The Viablity of a pure DW army.

[[TA]Typher]

I love playing pure Deathwing.

 

Ok, I'll admit I'm not a pro player. I don't play in tourneys and when I play I play for fun. I help my opponent, give him advice, I'm even willing to lose instead of not reminding them about something they missed.

 

With all that said I have yet to win a game with a pure Deathwing army under the new Codex. I've only played a three games so far with them, each has been a loss. The first Vs orks was close until the end, and I was basically tabled on turn 6. It was a good game despite the loss. It was a dramatic up-hill battle, but I actually had a chance to win.

 

My next two games have been against tau. Both times I was tabled. Neither game was close. Neither game was fun. Reviewing both games and talking to my opponents I really don't think I had a chance to win either game. The survivability of a PURE DW army seems really bad. Both times I ran with a BoF, I dunno, but it seems almost a necessity. Without being able to bring more units close in a timely manor and forcing the Tau to make hard choices on who to shoot, it seems that the design of the DW is really flawed. Even running a landraider didn't seem to help. Castling Tau, and some of the over the top rules they have seems really unbalanced.

 

Missing an extra 3+ invul save on my Sgt. didn't help either.

 

My List.

 

Belial + 5 DWK in a Crusader

 

This gives me 3 units on the board.

 

In reserve, command squad with the Bof, Hvy Flamer and a couple TH/SS

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

 

 

 

Placing only the Landraider on the board really limits my options, but what are my options? Foot slot across the board? I tried that... it was a bad idea. Out shoot the Tau? I don't need to be rainman to know that is a fail-plan. With the "new" DW rule vengeance strike you really lose out if you don't DS them.

 

Running Belial up in the Landraider and bringing in the other DW on turn 2, guarantees you can get the DWA units where you need them. Surviving 1 to 2 rounds with only the raider on the board is questionable. Again what are your options? Drop the DW in on turn 1? Sure you can, but you are DSing them father back and now they have to footslog, AND the Tau have more time and distance to side shuffle away from you.

 

Like I said, I'm not a pro, but I really find it irritating that I need to have a mixedwing army to even have a shot to win a friendly game. I shouldn't have too. I don't have a RW army and I really don't want one. If I play a straight power armor army I do fairly well. They seem more balanced. A mixedwing army seems dramatically better then a pure DW.

 

Anyway... how have you guys been fairing against Tau with your DW? The three major rulings in the recent FAQ only seem to make the DW less and less viable. PFG, DWA and Sgt loadout all bashed the DW. Am I missing something? As far as I know the DW armies haven't dominated or even really won a whole lot of tourneys. Is it a money thing for GW? 4 or 5 boxes of DW terms and a Landraider isn't cheap.

 

Sorry to ramble, but I'm kinda disappointed in the DW in 6th ed and I'm really thinking about shelving it. That or just refusing to play against certain armies, which seems almost worse then shelving my army.

[Disciple of Caliban Sgt]

TA,

 

My opinion pure DW is and will always be an uphill battle. Mixed wing I think is the way the Army/Codex was designed to be played. I know what you mean about Ravenwing not being a major fan myself but I think if you took one full squad of Ravenwing you'd find life much easier. Of course this does nothing for your pure DW but you can combat squad the six bikes add an AB and you have two sets of Melta (if you kit them that way) for good anti tank as well as having homers for good deep strike. Also if you get a Landspeeder it helps with your number of units on the board and having more Termi's in reserve for deepstrike.

 

So while this doesn't help with your all DW I'm not sure against Tau since even before the new codex that was a bad match up for DW from what I can see the new codex is just more tough shooting and really is the rock to the DW scissors. Sorry I couldn't be more help but I think vs. Tau you'll need some other kind off support WW's bikes or something. I like huge games of 3K + so getting support and plenty of DW is fine for me.

[IanSturrock]

You could try adding a Terminator Librarian with power field, 5-man DW squad with Cyclone, and a couple of Venerable Rifleman Dreads (2 x twin-linked autocannons) to sit by a backfield objective. They'd be hard to shift -- perhaps harder than a Land Raider -- just because they could aim to stay 48" away from the enemy. Very expensive though.

