Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So my dark angels army is all over the place, and for the most part is a 4th ed SM army, that's painted green. I have been looking to turn it into a doublewing army, and was considering the possibility of landspeeder spam, since Ravenwing armies are made for that kind of thing (max of 22 speeders in an army, including Sammael's awesome-mobile) and had also heard about some kinds of landraider spam. But I was wondering, would it be possible to field a doublewing army spaming landspeeders and landraider crusaders? Maybe Sammael in his speeder for HQ, two 6-man bike squads with the attached speeders for Troops, and fill up the heavy supports with LRCs and fast attacks with Ravenwing support squadrons. What do the people of DakkaDakka think? Does this idea hold water? And what do it's potential points costs look like? Keep in mind this is a rough list, and the bikes would probably have melta weapons.

You're not anywhere near 1750 or 1850. You're closer to 'ard boyz levels with that setup. The other thing with that list is it's not a doublewing since you have no terminators. You're ravenwing with some armor support.

Doublewing is usually defined as Ravenwing Bike squadrons scouting ahead to teleport in terminators with the "deathwing assault" rule. It can be very effective but doesn't include Land Raiders usually.

Interesting. Thanks for the replys. Now could you guys tell me, in general, which landraider do you think is better, the Crusader, or the vanilla landraider? So far I've been thinking that the Crusader might be better, since it can pump out far more shots, and it has the multi-melta. However, the vanilla is much longer range, and can really just camp in the back and take out tanks with its 48" ranged lascannons. So which one's better, in general?

Yeah, you are at least in the 3000+ point range for army. 6 Ravenwing bike squads with Landspeeder runs about 320+ each.

For answer on Land Raiders...

Read first post http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/245840.page#800849

You need to decide role for your Land Raiders.

Deathravens is a very expensive army point-wise.
I went the other route and took several DW Termie squads on foot supported by Tacticals and RW Bikers.
Please find my RTT report at the corresponding board.

Not a lot of point having Land Raiders if there's no terminators inside. If going the speeder spam route (which can certainly be effective) I'd be inclined to use the HS slots for Vindicators, Dakka Preds, or Whirlwinds, depending on points and on how I'd armed my speeders -- probably Whirlwinds, though, as if with 22 speeders on the board, it might be hard to get clear lines of fire for other vehicles.

For a 5-speeder Ravenwing Support Squad, you probably want either Typhoon/Heavy Bolter + 4 x Heavy Bolter, or Heavy Flamer/Multi-melta with either 4 x Multi-melta or (if you have the points) 3 x Multi-melta, 1 x Assault Cannon/Multi-melta.

Land Speeder squadrons are too fragile for my liking.
If you give them MM/HF they need to get into position for at least one round giving the enemy the opportunity to shoot them.
I'd prefer Typhoons.

So, it would probably be better to just go with traditional doublewing, then? What if I were to run 2 termi squads, two 6-man bike squads with the speeders, Sammael in his speeder, and some support squadrons? And maybe Belial so the Terminators can capture objectives. Hows that?

Oh, BTW, if I have Sammael so the attack squadrons count as troops, do the attached speeders also count as scoring, since they are purchased with the squadron, even thought they always deploy seperately?

Yorick_of_Tau wrote:So, it would probably be better to just go with traditional doublewing, then? What if I were to run 2 termi squads, two 6-man bike squads with the speeders, Sammael in his speeder, and some support squadrons? And maybe Belial so the Terminators can capture objectives. Hows that?

Oh, BTW, if I have Sammael so the attack squadrons count as troops, do the attached speeders also count as scoring, since they are purchased with the squadron, even thought they always deploy seperately?

Not bad.

On Attack Squadrons... The bikes, attack bike, and land speeder are each a scoring unit. You could combat squad the 6 bikes, also. That would be 4 scoring units from 1 troop selection. Keep in mind, if you outflank with squadron you'll be unable to combat squad the bikes per codex rule.

Scoring Terminators are excellent, and are definitely the one key advantage DAs have over vanilla marines right now. Termies are a lot tougher to shift off an objective than either bikers or PA troops are, especially if you also take advantage of DA Termies' ability to mix CC weapons and ranged weapons in one squad.

That said -- Belial is somewhat overpriced at 130 pts. :( He's OK, just not as good as most of DAs' other independent characters, like the chaplain, and definitely nowhere near as good as Sammael on his speeder. Still, adding Belial does give you the possibility to add 2 apothecaries -- one in a Terminator squad, and another one in a Command Squad. If you have Sammael too, that's another possible apothecary in a bike squad. Expensive, to field 3 apothecaries, bit it can make your units very, very tough.

Belial is certainly not viable as an independant character or as an HQ choice, but it might be worth the points to have terminators and bikes as troops.

That way, some of the Terminators could hold my deployment zone objectives and deathwing assault onto the middle objectives, with the help of some of the teleport homers and scout moves, while the other squads outflanked and deep-struck onto the enemie's back objectives. To me that ability for troops to threaten the whole table without having to be transported, or even in play, is well worth the extra 130 points.

Yes, agreed -- that was the point I was trying to make, really, that if 130 pts is worth it for you to take Termies as troops, get Belial, but if not... don't.

Bikes as troops can be hellishly effective too, of course -- the ability to turbo-boost onto an objective from the other side of the board on Turn 5 can be awesome.

Although if you want to go with a more all-biker army you can field a better list using the SM codex.

Arguably, yes, although you don't get scoring Attack Bikes or scoring speeders in the SM codex, or scoring bikes who are also Scouts and Fearless (though of course the latter may be a drawback in some circumstances), or an old-school Apothecary on a bike... or Sammael on his speeder, for that matter. So I'd say "different" rather than inherently "better".

SM Codex stuff is generally a lot cheaper than DA Codex stuff, but doesn't quite do the same thing.

Well, Deathraven armies are very expensive as it includes both Belial and Sammael.
I'd consider Deathravens at the 2000 pt level but not below, because otherwise you cannot include enough units in there.

At smaller pt games, I prefer Belial over Sammael as he gives me Termies as scoring units and Termies are more durable than Bikers.

In the recent RTT, I was a bit annoyed about the performance of the RW Biker unit used as fast attack.
It outflanked the enemy but got stuck in cc with Pathfinders and Fire Warriors. One basic attack is not sufficient to kill enemy units.

RW are not good in CC, basically. There are ways to make them suck a bit less, but CC is really not their optimal role. They should be using their base 12" movement to stay *out* of CC and shoot the feth out of their enemies.

They can be OK supporting other units, or finishing off seriously weakened units, but otherwise, CC should be a last resort.

Absolutely true.
RW Bikers do not excel in cc.
With one basic attack their impact is really low.
I seem them more in a support or harrassing role.

Having 3 bikes tie up a unit of pathfinders (egads markerlights!) isn't too bad.

MarvinGayeIsMyDaddy wrote:Having 3 bikes tie up a unit of pathfinders (egads markerlights!) isn't too bad.

True. That's priceless.
I prefer a full squad of 6 RW Bikers in my Deathwing army.
It's more versatile and can also take on tanks with meltas and melta bombs,
while the long-range weapons of the Termies suck vs. heavier tanks.