He gives you a squad of Henchmen to use if you're not using Coteaz (who is consequently not the best HQ to use all of the time. Sometimes, having a Henchmen squad in an elites slot instead of a troops slot can be helpful if you're loading up on other kinds of troops). He's got a TL Multi-Melta, which is a bit of a rarity outside of Henchmen in C:GK. He also has his leadership modification ability, which makes him like Calgar-lite. But yes, I'd say the majority of the use that comes out of Karazamov is his pinpoint accuracy bombardments with the OSR. It's a capability that can not be replicated elsewhere in the codex.
Match-up specific strategies and tactics
Obviously, different opponents will require different tactics (sometimes strategies) to overcome, and I will go over all my thoughts and experience on the most common match-ups.
Codex: Space Marines Space Marines are a grab bag of possibilities. One match, you may be facing a shooting line from hell. Next match, you'll be eating a ton of close quarters battle goodness. Best you can do is either have an army and strategy that is flexible enough in application to either take the fight to them or be able to stave off incoming forces long enough to divide and conquer, or have an army that is so offensively oriented that your opponent can do nothing to stop you (... not that hard where C:SM is concerned). Overall, a match-up to be wary of, but hardly your toughest fight.
Codex: Blood Angels Blood Angels will typically come in three varieties. First type is the mechanized speed demon force, Second is the Assault Squads from hell, and Third is the gunline.
Mech Blood Angels used to be the force to be reckoned with in 5th, but now, it's almost too easy to neutralize. Predators and Rhinos fall easy prey to S5 storm bolters and psycannons, and the token troops occupying the razorbacks pose almost no threat to anything. Use flanking/rear attacks to destroy the high priority threats first, then mop up the rest.
Assault Squad Spam Blood Angels seems to be more popular then the gunline, at least around my neck of the woods. This kind of list will consist of either regular Assault Squads or Sanguinary Guard and will be supported by either Devastators, Predators, Baal Predators, or Stormravens. Depending on how assault capable your forces are, Assault Squads vary between Medium to Low on the target priority list, as our standard equipment sees them off with only Feel No Pain to keep them company. Sanguinary Guard go High now as we require Daemonhammers or Doomfists to ignore their armor save. Depending on your army's configuration, you will have to choose between prioritizing their firebase or their incoming assault forces. A diversion like a Strike Squad or a Dreadknight romping about in their backfield can suffice for keep fire support occupied while the rest of your force focuses on engaging the assault squads.
Gunline Blood Angels are a rare breed for some odd reason. If the OPFOR is composed entirely of shooting elements, get in close and engage in CQB where we have the great advantage. If the OPFOR has a Shock Unit supported by a list full of shooting units, this is where it gets tough. Thanks to Corbulo, Blood Angel Shock Units are all but immune to small arms fire from the front, and their flanks are well covered by the firebase. Combat Squad what you can and get in danger close to engage the gunline elements. You will most likely win those individual skirmishes, as those gunline elements typically have little to no close combat capability. The results of this are two-fold: You force many little situations of local superiority and you force the Shock Unit to decide where to go. As with basically all Shock Units, it can only be in once place at a time, and when you have the entire board covered, there aren't exactly many winning situations to be had. If you feel confident enough to engage the shock unit and win in a straight-up fight, then you should be fine for the most part.
Codex: Space Wolves This is no doubt a tough fight no matter which kind of Space Wolves you run into, as our psychic powers won't be as reliable as they normally are. The Space Pups come in three main varieties: Mechanized wolves, Drop Pod wolves, and Hybrid wolves.
Regardless of the army build, Wolf Scouts and Lone Wolves will be a pain in the rear to deal with. Thankfully, the Scouts can no longer assault when they come in, so shooting them once should deal with them sufficiently. Lone Wolves are probably the second best distraction in the game. If you can, ignore the Lone Wolf. If you must kill the lone wolf, use the unit with the least amount of shooting options first so that you can try to preserve your offensive options as much as possible.