I think the other option that works is *more* Land Raiders... one is never enough. Two is starting to get effective. Three is a very tough nut to crack for most opponents, even Tau. You could potentially have a DW command squad with Devastation Banner and PFG (on a librarian, again), in range to give 2 or 3 Land Raider Crusaders a 4++ save and Salvo hurricanes. DW command squad starts out in a Raider. 1st turn, move all 3 raiders max speed and pop smoke. 2nd turn, move again, DW command squad disembarks so that the PFG starts working, and then start shooting. Blast any infantry to pieces; hop out and chainfist tanks; maybe have Belial guiding in more Termies... it's all good.

[Brother Immolator]

I wouldnt suggest dreads against a tau list with all the str7+ anti tank they filed, they dont even need railguns. Best have a predator in there.

Just my 2cents.

[Chaplain Lucifer]

I think 3 games and 3 losses is not enough to question viability of DW on 6th. You need more games in to adjust to new codex and using that same codex under 6th ed rules... Sometimes you need alot of playtesting to find out what works for you.

[IanSturrock]

Isn't most of their S7, only 36" range, though?

[twopounder]

I haven't played against the new Tau yet, but thus far I'm undefeated with my deathwing. A big part of playing deathwing is placement and who to deathwing assault. How you equip your squads is very important as well. I can field 5 squads of th/ss and 6 squads of standard, in addition to 10 knights. I can also swap out the 6 assault cannons for 6 heavy flamers if necessary.

 

This allows for maneuvers such as putting belial in a squad of 8 th/ss and 2 heavy flamers. You can then drop him right on top of a soft infantry unit, incinerate it, then survive the counter attack to drop more DW squads on his teleport homer.

 

Or you can use the ss/th as line units and deep strike the shooty units for the twin-linked weapons.

 

Deathwing are not easy to win with. They take a lot of tactical prowess (and practice), and a single mistake can lose you the game. Every terminator is critical, and you have to keep objectives at the forefront of the game. They're basically your only chance of winning. It's nearly impossible for terminators to go toe-to-toe with a vastly numerically superior force. If you have to roll a lot of saves, you're in trouble. If you get hit by IG melta kill teams, you're in trouble. Orks can quickly overwhelm you in close combat.

 

I notice you don't have any knights. They're an excellent crowd control solution with the best survivability in the game. Point for point, they're the best unit in the game.

 

Don't give up, keep trying until you get a handle on it.

[elphilo]

As other have said Deathwing is a tough thing to play. Unless you play Draigowing, you're always going to be out numbered. Its tough list to run. Its all about placement and applying your force properly. Its not one of those armies you can just pick up and win. So keep at it. Eventually you'll find something that works and you'll be able to take all comers!

[IndigoJack]

As many have said, pure DW suffer from low model count. It's the main reason I say that DW are more expensive than they should be. IMO, they really neee a price break in this codex, not a bump up. That being said, now that I'm (almost) out of school for the summer and adepticon is over, much of my gaming time will be spent with pure DW and trying to make them work for me. 

 

As far as DW vs tau go, the riflemen aren't really a bad idea. Combine them with CMLs and you should be able to handle infantry heavy tau lists. Use the rifleman to strip drones at range, then use the CMLs to hit suits and instant death them. Use your storm bolters to clean up infantry. I have no advice about a riptide, I have yet to face one and that may very well render the rest of my advice moot. I will be getting some tau games in very soon though, and I'll try and post a lessons learned if anything particularly good or bad happens.

[Master Avoghai]

Belial + 5 DWK in a Crusader

 

This gives me 3 units on the board.

 

In reserve, command squad with the Bof, Hvy Flamer and a couple TH/SS

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

How many points does it make?

 

Seems really low nimber of point like 1500 or less...

 

40k v6 seems to be made for >1850pts to keep balance between armies. There are armies really tough to play in low amount of points that become meh if you play with 500 more points.

[[TA]Typher]

 

 

 

Belial + 5 DWK in a Crusader

 

This gives me 3 units on the board.

 

In reserve, command squad with the Bof, Hvy Flamer and a couple TH/SS

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

 

7 man unit Term Squad (CML, 3 TH/SS, 1 Sgt with horrible standard loadout)

How many points does it make?

