Chapter Update 7/21/2025

Hello battle brethren! Another weekend is past us, and with it bitter defeats and glorious victories! We're here to discuss the latter, with my weekly roundup of the most successful Dark Angels lists of the weekend. Four lists went 4-1 over the weekend, with two of them being Wrath of the Rock lists, and the Stormlance Task Force coming back with the other two!

We'll talk about the Stormlance lists first - get through discussing that grubby detachment that lesser chapters can use so we can get to the lists using our righteous bespoke detachment! The first of these was played at Capital Clash - Dakka Dakka!, a 5-round, 51 plyaer event held in Holt, ACT, Australia. Tim Neal of ACT 40K took 5th place with his Stormlance list. You can see the full list on BCP, and the short version starts off our discussion below.

Clonestodes
Azrael - Warlord
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Lieutenant with Combi-weapon
Ballistus Dreadnought
Ballistus Dreadnought
Ballistus Dreadnought
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey 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
Ministorum Priest

This is an interesting list for a few reasons. The first is rolling with 3 Terminator Chaplains to attach to the Deathwing Knight squads. If they all had swords that would seem a little less counter-intuitive, as having both +1 to Wound and Anti Big Thing 4+ seem on a Strength 6 weapon seems redundant. However, Death Guard are one of the bullies of the meta at the moment, and with even basic Plague Marines being T6 and Deathshroud Terminators being T7 (and if you play into Death Guard you're certainly going to see Deathshroud Terminators), the Terminator Chaplains are a sensible adaptation to the meta. 

The two Infiltrator Squads strike me as being in the list for a similar reason. I don't think they've been included to sit on the backfield objective, but to make it impossible for a Death Guard player to drop Deathshrouds within charge range of Tim's stuff out of Deep Strike. They can also help out a little with some chaff-clearing shooting, maybe tossing the odd grenade here or there, and scoring positional Secondaries. He also has the Combi-Lieutenant for such considerations.

As a shooting element, Tim went with a trio of Ballisti. The Ballistus Dreadnought is not a fantastic shooting platform, but it's not an expensive one, it's adequate for its cost, and it is Toughness 10 with a 2+ save, which between them and the Deathwing Knights presents opponents with a bit of a stat check. They can pop transports so the Deathwing Knights can charge and kill the embarked squads instead of having to kill the transports themselves, and stand on objectives and be a nuisance to take off due to their high Toughness and Save characteristics.

Azrael is paired up with a squad of Inner Circle Companions, which is never a bad choice. 

The odd man out is the Ministorum Priest, like the water boy for an elite football team. I imagine he either stands on the backfield objective when Tim playing into Death Guard, or goes into Reserve to pop out when it's time to score a Secondary when he isn't.

Tim started strong, crushing Noble Imperial Knights 90-43. 2nd round was his loss, a tight 73-76 against Hammer Militarum. 3rd round he rallied for a close 79-70 win against a Daemonic Incursion. 4th round he had another close win, 82-72 against Beastslayer Space Wolves. 5th round he ended with a comfortable 82-68 win against Infernal Lance Chaos Knights. Good job Tim!

The other Stormlance that went 4-1 over the weekend was played at The Gang's 40K Grand Tournament @ Gamez & More played in Rochester, Minnesota, a 5-round, 26 player event. Ian Muggli took 2nd place with his list! You can see Ian's list on BCP, and we'll discuss it below.

Lance
Azrael - Warlord
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Techmarine
Intercessor Squad: 5 bolter boys
Bladeguard Veteran Squad: 3 awesome swordy-boardy boys
Bladeguard Veteran Squad: 3 awesome swordy-boardy boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky swordy boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky swordy boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky swordy boys
Gladiator Lancer
Gladiator Lancer
Gladiator Lancer
Infiltrator Squad: 5 stay-off-my-lawn boys
Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys

You'd think this list would have the 3 Terminator Chaplains, but no, just the one.  To be fair, sword Deathwing Knights are nothing to sneeze at into anything that's not Toughness 12, and with big Knights dropping down to Toughness 11 they wound twice as often as they used to, so they don't need to be paired with Chaplains quite so badly. There is still the one though, giving Ian a squad he can send after those big boys.

