ThePhish wrote:

Exergy wrote:

skink007 wrote:
No 2d6 to pen, but all MCs get smash attacks. With the Talos this means you can get up to 4 str 10 attacks on rear armor.... even a landraider is shuddering at that.

they use to get 7+2d6 which has a better probibility to pen AV14 than 10+d6. Also they could get up to 8 attacks.
The changes might be a buff for cronos but are a nerf for Talos.

Definitely a nerf to the talos, but when it only takes 3/4 glances to wreck a vehicle, you don't 'need' penetrating hits. The number of attacks is what really sucks. Although it's easier to hit vehicles in cc now, it's not enough to make up for the loss of half of your attacks.

Wyches wreck vehicles(and dreads) so easily now it isnt a huge concern. Talos were really only needed for dreads, but now that 5 wyches can kill a dread before it can strike you really dont need them.

I love the Talos and Cronos models, but i'm really struggling to find a way to work them into my lists these days.

I will still take them for fluffy Coven build lists, but they seem woefully underimpressive under the new rules for any serious list.

I might experiment with WWP delivered Cronos, as they have multiple shooting attacks they can drop on someone coming out of a WWP. It might be worth a shot if you could demech the enemies around the WWP area, especially since you can't camp on an objective inside a tank these days to claim it.

TL Liquifier plus splinter cannon Talos might be worth a look, now they are less useful as tank hunters, also..

Ascalam wrote:I love the Talos and Cronos models, but i'm really struggling to find a way to work them into my lists these days.

I will still take them for fluffy Coven build lists, but they seem woefully underimpressive under the new rules for any serious list.

I might experiment with WWP delivered Cronos, as they have multiple shooting attacks they can drop on someone coming out of a WWP. It might be worth a shot if you could demech the enemies around the WWP area, especially since you can't camp on an objective inside a tank these days to claim it.

TL Liquifier plus splinter cannon Talos might be worth a look, now they are less useful as tank hunters, also..

I use to run the talos with a splinter cannon to try and get it a pain token. That 4+ against Krak missiles was gold. Now that it is only a 5+ I dont know. At least it works against lascannons now.

Another battle report (against space wolves) if people are interested:

Battle report 4

Wyches seem just as squishy as ever. Not being able to keep an agoniser hekatrix safe with ablative wounds is a real pain.

Exergy wrote:

I use to run the talos with a splinter cannon to try and get it a pain token. That 4+ against Krak missiles was gold. Now that it is only a 5+ I dont know. At least it works against lascannons now.

Sadly it's way easier and cheaper to spam missile launchers than lascannons...

I'm new to this forum but have been using this thread to adjust my play style for 6th edition. I have been a DE player since the newest codex was released, and yes at first I was pissed at the changes that GW did to them with 6th ed, and the faq's. But after realizing that my army wasn't nerfed, but instead changed I have been Rick rolling everybody so far.

Beast Masters and the baron are the new assault unit for dark eldar. My squad consist of the baron, 5 beast masters, 8 khymera's, and 6 razor wing flocks. I have enough diversity that besides a few blast templates I can spread the damage around enough that I can take a trashing pretty well from a lot of different units.

Wyches are the best anti armor in the codex, so I have 2 small 5 man squads in venoms, but I also run lelith and keep her and a squad of 9 wyches (hekatrix, and hydra guantlets) back as a counter attack unit.

Something that I have always used that not a lot of other DE players I've seen use are disentigrator cannons; a ravage with three of those can ruin a lot of people's days. Dark Lances are nice, but I've never really thought that I had to take 500 of them to have a list that I can win with.

Granted everyone plays differently, and the people we play against aren't all going to play the same either. Personally I don't play a lot of tournaments (that doesn't mean that I have never played tournaments, nor that I'm not good in them, just paper rock scissor list are boring to play against) because I bring a good all comers list that does well against pretty much whatever you throw at it, but in tournaments in 5th ed it came down to Spam Spam Spam. The only thing I have duplicated in my army are the two 5 man wych squads. The DE codex has so many great units, that to spam one or two units seems like a dis-justice. That is just me though. If it works for you keep doing it, but the DE are fine this edition.

Just my two cents.


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Besides, if a Husk blade become ap2, I can think of an Archon and some Incubi in a raider, as another great assault unit.

DE are fine this edition to be honest.

That being said grey knights are scary this edition with access to cheap inquisitors with divination. Prescience is brutal with psycannons and psybolts, they were already hard for DE to beat, and now they got even shootier. Not to mention, overwatch, divination and Hull points all make S5 bolters very good.

Here is my battle report if anyone is interested:

Battle Report 5

Bolters really hurt your vehicles if they're in large number or lucky. The new vehicle Wrecked rules really benefit weak troops however. But not Assaulting counters this.

Beast packs are definitely our go-to close combat squad these days. They can reclaim some of the glory that Wyches had in 5th.

I've been cheesing it up by throwing Baron at the front of the unit and using the 2+ LoS! the put shots wherever I want them to be. Bolter wounds go on the multiwound flock models, lascannons ping off the Khymera's invulnerable save or a clawed fiend. Clawed fiends have seen a place in my list explicitly because of this strategy. I'll throw the first few strength 6+ wounds on a clawed fiend, ramping up his attacks as high as possible while keeping him snugly in the center of the unit. When they charge, he ends up in the second rank and protected from wounds while doing a boatload of damage.

My preferred beastpack is four beastmasters, five Khymerae, four flocks and a clawed fiend. A good medley.

I'm going to start experiment with Wracks soon. See if I can breathe a bit of life into the old mech hybrid build.

Mushkilla wrote:DE are fine this edition to be honest.

That being said grey knights are scary this edition with access to cheap inquisitors with divination. Prescience is brutal with psycannons and psybolts, they were already hard for DE to beat, and now they got even shootier. Not to mention, overwatch, divination and Hull points all make S5 bolters very good.

Here is my battle report if anyone is interested:

Battle Report 5

I like reading your battle reports.

Question, I know you are trying out different units to see how they work with your reaver squads (which by the way are kicking butt very nicely). But have you ever thought about 2 squads of 5 wyches with haywire grenades in venoms, and a succubus with hekatrix bloodbrides in another venom, instead of the raiders. Save yourself some points from not paying more for the raiders, and smaller squads, and have every wych with a haywire grenade you would make those dreadnaughts crap themselves, and venoms come with flickfields for free. If you have the points you can upgrade to a hekatrix in each wych squad.


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Lokas wrote:I've been cheesing it up by throwing Baron at the front of the unit and using the 2+ LoS! the put shots wherever I want them to be.

I totally forgot about that. That is something I'll have to do, and maybe run a clawed fiend again to do like you said and max out his attacks. Good advice.

The other thing I'd suggest is keeping your beastmasters safe. They may never do anything in combat short of dying pitifully to a rogue fart, but they're characters.

Don't want that mean motherhumper with a power fist to start punking some Razorwing flocks? Challenge him with Bill the expendable hellion. That powerfist will kill the crap out of bill, but you won't be morosely sweeping your razorwings off the table. Does that cheeky cheap sergeant with a chain sword want to challenge Baron out of combat, depriving you of his high strength attacks? Accept the challenge with Tommy 'I pissed off the boss' Jones. The two can flail uselessly at each other while the Baron is free to do his dirty deeds.

Remember to hit and run on Baron's initiative 6!

It's the only deathstar I'd consider fielding.

Mostly because it's only 261 points, durable, powerful, and my favorite, quick.

Question?

I know this has probably been brought up on this thread before (but I don't want to look through 11 pages of rants to find it), but when a vehicle is wrecked, how does that stop you from assaulting the next turn? I can't find it in the Rule book. Could someone tell me the page in the rule book that it is on too?

Thanks

CrimsonKing wrote:
I like reading your battle reports.

Question, I know you are trying out different units to see how they work with your reaver squads (which by the way are kicking butt very nicely). But have you ever thought about 2 squads of 5 wyches with haywire grenades in venoms, and a succubus with hekatrix bloodbrides in another venom, instead of the raiders. Save yourself some points from not paying more for the raiders, and smaller squads, and have every wych with a haywire grenade you would make those dreadnaughts crap themselves, and venoms come with flickfields for free. If you have the points you can upgrade to a hekatrix in each wych squad.

Thanks,

You read my mind, I actually have that exact list written down in "lists to try pile", and it is what I will be trying next . I wanted to try raiders as It means I can run more troops (no need for brides, if only the venom could carry six), it also means I can add some extra bodies if need be (raiders also work out a bit cheaper without the night shields) with the three venom list I have 20 or so points floating around that I can't do much with.

That being said I'm very impressed with haywire, and I think MSU really helps wyches as it minimises the casualties you take from explosions. Venoms are also a lot smaller so they are miles easier to hide (which I really like). Venoms are also great at softening up targets. I'm also considering running raiders with dis-integrators and wyches with haywire. Lots to try!

CrimsonKing wrote:Question?

I know this has probably been brought up on this thread before (but I don't want to look through 11 pages of rants to find it), but when a vehicle is wrecked, how does that stop you from assaulting the next turn? I can't find it in the Rule book. Could someone tell me the page in the rule book that it is on too?

Thanks

The basic argument is (and I wholly disagree with this conclusion) that assault vehicle (RAW) gives you permission to assault the turn that you disembark. Since it is the enemy's turn when you are forced to disembark via a wreck, you cannot make a charge and therefore the permission is wasted. When the next turn comes around, the permission to assault via Assault Vehicle has expired, and you're no longer permitted to assault.

At least that's my understanding of it after reading the lengthy YMDC thread on the topic.

Lokas wrote:

CrimsonKing wrote:Question?

I know this has probably been brought up on this thread before (but I don't want to look through 11 pages of rants to find it), but when a vehicle is wrecked, how does that stop you from assaulting the next turn? I can't find it in the Rule book. Could someone tell me the page in the rule book that it is on too?

Thanks

The basic argument is (and I wholly disagree with this conclusion) that assault vehicle (RAW) gives you permission to assault the turn that you disembark. Since it is the enemy's turn when you are forced to disembark via a wreck, you cannot make a charge and therefore the permission is wasted. When the next turn comes around, the permission to assault via Assault Vehicle has expired, and you're no longer permitted to assault.

At least that's my understanding of it after reading the lengthy YMDC thread on the topic.

I think RAW it has a leg to stand on. My personal take is that it wasn't what was intended and so I wouldn't insist that it be played that way when I pop someone's assault transport (unless it was Terminators in a Land Raider in which case they've already got all the help they needed from power weapon changes).

The reason I think that is because the Assault Vehicle rule has that little bit about being able to assault the turn that they disembark even if the vehicle was destroyed, something which could only happen on your own turn when a flat out skimmer fails a dangerous terrain test (in which case the troops wouldn't have been able to get out normally anyway) or a zooming flyer transport is prevented from moving.

I agree that, RAW, that's how it is.

However, I'm of the belief that it was unintended, either an oversight or just straight up not a consequence they thought about.

There are enough spelling mistakes in the big book to cement my belief in GW's fallibility.

Either way, I can't imagine anyone but TFG playing it that way. I certainly haven't seen anyone trying to enforce that at my FLGS. Even after I mentioned it during idle chatter and told just about all the regulars about it. They were of the mind that it was a mistake too, and nobody has tried to play it that way.

I could see people acting differently at tournaments though.

Lokas wrote:I agree that, RAW, that's how it is.

However, I'm of the belief that it was unintended, either an oversight or just straight up not a consequence they thought about.

There are enough spelling mistakes in the big book to cement my belief in GW's fallibility.

Either way, I can't imagine anyone but TFG playing it that way. I certainly haven't seen anyone trying to enforce that at my FLGS. Even after I mentioned it during idle chatter and told just about all the regulars about it. They were of the mind that it was a mistake too, and nobody has tried to play it that way.

I could see people acting differently at tournaments though.

Okay, I agree with you. I have looked in the book were it talks about vehicle blowing up and and wrecked and what disembarking means and emergency disembarking also, and I have asked around locally about it too, and it just doesn't make any sense to me. I guess if you were really trying to screw your opponent over you could maybe make an argument to a Nazi about it and they would agree, but I don't play d-bag tactics like that anyways. I just saw a number of people talking about that and it really just confused me and everyone else locally, but since it was brought up I thought I would ask.

I got a question...

I don't want to spam Ravagers, I want to take 2 flyers and 1 Ravager, what flyers are the best out of the two we get?

Puscifer wrote:I got a question...

I don't want to spam Ravagers, I want to take 2 flyers and 1 Ravager, what flyers are the best out of the two we get?

Both are good for different reasons.

The Razorwing with lances + monoscythes + flickers is a good all rounder, capable at killing tanks, infantry and reasonably decent at dogfighting.
With Dissies instead of lances (and maybe a splinter cannon) it's great anti-infantry and light vehicle harrassment.

The Voidraven is straight up anti-armour, with its 2 Str9 shots, it's role is taking out heavy vehicles and enemy flyers.

The bonus of our flyers is that we don't need to evade to get our 5+ save, so we're able to consistantly fire at full BS while taking hits. ( I recently took and ignored the hits from 2 squads of lootas, a battlewagon, a boss in mega armour?, a squad of boyz and a dakkajet I'm sure something else... and walked away only having lost 1 Hull Point. )

The best way would probably be 2 Lance Razorwings with flickers and maybe night shields, and then a Dark Lance Ravager, while givign all your raiders Dissies.
That way your light transports can kill their light transports, your tank can kill tanks and the flyers can intercept flyers / kill tanks / maul infantry as required.

Thanks.

I don't know if I'm going to be taking Raiders as I'm going with Venom Spam with Haywyches as troops and Blasterborn as Elites.

I think I've got AI covered with the mass Splinter Cannon fire I'll have, but ranged AT, I'm not so sure.

Puscifer wrote:Thanks.

I don't know if I'm going to be taking Raiders as I'm going with Venom Spam with Haywyches as troops and Blasterborn as Elites.

I think I've got AI covered with the mass Splinter Cannon fire I'll have, but ranged AT, I'm not so sure.

If you are going venom spam with the wyches and haywire, I would really take 2 razorwings loaded with dak lances, and then take a ravager with dissies. Personnaly I take two ravagers (one dark lance, and one dissies) and then I sometimes bring a razorwing (but I'm trying different things).

I personnaly am having a difficult time using flyers. It's not that they don't do anything, it is just for the points, could I take something else that can do the same thing and be coesive with my army build? Can I get more use out of something else in our codex without spamming what I am already bringing?

If you're looking for ranged anti-tank in our fliers, then you are going to be sorely disappointed.

The Voidraven isn't bad for AT, but it's not going to be on the board the first turn, it has limited shooting potential, and it's more expensive than a Ravager. It's not a bad unit, I love Voidravens! They're fething awesome. But If I'm taking one, I'm taking it with two dark lance Ravagers for my other two heavy supports. I tried a list with two Voidravens as my heavy support, but I lacked first turn anti-armor, which gutted my alpha-strike. I wasn't exactly going to open up transports with splinter cannon fire.

Don't take Razorwings as anti-tank though. They are not good in this role. It dilutes their exceptional anti-infantry firepower. Dark Lances do not want to shoot at Monoscythe missile targets, and Monoscythe missiles do not want to shoot at Dark Lance targets. Dark Lance razorwings were the way to go in 5th because you could blow your entire missile load in a single shooting phase, and if you survived 'till the next turn you could function as a less efficient Ravager. Now? You can only fire two missiles per turn, and your movement is heavily restricted. So you've got two shooting phases minimum where your dark lances are going to waste (or your missiles are) out of 2-5 turns tops that you'll get to shooting. On average, you'd only get 2 turns firing at vehicles with 2 dark lances. Which, let's face it, isn't exactly a great threat to armor.

Now if you're going to bring blasterborn, you could have them function as your first turn AT and then bring in Voidravens in subsequent turns to mop up what armor is left. You've already got anti-infantry covered by all dem splinter cannons, so you really don't need the missiles. At the same time though, you've really got turn 2+ anti-armor covered by wych squads with haywire, so do you really need the voidraven? Couldn't you be better off with more Ravagers giving you more first turn anti-armor shots, as well as more points to play with? I know that's probably not the answer you wanna hear, but Ravagers are still king of our Heavy Support options. Although a flier or two won't be remiss, especially if you use it for dogfighting.

I'm regretting buying my razorwing personally, that whole zooming restriction has just made me hate our supersonic flyers to be honest. Yeah, great, they can survive until the end unlike 5th ed, but what's the point if they're gonna b firing at nothing? Are they surviving because they need a 6 to be hit, or simply because our opponents have just decided to ignore it?

Personally, not too bothered by flyers unless they're necrons, so, I'd rather just fill my HS slots with all the ravagers in the universe and kill ground units quicker and better.

So off the current subject on the tread, but I played a game today and again beast masters were awesome as always, but I think I am going back to my normal setup of 5 beast masters, 10 khymera, and 6 razorwings. The clawed fiend personally doesn't fit my play style, but I love the fact that the beast masters themselves are characters.

Something that I never really thought of before for an HQ choice is the Duke. Call me slow to the block but for 150 points this guy is awesome. Now normally my hq of choice is Lelith (lots of attacks, high WS and In, and ignores armor). But let's be honest I normally fight space marines in one form or another, or something that is toughness 4 or more (overlord, tyranid in some shape or other, biker captain). So she is wounding on a 5 or greater which usually translates to 1 or 2 dead. But the Duke wounds on a 2+ (he has great options for combat drugs which can increase that number) and he IGNORES ARMOR on roll of a 5 or a 6. Against tough 4 models so does Lelith! So instead of just wounding 1 or 2 or wait maybe 3 times, I am more likely wounding 3 or 4 and possible 1 or 2 of those ignore armor, and the others my opponent has to roll for which could bring the total up higher. He also has a blast pistol, and a shadowfield (so better save), and he pimps my ride for a squad of trueborn or warriors, making them wound on 3+ instead of 4+ for their splinter shots.

Duke sliscus you are now my regular hq choice. I already had a model made for him, just need to give it a cape and he will be ready to be painted and get his swag on.

I'm using the Duke. He's just too good for 150 points. All of those goodies and only one downfall... 2 wounds.

CrimsonKing wrote:
But the Duke wounds on a 2+ (he has great options for combat drugs which can increase that number) and he IGNORES ARMOR on roll of a 5 or a 6. Against tough 4 models so does Lelith! So instead of just wounding 1 or 2 or wait maybe 3 times, I am more likely wounding 3 or 4 and possible 1 or 2 of those ignore armor, and the others my opponent has to roll for which could bring the total up higher. He also has a blast pistol, and a shadowfield (so better save), and he pimps my ride for a squad of trueborn or warriors, making them wound on 3+ instead of 4+ for their splinter shots..

I am personally on the fence with the duke. Yeah he has all that nice CC stuff, but he needs to be deployed with Warriors or Trueborn who will(if played right) will NEVER get into CC. The silver lining here, is something I'm unsure about, does the Duke have to STAY with the squad to confer the 3+ poison, or just be deployed with them? If he doesn't have to stay with them, then I guess first turn you could just scoot him over to a wych squad, in which case yes...the Duke definitely found a place in my list.

I've just posted my first DE list since 3rd ed:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/468974.page

I'd be happy if you Dakkaites could give me some feedback please?

Unless you're not running any Warriors or Trueborn, then he can be run where you like.

But ultimately in my experience the best way to run Sliscus is with a squad of 20 Warriors with 2 Splinter Cannons. And this set up has gotten even better with 6th.

For 200pts you now get at full strength:
At Overwatch: 48 Poison (3+) Shots (Which should work out at 8 hits, 5-6 wounds.)
At 12" (Stationary): 48 Poison (3+) Shots (24 hits and 16 wounds.)
At 18" (Moved 6"): 44 Poison (3+) Shots (22 hits and 14-15 wounds.)
At 24" (Stationary): 30 Poison (3+) Shots (15 hits and 10 wounds.)
At 30" (Moved 6"): 28 Poison (3+) Shots (14 hits and 9-10 wounds.)

I'm gravitating towards the Trueborn accompanyment for Sliscus which is pretty common for him, Splinter Cannons and Shardcarbines all round, slapping some Haywire Grenades on the unit too so it can handle all comers.

