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With new Grey Knight rules, and a new beautiful Castellan Crowe model, I was thinking about potential new units or models.

Are there any roles that would both be useful in a Grey Knight army and would work thematically that a potential new unit could fill?

I'm not really looking at copy-paste SM units, but if it works then that's fine.

I'm having a hard time thinking of anything, any ideas?

Honestly, I'm expecting/hoping for Grey Knights to get a full Primaris range refresh, and I'd rather they deliver that before adding new units. That doesn't seem like a massive ask, though; setting aside characters, they've only got two actual box sets to "replace" at the moment. No reason we can't have both.

Right now, for unique units the Grey Knights have:

Strike Squad - analogous to Tactical/Assault (or Intercessor/Assault Intercessor)

Terminator Squad - self-explanatory

Interceptor Squad - Marines with personal teleporters, analogous to Assault Jump Squads

Purgation Squad - analogous to Devastators

Nemesis Dreadknight - analogous to Invictor Tactical Warsuit

Paladin Squad - just Terminators with +1W for some reason

Purifier Squad - just Strike Squad but with a melee Smite buff

In terms of pure translations:

A Primaris translation of Strike Squads seems pretty simple; Intercessor stats, a force weapon of your choice, and a new kind of bolter (with or without intercessor-style add-ons).

Primaris Paladins would be nice, as a purely melee-focused Gravis unit; Aggressors with a force weapon replacing one gun, and new Pistol-type guns with suitably occult/knightly presentation. Give them teleporters to help with their speed and suit Grey Knights.

Primaris Dreadknight would be very simple, considering the Invictor came after the Dreadknight and looks a lot less stupid. Give it a real monster/vehicle-killer focus, as it's meant for going toe-to-toe with larger daemons.

In terms of genuinely new units or more different adaptations:

Grey Knight archivists, inspired somewhat by the Blood Ravens; a character or a unit of veterans trusted with knowledge of darker and stranger lore than the rest of the Chapter, allowing them to modify psychic powers in interesting ways.

A Primaris analogue to Purifiers; Phobos armour Fast Attack infiltrators, exclusively equipped with flame weapons, with different add-ons to focus the purifying heat in different ways.

A Primaris analogue to the Impulsor that can teleport in, pick up a squad, and move all in the same turn.

Grey Knights don't have anything to ride like Knights, and that's just sad; bikes don't really fit their "teleport in" theme, but something has to be done, here. Maybe fuse it with the Impulsor, into a unit of fast-moving "Dragoons" bike-pods that can act as a collective transport? Each big "bike" holds 2 infantry models or 1 terminator/gravis model each?

Probably biased as I don't play them, but I kind of hope they don't get any new non-character units. Their current units are pleasantly distinct from the copy+pasted stuff most chapters get. If you wanted to add more diversity to their abilities, I feel like it might be better accomplished via exarch/harlequin style alternative special rules for existing units or through new psychic powers or even just through new actions. Maybe a brother captain gains the option to perform a ritual as an action that bolsters a nearby CORE squad, for instance.

That said, their devastator equivalents could use some properly long-ranged weapons. I wouldn't mind Mr. I See Dead People and his ghost buddies making a comeback either.

Getting Primaris units would be fine, although weird. I would prefer NEW Primaris units and not reusing SM models if possible. Keeping unique Grey Knight models would be important in my opinion.

Honestly though, once GK gets their extra wound finally, Primaris would be irrelevant. Storm Bolters are amazing, Paladins would be way better than any Gravis armor unit, and although Primaris have ok weapons, some new GK weapons to fill those roles would be better than being forced to take a Primaris unit.

In terms of new ideas, what about mobile terminator squads, bikes, snipers. We have so many Character units, so I can't think of any that would be useful and thematic. Maybe even just reintroducing Inquisitor models back.

shane_hawley wrote:
Getting Primaris units would be fine, although weird. I would prefer NEW Primaris units and not reusing SM models if possible. Keeping unique Grey Knight models would be important in my opinion.

Agreed. I try not to hate on the primaris lore too much, but GK are a great example of the awkward way in which they were handled. Do you leave GK stuck at non-truescale? Do you resell everyone a taller version of their old models? Do do a bunch of weirdly specific or redundant new units for the sake of giving them primaris units that don't feel too out of place?

In terms of new ideas, what about mobile terminator squads, bikes, snipers. We have so many Character units, so I can't think of any that would be useful and thematic. Maybe even just reintroducing Inquisitor models back.

What would mobile terminator squads look like? I already think of them as getting around exclusively via teleportariums and gates of infinity. I guess you could make them teleporting jump packers, but that steps on the interceptors' (wrong name?) toes.

I'm not sure snipers feel all that appropriate for GK. I feel like daemons aren't generally predictable enough to line up the perfect assassination shot from a sky scraper. When the GK want to pull off an assassination, teleporting into the room and opening fire seems to be more their style. And if you want a weapon to snipe out medium-sized daemons in the middle of a pitched battle, a lascannon or a multimelta that can shoot through walls seems like the better tool for the job.

GK are a really specialized army, with a pretty specific way of doing things. It makes sense that they don't have the same variety of tools that other chapters do, but that makes it tough to justify entire new units rather than just expanding their wargear section.