vs Lamenters

This week I played against an army I've seen around the club for years, but that I've never had the pleasure to play against until now. The Grey Knights took to the field against the unluckiest of Chapters, the Lamenters!

My opponent was a lovely dude who I've seen around a lot. His group typically plays narrative games and I've never really mixed with them before. However, a couple weeks back, the Lamenters player approached me on a Thursday night and asked if I wanted to get a game in. I said, sure! I've never played against Blood Angels, let alone this specific successor. I knew that the Blood Angels had received an update recently and that I'd have to be facing Combat Doctrines and a host of abilities I couldn't predict. To my surprise, my opponent let me know that he was nervous to face me; he'd heard about my games at LVO with pre-RotD Grey Knights and he was intimidated! I felt very humbled.

When we met up, we jumped right into it.

My opponent brought a ton of Primaris bodies, which always makes act like a cat on hot bricks. He had a Redemptor (oof, so many AP-2 shots in turn one), Stalker Intercessors (Imperial Fists flashbacks), Eliminators (God damn them), and six Aggressors. This really bothered me! He also had a ton of Rievers, a Death Company Dread, Jumpy Dudes with plasma and bolter loadouts, and a Librarian Dreadnought. He talked a big game about the Libby Dread, stressing the thing's speed and melee effectiveness, enough so that I thought, "alright, I need to kill that guy immediately."

I wanted to try something new. This was my first game in the wild* with the new Psychic Awakening rules and I felt like mixing some things up. I brought my typical Terminator battalion and my ten-man Paladin bomb, but I decided I was going to deep strike my Dreadknights today. This required some shifting of my list so I could attach the Dreadknight Teleporters to my battlesuits, which left me with an awkward 23 points to fill. I threw in a squad of Servitors for screening and called it good.

When I was making this list, I realized something: the two Dreadknights plus the GMNDK only came out to 518 points. With my Paladin bomb, I usually only have the room to add a few characters into the mix to support them. I'd resolved to keep my Paladins on the board so that I could Gate them across the battlefield turn one, so what was I to do with the remaining 482 points? Joyously, I found I could fit two Terminator squads and my Apothecary in deep strike and come in just under 1000 points.

Dreadknight/Terminator bomb. Respect to Lawrence Baker, but fuck the internet's meta lists. Let's try something different.

We settled on playing The Four Pillars from CA19. I secured first turn. He deployed very aggressively.

I deployed very cagey, in contrast. I planned on starting out in Tide of Shadows in case he seized the initiative, but he didn't. So instead I started out in Tide of Convergence. I had a plan.

My Chaplain chanted the Invocation of Focus on my Paladins, and then I gated them across the board. Grand Master Simandus and my yet-unnamed Chaplain stayed in the home base to gain me some CP and switch the Tides if I needed them.

My Paladins touched down just outside my opponent's deployment zone and cast Sanctuary on themselves. In my shooting phase, I popped Psybolt Ammunition on them. In conjunction with Tide of Shadows and the Invocation of Focus, this meant my boys were pumping out 40 S6 AP-2 D2 shots at whatever they felt like. But I opted to split my fire and then I rolled below average. They only killed 4/5 of an Infiltrator squad with 20 shots, but then the other 20 shots killed his Death Company Dreadnought.

That lone Infiltrator is preventing my entire deep stroking force from touching down on in that corner of the table.

On his turn my opponent decided that he absolutely could not let those Paladins live. He emptied a lot of shots into them, but cover and the Redoubtable Defense stratagem meant he only killed one Paladin in his whole shooting phase. I chose not to deny Wings of Sanguinious and then waited for him to move his Libby Dread in. He did, and I was elated. He'd brought my prey right to me.

We took two wounds off the Dreadnought in overwatch, and then my Warding Stave Paladins soaked all of his attacks with Transhuman Physiology and the 3++ that the Warding Stave permits them when coupled with Sanctuary. I didn't lose a single Paladin on the charge. We fought back and obliterated the Libby Dread.

A fun note here: Invocation of Focus gives psi and Nemesis weapons an additional -1 AP, which means that Nemesis Daemon Hammers have AP -4! His Dread didn't even get a save!

On my next turnI dropped in my Dreadknights, my GMNDK, and two Terminator squads on his right flank. I honestly wasn't sure how well these guys were gonna do, but, man, I thought it looked so cool to drop them in like this.

