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Lords

Highborn: 571pts
Forest Dragon
Sword of Bloodshed
The Helm of the Hunt
Merciw's Locus
Light Armor
Shield

Heroes

Spellsinger: 175
Lv 2
Divination Orb
A Pageant of Shrikes

Noble: 154
Alter Kindred
Light Armor
Shield
The Bow of Loren
Briarsheath

Core

7 Units of 10 Glade Guard w/Champion: 882

2 Units of 5 Glade Riders w/Champion: 258

1 Unit of 6 Glade Riders w/Champion: 153

17 Eternal Guard: 284
Full Command
Gaemrath

23 Points left to spend

Oh I'm so tired of my internet shutting down without telling me and then make my replies go down the drain!
Hang in there, I'll spend some time rewriting it..I won't leave with just a vote for "No".

For a competive build you need at least a BSB.

Your only good close combat unit is your dragon rider (who could really use a ward save - although I love the sword of bloodshed + Merciew's Locus + dragon combo).

IIRC Your eternal guard need a noble or a highborn in them to make them stubborn. I love the models, but struggle in close combat without support or buffs.

By champion are you talking about command or just the unit champion? IMHO I think shooting unit champions are not useful.

Take the list out for a spin though, never know until you try it.

Good luck!

I'll make a quick list of possible flaws and somethings I like about this list.

Flaws
1. The Highborn and Forest Dragon is a huge shooting magnet with it lack of wardsave and proper armour save, also the extra attacks from Sword of Bloodshed aint really worth the points with "just" 4 strength.

2. The Spellsinger MUST have a Elven Steed or Unicorn, its a requirement of Glamourweave Kindred.

3. Too many points are tied up in Glade Riders for my liking, they are rather expensive and you only need so many fast cavalry units.

Things I like
1. Using a Forest Dragon, all to many go with Level 4 Wizards without even glancing at all the other pretty toys. The Forest Dragon can work with a good setup of magic items and some tailoring of the rest of the list around it.

2. I like the idea of a more or less "unhittable" with shooting Noble, I think he could work, though you will have to watch out for magic and auto hitting units.

Whats your overall idea for this army? Write some general tactics/ideas down and I'll see what advice I can come up with.

I am trying to go for Elves only, focus on the shooting phase with limited magic. I also want the army to be able to compete. Like i said no forest spirits. They are good but not what i am looking for. The Eternal guard are my "anvil" unit and the dragon is my "hammer" if it is even possible to call those units that. I will make corrections to the heroes. What change would you recommend in my alter noble so i can give the eternal guard stuborn?

Thanks for the helpful replies.

I voted "yes". Glade guard spam could be very deadly against certain combat-only armies. The dragon would also be a great counter-charge unit against non-cannon armies (all but 2).

And you have one block to try to be stubborn, although the list would probably need to be reworked to up the numbers quite significantly. And a BSB, as mentioned, probably instead of the alter.

You'd win some games with this army, although I don't know how much fun an attempted gunline of only bows would be, and against most armies you would probably struggle. Doesn't mean it's not worth doing, but I'd try it at a lower point level to see how you like all those glade guard first!

I "won" my first game with wood elves, i was using 850 pts of them for the woodland ambush senario in the book and i came out about 300 points ahead, but to your point gunline armies are no fun to face, that is why i took the cav. I wanted to have fun, i am going in with the expectation to lose. I just dont want to always lose with them.

For the Highborn and Forest Dragon, there is quite a few possible combinations of magic items, I'll write down two that crossed my mind.

A. The Dawnspear, Shield of Ptolos, Stone of the Crystal Mere and Potion of Foolhardiness.
This got a nice 1+ save against shooting to absorb up any arrows, bolts and bullets flying its way and a 3+ "gamble" wardsave to keep the Highborn and Dragon protected from warmachines and later on combat. The Dawnspear will help keeping them and any other Wood Elves fighting the same unit alive. Potion of Foolhardiness for another attack on the charge(once).
B. The Spear of Twilight, Shield of Ptolos, Stone of the Crystal Mere and The other Trickster's Shard
A alternetive of A. that is better att killing characters and elite infantry with wardsave.

I am not convinced that the list would be competitive enough. Once the enemy gets into combat I think you would be done. You need to get a noble in that eternal guard unit to make it stubborn and add more elves to it. I think the noble should probably be a BSB too. You could get a ton of points from dropping all the champions, the big unit of glade riders, and one unit of glade guard. I would then bulk up the eternal guard and pick up some wardancers as your counter charge unit. Also here is a build I think is pretty good for your highborn.

highborn - dragon, murder of spites, spear of twilight, stone of crystal mere, LA, enchanted shield = 563

I will look to make a list when I have more time.

