What in my army can counter these things! They sit at the very nadir of effectiveness of Dark Lances, which are great against AV 10,11,13 and 14 but have trouble with AV 12, especially when that AV 12 has a 3+ cover save when jinking and has the possibility ti downgrade pens to glances. If i was to do the math, the Wave Serpent has 3 hull points, so I glance on 4+ so i need 6 hits, he has a 3+ jink so i need 18(!!!!) Dark Lance shots to take down a single Wave Serpent via hull points.That simply isn't possible, *EVEN* when they are snap firing they still have the ability destroy most Dark Eldar vehicles with the Twin-Linked Scatter laser and the 'Twin-linked' Serpent Shield. 'Haywire Wyches!' i here you shout, but how on Earth do the Wyches get there in a 2 Hull Point AV 10 Venom. Without resorted to Eldar allies, how can i handle this horrible, horrible machine that can personally take out every tank in my army even when snap firing?
Waveserpents have always been the bane of the DE army, back even when Eldar had their 4th edition codex.
I've played quite a few games vs DE with my Eldar, and there really doesn't seem to be an answer. It just seems to be one of those rock paper scissors match, much like how DE are to Tyranids.
Beast star with fortune or invisibility will tear up serpent spam. Reserve the venoms so they don't get torn up by serpent shields, then use them later to hunt jetbikes.
schadenfreude wrote: Beast star with fortune or invisibility will tear up serpent spam. Reserve the venoms so they don't get torn up by serpent shields, then use them later to hunt jetbikes.
Well, it this case, I'd tie up the Beaststar with a Council long enough so that the Serpents can do enough damage.
Well that's...disappointing. A Beaststar could work, but Fortune or Invisibility aren't the most reliable of things, especially as I am playing Dark Eldar main so he will have more Warp Charges then me.
Sigh, it's not the fact that Wave Serpents are so good that annoys me, it's the fact they are so dam indestructible! They could have half the fire power and still obliterate my army due to it's Jink save and good AV. I might just refuse to play anyone that brings more then 2 of them, it's a shame a single unit of over powered can ruin a game for me.
I haven't seen anyone use them in a long long time. but scourges have the maneuverability and weapon loadout to eat wave serpents alive. they are pretty pricey, if i remember right. but ranged haywire on jump troops still makes me cringe.
For melee, think talos. yeah. its not that good against most other models either. but its way more survivable to get to a wave serpent than wyches. and its enough against rear armor. while its not usually fast enough, it can allow you to control where the wave serpents can move. use it to keep em behind buildings to avoid your assault.
Currently eldar steam roll DE. It sucks but we just need to hang tight until fall when we allegedly get our update. I'm praying they add some tools when they do, though odds are it will always be a rough fight. What we need is MUCH more open availability for haywire blasters, its a very fluffy weapon that suits us, it just needs assault 2 and as I said, better access and I think we shimmy up the poll quite a bit.
What do i do when the Dire Avengers inside the Wave Serpent stop running scared and realize they have range 18'' rending storm bolters? Or a Wraithknight instant kills it? Or in fact any other of that ''Roll a 6 to win'' Over Powered Cr*p Eldar get? Scourges would be...inefficient to say the least. 2 Haywire shots in a unit of 5, so you are wasting 9 Carbine shots for 2 maybe-glances which he gets a 3+ cover save against, knowing full well they will instantly die next turn.
I am kind of contemplating taking a Tantalus Grotstar with Urien to make them Str 6 (7 on the charge). AV 12 4HP is as resilient as we are going to get without bringing Vect into this and the Grots can handle most things in the Eldar army...until he throws a Wraithknight my way and Instant Kills everything. Sigh, Is it just me or is the power difference between ever middle tier armies such as Dark Eldar and Hier Tier armies such as Eldar and Tau is just getting larger, I'd hate to know what it feels like to be a Blood Angles player!
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: What do i do when the Dire Avengers inside the Wave Serpent stop running scared and realize they have range 18'' rending storm bolters? Or a Wraithknight instant kills it? Or in fact any other of that ''Roll a 6 to win'' Over Powered Cr*p Eldar get? Scourges would be...inefficient to say the least. 2 Haywire shots in a unit of 5, so you are wasting 9 Carbine shots for 2 maybe-glances which he gets a 3+ cover save against, knowing full well they will instantly die next turn.
I am kind of contemplating taking a Tantalus Grotstar with Urien to make them Str 6 (7 on the charge). AV 12 4HP is as resilient as we are going to get without bringing Vect into this and the Grots can handle most things in the Eldar army...until he throws a Wraithknight my way and Instant Kills everything. Sigh, Is it just me or is the power difference between ever middle tier armies such as Dark Eldar and Hier Tier armies such as Eldar and Tau is just getting larger, I'd hate to know what it feels like to be a Blood Angles player!
Eldar weren't pushing models out the factories.
GW buffs Eldar to become disgusting monstrosities. Tau previously.
If you were at Adepticon, you would have seen Trip Tide and Knights bloody everywhere. I think there were maybe, 5-6 people not running some disgusting form of Trip Tide + Allied Knights? The game has devolved quite the bit, but thankfully Orks and DE are next to get re-done.
The only things that I can really think of that would be helpful have already been mentioned, Scourges, Grots, Hwyches. Maybe you can ram them with your raiders if you're desperate. Or if you're taking the Tantalus then you should also consider taking eldar fire dragon allies embarked on it. get a nice little range bonus thanks to open topped. But taking pansy allies is always a meh in my book. Maybe you could even take heat lances on your reavers...yeah, i'd just wait till the update.
Wraithknights should not be an issue for you. You've got poison weapons everywhere. When i've started my Wraithknight on the table against DE, it has ALWAYS given up first blood.
DE will struggle against AV12 with good saves, that's simply the nature of the codex. Same reason Daemons struggle against GK's, and other armies counter other armies. Take your lickings against Eldar, and just hope you play against Orks next.
schadenfreude wrote: Beast star with fortune or invisibility will tear up serpent spam. Reserve the venoms so they don't get torn up by serpent shields, then use them later to hunt jetbikes.
Well, it this case, I'd tie up the Beaststar with a Council long enough so that the Serpents can do enough damage.
Reavers, shattershard and crucible, bye bye council.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Red Corsair wrote: Currently eldar steam roll DE. It sucks but we just need to hang tight until fall when we allegedly get our update. I'm praying they add some tools when they do, though odds are it will always be a rough fight. What we need is MUCH more open availability for haywire blasters, its a very fluffy weapon that suits us, it just needs assault 2 and as I said, better access and I think we shimmy up the poll quite a bit.
I don't see how this is even slightly possible, if someone brings 5 serpents then it is pretty difficult to hide your whole army from them. The fact that they spam str 7 cover ignoring shots and take 18 lances on average to take down mean that they really are the bane of DE.
I don't see many viable ways of taking out a wave serpent vs a good player. Possibly try to bait his shield and then hit it with all the lances you have.
If you have enough lances on the table, and the opponent plays very cautiously, then at least you can limit their firepower by forcing them all (most) to jink.
I can't see the beaststar or wyches getting close enough to the 12 move skimmer, plus if you do get close then it can boost 30 inches away in its next turn.
As for the wraithkngiht, I hate them. T8 and 6 wounds with a 12 inch move makes them incredibly powerful. I dislike them much more than the riptide. At least the riptide is bad in cc and is effected by morale and small arms. The wraith knight ignores almost everything on the table. With this said, DE players shouldn't have a problem. For you guys a wraith knight is just as tough as 6 tactical marines.
Its easy to hide your army when the enemy has 5 or so wave serpents, each with a 12 move and a potential 60 inch range? What kind of boards are you playing on?
City block with no LoS between each street or something. Your deployment zone must be seriously stacked with terrain if you are able to hide your whole army from wave serpent spam.
DE vehicles can be used as a delivery system, sure. However:
If you turbo boost up to the wave serpents wyches will mince them the turn after.
They wont make mince meat of them if they are dead. If you are jinking for a 4+ save, and the serpent fires it's shield at you (using a conservative 4 shots average) then a venom will lose slightly more than 3 hull points. (A raider without FF would lose 3.8)
The type and amount of firepower that a waveserpent puts out is just perfect against venoms and raiders. Whilst they won't explode anymore, they will still die to hullpoint loss.
Jump the dire avengers out and the wyches are toast.
I really can't see this being a very viable strategy, particularly as you are relying on the wyches surviving a turn, and also because of random charge distances, especially if the serpent gets behind cover.
Thats why you need to make them Jink with the Ravagers turn 1 so they are hitting on 6's.
Plus the way I play it there is a Beastpack on the way up as well.
You have to give them a problem, shoot the Haywire or shoot the Beastpack which will glance them all the death the next turn when tney get in.
The amount of short sighted, narrow / close minded people on this forum bemuse me, all I ever hear is moaning from people and no answers, I give them one and someone attempts to shoot it down (as usual).
Lets put it this way, it works for me, I have no problems against Eldar so either I'm the luckiest person on the planet or I know what I am doing.
The only list in the game I can ever see as being a problem for me is Necron Flyer spam, other than that I have no issues with anything.
Shingen wrote: Thats why you need to make them Jink with the Ravagers turn 1 so they are hitting on 6's.
Plus the way I play it there is a Beastpack on the way up as well.
You have to give them a problem, shoot the Haywire or shoot the Beastpack which will glance them all the death the next turn when tney get in.
The amount of short sighted, narrow / close minded people on this forum bemuse me, all I ever hear is moaning from people and no answers, I give them one and someone attempts to shoot it down (as usual).
Lets put it this way, it works for me, I have no problems against Eldar so either I'm the luckiest person on the planet or I know what I am doing.
The only list in the game I can ever see as being a problem for me is Necron Flyer spam, other than that I have no issues with anything.
Someone disagrees with you so they must be closed minded and short sighted. Nice attitude, oh great all knowing one.
I particularly like the part in your strategy, where you can hide you entire army on turn one, but the opponent can't deploy his out of LoS or in fact behind any cover at all.
Maybe you got lucky, maybe you play bad eldar players, maybe you are the best player ever all knowing one, however, the fact remains that your strategy still revolves around charging melee units up the board, against the fastest and hardest hitting transport in the game. Over a series of games I can see this failing more times than it succeeds. It might be the best DE has to offer, but really you are still going to be fighting an uphill battle.
Wave Serpents are not that good for the points cost. CC or rear armor and they are screwed, I really don't get the hype either.
Its not about me being right or wrong or being and the rest of what you said, its about the attitude of some people who are so defeatist, it doesn't help newer players learn anything.
Oh, make them jink with Ravagers? Oh, hitting on 3+ S8 against AV 12, any smart Eldar player will have his Serpents hidden behind some terrain which with holo-fields give them 4+ or 3+ cover. Now lets see what you can do with your Ravagers shooting. And EVEN if Serpent jink, twin linked scatter + twin linked shield has stilla good chance of killing your Venoms.
I agree that beasts especially with fortune/invis might reach Serpents but seriously. 1-2 Serpents is not problem, but play against 4-5+ and your Wyches wont reach anything. Serpent Spam kill DE, simple as that, unless you have lucky dice rolls, in which case you can win with anything.
Zanais wrote: Oh, make them jink with Ravagers? Oh, hitting on 3+ S8 against AV 12, any smart Eldar player will have his Serpents hidden behind some terrain which with holo-fields give them 4+ or 3+ cover. Now lets see what you can do with your Ravagers shooting. And EVEN if Serpent jink, twin linked scatter + twin linked shield has stilla good chance of killing your Venoms.
Oh, you can use the fast skimmer nature of the Ravager to get an angle on the serpents. Especially if he's got 4+ of them. There's only so much terrain available. Aside from that, you've got things like blasterborn, haywire wyches, beastpacks that WILL be able to get to the serpents by turn 3 AT THE VERY latest.
Most well build DE lists are going to have 2-3 Ravagers, 6+ venoms and a beastpack. 2-3 Ravagers should kill a serpent, or at least make 2 serpents jink.
A jinking serpent with SL, Cannon and holofield snap-shotting will average .35 glances, and .83 penetrations against a venom. Admittedly, that's pretty darn good. But even if you lose a Venom, you've got guys inside he'll have to take care of at some point. Any Wych squad that reaches a Serpent is going to destroy it.
Beastpack should be able to charge turn 2 with its 12" plus run turn 1.
Turbo boost the venoms turn 1 to get trueborn and wyches in range turn 2. The ravagers force the serpents to jink so you can hope they don't pop you turn 2.
Max pressure, get in their faces and give them loads to worry about.
Seriously though love this mentality that everyone who has a different experience or trouble against an OP army is just some close minded scrub who needs to face the fact that they are playing wrong.
I agree that the Wave Serpents are a high-priority target, but DE have a large number of units that can crush them.
Oh in that case then you should be able to name a couple
I don't think we have much in the form of cost effective counters tbh. Serpents are a natural counter to our glass cannon, I think even if they weren't OP we'd have trouble with them
Seriously though, you seem to be focussing of that single point of the whole thing without taking into account the rest of the comments and dismissing them without question.
Sure we might disagree but after playing 2 games a week with DE against competitive lists I would hope I have learnt enough to formalize tactics that work the majority of the time.
I play both DE and Eldar. Sure, 2-3 Ravager will force to jink/stun/destroy 1 Serpent. What about rest? Playing against DE you just place your Serpents as far away as possible and use your 60" shields. And dont forget Eldar will have other things in his list not only Serpents. Seriously, even Avengers can kill Venoms and Raiders, amount of S6-7 Eldars can shoot against AV10 army is too much most of the time for DE to handle. Every destroyed Venom is also killing few Wyches onboard, force pinning, maybe LD test.
I dont know against which Eldars players you played, but dont say Eldars are easy preu for DE cause it just not true. If I go to tournament I take Eldar vs DE anytime.
Oh, you can use the fast skimmer nature of the Ravager to get an angle on the serpents. Especially if he's got 4+ of them. There's only so much terrain available. Aside from that, you've got things like blasterborn, haywire wyches, beastpacks that WILL be able to get to the serpents by turn 3 AT THE VERY latest.
A serpant is going to down a venom/ravager a turn. If you have 9-11 vehicles by turn 3 against serpants you wont have any left.
2-3 Ravagers should kill a serpent, or at least make 2 serpents jink.
9 DL shots, 6 hit, 3 glance/pen, 3+ cover from jink 1 result. Takes 3 ravagers on average 3 turns to kill a serpant.
A jinking serpent with SL, Cannon and holofield snap-shotting will average .35 glances, and .83 penetrations against a venom. Admittedly, that's pretty darn good. But even if you lose a Venom, you've got guys inside he'll have to take care of at some point. Any Wych squad that reaches a Serpent is going to destroy it.
but once the wyches are on the ground their threat range is easily avoidable. Even with the venom alive, the serpants can move pretty fast to avoid combat.
I played a great game against Eldar in a Tournament a few days ago, not a single Wave Serpent to be seen and we both had an enjoyable match. Had another game against a different Eldar player in the Semi-Finals, got all but tabled turn 3 and have up. Do you want to know why i lost? He got first turn.
Saying use LOS is utterly useless, any player worth his salt will assault you from different angles, and planning on the other player being inept is a bad plan. Wraithknights are not half as helpless as people make out, it takes 18 wounds (36 hits, 40 odd shots) to kill that thing, which isn't easy to do in a single turn if he deploys smartly, especially when they can get back wounds from that Stone and Renewer. I think i will just have to accept Warhammer isn't balanced and if you play Wave Serpents (3+), you won't play me.
Umm I must agree that Eldar WS are Bane to DE. Yes we have Tools to kill a few, but its still an Uphill battle.
NOW dont think im all negative thats just how WH40k is, Rock, Paper, Scissors. DE tables Nids, Eldar tables DE, etc... Each army has play-styles, strengths and weaknesses , there will always bee counters to those, a good player will understand these and try his best to work against them but it will be an uphill battle, at least in 40k Rock and beat Paper
Amishprn86 wrote: Umm I must agree that Eldar WS are Bane to DE. Yes we have Tools to kill a few, but its still an Uphill battle.
NOW dont think im all negative thats just how WH40k is, Rock, Paper, Scissors. DE tables Nids, Eldar tables DE, etc... Each army has play-styles, strengths and weaknesses , there will always bee counters to those, a good player will understand these and try his best to work against them but it will be an uphill battle, at least in 40k Rock and beat Paper
Seen Daemons (6e) beat them many times, seen some Battle reports where MSUSoB win aswel.
Eldar are more of a Low model count elite unit if they do WS spam, Ignore Cover, CC, AT while out man. If they only have 8-9 units on the table they can only kill at most 8-9 of your units at the most and for each unit you kill you are Hitting a bigger blow. If you can get units like Hive Guard in Range they could do some good damage or IG with Ignore Cover S8/S9.
Im not an expert just how I see it, I do feel Eldar is a very strong top tier army and many times will be an Up hill battle.
If I get in combat with the beast pack I can turbo boost eldar jetbikes to trap the guys inside and it's game over. Shooting will always be a problem but you just have to deal with it I guess.
Shingen wrote: Wave Serpents are not that good for the points cost. CC or rear armor and they are screwed, I really don't get the hype either.
Its not about me being right or wrong or being and the rest of what you said, its about the attitude of some people who are so defeatist, it doesn't help newer players learn anything.
Funniest/Saddest and most incorrect thing I have read here for a long time pretending that OP units are not doesn't help anyone either...........
I played a great game against Eldar in a Tournament a few days ago, not a single Wave Serpent to be seen and we both had an enjoyable match
Its amazing how much fun games can be when the cheese units ae not spammed or even taken...............
Shingen, can you post us your list? I am interested to see what you use to bring them down. The only viable thing i see if the Beast Pack, but even that is not invincible. Ravagers simply aren't effective, Void Ravens fail due to cover saves and Grotesques rely on their Raider to get them anywhere.
So, prey tell, what is this list you have came up with that pushes such massive threats such as Wave Serpents down to non-issue? Just to be stated, if you even mention Eldar allies i will be extremely unhappy.
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: Shingen, can you post us your list? I am interested to see what you use to bring them down. The only viable thing i see if the Beast Pack, but even that is not invincible. Ravagers simply aren't effective, Void Ravens fail due to cover saves and Grotesques rely on their Raider to get them anywhere.
So, prey tell, what is this list you have came up with that pushes such massive threats such as Wave Serpents down to non-issue? Just to be stated, if you even mention Eldar allies i will be extremely unhappy.
I second this. I would REALLY like to see that list.
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: What in my army can counter these things! They sit at the very nadir of effectiveness of Dark Lances, which are great against AV 10,11,13 and 14 but have trouble with AV 12, especially when that AV 12 has a 3+ cover save when jinking and has the possibility ti downgrade pens to glances. If i was to do the math, the Wave Serpent has 3 hull points, so I glance on 4+ so i need 6 hits, he has a 3+ jink so i need 18(!!!!) Dark Lance shots to take down a single Wave Serpent via hull points.That simply isn't possible, *EVEN* when they are snap firing they still have the ability destroy most Dark Eldar vehicles with the Twin-Linked Scatter laser and the 'Twin-linked' Serpent Shield. 'Haywire Wyches!' i here you shout, but how on Earth do the Wyches get there in a 2 Hull Point AV 10 Venom. Without resorted to Eldar allies, how can i handle this horrible, horrible machine that can personally take out every tank in my army even when snap firing?
Actually you need 18 HITS not SHOTS. That is 27 shots at bs4!
Automatically Appended Next Post: In comparison a land raider with its full 4 hps requires 24 dark lance shots (assuming no explodes results), whilst a leman russ requires only 18 shots (also assuming no explodes results).
Show that to those who say its not hard to take down a serpent.
Amishprn86 wrote: Umm I must agree that Eldar WS are Bane to DE. Yes we have Tools to kill a few, but its still an Uphill battle.
NOW dont think im all negative thats just how WH40k is, Rock, Paper, Scissors. DE tables Nids, Eldar tables DE, etc... Each army has play-styles, strengths and weaknesses , there will always bee counters to those, a good player will understand these and try his best to work against them but it will be an uphill battle, at least in 40k Rock and beat Paper
I respect this positive attitude, but in my experience this just isn't true. Even without allies, many armies currently have the tools to work around their traditional weaknesses seamlessly. Eldar WS are a great example of this, as there's nothing fragile about these MFers.
Need to do 3 Hull Points. Glance on 4's. So i need 6 hits to cause 3 Hull Points. He *can* have a 3+ jink, so that Sky Rockets to 18 hits needed to cause 3 Hull Points. To get 18 hits, 1/3 will miss, meaning 27 shots are needed.
Is this wrong? I am not great with maths.
Edit: That, in context, is the equivalent of 9 Ravagers all shooting into a single Wave Serpent that is Jinking. On the other hand, a single Wave Serpent shooting does 3 Scatter Laser hits and 4 possible Serpent Shield hits, which causes 4 ish glances on almost anything in my army! Sure i can make him jink, but even a jinking Wave Serpent is a considerable threat!
