New Deathwing

So I have only just recently been able to have a look at the new Dark Angels Codex and see how the changed effect my Deathwing and overall I have to say it hasnt changed much. A few points value increases with the biggest being the 60 point increase in Belial. However, he has increased in ability so I feel its worth it.

I am also not that impressed with the Deathwing Knights. I feel they are expensive for a unit that is essentially a 1 turn wonder but time will tell if I am wrong on that.

I am also slightly irritated that they made the Command Squad into a non-scoring unit. No longer are they just Deathwing Terminators with some upgrades. This fact reduces the number of troops choices in my 1750 list. Oh well.

The thing I am most delighted about however is the fact that I can now take my Land Raider Redeemer. I know its not the best LR and it has some issues especially since Templates cant Snapshot but I still love the idea of it. Plus it just looks awesome.

Overall then, aside from only 3 arm swaps I havent had to change very much in my list. The only thing I did have to drop in my 1750 list was my Dreadnought and that has not reduced my combat power by too much though I will miss that TLLC and Missile launcher especially since it now has Flak missiles.

Arm changes were to one of my Sergeants. He has now become my Company Champion so had to loose his Storm Bolter.

2nd arm swap was one of my Belials. He used to have a TH/SS mix with a large sword counting as the TH. This had to change. So he went from this:

to this:

 



The last change was to my Libby. He used to carry a Storm Shield to represent the Invulnerable power that DA libbies used to have. With that power gone he now has a SB.

 

to this:

 

 

 

Now all I need to do is play some games and see how it goes. I do have a Doubles Tournament coming up next week. 1k points each and my partner and I are both doing Deathwing.

Kitbashing - fun for the whole family

Recently, Ron over at FTW put up a post on converting your independent characters. (http://fromthewarp.blogspot.com/2011/04/converting-your-independent-characters.html) In it he talked about a number of ways to do this.

I want to talk about my favourite method which is kitbashing. With the plethora of plastics this makes things much easier than it used to be.

Because I am at the stage where my army is fully built I find myself spending much of my time making my IC's looking awesome. I am also on a drive to purge all metal from my Smurfwing army to make it as light and easy to transport as possible.

I enjoy kitbashing as you can get a great look without resorting to too much greenstuff or cutting. I love going through my bits box or perusing bits sites looking for inspiration for my next mini.

Anyways, on to my 3 IC's for my army. Captain, Librarian and Chaplain.

Captain:

First up. Captain Agemman of the First Company. I have previously posted this chap but I am going to explain a bit about how and what I used to build him.

Firstly, he is mostly based off the Chaos Terminator Lord. His legs, torso, arms and cloak come from that kit. Other bits come from: Tactical Marine Box, Venerable Dreadnought box, Dark Angels Veteran upgrade, Space Wolf Terminator box and forgeworld.

Firstly I greenstuffed in all the holes in his cloak to make it less tatty.I then cut away the chaos bits off his legs and replaced them with a DA terminator shoulder shield and a banner top.

Torso was made by cutting up the chaos torso and then cutting and fitting in the front of a venerable dreadnought. Some minor GS was used to make sure they blended into each other.

Apart from that everything is standard. So with a nights worth of cutting and GS I have made a very unique looking IC that looks good and that stands out.

Librarian.

When I saw the new GKT box I just knew I had to use the bits to make a librarian. They came with a ready made Hood for instance. I have also previously posted a model I made to use as a librarian and I admit that I used the arms off that model for the new one.

The majority of the chap is from the  GKT box. However there are bits from the Sanguinary Guard, Assault Terminators and the DA veteran box. There was no cutting involved in making him and only a teeny bit of Greenstuff to cover up some of the GK iconography on the left leg and the hip guards.

Not much work but again, I am left with a unique and good looking librarian who stands out on the table top.

