Grey Knight vs SM Matchup

[Forestradio]

Already in GK favor last patch, now completely ridiculous.

Teleporting aegis halberd BC is still rofl, marginal aegis nerf barely made any difference.

Nuff said on retreating paladins and terminators, you'll notice that gk can kill sm terminators with pretty much only BC and some supporting fire...

Replay (vs Tex apo) attached, I make huge mistakes all over (including rhino driving forward instead of backwards like a baws, gg relic), lost models and squads needlessly, but np matchup saves the day.

http://www.gamereplays.org/dawnofwar2/r ... ost9808754

[Adeptus Noobus]

SM T1 is inferior in almost every way to GK T1 which means SM will have to rat quite hard now. Early Snipers (as Torpid has suggested somewhere else in this forum) might pressure the BC enough to somewhat take him out of the equation during fights. They also stay relevant in the late game vs the Librarian e.g.
I could also see Libby supported Devs be a thing as they would be able to kite the BC and combat the support backline that GK relies on very much. Dreadnoughts seem to be a no-brainer too.

[ytimk]

Question from newb: I thought a big GK weakness was hard AV? Kind of strategy talk rather than balance: Isn't an option to force them to change by getting fast vehicles? Dread obviously, but what about Razorback for onfield prescence? Or WW to keep disrupting all the GK infantry?

Im guessing cloaked Ops getting map control is a pain cause it forces Scout Sargents for detection?
Is it fair to say it is micro intensive to keep kiting fatty BC all the time?
Is this a MU where the SM need to have become dominant before T3?

Also whats 'ratting'? Is it like avoiding engagements and back-capping a lot?

[Corrie]

Give up playing SM and play INQ and laugh at the stunned BC try deal with your ridiculously early banewolf

On a serious note, @ytmik you should check out viewtopic.php?f=11&t=718 Codex explains what ratting is here and goes over loads of good tactics for a new and vet player to consider.

[Cyris]

I think the matchup was worse for SM in the previous patch. The strength of Ops is undeniable, but the purgation + INT in T1 meant I could go heavy T1 and genbash the SM out of existence, and the old Rhino was impossible for SM to handle. I find it amusing fluff-wise that GK counter SM, but struggle against Chaos

And yeah, Inq does a number on GK. Ops are not terribly good against IG and stunning the BC is super effective (and sent stomp / assail both help control the BC further).

[Forestradio]

Give up playing SM

sounds balanced

[Cheekie Monkie]

Both the BC and the GK roster were designed to troll Apo. High burst damage, silences, immune to KB are all traits which are the stuff of nightmares for any Apo player. It is also a truth universally acknowledged, that a GK player in possession of more than one IST must be in want of a good bleed, of which I believe the TM is best suited to do so. He doesn't need to invest in early wargear to be effective in T1, an absolute blessing since SM needs to spend a disproportionate amount of power to counter any GK army.

I'd consider flamers a relatively poor investment vs GK despite the fact that they run a higher proportion of light infantry in this patch. They alleviate pressure off the BC as you're missing a bolter, get kited to death by the faster ops and vengeance round devs gen bash relatively well anyway.

Taking all these points into consideration, I do think Tex was right to get double snipers, though they did come too little too late. They're better off in T1 when the BC isn't teleporting everywhere and you need the early bleed on the ISTs to stop GK from teching too quickly. If you're even on the tech race, elite training would also be a good consideration and will definitely help if GK is running rhino in T1. When the theorycraft is all well and done, I'd consider running this BO vs GK:

T1
Starting scout -> Tac -> Scout -> Scout -> Dev (Veng) -> Sergeant (anti ops) -> sniper -> sniper. Add shotguns and elite training to taste.

T2 is where things get interesting. A librarian is a definite must have for the all important VOT, though it might be better to get a razorback if the BC gets an early teleporter + halberd combo. It hits the field much, much earlier than a dread, has a similar purpose to both a melta dread and a librarian and will also help your units stay on the field for longer (since he'll be bleeding you to poop with his halberd no matter what). It is open season to a lasrhino, but so is the melta dread! Because you've been reading all this time you're a TM!

