Welcome to the final piece of the Khorne Daemonkin puzzle – the Gorepack Formation.
Made up of Flesh Hounds and Chaos Bikers, this is the unit that generates the most interesting in the KDK army and I feel is the best option to bring the book to the winners circle. This is Goatboy and as usual you can read up on more tactics in the Frontline Tactics Corner.
The Gorepack is my favorite Formation from the Khorne Daemonkin Codex. It emphasizes everything I like about the KDK book. Small fixes to make Chaos Space Marine choices good as well as enough room in its options to fit into just about any KDK army. Lucky for us, this formation is not just locked in as a choice for the Bloodhost Detachment and can be utilized in just about any Chaos army. The initial taxes in a Bloodhost Detachment means that most likely this formation is just going to be tacked onto a CAD instead of part of that “Decuroin” style detachment.
Overview:
The formation is made up of 2-4 Units of Chaos Bikers and 1-4 units of Flesh Hounds. There are no other restrictions on the options for each unit so the normal make up you see for them from their reviews explains their set up. This formation is designed to be the “scouting” force for a KDK force with the Flesh Hounds finding their enemy first and the Chaos Bikers coming in like a true hunting party. Their initial design is built to go after enemy Psykers as we all know Khorne does not like the mind bullets/games those pesky science wizards bring to the table.
Normally the set up is 2 Units of minimal bikers with special weapon of choice (normally Melta) and 4 units of Flesh Hounds. I could see using a full set of Chaos Bikers to bring as much “special” weapons to the table top especially if your local meta has a heavy amount of Gladius there.
Wargear:
There are no additional wargear options for both units that isn’t part of their initial choice. The Chaos Bikers have all the special weapon options as well as aspiring champion options. The Flesh Hounds of Khorne just get additional rules to help make their fighting ability a lot better.
Special Rules: The formation choices have all the rules they come with for their unit choice as well as the next additional rules.
- Move through Cover: Bikers don’t have to worry about rolling dangerous terrain. Sweet!
- Preferred Enemy (Psyker): Remember how they are designed to hunt Mind Wizards?
- Run them to the Ground: Flesh Hound units get Hammer of Wrath and bikers get the Shred special rule when resolving their Hammer of Wrath attacks.
These rules are set up for this formation to get there, charge, and just punish the opponent with a ton of saves to take. I wish they got an additional strength for Hammer of Wrath attacks but I guess we all can’t be White Scars.
Tactics:
I’ve posted this list in the other 2 reviews for units this formation is based off of. I think it is my next Goatboy list and I really feel it utilizes this formation not the fullest. It brings a lot of game winning options to the table by utilizing the Blood Tithe pretty well, putting a ton of pressure on your opponent, and letting you win the Maelstrom game by having a ton of options to score across the table top.
Here is the list again if you are just reading this formation review.
KDK CAD/Gorepack X 2
HQ: Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage
HQ: Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage
Troops: Bloodletters X 8, Character Upgrade
Troops: Bloodletters X 8, Character Upgrade
Troops: Bloodletters X 8, Character Upgrade
Gorepack #1
Chaos Bikers X 3, Meltagun X 2, Meltabomb
Chaos Bikers X 3, Meltagun X 2, Meltabomb
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Gorepack #2
Chaos Bikers X 3, Meltagun X 2, Meltabomb
Chaos Bikers X 3, Meltagun X 2, Meltabomb
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Flesh Hounds of Khorne X 5
Each Gorepack covers so much real estate that it gets hard for an army to fully remove them off the table top. Add in the Daemon rule on the Flesh Hounds of Khorne and it takes awhile to dig those suckers off of an objective. It also helps they have a huge 50mm base that can easily keep those drop pod armies at bay when they come in and try to snag an objective.
