Nemesis Dreadknight Tactica

Here is my first tactical article on the technical application of the Nemesis Dreadknight (NDK).

First up is how I kit mine:

— Personal Teleporter (PT)
— Heavy Incinerator (HI)







I am not a fan of the sword as it's expensive plus you give up one attack. An NDK with two Doomfists has a base of four attacks and five on the charge. The NDK is WS5 so he is hitting most units on a 3+ which is good enough for me. They can pound the heck out of armor in melee since they are monstrous creatures (2d6 armor penetration coupled with S7 via Hammerhand) and should be able to take out a five man squad of Marines in no more than two rounds of melee. Versus a razorspam army an NDK can quickly roll up an entire flank - pops transports with your psyflemen and psycannons while your NDK eats whatever spills out.

I have always outflanked my NDK - nothing on the table can hide from his HI template the turn he arrives by using his shunt move... 30" onto the table from either short edge plus another 12" to place the template plus another 8" for the template. That's a total distance of 50" ! Therefore the NDK can always cover more than the length of the table (roughly 70 percent) in one turn with the HI template. If you're playing against an army with lots of mech it's fairly easy to drop the HI template across the rear sides of two vehicles. I remember one game versus Imperial Guard when my NDK destroyed a squadron of two Leman Russ using this tactic. Sure the dice were very hot but it can happen. The NDK was shot off the table the following turn but he had left a big mark with two smoking craters. This tactic is also useful if you need to dig out a heavily entrenched enemy troop such as dark eldar Warriors.

Another tactic I have used with the NDK is to use his shunt move to cut off an assault from an enemy unit versus my Paladins or Grey Knight terminators. The NDK has a huge base so it's quite easy to position him in such a manner as to completely block off another friendly unit from the enemy charge arc. This tactic buys you some much needed extra time and helps to ensure your Paladins, Grey Knight terminators or a squad of Purifiers will be able to charge the following turn rather than be charged. I used this tactic once to prevent a large squad of Death Company mounted in a Blood Angels Stormraven from assaulting my Paladins. The next turn my Librarian successfully cast Quicksilver and the Paladins cut down the entire squad of enemy Death Company.

Returning to the topic of options (wargear) you can spend lots and lots of points on an NDK such as including a gatling heavy psilencer as a second weapon. Sure the big gun looks really cool but as I said in the beginning I just stick with the personal teleporter and heavy incinerator - he costs almost as much as a landraider equipped as such and to me there is no need to tack on any more unnecessary points. The personal teleporter while very expensive is a must have - a walking NDK will be shot off the table more often than not before he can launch one assault. If you are going to spend all those points it's worth it to take the teleporter as it makes the NDK much more of a big threat, which is exactly what you want.

Typically I will only ever use at most one NDK and that is only for games at 2500 points or more. The NDK is situational at best while psyflemen always tend to do well and are roughly half the cost each - so you can almost afford to take two psyflemen in place of one NDK. An NDK can make for some exciting moments in a game though so there is always that potential. Versus armies such as lance heavy dark eldar the NDK has a very short predicted life span on the table - the enemy will quickly blast him into a pulp from a position of safe range and there's not much you can do to prevent it either. Sometimes the NDK is nothing more than expensive fire magnet drawing enemy firepower away from the rest of your army so in my opinion the NDK is more of a fun unit to play as opposed to a really competitive melee beast. Sure there are times he will shine but there will probably be more times when he comes and goes just as quickly.

Taking my Mordrak list to 1850

All right I have been playing my Mordrak list exclusively at 1500 points as of late. For whatever reason all the tournaments lately have been 1500 points. The one coming up at the end of this month is 1850 however and I am looking to take my 1500 point list to 1850. My 1500 list is:

