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.

So out of curiosity, what would someone have to do to prove that BA can compete in the current meta? What would be acceptable list building restrictions?

Just show me something that BA can do worthwhile that vanilla marines can't do strictly better. Mixing them is fine, but if you just ally in some grav cents, you might as well take all vanilla as far as I can tell.

If you're going comp then I think Martel is right, just go vanilla.

The BA may have a few odd's and sod's that you may find handy in a particular situation but unless you're specifically working on using the tool's they bring in a cohesive way with the rest of your force? I wouldn't bother as vanilla 9 time's out of 10 are better.

Remtek wrote:
The BA SM mix fell flat once C:SM could take their own pods. OP is asking about BA in regards to competitive play, which makes how they work in casual/friendly games a moot point. BA has good internal balance making us a great book for casual play, but not in a competitive format.

This is of course just my opinion, but the unique BA competitive units are Priest and Vertias vitae relic. I can't think of another slot that C:SM can't do better.

Spot on.
The two current 'signature' units in the BA codex - Fast mech and jump units just aren't very good in the rules currently.
Most of the builds can be done better in other codexes too.

For example, I play GK and can get all of my army in my opponents deployment zone turn 1 (without reserving) shooting Gatling Psilencers and Incinerators. It's the fast aggressive marine army that I always wanted from BA

Martel732 wrote:
I have no patience left for sugar-coating any aspect of this dumpster fire of a codex. If that rubs some the wrong way, so be it. I also have no patience for people trying weedle out an argument about why a terrible unit is anything other than terrible. Metas don't change which units are terrible, they just might make terrible units viable. Anyone who played BA in 3rd or 5th or even 4th knows that this incarnation is a giant steaming pile of gak. I'm insulted. Constantly, by this codex. Maybe that's what you are reading.

It doesn't sound like Red Thirst plays somewhere where the terribleness of the BA even matters, so kudos to him. I'm lucky to have models left on turn 4, usually. So think about that.

Martel, I play against strong lists too. Eldar jetbike lists with wraithknights, centstars, Necron decurions, Tau stormsurge lists. Our codex may be the worst of the bunch right now due to the mechanics of the game not favouring our playstyle, but that doesn't mean you should have no models left on turn 4. Perhaps you should stop being so closed off to other people's ideas and try and develop your game. You might be surprised to actually win some games against these superpower lists and, at the very least, be consistently competitive.

 Clan Lykos wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I have no patience left for sugar-coating any aspect of this dumpster fire of a codex. If that rubs some the wrong way, so be it. I also have no patience for people trying weedle out an argument about why a terrible unit is anything other than terrible. Metas don't change which units are terrible, they just might make terrible units viable. Anyone who played BA in 3rd or 5th or even 4th knows that this incarnation is a giant steaming pile of gak. I'm insulted. Constantly, by this codex. Maybe that's what you are reading.

It doesn't sound like Red Thirst plays somewhere where the terribleness of the BA even matters, so kudos to him. I'm lucky to have models left on turn 4, usually. So think about that.

Martel, I play against strong lists too. Eldar jetbike lists with wraithknights, centstars, Necron decurions, Tau stormsurge lists. Our codex may be the worst of the bunch right now due to the mechanics of the game not favouring our playstyle, but that doesn't mean you should have no models left on turn 4. Perhaps you should stop being so closed off to other people's ideas and try and develop your game. You might be surprised to actually win some games against these superpower lists and, at the very least, be consistently competitive.

Actually, I'm questioning what your opponents are doing wrong. The MSU and pray for overkill scheme only gets you so far. BA can't get free transports, so we can only field so many protected units. I'm not sure what development you are talking about. I've thought about the formation with free power weapons, but deep striking jumpers sucks so bad. Plus, Stormravens are bad. Then there the assault from DS list that has the 1000 pts tax. Those are the two most effective formations as I can tell. And both are pretty bad. So that leaves us with no access to the grav cannon, paying full price for units that no one is scared of, and no real anti-deathstar tech. So what development should I undertake?

