Dark Angels Tactics 2018 - Chapter Approved page 41

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**MilkmanAl**

Oh yeah, sorry. Stormbolter and chainsword. I have a bunch of DWK and other heavy-hitting units that are really expensive, so crowd control comes at a premium.

**Maelstrom808**

Standard setup that's been seeing most of my lists that I've been putting together lately. Should have the first opportunity to actually put it to the test tomorrow.

Drop pod with:
5x vets with storm bolter and chainsword
2x company champs
Lieutenant w/ mace of redemption
Azzy
Asmodai

**Galas**

Hmm... I'll try the 5 man squad with stormbolters and Chainsword. I have a ton of Stormbolters from Terminators, but do you know a cheap source of chainswords?

I have a ton of Chaos Marines chainsword but they are very... chaosy

**Snail22**

Thanks for the vet feedback yall.
Guess i know where all my excess deathwing storm bolter hands are going.
Out of interest, havent ever bought a codex or played, were stormbolters always available to powerarmour units?

**ZergSmasher**

Snail22 wrote:
Out of interest, havent ever bought a codex or played, were stormbolters always available to powerarmour units?

They were indeed, at least for characters. They weren't a very competitive choice in the last edition at least, costing 5 points for an Assault 2 gun (2 shots instead of 4). They're a steal now!

**Maelstrom808**

Incredibly cost effective now. Shame we can't go all John Woo with them and dual weild

**MilkmanAl**

I'm really liking this vets with champions idea a lot. I'd initially planned to drop the Champs behind my bikers, but if they bring their own crowd control and bodyguards, there's no need for that. I don't like the diminished chances of getting multiple Champions immediately into combat (since there are fewer of them to begin with, obviously), but I think that trade is probably worthwhile. It cuts down the cost of the drop dramatically, too. I'll give that a shot next time around, for sure.

**ZergSmasher**

Guys, I'm expecting Champions to get a price bump at some point, so I'm not sure it's a great idea to go all in with converting them. They may be the next Malefic Lords. That said, right now they are really solid! I've got one and I should perhaps make another.

**Galas**

I have a BT Emperor's Champion that I have painted green, that I use as my Company Champion. And two Ultramarines honour guard that I use as the same.

So no problem for me

**TangoTwoBravo**

ZergSmasher wrote:
Guys, I'm expecting Champions to get a price bump at some point, so I'm not sure it's a great idea to go all in with converting them. They may be the next Malefic Lords. That said, right now they are really solid! I've got one and I should perhaps make another.

I expect a numbers restriction rather than a points bump, although of course the latter is possible. They might do something like "You may take one Company Champion per Dark Angels Detachment" or something like that.

**MilkmanAl**

Agree. I don't think they're *that* much better than DWK, so more than 5-ish point increase would basically render them useless. Numbers restriction makes more sense to me.

**Vector Strike**

Used the Company Champions today. Wasn't really amazed.

3 charged a 4-man Deathwatch Terminator unit (Sarge with TH/SS, 3 with Assault Cannons and another one was barebones). One died to Overwatch (highly unusual, I know) and the other 2 killed 1 Termie. The Termie unit cleaned the ground with them.

Later, other 2 charged a Captain with just a Chainsword and a 4++. NEITHER managed to land a single wound, while the Captain dealt 2W to one of them. Next round, the Captain left the battle while those Champions endured some shooting to 1W left each. They charged the Captain AGAIN and... failed miserably to deal one simple wound. The Captain killed them.

My tip is to not use them vs anything with a reasonable invulnerable save

**axisofentropy**

Does a Dark Angels Company Champion pay for his Combat Shield or is he only 40 points for everything? It's not explicitly listed in his wargear.

And where's the dataslate for the Dark Angels Chapter Champion?

Automatically Appended Next Post:
And yes I expect GW will change the Blade of Caliban points cost upwards from zero.

**Galas**

It will be FAQed to have the Combat Shield in his wargear like those Eldar models did.

And yes theres no Dataslate for the Dark Angels Chapter Champion because technically that one is the Deathwing Champion.

**MilkmanAl**

Geez, Vector, you had some pretty awful luck. By the numbers, each Champ should kill a Terminator pretty reliably each round of combat. The Captain should've been toast, too. Give them another shot. It sounds like your dice hated you.

**axisofentropy**

Galas wrote:

And yes theres no Dataslate for the Dark Angels Chapter Champion because technically that one is the Deathwing Champion.

but there's a chapter champion listed in the points costs

**Maelstrom808**

So had my first game with the new book tonight. Played ITC missions against my usual opponent who is probably one of the best Tau players in the area. Pulled out a win but it was a blood bath. Proxied ravenwing and my character and vet packed drop pod.

I'm not going to do a full write-up, but I'll list the noteworthy bits.

