Which Should YOU Play – The Renegade or Chaos Knight?

By Frontline Gaming | May 4th, 2016 | Categories: 40k News & Articles, Imperial Knights, Tactics

Which Chaos Knight should YOU play, the new Renegade Knight OR the Chaos Knight from Forge World?

Let’s explore what makes the new Renegade Knights so cool!

Games Workshop has just released a new boxed set “Imperial Knights : Renegade” This is an amazing separate game for $195 MSRP that comes with 2 knights, unique rules for a standalone game, and a Sanctum Imperialis terrain set. This is a $347 value, which makes this boxed set an amazing deal for buying knights.

Chaos Daemons and Chaos Space Marines can now take Renegade Knights, which are nearly identical to the loyalist versions. These knights are taken as battle brothers to those two armies though a formation called the Forsworn Detachment (obviously meant as a counterpart to the Oathsworn Detachment).

This article will be focused on how this detachment could assist current Chaos armies, and what gaps they could fill. It is expected that the weapon profiles for the chaos knights will match the imperial versions.

The kit comes with the following

Two weapons that can both be built as battle cannons or thermal cannons (they share parts)
One gattling cannon
Two chainswords
One gauntlet
Two carapace mount heavy stubbers
One carapace mount meltagun
One rocket pod (can be assembled in two ways)
One AA gun

Renegade Knight

The base cost on this unit is 325 points, which gives you a bare bones knight with the same stat line and wargear a Knight Gallant. You can trade out the thunderstrike gauntlet for a thermal cannon for 45 points, which has the same gearset as a Knight Errant. Alternatively, you can trade out the thunderstrike gauntlet for a rapid-fire battlecannon or avenger gatling cannon for 50 points — giving the same loadout as either a Knight Paladin or Knight Warden.

Like all the imperial knights, you can choose to swap out a heavy stubber with a meltagun for five points. Each knight can also add a Ironstorm Missile Pod, Twin Icarus Autocannon, or a Stormspear Rocket Pod for the same costs as the Imperial Knights.

You can also swap out the reaper chainsword for a thermal cannon for 55 points or rapid fire battle cannon for 60 points. This lets you create a chaos knight with the same wargear as a Knight Crusader for 430 points — five more points than the Imperial version.

This is where it gets interesting. Unlike any of the Imperial versions, you can put on two Avenger Gatling Cannons, or two Rapid Fire BattleCannons. This lets you really specialize a knight for a particular role. The dual avenger gatling cannon knight is very appealing, as it can throw out 24 STR 6, AP3 rending shots a turn.

Forsworn Knight Detachment

This formation lets you bring up to three lords of war. Each unit must have the Renegade Knight Faction, and it cannot be your primary detachment.

If you have three Renegade Knights, all models in the detachment have Preferred Enemy (Imperial Knights). In return the Imperial Knights get Preferred Enemy (Fallen Household). This is a pretty weak benefit, and I would not take it specifically for that reason. If you are already taking three knights, it’s ‘sort of OK’ but will hurt you as much as help you.

Chaos Knights vs Renegade Knights – Which is the right knight for you?
By jy2 on Dakka

For the release of the new Imperial Knights: Renegade, Chaos players now have options for their Super-heavy walkers. Assuming Forgeworld experimental units are allowed in your competitive meta, we now have the Khorne Lord of Skulls, the Kytan, the Chaos Knight and the Renegade Knight. The Lord of Skulls has its niche as an over-priced, under-performing LoW Super-heavy. The Kytan fills the need for an excellent and reasonably priced assault Super-heavy walker. As for the Chaos and Renegade Knights, they are more of a low-cost, all-purpose Super-heavy that can fit into the budget of many Chaos lists. The question then is, why should you take one over the other? What are their roles and how do they differ? Which one is better? In this mini-tactica, I will take a more in-depth look at the two knights. I will also rank them according to their strengths and weaknesses.

So why am I qualified to write about the Chaos and Renegade Knights? What is my expertise with them?

