote:

Fetterkey wrote:
Is that a joke? What if they just shoot you with a Manticore? What if they have Vendettas? What if they drive up and melta you? The venerable psyfleman is probably the most overblown unit since SM Vanguard Veterans were first leaked and everyone started freaking out about the prospect of models assaulting out of deepstrike. It is not effective for its points cost, at all-- not only does it waste the stat upgrades provided by the 60 point Venerable upgrade, which are dubiously worth it to begin with, but it uses a more competitive slot than its non-venerable counterpart to boot! I would take 3 normal psyflemen over 2 venerable psyflemen any day, and for a mere 15 point premium I honestly don't know why people would field the Venerable variant.

You're totally underestimating the Ven Dread in a Grey Knight list. What you've posted here would be true, if it was any other list that features Venerables.

You say nothing of the "Venerable" rule here though. Which isnt generally worth much in regular marine lists. Psychic Pilots make Venerables totally worth it in Grey Knight lists. Venerables will generally reduce hits to shaken/stunned. Odds are good that you can keep firing anytime your Armour is compromised.

That's were your extra points come in.

Worth it? Some will say no, some will say yes. I personally think, yes.

The Venerable rule is good. It's not 60 points good. It's definitely not "60 points and an important slot" good. It's absolutely not "60 points and an important slot in an army that already has several units in this role" good.

Therion wrote:Dreadnoughts are points by point even better firepower than Hydras, the previous kings of that role.

Uh, no? Basic psyflemen cost 1.8x as much and have roughly equivalent offensive capabilities-- the extended range, SMF denial, and added heavy bolter of the Hydra sets it on par with the +1 BS and S from the psyfleman-- and venerable psyflemen cost an absurd 2.6x as much and are not much better offensively at all.

Therion wrote:Just for numbers comparison, my GK at 1750 points has a combined 50 heavy/special weapons. Many of them are BS4 and/or twin-linked. Some are BS3. My favorite Mech IG list has 57 heavy/special weapons in the same points limit. It has much fewer meltas, no crazy guns like S8 autocannons or psycannons, absolutely zero counter-charge, no power weapons, doesn't block scouts and infiltrates, cannot shoot at deep strikers, doesn't have any psychic defence like the Reinforced Aegis bubbles, and overall only edges out in the amount of tanks department. My GK has 12 vehicles at this limit while my IG has 15. Like I said previously, marginals are small but the GK are simply better overall. Perhaps they're completely equal heads up but against all comers in random terrains and missions? It's not even a hard one to figure out. GK have it.

That doesn't say anything about the Codex as a whole, just about your lists. Personally, I'd say Hydra autocannons or Manticore launchers are far crazier than the IMO underwhelming psycannon. Against all comers, I think GK ghetto mech IG will be strongly outperformed by actual mech IG. It's a fun way to start up a new force using models that you already have, but ultimately not one that I think will be competitively valid.

Fetterkey wrote:

Uhhh...fetterkey...Psychic Pilot?


Hydra's can be shut down easily.

GK Dreadnoughts are destroyed or are shooting and with a higher str shot at higher BS (first at targets that threaten them, I'm looking at you Vendetta)....and they're 4ft away. 4 feet is all you need rather than the ridiculous and useless what? 72" range? The "no flat out save" feature is nice, granted, but lots of hits at STR 8 easily matches that.

Manticore? Whoopee dooo, you're not ap1...and thats when you hit me dead on 1/3 of the time.

Underpowered GK??? umpfff... LOL...
I've played 2 games with the new dex using a take alla comers list( against Guard and chaos) and won both pretty easily ( a very good luck assisted me against the guard)...

Sincerely, the only problem I've found is the lack of mobility of GK Termies and Paladins ( the only solution is to steal the chimeras of your henchmen)

Servoskulls provide good DS on the objectives ( and the threat of merciless slaughter at the hand of orbital strikes if the enemy approach too much)

Snyper dreddy are 1shot1kill guys against most vehicles

I also assure you that psycannons can tear apart almost everything with ease...

... "in summa" GKs are far from underpowered... they can't have top-tier builds like the hated SW or the Mechguard but ...
For now I tried a "Razorspam/teleportedassault list" and an incredibly funny "Orbital strike spam" list and I assure that even the second one performed pretty well...

What points value are people playing at? I see GKs being signifcantly stronger at 2k vs 1500, but I could be wrong.

Uh, no? Basic psyflemen cost 1.8x as much and have roughly equivalent offensive capabilities-- the extended range, SMF denial, and added heavy bolter of the Hydra sets it on par with the +1 BS and S from the psyfleman-- and venerable psyflemen cost an absurd 2.6x as much and are not much better offensively at all.

