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Ok my buddy is loosing repeatedly to my ultramarines. His latest list was:

HQ-

Farseer - singing spear

Elites-

Firedragons x5
Exarch with flamer
in a WS

Striking ScorpionsX6
Exarch with S/claw and biting blade

Troops-
Dire Avengers X6
Exarch with TL avenger catapult

Direavengers X10
Exarch with Avenger catapult

Gaurdians X10
brightlance
WS

Rangers X5

Fast Attack:
Crimson hunter exarch
w/starcannons

warpspiders x10
exarchw/ fastshot TL death spinner

Heavy support
Falcon w/ PL, SL, SC

War Walker x2
w/scatter lasers

wraith knight
w/ 2xWC

He wants a competitive list but still enjoys the fluff of biel tan craftworld. He would prefer no Jetbikes.

Well, Serpents are the work horses in an Eldar army these days.

The Falcon could be replaced by a Serpents. Moreover, you can certainly find some points to add to more Serpents. Then it would be a force to reckon with.

So just more serpent spam? Is that really all Eldar has going for them? I thought they were supposed to be a tier 1 army? if they are only that good because of 1 broken unit that is disappointing.

what units would you recommend replacing or adding other than the obvious WS

I have heard of a seer council? Is that for Eldar? Aren't they supposed to be some sort of deathstar?

Well, foot slogging is a slow way to die.

A Seer Council on jetbikes is an option, with 2 Farseers and 6 Warlocks (and the DE Baron). This unit is harder to crack as a coconut, but also has some hard counters like mindstrike missiles.

I looked at your eldar army (nice job btw) is the large group of farseer/ warlocks your own version of a seer council minus the jetbikes?

Bal4eva wrote:
I looked at your eldar army (nice job btw) is the large group of farseer/ warlocks your own version of a seer council minus the jetbikes?

Thanks. This is the army that I played in the 5th ed at various occasions.
My 6th ed Eldar army is different, either Serpent spam with Jetseer on jetbike, 2x10 Dire Avengers, 10 Guardians, 2x5 Fire Dragons, all in Serpents, Warwalkers w/ dual scatterlasers.
The other variant has a Seer Council as mentioned above with DE allies, Baron and 2x5 Warriors in Venoms.

Anyone else? What specifically are the strengths and weaknesses of this list? What would you drop in order to add more WS?

I actually applaud his/your list. You are actually playing Eldar the way they should be played. The individuality of the Aspect warriors is the core of eldar and you don't spam anything. Just don't let him be another netlist TFG....seerstar and serpent spam are codex abuses that are crutches for people with little tactical capability looking for the "I win" button. Tell your friend to stick with it, the biggest thing is knowing your army. I still beat a lot of people with "power" armies using Chaos Marines because I have been playing them for over 10 years. I know their strength and weaknesses. Eldar are very unforgiving when you throw the wrong aspect at the wrong unit.

Thanks for the complement! Its my friends list I am trying to help him out. He feels like I am beating him too easily especially considering I am playing an "inferior" SM army. What is the preferred way to run a wraithknight? What if any buff tactics should he be using?


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He is IMO overly cautious of being TFG. How many WS is ok and how many are considered spam?

Well from a military aspect I look at everything in redundancies. For example, 1 riptide is a liability, 2 riptides is tactically sound and in MHO completely acceptable.....Triptide (or more ) is absolutely TFG. I don't personally run Eldar in the current environment and will not begin to try to advise on the best loadouts for say a WK, others are infinitely more qualified for that. With serpents, just use this rule; if you are buying them to transport your troops (full squads) then get as many as you need; but if your buying troops (minimum) just to get the serpent, well that's spamming. Obviously he wants fortune and misfortune for powers from what I have seen, and to be honest, going for a full seer council even on Jetbike I don't see a problem with. But when you grab the Baron well you see where I am going with that. Tell your friend to not get discouraged....it can be easy to want to just play the "I win" armies. For competitive that's fine, I still will call someone "TFG", but I go into an event expecting it. In casual play, I see my opponent start putting down Seerstar or RipTide-alwave...I just put my minis back and say "great game man you designed your list superbly, anyone else want a casual game?"

Oh and I am not sure about the warp spiders. I think they are amazing in Killteam, and no one in the game does jump-shoot-jump as good as them, I just have never really seen them pull their weight in the current game. Not sure how many points those guy come out to, but they may be better served getting you a couple wave serpents for the troops.

The two common loadouts for WKs are the standard 2xHWC, or a Suncannon with Scatter Laser.

I would recommend throwing the Farseer on a jetbike and give him a unit of 3 jetbikes to soak up wounds. Or just give him a jetbike and mantle of the laughing god for 2+ re-rollable cover saves. It allows him to always be in a position to buff who he needs to buff. It also lets him be a bit of an ace-in-the-hole for last turn objective denial.

He doesn't overly need to have that squad of rangers. Most of the time you can just place all of your objectives mid-field and run to them late game.

He doesn't need to have exarchs in his dire avenger squads. They generally don't do enough work to be worth their points (although on rare occasion they'll do something awesome and make for a pretty great game).

