Did the Company of Hunters become our best detachment?

 Hello battle brethren! Games Workshop released a new Balance Dataslate! You can download it over on Warhammer Community, and I highly recommend it, because there are some extensive changes you should be aware of.

I've written at some length about the failings of the rules for Ravenwing, both at the individual unit level and the detachment rules. At the core of that has been the disconnect between Black Knights' best mode of attack being shooting but their datasheet rule being a buff to melee. I kind of figured the solution to that would be to give them a datasheet rule that buffs their shooting, but GW went a different route. 

Well, that is interesting. Giving Dev wounds to the Black Knight combat weapons does put more emphasis on their assault capability. Remember they have Anti Vehicle/Monster 4+ on the charge. Now, instead of maybe taking the last couple wounds off a mostly-dead monster, they can actually do a respectable chunk of damage on the charge. Average dice if you can get all 6 members of a squad in range to attack generates 6 wounds that can only be saved by FNP rolls. Between the plasma talons and close combat weapons, I think we can now reasonably expect most Black Knight squads to pick up the majority of vehicles and/or monsters in one turn just on their native abilities, not counting Oath, stratagem use, or the extra capability of attached characters or Command Squads. 

Speaking of Command Squads, I updated my Warhammer app. The Black Knight combat weapons carried by the Ancient and Apothecary got Devastating Wounds as well. All the more reason to run the big 9-man bricks!

The upgrades don't stop there though. Sammael has also had a noteworthy upgrade. An issue with Samamel's rule has been that it was made semi-redundant by the Company of Hunters detachment rule. This resolves that issue nicely. 

Speaking of the Company of Hunters detachment rule, it also received a glow-up. The previous version was okay for mounted units but way better for tanks like Vindicators. Now, mounted units get to freely act however we want them both after advancing and after falling back. Given that we're actually going to want to be charging with our mounted units now, this is a wild upgrade to the detachment rule.

There's another change to be excited about, but it's in the Space Marines section. Outriders have had their Turbo-boost datasheet rule replaced with Thunderous Impact, which increases their melee Strength and Damage by 1 on the charge. By itself it's nice. It actually gives them some respectable damage output. However, as a datasheet rule, they also convey it on attached characters. That means we could have Sammael charging in at S7 Damage 3, or a Ravenwing Champion at S6 Damage 3. That starts to become sexy. 

Going back to the Dark Angels section of the Balance Dataslate, the Master of Manoeuvre enhancement got a side-grade, being changed from being able to come out of Strategic Reserve a turn earlier to being able to reroll Advance and Charge rolls. That's got some different play than the previous version had. Rather than using it on a big brick of Ravenwing Knights to have them pop out of Strat Reserve 1st turn, it's got me thinking about having Sammael and a Ravenwing Command Squad both attached to Outrider squads going into Strat Reserve, and when they pop out getting + on their Charge rolls due to their datasheet rules, putting those Damage 3 weapons to work with more reliable charges out of Reserve.

I do have one question Games Workshop hasn't provided an answer to. The updated CoH detachment rule makes the Mounted Strategist enhancement redundant. Is GW going to change that enhancement in some way, or are we going to be left effectively having only 3 enhancements in the detachment?

All of these changes have been to the good, and it certainly makes the prospect of playing a bike-heavy list more exciting. I don't think the best lists will be all Bikes and Speeders though. I think we're still going to want to field some manner of tanks for fire support, to solve problems our Ravenwing units can't easily solve on their own. There are also challenges to moving Mounted units around the board that haven't went away. 

I'm excited to give a revamped Company of Hunters list a try, but I think it's going to be a higher-skill detachment than the Gladius, or the Lion's Blade for that matter. I suspect the Gladius will remain our winningest detachment, but maybe the Company of Hunters and the Lion's Blade are good enough that we'll have three detachments appearing among our top lists. Maybe I'm being unreasonably optimistic, but for the time being I'm going to enjoy being excited about it.  

Dank List Wargaming on YouTube has a new video up. I'm looking forward to putting that on while I'm hobbying today. Follow my blog for more Dark Angels focused news and analysis. Enjoy the new lease on life for the Ravenwing, and may your games bring glorious victory! For the Lion!