The Flesh Hounds end up doing most of the heavy lifting as they take Overwatch for the incoming D Thirsters, give terrible paths for your opponent to fly through, and in a pink deal with most basic troops pretty easily. It helps they are basically “immune” to Grav as it takes 2 6’s to give any chance to remove one single Flesh Hound base. In fact the games movement away from a ton of massed Strength 8 means you will have to do 2 wounds too remove single Flesh Hound from the game.
Each Dog unit with its Fearless options help keep things locked down as an opponent has to murder each and every base. Plus when dealing with a GC creature – the bases can be easily spread out to allow only one stomp per Model – thus ensuring those GC don’t go crazy and shoot you all over the table top. Sure if your opponent rolls 3 6’s you are in a world of hurt – but you have 7 other doggie units ready to fall on that spear and win you the game.
As this army doesn’t seem to care about shooting it means awesome cover saves or other “protection options are just not really that big of a deal as you move closer, pre measure those charge ranges, and hope you only have to reroll one dice on the charge with your fleet option. This type of simple army set up can be especially useful in an big tournament environment when you could end up fighting for every minute as your opponent slowly moves through their turn. It is also nice to have a “simple” army that is both powerful, fun, and feels very fluffy for the initial army codex.
This formation also really helps to build an MSU style of play that KDK is very good at. The more units you have the more Blood Tithe you can generate (by both killing and being killed) in a turn. It also helps you to cover the table and dominate the maelstrom game. Combined with a CAD, you could potentially swarm the board with Bikers and Dogs, and slap in some Heldrakes, too! What more could a devotee to Khorne ask for?
Be sure to let us know what you think in the comments section and remember, Frontline Gaming sells Games Workshop product at up to 25% off, every day.
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You have hit the nail on the head.
Dude. I’ve been running this Formation basically since it came out, and I just now realized that I’ve been completely blanking on the MTC and PE:Psykers the whole time. There have actually been a bunch of times when both of those would have been significant, too.
this is a great review and good job. I swear by gorepack as it is the most solid formation in the book, I generally only run just one as i like to fill out my list with other heavy hitters but this is the bread and butter for my Juggerlord and scoring all together.
What do you think about 1 single D-Thirster, and 1 Jugger-Lord, hidden in a larger Hound unit with the Axe that gives you a Bloodthirster when he dies? ~100pts cheaper (to buy the extra Hounds with, for example).
I think if you’re going to be sticking characters into larger-size packs (which I feel is probably a stronger option overall), you’d be better off running a CSM CAD to get the Axe of Blind Fury.
Hiding your Warlord in there works pretty well, too, but seriously, nothing in the KDK List hits like a Blind Fury JuggerLord.
I wrote a list a little while ago using dual cads with 4 lords on bikes and juggernaughts and a gorepack mainly for fun but it ended up doing pretty well.
I have no D thirsters. Just lots of biker lords, bikes, and lots of flesh hounds. I wonder how well I could do with Biker lords instead attached to the bikes then maybe some heldrakes or something added to the CAD.
I don’t have any D-Thirsters either. Do alright using JuggerLords mixed in with the Hounds. The issue is really against things like multiple Knights. Without D-Thirsters, it’s hard to get the punch to take those down, since so few of your Units can pack real Anti-Vehicle.
As long as you’re not facing Knights or Wraithknights, you’d do pretty well there; Heldrakes are superior against Scat Bikes, MEQs of all sorts, and many other things, but the D-Thirster can be used to sorta-kinda-maybe fill the gap against units that Hounds otherwise can’t deal with.
No, seriously, have at least one person proofread your articles before you post them. 🙂
Gore pack msu seems like the secret sauce that makes KDK run like a Swiss watch. Being able to throw all of those msu khorne dogs into the meat grinder where they either hold objectives, threat short range units, and then die and give blood tithe points really helps kdk not run out of gas early on. That as well, and giving bikes shred as well as the hounds HoW makes the army hit hard on the charge. Very khorne. I’ve considered making a KDK chaos force myself with Alpha Legion.