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Fresh-Faced New User




I know I know, people are gonna jump in and say "No no no, you dont understand, the Chaos knights book is just BALANCED and not super OP like the last 4 codex GW has put out"

Mostly what that means is people's opinion of "Balanced" means "I'm going to win every single game, and it'll never really be in doubt, but itll be kind of close sometimes so I'll call it balanced"

So knights, specifically Chaos but its pretty likely this applies to imperial as well for the most part. Realistically knights can never be an S tier or even upper A tier list, it would be functionally impossible for them to really top table without being so aggressively under costed that it would just get absurd. The fact is as a low model count list that has no cheap chaff unit it can take to just sit on an objective or use actions knights are immediately on the back foot when it comes to secondary options and primary, nerfs to mobility in the new codex only make the issue more significant and those problems have all been there since the inception of the knights codex. Even during the heyday of knights as part of the top tier meta it was a single knight in a soup list and by far the more significant contributor to that particular list was virtually unlimited command points and the ability for smash captains to eliminate anything that might be able to actually hurt the knight from anywhere on the board.

So what should knights feel like to play and to play against? These are supposed to be towering monstrosities of death and despair, the very sight of them on the battlefield triggers fear even in the hive mind of the tyranids or the stalwart Adeptus Custodes. Mountains of armor and massive weaponry that evaporate anything that gets hit.

So the first issue is one thats been commented on in every review/hot take/look at the new codex. Knights are squishy, no really squishy. T8 is a nice stat to have, but with the amount of flat bonuses to wound, rerolls, auto wounding on 6s with just pure volume of fire realistically it just doesnt do a whole lot to keep you alive, not to mention the plethora of fairly inexpensive heavy weapons out there that are str 8 and higher. The 3+/5++ for ranged profile is one of the more confusing decisions that GW made for this codex, at the bare minimum all of the titanic knights should be sitting at a 2+ base armor save and likely a 4+ invulnerable save as well. These models are INCREDIBLY expensive, a single knight is bare minimum 20% of your army and while rotate ion shields exists thats a pretty poor solution for an already CP strapped faction and given how prevalent 4+ invul saves are now it really makes no sense that a marine with a stormshield somehow is more difficult to damage than something with literal shield generators and multiple feet thick plates of armor. GW has acknowledged how absurd AP has gotten with the armor of contempt change and with the status of the game right now basically everything you do when building a knights list needs to be in service of making yourself more difficult to kill, any relics, households, and favors of the dark gods that increase your offense are essentially noob traps and need to be looked over in favor of the ones that keep you alive as long as possible.

Second up is the array of defensive tech that has arisen in the game that hits an army like knights much harder than the vast majority of other factions. Namely mass 4+ invul and trans human effects. Trans human effects should be changed to say "Attacks from non titantic units cannot wound this model on an unmodified roll of a 1, 2, or 3" I dont care how specially conditioned, genetically engineered, fight through the pain you are, when someone hits you with a literal building or fires a gun at you that with some small modifications could use YOU as the actual ammunition just for fun, there shouldnt be a rule that destroys the effectiveness of that model so completely. It hurts knights even more thanks to those low model counts so you cant just pivot to another unit and high costs you NEED to be getting work done with every single activation and when trans human goes off on a model that also has a reasonable save the entire game for the knights can go up in smoke because apparently a freight train made out of buzz saws that can cut a city block in half aint got nothing on a space marine with a shield. With this interaction it really feels like most knights lore should just be "Knights were invented because it seemed like they'd be great ofr large scale warfare, then after getting them out there everyone just decided it wasn't worthwhile so they melted them down". This is the Indiana Jones fridge made manifest in 40k and for knights to even be remotely viable this cannot be something they have to constantly deal with.

The knight tyrant, what the hell guys, The 600 point gun platform that has no melee options besides the new god awful feet attacks and he couldnt even get a 2+ ballistic skill? 1 shot on the "Hey what if rail guns were just...just terrible" harpoon? Every other gun a roll to see the shots? In a faction that's already worried about getting enough done with each model you take the most expensive one and make it the most unreliable and slower. Change its BS to 2+ Volcano cannon to heavy 3, Ectoplasmic decimator to Heavy 6+d6, Darkflame cannon to Heavy 10+d6, and the harpoon do heavy 2 ignoring invulnerable saves. Why does it get two shots compared to the rail gun's 1? Because 18" range, thats why. Now we're at least looking at a gun platform that actually feels like it could get 600 points worth of work done and should actually be on the target priority list instead of just ignored. Either make some relics specifically for the tyrant or let them take more relics from the codex, why can a tyrant not have the helm of warp sight? The tyrants banner? As of right now the tyrant can only take two of the relics in the codex, one to give it an extra fell bond and one that allows it to have an extra harbinger of dread. Two things it absolutely doesnt want. Also change the detachment rules to give +6 CP for any combination of 3 Abhorrent or Tyrant class models, Taking one of these things should be at least tempting and not just the addition of one in the list functionally lock you into one of two builds in order to have even a reasonable number of CP to start the game with. We only really have like 7 data sheets given almost all the war dog models are just the same thing renamed to get around rule of 3 problems, why make one of them functionally useless?

