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.

So another player thats in my group decided to make his appearance again after disappearing for awhile, this time he came with his Grey Knights (he usually runs necrons). I run Orks, so we did a 1500pt game.

His entire army melted before my deffguns and SAGs with the exception of 2 things that literally won the game for him: Dreadknights.

I couldnt touch them. Due to the 2+ armor save, my shoota boyz and lootas never hurt him and due to his crazy melee attacks anything with a klaw that engaged it got instapasted.

How do you deal with these things? The only range attacks Orks have that are AP2+ are either the SAG (which is unlikely to hit a single target) or only fire one shot and still have a BS2, meaning even less likely than the SAG to land without sheer numbers (which isnt possible with these weapons).

This is what i ran:

HQ:
2 Big Meks w/ SAG, Cybork, Heavy Armor

Elites:
6 Lootas
6 Lootas
4 Nob Bikers w/ Klaws and BP

Troops:
4 groups of 12 Shoota boyz w/ Nobklaw and Bigshoota
All mounted in Trukks w/ Red Paint and Reinforced Rams

Fast Attacks:
Deffkopta w/ TL Rokkits x3 (3 individual models, not 1 unit)

There was practically nothing his army aside from those Dreadknights could do to me. By turn 2 he had his warboss, the 2 dreadknights, and a couple straggling minions on the board. I lost by annihilation rather than objectives because those DK's were unstoppable.

What, besides green tiding and hoping for dumb luck, could i do to take these things down?

Allies?

Orks don't have a lot of effective ranged weapons; against Dreadknights you're pretty much stuck hoping for dumb luck with a lot of fire.

Whats the stats on a DK again? I havnt read that dex since it launched

 KingCracker wrote:
Whats the stats on a DK again? I havnt read that dex since it launched

Basically Monstrous Creature in Terminator Armor with a PF

the knights are T6 with a 2+ save, and a DCCW that is also force


You best bet to kill it would be lootas, tons of them. Light him up, and hope to put on a ton of wounds.


Another option might be Killa Cans. KMB on them is BS3, S8 AP2, and you can even try to fight in close combat, but you will hit on a 5+ which is bad.




Lastly, the Knight will have maybe 4-5 attacks. If you slam a 30 man boy unit into them, it will take a long time to get that unit down to where it will not be fearless. You will get a bunch of attacks that wound on a 6+, but you might take it down eventually or just tie it up for a while

A PK Nob in the squad would not help, as the Knight is a Character and can challenge, so the klaw would die before it could swing and hurt the knight.

Tried out Zzap gunz?

Zzap guns are only attainable by Battlewagons and, on average, theyre weaker than Killkannons

Killkannons are 24" S7 AP3 Large Blast, Ordnance 1.
Zzaps are 36" S2D6 (on average 4-8str based on my luck with SAG rolls) AP 2 Heavy 1. Yes that additional AP is strong, but Toughness 7 means majority of the time i wouldnt be wounding that thing unless i rolled baller dice.
Also, Zzaps are bad for infantry. Once i take out the dread, if i do, what then? That BW took the points away from something else in my army that was also vital for the rest of his army.
To me, trading the large blast for a single shot of slightly better stats isnt worth it on a BW

EDIT: Hmm, my bad, i could have a zzap gun Big Gun operated by Gretchin, which wouldnt be...that bad since its BS3 and it would have T7. I is thinking....now....

Vineheart01 wrote:

EDIT: Hmm, my bad, i could have a zzap gun Big Gun operated by Gretchin, which wouldnt be...that bad since its BS3 and it would have T7. I is thinking....now....

That's what i ment and it's cheap! 30p for each kannon and then for more crew or ammo runts taking a aegies defence line they get cover 2+ because they are small targets. <3

Vineheart01 wrote:
Zzap guns are only attainable by Battlewagons and, on average, theyre weaker than Killkannons

Killkannons are 24" S7 AP3 Large Blast, Ordnance 1.
Zzaps are 36" S2D6 (on average 4-8str based on my luck with SAG rolls) AP 2 Heavy 1. Yes that additional AP is strong, but Toughness 7 means majority of the time i wouldnt be wounding that thing unless i rolled baller dice.
Also, Zzaps are bad for infantry. Once i take out the dread, if i do, what then? That BW took the points away from something else in my army that was also vital for the rest of his army.
To me, trading the large blast for a single shot of slightly better stats isnt worth it on a BW

EDIT: Hmm, my bad, i could have a zzap gun Big Gun operated by Gretchin, which wouldnt be...that bad since its BS3 and it would have T7. I is thinking....now....

Zzap guns should average S7 from 2d6...

Zzap gun is not ideal because its strength is variable and it is clearly designed to kill Terminators, not Monstrous Creatures with 6 toughness.

The problem you're dealing with with a Zap gun is the variable strength, which means you're not consistently wounding the Dreadknight. So even though you're cutting through the 2+ save, you've still got a rather mediocre rate of inflicting wounds and also you are still left with a 5+ invulnerable save.

