Deathwatch with Dark Angels?

[GoblinChow]

I am getting a decent Dark Angels army together (Still need a few more transports and drop pods) I play them against a Chaos Space Marines army I am just starting to flesh out. Cathie (My Girlfriend) fell in love with a filthy xenos army. (Harlequins) We will be using two Death Masque sets to start her army out. She is going to add some Eldar to it as she goes. We will probably get her up to around 1850 to 2000 points this year, and then just slowly add on as she falls in love with new units and paint jobs. This will increase the competitive possibilities within the household as the Harlequins will be a third army that will work well against both chaos and Dark Angels.

Our first plan was to ebay off the rules, spare parts and the Deathwatch stuff from the Death Masque sets. I am wondering if this might be a bad idea. We will, after all, need some extra help containing the aliens that will be living on the table. Those things need to be kept in check! (Still ging to sell off the redundant rules and stuff) Would the Dark Angels work well with the Deathwatch? Would the pieces from the two sets of Death Masque be a decent starting point for a small army or a small force that could combine with the Angels for the greater good?

Any plans for a new army will have to wait until after the Holidays. I have my hands full finishing up my Dark Angels and building a Chaos army to compete with them. Add that to the fact that only half of the small table has painted terrain, and I won't be painting a new army for a while. I also have to consider building a Space Marine army at some point, as my Daughters have all given me a bunch of kits to get me back into gaming. They all secretly discussed buying me an army, and they bought things locally to themselves. I think they got mixed up when a store owner directed one of them to buy some Space Marines kits that could be done up as Dark Angels. (Scouts and venerable Dreadnought) Now, I have ended up with several Space Marine kits that can't be built as Dark Angels models and aren't even available in the codex. I have Stormtalons, Hunters (Which I might try to convert into a chaos Rhino) and other Marine only units. I was thinking of someday using that stuff and doing a small space marine army with it. (Something less seen than the Ultramarines, though, like Templars, or Imperial Fists or White Scars) In this case, the Deathwatch would be a perfect match to almost any Space Marine unit. If all else fails, the Deathwatch are just Space Marines themselves, and the kits could be built as any chapter.

It won't take much space to hang on to them, and I can always sell them off later if I change my mind. I am already looking to branch out from the whole Marines thing, as the Dark Angels are Space Marines, the Chaos guys are crooked Space Marines and this would give me even more Space Marines. At least the Harlequins can function as bad guys. (Not that the Imperium is above reproach)

Should I keep them? should I grab something else to stash away with them? Cathie wonders if we should augment them with a Deathwatch Overkill box set, but that would just mean another faction waiting to live on the shelf. (I have the gut feeling we will never actually sell off the "Other" half of a boxed set, but every different box set we buy for one army will beget another new army down the road.) I think we should hang on to them until we decide whether to build a Space Marines army, and then either build them as regular marines, or as Deathwatch to augment our other forces when the Harlequins come out to play. It wouldn't make sense to have them battling Dark Angels or Space Marines on a regular basis, and even Chaos wouldn't really be their thing. I don't see myself getting Orks, 'nids or Tau in the near future, so their role would be a touch limited.

All of this thinking is mostly to prevent myself from selling off the Deathwatch figures only to end up wishing I still had them down the road. If I wont ever use them, I might as well sell them and buy some more cool stuff. Cathie thinks her Harlequins are sooooo cute, she can't see why anybody would want a force dedicated to wiping them off of the map. That's all the more reason for me to keep them. As you can see, we are already having some fun with the rivalry, so it might be another point in favor of keeping them.

Thanks for any input on this. I am not going to get the codex right away, or anything like that. Anything I do with them will be mid Winter at the earliest. I still have too much other stuff on my plate right now!. I am just debating whether or not there are enough fun possibilities to make it worth hanging on to them.

[Father Mehman]

Dark Angels don't really care for the Inquisition but it's not unheard of for them to work together. Find a reason they should work with the big "I" and you've got yourself an interesting story already ! I don't see a reason for you to abandon the Death Watch minis, honestly. I know if I sold them off, as you say, I'd regret it down the road.

As for your generic Space Marine sets, have you thought about another Chapter in the near future? If not, set them aside until such time that inspiration strikes.

It's great that your girlfriend also enjoys the Hobby. She can have her Harlequin and Eldar force whilst you get Death Watch, Dark Angels, and a little something for the two of you down the road.

[GoblinChow]

THanks for the reply.   I wasn't thinking as much of the inquisition as I was trying to come up with excuses for the Dark Angels to be fighting off Harlequins. (Or other aliens)  That  would be a very good reason for them to welcome a bit of help from the Deathwatch.  I was looking closely, and the Kill Team even has a Dark Angel on it.  I am really leaning towards keeping them, and adding some Blackwatch to my collection just for fun.   I can add it to my other Imperium forces or run it as its own small army.