Yes - that is spot on. However there is also the fact that the last hull point is just as likely to be taken down with the 19th shot (assuming the average that it took 18 to take off 2), as the 27th shot so realistically it is around the 22nd/23rd shot that we expect it to lose the 3rd hull point (with the raider it becomes the 21st/22nd shot and the russ gets 15th/16th shot). But that's overcomplicating the issue, especially when you consider even the 27th may not cause that 3rd hp and thus have to also take that into account.
The maths you have used is correct. You simply forgot to account the to hit roll in the first instance.
DE are all about high pressure builds unless you want to sit at the back of the board with your nightshields and pray nothing bad happens.
Try Reavers, a Beastpack and Deep Striking units as a starting point as well as Haywire Wyches. The aim is to swamp their side of the board, its possible to surround Wave Serpents with Vehicles or troops turn 1 in such a way that they cant go anywhere or at the very least have to move 12" to make 1 of their weapons snap fire. They also wouldn't be able to get any troops out the vehicle due to enemy models being in the way of the hatch.
Use your heavy support to force jinks so they have to snap shoot.
Its really not rocket science... You simply overwhelm them, thats kinda the whole point of DEMSU builds, there is simply too much for your opponent to kill.
Throw a few Trophies on the Venoms to reroll pinning and leadership tests and you are golden.
Yes you will lose a few vehicles turn 1 but you are restricting their movement, making them pick targets and you are almost guaranteed to kill probably half the serpents turn 2. Bare in mind that a Serpent and 5 Avengers costs pretty much the same as 2 units of Wyches in Venoms who cares if you lose 1 of the Venoms, you have 5 more plus the rest of your list.
Im not going to post lists to try and prove my point, sit down, look through the Codex and pick models that will work.
I have 1/2 lists for tournaments and I dont deviate from them (except I need to update them for 7th ED now a bit), no list tailoring, all comers lists.
Just thought about a wraithknight compared to a serpent, both in the open...
It will take 18 dark lance shots on average to kill a wraithknight in the open. That means a serpent is 50% more durable in comparison (when considering dark lances of course). And the dark lance is supposed to be an AT weapon.
Some people will moan that I am talking about both being in the open, but if you consider them both in cover then the serp will still get a 3+ but won't have to jink! Yes - the wraithknight becomes slightly more durable in this scenario (25% more) - but you'd bloody well hope so at twice the points! Also such durability in the open IS important in the WS debate, as it is a transport after all, being able to burst across open terrain without a care in the world to deliver its shooty cargo is a massive advantage!
Now when you consider that people believe the wraithknight to be incredibly durable, you begin to see how insane a serpent truely is.
I'm not going to provide you with a list of a silver platter, plus my way of playing doesn't necessarily suit your style of play.
Put it this way however, I have 0 "ZERO" Dark Lances or Blasters in my lists (Except for a Blast Pistol if I am using Sliscus).
You can work it out yourself, I am trying to explain but everyone just keeps dismissing outright without thinking about it.
Think outside the box, open Battlescribe or Army Builder and have a think about, get your models out (I have Serpents and DE) and throw some dice and practice on your own then give it a shot when your playing a friend or something.
No there are more than 1, I could tell you loads of things to try but I am not going to simply "tell" you how to play your game, my style of play works for me, might not work for other people. You can do what you wish with what information I have already handed out in the thread, all I have had back from trying to help people think in a different way is hostility and stupid comments like:
> "Have a nice day"
> "I literally just choked on my food because I laughed so hard when reading this!"
If you want a interesting, intelligent, mature conversation about it and would like to think for yourself a bit without being spoon fed let me know...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Poly Ranger wrote: Just thought about a wraithknight compared to a serpent, both in the open...
It will take 18 dark lance shots on average to kill a wraithknight in the open. That means a serpent is 50% more durable in comparison (when considering dark lances of course). And the dark lance is supposed to be an AT weapon.
Some people will moan that I am talking about both being in the open, but if you consider them both in cover then the serp will still get a 3+ but won't have to jink! Yes - the wraithknight becomes slightly more durable in this scenario (25% more) - but you'd bloody well hope so at twice the points! Also such durability in the open IS important in the WS debate, as it is a transport after all, being able to burst across open terrain without a care in the world to deliver its shooty cargo is a massive advantage!
Now when you consider that people believe the wraithknight to be incredibly durable, you begin to see how insane a serpent truely is.
Eldar Allies (I know some people hate me for saying it) really help with this.
I have a Farseer with 9 Reavers and hope for Misfortune, simply rend the stupid thing to Death...
Shingen wrote: DE are all about high pressure builds unless you want to sit at the back of the board with your nightshields and pray nothing bad happens.
Try Reavers (1 in 3 get Special Weapons? Not cost efficient), a Beastpack (Strength 4, sure they get a lot of attacks but it's not a done deal. They are also quite killable without Eldar allies, which i will not consider) and Deep Striking units (Such as Scourges? 2 Haywire Blasters is not cost efficient. Blasterborn might work, but they are a lot of points for a few weapons we KNOW are not effective) as a starting point as well as Haywire Wyches (Who make terrible troops for taking objectives. Also, Venoms are not survivable in the slightest) . The aim is to swamp their side of the board (They move just as fast as us), its possible to surround Wave Serpents with Vehicles or troops turn 1 (Yes, lets Turbo Boost into the middle of the entire Eldar army. I am sure that 4+ cover save will save us...) in such a way that they cant go anywhere or at the very least have to move 12" to make 1 of their weapons snap fire (Not much of a problem, even snap firing the Scatter Laser gets a hit, then the Shield will kill *something*). They also wouldn't be able to get any troops out the vehicle due to enemy models being in the way of the hatch (How close do you think i am! Is this Eldar player an idiot? Why would he WANT to get out his small 5 man DA units until at least turn 4, and if you have enough vehicles turn 4 to do this, then congratz!).
Use your heavy support to force jinks so they have to snap shoot.
Its really not rocket science... You simply overwhelm them, thats kinda the whole point of DEMSU builds, there is simply too much for your opponent to kill.
Throw a few Trophies on the Venoms to reroll pinning and leadership tests and you are golden.
Yes you will lose a few vehicles turn 1 but you are restricting their movement (How, they are Skimmers also, they can fly over us...), making them pick targets and you are almost guaranteed to kill probably half the serpents turn 2 (With what magic devise? They priorities Wyches, then next turn our Dark Light glances ineffectually off their hulls). Bare in mind that a Serpent and 5 Avengers costs pretty much the same as 2 units of Wyches in Venoms who cares if you lose 1 of the Venoms, you have 5 more plus the rest of your list. (Bare in mind 5 Avengers and a Serpent is almost 100% likely to kill something a turn in the Dark Eldar army, while 2 Haywire Wyches in Venoms are only effective against a single thing (Venom doesn't shoot if you are turbo boosting to get close), then factor in failing the charge, not hitting with enough attacks, it's quite likely 5 Wyches might fail to kill a Serpent).
Im not going to post lists to try and prove my point, sit down, look through the Codex and pick models that will work.
I have 1/2 lists for tournaments and I dont deviate from them (except I need to update them for 7th ED now a bit), no list tailoring, all comers lists.
Please, i would REALLY like to see this list. Because this turn 1 suicide rush sounds...well, like a suicide rush. Bare in mind he only has 3/4 Serpents, the rest can be anything from Warp Spiders (Don't even get me started on them!) to War Walkers to Seer Councils to the Laughing Autarch.
Oh, there is another thing. How do Dark Eldar handle the Laughing Autarch save for the Beast Pack which will never reach him? I can't think, other then Liquifiers, that our entire army has a single ignore cover weapon while he Laser Lances and Fusion Guns his way through our Transports and 5 Man squads.
**EDIT** No Dark Light? Interesting. That means, since you are running Sliscus, you are running several Haywire Wyches and maybe a 5 Man Venom Squad or two? A Splinter Born squad? Your heavy support is...Talosi? You said Deep Striking, so i assume Scourges? This list sounds interesting to say the least, which makes me want to see it even more!
Also, Rending? Our Poison is Strength 1, unless you are rending with Heat Lances i am confused here?
Nobody wants to be spoonfed, people just think you are doing the typical 40k gamer of thing of pretending that you know some elite way to beat a tough match up, that nobody else has thought of yet, even though you quite clearly have the same tools to work with that the rest of us have had for the last 3 and a half years, and truthfully are just trying to elevate what you believe is people's impressions of yourself as an intelligent gamer with such nonsense talk of "oh the Wave Serpent match up never gives me trouble as DE, don't know what you guys could possibly be doing wrong".
Your listed counters are not cost efficient counters. Even with the cost aside, I'm not sure they are counters at all. Other than Haywire Wyches, logic expresses to me that almost nothing you just mentioned will work in a sensible game.
You're either lying, or you play against bad Eldar. There's not much else to it if you are unwilling to share a list and prove us otherwise. Maybe you will get some good C&C. By the sounds of it, you could probably use it.
Shingen wrote: DE are all about high pressure builds unless you want to sit at the back of the board with your nightshields and pray nothing bad happens.
Try Reavers (1 in 3 get Special Weapons? Not cost efficient), a Beastpack (Strength 4, sure they get a lot of attacks but it's not a done deal. They are also quite killable without Eldar allies, which i will not consider) and Deep Striking units (Such as Scourges? 2 Haywire Blasters is not cost efficient. Blasterborn might work, but they are a lot of points for a few weapons we KNOW are not effective) as a starting point as well as Haywire Wyches (Who make terrible troops for taking objectives. Also, Venoms are not survivable in the slightest) . The aim is to swamp their side of the board (They move just as fast as us), its possible to surround Wave Serpents with Vehicles or troops turn 1 (Yes, lets Turbo Boost into the middle of the entire Eldar army. I am sure that 4+ cover save will save us...) in such a way that they cant go anywhere or at the very least have to move 12" to make 1 of their weapons snap fire (Not much of a problem, even snap firing the Scatter Laser gets a hit, then the Shield will kill *something*). They also wouldn't be able to get any troops out the vehicle due to enemy models being in the way of the hatch (How close do you think i am! Is this Eldar player an idiot? Why would he WANT to get out his small 5 man DA units until at least turn 4, and if you have enough vehicles turn 4 to do this, then congratz!).
Use your heavy support to force jinks so they have to snap shoot.
Its really not rocket science... You simply overwhelm them, thats kinda the whole point of DEMSU builds, there is simply too much for your opponent to kill.
Throw a few Trophies on the Venoms to reroll pinning and leadership tests and you are golden.
Yes you will lose a few vehicles turn 1 but you are restricting their movement (How, they are Skimmers also, they can fly over us...), making them pick targets and you are almost guaranteed to kill probably half the serpents turn 2 (With what magic devise? They priorities Wyches, then next turn our Dark Light glances ineffectually off their hulls). Bare in mind that a Serpent and 5 Avengers costs pretty much the same as 2 units of Wyches in Venoms who cares if you lose 1 of the Venoms, you have 5 more plus the rest of your list. (Bare in mind 5 Avengers and a Serpent is almost 100% likely to kill something a turn in the Dark Eldar army, while 2 Haywire Wyches in Venoms are only effective against a single thing (Venom doesn't shoot if you are turbo boosting to get close), then factor in failing the charge, not hitting with enough attacks, it's quite likely 5 Wyches might fail to kill a Serpent).
Im not going to post lists to try and prove my point, sit down, look through the Codex and pick models that will work.
I have 1/2 lists for tournaments and I dont deviate from them (except I need to update them for 7th ED now a bit), no list tailoring, all comers lists.
Please, i would REALLY like to see this list. Because this turn 1 suicide rush sounds...well, like a suicide rush. Bare in mind he only has 3/4 Serpents, the rest can be anything from Warp Spiders (Don't even get me started on them!) to War Walkers to Seer Councils to the Laughing Autarch.
Oh, there is another thing. How do Dark Eldar handle the Laughing Autarch save for the Beast Pack which will never reach him? I can't think, other then Liquifiers, that our entire army has a single ignore cover weapon while he Laser Lances and Fusion Guns his way through our Transports and 5 Man squads.
**EDIT** No Dark Light? Interesting. That means, since you are running Sliscus, you are running several Haywire Wyches and maybe a 5 Man Venom Squad or two? A Splinter Born squad? Your heavy support is...Talosi? You said Deep Striking, so i assume Scourges? This list sounds interesting to say the least, which makes me want to see it even more!
Also, Rending? Our Poison is Strength 1, unless you are rending with Heat Lances i am confused here?
Rending is for the Reavers, their bladevane attacks are S6 and S4 but against anything with a toughness value its irrelevant as a 6 is an auto wound with rending anyway at AP2 (I am assuming you knew that but as you quoted S1 I thought I better mention it!).
That also benefits the Poison weapons as they are auto wounding at AP2 as well, Wraithknights as you can imagine are not too pleased about that, or Nids, or Riptides etc etc.
Shuppet with regards to how to deal with everything you listed...
In Elites I have 3 Shard Truborn in a Venom with Sliscus and a Haemo (Crucible and Shattershard), Sliscus obviously gives all the vehicles retrofire jets for free so you can deep strike them, just drop them "near" to the council and fire off the crucible. Or drop some Ravagers behind their lines. I prefer not to use Dark Lance Rav's however for forcing Jink they are good. For what they provide to me personally (they miss all the bloody time and hardly ever penetrate) I would rather take my changes with the stuff that glances on a 2 constantly that a 4+ (again personal preference). I prefer (almost) guaranteed kills and not speculative shots.
Yes a lot of it is a "suicide rush" as you put it however if you use LOS terrain to your advantage and the MSU aspect of DE its unlikely all your opponents serpents are going to be able to hit something, venom's are extremely small and easy to hide. Yes they will make a dent in the vehicles but they wont get them all and only a couple need to make it through. As I said about 20 posts ago the Venom's for me are a delivery method and nothing more (unless they are still alive).
"(How, they are Skimmers also, they can fly over us...)" - Yes they cant but they still have to be 1" away from one of our models, if they move more than 6" the guys inside cant get out to kill any Wyches if they fall out the Venoms...
Consider also that the Reavers will hopefully have either a free pain token or +1 strength from combat drugs which means after they have bladevaned they can go and stuff 27 combat attacks + the farseer(s) attacks into the backside of one of the serpents which should finish another one off. This also benefits the Wyches as hopefully you fell out on top of a wreck for a 5+ cover save (if obscured by the wreck) and FNP.
For the sake of trying to move this conversation on without all the willy waggling because I'm rather tired of it by now...
I'm not trying to make myself out to be something I am not, I do not need a big head, I am confident in my abilities and that is that. Positive thinking is something I do all the time, being negative isn't part of my Psyche, I get a little overexcited at times and I apologize if I come across a bit strong / overbearing at times. My social skills are a bag of gak and I hate explaining myself!
I am not saying I win all the time, god no, I do lose fairly often at times, plus I don't play Eldar each week. I use the same list whatever I am playing be it Farsight Bomb, O'Vesa (thank god thats gone!), Necron Wraithwing, Centurian Deathstars or anything else. As I mentioned before its a list I have played with (A LOT), its been a work in progress for about 4 months as I am getting ready for tournaments later this year and its a list I am very comfortable using (not taking Eldar allies at the moment but considering it, don't think DE need them though!.
I don't, cant and wont win every game, I do lose to Eldar now and again (my friend beat me last week with what was essentially a highlander list, Falcon and a Eldrad blob squad behind an Aegis!). Don't get me wrong, placement has a lot of part in it, your opponent should be able to read the situation but the amount of people that flap and cant concentrate when there are a million and one things going on is pretty high;
Sorry if I have been irate in the past on this thread but the sheer amount of negativity when there are options available just makes me cringe...
Shingen wrote: Rending is for the Reavers, their bladevane attacks are S6 and S4 but against anything with a toughness value its irrelevant as a 6 is an auto wound with rending anyway at AP2 (I am assuming you knew that but as you quoted S1 I thought I better mention it!).
That also benefits the Poison weapons as they are auto wounding at AP2 as well, Wraithknights as you can imagine are not too pleased about that, or Nids, or Riptides etc etc.
Can you clarify this for me? While rending on reavers blade vanes is nice vs infantry, you can not use the blade vane attack vs vehicles... and killing infantry has never been an issue for any DE army I have built.
I think he was talking about killing the WK with the rending ^
Thanks for the positive explanation but all any of us really wanted was to see the list you use, as it's hella annoying when we all struggle with a certain match up and someone comes in and says "well I know how to beat it, but not telling!". It just comes across pretty dickish, doesn't add anything to the discussion, and makes people suspect you don't actual know any better than the rest of us do. Any statements like that are just completely subjective anyway and if you aren't willing to contribute (you know, the question asked in the original post was "how can I handle this horrible match up" then maybe consider not posting.
Shingen wrote: Eldar Allies (I know some people hate me for saying it) really help with this.
Well, that's because the original post specifically stated "without resorting to Eldar allies".
I do appreciate that you gone into a bit of detail with your strategies though now and people can decide for themselves if what works for you works for them. From my perspective
Sliscus, Wyches and Reavers are definitely good. Shattershard on a DS Skimmer finds its way into everything I build. Also gets the thumbs up from me. Crucible of Malediction is going to do absolutely feth all to a SeerCouncil. It's cheap to take so no harm done really, might make its points back with some lucky rolls against certain match ups, but it's far from a reliable counter to anything. Trueborn with Shardcarbines seems like just a more expensive way to take as many shots as a Venom, at half the range, with no Twin-Linked, and no mobility of its own. Definitely a pass.
All in all I think all that can be really taken from what you said is "Take Sliscus, spam Wyches and use your Reavers better". Which I don't think is bad advice at all. But isn't necessary that easy to add to an army and leads to a pretty focused build. It would also take a lot of Wyches to even the score against Wave Serpents.
The Shardcarbines are poison 3+ though and the Haemos pistol is as well because of Sliscus special rule.
Raider full of guys would be better but points are at a premium.
The Seer Council can be a pain in the ass I agree. I like to stick rending on them which can help. Best bet weirdly is to misfortune them and then let them charge your beastpack. They might have rerollable saves but a lot of them will be against their invuls. If you get turn 1 as well reavers can make a bit of a mess of them as they pretty much just ignore the Baron.
Oh forgot to mention. Trueborn with splinter weps have haywire grenades so they still have AT if needed.
Red Corsair wrote: Currently eldar steam roll DE. It sucks but we just need to hang tight until fall when we allegedly get our update. I'm praying they add some tools when they do, though odds are it will always be a rough fight. What we need is MUCH more open availability for haywire blasters, its a very fluffy weapon that suits us, it just needs assault 2 and as I said, better access and I think we shimmy up the poll quite a bit.
So because you're incapable of dealing with one or two vehicles, your army should have completely OP weapons ? ... definitely bro.
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Zanais wrote: Oh, make them jink with Ravagers? Oh, hitting on 3+ S8 against AV 12, any smart Eldar player will have his Serpents hidden behind some terrain which with holo-fields give them 4+ or 3+ cover. Now lets see what you can do with your Ravagers shooting. And EVEN if Serpent jink, twin linked scatter + twin linked shield has stilla good chance of killing your Venoms.
I agree that beasts especially with fortune/invis might reach Serpents but seriously. 1-2 Serpents is not problem, but play against 4-5+ and your Wyches wont reach anything. Serpent Spam kill DE, simple as that, unless you have lucky dice rolls, in which case you can win with anything.
No. You either hide or jink or shoot. Serpents don't have jink + cover + shoot every turn all the time. I don't know how many HP a Venom has, but on jink a full SL+SC+SS will have on average 1.485 S6 hits and 1.0725 S7 ignore cover hits. It looks like a Vyper so I guess it has armor 10, open-top and JINK. My guess is that it may still die if it does not jink .. and might die even if it does.. who knows. Probably not the best unit to fight a Wave Serpent with.
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Zanais wrote: I play both DE and Eldar. Sure, 2-3 Ravager will force to jink/stun/destroy 1 Serpent. What about rest? Playing against DE you just place your Serpents as far away as possible and use your 60" shields. And dont forget Eldar will have other things in his list not only Serpents. Seriously, even Avengers can kill Venoms and Raiders, amount of S6-7 Eldars can shoot against AV10 army is too much most of the time for DE to handle. Every destroyed Venom is also killing few Wyches onboard, force pinning, maybe LD test.
I dont know against which Eldars players you played, but dont say Eldars are easy preu for DE cause it just not true. If I go to tournament I take Eldar vs DE anytime.
You would be easy prey for DE, with your 60" shields. The only way the WS is competitive is when you fire at least SL+SS @36", or SL+SC+SS@24". If the shields were 36" or even 30" I'd probably never see the difference.
Red Corsair wrote: Currently eldar steam roll DE. It sucks but we just need to hang tight until fall when we allegedly get our update. I'm praying they add some tools when they do, though odds are it will always be a rough fight. What we need is MUCH more open availability for haywire blasters, its a very fluffy weapon that suits us, it just needs assault 2 and as I said, better access and I think we shimmy up the poll quite a bit.
