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I've been using Grey Knights a while and I've come to the conclusion that Terminators are poor value for their points cost.

They are double the points cost of a normal troops choice. But with this you get the same number of models, thus the same number of weapons and whilst they may have slightly more powerful attacks, or one more attack each, they don't get double, this is arguably compensated by the 2+ save, but an opponent simply has to spam lots of fire on them and if they roll 5-6 wounds odds are you'll lose at least one.

The other problem is with the exception of buying a costly land raider or storm raven, the only way to get them into combat quickly is deepstrike. Which leaves them susceptible to mishaps and the other disadvantage of choosing between scattering to anticipate lots of blast templates and forgoing any shooting, or vice versa. I find even fielding larger squads of 7-8 Terminators is limited in effectivness. They soak up most of the fire from AP2 weapons and are decimated.

Arguably they have pretty much absorbed an entire rounds shooting and left most other units intact and unharmed. But is this worth the 200-300 points. It seems ironic my use of the hard hitting elites is as cannon fodder and bullet sponge to allow the softer and larger units to close in.

What are your thoughts? Am I using them wrong or do you think 10 marines spitting out 20 bolter shots is a better bargain than 5 Terminators spitting 10.

Those then will need to be at half the range to fire like that, while the terminators can still fire on the move at full distance.

However, you will be getting in exchange in general (This applies to all MEQ terminators)

+1A standard
2+ Armor
5++ Invulnerability
Deep Strike
4+ armor penetration at worst

With differences sorting out the varied factions Terminators, since GK is the example.

Force Weapon
+1S Ability for the entire squad
+1S to Stormbolters
Varied Defenses against Psykers
Grenades
Heavy Weapons to use with Relentless (Psycannon)
Free I5 attacks, or S8 thunderhammers

Generally, terminators need to be defended a bit if you want them to reach combat, as while they can do okay at range (Not effectively) They will want to close in. These most likely will want to be deepstriked if you don't use them in a land raider.

You probably DON'T want GKT in combat, though. They're a shooting unit with above average melee capability. If you can get them stuck in, sure, go for it, but you probably shouldn't be aiming to get them into CC.

What Terminators give up in firepower they make up for in force concentration. While it's true that their points in Strike Squads is more shooting and just as many attacks, the Terminators can focus their power on a smaller part of the enemy army and thus gain local superiority. It takes a better CC unit to kill 5 GKT than to kill 10 Strike Squad Marines. The Terminators also don't lose Force Weapon attacks by taking Psycannons.

As GK PA marines already have a force weapon and a stormbolter, difference in efficiency is not that great. However, if you compare a tactical marine to a tactical terminator difference is pretty significant.

Ah cool.
See that's the other trouble with GK terminators, all their special rules and upgrades and knowning when to use them. That's the other thing. You can easily spend too much on upgrades and have say your brotherhood banner or an equally valuable unit worth 60-70pts get wiped out in a matter of moments.

Grey Knights have never been a melee army. They have always been a shooty army that whittles down the enemy so they can finish them off in melee.

And terminators are far from bad. I recently went undefeated at the CoC in Sacramento(didn't win because I didn't massacre all my opponents) so it is very possible to win competitive games with them. And yes I did face flyers.

It is all about proper positioning and usage of rules.

Yeah, I like terminators. As you mention, they cost twice as much, but come with an armor save that fails half as often. Then, on top of that, you get a 5++, more bolter damage at long range, the ability to deepstrike, and everybody in the squad gets a power fist.

All for free.

Whatever you lose compared to taking tac squads is trivial compared to the gains.

Well, except that they don't score. A problem which some codices can remedy.

I went up against Terminators the other day. Three units of five cracked open two Killa Kans like nobodies business, but then crumbled pathetically under a torrent of fire from Burna boyz and in melee against 20-odd Slugga boyz with a Nob.

Overall, at least 600pts of Terminators (plus various gear) lost handily to 150 of Burna Boyz and 150 of Sluggas.

There were enough boyz left over to re-fight that battle and have a good shot of winning as well. Thats how badly they did.

Ah, anecdotal evidence. Where would science be without you?

With the amount of high AP blast weapons many armies can bring, they die fast, that 5+ isnt going to save you.
my main army has atleast 3 str 7 or high blasts.
And shoot enough boolters, and they will die.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
With the amount of high AP blast weapons many armies can bring, they die fast, that 5+ isnt going to save you.
my main army has atleast 3 str 7 or high blasts.
And shoot enough bolters, and they will die.