Mordrak + 3 Ghost Knights w/Halberds

Librarian w/Homer, Rift, Shrouding, Sanctuary & Might

5 Termies 4 w/Halberds 1 w/Hammer Psycannon

10 Man Strike Squad Halberd 2 x Psycannon Psybolt Ammo

Storm Raven w/TLLC & TLMM

Dreadnought w/ 2 x TLAC & Psybolt Ammo

Dread Knight w/Great Sword & Heavy Incinerator

My 1500 point list has been doing great going 9-1 at the last three tournies. (Would be undefeated by I had a cranial - rectal inversion in my last game.) Now I could just add some purifiers or some more dreads but I don't like spamming units and am trying to actually have some theme to my army. I envision this list as a planetary assault force led by Mordrak. Everything either needs to deep strike in or ride in a Raven. Thus only one dread. I could put purifiers in the Raven but that is usually the command group's ride. I very rarely deep strike Mordrak and his men. Thus I am left with a couple of options either more termies, strikes or interceptors. After thinking about it I am going to add a ten man squad of interceptors. My reasons are 1) they actually can move fast which other than the raven everything is very slow in my army once it lands. 2) I can make them scoring if I need to using the grand strategy and 3) If I do deep strike Mordrak first turn their 30" move allows them to support his group.
All right I will have a ten man squad with justicar w/hammer and 2 x psycannons. Here is where I could use some opinions. I have 60 points left over after this. I have come up with two trains of thought on how to use these. The first is give the interceptors psybolt ammo and add a heavy psycannon to the knight or give Mordrak another buddy. I like this because it makes my two big squads have strength 5 stormbolters which are good for applying wounds to meqs and mowing down horde orks (which we seem to have a lot of around here). I could go either way on the extra termie or the heavy psycannon I will have to get some practice in to see which I like better.

The second option is to drop the psybolt ammo on the strikes and add a personal teleporter to the Knight. I would probably tack the other five points on to the strikes to get their justicar a hammer. I like this idea because it gives me another fast unit to complement the interceptors. Plus I could also use this with the interceptors and a first turn Mordrak deep strike to really put some pressure on an enemies weak spot or flank. Three units basically deep striking in with out deviating could really put a crimp in an opponent's plans and put him on the defensive. If am able to give the knight and the interceptors scout I could basically move 42" on the first turn and lay a lot of shooting on my opponent plus they would then have a bunch of angry silver men to deal with on the next turn. Coupled with a turboing Raven filled with termies I could in theory overwhelm a flank before my opponent could mount an adequate response.

Well there are my two trains of thought. Just wondering what you guys think. Would appreciate and comments or constructive criticism.

Knock-Off Companies - Good or Bad?

Ok - a little discussion around something that I'm seeing a lot of lately.   There seems to have been an upsurge in people who are making knock off copies of GW products.   I'm sure many of us have seen the websites that offer "Forgeworld" products for a fraction of the prices of the real thing.    Prices almost too good to be true.  Most of these seem to be from China - who is well known for having little regard for copy right laws or others intellectual properties.

I have heard several views on this.  It's a great deal.  Good products and a great price.  GW price gouges us and is a terrible company to it's loyal customer base.  The list of reasons why it's a good thing goes on and on.   The guys doing this are probably just a few talented folks that want to make a buck, and live in a dirt poor part of the world.

But I am concerned about what the impact of this is on the people who make our games.  Let's say it's GW- my personal favorite.   Games Workshop is in business to make money.  Period.  I'm sure they love games and gamers - are probably gamers themselves - and aren't out to "exploit" their fanbase.  But they company has to make money.  No money - no reason to be in business - no hobby for us to play.   They invest a lot of money in their intellectual property.   Let's face it - almost no other company has the pagentry and story lines that the Games Workshop universe offers.   How many total Black Library books have they published to date.   Their investment in their products is far from insignificant.

So to me it seems unfair that they have no way of protecting this with the bootleggers.   I personally think it is wrong for the knockoffs.   At the end of the day though - they stay in business because we - the gaming community-support them.   We look at the short term that we get to save a couple bucks - and forget the long term that the company that is REALLY making the product - has to make money to keep making the product.

As gamers, we have to make our choices on where we get our stuff.  I try to support the local stores as much as possible.  Without them I don't have a place to play and a distributor of the stuff I want to buy.   That's my personal choice.   I encourage each of us to think about the impacts of where we spend our hobby dollars beyond just the best deal you can get.

Thoughts?

Adepticon 2012

So - Adepticon planning has begun for the Blade and Bolter Boys.  Something new for us this year - after three years of Ultramarines in the team tourney.  The Team Tourney is the main reason that we attend Adepticon - a ton of fun with good friends.  Nothing against the rest of the tournament - but the Team is something special.   We've been in the top 5 last two years - but still missed out on any of the awards.  So close - but still so far away.

Anyone else going and have you started planning already?