10th Edition Competitive Faction Focus – Dark Angels

In our Faction Focus series we look at how to play specific factions – their rules, their units, how they complete missions, and what you need to know about playing them. In this Faction Focus we’re looking at the Dark Angels Chapter of Space Marines.

If there’s anything in Warhammer that’s more emblematic than seeing a Space Marine and thinking he looks under-dressed? Dark Angels set out to answer that question by technically being the same base Codex as the rest of the Space Marine factions, but draping a garment over the top and saying that it’s a wholly different thing. Oh, and adding a few very important units, it turns out.

Changelog

• Update (latest): 2024-09-30 for the Codex and new Detachments
• Published: 2023-08-29

Why Should You Play Dark Angels?

As of this writing, Dark Angels are very well positioned in Warhammer 40k. If you’re playing Space Marines competitively it largely doesn’t do you any good to not play one of the special chapters if you’re running a Codex Detachment as you’re just leaving behind some of the faction’s best units. And in that sense, the Dark Angels offer the game’s best Terminators (Deathwing Knights), and some solid character options – they broaden an already diverse range with some solid upgrades and sidegrades. These units fill gaps in the core range for Space Marines and work exceedingly well in the Gladius Task Force.

If you looked at the Marines Index and said “where’s all the stuff?”, Dark Angels are for you.

Also, the robes-and-swords aesthetic is just generally pretty cool.

Army Rules

The Dark Angels have a series of army rules. Their core army rule is Oath of Moment, taken from Space Marines.

Oath of Moment

At the start of your Command phase, pick one unit from your opponent’s army. Until the start of your next Command phase, that enemy unit is your Oath target. Each time a model with this ability makes an attack against your Oath target, you can re-roll the Hit roll. This is a very strong ability, and gives you the ability to take down any target in the game by giving you a huge boost in efficiency. It’s particularly great for Eradicators but it’s useful for every unit in your army. That said, it can be difficult to make Oath work well in an army that has to play across multiple phases, as you’ll often find you need to carefully plan where and when you’ll use it to get the most out of the ability.

The Unforgiven

If you’re running Dark Angels, you can’t run marines from any other Chapter.

The Ravenwing

If you’re running Dark Angels, then MOUNTED units and Vehicles with FLY gain the RAVENWING keyword. This is primarily useful for Outriders and Bike Chaplains, who can also join units of Black Knights, and for running the Company of Hunters detachment.

The Deathwing

If you’re running Dark Angels, then Terminator units, Bladeguard units, Veteran units, Land Raiders, Repulsors, and Dreadnoughts gain the DEATHWING keyword. This is mostly used if you’re running the Inner Circle Task Force Detachment.

Five Things You Need To Know to Play Dark Angels

1. You’re better off Playing Gladius Task Force. The Dark Angels have three Detachments in their Codex Supplement and they’re all generally bad. Sure, they give you more of that fun Dark Angels specific flavor, but most of what you get just pales in comparison to the abilities on offer in the Gladius – they generally lack the mobility conferred by Doctrines and the raw output of Gladius’ Stratagem and Enhancement suite.

2. The Unique Units are spice, not the whole meal. Many of the most interesting units in the Dark Angels index are upgrades of existing units, like Deathwing Knights, Ravenwing Black Knights, or Inner Circle Companions. While these all provide some interesting options at reasonable points premiums, it’s important that you wanted the role that the base unit would have provided in the first place. Except….

3. You need some Deathwing Knights. When we initially wrote this Faction Focus, this section started with “they may look underwhelming, but…” and hoo boy has the Dataslate changed that. They were already a unit you could build around before the Dataslate upgraded their damage output, and now they’re one of the game’s best units. You can drop a staggering number of buffs on them with the Gladius Detachment to fully supercharge them and they’re one of the few true melee units in the game that can just own the center of the table. Want to mow down Lychguard? Charge a unit with Fights First, then chew them up like Pac-Man right after? Deathwing Knights are your unit. -1 Damage. 4 Wounds. Armour of Contempt. Fight on Death. Truly they do it all.

4. The Lion is better than he used to be: At 300 points, the Lion has gone from a disappointment to something you might run as a fringe play. His biggest challenge is that it’s very difficult to justify spending that many points on a model which controls as little space as the Lion does. While in Gladius he can advance and charge, and he will absolutely mow down most things he touches, but his low wound count and middling resiliency for his points can often leave him on cleanup duty or struggling to cross the board in the face of armies with guns bristling. He’s definitely a fun unit and one that’s reasonably viable, but not one to expect to see on top tables any time soon. That said, there have been successful competitive lists which have run him with tons of Inner Circle Companions and no Deathwing Knights, so if you want to run him, we’re not going to stop you.

5. Oath is hard to use for a multi-phased army: Although tenth edition has become much more melee-focused as recommended terrain layouts have become denser, your armies will often feature a mix of shooting and melee elements. Which elements depends a little bit on what you’re trying to beat, but Eradicators, Inceptors, Gladiator Lancers, Repulsor Executioners, and Aggressors all show up in 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.

What Are the Must-Have Units to Start This Faction?

Dark Angels are Space Marines, and they don’t fall far from the Index’s tree, but since their Codex they’ve diverged in the sense that Dark Angels armies tend to be built primarily around the Codex’s best units and then the Space Marine units that best support those on the battlefield. While broadly units that are good in Space Marines will be good in the Dark Angels, the army’s focus on Deathwing Knights pushes it harder into melee than most lists – something which works well with the dense terrain layouts and blocked line of sights in the Pariah Nexus Tournament Companion.

