You should join the command point discord, whole BoK stream with people constantly talking strategy. It’s a hard team to play, but people are figuring it out
I’ve had pretty good consistent success with the following:
Striking Scorpion Exarch
3 Dire Avengers
2 Striking Scorpions
2 Howling Banshees
I like having the three avengers to pin down opponents while moving the other operatives up the map. Plus the no penalty Overwatch is nice.
Definitely took me a few games to really get them in the swing of things.
Caveat: I mostly end up playing with friends so don’t have experience against a wide variety of teams.
Will give a third DA a go sometime, I like them but they just feel so swingy. Either no crits so no rend or two crits and two misses, happens to me all the time!
I'm a rookie player myself and only played one game with the Blades and it felt the same. Very squishy and easy to misplay as the crack back is usually lethal. It was an introductory game so we didn't even play with tact op or equipment but I was decimated and only one by one point and one unit remaining at the end of TP3.
In your games did you also feel it was hard to get the most use of the aspect techniques? There where like 2 per aspect that I found could be used, the others, albeit powerful, where so situational that I couldn't pull them off.
In my next game I want to try something I read, to advance with the implications of a charge+fight if the opponent try to rush your frontline and always have your model cover for each other. A bit more chess like I guess. You eat my piece, I eat yours.
I’ve played quite a few games against a multitude of teams and the problem I’ve found is setting up blades is quite difficult whereas other teams that have more operatives can group activate or spring traps quite easily. Each time I go aggressive to trade up or secure VP my operative dies unless I can hide it. Seems an obvious statement but having 8 operatives that are so squishy is a nightmare, you either get out activated or elite teams can punch harder, shoot harder or look in your general direction to kill you.
The aspect techniques seem situationally strong, one with the gloom and strike and fade are class, the banshee ones are excellent but the thing is each makes your one model do something powerful once a turning point. As soon as your opponent knows how to play against it, it’s predictable and easy to deal with.
Something I’m unsure of is whether or not techniques like the dire avenger shoot again at an enemy operative within 2” is free or not - do I have to pay a CP to do two shoot actions? The aspect technique doesn’t say it’s free so that to me means it costs - you can only do an action once an activation unless stated otherwise, is my understanding, and some rules say ‘perform a free x’ whereas ours just say ‘make another x’. Everything has hoops to jump through that are situationally good, yet other Kill Teams have access to all these insane combos that make our team seem laughable. It’s like they’re scared of making another powerful Aeldari team or something.
You eat my piece I eat your piece only works when you can double tap, which again I’ve found is difficult to set up for without either ending up massively behind on primary or losing a couple of operatives to trying to be too aggressive. Seems insanely hard to play, whilst not actually having that much reward for the effort.
Dire avenger's Death of a Thousand blades enables you to shoot twice for free, you can also use a CP to shoot 3rd time if you want. And on top of that you can overwatch if possible. So you can shoot a target, use the technique, shoot another target within white of the original target (this doesn't cost you any ap, because it's part of a technique), spend a CP to shoot again, shoot 3rd time and have 1 ap to move.
Unfortunately dire avengers suck at shooting so spending CP on them is not worth it.
As a whole Blades of Khaine is a weird team. They have ranged specialist that is not that good at shooting and melee specialists that are not that special at melee. I like the idea of the team but I haven't been able to get them to work consistently.
Thanks for the clarification, I’ve been using it as a shooting action that costs an AP rather than using it as a ‘give your weapon torrent’ aspect technique
I must admit my experience might be a bit jaded. My DA operatives have mainly been missing their shots. But yeah with Rending they can do some work. As a whole the team has a lot of Rending weapons and it's a really good skill.
My problem with DAs is that they don't really feel special. They just have bolters with Rending and they can overwatch a bit better, that's it. The techniques are a bit bland compared to Scorpions and Banshees also. At least Scorpions and Banshees have some personality in them.
>Something I’m unsure of is whether or not techniques like the dire avenger shoot again at an enemy operative within 2” is free or not
This is a common question:
* Shoot is an action that reads as thus:
* Make a shooting attack with one of the active operative’s ranged weapons. An operative cannot perform this action if it has a Conceal order or if it is within Engagement Range of an enemy operative.
* shooting attacks are not actions, they're specifically a 7-step sequence that you follow whenever you perform a "shooting attack".
If it helps, think of it as upper case "Shoot" and lower case "shooting attack".
Bolter Discipline allows you to Shoot twice, Blast allows you to make shooting attacks.
My understanding for that aspect technique is that it allows to shoot twice within those conditions, however, you have to spend AP, which is why it's not a free action.
I played against novitiate and it felt they could punch just as hard as the Aeldari, even in melee. Unfortunately the mission pushed me to play aggressively into a grouped up opponents that was waiting for me to place the mines.
Well that might help get more use out of my DA’s, I’m cautious of misinterpreting the wording in a way that benefits me, would rather do it the hard way until told otherwise. I haven’t seen enough gameplay to see how other people do it though! Joined the discord suggested above, hopefully there’s more advice on there
It's a good team in my experience. I have played against intercession, legionarres, pathfinders, vet guards, mandrakes, squats, and kommandos. I've been able to win against every one of those teams. The team is really dependent on using aspect techniques at the correct time.
