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I've been making most of my lists with Hawkshroud as the household. Getting access to the Overwatch stratagem is excellent with things like Crusaders and Valiants if they're in range. I like the Valiant a lot. Taking the Traitor's Pyre is just so excellent. I can wipe out even big tanks just by getting lots of shots to hit and wound, and it shuts down a lot of flyer/eldar shenanigans right away.

As for other knights, I tend to go with more Crusaders. The volume of fire they can pump out is devastating!

Getting my order today(last week I was in summer cottage about 500km away from FLG I had preordered them ). Won't get anything built for tomorrow in time but maybe I can get castellan built for week later. Not sure about renegade contents as I'm not sure do I have magnets to build those...Those might have to wait for august as I'll be heading to Japan in less than 3 weeks.

Anyway for next week was thus planning to use following knight/ig list:

castellan(2xsiegebreakers, 1xmissile battery)
crusader
errant

Castellan to get me 3rd big knight for cp's plus super vehicle/monster killer. Errant as I only have 2 questor chassis assembled and errant is glued up. One full version fully magnetized+contents of renegade unassembled.

No small knights as I wanted some CP allies so:

Cadian battallion:

2xcompany commander(grand strategist+kurov aquilla. Maybe split them up?)
3xinfantry squad(all have plasma gun, 1 has heavy bolter)
3xmortar

so far fairly standard CP battery though some upgrades to give them some punch. Heavy bolter as I had 10 pts to spare.

Militarum tempestrum(whatever) battallion
2xtempestor prime(rod)

3x5 squads(2 have 2 plasma, one has 1 volley gun)
2xcommand squads(1 has 4 plasma, 1 has 4 volley gun)

These will come turn 2-3 as needed. Objective grabbers etc to give me reach for long distance.

Total 16CP. Likely 6 CP goes to warlord and relics. Cawl's wrath and 4++ for castellan at least. Look this week more of others. Leaves 10CP with recovery+nicking away so at least knights should have plenty of CP to use.

tneva82 wrote:
Getting my order today(last week I was in summer cottage about 500km away from FLG I had preordered them ). Won't get anything built for tomorrow in time but maybe I can get castellan built for week later. Not sure about renegade contents as I'm not sure do I have magnets to build those...Those might have to wait for august as I'll be heading to Japan in less than 3 weeks.

Anyway for next week was thus planning to use following knight/ig list:

castellan(2xsiegebreakers, 1xmissile battery)
crusader
errant

Castellan to get me 3rd big knight for cp's plus super vehicle/monster killer. Errant as I only have 2 questor chassis assembled and errant is glued up. One full version fully magnetized+contents of renegade unassembled.

No small knights as I wanted some CP allies so:

Cadian battallion:

2xcompany commander(grand strategist+kurov aquilla. Maybe split them up?)
3xinfantry squad(all have plasma gun, 1 has heavy bolter)
3xmortar

so far fairly standard CP battery though some upgrades to give them some punch. Heavy bolter as I had 10 pts to spare.

Militarum tempestrum(whatever) battallion
2xtempestor prime(rod)

3x5 squads(2 have 2 plasma, one has 1 volley gun)
2xcommand squads(1 has 4 plasma, 1 has 4 volley gun)

These will come turn 2-3 as needed. Objective grabbers etc to give me reach for long distance.

Total 16CP. Likely 6 CP goes to warlord and relics. Cawl's wrath and 4++ for castellan at least. Look this week more of others. Leaves 10CP with recovery+nicking away so at least knights should have plenty of CP to use.

I think you're like 207 points over 2000 with that list though :/

I do have something similar in mind for my current list (though i keep going "what if i do this instead?" - driving me nuts), but i keep going back to this -



The 16 CP base would mean I start the game with 9CP. (-7 for 2 extra traits and relics for Knights and 1 for Aquila)
Essentially gives me ld 10 Conscripts and 7 obsec units.
I’ve been toying with dropping the Valiant for either 4 normal Knights or 3 Knights and 2 Armigers, but, I keep coming up against either a lack of CP or not being 100% sure on the additional Knights/Armigers out damaging/scoring/surviving what I have listed above.

