Friday, March 10, 2017

Horus Heresy Review: Grey Slayer Pack


Background.
Before the Codex penned by Guilliman, there was the Principia Bellicosa of the Great Crusade era. The Space Wolves cared as little for the Principia Bellicosa as they would come to care about the Codex. Hence in 30k, the Space Wolves are not able to select any unit other than the Grey Slayer Pack as their compulsory troops. This is beneficial, and also a drawback associated with running the Space Wolves.

Strengths.
Although they lack the Fury of the Legion rule of the Tactical Squad (and yes: Space Wolves can still run tactical squads, but there's not point since Grey Slayer Squads are an excellent replacement), they have Warrior's Mettle. In short, they can charge after running or shooting. This is amazing (and harkens back to a different era of the core rules for old timers like me!). Re rolling pinning tests is just the icing on the cake.

More than this, the squad is incredibly flexible with multiple load outs that can really work very well in the game. We'll look at a few possible builds below.

Weaknesses.
To balance out the Warrior's Mettle bonuses, they can't go to ground. You probably were never going to anyway because you're playing Space Wolves. So, its fluffy and appropriate. However, the charging after running or shooting suffers a one inch negative modifier.

There's also the minor matter of what independent characters should join on to them. In my opinion: none of them. This is so they retain their Warrior's Mettle rule. Place the apothecaries with terminators and the like and be happy with it.

Builds.
I see these squads as a melee orientated squad, and therefore they should be kitted out accordingly. But since they're also scoring, there's a temptation to take a big blob of them for objective camping.

20 Grey Slayers, bolt guns, 1 vexilla, Huscarl with artificer armour, melta bombs and thunder hammer (290 points).
Not a recommended build really. But this is a back-field objective camping build. Plenty of models and wounds knocking around here.

10 Grey Slayers, 9 power weapons, 1 vexilla, Huscarl with artificer armour, melta bombs and thunder hammer (215 points).
Highly close combat orientated and decidedly deadly. Take with a land raider to assault out of.

10 Grey Slayers, 5 combat shields, 2 hand flamers, 5 power weapons, 1 vexilla, Huscarl with artificer armour, melta bombs, and lightning claws (225 points).
Mixed threats here and nice for land raiders or rhinos alike.

10 Grey Slayers, 2 plasma pistols, 1 vexilla, Huscarl with artificer armour, plasma pistol, melta bombs and power fist (190 points).
Plasma death from the back of a rhino with a power fist to back it up. I actually like this set up a lot myself and the points cost is attractive at under 200. 

2 comments:

Leonhart040 said...

"10 Grey Slayers, all with combat shields and 9 power weapons," According to the rules "Any model in the squad may take one of the following options: [...]". So this means they can only take shields OR power weapons, isn't it?

jabberjabber said...

Ahhh -- good eyes! I completely missed that wording.
Apologies to my readers. I have corrected this oversight now.

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