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blood angels lost more than most in v4. rhino rush primarily hurt them.

but they also gained a lot,
-chaplain re-roll to hit with a couple of str9 powerfist buddies is brilliant and means they'll smash up pretty much anything
-new librarian is a good bonus.
-asscannons boost, the baal is now really nice, and you can still have your 9 tornados just like any marine army can
-drop pod for the furioso is also nice, but not crucial (dont wanna hear the rule arguement)
-more use of infiltrate in v4 means the super-cheap scouts are now way more useful than they used to be

if you compare blood angels to a standard shooty marine army, whats the difference?
your counter assault element of chaplain + furious charge assault squad is now cheaper, and gets free feel no pain, and free powerfists (HUGE)
your lascannons are a bit unreliable
your guys all have furious charge for free
no options of traits

thats pretty good imo.

Posted By Augustus on 02/27/2006 10:07 PM

Relic_OMO writes:

If this were true, it would seem strange that Blood Angels almost always figure in the top 3 ...

Not anymore, the blood angels codex has been ruined by the V4 rules, the rhino rush, their defining tactic is gone, the casualty removal rules ensure that only foolish players are ever slaughtered by the deathcompany, the BA exsanguinator deathcompany unkillable unit is gone, their rhinos can not even use the turbo boost anymore or they almost explode, the codex is one of the oldest legacy codices out there and all they have left is a predictable jump pack and or scout berserk assault.  Even a mediocre tyranid army would probably give them a fit.  A sad army, once they were a great tourney army...

DIFFERENT RULES

success people seem to have with Tyranids, Death Guard, and Orks.

Have you been to a tourney in the last 2 years?  Or read the boards? No one has succes with Orcs!  Marines who leave all their heavy weapons behind?  Your kidding, this statement flies in the face of almost a year of dakka posts. 

...Armoured Company has also won a few large tournaments. The occasional good result from these 'non-competitive' armies might be expected, but it seems odd that people seem to do well so regularly with them.

HAs armored company ever won a GT? Even under the old rules? Nope.  What are you talking about?  The new centering blast and escalation rules, and half strength vs vehicle ordinance hole rules completely defanged that army...  Do you play with the current rules?

Times have changed, this isnt V3 anymore, many of the tournaments in historical perspective were won by armies that were completely different under the V3 or older rules.  Have these armies won tourneys? Sure, have they been under the current V4 rules? Nope.

 

 

My schedule does not normally let me go to many tournaments, but I have been to a couple, and both Blood Angels and Tyranids figured prominently in the top 3 at both. Granted, they were only small tournaments, only about 30 people or so.

As for the rest of your claims, I just went and looked at the results for the 4 GTs held last year. Now, I didn't go to these, but I assume they were under 4th ed rules, since 4th ed came out sometime in 2004, from memory. Out of the 12 top 3 places from these 4 GTs, I see 3 Blood Angels, 1 Orks, 3 Marines, 2 Tyranids, and one Dark Eldar, Tau, and Chaos. I also see that Death Guard has the highest battle score and a Best General at one of these, and many other high-scoring Tyranid, Blood Angels, and otherwise 'non-competitive' armies are also there. I also recall reading on these threads that someone won Adepticon with Armoured Company, which seems to be a very tough tournament as well. From posts by various UK and European players, it seems that Blood Angels and Tyranids are still very successful over there too, and I assume they play under 4th ed rules as well.

If last year's GTs were under 3rd ed rules, of course, I stand corrected. Otherwise, it looks like there's plenty of success for the 'sad' armies.

As others have said, the biggest obstacle to BA effectiveness is the preconceived notions of the players.

You want a competitive BA list? Take a mauleed ultramarine variant (preferably the one with three preds instead of devs), paint your tac squads, tanks, and termies red and your assault squad black.

TA DA! Competitive Blood Angels!

Another Element of competitive armies:

-It's what you take away from an army that makes it competitive; not what you add.

By this I mean learn to minimize te fat in your army... that bionics upgrade or that hunter killer missile or those 3 extra marines in that Las/plas squad.

This is taken from an older threat. Its two concepts that I have in mind when I make a list.

1. Target denial.

- For example play without vehicles and the enemys anti tank weapons will be useless.

- Or play without 4+ or worse saves (a concept many have done ^^) and make weapons without good AP inefficient.

- Or play without walking infantery and assault units will find it hard to scratch you. (All mounted in Skimmers for example.)

The concept of target denial in listbuilduing, as you see, revolves around specialisation. By totally neglecting one type of unit, the unexpecting (tournament) opponent will find a portion of his specialized weapons becoming extremey ineffective. Thus by sacrificing diversity (thats bad for many reasons), you gain an overall advantage, because a part of the opponents investment becomes useless.

