Black knights any use?

[Malakithe]

Black Knights any use? Nope..../endthread

[Gothmaug]

Did you see the soulblight gravelord article today? See according to GW's experts, black knights are "Durable and Hard Hitting elites"😂🤣😂. I guess I should sideline my blood knights, and break out the black knights again.....😉

 

From todays article:

"On the battlefield, Soulblight Gravelord armies often comprise large infantry units that are incredibly tough to destroy due to their refusal to stay dead, as your Vampires and Necromancers replenish lost troops using Necromantic wizardry.* Wight infantry and cavalry in the form of Grave Guard and Black Knights offer the army durable, hard-hitting elite options, while Dire Wolves and Fell Bats surge ahead of the main army to pick off vulnerable or isolated units."

[Doko]

Yep a save of 5 is durable and 0,0000 rend damage is hard hitting.

I guess my black knigths are the poor version of the dude who written that article....

[JackStreicher]

31 minutes ago, Gothmaug said:

Black Knights offer the army durable, hard-hitting elite options

Seems like they forgot to actually write such a Warscroll 🤣🤣

[InvkrMainr]

I asked the guy who tested SGLs and this was his thoughts:

 

 

I do really miss the lance rule though

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

31 minutes ago, InvkrMainr said:

I asked the guy who tested SGLs and this was his thoughts:

 

 

I do really miss the lance rule though

I just find them so hard to put in lists when they are not battleline. In theory, I am not against including a fast unit of 5 summonables that does a few mortals, fights a bit and dies. At least that way, I can be fairly sure I have something to summon with Endless Legions fairly quickly. But in most of my recent lists I just don't have room for them. It's not like I can decide to swap out a unit of Direwolves for a unit of Black Knights outside Legion of Blood.

[AHexInScarletRed]

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I just find them so hard to put in lists when they are not battleline. In theory, I am not against including a fast unit of 5 summonables that does a few mortals, fights a bit and dies. At least that way, I can be fairly sure I have something to summon with Endless Legions fairly quickly. But in most of my recent lists I just don't have room for them. It's not like I can decide to swap out a unit of Direwolves for a unit of Black Knights outside Legion of Blood.

You can hypothetically play them instead of Dire Wolves in Kastelai. If you field like a block of Skeletons or Zombies and 2 Units of Blood Knights - which is likely - Battleline is taken care of, so you can freely choose the rest. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

1 minute ago, AHexInScarletRed said:

You can hypothetically play them instead of Dire Wolves in Kastelai. If you field like a block of Skeletons or Zombies and 2 Units of Blood Knights - which is likely - Battleline is taken care of, so you can freely choose the rest. 

Good catch! Might be worth considering in that case. They compete with Vargheists in Kastelai, though, which benefit more from the allegiance abilities of that subfaction.

[AHexInScarletRed]

9 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Good catch! Might be worth considering in that case. They compete with Vargheists in Kastelai, though, which benefit more from the allegiance abilities of that subfaction.

I'm on the fence about what goes into the list, anyway. Vhordrai, a Coven Throne (given it can use its CA multiple times a turn), a big block or Skeletons/Zombies and two units of Blood Knights seem like the best core Kastelai can build around, but to me, there's no other auto-include apart from that, but there's still like 400 pts left. Wolves, Vargheists, Bats or a cheap hero on foot accompanying the Horde all seem like good options. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

1 minute ago, AHexInScarletRed said:

I'm on the fence about what goes into the list, anyway. Vhordrai, a Coven Throne (given it can use its CA multiple times a turn), a big block or Skeletons/Zombies and two units of Blood Knights seem like the best core Kastelai can build around, but to me, there's no other auto-include apart from that, but there's still like 400 pts left. Wolves, Vargheists, Bats or a cheap hero on foot accompanying the Horde all seem like good options. 

