Black Knights improvements?

[Dark Luke]

Does anyone else think that black knights either need a extra wound or a reduction in points. I’m in the process of building a 2000pt ravenwing force and when battling with them they always get easily taken out.

So i’ve only opted for 1 unit of 3

There battle brothers the champion, apothecary and ancient each have 5 wounds and they’re bonuses and obviously double or a little more in points to pay for them.

 

3W knights would be nice, especially with all the training they go through in the lore.

 

Anyone agree or thoughts on the matter?

[ShadowCore67]

I think they need a slight point reduction and a better jink akin to 7th edition. The point of them is that they're elite riders yet as of now there's nothing in their rules showing that

[Dark Luke]

Yeah I think a 4+ invul is asking for abit to much but maybe if you advance still charge? You can shoot stil because the plasma talons being assault. I’m hoping both ravenwing and death get some good stratagems in the new codex

[Chaplain Lucifer]

Codex is not far so maybe BK got some good kind of attention. Let's wait and see!

[shabbadoo]

The Jink rule is pretty much useless; especially for Black Knights. They can't shoot if they Jink (EDIT: Wrong! They CAN!!! D'oh!), and they can't charge if they Jink. So, both of their unit strengths are rendered inoperative if they elect to Jink, and so they become nothing more than shooting gallery targets (other Ravenwing too, excepting models armed with flamers). If the Jink rule isn't changed in the codex, then somebody should politely ask GW what the kind of rule Jink supposed to be. Obviously it shouldn't be me asking.

Edited November 21, 2017 by shabbadoo

[Berzul]

The Jink rule is pretty much useless; especially for Black Knights. They can't shoot if they Jink, and they can't charge if they Jink. So, both of their unit strengths are rendered inoperative if they elect to Jink, and so they become nothing more than shooting gallery targets (other Ravenwing too, excepting models armed with flamers). If the Jink rule isn't changed in the codex, then somebody should politely ask GW kind of rule is Jink supposed to be. Obviously it shouldn't be me asking.

 

 

Black Knights have assault weapons, so they CAN jink and shoot. They can't Jink and Charge.

 

I do feel that allowing them to Jink and Charge would be the wrong way to go about improving them, though. If they could, then why would you EVER not jink them? Might as well just give them the 5++ and set their move at 20

[ShadowCore67]

Idk how balanced it would be but I think jink should be -1 to hit. Makes hell of a lot more sense than "Oh I'm going fast so now there's a chance I'm immune to all damage"

[Berzul]

Idk how balanced it would be but I think jink should be -1 to hit. Makes hell of a lot more sense than "Oh I'm going fast so now there's a chance I'm immune to all damage"

Ok, I laughed at that, way more than I should have! XD

[Komodo]

Idk how balanced it would be but I think jink should be -1 to hit. Makes hell of a lot more sense than "Oh I'm going fast so now there's a chance I'm immune to all damage"

It's actually a great idea. And a nice possible combo with DarkShroud giving them -2 to hit -- huge advantage!

[Grand Master Raziel]

I'd like to be able to shoot after falling back with Ravenwing units, but the Black Knights in particular.  Either that or they need to be far cheaper than they currently are.  I think all the Index stuff is overcosted.  Generally speaking, armies that have received dexes thus far have seen points-reductions across the board.

[Aothaine]

Point reductions are coming in about two weeks with the chapter approved unless they leave out the blood angels and dark angels as they are getting new dexes soon.

[Kasper_Hawser]

I think like the White Scars/Ultramarines, the Ravenwing in general (but especially Black Knights), should be allowed to fall back and either charge or shoot to reflect former Hit and Run rules.

 

As for Jink being useless, bear in mind that EVERYONE who could last time, lost their jinks, while Ravenwing retained jink and in a way, got upgraded into an Invuln save, so no more removing cover for your Ravenwing by iron warriors or fists, only mortal wounds bypass it. On the balancing side, it became worse to 5+ invuln, but I think its good enough considering most heavy weapons wound bikes on 3+ instead of 2+ now. So Ravenwing were only slightly nerfed but EVERYONE'S bikes and flyers got worse.

 

As mentioned, Black Knights plasma talons are assault so they can fire after advancing. Personally I don't think they should be buffed in survivability, but buffed in maybe weapons like the pick axes having a chance to deal mortal wounds but low AP. (can't remember if they already do that)

[shabbadoo]

I stand corrected! Plasma talons are Assault weapons, so Black Knights can use Jink the best of any Ravenwing unit. Too bad most every other Ravenwing model can't. Simply changing Jink to be a minimum movement-dependent ability would fix much. For example, "If a unit with the Jink rules moves 10" or more away form its previous position it gains a 5+ Invulnerable save." Then every unit can do its thing. We're already taking -1 penalties on any heavy weapon fire for units that moved and that have such weapons, so no additional shooting penalty is needed, but at least everything would be able to make use of their special rule and still do something. Would be nice to have a special ability we can use without necessarily gutting the capabilities of most of the Ravnwing's units when we use it.  GW could even put a Jink counter on the new [Ravenwing] bikes sprues that are NOT coming out to place next to the unit when the ability is used!

