Blood Angels vs Thousand Sons and Daemons: Battle Report Post September FAQ

Hello all. It has been a while since I wrote an article here, but rest assured I have been busy painting, building and playing aplenty in 8th edition primarily with my Blood Angels.

Recently I got a chance to playtest a list Post September FAQ via Vassal.  If you don't know what Vassal is, go check it out. A great program to run 40k simulation games.  I use it all the time to playtest and refine lists and build ideas.

The September FAQ brought with it a lot of changes to the game, specifically geared towards curbing the power of Blood Angels, or more specifically, the smash captain character.  These changes, especially to units with the Fly keyword, have had major impacts on how we play the game.  I wanted to playtest these changes just to see how different things play now and the answer is; it is challenging yes, but not something that can't be overcome.  So, let's have a look at the armies.

My Blood Angels army is a more refined version of the army I took to ATC earlier this year. I didn't do as well as I would have liked at ATC, but having made some changes to the list, it has become much better. Primarily this happened by adding a Chaplain to the army. It has improved the power of the list tremendously. Enough talk though, here is the army rundown:

Battalion - Blood Angels
The Sanguinor (Warlord: Heroic Bearing)
Mephiston

Scouts, Bolters
Tacticals x2

Vanguard - Blood Angels
Captain, Jump Pack, Inferno Pistol, Thunderhammer (Relic: Angel's Wings)
Chaplain, Jump Pack, Inferno Pistol, Crozius

8x Sanguinary Guard
8x Sanguinary Guard
Sanguinary Ancient (Relic: Standard of Sacrifice)
Relic Sicaran Battle Tank
Relic Sicaran Battle Tank

And here is the list I was up against:

Battalion - Thousand Sons
Ahriman on Disc
Daemon Prince with Wings  (Warlord: High Magister, Relic: Helm of the Third Eye)
Daemon Prince with Wings (Relic: Dark Matter Crystal)

Cultists x2
20 Tzaangors w/ Brayhorn

Battalion - Chaos Daemons
Fluxmaster x2

20 Pink Horrors
10 Brimstone Horrors
15 Bloodletters
15 Bloodletters
15 Bloodletters

Super Heavy Auxiliary - Thousand Sons
Magnus the Red

The Mission

I playtested the mission Aggressive Recon from the Warzone Atlanta 2018 mission packet. As this is my next major event, I wanted to prep for and practice the missions.  This mission uses 6 objectives as the primary. Each can only be scored by each army once starting on battle round 2. The first player to score an objective gets 2 victory points and it cannot be scored again by that player. If the opponent then comes and scores that objective later, they get 3 victory points. The secondary is based on percentage of kill points destroyed. The tertiaries are Alternative First Blood, Slay the Warlord, and Linebreaker, each worth 2 battle points each, unless scored by both players then they are only worth 1 battle point each.

We rolled up deployment and got good old fashioned dawn of war. Was kind of hoping for hammer and anvil here because I had range with the Sicarans to shoot most of his daemons away.

Deployment

The two big pieces in the center were considered line of sight blocking terrain 9" high. I deployed the Blood Angels heavy on the left side with some tacticals over to the right to stretch out my opponents deep strike ability since there were 3 bloodletter bombs ready to come down on me turn 2. The scouts forward deployed to help in that regard as well, although they died quickly as we will see.

The Thousand Sons spent 6 command points to put all 3 bloodletter bombs in reserve, and deployed the rest of the army. The Tzaangor bomb was deployed right across from my lines with a demon prince beside them to use dark matter crystal to redeploy them and charge me. Cultists and horrors blocked off the important characters out in front of Ahriman, the demon princes and Magnus.

Thousand Sons finished deployment first and got the +1 to the roll.  They managed to take turn 1 and I could not seize, which actually in this mission is not so bad.

Thousand Sons Turn 1

This is a look at the board at the end of Thousand Sons turn 1.  Magnus flew up and used Warptime to get right on my scouts which he smited and assaulted, earning First Blood.  The Tzaangors moved up and the Daemon Prince moved in range to dark matter crystal them 9" away from my lines on the left side. Ahriman and the other Daemon Prince were successfully able to buff Magnus casting Weaver of Fates and Glamour of Tzeentch on him, making his invulnerable save 3++ with a -1 penalty to hit. The Tzaangors successfully charged in, managing to hit my tactical squad and tag my razorback meaning it would not shoot in my turn 1. Due to some fortunate saves on my part, the tzaangors only dropped 1 tactical marine.

