How to properly field Deathwing Knights

[Berzul]

Hi everyone!

 

I'm getting myself my first deathwing knights. I've never played them before, not even by using my terminators as a proxy unit (cause I try not to proxy, unless I absolutely have to). So, of course, the first thing I ask myself is how to properly field them.

 

Since I play a 99% shooty army almost every single time, playing with a melee-only unit feels really weird to me. Landraiders, of course, would be an ideal way to put them in play. Just drive them up and deathwing assault, sure. But, are there any other ways that have proven correct, for you guys?

 

Are they worth the deepstrike for that one turn of not being able to assault? Should you just place them in on regular deployment and then run up as fast as you can? 

 

Thanks in advance for any advice.

[Sinthos117]

Chaplains are fantastic with knights.  They ensure that the turn you use smite is devastating.  I run them in a land raider or cestus assault ram.

[Quixus]

Run them in a Land Raider Crusader. You can put more Knights into the crusader and the vehicle's weapons complement the knights nicely. Both want to be close.

 

If you have the resources (points and money), a Spartan will allow you to get an even bigger squad to the enemy and the vehicle weapons are great too.

[Solrac]

Deep Striking doesn't do so bad either. As they aren't mobile, opponents will naturally move away from them so you can use that to your advantage to force your opponent into some fire lanes. They can also soak up a lot of fire and still be left standing. If you do choose to deep strike I recommend you take at least 7 of them for redundancy so when they finally get into combat your Smite will still be decent. This is a much cheaper option than taking a Transport but obviously they lose the combat effectiveness so you have to decide what you want to use them for.

[Disciple of Caliban Sgt]

I agree with Solrac. Using them as a deepstrike must deal with unit works well for me. Also as stated having a Chaplain with them with Mace of Red. is awesome. Deepstrike him in with about 7 and let the mayhem begin. I've seen an entire army of Imp Guard shoot at said unit and not wipe it out (I believe they lost two or three members) and then they proceeded to wreck four blobs and a tank with their Smite mode. Being Guard no need to smite the blobs. They've also done a number on Orks for me as well. So properly supported with other shooty elements they do well.

[Syphid]

Load up a Storm Eagle for airborne Knights!

[DarkAngeal]

Load up a doomhammer with 10 of them, and include a librarian and a interrogator chaplain

[Chaplain Lucifer]

I used them mainly on DS missions with Belial and a Librarian. Theycan absorb tons of fire away from the army but that also leaves them crippled when they have to go for a more difficult CC. So f you are DSing the magic number is 7 plus character, IMHO.

[Quixus]

Load up a Storm Eagle for airborne Knights!

Because of their lack of ranged weapons airborne Knights unfortunately cannot do anything before turn 3, unless you also buy a ready for take-off landing pad.

[Galthan Ironsturm]

I'm agree with Luci', 7 DWK and 1 Librarian (+ eventualy Belial) are just Magic !

[SvenONE]

So I have a full squad of 10 because I always had these great dreams of them deep striking near an enemy and beating the crap out of everything.  Well I've tried this enough times to say that it's the worst way to go.  With the amount of mobile firepower from every other army it's become a bit of a struggle, nothing causes more eyerolls than watching 2 Flying Hive Tyrants just pumping twinllinked shots into you.  I now rarely any more than the minimum 5, and I rarely put them on the table without a LRC/LRR.  Unless you are playing on a board with no difficult terrain and an opponent who keeps moving closer to you for some reason they are just going to get stuck in difficult terrain and kited around.  Not to mention that if you're charging through or anywhere near difficult terrain you're missing out on initiative strikes.

[aura_enchanted]

I run the dwcs as a melee hit squad that fulfills a similar role to the dwk's. Knights are a big ugly field bully that generate instant threat if their allowed to touch anything chances are they will steam roll it. You can use this to a number of different effects on a battlezone ill list a few

 

1) a very expensive gun magnet their cheaper than a squad of kitted out terminators but their more expensive on an individual level. They can be a sacrificial lamb if you need to offer one up to buy you a turn free of the enemies biggest anti infantry or light anti tank threats

 

2) a cc pain train by loading them in an assault vehicle knights get a huge potential threat radius and as long as the raider isn't immobilized they can be very hard to get out of the way of, since their natively amazing at close combat you can use them to tangle with softened up cc units and club them to death, save their turbo smite mode for when something absolutely has to die and crush whatever that may be with them. Once a terminator is in close combat regardless of loadout he's in his elemenet he's a 12" operator and keeping them in a cycle of charges and assaults they can mulch lots of different units

 

3) because of their bully nature you can use them as a way to bait out another bully Logan grimnar is one of the few infantry models who can tear apart knights effectively if you can tangle him up in knights you can use it as a chance to set him up for a rough landing after he consolidates out of combat. Logan is then at the mercy of the shooting phase and losing a Lord of war can be a fatal blow to many armies due to their price and role.

