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Why does everyone think that Dark Angels is one of the worst armies in 40K? For me (whom have only read the 1d4chan tactica) think that thye don't seem that bad. So can someone tell me why they are so bad?

They are elite army which cost more than vanilla.

Well, most people that I know complain that they do not have grav guns, their bikes cost more by 6 points (although they have additional special rules), they do not have centurions, and their flyers cost significantly more points. Basically, they are less effective for power gamers.

I understand the hate but think it is over exaggerated. I think they have a number of fun and unique items, plus they have some real cool models. Also, you can always ally with normal marines if you really want some of the things that they are missing.

Because you can get all the same rules with vanilla marine bikers for far less points barring black knights which are over costed anyways.

They are 3 armies in one book that are weaker then their vanilla equivalents and more points. There is no useful synergy amongst themselves beyond using over costed units to slightly benefit over costed units.

And they have special rules oriented to fighting chaos for no apparent reason what so ever.

Which actually makes them a fairly fun army to play against chaos marines...unless they bring a heldrake for which dark angels have no good answer for and can almost solo a ravenwing army.

Raven wing can be decent - Land speeder spam is a viable strategy - this is essentially the only thing that DA can do better than any other marine chapter. Though - they are still paying out the butt for their bikes which can't take grav and Azreal and sammael or horrifically overpriced to make them troops. They are definitely a subpar option. Their chaper tactic is stubborn FFS. Realistically I think all they need is a chapter tactic to go to mid tier - like space wolves. How about this?

Plasma Mastery - Plasma weapons used by models with the dark angels chapter tactic do not overheat and furthermore re roll their 1's on their wound and penetration rolls?

It's not that they are bad per se, it's that every other Space Marine chapter can pretty much do everything the Dark Angels can do, but for cheaper points or more effective on the table top.

The few things the Dark Angels can do that are different, are so very minor (Deathwing Terminators with Split Fire, or twin linked the turn they deepstrike, or Ravenwing with Plasma Talons- a TL Plasma gun), that it's inconsequential during a game. Only the Deathwing gain a lot of bonuses versus Chaos, and even that isn't saying much.

As noted, the Flyers are all over cost-ed and really leave you scratching your head: Nephilim that's the AA fighter has a bunch of S6 weapons. The other one... applies a toughness debuff to a unit. You pay 160 points for a flyer that applies a -3 WS and I debuff to a unit (large template, one use only), or a S5 blast that causes blindness... both, not very good.

Then there is that unholy speeder Abomination that has a Plasma Cannon on it- one of only a few vehicles in the game that can blow itself up when it shoots it's own gun.

It's not as bad as it was in 5th/6th edition when you were better off then playing C:SM "Emerald Marines", but it's pretty close. GW managed to make a good codex with the Space Marines, Blood Angels, and Space Wolves. Why couldn't they do it with the Dark Angels? Rhetorical question BTW.

It's not as bad as it was in 5th/6th edition when you were better off then playing C:SM "Emerald Marines", but it's pretty close. GW managed to make a good codex with the Space Marines, Blood Angels, and Space Wolves. Why couldn't they do it with the Dark Angels? Rhetorical question BTW.

Because DA always comes out before the rest, and as a result it tends to be the "testbed" for new idea's that the rest either crib or do better, it was also one of the very first codex released out for it's edition, another painful spot to be in.

I know it's a Rhetorical question, but that one tends to answer it.

Yah DA have been missing the mark for a while.

nothing like a couple crusaders punching a hole thru an enemy line to unload a couple squads of Termy knights to wreak havoc amongst the enemy, then have a couple of squads of bikes go around creating havoc while dropping a porter to port in squads of termies behind enemy lines.

ahh the glory of war as only the Dark Angels can bring it.

no, fire bad...

They have a history of being the most evil chapter still "loyal" to the emperor. Literally they have done everything from killing there own men, to almost going to war with another chapter because of there dark past. Also there primarch is a pompous ass.

Table top wise they get alot more love then other chapters (except wolves and blood angels) which pisses some people off.

 zombiekila707 wrote:


Table top wise they get alot more love then other chapters (except wolves and blood angels) which pisses some people off.

Dude, what?

 Von Chogg wrote:

 zombiekila707 wrote:


Table top wise they get alot more love then other chapters (except wolves and blood angels) which pisses some people off.

Dude, what?

Yeah I've gotta ask that considering they always get the worst of the competitive SM codex's,

Every Space Marine army is a core set of units plus a couple of unique tricks. C:SM's unique tricks include Centurions and anything that comes out of Chapter Tactics, BA have Death Company and Sanguiniary Priests, Space Wolves get Thunderwolves and two special weapon Tactical Marines, et cetera.

