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Going Psychic Heavy with Blood Angels... Viable?


Arufel87

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I thought that it would be useful to start a discussion on the best way to focus on psychic heavy blood angels. I think that the best way to go about it is to take Meph with either a standard level 2 libby or a libby dread. I would roll biomancy on Meph, sanguinary on a dread and either sanguinary or divination on a standard libby. I'm not sure what other peoples opinions are on this but would you consider 5 mastery levels plus a d6 roll enough to go up against other psyker heavy armies such as eldar, tyranids, daemons or grey knights? Or is it pointless to even take psykers against these armies? 

I have a list that I am planing to play-test over the w.end (if not going to ski), it has Libby Dread L2 HQ (immune to most of the perils) as WL, Meph and Servin Loth = 8 WC's just there. 

 

Both Mepth and Servin are down T1 in DP's with their own stern guard friends and do the magic tricks (6WC+D6 is ok for the Invis/Shrouded), while T2 on the Libby Dread might come on in SR. 

 

However; I think there are armies such as Demons, GK, Eldar that might do this much better any day of the week. For instance my GK termie army is able to dish out 10-11 WC + D6 T1. Potentially shutting a lot of enemy psychers down.

 

 

~ BT

I am with sockwithaticket, rename the post :) Think this is a really important discussion the BA community should be having. Mephy, Libnaughts and our sanguinary powers make us quite psychically viable. I guess the questions are points viability, tayloring v allcommers, strats and set ups ran. Would love to hear a robust discussion as i don't think mathhammer will give us the best picture compared to bat reps. Would love to hear any experiences but in particular any Metphy & Astorath v eldar (denying machines).

We are never going to match psychic-heavy armies at their own game, at least not without significantly unbalancing the army.

 

Psychic powers within a BA force are suited to more of a complementary role rather than a main one, and even then there is still such an element of randomness in getting useful or useless powers that quickening is the only power that you can have a solid chance of pulling off against a psyker-strong enemy. The WC2 for prescience makes it much less of a given in this situation now.

 

Just my tuppence. I'm not saying don't take psykers at all, just that focusing on them is not playing to our strengths - the stats don't quite match the fluff here - and bringing enough WC to the table just sucks points from more reliable and effective areas.

I thought that it would be useful to start a discussion on the best way to focus on psychic heavy blood angels. I think that the best way to go about it is to take Meph with either a standard level 2 libby or a libby dread. I would roll biomancy on Meph, sanguinary on a dread and either sanguinary or divination on a standard libby. I'm not sure what other peoples opinions are on this but would you consider 5 mastery levels plus a d6 roll enough to go up against other psyker heavy armies such as eldar, tyranids, daemons or grey knights? Or is it pointless to even take psykers against these armies? 

I believe it would be pointless against Grey Knights. All their units (except vehicles) have at least ML1 and The Aegis rule. They dominate in either players Psychic phase without tying and when they do there's no stopping them. They bring over 10 warp charges in smaller games and can get to 20 warp charges in larger games if pushed. Who ever said fight fire with fire never went up against the Grey Knights. 

We are never going to match psychic-heavy armies at their own game, at least not without significantly unbalancing the army.

 

Psychic powers within a BA force are suited to more of a complementary role rather than a main one, and even then there is still such an element of randomness in getting useful or useless powers that quickening is the only power that you can have a solid chance of pulling off against a psyker-strong enemy. The WC2 for prescience makes it much less of a given in this situation now.

 

Just my tuppence. I'm not saying don't take psykers at all, just that focusing on them is not playing to our strengths - the stats don't quite match the fluff here - and bringing enough WC to the table just sucks points from more reliable and effective areas.

Having fielded a few psyker heavy lists recently, I can only add that I couldn't have said it better myself. Take what you can get from a BA psyker phase and be content if its anything.

So is it worth bringing a single Libby in order to have some sort of defence against psyker heavy opponents? I'm thinking particularly in terms of large squads of DC or sanguard to prevent the effects of maledictions?

Psyker-strong foes will likely have at least one ML3 psyker. So only Mephiston will gain a +1 to DtW against these. For that alone, it just isn't worth the points.