The only problem is It ends up so expensive, and then I feel obligated to throw another 60+ points in to get them a guaranteed pain token and make them a bit tougher because they are so expensive, and suddenly a huge chunk of my army is this not particularly durable "deathstar" that isn't even scoring.

Which is why I've found the Warrior Blob most effective: Costs less, puts out more overall firepower, is just as durable but with more bodies and is scoring.

Ovion wrote:Unless you're not running any Warriors or Trueborn, then he can be run where you like.

But ultimately in my experience the best way to run Sliscus is with a squad of 20 Warriors with 2 Splinter Cannons. And this set up has gotten even better with 6th.

For 200pts you now get at full strength:
At Overwatch: 48 Poison (3+) Shots (Which should work out at 8 hits, 5-6 wounds.)
At 12" (Stationary): 48 Poison (3+) Shots (24 hits and 16 wounds.)
At 18" (Moved 6"): 44 Poison (3+) Shots (22 hits and 14-15 wounds.)
At 24" (Stationary): 30 Poison (3+) Shots (15 hits and 10 wounds.)
At 30" (Moved 6"): 28 Poison (3+) Shots (14 hits and 9-10 wounds.)

If somebody shoots at them they might as well be dead though...unless you throw duke in front and take the 2++ saves...and cover maybe...
but still a pretty weak blob...

Puscifer wrote:I'm using the Duke. He's just too good for 150 points. All of those goodies and only one downfall... 2 wounds.

the shadowfielded wound is the only one that matters


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reaper501 wrote:

CrimsonKing wrote:
But the Duke wounds on a 2+ (he has great options for combat drugs which can increase that number) and he IGNORES ARMOR on roll of a 5 or a 6. Against tough 4 models so does Lelith! So instead of just wounding 1 or 2 or wait maybe 3 times, I am more likely wounding 3 or 4 and possible 1 or 2 of those ignore armor, and the others my opponent has to roll for which could bring the total up higher. He also has a blast pistol, and a shadowfield (so better save), and he pimps my ride for a squad of trueborn or warriors, making them wound on 3+ instead of 4+ for their splinter shots..

I am personally on the fence with the duke. Yeah he has all that nice CC stuff, but he needs to be deployed with Warriors or Trueborn who will(if played right) will NEVER get into CC. The silver lining here, is something I'm unsure about, does the Duke have to STAY with the squad to confer the 3+ poison, or just be deployed with them? If he doesn't have to stay with them, then I guess first turn you could just scoot him over to a wych squad, in which case yes...the Duke definitely found a place in my list.

he must start the game with them, but then he can immidiately jump out and join a cc squad. The squad he is deployed with has 3+ posion forever, even if the duke dies.

Yeah he doesn't have to stay with them. So the way I have him fielded is with a small 5 man trueborn outside of the vehicles (2 with splinter cannons, and 3 with shard carbines) Have them a little further away from the front line. Turn one, have the trueborn jump in their venom, and have the duke jump into the Raider with the wyches. Give each a little bit more protection as quick as possible. Just have to be careful turn 1 if I don't go first.

I found out in a recent game that the craters left by exploding vehicles works really well with PGLs (giving a 4+ cover save) which helps protect the survivors from rapid fire and overwatch. Another thing I have been trying out is cheap succubi to boost wych squads. They are survivable 2+ look out sir. A succubus with a venom blade is as effective against T4 as 6.66 wyches on the charge (with haywire that's around 80pts). They are as effective as 8.39 wyches when not on the charge. Wyches of course benefit more from certain drug rolls (+1WS, +1A). Succubi also make the unit stay effective despite casualties. The other main advantage is when transports explode as the controlling player you get to allocate wounds. Succubi tend to suffer instant death against most things, so her extra wounds often get wasted, now you can allocate 1-2 wounds to the succubus in order to save a few wyches when their transport bites the dust. The other interesting mechanic is being able to save/transfer pain tokens from a unit that is almost dead.

Here is another battle report, this time against TAU if anyone is interested:

Battle Report 6

Does the PGL's always confer a +1 to cover save or only when being overwatched? I understood it to mean that you could use it when assaulting to give you a +1 to your cover save because that is when you are shooting the grendaes out of it anyways. If I am wrong that is a cool tidbit of info to remember for future gaming myself.

CrimsonKing wrote:Does the PGL's always confer a +1 to cover save or only when being overwatched? I understood it to mean that you could use it when assaulting to give you a +1 to your cover save because that is when you are shooting the grendaes out of it anyways. If I am wrong that is a cool tidbit of info to remember for future gaming myself.

It gives you defensive grenades which grant the Stealth USR (+1 to cover saves) against shooting within 8"

So as long as you're not assaulting from further than 8" you'll get the cover save bonus.

So that means even when being shot at by anyone within 8 inches. Very nice


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Oh yeah, I know I have posted it on here a few times about how cool I think he is, but I played a game last Friday and used The Duke for the first time in a long time ( the first time using him right), and can I just say that at the end of the game that he and the 2 wyches left in the squad had 4 pain tokens, and he did a bunch of the killing himself. HAnding out wounds like they were candy to kids on Halloween. The first fight he was I rolled two 5's and a 6, not to mention not a single 1, so he wounded a think 4 times (because he missed one of his hits).
He won all of his duels and kicked everyone's but.

Oh yeah I was playing Necrons at 1850. I tabled him.

I also brought a void Raven, and I like the str 9 guns on it. They get the job done. That and the mine I can use on a turn that otherwise I wouldn't really get to do anything. It was a great game.

CrimsonKing wrote:So that means even when being shot at by anyone within 8 inches. Very nice


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Oh yeah, I know I have posted it on here a few times about how cool I think he is, but I played a game last Friday and used The Duke for the first time in a long time ( the first time using him right), and can I just say that at the end of the game that he and the 2 wyches left in the squad had 4 pain tokens, and he did a bunch of the killing himself. HAnding out wounds like they were candy to kids on Halloween. The first fight he was I rolled two 5's and a 6, not to mention not a single 1, so he wounded a think 4 times (because he missed one of his hits).
He won all of his duels and kicked everyone's but.

Oh yeah I was playing Necrons at 1850. I tabled him.

I also brought a void Raven, and I like the str 9 guns on it. They get the job done. That and the mine I can use on a turn that otherwise I wouldn't really get to do anything. It was a great game.

This sounds a lot like the sort of list I am working on getting together at the moment, could you give a rundown of what the full army looked like?

My 1850 list is

The Baron
The Duke

Trueborn x5- splinter cannon x2, slpinter carbine x3
venom- ns, sc

wych x5- haywire grenades
venom- ns, sc
wych x5- haywire grenades
venom- ns, sc
wyches x9- haywire grenades, hydra guantlets, hekatrix,blast pistol, agoniser
raider- ns, ff, dl
warriors x10- blaster, sc
raider- ns, ff, dl, splinter racks

beastmasters x5
khymera x10
razorwing flocks x6

ravager- ns, ff, dl x3
ravager- ns, ff, disentegrator cannons x3
voidraven- ns, ff, shattershard missiles x2

That is pretty much my 1850 list. I had my trueborn and the duke out of the venom and parked close to the wych's raider so the duke could jump in that and the trueborn in their venom. I was able to completely cover them so my opponent couldn't see them.

I don't see varying to greathly from this list for my army. It really encompasses what I like in the codex. At more points I cna add things, and play around with different builds too, but I like this list.

After a brief period of more infantry armies my club seems to have switched back to their old habits of Massed Mech. Haywire wyches have been amazing at dealing with this, but what I think is overlooked is why venoms/disintigrator raiders work so well with them. The splinter cannon/disintigrator are great at peeling back any potential bubble wrap around the unit (infantry unit positioned in order to prevent you form charging a tank). They often kill enough so your wyches can engage the target vehicle with their haywire grenades.

If any one is interested, here is a battle report against a mechanised space wolves army where this happened:

Battle report 7

Dude you have some pretty epic games. The first two rounds I'm thinking you are done for; you pull it out of your ass everytime. Love the Battle Reports, and how gutsy you are with your models. 3 vindicators would have had me gaking myself, and calling the other player a cheap whore (sorry for the language).

Huh, ass isn't a bad word in this forum; interesting

CrimsonKing wrote:


Huh, ass isn't a bad word in this forum; interesting

Why should it be? Donkeys are people too.

So I was playing my first game in the month of August yesterday, and I was pondering. I like my new 5 man haywyches but man, I wish they could kill gak that didn't have an armor value. I'm one of those folk who looks at the new rules and just really baulks at how the wyches got nailed.

Then an epiphany hit me as I idly fed cheap warrior squads into the enemy's guns to soak up overwatch for my Wracks. What happened was, thanks to some excellent rolling balancing out some poor rolling, a 5 man warrior squad ended up in combat while the Wrack's charge failed and they killed near half of a tactical squad on their own before the Wracks came in and watched the Warriors finish that squad off before their initiative step.

Now, my grand plan isn't to charge the enemy with warrior squads and expect tremendous dice rolls.

But rather, I was inspired by how well that cheap squad performed despite the fact that I didn't give a damn if it died or not. So I began to think, what if I just kept my wyches so cheap that I didn't give a damn if they got wiped by overwatch or not? Two possible ways to do this come to mind. 5 man wych squad with haywires and a hekatrix with a venom blade, or 5 man wyches with haywires and one using razorflails.

Math-hammered out (and neglecting to incorporate combat drugs) the razorflails will do 1.5 wounds.

The Hekatrix with a venom blade will do 1.66~ without poison weapon rerolls.

Obviously, the hekatrix will perform better and can challenge, and can get those oh so juicy poison weapon rerolls. However, challenges work both ways and it is of course the more expensive option.

Either way, it's squad that costs well under 100 points and can probably do... some very nasty things. I'd probably include them in a Duke Sliscus list for maximum efficiency.

Something like

Duke
20 man warrior blob
(4x) 5 man wyches as above
(2x) 6 man Reaver squads
(2-3x) Ravagers
Possibly a flier.

I could probably fit more at 1500 points, but I'm just theorycrafting at the moment.

CrimsonKing wrote:
Dude you have some pretty epic games. The first two rounds I'm thinking you are done for; you pull it out of your ass everytime. Love the Battle Reports, and how gutsy you are with your models. 3 vindicators would have had me gaking myself, and calling the other player a cheap whore (sorry for the language).

Yeah so far the games have been pretty intense. I was gaking myself! I was saying to myself: why don't I have lances so I can sit back and shoot. In hind sight I'm really glad I didn't have any because I that would have lost me the game. Not having them forced to play aggressively. I find with DE you really need to go for the jugular. I think it was Dashofpepper who once said "Every additional model and expenditure of points that you put into something that is not created, honed, and visualized to kill something is a waste of points".

 Lokas wrote:
Two possible ways to do this come to mind. 5 man wych squad with haywires and a hekatrix with a venom blade, or 5 man wyches with haywires and one using razorflails.

I would go for the hekatrix/venom blade, for five points more you get more leadership, extra attack a better weapon and more importantly "look out sir" to help make sure the venom blade is the last model you lose.

Mushkilla wrote:

CrimsonKing wrote:
Dude you have some pretty epic games. The first two rounds I'm thinking you are done for; you pull it out of your ass everytime. Love the Battle Reports, and how gutsy you are with your models. 3 vindicators would have had me gaking myself, and calling the other player a cheap whore (sorry for the language).

Yeah so far the games have been pretty intense. I was gaking myself! I was saying to myself: why don't I have lances so I can sit back and shoot. In hind sight I'm really glad I didn't have any because I that would have lost me the game. Not having them forced to play aggressively. I find with DE you really need to go for the jugular. I think it was Dashofpepper who once said "Every additional model and expenditure of points that you put into something that is not created, honed, and visualized to kill something is a waste of points".
.

I agree with you. About 85% of my list is doing exactly what I want it to do, but I usually have one unit that just really doesn't pull it's weight. I think DE in general (just from being so glass hammer), you really have to have a purpose. Know what your units are going to do, and they need to do them. You can't have just have them sitting around waiting. They don't necessarily have to be destroying huge swathes of your opponent's army every turn but putting pressure on your opponent and making them play your way and not what they had strategized.

You did a really good job against your opponent. I think going into that battle he thought he had you because he brought (in my opinion) a dick list, and you TABLED him. Not just beat him, but tabled him. You got all the objectives, and he had zilch.

The problem I run into with my dark eldar reavers is at 1850 there is a lot of stuff on the board so it is hard to have your bikes turbo boost and be somewhere where someone isn't going to assault you the next turn, and I would like to get more than one movement out of my squad.

Alright, playing a game today gents.

This is the list I'll be using.

Duke Sliscus

Warriors x20 w/ Splinter Cannons

(2x) 5 Wyches w/ Haywires and a Razorflail mounted in a Venom w/ extra splinter cannon and Night Shields

(2x) 5 Wyches w/ Haywires and a Hekatrix w/ Venom Blade mounted in a Venom w/ extra splinter cannon and Night Shields

(2x) Reaver Jetbikes w/ Heat Lances and a Cluster Caltrop

(2x) Ravagers w/ Dark Lances

I haven't decided if I'll be rolling for strategic or command warlord traits yet. I decided to go with the 2 of each Wych squad to see how well they perform on the tabletop. Also because I have to models with razorflails built, and two hekatrixes built.

My opponent will be using his hybrid guard list, so if it's anything like last time it'll be a pair of 20 man shooting blobs, a pair of veterans in chimera and some Leman Russ backup. Maybe some outflanking sentinels, maybe some heavy weapon squads. We'll see when we get there. I'm looking forward to playing this guy, he's both a good friend and always an excellent challenge. I'll give you my post-game thoughts when I get back.

Just started to dive into the DARK side of the Eldar race. Have been a craftworld player for some time and have now embraced my darker side. I have found that the synergy that Eldar and Dark Eldar bring to the table is phenomenal. I have recently won my first tournament with my allied list of the 2.

Really enjoying the Dark little guys! Will keep lurking on this thread to continue to learn more!

I've been having trouble getting consistent feedback on my hopeful 1500pt list. Some say its great, others that it lacks focus, some bodies, others AT.


Archon - 115pts.
-Power Lance, Drugs, Shadow Field

9x Harlequins - 224pts.
- 8x Kisses, ShadowSeer

Warriors (10) - 180pts.
-Splinter cannon, Raider w. Night shields, Splinter Racks
Warriors (10 - 180pts.
-Splinter Cannon, Raider w. Night Shields, Splinter Racks

Wytches (5) - 125pts.
-Venom w. Dual SC, Haywire Grenades
Wytches (5) - 125pts.
-Venom w. Dual SC, Haywire Grenades

Reavers (6) - 156pts.
-2x Heat Lances

2x Ravagers - 230pts, (3DLs) + Night Shields
Razorwing w, Flicker Fields and Splinter Cannons, DLs - 165pts.

1500


Right now i'm looking at: 10 dark lances (all from vehicles), 2 squads with haywire, 2 heatlances and a metric ton of splinter fire. THe overall goal was to hang back and attempt to outshoot, using my wytches as flanking forces while the Archon and his harlequin pets protected the more vulnerable Ravagers + Raiders. I'm wondering though if this is still a solid idea. I'm planning on using the list in serious tournament play, and other than adding 6 reavers, i have no idea where to take this above 1500pts.

How do people feel about 3x 3 Trueborn with 2x Dark Lances ---- transport or no? I think the squad would be pretty easy to hide in ruins or in a building. plus they're cheap at 86pts a pop and throw in more non vehicle dark light weapons.

Could this list do well at tournaments?

I really like your list a lot. If you shrink that list down to about 750 pts that is exactly what I take for my eldar/dark eldar allies force. The other half is comprised of eldrad, 10 rangers, 10 guardians plus Missile launcher, 3 war walkers with scatter lasers, and an aegis defense line. I force a shoot out. And it has done well. With winning lists comprising of cheesy necron builds,they didn't give it much trouble. It has enough fire power to shred them if they try and come close and outrange them from afar.

thelordcal wrote:
I've been having trouble getting consistent feedback on my hopeful 1500pt list. Some say its great, others that it lacks focus, some bodies, others AT.


Archon - 115pts.
-Power Lance, Drugs, Shadow Field

9x Harlequins - 224pts.
- 8x Kisses, ShadowSeer

Warriors (10) - 180pts.
-Splinter cannon, Raider w. Night shields, Splinter Racks
Warriors (10 - 180pts.
-Splinter Cannon, Raider w. Night Shields, Splinter Racks

Wytches (5) - 125pts.
-Venom w. Dual SC, Haywire Grenades
Wytches (5) - 125pts.
-Venom w. Dual SC, Haywire Grenades

Reavers (6) - 156pts.
-2x Heat Lances

2x Ravagers - 230pts, (3DLs) + Night Shields
Razorwing w, Flicker Fields and Splinter Cannons, DLs - 165pts.

1500


Right now i'm looking at: 10 dark lances (all from vehicles), 2 squads with haywire, 2 heatlances and a metric ton of splinter fire. THe overall goal was to hang back and attempt to outshoot, using my wytches as flanking forces while the Archon and his harlequin pets protected the more vulnerable Ravagers + Raiders. I'm wondering though if this is still a solid idea. I'm planning on using the list in serious tournament play, and other than adding 6 reavers, i have no idea where to take this above 1500pts.

How do people feel about 3x 3 Trueborn with 2x Dark Lances ---- transport or no? I think the squad would be pretty easy to hide in ruins or in a building. plus they're cheap at 86pts a pop and throw in more non vehicle dark light weapons.

Could this list do well at tournaments?

I like your list overall. The only things I would think about changing would be, 1st the Harlequins. Don't get me wrong, I love Harlequins. But in a Dark Eldar army I don't believe they are as good as if you had Eldar for Allies, or were playing just Eldar. The reason being Doom. Harlies with kisses need Doom to really take advantage of the 6's for rending to just completely wipe a squad out before they get a chance to roll and take a few of you out. Fortune also helps to keep them alive. You a using them correctly (counter charge unit). But I think if you made them a squad of incubi, and give the archon a PGL that they will be a little bit more durable overall, and that they will pack a nasty punch to everything short of armor 2.

Your Razorwing is a good anit infantry unit, but maybe you might want to switch that out for a Void Raven. A little bit more anti armor, and maybe add two shattershard missiles. Besides that I think keep the list the way it is.

Personally not a big spammer, so 3 squads of trueborn with 2 dl's each doesn't appeal to me. As for tournaments, it depends on your area and how others game where you live.

@thelordcal

How about dropping FF and splinter cannon on Razorwing? It will take a lot of BS1 shooting to even hit that thing, if it gets shot down after 3 or 4 units worth of shooting, then it still has done a great job at drawing enemy's fire for an entire turn. Our flyers can only fire 4 weapons a turn now, so having the splinter cannon is hardly gonna see much use, unless you're firing 1 missile each turn... Which would be a waste, because of the zooming movements, forced reserve, etc, you're looking at about 3 turns of shootings in 5 turns, average, so you might as well empty all your missiles asap and just AI with dissie + twin-linked splinter rifle for the remaining of the game, and put that 20pts elsewhere... Like, giving archon his agoniser, I haven't much love for power lance personally, S4(S5 on 1/6 chance) AP3 on the turn you charged, then S3 AP4 for the rest of the combat, don't forget marines with ATSKNF or any army with fearless is immune to our sweeping advances. Or replace reavers' heat lances with blasters.

Sniperborns are all dependant on game type, table size and terrains, if you field them with a venom with standard loadout: stationary, 36" 12 poisoned shots 2 darklight shots at full BS, or (up to)48" 12 poisoned shots at full BS and 2 darklight shots at BS1... If you're lucky, the BS1 48" darklance might hit and that'd make them a bit better than the standard blasterborn setup on 1st turn! But personally, I'd much prefer playing a mobile DE army than a gun line one.

I think your list is a bit light on the AT side at 1500pt, but I'm no veteran player, so take my word with a pinch of salt or however the saying goes.