What about this?

highborn - dragon, murder of spites, spear of twilight, stone of crystal mere, LA, enchanted shield = 563 (he gets d6 poisoned/magical str.2 attacks + 4 KB attacks, a 3+ ward save, and a 3+ armor save)

Spellsinger - level 2, orb, shrikes = 175
Noble - BSB, talisman of endurance, dragonhelm, relic sword, LA = 142

C: 7 Units of 10 Glade Guard = 840
C: 2 Units of 5 Glade Riders = 240
C: unit of 25 eternal guard with command = 330

S: unit of 10 wardancers with command = 201

Total = 2491

Very nice! Also gives you a decent starting (breakpoint? I forget the name) of 5... 2 for the general, 1 for the BSB, 1 for the EG banner, 1 for the wardancer banner. You could always add in another somewhere as well.

It'd be nice to have musicians in those glade riders, though... in fact, I think it's pretty much necessary. Not sure how I'd get it, though! Possibly by taking shrikes from the spellsinger.

It would be nice to get the bonus to leadership for rallying. I also realized that the wardancers don't get a standard bearer in their command so you would need to find another unit. Maybe double up one of those glade guard units and stick a banner on them. I think dropping the shrikes would be the way to go also. You could also drop that command on the wardancers for a full command on the big glade guard unit if you went that route.

I just want to state for the record, that I keep thinking about how great the dragon + locus of Merciew (Sp?) is since I first read this list.

With a dragon rider you want to be in close combat ASAP, and with the locus it is ok to be charged since lances lose their bonus as do greatswords. It really frees you to move up your full fly move on the first turn, because most units designed to fight high T creatures (like the dragon), rely on special weapons. In melee means no shooting and cuts down on a lot of magic.

I would echo the suggestion for the shield of Ptolos, but PLEASE keep the locus. I want to steal your idea, so please post if it works.

Good luck!

I would like to know how it fairs as well. I always pass on it for the ward save instead. If it was an enchanted item instead, then I could still take a talisman for the ward save. I think the only character I would take the locus with is a dragon rider as there are many things out there that still have a higher strength than our T3, or have poison, kb, or auto wound attacks.

OT - Can wood elf characters take magical heavy armor, since it only gives them choice of light armor on their options?

I hope they can take magical heavy armors.

I have not read any limitations on that in the faq.s but then again I am still trying to make sense of the eternal guard kindred ruling in the faqs. so they don't help much.

I designed the dragon guy to fight against swordmasters, PG, and all orcs with their stupid +1 s choppas. I think your point about it being good agianst all other types is a good point. So i was thining i could drop the Sword of Bloodshed for the +2 A sword, and free up another 20 points to use on a ward. Is that reasonable?

Does his item not negate his own strength modifiers as well? Perhaps I am thinking of one from the wood elf book...

Yes, it negates his own stregnth modifiers, that is why i picked the sword of bloodshed, i noticed above that i put the +2s sword, i meant to change it to the +2 a sword so i could free up points. I have corrected the error

Someone mentioned taking a BSB, but unfortunately WE have no place to hide one. Their only RNF unit is overcosted and useless against anything better than gnoblars, every other unit by design will be too small to allow it to survive for long. Giving the BSB forest spirit won't allow it to hide either, as it is a different unit type (cav or foot vs monsterous infantry, etc)

I've never had any use for champs in shooting units. Better to have a musician in all, or a standard in a few so you don't auto lose those missions that require them for a victory condition.

An interesting premise over all, but certainly in my meta game the army would disintegrate like wet tissue.

@unrealpawnage The issue you will have is that the locus takes the typical ward save item slot, so you will need to go with an armor that gives a ward save.

If you drop the HoTH that frees points to get the armour of fortune (hvy armor w/5+ ward). I know that you lose an attack with this, but you already have a serious number of high Initiative attacks and you keep the 3+ AS.

Just want to toss this out there: with a dragon, why not the Annoyance of Nettlings?

I don't think the nettlings would protect the dragon, just the rider... (could be mistaken)

That would make the difference. I thought there was something about it all being one model, and the way it's worded or something.