Chaplain

Now this guy is my pride and joy. I am so thrilled with how he came out. He actually has the most GS work done on him, primarily on the helmet. I used one of Rons tutorials for this(http://fromthewarp.blogspot.com/2010/11/chaplain-skull-helmet-conversion.html)
I learned that this takes a lot of effort for a novice like me so have commissioned him for a second helmet that is going onto another Chaplain that I have planned.

This guy has bits from all over. Torso came from from the Chaos Terminator Lord with the iconography removed and a random skill put in its place. Legs from the GKT kit. Shoulder pads from Forge world. Storm bolter arm from the Terminator Kit. Combat arm from the Chaos Lord kit and the horrifying flail bit from an Empire Flagellant. The skull that makes up his helmet came from one of the new Tomb King Boxes.

I wanted to make him as vicious looking as possible which is why didnt give him a traditional Crozius. This flail makes him look like he is bringing it down onto the bodies of the Emperors Enemies.

So there we go. Three IC's that have been built by kitbashing and looking good. Have a look in your bits box and see what you can come up with.

Updated Banner Bearer

My 40k Hiatus has ended. After almost 5 months I am back in the saddle and rearing to go. It was mostly caused by burnout and also having to go back to South Africa for 2 months to deal with some personal issues. I am currently working on getting my guard stuff painted so that I can maybe get a game in with them sometime later this year.

Anyways, one of the first things that I did on my return was to update the banner bearer of my First Company.Before he was just a plain terminator carrying the banner but I figured that the chap who carried the sacred banner of the First would be a grizzled old veteran, bedecked with honours etc.

Thus I took the banner off the old chap (who has since had a CML and stormbolter added in its place), hacked apart a Space Hulk terminator (also previously seen on this blog) and grafted the bits together.

And viola, a really good looking banner bearer.

My aim is to get the whole Deathwing "Command Squad" looking like this using the most ornate bodies I can find.

Deathwing vs Wolfwing Part 2

 know that there have been many, many comparisons done between the Deathwing and the Wolfwing. The pros and cons of each. I have even talked about some of them in an earlier post detailing why I chose DW over WW. There is a very good over all comparision between Deathwing and Wolfwing done by Ron at FTW and can be read HERE

This however will be a direct comparison between my current Deathwing list and the closest I can get to it using the Wolfwing.

THE LISTS:

My Death Wing - 1750

~Belial

~Interogator Chaplain in Termie armour

~Squad 1

3 x Lightning Claws

Apothocary with Stormbolter / Powerfist

Banner Bearer with Stormbolter / Power fist

~Squad 2

Power Weapon / Storm Bolter

Heavy Flamer with Chainfist

2 x Powerfist / Storm Bolter

Lightning Claws

~Squad 3

Power Weapon / Storm Bolter

Stormbolter / Chainfist

2 x Powerfist / Storm Bolter

Lightning Claws

~Squad 4

2 x TH/SS

Assault Cannon / Powerfist

2 x Powerfist / Stormbolter

~Dreadnought with Assault Cannon

~Dreadnought with Plasma Cannon

~Land Raider with Extra Armour

This gives me 2 IC, 20 terminators, 2 Dreads and a Land Raider.

Belial and the chaplain run with Squad 1. This gives them a total of 6 LC and 5 PW I5 WS5 attacks, 15 LC I4 W4 attacks and 8 I1 W4 Powerfist attacks on the charge. Rerolling to hit. Its pretty devastating when it hits. These chaps either DS or walk across the field. The apothecary gives them the ability to shrug off 1 non-instant death wound per turn as long as they are not in CC.

Squad 3 Rolls in the Raider. This means that they generally sit in the backfield  protecting an objective while the raider snipes at vehicles.

Squad 2 and 4 walk across the field, each supported by a dreadnought.

This seems to work. I have not lost a 1v1 game yet using this configuration.

