The Story of my 1000pt Blood Angel League Army

[retrovertigo]

Introduction

 

I'm newly returned to 40k after about 13-14yrs in the Wilderness of playing with cars and video games. I got back in around the turn of the year when my wife bought me the BRB for Xmas. I began with a Chaos Space Marine army, painting about 3000pts in under 10 weeks. Sadly, I subscribed to the GW promo photo mode of buying one of each thing and mainly buying the shiney flashy things. In a nutshell, my army looked alright but sucked HARD on the table. Feeling irritated by my noobish mistakes, and learning very very fast what makes a good 40k army (planning and preparation before buying...) I sold the whole lot on eBay and started over with Blood Angels. Why the Angels? Well my wife had also bought me Fear To Tread by James Swallow and that book really caught my imagination.

 

So flash forward a couple of months. I now have around 3000pts of Blood Angels, about 50% painted, and with a lot of games under my belt. The local club started a 1000pt 40k all-comers league last month and so I signed up with the best my chapter could muster.

 

My 1000pts list:

 

HQ - Mephiston

 

Elite - Furioso Dreadnought with Frag Cannon and melta gun, in a drop pod.

 

Troop - 10 man assault squad with melta gun.

Troop - 5 man assault squad with flamer.

 

Fast - Baal Predator with twinlinked Assault Cannon and Heavy Bolter sponsons

Fast - 2 Attack Bikes, one multi melta, one heavy bolter.

Fast - 1 Attack Bike with multi melta

 

No other upgrades or luxuries other than those listed. 1000pts on the nose. Twice a season, we have a 250pt transfer window where we can swap out no more than 250pts for something else. 

 

A lot of people have raised their eyebrows at the lack of Sanguinary Priests and the inclusion of Mephiston. A lack of FNP is a big loss here and I may swap one in later should it feel amiss, but I feel I can cope without considering what I else I have. Mephiston is a Space Marine Greater Daemon. At 1000pts I think he hits even harder than at higher points games, even if he swallows a quarter of my list. In all but one game, at every points cost from 1000 to 2500pts, he has been in contention for MVP with only Bloodthirsters proving a genuine deterrent to my use of him.

 

The game plan

 

Drop the pod and Furioso turn one into the enemies deployment zone and go for First Blood with unit deletion or else cause a massive distraction and hope not to get destroyed turn one, for a turn two charge.

 

Along one flank, fast move across the board with the flamer squad providing a screen for Mephiston accompanied by the lone bike. Along the other send the two other bikes, turbo boost if needed to get into the other side of the enemy deployment zone.

 

Baal pred either scout move up for turn one shooting from cover, or move up with the larger assault squad combat squaded in support.

 

Go for target saturation with four scary threats hitting from four different points very quickly and force the enemy to pick who to target leaving the other prongs of the attack to get busy. I'd cheerfully told a couple of players at the club I would probably ignore objectives in my own deployment zone and focus on either tabling the enemy or taking those he tried to get, for myself. Plus First Blood. Super aggressive, probably arrogant, certainly brave with the BA Codex in 6th Edition.

 

Some Pics

 

Just a few pics of the army thus far - apologies for the dreadful quality

 

 

How will I get on? Well this is what this thread will be about. My league progress and thoughts on the tactics and my list, how my tactics evolve or fail completely!  ;D

[Xenith]

Really nice looking army you have there!

[Jaspazz]

Wow the painting on these are just amazing I am just half way through painting a dreadnought and I can already tell that youres is twice as good as mine well done

 

-Jaspazz away

[Taranis]

Epic. In a great big way. (your painting). Looking forward to hearing your experience in the league.

[marine7312000]

I'm loving the gritty look your red has.

[Ushtarador]

Those Angels look amazing, and that list looks beardy as hell, I like your style :P

 

Looking forward to hear your reports!

[retrovertigo]

Thanks for the complements everyone, they're a sort of decent tabletop standard. Gritty and battle worn hides a lack of painting ability! :)

 

I'm honestly not beardy - I had to google what that meant! :D I do love to really think long and hard about my lists though, and I've had a ton of games already with the Angels so I knew which units I really liked and wanted to use, the bikes were brand new to this list simply to fill the points!

 

....

 

First League Battle - Chaos Space Marines vs Blood Angels

 

My opponent:

 

HQ

Chaos Lord - Lightning Claw, Chaos Bike, Sigil of Corruption, Mark of Nurgle.