Here's what i'm thinking:

Archon - 105pts.
-Shadow Field, Blaster

True Born (3) - 146
-3x Blaster, Venom w. Dual SC
True Born (3) - 146
-3x Blaster, Venom w. Dual SC

Warrior Squad (10) - 170
-Splinter Cannon, Raider w. Racks
Warrior Squad (10) - 170
--Splinter Cannon, Raider w. Racks
Warrior Squad (5) - 125.
-Blaster, Venom w. Dual SC
Warrior Squad (5) - 125
-Blaster, Venom w. Dual SC

Reaver (6) - 156
-2x Heat Lances

Ravager 3 DLs, - XXX
Ravager 3 DLs, - XXX
Void Raven - XXX

1498pts. Now that's a lot of shooting!

Blasters - 9
Dark Lances - 8
Splinter Cannons - 10
Heat Lances - 2

And an Anti Flyer!

Yes i know the archon is expensive, but is far more survivable than a Haem and what's not to love about a BS 7 blaster? I'm a little nervous not having any dedicated CC elements, it'll be like playing wood elves in 6th edition fantasy!!! I also squeezed every ablative wound and all of the night shield to make enough room for the Void Raven. I guess i could drop the Archon to Haemy with Hexrifle and save 40pts to throw night shields back onto the Raiders + Ravagers. But i'm kinda interested to see how well the Archon does. Plus what would a bunch of warriors be doing wilth those eldar of ill repute

The Flickerfield on the Razorwing is pretty much the best upgrade to buy.

While every other flyer needs to restrict itself to snapshots to jink, it just goes 'haha' and takes its 5+ invun. It makes at great agaisnt other flyers.

Dropping the Splinter Cannon is a good plan though.
I also prefer my Razorwing Lancey to disintegrator-y.

@Ovion

Oh true, my bad, I was thinking too much in my own gaming environment: I'm the only one with flyers.. haha

@thelordcal

I believe the standard competitive DE list is very shooty, our shooting side is waaaay better than our assault side in 6th ed, and don't forget we're still more mobile than the other armies.

So this is a little late, but I've been busy building a new gaming rig so neener neener.

First; Holy crap Nightfighting makes Dark Eldar invincible. Not really, but the massed firepower of over 1300 points of Guard failed to scratch the paint on Sliscus's codpiece during the first turn.

Two; 5 man wych squads... are actually phenomenal. They're cheap enough to throw away, and potent enough that they can put the hurt on squads that have been weakened by vehicle explosions/splinter fire/a stray fart. 5 man Wych squads claimed the lives of two weakened plasmavets squad, and a 13 man blob. 5 Wyches wiped the latter with splinter pistol fire and two rounds of assault and went on to hunker down on an objective. Good stuff. Should also be noted that I lost two out of the four of the squads I came with, and the remainders were far from unscathed.

Three; It's really easy to surround chimeras with the rerollable 2d6 charge and full coherency. Still takes 2 squads of Wyches to totally box in a squad and auto-destroy them, but the enemy's warlord died this way fairly early in the game.

I'm definitely going to go with the Hekatrix with a venom blade. She can handle most characters in close combat save the true beatstick ICs.

I'm definitely adding this to my repertoire. It's different enough from my Sathonyx list to keep me interested, and distracted from actually painting the models I build.

I managed to get in a bigger game against a necron tesla/flyer list. It was really tough, tesla is brutal on overwatch and isn't nice to wyches. That being said the reavers mobility is fantastic for contesting objectives and avoiding strafing runs.

Here is the report if anyone is interested:

The Black Buzzards VS Necron Teslatastic - 1500pts

I like the hextrix but think the HQ choices are just too valueable.
I am now fully converted to the "love the baron" bandwagon now that I simply play him with a converted jetbike model.(it has a skyboard on it too) Him and bike are crazy good.

I was on the baronwagon before he was popular... [/hipster]

The Baron is pretty good with just about any unit he's attached to. He brings a lot of usefulness with a small price tag.

ThePhish wrote:
The Baron is pretty good with just about any unit he's attached to. He brings a lot of usefulness with a small price tag.

there really is so much there. The PGL, stealth, Shadowfield, Hit and run(rerollable), Str6 in combat, +1 to go first.

I thought you could only reroll the hit and run with Hellion units?

 Lokas wrote:
I thought you could only reroll the hit and run with Hellion units?

not how I was reading the rules but maybe.

The wording is a bit ambiguous, hit and run reroll is granted by "Master of the Skies", if you consider the whole section to mean "These effects only apply when Baron is with an unit of Hellions" then Lokas is right, if you treat the two sentences as separate, then Exergy is right, since a model with Hit and Run will grant the entire unit that USR.

Well, here's how interpret it.

Baron Sathonyx can make the rerolls to hit and run and dangerous terrain tests if he was a single model unit, as the rule says "Baron Sathonyx and any unit of Hellios he joins..."

It doesn't say he has to be with a unit of hellions to take advantage of his rule.

However, the initiative test and distance roll for hit and run are taken per unit, not per model. "A unit that contains at least on model with this special rule... If the unit wishes to do so, it must take an initiative test."

So it's the unit making the test, not the Baron. The unit, if it is not hellions, does not get the rerolls.

However, as Dangerous Terrain is done on a model-by-model basis, you'd be able to reroll Baron's dangerous terrain rolls but not his unit's. If they aren't Hellions.

Aye, sorry, that was what I meant as well, Baron gets those effects, or when he's with a blob of Hellions. And that's how I read the rules too, feel a bit cheesy to say the hit and run part is separate.

I felt the same way about Lelith's "penetrating blade" granting ignore armour to her grenades as well...

Played an 1850 point game yesterday. It was a blast; I tabled him. But I brought a ancient haemoculus and a regular haemonculus with some grotesque (and they still have it). I had 3 liquefier guns in it, and 2 venom blades, and the upgrade grotesque had scissor hands, oh and the ancient haemo had a casket of flensing that I for got to use. They are a good clean up and tarpit group.

I also brought 6 reaver jetbikes (2 heat lances, and a cluster caltrop); they worked very well for me also. I used them the way I wanted to, and just had them zipping around and blade vaning everything I could. They just shot one squad and were going to assault but the squad ran off the table so that didn't happen. Also brought a 20 man squad of warriors with a blaster (just in case) and 2 splinter cannons (the Duke started with them, so they had 3+ poison shots). They just camped on the objective and shot everything within 36 inches of them. The Duke was kicking butt and taking names too; I rolled a 1 and a 5 for combat drugs so obviously I went with the 3d6 for running. Just kidding the extra attack is the one I took, so first challenge he had, he hit 6 times and wounded 6 times with 4 dice being a 5 or 6. Needless to say the wolf guard died very violently. Oh and I went the route of giving all my hekatrixes venom blades and they worked really well. Just more wounds.

I also tried a talos again. It stayed alive and did some damage on its own too. I had enough of other higher priority targets that he was left alone.

Really happy with the list, and the friend I played against (who is my regular weekly opponent) said that it was probably one of the best list I had put together. It had everything that a well balanced list needed. It could take on everything reasonably well.

I've said it before but I love the changes in 6th edition, and the Dark Eldar are just fine.

Regardless of Sathy's rerolls, he's still our best HQ by a big margin.

Speaking of, after the great success of my wyches in my last game, I decided to bring this wisdom over to my other list.

Baron

(2x) 5 Wyches w/ Haywires and a Razorflail mounted in a Venom w/ extra Splinter Cannon

(2x) 5 Wyches w/ Haywires and a Hekatrix w/ a Venom Blade mounted in a Venom w/ Extra Splinter Cannon

(2x) 6 Reaver Jetbikers, 2 heat lances, 1 cluster caltrop

Beast Pack, 3 Beastmasters, 4 Razorwing Flocks, 5 Khymerae

(3x) Ravager w/ Dark Lances

Total is 1478, gives me the proper wiggle room when I build two more Hekatrixes with venom blades. Got a game in with this list today thanks to class letting out early. It was against my good old guard buddy. I lost this round due to a few poor decisions, forgetting to pre-measure a couple times, and as always, uncooperative dice. Either way, it was a close victory thanks to secondary objectives (I snagged all three and he only managed linebreaker) and we came close to tabling each other. He had a primary objective held by a commanding officer with only one arm and a missing command squad, and fourteen plucky guardsmen. I had three reavers and an immobilized ravager with a single hull point and a missing dark lance.

It was a brutal beat down shoot 'em up, and a lot of fun. I think this may become my main list, despite the fact that I lost, it did exactly what I wanted it to, and really suits my playstyle. I think I may have just nailed the holy grail my friends.

Interesting list, not as experienced a DE here, so a few questions:

1) How well do those HWG wyches perform? Are they any good in AI combat? I'm only fielding one HWG wyches unit at 8-10 size, while they're still amazing at AT, I'd rather to have the option to AI decently, also at 8 wyches, I could almost guarantee 4HP off any vehicle they assault, even if they get WS1!

2) I'm still trying to decide on how to run a beast pack, is 5 khymerae enough at 1500pt? I'm thinking to run a pack of 10 with 4 razorwing flocks, is that a bit of an overkill?

3) A non-list related question... I want to build a grotesque unit(of 4), seeing the rumoured release list saying we'll get grotesque squad next year, would my fellow DE advise me to wait...?

And, no doubt, Baron is the best! I just like him for the +1 initiative...

They're not the end-all-be-all, but they pull their weight. In my last game, the wyches w/ a hekatrix killed three times their number in guardsmen. It's a matter of knowing what they can and can't kill, and if they can't kill it on their own, bolster them with another wych squad or a reaver squad, or the beaststar. They also tend to take less damage from overwatch due to the fact that there are fewer bodies per unit, but more units. Overwatch can only be done once per turn after all, so if you put some hurt on the first squad charging in, the second comes in unscathed.

5 Khymerae is plenty. You don't need more if you put the Baron in front. Make sure he's the closest model to whatever is threatening you, and then use LoS! to allocate the wounds wherever you want them. Battlecannon throwing down a half dozen instant-death wounds? Well, Baron will probably eat one with his shadow field, and the Khymerae can soak up the rest on their invulns. That punisher put down a dozen low strength shots? LoS! them onto the Razorwings, taking advantage of their high number of wounds to tank damage without losing efficiency. It hasn't been completely destroyed in a game yet, and Sathy has only lost his Shadowfield once and has yet to die for me.

I would suggest converting your own, if you're confident in your modeling skills. The finecast model is terrible and I don't have high hopes for the upcoming models considering the precedent. If you're not so confident with your green stuff skills, then patience and hope are your best bet.

And if you think he's only good for the +1 iniative, you haven't had him outflank a unit of Reaver Jetbikes, or entertained the idea of a Khymerae throwing an assault grenade in the shooting phase. Which, yes, you can do that. The whole squad counts as being armed with grenades, including the meat-puppies. There's no real gameplay situation where this would be useful, but it is hilarious.

... Welp, time to rethink my list then.. !

And, nah, my green stuff skill is so good, last time I tried to convert my own baron model, I ended up just building a normal hellion and then writing "DIS BARON!" on the base... So, I'll just wait and pray, I guess...

Also, haha... Then again, they do have those weird arm things on their back!

Baronyu wrote:


3) A non-list related question... I want to build a grotesque unit(of 4), seeing the rumoured release list saying we'll get grotesque squad next year, would my fellow DE advise me to wait...?

I converted up 8 grots from rat ogres and left overs from the Talos. It was easy and cheap and required minimal green stuff. I would convert your own. It is unlikely that the new grots will be cheap or very good. If they are, you can always add another squad.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/436789.page

Oh wow, they look amazing! Do you get a lot of spare coven-y bits from a box of Talos then?

Baronyu wrote:
Oh wow, they look amazing! Do you get a lot of spare coven-y bits from a box of Talos then?

yup, 8 rat ogres from ebay, leftovers from the talos and some random things from my bits box.



o, terminator bases from AoBR(you can get them wherever)

Good looking grotesques... I have also seen fantastic looking grotesques made by combining the bits in a talos/cronos kit with the new vampire counts monstrous infantry kit.

Lokas thanks for your continued input in this thread. It's really helping me advance my list building even with having so little free time these days.

But I don't always agree.. I love being wrong as it makes the game a more varied experience for me, but here are some things I need convincing on. I'd love it if you could give me your sales pitch on them.

#1. Ravagers. I understand the nightfight/night vision change helps them quite a bit. But they are directly competing with similar weapons platforms with measurably increased survivabilty (the flyers). Is their presence on the first turn of the games with nightfight worth it? Do you reserve them if it isn't nightfight on turn 1? Do you roll on strategic traits for more chances of nightfight?

#2. Baron. I get it, reroll first turn, stealth, hit and run, semi tanky with shadow field. An he is in a slot that isn't really dark eldar's strength. But I guess I'm just not interested in any of the units he typically joins, hellions, beastmasters and jetbikes. And if he is joining an infantry unit, isn't duke sliscus just going to be all around better? He has a decent chance of giving the unit he joins feel no pain, the 3+ poison, good drugs for our mostly wych troops and for our exceedingly useful jetbikes.

To add to the discussion, I'd like to just stress the strengths of hay wyches in venoms, reavers, and both flyers. I've been hit and miss with my grot-star and Harlie-star, but incredibly mobile MSU shooty has been really working well.

Also, across all codecies, increasing my percentage spent on functional scoring units, and diversifying the types of shooting attacks I have, and the amount of heavy and fast attack I field has improved my game in 6th.

Exergy wrote:

Baronyu wrote:


3) A non-list related question... I want to build a grotesque unit(of 4), seeing the rumoured release list saying we'll get grotesque squad next year, would my fellow DE advise me to wait...?

I converted up 8 grots from rat ogres and left overs from the Talos. It was easy and cheap and required minimal green stuff. I would convert your own. It is unlikely that the new grots will be cheap or very good. If they are, you can always add another squad.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/436789.page

There's lots of ways to convert up Grotesques.

Island of Blood Rat Ogres are popular.
I've used Wood Elf Dryads (bulked out a little GS).
You also have several options in the Beastmen range, then those newish Vampire Counts beasties. Several Ogre Kingdoms models (the base Ogres are fairly good. I intend to make some Urien-Boosted Grotesques out of these).

A lot of Fantasy models in the end, and that's before looking at alternate model ranges.

Ork Warbosses from AOBR for most of mine.

IOB rat ogres work great.

I've even seen some converted from yehtees and ogryn.

 Shep wrote:
Good looking grotesques... I have also seen fantastic looking grotesques made by combining the bits in a talos/cronos kit with the new vampire counts monstrous infantry kit.

Lokas thanks for your continued input in this thread. It's really helping me advance my list building even with having so little free time these days.

But I don't always agree.. I love being wrong as it makes the game a more varied experience for me, but here are some things I need convincing on. I'd love it if you could give me your sales pitch on them.

#1. Ravagers. I understand the nightfight/night vision change helps them quite a bit. But they are directly competing with similar weapons platforms with measurably increased survivabilty (the flyers). Is their presence on the first turn of the games with nightfight worth it? Do you reserve them if it isn't nightfight on turn 1? Do you roll on strategic traits for more chances of nightfight?

#2. Baron. I get it, reroll first turn, stealth, hit and run, semi tanky with shadow field. An he is in a slot that isn't really dark eldar's strength. But I guess I'm just not interested in any of the units he typically joins, hellions, beastmasters and jetbikes. And if he is joining an infantry unit, isn't duke sliscus just going to be all around better? He has a decent chance of giving the unit he joins feel no pain, the 3+ poison, good drugs for our mostly wych troops and for our exceedingly useful jetbikes.

To add to the discussion, I'd like to just stress the strengths of hay wyches in venoms, reavers, and both flyers. I've been hit and miss with my grot-star and Harlie-star, but incredibly mobile MSU shooty has been really working well.

Also, across all codecies, increasing my percentage spent on functional scoring units, and diversifying the types of shooting attacks I have, and the amount of heavy and fast attack I field has improved my game in 6th.

Always happy to help. I wish I had the time to write up proper battle reports and really go in depth with what my games and what I've been tinkering with, but unfortunately with the fall semester starting up, I've been doing a precarious balancing act of wargaming, video-gaming, and schoolwork.

As for your points. I'm actually not going to disagree with any of them, at least not outright. Voidravens and Razorwings are both potent assets. Ones that I've experimented with and have never found disappointing, provided I don't attempt to do silly things with them such as firing shatterfields at vehicles. That being said, the way I build my lists is with a heavy first-turn alpha-strike in mind. You'll notice that I don't include a lot of short range weaponry, most of my firepower in both of my 'main' lists comes in the form of splinter cannons and dark lances. I do this because I'm a very aggressive player and I prefer to shut down as much of my opponent's army as possible on the first turn, this is the way I play and it has worked best for me. Ravagers are key to this strategy, as they give me an incredibly cost-effective source of first turn anti-tank fire.

However.

My way is not the only way to play. I expect I'll be changing this philosophy when a proper Voidraven kit is released. Mushkilla's battle reports in particular have cemented my belief that Dark Eldar can play well even without their alpha-strike in sixth. There is a lot of potential for lists with fliers as our heavy support, and I plan on tapping into it in-depth when I have the opportunity. It will mean a different playstyle, one that focuses on using our speed to acquire good hiding spots and cover on the first turn as opposed to finding the best firing position on my side of the board and unleashing hell.

As for specifically how I use my Ravagers. Most of my games, they start on the board. There is a very specific set of circumstances that have to be in place for me to hold them in reserve. If I don't have the first turn, it is not night fight, my opponent has sufficient firepower and line of sight and/or mobility to acquire line of sight to threaten my Ravagers and the terrain is too thin that I don't feel like I can get cover for all three of them. I have yet to play a game where I've kept them off the board. I have played games where it wasn't night fight and I didn't have the first turn, but there was sufficient terrain to keep the big guns safe. Venoms don't hog up a lot of real-estate thanks to their small frames, so I can often get cover or LoS blockage for my entire army. Ravagers aren't as survivable as the aircraft, by a fair margin, but they are 40 points cheaper as well. If they only survive to turn 2 or 3, they've usually made their points back by popping light transports, AV 10-11. I try to avoid firing them at AV 12, as strength 8 versus AV 12 is not very efficient, so I save the battle tanks and such for my HWG wyches who don't give a damn about AV, or my heat lances. Besides, crippling my opponent's mobility on the first turn is usually more damning than crippling their firepower. I've won more games because troops couldn't make it to objectives in time, or lost their transport and withered under a hail of splinter cannon shots than I've won games because their big guns were disabled.

Secondly, on the baron... No, you're totally right. Sliscus would be much more useful if you're not taking any of the units that Baron runs with. I've seen people take him as a 100~ point tax to make their army legal, but he never does anything in those games. It's a huge waste of his potential and those sorts of lists would often be better suited by alternative choices. Sliscus makes Warrior blobs absolutely terrifying, as they can advance for 1-2 turns with splinter cannons firing at full capacity, along with any rifles in range. He makes MSU wych squads and Reaver squads a considerable CC threat. He allows your vehicles to deep strike, which can be exceptionally useful for acquiring good firing positions. I'm debating taking advantage of this by adding a pair of the old fashioned MSU warrior squads from 5th in my Sliscus list, and deep-striking them in either Venoms or Raiders. Raiders would put 2 dark lance shots wherever I damn well please, but venoms are cheaper, smaller, less likely to mishap and a good anti-infantry threat.

And Dark Eldar scoring units are beastly. I love our troops selection. I used to max out at 6 troops at 1500 points, just because they were good and did exactly what I wanted them to do. I never feel bad about spending the majority of my points on our footsloggers, they're damned good.

 Shep wrote:
I have also seen fantastic looking grotesques made by combining the bits in a talos/cronos kit with the new vampire counts monstrous infantry kit.

Have a link to these? I can't seem to find anything.

ThePhish wrote:

 Shep wrote:
I have also seen fantastic looking grotesques made by combining the bits in a talos/cronos kit with the new vampire counts monstrous infantry kit.

Have a link to these? I can't seem to find anything.

Probably these

I plan on using Legion of Everblight Warspears for my Grotesques (when I get around to converting them, along with all my other projects)

Put some extra talos/chronos masks on, give 'em some lumps and tumors on their backs with more talos/chronos bits for vials and protruding bones and gak. Some DE looking weapons from various kits, and bam. Some wicked Grotesques.

