As everyone gets their head around 8th Edition, Blood Angel Players have seen their new army and I for one, Like it a lot! Let’s dive in and see what the Blood Angels can do! Check the Tactics Corner for more great articles!
Hey guys and gals, BigVik here with my first impressions on Blood Angels in 8th Edition. I’m going to try to keep this to 1 article, as my AM one turned into a mini dissertation on list design. So I’ll be breaking this up into 2 sections, Support Characters, and Package Assembly. I’ll leave the final list builds to you guys in the comments section!
Support Characters
Space Marine Ports
As with everything Blood Angels, Librarians in Blood Angels are for 1 of two things, nuking your opponent’s units, or buffing your units for maximum fist to face. Each librarian gets to choose 2 powers, I would go +1 attack and 4+ invulnerable save. This allows you to have an anvil unit for taking over-watch shots, and a hammer unit for hitting all the harder in assault.
Company Ancient
This guy is best for shooty units because of the language of the standard’s ability. A full set of shots is usually far better than one swing, along with the necessitated lesser control of unit placing during assault.
Rhino Primaris
This guy is cool, he repairs, he gives +1 to hit for shooting, and a morale buff, all that being said, Blood Angels are a very assault based faction, but I could see a shooting support base using this guy and a captain quite well.
Blood Angels
The Chapter Master of the Blood Angels, he gives re-rolls to hits, and is character assassin in assault. You want a captain staying behind to give re-roll 1’s? Go with a Captain. You want buff character who gets in there and gets his own head count? Dante is your man!
What else do I have to say, he’s a dreadnought, he’s a librarian, he can have a gun and force weapon, he hits like a brick, and he buffs. He’s not massively points efficient, and if he’s your primary vehicle, then he’s probably dead, but I can definitely see a place for Librarian Dreads.
Lord Dracula in the 41st Millennium, for 15 points over a librarian with a jump pack (38 over a stock Librarian with staff) he gains a toughness, a wound, an attack, 1 better save, has 5+ super feel no pain, and knows the entire sanguinary discipline and casts an extra power, which makes him a supreme tool box. I love Mephy, stack him in a Razorback to get him where he needs to go, and you get some great Dracula action in!
The super chaplain of the Blood Angels, he makes death company functionally fearless, gives re-rolls to hit in combat, and has a once per game “mini-feat” where he predominantly gives +1 to hit, with some attached risk, but its Blood Angels, what’s a little risk when you’re throwing flying black clad blood crazed vampires with thunder hammers at your opponent’s face? His combat prowess is also noticeable.
What is most probably the warp manifestation of Sanguinius’ soul, he is another buff bot who gives +1 attack with a death mask to debuff in combat, and hits like a ton of bricks in combat.
The super apothecary of the Blood Angels, they heal or bring a model back on a 4+, but for a small charge of 15 points, you get a strength buff in close combat too!
If the Sanguinary Priest wasn’t enough, Corbulo is one step more, for an additional 25 points over the sanguinary priest, he gains an exploding 6’s mechanic for hit rolls in combat to gain EVEN MOAR attacks to ensure the death of everything your opponent loves once you get into combat.
The Sanguinary Guard Ancient has a really unique standard, in addition to the typical standard stuff, he gives an aura of re-roll 1’s to wound in combat. Granted this guy is pretty expensive for a mini-character, but this is great dice mitigation that few other space marine armies, short of Row Boat armies, gain.
The Death Company Chaplain, he, in addition to giving re-rolls to hit in combat, and a leadership buff for Death Company, he also gives a re-roll to charge rolls, which is all the dice mitigation, something that this army truly lives on as we move forward.
Flesh Tearers
The Chapter Master of the super uber pissed off vampires, in addition to re-roll to hit rolls, he makes each unit which consolidates to within 6” of him roll a d6,on a 6 they immediately fight again… which is good for fighty msu, though you lose all of the exclusive BA units, so I’m not sure how much he’ll be seen on the table.
Package Assembly
Dante’s Sanguinary Bomb
HQ
Dante
Brother Corbulo
Librarian/Mephiston
Elites
Sanguinary Ancient
All the Sangunary Guard
Razorbacks and Storm Ravens to taste
Suggested Sanguinary Guard unit build
I think the trick here is that Dante gives re-rolls, and the Sanguinary Guard gain it when near their warlord, so the other character should probably be your warlord.
I don’t see a point for the Encarmine Axe due to it being more points, for less ap and the sword being best for killing marines, though there will be times when the math goes the other way.
Furthermore the fist is almost superfluous due to the sword and axe doing d3 wounds as well, and hit better in combat.
All the Death Company
HQ
Astorath the Grim
Lemartes Guardian of the Lost
Brother Corbulo
Chief Librarian Mephiston
Elites
Sangunary Ancient
All the Death Company
Razorbacks and Storm Ravens to taste
Suggested Death Company builds
Death Company, in my opinion should all be fielded with jump packs, and bolter/chainsword, with 1-2 thunder hammers in the unit to allow for monster hunting. This puts a 10 man unit at 220-240 points, though not super points efficient, this allows for 4-6 units to drop in turn 1 or 2 to box your opponent in with super scary assault units, that will very hard
Wrap up
Sanguinary Guard and Death Company are really dual sides of the same coin. Sangunary Guard are 2 wounds with 2+ armor and super ap multi-wound weaponry, making them very powerful power armor slayers.
Death Company are less than half the price per model, with similar threat to single wound targets and 6+ super feel no pain, with the capacity to take the very scary Thunder hammer in this edition of high-wound models, though the lack of multiple wounds on the mildly expensive Death Company is it’s own weakness.
What things do you guys think I missed, what other units do you think could work as a primary deliverable? Tell me in the comments below!
And as always, Frontline Gaming sells gaming goodies at a discount, every day!
Frontline Gaming will buy your used models for cash or store credit!
