Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey everyone, here's a -1850 point Blood Angel army list that focuses on th alpha strike while also having strong support. Hope you enjoy and any advice would be very helpful.

BATTALION DETACHMENT
HQ
-Sanguinor = 170pts
-Astorath = 143pts

TROOPS
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 5 Bolt Guns = 55pts
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 5 Bolt Guns = 55pts
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 5 Bolt Guns = 55pts

SPEARHEAD DETACHMENT
HQ
-Index Sanguinary Priest1 with Chainsword & Bolt pistol + Jump Pack = 86pts

HEAVY SUPPORT
-Predator + Autocannon + Lascannon Sponsons = 192pts
-Predator + Autocannon + Lascannon Sponsons = 192pts
-Predator + Autocannon + Lascannon Sponsons = 192pts

VANGUARD DETACHMENT
HQ
-Index Sanguinary Priest2 with Chainsword & Bolt pistol + Jump Pack + Armory of Ball Veritas Vitae = 86pts

ELITES
-Sanguinary Guard (7 men) + 7 Powerfists + 7 Angelus Boltgun = 245pts
-Sanguinary Guard Ancient: Warlord + Encarmine Sword + Angelus Boltgun + Standard of Sacrifice = 99pts
-Death Company (14 men) + Jump Packs + 15 Chainswords and Boltguns = 280pts

=1850pts

Sanguinor, Ancient, and Priest1 would support the Sanguinary Guard Squad while Astorath and Priest2 would support the DC squad. Scouts would either take the midline or be deepstrike denial while the Predators would snipe vehicles and monsters.

The Standard of Sacrifice on the Ancient will be difficult to leverage while assaulting. As of now the rules restrict the benefit to **models** within 6'', which means that charging without the Ancient in tow somehow is going to put your charging units out of range.

I like the general design of the list but I would like to know your reasons for bringing two Sanguiniary Priests.

2 sanguinary priests because wounding on 2's is awesome and you want to do it all the time.

Let me rephrase then - why bring a priest for the Sanguiniary Guard if they are using power fists? They would benefit more from a couple of extra squad members.

The priest can revive killed models, the turn after they got killed. You can get two more sang guard models with fists for the cost of the priest, its better to start with two more models in the first place, than reviving one at a 50% chance next turn. But then you are missing an HQ unit. Anyway, why the sanguinor ? He gives +1 attack, and thats pretty much all. Replace the sanguinor with a librarian with JP to buff the sang guard with +1 attack. He can also smite, deny the witch, and have another psychic power.

I dont like the preds, i think they are to expensive. I also think its a mistake that one pred is 102. Its 90 in the SM codex. It was 102 in the index imperium 1, so probably a copy and paste error.

I don’t like the predators either.
A shadowsword can kill a tank reliably each turn and has 30 S5 AP-1 shots and 4 las cannons.

But the three preds are necessary to have the spearhead detachment and use killshot. Replacing the autocannon with lascannons and remove the sponsons will save 120 pts. That is one razorback with twin lascannons. Instead of 6 lascannons its now 8 lascannons, but no autocannons.

Hi, Sanguinary Priest cann't use jump packs now.

JJ218 wrote:
Hi, Sanguinary Priest cann't use jump packs now.

That's why he used Sanguinary Priests from the Index where they can.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

p5freak wrote:
But the three preds are necessary to have the spearhead detachment and use killshot. Replacing the autocannon with lascannons and remove the sponsons will save 120 pts. That is one razorback with twin lascannons. Instead of 6 lascannons its now 8 lascannons, but no autocannons.

A Shadowsword has a ''kill shot'' anyway.
Its better to take the entry from the AM codex than from the Index.

 wuestenfux wrote:

A Shadowsword has a ''kill shot'' anyway.
Its better to take the entry from the AM codex than from the Index.

He cant just pick a shadowsword. First he would lose the spearhead detachment, then lose another CP for the auxiliary detachment for the shadowsword.

A single shadowsword occupies a Superheavy Auxiliary detachment which does not subtract CP.

sossen wrote:
A single shadowsword occupies a Superheavy Auxiliary detachment which does not subtract CP.