Dark Angels are considered the worst because their unique tricks are either outright bad (the Nephilim, the plasma-battery Land Speeder), normal units that pay extra for irrelevant rules (Deathwing, Ravenwing), or so incredibly expensive that their awesomeness is mitigated (Black Knights, Deathwing Knights).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Von Chogg wrote:

 zombiekila707 wrote:


Table top wise they get alot more love then other chapters (except wolves and blood angels) which pisses some people off.

Dude, what?

Yeah I've gotta ask that considering they always get the worst of the competitive SM codex's,

He's complaining that they get a full Codex while the White Scars, Salamanders, Raven Guard, Iron Hands, Imperial Fists, and Ultramarines have to share a Codex.

They're pretty awful game-wise. It's unfortunate, because Deathwing could be pretty cool if Belial was ~50 points cheaper, and the Terminators were buffed in some way or reduced in points.

It's as if the designers of the codex think they're doing you a favor by letting you bring an army full of Terminators, when in reality playing Deathwing should net you a per-model discount since Terminators are so awful in this edition.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
They're pretty awful game-wise. It's unfortunate, because Deathwing could be pretty cool if Belial was ~50 points cheaper, and the Terminators were buffed in some way or reduced in points.

It's as if the designers of the codex think they're doing you a favor by letting you bring an army full of Terminators, when in reality playing Deathwing should net you a per-model discount since Terminators are so awful in this edition.

They were pretty bad in the last edition as well.

And the only good ones in 5th was Assault Terminators...

Yeah there's a theme here.

 zombiekila707 wrote:
They have a history of being the most evil chapter still "loyal" to the emperor. Literally they have done everything from killing there own men, to almost going to war with another chapter because of there dark past. Also there primarch is a pompous ass.

Table top wise they get alot more love then other chapters (except wolves and blood angels) which pisses some people off.

What?

Dark Angels like to keep their secrets. They're still loyal to big E. It's just that they're feeling guilty about half of them touring to chaos once upon a time, and if someone just pokes their nose where it doesn't belong, well then...things happen. As per the Lion being anything but a bad ass mysterious knight commander - well sir, I disagree with your opinion and bid you good day.

The problem with being a DA player is that they are a hard army to play and aren't competitive because there's no easy button (IE spam this to win). So there's a lot of internet hate because of it. However, we are over priced when compared to our other loyalist counter parts. Additionally, our units don't work too well in support. We have an army wide stubborn which is nice (I guess) but not too useful. Our fliers are horribly weak for the points. Terminators are dangerous and better than the Space Marine counter parts but suffer in terms of points for it. The same goes with our bikes (exception being the Ravenwing knights those things are awesome).

We also have some very derpy relics and units (Landspeeder Vengeance and Dark Talon) and Cloak of Fallen heroes (I'm not sure I never use it). I do believe it when people say that GW uses the codex to test things before launching the SM codex which is the flag ship of GW.

/2 cents

problem with the dark angels is they're ultimatly basicly just a glorified codex chapter.

their big differances? Deathwing... their first company uses terminator armor, except this isn't SUPER Unique, sure plenty of codex chapters don't have eneugh to outfit their entire first company but I suspect most of the first founding ones do. (does anyone belive for a moment the Ultramarines, just for example, don't have 100 suits of terminator armor?) and sure they have the ravenwing but white scars do bikes pretty well too.

Dark Angels need something to make them stand out from the rest.

Given space wolves and blood angels are both "choppy Marines" Maybe dark angels should be given a face lift to make them become "shooty Marines"
Give them the ability to buy Kraken rounds for their tatical squads. suddenly dark angels become THE codex to play if you're looking at a Marine gunline.

just some random ideas.

Attention! There are alot of whining ahead, proceed with cotion.

Good example of the fact that DA codex is testing ground for other SMs is the rule "Hover Strike" of Dark Talon. It is stupidly bad rule and GW didn't even bother to replace it with prper Hover and Strafing Run USRs in FAQs.

Another example Ezekiels sword named Traitor's Bane do not in fact have Traitor's Bane SR.

Despite been from psycher heavy chapter (last Librarium Conclave formation strongly implies this) DA librarians pay 10 points more then any other psycher in the univers.

Nephelim Jetfighter, dedicated AA jet, of a faction that is build around hunting Chaos Space Marines theme, can not harm Helldrakes, the only flyer type of said Chaos Space Marines.