 

TROOPS

5 Chaos Space Marines - Chaos Champion with Melta Bombs, Close Combat Weapons, Melta Gun, Mark of Nurgle.

5 Chaos Space Marines - Chaos Champion with Melta Bombs, Close Combat Weapons, Melta Gun, Mark of Nurgle.

5 Chaos Space Marines - Chaos Champion with Melta Bombs, Close Combat Weapons, Melta Gun, Mark of Nurgle.

 

FAST ATTACK:

5 Chaos Bikers - Champion w/ Melta Bombs, Melta Gun, Mark of Nurgle.

Helldrake - w/ Baleflamer.

 

HEAVY SUPPORT:

Defiler

 

TOTAL 999

 

Deployment

 

Out of the whole league, this was the guy I didn't want to play first because of the Heldrake. I have one myself and so I know exactly how infuriating they are to face as a powerarmour army. Coupled with toughness 5 and 6 across his whole army and the six strong bike pack I wasn't optimistic going into this with my force.

 

I won the roll off to go first, we were playing Vanguard deployment (with the thick edge on my left) and Emperors Will for objectives so I felt it suited my fast attack, aggressive army pretty well with his much slower and reliant on footslogging it across the table. With that in mind I placed my objective in the furthest bit of cover from his deployment zone, right on the table edge thus ensuring he had almost the furthest distance possible to have to cover to capture mine - which I had absolutely no intention of holding onto. My plan was to get as many of the second objectives as possible, and force the fighting around his own objective marker instead.

 

Going first I put Mephiston and the five man flamer team as far up the fat end of my deployment zone wedge as I could, with the solo multimelta bike in support - everything capable of moving 12" a turn.

 

On the opposite flank in the thin tip of the wedge I placed my other two bikes behind cover, concious that if he won the initiative his Defiler could potentially be a problem turn one.

 

In the centre I wedged the Baal Predator behind a low wall for cover with the ten man squad huddled behind it for cover. The dread and pod awaited in reserve.

 

My opponent deployed using the large amount of ruins on his side of the table, putting one of his CSM squads in a ruin approx half way along his DZ, another two were then positioned in a large ruin in the fat end of his DZ wedge with the Defiler hiding behind the ruin. The Lord and his biker brigade were positioned right in the middle of his lefthand table half ready to roll out and wreak face. Heldrake in reserve of course.

 

I think looking back he made his first and worst mistake here, by counter deploying very defencively with his infantry and Defiler all in around one quarter width of the board. As I'll explain this worked very well for me indeed.

 

The Battle

 

Turn one and my pod came down right in front of the big ruin, Furioso jumped out and ran around one side of it putting the pod and part of the ruin blocking LOS between it and the Defiler. Two Frag Cannon templates ignoring cover and one meltagun shot disappointingly only killed three marines from two units, but he was rattled. Crucially my Dread was in cover for his turn of shooting.

 

Mephiston and his fellow units moved straight up the flank around cover, with the bike peeling off to head across the middle of the board and the assault team and Mephiston heading around the back of the board. Bikes on the other side turboboosted up the far edge putting cover between them and the enemy. Baal stayed put and fired into the Lord and his bike killing two of them. The assault squad leaping over and forming a screen the Lord couldn't ignore, melta gun failing to do anything.

 

His first turn saw some epically bad dice rolls with the Defiler scoring a direct hit on the Baal with his pie plate and failing to even glance it. His bikes moved up and fired killing a couple of marines, and the CSM in the far ruin shot at the solo attack bike and took a wound off it.

 

My second turn the Furioso advanced through the ruin, killing more traitors but failing to remove a full combat squad yet. First Blood denied... still! The solo bike hit but failed to damage the Defiler due to it's invun save, a common thread for this game. Mephiston and his squad moved up to the far ruin, putting a flamer template into them and killing one traitor, Mephiston then ran, endevouring to be within assault range of the Defiler next turn. The bikes on the other flank rounded the ruins and caught up with the Furioso, killing another couple of traitors in the big ruin, leaving just two in one squad and one in the other. Still no First Blood. The Baal shot, hit, and failed to damage the Defiler hoping for rending hits, getting two, and then losing them to it's Invunerable save. The bigger assault squad moved up, firing their melta and bolt pistols at the Lord and bikes, killing another one - just three left. Fantastic shooting against T6! Charging in vain at the three bikes, I lost a couple more Angels as he held firm with the Lord and his claw slashing my brothers down where they stood.

