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p5freak wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

There's no confusion, they meant Advancing. You'd like it to allow shooting too, sure, but it seems that wasn't their intent.

Ok, why would i advance my baal pred D6+6 when i cannot fire any of my guns, because they all are heavy ?

Because... you put heavy flamers on it, so you need to get up the board in turn 1 so you're in range of something turn 2?

Voss wrote:

Because... you put heavy flamers on it, so you need to get up the board in turn 1 so you're in range of something turn 2?

Yea, i'm in range of my enemys melta guns turn 1 and dead before turn 2

p5freak wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

There's no confusion, they meant Advancing. You'd like it to allow shooting too, sure, but it seems that wasn't their intent.

Ok, why would i advance my baal pred D6+6 when i cannot fire any of my guns, because they all are heavy ?

Because you weren't in range to shoot at anything anyways and getting in range of a certain objective is really important this turn? Not every stratagem is Veterans of the Long War, some are situational and that's still working as intended.

Guys-guys! Important question!

I really need a stats for a Named characters in-built warlord traits to see what they get?

If anyone has a codex hearby pretty-please could you spoil that?

p5freak wrote:

Voss wrote:

Because... you put heavy flamers on it, so you need to get up the board in turn 1 so you're in range of something turn 2?

Yea, i'm in range of my enemys melta guns turn 1 and dead before turn 2

Well, then the problem you're having with Baal Predators has zero to do with the advance rule.

p5freak wrote:

Voss wrote:

Because... you put heavy flamers on it, so you need to get up the board in turn 1 so you're in range of something turn 2?

Yea, i'm in range of my enemys melta guns turn 1 and dead before turn 2

Assuming you are moving straight towards the enemy, and not away, or towards a flank or the center where they are weaker.

Loving the idea of a 15 man Death Company Squad that moves 12+d6" before the first turn, 12" on the first turn, then charges with 3d6 in the first turn and wrecks face with the Red Thirst... Bonus points if my Captain takes up the Black Rage and joins them

diepotato47 wrote:
Loving the idea of a 15 man Death Company Squad that moves 12+d6" before the first turn, 12" on the first turn, then charges with 3d6 in the first turn and wrecks face with the Red Thirst... Bonus points if my Captain takes up the Black Rage and joins them

You'd be burning a lot of CP, since you'd have to pay separately for the Captain. I'm also pretty sure it doesn't work:
Descent of Angels requires the unit to be set up on the battlefield that turn.
Forlorn Fury is used before the first battle round (or before the game begins, as the author's summary is weird "before the first Battle Round but before the game begins"), so the DC wouldn't be set up that turn (and thus can't use descent of angels).

But... if you're using descent of angels, you don't need forlorn fury at all. Just Jump Pack Assault and charge from 9".
Forlorn Fury seems an absolute waste of CP, unless you absolutely need to walk DC on foot, but need them to pretend they have jump packs before the game starts. I don't have any idea when that would be true.


I actually found the frontlinegaming 'review' (read: advertising masquerading as a speculative opinion piece) really puzzling. Some of what he labels 'competitive' is must take (some, like red thirst, aren't even optional), others are meh, and efficient and situational seem to translate to mediocre and trash.
Are they just barred by GW from saying anything negative?

Don't get me wrong, some of this looks really good, but a 3 CP stratagem to do 1d3 mortal wounds to units, if you roll a 6+ if they are within 1d6" of a point is definitely not 'efficient.' It's not even worth considering. And a lot of the 'pay CP to do d3 mortal wounds' instead of rolling attacks normally aren't necessarily terrible, but they're really far from 'efficient.'

I encounter his review pretty accurate. Yeah, some "efficient" should have been situational, and I think he rated Red Thrist as competitive compared with other chapter/legion tactics in the game.

He was right that for people theres only two states for a unit/rule: OP or trash.

Red Thirst is definitely one of the better <> traits. -1 to hit traits are probably better (though less so if the meta shifts to closer ranged engagements due to Tyranids) but there aren't many other traits that are as uniquely powerful as the Red Thirst.

diepotato47 wrote:
Loving the idea of a 15 man Death Company Squad that moves 12+d6" before the first turn, 12" on the first turn, then charges with 3d6 in the first turn and wrecks face with the Red Thirst... Bonus points if my Captain takes up the Black Rage and joins them

You can't do the Descent of Angels 3d6" Charge, but if your Death Company just moved halfway across the board anyway, so you probably have them in decent position for a charge. Bonus points if you get Lemartes near them so they reroll charges to close even better. So it works. Red Thirst makes for even more fun since they are going to wound easier.

