Can Primaris–Only–BA a thing?

[Maggotlord]

Hi all,

 

the title says it all: Can Primaris only BA a thing? If so, which units do you think work well?

 

I´m especially interested in the Primaris Chaplain on bike. Are Primaris DC any good?

 

Thanks in advance.

[Jolemai]

There was a time when the triple Repulsor type lists worked nicely, so it is possible. You're basically playing a Codex list with our Doctrines and Chapter buffs. Things like any of the Troops choices, Bladeguard holding the centre of the board, Redemptor Dreadnought, etc, can be fairly powerful.

 

Firstborn are what give us the mobility to get into combat and cause carnage. Going Primaris only you lack Sanguinary Guard and jump pack Death Company, so you need to cater for that in your lists. If you are going some the Matched Play route, secondaries like Oath of Moment, Shock Tactics, and even Raise Banner  can be built to take advantage of.

 

Primaris DC lack mobility and wargear choices. They are more a support unit so one can be viable but not necessarily built around.

[Blindhamster]

My blood angels became primaris only since primaris have been a thing, it’s possible, and whilst it has more flavour now than it used to, it still lacks the spice of our unique units. I think primaris death company are pretty good for their points but they’re quite slow. Mephiston is very good as always so is almost a given. If rumours are to be believed, we will get Dante soon, and maybe even sanguinary guard. If those things happen I’d honestly say it’ll go from possible to legitimately good.

[Bloody Legionnaire]

None of the “none codex compliant chapters” are ones I’d want to run as Primaris only. These chapters (SWs, BAs, DAs) get their flavor from their legacy marine units. I understand Black Templars are also a non-compliant chapter, but they were designed to function better with Primaris units than the other 3. You can do it, but IMO you’re really limiting what your Blood Angels can do with out sanguinary guard, priests/death company. Your blood angels will be much more “vanilla” than they otherwise could be.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Lore-wise they already basically are all primaris

[tychobi]

Infantry rush assaultcessor spam works fine. Bikes and incursors and warsuits. Full agro primaris are a lot for some enemies to handle. Can be tricky to play and hard countered but very satisfying when you rush into the enemy zone chainsaws buzzing. 

[CCE1981]

Prior to 9th I had a heavy infantry list for Blood Angels.  I think you can do it in the upcoming Arcs of Omen.  Incursors to start in the middle of the board, Assault Intercessor Death Company to rush up, Heavy Intercessors to run and hold the middle.  Bladeguard to be the real heavy hitters in an impulsor coming from the edge of the board.

[Blindhamster]

9 hours ago, Bloody Legionnaire said:

None of the “none codex compliant chapters” are ones I’d want to run as Primaris only. These chapters (SWs, BAs, DAs) get their flavor from their legacy marine units. I understand Black Templars are also a non-compliant chapter, but they were designed to function better with Primaris units than the other 3. You can do it, but IMO you’re really limiting what your Blood Angels can do with out sanguinary guard, priests/death company. Your blood angels will be much more “vanilla” than they otherwise could be.

I think that depends.

 

The issue with our codex currently, is that sanguinary guard are so good they’re more or less guaranteed to get nerfed next update. People spam them so hard that it’s painful. It isn’t fluffy or anything either.

 

that said, I’m sure they’re going to appear in primaris form not too long after we get Dante.

 

and from a flavour perspective, death company intercessors serve the same purpose as regular death company (regular death company are better functionally due to being faster and having better weapon options (a thing that could have been fixed simply by not restricting options on DC intercessors))

 

the important flavour unit primaris are missing, imo, is a primaris sanguinary priest.

 

you can make a very thematic blood angel army with primaris these days, it fulfils all the visual queues (a block of black armoured marines that are more choppy and a little tougher than the red guys), a sea of red, with yellow helmeted faster units and blue helmeted support units. You can throw in mephiston for a “proper” blood angel character that is also pretty good. You can get a good choppy unit with gold helmets in bladeguard (and they work very well for us being equipped with MC power swords so wounding on 2s generally). You can even lean into the flight angle and throw in inceptors and suppressors (the latter works well for us as a way to negate overwatch for melee units).

 

it uses vanilla units, sure but it’s very much able to be made as a thematic blood angel army. Primaris captains and gravis captain with blood angel relics are cool too. Now if you actually meant that we get all our power and meta advantage from spamming sanguinary guard, totally agree. The only reason blood angels sit at the top of the marine pile for wins is that that one unit is just /better/ than anything else marine have access to since AoC.

 

once jump infantry appear next year (hopefully) we really will be “there” imo as far as flavourful army building goes. But to get a better army on the table, our death company intercessors need an update (perhaps getting jump options via the new units, plus less restrictive weapon options ideally). We do need a sanguinary guard type unit, I still think the primaris version will be more like victrix guard for ultramarines and be units of 2 as actual bodyguards. And more than anything else, I feel we need a proper primaris priest and perhaps a primaris death company chaplain.