- ravenwing is strong but there are hard choices to be made. You want to keep your units together to maximize all of your force multipliers with Sammael, the talonmaster, and the darkshroud, but many abilities and pushing objectives will force you to split up, especially against a mobile opponent. Making the choice of maximizing your damage output vs keeping them alive through your opponent's turn is a difficult call on almost every turn (which for me makes for highly engaging gameplay).

- the drop pod worked for me but it was hard to utilize. Due to the large footprint of the pod (we played with the doors open), and savy deployment and moves by my opponent, it was hard to find good places to drop. In addition, you need to make sure you are dropping against units that it makes sense to engage. In my case I really had little choice but to drop it against a couple units of plasma crisis suits and their accompanying gun drones. I was fortunate enough to have him in a position where he had to engage the stuff that dropped in so that he had a chance to score some points and deny me the same, otherwise he could have simply jumped away. In the end it worked out, but it could have gone very bad.

- killing all of his markerlights, then getting -1 to hit my guys thanks to the darkshroud just felt like kicking a puppy. It really neutered his ability to respond to my moves.

In the end this feels like a ”high floor/high ceiling” type of build. It can be frustrating but also highly rewarding. Mistakes by either player will hurt...a lot.

**Vector Strike**

On Company Champions: I really hope they don't limit their numbers. I'd like to see Blade of Caliban costing 5p or something like that.
They can't get a Jump Pack, both Stormraven and Land Raider can be destroyed and Drop Pods put them 9" away. A smart player can really keep them away from you. No reason to limit their number, I'd say.

Also, I don't think they'll fix the Combat Shield thing, as SM has the same situation and their codex already got a FAQ... which didn't even touch Company Champions.

**Galas**

axisofentropy wrote:
Galas wrote:

And yes theres no Dataslate for the Dark Angels Chapter Champion because technically that one is the Deathwing Champion.
but there's a chapter champion listed in the points costs

I know. But probably thats a problem of copy-pasting the point costs.

**frightnight**

My champ is a champion from the command squad set with the sword from the DA upgrade sprue and a backpack made from an old Swooping Hawk set of wings and the original Cypher backpack with the skeleton draped on it. He looks like a real avenging angel, I'm pretty proud of it (paint job needs some retouching, though, I painted it years ago)

As usual, I've whipped up several lists that I want to try out, but won't have time to do the games for a while.

**daedalus**

I had my new years 2v2 game yesterday, 1000 points per player. Went Sammael, a Talonmaster, 2 bike squads (plasmax2, combiplasma), and a black knights squad. Teammate did deathwing with a single bike squad.

They did blood angels and space wolves, though I wouldn't be able to relate the exact lists to you. I recall bjorn and a squad of wolfen on the SW side, and a captain, chaplin, and a couple assault squads on the BA side.

They got too many tactical objectives first turn, which led us to try to table them to win. It went pretty blow for blow the entire time, but we barely wound up tabling them on round 5.

Some takeaways:

Other than soaking a decent number of bullets, the DW didn't do a whole lot. they wiped out a couple of devastator squads on the other side of the map from where all the action was going on at, but then couldn't really walk back far enough to do anything good.

Attack bikes are a good source of ablative wounds, though I'm not sure they're point efficient.

Bikes as a whole put out buckets of bullets though, particularly with the support hqs. Man, I was impressed.

Sammael is a monster in melee, and seems all around solid.

I made some pretty stupid mistakes, and we still wound up with maybe 400-500 points on the table when it ended. They had a few too, but all things considered, I could easily see a heavy Ravenwing list being a solid tournament contender for the future.

**Aaranis**

Hmm all of these reports are discouraging for my Deathwing-heavy project. I'd really like to build around a unit of 5 Knights, the Deathwing Champion, Apothecary, Ancient + Asmodai for maximum effectiveness. I don't play tournaments but my local meta has some solid lists, although no cheesy lists. I'd deliver them trough a deep-strike, but Asmodai can't do that, so either I load them up in a Land Raider (seems really costly), a Stormraven (dislike the model heavily), or I drop Asmodai and load up an Interrogator-Chaplain or a Librarian Terminator to cast Repugnance for the rerolls. What do you think is best ?

Also, how do you use your Knights ? Do you make them go after tanks, monsters, characters ? What are they best fighting against ?

Thinking to flesh out the rest of the list with Ravenwing and Greenwing, but I have some hesitations again.

Ravenwing: what roles do bikes fill ? Inceptors with bolters are good enough dakka-dealers and have roughly the same resilience, but can fly. Black Knights and their plasma can be replaced by Hellblasters for busting T7+, are they best used in CC with their Corvus hammers ? I was thinking about using Land Speeders with various heavy weapons, supported by either Sammael or a Talon Master. They're faster, can fly and looks resilient enough, the -1 to hit is mitigated by the characters' rerolls.