So because you're incapable of dealing with one or two vehicles, your army should have completely OP weapons ? ... definitely bro.
Good post!
You have completely ignored the fact that DE is a glass cannon army that is the easiest to kill and completely underpowered in this aspect, and as such to balance this NEEDS to have Overpowered weaponry or else they are just "glass, with regular shooting."
Have you looked at the dex? It's a T3 army with AV10 FA on all but two Vehicles who were lucky enough to get AV 11. (no serpent shields FYI)
That means the transports die to bolter fire.
The army has a Haywire Blaster. It's a balanced gun that fires only a single Haywire shot, but can only be taken on 2 different units in the army.'
One of the units that can take it cost 22 PPM (before factoring in gun price) for a T3 model with a 4+ save. AKA Pathfinder resilience. Except they don't get Markerlights. On a minimum 5 man squad, it can be purchased twice. And then none of the other weapons can be touched, leaving it with 9 wasted Shardcarbine shots everytime it uses its Blasters as poison does not affect Vehicles. 130 pts for 2 shots, carried by 5 deepstriking Pathfinders, 3 of which don't get to shoot. Absolutely useless.
The other units that can take it is a 100 pt 3 wound MC who alone takes up a crucial HS support. He gets 1 haywire shot if you choose to replace his other, better weapon, and nothing else.
Being able to kill Vehicles is something an army built off the concept of being paper-thing but hard hitting glass cannon (it even describes it as such in the codex) should be capable of doing. Should be capable of doing easily in fact, let alone be "incapable" of. The gun is balanced, the poster you quoted was merely asking for more availability for it amongst the army. Next time you enter a thread in this catergory, I'd suggest familiarizing yourself with the army before making comments about it and looking foolish. You don't even know the stats of the units you are talking about let alone the army as a whole lol.
But let me guess, you're the type of player who brings Superheavies to a 1500 pt game and thinks Haywire is just OPbs amirite
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: I played a great game against Eldar in a Tournament a few days ago, not a single Wave Serpent to be seen and we both had an enjoyable match. Had another game against a different Eldar player in the Semi-Finals, got all but tabled turn 3 and have up. Do you want to know why i lost? He got first turn.
Saying use LOS is utterly useless, any player worth his salt will assault you from different angles, and planning on the other player being inept is a bad plan. Wraithknights are not half as helpless as people make out, it takes 18 wounds (36 hits, 40 odd shots) to kill that thing, which isn't easy to do in a single turn if he deploys smartly, especially when they can get back wounds from that Stone and Renewer. I think i will just have to accept Warhammer isn't balanced and if you play Wave Serpents (3+), you won't play me.
Eldar. Tournament. not a single Wave Serpent. > If you play against people who don't even take 3WS for their elite, I sure hope you win, because they can't play Eldar.
Tabled. Wraith Knights. > Let me guess, he also had a Jet Council ? Maybe the Serpents aren't the issue here ? Either way, you are correct, wh40k is not balanced, and the DE are rather weak compared to ALL armies. http://www.torrentoffire.com/4789/6th-edition-retrospective-reign-of-the-xenos
Red Corsair wrote: Currently eldar steam roll DE. It sucks but we just need to hang tight until fall when we allegedly get our update. I'm praying they add some tools when they do, though odds are it will always be a rough fight. What we need is MUCH more open availability for haywire blasters, its a very fluffy weapon that suits us, it just needs assault 2 and as I said, better access and I think we shimmy up the poll quite a bit.
So because you're incapable of dealing with one or two vehicles, your army should have completely OP weapons ? ... definitely bro.
Good post!
You have completely ignored the fact that DE is a glass cannon army that is the easiest to kill and completely underpowered in this aspect, and as such to balance this NEEDS to have Overpowered weaponry or else they are just "glass, with regular shooting."
Have you looked at the dex? It's a T3 army with AV10 FA on all but two Vehicles who were lucky enough to get AV 11. (no serpent shields FYI)
That means the transports die to bolter fire.
The army has a Haywire Blaster. It's a balanced gun that fires only a single Haywire shot, but can only be taken on 2 different units in the army.
One of the units that can take it cost 22 PPM (before factoring in gun price) for a T3 model with a 4+ save. AKA Pathfinder resilience. Except they don't get Markerlights. On a minimum 5 man squad, it can be purchased twice. And then none of the other weapons can be touched, leaving it with 9 wasted Shardcarbine shots everytime it uses its Blasters as poison does not affect Vehicles. 130 pts for 2 shots, carried by 5 deepstriking Pathfinders, 3 of which don't get to shoot. Absolutely useless.
The other units that can take it is a 100 pt 3 wound MC who alone takes up a crucial HS support. He gets 1 haywire shot if you choose to replace his other, better weapon, and nothing else.
The gun is balanced, the poster you quoted was merely asking for more availability for it amongst the army. Next time you enter a thread in this catergory, I'd suggest familiarizing yourself with the army before making comments about it and looking foolish.
But let me guess, you're the type of player who brings Superheavies to a 1500 pt game and thinks Haywire is just OPbs amirite
I don't have any of the OP units in the new Eldar dex (jet Council+baron, Wraithknight I hear), and Haywire is OPbs. Because it doesn't cost much and it does insane damage to vehicles, which are already too fragile in this edition (Termagants took down two of my wave serpents in assault. see how OP those Serpents are ?).
You are right, there are a lot of issues with your DE codex, they should not be fixed with a broken OP weapon made available for everyone in that dex only, they should be fixed by not being broken, i.e. fixing point costs, buffing stuff left and right.
Not introducing more bugged Haywire gear.
Haywire is bs, it's automatic AV weapon without any of the AV rules, I'd much rather have Vehicles more vulnerable to high S low AP fire than have them vulnerable to bs weapons and grenades that automagically deal damage to vehicles, even when wielded by a smelly grot.
The fact that you even mention that it can hurt Superheavies is proof that it's completely imbalanced and should be kept to a minimum.
you are correct, wh40k is not balanced, and the DE are rather weak compared to ALL armies
Hence why some "OP weaponry" might actually help re-balance the army. The core concept of Dark Eldar is to have OP Weaponry, unfortunately in 7th, everyone else seems to have caught up, and done a couple of laps around us in the resilience track while we are at it.
Termagants can kill our Vehicles in shooting, let alone assault.
We are paper-thin, our most durable tanks compared to some other armies literally turn a Heavy Bolter into into a Lascannon. The entire army is paperthin. We do not have Serpent Shields. We do not have defensive Psychic Powers.
The Trade off for all this is meant to be "an unholy amount of of high-end heavy weaponry, ideal for busting open enemy tanks". This is a quote from the codex.
Instead we can't kill a spammable Skimmer transport in anything bar assault.
DE needs more units that can take the Haywire Blaster. You may not like this fact because you are an Eldar player, but unfortunately that's how it rolls. Our weaponry is supposed to overpowered to make up for our underpowered resilience.
Termagants can kill our Vehicles in shooting, let alone assault.
We are paper-thin, our most durable tanks compared to some other armies literally turn a Heavy Bolter into into a Lascannon.
The entire army is paperthin. We do not have Serpent Shields. We do not have defensive Psychic Powers.
The Trade off for all this is meant to be "an unholy amount of of high-end heavy weaponry, ideal for busting open enemy tanks". This is a quote from the codex.
Instead we can't kill a spammable Skimmer transport in anything bar assault.
DE needs more units that can take the Haywire Blaster. You may not like this fact because you are an Eldar player, but unfortunately that's how it rolls. Our weaponry is supposed to overpowered to make up for our underpowered resilience.
Let go of that Haywire Blaster.
Your codex sucks, it needs to be redone, leave it at that, let the professionals do it, they've shown they can do a decent job when they try (top 5 armies are tied between 49% and 52% win rate inside the top-5 group).
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: Need to do 3 Hull Points. Glance on 4's. So i need 6 hits to cause 3 Hull Points. He *can* have a 3+ jink, so that Sky Rockets to 18 hits needed to cause 3 Hull Points. To get 18 hits, 1/3 will miss, meaning 27 shots are needed.
Is this wrong? I am not great with maths.
Edit: That, in context, is the equivalent of 9 Ravagers all shooting into a single Wave Serpent that is Jinking. On the other hand, a single Wave Serpent shooting does 3 Scatter Laser hits and 4 possible Serpent Shield hits, which causes 4 ish glances on almost anything in my army! Sure i can make him jink, but even a jinking Wave Serpent is a considerable threat!
You are not great with maths. or strategy for that matter.
If your enemy has 4+ WS, you start by forcing one to Jink, then switch target, force another one, etc.
The WS, once it has jinked, is basically useless because it will average 1.5S6 hit and 1S7 hit in the next phase, still at 145 points. It is not a considerable threat, and whenever it fires its shield it becomes extremely vulnerable to any AT weapon, be it melta or even lance.
If you decide to give your Eldar opponent tons of value for a single Jink, you deserve to lose.
Yeah your maths is a bit off as well. Being that we can take 3 Ravagers that will force a Wave Serpent to jink, while nothing else will be capable of it bar 3 squads of Trueborn from turn two onwards, how many Wave Serpents does Eldar usually minimum of? call it 7? Whats 7 - 3? Hey lets say its turn 2 and all the Venoms arrived safely and didn't mishap (because they will never make it into threat range without DS), and assuming that the Eldar player decided not to kill the Ravagers turn 1 with the 6 Wave Serpents that did not jink (and whatever else he has in his army) and lets do some more maths and subtract their 3 volleys from the amount of Wave Serpents as well. What does the equation look like now, 7 - 3 - 3 = ? Still one remaining. 600 points of shooting from the DE Side under perfect conditions later and we have achieved exactly.... feth all. 3 glances spread evenly between 6 models with 3 HP each 6 x 3 - 3 = ? Still 15 HP aka 6 turns of unhampered shooting to bring them down. On paper thin platforms. While 3 are not even jinking. And the rest of our army has Splinter Weaponry that has S0 against any Vehicles. DE needs a way to deal with this. Or else its just a paperthin army with middling firepower. GG.
Shingen wrote: I'm not going to provide you with a list of a silver platter, plus my way of playing doesn't necessarily suit your style of play.
Eldar Allies (I know some people hate me for saying it) really help with this.
I have a Farseer with 9 Reavers and hope for Misfortune, simply rend the stupid thing to Death...
Their style of play is to read random whine on the forum, then whine some more about it instead of finding a solution to the problem, I don't think your solutions are going to suit that
Thanks for the insight into what DE can do against WS though, I'm glad to hear that.
I believe DE stand a chance against non-ultimate Eldar lists (not SeerStar / Spiders / WraithKnight), but their codex is ultimately too weak to fight at full force against full competitive lists.
OT: When is that codex (and orks) being renewed ?
The fact you are in here learning about DE as you are also in here telling DE players how you know their army better than them, is probably a good suggestion that you should stop posting.
Yeah your maths is a bit off as well. Being that we can take 3 Ravagers that will force a Wave Serpent to jink, while nothing else will be capable of it bar 3 squads of Trueborn from turn two onwards, how many Wave Serpents does Eldar usually minimum of? call it 7? Whats 7 - 3? Hey lets say its turn 2 and all the Venoms arrived safely and didn't mishap (because they will never make it into threat range without DS), and assuming that the Eldar player decided not to kill the Ravagers turn 1 with the 6 Wave Serpents that did not jink (and whatever else he has in his army) and lets do some more maths and subtract their 3 volleys from the amount of Wave Serpents as well. What does the equation look like now, 7 - 3 - 3 = ? Still one remaining. 600 points of shooting from the DE Side under perfect conditions later and we have achieved exactly.... feth all. 3 glances spread evenly between 6 models with 3 HP each 6 x 3 - 3 = ? Still 15 HP aka 6 turns of unhampered shooting to bring them down. On paper thin platforms. While 3 are not even jinking. And the rest of our army has Splinter Weaponry that has S0 against any Vehicles.
That's the part you're misunderstanding.
In 2000 points, if I bring 7 WS, I have almost nothing else, so if you manage to deactivate half of them and bring half of your army to assault range, you've won.
If you make 4 WS jink, they will together have the same firepower as just one WS.
It seems as if you achieve "nothing", but the WS with the DA inside costs 210 points and is worthless in assault.
When you make 4 WS jink, you actually cut the Eldar Army's firepower (that's basically all of its power more or less) by 600 points.
You do not need to bring them down via shooting, you just need them deactivated enough that you can get 500-1000 points of assault troops in their face, at which point they're all dead.
I agree it would suck to have an accomplishment taken away from me, if I won a tourney with Eldar without using Wave Serpents, WK's & Seerstars. Although I don't think WK's are OP, they are just badass as hell and the 250 pt cost reflects that.
But it's pretty undeniable that everything they do have pushes them into OP territory quite easily. Wave Serpents are too much. These things are more OP than Riptides, whether you choose to use them or not. I've never seen anyone bar an Eldar player trying to defend his army say otherwise. It's pretty much a non-debate.
That being said, all their other stuff is nearly entirely on par with some of the best stuff that other balanced armies have.
Jinking Wave Serpents doesn't just "deactivate them". D6+1 TL snapshots x3 is still pretty badass. Half of them not jinking at all. It is far from a victory, the returning fire will absolutely SHRED any part of a DE army that threatens the Serpents.
You need 1-st turn. You need your enemy to bring sane ammount of waveserpents. 2-3 will dominate the field. 4+ will make the game unplayable for you.
No matter what you do, you can't beat a ws spam with pure dark eldar army in a regular game unless you're extremely lucky and your enemy extremely unlucky.
Another option is to play a heavy-blos map where mellee is doable and you can avoid being shot apart turn 1.
koooaei wrote: You need 1-st turn. You need your enemy to bring sane ammount of waveserpents. 2-3 will dominate the field. 4+ will make the game unplayable for you.
No matter what you do, you can't beat a ws spam with pure dark eldar army in a regular game.
Another option is to play a heavy-blos map where mellee is doable and you can avoid being shot apart turn 1.
And Riptides without Buffmander may not be OP anymore (I don't know).
And SeerStar without Baron may not be OP either.
Jinked Serpents are 1/4th of a Serpent, so it's a good reduction, as I stated. You will be shredded, and that is not an issue, because your goal is to end up in assault with 500-1000 points of assault units and rip that Mech apart. Not to win the first or second turn, but to arrive third turn with enough forces to HulkSmash the Mech.
All of your army list, tactics and strategy have to be geared towards exactly that: reach assault with 500+ points of cold-blooded killers.
Given existing special characters, special rules, LoS, DS, etc. it is possible.
You may still lose, but it won't be a massacre anymore, because you have the tools to break his tools.
A shooty army will always win the first and second turn, the only thing you can do to counter that turn 1-2 one-sided massacre is another shooty army, which does not exist with current DE.
With regards to the DE Codex, I think it's very clear that DE in general is weak, and that plays a part in the DE player perception of the Eldar army, which in general is strong.
I came to a thread about DE vs WS, and I gave strong advice on how to counter WS spam, by forcing jinks and rushing for assault rather than attempting to destroy WS.
What if he just shreds the assaulty part of your army and sensibly ignores the Lances that won't kill him for another 5-6 turns anyway?
Riptides still OP, SeerStar probably not. I never really thought the SeerStar or the WK are OP, just the Serpent.
Automatically Appended Next Post: However I agree that people should look at DE as an assault based army, it has a lot to offer. Not strictly assault (we have dope flyers too) but when I see Venoms with Warriors and not Wyches, I feel like they are doing it wrong.
I came to a thread about DE vs WS, and I gave strong advice on how to counter WS spam, by forcing jinks and rushing for assault rather than attempting to destroy WS
No you came to defend the un-defendable - Wave Serpents. Look I get it - people want OP units, and don't want to consider the fact that they might be OP.....
Your only real advice is "play Eldar" ...............
I came to a thread about DE vs WS, and I gave strong advice on how to counter WS spam, by forcing jinks and rushing for assault rather than attempting to destroy WS
No you came to defend the un-defendable - Wave Serpents. Look I get it - people want OP units, and don't want to consider the fact that they might be OP.....
Your only real advice is "play Eldar" ...............
Yeah I see no advice on how to actually beat Eldar, just how to jink Serpents. Yeah, we know how to do that, doesn't work. I swear a lot of people are just theorycrafting and mathhammering, have you actually tried playing DE vs a competent Serpent Spam eldar player? Criticisms of the army and claims that we are "too weak, get over it, wait for next codex" are not considered "strong advice".
Whats funny is having a super secret list that "apparently" wins sometimes against Eldar Wave Serpent Spam but apparently is too super secret to share?
While I dont believe, that haywire-wyches in masses will be a good counter for WS-Spam, I think its the best a pure DE list can bring against them.
- Forcing jinks is to situational. If the Serpent is in cover, it wont need to jink.
- Haywire blasters are to expensive to get
- Ravagers... well we all know that they are not an option against serpents
- Fliers... cant rely on a unit, that might arrive in turn 4
- Blasterborn... same Problem as ravager.
- Reavers with heat Lances... too expensive
soo haywyches in venoms are our best bet against an clearly OP unit.
Hope Eldar get a new Codex soon... the actual one isnt good for the whole meta.
I think another thing people aren't considering here is with average terrain saturation. Most of the serpents will not even need to jink. Remember, a serpent with holofields behind ruins is rocking a 3+ save without jinking at all. Any somewhat competent Eldar player with 4 serpents at 1850 will rarely need to even jink with a single Serpent. Even with no terrain at all, you can deploy the serpents to obscure each other for a 4+ save with holofields. It's also a 4+ with any other intervening models in the way, including your own.
Also as for the 7 wave serpents at 2000 points. With the standard upgrades, that comes out to 1470 points. that's still 530 points left for outflanking war walkers and deep striking Warpspiders to counter your own deep striking AV 10 paper vehicles.
Please don't get into an ''Are Wave Serpents OP or not?'' Argument on my thread, go make your own! What this thread is about is how to handle them, and it seems we have our answer. Assault. Now the real problem is we only have a single competent melee unit in the Beast pack, which leads to further problems as they can be utterly controlled by an Eldar Farseer or a few Warlocks rolling Telepathy/Horrify. Grotesques are an option, but the Raider is hardly a reliable way to move them across the bored and once they are walking they are simply scatter laser targets.
Making things Jink is...problematic. If the Wave Serpent has access to any sort of cover, then thanks to Holofields he won't need to jink to stay alive from the scant shots i can put his way, and even a Jinking Wave Serpent is enough to put out a considerable threat. We could think outside the box? Scourges are not cost effective, Reavers with Special Weapons are wasting its Anti Infantry Ability, Talosi are to slow, Void Ravens to Fragile, Reapers suffer single shot syndrome. It seems we have come to an en-passe were we KNOW the best way to deal with Serpents, it's just the Best Way is either not effective enough or relies on the other player being bad/luck, and there is simply nothing we can do about. Less of a 'Best Anti Wave Serpent List' and more of a 'Best Chance We Got'.
On the other hand, i can create a perfectly competitive list without Eldar, Vect, Corteaz + a Revenent Titian, with Wych Venoms and Ravagers to taste. I go first, i win. See, we Dark Eldar can still compete, we just have to be utter scumbags to do so...
Don't know if you guys have seen this, but there is a very good videorep between Rob Fortin, running beast-pack venom-spam Deldar, against Justin Cook, winner of Nova 2013 with his O'vesastar, running wave serpent-spam Eldar.
This battle will probably give you some insight to your question.
On the other hand, i can create a perfectly competitive list without Eldar, Vect, Corteaz + a Revenent Titian, with Wych Venoms and Ravagers to taste. I go first, i win. See, we Dark Eldar can still compete, we just have to be utter scumbags to do so...
That combo isn't an auto-win anymore, especially with the nerf to Strength D.
Please don't get into an ''Are Wave Serpents OP or not?'' Argument on my thread, go make your own! What this thread is about is how to handle them, and it seems we have our answer. Assault. Now the real problem is we only have a single competent melee unit in the Beast pack, which leads to further problems as they can be utterly controlled by an Eldar Farseer or a few Warlocks rolling Telepathy/Horrify. Grotesques are an option, but the Raider is hardly a reliable way to move them across the bored and once they are walking they are simply scatter laser targets.
Making things Jink is...problematic. If the Wave Serpent has access to any sort of cover, then thanks to Holofields he won't need to jink to stay alive from the scant shots i can put his way, and even a Jinking Wave Serpent is enough to put out a considerable threat. We could think outside the box? Scourges are not cost effective, Reavers with Special Weapons are wasting its Anti Infantry Ability, Talosi are to slow, Void Ravens to Fragile, Reapers suffer single shot syndrome. It seems we have come to an en-passe were we KNOW the best way to deal with Serpents, it's just the Best Way is either not effective enough or relies on the other player being bad/luck, and there is simply nothing we can do about. Less of a 'Best Anti Wave Serpent List' and more of a 'Best Chance We Got'.
On the other hand, i can create a perfectly competitive list without Eldar, Vect, Corteaz + a Revenent Titian, with Wych Venoms and Ravagers to taste. I go first, i win. See, we Dark Eldar can still compete, we just have to be utter scumbags to do so...
