Ravenwing Army Breakdown Part 5: Allies (Space Marines)

Ravenwing Army Breakdown Part 5: Allies (Space Marines)

The first part of our allies breakdown will look at how the Ravenwing play with other flavors of power armor.

Dark Angels
Not “allies” per say but the rest of the Dark Angels codex has surprisingly little to offer the Ravenwing. There isn’t really anything that greenwing do that codex marines don’t do better, and Deathwing are suffering from the sorry state of terminators in today’s competitive meta. If you do insist on running pure Dark Angels though, a DA librarius conclave with Ezekiel and some Deathwing Knights in a transport could make one hell of a death star, while the other conclave members roll around on bikes with your Ravenwing. Drop pod tactical or devastator squads with grav cannons are options if you like greenwing, but codex marines do that better.

Space Marines
Who likes bikes as much as we do? Our White Scar Battle Brothers that’s who! White Scars have a lot to offer us as allies including a librarius conclave that can actually all be on bikes, troop choice bike squads (Obsec is nice, but you’re penalized for not having troops in NOVA format games too), and the Hunter’s Eye. Even better, if the new FAQ is adopted and White Scars lose their chapter tactics by joining Dark Angels, black knights all have skilled rider so they only lose the Hammer of Wrath bonus.
Besides White Scars specifically, space marines have a staggering number of options for us. Skyhammer Annihilation Force can combined with all of our scouting firepower for a ridiculous alpha strike. The Raven Guard detachment can allow for some silly first-turn assaults, and thunderfire cannons can give us some long range firepower we’re otherwise lacking. This works in reverse too, because it’s easy to throw a few cheap Ravenwing units into other space marine armies to fill gaps where they need mobility or good short-range shooting. With space marine allies, you’ll have an easier time finding things that don’t work than do.

The only thing Librarian Faustus enjoys more than purging heretics, is purging heretics with friends.

Space Wolves
The infamous super friends. Take a black knight command squad, a bunch of thunderwolf iron priests, and sprinkle in your choice of Tigirius, Azrael, chaplain, or other goodies, until you have a 1700 point unkillable death star rolling around the field.
Besides thunderstar super friends, Space Wolves don’t have a lot of offer us, mostly because the real strength of their codex is only in their thunder wolves and their formations, which can be a bit expensive. If you don’t want to do the giant wolfstar, try smaller units of thunderwolves as dedicated melee units supported by the Ravenwing. I haven’t seen it tried but it might be more reliable than the 1700 point death star version.

Blood Angels
Blood Angels have the least to offer Dark Angels as allies, and vice versa. Without going too in-depth into Blood Angels tactics, most of their top-end strategies revolve around expensive alpha strikes and jump packs, and we end up stepping on each other’s toes more than supporting each other. A sanguinary priest or chaplain with a jump pack can be a cheap and easy addition to a Dark Angels force though, and depending on how the FAQ hashes out it may be useful to have them in front for re-rollable charges.

Up next will be our other battle brothers!