The Eldar should be burning down 20+ marines a turn no matter what you do. You can't get out of the 36" range, and they have the unit count to burn you down even if you go MSU. If they aren't, they haven't tuned their list imo.

So hook me up with your magical list. If you had one, that would be awesome because losing to BA is now really embarrassing for other lists.

Martel732 wrote:

 Clan Lykos wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I have no patience left for sugar-coating any aspect of this dumpster fire of a codex. If that rubs some the wrong way, so be it. I also have no patience for people trying weedle out an argument about why a terrible unit is anything other than terrible. Metas don't change which units are terrible, they just might make terrible units viable. Anyone who played BA in 3rd or 5th or even 4th knows that this incarnation is a giant steaming pile of gak. I'm insulted. Constantly, by this codex. Maybe that's what you are reading.

It doesn't sound like Red Thirst plays somewhere where the terribleness of the BA even matters, so kudos to him. I'm lucky to have models left on turn 4, usually. So think about that.

Martel, I play against strong lists too. Eldar jetbike lists with wraithknights, centstars, Necron decurions, Tau stormsurge lists. Our codex may be the worst of the bunch right now due to the mechanics of the game not favouring our playstyle, but that doesn't mean you should have no models left on turn 4. Perhaps you should stop being so closed off to other people's ideas and try and develop your game. You might be surprised to actually win some games against these superpower lists and, at the very least, be consistently competitive.

Actually, I'm questioning what your opponents are doing wrong. The MSU and pray for overkill scheme only gets you so far. BA can't get free transports, so we can only field so many protected units. I'm not sure what development you are talking about. I've thought about the formation with free power weapons, but deep striking jumpers sucks so bad. Plus, Stormravens are bad. Then there the assault from DS list that has the 1000 pts tax. Those are the two most effective formations as I can tell. And both are pretty bad. So that leaves us with no access to the grav cannon, paying full price for units that no one is scared of, and no real anti-deathstar tech. So what development should I undertake?

The Eldar should be burning down 20+ marines a turn no matter what you do. You can't get out of the 36" range, and they have the unit count to burn you down even if you go MSU. If they aren't, they haven't tuned their list imo.

So hook me up with your magical list. If you had one, that would be awesome because losing to BA is now really embarrassing for other lists.

Eldar can only burn down 20+ marines if you give them the targets.
No magical list. In my 1750 list: Mephiston, a couple of death company squads, a TH/SS squad in a crusader, three scout squads, a lascannon pred/vindicator (interchangeable), two stormravens, and two attack bikes.
The main list it struggles against due to list design is drop pod marines with centurions.
It tends to do pretty well because a lot of people ignore flyers, which is exactly what I want. Not that I can do much damage, but that way I can attempt to claim objectives on the last turn. I agree that we don't have a great codex, but that doesn't mean we can't exploit the mechanics of last turn objective capping.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I would love to see your list that keeps getting tabled by turn 4.

Despite Martel's eternal doom and gloom he is right.

Cutting edge lists aren't 5th ed TAC lists anymore such as Clan Lykos' list above. They get taken apart by the more focussed lists that other codexes can put out.
BA's problem is that it doesn't have anything you can build a focussed list around like the other Marine codexes - Thunderwolves, Ravenwing, LibCon, Centurions, Dreadknights etc

The units that are meant to be BA strengths - jump troops and fast mech are poor in the rules and can't be built around. Hence the MSU approach which most people tend to go for. Put enough stuff on the table and hope your opponent doesn't delete it before the end of the game.

Bartali wrote:
Despite Martel's eternal doom and gloom he is right.

