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DW can't kill any vehicle efficiently. As a result, they're always going to need soup help.

 grouchoben wrote:
I have a feeling that DW are going to be a strong army post-FAQ. It's quite likely that the Castallan is going to be nerfed, and so with it IKs, who are a bit of a problem for us atm.

Orks are going to rise, and there's no better target for our SIA than greenskins (okay, Daemon Princes, but you know what I mean). We're one of the only armies that can turn hordes into red paste.

What do you think, fellow watchmasters? How far are DW from being a top-table army?

I think it's safe to say that the Loyal 32 will be going away. Sure, a Guard battalion still provides top tier board control, but when it isn't a massive force multiplier through CP support, is it going to be as common? We shall see. After all, 200 points of Vets will paste those guard squads verrrrrrry quickly, and a reduction in CP resources will reduce the lethality of the opponent's other detachments. For me, it all starts with the CP farm issue, and if less forces are committing to that style and begin branching out to be more resilient (a basic benefit of the Guard batt), then DW has the flexibility to not be majorly impacted by this.

One of the other big DW challenges has been anti-tank, but its more specific than that. For a force with access to the Corvus and Land Raiders, this honestly shouldn't be a problem, but it's more of a lack of access to cost effective anti-tank than one of access to options in general. This should hopefully be addressed via Land Raider/Repulsor/Corvus point or rule adjustments.

Marine durability is still an issue, but Deathwatch are much more lethal, making that less of a concern.

Bonus unpopular opinion:

Corvus and Land Raiders are both junk.

DW are lethal, but give up points VERY quicky. I haven't lost to them yet in 8th with BA or BA/IG soup. They're just too easy to knock off objectives.

Martel732 wrote:DW can't kill any vehicle efficiently. As a result, they're always going to need soup help.

Martel732 wrote:Corvus and Land Raiders are both junk.

DW are lethal, but give up points VERY quicky. I haven't lost to them yet in 8th with BA or BA/IG soup. They're just too easy to knock off objectives.

Hot takes as usual, Marty

An errata adjusting the Land Raider by points or otherwise (or the Corvus) isn't unrealistic, though probably unlikely. Post-FAQ, the Loyal 32 won't be a requirement for Imperium (DW included), which frees up points for AT options elsewhere. Wouldn't it be great if they could just go internal for that?

Also, how much of that lethality is boosted by the silly stormbolter build. Freakin' hate that this is a thing (Yes I'm uber salty because of my stupid inability to win any ebay bid for stormbolter bits).

I don't use the loyal 32 exactly. I bolt on a couple of russes, couple of primaris psykers, and a repair idiot for the russes. This helps both BA and DW immensely. Sometimes you just need bodies to throw into the gears to slow X down. You dont' want those bodies to be BA, much less DW. The Russ is so much better than any marine vehicle, it's a bit nauseating.

DW are extremely effective, but amplify an already glaring weakness with marines. I've moved away from using the vets and use primaris exclusively in order to try to make up some durability.

Of of curiosity, has anyone here beat Drukhari with DW, or at least, not instantly lost in a hail of dissy cannons?

Corvus and landraiders both need price cuts badly. I guess DW can bring lascannon ven dreads.

Martel732 wrote:
I don't use the loyal 32 exactly. I bolt on a couple of russes, couple of primaris psykers, and a repair idiot for the russes. This helps both BA and DW immensely. Sometimes you just need bodies to throw into the gears to slow X down. You dont' want those bodies to be BA, much less DW. The Russ is so much better than any marine vehicle, it's a bit nauseating.

DW are extremely effective, but amplify an already glaring weakness with marines. I've moved away from using the vets and use primaris exclusively in order to try to make up some durability.

Of of curiosity, has anyone here beat Drukhari with DW, or at least, not instantly lost in a hail of dissy cannons?

Corvus and landraiders both need price cuts badly. I guess DW can bring lascannon ven dreads.

Playing the wrong marines man - should be playing space wolves. -2 to hit flyers with stratagem - 9 d6 damage shots for less than a Repulsor. LOL. Also with a stratagem to ignore negative to hit penalties LOL.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I don't use the loyal 32 exactly. I bolt on a couple of russes, couple of primaris psykers, and a repair idiot for the russes. This helps both BA and DW immensely. Sometimes you just need bodies to throw into the gears to slow X down. You dont' want those bodies to be BA, much less DW. The Russ is so much better than any marine vehicle, it's a bit nauseating.