Thats true But he still loses the spearhead detachment.

sossen wrote:Let me rephrase then - why bring a priest for the Sanguiniary Guard if they are using power fists? They would benefit more from a couple of extra squad members.

My thinking was that the SG would be going after the elite units, vehicles, and monsters so hitting at strength 10 would be a nice bonus. And If had to choose a cheap hero, the Priest and Librarians are my favorite. So I guess I can change one out for a Liby. Which would you recommend?

wuestenfux wrote:I don’t like the predators either.
A shadowsword can kill a tank reliably each turn and has 30 S5 AP-1 shots and 4 las cannons.

Considering a Shadowsword cost the same in dollars as two Preds(already have one) it is certainly viable but do you mind explaining how that would work on the force organization chart (I've never considered an auxiliary force). Does anyone else have any ideas as to anti-tank options, I would prefer to keep it mobile(vehicles/flyers) since Devs are too static for me.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

sossen wrote:
The Standard of Sacrifice on the Ancient will be difficult to leverage while assaulting. As of now the rules restrict the benefit to **models** within 6'', which means that charging without the Ancient in tow somehow is going to put your charging units out of range.

I did not know that, that seems like a serious oversight. Does anyone have any strategies on how to handle this issue or do you think the ancient is even worth it?

p5freak wrote:
. Anyway, why the sanguinor ? He gives +1 attack, and thats pretty much all. Replace the sanguinor with a librarian with JP to buff the sang guard with +1 attack. He can also smite, deny the witch, and have another psychic power.

.

I think for 53 pts more, the sanguinor is just straight better. You can fail the cast and you are quite squeashy. In cc the Sang bring 4 times the dmg output along with usefull -1 and disengage.

But in this list i think some psycher would definitely do well instead of sanguinary priests.

Dante999 wrote:
My thinking was that the SG would be going after the elite units, vehicles, and monsters so hitting at strength 10 would be a nice bonus. And If had to choose a cheap hero, the Priest and Librarians are my favorite. So I guess I can change one out for a Liby. Which would you recommend?

If you want to deepstrike with JP the normal librarian is your only choice. Neither mephiston nor the dread can use JP.

Dante999 wrote:
Considering a Shadowsword cost the same in dollars as two Preds(already have one) it is certainly viable but do you mind explaining how that would work on the force organization chart (I've never considered an auxiliary force). Does anyone else have any ideas as to anti-tank options, I would prefer to keep it mobile(vehicles/flyers) since Devs are too static for me.

You simply use the shadowsword as a superheavy auxiliary detachment. You do lose the spearhead detachment -1 CP.

Dante999 wrote:
I did not know that, that seems like a serious oversight. Does anyone have any strategies on how to handle this issue or do you think the ancient is even worth it?

All you can do is reroll a dice on the charge roll to make the 9" charge. You probably already used descent of angels for the sang guard.

PandatheWarrior wrote:
I think for 53 pts more, the sanguinor is just straight better. You can fail the cast and you are quite squeashy. In cc the Sang bring 4 times the dmg output along with usefull -1 and disengage.

But in this list i think some psycher would definitely do well instead of sanguinary priests.

You can fail the charge on the sanguinor, then he is useless. He wouldnt even give +1 attack.

p5freak wrote:


You can fail the charge on the sanguinor, then he is useless. He wouldnt even give +1 attack.

Yeh obviously same as the psyker wich also fail one of his two powers. Altho you can chain to get the buff and if it fails the charge he won't be deleted by a some random plasma like the JP Psyker.

I'm not saying it's a bad choice, just overcosted.

-Really not finding priests or apothecaries to be worthwhile. The strength buff is not relevant in many situations, such as when you are going from s4 to 5 but hitting t3 daemons/guard/eldar, or hitting t6 or t7 big things. And as I figured out in like my first game of 8e, I'd rather just take more dudes than count on an apothecary to revive some, which also implies that my opponent was nice enough to leave part of the unit alive despite clearly being able to see the apothecary near it.

