Dreadknight

So, I've gotten some games in with the Dreadknight.  Prior to 6th edition, no one would take these, because they felt that the Psyrifle Dread was a better use of the slot.  While the Psyrifle Dread is still good, and one of best air defense Grey Knights have, the Dreadknight has been a game changer for me in every game I've taken them.

Bell of Lost Souls made a list of things your Army needs to be able to deal with in 6th, it has to be able to score, deal with light mech spam, deal with hordes, deal with heavy infantry, counter flyers, counter death starts, and counter heavy vehicles.  These are the roles I am assessing the Dreadknight for.

Scoring - Only with the help of a Grand Master.  As a scoring unit, they are hard to get cover for, and only have 4 wounds.  While they might be durable at end game (where a lot of big weapons have been destroyed), most of the time I would rather have 5-10 models that can go to ground if need be.

Light Mech Spam - Good.  Str 10, with smash, makes them reliable anti-mech (should be able to kill 1 a turn fairly reliably.  If given the Heavy Psycannon or the Heavy Incinerator, can also pop light mech at range.

Hordes - Decent, better with incinerator upgrade.  The incinerator can take out a lot of hordes, and ignores cover.  The Dread Knights toughness is high enough that most hordes are going to need 6's to wound (unless poison).  Additionally, as a character, the DK can issue a challenge and likely take out the leader of the horde (the one most likely to have a weapon that can hurt it).  Still only 4 attacks, so while it can hold up a horde, it will take the DK a long time to smash through a horde in melee - but with a personal teleporter and a Heavy Incinerator...

Heavy Inf - Good.  AP 2, str 10, will crush most heavy infantry, except terminators with storm shields and hammers, and special melee characters.

Counter flyer - Weak.  If the DK takes a gatling psilencer, and manages to get behind a flyer (with rear armor 10) the DK can provide some AA threat (with 12 S 4 shots), but not a good plan

Counter Deathstar - Decent.  It really depends on the death star, lots of low AP, High strength hits, especially coupled with decent invuln saves, are going to give the DK problems.  Chaos lords, who go before init 4 with AP 2 weapons, characters with eternal warrior, etc will give DK problems.  But if the DK goes faster, and the character does not have eternal warrior, the DK has a decent chance.

Heavy Vehicles - Good - Taking a personal teleporter makes sure you get there, but once you are there, you should no problem using smash (which is only costing you 1 attack because according to the faq, you halve your attacks before applying modifiers - so you start with 3, go to 2 for smash (round up), +1 for charge, + 1 for 2 power fist or powerfist and sword) to put 2-3 glances / penetrating on armor 13-14.

While you can take a Dk without teleporter, especially since they can deep strike, I use them as my main anti-tank.  Their mission is to put pressure, on turn 1, on anything that is threat to my marines (AP 3 templates, massed fire from lootas, etc).  Then I go for anything that my Psycannons are going to have trouble with (land raiders, monoliths, etc), then I go for whatever else.

Equipping the Dread Knight:
Personal Teleporter:  As I have said, to put hard pressure on tanks and artillery early, you need a personal teleporter - but by the time you take 2 of them, you could have almost bought a 3rd Dread.  While you could use them as counter charge unit, and run them alongside you infantry, maybe with a heavy psycannon, I think there are cheaper ways to get psycannons.  The ability to teleport next to your  enemy on turn 1, especially with 2 of these, pretty much destroys the enemy's plan, and forces him to fight on your terms.  The Dread Knight can teleport, so you can put turn 2 pressure on his stuff (and maybe knowing that you could deep strike into his deployment zone will mess him up just as much).

Heavy Psycannon: Not bad in that it gives you a str 7 rending large template.  While this could be devastating, it could scatter, and against small units / single vehicles, it is less effective than a normal psycannon.  Not a bad choice, but I don't think the best.

Heavy Incinerator - This is the best.  Not only is this the cheapest ranged weapons, but it never misses, it ignores cover, and is almost as powerful as the Psycannon (except for the occasional rend).

Gatling Psilencer - Mostly No.  12 Str 4 shots that always wound deamons on a 4.  Str 6 and 7 also generally wounds demons on 4.  It can be effective as a second gun, against hordes, but it is AP -, so you figure, on average, after misses and saves (5+ armor or cover), you are looking at killing 1-2 xenos a turn).  This is the only weapon DK can use to hit enemy aircraft, if it has rear armor 10, and if the DK can get behind it.

2 Power fists - Extra attack, S 10, free.  This is how I do it.

Power fist + Sword - Still get an extra attack, and Str 10, and get to re-roll to hit, to wound and armor penetrate - for 25 points.  This is a pretty good deal, and the sword looks cool, but usually if I have 25 points, I'll give a unit Psybolt ammo instead.

Power fist + hammer - NO.  You are still S 10, but you lose an attack for concussive, which doesn't do anything against vehicles anymore, and anything that is going to survive a S 10 hit is probably already going at initiative 1.

I like running 2 of these, with incinerators and teleporters.   On turn 1, they can clear a battlement, clear an aegis defense line, position themselves to take out artillery, flame lootas.  Be careful not to teleport right next to his counter charge unit, or his plasma spam unit (unless you think you can flamer them down in 1 attack), but the enemy will almost have to reverse some of his aggressive units, to deal with these.