Ideally you would be using Kustom Mega Blasters on Killa Kanz, but because Kustom Mega Blasters suck against anything else, it cannot sensibly be placed into an ordinary TAC list.

So that leaves either lots and lots of high strength attacks (Lootas) or Power Klaw attacks, neither of which are ideal because of the lack of a strong invulnerable save on any Ork unit in the Codex, even when you include independent characters.

Got any meganobs mine have taken down a few DK's without to much problem.

Always killed them through attrition or throwing something stupid at them. Like 6 Nob Bikers + Biker Boss. I'd only do that last resort though. Normally I drop them from sustained fire from tons of shootas/Lootas/Bikes Being Deffrolla'd sometimes pulls off a wound or two.

pepe5454 wrote:
Got any meganobs mine have taken down a few DK's without to much problem.

Weapon skill 5....

Hits on 3s with rerolls, wounds on 2s with rerolls, cuts through the 2+ save, no invuln, then instant death with 4 attacks, all at initiative 4 - yeah, no.

Meganobs would be worse than biker nobs because at least biker nobs get there faster.

To be honest, I'd just throw a 30 strong Shoota Boy squad at it and just tarpit it before it kills anything valuable. It can only kill a maximum of 4 Boyz per turn, and they're Fearless until they hit 10 models.

Multi charge.
With normal attacks you need what? 72 attacks to get a single wound on theDK.
Only Pk can reliably wound the DK. Multicharge with 2 mobs. One nob to decline the challenge, and one nob to take it down.

XC18 wrote:
Multi charge.
With normal attacks you need what? 72 attacks to get a single wound on theDK.
Only Pk can reliably wound the DK. Multicharge with 2 mobs. One nob to decline the challenge, and one nob to take it down.

you can also do this with a warboss AND a powerclaw nob. 19 shootaboys with nob and a warboss in a battleweagon. go for it!

You can also take 15 loota's with 3 Kustom Mega blasta meks and put them in a battlewagon and shoot from the open topped vehicle. at sum point those S8 ap2 shots will hit!

How about just nobz with couple pks. 7-8 with 3 pks should take them out. He can't challege you and you have naked nobz soaking the damage.

I suppose so. But the DK's hits are ID Ap2, so I'd better lose a boy than a nob each time he swings ;(

due to BS2, it seems to me like its literally just hope for dumb luck on dice.

Granted, that game i did ignore it with my lootas, big mistake, but still it was ridiculous. I first focused on taking out his transports (which both of them didnt even get to move muhahaha)

Use tons of Lootas and snap shot the thing to death by running and gunning. If he has only two Dreadknights left then there is no way you can lose on kill points or objectives. Troll around until the game ends.

That or you get the Greenskins Space Marines Chapter to fight with you.

I've played against a friend that uses dread knights. The last game he used two. He uses the teleporter for them, so I know I could not take them out in one turn. I just ignored them until my dakka jets came it. Waaaghed and had 18 twin linked shots at him. Was able to kill one by over loading his save rolls.

I recently got some Gretchin primarily for my ADL quad gun, but when i read what the runtherder did i think i found something to deal with dreadknights.

Grabba sticks.

30 Gretchin, 3 Runtherders all charge at a dreadknight. The rules ONLY say i cannot lower his attacks to less than 1, and it does not say it doesnt happen every turn. 30 Gretchin to go through one by one...he goin nowhere muhahaha

Vineheart01 wrote:Meganobs would be worse than biker nobs because at least biker nobs get there faster.

OMG no, this is an awful suggestion! Biker nobz have a huge challenge to make their points back and they aren't faster than meganobz since the meganobz can take a trukk with RPJ and actually move faster you just need to know how to use your trukks right so for 45 pts you could have something that crashes through terrain, tank shocks, and brings armor 2+ with 2 wounds death to the enemy with a hilarious kareen result or a giant FU, even if the trukk gets it's worse result, it's still S:3 explosion as opposed the 4's we normally get.

TedNugent wrote:To be honest, I'd just throw a 30 strong Shoota Boy squad at it and just tarpit it before it kills anything valuable. It can only kill a maximum of 4 Boyz per turn, and they're Fearless until they hit 10 models.

Correct, and not to mention you can hide a power klaw amongst the mob to crack the 2+ armor saves and wound it on a 2+... Just make sure the nob is in the mid to back. And shoota fire is enough to cause some pre assualt wounds. 120 shots or so 1 to 2 failures if you are lucky between 18 inch shot and overwatch and then power klaw finishes cause the DK can't kill your nob if he isn't closest.

enooNaMI wrote:
Use tons of Lootas and snap shot the thing to death by running and gunning. If he has only two Dreadknights left then there is no way you can lose on kill points or objectives. Troll around until the game ends.

That or you get the Greenskins Space Marines Chapter to fight with you.

*Face palm* I'm not sure if you are an actual ork player but using lootas in that fashion is nearly worthless, i know everyone says Snap fire isn't that bad for orks, while that is true it really doesn't mean you want to lower your accuracy any more than you need to. if you want something that peppers the enemy with speed and lots of shots you should either consider buggies or just get a dakka jet, those work wonders for me like highly accurate loota squads that pin, have a single S point less and a shorter range whichyou make up for in mobility. in short, don't make lootas walk it's a sign you need to revise your tactics or the match is that close neither should be happening.