-The SG bomb with SG ancient warlord and relic banner combo is amazing. I used to have them use descent of angels to charge and just accepted that the ancient will be struggling to keep up, but I have adopted a different strategy now. Now I have a DC unit blow descent out of deep strike while the SG land in cover elsewhere and just pew pew for a turn so they can come out in formation on the following turn. They should survive just about anything with 1+ cover armor, 2 wounds each, and 5+ fnp. Also the enemy should be very busy trying to get rid of a DC unit ripping into them. (Also when you think about the sheer ridiculousness of a 99 point model granting an aura of 5+fnp, +1 ld, reroll 1's to wound in melee, and reroll all hits all the time for SG and himself, it's reaaaaal damn hard not to bring him.)

-Sanguinor is kinda cool, but a bit overpriced. I prefer to just use Mephy with unleash rage, wings, and quickening. He can get anywhere in an absolute hurry and throw rage on those that want it, in addition to being a small toolbox of other things like throwing a smite or beating down something. I'm convinced Mephy is our best HQ slot hands down, being very affordable, durable with his own 5+ fnp, providing psychic defenses and tools, and able to punch hard.

-I'm not finding the vitae to be worthwhile, especially as a second relic. Almost all of our good strats cost multiple CP, and the vitae only gives you one refund chance per strat and not per CP spent like some other armies. Even when I run double battalion for 9 CP, I would probably burn 2 for a descent, and most likely use either 3 or 6 for honor the chapter at different points, which means that if I spent 1 to bring the vitae, I would just average getting that 1 back. Doesn't seem like a great deal to me.

-Given the morale issues that a big squad could face, Astorath seems like the better choice for a DC nanny, but after a bit of experimenting, I think Lemmy is actually the winner.
First, Lemmy brings their descent charge from 74% success to over 93% without using CP.
Second, when people get their frontlines ripped apart by a DC charge, they kill the DC on their turn. Not moderately wound and let them run away. Kill. I have never actually benefitted from either Lemmy's leadership buff OR Asto's fearless aura on them yet. If they do decide they want to be funny and let the last few DC flee for the novelty of it, that means they can't shoot the escort character, since morale is end of turn.
Third, their durability is same-ish. Lemmy loses a wound and an armor but gains a 6+ fnp. All pretty irrelevant since either one of them is going to go down if a proper enemy unit gets a bead on them.
Fourth, a somewhat common circumstance is that the DC get wiped but the character lives. In this situation being able to get in there and cause havoc before dropping next turn is a boon. Lemmy boasts 2 extra swings over asty on the charge in exchange for 1 AP and Asty's ability to turn high wound rolls into guaranteed 3 damage instead of d3, and of course Lemmy gets his own reroll charge ability.
Fifth, Lemmy is cheaper.
To Asto's credit, if he lives through the DC dying, he could then hop over to other units and be their buddy, whereas Lemmy can't, but I mainly use the dual threat SG/DC setup, and the SG already have their reroll addiction handled thanks to the best 99 point warlord ever, so I'm firmly on team Lemmy with that setup.

 niv-mizzet wrote:
-Sanguinor is kinda cool, but a bit overpriced. I prefer to just use Mephy with unleash rage, wings, and quickening. He can get anywhere in an absolute hurry and throw rage on those that want it, in addition to being a small toolbox of other things like throwing a smite or beating down something. I'm convinced Mephy is our best HQ slot hands down, being very affordable, durable with his own 5+ fnp, providing psychic defenses and tools, and able to punch hard.

I will not deny that Mephiston is a terrifying and effective addition to any army, but I am concerned with his lack of a jump pack. It would take him at least two turns for him to reach my strike force with Wings, which would leave him open to being shot at in the second turn. (Since I'm sure they focussed their first turn of shooting on the DC) I could put him in a rhino but that would jump up his cost to 217pts and doesn't really help in putting him where he needs to be, when he is needed. However I can replace all of my HQ with Lemartes and two jump Librarians (although I'm not sure what to do with the second Liby, put him with DC to give them Rage and Shield?). However, with this I am lacking an HQ beat-stick so hopefully the SG squad will be enough to fill the role. (I could take out the extra DC squad[below] and a Liby and take any of the HQ, even Dante)

Also, If I take the Shadowsword I have just enough points to add another jump DC squad(100pts) so I have another question. Do you think I should go 15 and 5 or 10 and 10 for the two DC squads? Or do you think I should take something else entirely?