Mech wolves are very similar to Mech blood angels, and you can deal with them in much the same way. In a way, mech wolves are less able then blood angels because they move much slower, giving them less ability to reposition after you initiate a flank attack. However, this puts you in range of their Rune Priests, which can carry all sorts of risks itself based on what powers they generated. If at all possible, try to hit the Rune Priests first, preferrably with Mindstrike weaponry.
Drop Pod wolves give you two methods of dealing with them: keep them at arms length and get into a gun battle, or let them come close, weather the storm, then shoot/charge them, aiming for the wipe.
Hybrid wolves provide a couple of ways of answering them. First, you can ignore the mech/shooting part of the list and prioritize the podding squads first. Second, you can deep strike yourself so you can engage the backfield elements and force the OPFOR to drop their squads into friendly territory to support. Either way, keep target prority in mind and don't be afraid to move on to other targets after you sufficiently weaken one squad (<25%).
Codex: Grey Knights This mirror match is an absolutely lethal match-up, as we are our own worst enemy. Close Combats will be on the whole lethal and extremely quick, and all our anti-psyker related weapons will work wonders on our own kind.
This fight will basically boil down to who is able to shoot first and inflict casualties faster then the other, then who is able to get the charge off.
Henchmen can change the equation a bit, especially those of the close combat variety. Henchmen outfight most of the Grey Knight units point for point, so pure grey knight opponents will be very threatened by henchmen and the accelerated rate of attrition they inflict.
Codex: Imperial Guard This is one of the toughest match-ups we have, bar none. On the whole, Guard units evaporate before Grey Knights, but there are simply so many that we get overwhelmed more often then not. Their shooting also has much better stand-off capability, which puts the onus on us to close the distance.
We may not exactly be great at stand-off shooting, but we must not neglect it. Henchmen can serve great purpose here, as they can fire on high priority targets with heavy weapons right from the start. Anything that can start opening up chimeras and shaking/destroying manticores/medusas/leman russ tanks in the opening phases of the game helps tremendously.
Line infantry are probably best off deep striking into terrain, hopefully establishing local superiority so they can fire at least once at full strength. Shoot as often as possible and charge if you can, you have to be active in as many phases as possible to have a chance of neutralizing enough of the army to be relatively safe in the later phases of the game.
The more bodies you bring to this fight, the better you usually are, as model quality means very little here.
Codex: Dark Eldar Dark Eldar are the iconic fire type army, as their offensive power is unparalleled even by the Imperial Guard. Thankfully, their defense is very lacking, and that is our only saving grace. Avoid spending too much on upgrades to bring more bodies, as you will probably be facing down a lot of firepower.
Achieving Local Superiority against Dark Eldar is like trying to catch fish with your bare hands. It's possible, but very unlikely, so you're better off just focusing fire and cutting off their mobility. Since they outrange most Grey Knights for the most part, Deep Strike will be the key tool to use here. As long as you can hamstring the Dark Eldar by neutralizing the Raiders/Venoms ASAP, you should stand a good chance of keeping the OPFOR in mid-range so that the fight is even.
Shooty Henchmen are worth their weight in gold in this match-up, as they take advantage of the Dark Eldar's poison weaponry to be more durable then Grey Knights given some good cover to hug. Combine this with their shooting ability, and most Dark Eldar players will learn to fear your Henchmen something fierce.
Codex: Necrons Necrons are probably the most annoying match-up to face. Vehicle support is basically null and void thanks to Gauss, so it's up to the boots on the ground to win the day. Grey Knights will outshoot Necrons at mid-range, but assault can pose a problem if you rely on low model count units to do the killing thanks to Mindshackle Scarabs.
On the ground, Terminators will be vital in providing counter-assault support against Wraiths/Lychguard and Characters, as they will be a bit much for the Power Armored Grey Knights to handle. As always, HQs that provide force multipliers to the unit will be the best choice for shooting/assault support, as beatsticks will become counter-productive to you.
