Chapter Update: 12/15/2025
Our top list this week was played by Jonathan Arkin, who is the host of Happy Krumpin' Wargaming over on YouTube, which you absolutely should check out. He brought his Wrath of the Rock list to the Safety's Off's Second Coming of the Double Critmas Charity GT held in Roebuck, South Carolina and went 5-0 to place 1st out of 34 players. You can check out Jonathan's list in its entirety on BCP, and we'll break it down below.
Jonathan's list
Lion Dad - Warlord
Azrael
Ancient in Terminator Armor: Deathwing Assault
Lieutenant with Combi-weapon
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Deathwing Knights: 5 awesome chonky macey boys
Desolation Squad: 5 steely-eyed missle boys
Inceptor Squad: 3 chonky flying plasma boys
Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Gladiator Lancer
Callidus Assassin
Jonathan's list starts off with a conventional core of units for a Wrath list. He's got 2 squads of Deathwing Knights, who as we all know are tough as nails and pack a considerable punch into most targets in the game. He's got Lion Dad to lead them to victory, protect them from Mortal Wounds, buff their output in melee, and smack down anything they might struggle with. Azrael is leading a squad of Inner Circle Companions, which is not always how we see him used, but it's not an unusual assignment. The ICCs certainly like to have the Invulnerable save and Sustained Hits on their Strike profile that Azrael provides.
One innovation in Jonathan's list is the Terminator Ancient with Deathwing Assault. This gives him a strong going-first first turn play. He can uppy Lion Dad, plop the squad the Ancient is attached to on his opponent's expansion objective on his turn, and then Rapid Ingress Lion Dad on his opponent's first turn to support the Deathwing Knights who are out forward. If an opponent wants to claim his expansion objective, he's going to have to clear the Deathwing Knights and Lion Dad, and they take a lot of clearing.
Another innovative choice is the Desolation Squad. Personally, I'm not fond of Desolators, but they do pack a pretty decent Indirect Fire punch with 5 Castellan launchers and the sergeant's Vengor Launcher, which gives him a tool to deal with pesky units lurking out of line of sight (think Aeldari Aspect Warriors) Plus they can put 4 Superkrak missiles into something if, say, Jonathan needs to crack a transport. They can also make good use of the benefit from the Relics of the Dark Age strat. They're not super-durable, so he has to be careful about exposing them, but they are a useful tool to have in the kit.
Jonathan included a squad of plasma Inceptors, which is another interesting choice. It's always good to have a Deep Strike threat, and Inceptors are harder to screen out with their 6" Deep Strike datasheet rule. They oblige opponents to sweat screening a little more than they might otherwise, potentially reducing the amount of pressure they're sending at the objectives Jonathan is holding. It's also nice to have the Strength 9 Twin-Linked Damage-3 shooting, and they're another squad that can make good use of the Relics strat.
For utility units, Jonathan has the typical Combi-Lieutenant, two squads of Scouts, and the Callidus Assassin. That's interesting because the Scouts and the Callidus can all uppy-downy. There may be games where Jonathan sticks the Combi-Lieutenant on his backfield objective so he can use all three of the other units to their full potential. If he's concerned about screening around his backfield objective, he can stick a squad of Scouts there instead.
Our man Jonathan actually did a video about his 5-0 run, which you can find here.
Jonathan enjoyed a nonstop ride on the win train! 1st round he drubbed Questoris Imperial Knights 87-50. 2nd round he squeaked out a 77-75 win against Space Marines (that opponent didn't post a list on BCP). 3rd round he trounced Berserker World Eaters 80-53. 4th round he bodied Pactbound Chaos Marines 100-66. 5th round he crushed the current bogeyman of the meta, Ultramarines Gladius with 15 Victrix Guard, 100-37. Congratulations on the win Jonathan!
The other event-winning list took the top place at the Rogue City Rumble GT held in Medford, Oregon, a 5-round, 28 player event. My hero Jofonz Bow of RBBR defeated all comers with his Company of Hunters list. Here's Jofonz' list on BCP. We'll look at it below.
We are the Wraiths of the Emperor, born of night,
We ride in silence, wielding His might.
Not for glory, nor for fame,
In shadows deep, we etch His name.
Our path is hidden, our strike is clean,
Ghosts in the dark, silent, unseen.
No trace we leave, no sign remains,
Only echoes, where darkness reigns.
The road is long, the battle rough,
But with my brothers, we are enough.
Through shadow alone, our spirits soar,
Together we ride, our engines roar.