Yeah, I checked the points for this list when you mentioned it:

• Vhordrai
• Coven Throne/Vengorian Lord
• 2x5 Blood Knights
• One big infantry block (probably skeletons if you want something defensive)

That really seems like the minimum you would want for a Blood Knight list.

I'm not so sure on the coven throne right now, by the way. It already seems like a unit will only be able to receive one command per phase, but I suspect we will also see a rule that units may only issue one command per phase. If that happens, the Coven Throne becomes a little less valuable again (although it's still quite good).

 

 

[Honk]

On 6/10/2021 at 4:37 PM, Gothmaug said:

See according to GW's experts

I suppose there are fluff writers, that think about what a unit wants to be and how great it is and how many points it should cost.

then there is the rule smith, who writes the Warscrolls. Sadly he only has a thumbnail of the model to work with.

 

But maybe 🤔 they find a spot within the core battalions 🧐 

[Reinholt]

The core problem with black knights, after a bit more tinkering, is this:

1. Can they screen, with the new coherency rules? Yes! Unfortunately, so can Dire Wolves, and so far those have been more effective, even with the coherency rules, because you just want more wounds and both have garbage tier saves.
2. Can they hit hard? I mean, no, honestly, just, no. If you want that, Dire Wolves again spam cheap attacks or you can just take Blood Knights and actually do the thing.
3. Can they move fast and/or deploy from off board? Yes, in many cases... but why not just take Vargheists?

I think the core issue is that given how weak their save and hitting ability is, they can do many of these things but we have better options in our book to do the exact same thing. It's not a unit that is useless in the grand sense but it is useless in the relative value sense, unfortunately. They either need a new warscroll (unlikely), a white dwarf update to give them a dynasty/faction bonus (more possible, especially if a wight/necromancer subfaction were created in WD in Gloomspite style updates), or they need a major points drop (most likely, I suppose, as if they went down to under 100 now they actually might be worth it).

Right now it is 120 points for 10 wounds with a 5+ and they hit like a wet noodle. The only real upside is the mobility. It's just not worth the points for no output and no save vs. our other units. Dire wolves are 135 for 20 wounds on a 5+ and Blood Knights hit like a truck. Even Vargheists are 155 for 12 wounds on a 5+ with way more damage output. I just don't see the niche for Black Knights until the points hit 100 or less.

[Sception]

IMO the big problem is the impact mortals on the charge.  It's not a great rule, and it seems way overvalued.  No fixing that until they get a new warscroll, which is probably 3 to 5 years away, maybe more.  Until then, they're just a non-unit.  Even wight kings have more going for them, if only as a tax for double-reinforced battleline grave guard.

[Evil Bob]

On 6/10/2021 at 10:37 AM, Gothmaug said:

Did you see the soulblight gravelord article today? See according to GW's experts, black knights are "Durable and Hard Hitting elites"😂🤣😂. I guess I should sideline my blood knights, and break out the black knights again.....😉

 

Seriously, I treat all Warhammer Community articles like 1950s wartime news reels.  “Entertainment” with accidental facts sometimes included.

[Andalf]

They seem pretty clearly intended to play into a Neferata list and if they were any better Legion of Blood would potentially be OP if you ask me.  For 725pts my battle line and Mortarch are covered, I have 3 MW missiles to play around and can clog up enemy deployment to get good spots for my two Blood Knight squads.  The Wight King dropping reroll ones on 15 black Knights in the hero phase and then all out defence plus Neferata’s CA and warscroll spell makes that block almost impossible to drop in one turn, and unlike skeleton and zombie squads I don’t need to worry about whether I get them stuck in on an objective I need them to be on.  This is a list:

Neferata

Wight King Mounted

Vengorian Lord

3 x 5 Black Knights

2 x 5 Blood Knights

1 x 15 Black Knights

There’s 125 points for battalions or spells left, maybe some fell bats.  I’m 90% sure this list dies immediately in AoS2.0 but I’m interested to see how list building mechanics and the terrain/scenario rules might do it some favours.