 Lokas wrote:
I plan on using Legion of Everblight Warspears for my Grotesques (when I get around to converting them, along with all my other projects)

Put some extra talos/chronos masks on, give 'em some lumps and tumors on their backs with more talos/chronos bits for vials and protruding bones and gak. Some DE looking weapons from various kits, and bam. Some wicked Grotesques.

This is what I am doing, going to run ten with Urien for fun. FYI that kit is absolutely amazing, each model is individually packed in i9ts one bubble pocket pre-cleaned with all its components and they fit perfect. It was my first PP kit and I have to admit I was blown away at the time and care put into their product compared to GW. If you haven't bought yours yet look on ebay stores, you can buy it now them with combined shipping and save big. http://eyeoferror.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/dark-eldar-grotesque-conversions.html this is where I got the idea originally.

Oh geez, so many choices...

Are those everblight warspears the right size for grotesque though? They look to be more wrack size...

 Lokas wrote:
Overwatch can only be done once per turn after all

This came up in a game I had and I couldn't find the rule that says how often you can overwatch. (I was the one overwatching, ironically.) Can you point me?

 Foo wrote:

 Lokas wrote:
Overwatch can only be done once per turn after all

This came up in a game I had and I couldn't find the rule that says how often you can overwatch. (I was the one overwatching, ironically.) Can you point me?

EDIT: Scrap this, went slowed.

In bold in the Overwatch Restrictions paragraph.

Baronyu wrote:
Oh geez, so many choices...

Are those everblight warspears the right size for grotesque though? They look to be more wrack size...

Scroll down on the link above http://eyeoferror.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/dark-eldar-grotesque-conversions.html . There's a size comparison. They are ~1.5 times the size of a wrack.

ThePhish wrote:

Baronyu wrote:
Oh geez, so many choices...

Are those everblight warspears the right size for grotesque though? They look to be more wrack size...

Scroll down on the link above http://eyeoferror.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/dark-eldar-grotesque-conversions.html . There's a size comparison. They are ~1.5 times the size of a wrack.

I saw, but aren't they still a bit less bulky than normal grotesque?

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Foo wrote:

 Lokas wrote:
Overwatch can only be done once per turn after all

This came up in a game I had and I couldn't find the rule that says how often you can overwatch. (I was the one overwatching, ironically.) Can you point me?

EDIT: Scrap this, went slowed.

In bold in the Overwatch Restrictions paragraph.

Thanks. Amazing the things you don't see when in the middle of a game!

I've personally been wrestling with taking an HQ that fits in with an "all" shooting army. Currently i'm just taking an Archon w. Shadow Field and Blaster to ride with my blaster born, but i've been contemplating:

Haemy - 75
-LG, Hex Rifle

Chilling with:

Wracks (5) - 85pts.
-LG, Apoth w. Hex Rifle


Maybe slapping a raider on em, they won't ride in it, but its another way to get another Dark Lance in the List, plus could easily use it to help screen troop carrying vehicles. The main idea would be for the squad to camp back court objectives (i know very un DE) providing decent 36" fire support and having access to decent charge deterrence via 2 LG. Plus they help clear out my back court of Deep Strikers.

Thoughts?

I've prepared a list with Lady malys in, but I never see her mentioned by people in this thread. Is the Duke really that better?

Lady Malys is kinda middle of nowhere:

Her CC ability isn't stellar for that cost, it's just a power weapon(AP3) that gives you +2 attacks, no drugs and striking at S3(4 with FC). Her psychic immunity only applies to her unit, although it's great, your enemy could just easily nuke the rest of your army with psychic instead. Her redeployment shenanigan happens before steal the initiative, so the only use for that is when you got 1st deployment, and decide to mess with your opponent's counter-deployment. And she only has a 4++ save.

At only 20 more points, Duke can bring a special weapons that can ignore armour on 5+ but otherwise works like a venom blade, 2 drugs roll(quite a nice boost for wych cult units), deep strike for our vehicles, a boost to 1 of our kabalites and a 2++ save.

So personally, I see Malys as more of a shenanigan character, I'd bring her for fun, but I wouldn't bring her if I'm going competitive(which I won't ever).

Just IMO though, not at all representing every DE out there!

I have found trying to get objectives in area terrain (or at least get a raider wreckage on an objective) really helps when it comes to scoring.

I had another 1500 point game if anyone is interested:

The Black Buzzards VS GK Razorspam - 1500pts

That's pretty much my thoughts on the good Lady. You save 20 points, but you lose the 2++, a blast pistol, free deep strike, 3+ poison, 2d6 drug rolls and poisoned weapons that are effectively rending on a 5+.

You do gain a better base statline, but not enough to make a difference aside from the extra wound. The extra ballistic skill is useless as she has no firearm, both the duke and the lady hit on a 3+ and neither have a high enough WS to make MEQ hit on a 5+, though Malys does have enough to make GEQ hit on a 5+. She also has 3 more attacks than the duke, but at strength and AP 3.

Baronyu also explained why her redeployment ability is pretty situational, and only useful when you have the first turn.

Her psychic immunity is her one high point, but it begs the question of where to put it? If you put her with a wych or CC unit, your opponent can just make them evaporate from gunfire without needing psychic powers. If you put it with a warrior blob, she's not going to be contributing anything to the fight (again, no ranged weapons aside from 'nades) and there's always just the option of shooting that unit. Or assaulting them. Malys isn't all that threatening of a CC threat.

Also, in regard to the grotesque models question. Yes, they are slightly less bulky than the 'official' GW model. But it is such a terrible model that I wouldn't exactly use it as a yardstick to compare your model to. You're better off comparing it to the art in the codex. Those models that can be easily converted to look like the codex art with some green stuff, some extra talos bits, and maybe a bit of guitar string (to make the little vestigal spine that connects their spine to their pelvis) or something similar.

Good points all around regarding lady Malys. I've been preparing a list with her in, but I might consider swapping her for the duke, I'll see if I can squeeze him in.

Also, can I deploy the Duke with a squad of Warriors, leave them and join my Wyches while embarking a transport with the Warriors. I mean, the question is, can these Warriors buy a Raider, as they'd be over 10 man limit. I guess that it's legal as that choice happens during army building, and whether to join the unit with the Duke happens later, but it's a question worth asking.

Totally legal for exactly the reasons you mentioned. Buying a transport happens at the list-building stage, attaching the duke happens at the deployment phase.

thelordcal wrote:I've personally been wrestling with taking an HQ that fits in with an "all" shooting army. Currently i'm just taking an Archon w. Shadow Field and Blaster to ride with my blaster born, but i've been contemplating:

Haemy - 75
-LG, Hex Rifle

Chilling with:

Wracks (5) - 85pts.
-LG, Apoth w. Hex Rifle


Maybe slapping a raider on em, they won't ride in it, but its another way to get another Dark Lance in the List, plus could easily use it to help screen troop carrying vehicles. The main idea would be for the squad to camp back court objectives (i know very un DE) providing decent 36" fire support and having access to decent charge deterrence via 2 LG. Plus they help clear out my back court of Deep Strikers.

Thoughts?

You're best off running Hex Squads cheap as possible. If it gets assaulted, it will die. Giving it a Liquifier Gun that 95% of the time will only be there as a (minimal) charge-deterrant is inefficient, as it really won't stop anything, or deter anyone, and is 10pts best used elsewhere. Same for the Wrack unit (though slightly less so) it's a weapon that is almost a polar opposite in task to the rifle.

I find that a Haemonculi without a WWP should be more than 65pts (and with, shouldn't be more than 100.)
Best ran as either A: Liquifier Gun + Venom Blade (versatile assult unit to accompany assaulty troops - primarily wracks / grotesques). B: Hex Rifle (Harrasment unit, to go with Hex Wracks / other Hex Haems and these days Eldar Rangers / Pathfinders).

Same for the Wracks - 3 men (2 wracks, 1 acothyst w/ Hex Rifle) is 55pts and so small as to be ignored until it's killed something important or the rest of your armies been wiped out. Great way to get a cheap raider too. Use the 30pts you save from the needless 2 men + liquifier elsewhere.

If deep strikers are a problem, then 5 wracks in a venom, with liquifier and acothyst with venom blade will be much more effective.

I've posted a list here:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/473230.page

I've bought a squad of metal Incubi yesterday on the local eBay variation so I will probably be changing the list. Or are Incubi not worth it anymore?

I'd be grateful for any comments either here, or in the Army Lists thread.

On a random note somehow my battle report ended up on YTTH and I had the privilege of having it analysed by Stelek himself.

 Alkasyn wrote:
I've posted a list here:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/473230.page

I've bought a squad of metal Incubi yesterday on the local eBay variation so I will probably be changing the list. Or are Incubi not worth it anymore?

I'd be grateful for any comments either here, or in the Army Lists thread.

Incubi are great at taking out Meq, but they cost more than meq and have to slog all the way across the battlefield with no gun of any sort. by the time you add in their transport, something to give them grenades, and a support unit they had better kill 2-3 full tactical squads to make it worth it.
The problem is, they cannot deal with Teq, even with the 85 point upgrade sergeant. They have a very niche role these days. I personally love the old models and run them as often as I can but they are not the cats meow, not that they were in 5th either.

Imotek stormlord brings with him night fighting, I know its cheese but how useful could he be with a long ranged force?

 ???????? wrote:
Imotek stormlord brings with him night fighting, I know its cheese but how useful could he be with a long ranged force?

DE and Necrons cannot ally, also DE dont do long range very well. Nothing in the codex has range over 36"

 Exergy wrote:

 Alkasyn wrote:
I've posted a list here:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/473230.page

I've bought a squad of metal Incubi yesterday on the local eBay variation so I will probably be changing the list. Or are Incubi not worth it anymore?

I'd be grateful for any comments either here, or in the Army Lists thread.

Incubi are great at taking out Meq, but they cost more than meq and have to slog all the way across the battlefield with no gun of any sort. by the time you add in their transport, something to give them grenades, and a support unit they had better kill 2-3 full tactical squads to make it worth it.
The problem is, they cannot deal with Teq, even with the 85 point upgrade sergeant. They have a very niche role these days. I personally love the old models and run them as often as I can but they are not the cats meow, not that they were in 5th either.

My sentiments exactly, the "Exarch" costs too much for me to be able to field him in a reasonable-priced list and the squad itself seems like an overkill most of the time. I'd actually be pretty worried if my 5 Incubi were to assault a 10 man Tactical squad with a Power Weapon.

What about multiple units of wyches with haywires in venoms with a haemi with liquifier.
The unit can get close destroy a transport or vehicle most of the time, if it is a transport(metal boxes anybody) you can then spray it with a flamer which ignores power armour half the time and termi 1/3. If you have not turboboosted you can also cover the unit in splinter cannon fire.
If you have turboboosted you get a 3+ cover save due to flickerfield and jink if not you get just better than a 4+.
Back this up with blasterborn for killing termis.

Also if he charges you have a flicker field and if the venom is destroyed he is in combat with a tarpit, no overwatch for Mr Marine.

 Exergy wrote:
Nothing in the codex has range over 36"

Flyer missiles being the only exception, and limited arc, flyer movement restrictions etc., so ya, not a long range threat really.

Wouldn't work.

For multiple reasons.

The foremost being that Venoms have a transport capacity of 5 models, Wyches have a minimum unit size of 5 models and therefore there is no room for a Haemonculus.

Moving flat out only gives a 4+. Having a flickerfield does not modify the jink cover save whatsoever.

 ???????? wrote:
What about multiple units of wyches with haywires in venoms with a haemi with liquifier.
The unit can get close destroy a transport or vehicle most of the time, if it is a transport(metal boxes anybody) you can then spray it with a flamer which ignores power armour half the time and termi 1/3. If you have not turboboosted you can also cover the unit in splinter cannon fire.
If you have turboboosted you get a 3+ cover save due to flickerfield and jink if not you get just better than a 4+.
Back this up with blasterborn for killing termis.

Also if he charges you have a flicker field and if the venom is destroyed he is in combat with a tarpit, no overwatch for Mr Marine.

Units of HWG wyches is the common setup these days, but not with a haemy, they get a measly 5+ FNP save for the price of a haemy, but they aren't living any longer than they would without the haemy. Put the haemy elsewhere for pain token. You only need 5 wyches to destroy a stationary HP4 vehicle, and about 7-8 if it's moving.

You do not get 3+ jink save with flickerfield, flickerfield gives you a 5+ invulnerable save, it doesn't give you stealth USR.

Flickerfield against assault will only at most save your raider for another day, but most of the time, it will still crash, if it's a dedicated vehicle assault unit.

In short, follow DE's philosophy, once an unit has done the job you bought it for, it can die, don't try to extend their miserable life.

On the topic of incubi, although I'm not one to field them, I think they're still decent if you're not fighting blobs and blobs of TEQ.

EDIT/PS: @Lokas

I had forgotten how normal grotesques look in the codex, haha... Still probably gonna go with either beastmen minotaurs or VC varghiests, I already have a box of chaos spawn for grotes conversion, so I'll match the creepy monster-looking theme for the remaining 2-3.

ThePhish wrote:

 Exergy wrote:
Nothing in the codex has range over 36"

Flyer missiles being the only exception, and limited arc, flyer movement restrictions etc., so ya, not a long range threat really.

Except you do have stuff with ranges between 24 and 36, which is also the distances at which you get +2 to cover saves.

A Ravager would be able to move 6" and fire all of its weapons within that +2 zone, giving it a 3+ Jink save and still able to operate at maximum firepower.

That is great long range potential.

Sorry I did not explain myself properly, the main reason for the haemi is the liquifier (which now can overwatch, not too useful but helpful).
Ok, I did not mean that flicker and jink combine but if you have both of them the chances are 3+ for turbo and flicker and about 4+ for jink and flicker, work the math out. This will hopefully negate the amount of fire it will be taking at the range it will be operating.

No, you won't get 3+ or 4+ with jink + flicker, they don't add to eachother, the only things that could improve jink save is stealth/shrouded/skilled rider... and/or any new special rules that might be in the upcoming new codices.

Also, same thing, don't put the haemy with the wyches with the aim to extend their life. They've done their job once they've blew the tank, let them die, don't waste point on an unit that will die either way.

EDIT: Wait, I think I see where the confusion is... You don't get to roll both saves, you use the best one, and if that failed, you punch your opponent and call him a cheater. Flicker in 6th ed is mainly for... A) You lost 1st turn, and you want to keep your stationary vehicles safe for that opening turn, and B) you get assaulted, as there is no cover save in CC. It's mostly considered overpriced because of the 50% nightfighting rule, and that we have no reason to stay stationary after the 1st turn.

Thanks did not know that you could not have both.

My reason for adding the haemi was adding a liquifier.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If reavers can move 48 how may units can it get over in it's movement.

All of them, potentially.

Which does not matter at all, because you can only direct your bladevane attacks into one unit per turn.

 ???????? wrote:


Also if he charges you have a flicker field and if the venom is destroyed he is in combat with a tarpit, no overwatch for Mr Marine.

if you assualt a transport and wreck or explode it the models inside a placed 1" away from the assaulting unit, out of combat.

Bumpity bump.

On the topic of conversions/count-as, what do most DE use for razorwings flocks? I kinda want 8 bases of them for a list I'm gonna attempt at some point... So any idea for cool-looking cost-efficient razorwing flocks conversions?

Also, when Baron joined an unit of beast, is he still a jump infantry, or is he now a pseudo-beast? Can he still use HoW? I assumed I'd have to move 6"(moving at the slowest: Baron as infantry), then charge using fleet?

Can't charge after fleet any more.

THe baron doesn't change type. He is still JI, with all the benefits and downsides.

Beasts move 12 these days, so he wouldn't be slowed down any.

Well, what I meant is, as JI, if he moved 12", he'd lose his HoW, so to gain his HoW, he'd have to be moving 6" to get the HoW. And I meant fleet for the reroll, because JI gets to reroll their assault distance w/o fleet... But I guess was kinda silly since I'd be using fleet reroll anyway, since that is the only shared reroll Baron and the beasts have.

His HOW would only be a single S 3 hit with no AP anyway IIRC

Not really worth it.

Very true, but if the situation does arise that I only need to move 6" in the movement phase to get into decent assault distance, it wouldn't hurt to get that I10 S3 hit... You never know, if you're extremely lucky that day, you might get an unsaved wound out of it!

And thanks for the answer.

Not really worth it no, but yes. You could use it.

I mean, if you can get less than 6 inches from your opponent's unit with just a 6 inch move, I don't see why you wouldn't use it. I'm not going to turn down an extra strength 3 attack, even if it is very unlikely to do anything, it's a free bonus. I don't often turn down free bonuses.

Now, you wouldn't wanna risk your charge though. You're better off using your 12" move to get within 2" of the enemy than diddling around 8" and gambling for the best so you can get HoW. The beautiful thing about Baron though is that he does come with fleet, so you can move 12" and still get rerolls to your assault move. I wish Jetbikes came with fleet, but that's just because it would really play into my feint tactics very well.

I usually run 6 razorwing flocks in my beast master list, But if you want to get them a little cheaper than buying 6 razorwing flocks, just buy one and then insta-mold it and use green stuff to make the other 5 that you need. They are all reasonably flat so doing that shouldn't be too complex. You might have to have a few test runs, but that would be one of the cheapest ways of doing that. I guess it depends on how much green stuff you have laying around.

I usually fill my list out with 8 or 10 khymera's as shields against strength 6 shots so my razorwings don't get insta-killed.

I use the Rippers with Wings from Forge World. I've done a very minor conversion, adding multiple round eyes on either side of the face to make them aesthetically similar to the GW Khymerae. It gives the unit a nice cohesive look, and makes more sense from a fluff perspective considering my army's personal story. My Kabal Of The Four Families is an amalgamation of different groups, all having been expelled from the dark city for one reason or another, and the man represented by Baron Sathy on the tabletop made a trek through the webway with his Hellion wing after his banishment and in the dark corners of the webway, he tamed daemonic beasts to supplement his dwindling forces before joining forces with the other families.

Ohh... Instant mold... That IS the cheapest way out there...

Rippers with wings are also nice... For some reason though, I kept imagining that when you said "multiple round eyes", you meant googly eyes stickies, and I just can't help but laugh when I imagine those rippers with them. Not a lot cheaper though, unless I use may be 2 rippers per base or something.

How about if I get a mass of these, do some simple cuttings, then glue on some spare scourges wings or some sorta wings? May be have 2 or 3 per base, would that be about the same size as the GW razorwing flocks model? I'm trying not to stray too far from the original's size so not to be modelling for advantage either by making them smaller(harder to get LoS or something) or larger(provide better cover for other units).

And off topic whining: As I'm collecting necrons as well, I can't help but notice how generous they are with necron kits. Their CCB/AnniBarge kit comes with a free overlord, a single kit can model for both unit, same goes for immortal/deathmark, ghost ark/doomsday, etc... While our ravager is just a raider with 2 more guns, it costs more than a raider and is a seperate kit for some reason!! And the official beastmaster range is a serious scam!!

EDIT: Forgot to say thanks, how rude am I!?

Thanks for the ideas.

Scourge wings are huge compared to razorwing flocks, so I'm not sure you could pull that off.
I was wondering about alternatives as I only have 1 razorwing flock and really need some more, but sooo expensive!

Mine will be floating swarms of flying trilobites.

My DE are a Dagon-worshipping cult of nutjobs,,,

Considering taking a horde of beasts/masters...what is the best HQ to pair with them? I know the Baron is good, but I don't run hellions and it seems like somewhat of a waste. Is there any other options?

dafluff wrote:
Considering taking a horde of beasts/masters...what is the best HQ to pair with them? I know the Baron is good, but I don't run hellions and it seems like somewhat of a waste. Is there any other options?