Ian went with a trio of Gladiator Lancers for his ranged element. They're more expensive than Ballisti, don't have that handy 2+ save, and have less big shots. On the flipside, their big shots are more likely to go to saves with the higher strength and in-built rerolls Lancers laser destroyers have, are less likely to grant a save with their superior AP, plus they have a bucket of dice they can throw at chaff while blasting big targets off the board with their main guns. Ian made the interesting choice to include a Techmarine to support them. In my experience, Techmarines rarely get a chance to repair a damaged vehicle, but it can be nice to give one +1 to Hit for the phase, and they get choppy if a vehicle they're minding gets destroyed. Amusingly, Techmarines also have one of the few Damage 3 melee attacks we can get on an Infantry model without buying an Enhancement for it, in the form of their 1 Servo-arm attack per turn. He can buff a vehicle and still do actions on Ian's turns too, so he might, say, score Cleanse for Ian from time to time.

Azrael with ICCs, a squad of Infiltrators, and a squad of Intercessors are all fairly conventional and strong choices. Interestingly, he seems to have gone with 3-man Bladeguard Veteran Squads for his Secondary-scoring utility units. That's an unconventional choice, but with 3 wounds each and a 4++ save, they can be harder to pick up than, say, Scouts or Jump Intercessors. Plus, light skirmishing units are going to have a hard time against them. 

Ian not only went 4-1, but he went 4-0 for the first four rounds, which is a statistic Stat-check.com tracks. 1st round he drubbed Outlander Genestealer Cult 90-61, efficiently laying the smack down on both heretics and xenos at the same time! 2nd round he crushed Haloscreed Mechanicus 100-43. 3rd round he similarly bodied Berzerker World Eaters 95-44. 4th round he beat down Hammer Militarum 98-47. Sadly, he took his loss in the 5th round, 75-84 against Kauyon T'au, and the player who took 1st place. Good run Ian!

Transitioning to our Wrath of the Rock lists, our first one was played at the Phoenix 40K 2 Day GT 2025, a 5-round, 26-player event held not in Phoenix Arizona as I was expecting, but Sandiacre England. I suppose the Sandiacre 40K 2 Day GT doesn't have quite the same ring to it. At this counter-intuitively named event, Andrew King of D6DRolled1 went 4-1 and took 2nd place. You can check out Andrew's list on BCP, and we'll discuss it below. 

.Eh
Lion Dad - Warlord
Azrael
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 swordy boys
Hellblaster Squad: 10 plasma boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Cerastus Knight Lancer

The elephant in the room is that Knight Lancer, so let's look at it first. The Lancer is a melee Knight, though it does also have an okay 12" shooting attack with 6 shots, Assault, and Sustained Hits 2. The real show is its shock lance in melee, with a 5-attack Strike profile at Strength 20 and 8 Damage, or a 10 attack Sweep profile at Strength 10 and 3 Damage. It has the typical big Knight profile with Toughness 11 and 28 wounds, with a straight, unconditional 4+ Invulnerable save. It's fast too, with a 14" move and the ability to Charge after it Advances, and because it's cute it can play Tank Shock for free. Not a bad value for 365 points.

Having spent about 20% of his points on that Knight Lancer, Andrew had to compress the rest of his list into less points, and did a pretty good job of it. He's got Lion Dad and two squads of DWKs to punch things to death and be hard to kill while doing it, Azrael and 10 Hellblasters to give him some ranged offense and to have a unit that can use Relics of the Dark Age, Intercessor to stick on his backfield objective, and the Combi-Lieutenant, Scouts, and Outriders to run around and score Secondaries. My only criticism is I'd like to see a Lieutenant to go with Azrael and the Hellblasters, but that would have involved cutting something else because Andrew couldn't afford to indulge. A case could be made for Sternguard, but the Hellblasters are likely more useful into more things (particularly with Relics) and they're Andrew's only real shooting threat, so he needs the more versatile unit.

Andrew did the opposite of Ian, in that he lost his first game, then went undefeated. That 1st round loss was bruising too, 32-87 against Infernal Lance Chaos Knights.  Apparently he only struggles into Chaos Knights though, because 2nd round he murdered him some Imperial Knights 100-35. 3rd round he dominated Rengade Chaos Marines 95-25, so he's good into Chaos too, it's just that combo of Chaos and Knights he had a hard time with. He bodied a Mechanicus list of unspecified detachment 94-31 in the 4th round. 5th round he let Starshatter Necrons feel good about themselves by scoring some points, but still prevailed 100-69. Good job Andrew!