Descent would be good on a squad of Vanguard Veterans or Sanguinary Guard. Not all that great on anything else since it only affects one unit. For 2 CP it should affect ALL jump pack units that come in on that turn, IMO.

Shame I can't do both.. with the same squad

 Galas wrote:

I encounter his review pretty accurate. Yeah, some "efficient" should have been situational, and I think he rated Red Thrist as competitive compared with other chapter/legion tactics in the game.

He shouldn't, as compared to most of them, it's clearly better. That it works on the charge or when charged fundamental alters several units and makes them much more functional. More so with some of the BA specific stratagems and psi powers.
Which frankly was always going to be a problem with the Angels and Wolves. Aside from a few generics, most are going to be tailored to those chapters, whereas the main book chapters (and CSM legions) have to split up the stratagem space among them, so they have fewer tools.

He was right that for people theres only two states for a unit/rule: OP or trash.

Not really. Some of them are quite good. Almost none are OP, and only a few are trash (orbital bombardment being obviously so, especially compared to the similarly priced 'entire unit fights again' stratagem).

The fundamental problem with the way he's evaluating things is that he's talking about them solely on the basis of what the stratagems can do. He talks about them as if there are unlimited CP, which skews the discussion severely, and talks about permanent effects (Red Thirst and warlord traits) in the exact same way. This is particularly bad when it comes to relics- two of the first three and the last are stupidly good (the hammer pretty much has to be discarded, simply because the global effects of the others are so high). But for the stratagems particularly you're never going to have enough CP to burn them in the way he's describing- especially if you're building lists around crazy expensive things like a full 15 death company with jump packs, or trying to get Descent of Angels to Work multiple times by combining it with wings of fire. If that's your goal, then fine, but you aren't going to do it while burning CP on Heavy Bolters (and turning said HBs into 1 shot weapons, which skews the odds pretty severely)

But he's also ignoring that the words he's using instead of a weird overlap of auto-take, good, average or bad have specific meanings.
'Efficient' is never a word to associate using any amount of CP on a gun by gun basis. You will never have that many CP.
Similarly anything that procs off a 6+ is not an 'efficient' use of CP, and there is quite a bit of that. 1 CP to give an entire unit of sternguard +1 to wound with their special boltguns (up to 20 shots) is merely 'situational,' but making 1 missile launcher shot +1 to hit and d3 mortal wounds rather than d6 wounds is somehow 'efficient.' This is a lot of stuff and nonsense, even if you want to bend the odds trying to take down a flyer.

Psi-powers are a little weird. Rage and shield are the obvious ones to take, Quickening... isn't. It situationally is on a librarian dread that you want to mash face with, but the run of the mill librarian shouldn't ever take it (higher WC, only affects libby). On the other hand, Blood Boil is a really good murder or weakening tool, but blood lance is fairly unreliable for.. anything, and given the other choices involved, should never be taken voluntarily.

 Kanluwen wrote:
The BA Intercessors and Hellblasters did not go up in price. They're $60.

I'm pleasantly surprised by this. I hope it's not a mistake.

Interesting point on this- the sprues by themselves don't cover a full squad. So you can pay $0 with the kit or $25 for two separately, though the aggressor/gravis shoulder pads are free in all cases. (Presumably the aggressor box only comes with a single sprue)

Voss wrote:

Well, then the problem you're having with Baal Predators has zero to do with the advance rule.

True. The baal pred so far is overpriced and pretty useless if equipped with the flamestormcannon (FSC). I wonder if GW forgot that they changed the FSC to heavy, when they created the Lucifer Pattern Engines stratagem, it would make perfect sense to advance fast and shoot the FSC. The need to wait another turn until it can fire. This delay can bring enemy troops in range to kill it, or give them time to move away from its pathetic 8" range. The AM hellhound is also a flamer tank, but its range is 16", and its only 101 pts.