I dropped in my Apothecary with Dynamic Insertion right in the middle of his commanders. In the psychic phase, I first used Inner Fire couple with Psychic Channeling to have my Apothecary assassinate his Ancient with the Blood Angels relic banner that grants everyone around him FNP. Then I switched over to Tide of Escalation and went to town smiting away his Aggressors.

I'm showing this picture again because I need to illustrate something. When my guys first touched down, there were six Aggressors in front of them. After smiting and shooting, there were zero Aggressors. We got through 18 wounds at T5 and however many points that is with almost no difficulty. My opponent made stayed true to his Lamenters and made some particularly unlucky saves against a Gatling Psilencer:

But still. This big deep strike force of mine ruined the foes they encountered. I was very happy with how this plan worked. A guy playing Gaslands at the table next to us leaned over and said, "someone sounds real pleased with their army."

Grey Knight Tactical Note: When casting smite with a squad, the smite can be drawn from any model in the unit. You don't have to choose the closest guy to the enemy. I was able to leverage this so that all of my smites from the Terminators went at the Aggressors, even though the unit might have been closer to those Intercessors on the left in that photo. I've utilized this knowledge to some effect recently and I think it is a surprisingly powerful and subtle piece of tech.

I only made one charge out of deep strike (because we'd killed everything else in charging distance). My Terminators got stuck in this little logjam with some Intercessors for literally the rest of the game. Falchions are nice when they go through, but only having S4 means that a lot of attacks simply don't hit home. His Sanguinary Priest kept reviving the dudes that I was killing, anyway.

Look at how lovely these Rievers are.

Flanking my castle.

On his second turn he deep stroked his Rievers and his Jumpy Dudes. The Rievers failed their charge (to my supreme fortune), and the Jumpy Dudes mostly whiffed their shots. The plasma guys took 3 wounds off of my Ven Dread, by my opponent was reticent to overcharge their shots so they didn't do as much damage as they could've.

Through shooting and fighting he whittled down my Paladin squad to just three guys. I didn't have the CP to spare them this gruesome fate, but honestly these guys had already done their jobs in drawing his focus and eliminating some of his major threats.

Dreadknights moving in to mop up.

In my third turn I opted to use Warp Shaping to switch to the Tide of Fury. So far I've mostly considered this Tide garbage, but I wanted to try it out. My opinion didn't change. I think I got two rerolls out of it for the remainder of the battle round, and only one of those rerolls actually translated into a wound. But who knows, maybe that swung the game for me.

At this point my opponent was in the Assault Doctrine, which was where he wanted to be. Blood Angels get an additional attack in that Doctrine, and I couldn't let those Rievers engage my Dreadknights and tear them apart with a thousand cuts. I moved Squad Fortis in and hacked apart the entire ten man squad of Rievers. I don't care what anybody says, Terminators are awesome.

A combination of smites and lucky bolter fire removed the threat that the Jumpy Dudes posed.

On my opponent's turn three he killed some of my Terminators holding an objective and then moved his Redemptor in to try and finish off the Paladin squad. He only had like seven or eight models left at this point. When his Redemptor was brought down to 1 wound after I fought back, he decided to concede.

Honored Brother Hector never fell, though. His lemon-yellow chassis remained standing.

This was a very fun game and a very reaffirming experience. I have played so long with a substandard army and tried so hard to actually master the rules of the game. In the last year I played at least one game every week, just to get in my reps in and squeeze out whatever tiny advantages the Sons of Titan had. I love my Grey Knights so much and I only want to see them do good. Now that I have some competitive rules the skills I've learned are really shining. I'm very excited to play more games and try out new strategies.

Shoutout to my opponent who is a super fun dude and who has a beautiful army. He free-handed all of the checker patterns and bleeding hearts on his Lamenters, on top of painting an entire force yellow. I'm always pleased to face off against skilled painters.

Bonus Content: My brother (Thousand Sons) was playing at the table next to me and got absolutely dunked on by Harlequins.

*"the wild" just means a game against someone who I haven't known for twenty years.

