High Lords of Terra - Game 1: Tyranids vs Blood Angels

I know this, and the following, are 5th edition battle reports but hopefully it's still pertinent in terms of a learning exercise, etc. you just had to adapt it a bit within the 6th edition construct. I'll likely combine the final four battles into two posts of two each though.

The mission was an objective based mission with set objectives. Three along the table centre (lengthwise) 18" apart and two along the table centre (widthwise) in each deployment zone, 6" from the table edge. Deployment was pitched battle. Central objectives were worth one point each, objective in your DZ was worth zero to you, three to your opponent, and objective in your opponent's DZ was worth three to you, zero to opponent.

Game was against Jason Collins using Vince's Blood Angels. I won roll-off and elected to give first to Jason.

Blood Skies for 6th edition

Minijunkie

Blood Skies was a Jumper divergent list in 5th edition which used Land Speeders to create saturation for Stormravens who would add fire support to a large body of Assault Marines. Furioso Dreads were used to increase killing capacity of certain units. This core concept transfers very well to 6th edition with Dreadnoughts getting a boost in terms of assaults (care little for overwatch and thus can take advantage of RCL), Stormravens become flyers and ASM stay roughly the same with gains and losses in multiple departments as discussed here. Let's look a list construct then.

Blood Rodeo - the 6th edition transition

I think I've gotten more e-mails about this topic than anything else ever (yes, even Draigowing). Apparently it's a popular concept which has been brought into further light with 6th edition and...Allies. Everyone's favorite topic lately.

Blood Rodeo is about using a screen of biker models to protect the FNP/FC Assault Marines of a Blood Angels army for any unwanted assaults/attention and basically ferry them into combat. Concept and tactics for 5th edition outlined here.

Jumper/DoA Blood Angels in 6th edition - Initial Analysis

GMM Studios

A very popular army in 5th edition, how do they fare in 6th? There seems to be a lot of doom & gloom and for a pure Jumper army, this is probably true. But then, pure Jumpers were always rather limited - they had huge match-up issues which is why the Hybrid variants (Blood Hammer, Blood Skies, Blood Rodeo, etc.) generally did better overall. All 6th edition really does is put further emphasis on the hybrid (non-Jumper units) nature of such armies - let's look at how and the other changes 6th edition has brought for this unique army.

Email in: A Blood Angels Planestrike List

"Hi Kirby, I’m a longtime lurker and first time emailer but I’ve followed your blog for a few months now and love what you do. Keep up the good work!

Now, I’m playing a 2,000 points game of Planestrike tomorrow for the first time, I’m the attacker playing Blood Angels against an Imperial Guard player. I’ve been playing the game for a while now but I’m really out of my comfort zone building a list for Planestrike. That being said, I racked my brain for hours trying to figure it out and this is what I came up with, tell me what you think:

Email in: Help my Dantewing!

"Hey Kirby,

First time writer, long time lurker. I've finally gotten around to having the free time to paint my flesh tearers dantewing. I'd really like to take this army to tournaments over the summer. I understand the general weakness of using a sanguinary guard heavy army, but I'm willing to roll with it anyway. My goal is to make this list as competitive as possible.

Here's what I have so far:

1500pts Outside the Box Competitive Blood Angels for VIC5

This evening in the 3++ Chat Bawks I had an interesting conversation with a regular to the blog and bawks - VIC5. He was reviewing a number of older articles of mine and drawing some inspiration on outside the box thinking and how he could apply that to his own Blood Angels at 1500pts. We got to talking and took it off the blog to refine things and then well, I fiddled. The net result is explored below. I also just received this message from him via email:  

Hey Taak, thanks very much for the list. I really appreciate your help and very much look forward to further unconventional army thoughts in the future. Perhaps something with foot Wolves? -- VIC5

Email in: Love the blog!

"Kirby,

I’ve been incorporating much of the advice that I read on your blog into my builds, and my game has been improving steadily.  While I am still a novice 40k player, I am definitely getting better.  Keep on keeping on!

With my current build, I have room left for one more unit.  I run a Mephiston that I use as an all-rounder (anti-infantry, anti-mech, whatever the situation, he’s a beast).  However, what I would ideally like is to have a bit of duality with another assault unit that can handle basic, non-terminator MEQ as well as vehicles up to AV14 (a mini Meph, if you will).  Here are a couple options that I’m looking at:

Army Comparison: DoA Blood Angels vs T6'R'Us Nidzilla

Two very iconic armies - who shall come out on top!

Advantages - Tyranids

Nidzilla is a Tyranid list based on lots of T6 wounds and plenty of Monstrous Creatures supported by little critters - the point is to overwhelm the opponent's ability to deal with so many high toughness wounds and eventually get beaten down in combat by the big critters and a sea of little gribblies.

Email in: Escalating Bloodhammer Advice

"Hey, Kirby,

First off, I’d like to say I respect your gameplay advice and have found it rather useful for upping my game. I’ve been following your recent adventures with Blood Angels, and was wanting to get into them myself. I’ve been playing a lot of heavily mechanized lists and wanted to switch it up with Bloodhammer. I’ll be playing them in an escalation league with the following ruleset, and I'd appreciate your perspective on setting up the force. Obtaining models and bitz is no issue for changing the list. The local meta is reasonably competition oriented, though disproportionately non-MEQ, but there will still be the odd marine player.