Wasnt directed at you, it was directed at the guy who didnt know what he was talking about but trying to tell everyone else what to do, dont take it personally
Automatically Appended Next Post:
jy2 wrote: Don't know if you guys have seen this, but there is a very good videorep between Rob Fortin, running beast-pack venom-spam Deldar, against Justin Cook, winner of Nova 2013 with his O'vesastar, running wave serpent-spam Eldar.
This battle will probably give you some insight to your question.
On the other hand, i can create a perfectly competitive list without Eldar, Vect, Corteaz + a Revenent Titian, with Wych Venoms and Ravagers to taste. I go first, i win. See, we Dark Eldar can still compete, we just have to be utter scumbags to do so...
That combo isn't an auto-win anymore, especially with the nerf to Strength D.
Thanks for posting this dude, not one I have seen so I will grab some snacks and sit down for a few hours of interesting watching...
Doesn't look like you factored in the Scatter Lasers being Twin Linked? That effectively nets them 1 hit, which is all they need to twin link the Serpent Shield, which will get somewhere between 1 and 2 hits. Vs Armour 10 or 11, that's going to cause a glance/pen or two if they are lucky, which is enough to make someone Jink or even wreck a Venom. A jinking Ravager is almost worthless, a Jinking Wave Serpent can potentially kill a Venom by it's lonesome...
As for that Battle Report, i might be happier if it was pure Dark Eldar or you know...not 3 hours long, but I am sure it will help! As for the cheese list, it might not be auto win, but it is certainly cheesey. Many lists will crumble before the might of the Revenent! Doesn't hold the place of terror it once did, but that's fine, auto win games aren't very fun anyway. Scratch that, as i have never faced a Tyranid player, i don't think i know the feeling
Shingen wrote: I have Nids as well and they do well against DE as long as you don't take loads of MC's which are like tissue paper to splinter weapons.
Tyranids have actually gotten better against DE in this edition, especially with Skyblight Nids. Triple-flyrants are just murder against DE vehicles and now that they only take 1 grounding test, they've become much more survivable. Hive crone templates will now kill a DE transport and possibly the crew inside as well. Lol.
jy2 wrote: Don't know if you guys have seen this, but there is a very good videorep between Rob Fortin, running beast-pack venom-spam Deldar, against Justin Cook, winner of Nova 2013 with his O'vesastar, running wave serpent-spam Eldar.
This battle will probably give you some insight to your question.
He barely wins the game despite Justin Cooks complete failure at playing eldar. He fed him defies the odds with lucky FB, then JC gives him warlord, along with rediculously bad reserve deployment. It's terrible that an incompetent eldar player with awful luck Barely lost to strong DE play.
Hey, a win is still a win, and it was a well-deserved win. And while Justin might not have been the most experienced mechdar player, he is still a top-notch, GT-winning player who really understands the game.
Hey, a win is still a win, and it was a well-deserved win. And while Justin might not have been the most experienced mechdar player, he is still a top-notch, GT-winning player who really understands the game.
Yea and it's still anecdotal evidence with TONS of problems. We were looking for in codex solutions without using allies for one. For two we want consistency, something that's obviously not displayed in that report. Eldar with first turn not getting FB is hilariously unlikely. Even going second it's unlikely.
Then there is the fact that the eldar player had no clue what he was doing.Saying he isn't the most experienced is giving way too much credit. Just look at SG's other batreps concerning him and mechdar and it's pretty clear he doesn't know how to run that army well. I am sure he understands 40k, its not that hard a game after all, I am also sure he will get better with mechdar but him not being able to run that army in those reports DOES impact its merit. Like I said before, him BARELY losing despite all these short comings just illustrates how mismatched it is.
Not trying to be harsh, just being bluntly honest about the posted link.
Anecdotal or not, I tend to look at it as a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.
Yes, Eldar is a tough matchup for DE, just like DE are for Tyranids. However, it isn't an unwinnable matchup and a build like beaststar certainly has a shot, even if they probably aren't the favorites most of the time.
That's the only time I've ever seen dark Eldar defeat Eldar (including my own attempts) and Corsair is right. That's not really a fair matchup. The player quality isn't on par with most Eldar tourney players of late.
Not to say that it's impossible, it just takes either tremendous luck or an incompetent opponent.
I'd like to agree with you but go ahead and try sometime. It's REALLY difficult for dark Eldar to match up against Eldar when both lists were designed to win. I'm not a pessimistic person- in fact I'd consider myself to be the opposite. But I'm also not a fool
I think the Tyranids match up vs DE is better than DE vs Wave Serpent.
DE lacks on ways to deal with cover saves from Venomthrope throwing off a lot of poison shots just as lacks on ways to deal with Jink, Tyranids can bring a lot of numbers and even Termagants can and will break Raiders & Venoms, and even DL can be shrugged off on important things like Exocrine a Tyrannofex by sticking to cover, keeping Venomthrope wrapped out of sight in MC's, with Catalyst rolls helping all the more. This plus 2+ saves on TFex meaning it still takes +70 poison HITS (not shots) to even bring him down, while he is melting open tops and any infantry and even scoring the odd glance with Acid Spray.
It's not a favourable match up and with their speed and range dictation the ball is in DE's court along with the advantage, but it's far from un-winnable for Nids. Unlike 7-9 Wave Serpents vs DE.
Shingen wrote: Or skill, tactics and good list building.
What's the edge dark eldar have over eldar?
Everything I see says that eldar are going to win out in any given set up.
Venoms are great, but not really any better than Vypers. Especially when you factor in that Vypers can actually KILL venoms, where as venoms are just throwing out ~4 wounding hits.
Lances are equal, except that eldar get them cheaper.
Those pesky serpent shields massively outrange the dark eldar, while ignoring cover for some reason.
Maybe it's just selection. 26 units for Eldar (not counting HQ's), vs 20 for the dark eldar (with 2 of the options being a troop choice with +1 attack)
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: Doesn't look like you factored in the Scatter Lasers being Twin Linked? That effectively nets them 1 hit, which is all they need to twin link the Serpent Shield, which will get somewhere between 1 and 2 hits. Vs Armour 10 or 11, that's going to cause a glance/pen or two if they are lucky, which is enough to make someone Jink or even wreck a Venom. A jinking Ravager is almost worthless, a Jinking Wave Serpent can potentially kill a Venom by it's lonesome...
As for that Battle Report, i might be happier if it was pure Dark Eldar or you know...not 3 hours long, but I am sure it will help! As for the cheese list, it might not be auto win, but it is certainly cheesey. Many lists will crumble before the might of the Revenent! Doesn't hold the place of terror it once did, but that's fine, auto win games aren't very fun anyway. Scratch that, as i have never faced a Tyranid player, i don't think i know the feeling
My math was wrong.
Overall average of 1.19 S6 hits for the TL-SL.
1/9th of the time there will be 0 SL hits > 0.5S6AP2 hit / 0.75 S7 Ignore Cover hits
8/9th there will be at least one SL hit > 1 S6AP2 hit / 1.35 S7 Ignore Cover hits
On average:
1.19 S6AP6
0.94 S6AP2
1.28 S7AP- Ignores Cover
Against AV10 no cover: 0.9pen / 0,38 glance - 30% pen death and 23% HP death (AP2 open topped 5++) -- 53% death
Against AV10 cover: 0,78 pen / 0,32 glance - 26% pen death and 16% HP death (AP2 4+ cover open topped 5++) -- 42% death. I guess jink is not a good option.
AV10 sucks though - I'm really starting to reconsider fielding Vypers for my next game...
Shingen wrote: Or skill, tactics and good list building.
What's the edge dark eldar have over eldar?
Everything I see says that eldar are going to win out in any given set up.
Venoms are great, but not really any better than Vypers. Especially when you factor in that Vypers can actually KILL venoms, where as venoms are just throwing out ~4 wounding hits.
Lances are equal, except that eldar get them cheaper.
Those pesky serpent shields massively outrange the dark eldar, while ignoring cover for some reason.
Maybe it's just selection. 26 units for Eldar (not counting HQ's), vs 20 for the dark eldar (with 2 of the options being a troop choice with +1 attack)
I think the DE have some great assault troops correct ? (I know, in 7th, that's not really great news)
Eldar don't have any.
Vypers can't transport anything, aren't any tougher than Venoms and are usually ditched for the better units in the codex.
Vypers can probably handle Venoms, but they don't have an invul save or Poison weapons which would be awesome against some more competitive units like WK.
Even if they could transport stuff we still wouldn't use them.
Lances don't seem very competitive for either Eldar or DE.
The Serpent Shields are limited to TL-SL range in practice (36"), board size, and oftentimes Shuriken cannon (24").
In my opinion, vehicles in general are too easy to kill, especially AV10-11-12 / rear10 that can be assaulted by anything S4 and shot down by very available weapons.
That's why the DE are having such a hard time, because that's the only vehicles they've got and they still have to get into assault.
I think the DE have some great assault troops correct ? (I know, in 7th, that's not really great news)
Eldar don't have any.
Vypers can't transport anything, aren't any tougher than Venoms and are usually ditched for the better units in the codex.
Vypers can probably handle Venoms, but they don't have an invul save or Poison weapons which would be awesome against some more competitive units like WK.
Even if they could transport stuff we still wouldn't use them.
Lances don't seem very competitive for either Eldar or DE.
The Serpent Shields are limited to TL-SL range in practice (36", board size, and oftentimes Shuriken cannon (24".
In my opinion, vehicles in general are too easy to kill, especially AV10-11-12 / rear10 that can be assaulted by anything S4 and shot down by very available weapons.
That's why the DE are having such a hard time, because that's the only vehicles they've got and they still have to get into assault.
Great Assault Troops? Wyches get S3 attacks, and are 6+ armor vs shoot and 4+ invul in combat. That 4+ invul looks good on paper, but the inability to get to combat, or kill in combat once they arrive hamstrings them. Incubi are slightly better, but at 22 point for S4 A2 power weapons, they out still outperformed by out armies dedicated assault units. Hellions? T4 5+ jet bikes? I'm just not seeing the assault unit that is going to really deal the damage.
3 Venoms shooting at WK. 36 shots, 24 hits, 12 wounds, 3+ armor = ~4 failed saves.
3 Vypers, 18 shots, 12 hits, 2 wounds at AP2 with no save.
3 Venom vs Riptide, 36 shots, 24 hits, 12 wounds, 2+ armor save - ~2 failed saves.
3 Vypers, 18 shots, 12 hits, 4 normal saves and 2 AP2 wounds ~ 2 failed saves.
Against T5 or T4 units with 2+ armor, the shurikens pull ahead of the poison shots.
In performance, vypers and venoms are very similar, with the exception of the vypers being able to take on armor. The fact that people aren't running vypers shows that the role they fill can be covered better by other eldar units, and dark eldar don't have that option.
Lances used to be the bread and butter of DE. Of course, you used to be able to get very large numbers of them.
If you want an assault army, it looks like Eldar do it better (Wraithblades, Wraith Knights, shining spears)
If you want a shooty army, looks like eldar are better, S6 > poison 4+, and S4 shuriken on par with splinters + survivable effective firepower; having units and transports who have ignore cover/ignore jink is a problem for DE, and something DE lack against enemies.
If you want a mobile army, Eldar jet bikes as troops and everything getting battle focus makes them quicker than their DE counterpart.
Characters now seem a toss-up, though the inability to mount up a DE character seems like a huge nerf. I miss the option for the sky boards and jetbikes.
Feth it all, the hour grows dark and the future seems grim for the Dark Eldar, in our hour of need there is only one force that we can turn to as allies. No it is not the Eldar nor is it something found outside our codex. That is right brothers, we must turn to the mandrake!
Fill your HQ slots with Haemonculi and d..d..d..DROP the webway bringing the living nightmares straight to your opponent's face spitting out baleblasts like the good neighbor we are. Trust me, no one will ever see it coming.
jy2 wrote: Anecdotal or not, I tend to look at it as a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.
Yes, Eldar is a tough matchup for DE, just like DE are for Tyranids. However, it isn't an unwinnable matchup and a build like beaststar certainly has a shot, even if they probably aren't the favorites most of the time.
I don't tend see light at the end of a dark tunnel as a valid strategy in a tactics forum. I also prefer advice come from a source who has actually played DE in at least 6th if not 7th. Have you played with them in either?
As for those matchups, tyranids are not an easy win for DE at all. They weren't in 6th, now in 7th Tyranids have a huge edge over them. With massed FMC's who only take grounding checks after being wounded but ALSO one at the END of turn, the pendulum swung way back in favor of nids. Even if I ground one, its back in the air again before I can shoot full BS shots and worse still I probably just helped give it the option to assault my units where it can hide if it needs to and with one smash attack, bang they can due it easier then before. Then there are the recyclable infantry in formations and yet even more fliers and the huge access to torrent flamers or even haywire flamers on fmc's which now not only deal an auto haywire hit to DE's crap hp skimmers but also a s5 hit and THEN it roasts the occupants. I think your stuck back in 5th when there actually was a mismatch in favor of DE.
As for DE against eldar, it really does come down to the skill level of the eldar player+luck. The people who keep claiming ONLY DE skill is required need to take their horse blinders off (some of them also need to show their list to be taken seriously). It takes a masterful stroke by the DE player, literally minimal poor rolling all while the eldar player needs to roll bad on his saves and make poor moves. The only solid advice I have seen is using eldar allies, which is ironic at the least as well as not following the OP's guidelines, and beastpacks. Sadly beastpacks are the last great tool we have left, which is rather sad, especially when yet again it almost always requires eldar support to show consistent results. Again ironic.
I think the DE have some great assault troops correct ? (I know, in 7th, that's not really great news)
Eldar don't have any.
Vypers can't transport anything, aren't any tougher than Venoms and are usually ditched for the better units in the codex.
Vypers can probably handle Venoms, but they don't have an invul save or Poison weapons which would be awesome against some more competitive units like WK.
Even if they could transport stuff we still wouldn't use them.
Lances don't seem very competitive for either Eldar or DE.
The Serpent Shields are limited to TL-SL range in practice (36", board size, and oftentimes Shuriken cannon (24".
In my opinion, vehicles in general are too easy to kill, especially AV10-11-12 / rear10 that can be assaulted by anything S4 and shot down by very available weapons.
That's why the DE are having such a hard time, because that's the only vehicles they've got and they still have to get into assault.
Great Assault Troops? Wyches get S3 attacks, and are 6+ armor vs shoot and 4+ invul in combat. That 4+ invul looks good on paper, but the inability to get to combat, or kill in combat once they arrive hamstrings them. Incubi are slightly better, but at 22 point for S4 A2 power weapons, they out still outperformed by out armies dedicated assault units. Hellions? T4 5+ jet bikes? I'm just not seeing the assault unit that is going to really deal the damage.
3 Venoms shooting at WK. 36 shots, 24 hits, 12 wounds, 3+ armor = ~4 failed saves.
3 Vypers, 18 shots, 12 hits, 2 wounds at AP2 with no save.
3 Venom vs Riptide, 36 shots, 24 hits, 12 wounds, 2+ armor save - ~2 failed saves.
3 Vypers, 18 shots, 12 hits, 4 normal saves and 2 AP2 wounds ~ 2 failed saves.
Against T5 or T4 units with 2+ armor, the shurikens pull ahead of the poison shots.
In performance, vypers and venoms are very similar, with the exception of the vypers being able to take on armor. The fact that people aren't running vypers shows that the role they fill can be covered better by other eldar units, and dark eldar don't have that option.
Lances used to be the bread and butter of DE. Of course, you used to be able to get very large numbers of them.
If you want an assault army, it looks like Eldar do it better (Wraithblades, Wraith Knights, shining spears)
If you want a shooty army, looks like eldar are better, S6 > poison 4+, and S4 shuriken on par with splinters + survivable effective firepower; having units and transports who have ignore cover/ignore jink is a problem for DE, and something DE lack against enemies.
If you want a mobile army, Eldar jet bikes as troops and everything getting battle focus makes them quicker than their DE counterpart.
Characters now seem a toss-up, though the inability to mount up a DE character seems like a huge nerf. I miss the option for the sky boards and jetbikes.
He doesn't even know most of the DE units, which should be clear evidence he doesn't play the army. I think that speaks volumes.
Morgoths' gimmick is claiming that Eldar aren't OP, he does it in his posts everythread even one they aren't mentioned. Feel free to check his posts if you want confirmation.
His posts in this one about Dark Eldar being so strong are really just a roundabout way of him calling Eldar balanced. He knows very little about the army and can doesn't own a codex to reference them so can barely even tread water in this thread. I wouldn't pay it too much mind.
Just thought id add: what vehicle crew apart from serp crew can safely make a cup of tea in the cabin, whilst calmly watching a deathstrike missile land plumb on their heads?
Ignatius wrote: That's the only time I've ever seen dark Eldar defeat Eldar (including my own attempts) and Corsair is right. That's not really a fair matchup. The player quality isn't on par with most Eldar tourney players of late.
Not to say that it's impossible, it just takes either tremendous luck or an incompetent opponent.
The player quality is there. It just needs a little more seasoning. Justin is a very tactical player. I've played against him before and he soundly beat my necrons. Even an inexperienced Justin is still a lot better than most of the other experienced Eldar players. Yes, he is a really good player.
I don't tend see light at the end of a dark tunnel as a valid strategy in a tactics forum. I also prefer advice come from a source who has actually played DE in at least 6th if not 7th. Have you played with them in either?
So I have to have played the army to be able to offer any insight at all? So it doesn't matter that I've played against Beaststar or Venom-spam DE many times before? Or that I myself am a mechdar player and knows their strengths and weaknesses very well?
Well, then....feel free to ignore any of the posts coming out of my mouth with regards to this matter.
And for the record, I haven't even offered any strategy advice yet. All I've done was to post a link to a battle report between the 2 armies discussed that may possibly offer some insight for some of the players here. You may have found it to be of no help, but I disagree. I think that there is actually a lot that can be gleaned from the report.
As for those matchups, tyranids are not an easy win for DE at all. They weren't in 6th, now in 7th Tyranids have a huge edge over them. With massed FMC's who only take grounding checks after being wounded but ALSO one at the END of turn, the pendulum swung way back in favor of nids. Even if I ground one, its back in the air again before I can shoot full BS shots and worse still I probably just helped give it the option to assault my units where it can hide if it needs to and with one smash attack, bang they can due it easier then before. Then there are the recyclable infantry in formations and yet even more fliers and the huge access to torrent flamers or even haywire flamers on fmc's which now not only deal an auto haywire hit to DE's crap hp skimmers but also a s5 hit and THEN it roasts the occupants.
You know, haywire is much much stronger against Eldar non-crap skimmers and Land Raiders, and just about any good vehicle right ?
Haywire being used against crap vehicles is the best way to minimize its efficiency.
He doesn't even know most of the DE units, which should be clear evidence he doesn't play the army. I think that speaks volumes.
Indeed I don't.
However I know the Wave Serpent much better than most players because I knew it a lot more when it wasn't really popular, and have updated my understanding of it to v7 rules.
Now if you don't need that intel to win that uphill battle, good for you.
Automatically Appended Next Post: About that Eldar vs DE battle report:
1> 2 D-cannon WraithKnight in 1850 points. Almost one third of the army of undercosted MC doom. Not sure that even registers as "Serpent Spam", there aren't even three Elite WS and the dragon squads are really minimalistic (I prefer exarch fast shot, 6 fusion shots > 4 hits > 3 pen > boom).
2> No Shuriken Cannons on the WS because the list was optimized to fit the WK first. Not really telling us much about real Serpent Spam.
3> DE deployment could've been much better, he's giving free LoS on his beasts and worse threat range on his skimmers.
4> Let his two first serpents die when there was still a way to save them, forced to jink two because he did not hide one behind the other, ...
5> Deploy new WS in front of the beasts to make sure they can't catch it... Tank Shocking Beasts.. wtf. He could have moved behind cover and shot the skimmers behind right ?
6> I'm not sure but deployment zone would favor DE because there is less depth overall, only one option for Eldar to increase distance (in the one deep corner), average assault distance is shorter.
Overall, Justin underestimated the Beast threat, DE were favored by deployment (no Eldar on the table T1, diagonal gives better advantage for Assault armies) yet messed it up slightly (beasts could've started wider, jetbikes behind, skimmers closer to the line, somewhat forcing worse deployment for the Eldar then cornering him then table in assault.).
The DE player also could have done better in the movement phase with his beasts.
With their movement and run, starting from the center of a diagonal deployment, he could've covered the whole Eldar deployment zone by the end of the second turn (2x average run inside the Eldar deployment zone), keeping the charge for third turn as he did, which would've netted him 3 Serpents, the Fire Dragons, and tarpitting the two MCs until the others joined in, or simply swarming the top-left corner and ignoring top-right for one turn.
Instead he charged two WS and one WK.
I have no idea how many more mistakes the DE player made, but the Eldar could've done much better.