Allright stop embarassing yourself now and run the maths point by point. I can already tell you what the result will be: The 135 point Psyrifleman will cause more penetrating hits than 135 points worth of Hydra autocannons against AV11 or AV12, while also remaining somewhat viable against AV13.

That doesn't say anything about the Codex as a whole, just about your lists.

Are you saying my mech GK list is just so good or my mech IG list just so bad? By all means entertain us and post a better mech IG list for 1750 points than the one I described (15 AV12 chassis and 57 heavy/special weapons which includes one Manticore and one PBS).

It's a fun way to start up a new force using models that you already have, but ultimately not one that I think will be competitively valid.

I'm not using any models that I already have. The process of painting three squads of brand new Purifiers has begun and Maelstrom is shipping me Cadian Battle Forces and 6 Chimeras. It seems to be you're implying that my idea for the GK is half-assed and not already metagamed and brainstormed for about 2.5 weeks with quite a few veteran tournament players.

I guess what I said was right and some people just have to see the devastation at a couple tournaments themselves before they realise what's up.

Deadshane1 wrote:Uhhh...fetterkey...Psychic Pilot?

Psychic Pilot is decent, and synergizes well with Venerable. However, it's not the be-all end-all, and normal GK Dreadnoughts have it too. When you get right down to it paying almost 150% as much for no real increase in offensive power is not at all worth it, except perhaps in lists that really really want to incorporate Dreadknights. Don't get me wrong, 2-3 Psyflemen will probably be standard-- but taking more than that is risky business indeed in competitive play, so I think the Venerable Psyflemen won't be hitting the table as often as some people might want to think.

Fetterkey wrote:

Deadshane1 wrote:Uhhh...fetterkey...Psychic Pilot?

Psychic Pilot is decent, and synergizes well with Venerable. However, it's not the be-all end-all, and normal GK Dreadnoughts have it too. When you get right down to it paying almost 150% as much for no real increase in offensive power is not at all worth it, except perhaps in lists that really really want to incorporate Dreadknights. Don't get me wrong, 2-3 Psyflemen will probably be standard-- but taking more than that is risky business indeed in competitive play, so I think the Venerable Psyflemen won't be hitting the table as often as some people might want to think.

Ven does give it more offensive power. After a few turns you are probably going to be down some dreads, vens have an much higher chance of still being alive. More turns shooting = more offense.

Deadshane1, the only issue with your statement is manticores. Manticores take away the dreads save entirely in your scenario AND get rear s5 damage on the rhino with 2d6 ordnance pen as a bonus.

So manticores can shut them down quite easily.

Fetterkey wrote:
Psychic Pilot is decent,

Decent?

If there's anything "overpowered" about this dex...this is it. The closest we've come to it in the game is Machine Spirit...which really doesnt compare.

Shooting till a unit is shaken and moving on to the next target is a fundamental tactic that any shooty army player has learned here in 5th.

Psychic pilot almost totally invalidates that tactic. Hell, it invalidates almost the entire Dark Eldar army if you're running a mechanised GK list.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

DevianID wrote:So manticores can shut them down quite easily.

Again, you cannot "shut down" GK vehicles.

You can destroy them...or not. Chances are, if you do not destroy them, they will be fighting at full effect next turn.

If there's anything "overpowered" about this dex...this is it. The closest we've come to it in the game is Machine Spirit...which really doesnt compare.

It's great but Cleansing Flame is easily the single most 'overpowered' thing in this book. Come on. Some close combat specialists can't even assault 5man squads of shooty Purifiers, and all sorts of slowed situations might arise. For example, 3 surviving Purifiers from 3 different squads assault a unit of 20 Genestealers/30 Orks/whatever. Boom. Hit by MatWardFlame and dead before anyone even swings.

Psychic pilot almost totally invalidates that tactic. Hell, it invalidates almost the entire Dark Eldar army if you're running a mechanised GK list.

Chimeras and other tanks en masse already invalidate Dark Eldar. The rest of the stuff just makes the situation completely hilarious.

Psychic pilot decent??? LOL... It's the only thing in the dex that I thinck is incrediblu Overpowered (or undercosted)...
And about the low model count... well... 2 shooting phases and your model count will surpass your adversary's one...

Deadshane1 wrote:

Fetterkey wrote:
Psychic Pilot is decent,

Decent?

If there's anything "overpowered" about this dex...this is it. The closest we've come to it in the game is Machine Spirit...which really doesnt compare.

Shooting till a unit is shaken and moving on to the next target is a fundamental tactic that any shooty army player has learned here in 5th.