Ravenwing Command Squad
Ravenwing Command Squad
Ravenwing Command Squad
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Outrider Squad: 3 choppy biker boys
Gladiator Lancer
Gladiator Lancer
Gladiator Lancer
Infiltrator Squad: 5 stay-off-my-lawn boys
Invader ATV: melta buggy
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome plasma biker boys
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome plasma biker boys
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome plasma biker boys
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike
What really stands out about Jofonz' list is that it includes none of the typical Dark Angels or Space Marines good stuff. No Lion Dad, Azrael, Deathwing Knights, ICCs, Land Speeders Vengeance, or Centurion Devastators. Instead, he's got 37 bikes (including the ATV), 3 tanks, one speeder, and a couple utility units.
The core of the list starts with three full squads of Ravenwing Knights. Ravenwing Knights are a unit I love, but I can't honestly say they are an unambiguously good unit the way Deathwing Knights are. They have some good qualities, but also some pretty significant drawbacks. Their main drawback is they're not very durable. A Toughness 5, 3-wound profile is pretty easy for almost any army to pick up, and while they have a 5+ Invulnerable save, that really doesn't matter against the weapons that are most deadly to them, being medium-to-high volume Damage 2/Damage 3 AP -2 attacks. Also, they have the Mounted keyword, which requires them to go around walls rather than through them (man, I wish the CoH had a move-through-walls strat!). They also have mediocre melee into Infantry with 2 or more wounds per model.
All that said, there are numerous upsides to Ravenwing Knights as well. They are an extremely fast unit that has good activations in both the Shooting phase and the Fight phase. With their 12" Move characteristic, you can usually position them where you want them to be even with having to go around terrain. Their Shooting attack are 2-shot Rapid Fire 1 plasma guns with an 18" range, which translates to 18 shots within 9". There are not many players who are going to be happy about having that pointed at their units, and they are quite good at picking up elite Infantry or light Vehicles/Monsters. Their melee attack is essentially a 3-swing power weapon with Devastating Wounds, with the added bonus of being Anti-Monster/Vehicle 4+ on the charge, which they confer to any attached unit or character. If you can put a fresh squad into the appropriate target and get them all in swinging range, average dice should yield 6 Dev Wounds sans Oath, which is a good chunk of most Vehicles. Finally, each member of the squad is OC 2, so they can put a lot of OC on an objective in a hurry. In the Company of Hunters, where they can both Shoot and Charge after making an Advance or Fall Back move, you can get maximum benefit out of their good qualities while at least trying to mitigate their drawbacks.
Jofonz is also using three Ravenwing Command Squads and three Outrider Squads. Ravenwing Command Squads are Ravenwing Knights with 4 wounds each, +1 OC per model, +1 to Advance and Charge rolls, free Heroic Intervention, you can restore a lost model in your Command phase, one member having equivalent attacks to a Captain with a master-crafted power weapon, and that member having the Character keyword and able to take Enhancements. You can attach them to Ravenwing Knights, in which case you get even more of what makes them good, but I suspect Jofonz is attaching them to the Outrider squads because the detachment's stratagems don't really provide a compelling reason to field full 9-man plasma bike bricks, and it's easier to move 6-man bike squads around the table than 9-man squads. The enhancements make it easier to keep them from getting in each other's way, but Jofonz isn't using any of them. Ravenwing Command Squads and Outriders compliment each other very well too.
Jofonz is backing up his bikes with three Gladiator Lancers, which makes sense to me. The best way of protecting Infantry from being vaporized by the Black Knights is to have them inside Transports, so it's important to have a reliable means of popping them. Lancers provide that, plus are a decent threat to bigger targets, can throw a bucket of dice at chaff, and are reasonably Oath-agnostic.
The last piece of Jofonz's offensive strategy is the Storm Speeder Thunderstrike. The Thunderstrike's own offensive ability is a little underwhelming, with two Strength 9 las-talon shots and 1 lascannon-equivalent shot, plus an Icarus rocket pod, but with a 14" move characteristic and Deep Strike it can put them where they will do the most good. The real reason to include it, though, is its Thunderstrike datasheet ability, which gives the rest of Jofonz' shooting +1 To Wound against a Monster or Vehicle hit by one of its attacks. That's a 33% increase in offense into anything Toughness 9+, making all the plasma fire much more of a threat to bigger targets. It's also handy to have something with Fly in your list, and in a Dark Angels list it gets the Ravenwing keyword, so it can benefit from the Ravenwing-keyworded stratagems. Rapid Reappraisal on something with Deep Strike sure seems spicy to me.
For utility work, Jofonz has an Infiltrator Squad to mind his backfield objective, a Scout Squad, and an Invader ATV.
I'd like to note that Jofonz' list used the old points for everything, so with the new points for Black Knights and the Thunderstrike, he'll have another 75 points to play with. I look forward to seeing what he adds to his list.
Jofonz also enjoyed a nonstop ride on the win train! 1st round he butchered Berserker World Eaters 91-18 (!). 2nd round he scored a comfortable 96-77 against Combined Arms Militarum. 3rd round he had a close 68-60 against Tallyband Death Guard. 4th round he drubbed Starshatter Necrons 88-60. 5th round he ended strong, crushing Subterranean Tyranids 90-50, Congratulations on your win Jofonz!