Thanks for all the responses guys, y'all are amazing!

If you want/need transportation i wouldnt go with a rhino, it can transport ten models, but cant do much else. You dont need to transport many models, as you will deepstrike them. Go with a razorback, its only 15 pts. more than a rhino, and it has a twin heavy bolter. Go with one 15 model DC squad to get the most from descent of angels.

Keep in mind that Mephy gets to move and then wings, meaning he can zip up 19" in a turn and has a reroll to charge. So he can either unleash rage on a squad up to 31" away or throw quicken on himself and add 3" to his rerollable charge. (Not to mention if he doesn't plan on charging, he could take an extra 2d6 inches of movement.) He does keep the 12" move on the following move phase too.

He also helps your deep strike count by deploying on the table and still having the speed to go be relevant with your deep strike team.

You can add an extra ~4'' movement to Mephiston on turn 1 by deploying him inside a transport on your deployment border. He can disembark right away within (not wholly within) 3'' and then act normally. With wings he moves 23'' and then charges 2d6'' with reroll - almost certainly a turn 1 charge.

 niv-mizzet wrote:
Keep in mind that Mephy gets to move and then wings, meaning he can zip up 19" in a turn and has a reroll to charge. So he can either unleash rage on a squad up to 31" away or throw quicken on himself and add 3" to his rerollable charge. (Not to mention if he doesn't plan on charging, he could take an extra 2d6 inches of movement.) He does keep the 12" move on the following move phase too.

He also helps your deep strike count by deploying on the table and still having the speed to go be relevant with your deep strike team.

Thanks for the info, I didn't know that. Consider I take Mephy and have him race up to support the SG squad what should I do with the other Librarian(put him with the DC or SG), or should I take a different HQ?

You can still keep your 6inch aura buffs if your characters don't make the charge, just make sure you that you keep one model within 6 inches of the buff character when making the charge with the unit. If you max out coherency and are careful with your placement you can get the buffs and only one model won't make it into combat assuming that the unit and the characters are all 9 inches away from the target unit.

I had some Fun with Mephiston in a droppod. He was joint by five Tacticals with Plasma and Combiplasma, and four Company Veterans all with Plasma, too.

Thanks to all of your replies, you are all amazing Here is my final list. I like it a lot so I'm probably going to keep it but if anyone wants to comment I would love to hear it. Stay cool y'all.


BATTALION DETACHMENT + 3CP
HQ
-Lemartes = 129pts
-Mephiston (Quickening, Wings, and Rage/Shield) = 145pts

TROOPS
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 4 Bolt Guns + 1 Heavy Bolter = 65pts
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 4 Bolt Guns + 1 Heavy Bolter = 65pts
-Scout Squad (5 men) + 4 Bolt Guns + 1 Heavy Bolter = 65pts

SUPER-HEAVY AUXILIARY DETACHMENT
Regiment: Imperial Guard(AM)
-Shadowsword + 4 Lascannon & Twin Heavy Bolter Sponsons + Twin Heavy Bolter + Pintle Heavy Stubber = 544pts

VANGUARD DETACHMENT + 1CP
HQ
-Librarian + Jump Pack + Force Sword/Bolt Pistol + Sanguinary Discipline(Rage & Shield) = 120pts

ELITES
-Sanguinary Guard (7 men) + 7 Powerfists + 7 Plasma Pistols = 312pts
-Sanguinary Guard Ancient: Warlord + Encarmine Sword + Plasma Pistols + Standard of Sacrifice = 105pts
-Death Company (15 men) + Jump Packs + 15 Chainswords and Boltguns = 300pts

=1850pts