The best way for Grey Knights to deal with Mortarion?

[Waking Dreamer]

So the latest Daemon Primarch has entered the scene and will soon be on the table in many Chaos armies, how will your Grey Knights plan on bringing him down?

 

So Mortarion's stats:

 

 

 

and his special auras:

 

 

As much as I enjoy the idea of Paladins in one half of a circle cheering, "Draigo! Draigo! Draigo!" while the Death Guard complete the other half of the circle chanting, "Mortarion...Mortarion..." as our Supreme GM eyes down the fallen Primarch while they slowly circle each other in the middle of the battlefield - how will your GK armies work on putting a stop the Lord of Death on the gaming table?

[Gentlemanloser]

Well there's really no choice but to shoot him.

 

And he's (along with RG who's just been powercreeped) really a middle finger to every army that doesn't have a 'primarch'.

 

Not impressed GW.

 

We don't know what his scythe does yet. Nor if he has an invulnerable save.

 

But even though Draigo hits on 2+, wounds on 3+ with rerolls.

 

He's still not taking morty out.

Edited September 5, 2017 by Gentlemanloser

[Trollbeard]

He has a 4+ Invuln, I think they leaked it one of the first leaks. Maybe smites and purge soul, or vortex to put some mortal wounds on him? He will get his disgustingly resilient, but good way to get past his invuln and toughness? Throw our GMNDK at him?

[Beams]

Inquisitor for terrify (-1 ld)

Primaris Psyker for terryfing visions (-2)

Banner and trait for +2 LD

Purge soul, Smite spam and Vortex.

 

Then everyone charges and hopes to either kill him out reduce his effectiveness enough to survive until the next turn

[Gentlemanloser]

Well Draigo would take that down to 5++ as Warlord (in cc).

[Helycon]

He can still save against all the wounds though. He looks VERY scary.

And as stated, we don't know what his weapons do yet. I'm pretty sure that he could take Draigo in a fight when it comes to the tabletop. He should, since he'll cost a ton of points more than Draigo.

 

Also, how did Gulliman get buffed?

Edited September 5, 2017 by Helycon

[Beams]

Yeah, the trick is making it harder for him to save.

 

A 5+++ (even with a reroll) is much easier to deal with than a 3+/4++/5+++ with some kind of buff to the +++.

[Seizeman]

The -1 to invulnerable trait is pretty much useless. The +1 to damage trait results in the same amount of damage and it is more versatile.

 

Honestly, he seems pretty easy to deal with. He's only T7 and 3+, so he's relatively easy to wound by light and medium fire. Also, just smite him to death. Yes, he'll take a lot  of fire, but he also costs a lot of points and needs to get close to be effective.

[Gentlemanloser]

Isn't it a shame our smites are only 12" range.

 

Putting him easily into range on his turn.

 

Seize i was only mentioning Draigos trait to 'forge the narrative'.

 

Draigo, the guy that slew morty and had enough time to carve Geronitans name into his heart in the middle of the battle.

 

Yeah...

Edited September 5, 2017 by Gentlemanloser

[Adeptus]

Smite him to bits would be my plan. Finally get some mileage out of that nerfed smite of ours.

[Aethernitas]

Smite him to bits would be my plan. Finally get some mileage out of that nerfed smite of ours.

This guy gets it.

 

I really don't get what the fuss is about? Grey Knights have one of the best rulesets to deal with Morty. Straight 3dmg Smite, +1 for the psychic test to get it off, the Option to debuff his Invul, wounding at least on 4+ with everything in cc with rerolls and multiwound cc weapons throughout. I've probably even forgotten something.Thats what ALL of our units get against Morty btw. Doesn't include relics, special unit rules, GMDK stratagem shooting and whatnot.

[Gentlemanloser]

He gets his fnp versus our smite.

 

And the range of it puts our units into "morty will now eat you in cc" range.

 

I doubt smite is the answer.

 

I still go with shooting. You don't want to get anywhere near morty.

[Amayasu]

He gets his fnp versus our smite.

 

And the range of it puts our units into "morty will now eat you in cc" range.

 

I doubt smite is the answer.

 

I still go with shooting. You don't want to get anywhere near morty.

 

He gets FnP against each point of Smite damage, not our Smite.

 

We have Brother Captains.

 

Smite is an answer, alongside Shooting.

[Gentlemanloser]

Yeah he'd get three fnp saves one for each point of damage our smites cause.

 

No one uses bcs. I doubt unless you're tailoring your list specifically people will start using them.