I am currently running a Chaos Knight with one of my Chaos armies. I currently run a Khorne Knight in a meta (the ITC) which allows one to use them in tournament play. I have had some success with him, going 5-1 and placing 13th at the LVO. As for the Renegade Knights, I admit that I have not actually run one yet. They are still so new that the rules actually have not even been officially released yet at the time of this article. However, I have and do run Imperial Knights. I have run anywhere from 1 to 5 Knights before. I have also played against anywhere from a 1 to 5 Knight army as well. Renegade Knights are almost identical to the Imperial ones, with the only difference being Imperial ones have better formations. But if you are talking about an apples to apples comparison (Forsworn versus the Oathsworn detachments), then the tactics you use between the two are basically the same. Hence, my experiences with the Imperial Knights should be fully applicable to the Renegade ones as well.

RENEGADE KNIGHT

So why should you take a Renegade Knight over a Chaos Knight?

Multiple Knights. With the Chaos Knight, you can only take one. With the Renegade Knight, you can take up to 3. If you want to run more than 1 knight in a tournament system/format like the ITC or others, then your only choice is the Renegade Knight. +1
Can be taken with non-Chaos factions. Many tournaments do not allow for Come the Apocalpyse allies. You want to run Imperial Knights with Orks or Necrons without resorting to Come the Apocalypse allies? Then your only choice are the Renegade Knights. +1

No Tax units. Unlike Chaos Knights, which would require you to take a Combined Arms Detachment, you do not need to take any other units to unlock the Renegade Knight. They are playable as is without requiring you to take any “tax” units. +1

Better shooters. The Renegade Knight can be configured to be a better shooter than the Chaos Knight. For up to 60-pts more, you can in essence double its firepower. The Renegade Knight is also a more flexible shooter, with options for 3 different guns as opposed to only 2 for the Chaos Knight. +1

Multiple Knights = more Stomps! While a single Renegade Knight is not better than a Chaos Knight in assault, multiple Renegade Knights in close combat are more dangerous simply because they are more stompy. Against normal units, that may not necessarily matter, but when you can assault multiple knights into an enemy deathstar unit, those extra stomp attacks will hurt. By the ways, I did not bring up the Destroyer attacks because a Chaos Knight with a D-Thirster will still out-punch 2 Renegade Knights, but they won’t out-stomp 2 Renegades. +1

Better durability versus small-arms firepower. When you take a Chaos Knight + something else, the “something else” can usually be hurt by small-arms firepower (S5 or less). With multiple Renegades, you are basically immune to small-arms firepower as well as most normal close-combat attacks. +1

Ranking: +6

CHAOS KNIGHT

Contrarily, you should take a Chaos Knight over a Renegade Knight because….

Daemon Knight. This is a humongous and probably the main distinction between the 2 types of knights. This is what makes the Chaos Knight a Chaos Knight rather than just a Renegade Knight. But before I go on, I want to note that in a format such as the ITC, a Daemon Knight of <Specific God> also counts as a Daemon of <Specific God>. That means that a Chaos Knight will have a 5++ Invulnerable save along with some other bonuses. This is a huge boon. A 5++ save means that a Chaos Knight is 50% more survivable than a Renegade Knight overall (not counting Ion Shields). You need to deal 6HP of damage to kill a Renegade Knight. For a Chaos Knight, you need to deal an average of 9HP of damage to kill him. Furthermore, the more durable a Knight is, the more damage it can do simply by being able to survive longer to inflict more pain. Then there are the other bonuses that comes along with being a Daemon Knight. +2