2. Target overload.

- Horde armys are an example here. You present more targets then the opponent can shoot.

- Another route is to take multiple similar/even units, that require specialized counters to be dealt with. An armoured Company becomes powerfull this way. The enemy has only a limited number of dedicated (anti tank) weapons and allthough these become very efficient, you present too many targets.

Raider: both kind of figure into resiliency, which is an abstract form of all these. The bottom line is your opponent should not be able to significantly impact your killing power in a single turn.

Here in Texas, we call this rule, "More boyz, less toys."

 

In our experience locally, either max out on dakka or choppy. 

 

That's all I can think of right now.  More later, wife wants dinner!

 

Peace,

Reodd

Um, mabye I'm wrong or something but by taking a quick glance at the GT results for 2005, Blood Angels came in first in 2 out of the 4 GTs (Baltimore and Seattle) and placed second in chicago. I beleive all these tournies were using the V4 rule set, so I don't see how you could claim that BA are not a competative army.

To recap, then, this is what I have distilled from this thread:

• Optimise for escalation. Either all-infantry (whole army starting on table) or all mechanised (whole army off table). This stops your force being destroyed piecemeal by heavy infiltrators or deep strikers. On table is preferable as you cannot be hampered by poor reserve rolls, though off table does give you a chance to observe the enemy and blow them away as you arrive.
• Emphasise firepower rather than assault. Shooting units can begin to inflict damage early in the game and can potentially hurt more units, without exposing themselves to too much risk. Mobile firepower is preferable as it can outwit static shooters and keep away from assaulters. Some counter assault is necessary, though. If you rely on assault, then you must have a reliable method of getting there.
• Strategy rating 3 helps in the dice off to pick a mission.
• Include several mobile objective grabbers. Objectives are important in most missions now. Be careful, though, as you usually sacrifice firepower for mobility.
• Be durable. Tougher armies can take more damage and are more forgiving than fragile ones. It should be hard for your opponent to significantly reduce your killing power in a single turn. Tough armies could be MEQ?s (T4 3+ save) or have a lot of bodies (Guard), or even be able to hide well (Tau). Another way to be resilient is to specialise. If you go mechanised all of your enemy?s basic guns are useless. Similarly, if you go all infantry all of their anti-tank guns are less than effective.
• Build an anti-MEQ force. 60% or more of your tournament games will be against MEQ?s.
• Include a push-back unit to limit enemy deployment.
• Include at least one infiltrating unit to hamper enemy infiltrating.
• Maximize your number of scoring units.
• Try to fill out the force org chart. This allows you o out manoeuvre the enemy in the deployment phase.

Lone Pilgrim,

Thats it exactly! I think you have done a great job of writing up the heart of the ideas.

Bravo!

@ lone pilgrim, it seems as if you can make it shorter:

* - Play shooty, infantry-based and min-maxed Codex Marines? Like Mauleed´s Marines, the list with Devs over Preds..?

The most important elements of a tournament style winning army are:
1. striking paint jobs
2.good sportsmanship

I cant say do this or do that. I tend to hang toward the assulty side of the game, because I feel its stronger than shooting, and because I fell its more fun than shooting. In fact all of last years GT winners won with assult armies. Everone has a differant opinion on how to win and each is valid.

My opinion is to Dominate two phases of the game. Its 2 out of 3. If you can best your opponent in two of the phases, you will win. You can dominate either through sheer might, or diversion. I like to make my opponent shoot at things that are more fearful than powerful, thus eliminating his shooting. And movement is perhaps the most important phase.

@Augustus last years GT circuit saw 2 Blood Angels winners, a Feral Ork, and Wycthe Cult winner. I think thats some good success for those armies. Either that or Marc Parker(who won with Ferals and Wytches) is just that much better at this game than everyone else.

Darkness wrote:
last years GT circuit saw 2 Blood Angels winners, a Feral Ork, and Wycthe Cult winner. I think thats some good success for those armies. Either that or Marc Parker(who won with Ferals and Wytches) is just that much better at this game than everyone else.

Contrary to what the willfully blockheaded will tell you, Wych Cults are STUPID HARD. Especially when using the Webway Portal.

i find most of the non competative and less competative armies Augstus listed do fairly well in most tourney's in my area at least and are not to be underestimated. And besides, if you know you are playing against the min maxed marine army from hell, formulate tactics against it, use terrain ect... no army is hands down that much better then any other army its just in my experience people don't think much about the tactics and use the same ones against min maxed marines as they do against a horde army and thats what leads to the success of these armies.