Knight despoiler, just get rid of the 20 point fee for doubling up on guns, this knight has a lot of potential to either be a bit of a catch all bringing a mix of weapons or more of a niche specialist to help cover something the rest of your list cant, its still and expensive model regardless at nearly 500 points kitted out theres no need to punish someone for doubling up, and I dont even know if it would still see play if you did.

Finally we come to the harbingers of dread, one of the coolest aspects of the book and by far the most significant missed opportunity. Having only one option for both the first and last turn, both of the powerful defensive debuffs placed 2 turns later than they would realistically be useful and because of the way you need to navigate around the chart there are really very few actual choices that can be made overall. This ability is the real opportunity to put some power into knights that you never have to worry about soup or anything and it feels absolutely awful that of the first three turns there are really only two options that even feel remotely worthwhile and theyre both on turn 2 so you cant even select both. Fill out the damn columns so there are always choices to be made, -1 leadership and combat attrition on turn 1 isnt a bonus, it just doesnt exist for the most part, then a 3" increase in Dread range shouldnt be a choice, it should be a 1cp/2cp stratagem 1 for a single knight 2 for your whole army. The entire middle column may as well not exist, the only reason anyone would take anything from it is because theyre forced to on round 1 and 5 or because you wanted to select the Darkness/Despair trait on turn 2 and then want the opposite option on Round 4. The only actually exceptional ability in the tree that is well placed is the fourth round despair option to remove Obsec from other models. At the absolute bare minimum the two once per game options to take another dread ability should be able to select any one they want instead of only from the current round and earlier but realistically this tree could make for so many interesting choices and really effect how you play the game instead of having one strong pick(Gheist Storm) two incredibly situational options if you're up against auras or actually in a position to effect actions in round 3, followed up by one really powerful option in round 4 when its probably not going to matter anymore thanks to all the things listed above. Give it some actually damn cool stuff, make round 3 of doom something that actually invokes the idea of "Mortal Terror" like "Units take a dread test at the beginning of each battle round, infantry units that fail are considered to have failed a morale test and may flee, monster/vehicle/characters that fail fight last this round" Right now looking at it I'm gonna go straight down the darkness side basically every game and then use the stratagem for an extra one round 4 for the remove obsec. Boring and a real missed opportunity.

Any of this gonna happen? Nope, sure isnt, only thing that might is the undercosting thing at the beginning cause that would sell a bunch more knights that they can just invalidate any time they want to rebalance things, too bad, this could be an amazing faction that adds a lot to the meta, instead its gonna be a quick blip and fade immediately.





This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2022/05/16 19:18:36


 
   
Made in us
Powerful Ushbati





United States

What I think does need to happen for both flavors of knight is that they need a foot soldier troop choice/tax.

The thing about this is it literally exists within the lore, they're Titanguard and if they'd toss em into the codex and release some neat models, maybe a commander of some kind it would really help to make Knight players armies feel like more of a force than just a few models for fun.
   
Made in ca
Librarian with Freaky Familiar






SO full disclosure i did not read everything you wrote because wall of text but here is what you want from knights both imperial and chose.

Knights should be the meta checker, they should exist purly as a beat stick army. They should be very tough to kill, and be able to dish out lots of Fire power.

However they should have very little synergy/strats, and not have obsec unless they are running armigers and even then, no obsec.

A knight list should serve as the checker that comes in, and swings really hard. It should be able to basically blow up most meta lists with sheer fire power, but get out played very quickly by very odd one out lists. IE should be able to curb stomp S tier meta lists, but get beatn by things like c and D tier.

YOu want knights dead center in terms of balance with a 50% win rate.

To many unpainted models to count. 
   
Made in us
Pious Palatine




 Backspacehacker wrote:
SO full disclosure i did not read everything you wrote because wall of text but here is what you want from knights both imperial and chose.

Knights should be the meta checker, they should exist purly as a beat stick army. They should be very tough to kill, and be able to dish out lots of Fire power.