Psychic pilot almost totally invalidates that tactic. Hell, it invalidates almost the entire Dark Eldar army if you're running a mechanised GK list.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

DevianID wrote:So manticores can shut them down quite easily.

Again, you cannot "shut down" GK vehicles.

You can destroy them...or not. Chances are, if you do not destroy them, they will be fighting at full effect next turn.

I'll have to agree with one point, that psychic pilot (fortitude) is the biggest gem in this book. Relatively "un supressable" firepower is hard to visualize on paper, but on the board I feel it's going to be the game changer out of the book.

I still don't think venerable dreads are worth it with riflemen setups, you've already got that on your heavies, you pay far more, and although you gain in defense, you gain nothing in offense (as has been mentioned by fetterkey). The only way I'd run a venerable is behind the forward advance of rhinos/chimeras/whatever you chose as transports. A bs 5 multimelta, with a cover save on a venerable, that can also get in combat and mess things up, and provides reinforced aegis to your main line...is good.

Although I'm currently using elite purifiers over Ven's, I feel they're basically equal in power level (and in price oddly enough), and are both solid choices.

It's a 50/50 to have meaningful impact on the damage table. If you knock one or both weapons off you cut a Psydread's offensive output down to either manageable or nil. Glances are virtually assured to do nothing significant to a Ven Dread, though, I'll give you that.

And a lot hinges on the use of Fortitude. The Ld10 psyhood will be very much in vogue in IG armies (esp considering that it was already) and cutting Fortitude successes by about 40% is actually a pretty big nuke to the Psyfleman gunline.

I think coteaz alone makes this army anything other than underpowered. Until we get an FAQ, there is a lot in the book that could go from good to bad or vice versa, but even with coteaz only granting 4 henchmen squads max he is still fantastic.

Eldar are a Psychic heavy army with units with all melta guns and all power weapons but there high cost and low number means most of the time they lose.

Plus there is no way the GK army could be as OP as the BA. army wide FNP for next to no point is bull%^*( and flying Dreads, Rhinos, Preads, str 10 lords.

i think it will be fun to play GK, it's about time they got an update as the last codex was the most underpowered codex i have seen to date.

in a game with my friend. he charged 5 GK into a grot unit of 30 with a slaver with a powerklaw the grots won

He stoped playing GK after that game

Therion wrote:

Uh, no? Basic psyflemen cost 1.8x as much and have roughly equivalent offensive capabilities-- the extended range, SMF denial, and added heavy bolter of the Hydra sets it on par with the +1 BS and S from the psyfleman-- and venerable psyflemen cost an absurd 2.6x as much and are not much better offensively at all.

Allright stop embarassing yourself now and run the maths point by point. I can already tell you what the result will be: The 135 point Psyrifleman will cause more penetrating hits than 135 points worth of Hydra autocannons against AV11 or AV12, while also remaining somewhat viable against AV13.

You are not only using bad metrics, you are wrong even under those metrics. Each Hydra gets 4 BS3 TL S7 shots for 75 points; each Psyfleman gets 4 BS4 TL S8 shots for 135 points; each Venerable Psyfleman gets 4 BS5 TL S8 shots for 195 points.


Hydra vs. AV 11: 3 hits, 1 pen
Psyfleman vs. AV 11: 3.5556 hits, 1.7778 pens
Venerable Psyfleman vs. AV 11: 3.8888 hits, 1.9444 pens

Hydra scores one pen per 75 points, Psyfleman scores one pen per 75.94 points, Venerable Psyfleman scores one pen per 100.29 points. The Hydra does slightly more damage per point, even without factoring in its ability to ignore Skimmers Moving Fast (which makes it twice as good in comparison to the other two against the appropriate targets in most cases), its heavy bolter, or its increased range.


Hydra vs. AV 12: 3 hits, .5 pens
Psyfleman vs. AV 12: 3.5556 hits, 1.1852 pens
Venerable Psyfleman vs. AV 12: 3.8888 hits, 1.2963 pens

Hydra scores one pen per 150 points, Psyfleman scores one pen per 113.90 points, Venerable Psyfleman scores one pen per 150.43 points. The Psyfleman is the most efficient here against AV 12 targets by far, though the Hydra is still more efficient than the Venerable Psyfleman. However, that's because Hydras aren't for targeting AV 12 vehicles, and IG have another-- better-- tool for dealing with those targets, namely:

Vendetta vs. AV 12: 2.25 hits, 1.125 pens

Vendetta scores one pen per 115.56 points, making it very slightly worse than the Psyfleman. This is made up for by:


Vendetta vs. AV 13: 2.25 hits, 0.75 pens
Psyfleman vs. AV 13: 3.5556 hits, 0.5926 pens
Venerable Psyfleman vs. AV 13: 3.8888 hits, 0.6481 pens

Vendetta scores one pen per 173.33 points, Psyfleman scores one pen per 227.81 points, Venerable Psyfleman scores one pen per 300.88 points. One might point out that this isn't a particularly fair comparison, because Psyflemen aren't for AV 13-- but you could (and indeed should) say the same about Hydras and AV 12.


