There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Shadowfield is the big one I feel, since DE vehicles are more than likely going to be wrecked/explode before they get immobilised

 Frozocrone wrote:
There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Could you link it, please, I can only see the old ones.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

That makes far too much sense.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Of course it does. I'm glad we're paying 40pts for this piece of crap.

As if I needed another reason to never use an Archon.

 Frozocrone wrote:
There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Shadowfield is the big one I feel, since DE vehicles are more than likely going to be wrecked/explode before they get immobilised

both of these make sense in terms of logic.
your skimmer is immobilised.... yet your performing evassive maneuvers? what by swinging on it? pushing it out of the way of those lascannon shots?

Your shadowfield which dissapates once it lets a shot through... yet because you ignored the wound though feeling no pain it decides to have another go? I can see how people took it RAW, but RAI they seem majorly obvious. I'll go take a look at the rest later thanks for informing us it was out.

 vipoid wrote:

 Frozocrone wrote:
There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Could you link it, please, I can only see the old ones.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

That makes far too much sense.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Of course it does. I'm glad we're paying 40pts for this piece of crap.

As if I needed another reason to never use an Archon.

Certainly, they are on the GW site as opposed to Black Libary. More regular updates? One can only hope.

Click on the rules errata and a list should pop up. Updates to BRB, DE, Orks and SW.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Certainly, they are on the GW site as opposed to Black Libary. More regular updates? One can only hope.

Click on the rules errata and a list should pop up. Updates to BRB, DE, Orks and SW.

Thanks.

Solar Shock wrote:

both of these make sense in terms of logic.
your skimmer is immobilised.... yet your performing evassive maneuvers? what by swinging on it? pushing it out of the way of those lascannon shots?

Your shadowfield which dissapates once it lets a shot through... yet because you ignored the wound though feeling no pain it decides to have another go? I can see how people took it RAW, but RAI they seem majorly obvious. I'll go take a look at the rest later thanks for informing us it was out.

The reason why people took the Shadowfield to do that is that that's exactly what the rules said. If a model makes its FNP, then it hasn't suffered an unsaved wound.

Logical or not, it feels an entirely unnecessary slap for an HQ who already got beaten bloody with the nerf bat.

 Frozocrone wrote:
There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Shadowfield is the big one I feel, since DE vehicles are more than likely going to be wrecked/explode before they get immobilised

Weird how no one made a thread in News and Rumors.

 vipoid wrote:

The reason why people took the Shadowfield to do that is that that's exactly what the rules said. If a model makes its FNP, then it hasn't suffered an unsaved wound.

Logical or not, it feels an entirely unnecessary slap for an HQ who already got beaten bloody with the nerf bat.

Yeh I can see where it comes from;

FNP is taken against an unsaved wound, but it specifically states to 'discount' it, however I feel it is clearly written to make obvious that making a FNP roll means you simply do not remove a wound. 'You treat it as having been saved' - doesn't mean it was saved; because it wasn't. But yeh could be taken that way RAW. It doesn't feel like an unnecessary slap considering the slap had already been dealt, you were simply disagreeing you'd been slapped so GW kindly reminded you you had

Other than the two already mentioned not much else applies.
For an FAQ, they answered about 4 questions spanning like 3 dex's and the BRB, surely we had more questions than that. If this is a new line of FAQing, I simply hope its more frequent

 Sinful Hero wrote:

 Frozocrone wrote:
There's a new FAQ out for Dark Eldar and the rules.

Immobilised Skimmers no longer get Jink

Shadowfield goes away when you make a successful FnP

Shadowfield is the big one I feel, since DE vehicles are more than likely going to be wrecked/explode before they get immobilised

Weird how no one made a thread in News and Rumors.

Maybe - it was posted in YMDC

Solar Shock wrote:

FNP is taken against an unsaved wound, but it specifically states to 'discount' it, however I feel it is clearly written to make obvious that making a FNP roll means you simply do not remove a wound. 'You treat it as having been saved' - doesn't mean it was saved; because it wasn't.

Except that you're then not treating the wound as if it had been saved.

Solar Shock wrote:
It doesn't feel like an unnecessary slap considering the slap had already been dealt, you were simply disagreeing you'd been slapped so GW kindly reminded you you had

Oh, there was no disagreement from me that a slap had occurred. As it stands, the only combat my Archon sees these days is when he fights my wyches for shelf space.

Yeah poor Archons, they used to be all hopped up on combat drugs and riding jetbikes...

If I take an archon these days it usually has blast pistol/huskblade/wwp/clone field/haywire for 160pts.

I then put it in an unit of trueborn with 4 blasters and a dracon with blast pistol/haywire for 6 blaster shots.

Then I debate with myself most of the game if the points are worth it to up the trueborn squad to 6 blaster shots.

Unrelated to the above, the Shadowfield ruling is interesting as most people tend to think that if FnP is rolled there was never an unsaved wound. The shadowfield is only lost if the bearer suffers 1 or more unsaved wounds, if the bearer makes its FnP roll the wound is treated as saved so there is not an unsaved wound suffered...

On the bonus, this means if a model makes FnP or RP against soultrap the model with soultrap in a challenge -should- still get +1 str for each wound suffered, because apparentally they were suffered.

also would mean the animus vitae can trigger even if a model makes RP or FnP.

Unless this is just a ruling only for SF, which would kinda be a big slap in the face to DE players for no apparent reason.

honestly though it seems like a really poorly done ruling, like something the e-mail response team would give and would later be contradicted by the same e-mail response team a week later when someone else asked, but thats the errata now I guess.

blaktoof wrote:
Yeah poor Archons, they used to be all hopped up on combat drugs and riding jetbikes...

I find this really depressing. Where are our options for Bike-HQs and Jump HQs?

blaktoof wrote:

If I take an archon these days it usually has blast pistol/huskblade/wwp/clone field/haywire for 160pts.

I then put it in an unit of trueborn with 4 blasters and a dracon with blast pistol/haywire for 6 blaster shots.

Then I debate with myself most of the game if the points are worth it to up the trueborn squad to 6 blaster shots.

If you don't mind me saying so, that seems like an odd loadout:

- Is the extra shot really worth it? I mean, if you removed the Dracon and replaced the Archon's Blast Pistol with a Blaster, you could save yourself 25pts. Plus, you'd be firing to full effect at 18" - rather than needing to get within just 6" of your target.

- Is the Huskblade doing anything useful? I mean, it doesn't strike me as the sort of squad you'd want in combat. And, if you do end up charging something, I'd have thought an Agoniser would be more useful (since you're likely to be finishing off a wounded character/MC, rather than trying to kill one on full wounds).

If you removed both the Dracon and the Huskblade, then for 10pts more you could give the squad a Raider - which would give you another darklight shot (one with 6x the range and the option of shooting a different target), give the squad some protection, give them mobility when they land, and allow you a trick against Imperial Knights.

However, if some or all of that stuff is for fun or fluff purposes, feel free to disregard my suggestions. Personally, I've sometimes considered running a 'gunslinger' Archon for a bit of fun. One with a Blast Pistol and Parasite's Kiss. I generally go off the idea when I remember that, for some stupid reason, the Blast Pistol only has a 6" range.

blaktoof wrote:

On the bonus, this means if a model makes FnP or RP against soultrap the model with soultrap in a challenge -should- still get +1 str for each wound suffered, because apparentally they were suffered.

also would mean the animus vitae can trigger even if a model makes RP or FnP..

I wouldn't count on that sticking.

 vipoid wrote:
the only combat my Archon sees these days is when he fights my wyches for shelf space.

Exalted

Thanks GW! Yes! I love the fact my sweet archon already lost his left nut and now lost his right!

Maybe there will be a supplement this year that gives us back some named HQs and GW realizes it made a little mistake and fixes that FAQ

 Solosam47 wrote:
Thanks GW! Yes! I love the fact my sweet archon already lost his left nut and now lost his right!

Wow.... as much as I like them I am losing enthusiasm for starting a DE army. The Archon and Drahzar(sp) are the only HQ units I like.

 Lord Blackscale wrote:
Wow.... as much as I like them I am losing enthusiasm for starting a DE army. The Archon and Drahzar(sp) are the only HQ units I like.

Archons are just fine for their points. I wish they could do a few more things and maybe provide army-wide buffs but then they'd cost more. I've been running mine with four Sslyths recently and he does great in assault. Alternately I run a naked Archon with blaster in a Venom and run him with maybe a Lhamaean or two for LOS needs (and maybe other needs...). Dark Eldar usually work best with a large number of small, hard-hitting units so as much as we often wish Archons were beefier, it's to our advantage that they're really cheap.

Armor of Misery isn't bad either, especially when you stack its -Ld mod with a Coven formation or two.

The cheapie way works great too: Archon naked or almost naked with four Grotesques in a Raider. That way he's safely encased in slabs of angry beef. Make it the Grotesquerie Coven formation and you have super-grotesques that get fearless on turn two. And the unit dishes out -2 Ld so the Archon can sweep with his I7.

 vipoid wrote:

blaktoof wrote:

If I take an archon these days it usually has blast pistol/huskblade/wwp/clone field/haywire for 160pts.

I then put it in an unit of trueborn with 4 blasters and a dracon with blast pistol/haywire for 6 blaster shots.

Then I debate with myself most of the game if the points are worth it to up the trueborn squad to 6 blaster shots.

If you don't mind me saying so, that seems like an odd loadout:

- Is the extra shot really worth it? I mean, if you removed the Dracon and replaced the Archon's Blast Pistol with a Blaster, you could save yourself 25pts. Plus, you'd be firing to full effect at 18" - rather than needing to get within just 6" of your target.

- Is the Huskblade doing anything useful? I mean, it doesn't strike me as the sort of squad you'd want in combat. And, if you do end up charging something, I'd have thought an Agoniser would be more useful (since you're likely to be finishing off a wounded character/MC, rather than trying to kill one on full wounds).

If you removed both the Dracon and the Huskblade, then for 10pts more you could give the squad a Raider - which would give you another darklight shot (one with 6x the range and the option of shooting a different target), give the squad some protection, give them mobility when they land, and allow you a trick against Imperial Knights.

However, if some or all of that stuff is for fun or fluff purposes, feel free to disregard my suggestions. Personally, I've sometimes considered running a 'gunslinger' Archon for a bit of fun. One with a Blast Pistol and Parasite's Kiss. I generally go off the idea when I remember that, for some stupid reason, the Blast Pistol only has a 6" range.

blaktoof wrote:

On the bonus, this means if a model makes FnP or RP against soultrap the model with soultrap in a challenge -should- still get +1 str for each wound suffered, because apparentally they were suffered.

also would mean the animus vitae can trigger even if a model makes RP or FnP..

I wouldn't count on that sticking.

regarding the archon.

If you drop the huskblade, dracon upgrade, dracon blast pistol and dracon haywire grenades you have 55 pts, which is enough to buy a Raider and scrounging up a few more points will give you a dark lance. You gain a 6" disembark from the raider, or sitting in the raider for jink saves, the amount of darklight shots is the same but one is now longer range and can target something else(raider dark lance gain from blast pistol dracon gone)

Against knights if you opt to deepstrike in with the raider I don't find the raider of much greater use in actual game play, although I have only fought knights about 3 times now. You can either sit in the raider for the jink save, and hope something doesn't hit the raider with a template weapon, or the raider doesn't get blown up..or disembark with the raider between the knight and the squad and spread the squad out so maybe some of the models won't have the shield faicing them if the knight moves it to try and block the squad. This still leaves you with the knight able to shout the squad or raider and will probably be able to assault you if it can blow the raider up.

with the -arguably good- load out I suggest I usually also run 2 units of haywire scourges, some reavers with blasters/caltrops etc. I usually try and setup so scourges come down at max range from knight target, and archon drops in a different firing arc. Knight now has to pick to put the shield on the scourges with 4 haywire blasters, or the squad with 6 darklight shots. The 6 darklight shots averages 5 hits, which with rear armor averages about 2 affects, usually 1 glance 1 pen, pen is probably not going to cause on explode (I always throughout every game roll statistically 1 order lower than average ) Most players don't do that math in their head and think 6 shots is more than 4, so block the 6 blasters, resulting in me getting 1 affect through on average, 2 if I am lucky with the squad, then the scourges get usually 3 affects from their arc. Knight is left with 1 hp usually(if I happen to roll slightly above average or well knight is dead in 1 go) and has the option to shoot at things. It will hurt things with its shooting, and I am sad, but if it opts to assault the blastersquad, I make sure it has very little chance of succeeding in a charge roll versus the scourges, it has a good chance to die to overwatch, if not there are 2 models with haywire that strike before it and only need 1 hp to drop it to 0.

The unit is also quite good at fragging non flying things that cause me problems- bastions with VSG, land raiders, wyvern squads, AV13+ vehicles with 3+ Hps, and my opponent usually has to dedicate a decent amount of shooting to remove it, which can be problematic if I drop it in their backfield or on a flank. They can't tie it up easily with walkers, as I will probably hit once with an overwatch blaster shot, and then have 2 haywire grenades that will strike before the walker does. A backfield MC has to worry about the huskblade gibbing it at I7. Usually decent assault units are not in the opponents backfield, so although its not a great assault unit it has enough assault deterrent to stop most backfield units from actually assaulting it to tie up its shooting. Is it an utterly amazing unit? Nope.

But it works at certain things quite well and forces an opponent to have to commit certain resources to get rid of it without risking losing other types of models.

If the archon has a Webway Portal wouldn't it be better to have the blast pistol for the extra CC attack, as much of a corner case it might be? I've thought about sticking an archon in a heatlance Scourge squad(upgrade the solarite to a blast pistol too), and have 4 Melta shots and 2 lance shots for maximum damage. And on the off chance it gets assaulted or assaults the squad has two extra CC attacks.

 Sinful Hero wrote:
If the archon has a Webway Portal wouldn't it be better to have the blast pistol for the extra CC attack, as much of a corner case it might be? I've thought about sticking an archon in a heatlance Scourge squad(upgrade the solarite to a blast pistol too), and have 4 Melta shots and 2 lance shots for maximum damage. And on the off chance it gets assaulted or assaults the squad has two extra CC attacks.

I like this. I want to try this out

 Lord Blackscale wrote:
Wow.... as much as I like them I am losing enthusiasm for starting a DE army. The Archon and Drahzar(sp) are the only HQ units I like.

You poor soul.

mercury14 wrote:

Archons are just fine for their points.

They're fine as a shooty HQ with a blaster and/or as a cheap WWP caddy. As a combat HQ, I'd leave them on the shelf.

blaktoof wrote:

Against knights if you opt to deepstrike in with the raider I don't find the raider of much greater use in actual game play, although I have only fought knights about 3 times now. You can either sit in the raider for the jink save, and hope something doesn't hit the raider with a template weapon, or the raider doesn't get blown up..or disembark with the raider between the knight and the squad and spread the squad out so maybe some of the models won't have the shield faicing them if the knight moves it to try and block the squad. This still leaves you with the knight able to shout the squad or raider and will probably be able to assault you if it can blow the raider up.

Against knights, you position the raider so that it's in 2 of the knight's arcs. Then, whichever arc it elects to shield, you shoot the other one.

So the Archon is our shooty HQ and the Succubus is our choppy choice?

 SisterSydney wrote:
So the Archon is our shooty HQ and the Succubus is our choppy choice?

Pretty much. Haemonculus is our Jack of all Trades.

 SisterSydney wrote:
So the Archon is our shooty HQ and the Succubus is our choppy choice?

Yep, that about sums it up.

Is there any use for Drahzar at all?

 Lord Blackscale wrote:
Is there any use for Drahzar at all?

The metal version makes a decent paperweight, if a little top-heavy.

Drahzar has legit good rules, he however has a legit terrible fething unit price.

Hollismason wrote:
Drahzar has legit good rules, he however has a legit terrible fething unit price.

It's not just his price (though he is horrendously overcosted).

- He can only join Incubi, and serves basically the same purpose as a Kalivex (whilst costing over 6 times as much). If you're using Incubi, you might as well just buy a second Incubi squad - complete with transport - and leave Drazhar at home.

- His melee weapon is nothing spectacular. S5 AP2... and? A Wolf Lord can get S6 AP2 attacks, and is a damn sight more durable. Which leads to...

- His durability is laughable.

The thing is, he costs as much as the beatstick HQs of other armies, but will lose to virtually all them in combat. Hell, he loses to our 95pt Succubus with Glaive.

Yeah Drazhar is pretty, subpar for his cost.

The best version of drazhar was the first full DE codex.

I still find it appalling he does not have assault grenades.

