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Greetings all.

I thought there had been a thread on this before, but when I looked I couldn't find it... My question is this: How on earth do daemons handle Imperial Knights? I'm fairly certain I could take down or tie up one (perhaps two), but what about three or more? I don't see much in the codex that could help (screamers do somewhat, but they aren't great at it) so it looks like allies will be the way to go. Any input from the group?

Daemonettes can handle them since they have rending attacks.

Daemonettes cannot handle them, as the most they can glance is AV12 and the Knight is AV13 in CC unless immobilised. Plaguebearers are a better option, but would struggle to engage.

Unfortunately the nerf to Smash made high armour tough to deal with in Daemons, and the better units for dealing with it aren't the sort you'd take all of the time.

Deep striking Burning Chariots, Skull Cannon and Soul Grinders could all potentially help, but it is hard to get the volume of shooting to reliably take them down.

Knights don't have huge numbers of attacks, so tarpits are probably the reliable way forward.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Daemonettes can handle them since they have rending attacks.

Demonettes can't hurt AV13

 Azreal13 wrote:
Daemonettes cannot handle them, as the most they can glance is AV12 and the Knight is AV13 in CC unless immobilised.

Knights can't get immobolized they're super-heavies

Plaguebearers, if you can get them into close combat (which is not that easy considering they can only move 6" a turn). Their CC attacks always glance on a 6. You could also try Plague Drones, which do have the movement to get into combat easy but they're kinda expensive.

Otherwise it's Screamers, using their Lamprey Bite attack since it has Armourbane. Though I've been keen to try out a Burning Chariot, now that 7th Edition has actually made it useable. D3 18" Lascannon shots on a Fast Skimmer should work reasonably well. Perhaps Grimoire it to make up for it's AV10/10/10.

I will say right now The Burning Chariot is terrible at anti tank. with an inconsistent amount of shots that still have to hit and pen, the short range making it easy to kill in return, and how hard it is to explode vehicles now most of the time the Chariot will at best deal 1 HP of damage which is terrible for 100 pts.

Now the ap3 torrent flamer on the other hand...

Screamers with their Armorbane attack can hurt them. Using the standard screamerstar will be very effective vs 1.

People focus a lot on killing knights but that isnt the only answer. I've had decent success tempting them into terrain to slow them down, blocking their movement and also tying them up. They do have stomp which is nasty but they don't have hit and run so fearless squads can tie them up.

Surely an answer for daemons is cheap throw away units, particularly summoned ones you effectively haven't paid for.

There's something very satisfying about taking a 300-odd point model out of the game with a sub 100 point unit, even if it is just for a turn or two.

Fragile wrote:
Screamers with their Armorbane attack can hurt them. Using the standard screamerstar will be very effective vs 1.

I don't think so

Screamers may be cappable of hurting av13 but they aren't good at it. They only have about a 44% chance of at least glancing. With 9 Screamers you only get 9 attacks and about 4-5 hitting that's only about 2 HPs of damage in a round of combat. Unless you get lucky and roll and explode it's going to take a several rounds to down a Knight's 6 HP which isn't good for how expensive a screamerstar is.

The real problem is that the screamerstar isn't invincible to knights. A 6 on its D-weapon or stomp will remove a model with no saves allowed thus getting around the 2++ rerollable save. This is especially problematic with stomp since it being a small blast template a 6 will remove 2-3 models in one go. Even if you don't lose the grimoire to this, losing screamers is still terrible since you need to those to kill the knight and losing any will make it much harder to down it.

I myself am a fan of using Plague Bearers. It can come close to me all it wants, or Ill meet it half way across the field with a Daemon Prince / Herald. Summon some Plague Bearers and just let it sit in CC all game slowly dying to glances whenever they happen. Eventually, sure, it'll get through but meh, just summon more and more. Or lash it to death. Lash always works.

Scarbrand? 7-9 str6-7 rerolling armourbane attacks could do some work if you can get him into combat. He's hella slow though, unfortunately.

A soul grinder (or better, a brace of blood slaughterers) buffed with grimoir for a 3++ save could probably open one up after a few rounds.

Fly around with lashprinces trying to get rear armour hits?

Be'Lakor.

Buffed soul grinders (invis/grimoire/cursed earth) have potential.

Plague bearers are good if you already have them in cover and on an objective (though who takes plaguebearers nowadays?).

Plague drones could do some glances, but I wouldn't recommend them unless they are buffed with invisibility, as they will suffer instant death and get hit hard by combat resolution.

Screamers of Tzeentch are an ok bet, especially as they normally have a place in many daemon lists.


