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I know there's already an Ork vs Knights thread, but I thought we could do with one for general anti-Knight tactics. The following applies to Knights generically, although please feel free to chip in with army-specific tactics.

The Knight, as I see it, has these strengths:
- Fast moving
- Long Range on the Paladin, good range on the Errant
- Huge CC prowess against vehicles and MCs
- Versatile and moveable shielding
- 6 HP

And these weaknesses:
- The Ion Shield can only cover one facing
- The Armour Values themselves are not phenomenal
- Not as good in CC against hordes
- Difficult to protect or hide.

If any more of either come to light I'll edit it in.

General anti-Knight tactics:

- Flanking: due to the shield only covering one facing, any threats that can attack from multiple angles are great. Things like outflankers and Drop Pod/Deep Strike units are very helpful, and even from deployment, splitting your heavy hitters onto the flanks will force the Knight to expose one side to defend against the other. It also means that if it focuses on one flank, the other remains relatively safe from it.

- The Knight can do nothing against Fliers, as their only significant armament are blast weapons or CC attacks. This means fliers can either protect embarked troops from the Knight until they are needed, or can focus on bringing it down. Night Scythes and Valkyries excel at the former, Stormtalons at the latter and Stormravens and Vendettas can do both pretty well. The mobility of fliers also gives you more chance of getting around the shield or forcing it to redeploy, leaving other attack routes open.

- I think that single-shot high-S/low-AP weapons (lascannons, Vanquishers, meltas, Railguns) will be better against the Knight that high ROF weapons aiming for glances (Tesla Destructors, Deffguns, HYMP) as 6 HP is a lot to strip through just glancing.

Surviving the Knight
- Cover seems essential to surviving attacks from a Knight, as none of their weapons ignore cover. Ruins or even plain obscured can help a lot, and if you GtG, you're further reducing the cost effectiveness of the Knight far more than your own units.

Army Specific Tactics
- Space Marines of all types are best using melta in Drop pods, preferably in multiple arcs to get around the shield. Sternguard, Wolf Guard or even a couple of tactical squads with meltas should hurt it.

- Grey Knights' best bet is the Dreadknight with Greatsword and Fist, although you will probably lose it in return.

-Tau can use fusion-suits as above, and I think putting a Railhead on each corner will mean that as soon as it goes after one, it will have to expose a weaker facing. Even with the shield, you're looking at open AV13 and AV12 with a 4++, which Hammerheads should be able to hurt.

- Demons can get some mileage out of mass FMCs (although the Stubbers can ground them, so be careful there), and if you are going to charge it, make sure you use multiple MCs, preferably with high initiative and other buffs.

- Dark Eldar can use lances to make it AV12 all round, which should make damaging the front armour easier. The mobility of Venoms and Raiders means you can get around the shield fairly easily. Wych squads with Haywire Grenades might be able to do some damage, but are unlikely to kill the Knight outright, and either way you lose the unit, either to Stomps if you fail to kill it or the explosion if you do.

- Eldar can use Crimson Hunters with Bright Lances as above, without fear of counter-attack from the Knight. A pair of Wraithknights should also be able to hurt it if you can stay out of CC for a while. In CC, you're still going to do some damage, but if you don't kill you'll lose the Wraithknight. Fire Prisms are also a safe bet as the AP1 gives you a good chance to do the extra D3 HP.


So, Dakka, have at it. I'll try and keep the OP updated as more thoughts come in, and feel free to point out any ommissions. After a while, I'll see about getting this up as an article.

With Tau, drop a couple of fusion suits next to it, if it turns the shields in that direction, nail it with missile-sides/railhead.

I was chatting with a friend about this. He has ordered 4 (works for GW so 50% helps). That us his 1490 list. 2 paladins and 2 errants.

Nasty against most armies but if my scars got 1st turn then I could put 2 melta squads 4 shots on 2 of them. With the extra +2 for ap1 I should be getting at least 2 explodes which would mean an average of 5/6 hp's. I then would need to rely on my 4+ jink save until turn 2. I would gave to line my guys so they face a side each forcing him to expose one side to non inv.

Of cause this is all good in theory but if he gets in I'm screwed. I have also got the talons on turn 2 plus the triple las pred and a vindicator to help strip them.