 

On came the Heldrake but although only in turn two, it felt like it might be the only thing left he could salvage a draw with. Although the Baleflamer failed to do much this turn. Vector Striking and killing the solo attack bike (First Blood to him!) it then failed to damage the Baal. Combat continued with the Lord killing virtually all of the assault marines, losing one bike in return. But he was still tied up in combat with them for atleast another turn so I was happy. The Defiler popped out of cover with the Furioso bearing down on him from one side and Mephiston the other, he took a hull point off the Baal with it's template and missed with it's Reaper. His legionnaires on the opposite flank shot and failed to kill any of the remaining flamer squad, and his straggles in the middle tried to glance the Furioso's rear armour with mere Boltguns and failed. 

 

By now I had him completely pinned inside his own table half, except his Heldrake, so I pushed home my attack. The score was 4 - 1, First Blood and Objective vs Linebreaker.The bikes and Furioso mopped up the stragglers in the large ruin, thus removing his scoring units from his objective, back to 1 - 1. My flamer unit shot then charged the traitors in the far ruin, hopefully (in the face of being outnumbered 2:1) stopping him legging it across the table to snatch my objective by bogging them down in close combat. The Baal continued to be ineffective shooting at the Defiler taking a HP and immobilising it. Sadly my big squad finally kicked the bucket after keeping the Lord and his bikers busy for a couple of turns and he consolidated towards my Baal - a breakthrough in the middle of my lines? Further back, Mephiston then assaulted the Defiler but again it's flipping invun rolls prevented a quick death.

 

In his turn the Lord and one remaining bike Hammer of Wrathed another HP off the Baal before killing it with a Powerfist. That was a Powerfist he didn't actually have in his list, little did I know as he didn't have a printed list with him - quite annoying, and I presume a mistake on his behalf. I presume... The Heldrake had now circled back round and was going after the other bikes and the Furioso but failed to do any damage. Combat continued in the far ruin with one marine holding back 5 or 6 traitors. In close combat Mephiston put his Sanguine Sword through the Defilers black machine heart and blew it up, consolidating towards the Lord.

 

Mephiston moved, then charged the Lord with the illicit Powerfist. Taking the challenge he didn't even let the Lord hit back, instant deathing him and laughing at his traitor corpse. My solo assault marine bravely battled the traitors in the far ruin and lived! The bikes and Furioso moving up behind the Heldrake but failing to kill it due to it's daemon save. Typical.

 

His final turn, the last biker died fast and hard to Mephiston who consolidated towards the far ruin. The Heldrake stopped and hovered, failing to even dent the Dread but taking one wound off the bikes. He finally killed my brave battle brother in the ruin, but all too late.

 

The last turn of the game. The Dread and Bikes all shot and finally blew up the Heldrake as it hovered in midair. Mephiston charged into the remaining traitors in the ruin, and killed every one of them (I think there was five of them) to cap off an excellent game for him. 

 

Game over. I got Linebreaker and Slay the Warlord, and he got First Blood. No objectives won by either of us. 2 - 1 score but he was tabled half-way through turn 5. In retrospect I could have camped my objective and made life much easier for myself, but the Heldrake would have put paid to that so a blitz of speed and aggression ended up winning the day instead. His excellent rolls for his daemon engines saves, and that Powerfist that shouldn't have been meant the game was tighter than it could/should have been. Considering I dictated his movement and forced him into such a small box of space on the board, despite such a lethal bike squad and HQ, really gave me the victory I think - had they charged Mephiston together instead of going down the middle... who knows.

[Ushtarador]

Well done brother, wipe those traitors off the battlefield :) sounds like your list is working out nicely, even against the hardest flyer on this points level!

 

I never knew that bloody helldrake can go into hovermode too o0

[retrovertigo]

Thanks! I would definitely use the assault marines less like cannon fodder next time. Although they worked very well to keep the Lord occupied long enough for Mephiston to get involved! The Heldrake was a real underperformer, I'd say mainly due to my infantry being locked in combat than the Heldrake itself.

[Boomkapow]

Well done brother. Send those traitorous bastards back to the eye!

[retrovertigo]

Before my latest Batrep, here's my latest complete unit (s).

What? Everyone knows Space Marine bikes can do wheelies! Bad picture i know, bad reflection/glare I'll do a better one soon. Yes no yellow helmets. My personal choice... sorry.

Onto my latest battle... against dread Dark Eldar

I'd been dreading playing DE since starting back into 40k - I'd heard tales of how hard they can be, Venom Spam etc and one lad at our club plays them very well and very mercilessly so I wasn't looking forward to a beating. I was playing one of two league DE armies, the other is the aforementioned Venom Spam list. This one was a little less horrid and I think a bit more balanced.

My Opponent:

HQ:

Duke Sliscus)

ELITES:

Kabalite Trueborn x4
Blasters.
Venom Dedicated Transport w/ Splinter Cannon, additional Splinter Cannon, Nightshield.

