Grey Knights in Shadow Wars

[Prot]

Unlike the other thread speculating on future rules, this thread is intended to discuss Grey Knights exclusively within the Shadow Wars system.

I know Syn has already had a game with his GK and I hope he shares that experience with you guys here.

From what I've read it looks like Psychic tricks are reserved for the Purifier spot and we are limited to 3-5 models per game, which seems very limiting but there are some interesting options. What kind of team do you think you'll field?

[Gentlemanloser]

Shadow war is already sold out!

 

I'd have to find the rules somewhere first. ;)

[AfroCampbell]

3-5 GKs is kinda too small... like not even a whole team is kinda not even fluffy.

[Prot]

I'm sure there'll be a digital release for the main rule set. Keep in mind the Grey Knight specifics are in the free PDF guide:

 

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/ShadowWar/SWA_Killteams_ENG.pdf

 

+EDIT+

Here are our psychic goodies:

 

PSYCHIC ABILITIES ASTRAL AIM

 

. In the shooting phase, before firing a ranged weapon, a Grey Knight Gunner can attempt to guide their shots with Astral Aim. To do so, he must first pass a Leadership test. If the test is passed, he can ignore the To Hit modifiers for cover when firing his ranged weapon this turn. If the test is failed, he cannot benefit from Astral Aim this turn. However, if you roll a double 6 for this test, the Grey Knight Gunner cannot shoot any ranged weapons this turn.

 

 

CLEANSING FLAME

 

So focused is a Purifier’s purpose that they can channel the energy of their mind into gouts of scorching flame which they use to immolate the impure. In the shooting phase, instead of firing a ranged weapon, a Grey Knight Purifier can attempt to assail his foes with psychic flame. To do so, he must first pass a Leadership test. If the test is passed, resolve an attack using the profile shown below. If the test is failed, he cannot use Cleansing Flame this turn, though he can still fire a ranged weapon as normal. However, if you roll a double 6 for this test, the Purifier cannot shoot any ranged weapons this turn either.

 

⌐Range¬ ⌐To Hit¬ Save Ammo Short Long Short Long Str. Dam. Mod. Roll Template - - 5 1 -2 - Flamer: Cleansing Flame’s psychic onslaught is represented by the teardrop-shaped flamer template.

 

HAMMERHAND

 

By directing his psychic wrath in combat, a Grey Knight can augment his own strength to the point where he can crush armour and bone with a single blow. At the start of the hand-to-hand phase, a fighter with this psychic ability can attempt to augment their Nemesis weapons with Hammerhand.

 

To do so, he must first pass a Leadership test. If the test is passed, increase the Damage characteristic of his hand-to-hand weapons to D3 (or D6 in the case of a Nemesis Daemon hammer) for the duration of the phase. If the test is failed, the Damage characteristic of their weapons remains the same. However, if you roll a double 6 for this test, the fighter counts have having made a fumble against each of their hand-to-hand combat opponents this phase in addition to any other fumbles they may roll.

 

PURGE SOUL

 

Drawing upon every ounce of his willpower a battle-brother can purge all traces of corruption from his enemies, even if it destroys them in the process.

 

In the shooting phase, instead of firing a ranged weapon, a fighter with this ability can attempt to purge the soul of his foe. To do so, he must first pass a Leadership test. If the test is passed, resolve an attack using the rules described below. If the test is failed, he cannot use Purge Soul this turn, though he can still fire a ranged weapon as normal. However, if you roll a double 6 for this test, the fighter cannot shoot any ranged weapons this turn either.

 

Purge Soul: Pick an enemy fighter that is within 8" of him and within his line of sight. Both the caster and the target fighter must roll a dice and add their Leadership characteristic. If the target’s total is greater than or equal to the caster’s total, nothing happens. If the caster’s total is greater than the target’s total, the target fighter suffers a number of wounds equal to the difference. No armour saves may be taken against wounds caused in this manner.

 

Edited April 3, 2017 by Prot

[SyNidus]

Was just going to come around here and share my experiences.

Yesterday i went down to my local GW where they had a nice table with Shadow Wars terrain set up. It was a nice little vertical sprawl with the terrain that was in the kit along with a fortress of redemption and other ruined buildings.

Now first thing you guys gotta note is that this is such a different game from Kill Teams. Where Kill Teams is a way to play 40k but at a smaller scale, SW is an entirely separate game where the focus is on individual models and squad level/action movie style combat.

With that in mind, let's begin. As a GK player our faction has a few key characteristics and advantages - Powerful hand-to-hand weapons, Powerful shooting weapons (storm bolters really put bolters to shame in this game), and psychics. But the price for that is that we cost more and have a limit of fielding 3-5 models only.