Simandus vs. Achilraen

Ritual of the Damned: What it means for me

Pretty much every other Grey Knights player has already written a blogpost or done a video review of the GK content from Ritual of the Damned. I've been hesitant because I am not a huge fan of speculative theory-crafting and I hadn't yet gotten a chance to play many games with the new rules. That, and I knew that the FAQ for RotD was going to change a few things in the book. But at this point I've gotten a few reps in and the FAQ released just this morning, so I'm ready to discuss what these rules mean for me!

I'm going to go through all of the new content bit by bit, so this might end up being a long post. I'm not going to talk about how competitive these rules are -- that has been covered to death elsewhere. Instead, I'm going to talk about how these rules change my army in particular, and how I'm going to use them.

TL;DR: I really enjoy these new rules and I am stoked for Grey Knights in the future.

Swarmed by Genestealers

Masters of the Warp

This is the big new rule. As long as your army is entirely Grey Knights (with the exception of an Inquisitor in there), then just before the first battle round you choose which Tide of the Warp will take effect. These Tides are essentially our equivalent of Combat Doctrines, giving us bonuses just for playing. The main difference here, and I think this is important, is that Tides don't just change for free, like Doctrines. The only way to shift to a new Tide is by casting the spell Warp Shaping. What this means is that I have to purposefully change my strategy based on the situation, and if I change it to the wrong thing then I might be fucked. Further, my opponent can effect whether or not I even get to change Tides. They could deny me when I try to cast Warp Shaping, or they could just snipe the psyker who knows the power. Then I'm stuck in whatever Tide I was in. This might seem like a downside, but I actually really like it! It makes it so I have to be careful, I have to plan appropriately. If I misstep then my strategy can fall apart, unlike Combat Doctrines where I just get bonuses for playing the game.

Anyway, the Tides of the Warp are all around great bonuses that will really alter how I play. There are four total:

Tide of Fury
This Tide is simple enough: Infantry units can reroll 1s to wound in the fight phase. It's fine, but I honestly can't see myself using it too often. Despite my greatest efforts, I just don't get my boys into combat as often as I'd like. 9" charges are just so unreliable, and we tend to get shot a lot while we're trudging up to the front lines. If this were my only option, sure, I'd love it. But the other Tides are just so appealing.

Tide of Convergence
Add 1 to the Strength and Damage of psi weapons. Meh. I don't use psi weapons on my infantry all that much, and it would be very difficult for me to commit to this one for my Dreadknights who are only hitting on 4s with their Psilencers (I just remembered this only applies to Infantry, so, fuck this whole Tide). If I ever used Purgation squads I might go for it, but I just don't use power armored GK. I'm a Terminator guy. Someday I might have enough psi weapons that I'll feel motivated to do this, but not today. When this might really be appealing is when I drop my Paladin bomb and use Psybolt Ammunition to turn all their storm bolters into psi weapons. 40 shots at S6 AP-1 D2 sounds rad! Fuck Primaris Marines!

Tide of Shadows
Hell yeah. Here's that sweet, sweet defensive boost my Terminators have been looking for. While this Tide is active, my GK always count as being in cover. On top of that, while they are actually in cover, attacks against them receive -1 to hit. This is just too good. I think I am always going to start in this Tide, and switch to the others when I need to. AP-1 has always been my bane. I played a game against Black Templars recently where my Paladins got shot by a full Crusader squad of 20 angry boys. When I rolled saves, I only took one wound. Terminator armor! But then my opponent reminded me that he was in the Assault Doctrine, and that all of those bolt pistol shots had AP-1. So... that roll translated into six failed saves, or two dead Paladins. The same goes for Aggressors in the Tactical Doctrine. AP0 to AP-1 is such a huge blow to my survivability, so always having cover and regaining my 2+ save is a tremendous advantage. I am looking forward to my Terminators feeling nigh indestructible again. In fact, I'd probably never leave the Tide of Shadows if it weren't for the last option.

Tide of Escalation
Smites do +1 damage. Fuck yes.

1+ saves, -1 to being hit. 1 CP to reduce incoming damage by 1. Tell me Terminators are bad now, internet.

Stratagems

Transhuman Physiology
2 CP when unit is targeted. That unit can only be wounded on a 4-6. God, I've been waiting for this. S8 weapons just flatten my Terminators, and I'm real excited to be able cut the effectiveness of tanks in half. Against lascannons and Eldar tanks, it's essentially giving a Terminator squad of mine T8 for a whole phase. More survivability for my boys, yes please.