Lasdev if lasrhino for obvious raisins. I fucking love raisins.

Libby for VOT and gate.

Late game melta dread.

Peel that ducking lasrhino off your vehicles with force barrier. Peel that ducking vindicare off your vehicles with stealthed snipers. I fucking hate ducks.

Pew pew mark target aaagh you dead GK libby.

Force barrier vs paladins to peel them off your dread. Ability knockback bitch.

Retreating paladins? No problem. Force barrier them back into your lines, mark target and force melee with your dread, because fuck practicality I have theorycraft.

So when the game is over and I've won the 16th MRT in a row vs GK abusing Scrubradio my full SM roster would have been:

Shotgun scout (sarge)
Plasma tac
Sniper
Sniper
Veng dev
razorback
Lasdev
Libby
Melta dread

[Atlas]

Nobody cares about GK balance Forest. They're unique and special snowflakes that nobody enjoys playing vs, that's all that matters

Normally I enjoy reading your posts because no matter what I think about them they offer insight. I must admit that I don't see the point of this particular post except for trying to agitate people in a non-funny manner

As for the topic at hand, I've already said most of my feelings on this matchup. In summation, I think that at the moment this matchup is unacceptably GK favored and that I know that GK is a work in progress and that this is not a final picture.

Since I can already anticipate people saying something like "Delete GK from game" and various other silly things of that nature I want to emphasize that Caeltos is already well aware of any issues you guys have with X unit and Y matchup and you don't need to say it 100 times to get your point across. It's not as easy as you think to balance a game with dozens of different matchups. Starcraft 2 has just three races and even there people are unhappy with X or Y. Things take time and patience and a whole lot of love that I believe Caeltos is showing.

In addition to that, having to make him constantly defend himself over X decision and Y replay isn't helping either. People have lives and obligations outside of Elite and Caeltos is no different. Now, would I like to have him weigh in a bit more on this or that? Sure, I think we'd all love to. But time is finite and I'd rather have him making sure he's got food on the table, working on Elite, and answering forum threads in that order.

We all got our own ideas on what to do. I mean personally, I'd like the Rhino just moved to T2, made 280/60 with vehicle armor included. I think GK could use a more dedicated anti-melee infantry armor squad in T1 like Crusaders or whatever. Kinda like Chosen Plagues only obviously reworked.
I think ops on paper are pretty comparable (if not slightly inferior) to catas as a fighting unit and that switching their speed from 6.5 to 5.5 or 5 and shaving some dps on the initial 4 models and buffing the sergeant dps to compensate would be the tweaks they need to not be too strong when they come out in T1. I think the halberd/aegis/tele on the BroCap are wargears that have too much value for its price atm and that GK Terms/Palas might also need some more tweaks to get them where they need to be.

^ See? I have my own opinions on where things can go for GK too. I just think that Caeltos has the best shot at working all of this into something great. He is the one guy with the most investment into making Elite a fun and well polished mod. Just pissing on things isn't doing that.

[Tex]

Honestly, despite all of the stupid things that happened in this game, and despite the fact that I should have played better, there was one passage of play that was very crucial and more ridiculous than anything else in the game. I lost a full health dread to paladins that chased it all the way from one end of the map to the other, and then retreated home losing only 1 model.

That fucking stupid psycannon needs to go away.
Also, slaughter starts on a 2 minute cooldown for a somewhat justifiable reason. Paladin retreat doesn't? It should be on a 3 minute cooldown right from the start.

[Forestradio]

I lost a full health dread to paladins that chased it all the way from one end of the map to the other, and then retreated home losing only 1 model.

[Corrie]

Honestly, despite all of the stupid things that happened in this game, and despite the fact that I should have played better, there was one passage of play that was very crucial and more ridiculous than anything else in the game. I lost a full health dread to paladins that chased it all the way from one end of the map to the other, and then retreated home losing only 1 model.