Note also that relying only on penetrating hits is a really bad metric because it doesn't take practical considerations into account-- the more standard immobilize/wreck paradigm is far more valid, but Hydras (surprise, surprise) perform even better under it, so maybe that's why you didn't use it. Also, note that even under your bad metric, the Venerable Psyfleman is less efficient than the Hydra against literally everything that the Hydra can pen.

Therion wrote:It seems to be you're implying that my idea for the GK is half-assed

Correct.

Therion wrote:I guess what I said was right and some people just have to see the devastation at a couple tournaments themselves before they realise what's up.

I'll be happy to change my mind if, a year from now, ghetto IG GK lists are tearing up the top tables at competitive events, but I really, *really* don't see that happening. At best I think they'll have a good short-run performance before people start figuring out that they're nothing special and that real mech IG plays that game better. Restricting Henchmen to 3 special weapons was a great balance move that prevented this list from being the be-all end-all.

but even with coteaz only granting 4 henchmen squads max he is still fantastic.

To me the chances or that happening are less than 1%.

Lord of Formosa: Inquisitorial Henchmen warbands are Troops choices in an army that includes Inquisitor Torquemada Coteaz, and are not limited by the number of Inquisitors in your army.

The most likely result will be that the above rule will completely override the generic rule with Henchman warbands, which states:

For each Inquisitor in your army, you may also include a unit of 3-12 henchmen, chosen in any combination from those shown. This unit does not use up a force organisation slot.

I'm very certain the result in any FAQ will be that an army can have a maximum of 6 Henchman warbands chosen as Troops choices, and a minimum of 2 Troops choices which can naturally both be Henchman warbands. The only other interpretation that makes any sense would be to somehow combine the two rules and say there can be an infinite amount of Henchman warbands, which still count towards the minimum 2 Troops choices because of the simple RAW fact that 'not using up a force organisation slot' does not make you not count towards compulsory Troops choices.

The manticore point could probably be reiterated.

You can still reduce your BS from the scatter distance if you fire indirectly, as long as you have LOS. Each pie that scatters forward will end up nailing the razorback, and ones that hit or only drift 1-2 inches will get a strength 10 ordnance hit with no cover on the dread, and a strength 5 ordnance hit on the razorback. Now, of course you'll have to roll a permanent result that isn't an immobilize, and you should probably buy a witch hunter psychic hood to try and make those stuns stick, and to try not to let the direct fire you will also have in the army shoot into shrouded dreads.

Its not a silver bullet, I just felt like it bears repeating, because it stands as an excellent example of an adjustment being made (from hydras to manticores) in order to counter-act the power of a new threat to the metagame.

Fortitude is VERY good. i have played with it over a half a dozen times. It makes people shoot at vehicles until they are dead, rather than just firing until a shaken result, then moving on. Even if you never get a chance to use it, it still results in you getting to shoot with significantly more shots than you would without it.

Getting cover while retaining LOS on shooty dreadnoughts is VERY easy. And even without shrouding, a constant 4+ cover save is an issue. People have serious problems with vendettas, who only have that 4+ cover for one turn, and can be reliably shaken. The dreadnought costs the same points as the vendetta.

Correct.

This just became fun You label the 20-30 hours of metagame and armybuilding 'work' that multiple tournament veterans and GT winners have put into this half-assed based on what exactly? Your opinion?

Now, since you smartly ignored my request earlier, put your money where your mouth is and post an IG list better than what I described. Additionally, you deftly ignored my entire post where I showed that IG lack important abilities the GK don't lack and are universally less versatile as a tournament army. Tournament data from major events shows IG to be if anything less succesful overall than for example Space Wolves or more recently even Blood Angels.

To me it wasn't ever in question (in this thread) that GK are a better army than IG overall, but the interesting fact was that they put a similar or better amount of firepower to the table while playing phases and possessing abilities that the IG don't have. The fact that you even brought up Venerable Dreadnoughts and Vendettas to the discussion, neither having ever been mentioned by me in my posts, just shows how desperate you are. I wouldn't use Venerable Dreadnoughts with GK simply because double psycannon Purifiers with Razorbacks are much more versatile.

