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I love the space marine battle novels, I always love reading imperium stories, so I want to bite the bullet and start a marine army.

It was always between Dark Angels and Blood angels. But there's certain aspects of blood angels I like more, being focused on fast vehicles and libby dreadnoughts.

Are they any good? Can you build death company army? Can I build an army centered around a chaplain leader?? Are blood angels a viable army?

Thank you for any help! (And mainly because I got the codex for christmas) merry Christmas all!!!

You'll need Deathstorm to build an actual Death Company army. But you do know how incredibly unfluffy that is, correct? But, if you take the specific Death Company squad and Dreadnaught in Deathstorm as your two troops, the Baal Detachment for four Elites, a Chaplain as your HQ and whatever vehicles you like in Heavy Support, yes it can be done. Will it be good? No, I don't think so.

Plenty of threads asking about Blood Angels being viable, and questioning tactics. Sadly I'm two publications behind so I don't know all the fancy new toys.

Awww man that's a bummer :(

I got the campaign box between me and a friend too :( I was really hoping they'd be half decent :(

The army can be very decent from the leaked info I've seen around Dakka. Just that list in particular isn't so hot. With all their reserve manipulations and tricks coming out of Deep Strike, not to mention the ASM Melta Pods, they have a lot of options for fun games. The codex itself is less than impressive but it's the other sources that really gives it a shine.

How do you mean it's other sources? I was kinda wanting to play a stand alone army. I don't really play tournaments or seriously. I just wanted to play a space marine chapter. Just kinda depressing thinking the book sucks :/

Have just played vs them once and can tell you for sure - they were great in this game. So much mobility. Droppods, jumppacks, fast vehicles. This alone makes them good for maelstorm. And DC are great for the points.

Neat formations only help. Oh, and you're the only army with access to charge from deepstrike. Though, it's gona shine only in larger games cause the requirement is formation of 3 stormravens + 3 full tac squads which alone ends up at 1000+ pts. Around 1200 to tool them up properly. But stormravens and BA tacticals are solid in the first place.

Koooaei I love you is that formation in the additional to make that? I may have to purchase it!

I mainly wanted them for their story. Plus I really like the death company models

Cheers lads!

 Andy140491 wrote:
Awww man that's a bummer :(
I got the campaign box between me and a friend too :( I was really hoping they'd be half decent :(

You can use the campaign box. You will get a box of Death Company and DC are a great unit!
What people mean is that the specific formation and load-out from the Campaign-book itself is less optimal.
It's a unit of 5 with way too many expensive toys, so people prefer to just make a regular DC-squad out of it instead of the 'Raphen's DC squad'.

The Exterminatus-book gives some nice Formations, but I think they are more for 'veteran Blood Angel players' as most of them require more models than you will have.

You can't really make a decent DC-only army, you will need at least the Deathstorm-Dreadnought as a Troops and a unit of Scouts.
Then you can take Astorath (a special character Chaplain) as HQ and more DC-units as Elites.

Oh no I gather that but I'm after starting a new army anyway. I already have a rather large dark eldar army so I was kinda looking for the polar opposite type army and blood angels kinda fit. I love the righteous feel to them too

So are death company quite effective units? I'm not after a "top army" just one I can put my effort into the only reason I would have gone normal SM is because of the centurions and thunder fire cannons. But they're not really enough for me to want vanilla marines :/

Where I much prefer death company, libby dreads, baal preds, oh and lemartes is my favourite character. Ever.


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Are there any units in particular that I should read into? Ones that are kinda mandatory??


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Oh and what would be a good addition after that campaign set? Some predators?

Seriously pick yourself up a pair of the new BA Tactical Squad kits. BA Tacticals are actually pretty freaking solid for the generally looked down-upon Tac Marines. The ability to spam templates combined with Drop Pods is sweet, and under the Baal Strike Force formation in the codex, even BA Tacs are dangerous on the charge in assaults due to gaining the +1S & +1I.