 

Seems really low nimber of point like 1500 or less...

 

40k v6 seems to be made for >1850pts to keep balance between armies. There are armies really tough to play in low amount of points that become meh if you play with 500 more points.

It's 1750.

 

I don't have 3 landraiders and even then it seems like that would have to be a extremely high point game to play. I use 5 deathingknights and even then they tear through tau units if they reach them.. 10 seems like overkill when you could use those points for additional units. I'm not a complete DW noob, I played they alot in 5th ed. I understand positioning, but sometimes it doesn't matter, with castling armies you either have to expose youself to get close enough to assault or hide. A DW army will never outshoot tau or gaurd. Close combat is your only advantage. Out lasting them by camping on objectives the whole game is an option but not a strong one.

 

You shouldn't be getting tabled at the end of turn 4 unless you've made huge mistakes. The high volume of fire with the new tau codex really breaks the DW. This is something new to the game and really hasn't been balanced correctly.

 

Cheap fire warriors and cheap ic units that give bonus shots doesn't seem balanced to me. The new DW rules are really not that great. Split fire? Hardly useful. Sure, there are instances but not really to the point of making a difference. Vengence strike? With the watered down mixed units that a DW unit needs this isn't as good as it sounds on paper. With so little shooting in a DW army i understand what they tried to do here, but it falls dramatically short. Deathwing assault? Not a great rule. Coming in on turn 1? Yeah, that's what i need, more rounds for them to shoot at me. Turn 2 is more ideal, but withthe 50% rule and the high cost of the DW you run the risk of the units on the table getting owned before the reserves arrival. Tau's ability to remove cover and the fearless rules makes hiding unlikely.

 

Sgt's with just powerswords? Great... Less survivability. Apothicaries without any meaningfull cc weapon? Awesome. Belials teleport homer is nice, but having to have him on the board a turn before u use it makes it problimatic. The banner of fortitune is a must, making other options like a DW banner unattainable.

 

Landradiers forced to take a 30point upgrade that isn't really that useful blows. I would have much prefered that they have tele-homers, or a invuln save. I have yet to loss a landraider to an explosion that wouldn't have killed me due to hull point loss.

 

I used to love chaplains in my DW, but i don't know why you would ever take one

 

Anyway guys, sorry, i'm just frustrated by the lack of meaningful thought that went into our codex. I refuse to buy bikes just because GW wants me too. If they would have done a better job on the codex i would have bought a DA flyer, but they are really subpar for the points. I might have bought another landraider or more terminators for my DW, it i don't think it would matter much. I don't understandthe GW business model. They seem completely random on how they make codexes, new units and administer balance.

 

For the cost to play the game they really should do a better job, and be more active in correcting problems.

 

If you have read my battle reports you'll see that i don't mind loosing. I help the other player remember things, even if it hurts my army. The game should be about fun. Getting tabled by turn 4 when you've played the best game you could really makes the army not worth it for me.

[cypherkk]

Hmm.

 

My thought on the list.

 

I'd make the two 7 man squads 1 10 man with two cml's. Combat squad then with both cml's in one. And one 5 man squad preferably a command squad with fortitude banner.

 

I'd think about a chappy in the dwk's instead of belial, use belial to auto hit with a deep striking unit. It you choose that method of deployment, deep striking isn't always the best answer. Though if you do, a couple of heavy flammers would be nice.

 

The above posters mentioned dreads, I've been thinking of 2-3 shooting dreads backed up by a Techmarine with a pf and some servitors to help keep then up and running.

[[TA]Typher]

Hmm.

 

My thought on the list.

 

I'd make the two 7 man squads 1 10 man with two cml's. Combat squad then with both cml's in one. And one 5 man squad preferably a command squad with fortitude banner.

 

I'd think about a chappy in the dwk's instead of belial, use belial to auto hit with a deep striking unit. It you choose that method of deployment, deep striking isn't always the best answer. Though if you do, a couple of heavy flammers would be nice.