Kdash wrote:

I think you're like 207 points over 2000 with that list though :/

Huh? Right forgot it did not have scion command squads. Been making lots of lists with my full scion battallion.

Undecided on what house. Mechanicum since I want to use them for the canticles time to time but which one. Raven, 6+++ or the one that gives rerolls against closest targets are my current go-to's. 6+++ is nice amount of extra wounds plus that troll come back alive strategem just for face of opponent, rerolls always nice though only closest is bit of bummer but also has 6=2 hits strategem which can be nice(wonder how that works with the relic gatling gun?). For stand back&shoot the advance move bonus from raven isn't that hot but strategem is pretty good.

 Eldarain wrote:
With the number of wounds on these things it's really tempting. The Raven Strategem for the Castellan tips it that way for me.

Maybe all Taranis with a Freeblade Raven Castellan would be worth trying.

I thought <FREEBLADE> replaces <HOUSEHOLD> so you could not be Freeblade Raven.

Think he refers to having freeblade knight in taranis detachment. You have one(sad) freeblade max per detachment so you have tarantis detachment with one of them possibly being freeblade instead

 Karhedron wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

However, with the melee shield you can boost your invulnerable to 4+ with a stratagem.

Sadly you cannot. "Sanctuary" specifically gives you a 5++ in close combat, it does not say you can use your Ion Shield in close combat (despite what the fluff says). This means that RAW, "Ion Bulwark" and "Rotate Ion Shields" do not boost your invulnerable save in close combat because the save is specifically provided by "Sanctuary", not by your Ion Shield. :(

Rotate Ion Shields does not care for the origin of the save and can be used in any phase. It does work.

No, he wanted to use the House Raven stratagem. A freeblade definitely can't do that.

You could have a Taranis (or whoever) Lance and an auxiliary Raven knight if you wanted. That ought to be doable from 1750 points and up. You could have a lance with a Gallant and two Errants, then an auxiliary Castellan from House Raven. It wouldn't start out as a character so you'd have to spend at least 1 of your 6 CPs on Cawl's Wrath, then of course use them on the stratagem itself. At 2k it looks a lot more viable.

Honestly I think my advice would instead be to play House Raven, if you want their stratagem. Take a Valiant with landstrider and a Castellan, and any 3rd knight you want.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually, having given this some thought I think you shouldn’t add a Raven knight – or any other kind – to a Taranis force. You’d be presenting your opponent with a more expensive, more dangerous, less tough target than the rest of your army. He’ll focus everything he has on taking it down.

Instead you could go all-raven, and build a highly aggressive army that saturates the board with threats (so for instance a Valiant and Questoris storming forward while a Castellan uses the stratagem and Cawl’s Wrath to rain death on things). Alternatively you could build a Taranis force that’s all about maximising the amount of wounds you have on the board, designed to outlive your opponent’s army.

This also feeds into what allies you bring. Guard infantry would probably live longer against the Raven army, because your opponent will be doing everything he can to stop knights rampaging across his army. But with Taranis they would be seriously incentivised to switch their focus away from the knights and towards any unfortunate infantry who happened to be nearby – as that’s the only easy way to get kill points and maelstrom objectives that require unit kills.

Plus of course Raven are a bit more CP-hungry they want to use their stratagem each turn, and often stuff like Full Tilt, which is ok but not essential for Taranis. So not only are raven allies likely to be a bit more survivable, they are also a bit more necessary.

"No, he wanted to use the House Raven stratagem. A freeblade definitely can't do that."

Why? Under freeblade it clearly states that you forego a Household Tradition if a Freeblade. It does not say anything about Strats.

Under Household Tradition, it only gives the various benefits from the houses, eg Terryn's advance/charge buff.

Am I missing something?

 grouchoben wrote:
"No, he wanted to use the House Raven stratagem. A freeblade definitely can't do that."

Why? Under freeblade it clearly states that you forego a Household Tradition if a Freeblade. It does not say anything about Strats.

