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Hi there

I'm getting more and more annoyed about the Imperial Knight which I think is OP as hell when you're fighting it with a non-shooting army.

I think that the Bloodthirster is one of the best chances to take it out but I can't get over the fact that the Stomp attack works on Monstrous creatures - maybe when it comes from bigger titans but not from the Imperial Knight (don't get me started about how easy the Imperial Knight can kill a Lord of Skulls). I think it's even possible to hit the Bloodthirster all three times with the Stomp so just with the Stomp attacks alone the Imperial Knight have roughly 42% to take out a Bloodthirster.

Have I missed something or should I just listen to GW and go play Imperial armies so I can get one as well? There must be some clever heads out there who aren't as pessimistic as I am.

Get your own lords of war(yes i know knights aint) deamon god.. and have fun wrecking their armor

Hehe I would like that but An'ggrath is just too much in a 2000 points battle.

Great Brass Scorpion, is that a valid Lord of War for Daemons?

I wouldn't put an EW lacking Monstrous creature up against something with a D strength melee attack anyway. It seems like a recipe to get your face smashed in. You aren't quite as screwed as someone who sunk hundreds of points into a screamer star or tzeentchilist uber-prince (that 2++ rerollable you banked on? Worthless) but that's mostly because you're not likely to dump as many points into your Murdercow and Princes as other gods.

Now, Khorne generally has the short end of the stick when it comes to vehicle killing. You don't get Slaanesh's rending, or the various vehicle killing rules Tzeentch has, or even Nurgle's hull point stripping.

Now I could recommend An'ggrath, but at 888 points the bloodthirster to end all bloodthirsters IS your army. And Gargantuan Creatures go down frustratlingly easily to S-D hits, meaning that if the knight can start swinging back, An'ggrath is likely to go screaming back to the warp. It's not likely, but it can be quite frustrating.

If the Brass Scorpion is a legit Lord of War, you could also try that, or if desperate you could ally in some Khornate marines and get in a vehicle cracking Termicide squad (chainfists and combi-meltas) and hope it works.

Yes it is. But as with all vehicles or titans no matter the size, they're afraid of getting close to extremely point-efficient Imperial Knight.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What's so special about the Brass Scorpion? Its' shooting aren't special against an Imperial Knight and it has the boring generic stats of a Daemon engine so the Imperial Knight hits first and harder against the bigger Chaos titans/super heavy vehicles.

Ummm...your answer is essentially, there is no good way to deal with it. Scarbrand does a decent job so long as the D explosion does not hit him, or multiple knights don't hit him (and that he is horrible otherwise), a blood thirster generally needs to get lucky not to die (EW doesn't matter because D largely by passes it as does stomp). Essentially Daemons are just largely screwed by knights because they rely on close combat to kill things.

Breng you allways Toss a D6 before the explosion to see it's strength it can be rather weak.
The blood thirster having WS10 is being hit on fives and the knight only have 4 attacks so it's a big chanse of not getting in any hits at all. If the D hits there's only 1 out of six chanse it kills him. the thirster being cheaper aswell i see them as a good unit to take out knights mainly due their base stats.

The center of the explosion is always Strength D, so one bad scatter and large chance they your MC dies.

Look at it this way. Blood thirster needs to smash to really do damage
So it has 4 attacks, hitting 2-3 times. Which net 2-6 Hull points. Completely dice dependent.

The Knight hits back 1-2 times Netting an average of 3 wounds. Then it stomps you and if it rolls a 6 you die, if not you need to take another save or 2.

Then if you have lost combat (which is possible) you take instability.

This also assumes you make it to combat with all 5 wounds...if not you are probably dead.

Thirster is also not much cheaper (250 + upgrades is usually around 300 points).

Thirster is also a pretty poor TAC unit choice, and is not usually taken against any other army.

That also assumes there is only 1 knight, how do you kill 3 or 4? Get lucky? Run 2 Thirsters?

What does the rest of your army do?

@phatonic:

That's why I'm more worried about the stomp (Doesn't a Bloodthirster reach the "waist" of the Imperial Knight?) as I wrote earlier there's a 42% chance that the Bloodthirster dies from this given that the blasts can be placed over it all three times.

Belakor beats these guys like theyre pledges.

He can use all sorts of fun powers and make them backfire/useless sometimes. He also has EW and armorbane and can fly. Give out cover saves to other units also

jakl277 wrote:
Belakor beats these guys like theyre pledges.

