In our Detachment Focus series we take a deep dive into an army’s Detachments, covering what’s in them, how they play, and how they’ll fit into the broader meta and your games. In this Detachment Focus we’re looking at the Questoris Companions from the Imperial Knights.

Imperial Knights has always been a faction about big stompy robots completing mighty deeds. Sure, you could always take the slightly smaller robots and do somewhat average deeds, but Questoris Companions focuses on those units that make a slightly bigger impression. 

We’d like to thank Games Workshop for providing us with a preview copy of these rules for Review purposes.

Detachment Overview

In a way, Questoris Companions is the Imperial Knights answer to the Chaos Knights’ Lords of Dread Detachment, in another it’s your Oath-focused Detachment. Like Lords of Dread, this Detachment is all big Knight focused. This also may be the most interesting Detachment in the book, as it fully changes how you interact with your army rule. You’ll want a good understanding of the Code Chivalric rules before playing this one.

Detachment Rule: Heroes of Legend

At the start of your turn if your Oath is fulfilled you can create a new one along with a new quality. You can’t get extra bonus CP from randomly rolling but this is an incredibly strong ability. Let’s be honest, you were never not taking the re-roll one Quality, so this gives you an opportunity to also get the +2 move and +2 control ones. The Deeds are also all much easier to complete compared to the index, so it’s not out of the question that you can get all three done by the end of battle round three.

Enhancements

Each of these Enhancements only work once per game, but you can use them again each time you finish an Oath. The good news is these are all incredibly cheap at 10 and 15 points, so you can slot them into your list easily for less than the cost of an Inquisitorial Agents squad.

• Herald of Triumph: When you charge you can expend this enhancement and force a Battle-shock Test at -1 for everything in engagement range. This is not great even if it didn’t have the expend clause. Pass on this one.
• Wyrmslayer Divination: In your shooting phase you can expend this enhancement and if you do you get full rerolls to hit against flying units. This is pretty situational and you already are rerolling one of your hits but may be useful in specific metas. I wouldn’t run to take this one.
• Pennant of Silvered Fury: When you fight you can expend this enhancement to get Sustained Hits 2. This is more like it. Sustained 2 can ratchet up the reliability of any Knight’s melee, especially on the sweep.
• Crushing Condemnation: After you destroy a unit in the Fight Phase you can expend this enhancement and if you do select another enemy within 12” and roll 6d6, and each 4+ is a mortal wound. Being able to throw your defeated foes like a grenade is something Knights used to be able to do and has been missing in tenth edition. It has always ruled and there’s no exception here.

Stratagems

All of these only work on Titanic Knights, so there’s no love for armigers here.

• Courageous Stand (Epic Deed, 1CP): This is your only defensive stratagem in the Detachment, giving you a 6+ Feel No Pain in the Shooting or Fight phase. This is fine but isn’t the most impactful as a stratagem.
• Titanic Duel (Epic Deed, 1CP): If you target a Monster, Walker, or Titanic unit with an attack you add 1 to the Hit and Wound roll. This will only be relevant in a few match ups, but at 1CP can be killer when applicable.
• Moment of Glory (Epic Deed, 1CP): Just before you consolidate with a model, you can Consolidate 3 extra inches but must end that move in combat. This is always nice to have in your back pocket to push past a screen.
• Hero’s Tread (Epic Deed, 1CP): In your command phase you can make an objective sticky and it counts as having 5 OC on it. You can ask anyone who’s played/played into Lords of Dread about just how powerful this ability is, and they’ll tell you how it can warp entire games. Aim to use this every turn.
• Unstoppable Warrior (Epic Deed, 2CP): The classic Fall Back and Shoot and Charge stratagem. Its very very strong on big Knights who tend to get tied up easily, but 2CP is a bit steep for the effect. That said, you’ll be generating a ton of extra CP with your multitude of Oaths so you should be able to use this relatively often.
• Driven By the Past (Epic Deed, 1CP): A Knight can advance and charge. Get a Lancer in your list STAT.

Playing This Detachment

You want a gameplan for which Oaths you want to complete and in which order going into each turn. Round one, you’ll likely be going for holding more objectives than your opponent, then probably kill more than three units in round two, and then finish off a character in round three. This all changes based on match up and your list however, so you’ll need to dial in what order works for you. Beyond that, you want a big Knight-focused list since all the support of the Detachment is only really for them. 

Strengths

• You get to use the other Qualities. You were only ever using one of the qualities in 99% of games, this Detachment lets you branch out.
• Strong Stratagems. There’s a great toolbox of strats here to keep your Knights in the game and to give them some unique capabilities.
• Cheap Enhancements. With all the enhancements at 10-15 points you can easily slot them into your lists.

Weaknesses

• Middling Enhancements. While they’re cheap, a lot of these aren’t super impactful, which is a shame in a Detachment like this.
• Few defensive buffs. The most valuable things you can give Knights are defensive buffs since they keep them in the game longer. Outside a once per phase 6+ feel no pain there’s not a lot here to help with that.
• No Armiger support. Big Knights take center stage here, leaving their smaller buddies to the side. Considering a lot of your datasheets are about buffing the smaller dudes, you’re missing out on some key support here.

A Sample List

Let’s go big! This is where you really want to throw four big Knights at your problems. You could theoretically look at five, but four with some support feels like the better call to us given the latest round of points updates.

”Sample

This list aims to get big dudes in your opponent’s face early and bully objectives in No Man’s Land. The Lancer provides an early threat you can shoot into your opponent’s front lines with Advance and Charge while the rest of your army pushes towards the center to blast and fight while completing oaths. Meanwhile the Helverins provide debuffs to your opponent’s force to keep your guys in the game. Where this list struggles is with scoring, while your big guys can shoot and do actions, you’ll want them moving around the table as much as possible and charging often, which can make things a little hairy on an action heavy turn.

Final Thoughts

This is another great entry into the Imperial Knights’ repertoire. It strikes a nice balance between great rules and a ruleset that will play very differently than other Detachments do. I’m happy to see the other Qualities from the army rule get some play, even if this Detachment is the only time they’ll see the table. I expect to see this Detachment pop up in Competitive Innovations once this book starts hitting tournament tables.

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