Under Household Tradition, it only gives the various benefits from the houses, eg Terryn's advance/charge buff.

Am I missing something?

If you don't have <Raven> keyword(because you went for<Freeblade> ) it wouldn't fit.

Or in otherwords. You have detachment A that's raven and detachment B that's non-raven. You claiming because you have Raven detachment you can use that strategem for non-raven knights?

If you do lose strats and traits why would you ever take a freeblade at all? Accessing Terryn's 'attack twice' strat on a Gallant, for example, beats the snot out of the dubious benefit of 1 chosen gift and 2 chosen burdens.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ah yes, I see, thanks. I'd missed the section on p90 about keyword replacement.

 grouchoben wrote:
If you do lose strats and traits why would you ever take a freeblade at all? Accessing Terryn's 'attack twice' strat on a Gallant, for example, beats the snot out of the dubious benefit of 1 chosen gift and 2 chosen burdens.

I haven't seen anyone talking about using the Terryn stratagem, though I might have suggested using an auxiliary Terryn Gallant.

Freeblades are imperial or mech, but do not come from houses. So they can use the imperial and mech stratagems and relics. A reason to take a freeblade is therefore to have Cawl's Wrath in an otherwise Imperial lance, or Traitor's Pyre in a Mech one. There are also stratagems like the fight when you die thing for Imperial or the fight as if on full wounds thing for Mech.

The Freeblade still counts as one of your three knights for the lance and it doesn't prevent other knights from getting household benefits. And note that actually you aren't allowed to have knights from two different households in a single Lance, but you are allowed to add in freeblades.

Qualities and Burdens are ok. Mainly they are fun, but they do actually do stuff.

Great point on the Cawl's Wrath example; I think I'm beginning to understand the role Freeblade plays.

Taking a single knight in a SH Aux detachment is rarely suited to being a Freeblade, then. Mortan for a shooty knight, or Terryn for a Gallant, Vulker's adamantium knight for an Atropos, who doesn't need Ion Bulwark, etc. Each unlock powerful traits and strats that you othewise trade in for the limited benefits of a quality + 2 burdens.

Where Freeblade is actually useful is to take Pyre or Wrath 'out of faction' in a SH Detachment.

That’s certainly one way round things. On the other hand, an auxiliary freeblade knight does get qualities and burdens, while a household one doesn’t get their house tradition. You’d be trading the option of house-specific stuff that costs CPs for a flat bonus that doesn’t. Whether that was the right choice might well depend on the knight in question.

So I wouldn’t run an auxiliary Taranis knight, because the household tradition is what makes them good. Their warlord trait and relic are average at best, and the stratagem wouldn’t be too useful either for a solo knight. On the other hand a House Raven Castellan would benefit hugely from their stratagem and doesn’t really care about advancing, so it would be fine as an auxiliary. But a Raven Valiant doesn’t make much sense at all as an auxiliary – it should be an Imperial freeblade, or maybe Hawkshroud for their “for the greater good” stratagem.

It might well be that in practice it makes more sense for auxiliary knights to be from houses than to be freeblades. Each kind of knight might have a house that works really well for it, providing more benefit than you’d get from being a freeblade. If that turns out to be the case, it would mean you wouldn’t see many freeblades at all, except sometimes to cross factions within a lance. We’ll see, I guess.

[wishlisting] It would have been cool if they’d added renegade knights to the book. They could have done, easily enough, or they could do it with a downloadable PDF. Essentially it could be made so that “Renegade” was a sub-faction like Imperial or Mech aready is. No access to Imperia/Mech stuff but the option to use generic stuff and maybe some new renegade options instead. And they should use the same datasheets, without the option to mount two of the same gun that they have now. A renegade dual-avenger knight will be fantastic if its points get dropped.[/wishlisting]

And of course freeblades adds fun and cool modeling options. If you are looking only at uber competive things each codex loses like 70% options anyway.

As for renegade knights i'l' bet eventually that comes as own codex. Why sell 2 factions for price of 1 when you can sell them for price of 2?

Ok so I am new to knights and have been reading through this sub.