The Libby May have a useful power too (puppet master would be amazing)

Good point about the Jink saves there, in fact cover in general is going to be vital to surviving them, as none of their weapons have Ignores Cover.

Mass melta is a good way of doing it, and if you can get melta on 2 facings then he's certainly in trouble. Also, consider putting the 2 meltas at each end of the squad if you're running in a line, so 1 blast will struggle to hit both (I think with multiple blasts you have to put both in the same place?)

Reserving a few units might be a good way to limit his first-turn usefulness, and ensure you get the drop on him.

I do not see the knight titan changing the meta at all right now. Being a vehicle and not a monsters creature is to much a liability right now. If the AV where 14 14 13 maybe they would shift the meta some, but right now most of the common spammed weapons can still take down AV 13 reliably. The 4+ inv save is not that big a deal because if they are being played right they should be in cover most of the time. I would not change my current tau or necron list at all to face a list of knight titans. What I think will happen is GW will tweak the rules in 7th edition to make knight titans really powerful so they will sell even more than they all ready will.
Has anyone tried to proxy a list made up of knight titans yet?

Dreadknights with sword and fist will have a pretty decent chance of bringing it down in a turn, but if it doesn't, it probably dies.

 Krellnus wrote:
Dreadknights with sword and fist will have a pretty decent chance of bringing it down in a turn, but if it doesn't, it probably dies.

Hmm, I have both, I might playtest that a few times. Mostly likely result, though, is that they kill each other. Both are I4, so the Dreadknight is still getting hit with 3-4 D-strength attacks even if it does kill the Knight. That said, it's more than a fair trade.

Ahhhh, I was thinking the DK was I5 for some reason.

I think you could buff it with Quicksilver from a libby (or is that only on the libby's unit?). Worst case scenario, and both are killed, you're trading 190-odd points for 370.

Actually my math has the dreadknight averaging almost 5hp while it dies in return.

Lances, lots of lances.

DE should actually be pretty effective against them, as long as you didn't bring splinterspam.

An Aquila strongpoint or two might help too

My flying circus is not scared, but all my other lists in 6th have slowly shed off excess AT because they aren't as needed anymore.
The fact that they are pretty fast means anybody who expects to face them needs to bring enough AT to counter them.

Anyways as far as flying circus goes I would probably ignore them as much as possible, but those heavy stubbers could do a lot to ground a FMC to then assault. I probably wouldn't assault one unless it had 3 hullpoints or less with Be'Lakor. If I actually had to assault one with full HPs I would probably dogpile it with 3 FMCs to make sure it's dead. An Iron Armed DP could do something to them with vector strikes. Heldrakes are almost completely immune to them and can just fly around and roast their troops.

Drop pod melta, either combi melt with sternguard or a drop pod with command squad and melta guns.

As a Space Wolf player, I don't feel threatened. For about 250 points I can bring 10 Combi-Meltas in a Drop Pod. That should do the trick. (With appropraite placement, he should only get invulns from about half of those, too.)
Judging by Escalation, Knights, and the fact that lots of alpha strike S8AP1 is generally great, my Wolf Guard have been getting lots of action lately.

 Brother Sergeant Bob wrote:
Drop pod melta, either combi melt with sternguard or a drop pod with command squad and melta guns.

So the Knight will shift the meta slightly.

Melta weapons were traded for plasma guns in the 6th edition so far.

Now one needs to bring them back.

2 crimson hunters with bright lances one of them an exarch.

For chaos 2 forgefiends with hades autocannons

 wuestenfux wrote:

 Brother Sergeant Bob wrote:
Drop pod melta, either combi melt with sternguard or a drop pod with command squad and melta guns.

So the Knight will shift the meta slightly.

Melta weapons were traded for plasma guns in the 6th edition so far.

Now one needs to bring them back.

I never stopped using Melta. Aside from general anti-tank, (4 Meltaguns was and is all the anti-tank I ever need, and asa Space Wolf player there's no harm in it,) they cause instant death against heavily prevalent T4, something that Plasmaguns can't do. In a pinch, they can cause havoc by ID'ing T4 Warlords. (I've played a lot of games where Ikilled Warlords and HQs with Meltaguns because of S8.)