 

[Grimoriano]

15 minutes ago, Andalf said:

They seem pretty clearly intended to play into a Neferata list and if they were any better Legion of Blood would potentially be OP if you ask me.  For 725pts my battle line and Mortarch are covered, I have 3 MW missiles to play around and can clog up enemy deployment to get good spots for my two Blood Knight squads.  The Wight King dropping reroll ones on 15 black Knights in the hero phase and then all out defence plus Neferata’s CA and warscroll spell makes that block almost impossible to drop in one turn, and unlike skeleton and zombie squads I don’t need to worry about whether I get them stuck in on an objective I need them to be on.  This is a list:

Neferata

Wight King Mounted

Vengorian Lord

3 x 5 Black Knights

2 x 5 Blood Knights

1 x 15 Black Knights

There’s 125 points for battalions or spells left, maybe some fell bats.  I’m 90% sure this list dies immediately in AoS2.0 but I’m interested to see how list building mechanics and the terrain/scenario rules might do it some favours.

 

I agree with, I like the new Black Knights, an msu army of them can make multiple charges for multiple mw. 

[Mcprowlington]

With unit coherency changes they aren't quite as laughable as they used to be. My big problem was that Dire wolves were twice as durable while doing the same damage, but now that dire wolves will only be able to actually safely attack with 5 models, atleast black knights do double the damage to compensate for having half the defensive value. The amount of units we have access to that have 2 inch range is also extremely limited so there's that. 

They're still pretty bad, but a little less so. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

I'll quote my post from the other thread here, because it's pertinent:

On 6/21/2021 at 11:04 AM, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Here are some thoughts I have had on using bravery bombs in AoS 3:

Right off the bat 🦇: I think bravery bomb lists are still bad, but a bravery bomb unit might be able to do some work. I think building your whole list around bravery is not good because it's just too match up dependent. Worst case, you go up agains OBR and your bravery bombs just do nothing. But even outside of that extreme case, there are a lot of armies where hitting them with battleshock is just not that good.

However, if you can fit a bravery bomb into an otherwise normal list for cheap, it becomes a potentially very valuable tool. Some units absolutely hate being hit with battleshock. In general, these will be multi-wound elite units like Blightkings, Ogors or Stormcast. Putting a unit into your list to potentially mess up those units as a best-case is probably worth it, even if the worst-case of your opponent just being battleshock immune across the board is pretty bad.

There are actually not a lot of options in Gravelords that really interact with bravery. Legion of Blood is a stand out, making an extra 1d3 models flee if your opponent suffers battleshock. The Soul-Crushing Contempt command trait (-1 bravery aura) is also found in this lineage. Other than that, there is the Coven Throne spell, which checks against bravery and makes the opponent unable to attack if they fail, and the spell Spirit Gale from the Lore of Vampires, which makes you roll 2d6 and deal mortal wounds equal to how much you beat to the opponent's bravery by. Of course, Gravelords also get -1 to bravery for each Deathrattle and Deadwalker unit within 3 of an opponent (up to -2) and there is now the option of including the Horrorghast endless spell to turn off Inspiring Presence and make an additional 1d3 units flee from battleshock.

I think there is one fairly nice combo you can consider for Legion of Blood, which is a Wight King on Steed with Soul-Crushing Contempt and a unit of Black Knights. The Wight King is Deathrattle, so if you get him an the Black Knights into an opponent, that's -3 bravery right there. The Black Knight mortals on charge help with getting in those extra wounds to trigger battleshock. Against Bravery 7, even one model dying will result losses to battleshock for the opponent 50% of the time, which will result in at least two models fleeing.

This combo is just 250 points, so it does not break the bank. It requires the Wight King to be general, but that's not the worst option in a Legion of Blood list, because you might well want to make Grave Guard battleline. You can spend another 65 points to bring the Horrorghast to make this combo more reliable and potent, but you will need a wizard nearby to use it (or make the Wight King a wizard).