However they should have very little synergy/strats, and not have obsec unless they are running armigers and even then, no obsec.

A knight list should serve as the checker that comes in, and swings really hard. It should be able to basically blow up most meta lists with sheer fire power, but get out played very quickly by very odd one out lists. IE should be able to curb stomp S tier meta lists, but get beatn by things like c and D tier.

YOu want knights dead center in terms of balance with a 50% win rate.


...Wow, you really have no idea how 40k works, do you?

Meta lists are meta because they kill things well AND because they play the mission well. Meta lists don't instantly lose if you outgun them. In fact, there's absolutely no way the knight rules you described could win EVER against Nids, Tau, Harlequins, or CWE. Not without tabling them. And guess what? If you can table a meta Nids army by turn 5, your 'C and D' tier armies would be dead by turn 3.

The scenario you've described is completely impossible unless you're adding "Attacks from this unit cannot damage any models from a faction with less than a 50% winrate" to the Knight's army rules.


 
   
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 Backspacehacker wrote:
SO full disclosure i did not read everything you wrote because wall of text but here is what you want from knights both imperial and chose.

Knights should be the meta checker, they should exist purly as a beat stick army. They should be very tough to kill, and be able to dish out lots of Fire power.

However they should have very little synergy/strats, and not have obsec unless they are running armigers and even then, no obsec.

A knight list should serve as the checker that comes in, and swings really hard. It should be able to basically blow up most meta lists with sheer fire power, but get out played very quickly by very odd one out lists. IE should be able to curb stomp S tier meta lists, but get beatn by things like c and D tier.

YOu want knights dead center in terms of balance with a 50% win rate.


This isnt really what I said, and honestly I dont care what winrates or the ending balance is(though I dont want them nid levels op or even close to that, its horrible for the game)

What I would like is that each of the 7 options we have in the book to be interesting and compelling to take for some reason, maybe you have to build a list specifically around a tyrant or something like that but I want to at least consider each model as something I could take advantage of in a given list and in addition to that I'd like the really cool new idea that is the faction ability(harbingers) to be something cool and impactful with real choices to make in a good number of games and boy does it seem like they seriously missed the mark on that.
   
Made in au
Owns Whole Set of Skullz Techpriests






Versteckt in den Schatten deines Geistes.

VIlacom wrote:
Mostly what that means is people's opinion of "Balanced" means "I'm going to win every single game, and it'll never really be in doubt, but itll be kind of close sometimes so I'll call it balanced"
I don't think that's what people mean by balanced...

VIlacom wrote:
Realistically knights can never be an S tier or even upper A tier list...
I don't think that matters to as many people as you think it would. For the past week all I've been thinking about when on walks is how to put together a Knight v Knight campaign that involves all the players in my group. I bought a Knight Abominant and 6 Wardogs just so I could bring that idea to the table (and I haven't even built my Imperial Knight army!). Not S tier? Whatever. Means nothing to me.

VIlacom wrote:
... nerfs to mobility...
On one hand I instinctively agree with you, but on the other hand things in 40k are too fast and we live in a world where games hinge on first turn charges, something that was basically impossible back in the day, so if something got slower then good; everything should be slower, and ranges should be shorter, and AP should be lower. And on the other, other hand, I just want a Krispy Kreme*.


*And that's a reference very few people will get.

VIlacom wrote:
So what should knights feel like to play and to play against? These are supposed to be towering monstrosities of death and despair, the very sight of them on the battlefield triggers fear even in the hive mind of the tyranids or the stalwart Adeptus Custodes. Mountains of armor and massive weaponry that evaporate anything that gets hit.
Actually I think the whole Doom and Despair thing they've added to Chaos Knights does a really good job of the 'terror' of facing corrupted Knights.

VIlacom wrote:
Knights are squishy, no really squishy. T8 is a nice stat to have, but with the amount of flat bonuses to wound, rerolls, auto wounding on 6s with just pure volume of fire realistically it just doesnt do a whole lot to keep you alive, not to mention the plethora of fairly inexpensive heavy weapons out there that are str 8 and higher.
You're not wrong, but this isn't a Knight problem. This is a 40k problem. Vehicles are pathetic overall, and GW has failed spectacularly in writing the mechanics for damaging units both from the "anything can wound anything" approach to the To Wound chart, right to the "Any stat can be above 10 now", but they never do that for Toughness. It impacts Knights because they're massive units that should be T10-12 without question, but this is something that affects all tanks. That and they keep heaping on additional rules to make things tougher (damage reduction, AP reductions, etc.) rather than fixing the core problems.