He can use all sorts of fun powers and make them backfire/useless sometimes. He also has EW and armorbane and can fly. Give out cover saves to other units also

He still takes the d6 wounds from D-strength hits if I'm not mistaken, and they still ignore all his saves in assault. Not ideal.

Now you could give him the Eternal Blade to give him a better shot at alpha striking it since he's going splat if it can start swinging back.

For a CSM army in the current meta, Belakor is almost an auto include for this specific reason. Puppet master the cheese tower and annihilate the chapter master. I view the heldrake/aegis or bastion as an autotake to handle flyers, for similar reasons. The damn csm codex didn't really address any of the new units so unfortunately your army is pretty dictated.

 Kain wrote:

jakl277 wrote:
Belakor beats these guys like theyre pledges.

He can use all sorts of fun powers and make them backfire/useless sometimes. He also has EW and armorbane and can fly. Give out cover saves to other units also

He still takes the d6 wounds from D-strength hits if I'm not mistaken, and they still ignore all his saves in assault. Not ideal.

Now you could give him the Eternal Blade to give him a better shot at alpha striking it since he's going splat if it can start swinging back.

Yea but you wouldnt charge it at full hp. Use puppet master and other stuff to disable/abuse it. Take some hp off with what shooting your army does have from CSM allies or whatever and then you can successfully take it out.

I have only had the displeasure of facing 2 knights. I was using a nurgle csm/daemon army. I used oblits and a las pred to weaken them a bit and belakor harassed them and finished one off. The rest of the my hard hitting units chased down anything else scoring and I won by hiding nurgle stuff in cover and holding objectives. It wasnt a fun game...but 40k is getting less and less fun as more and more giant i cant kill this without being prepared units are introduced.

I have been trying to sort this out and have been coming up empty.

I have heard:

1. Just vector strike it to death, it is unlikely they will shoot you down.
2. A big unit of plague bearers.
3. Ignore it.
4. daemon prince with telekinesis.
5. Be'lakor.
6. Throw 2 MC in at once and take it down first.

The problem with vector striking is you don't really do a lot of damage. You might strip off a few hull points and any decent player is going to cover this weak point by taking some anti-air support.

Plague bearers... I don't know why people keep suggesting this. Then can never catch a knight and if they do they strip off a point or two then die to instability after stomps. 2 x 20 squads don't really fit into a TAC list either.

You can't ignore it, they just have to much damage out put.

As for a daemon prince with telekinesis. This sadly maybe the best option. A bit out of luck for Khorne, but it maybe the quickest safe way to strip of HPs.

Be'lakor. Has a better chance then most in CC. It just sucks that it is a chance. Not a good answer, just a hope and as many points as a IK. Also all they have to do to counter it is stand in area terrain. The other problem is they can bubble wrap with troops and just wait in terrain. If they out shoot your list you have to go to them. A lot of stuff works still you take it out of a vacuum environment. Ill add in the two MC Idea here too. same problems as above, but better odds. After you are still left standing out in the open and have a good chance to get hit when they blow up. You can dodge the S bu hitting the long edge of the base if it does not scatter though.

I don't know about OP, but it is rough. The counter to termies is ap2, hoards by rate of fire, 2+ cover by flamers , psychers by DTW/fiends/ rune priest. The counter to IK is.... a sister list full of melta and some luck. Not a unit a list. It is rough that with almost everything even the things designed to kill it you are hoping for a lucky explodes result more then you can tactics it out with a TAC.

BRING flying circus,ignore the dam thing kill off everything else,problem solved kill all scouring units,cast puppet master or halluisgen and tell it to suck it,there you go.

I suggest using craploads of slaanesh dual-lash princes.

If you are going to take on Kights with CD you will need to use your mobility, terrain, and your cheap units to block. Strategies will change greatly depending on how many Knights but do you honestly think a CC specialized 375 pts unit should get killed before it can strike by a 300 pts flying MC with no risk to the MC? You are paying for your mobility (24" ignore terrain vs 12" and roll 3d6 take highest through terrain) and your better use against 10 man 3+ or better units (which the knight is awful against).

If you want to take down a knight with FMC daemons you will want to change two of them on the sides of the knight. This way you are assured a kill and if the blast doesn't scatter you will not take the D and if it does scatter there is a high chance you will be missed and it cannot hit both. If there are multiple knights you will need screening units to block the other knights from charging.