Now lets have a look at as close a list as I can come up with using WW

Wolf Wing – 1805 points

~Logan Grimnar

~Wolf Priest in Termie Armour

~Squad 1

3 x Wolf Claw

2 x Powerfist / Stormbolter

~Squad 2

Power Weapon/Storm Bolter

Heavy Flamer/Chain F ist

Wolf Claws

2 x Stormbolter/PowerFist

~Squad 3

Power Weapon/Storm Bolter

Wolf Claws

Stormbolter / Chainfist

2 x Stormbolter/PowerFist

~Squad 4

2 x TH/SS

Assault Cannon / Powerfist

2 x Powerfist / Stormbolter

~Dreadnought with Plasma Cannon

~Dreadnought with Assault Cannon

~Land Raider with extra armour

This is an exact model count duplicate.

My tactics would be slightly different here. I would run Grimnar with Squad 1 and the Wolf priest with Squad 4. This way, both of the squads would get preferred enemy.

Assuming he does not use his Living Legend rule, Grimnar gets 6 attacks on the charge, the Wolf Claw chaps would get 12 I4, WS4 attacks and I would choose for them to re-roll “to wound” and the Powerfists get 6 I1 WS4 attacks. Getting charged or charging this unit would be a very painful experience.

Squad 2 and 4 would be supported by a dreadnought each

Squad 3 would sit in the Raider, same as the Deathwing and Squad 4 would be walking.

COMPARISON:

The Wolfwing comes in at 55 points more costly. This can be solved by removing a single TH/SS termie from the list. This of course drops your unit count by 1.

Belial vs Grimnar is a no brainer. Grimnar utterly outclasses Belial in every way possible except price. He is more than double the cost of Belial.

Chaplain vs Wolf Priest. This one is a little more tough to call. The Wolf priest is 25 points cheaper and gives preferred enemy. However I would have to go with the Chaplain. He retains the old chaplain stats i.e. higher Initiative, more wounds and attacks and also allows you to re-roll hits on the charge. I think that is worth the 25 points.

Squad 1. The WW squad is cheaper but is missing out on the extra attack from the banner as well as the ignored wound from the apothecary. Do I think that makes a difference. Well, if Grimnar is attached I don’t think the extra attack matters but I think that being able to shrug off a wound is well worth the extra points. A Deathwing termie costs 53 points, the apothecary upgrade is 30. Save 1 wound and it has paid for itself. I think the Deathwing Squad comes out on top.

Squad 2 and 3 are almost identical in price so no real differences.

Squad 4. The WW squad is more expensive but overall is the better pick. You get the upgraded Storm shields so its more survivable and if you attach the Wolfpriest its going to be quite nasty in combat.

Dreadnoughts – roughly the same price so no real difference there. However the old style smoke makes them more survivable so I would choose the DW dreads.

Land Raider. Also a hard one to choose between. They cost the same but the WW version comes with the new POTMS. For a raider that is being used as a firebase I think this may be the better bet as it allows you to shoot with BS4 and split fire. However for a moving LR you really need the extra armour to stay mobile. While you can afford this in the DW list you won’t be able to get it in the WW list. In fact, with the old POTMS you can still go 6 inches without the extra armour if you are stunned plus shoot a weapon at BS2.

This, coupled with the old style smoke makes me choose the DW raider.

A few other army wide differences are the smoke launchers and the fact that Deathwing armies are all fearless. The smoke is an important issue. With the plethora of Melta around, the ability to make all penetrating hits glancing for a round is invaluable and has saved my bacon more than once. The pros and cons of fearless units are well documented so I wont rehash that except to say that I really like it.

CONCLUSION:

Its odd, when I started this I fully expected for the Wolfwing to come out on top. However, looking at it I would hazard that the Deathwing sneaks out in front. Now granted that this is a direct comparision and I doubt that a Wolfwing player would have a unit set up like this and is unlikely to have the same play style or tactics usage but I think the principles are sound. This is especially true since to get an army comparable to mine the Wolfwing has to compromise on number of models or wargear choices. It cant have both as it is just too pricey.