Well, i have 1700 pts of wood elves to build, then i will test the army out. I hope it goes well. I decided to go with:
Lords

Highborn: 561pts
Forest Dragon
Ogre Blade
The Helm of the Hunt
Stone of the crystal mere
Light Armor
Shield

Heroes

Spellsinger: 175
Lv 2
Divination Orb
A Pageant of Shrikes

Core

5 Units of 10 Glade Guard w/Champion: 630

1 Units of 10 Glade Riders w/Full Command: 276

1 Unit of 6 Glade Riders w/Champion: 153

14 Glade Guard: 217
Full Command

3 units of 8 dryads/Branch Nymph: 324

I have 164 points left to spend on a noble, any suggestions?
The unit of 14 glade guard will “bunker” my mage, and the noble. I will use glade riders to hunt war machines, dryads to hold up the enemy in trees so I can counter attack with the dragon lord or with more dryads to break them since you don't get rank bonus if you are in trees and lose steadfast.

Any suggestions for the updated?

Just a thought but why champions in the GG units? would you not be better served with some banners so you dont auto lose the banner scenario?

the remaining 164 points you mention might best be used to get a BSB for your army, would be helpful with the rerolls since most your army wont be near your enough to benefit from your highborns leadership. I imagine he would swooping away in front of your army munching on units

let us know how the Dragon fares I am still in the process of converting mine and have not got him to the table yet!

I think I would've preferred to keep the eternal guard than to add dryads... you need something that can stand up to enemy blocks.

However, dryads are good units... just hard to use against all the large blocks that are common in 8th. I liked the idea of having the eternal guard (perhaps with more numbers) try to stay stubborn for a turn, then hit the enemy hard with the dragon.

I think that dynamic would work better than the current units... I'm just not seeing how they would work together. In 7th, dryads and GG were crazy- GG could shoot and shoot, then flee a charge through the dryads (who are ItP) who could receive the charge and do damage. But in 8th anything decent charging them will usually break them, since people are taking such larger units. So I'm having a hard time finding a use for them... and in an army like this, I think you could use a solid block of your own more than 3 skirmishing combat units.

Largely agreed.

I wonder if that many units won't get in each other's way now and again? I'd suggest something like two units of 15 Glade Guard, and one of 19? Also, I too think banners would help more than champions (but I'd get both in that bigger unit, to accept challenges).

Also, I hate Glade Riders. I've seen them used to effect and all, it's just that...I look at Dark Riders and Reavers, and I think, "that's a lot of points for something that is so fragile, and something that generally does comparatively little", and then I look at these guys, who are more points and do less. I'm not saying drop them, but I am suggesting that you cut back and maybe get an eagle?

Finally, I liked the idea of no forest spirits, but I was wondering why you didn't have any War Dancers, Way Watchers, or Wild Riders (are they even good anymore)?

Good luck with the list.

I Just want to second the vote for a battle standard bearer, and with your army being pretty shooty, I would give him the hail of doom arrow and Aysendi's Bane.

I think with the other points you should consider some standards and the magic standard that gives flaming attacks. good for anti-regeneration and causes fear to many cheap archer slayers (like chaos hounds).

Good luck!

Well, the first game didnt go well, i played a 6k, 2500 in wood elves and 3500 in bretonnians agianst my friend who plays OnG. I was beat on turn 3 when he realesed 18 fanatics into my lines, then cast waaa, to move them 2 d6 toward the nearest enemy, i lost about 1/2 of my army to the fanatics alone, other than that the dragon lord caused 2 wounds on grimgore and killed a couple doom divers. The dyrads killed a couple 50 man blocks of night goblins but that was about it. I am deffiently going to change the list up once i get some eternal guard. I also ran a nobel as my General in the block of 14 GG with the spell singer. I decided the highborn would not be the general because he was going to be killed early on. Overall it was a good learning experience.

Glade guard and glade riders did next to nothing in this game because of the fact that the fanatics slaughered them before they could do any real damage.
Dragon Lord is worth his points
Dyrads in units of 8 are great for flanking and recieving charges
Waywatchers are good as long as you remember to move them, my 6 died 2nd turn to a hoard of black orcs because i forgot about them in the back of his deployment.

Next units to get are Eternal guard and a bsb.

Ah, sorry to hear it didn't work out the first time! Keep at it, you'll work out how best to use what you've got...

Also just a note, the model with the highest leadership has to be your general. So likely it must be the highborn... you only get to choose if you have multiple models with the highest leadership. This was a change from 7th edition...