Our other 4-1 Wrath list from the weekend comes from the Big Beef Beat down, a 30-player event held in Omaha Nebraska. Matthew Doughman too 5th place. You can find Matthew's list on BCP. Let's have a look at what he brought. 

Wrath
Lion Dad - Warlord
Azrael
Chaplain in Terminator Armour
Judiciar: Ancient Weapons
Lieutenant with Combi-weapon
Intercessor Squad: 5 bolter boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky swordy boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Eradicator Squad: 3 chonky melta boys
Inceptor Squad: 6 chonky flying plasma boys
Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys
Invader ATV: Melta buggy
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Sternguard Veteran Squad: 5 awesome bolter boys

People playing Wrath lists must be getting good use out of Lion Dad, because he certainly seems to be appearing in a lot of them. He's pricey, but I suppose what he provides is an ability to apply pressure at different parts of the table, because the detachment doesn't let us move most of our units any faster than their datasheets allow us to. 

Matthew decided to rock with two Fights First unit, Lion Dad and ICCs with the attached Judiciar, with the Judiciar having Ancient Weapons, which slaps. He's only got the two units of DWKs, which hasn't been unusual in lists with Lion Dad, and the one with swords has the Termie Chappie to lead them into +1 To Wound and glory. Azrael has his small unit of Sternguard to hang with, to their mutual benefits. There are the usual Combi-Lieutenant and Scouts for running around scoring points, plus an ATV that can do that as well, and maybe occasionally be a target for Relics if there's nothing else to use it on, and the Intercessors for backfield objective duty.

Matthew's main shooting threat is his big squad of Inceptors, which can throw out a lot of Strength 10 twin-linked 3-Damage shots when buffed by the Relics strat. Not many opponents are going to be super-happy to have that pointed at their units, and having the 6" Deep Strike ability on their datasheet makes it hard for opponents to screen out their alpha strike. They're backed up by a small squad of Eradicators, who can be buffed to Strength 11 if Matthew has to put them into big Knights. If they can get within Melta range, they could take down a big Knight if they get lucky.

Matthew started the weekend strong by crushing Warpbane Grey Knights 90-41 in the 1st round. 2nd round he defeated Soulforged Chaos Marines by a similarly bruising margin, 76-27.  3rd round he buried Oathband Votann 97-33. 4th round he took his loss, 50-70 against Imperial Knights. He bounced back in the 5th round though, scoring a very solid 79-35 against Infernal Chaos Knights. Capital performance Matthew!

I'd like to discuss one more list, that didn't technically reach my criteria for inclusion, but actually won more games than any of the lists we've previously seen in this article. It was played at Warhammer Open Tacoma, an 8-round, 462 player event held in Tacoma Washington. Sean Dahlin of Heroic Knights went 5-3 with a Company of Hunters list to place 79th, making him the highest-scoring Dark Angels player at that event. Here's Sean's list on BCP, and we will discuss it below. 

Zoom Zoom Heretic Go Boom (Best list name this week!)
Sammael - Warlord
Lieutenant with Combi-weapon
Ravenwing Command Squad: Recon Hunter
Ravenwing Command Squad: Master of Manoeuvre
Ravenwing Command Squad
Outrider Squad: 6 choppy biker boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Invader ATV: melta buggy
Invader ATV: melta buggy
Invader ATV: melta buggy
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome plasma biker boys
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome plasma biker boys
Ravenwing Black Knights: 3 awesome plasma biker boys
Ravenwing Darkshroud
Storm Speeder Hammerstrike
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike

Dang! But for that Combi-Lieutenant, this list is all-Ravenwing, all-the-time! The strength of the detachment is the detachment rule, and it's strongest on Mounted units, so I can see the logic behind it. Big bricks of Black Knights can definitely deliver both shooting and assault pain, and Outriders can throw a pile of attacks while boosting an attached character's melee attacks to Damage 3, which is an important break point.

The Hammerstrike and Thunderstrike can buff the Black Knights' shooting into important targets, and the Hammerstrike at least is a fairly consequential shooting threat all by itself. The Thunderstrike is okay, but is much more valuable for the buff it gives other units' shooting than for its own. 

