Returning to 40k - need to build effective army

[DarkTrev]

Hi

I am returning to 40k after many years away. I have a number of Dark Angels which I was getting ready to use in Advanced Space Crusade (rolling back the years). I'm interested in any suggestions for units to use/not use, or which work together or don't. Also any obvious strengths/weaknesses would be useful. An initial foray against Plague marines started well, but ended in total destruction - those 2+ saves hurt. Units available currently include:-

Librarian, Interrogator Chaplain, Masters, Sergeants,

Deathwing Knights

Deathwing terms incl command

Veterans

Tactical squad

Other squad (holding 2 bolt pistols each, not sure they're useful)

Scouts (at least 5 squads incl snipers)

Dreadnought

Rhino

Ravenwing Dark Talon

Ravenwing bikes

Intercessors (just purchased)

Thanks in advance for any help,

Trevor

[G8Keeper]

Hi Trevor, welcome to the Rock!

 

First off you have some of the more powerful units for Dark Angels already.  Things like the Dark Talon and Deathwing Knights do well when used and supported correctly.  Rather than go through how to do this I would have a few more light hearted practice games.  Try out using the Speed of the Raven stratagem with the Dark Talon to surprise enemies and generally look at unit, wargear, psychic power and stratagem combinations.

 

Facing Death Guard can be painful especially with their Disgustingly Resilient rule but if you remove any mobile units they have you should find you can easily outmanoeuvre them and get them reacting to you.  What initially went well for you in the game?

[ValourousHeart]

Not sure how helpful this is, but 8th isn't like any of the previous editions.

 

With the new wounding mechanic, they have eliminated unkillable units.

And because of that, now units that were considered subpar for tournaments previously can now be used viably.

 

So my best advice is to forget what worked and didn't work in the past.

And instead, build the list you always wanted to play.

Chances are it will work better than you ever thought possible, and you'll have a blast in the process.

 

As for a nice combination, try pairing an Interrogator-Chaplain with a Reiver Squad and the eye of the unseen relic.

If you get all 3 near a unit, that unit will have -3 to their leadership and all enemy characters will fight last even if they charged.

That is effectively the same as causing 3 extra wounds when they take their morale check.

 

Plus Reivers have those cool grappling hooks, so they are Batman Marines.

[march10k]

That's true to a point.  There are still vast gulfs between a given codex's best and worst units.  You can say that there are no unplayable units, but there are still, unfortunately, spammable no-brainer units.  Like Dark Talons.  The Nephilim is viable now, sure, but that doesn't mean it's in the same league as a DT. 

 

Nearly as impactful as the change in the wounding mechanic is the elimination of template and blast weapons.  No pieplates means a huge boost to hordes, and places a corresponding premium on the few remaining horde control weapons.  Punisher cannons and hurricane bolters are immensely important now if you're not answering a horde with a horde.  Stormbolters, too, if you can mass them on the cheap and get them in close.  D3 shots for a small blast and D6 shots for a pieplate just doesn't have the same horde control heft.  That's partially offset by the D6 shots from a battle cannon being a lot more effective against tough single models than the former max of one hit, pending scatter...but only partially.  The challenge of efficiently removing job lots of chaff troops really makes choosing the nephilim over the dark talon or the redeemer over the crusader a bad idea.  So there are still sub-par choices when you take opportunity cost into account.

[ValourousHeart]

@ March10k,

 

My post wasn't to say that the changes in 8th had any effect on players whose only joy in life is to suck the happiness out of everyone around them.

In this edition, it is harder, if not impossible, to find a list that has zero chance to win, without purposely crafting both lists to weigh the scale heavily to one side.

But those examples take us into the AOS nonsense of pitting a night goblin against Nagash. 

 

Your Dark Talon vs Nephilim example I feel weakens the point you are trying to make.

Yes, certainly, there are units that are better suited to certain roles than others.

But I don't see the Dark Dark Talon and Nephilim as having the same role, and I think that becomes clear when you have both in your army.

You would send the Dark Talon to deal with a hoard unit where the hurricane bolters can really shine.

