Buster Gundam is totally a Broadside...

Just look at it!

Looks better than the old Broadside model, I think...

That said, I really can't bring myself to field Tau (yet?). Besides, I kinda prefer Buster like this:

Also cleaned up that first Gundam I'd built yonks ago, Cherudim.

Looks okay from the front, but seriously, a lot of the models from Gundam 00 have absurd sticky-outy bits on their backs that I think are just annoying. In other news, here's a little something that's been long overdue...

Yep, at long last, a good old Land Raider for the Blood Angels. I just really hope the upcoming new codex doesn't shake things up too much...

Almost got a new Librarian... Aaaand he's done!

Soon, soon...

I've kept to my usual habit of blending red to yellow on force weapons, though this time, I've gone with a different technique. Usually, I start by painting the area for blending Mephiston Red, then work from one end and blend as I go with Blood Red, Trollslayer Orange, Golden Yellow and Vallejo's Pale Yellow. This time, I started with Iyanden Darksun, then blended starting from the centre. I found this saved quite a bit more time and effort.

The blue is achieved with Ultramarine Blue washed with Asurmen Blue, line highlighted with Lothern Blue. I still intend to highlight a little further, perhaps mixing some white in.

As I mentioned earlier, I'd decided to base all the gold areas with Iyanden Darksun before painting on Shining Gold, shading with Devlan Mud. I daresay that is what made a really big difference compared to my old technique of painting layer upon layer of Shining Gold on black, then shading with Chestnut Ink, making the mini as a whole appear much brighter.

<Moments later...>

And here he is, standing amongst my old Librarians for comparison:

What we have here is a small psychic nuclear weapon worth of Librarians... Is that a cat's whisker I see before me? 

Well, I'm pleased with how he turned out, and I've a list or two which I'm itching to try out... Next up, I think it's high time I got back to work on my Grey Knights...

Here he is again, in all his glory, ready to deliver the Emperor's wrath...

WIP: Another Librarian

Just got back from a quick break in Sydney a couple of days ago. The thing about going to Australia is that it is, for me, GW hell. Why? EVERYTHING is about 30 to 50% more expensive compared to Malaysia. And just to add insult to injury, there are a LOT of GW shops over there.... That said, I couldn't go all the way to Sydney and not make at least one pilgrimage to a friendly GW, so I stopped at GW Chatswood, staffed by the exceedingly friendly Franz, and picked up one dinky model: A plastic Librarian.

Here's how it's looking now...

Suffice it to say, I had to swap out the head for something a bit more fitting for a Blood Angel, i.e. hairier. I also left out the creepy cherub thing. Yeah, I know his skin tone seems a bit different from his bros in the back. In the past, I used Tallarn Flesh as a base and Elf Flesh to highlight. I'm currently using Vallejo's Dwarf Skin and Basic Skintone now.

Like the plastic commissar, the Librarian is a wonderfully detailed model. There are two things in particular I really like about this model:

1. The head socket gives you the freedom to pop in a different head, should you so choose. Tight fit, mind you.
2. The arms and staff are a single piece, allowing you to just paint those bits separately and glue them on later. 

Still lots to do. Right now, I'm trying to decide whether I want to base the gold bits in Iyanden Darksun first. Then comes the fiddly markings on the staff. Force weapons take me ages...

Update:
Later that day...

Yeah, I went with the Iyanden Darksun undercoat. I like. Those who know me may notice this is the first time I've deigned to paint in the eyes. Since he's a psyker, I don't have to dot them, hah!

Hungry for 7th...

Man, I am dying for a game of 7th ed... So, to keep myself from going insane, I've been keeping myself busy catching up with some old models and making them presentable. Also, I just whipped these up:

Nothing complicated here. Just a little paint and varnish and putting some old, old decals to good use. For Eternal War missions, I'd just use them like I used to. For Maelstrom of War, the Mysterious Objective dice can just be left beside it, so as not to obscure the number.

Inspired by the performance of the Red Thunder, I decided my Blood Angels needed more boots on the ground, so here are my 3 Tactical Squads to bolster the ranks.

I assembled the heavy bolter dude a long, long time ago, mostly because I thought the gun looked cool. Then, having played around with Razorback Assault Squads for a while, I promptly forgot him. Now, after a few more games of putting mere mortals on the board, a gene-enhanced super-soldier toting a massive, rapid-firing gun is looking more attractive than ever, so I painted this guy up, just in case.

