Lists of the Week: 3/10/2025

Hello battle brethren! It was a rough weekend for us, with no event wins and a 37% win rate putting us in a 3-way tie with Sisters and Thousand Sons for Tail End Charlie. In spite of this, we did have a couple lists go 4-1 at their events, so at least we have something to talk about.

Our first list was played at 2 GT Bilbao in Bilbao Spain, a 5-round, 52-player event. Rodrigo Serna of Lábaro cantabro went 4-1 with a Gladius Task Force and placed 6th. You can see Rodrigo's list on BCP and below.

Asurmen está fuerte

Azrael - Warlord
Judiciar: The Honour Vehement
Lieutenant with Combi-weapon
Intercessor Squad: 5 bolter boys
Assault Intercessors with Jump Packs: 5 flying choppy boys
Assault Intercessors with Jump Packs: 5 flying choppy boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Desolation Squad: 4 superkrak missile boys and a Vengor sergeant
Gladiator Lancer
Gladiator Lancer
Infiltrator Squad: 5 stay-off-my-lawn boys
Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys
Scout Squad
Callidus Assassin

Most of this list is fairly conventional. Azrael goes with the Intercessors, the Judiciar with the ICCs, it's got Deathwing Knights and Jump Intercessors, Scouts and the Callidus for uppy-downy scoring, Infiltrators to sit on the home objective, and Gladiators for long range fire support.

The interesting deviation is the squad of Desolators. I think they've been included as anti-Aeldari, anti-Bridgehead Guard tech. Anyone playing an army largely comprised of T3 Infantry is not going to be super happy to see a unit that can crank out 5D3 S4 Indirect Blast + 1D6 S7 Indirect Blast. A typical 10-man Guard squad will face a minimum of 18 shots with a potential maximum of 33. Having Indirect gives Rodrigo a response to Aeldari movement shenanigans. Plus, it gives Rodrigo an option for hitting something in his opponent's deployment zone first turn if he goes first. Most players use a pretty weedy unit as their backfield objective holder. If you've got a Desolator Squad in your list and you put Oath on your opponent's backfield unit, you stand a pretty good chance of picking it up on your first activation, and then your opponent has to have something he was going to do something else with mind that backfield objective.   They've also got the superkrak rockets to put into bigger, tougher targets as needed. 

You know, I never picked up any Desolators because I thought they were goofy looking. I still think they're goofy looking, but I may have to get over myself and get some anyway.

Rodrigo started strong by drubbing Imperial Knights in the 1st round, 90-56. 2nd round he squeaked out a 79-78 win against Blood Angels. 3rd round he suffered an 80-92 loss against Aeldari - maybe he needed more Desolators? 4th round he had another tight match, winning 89-84 against Tyranids. 5th round he ended strong with an 82-66 win against Chaos Knights.

Our other list from this week was played by Vanguard Tactics' Jay Seebarun, whose lists pop up here with some frequency. Jay went 4-1 with his Gladius Task Force at the Hobby Henchmen Spring GT held somewhere in England - it was unclear to me from the event listing, but I suppose a Briton can make sense of it. Anyhow, it was a 5-round, 24 player event. Jay took 3rd, which is not bad by any measure. You can see Jay's list on BCP and below.

Dark Angels: Hobby Henchman

Azrael
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Intercessor Squad: 5 bolter boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Inceptor Squad: 3 chonky flying plasma boys
Inceptor Squad: 3 chonky flying plasma boys
Infiltrator Squad: 5 stay-off-my-lawn boys
Infiltrator Squad: 5 stay-off-my-lawn boys
Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys
Vindicator
Vindicator
Whirlwind

Well, this list is certainly interesting! It does have some of the usual conventional elements, but there are some inclusions we haven't seen in a while. For starters, let's talk about the Terminator Chaplains. Conventional wisdom is that Deathwing Knights don't need attached characters, and DWKs with Maces wouldn't seem to need the +1 To Wound the Chaplains confer. That said, it would make them wound elite Infantry and Mounted units more reliably, but my thought is that they've been included so the DWKs have a save versus Mortal and Devastating Wounds all the time, not just for one turn. I suspect Jay included the Chaplains with any eye towards matchups with Aeldari and Daemons. I'm not up to speed on all of the Aeldari tricks as yet, but I've been writing an article abouit the Daemons Legion of Excess, and brethren there sure are a lot of units that do Dev Wounds in that detachment. 

It's also interesting to see two squads of Infiltrators. I think their purpose is to zone out the mid-board from Reserves shenanigans. Well placed Infiltrators will prevent Fire Dragons from entering play next to his Vindicators, obliging them to march down the table and face getting their faces punched in by the DWKs and ICCs. 