My team consisted of 3 men, a Justicar with a Hammer, a GK with a sword and a GK Gunner with a psycannon. I had 2 games, 1 against Skitarii and another against Space marine Scouts. The Skitarii managed 7 or 8 models whilst the Space marines had 6 scouts. In both cases i found that our stormbolters equipped with Psybolt ammunition are such a powerful weapon because not only were they S5, but it also gave a -2 modifier to the target's save roll (so those scouts had to roll 6+ to save). In combat, there's a greater emphasis on model to model combat. It's not about weight of attacks, it's about the skill of the attacker vs the skill of his opponent, the difference being the one whose WS+D6 is highest wins, and the hits is equivalent to the difference between the winner and the loser. It's a fantastic little system suited for one on one combat.

The other thing to note is the verticality of the game. Jumping down from gantries onto pathways to surprise an opponent is so cool. But if you fail your initiative test, you flop and fall, taking damage equivalent to the height instead of executing a perfect superhero landing. Likewise, the changes of angle may find you unexpectedly exposed to a flanking attack, which was what happened to my GK. The power armour saved me, and allowed me to kill enough of my Scout opponent's men to force them to take a LD test. He failed this and his force bottled out, leaving me the victor on the field of battle.

I played 1000 points and things get tight very quickly, but we do have tools to make our fighters more deadly. Stormbolters and Power Armour, just amazing.

If you're sick of facing that Imperial or Eldar knight for the Umpteenth thousand time, and you want a game that focuses on the tactics of manoeuvre and terrain, then Shadow Wars is what you want. Don't worry about having less models, it's a great challenge that is not insurmountable nor does it feel futile. You feel the tension of less models, but you don't feel the futility of trying to wound armour. You're not invincible though, and my justicar in both games was brought low by the enemy in close quarters, which whilst embarrassing for my men, was a real awesome moment for both my opponent and me. It really reminded me that my men aren't walking tanks. They're strong but they need finesse too.


EDIT:
This is the team I'll be taking next time

Justicar - Sword - 310
GK Trooper - Falchion, Frag - 230
GK Trooper - Falchion - 205
GK Gunner - Stave, Psybolt Ammo - 255
Total: 1000

Our cheapest melee weapons are the falchions, which, after playing the game and thinking more about, they are a fantastic "basic" weapon. What it lacks in save modifiers it makes up for in having 2 parries (meaning greater chance of winning the assault). Also, our gunner is good because Astral aim allows him to shoot those painful psybolts with greater accuracy.

Edited April 3, 2017 by SyNidus

[Gentlemanloser]

Can you take more than one gunner?

 

Is it only the point costs to worry about?

[SyNidus]

I don't know whether we can take more than 1 gunner, i assume we can, but if i recall correctly you need to have at least 1 leader and 1 trooper. 

As for things to worry about, points cost seems to be just about it. You really need to be careful though, because model count is small, it's easy to get surrounded. This is partly because i went down a central path. Oh note, movement is a stat, generally speaking, light armoured models (5" in scout armour vs 4" for our Power Armoured models) tend to be able to move faster. So in my game against the scouts, they were able to execute a pincer manoeuvre and catch my guys in a bad spot. It's a good thing though i was able to crumple 1 side of his pincer with combined shooting. I then re-oriented to face the other pincer, that's when the justicar died and my gunner was downed (not dead yet, i just needed to roll to get back up on his feet).

I think the other think to worry about is not bringing template/blast weapons. You can still only shoot at 1 target, so you will want to have templates to make sure you can engage multiple models in shooting.

[duz_]

Thanks for the insight!

I know my local GW is super pumped for the game and they've launched a campaign.

 

I was thinking I might take my guard, having read your write up though I might take my GKs! :)

[Sete]

GK with Power Sword 4 dudes 895 points.

It's expensive, still have some points to Upgrade some stuff.

[SyNidus]

Thanks for the insight!

I know my local GW is super pumped for the game and they've launched a campaign.

 

I was thinking I might take my guard, having read your write up though I might take my GKs! :)

You're welcome :) I think they'd be interesting for a campaign because their progression is slightly different as they don't have new recruits which level up with each successive mission.

[Trevak Dal]

I thought it was interesting that the falchions seem to be the cheapest option, and made them essentially Better NFSs and able to parry twice and get a lightning claw like reroll as well as +1 attack...

[SyNidus]

I thought it was interesting that the falchions seem to be the cheapest option, and made them essentially Better NFSs and able to parry twice and get a lightning claw like reroll as well as +1 attack...

Almost seems better. Note that in SW, being armed with 2 weapons doesn't mean +1 A, rather it means that he doesn't need to split the attacks he makes between his sword and his stormbolter.

 

In this game, combat works as follows:

 

1. Both models attack at the same time.

2. Both players roll XD6 (x being the number of Attacks the model has, e.g. Justicar rolls 2D6.)

3. Both players take their highest dice rolled and adds it to their model's WS (e.g. i roll 2 & 4, i add 4 to my WS 4= 8) There are modifiers for this.

4. Compare both numbers, the one with the highest number wins. The difference between the numbers is the number of times the loser is hit, e.g. You get 10, whilst your opponent's total is 7 = your opponent takes 3 hits.

