Why the Thunderwolf Stormlance works and the Ravenwing Knight Company of Hunters doesn't

 

Hello battle brothers! As we all know, the Gladius is the most competitive detachment we can play at this point in 10th edition. There is some lament about this state of affairs, as I think we'd all like to be able to play our bespoke detachments without feeling like we're handicapping ourselves, but that just isn't the case. 

What really seems egregious to me is that the Stormlance Task Force full of Space Wolf Thunderwolves is a competitive build, whereas the Company of Hunters with a similar investment in Ravenwing Knights doesn't come near to being as effective. I'd like to do a side-by-side comparison of the two detachments and the respective mounted units to see why one is a winner and one isn't even a blip in the meta.

We'll start off taking a look at Thunderwolf Cavalry.They have a pretty beefy profile - T6, 4 wounds, 3+ save, OC 2. That's a lot of chonk to chew through, and it's not the end of their defensive profile

Every member of a Thunderwolf Cavalry unit can take a storm shield, granting them a 4+ invulnerable save. They sacrifice getting guns to do so, but the shooting Thundercav can access is pretty negligible, so they're not losing much by doing so. 

Now let's look at offense. Thundercav aren't really going to be toting around any guns, so it's strictly going to be melee output. As you can see here, they aren't necessarily throwing out high-quality attacks, but there sure are a lot of them. That doesn't seem like a big deal so far. Seven S5 AP-1 D1 attacks seems like it'll chew up chaff, but not really punch up into bigger things. The sauce is in the datasheet ability.

That is quite a datasheet ability. On the charge, Thunderwolf Cavalry literally double their damage output. Seven D1 attacks doesn't seem like a lot to worry about, but seven D2 attacks amazing output. If all of those go through, that will put down an Armiger, or a Leman Russ. 

I'll grant all of a single Thundercav model's attacks aren't likely to go through a target like an Armiger, but it's noteworthy that one member of the squad can do enough damage to put one down, and a full squad of Thundercav, not counting characters, is 6 models. That's a ceiling of 84 damage for the unit. 

Now let's look at the Black Knights. Right off the bat, the defensive profile is less impressive, sporting 1 less Toughness and Wound. They have an inherent 5++ invulnerable save, but that's worse than the 4++ Thundercav can get by taking storm shields. Both units have the same OC. The Ravenwing Knights are a little faster, with a 12" move to Thundercav's 10".

Moving on to the offensive profile, Black Knights have significant shooting, which Thundercav lacks. That gives them a bigger potential threat envelope, but to get full damage output out of the shooting, they have to be within 9" of their target, which is still further away than eyeball-to-eyeball. Within that envelope, they can safely do up to 3 damage with their plasma talons, or up to 6 if they risk hazardous rolls. 

On top of that, Black Knights have their combat weapons, which are essentially power weapons. They can charge in and do some chip damage with those. 

Sadly, Black Knights' datasheet ability does not synergize nearly as well with their primary mode of attack as Thundercav's ability does. Gaining Anti Big Thing 4+ on their melee weapons is nice, but the big show with Black Knights is their plasma talons. Buffing their melee is incidental at best. 

A single Black Knight's damage ceiling is 9 whereas a Thundercav's is 14. The Black Knights can do significant damage from a longer range than Thundercav can, and their primary mode of attack has much better A, but at the cost of taking Hazardous rolls. Black Knights are a little faster, but Thundercav are significantly tougher. A full Black Knight squad is 20 points cheaper than a full Thundercav squad, but I'd say just on a unit-by-unit comparison, Thundercav are a better buy. 

Units don't exist in a vacuum though. They will often be played with attached characters, and brother do Space Wolf players have a lot of options to attach to Thunderwolves. 

The bog standard is going to be the Wolf Guard Battle Leader on Thunderwolf. He's essentially a mounted Lieutenant character, granting Lethal Hits and a reactive move that can be triggered after his attached unit has been shot at. It has to be used to move closer to the nearest enemy unit and can result in the unit entering Engagement range. So, if you're not careful, shooting the Thunderwolf unit could result in it getting into combat and killing your units on your turn. The WG Battle Leader can be equipped with a power fist or thunder hammer, and they benefit from the Thundercav's datasheet ability, which means on the charge he's swinging Damage 3 attacks. For all this utility, the Battle Leader costs only 80 points. 