Masters of Combat
2 CP when a Paladin squad is targeted in the fight phase. If any Paladins die, those Paladins can fight before I remove them (assuming they haven't already fought). I can't see myself using this all the time, because my Paladins are usually the ones doing the charging and thus fighting first. But it will be a good tool to have in my back pocket in case I get charged by the dreaded Eldar jetbike Autarch Achilraen.

Vengeance of the Machine Spirit
2 CP, a Land Raider or Stormraven can auto-explode. This will be great if I ever choose to field my Stormraven again. More often than not, I fly my Stormraven into my opponent's backline chock-full of Paladins, and then my opponent pops it. At least now I'll be able to punish them for doing that.

Overwhelming Assault
1 CP, a Dreadknight gets +1A and can reroll wounds of 1 and reroll damage rolls for a fight phase. This will be cool on my dude with two Dreadfists who I like to throw up into my opponent's face turn one. Seven attacks that reliably do 2 damage and wound on 2s against most things is nothing to sneeze at. I can also see using this on my GMNDK all of the goddamn time.

*Gundam Wing theme*

Dynamic Insertion
Hell yes. 1 CP, a Grey Knights unit can deep strike 3" away from enemy units. They can't charge after that, but this is going to be an incredibly useful stratagem that I will use almost every single game. Even beyond the obvious combo with Powerful Adept and the spell Inner Fire, this will allow me to throw Terminators onto objectives almost anywhere I wish. The flexibility with this is insane. It will change my whole mindset. I spend so much time visualizing 9" bubbles around enemy units -- it's going to take some time to readjust that. Also? This will absolutely fuck with a savvy opponent. They are going to have to be a lot tighter with their screening. The only big downside to this strat is that it sounds like a sex joke.

Bring Down the Beast
2 CP, if a Grey Knight shoots a unit, every other Grey Knight can reroll shots against that unit for the rest of the phase. I've yet to apply this, but I am so stoked for when I find the primo opportunity for it. I'm imagining my BroCap slapping a Rhino with 4 storm bolter shots and then everyone else just fucking tearing it apart with bolter fire.

Big Guns Never Tire
1 CP, a vehicle can ignore the penalties for moving and firing Heavy weapons. Meh. I'll never use this. My vehicles only ever have like three heavy weapons, max. I'll just reroll a missed hit with a CP.

Fury of the Proven
1 CP, a Terminator unit adds 1 to their hit rolls. GOD, my Paladins are going to just crush everything.

Powerful Adept
1 CP, add 6" to the range of psychic powers for one psyker. I can see this being important for smites in niche situations, but it will be very handy for character sniping with Purge Soul. Also the obvious combo with Inner Fire and Dynamic Insertion.

Duty Eternal
1 CP, a targeted Dreadnought halves all damage from incoming attacks for the rest of the phase. I was really excited for this one when it came out in the Space Marines Codex, but I haven't actually used it. My VenDread is usually tucked away and so isn't targeted by multi-damage weapons a lot. Thunderfire Cannons and deep striking infantry come at him most, and those all do 1 damage. I'll be playing against Harlequins in a couple weeks, so I'm sure Honored Brother Ewan will be thankful for this strat against their fusion pistols.

Fight on the Move
1 CP, an Interceptor can fall back and still shoot and charge. Pass. I don't play with power armored GK.

Empyric Surge
1 CP, after a Psyker casts a spell, all GK psykers within 6" add 1 to their psychic checks. This has proven to be a nice little buff on my Paladin/Character hate ball that falls from deep strike. Pop this after an easy spell and then enjoy all my other spells being +2 to cast.

Redoubtable Defense
1 or 2 CP, a targeted Terminator unit of 5 or 6+ models reduces incoming damage by 1. I am all about all of these bonuses to Terminator survivability. I'm just thinking of autocannons and plasma guns and Derek's fucking multi-damage snipers on his characters. Or the claws of my brother's Thousand Sons Daemons Prince. It will basically make them all have to apply twice the firepower to kill a single squad. And against Paladins? Oof. Yes.

Steady Advance
1 CP, a Grey Knights infantry unit can benefit from Bolter Discipline as if it stood still or some bullshit like that. Terminators always benefit from Bolter Discipline, so this was a waste of text for me. Next.

