I've found the best way to do it, is to isolate the formations as you go in for the kill. The Knights tend to have a significant advantage when it comes to actual damage throughput. When fully engaged, the Knights tend to be capable of inflicting large actual casualties, rather than relying on the other aspects of combat results.


That's always been the problem with him. I stuck him where he is, so that he's usable in any of the formations, without being an auto-include in any one. At 20cm move, he'd nearly always go in a Paladin formation because the speed hindered him in other formations, and at 30cm move, he'd absolutely always go in a Lancer formation because of the synergy. I did toy with the idea of making the Baron a purely character-based upgrade like the Seneschal, with the current model being the Lancer variant, but I put that back in the drawer (for now at least), because I couldn't get it to work, and because I wasn't sure it was necessary.


From a thematic point, it was meant to reflect a more noble attitude. Even though they're listed in the Allies section, I consider the Lightnings and Thunderbolts to be integral components of the Knight command structure, flown by Knightworld pilots, not assets on loan from the Imperial Navy. The air assets are those that for the most part, practice the "art" of aerial combat, much in the same way that the knights embody the pinnacle (at least in their perception) of single-pilot mounted combat. That that nature, of obsessive compulsive perfection of martial combat is a driving mentality for the Knights.
From a mechanical perspective, it was to limit the ability of the Knights with regard to deepstrike weaponry. Trebuchets are currently the only means by which a Knight Army can target out of LOS formations with templates. I didn't want to just remove Marauders, and Lightnings have the added benefit of being a reasonable threat to air transports.

Honestly, they're on the cusp for me. I think they add something tangible to the list, but I don't think they're a necessity. Do you not feel they're appropriate? If not, why not? Convince me!


They're also 15% cheaper (with the ability to take cheaper formations of them), and should be more likely to be useable in an offensive manner. That might sound contradictory, but at the original 500pts, a Custodian (of either ilk) Formation was invariably the BTS. Which meant pressure to protect from the Knight player, and pressure to kill from the opponent, regardless of any actual combat threat. Now, even the larger Custodian Formations are cheaper than a Baron-led Knight Formation. Meaning protection/dedication to kill, is based on it's actual combat potential. I'm not completely confidant I got the costing right, but the games I've played, it seems to be within an acceptable margin of error.

More reports from other players will go a long way to figuring if this is the better approach, and hammering down the issues. MORE REPORTS!

Morgan Vening
- KnightWorld SubChampion

In general, if a list doesn't have a significant focus on aircraft (like, for example, the Elysian Drop Troopers), or have a significantly different level of technology (like, for example, the Mossinian Rebels) to normal Imperial forces, then I tend to err on the side of sticking with Thunderbolts and Marauders. Just personal preference, really.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

Played this today against the Ork Gargant list (experimental too). I saved an amazing amount of TK shots using my knightshield, perhaps 10 and that skewed the result a bit. In my view the knightshield save should be rolled once for every damage inflicted by the TK weapon. Felt wrong that the mega-gargant was hitting paladins with D6/D3 shots and a single 4+ would avoid all of the damage.
Otherwise, nothing to report. Lancers are not very attractive right now compared to Errants and my new favourite the double Inferno gun Warhound. In the 300 bracket that's what I like. Wardens w/out 2 DC and void shields seem pointless compared to paying slightly more and getting castellans/crusaders or just buying t-bolts/lightnings and ballistas. Didn't use sentinels as can't realistically find a role for them in a multi-purpose list. They would have been useful here to block the mega-gargant but in a general list no need. My Errants worked in packs and nearly destroyed a normal gargant over 2 turns but at least kept it out of the game: move errants and give gargant BMs and damage, then move errants into assault and use the TK weapons + mw firefight from previous errants to break the gargant. I might consider having less fms in the future though as 3-strong fms are a bit risky. This is what I used:
- Baron+3 errants
- 3 errants * 3
- 3 trebuchets * 2
- 3 ballistas
- 2 t-bolts (why are they 175 pts in this list? these are not SR5 marines)
- warhound w/ inferno guns (300 pts but so delicious)
- 5 paladins+1 seneschal (the upgrade would have been better on one of the errants to assault w/ 2 fms at same time)
In the end I won comfortably 2-0 with Blitz+another 2 objectives on his side. The gargants were too slow and too unsupported to stop me caving the soft ork flanks and also too slow to break through my relatively unsupported middle.