I'm pleased to see that 2 editions since I started my Blood Angels, the meltagun still hasn't gone out of fashion. You gotta love a weapon designed to kill any one thing it's pointed at...

While I can say my technique with decals has improved over the years, the quality of Space Marine decals has not. Seriously, how do you get these things to lie perfectly flat on those pauldrons??

Left: New grunt, right: Very, very old grunt. From my first Tactical Squad, in fact. 

There's still plenty of line highlights that need doing here, but on the whole I'm pretty pleased with my rank and file.  Now let's see how well I keep them alive...

FAQs are here!

The FAQs are up, and the world of 40k is shaken most mightily. Of particular note is that ALL the 5th ed codices (Grey Knights, Blood Angels, Space Wolves) and the Orks have lost their codex specific psychic powers in favour of the new 7th ed powers.

It is also worth noting that the little summary card that comes with the Psychic Power Cards was in fact meant to indicate what powers could possibly be taken in a faction, but is NOT a blanket statement determining what is available to all psykers within that faction.For example, Chaos Marine players rejoiced on seeing Divination get a tick in its happy little box. However, that just refers to such things as the Hamadrya or the Banestar of Mammon. Alas, the Master of the Corvidae, Ahriman, STILL has no access to Divination. Shame on you, GW...

Here's what's going on with the other factions I play:

Blood Angels
Fine, no more Sanguine Sword and what-have-you. I can live with that. And I can definitely live with the fact that upgrading a Librarian to a Epistolary is now 25 pts, rather than the insanely priced 50 pts. Also, the Furioso Librarian is a level 2 psyker, which makes more sense.

On the downside, Blood Angels still have the most absurdly expensive Land Speeder Typhoons, at 90 pts compared to the rest of the Imperium's 75 pts. Also, there appears to be some kind of typo - Blood Angel Razorbacks, Rhinos, Vindicators, Whirlwinds and Predators have all lost Fast. Since there was no accompanying revision to the points costs of these vehicles, I think it's safe to assume that these vehicles did NOT, in fact, lose Fast, it's just that whoever prepared the document was either too lazy, too ignorant, too careless or too feckless to noticed he omitted one of the Blood Angel's defining characteristics.

Astra Militarum
Nothing much. The Primaris Psyker and Wyrdvane Psykers now add Daemonology to their repertoirs.

Chaos Space Marines
The Heldrake has lost it's ridiculous bendy gun, and now fires like it bloody well should - as a hull-mounted weapon, to the front. The Spell Familiar didn't change, so I'm guessing one gets to reroll a failed attempt to cast a psychic power.

Dark Angels
Psykers add Daemonology to their repertoirs. This FAQ still doesn't address the question of whether Deathwing Terminator Sergeants can switch out their weapons for thunder hammer and storm shield. And Blades of Caliban are still the most absurdly useless weapon in the book, coz who the hell needs an AP3 Unwieldly weapon, eh?

Necrons
Canoptek Spyders have had their Gloom Prism updated - it gives +2 to Deny the Witch in a 3" bubble. Also, if Deathmarks choose an Independent Character as a target, they wound any unit the IC joins on a 2+ as well. Nice! Other than that, nothing new that I can see.

Grey Knights
Saved the best for last. Since these guys have lost their codex powers, they've ALL been replaced with the new versions from Sanctic Daemonology. Pretty much everything with Hammerhand now has the new, improved Hammerhand AND Banishment. The Purifiers (including Crowe) have Cleansing Flame as well. All the vehicles which had Fortitude now have Banishment and Sanctuary. Grandmasters and Brother Captains now roll for their powers, with access to Sanctic Daemonology, Divination, Pyromancy, Telekinesis and Telepathy.

The Aegis now means rerolling 1's on Deny the Witch attempts. Reinforced Aegis means the unit can reroll any failed Deny the Witch attempts.

Back to the Tacticals!

I've had this niggling urge to put a lot of good honest marines with bolters on the board for quite a while now. Having been playing Blood Angels since I got in 40k properly (about late 2009), I can put lotsa Assault Marines on the board, but for some reason I never got round to fielding any significant amount of Tacticals on the board, so here's what I'm up to:

Batrep: Blood Angels + Knight vs Khornate Chaos Marines, 1750 pts*

This is my 2nd outing with the Knight, and since it's been bloody ages since I've scribbled down a batrep, I figured it's high time I did. My opponent for this scrap was David, who was rather bravely fielding a very fluffy Chaos Marine list: (almost) pure Khorne! Anyway, a quick look at the lists.