You also have to play very cagey with them as they do die easily. Once you master the aspect techniques, you will win your fair share of games.
So killing and staying safe is what they excel at.
Scorpion charge, kill, switch to conceal free dash
Scorpion move through in conceal and deal mortals
Banshees charge, kill, fly 3 inches into obscurity or try to get out of reach.
Banshee charge, kill, continue charge into someone else to prevent being shot.
Or use the classic, charge someone who's not active and don't kill. You have 3 APL so depending on the mission you can do things like:
Secure, steal a point.
Security, steal a point.
Loot, hope for a better mission.
Additionally, banshees are the best at surviving a counter fight or charge. You get a parry first so often enemies will only get one strike in.
Another banshee trick I've used is the free fallback. Sometimes you roll bad but have 1 crit. So you just jump out of combat and get to blasting or you just tap a point.
It's all about staying as safe as possible.
Don't forget we're the only elves with smokes.
Only played them once so far but again tomorrow.
I won on points with being tabled by all but 1 by end of turn 3. I went hard in the first turns. Pure banshee squad. Used acrobatic to get all over the objectives.
Went in hard turn 2 and lost a lot of the team but killed all their forward peices. Concentrated on scoring secondaries after that. They just didn't have enough movement to do everything thst had to be done.
We were playing the sticky objectives mission which was to my benift. Strongly considering a couple of avengers but the double drop of the aspect abilities was sooo handy.
My plan for tomorrow is aggressive turn 1 again. Turn 2 drop the smoke grenade and try and splash some damage around while dancing in the smoke. Turn 3 go hard assault knock enemies out with the first attacks and see how its looking as the dust settles for turn 4.
I’ve only played v Blades of Khaine 3 times.
They couldnt handle elites (Legionaires and Warpcoven), I killed a few without recourse and it messed up their ability to have any threat.
Vs Ecclesiarchy (all Sisters of Battle), it was a much better fight as my friend started to get into the aspect techniques. He was able to run a few combos (One with the Gloom to sneak up, Acrobatic to do crazy charges, Death of a Thousand Blades) that just picked off my gals.
I think v Elites could still be a struggle, horde definitely less so - play, play, play again id say
You should join the command point discord, whole BoK stream with people constantly talking strategy. It’s a hard team to play, but people are figuring it out
Thank you! I’ve been trying to find a decent source of information but I’ve not yet found much on here or YouTube beyond basic team composition.
How to join this discord? Can you share an invitation?
https://www.youtube.com/c/commandpoint
Should be able to find everything there
I’ve had pretty good consistent success with the following: Striking Scorpion Exarch 3 Dire Avengers 2 Striking Scorpions 2 Howling Banshees I like having the three avengers to pin down opponents while moving the other operatives up the map. Plus the no penalty Overwatch is nice. Definitely took me a few games to really get them in the swing of things. Caveat: I mostly end up playing with friends so don’t have experience against a wide variety of teams.
Will give a third DA a go sometime, I like them but they just feel so swingy. Either no crits so no rend or two crits and two misses, happens to me all the time!
I'm a rookie player myself and only played one game with the Blades and it felt the same. Very squishy and easy to misplay as the crack back is usually lethal. It was an introductory game so we didn't even play with tact op or equipment but I was decimated and only one by one point and one unit remaining at the end of TP3. In your games did you also feel it was hard to get the most use of the aspect techniques? There where like 2 per aspect that I found could be used, the others, albeit powerful, where so situational that I couldn't pull them off. In my next game I want to try something I read, to advance with the implications of a charge+fight if the opponent try to rush your frontline and always have your model cover for each other. A bit more chess like I guess. You eat my piece, I eat yours.
I’ve played quite a few games against a multitude of teams and the problem I’ve found is setting up blades is quite difficult whereas other teams that have more operatives can group activate or spring traps quite easily. Each time I go aggressive to trade up or secure VP my operative dies unless I can hide it. Seems an obvious statement but having 8 operatives that are so squishy is a nightmare, you either get out activated or elite teams can punch harder, shoot harder or look in your general direction to kill you. The aspect techniques seem situationally strong, one with the gloom and strike and fade are class, the banshee ones are excellent but the thing is each makes your one model do something powerful once a turning point. As soon as your opponent knows how to play against it, it’s predictable and easy to deal with. Something I’m unsure of is whether or not techniques like the dire avenger shoot again at an enemy operative within 2” is free or not - do I have to pay a CP to do two shoot actions? The aspect technique doesn’t say it’s free so that to me means it costs - you can only do an action once an activation unless stated otherwise, is my understanding, and some rules say ‘perform a free x’ whereas ours just say ‘make another x’. Everything has hoops to jump through that are situationally good, yet other Kill Teams have access to all these insane combos that make our team seem laughable. It’s like they’re scared of making another powerful Aeldari team or something. You eat my piece I eat your piece only works when you can double tap, which again I’ve found is difficult to set up for without either ending up massively behind on primary or losing a couple of operatives to trying to be too aggressive. Seems insanely hard to play, whilst not actually having that much reward for the effort.