First rules question is. Does House Raven allow Advance and then making heavy into assault also removing the to hit penalty? Essentially meaning you can advance your units to hit at full BS instead of a -1?

That being said would 2 Crusaders and a Gallant be an effective use of the household? Not a huge fan of the Dominus or Armigers so preferring to stick with the Questoris classes.

I am thinking:

Crusader - TC, Endless Fury, Ion Bulwark
Crusader - TC, Avenger GC, Sainted Ion
Gallant - Cunning Commander (Free heroic interventions)

This would be supported by some sort of ground troops. Most likely my Grey Knights because I already own them. Eventually the hope is Peltasts could fill this role.

House Taranis also looks intriguing.

 TheMostWize wrote:
Ok so I am new to knights and have been reading through this sub.

First rules question is. Does House Raven allow Advance and then making heavy into assault also removing the to hit penalty? Essentially meaning you can advance your units to hit at full BS instead of a -1?

That being said would 2 Crusaders and a Gallant be an effective use of the household? Not a huge fan of the Dominus or Armigers so preferring to stick with the Questoris classes.

I am thinking:

Crusader - TC, Endless Fury, Ion Bulwark
Crusader - TC, Avenger GC, Sainted Ion
Gallant - Cunning Commander (Free heroic interventions)

This would be supported by some sort of ground troops. Most likely my Grey Knights because I already own them. Eventually the hope is Peltasts could fill this role.

House Taranis also looks intriguing.

You can advance and fire without penalty, yes. Your guns become assault, and you suffer no penalty to hit when firing assault weapons.

I wouldn't run that detachment as House Raven. None of the knights particularly benefit from the house trait. Crusaders are in no hurry, so they don’t need to advance and fire. The Gallant wants to advance but hasn’t really got any guns, so who cares whether it can fire or not?

House Raven actually works really well with the Dominus chassis. Being able to advance and fire is great for a Valiant, while their stratagem is fantastic on a Dominus. Neither is anywhere near as good on a Questoris knight, sadly.

House Raven definitely wants a warlord with Landstrider mixed in somewhere, so that they get to run around the place faster.

If you want to run Questoris knights then I’d recommend Taranis over Raven. You get more wounds/point, which is what Taranis wants.

Mandragola wrote:

 TheMostWize wrote:
Ok so I am new to knights and have been reading through this sub.

First rules question is. Does House Raven allow Advance and then making heavy into assault also removing the to hit penalty? Essentially meaning you can advance your units to hit at full BS instead of a -1?

That being said would 2 Crusaders and a Gallant be an effective use of the household? Not a huge fan of the Dominus or Armigers so preferring to stick with the Questoris classes.

I am thinking:

Crusader - TC, Endless Fury, Ion Bulwark
Crusader - TC, Avenger GC, Sainted Ion
Gallant - Cunning Commander (Free heroic interventions)

This would be supported by some sort of ground troops. Most likely my Grey Knights because I already own them. Eventually the hope is Peltasts could fill this role.

House Taranis also looks intriguing.

You can advance and fire without penalty, yes. Your guns become assault, and you suffer no penalty to hit when firing assault weapons.

I wouldn't run that detachment as House Raven. None of the knights particularly benefit from the house trait. Crusaders are in no hurry, so they don’t need to advance and fire. The Gallant wants to advance but hasn’t really got any guns, so who cares whether it can fire or not?

House Raven actually works really well with the Dominus chassis. Being able to advance and fire is great for a Valiant, while their stratagem is fantastic on a Dominus. Neither is anywhere near as good on a Questoris knight, sadly.

House Raven definitely wants a warlord with Landstrider mixed in somewhere, so that they get to run around the place faster.

If you want to run Questoris knights then I’d recommend Taranis over Raven. You get more wounds/point, which is what Taranis wants.

Easy enough. Thank you for the input I will make that change then.

Is the 2 Crusader Gallant set up best or would it be better served to change one to a warden? Or 1 Crusader and 2 Wardens?

 ph34r wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
With the number of wounds on these things it's really tempting. The Raven Strategem for the Castellan tips it that way for me.