My Blood Angels:
Librarian with plasma pistol and force axe (Powers: Prescience and Scrier's Gaze)
5 Assault Marines with Infernus pistol, meltabombs, and a meltagun in a Land Raider Redeemer with multimelta
5 Assault Marines with Infernus pistol, meltabombs, and a meltagun in a Razorback with lascannon and twin-linked plasmagun
5 Assault Marines with Infernus pistol, meltabombs, and a flamer in a Razorback with lascannon and twin-linked plasmagun
5 Scouts with sniper rifles, a missile launcher and camo cloaks
2 x Stormraven Gunships, each with hurricane bolters
Baal Predator with heavy bolter sponsons
Knight Errant

Warlord Trait: Strategic Genius

All ground vehicles were also upgraded with searchlights. Nothing complicated here, just a Knight Errant marching forth with mechanized Blood Angels in support. A pair of Stormravens covers the air support, and a Baal Predator is there to make a right nuisance of himself. Bitter experience has taught me that 1 Stormraven is never enough, and putting anything in there without an invulnerable save is a horribly risky move. At this points level, the Stormraven is a serious investment in points, and 1 cannot be relied on to do what needs doing.

*ADDENDUM: On closer inspection of my list the next morning, I realized that I didn't actually have points to field the Baal Predator. This is quite an embarrassing oversight on my part. Sorry, David. Still, given the performance of the Scouts (or lack thereof), this battle played out evenly enough to give some insight on the use of the Knight Errant, so I'm still leaving this batrep here.

David's Chaos Marines:
Kharne the Betrayer
Khorne Daemon Prince with wings, power armour and Axe of Blind Fury
8 Berserkers with a power axe for the champion, in a Rhino
8 Berserkers with a power axe for the champion, in a Rhino
8 Berserkers with a power axe for the champion, in a Rhino
Vindicator with siege shield and daemonic possession
Vindicator with siege shield and daemonic possession
3 Obliterators with Mark of Nurgle and Veterans of the Long War
Heldrake

Yeah, *almost* pure Khorne. But seriously, who in their right mind would field Obliterators and not give them the Mark of Nurgle? This is one of those lists that looks really characterful on paper but, in 6th edition 40k, is insanely difficult to play. Between the Berserkers and Kharne, that's nearly 700 pts of close combat lethality, but with only Rhinos to get them across the board and only 8 bodies in each squad, it is not going to be easy to put their skills to use.

Mission: The Relic
Deployment: Hammer and Anvil. I won the roll to go first and took first turn. Night fighting was active on the first turn.

Seeing as I was the one here with the bigger guns and troops in nice fast transports, I decided on a strategy of mauling the enemy at range, keeping the Knight close to the centre to threaten any attempt to grab the relic and, of course, brutalize anything worth shooting at with that lovely thermal cannon. In its first outing, the poor Knight was nuked when it lost 4 hull points to a single melta hit. As such, I was especially wary of the 2 Vindicators.

Ordinarily I would outflank my Baal Predator, but I could see this was a game where I wanted to inflict as much ballistic violence as possible, and so opted to have it start on the board, so I could fire as many guns as possible for as many turns as possible.

So, a simple mission with a simple plan. Read on to find out how it played out...

Quick update

Been a while since I posted anything, so I'm just gonna leave an update on what's been going on.

First off, I've been involved in a big game of Apocalypse. 10,000 pts and 3 players a side, with an Armageddon theme, i.e. Orks vs the Imperium. As elected Warmaster for the Imperials I spent a hell of a lot of time planning and plotting how to annihilate my Orky foes, and to fit the event, I had kitbashed Tycho here.

Ooh, what's that, Tycho? Got a new trophy for yourself, I see! That pretty much says everything about how that Apocalypse game went... :-)

For the game I had also assembled a couple of gunslinger sergeants. Those of you who have looked at the Blood Angel codex a little more closely will note that Blood Angel Assault sergeants can wield 2 pistol weapons at once. So, for 240 pts, I can deep strike 4 melta weapons with the Blood Angels' signature accuracy. Sounded good to me, and especially lethal in games of Apocalypse, where the Precision Coordinates Strategic Asset pretty much guarantees these guys will be a position to seriously hurt something. Honestly, though, paired pistols are just too cool not to take. I just wish models were allowed to use them in close combat in the same way as Cypher.