Lash princes work reasonably well and are essentially invulnerable to the knights.

Plaguebearers could do it but are not a great way.

Vector strikes are possible but not great with S6 daemons. You need S7 or better to really manage this.

Be'Lakor is great against all titans and knights. Get it down to 4HP and you are nearly assured a kill when Be'Lakor charges.

I would focus on the other components of the opponent's list. His knights are very slow on a properly terrain laden board and they cannot contest being vehicles (if they are primary they score but do not contest). What this means is you can swoop anything of yours in Turn 5 on the objective and contest very easily as the knight cannot bubble wrap it. You could also drop a troop onto it and you would not only score the objective but contest it therefore getting a full objective swing in scores.

Ironically people keep saying how these are the deaths of screamer star and seer council...the screamer star has an excellent chance to kill a knight in 1 round of combat with lamprey bite and only take 1-2 dead screamers, wow such a hard counter. Even the titans explosion has an excellent chance of not even hitting the screamer star and even if it does could be shunted off the heralds onto the screamers if needed. Seer star is multitudes worse with an almost guarantee to kill the knight before it swings and such a large footprint that proper positioning of models negates any chance to loose important models.

Screamers have a very low chance of doing a lot actually, throw in losing 2 or so screamers and then stop attacks, and then instability and it is a pretty hard counter.

I do honestly think a 345 cc monster should have a good chance to kill a 375 cc monster . And since the 375 one has a good chance to one shot the 345 point guy I'm not sure I see that as being even.

 ansacs wrote:
If you are going to take on Kights with CD you will need to use your mobility, terrain, and your cheap units to block. Strategies will change greatly depending on how many Knights but do you honestly think a CC specialized 375 pts unit should get killed before it can strike by a 300 pts flying MC with no risk to the MC? You are paying for your mobility (24" ignore terrain vs 12" and roll 3d6 take highest through terrain) and your better use against 10 man 3+ or better units (which the knight is awful against).

You can't really call something with WS 4 a CC specialist. I'd lean towards calling them a tank that also happens to have few weaknesses in CC. The daemon princes can actually be a CC specialist. So if they make it to the thing they are good at then it i a reasonable to think they would do well there. I don't think people are really bothered by the risk so much as the best answer CD have is jump through hoops to get two HP off then take a big risk to trade 350 points for 375 and all the Knight has to do to counter is stand in terrain and take pot shots till the prince falls, or kill other things till something else knocks the prince down for it.

If you want to take down a knight with FMC daemons you will want to change two of them on the sides of the knight. This way you are assured a kill and if the blast doesn't scatter you will not take the D and if it does scatter there is a high chance you will be missed and it cannot hit both. If there are multiple knights you will need screening units to block the other knights from charging.

Again area terrain and the knights could use screening units just as easily if not more with you having to go to them. You also can't just say the after blast will not hit, You could do all of that right and still lose 2-3 wounds and be out in the open to lose that 700 you used to kill that 375.

Lash princes work reasonably well and are essentially invulnerable to the knights.

So 50/50 you get iron arm> power goes off> DTW fails> 7 shots> call it 6 hits> then what glance on 6s or 5s if you can get the side ( average +2 strength from Iron arm) > and the Knights 4++ half of them. Even if the knights need 6s to hit, if they do they hurt and you can't play in a vacuum the lash prince is not invulnerable to the AA support fallowed by the knights finishing them off.

Plaguebearers could do it but are not a great way.

can't keep up with the knight and if they do get locked in 20 attacks> 10 hits > 1.6 HPs then die to instability after the stomp. not counting the models they would lose before they got there.

Be'Lakor is great against all titans and knights. Get it down to 4HP and you are nearly assured a kill when Be'Lakor charges.

Best answer so far. Some places do allow supplements and not data sheets and again they could stand in terrain.

I would focus on the other components of the opponent's list. His knights are very slow on a properly terrain laden board and they cannot contest being vehicles (if they are primary they score but do not contest). What this means is you can swoop anything of yours in Turn 5 on the objective and contest very easily as the knight cannot bubble wrap it. You could also drop a troop onto it and you would not only score the objective but contest it therefore getting a full objective swing in scores.

They have to much damage out put to ignore. A land raider you can do this even death stars to a degree, but 3 separate units with both strong assault and fire power is hard. Also the bases are big enough to keep people off objectives they don't need to contest. Just stand them on an objective and you can't get close enough with out assaulting them.