Untainted and Unbowed
1 CP, Purifiers get a 4++ and can't fail morale. PAGK? Still one wound on those guys, right? Pass.

Preternatural Senses
1 CP, Purgation Squad can overwatch on 4s. Sure, if they were even alive by the time they were charged.

Inquisitor, Brotherhood Champion, and Paladin Squad

Dominus Discipline

A new Discipline! Six whole new powers! This is tremendous because of how many psykers I run (all of them), and how often I run out of powers to cast. Dominus powers can only be taken by characters, however, which means I have to be careful when and how I employ them. Honestly, I will probably only take two or three of these new powers in each game. Some of which I'll even need to double up on. This leaves the jobs of casting Sanctuary and Gate to my Terminator squads, which is fine. That's what they were doing anyway.

Warp Shaping
WC 5, change the active Tide. This is obviously essential. I am thinking that I want this on two character each game, my BroCap and someone else. Probably my Chaplain. If I lose this power in a battle, I lose a tremendous amount of flexibility and strength. Doubling up will be important. The BroCap can always smite if the Chaplain is still around.

Armoured Resilience
WC 6, a GK Infantry unit in  12" gets a -1 to wound shield. Hello, Paladins. Here's some more protection. God, it is almost ridiculous how many buffs I can give them. Let's do some quick thinking: Sanctuary, Hammerhand, Armoured Resilience, Fury of the Proven, Redoubtable Defense, and maybe Transhuman Physiology. This is, admittedly, 3 spells and 3-5 CP spent on a single unit for a single round, but I would like to see anything try and kill them or avoid being killed by them with all these buffs stacking. Maybe I'll ask to fight Matthew's Knights just to see how my Paladins do.

Ethereal Manipulation
WC 7, a GK unit within 6" can reroll hits in the shooting phase against targets with half range. Honestly, I don't see myself ever giving someone this power, not when there's others like Warp Shaping or Empyrean Domination that I absolutely need. I'll always have a Grand Mear units that I want to reroll, anyway. I can deal with missing all my 2s.

Edict Imperator
WC 7, a GK unit within 12" can shoot and then move, but can't shoot or charge later in the phase. More mobility! This is going to be a fun power to use. Often times I face the problem of my Dreadknights just not getting up the field fast enough. This lets them move up 8" closer and then tuck themselves away in cover, benefitting from Tide of Shadows. I just need to think of a character to give them that. Maybe a Librarian?

Empyrean Domination
WC 7, get a CP. Always. Use this always, all the time. Every turn. Why am I even still talking about this?

Inner Fire
WC 5, do a fuckton of mortal wounds to an enemy within 1" (or 7" with Powerful Adept). This is such a cool power. Psychic assassins are going to be a mainstay of my army now. Apothecary with a Nemesis daemon hammer dropping in 3" away with Dynamic Insertion and annihilating whatever he wants. Y'all best be surrounding your HQs with at least five solid inches of bodies.

Hide your Captains, hide your Chaos Lords.

Relics of Titan

Blade of the Forsworn
A unique Nemesis force sword. Bonus to Strength, consistent 3 Damage, and ignores the invulns of daemons. I can't see this one being useful a whole lot, but I will probably give it to Grand Master Simandus sometimes and flavor it as the Blade of Doom Mons. Daemon Princes can be a real pain in my ass, especially when they're Tzeentch flavored and they have a 3++. This sword will allow Simandus to really wreck their shit.

Sanctic Shard
Add 1 to psychic tests, and reroll psychic tests. This is often paraded as the best relic in the book, and it's really hard to argue that. I'll probably end up giving this to some of my backline characters who are casting Warp Shaping or Empyrean Domination. A Grand Master with this and the Lore Master Warlord Trait can just do both of those things, and let my VenDread reroll ones. Actually, that may be something to consider. He could do a good job of protecting Honored Brother Ewan from pesky deep strikers, as well. Hmm. I like this thought.

Augurium Scrolls
Nemesis weapons within 6" get additional hits on 6s. Seems good, I suppose, but the only place where a character with a relic will be is deep striking with my Paladins, and I can't think of a single time where I've thought, "God, if only my Paladins had more attacks."