If you are against one or perhaps 2 knights, these will suffice. If you are against a whole list of them, then you will have to go for the objectives and a tactical win.

Daemons have the potential to summon a lot of units now, and due to the changes in 7th, a squad can charge a vehicle, even if they cannot hurt it. Tarpitting the knights with pink horrors could work in theory, especially if they are buffed.

I see the problem, you need to get into CC and face those stomp attacks....avoid using expensive multi-wound models like drones and princes.

The most point effecient way would for sure be a plague bringer swarm with touch of rust glancing on 6s. Problem is getting that to happen..

Screamers still seem like your best bet. They're fast enough to actually get into CC, which isn't happening with any of the other options unless the Knight wants to get stuck in as well. Armorbane and AP2 means a decent chance to, if not score Explode results, at least chuck some weapon destroyeds and Stuns to reduce the number of attacks coming back. Stomps shouldn't be that big a problem if you have enough Screamers in the unit. They come on flying bases that are smaller than the screamers themselves, so even if everyone is packed into the combat, they'd actually get fewer hits on them than normal 25mm base troops.

Another option if you just wanna tarpit would be a giant horde of tzeentch Furies lead by a Herald on disc. Fast, cheap, and with the herald they won't evaporate after a few casualties. This could work to hold the Knight in place so it's not blasting the rest of your army, and also so any slowpokes like Plaguebearers can trudge into combat and actually hurt it.

 changerofways wrote:
I see the problem, you need to get into CC and face those stomp attacks....avoid using expensive multi-wound models like drones and princes.

The most point effecient way would for sure be a plague bringer swarm with touch of rust glancing on 6s. Problem is getting that to happen..

Agree, the tricky part is that the knight strike hard at any daemon or unit in cc. Otherwise a lord of change with staff would be great.
Not seeing how you tie it up in combat, he would anihilate any daemons in max 2 turns.

Fast hitting biomancy princes is probably best, just pray you kill it before it strike back.
Actually, make that dual boimancy princes, working as a team.

Two words...Lord of Skulls.

...is far too expensive for what it actually brings to the table?

It is. It needs some more HP to be better. Still fun and intimidating. Has better shooting than the knights, but swings at the same speed, so they'll just blow each other up.

Except with a grimoire you can give it a 3++ save which works against the reaper chainsword (most of the time) whilst the ion shield doesn't stop a great cleaver.

Screamers, plaguebearers are good. Anything which forces them to make difficult terrain tests halves their speed.

Skarbrand is awesome but likely to be shot to death by many battlecannon shells. Four knights generally means seven S8 ordnance templates a turn (three paladins and one errant is the mix I've seen most often) - even the exiled one isn't going to survive that in the face.

You could of course respond in kind. Ang'grath the Unbound will eat a knight for breakfast and battlecannon fire will bounce off.

Imperial Knights are actually pretty easy to deal with. Here's something that is important to remember.

Imperial Knights choose their shield facing before the game begins and subsequently during the shooting phase. This means that during the Psychic Phase you most certainly can summon behind them, or otherwise get around to which facing side or rear that they do not have a shield


Here's 10 ways to kill a knight.

1. Biomancy Lash Prince or Lord Of Change: 2d6 ST shots w/ lash if it get's Iron Arm these can be ST9. It Flies, it can also Deep Strike behind to rear facing. Lord's of Change come with Flickering Fire.

2. A large unit of Plaguebearers can glance it to death ; Use the Psychic Spell Miasma to reduce it's initiave by D3 and it's Weapon Skill.

3. You can actually summon or purchase Heralds on Seeker Chariots w/ Sacrifice. These charge at 2D6 ST4 RENDING attacks, then an additional 4 Rending Attacks .

4. Charge it with Screamers, whom you can actually summon units of 3.

5. Deep Strike a Herald of Tzeentch behind it with Exalted Locus of Conjuration. Fire off Flickering Fire for 2d6 to 4D6 ST6 shots to rear armour.

6. Deep Strike a unit of Pink Horrors behind it and shoot it with Flickering Fire.

7. Cast Acquisence ( -5 Initiative) or a Charge with Fiends ( Also - on Initiave) or anything that reduces it's initiative and charge it with Soul Grinder

8. Cast Misfortune (Easily taken by choosing Divination with Tzeentch Heralds, Plus it gives you the ability to Prescience) on it and shoot it to death with Flickering Fire ST5/6 Flickering Fires.