Blood Angels Turn 1

So the changes to the Fly keyword were felt right away. Normally I could just hop over the tacticals with the Sanguinary Guard in the charge phase, but with the changes to how Fly interacts now, I can only move over models and terrain in the movement phase. This meant I'd have to not only fall back with the tacticals, but also I would likely not be able to get The Sanguinor or the Sanguinary Ancient into combat with them. Between combined firepower of the Sicarans and the Sanguinary Guard I was able to kill most of the Tzaangors in shooting, but would have to charge and kill the rest.

On the right side, I moved my other squad of Sanguinary Guard and the Chaplain up the right side to deal with Magnus. I fired both Sicarans into Magnus, who had both Weaver of Fates up for the 3++ and Glamour of Tzeentch for -1 to hit. Fortunately Sicarans don't care about any penalties to hit if the target can Fly. I then charged my Sanguinary Guard in needing an 8 to get in and leaving one daisy chained back so the squad could get re-rolls to hit from the Chaplain. This is, in my opinion, what makes the list tick because both squads are getting re-rolls to hit in the Fight phase. One squad gets it from The Sanguinor, as he is the warlord, and the Chaplain of course gives the re-rolls to the other unit.

This is where Glamour came in handy, as between the combined firepower of the Sicarans and then the Sanguinary Guard hits in assault (at -1 to hit) it left Magnus with a single wound remaining! I now had a hard choice in front of me. I could pay 3 CP to let the squad fight again, possibly removing a huge threat to my backfield. Or, I could just wait.  Magnus swung back and killed a few of the Sanguinary Guard but left me with enough, I felt, to be able to sneak a single wound through. I opted to fight again with them burning those precious command points. Sadly for me, Magnus made every save on the second bout leaving me minus 3 CP with nothing to show for it. Bummer.

Thousand Sons Turn 2

This is of course the pic from the end of the player turn, but what is missing is the 3rd squad of bloodletters. I'll get to that in a moment.

At the start of the turn, Thousand Sons scored both of their backfield objectives getting an early lead on the primary 4-0. Magnus fell back hoping to mortal wound and smite the Sanguinary Guard to death and heal up from his damage. The horor blob in the center moved up.  One bloodletter bomb dropped on my far right flank meaning to take the objective from me and prevent me from scoring at top of my turn 2, which worked.  Two other bloodletter squads dropped down on the left side. One squad charged into my sanguinary Guard, who stood tall against all those -3 AP attacks mainly because of the Standard of Sacrifice. With the added +1 attack and re-rolling to hits and wounds of 1 in the fight phase, the Sanguinary Guard were able to wipe out the charging bloodletter bomb in combat, only losing 2 in the squad.

Magnus got buffed again and healed up from 1 wound to 4 wounds. Meanwhile a healthy dose of smite and other mortal wound spells knocked that squad down to 2 models remaining.

Another thing that is important to note here. The squad of cultists in the middle of the board on the right, moved and advanced and even after a cp re-roll to advance could not make it within range of the objective marker. Meaning the only way they could score it next turn would be with the Herald there.

Blood Angels Turn 2

At the top of turn 2, Blood Angels were only sitting on one objective which we scored making the Primary 4-2.  Again, another turn where not being able to Fly in the charge phase would be a factor. The daemon prince on the left side was screened well with bloodletters and with those and the cultists there I'd need to unleash a lot to take everything down to prevent them from scoring the objective. That is what I did. Between the might of the Sicarans, tacticals, Sanguinary Guard and razorback I killed all the Bloodletters down to a single man, leaving me a small hole to charge the daemon prince with my Sanguinary Guard. However, again, due to the change to the Fly keyword, I would not be able to just hop Sanguinor over meaning he would not be able to get into combat with the daemon prince.  He would have to settle for killing cultists instead. This was a recurring theme in this game. Not being able to move over intervening models in the Charge phase is significant.

Mephiston was essentially a lost puppy in this game. He had attempted Unleash Rage on the Sanguinary Guard earlier in the game when they charged Magnus, but it was denied. He never could get any psychic powers going thanks to the might of the Thousand Sons. He charged into the Brimstone Horrors, but whiffed awfully.

The other Sicaran and razorback thinned out a lot of the bloodletters on that right flank but they still held the objective. The 2 remaining Sanguinary Guard and the Chaplain moved up to the Herald and despite shooting and melee, the Herald lived, but the key here being the Cultists were too far to score that objective at the start of next turn, meaning I outnumbered them on the objective. They would not gain those points.

By the time the dust settled, Sanguinor and Sanguinary Guard had wiped out the last bloodletter, the daemon prince, and the squad of cultists. This was a pretty big blow as now that entire left flank was secured.