The next list we're looking at is Imperial News Network's Raul Valencia's Wrath of the Rock list, which he took to Rise of The Empire GT 2025 in Houston, Texas, went 5-1 with, and placed 2nd out of 83 players. Here's Raul's list on BCP. Let's take a look at it below.
Deathwing Knights? Bro they used to be Damage 3 and have a 6” deepstrike. And they costed LESS back then (Note: I do miss me those Damage 3 Deathwing Knights) Lion Dad - Warlord Azrael Judiciar Lieutenant with Combi-weapon Ravenwing Command Squad: Ancient Weapons Intercessor Squad: 5 bolter boys Centurion Devastator Squad: 3 super-chonky las-missile boys Centurion Devastator Squad: 3 super-chonky las-missile boys Hellblaster Squad: 10 plasma boys Incursor Squad: 5 spotty boys Inner Circle Companions: 6 spooky awesome swordy boys Invader ATV: melta buggy Ravenwing Black Knights: 3 awesome plasma biker boys Ravenwing Black Knights: 3 awesome plasma biker boys Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Holy balls, there are no Deathwing Knights in this list! Raul is clearly leaning more into shooting than assault with this list. He's got the two squads of Centurion Devastators, which are not unusual to see and are a very good shooting platform, but he also has 10 Hellblasters, plus two squads of Ravenwing Knights and a Ravenwing Command Squad. Plus, he's got an Incursor squad to buff his shooting into a target per turn. Incursors and Cent Devs pair very well with each other, because giving Cent Devs +1 To Hit effectively makes their inbuilt Reroll 1's To Hit rerolling all their missed rolls. All of these units make good targets for Relics of the Dark Age, depending on what he puts the shooting into.
I suspect Raul puts the Hellblasters onto the center objective, with Lion Dad and the ICCs waiting in the wings behind LOS-blocking walls. This gives opponents a dilemma. If the opponent shoots the Hellblasters, he's likely to get shot back in his turn, and the dead Hellblasters don't have to target the unit that caused the casualties, so they potentially degrade units that have yet to shoot at them. So, shooting them isn't a great solution. Charging them is not good either, because it would be a neat trick to charge in such a way that the unit charging in is not vulnerable to being counter-charged by either Lion Dad or the Judiciar-led ICCs (or both) and getting mauled by a very choppy Fights First unit. It's a pretty good game plan, and it clearly seems to have worked for Raul.
Meanwhile Raul has the Ravenwing Knights to bomb around and pick up skirmish units - he might even be running the Command Squad unattached to be a third small skirmish unit. Any one of those units has 6 OC too, so they can out-OC most small units. For utility units, he's got a pretty good spread - the Combi-Lieutenant, two squads of Scouts, an ATV, and Intercessors to sit on and sticky his backfield objective.
1st round Raul got the mirror match - another Dark Angels Wrath list - and scored a comfortable 84-70. 2nd round was a close 71-66 versus Drukhari Spectacle of Spite. 3rd round he drubbed Rage Blood Angels 83-57. 4th round he scored a respectable 72-50 against Goretrack World Eaters. 5th round he manhandled Plague Legion Daemons 100-69. His loss came in the 6th round, a nail-biting 77-79 against the event-winning Astra Militarum Grizzled Company list. Well done Raul!
Honorable Mentions
Edwin Mehta of Making Saves went 4-1-1 with his Wrath of the Rock list at the King of Blades, the 2nd - 40k Grand Tournament held in Phoenix, Arizona, placing 8th out of 62 players. Here's Edwin's list for you to check out.
Noah Lockard went 4-1 with his Gladius list at the Rise of The Empire GT 2025 that Raul placed 2nd at. Noah placed 12th out of 83 players. Check out Noah's list here.
Well done honored battle brethren!
Statistics
The numbers were a little lower this weekend past, with 27 players who played 126 games and won 67 of them, earning an admirable 55% win rate. 5 lists went X/0-X/1, and 2 won the events they were played at.
Most played by a lot, as usual, was Wrath of the Rock, with 19 players, a 54% win rate, 3 of the X-results, and 1 of the event wins.
Gladius had 4 players who managed a 50% win rate and 1 X-result.
One player played the Librarius Conclave and scored a 40% win rate.
One player played an Ironstorm and scored a 60% win rate.
Jofonz Bow was the sole player playing the Company of Hunters, scoring a 100% win rate and winning his event with it.
That, honored battle brethren, is what I have for you. Be sure to check out Black Crow Gaming and Dank List Wargaming over on YouTube for more fun Dark Angels content. As always, I hope you find my work enjoyable and informative. May you strive to be ever-victorious. For The Lion!
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