Old Shatter Hands is ready, putting the final touches on my Blood Angels army that I started earlier this year. My Land Raider is nearing completion, pictured above and work will soon commence on my Furioso Dreadnought below. What this means for you is not less Tau articles here but I plan on letting my friends and brothers field my Blood Angels army to give me field practice and insight how to crack the army with the power of the Tau'Va. (Pete, get ready!)
One thing I can tell you right now is that now matter how sick Blood Angels are in the assault, they still die like all marines. T4 and 3+ armor are no match for plasma rifles, massed missile pods and railguns. Like all marine lists, I am sure that getting them out on foot and keeping your distance will still be the key to victory. I'd also like to invite MFerek to fight against my Blood Angels when the new codex comes out. (Mark, if you're reading this is an official challenge.) Hopefully we'll have a battle report to share with you all.
Tau players will have to watch out for a few things that I am 90% sure will happen. The Blood Angels are likely to get a host of units that, like Vanguard Vets, can deepstrike and assault on the same turn. This is enough to cause a Tau to tear his single lock of hair out. How are you guys thinking of dealing with this? I'm planning on using cheap mobile units to protect my fellows and might even consider working a few squads of Gun Drones in my list to protect my key units. Any thoughts from the rest of you out there?
12 comments:
Seams they are getting a deepstrikeing rhino that jumptroops can assult out of if they deepstrike it.
Also..psyker dreads ;)
/Zirjin
I think the Blood Angels will be no more scary than any other marine flavour, but they will play a little differently. The Space Wolves were supposed to bring the doom of killer troops, thunderwolves and Long Fangs but I've not heard anybody considering them to be unbeatable or unkillable.
I think that they will just form a third assaulty marine option (not including regular marines).
- Black Templars come at you in transports with assaulty, vow-powered nutcases. Expect Land Raiders and Rhinos.
- Space Wolves come riding Thunderwolves and jumping out of drop pods. Grey Hunters give you a short-range firefight and have counter attack to make assaults nasty
- Blood Angels get up in your face early on with pods and Storm Harbingers (the lander) to drop assault things at you. The rest of their force comes across the board on jump packs.
Dealing with them will require a good lockdown on board control. You need to dictate where they can drop pod (by castling around terrain?) and consider whether your units should play from reserve. Power armour all goes down the same way to our firepower and as long as you are ready for a rapid attacking force, I don't see they will be game breaking.
Looking forward to having some harsh playtests with OSH though :-)
Hey dude, bring your Blood Angels to Bolscon! Fritz and I are trying to start up a BA vs Eldar Apocalypse!
Bolscon. I'll try to get there. My wife does have veto-power on stuff like that. We'll see.
GW seems to think that Blood Angels are all about Deepstriking, so for the Tau, it will probably be just like fighting Chaos Daemons. The only downside is that these enemies will have a 3+ save.
OSH - I wish we were both on the same side of the water, because I'd really like to give you a game with my Space Wolves.
OSH, I noticed from my last comment on your previous blog that there was quite a debate about the Pulse rifle/carbine issue.
Towards the end some people were also commenting on the lack of troops choices; along with comments in the past about Ethereals being the Worst HQ in 40k, our lack of ability to fight in close combat, etc.
So I would just like to draw this blog away to ask you a question my mate asked me -
Why did you decide to buy a Tau army?? what was it that appealed to you about the Tau? was it how they look or did you read into their background BEFORE you decided to build a Tau army?
I'd also like to know everyone else's reason for getting a Tau army too please!
The tau let me fight in a way that is a close to a modern army as 40k gets. They have a mobile fire support base, recognise that bringing foes down at range is less risky, are technologically and tactically adaptable and have some cool guns.
Of course, it does bring the issue that modern armies aren't set up to deal with 7ft superhumans with APC-level armour, hugely adaptive green fungi beasts, ravenous hyper-predatory insectoids and other such nasties. Given that shooting is greatly weaker on the table in 40k than would probably be the case on a real 40k battlefield, you have some problems with tau.
I like the model lines, the way the army is put together, the concept of the Greater Good and the challenge on the tabletop. I feel like playing Tau makes me really have to think about where I go, what moves to make, how to really prioritise my targets and movement and how to play conservatively most of the time. It's a fun mental challenge and very satisfying when you get it figured out and pull out a win (or a draw where you mostly massacre the opposition).
Reading the fluff in the Taros campaign was particularly good too. I like the much more tactical nature of the battle compared to much of the 40k fluff.
Of course....that's just me ;-)
Can't wait to see a batrep with your new codex Blood Angels vs the Tau. Your army is looking great.
I have no doubt that when the codex comes out we'll have some players crying into their internet about the Blood Angel's version of Lash, Biker Nobs, Valkyries, Jaws of the World Wolf or Doom of Malantai. Still, here's hoping.
You're clearly making more progress on getting your Blood Angels painted than I am. They look fantastic so far, I'm truly envious. It'll be great to hear your perspective on how they play in relation to your primary army.
If you stop by my blog you'll find my idea for a new Blood Angels unit, something that could really give the Tau shock ;)
Ahhh another brother :D Angels of Death r incoming! hahah i'm wating for new codex. I hope to deploy my 10 death company models.. i play BA for them... ahhhh have nice day.
Like with all the recent codex we will have to wait and see actual copies and have seen some people play with it. You will see a lot of forum whining, regardless. That just can't be helped.
Assaulting from deepstrike puts a big hit on any army that is weak in hand to hand. At least it is no longer 4th edition, where you consolidated into new assaults. It might be hard to protect those suits and even the broadsides that you thought were safe getting charged from the rear.
Yeah, I think BA are going to be uniquely outfitted to wreck the Tau. We'll see what happens in one month!
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