Well, I am glad I have finally figured out what I am going to do with my box of Reivers. Five will become Crimson Fists with Bolt Carbines and Grapnel Launchers (for dropping into cover and laying down some cover-ignoring support fire). The other five will become Blood Angels with Heavy Bolt Pistol and Combat Knife with Grav Chutes. It is too bad the Blood Angels ones won't really benefit from any of our new Strategems.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWyLFTbr494

Watching it right now.

Voss wrote:

diepotato47 wrote:
Loving the idea of a 15 man Death Company Squad that moves 12+d6" before the first turn, 12" on the first turn, then charges with 3d6 in the first turn and wrecks face with the Red Thirst... Bonus points if my Captain takes up the Black Rage and joins them

You'd be burning a lot of CP, since you'd have to pay separately for the Captain. I'm also pretty sure it doesn't work:
Descent of Angels requires the unit to be set up on the battlefield that turn.
Forlorn Fury is used before the first battle round (or before the game begins, as the author's summary is weird "before the first Battle Round but before the game begins"), so the DC wouldn't be set up that turn (and thus can't use descent of angels).

True. Got to do one or the other and it is pricy. But it might be worthwhile if you can block a Baneblade or something like that Turn 1.

- Captain with Angels Wing superjumppack (re-roll charge, cannot be overwatched) and a Hammer or something.
- If you get first turn, turn him Death Company (1CP) and Forelorn Fury (2CP) for 12+D6 inch before the game.
- Another 12 inch in your turn.
- Declare a charge against pretty much everything in 12 inch at that point (because you cannot be overwatched) and charge the juiciest target, hopping across screens if necessary.
- If you really got CP to burn, you could up his attacks with strategems, kill something, pile into something else you also multi-charged and burn another 3 CP to fight again. But it's getting kinda silly at that point.


Alternatively, Drop Death Company + Lemartes from Reserves and use Descent of Angels for a 3D6 charge, re-rollable thanks to Lemartes (who himself will, unfortunately, have to come in with 2D6 on his own).

 Galas wrote:
https://spikeybits.com/2017/12/new-blood-angels-codex-datasheets-strats-more.html

-Cataphractii and Tartaros Terminator armor are now included in the codex. They have a +4 invulnerable save. They can take double lightning claws. No Tartaros Captain option.

Hopefully 4++ refers just cataphractii. They are supposed to be cumbersome but extra protection. Tartaros should be agile ones.

Yeah, the one with the 4++ is the cathapracti. The Tartaros has one more inch of movement compared with the normal terminator armour.

 Omega-soul wrote:
Guys-guys! Important question!

I really need a stats for a Named characters in-built warlord traits to see what they get?

If anyone has a codex hearby pretty-please could you spoil that?

from wh40k 4chan: Heroic Bearing: All friendly BLOOD ANGELS units withing 6" autopass morale tests. Dante has this as his mandatory trait.

Rezolut wrote:

 Omega-soul wrote:
Guys-guys! Important question!

I really need a stats for a Named characters in-built warlord traits to see what they get?

If anyone has a codex hearby pretty-please could you spoil that?

from wh40k 4chan: Heroic Bearing: All friendly BLOOD ANGELS units withing 6" autopass morale tests. Dante has this as his mandatory trait.

Yay... Dante just keeps getting worse and worse.

 casvalremdeikun wrote:

Rezolut wrote:

 Omega-soul wrote:
Guys-guys! Important question!

I really need a stats for a Named characters in-built warlord traits to see what they get?

If anyone has a codex hearby pretty-please could you spoil that?

from wh40k 4chan: Heroic Bearing: All friendly BLOOD ANGELS units withing 6" autopass morale tests. Dante has this as his mandatory trait.

Yay... Dante just keeps getting worse and worse.

Yeah I was disappointed in this too. Morale warlord traits are not my favorite at all, specially for SM armies in general with ATSKNF. He's one of the most expensive characters of all the SM named characters at 215 points and tbh, Azreal at 170, literally blows him out of the water in CC, special rules, and auras, and so does Calgar at 200 points. He should be in the 180 point range imo for what he does, or have another special ability. He literally only has chapter master. the rest is gear and he's not carrying better gear than say Azreal.

bobafett012 wrote:

 casvalremdeikun wrote:

Rezolut wrote:

 Omega-soul wrote:
Guys-guys! Important question!