Ironically people keep saying how these are the deaths of screamer star and seer council...the screamer star has an excellent chance to kill a knight in 1 round of combat with lamprey bite and only take 1-2 dead screamers, wow such a hard counter. Even the titans explosion has an excellent chance of not even hitting the screamer star and even if it does could be shunted off the heralds onto the screamers if needed. Seer star is multitudes worse with an almost guarantee to kill the knight before it swings and such a large footprint that proper positioning of models negates any chance to loose important models.

Breng77 got it right. S5 + 2d6 on average does 12 so nothing. Then it gets around their strongest point. Lose a few more to instability and maybe they can gold it up for a few rounds. When you figure for FW, the heralds and all the cost you could be facing two Knights then they are gone fast at the cost of 1-2 HPs.


When you math out a lot of the suggestions they go from what look like so-so options to needing to get lucky on rolls to work.

All you guys going about suggesting Nurgle, Tzeentch, and Slaanesh units clearly can't read something as basic as a thread title. :U

@Kain
Mostly does not mean only. Reread the thread title. The problem being that the only CD Khorne units that can do it are the DPs and greater daemons. All of which are the same strategy of charge it with multiple daemons and hope the blast doesn't scatter. That or focus down on the rest of the list.

@Screamerstar is hard countered people
On average a 10 lamprey attacks will kill an imperial knight. Try actually doing the mathhammer. Depending on how you are playing the rules for lamprey attacks either the screamer star can do it with pathetic ease on the charge or they can do it with relatively even odds.

The D weapon averages 2 dead screamers at the same initiative. If you got invisibility then the Knight struggles with an amazing 1 kill!

The stomp has a 1/6 chance to do nothing and a 1/6 chance to kill up to 3 screamers per stomp. Actually with the movement you have you should be able to get them all in b2b and limit it to up to 2 screamers hit.

If the knight is staying in area terrain I am happy. It is 2 battle cannons of shooting that both have to target the same target. That is pathetic firepower for 375 pts. That is also the "good" option against daemons. Feel free to stay in terrain and have to move a max of 6" on a 3d6 take highest when you move out. Fine with me. I will focus on the rest of the board and just be careful not to let the knight charge me out of the terrain unless I can win the fight.



So the knight has a 4.33" base on the narrow part. If you center it on the objective it is 2.16" from the objective. This means it you even use a 25mm infantry base as an objective you can still move to >1" of the night and be within 3" of the objective 2.16 +1 = 3.16 -0.5 = 2.66 I usually use 3 dimensional objectives as markers and most use power chip size objectives (39mm or 1.54" You can most definitely score the objectives if you can focus down the rest of the opponent's list. The interesting thing is that the chance are about even if the knight can kill a 10 model daemon unit off the objective or if the unit stays locked for another turn (even after instability). If you can throw 2 small units of even 1 model onto each side of it you have the objective. Though this is not an easy task to do at that point. BTW the knight is still a vehicle and so has to shoot within it's facing and cannot shoot both forward and backwards.

I latter said you need S7+ to seriously threaten it. If you are taking lash princes you are already trying to get iron arm so this doesn't change the game plan. It you don't you might have to ignore it though.

It is a CC specialist it just specializes in hordes and MC/vehicles rather than SM killing like everything else. The gun is nice but ultimately a double shot battle cannon is not that threatening. The WS and low number of attacks are what help to balance it.

If he wants a mono-khorne list let him run one. I certainly wouldn't suggest such fluff heresy as slaaneshi pansies in his army of rage. I'd suggest allied khornate termicide marines if he wants to keep it Khornate, get cultists for cheap troops and a juggerlord for a good, cheap beatstick.

Bam, knight killer without needing to sully Khorne with other, less manly gods.

Yes I was certainly looking for mostly using Khorne Daemons without the help of Special Characters but as I knew that would lead to a fast chat and because I appreciate people taking their time and sharing their thoughts, I will not say anything.

I will not stop the discussion about tactics but I do have some questions of a slightly different nature:

How far up the Imperial Knight does a Bloodthirster reach?

It would make a big difference, but would you call the Imperial Knigh point inefficient if vehicles, walkers and monstrous creatures couldn't be affected by its' stomp attacks?

@Kain his said mostly Khorne. He did say CD and not CSM though. Besides the Khorne discussion would be over quick. Blood thirster/prince so-so, Hearald/crusher/hounds/cannon bad soulgrinder, Although the cannon does help some with the charging into cover problem.

