40K: Imperial Knights – Customizing Your Champion
Games Workshop has a new Knight Preview and it’s showcasing some of the new Traits, Artefacts, and Freeblade options you can choose if you want to customize your own “Champion” Knight. It’s Pimp My Ride – Grimdark Edition!
With the Imperial Knight Codex heading to pre-order this weekend, folks are ready for some robot vs robot fights. With the new codex players are going to find a ton of options if they want to get under the hood and customize their Knight!
One model in each of your Imperial Knights Super-heavy Detachments can be a Character – and one of these Characters can be your Warlord and gain access to a range of new Warlord Traits. If you’re fielding an army of only Knights, this allows you to fully represent the unique skills of your Warlord. If you’re taking one of the larger Imperial Knights as part of a wider Imperium force, consider adding a couple of Armiger Warglaives or Helverins to fill out a full Super-heavy Detachment, so your larger Knight can gain Character keyword.
All together, there are 15 unique Warlord Traits – 6 that are “generic” and one for each of the 9 specific Households players can choose from. These Traits are going to be pretty important to pick as Knights are typically a pretty low model count army. Getting the most out of a single Knight can be the difference between victory and defeat. Luckily, depending on what you’re looking for, the Traits have you covered:
Ion Bulwark ups your Ion shield save to a 4+ Invulnerable. Blocking 50% of ranged shots is going to make those wounds go the distance! And speaking of going the distance, adding 2 to your advance and charge rolls to ALL knights within 6″ is going to be make your Knights that much faster.
The House Specific Traits aren’t ones you’re going to want to skip over either – Especially if you’re going toe-to-toe vs other Knights:
Legacy of the Black Pall is great against armies who want to stand-off and shoot. And Adamantium Knight is going to prevent weapons from wounding you with anything less than a 4+ dice roll! Now, Knights are T8 to start – so we’re looking at some pretty high strength guns to get those rolls anyways. But those guns typically also do more than just a single point of damage. That’s really going to put a damper on your opponent’s game plan when their “Titan Killer” gun whiffs on a 1, 2, or 3 to wound.
Knightly Relics
Just like all the armies that have gotten a Codex in the latest edition, Knights are bringing some new, powerful artefacts with them to the tabletop. With 22 Artefacts to choose from, there is bound to be one that suits your needs on the tabletop! Here’s a few that Games Workshop is teasing now:
The Paragon Gauntlet isn’t your stock Thunderstrike Guantlet – it comes with a bit more of a punch! This thing does 8 damage per wound. You do not want to fail a save when this one makes contact.
Flyers are always in need of a good swatting from Knights and Skyshield can provide the extra munitions you’ll need. This weapon replaces the twin Icarus Autocannons and just makes it better – more shots, better AP and extra range.
Many a 40K game has come down to taking an objective. Banner of Macharius Triumphant will allow your Knight to basically become “Objective Secured” – and if another unit has a similar ability, you go back to model count…only this Knight counts as 10 models!
Who doesn’t like more dakka?! Endless Fury replaces your typical avenger gatling cannon with a new version. Every unmodified 6 you roll to hit counts as 2 hits instead of 1! with 14 shots you’re bound to pick-up some extra hits with a bucket of dice.
Again – that’s just 4 of the artefacts you can choose from – there are 22 more waiting to be used in battle!
Create-A-Knight
Freeblades are the ultimate in customization. These are Knights who do not belong to a great house for various reasons. Being on their own, these Knights can develop certain ticks that make them truly unique. To represent that, GW has created two new charts to roll (or pick) from:
Codex: Imperial Knights contains tables for generating one of these legendary heroes. For each, you’ll be able to pick one Quality – a powerful ability that represents their unique form of heroism – or you can roll on a table for two. But in return, you’ll have to pick two Burdens (or roll for one) to represent the eccentricities and flaws of each Freeblade. Burdens don’t apply all the time – you’ll test your Leadership at the start of each turn to see if they have an effect.
Here are two of the Qualities you could end-up with. Either one of these could be useful on their own. But again, you could end-up with both if you opted to roll for them. But don’t forget you’re also going to end up with a Burden or two of your own:
Hmm…Those can be pretty rough! If you wanted to get the most bang for your knightly buck, you could opt to roll on both charts. You’ll end up with two perks and 1 burden. Then again, it would really stink to have a shooty knight and get Driven to Slaughter…
If you’ve been wanting to run a full Knight Army or if you’re just looking to add a Freeblade, you’re in luck – the new Codex is going to allow you to do both! It’s going to be a rock’em-sock’em good time!
Just watch out for Chainsaw Crotches.