In the air, Necrons bring an insane amount of fliers, and there's honestly not much we can do about that outside of allies, Stormravens, and fortifications. About the best we can do in the air is to hit the Doom Scythes first, hopefully take those down, and ignore the Night Scythes, hoping those don't do much damage.
Target priority will be a bit simpler then normal against Necrons. First target priority will be the close combat capable necrons, as those are willing to close in and engage in CQB. Second target priority will be Doom Scythes, as those can do quite a bit of damage left unattended. The other vehicles are third on the list. Warriors/Immortals can be saved for last, as they are relatively easily dispatched in CQB. In any case, focus fire as much as possible, as Reanimation Protocols can render your efforts moot if you spread out your damage too much.
Codex: Orks This match-up is pretty simple for Grey Knights. We come with Storm Bolters standard (S5 is almost a given), have super assault cannons in every slot, and rock force weapons standard. This means that their troops are dropping like flies as they advance, all of their armor is extremely vulnerable to every single unit we bring (Hit the Flanks of those battlewagons, same deal), and Nobs are facing serious damage in assault against even our basic strike squads.
Dreadknights serve a great purpose here, as their heavy incinerators can make extremely short work of any orks you want to hit. Combine this with Karazamov, and there is basically no ork unit that will ever want to assault the Dreadknight, EVER (excluding Ghazghkull, but whatever).
Since Orks want to drown you in dice (either via shooting or close combat) and require a lot of space to do so, don't let them get that space. Use the terrain to your advantage. Set yourself up so that there are only a few ways to get in at you cleanly without having to deal with terrain, and take care of the problem one target at a time.
Nob Bikers may be terrifying to other Marine armies, but they shouldn't phase us at all. Toughness 5 is a little bit of a concern, but that's what Librarians are for IMO. Soften them up with your shooting phase (hopefully, you should have at least 3 full squads of guys for their one Nob Squad points-wise), let one unit get charged (I'd suggest combat squading one of those squads and putting them out front to soak the charges), then surround the nobs, shoot, then charge. Librarians help tremendously here, as they can cast Hammerhand and Might of Titan, letting the squads save their warp charge for force weapon activation. This has taken care of Nob Bikers every time I fought them, and I rarely see them now because of that (This is just against me though... seems they show up a bit more often against other non-GK people).
Ork Fighta-Bombas can be rather destructive given the right unit combinations. As always, Stormravens can help keep the skies clear for you so you can concentrate on the fight on the ground. Stormravens also bring the additional benefit of being able to reach the backfield, taking care of ork fire support and hopefully diverting some of the orks back towards their own board edge.
Codex: Chaos Space Marines This is quite the classic match-up for us Grey Knights. The current codex is too new for me to throw out any specific tactics that are proven to work against them, but I will still record my thoughts at the moment about what I think will be a good way to play against them. As I get more experience beating some Chaotic bum, I'll post more and more tactics that I find effective against them.
My general impression of the new codex and the few times I've crossed blades with them is that, for the most part, the basic units for chaos are about the same as before. Not much has changed with their weapon options and specific usage tactics, and the cult troops are pretty much where they were before with the Gavdex (Berzerkers got a big middle finger though... sucks to be them, I suppose). Just get to mid-range and flood them with saves, and they'll go down just as easily as they did before.
Daemon Princes cost a ton more overall, but are much more capable. Biggest detractor from Daemon Princes is that they are now not immune to instant death! Combine this with the fact that we get Preferred Enemy rerolls against them, and they're looking at bullying shooty henchmen and strike squads only (even then, he still might get taken out by that one lucky force weapon hit). This combines into there being more Lords and Sorcerers coming to play, which will either be better or worse for us (Better if it's a Lord, as they are pretty much forced into the Melee beatstick role, worse if it's a sorcerer, as they have access to Telepathy and have ML 3 for half what we pay...).