Edited September 5, 2017 by Gentlemanloser

[Amayasu]

No one uses bcs. I doubt unless you're tailoring your list specifically people will start using them.

 

I do.

 

Metas shift all the time; Morty represents a shift. 

[Gentlemanloser]

Sure. If you're tailoring your list to defeat morty...

[Aethernitas]

Did you even read my post? All of those things I mentioned are readily available on even our cheapest units, the Strikes. You don't have to tailor at all, you just play a Grey Knights list.

Every smite does 2 points of actual dmg and combined with shooting you can easily drop Morty to 8W or less before he even gets to throw the dice for his AOE smite. Deepstriking just 4 units of 5 man strikes without any equipment are (on average) enough to drop him to 6W with just shooting and smiting. If just one of them makes the charge (which again is average without warlord traits etc.) you drop him to 3W or with a little luck kill him. By that point you've lost 2,67 wounds in Strikes to his ability. Suffice to say that this math represents a minimum amount of effort. If you also factor in a lil shooting from a Stormraven or really anything else but Strikes it becomes even easier.

I think that should quite nicely illustrate how point efficient we can deal with Morty. I'd rather enjoy if people did the actual math before getting agitated over nothing.

Edited September 5, 2017 by Aethernitas

[Adeptus]

Mortarion is going to represent a very large points investment. I'd be happy to drop four or five units within 12" of him to smite him off the board in two turns. He's only going to be saving one out of three wounds, and he's only going to be able to retaliate against one unit at a time. I'll trade a strike squad or two for Mortarion every day of the week. And lets not forget, if we're inside 12" we're also doubling our stormbolter shots.

Edited September 5, 2017 by Adeptus

[Amayasu]

Sure. If you're tailoring your list to defeat morty...

 

Smite is too close! Use BCs? Sure if you want to tailor against a model that isn't out yet! But I already use BCs... yeah but that's tailoring to beat Morty!

 

... and so on. The argument eats itself.

 

What you're really saying is that your list will struggle unless you tailor. Mine on the other hand will be fine, because I actually like BCs, they're better than people generally seem to think they are.

Edited September 6, 2017 by Amayasu

[Everon]

Not sure if any one mentioned it, but I believe I saw on a dropped relic today, Morty can upgrade his 5+++ to a 4+++. So now he can 50-50 every damage from smite. Well, me things a Draigo - Bro Cap might be a good combo. Draigo hits him for big wounds if he comes close, while your squad hangs back and 24" smites

[Aethernitas]

Not sure if any one mentioned it, but I believe I saw on a dropped relic today, Morty can upgrade his 5+++ to a 4+++. So now he can 50-50 every damage from smite. Well, me things a Draigo - Bro Cap might be a good combo. Draigo hits him for big wounds if he comes close, while your squad hangs back and 24" smites

No he cannot. What you're referring to is a Warlord Trait and Morty has a fixed Warlord Trait which is NOT this one but the one that let's you reroll all to wound rolls for plague weapons in 7".

 

 

[Everon]

Ok, thanks for clarifying Aethernitas. Must have misread while at work

[hmk17]

18 wounds... bleech! 12 would have been bad enough with the standard nurgle and death guard defenses.

 

Strikes do seem to be one of our best options in this fight...

Trying to recall if combat squads count against half the army in reserves rule for match play...

[Adeptus]

I've no doubt he'll be able to boost his Disgustingly Resilient roll one way or another, but the point remains that two Strike Squads are dealing 3-4 wounds to him, and if you use those squads to protect two more squads and maybe a character you're looking at 7-10 wounds a turn from Smiting, and what, another 4-5 wounds from stormbolters? With a bit of luck you can destroy him in turn one, and even without luck you can pretty much guarantee to delete him in two turns.

 

Sure, it's a big investment (four strike squads and a BroCap are 572 points) and without seeing how much Mortarion costs and what his wargear looks like and what the DG Stratagems are like, it's hard to form a complete picture, but I think our inherent bonuses against Daemons and our ability to alpha-strike should give us a very solid edge against Mortarion.

[Godeskian]

Under what circumstances do you think you'll be playing opponents that LET you smite him repeatedly?

 

The assumption appears to be that Mortarion will be standing at the head of his army, alone and unsupported, instead of safely ensconced in the center where the smites can't get at him.

 

Certainly I'd never put him in a position where 4, four squads!! Of Strikes could nominate him as the closest enemy models without first having to wade through a good chunk of the rest of his army