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Hey guys.

After a long break, I wanted to get back into 40k with a new army. I'm after something that's more unique, and less seen. I'm not bothered about Rules, but lore is a big part, aswell as perhaps being slightly more diverse on the battlefield?

Cheers!

Harlequins are a far more fun army overall. GK at the end of the day have more units but if you sort out the ones that are not just "A dude, with a storm bolter, holding a force weapon" then you get

1) dudes with force weapons and storm bolters

2) Dreadknight

3) Space Marine Vehicles.

At the end of the day, if you want something unique, and one of your options is not space marines, then the answer is that one.

I'd go Harlequins simply because they're so rare. You'll stand out for sure, and the more non-marine players the merrier

As the_scotsman said, both are very limited in their unit roster.

Harlequins are harder to paint well, but open up potential souping with Craftworld, Drukhari and Ynnari.

I believe Harlequins are cheaper to build a force with as well. Something around 80€ for 500points I believe?

From a lore perspective, both are interesting imo and both have a place for a converted Inquisitor along

a_typical_hero wrote:
As the_scotsman said, both are very limited in their unit roster.

Harlequins are harder to paint well, but open up potential souping with Craftworld, Drukhari and Ynnari.

I believe Harlequins are cheaper to build a force with as well. Something around 80€ for 500points I believe?

From a lore perspective, both are interesting imo and both have a place for a converted Inquisitor along

Only thing is buddy, it'll be a stand alone army, I wouldn't soup

 Andy140491 wrote:


Only thing is buddy, it'll be a stand alone army, I wouldn't soup

Grey Knights function substantially stronger without allies (they have specific buffs that dont activate unless your army is comprised entirely of GK). They came out of 8th relatively strong (though in fairness probably not quite as strong as Harlequins did), and are poised to be even more interesting once the wound buff goes through.

Despite being somewhat bland looking on paper, they offer a lot of shenanigans and mobility on the table and are frankly a fun army to play that is a bit more forgiving than the murderclowns.Especially for a returning player.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Andy140491 wrote:


Only thing is buddy, it'll be a stand alone army, I wouldn't soup

Grey Knights function substantially stronger without allies (they have specific buffs that dont activate unless your army is comprised entirely of GK). They came out of 8th relatively strong (though in fairness probably not quite as strong as Harlequins did), and are poised to be even more interesting once the wound buff goes through.

Despite being somewhat bland looking on paper, they offer a lot of shenanigans and mobility on the table and are frankly a fun army to play that is a bit more forgiving than the murderclowns.Especially for a returning player.

So out of the two, would you suggest that the grey knights are slightly more unique, whilst being more flexible?

How viable is an all terminator list?

a_typical_hero wrote:


Harlequins are harder to paint well, but open up potential souping with Craftworld, Drukhari and Ynnari.

I am always very curious about this. Harlequin models are extremely flat, smooth, and simple. The only reason people consider them hard to paint is because they feel like they HAVE to do tons of freehand on them...which for some reason people don't apply to Space Marines, despite them also being fairly wide, flat, paneled, etc.

That's true to an extent, but they're also a lot smaller and lither. Things like the hands and boots can be very fiddly.

 Andy140491 wrote:

So out of the two, would you suggest that the grey knights are slightly more unique, whilst being more flexible?

How viable is an all terminator list?

Both armies are unique, and I dont think there's any play in trying to suss out "more unique". I get what you're trying to dig into, but I dont really feel its a metric that needs considering.

Harlequins I'd argue are a little bit of a one trick army at the moment. They use their speed to dance around an enemy, then when they spot (or create) a weak spot they go in for the kill. Unfortunately, due to the size of their roster this means there's only a handful of viable army compositions, especially at the higher ends of the competitive spectrum.

GK are similarly hampered by being an army that wants to be in the face of the opponent while having limited means to do so (though I suspect 9th adaptations will involve a lot more transports once the dust settles on new codices). They're a mid-range shooting and close assault army that can struggle against a more mobile, or longer ranged, opponent. They have tools to deal with them though, but they're not fire and forget plays, you need to understand the way your army and your units work to get them to function adequately.