VIlacom wrote:
Second up is the array of defensive tech that has arisen in the game that hits an army like knights much harder than the vast majority of other factions. Namely mass 4+ invul and trans human effects. Trans human effects should be changed to say "Attacks from non titantic units cannot wound this model on an unmodified roll of a 1, 2, or 3" I dont care how specially conditioned, genetically engineered, fight through the pain you are, when someone hits you with a literal building or fires a gun at you that with some small modifications could use YOU as the actual ammunition just for fun, there shouldn't be a rule that destroys the effectiveness of that model so completely.
That's actually a good idea. Titanic units should ignore 'Transhuman Effects'. Of course, Transhuman rules are stupid and shouldn't be in the game at all. They're just another version of "fixing toughness without fixing toughness" that they've heaped upon the core rules in order to fix a problem that should be easy to fix, yet they never actually fix it.

VIlacom wrote:
Every other gun a roll to see the shots?
If I had to guess, they were afraid of making it too powerful. Still dumb that its weapons are still so swingy.

As for the Harpoon vs Railgun issue, the Railgun has dumb rules and shouldn't do what it does. The problem isn't the Harpoon.

VIlacom wrote:
Knight despoiler, just get rid of the 20 point fee for doubling up on guns...
I agree with this. You can make the 'greater than the sum of its parts' argument, but I'd make the "things should cost what they are worth". Each gun doesn't become more killy because there are two of them.

But for the 'meta' stuff, so many of us don't give a gak. Sorry!

Industrial Insanity - My Terrain Blog
"GW really needs to understand 'Less is more' when it comes to AoS." - Wha-Mu-077

 
   
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 H.B.M.C. wrote:
VIlacom wrote:
Mostly what that means is people's opinion of "Balanced" means "I'm going to win every single game, and it'll never really be in doubt, but itll be kind of close sometimes so I'll call it balanced"
I don't think that's what people mean by balanced...

VIlacom wrote:
Realistically knights can never be an S tier or even upper A tier list...
I don't think that matters to as many people as you think it would. For the past week all I've been thinking about when on walks is how to put together a Knight v Knight campaign that involves all the players in my group. I bought a Knight Abominant and 6 Wardogs just so I could bring that idea to the table (and I haven't even built my Imperial Knight army!). Not S tier? Whatever. Means nothing to me.

VIlacom wrote:
... nerfs to mobility...
On one hand I instinctively agree with you, but on the other hand things in 40k are too fast and we live in a world where games hinge on first turn charges, something that was basically impossible back in the day, so if something got slower then good; everything should be slower, and ranges should be shorter, and AP should be lower. And on the other, other hand, I just want a Krispy Kreme*.


*And that's a reference very few people will get.

VIlacom wrote:
So what should knights feel like to play and to play against? These are supposed to be towering monstrosities of death and despair, the very sight of them on the battlefield triggers fear even in the hive mind of the tyranids or the stalwart Adeptus Custodes. Mountains of armor and massive weaponry that evaporate anything that gets hit.
Actually I think the whole Doom and Despair thing they've added to Chaos Knights does a really good job of the 'terror' of facing corrupted Knights.

VIlacom wrote:
Knights are squishy, no really squishy. T8 is a nice stat to have, but with the amount of flat bonuses to wound, rerolls, auto wounding on 6s with just pure volume of fire realistically it just doesnt do a whole lot to keep you alive, not to mention the plethora of fairly inexpensive heavy weapons out there that are str 8 and higher.
You're not wrong, but this isn't a Knight problem. This is a 40k problem. Vehicles are pathetic overall, and GW has failed spectacularly in writing the mechanics for damaging units both from the "anything can wound anything" approach to the To Wound chart, right to the "Any stat can be above 10 now", but they never do that for Toughness. It impacts Knights because they're massive units that should be T10-12 without question, but this is something that affects all tanks. That and they keep heaping on additional rules to make things tougher (damage reduction, AP reductions, etc.) rather than fixing the core problems.

VIlacom wrote:
Second up is the array of defensive tech that has arisen in the game that hits an army like knights much harder than the vast majority of other factions. Namely mass 4+ invul and trans human effects. Trans human effects should be changed to say "Attacks from non titantic units cannot wound this model on an unmodified roll of a 1, 2, or 3" I dont care how specially conditioned, genetically engineered, fight through the pain you are, when someone hits you with a literal building or fires a gun at you that with some small modifications could use YOU as the actual ammunition just for fun, there shouldn't be a rule that destroys the effectiveness of that model so completely.
That's actually a good idea. Titanic units should ignore 'Transhuman Effects'. Of course, Transhuman rules are stupid and shouldn't be in the game at all. They're just another version of "fixing toughness without fixing toughness" that they've heaped upon the core rules in order to fix a problem that should be easy to fix, yet they never actually fix it.