 

The above posters mentioned dreads, I've been thinking of 2-3 shooting dreads backed up by a Techmarine with a pf and some servitors to help keep then up and running.

I don't think DW terms can combat squad. Also why would u take a chaplian? They only allow themselves to reroll hits, not the unit, if i'm reading hatered correctly. A lib woth divination would let them reroll AND have a shot at insta-killing someone with his force weapon.

 

If u don't put belial on the board prior to the DWA they will scatter and lead to miss drops, which are devistating for the DW.

 

Dreads are good, but te DW is expensive and don't leave enough points to bring them most of the time. I haven't ruled them out, but i'd rather have more troops on the board if possible.

[IndigoJack]

DW cannot combat squad and it's the reason that 10 man squads of DW are a bad idea. Chaplains allow the whole unit to re-roll to hits in the first round of combat (even if you didn't charge) but a libby with prescience is cheaper and, as long as you don't encounter a lot of psychic defense, are better.

[[TA]Typher]

DW cannot combat squad and it's the reason that 10 man squads of DW are a bad idea. Chaplains allow the whole unit to re-roll to hits in the first round of combat (even if you didn't charge) but a libby with prescience is cheaper and, as long as you don't encounter a lot of psychic defense, are better.

In 5th edition the litanies of hate special rule allowed a chaplian to confer hatered to a unit. Now they chaplian just has the hatered rule. Reading that rule is says that "a model" with this rule can reroll misses the first turn. I don't see anything that allows a unit to convey this rule to the unit he's with. What am i missing then? Unless I'm mistaken (which is totally possible) the RAW only appplies to the chaplain NOT the unit.

[BigGumbo]

 

DW cannot combat squad and it's the reason that 10 man squads of DW are a bad idea. Chaplains allow the whole unit to re-roll to hits in the first round of combat (even if you didn't charge) but a libby with prescience is cheaper and, as long as you don't encounter a lot of psychic defense, are better.

In 5th edition the litanies of hate special rule allowed a chaplian to confer hatered to a unit. Now they chaplian just has the hatered rule. Reading that rule is says that "a model" with this rule can reroll misses the first turn. I don't see anything that allows a unit to convey this rule to the unit he's with. What am i missing then? Unless I'm mistaken (which is totally possible) the RAW only appplies to the chaplain NOT the unit.

The relevant rule is not Hatred but Zealot. A model with the Zealot rule (including both levels of DA Chappy) confers Fearless and Hatred to any unit that he joins.

[[TA]Typher]

 

 

 

DW cannot combat squad and it's the reason that 10 man squads of DW are a bad idea. Chaplains allow the whole unit to re-roll to hits in the first round of combat (even if you didn't charge) but a libby with prescience is cheaper and, as long as you don't encounter a lot of psychic defense, are better.

In 5th edition the litanies of hate special rule allowed a chaplian to confer hatered to a unit. Now they chaplian just has the hatered rule. Reading that rule is says that "a model" with this rule can reroll misses the first turn. I don't see anything that allows a unit to convey this rule to the unit he's with. What am i missing then? Unless I'm mistaken (which is totally possible) the RAW only appplies to the chaplain NOT the unit.

The relevant rule is not Hatred but Zealot. A model with the Zealot rule (including both levels of DA Chappy) confers Fearless and Hatred to any unit that he joins.

Ok. I knew it was in there. Thank you. I see what i missed.

[jeremy1391]

Belial needs to deep strike with the heavy flamer squad! Especially against tau flambé this space dolphins :)

[[TA]Typher]

Belial needs to deep strike with the heavy flamer squad! Especially against tau flambé this space dolphins :)

Yes, that does work well, but it's short sighted imo. DWAing him negates his tele-homer, unless u placed the other DW in normal reserve. Of course that just leads to getting killed piecemeal.

 

So unless he's in the board prior to the DWA or u use RW bikers the scatter has a good chance of crippling ur forces. Scattering 10 inches away when you already spaced you drop 10 inches away for safety reasons leads to units that can't support each other and being killed piecemeal.

[twopounder]

Belial needs to deep strike with the heavy flamer squad! Especially against tau flambé this space dolphins

Yes, that does work well, but it's short sighted imo. DWAing him negates his tele-homer, unless u placed the other DW in normal reserve. Of course that just leads to getting killed piecemeal.

