New BA player needing feedback

[sneakyxeno]

 I'm strongly considering starting a Blood Angels army to use in 2v2 tournaments at my FLGS. My brother plays Grey Knights and a friend plays  Space Wolves. I've built a 1k point list would this be a good foundation on?

 

For a warlord I would use a Mastery lvl 2 Librarian with Angel's Wings and melta bombs, a Death Company with jump packs that includes 1 power weapon and 2 thunderhammers, 2 units of 10 tac marines in drop pods that include a flamer, a heavy flamer and sarg with a combi-flamer, lastly 2 units of 5 assault marines with 2 melta guns and sarg with a combi-melta.

 

My game plan is to Null-deploy and hopefully drop in on the oppositions flank. I'm concerned though, that if my Death Company do start on the board they will be shot off but, coming in via deepstrike leaves them vulnerable to shooting on the turn they arrive if I can't drop in behind cover.

 

In the future, I would like to add some heavy support tanks, maybe tri-las preds or vindicators. My questions are about if it is worth running a single psyker or swapping him out for a Chaplain. I have experience playing 40k as I already play Dark Eldar and Craftworld Eldar. Any input on HQs or getting the Death Company into combat would be useful. Also, suggestions on what to add to this to round it out to 2k would be noted.

[LutherMax]

Sounds like a solid start. I don't have much experience with Librarians (except Mephiston who is famously awesome) but I know they are a popular choice and can be used to buff your other units as need arises. A Chaplain would of course be good for buffing the Death Company but maybe the Librarian is a more versatile choice to start with.

 

Only thing is he could probably do with a support unit to attach to... Sanguinary Guard could be an option. Also, if you have the points you could give him Valour's Edge (AP2 on Initiative) or Gallian's Staff.

 

Will your Death Company be 10-strong? When you don't have a Chaplain or Astorath to buff them you could consider two 5-man units. That way your opponent has to choose which one to shoot at and you can still converge and charge the same unit. Cover is the other thing you'll need to protect them from enemy fire, or a transport - A Land Raider or Stormraven as they can assault directly out of them. Stormraven's are good fire support (which you lack at the moment) but they tend to draw a lot of fire themselves and it can be quite risky having an expensive unit embarked cos if they do blow up you will likely lose everything to Crash and Burn. Plus they come on turn 2 earliest, so Land Raider could be a safer option.

 

As for heavy support Stormravens are popular but as mentioned safer with something cheap (or nothing) embarked. Vindicators also popular and great distraction from your DC thanks to the S10 blast weapon everyone will want to eliminate. Baal Preds great anti-infantry or las-Preds for anti-armour - and you should also look into Sicaran battle tanks and Deredeo Dreadnoughts ;)

[sneakyxeno]

Thanks. Splitting up the Death Company sounds like a good idea. I'd like to include sanguinary guard in higher points matches. A stormraven sounds like it would be a good addition and could potentially hold a 5 man squad of some sort for later game objective grabbing. The lack of fire support is the reason I was looking at tri-las Preds but, the Stormraven looks to be more versatile.

[Nova_chron]

I've had great results with scout squads dropping out of the Raven use them for combat drop into cover and shoot something or just to have 10 angry recruits ready to charge from cover into the back field.