I'd also like to comment on the Inceptors and Whirlwind, which I imagine have been included for the same reason Rodrigo included his Desolators - as a response to Aeldari movement shenanigans. Aeldari players are going to use Battle Focus to have their units pop out, shoot, and then pop back behind walls to protect them from clap-backs. Being able to drop some Damage 2/3 plasma behind those walls to light them up, and being able to hit them regardless of LOS, is going to be a major asset. Plus, the Whirlwind, like the Desolators, gives you the option of that first-turn strike on the weedy backfield objective holding unit. Since Jay doesn't have any uppy-downy units, he's likely also counting on the Inceptors to score Secondaries for him.

Jay suffered a 1st round 59-73 loss against Chaos Marines. He recovered for the 2nd round though, with a convincing 98-63 win against Necrons. 3rd round he scored a tidy 93-80 win against Tyranids. 4th round he scored a comfortable 75-58 against Astra Militarum. 5th round he ended strong with a solid 93-73 win against Death Guard.

Statistics

As previously mentioned, it was not a good weekend for the 1st Legion chapter. We had a 37% overall win rate, with just 2 X/1 results out of 28 players. Our 10-week overall win rate is 46%. Last week I stated we were doing okay. This week looks like it's showing otherwise. We've had just 3 event wins over that time period. The top event winning faction in that same time period has been Chaos Daemons with 17. Vanilla Marines have had 15 event wins, and even a fairly equivalent faction to us, Blood Angels, has had 6. 

The detachment with the highest win percentage was the Ironstorm Spearhead, because it was played by just 1 stalwart who went 4-2 with it for a 67%.

The most played was, again, the Gladius Task Force, with 12 players who scored a 44% win rate and both our X/1 results. 

2 players used the Unforgiven Task Force, scoring a 45% win rate.

7 players used the Company of Hunters, scoring a 30% win rate. I'm playing a CoH at a GT this coming weekend. I hope I can help improve those numbers a bit.

The Stormlance Task Force also had 7 players, who only scored a 28% win rate, though the detachment has a 52% 10-week win rate. 

3 players used the Vanguard Spearhead, scoring a 27% win rate.

2 players took the Unforgiven Task Force, scoring a 45% win rate

1 optimist used the Inner Circle Task Force. That stalwart only got a 17% win rate, but give them credit for playing all 6 games at their event. 

Factions To Be Aware Of

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Aeldari were the top dogs of the weekend with 88 players scoring 2 event wins, 24 X/0-X/1 results and a 57% win rate, A full 4 detachments with win rates over 55%.

• Devoted of Ynnead had 34 players, 14 X/0-X/1 results, and a 62% win rate.
• Aspect Host had 31 players, 8 X/0-X/1 result, both event wins, and a 56% win rate
• Windrider Host had 5 players, 1 X/0-X/1 result, and a 58% win rate
• Spirit Conclave had 4 players, 1 X/0-X/1 result, anda 58% win rate

It looks like GW is going to be playing whack-a-mole with Aeldari for a while again.

Genestealer Cult was right behind Aeldari in win percentage at 56%, with 26 players, 7 X/0-X/1 results and 2 event wins. 4 of their 5 detachments scored above 50%, with only Biosantic Brood Surge scoring under at 42%.

• Host of Ascension had 7 players, 3 X/0-X/1 results, 1 event win, and a whopping 70% win rate
• Final Day had 7 players, 2 X/0-X/1 results, 1 event win, and a 57% win rate

Chaos Daemons also had a 56% win rate, with 42 players, 13 X/0-X/1 results and 4 event wins. Again, Legion of Excess is outperforming the other detachments, but none of them did badly over the weekend.

• Legion of Excess had 16 players, 7 X/0-X/1 results, 2 event wins, and a 63% win rate
• Scintillating Legion had 4 players, 2 X/0-X/1 results, 1 event win, and a 59% win rate
• Blood Legion had 2 players and a 55% win rate
• Daemonic Incursion had 16 players, 3 X/0-X/1 results, and a 51% win rate
• Plague Legion had 4 players and only a 48% win rate, but picked up the 4th event win

Adeptus Custodes Solar Spearhead had 17 players anda  57% win rate.

Necrons had 53 players and picked up 10 X/0-X/1 result. The vast majority of them played either Starshatter Arsenal or Awakened Dynasty. Both detachments scored over 50%, and they split the X/0-X/1 results between them, 5 and 5.

That, battle brethren, is what I have for you. Do me a favor and Follow me if you like my work. For similar work, here's Dank List Wargaming's latest video, with guest Adam Wisch who talks about going 4-1 with a Company of Hunters. Drop a comment telling Bailey to paint his flags! Until next time, battle brethren. For the Lion!