Actual math on the screamers ends up as 0.694 glances and 1.389 pens. That is not even odds at the very least. Conservatively 2 HPs optimistically 4 and again this is not counting losing a few screamers on the way over and if it take a few more out before they swing. The stomp also has a 2/3 chance to force a handful more saves.

If you have invisibility on the screamers the night may well have forewarning and prescience. The stomp is also d3. and can move to get the most. It will be more hits then you are making it out.

ansacs, I really think you are misunderstanding how an assault army works. We have to go to them. Those 6 battle cannons shots are 6 more then we have. So the daemon prince fly over they get shot by anti-air. The knights handle ever thing else well and they are still good against daemon princes.

I concede that it can complete block an objective, but it can turn in ways to make it a lot harder and you may only be able to fit 1-2 guys in the area in does not protect making it a lot easier to shoot off.

@OP
Did you have any interest in CSM options. They actually have a really good number of khorne options that work great against knights. From CC to ranged they can work on knights.

@deviant cadaver
You are not factoring in prescience. Have you ever seen a screamer star without prescience? Additionally if we are really going to discuss this we have to determine do lamprey bites get 1 attack on the charge or 1+1 for charging? With just 1 attack they come out ~5 HP average without invisibility or the heralds being able to help. It is quite possible and actually very likely that an HP or two gets stripped from flickering fire with a conjuration locus before they commit to the side armour of 12.

I am not underestimating the stomp. The stomp cannot be placed over the knights own base. Therefore if you place all your models b2b with the knight you will reduce the knights possible damage to 1-3 screamers per stomp depending on whether you take D weapon casualties out between the models in b2b and if you could space your models in b2b.

I understand how an assault army works just fine. I also understand that 3 knights is 1125 pts and only allows an allied FOC to get your AA needs (or formation but the best formations are desperate allies and reduces scoring even more). The sort of knights lists you are all talking about with multiple scoring knights will always be at a deficit for AA, range anti tank, and cover ignoring weapons. Honestly I think the biggest problem is talking about these units on the forums you cannot get a sense of the fact the knights cannot afford to bunch up in terrain in a corner and expect to move out and score all the objective turn 5. Knights always end up moving through terrain as the bases are so wide so over 3 turns they tend to average closer to ~20" of movement than the 36" they could theoretically do. Knights bases are so wide you can wrap a ~15 man unit around it as long as you have the movement and charge distances to do it. If knights want to win they have to spread out, this means they cannot counter charge though and their stubbers loose range pretty fast. They cannot spread themselves out like a normal 10 man daemon units and create a blocking wall to block charges and movement.


For pure Khorne Daemons lists you will probably want to spam as many greater gifts as possible and hope you roll a bunch of touch of uncreation results with hellfire gaze being a distant second. Each touch of uncreation you get will be a huge increase in your chances to kill a knight. A blood thirster with this reward can almost solo a full HP knight. Still wouldn't recommend it. Try to take 2 HP off first to edge the bet.

Interestingly enough as long as no 6's are rolled your Blood Thirster will survive an assault round with a knight with 2.2 wounds remaining. If a single 6 is rolled at any time to wound however the thirst goes poof. There is unfortunately a 40% chance for the knight to roll a 6 to wound with the 3 tries he will average. So not a great thing to count on. This is why if you are going to use MCs to take a knight down you need to use enough to ensure it is done before it swings back.

@ansacs:
Yes I am, as long as it at least roughly follows the background. In the 40k army list section you can see which army I very much would like to field:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/586610.page#6666458

 ansacs wrote:
... before they commit to the side armour of 12.

Why would the screamers get to attack the side?
Aren't Knights walkers?

Mutter wrote:

 ansacs wrote:
... before they commit to the side armour of 12.

Why would the screamers get to attack the side?
Aren't Knights walkers?

Hes talking of the sweep over thing i belive when you dont charge.

Send in Kharn buffed by a Divination/Telepathy Sorceror.

7 S7 Ap2 Armorbane rolls tha


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Send in Kharn buffed by a Divination/Telepathy Sorceror.

Make Kharn+unit with him Invisible, so that the knight need 5's to hit.

7 S7 Ap2 Armorbane rolls that hit on 2+ should do the trick.

Send in a Maulerfiend with tentacles so that he have only 2 attacks if he ripost and also if the Maulers survive any stomp they still have 4 S10 Ap2 Attacks.