[HH1.0] Dark Angels Tactics

[Guest Metaliptica]

Quick question : anyone knows what happens when your opponent drops to Initiative 0 ? I just realised that the companion's shield and stasis grenades can stack !

[Astartes Consul]

Just from reading through the rules, Deathwing Companions in terminator armour look like a much better value proposition than any of their other load outs?

[Erren]

So, this is what I’ve come up with so far for a Stormwing force. It’s designed for Centurion/Deception format, where hopefully blasts don’t immediately destroy it. Around here that usually means 1500 points, but it would be super easy to grow this to 2000. Those big units eat up points quickly. First thing I’d probably do would be to swap a 10-man Tactical squad to Assault, add another Centurion, and add a second Javelin. Does anyone see any obvious improvements? I’m assuming that Apothecary detachments count towards your limitations for non-Tactical/Assault units, otherwise I’d drop a 10-man Tac squad and spread those points around.

 

+++ 1500 I Legion Deception Stormwing (Warhammer 30,000 - The Horus Heresy) [1,500pts] +++

 

++ Crusade (Legiones Astartes: Age of Darkness Army List) [1,500pts] ++

 

+ HQ +

 

Praetor, Legion [235pts]: Artificer Armour, Bolt Pistol, Digital Lasers, Iron Halo, Jump Pack, Mastercraft a Single Weapon, Melta Bombs, Stormwing, Terranic Greatsword, Warlord

. Combi-weapon

. . Combi-Weapon: Grenade Launcher: Stasis Shells (grenade launcher)

 

+ Elites +

 

Apothecarion Detachment [110pts]

. Apothecary, Legion: Jump Pack, Power Armour

. . Chainsword or Combat Blade: Chainswords/Combat Blades

. Apothecary, Legion: Augury Scanner, None (Infantry, Power Armour), Power Armour

. . Chainsword or Combat Blade: Chainswords/Combat Blades

 

+ Troops +

 

Assault Squad, Legion (Compulsory) [400pts]: 19x Assault Space Marines, Legion

. Additional Wargear: 4x Power Axe

. Assault Sergeant, Legion: Artificer Armour, Bolt Pistol, Melta Bombs, Power Fist, Stormwing

. Standard Wargear

. . Chainsword or Combat Blade: Chainswords/Combat Blades

 

Tactical Squad, Legion [150pts]: Bolters, 9x Tactical Space Marines, Legion

. Additional Wargear: Vexilla, Legion

. Tactical Sergeant, Legion: Artificer Armour, Bolter, Melta Bombs

 

Tactical Squad, Legion [150pts]: Bolters, 9x Tactical Space Marines, Legion

. Additional Wargear: Vexilla, Legion

. Tactical Sergeant, Legion: Artificer Armour, Bolter, Melta Bombs

 

Tactical Squad, Legion (Compulsory) [380pts]: Bolters, 19x Tactical Space Marines, Legion

. Additional Wargear: Vexilla, Legion

. Centurion: Artificer Armour, Bolt Pistol, Melta Bombs, On Foot, Refractor Field, Terranic Greatsword

. . Consul: Centurion, Legion

. Tactical Sergeant, Legion: Artificer Armour, Melta Bombs, Power Fist, Stormwing

 

+ Fast Attack +

 

Javelin Attack Speeder Squadron, Legion [75pts]

. Javelin Attack Speeder, Legion: 2x Hunter-killer Missile, Multi-melta, Twin-linked Cyclone missile launcher

 

+ Allegiance +

 

Legion and Allegiance: I: Dark Angels, Loyalist

 

Rite of War: The Storm of War

 

+ Use Playtest Rules +

 

Use Playtest Rules Errata 1.0 (From FAQ 1.1 Feb/2019): Playtest Rules Errata 1.0 On

[ShadowCore67]

Quick question : anyone knows what happens when your opponent drops to Initiative 0 ? I just realised that the companion's shield and stasis grenades can stack !

Initiative can't be dropped below 1. Page 14 of the BRB.

 

Unfortunately this makes the shields half useless unless you completely wiff your stasis shot or are in combat for more than one round.

[Guest Metaliptica]

 

Quick question : anyone knows what happens when your opponent drops to Initiative 0 ? I just realised that the companion's shield and stasis grenades can stack !

Initiative can't be dropped below 1. Page 14 of the BRB.

 

Unfortunately this makes the shields half useless unless you completely wiff your stasis shot or are in combat for more than one round.

 

My bad then ty for your help :)

[Nomadic Thunder]

I have posted the question in the rules section here:

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/366880-stasis-and-initiative-tests/?do=findComment&comment=5613630

 

Just wondering how you guys play this, or if you’ve seen it come up at all?