Your own math, which I haven't bothered to double check, proves that the Dreadnought outshoots the Hydras against AV12, meaning in the very specific GK vs IG matchup that everyone was talking about. Thank you. The fact that the Dreadnought does this for a shooty/assault hybrid army while also being immune to shakes and stuns and providing effective psychic defence and having unbelievably easy access to non-stop 4+ cover saves is incredible to say the least.

I really, *really* don't see that happening

I really couldn't see most of the best mech IG players in the world getting beat non-stop by double Land Raiders, Genestealer hordes and Space Wolves of all shapes and sizes at the ETC last time around either, but it happened. Mech IG isn't all that hard to figure out and really has a lot of holes that can be blown right open with the right tools. GK simply have less holes and more tools. Once you get out of your basement and get playing to the real world you'll 'see this happening'.

Deadshane1 wrote: Adapt or Quit playing.

The point is some armies can't adapt. They simply don't have the tools and codex options to deal with the army crushing abilities of the G/Ks. Maybe the abilities are worse on paper than they are in game. I hope so, otherwise I think GKs are going to do for 40k what daemons did for fantasy. It's no fun when 2/3s of the tournament armies are all the same book.

EDIT: Updated with Less Heresy (tm)

Therion wrote:To me it wasn't ever in question that GK are a better army than IG overall

That's where you went wrong. Motivated cognition, anyone?

Therion wrote:The fact that you even brought up Venerable Dreadnoughts and Vendettas to the discussion, neither having never been mentioned by me in my posts, just shows how desperate you are.

Or it shows that I'm trying to draw a more complete picture of the situation?

Therion wrote:I wouldn't use Venerable Dreadnoughts with GK simply because double psycannon Purifiers with Razorbacks are much more versatile.

Agreed, but I'd probably go Rhino instead of Razorback there.

Therion wrote:Mech IG isn't all that hard to figure out and really has a lot of holes that can be blown right open with the right tools. GK simply have less holes and more tools.

That may be true-- it's too early to tell at this stage-- but when GK ape mech IG without the help of Hydras, Manticores, Vendettas, Veteran squads, or bubblewrap units, they open up the same holes but without the same tools. On the plus side, you won't auto-lose to Dark Eldar like a lot of the Grey Knight builds that I've been seeing, but on the minus side, IG don't really sweat Dark Eldar too much either...

I will stand by my opinion. The standard GK is indeed powerful but if you get enamored with all the "bright shiny" options it will fall apart. Field a 200+ point character, add in a couple 200 pt + baby carriers then get enamored with shiny paladins for 300 points and now you are talking about 1100 points in troop choices. Add in about Make them about 300 points per squad and you have 30 wounds out there with a majority of 3+ AC. That is not going to last too long against long fang ML spam or vulkan flamer heaven. While I would salivate for units with 3+ AC, T4 and a base weapon that is S5 ROF2 out to 24", it does come at a cost and you need to have a solid basis for your army.

Unbalance your force with the pretty shiney stuff, and you opponent will ignore it all and go for your troop choices. Great you have 10 or so pain in the a$$es but if you have no troop choices, you will lose every game based on inability to control any objectives.

I'm really surprised at all of the people underestimating the Ork codex. Sure, it doesn't have a particularly good counter to these godly purifiers in melee- but should you even try to engage intact purifier squads that way?

Killa Kans, or even the lowly Deffdread can have a wonderful time with them in melee. Ghaz on his rampage can counterassault if they get too close to your lines.

For all of that, the ever overlooked MANZ has a decent chance. Puriflame will only yield 1 or 2 hits, and an equal number of MANZ to a purifier squad will take about 3 deaths to melee if the manz charge. 10 attacks, 5 hits, 3 wounds, ID. If they charge, it goes to 15a, 8h, 4wounds, ID. Then the Manz hit back from being charged and flamed- 18 attacks, 9 hits, 8 wounds. 8 purifiers down, the flames once more won't land a wound, 4 attacks from the remainder, 2 wounds, ID, and the 3 surviving MANZ wrap things up. It isn't a clean solution, but it would work if you really needed it to.

Sure, it is overkill- but I didn't even add in the BW hits, or their shoota shots! And remember- if using force isn't working, then you're not using enough of it.

With so many other toys in the GK army, it just seems unlikely that someone will go all purifier- and if they do, then lootas will be unmolested while they stack saves on the 3+ armor folks.

The question I would have is how you are advancing shrouded----if you don't play with Land Raiders.

AgeOfEgos wrote:The question I would have is how you are advancing shrouded----if you don't play with Land Raiders.

From what has been said, the Librarian can sit in a Chimera.