 

As to Black Knights more specifically, bikes gaining an additional wound only addresses part of their long standing cost problem.  Small elite forces simply lack wounds and firepower, and though the wound issue has been dealt with to a great degree (multi-wound weapons still take them down, but that is reasonable considering what kinds of weapons do multiple wounds) these units often do not also have the required level of firepower/close combat capability to be competitive in those ways as well. When a unit costs three to four times the cost of equipped basic infantry, there is going to be a problem. Bikes (and Terminators) are a bit too expensive for what they can do. Terminators are a bit better off at the moment, as they can drop right in on somebody and shoot them up, often leaving the enemy only a single turn to do something effective before getting jumped in melee. They can also weather retaliation a bit better with their 2+ save and *constant* 5++ save. Not so with bikes; even more so with Jinking Ravenwing who mostly won' be doing anything to the enemy if they Jink. Black Knights don't really have any rules problems, but they do have a points problem for the same old reasons. Ravenwing Bikes should be no more than 25 points base, 35 for attack bikes and, and Black Knights should be no more than 40 points fully equipped (RW Land Speeders of all types should get a slight point reduction as well). Unforgiven/Jink are effectively our Chapter Tactics, and we should no more be made to pay for these [crappy] "abilities" than any other other Chapter is NOT made to pay for what they all get, which are very useful Chapter Tactics in comparison.

 

So, a points reduction across the board and a tweaking of the Jink rule to not be crap for most Ravenwing units would take care of things wearing the black.

Edited November 22, 2017 by shabbadoo

[Berzul]

I think that is the best point given so far.

 

No other Space Marine Chapter has a downside for their Chapter Tactics. They just get a standing bonus of ability, no downside.

 

We get fearless on units that would hardly ever even be making morale rolls (do 5-man squads at Ld8+ with ATSNKF even care about fearless?), and we get a 5++ save on units that cannot fire or charge if they use it.

 

I love my Dark Angels, but I do feel like these are the worst chapter tactics out there right now. I don't mind them as much, but I do understand that they do not present much usefulness across the army, aside from the Black Knights (who, by costing 50pts a piece, are hardly used anyway).

 

I really hope we get better rules in the codex.

[ShadowCore67]

Keep in mind that Jink/Unforgiven aren't chapter tactics. In 7th edition, the DA chapter tactic was grim resolve. The ravenwing and deathwing rules were bonuses on top of that. So what's most likely to happen is DA will get their tactic that is a flat bonus too ALL the units in the codex, and then deathwing/ravenwing will get their respective rules as before.

 

As much as I'd also like to see jink/black knights buffed, its unfair to compare the jink rule to a chapter tactic, because it isn't a chapter tactic.

[Alvena]

Point reductions are coming in about two weeks with the chapter approved unless they leave out the blood angels and dark angels as they are getting new dexes soon.

 

We are not at all in the chapter approved.  the only part concerning us, may be, the custom vehicules (landraider for sure, maybe other).

So if we are lucky they will let's us play the ares but it's a little unsure with the rules of 5 weapon mount points. We will see  soon

[shabbadoo]

Keep in mind that Jink/Unforgiven aren't chapter tactics. In 7th edition, the DA chapter tactic was grim resolve. The ravenwing and deathwing rules were bonuses on top of that. So what's most likely to happen is DA will get their tactic that is a flat bonus too ALL the units in the codex, and then deathwing/ravenwing will get their respective rules as before.

 

As much as I'd also like to see jink/black knights buffed, its unfair to compare the jink rule to a chapter tactic, because it isn't a chapter tactic.

[As a caveat, If I am off on something (just checked the FAQ, and nothing new there), anyone/everyone be so kind as to bash my skull in with some righteous learnin'! ]

 

We are not talking about 7E, but 8E, where you will note Grim Resolve is conspicuously absent. What we have in the "get us by" index is not specifically called Chapter Tactics, but that is very much what it is. They don't call it Chapter Tactics most likely because it is multiple rules for differing units, not one Chapter-wide blanket rule like the other Chapter Tactics are. Vanilla Marines get ATSKNF, plus Chapter Tactics. All Dark Angels get ATSKNF, and either Jink (only Ravenwing), Unforgiven (only Deathwing, Venerable Dreadnoughts, and most characters), or NOTHING (Greenwing). Yes, NOTHING for Greenwing units, and so you are utterly correct when you say that it is unfair to make the comparison between Chapter Tactics and what is the Dark Angels' mostly NOTHING.

