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I have been scanning the 40k Lists forum for some BA lists and coming to find very few. I have always looked here for some inspiration when I want to build a list. That brings me to my question...

Have Blood Angels started to fade in the world of 40k 6th Ed.?

I just want to see what people are using around the world and see that "muse" I get when seeing what others are running.

Thoughts!?

I think you'll tend to find lists for the very top tier armies most commonly. For me, that means Space Wolves, Grey Knights and Necrons but it's always debatable.

Blood Angels have faded somewhat but they are still a viable army and one people will still be able to have a lot of fun with but the power gamers out there might be looking to the more recent codices

Also consider that every army will fade somewhat after their codex comes out.

I was considering BA myself when I wanted to switch to a more competitive army, it's only the fact that I'm fed up of Marines in general that I chose Necrons.

I can't tell you the future of Blood Angels in 6th, but I can tell you the future of this thread being in Dakka Discussions, instead of 40K Discussions: and the future is grim. Also possibly dark.


....TM

There are quite a few BA loyalists over on B&C these days. I would say that the BA are starting to fade a bit in popularity, as it's been a while since they've had any new shiny toys. That does not mean, however, that they are fading in power. All things considered, T5 Bikes able to get FNP, 2+ save jump infantry, an incredibly durable flyer, and a wonderful selection of psychic powers really give a reason to be reinvigorated with the army. I've really enjoyed playing BA in 6th so far but then again my other army is DE.

There are some great builds for BA these days, especially with the changes to the Rage rule. I can't speak to how competitive they can be on the tournament circuit, but I'm sure a more veteran player could create some pretty sick builds for the 9th legion.

Thank you for that slice of insite Davylove21. That did shed light.

Also... thank you to timetowaste85. I did misplace this thread.

Could I get this moved please?

The Blood Angels are my first army and I will play them until the Emperor gets off his golden throne on his own feet.

What changed for them in 6th?
The Stormraven got even better and shooty squads like Sternguard and Honour guard with a priest and a Divination librarian became plain awesome. As well as assault terminators.

Our fast vehicles gained an increase in shooting capability as well, and bikes are much harder to kill.

Last but certainly not least we can now field DC without the forced movement which is awesome.

All in all I'm very pleased with the transition to the new edition.

Yesterday two friends of mine played one a BA the other a devient slaanesh player each had 2k, at the end of the game it was 16-0 for the slaanesh player a flawless victory.

I dont know whats changed but as the BA player is an experienced player and a ex GW staffer i dont think its him suddenly being crap.

hobojebus wrote:
Yesterday two friends of mine played one a BA the other a devient slaanesh player each had 2k, at the end of the game it was 16-0 for the slaanesh player a flawless victory.

I dont know whats changed but as the BA player is an experienced player and a ex GW staffer i dont think its him suddenly being crap.

Hmm that sounds like a pretty bad game for the BA player. Any information on lists, strategies and the like?

Was fatewever used as an ally. He makes killing chaos difficult... IMHO.

BA's didn't really lose anything in the transition to 6th except that wannabe-IG lists with tons of armor don't work as effectively due to the vehicle over-nerfs, which many other factions have to deal with as well.

Aside from that, many of their hallmark units got even more effective (jump pack units, death company, reserves have more reliable entry, etc) with many of their riskier tactics made less risky (e.g. deep strike mishaps and dangerous terrain tests).

-Death Company hit like a freight train more than ever
-Sanguinary Guard became more viable thanks to power weapon rules
-Feel No Pain can be used against everything but Instant Death
-Stormraven

Few of the reasons why Blood Angels will continue to be a formidable army.

gregornet wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Yesterday two friends of mine played one a BA the other a devient slaanesh player each had 2k, at the end of the game it was 16-0 for the slaanesh player a flawless victory.

I dont know whats changed but as the BA player is an experienced player and a ex GW staffer i dont think its him suddenly being crap.

