Disappointed with the Grey Knights

Uh-oh. I can see the flaming arrows flying my way just from people reading the title.

As a caveat, let me start by saying that the new Grey Knight codex is a good codex. The fluff is there. The list mechanics are good. It doesn't look over-powered, despite what people may be crying about on the webz. It offers more options than any other codex I can think of.

So, why am I disappointed? Because I was hoping for something that was actually different.

Games Workshop started this codex with one idea in mind: to make another Space Marine codex. It is almost as if they wanted to make a new chapter but then remembered that the Daemonhunters codex was so far out of date that they would either need to completely kill it or update it.

So they did a little of both. They killed the Daemonhunters and updated aspects of it, then slammed that work into the New Space Marine Codex.

I understand the decision. Space Marines sell. Period. And GW wants to make money. So make the next best Space Marine, add some crap from an older codex into it, and you (theoretically) get twice the return.

The problem is that it is still J.A.S.M.C. (Just Another Space Marine Codex). In fact, they should have just started a new chapter named JASM.

Granted, as far as Space Marines go, they did mix it up again. The concept in the design was to reverse the current Marine paradigm on its head. Use Terminators for troops and Power Armor as Elites and Fast choices. I'll admit, that is cool.

But where do you go from there?

If Terminators are troops and you are still in the whole "Space Marines" mindset, then what are really heavy elite choices? Their answer: Terminators with two wounds (aka: Paladins).

If Terminators are troops and you are still in the whole "Space Marines" mindset, then what are the heavily armored, heavy-weapon toting Heavy choices? Their answer: a monstrous creature (aka: Dreadknight).

As a side note, by adding a Monstrous Creature to a Space Marine codex they are actually taking away from the other codexes that have Monstrous Creatures. Just my opinion.

They started out with a good and original idea, then stumbled over their own hangups and tried to go back to the original Space Marines analogies. If x is this, then y should be this.

Cool models. Nice rules. But nothing really original. Just adding on to the add-ons of a Space Marine chapter.

Everyone being a psyker is cool and makes sense. But they missed on making this army an actually anti-Deamon army. Most notably the nerfing of the Psycannon. The original Psycannon didn't allow for Invulnerable saves. These were hugely expensive weapons that made Deamon players actually stop and reconsider what it was they were about to get themselves into.

The current Psycannon is now just another variation of an autocannon. Nothing special there. Just a tweak to some rules that already exist. The Psilencer comes closer to something unique with a rule specific to Deamons (always wounding on a 4+), but it is, again, just a little rule tweak.

So they started with a Space Marine codex and just changed some rules and gave the weapons a “Deamon-something” name, but it’s still just another Marine codex.

My biggest disappointment isn’t with the codex per se, but with what people will do with it.

There is a trend for players, specifically the young’ins, to jump on the latest Marine codex because it is perceived to be more powerful than the last Marine codex. GW sort of promotes this trend by publishing a new Marine codex every six months. The most blatant example of this occurred at Adepticon where 38 out of the 40 “count-as” requests were for people wanting to play the Space Wolves codex with their formerly standard Codex Marines.

The problem with this codex is that there are a lot of tricks, more than any other Marine codex. I can see many young players jumping on the bandwagon and reading the first and last sentence of the rules paragraph for whatever they are purchasing and misinterpreting the rules. What this means is that EVERYBODY needs to read this codex carefully so when they are playing against GK players they are not blown off the table due to rules being played wrong.

Another issue you will face is simple list/points issues. Grey Knights, when fitted out with the really cool weapons, are expensive. So if you find yourself looking at a horde of terminators at the 1,500 point level, then you will need to sit down with your opponent and start counting points and show him where he screwed up.

I’m not saying this is a bum codex. As for Space Marines codexes go, this one is the nicest. But it’s just a beefed up version of the rules for Space Marines.

There are two notable exceptions: the grenades and the Brotherhood Champion.

There are two pages of different grenades that can be purchased that have totally different effects on your enemies. This is a really cool and unique addition that I am glad they added. My only question is why aren’t all types of grenades available to the Inquisitors? Are you going to tell an inquisitor “Sorry, sir, but you can’t take that grenade”?

The Brotherhood Champion allows the player to choose his “battle stance” during close combat. Each stance gives him different abilities, such as making a quick hits against everyone in base contact or defend himself against oncoming attacks. Talk about “getting into” the action! I can see this idea being expanded upon in future codexes with additional stances becoming available to champions.

Now, for the inquisitor aspects of the codex….

GW threw inquisitors and henchmen into the codex as an afterthought. This is first and foremost a Marine codex, but they needed to do something with the inquisitorial aspects of the now dead Deamonhunter codex to avoid the torch and pitchfork crowd. So they added the inquisitors.

An Inquisitor list is what I call a “trick” army. They are difficult to play and play against. And rightfully so. Basically you are taking a relatively weak unit and making it completely deadly by adding some funky rules.

I only wished they had separated it into a completely different codex. They could have had a blast with that and there is enough material for it when you include options for Space Marine and Imperial Guard units to be added as troops. A separate Inquisition codex would have allowed players with existing armies to use those models to put together a very funky force.

But how it stands now, it is just an add-on to a Marine codex, almost as if it was an after-thought. They could have done so much more with the Inquisition side of the book, but just took the easy way out.

I know that some folks are going to vehemently hate my opinions on this. But please understand that I do like the codex, I was just expecting more - something better, something unqiue. My main concern is with codex abuse by army jumpers.

Let me know what you think.