Filch wrote:
The only logical choice is to not even play 5 ik.

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
If 5 Knights is an "I win" button, why is it that they never win tournaments?

SJ

 Filch wrote:
Is it even viable for an army of 5 IK to fight equal amount of points of anti tank spam?

I am playing in a environment where its okay to tailor before a match begins. So when I go to play my 5 IK, people just spam anti tanks. Is there anything I can do about it as the IK player?

So the marine/ sister player spams meltaguns. The skitarii player spams arc. The tau player spams fusion.

The only logical choice is to not even play 5 ik.

I can fit 4 wardens and a gallant in a 1850 list. The enrmy would have like 20-30 anti tank guns. Some on vehicles or stuff like centurion and heavy weapons team.

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
Its not your list, nor their list, its the table you are playing on. More tall, LoS blocking terrain will counter tge bulk of your issues. Don't fight on an open plan, fight in a hive city. Remember, its your 5 Spartans against their anti-tank Persians, so it behooves you to stop them at Thermopile than in the verdant plains.

SJ

 Jimsolo wrote:
The only solution is to create more balanced lists, unfortunately.

 Filch wrote:
5 IK is an army so deal with it.

 Filch wrote:
5 IK is an army so deal with it.

 koooaei wrote:
We generally discuss lists beforehands. At least the general consensus. If any of the players feels that either of lists ain't going to match the other, we suggest some changes. We come to a concensus where everyone's more or less happy before the game.

 koooaei wrote:
Not much. There are generally just some minor changes. For example, when i was running 150 guardsmen against sm, i suggested him swapping his lazcannons and grav for anti-infantry stuff. Cause otherwise, it'd be a bit too one-sided and i wouldn't have enjoyed it.

 koooaei wrote:
Not when there are 150 of them. Ig still won that game but it ended up being much closer and much more enjoyable. In fact, it was a hair close of a loss for IG but Yarikk is a tough old fart not willing to die.

Fists don't help much vs melee guards all in all. Bolters do help.

 Filch wrote:
5 IK is an army so deal with it.

Martel732 wrote:

That's the power of a focused list. You make your opponent bring equipment that doesn't help them. Don't tell them ahead of time.

 koooaei wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

That's the power of a focused list. You make your opponent bring equipment that doesn't help them. Don't tell them ahead of time.

When i see that he'll have hard time dealing with my army simply cause of build, i'm not happy with it. You know, there should be some sort of challenge or at least equal starting.

vipoid wrote:

 Filch wrote:
5 IK is an army so deal with it.

Yeah, you're not exactly inviting sympathy.

But, by the same token, anti-vehicle exists so deal with it.

Martel732 wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

That's the power of a focused list. You make your opponent bring equipment that doesn't help them. Don't tell them ahead of time.

When i see that he'll have hard time dealing with my army simply cause of build, i'm not happy with it. You know, there should be some sort of challenge or at least equal starting.

In Starcraft, build order victories are just as good as micro victories. I don't see why it should be any different in 40K.

 Filch wrote:

vipoid wrote:

 Filch wrote:
5 IK is an army so deal with it.

Yeah, you're not exactly inviting sympathy.

But, by the same token, anti-vehicle exists so deal with it.

KhorneontheCobb wrote:Bringing 5 Knights and complaining that people bring melta when they know they'll face you is the ultimate crybaby move.
I play the game for fun and the crybabies are the least fun to play... I wouldn't even play against you. Not because of the 5 Knights- because you'd whine if I brought some melta to deal with it.

I posted this tread on getting tips to prepare against 100% counters. It is expected a TAC has enough anti tank weaponry but has enough anti infantry and anti air therby making a well rounded list. I by no way am I complaining about a few meltas but presenting the premise of the dilema I bring 5 strong vehicles to move quickly, shoot quickly, and assault quickly so the game is 1-3 hours max instead of 3-5hours when I bring an infantry based army. And by brjnging 5 vehicles, the opponent swaps everything to anti tank and I mean everything, every sergeant has a melta bomb and combi melta, all troops getting melta, even swapping in tfc or some units for they usually bring for anti tank options. Often just alterating 500pts-700pts for anti vehicles.