Vineheart01 wrote:I recently got some Gretchin primarily for my ADL quad gun, but when i read what the runtherder did i think i found something to deal with dreadknights.

Grabba sticks.

30 Gretchin, 3 Runtherders all charge at a dreadknight. The rules ONLY say i cannot lower his attacks to less than 1, and it does not say it doesnt happen every turn. 30 Gretchin to go through one by one...he goin nowhere muhahaha

Considering gretchin cannot even hurt a DK and you can only have a max of 3 grabbas that would have to be within b2b of the enemy this is a stalling tactic that is bound to fail and not be worth the investment IMO. Gretchin aren't fearless, only 3 models can attack the delayed DK and they hit on 4 wound on 6 and then even worse he still keeps his 2+ save... so guess what happens? DK isn't hurt, smashes 1 model you fail morale have squigs gobble up more gretchin and re-roll only to probably still fail then get swept and wonder why that was a smart move opposed to 30 shoota boyz and losing only 3 on average a round.

This is to the original OP, your main weakness in my opinion was you took too many toyz before the boyz and Ork motto is "Boyz before Toyz!". you need a butt ton of fearless models that are decent in close combat with an exhausting amount of firepower that discourages all enemies from apporaching other than the wraithguard or dreadnoughts. Trukk boyz are good for getting to the enemy but very bad for sustianed attack which in this edition really needs to happen against the grey knights in order to win they aren't a flood me with wounds and watch me fire army consider yourself lucky to have not faced paladins which can be even worse for you sir. My suggestion is you had a solid list but you scrap the koptas for a Dakka jet, drop a SAG mek and nob bikers for a wartruk, mega nobz and mega boss (you will save points from this exchange) and lastly you convert those trukk boyz into some objective holding foot sloggers and with the points left over grab yourself a Big gunz krew for your kannons which are longer range and about the same BS making it a 1 to 1 exchange for S:8 ap:3

The gretchin idea is nothing but a stall, yes, and where does it say base contact? All i find is a description of "Arms reach" which tells me that if hes able to attack (2inches from model in base contact, btw) he can do it.
The purpose would be to just go HI HOW YOU and ignore it from then out.

Anyway im working on the lack of boyz issue. I was working on a biker boss but debating on either painting him up (since hes built just not painted) or building more boyz. Right now i only got 4squads of 12painted shooty boyz. I intend to make a 5th and then beef the squads up to 30strong (theyre color coded) for in case im not running trukks. Which, against Grey Knights, i dont think i ever will again due to this damn dreadknight.

EDIT: I have a ton of boyz btw theyre just unassembled since i have this thing against building unpainted models. The biker boss was an exception obviously since hes a conversion using plasticard n such.

The Dreadknight is a character and can therefore challenge the PK Nob.

Why waste the points trying to kill the dreadknight? If you throw a 30 strong shoota boy squad at the Dreadknight, they can tarpit it until the end of the game, with neither unit dying. A tie is a better result than potentially losing a Power Klaw Nob, or spending too much on a tarpit.

I was suggesting a tarpit - there are better ways to kill a Dreadknight, I suspect, than a single hidden Power Klaw. And if there's nothing in the Codex that can, which I'm beginning to suspect, well - all the more reason to tarpit the damn thing and forget about it.

I mean - there has been to little stress on the fact that in this edition, we have the best damn tarpit unit in the game. The best. Around. Nothing's ever gonna keep it down.

lootas are probably your best bet at taking them out. You might have luck using flashgitz and I do mean luck with their random ap, but their also a huge points sink.

I know Ghazzy would eat them for breakfast with prophet of the waaagh, maybe you could try that.

 TedNugent wrote:
The Dreadknight is a character and can therefore challenge the PK Nob.

Why waste the points trying to kill the dreadknight? If you throw a 30 strong shoota boy squad at the Dreadknight, they can tarpit it until the end of the game, with neither unit dying. A tie is a better result than potentially losing a Power Klaw Nob, or spending too much on a tarpit.

I was suggesting a tarpit - there are better ways to kill a Dreadknight, I suspect, than a single hidden Power Klaw. And if there's nothing in the Codex that can, which I'm beginning to suspect, well - all the more reason to tarpit the damn thing and forget about it.

I mean - there has been to little stress on the fact that in this edition, we have the best damn tarpit unit in the game. The best. Around. Nothing's ever gonna keep it down.

thus the point of keeping him in the back, can't be challenged if you aren't in 2 inches of something that is in base contact. It's pretty easy to avoid a challenge imo

Once you swing, you're in combat, right? Once you're in combat, you can get challenged. How do you avoid that?

i think he means on the charge, keep the nob back so he cant attack or be attacked, thus losing the 4-5 (if he has a slugga or shoota) attacks but avoiding the challenge. On turn 2 of the assault when you get to pile in again on your initiative, then move him in. Unless i am mistaken, challenges can only be made at the start of the conflict not a turn later.