TROOPS:

10 Kabalite Warriors. Raider Dedicated Transport w/ Dark Lance, Flickerfield, Splinter Racks.

7 Wyches, Hekatrix w/ Agoniser, Phantasm Grenade Launcher. Hyrdra Gauntlets, Haywire Grenades, Raider Dedicated Transport w/ Dark Lance,

Enhanced Aethersails, Flickerfield, Shock Prow.

FAST ATTACK:

6 Reaver Jetbikes - 2 Heat Lances

HEAVY SUPPORT:

Ravager - w/ 3 Dark Lances, Flickerfield, Nightshield.

TOTAL = 998

Deployment:

We rolled Hammer and Anvil, but as we were on a 4x4 board it didn't really matter. Mission was Crusade with four objectives - one pretty much on the boundary of deployment zones and two in the middle section of the board. He won the roll and went first.

The board had some large ruins on his side, and some much smaller sub-one story ruines (more like crumbling walls...) on mine. He put his Warrior Raider and the other Wyche Raider on his right flank behind a big ruin, with the warriors on foot next to his Duke (I'll explain why in a bit). The Venom and Ravager centrally behind a ruin, and his Reaver bikes down his left flank. He rolled the move through cover Warlord Trait.

I counter deployed by firstly putting half my melta squad (with the melta) in reserve, with the flamer squad. My DZ had very little cover (bad...) and so I put the Baal behind the biggest ruin (barely big enough) with Mephiston out of LOS, with the barebones assault marines crowded in behind. Centrally I put the three bikes behind a wall, more left and central. This left my right flank empty and an objective for the taking. I vowed not to ignore objectives this time, but figured I needed to weather some early heavy shooting or the objectives were pointless. Dread of course was in the pod and in reserve.

The Battle

The Dark Eldar Warrior and Duke started together on foot. This gave the warriors the 3+ poison bonus (apparently). The Duke promptly left and joined the Wyches in their Raider and the Warriors embarked theirs Raider belatedly. The Venom and Warrior Raider then jumped into a very central and sheltered middle section, with just my Baal to worry about next turn. The Duke and the Wyches zoomed over and joined up with the Ravager and moved forward around a large ruin. The Reavers sped across his left flank and then turboboosted across to my far right corner behind a small ruin. One Raider loosened off some Darklance shots at my three hiding bikes, and killed one from the unit of two.

My turn the pod dropped in behind his Venom/Raider combo. Scattered a little but a ruin stopped it short and the Dread jumped out. Two Frag Cannon templates and a melta shot blew up his Venom and killed all four Trueborn inside. First Blood to me. The Baal Pred popped out of it's cover, rounded the ruin the Raider was hiding behind and promptly blew it up with it's ten shots of Assault Cannon and Heavy Bolter - jinking can only do so much! A couple of Warriors died in the explosion. The bikes screeched out of cover and headed round the other side of this ruin towards where the Duke's raider sat but failed to damage it due to a combo of inv save and bad rolls by me. Mephiston and the bare assault squad moved up behind the Baal and took the objective.

Next DE turn, and their Darklances rolled a succession of ones or failed to glance anything - Pred or Furioso! The Duke's Raider emptied out and they headed straight for my Dread - with a meltagun and a template weapon it could have been ignored to be honest! They assaulted it, it overwatched and killed (I think...) half the Wyches. The rest jumped in and Haywire Grenaded it death, but it didn't explode. Shame. The Reavers moved right around behind my army, fired at the Bikes and failed to cause a wound. The Ravager landed ontop of a ruin and unloaded it's Darklances at my Pred and rolled all ones. Amazing. His Raider-less Warriors advanced and took the other middle-board objective.

My turn and by now Mephiston had worked his way into the middle of the board without taking a single shot. He assaulted into the Duke and the remaining Hestarix (?) after the Droppod and the bikes had whittled down the rest of the Wyches. This combat went on for almost the rest of the game, but Mephiston killed the final Wyche after several lookout sirs were passed and failed to wound. Neither the Duke or Mephiston scored a wound - 2+inv on the Duke was mental, Transfixing Gaze meant in later turns I was landing five str 10 wounds and not getting a single one through. DE tank. The Baal drove around behind all this action and confronted the Reavers. Ten shots of pure Imperial Dakka and five of his jetbikes were dead, the final one running in fear. My flamer combat squad deepstriked in next to the Warriors, just out of range as I scattered a couple of inches.