Cutting edge lists aren't 5th ed TAC lists anymore such as Clan Lykos' list above. They get taken apart by the more focussed lists that other codexes can put out.
BA's problem is that it doesn't have anything you can build a focussed list around like the other Marine codexes - Thunderwolves, Ravenwing, LibCon, Centurions, Dreadknights etc

The units that are meant to be BA strengths - jump troops and fast mech are poor in the rules and can't be built around. Hence the MSU approach which most people tend to go for. Put enough stuff on the table and hope your opponent doesn't delete it before the end of the game.

Yeah, no kidding. We can't make a cutting edge 7th list as I've stated. We need to use whatever we can to give us a shot. Considering my meta spams strength 6/7 and they tend to ignore flyers this list has been managing quite well.

Typically I'll do something like two tacs with melta combi-melta in rhinos, another tac with plasma combi-plasma (just to get another Rhino), Sternguard with 4X combi-melta in a Rhino with Mephiston, Jump pack libby with 10 DC, Fragnought in pod, 3 X MM attack bikes, grav bikers. Or maybe two grav biker squads depending on the points. Of course, the Rhinos aren't free, so this list is strictly inferior to a Gladius.

I've also got a version with priests instead of librarians that would obviously bring even more bodies. Too bad priests are now a joke compared to what they used to be.

The results are usually the same: utter failure.

What I don't understand is how you aren't being tabled before turn 4 with your list sans Stormravens. But you can't win with two Stormravens. There's not enough terrain to keep that few models safe from something like Eldar or Tau. Both of these armies can move and shoot as they clear the LOS blocking terrain.

Additionally, D weapons make the LR a bigger joke than it already is. Hell, I might have a shot of tabling you because I have grav bikers in my list. Just like with Eldar, you can't hide from them very well. That doesn't inspire confidence in your assessments. At this point, I dismiss any list that involves land raiders as bad. Because they are. I'm pretty bummed. I was really hoping you had something, not just a list with three incredibly overcosted vehicles in it.

Martel732 wrote:
Typically I'll do something like two tacs with melta combi-melta in rhinos, another tac with plasma combi-plasma (just to get another Rhino), Sternguard with 4X combi-melta in a Rhino with Mephiston, Jump pack libby with 10 DC, Fragnought in pod, 3 X MM attack bikes, grav bikers. Or maybe two grav biker squads depending on the points. Of course, the Rhinos aren't free, so this list is strictly inferior to a Gladius.

I've also got a version with priests instead of librarians that would obviously bring even more bodies. Too bad priests are now a joke compared to what they used to be.

The results are usually the same: utter failure.

What I don't understand is how you aren't being tabled before turn 4 with your list sans Stormravens. But you can't win with two Stormravens. There's not enough terrain to keep that few models safe from something like Eldar or Tau. Both of these armies can move and shoot as they clear the LOS blocking terrain.

Additionally, D weapons make the LR a bigger joke than it already is. Hell, I might have a shot of tabling you because I have grav bikers in my list. Just like with Eldar, you can't hide from them very well. That doesn't inspire confidence in your assessments. At this point, I dismiss any list that involves land raiders as bad. Because they are. I'm pretty bummed. I was really hoping you had something, not just a list with three incredibly overcosted vehicles in it.

Maybe you should take a lesson since I'm not getting tabled by turn 4.

Maybe instead of 'L2P' style comments, you could answer Martel's questions ?

Bartali wrote:
Maybe instead of 'L2P' style comments, you could answer Martel's questions ?

He didn't ask any questions in his last post, bruss. Rather, chose to focus on all the poor selections I made, despite them working for me. I'm happy for him (and you) to ignore what I have found to be working, seeing as I am still making unit selections in the confines of the BA codex. But the OP might be interested in seeing what BA units are working for some people. So this two cents is for the masses and can be listened to or not.

My contention is that they don't work against properly played eldar lists. Land raiders don't survive str d for long and stormravens are an inconvenience at best for eldar. Thats 650 pts if your list doing nothing.

I'm not convinced your list would last against other ba lists much less tau.

It sounds like the "strong" lists you play against are not being properly utilized. I mean, you don't even have reserve manipulation for the ravens.