Force-multiplier additions to increase durability. The Chaos Knight is way more durable than a Renegade Knight because of the force-multiplier effects you can bundle onto it. Just a successful Grimoire on it (3++ Invulnerable with a 2++ on its Ion Shield facing) means that you will need to do 18HP‘s of damage on average to kill him! That increases his durability over a Renegade Knight by 300%. That means 1 Chaos Knight is just as survivable as 3 Renegade Knights!!! If you count the Ion Shield facings (assuming all of the enemy firepower is directed at the shielded facing), it will take 12HP of damage to kill a normal Renegade Knight (4++). Shooting a Grimoire’d Chaos Knight at his Ion Shield facing (2++) would require you to do 36HP of damage!!!Then you have powers such as Cursed Earth, Forewarning and a Relic that can be cast/used to increase the Chaos Knight’s durability even more. This essentially turns the Chaos Knight into a deathstar all by itself. In one game, I have had my Chaos Knight go through a Brass Scorpion and several Chaos walkers (Soulgrinders and Blood Slaughterers) all by himself. I have had him survive the firepower of an entire Tau army and a Gladius Battle Company as well. With force-multipliers, his durability becomes God-like. Not even 3 Renegade Knights can withstand the amount of punishment a fully-buffed Chaos Knight can. +2

Dirge Caster. This is a nifty option available to the Chaos Knight that his Renegade cousin does not have. While not necessarily useful at all times, it is a good feature against certain armies, namely Tau with their Supporting Fire and Dark Angels Battle Company with their full-BS Overwatch. +.5

Better in close-combat. Yes, a Chaos Knight is better than a Renegade Knight in close combat, even with the same configurations. Assuming ITC intepretations, just the 5++ Invuln save (potentially buffed up to a 3++ or even 2++) makes a big difference in assault. However, a Khorne Knight also gets +D3 Attacks on the charge and can re-roll the number of Stomp attacks. The Tzeentch Knight re-roll saves of 1 as well as To Hit rolls of 1. The Nurgle Knight has It Will No Die and Shroud, and the Slaanesh Knight is Fleet, runs an extra 3″ and can potentially cause the enemy to strike at Initiative 1. +1

Chaos Relics. If you are playing in the ITC format, then you can take Chaos Legacy Relics on your Chaos Knights (under certain conditions). Each Relic has different abilities but there is one in particular that is really good on a Khorne Knight. I won’t go into detail with it here, but suffice to say, being able to take Relics on a Chaos Knight is a boon. +1

Cost Effectiveness. Whereas a single Renegade Knight is cheaper on average, a Chaos Knight is the more cost effective unit especially when taking into account its durability. An unbuffed Chaos Knight is 1.5x more durable than a Renegade Knight. However, most of the time, you would want to buff up your Chaos Knight. A fully buffed Chaos Knight is potentially 3x more durable than a Renegade Knight. You are getting much more bang for the buck with the Chaos Knight. The Chaos Knight is much more resilient than even 2 Renegade Knights, but for the cost of the 2 Renegades, you can take a Chaos Knight as well as a Greater Daemon/Daemon Prince with the Grimoire. Not only are the Chaos Knight +FMC combo much more resilient, but they can do much more damage than the 2 Renegades. +1

Better scoring. You can actually build a more balanced Chaos list with better scoring units with the Chaos Knight than with multiple Renegade Knights. For example, for the price of 2 Renegade Knights (750-pts), you can get a Khorne Knight, a Herald of Nurgle and 6 units of 3 Nurglings (almost a full Tallyband!). Whereas the Renegade Knights will play better in a Victory Points mission, the Chaos Knight + troops is the better overall Take-All-Comer’s build due to the fact that it plays the objective game much, much better. +1

Ranking: +7.5

CONCLUSION

To me, it is a no-brainer. The Chaos Knight is the better choice between the 2 types of Knights. For just a miminal cost increase, the performance of the Chaos Knight out-performs and out-survives the Renegade Knight at an exponential pace. The Chaos Knight is a threat that rivals that of a deathstar and with the resiliency to boot. You can also build a more balanced army with a Chaos Knight with much better scoring than you can with multiple Renegade Knights. There are reasons to run Renegades – when you want to run multiple Knights in your army, when you want to take a Knight with a Necron or Ork detachment, if you are so tight with points that you actually cannot afford to take a Chaos Knight or if your meta simply does not allow Forgeworld experimental units. Other than that, there really is no reason to take the Renegade over a Chaos Knight. The Chaos Knight is superior by far.

