Old School here with another post for Dark Angels in 6th Edition. So far we have covered Deathwing and Ravenwing. Today's post is about the rest of the book (at least from the perspective of units I have used on the table). Here is where we delve into territory where our old codex may be screwy in terms of options and points cost, so while I will lightly tough on allies below, it's not the focus. Allies will be part of the next post. Also throughout this post will be images from other hobbyists with great DA models, most are linked! Here we go ...
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| One of the best dreads ever, by Jorvic |
Dreadnoughts
Our dreads have always been a pretty decent little unit to have around, though hull points can be a curse or a blessing. On one hand, we can get glanced and still have a full movement/ shooting phase, but on the other hand, we are a little less able to lock up weak units in close combat knowing that they could only glance us. We also square off against grenades at our weapons skill in close combat, which is very scary for a dreadnought. We simply cannot rely on some of the tricks we used to like locking enemies in combat who can't hurt us, ect. I do love them as a weapons platform and plan to keep testing them in 6th edition lists, but may use more ravenwing units since they have gotten more useful for the points and come with fearless wounds rather than hull points.
Venerable Dreadnoughts
The ven dread's cool ability to make you re-roll a result is suddenly less attractive when it only comes attached to a hull-point stealing pen result and the added expense to the dreadnought frame for that ability along with BS 5, given the thoughts I have on the regular dread above, really steer me away from them more than in the past. I may revisit them later if I begin to see less melta on the board, but if I do take them, (or any dreads in the future) they may be from an ally or in a pod.
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| By Aric Wulf |
Predators
The predator tank has always been an option in my Dark Angels lists and when I field them, they have been decent performers. We could now potentially use at least one cheaper pred from our allies, but if we want to take DA on their own, preds are a better choice than before in my opinion. First, AV13 front is harder to pen and glances don't shut us down right away anymore, so we will get more turns of shooting if they can walk away with a hull point.
We still have to be weary of side armor (even more so with flyers), but we always have ways to cover the side of a mobile tank (termies, nikes ect.). With the Dark Angels general lack of ability to deal with flyers on their own, a tank that has been blessed with divination can shoot a little more accurately into the air, potentially downing smaller craft like the Voidraven, Nightscythe or flying MCs for that matter - which also means that the tank can really hose ground units now if it has been given re-rolls to hit via divination (this goes for the lascannon versions too)! My past favorite was the Auto Cannon/ Las sponson version, but I will now look to the AC/ Bolter as another option)
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| A unique take on the color scheme from Hortwerth |
Land Raiders
The Land Raider is still a great tank for Deathwing terminators. We play a game of give and take with the fact that we can only assault out if it moves 6", though the random charge potentiall gives us more range and we do disembark 6" instead of 2". What it still brings to the table for us is what it always did before - a tough, mobile gun platform and protection for the squad inside. I won't comment on the lascannon (God Hammer) version because I have never taken them for DA, though I will say that the Deathwing heavy armies really benefit from the extra guns. It is still a target for melta and some flyers can really give it hell, but I think it still has a place in most lists for the moment - afterall it take roughly 36 missile launcher shots to drop it these days!
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| from CMON, I hope the bring Asmodai back! |
Chaplains
The Interigator Chaplain is the unit I have the most experience with playing mostly deathwing and while I had a love/hate relationship with him, I feel it is time to part ways. The Librarians can now take divination, which can basically give me "Super Guide" and includes re-rolls to-hit in close combat. Sorry Chappy. This works for the chaplain on bike too. The only reason I would take a bike chaplain over a div libby is to take the 4++.
There are many other units in the codex that I really don't have experience with like scouts, which I think would be better from allies, veterans, which I just don't care for along with vindicators and whirlwinds (in this book codex anyway). I just don't have the experience with them and I would be wrong to shoot from the hip here.
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| My Zeke! |
Psykers/ Librarians
We can now step away from the lame powers our codex gave us and step into the strange new world of Disciplines! This comes at the price of us losing the board wide hood (FAQ) and also comes with the fact that our librarians are still LD9, however, we have the ability to take Divination, which has a Primaris Power that allows us to re-roll misses, which is fairly useful for our shooting units as well as our CC units. I still prefer Ezekiel if I am going to take a librarian as I own the model (which is a great model) and while he is a mastery level 1, he does have the option of knowing more powers. I have played with Ezekiel in 6th edition and found him to be pretty useful twin-linking my Speeders and my dreadnoughts! I plan to playtest the regular libbies in the following week and will come back to tell you what I think.
That is all I have today. The next DA in 6th Ed article will take us through the ally options. Thanks for reading and as always, feedback is appreciated. You can see that I clearly had a select set of units that I really played with and if you have wider experience in the codex, please provide your insight.
Good words Old School, like your thinking. A question about Ven dreads - am very find of mine even though he often achieved little (but looks so cool!).
ReplyDeleteI read elsewhere someone suggested that as the FAQ says we should refer to the main rule book for vehicle stats, and that there were no specific stats for Dark Angel vet dreads, that we should use the profile for standard Space Marine Ven dreads ( ie with a better stat line than the one in our codex)
Do you think that's a fair intrepration of the rules? If so I'll field him just for the novelty of the better stat line!
Oh - and tanks, I've always always taken a pred with twin linked las cannons before. For some reason the one gun made him less of a threat but meant he always got six turns of moving and shooting - which usually gave static targets a bad day. Will be interested to see how the new rules change that.
Bluey