And you would send the Nephilim to deal a big model where those Lascannons and missiles would give a better advantage.

Even if you took the Avenger Mega Bolter instead of the Lascannons, you would still likely run the Nephilim at Killa-Kans instead of the Ork Boyz, at least at first.

 

In my mind, you would be more likely to weigh a Dark Talon against a Crusader than you would against a Nephilim.

And in that matchup, you would be asking other questions, like do I need the transport or the mortal wounds?

 

As for the changes with blast templates... I think you might be idealizing your memories.

Yes, you could fit 7 TDA models under the plasma cannon template... but if you were playing a good player, you probably only got 1 or 2 hits.

[Kasper_Hawser]

Hi

I am returning to 40k after many years away. I have a number of Dark Angels which I was getting ready to use in Advanced Space Crusade (rolling back the years). I'm interested in any suggestions for units to use/not use, or which work together or don't. Also any obvious strengths/weaknesses would be useful. An initial foray against Plague marines started well, but ended in total destruction - those 2+ saves hurt. Units available currently include:-

Librarian, Interrogator Chaplain, Masters, Sergeants,

Deathwing Knights

Deathwing terms incl command

Veterans

Tactical squad

Other squad (holding 2 bolt pistols each, not sure they're useful)

Scouts (at least 5 squads incl snipers)

Dreadnought

Rhino

Ravenwing Dark Talon

Ravenwing bikes

Intercessors (just purchased)

Thanks in advance for any help,

Trevor

 

Looks like you got all the basics covered. Not sure how well versed you are in Dark Angel strategems but I hope the following will highlight their strengths for you to exploit:

 

1) Plasma weaponry. It's a no brainer, but in 8th edition, one of the best strategems the Dark Angels get is Weapons from the dark Age, which increases damage of plasma weaponry by 1. so even normal plasma shots can kill terminators and other 2 wound models in one shot. But it also shines against Vehicles and Monstrous Creatures when overcharged, especially on stationary Plasma Cannons. combined with DA natural reroll ones if they don't move, you have a safer chance of overcharging your plasma even without a HQ buffing.

 

2) DWK have a better chance of surviving enemy fire thanks to Fortress of Shields so may actually make it into combat. Their hammers also don't suffer the -1 to hit that Thunderhammers have now at the cost of one damage and one AP.

 

3) scouts are important to help bubble wrap your important units and control the battlefield from outflanking/deepstriking harassers who will try for Turn 1 charges. Beware.

 

Hope this helps.

[Helycon]

 

 

Hi

I am returning to 40k after many years away. I have a number of Dark Angels which I was getting ready to use in Advanced Space Crusade (rolling back the years). I'm interested in any suggestions for units to use/not use, or which work together or don't. Also any obvious strengths/weaknesses would be useful. An initial foray against Plague marines started well, but ended in total destruction - those 2+ saves hurt. Units available currently include:-

Librarian, Interrogator Chaplain, Masters, Sergeants,

Deathwing Knights

Deathwing terms incl command

Veterans

Tactical squad

Other squad (holding 2 bolt pistols each, not sure they're useful)

Scouts (at least 5 squads incl snipers)

Dreadnought

Rhino

Ravenwing Dark Talon

Ravenwing bikes

Intercessors (just purchased)

Thanks in advance for any help,

Trevor

Looks like you got all the basics covered. Not sure how well versed you are in Dark Angel strategems but I hope the following will highlight their strengths for you to exploit:

 

1) Plasma weaponry. It's a no brainer, but in 8th edition, one of the best strategems the Dark Angels get is Weapons from the dark Age, which increases damage of plasma weaponry by 1. so even normal plasma shots can kill terminators and other 2 wound models in one shot. But it also shines against Vehicles and Monstrous Creatures when overcharged, especially on stationary Plasma Cannons. combined with DA natural reroll ones if they don't move, you have a safer chance of overcharging your plasma even without a HQ buffing.

 

2) DWK have a better chance of surviving enemy fire thanks to Fortress of Shields so may actually make it into combat. Their hammers also don't suffer the -1 to hit that Thunderhammers have now at the cost of one damage and one AP.