 

Hit a unit with a stasis missile/grenade and then hit them with a blind weapon (darkfire/shroudbombs/Lions pistol etc.).

Would they test initiative at 1 or at their regular stat value?

 

I’d say it’s good to go personally and would rarely come up in most lists/games due to the lack of blind weapons in legion lists.

Edited October 7, 2020 by Nomadic Thunder

[Gorgoff]

I have posted the question in the rules section here:

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/366880-stasis-and-initiative-tests/?do=findComment&comment=5613630

 

Just wondering how you guys play this, or if you’ve seen it come up at all?

 

Hit a unit with a stasis missile/grenade and then hit them with a blind weapon (darkfire/shroudbombs/Lions pistol etc.).

Would they test initiative at 1 or at their regular stat value?

 

I’d say it’s good to go personally and would rarely come up in most lists/games due to the lack of blind weapons in legion lists.

Ini1

[Charlo]

I saw this in Facebook and you use the stat on the model, not the modified one apparently.

[Nomadic Thunder]

I’d disagree though and there didn’t seem a clear consensus in the discussion.

I was wondering if anyone plays with this combo or could shed some light it from their own experience

[Gorgoff]

I saw this in Facebook and you use the stat on the model, not the modified one apparently.

Stasis Anomaly reduces your I to 1 until the end of the game turn.

Against Blind you test at the end of the phase.

 

Can't see a reason why you should test with your regular I.

Edited October 8, 2020 by Gorgoff

[ShadowCore67]

There's no rule saying characteristic tests must be taken against unmodified characteristics (That I'm aware of).

[Guest Metaliptica]

This is going to be a long post so be warned

We all had a lot of time to play with the new rules for the legion and I wished to share with you my thoughts and experience using them. I already posted a similar post on the 30k Dark Angels Fb group, but hoped to get some extra feedback on things that I might be overlooking or missed.

Let us start with the LA Dark Angels special rule:
Loosing covenant of death is such a relief and made all of my games more enjoyable since I could focus on the objective without this threat of paying VP if I didn’t kill enough units.
Mastery of the blade is a nice boost to our units and the Scion rule can potentially give us some nice bonuses to give each of our units a singular playstyle. But here is the catch: right now, I don’t feel like any scion rule are worth their 25 points and I don’t even think that they should all cost the same price. AS an example, from my games: I can say that the scion of the Firewing is straight up better than the Deathwing one. Even then, a Chaplain upgrade cost +35 pts and gets you a power weapon on top of an improved version of the scion of the Firewing. I played with the scions’ rules, but unless I play a DA specific RoW, I’ll probably never bother picking one up. Simply put, until the Scions rules get revisited or receive significant point drop, I’ll never bother using them outside of limitations.
A small point about the wargear: while we are all familiar with Calibanite Warblade and Terranic Greatswords, I want to address 2 points.
The first is the buff to plasma repeaters. Since you can now take them on bike, I used them in an Unbroken Vow list and a second time in the Seeker’s Arrow one. Simply put: my unit of 6 outriders with repeaters were the MVP in both of these games! Brutal!
My second one is about those stasis grenades. They are (I feel) our most powerful Legion specific wargear and it was such a pleasure to watch Invictus Suzerain strike at I1! (I mean to be fair, I only watched 2 models attack since the rest were massacred by Holguin beforehand) No more fear of having unwieldy AP2 weapons removed before they could strike. These grenades are powerful and I would advise anyone facing a DA army to keep track on the units who have them
 

Concerning our Legion specific RoW:
Generally speaking, some are better than others but there is one thing that all of them miss: some kind of interesting interaction with the Primarch (I’ll speak about that in more details when discussing the Lion’s rules but I think it was worth mentioning here).

The Eskaton Imperative:
This was my most anticipated one. Since Angels of Caliban, I just needed a Dreadwing list and start to pour phosphex on the battlefield. Rulewise, the RoW is fun and thematic. In my list, I avoided ground transports such as Rhinos to bring flyers, drop pods and Termites instead and I must say this seemed to be a good move. Even if your opponent has some kind of move through cover rule, the idea of earning some additional VP if troops are still within his Deployment Zone will make him play close to his table edge and therefor give you an easier access to the middle of the table. The Salt the Earth, Burn the Sky is a very nice rule but since it requires you to purchase a scion of the Dreadwing rule first, getting both stasis and rad grenades on one unit will cost you the small price of a barebone Chaplain. A bit pricy, but the rule has some potential. if it was up to me, I’d say that the rule could have given you the ability to equip phosphex bombs like with the Mournival rules, as well as giving the Plasma Incinerator upgrade suspensor webs.
Overall: it is a solid RoW. Fun, unique, thematic and will give both players an enjoyable experience. Note however that this RoW is more difficult to run in low points games due to limitations to compulsory troops and the need to start with every units embarqued in a transport.