His artefact is an item that gives a 2+ armor save, which yeah DE can't get easily but that's pretty crap.

The WS bonus, is okay. Against many assault units, you are already higher WS at WS 5. (6 for klaivex) so its of questionable utility.

Muderous assault only affects him, so with charge and rampage you might get to roll 8 attack dice, but if you are charging anything in cover its at I1...also 8 attack dice although it could give you 8 6's (very unlikely) you are most likely to roll around 1-2. Given the attacks will probably hit on a 3+ and wound on a 3+ you are not even on average generating an additional wound on a model/unit with it.

He's just not worth the points, for possibly being the 'father of scorpions' hes pretty subpar compared to the other phoenix lords.

Yeah he doesn't have assault grenades does he. Had forgotten that.

Just a terrible unit, in fact I can't think of a single named Dark Eldar character except for Urien that's worth playing with.

I suppose he is best used as a counts-as klaivex.

I thought the Archon was the "make an archon's court possible" choice.

Alcibiades wrote:
I thought the Archon was the "make an archon's court possible" choice.

Not since the new book - Courts are now standard HQ choices.

 vipoid wrote:

Alcibiades wrote:
I thought the Archon was the "make an archon's court possible" choice.

Not since the new book - Courts are now standard HQ choices.

Depends- I believe some tournaments require the archon. I think it's kinda beardy myself.

 Sinful Hero wrote:

Depends- I believe some tournaments require the archon. I think it's kinda beardy myself.

Taking an HQ choice is beardy?

 vipoid wrote:

 Sinful Hero wrote:

Depends- I believe some tournaments require the archon. I think it's kinda beardy myself.

Taking an HQ choice is beardy?

Taking a retinue without the HQ is to me.

 Sinful Hero wrote:

Taking a retinue without the HQ is to me.

But why? Is it for fluff reasons, or do you consider it OP?

 vipoid wrote:

 Sinful Hero wrote:

Taking a retinue without the HQ is to me.

But why? Is it for fluff reasons, or do you consider it OP?

Fluff and hanging on to older codex restrictions I guess. Other than spamming templates, I'm not sure why one would want to anyway, unless you just don't want to drop the points on an Archon or something. But even then to make it useful you'll be spending even more points on it. Not sure if I would tell someone I wouldn't play against it, but I would be a little irritated to see it.

RAI must be that the archon unlocks the court.

Otherwise there is no point in the archon, as he is strictly inferior to all other HQ choices. Hence the designers would not have put him in.

 Sinful Hero wrote:

Fluff and hanging on to older codex restrictions I guess. Other than spamming templates, I'm not sure why one would want to anyway, unless you just don't want to drop the points on an Archon or something. But even then to make it useful you'll be spending even more points on it. Not sure if I would tell someone I wouldn't play against it, but I would be a little irritated to see it.

Personally, I do it when I want to run a CAD and a Coven detachment or formation, and don't have any use for a standard HQ.

I know some people do it and end up with no HQ characters at all, but that just seems wrong to me.

Alcibiades wrote:
RAI must be that the archon unlocks the court.

Otherwise there is no point in the archon, as he is strictly inferior to all other HQ choices. Hence the designers would not have put him in.

Sorry, but this is nonsense for several reasons:

1) GW has a long history of worthless units and atrocious balance. I don't see why one more would surprise anyone.

2) If we're going to talk about pointless units, though, hellions are basically outclassed in every way by Reavers.

3) The Archon is only pointless as a melee HQ. He's still a decent shooty HQ with a Blaster, and also the cheapest WWP-caddy you can get. That's more than a lot of other units have.

What's the Archon, 75 pts with a power sword?

You get 6 attacks on the charge at WS7, I7, Ld10, 3W, AP3, potential FNP & furious charge. Sure he's squishy but how is that pointless?

I think for a WWP HQ I would rather use a Haemonculus, preferably from a Coven formation, since he supports the unit further through Master of Pain.

Blaster Archon seems good...although I might just switch to the 10pt one (can't remember the name) and just use the Haemonculus from Dark Artisan as my Warlord (seriously considering a Corpsethief and Artisan army).

mercury14 wrote:
What's the Archon, 75 pts with a power sword?

You get 6 attacks on the charge at WS7, I7, Ld10, 3W, AP3, potential FNP & furious charge. Sure he's squishy but how is that pointless?

Would you like the list?

1) He's not exactly versatile. Is your opponent T5? Well enjoy doing 1 wound every 2 turns. Has he got a 2+ save? Enjoy doing 1 wound every 5 turns.

2) Ok, let's be fair. On the charge, against standard MEQ, he does 1.33 wounds. A Venom costs 10pts less and can do that from 36" away. Remind me what's so great about this guy?

3) Survivability, what's that? Call me crazy, but I have issues with any HQ who gets insta-glibbed by a measly Power Maul. Most T3 HQs would at least get some kind of save. Not this chap.

4) Challenges. In many ways, this is just exacerbating the above - as it gives your opponent a way to single out your Archon. In addition, whilst WS7 and I7 look impressive, they're largely wasted. Archons - especially your build - just can't go toe-to-toe with other HQs. So, most of the time, you're just fighting WS4, I4-5 guys - making his high WS and initiative largely wasted.

5) What's the point? Why is this guy in your list at all? If he's your warlord then you're basically offering your opponent Slay the Warlord on a silver platter. I'm not sure I'd even want a Blaster Archon as my Warlord - but at least he can hide out in a vehicle 18" from his target. Your poor sod is stuck on the front lines. And, if he's a secondary HQ, then I still don't see the point because he's bringing such pitiful damage output.

 Frozocrone wrote:
I think for a WWP HQ I would rather use a Haemonculus, preferably from a Coven formation, since he supports the unit further through Master of Pain.

Depends on what unit they're joining. If it's a primarily anti-vehicle unit (trueborn, heat-lance scourges), then I'd rather have a blaster archon join them - since damage output is far more important than survivability.

 Frozocrone wrote:

Blaster Archon seems good...although I might just switch to the 10pt one (can't remember the name) and just use the Haemonculus from Dark Artisan as my Warlord (seriously considering a Corpsethief and Artisan army).

I often use Coven haemonculi as my Warlord, and I've heard that DA in particular makes for an outstanding warlord-bunker. One thing I quite like is that it's very self-contained - you can put it into a list without needing to build said list around it, if you see what I mean. I haven't actually used it much myself, but I intend to correct that soon.

I use Archons as disposable drop pods.

Attach a webway portal, shadowfield archon to a nasty short ranged shooty unit or CC unit. (wraithguard, Grotesques etc)

Jump them in, and use the Archon's Shadowfield to tank hits for them for a turn (average before he dies)

Then the unit is more or less undamaged, with luck, and can go rampage over the Archon's corpse towards the enemy.

Bit expensive, but it works for me.

I'd never take an Archon as my actual HQ though...

@vipoid

Yeah, I have, that's why I want to get Corpsethief Claw so that I can build around it

I personally like having a Liquifier gun on the Talos and Haemonculus as with the Cronos' weapon, that's three Templates (and TL Splinter Cannon on the Talos) which can easily kill infantry. It is a bit costly (~30 IIRC) and you can afford to drop it if you need points but it is a nice option to have.

 Ascalam wrote:
I use Archons as disposable drop pods.

Attach a webway portal, shadowfield archon to a nasty short ranged shooty unit or CC unit. (wraithguard, Grotesques etc)

Jump them in, and use the Archon's Shadowfield to tank hits for them for a turn (average before he dies)

Then the unit is more or less undamaged, with luck, and can go rampage over the Archon's corpse towards the enemy.

With regard to the Grotesques, is their Ld not a problem? I mean, once the Archon is dead they're just Ld4.

 Ascalam wrote:
I'd never take an Archon as my actual HQ though...

I'm the same. I've sometimes considered it, but I just always end up deciding against it for a mix of general reasons and personal preferences:

- No AP2 melee weapons. Not so much as Rending.

- No cheap melee weapons like the old Venom Blade.

- T3 bothers me. A lot. There are just too many things that can ID it for my tastes. Granted, there are quite a few things that can ID a Haemonculus, but I'll get to that.

- I dislike Shadow Fields. They're just too unreliable for my tastes. With a Haemonculus, I at least know what to avoid. With an Archon, I have no idea which wound will be his last, as it were.

- Haemonculi have nicer models.

 Frozocrone wrote:
@vipoid
I personally like having a Liquifier gun on the Talos and Haemonculus as with the Cronos' weapon, that's three Templates (and TL Splinter Cannon on the Talos) which can easily kill infantry. It is a bit costly (~30 IIRC) and you can afford to drop it if you need points but it is a nice option to have.

Hmm, it seems I build mine quite differently. I run mine along these lines:
Cronos w/ Spirit Probe
Haemonculus w/ Scissorhands, Vexator Mask (might add more stuff if I have spare points)
Talos w/ Ichor Injector, Heat Lance

I like the Heat Lance because it gives me the option of trying to pop a vehicle when they land. The rest of the stuff is tailored for combat - Vexator Mask lets the Haemonculus pin down a fast character or MC in a challenge, whilst the other two murder him. Ichor Injector let's me threaten MCs and other multi-wound units.

I dislike the Liquifier Gun on the Talos because it removes one of his attacks, and makes me feel that I'm wasting the bonuses the formation is getting. Although, if points allow I'd certainly give the Haemonculus one.

Vipoid, I never said a 75 pt p-sword Archon was "good". I just disagreed that for 75 points he's pointless. Of course a Coven supplement Haemi buried in Grots or MCs is going to be more durable.

I tend to bury a naked/CC Archon in Grots though too and he usually survives just fine.

Also with the shadow field, you use LOS if the wounds are S6+ and then use discretion taking other wounds based on the situation. Or if it's like a lascannon or something you just take it on the shadowfield.

It's a calculated risk.

mercury14 wrote:
Vipoid, I never said a 75 pt p-sword Archon was "good". I just disagreed that for 75 points he's pointless.

But that's the thing - what *is* the point? I'm not seeing it.

mercury14 wrote:
I tend to bury a naked/CC Archon in Grots though too and he usually survives just fine.

It just seems that there are better choices - ones which can survive, but also do something. A Succubus with a Glaive is 95pts and can help them out against 2+ saves, whilst benefiting greatly from their toughness. An 80pt Haemonculus with Scissorhands can help out a bit in combat, whilst also buffing their pfp (so you can get FC and Fearless faster). Hell, even a naked haemonculus just seems like a far better choice because he can actually help them without needing to do anything in combat.

I think the point is to have an ultra-cheap HQ and run MSU where the enemy can't kill anything worth any points. That's our best defense.

It appears that we can take a 10-point Lhamaean as our warlord though to perhaps she's the best choice.

mercury14 wrote:
I think the point is to have an ultra-cheap HQ and run MSU where the enemy can't kill anything worth any points. That's our best defense.

But that's the thing - there's very little difference in base price between an Archon and a Haemonculus (and, if you give them each a cheap weapon they're the same cost), and the latter adds much more.


Regardless, I agree that MSU is one of our best strategies. I used to like gunboats (10 warriors in a raider with splinter racks), but more recently I'm moving to only ever using 5-man squads with a special weapon. My Warlord will always get a bit of extra gear for flavour reasons (Parasite's Kiss, Vexator Mask or somesuch), but everything else gets the absolute minimum.

Amusingly though, the 'MSU' list I made recently included a ~400pt Dark Artisan formation.

I wish the Archon was able to be kitted out fo multiple roles, like the Autarch, but with DE goodies.

 Lord Blackscale wrote:
I wish the Archon was able to be kitted out fo multiple roles, like the Autarch, but with DE goodies.

Agreed. He's just so limited - no wings/jetbike option, no AP2 (and a really crap weapon selection) , and no support abilities.

I forget, if a vehicle moves combat speed do passengers snap shoot heavy weapons?

Trying to decide if it's worth putting two dark lances and a blaster archon in a Blasterborn squad with a raider.

 Sinful Hero wrote:
I forget, if a vehicle moves combat speed do passengers snap shoot heavy weapons?

Trying to decide if it's worth putting two dark lances and a blaster archon in a Blasterborn squad with a raider.

Yes. It needs to remain stationary in order for normal shots to be made.

 vipoid wrote:

 Ascalam wrote:
I use Archons as disposable drop pods.

Attach a webway portal, shadowfield archon to a nasty short ranged shooty unit or CC unit. (wraithguard, Grotesques etc)

Jump them in, and use the Archon's Shadowfield to tank hits for them for a turn (average before he dies)

Then the unit is more or less undamaged, with luck, and can go rampage over the Archon's corpse towards the enemy.

With regard to the Grotesques, is their Ld not a problem? I mean, once the Archon is dead they're just Ld4.

Can be, but if you are running them from the Haemonculus coven supplement (Grotesquerie) they wind up fearless pretty fast IIRC

 Frozocrone wrote:
@vipoid

Yeah, I have, that's why I want to get Corpsethief Claw so that I can build around it

I personally like having a Liquifier gun on the Talos and Haemonculus as with the Cronos' weapon, that's three Templates (and TL Splinter Cannon on the Talos) which can easily kill infantry. It is a bit costly (~30 IIRC) and you can afford to drop it if you need points but it is a nice option to have.

I was strongly considering this army as well, but after much self deliberation decided against it. Yes it would be nasty and very survivable. But it is unfortunately slow as a whole and at range can only engage a few targets a turn.

I also always run TL Haywire blasters on talos as well. In corpsethief, thats 5 TL haywire blasters that are not only fantastic for killing things like landraiders or vehicles in general, but are also great against fliers like the now ever so popular fireraptor.

just a thought.

 gameandwatch wrote:

 Frozocrone wrote:
@vipoid

Yeah, I have, that's why I want to get Corpsethief Claw so that I can build around it

I personally like having a Liquifier gun on the Talos and Haemonculus as with the Cronos' weapon, that's three Templates (and TL Splinter Cannon on the Talos) which can easily kill infantry. It is a bit costly (~30 IIRC) and you can afford to drop it if you need points but it is a nice option to have.

I was strongly considering this army as well, but after much self deliberation decided against it. Yes it would be nasty and very survivable. But it is unfortunately slow as a whole and at range can only engage a few targets a turn.

I also always run TL Haywire blasters on talos as well. In corpsethief, thats 5 TL haywire blasters that are not only fantastic for killing things like landraiders or vehicles in general, but are also great against fliers like the now ever so popular fireraptor.

just a thought.

It is a valid point you make. I think I've only ever run Splinter Cannons and with a 36" range, I've found myself to always be in range so...eh. Scout moves should help close the distance but still. Will definitely try Haywire though before committing.

 Sinful Hero wrote:
I forget, if a vehicle moves combat speed do passengers snap shoot heavy weapons?

Trying to decide if it's worth putting two dark lances and a blaster archon in a Blasterborn squad with a raider.

Yes.

Just use blasters though, you'll be in range.

mercury14 wrote:

 Sinful Hero wrote:
I forget, if a vehicle moves combat speed do passengers snap shoot heavy weapons?

Trying to decide if it's worth putting two dark lances and a blaster archon in a Blasterborn squad with a raider.

Yes.

Just use blasters though, you'll be in range.

I was mostly wondering if adding dark lances to a Blasterborn squad mostly. The splinter rifle usually doesn't have much to shoot at if they're hunting armor. Bu if they fire snap-shots most of the time, I don't think the points are worth it.

 extremefreak17 wrote:
Question about reavers:

Lets say I were to take a unit of six with 2 blasters, 2 cluster caltrops, and an arena champ w/agonizer. Which models do i give the blasters and caltrops to? Would I want to give the arena champ one of each and then put the other two on another single model? Or maybe spread them throughout the unit?

I know this might not be the best loadout for the sqaud, but i am more or less trying to figure out which models to magnetize the upgrades to, and dont want to have to use magnets on every model.

Furthermore, Basters or heat lances?

Keep them cheap! Max caltrops and no guns. Scream at the enemy and jink (3+ cover).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BlaxicanX wrote:

 lambsandlions wrote:
How good are reaver jetbikes? In the old codex they were mostly just harassers who made little sweeps by your opponent but now that bladevanes are HoW based they may have actually good better? A unit of 9 can dish out 3d6 s6 rending HoW attacks. This can very realistically destroy most vehicles who's rear armor is usually av10. Against marines, 10 HoW does 6.66 regular wounds and 1.66 rending wounds, or about 3.75 unsaved wounds. Plus you still have the regular bladevanes s4 rending HoW hits, plus 3 s3 normal attacks per reaver.

