Swindon Wargamers And Tacticians

The other day I summarized my thoughts on the new BA codex for some of my mates and I thought I'd post my analysis of the Blood Angels codex with some brief thoughts on the various rules/units which may be of interest to people. I'm in no way an expert on 40K so these are more gut feelings on advantages/disadvantages, but may serve to give you a feel for the codex and how it is looking like it will play out.

NB. where I say things like "same as codex" I mean the vanilla marine codex.

Rules/Army List Analysis

Rules changes

And they shall no no fear - same as codex
combat squads - as codex
Red Thirst - roll a d6 for all units (with the "Red Thirst" special rule) at the start of the game - on a 1 that unit replaces ATSKNF with Furious Charge and Fearless
Decent of Angels - several units have this, as per usual GW style, in the small print (see a tiny note in the jump pack rules), anything with a jump pack gets this. Basically a reroll on deep strike + only scatter 1d6" anyway rather than 2d6"

HQ's

I can't remember the name of all the HQ's but I will try to summarise what I can.

Dante - the only "Chapter Master" entry in the list (no "chapter master" for successor chapters to use), essentially makes Sanguinary Guard "troops" rather than elites
Mephiston - better than a demon prince, but not an independent character, so he can't join units or do anything but wander around and get shot at. Could potentially 1v1 kill anything in close combat
Sanguinor - close combat monster, costs more than a land raider, questionable whether he'd make his points back. good vs big things, would probably get overwhelmed by small things
Astorath - allows death company to remove 0-1 restriction, makes red thirst a 1-3 on a d6 rather than a 1, other than that an expensive chaplain
Tycho - two versions of him, normal and death company - ok in both really although death company come with baggage I'll go over later - interestingly Tycho gets "Rites of Battle", so all units roll on his leadership - nice bonus
Seth - chapter master of the flesh tearers - bit of a combat monster and designed to wipe out units (although characters and vehicles too are possible) - can either attack a lot (S8 rending weapon that strikes at initiative) or auto-hit everything in base contact at S8 rending. Oh and anything that tries to hit him and rolls a 1 grants him an auto S4 hit back at them as he gives 'em a kick to the nads (or whatever appendage his boot finds first )

Chapter Master - doesn't exist, so nothing for your successor chapter and no orbital bombardment
Captain - same as codex except (most notably) no relic blade and no artificer armour (yeah i know...) a poor cousin of the codex captain, unlikely to get used
Librarian - same as codex stats-wise, different powers... are they better... erm... jury is still out. They get a meltagun like power (4d6" range) the ability to move like they have a jump pack and a few others. Probably the best is the S10 power which means hitting at Initiative but at S10... which is awesome. Usual upgrades like Epistolary etc.
Reclusiarch - better version of a chaplain (his best ability? he isn't taking up an elite slot )
Honour Guard - replaces command squad/honour guard from codex. Mostly the same options but no access to bikes. quite a nice option though for the BA's
Master of the Forge - doesn't exist

Elites

Terminator Squad - as codex
Terminator Assault squad - as codex, but TH/SS termies cost more
Sternguard - as codex
Furioso Dreadnaught - WS6 A2(3) - lots of options, can be turned into a librarian furioso too. (replaces Venerable dreadnought)
Sanguinary Guard - jump pack dudes with glaive encarmine (2 handed master crafted power weapon), they cost the same as a terminator squad, lack inv. saves and have 2handed weapons which means no extra attack from a pistol (i get the impression they were playtested as having "relic blades" but S6 proved too nails, so they became basically master-crafted power weapons) - this makes them weaksauce vs a lot of things tbh. Way overcosted for what they can accomplish.
Chaplain - same as normal codex
Sanguinary Priests - can take 1 to 3 of them and place them wherever you like. Have a 6" feel no pain & furious charge bubble. Can be given termie armour or jump packs. Only downside - easy kill point in 1/3 of standard missions.
Techmarine - same as codex (no option in HQ btw for the master of the forge)