Overall, I think this is a fairly nice use for a min-size unit of Black Knights and the Wight King. I would not feel bad running it in a Legion of Blood list.

[Jaxler]

The problem is that they're a unit that does nothing. Their dps is bad, their toughness is really bad, and they are too expensive. The book already has a plethora of reasonably priced low dps chaff. Zombies cover lots of area, have consistent (if low) mortal wound output. Dire wolves are good fast tar pits with enough wounds to take a good hit. Skeletons are sturdier in theory. 

Basically, black knights have no purpose. Even of they were 80-100 points, (which, even then, they'd be questionable) they'd feel bad. They do nothing save sit there quickly. That isn't useless, but like, the book is spoiled for options in that regard. Black knights need a proper role, but they just don't. 

Edited June 25, 2021 by Jaxler

[Avatar Rage]

Pop em as battle line in a legion of blood army with blood knights as support.

Then you got yourself a nice little cavalry army.

[Gery81]

Black Knights and a mounted WK is the best tool in a Deathrattle themed army to keep Mannfred honest. 4 min squads of BKs and the WK is a potential 5d3 mortals after the charge. You can add some more with making the WK a wizard and load up on Arcane missiles too

Edited June 27, 2021 by Gery81

[Reinholt]

6 hours ago, Avatar Rage said:

Pop em as battle line in a legion of blood army with blood knights as support.

Then you got yourself a nice little cavalry army.

The problem with this is that you can just use the Blood Knights themselves as the battle line in a Kastelai army, or if you go Vyrkos, use the also fast Dire Wolves to get more output and wounds.

 

@Jaxler mentioned it above, but the problem is there is nothing they can do that something else doesn't do better, and when you look at their specific package, it's not worth the points in comparison. Unless I literally do not have enough points for any other unit and 100% need the speed, I'd always rather have Dire Wolves or Blood Knights. Now, in the niche case where they were the same cost as the Deathrattle on foot (after four GHBs of GW moving the points down in very small increments), I would likely take one unit (maybe two depending on the meta and need for blocking gribblies) for screening and objective grabbing, as well as potentially fulfilling movement based VP conditions in AoS 3.0. But that would be because they have reached sub-100 throw away points levels.

 

Which sucks, because they are cool and I want to use them. Unfortunately, I just can't find the niche in the current army, especially when for ~50% more I can get Blood Knights which are about 500% more awesome.

Edited June 27, 2021 by Reinholt

[Andalf]

You’re exactly correct about it Reinholt, they are that good at 195 points I think.  I wouldn’t count on Black Knights going down to compensate either when you see every Soulblight list packing 10+ of them.  It’s just another obvious ‘nerf-this-to-oblivion’ sign posted by the creators of a relatively shallow FOMO pecking order of operations.  Everybody who bought more than 10 of these things on release is going to be joining the chorus of rape-whistles @ the next GHB when they go to 230 points, justifiably or not.

I would suggest to you that you try the units that you feel are ‘cool’ even if the internet or your warhammer-spidey-senses tell you otherwise.  It’s the little things with this unit, and if you can get one of those little factors to turn up, using the 6” auto charge, managing to juice more than one D3 MW, yeah we know Dire Wolves take up more space, but they don’t take some of the natural buffs as well.  I’ve been using them with the rumoured changes and they honestly aren’t that much different in affect/output to the Dawnriders that I also use all the time.  They require tactics and actual table top situations to thrive, not the made up fantasy settings I keep hearing people stuffing them into.

Edited June 27, 2021 by Andalf

[Liquidsteel]

I was literally going to say the same thing in the other thread, I will go to 10 and then probably 20, however only after I've painted all the rest.

And I do believe that they will see an increase at the Winter FAQ, but 20 should still be workable if that's the list you're going for, you probably just drop a unit of fel bats or something.

 

[JackStreicher]

tbh, Blood Knights are good on their own. They only become really good if you pump a ton of Command Points into them ^^