 

Think about that for a moment. 80% of the Dark Angels Chapter has NO additional special rule beyond ATSKNF. The only thing that differentiates Greenwing from their counterparts from other Chapters is their LACK of any abilities beyond ASTSKNF, meaning Greenwing are quite literally *under-trained* compared to their counterparts. Pretty brilliant, huh? Another ball rolling about on the ground. I think you dropped it, GW. That is certainly deserving of a "What the   GW?!" from every Dark Angels player. Let's hope GW realized this too and fixed this crap in the actual codex. If not, GW ought to be prepared to issue an "OMG! Somehow the ChapterTactics rule totally got left out of the Dark Angels codex! We are sooo bad, aren't we? Teehee!" FAQ. The 7e rules might have given me a slight bit of hope, but the "get you by" index rules destroyed that slightest bit of confidence, so who knows what they have done.

 

GW really needs to do one of two things:

 

1. Give the Ravenwing, Deathing/HQs, AND GREENWING varied "Chapter Tactics" rules, and leave their points as basic as everyone else's ( i.e. if they don't have more than others then they should NOT cost more)...

 

...or...

 

2. Give the Dark Angels a Chapter-wide Chapter Tactics rule (i.e. Grim Resolve or something else), and then give the *additional* special rules to the Ravenwing and Deathwing/HQs, but at the price of having to pay *additional* points for them having more rules than their counterparts (the amount of additional points being representative of the actual usefulness of the rules gained, of course, not the "Add 5/10 points, cuz dey gots more!" shenanigans of the past).

 

Well, we'll see what they've done to us in a few weeks. Then the conversation can begin anew.

Edited November 22, 2017 by shabbadoo

[TheFinisher4Ever]

Jink and Unforgiven are most certainly not our chapter tactic, just like ATSKNF isn't the space marine tactic, battle focus isn't the elder tactic and disgustingly resilient isn't the Deathguard Tactic. None of the rules in the index have ever turned into a chapter tactic. Dark Angels will get a chapter tactic in their codex just like every other codex has, including other mono faction codexes like Grey Knights or Deathguard.

[Berzul]

Yeah. They are not Chapter Tactics in the technical sense.

 

But, chapter tactics are, what? A universal rule for the army.

 

As space marines have ATSKNF and one rule apllied to their army, what we have is ATSKNF and two rules, applied each for specific units, while not including the total of our army.

 

While not technically the same, they are each others equivalent, as the index stands today at least.

 

In that sense, we get

 

Nothing for greenwing

No morale for Deathwing (woopdy f*****g doo)

5++ save on ravenwing but they cant fire lr charge (except black knights, which are overpriced anyway)

 

These arw rules that eithwr do close to nothing (DW), are nothing (GW) or hinder the unit that uses it (RW), all in a way Chapter Tactics dont.

 

I know this sounds like a hissy fit, and Im sorry it reads thatway. Personally, I am happy playing my army as is; I'm just acknowledging the fact that our special rules kinda suck, and our Knigh squads are overpriced.

 

And I hope this changes in the codex :D

[SnakeChisler]

Currently elite units across the board are becoming rarer in our area.

 

Anyone that can is gravitating to getting as much mortal wound spam in thier army as possible so improving Black Knights and other elite high cost units would mean giving them the equivalent of FNP and pushing up the cost of dishing out mortal wounds.

 

I just can't see GW backtracking and acknowledging the fact that within so short a space of time with 8th that they haven't got a bit too mortal wound crazy.

 

What made the BK's so formidable was thier durability and thier all round combat/shooting prowess, if you wanted them dead then you really had to dedicate some resources to the job this is now not the case, even bumping them to 3 wounds won't address the underlying issues.

 

In terms of redress I don't currently see how bikers and other elites could get rebalanced into the game without an overhaul.

Ex - razorback dual assault cannon = 2 black knights

10 points per wound Verses 25 points per wound

 

Also the -1 weapons appear to be your best bang per buck these days

 

I've still got a large Ravenwing army but 8th might be an opertunity to rebase and repaint at least the Knights (sigh).

 

I've been playing 40k since 4th so these things tend to cycle round but with the direction the current round of books have gone I'm not optimistic that bikers will be viable in 8th, hopefully our dex will at least enable me to at least field them and last beyond T2 so they can get some dirt on thier wheels.

[Berzul]

Well, DW got the short end of the stick last edition, while the Ravenwing was amazing. Now the Deathwing are a lot better, and the Ravenwing (a good part of it, anyway) got a lot worse.

 

Its just a cycle.

 

What I do feel bad about is that, without a Codex, my greenwing have had little room to shine.

 

I LOVED playing greenwing last edition. Right now, im constantly going DW for my games, and my tacticals usually come in small sizes.