Their fast attack selections gained quite a bit of viability, as bikers are dirt cheap now, as are Raptors. Warp Talons are a mixed bag, as they come with double lightning claws for cheap, but are daemons and have no grenades. Basically, not much has changed, but there will generally be more of them.
Biggest things that I'm wary of are those Sorcerers, Heldrakes, Maulerfiends, and Noise Marines. Sorcerers have a decent chance of getting Invisibility, which will complicate issues a bit for us. You remember those Harlequins with their 2+ cover saves and all that? Let's now make them Terminators or Bikers. Heldrakes are going to be extremely deadly to Power Armor players, as they will tear right through entire squads in a heartbeat. Maulerfiends are quite the distraction to deal with, as they're fast, cheap, and deadly. Noise Marines compete quite well with Grey Knights at Mid-range, and they're able to pack AP3 flamers as well (I'm noticing a trend here...) so CQB can be quite a risky proposition.
Basically, Chaos Space Marines can do anything they want to do, so it's best to be prepared to either keep your distance or get in to CQB ASAP. Anti-air abilities are pretty much required in this match-up, as going without it can spell disaster pretty quickly for you. Pack at least one dedicated assault unit (Terminators/Paladins or assault Henchmen) so you can deal with flying DPs and close combat threats should they appear.
Give me some time with this, I'll be back with more detailed analysis on common threats, combos, and counters.
Codex: Eldar This match-up has the potential to be the most annoying fight to go through. Our psychic powers are basically null and void thanks to Runes of Warding, and Eldar have access to some of the best force multipliers in the game. Their units are super specialized, fragile, and expensive. Their units are individually lackluster for the most part, but those psychic powers more then make up for those individual flaws in creating a coherent fighting force.
What's most important to remember in this fight is that Eldar consist of many completely specialized units working together to achieve the end goal of victory. Your first step in this fight is to identify which element of his force is most deadly/disruptive to you and neutralize it first. If Mr. Eldar doesn't tailor his lists for you, there will be certain parts of the army that will be useless for the most part against you (If he does... target priority is basically whatever you can hurt at the time).
Eldar have two ways of operating that I've seen: Earth type and Air/Fire type. While Air/Fire is typical of Eldar, Earth seems like an anomaly that certain players like to use to shake up the metagame from time to time.
Air/Fire Eldar consist of mobile units designed to achieve local superiority and wipe out entire elements of the OPFOR at a time (sound familiar?). There are two ways to combat this: Consolidate on a position that offers little visual cover to the OPFOR and destroy whatever comes close, or use a small firebase to engage high priority targets while the rest of your forces deep strike to turn the tables and surgically remove key parts of the eldar offensive. You have to judge the situation and choose the option that exposes you to the least return fire. If you're facing War Walkers, Vypers, Night Spinners, Falcons, and other long range type Eldar, then the "castling" tactic is probably not the way to go, as that will maximize damage to you while ensuring that most of your army can not reach the OPFOR.
Earth Eldar can be VERY annoying based on what's doing the surviving. These armies use the defensive force multipliers combined with certain units to create situations where shooting at them with basic weapons basically amounts to nothing happening. This is a situation where Incinerators/Heavy Incinerators become necessary, as psychic powers like Perfect Timing are not accessible to help circumvent this. Assaulting can be a risky proposition, as there is usually a squad of Harlequins/Striking Scorpions/Banshees waiting to counter-charge. You'll have two realistic options for dealing with this based on what you brought. If you have incinerators, use those to obliterate the units using the cover save tricks; this forces the Eldar player's hand, which you can subsequently take advantage of by shooting/charging the assault element and breaking that part of the army. If you don't have incinerators, you have to close the distance ASAP and get into assault. That counter-charge unit will do some serious damage, so you have to try to get multiple units into combat with that unit simultaneously to try to overwhelm it and break it's back.
Rest of the match-ups coming after the next post.