 

One thing I have going for me is my "Small Table"  which is now getting set up on a dedicated two and a half by three and a half foot platform.  This thing will be quite crowded with terrain and is very suitable for smaller armies to fight on.  Tanks, Flyers and long range shooters are less important than close combat, rapid fire and initiative.  Bikes and dreadnoughts do well, but even a rhino is not able to go exactly where it wants to.  It works well for smaller "Kill Team" types of missions and I am working on some walls that will replace some of the scenery to make it work for modified Zone Mortalis rules.  I used the smaller table when I only had two tiny armies because having one Dark Vengeance boxed set running around on a 4x8 foot table was pretty boring.  Now my Chaos army is almost big enough to play exclusively on the big table, but there is still a place for a small, cramped skirmish.  I plan to utilize the small table for fast fights, and for smaller armies.  Cathie's Harlequins will fight many battles on this table while they are being built up to a full sized army, so I really can make a couple of smaller armies and fight 750-1000 point battles and have a lot of fun doing it.  I think it might see more use than the big table since it has a permanent place to live.  The big table needs to be put away when it isn't being used.    The small table makes smaller armies just as much fun as larger ones.

 

The more I look at pictures of Blackwatch units, the more I can see myself having a few of them.  I really like the idea of finding the most obscure chapters imaginable and sticking a marine from one of them into my squad.  (Complete with a fantastic backstory as to how he got there)  Cathie has just dared me to find a chapter with pink armor and make a Kill team member with a pink pauldron.   I may just do that.  If nothing else, it will so offend the Harlequin's sense of fashion that they will lose Psychic powers for one turn until they can all stop laughing!   (I'm sure if I keep reading the rules long enough I will find a way to justify that!)  

 

Keep having fun, I sure am!

Dave

[Jacques Corbin]

Also, consider that maybe a Dark Angel "serving" in the Deathwatch could have called in a tip on a Blackshield with a hood. The Inner Circle might want to meet this individual, or at least have one of their Chaplains "interview" him. The Dark Angels wouldn't need much more justification than that to interject themselves into conflict with the Harlequins, all to maintain status quo regarding THE WORST KEPT SECRET IN THE IMPERIUM. Looking at you, Chaplain Lucifer!

[deathspectersgt7]

Roscommon County    hmmmm !!! And a Dark Angel.

[Wrath of Bruinen]

As a long-time Dark Angels player and recent Deathwatch convert, I've been wondering the same thing myself, so I'm interested to see what others think. I think there is a lot of potential synergy with the two armies, particularly based around bikes and terminators - Deathwatch bikers can be taken in small 1-man units with a teleport homer, and can also take 1 man terminator squads. Something to consider might be a Deathwatch CAD, allied with some Ravenwing and Deathwing.

 

Something along the lines of:

 

Deathwatch CAD:

Watch Master 

 

Deathwatch Veteran Squad with 2x frag cannons in a pod with locator beacon

Deathwatch Veteran Squad with stalker bolters

 

1x Biker with teleport homer

1x Biker with teleport homer

 

1x Terminator w/ heavy flamer and melta powerfist

1x Terminator w/ heavy flamer and melta powerfist

 

Ravenwing Attack Squadron:

3x ravenwing bikers

Landspeeder Typhoon

 

Ravenwing Attach Squadron

3x ravenwing bikers

Landspeeder Typhoon

 

Deathwing Strike Force:

Terminator Librarian (lvl 2)

Deathwing command squad w/ apothecary

Deathwing knights

Deathwing squad

 

That comes to ~1785 points - in an 1850 point list you could spend the remaining points on wargear for your terminators and ravenwing bikers.

 

When your Deathwing automatically come in t2, and your 2 suicide deathwatch termies hopefully come in, you will have teleport homers on the two deathwatch bikes (having such small footprints will make them easy to hide) and 12" no scatter deep strike from the ravenwing, plus a locator beacon on the drop pod, so you should be able to come down exactly where you want them. 

 

Harlequins are brutal in assault, but you will have plenty of template weapons to overwatch with, plus bs2 overwatch on your dark angels. They also have easy access to AP2 in combat, so storm shields on your termies (and/or deathwing knights) won't go astray. 

[GoblinChow]

Roscommon County hmmmm !!! And a Dark Angel.

You're not allowed to know where Roscommon County is unless you're from here! It's almost as much of a secret as The Fallen those 9 traitor legions that the Dark Angels had nothing to do with!

You from Michigan?

[jeremy1391]

I'm sure if the Watch Company that is working in conjunction with you DA was led by a watch captain/librarian/chaplain that were from an unforgiven chapter then there wouldn't be much of a schism. In fact by extension that watch captain could use his authority to further the cause of the Dark Angels.

[Irbis]

I'm sure if the Watch Company that is working in conjunction with you DA was led by a watch captain/librarian/chaplain that were from an unforgiven chapter then there wouldn't be much of a schism. In fact by extension that watch captain could use his authority to further the cause of the Dark Angels.

I don't know. He would be watched by marines from at least 20 chapters, if he tried to do something shady a lot of questions would fly. Not to mention Watch Librarians and Ordo Xenos inquisitors who might insist on checking for psychic corruption and/or taint, seeing DW has its own indoctrination protocols and secrets that have to be enforced and protected somehow.

I have a feeling most of Inner Circle would :cuss their collective pants on the prospect of so much scrutiny and would rather dump DA they consider unworthy of any more secrets into DW to protect their guise of completely normal chapter. It would be rather ironic if other chapters had positive view of DA loyalty and sanity due to their DW interaction not knowing these were in facts outcasts not representing their chapter in any way

[deathspectersgt7]

Ogemaw County most of the time .  Howdy Neigbor :D

[Crazy Jay]

First off, GO BUCKEYES!!!!! Alright, now that that's out of the way, are there any options that were originally DA specific found in the Death Watch army?