'Ard Boyz Round 2

So after getting second place in the last round, I am correcting my mistakes. I really need a couple of meltas or lascannons because I need some land raider busting...Yes I know I could get rid of the Warband and get the vindicare assassin....but I kind of feel the warband is more durable....

So my last list had draigo, 2 units of 6 paladins and 2 GKSS of 10 and one unit of purifers of 6. While they all did well the paladin did not have enough people to really overwhelm in assault and I need more purifiers for horde lists....So this time I have 10 Terminators....One that will be going in for the kill (they have incinerators) and one that will run around and shot people (probably on the flanks).

The Puriferes will be split into 5 man squads of 1 Hammer, 2/3 Halberds and 2 Psycannons. That will have the rhinos being a mobile gun platform and the other 2 psycannons in the squad shooting at units and vehicles coming in close.

Really my only question is, should I change the warband to a Vindicare Assassin?

Terminators x 10 - 495, 2 Psycannons, Banner, Psybolt 1 Hammer (Halberds and Swords)

Terminators x 10 - 455, 2 Incenerators, Banner, Psybolt, 1 Hammer (Halberds and Swords)

3- Dreadnoughts - 405, 2 TL Auto Cannons, Psybolt Ammo

Grand Master- 210, Rad and Psy grenades, Psybolt ammo

Purifers x 10 - 335, 4 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino

Purifers x 10 - 335, 4 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino

Xeno - 102, Psyker, Power Armor, 3 Skulls, Rad and Psy

Warband - 161, Weapon smith x 2, Warriors (Meltas, 4+ Armor) x 2, Chimera

Looks like a solid list,but a couple of things; footslogging incinerators are virtually useless. Incinerators on a unit in a rhino is pretty awesome since you can drive up and flame someone. Foot terminators, though. Your opponent has to be stupid enough to walk right up to your face. You'll get one, maybe two shots peer game. Plus, you dont want to deny yourself the charge by causing casualties so you might not even want to shoot. Just upgrade to psycannons.

Secondly, swap the psybolt ammo on the GM for defensive grenades, or possibly a servo skull.

And some people will swear by the vindicare, but i diont buy it. He's not.likely to live past the first turn, and cover means that even if he has a 90% chance of penning a land raider its still a tossup. With cover the vindicare only has a roughly 25% chance of popping or immobilizing a LR, give or take. And 3+ cover isnt that good on a t4 2w model. So, yeah.

I do love the Vindicare, but he isn't at his best taking long odds shots against stuff like Land Raiders. He will have as good a chance as anyone in a GK list to pop a LR, but he is better used to pick out key squad leaders or upgrade guys.

If you are really worried about Land Raiders, have you considered making the xeno =I= a ranged attack choice with a conversion beamer sitting in the back field to get S10 AP1? With servo skulls on the board, you should not have to worry about missing for the first few turns at least.

With PA, 3 servo skulls and a conversion beamer, this =I= comes in at 90pts, giving you 12pts to play around with elsewhere.

The beauty of this choice is that unlike the Vindicare who needs to get uncomfortably close to most standard infantry weapons, this =I= should be sitting well outside of 42" so your opponents will need to divert really long range AT firepower to try and deal with him. With 3 psyrifle on the field and all those termies, I find that more often than not, people will find more 'important' things to shoot at, especially if you are aggressive with your termies.

Personally, I would not bother with the warband. Since they need to get really close up and personal to use their meltas, being your only melta unit and riding in a Chimera, at 2.5k, it would be hard to see those guys having a good chance to get close to what you want slagged.

Have you considered switching one of your purifier squads into interceptors?

I think they add some much needed mobility to your average GK list. If you take a 10 men interceptor squad with two hammers and a pair of psycannons, you can combat squad them and shunt them across the field to take shots with psycannons and hope for rending and/or put both hammers in one combat squad and hope they can crack AV14 on the charge.

If you put a hammer on the justicar and the other on a random guy, you can have 5 S10 attacks on the charge if you can get hammerhand off. Add potentially another 4 S7 rending psycannon shots and I think that's probably as good a shot as you are ever going to get with a simple unit from a GK list.

If you are still worried about crowd control, the warband choice I would take is some death cult assassins and crusaders. These guys would rip through crowds easily and can even threaten some hammer units.

Ive found foot gks work amazingly well, as you pack in more guns and cc punch. Their only real disadvatage, how slow they are, is effectively negated by Interceptors, deep strike and scout move or outflanking from the grand master. I love Interceptors.

And, yeah, the vindicare does have his uses. But as youve mentioned, with his shorter range and vulnerability he probably wont last long and I question if killing one, maybe two squad leaders is worth that many points.

If your Vindicare dies after only a round or two, then you are either really unlucky, not using him right, or he has done his job of attracting a disproportionate amount of enemy fire early on, allowing the rest of your army to get into position relatively unharmed.

At 36" range, the Vindicare will be outside of the vast majority of infantry weapons first turn. That means if people are taking him out first turn, they are doing it with their anti-tank guns. These are typically low rate of fire, so good deployment plus the Vindicare's stealth rule should make it very unlikely that your opponent can pick him off without using up a disproportionate amount of his AT firepower. That means your psyrifles and termies get a free pass that turn. Hardly a disaster even if the Vindicare does die.

During the game, the best chance an opponent will have to kill off the vindicare is if he can get a decent sized squad in range and just blast him with enough bolter/lasguns etc to make him fail 2 wounds and/or charge him. But if you are using the rest of your army well, he shouldn't really get that chance till much later if at all.

A vindicare is particularly useful if you want to go all out and not opt to take any swords or warding staves in your squads and/or if you prefer to combat squad.

Most non-dedicated CC units will only have 1 or 2 guys with power weapons or fists. If your termie squad charges in and cannot wipe them out, the 2-6 power weapon/fist swings back can easily take out 2-3 termies/paladins. Even if you do wipe the enemy out with halberts before they can swing, you are left whistling in the wind, ready to be blasted by the enemy's entire army next turn.

A vindicare taking those special weapons out before the charge will make that enemy squad all but harmless against your termies/paladins.

Do that a couple of times and your vindicare has made his points back in saved termies/paladins without even considering the cost of the enemy guys he took out.

Grey knights is a small army, so anything that boosts your unit durability directly or indirectly is good, and the Vindicare can be good at both if used right in addition to his own formidable offensive capabilities.

Average on 4d6 is 12, meaning that your average penetrating roll is 15 AP1.

vindicaire would be my primary anti-tank unit on everything except Wave Serpents.

Thanks for the advice guys. I will consider the Interceptors....that's not a bad idea....

Just to add, if you take the Vindicare, don't forget about pinning. And pinning is a little more useful for him since he will usually be picking off the squad leader, so the remaining guys are testing at one lower.

Don't count on him pinning units, but when he does, it can be really useful, not to mention satisfying.