There have been one or a few people expressing their attitude and opinion that 5 IK is not an army hence why I made the comment, that 5 IK is a valid army option although not the best but still an army option. Many of you not to name names are not helpful to this discussion and exhibiting trolling behavior and close to overstepping rule 1 so I ask you nicely to please leave the discussion if you have no useful tips. I do not welcome your snide comments. Thank you to everyone else who gave me some helpful tips for strategy and tactic ik n the tactics forum.

j have been exploring the capabilities of 5 IK for a while and been struggling ever since 2 Wraithknights can pwn all 5 and win turn 2. I have put considerable efforts into painting and magnetizing my IK so I want to use as many as I can as often as I can. If you dont respect that then please leave. atleast I am not some guy with 5 Wraith Knights, 2x3 jetbikers, jetbike farseer at 1850pts. I don'tthink 100% grav can wreck 5 WK. Only SM and maybe skitarii can have so many grav as opposed to every army but nids lack ranged anti tank.

as someone already stated, the few solutions are to run 3 IK at most but then which is the optimal build and how to prep for 100 % counter? The second choice is to not even bring 1 IK. Stuck to playing nerfed csm. In addition, the flgs has house ruled that the Chaos IK is not a daemon even when taking the upgrade because ot lacks the keywords Daemon as opposed to Daemon Knight of X in its profile. The flgs runs leagues, campaigns, and small tournaments that allow pre match up tailoring. So no static list set jn stone. I dont list tailor be I am used to building TAC lists. Also CSM has obliterators which provides me so much versatility. And ac havocs to deal with pretty much anything.

So the toss up is 3 IK, 100 guards; Adamantine Lance or Baronial Court or house hold; Avenger gat vs rap battle cannon.

If you had any combination of non cerastus knights and a CSM army how would you build it in an environment where list tailoring is allowed, dont need to post a list but even if i listen to the 100 guards men advice even then the opponent will tailor to that too. They will bring a large amount of anti tank and anti infantry if they hear 1-3 IK and mass infantry.

I dont have guards but CSM has cultists and R&H cultists which act just like guard. So we can go that route. However I do have many many marines so I want to use as many of those. However I been toying with the idea of buying cheap fabric and painting small camouflage and then guling that on to every marine and gluing a coffee straw on each bolter to make scout snipers and play SM. I was considering 3 IK and the rest are sniper scouts aimming to kill the enemy heavy/special weapons carrier. That takes care of non drop pod marine armies which brings me to my next question.

How do you deal with massive turn 1 melta drop pod marines?

 Filch wrote:
It is expected a TAC has enough anti tank weaponry but has enough anti infantry and anti air therby making a well rounded list.

Martel732 wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

That's the power of a focused list. You make your opponent bring equipment that doesn't help them. Don't tell them ahead of time.

When i see that he'll have hard time dealing with my army simply cause of build, i'm not happy with it. You know, there should be some sort of challenge or at least equal starting.

In Starcraft, build order victories are just as good as micro victories. I don't see why it should be any different in 40K.

 Frozocrone wrote:
You want guardsmen to bubblewrap your knights so they don't die to melta - or have large blocking line of sight terrain to his knights. Have the knights back to back, in the corners, just mitigate the facings your opponent can shoot at

 Filch wrote:
I already spent $150x5=$750 on the 5 Knights. And that was before taxes. I have to save up a whole new year or 2 to get another army.

 Brennonjw wrote:
here's the problem: For a friendly game, the two players generally tell each other what armies they will be playing. Because of the nature of a knight list (EVERYONE knows your AV and general army build from the get-go) a spam of anti-tank is the only way for the other player to make his army even a slight threat as all of his general infantry is worthless. Your best bet is probably the formation that gives you a +1 to your invuln when within 6" of another knight. To counter drop pod spam, play defensively for the first turn or two, only letting his drop pods hit your front or side. You play CSM, so bring Typhon and ~250 points of zombies, now you can bog AT weapons down in combat.

 Filch wrote:
thank you for the advice but it you have been reading we progressed to using less knights in an attempt to doubke think trick the opponent and punish them for taking 500pts of anti tank guns.

Yes a 5 IK list can work only if its a tournament in which your list is set in stone and 0% tailoring is allowed. This forces people to either take a TAC list or a gimmicky death star list like draigo star, or spam scat bikes or spam Wraith Knights.