Standard BRB missions, max 4 games per tier of 250 points, ranging from 250 to 1500. A single list per point level, and it must contain all units from previous level, though upgrades/body count do not matter, eg, a Librarian could be in power armour at 500, TDA at 1000, then power armour again at 1250, and a boyz mob could be 20 strong at 250 and 12 strong at 500.

Email in: DoA with Drop Dreads

"Hello Kirby

Wanted to try a differant approach to DoA Army with the Release of the Death Spectre Transfer Sheets I didnt know what they were so thought i would google them and from the little bits I could find i Know they used Jumpers and their Prefered heavy support was Drop Dreads and Thunder Hawks as a Codex Chapter But I wanted to give them a try as BA so ya hehe...

I know missle Devs/Honour Guard and even Vanguard would be alot better and that the Dreads wont last long but its a nice distraction... for alot of points lol...

1500 Spectres

Email in: Blood Rodeo Adapation???

"You and your blog authors are the best list builders I know. I was browsing your older Blood Angels articles the other day for ideas on how to expand my current list (jump variant with Stormravens), and had this crazy idea, but no real way to test it (no one I know has bikes to proxy). I was wondering if you do me the honor of evaluating it and seeing if it made any sense.

What if you combine your Blood Rodeo and Blood Hammer lists? Here's what I'm thinking it might look like:

Email in: Beginner Army List Advice

"Love the blog! I’m a new player to Warhammer 40k (still building the army!), but I’ve done quite a bit of reading and I have a general idea of what I’m going for. Would you mind taking a look at this list to give me some pointers? I’m sure once I get some experience playing I’ll learn more of the BA tactics, but any advice for a beginner would be appreciated!

Battle Report: Blood Angels Blood Hammer versus Imperial Guard Hybrid

In prep for some tournaments coming up I've been playing the two major Blood Angel lists I prefer - foot and mech against a variety of opponents and armies. Will hopefully have at least 1/3rd of the bat reps up over the coming weeks with some tournaments around 1-2 months away. First one is a the Blood Hammer list versus a Mech Guard with some foot Platoons. Lists will be in comments sections.

Game was rolled off as five objectives, Dawn of War with Imperial Guard winning roll-off and giving me 1st.

Email in: Blood Hammer: 50-65 extra points

Dakka

"I'm headed to a tournament in a couple weeks and I'd love to run some ideas past the 3++ crowd.

Following are 1800pt for a 1850pt tournament. I've been playing a number of different 2k versions of this list for only a couple weeks and they've been doing quite well. Unfortunately I don't have time to play test many games before the tournament and I'm interested in what you, and others, think I should be doing with the last points. I have a number of ideas with the best/worst being the option of taking a Techmarine. I'm also reticent to change too many of the basics of the army without time to play-test the changes.

Email in: Blood Angels: Terminators + Devs 2000 pts

The Art of War

"Hi
I am a player who just got back into 40k, and i was wondering if i should invest in this army:

Librarian w/JP
10man Terminators w/2x Cyclone Missile Launcher
Sanguinary Priest in Terminator Armour
3x Sanguinary w/2x JP
2x 10man Assault Marine w/2x Meltaguns, PF, & Handflamer
10man Assault Marine w/2x Meltaguns, PF, & Infernus Pistol
3x 5man Devastators w/4x ML

Email in: Blood Angels Jumper List 1850

122nd Cadian

"Kirby,

Firstly I'd like to say you have an amazing blog I have been a lurker on it for almost a 6 months now and enjoy the articles you and Abusepuppy write. Secondly I would like you input on a BA DOA list if you have time of course!

So the list is 1850 and is a counts as Night Lords list.

Email in: 1000p BA Jumpers with Devs, streched too thin?

B&C

"Apologies, I have updated the army list and refined it somewhat. I decided it would be best to take out one unit, beef up the ASM and spread the remaining points among the other troops. I feel there are two ways I could have gone and wonder what your thoughts are on what would be more effective at this size of game.

HQ:
Librarian w/JP - 125 points
Honour Guard w/3xMelta, Company Standard, JP's - 210

Email in: Blood Angels army list

Winterdyne

"I was wondering if you would give a list a look for me. There is a 2000 point tournament coming up and I am stuck with how to finish my list. I am planning on doing a foot list as every one like to run lots of tanks. Any way to the list.

HQ
Mephiston

Elites
Sanguinary Priest, jump pack, power weapon, melta bomb

Email in: BA DOA list

"Hey Kirbs,

Thanks for responding to my earlier Mech Marine question - the other list I've been noodling with is a pure DoA list (have been playing a sort of Blood Hammer list but decided I wanted to go whole hog and have the fun of saying "ok, I'm deployed." and then 10 minutes later "ok, my first turn is over" after my opponent moves and has nothing to shoot at.) Have been playing the Dante variant, simply because I don't have the models for the second Honor Guard squad needed for list 2 assembled. Both lists are 2k.