Survivability wise reavers are rocking t4 with a 3++ jink save making them about as hard to kill as marines. Jinking is not a big deal for the reavers as their splinter rifle is not the most impressive weapon. Combat drugs can also do a lot to make the t5.

A few units of 9 reavers could be very scary might be a better counter to serpent spam than scourges.

...

Also, with the average roll on the combat drugs table being 4, you've got a decent chance of rolling around with T5 reavers, for extra lulz.

That is not how statistics works. The average roll for any one side of a D6 is exactly the same (assuming everything else is constant). If you roll a single die many times over the average of all the numbers rolled should equal 4 because you have rolled every number between 1 and 6 an equal amount of times. that does not mean the the number 4 is the most rolled side of the die though.

[nitpick]Actually the average roll on 1d6 is 3.5, which isn't even possible as the result of any individual roll. Try finding an entry for "3.5" in the Combat Drugs table, I'll wait....[/nitpick]

PS Math: (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6 = 3.5

A Archon supported by a farseer can be HARD to get rid of.
Fortune makes him a real killer.

High toughness creatures can be rough on you..bring in the lowly agonizer and watch those wraithknights eat dirt.

The new dex is about finding units that work together.

I miss the old husk blade but it's gone,gone.

Denizen of the Dark City wrote:

High toughness creatures can be rough on you..bring in the lowly agonizer and watch those wraithknights eat dirt.

Why are high-toughness creatures rough on us? Surely we're one of the best armies for dealing with them?


The only high-toughness creatures I have problems with are those with 2+ saves. So, I'll just kit out my Archon for... oh... wait.

 SisterSydney wrote:
[nitpick]Actually the average roll on 1d6 is 3.5, which isn't even possible as the result of any individual roll. Try finding an entry for "3.5" in the Combat Drugs table, I'll wait....[/nitpick]

PS Math: (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6 = 3.5

And as 3.5 is not a value that can be obtained using a dice we round to the nearest achievable value; which is 4, as you round 3.5 up.
Yeh archon's arent worthless, but certainly not as interesting or as customisable as our other HQ choices imo. The haemi provides so much more and the succubus is certainly more choppy. A shooty archon isn't bad, but for his cost isn't bringing much more that can't be found elsewhere in our army.

Solar Shock wrote:

 SisterSydney wrote:
[nitpick]Actually the average roll on 1d6 is 3.5, which isn't even possible as the result of any individual roll. Try finding an entry for "3.5" in the Combat Drugs table, I'll wait....[/nitpick]

PS Math: (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6 = 3.5

And as 3.5 is not a value that can be obtained using a dice we round to the nearest achievable value; which is 4, as you round 3.5 up.

That's a really dicey way to round.

I mean, it just seems like trying to manipulate the facts for no good reason. 3.5 can't be rolled, but it's still the average. If you roll 2 dice, then the average is 7. Using your method, the average jumps to 8 for no good reason.

To put it another way, there's no value whatsoever in rounding at this point. You only round if you need a whole number for some reason, or a more manageable figure after some mathhammer. Rounding the result of a single d6 serves no purpose but to mislead (intentionally or otherwise).

Can we all just agree that you are likely to get something good out of Combat Drugs 2/3 times (Personally don't rate the Initiative one as you still have I6 and what on earth is that Ld Gak)?

I'd argue we still have good weapons in the form of Blasters to deal with High Toughness 2+, which is why I'm considering 2x 5 units of Trueborn. Not ideal, but it's there, if need be.

 Frozocrone wrote:

I'd argue we still have good weapons in the form of Blasters to deal with High Toughness 2+, which is why I'm considering 2x 5 units of Trueborn. Not ideal, but it's there, if need be.

Well, Dreadknights are a massive pain in that regard as they have a 5++ save and a cheap psychic power to make it a 4++.

Statistically, you need 14-15 blaster shots to take them down. So, those two trueborn squads would have to fire at the Dreadknight, then both survive and fire at it again next turn. Just saying.

 vipoid wrote:

 Frozocrone wrote:

I'd argue we still have good weapons in the form of Blasters to deal with High Toughness 2+, which is why I'm considering 2x 5 units of Trueborn. Not ideal, but it's there, if need be.

Well, Dreadknights are a massive pain in that regard as they have a 5++ save and a cheap psychic power to make it a 4++.

Statistically, you need 14-15 blaster shots to take them down. So, those two trueborn squads would have to fire at the Dreadknight, then both survive and fire at it again next turn. Just saying.

Yeah, I think firing your Blasterborn at a Dreadknight, when you can pour poison shots into it, is a little bit of a waste. I find Venoms full of Warriors with one Blaster to be pretty decent at whittling down Dreadknights since we can spam them due to their relative cheapness. At 12 inches, that's 20 poison shots and one AP2 shot per Venom. Not too shabby.

In case anyone is interested, those warriors with blaster in a venom (in rapid fire range) average 1.4 wounds on a dreadknight.


As a question, do you guys think its better to disembark passengers to fire at a DK, or leave them embarked? Assume the DK has a Heavy Incinerator and Heavy Psycannon.

Anyone else looking at the Harlequin 12" -2 Ld bubble artifact stacking with armor of misery and coven formations? -4 Ld bubble FTW.

mercury14 wrote:
Anyone else looking at the Harlequin 12" -2 Ld bubble artifact stacking with armor of misery and coven formations? -4 Ld bubble FTW.

What would you use it for?

 vipoid wrote:

mercury14 wrote:
Anyone else looking at the Harlequin 12" -2 Ld bubble artifact stacking with armor of misery and coven formations? -4 Ld bubble FTW.

What would you use it for?

Forcing morale checks? In the opponents' deployment zone perhaps? Sweeping them in CC.

Necrons getting swept in CC circumvents their RP.

 vipoid wrote:
In case anyone is interested, those warriors with blaster in a venom (in rapid fire range) average 1.4 wounds on a dreadknight.


As a question, do you guys think its better to disembark passengers to fire at a DK, or leave them embarked? Assume the DK has a Heavy Incinerator and Heavy Psycannon.

Yeah, that sounds about right. That's why I mentioned it works because the Warrior/Venom combo is so cheap we can bring lots of them. And two cheap HQs in Venoms as well. Dreadknights are good but they're still just four wound MCs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 vipoid wrote:

mercury14 wrote:
Anyone else looking at the Harlequin 12" -2 Ld bubble artifact stacking with armor of misery and coven formations? -4 Ld bubble FTW.

What would you use it for?

Check out the new Harlequin psychic powers. Numbers 5 and 6, specifically. Couple one of those with -5 Ld from Shadowseer Mask, Armor of Misery, and Covens formation. And if you're really frisky, run a DE/CWE/Harlie list where you also take a Farseer with Psychic Shriek.

And a Hemlock.

mercury14 wrote:

Necrons getting swept in CC circumvents their RP.

You're thinking of the old book - the new one doesn't have that weakness.

 vipoid wrote:

mercury14 wrote:

Necrons getting swept in CC circumvents their RP.

You're thinking of the old book - the new one doesn't have that weakness.

Sure it does. If my Harlies assault a group of Immortals, win combat by 2, and they eat a -3 leadership penalty from the relic plus nearby coven unit, they need to roll 5 or less or they break. And they have almost no chance to avoid being swept.

mercury14 wrote:
Sure it does. If my Harlies assault a group of Immortals, win combat by 2, and they eat a -3 leadership penalty from the relic plus nearby coven unit, they need to roll 5 or less or they break. And they have almost no chance to avoid being swept.

I don't understand - how is that bypassing their RPs?

 vipoid wrote:

mercury14 wrote:
Sure it does. If my Harlies assault a group of Immortals, win combat by 2, and they eat a -3 leadership penalty from the relic plus nearby coven unit, they need to roll 5 or less or they break. And they have almost no chance to avoid being swept.

I don't understand - how is that bypassing their RPs?

I should have said it bypasses models altogether.

Kisses can partially bypass their RP though.

 vipoid wrote:

mercury14 wrote:
Sure it does. If my Harlies assault a group of Immortals, win combat by 2, and they eat a -3 leadership penalty from the relic plus nearby coven unit, they need to roll 5 or less or they break. And they have almost no chance to avoid being swept.

I don't understand - how is that bypassing their RPs?

It doesn't bypass it. They still get it, but the possible -5 Ld means you just have to kill one of them in CC, to make them effectively Ld 4, which makes is pretty easy to sweep them. So if I charge my Grotesquerie into a 20 man block of Warriors with D-Lord/Kryptek or whatever SC they have, all I need to do is enough wounds to make them have to test leadership. Once I force a leadership test on them, they stand a really, really good chance of getting swept. So even if I only kill one or two Warriors, that could be enough.

Due to the super resiliency of the new Necrons, sweeping them in CC seems to be the only effective way to kill them in any kind of large numbers. The Harlie/DE/CWE alliance gives us tools which makes that much easier.

vipoid wrote:
That's a really dicey way to round.

Primarily I was kidding, but mathematically you round a .5 up in the circumstance of needing a single digit value.

sweetbacon wrote:
Due to the super resiliency of the new Necrons, sweeping them in CC seems to be the only effective way to kill them in any kind of large numbers. The Harlie/DE/CWE alliance gives us tools which makes that much easier.

Interesting, but in reality that is true for any/all units as leadership tests are. But I see what you mean with regards to necrons, rather than trying to force your way through 2 saves you can simply use CC to wipe them, as they have a low initiative anyway. Means either needing to keep the bubble as the unit forcing the checks, or as a nearby unit. Could be good fun to throw in a hemlock.

Solar Shock wrote:

vipoid wrote:
That's a really dicey way to round.

Primarily I was kidding, but mathematically you round a .5 up in the circumstance of needing a single digit value.

sweetbacon wrote:
Due to the super resiliency of the new Necrons, sweeping them in CC seems to be the only effective way to kill them in any kind of large numbers. The Harlie/DE/CWE alliance gives us tools which makes that much easier.

Interesting, but in reality that is true for any/all units as leadership tests are. But I see what you mean with regards to necrons, rather than trying to force your way through 2 saves you can simply use CC to wipe them, as they have a low initiative anyway. Means either needing to keep the bubble as the unit forcing the checks, or as a nearby unit. Could be good fun to throw in a hemlock.

Yes, thats exactly what I meant. Trying to kill a 20 man Warrior blob which has a 4+/4++ (with Decurion), and which also re-rolls ones (possibly) through shooting will take your entire army. And even then you'll probably have to shoot everything you have it for multiple turns. And that's just one basic troops unit. Using the Ld decreasing/wounding tools at our disposal as DE/CWE/Harlequins seems like a much more efficient way to deal with Necrons now.

In terms of killing a 20-man warrior block, what would you use against it in combat?

 vipoid wrote:
In terms of killing a 20-man warrior block, what would you use against it in combat?

As DE, I would use the only really viable CC unit we have, the Grotesquerie, with Succubus w/AoM, with Shadowseer w/Mask.

sweetbacon wrote:

 vipoid wrote:
In terms of killing a 20-man warrior block, what would you use against it in combat?

As DE, I would use the only really viable CC unit we have, the Grotesquerie, with Succubus w/AoM, with Shadowseer w/Mask.

You don't think Dark Artisan is viable?

 vipoid wrote:

sweetbacon wrote:

 vipoid wrote:
In terms of killing a 20-man warrior block, what would you use against it in combat?

As DE, I would use the only really viable CC unit we have, the Grotesquerie, with Succubus w/AoM, with Shadowseer w/Mask.

You don't think Dark Artisan is viable?

Oh yeah, the DA is absolutely viable. And they would also work well as a CC unit/tarpit for Necrons. I cited the Grotesquerie as an example because I wanted the -5 Ld debuff that I get with the AoM and Shadowseer Mask artefact. Since a Shadowseer can't join the DA, the Grotesques with Succubus and Shadowseer are my preferred Ld debuffing CC unit.

I hadn't actually realised the Shadowseer was an IC now - I'd assumed he was still an upgrade for a Harlequin troupe.

You may be right. I'll have to double check that one.

 vipoid wrote:
I hadn't actually realised the Shadowseer was an IC now - I'd assumed he was still an upgrade for a Harlequin troupe.

Nope! New Shadowseers are IC's in the Elites slot.

Awesome!. Thanks.

I've been looking into ways to sweep the necron in close combat as well. I haven't read their codex, so I am curious whether they have ways to make units fearless or stubborn before I rush into that strategy. Does anyone know if they have characters, wargear, or formation bonuses that would convey those rules?

As far as I'm aware, the best they can do is reroll morale tests.

Catacomb Command Barge allows re-rolling Fear, Morale and Pinning tests to units within 12", 18 if it is the Warlord and has a specific Necron Trait

Like last edition, Canoptek units (Wraiths, Scarabs and Spyders) have Fearless.

Other than that I can't see anything in my Codex.

The Praetorians have Fearless and they have one codex Warlord trait that gives them Zealot and one that lets them re-roll failed morale tests if the unit is within 12 inches (I think) of the Warlord. The Catacomb Command Barge has this same Special Rule, also. Other than that, I didn't see anything giving them Fearless or Zealot.

Actually, Nemessor comes with the Zealot warlord trait - so he and his unit are effectively Fearless.

Also, he can change his warlord trait as the game progresses. He can't pick the same one again once he's switched it out, but he can pick the 'Fearless and IWND' one from the rulebook.

Death Jesters. I think DE can really use these guys. BS5/WS5, I7, 3A, 2W fear, fleet, furious charge, 5++ save. Independent character. He can also take Harlequin relics which are good, one being a -2Ld bubble.

If he kills even one model, the target must make a morale check as if it lost -25% of the unit AND that check is made with -2 Ld. He has a shuriken cannon that hits on a 2+ as well as a freaky shrieker ammo round that's good vs targets with a 5+ save, less reliable vs MEQ. And if the target fails morale the Jester gets to pick which way the flee. So they can run off a side map edge or even your own.

Couple that with armor of misery and/or Coven units and whatever he shoots has a scary-good chance of running away. And there's a lot of battlefield control here since people will be afraid not only to stay on their own baseline but near the sides of the board.

Thoughts?

mercury14 wrote:
Death Jesters. I think DE can really use these guys. BS5/WS5, I7, 3A, 2W fear, fleet, furious charge, 5++ save. Independent character. He can also take Harlequin relics which are good, one being a -2Ld bubble.

If he kills even one model, the target must make a morale check as if it lost -25% of the unit AND that check is made with -2 Ld. He has a shuriken cannon that hits on a 2+ as well as a freaky shrieker ammo round that's good vs targets with a 5+ save, less reliable vs MEQ. And if the target fails morale the Jester gets to pick which way the flee. So they can run off a side map edge or even your own.

Couple that with armor of misery and/or Coven units and whatever he shoots has a scary-good chance of running away. And there's a lot of battlefield control here since people will be afraid not only to stay on their own baseline but near the sides of the board.

Thoughts?

I'm with you on this.
Lately I have been using units that cause negative modifiers to leadership.
Seems to be working out well..I can see the Death Jester fitting in nicely.

As we all know we have some nice wargear that effects leadership..but doesn't do squat against ATSKNF.
Stacking negative mods gets around this nicely..unless they have stubborn/Fearless or the above.

Run away and die tired.

I'd take a gortesquery with a succubus + AoM and a seer with the mask and flat out turn 1 to lower their infantries LD by 5 in the overlap and 3 on the flanks then start forcing moral checks, using the DJ's first stacking for -7/-5. Should be able to route anything not in a tank first turn.

Does next to nothing against nids, orks and demons or anything mounted in vehicles. Pretty much auto win vs Tau and Bike armies however. Its on units we would take anyway as well so it's not overly gimmicky, just another tool.

Edit: did we ever have trouble with bike armies though? lol.

It would be hilarious vs pods if you made them run off your edge Unrealistic though as you'd need to leave massive hole in your line to bait them and it would ruin you after they drop.

The thing worth mentioning regarding harlequins is to get these HQS you have to buy the entire mask for a battle forged army.

That means 3 troupes, 2 FA, 1 HS and then you can start looking at the elite ICs.

Is it worth it?

3 min troupes no upgrades is 255pts, 2 min FA is 100 more, 1 min HS is 75 more, thats 430pts before any ICs. You probably will also want to buy DTs for the squads somewhere, and some squad upgrades etc.

I just don't see buying -LD modifier stuff as a worthwhile investment in a TAC tournament list, if you know your opponent is playing a list that isn't fearless/stubborn/ATSKNF then maybe but in other settings...not really worth it.

blaktoof wrote:
The thing worth mentioning regarding harlequins is to get these HQS you have to buy the entire mask for a battle forged army.

That means 3 troupes, 2 FA, 1 HS and then you can start looking at the elite ICs.