I got a game over the weekend, however only against SM (white scars) and Eldar ( WK spam)

 

Overall I think the psychers were there for more than buffs, altough I didnt face the real counter, all of them did earn points back. Specially meph with biomancy (got the attack buff, and the 4++) with quickening from the walking grave libby (dread); is going trough bikes and WKs like knife trough butter(power of force)

 

On the other hand, while playing GKs; there have been games where I have thrown 12 deny rolls and didnt get a single one ... Therefore BA migh not be the most effective PSY army out there however it has synergies on its own while still beeing competetive.

 

~BT

Ps. Sorry for typos I am on my phone

I personnally tend to play psyker heavy or no psyker at all. Especially since psychic power are much more difficult than before. I tend to play with Mephiston + either a Dreadnought or a Jump Pack Librarian. Sometimes I have more than 1 FOC to get 3 Librarian. 

Good discussion that needs to be had. Kudos! Havnt played a BA heavy list before but have seen a list with rs allies and you guessed....... it Sevrin Lot HQ.. List had Mephy and a ml2 libby dread. Kinda got me thinking. Another option is a lone ml1 libby just to quicken whenever convient but i just tend towards the points sink of trying to make BA psychic is too expsensive to absorb casulties when assaulting.
I'm thinking psychic heavy with meph a ml2 libby and some If support with their ml2 libby with the bones of Osrak (extra dice and reroll failed tests) and maybe coteaz as well, that's 10 dice though I'm not sure on the best way to use them. Coteaz and meph are limited on foot coteaz attached to a thunder fire with div maybe, some delivery method for meph ( drop pod with command squadand Ba lib maybe) If lib in a bike command squad. Lots of wc and physic threat turn 1 all pretty durable with some other distractions thrown in.

Even a lvl1 libby gives some decent defense. You get +1 to deny the witch for being a pysker, and another +1 for being a higher mastery level (so mephiston has a chance of getting that at least). Not to mention that they all come with psychic hoods (so they protect nearby units), and we have a warlord trait for +1 to deny as well (mephy has it standard).

 

I agree with the sentiment that we can do decently in the psychic phase, but it can't be the entirety of a build. The bonuses can be great but the random nature of the psychic phase makes it hard to rely on more than one or two powers a turn.

It's too bad Librarian dreadnoughts didn't get a formation of some kind. For now I agree with the above in that psykers should be a support role only. Other armies will be outfitted to focus on psychic. Though I do suppose that raises the question: what is it that Blood Angels should be focusing on? 

Though I do suppose that raises the question: what is it that Blood Angels should be focusing on? 

Throwing lots of fast, hard-hitting jump units into your opponent's army of course. ;)

 

If going for a straight BSF, DC and/or SG backed up by your choice of support form a strong core to the army. There are plenty of options and variations but with +1S and +1I on the charge, that is our key strength. The rest of the army should be looking to either boost those strengths or cover any weaknesses.

The Libby Dreadnought can be really mean with +d3 Ini/A and 5++. Also I'm thinking of painting my Knight as Gerantius to give him quickening. A knight with +d3 A and Ini is damn nice. 

I ran my libby dread for the first time yesterday and got Quickening and Shield of Sanguinius.  Nice combination.  

The Libby Dreadnought can be really mean with +d3 Ini/A and 5++. Also I'm thinking of painting my Knight as Gerantius to give him quickening. A knight with +d3 A and Ini is damn nice.

Oh Lord a knight with quickening. I'm half tempted to just make some giant angelic monster from a wraith knight and use the Geranitus rules to run it as a proper Sanguinor / Psychic manifestation of Sanguinius' powers... Who wants to sponsor me?

Phhhhh, That sounds unspeakably awesome.

Well then it is added to my to do list... This is going to get very silly very quickly... By which i mean slowly because I still have 4 dreads, 10 assault, 10 tac, 10 DC, multiple characters, a bike squad and a storm raven to paint first. Not to mention the repaints on my older models teehee.gif

eBay got the best of me and I got carried away but I've put the ban on anymore models.... For now... Except maybe some Terminators wallbash.gif

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