In closing, I will leave you with an 1850 Chaos Knight/Infernal Tetrad list that I am planning to run in the future.

Daemon Prince of Khorne – Flight, 2x Greater, 1x Lesser, Armour of Scorn
Daemon Prince of Nurgle – Flight, ML 2, 2x Greater
Daemon Prince of Slaanesh – Flight, ML 2, 1x Exalted (Grimoire), 1x Greater
Daemon Prince of Tzeentch – Flight, ML 2, 2x Greater, 1x Lesser, Impossible Robes

Herald of Tzeentch – ML 2
11x Pink Horrors
3x Nurglings
Chaos Knight of Tzeentch (or Khorne)

When You Positively Absolutely Got To Kill

Dual avenger gatling cannon knights clock in at 435 points each. Three of those would run you 1,305 points. This would give you 72 STR 6, AP3, BS4 rending dice per turn! The amount of firepower that can dish out is staggering. Since they are still knights, rushing into assault with them is not high on my units priority list.

The mathhammer shows this damage output each round.

Target	Cover	Math	Wounds
MEQ	None	(2/3 to hit) * (5/6 to wound) * 72 shots	40
Scat Bike	Jink	(2/3 to hit) * (5/6 to wound) * (½ save) * 72 shots	20
Wraithknight	None	(2/3 to hit) * (1/6 to wound) * (1/3 failed FNP) * * 72 shots	8
Rhinos	None	(2/3 to hit) * (1/3 to glance/pen) * 72 shots	16 Hull Points
Stormsurge	None	(2/3 to hit) * (1/2 to wound) * (1/2 failed save) * (⅔ failed FNP) * 72 shots	8
Centurion	None	(2/3 to hit) * (1/2 to wound) * (1/6 failed save) * 72 shots +(2/3 to hit) * (1/6 to wound) * 72 shots	12

This firepower will shred many armies on the table today. It’s quite feasible to kill a WK in one round of shooting, and then focus the rest of the fire on scat bikes for the remainder of the turns. This means you could very realistically expect to table a wraithknight and scat bike list by turn three.

Warp Spider armies also will have a hard time against this army. Each spinner has a ⅙ chance of causing a glancing hit. Even if you are taking all the spinners in the aspect host formation, this is what the odds look like.

(⅚ to hit) * (⅙ to wound) * (½ save) *10 shots = .7 hull points per squad. Through clever deep striking they might be able to negate the ion shield on some of the deep striking squads. This might allow the entire warp sider host to kill one knight. The problem is that the remaining knights will have enough shots and range to shred all of the spiders — even with a flickerjump.

Some armies will be a bad matchup. A cent-star, for example can resist the incoming damage and deliver enough counter-punch to kill the knights. An Infernal Tetrad list with shrouding up also is a big problem, as the knights cannot do enough damage before they are in assault.

This leaves you 545 more points to finish out your ITC list if you are playing in that format. You could grab a forgehost with 3 soulgrinders all with phlegm to maximize your AV13 spam. Alternatively, you could bring a Tallyband and surround your knights with nurglings and plaguebearers.

You could also take a CAD with a two squads of horrors and fateweaver to fly around and cause havoc, and this is what I chose for my sample list. The idea is that fateweaver swoops around causing problems when he can with two horror squads to feed him psychic dice. While fatey is doing his usual shenanigans, the gatling cannons are busy clearing house.

1848 Points:

Daemon CAD

···11 Horrors
···11 Horrors
···Fateweaver

Chaos Renegade Knights Forsworn Knight Detachment

···Renegade Knight [Gatling Cannon, Gatling Cannon]
···Renegade Knight [Gatling Cannon, Gatling Cannon, MeltaGun]
···Renegade Knight [Gatling Cannon, Gatling Cannon, Stormspear]

I expect we will see the cost for avenger gatling cannon’s on ebay bit stores go up! I also would not be surprised to see if a third party starts making them. If you are thinking of running a shooty knight list, grab extra sets of these!

Remember you are not required to bring 3 of these. Just taking 2 will cost you 880 points, leaving you 970 for the rest of your daemons/CSM/Renegades.