I think once the wound increase happens, all Terminator armies for GKs will be a thing, or at least an experiment. Paladins are already terrifying, and GK are one of the few armies that can take Terminators in their Troops slots for the critical Objective Secured function. There's definitely potential there, especially as all the characters (which are already the linchpins of the army) are in Terminator armor.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Andy140491 wrote:

So out of the two, would you suggest that the grey knights are slightly more unique, whilst being more flexible?

How viable is an all terminator list?

Both armies are unique, and I dont think there's any play in trying to suss out "more unique". I get what you're trying to dig into, but I dont really feel its a metric that needs considering.

Harlequins I'd argue are a little bit of a one trick army at the moment. They use their speed to dance around an enemy, then when they spot (or create) a weak spot they go in for the kill. Unfortunately, due to the size of their roster this means there's only a handful of viable army compositions, especially at the higher ends of the competitive spectrum.

GK are similarly hampered by being an army that wants to be in the face of the opponent while having limited means to do so (though I suspect 9th adaptations will involve a lot more transports once the dust settles on new codices). They're a mid-range shooting and close assault army that can struggle against a more mobile, or longer ranged, opponent. They have tools to deal with them though, but they're not fire and forget plays, you need to understand the way your army and your units work to get them to function adequately.

I think once the wound increase happens, all Terminator armies for GKs will be a thing, or at least an experiment. Paladins are already terrifying, and GK are one of the few armies that can take Terminators in their Troops slots for the critical Objective Secured function. There's definitely potential there, especially as all the characters (which are already the linchpins of the army) are in Terminator armor.

So do you think that transports will become more integrated into armies? Also, I was watching tabletop tactics report on them, and they had mentioned the characters such as draigo going massively up in cost being an issue?

 Andy140491 wrote:

So do you think that transports will become more integrated into armies? Also, I was watching tabletop tactics report on them, and they had mentioned the characters such as draigo going massively up in cost being an issue?

GK characters didnt really go up all that much. They all came out below the curve with the "average" points increases from the edition change. And to be honest, even at 190 Draigo is still a complete terror, Voldus at 160 for basically three psykers stapled together continues to be an absolute gem. The biggest issue for GKs is the detachment structure limiting your HQ slots, which causes some painful choices (which in all fairness all armies have to make).

I do indeed think transports will be a bigger deal in 9th, in no small part because of the way that scoring has changed. Razorbacks especially (which the GK do get) are looking quite tasty to my addled brain right now.

Harleqins are hands down more unique than GK. GK is defensively identical to all other marine armies, nearly all of their weaponry exists within other marine armies save for a couple special weapons and a couple melee weapons, and their shtick of being an all-psyker army is also occupied by two other factions.

Harlequins have a couple of units that are similar to other armies' units (A Starweaver is similar to a Venom, a Voidweaver is similar to a Vyper) but they have multiple elements wholly unique to them. An equivalent to an imperial assassin that can run nearly across the board. A fire support character that can snipe out sergeants and special weapons using Morale. Harlequins themselves are like the best aspects of three types of lesser daemons with squad-wide meltagun access, but they also have a ridiculously fast open-topped transport

Sterling191 wrote:

 Andy140491 wrote:

So do you think that transports will become more integrated into armies? Also, I was watching tabletop tactics report on them, and they had mentioned the characters such as draigo going massively up in cost being an issue?

GK characters didnt really go up all that much. They all came out below the curve with the "average" points increases from the edition change. And to be honest, even at 190 Draigo is still a complete terror, Voldus at 160 for basically three psykers stapled together continues to be an absolute gem. The biggest issue for GKs is the detachment structure limiting your HQ slots, which causes some painful choices (which in all fairness all armies have to make).

I do indeed think transports will be a bigger deal in 9th, in no small part because of the way that scoring has changed. Razorbacks especially (which the GK do get) are looking quite tasty to my addled brain right now.

Even though GK can port most of their units in? Do you still think units like razorback a will be used? I'm just thinking, in an already expensive army, whether or not they'd be taken?


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the_scotsman wrote:
Harleqins are hands down more unique than GK. GK is defensively identical to all other marine armies, nearly all of their weaponry exists within other marine armies save for a couple special weapons and a couple melee weapons, and their shtick of being an all-psyker army is also occupied by two other factions.