Is it worth it?

3 min troupes no upgrades is 255pts, 2 min FA is 100 more, 1 min HS is 75 more, thats 430pts before any ICs. You probably will also want to buy DTs for the squads somewhere, and some squad upgrades etc.

I just don't see buying -LD modifier stuff as a worthwhile investment in a TAC tournament list, if you know your opponent is playing a list that isn't fearless/stubborn/ATSKNF then maybe but in other settings...not really worth it.

You can buy the transport as the FA remember.

What's the best way to ally in DJs? I.e. A detachment with a few DJs and the least amount of tax? I know about the Masque and the six formations but none of them does the job, will there be anything else?

ryuken87 wrote:
What's the best way to ally in DJs? I.e. A detachment with a few DJs and the least amount of tax? I know about the Masque and the six formations but none of them does the job, will there be anything else?

With out the book we know as much as you.

In someways I'm glad shenanigans are being limited by preventing the shadow seer/death jester from being acquired cheaply to buff non harlequin units.

On another note I have written another guide:

The Pragmatic Realspace Raider: Screening with Reavers

Hope it's helpful.

 Red Corsair wrote:

ryuken87 wrote:
What's the best way to ally in DJs? I.e. A detachment with a few DJs and the least amount of tax? I know about the Masque and the six formations but none of them does the job, will there be anything else?

With out the book we know as much as you.

Cool, thought I might have missed something in the rumour thread. The more I read about the new Harlequins the more frustrating it seems as there are some nice units and abilities, not to mention great models, but as of yet there doesn't seem a good way to integrate them into a DE force.

 Red Corsair wrote:

blaktoof wrote:
The thing worth mentioning regarding harlequins is to get these HQS you have to buy the entire mask for a battle forged army.

That means 3 troupes, 2 FA, 1 HS and then you can start looking at the elite ICs.

Is it worth it?

3 min troupes no upgrades is 255pts, 2 min FA is 100 more, 1 min HS is 75 more, thats 430pts before any ICs. You probably will also want to buy DTs for the squads somewhere, and some squad upgrades etc.

I just don't see buying -LD modifier stuff as a worthwhile investment in a TAC tournament list, if you know your opponent is playing a list that isn't fearless/stubborn/ATSKNF then maybe but in other settings...not really worth it.

You can buy the transport as the FA remember.

That doesn't necessarily save much points, assuming you spend the two FA slots on transports that is 470pts min(fast attack goes from 100min points to fill out to 140pts) without any upgrades for anything and you still have 1 footslogging troupe.

It is possible to pick up raiders/venoms from DE fast attack, and since this is a DE tactica thread would make sense . Even still you will probably want to give up a FA slot from a DE force org to get the third troop into a venom/raider. So you are looking at a two source list so far, with 470pts spent on the masque before you even buy a shadowseer, deathjester, or upgrade anything in the masque. It is definately doable, but you are looking at spending 800pts to ally in a 'decent' not even great, harlequin troupe +2 harlequin characters. Some people may find that worthwhile, but it doesn't leave many points for other things and is dedicating a lot to what are essentially slightly better bloodbrides.

Just a clarification regarding a couple rumors that have been going around...

Yes, the Masque is a particularly obnoxious detachment to include, but there are various formations available as well. The most useful to us is probably the one that includes a Shadowseer, a Death Jester, and a unit of Troupes.

Remember that the Death Jester cannot take the -2 Leadership artifact, but the Shadowseer can. Better yet, it makes the Shadowseer Fearless. This is a fantastic asset for something like a unit of Sslyth, which have only 3 leadership and few attractive ICs to escort them in our own codex. (Sslyth don't have Power from Pain, so a Haemonculus doesn't help much.) The Shadowseer's psychic potential helps, as well.

As far as the Troupes are concerned, I like buying them a Starweaver and a set of neuropistols, then putting the Death Jester with them. That volume of Fleshbane AP2 is attractive even to a codex full of poison. The Starweaver's pair of Shuriken Cannons are nothing to sneeze at, either.

The single squad formation doesn't allow you to split off the ICs, unfortunately.

I had missed that note in that formation's sidebar. That is quite a significant problem for Harlequin inclusion. So much for that, then.

I think there is one formation that is not too expensive that gives eldar/dark eldar nearby crusader. Which I think is the one we are discussing above

3) "company of actors"
1 Troupe, 1 DJ, 1 SS

Restrictions:
- all models from this formation must deployed as a single unit. DJ & SS can't leave the unit

Special rules:
- crusader
- heralds of the Laughing's God (any models with the Eldar or Dark Eldar faction (friend or foe) within 6" from one or more models of this formation gain the crusader special rule)

Which although the ICs cannot be split off, you could take, at 7 models, and add DE HQs to it, and put them in a raider. Or just buy a raider from FA. This is assuming they are battle brothers.

Dj is 60, SS is 60, you can get 5 harlequins for 95 so 215 before upgrades. Not a bad investment for a force multiplier unit. Since it says dark eldar faction it would affect literally everything in the DE books that can run, talos/cronos/grots/wyches/etc. the bonus sweeping advance is also nice to push some of the not so high I coven units up a bit for SA.

Does it specifically say that those models can't leave the unit?

If so, does that mean that the Haemonculus in a Dark Artisan formation can break off (since no such restriction is given)?

It supposedly states the SS and DJ may not leave the unit, nothing about other ICs attached not being able to leave/join


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Follow Me, My Children!: All units in this Formation must be fielded as a single unit, even though this is not normally allowed. Models with the Independent Character special rule cannot join this unit.

I guess it depends on what 'fielded' means.

I assume it means they start the game together as one unit, but its ambiguous if that means they must remain together throughout the game.

Some further thought on harlequin allies for Dark Eldar. One of the tactical options Dark Eldar lost was being able to stuff an IC+Trueborn/wracks/bloodbrides(it could have happend..) into a venom because they had an old squad size of 3 models. Now the squad sizes are 5 models. Of course there is the raider option, but the venom offered a very small footprint and had good firepower, often complementing the squad aboard firing.

IE trueborn with blasters pop a transport venom shoots contents. The reliability of a single dark lance from a raider popping a transport and the models aboard the venom killing the contents are a different picture that is much less attractive.

With harlequins comes the starweaver, it is the size of a venom and with the stock 2 splinter cannons puts out a good amount of anti infantry fire power, more importantly its transport capacity is the magical number 6. Allowing for trueborn to be put into a small anti infantry fast skimmer again along with an IC. Although the starweave does not have deepstrike, an attached DE IC with WWP would extend it to the vehicle as per the rules for WWP.

One could take 3 troupes, 2 starweavers as fast attack, and a void weave from HS for a masque, which would run a min of 500pts before upgrades, but would offer some nice things to a DE list.

hard to speculate on list, as there are also a ridiculous amount of a characters from elites you can add to a masque, but the DE list could be something like-

[Realspace Raiders Detachment]
HQ
Archon- Blaster WWP 110
Archon- Blaster WWP 110

Elites
Trueborn x5 Blasters x4 115
Trueborn x5 Blasters x4 115

Troops
Warrriors x10 splinter cannon x1 95
: dt Raider, Dark Lance, Night Shields, Splinter Racks 90

Warrriors x10 splinter cannon x1 95
: dt Raider, Dark Lance, Night Shields, Splinter Racks 90

Fast Attack
Scourges x 5 Haywire Blaster x4 120
Scourges x 5 Haywire Blaster x4 120

Detachment Cost : 1060

[Harlequin Masque]

Troops
Troupe x5 5 Kisses 120
dt Starweaver 70
Troupe x5 5 Kisses 120
dt Starweaver 70
Troupe x5 5 Kisses 120
dt Starweaver 70

Fast Attack
Starweaver 70
Starweaver 70

Heavy Support
Voidweaver 1x prism cannon 80

Detachment Cost: 790

total: 1850

Essentially this list replaces Venoms for Starweavers.

Archon+trueborn each go into one of the FA starweavers from the masque.

This army could beta strike in Archon+Trueborn in the starweavers, along with the haywire scourges on any heavy armor or juicy transport targets. Even without them all the str6 Shots have a decent chance to open up light transports, along with the dark lances from the raiders.
Raiders have stealth and start with the RR detachment bonuses,harlequins supposedly can give d3 of their detachment units scout/infil/deepstrike so you can do some shenanigans with the three mounted troupe units, but probably want to start them on table for a turn 2 charge.

Army has:
2 Dark lances
10 Blasters (split up in two squads of 5 shots)
8 Haywire blasters
2 splinter cannons
A bunch of twin linked splinter rifles
15 harlequins kisses(split into 3 units of 5)
1 prism cannon
12 shuriken cannons
a few random pistols+rifles

Could add 1-2 harlequin elites to bring to 2k, or another unit of scourges with haywire blasters.

Harlequins are a good add as they can fill the role of Wyches previously. So taking multiple squads is not a bad idea at all. So that special detachment is actually quite excellent.

You have to take two troops but just take the bare minimum and then fill out the rest of the list with Harlequins.

It's going to work even better with Real Space Raider detachment because then you can purchase Raiders with those Fast Attack Slots , so now you can have 10 Harlequins in a Assault transport.

Anyone have any experiences with the new necrons? Two players in my FLGS tournament of 14 people used the decurion thing last week and rolled everyone. The only game one of them lost was against the other Cron player in the finals. It's horrible to watch, their whole army is as durable as terminators.

(Thankfully) no firsthand experience yet, but spent a lot of time this week reading/watching new Necron battle reports and I don't think I've seen them lose a game yet. And they don't seem to be just squeaking by either. Most of the games have been decided rather convincingly in the 'Crons' favor by Turn 2 or Turn 3. From what I've seen, it doesn't matter what lists they face, to include Knights, Draigostar, Eldar, Tau, TWC spam, it's super hard to kill enough of them to make a difference. What they can't outright kill, they can neutralize through tarpitting. I'm not saying they are unbeatable, but so far their army-wide resiliency is giving the meta lots of fits.

I've only played them once so far, in a 2v2 (DE and GK vs Necrons and Orks). Their resilience seems a bit nuts, to be honest. My Venoms basically spent the entire game shooting his immortals, and managed just a handful of casualties between them.

Possibly the defining moment for this was his unit of 20 flayed ones, with Orikan and an Overlord with Res Orb.. At one point, he had to cluster them to go through a bottle-neck in the terrain. my flier came on and unloaded all 4 Monoscythe missiles into them. All four hit, for a total of 78 hits and 58 wounds. After saves and popping his res orb, that amounted to... 4 dead flayed ones. Later on, most of my army shot them (venoms, warriors, various dark lances and blasters), along with a GK squad and DK. I don't think we even reduced them to half strength. It was only a combined charge from both the GK squad and the DK that finally got them.

I posted it in the Harlequins thread but this formation from the book


1) 3 Troups, 3 DJ, 3 SS, 1 Solitaire, 2 units of Skyweavers, 1 unit of Voidweavers
Restriction: none
Special rules:
– outstanding performace (you may reroll inv saves of 1 for all the models of the formation)
– emissary of Cegorach (if the troup master is your warlord, you can reroll his harlequin’s warlord trait)
– pressing Crescendo (from the beginning of turn 2, all units in this formation with the Fleet special rule can Run and Charge in the same turn) <– this is huge!

Paired with a Real Space Raider Detachment is insanely good. Just use your fast attack to take Raiders for the Harlequins, then take 3 Squads of Grotesques and stick Shadowseers in the units so that they have hit and run.

Take a Archon super beast and put 5 Harlequins with him in a Venom.

Stick the 3 Death Jesters in 3 Squads of 5 Man Warriors in Venoms

Take Razorwings in the Fast Attack for FMC and Flyer control.

If points allow take Ravagers in H. Support.

Here is a beast of a Squad

4 Incubi w/ Klaivex
Shadowseer
Venom

Congrats your incubi now have hit and run.

mercury14 wrote:
Anyone have any experiences with the new necrons? Two players in my FLGS tournament of 14 people used the decurion thing last week and rolled everyone. The only game one of them lost was against the other Cron player in the finals. It's horrible to watch, their whole army is as durable as terminators.

I've fought them twice and won both times. Once using my dark eldar (but it was down to the wire and he made a couple tactical mistakes I don't expect him to repeat ever again) and the second time using my Tau (which I won pretty decisively but it was a small purge the alien game). They are tough as hell and neither game even had the Necron using Wraiths (because they didn't have any before now but probably will soon) and they weren't using the decurion because luckily tomb blades have been unavailable for purchase and are a requirement to use it.

Hopefully GW takes their time restocking supplies on the tomb blades lol. My immovable object was a large lychguard unit with several characters which require ungodly numbers to displace.

The new necrons are super durable.

Even the basic warrior is Toughness 4, 4+ save, and has a RP of 4+ with a possible reroll or rerolls of 1.

Venoms don't do so great here, we average 9 hits, 4.5 wounds, they save half of those, and then get a 4+ RP on the rest with a possible reroll or reroll of 1s.

Venoms net below 1 kill on average against warriors.

Venoms don't do great however we havea basic transport that's AP2 ST5 so that's something at least.

With regard to the new Necrons, do you think there's anything that would work well as allies for a DE army?

Necron Allies? I guess Immortals in a Nightscythe for Objective Secured end game steals and some AA would be cool. Bit expensive per unit though, 215 each, not including the HQ..

Alternatively you coud go Deathbringer Flight, but Deathray...meh.

Honestly you'd probably be better served by just taking Court of the Archons w/ Venoms and throwing Death Jesters in there.

You can get up to 4 Venoms out of the HQ slot that way w/ a x 2 Archon build or go the cheap route and just buy 2 HQ Lhaemens w/ Venoms.

Here's a report against the new Necrons if anyone is interested:

BR1: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Necrons - 1250pts

 Mushkilla wrote:
Here's a report against the new Necrons if anyone is interested:

BR1: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Necrons - 1250pts

This was a fantastic read. Thank you so much. Seems like you played a near perfect strategy with what you brought.

 Gamerely wrote:
This was a fantastic read. Thank you so much. Seems like you played a near perfect strategy with what you brought.

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed the report.

To be fair I had a good bit of luck too: both units of grotesques coming in turn 2, the wraiths falling for the talos bait, and the spyder getting killed by a lucky flesh gauntlet blow meaning there was no fearless unit preventing the grotesque unit from sweeping the warriors and immortals.

I love it! I have enough coven models I am finishing up to field 20 grots + corpse thief. Sounds like a great army to fit into my Bikes saddlebags this summer

 Red Corsair wrote:
Sounds like a great army to fit into my Bikes saddlebags this summer

That was one of the main goals when designing this list (it needs to fit in a shoe box).

 Mushkilla wrote:
Here's a report against the new Necrons if anyone is interested:

BR1: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Necrons - 1250pts

Nice match.

Necrons rolled through my FLGS tournament this week, tabling Tyrannids without losing a model and blowing out two other armies (one was 2 knights).

 Mushkilla wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
This was a fantastic read. Thank you so much. Seems like you played a near perfect strategy with what you brought.

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed the report.

To be fair I had a good bit of luck too: both units of grotesques coming in turn 2, the wraiths falling for the talos bait, and the spyder getting killed by a lucky flesh gauntlet blow meaning there was no fearless unit preventing the grotesque unit from sweeping the warriors and immortals.

The wraith bait was nice, with your enclosure tactic it allowed you to dictate the charges and with which units, the flesh gauntlet, well thats the exact reason you take those kinds of weapons you dont take it for the statistical chance, you take it because you can do exactly that on occasion

But really well played and I thoroughly enjoyed it, aswell as all your other reports

How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Consider dark angels as your next army then.

 HawaiiMatt wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Consider dark angels as your next army then.

I don't think the world needs more Space Marine players.

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Dark Eldar have almost always been niche (aside from that time in 6th when all eldar players were allying in the baron). I think most of us like it that way. It's a great army with lots of play styles which keeps things interesting. Also we are almost always masively underestimated.

I still think Dark Eldar competitive is going to be mass Reavers and Razorwings. Their just so good.

DE will be niche because they have a huge learning curve to be effective, not just take unit A, place with unit B and nom nom nom.

Also I agree we don't need more SM players but DA is a different story lol

 Solosam47 wrote:
DE will be niche because they have a huge learning curve to be effective, not just take unit A, place with unit B and nom nom nom.

I think venom spam is the closest we have to a "point and click" list. But then again I have never been a fan of it, so maybe i'm biased.

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

I don't mind being niche, but I do wish our army had a bit more bite to it.