The same applies for every single infantry unit. The point of terminators is that it takes twice as many bolters and 33% more ap2 blasts. Once they're in CC, again, it takes twice as many attacks to kill them. Assault terminators practically ignore those high strength blasts too, for the same cost. Also note that these blasts must be large templates, or they only hit 1 terminator most of the time (catching 2 terminators 1 out of 5 hits with the perfect scatter).

The reason people think they're bad is that they expect too much. They're actually very reasonable costed for what they bring. And you know, shooting twice as many bolters at my terminators means you're shooting a hell of a lot less at my scoring units.

Only if they are 2 inches apart something that is hard to do when you cannot move after disembarking.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
you cannot move after disembarking.

What? You mean aside from the 6" move you get from disembarking from a drop pod or the 6" move followed by the 2d6 assault from disembarking from a land raider? Also there's that d6 run you get after deepstriking (requiring a 2+ for max coherency).

No, if your vehicle moved you cannot.
Besides, very rarely do you see people do this, ohn and isnt the running after DS wasting shooting?

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
No, if your vehicle moved you cannot.

You might want to check your rule book there.

hh and isnt the running after DS wasting shooting?

Assault terminators don't care about that. I'd gladly not fire 5 storm bolters to keep my terminators alive.

 Dakkamite wrote:
I went up against Terminators the other day. Three units of five cracked open two Killa Kans like nobodies business, but then crumbled pathetically under a torrent of fire from Burna boyz and in melee against 20-odd Slugga boyz with a Nob.

Overall, at least 600pts of Terminators (plus various gear) lost handily to 150 of Burna Boyz and 150 of Sluggas.

There were enough boyz left over to re-fight that battle and have a good shot of winning as well. Thats how badly they did.

Well seeing as you fought them with exactly what kills them really really well (making them take lots of armor saves or tying them down in melee)....

With T4 and a 2+/3++, Termies can survive quite a bit of fire-power. Note, that is for TH/SS which is honestly the only kind of Terminator worth bringing anymore. Tac Termies were never as amazing as Assault Termies, and the LC variant is never really bought in a full unit

Why are we talking about Assault and Tactical Termies? This was about Grey Knight terminators.

Griddlelol wrote:Assault terminators don't care about that. I'd gladly not fire 5 storm bolters to keep my terminators alive.

Or regular terminators, for that matter.

There aren't very many units in the game that have Ap2 weapons in both shooting and close combat simultaneously. Most things with Ap2 weapons are going to be using them as nothing more than glorified clubs against models with a 2+ save and S8 Ap2 attacks in close combat. Unless you've got something that's specifically good against terminators in close combat, terminators are ruinously difficult to kill in close combat, THSS or no.

And then, yeah, either you don't care about Ap2 weapons most of the time, or you get to run around shooting stuff with assault cannons or psycannons or whatever.

It's even harsher for CSM termies who drop their x2 strength close combat weapon for a +1 strength, +1 attack close weapon, but gain the ability to combi-weapon stuff the turn they arrive. If SM players could give their sternguard terminator armor (and a power weapon) and still be as cheap as a CSM terminator, they'd do it in a heartbeat.

 Ailaros wrote:
If SM players could give their sternguard terminator armor (and a power weapon) and still be as cheap as a CSM terminator, they'd do it in a heartbeat.

You mean like SW players can? Albeit without the awesome special ammunition. Man, that'd be sweet.

Why are we talking about Assault and Tactical Termies? This was about Grey Knight terminators.

Well, as far as I can see in the OP, everything they said can and has been applied over the years to any version of Terminators, other than a mention of a Storm Raven.

I think that Terminators are perfectly fine for their points. Especially non-Grey Knights versions (though I have no experience with Grey Knights either way).

Especially in games where my opponent isn't spamming things like crazy, I would be perfectly confident in taking a Deathwing army. With those particular Terminators, it's force concentration at it's finest.

I really can't believe anyone doubts how effective terminators are, especially GK terms. They are troops options without any special characters. When I have fielded terminator-only armies, most opponents groan, even with my terrible record. Killing terminators is getting tougher.