Hmm that sounds like a pretty bad game for the BA player. Any information on lists, strategies and the like?

No we were watching dave chepells show in the other room, his list had:

10 deathcompany in rhino
10 assault marines in a deepstriking land raider with tyco
10 assault marrines with jump packs.
2x10 tac marines equiped with plasmagun/cannon
death company dread
furioso dread
ironclad with grapple hook

May of been more but wasnt really watching, but its a fairly well rounded army he took the deep striking landraider instead of the storm raven just to try it but botched the deepstrike and let his opponent place it out of the way meaning it did nothing all game.

hobojebus wrote:

gregornet wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Yesterday two friends of mine played one a BA the other a devient slaanesh player each had 2k, at the end of the game it was 16-0 for the slaanesh player a flawless victory.

I dont know whats changed but as the BA player is an experienced player and a ex GW staffer i dont think its him suddenly being crap.

Hmm that sounds like a pretty bad game for the BA player. Any information on lists, strategies and the like?

No we were watching dave chepells show in the other room, his list had:

10 deathcompany in rhino
10 assault marines in a deepstriking land raider with tyco
10 assault marrines with jump packs.
2x10 tac marines equiped with plasmagun/cannon
death company dread
furioso dread
ironclad with grapple hook

May of been more but wasnt really watching, but its a fairly well rounded army he took the deep striking landraider instead of the storm raven just to try it but botched the deepstrike and let his opponent place it out of the way meaning it did nothing all game.

I can see that, 625+ points made ineffective can really ruin an army. Perhaps a second round without that mishap would go differently? I wouldn't base an entire army's strength on one roll of the scatter dice.

Blood Angels in 6th are seriously weak.

The staple of dirt cheap razorbacks is dead, since they can no longer assault out of vehicles. This means they have to footslog, with the new cover they die. Quickly.

Furious Charge got nerfed - they won't annialate MEQ before they get to strike back, and FNP got nerfed somewhat. In 5th it was downright unfair that they were DOUBLY resistant to 90% of your dakka for free.

All they have going for them is Death Company and Blendernaughts. DC are so powerful that on their own they are downright broken. However since you really need to hold objectives, this limits their use greatly. Suffice that to say, they will kill anything they assault, and for a fraction of the points. The less said about Blendernaughts the better (spankers).

Oh, Fast Vehicles got hit hard too. They were heavily reliant on them.

Death Company and Stormravens are amazing. Attack Bikes got better. Vindicators got much better than they were.

Landraiders have suffered quite a bit, but the jury is still out on whether the shooty razorback armies are crippled or not. Vehicles are more vulnerable than they used to be, but they're also faster, and las/plas backs can move twice as fast while shooting to full effect.

As with any major rules shakeup, armies and players need to change and adapt. Players unable or unwilling to do so will be convinced that their army sucks and has been nerfed. This happens every update, and there are continual threads about it. Good players tend to adapt quickly. Others will do it more slowly.

he took the deep striking landraider instead of the storm raven

Yeah, the outcome of this game isn't representative of BA sucking. It's representative of the fact that Deep Striking a Land Raider is an absurdly poor idea.

BA might fade out for tournmanets and top tier armies but they will always be a competitive list and fairly popular for casual players.

We wrote:
BA might fade out for tournmanets and top tier armies but they will always be a competitive list and fairly popular for casual players.

Honestly I wouldn't even say they were competitive.

Deamons, GK, IG, Necrons, Vanilla Marines, Space Wolves are all head and shoulders better than them.

They're not *rubbish* and they're fine in local play if you're willing to work hard at them and disregard everything you did in 5th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mannahnin wrote:
the jury is still out on whether the shooty razorback armies are crippled or not. Vehicles are more vulnerable than they used to be, but they're also faster, and las/plas backs can move twice as fast while shooting to full effect.