Stave of Supremecy
It's a Nemesis warding stave that makes enemy psykers Perils on doubles. I don't think I've ever seen an opponent Perils on a spell. There aren't a whole lot of psyker-heavy armies in our local meta, beyond me and my brother's Thousand Sons. I'm usually fine with just denying their spells the old fashioned way. It could be worse, though. It could be the Liber Daemonica, arguably the worst fucking relic in the game.

Artisan Nullifier Matrix
Librarian toy. Once per turn a psyker within 6" can increase or decrease by 1 the value shown on one of the dice when they try to cast a spell. I can't see myself using this one a whole lot, but it might be a nice way to avoid Perils without having to spend CP, and maybe it could help facilitate Vortex of Doom. But, honestly, what interests me most about this relic is what the fuck is this ruling. Does it mean literally changing the face of the die? Is this a modifier? Can I do this before or after rerolling? Or even in addition to rerolling? It's so weird. I wish the FAQ had addressed this. If I change a double 1 with this, is it still a Perils?

Aetheric Conduit
Here's a relic that makes our Techmarines better, for some reason. At least it's not the Liber Daemonica.


Litanies of Purity

*APOPLECTIC SCREAMING*

I get Chaplains now! More things to do! More buffs for my guys! Grey Knights Chaplains are in a weird place for me. They can't start screaming at their friends while they are in space, nor while they are in a transport. So these faithful boys have to be on the field at the beginning of a round to do their whole thing, which means their targets are very limited. He will never be able to cheer on a Paladin Squad the turn they hit the field, even if I Gate him up the board. The timing just won't work that way. So if I want to get him to benefit my deep strikers (which are the most crucial units of my army), he won't be able to until at the earliest turn three. That feels like too late. So I'll have to think of other jobs for him.

Litany of Faith
Grants a 5+++ FNP against mortal wounds to a unit within 6". This was real useful against Thousand Sons, but I don't think it will be worth the time against anyone else.

Words of Power
A GK unit within 6" can reroll damage rolls. Here's a nice one. This could be very usefull sitting next to Honored Brother Ewan. His lascannons are begging for this. If somehow I could get him up field, he could also use this on my Paladins and let them reroll for their Nemesis halberds... but, no, I can't see that working. Maybe late game after my VenDread has been exploded.

Intonement for Guidance
A GK unit within 6" ignores all penalties to hit and modifiers to BS. Another good one on Honored Brother Ewan! I don't really have many other heavy-hitting shooters, though. Could be solid against Harlequins and their constant -1 to being hit.

Refrain of Convergence
Add 3 to the Chaplain's Deny the Witch attempts, giving him a total of +4. Was real useful against Thousand Sons, but, again, I can't see myself using it against many others. Dealing with psykers is usually pretty easy for me.

Recitation of Projection
Add 6" to the ranged weapons of a GK unit within 6". Good if I want to extend the range of my storm bolters, I guess? Again, not really my thing, but I see its use in other lists.

Invocation of Focus
A GK unit within 6" improves the AP of its Nemesis and psi weapons by 1. This could be really cool coupled with Psybolt Ammunition or Tide of Convergence, but many other people have pointed that out. For me, I just don't utilize a lot of concentrated fire beyond my Paladins. And again, my Chaplain is going to have a very hard time getting to them when they are at full strength and want to be using Psybolt Ammunition anyway. This might be worth considering, though, because if he does make it up field then he'll really be improving their killability.


Closing Thoughts:

Here's an old Librarian of mine, complete with only books as weapons and a shitty paintjob.

GREY KNIGHTS!

vs Thousand Sons

This week I played against my brother's Thousand Sons using the new rules from Ritual of the Damned! Spoiler: I am loving them.

We thought about playing the new Disrupt the Ritual mission from RotD, but I wanted to try out my new stuff in a more controlled environment. So we just did an Eternal War mission from CA2019.

I ran six characters because I really wanted to try out each and every new spell. I admittedly spread myself a little thin with relics and psychic powers, which ended up to my detriment. But I still got to use a lot of new things! Brought my Chaplain for the first time, as well!

My brother recently bought Magnus and so brought him to our game. He also brought three fucking Daemon Princes, and Ahriman. And a Noctilith Crown so that he could reroll psychic checks. He said that, unopposed, this list could dish out 30-40 mortal wounds. He had a bunch of Sorcerers in different detachments so that he could run the new Cults and use all his fun toys as well. It looked like we in for a very psychic-focused battle.