Thousand Sons Turn 3

At the top of this turn, the Thousand Sons were able to score the objective on my right flank, making the score 6-2 on the Primary in favor of the heretics. The cultists moved down to secure the objective in the right neutral zone, while not being foolish enough to dare charge the Sanguinary Guard. The remaining Bloodletters on the right flank moved up to engage the Chaplain. The Horror blob and the warlord Daemon Prince along with Ahriman moved down to prepare to engage the tanks. First they'd have to get through Mephiston though, which is no easy feat.

That said, between the combined psychic powers of Ahriman and the Daemon Prince, Mephiston was turned to ashes. The Bloodletters on the right flank managed to put a wound on the Chaplain in combat.

Blood Angels Turn 3

At the top of turn 3, Blood Angels scored the objective in the middle left side, making the score now 6-4 on the Primary. Rather than engage the Cultists with the last remaining Sanguinary Guard from the squad on the right flank, they pushed up to assault the Herald, who had fallen back the previous turn, and potentially take the objective, worth a precious 3 victory points. That is exactly what happened, but I'd need to hold it for another turn to score the points. The Sanguinary Guard blob moved around the side of the building to get in range of the Pink Horrors.

The Razorbacks took down the brimstone horror blob quite easily leaving the warlord Daemon Prince there as the closest enemy target for the Sicarans, who whittled him down. I moved my smash captain up in position to charge him if the firepower was not enough to bring him down, which it was not.  The Captain charged in and triggered red rampage, as he had managed to get Weaver of Fates off on the warlord in the previous turn and I needed as many attacks as I could get to get through that 3++. With 8 attacks, however, it proved more than enough as he failed 2 saves and Boom. Slay the Warlord!

Thousand Sons Turn 4

The cultists on the right score the objective here making the score now 8-4 in favor of the Heritics on the primary. While they didn't seem to be performing well in the killing department, they were scoring plenty of points.

Ahriman moved up to engage the warlord with psychic powers and try to charge the tanks afterwards. The pinks fell back to try and prevent the Sanguinary Guard from leap frogging over them to get to Ahriman on the next turn.Ahriman did manage to put 4 wounds on the captain, but this was after a super smite went off that did a whopping 6 damage. Rolled 6 of his ignore wound rolls with the Death Company ability and he passed 2 of them, meaning Ahriman would have to charge him instead of the tanks. He did and despite getting hit by an inferno pistol in overwatch, he got in and killed the captain.

On the right side, the Chaplain continued to struggle to kill the last bloodletter.

Blood Angels Turn 4

With the Cultists having moved and advanced back to their home objective, I could not score it. In fact, I was not able to score ANY objectives on this turn. Despite the fact I was killing a lot I was being outplayed on the objectives and in danger of losing the primary.

I moved one of the Sicarans over to prepare to go recapture my right flank objective. I moved the Sanguinary Ancient onto one backfield objective and the Sangunary Guard moved over to help kill the cultists on the right side. Between the combined fire of all the tanks I was able to kill Ahriman and whittle the Pink Horrors down quite a bit. Sanguinor would charge in killing more and after all was said and done and morale losses were accounted for there were only 3 Pink Horrors left and a single Bloodletter, who despite my best efforts with the Chaplain I just could not finish off.

Thousand Sons Turn 5

Not much happened on this turn as the Pinks fell back, but oddly enough, the Bloodletter was able to sneak the final wound through on that Chaplain and moved towards that objective on the neutral zone on the right side. Warzone Atlanta missions use variable game length and the Thousand Sons would need the game to end on 5 to have a chance to hang on and keep it close.

Blood Angels Turn 5

The Sanguinary Ancient and the Sanguinary Guard managed to score the backfield objectives netting me 3 each, as they had already been scored previously. That made the score now 10-8 on the primary in favor of the Blood Angels.

The Sicaran continued to move onto the objective on the right flank. The Sanguinary Guard moved down to take the objective in the neutral zone on the right side.  As it were, I needed the game to continue to Turn 6 so chose not to shoot or charge the last bloodletter in hopes it would continue.

End of the Game

The game did in fact continue on to turn 6 which resulted in scoring another 2 objectives, which allowed Blood Angels to take the primary 16-8.  In the end the last Bloodletter was killed leaving the Thousand Sons tabled.  After calculating up all the points, the Blood Angels pull out the W.

Result: Blood Angels 28 Thousand Sons 7

Despite the fact that I was able to really wipe out the Thousand Sons army, I was still losing on the primary until the end. By turn 5 I had managed victory but needed the extra turn to really pull it away for the points. I feel the changes to Fly have made it more challenging to run a list of this nature, but the thing to consider is the same restrictions apply to your opponent. There were several instances where the Daemon Princes, for example, could not charge because Horrors were screening them in and they could not jump over them in the charge phase.

All in all a good test for the Blood Angels.