Sean has a lot of MSU mounted units to run around and do whatever he needs them to do besides the big bricks that are the main damage dealers. My one criticism is that I'd have included one more big brick of Outriders so the characters can all be attached to big units to fully take advantage of the Apothecaries' ability to bring back bikes. That said, there's exactly four 3-man Mounted units, and 4 characters that can be attached to them, so Sean could be attaching his Command Squads and Sammy to the 3-man squads. 9-man bricks can be challenging to move around the table, and the Ravenwing shooting doesn't suffer much from being more dispersed if your game plan. It also gives Sean some ability to adjust his list to perform against whatever he happens to be facing. 

One thing I'm not confident about is the value of the Darkshroud. I think it comes into its own when it's used to protect vehicles, because the misses it generates against vehicles are apt to be more consequential than against the bike squads. Maybe Sean keeps it near the Storm Speeders for that very reason. I'm inclined to think another Hammerstrike would have served him better though.

It must be funny whenever Sean plays this list into a Drukhari player. His opponent, banking on all that Anti-Infantry Drukhari pack, sees all the Bikes and the one single solitary Infantry character, and dies inside just a little bit.

Sean started strong with a comfortable 1st round 95-64 against Dread Chaos Knights. 
2nd round he crushed Vectorum Death Guard 100-42. 3rd round he brutalized Shatterstar Necrons 94-20. 4th round he took his first loss, 50-73 against Infernal Chaos Knights. 5th round he took another loss, 78-90 against Hammer Death Guard. 6th round he drubbed Dread Chaos Knights again, 100-60. 7th round he murdered an Ultramarines Gladius 100-28. Finally, in the 8th round, he played against Infernal Chaos Knights again, and lost by the teeniest margin, 64-65. 

That was a lot of 40K Sean!  Good job on your performance! Facing Chaos Knights 4 times in 8 games was crazy! It seems like you've got it locked down against that Lords of Dread detachment, but the Infernal Lance gives you trouble. 

After the 4th round, players got placed into brackets. Sean finished in the 3rd bracket. Another brethren, Craig Sniffen, went 5-3 with a Gladius at this event, but he finished in a lower bracket. 

Statistics

It wasn't our best weekend, but it wasn't our worst. 40 players played 211 games and won 100 of them, for a 47% win rate. We didn't have any event wins, but we did have 4 X/1 results. Meta Monday credits us with getting 7, 5 of them Wrath lists, but I only found 2. That gives us an X-Representation score of 0.72, which is better than last week, but not what I'd call good. 

We had a bigger variety of detachments played last weekend than we've seen in a while. Again the most played was the Wrath of the Rock detachment, with 26 players who scored a 44% win rate and earned 2 X-results. 

Second most played was the Gladius, with 4 players who scored a respectable 58% win rate, but no high results.

The Stormlance saw a bit of a revival, with 3 players who earned a 73% win rate and picked up the other 2 X results.

The Company of Hunters also had 3 players, who scored a decent 59% win rate.

One player tried his luck with the Lion's Blade, scoring a 25% win rate.

One diehard played an Inner Circle Task Force. That stalwart went 0-5. At least he played all his games!

An Ironstorm Spearhead made the rounds, going 1-4.

Finally, a Librarius Conclave was played and went 2-2-1.

Factions and Detachments To Watch Out For

The usual suspects are making this list again, starting with Chaos Knights, who had 71 players who scored a 61% win rate, 17 X-results, and 4 event wins, giving them a 1.73 X-Representation score. The Infernal Lance and Lords of Dread detachments had both the lion's share of players and high scoring results between the two of them, with 63 players, 15 of the X-results, and 3 of the event wins, split pretty evenly between the two of them.

Imperial Knights were right behind them, with 79 players, a 60% win rate, 20 X-results, and 2 event wins. They had a 1.83 X-Representation score.

Death Guard were up there too, with 112 players who scored a 54% win rate, 16 X-results, and 4 event wins. One of those event wins was Tacoma Open, the largest event of the weekend by far. Their X-Rep score is a fairly reasonable 1.04. Virulent Vectorum, Mortarion's Hammer, and Champions of Contagion were the most popular and successful detachments.

That, honored battle brethren, is what I have for you. Fun and informative Dark Angels content can be found on YouTube at Dank List Wargaming and Black Crow Gaming. I'd like to thank Meta Monday for the weekly data compilation, which I use to alert you to what factions to watch out for. I hope you enjoyed my work and that it helps you find success in your games. Forth, Unforgiven, for glorious victory! For The Lion!