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After discussing with a friend how to actually run a Deathwing Strike Force, because it's rules are terrible, I had a huge realization.

You have a boatload of elite slots (2 mandatory, 10 optional for 12 in total), and you can fill them with Venerable Dreadnoughts as there is no stipulation to what you can bring other than it have the "Deathwing" special rule and be placed in deep strike, which you can do via drop pods.

I had thought you had to ignore Drop Pod Assault with the strike force, but again I was wrong. That's just for the Deathwing Redemption Force, which is an auxillary formation listed elsewhere in the book. Because of Drop Pods, you can run the list and not auto-lose on turn 1.

That got the wheels turning. YOU CAN BRING SO MANY DREADNOUGHTS, YOU GUYS. The best part is, you can scale it to whatever amount of points you want to play by adding more Venerable Dreads in Pods for 160+ points.

We usually play 2k around my neck of the woods. (If you play 1850, just play 2000. It's much more enjoyable with today's ludicrousness if you ask me.) So here's the list.
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MANDATORY HQ
Librarian with Jump Pack - 90 (bare-bones with jump pack and Shroud of Heroes) up to 145 (terminator, level 2 psyker, Shroud of Heroes, Foe Smiter + tax) points. He's literally just here because he has to be, and a jump pack is a cheaper option to gain deep strike than Terminator armor. Plus, it lets you actually kit him out Foe Smiter if you want to without having to spend the 5 point "gain storm bolter so I can swap it for the relic stormbolter" tax. I highly recommend giving him Shroud of Heroes relic because it's 10 points to gain FNP and Shrouded. There are no units for you to join in this list, so the Shrouded thing is always going to be active. It's the cheapest way to add some actual survivability to your Libby. Get him into ruins and you're at a 2+ cover which is often better than 2+ armor from being a terminator

Even if you go the Terminator armor route like you're theoretically supposed to, it's worth taking the Shroud of Heroes because FNP and Shrouded are still good. It just ends up being 20 points for the previously mentioned tax if you want to get Foe Smiter, and all you're gaining is a 5++ and a 2+ armor vs ignores cover weapons instead of a 3+.

But seriously, the whole point is to try and not die and possibly hold an objective so the cheaper, the better. Could be worth taking another mastery level for more psychic powers. If you don't care about if your warlord lives or dies, you can always risk summoning daemons! I'd probably just go Divination, though, as it's got a lot of powers that benefit either keeping your warlord alive, or enhancing the shooting of a dreadnought.

My ideal list for 2k is Jump Pack librarian with Shroud of Heroes.

Elite Slots:

Venerable Dreadnought + Drop Pod (160 minimum per).
Close combat weapon/Heavy Flamer and TL Flamer = +15 points
Missile Launcher and TL-Lascannon = +25 points

You can do this up to 12 times. Kit them out however the hell you feel like it. For a 2000 point game, you can bring the maximum amount if you also bring a barebones Librarian with just a jump pack (no Shroud, sadly). It's exactly 2000 points to do this if you take literally NO options. Even scaling back a single Dreadnought frees up 160 points which you can get quite a lot of use out of.

My ideal 2000 point game has 10 Dreadnoughts. Half the list are what I call "close combat" dreads which are CCW/Heavy Flamer + TL Heavy Flamer. Other half are high strength shooty dreads with Missile Launchers and TL-Lascannons.

ALLIED FORMATION

Ravenwing Attack Squadron

Barebones: Attack Bike + single Land Speeder (95 points)

The entire reason you bring this is because in the Deathwing Strike Force rules, you can simply elect to have your reserves arrive if you have the Ravenwing Attack Squadron in your list. It's 95 points to make sure your other pods show up turn 2. All you need to do is find a nook to hide your attack bike or land speeder in and they've done their job. Two heavy bolters is simply a bonus. Depending on how you decide to kit up your dreadnoughts, you can always get more bikes and equip them and the land speeder with multi-meltas.

For my ideal 2k list, you give the bike a Multi-Melta and add another Heavy Bolter to the Land Speeder.
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Thoughts? Critiques? Ways you'd rather run it?

Part of me says it'd be better to leave the CCW guys stock (maybe swap out the storm bolter for heavy flamer) so you have some multi-meltas for turn 1 tank busting. Turn 2 and beyond, you can assault with anything you've got left and that should be sufficient against most armor. Points freed up could go toward Deathwind Launchers in the drop pods or more attack bikes.

Obviously someone with enough melta will shred you to death. Still, it's 20 AV 12 targets on the board by turn 2. Nothing is objective secured, but you'll have the coverage and clogging necessary to really hamper the mobility of a lot of armies. Anyone who wasn't prepared for hordes of armor would struggle to do much more than pop a dread every turn or two depending on rolls, and you'll at least contest or control every objective against someone who is not OS as well.

You're not really gaining a whole lot of benefit from the formation, either, other than simply being a legal non-unbound list. All it really gives you is the guaranteed turn 2 deep striking by way of RAS, and you get to run and shoot or shoot and run the turn after you arrive from deep strike. It lets you flamer guys toast infantry because they'll most likely be in optimal positions for templates. It's also enough high strength shooting to reliably handle a lot of armor lists other than ones that just jink all day.

Its an interesting idea, although I don't know anyone who has that many Venerable Dreadnoughts sitting around. I have to think Necrons would be a real problem for this list, as would grav spam. Still, its nice to see people thinking outside the box instead of just running the latest netlists for their codex!