The battlefield.

The game started off pretty tame. Neither of us had guns beyond 24" so we both spent the first turn kind of moving into the battle itself. He got off a few psychic powers and I got a few storm bolter shots, but nothing dramatic. I started out in the Tide of Shadows, and it really mitigated the damage that his Inferno Bolters could inflict on my Terminators.

I also defied my typical habit and brought some PAGK! I set up these Purgators with Psycannons deep in some ruins. On my turn I teleported them forward, failed to kill some Rubric Marines, and then they all got smote to death. Fragile little boys. Putting them back on the shelf again.

Edict Imperator to try and contest an objective!

The new powers are very cool. My Brotherhood Champion used Edict Imperator to run my Dreadknight up into his troops. I obviously couldn't take the objective from them because I couldn't charge and the Rubrics had ObSec, but I gave him a problem that he had to deal with. That extra mobility is going to be very helpful.

My Chaplain got me an extra Command Point with Empyrean Domination, which felt very good. My plan in my first psychic phase was to switch over to Tide of Escalation, but my BroCap failed to get off Warp Shaping, even with a reroll. So I was stuck in Tide of Shadows. Which isn't a terrible place to be, but I was really hoping to smite away some Rubrics on my turn.

All of his psykers staying within the reroll bubble of the Noctilith Crown.

Moving forward. Magnus having 16" fly is really good.

My brother was really worried about how much damage I was going to do to Magnus because of my daemon bonuses. He hid his Primarch away early on to try and keep him safe, and then rushed him out. Math-wise, all of my Grey Knights in my backline could have taken him out in one psychic phase. The problem was that my brother had so many competent psykers who were denying most of my casts. It is no exaggeration to say that at least 50% of this game was spent in psychic phases. I always enjoy playing against my brother's warcoven. It always leads to incredibly intense and kind of hard to follow psychic phases where we are baiting out each other's denials and using stratagems that augment our abilities and hinder each other. It's a unique kind of 40k that only happens between us.

This moment right here was my best chance to kill the Crimson King. He charged one of my Terminator squads and we made a miraculous number of 5++ Crux Terminatus saves. Then all my characters and the Paladin Squad moved in, but they failed to even drop Magnus to his second bracket. When he fought back, Magnus slew my BroCap and the Paladin Squad accompanying him. This was a problem -- with my BroCap dead, I was stuck in Tide of Shadows. Again, not a bad place to be, but I could have really used the enhanced smites.

Hello there, heretics.

He pulled Magnus back and smote away another character. I moved in to surround his Noctilith Crown and his mass of characters, and then I deep striked.

I used the new stratagem Dynamic Insertion to drop my Apothecary on an objective and used Powerful Adept to extend the range of Inner Fire. My Apothecary wiped out a full squad of Rubric Marines and took two wounds himself. This was a CP intensive but very cool little move. Now my Apothecary was in his back line and ready to start slaying.

My Paladins and Grand Master Simandus came in outside of the range of his Noctilith Crown's perils bubble so that they could all safely smite. I'd gotten around 1000 points of my forces into a relatively safe position squeezed between a few buildings. We were ready to go.

With psychic and shooting we slew two of his Daemon Princes.

At this point, most of his Rubrics were dead and his characters were exposed. We started moving in.

My Apothecary went on a Sorcerer killing spree after he'd razed the objective he landed on.

Grey Knights are so cool.

At this point the game was mine. Magnus was back up to full health and one of his Daemon Princes was running wild around the battlefield, but I'd created such a presence in his deployment zone that he couldn't hold back the Sons of Titan. He could either stay here and try to fight me off his objectives or flee into my deployment zone and hope to start gaining points of his own. His options weren't great.

The inexorable onslaught.

I didn't get to use as much new stuff as I wanted in this game, but what I did use was fantastic. The flexibility and options that these new rules provide is going to be invaluable. Particularly Empyrean Domination, as it provided me +5 CP over the coarse of the whole game. I also really like the new Chaplain litanies. My Chaplain knew Litany of Faith which let him deliver a 5+++ against mortal wounds to anyone I needed, and Refrain of Convergence which allowed him to Deny the Witch at +4. He ended up being an incredibly useful piece of anti-Tzeentch tech.

Useful notes.

I'm excited to keep using these rules, and really experience the power that the Tides will give me.