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what are people's feelings about this list given my latest batrep? I'm taking this to Bristol in January and don't want to take an unfair list and ruin 3 people's games during the event. The list has certainly been taken down a lot since the early days and I feel w/ the knightshield tweak I proposed it could get to a balanced level.

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Apologies for the lateness of this reply. Have had to cover at work for an absentee employee. Stupid work getting in the way of my private time!


Then it'd kind of make it even less likely to be used. As most TK weapons are d3/d6, unless the opponent is rolling consistently low, you get a curve that trends towards pointlessness. 1 Damage = 50% save. 2 Damage = 25% save. 3 Damage = 12.5% save. 4 Damage = 6.25% save. Etc. And with all but the Baron now being DC1, it's not likely to allow the partial damage that Wardens and Custodians might have lived through.

If that's the case, I'd probably just argue for a fixed 5+, or remove the KnightShield completely and just give them an Invulnerable Save (and reconsider points cost or downgrade them slightly). As it is, I've rarely played against an army that has TK shooting. So it's harder for me to see it as a powerful defensive ability. It just seems like it's kind of like Skimmer. Against most armies, it's mostly irrelevant, but against a few specific armies, it can get fairly significant. Be curious what other people's experiences are.


Why so on the Lancers v Errants? I still think Lancers have the edge, but only very slightly now. It's a lot easier to get into FF range with Lancers (45cm), than to get into premium assault range with the Errants. Though the Errants are more potent if the do.


Wardens were the one thing I wasn't happy with, but I really didn't feel I could make them cheaper as it would conflict too much with the Ballista and Trebuchet formations. Consider them "pending change". Hell, if anyone has a suggestion, I'm listening.


The biggest problem I have with the sentinels on table, is they tend to excel too much as bullet magnets. Normally, that'd sound like a good thing, but the reality doesn't seem to bear it out. Namely, if an opponent has a couple of aircraft, or artillery formations, firing them at a Knight formation is akin to throwing wads of paper at a tank. Example, a Thunderbolt formation will kill ~2 Sentinels, putting 3 BM's on the formation. Whereas against a Knight formation, they've only got ~25% chance of killing a Knight. So there's a quasi-psychological thing going on there.


To be fair, an in no means denigrating your win, but OGBM is probably the single most favourable matchup I could think of for a Knight list. The gargants are slow enough for the Knights to pick engagements, the costing makes it more likely you will have activation parity if not advantage, the lack of deep strike means softer assets like Trebuchets are a lot more robust, and you aren't at a SR disadvantage (which hurts any non-airdrop engagement based army). The Errants in particular are obviously strong choices. Against an Eldar or Imperial Titan list, their effectiveness decreases significantly.


That's been something that I'm kind of glad has worked out. I think 3-strong are on the cusp. They are workable, but do benefit significantly from additional units. Unlike the previous version, which very much was a huge gamble to take 3-strong formations. The goal is to have each option (lots of small formation, less larger formations, or a combination of the two) be relatively balanced and viable.


That's a long story. Quick summary, is I think Thunderbolts are just a little underpriced. Not enough to warrant 175 in and of itself, but more than the current 150pts. So it came down to a list design decision, and one of the biggest problems I've had with the Knights, is how Allies (particularly TBolts) so easily circumvent the 1:1 Core/Support ratio. One of the parts I'm happiest about is the reliance on the basic Knights to pull the workhorse details. And with the reduction of the Custodians, there's some competition for the support formations. But when you have the ability to take an additional 2-3 or more cheap activations (and I'll admit, I routinely did) to work around that ratio, I figured 'rounding up' was a better solution than putting another restriction (either hard or soft cap) on Thunderbolts.


Like I said earlier, if I had to play against any army, it'd be OGBM. That's not to say it shouldn't be challenging, but there's several Rock/Scissor/Paper matchups that give a modest boost to an opponent off the bat. Against a more fluid and speedy army, I'd expect the win to not be as comfortable.

Morgan Vening
- KnightWorld SubChampion

Yes, I share the feeling that knights have taken so many downgrades already to get to this stage that it's more tweaking than just straight making them worse. It's weird that so far I've faced a lot of armies w/ knights but mostly the 'good' matchups so OGBM, tyranids, IG of various kinds and chaos marines (chaos marines aren't that good matchup to be fair).