Anyway, hindsight is always 20/20, but the main thing is that game does not feature a Serpent Spam list imo, and there are too many situational advantages for the DE to make it a fair comparison.
morgoth wrote: Anyway, hindsight is always 20/20, but the main thing is that game does not feature a Serpent Spam list imo
What do you consider Serpent Spam? How many? My reason for asking is that in my tournament list I usually run 3 or 4, but don't consider that spam. I'm interested to find out your take.
morgoth wrote: Anyway, hindsight is always 20/20, but the main thing is that game does not feature a Serpent Spam list imo
What do you consider Serpent Spam? How many? My reason for asking is that in my tournament list I usually run 3 or 4, but don't consider that spam. I'm interested to find out your take.
As an Eldar, you are forced - yes, forced - to take three WS if you want to field Elite.
You may want to have one unit of troops somewhat protected - or maybe even Wraith - so you're very likely going to take a fourth.
That, in my opinion, is the minimum core of a decent Eldar Army.
In my opinion, if that's the core, then it can't possibly be considered spam, because we don't even have another decent option.
Then comes the spam, or my list, where the goal really is to get as many WS on the board, just because those models are awesome.
I get 7 with shu-cannon TLSL and holofields and 2 Prisms in 2K - and it's very far from a competitive list in my humble opinion.
not sure how your oponnent is both indestructable, AND killing your whole army with wave serpants...
if the sheild is used offensively, it cant be used defensively,
if they jink for the cover save, they are making snap shots.
if dark lances work on av 14 and 13, they work just as well on av 12... not sure how on earth you see them as working "worse" when in fact they work just as well on av 12 as 13+14.
other then that, you have acess to haywire, and fast transports with a lot of firepower yourself. any masses str 7+ fire will do the trick
First off- good for your humble opinion about your list, but just because it's an opinion doesn't make it correct. That's a darn good list you've got and I haven't even seen the whole thing.
Second, let's get this thread back on track. It's about Dark Eldar and their attempts to take on Wave Serpents in numbers (as few as 3 at I time even). Wave serpents are a tough match up and we are trying to find strategies to take them out.
Eldar players coming into the thread can be a great help, if you tell us what your afraid of or what has taken them out in the past. But coming in post after post saying it's not as good as we think, etc etc isn't helping.
Now then. What I've been relying on is my two ravagers focusing on one every turn. It generally will take one out, but I'd like to hear some other suggestions as I'm a little shaky on it
morgoth wrote: Anyway, hindsight is always 20/20, but the main thing is that game does not feature a Serpent Spam list imo
What do you consider Serpent Spam? How many? My reason for asking is that in my tournament list I usually run 3 or 4, but don't consider that spam. I'm interested to find out your take.
As an Eldar, you are forced - yes, forced - to take three WS if you want to field Elite.
You may want to have one unit of troops somewhat protected - or maybe even Wraith - so you're very likely going to take a fourth.
That, in my opinion, is the minimum core of a decent Eldar Army.
In my opinion, if that's the core, then it can't possibly be considered spam, because we don't even have another decent option.
Then comes the spam, or my list, where the goal really is to get as many WS on the board, just because those models are awesome.
I get 7 with shu-cannon TLSL and holofields and 2 Prisms in 2K - and it's very far from a competitive list in my humble opinion.
That's fair. I tend to agree. My tournament list usually sports 2-3 Wraith Knights, a couple units of jetbikes, and a unit of warp spiders with those 3-4 serpents... all depends on points of the tourney. I have NOT played any 7th tournaments, but i think the list will translate over just fine.
how can DE counter WS? As an Eldar player, I don't think they can, - but then that is true for most lists - what I WOULD say is remember that flamer template weapons have no cover save allowed - this was used to great effect by a Tyranid player I played recently who rear shot me from a hive crone.. .. rear armour.. other than very expensive one shot reveal units that will die after delivery, there really isn't much anyone can do other than deep strike a powerclaw.. joking aside the LOS guy was probably closest, when he started saying that everyone trolled it, but you must try to close on them in one go. I don't see it as being unrealistic.. I play eldar but my main worry with my WS is being far away enough.. (that other players of eldar seem to ignore).. you see, secretly, most eldar players like to be at least 24 inches from you because they like to use the Shuriken Canon too.. not only is 24 inches very close, this ALSO limits their movement to 6 inches.. so I would say to any DE player - stay around 24 inches away (the average WS player will let you - even WANT you that far away) but out of LOS and you should be able be able to assault them with a raider - shooting with lances is all but pointless... rear armour? close combat? that's another thing.. even if you LITERALLY end up using one raider per wave serp it would work - probably nuke them all..
jy2 wrote: All I've done was to post a link to a battle report between the 2 armies discussed that may possibly offer some insight for some of the players here. You may have found it to be of no help, but I disagree. I think that there is actually a lot that can be gleaned from the report.
Yes, this is what we learned:
1) When a shooty army going first with highly mobile 60” ignores cover shots in a vanguard strike deployment decides to reserve most of his force against an assaulty army instead of shooting it, and
2) focuses on the non-assault units when his reserves do arrive,
3) he will have a difficult time winning.
How this is supposed to help a Dark Eldar player beat a competent Wave Serpent player however, I have no idea.
easysauce wrote: not sure how your oponnent is both indestructable, AND killing your whole army with wave serpants...
if the sheild is used offensively, it cant be used defensively,
if they jink for the cover save, they are making snap shots.
if dark lances work on av 14 and 13, they work just as well on av 12... not sure how on earth you see them as working "worse" when in fact they work just as well on av 12 as 13+14.
other then that, you have acess to haywire, and fast transports with a lot of firepower yourself. any masses str 7+ fire will do the trick
1. If the shield is used offensively, he wont need to use it defensively. After All the S7 ignores cover, you are not likely to have much to shoot back it it.
2. Serpents wont need to jink most of the time with cover and intervening models + holofields. Even if they do jink, A snap shooting Serpent has a pretty decent chance at wrecking a venom anyway. (math for that is above)
3. The thing about Dark Lances "not being good" against AV 12 works like this. You are penning AV 12 on the same number as AV 13/14. This is bad because it is much cheaper to bring AV 12 to the table than it is to bring AV 13/14. For example, for the cost of a land raider, you could bring 2 Serpents. So to have the same effect on the enemy, you would have to bring twice as many Dark Lances. Its more of a efficiency problem, as dark lances are not cheap.
4. Where is Dark Eldar getting this massed S7 fire from?
Ignatius wrote: That's the only time I've ever seen dark Eldar defeat Eldar (including my own attempts) and Corsair is right. That's not really a fair matchup. The player quality isn't on par with most Eldar tourney players of late.
Not to say that it's impossible, it just takes either tremendous luck or an incompetent opponent.
The player quality is there. It just needs a little more seasoning. Justin is a very tactical player. I've played against him before and he soundly beat my necrons. Even an inexperienced Justin is still a lot better than most of the other experienced Eldar players. Yes, he is a really good player.
I don't tend see light at the end of a dark tunnel as a valid strategy in a tactics forum. I also prefer advice come from a source who has actually played DE in at least 6th if not 7th. Have you played with them in either?
So I have to have played the army to be able to offer any insight at all? So it doesn't matter that I've played against Beaststar or Venom-spam DE many times before? Or that I myself am a mechdar player and knows their strengths and weaknesses very well?
Well, then....feel free to ignore any of the posts coming out of my mouth with regards to this matter.
And for the record, I haven't even offered any strategy advice yet. All I've done was to post a link to a battle report between the 2 armies discussed that may possibly offer some insight for some of the players here. You may have found it to be of no help, but I disagree. I think that there is actually a lot that can be gleaned from the report.
You can offer insight all you want, but your credibility on the issue at hand will be suspect when your experience is lacking. Consider the fact that if your inexperience with DE doesn't weigh on your insight at all, then all your experience with Necrons or tyranids doesn't matter either on that venue. You can't have it both ways.
And considering you have openly admitted to a lack of DE opponents in your own threads this wreaks a bit. Many times? From my knowledge you have played GTA (an Eldar player btw) who doesn't field DE primary and used to splash a beastpack then switched to pure seercouncil when the new book dropped with an venom for GT's and Franky who also heavily relies on Eldar. Playing a 'handful' of games against DE doesn't an expert make.
Oh and whats with the Justin Cook pitch? We get it, you think he's the greatest player ever. I notice every player you face shares this title. Rather convenient for you win or lose I'd say. Talk the crap out of them then you come out on top no matter what. In those videos, his CWE play was utter garbage which is all that's relevant. I don't care how great he should be or can be, he was playing serpent spam like crap.
Even an inexperienced Justin is still a lot better than most of the other experienced Eldar players. Yes, he is a really good player. BTW this line almost made me spew my coffee. This has to be the most pretentious, stuck up, insulting post I have ever read. Maybe he should wear a cape and hang out on ledges as well?
I gotta agree, I respect Jy2 giving opinions because he often posts explanations with a lot of depth and clarity. However, the whole Jy2 to circle jerk is getting pretty played out. How come whenever he gives an opinion on a race he DOES play you can't even voice a disagreement without a bunch of people telling you that you aren't on Jy2's level (without having any idea if you are or not) and to stop arguing against the facts (as seen by Jy2 of course). Then he perpetuates this circle by saying everyone he's Ever played is a god tier player and their actions and opinions should be studied and learned from, even when it's a guy playing Eldar at 11 year old kid with a netlist level.
Can't we just merit advice on the quality of the content, and not by who is saying it?
SHUPPET wrote: I gotta agree, I respect Jy2 giving opinions because he often posts explanations with a lot of depth and clarity. However, the whole Jy2 to circle jerk is getting pretty played out. How come whenever he gives an opinion on a race he DOES play you can't even voice a disagreement without a bunch of people telling you that you aren't on Jy2's level (without having any idea if you are or not) and to stop arguing against the facts (as seen by Jy2 of course). Then he perpetuates this circle by saying everyone he's Ever played is a god tier player and their actions and opinions should be studied and learned from, even when it's a guy playing Eldar at 11 year old kid with a netlist level.
Can't we just merit advice on the quality of the content, and not by who is saying it?
I think some people are afraid of that because it means no matter how much they work on their standing, they'll still be just a fool.
That Justin guy, if he's really a good player, had a really bad day that day because he made major mistakes that aren't even related to the army he's playing.
I don't think any of the two players in that match did really good tbh. They may be good outside of that match, but they both made mistakes with a serious, foreseeable impact.
Soo the only counter that Dark Eldar effectively have against Eldar Cheese Serpents are ...wait for it more Edlar Cheese Serpents or other Eldar Allied units
That seems to be very poor idea
And of course the "Skill" to be able to use Cheese Serpents - after all its a mark of really good player that they can use OP units as well as average ones - poor players simply can;t do that...........
Yeah it's a shame that this thread just got ravaged by Eldar players raging that people suggested that their Serpents are broken... Was meant to be a strategy discussion, nmid that tho rite it's all bout blindly defending your own army whether it's relevant to the convo or not
Mr Morden wrote: Soo the only counter that Dark Eldar effectively have against Eldar Cheese Serpents are ...wait for it more Edlar Cheese Serpents or other Eldar Allied units
That seems to be very poor idea
And of course the "Skill" to be able to use Cheese Serpents - after all its a mark of really good player that they can use OP units as well as average ones - poor players simply can;t do that...........
No matter what you think, a bad WS player will lose to a good DE player most of the time.
No matter how OP a unit is, it cannot compensate the enormous impact that better strategy and tactics have on a game like WH40K, beginning with list choices and finishing with movement and targeting choices.
Because we have the chance to have a sample game, I'll use it for reference:
1. Eldar picked a WK warlord, missing on the very awesome warlord traits to deny Victory Points.
2. Eldar lost one WS in the early game because he decided to engage before his forces were regrouped, and without making good use of the cover.
3. Eldar lost more WS in the third turn because he did not realize what threat the Beasts were posing, and instead of deploying to counter that, he simply offered three units for them to charge where he could've limited that to just one WS (or even zero if you're me).
Even though he was rocking competitive units (WS) and OP units (naked WK), none of that could compensate the major tactical mistakes he made.
I am sorry but that is an unfair representation of an Eldar vs dark Eldar match. In the later stages of a tournament it is unreasonable to assume the other player is an idiot or will make stupid mistakes. Before giving a suggestion, think if YOU were the eldar player would it work on you? I know if I played serpent spam I wouldn't let myself be caught under any circumstances by wyches, those venoms would be dead. That beast lack would either be tar pitted or psychicly controlled. And God help you if you make a WK a warlord vs Dark Eldar, you are not thinking straight. I don't want to win due to the opponent being an idiot, I want to be on an even footing against a fair opponent, but in WH40K that seems like an unrealistic idea.
No matter how OP a unit is, it cannot compensate the enormous impact that better strategy and tactics have on a game like WH40K, beginning with list choices and finishing with movement and targeting choices.
Good to see you admitting that the Wave Serpent is OP - excellent progress.
Right, so your argument now is - if the Eldar player is incompetent he might still loose even with OP units - but again a "fair" match up is simply one way game - which again helps confirm the OP nature of the Wave Serpent.
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: I am sorry but that is an unfair representation of an Eldar vs dark Eldar match. In the later stages of a tournament it is unreasonable to assume the other player is an idiot or will make stupid mistakes. Before giving a suggestion, think if YOU were the eldar player would it work on you? I know if I played serpent spam I wouldn't let myself be caught under any circumstances by wyches, those venoms would be dead. That beast lack would either be tar pitted or psychicly controlled. And God help you if you make a WK a warlord vs Dark Eldar, you are not thinking straight. I don't want to win due to the opponent being an idiot, I want to be on an even footing against a fair opponent, but in WH40K that seems like an unrealistic idea.
I think everyone agrees that game clearly shows a better DE than Eldar player, although both make mistakes that can cost a game.
If I was the Eldar player, it would be unfair because the DE guy clearly doesn't have my understanding of movement and deployment.
Let's simply move on to your problem: you want to be able to win against an opponent that has about the same level as yourself.
1. That may not be possible, some units in some strategy games are just excellent in one skill bracket and balanced at the top for example (widow mines in SC2:HotS come to mind)
2. That may require improving your knowledge of the rules that can be played against the WS 3. It WILL absolutely require that you understand the WS, what it can and can't do, when it's making its points back, and when it's lackluster
1. Can't help you with that
2. The WS has a few rules that can make it weak:
a. Jink: If the Eldar player chooses to Jink, his WS goes down to 25% efficiency for one turn > maximize the jinks.
b. Movement: If you can force a WS to move 12", one of his weapons snap fires, more than 12" and that's just like a Jink. The WS is bulky, it's 7" x 4", or 9" x 6" if you count the 1" distance, so restricting it's movements is easy (12-9 = 3", 12-6 = 6" - any flat out move kills its DPS.
c. Serpent Shield: If he shoots his field, he becomes very vulnerable to pens > focus on those who dropped their shield
d. Shooting Phase: 55% of his firepower is "ignores cover", the rest is not, take your movement decisions based on that > keep cover to deny 45%, hide a skimmer behind another one, especially the important ones behind the meatshields.
e. Assault Phase: the WS is worthless, it will be taken down by any S4+ attack, this is your best bet to destroy it even though it seems impossible at first. Any trick in the book is good, Infiltrate / Outflank, Deep Strike, meatshields, LoS, ...
3. You may notice that your take on the subject clearly shows your knowledge of your own army, yet little of your enemy's.
a. Following proper deployment and movement, Assault cannot be avoided. It can be diminished, and sometimes delayed by killing all transports, but you basically cannot prevent it. It's going to happen, DE wants it early, Eldar wants it late
b. There is no unit in the Eldar codex - except a SeerStar - that could possibly handle a beast pack.
c. I don't play victory points and I would never give up a warlord trait for a VP, no matter the opponent
d. You will always win because you capitalized on your opponent's mistakes, outweighing his capitalization on your mistakes, in other words, winning because he's an "idiot"
e. Analyze the DE player's errors to see how he could've done better, then analyze the capitalized Eldar mistakes, and see how you could better capitalize or cause these mistakes.
I'm thinking webway spam might be the way to go.
Taking anything with a DE armor value of 10 or 11 and opened topped it just pissing points away.
It looks like 2 detachments is pretty common for list building for tournaments. If that's the case, the double escape hatch fortifications might be the way to go.
Opening 2 portals center field (or just past center field) ~24" apart puts most of the table within threat range.
At 1850, you get 2 haemonculi to deliver the webways, 2 bunkers with hatches, 3 tooled up archons, 6 units of wyches, 6 units of warriors, and 4 Talos.
The idea would be to reserve almost everything and flood the table with assault units, grab stuff, and wait for the Archons to come and finish crap off. You'd take horrible losses, but with lots of minimum sized units, the idea is to put more on the table than the opponent can target.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Just another thought; DE get Combined Arms Detachments stupidly cheap. If detachments aren't limited, you could go with the Void-Wall.
Multiple bunkers and void shield generators, in over-lapping areas to give you a stupid number of AV12 replenishing void shields. Then park a fair bit of fire power inside (like Night Shielded ravagers, to force the enemy closer).
2 Wave Serpents firing at 24" is going to knock down ~4 shields. For the same cost, you get 9 shields.
It might just be possible to win the shoot out by taking ~4 wave shield generators (400 points for 12 shields), and be able to absorb the firepower, recover the shields and dish out a ton of damage of your own.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Just another thought; DE get Combined Arms Detachments stupidly cheap. If detachments aren't limited, you could go with the Void-Wall.
Multiple bunkers and void shield generators, in over-lapping areas to give you a stupid number of AV12 replenishing void shields. Then park a fair bit of fire power inside (like Night Shielded ravagers, to force the enemy closer).
2 Wave Serpents firing at 24" is going to knock down ~4 shields. For the same cost, you get 9 shields.
It might just be possible to win the shoot out by taking ~4 wave shield generators (400 points for 12 shields), and be able to absorb the firepower, recover the shields and dish out a ton of damage of your own.
This part would require either careful planning or expertise. Since the wave serpent might actually move in on one of the side shield zones and and get protection if your forces are not in the interlocking shield zone. And if you move in toe the same shield zone to fire then it is an even playing field. One needs to practice with this to not allow getting flat out serpents in the shields where you cant charge them.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Just another thought; DE get Combined Arms Detachments stupidly cheap. If detachments aren't limited, you could go with the Void-Wall.
Multiple bunkers and void shield generators, in over-lapping areas to give you a stupid number of AV12 replenishing void shields. Then park a fair bit of fire power inside (like Night Shielded ravagers, to force the enemy closer).
2 Wave Serpents firing at 24" is going to knock down ~4 shields. For the same cost, you get 9 shields.
It might just be possible to win the shoot out by taking ~4 wave shield generators (400 points for 12 shields), and be able to absorb the firepower, recover the shields and dish out a ton of damage of your own.
This part would require either careful planning or expertise. Since the wave serpent might actually move in on one of the side shield zones and and get protection if your forces are not in the interlocking shield zone. And if you move in toe the same shield zone to fire then it is an even playing field. One needs to practice with this to not allow getting flat out serpents in the shields where you cant charge them.
A core of wyches with haywire would massacre serpents that came in too close. Seems like you can force the issue of a shoot out with you gaining void shields, or them coming in too close where you can assault with haywire.
I'm by no means an expert, but 100 points per 12" bubble of Three 12 regenerating shields seems to cover the major weakness of DE, the glasscannon effect.
2. The WS has a few rules that can make it weak:
a. Jink: If the Eldar player chooses to Jink, his WS goes down to 25% efficiency for one turn > maximize the jinks.
I would agree with you accept this isn't what it seems on at face value. A WS can choose not to jink early on forcing you to commit to it first. Say you fire 6 dark lances at one that =2HP.
Meaning it can literally absorb the fire from two ravagers or 6 raiders or one ravager and 3 raiders before deciding to jink on the last ones, meaning you haven't prevented it from firing at full effect until you have shot that 7th dark lances into it. In a serpent spam list the best you can expect is to force 1-2 to jink against any opponent with a brain. That leaves at least 3-5 ready to fire at full BS in return.
I am also finding it hard to fathom why every eldar advocate assumes their is no cover for their WS, even if the table were bare a smart eldar player will use two of his own WS to BLOS to the rest again meaning max two are jinking.
b. Movement: If you can force a WS to move 12", one of his weapons snap fires, more than 12" and that's just like a Jink. The WS is bulky, it's 7" x 4", or 9" x 6" if you count the 1" distance, so restricting it's movements is easy (12-9 = 3", 12-6 = 6" - any flat out move kills its DPS.
This is only valid if you choose to flat out turn one with a large portion of your fleet to close the required gap, now your forcing jinks are you.
d. Shooting Phase: 55% of his firepower is "ignores cover", the rest is not, take your movement decisions based on that > keep cover to deny 45%, hide a skimmer behind another one, especially the important ones behind the meatshields.