The blood angels codex rewards you for taking a balanced force. 2 squads of tactical marines in your preferred method of transportation is a good start for covering your troops. HQ is pretty much personal taste. There are a ton of strong options. Elites are crowded, but the best choices are death company, sanguinary guard, and everything else in order. Fast attack has assault marines, and heavy support is generally just awesome.

 th3maninblak wrote:
The blood angels codex rewards you for taking a balanced force. 2 squads of tactical marines in your preferred method of transportation is a good start for covering your troops. HQ is pretty much personal taste. There are a ton of strong options. Elites are crowded, but the best choices are death company, sanguinary guard, and everything else in order. Fast attack has assault marines, and heavy support is generally just awesome.

Actually the only two BA heavies I find worthwhile are the fast tri-las pred and the Stormraven.

Except, you know, fast vindicators and baal predators.

 th3maninblak wrote:
Except, you know, fast vindicators and baal predators.

I don't think either of those are worth a heavy slot. In fact, I think both are quite poor heavy support. The Vindicator is one of the most overrated tanks, imo. Even fast ones.

Martel732 wrote:
Actually the only two BA heavies I find worthwhile are the fast tri-las pred and the Stormraven.

I have to agree, for HS I generally tend to look more in IA2-SE from Forge World.
Especially the Fire Raptor Gunship and Sicaran are two I really love.

Not sure how the tri las pred is all that fantastic. 15 more points than the baal and is one of the most linear and single purpose tanks in the game.

 th3maninblak wrote:
Not sure how the tri las pred is all that fantastic. 15 more points than the baal and is one of the most linear and single purpose tanks in the game.

Anti-tank and anti-MC. The BA need those things way more than anti-infantry.

Martel732 wrote:

 th3maninblak wrote:
Not sure how the tri las pred is all that fantastic. 15 more points than the baal and is one of the most linear and single purpose tanks in the game.

Anti-tank and anti-MC. The BA need those things way more than anti-infantry.

Because the Baal only ever shoots at infantry. A twin linked assault cannon is statistically better than a TL lascannon against anything other than av14. Tri las preds and baals are equally good vs MCs, and the baal is better vs light armor.

 th3maninblak wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 th3maninblak wrote:
Not sure how the tri las pred is all that fantastic. 15 more points than the baal and is one of the most linear and single purpose tanks in the game.

Anti-tank and anti-MC. The BA need those things way more than anti-infantry.

Because the Baal only ever shoots at infantry. A twin linked assault cannon is statistically better than a TL lascannon against anything other than av14. Tri las preds and baals are equally good vs MCs, and the baal is better vs light armor.

Except that the lascannon will probably get far more shots off than the assault cannon because of range. Predator hulls need to do everything they can to keep their 13 AV front pointed towards the enemy. 48" guns facilitate this. Baals and Vindicators must get within 24", exposing their crappy 11AV sides. I've used the Baal many, many times with the 5th ed codex, and I think the assault cannon is a relatively poor weapon in an actual game because of its range.

I have three Baal preds I will probably never use again. Because the other choices in the heavy slots just fill way more important needs.

I tend to agree with martel here on the baal. The baal pred is overcosted now it is in heavy and now that other tanks have been reduced. I mean is an assault cannon or flamestorm really worth 40pts more than an autocannon? Really?
However I think the auto-las pred is a much more points efficient tank than a tri-las. Tri-las' trick you into firing at av13/14 which tbf it is not really that effective against, especially if cover plays a part. You really want it firing at av11/12 where it wrecks face. If doing this then the extra shot from the autocannon is far better since it costs 35pts less.
Vindis can be great depending on your list. However the new dex really lends itself to close, fast assault, where you don't want to be dropping a st10 ap2 pie plate anywhere near. If making an assault oriented army, the vindi is a huge risk.
Kangodo has hit the nail on the head with IA:2 though. Rapiers batteries, sicarans, whirlwind scorpius, spartans are far superior to their equivalent codex options; las devs, preds, whirlwinds and landraiders respectively.