Alternatively, could we at least have some more options? I don't see why every other army can have bikes, wings, jetbikes etc., yet not a single one of our characters is allowed so much as wings. In an army that happily grafts wings onto its infantry. And which has Skyboards. And Jetbikes. And while I'm complaining, why is it that SM Honour Guard get to pay just 10 measly points for S6 AP3 power weapons, but even our T3 sergeants have to pay 15pts for S3 AP3 power weapons, and more than twice that for a AP3 power weapon that only wounds on a 4+? And why are we not even allowed a relic weapon that's AP2?

I guess it just makes me sad when I look at the new Necron book, which saw huge boosts for virtually every unit that was bad in 5th/6th and an interesting detachment that rewards a more flavourful army. Then I look at ours with our slashed SCs, crap detachment and bad units that got even worse. Sigh.

On the other hand, maybe DE are really rewarding players who are true to their fluff - i.e. masochists...

 vipoid wrote:
Alternatively, could we at least have some more options? I don't see why every other army can have bikes, wings, jetbikes etc., yet not a single one of our characters is allowed so much as wings. In an army that happily grafts wings onto its infantry. And which has Skyboards. And Jetbikes.

Given up hope on that one. On the bright side at least we have a working WWP now. The Coven supplement is solid, but our main codex is nothing special, and could have done with a more options. Hellions and Wyches in particular are very disappointing.

 vipoid wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

I don't mind being niche, but I do wish our army had a bit more bite to it.

Alternatively, could we at least have some more options? I don't see why every other army can have bikes, wings, jetbikes etc., yet not a single one of our characters is allowed so much as wings. In an army that happily grafts wings onto its infantry. And which has Skyboards. And Jetbikes. And while I'm complaining, why is it that SM Honour Guard get to pay just 10 measly points for S6 AP3 power weapons, but even our T3 sergeants have to pay 15pts for S3 AP3 power weapons, and more than twice that for a AP3 power weapon that only wounds on a 4+? And why are we not even allowed a relic weapon that's AP2?

I guess it just makes me sad when I look at the new Necron book, which saw huge boosts for virtually every unit that was bad in 5th/6th and an interesting detachment that rewards a more flavourful army. Then I look at ours with our slashed SCs, crap detachment and bad units that got even worse. Sigh.

On the other hand, maybe DE are really rewarding players who are true to their fluff - i.e. masochists...

Some unique characters would be nice but honestly I feel everyone who doesn't play necrons was sad on the new codex release cause it was such a good codex, left everyone else wanting more from theirs :(

 Mushkilla wrote:

Given up hope on that one. On the bright side at least we have a working WWP now. The Coven supplement is solid, but our main codex is nothing special, and could have done with a more options. Hellions and Wyches in particular are very disappointing.

Agreed.

 Mushkilla wrote:
I think venom spam is the closest we have to a "point and click" list. But then again I have never been a fan of it, so maybe i'm biased.

I've never used it myself (don't have nearly enough venoms), but the lists I've seen all seem very reliant on just a few Ravagers to deal with mech. It seems like as soon as they're dead/suppressed, then all you've got left that can touch vehicles is a handful of blasters. I guess I could be underestimating 3 Ravagers.

Either way though, it just seems like a really dull list.

 vipoid wrote:
I've never used it myself (don't have nearly enough venoms), but the lists I've seen all seem very reliant on just a few Ravagers to deal with mech. It seems like as soon as they're dead/suppressed, then all you've got left that can touch vehicles is a handful of blasters. I guess I could be underestimating 3 Ravagers.

Honestly I have given up on dark lances and blasters. Assault feels so much more reliable at dealing with armour.

I agree that, for the most part, the regular DE codex is pretty bland. I thought it was fairly well balanced against other 7th codexes until Necrons came out. It has some solid units like Venoms, Scourges, Razorwings, Ravagers, and, possibly Reavers. But most of the stuff that I actually have fun playing with is in the Covens supplement. I don't always win playing Coven-heavy lists, but losing is much more fun when I get to mulch large parts of my opponent's army with Talos and Grotesques. Honestly, if the Covens supplement allowed Ravagers and/or Razorwings, I'd probably would just stop using regular DE codex units altogether.

Reavers are insane for their point cost and next to Tomb Blades the best bargain Jetbikes in the game.

Hollismason wrote:
Reavers are insane for their point cost and next to Tomb Blades the best bargain Jetbikes in the game.

They are good but they fulfill roles that we never had issues with, AI. Meanwhile they suck balls against FMC's which are the big thing as of late, not to mention their weakness against high AV. I am liking coven units more and more for the fact that they, unlike every other option, are very durable and make the FMC's think twice about landing. Bikes are great until a Flyrant egrubs the lot.

 Mushkilla wrote:
Honestly I have given up on dark lances and blasters. Assault feels so much more reliable at dealing with armour.

My problem with only using assault to deal with armour is transports. If you assault and kill a transport in assault, then you've basically wasted your turn killing a cheap vehicle and its contents can just step out and shoot/assault you in their turn.

I guess it's good if you can fully surround it, but that seems very difficult to pull off.

sweetbacon wrote:
I agree that, for the most part, the regular DE codex is pretty bland. I thought it was fairly well balanced against other 7th codexes until Necrons came out. It has some solid units like Venoms, Scourges, Razorwings, Ravagers, and, possibly Reavers. But most of the stuff that I actually have fun playing with is in the Covens supplement. I don't always win playing Coven-heavy lists, but losing is much more fun when I get to mulch large parts of my opponent's army with Talos and Grotesques. Honestly, if the Covens supplement allowed Ravagers and/or Razorwings, I'd probably would just stop using regular DE codex units altogether.

I feel exactly the same with regard to Coven stuff.

Hollismason wrote:
Reavers are insane for their point cost and next to Tomb Blades the best bargain Jetbikes in the game.

They're a nice unit, but I really don't think they're the best jetbikes in the game.

 vipoid wrote:
My problem with only using assault to deal with armour is transports. If you assault and kill a transport in assault, then you've basically wasted your turn killing a cheap vehicle and its contents can just step out and shoot/assault you in their turn.

I guess it's good if you can fully surround it, but that seems very difficult to pull off.

That's true, but I find with large footprint units you can get around this by charging more than one thing in a turn. Multiple charges can really boost the damage out put of assault units when done right. Surrounds also are not as hard to pull off as people think given a bit of practice (It's on my list of pragmatic realspace raider articles to write). For smaller units, though like talos, it's definitely an inconvenience, and partly why I'm considering heatlances. Haywire blasters can't make vehicles explode, so more often then not the unit will just disembark behind the wrecked vehicle where you can't charge them.

Question for everyone.

If you were to take a squad of Grotesques how do you equip them, in what # and with what IC if any?

Working on converting some and I really hope they are competitive.

Incognito15 wrote:
Question for everyone.

If you were to take a squad of Grotesques how do you equip them, in what # and with what IC if any?

Working on converting some and I really hope they are competitive.

Depends what you want to do with them. In a regular Dark Eldar list? I would suggest the following:

3 grotesques
1 aberration with agoniser
1 succubus with glaive and haywire grenade
1 Raiders (night shields and enhanced aether sails optional)

One another note I have written another guide if anyone is interested:

The Pragmatic Realspace Raider: Mastering the Multiple Charge

Hope that helps.

I'd rather take a Abberation with Scissorhands, cheaper and it gives you rending.

Well its at 1850 pts. As of now my Dark Eldar arent big enough to be a stand alone army so I have to bring in Eldar (I know its a crutch).

I was thinking of making a mini deathstar. 6 of them and a =Archon with Webway and a Farseer.

Raiders die so easily but I could do that. 2 groups of 3 in Raiders if need be.

Which would you guys recommend?

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

I've always thought of Deldar as a spoiler army- they ignore high toughness and high AV. That's pretty much what Deldar are good at. Unfortunately we don't have really good anti-air outside of our own flyers, so I think that's holding Deldar back a little.

If you don't mind allying in, some Crimson Hunters can help you out

I really got the feeling we were written as a supporting actor to the Eldar codex this last go around, anyway.

As to grotesques. I like running the Grotesquerie from the covens book, full strength, with a tooled up coven heamy.

Tough as nails to kill, and the coven PFP chart is fun.

I could do that. Just curious on why you like the Crimson Hunter over the Razorwing?

 Ascalam wrote:

Tough as nails to kill, and the coven PFP chart is fun.

I wish my Grotesques were tough as nails to kill.

So which is better:

Grotesquerie in Raiders (just bare 3 man)

or

Archon with webway, 6 Grotesque and Farseer.

I will be supporting either one with 4 Venoms, 3 Ravager, and 2 Wraithknight.

Incognito15 wrote:
So which is better:

Grotesquerie in Raiders (just bare 3 man)

or

Archon with webway, 6 Grotesque and Farseer.

I will be supporting either one with 4 Venoms, 3 Ravager, and 2 Wraithknight.

Probs Grotesquire, although there was a recent Batrep a few pages back where someone had two units of 10 Grotesques with WWP Haemonculi for a large footprint.


Has anyone tried using Harlequin allies? I am stuck on whether to take the Warriors of the Laughing God or the Greater Good Support Cadre for allies

Everytime I used Grots they been really good, tho I havent used them against IG new book.

I take them in Large numbers with a Haemi DS'ing, via wwp, I love the idea of 6-8 Grots Landing in front then having Radiers/venoms/scourges/bikes right behind.

The Opponent will either HAVE to do 1 of 3 things...

1) Move away (moving out of position into a place I like and pre set up due to Venoms/scourges/bikes)
2) Shoot them and try to kill them (Means My Vehicles , scourges and Bikes are all free from being shot at)
3) Ignore them and kill other stuff (means I get to charge next turn)

I dont know how Comp it is, but I find it very fun.

Archon - Shadowfield, Webway Portal, Haywire Grenade, Huskblade

5x Warriors - Venom
5x Warriors - Venom

6x Grotesque
3x Grotesque - Raider
3x Grotesque - Raider

Venom
Venom
Venom
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
Razorwing Jetfighter

3x Ravager

How does that look? I am really excited to try it out.

Looks shooty but I think you could do with some more Anti Tank maybe take a Squad of Scourges instead of two Venoms, also who's in the Venoms?

Venoms (except for the 2 w the troop warriors) are fast attack. Sadly Dark Eldar always struggle vs tank.

Was looking at it and I think I need to drop a venom for a haemonculus so I can take a Grotesquerie. Fearless will be big as they will fail their pinning checks as soon as their Raiders are blown up.

I have not had much luck with Scourge they are a lot of points for what they do.

You are correct about the Grotesquerie. If you're going to take Grots (and you should!), ALWAYS take them from the Covens supplement or else you're wasting 1/3 of your PfP turn benefits.

As for your list, I like it, but I do agree that if you're running RSR, another Razorwing or two units of Scourges would be helpful, to boost your AT. When it comes DE, if one is good, two are better.

If you're not fond of Scourges, I'd go with another Razorwing then.

What would you guys recommend to drop to fit the points?

Should I Drop the 6 man grot (not from the grotesquerie) for a flyer and....?

You should give your Archon a Soul Trap.

Get rid of all of the Raiders for the Grotesques, take the Grotesquerie

6 Grotesques

3 Grotesques
w/ Raider

3 Grotesques
w/ Raider

= 530 points


Grotesquire

6 Grotesques

6 Grotesques

Haemonoculus w/ Webway Portal

= 525

You could drop points on the Grotesques to having them be 5 man each then equip the Haemonoculus up with more gear 1 Grotesque less would do it.

Now their all fearless and you have two grot bombs.

Also, give your Archon a Soul Trap if he has a Huskblade. He also apparently has no items from the Artefacts of Cruelty, stick him with the Armour of Misery, if he fails the Shadow Field he still has a invulnerable save.

So I think I have my final list for an upcoming tournament.

Archon - Webway Portal, Shadowfield, Huskblade, Haywire Grenade
Venom - Splinter Cannon

5x Warriors - Blaster
Venom - Splinter Cannon
5x Warriors
Venom - Splinter Cannon

8x Trueborn - 2x Dark Lance

Venom - Splinter Cannon
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
Razorwing Jetfighter - 2x Dark Lances

3x Ravager - 3x Dark Lance

Grotesquerie

Haemonculus - Webway Portal

5x Grotesque
5x Grotesque

Incognito15 wrote:
I could do that. Just curious on why you like the Crimson Hunter over the Razorwing?

Could just be personal preference, but i like the high strength accurate firepower over the low strength massed firepower of the Razorwing.

Razorwings are great for crowd control, but i prefer to have a crimson hunter exarch to cover my bets if other folk are bringing flyers. Lot of Necrons and flying nids in my area :(

Incognito15 wrote:
So I think I have my final list for an upcoming tournament.

Archon - Webway Portal, Shadowfield, Huskblade, Haywire Grenade
Venom - Splinter Cannon

5x Warriors - Blaster
Venom - Splinter Cannon
5x Warriors
Venom - Splinter Cannon

8x Trueborn - 2x Dark Lance

Venom - Splinter Cannon
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
Razorwing Jetfighter - 2x Dark Lances

3x Ravager - 3x Dark Lance

Grotesquerie

Haemonculus - Webway Portal

5x Grotesque
5x Grotesque

A few points:

- Why the Archon? It seems that a Succubus with Glaive would be much more useful. Grotesques already have ID weapons (making the Huskblade rather redundant), but they're very lacking in AP2. Unless I'm wrong and the Archon isn't going with them. But, in that case, what on earth is he doing?

- You might want to consider giving your Haemonculus Sindriq's Sump, so that he won't slow the Grotesques down if they roll Fleet.

- With regard to the Grotesques themselves, is WWP really the best route to take? It seems that removing a grotesque from each squad and starting them in Raiders would be better - as you can actually assault out of them. I'd also recommend Aberrations (with Scissorhands if you have the points) - mainly to accept challenges for your characters, though they can also help against vehicles.

- I'd want Cluster Caltrops on Reavers - not Blasters. If you want to use the blasters, then you have to forfeit the Reaver's main defence (Jinking for a 3++ save). Also, Blasters aren't a great weapon to begin with. If you really must have a ranged weapon, I'd suggest the Heat Lance for being cheaper and giving you a melta weapon. But, Cluster Caltrops would still be my first choice.

- Are you using the Realspace Raiders detachment for this list? I can only assume so since you've using 4 FA slots, but... ugh. I'd seriously try to put that Venom elsewhere so that you can use a proper CAD.

- Have you got no other way to get more Dark Lances than that truebron squad? No Ravager or something you could add? It just seems like the least efficient way to get 2 Dark Lance shots. It might be better to either give them Blasters and give them that empty venom as a dedicated transport. Or, perhaps just get 2 more Warrior squads in Venoms with a blaster each. One can have the empty venom, and (if your HQ is going with the Grotesques) the other squad can have his Venom.

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Last dex we were on the weaker scale (outside of allies) but with a very unique playstyle and feel to the army. This dex we are just weak, and much more standardised. Not a change I'm a big fan of to be quite honest, there was a lot more flavor in the last dex

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Last dex we were on the weaker scale (outside of allies) but with a very unique playstyle and feel to the army. This dex we are just weak, and much more standardised. Not a change I'm a big fan of to be quite honest, there was a lot more flavor in the last dex

i didnt play last dex, but imo it seemed more that the unique playstyle and feel was more to do with having little other viable styles, combined with a very outdated codex. I think this dex offers the ability to use much more of the available units. I agree that some flavour was lost with the loss of some interesting special characters.

cant comment on strength, but then its not like GW ever aim for balance it seems. With the strength of the latest necron dex as an example.

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Last dex we were on the weaker scale (outside of allies) but with a very unique playstyle and feel to the army. This dex we are just weak, and much more standardised. Not a change I'm a big fan of to be quite honest, there was a lot more flavor in the last dex

IMO ALOT of the new nerfs was just pointless.... Look at Ravagers vs Other 110-125 Pt tanks.... no need for the increase in points. Look at a Falcom, 2 shot S8 ap 2 at 48" on AV12 that can get TL guns or a 3rd S8 AP2 with a Transport of 6.

Then there is Haywire Grenades being MUCH harder to get, yes we have s8 lance... but it takes WAY to much to kill anything. S8 isnt good AT. it takes 9 Dark Lances to kill 1 AV12 vehicle if they get 0 Saves, with a 4+ jink or a 5+ cover that goes up to 15+ lances for 1 AV 12 Vehicle. IMO the old book over all was more powerful, AT on Bikes/scourges make it a much more Glass Cannon style army.

If you want DE to be Highly Competitive you need to Ally in Eldar, Fire Dragons, D-scythes, Autarch, Crimson Hunter etc... At that point your no longer DE.