Battle Cannon Bridgade

Another fun option is to consider double dual battle cannons on each Knight. The cost is the same as the Dual Avenger Gatling Cannon Knight, and instead of 72 dice per turn, this set throws out 12 battle cannon shots per turn.

Personally, I tend to be more scared of the 72 rending STR 6 shots than the 12 large blasts, but that’s due to my experience at seeing large blasts scatter. Battle cannons also are weaker against vehicles, as they cannot kill a razorback in a single hit. If I wanted to field such an army, this is something I would consider.

The idea is that you take 4 Tzeentch heralds and dip into the Divination tree to grab Perfect Timing, Forewarning, and Prescience. Those 12 STR 8, AP3 blasts become a much larger concern when they are rerolling the scatter dice. The army has 14 psychic dice available to help beef up the knights.

1848 Points:

Daemon CAD

···11 Horrors
···11 Horrors
···Tzeentch Herald w/Level 3 Psyker
···Tzeentch Herald w/Level 3 Psyker
···Tzeentch Herald w/Level 2 Psyker
···Tzeentch Herald w/Level 2 Psyker

Chaos Renegade Knights Forsworn Knight Detachment

···Renegade Knight [Double Battle Cannon, Double Battle Cannon, MeltaGun]
···Renegade Knight [Double Battle Cannon, Double Battle Cannon, MeltaGun]
···Renegade Knight [Double Battle Cannon, Double Battle Cannon, MeltaGun]

The buff-heralds in this format will also with with the Dual Avenger Gatling Cannon Knights. (Gat-Knights?) Prescience will increase the number of MEQ killed from 40 to 52, or a 30% increase in damage output.

Pacific Rim

Chaos Knights with the the thunderstrike gauntlet and reaper chainsword are only 325 points. Two of these would run 650 points, allowing you to bring a Rotswarm or MurderHorde. This results in an extremely fast moving assault force that will smash face when they hit.

Another idea an Infernal Tetrad with two such knights. One of the biggest weaknesses of the Tetrad list is a Stormsurge. The two knights counter this quite well. The stomps can also assist in clearing out tarpits — though large tarpit units of fearless units are still a problem.

While you have to weaken the Tetrad slightly to bring two knights, it’s still pretty good synergy. Alternatively you could only bring one buffed knight and add additional buffs to the Tetrad, but I just like the feel of this one a little more.

1850 Points:

Infernal Tetrad

···Daemon Prince of Khorne [Armour of Scorn, 2x Greater Reward, 1x Lesser Reward, Flight]
···Daemon Prince of Nurgle [2x Greater Reward, 1x Lesser Reward, Flight, ML 2]
···Daemon Prince of Slaanesh [2x Greater Reward, Flight, ML 2]
···Daemon Prince of Tzeentch [The Impossible Robe, 2x Greater Reward, 1x Lesser Reward, Flight, ML 2]

Chaos Renegade Knights Forsworn Knight Detachment

···Renegade Knight [Reaper Chainsword, Thunderstrike Gauntlet]
···Renegade Knight [Reaper Chainsword, Thunderstrike Gauntlet]

Keeping Your Options Open

Don’t forget that you can also magnetize your models to hot swap the weapons as the game dictates. Given the cost of knights, this is the most logical solution I can see. Since the kit does not come with every possible combination, you will need to check bit vendors to fill out the extra parts — or find a third party that makes resin pieces to fit. Luckily with this set going onto the market, we can expect to find more bits available.

This process is fairly easy and TableWar sells you all the magnets you would need to do this. I like utilizing one of the four fundamental forces of nature in my army. It’s functional and cool all at the same time.

In Summary

The Forsworn Knight Detachment gives some nice tricks with double weapons. This lets you specialize in some interesting ways. You can use it as the core of your forces and build around that firepower.

It also lets specialized lists, such as Daemonic Incursion or Black Legion Warband cannot take Lords of War, and this allows those lists to still utilize such a tool. This can be great if you want to have that extra super-heavy walker in your army.