Harlequins have a couple of units that are similar to other armies' units (A Starweaver is similar to a Venom, a Voidweaver is similar to a Vyper) but they have multiple elements wholly unique to them. An equivalent to an imperial assassin that can run nearly across the board. A fire support character that can snipe out sergeants and special weapons using Morale. Harlequins themselves are like the best aspects of three types of lesser daemons with squad-wide meltagun access, but they also have a ridiculously fast open-topped transport

How do you mean about the 3 lesser daemons? And the speed and aspect does interest me. I keep hearing about a death jesters 'humbling cruelty'. I've no idea what it is, it just sounds awesome

the_scotsman wrote:
Harleqins are hands down more unique than GK. GK is defensively identical to all other marine armies, nearly all of their weaponry exists within other marine armies save for a couple special weapons and a couple melee weapons, and their shtick of being an all-psyker army is also occupied by two other factions.

Harlequins have a couple of units that are similar to other armies' units (A Starweaver is similar to a Venom, a Voidweaver is similar to a Vyper) but they have multiple elements wholly unique to them. An equivalent to an imperial assassin that can run nearly across the board. A fire support character that can snipe out sergeants and special weapons using Morale. Harlequins themselves are like the best aspects of three types of lesser daemons with squad-wide meltagun access, but they also have a ridiculously fast open-topped transport

Yeah...no. The GK playstyle is fundamentally separated from how Marines play, and how they function as a Psyker army is entirely different from how the Thousand Sons or Daemons play. Just as the Harlequin playstyle is fundamentally separated from how Craftworlds or Drukhari play.

The semantics of individual unit statlines is garbage. What matters is how they function on the table. And from that aspect, they're both distinct, standalone armies with their own specific way of approaching the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Andy140491 wrote:

Even though GK can port most of their units in? Do you still think units like razorback a will be used? I'm just thinking, in an already expensive army, whether or not they'd be taken?

I do actually. Razorbacks arent just metal boxes, they're gunships in their own right (and with certain buffs scary ones at that). They also play into the metagame of denying your opponent Secondary objective choices as they reduce the number of pure infantry bodies you have on the table.

Remember, you can only start half your army in deep strike, and even then with the smaller table finding a good landing spot against a competent opponent is that much more difficult. Moving around on the table is something every army is going to need a tool for.

the_scotsman wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:


Harlequins are harder to paint well, but open up potential souping with Craftworld, Drukhari and Ynnari.

I am always very curious about this. Harlequin models are extremely flat, smooth, and simple. The only reason people consider them hard to paint is because they feel like they HAVE to do tons of freehand on them...which for some reason people don't apply to Space Marines, despite them also being fairly wide, flat, paneled, etc.

While you don't have to follow the official paint scheme and can do any kind of pattern on your Marines, just as you can only use a single color for your Murderclowns, I feel it is encouraged / wanted that you go wild and creative with Harlequins.

At the bottom of it, of course you are right. Let me rephrase it to "If you want to follow along the official paint scheme, then Grey Knights are easier to paint, while at the same time limit your creativity. With Harlys you can go wild without it feeling out of place."

This is a real tough decision to make! I really can't even think of a clear winner.

Is anyone able to come up with a pros and cons list?


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Sterling191 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Harleqins are hands down more unique than GK. GK is defensively identical to all other marine armies, nearly all of their weaponry exists within other marine armies save for a couple special weapons and a couple melee weapons, and their shtick of being an all-psyker army is also occupied by two other factions.

Harlequins have a couple of units that are similar to other armies' units (A Starweaver is similar to a Venom, a Voidweaver is similar to a Vyper) but they have multiple elements wholly unique to them. An equivalent to an imperial assassin that can run nearly across the board. A fire support character that can snipe out sergeants and special weapons using Morale. Harlequins themselves are like the best aspects of three types of lesser daemons with squad-wide meltagun access, but they also have a ridiculously fast open-topped transport

Yeah...no. The GK playstyle is fundamentally separated from how Marines play, and how they function as a Psyker army is entirely different from how the Thousand Sons or Daemons play. Just as the Harlequin playstyle is fundamentally separated from how Craftworlds or Drukhari play.

The semantics of individual unit statlines is garbage. What matters is how they function on the table. And from that aspect, they're both distinct, standalone armies with their own specific way of approaching the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Andy140491 wrote:

Even though GK can port most of their units in? Do you still think units like razorback a will be used? I'm just thinking, in an already expensive army, whether or not they'd be taken?