So now I have enough skimmers to impede his movement, force jinks AND use as meat shields for my other skimmers.... I think you need to look at the DE book finally, because are skimmers aren't actually that cheap.
e. Assault Phase: the WS is worthless, it will be taken down by any S4+ attack, this is your best bet to destroy it even though it seems impossible at first. Any trick in the book is good, Infiltrate / Outflank, Deep Strike, meatshields, LoS, ...
Again, where are all these s4 CC attacks comming from, you realize we have very few units with s4 right? You talking about basically only the beastpack here which is fast, exactly as fast as our vehicles and theirs. But also notice it cannot infiltrate, outflank or DS and btw even if it could you may want to brush up on the rules considering you cannot assault after any said actions, making it a worthless tactic as assault goes.
3. You may notice that your take on the subject clearly shows your knowledge of your own army, yet little of your enemy's.
a. Following proper deployment and movement, Assault cannot be avoided. It can be diminished, and sometimes delayed by killing all transports, but you basically cannot prevent it. It's going to happen, DE wants it early, Eldar wants it late
Assault with what again? A single beastpack? with out support characters the beast pack is midiocre, with them it often is also exaggerated. Their as good as any ws4 s4 volume attack unit, and if you play them right your taking up a massive footprint which generally means your first turn isn't that many attacks. Its a shame WS can't be locked in CC isn't it. It takes at least 27 attacks to hull one out. That's 7 dogs needing to be within range! not as easy as you'd think. I'll agree this is are best unit, however its not impacting the game until turn 2 the soonest. One WS turn 2 will help, but won't save the game either.
b. There is no unit in the Eldar codex - except a SeerStar - that could possibly handle a beast pack.
They don't need to handle it. A Beastpack works best when it can hide in assault early, then hit and run for extra movement. You can't do either against a vehicle list.
The best shot DE have currently, is with multiple CAD so they can spam 3 man wrack units in raiders and venoms. I am talking the 24 MSU scoring unit range. Problem is most events wont allow it, and even if they did multiple CAD opens up better lists against it, like 36 scoring marine units anyone. sort of a catch 22. Not sure spamming 24 units that do nothing but saturate targets is a list I even want to try to field anyway.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Just another thought; DE get Combined Arms Detachments stupidly cheap. If detachments aren't limited, you could go with the Void-Wall.
Multiple bunkers and void shield generators, in over-lapping areas to give you a stupid number of AV12 replenishing void shields. Then park a fair bit of fire power inside (like Night Shielded ravagers, to force the enemy closer).
2 Wave Serpents firing at 24" is going to knock down ~4 shields. For the same cost, you get 9 shields.
It might just be possible to win the shoot out by taking ~4 wave shield generators (400 points for 12 shields), and be able to absorb the firepower, recover the shields and dish out a ton of damage of your own.
This part would require either careful planning or expertise. Since the wave serpent might actually move in on one of the side shield zones and and get protection if your forces are not in the interlocking shield zone. And if you move in toe the same shield zone to fire then it is an even playing field. One needs to practice with this to not allow getting flat out serpents in the shields where you cant charge them.
A core of wyches with haywire would massacre serpents that came in too close. Seems like you can force the issue of a shoot out with you gaining void shields, or them coming in too close where you can assault with haywire.
I'm by no means an expert, but 100 points per 12" bubble of Three 12 regenerating shields seems to cover the major weakness of DE, the glasscannon effect.
-Matt
This is the sort of planning i am talking about.
Void shield would indeed help at least with negating the alpha strike, if not actually provide game length protection.
2. a.This is just a reminder of the rules that can play against the WS.
b. WTF ? what ? I just tell you about a rule that can play against the WS and you imagine a scenario that is unlikely to be attempted - although very ballsy I like it. Much more logical than shooting with your crap weapons for sure
c. AV12 for 145 points is weak, in other words, once the field is shot, the WS is not very resilient in comparison to other tanks
d. Again, just a reminder of the rules, telling you that you can keep all your skimmer perpendicular to hide each other, and probably only ever have a front of one skimmer that he can shoot.
e. I'm currently updating my knowledge to 7th and making a summary of those rules, I was searching for such a limitation but did not find it @ infiltrate / outflank. You still don't get it though, there is zero need to assault the turn you outflank, you only need to restrict the WS movement options and then charge it next turn.
3. a. You can run more than one beastpack can't you ? it's not mediocre without support characters, especially not against WS. Any WS4S4 volume attack unit is godly vs a Serpent. You may not understand this, but as his volume of fire diminishes, your life expectancy increases dramatically, you're not trying to kill him, you're trying to diminish his firepower enough that he can't kill more than 10% of your army per turn while you seek contact.
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
If you are not prepared to even try to make an anti-WS list to test their weaknesses and then merge it into your TAC list, then you don't stand any chance of success.
When faced with an enemy you cannot beat with your current list/tactic, you need to formulate a new list/tactic to beat that enemy, and then merge that into your TAC.
Otherwise it's not a TAC, it's an old rotting list.
When I hear that your transports can move 30" and you're having trouble reaching assault, I wonder just how you manage having that trouble.
What do you care if you lose one turn of shooting or even all your transports when that shooting and transport is worthless ? What if you manage to force him to flat out ? Isn't that infinitely better than any of your current scenarios ? Doesn't that leave your multiple beast packs untouched and not even requiring any 2++ rerollable because they're out of sight and not a priority ?
I'd love to play test this and I'm not even playing DE.
Apparently you didn't even try it. well.. that may be why you're losing your games against WS.
Jink: If the Eldar player chooses to Jink, his WS goes down to 25% efficiency for one turn > maximize the jinks.
Nope. One hit from a scatterlaser and you lose about 40% of your efficiency.
The truth is the way to take out serpents is cc and/or haywire. We can easily spam haywire and add a few beastpacks to our lists to give us a fighting chance. The trick is to get into combat with most of our damage units intact. The best approach is multiple CAD
I'm not really sure about your list, it looks rather ... I don't know... I don't get the HQ choices, I'm not sure you need the Eldar units either, even though their haywire jump off the table may be ... just awesome.
About the damage reduction from Normal WS to Jink WS, we both got it wrong:
Everyone has their preference for a beastpack. I like a phoenix lord but go with a shard seer if you prefer.
Of course you want swooping hawks. They are amazing taking out any skimmer.
As to the reduction in firepower ... likely you will not be able to effectively make four skimmers snapshot (assuming they are spammed).Some will have cover without jinking, some will be out of range, etc. That said TLD6 +1 snapshots from each serpent will still do damage. But that is not your only problem. They can still claim objectives and are objective secured troops.
Everyone has their preference for a beastpack. I like a phoenix lord but go with a shard seer if you prefer.
Of course you want swooping hawks. They are amazing taking out any skimmer
Everyone has their preference for a beastpack. I like a phoenix lord but go with a shard seer if you prefer.
Of course you want swooping hawks. They are amazing taking out any skimmer
Any vehicle in the game you mean ?
They must be AV14 murderers.
What's the awesomeness of swooping hawks? A shot with a haywire grenade hitting on a 3+ for 80 points, or a 2+ for 90 points. Sure you don't scatter, but you've got a 6" range. I'd expect to see a glance, followed by the death of the squad. If they were troops, I could see it, but as FA, i'm not impressed.
I'd much rather have scourages (slightly better armor) who are tossing at 2 haywire blasts at 24" at BS4. More likely to hit, and not as quite point-blank (65 points a shot).
Or are you using hawks to assault with haywire?
You'd still have to survive at least a round of shooting, and that's not something that T3 4+ save models do exceptionally well, especially at point blank.
You most certainly assault with the Hawks. They have a no scatter DS so should be able to get cover or LoS blockers to mitigate the drop and there are THREE squads. So what you spend all your dakka on them and let the Wyches assault? In every game that I have used Hawks they have outdone Warp Spiders for AT.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
Actually, I'd argue that in the shadow of the Tactical Objective Cards, ignoring scoring in favor of tabling your opponent is not only a viable strategy, it may become a vital one. Focusing on that goal may in fact help some players bring some focus to their tactics.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
Actually, I'd argue that in the shadow of the Tactical Objective Cards, ignoring scoring in favor of tabling your opponent is not only a viable strategy, it may become a vital one. Focusing on that goal may in fact help some players bring some focus to their tactics.
By no means do I agree with "real men table their opponents...blah blah blah" - I must say I have been in the position where I have gotten a crap draw on my tactical objectives for a couple turns and I have to turn to more direct tactics, like inflicting as much damage as possible with hopes of tabling, in order to survive and win those games. So, in essence I agree with Jimsolo... there is a time and place for it.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
Actually, I'd argue that in the shadow of the Tactical Objective Cards, ignoring scoring in favor of tabling your opponent is not only a viable strategy, it may become a vital one. Focusing on that goal may in fact help some players bring some focus to their tactics.
Good luck trying to table eldar with DE. In maelstrom they literally can ignore us and win handily. It's also nearly impossible to table a solid Eldar list unless your clubbing seals.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
Actually, I'd argue that in the shadow of the Tactical Objective Cards, ignoring scoring in favor of tabling your opponent is not only a viable strategy, it may become a vital one. Focusing on that goal may in fact help some players bring some focus to their tactics.
Good luck trying to table eldar with DE. In maelstrom they literally can ignore us and win handily. It's also nearly impossible to table a solid Eldar list unless your clubbing seals.
Can I ask an honest question Red? Why do you participate in these threads? I'm not trying to troll you, I'd legitimately like to know.
Your advice seems to boil down to "Can't win. Don't try. Quit now." in the various DE threads. Seems like that'd be a one-and-done proposition.
Do you have any suggestions for how DE can handle Wave Serpents?
Good luck trying to table eldar with DE. In maelstrom they literally can ignore us and win handily. It's also nearly impossible to table a solid Eldar list unless your clubbing seals.
Can I ask an honest question Red? Why do you participate in these threads? I'm not trying to troll you, I'd legitimately like to know.
Your advice seems to boil down to "Can't win. Don't try. Quit now." in the various DE threads. Seems like that'd be a one-and-done proposition.
Do you have any suggestions for how DE can handle Wave Serpents?
He didn't say they can't be beat, only that they can't be tabled.
How would I deal with eldar? MSU. Nobody does it like DE.
We get 30 point troop units, 36 points elite units, 12 point fast attack units, and 50 point HQ's.
At 1850 points, you could plop down 64 units.
Compare that to the typical eldar list of 10-12 units + a few characters, and you've got them really struggling to kill enough.
morgoth wrote: .
b. Nobody cares how a beastpack works best as long as it makes the difference. Scoring range is for wussies, real man table their opponent and take objectives as a secondary goal.
This one section demonstrably proves your utter failure to understand the situation at hand, and I'd even further it indicates a lack of understanding of how the game is fundamentally played.
I'm not the one losing and whining because I don't know why I lost.
Good luck trying to table eldar with DE. In maelstrom they literally can ignore us and win handily. It's also nearly impossible to table a solid Eldar list unless your clubbing seals.
Can I ask an honest question Red? Why do you participate in these threads? I'm not trying to troll you, I'd legitimately like to know.
Your advice seems to boil down to "Can't win. Don't try. Quit now." in the various DE threads. Seems like that'd be a one-and-done proposition.
Do you have any suggestions for how DE can handle Wave Serpents?
He didn't say they can't be beat, only that they can't be tabled.
How would I deal with eldar? MSU. Nobody does it like DE.
We get 30 point troop units, 36 points elite units, 12 point fast attack units, and 50 point HQ's.
At 1850 points, you could plop down 64 units.
Compare that to the typical eldar list of 10-12 units + a few characters, and you've got them really struggling to kill enough.
Why would you defend a troll I don't know.
And you can easily table Eldar with DE, you have the exact same mobility, better assault, worse shooting.
MSU is not going to be a thing for long, it doesn't fit the standard FoC, and it's a kind of cheese in itself (lol you can't kill 10 of my guys because I only have two in this unit trollolololo)
I will respond to this thread just once and then I will be done here. This is in regards to a videorep between Justin's mechdar and Rob's beaststar DE. Videorep can be found here:
I will analyze Justin's play as Eldar in that battle. You can then decide for yourself whether he was a competent Eldar player or not. More importantly, you can decide whether you might have learned anything about Eldar tactics from the perspective of a high-level, tournament player.
So Why Reserve?
Spoiler:
Seems to me that the number #1 complaint about his play was why didn't he just deploy everything and then shoot the bejesus out of the DE? Why did he leave the majority of his army in reserves? I'll tell you why.
The Trap: Justin didn't wanted to get boxed in by the beaststar. An army such as the beaststar works very similar to my Necrons in that it employs the strategy of Positional Dominance. Basically, that is to control the Movement of the opponent with fast, high-pressure unit(s) whereas the rest of the army puts themselves in advantageous positions (i.e. encamp themselves onto the objectives). Once trapped, Eldar will have a harder time to play against the beaststar as they will be more ripe for the multi-assault as well as out of position with regards to the objectives. They will then need to waste 1 turn to break out of the beaststar's threat range, which means moving flat-out and not firing anyways. So why let your opponent dictate how you play the game? By starting off mainly in reserves, mechdar can dictate the pace of the game on their own terms.
Denial: Justin is going 2nd against an army with 13+ dark lances. Not that those dark lances are all that effective, but reserving his army can serve to minimize the damage from enemy shooting. But mainly, the strategy of Denial through Reserves was to set up the next phase of his strategy, which was....
The Beta-Strike: When his reserves come in, Justin will essentially get the 2nd strike with minimal losses to his offensive output from DE's alpha-strike, or 1st strike. Now what about the chance for bad reserves (i.e. getting less than average reserves coming in)? That's fine. That just means he will have more serpents surviving until Turn 5 to grab/contest objectives. As long as he kills the DE troops, his serpents (most of them anyways) can make it to the objectives and can't be contested.
The Position Game
Spoiler:
While most people will think of the game as a game of shooting or assault, the really experienced gamers know that positioning, or the Movement phase, is just as important. You set yourself up for the win in the Movement phases through strategic positioning and the movement of your units. So how did Justin try to use the Movement phase to his advantage?
The Bait: He started on the table 2 wave serpents. Those serpents were actually just bait for the beaststar to try to take them out of position. Had they gone after the serpents, Justin could have refused flank deployed on the opposite side of the table with his units coming in from reserves. Basically, this could have bought him time kill the rest of Rob's army before the beaststar could react. Had the beaststar gone after the 2 serpents, it would have most likely taken them at least 2 turns to reverse direction to go after the rest of Justin's army. 2 turns of unmolested shooting is enough to gimp the rest of the DE army.
Spreading Out: Against a build like the beaststar, you need to spread out. The last thing you would want to do is to castle up in a protective formation and then let them box you in. By deploying your entire army, you would have had more initial firepower. However, you would have also more likely to stay boxed in. By reserving his army, it made it easier for Justin to spread out his army. Justin did try to spread out his army on the 2 opposite flanks. However, one of his mistakes was that he could have done better spreading out, but I will go more into this later.
Playing Against Deathstars
Spoiler:
Someone here mentioned that Justin should have had his entire army on the table to deal with the beaststar. I'll say this now - WRONG! When playing against a deathstar army, in most cases, you almost always go after the supporting units. DO NOT go after the beaststar. That is what the DE player wants. Waste your firepower on them and in the end, the DE troops/skimmers will be sitting pretty on the objectives. Instead, you need to take out all the supporting units, starting with the Objective Secured troops. Feed 1 or 2 units a turn to the beaststar and while he is "distracted" with your bait, kill off his most important units - his troops. This was exactly what Justin had planned to do, and despite a few mistakes that he made, he almost won it because of good target priority.
Justin's Mistakes
Spoiler:
Although Justin is a great player, his relative inexperience playing mechdar did lead him into making a few mistakes.
Tank Shocking: Tank shocking the beaststar would have been a brilliant strategy, but Justin forgot about 1 very important thing - Grisly Trophies. This changed his tactic from a brilliant play to a hail-mary play. It also somewhat messed up the positioning of his wave serpents. Actually, I'd say this mistake was more due to him probably not being knowledgeable enough about Dark Eldar than it is about his Eldar tactics.
Didn't Spread Out Enough: This was a rather large mistake and ended up with him costing Justin 2 wave serpents and 1 of the troops inside (though I have to give credit to Rob for his ingenuous strategy as well). Yes, Justin spread out with his army. He just didn't spread out far enough and as a result, lost an extra wave serpent along with the troops inside.
Giving Up Warlord: This is a mistake that could have been prevented had Justin just reversed the positions of his 2 wraithknights.
Why would you defend a troll I don't know.
And you can easily table Eldar with DE, you have the exact same mobility, better assault, worse shooting.
MSU is not going to be a thing for long, it doesn't fit the standard FoC, and it's a kind of cheese in itself (lol you can't kill 10 of my guys because I only have two in this unit trollolololo)
Trolling aside, the point of trying to table Eldar with DE is pretty futile. ~half of the shooting of a DE army does nothing at all to mechdar. Massed Poison on a 4+ is a pretty poor trade for massed S6 shooting.
It's pretty basic really. One army ignores poison, and the other is hosed by S6 firepower. Poison really isn't a good rule for the basis of an army. All too often it is totally useless.
As far as MSU goes, it isn't as one sided as it looks. Even with 64 units; it's 64 fairly slow units and you can expect to lose ~10 a round. While you won't get tabled, it is very likely that victory will be based on the draw of the mission cards. The eldar can gun down waves of wracks as they go to ground on objectives, but can't really cross the table. Even if it did work against mech-eldar, it would really struggle against combat squad marines.
Learned nothing, and wasted forever reading what seems like nothing more than a long ass justification of your decision to tell us all to learn from someone playing his first or second game of Eldar.
Everyone was polite at first but you still trying to push this dead horse about how we can all learn from one of your many "pro-level" opponents, who struggled to win a match in which his army just short of hard counters his opponents, is pretentious and quite frankly a little insulting. Believe it or not we do know the game, and no we don't need to pay any heed to such a blatantly low skill match up full of decisions so unrealistic that it's one step away from being anecdotal, just because you have the belief that anyone to ever beat you at 40k must be a godtier player whose games the rest of us should endeavour to learn from.
I guarantee when I play this match up it is at a much higher level of play, and I strongly suspect the same is true for Red Corsair, Hawaii Matt, and well practically anyone who shares with their opponent the virtue of having a solid grasp on the game and more importantly the match-up.
SHUPPET wrote: Everyone was polite at first but you still trying to push this dead horse about how we can all learn from one of your many "pro-level" opponents, who struggled to win a match in which his army just short of hard counters his opponents, is pretentious and quite frankly a little insulting. Believe it or not we do know the game, and no we don't need to pay any heed to such a blatantly low skill match up full of decisions so unrealistic that it's one step away from being anecdotal, just because you have the belief that anyone to ever beat you at 40k must be a godtier player whose games the rest of us should endeavour to learn from.
I guarantee when I play this match up it is at a much higher level of play, and I strongly suspect the same is true for Red Corsair, Hawaii Matt, and well practically anyone who shares with their opponent the virtue of having a solid grasp on the game and more importantly the match-up.
I'm not sure if you're misusing the word anecdotal here intentionally or not...
It was deliberately used as an exaggeration "one step away from being anecdotal", however this is not a misuse of the word, so I guess the answer to your question is "neither", and "spend a little more time reading or working on your comprehension before attempting to point out English mistakes", which are by and large irrelevant anyway.
jy2 wrote: I will respond to this thread just once and then I will be done here. This is in regards to a videorep between Justin's mechdar and Rob's beaststar DE. Videorep can be found here:
Thank you for your insights and explanation of Justin's thoughts on that game.
1. about boxing: losing two turns of shooting to avoid boxing ? not worth it, since it usually costs 1 turn.
2. denial is great when you know you can't win a straight fight. I don't believe that was the case.
3. his beta strike was really awesome... definitely worth it, pretty sure the DE player shat his pants on that one.
4. the most important phase of 40K is deployment, second is movement.
5. he lost one serpent without a good excuse for it. he could've had those two turns from the start.
6. clearly, it's always clear all then clear deathstar or ignore. No reason to feed it because it cannot be tarpitted, you can make it move 3" pile in in the wrong direction with every feed, but it's not that awesome.
7. grisly trophies have nothing to do with his very bad use of tank shocks. In that turn, I could have killed 14 beasts and the Baron, using only tank shocks. I assume I'm not the only one. The very minimum for that turn would have been 7 coherency kills and a fragon charge to delay the beastpack 3" to the right - if you wanted to take as many casualties as he did.
8. Rob could've spread more. Justin really underestimated the beast pack.
9. No warlord traits and picking a WK as warlord against DE ? big mistake.
Why would you defend a troll I don't know.
And you can easily table Eldar with DE, you have the exact same mobility, better assault, worse shooting.
MSU is not going to be a thing for long, it doesn't fit the standard FoC, and it's a kind of cheese in itself (lol you can't kill 10 of my guys because I only have two in this unit trollolololo)
Trolling aside, the point of trying to table Eldar with DE is pretty futile. ~half of the shooting of a DE army does nothing at all to mechdar. Massed Poison on a 4+ is a pretty poor trade for massed S6 shooting.