The falcon would be better as a Fire Prism, or Night Spinner (I personally love nightspinners). Falcons are fine and dandy, but they're outclassed by other vehicles in whichever role you play them. Serpents are better transports, Fire prisms are better anti-tank, and Night Spinners are better generalists.

Hopefully a few of the points shifts I mentioned will free enough points up to get a third walker. It always makes me sad to see them in groups of 2.

I personally REALLY like your friend's list. It's very fluffy yet still fairly competitive. A couple minor tweaks here and there and some smart play SHOULD see it do well. Eldar are VERY unforgiving to players who make tactical mistakes. Just make good use of battle focus to hide units from view where possible, or to close gaps when you need to.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Another thing I could mention is with his striking scorpion Exarch, don't use the biting blade combo. You only get the bonuses from one of the weapons at a time and the biting blade is 2 handed so you also don't get the bonus for having two close combat weapons when using it. Claw/Chainsword is better and cheaper.


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Here's my rendition of the list and some reasonings behind the changes


In terms of tactics, here's a VERY general outline of how to use it.

Things to throw in your opponent's face:
- Scorpions
- Wraithknight
- Guardians
- Fire Dragons

Things to hide (battle focus is your friend)
- War Walkers
- Spiders
- Farseer

Everything else can just sort of hang out in between and be where they need to be.

Bal4eva wrote:
Ok my buddy is loosing repeatedly to my ultramarines. His latest list was:

HQ-

Farseer - singing spear

Elites-

Firedragons x5
Exarch with flamer
in a WS

Striking ScorpionsX6
Exarch with S/claw and biting blade

Troops-
Dire Avengers X6
Exarch with TL avenger catapult

Direavengers X10
Exarch with Avenger catapult

Gaurdians X10
brightlance
WS

Rangers X5

Fast Attack:
Crimson hunter exarch
w/starcannons

warpspiders x10
exarchw/ fastshot TL death spinner

Heavy support
Falcon w/ PL, SL, SC

War Walker x2
w/scatter lasers

wraith knight
w/ 2xWC

He wants a competitive list but still enjoys the fluff of biel tan craftworld. He would prefer no Jetbikes.

Fire dragons with a flamer makes no sense unless you are specifically building an anti-horde list. And even then, there are better options. Do not combine anti infantry with anti tank. Take the extra melta shot

Biting blade is not a good weapon now. Consider swapping it for a scorpion sword.

Dire avengers, take 2 squads of 8 instead of 10 and 6. Consider taking power weapon and shimmer shield for a 5++ objective holder or small tarpit as a roadblock if need be to assault units.

Guardians with a bright lance are a good objective camper squad. Consider taking a warlock for conceal/reveal with them.

Rangers sole purpose in life is to camp an objective. That's it. They will never win their points back unless your opponent completely ignores them and you kill a MC with them.

Crimson hunter exarch with starcannons is a complete waste of its purpose. There are easier, more reliable ways to take a star cannon. Take the bright lances, make it a vehicle hunter.

Drop the falcon for either another Wave Serpent or, better yet, a night spinner. That's not a bad option. Vaul's Wrath Support Battery is also a good choice. 90 points for 3 lascannon shots if all 3 shots hit? Or 3 barrage weapons that rend? Pair a farseer with them and suddenly, your HQ is T7.

War walkers are ok as is, consider adding a 3rd one and doing SL/StC to make up for the star cannons you lose in the Crimson Hunter.

Wraithknight is kitted out appropriately. Taking the Suncannon is seldom a wise move as str 6 weaponry is better suited to other weapon delivery platforms.

Bojazz has a solid list, however over the Nightspinner vs. Space Marines is the Fire Prism. I preach this a lot, the Fire Prism is handcrafted to ruin SM's days. It's got the lance for the pesky LR or Predator, a TEQ murdering blast (don't rely on it, but it works.) and the beautiful S: 5 AP: 3 MEQ slayer. I'd even suggest two with Holo's over the Walkers, but that's just me.

I'd suggest the Fire Dragon Exarch with Fast Shot. Even if the majority of the team is wiped, he is a single model capable of melting anything. Well worth the points, and capable of saving you on many an occasion.

To answer the TFG Limit question: At 2k, you won't hear much if you've got 2-3 Serpents. I run 2 at 1500 and have never heard any rumblings.

If you can find a way to smuggle Crushing Blow onto the Exarch of the Scorpions, you can have an Exarch striking at full initiative, S: 8 and AP: 2. Dwell on that.

By order of operations for multiple modifiers, Crushing blow would give you S:7. Multiply, THEN add. (BRB p.2 under multiple modifiers)

deathmagiks makes very good points about the crimson hunter, and replacing those lost starcannons with the warwalkers. I tried to keep the list as close to the original as possible while boosting it's effectiveness.

Will1541 is absolutely right about the fire prisms vs Marines. As mentioned, the spinners are just a personal preference.

Bojazz wrote:
By order of operations for multiple modifiers, Crushing blow would give you S:7. Multiply, THEN add. (BRB p.2 under multiple modifiers)

deathmagiks makes very good points about the crimson hunter, and replacing those lost starcannons with the warwalkers. I tried to keep the list as close to the original as possible while boosting it's effectiveness.

