1500 Shooting Blood Angels

[ElectricPaladin]

In honor of the counts-as Captain Tycho I'm in the process of making, I decided to put together a shooting-centric Blood Angels list, just to see what it's like. I'm curious to read your input.

HQ
• Captain Tycho

Elites
• 10 Sternguard Veterans, 2 Heavy Flamers, 3 Combi-Meltas
• 3 Sanguinary Priests, 2 on foot w/tactical gear, 1 jump w/assault gear

Troops
• 10 Assault Marines, 2 Meltaguns, Sergeant w/Combat Shield, Plasma Pistol, Power Maul
• 10 Tactical Marines, Flamer & Heavy Bolter

Heavy Support
• Stormraven w/Lascannons & Multi-Meltas

It's odd.. at first, I thought this list was too small. But no, it's got thirty-four 3+ (well, thirty-three 3+ and one 2+ 4++) bodies, and all of them to have 5+ Feel No Pain. At 1500 points, that's actually a pretty decent sized force, and not at all easy to remove. It's only three squads, but all of them have the capacity to divide until two smaller squads.

What is dangerous is that the force will present a small profile: either a single land raider driving up the field with assault marines deep striking and a stormraven in reserve, or a land raider flanked by assault marines, with a storm raven in reserve.

That said, since I've almost always won with my Blood Angels by advancing directly down my opponent's throat, with my entire army in a single tight formation, it's not actually that big a deal, and I can always peel off my assault marines later to grab an objective, speedy as they are.

So, what do you think? I'd have to make some alterations to unpainted models to make this army work, and I'm eager to read your comments...

[Caitsidhe]

I think it is a very solid list for a 1500pt game. It is an assault army and thus suffers the issues all assault armies suffer. I understand you built it as a shooting-centric list, but with Assault Marines and ample short range special weapons (flamers and melta) you really do have to get in close to close the deal. A Stormraven is a good air-to-air killer which should help you with the one Helldrake (if fighting CSM) you are likely to see at 1500pts (perhaps two).

[Katharon]

I would argue against diluting the ranged power of the Sternguard by giving them heavy flamers. Far better to use those points to give them a ton of combi-weapons. That way at least they can choose to fire either their special ammunition or their combi-weapon. Nothing made me laugh more, when the new 6th ed rules first came out for Overwatch, than when a buddy of mine charged my Sternguard and they were armed with 10 combi-flamers. The sheer look of horror was one that I'll never forget.

[vonDietdrich]

Having played a lot of Blood Angels.. I enjoy seeing Captain Tycho quite a bit. He doesn't get enough face time by half.

That said, there's a couple of problems that pop out at me with this list.

From your description of the list, presumably you're running a Land Raider Crusader though I don't see it in there. Those things are awesome, and a Land Raider + Storm Raven is decently durable and will offset some of your troop issues.

However, presenting a slim profile can be both good and very, very bad. A problem I've run into is that a lot of Blood Angels are priced to where you usually only want to take a few max squads (to benefit from Sanguinary Priests and other squad-wide benefits), and those squads tend to be more expensive than their counterparts in other codexes. For Captain Tycho to be used at his best, he's got to be run with a full 10 man squad (so that he can bestow Special Issue Ammo).

In other words, if your opponent only has one or two targets to pick from (especially if some of your troops are tied up in melee), you're going to see large portions of your list get blitzed with every bullet that your opponent has. The downside of Land Raiders and Storm Ravens is that if your opponent has literally any other legal targets, he will fire at them instead (unlike lighter tanks, which will eat up some fire but possibly be destroyed).

What this means in practical considerations for a game is, your army's movements are very powerfully telegraphed, and can be countered by clever positioning. It won't be hard to see what you're doing and hem in your movements.

The minute your troops disembark, they will get blasted. Your opponent will focus all of his guns on solely your troops, and Blood Angels (even with Tycho + Sternguard) are not a shooting army. They can't lay down the sheer weight of fire required to go toe to toe with dedicated shooting armies. Even Storm Shield terminators with a Sanguinary Priest terminator have a rough time weathering multiple turns of dedicated shooting: regular power armor will melt like ice cream on a summer day, even with FNP.

The other issue is, while yes, you can theoretically squad all of your troops.. that means you've only got two ways to ferry them up the field. In my experience, against any competent opponent, a Marine that's on foot might as well be dead if he doesn't have more enticing things to shoot at. Which returns me to the problem with heavily armored transports not drawing aggro.

Your Meta May Vary, of course. If you think this sort of list will be effective in your LGS, go for it. It'll be fun, which is the point. But it has several glaring tactical and strategic flaws that can be defeated in the list-building phase, and one of the frustrating things about Blood Angels is that it sucks to start off on the back foot because of differences in army construction between you and your opponent. So long as you're aware of these things and don't get blind-sided when you actually play the army.. I don't see why not. But you will be fighting an uphill battle each game. Good luck.

[ElectricPaladin]

Some of the list above is in consideration of the models I have. I've actually taken it one step further in obedience to the models I have, and the first few times I play the list I'll be using it with a combi melta on the sternguard sergeant only and a combi-plasma on the tactical sergeant. I'll hit eBay at some point and get a few extra marines that I can bash up into the alternate models I need for a naked tactical sergeant and two more sternguard with combi-meltas.

As far as the heavy flamers go... I dunno. I kinda like 'em. Combi-weapons only do their trick once, and I really like heavy flamers. But I'll play around and see if the list is stronger without them.

Re: vonDietdrich...

Yeah, it's a crusader. The only land raider I bother to own!

Firstly one of your concerns is no a problem: combat squadded units can now share a ride in the same transport! So there's nothing stopping me from dividing my sternguard in two and having them ride up the field together, then split up upon arrival, or having half of the squad jump out along the way to claim an objective while the rest of the squad continues.

The rest of your post, I think I understand. To restate your point: the Blood Angels have a problem with their stuff being too expensive, because their codex is ancient, and because this list includes two enormous and expensive vehicles as well as over-priced Blood Angels stuff, it intensifies this problem. It's true - if I were building this list with Codex: Space Marines, I could probably fit in a whole other vehicle, like a vanilla predator or something, to drive up alongside the land raider and draw aggro.

But, like you said, that's just part of the uphill battle we face playing Blood Angels...

Thanks for the reminder, though. I will definitely keep it in mind, and report back when I see how the list fares in real play!

[Wolfshade]

You know, I've not used Tycho since 2nd ed.

I like this list, might tinker down a 1,000pt version (my usual level) and have fun with that.

[ElectricPaladin]

You know, I've not used Tycho since 2nd ed.

I like this list, might tinker down a 1,000pt version (my usual level) and have fun with that.

Personally, if I were doing it at 1k, I'd take out the stormraven and tacs and replace them with sniper scouts. Maybe you'd have to bring the sternguard down to five men, and put them in the stormraven instead and take out the crusader instead... I dunno.

Let me know how it goes!