Starting Blood Angels in the 8th edition ?

[Brother Clavero]

Greetings all!  So with all of the changes, both good and bad, in the new edition, what advice could  you give to a player wanting to start a Blood Angels army? 

   

Edited June 26, 2017 by Brother Clavero

[_evil_homer_]

I'm in the same boat.  I decided I wanted a CC centric army and didn't want to paint 100 orcs or tyranids.  I will be building slow, starting with 10 DC and Lemartes and adding a Vanguard Veteran squad next month.  I really want to field an army that pressures the opponent early and often.  Hopefully I've chosen well.

[Brother Clavero]

_evil_homer_  : I'm thinking about the same kind of army tactic, early and continuous pressure on the enemy. I was thinking about deployment via drop pods and stormravens with stormtalons for support. Now to decide just what units to put in them!

[PlayOn]

I have finally decided to start playing 40k and Blood Angels is for so I am deciding how to start after getting the start collecting box sense I don't know anything about the game besides what I have watched.

[Aothaine]

Here is what I would suggest. Build your assault squads to tackle characters/monsters/vehicles and use inceptors to target hordes. Also think about including 1-3 Baal Predators. They are amazing! In both twin assault cannon and firestorm cannon variants. 

 

The metas are not really defined yet but prepare to play against hordes in both melee and shooty forms. The inceptors have the speed to catch up to your deep-striked death company. 

 

Another approach is to use transports to move your units up the line, razorbacks are the best imho.

 

And use the razorbacks for the anti-horde.

 

Just keep in mind that assault based armies are going to have a hard time against fliers. So you may want to include 1-2 of your own flyers as well.

[Brother_Angelus]

By all accounts Storm Ravens are big winners in this edition. They shoot, they transport, and they can weather a lot of incoming fire. I'd expect to pick at least one at any reasonable point level. Twin assault cannons are great too, so razorbacks for your small troop units are another good pick. Drop pods aren't nearly as useful as they were in 7th, due to the 9" exclusion zone around your opponents stuff, and we already have ready access to jump packs & storm ravens, so most units can move very quickly anyway.

 

We have some really punchy specialist units too, DC for clearing large quantities of infantry in combat, Vanvets for beating on vehicles & monsters, and company vets for shooting up vehicles and monsters. Having such broad access to jump packs means a lot of our units can get 'Fly', greatly increases their manoeuvrability and importantly for company veterans allows them to still shoot their special weapons after retreating from combat.

 

Dante, Captains & Primaris Lts are good all-rounders, offering rerolls for shooting & combat. Chaplains, Sanguinary Priests, Terminator Ancients & Sanguinary Ancients give you boosts or re-rolls specifically for close combat. Astorath & Lemartes obviously boost Death Company really nicely. Picking the right characters to support your play style and army composition is big deal in this edition.

 

The 'meta' hasn't really shaken out yet, and there are still a lot of theories about what or who will be the 'best'. Probably build a balanced collection of units you like to start and adapt from there.

 

My personal feeling is to shy away from direct assaults and charging straight into combat, but rather use the movement and firepower of storm ravens and use careful application of specialist units to systematically pick winnable fights. Ofcourse each opponent will need to be handled differently, but overall we can't go toe-to-toe with orks, nids or zerkers close up (due to numbers, power, or both), so why fight on their terms?

Edited June 27, 2017 by Brother_Angelus

[dread05]

I'm also in line with the OP. I'm new in 40k, and also new in playing and painting minis. I was reading the 40k lore for months before buying my first kit, and I chose BA for their fluff. Since I had no idea what I was doing, I started with two tactical squads with which I went a full flamer loadout. Then 8th dropped and kinda invalidated them. Now I'm planing on building a company veteran squad with plasma's  bodyguarding a captain with combi plasma, a sanguinary guard bodyguarding a Dante conversion, and a company ancient and apothecary to buff my tacticals. As you can clearly see, I have to cohesive plan in building my army. Although I take my time to arm my untis with relevant weapons, by no means do I plan for competitive play. In my mind I just want them to look cool, and if by chance I'll manage to play a game, we'll see.

Edited June 27, 2017 by dread05

[Xenith]

C&P from another Starting BA thread a couple of days ago.

 

Hello, and welcome to Baal!

 

The best thing to do is to buy and paint the models you like the most.

 

Getting into BA has never been easier, with the mephiston red paints and sprays, and the Start Collecting! boxed set, which is a solid start to any army. The multiple detachment options in the main rulebook mean you can pretty much field anything you like, and have it as a legal army.

 

Blood Angels excel in combat, and in 8th ed, we seem to be all about our characters with lots of overlapping buff auras.

 

Cool options would be:

 

Start collecting Blood Angels + BA terminator squad. + your favourite character choice as a warlord.

 This will be about £100, but you get a lot for it. I'd give Karlaen in the SC box the banner from the terminator boxed set, then make the rest as THammer/SShield terminators. You end up with an awesome tank, tactical squad (can be 2x 5 man) and 6 terms.

 

The next step would be a rhino or razorback for the tactical squads.

 

What models do you like?

 

TL,DR

 

Buy the models you like.

[Mcrat]

I'd give Karlaen in the SC box the banner from the terminator boxed set, then make the rest as THammer/SShield terminators.

 

This sounds cool. I'm going to do this

[Xenith]

 

I'd give Karlaen in the SC box the banner from the terminator boxed set, then make the rest as THammer/SShield terminators.

 

This sounds cool. I'm going to do this

 

 

Yea, I'll be doing it if I ever get another BA terms box. The banner and cloak will look cool, and the banner will hide his weird leg pose a bit.

[Brother Clavero]

  Thanks for all of the great replies!