Which Codex for a Bike Based Army?

[Corby]

The standard Space Marine codex allows the most flexibility in a biker army. Troops bikers, a command squad on bikes, HQs on bikes, and plenty of various supporting units from other FOC slots.

 

Blood Angels cannot get biker troops, but can build a neat army using both bikers (in the Fast slots) and Assault Marines (in Troops slots). I can't remember if you can get Sanguinary Priests on bikes though, and if you can't you lose some of the punch that the Blood Angels can provide.

 

Space Wolves can only field Swiftclaws, which are a fun, but unreliable unit. The Headstrong rule for Blood Claw type units is tough to overcome and requires expensive investments into bike-mounted HQs to keep the leash tight (haha).

 

Dark Angels have Ravenwing, but their use as Troops requires you to invest in a Sammael, who isn't all that wonderful of a character. You'll also end up with a smaller army due to the old-codex points costs. Of course, the Ravenwing bikes carry teleport homers, which can be fun if you decide to build a combination Raven/Deathwing list.

 

 

I'd personally stick with the standard Space Marine codex because it's so flexible.

 

Blood Angel Sanguinary priests do have the option to take a bike.

 

@ OP

 

Codex Space marines would be your best bet for a bike army in my opinion , as you've the option to make them scoring, access to command squads , as well as HQ options like librarians , chaplains , captains and Korroso Khan.

 

There is also the ridiculous Ba bike star (I'm not advocating you try this) which a friend of mine thought up a while back. Basically the list revolves around this unit:

2 Librarians /w combi-melta , Bike , sanguine sword + blood lance

2 Chaplains /w combi-melta , power fist + bike

3 Sanguinary priests /w combi-melta , lightning claw and bike

8 Bikers /w 2 meltaguns + Sgt /w power fist

This comes in at 1250 points. The regular bikes take shots that can insta kill characters , and generally act as meat shields. It has a lot of melta and you have the option to split off to shoot 8 targets in a single turn with melta ( Not that you want to as the characters get picked off then , but because you've the option if you ever really needed it in exceptional circumstances) and the unit is nasty in combat. Of course this unit has alot of weaknesses (namely it costs more than draigo + 10 paladins) and is a ridiculous rock army that can be countered with good blocking by opponents and requires you to be very good at engineering charges/making sure the characters can't get picked out in assault. But funny all the same.

 

And then you fill in the rest of the list with as many scoring units as possible.