While scouring my collection for stuff to field in the big Apoc game, I noticed poor old Sgt Gideon from Space Hulk. Dug him out and am currently working on finishing him off.

I've been a bit naughty with Gideon. He really hasn't seen all that much combat, let alone against Tyranids, to warrant the placing of that lovely trophy at his feet. Still, at some point he'll make a lovely Terminator Captain. Just a couple of final little touches to go. And when he's done, I've lots of Tactical Marines that still need my attention. And when *they're* done...

In case there's any doubt at all on what's in the box...

Oh, yes... It'll be quite some time before I get this guy operational, though. That's what I've been working on, and now I've gotta get back to work, so, I'm-a sign off here.

What's on the table: TACTICALS!

In a couple of previous posts, you might have glimpsed, them, well, here they are now, dominating my table:

As part of a Grande Planne to get some use out of Tacticals again, I've started work on 2 squads of Tactical Marines. All these models are a few years old and have been gathering dust on my shelves since I discovered the joys of Blood Angel Assault Marines in Razorbacks, which is to say, a hell of a long time. The marines with heavy weapons on the right have been waiting to be fielded in some way since I constructed them. I think of it as one of the perks of having an old collection, really. When I want to assemble a new unit, sometimes, just sometimes, I can reach into my reservoir of neglected plastic and pull out goodies. Like E K Tycho.

Anyway, here's a stage by stage breakdown of what I'm doing with them.

A dab here, a dab there...

So, I've been giving my first army, the Blood Angels, a little love. Mostly I'm looking at the good old mechanized elements. Here's how they're looking...

Still get the feeling there's more to do, but can't motivate myself to do much more really. Right now, I just want to inflict this list:

Tycho (sane)
Librarian with plasma pistol
5 Sternguard with 2 combimeltas, 2 combiplasmas and 1 heavy flamer
Land Raider Redeemer with multimelta
5 Assault Marines with meltagun and infernus pistol in a Lasplas Razorback
5 Assault Marines with meltagun and infernus pistol in a Lasplas Razorback
5 Assault Marines with flamer and infernus pistol in a Lasplas Razorback
Stormraven with hurricane bolters
Baal Predator with twin-linked assault cannon and heavy bolter sponsons
Baal Predator with twin-linked assault cannon and heavy bolter sponsons

1,750 pts precisely. If this doesn't do anything for me, I've a Death Company version, with the Sternguard and Librarian replaced with Death Company and a Chaplain. Suffice it to say, Tycho gets replaced with psycho Tycho.

Anyway, on the face of it, I think the list looks like fun to use. Lotsa plasma and melta and assault cannon death and maiming, with no marine having to walk. And, in true Tycho fashion, the list is brutally direct. No deep striking, no need for jump infantry, just a vicious, fast, armoured assault. It's fluffy, it's painted with love and it's full of some of the nastiest things in the Blood Angel codex. I must test this...

Yay?

Just saw this on Bell of Lost Souls and am feeling kind of ambiguous about it. On one hand, yay! Blood Angels! Given the quality of the starter set plastics, I absolutely welcome it! And Orks! Ooooh, is that the 6th army on the horizon?

Anyway, on the other hand... if the rumour that it's essentially a compilation of 6th ed's Big Black Rulebook , Stronghold Assault and Escalation... I have to confess, I'd feel a bit cheated, having already invested in all of these separate rulebooks... But you know what? I'm not fussed. What I'm really waiting for now is Imperial Guard! Or whatever the hell GW's decided to call them now... Please, oh, please don't let anything in my present collection be rendered hopelessly obsolete...

How to do blood drops

... or any water-drop-ish kind of shape, for that matter. Freehanding a nice, mostly symmetrical blood drop shape is not an easy thing to do with a brush, and it's even more difficult to make sure that drop is in exactly the right place, so here's an easy way to make it happen that I've been using for years on my Blood Angels. Firstly, you have to get out your fine detail brush and draw an inverted cross:

It doesn't have to be perfect, all you need is to make sure each tip of the cross clearly marks the position of the desired blood drop, i.e. .

Breathe slowly and draw in those lines marked in yellow. From then on, all you do is fill in your blood drop and viola!

For a large-ish area like this Land Raider's door, it's usually best to use multiple thin layers until you get a nice, solid coat. I like adding in little scribblings of white text (coz the Astartes do love their inspirational words) so I'd dab in those lines there while waiting for each coat to dry on the big drop.

Suffice it to say, practice makes perfect. I for one have used this trick a few dozen times on my rank and file Marines, and certainly prefer it to fiddling about with decals.

