A new army, but what's next?

Your favourite gretchin Simson here again, bringing you a little update on my newest project: Dark Angels army. I playtested my very first 1000 point list today, against a Chaos army that included something like 30 Cultists (three squads), bunch of Khorne 'Zerkers, Maulerfiend and Slaneesh Sorcerer & Daemon Prince, both of them level 3 psykers. My list (for those who didn't read the previous post) included total of 15 Tactical Marines, five of them behind ADL, the rest in a Rhino. Besides that a Ravenwing Command squad with Librarian, Ravenwing squad and a Darkshroud.

I won't do a detailed batrep here. Partly because we never finished the game because the store closed and other part is because I honestly forgot to take pictures.

But overall it went something like this:
We played with the new tactical objectives, each turn you must have three of them and at the end of your turn you may disregard one of them. The Librarian had Misfortune and Perfect Timing from Divination (thusly aquiring Presience with psychic focus) and as my Warlord he got Feel no Pain from the big rulebook, personal traits.

My new army started with the classical story of hunting the fallen

The Chaos had loads of psychic powers and Sorcerer as Warlord.

I started the game and Scouted forward and started the game. I advanced quickly, trying to do enough damage in the first turn with loads of plasma. However, since he had twice the psychic dice I got, he dominated the psychic phase. I didn't get the perfect timing on so the damage I did was small. After that he started a counter-attack, getting into close combat with my command squad who got their butts kicked by the Demon Prince and sorcerer. On the other hand my Tacticals were succesful, wiping out the rest of his Berzerkers. After that it was my turn. The Librarian had escaped and my Ravenwing squad flanked the Maulerfiend, getting plasma shots to it's rear armor but leaving it alive. Even in close combat he survived since my Ravenwing Sergeant missed his melta bomb.

While they were stuck in a combat with the Maulerfiend, the rest of my army got chopped to pieces as five of my Tacticals died to Psychic Shriek from the sorcerer and Daemon Prince sought out my Librarian and slayed him. After that we had to quit since the store was about to close. The game did not go well as I was far more aggressive than I should've been against so cc-orientated army. I also clearly didn't master my army as I forgot both Grim Resolve (stubborn on all of my guys) and Preferred Enemy (CSM) that my Command Squad and Librarian had. It was unfortunate how they didn't meet my expectations because of poor positioning and the amount of mastery levels my opponent had... On the other hand, I'm pretty happy with both the Tactical Squad that did their duty and stood their ground, nearly killing my opponent's Warlord before time ran out and my Ravenwing squad that was able to deal good damage thanks to their speed.

Company Master Malachiar

So after this promising beginning, what to do next? Tough to say. I'm certain that I will continue building and playing Dark Angels for a while. They clearly have boots to fill now that I'm officially finished with Eldar and it starts to seem clear that my  Space Wolves aren't inspiring me enough since I haven't bought a single thing for them in eight months after I bought the first of them.

So my plan is to continue and make them a working force. But that takes some time and work. And a good plan. After my first rush of inspiration where I just gathered everything I could and threw something green on it, it would seem  a good idea to think for a while. Decide what units do I need and how will I get them.
At the moment I have:

10x Tactical Marines
Rhino (wip)
Librarian (wip)
Company Master
Ravenwing Command Squad
Ravenwing Attack Squadron, six bikes
Darkshroud


The Fast Attack slot is clearly capable of great things, but my weak spot is at the moment in the Troops section. It would be easy to slap another Tactical Squad, but I don't truly like them. A jack-of-all-trades, master of none unit fits somewhere in the field but in long range specializing is the way to go. And we are Angels of Vengeance, not some Ultramarines or Imperial Fists, so might as well make the army cool. Another thing is my HQ choice. I wasn't happy with my Librarian in the last game. Of course it was some bad rolling and you should never decide things based on one game, but for warlord he's a bit weak with no inv and only 3+ armor. After concidering the different options I have decided two possible ways to continue making my first proper list of 1000 points.


Belial
5x Deathwing Terminators
10x Tactical Marines in Rhino
4x Ravenwing Bikes with dual Plasma
4x Ravenwing Bikes with dual Melta

Or, alternative way. A bit more fluffy with less competitive choices, altough I would love to create this one because of awesomeness!

Company Master
5x Company Veterans in Drop Pod, tons of Plasma...
5x Tactical Marines
5x Tactical Marines
6x Ravenwing Bikes
6x Ravenwing Bikes



The second list would be awesome to build, it has interesting parts and fun units, but to be honest it doesn't work as a list. Tough to say, but the first list solves my problem of having only one troops choice pretty well and gives me an excuse to use special character. On the other hand, Deathwing isn't my favourite and I'd prefer not to mix all three ways together. I wish there was a legit way to play Ravenwing/Greenwing combo without two Tactical Squads. I believe that Azrael might be worth looking into here...

But that's all I'm sharing with you today. Wish me luck on this new project, it will be needed. And hey, good luck to your hobbyism as well! Greetings from Espoo and farewell, Simson out!