Competitive viability of Black Templars?

[SonOfDornM42]

some of the stratagems seem quite good, and I've used devout push quite a few times in games and the vows seem very good (especially Suffer Not the Unclean and Accept Any Challenge) but the Primaris Crusader Squad seems to be under-preforming against anything other than AP 0, S 4 weapons.

Edited July 12, 2023 by SonOfDornM42

[SkimaskMohawk]

Templars got a 5th place at Heeyaw, coming in after two thousand sons and two eldar players. Apparently it was righteous crusaders with helbrecht, grimaldus, and a PCS.

 

Personally, i think mass PCS are a hard sell right now, as blast weapons are still realllllly good and it's really hard to get them all in engagement range to maximize their damage output. One unit as a mixup to a bunch of heavy armour would force something like a rapid battlecannon to choose between the two, maybe allow your big shooting to still be alive.

[Sea Creature]

My 20 man PCS with Grimaldus took two Basilisks to the face, didn’t lose one Marine. Cover and AoC are huge.

[SkimaskMohawk]

21 minutes ago, Sea Creature said:

My 20 man PCS with Grimaldus took two Basilisks to the face, didn’t lose one Marine. Cover and AoC are huge.

 

Basilisks can be a bit low damage on the crusaders for sure, as even with the sentinel mark and the order they only average 5 damage. Though, they drop your movement really hard, which sucks for a melee unit. 

 

There's just some really brutal blast units that can focus fire down the crusaders if they want them dead. Desolators doing the full combo of oath, doctrine and bolter drill one-round the unit (even through AoC and cover). Knights basically all have blast weapons. Eldar can still fate dice a mortal wound cascade. 

[Sea Creature]

Even if they are just a distraction carnifex that can be quite tactical, freeing up other units to get into better position. I was using mine defensively that game so the loss of movement wasn’t so bad.

[Medjugorje]

Imo the RC detachment is mostly good because of FnP and fight back on3+ for 1 CP.

 

But the Gladius is just far better on them... PSB are so goood  - they dont need more buffs then reroll everything^^ so its more important to come into close combat and therefor you need advance + charge.

[9x19 Parabellum]

Interesting.  I look at PSB and find them to be super overpriced. 35 ppm...compare them to Possessed.  Is there an angle I'm missing?  They seem super fragile to shooty stuff.

 

I love them, don't get me wrong, and I want to include them but I just look at PCS and/or even Assault Intercessors at, literally, half the cost (or less) and I have a hard time justifying them. 32 points of PCS gets me 4 wounds and 10 (TEN!) chainsword attacks.

 

[SkimaskMohawk]

2 hours ago, Sea Creature said:

Even if they are just a distraction carnifex that can be quite tactical, freeing up other units to get into better position. I was using mine defensively that game so the loss of movement wasn’t so bad.

 

Yea they can definitely be a good distraction, especially if you can combo up AoC and cover to neuter some better AP weapons and force some overcommittment. 

 

I also keep on forgetting the points increases too; all those big killy weapons still kill a lot, but the amount they need to spend to kill a blob off is a lot higher; I think only full deso combo can wipe them without any unit follow up.

 

@9x19 Parabellum sword brethren are weird in that they're more of an escort for a character that theyre buffing up via their ability. Jamming helbrecht into them allows for you to combo with either acclamation into Lethal hits on a 5+ in crusaders, or honour the chapter off their str 6 to wound a lot of tough stuff on 4s. Whenever helbrecht is FAQd to get chapter master then a combo with lt/castellan will be even better too. But ya, still a deathstar melee unit, that needs you to spend like  400+ points on just the dudes on foot, nevermind the transport you definitely have to take for them to avoid dying to the hyper lethal shooting. 

Edited July 14, 2023 by SkimaskMohawk

[Tokugawa]

SB are very overpriced, chosen have almost an equivalent profile, permanent advance-charge, and 23pts per model. 

 

Helbrecht could be considered "underpriced", and SB have some synergies with him, give him Dmg2 sweep. 

 

So "Helbrecht + 1 unit of SB" could be playable, and Templars players like to try this flavourful way. Standalone SB are just weak.

[Kastor Krieg]

12 hours ago, Tokugawa said:

SB are very overpriced, chosen have almost an equivalent profile, permanent advance-charge, and 23pts per model.

And yet, Chosen are a C-tier unit at best in every CSM analysis I've seen, while PSB are A-tier. Funny how that works.

[9x19 Parabellum]

 That's very strange to me.  The PSB special ability is great, but so is the Chosen ability.   Aside from that they are virtually identical units.  How the PSB unit is +12 points over the Chosen, and considered an A unit is beyond me.  (I would add I don't consider it an A tier unit, fyi).

[SkimaskMohawk]

3 hours ago, Kastor Krieg said:

And yet, Chosen are a C-tier unit at best in every CSM analysis I've seen, while PSB are A-tier. Funny how that works.