Troops

Tactical Squad - as codex
Assault Squad - as codex except they can take meltaguns x2 in a 10man squad.
Death Company - nice idea, start with 3 dudes, can go up to like 30 or something daft (at 20pts a model) can be given anything from a power sword to a thunder hammer. Grossly expensive unit. Main issue with them is they have "Rage", nice in fluff, but basically it means they always head for the closest enemy unit, so it is an expensive unit you have no control over. Even sticking an IC with them, you can't make them go where you want them too. Silly easy to kite with the right unit. They do get fleet etc. but a unit you have no control over... I'm not sure that is enough of a positive. You can also pile them in rhinos, drop pods or give them jump packs etc.
Death Company Dreadnought - awesome close combat dreadnoughts (similar to codex venerable in they ignore stunned/shaken), but to have 1 you need to take 5 death company first. This is one heck of a crutch as you have to answer the question of whether or not the death company has a place in your army. If not, an expensive unit just to qualify for a decent dread is a pain.
Scouts - as codex (no option for land speeder storms)

Dedicated Transports

Rhino - can go an extra 6", but costs 15pts more than a codex one
Razorback - as codex but +15pts
Drop Pod - codex points cost, but 2 less passengers... so no 10man squad + leader... why?
Land Raiders (various flavours) - can't remember if these are fast or not, I don't think so (pretty sure it is rhino chassis only) but they are now dedicated transports rather than heavy support choices. obviously they get the whole "deep strike" deal, but honestly I can't see that being genuinely useful. deep strike is pretty dodgy anyway (i don't think they get an accurate deep strike like a drop pod) and you could come down turn 5 (which with a 250pt land raider and potentially a 250pt unit inside) could be very bad for the battle... not to mention the fact you might land in melta range!

Fast Attack

Vanguard Vets - Very nice for Blood Angels, get decent of angels if they have jump packs (anything with a jump pack gets decent of angels) which means (and apply this to any jump pack troop in the game) they can reroll the scatter dice on deep strike and only scatter 1d6" anyway. VV also can assault when they land. Makes them usable for BA's. Not a game winning unit, but they actually come in cheaper for Blood Angels
Baal Predator - fast predator with choices of twin-linked assault cannons or flamestorm cannons
Bikes/Attack Bikes/Scout Bikes etc. - same as codex
Land Speeders - same as codex, but no storm option

Heavy Support

Devastators - same as codex
Whirlwind - as codex, but fast and so costs more
Vindicator - same as codex, but fast and so costs more
Predator - same as codex, but fast and so costs more
Thunderfire - no option for BA's to take this
Dreadnought - normal dreads
Stormraven gunship - as mentioned above, better than the IGuard version and can carry 2 units (well, a unit and a dreadnought) - no model for it though - maybe forgeword? I've seen some people have created themselves and the consensus seems to be an amalgamation of the land raider and vendetta... yeah expensive model!

Conclusion

Well, I think that covers the lot. It isn't the uber codex I was expecting and in many ways really suffers vs the vanilla codex. It doesn't beat the Space Wolf codex for sheer power (but at least they don't ride giants bats I guess, so small mercy there ). For someone that wants to play Blood Angels, it is an okay codex - despite what they've added, it is weaker than previous Blood Angels codex's in many way. There are a lot of redundant units (Sanguinary Guard and Death Company arguably) but there is some fun to be had. As Blood Angels were my first army, I do have a soft spot for them, especially now they have a codex, so I am going to give them a whirl. I actually have 4 dreadnoughts (5 if I wanted to use the world eaters one I have as a proxy... erm... well 6 if you count the venerable i bought but never assembled... *cough*). But tbh I probably wouldn't do a dread army. I have my "small model count" army in my Deathwing, so I'd probably do a similar army to the one I was planning to do as Vanilla marines. Mind you at first pass of the points, the points increase of the rhino's and vindicators alone means on average you are 1 whole unit/tank down if you go Blood Angels over Vanilla marines. Hmm...

Well, I tried, but a fun/varied "Blood Angels" army just doesn't seem possible.

After having spent days and nights pouring over it and writing various lists, the codex seems to almost be shoehorning you into 6 predators and nothing but assault-style units. Competitive yes, but it leaves very little scope for anything fun or varied (especially for friendly games). If you take the fun stuff or like variety in your units it leaves huge gaps in the army that then tactically don't work well together.

On top of that, the bits that are missing (Relic Blades, Artificer armour, Land Speeder Storms, Thunderfire Cannons, Master of the Forge etc.) really pull the list too far away from what I like about Space Marines. Especially when I'd quite like to use things like Storms and the MotF.

The models are still awesome however, but will now be integrated into my vanilla marine army instead I think.

I'm sure plenty of people will make this army work, but for now at least it just isn't inspiring me and I can't see how to make it so.

btw this isn't a plea for help with a list (or a judgement on anyone else who uses the Codex ), just my opinion on how the Codex feels to my playstyle! Back to the Sons of Medusa it is!