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I've been playing against an old friend of mine for a while now, and I just can't seem to get a decent win off. I play High Elves, he plays Wood Elves, and we've been playing around 1500 points, but when we do play lower point value games I get hosed even worse.

My main problem is that I'm going magic heavy, and my mages keep being sniped by a ridiculous amount of arrows from one of his generals attacks.

I'm looking for input on a complete army redesign. I've got every model available to form a unit at least 20 models strong for any single choice, with the exception of silver helms and shadow warriors (or whatever the skirmishers that can scout are called).

My typical lists ran phoenix guard and white lions as the heavy hitters and anvil units, two eagles, a minimum core of spear elves in a single block, archmage, mage, and an occasional RBT. I don't mind completely switching everything around though.

Thoughts?

What units does he usually take? That'll give us a better idea on how to help you.

white lions of crace are your answer to his bows also get a nice ward for your mage

I know dryads for sure, a unit of standard archers for core, a unit of seriously nasty close combat models, and his lord with the bow of ridiculousness along with a sorceror.

When you say "a ridiculous amount of arrows from one of his generals attacks", do you mean 4-5 (the Bow of Loren) or around 10 (Hail of Doom Arrow)?
And are said unit of "seriously nasty close combat models" elves, and are they skirmishers? Thems be Wardancers. Cavalry, Wild Riders. Monsters, Treekin.

At any rate, you shouldn't be doing too bad; Wood Elves are far and wide the worst army in the game. Of course, their ideal targets are high-point cost, low T models...High and Dark Elves. So it's understandable.

Here are my two Warptokens:

- Repeater Bolt Throwers are never that great. Not sure how useful Eagles will be against Wood Elves either.

- I'd get some magic and a BSB if you can. That probably means an Archmage, which is costly at this point level, but oh well. Otherwise, I'd consider just one character. Give all of them as much protection as you can. You'll be good enough at magic without help, and your units will do the killing in close combat.
Really, you want to keep your characters alive, but keep them cheap. You need bodies.

- White Lions and Phoenix Guard are indeed your friends against Wood Elves of all sorts. They're durable.

- Honestly, I'd consider something like one-two blocks of spear elves and one block each of Lions and Guard, augmented by a Lion Chariot and maybe an Eagle. Keep it simple, keep those units big and healthy and resistant to arrows.

From what it sounds like the Highborn either has the Bow of Loren which shoots as many attacks as the character has in his profile, but when you say "snipe" it makes reference to the hunters talon and/or a pageant of shrikes which both can target a single character but the hunters talon can only fire 1 shot so I am not sure what combo he is using to get multiple shots off targeting a single model, can you please elaborate? Are you running your mages with a unit? Is he "sniping" them or is he just putting so many shots into the unit that your mages get killed eventually? These and more details would help us get a better picture, but Warpsolution hit it on the head as a book we are the worst army in the game, but in small point games we tend to do better then large points game as we can usual handle our opponents better.

put your mage in a unit, march the unit up and charge the enemy - game over . If he has dryads, put the item that gives the entire unit magical attacks (15pts or so) and you've won that as well. There's very little reason why you shouldn't be able to knock off a WE army.


If you're trying to win by outgunning him in the magic phase, you'll lose. HE excel in combat. WE don't suck at combat, but ASF and whatever your weapon of choice, (grt wpn, halberd, great swords), all tear up wood elves who have no armor and strike last. Get into combat as soon as you can. Really in low point games, there's no reason to take magic in my opinion

Take some magic for the defensive ability. Wood Elves can take, what, Loren, Life, Shadow...they're probably taking Life against High Elves. Dryads with T6 or archers with a 5+ Regeneration aren't a good thing.
Unless you too have the Lore of Life and do the same thing to your guys.

It is usually five shots from the character, all of which are targeted at my mage(s), so sniping. I've never tried an archmage build simply because of the points we play at; 225 point archmage in a 1000 or 1500 point game is tough.

Definitely wardancers, not really sure what to do against them. They ate through my white lions pretty quickly. They didn't have an armor save, but had a very decent ward save of some kind.

Didn't know dryads were affected by magic attacks. What causes that?