 Amishprn86 wrote:

IMO ALOT of the new nerfs was just pointless.... Look at Ravagers vs Other 110-125 Pt tanks.... no need for the increase in points.

Agreed.

What's worse is that they also removed the Ravager's ability to move 12" and fire all 3 guns at full BS. You know, the ability that's key to the DE's entire theme.

 Amishprn86 wrote:
Then there is Haywire Grenades being MUCH harder to get, yes we have s8 lance... but it takes WAY to much to kill anything. S8 isnt good AT. it takes 9 Dark Lances to kill 1 AV12 vehicle if they get 0 Saves, with a 4+ jink or a 5+ cover that goes up to 15+ lances for 1 AV 12 Vehicle.

Yeah, I was really disappointed that Dark Lances and Blasters got no buffs whatsoever (not to mention staying insanely expensive).

Solar Shock wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Gamerely wrote:
How do you guys feel about Dark Eldar placing in the bottom 5 of the recent LVO Tournament? I'm just starting Dark Eldar and... I kind of like it... I like being niche.

Last dex we were on the weaker scale (outside of allies) but with a very unique playstyle and feel to the army. This dex we are just weak, and much more standardised. Not a change I'm a big fan of to be quite honest, there was a lot more flavor in the last dex

i didnt play last dex, but imo it seemed more that the unique playstyle and feel was more to do with having little other viable styles, combined with a very outdated codex. I think this dex offers the ability to use much more of the available units. I agree that some flavour was lost with the loss of some interesting special characters.

cant comment on strength, but then its not like GW ever aim for balance it seems. With the strength of the latest necron dex as an example.

I disagree, I think there was many more playstyles in the last dex than there is in this one, it's all pretty standardised now

The old codex also didn't charge me an extra £30 to use some playstyles...

 vipoid wrote:

Incognito15 wrote:
So I think I have my final list for an upcoming tournament.

Archon - Webway Portal, Shadowfield, Huskblade, Haywire Grenade
Venom - Splinter Cannon

5x Warriors - Blaster
Venom - Splinter Cannon
5x Warriors
Venom - Splinter Cannon

8x Trueborn - 2x Dark Lance

Venom - Splinter Cannon
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
6x Reavers - 2x Blaster
Razorwing Jetfighter - 2x Dark Lances

3x Ravager - 3x Dark Lance

Grotesquerie

Haemonculus - Webway Portal

5x Grotesque
5x Grotesque

A few points:

- Why the Archon? It seems that a Succubus with Glaive would be much more useful. Grotesques already have ID weapons (making the Huskblade rather redundant), but they're very lacking in AP2. Unless I'm wrong and the Archon isn't going with them. But, in that case, what on earth is he doing?

- You might want to consider giving your Haemonculus Sindriq's Sump, so that he won't slow the Grotesques down if they roll Fleet.

- With regard to the Grotesques themselves, is WWP really the best route to take? It seems that removing a grotesque from each squad and starting them in Raiders would be better - as you can actually assault out of them. I'd also recommend Aberrations (with Scissorhands if you have the points) - mainly to accept challenges for your characters, though they can also help against vehicles.

- I'd want Cluster Caltrops on Reavers - not Blasters. If you want to use the blasters, then you have to forfeit the Reaver's main defence (Jinking for a 3++ save). Also, Blasters aren't a great weapon to begin with. If you really must have a ranged weapon, I'd suggest the Heat Lance for being cheaper and giving you a melta weapon. But, Cluster Caltrops would still be my first choice.

- Are you using the Realspace Raiders detachment for this list? I can only assume so since you've using 4 FA slots, but... ugh. I'd seriously try to put that Venom elsewhere so that you can use a proper CAD.

- Have you got no other way to get more Dark Lances than that truebron squad? No Ravager or something you could add? It just seems like the least efficient way to get 2 Dark Lance shots. It might be better to either give them Blasters and give them that empty venom as a dedicated transport. Or, perhaps just get 2 more Warrior squads in Venoms with a blaster each. One can have the empty venom, and (if your HQ is going with the Grotesques) the other squad can have his Venom.

I agree with the Archon. It will be a Succubus.

Thanks I never noticed Syndrics Pump. Good investment.

I am strugging with how to use Grotesques. WWP or Raiders probably will come down to a coin flip.

Never used Cluster Caltrops but I will. Switched them out.

Fit everything into a CAD. (revised list will be posted later)

No. Sadly I am maxing out my DE collection. I already have three Ravagers. Dont own any Scourge. And Trueborn in Venom I always feel like I am wasting the Venom because it has to get close and dies immediately. My other thought is tournament will be pure Maelstrom so an objective sitter isnt the worst thing.

Thanks for the help.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Revised List:

Succubus - Archite Glaive, Haywire Grenade

(3x) 5x Warriors - Venom - Splinter Cannon

7x Trueborn - 2x Dark Lance - Venom - Splinter Cannon

(2x) 6x Reavers - 2x Cluster Caltrops
Razorwing Jetfighter - 2x Dark Lances

(3x) Ravager - 3x Dark Lance

Grotesquerie

Haemonculus - Syndrics Sump

4x Grotesque - Aberration - Raider w/ Dark Lance
4x Grotesque - Aberration - Raider w/ Dark Lance

I agree somewhat with allying to be competitive - I find myself adding a Firebase Support Cadre to every list for good AA and AT (with Scourge and soon to be Reapers)

How many points does a Firebase Support Cadre take up?

How about a necron ally. The deathbringer flight lets you take 2 to 4 Doom Scythes. S10 AP1 blast, lance is about as good as you can get at vehicle busting outside of Destroyer weapons. Also packing telsa, these guys can double duty as air-to-air. Finally, they can bubble a -1 Ld, which is nice to combine with all the DE Leadership stuff.

-Matt

Incognito15 wrote:
How many points does a Firebase Support Cadre take up?

My current set up is 710 and consists of 4 EWO Missilesides, 2 Target Lock (so I can target three units a turn) and then Riptide w. IA, SMS and EWO. I find Stim packs not that good, unless you run double Riptide.

Doombringer flight could be interesting. I have two Scythes that need building. I'm not too sure how it would work w/ Come the Apocalypse Allies (and the Ld hurts DE too). There's just something about 24 TL S7 shots with Tank hunters that makes me think Firebase would be better for AT and AA (leave AV13/14 to Haywire Scourge and Reapers).

I think both the crimson hunter and razorwing are good at AA. The razorwing is arguably better at AA against FMC, and the crimson hunter is better at AA against flyers.

I tend to see more FMC than flyer spam so the Razorwing tends to see more play.

I think the thing to remember is in a list with 3 flyrants for example, your opponent has invested 780 pts into FMC, in a 5 flyrant list you are looking at a little over 1200pts in FMC. Unless you are bringing at least half as many points in flyers yourself, theres not much point as they can jink the few targets you fire at and then probably wipe you out even if you do jink next round.

Also certain formats [cough ITC/LVO] have changed the rules on how FMC work so they are immune to blasts/templates/auto hit. So missiles which normally RAW work against them, have no effect, as does the upgraded disintegrator cannon on voidravens for example, and the wraithfighter, as well as immunity to blasts that would incidentally normally scatter onto FMC and affect them under the rules in the rulebook.

I find splinter raiders with splinter racks can do good against FMC, but if the FMC has e-grubs or a template weapon the outcome if you do not kill the FMC is not pretty.

Oh yeah, deffo. In my list I've got 3 Venoms w/ Kabalite Warriors and 2 Raiders w/ Splinter Racks, Nightshields and 10x Kabalite Warriors. I'm tempted to get behind it and fire, so it has to glide to come and shoot (and therefore be vulnerable to everything in the army).

 vipoid wrote:
The old codex also didn't charge me an extra £30 to use some playstyles...

Ahh the sad story there is.... once they realised they could.... why wouldn't they? Suppliments, formations... its all $$$. I mean, look at it in general... staggered releases.... units before dex.... Suppliments at the same time as dex releases.... formations in other books released weeks later. Lets not kind ourselves, each of those is aimed at maximising product sales in pretty much every way

Gota get my fix! one way or another!

That firebase support cadre does sound pretty damn useful! also pretty effective for other armies and not only anything with lots of fliers, i mean EWO works on DSing troops and drop pods right?

blaktoof wrote:
I think both the crimson hunter and razorwing are good at AA.

I really wouldn't consider the Razorwing good anti-air.

Frankly, if you want AA, you picked the wrong codex.

Solar Shock wrote:

 vipoid wrote:
The old codex also didn't charge me an extra £30 to use some playstyles...

Ahh the sad story there is.... once they realised they could.... why wouldn't they? Suppliments, formations... its all $$$. I mean, look at it in general... staggered releases.... units before dex.... Suppliments at the same time as dex releases.... formations in other books released weeks later. Lets not kind ourselves, each of those is aimed at maximising product sales in pretty much every way

Gota get my fix! one way or another!

That firebase support cadre does sound pretty damn useful! also pretty effective for other armies and not only anything with lots of fliers, i mean EWO works on DSing troops and drop pods right?

Yeah. It's also really good for additional AT so you don't have to rely on Scourge and equivalents - giving you a bit more room for Anti Infantry (so Gunboats, Razorwing Missiles and co ). Helps against SM too with PE: SM

I'll probably test Deathbringer Flight and see how well it does - but FBSC has proven itself in competitive games and I wouldn't fault you for taking it
(side note, there's a bit of fluff with DE and Tau fighting against Nids where DE asked Tau for some of their soldiers to help the Tau against the Nids. Of which, Tau complied and were shortly aided by mysterious hulking blue creatures that the DE set upon the Nids. Kekekekekeh..)

Anyone else more than a little sad about tomb-blades?
Massed S5 ignore cover, ignore our armor shooting? Wheee.
Looks like I need those Autarch jet bikes on point tanking hits after all.

-Matt

Very much. Fast enough to get close enough to us too.

The only consolation I can take is that with my poison I don't care about your higher toughness XD

 HawaiiMatt wrote:
Anyone else more than a little sad about tomb-blades?
Massed S5 ignore cover, ignore our armor shooting? Wheee.
Looks like I need those Autarch jet bikes on point tanking hits after all.

-Matt

That and its a required unit in the decurion... so its not like they are going to be rare or a playstyle choice There WILL be a unit of them
But with what Frozen said, atleast poison dont care about there T, and with going first hopefully you can put enough poison potential on them to force a jink turn 1 (if your going first), as some high volume poison from some venoms should certainly give them good reason to jink. thus they can't snapshoot their blasts right?

That's correct Solar, they can't shoot Particler Beamers if Jinking. But I think the general consensus is that Gauss Blasters are better in most cases (can Jink, TL and universally good).

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/637532.page

That thread is QS vs Lance. I think it may be relevant for you guys to look at.

While I know myself, and other Necron players in my area wouldn't rule it that way, it may be something you guys come across.

I dont think what they are trying to say is correct;
As the statement is referring to "model" characteristics, lance is not a model rule, its a weapon profile rule. But thats for that topic

@Frozen, I thought the point was we were worried about the Ignores cover blasts? Although ignores cover gauss is possibly equally as bad... Gauss blasters are STR4? So they would be needing 6's on AP rolls anyways? which would be a gauss glance?

Although when I think about it, Str 5 blasts TL are probably < Str 4 TL shots. Sadly I cant remember the weapon profiles of the Cron stuff.

On Tomb Blades, Guass Blasters are S5 AP4 Rapid Fire, Twin Linked, Particle Beamers are S6 AP5 Blast

Ignores cover guass blasters with twin linked are very good, possibly one of the best ground to air units in the game.

Always wounds on 6s always glances on 6s, hits 30% of the time even when snap firing thanks to twin linked and can have ignores cover.

You can get I believe ~13 tomb blades with a 3+ save upgrade and ignores cover for the cost of 1 flying hive tyrant with e grubs and twin devourers.

26 shots with about a third hitting, is 8-9 hits at str5 ap4 always wounds/glances on 6s. Many FMC are T 5 so that is 4-5 wounds with ap4. Against an AV10 flyer that will be on average 1pen2glances or a dead AV10 HP3 flyer if you don't have a ++ save (no cover saves due to nebulascope)

honestly they are possibly one of the best mobile shooty units in the game for the cost at the moment. Coupled with a 3+ save with a 5+ RP (possibly re-roll of 1s or a 4+ RP with reroll of 1s depending on formation and characters in unit) they can also be quite resilient.

The beamers being blasts cant target flyers, but at s6 ap5 they deny most DE FnP and armor saves.

Excellently put Blaktoof, thanks for the concise description
Yeh they seem nasty. I suppose luckily, if they choose the blast our transports fair better as its single shot, but if they go blasters then they are better against our AV but not denying FnP.

But if they bring a unit of both then seems your Sod out of luck! And if they are as versatile as they seem... who wouldn't bring one of each

Here's a report against the Serpent Spam if anyone is interested:

BR2: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Serpent Spam - 1250pts

 Mushkilla wrote:
Here's a report against the Serpent Spam if anyone is interested:

BR2: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Serpent Spam - 1250pts

God I hate battlereports of that size. Can someone give a short version? Lol. Because I am actually interested in what transpired I am just not diving through that

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Mushkilla wrote:
Here's a report against the Serpent Spam if anyone is interested:

BR2: The Repugnant Ramblers Vs Serpent Spam - 1250pts

God I hate battlereports of that size. Can someone give a short version? Lol. Because I am actually interested in what transpired I am just not diving through that

Short version: The bad guys won.

 SHUPPET wrote:
God I hate battlereports of that size. Can someone give a short version? Lol. Because I am actually interested in what transpired I am just not diving through that

Any advice on how to make the reports more palatable?

I always figured the pictures and 3-4 sentences summarising each turn kept things relatively short.

Hell you could even just look at the pictures, and only read the words if you felt you needed more information.

Does anyone else see the potential of fitting a Shadowseer into a unit of Incubi? She seems like a really good buy for them, being quite cheap (similar to a Succubus at mastery level 1) but she would grant them Fearless, Hit'n'run and -2 Leadership to enemy units.

She also hits quite hard with 5 fleshbane attacks and has pinning grenades, which used along with the -2 will mitigate overwatch sometimes. While she may not hit as hard as a Sucubus, she offers a lot more buffs.

Incubi hit hard, by turn 4 they have furious charge. That's 3 Strength 5 AP 2 attacks each, Hit'n'Run allows them to keep that attack increase instead of getting bogged down in those last few tactical marines. The psyker level is just a bonus, but Veil of Tears will always have a chance to be useful.

My only concern is how hard it is to get them into a battle forged army.

SHUPPET wrote:

God I hate battlereports of that size. Can someone give a short version? Lol. Because I am actually interested in what transpired I am just not diving through that

I think your doing Mush a disservice there, his reports are long but only because there are pictures, VP updates and explanations. Overall it takes me about 10 minutes to get through the entire thing and that includes reading it all and observing all the pictures. Each player turn is summarised in around 5 lines of text which includes details of why he made moves or the little details the pictures dont show.

if you wanted a brief or short version scroll to the end? he has the VP final totals, thats a 10 second job and you will know who won. Or just scan the pictures in 2 minutes, heck skim reading the text and skipping the images would only be 5 minutes at most. I think Mush's batreps are a standard to which most other batreps fall short. He provides you with all the information for you to decide how you'd like to consume it.

But as a brief;

he clustered the objectives as close as he could in the eldar half, achieving 4 surrounding a piece of terrain. He then used his sheer durability with his two grot bombs to hold basically the entire 4, using the objectives he was able to hold the serpents at arms length while allowing him good odds of drawing cards he could achieve. He played to the mission and was able to deny the eldar list any kill x unit, as both grot units survived the entire game. He made it difficult for the serpents to gain much and kept his scoring on a roll.

A note: in the time it takes to read my post you could have read a 1\5th of the report, so with a little more effort you could have read it yourself

They aren't too long at all.

 ALEXisAWESOME wrote:
Does anyone else see the potential of fitting a Shadowseer into a unit of Incubi? She seems like a really good buy for them, being quite cheap (similar to a Succubus at mastery level 1) but she would grant them Fearless, Hit'n'run and -2 Leadership to enemy units.

She also hits quite hard with 5 fleshbane attacks and has pinning grenades, which used along with the -2 will mitigate overwatch sometimes. While she may not hit as hard as a Sucubus, she offers a lot more buffs.

Incubi hit hard, by turn 4 they have furious charge. That's 3 Strength 5 AP 2 attacks each, Hit'n'Run allows them to keep that attack increase instead of getting bogged down in those last few tactical marines. The psyker level is just a bonus, but Veil of Tears will always have a chance to be useful.