I do actually. Razorbacks arent just metal boxes, they're gunships in their own right (and with certain buffs scary ones at that). They also play into the metagame of denying your opponent Secondary objective choices as they reduce the number of pure infantry bodies you have on the table.

Remember, you can only start half your army in deep strike, and even then with the smaller table finding a good landing spot against a competent opponent is that much more difficult. Moving around on the table is something every army is going to need a tool for.

Just out of curiosity dude, what makes GK so different to standard marines?

I play Harlequins so I'm a little bias here but I think Harlequins are a better choice in the current state of things.
In terms of diversity, you won't see much from Harlequins when it comes to playstyle choice due to having very few options to choose from but the choices we do have are all very good.
You will either have few Troupes with transports or a lot of Troupes on foot and usually both are supported with Skyweaver bikes. Both styles pretty much emphasize an in your face style.
The characters are also very strong and you'll often see one of each in most lists.

As for the models, I would say Harlequins have one of the best sculpts in the game. At first I was pretty pessimistic about the Troupes being mono posed but it's actually the opposite, the kit gives you so many options in terms of bits which was pretty shocking for me to see in a xenos faction. It gives you several head and mask options as well as four melee and three gun options. All of which have different sleeves and arms.

On the negatives, if you plan on using more than 2 fusions pistols per box, you will either need to convert them or buy third party bits because they're impossible to find for sale.
They're also up there on painting difficulty especially if you plan on doing diamond patterns but their color schemes are very versatile.

On a side note, I would hold off on Grey Knights because their models, while still good for today standards, are starting to see their age. I wouldn't be surprised if they get new kits this edition but I wouldn't hold your breath.

 SiLKY wrote:
I play Harlequins so I'm a little bias here but I think Harlequins are a better choice in the current state of things.
In terms of diversity, you won't see much from Harlequins when it comes to playstyle choice due to having very few options to choose from but the choices we do have are all very good.
You will either have few Troupes with transports or a lot of Troupes on foot and usually both are supported with Skyweaver bikes. Both styles pretty much emphasize an in your face style.
The characters are also very strong and you'll often see one of each in most lists.

As for the models, I would say Harlequins have one of the best sculpts in the game. At first I was pretty pessimistic about the Troupes being mono posed but it's actually the opposite, the kit gives you so many options in terms of bits which was pretty shocking for me to see in a xenos faction. It gives you several head and mask options as well as four melee and three gun options. All of which have different sleeves and arms.

On the negatives, if you plan on using more than 2 fusions pistols per box, you will either need to convert them or buy third party bits because they're impossible to find for sale.
They're also up there on painting difficulty especially if you plan on doing diamond patterns but their color schemes are very versatile.

On a side note, I would hold off on Grey Knights because their models, while still good for today standards, are starting to see their age. I wouldn't be surprised if they get new kits this edition but I wouldn't hold your breath.

Cheers dude! I really appreciate that! Tbh, the lack of models doesn't bother me too much. I heard that the different forms can give a different feel to the playstyle too!

What I mean about them being similar to the various types of lesser daemons is they have the damage output of bloodletters, the 4++ of horrors, and the advance+charge of daemonettes.

I just have to respectfully disagree about GK being that fundamentally different from normal marines. Your typical GK army has some terminator units in deep strike, some strike squads in razorbacks, and a dreadknight or two, they deep strike, shoot you up with a bunch of bolter weapons, and try to charge with a re-roll.

The difference between them and normal marines atm is just: They use 1W power armor models so they die to a stiff breeze, and they use Dreadknights and Terminators instead of infiltrating warsuits and incursors so they hit you turn 2 instead of turn 1, and they do some psychic shenanigans.

Are they different from marines: Yes.

Will they feel actually distinct enough to make people go "oh, I'm sick of space marines but I'd love to play those super unique GK!!" no.

Humbling Cruelty is one of the Death Jester's unique rules. Basically, each of the Harlequin characters have a signature ability: Troupe Masters have a reroll all wounds in melee aura, Shadowseers have a -1 to wound for infantry aura, Solitaires have a once per game ability that makes them A10 and advance 2d6" and Death Jesters subtract 2 from the leadership of any unit they kill a model out of and if any models flee he picks the first one, allowing you to "snipe" special weapons.