Greenwing: Intercessors really interest me, I'd like something that can hold my backfield objectives decently while having ObSec against late turns contesting shenanigans, and Scouts don't look like they'd be good for this role. I also have 30 tacs but as I understood they are somewhat mediocre, is that correct ? I could use full Scouts but they look like they'd just die quickly. Maybe a mix of Intercessors and Scouts ?

**Grimgold**

I think intercessors would be pretty good for backline holding, give them the stalker pattern bolt guns because DA get additional benefits for not moving, and have them camp out in the back because a 36" range str 4 AP -2 weapon gives them quite a bit of board presence.

**Breng77**

Attack bikes don't really seem worth it because of the -1 to hit on the heavy weapon. 2 bikers is only 9 points more, is slightly more durable, has more shots, and more attacks in close combat, so unless you are going full squad it doesn't seem worth it.

I just played my DA + white scars list in a 1500 point tourney. It performed very well getting me the overall win with 3 max point wins.

Plasma inceptors are amazing, as are Sammie and the talonmaster, bike squads are good all around units that can handle multiple tasks during a game.

**TangoTwoBravo**

Aaranis wrote:
Hmm all of these reports are discouraging for my Deathwing-heavy project. I'd really like to build around a unit of 5 Knights, the Deathwing Champion, Apothecary, Ancient + Asmodai for maximum effectiveness. I don't play tournaments but my local meta has some solid lists, although no cheesy lists. I'd deliver them trough a deep-strike, but Asmodai can't do that, so either I load them up in a Land Raider (seems really costly), a Stormraven (dislike the model heavily), or I drop Asmodai and load up an Interrogator-Chaplain or a Librarian Terminator to cast Repugnance for the rerolls. What do you think is best ?

Also, how do you use your Knights ? Do you make them go after tanks, monsters, characters ? What are they best fighting against ?

My Deathwing Knights will take on anything (well, maybe not Grots...) Mine have smashed tanks, Dreads, Killa Kans, Ork Mobs (the Flail and an accompanying DW Champion helped), Warbosses and other Terminators. They are best against high-value models with multiple wounds that rely on invulnerable saves. The -2 AP on the Maces mean that a 4++ or 5++ on the opponent is just business as usual, while Str 8 means that you will usually wound. The 3 wounds per strike is the killer. Combined with a Librarian's Righteous Repugnance and a DW Ancient within 6" and they can take down all sorts of nasties. Their flaw is relying on charge rolls. These guys have spent more of my CP than any other squad. I recall one tourney game where they never got into combat (but they also shaped the enemy). Still, a DW Knights squad in your list is an answer to the biggest, nastiest threat that your opponent can muster.

**axisofentropy**

Aeri wrote:
I began a unit rating for myself, but might aswell post it to open the discussion.
I didn't rate every unit, because I just dont have all of them and therefore dont care.

HQ:

Azrael: A+ [No explanation needed I guess. Great to keep Devs/Hellblasters alive]
Asmodai: A- [Great DWK Force Multiplier, but no Teleport Strike. Relies on riding a Landraider with a unit of DWK. Also works great with Company Veterans geared for melee.]
Sammael: A+ [Swift and deadly. Great Support for Black Knights and other Ravenwing units aswell. Can assault flyers with his S8 sword making him super versatile.]
Belial: B [Great Deathwing Multiplier and Combat beast, but suffers from the same problem every melee buff character has - he might not make the charge to support his unit.]
Interrogator Chaplain: C+ [Very expensive compared to a chaplain. The extra -1 to morale is rarely worth it. Pick a chaplain or Asmodai instead.]
Chaplain: B- [Good Melee Buff. When used in Terminator Armour to deep strike with terminators you have a high chance of him not making the charge and therefore not beeing able to buff the charging units. Works great in a transport though.]
Librarians C [Don't like our Powers, so librarians mostly don't see the board anymore.]

Troops:

Scouts: A- [Cheap and very versatile troop choice. Great to take objectives early on and harass/charge shooty units.]
Tactical Squad: B [The same solid troop choice as ever. Sturdy, can take many different weapons and are very flexible. Kind of expensive though, since our best units are super pricey. Need a Razorback or Rhino for best effectiveness or are doomed as a backline place and forget unit.]

Elite:

Deathwing Knights: A- [Pure deadlyness. Even better with Asmodai and a Deahwing Ancient. May get stuck if your Landraider blows early though. Darkshroud helps a lot to prevent this.]
Deathwing Terminators: C [Price and outshined in melee by DWK. For shooting there are better choices. Great to harass a backfield unit though and soak up enemy fire. If left alone they can hurt quite badly, so the enemy HAS to deal with them.]
Dreadnoughts: B+ [As Rifledreads a very solid choice, specially with our new reroll 1s. No degrading aswell. I prefer 2 with Twin Las/Twin Autocannon in my force.]
Venerable Dreadnoughts: A [Very potent backfield heavy weapon plattforms. BS2+ and reroll 1s almost guarantees hits. And they come with a 6+ FNP for extra toughness. worth the 20P upgrade!]

