Most competitive Dark Angels lists start form the choice to build around Deathwing – the more competitive of the two options – or Ravenwing. Building with both isn’t a particularly viable option, as the army’s units are expensive and trying to build with both will mean giving neither the support it needs and splitting your army’s focus in unhelpful ways. Deathwing Aversion (Malediction) – WC 6 – Select one enemy unit within 24″ of this PSYKER. Until the start of your next Psychic phase:

Why do this? Well the primary reason is to add these units to a Deathwing Detachment without losing the 1st Company rule, which requires everything in the Detachment have DEATHWING. Additionally, if a unit didn’t have INNER CIRCLE, they’ll gain it in a Dark Angels detachment if you’ve given them the upgrade. The history of the Dark Angels, exploring their glorious rise and tragic fall, and the secretive hunt that has driven them for ten thousand years Date Unknown, Late M41: Battle for Honoria — The Dark Angels and their Imperial Guard allies battle Waaagh! Groblonik.

As we covered a little earlier, there are three “super-doctrines” in the Dark Angels codex. GW really did their best to make the book feel like it has three separate fighting styles, all combined into one army via a special rule called Sons of the Lion. Devastator: Speed of the Raven Deathwing Knights might look underwhelming, but have you heard of Synergy?: Deathwing Knights single-handedly spawned an archetype centered around using them with all of the myriad buffs you can contribute to them from Gladius such as Oath of Moment for full rerolls, and Honour the Chapter for the spicy Lance and +1AP while in Assault Doctrine. Which just so happens to solve the mobility problem that is inherent to a M5 model by granting Advance and Charge. One of the few true melee units in the game that can keep pace with how difficult it can be to get to combat as well as how pillowfisted it can feel when you get there. Want to mow down Lychguard? Charge Custodes, have them fight first then chew them up like Pac-Man right after? Deathwing Knights are your unit. -1 Damage. 4 Wounds. Armour of Contempt. Truly they do it all. Secret Agenda (1 CP) –Use this Stratagem after selecting secondary objectives or Agendas. Do not reveal one of your selections to your opponent. The first time you score victory points or experience points for it, reveal it to your opponent. Note that you must still have a record of your selection. We recommend writing it down and concealing it until revealed. You can only use this Stratagem once. This Stratagem had a lot more play before Nephilim removed To the Last from the picture; now there are scant few End Game objectives you’d actually take with it and spend your precious CP on it. As it is, the only objectives that really work for it are Assassination, Bring it Down, No Prisoners, and potentially Martial Interdiction – most of the other end game objectives have actions that give them away pretty much immediately. D ( Gunum: S+ Gold Ultra Tier) Overall the Dark Angels have a wealth of options that they add to a fairly generic Gladius Task Force through their units. How to Score Points with Dark Angels With Dark Angels general prevalence towards anvil units and Lone Operatives, holding objectives is fairly trivial. Jam some Deathwing Knights or a Land Raider onto the ones closest to your opponent. Hold the sides with Scouts or Infiltrators with a Phobos Librarian. Do the same on your deployment objective, or put some artillery there like Desolation Marines or Whirlwinds/Thunderfire Cannons. Need to take an objective off your opponent? Inceptors are perfectly capable of doing so with their 3″ deep strike, or charge them with the a unit that will remove them with extreme prejudice.

This one isn’t terribly complicated. You’ve got a ton of ObSect Terminators, with three large units of standard terminators supported by two assault squads and a Command squad, along with a unit of Deathwing knights. It’s all terminators, all the time. The list can put together a nasty ball of well-supported terminators to walk to midtable while the assault terminators can teleport in where needed. This list is slow, but it’s very, very hard to kill. Lots of Unique Vehicles, Not Enough Support – From the Dark Talon to the Land Speeder Vengeance, the loss of re-rolls to support over-charging plasma batteries, or to help our Rift Cannons do damage is a meaningful change from times past and can make it harder to depend on those vehicles.

Jink

Oath is hard to use for a multi-phased army: Make no mistake, as much as there are many viable combat options present for Dark Angels, this is still 10th Edition. You are going to run shooting elements of some (and often many) stripe. What that is depends a little bit on what you’re trying to build to beat, but Aggressors, Desolation Marines, and Inceptors (as well as some more exotic fare) all show up regularly in well performing Dark Angels lists. Oath of Moment is a resource, not an army wide buff. It’s on you as the player using it to figure out if you need to save it for your melee, or if you can pump up your shooting phase to full effect. In the earlier stages of the game where you’re not charging this is a lot easier, but knowing the breakpoints where you need it to make a crucial combat happen and where you can skip it will improve your performance significantly. Must Have Dark Angels Units Sapphon — Current Grand Master of Chaplains & Master of Sanctity. He received the post neither due to age nor ability as an interrogator (Asmodai is his superior in both these things) but due to his ability as an inspirational leader, also referred to as the Finder of Secrets. [4c] Lastly, I could say a thousand more words on Deathwing Knights than what was covered above, but simply put they’re one of the best datasheets in the game and are well worth your time. Add a Captain in Terminator Armour with Adept of the Codex to keep them in Tactical Doctrine when they don’t need to go supersonic, and consider an Ancient in Terminator Armour to bump up their low OC, and go to town. The primary issue here is the cost-benefit analysis for the jet from the Dark Angels’ chapter tactic; unlike the Nephilim, the Dark Talon can hover, so you could conceivably fly it to where you want it to be and, if it survives, have it sit still and start hitting on 2s. The issue here – as with all aircraft and vehicles – is that without CORE the Dark Talon is missing consistency, and brining a Techmarine isn’t a particularly good solution. The mortal wound output is still worth looking at however, particularly in an environment flush with Scarab Occult Terminators, Deathshrouds, and even other Deathwing. The last unit that I want to cover isn’t super Dark Angels specific, but it does benefit heavily from working alongside such a heavy pushing unit as the Deathwing Knights, which is a Land Raider Redeemer filled to the brim with 6 Aggressors and an Apothecary Biologis with Bolter Discipline. Piloted by great success by Lesiu of Team Poland on their way to a WTC victory, this behemoth of a unit with insane damage output courtesy of “Lethal Hits, Sustained Hits 1, Critical Hits on a 5+, +2 AP and Ignore Cover with Oath Of Moment” is capable of crunching through a Wraithknight with around 16 average damage and a lot of room to spike high. Delivery is manageable through the resilience of the platform, and Squad Tactics allows the unit to do some shenanigans if anyone tries to get close.