Deathwing Army point minimum

[Noxnoctis22]

I'm currently starting to build my first DA army and I'm starting off at the 1500 point but it just seems like a really hard point level to fit a decent army into. What do you feel is the "proper" point amount to field a decent DA Army?

[SvenONE]

1850, I'd say.

 

It's important to note that Deathwing armies aren't so much all about Deathwing Terminators as much as they are about exploiting the fact we have Landraiders in our codex.  

[Noxnoctis22]

I can see how it's really all about the LRC with a DW army. I've already got one (granted still on the sprue) but it seems like I'll need a second one if I plan to field a DW army.

 

Random question as I'm playing with my lists at the moment....

 

Techmarine vs. Librarian for a 2nd HQ choice. Both on a bike with power field generator. Pros/Cons?

[Teetengee]

1 Psyker can be hard to use, also you may want the techmarine for land raider issues, as you may find 2 is still insufficient. :)

[Pbenner]

1850 is the bare minimum that I feel Deathwing to be balanced in, I don't think it really gets to an even playing field until 2500, and with Deathwing, playing up to 3000-3500 points still doesn't feel like an unwieldy army.  

 

Paul

[Noxnoctis22]

So the answer is more Land Raiders, more Deathwing Terminators, more points....hahaha

 

Just trying to see what the "shallow end" is for DW armies before I dive into the "deep end". Want to play a few smaller point games to wrap my head around it all more. Reading about DW is one thing, playing them and winning is another.

[Solrac]

I played a 1000pt maelstrom mission last night at my local.

 

I have a standard Land Raider in that 1000pts. My Ultramarine opponent only had a couple of missile launchers in his whole army (Cyclones and missiles on the Storm Raven and a Tac marine with a missile launcher) so he could only glance my LR. It suffered only 1 HP the whole game. My opponent also got secure objective 6 three times so guess where I parked my super scoring LR? On objective 6 (lucky for me it was in my deployment zone).

 

The LR also racked up a few kills including the Storm Raven in turn 4.

 

I ended up winning 8 - 5 even with his blasphemous Tiggy summoning Daemons.

 

This is just to give you an idea on how good LRs can be.

[Darkangeldentist]

1000pts is probably too low to make a durable Deathwing army but it can still work if you get a nice matchup. As Solrac pointed out a land raider, particularly with the deathwing vehicle upgrade for superscoring status can really skew a game if the opponent just doesn't have the tools to deal with it.

 

Land raiders are often a big part of Deathwing's viability in the current game and 1500pts is about the minimum point level where I feel we can take 1-2 land raiders and still afford enough terminators to take some control of the game. Below is what I had previously taken for Deathwing competitively and it worked well. 7th edition has changed things and I would consider dropping the librarian for deathwing upgrades and some other bits but it still works well enough.

 

Belial: sword and storm bolter

Librarian: terminator armour, auspex (mastery level 1)

5x Deathwing: heavy flamer

5x Deathwing: assault cannon

5x Deathwing: assault cannon

Land raider

Land raider

 

It's not the easiest list to use but it works well on the table and presents a tough nut for a lot of lists to crack if they don't bring the right tank busting weapons.

 

So I'd say that Deathwing works well at 1500pts but regardless of the points level it will be a brittle list. Poor dice rolls can really punish you.

[aura_enchanted]

I played a 1000pt maelstrom mission last night at my local.

 

I have a standard Land Raider in that 1000pts. My Ultramarine opponent only had a couple of missile launchers in his whole army (Cyclones and missiles on the Storm Raven and a Tac marine with a missile launcher) so he could only glance my LR. It suffered only 1 HP the whole game. My opponent also got secure objective 6 three times so guess where I parked my super scoring LR? On objective 6 (lucky for me it was in my deployment zone).

 

The LR also racked up a few kills including the Storm Raven in turn 4.

 

I ended up winning 8 - 5 even with his blasphemous Tiggy summoning Daemons.

 

This is just to give you an idea on how good LRs can be.

witchcraft! Heresy! And damnation!!!

 

As a general rule of thumb I say keep deathwing off the table until games over 1100pts. By then a single squad of deathwing isn't decimating your points cap and you can bring at least a single land raider.

 

The lr is the lynchpin to a good deathwing army and not taking one turns any match into a fools errand.

 

At point values south of there greenwing and ravenwing are much more viable forces and simply do so much more with the points given because a squad of bloody troops choices doesn't set you back an imperial tonne of points.

 

I think that even then your going to be hard pressed to give many reasons to go full dw simply because those other forces offer so much for so little and including even a few "other" marines will add incredible diversity and options to your army that pure dw just can't offer. Such as say speed and special weapons access.

[Noxnoctis22]

This is what I'm looking at for 1500 points, 1450 to be exact. Pushing it to 1750, 1730 to be exact, would let me add another LRC as a DW Vehicle.

 

Belial - SoS & SB

5x DW Knights

5x DW Terminators - 1x AC, 1x CF

5x DW Terminators - 1x CML, 1x TH/SS

5x DW Terminators - 1x CML, 1x TH/SS

LRC - DW  Vehicle

 

I think once I able to get a few games under my belt I'll have a better feel as to what is "right" for DW.

[Teetengee]

I really think that you need more than one land raider to make them effective these days, as almost every anti tank the opponent has will be aimed at it. The idea is target saturation (which admittedly, is hard to do with DW terminators.

[Noxnoctis22]

I'm in complete agreement on the more than 1 LR view. Need to have at least 2 so your enemy has to choose which one to fire at. With only 1 it's just going to be an anti-tank magnet.

 

TO EBAY WE GO FOR A LR!!!