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Hello everyone!

Im hoping that i can pluck some knowledge and ask about the black templars as an army and if they're any good on the tabletop in the current edition.

Also if i was to go with these crusaders, would i get away with using grey knights steel as an undercoat with the black contrast to give them a metallic sheen? As im no.good at painting pure white.

Hello and welcome. Marines of all flavours are pretty good, but some other chapters have more powerfull rules if that is what you're looking for.

Emperors champion is really fun and strong duelist, although slow. I would highly recommend bringing him in a BT army. As for strong rules they have a relic that gives a 4+iv save aura for one turn wich is insane if you like to blob up. Their chapter trait combined with some relics and traits makes them really good at completing charge moves. They can reroll any dice for charge range and get up to +3 making even a 10" charge about 75% chance of success. However you might find it hard to actually deal damage while in melee, especially against tough targets.

BT rules stack pretty well with terminators. They are not a strong unit to begin with but of you like them BT is a great chapter for them.

As for painting white, practice makes perfect. My advice would be to make it off-white with a hint of brown or blue instead of going grey to white. It looks more natural that way. Also painting black can be a chore depending on your choice of technice. But I found painting them very rewarding and the chapter symbol is easy to manage for freehand practice.

They're better than Blood Angels as a melee Chapter as they get into melee significantly easier.

Gitdakka wrote:


As for painting white, practice makes perfect. My advice would be to make it off-white with a hint of brown or blue instead of going grey to white. It looks more natural that way. Also painting black can be a chore depending on your choice of technice. But I found painting them very rewarding and the chapter symbol is easy to manage for freehand practice.

I had managed to pull off a good shiny red before with one of the red contrast paints over a metallic base, so i figured i might give that a try, in terms of that method if i used greyseer on the shoulders for the white. Though with metallic black im unsure if the matt shoulder would work

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're better than Blood Angels as a melee Chapter as they get into melee significantly easier.

As much as I dislike the way BA play atm, I'd pick them over BT vs the field. Tripointing is the only melee marine thing that matters.


That being said, vanilla marines have plenty of broken rules atm.

Martel732 wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're better than Blood Angels as a melee Chapter as they get into melee significantly easier.

As much as I dislike the way BA play atm, I'd pick them over BT vs the field. Tripointing is the only melee marine thing that matters.


That being said, vanilla marines have plenty of broken rules atm.

Black templars are better at tripointing since they have more charge range. And if it fails they have strategem to deny infantry retreat on 2+. They are also less killy in melee wich reduces the chance of the tri pointed target dying.

So in terms of an actual list for Black templars, im guessing take their special HQ models as a must (high marshal and emperors champion)

Though for troops i imagine take a healthy mix of new primaris and classic tacticals?

And elites go terminator heavy?

I wouldn't touch classical tacticals for a melee heavy list. Too flimsy. Autobolter intercessors are amazing for assault lists.

To be more clear, assault lists get within range of all the most horrible stuff in the game. This includes mortal wound spam, which will wreck classical marines VERY quickly. I know that's not the meta right now, but it will come back I assure you.

Lithiak wrote:
So in terms of an actual list for Black templars, im guessing take their special HQ models as a must (high marshal and emperors champion)

Though for troops i imagine take a healthy mix of new primaris and classic tacticals?

And elites go terminator heavy?

Nah you can toss Helbrecht to be honest. You can make a basic Captain do everything he does and more. Champ entirely depends if you were running generic Champs to begin with on foot.

Doesn't helbrecht reroll all hit rolls?

Martel732 wrote:
Doesn't helbrecht reroll all hit rolls?

Yeah, he does. You also get access to the Chapter Master Strat and don't need him as he doesn't contribute much. However, a Chapter Master with the Crusader's Helm? Sign me the feth up.

Right. I wish they'd get rid of generic chapter masters, as they are frequently better than the actual chapter masters. I'd never use if I ran vanilla.

Martel732 wrote:
I wouldn't touch classical tacticals for a melee heavy list. Too flimsy. Autobolter intercessors are amazing for assault lists.

To be more clear, assault lists get within range of all the most horrible stuff in the game. This includes mortal wound spam, which will wreck classical marines VERY quickly. I know that's not the meta right now, but it will come back I assure you.

Black templars has built in mortal wound defense

So? Their primaris are still way better against them than oldbois. Other bad things happen at close range, too. Like rapid fire one damage weapons.

Martel732 wrote:
Right. I wish they'd get rid of generic chapter masters, as they are frequently better than the actual chapter masters. I'd never use if I ran vanilla.