It's pretty basic really. One army ignores poison, and the other is hosed by S6 firepower. Poison really isn't a good rule for the basis of an army. All too often it is totally useless.
As far as MSU goes, it isn't as one sided as it looks. Even with 64 units; it's 64 fairly slow units and you can expect to lose ~10 a round. While you won't get tabled, it is very likely that victory will be based on the draw of the mission cards. The eldar can gun down waves of wracks as they go to ground on objectives, but can't really cross the table. Even if it did work against mech-eldar, it would really struggle against combat squad marines.
Who told you to use the poison on vehicles ? who forced you really ?
I will analyze Justin's play as Eldar in that battle. You can then decide for yourself whether he was a competent Eldar player or not. More importantly, you can decide whether you might have learned anything about Eldar tactics from the perspective of a high-level, tournament player.
So Why Reserve? Seems to me that the number #1 complaint about his play was why didn't he just deploy everything and then shoot the bejesus out of the DE? Why did he leave the majority of his army in reserves? I'll tell you why.
The Trap: Justin didn't wanted to get boxed in by the beaststar. An army such as the beaststar works very similar to my Necrons in that it employs the strategy of Positional Dominance. Basically, that is to control the Movement of the opponent with fast, high-pressure unit(s) whereas the rest of the army puts themselves in advantageous positions (i.e. encamp themselves onto the objectives). Once trapped, Eldar will have a harder time to play against the beaststar as they will be more ripe for the multi-assault as well as out of position with regards to the objectives. They will then need to waste 1 turn to break out of the beaststar's threat range, which means moving flat-out and not firing anyways. So why let your opponent dictate how you play the game? By starting off mainly in reserves, mechdar can dictate the pace of the game on their own terms.
Denial: Justin is going 2nd against an army with 13+ dark lances. Not that those dark lances are all that effective, but reserving his army can serve to minimize the damage from enemy shooting. But mainly, the strategy of Denial through Reserves was to set up the next phase of his strategy, which was....
The Beta-Strike: When his reserves come in, Justin will essentially get the 2nd strike with minimal losses to his offensive output from DE's alpha-strike, or 1st strike. Now what about the chance for bad reserves (i.e. getting less than average reserves coming in)? That's fine. That just means he will have more serpents surviving until Turn 5 to grab/contest objectives. As long as he kills the DE troops, his serpents (most of them anyways) can make it to the objectives and can't be contested.
The Position Game While most people will think of the game as a game of shooting or assault, the really experienced gamers know that positioning, or the Movement phase, is just as important. You set yourself up for the win in the Movement phases through strategic positioning and the movement of your units. So how did Justin try to use the Movement phase to his advantage?
This just illustrates how Justin (and yourself) understand nothing about a DE vs. Eldar matchup. On average, it will take around 56 wounds (from S6/7 weapons) to kill that beast pack. The six wave serpents alone should deliver 50 wounds per turn. As fast skimmers with twin-linked weapons, the serpents can move 12” and still fire with 80% effectiveness. By starting with all his serpents on the board, Justin would have eliminated the entire pack before it did anything. Not only would this eliminate the only serious threat to his army, it would have simultaneously granted him positional dominance for the rest of the game.
On average, it takes 27 lances to down a wave serpent with cover/jink and a holofield. Assuming Rob did exceptionally well with his 13 lances, this would leave Justin with “merely” five serpents at the center of the board to deal with the remainder of Rob’s army. I’ll leave the math to you on how easy it is for a serpent to down AV 10/11 vehicles (hint - it’s around one per serpent).
Now, do I really need to continue with how quickly the remainder of Rob’s force would disappear after turn 2; assuming he had faced anything resembling a competent opponent?
This just illustrates how Justin (and yourself) understand nothing about a DE vs. Eldar matchup. On average, it will take around 56 wounds (from S6/7 weapons) to kill that beast pack. The six wave serpents alone should deliver 50 wounds per turn. As fast skimmers with twin-linked weapons, the serpents can move 12” and still fire with 80% effectiveness. By starting with all his serpents on the board, Justin would have eliminated the entire pack before it did anything. Not only would this eliminate the only serious threat to his army, it would have simultaneously granted him positional dominance for the rest of the game.
On average, it takes 27 lances to down a wave serpent with cover/jink and a holofield. Assuming Rob did exceptionally well with his 13 lances, this would leave Justin with “merely” five serpents at the center of the board to deal with the remainder of Rob’s army. I’ll leave the math to you on how easy it is for a serpent to down AV 10/11 vehicles (hint - it’s around one per serpent).
Now, do I really need to continue with how quickly the remainder of Rob’s force would disappear after turn 2; assuming he had faced anything resembling a competent opponent?
1. Incorrect, the Beast Pack there has Eldrad, the Haemonculus and the Baron in it, totalling 42 wounds at mostly T3, some T4, or 50.4 S6/7 hits without saves, half of which will get the 4++ from the Khymeras, which, once fortuned (assumed), is equivalent to at least 60 hits on the Khymeras before even hitting anything else. With the rerolls and BS4 of the WS that do not have Shuriken Cannons in this setup, it's 8 full Wave Serpents or two turns of shooting just to get the Khymeras, not counting the Baron, Haemonculus, Eldrad, Beastmasters and Razorwing Flocks, most of those wounds can be hurt by ID though. Let's not forget possible invisibility or shrouding which do make it much better.
2. You're not counting the Wraith Knights
3. You're underestimating the Beast Star too. If Justin had deployed all, they would've mostly moved through Cover and would've had a 2+/3+ rerollable cover save against most attacks with a 4++ rerollable against the Serpent Shields.
1. Incorrect, the Beast Pack there has Eldrad, the Haemonculus and the Baron in it, totalling 42 wounds at mostly T3, some T4, or 50.4 S6/7 hits without saves, half of which will get the 4++ from the Khymeras, which, once fortuned (assumed), is equivalent to at least 60 hits on the Khymeras before even hitting anything else. With the rerolls and BS4 of the WS that do not have Shuriken Cannons in this setup, it's 8 full Wave Serpents or two turns of shooting just to get the Khymeras, not counting the Baron, Haemonculus, Eldrad, Beastmasters and Razorwing Flocks, most of those wounds can be hurt by ID though. Let's not forget possible invisibility or shrouding which do make it much better.
2. You're not counting the Wraith Knights
3. You're underestimating the Beast Star too. If Justin had deployed all, they would've mostly moved through Cover and would've had a 2+/3+ rerollable cover save against most attacks with a 4++ rerollable against the Serpent Shields.
Justin had the first turn, so there’s no worry about invisibility. Where are you getting a 2+/3+ rerollable cover save from? Eldrad’s powers were Invisibility, Executioner, Doom, and Guide. Woods + stealth is a 4+ non-rerollable, which is the same as the Khymerae’s invuln. That’s 40 wounds.
The flocks are 2 wounds, boosted to 4 if they have cover.
The beast masters are 5 wounds, boosted to 10 if they have cover, but don’t really matter regardless.
I assumed the Baron was the only character in the pack, but in the report, the Khymerae were all up front, and characters won’t matter once the rest of the pack is gone. If they were all up front, the baron would die from the first hit to get through the shadow field. Eldrad dies from 9 wounds (cover doesn’t matter), and would not be in the front after the first turn due to his slow speed. The Haemy dies after about 3 wounds (6 with cover), would also not be in the front after the first turn, and would deny the entire pack access to fleet (which he does not have) if he remained with the unit.
The wraith knights are largely inconsequential, as the serpents can pretty much handle the DE by themselves (hence the reason for this thread).
Justin had the first turn, so there’s no worry about invisibility. Where are you getting a 2+/3+ rerollable cover save from? Eldrad’s powers were Invisibility, Executioner, Doom, and Guide. Woods + stealth is a 4+ non-rerollable, which is the same as the Khymerae’s invuln. That’s 40 wounds.
The flocks are 2 wounds, boosted to 4 if they have cover.
The beast masters are 5 wounds, boosted to 10 if they have cover, but don’t really matter regardless.
I assumed the Baron was the only character in the pack, but in the report, the Khymerae were all up front, and characters won’t matter once the rest of the pack is gone. If they were all up front, the baron would die from the first hit to get through the shadow field. Eldrad dies from 9 wounds (cover doesn’t matter), and would not be in the front after the first turn due to his slow speed. The Haemy dies after about 3 wounds (6 with cover), would also not be in the front after the first turn, and would deny the entire pack access to fleet (which he does not have) if he remained with the unit.
The wraith knights are largely inconsequential, as the serpents can pretty much handle the DE by themselves (hence the reason for this thread).
I think you're focusing on this specific game and drawing conclusions for other games.
The DE would have deployed differently if the Eldar had decided to put all his forces on the table.
The Deployment happens before spells are rolled.
In most of the cases, the beast star will not be down in one turn, may even be out of sight on first turn.
Because of that, invisibility matters, 2+ / 3+ rerollable are perfectly possible with ruins / others+shrouded (depending on spells).
In this case, the Beast Star did not really get a perfect combo up and was rather weak because of that.
I'm definitely not going to say the deployment decision was a smart one, but your arguments against it aren't correct imo.
In most cases, a decent serpent army can put down a beast pack in a single turn. The only way to keep it alive for a second turn is for the DE player to go first with fortune/invisibility. With DE primary, you will pretty much never have both powers up, and the OP doesn’t even want eldar allies to begin with. Cover saves don’t matter much, given how many ignores cover shots are involved, and the serpent’s maneuverability, which allows it to focus on portions of the pack that can’t fit inside terrain.
If the DE player hides the beast pack (difficult vs. 60” ignores cover shots on a 12”/turn mobile platform), that just gives the serpents free reign against the rest of his (incredibly fragile) list - especially since the positioning required to hide the pack probably set back its assault by a turn (if not more).
In none of these situations does it help to reserve the serpents (the cornerstone of Justin’s strategy). That just cuts firepower when you need it most, in order to “preserve” units that are virtually unkillable (outside assault).
@jy2 I understand that you think he's a great player- and he may be with other armies but from the evidence I've seen he's not. It's not a big deal, he's just not up to par with the better Eldar tournament players now. You can analyze it all you want, it doesn't change that he made critical mistakes that many other players wouldn't have made.
@morgoth this is a tactics thread for Dark Eldar dealing with wave serpents without Eldar allies. You don't think Eldar are as good as claimed. Noted. For the past three pages you've done nothing but troll the thread, and if we can I'd like to return to the topic at hand- regardless of whether you agree with the rest of the thread. This is not a debate thread in general discussion, this is a tactics thread where your arguments not only don't help, but they are impeding our ability to create a solutions.
To begin with Justin's list was really unoriginal. Four DAvu and a pair of WK. It is also hard to read that batrep - it is so long. That said DE should have some tools to negate that list. There is no way that Justin should have reserved though. He split his force in half and gave up his alpha strike.
On topic ... we have been discussing the Duke a bit at TDC ... you can drop three blasterborn squads behind serpents and do some damage. You can take heat of your wyches early. Four blaster shots and a venom is almost the same cost as a rav with one more shot and the dual scs.
1. They won't arrive until after the serpents' alpha (and possibly even beta, gamma, and delta) strikes.
2. Seeing those blasters in reserve, why would your opponent position his serpents in a way that allows you to deep strike behind them?
I don't see deep striking blasterborn taking the heat off anything. Instead, they'll have to bum rush the serpents along with your wyches and beastpack in an attempt at target saturation. I hope you're going first.
Good luck trying to table eldar with DE. In maelstrom they literally can ignore us and win handily. It's also nearly impossible to table a solid Eldar list unless your clubbing seals.
Can I ask an honest question Red? Why do you participate in these threads? I'm not trying to troll you, I'd legitimately like to know.
Your advice seems to boil down to "Can't win. Don't try. Quit now." in the various DE threads. Seems like that'd be a one-and-done proposition.
Do you have any suggestions for how DE can handle Wave Serpents?
He didn't say they can't be beat, only that they can't be tabled.
How would I deal with eldar? MSU. Nobody does it like DE.
We get 30 point troop units, 36 points elite units, 12 point fast attack units, and 50 point HQ's.
At 1850 points, you could plop down 64 units.
Compare that to the typical eldar list of 10-12 units + a few characters, and you've got them really struggling to kill enough.
Thanks Matt. Pretty much this. I never said they can't be beat but suggesting DE can table CWE serpent spam is ridiculous as a strategy.
I participate in these threads to share and garner experience and ideas. That doesn't mean I should or will sit by and listen to poor ideas without providing feedback. So far this thread hasn't been about sharing useful ideas, if you reread it you'll find that it sways way off course where 1-2 people with little or no experience on the subject with DE decided to lecture every experienced player on how WS weren't actually that good and that we were bad and or whiny and should have been trying to table our enemies.
I never said can't win, quit or don't try and suggesting I did very much is trolling and or flaming behavior on your part. Saying your not trying to doesn't excuse you.
Can I ask you what DE models you own and have used? What point level you normally play at?
Automatically Appended Next Post:
SHUPPET wrote: Everyone was polite at first but you still trying to push this dead horse about how we can all learn from one of your many "pro-level" opponents, who struggled to win a match in which his army just short of hard counters his opponents, is pretentious and quite frankly a little insulting. Believe it or not we do know the game, and no we don't need to pay any heed to such a blatantly low skill match up full of decisions so unrealistic that it's one step away from being anecdotal, just because you have the belief that anyone to ever beat you at 40k must be a godtier player whose games the rest of us should endeavour to learn from.
I guarantee when I play this match up it is at a much higher level of play, and I strongly suspect the same is true for Red Corsair, Hawaii Matt, and well practically anyone who shares with their opponent the virtue of having a solid grasp on the game and more importantly the match-up.
^This
You came in with a poor example, which in itself is fine, but then you championed the idea that Justin Cook is basically better then all of us and anything he does, even with little experience leaves us in his shadow. All this coming from you, a guy whose only ever played against the guy one time and who has minimal experience with the topic at hand anyway Ego much?
You do realize that just because someone plays at events or writes batreps it doesn't make them the best or only good player ever right?
I've read this thread with many differing reactions.
Sympathy, confusion, shock and mild amusement.
How do Dark Eldar beat serpent spam? (5+ waveserpents)
The recipe is:
3 ravagers
4+ units of haywire wyches in venoms
Beaststar (all khymerae, none of this razorwing foo foo stuff)
as many allied in waveserpents as you can get.
Pray you go first.
Then, and pretty much ONLY then can you beat a serpentspam army when playing against a halfway competent opponent. But to do so, you have to be a good general yourself!
If he goes first... you lose. If you roll poorly with serpent shields... you lose. If you deploy stupidly... you lose.
Gw could not have written a better Dark Eldar counter than the waveserpent. What it comes with stock is designed to destroy us, and do so easily. When upgraded slightly, it is death incarnate to our forces.
To think differently means one of two things- You have yet to face a tournament level list featuring them at the hands of an able general, or, your love for the DE blinds you to the fact that, yes, there are better units than ours out there. Much better!
The above is just my opinion, backed by many many years of tournament play using DE.
Can people stop suggest to use Eldar allies? That is is something I explicitly wanted to avoid, because as soon as people start saying "take an allied Farsees, oh, and a Wave Serpent or two, and what the check, throw in a WraithKnight as well" well then, what is the point of playing Dark Eldar at all? If you did that then 're Dark Elder would simply be holding your Elder forces back! Pure Dark Eldar, how do we counter a WELL ROUNDED Eldar list that contains three WaveSerpents, Warp Spiders and those Forge World skimmers that have pulse lasers. It's not even overly competitive, I just want to be able to have a good with a friend, because as far as I know, me removing models every shooting phase is no fun for either of us...
Automatically Appended Next Post: Can people stop suggest to use Eldar allies? That is is something I explicitly wanted to avoid, because as soon as people start saying "take an allied Farsees, oh, and a Wave Serpent or two, and what the check, throw in a WraithKnight as well" well then, what is the point of playing Dark Eldar at all? If you did that then 're Dark Elder would simply be holding your Elder forces back! Pure Dark Eldar, how do we counter a WELL ROUNDED Eldar list that contains three WaveSerpents, Warp Spiders and those Forge World skimmers that have pulse lasers. It's not even overly competitive, I just want to be able to have a good with a friend, because as far as I know, me removing models every shooting phase is no fun for either of us...
To think differently means one of two things- You have yet to face a tournament level list featuring them at the hands of an able general, or, your love for the DE blinds you to the fact that, yes, there are better units than ours out there. Much better!
The above is just my opinion, backed by many many years of tournament play using DE.
All that tournament experience didn't help you read the original post about beating Eldar without using allies
I agree with your opinions though, although i think you missed the third reason - the bulk of the players insisting Eldar are an easy matchup, are of course Eldar players.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Jancoran wrote: hmm... Is there a summary of whats been covered? Six pages is daunting!
In the way of actual answers to the topic, very little. Almost every suggestion has Eldar allies or is to just "outplay" the Wave Serpents.
I think the best suggestions involve Beastpacks, Sliscus, Wyches, and putting Haywire Grenades on deepstriking Blasterborn. Ravagers don't seem cost effective in this match up. I'm sure there was 1 or 2 other good suggestions as well.
What in my army can counter these things! They sit at the very nadir of effectiveness of Dark Lances, which are great against AV 10,11,13 and 14 but have trouble with AV 12, especially when that AV 12 has a 3+ cover save when jinking and has the possibility ti downgrade pens to glances. If i was to do the math, the Wave Serpent has 3 hull points, so I glance on 4+ so i need 6 hits, he has a 3+ jink so i need 18(!!!!) Dark Lance shots to take down a single Wave Serpent via hull points.That simply isn't possible, *EVEN* when they are snap firing they still have the ability destroy most Dark Eldar vehicles with the Twin-Linked Scatter laser and the 'Twin-linked' Serpent Shield. 'Haywire Wyches!' i here you shout, but how on Earth do the Wyches get there in a 2 Hull Point AV 10 Venom. Without resorted to Eldar allies, how can i handle this horrible, horrible machine that can personally take out every tank in my army even when snap firing?
Well here's my suggestions WITHOUT the use of allies.
1. Beast Packs are really fast. I use 4 Clawed Fiends. Arrange the unit this way: 3 BeastMasters in the front, 1 Clawed Fiend, Beast Master, 3 Clawed Fiends, 2 Razorwing Flocks. If you mull this for a while it will make sense to you. This unit is fast, becomes very tough and hits really hard when it arrives.
Clearly it would benefit from a Phantasm Grenade Launcher and the stealth doesn't hurt. So Baron Sathonyx makes an ideal attendant for the unit. If you do, put one more beast Master up front. This unit can benefit greatly from mobile cover. The Dark Eldar have a hell of a lot of it available.
2. 4 Grotesques, Abberation with Scissorhands, the Master Haemonculus upgrade and led by the evil Urien Rakarth in a Raider. The Raider is an assault vehicle. It can land on the enemy doorstep, wait for the inevitable fussilade to kill; the vehicle and then assault from the wreckage. Tough, resilient and a major issue if they get the charge, and they can multicharge without losing much efficacy.
3. Webway Portals and Talos Pain Engines unloaded up front and personal.
4. Sslyth. Each Archon allows you to take a group of 3. 105 points isn't a lot to commit, it's 6 wounds that are tougher than Wyches when concerning themselves with vehicles they want to kill, and 15 STR 5 attacks is nothing to sniff at. best of all, it's an HQ slot so it can be taken without losing much.
5. Overlooked perhaps in 7E is the way Ramming now works. You're already headed that way anyways. You may have even accepted the death of the Raiders. Accept their death on your terms. Shock Prows help. Spear them in the rear and git 'em.
These methods don't rely on Lances. They rely on brazen courage and speed, something the Dark Eldar are all about. =)
Squad positioning > single Dark Lance shot. Even the Dais, you might have 3 shots but your squad is more important. Deepstriking is probably better. And I have trouble ever justifying Raider over Venom. Which you should also deepstrike.
its fairly clear that the answer cna be broken down in several sections:
All but the most die hard Wave Serpent Applogists (and for some reason these seem to be Eldar players -wow what a surprise) confirm that this unit is OP, especially when in numbers.
The suggestions are:
Make sure you only play against Eldar players that don't know what they are doing (see the one single flawed battle report that was dredged up where Dark Eldar/Eldar (not just Dark Eldar obviously) force manages to defeat a very poorly played (almost suspiciously so) Eldar force)
Use Eldar Allies - so debatable why its even worth playing Dark Eldar which brings us on to the other genius suggestion:
Don't play Dark Eldar they are not good enough (but apparently Wave Serpents are totally balanced)
re the much more pertinent sugegsitons:
Beast packs - need to try them more to see if effective Grotesques in a Raider - they, Urien and the Horms are not fleet so its harder to get he charge off and if one WS destroyed the vehicle (which it will) Other Eldar can trash them as they sit in the open.
