Friendly Knights (AKA Happy Sunshine Cuddle Robots)

[THUNDERFISTS]

I'm curious to see people's thoughts on how to make a Knight list friendly for casual play. Often I find myself falling into the habit of trying to create the hardest lists for a fairly competitive meta of players, but for new(ish) people and others just wanting to play for fun, the Knights can be a real kick in the pants. Now, I have not run into anyone REFUSING to play because I brought three Knights, but that may be on the horizon.

 

So far my thoughts are to limit the super-good options and hope that's enough to create more relaxing games:

 

-No Cawl's Wrath or Endless Fury, or at least not both

-Ally with Space Marines instead of Guard

-No Ion Bulwark (this one hurts the most)

-Lesser seen Houses - Cadmus, Vulker...?

-Only random Freeblades (I can feel the headache coming on already)

 

Any ideas?

[Clingy]

Don’t take Crusader or Gallant, take Valiant as it’s a fun one rather than a good one?

 

Gallants and crusaders are excellent so maybe just opt for errants and paladins.

 

Sounds like your other ideas are on the right track

[Emicus]

Run 1 questoris and rest armigers :)

[Lord Blackwood]

If you want something really friendly I  would say 

1 -2 Big Knights ( Limits you on  Command points ) 
Armigers !  

If you are going to ally, commit yourself to one investment from that list that is points dense.  

IE: Take a pair of Predators , or A fatty squad of hellblasters or something. 

Limit your  relic choices to ones that you feel arent as powerful ( as you mentioned no cawls wrath , no ion bulwark ) 

Select less powerful frames: Paladin , Errant , avoid the crusader and the Gallant 

All of these help tone down the knight porition of the list. 
 

[Black Knight]

Paint them all like clowns? Maybe not but I think allying with Mech might be the most benign. Lower toughness but they look like they belong, looks and lore wise.

 

Honestly if someone refuses to play you it is because the word "Knights" was mentioned and not if your list is competitive. Also even with a subpar list, if you know what you doing and are aggressive its still going to hurt them. I think it is more about how you play the particular game. If you play it naratively doing stupid that is fun (E.g Charging something that is not a threat but it infringed on your honor) then you and your opponent will have a lot more fun.

 

Freeblades are a good start, especially the traits that make you do stuff that is not so clever.

 

Do not neuter yourself too much or people will catch on and wont want to play you for that reason.

[Vel'Cona]

Honestly if you want friendly IK the best way to go is pure IK.  Most of the dominant strategies for Knights revolve around souping with IG/Custodes/BA/etc. but flat IK lists struggle with objective holding and massed Infantry (to some extent, depending on build) so the best chance your opponents will have is if you do a legit 2-3 Questoris/2-3 Armiger build.

[jeffersonian000]

A pure IK list with 3 Questoris and 3 Armigers hits at around 1750pts and plays well with a mix of different units and not enough CP to be “scary!”

 

SJ

[sneakybamsen]

I'm considering a 1750 list of less-kickass-knights:

 

Castigator - 500

Crusader with RFBC, dual stubbers - 485

Castellan with four missiles and 1 twin cannon - 593

Warglaive with stubber - 164

 

Should end up at 1742 pts. Starts at 9 CP, doesn't pack too much of a punch, if you don't optimize traits, relics and household. Vulker for instance is a little limited in it's benefits to a list like this. I made one version where the castigator has relic and trait (Auric Mask and Fearsome Reputaion) for making morale more of a pain (he needs to get in close anyways to do maximum damage), the Castellan had Mark of the Omnissiah, so it might stay alive/effective a little longer, and the Crusader had armour of the sainted iron. I then yanked it down to 1650 as a cap, to make it more manageable to opponents, by removing the warglaive and adding a stormspear rocket pod, and swapping a set of missiles for a twin cannon on the Castellan.

 

On the other hand, if you have an army like above, cranking it up to semi-competitiveness is not too hard. House raven with Cawl's Wrath and Ion Bulwark on the Castellan, Endless Fury on the crusader and Blessed by the Sacristans and Armour of the Sainted Iron on the Castigator. Packs a lot more punch with advancing and shooting wihout penalty (only the stubber on the warglaive will be -1), being able to use the Raven Stratagem, and the traits and relics making the most of the dakka on the three big guys. Giving Ion Bulwark to the Castellan is to save some CP. I'd make the Castigator warlord any day of the week. It's cheaper to rotate it's shields, it's a lot better in CC, so more dangerous to get in close with, and the Castellan as warlord is going to be too easy to pick as primary target. With the Castigator, it's harder to choose between them.

 

Regards