Next DE turn and the Mephiston vs Duke fight rumbled on with no wounds again inflicted. His Ravager shot again after dropping off the building, and again failed to kill anything. The Warriors rapid fired into my bare bones assault squad and killed all but one marine who ran off His last Raider killed a couple of the flamer marines and moved forward a little, preparing to Shock Prow the Pred. His remaining Reaver bike continued to run towards his board edge in fear, but it was looking bad for his army unless his Raider and Ravager could start hitting me harder.

In reply my Baal Pred turned around and blew up the last Raider. My last reserve squad dropped in behind the Ravager and melta gunned a HP off and immobilised it before the bikes finished it off with multimeltas. The flamer marines walked, flamed and shot up the warriors, before Hammer of Wrathing them leaving just three for combat vs three marines. The marines tanked their CC higher I attacks before battering them into the dirt and stealing the objective from them. Mephiston landed another five wounds, str 10, one went through his 2+inv - one very very dead Duke. Consolidated into Linebreaker position.

FInal round. With only a bike, he rolled... and it ran off the board. I won 9 - 0, getting the win plus the bonus point for all three secondary objectives.

To say I was pleased would be an understatement. My first game against anyone's Dark Eldar went really well. I finished with an unscathed Baal Pred, my Droppod, two attack bikes, Mephiston (unwounded), and the remnants of three combat squads. His really bad Darklance rolls helped, but an inability to wound Mephiston with no AP2, and a bit of a Dark Eldar zerg rush tactic meant I could actually play the way I wanted and not get kited around the board or hit from lots of angles at once (which I did to him).

I may be playing the Venom Spam DE list next week, so I doubt it will go as well

[Boomkapow]

Well done! My body hasn't played his dark eldar yet, but when he does this info will be invaluable. Thanks for the write up.

[retrovertigo]

Thanks I'm beating some experienced 40k players with this list, so pretty pleased so far.

Two games lined up for Sunday.

1st one against this Imperial Guard list (I've never played against IG in my life)

HQ:

Company Command Squad
Company Commander w/ Laspistol, Power Maul.
Master of Ordnance.
Regimental Standard.

ELITES:

Guardsman Marbo

Storm Trooper Squad (5)
Storm Trooper Sergeant w/ Boltgun, Bolt Pistol.

TROOPS:

Infantry Platoon*

Platoon Command Squad*
Platoon Commander w/ Close Combat Weapon, Laspistol.
Vox-caster.

Heavy Weapons Squad*
Missile Launcher (3).

Infantry Squad*
Sergeant w/ Close Combat Weapon, Laspistol.
Grenade Launcher, Heavy Bolter,
Vox-caster.

Infantry Squad*
Sergeant w/ Close Combat Weapon, Laspistol.
Lascannon Heavy Weapons Team,
Plasma Gun, Vox-caster.

Infantry Squad*
Sergeant w/ Close Combat Weapon, Laspistol.
Flamer, Heavy Bolter, Vox-caster.

Special Weapon Squad*
Sniper Rifles (3).

Veteran Squad
Veteran Sergeant w/ Close Combat Weapon, Laspistol.
Grenade Launcher (3), Missile Launcher, Vox-caster.

FAST ATTACK:

Rough Rider Squad (6)
Mogul Kamir replaces Sargent.

Valkyrie Assault Carrier Squadron
Multiple Rocket Pods (2), Multi-laser.

Entries marked with an asterisk (*) donates attached units.

TOTAL = 1000

And afterwards the ruthless Dark Eldar player with this list:

HQ:

Haemonculi
w/ Liquifier.

TROOPS

Kabalite Warriors (5)
Blaster.
Venom w/ additional Splinter Cannon.

Kabalite Warriors (5)
Blaster.
Venom w/ additional Splinter Cannon.

Kabalite Warriors (5)
Blaster.
Venom w/ additional Splinter Cannon.

Kabalite Warriors (10)
Raider w/ Dark Lance, Splinter Racks.

Kabalite Warriors (6)
Blaster.
Raider w/ Dark Lance.

FAST:

Reavers (3)

HEAVY SUPPORT:

Ravager
Dark Lances (3)

Ravager
Dark Lances (3)

TOTAL = 1000

Guard list looks very doable with lots of deepstrike and the pod, the Valkyrie will be a total pain in the ass though. Dark Eldar army looks formidable though, but very stripped down and basic in terms of gear.

[p34ce]

Has there been any official information about how the Frag Cannon behaves during overwatch? You said you killed half a Wych squad with one overwatch - I'd be interested to know if you took 2d3 auto-hits (since you're not running a Heavy Flamer) or just got lucky?