The Unbroken Vow:
This RoW is so bad I would actually recommend avoiding it if the goal is to have fun.
I’ve tried to make this work twice and none of the games I played were enjoyable/fun. I’ll be direct here: the problem is your movement phase is too predictable. Every turn, your opponent knows that you have to commit at least one unit (with the Scion of the Deathwing upgrade) to this central objective and he will prepare for it. This RoW could be borderline usable when facing a CC oriented army like BA, WE, SW or EC as the benefits from the RoW would actually make the matchup better (but even then; sitting on an objective, waiting to be charged by WE is not called a good plan in my book). Add to this that the Deathwing is not really the best Scion trait and the RoW ends up being too hard and limiting to make it work.

The Serpent’s Bane:
I love the dynamic it created by creating this new hunt mechanic. The bonuses are nice and strong and synergize well with the Scion of the Firewing rule when used with CC squads. Side note: beware of Firewing Engmatus with Rage! BUT: The fact that failing to kill all of the targets automatically makes you Loose was just a bad and unhealthy mechanic in the game I played. Why you may ask? because the mission played becomes irrelevant. The game just becomes a big Hide and seek where your opponent will actively avoid the objective and your units to secure his auto win. If your opponent did bring flyers with some transport capacity, Spartans, or have the ability to improve the mobility of targeted units, then good luck trying to win. With this RoW, mobile CC units and long-range firepower are your greatest friends.

The Seeker’s arrow:
After all the talk about the Ravenwing protocol being better than this RoW, I must say that I absolutely loved playing this one! Finally, a RoW that doesn’t give away VP for the enemy. The extra mobility and the ability to outflank turn 1 on a 2+ are amazing! Add now that outriders with plasma repeaters legally exists and that you no longer get frown upon when using molecular acid shells on your jetbike and you end up with a really fun and strong RoW that is not too hard to make work. This is hands down my favorite new Dark Angel Rite of War from book 9. Yes: The Scion of the Ravenwing is not very useful on bikes and the price to get access to hit and run is high, but when you compare this rite with some others from this book, I feel it is clearly amongst the best written one.

 

Ok now let us talk about units:

Dreadwing interemptors:
Load them in a Termite, drop near a high priority target and delete them. They often get compared to plasma support tactical squads and from my experience, these are much better marine killers (in a vacuum, the damage output is somewhat similar for both weapons, but add now that the interemptors don’t suffer from gets hot and ignore cover and the difference really starts to emerge) They suffer from not having obsec but they are not designed to hold objectives. As stated earlier: put them in a termite or drop pod of you have the option and let them do their thing in the enemy deployment zone. That said, against anything with T5 or more, they will disappoint. They are marine killers. Against mechanicum or deamons, bring Terranic Greatswords and against custodes, let your medusas do the talking.
With the Mournival ruleset, they do get the option to get bolt pistols and they suddenly become somehow threatening in close combat thanks to the mastery of the blade and rad grenades. They will not win against dedicated melee units, but your opponent now cannot just throw a tactical squad to kill them.

Inner Circle Knights Cenobium:
What’s not to love about their profile? Strong CC, Strong shooting, stubborn, and resistant to psychic powers. My preferred loadout is having 3 Hammers and 2 Swords for weapons, Accompanied by a Chaplain with combi grenades + stasis. As their order exemplars rule, I tend to go to the ones that gives me +1 attack as the Chaplain already gives me enough rerolls.
I can see them working quite well with Sedras, but I haven’t tried this combo before but I fear his lack of stasis grenades will make me regret my Chaplain.
While their profile is strong, 275 is still pricy for a 1 wound terminator squad so I threat them like a glass Canon and as such, I feel they need a transport more than any other terminator squad. (good thing they come with the option to take a spartan.
My plan with them is usually to bring them to where the fight is the most intense (usually in the middle of the board) with an assault transport, then let them charge the first elite unit in sight.

Firewing Enigmatus Cabal:
Not going to lie. When I first saw these guys, I wasn’t really impressed by their profile. 150pts for 3 guys with power armor, no invul and AP3 weapons isn’t really impressive. Then I realized that that for the price of a naked centurion, you get a centurion statline with an improved jetpack, improved calibanite warblade, needle pistol, scion of the firewing and hatred character (because you REALLY want people to know that you hate characters) The lack of AP2 is regrettable, but take a praetor or champion with paragon blade and have some fun ! I did run a squad of these with a champion with combi grenade + stasis (do you see the pattern here?), jump pack and paragon blade and I must admit that these guys did do some amazing work thanks to the RAGE and Infiltrate special rule given by the Firewing RoW. They do get blown up easily, but finding refuge in CC to protect them from krak missile is a viable strategy.