Even without Hellions, the Baron is a bargain (plus Hellions aren't that good to begin with as either Elites or Troops). He actually synergizes pretty well with beast masters, giving them stealth, hit and run, assault and defensive grenades and the ability to assign wounds to specific models with Look Out Sir! Provided you can position him properly, any wound with S5 or lower you can assign to your Razorwing Flock and any high strength hits to your Khymerae. In 6th, his movement of Jump Infantry is similar to their beasts, even though you do not move at the speed of the slowest model anymore. So for his point cost, he is awesome with beasts.

Okay thanks that is helpful! Im new to DE...how does look out sir work? What do you think is the best setup of the beasts in a 1,500 - 2k army?

dafluff wrote:
Okay thanks that is helpful! Im new to DE...how does look out sir work? What do you think is the best setup of the beasts in a 1,500 - 2k army?

3 packs of beastmasters with 4 (2 + 2) Razorwing flocks and 5 Khymera are the basis which You can further update if needed. Cheap beastmasters can be converted out of Hellion box and cheap Razorwing flocks can be made from spare bladevanes, which come in Raider/Ravager/Venom kits.

The hellion conversion is brilliant. The beast master models are so pricey. Thanks you for the advice, very helpful.

You also get to kitbash Your own Baron from remaining bits. Although You can wait for the official and pricey model by GW which is bound to be released later this year.

The cheapest razorwing flock so far looks like this

IIRC it was posted by one of our fellow dakkanauts, but I unfortunately cannot qoute his name since I am unable to find that initial post. I have to admit that I shamelessly stole his idea as soon as I saw it

CainTheHunter wrote:
You also get to kitbash Your own Baron from remaining bits. Although You can wait for the official and pricey model by GW which is bound to be released later this year.

The cheapest razorwing flock so far looks like this
[img]http://lh4.ggpht.com/-U7V0enGOWEE/Tjh0RdTKzeI/AAAAAAAAAek/yj7CIsYlxLs/2011-08-02%2525252021.21.34.png[/img
IIRC it was posted by one of our fellow dakkanauts, but I unfortunately cannot qoute his name since I am unable to find that initial post. I have to admit that I shamelessly stole his idea as soon as I saw it

Pretty sure I've been reading that line since the beginning of time... Face it, we're back to the unwanted pile now, there won't be actual baron model for us... The rumoured release list for next year only has a "grotesque squad"!

For razorwing flock, I've read a poster on here who thought about getting a mass of these:

http://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/bat/latest/P03355B

And just stick them on a large base, but it's been a year and I'm not sure if he had posted any photos, so who knows if they look nice or not.

And tbh, even those "conversions" you posted look better than the official models!

dafluff wrote:
Considering taking a horde of beasts/masters...what is the best HQ to pair with them? I know the Baron is good, but I don't run hellions and it seems like somewhat of a waste. Is there any other options?

The baron does not need to be taken with Hellions. He is the only HQ to pair with beastpacks because he is the only one who can keep up with them.

Making hellions troops is arguably the lowest priority reason to take the Baron. You take the baron for his bonus to your deployment roll and because he is an undercosted strength 6 beatstick with a 2++ who allows for hilariously logic-breaking moves like having a khymerae throw a grenade at an enemy unit.

@Lokas : Does he hold his own once in combat? Or is he picked off relatively fast?

Well, he has his 2+ invulnerable save until first failure. He packs out several high strenght attacks when assaulting, but he is also probably the only special character without a power weapon.

Urien and Duke(if you roll 2-4).

dafluff wrote:
@Lokas : Does he hold his own once in combat? Or is he picked off relatively fast?

he has a shadowfield (2++ on his first wound) once that goes he is as good as dead. When he charges he does so at str6 or 7 but in subsiquent rounds he is only str4. He has 4 attacks and no power weapon. So he is no beast, but he is alright for a hundred points with all his special rules

He gives you +1 to your deployment roll off, and he makes beast masters king in 6th edition. I have used him and a large beast master unit and rolled through half of people's armies with just that unit, let alone the rest of the 1850 points worth of DE that stood back in awe as that unit chewed everything my opponent threw at them. Screw hellions, you take the baron because he gives you a death star unit that can rick roll people all day, everyday. The rest of your army is just eye candy to distract your opponent until it is too late for them to figure out what is happening to them. Throw the baron in the front, look out sir to your 4++ khymeras for toughness 6 or above, and look out sir on your razorwing flocks on toughness 5 or less. Use your beast master characters to accept challenges and let the baron add his usually wound you 2's to the rest of the enemy unit. The whole reason you are taking a best master squad is because of the razorwing flocks (rending), everything else there is just a delivery system that is helpful in a tight spot.

Beasts are awesome.
Last game they ate a Black templar terminator squad, managed to grind up a 10 man crusader squad and only failed at the attempt to put down another crusader squad with the emperors champion attached (I knew I couldn't win, but it hindered the opponent to take an objective).

This is what I am using for my Razorwing flocks:
http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Tyranids/TYRANID-RIPPERS-WITH-WINGS.html
You get 9 in one pack. That's enough for 4 bases with 2-3 each.

I like the unused beast myself.

The Psycho-monkeys are fun to use, especially if you can Look Out Sir to them to build up their attacks before you charge in on a small, tough unit.

Sure, they'll lose most of their wounds, but they hit like a 900 ton mallet


I realise that the Razorwings are the best of the three, and the Khymerae are a better bullet-stop, but there's something about 5 rat-tailed multi-eyed gorillas that freaks opponents out no end, and they've always worked really well for me..

 Ascalam wrote:
I like the unused beast myself.

The Psycho-monkeys are fun to use, especially if you can Look Out Sir to them to build up their attacks before you charge in on a small, tough unit.

Sure, they'll lose most of their wounds, but they hit like a 900 ton mallet


I realise that the Razorwings are the best of the three, and the Khymerae are a better bullet-stop, but there's something about 5 rat-tailed multi-eyed gorillas that freaks opponents out no end, and they've always worked really well for me..

Oh yeah, let the clawed fiend take a couple of look out sir hits for the baron and then have him in your second row for the assault and have him pound on a few dudes heads and add to the would pool with the extra attacks that he gets.

I've actually stopped using the beast masters unit lately just to try out other units and make the game more even instead of me crushing all of my friend's faces and them not wanting to play with me anymore.

Clawed fiends are just a bit overcost for me, razorwings provide more wounds and they got rending, their toughness is useless because it's impossible for them to get majority. I could get S5 attacks from grotesque at cheaper price, they can bring liquifier and/or poisoned weapon with abberation, and I'd be using the T5 majority as well.

I've found that using the Baron for LOS! was a quick way to get him insta killed. Maybe due to poor rolling, but all it took was my opponent asking, "Is that your warlord?", "yes", S6 shots at that guy. It only took 2 shots last game. Passed LOS!, khymera died, Failed LOS!, Failed Shadow field. Bye bye baron. I gave up a secondary objective top of turn 1. My Baron will be running 2nd row from now on, with a nice khymera bubble wrap.

Maybe take a Clawed Fiend to stick wounds on as it doesn't Insta-die from a S6 shot if it fails a save (which it won't get for a lot of S6 shooting anyway).

When it's down to one wound left you start putting the high strength wounds on Khymerae and hope to pass the Invulnerable save and the low strength wounds on the Razorwing flocks.

Failing both LOS! and the Shadowfield is a 1/36 chance, so it takes some pretty unlucky rolling for you to fail.

ThePhish wrote:
I've found that using the Baron for LOS! was a quick way to get him insta killed. Maybe due to poor rolling, but all it took was my opponent asking, "Is that your warlord?", "yes", S6 shots at that guy. It only took 2 shots last game. Passed LOS!, khymera died, Failed LOS!, Failed Shadow field. Bye bye baron. I gave up a secondary objective top of turn 1. My Baron will be running 2nd row from now on, with a nice khymera bubble wrap.

One game? Or every game?

That's just bad luck, really, you rolled 1 twice, on 2 dice.

I'm not making fun of your misfortune, I consistently roll 1 on 1-2 dice as well, most of my early games with my friends, they all thought my archon w/ SF was a joke, because I always fail that 2+ roll on the 1st hit he takes, so I had never managed to get my archon into range to do his crazy CC damage. It's only a recent 5th ed game that they started to see my archon as a threat, as I managed to single-handedly(literally 1 model, his escort-wyches got murdered) took down a full size assault marine squad with a HQ through agoniser, shadowfield and sweeping advance(I dealt some wounds, took none thanks to my SF, then I won combat and swept them away). So don't sweep the Baron LOS tactic under the carpet because of 1 poor rolling experience!

I feel your pain with the double 1 rolling. My worst roll i believe went like this....

Eldrad in a group of wraithguards. A wraithguard went down on the side and exposed eldrad. 1 melta shot from a tac squad was fired in. rolled a 1 for the look out sir. Had a re-rollable 3+ invulnerable and all 3 wounds. Rolled another 1 and then a 2. All 3 wounds went bye bye. It was hilarious. But in a bad way.


Back on topic, I am myself now looking into the beastmaster unit headed by the baron. Looking for cheap ways to model flocks. Loved some of the ideas.

I also found the post stating S5 or less always goes to flocks and S6 or more goes to kymera.

That 1/36 chance to fail LOS and fail your shield hopefully shouldnt happen before that unit gets into combat. They should be in combat on turn 2 should they not?

Don't you do LOS after your saves?

"When a wound (or unsaved wound) is allocated to one of your characters... ...he's allowed a Look Out, Sir! attempt."

 Foo wrote:
Don't you do LOS after your saves?

not with mixed saves, otherwise the whole unit would have a 2++

I am confused by that part as well "or unsaved wound". I dont think this is true, but it makes it seem like you can roll for your 2++ save and then if he fails it, just pass the wound back. Shield would still break because he fails the save but then he wouldnt take the wound for it. so the wound would just automaticly go trough to whoever he LOS to.

Once again, I dont think this is how it works, but I just dont understand that little part or why they would say it.

That's how I interpreted it.

I could see how broken that could be though. Not in this case as the shield would still break and no more 2++ saves. But say there is a 2+ save HQ who whenever he fails his 2+ save just kills off a member of his unit on a 2+ LOS. There could be some really dumb stuff that could be done there.

Idk what is right and wrong in this situation. I just continue to play LOS before taking saves until I completely understand this aspect.

In a mixed save unit, wounds are allocated before saves are taken. Look Out Sir! is rolled when a wound is allocated to a character.

In a mixed save unit it goes Allocation > Look out Sir! > Roll saves.

In a same-save unit, you roll all the saves at once and then allocate the wounds, so it goes Roll Saves > Allocation > Look Out Sir!

This came up in my gaming group because one player felt that no matter what, LoS! is rolled before saves. So, I've heard this discussion before. The key is that when Look Out Sir! is described, on page 16, it's specifically said that it occurs when an unsaved wound or wound is allocated to a character. This is because of how the order of things can change depending on the unit composition.

AWESOME! thank you for that :-) very helpful.

Baronyu wrote:

One game? Or every game?

That's just bad luck, really, you rolled 1 twice, on 2 dice.

I'm not making fun of your misfortune, I consistently roll 1 on 1-2 dice as well, most of my early games with my friends, they all thought my archon w/ SF was a joke, because I always fail that 2+ roll on the 1st hit he takes, so I had never managed to get my archon into range to do his crazy CC damage. It's only a recent 5th ed game that they started to see my archon as a threat, as I managed to single-handedly(literally 1 model, his escort-wyches got murdered) took down a full size assault marine squad with a HQ through agoniser, shadowfield and sweeping advance(I dealt some wounds, took none thanks to my SF, then I won combat and swept them away). So don't sweep the Baron LOS tactic under the carpet because of 1 poor rolling experience!

Thankfully, just 1 game, or I would start buying stock in a dice company. Still an excellent HQ. I will probably continue to use hims as I did in my last game to try and preserve more the of the squad.

ThePhish wrote:
I've found that using the Baron for LOS! was a quick way to get him insta killed. Maybe due to poor rolling, but all it took was my opponent asking, "Is that your warlord?", "yes", S6 shots at that guy. It only took 2 shots last game. Passed LOS!, khymera died, Failed LOS!, Failed Shadow field. Bye bye baron. I gave up a secondary objective top of turn 1. My Baron will be running 2nd row from now on, with a nice khymera bubble wrap.

Sort of off subject, but it works for me. Locally we are against GW dice. Do you use GW dice when you play? If so get rid of them as quickly as possible and pick up a pack of 36 from someone else. I have two sets of 36 dice. One set I use for small arms fire and non special weapons in close combat. The other set I use for high strength shots and special weapons in close combat. It's funny but ask my friends who I play with, I have some pretty hot dice rolls. It is a system that works for me.

But on to things that are more real and back on subject; I wouldn't base any changes on one game. I would honestly play probably at least 10 games with a list (or if you can 20 to 30) to really see how it works. Luck wasn't on your side with those rolls. I have seen terminators take 47 wounds and not lose a single guy, I have made 29 saves in a row with my archon with his SF. Crazy things happen when you roll dice.

Failing both LOS! and the Shadowfield is a 1/36 chance...
That's just bad luck, really, you rolled 1 twice, on 2 dice.

I was re-reading and missed this. I failed my LOS! on a 3, then failed the shadowfield. Why would I need to roll a 1 twice in a row? I thought it was 1-3 to fail LOS! and then take the save. What am I missing here?


edit....nevermind, I found it, pg. 39. Genius, that's me. Bastard wouldn't have been dead. Oh well. Lesson learned. Thanks guys.

LOS for HQ's is on a 2+

Squad sergeants are on a 4+

I don't know who started this....but wow...

Just started my DE army last week and have got more wins so far in 6 edition with them than I have with I.G and SM. I didn't drop Wytches, and I still run a CC Archon. This army is very fast compared to my others with ALL the units.

Today I made a demon player whine and whine about how broken my warriors were because they could kill BOTH demon princes with rapid fire posion.....

Not to mention the jink on the skimmers means NOT buying flickerfields. If your not geting first turn, make sure they stay nice and hidden in deployment.

Just stop trying to play 5th edition DE and adapt, DE is STILL one of the most powerful armies to run out there. I have killed hordes, small elites, and well mixed units.

Frankly, I still intend to get flickerfields when I can.

With the no-save-first-turn and no-save-in-combat, and no-save-against-weapons-that-ignore-cover I've found still taking it is rather useful.

Well that changes everything.

None of us had realized that our poison weapons wound on a fixed number, or that we get jink saves now.

 Lokas wrote:
Well that changes everything.

None of us had realized that our poison weapons wound on a fixed number, or that we get jink saves now.

YESSSSS!

 Lokas wrote:
Well that changes everything.

None of us had realized that our poison weapons wound on a fixed number, or that we get jink saves now.

yeah I totally thought 9 point guardsmen were a good idea.

@Ovion

But we got a 50% chance at getting nightfighting + 16% chance to make it happen if we pick that warlord table, so the "no-cover-save-on-1st-turn" only happens when you failed both of those.

@Fido198674

We know our poisoned shootings have only gotten better this edition. We know we're still amazing at hurting high T enemy unit. We know we're faster than others, albeit not by so much this edition. We know we have jink saves. We know we're still a good army. And we've mostly adapted to this edition, but that doesn't change the fact that we have seen quite a few unnecessary nerfhammer striking on our army... And funny enough, this thread is all about discussing how we adapt to the changes instead of going "shut up and adapt"!

Baronyu wrote:
@Ovion

But we got a 50% chance at getting nightfighting + 16% chance to make it happen if we pick that warlord table, so the "no-cover-save-on-1st-turn" only happens when you failed both of those.

50% chance of night fighting, + 8% chance from warlord table(16%*50%)
58% chance of night fighting

Why is it only an 8% chance on the warlord table?

Baronyu wrote:
Why is it only an 8% chance on the warlord table?

because the two events are independent. there is a 50% chance from the game, then the warlord talbe only takes effect IF the game's 50% chance failed.

So 50% chance of night-fighting from the game. + (16% chance warlord table * 50% not night-fighting from the game)

Ah... makes sense... Still, we have a better chance at getting nightfighting than in last ed...

Ok, so by the numbers, it's still a 4/10 chance for getting no cover save on the first turn.
Then 10/10 the time, you still have:
No save against attacks made in close combat.
No save against weapons that ignore cover. (i.e. flamers which are now more common due to overwatch)
Furthermore, they provide a save against failed Difficult Terrain tests.

I think the up to 120pts spent on 5+ Invulnerable saves for vehicles across the board is still plenty worth it.

Now, Tau Disruption pods have become significantly less worth it now (hell, almost pointless), only providing any benefit at all, turn 1...

I don't care what other people say, I still take night shields and flickerfields on all my transports and vehicles. For me it is worth it. I'm not losing a lot of fights either.

Not saying that FF is really that useless, I mean, it has all those uses that Ovion listed, but it's just that the choice isn't so clean-cut this ed. Myself, for example, is still struggling to decide whether to take FF or NS, CrimsonKing's solution is a bit too costly for the still-fragile boats of ours.

Baronyu wrote:
Not saying that FF is really that useless, I mean, it has all those uses that Ovion listed, but it's just that the choice isn't so clean-cut this ed. Myself, for example, is still struggling to decide whether to take FF or NS, CrimsonKing's solution is a bit too costly for the still-fragile boats of ours.

I go with both where able for 'heavy hitters' such as Ravagers / Razorwings / Voidravens, then flickerfields for everything else.
I also tend to put Night Shields on Venoms when able, but my Venoms tend to hang back and strafe, so it's beneficial for them to have both.

I love Night Shields, and they're good for stopping rapid fire, melta and such, but ultimately, on Raiders or anything else that's rushing into 18" or less of the enemy it's generally not worth it as ranges quite quickly close enough that small arms are just as dangerous. If hanging out at over 18" away - great, go for it.

i take FF on ravagers and the fliers. Things that cost over 100pts. Raiders on the other hand i leave relatively naked

Definitely take FF on the fliers then you don't need to do evasive maneuvers and still get the 5+ save.

For me, it's...

Ravager - FF for sure, NS is good against melta and stuff, but there aren't too many AT/spammy weapons that has a shorter range than our DL/dissie, so I think 10 points to reduce effectiveness of a few weapons while still running the chance of getting shot down by everything over 36" is a bit of a waste. Can imagine NS being fun for necrons/eldar/DE though...

I might be a bit list-tailoring though, as I only play against my gaming group who mostly rely on super long range AT guns to take down my vehicles...

Flyers - FF, I'm still in emo mood about the whole supersonic movement restriction thing... So they aren't gonna get that extra 10 points!

Raider/venom - This is the main one I'm struggling with, I certainly want them to survive until their job is done, having my assault unit stranded on my end of the table makes me sad. FF and NS both improve their odd of survival, but taking both feels such a waste when they inevitably go down by turn 3... So I don't know...

Baronyu wrote:For me, it's...

Ravager - FF for sure, NS is good against melta and stuff, but there aren't too many AT/spammy weapons that has a shorter range than our DL/dissie, so I think 10 points to reduce effectiveness of a few weapons while still running the chance of getting shot down by everything over 36" is a bit of a waste. Can imagine NS being fun for necrons/eldar/DE though...

I might be a bit list-tailoring though, as I only play against my gaming group who mostly rely on super long range AT guns to take down my vehicles...

Flyers - FF, I'm still in emo mood about the whole supersonic movement restriction thing... So they aren't gonna get that extra 10 points!

Raider/venom - This is the main one I'm struggling with, I certainly want them to survive until their job is done, having my assault unit stranded on my end of the table makes me sad. FF and NS both improve their odd of survival, but taking both feels such a waste when they inevitably go down by turn 3... So I don't know...

The Night Shields on things that hang back are there invaribly to ensure that only the vehicles target will really be in range to shoot back it it if it survives. That 6" reduction is usually enough to prevent 2/3rds+ of the enemy army being able to target it. With flyers, it prevents things that aren't practically touching the base from rapid firing it, and is more useful still.

Flickerfield on the flyer is amazing, it means it can fight at full capacity AND take the saves, other flyers need to evade and then either fire snap shots only, or disengage next turn.

Venoms come with Flickers as standard anyway, so that reduces that argument.

Played a game yesterday and charged a unit with both Wracks (they soaked up the single wound from overwatch) and then Wyches.

I ran into a problem, though. After I made it into combat, was mostly base-to-base or as close to it as possible with the Wyches and a Haemi. They attacked and killed five Orks.

When we got down to I4, the 3" pile-in wasn't enough to get the Wracks into base contact with any Orks, so they didn't get to attack. The Orks, however, moved in their 3" and were able to attack the Wracks back, because the combination of Wrack 3" and Ork 3" made up the 4" gap between them.

Did I do this correctly? Is that how things are supposed to work?

My grief with night shields on things that are going to sit at 36" (Ravagers, sometimes venoms, etc) is that, as has been mentioned, most IoM anti-tank weapons have a 48" range. So if we're shooting at them, they can shoot at us regardless of the night shields. But even against other DE players, or players who have a 36" threat bubble, they can just move up 6" and still be able to hit you. Considering most dark lances and the like are mounted on vehicles to begin with, that's not really a huge sacrifice, it's not like you're forcing them to snap fire to get at you. In my personal experience, Night Shields have never been a major hindrance for me when I've played against them, or for my opponents when I've used them. The exception being <24" weapons. It severely hinders Rapid Fire weapons ability to hurt our transports, or short range weapons like plasma or meltaguns. If I'm planning on putting my vehicles in those threat ranges, I'll give 'em a night shield. My warrior gunboats frequently get this upgrade because of how they operate in that 24" bubble.

I create a well tooled all comers list. Unless people you play against at tournaments all have the same list and you are the only DE player there, then no night shields would be fine. I play a lot of marine, marine varient armies, necron and tyranid armies. All of those armies I find having NS to be very advantageuos. Not for the big guns but for the small arms fire that can glance to death our vehicles. Yes you can move away from them, but at 1850 (which is usually the points I play at) there is only so much space on the board before you are within 24" of someone. It is about playing to your strengths and their weaknesses, making them play your game instead of vice versa, and hindering their ability to shoot at you with all they have.

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m2570041a_Dark_Eldar_v1.1.pdf

Huskblade and klaives are AP2, Baron add +2 S to hammer of wrath!

Nice... This and the Tau FAQ have pleased me greatly...

Well the baronstar got nerfed. No more LoS! shenanigans.

Oh well. That just means going back to the way I played beast packs at the start of 6th, before I knew about LoS! gak. Put the razorwings closest to the dudes with bolters, and put the khymerae closest to the dudes with strength 6+. Easy peasy. And, actually, we received a kinda-buff in regards to challenges. Since it has been confirmed that excess unsaved wounds do not confer to the unit, Beastmasters are the ultimate fodder to keep scary characters away from the meat and bones of your unit. Don't want that powerfist punching your Razorwings to death? Challenge him with a beastmaster instead! That Beastmaster will get a powerfist rectal exam, but it's better than losing 5 wounds at a whack.

I have to say, I'm a little excited that Jetbiker wounds are now totally randomized. My FLGS had gotten used to hiding their characters and special weapons in either the front or back of the unit (depending on how we house-ruled the wounds being allocated at the time) and now there is no possible hiding places, and Reavers throw down enough bladevane wounds to make sure a few will land on somebody important.

What's stopping you from doing the Baron LoS thing that you were doing before? But anyway, you can't throw grenades with khymerae anymore.

Anyone remember when we were called "cupcakes" and all sort of names in that big thread where some of us said we wanted agoniser to be AP2? Now, instead of AP2 agoniser being on character(challenges, limit casualty), we have AP2 non-character melee specialists... Will we get upgraded to something better than "cupcakes"?

Damn GW, I haven't even finish building my grotesques and beastmaster unit and they're tempting me with incubi!!

Still no clarification for Lelith's penetrating blade though, should we take it as for CC only? Or we take it as a metaphor for how good she is with her attacks and apply to her grenades as well?

LoS! May only be allocated to the closest model as per the rulebook FAQ.

Sure, you could put a Razorwing flock and a Khymerae in BtB with the Baron, making both the closest and therefore allowing you to choose which buuut, you take 2 strength 6+ wounds and that Khymerae fails his first save? Looks like that wound is getting allocated to the flock and there goes 5 perfectly good wounds, 5 perfectly good attacks, and a whole base's worth of rending.

You're better off just using movement to create a formation that has your beasts closest to whatever you want them to get shot by.

So Baronstar is nerfed, but Incubi are back as the Terminator killers they always should be.

Yeah, Baronstar is nerfed but not badly.

I'm honestly not upset about this nerf, at all. Baronstar is still an incredibly survivable, incredibly killy deathstar for near half the cost of most competing death stars and much faster. It went down in durability a bit, but you're still getting an incredibly good buy for only 260~ points.

I wish we'd gotten something for our Agonisers. They cost nearly as much as a power fist and aren't half as useful. Even just giving them the proper poisoned weapon rules would've been nice.

Oh well. Venom Blades are still the most obvious choice for just about every character in our army, the exception being Archons who have a few viable weapons. I'm glad to have Incubi back to being useful. Overall, I'm very happy with this FAQ. Although I'm not seeing the part that says I can't have my Khymerae hucking assault grenades.

Baronstar is still a very cheap unit that can bring a lot of hurts, so I'm ok with that.

Also, harliestar is dead, I guess? Eldar psychics don't work on DE.

It's been that way since the start of 6th.

You take Harlequins as part of an eldar allied detachment, and stick an archon or two in the unit. The ICs count as being part of the unit, the unit being from Codex: Eldar, and therefore able to receive the benefit of psychic powers.

Agoniser would have been nice, but the agoniser has always been the equalizer for SM. It will still kill run-of-the-mill SM and everything that isn't wearing terminator armor.

I was glad to see a rule clearing up questions on beasts assaulting through cover. Assault I1 sucks, but with Baron, doesn't matter.

We can 'officially' assault the turn after a wreck/explodes now from raiders/venoms.

So now that incubi have ap2 weapons, would it be viable to attach a haemy with huskblade to the unit? Thats one extra ap2 weapon (and instant death as well) and a pain token, but losing fleet on the down side. But have them in a raider to keep the mobility.
Just an idea I had.

Even though it's AP2 now, I'd still stick with the Venom Blade.
You're paying an extra 30pts for a weapon that will wound marines on a 5+, and 95% of the time be fighting 1 wound models.
And half of the time you ARE fighting a multiwound model, it'll likely be something you don't want the Haemy to be fighting anyway

Yeah, 35pts is a huge investment just to get ID and AP2. I think it's Archon-only for me, if I even bother with it at all.

I am attaching the Duke to my incubi squad. I really like what he brings to the table, and with him letting you roll 2d6 for drugs, that increases your chances to get a 6 and start off with a pain token regardless.

"Q: If a melee weapon ignores armour saves, such as a Tyranid bonesword or Captain Tycho’s Dead Man’s Hand, is it treated as an unusual power weapon and therefore AP3? (p61)
A: No – it ignores armour saves completely."

Following this logic, since Lelith herself ignores armour saves, I think that means her ranged attacks do, too.

A S4 AP1 grenade could actually be quite useful, I think.

Not actually AP1, the distinction is important, due to the lack of +2 to damage.

I'm going with huskblade archon, it'll be a waste against W1 models as Ovion said, but I like the result when I use him to character hunt.

Haemy will never be playing with big toys in my list, he's gonna stay with liquifier/venom blade/hexrifle!

Sad my grotesques archon combo has gone down a rank since FAQ, before I even got to build my grotesques...! But I'm still gonna build myself some grotesques anyway, inspired the conversions I've seen of them so far.

I like grotesque, at 1850 I run 3 grotesque with liquifier gun, and scissor hand, and I run them with 2 haemies. One is an ancient and has venom blade liquifier gun and casket of flensing. The other has venom blade and liquifier gun. I run them in a raider and they start with 3 pain tokens and are a good tarpit unit, and can have the potential to be anti armor also. Just throw the 2 haemies out front and the grotesque in between, you can still los and place the wounds accordingly. The squad is toughtness 5, and you have enough wounds to keep them going for as long as you want.

Baronyu wrote:
I'm going with huskblade archon, it'll be a waste against W1 models as Ovion said, but I like the result when I use him to character hunt.

Haemy will never be playing with big toys in my list, he's gonna stay with liquifier/venom blade/hexrifle!

Sad my grotesques archon combo has gone down a rank since FAQ, before I even got to build my grotesques...! But I'm still gonna build myself some grotesques anyway, inspired the conversions I've seen of them so far.

Getting combat drugs for the huskblade Archon may be a good investment. Sure, you can roll useless stuff like extra run or more WS, but +1A, +1S and especially re-rolls to wound can make your huskblade really worth the points!

Were I to run an Archon (and I may, in higher point games) it would be with a huskblade, clone field, phantasm grenade launcher and combat drugs. Throw that in a unit of 4 grotesques that boasts a liquifier gun and an aberration with a scissorhand, and a venom/liquifier haemonculus. Expensive, but majority toughness 5, feel no pain, furious charge, tons of poison attacks and high strength attacks, three characters to make sure challenges are always in your favor and one hell of a points cost.

That does sound like a bad unit to try to deal with, I'll have to try that out.

I always go for combat drugs on archon, even when I used to run agoniser, and only 50% of the drugs work on him(and I've never rolled that 50%... ) Though, with sole trap, huskblade, drugs and SF, he is dangerously close to Duke's cost but without the kabalite boost or double drugs roll...

I'm planning to go Lelith instead on Lokas's grotesques setup, against those pesky WS4/5 T4 marines, Lelith should get 11/10 WS9 S4 attacks on the charge, which would do about 3.33 ignore armour wounds, I think? Which should be enough if I throw her against characters, or if the squad being charged only have single-wound, I'd put her against the core unit. My question is, will her shardnet reduce the number of attacks of the enemy's character in challenge? It says only the challenger and the challengee can strike blows, but shardnet is a debuff...

 Ovion wrote:
Not actually AP1, the distinction is important, due to the lack of +2 to damage.

True enough.

Baronyu wrote:
I always go for combat drugs on archon, even when I used to run agoniser, and only 50% of the drugs work on him(and I've never rolled that 50%... ) Though, with sole trap, huskblade, drugs and SF, he is dangerously close to Duke's cost but without the kabalite boost or double drugs roll...

I'm planning to go Lelith instead on Lokas's grotesques setup, against those pesky WS4/5 T4 marines, Lelith should get 11/10 WS9 S4 attacks on the charge, which would do about 3.33 ignore armour wounds, I think? Which should be enough if I throw her against characters, or if the squad being charged only have single-wound, I'd put her against the core unit. My question is, will her shardnet reduce the number of attacks of the enemy's character in challenge? It says only the challenger and the challengee can strike blows, but shardnet is a debuff...

Yes it will reduce the challenger's attacks by 1. Technically when you challenger they are supposed to removed and base contact with each other.

Now that our weapon options have been pretty much locked in, we could really scrutinize them against each other.

Starting with the big boy, the huskblade. This is a fantastic weapon in any meta, in some metas with heavy MSU spam, it won't be as good, but just about every army has a couple units that are terrified of this weapon, and combat drugs adds even more threat most of the time. I like this for archons.

Agonizer. Hmm, someone mentioned the venom blade as a "replacement" to the agonizer. Well since both of them wound on a set value, it's pretty easy to check. What I found out was that the agonizer outperforms the venom blade against 4+ armor by 8% and against 3+ armor by a massive 22%. The venom blade outperforms the agonizer against 5+ armor by 6% and 6+ armor by 30%. It also does better against 2+, but only by 6%. I think that the margin between the agonizer and venom blade against 3+ armor is significant enough to merit the cost. This is marinehammer after all.

Flesh gauntlet. No one ever mentions this. I love this weapon. Set wounding with instant death, it is the other half of the huskblade. I really like it when paired with a venom blade. Use the venom blade against single wounders and the gauntlet on the others.

Power sword. I think it's a good way to go with wyches. Using agonizers lock you out of +1 strength drugs and furious charge. As we saw with the agonizer math, ignoring 3+ armor has a significant impact on those fights with marines.

Power axe. I have put quite a lot of thought into these. In cases where you could be a lone character, it is a terrible idea. You'll end up being caught by too many challenges, and dark eldar are fragile to a fault. I can see using it in a character heavy unit, such as a harlequin unit.

Venom blade. Until we got back our ap2 weapons, this weapon seemed to be luring us all away. But after doing the math, I now see that it is worth it's 5 points, but you may come up short against 3+ armor at the wrong time. I like it paired with a weapon that has an AP value. Since it is so cheap, you could replace a pistol with it, buy haywires for a "ranged attack" and be done.

In the casual, terrain heavy games that I play, incubi are absolutely bonkers. An archon with PGL leading them is terrifying, they aren't too worried about their ride exploding, nor are they overly worried about over watch. I do like that they are still very vulnerable to things like a 30 man shoota boy unit, or a battle cannon. They feel about right.

Note: if you play with the recommended terrain density in a competitive environment, don't take incubi. Just take guns.

 Shep wrote:
Now that our weapon options have been pretty much locked in, we could really scrutinize them against each other.

Starting with the big boy, the huskblade. This is a fantastic weapon in any meta, in some metas with heavy MSU spam, it won't be as good, but just about every army has a couple units that are terrified of this weapon, and combat drugs adds even more threat most of the time. I like this for archons.

Problem with Huskblades is it's 35pts, on a Str3, T3 platform with most targets that will take advantage of the Instant Death effect invaribly being wounded on 5+ / 6's, OR, be wounding on 5+ and only have 1 wound anyway. At the end of the day, how many wounds will it actually cause through a game?

Agonizer. Hmm, someone mentioned the venom blade as a "replacement" to the agonizer. Well since both of them wound on a set value, it's pretty easy to check. What I found out was that the agonizer outperforms the venom blade against 4+ armor by 8% and against 3+ armor by a massive 22%. The venom blade outperforms the agonizer against 5+ armor by 6% and 6+ armor by 30%. It also does better against 2+, but only by 6%. I think that the margin between the agonizer and venom blade against 3+ armor is significant enough to merit the cost. This is marinehammer after all.

The Agoniser can and has always been the equaliser for our low toughness dudes. Shame it can't hurt armour is all, would have been nice if it had kept always-glance-on-6 effect it used to have.

Flesh gauntlet. No one ever mentions this. I love this weapon. Set wounding with instant death, it is the other half of the huskblade. I really like it when paired with a venom blade. Use the venom blade against single wounders and the gauntlet on the others.

I think the reason it's generally not mentioned is only the 3 models can have it, Haemonculi, Aberration and Acotyhst. It's better than what it was, but I think primarily on the Grotesque. It's the same problem as the Huskblade, generally you're looking at something where targets are either single wound, or something you don't want the model with it in base-to-base with. For 15pts less, while you don't get the instant death, it's 2+ poison.

I do love the idea of it, and tried it out a reasonable amount back in 5th, and I suppose I should try again now in 6th - but I think it'll come to the same conclusion, which is what I said above.

Power sword. I think it's a good way to go with wyches. Using agonizers lock you out of +1 strength drugs and furious charge. As we saw with the agonizer math, ignoring 3+ armor has a significant impact on those fights with marines.

Power axe. I have put quite a lot of thought into these. In cases where you could be a lone character, it is a terrible idea. You'll end up being caught by too many challenges, and dark eldar are fragile to a fault. I can see using it in a character heavy unit, such as a harlequin unit.

The only model in the Harlequins that gets a Power Weapon is the Troupe Master. Losing the high-initiative attacks is going to be crippling on pretty much any DE, or Eldar in general.

Venom blade. Until we got back our ap2 weapons, this weapon seemed to be luring us all away. But after doing the math, I now see that it is worth it's 5 points, but you may come up short against 3+ armor at the wrong time. I like it paired with a weapon that has an AP value. Since it is so cheap, you could replace a pistol with it, buy haywires for a "ranged attack" and be done.

I love this thing. 5pts, massive chance to wound - with the poison re-rolls it has a 97.5 chance for any successful hit to wound. It's the only thing I tend to take on anything that can take it.

In the casual, terrain heavy games that I play, incubi are absolutely bonkers. An archon with PGL leading them is terrifying, they aren't too worried about their ride exploding, nor are they overly worried about over watch. I do like that they are still very vulnerable to things like a 30 man shoota boy unit, or a battle cannon. They feel about right.

Note: if you play with the recommended terrain density in a competitive environment, don't take incubi. Just take guns.

You also forgot the Scissorhand, which I feel deserves an honourable mention now. While before it was completely outshone by the Venom Blade, now on things like the Aberration, it will generally wound on a 2+ anyway.

I think overall, the extra bodies you can take elsewhere ultimately, rarely justifies the cost of the Huskblade or even Agoniser...

Admittedly the Archon is a different beast that can possibly take the return hits from bigger beasties, I still don't think it's really worth it, and Haemonculi really want to be kept as cheap as possible (I don't like mine to be more than 65pts, 100 with a WWP).

Baronyu wrote:
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m2570041a_Dark_Eldar_v1.1.pdf

Huskblade and klaives are AP2, Baron add +2 S to hammer of wrath!

OMFG, it is better than I could have guessed

 Shep wrote:
Now that our weapon options have been pretty much locked in, we could really scrutinize them against each other.

Starting with the big boy, the huskblade. This is a fantastic weapon in any meta, in some metas with heavy MSU spam, it won't be as good, but just about every army has a couple units that are terrified of this weapon, and combat drugs adds even more threat most of the time. I like this for archons.

Agonizer. Hmm, someone mentioned the venom blade as a "replacement" to the agonizer. Well since both of them wound on a set value, it's pretty easy to check. What I found out was that the agonizer outperforms the venom blade against 4+ armor by 8% and against 3+ armor by a massive 22%. The venom blade outperforms the agonizer against 5+ armor by 6% and 6+ armor by 30%. It also does better against 2+, but only by 6%. I think that the margin between the agonizer and venom blade against 3+ armor is significant enough to merit the cost. This is marinehammer after all.

Flesh gauntlet. No one ever mentions this. I love this weapon. Set wounding with instant death, it is the other half of the huskblade. I really like it when paired with a venom blade. Use the venom blade against single wounders and the gauntlet on the others.

Power sword. I think it's a good way to go with wyches. Using agonizers lock you out of +1 strength drugs and furious charge. As we saw with the agonizer math, ignoring 3+ armor has a significant impact on those fights with marines.

Power axe. I have put quite a lot of thought into these. In cases where you could be a lone character, it is a terrible idea. You'll end up being caught by too many challenges, and dark eldar are fragile to a fault. I can see using it in a character heavy unit, such as a harlequin unit.

Venom blade. Until we got back our ap2 weapons, this weapon seemed to be luring us all away. But after doing the math, I now see that it is worth it's 5 points, but you may come up short against 3+ armor at the wrong time. I like it paired with a weapon that has an AP value. Since it is so cheap, you could replace a pistol with it, buy haywires for a "ranged attack" and be done.

In the casual, terrain heavy games that I play, incubi are absolutely bonkers. An archon with PGL leading them is terrifying, they aren't too worried about their ride exploding, nor are they overly worried about over watch. I do like that they are still very vulnerable to things like a 30 man shoota boy unit, or a battle cannon. They feel about right.

Note: if you play with the recommended terrain density in a competitive environment, don't take incubi. Just take guns.

I view flesh guantlet as a no because it isn't a power weapon.

For the harlequins, just take kisses, and without the psychic help from the farseer I don't think a Harlequin troupe should be taking up a slot for the DE.

Huskblades are nice, but I run the duke, and/or the baron, so I'm not worrying about it, I might take an Archon on ocasion, but more as a fun list.

The agoniser just isn't worth it being ap3. Venom blade for me everytime now. I love the thing, I never thought I would because of the whole armor save thing, but is still just does more wounds which means more chances to fail the random dice rolls.

I like the fact the incubi have ap2 now. They have a spot in my army now.

Very pleased with our FAQ.

My Archon is definitely picking up a huskblade and a soultrap. I'm honestly not sure if the huskblade is worth it... but it's fun. I get great joy out of my arrogant Archon challenging enemy HQs, and now he's a very scary opponent for any Non-eternal warriors.

Currently I run my Archon with allied Harlies (so they can get fortune) and it's working very well. It's the only assault element in my army and they do a good job of absorbing fire or deterring enemy units from getting near them.

However, I'm thinking of dropping the Harlies for some Grotes or possibly Incubi. Tough choices ahead, especially because Harlequins and Incubi are my two favorite units. Grotes I think are one of our few units that can hang with SS termies. They could absorb the hits while the Archon toys with whatever IC is inevitably in the termie unit.

I remember when the new DE book first came out, I was trying units for giggles, and one of these tests was a maxed out Grotesque unit. (10 Grots, Ab, Scissorhand)

This 400 odd points of hulking flesh led by a Haemonculi walked casually across the field, absorbing every shot thrown at it and taking the grand total of 3 wounds (this was the combined firepower of at least 5 plasma cannons, a few missile launchers, bunch of bolters... possibly something else).

After their 3 turn stroll through the park, they hopped up onto a Skyshield Landing Pad where he'd been hiding a squad of TH/SS terminators - his logic being, he can't really hurt me here, I'll wait for him to come to me.

The Grotesque Squad promptly wipes out the terminators.

This whole experience was admittedly probably a whole heap of luck, but fun all the same.

10 grotesques, 3 wounds, strolled across the board... Beautiful...

I think flesh gauntlets work best on abberations, for 5pts more than the usual scissorhands, you lose 1 attack but gain the ability to ID, you'd be wounding on 3+/2+ while using the new poisoned USR anyway, get them another PT, and they're basically running with ID venom blade on charge! But if you have no intention in throwing the abberation into challenges, it's probably still best to go with scissorhands...

I also think power lance can work for us on some units... against certain army... Take helliarch for example, if you're hunting MEQs, then 1st turn, challenge with drugged helliarch on power lance, should give you a good chance at winning combat. Survive another round of combat on your opponent's turn, hit and run, then charge another unit with power lance again(if they're in good numbers still)... And it looks kinda cool on them.

@Red Viper
Why not run both at the same time? I'm planning to eventually run baron-beastmasters and grotesques together in one 1500 list... Probably not gonna be the super win win list, but it's one I definitely would enjoy...

I love running 10 grots with two heamonculi. In my tests with this unit I learned some great things, this unit is nearly indestructible lol. If it has a weakness it is mobility. My brother shot two units of stern guard and two thunderfire canons plus some tactical pot shots only to discover he killed one and a half grots. He assaulted it with ten stern guard just to watch them get pulled apart, he wanted them to speed bump me for at least a turn lol. So from then on he just avoids the teamster unit entirely. I love that unit more then words can describe. I think two 6man units one with urien and another with two Heamis would be my new take. All upgraded to S6. Exspensive but now I will have two fronts to push with... Muahahaha!

.:End ghitty rant:.

Yeah it sounds like a fun unit. I have a bunch of rat ogres laying around...

Do you guys think 4 in a raider with archon and haemonculus would be workable? Or should I just run 10 + ICs and dare my opponent to try?

I have never used Grotes before, but this sounds like a lot of fun. I don't fight a lot of S10... and I'm the GK player in my group, so...

Works for me, though usually i run urien with them instead of the haemy and archon

Red Viper wrote:Yeah it sounds like a fun unit. I have a bunch of rat ogres laying around...

Do you guys think 4 in a raider with archon and haemonculus would be workable? Or should I just run 10 + ICs and dare my opponent to try?

I have never used Grotes before, but this sounds like a lot of fun. I don't fight a lot of S10... and I'm the GK player in my group, so...

3-4 in a raider with a Haemonculi is the 'standard' for Grotesques.
Or at least it WAS in 5th... (the wound allocation shenanigans with a 3 man unit was great). From the games I've played, I think if anything they're slightly less durable now.
Most games I have done with my DE have been more Wrack focused than groesquey, or 500-1000pts.

I really should really roll out my Dark Eldar again, but I've been enjoying using my Tau (last christmas' present to myself that I finally fairly solidly finished just in time for 6th )
Maybe in a lil while.

I like the foot slogging group of grots personally, for the cost of that raider you almost get 6 more wounds and more importantly your units foot print is hard to avoid and with an aggressive deployment and a decent run move you can put the pressure on just fine. That and a big group will definitely make your opponent a reactionary player for sure which is what I like the unit for most. If they panic fire into them it's a waste of shots and if they run away you can use your other faster units to pick away at the flanks. When you hit them finally it's the killer blow usually. But maybe I should try one smaller unit in a raider and the larger ground unit and see what tactics I can cook up there.

I think at the end of the day, I need to buy 2 more boxes of Dryads to convert into more Grotesques anyway.

30 grots anyone?

 Ovion wrote:


3-4 in a raider with a Haemonculi is the 'standard' for Grotesques.
Or at least it WAS in 5th... (the wound allocation shenanigans with a 3 man unit was great). From the games I've played, I think if anything they're slightly less durable now.
Most games I have done with my DE have been more Wrack focused than groesquey, or 500-1000pts.

While FNP itself got a little worse, it's now much harder to lose it. Only instant death and S10 can remove it from Grotes, so I think they got tougher overall. I can see my megalomaniac Archon enjoying himself with such a beefy bodyguard unit. Plus, it's nice that he will have FNP and Furious Charge.

I think I'm going to try 4 in a raider first and see how they hold up.

 Red Viper wrote:

 Ovion wrote:


3-4 in a raider with a Haemonculi is the 'standard' for Grotesques.
Or at least it WAS in 5th... (the wound allocation shenanigans with a 3 man unit was great). From the games I've played, I think if anything they're slightly less durable now.
Most games I have done with my DE have been more Wrack focused than groesquey, or 500-1000pts.

While FNP itself got a little worse, it's now much harder to lose it. Only instant death and S10 can remove it from Grotes, so I think they got tougher overall. I can see my megalomaniac Archon enjoying himself with such a beefy bodyguard unit. Plus, it's nice that he will have FNP and Furious Charge.

I think I'm going to try 4 in a raider first and see how they hold up.

The reason they're a little less durable, is in 5th, with 3 Grotesques and a Haemonculi, you were generally able to take 7 wounds before losing a single model. While yes we get the worse but more durable FnP save (which as a coven is my only save generally, so I'm OK with that at the end of the day.)

Also - 30 Grotesques (Liquifiers, Abs, Venom Blades) with 3-6 Haemonculi (with Venom Blades and Liquifiers) = 1320-1515
I can fit 2 troops and a heavy support in at 1500 with 30 grotesques.
And plenty at 2000.

So, 6-10 is the recommended number if one is to try foot slogging grotesques?

I usually run 3 in a raider with a master haemonculus, and a regular haemonculus. I think I need to put my fourth together and run (liq. gun, and scissor hand) with the haemies. Thats 3 liq. guns and and bunch of venom blades. Not to mention I threw a casket of flensing on the master haemie just to see how it works. I should probably take it off because I have never used it though, usually by the time I get in range I am using the liq. gun and then assaulting.
I am interested in using 10 on foot with say urien and and maybe another haemy. I have the old school urien model that I usually use for a haemy, and I have the new fine cast one too that I need to clean up and put together and paint.

Scissorhand on a Haemonculi is going to be less effective than a Venom Blade, because the Poisoned 2+ will cause more wounds.

I'm also always dubious about the ancient, I just don't see the extra stats worth the extra 30pts (that's a whole extra grotesque, 3 more wracks, half a vehicle, etc).

Also, apart from the +1Str from Urien is the only reason to take him, the 3 Haemonculi you could take instead are usually better.

Liquifier is of course, always great, love that APd6.

 Ovion wrote:
I think at the end of the day, I need to buy 2 more boxes of Dryads to convert into more Grotesques anyway.

30 grots anyone?

OMG! This! This 1000 times!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Baronyu wrote:
So, 6-10 is the recommended number if one is to try foot slogging grotesques?

That's my take. I like 8, 10 is a bit overkill to be honest. If you were to run two units I would go with 6 each. But otherwise 6 would be my min for footslogging, it lets you take punishment from bad matchups or a bad string of rolling.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What are you guys thoughts on mind phase gauntlets, in a challenge they are ridiculous at stopping tough IC. Hit draigo three times and even he will sit there looking dumb.

 Ovion wrote:

I'm also always dubious about the ancient, I just don't see the extra stats worth the extra 30pts (that's a whole extra grotesque, 3 more wracks, half a vehicle, etc).

yeah for 10 points it would be a no brainer, 20 a little expensive, 30 way too much. I think +15 points is about right.

 Red Corsair wrote:
What are you guys thoughts on mind phase gauntlets, in a challenge they are ridiculous at stopping tough IC. Hit draigo three times and even he will sit there looking dumb.

I've been considering taking an ancient equipped with the mindphase gauntlet for exactly that purpose. I haven't had a chance to try it out yet though. Higher Initiative on the Ancient lets him attack before most other HQ's. S test and LD test for every hit. They're going to fail something. It would make one hell of a tar pit and maybe win by attrition??

I was using the scissorhand in 5th edition because of the extra attacks, and wounding on 3+ always. I might switch it out to a venom blade, and go with the ancient and the mindphase gauntlet, that is something to think about with the way it removes your opponent from play.

If only mindphase gauntlet and vexator mask works like MSS(3D6 instead of just a normal test), it'd have made them more awesome.

I don't think mindphase gauntlet is ever gonna be worth the points, of the 3 models who can take it, 2 of which are S3 models, even if you factored in FC, they wouldn't be doing a whole lot of wound with zero AP, especially if your plan is to use it to stop strong CC characters... Who would probably have good saves, good T, good S and good Ld. And they'll only work on characters who are I3 or lower, they won't stop the attacks if they strike on the same initiative.

Baronyu wrote:
If only mindphase gauntlet and vexator mask works like MSS(3D6 instead of just a normal test), it'd have made them more awesome.

I don't think mindphase gauntlet is ever gonna be worth the points, of the 3 models who can take it, 2 of which are S3 models, even if you factored in FC, they wouldn't be doing a whole lot of wound with zero AP, especially if your plan is to use it to stop strong CC characters... Who would probably have good saves, good T, good S and good Ld. And they'll only work on characters who are I3 or lower, they won't stop the attacks if they strike on the same initiative.

Yea except it triggers off hits not wounds. So actually even draigo will fail it often. I know from testing with dice and a few extra minutes one night. Now that Paladins aren't [ch] you can challenge draigo and neutralize him completely. Of course discretion is the better side of valor but if you simple have to confront him like I want to, it's a hilarious option.

 Red Corsair wrote:
Yea except it triggers off hits not wounds. So actually even draigo will fail it often. I know from testing with dice and a few extra minutes one night. Now that Paladins aren't [ch] you can challenge draigo and neutralize him completely. Of course discretion is the better side of valor but if you simple have to confront him like I want to, it's a hilarious option.

Oh, never noticed that part... I guess it can be a fun weapon for special occasions then.

 Red Corsair wrote:

Baronyu wrote:
If only mindphase gauntlet and vexator mask works like MSS(3D6 instead of just a normal test), it'd have made them more awesome.

I don't think mindphase gauntlet is ever gonna be worth the points, of the 3 models who can take it, 2 of which are S3 models, even if you factored in FC, they wouldn't be doing a whole lot of wound with zero AP, especially if your plan is to use it to stop strong CC characters... Who would probably have good saves, good T, good S and good Ld. And they'll only work on characters who are I3 or lower, they won't stop the attacks if they strike on the same initiative.

Yea except it triggers off hits not wounds. So actually even draigo will fail it often. I know from testing with dice and a few extra minutes one night. Now that Paladins aren't [ch] you can challenge draigo and neutralize him completely. Of course discretion is the better side of valor but if you simple have to confront him like I want to, it's a hilarious option.

except haemi ancients are init 5 and draigo is also init 5. He still gets to attack. Now if you are tlaking about a character with a PF then it is a great idea.

Yea but my haemi is always trip pain tokens, so if you set up the charge it works at I6, but yea against draigo you are better off avoiding him lol. Though a 10 an squad of super grots with lady malice and haemis will tear even paladins apart.

 Red Corsair wrote:
Yea but my haemi is always trip pain tokens, so if you set up the charge it works at I6, but yea against draigo you are better off avoiding him lol. Though a 10 an squad of super grots with lady malice and haemis will tear even paladins apart.

FC no longer gives +1 init

 Exergy wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:
Yea but my haemi is always trip pain tokens, so if you set up the charge it works at I6, but yea against draigo you are better off avoiding him lol. Though a 10 an squad of super grots with lady malice and haemis will tear even paladins apart.

FC no longer gives +1 init

I knew I should actually play with my DE during 6th lol. Good catch. So he is pretty limited now but very useful against unweildy weapon carriers like Lysander or Belial.

Well, I had my first game with Archon + Haemie + 4 Grots in a raider against my friends massive ork army.

At a crucial point in the game, my Archon's raider got shot down. They were 12 inches from the Nob Biker unit. Next turn I move and try to assault him... I roll a 4. Damn.

Now I know I'm in for the pain train. His painboy accepts the challenge my Archon issued, and got huskbladed. My Grots killed 3 bikers, leaving 2 bikers and the Warboss.... the warboss is S10.

My unit is wiped out, but my Archon aint skerrd. He challenges again, this time the Warboss accepts. I hit with all my attacks, but then cannot roll a 6 to wound. Luckily I made 3 shadowfield saves. Next turn, the warboss got huskbladed. Boom. S6 Archon running around... although then I conceded because the rest of my army was pretty much gone.

Not a great first showing, but that's one of their worst match ups. Also, if I had gotten the charge off I think I would have nearly wiped out his unit. A little bit of bad luck in failing the charge there. His warboss still would have killed 3 of my grots though, no way around it.

I see potential and I look forward to trying them again.

So yesterday was my first game with my incubi squad. I run the Duke and 6 incubi in a raider. I had a haemonculus with them also for a pain token. They did a very good job. I played against nids and they only lost 1 incubi. But I think they are going to be regulars in my army from now on. Also I think that the size is about right. Not too big to wipe out your opponent in one turn hopefully, but still big enough to take care of business.

 Red Viper wrote:
Well, I had my first game with Archon + Haemie + 4 Grots in a raider against my friends massive ork army.

At a crucial point in the game, my Archon's raider got shot down. They were 12 inches from the Nob Biker unit. Next turn I move and try to assault him... I roll a 4. Damn.

Now I know I'm in for the pain train. His painboy accepts the challenge my Archon issued, and got huskbladed. My Grots killed 3 bikers, leaving 2 bikers and the Warboss.... the warboss is S10.

My unit is wiped out, but my Archon aint skerrd. He challenges again, this time the Warboss accepts. I hit with all my attacks, but then cannot roll a 6 to wound. Luckily I made 3 shadowfield saves. Next turn, the warboss got huskbladed. Boom. S6 Archon running around... although then I conceded because the rest of my army was pretty much gone.

Not a great first showing, but that's one of their worst match ups. Also, if I had gotten the charge off I think I would have nearly wiped out his unit. A little bit of bad luck in failing the charge there. His warboss still would have killed 3 of my grots though, no way around it.

next time challenge with the haemi. then use the abbveration and archon to try and kill the warboss with precision strikes. It might not work, but you have a better chance than otherwise.

Obivously if you get the charge off, try and put the haemi and archon in contact with the warboss, but nothing else. That way his attacks have to go against one of them.

So I played my first 1850 game today (at least since 6th has dropped)

I basically just threw the duke and a warrior blob onto my 1500 point baron list. And you know what? It worked out spectacularly. I'm still in love with the 3+ warrior blob.

Unfortunately I have had more than my fair share of bourbon this evening so I will put out a detailed report when I can think more clearly.

So, the morning has come, I have a piping hot cup of tea and much to say.

First, I gotta say that I'm loving the Sliscus/Baron tag-team. Both are amazing force multipliers, and the warrior blob that accompanies the Baron into battle gives me an infantry unit that's durable enough to last.

My game was against a Blood Angel razorspam list, something like 4 or 5 razorbacks with minimalist assault squads inside and filled out FA and HS slots with predators. Not exactly the easiest list to play against, but I went into it with the plan of focusing on his troops. The basic idea was that if I could hold onto one objective and he couldn't hold onto any, I would win. So the first turn saw me popping open a bunch of Razorbacks with Dark Lances while turbo-boosting my jetbikes across the table on either side of his tanks. The venoms and beasts hid in LoS blocking cover, and the warrior blob hunkered down in a ruin. Drugs saw pain tokens for everybody. My opponent's turn, he shifted his remaining razorbacks to deny the Ravagers LoS, but then blew them away with his predators thus making it a moot point. Not much else happened.

Turn two, beast pack jumped forward and within danger range of one of the razorbacks, the jetbikes moved in and everything else stayed put. Splinter cannon fire from the blob severely depleted one assault marine squad, heat lances gutted a razorback and a predator and the beast pack surrounded and wrecked the razorback, insta-killing the squad inside as they couldn't disembark when the wreck was totally surrounded. I'm incredibly happy that I didn't explode the damn thing, and nearly panicked when the duke got two penetrating hits, only to roll a stunned and weapon destroyed result. Here's where my opponent started to mess up. He knew his MSU marine squads couldn't handle the beast pack, and now they were all on foot or dead. He pulled them back as best he could (and made a comment about how he missed his jump packs now) and then split his armored forces in two. He sent half his remaining predators hunting for my hiding venoms and the other half to get good firing lines on the beast pack. Despite his fast vehicles, he couldn't get LoS on the venoms, and he'd now drastically weakened the amount of firepower he put out towards the beast pack, which survived thanks to the Khymerae being cleverly placed (to toot my own horn a bit) on the outside of the assault, so they soaked up the auto/lascannon fire. Also he should have sent the Baal predators after the beast squad, those extra assault cannon shots would've probably made a difference.

Regardless, his forces were now split and pretty vulnerable. His troops were in retreat from the beast pack and I still had all of my venoms sitting behind the same ruin my warrior pack was hiding in. Now it was pretty much a cakewalk for me. I heat lanced one predator, assaulted another with the beast pack, blade-vaned an assault squad off the board, the venoms emerged from cover and began showering everything with a toughness value in poison and my warrior squad did much the same. In return for leaving him with only one scoring unit (or something like that) he killed off two of my venoms and immobilized a third. Feel no pain saw my MSU wyches survive decently well and they charged off after the tank to avenge their fallen transports. Splinter cannons and bladevanes killed the last assault marine squad and the beast pack did an extraordinary amount of damage to itself by making a predator explode. I lost all of my remaining Khymerae, the duke took a wound and one of my razorwing flocks only had two wounds left. Guess my good luck couldn't hold out forever. My opponent conceded at the end of my turn, since he had no scoring units left.

I can't remember what mission we were playing or how many objectives there were. I'm also not quite sure what happened to his warlord, I know he had one and he was attached to one of the assault marine squads but I have no idea if he'd gone with a captain or a librarian. If he went with the librarian, he didn't use any psychic powers. I think he was in the razorback that I prevented from disembarking but I cannot remember. The first stop after our game was my friend's house and he demanded I try this wonderful bourbon he'd gotten after hearing about how I'd acquired a thirst for Woodford reserve.

I ended up going home in a cab. It was a good night.

I've found from experience that most DE vehicles last longer than they would previously, as glances no longer role on the vehicle damage chart, so you can reliably move them without shaken and stunned results getting you down. Now, your open topped AV 10 transport is a fragile as a rhino (taking into account jink)

So, in regards to vehicles, they are not necessarily weaker (in fact I feel they have gotten nice little buffs) but instead, they are just more in line with other transports now. The role of transports in general has changed, no longer will a rhino last to turn 6 with only the stormbolter blown off! Now transports are used to TRANSPORT troops, rather than mobile bunkers.

God forbid we begin using transports as, well, transports!

Can't say that is the case for all the transports in game, nightscythe for example can last the entire game while doing good fire support. I hate to use points to points comparison, but we pay a measly amount compared with NS, land raider, etc, so I agree, we shouldn't expect our transports to last as long, but I don't think anyone is to begin with.

In regards to Lokas' batrep, I wonder if Baron hellions gang would work in that setup? Might be a little costly, but you do get better drugs!

I haven't contributed to this topic before because I've been testing things with all the three of my armies in sixth and now finally I can actually say something. Please forgive me if I mention something that has been said already, I have read through the topic but will propably not remember everything that has been said. All my points are based on my own experience and a little thinking.

First off I want to start with Wyches because they are what I based my army on when I started DE (I liked the models). 5 wyches in a Venom with two splinter cannons has been working well for me. 12 shots (16 if counting the pistols from the squad) will tenderize the enemy enough to make the overwatch more of a nuisance than an actual threat. The venoms can survive incredibly well especially if nightfighting is in use. Additionally equipping the wyches with haywire grenades makes them just plain evil against vehicles. Best of all, people like to field shooty units now more than before so wyches can eradicate pretty much anything in melee now with the weakness being if they end any of your own turns outside of melee they are pretty much dead. All this applies to the Succubus and the Bloodbrides also.

I don't even remember why did I get Scourges during 5th edition but now in 6th those haywire blasters are quite good. Throw in a solarite with a blast pistol if you have the points and they have a tad bit more potential. Deep strike near a vehicle and they can do some serious damage. Being a rather fast moving unit helps too.

Not much to say about Razorwing Jetfighters. I have never fielded Ravagers because I liked the look of Razorwings more (even though a ravager was a better option) but now in 6th this vehicle that I love oh so much is evil. Because of the lack of skyfire it can be hard to shoot down and if upgraded with a flickerfield it will survive even longer.

Raiders and Kabalite Warriors have always belonged together and in my opinnion nothing much has really changed with those two. They are quite good and work nicely. I am going to be testing a footslogging 20 man squad soon though.

Beastmaster units got interesting. Especially with the new wound allocation. Put some Khymerae in the front and that invulnerable save will be a wonderful source of swearing (from the enemy side that is).

Now that the huskblade is AP2 it is quite killy. An Archon with one and a soul trap and shadowfield is rather effective. I had a game where the enemy got the first turn and had incredibly good luck with dice (and I had bad luck with them) and his victory was assured before my first turn had even begun, but as I always play my games to the last man (or turn) no matter what my Archon ended up S10 with 4 pain tokens, and was the sole survivor of my army until finally was taken down on turn 6 when the enemy finally managed to get through that shadowfield. He single handedly slaughtered a lot of space puppies that day.

The Court of the Archon can be a good unit also. The thing just is that making it larger than the minimum size can be problematic. Medusae can be awesome or completely useless because of the random S and AP of the shooting but if you are the favorite of the dice gods that Eyeburst attack can get rid of those pesky 2+ save enemies. There is really never no need for two Lhameans. One is enough. Ur-Ghuls are quite useful. If you really want a large Court taking 5 of them is not really a bad idea. 3 attacks at S4 and they are quite nice meatshields to boot. Sslyths are my personal favorites though. They are expensive but well equipped and T5 W2 is never a bad thing. ID only on S10? Works for me. They are incredibly good front line men for the court also because of their survivability.

Reavers got a bit more durable now that the double toughness is gone but that's pretty much all that changed about them.

Mandrakes. I love them. They die often and can't charge on the first turn if they infiltrate but if they do get into melee they can be deadly. If they get that pain token they can be a surprisingly effective harassment unit.

That's it... I think. I hope I remembered everything I was going to say. Feel free to point out if you disagree about something. Oh, and before anybody is going to say "but unit X does it better" I never said that any of these units were the best possible choices for any purpose

For the same 160~ points that my beastpack loadout costs me, you'd only be able to get 10 naked Hellions.

The beasts actually have more bases, not to mention that the flocks alone have literally twice the wounds of the hellions. Then there's all the other benefits of the beast pack, rending, invulnerable saves and so on.

I don't think losing all of that is quite balanced out by the better drugs and the fact that the hellions would be scoring. Now, if you went balls out with it and took a full blown 20 strong Hellion mob with Sliscus on the side? That might be worth taking. Much more expensive, less cost-efficient, but it would certainly punk the hell out of whatever it came in contact with while also posing a frightening shooting threat. 40 Splinter Pod shots ain't nothin' to sniff at, especially if you jump from ruin to ruin to benefit from a 3+ cover save.

 gaovinni wrote:
Reavers got a bit more durable now that the double toughness is gone but that's pretty much all that changed about them.

Not true.

They turboboost 36 inches. This means that they can move 12", then move 36" in the shooting phase. 48" on any turn is nice.

They get Jink, giving them a cover save just for moving, not necessarily turboboosting.

They have Skilled Rider, meaning they completely ignore dangerous terrain.

Also, Skilled Rider adds 1 to the Jink save. So, moving any gives them a 4+ cover, and turboboosting gives them a 3+ cover.

There's a lot that changed about them.

Also, Bladevanes are still nasty, especially when using multiple units.

EDIT: And AP1 is nasty.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Red Corsair wrote:

 Exergy wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:
Yea but my haemi is always trip pain tokens, so if you set up the charge it works at I6, but yea against draigo you are better off avoiding him lol. Though a 10 an squad of super grots with lady malice and haemis will tear even paladins apart.

FC no longer gives +1 init

I knew I should actually play with my DE during 6th lol. Good catch. So he is pretty limited now but very useful against unweildy weapon carriers like Lysander or Belial.

Which is precisely why he is so good.

The only real threats against Grots is S10. Lysander, Arjac, PK Warboss, Dreadknight, Justicar with Hammerhand and NFH, etc. The Haemi with Mindphase makes them much more survivable versus these characters.

Personally I find a 20 man blob of warrior's in ruins with the duke starting with them to give them the 3+ poison shot to be amazing.

somerandomdude wrote:

 gaovinni wrote:
Reavers got a bit more durable now that the double toughness is gone but that's pretty much all that changed about them.

Not true.

They turboboost 36 inches. This means that they can move 12", then move 36" in the shooting phase. 48" on any turn is nice.

They get Jink, giving them a cover save just for moving, not necessarily turboboosting.

They have Skilled Rider, meaning they completely ignore dangerous terrain.

Also, Skilled Rider adds 1 to the Jink save. So, moving any gives them a 4+ cover, and turboboosting gives them a 3+ cover.

There's a lot that changed about them.

Also, Bladevanes are still nasty, especially when using multiple units.

EDIT: And AP1 is nasty.

Ah. Sorry. Still a bit off with the jetbike rules. Haven't fielded them much... yet.

I'm finding running a naked Haemonculus as my only HQ and hiding him all game behind a building is great. He unlocks Wracks as troops and is cheap. Fulfils the HQ requirement and rarely gives up Slay the Warlord as he is out of LoS (or in reserve).

Drager wrote:
I'm finding running a naked Haemonculus as my only HQ and hiding him all game behind a building is great. He unlocks Wracks as troops and is cheap. Fulfils the HQ requirement and rarely gives up Slay the Warlord as he is out of LoS (or in reserve).

I found the disadvantage with that is he is easy warlord points against any sort of army with mobility (flyers, turboboost attacks, barrage weapons, scouts, fast skimmers etc). It can be a good opportunity for your opponent to get line breaker while he is at it. For example: Slash attacking, bladevaning, or vector striking the haemi on the last turn to get line breaker and a warlord victory point.

Also, I'd still run him with a Hex Rifle even on his own, so he can do something (Possibly with a 3man squad of wracks, with a hex rifle), but ultimately running him as a naked, squishy, 50 point target just seems wasteful to me.

 Exergy wrote:


next time challenge with the haemi. then use the abbveration and archon to try and kill the warboss with precision strikes. It might not work, but you have a better chance than otherwise.

Obivously if you get the charge off, try and put the haemi and archon in contact with the warboss, but nothing else. That way his attacks have to go against one of them.

Thanks for the tip. I'm still a little sketchy on some of the new rules, so that is very handy. I ebayed a mini rulebook and have not received it yet, I can't wait to study it. Challenge rules, precision strikes, flyers, and the new psychic abilities are all at the top of my list.

My dice let me down that game though, I think I was doomed to lose. I had about 18 Lances/Blasters in my list, primarily shooting at my opponent's AV10 trukks. By the end of turn two, I had only destroyed one trukk and had stripped one hull point off another. The one destroyed trukk was on my very first shot of the game, hah. The amount of 1's I rolled defied all math. The strange thing is that I was hitting pretty normal, just could not pen anything.

But, I did get first blood and my opponent's warboss got destroyed by a space elf pirate, so I still had fun.

 Ovion wrote:
Also, I'd still run him with a Hex Rifle even on his own, so he can do something (Possibly with a 3man squad of wracks, with a hex rifle), but ultimately running him as a naked, squishy, 50 point target just seems wasteful to me.

I find the Hexrifle wasteful. I can spend those points better elsewhere. I have rarely given up warlord with this as I play a pure shooting force, mobile enemy units are unlikely to get anywhere near him without being eliminated. Particularly on the last turn. If I think someone will hit him with such an attack I'll just cram him into a transport.

I guess I see the HQ slot as a 50 point upgrade to give Wracks scoring and nothing else. We have no good sooting HQs you see.

I don't find the Hex Rifle wasteful at all, I have used at least 2 in pretty much every game, and I'm probably bumping that up to 4 in 6th.

They've pretty much always paid for themselves, the Hex-Wracks take objectives and snipe out models, usually once a game (that has them) I'll take out a multi-wound model with the Hex effect. (which is a nice bonus), my favourite being when I dropped a 4-wound Tomb Spyder home-brew special character turn 1 with the first shot of the game from a Hex Rifle.

Ok, yes, most of the time they're a 36" range rending splinter rifle, but they generally do well.


I'm actually debating trying a mech-y list, with 6x 3 Wracks w/ a Hex Rifle, 3 in raiders, 3 in venoms, then 3 raiders of Grotesques, throw in a razorwing, maybe some talos and see what happens.

 Ovion wrote:
I don't find the Hex Rifle wasteful at all, I have used at least 2 in pretty much every game, and I'm probably bumping that up to 4 in 6th.

They've pretty much always paid for themselves, the Hex-Wracks take objectives and snipe out models, usually once a game (that has them) I'll take out a multi-wound model with the Hex effect. (which is a nice bonus), my favourite being when I dropped a 4-wound Tomb Spyder home-brew special character turn 1 with the first shot of the game from a Hex Rifle.

Ok, yes, most of the time they're a 36" range rending splinter rifle, but they generally do well.


I'm actually debating trying a mech-y list, with 6x 3 Wracks w/ a Hex Rifle, 3 in raiders, 3 in venoms, then 3 raiders of Grotesques, throw in a razorwing, maybe some talos and see what happens.

Sounds like a fun list. I haven't used the Hexrifle myself, but it sounds like a good try for a bunch of cheap units of wracks as troops and like you said just have them camp out and take pop shots and see if you can't take out a few characters.

Seperate note:

Any list suggestions anyone for taking on a heavy chimera guard army? I know he has 2 vendetta's, I think 6 chimera's, 1 basilisk, and two manticores at 1850. Filled with veterans, and heavy weapon autocannons.

I was thinking about taking:

archon- blaster

4 trueborn- 4 blasters in venom x3

5 wyches- hekatrix w/ venom blade and haywire in venom x4

6 reavers- 2 heatlances, arena champion venom blade

ravager- 3 dark lances x2

void raven- 2 shattershard missiles

I run my venoms with the extra splinter cannon and night shields also, and my raiders and ravagers with night shields and flickerfields.

I'm sure I could have made it more venomy by not taking the reavers but I like them, and they can move 48 inches on turn 1 so hopefully with the other venoms moving up and the ravagers taking out a vehicles or two that they can make it to turn two and hopefully pop a manticore, and hopefully the voidraven can either shoot a vendetta down or take out the other manticore, while the wyches haywire grenade and the trueborn use their blasters on the transports.

That is my theory, I usually don't play this list because I don't like the spamminess of it, but a friend plays that kind of guard list and wants to play, and instead of bringing my normal DE list to get slaughtered, I thought I would try something more competitive.

Well you should run the baron to help with first turn, then get as close as possible to one flank of his army depending on terrain. You need to close the gap so his artillery can't splash all your light transports without endangering his own line and also so the parking lot gets in it's own way and also to reduce the effectiveness of his vendettas so maybe he switches to hover mode which if he falls for it you don't need snap shots to hit them. then your wyches will make a run through his lot even after they lose a few rides. With PGL you can use your wrecks to get great cover as well.

 Ovion wrote:
Also, I'd still run him with a Hex Rifle even on his own, so he can do something (Possibly with a 3man squad of wracks, with a hex rifle), but ultimately running him as a naked, squishy, 50 point target just seems wasteful to me.

I've run a couple games with a hex rifle Haemi joining a squad of Mandrakes in some ruins. He gives them a pain token, so they have their shooting attack, and they give him Stealth and can be 5++ blockers.

Sadly, he has yet to find anything worth shooting, multi-Wound-wise, but the 'drakes have been pretty amazing shooters.

Haemonculus can't join the squad of mandrakes on the first turn as per the infiltrate special rules.

 Lokas wrote:
Haemonculus can't join the squad of mandrakes on the first turn as per the infiltrate special rules.

Sure he can, just not during deployment.

Drager wrote:

 Lokas wrote:
Haemonculus can't join the squad of mandrakes on the first turn as per the infiltrate special rules.

Sure he can, just not during deployment.

What he said. I have the Haemi move to them during the move phase and join up with them then.

Had a great game the other day, where I was experimenting with Pain engines, they are pretty good this edition. If anyone is interested here is the battle report:

BR10: The Black Buzzards VS SM Salamanders - 1500pts

They are still a tad fragile, but 6th has been kind to them in places

Now if only you could start them off with a Pain Token, they'd be used a whole lot more.

I take them anyway, as my DE are a Coven list.

Good to know, I quite like the Talos model and, in general, the coven side of thing. Would really love to get some wracks in, but stupid moneys, why can't I have all of them?

If you use Plague Monks you get 2 full squads for the cost of half a unit.

Mine were built from 2nd ed ork torsos, Dark elf warrion legs and all sorts of gubbins from the bits box for arms, plus spare masks from the talos/cronos kit.

The 'official' ones are ok, but grotesquely overpriced (pun intended)

 Ascalam wrote:
WWP Assaults are now no-go, as is zoom and assault.

We pay extra in points and fragility for our fast vehicles to be able to zoom-drop-assault, but now we can't do that. Ork trukks are in the same boat.

WWP delivery shooty units might be worth a go though.

Our assault units are likely to get shot up a bit more trying to get into assault, and out Pain Engines are now even less able to handle vehicles due to the loss of the 2d6 to pen.

I'll need to read the book, and try a few games to see how the rules interact, but right now it looks like we took a hefty kick in the effectiveness, and had our speciality (speed)handed out to every other army.

All open topped vehicles are assault vehicles, how does this effect Ork Trucks and DE transports negatively?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ovion wrote:
From what I recall (and will go check and correct if wrong in a minute)
On a roll of 4+, you get night fight turn 1.
Then at the start of each subsequent turn, on a roll of a 4+ it goes away and you don't need to roll for it again.

This is wrong, it's either on first turn or every subsequent turn AFTER turn 5. The paragraphs are seperated that reference these two things in the night fighting section.

If you want to be able to drop troops and have them assault in the same turn they can only go 6''

The 5th ed standard practise was to zoom 12'' over intervening troops/scenery, drop troops and have them assault.

I grant you that the 2d6 assault can make up for this:

5th: move 12'', disembark 2'', move 6'', (DE run D6'' due to fleet) assault 6'' : 20 '' (21-26 DE)

6th: move 6'', disembark 6'', assault 2d6 '' : 14-24 '' with fleet no longer allowing for extra distance (though the reroll can help)

This IS a downgrade. You have the potential to exceed the 5th ed range for assaulting from an open-topped vehicle, but the average is lower, and the potential low-end is woefully low (14'')

 Ascalam wrote:

I'll need to read the book, and try a few games to see how the rules interact, but right now it looks like we took a hefty kick in the effectiveness, and had our speciality (speed)handed out to every other army.

My advice would be to give the game ago rather then theory hammering things and then claiming the sky is falling. If you haven't had many/any games in 6th it makes sense why you are underestimating fleet.

Fleet is huge this edition, as it lets you re-roll one or more dice, which means your average charge distance with fleet is 9" (57% chance of making a 9" charge). It also makes fleet models a lot more reliable at charging through terrain, the average charge distance through terrain is 8" (52% chance of making a 8" charge). With fleet you have a 93% chance of making a 6" charge in the open and a 82% chance of making a 6" charge through difficult terrain. Finally now you can shoot before assaulting which is great when you assault troops have good BS, plasma grenades, and splinter pistols. As soon as you don't have fleet charging becomes really unreliable making assault units without fleet a liability, so it's not something you should dismiss so casually.

Hope that helps.

Well, I'll bring my DE army back to the table. The first game will be next week.
In this thread, we here a lot about deathstars of Harlie or Grotesque type. The Grotesque deathstar seems viable due to the toughness of the models, FnP, and the models are multi-wound. A Harliestar seems to be more fragile, especially if its a dark one since it cannot be fortuned. I guess that I will stay away from a Harliestar of any type.
By the way, recently, I tried a Seer Council joined by Fuegan against BA and it worked very well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If you run a deathstar of any type, what kind of fire support do you use?
At the moment I have three Razorwings (awesome models) and I plan to use them. Fire support could come from a Warrior blob, Trueborn, and Venoms. Thoughts?

 Ascalam wrote:
Mine were built from 2nd ed ork torsos, Dark elf warrion legs and all sorts of gubbins from the bits box for arms, plus spare masks from the talos/cronos kit.

The 'official' ones are ok, but grotesquely overpriced (pun intended)

DE warrior torso + heads/ DELF Corsair Arms / Empire Flaggellant Legs


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Mushkilla wrote:
Finally now you can shoot before assaulting which is great when you assault troops have good BS, plasma grenades, and splinter pistols. As soon as you don't have fleet charging becomes really unreliable making assault units without fleet a liability, so it's not something you should dismiss so casually.
)

Be careful when shooting before you charge, you can end up increasing the charge range required by killing models.

 Exergy wrote:

Be careful when shooting before you charge, you can end up increasing the charge range required by killing models.

In my experience shooting with wyches kills at most 2-3 models, so I haven't had that problem.

Mushkilla wrote:

 Exergy wrote:

Be careful when shooting before you charge, you can end up increasing the charge range required by killing models.

In my experience shooting with wyches kills at most 2-3 models, so I haven't had that problem.

2-3 models can be 2-3 inches. I only shoot when I am right on top of the enemy.

Sorry to side track but how do you guys do against flyers? I haven't gotten the chance to face a mass flyer list yet. I'm thinking it shouldn't be to big a problem considering that it's pretty easy to out maneuver them.

Razorwings are good dogfighters, Voidravens are better dogfighters.

Lances / dissies from the ground if they hit will do fine.
Otherwise - same boat as everyone else, needs a gun emplacment of some kind. But ultimately, out own flyers are decent enough for the task.

Mass flyers kind of feth us over. Even if we take 3 Voidravens and an ADL with a quad gun, that's not going to be all that fantastic against 6+ Scythes.

In regards to shooting and then charging.

We could do that last edition too. The reason nobody did was because it was a bad idea. It still is for the most part. Provided your opponent isn't arrayed in a square formation with you impacting a flat side, every base removed is an additional 25mm needed to get into base to base contact to make the charge successful. Maybe less, maybe more depending on how the enemy is spaced.

It's especially dangerous now that charge rolls are random. Before, I could eyeball my six inches and figure if I took out three models I'd still have the charge. Now? Well I know how far I am. I know how far I might be if I kill some models, but can I roll that high? There's too many variables, I don't bother shooting unless I'm already nuts to butts with the enemy.

I have not encountered a mass flyer list so far but I've been taking out enemy fliers with my Razorwing or just lucky hits from the ground troops. If something goes to hover mode though I will not waste the opportunity to take it down.

 gaovinni wrote:
I have not encountered a mass flyer list so far but I've been taking out enemy fliers with my Razorwing or just lucky hits from the ground troops. If something goes to hover mode though I will not waste the opportunity to take it down.

I'm running 3 Razorwings. So no Ravagers for me as they are easier to take down.