A little Blood Angel love... 3 years overdue!

So, having put Captain Erasmus K. Tycho together, I was spoiling for a fight with my Blood Angels over the weekend, to give the little dude his baptism of fire, so to speak. Alas, it was not to be, as I only managed to get in 1 game, at 1,000 pts. At 1,000 pts, Tycho is something of a meaningless point sink, so I opted for other things, but to cut a long story short, gaming-wise, my weekend was crap.

The K stands for Kitbashed!

That having been said, I dusted off some of my older Blood Angel models for the first time in ages, and you know what? I felt inspired to dab a little love on the old tanks and bring them to war...

These 2 Baals served me for yonks, and only this weekend did I get round to putting the finishing touches on the lenses and jewels. Still need a little more work and cleanup here and there. I've decided these guys absolutely must be part of my next few Blood Angel lists, simply because I have something of a soft spot for these models.

I've decided to spruce up this guy, too. Did up its lenses and am currently working my way through washing all the rivets with Devlan Mud and touching up the shading here and there.

So many nice, big open areas to work with! Suffice it to say, I absolutely have to slap on a decal or two or three...

And when the decals are done, there will be weathering. Nothing more fancy than a quick dirtying with Calthan Brown planned, but it'll do for now.

Kitbashed Tycho!

I mentioned previously that I was in the mood to paint something nice.Well, since then a whole bunch of other stuff came up and after painting a fortification or two for the FLGS, I decided to throw together some bits to make a Captain Erasmus Tycho for an Armageddon-themed Apocalypse event that's kinda slowly taking off.

Frankly, I just knew I had to kitbash my own Tycho. It's pretty easy for any Blood Angel player to scrounge up the right bits. And I think the original model looks meh. Not nearly dynamic enough. That is not the wrathful angel that is Erasmus Tycho. That's just some grizzled, wounded pretty marine posing for a photo. And I definitely don't approve of that absurd breastplate... Or that absurdly bulky and unwieldly combi-melta... Or even his trademark mask, which is way too bulky to even look like a mask...

So, sod original Tycho; here's my version in grey plastic:

Combi-melta and legs from the lovely new Sternguard Veterans kit.
Arms from the Command Squad.
Backpack and wing-thingy on the left pauldron from the Death Company.
Front torso, head and right pauldron from the Sanguinary Guard.

Note that at this point the head is not glued on yet. If you're gonna follow how I did this, do bear in mind I'm using a lot of Citadel's older colours, so do bear with me...

4 years of grimdark - HQ showcase!

It's been quite a while since I started 40k, and I just felt like looking back to my earlier forays into the grimdark. I always knew that I wouldn't have the discipline to paint every miniature in my armies to the very best of my abilities, but that said, I would most certainly lavish a bit more love on the HQ units. This post is a collection of the minis which have led my armies to glory or defeat since I got into the hobby.

The first HQ unit I painted was this Blood Angel Captain. I bought and assembled him based more on how cool he looks as a model rather than how much pain he can dish out on the battlefield. I really hadn't played that many games at the time, mind you. The thing was, by the time I'd gotten the rest of the army to a reasonable standard, I realized how bloody useless he was compared to the Reclusiarch and Librarian, so this is one mini which has never been fielded in combat...

I got the Lemartes model and decided against ever using him as Lemartes, simply because Death Company with jump packs is ludicrously expensive. With all the Blood Angel iconography on him, though, he made an ideal Reclusiarch, and as such has led my Death Company into absurdly violent and destructive charges.

While a Reclusiarch or Chaplain truly shines when he leads the Death Company, Librarians have far greater utility, especially now in 6th edition, with access to the Divination psychic powers. Even back in 5th, the Unleash Rage power worked just as well as Prescience (at least in close combat) and my Librarians often found themselves leading Assault Terminators into battle. Now he finds himself going to war alongside my Sternguard, lending his plasma pistol to their devastating salvos.

Here's another Librarian I painted up, for the sake of WYSIWYG when I don't have the points to have him toting a plasma pistol. That staff took bloody ages...

I made a half-hearted foray into Grey Knights, once upon a time. The things that stopped me from getting into them more seriously were the Dreadknight (one of the most stupid-looking models I've ever seen, in my opinion) and the simple fact that after painting up a few Grey Knight Terminators, I couldn't really be bothered to make it happen. This guy's my take on the Brotherhood Champion. I figured one long Nemesis Force Sword didn't quite feel like it could pull off such cool abilities as Blade Shield and Sword Storm, so I snipped up some falchions and came up with this guy. I'm pretty pleased with the result, and every so often I still toy with the idea of a Grey Knight allied contingent.