VIlacom wrote:
Every other gun a roll to see the shots?
If I had to guess, they were afraid of making it too powerful. Still dumb that its weapons are still so swingy.

As for the Harpoon vs Railgun issue, the Railgun has dumb rules and shouldn't do what it does. The problem isn't the Harpoon.

VIlacom wrote:
Knight despoiler, just get rid of the 20 point fee for doubling up on guns...
I agree with this. You can make the 'greater than the sum of its parts' argument, but I'd make the "things should cost what they are worth". Each gun doesn't become more killy because there are two of them.

But for the 'meta' stuff, so many of us don't give a gak. Sorry!


Honestly I said very little about anything meta and mostly just said I'd like an actual 7 interesting datasheets, 100% agree with you on the transhuman thing but it hurts factions like knights more than most, and I think the harbingers are such a shadow of what they really could have been(why is the realistically best harbinger ability a psychic spell?)

I never expect to see knights as a top meta pick, nor do I particularly care to. I come from warmachine where realistically any faction can be the winner of a large tourny and no one would bat an eye which is about as close to balance as any wargame with dice rolls can get. But knights are just such a missed opportunity for such a small codex I really just dont understand what GW was putting time into
   
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NE Ohio, USA

 Backspacehacker wrote:
SO full disclosure i did not read everything you wrote because wall of text but here is what you want from knights both imperial and chose.


So if you didn't read it, how exactly do you know what they want?
   
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The Great State of New Jersey

 Togusa wrote:
What I think does need to happen for both flavors of knight is that they need a foot soldier troop choice/tax.

The thing about this is it literally exists within the lore, they're Titanguard and if they'd toss em into the codex and release some neat models, maybe a commander of some kind it would really help to make Knight players armies feel like more of a force than just a few models for fun.


Secutarii/Titanguard are specifically Ad Mech forces deployed in support of Titans, not Knights (which are not Titans as they fall outside the auspices of the Adeptus Titanicus). In more practical terms, Knights themselves typically form the security force for the titans, either acting as close support forces or scouts and flankers.

There are mentions of household serfs, etc. which support knight households in wartime as militia infantry types, but not much details about them (though to my eyes it looks like the chaos knights book has a few depictions of them. Personally I would be glad to see them, but they should be a "reverse tax" type unit, I.E. you can't field them until you've first filled your quota of a certain number of knights/armigers.

CoALabaer wrote:
Wargamers hate two things: the state of the game and change.
 
   
Made in ch
The Dread Evil Lord Varlak





Why not lean into the Knight theme.

Big knight is the head honcho, for any big knight you can field squires (eg wardogs) and for any number of wardogs you can field Household serfs / slaves. And you should want to do so synergetically.

Right now knights are just a skew army, that is honestly really unhealthy for the game and for the players. Better to upgrade them into a full fledged army by filling troop and fa and even elite slots.

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A Mostly Renegades and Heretics blog.
GW:"Space marines got too many options to balance, therefore we decided to legends HH units."
Players: "why?!? Now we finally got decent plastic kits and you cut them?"
Chaos marines players: "Since when are Daemonengines 30k models and why do i have NO droppods now?"
GW" MONEY.... erm i meant TOO MANY OPTIONS (to resell your army to you again by disalowing former units)! Do you want specific tyranid fighiting Primaris? Even a new sabotage lieutnant!"
Chaos players: Guess i stop playing or go to HH.  
   
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Decrepit Dakkanaut





Knights aren't as skew as they used to be with baby knights and the roles they can fill.
   
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Trustworthy Shas'vre





Cobleskill

When I built my knight force, I had a very clear idea as to what I wanted it to be...

Oh.
You want my concept?

Okay.
My Warlord was a melee knight that excelled at close range. Strike first, meltagun & kraks so I could use my guns in melee too.

The grand majority of my other models were going to be autocannon equipped war dogs, with meltas to discourage close in fighting. These would be effectively turrets, to sit on objectives and give fire support to anything in range and LOS. If I can change out the meltas with havocs imma gonna be happy happy.

The last model? A melee wardog. Why? Counter assault support for my autocannon equipped wardogs while my warlord is beating things to death elsewhere.

'No plan survives contact with the enemy. Who are we?'
'THE ENEMY!!!'
Racerguy180 wrote:
rules come and go, models are forever...like herpes.
 
   
 
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