The poster was right that I didn't ask any questions. So how do you propose to keep your LR on the table against Str D and keep your DC from being scrubbed off the table by scatterlasers? It sounds like you are solely rely on LOS blocking terrain. What if there are enough firing lines that that doesn't work?

Even further, lets look at how this stacks up against my own list. The LR can be disabled by either melta units or a single grav "6" effect. An immobilized LR is a useless land raider. And it also makes the TH/SS terminators inside useless. I personally like my chances overrunning your land units while you hope that your Stormravens come into the fight and make the difference. Your list basically has no ranged firepower until the ravens show up and by then a blitzing list is already all over you.

The point behind my list is to force firepower to be wasted against Rhinos. It's basically a Gladius without free stuff. While the Eldar can trivially accomplish this, lists like the one you posted and even many drop lists are quite vulnerable to the humble Rhino. Very frequently, GK players are only eligible to shoot Rhinos because all my other units are behind the Rhino wall. And often, some Rhinos survive against IoM drop lists. Because no scatterlasers in the Imperium. This obviously doesn't apply to Skitarii, but you can't have everything when you are a gakky as the BA.

In defence of the Chaplain over libby, at 1500+ a single librarian won't get many powers off, if any at all. My 1850 list runs 2, which seems to be a really nice sweet spot. If you only have room for 1 HQ, a chaplain works great. He buffs his unit without needing to rely on psy powers, is a decent combatant himself and can carry the Veritas Vitae.

MSU strategies still work very well, particularly with missions favoring maelstrom as a secondary objective (or even the primary). Death stars struggle when the mission demands a high number of mobile units, which is something we do exceptionally. With my standard 4x5 units of death co, I can play them like a pack of wolves, ganging up on big targets or picking off weak or out of position units.

For those that are wondering, this is my best list at the moment.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/669073.page

I'd use a priest as a single HQ.

Also, Martel, the reason that you're losing might be due to the fact that the list you're playing is AWFUL.

And we can actually imitate battle companies reasonably well. Flesh tearers strike force lets us put 6 fast rhinos on the tabe for free, filled with special weapons. Just for fun I put together a list with 7 fast rhinos, 3 fast tri las preds, and 3 fragnoughts in pods. If I had the models I'd play that in a heartbeat.

None of those rhinos/models are obsec, and the units are more expensive plus no chapter tactics that synergize with msu. I play both BA and battle company, they are miles apart imo. If you want to supplement the battle company with assault you can grab command squads geared towards close combat. Overall they are more useful than DC plus a bike command squad still gives a free transport and both are obsec.

I don't see anywhere in Flesh Tearer Strike force stating that anything is free. If I wanted asm spam, i'd play asm spam. And its a ba list; of course its terrible. Your list is terrible, too. I'm still looking for a non-terrible BA list.

Martel732 wrote:
I don't see anywhere in Flesh Tearer Strike force stating that anything is free. If I wanted asm spam, i'd play asm spam. And its a ba list; of course its terrible. Your list is terrible, too. I'm still looking for a non-terrible BA list.

You won't be able to find a strictly non-terrible BA list. That doesn't mean you can't win games or at least be competitive by playing smart. The game still does have a component of luck.

Does it? How far from the mean can 80 BS 4 scatterlaser shots vs AV 11 or T4 deviate? Back in 2nd or 3rd, I'd agree with you more. But 7th ed is the edition of LARGE DIE POOLS. This means you can rely on luck a lot less. Luck can still save you or kill you on LD rolls, however.

Of course I win games. But usually the scenario is I've got obj sec MSU vs Pentaflyrant, or I am able to literally kite GK around the table. Even Necrons usually go down to the last turn if I've got an MSU CAD vs decurion, because he needs to wipe my units. But Tau/Eldar/TWC superfriends? BA are relatively powerless.