You get the ability to swap out those abilities for 1 of three alternative versions if you want, meaning that the Death Jester can instead have "Humbling Cruelty" which is any squad he hits with his shooting attack is at -2" movement and cannot fire overwatch. You can also give him 36" range, ignores cover, and mortal wounds on 6s to wound, or each hit is 3 hits vs a unit with 6 or more model.

That means, even though harlequins only have 4 characters, you can vary up what those characters do drastically by changing their ability.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
You can run troupes in 3 ways basically, either loaded up with melee weapons riding along with a troupe master (who gives them full rerolls to wound, meaning they just shred stuff in CC), or you can give them some Fusion pistols and have them staying in the transport and shooting out via open-topped, or you can have them on foot in a 10-man squad with several naked sword+Pistol clowns for wound tanking, in which case the Shadowseer can do stuff like Warptime them up the field, give them -1 to hit, and -1 to wound with her aura.

Bikers are pretty much mono-build at this point, you always want them to have Glaives and Haywire Cannons so they can demolish vehicles for you, they've been competitive in that loadout for a while and nothings changed.

and Voidweavers are kind of a "Jack of all Trades" unit that has kind of a mini Fire Prism gun, it's never been amazing but it's never been terrible, I find in 9th they're actually nice to have because if your opponent does take something like 30 ork boyz blobs against you you have 12 anti-infantry shots per VW which is pretty solid output and otherwise, it can just lob an antitank shot and grab objectives and secondaries.I usually like to include 1-2 just in case my opponent is one of those rare skew lists that includes no vehicles and I don't lose all the efficiency vs them if I put all my eggs into the haywire bike basket.

the_scotsman wrote:

I just have to respectfully disagree about GK being that fundamentally different from normal marines. Your typical GK army has some terminator units in deep strike, some strike squads in razorbacks, and a dreadknight or two, they deep strike, shoot you up with a bunch of bolter weapons, and try to charge with a re-roll.

Congratulations, you managed to just describe 95% of the armies in 40k right there. With that level of absurd vaguery, you have no unique armies.

the_scotsman wrote:

The difference between them and normal marines atm is just: They use 1W power armor models so they die to a stiff breeze, and they use Dreadknights and Terminators instead of infiltrating warsuits and incursors so they hit you turn 2 instead of turn 1, and they do some psychic shenanigans.

This is decidedly false.

 Andy140491 wrote:

Just out of curiosity dude, what makes GK so different to standard marines?

The playstyle. The interplay of Tides (which are your army wide "stances" for lack of a better term) and knowing when to shift them based on your army list and tactical events on the table to get the most out of your list is a dance that's just delightful to my brain. Knowing how/when/where to place, maneuver and teleport your units (because they're inherently expensive and cannot be thrown away like a good chunk of Marine units can) for the hammerblow, and knowing that if you fail, you're in trouble.

Again, look beyond the basic statlines. There's a host of rules and abilities that sit on top of those statlines that make them very, very different from Codex (or even non-codex) Marines. The army is one that can dance between psychic artillery (yes, even with the smite changes), brutal mid range firepower, and deceptively mobile assault elements.

But you have to plan for each phase of the engagement, as opposed to just banzai'ing in with an advance and charge rule, or sitting back in a Chapter Master's bubble and shooting everyone off the table.

I'm really struggling to decide between these two guys!

Harlequins! It's an army that truly shows off your skill. It doesn't have anything that holds your hand. You can't fall back on high toughness or high wounds or power armor. You make a dumb move and get caught in the open? You get punished for it. But if you play smart you can absolutely DISMANTLE your enemy and they'll have no idea what just happened to them.

And as far as hobbying goes, no other army is this open to creative paint jobs.

Harlequins are awesome. But they’re not diverse. They have like 4 units.

Well, I have both a painted Harlie army and a painted GK army.
I think the question is not either or.
I'd go for both armies in a long run.

GK are probably the most tactical army in the game, given that they are active in every phase (especially the psychic phase) and heavily rely on the synergies between all their spells, stratagems, and tides of the warp. I've been a GK fan for 10 years, but the stuff they got with the latest rules is really fun.