That fucking stupid psycannon needs to go away.
Also, slaughter starts on a 2 minute cooldown for a somewhat justifiable reason. Paladin retreat doesn't? It should be on a 3 minute cooldown right from the start.

Iv'e mentioned this before that paladins psycannon half healthed my leman while i tried to kite them and when they do enough damage to your tank while your meant to be kiting they just teleport in its path swing 2 hammers and retreat

[Max_Damage]

Also, slaughter starts on a 2 minute cooldown for a somewhat justifiable reason. Paladin retreat doesn't? It should be on a 3 minute cooldown right from the start.

Slaughter has bee nerfed out of the game. By the time the cooldown passes, vanilla CSM are long obsolete.

[Dark Riku]

Slaughter has bee nerfed out of the game. By the time the cooldown passes, vanilla CSM are long obsolete.

No
But let's keep this about GK's vs SM's, ok?

[Adeptus Noobus]

Slaughter has bee nerfed out of the game. By the time the cooldown passes, vanilla CSM are long obsolete.

No
But let's keep this about GK's vs SM's, ok?

It's like you are looking for his posts, Riku XD

I have to support Tex here: The Paladins basically chased the Dread into base with their Psycannons, got the kill and then simply retreated out. Now this could not have happened if they did not have theirs Psycannons. It strikes me as very odd, that Paladins, being a melee superiority unit, also have access to this fantastic ranged weapon while losing none of their melee prowess.

[ol'smithy]

SM have trouble vs termie variants as they don't have the stuns and control abilities of other factions, like entangling web/chains of torment/pestilent strike/excruciators etc.

Solution? Give the Libby some sort of stun/channeled disable/slowdown ability with an upgrade. I'm sure it stays true to the fluff also

[Black Relic]

Ill pitch in here. I think Paladins psy-cannon does needs a bit of a drop in dps but the upgrade should still stay. I think the reinforcement cost should also go up since the Paladins can retreat. Perhaps 115/30. I dont want the reinforcement cost to go back the SM variant terminators since GK rely on Paladins and Terminators so much but I do think it needs to sting more. And taking down a Terminator that can retreat should also yeild a bit more EXP imo. ~ 350 instead of 300.

I still think Operative should have a reduction a damage based on distance (0.8, 0.9, 1, 1.1) those would be my new values scratching what I mentioned before.

[egewithin]

I am always loosing 90% (if only I am lucky enough) of a squads health when there are 3 Opretavies around. Sneak in and wipe out infantry. I think they need a production limit like in first DoW. So we don't have to only nerf them. Someone can handle untill 2 Operatives but 3, 4, 5, ... You can't deal with it.

[Adeptus Noobus]

I am always loosing 90% (if only I am lucky enough) of a squads health when there are 3 Opretavies around. Sneak in and wipe out infantry. I think they need a production limit like in first DoW. So we don't have to only nerf them. Someone can handle untill 2 Operatives but 3, 4, 5, ... You can't deal with it.

If somebody spends 750/90 to get 3 Operatives he will pay the price in T2 as Operatives will do nothing against a Walker or Transport-Vehicle. Operatives are also not the most robust and will die off very quickly. Combine that with the fact that they cost 31/4 ro reinforce and you have yourself a strategy. Normal ranged units outrange them (38) and the detection radius for detectors is greater than their weapon range (28).

[Crewfinity]

3, 4, or 5 should really be wrecking the GK player's economy, to the point that rhey struggle to get to T2 at a reasonable time, much less get any additional purchases. At that point you should be able to rush a vehicle if you turtle at your Gen farm behind some spotters and protection. GK has very bad transitional AV besides the rhino, especially if they invest in that many ops squads.

I think a lot of people's current issues with GK stem from being unfamiliar with the role ops play in their current composition and how to counter them. They are a very powerful #squad and fulfill many roles, which is necessary since purgations and inclterceptors were moved. However, that's not to say they are uncounterable.