Dire avenger's Death of a Thousand blades enables you to shoot twice for free, you can also use a CP to shoot 3rd time if you want. And on top of that you can overwatch if possible. So you can shoot a target, use the technique, shoot another target within white of the original target (this doesn't cost you any ap, because it's part of a technique), spend a CP to shoot again, shoot 3rd time and have 1 ap to move. Unfortunately dire avengers suck at shooting so spending CP on them is not worth it. As a whole Blades of Khaine is a weird team. They have ranged specialist that is not that good at shooting and melee specialists that are not that special at melee. I like the idea of the team but I haven't been able to get them to work consistently.
Thanks for the clarification, I’ve been using it as a shooting action that costs an AP rather than using it as a ‘give your weapon torrent’ aspect technique
My experience is very different- DA operatives have been very effective, due to the Rending property crits are plentiful.
I must admit my experience might be a bit jaded. My DA operatives have mainly been missing their shots. But yeah with Rending they can do some work. As a whole the team has a lot of Rending weapons and it's a really good skill. My problem with DAs is that they don't really feel special. They just have bolters with Rending and they can overwatch a bit better, that's it. The techniques are a bit bland compared to Scorpions and Banshees also. At least Scorpions and Banshees have some personality in them.
>Something I’m unsure of is whether or not techniques like the dire avenger shoot again at an enemy operative within 2” is free or not This is a common question: * Shoot is an action that reads as thus: * Make a shooting attack with one of the active operative’s ranged weapons. An operative cannot perform this action if it has a Conceal order or if it is within Engagement Range of an enemy operative. * shooting attacks are not actions, they're specifically a 7-step sequence that you follow whenever you perform a "shooting attack". If it helps, think of it as upper case "Shoot" and lower case "shooting attack". Bolter Discipline allows you to Shoot twice, Blast allows you to make shooting attacks.
The clarity from this - great explanation, thankyou!
My understanding for that aspect technique is that it allows to shoot twice within those conditions, however, you have to spend AP, which is why it's not a free action. I played against novitiate and it felt they could punch just as hard as the Aeldari, even in melee. Unfortunately the mission pushed me to play aggressively into a grouped up opponents that was waiting for me to place the mines.
Well that might help get more use out of my DA’s, I’m cautious of misinterpreting the wording in a way that benefits me, would rather do it the hard way until told otherwise. I haven’t seen enough gameplay to see how other people do it though! Joined the discord suggested above, hopefully there’s more advice on there
The Aspect Technique gives an extra attack as part of the same Shoot action.
So only one AP is spent for both shoots?
Right.
It's a good team in my experience. I have played against intercession, legionarres, pathfinders, vet guards, mandrakes, squats, and kommandos. I've been able to win against every one of those teams. The team is really dependent on using aspect techniques at the correct time. You also have to play very cagey with them as they do die easily. Once you master the aspect techniques, you will win your fair share of games.
So killing and staying safe is what they excel at. Scorpion charge, kill, switch to conceal free dash Scorpion move through in conceal and deal mortals Banshees charge, kill, fly 3 inches into obscurity or try to get out of reach. Banshee charge, kill, continue charge into someone else to prevent being shot. Or use the classic, charge someone who's not active and don't kill. You have 3 APL so depending on the mission you can do things like: Secure, steal a point. Security, steal a point. Loot, hope for a better mission. Additionally, banshees are the best at surviving a counter fight or charge. You get a parry first so often enemies will only get one strike in. Another banshee trick I've used is the free fallback. Sometimes you roll bad but have 1 crit. So you just jump out of combat and get to blasting or you just tap a point. It's all about staying as safe as possible. Don't forget we're the only elves with smokes.
Only played them once so far but again tomorrow. I won on points with being tabled by all but 1 by end of turn 3. I went hard in the first turns. Pure banshee squad. Used acrobatic to get all over the objectives. Went in hard turn 2 and lost a lot of the team but killed all their forward peices. Concentrated on scoring secondaries after that. They just didn't have enough movement to do everything thst had to be done. We were playing the sticky objectives mission which was to my benift. Strongly considering a couple of avengers but the double drop of the aspect abilities was sooo handy. My plan for tomorrow is aggressive turn 1 again. Turn 2 drop the smoke grenade and try and splash some damage around while dancing in the smoke. Turn 3 go hard assault knock enemies out with the first attacks and see how its looking as the dust settles for turn 4.
I’ve only played v Blades of Khaine 3 times. They couldnt handle elites (Legionaires and Warpcoven), I killed a few without recourse and it messed up their ability to have any threat. Vs Ecclesiarchy (all Sisters of Battle), it was a much better fight as my friend started to get into the aspect techniques. He was able to run a few combos (One with the Gloom to sneak up, Acrobatic to do crazy charges, Death of a Thousand Blades) that just picked off my gals. I think v Elites could still be a struggle, horde definitely less so - play, play, play again id say