BA Today

[Xenith]

 

The attacks from these guys are insane. If you want to shower something with LOTS of S4 AP-1 attacks, then these are the way to go. They’ll have really good chaff clearing capabilities until they get re-costed to the more reasonable 60-point mark.

 

Yea, 3 of them have more wounds and better AP for fewer points than a 10 man assault squad. That's before you even get to the 2" faster move, much better shooting, and overall weakening of the fly rule this edition. Assault squad wins on attacks, but only just.

 

If a tactical marine is the cornerstone unit at 15pts, then these guys should be 60 as you say. 

[Rhavien]

They are quite insane. AP -2 starting at turn 3 if they survive long enough. For sake of balance I almost hope the sarge won't get an option to swap his CC weapon. Imagine a thunderhammer...

Guess with our +1 to wound and charge CT we make the most out of those bikers. With their speed you are nearly guaranteed to get into combat and be a threat to nearly anything south of toughness 8.

[Blindhamster]

worth noting though, that the bikes will struggle if they dont wipe their target on the turn of their charge. They also don't get their bike benefit if they get charged. Their close combat power assumes that every time they're in combat they got the charge off. During the tests in the preview they were wiped by scarabs every time they didn't get the charge, and it doesn't surprise me at all.

[SnorriSnorrison]

 

The attacks from these guys are insane. If you want to shower something with LOTS of S4 AP-1 attacks, then these are the way to go. They’ll have really good chaff clearing capabilities until they get re-costed to the more reasonable 60-point mark.

 

 

Yea, 3 of them have more wounds and better AP for fewer points than a 10 man assault squad. That's before you even get to the 2" faster move, much better shooting, and overall weakening of the fly rule this edition. Assault squad wins on attacks, but only just.

 

If a tactical marine is the cornerstone unit at 15pts, then these guys should be 60 as you say.

Yeah, let’s wait and hope for codex-wide Astartes chainswords though, then the Assault squad might look a bit better. RAS are still quite terrible unfortunately, so mostly any other choice is going to be more desirable.

 

 

They are quite insane. AP -2 starting at turn 3 if they survive long enough. For sake of balance I almost hope the sarge won't get an option to swap his CC weapon. Imagine a thunderhammer...

Guess with our +1 to wound and charge CT we make the most out of those bikers. With their speed you are nearly guaranteed to get into combat and be a threat to nearly anything south of toughness 8.

That’s why I got 6 of them! :D

[Arkhanist]

have built 5 assault intercessors, the lieutenant and a bike. heads have been clipped so i can slot them in and out for easy spraying. I've also been working out how im going to do blood angels icons on the shoulders too.

I used the pop goes the monkey curved icons for Dark Imperium, but looking back they're a bit chunky for the chapter icon even with sanding, and don't fit the design of the primaris upgrade sprue since the cease & desist from GW. Brilliant for the company blood drop though with a bit of sanding (to make them a bit thinner)

 

I've just orded some bits from this guy on UK ebay who does nice resin tacticus and phobos BA shoulder pads with a very similar logo to the primaris upgrade sprue but substantially cheaper. They're lower profile than PGTM, but does mean of course I'll need to do a bit of cutting to fit them on to Indomitus guys. He also does a brass etch of the same design which is suitable for ETB minis you don't want to cut the existing shoulders off, or gravis pads if you don't want to pay £9 for 3 on the upgrade sprue. The only downside is the blood drop in the brass version is flat, but I'm going to experiment with putting the teeny-tiny drops from my existing PGTM shapeways icons over the top.

 

Edited July 30, 2020 by Arkhanist

[Vermintide]

Given that we've already seen the hints of a Chaplain on bike, it's going to be a no-brainer to back them up with litanies which will only make them even more absurdly strong. I think these bikers are going to be pretty much an auto-include for BA lists in the early days of this edition.

 

Not sure how I feel about the Bladeguard lads on the other hand. They look like they're more or less meant to be run as bodyguards for a Captain/Lieutenant/Ancient mini-deathstar jumping out of a Rpulsor, and would be pretty niche outside of that. On their own it would seem like we have better options.

 

The only unit I'm not so hot on, I guess, is the Judiciar. I'm thinking I'll be combining the models of the Chaplain/Judiciar to make a cooler looking on-foot Chaplain. Judiciar seems like a good character assassin, but  pretty niche, especially foot-slogging.

[Arkhanist]

The Judicar is there to blunt chargers - being able to make an enemy unit within 6" fight last every single fight phase means he and the defending unit he's buffing can get its licks in first. Mobility is definitely an issue, but him plus the benefits of Defensible terrain (+1 to hit instead of overwatch) is gonna make even half-decent melee units hard to get rid off short of shooting them to entirely pieces. Not much use against a gunline (they will of course want one against US) but 9th definitely seems to pushing the ability to take and hold objectives to be very important, so I can see him plus some intercessors or terminators in cover making a mid-field objective tough to take.

[Vermintide]

Fair point, I hadn't thought of it that way. I was seeing it as more of an ability to make sure you get the hits in first on a powerful enemy unit, for instance.

 

I was thinking "Huh, not sure this guy will make the cut when we're this crowded for Elites already" but then gain, a standard Battalion basically has room for everything now.