They are weak to long range detection and AOE, as well as suppression. They have many strengths, but combinations of units such as detectors and artillery units can shut them down fairly well. Ex grenade launcher heretics with champion or rangers behind a shurican, or even double shoota nobz.

They are very strong against lone squads or isolated commanders, much the same as warp spiders are. The correct counter play is much the same as countering warp spiders, as they are a high-dps but fragile squad that is very good at appearing out of nowhere and picking off lone squads. With the recent round of changes, the GK tier one plays extremely differently than it used to, and it takes a lot of getting used to, especially for playing against since ops are designed to be such a high-efficiency unit in tier one. However, in general the GK tier one is much weaker against massive pushes, especially with single target units or multiple melee units, or jump squads. This can leave their Gen farms very vulnerable, due to a general lack of GK control abilities in T1, which is balanced by their extremely good one on one unit matchup (every unit is great at skirmishing). So, going multiple ops can leave them vulnerable to a big push that bashes their gens. One other consideration is that grey knights currently have a lack of big impact engagement openers such as ASM, more typically they can either poke with IST or ops until the enemy turns and walks into a favorable engagement with weakened squads, or just rush all in with WATH and hoping you don't have the DPS to deal with them quickly enough. It can be extremely tough to deal with, but it is quite weak to vehicle rushes or continuous pressure and committal to big impact engagements. They are a race that is extremely good at skirmishing, bleeding you dry, and getting favorable trades with your squads, but have downsides in a weakness to aggression and lack of general crowd control and reliable AV. those are my impressions at least.

This kinda got off topic, but as far as ops spam goes they are amazing at picking off isolated units but have a hard time approaching a blob with artillery or detection, and are extremely weak to vehicles.

[Dark Riku]

That's all great for most MU's Crewfinity. But this is not a thread about the GK's MU's. It's specifically about the SM MU.
Non the less, a nice post about GK's

[Crewfinity]

That's all great for most MU's Crewfinity. But this is not a thread about the GK's MU's. It's specifically about the SM MU.
Non the less, a nice post about GK's

Lol whoops. this is what happens when I start posting after drinking....

[Tex]

SM AC cannon for termies still costs 100-80.

The GK psycannon is about 10000 times fucking better and costs 100-30.

That right there is what I call GLARING DISPARITY. At the very least, if we are going to equip rape mode paladins with a rape mode gun. Lets make it cost a crap ton of power k?

[Caeltos]

SM AC cost was reduced from 100/80 down to 100/60, the Force Commander AC was also reduced by ~20 power as well.

We've had alot of internal discussions about the Pyscanons(in general) within the team. But the problem that lies ahead is we need to tinker with assets to make sure things pan out and work accordingly. If that doesn't work (which we've had abit of a trouble adjusting) we'll need completely new stuff instead, and that will take some time. Unfortunately, all of this takes alot of time and we've got to make some compromises in the long run.

For an ex. We've tried to adjust the firing patterns of the Storm Bolters, and the ranged damage formulas for the Terminators(GK), but what has happend is that the damage per second goes completely bananas, as in non-existant, or that it has absolutely no damage. Both of these are just poor to implement, so it's about cutting corners until we can make things work. I don't think it's as much as an issue with the price of the psycanon, but more the current design of the Paladin at the moment. (I've expressed my original intention and design goals regarding Paladin/Grey Knight Terminators) in the general discussion a while back, but in order to accomplish this, we need to take some steps towards rigging their animations, and changing how they behave. Animations plays as pretty important role in how you're going to balance something. Imagine you're making a new unit. It's not all just about the values of the unit, you'll want to imaginate and come up with the how the unit moves, and it's special attack animation. For an example, if he is intended to have a 180 degree special attack, you'll need to rig the animation to make a move that reflects that, or whatever your intended ideas are.