So unless he's in the board prior to the DWA or u use RW bikers the scatter has a good chance of crippling ur forces. Scattering 10 inches away when you already spaced you drop 10 inches away for safety reasons leads to units that can't support each other and being killed piecemeal.

It works fantastically for me. 10x dw knights and belial with 4 squads in reserve. He weathered shooting and assault so my other terminators could come down on target and get twin-linked shots of doom. Worked in 3 of 3 games to great effect.

[Master Avoghai]

Belial needs to deep strike with the heavy flamer squad! Especially against tau flambé this space dolphins

Yes, that does work well, but it's short sighted imo. DWAing him negates his tele-homer, unless u placed the other DW in normal reserve. Of course that just leads to getting killed piecemeal.

So unless he's in the board prior to the DWA or u use RW bikers the scatter has a good chance of crippling ur forces. Scattering 10 inches away when you already spaced you drop 10 inches away for safety reasons leads to units that can't support each other and being killed piecemeal.

It works fantastically for me. 10x dw knights and belial with 4 squads in reserve. He weathered shooting and assault so my other terminators could come down on target and get twin-linked shots of doom. Worked in 3 of 3 games to great effect.

Belial + 1x10 DWK + 3 squads i reserve means 8 squad in total following the 50% reserve rule doesn't he?

Or did you play all your army in reserve (which is clearly forbidden now hence not a viable tactic)

[twopounder]

Belial needs to deep strike with the heavy flamer squad! Especially against tau flambé this space dolphins

Yes, that does work well, but it's short sighted imo. DWAing him negates his tele-homer, unless u placed the other DW in normal reserve. Of course that just leads to getting killed piecemeal.

So unless he's in the board prior to the DWA or u use RW bikers the scatter has a good chance of crippling ur forces. Scattering 10 inches away when you already spaced you drop 10 inches away for safety reasons leads to units that can't support each other and being killed piecemeal.

It works fantastically for me. 10x dw knights and belial with 4 squads in reserve. He weathered shooting and assault so my other terminators could come down on target and get twin-linked shots of doom. Worked in 3 of 3 games to great effect.

Belial + 1x10 DWK + 3 squads i reserve means 8 squad in total following the 50% reserve rule doesn't he?

Or did you play all your army in reserve (which is clearly forbidden now hence not a viable tactic)

Actually it means 5 units. You only need 50% of your army on the table. By your math, you need 66% of your army on the table. In my case, 1 librarian, 3 devastator squads, and another termie squad.

Even if it was true that you needed 66%, how do you figure that it's impossible for me to field 12 units?

[Master Avoghai]

Well as the OP was PURE DW army, I've supposed that you had other DW squads on the table.... Didn't even think it could be RW or GW...

 

And yes it's totally possible to have 12 units of DW on the table but it implies large battles ;)

[twopounder]

Gah, and my edit just deleted my changes. Okay, lets try a third time. It's 3 am here and I'm misreading way too much.

 

I was playing against someone who was running a full company of ultramarines, so yes, I had more than that on the table. If I recall correctly, I had 3 dev squads, 5 terminator squads, a librarian, and belial and probably more that I can't think of at the moment.

[march10k]

Three land raiders is tough to cram into 1750 or 1850, but one is just never going to cut it. You need two, and they do need the DW upgrade...and a PFG. AV14 with a 4+ save and the ability to reroll when they go kablooey vastly improves their survivability. Tau can't reliably stop that. I would put belial and an assaulty squad in one, knights in the other, and DWA two squads of tactical terminators. At 1850, you can also afford a PFG prescience bike librarian to hide behind the tanks. Try that.

 

/edit/

 

Oh, yeah...and go second on purpose...give him NOTHING except the two boosted crusaders to shoot at for two turns...that's devastating to a shooty army. Then, on the bottom of turn two, DWA the 2x5 tactical termies, unload with your own shooting, drop the assault ramps, and charge. Multicharge, if possible. Us the hulls of the crusaders to block LOS between enemy units with AP2 interceptor shooting and your DWAers.