I really need a stats for a Named characters in-built warlord traits to see what they get?

If anyone has a codex hearby pretty-please could you spoil that?

from wh40k 4chan: Heroic Bearing: All friendly BLOOD ANGELS units withing 6" autopass morale tests. Dante has this as his mandatory trait.

Yay... Dante just keeps getting worse and worse.

Yeah I was disappointed in this too. Morale warlord traits are not my favorite at all, specially for SM armies in general with ATSKNF. He's one of the most expensive characters of all the SM named characters at 215 points and tbh, Azreal at 170, literally blows him out of the water in CC, special rules, and auras, and so does Calgar at 200 points. He should be in the 180 point range imo for what he does, or have another special ability. He literally only has chapter master. the rest is gear and he's not carrying better gear than say Azreal.

180? He should be 150 at best. Pedro Kantor is 170 and he hands out a ton of buffs while still being on par with Dante, who is only a beatstick.

I beg to disagree.
First of all - azrael/calgar/cantor are slow infantry - being fast is excellent for a buffing character
He have a deep strike - which means superior tactical flexibility than all the rest of chapter masters.
With stratagems - that means he will always be there where his attetion needed the most
With Red thirst - that means wounding on 2+ all the infantry
6 attacks - 2+ to hit rerollable, 2+ to-wound (rerollable vs characters) means all that goes right into the enemy.

There is also so much synergy with evrything else - Red Rampage stratagem +d3 attack, and other sources of bonus attacks.
And most of them will go through. So even vehicles will blow up thanks to inferno pistol

And 6 inch bubble fearles is essential for blobs of 15 death company marines/10 Sanguinary guard as the banner of the Ancient don't give us fearless now.


So in my opinion, the only thing he lacks for 215 points is the bonus command points.
That is THE SHAME that one of the few greartest Commandor of the whole Imperium, that coordinates entire galactic sectors don't give a f- command points.
That is just ridiculous.

Also - I enjoy underpriced Mephiston better than slightly overpriced Dante.
Btw - they should drop 10 points for Inferno pistol he equiped with

 Omega-soul wrote:
So in my opinion, the only thing he lacks for 215 points is the bonus command points.
That is THE SHAME that one of the few greartest Commandor of the whole Imperium, that coordinates entire galactic sectors don't give a f- command points.
That is just ridiculous.

Not everyone seems to be getting free command points though, at least the Blood Angels have decent ways to recycle them from what i've heard.

Logan Grimnar or Eldrad Ulthran don't give command points either despite being renowned and vastly experienced commanders. Sure Eldrad gets a Warlord Trait (IF he's selected to be your Warlord) that recycles them on a 6+ at the start of each turn which would probably equate to 1 free command point considering the length of most games nowadays wheras the likes of Guard and Marines have a number of recycle mechanics on a 5+ or a few characters that give extra points.

Going off the reviews so far:

The Good:

1. Red Thirst is amazing. BA have a few ways to buff Strength, Attacks and get re-rolls. Stacking all of that together makes them very good in CC, which is as it should be.

2. Flavourful, useful Stratagems. Sure, there are some duds but there are a lot of great ones too. I think BA will probably be one of the more CP-hungry armies in the game, so we'll probably see armies built around maximising them if possible. This is especially true because we don't have the same CP-generating abilities other armies do.

3. Great Relics. The only problem I have is choosing which one to take.

4. Death Company, Sangiunary Guard and Sanguinary Priests look like being the core of a lot of BA armies, which adds to the uniqueness of the army. I think we'll be seeing fewer and fewer BA armies that are just "red Marines".

The Bad:

1. Baal Predators still suck. Seriously, just a copy-paste from the Index with a barely useable Strat added in? I guess mine will stay in the cupboard this edition.

2. Dante. Just...WTF? Expensive, no additional trait beyond standard Chapter Master and a fairly crappy Warlord Trait. Sure, he's a beatstick, but I don't think BA are going to have any problems creating characters who are good in CC.

3. No change in points for the various Encarmine weapons. They're basically Force weapons, which all got a substantial price cut in Chapter Approved. Seems like another oversight/lack of effort from GW.