It really depends on what the Chapter Master does extra. For example, Shrike offers a decent amount for a type of list and doesn't need to be a Warlord or anything, and of course he's naturally mobile. HOWEVER, outside that type of list, he is easily disposable. In an army like Dark Angels, the 4++ from Azrael is the only reason to run them in the first place. I forgot what Dante did unique of course.


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Martel732 wrote:
So? Their primaris are still way better against them than oldbois. Other bad things happen at close range, too. Like rapid fire one damage weapons.

Exactly. Intercessors won't care about those types of weapons as much. Plus they won't care as heavily about getting into melee with something.

Martel732 wrote:
Doesn't helbrecht reroll all hit rolls?

He is a Chapter Master, true. If he's your warlord his aura bubble also includes +1A and +1S for templar units in range, and their custom Litanies can stack another attack on top of that.

They've got a pretty good stack of anti-psycher tricks. It's not going to stop Eldar/TSons/GKs who can bury you in psychic powers, but they're above average in the denial game. And because they're using Litanies instead of Powers themselves, you don't have to worry about losing important buffs when you do run into one of those psycher-heavy armies.

I think they've got potential, but they're not quite in the same league as the other vanilla chapters.

I don't think the static elite castles will be viable as much once all the PAs are out. BA were already abusing them before the lockdown. However, a couple of simple counter charges ruins a lot of BA lists. In this way, BT maybe encourage more robust list building.

So... from what i can gather... Primaris inters with auto rifles, and chaplain grimdalus

For elites take a mix of TH/SS and LC assault terminators (though i hear normal termies are good to throw a sudden deep strike)

And HQs run either high marshal or a chapter master with crusader helm, and the EC

Fast attack i was thinking bikes/attack bikes with melta to deal with nasty vehicles

Don't use melta. Ever. There are no true AT guns in 8th, you have to kill big stuff with wonky approaches.

Martel732 wrote:
Don't use melta. Ever. There are no true AT guns in 8th, you have to kill big stuff with wonky approaches.

which really is annoying and is one of elements of 8th edition I hope gets fixed in 9th edition.

You're talking to someone with lots of melta models, so yeah... I've contemplated trashing them all to save space.

GW have had issues with single shot AT guns for many editions, not just 8th unfortunately.

Because of invulns and the old magical vehicle damage table. DId you roll 5 or 6? Still there! But yes, GW needs to look at some WWII penetration tables.

Biggest trick to painting white is to paint Ulthuan Grey instead. It looks white but looks kore natural than White Scar does.

Lithiak wrote:
So... from what i can gather... Primaris inters with auto rifles, and chaplain grimdalus

For elites take a mix of TH/SS and LC assault terminators (though i hear normal termies are good to throw a sudden deep strike)

And HQs run either high marshal or a chapter master with crusader helm, and the EC

Fast attack i was thinking bikes/attack bikes with melta to deal with nasty vehicles

Nah don't use Helbrecht. You'll get so much more out of a generic Chapter Master. Also forget about the normal Terminators if you're gonna bother with Terminators in the first place. Just go the TH/SS route as that's more a niche to fill compared to LCs (in which case just use the variant that has the 4++, because who cares about additional movement when you just make your charge?). Also Plasma > Melta.

Martel732 wrote:
Because of invulns and the old magical vehicle damage table. DId you roll 5 or 6? Still there! But yes, GW needs to look at some WWII penetration tables.

the easiest solution would just be to give some weapons an "anti-tank" property that ups their damage specificly agaisnt tanks. is a Lascanon did 1d6+3 dmg vs anything that had the vehicle keyword it'd sudden;y be a lot better

Thats what the game needs. More damage.

But not the best solution.

At any rate, stick with plasma and I guess hammers for AT. Also, S5 spam.

BrianDavion wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Because of invulns and the old magical vehicle damage table. DId you roll 5 or 6? Still there! But yes, GW needs to look at some WWII penetration tables.

the easiest solution would just be to give some weapons an "anti-tank" property that ups their damage specificly agaisnt tanks. is a Lascanon did 1d6+3 dmg vs anything that had the vehicle keyword it'd sudden;y be a lot better

Yay, we can go back to invulnerable Monstrous Creatures against Lascannons again!

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're better than Blood Angels as a melee Chapter as they get into melee significantly easier.

This right here is the perfect example of why you shouldn't believe all the things you read online!

It is a rare occasion to discover a statement as wrong as this lol. Oh dear...


Anyways, to answer TC: The Blood Angels are one of the best Astartes chapters, easily. The Black Templars are possibly the least competitive, unfortunately. That isn't to say that you can't make a decent army.