Grey Knight Terminator/Paladin are intended to be more of a more agile variant of a Terminator, coupled with Psyker potentials. (Grey Knights are afterall very Psykerish). Whereas the Space Marine variants should be the most sustain-potent fighters of them all, or heavy-specialized ranged terminators. Whereas the Chaos Terminators reflects more on the damage output over durability.

[Hellstar]

I am always loosing 90% (if only I am lucky enough) of a squads health when there are 3 Opretavies around. Sneak in and wipe out infantry. I think they need a production limit like in first DoW. So we don't have to only nerf them.

I strongly detest artificial build limits like this on units - like enough to leave games that implement such artificial limits. I already had serious issues with the way coh2 was being balanced, but now that they've introduced artificial limits on "heavies" (ex: can now build only 1 king tiger) I uninstalled the game and haven't looked back.

If I hadn't already left the disaster that is called sc2 before this incident (I had), I would have left when they introduced yet another "can only build one of" unit for the protoss - the mothership core.

I strongly disagree with the artificial limits imposed on great unclean ones and avatars, but if I had to venture to guess, I'd guess that it is a holdover from vanilla dow2 which no one has ever bothered to question.

In short, HELL NO, no artificial build limits on operatives, or any other unit for that matter.

[Adeptus Noobus]

I am always loosing 90% (if only I am lucky enough) of a squads health when there are 3 Opretavies around. Sneak in and wipe out infantry. I think they need a production limit like in first DoW. So we don't have to only nerf them.

I strongly detest artificial build limits like this on units - like enough to leave games that implement such artificial limits. I already had serious issues with the way coh2 was being balanced, but now that they've introduced artificial limits on "heavies" (ex: can now build only 1 king tiger) I uninstalled the game and haven't looked back.

If I hadn't already left the disaster that is called sc2 before this incident (I had), I would have left when they introduced yet another "can only build one of" unit for the protoss - the mothership core.

I strongly disagree with the artificial limits imposed on great unclean ones and avatars, but if I had to venture to guess, I'd guess that it is a holdover from vanilla dow2 which no one has ever bothered to question.

In short, HELL NO, no artificial build limits on operatives, or any other unit for that matter.

Operatives are barely comparable to GUOs or Avatars or Baneblades...
A GUO has 6125 hp and is a T3 super unit. Getting multiple GUOs would be a game breaking feature. Operatives on the other hand are not a super unit and spamming them can actually be countered very well. People must sometimes accept that they will have to bide their time and tech faster to punish them with a fast T2 unit instead (preferably a Walker/Vehicle vs GK). Protect your units with a detector and outrange Operatives, as I have said before.

[egewithin]

Also, multiple Phobos is just unfairly amounts of AV. Super units are super because you can get one of them. If 2, then they would be tuned down.

[Adeptus Noobus]

I have just been made aware of another reason multiple Avatars would be even more game breaking:

Avatar Aura

Allied infantry units within 20 radius do 30% more damage, receive 30% less ranged damage, and are immune to suppression. Passive ability.

Thanks Forest.

[Hellstar]

Operatives are barely comparable to GUOs or Avatars or Baneblades...

nobody compared them.

Getting multiple GUOs would be a game breaking feature.

without testing it, my intuition strongly tells me no. you could probably put the same amount of resources into GUO hard counters and most likely beat it that way.

Also, multiple Phobos is just unfairly amounts of AV.

again, you could probably counter it with the same resources in AV yourself.

having said that, if multiple GUOs or Avatars or whatever else could not be beaten by competent play, then it points to a fundamental imbalance in the units, so balance them, but do not impose artificial limits on their creation, which is not only stupid in and of itself but is also a band-aid covering the real problem.

[Sub_Zero]

I am sorry for off-topic but what is the deal with sternguard/vanguard veterans then? BARELY they are super-units...

[Wise Windu]

Back on topic please. If you want to discuss game design, make a thread about game design. This thread is for the GK vs SM matchup.