Should I try and keep the mage alive or just say to hell with him and pick something else as a general? I've gotten used to relying on magic as a heavy hitter for my HE. Guess that's what I'm doing wrong.

There is no ability in the WE book that allows a lord to snipe with 5 shots. So your opponent may not know how to play much better than you. Like I said, put your mage in a unit and he can't target him unless he has the talon's claw (1 shot) or the one str4 pageant of shrikes (which always hits on a 3+) Get your mage a ward save if you're that worried about sniping. Get into combat - you can't shoot into combat. Read his rulebook, I don't think he's playing it right.

Correct your opponent cant be targetting your mage with 5 shots, there is no build in the WE army book that allows you to do that. The only thing that alows you to target characters is the Hunters Talon and the Pageant of Shrikes. The bow of loren gives you 5 shots with alter kindred but he cannot target characters in a unit with it, your friend has been playing it wrong the entire time. If he argues this just make him read the bow of loren and ask him where it says he can target individual models, if he continues to argue have him get on here and talk to some veteran wood elf players, if we could do that I would have been running it the entire time and it would have given us something really nasty against opponents.

Wardancers have Always Strikes First, Killing Blow (-1 attack), or a 4+ Ward. They cannot have the same ability two turns in a row. They've also got a 6+ Ward base and MR1, in addition to "wardancer weapons", which give them +1 attack and +1S in the first round of combat.
That said, they're T3. Arrows and magic missiles are good weapons against them. Phoenix Guard and Sword Masters would be better against them than the Lions, but Masters at least will lose a lot more to shooting.

Dryads lose their Ward save if an attack is magical.

At low-point games, having two characters is tough. You could try to run without a BSB and just let your Ld/Stubborn save you, or hope to not lose combat in the first place. A mage in a unit of archers isn't a bad choice, and the Banner of Sorcery can give you a big ol' boost to your magic phase.

As somebody who plays both armies, I would definitely agree with everone telling you to run an archmage. The strength of HE is magic, so don't quit.

As others have told you, he cannot snipe your character with 5 shots per round. It is not possible.

If you are worried about your archmage being killed early, it may be the lore you are playing. Take a look at the ranges of spells in each lore, choose a lore with longer ranges, as a HE general you are spoiled for choice.

Good luck!

Many thanks for the advice and input!

My opponent has been unable to show me a legal combination that allows him to do what hes been doing. If I could only post an image of his stupor...

Ive kept the archmage and switched to the lore of fire, no BSB in less than 1400a point games. Its done surprisingly well to just launch max strength fireballs. The mage sits in an archer line that gets augmented with flaming sword.

Ive been taking two RBT's just to supplement the shooting phase. They do well enough to add a little hurt.

Won the last two games at 1000 and 1250 lost the one at 750. Much closer loss though!

Fire's an all right Lore, to be sure.

Bolt throwers though, are less than ideal by basically all accounts. They'd probably be better replaced by their equivalent in more archers, especially against Wood Elves.

But glad to hear you're doing better. I just hope the Bow of Loren + Alter Kindred combo mistake was an honest one.

Aipoch wrote:Many thanks for the advice and input!

My opponent has been unable to show me a legal combination that allows him to do what hes been doing. If I could only post an image of his stupor...

Ive kept the archmage and switched to the lore of fire, no BSB in less than 1400a point games. Its done surprisingly well to just launch max strength fireballs. The mage sits in an archer line that gets augmented with flaming sword.

Ive been taking two RBT's just to supplement the shooting phase. They do well enough to add a little hurt.

Won the last two games at 1000 and 1250 lost the one at 750. Much closer loss though!

Glad to see you turned things around and if he continues to complain and moan about not being able to do it tell him to come on here and talk to people who actually read the rules, or at least do so correctly. Lore of Fire is nasty to take against wood elves especially since alot of our stuff is flamable and its a good offensive magic, just run it against other opponents besides Wood Elves so you dont get accused of tailoring your lists . RBT's really in the long run when I used to play HE I found were not worth taking as I would put that more into blocks of infantry. Other then that good luck to you man, you should also post some of your battle reports on here as well, kind of curious about this WE player and what he runs.