9. Simply Charge him with Skarbrand

10. My Favourite : Charge it with Slaanesh Chaos Furies led by a Herald of Slaanesh on a Steed w/ Beguilement and Greater Aether Blade possibly, They're ST4 , Ini 4, Rending Attacks. It's a 165 points for 20 of these things and they get Hammer of Wrath attacks that are rending as well that hit automatically. You can also just stick a Herald of Slaanesh with a Greater Locus and they'll be +5 to initiative. Or a Beguilement , Heralds can keep up with Furies by using steeds or just bare bones the Chaos Furies.


Basically you have multiple ways to deal with Imperial Knights, the thing to remember is tha t you have multiple Psychic Spells that reduce initiative or Weapon Skill and Access to units that reduce initiative as well. You also can summon units who's attacks have Armourbane and AP2. Most shooting is done in the Psychic Phase which with clever movement or summoning you can easily get to rear facing. You have access to a Psychic Discipline that includes Misfortune making all attacks rending.

The easiest and quickest way I've found is simply deep strike a unit of Pink Horrors behind it with a Herald with a Exalted Locus or just a Herald witha Exalted Locus deepstrikes behind it or is summoned behind it remember summoning as a 12 inch range, simply move up to it and summon a unit behind it that can fire off a Level 2 Flickering for 3D6 ST5/6. ST5 can get Penetrating hits on Rear Armour, but unfortunately cannot auto destroy it so your stuck iwth glancing it to death but it's pretty easy when it's ST6.

So yeah they really shouldn't give you any trouble. Multiples can be annoying , but you can summon small units that have 3 attacks with armour bane.

Even with it's 4+ invunerable, you can very well glance it to death with misfortune or straight up penetrate and kill it with Misfortune and Flickering

I disagree with a lot of hollis' points. I'll underline the ones I disagree with, and then explain.

Hollismason wrote:

Here's 10 ways to kill a knight.

1. Biomancy Lash Prince or Lord Of Change: 2d6 ST shots w/ lash if it get's Iron Arm these can be ST9. It Flies, it can also Deep Strike behind to rear facing. Lord's of Change come with Flickering Fire.

2. A large unit of Plaguebearers can glance it to death ; Use the Psychic Spell Miasma to reduce it's initiave by D3 and it's Weapon Skill.

3. You can actually summon or purchase Heralds on Seeker Chariots w/ Sacrifice. These charge at 2D6 ST4 RENDING attacks, then an additional 4 Rending Attacks .

4. Charge it with Screamers, whom you can actually summon units of 3.

5.Deep Strike a Herald of Tzeentch behind it with Exalted Locus of Conjuration. Fire off Flickering Fire for 2d6 to 4D6 ST6 shots to rear armour.

6. Deep Strike a unit of Pink Horrors behind it and shoot it with Flickering Fire.

7. Cast Acquisence ( -5 Initiative) or a Charge with Fiends ( Also - on Initiave) or anything that reduces it's initiative and charge it with Soul Grinder

8. Cast Misfortune (Easily taken by choosing Divination with Tzeentch Heralds, Plus it gives you the ability to Prescience) on it and shoot it to death with Flickering Fire ST5/6 Flickering Fires.

9. Simply Charge him with Skarbrand

10. My Favourite : Charge it with Slaanesh Chaos Furies led by a Herald of Slaanesh on a Steed w/ Beguilement and Greater Aether Blade possibly, They're ST4 , Ini 4, Rending Attacks. It's a 165 points for 20 of these things and they get Hammer of Wrath attacks that are rending as well that hit automatically. You can also just stick a Herald of Slaanesh with a Greater Locus and they'll be +5 to initiative. Or a Beguilement , Heralds can keep up with Furies by using steeds or just bare bones the Chaos Furies.

Ok lets get some things straight. A knight is AV 13/12/12. This means that any of your points discussing flickering fire without the use of an exalted loci are wrong,as they will not be able to hurt a knight at all.
Even with the loci, you will need to pass the psychic test, roll to hit, and then get 6's. I just don't see that as a viable counter, especially when said unit costs 200+ points and will be killed or tied up by the knight next turn.

Second. Daemon chariots are awful. Especially if you put your 50-100+ character in there, as they will be dead as soon as they get in line of sight. They also take up valuable heavy support slots which are better used by grinders.
If, by some luck, you manage to charge a knight with 2 HP remaining, you will deal on average 7 HOW hits. Then you need to roll 6's, and after that you need 5's or 6's to glance. On average therefore a charging chariot will deal a grand total of 0.3 HP of damage, before it gets cut in half.

3rd. Hammer of Wrath hits do not have rending unless specifically stated. This means that your 10th point is much less viable as furies do not get rending on their HOW hits. If the herald dies, then the furies will disappear after 1-2 rounds of cc.

4th. A lot of these ideas require psychic powers, which are randomly generated so are not a guaranteed tool in your army. They are also quite unreliable now