DW are extremely effective, but amplify an already glaring weakness with marines. I've moved away from using the vets and use primaris exclusively in order to try to make up some durability.

Of of curiosity, has anyone here beat Drukhari with DW, or at least, not instantly lost in a hail of dissy cannons?

Corvus and landraiders both need price cuts badly. I guess DW can bring lascannon ven dreads.

Playing the wrong marines man - should be playing space wolves. -2 to hit flyers with stratagem - 9 d6 damage shots for less than a Repulsor. LOL. Also with a stratagem to ignore negative to hit penalties LOL.

I hate the SW and everything about them. I will never own a SW model and they are at the top of my "squat" list. If I could incinerate every SW model, I'd be temporarily happy with the game.

Martel732 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I don't use the loyal 32 exactly. I bolt on a couple of russes, couple of primaris psykers, and a repair idiot for the russes. This helps both BA and DW immensely. Sometimes you just need bodies to throw into the gears to slow X down. You dont' want those bodies to be BA, much less DW. The Russ is so much better than any marine vehicle, it's a bit nauseating.

DW are extremely effective, but amplify an already glaring weakness with marines. I've moved away from using the vets and use primaris exclusively in order to try to make up some durability.

Of of curiosity, has anyone here beat Drukhari with DW, or at least, not instantly lost in a hail of dissy cannons?

Corvus and landraiders both need price cuts badly. I guess DW can bring lascannon ven dreads.

Playing the wrong marines man - should be playing space wolves. -2 to hit flyers with stratagem - 9 d6 damage shots for less than a Repulsor. LOL. Also with a stratagem to ignore negative to hit penalties LOL.

I hate the SW and everything about them. I will never own a SW model and they are at the top of my "squat" list. If I could incinerate every SW model, I'd be temporarily happy with the game.

Deathwatch are very strong, but they require some skill to play right.

Things you should consider:

1. Xiphons. Forgeworld flyers that have solid missiles
2. Helverins.

Then,

3. 10 man kill teams. You'll want primaris stuff. Hellblasters, aggressors, primaris marines.

You can make a really solid list with this. You'll struggle against Knights but everyone is right now. Take it in stride until they're nerfed.

A watch master is almost required to play the army. Changing tactics on the fly is hot.

I've teamed my "bloodwatch" with an errant and two helverins before. I actually won that game vs drukhari.

I use the errant as a poor mans castellano. They both have the same critical d6 roll for the main gun, but the errant isn't burning 3cp to live nor wasting points on meltaguns.

And yes watchmasters are total pimps.

Martel732 wrote:
I've teamed my "bloodwatch" with an errant and two helverins before. I actually won that game vs drukhari.

I use the errant as a poor mans castellano. They both have the same critical d6 roll for the main gun, but the errant isn't burning 3cp to live nor wasting points on meltaguns.

And yes watchmasters are total pimps.

Just go all out and get a crusader - can have same thermal lance plus an endless furry. Apparently this is a bad unit though per dakaa.

 grouchoben wrote:
I have a feeling that DW are going to be a strong army post-FAQ. It's quite likely that the Castallan is going to be nerfed, and so with it IKs, who are a bit of a problem for us atm.

Orks are going to rise, and there's no better target for our SIA than greenskins (okay, Daemon Princes, but you know what I mean). We're one of the only armies that can turn hordes into red paste.

What do you think, fellow watchmasters? How far are DW from being a top-table army?

Stem the Green Tide is a powerful tool against newer Ork players, who often focus on a single giant mob that must makes its charge as early as possible. Reducing their charge ranges is worth every CP in that case. We also are one of the few factions that can stand up to them in melee, with everything being T4 or T5. The redemptor also likes to shoot up Orks.

The counterpoint is that we don't like to get bound up in melee and that frag cannons can be hurt by the extra long charge ranges of Waagghh'd up orks. We also don't have a great solution for their ability to spam dreadnoughts - its kinda funny that the solution to Hellblaster spam can be fielding a dozen dreadnought class plasma-soakers.

 Marmatag wrote:
Deathwatch are very strong, but they require some skill to play right.

Things you should consider:

1. Xiphons. Forgeworld flyers that have solid missiles
2. Helverins.

Agreed, My xiphon is basically stapled to my DW lists. With a jump cap you can guarantee it one turn with rerolls, which I normally trigger the doctrine for. It also makes an insanely good decapitation unit, where its missiles really come into their own. Placing it late I can often put it out of range of a chunk of guns, run it across the face of my opponent for the captain bubble, then 90˚ to cut in and leave their warlord/high value character as its nearest target. My Xiphon has killed Abaddon, Rowboat, Kharne, and Typhus in the last month. The pilot deserves a goddam raise.