The Ugly:

1. No new Mephiston model.

Overall I'm pretty happy and I think GW have probably solved the problem of Marine CC being pretty weak. +1 to wound is huge and really buffs the efficiency of any BA unit In assault. I think we'll still need to be careful with army composition as a lot of the initial armies I've seen have gone all-in on assault, leaving very little to deal with enemy armour or tough units at a distance. BA are good in CC but not particularly resilient so they still lose models at a pretty rapid rate. Luckily, a core of Tacticals with heavy weapons helps with filling our a Battalion detachment for extra CPs.

Finally, I thought the FLG review was OK, but pretty rose-tinted. Any rating system that doesn't acknowledge the possibility of something just being bad is not fit for purpose. You have to be very, very generous to think things like Orbital Bombardment are anything other than a waste of CPs. That then brings into question the quality of the rest of the review. I hope the review of the units will be a little more realistic and robust.

Slipspace wrote:
Going off the reviews so far:

The Good:

1. Red Thirst is amazing. BA have a few ways to buff Strength, Attacks and get re-rolls. Stacking all of that together makes them very good in CC, which is as it should be.

2. Flavourful, useful Stratagems. Sure, there are some duds but there are a lot of great ones too. I think BA will probably be one of the more CP-hungry armies in the game, so we'll probably see armies built around maximising them if possible. This is especially true because we don't have the same CP-generating abilities other armies do.

3. Great Relics. The only problem I have is choosing which one to take.

4. Death Company, Sangiunary Guard and Sanguinary Priests look like being the core of a lot of BA armies, which adds to the uniqueness of the army. I think we'll be seeing fewer and fewer BA armies that are just "red Marines".

The Bad:

1. Baal Predators still suck. Seriously, just a copy-paste from the Index with a barely useable Strat added in? I guess mine will stay in the cupboard this edition.

2. Dante. Just...WTF? Expensive, no additional trait beyond standard Chapter Master and a fairly crappy Warlord Trait. Sure, he's a beatstick, but I don't think BA are going to have any problems creating characters who are good in CC.

3. No change in points for the various Encarmine weapons. They're basically Force weapons, which all got a substantial price cut in Chapter Approved. Seems like another oversight/lack of effort from GW.

The Ugly:

1. No new Mephiston model.

Overall I'm pretty happy and I think GW have probably solved the problem of Marine CC being pretty weak. +1 to wound is huge and really buffs the efficiency of any BA unit In assault. I think we'll still need to be careful with army composition as a lot of the initial armies I've seen have gone all-in on assault, leaving very little to deal with enemy armour or tough units at a distance. BA are good in CC but not particularly resilient so they still lose models at a pretty rapid rate. Luckily, a core of Tacticals with heavy weapons helps with filling our a Battalion detachment for extra CPs.

Finally, I thought the FLG review was OK, but pretty rose-tinted. Any rating system that doesn't acknowledge the possibility of something just being bad is not fit for purpose. You have to be very, very generous to think things like Orbital Bombardment are anything other than a waste of CPs. That then brings into question the quality of the rest of the review. I hope the review of the units will be a little more realistic and robust.

Eh. I enjoyed the different approach. I get bored of the binary, min-maxing view of Codexes. The YES, Maybe and Ehhhhh rating system was refreshing to me.

I'm just happy that Sanguinary Guard are usable now. I've not used death company often, mostly because I play second company, but I've always loved the idea of a full melee Vanguard unit of stormshields and various power weapons and a big unit of Sanguinary Guard. Seems fairly reasonable with the new codex so I'm stoked

 JohnnyHell wrote:
Eh. I enjoyed the different approach. I get bored of the binary, min-maxing view of Codexes. The YES, Maybe and Ehhhhh rating system was refreshing to me.

But if you remove negative from the review you don't end up with less binary but instead more like unary which is even worse.

tneva82 wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:
Eh. I enjoyed the different approach. I get bored of the binary, min-maxing view of Codexes. The YES, Maybe and Ehhhhh rating system was refreshing to me.

But if you remove negative from the review you don't end up with less binary but instead more like unary which is even worse.

They didn't remove negative. You're just perceiving it that way.