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Hi guys. I just faced a 1500 list of Grey Knights with my Iron Hands. My list is not competitive at all and my opponent is just getting used to his army. On sight, I thought his list would be ridiculously overpowered, but he conceded at about the beginning of turn 4.
I've posted this here and not is the lists because I want a idea of what people think is actually overpowered.
The list was, roughly,
Kaldor Draigo, a librarian and Palladian squad all together.
2 five man strike squads
2 dreadnights, .
All upgraded to the hilt, deep striking, and so on.
Generally, when talking about a list or army being overpowered, you're looking at something that either out right hard counters an entire army to the point almost any game is a foregone conclusion, OR, an army that is built to simply steamroll the opposition with as little effort as possible.
The former would be something like 5th edition Grey Knights vs. Daemons... There was nothing 'fair' about that match-up at the time, as the Knights had special rules out the ying-yang, on top of abilities that outright prevented the entire Daemon army from even working. (to the point of even being able to prevent a single Daemon model from legally deployed on the table!)
A more current example would be the likes of a fully optimised Necron Decurion army, which is simply all but impossible to actively hurt, or else a fully optimised Space Marine Gladius Formation in a purely objective based game.
Although, the new Dark Angel rules are also a pretty hard and effective 'screw you!' to any army that relies heavily on assaults to get the job done, especially the likes of non-flying circus Tyranids, Daemons and a fair number of Ork builds.
The later would be the likes of list tailoring to your opponent's army, or else knowingly bringing highly optimised lists to a 'casual fight' or beginners type environment...
For example, if you know your opponent plays say horde Tyranids, and you thus bring an entire army of templates & Thunderfire Cannons with which to utterly devastate them. Or else seeing your opponent is going to play a Terminator army, and then you suddenly decide to change all your meltaguns into Grav weapons, etc...
Then there's simply knowingly playing 'Tournament' style lists against an opponent who either isn't prepared, and/or, can't bring their own army up to that level. Beginners are good examples, as their collections are simply too limited and small to ever stand a chance against for example, your finely honed Iron Hands list with T5/4+ FnP bikers led by the infamous Captain 'Smashfether', backed up by a Centstar led by the Inquisition character who can pick his psychic powers!
Likewise, someone who's brought their super fluffy mono-Khorne Daemon army, suddenly finding themselves up against a tricked-out Eldar tourney list featuring MSU Scatbikers, backed up by Scytheguard in a Raider w/Webway Portal... Or else someone wanting to play their pure Deathwing army and finds themselves staring at the ugly end of a 2++ re-rolling Screamerstar + summoned friends, etc...
Another example of something being entirely 'overpowered' is bringing something insane like one of the better super heavies or gargantuan creatures to a very low pts game... Pretty much no one is going to be capable for example of fighting an 'army' consisting of a pair of Knight Titans or a Warhound at only 750pts!
Command squad with apothecary, 4 grav guns, paperback with assault cannon
Venerable dreadnought with power fist, storm bolter and plasma cannon
Tac squad, 5 marines, no upgrades
Tac squad, 5 marines, plasma gun, razorback with assault cannon
Assault squad, 7 marines, jump packs, 2 flames, vet with power axe
Attack bike with multimelta
Vindicator
Vindicator
Dev squad, 5 marines, 2 with plasma cannons, 2 with lascannons.
It's this overpowered?
He walked the knights across the table and dropped the rest in my deployment zone through the course of the game. Deploying second, I split my force in 3, two groups of vehicles and infantry called up in opposite corners, command squad, assault squad, attack bike and Libby coming on from reserve in the centre to mop up.
Overpowered is things that violate the otherwise regular rules of the game so completely that it leaves a person feeling their experience is pointless.
For example, an Imperial Knight charges some of your marines. It kills a few, no big deal, but then at I1, it Stomps your Land Raider 15" away and not at all related to the combat removing it from the game.
That is overpowered.
"'players must agree how they are going to select their armies, and if any restrictions apply to the number and type of models they can use."
This is an actual rule in the actual rulebook. Quit whining about how you can imagine someone's army touching you in a bad place and play by the actual rules.
Freelance Ontologist
When people ask, "What's the point in understanding everything?" they've just disqualified themselves from using questions and should disappear in a puff of paradox. But they don't understand and just continue existing, which are also their only two strategies for life.
Command squad with apothecary, 4 grav guns, paperback with assault cannon
Venerable dreadnought with power fist, storm bolter and plasma cannon
Tac squad, 5 marines, no upgrades
Tac squad, 5 marines, plasma gun, razorback with assault cannon
Assault squad, 7 marines, jump packs, 2 flames, vet with power axe
Attack bike with multimelta
Vindicator
Vindicator
Dev squad, 5 marines, 2 with plasma cannons, 2 with lascannons.
It's this overpowered?
He walked the knights across the table and dropped the rest in my deployment zone through the course of the game. Deploying second, I split my force in 3, two groups of vehicles and infantry called up in opposite corners, command squad, assault squad, attack bike and Libby coming on from reserve in the centre to mop up.
The only thing that's kinda nasty there is the grav'ed-up Command squad, as grav is a massive hard counter to TEQ's in general.
Overall though, if this is supposed to be 1500pts and all he had was what, 20 models to his list? I'd say it's much more a case of your opponent massively over doing it on the upgrades rather than your list being really filthy.
