Goatboy’s Warhammer 40K – Rating Grey Knights, Thousand Sons, Orks, Custodes & Chaos Knights
This week we get to talk about 5 new 40K armies how they are shaping up in 10th Edition. Hello Grey Knights, Thousand Sons, Orks, Custodes & Chaos Knights.
Overall we had a pretty good mix with the dual psychic coin of Grey Knights Vs Thousand Sons, Chaos Knights, Custodes, and Orks. Each of these armies have had time in the sun during 9th with new releases roaming the top table tops and crazy armies wrecking shop. Right now Chaos Knights and Orks are the current good lists in current 9th edition and each of their previews showed some interesting tweaks to the current make up.
Orks
We’ll start with Orks as right now they are the kind of pressure in the environment. They come at you hard, and hit you hard. It seems Goffs won the Subfaction bonus for the army with “sustained” melee hits. Ghazghull had a major tweak too as he is no longer the walking tank of doom and now likes to be with his friends – beyond Makari hitching a ride on his bio mechanical coat tails. Overall the preview wasn’t nearly as meaty as others but it again showed the they feel the army should get to you, hit you hard, and maybe hit you a few times with their bullets. It’s hard to say how the army will be as we are missing some of the Beast Snagga stuff that is dominating their army with the Squighog Boyz, Beastboss, and the Kill Rig. I hope the army is just a crazy filled smoke monster that comes at you and tries to take whatever candy you have left.
Adeptus Custodes
Next up will talk about the Custodes and the major question we have with how the Forge World stuff will look for them. Right now the army utilizes a lot of FW options to help give some movement tricks and extra bodies for the tabletop. I do like how the Stances are still there and much easier to remember as stacking a bunch of cards just was annoying. I feel like we are missing a good deal of pieces beyond FW with this preview and while they look like the hit like a sack of bricks in combat I am guessing they are going to be hurting on the long range fire power department. Again it is dependent on if FW rules shows up, and are good, and usable by the army.
Grey Knights
Let’s jump into Grey Knights now and wow, this is an interesting army for sure. The weirdest thing for me to see is the Purgation squad having a 2+ armor save with a regular Grey Knight body. I wonder if all their troops are the same way. I also can see how this army could be a threat to any non-vehicle list with a ton of weapons that can just power out the wounds. I love how much this army is poised to fly across the table with its teleport tricks and my favorite model for Grey Knights – the Dreadknight – looks pretty mean. I just hope we can take more as Grandmasters as we all know I like to play with 5 of them from time to time. The no LOS Purgration squad shooting could be pretty gnarly – especially with things like 4 Incinerators just pouring some firepower from behind a wall or just 12 Psycannon shots.
Thousand Sons
Next we’ll go into the Thousand Sons with the preview that could be extra devastating if there is some way to combo some fun things into their army. Say for instance, things like a Chaos Knight with double battle cannons and enough Cabal points to turn off Armor saves. This is an interesting set of rules as they all feel pretty dang powerful. I get the feeling there will be a lot of things that somehow activate Psychic weapons for units and causes all kinds of – psychic murder death. I really wish they had shown Magnus or Ahriman but will just have to wait for the real release to see how nuts they are in this game. This is one of those armies I like but never want to build and paint. A client had me paint some and I am still mentally broken by doing all that gold and blue. Heck he ordered some more Warp Flamers so I can’t escape it.
Chaos Knights
Finally we get to one of my favorite armies – Chaos Knights. Overall their rule feels ok and is really dependent on if they get a lot of access to ways to cause Battleshock tests throughout the game. I do like how the Abominant is set up as another “Battleshock” ball of doom. I just hope there are other things that cause it too. The real question right now is how the War Dogs are all set up as that is how the army seems to work now. I hope they are good as I got 13 of those jerks and I hope I can still use em. I do enjoy the Abominant though so maybe I paint up one of them or finish my Knight Tyrant as those weapons looked hot for Imperial Knights and I am sure they are good for the Chaos side.
What’s Left?
So what do we have left? Genestealer Cult, all the “other” Marines, Imperial Agents, and Drukhari. We’ll see the good ole Evil Dark Eldar and how that army works out in the end. They came in so strong and got hit so many times will see how they end up. Still – super exciting times coming and a whole new game to dance with.
What army are you most excited about?