Plasma battery of giant Land Speeder Vengeance is huge two-burreled weapon that can not be fired full power if LSV moved despite that LSs are relentless, have shorter range than Plasma Cannon (that can be operated by Tactical Marine) and do not have twin-linked USR.

DA don't have Grav-Guns (but I don't see this as a problem) and special ammo for bolters for veterans and command squads (now THIS I want). Have strong emphasis on plasma, but have no SR for plasma.

There alot of such examples that tells you that DA codex is half-assed codex. But fluff and models a pretty cool and RW can kick some ass (if there are no Helldrakes in enemy army).

 Reinokarite wrote:
Attention! There are alot of whining ahead, proceed with cotion.

Good example of the fact that DA codex is testing ground for other SMs is the rule "Hover Strike" of Dark Talon. It is stupidly bad rule and GW didn't even bother to replace it with prper Hover and Strafing Run USRs in FAQs.

Another example Ezekiels sword named Traitor's Bane do not in fact have Traitor's Bane SR.

Despite been from psycher heavy chapter (last Librarium Conclave formation strongly implies this) DA librarians pay 10 points more then any other psycher in the univers.

Nephelim Jetfighter, dedicated AA jet, of a faction that is build around hunting Chaos Space Marines theme, can not harm Helldrakes, the only flyer type of said Chaos Space Marines.

Plasma battery of giant Land Speeder Vengeance is huge two-burreled weapon that can not be fired full power if LSV moved despite that LSs are relentless, have shorter range than Plasma Cannon (that can be operated by Tactical Marine) and do not have twin-linked USR.

DA don't have Grav-Guns (but I don't see this as a problem) and special ammo for bolters for veterans and command squads (now THIS I want). Have strong emphasis on plasma, but have no SR for plasma.

There alot of such examples that tells you that DA codex is half-assed codex. But fluff and models a pretty cool and RW can kick some ass (if there are no Helldrakes in enemy army).

Pretty much.

espite been from psycher heavy chapter (last Librarium Conclave formation strongly implies this) DA librarians pay 10 points more then any other psycher in the univers.

except the dark angels Librarians are members of the DA inner circle and thus get special rules above and beyond standard chapter tactics. thus being more expensive then vanilla Libby's is fair

BrianDavion wrote:

espite been from psycher heavy chapter (last Librarium Conclave formation strongly implies this) DA librarians pay 10 points more then any other psycher in the univers.

except the dark angels Librarians are members of the DA inner circle and thus get special rules above and beyond standard chapter tactics. thus being more expensive then vanilla Libby's is fair

Except vanilla marines do not pay for chapter tactics, ever.

for the past couple of years DA have been seen a lot, why, because it is cheaper to field their units not talking points wise but cash wise, this is all thanks to the Dark Vengeance starter sets. 5 termies or 3 bikes or 10 marines for about $15 a group. that is not a prize to sneeze at.

If they could just ignore Gets Hot, and had all their unique units cost 1-2 points less, and got some sort of Libby/Chappy discount/formation (yes I know they have one)... then they'd be useable.

BrianDavion wrote:

espite been from psycher heavy chapter (last Librarium Conclave formation strongly implies this) DA librarians pay 10 points more then any other psycher in the univers.

except the dark angels Librarians are members of the DA inner circle and thus get special rules above and beyond standard chapter tactics. thus being more expensive then vanilla Libby's is fair

Incorrect assumption about the points cost. The issue isn't on the front end. A stock Librarian costs the same in any marine codex. The issue is it costs them 10 more points than any other psyker in the entire game to add another Mastery level.

Dark Angels would be fine if the points costs for units were balanced. Paying 18 more points for a default 3 bike squad (and even more beyond that) means you're giving up at the very least an entire special weapon. In return, you get teleport homers on every unit, and Hit and Run. Thing about teleport homers is any other book gets to pay 10 points somewhere else in their army on much cheaper units, and you only ever need the one in a squad, on it's sgt. And the thing about the Hit and Run is that needs to be a chapter tactic for any Dark Angels unit with the "Bike" unit type, to make it in line with 6th Ed Marines.

There's just a lot of idiosyncrasies in the book, and it's twofold the reason why. As others have pointed out, it was the first 6E book so a lot of it's point costs were going off what was balanced from last edition, and it also means anything coming out after it looks to it to figure out what worked and didn't work. It doesn't even have internal balanced, points-wise. For example, it's cheaper to bring Storm Shields on Company Veterans than it is on Command Squad units despite literally the same stat-line and basically the same wargear options. (Remove banners, apothecaries and champions and it's literally the same unit.)