On that note, competitive Dark Angels lists tend to start with three units of Deathwing Knights. Since their Dataslate buffs they’ve become one of the game’s best units, and this three-unit block makes up the basis of the most successful competitive marine lists. Deathwing Knights are one of the few units in the game which can just push to the center of the table and just handle whatever challenges come their way while other faster units move ahead and support them. The Deathwing Knights received a massive buff in the most recent Dataslate, with their maces gaining ANTI-MONSTER 4+ and ANTI-VEHICLE 4+, plus AP-2, pushing them above the threshold of usability. At S6, you’ll usually want Maces of Absolution as your weapon, though going with two units of Maces and one unit of Power Weapons – the dataslate made those Damage 2 with 5 Attacks each – is also a very reasonable option.

Also appearing in most Dark Angels list are Inner Circle Companions. One of the new datasheets introduced with the Dark Angels’ Codex, Inner Circle Companions can be led by Azrael, Asmodai, Ezekiel, or Lazarus and come in units of 3 or 6, with three wounds apiece. You want them led by a character since that activates their Braziers of Judgement ability, giving them -1 to be hit, and you have some options there – they can be lead by any Leader who can join a unit of Sterngard Veterans, which means they can be lead by a Judiciar to give them Fights First. He’s a pretty common pick, but then so is Azrael.

Azrael is a very efficient little package of Sustained Hits 1 and a 4+ Invulnerable Save for his unit, as well as a command point every turn allowing easier stratagem use and less punishing play on Fixed Objectives. His Lion Helm also gives you a once-per-game 4+ Feel No Pain for the unit against Mortal Wounds, and that’s a big deal now that Devastating Wounds cause mortals again. His [SUSTAINED HITS 1] may not combo with the sweep mode on Inner Circle Companions but it works just fine with their bigger Strike Attacks. He’s also still fine in the classic combo with Sterngard Veterans or Hellblasters if you have those lying around. He’s also not too bad in a scrap himself.

From there, you’re usually going to be supplementing your Deathwing Knights with the stand-out stars of the space marines faction, running a unit of Eradicators with an Apothecary Biologis, possibly in a transport. You may take Gladiator Lancers for dealing with big threats at a distance. You’ll need lots of fast support for doing actions and capturing objectives early, and Scout Squads and Assault Intercessors with Jump Packs are cheap, versatile units for doing both. Land Raider Redeemers make great transports for a unit of Deathwing Knights. And a unit of Infiltrators or Intercessors is great for controlling your home objective and keeping enemy units out of your backfield.

How Does This Faction Secure Objectives?

Easy: Deathwing Knights. They’re one of the best anvil units in the game, and help make holding objectives – particularly in the center of the table – fairly trivial. Jam some or a Land Raider or onto the objectives closest to your opponent. Armour of Contempt will allow most units to hold their own against non-concentrated fire, and will help your biggest units all but survive the biggest guns. Need to take other objectives? Assault Intercessors can put out a surprising amount of damage, and units like Eradicators, Inceptors, and even Desolators can help clear them.

You can easily build a strong Tactical Objective list with a mix of Scout Squads, Assault Intercessors, and maybe a Callidus Assassin, which will give your army plenty of mobile action ability while you park on objectives midfield.

How Does This Faction Handle Enemy Hordes?

Gratuitous Violence comes easily to the Dark Angels. Having the option of a real melee presence diversifies the threat profile of the army and makes you very hard to deal with. Desolation Marines and Aggressors both do indiscriminate damage to almost any target with Oath of Moment and Bolter Discipline, either as a constant source over the game, or in one explosive volley depending on your choice of Caddy. Inner Circle Companions come with a Sweep Attack mode that ups their counts and gives them SUSTAINED HITS 2 and turns them into a real blender.

How Does This Faction Handle Enemy Tanks and Monsters?

Nearly any Space Marines unit is capable of punching up through Oath of Moment, especially when supported by the fairly ubiquitous Grenade stratagem to chunk through anything skirmishing on a flank. The question then as always with Marines is how do you kill things without Oath of Moment?

Well, in Dark Angels you have some extra options. The first is Deathwing Knights, whose maces have [ANTI-VEHICLE 4+] and [ANTI-MONSTER 4+] and AP-2, 2-damage swings, giving them the ability to wound bigger threats like knights, greater daemons, and tanks. Not a lot of things like getting hit by those. Inner Circle Companions

For ranged combat, Eradicators and Gladiator Lancers bring their own re-rolls to the game, and those are your best plays.

Playing This Faction

Overall Dark Angels play a little bit like a rolling freight train. You’re trying to push through your opponent with powerful melee, and divert anything that could cause a problem to that off the tracks by shooting it before it becomes one. Whether that’s scoring units, or something that could actually hold you up is up to you.

Competitively, the best Dark Angels lists use the Gladius Task Force, though players have had success recently using the Stormlance Task Force as well – army-wide Advance and Charge helps mitigate the slower movement speed on Deathwing Knights, and Jump Assault Intercessors really enjoy the extra movement freedom. That said, if you want to play the army on hard mode, there are three Dark Angels-specific Detachments. They’re not very good, though Inner Circle Task Force is the best of them.

Click on the banners below to visit the relevant page for each.

Sample List

Rafael’s List is a list which went 5-0 at the 2024 London GT, and although it didn’t make the top cut, it’s an excellent example of a Gladius Dark Angels list.

Rafael Harbinson – LGT 22nd Place – Gladius Task Force

Army List - Click to Expand

Final Thoughts

Dark Angels have taken a while to find their footing, but thanks to those Dataslate changes are currently among the best factions in the game, and easily on par with Space Wolves as the best way to play Space Marines. That’s likely going to change when the next points update hits, but even after that, Deathwing Knights are liable to be a powerful unit to reckon with – the only question will be whether they leave you with enough points left over for the rest of the hammer.

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