Then there's the Wolf Lord on Thunderwolf. He can also be equipped with a power fist or thunder hammer, grants discounted stratagems like a Captain, and grants +1 to Advance and Charge Rolls. He costs 100 points. 

Logan Grimnar is worth being aware of too. On his sled he's 180 points, brings a pile of attacks (potentially Damage 4 attacks on the charge with his axe's Strike profile), generated CP by killing units, and once per game he can call a Wolf Waaagh, letting all units in the army reroll charge rolls and melee hit rolls that turn. It's worth noting that he gets those abilities whether he's on his sled or on foot. The Thundercav Stormlance I looked at took him on foot. 

As far as Canis Wolfborn and Harald Deathwolf go, both of those guys have some pretty interesting abilities, but being named characters can't take enhancements and probably can't be attached to units that also have Battle Leaders attached, so I figure they're marginal. 

Not as bit a list as the characters that can lead Thundercav, though I suppose our list would also include the Bike Chaplain.

Starting with Sammael, he's actually a pretty baller character - good gun good melee profile, more wounds than any of our other characters save Lion Dad. His datasheet abilities allow his attached unit to shoot and charge after advancing (Grand Master of the Ravenwing), and force opposing units falling back from his attached unit to make Desperate Escape tests (Cut Off Their Escape). Those are nice, but GMotRW is made at least semi-redundant by the Company of Hunters detachment rule, and COTE would be way better for a mounted assault unit than a mounted shooting unit. Ironically, Thundercav would probably love to be led by Sammael. I've said it before in other articles, but Sammael really wants to be attached to a mounted assault unit we just don't have. He's also wildly overcosted for what he does at 130 points.

The same amount of points we'd spend on Sammael would get us a Ravenwing Command Squad, and that's objectively always going to be a better choice to attach to Ravenwing Knights. The RWCS adds 50% more shooting  and melee output to the RWBK squad, +1 OC per member of the squad, brings back a lost member per friendly Command Phase, and grants +1 to Advance and Charge rolls and free Heroic Intervention. That's a lot of value for the points, but it's still not enough to elevate the combined squad up to a competitive choice. 

Then there's the Bike Chaplain, a generic Space Marine unit that can be attached to Ravenwing Knights. He's 75 points, so doesn't cost a lot. He has a Chaplain's melee profile, which is decent but not amazing, and a twin bolt rifle mounted on his bike. His datasheet abilities grant +1 to melee wound rolls (Litany of Hate) and Devastating Wounds to shooting at a unit within 12" (Catechism of Fire). Litany of Hate is a meh ability on Ravenwing Knights. It would really only be relevant into Infantry and Mounted units, and melee is not really their main show anyway. Catechism of Fire is decent, but it comes at the opportunity cost of not being able to attach a Ravenwing Command Squad to the squad. 6-9 extra plasma talon shots is always going to be better than having a few pop Devastating Wounds. 

Now let's compare the detachments, starting with the detachment rules. As you can see, the Stormlance detachment rule really suits Thundercav right down to the ground, and it's not so bad for a lot of other units a Space Wolf player might be inclined to use.

The Company of Hunters detachment rule is similarly pretty good for Ravenwing Knights and any other Ravenwing units we might be inclined to use. 

The Stormlance's enhancements include Fury of the Storm (25pts) to buff a mounted character's melee weapons with improved Strength and AP, Hunter's Instincts (10pts) to bring a mounted unit out of Strategic Reserve a turn sooner, Feinting Withdrawal (20pts) to allow a unit to shoot after it falls back, and Portent of Wisdom (15pts) to allow the bearer's unit to reroll Advance rolls. 

Fury of the Storm potentially puts a Wolf Lord or Battle Leader's power fist up to S10 AP-4 on the charge, which is a pretty significant buff. Hunter's Instinct is going to let the Space Wolf player Rapid Ingress a brick of Thundercav Turn 1, so that is definitely worth spending 10 points on. If there's 15 points to spare, the SW player may stick Portent of Wisdom on a Battle Leader, though when we get into Stratagems, you'll see why that's not tremendously important. I think it's pretty unlikely we'd ever see a SW player put Feinting Withdrawal on anything, because falling back and shooting isn't super-important to a Thundercav list.