 

I like using my terninators in role number 2 as I find it the most engaging and logical to me, they feel useful in that role and it's satisfying to use them in what I feel is the role the god Emperor intended

[Prot]

Allow me to be the Debbie Downer. Just understand I only say this after much consideration and NOT posting because I don't want to ruin your good vibe with what I consider to be one of the coolest units in 40k. And I mean that.

 

First off, the biggest problem is they are still Terminators and Terminators at this point and time (I think) are the biggest point sink in almost any Marine based army which has an uphill battle in GW's Xenos utopian environment. Simply put, they are underpowered, and tremendously over priced.

 

As I say in my thread (Terminators SHOULD be Wraiths) you have to go into this realizing that an out of work, pointy eared artist from the Alaitoc craftworld has the ability (with a bit of luck) to go straight through the best infantry armour mankind ever built with a 'shuriken'. (bypassing the 2+)

 

With DA specifically the problem starts to snowball because you're taking an expensive unit, and you're trying to maximize that effort usually through the avenue of yet even more expensive units: Landraiders, expensive HQ's, etc.

 

So what I'm going to say isn't nearly as specific as what character to run, or how to deep strike them. Instead I'm saying once you make the decision to go down that road, you are going to want to do one of two things: 1) Make sure the list compensates for this point sink as much as you reasonably can. (Think cheap shooty units to compensate for expensive, gunless units). Or 2) you want to work this angle deeper, and make the Knights an integral part of an ongoing theme. (Think Belial, Pods, etc.)

 

Don't get me wrong I totally love the Knights, but as soon as I start using them I have to compensate. I create the rest of my list knowing I'm probably in the hole now. Make sure you have this mindset for success...

 

I guess that's a really long winded way of saying: I don't think it's necessarily the character, or delivery method of the squad that's going to save you. I wholeheartedly believe it will be the execution of the army that will support your decision accordingly.

 

What does this mean? For me it usually means isolating parts of the table, learning to ignore the 'carrot ' that may be dangling in front of you, and isolating for success.

 

Specifically this could be realizing a good triangle of objectives allows you to control 1/3 of the table. Or it could be as specific as cutting the strongest element of someone's list off from his army..... I've done that with Tau. Precision deep strking and using sound wound allocation by positioning Belial has resulted in me taking out a full HQ of Tau while the rest of the list plays clean up.

 

Stuff like that. Execution of the list, and concentrating on very specific real estate goals with overlapping your support is going to be key.

 

Sorry for the long winded response. Good luck, and most importantly, have fun painting those guys. They're some of the coolest figs in the game.

[Isiah]

Great post Prot.

[shabbadoo]

I like Deepstriking in Deathwing Knights accompanied by a Belial with thunder hammer and storm shield.  They show up Turn 1...and are an immediate problem.  I like to Drop Pod in a Venerable Dreadnought with multi-melta and heavy flamer as well for support.  Clustered up when they drop in, the Deathwing Knights and Belial are all T 5 automatically.  Belial is mostly there so the unit can show up exactly where it will be the biggest pain in the enemy's butt. He's also there so I am more inclined to unleash the Smite as soon as a target presents and not save it for the "perfect" target, knowing that, once the Smite is used, the unit will not then be able to be tar-pitted by something like a Hellbrute, Soulgrinder, etc. due to Belial being there with a big swattty thing in his hand.  This force dropping in, in such a way, definitely causes a great amount of consternation by way of screwwing up the enemy's deployment strategy and completely altering their initial attack plan.  Definitely pricey, as Prot said, but wow are they effective when used this way.  I only use them in games of 1,500+ points though.

[Berzul]

Wow, thanks everyone. These are all great points (Prot, thenk you specially for a very critical analysis). I'm not sure how I would field the DWK, if I added them to my army. Currently I'm playing almost every game without even normal DW, and with great results (just got a victory sunday night on a greenwing list that had seemed pretty weak at first glance).

 

Reading all your comments, added to my latest results on a non-terminator playstyle,  the decision to include knights becomes even harder. But I have a lot of info on how to do it right, now. Thanks everyone.

[Syphid]

 

Load up a Storm Eagle for airborne Knights!

Because of their lack of ranged weapons airborne Knights unfortunately cannot do anything before turn 3, unless you also buy a ready for take-off landing pad.

 

 

Yes, but on turn 2 your Storm Eagle can use its weapons to take out transports and bubblewraps while being safe from fast melta and small arms fire, protecting your Knights so that they don't get shot and can reach assault on your terms.  I field a Storm Eagle with Multi Melta and Hellstrike Missiles and I find it's a versatile transport that can take anything on.