Hell I've already started. Let's go point out a lot of the other dumb crap in the book.

1) Nephilim Jetfighter. Fluff says it's an anti-air unit, yet it only has a SINGLE option to cause penetrating hits to anything AV12, that being it's twin-linked LasCannon. You're better off bringing the Avenger Mega-Bolter because then at least the jetfighter serves a purpose as a pure Rate of Fire flyer, but it's still not terribly effective for it's points cost. It has One-Use only missiles that are only S6 AP4, with no special rules. And to top it all off, it's 190 points for the friggin' thing. Just terrible unit.

2) Terminators are awful. In general. This goes beyond just Dark Angels, but seeing as we're supposed to the chapter who's all about them Terminators, it's especially so. Our special Knight terminators are one-trick ponies who are just not that effective once they blow their once-a-game ability. A change to stormbolters would go a long way toward making Terminators actually worth bringing, but for now, 44 points a pop for a dude who's still effectively shooting a regular ol' boltgun? Bogus.

3) Land Speeder Vengeance. There are several issues with this, mostly that it's design doesn't make sense. Why is it twice as large as a normal speeder yet still has a speeder stat-line exactly? At least make it AV11 on the front and sides, if not 12. Give it another hull point maybe, just SOMETHING please. The reason it's overcosted is some genius at GW decided it's plasma thingy is worth 90 whopping points on it's own. Remember, regular speeder statline. Only difference in rules between it and just a regular ol' speeder is the gun, yet a default regular landspeeder is 50 points and the LSV is 140 freakin' points. Dumb. Dumb dumb dumb. It's one of the only twin-barrelled weapons in the entire game that's not twin-linked, to top things off. Firing the Heavy 3 version means you've damaged one of your two hull points on average every two rounds. It's freakin' pathetic. Blows itself up.

90 point weapon. Ridiculous.

4) The Librarians issue and the Storm Shield issue. Easily resolved with an FAQ going "oops" but they haven't done it. They literally FAQ'd the 5th edition Blood Angels book to allow them to buy psyker levels, and hadn't touched the over-paying of mastery levels for DA libbies.

5) Lack of any of the actual goodies from Space Marines. I get grav weaponry was added later on so whatever, but Thunderfire Cannons were out already. We don't have a heavy support option worth bringing.

6) Deathwing Command Squads, while cool on paper, are awful. The champion looks cool on paper til you realize it just means you have that much less shooting in the squad, and the Apothecary costs you points to give up having a power fist.

Ravenwing command squads are 2pts cheaper then black knight squads and all around a better choice for some unfathomable reason. In a Ravenwing army there is almost no reason to actually run black knights over command squad.

Sammael is a 200pt tax to run Ravenwing and complements the army in zero useful ways. Heck he doesn't really look thematically right to me (drives me nuts having this random jetbike in the army). An litterally ever other HQ choice for the Ravenwing is better.

There is no incentive to run "green" Dark Angels as they are just plain worse then vanilla marines. An are absolutely just an after thought in the codex. In all honestly there should just be 2 supplements Ravenwing and Deathwing and a DA chapter tactics in the vanilla codex for all the effort that is put into green DA.

You can't alter Deathwing sergeants weapons like the rest of the squad so your stuck with the odd ball stormbolter power SWORD in the terminator squad.

The banners are neat but too weak to make anything truly matter. Or maybe the rest of the book is too weak...

GW consistently goes out of its way to make sure the DA are one of the most up to date in FAQ and ERRATA. Which would be a positive if they didn't use it to nerf any small minute advantage the DA have ever scrounged up. No seriously though what is with that? I dread FAQ for the DA. Any answers to any of the real questions? No? Its another nerf isn't it? .... *sigh*

How about White Scars singing everything you can do I can do better?

Or why Ravenwing would be a fun cool army if it wasn't hard countered with no defense against cover ignoring weapons. Playing against a heldrake you say? Yup thats a losing. Tau on the the other side of the board? That is also a losing. It can be fustrating to play pick up the +300pt unit a turn because something had ignores cover. Which White Scars mitigate by being cheaper.

Paying premium with those teleport homers? Hope you brought termies.

Then there is Asmodai...the named chaplain...because reasons..

Dark angels are good army when they are allies. Stand alone they are subpar army like CSM.

Stand alone CSM are not great, but DA make them look like tournament winners.

CSMs are the least problem codex for DA. But CSM usualy do better against other armies.

Those DW knights get hammer of wrath - THIS IS HUGE!