Having many tall terrain will help as suggested. And night fighting for the cover saves is wanted?

Bubble wrapping the knight so enemies can't ds 6" near the IK had been suggested with 100 guards.

j wish i bought a Cerastus Knight which has flank speed.

However due to my opponents being smart asses, they purposesly chose the low terrain pieces, and try to use few terrain for their drop army.

Do you know what a complaint sounds like?
"I dont like people who tailor their list to beat mine." That is a complaint. Not once have i said anything like that. I come here and present a situation where people alter 500-800pts out of 1500pt list for anti tank weaponry and I ask for suggestion and then all the people who hate IK jump down my throat exclaiming that 5 IK should not be an army or what ever it is they are upset about. My response was, 5 IK is officially considered an army by the rules so deal with that fact and accept it as a truth as opposed to your belief and attitude that 5 ik isnt an army.

If I can do a straight trade for my IK for WK and my CSM for ScatBikes, only SM grav drop can hurt me as bad compared to any army with melta/fusion lascannons/lances.

There seems to be much less hate for 5 WK and scat bikes and seer council as opposed to 5 IK.

 Filch wrote:
Is it even viable for an army of 5 IK to fight equal amount of points of anti tank spam?

 greyknight12 wrote:

 Filch wrote:
Is it even viable for an army of 5 IK to fight equal amount of points of anti tank spam?

The short, simple answer is no. Anti-tank is simply more points efficient when facing an army made entirely of tanks, especially when each one is roughly 370 points.

MEQ in general are hard for IK to deal with, simply because they survivable enough that the knights do very little damage to them. Battle cannons are AP3, but if you are in fact playing with a lot of terrain as Jeffersonian suggests then your target is probably rocking a 4+ cover save from ruins, so you only kill 50% of the spread out marines you hit. You kill even less if they go to ground or have stealth or shrouding up. If you make it to close combat you only have 3 attacks base at WS4, so you can't deal with numbers because your stomps are only AP4 5/6 of the time. The point being that MEQs will almost always get some sort of 3+ save against you, and you simply don't have the volume of fire to get through that. Meanwhile, your opponent sits on objectives and accrues points, or contests them so you don't. Furthermore, 740 points of marines or eldar can claim 6 objectives, 740 points of IK can claim no more than 2. As long as they kill even a couple knights, it is likely that your opponent will have enough left to stick units on objectives you simply can't reach. A mere 2 suicide units that each successfully take down a knight can make it next to impossible for you to win any objectives game.

This is the dirty secret of imperial knight armies: knights don't deal enough damage to be competitive, nor is their durability sufficient in this age of D-weapons and highly-mobile melta. That's why they don't win tournaments, and you don't see them even included in many top lists. For 375 points, you can get a significantly greater amount of damage out of any of the top codecies. Imperial knights are a spam army like many others (flyrants, scatbikes, flying daemons), but they are either less durable or produce less damage and so they lose. Even an army with low amounts of anti-tank can probably still tarpit them enough to make the game close.

I own more than 5 knights, and I love to play them when I get the chance, but they have a lot of weaknesses that an opponent can exploit and you have run into the most obvious. I'd say generally your best bet is going to be running them as obsec and concentrating them on 2 or 3 objectives. If drop melta is your problem, then deploy them backs to a corner, shoulder to shoulder so you can get your ion saves or at least a cover save from each other if they get to a different facing (and make sure there's no cover in front of you). Take their initial drop on the chin, then blast them point-blank. If they are sternguard you can just run ignore them for the rest of the game, if not hopefully you can kill some of the guys with meltas. Your ion save will reduce incoming damage by 50%, so try to keep them from being able to hit more than one facing. Then camp on objectives and hope you can survive/destroy the rest of their anti-tank.

Martel732 wrote:
Grav is amazingly inefficient against super heavy walkers, as they ignore immobilized.

 Frozocrone wrote:
TAC lists are dead.

Not sure what you're getting at tbh...you bring an all rock list to a meta where you're allowed to tailor beforehand and you expect and/or want people to keep their scissors in?

You want guardsmen to bubblewrap your knights so they don't die to melta - or have large blocking line of sight terrain to his knights. Have the knights back to back, in the corners, just mitigate the facings your opponent can shoot at