I also crutch pretty hard on my DSing SCA-Levi and DSing Hellblasters. Between these three I can put damage on a lot of targets. So yeah, I think a few well chosen FW units makes DW come alive as a faction. Without them I don't think they can offer enough AT to compete. I just assume that discussions of faction strengths includes FW in it now, as I'm lucky and I've never been to a competition or played a player who have a problem with FW.

I don't like hellblasters at all, even with access to DS. The Xiphon is much better, imo.

(And Helverins too, agreed. I won a local tournament last month with a Gallant, 2 Helverins and a Xiphon in my list.)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I hear you , but I love Hellblasters for selectively murdering something, having dropped down into cover/LOS blocked positions: they make a part of the board asymmetric really quick. If your terrain lets you do this, they can do some nasty damage. Playing on planet bowling ball they get shredded the turn they drop, every time.

I prefer a 3 man inceptor squad with plasma to hell blasters. Free deep strike is nice

Don't care for them, either.

Martel732 wrote:
Don't care for them, either.

I don't think you care for much of anything.

Plasma Inceptors are too glassy for my liking, but yeah they really do shoot the guts out of things.

Martel732 wrote:Corvus and Land Raiders are both junk.

Martel732 wrote:I hate the SW and everything about them. I will never own a SW model and they are at the top of my "squat" list. If I could incinerate every SW model, I'd be temporarily happy with the game.

Martel732 wrote:I don't like hellblasters at all, even with access to DS. The Xiphon is much better, imo.

Martel732 wrote:Don't care for them, either.

Might be worth just posting what you do like - would definitely take up less space than this

Regarding the Hellblaster vs Plasma Inceptor discussion, it highlights the weird situation we're in for 8th edition. Things like Land Raiders are just not durable enough against weapons they used to shrug off, like plasma, so for their points they aren't worth it. Which is a total bummer because they're cool, flavourful models for DW. They're also one of the only platforms DW can turn to with las cannons for traditional vehicle hunting work, but they aren't anywhere close to cost effective because of that durability issue.

But at the same time we now get to consider plasma a solution for tanks, so it kind of cuts both ways.

Durability isn't the problem for Land Raiders this edition and you know it.

 Xenomancers wrote:
I prefer a 3 man inceptor squad with plasma to hell blasters. Free deep strike is nice

Are you playing with the turn 1 Deep Strike restrictions?

I like sia intercessors and watchmasters. Not a whole lot else, really. I guess dw leviathans are good too.

Not stormbolter/chainsword vets? They die quick but 210pts buys you a bucket of sia dakka, a few 3++'s, can deepstrike, and make 32 attacks in CC too.

 grouchoben wrote:
Not stormbolter/chainsword vets? They die quick but 210pts buys you a bucket of sia dakka, a few 3++'s, can deepstrike, and make 32 attacks in CC too.

Yeah deepstriking vets can be a very strong unit. I've not been able to try them out yet, but I plan to soon. The amount of dakka they put out combined with their 3+ Invulns and decent CQC ability they are no joke. Very solid anti infantry and even passable anti vehicle with stratagems and the like.

 grouchoben wrote:
Not stormbolter/chainsword vets? They die quick but 210pts buys you a bucket of sia dakka, a few 3++'s, can deepstrike, and make 32 attacks in CC too.

Too fragile for me. Lots of psykers in my meta, and mortal wounds eat these kinds of squads alive.

That makes them the perfect DS candidates.

It's tough to fit everything in, but I've still been trying to make a way to get in lots of Deathwatch troops, the 32, and then some Scouts + something for tanks.

Speaking of Scouts, isn't anyone else annoyed they're not an option? They could've easily just given a whole squad an additional to movement or charge or something and then they could've been a FA choice or something.

It doesn’t make sense for scouts to be in DW as they are space marines in training - DW recruits veteran marines from other chapters. Just ally in a scout batallion if necessary

C4790M wrote:
It doesn’t make sense for scouts to be in DW as they are space marines in training - DW recruits veteran marines from other chapters. Just ally in a scout batallion if necessary

They use Scout armor for Infiltration and stuff. It happens in the RPG and everything.

Deathwatch marines that perform the role of scouts in a FA slot would be very cool though.