Maybe all Taranis with a Freeblade Raven Castellan would be worth trying.

I thought <FREEBLADE> replaces <HOUSEHOLD> so you could not be Freeblade Raven.

Right. I got greedy and confused the ability to mix Imperialis and Mechanicus that way.

What do you guys consider a good relic/trait combination for a single Errant in an Aux detachment

List:


The Errant is already build in this configuration (only rocket/icarus magnetized) so i was thinking about using him as a forward threat (with his enginseer babysitter tailing him) while the rest of my stuff hunkers down as a little firebase in the back
for this reason i thought i chose relic/wl trait in a manner to make him as resiliant as possible to divert attention.

is the combination of saint ion and bulwark overkill or would you recommend Vulker for adamantium knight (was thinking taranis for the revive)
offensive choices like landstrider dont really appeal to me since i wanna be shooting his gun every turn and i also dont wanna run away to far from his repair buddy
thoughts ?

Emulgator wrote:
What do you guys consider a good relic/trait combination for a single Errant in an Aux detachment

List:

Spoiler:

+++ New Roster (Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition) [58 PL, 998pts] +++

++ Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment (Imperium - Imperial Knights) ++

+ No Force Org Slot +

Exalted Court: Exalted Court: 1 Extra Warlord Trait (-1CP)

Heirlooms of the Household: Heirlooms of the Household: 1 Extra Heirloom (-1CP)

Household Choice: House Taranis, Questor Mechanicus

+ Lord of War +

Knight Errant: Heirloom: Armour of the Sainted Ion, Meltagun, Reaper chainsword, Thermal cannon, Warlord Trait: Ion Bulwark
. Character: Exalted Court Member

++ Battalion Detachment +5CP (Imperium - Adeptus Mechanicus) ++

Forge World: Stygies VIII

+ HQ +

Tech-Priest Dominus: Autocaduceus of Arkhan Land, Macrostubber, Omnissian Axe, Volkite Blaster

Tech-Priest Enginseer: Omnissian Axe, Servo-arm
. Warlord: Necromechanic

+ Troops +

Skitarii Rangers: 4x Skitarii Ranger
. Ranger Alpha: Galvanic rifle

Skitarii Vanguards: Enhanced data-tether
. 2x Skitarii Vanguard
. 2x Vanguard (Plasma caliver): 2x Plasma caliver
. Vanguard Alpha: Radium Carbine

Skitarii Vanguards: 4x Skitarii Vanguard
. Vanguard Alpha: Radium Carbine

+ Heavy Support +

Onager Dunecrawler: Broad Spectrum Data-tether
. Neutron laser & cognis heavy Stubber: Cognis heavy stubber, Neutron Laser

Onager Dunecrawler: Broad Spectrum Data-tether, Icarus Array

Created with BattleScribe (https://battlescribe.net)

The Errant is already build in this configuration (only rocket/icarus magnetized) so i was thinking about using him as a forward threat (with his enginseer babysitter tailing him) while the rest of my stuff hunkers down as a little firebase in the back
for this reason i thought i chose relic/wl trait in a manner to make him as resiliant as possible to divert attention.

is the combination of saint ion and bulwark overkill or would you recommend Vulker for adamantium knight (was thinking taranis for the revive)
offensive choices like landstrider dont really appeal to me since i wanna be shooting his gun every turn and i also dont wanna run away to far from his repair buddy
thoughts ?

If you're going Mechanicus, and want to stick with the Errant, i'd prob look at running Tanaris and the Tanaris melta relic - especially if you're running the 4+ invuln.

It increases your range, always gives you melta bonus and you'll gain the survivability from the 4++ and the 6+++.

But he would loose the household traditon 6+++ as Aux detachments got broken in the codex

 Ideasweasel wrote:
But he would loose the household traditon 6+++ as Aux detachments got broken in the codex

Oops, completely forgot and didn't think properly before posting

Kdash wrote:


If you're going Mechanicus, and want to stick with the Errant, i'd prob look at running Tanaris and the Tanaris melta relic - especially if you're running the 4+ invuln.