Vulnerability and firepower of the transports are irrelevent. They're an assault based army with squishy troops, and they lost the ability to assault out of transports. So they can either footslog and endure blasts, high volume firepower and low AP for 3 turns, or they can disembark right next to the enemy's gunline and take rapid-firing death to the face.

Footslogging is somewhat more viable, depending on who you're facing, but it still means taking firepower and throwing away the gaurenteed charge that fast vehicles got you.

Hard army to play , but that hasnt changed much from what they were in 5th ed .you have to use both jump units to charge and kill stuff and rhinos for LoS blocking and protection . they SR is very good , FnP is still good , they have very good HQs on the cheap . And if they dont have something they can always battlebrother it from other marines.

 Testify wrote:
Blood Angels in 6th are seriously weak.

The staple of dirt cheap razorbacks is dead, since they can no longer assault out of vehicles. This means they have to footslog, with the new cover they die. Quickly.

Furious Charge got nerfed - they won't annialate MEQ before they get to strike back, and FNP got nerfed somewhat. In 5th it was downright unfair that they were DOUBLY resistant to 90% of your dakka for free.

All they have going for them is Death Company and Blendernaughts. DC are so powerful that on their own they are downright broken. However since you really need to hold objectives, this limits their use greatly. Suffice that to say, they will kill anything they assault, and for a fraction of the points. The less said about Blendernaughts the better (spankers).

Oh, Fast Vehicles got hit hard too. They were heavily reliant on them.

Much of this applies to many other SM armies, if not all of them to some extent.


BA's got a lot where other SM armies didn't necessarily. Their risks from their hallmark units either got mitigated or turned into bonuses (e.g. deep strike mishaps/dangerous terrain tests are easier now, Rage is super good, etc) and jump infantry got noticeably better. FNP is a wash at worst, it's not as reliable on the die roll but is more reliable in terms of what you get to take it against (anything but a battlecannon pretty much). They have a flyer transport where other SM armies do not aside from GK's. They can make excellent use of psychic support still as well. Yeah, they took some hits, but no worse than other MEQ armies unless you were trying to play an IG-style tank horde, and in many instances came out ahead.

I have a quick question about the Death Company dread. Can you incluse it an army that doesn't have any Death Company?? I've borrowed a friends codex and it says that you can include one for each DC squad. He doesn't include but still takes it as a troops choice. Is he me over??

 Testify wrote:
Blood Angels in 6th are seriously weak.

The staple of dirt cheap razorbacks is dead, since they can no longer assault out of vehicles. This means they have to footslog, with the new cover they die. Quickly.

Furious Charge got nerfed - they won't annialate MEQ before they get to strike back, and FNP got nerfed somewhat. In 5th it was downright unfair that they were DOUBLY resistant to 90% of your dakka for free.

All they have going for them is Death Company and Blendernaughts. DC are so powerful that on their own they are downright broken. However since you really need to hold objectives, this limits their use greatly. Suffice that to say, they will kill anything they assault, and for a fraction of the points. The less said about Blendernaughts the better (spankers).

Oh, Fast Vehicles got hit hard too. They were heavily reliant on them.

There were other BA lists besides Razorback spam. It may have been what most people considered to be the best list for them, but it was hardly the only viable one. For instance, my typical 5E list didn't include a single ground transport and I did pretty well most of the time.

Furious Charge was nerfed, FNP was not. FNP can now be used against everything except Instant Death wounds.

Death Company not being able to hold objectives is a small matter in my mind. The current BA codex seems more focused on tabling than objective holding to me. Who needs to hold objectives when your opponent has no units left?

Stormraven. Flyers are nothing to scoff at, and the Stormraven is in the top tier of them.

New power weapon rules help BA as well, as they are able to field a ridiculous amount of 2+ units, many of them with jump packs to boot.

LibrarianJaymez wrote:
I have a quick question about the Death Company dread. Can you incluse it an army that doesn't have any Death Company?? I've borrowed a friends codex and it says that you can include one for each DC squad. He doesn't include but still takes it as a troops choice. Is he me over??