5. Take the number of hits and split them between the weapons you have, e.g. If you have a sword and stormbolter, and you score 3 hits, 1 attack must be from the sword, 1 from the stormbolter, and the remaining 1 you can choose which weapon to use (hint: use the sword).

6. Roll to wound as normal (S of the weapon vs T of the target)

7. Then the opponent rolls to save against the successful wounds, applying the save modifiers. E.g. -2 save modifier will make a 3+ save into a 5+ save.

8. For each unsaved wound, look at the damage of the weapon, most are 1 damage (this is where hammer hand comes in btw, making your damage D3 rolls instead of 1). The opponent then rolls D6 for each damage taken. On a roll of 1, it's only a flesh wound and your opponent remains standing but has -1WS & -1BS. 2-5 the model is turned face down, it's considered down, and can still crawl to safety and try to recover. On a roll of 6, the model is removed from played.

 

Anyway, coming back to the falchions, since it's paired, that means you won't be using the stormbolter's profile to roll to wound (see Step 5). Also, the falchion is rather weak actually, as it's S4 with no save modifier. You do get re-roll to wounds though. And you get 2 parries, which is really good too. You can use parry to force your opponent to re-roll one of his D6 when rolling to hit (See Step 3). If your opponent has a parry, your parries cancel each other out. However, with falchions, this means that even if your first parry is cancelled out, you still have 1 more with which to force your opponent to re-roll. This is really useful to making sure you actually score hits.

 

Personally, i prefer the sword. You're striking at S6 with a -3 sv modifier (a model with 4+ save loses his save), and you get 1 parry, which is awesome! But the dual Falchions are good and it makes our average Trooper better in hand to hand than most other faction leaders.

[Plasmablasts]

How does rolling for damage work against models with >1 wound?

 

I note that Hammerhand works differently in SW:A as, instead of a strength boost, it increases the damage characteristic of your NFW from 1 to d3 (for the Daemonhammer, from d3 to d6), which looks like it significantly increases the likelihood of removing your opponent's model from play. The Daemonhammer looks particularly scary, as the SW:A version of "Concussive" seems to convert "down" results into "out of action" automatically. There's no "Force" rule, but "Hammerhand" seems to act as an appropriate "Force-lite" effect.

[Sete]

After making a List of Tempestus with HotShot and Carapace, capping at 7 Guys, a 4/5 GK kill team is a force to be reckoned with.

 

Purge soul is extremely powerful Vs Nids for example.

 

Unless people bring a lot of recruits, like chaos with Cultists, GK can easily hold its own

[Bartali]

This is annoying. I was looking forward to this game, which would of been my first GW purchase in a while. But we all know what happened last Saturday. Doubly annoying that GK appear to be ok to good in it.

 

Hoping they announce something before this Saturday, I really don't want to be queuing outside my local GW at 10am

[Prot]

The Grey Knight rules are looking solid. I am not sold on taking Terminators yet because my understanding is any unit that is hit is pinned. I could be wrong, I don't have the rules yet.

[Sete]

I think SM have a mechanic to re reroll pining tests. I don't have the full rules aswell. But you are also forced to shoot the closest model.

 

GK are solid.

I have a box around and some termies, so i might make a GK along with noob scions.

The stave gives 3++ in close combat aswell.

[Panzer]

The Grey Knight rules are looking solid. I am not sold on taking Terminators yet because my understanding is any unit that is hit is pinned. I could be wrong, I don't have the rules yet.

You are right. However Space Marines can get up early without any friendly model being nearby with a simply initiative test at the beginning of your turn. ;)

[Phiasco]

Forgive my noobness, but I can't seem to find where it says how to/how much special operatives cost. I love the idea of throwing a termy or purifier in there, but I'm not quite sure how :/

[newdigitalGK]

just re-read first post removing to stay on topic.

Edited April 5, 2017 by newdigitalGK

[jeffersonian000]

GKs also have ATSKNF, just like SMs do, allowing for early test to get up as well as ignoring fear.

 

My current issue is that I don't know the rules yet for list building, so don't know how to build an Interceptor list or a GKT list.

 

SJ

[Gentlemanloser]

From what i gather you can't build a tda list. It seems like star players from blood bowl.

 

Start of a new mission, you can spend promethean caches you earned on previous missions to hire a specialist for that single mission.

 

Like a purifier or gkt to add to your squad.

 

Not sure i like this. As it seems to me to be;

 

I've go 5 caches you've got none.

 

I'm hiring 2 specialists for this match

You can't. And now have next to no chance of beating me.

 

So I'm gonna win more caches to hire again for our next match.

[jeffersonian000]

Yeah, that blows.

 

SJ

[Sete]

Even if you lose you get 1 cache winner gets d3

 

So you can choose to retreat from a mission and still get one.

 

Chill

Edited April 5, 2017 by Sete

[Gentlemanloser]

Eh.

 

So i can when trying to set up a game, retreat from 50 missions.

 

 

And start with 50 caches to run a butt loads of specialists?

 

Retreating seems like a terrible mechanic.