Webway portal - Can't assault out of it? Plus need to survive long enough to delivery it? Delivery unit almost certian to die doning nothing else and the Eldar know that assault units have a turn of stadning around when they get out - ready to be shot by the Cheese Serpents and their cargo
Ssylth - remember you need to take all the other comp elements of a Court so to get each unit of 3 you need to spend 145 pts not 105.
Ramming - again need to try but sounds fun.......
1 hit at a strength equal to half your armor value.
That's S5, + 1 or 2 more for the prow.
At best you're looking at 1 S7 hit.
I guess you could go with raiders and shock prows and retrofire engines. Deep strike in, take your pot shots, Jink to try and survive, then ram.
I think you're more likely to get the kills with the dark lances then the rams.
One thing that I have noticed, is that Achons are total beat sticks compared to anything eldar. The set up I've been testing is Agonizer, Huskblade, combat drugs, shadowfield, soul trap, and haywire grenades.
You choose between S3 AP2 instant death, and wound on 4+ AP3. Soul trap can boost you to S6, and drugs + furious charge can give you another 2 points of strength.
I've had some luck using the stunclaw to grab and isolate an IC, and let the Achons go to town.
If the Achons get charged up (via soul trap) they become a huge threat to anything. Looking forward to the new book where they get jetbikes back.
While they don't kill waveserpents on their own, they do make the eldar player want to keep his stuff in the transport.
First:
I think we need some sample eldar list for reference.
For examle pretty soft 1750 tac one:
Farseer, jbike, sing spear, mantle, spirit stone of anat...blah
5 DAvengers in serpent (scatterL, Shur Cannon, Holo)
5 DAvengers in serpent (scatterL, Shur Cannon, Holo)
5 DAvengers in serpent (scatterL, Shur Cannon, Holo)
5 DAvengers in serpent (scatterL, Shur Cannon, Holo)
Crimson hunter
5 warp spiders
wraithknight
wraithknight
Automatically Appended Next Post: Second: we need to go from the contrary - removing what will make us lose untill we'll come to something (or not :/) .
I think the first, what will make us lose to the list from the previous post, is not having the first turn - there are 6 (7) fast moving units, each capable of one-shoting our vehicles, or killing ...loads of our infantry.
Reserve "games" will not help: we need to have something on the table capable of surviving one turn to not autolose (1/4 of the force for example), most of it will be dead or incapable after fighting for 1-2 turns agains full enemy army, then will have "first turn with half the army" (not so good first turn either cause we'll be flying from table edge/scattering with deep strike)... It just better to get normal first turn.
Soo, it makes us in need of Vect or/and Baron.
The chances, as I remember, are 62% first turn for Baron, 67% for Vect and 73% for a team of both.
Baron is fine, Vect is overcosted as hell, but still 240 points is less than 4 venoms which shurely be dead if we'll go second. So we are keepeng both.
345 points/
As was suggested previously - for serpent hunt we'll be using beastpack with max chimerae. (360 points) Baron will be with them, vect will join them at the end of first turn for fearless (transport 6' + 6' disembark)
Forth: Wrathknights. Chimerae suck against them, but we have obvious plan - venoms! 2 6W 3+ model will need 54 poisoned hits to die, so 6 venoms looks fine to alpha them.
6*65=390
warriors with blasters inside - they are troops and they needed to fight turbo-busting around beastpack serpents.
60*6=360
1455 points
For the last ~300 points i think we still need to add some razorwings to beaststar and ravagers (maybe drop some chimerae) for some flexibility against other armies.
As I see the most obvious way for Eldar be to reserve all exept serpents, than DE will have 2 turns of fighting against half the points.
Still will be hard battle - I think all venoms will be down before they'll got a chance to shoot at knights, but hope all serpents will be down too,
So it will be knights and remains of avengers vs warriors and remains of beasts.
50/50
:/
If you try and alpha and don't go first, it's over. If you do get the alpha, you still have a solid fight. I don't find that giving up 27% of the games outright as acceptable.
Wave Serpents have to be killed in combat. We lack the volume of mid strength shots to get past a 3+ jink, even if we are firing on rear armor 10.
Wraithknights can be killed by most things, and agonizers do a pretty good job, as well as massed poisoned shots or blaster/lance fire. I don't like poison, because if the knight get's re-rolls he's suddenly immune.
I'm thinking that deep striking is still the way to go, you just have to put something survivable on the table until the force comes in.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Looking at some shooting match ups, venoms aren't the way to go against serpents.
With only 2 hull points, venoms will die to a single serpent firing all too often, even with the 4+ jink. Jinking the venom hoses your firepower, significantly.
On the other hand, having a 3rd hull point, a jinking Raider with a night shield has a shot at surviving from a single serpents, forcing the eldar to massively over-kill, which keeps something else alive.
Automatically Appended Next Post: How about a different approach.
A 210 point unit (5 dire avengers, serpent, shur-cannon, twin-scatter and holo) will typically kill a DE transport, and if in range, 5 DE that were inside (via dire avengers); every turn.
What can DE field that can shrug off D6+1 S7 no cover, 3 S6 eldar-rending and 4 S6 shots, that costs a lot less than 210 points?
To me, that is what to build the list around.
The only two things I see that can take that firepower is:
Vect and his bitch'n ride (445, + the cost of 9 homies to hang out with him), and the Monstrous Heavy Support Choices. You can't spam vect, so that leaves us with the heavies.
A wave serpent firing at full effect at a Talos in the open is going to do ~ 1.6 wounds. That's 210 points of shooting being absorbed by 110 points of monster.
Fluff out the troops with as cheap as possible units. You won't survive if the eldar bother to shoot at you, so be as numerous and cheap as possible to limit your losses when you do draw that attention.
With double force org (really the only options since we cannot ally) 6 Talos at 660 points, each with the injectors and haywire blaster. In combat they will tear up the serpents, on the way in, they will get some haywire hits.
With D6+1 S7 AP2 attacks and forcing Toughness tests or instant death, they are a threat to everything, but still cheap and durable enough to take lots of. Poisoned shots from the rest of the army can threaten wraithknights and other hard targets.
@HM, talos and infantry with agonizers/hayware are sloooow. You will never ger into cc with eldar with them (if wrathknight will not charge you themself).
For absorbing damage chimerae are the best in DE codex - full fire of static serpent kills 4 of them(48 points), and they are beasts, so only one turn of shooting before charge.
Also i think you don't get 27% of going second with B+V. Half of it - chance of stealing for eldar if we win initial roll, second halve - our chance not to steal with vect. In both cases it's still wery risky for an opponent to leave knights and other soft targets on the table against 6 venoms, so even if eldar goes first he still need to reserve significant part of his army.
elotar wrote: @HM, talos and infantry with agonizers/hayware are sloooow. You will never ger into cc with eldar with them (if wrathknight will not charge you themself).
For absorbing damage chimerae are the best in DE codex - full fire of static serpent kills 4 of them(48 points), and they are beasts, so only one turn of shooting before charge.
Also i think you don't get 27% of going second with B+V. Half of it - chance of stealing for eldar if we win initial roll, second halve - our chance not to steal with vect. In both cases it's still wery risky for an opponent to leave knights and other soft targets on the table against 6 venoms, so even if eldar goes first he still need to reserve significant part of his army.
He's doesn't have to reserve a significant portion. He can reserve just the knights. With only mech on the table, venoms do nothing at all.
I haven't played much, but I've been watching as I piece together my army. 4 serpents can largely ignore the rest of the army and gun down the beast pack without too much concern.
One volley from the warwalkers, followed by the serpents (at 30-36" out) tend to obliterate all.
I don't think avoiding 6 Talos is as easy as it sounds, and at 660 points, you could pair the talos spam with the beast pack.
Hell, at 660 points, you can run 6 talos with 2 beast packs (5 beast masters, 15 chamerae and 3 razorwings). That I have not seen, and might just work.
What is interesting is that 9 point warriors soak the shooting almost as well. 2/3rds of the serp shooting is AP- or AP6, letting warriors take their 5+ save. Full shooting kills ~6 and a half warriors, about 57 points worth. If you're in cover, it drops down to 51 points worth killed. Is the answer in plain sight? Spam warriors?
All that tournament experience didn't help you read the original post about beating Eldar without using allies
Lol, oh I read it, it is just that the answer he wants is not possible.
It is like asking "What is 2+2, and don't say 4!"
He then later appended his question (how do DE beat waveserpents) to "How does DE beat 2-3 serpents and other units in a well rounded list?"
Two completely questions.
''Not possible'' to beat Eldar with Dark Eldar without resorting to allies. Well i am sorry to say, but that's simply not good enough Gamesworkshop, shame on you. Yes, i am very interested in a Pure Dark Eldar list that can beat a Serpent Spam, because if i come across it in a tournament i want to have a list that has a fighting chance. The reason i changed the question is because it has already been answered, albeit not to my satisfaction, that there simply is no definite answer. Beast Packs may work due to their speed and strength 4 attacks, they may also be shot of the table very easily because no allies means no invisibility, no fortune and no shrouded, so it is basically just 30 wounds with a 4++. To a Serpent Spam, that isn't overly daunting, especially when you consider a Farseer rolling on telepathy could control them, a Wraithknight would tarpit them. Grotesques could work for the same reasons, but they are also reliant on a 3 HPAV 10 Raider to get them were they need to be. Blaster born leave much to be desired, even with a perfect deep strike into rear armour 4 Dark Lance shots, 3 hits, 1.5 glance/pen, 3+ cover, 0.5 Glance/Pens. add that to only exploding o a 6, they are far from reliable. But i also disagree strongly with your comment;
It is like asking "What is 2+2, and don't say 4!"
A comment which i find frankly ignorant, due to the nature of the game. It's a dice based game, meaning there is always an inherent luck factor, so saying that Dark Eldar don't have the tools is just wrong, Beast Pack as previously mentioned. The problem lays with these tools being inefficient points wise or the Eldar being able to counter it. Comparing a luck based, tactically driven miniature war gaming scenario into ''2+2'' shows a distinct lack of thought in the subject.
As for my new question, how would you handle 2/3 Wave Serpents for similar points? The problem i am seeing is if the best tool we have is the Beast Pack, then they will be a priority to go down, then i am left with just a load of lances. Has anyone considered multiple Beast Packs? They are cheap enough and durable and now even scoring, is 2/3 Khymerae beast packs out of the question?
As for my new question, how would you handle 2/3 Wave Serpents for similar points? The problem i am seeing is if the best tool we have is the Beast Pack, then they will be a priority to go down, then i am left with just a load of lances. Has anyone considered multiple Beast Packs? They are cheap enough and durable and now even scoring, is 2/3 Khymerae beast packs out of the question?
''
I don't get the drama really. For a cost of the serpent you can get 14 chimerae pack, which is fast and got enough wounds to survive 2 turns of it's shooting and kill it (moving serpent kills like 3 chimerae per turn, static - 4).
The real problem is if he DO NOT shoot at beasts, but drop our vehicles, and then deal with beasts using units, equiped for it (knights/wrathlords/ets). That's why you need army-wide tactics agains eldar.
Automatically Appended Next Post: So list:
Vect - 240
Baron - 105
Wariors in raider - 105 (no blasters - warriors just for poison shots)
Wariors in raider - 105
Wariors in raider - 105
Wariors in raider - 105
Wariors in raider - 105
Wariors in raider - 105
Double beast pack is the only hope. Though your packs really need some rending to help out.
Ravagers seem to be pretty meh now. With a 1:6 explodes on the penetrating hit, the full allotment of firepower is going to net 3 hull points to a target in the open.
I'd rather have the talos. If I'm only going to get 3 glances, I'll take the hayware blasters (more reliable) and the much more durable T7 3+ save over the Av11 open-topped.
If you just want poisoned shots, why aren't you running venoms?
who said anything about damaging the AV 12 with them? They are just darn good.
Personally, I think Lances are the worst tool against AV 12. So you just have to go in all gung ho on em to beat them. I did post several ideas above. I'll probably blog on it as well.
Can only damage it on the rear - due to the Wave Sepents "oh so weak" AV 12 armour..................
They still outdamage Lances on the rear Armor, doing 3HP instead of 2 before jink. They can Deepstrike and are far better than Lances vs infantry. Compliments a Venom / Wyche heavy list well, anything T3-5 with good armor (aka things that Venoms suck against) will get chewed out by Dissies.
ATM I'm looking at running:something like this (I might tweak a little to fit Sliscus in a squad, not that he's ever gonna make it to combat regardless):
1710 pts, I'll probably just take flickerfields and whatever else to tighten it up, or add another Ravager at 1850, Rending alleviates not having Hit & Run a little (e.g a Wraithknight can no longer tar pit neither can TEQ), and it should only take 7 beasts in CC to wreck a Wave Serpent if my estimates are correct (8 to secure). Hopefully splitting 30 beasts into multiple squads leaves enough still alive for each pack to wreck or cripple a Wave Serpent, or at the very least FATALITY one left crippled from Dissies. Wraithknights and anything not in a Vehicle can eat 72 Splintershots.
Can anyone see any major holes? Even against other armies than Eldar
I would get some grisly trophies in their to re-roll those leadership tests. It would be pretty easy to force leadership on a lot of units in your army every turn. Also I am not seeing what sliscus is doing for you since deep strike doesnt help you get into CC until turn three.
Also your beast packs would drop like flies to wave serpents, same with your venoms.
All good points, Sliscus was a combined pick for combat drugs and allowing Venoms to DS against Tau and DS Ravs all in one, but you are right he's not worth the points, I'd be better off with Retrofire Jets and it's not even necessary. Good call on the Grizzlies as well. I'm gonna go back and tighten this up, TY
TY shingen. I'm thinking CC units capable of pulling a beastpack out of a tarpit can achieve the same thing Hit & Run is taken for, and even cover multiple beast packs (even though I think I'm gonna cut mine down to one). Not that the Baron is bad, I'm only saying this because in a Sliscus list 2x min size Reaver squads with an Agonizer Arena Champ getting double combat drugs could really put the hurt on a WK or something, and do a bit more for your list than Baron. And jetbikes are just great in general.
SHUPPET wrote: ATM I'm looking at running:something like this (I might tweak a little to fit Sliscus in a squad, not that he's ever gonna make it to combat regardless):
1710 pts, I'll probably just take flickerfields and whatever else to tighten it up, or add another Ravager at 1850, Rending alleviates not having Hit & Run a little (e.g a Wraithknight can no longer tar pit neither can TEQ), and it should only take 7 beasts in CC to wreck a Wave Serpent if my estimates are correct (8 to secure). Hopefully splitting 30 beasts into multiple squads leaves enough still alive for each pack to wreck or cripple a Wave Serpent, or at the very least FATALITY one left crippled from Dissies. Wraithknights and anything not in a Vehicle can eat 72 Splintershots.
Can anyone see any major holes? Even against other armies than Eldar
I apologize in advance if I get any of the DE rules wrong, but wouldn't LD be a problem for the 2nd unit of beastpack? Especially against potential mechdar tankshock strategies, where a serpent can potentially tankshock both units of beasts. 1 may not be so bad, but if he is tankshocking with 4-5 serpents, especially when he is trying to get away from your beasts, that is a potential problem that needs to be addressed in your list.
I like the dual-beastpack list. I just think you should have another character in there (i.e. the Baron) to lead the 2nd unit of beasts and perhaps some grisly trophies.
Also, for a TAC list, I think you should consider 1 or 2 dark lance ravagers over the disintegrator ones. Darklances are more useful against the other competitive builds - land raiders, Necron AV13-spam, MSU-mech builds, paladins, crisis suits, T4 multi-wound daemons/tyranids (basically, units that can be ID'd), etc.
I'd swap out duke for a pair of haemonculi. You can start by giving a pain token to each beast pack.
As for tank shock issues, string some wyches into the middle of the packs. No serpents want to get near a squad of haywire.
The weakness of the list in TAC is going to be mech. My dread-list would eat this up. The problem with beast packs is any walker with front armor 12. They can glance it (4+ to hit, 6 for armor pen, and then a 5-6 on the rend roll) but it's a long shot, so you are stuck in combat.
Coteaz
4x3 alcolytes, 4x psibacks
3x dreads, psi-ammo, double autocannons
1 BA librarian
5 death company (1 hand flamer), razorback, double h.flamer
1 BA deathcompany dread (heavy flamer, meltagun)
3 BA dreads, assault cannons heavy flamers
Baal Predator, assault cannon
Land Speeder, dual heavy flamers
SHUPPET wrote: ATM I'm looking at running:something like this (I might tweak a little to fit Sliscus in a squad, not that he's ever gonna make it to combat regardless):
1710 pts, I'll probably just take flickerfields and whatever else to tighten it up, or add another Ravager at 1850, Rending alleviates not having Hit & Run a little (e.g a Wraithknight can no longer tar pit neither can TEQ), and it should only take 7 beasts in CC to wreck a Wave Serpent if my estimates are correct (8 to secure). Hopefully splitting 30 beasts into multiple squads leaves enough still alive for each pack to wreck or cripple a Wave Serpent, or at the very least FATALITY one left crippled from Dissies. Wraithknights and anything not in a Vehicle can eat 72 Splintershots.
Can anyone see any major holes? Even against other armies than Eldar
I really want to like the Dissies, but the whole idea of deep striking for rear really fall apart if he deploys on the table edge.
If he deploys on the table edge, run a beast pack up each flank. If he wants to use the shuriken cannon or the wave, he's got to turn towards the outside.
HawaiiMatt wrote: If he deploys on the table edge, run a beast pack up each flank. If he wants to use the shuriken cannon or the wave, he's got to turn towards the outside.
What I mean is, he can hug his own table edge. Even if it is too cluttered to do so, he can get away with turning his serpents a bit because you are not likely to want to DS those raiders so close to the board edge.
Yeah, I get that. But with only a 22.5 degree arc of fire to the side, if you huge the table edge, you can force him to turn, or only fire with the turret. As soon as he turns, he's got his rear open. For 110 points, I'd risk the deep strike, it isn't like you have another option anyway.
Also, if he is hugging the table edge, he isn't claiming objectives.
Shingen wrote: 105 pts, sliscus gives all the vehicles jets for free.
Haemos with the beastpack are pointless, Khymerae don't have power from pain so don't benefit from tokens.
Odd, I don't see that in the rules.
I do see that having a pain token gives a special rule to a whole unit.
Sharing the pain says the IC's and the attached unit all pool their tokens together.
SHUPPET wrote: They pool their tokens together but tokens have no affect on units without the special rule (i believe).
Each pain token confers a special rule to the entire unit, as shown in the list below. That's the direct quote.
Share the pain gives the token to the unit.
The token gives the special rules to the entire unit.
It doesn't do a lot though, as 1 token is feel no pain, and all the serpent shooting is instant death vs the T3 beasts. I had it backwards and thought the 1st with furious charge.
HawaiiMatt wrote: Yeah, I get that. But with only a 22.5 degree arc of fire to the side, if you huge the table edge, you can force him to turn, or only fire with the turret. As soon as he turns, he's got his rear open. For 110 points, I'd risk the deep strike, it isn't like you have another option anyway.
Also, if he is hugging the table edge, he isn't claiming objectives.
-Matt
Fair enough, I guess 110 points could be worth the risk.
That is a little odd on the power from pain point.
Perhaps it was in the old FAQ but I am sure I read somewhere they didnt benefit from it.
I just scanned the codex and I cannot find anywhere it says models, it just says unit, so in theory, yes, Khymerae benefit from it as part of the unit (although if all the Beastmasters die I guess they lose it).
Automatically Appended Next Post: Yup it was in the old FAQ...
"Quote :
Q: When a unit comprised of some models with Power from Pain and
some without has a pain token, does the effect it gives apply to every
model in the unit or just to the models with the Power from Pain special
rule? (p25)
A: It only applies to the models with the Power from Pain
special rule."
extremefreak17 wrote: Interesting. Does this mean that a Seer Council with the Baron now gets FNP when they kill something?
No. You need to have the PfP special rule to benefit from it.
Just because the FAQ used to be there but isn't anymore doesn't mean that everyone in the unit would benefit from it (unless it is something like Fearless, which affects the entire unit). The FAQ was just there to help clarify what many people believed anyways - that you don't benefit unless you have the PfP special rule. Just because it is no longer there doesn't automatically mean that the reverse must be true.
Jy2, the literal reading of the PFP rule makes it affect the whole unit, and the omission of an FAQ changing that certainly does mean that rawPFP affects models in a unit with a pain token even if they don't have the rule themselves. It's simply what the rule says - there is no other way to read it: "confers a special rule to the entire unit".
edit: If you wish to belabour the point, I suggest a YMDC thread.
extremefreak17 wrote: Interesting. Does this mean that a Seer Council with the Baron now gets FNP when they kill something?
No. When a unit with pain power kills a unit, they gain a token. The seer council doesn't have the PP rule, and can't generate a token. If the Baron has a token and then joins them they benefit, but since the unit itself does not have the rule, they don't gain tokens.
That's why the Haemonculi is nice, he start with one.
Oddly, it looks like the Parasite Engine can pass out tokens to anyone (friendly unit).
pretending that 
Ego much?