Fast Attack:
Black Knights: A [Some of our best units. Deadly. Fast. Reliable. With Weapons of the Dark Age also super deadly. 6 can kill a Monolith in 1 shooting phase. They are also small enough to evade enemy fire if placed carefully. In melee they are "ok". Not as great as they used to be, but can still pack a punch with sammy and/or an ancient. Very expensive though.]
Ravenwing Bikes C- [Very expensive for what they bring to the field. Mediocre in melee, mediocre in shooting. I see little reason to field these guys.]
Darkshroud A [Great defensive tool. Let it protect the backfield, your transports or your bikes. It makes your units a lot tougher for very little points. Don't bother with weapon upgrades, it's not there to shoot stuff.]
Land Speeders B- [Very expensive, but versatile. Best used stationary because of their heavy weapons, and this is exactly where they are outshined by Dreadnoughts.]

Heavy Support:
Devastators B+ [Superb Heavy hitters for your backline. With rerolls to 1s and our Plasma Stratagem they can really hurt stuff for reasonable points. Add Azrael or other buff units to make them even better. Might die quite easily though, since the unit is just 5 Marines.]
Predators A- [Tough and can hurt a lot. Best used with Predator Auto Cannon and Las Cannon sponsons. Other than Ven Dreads they lose BS when taking damage, making them less effective the longer the battle lasts.]
Landspeeder Vengeance D [Nopes. Just don't]
Land Raider Redeemer A- [Love this thing with DWK in it. The flamers are also great to kill flyers and other hard to hit stuff. Creates a nice threat bubble, but is kinda slow. Also can leave combat due to our new stratagem, eliminating one of the greatest weaknesses of landraiders. But who would want to charge this thing anyways?]
Land Raider Crusader B+ [Greater transport capacity, but less dmg output. IMHO the Darkshroud is better to take the anti horde role.]

Flyers:
Nephilim Jetfighter: B+ [Great damage output and survivability. Can get kinda expensive though. Still a solid choice.]
Dark Talon: A- [One of our best anti horde tools. Cheap, tough and reliable. BF2+ hurricane bolters can get stuff done. The rift canon is a great addition to take on heavier targets. The stasis bomb is a 1 time gimmick - a good one.]

this is good and i've added to OP

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Here's my own garbage takes:

HQ: Azreal will be Warlord of nearly every Dark Angel army. Sammeal, Belial, Asmodai, Talonmaster, and a Jump Pack Master fill out the remaining HQ slots.

Troops: Scouts. Some with heavy weapons for mortal wound stratagems.

Elites: For now, the Company Champion's Blade of Caliban costs 0. Abuse this until it changes but don't spend money on it. Aggressors with boltstorms pair well with Azreal. Deathwing Ancient belongs in every Deathwing army.

Fast Attack: This is the good stuff. Plasma Inceptors and Black Knights can anchor an alpha-strike army. Darkshroud provides powerful defense if you need to play for all 6 turns.

Heavy Support: Plasma Cannon Devastators love Grim Resolve. Hellblasters pair well with Azreal.

Flyer: Dark Talon is great. Stormraven recently got more expensive but Fire Raptors got cheaper. Both require support to succeed.

Dedicated Transport: If you want a parking lot, play Ultramarines with Roboute.

**Vector Strike**

Can normal Chaplains take Terminator armour? Can't find that option in the codex

**Swillsswil**

Vector Strike wrote:
Can normal Chaplains take Terminator armour? Can't find that option in the codex

No they cannot. Anyone worthy of wearing terminator armour is deathwing/inner circle, and standard chaplains don't have those honors, only int-chaplains. Int-chaplain is almost always an auto-upgrade anyway in my experience.

**axisofentropy**

Swillsswil wrote:
Vector Strike wrote:
Can normal Chaplains take Terminator armour? Can't find that option in the codex

No they cannot. Anyone worthy of wearing terminator armour is deathwing/inner circle, and standard chaplains don't have those honors, only int-chaplains. Int-chaplain is almost always an auto-upgrade anyway in my experience.

Belial or Asmodai.

**Swillsswil**

axisofentropy wrote:
Swillsswil wrote:
Vector Strike wrote:
Can normal Chaplains take Terminator armour? Can't find that option in the codex

No they cannot. Anyone worthy of wearing terminator armour is deathwing/inner circle, and standard chaplains don't have those honors, only int-chaplains. Int-chaplain is almost always an auto-upgrade anyway in my experience.
Belial or Asmodai.

Yes both great options. Unless you are a successor. Also Asmodai can't deep strike.