Assault marines get free fast rhinos or drop pods when they take off their jump packs. So that list has close to 300 points worth of free fast vehicles. No, they're not obsec, but you can load 3 of those ASM squads with 2 grav guns and the other 3 with 2 meltas and go to town. No, they arent obsec. But they ARE fast.

And I don't think the list I posted in the link is terrible at all. In fact, I've had a ton of luck with it. Even against a list that had trip obsec land raiders and an imperial knight, I managed to pull out an easy win.

 th3maninblak wrote:
Assault marines get free fast rhinos or drop pods when they take off their jump packs. So that list has close to 300 points worth of free fast vehicles. No, they're not obsec, but you can load 3 of those ASM squads with 2 grav guns and the other 3 with 2 meltas and go to town. No, they arent obsec. But they ARE fast.

And I don't think the list I posted in the link is terrible at all. In fact, I've had a ton of luck with it. Even against a list that had trip obsec land raiders and an imperial knight, I managed to pull out an easy win.

Your list and my are both weak against many common builds found in 7th ed. And they have things that are better against. For example, I have found it's nearly impossible to beat Necron without obj sec. Since my list has the possibility for six obj units, I think it has the advantage against Necrons. Your list has the advantage against grav-based lists and any lists that might struggle against AV in general. But there are so many list archetypes that are too much of an uphill battle for both lists.

 Hive City Dweller wrote:
Hello all,

While I'm in ardent anticipation of a proper Ad Mech codex I am thinking about current competitive armies I may enjoy in the meantime. Having read through a lot of the BA posts on here and elsewhere I see that they are currently considered pretty low tier, which is a shame considering their gorgeous model range.

My question is this: If I were to cherry pick some of the better BA units, (Sanguinary Guard, Death Company, Sanguinary Priests, Fast tanks etc) and combine them with the toys and buffs of their Vanilla brothers as allies, would this army be on equal footing or worse off than a straight forward vanilla marines list? And what would you advise allying in to tip the scale in the BA's favor?

Thanks for your help!

dark angels would be a better fit i think, double angels could be really really strong

Martel732 wrote:

 th3maninblak wrote:
Assault marines get free fast rhinos or drop pods when they take off their jump packs. So that list has close to 300 points worth of free fast vehicles. No, they're not obsec, but you can load 3 of those ASM squads with 2 grav guns and the other 3 with 2 meltas and go to town. No, they arent obsec. But they ARE fast.

And I don't think the list I posted in the link is terrible at all. In fact, I've had a ton of luck with it. Even against a list that had trip obsec land raiders and an imperial knight, I managed to pull out an easy win.

Your list and my are both weak against many common builds found in 7th ed. And they have things that are better against. For example, I have found it's nearly impossible to beat Necron without obj sec. Since my list has the possibility for six obj units, I think it has the advantage against Necrons. Your list has the advantage against grav-based lists and any lists that might struggle against AV in general. But there are so many list archetypes that are too much of an uphill battle for both lists.

My second paragraph was more about the list I provided in the link, not the "mock battle company" I was theory crafting about. Beating necrons without obsec with my double librarian list is actually very easy. Aside from monsters and wraiths, most of their army has no protection from ld based shenanigans aside from naturally high leadership. This means forcing morale tests at a penalty via casualties qnd fear of the dark (or even combat resolution) works wonderfully.

Martel732 wrote:
Does it? How far from the mean can 80 BS 4 scatterlaser shots vs AV 11 or T4 deviate? Back in 2nd or 3rd, I'd agree with you more. But 7th ed is the edition of LARGE DIE POOLS. This means you can rely on luck a lot less. Luck can still save you or kill you on LD rolls, however.

Hence, "component of luck". There are also small dice pools that are bound to deviate from the mean at times such as the psychic phase, any characteristic tests, reserves, scatters, etc. All of these can have big consequences on the game depending on the circumstances.