As to GKT, they are probably the base compromise between tactical termies and TH/SS termies in that they are designed to fit right in the middle. I run an all TDA Ghosteing (Mordrak, Ghost Knights, Librarian, GKTs), which fair quite well versus most armies. What makes them shine is their flexibility. I can walk them if the terrain is favorable, or DS them if it isn't. They are scoreing, and can be combat squaded if small units make sense or left together if bigger squads are the better choices. Their mixed Nemesis Force Weapons allows for i6 activations followed up by AP2 shell-crackers. One Nemesis Force Staff can suck up every single wound in CC ("None Shall Pass!"). The Psycannon is the ultimate heavy weapon for a scoot-and-shoot based army. S5 Stormbolters? Auto-activating force weapons and 4 attacks on a charge?

Frankly, when played well, GKT are a terror that can tarpit with ease. Generally, the games I lose with them are ones where I'm outnumbered by a huge margin and lose on objectives held. Of course there are counter-GKT army builds, yet the only times I'll encouter those are from list-tailoring opponents as most players tend to build towards countering MEQ, not TEQ.

All in all, GKT are a solid troop choice ... if you plan your army around utilizing them.

SJ

The problem is that you're comparing GKTs to GKSSs. When you compare them to Tactical Squads, they become bad at shooting, slightly more fragile on a point-by-point basis, but have vastly superior assault power.

But as nice as GKTs are, GKSSs are much better.

 Jingles wrote:
Ah cool.
See that's the other trouble with GK terminators, all their special rules and upgrades and knowning when to use them. That's the other thing. You can easily spend too much on upgrades and have say your brotherhood banner or an equally valuable unit worth 60-70pts get wiped out in a matter of moments.

My thoughts exactly.

you can thank GW's craptacular ruleset. The all or nothing saving throw sucks, they should bring back save modifiers.

most people will spam AP3 and AP2 when they find out they're playing against marines.

kb305 wrote:
you can thank GW's craptacular ruleset. The all or nothing saving throw sucks, they should bring back save modifiers.

most people will spam AP3 and AP2 when they find out they're playing against marines.

*All the time*

it's kinda why most people don't spam heavy bolters, no point because it's a MEQ dominated environment due to 1/2 of the entire game being MEQ.

Thats not GW's fault, its the player base.

Thank's to years of the majority of the player base buying space marines GW released many varients of space marines so they could make more money.

I garuntee if the various Xenos had been the more popular armies we would see more Xeno codices.


GW makes what people will buy, and the market wants more space marines.

Space marines or no, I only bring Ap1 weapons when I can get away with it anyways. Most of my weapons that aren't Ap1 are Ap2. Doesn't change the fact that terminators are neat, though.

In my local meta, Terminators are quite decisive. No one plays loyalist marines as primary, and those that have the armies have few or no terminators. Only the sole Grey Knight player has a terminator selection, but even he prefers a henchmen list, though one guy recently got a Deathwing list finalized, so we'll see what happens there.

Because of that, most people don't load up on Ap2, which makes terminators (and Meganobz, Honour Guard, Sanguinary Guard and other 2+ units) really decisive when they hit, because they're so rare. Most people have some AP2 capacity, I mean, who doesn't have some melta or plasma equivalent in their army? But, our group likes hordes, light infantry, tanks and fliers. When marines are rare, terminators and their equivalents have a very usable niche, just like anything else not seen constantly.

That being said, I find tactical terminators lackluster. They've got "meh" shooting, and "meh" close combat, and are viable only really due to their durability, though TH/SS termies are better with their 3++. Storm bolters are inconsequential for the most part, assault cannons are overpriced for what they do, and power fists can wreck face, but they go last, and stand a 50/50 chance of hitting most of the time anyways.

Not exactly thrilling units on their own. However, they soak up a lot of fire or close combat to kill, and thus have strategic uses. I'm going to be experimenting with a Dreadnought in the drop pod with homing beacon, vanguard and terminators coming in off it, should make a nice, durable, and somewhat killy rear-area annoyance as the rest of my footsloggers move up the field.

One thing that hasn't been mentioned is the psychological factor. You MUST kill terminators or they will wipe out pretty much anything in their path, and your opponent knows this. Put a unit of terminators up front and they're going to see that 2+ save and terrifying killing power and pay attention to it, leaving the rest of your army free to act. Is this sometimes a mistake? Of course, but ignoring that threat is easier said than done.

And since you're playing GK don't forget about how awesome relentless makes psycannons.