Grey Knights are actually a really, really bad army for beginners or newer players, as there's too much temptation to go overboard on the upgrades and/or take all the super expensive toys (like Draigo!)
Most GK players I've gone up against who chose them as their first army fall into this trap, and tend to over spend by a couple hundred pts on stuff they really don't need. (ie: I face one guy who'd given most of his Interceptors Falchions!)
Add to this that a pure Grey Knight army which doesn't go for allies has a very difficult time dealing with heavy armour, such as your Vindicators, at range.
Command squad with apothecary, 4 grav guns, paperback with assault cannon
Venerable dreadnought with power fist, storm bolter and plasma cannon
Tac squad, 5 marines, no upgrades
Tac squad, 5 marines, plasma gun, razorback with assault cannon
Assault squad, 7 marines, jump packs, 2 flames, vet with power axe
Attack bike with multimelta
Vindicator
Vindicator
Dev squad, 5 marines, 2 with plasma cannons, 2 with lascannons.
It's this overpowered?
He walked the knights across the table and dropped the rest in my deployment zone through the course of the game. Deploying second, I split my force in 3, two groups of vehicles and infantry called up in opposite corners, command squad, assault squad, attack bike and Libby coming on from reserve in the centre to mop up.
Your army is by no means overpowered, no. But, it is something of a counter compared to his rather small model count army, as you definitely had the tools to wipe him off the board rather quickly. Vindicators and plasma cannons to mulch the terminators, and grav guns for the Dreadknights, etc. Truth be told, his army just wasn't very good. 1500pts, but only five units on the table? Way too easy for you to focus stuff down.
"Through the darkness of future past, the magician longs to see.
One chants out between two worlds: Fire, walk with me." - Twin Peaks
"You listen to me. While I will admit to a certain cynicism, the fact is that I am a naysayer and hatchetman in the fight against violence. I pride myself in taking a punch and I'll gladly take another because I choose to live my life in the company of Gandhi and King. My concerns are global. I reject absolutely revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method... is love. I love you Sheriff Truman." - Twin Peaks
Beginners have a rough time starting the game - It can be difficult trying to mash "all I have" into a list, and their army's shortcomings need to be taken into account if you want a fair fight. Your list is not what most would consider overpowered though.
"And the Angels of Darkness descended on pinions of fire and light... the great and terrible dark angels"
Command squad with apothecary, 4 grav guns, paperback with assault cannon
Venerable dreadnought with power fist, storm bolter and plasma cannon
Tac squad, 5 marines, no upgrades
Tac squad, 5 marines, plasma gun, razorback with assault cannon
Assault squad, 7 marines, jump packs, 2 flames, vet with power axe
Attack bike with multimelta
Vindicator
Vindicator
Dev squad, 5 marines, 2 with plasma cannons, 2 with lascannons.
It's this overpowered?
He walked the knights across the table and dropped the rest in my deployment zone through the course of the game. Deploying second, I split my force in 3, two groups of vehicles and infantry called up in opposite corners, command squad, assault squad, attack bike and Libby coming on from reserve in the centre to mop up.
Is your list overpowered. No. But look at it this way, you had 2 Vindicators against a list of 10(?) paladins+2 character models and another 10 space marines plus two dreadknights. So long as you could keep the knights away from the vindis, and with him moving towards you, those demolisher cannons were going to ... well, demolish, his units, and ID most of those characters. Only really leaving the two knights left to deal with. Which the command squad with grav guns eliminates pretty easily. You had a very, very strong build against your opponent's list, and if he is new to the army (and it sounds like maybe the game) he might not have been aware of how powerful those units would be against his or of how to reduce the effects of those units.
He took all the "strongest" and kitted them to death. Each loss is gonna hurt him like hell.
He needs to run less paladin, more purifiers and the likes.
He can bring a full deepstrike force with his round 1 deep strike, take a ADL with a coms relay to make it more dependable and ally in some space wolves to get some fast attack slot drop pods, drop in his purifiers automatically round 1 and hope for the rest of his units to come down with them in their own round 1 deep strike rolls. This will give him a hell of a lot of bolter rounds round 1, some pretty nasty psychic powers and then he can round it out with whatever he needs against you specifically.
this match looks like a pretty solid example of why a death star can be risky. the GK player was obviously running a "deathknight + old school dragiowing" list. it just so happens your list was nearly the perfect counter to it. had your army composition been differnt it woulda been a very very differnt game.
this is why death stars are always a bit of a dice throw. if you run into a hard counter to it, it tends to go bad
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
From what I understand he plays IG pure armoured lists, which obviously is hard to play against, so not a beginner but new to the army and the style, going from shooty to a close combat army
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/06/29 10:47:44
Well - paladins are bad...so there is that.
He coulda have run something like this.
2x 10 man term squads
2x Libby
2x dreadknight
It would have done a lot better.
the vidis should not survive the NDK shunt - then you have 20 terms with 4++ from sanct dumping 16 psycannon shots into your devs...
GK are all about alpha strike and killing your pretty toys before you get to use them. Then crushing you in CC. When you lose to GK - a lot of times they have most of their army left over - because they are so alpha strike reliant.
If we fail to anticipate the unforeseen or expect the unexpected in a universe of infinite possibilities, we may find ourselves at the mercy of anyone or anything that cannot be programmed, categorized or easily referenced.
- Fox Mulder
"And the Angels of Darkness descended on pinions of fire and light... the great and terrible dark angels" 