I find it difficult to break them with anything other than dc. So guess what they kill first? That or spoiling assault them with wraiths.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Clan Lykos wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Does it? How far from the mean can 80 BS 4 scatterlaser shots vs AV 11 or T4 deviate? Back in 2nd or 3rd, I'd agree with you more. But 7th ed is the edition of LARGE DIE POOLS. This means you can rely on luck a lot less. Luck can still save you or kill you on LD rolls, however.

Hence, "component of luck". There are also small dice pools that are bound to deviate from the mean at times such as the psychic phase, any characteristic tests, reserves, scatters, etc. All of these can have big consequences on the game depending on the circumstances.

I would need insane luck vs eldar/tau combined with their extreme bad luck to get enough units into cc.

Martel732 wrote:

 Clan Lykos wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Does it? How far from the mean can 80 BS 4 scatterlaser shots vs AV 11 or T4 deviate? Back in 2nd or 3rd, I'd agree with you more. But 7th ed is the edition of LARGE DIE POOLS. This means you can rely on luck a lot less. Luck can still save you or kill you on LD rolls, however.

Hence, "component of luck". There are also small dice pools that are bound to deviate from the mean at times such as the psychic phase, any characteristic tests, reserves, scatters, etc. All of these can have big consequences on the game depending on the circumstances.

I would need insane luck vs eldar/tau combined with their extreme bad luck to get enough units into cc.

Probably, good luck.

Martel has a point. A squad of 5 Scatterbikes will HP out a Rhino with relative ease.

So, we can look at what Blood Angels really have unique to them in terms of units:
1. Priests are actually cool. FNP is a solid buff, but you need units where you would want it.
2. Librarians have their own Discipline that's either decent or meh.
3. Dante is a good Jet Pack character (EW is a blessing).
4. Sanguine Guard are terrible. Death Company survive against anything better that isn't AP3 specifically for the points, and require too many characters to really make them work.
5. Death Company are one of the only things I'd want out of your codex. FNP hidden power Fists with Relentless and also Bolters instead of just Pistols, which doesn't matter with Rage? Pretty cool stuff.
6. The Frag weapon on the Dreadnoughts is cool, but better stats is even better. Assault Cannons are going to prove more reliable after the initial drop.
7. Heavy Flamers on Tacticals is a nice touch, but until we can get double Plasma/Melta/Grav on them, they'll still be inferior to Bikers.
8. Melta Guns on Assault Marines is actually great. That's the only thing that makes them great though. I've been hearing NASTY things about how Raven Guard jump stuff operates now.

So honestly the question is, which of the unique things are you actually in need of?

Ok, response to all this.

1. Priests are great. But you're right, you need to find a good unit to put them in. Sanguinary Guard are the obvious choice, but large units of assault marines (particularly 2-4 of them with double CAD) work very well too.

2. Our librarians are SUPER fighty. Between baal or flesh tearers strike force and quickening, they beat face really well. And the Sanguinary discipline is pretty baller. Mephiston is worth mentioning as well. He's a house.

3. Dante is incredible. Nuff said. Str7 ap2 on the charge, hit and run, mobile, durable, and a great warlord trait. All for less than captain america.

4. False. Sanguinary guard are better against eldar than death co are, particularly with a priest, as they are much more resilient to torrenting. Death co are the better unit though.

5. Death company are amazing. This kind of goes without saying. 10 with 2 fists and a character will run over almost everything in the game. 5 with a fist is great for MSU.

6. The frag cannon is INCREDIBLE. 2 shots from a str6 rending template? Please.

7. Heavy flamers on tacs is sick. 10 dudes with 2 hand flamers, a flamer, and a heavy flamer in a pod will roast almost anything. 2 hand flamers and a heavy flamer in a razorback is also cool. You shouldn't take more than your minimum troops anyways.

8. 4 melta shots in a pod for 135 points is amazing. Even 10 dudes with an axe and 2 melta guns and a priest is also good in Baal Strike force or Flesh Tearers strike force is pretty good at killing stuff.