Grey Knights... the antidote to Harlequins ?

[L30n1d4s]

So, as I understand it, here is the situation:

 

 

1 - Grey Knights, once one of the top tier armies in the game (long live the old multi-GMNDK and massed Interceptor builds), have now fallen back into the ranks of competitive, but not top-level meta choices

 

 

2 - In their place, we have seen the rise of Custodes and Tau (both still very competitive choices, especially Tau), the newly minted Craftworld Eldar, and ESPECIALLY the new Harlequins

 

 

3 - While Tau, Custodes, Craftworld are all very strong, with things like Crusher Stampede Nids, AdMech, and Drukhari not too far behind, it seems to me that Harlequins are definitely the army to beat at the moment. Not only are they hyper-mobile, very deadly in close combat, excellent at shooting (thanks mainly to the under-priced/overpowered Void Weavers), they are also tremendously (and surprisingly) durable for their points cost, especially with universal 4++ saves, tons of access to -1 to Hit, no-rerolls to Hit, and even no hitting on better than a 4+ across the army. Finally, they seem very well-positioned to play both the Primary and Secondary game right now, especially with the hyper-mobile and affordable Objective Secured units they have access to.

 

 

 

Taken all together, this has gotten me thinking.... what if Grey Knights were actually the "hard-counter" (or at minimum, the "stealth counter") to Harlequins?

 

Why do I say this? Well, let's take a look at a couple of things:

 

 

1 - Mobility -- There are very few Imperium armies (or armies of any kind, really) that can keep up with the mobility of Harlequins. Arguably, with mass access to Deep Strike (for free), the "Gates of Infinity" power, the "Teleportation Shunt" Strat, and the "Sigil of Exigence" Relic, not to mention the base mobility stats of NDKs and Interceptors, I think Grey Knights can actually hang with Harlequins in terms of grabbing objectives, maneuvering for Secondaries, redeploying forces to react to their opponent/get the angle for shooting or setting up a key charge. I am not arguing that GKs have absolutely equivalent mobility to Harlequins (universal Advance and Charge, Fall Back and Charge, and ignore intervening models/terrain is pretty hard to compete with), but I am saying that a skilled GK player will not be left totally in the dust by the Killer Clowns like most armies out there, giving them a fair chance to compete.

 

 

2 - Firepower/Melee "Spikes" -- Given how fast and "tricksy" the Harlies are, coming to grips with them is probably one of the hardest things to do and, when you actually achieve that, opposing players really need to be able to "spike" their damage output and make the Harlequins pay dearly, since there may not be another opportunity before they shred your army back in the next turn. With their unique Strats and Psychic powers (and even Chaplain Litanies), Grey Knights have one of the best ability to "amp up" their raw damage for a period of time and really put the hurt on whoever they are engaging.

 

To illustrate this, consider a unit of 3 Voidweavers, 1-3 of which are likely found in almost every competitive Harlequin list. With T5, 18W total, a 4++, -1 to hit, and no-rerolls to hit of any kind against them, they are actually deceptively hard to kill, and if you don't kill them, they will make you pay with their exceptional firepower. Well, let's say a single squad of 10 "Rapiers" Interceptors with Halberds gets a charge off on the Voidweavers. With "Symphonic Strike" cast and the "Deadly Efficiency" Strat used, they have 41 x S6 AP-2 Dmg2 attacks, yielding an average of 34 hits (no re-rolls), 22 wounds, 11 unsaved wounds, and 22 damage, killing all 3 Voidweavers with some room to spare. Similarly, GK shooting is ideal to take out Harlequin infantry... since they all get a 4++, the lack of AP for GK Stormbolters doesn't matter and the high volume of S4 shots helps a lot. Without any buffs, a 10 man Strike or Interceptor squad puts out 40 shots, gets about 27 hits, 18 wounds, and 9 failed saves, so wiping out almost a full Troupe or killing basically any Harlequin character (if they can get a shot at it). Even Incinerators, which are not looked on very highly right now, are very solid against Harlequins, since they auto-hit (bypassing all the Harlequin defenses against to Hit rolls) and are S6 (so wounds T3 Harlie infantry on a 2+ and T5 vehicles on a 3+)... a squad of 10 Purifiers with 4 Incinerators can easily kill a 5 clown Troupe or even significantly damage a Starweaver/Voidweaver with average rolling.

 

 

3- Mortal Wounds -- This is the most compelling reason why I think GKs might be the "antidote" army against Harlequins. While Harlies are truly tough to kill by normal means (especially their vehicles and bikes), they have relatively low numbers of wounds (so every MW that gets through really hurts) and they only have moderate ability to protect themselves against MWs (i.e. their Shadowseer can potentially deny Psychic Powers and they have one relic that gives a 6" aura of ignoring MWs on a 5+++). With perhaps the 1k Sons being the only exception, there is probably no army in the game that can generate as many MW as Grey Knights. First and foremost, of course, is their very powerful Psychic phase, with almost every unit having Smite, Purifying Flame on Crowe/Purifiers, and the notorious "MW Bomb Librarian" all giving a GK general the ability to drops bucket-fulls of MWs in a single Psychic Phase.

 

Since MWs just by-pass all the Harlequin -1 to hit, no-rolls to hit, 4++ Invul, etc. defenses, they are particularly dangerous to the Space Clowns. Take again our example unit of 3 Voidweavers, which have 18Ws to chew through. Well, between the "MW Bomb Libby" and a pair of 5 man Strike Squads Deep Striking in, they can reliably generate 15MW on the Voidweavers, leaving one left with 3W (which a GKs player should be able to reliably finish off with massed SB and Psyweapon shooting). Similarly, GKs can generate crazy amounts of MWs in the close combat phase, number one through Tides of Convergence and, number two, even more MWs if they get the "Words of Power" Litany cast on them. Finally, they can use things like the "Banner of Refining Flame" relic to produce even more MWs and, if the Harlequin player tries to return the favor with their own Shadowssers, the GKs have both a 5+++ against MWs and they have built-in bonuses to their own Deny the Witch tests, helping them dominate any attempt to go toe-to-toe with them in a MW attrition game.

 

 

I know there are probably other ways in which GKs are good against Harlequins that I haven't discussed here, and also some areas where they are vulnerable to Harlequin abilities, but overall it seems to me that they might be a very strong "counter-army" to the current Meta-dominating Harlequin forces!

Edited April 3, 2022 by L30n1d4s

[Brother Lunkhead]

Good observations brother

 

As I've only a GK kill team right now and have no practical experience with a full scale army in 9th ed. (gradually putting together my army though), I'm very interested to hear from anyone here who's clashed with the Harlequins

[Grimlock]

So there is a lot in this post to unpack. I have faced them twice, game 1 got spanked by 9 voidreavers. Second game I won against 6 of them. I found that the list that I brought did not fit into what i needed to do in order to win against the dark elves.

 

1 - don’t take purifying ritual, take psychic interrogation. Keeps your smites rolling.

 

2 - stranglehold was good for 15, but the board was in my favor

 

3 - banners fire and forget.

 

Looks fellow Knights we are not in S or A tier any longer. Id say we are around mid B tier. I watched the #1 GK player in the US last year get absolutely smashed by both DE and Tau. Where do we go from here? Well for me competitive is over, I’m moving on to something else I am looking at a couple of other games. “If” GW can fix this mess of an edition I might return to competitive but this whole edition is a train wreck.

Edited April 4, 2022 by Grimlock

[Archadeus]

I had my first game against the quins in my recent RTT, and I think the matchup is rough but if you play it right mortals really can carry you through. And our volume of fire is perfect against their infantry. Also my incinerator squad did some serious work.