 

3) scouts are important to help bubble wrap your important units and control the battlefield from outflanking/deepstriking harassers who will try for Turn 1 charges. Beware.

 

Hope this helps.

Fortress of Shields only works in the fight phase, which makes it 'meh'.

[Kasper_Hawser]

@ Halcyon - didn't know that. Still, every little bit helps. And at least no -1 to hit nonsense.

[Darkangeldentist]

Hello and welcome back to the Rock. I am in a similar position having come back to the game not that long ago after some hiatus. (I've my own thread titled "Coming back to the game" where I muse and ramble about my experiences.) Most of the models you list have their uses and their effectiveness will be somewhat dependent on your local meta and what kind of games you want to play. (Relaxed casual games can make decent use of almost any combination of units and provided you play a range of missions (maelstrom of war tactical objective games can be very good for this type of game) any inherent weakness of your list in dealing with the opponent can be somewhat limited. 

 

Your collection sounds fairly well rounded, Deathwing knights and the Dark talon are the standout 'good' units being fairly easy to use and difficult to take down. Tactical marines aren't popular but I like and use them as a core of bodies to objective grab and occupy board space. Scouts are cheaper and more flexible for deployment but the point is that as troops they can do a useful job and help build a list that generates a good number of command points.

 

One of the biggest changes 8th edition introduced were command points which, via stratagems can greatly influence games from being able to re-roll a critical die roll, increase the damage dealt by our plasma weaponry or allow units to advance (run) and still shoot/charge as well as a host of other useful benefits. 

 

Main thing when getting back into the game is just to play as many games as you can. Review each game to look at what worked and what didn't and analyse to identify what problems you can work around tactically and which require adjusting your list to counter. 

[Helycon]

@ Halcyon - didn't know that. Still, every little bit helps. And at least no -1 to hit nonsense.

 

Aye, it makes no sense though. Pretty sure a wall of shields works as well when being shot at. They should just change it to work for a full round and do a -1 to wound rolls. Going to T5 only gives it an edge to power swords and the like, really. 

[sneakybamsen]

-1 to wound is better than going from T4 to T5, Helycon :)

 

But yes, it should work against shooting too, and probably be a bit more like the rules were in 7th. Those made sense. The stratagem usage (at 2CP as far as I remember) is clumsy for making it work as it is situational and limited in use.

[Kasper_Hawser]

 

@ Halcyon - didn't know that. Still, every little bit helps. And at least no -1 to hit nonsense.

 

Aye, it makes no sense though. Pretty sure a wall of shields works as well when being shot at. They should just change it to work for a full round and do a -1 to wound rolls. Going to T5 only gives it an edge to power swords and the like, really. 

 

 

Not just power swords though, there are plenty of S5 weaponry (looking at you Tau, pulse and SMS), weaponry that rely on forcing saves rather than piercing armour. And of course most MEQ are S4.

 

Still, every little bit counts, meaning power fists and hammers willl only wound on 3+, never 2+, which combined with their -1 to hit, means more surviving terminators. But again, only against CC.

[G8Keeper]

I try and use Fortress of Shields along with Aversion cast on the unit my Knights are in combat with.  Anything such as Power Fists etc suffers horrendously, although granted it does mean taking a deep striking Librarian.  If I'm very lucky I also get Righteous Repugnance off, make sure to save a command point for a re-roll for that one, or bring a Chaplain too (points starting to rack up here).

[Helycon]

There are a bit more weapons that suffer, yes, but power swords are probably the most common and worst off.

 

I'm aware that -1 to wound is better overall, but when you calculate it, there's S6 and S7 and currently doesn't affect. From then on, you start hitting S11 that's no longer affected. Why not include those as well? It adds up to the exact same for the wounding table for every other type of hit :) .

 

And gief ranged use as well, pretty sure that's what the Romans used their metal bawkses for :P.

[DarkTrev]

Thanks to all your multiple replies, I appreciate the time taken and I'll get to you in turn when I can.