Will1541 is absolutely right about the fire prisms vs Marines. As mentioned, the spinners are just a personal preference.

Order of operations would be correct *IF* it didn't affect his base stateline, the same way getting +1 str on the chaos boon table permanently alters the str of a model.

Wait, I'm confused. How can you tell the difference? Crushing blow just says that it gives +1 Strength. Multiple modifiers says it applies to "rules or wargear that modify a characteristic".

What makes Crushing blow not count as a rule that modifies a characteristic?

EDIT: Upon researching the subject, it seems it was a topic of debate when the codex was initially released, though BAO rules it as S:7, as do most forums I've browsed.

Thanks for the break down this should really help.

Bojazz wrote:
Wait, I'm confused. How can you tell the difference? Crushing blow just says that it gives +1 Strength. Multiple modifiers says it applies to "rules or wargear that modify a characteristic".

What makes Crushing blow not count as a rule that modifies a characteristic?

EDIT: Upon researching the subject, it seems it was a topic of debate when the codex was initially released, though BAO rules it as S:7, as do most forums I've browsed.

Because it's not modifying a characteristic, it's replacing it. The power takes place upon list creation, meaning the stat line of that character has changed prior to its base being set on the table top.

For example, let's take a look at chaos marks. You give a mark of X god to a CSM, it doesn't modify their existing stat line, it replaces it within the stat line readout. A nurgle marine, for example, is not T4 + 1, he's T5 base. Hence, a crushing blow exarch is not str 3 + 1, he's str 4. It's not wargear or something that affects him, it's him being the Jersey Shore Exarch, touting his mad pecs to all the Eldar ladies and tearing off his space elf shirt at the first guy he sees and going "Do you even lift, bro?"

Replacing a characteristic would be "this model has 4 toughness". +1 is a modification, by definition. Nowhere does it say that a Crushing Blow exarch is S:4. It DOES say he has +1 S though. Also that you said that it's different because it happens at creation, yet earlier you compared it to rolling +1 strength on the boon table, which does NOT happen at creation. Before this turns into a repeat of the YMDC thread I think I'll stick with playing Crushing blow as S:7, that seems to be what most players and tournaments agree on.
Astronomican
Warseer
Bay Area Open Tournament
Adepticon
Dakka
1D4chan

Boon table used for purposes of illustration mostly, but fair enough.

Interesting... Was ruled the other way during Feast of Blades.
Agree to disagree? I do see the merit in your point though.

Hmm, I wasn't aware of the Feast of Blades ruling. Their 2013 FAQ doesn't contain a ruling, and their 2014 isn't posted yet. I'll have to take your word on that one. But yes, it is a topic of contention for sure. The best anyone can hope for is a FAQ, or a group that can agree on a house rule.

Back to the topic of the thread though, I'm glad we could help your friend! I hope he slaughters many marines!

Bojazz wrote:
By order of operations for multiple modifiers, Crushing blow would give you S:7.

RUINED. MY. DAY.

This is the sort of list i'd take along to my local club for a friendly game.

There's a few things i'd immediately swap around within it;

- Make the Serpents TL Scatter Lasers, Shuricannon, and Holofield if they arn't already
-Give one to some Avengers, and keep the guardians as backfield scoring units. Have them plink away with the BL.
-Crimson Hunter should have Bright Lances.
-Dragon Exarch gets fast shot - at 10 points, it's a steal for a 2nd flamer shot. I'd take a firepike, or just a fusion gun. Don't mix their roles.
-Split the spiders into two units. 10 seems hard to get into range for all of them, and 5 is easier to hide.


Other than that, it looks like a pretty strong social list. I wouldn't take more than two serpents to a friendly game, they're just too strong.

What sort of UM list has he been facing?

Belly wrote:
This is the sort of list i'd take along to my local club for a friendly game.

There's a few things i'd immediately swap around within it;

- Make the Serpents TL Scatter Lasers, Shuricannon, and Holofield if they arn't already
-Give one to some Avengers, and keep the guardians as backfield scoring units. Have them plink away with the BL.
-Crimson Hunter should have Bright Lances.
-Dragon Exarch gets fast shot - at 10 points, it's a steal for a 2nd flamer shot. I'd take a firepike, or just a fusion gun. Don't mix their roles.
-Split the spiders into two units. 10 seems hard to get into range for all of them, and 5 is easier to hide.


Other than that, it looks like a pretty strong social list. I wouldn't take more than two serpents to a friendly game, they're just too strong.

What sort of UM list has he been facing?

I run a variety of things. I try new things every game. We are both new players but I feel like I put in more time to plan my list/ attack than he does. Most recently he was caught of guard by my sternguard drop pod killing a WS turn 1 along with TF cannon killing most of the Warp Spiders. He has also previously been upset by orbital bombardment on turn 1. This normally causes him to not know what to do the rest of the game. He also asked to play against my Imperial Knight despite my telling him I didn't think that would be fair.