[coke123]

I've had one or two people show some interest in what I'm running for Grey Knights, so I've decided to share and do a little run-through of what I think makes my particular build tick, and some stuff I tried but didn't love.

Basically, I play Hybrid Grey Knights with a fairly mech-centric Imperial Guard allied detachment. It actually plays a lot like the full-mech Grey Knights of 5th edition, where you really just use the transports as nature intended, as a vehicle and not a bunker. I've been running variants of this list ever since 6th edition dropped.

Anyways, onto the list:

Coteaz

10 GKSS with 2 Psycannons, Psyammo, Rhino with Searchlight
10 GKSS with 2 Psycannons, Psyammo, Rhino with Searchlight

5 GKSS with 1 Psycannon

4 Death Cult Assassins, 1 Crusader

Stormraven with TL Assault Cannon, TL Multi-Melta, Hurricane Bolters, Psyammo

Company Command Squad with 4 Plasma Guns, Chimera with Multilaser, Heavy Flamer

Veteran Squad with 3 Plasma Guns, Vox Caster, Chimera with Multilaser, Heavy Flamer

Veteran Squad with 3 Flamers, Demolitions

Vendetta

Manticore

Basically it's pretty straightforward. GKSS roll forward with Coteaz and take midfield, backed up by CCS and plasmavets in chimeras. The CCS and plasmavets form a tag team, with the CCS performing orders on both units to either twin link all that plasma fire vs vehicles/MCs or to force infantry to reroll successful cover saves. They are also my answer to all these T6 2+ save MCs that GW just seems to love printing these days. They basically make any unit they want dead.

The rest seems pretty obvious to me, Manticore blasts shit dead, and most importantly keeps my opponent's vehicles honest, Vendetta and Stormraven pull double time in being both my AA and my most aggressive push. DCA are dirt cheap scoring in a flyer, as are the flamervets.

As for other stuff I've tried and don't love-

I swapped the Stormraven, Coteaz, DCA, veterans, and CCS for 5 more GKSS, a basic Infantry Platoon with Autocannons, Draigo and 5 Paladins. This was mostly a metagame call in order to try and beat Screamers at the peak of their brokenness, and they worked quite well; although I think this is less relevant now that daemons have faded back into fairness- bringing all that extra firepower in veterans, as well as having coteaz (since he's the goddamn batman) is just better. The platoon just never did enough to warrant their inclusion, and frankly Grey Knights just don't have any interactions with blobs that they can abuse *glares at Azrael*.

I also ran an army that swapped the veterans and CCS for ,+5 GKSS, a platoon, Primaris psyker, and Psyker Battle Squad. PBS are a fantastic unit, but without insane IG firepower to back them up, they're somewhat lacklustre. Quite often the PBS was rather ineffectual, where I'd make a MEq unit ran, and then they just go "lolATSKNF" and continue not caring. It wasn't worth losing the plasma guns, which GK really, really need now that Riptides are a thing- I found that my worst matchups were dual Riptide or more aggressive GK builds with Dreadknights. Yes, these were even worse than Heldrakes; Heldrakes can be answered with proper placement, but MCs that just run into you giving precisely zero fucks about you do to them is much harder. Also, Primaris are really ordinary, I'd prefer a Commissar tbh.

Anyways, fire away.

 

[Magpie_Oz]

What is the role of the demo vets?

"Heldrakes can be answered with proper placement"

Talk to me ......

 

[coke123]

What is the role of the demo vets?

They're a cheap scoring unit that is both easily inserted into enemy lines, and puts out pretty good damage on most things with flamers, especialy typical backfield units. Basically, they go in the Vendetta.

Demolition Charges are 100% optional; I had 30pts to spare and figured another blast, more S8, and more AP2 is probably better than 2 more DCA.

"Heldrakes can be answered with proper placement"

Talk to me ......

OK, this could be an article in itself (and I may do one once I get back to Australia), but here's a quickfire summary of stuff you can do.

To start with, the obvious- hide. Heldrake still can't kill what it cannot see, so if you can find a ruin or something to hide beneath, that helps. If there's a Skyshield Landing Pad on the table, punch the air and do some mad airkicks in triumph, and then make a beeline towards it- if you hide beneath it, they can't see a damn thing. Don't be a numpty and go for the 4++, just use it to hide.

Failing that, then abuse the template placement rules. Basically, you combat squad, spread your units out, and put every unit into a 'V' formation, as illustrated below.

EDIT: My fucking awesome diagram of doom won't display properly, but I imagine most people understand how a V formation works, right?

Basically, by making your army MSU, you force your opponent to maximise over a 5 man squad. By taking up a V-Formation, you pretty much ensure that they're only able to put 2-3 marines under their flamer template every turn, and if the Heldrake only kills 2-3 MEq per turn, then you've pretty much mitigated the Baleflamer. Then you only really need to worry about Vector Strikes, which are a pain, but cannot realistically be done repeatedly over a game, since they require you to fly over your target.

If you present your opponent's Heldrakes with 5-6 units which it can't even guarantee it'll destroy wholesale, then you're doing well, because the rest of the CSM book is crap (except Spawn).

 

[Magpie_Oz]

What is MSU ?

 

[OrchidDoc]

What is MSU ?

MSU is Many Small Units (or Multiple Small Units)

 

[coke123]

As OrchidDoc said, MSU stands for Many/Multiple Small Units. It's the building strategy that dominated 5th edition, whereby you take infantry units in the smallest unit size possible.

This achieves two things- firstly, it allows you to take more transports. In 5th edition, vehicles where horrendously good, so the best strategy was usually to just take 5 marines in a Razorback- the Razorback itself has a better gun than the 5 marines did, was very difficult to kill, and was very fast. The 5 marines would simply hide inside the Razorback to make it scoring. The changes 6th edition brought made this less of a problem, so you will probably have noticed people tend to take fewer vehicles and more large infantry units.

The second thing, which is more relevant, is that it increases the resilience of your army by generating overkill, whilst minimising overkill on your opponent's units. If you compare 2 units of 5 marine to a single unit of 10, consider that if 5 unsaved wounds are caused on the 5 man squad, then there is a wound wasted- there is no real difference between 5 and 6 unsaved wounds- your opponent has wasted firepower. However, on the 10 man squad, that 6th wound has actually had an effect- your unit had 6 guys to lose, so you actually lose firepower. In this scenario, your opponent has not wasted firepower; they have gotten values out of their shooting. So the smaller squads tend to cause your opponent's firepower to be wasted.

Then also consider that the 2 5-man squads and 1 10 man squad have the same number of shots- however, in the MSU case, you can fire one squad, see if it wipes out a unit, and then fire the second. this means that you're less likely to overkill yourself, since you can simply opt to hit a different target with the second half of your shooting with MSU. Compared to a single 10 man squad, where all shots must be directed into one unit, you simply do not have this flexibility.

Make sense?