Baal Pred Advice

[Zynk Kaladin]

I was looking at my models earlier this week and I noticed my two baal predators (TLAssC, x2 HB) sitting there half finished.  After a long inner monologue I began to wonder why I haven't fielded them more often.   Between the two of them, they put out a darn impressive amount of medium firepower to hard counter light infantry, medium infantry, and light vehicles.  Also, With scout and being fast vehicles they can reposition themselves easily to strike or park where they're needed most.  They can work really well with a couple of fragiosos to saturate your enemy with AV13 targets while the rest of your army does its job.  Additionally, they offer a great mobile cover platform for our assault marines, libbies, priests, mephiston, etc.

 

Any cool tactical (tacticool) and useful advice on running the baals?

 

EDIT: spelling errors

[Morticon]

I think they're awesome.  

 

I hardly ever outflank mine on account of wanting as much firepower on the board from turn one.  The amount of Dakka they put out takes a lot of pressure off my razors.  

My only advice is to not get overzealous with them.  Besides their firepower, their strength is two-fold:  One in their AV13, and two is their ability to move 6"and lay down 10 medium strength shots. Moving them too far forward (in an effort to guard jumpers etc) leaves them open to be hit on the flanks.  Rather just use their 6" to reposition and keep laying down the dakka for as long as you can (as opposed to driving up through their lines).  

[Zynk Kaladin]

Good point.  Considering I almost never run any long ranged support units, I'll definitely have to get over my urge to jam as many units in my opponent's deployment zone as possible.  Long ranged fire support will definitely help mix up my playstyle.

 

I guess it might help to know what type of list I'm thinking of making for the Baals to support.  My intention is to be able to take all comers, but in the rock,paper,scissors 6th ed, it may not be 100% possible.  Here's my idea:

 

+1 Meph
+1 Frag(M,MG,Pod)
+1 Frag(M,MG,Pod)
+8  DC(PF,IP, Pod)
+10 ASM(2M,MB)
+10 ASM(2M) <--combat squaded
+1 Baal(TLAssC,2HB)

+1 Baal(TLAssC,2HB)
+1 Raven(TLMM,TLAssC,HB) <--5 regular ASM combat squad

 

1750

 

My idea is to combat squad the non-meltabomb ASM into a sergeant and two meltas(and thrown krak grenade) turn 2 DoA tank/heavy infantry hunter and support for the (hopefully) turn 2 Death Company.  The other half will load up in the Raven, the bird can provide air or ground support, for late game objective grabbing.  Mephiston will hide with the meltabomb assault squad who will support him in combat, give a cover save and block LOS.  The Fragiosos are fairly obvious: turn 1 wreck-train.

 

I want my Baals to support and compliment the Fragiosos on turn 1 by throwing dakka down field, so I agree with not outflanking them.  I feel that all types of infantry, even terminators, are threatened on turn 1 by 8 Twin-linked Assault Cannon, 12 Heavy Bolter, 4 frag templates, 2 meltas, and 2 magna grapple shots.  I agree with staying as far away from my enemy's deployment zone with the Baals as possible.  To that end, I recognize they'll only be useful as mobile cover for Meph and the full ASM for 1 or 2 turns.  However, I feel I have enough threats on the board by then to feel confident the mini-horde will do ok when leaving the Baals.

 

Hopefully I can play test this list soon and experience how Baals function.  In theory I feel pretty confident about their ability, though.

[Zynk Kaladin]

I forgot to mention because of the Baals mobility, they may be able to get some nice side armor shots if I position them on different sides of the board.  For whatever reason I'm never confident with my Fragiosos to gank transports who always seem to just strip 1 or 2 hull points off instead of the desired explodes result.  The extra reach may be just what the doctor ordered!

[Midnightmare]

That is a very similar list to what I run often at that point level (I have also been running priest-less) and the RAS do suffer as they need all the help they can get, but all the other threats do take the heat off them. You still need to protect them though. (Dunno if it is just me as I haven't got the codex in front of me but are your points off?)

 

OT Baals and the Furioso twins complement each other very well due to the immediate threat the offer. I can't speak highly of them enough :)

[Ushtarador]

I had great success running 2 baals in my all-reserves-list. I would deploy Mephiston, 2 attack bikes and a unit of scouts sitting next to a comms relay, then bring in 2 outflanking baals alongside a lot of other things all at the same time. If you always stay at 24'' and hammer away at infantry units, they put down a lot of hurt and are surprisingly durable, I love them

Also, I had a game with this list where the necron player decided to reserve a large portion of his army because he was afraid of my alpha-strike. I then chose to deploy most things instead, and with the scouting move my baals were in range of his wraiths turn 1 and just totally decimated them!

[knife&fork]

My main concern with Baal preds are: What if I don't get first turn?

 

Normal preds I can at least try to hide out of LoS. Baal preds need to get up close and personal and I think they will have trouble surviving the amount of firepower we see these days, particularly by tau and eldar. 

[redhorse]

If you don't get first turn, you definitely should outflank them. At least, that has been my strategy. I actually think outflanking them is one of the better tactics. but I do frequently run them on the board. I think the hardest matchup for blood angels are opponents that castle up, like tau and eldar or even  both in the same list!