A throwback from 5th edition, my Librarian with a jump pack led my Descent of Angels army. In 5th, there was much to be said for null deployment, coupled with the Blood Angels jump infantry's unparalleled reliability in Deep Striking. These days, not so much, and 6th is really not kind at all to squads of jump infantry having to get across the board the old-fashioned way, even with their jump packs. Maybe I'll cobble something together again sometime and give it a whirl...

Ah, the Crimson King... Master of the most consistent of my armies. Since I got my hands on a pair of Necron fliers, the Crimson King has rarely known defeat. Mind you, it took a few defeats in the early days of the Necron codex before I learnt how to properly wield the 20 Warriors who walk with him, the Crimson Guard. I love his pose. Body upright, strong and proud, in contrast to his hunched Warriors. One arm bearing his custom-built Warscythe, commanding his legions onward, the other clutching his precious Resurrection Orb close to him, and his head very slightly tilted back in utter contempt for his foes.

My nameless and cursed Chaos Lord onna Bike. To be sure, he has performed spectacular feats of martial prowess, killing monstrous creatures, battlesuits, Terminators, Obliterators and Leman Russes with the reckless abandon that Khornate champions are wont to display. The thing is, he has never, EVER ascended to Daemonhood. Turned into a Spawn twice and got gunned down shortly after, though. His quest continues...

Belial, Master of the Deathwing, leader of what is by far the most stressful of all my armies. Deathwing is what I field when I want to travel light and have a radically different experience of 40k. I don't know about the rest of you, but in 6th edition, this army strikes me as playing in Hard mode. The simple reason is 6th edition is the edition of the gun. As they say, everything counts in large amounts, and in this edition, I feel we're seeing more models on the board, more guns and certainly more anti-infantry firepower. Not good news for Terminators and man, it stings when every little casualty counts.

"Glory for the first man to die!" In an age of gene-enhanced super-soldiers, fearsome aliens and traitors in league with unspeakable horrors, there's a special kind of charm to the humble human in all his frailty. I decided I needed a right hardass to lead the army of Men to glory, and nothing was quite as fitting in my eyes as a Lord Commissar. I'd been reading a bit too much of Gaunt's Ghosts, I think. Given my general loathing of metal and resin, I used the little officer dude that came with the Baneblade kit, seeing as he had a nice big commissar-esque hat. No, I don't have a Baneblade (yet), I just picked this guy up separately off eBay.

So, that's it from me for now. Next up, a closer look at my lovely Imperial Guard army, the Red Thunder!

The Unkindness...

... of Stormravens! So, I've been slinging this list around a bit:

Librarian with plasma pistol
10 Sternguard Veterans, 2 with heavy flamers, 2 with combi flamers, 3 with combi plasma and 3 with combi melta
Furioso Dreadnought with Frag Cannon and heavy flamer in a Drop Pod
5 Assault Marines with meltagun and Infernus Pistol, in a Razorback with Lascannon and twin-linked plasmagun
5 Assault Marines with meltagun and Infernus Pistol, in a Razorback with Lascannon and twin-linked plasmagun
5 Scouts with camo cloaks, sniper rifles and a missile launcher
Stormraven Gunship with twin-linked assault cannon, twin-linked multimelta and hurricane bolters
Stormraven Gunship with twin-linked assault cannon, twin-linked multimelta and hurricane bolters
Stormraven Gunship with twin-linked assault cannon, twin-linked multimelta and hurricane bolters

This comes to 1,747 pts, because poor old Blood Angels still have to pay to install searchlights. Sheesh. This is a list that plays to the Blood Angel's strengths, notably:

• Cheap combi-weapons for Sternguard. The 10 Sternguard come to 310 pts, compared to 335 for an identical loadout for Space Marines in the current codex.
• Librarians with Divination. Prescience just goes far too well with combi-plasma and Vengeance rounds.
• Stormravens with Bloodstrike missiles. Hurray for AP 1!
• The Furioso Dreadnought. Because sometimes you just need a good, cheap-ish infantry eraser. 
• Assault Squads in Fast Razorbacks, getting the most out of the Lascannon + twin-linked plasmagun configuration.

I have inflicted this list in three games thus far. Here's a brief overview of how those games went: