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After playing a few games with my Deathwing-heavy Dark Angels I've realized that my AA capability isn't anywhere near as good as I had hoped it would be, and that units that rely on cover saves are absolute nightmares for me to deal with (played my first game against a Farsight bomb and, yeah, that was hilarious.) Right now my AA comes from an ADL with quad-gun, and 3 5-man tac squads with Flakk missiles. My solution to cover saves is to assault with my terminators.

I was hoping to get a little advice on what to take to deal with those two issues. If I stick to just my codex I have Whirlwinds or LRRs to work with to eliminate cover; I can also simply put some flamers or heavy flamers on units, which may not be a terrible way to go (right now my bikes are packing meltaguns to go hunting tanks, but it's easy enough to slip them flamers instead.) As far as AA goes... eh? There isn't much in the codex except for Flakk and mediocre fliers.

I've thought about picking up some Tau allies, but even with $25 broadsides I kept looking at the models and thinking 'Are these really worth the money?' I have some of the old crisis suit style broadsides, but they're sufficiently ugly (and difficult to strip the paint off of) that I'm not sure I'd care to use them. Eldar would be great since I've been itching to paint some Eldar up just for fun, but I'm not familiar enough with their codex to know what I'd do with them. Allying in some Space Marines for TFCs is a possibility, but paying for an extra HQ just to get a single TFC probably isn't worthwhile (the troop cost isn't a big deal since I'm already going to be using some Tac marines or Scouts from the DA codex to begin with.)

To ignore cover:

-DAs field the cheapest Whirlwind amongst SM codexes, I personally don't own one but I've seen plenty of good reviews for it; hide it behind a wall and pound away with big pie plates.

-DW terminator with HF is becoming more and more tempting; bring them down with Belial or a beacon to place the template precisely for the best effect, you can add an HQ in TDA and combi-flamer for extra umf.

AA answer:

-well uh... I don't know...
-I field the Aegis Line with quad gun and a Contemptor Mortis with dual Kheres and CML (which creates an awesome no-fly zone) but not everyone likes FW.
-The DA flyers aren't worth the point-sink sadly
-another good option I'm tempted with is the Sentry Gun battery (Imperial Armour): for 105pts you get 3 Krak missiles with Skyfire, Interceptor, BS3 but twin-linked against flyers and fast skimmers works similar to a gun emplacement but does not need to be manned (latest rules in IA 12)

Hope this helps.

For anti-light infantry if you're not using your FA already then you need to use this unit:

5 Assault Marines - 105
No Jump Packs, Drop Pod, 2xFlamers, Combi-Flamer

Use 2-3 depending on if you run any other pods. Supplement wtih 65pt whirlwinds and just laugh and laugh.

As for anti-flyer

IG allies as blobs with AC's or LC's that are divinated are solid.

Tau Broadsides but make sure to take a chip commander to tank for them.

Eldar aren't actually all that great at anti-flyer. If your main purpose for allies if anti-flyer I'd avoid. Though they have some great other units.

Space Marines are solid because you can grab a Stormraven and Storm Talon for anti-flyer duty if you want to. Added bonus of being able to use nullzone for the next two months.

Just some thoughts. I've played quite a while with DA. Generally with IG allies and I don't use any Deathwing but there are some solid tools in the book.

Hm, never even thought about going drop pod. That might not be a bad way to go, especially since it'd be an easy way to stick some extra teleport homers on the table. Do that and give some Whirlwinds a whirl and it could be pretty interesting. It probably will mean shifting away from Deathwing + Support to a truly mixed army, but I can live with that.

Sounds like Eldar will have to stay off the table for this list (which is fine, as it'd be about as fluffy as a brick to the skull.) Glad to hear that I was right in passing by on the DA fliers. I think I'll give a guard blob a go (eventually, it'll take me awhile to get it put together and painted but I have most of the bits I'll need) since I've been wanting to put a platoon together for awhile now, and this is a good excuse. No way in heck I'll have it done for Nova, but I'm just doing the narrative there so I'm not terribly worried.

I like the idea of sticking some HFs on my terminators as well, although it's probably not worth it unless I'm going pure DW. I'm reluctant to put the HFs or Plasma Cannons on the guys, but it's probably worth a quick proxy.

Thanks for the advice, and if anyone else has any good ideas please feel free to share more. I'm having a bit of fun playing with my list for a change, which is nice.

