A look at the Grey Knights

With the Grey Knight Codex due for release this Saturday I thought I would take a look and compare the Old Codex to the New Codex. I'm going to give a breif overview of the changes to the book and will go more in depth after playing with the Grey Knights doing a Unit by Unit breakdown.

The Biggest change I have noticed is that Grey Knights are no longer Super Marines, they share the same stat line including Leadership. This means gone are the days of hitting most enemies on a 3+ and sticking around after losing nearly everyone in the squad. Now, they will be hitting on a 4+ generally and being hit by their Bloodletter/Bloodcrusher enemies on a 3+!!!! Now that every unit has a psychic power LD10 is almost a must, but Grey Knights have been dropped to 8, pushing 9 with their Justicar/Knight of flame. This means that alot of Psychic tests will be failed at crucial points especially if you happen to lose your justicar to weight of fire.

The Psycannon and Incinerator no longer ignore invulnerable saves which means that their chosen foe now gets a chance to survive against the Grey Knights shooting! The bonus being Incinerators are now Strength 6 and Psycannons are Rending (not much use against Daemons). The Psilencer does wound on a 4+ against Daemons (unless usually better) but as a heavy weapon in an assault orientated army it is a bit out of place, which is probably why its free. The Incinerator has doubled in points for the gain of one point in strength and with my large number of old models which came with an incinerator (I have 5) it means I have to take an elite choice (Purifiers) or pay equal to another man for each one. The Psycannon has dropped by 15 points and is now a cheap 10pts for a Strength 6 AP4 Rending Assault 2, Heavy 3 gun, BARGAIN.

Now, Grey Knights in Power Armour have Dropped by 5pts per model and as stated earlier dropped alot of Stats and rules, for 20pts you get, a Space Marine armed with a Force Weapon and Storm Bolter, for 25pts you used to get a Khorne Bezerker armed with a Str 6 weapon and Storm Bolter with 2 Attacks. But before I condem the change (I want Str 6) lets look at the cost of a Space Marine (15pts) with Power Weapon (15pts) and Storm bolter (5pts) that is 35pts, 15pts more than a Grey Knight!!! The big problem I have is that now, Grey Knights are just Space Marines with Prefered Enemy against Daemons, who go last againts Daemonettes, will get ripped apart by Bloodletters/crushers hitting easier and cant even ignore their saves in shooting.

The good points though are that now Grey Knights get a thunderhammer, and for only 10pts (the difference between a Power weapon and Thunderhammer), their Force Swords give the Termies a 4+ inv in combat, can take a Halberd which gives +2 initiative for 5pts (taking them to the same cost as an old Grey Knight) but with only 1 attack each basic (no +1 for their storm bolter) they only way to get an extra attack is with a Falchion at 10pts. What seems to be a popular choice (though I will be taking a minumum if at all) is the Null Staff, which gives you a +2 inv in combat at a massive 25pts!!! if it was a bit cheaper I would consider them, but thats another Man with +2 initiative (which means I wouldnt need the 2+ save).

Also, with all the new toys and units then I think this new Codex could be a winner, but I feel they missed out on the fluff big time and it is obvious they wanted to streamline the Grey Knights for newer/younger players. The drop to a standard Space Marines stats will really hurt a close combat psychic weilding army that now has a low LD and average WS.

By this time next week I should have had a good read through the Codex (and not just a glance in the shop) and will begin my in-depth analysis of each unit and its role (and changes). Until then, enjoy.