Deathwing Companions:
Now this is the star of the roster IMHO. Probably slightly undercosted for what they do. These guys are simply the best bodyguards in the game bar none. No precision shots/strike, automatic pass for Look out Sir, and decent CC abilities. I equipped mine with tartaros armor, 3 thunder hammers and 2 Terranic Greatswords. Throw in a good CC character with access to AP2 at initiative + some stasis grenades and your opponent will have to fear this unit. Great unit overall. I haven’t tried the power armored version of these guys but I imagine they will work well with Corswain, 3 power fists and 2 Terranic Greatswords as well.

 

Now here comes the only character from the book I tried:

Lion El’Jonson
I think there is a lot to talk about here. The more I play with the Lion, the more I think his ruleset suffer from a lack of character and if I had to take a guess, I’d say that the scars from book 7 are still here. A lot of the directions taken for the Lion feel thematic but lack the power to actually make it work.
There is no situation where the Lion Truly shines by Primarch standards. He lacks access to some Instant death to be a reliable monster hunter, he lacks the raw damage output to slay big squads of infantry or be an effective duelist, no synergy with the legion specific RoW, a gun that can potentially never be used in a game, a low tier armor and an unbalanced choice of weapons.
I used the Lion all of my games and by himself, he will struggle to earn his points back. 
His redeeming factors are: a strong army wide moral buff, Stasis grenades that can combo nicely with his gun on overwatch and Deathwing Companions, an automatic 8 inch charge move which is powerful and being an above average mid-tier beatstick.
On a side note : when used with the Mournival rules, the Lion gained the relentless since he is very bulky. Well his gun went from useless to insanely powerful! Shoot, charge and the stasis give very good odds of blinding your opponent. Probably too good if I need to be perfectly honest.
All in all, yeah: I am disappointed by the Lion’s rule. Not because my favorite primarch isn’t the all-powerful autowin primarch that Russ or Magnus were upon release, but because there wasn’t a moment where I felt that I had brought the Lion that I read about in all of those BL stories to the field when playing with its current rules.

Edited November 16, 2020 by Metaliptica

[Charlo]

This is really excellent stuff. Thanks for taking the time to write it up!

[Brother Sutek]

I'd be more grateful if the rules were at least average and the sense that the army wasn't punished for taking fluffy choices. I'd love to take many of the upgrades if they weren't very cost prohibitive for the slight game benefit they give. The feeling that I will seldom if ever run the new Rites or upgrade using the Scion rules is annoying as I prefer HH due to the more narrative feeling most people playing this have. The Lion doesn't make sense as a Primarch as he is decent killing things but doesn't add to the army much more than that IMO. My biggest peeve is the lack to teleport transponders for Deathwing, in almost every HH story featuring them there is mention of them teleporting down to decapitate the enemy strong-points. In the rules...nothing. I'm not even mad at the nerf of Acid Bolters as the were really strong and too many opponents whined about them. Do I like how they are now? No and I'd prefer them to have been rending instead but it is what it is.

[Guest Metaliptica]

The nerf to Acid shells was needed and I personnally do like the change. My only grief is that we can't put them on vehicules like the iron warriors do. Before the nerf, the restriction made sence from a balancing perspective but now it would have been really cool to see vehicules equiped with our unique amunition.

Regarding the rest, the more I think about them, the more I think they miss some key features
Dreadwing prevents me from using my jetpack destroyers and I really wanted to recreate that scene from angels of caliban with the dreadwing arriving from the sky. This is not gamebreaking but from a narrative perspective, this is a bit of a let down for me.
Deathwing is straight up garbage and everytime someone think about using it, a watcher dies.
Firewing could have used the enigmatus cabals as compulsory troops so you don't have to invest too much points in the Scion tax
I don't know about the others as I have not tried them but what I hear and read isn't encouraging.

And then there is the Lion ... I don't even feel he is a decent beatstick on his own (for a 460 pts primarch that is) but him having no strategic bonus or deep strike mechanic (Tuchulcha says hello) is just hard to justify from a lore perspective. He has been described as a duelist, a monster hunter, a warrior and a strategist. Yet he is none of that on the tabbletop.
 