 

It is funny, because both units very similar in their role and can have some very similar output for their points.

 

A full unit of chosen with master of executions is 310; 5 sword bros with castellan and marshall is also 310. Both can get places fast and both can do some big damage to unsuspecting units; the chosen have to choose in list building between lethal and sustained, while sword bros basically need to juggle oath/doctrine/CP stuff to make sure your resources are being used properly. Chosen have more staying power and OC, but are more vulnerable to blast weapons and need to play engagement range games. So really, whether it's an A or C, the units are about the same rank. 

 

But about sword bros specifically, it really does feel like they want Gladius for the run+charge and for access to Honour the chapter to boost their output. The double character definitely sounds good going with them, as 14 2+, Str 5, -2, 3D attacks is solid, especially when combod with lethal hits and the potentially free bonus AP and +1 to wound. 

[Sir Clausel]

I think the ability to have +1D on all attacks that does it. And the fact that a character can be effected too. That is really really powerful. 

Chosen have only one way to have d2. And thats a 1 in 5 that can get it. 

[SkimaskMohawk]

2 hours ago, Sir Clausel said:

I think the ability to have +1D on all attacks that does it. And the fact that a character can be effected too. That is really really powerful. 

Chosen have only one way to have d2. And thats a 1 in 5 that can get it. 

 

Ya, but it kinda doesn't matter for the chosen if they're lead properly.

 

Master of executions for the rerolls against below starting and then slaanesh for blending or khorne high durability targets; a full slaanesh average something like 20 failed saves against meq with the accursed weapons, and then another 9 failed saves against the 2 damage weapons and 2 mortals. 20 dead marines in average.

 

The equivalent sword bro unit I talked about earlier does 8.3 failed wounds from the mastercrafted swords, 4.8 from the chainswords, and 1 from the hammer. We'll call it an average 14 dead marines , and that's with bonus damage activated and an assumed free CP for honour the chapter during assault doctrine. Similarily, they'll fall behind khorne chosen against targets either would usually wound on 6s. 

 

Both can pump out the damage, just sword bros can flex into different targets more easily at the cost of needing a strat and doctrine. 

[Sir Clausel]

But if you run them as real BT with wows you can get both sustained and lethal hits by choosing one of them from the start and paying a cp for the other. Add in helbrect and they crit on 5+ and have +1 strenght.

And all the while you can still pick the unit they are hitting with OoM for full rerolls. Sword bros has the potential to do insane dmg that i simply doubt the chosen can do. 

I do think they are a little overcosted perhaps(havent tried them yet but compared to other stuff i get what people are saying) but their potential is huge. 

[SkimaskMohawk]

51 minutes ago, Sir Clausel said:

But if you run them as real BT with wows you can get both sustained and lethal hits by choosing one of them from the start and paying a cp for the other. Add in helbrect and they crit on 5+ and have +1 strenght.

And all the while you can still pick the unit they are hitting with OoM for full rerolls. Sword bros has the potential to do insane dmg that i simply doubt the chosen can do. 

I do think they are a little overcosted perhaps(havent tried them yet but compared to other stuff i get what people are saying) but their potential is huge. 

 

Crusaders is best used for the army wide fnp, as it benefits every unit instead of just the melee ones. Let's say you do take crusaders and sustained hits (or use acclamation), that 310 point crusader unit is now doing less than it did in Gladius with Honour. Against big vehicles, the MC weapons average 8.5 damage, chainswords about 4, and the thunder hammer fails to make through. Against meq it's 6.7 failed saves from the MCs, 3.7 from the chainswords and a generous 1 from the hammer.  So you're slower and have less output in Crusaders...

 

I didn't look at helbrecht because it's a lopsided comparison in terms of points. Him and 5 sword bros are 270, and you can't add in anything to them or subtract anything from the chosen that make it equal. But let's go with it, you've taken either sustained or lethal and have used acclamation for the other; against meq helbrecht averages 8.8 failed saves, the srgt averages 2.3, the chainswords 5.7, and the thunderhammer 1. It's better than the double character unit in output, but you're also spending a CP, are slower, and have no army defensive bonuses. Also it's still worse than the chosen, but that's not a shocker as it's 40 points less than them. Also the +1 str only really helps the chainswords, while in Gladius it'd pair a lot more nicely.

 

If we want to do oath in there too, on top of strats and a reckless vow, then ya, helbrecht goes up to 12, srgt to 3, chainswords to 9 and the hammer to 2. You've finally beaten the chosens output at the cost of the parity in speed, a CP, denying the rest of your army the increase of output with oath, and a very risky vow. 

 

This has gotten rather far afield from my original point; for the same cost, chosen and sword bros do about the same, and should be rated about the same as a result. Yes, sword bros can scale up to a big unit and you can make them do big damage, but is a ~500 point melee unit of 11-12 marines, compromising your detachment, and hogging oath and CP competitively viable? Probably not.