A 6 man dev squad with 4 missiles launchers with flakk manning the quad gun behind a ADL is what have been using at it works really well. Sometimes i will also through a libby in there with prescience to TL the squad and/or fire the quad gun at BS 5 and save the Dev Sgts signum buff for a ML. I also bring 2 whirlwinds for more ground pounding. Might not be able to fit all that in there with DW until around 1750 or so. It worked reall well against my friends Tau, not farsight bomb just lots of markers and missiles. I also like to use a lot of 5 man heavy weapon combat squads.

 Hulksmash wrote:
Eldar aren't actually all that great at anti-flyer.

By what standard? Crimson Hunters, Scatter Walkers, and Wave Serpents are all incredibly gifted at anti-air fire, and the latter two at least are units that are in just about every list for other reasons anyway.

For AA, I use 3 Laserbacks. 3 twin-linked lascannons help a lot. And for FMC defense, all it takes is a bolter hit to drop one and make it easier to shoot.

 Godless-Mimicry wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
Eldar aren't actually all that great at anti-flyer.

By what standard? Crimson Hunters, Scatter Walkers, and Wave Serpents are all incredibly gifted at anti-air fire, and the latter two at least are units that are in just about every list for other reasons anyway.

By the standards of being Allies? By the standards of AV12 flyers being the ones to worry about? By the standards that all of those listed options are of significant cost or easily dispacted?

In an allied force you've got Warwalkers that'll go down to a stiff breeze. They don't hold up and if they are your "anti-flyer" they have even more priority. Crimson Hunter is reliant on coming in after the enemy flyer. Solid choice but isn't going to hang on an individual basis. Wave Serpents have a squad tax and provide 4 TL St6 shots. That isn't effecient anti-flyer. All are fine in a dual role in armies reliant on them but you're veering into heavy point investments for something that other armies do better as allies.

What stiff breeze is going to take out the Walkers after they Battle Focus into terrain or out of LOS? If Walkers were so easily disposed of now they wouldn't be staples in most competitive Eldar lists. If they are getting taken out by a stiff breeze then the Eldar player is playing them wrong.

As for your assertion that Wave Serpents are only getting 4 S6 shots only, go take a look at the book again and tell me what a Serpent Shield does.

But to the overall point, I thought you meant that in general Eldar aren't good at tackling flyers, not just as an ally, in which case you are probably right as they can't take as much of this stuff as an allied force.

6HP of 10/10/10 is exceedingly fragile. Eldar primary can afford to field WW since they can bring other threats. Sticking them into a DA army is asking for them to drop quickly and early.

Hulk pretty much said what needed to be said. Flamer pods and Whirlwinds are excellent infantry killing for bargain bin cost. Your anti-flyer is coming from allies since DA are fairly poor at it.

Whirlwinds and the cheap prescience Libby's with devs were the all stars of my games.

I thought about how I could shuffle my list around a bit to accommodate the suggestions on here and had a few more questions.

Why drop pod flamers instead of ravenwing bikers with flamers? I'm guessing it's since you're less likely to get shot to hell before getting in range (unless there's a lot of interceptor fire on the table,) plus you'd have 2 extra warm bodies to absorb wounds.

What do you stick in with the IG blob when fielding DA? Since all of their ICs except for the Techmarine are Inner Circle (and thus have no ATSKNF) it seems a bit odd. Stick a cheap libby and techmarine in with the blob and call it good? After playing a few games with my Deathwing models I've come to appreciate how incredibly weak Fearless is when you're facing psykers. The techmarine alone might be enough, although then I'm relying on keeping the CCS alive in order to get twin-linked. I imagine that this topic has been fairly well covered in other threads so I'm going to hunt around to see if I can find the solution on my own, but maybe DA have some extra special shenanigans that I'm missing.

Deathwing dread with ML and TL lascannon could be some flier hurt, also rather than wasting tac squad shooting their lone missile launcher I'd say flakk missiles, nephilum is pretty meh.

Mortis Dread is the way to go. 155pts gives you 2 twin linked Lascannon shots, intercepting and skyfire. A pair of them will take out armor and air with ease.

 Lansirill wrote:

What do you stick in with the IG blob when fielding DA? Since all of their ICs except for the Techmarine are Inner Circle (and thus have no ATSKNF) it seems a bit odd.

I think the conventional wisdom is to go with Azrael for the 4++