Thus, for me when ever I run into a castle list I always outflank. It adds some fog of war to the game. Often enough an opponent will be so concerned with deploying to compensate for freaking predator's coming at there back door, mistakes are made for my deployed units to take advantage. Besides, what is typically deployed back field that can immediately knock out two predators? Not much, and if they are, good job! You got your opponent to deploy a very useful unit back field, just to deal with your predators! 

When I do deploy them, I never, ever deploy them separately. I use their great mobility to re-deploy as needed.  When deployed as pair they become an area denial unit: go in front of these fellas and prepare to whether the storm!  It helps to control my opponents deployment. Once they have done their job, I can elect to forgo shooting and re-deploy 24'' away! 

I also still run priest's, so go figure.  I also personally think the magna grapple is not worth it. 

If your that close to some terminators, then they are likely hammernators. Hammertime will take you out!

[Zeller]

Can the Baal be repositioned 12" instead of 6"? Is the 6" redeploy simply to make sure that you can then shoot normally in the following shooting phase? I wasn't aware scouting had any impact on shooting.

[Sanguine Eternal]

I often run 3 in a list, and usually have pretty good results.  That's a lot of s6 and hopefully some rending shots a turn, mixed in with a good amount of heavy bolter fire if your tank is in a good shooting position.  I find they aren't actually that bad at inflicting glances or even pens on light armoured fliers.  TL AC's are amazing for that.  Don't get any 6's to hit, try again.

I didn't think the scout move counted towards turn 1 movement.  Doesn't specify that in the USR section.  An infiltrated scout squad still gets to fire its snipers at full BS, so why wouldn't a scouting tank be able to fire all weapons if moved 12" in scout phase and 6" in movement phase?

@knife&fork

If I don't get first turn, I try to deploy as hidden as possible with the terrain that I have, and hope for the best.  Maybe outflanking them wouldn't be a bad idea?  I have never tried it.

@ Ushtarador

 

In terms of declaring what unit is doing what, whether its deepstriking, in a pod, infiltrating, or outflanking... Correct me if I am wrong but I was always under the impression that was discussed before each players forces were deployed, to prevent any sort of shenanigans.

[Ushtarador]

You declare this during your deployment, else you couldn't really react to your opponent. There has to be some benefit to going second :)

[Sanguine Eternal]

Good point.  Considering I almost never run any long ranged support units, I'll definitely have to get over my urge to jam as many units in my opponent's deployment zone as possible.  Long ranged fire support will definitely help mix up my playstyle.

 

I guess it might help to know what type of list I'm thinking of making for the Baals to support.  My intention is to be able to take all comers, but in the rock,paper,scissors 6th ed, it may not be 100% possible.  Here's my idea:

 

+1 Meph

+1 Frag(M,MG,Pod)

+1 Frag(M,MG,Pod)

+8  DC(PF,IP, Pod)

+10 ASM(2M,MB)

+10 ASM(2M) <--combat squaded

+1 Baal(TLAssC,2HB)

+1 Baal(TLAssC,2HB)

+1 Raven(TLMM,TLAssC,HB) <--5 regular ASM combat squad

 

1750

 

My idea is to combat squad the non-meltabomb ASM into a sergeant and two meltas(and thrown krak grenade) turn 2 DoA tank/heavy infantry hunter and support for the (hopefully) turn 2 Death Company.  The other half will load up in the Raven, the bird can provide air or ground support, for late game objective grabbing.  Mephiston will hide with the meltabomb assault squad who will support him in combat, give a cover save and block LOS.  The Fragiosos are fairly obvious: turn 1 wreck-train.

 

I want my Baals to support and compliment the Fragiosos on turn 1 by throwing dakka down field, so I agree with not outflanking them.  I feel that all types of infantry, even terminators, are threatened on turn 1 by 8 Twin-linked Assault Cannon, 12 Heavy Bolter, 4 frag templates, 2 meltas, and 2 magna grapple shots.  I agree with staying as far away from my enemy's deployment zone with the Baals as possible.  To that end, I recognize they'll only be useful as mobile cover for Meph and the full ASM for 1 or 2 turns.  However, I feel I have enough threats on the board by then to feel confident the mini-horde will do ok when leaving the Baals.

 

Hopefully I can play test this list soon and experience how Baals function.  In theory I feel pretty confident about their ability, though.

 

 

I had a similar idea as well, but instead of the DC, I was going to add another fragioso in DP.  Might have to wait till christmas so I can buy myself a storm raven to try it out...

 

@ Ushtarador

 

Makes sense.  So I shouldn't really be spilling the beans until I know if I am going first or second then...  Giving away all my secrets!  I usually win first turn roll anyways.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Outflanking Baals are at their best in Hammer and Anvil games where, in order to hide from them, your opponent practically has to hug one table side and pray that they appear on the other. It's also useful if you want to sneak something round an Aegis defence line, as there's nothing funnier than seeing some fire warriors/camo-cloaked scouts hiding behind an ADL and manning a quad gun only to have a Baal sneak round behind them and shred the lot of them.

[Sanguine Eternal]

I had a game last night running a mech list with 3 baal preds, 3 fragiosos in pods, and a vindi, 10 scouts, 10 tact, and mephy.  Hammer and Anvil, I outflanked them for the first time since he had first turn.

Man that was fun, will definitely be utilizing outflank more often from now on.  That game was a blood bath for both sides.  Plus I rolled for scriers gaze on divination, so roll 3d6 for outflank and choose my result I want.  Guaranteed in his back door.