The Company of Hunter's suite of enhancements includes Mounted Strategist (30pts) allowing the attached unit to charge after it advances or falls back, Master Crafted Weapon (10pts) granting the bearer's weapon Precision, Recon Hunter (20pts) granting the attached unit Scouts 9", and Master of Manoeuvre (15pts) to bring the attached unit out of Strategic Reserve a turn sooner. 

Right off the bat, I'd like to point out that Hunter's Instinct and Master of Manoeuvre do exactly the same thing, but MoM is 5 points more expensive, and Feinting Withdrawal and Mounted Strategist are rough equivalents, but  Mounted Strategist is 10 points more expensive and has more restrictive terms and conditions. Master Crafted Weapon is practically useless, the only options we have to put it on are a RW Champion's power weapon or a Bike Chaplain's crozius, neither of which are likely to pick up an enemy character in one go. Recon Hunter is good, can help get a RWBK brick into Rapid Fire range faster, but can be risky to use against armies that want to get closer faster.

As we move into Stratagems, I'm just going to describe them in the text in an effort to save space. The Stormlance suite of strats includes Ride Hard Ride Fast for -1 shooting to hits and wounds against the selected unit, Blitzing Fusillade to give the selected unit's ranged weapons Assault (and Sustained Hits 1 if they already have assault), Wind-swift Evasion for a 6" reactive move after an enemy unit moved within 9" of the selected unit, Full Throttle for an auto 6" advance or auto 9" for a mounted unit, and Shock Assault to grant the selected unit a reroll on the charge roll and Lance on their melee weapons. 

The Company of Hunters suite of strats includes Talon Strike granting the selected unit +1 on to wound rolls against an opposing Infantry or Mounted Character unit in either the Shooting of Fight phase, Hunters Trail to allow a Ravenwing Mounted unit sticky an objective, High Speed Focus to grant a Ravenwing unit -1 against enemy shooting attacks, Death on the Wind to force a unit shot by a Ravenwing unit to take a Battle Shock test, and Rapid Reappraisal to put a Ravenwing unit on the table in to Strategic Reserve.

Comparing these strats, Ride Hard Ride Fast and High Speed Focus are equivalent defensive strats, but the Stormlance's version is just better. For their main offensive strats therer's Shock Assault and Talon Strike. Talon Strike has the flexibility of being usable in both the Shooting and Fight phases, but Shock Assault lacks the restrictions of Talon Strike, helping a unit punch up into vehicles and monsters, which is what a RWBK's plasma talons could really use, and their close combat weapons don't need it because of their datasheet ability. For marginal offensive strats, I'd rate Blitzing Fusillade higher than Death on the Wind because it can be used on any unit in the list and actually does something, whereas forcing Battleshock tests is practically useless. Stickying objectives with Hunter's Trail and reserve shenanigans with Rapid Reappraisal definintely have their utilities and I think there could be some play with RR in a list designed to do Secret Missions, but Wind Swift Evasion and Full Throttle are just better strats that have less restrictive terms and conditions to boot. 

Having looked at all this, we can see that there's not just one reason a Thundercav Stormlance is competitive but a Company of Hunters isn't. It starts with Thunderwolf Cavalry just being a better unit than Ravenwing Black Knights, being both considerably tougher and being able to dish out more damage. Thundercav enjoy better synergies with their available supporting characters than Ravenwing Black Knights do. While the two detachment rules suite their respective central units about equally well, the Stormlances's Enhancements and Stratagems are better than the Company of Hunters' equivalents. The Stormlance's various rules synergize with Thunderwolf Cavalry so well you'd be hard pressed to convince me that was not done by design, whereas the Company of Hunters' various rules leave me wondering what units the developers were envisioning us using them with. 

I'd like to seem Games Workshop bring the Company of Hunters up to be at least as competitive as the Thundercav Stormlance, One thing they could do is allow us to attach another character to a unit that has a Ravenwing Command Squad attached, which would let us work some synergies. That said, I think the Company of Hunters would have to be pretty heavily reworked to make it work for Ravenwing Knights as well as the Stormlance works for Thundercav. At the very least, there is no reason our rules that are directly equivalent to rules in the Stormlance should be worse or more expensive, and that should get rectified in a Balance Dataslate. Whether or not we'll see that depends on how much of a priority is is to Games Workshop to have our bespoke detachments have competitive play. I, for one, am not holding my breath.