My only concern is how hard it is to get them into a battle forged army.

Yeah they are pretty great in my estimation of what they can do, because of the skills they offer. Another great unit is Grotesques, being able to give Grotesques Hit and Run is crazy.

Yeah a Shadowseer would be great. Unfortunately Harlequins have been organised in a really crappy way for allying in to a DE army.

 Mushkilla wrote:


Any advice on how to make the reports more palatable?

I always figured the pictures and 3-4 sentences summarising each turn kept things relatively short.

Hell you could even just look at the pictures, and only read the words if you felt you needed more information.

ryuken87 wrote:
They aren't too long at all.

Solar Shock wrote:

I think your doing Mush a disservice there, his reports are long but only because there are pictures, VP updates and explanations. Overall it takes me about 10 minutes to get through the entire thing and that includes reading it all and observing all the pictures. Each player turn is summarised in around 5 lines of text which includes details of why he made moves or the little details the pictures dont show.

It's not an attack on the size of the battlereport guys.... I'm just saying that I PERSONALLY dislike battle reports of that size, a lot are this size or larger, but to ME, personally, I was interested in what happened in a less in depth, more concise format. However Mush if you are actually asking how to make your BR appeal to somebody who feels the way about Battlereports that I do, I'd recommend just including a quick overview in the conclusion next to the score, and as such I'm more likely to actually scroll through the BR itself to see the more indepth version of the things I'm curious about.

Solar Shock wrote:
he clustered the objectives as close as he could in the eldar half, achieving 4 surrounding a piece of terrain. He then used his sheer durability with his two grot bombs to hold basically the entire 4, using the objectives he was able to hold the serpents at arms length while allowing him good odds of drawing cards he could achieve. He played to the mission and was able to deny the eldar list any kill x unit, as both grot units survived the entire game. He made it difficult for the serpents to gain much and kept his scoring on a roll.

This is exactly what I was looking for, thanks a bunch!

Solar Shock wrote:
A note: in the time it takes to read my post you could have read a 1\5th of the report, so with a little more effort you could have read it yourself

Thanks dad, but I'm well aware of the amount of time it would have taken me personally to chew through something of that size, which is why I appealed to those that had already read it for a shorthand version

It's not to difficult to get Harlequins into the Dark Eldar army with their MASQUE, it works pretty well.

Just purchase the mandatory 2 F. Attack as Starweavers then stick a 5 man squad of Kabalite Warriors in it with Blaster.Then purchase Raiders and Venoms from the Fast Attack portion of the D Eldar codex or buy them their own Transport.It works out really well.I actually think Wyches can be viable now with 1 or 2 Shadow Seers the squads are cheap enough and the Shadowseer has hit and run + the Veil Power.

15 Wyches w/ 3 Hydra Gauntlets, Shadowseer is 225. The Shadowseer being ML1 autoget's the primaris from Phantomancy which is pretty great and can get abilities to give them shrouding , and cover or go with a Raider, their cheap alternatives to Harlequins basically.

Thoughts on this null deployment list? I'm intending on taking it to a tournament come April (if it's good shall buy models)

DE CAD
Lhamaean 10
5x Kabalite Warriors w/ Blaster, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 120
5x Kabalite Warriors w/ Blaster, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 120
5x Scourge w/ (4x Heat Lance or Haywire?) 120
5x Scourge w/ (4x Heat Lance or Haywire?) 120
8x Reavers w/ 3x Cluster Caltrops, Arena Champion 199

DE Formation
Scalpel Squadron
5x Wracks w/ Ossefactor, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 130
5x Wracks w/ Ossefactor, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 130

Eldar Allied
Autarch w/ Jetbike, Banshee Mask 90
3x Windrider Jetbikes 51
Crimson Hunter 160

Thoughts?

 ALEXisAWESOME wrote:
Does anyone else see the potential of fitting a Shadowseer into a unit of Incubi? She seems like a really good buy for them, being quite cheap (similar to a Succubus at mastery level 1) but she would grant them Fearless, Hit'n'run and -2 Leadership to enemy units.

She also hits quite hard with 5 fleshbane attacks and has pinning grenades, which used along with the -2 will mitigate overwatch sometimes. While she may not hit as hard as a Sucubus, she offers a lot more buffs.

Incubi hit hard, by turn 4 they have furious charge. That's 3 Strength 5 AP 2 attacks each, Hit'n'Run allows them to keep that attack increase instead of getting bogged down in those last few tactical marines. The psyker level is just a bonus, but Veil of Tears will always have a chance to be useful.

My only concern is how hard it is to get them into a battle forged army.

You still don't have grenades on the Incubi, which is the main reason nobody takes them. Sure, they hit hard... but at I1. So the Shadowseer would be making them stronger where they are strong (locked into a continuing assault), but no stronger where they are weak (initiating that assault in the first place). Because it doesn't cover the crippling weakness of the unit, I really can't see this combination being that useful in the long run.

 Frozocrone wrote:
Thoughts on this null deployment list? I'm intending on taking it to a tournament come April (if it's good shall buy models)

DE CAD
Lhamaean 10
5x Kabalite Warriors w/ Blaster, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 120
5x Kabalite Warriors w/ Blaster, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 120
5x Scourge w/ (4x Heat Lance or Haywire?) 120
5x Scourge w/ (4x Heat Lance or Haywire?) 120
8x Reavers w/ 3x Cluster Caltrops, Arena Champion 199

DE Formation
Scalpel Squadron
5x Wracks w/ Ossefactor, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 130
5x Wracks w/ Ossefactor, Venom w/ 2x Splinter Cannon 130

Eldar Allied
Autarch w/ Jetbike, Banshee Mask 90
3x Windrider Jetbikes 51
Crimson Hunter 160

Thoughts?

Im definitely interested to hear about this list plus the discussion that follows because i too would love to make a null deployment list! They look so much fun and potentially throw alot of lists out of their groove early on which is a major boost to DE potential!

 SHUPPET wrote:
However Mush if you are actually asking how to make your BR appeal to somebody who feels the way about Battlereports that I do, I'd recommend just including a quick overview in the conclusion next to the score, and as such I'm more likely to actually scroll through the BR itself to see the more indepth version of the things I'm curious about.

I was being genuine, I'm always looking for ways to make battle reports more accessible. Personally I have always struggled with large bodies of text, hence why I'm a big fan of diagrams. I'll add a quick summary at the end in future. Thanks for the feedback.

 Mushkilla wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:
However Mush if you are actually asking how to make your BR appeal to somebody who feels the way about Battlereports that I do, I'd recommend just including a quick overview in the conclusion next to the score, and as such I'm more likely to actually scroll through the BR itself to see the more indepth version of the things I'm curious about.

I was being genuine, I'm always looking for ways to make battle reports more accessible. Personally I have always struggled with large bodies of text, hence why I'm a big fan of diagrams. I'll add a quick summary at the end in future. Thanks for the feedback.

I like SHUPPET's idea but not cause im lazy, I feel Mush has something going with his bat reps but at work i cant read the whole thing right away, id like a quick overview so i can read it real fast and get an idea then come back to it later for the meaty parts. An interesting idea too would be if we started a thread for the batreps then the whole community talked about what happened, what could have changed, why things worked, why they didnt work, and overall status of the DE in a typical meta.

Keep up the works Mush

 Solosam47 wrote:

 Mushkilla wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:
However Mush if you are actually asking how to make your BR appeal to somebody who feels the way about Battlereports that I do, I'd recommend just including a quick overview in the conclusion next to the score, and as such I'm more likely to actually scroll through the BR itself to see the more indepth version of the things I'm curious about.

I was being genuine, I'm always looking for ways to make battle reports more accessible. Personally I have always struggled with large bodies of text, hence why I'm a big fan of diagrams. I'll add a quick summary at the end in future. Thanks for the feedback.

I like SHUPPET's idea but not cause im lazy, I feel Mush has something going with his bat reps but at work i cant read the whole thing right away, id like a quick overview so i can read it real fast and get an idea then come back to it later for the meaty parts. An interesting idea too would be if we started a thread for the batreps then the whole community talked about what happened, what could have changed, why things worked, why they didnt work, and overall status of the DE in a typical meta.

Keep up the works Mush

For me its more that I cannot keep track of what happens throughout a match in written form, I am perfectly fine at it while playing (actually pretty good) but when reading a battle report, every sentence may as well be for a new match, I cannot put the things together for some reason, probably mild ADHD lol when it comes to staying focused on things that I'm not directly involved in. Even the overview at the end is a challenge for me, but makes it certainly a lot easier to digest. I really like These suggestions here

 Solosam47 wrote:
I like SHUPPET's idea but not cause im lazy, I feel Mush has something going with his bat reps but at work i cant read the whole thing right away, id like a quick overview so i can read it real fast and get an idea then come back to it later for the meaty parts.

I'll add a summary at the end in future to make things easier, for people who just want a quick summary. I'll also hide lists behind spoilers so to make things more compact.

 Solosam47 wrote:
An interesting idea too would be if we started a thread for the batreps then the whole community talked about what happened, what could have changed, why things worked, why they didnt work, and overall status of the DE in a typical meta.

Keep up the works Mush

That's what I feel the battle report threads over at TDC are for, I didn't really want to have to keep track of multiple report threads on different forums and felt it was easier to just keep them in one place.

Thanks for the feedback!

This past Saturday I played a 3 round RTT at 1700 pts.

My list:
Heami-wwp,FG
Heami-wwp,FG

10 grots- abberation, SH
10 grots- abberation, SH

Corpsethief claw:
5 Talos- 5 TLHB, 5 Ichor IN, 5 Chain FL

Missions Maelstrom

I looked around at my opponents and of them the one I feared most was the GK list with 2 dreadknights and a terminator unit with draigo and a libby. He was using their special detachment for T1 deepstrike.

Warlord trait: 3 add or subtract one to reserves

The mission was cloak and shadows (or whatever) and I he placed objectives first. I placed all three of mine off his first placement forming a diamond, the other two were on the opposite edge. I won first deployment and took the side with the 4 objectives since their was more area terrain as well. I also decided to deploy my entire army because I wanted to force him to DS in risky situations off of the objectives.

Short overview is he was way too intimidated by all my CC units and we basically watched eachother for 3 turns. I drew AWFUL card however and couldn't score a point until turn 3 when I got FB, big game hunter AND witch slayer with my corpse thief claw shooting his venerable dread in ruins. I mayde sure that when he finally assaulted my claw with his NDK I was in terrain and I thankfully mulched it before it could swing. I won 5-4 only because I made a SERIOUSLY stupid decision to accept a challenge giving him two points, I chalked it up to the very casual nature of our game and him taking 30 minute turns to my 3 minute turns. ( I figured out he had the challenge card earlier, but spaced out after his lengthy deliberations. I tend to do that, it one of my worse faults in boring games)

My second match was against an Iyandin eldar army with 2 WS, 2 Wraithknights (one with sun canon lol) 2 units of wraith blades (axes) lead by spirit seers a WG unit(canons) a DA unit and two bike units led by warlocks.

Warlord trait: 3 add or subtract one to reserves (again lol)

Mission the standard mission 1 maelstrom. This game I reserved both grot units. I used the same objective tactic as the last game only this time his side had the majority with my corpse thief claw sitting between my two. This game was a blow out and I tabled him. Corspe thief proved insane here and by turn two managed to earn me 5 VP's due to some poor decisions from him. He decided to go for a maelstrom to the right of my claw with a windrider unit turn one, on my turn I drew the same objective as well as assasinate (his unit had a warlock) to I got FB, objective 5 and assasssinate. To make things worse he tried the same thing on the other objective next turn only to see me draw that objective and again make the charge. He really had no idea how to face my list, especially when my two massive grot units deep struck between all 4 of his objectives.

The big winning unit was the corspe thief claw though, it finally died but not before soaking all his shooting for 5 turns and earning my something like 10 vp's. My rolls cmae on fir eto make it worse and one of his WK assaulted a grot squad and dropped 3 grots (would have been 4 but I made my 6+ from HoW lol) only to see my warlord hit every time and wound every time including two 6's, of which he failed one and I insta gibbed it!

Game 3 some how i roll the same warlord trait again lol

I played a super shooty tau army from hell with 2 missleside units, 2 riptides one ion on burst and two crisis missle pod units led by commanders. I got tabled :(

BUT, my rolling was HORRID, I rolled my corpse thief claws 3+ saves like they were 5+ and his rolling was on fire (like he needed it with 2+ TL to hit rolls and one unit having monsterhunter) Depsite this I had two talos with one wound each making a multi charge verse a broad side unit and one crisis unit, except they died to over watch!!! Had my saves been average the turn before I am possitive I'd have survived and wiped those two units lifting a HUGE burdon off my two grot units that were sitting 1" away from his line but about to take the entire armies fire rather then half.

The worst part of that match was also terrain, the table was so open he literally just lined up across from me and had LOS on my unit with everything turn one. I large LOS blocker in the middle would have seen me hugging it turn 1 for a max threat overload turn 2 despite making the charge unlikely.

So all in all I have to say I am impressed with how well I did against ALL tough matchups in maelstrom on a 6x4 table with 3 units lol.

At 1850 I think I might cut some fat and try to take 4 units of 5 grots with WWP heamis ( dual cad) plus corpse thief. I think it would give me more flexibility and allow me to detach the haemis if I need more MSU for objectives OR to soak overwatch verse tau.

 Red Corsair wrote:
So all in all I have to say I am impressed with how well I did against ALL tough matchups in maelstrom on a 6x4 table with 3 units lol.

Yeah its surprising how well it does. It's like some weird inverse of MSU. Also if you some how end up playing kill point...

 Red Corsair wrote:
placed all three of mine off his first placement forming a diamond, the other two were on the opposite edge. I won first deployment and took the side with the 4 objectives since their was more area terrain as well.

The Diamond objective placement strategy is ridiculously strong with this list, and can really help in the tougher matchups. Good to hear you managed to get some good mileage out of it. Smart to start everything on the board against Grey Knights, especially if you have the objectives in your deployment zone.

 Red Corsair wrote:
At 1850 I think I might cut some fat and try to take 4 units of 5 grots with WWP heamis ( dual cad) plus corpse thief. I think it would give me more flexibility and allow me to detach the haemis if I need more MSU for objectives OR to soak overwatch verse tau.

Really curious to see how that plays out. Definitely gives you more flexibility, but doubles your WWP/Haemonculus Tax. Why dual CAD? The Covenite Coterie detachment should have enough slots, or am I missing something?

Sounds sweet Red, sounds like some enjoyable plays, I agree that more grots would be really useful, would also help you pin armies more, split fire to some degree, allowing you access from more directions, i mean with pinpoint WWP and two slightly smaller units you could easily encapsulate vehicles, allowing one unit to shoot and charge and one unit to shoot another and also charge, so making huge effectiveness of your footprints. I suppose you can also in that force some really big decisions early Sounds agressive and fun

Yeh why dual cad out of interest?

Glad to hear of your experiences Red, the diamond formation seems powerful, as its to some extent a guaranteed placement. How were you finding the durability after the initial deepstrike? how were you DSing, reasonably aggressively?

What exactly is this Diamond Objective Placement Strategy?

Are talking about just placing them as close together?

 KiloFiX wrote:
What exactly is this Diamond Objective Placement Strategy?

Are talking about just placing them as close together?

Kind of.

http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11700-br2-the-repugnant-ramblers-vs-serpent-spam-1250pts#131192

That is mush's batrep, it illustrates this better than just words.

If you look at the picture in the Objective Placement section of his batrep you can see that his opponent placed objective 1, and he clustered his 2,4 and 6 such that they are as close to each other as possible with some terrain inside the 'diamond'. That's why the shape is important -- its not just keeping objectives close but such that there's a good central location in between them, like a ruin or such.

Ahh, ok - thanks man.

Sorry boys, away from my book so I am probably brain farting that the coven coterie is only two HQ. Is it 4? If so then yea, no point in taking two detachments.

My theory on taking the 4 units is mainly to mitigate some of the tough match ups especially gunline tau. I rolled poorly, but to the same note, in every game I got the best warlord trait for the list and in the two games I used the WWP's I got both my units in. having 4 would allow me to mitigate bad rolls slightly and also avoid relying on multi charging.

Against my eldar opponenty I pulled off some spectacular multi assaults, but he even started identifying his errors and where he could have made it difficult or impossible, in future games this could make it harder as I'll be dedicating WAY too many points at softer less expensive targets, meaning I can't hide from shooting. Don't forget fellas that with 11 bodies it is difficult to benefit from rampage. Splitting the larger units in half not only gives you more flexibility but also will get you ~2 extra attacks per grot.