Sorry if I sound salty and disapointed in my posts, but in all fairness : I really am. The Dark Angels are the reason I started the Hobby and the Lion is my favorite character from 30k. I've read every DA novels because of him and now that I have his ruleset, I just don't recognise the Primarch I've read about and that made me start my Dark Angel Army in the first place. I wanted rules for the Lion and they gave me Angron 0.5 instead.

[Brother Sutek]

Other than the ABR I agree with your sentiment. I am annoyed that I built my Destroyers with jump packs and now I can't use them as such. I get that the DAs are supposed to be the elite of the Legions but our Rites push that to the extreme. I don't have enough play time to back my comments up with empirical fact but I don't see our Legion working well with the limits put on it if we use the Rites as they are. I also don't want to invest in multiple land raiders to be able to have dedicated transports when the troops that will go in them are already high priced. This feels like the 8th edition Tomb Kings armybook for fantasy, lots of really neat ideas and some fantastic models with poor rules implementation.

 

Now that being said I am excited to field my Ravenwing and with the nerf to ABR my opps won't be annoyed anymore. Honestly I'll only upgrade them when facing bike armies as my main opps don't field anything that fleshbane will help with other than bikes. Stasis and Rad will definitely make a home in my lists as well. Will also have to save up for a second or possibly third Termite.

[ShadowCore67]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned how almost completely useless the ironwing scion and RoW are.

[Nomadic Thunder]

It’s because the scion is not worth thinking about.

 

I’ve considered the new ironwing rite of war but I don’t feel like it’s fair to bring two squadrons of executioner predators as troops, which is the only reason I’ve had a think about it.

[Guest Metaliptica]

Yeah Ironwing is probably the most overcosted upgrade of the bunch. I didn't mention it since I have no experience using it but knowing that a universal 5 pts upgrade can nullify your 25 pts scion is saying a lot. At 25 pts, they could have given us rending when targetting vehicules.

I think that they need to recost the existing rules or completely rewrite them in order to make them work. Because right now, all of the Scion of the Hexagrammaton upgrade could be free (except from the firewing one) and it wouldn't break the balance IMHO.

 

Regarding the rites, I'd say an argument could be made if the Hexagrammaton was a free upgrade (at least rulewise). But paying 50/75 pts to unlock a very restricting RoW that gives VP to your ennemy, or straight up allow you to loose the game regardless of the VP scorred is hard to justify.

Edited December 9, 2020 by Captain Idaho
Off topic element removed

[depthcharge12]

Maybe I’m missing something but where does it say you cannot take jump packs on destroyers? It just makes them jump infantry, so then per RAW they don’t need a transport. Only Infantry, not Jump Infantry need a transport.

[Monkeychunks]

Jump Infantry are still Infantry and held to the same requirements. 'Jump' is a prefix and not a full unit type.

[depthcharge12]

Jump Infantry are still Infantry and held to the same requirements. 'Jump' is a prefix and not a full unit type.

Lol why does it have a separate entry then? Who made you the determiner of what is and isn’t a prefix?

 

Jump infantry have a separate entry than infantry. Not one and the same.

[Darkwrath121]

 

Jump Infantry are still Infantry and held to the same requirements. 'Jump' is a prefix and not a full unit type.

Lol why does it have a separate entry then? Who made you the determiner of what is and isn’t a prefix?

 

Jump infantry have a separate entry than infantry. Not one and the same.

Page 66 in the rulebook.

 

Jump packs confer additional 'jump' rules while also still being the main unit-type. It emphasises that jump-X isn't a distinct category. Rather, they're functionally a subtype of whatever unit type (infantry, monstrous creature).

Edited December 9, 2020 by Darkwrath121

[Captain Idaho]

=][= This thread is to discuss tactics for using Dark Angels in the Horus Heresy game. No wish listing, proposed fixes or other complaints about the rules design being half worked. A review thread can cover the latter, for example. =][=

[depthcharge12]

 

 

Jump Infantry are still Infantry and held to the same requirements. 'Jump' is a prefix and not a full unit type.

Lol why does it have a separate entry then? Who made you the determiner of what is and isn’t a prefix?

 

Jump infantry have a separate entry than infantry. Not one and the same.

Page 66 in the rulebook.

 

Jump packs confer additional 'jump' rules while also still being the main unit-type. It emphasises that jump-X isn't a distinct category. Rather, they're functionally a subtype of whatever unit type (infantry, monstrous creature).

There is a precedent in the RG LA rules that suggest they are different. Jump Infantry do not receive the same ruling:

 

 

Otherwise they would have both infantry and jump infantry rules from that list, and I have never seen it argued that way.

 

Edit: they are not type infantry with wargear being jump packs that are the sole enabler of the rules they are indeed a separate entity jump infantry with the wargear.

Edited December 9, 2020 by depthcharge12