It increases your range, always gives you melta bonus and you'll gain the survivability from the 4++ and the 6+++.

I guess with rotate ion shields every turn i wont use the 2+ a lot, the relic thermal cannon just felt a bit underwhelming to me compared to the other weapon relics...

The Taranis relic is pretty weak. Most of the time it's no different to the normal Thermal Cannon. I don't honestly see much reason to run Taranis outside of a Lance.

I'm not sure there's really any house that stands out as great for a solo Errant. The relic options for its weapons are bad. House Raven would be good for it in a lance but the stratagem isn't brilliant for it.

The best thing might be to paint it in some sort of generic Admech scheme, so you can use it as a freeblade or make your own Admech house later on if you decide to get more knights.

Is there a clear picture of house colors for all of the knights (with labels for which house is which)? I don't know one house from the next.

Mandragola wrote:
The Taranis relic is pretty weak. Most of the time it's no different to the normal Thermal Cannon. I don't honestly see much reason to run Taranis outside of a Lance.

I'm not sure there's really any house that stands out as great for a solo Errant. The relic options for its weapons are bad. House Raven would be good for it in a lance but the stratagem isn't brilliant for it.

The best thing might be to paint it in some sort of generic Admech scheme, so you can use it as a freeblade or make your own Admech house later on if you decide to get more knights.

I chose Taranis initially for the 2cp Our Darkest Hour+Machine Spirit Resourgent combo

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Is there a clear picture of house colors for all of the knights (with labels for which house is which)? I don't know one house from the next.

...the Codex.

Mandragola wrote:

 TheMostWize wrote:

First rules question is. Does House Raven allow Advance and then making heavy into assault also removing the to hit penalty? Essentially meaning you can advance your units to hit at full BS instead of a -1?

That being said would 2 Crusaders and a Gallant be an effective use of the household? Not a huge fan of the Dominus or Armigers so preferring to stick with the Questoris classes.

I am thinking:

Crusader - TC, Endless Fury, Ion Bulwark
Crusader - TC, Avenger GC, Sainted Ion
Gallant - Cunning Commander (Free heroic interventions)

You can advance and fire without penalty, yes. Your guns become assault, and you suffer no penalty to hit when firing assault weapons.

I wouldn't run that detachment as House Raven. None of the knights particularly benefit from the house trait. Crusaders are in no hurry, so they don’t need to advance and fire. The Gallant wants to advance but hasn’t really got any guns, so who cares whether it can fire or not?

House Raven actually works really well with the Dominus chassis. Being able to advance and fire is great for a Valiant, while their stratagem is fantastic on a Dominus. Neither is anywhere near as good on a Questoris knight, sadly.

House Raven definitely wants a warlord with Landstrider mixed in somewhere, so that they get to run around the place faster.

I disagree. The Raven stratagem is fantastic on Crusaders and worth considering for that alone (if you have enough CPs). The Traits is handy too as it means your Crusaders can start off well back (preferably behind some LOS blocking terrain) in case you do not get T1. Then in your turn, you have extra movement to get into some good LOS. If you are facing an enemy without any particularly scary CC units, you can use the Advance and Fire trait to get into range to use those stompy feet too.

 Karhedron wrote:

I disagree. The Raven stratagem is fantastic on Crusaders and worth considering for that alone (if you have enough CPs).

Yes, I can not understand how people can not get it. Re-rolls for all and every 1s for a shooting phase for 12/14 shots from Gatling Cannon, 2D6 shots from RFBC, 6 shots from heavy stabbers, D6 shots from missile pod and D6 shots from heavy flamer? It worth its price in gold.

 Karhedron wrote:

The Traits is handy too as it means your Crusaders can start off well back (preferably behind some LOS blocking terrain) in case you do not get T1. Then in your turn, you have extra movement to get into some good LOS. If you are facing an enemy without any particularly scary CC units, you can use the Advance and Fire trait to get into range to use those stompy feet too.

Or if you do not want to be in CC you can move and advance as far away as you can and still shoot at full efficiency.