So while I love the 10 man units, I just see much more flexibility with 5 man units. To save points you could always use two units in raiders instead in smaller point games. Since they arrive turn 2 they are fearless anyway.

Biigest thing I took away from the toutrnament however is the corpse thief claw. It honestly had me wondering if I could squeeze either a second one into a list. It is such a MASSIVE unit itself and is so hard to run from. the amount of firepower it can take is criminal. I have to models to build three more taloi/cronos so I think a more practical solution will be taking a Dark artisan instead. I can WWP it turn 2 so I can increase the FNP of the claw formation and will add another high toughness threat.

hardest decision now is where to evolve to. More grot units or more MC's. Guess I'll just have to play more games lol.

 Red Corsair wrote:
Sorry boys, away from my book so I am probably brain farting that the coven coterie is only two HQ. Is it 4? If so then yea, no point in taking two detachments.

6 hqs, 8 elites and 4 heavies, its pretty slick in that regard. If your running four units of grotesques there's not reason not to take two from the grotesquery formation: 1 grotesquery (2 grots, 1 haemi), 3 haemies 2 grots (from covenite coterie), Corpse thief. You could take 2 grotesqueries if you only wanted two haemonculus.

 Red Corsair wrote:
My theory on taking the 4 units is mainly to mitigate some of the tough match ups especially gunline tau. I rolled poorly, but to the same note, in every game I got the best warlord trait for the list and in the two games I used the WWP's I got both my units in. having 4 would allow me to mitigate bad rolls slightly and also avoid relying on multi charging.

Against my eldar opponenty I pulled off some spectacular multi assaults, but he even started identifying his errors and where he could have made it difficult or impossible, in future games this could make it harder as I'll be dedicating WAY too many points at softer less expensive targets, meaning I can't hide from shooting. Don't forget fellas that with 11 bodies it is difficult to benefit from rampage. Splitting the larger units in half not only gives you more flexibility but also will get you ~2 extra attacks per grot.

So while I love the 10 man units, I just see much more flexibility with 5 man units. To save points you could always use two units in raiders instead in smaller point games. Since they arrive turn 2 they are fearless anyway.

There are a few things to consider going down the smaller squads route aside from the extra haemi/WWP/raider expenses:

-It reduces your defence. A 10 man unit is a lot scarier to charge than a 5 man unit. It's also a lot harder to tie up with chaff (as most chaff won't last more than a round of combat).
-It makes it easier for your opponent to score Tactical Objectives that revolve around destroying units.
-Your reserves work very differently. If I have 10 man units and I succeed two reserve rolls I have 20 models on the table, with 5 man units I only have 10. If I succeed only one roll with a 10 man unit I have 10 models on the table, with 5 man units I only have 5 (which can be easy to overwhelm if nothing else comes on). Reserves don't have to come on turn 2. If anything I'm quite happy to fail two reserve rolls on turn 2, because it gives me another shot at all 20 coming on at the same time turn 3 (and importantly reduces the number of turns my opponent has to kill them). But also it gives me WND against dangerous terrain that turn and if I'm going second I get Zealot on turn 4 which is the earliest my opponent can charge me.

Of course there are many positives to smaller squads in addition to what you mentioned:

-smaller footprint makes them easier to hide, and gives your more options on where to land when deep-striking.
-smaller units don't mind getting tied up by walkers.
-smaller units can score more objectives.

Just wanted to illustrate that there is a trade off involved. But the big one for me, is only succeeding one reserve roll and as a result having to be very conservative with my deep-strike (5 grots vs entire enemy army). Larger squads make you less vulnerable to divide and conquer. Still I'm really curious to see how MSU will go!

 Red Corsair wrote:
Biigest thing I took away from the toutrnament however is the corpse thief claw. It honestly had me wondering if I could squeeze either a second one into a list. It is such a MASSIVE unit itself and is so hard to run from. the amount of firepower it can take is criminal. I have to models to build three more taloi/cronos so I think a more practical solution will be taking a Dark artisan instead. I can WWP it turn 2 so I can increase the FNP of the claw formation and will add another high toughness threat.

Yeah, it sounds awesome, definitely something I want to try in higher point games.

 Red Corsair wrote:
hardest decision now is where to evolve to. More grot units or more MC's. Guess I'll just have to play more games lol.

For an army composition that doesn't have much in the way of variety there seem to be a lot of hard choices! It's kind of surprising that a simple assault army, can have so much depth. With most lists I can work out what I should evolve to with theory hammer. With this style of list though I feel I need to get a load of games in against a ton of different armies before working out which direction to take it in.

I agree that a DA would be a great addition, it complements the other units really well. In my opinion its sort of a multiplier, alone its ok, but the more units you get around it the better. So to that extent, a corpusthief claw and some grot units would be perfect. I I think trying to get another claw in there would be difficult, crazily scary if you did, but i think the DA is a good place to start.

So DA, groteserie, then Covens detachment with 3 haemy's and 2 grot units. Thats 4 grot units, each with a haemy, the DA and a claw. Not sure the min points on that, but i imagine pretty steep. I would run smaller grot units, potentially 5-7, sticking the larger with the groteserie to attempt to get maximum benefit from the haemy's buffs.

I have a feeling that 2x3 Grot units and 2x7 grot units could work really well. Yes you are giving your opponent a weak unit of 3 that if focussed is going to go down a lot quicker, but i mean if my opponent was whittling down a 3 man grot unit in order to get a single VP i'd be worried about what else i was doing wrong! He should be by this point facing some serious issues if you've managed to get him pinned in position, ready to charge with 3-4 grot units. Also as you mentioned, the footprint is much smaller, a 3 man grot unit can actually fit in some rather tight spaces due to the base shapes. Could be great for DSing into the middle of his ranks while you've got 5 talos at his front door and 2 grot units closing the flanks off. If you can get a 3 man grot unit behind say some sort of meatwall you can actually open up the field as he will have to pile in and draw his force inwards, but thats a very specific scenario in which it could be effective. You may not insta-gib his chaff, but 3 grots should hold them up for a bit, and you can always throw in another grot unit to help clear them up.

Really good tournament batreps, Red. Thanks very much for taking the time to write it up. I loved your list and, even though the sample size is still microscopic, between your experience and Mushkilla's, I'm really excited to see what appears to be more recognition that the Coven units, when played by good generals, cause the top tier armies lots of problems due to their resilience and the awesome board control they can have due to their large footprint. I would concur with the others who recommended adding a DA (or two if you're willing to shrink the Grot squads) to your list as you expand it, as it would be a great force multiplier. In your last game against the Tau, a DA giving your Corpsethief 4+FNP, re-rolling ones would've been huge as if your opponent focused on killing the DA (which is REALLY hard to do), your Grots and Corpsethief would've made it into CC and then it would be all over. The DA is kind of like a super Canoptek Spyder for the new Necrons. Everybody breezily states "oh just kill the Spyder" and your Wraith problem is solved. That's much easier said than done and doubly so for the DA which is much tougher than a Spyder. You might kill the Spyder/DA eventually, but by then the Talos/Grots are already into your lines.

For an all Coven list, do you think:

List A:
Dark Artisan
Corpsethief Claw
3 x Scaple Squadron

List B:
Dark Artisan
Corpsethief Claw
Grotesquerie
Scaple Squadron

....would be better?

I'd say the second list - since Grotesques are likely to be much more useful than Wracks.

Also, it means you're using every Coven unit.

Quick question: What, if any, is the best use of the hex rifle? I kinda like the idea of them, but I cannot think of where they would fit into an army.

I've got one idea for these lists, since many of the afformentioned formations include the Freakish Spectacle special rule (-1 leadership for every enemy unit within 12"), why not go unbound and include a Shadowseer or two? You can pick up that Mask of Shadows for another negative modifier to leadership and go to town. Then take a DE Haemie with Armor of Misery to make it really fun. It's something I'm considering.

 Lord Blackscale wrote:
Quick question: What, if any, is the best use of the hex rifle? I kinda like the idea of them, but I cannot think of where they would fit into an army.

You use them to create dioramas to decorate your shelves.

Still, I have used them on occasion. Generally, I give one to my Warlord-Haemonculus and another to his 5-man Wrack squad (if I can afford it), along with an Ossefactor (if only my Haemonculi could take those... ). Basically, the squad sits in a Raider on a backfield objective and takes pot-shots. It's a decent objective-holder, but you could probably trade out the hexrifles and not notice the difference.

If you're wondering why I use said unit, it was for a few reasons:

- I had some Wrack models I wanted to use.
- I wanted to try the Covenite Fleshcorps formation (though I've also done this with a codex-haemonculus).
- I'd been using a lot of melee Haemonculi, and wanted to try a ranged one (though putting him with Wracks also leaves me the option of melee).
- I wanted him to shoot from long-range, since his squad wouldn't be very survivable and I didn't want him on the front-lines.
- I'd been modelling a sorcerer-haemonculus and the Hexrifle fit his flavour.

Anyway, my Haemonculus's hexrifle occasionally does something noteworthy, like insta-killing killing a Painboy (albeit too late in the game to really matter) or rending a terminator to death. But, it can't do anything reliably and might average maybe one infantry model killed per 2 games. It's sad, because it's a weapon I really want to kile, but it's really not worth its cost. Maybe if it had Fleshbane or Shred, or if it caused ID on to-wound rolls of 6. Sigh.

In terms of targets, I'd probably aim for non-EW MCs, if they have any. Otherwise, perhaps try to pick special weapons out of squads (maybe aim at ICs, if you're feeling really lucky ).

In case you're wondering, I usually only end up with one of these units in my army. Theoretically, if I was using Fleshcorps again, I might add a Hexrifle to the other two Wrack squads. But, I usually just don't have the points for that - as I tend to cram as many minimalist-units into my lists as possible.

Glad you guys are gaining so much from my brief write up. I honestly love having those two massive grot units, and silly me not realizing I have 6 HQ's to play with actually opens up much more theory.

In both my first two matchups I found myself seriously worried about ID on those grots. There was a turn when a small 6 man interceptor squad had hammer hand and force active and I lost 4 grots in a puff of smoke. I mean, that's 12 wounds and although heavily force influenced armies are rare, that and Iyandin wraith heavy armies can really have you relying on your opponents dice to be flat. I have always been good at model positioning so I cycled the lead models in my first two games, especially against the Heavy D canons on my CTC so any lucky 6 would only finish off single wounders where possible, but with 3 units you can't always get away with this. Sometime your opponent is as good as you with positioning and it can be a nightmare.

Now, having said that, I believe getting urien in there would really help both the grots AND the CTC as it would get me EW by turn 4, turn three if I break off one squads WWP carrier after the drop and join the one unit. This gives major flexibility to the list allowing that unit to soak the potential counters.

My next list will probably be one of two lists:
#1
CTC: 5x Ichor injectors, 5x Chain flails

2 Heamy: WWP, FG
Heamy: FG
Urien Rackarth

2x 10 grot units w/ abberation

1845
#2
CTC:4x Ichor injectors, 5xChain flails

DA: Heamy:FG
WWP Talos: IJ, CF
Cronos: SS

2 Heamy: WWP, FG

2x 8 grot units w/ abberation

1850

The last tourny was 1700, so next increment will be 1850 most likely.

I like the second a little more right now overall, but I can really see list one ironing out some of the kinks in my original list and allowing me to adapt to hard counters.

Also I want to give props to Mushkilla for inspiring me to re-look at massed grots. I ran 10 with max haemies in 5th and had dreams of trying 20, but 6th and 7th had me preferring to scale back to 3-4 man units in raiders. So thanks Mush for reigniting my sick passion for all things made from recycled meat!!

I like what you did before with the Corpsethief Claw with Heat Lances. It gave you the ability to break transports and eat the juicy bodies on the inside for extra kill points. Putting two close combat weapons on them might be a waste, maybe you should mix it up for different situations? Three with Chain Flials and two with Ichor Injector should handle anything you come across. Even Wraithknights would worry.

Here's the list I was considering for 2k points.

Coven Supplement

Corpsethief Claw x5 Heat Lance

Dark Artisan - Spirit Probe, WWP, Chain Flials

Grotequerie - 7 Grots +1 Aberation w/ Scissorhand x2, Haemie w/ Syndric's Sump, WWP

Deldar
Haemie w/ WWP, Armor of Misery

Harlequins
Shadowseer ML 2, Mask of Secrets
Shadowseer ML 2

I know it's unbound, but I don't get ObSec with the Coven book and each formation includes Freakish Spectacle, so why stay bound? Deldar Haemie and Mask of Secrets for additional negative modifiers to Leadership and Psyker support. And I haven't even begun to mention the benefits of Hit and Run to large blobs or Groteques.

I have considered swapping out one of the Shadowseers for a Death Jester for the Shrieker Cannon, but I'm worried about all the rolls that need to happen to make it work. First I need to hit, then wound, then my opponent needs to fail any cover/armor saves, then he need to fail a moral... I would rather just nail my opponent twice with Psychic Shriek at -5 Leadership.

I actually took Haywire blasters since they have a 24" threat range before movement rather then a 9" I also didn't want to tempt myself into shooting poor targets and making my assaults longer.

The only real reason I took the HB's by the way was to combat imperial knights which I didn't face. Ad lance crushes the coven list flat, but against single knights if you shoot him down to 4 HP's before assaulting you have a solid shot at killing him smashing since your hitting on 3's and doing HP's on 3's with rerolls due to the smash rules. You are more then likely going to be assaulted by the faster knight as well, so if your savvy enough to get your closest model in terrain you actually have a shot at downing one without taking damage, though I'll admit this is very tough.

Incidentally I never played a single knight, at a store that usually has at least 2 if not more players fielding them. If not for knights I'd say always keep the TL splinter canons, they are much better against FMC's especially the demonic variety and they keep them cheap, I generally run them the first turn anyway.

In regard to ichor injectors and chain flails, I'd never leave home without them. They were clutch in both my winning games. Chain flails guraentees you can shred horde's and eternal warrior characters like draigo and Ichor injectors become important when you are down to your last couple models. I actually only killed the Iyandin WK which was his warlord with the scatter shield because of them. I did 4 wounds, 2 of which were ID and he failed the second he took. My taloi were on their last wounds each as well and died shortly after.

Your list is great, I am just less inclined to run so many books at once, especially unbound. Honestly I don't think you need too.

 vipoid wrote:
I'd say the second list - since Grotesques are likely to be much more useful than Wracks.

Also, it means you're using every Coven unit.

But what about the 6 Splinter Cannons and MSU that you would get with 3 x Scapel?

Or are Grots still much better?

 Red Corsair wrote:
I actually took Haywire blasters since they have a 24" threat range before movement rather then a 9" I also didn't want to tempt myself into shooting poor targets and making my assaults longer.

The only real reason I took the HB's by the way was to combat imperial knights which I didn't face. Ad lance crushes the coven list flat, but against single knights if you shoot him down to 4 HP's before assaulting you have a solid shot at killing him smashing since your hitting on 3's and doing HP's on 3's with rerolls due to the smash rules. You are more then likely going to be assaulted by the faster knight as well, so if your savvy enough to get your closest model in terrain you actually have a shot at downing one without taking damage, though I'll admit this is very tough.

Incidentally I never played a single knight, at a store that usually has at least 2 if not more players fielding them. If not for knights I'd say always keep the TL splinter canons, they are much better against FMC's especially the demonic variety and they keep them cheap, I generally run them the first turn anyway.

In regard to ichor injectors and chain flails, I'd never leave home without them. They were clutch in both my winning games. Chain flails guraentees you can shred horde's and eternal warrior characters like draigo and Ichor injectors become important when you are down to your last couple models. I actually only killed the Iyandin WK which was his warlord with the scatter shield because of them. I did 4 wounds, 2 of which were ID and he failed the second he took. My taloi were on their last wounds each as well and died shortly after.

Your list is great, I am just less inclined to run so many books at once, especially unbound. Honestly I don't think you need too.

You make a valid argument for Haywire Blasters, I'll use them instead.

 KiloFiX wrote:

But what about the 6 Splinter Cannons and MSU that you would get with 3 x Scapel?

Or are Grots still much better?

The thing is, even with 3x Scalpel Squadron, your list still isn't MSU - it has what amounts to 3 MSU units, and 2 mini-death-stars.

Regardless, my concern is that Wracks and Venoms are useless against vehicles - so against a mechanised enemy you'll have just two units capable of even scratching vehicles. In contrast, Grotesques can destroy most vehicles in combat (as well as being durable and exceptional against most infantry).