As for the Errant/Lancer difference it's just a pip on the FF and an extra FF attack. The big difference is that Errants are very good at carving up SHTs and smaller Titans whereas lancers are better at being attacked but only slightly. For the lancer role I prefer Warhounds due to better initiative and more varied weaponry (INFERNO GUNS!).

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So Morgan, still not interested in including 1.3 in the army book? Would give a year's worth of advertising

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I'm still not sure it's ready, and there's still the decision of which way to go, but if it is to go in, then this version is the one I think should go in (1.3A, with the ATSKNF equivalent), as it's the direction I'd prefer to take it.

Morgan Vening
- KnightWorld SubChampion

No worries. Will make the changes.

Problem w/ Wardens is that there's no role for them except as tougher AA/artillery. But since they still take a support fm slot, it's better to have a cheap activation: assault armies can really use multiple activations. FWIW, I'd use them at 200 pts for the 3 of them over ballistas. The lack of indirect fire on the frag launcher doesn't make them very attractive I'm afraid. They could be decent guarding the trebuchet and ballista backline since they are okayish in assaults, but that's never been a problem for me.
Sentinels at IG fm sizes would help them being taken more often IMO.
Also, once the lightning fighter stats are finalised they should be included at a reasonable fm size. Not saying 4 is unusable but it seems odd.

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Assume fighters will go in as flight of 2 for 150 with these stats:
Armour --
Wingtip Lascannons: 30cm AT5+/AA5+
Long-Barrel Autocannon: 45cm AP5+/AT6+/AA5+

Right?

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They'll use the stats and intial costings approved by the consensus, yes.

I will look at how they fit into the list, and whether there are any changes to costing, formation size, or even continued inclusion, but for now, they're good.

Morgan Vening

Played against the new Ork Big Gargant list (3.04) again (Bristol tourney prep) and lost this time (could probably had gone to a dull draw instead at 1 point each). Quick summary of what I took and what happened w/ it:
- 4 Paladins w/ Baron as BTS: still hard to destroy completely due to the Baron's fearlessness, still a bit meh - they can hold the line but aren't very dynamic due to slow move and unspectacular guns.
- 4 paladins alone: went to catch some objectives that were uncontested, their role would best be done by cheapo sentinels but didn't bring them as they take a support slot and cost a minimum of 175
- 4 errants + 4 errants w/ seneschal: were given the hard job of trying to at least entertain the mega-gargant for a bit so its presence wasn't felt but got the sh*t kicked out of them even though they were in cover. Got assaulted by lootas and the mega-garg's support fire was devastating.
- 3 trebuchets + 3 trebuchets: finally after all these games somebody went after them! I was facing 3 fms of ork fighters and the trebuchets were taken out quickly or at least broken beyond repair. Definitely not worth more than 150.
- Warhound w/ infernos: still awesome! Will start taking a 2nd warhound too, perhaps w/ 2 vulcans.
- 2 castellans: one died tripping in a tree, the other got shot by a gargant and then assaulted by it.
- 2 crusaders: shot ineffectively 3 times at the smaller gargant. Didn't have their kind of targets on the table.
- 2 lightnings: did well I suppose considering they were the only AA but were out-shined by the ork fighters

Not any new changes compared to what I proposed earlier based on this game but I will change my list for the next game.

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Any more progress on this list?

I was quite happy with the changes in this version but I looks like play testing has dried up? I don't have an opponent at present as the other epic gamers have moved south with work and the new recruits are still at the initial collecting/painting stage.

I would like to trial the Wardens with indirect on the frag launcher, 2BP or alternatively a disrupt/ignore cover. The 1Bp, 45cm attack seems a waste of time in comparison to the other 2 choices. Preference would be for indirect, potentially providing an alternate to the trebs.

My other thought after the last game was to move the Paladin to 3+ in CC and go back to 3 for 300pts. From the old fluff I thought the Paladins were the experienced knights and with the suit having a comparable CC rig to the Errants I could easily see them being on par in CC. I think this would make them more attractive and useful for holding the line whilst the spec knights aim to work to their strengths.

MV,
Perhaps these suggestions go against your intent but at this stage I can't see them altering the character of this list in any great way, but rather a balancing of the current knight platforms/weapon options.

Cheers