[Indefragable]

I smell a nerf coming for the Primaris bikes. @Blindhamster points out that they do in fact have a weakness, but based on what they can do on the charge, for their points value, and the likely over saturation of them in lists, and the inevitable grumbling to follow.....I would be reluctant on overloading on them at this moment. 

[Arkhanist]

They are underpriced for their capability realistically, which certainly wouldn't be the first time that's happened to a shiny new unit. They're definitely something you need to use with care; as pointed out, they're vulnerable to counter charges or hordes. I do expect the points to go up, rather than a stats nerf.

[Blindhamster]

I doubt they'll go as high as 60 though. 50 maybe. They're good but I do think their effectiveness is being overstated a bit.

[Vermintide]

The price seems fair as it is honestly, it's pretty comparable with Death Company (once you kit them out with toys), trading a little in weight of attacks for durability, otherwise they seem like a very similar unit. Packing a big charge on paper, but likely fairly fragile. They just look a bit stronger than we're used to, perhaps, by the fairly unexciting standards of vanilla Marine units in melee.

 

Still, it's nice to have some Primaris stuff we can really put to use as BA players. I'm inclined to suspect we'll see some sort of stratagem to allow them to fall back and charge again, considering their ability only kicks in on the charge, so they'll be a CP drain too if so.

Edited July 30, 2020 by Vermintide

[Warhead01]

Today in BA.
I may have mentioned buying the Sm half of the big box over Ebay.
It arrived today, a day earlier than expected.
I officially have a back log. 

Yesterday I finished the reds on 3 Aggressors and 2 more suppressors, just have to add the black lining and brown lining and the armor is done.

Trying to get the fire power painted as quickly as I can and that's still a little slow right now. Not really sure if trying to batch paint is actually faster than one at a time. 
 

[The Unseen]

The outriders are basically an attack bike for stats, with some extra melee attacks but less gun. And that's pretty much what they cost, so I'd say people freaking out about them is incredibly premature.

 

If you can take squads of 6 and give the sergeant a melee weapon, then you'd start seeing some serious power plays from them.

Till then, they put out a lot of str4 ap-1 shots/attacks on a durable platform. That isn't exactly something marines struggle to bring elsewhere, so they might be pushed just a bit to make them appealing, otherwise you'd just look at the literally 2 dozen other units that spit out bolterfire en masse.

 

I do think they're good at that price, but I was also running mm attack bikes in 8th.

And having a primaris unit with some actual cc presence besides aggressors is very nice.

 

But compare them to inceptors and you'll see they arent super under costed or anything.

[Karhedron]

Bikes look strong but have markings of a glass hammer unit, even with T5 4W. If they get charged, their bonuses are not so scary and if they wipe the target when they charge, you can expect your opponent to direct a lot of multi-damage weaponry their way. They cost as much as 3 Tactical Marines and while they are faster and slightly more durable, they have downsides. They get slightly less firepower than 3 Tactical Marines (although it does have an extra point of AP). They also don't have ObjSec and are a juicier target for multi-damage weapons.

 

My initial feeling is that 45 points is a fair price. They will probably kill something but you will have to play carefully with them if you want to keep them alive beyond the initial charge. They look like a promising unit to put in Reserve as they can move quickly around the battlefield to wipe enemy units off lightly contested objectives from T3 onwards.

[Warhead01]

Today in BA.
Assembled a new Primaris Chaplin, Primaris LT (?) and Bladeguard Ancient 
That Chaplin is really cool.
 

[Indefragable]

Cleared out BattleScribe after ~5 years.

 

147........

[Warhead01]

Today in BA.

 

Built, primed and base coats on the following.
3 eradicators, Bladeguard. Built primed and base coats on the Primaris LT and Primaris LT. 

 

I am really pleased with how fast these few models have gone together so far. 
I have the bikers, Captain and assault Intercessor squad and Judiciar left to catch up. Need to fins a better head for the Judiciar.
Hopefully I have some left over BA heads around some where.

[Majkhel]

Watch out for the bikes - it's best to prime/basecoat the main body before attaching the side plates/legs/exhausts sections.

[Blindhamster]

ive been working on some press molded copies of the primaris upgrade chapter icon that i can then make super thin casts of to stick onto shoulderpads - allowing me to keep consistent design without needing to replace the assault intercessor or bladeguard etc pads.

I also replaced the chapter pad on my gravis captain, another step toward bringing him in line with my on foot captain for iconography. I plan to try and bring the bladeguard and phobos captains inline and give all four the same heads too. The idea being its the same captain equipped differently based on mission parameters.

[Farsun]

In a first for me...I've actually painted 3 assault intercessors and working on my AI sergeant. The switch to Blood Angels have prompted me to paint.

[Warhead01]

Today in BA.

This guy.

[Xenith]

Watch out for the bikes - it's best to prime/basecoat the main body before attaching the side plates/legs/exhausts sections.

With a little trimming you can separate the foot/side panel and attach the panel for easer sub-assembly. You then have a leg/exhaust part.

Today in BA.

This guy.

Great work, you're churning these out at a rate of knots!

[Warhead01]

 

 

 

 

 

Great work, you're churning these out at a rate of knots!

 

Thanks!

Feels like it's taking for ever.  But it will be worth it. 

[BluejayJunior]

Today in BA.

This guy.

Very well done white robes!