How to kill a knight: hit it with a D-weapon a couple times, watch your opponent cry. A Warhound or Revenant should take one off the table in a single shooting phase (with a second D-weapon left over to kill something else if you're confident in your dice), and even a Shadowsword will probably kill one before it can earn its points back.

 Paradigm wrote:
- Spreading and spacing will obviously help, but also think about positioning. If you have multiple special weapons in a squad, separate them by 5" if possible so the Knight can't take out both in one shot.

This isn't necessary. Knight weapons are just normal blast weapons and follow the normal wound allocation rules, they don't get to snipe out special weapons.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 Brother Sergeant Bob wrote:
Drop pod melta, either combi melt with sternguard or a drop pod with command squad and melta guns.

So the Knight will shift the meta slightly.

Melta weapons were traded for plasma guns in the 6th edition so far.

Now one needs to bring them back.

As a Salamander, I never stopped bringing them. I won't even have to change things up that much. So at least there's that...

Do they blow up like normal on a pen?

Do they have a 4+ invo in cc?

 schadenfreude wrote:
Do they blow up like normal on a pen?

Do they have a 4+ invo in cc?

They count as superheavies and are treated that way when it comes to damage.

Might not be too much of a problem for white scars. They are fast enough to get into the side arcs to avoid the 4+ invo. Imobolized from grav guns sounds pretty good, and mm attack bikes can get within 12" on turn 1.

Deamons and necrons can tar pit the ones without a d weapon in cc with a 3++ invo unit. Necrons are in great shape, they could strip a lot of hp with 5 gauss + 2 voltaic staffs jumping out of a night scythe. Average rolls are 5.5555 hp stripped easily avoiding the shield.

Ork boys and a blob seem like a hopeless tarpit if they only have 3/4 attacks, and blobs can be loaded with melta. Like WK they have speed to avoid a tarpit, but the tarpit can area deny them.

Eldar can flat out a wave serp loaded with wg or fire dragons. It would only have 1 turn to get past a 4+ jink with serpent shield.

OP has been updated with these ideas and corrections, keep it coming.

 schadenfreude wrote:
Might not be too much of a problem for white scars. They are fast enough to get into the side arcs to avoid the 4+ invo. Imobolized from grav guns sounds pretty good, and mm attack bikes can get within 12" on turn 1.

Deamons and necrons can tar pit the ones without a d weapon in cc with a 3++ invo unit. Necrons are in great shape, they could strip a lot of hp with 5 gauss + 2 voltaic staffs jumping out of a night scythe. Average rolls are 5.5555 hp stripped easily avoiding the shield.

Ork boys and a blob seem like a hopeless tarpit if they only have 3/4 attacks, and blobs can be loaded with melta. Like WK they have speed to avoid a tarpit, but the tarpit can area deny them.

Eldar can flat out a wave serp loaded with wg or fire dragons. It would only have 1 turn to get past a 4+ jink with serpent shield.

AFAIK they all got D CC weapons.

And stomp on top of that, so blobs also wont work out well.




Anyway, any "glace-spree" tactic will probably work.
Haywire, gauss, etc...

How does the stomp work?

ADL is worthless vs Knights, don't forget they are tall enough to see right over the top with no obstruction.

 schadenfreude wrote:
How does the stomp work?

in general, it gives D3 additional attacks at CC, who are small blasts and can be up to a small distance away from the knight.
Meaning, potentially, it can take out dozens of troops each combat round.

My SOB will use a few more melta dominions in immolators. Nothing too scary.

My Marines on the other hand might have more of a problem. My IF get "tank hunter" for devastator squads. I haven't used my dev squad in a long time. Might have to dust them off.

For Tyranids, I'm still leaning towards a somewhat high-risk strategy of Monstrous Creature Smash Attacks". Provided I am faster than the Knight, it should go down with a few penetrating hits?

A Royal Court consisting of 4 StormTeks and a VeilTek is a lot cheaper than a Scythe + 5 Warriors + 2 StormTeks, and can kill two Knights in the same time as it takes the scythe to arrive and kill one.

How about a Scarab Blob?

Ten bases, attacks from titan kill max 8 with Spacing, 2 remaining scarabs drop it to AV 11 an average