No, you must have at least 5 DC marines in order to include a DC dread.

I play ba and found them most effective as a pod spam now. You get a scout biker or scouts with a beacon. Drop on round one with many 5 man o e melta squads. Sprinkle a few plama guns. Get eldar to help with the rest of the pods on round two or gk on round one. Depends on what you usually face. You can now claim up to 3 victory points on first round. Line breaker - done, kill the warlod - very likely, first blood, again probably yes. The many small units will keep you alive since its hard to cause large numbers of casualtties when there is a high target saturation with feel no pain.

-=MAKO=- wrote:
I play ba and found them most effective as a pod spam now. You get a scout biker or scouts with a beacon. Drop on round one with many 5 man o e melta squads. Sprinkle a few plama guns. Get eldar to help with the rest of the pods on round two or gk on round one. Depends on what you usually face. You can now claim up to 3 victory points on first round. Line breaker - done, kill the warlod - very likely, first blood, again probably yes. The many small units will keep you alive since its hard to cause large numbers of casualtties when there is a high target saturation with feel no pain.

Wow super smart!

Control the board, block line of sight with pods and up to 24 free storm Bolter shots if 6 assault squads are used. If you are playing 2000k that's 48 free storm Bolter shots...

Just pick your target and deploy: don't think any HQ can handle like 12 plasma shots each turn.
First blood: check
Warlord: check
Linebreaker: check
Multiple objectives: check
Single objective: check

You sir are a genius!

Testify wrote:

Mannahnin wrote: the jury is still out on whether the shooty razorback armies are crippled or not. Vehicles are more vulnerable than they used to be, but they're also faster, and las/plas backs can move twice as fast while shooting to full effect.

Vulnerability and firepower of the transports are irrelevent. They're an assault based army with squishy troops, and they lost the ability to assault out of transports.

Since when has a razorback army ever been assault based? It's a shooty army. Assaults are only used as a last resort. Razorback armies rarely even take priests, because Furious Charge and FNP are so irrelevant for them. Their main real loss is that the transports can no longer hold objectives with a squad still embarked, and the vehicles in general can't contest objectives.

Testify wrote:So they can either footslog and endure blasts, high volume firepower and low AP for 3 turns, or they can disembark right next to the enemy's gunline and take rapid-firing death to the face.

No, the way that army works is that they shoot the enemy to death (which is a bit easier now thanks to reduced cover saves and 6" greater speed while firing both guns now), then they drop troops on the objectives late game. That's the way the shooty razor army has always worked. What it's lost are a) that you now have to get the troops out of the razors at the end, and b) that you can't use empty razors and preds tank-shocking to deny enemy objectives at the end.

Just take a moment...and ponder a question, "What is it like to be Tau?"

Blood Angels still work in 6th and to be honest Stormravens are amazing!

Maybe Im missing it as Im new to 6th but how did Death Company get better? Does this mean I can actually dust those models off?

They got better because before Death Company had to move towards the closest enemy unit that was in line of sight. Now the Rage USR gives them +2 Attacks on the charge and it no longer forces them to chase the nearest enemy unit.

Honestly I wouldn't even say they were competitive.

Deamons, GK, IG, Necrons, Vanilla Marines, Space Wolves are all head and shoulders better than them.

Vanilla marines and Daemons better than them in 5th? I'm sorry but what?

This was all very useful and helpful information. I am still reading through the BRB and im not sure what some people mean when refering to the new PW rules. Must have not gotten to that part yet or will have to go back and reread something as I may have over looked it. BA is my primary army. I have approx 4000pts in BA. I also have about 2500 in SW. I was primarily trying to figure out what army I should focus on for 6th ed. Its still up in the air but this does give BA a stronger hand in the game.

Thanks Dakka! Good to know that people all over the world are willing to help out