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I have heard some people say some good things about 10 men mandrake squads, anyone willing to share their experiences with them? Are they worth the 150 points or not?

They are a great harassment unit. Good for hitting a combat squad or a long fangs pack in the opponents backfield.

They would be great to hit a long fang squad if they could actually hit it. If you opponent doesn't deploy close to a short table edge or you role the wrong side for deployment then your mandrakes will march on and promptly do nothing.

I'd love to come in here and post a lengthy explanation of why Mandrakes aren't worth their cost, but it seems that the forum lately is full of people eager to defend units I consider bad.

I hope that means I'll be seeing more bad lists in tournaments being played against me! =D

I can't say much other than how annoyed I am that I can't attach the special mandrake to a mandrake unit. Not being able to do that pretty much forced me to not pick up DE.

Mandrakes are pretty good if you're able infiltrate them behind cover near a soft unit like a Tau Firesquad or Eldar Guardians.

After they've waded through that and grabbed a pain token, they're much more survivable and get their ranged attack.

They're not a good unit, but they're not bad if you're careful.

There are much better reasons to play DE than the mandrakes. The idea behind them is cool and its a shame they are only mediocre at best. Personally I thiink if they automatically started with the balefire attack and then used the regular Power From Pain rules they would actually be worth their points. I'm personally much more miffed about the relative uncompetitiveness of reaver jetbikes. They are so cool...so dark eldar and yet they aren't worth taking unless you are interested in fluff or are playing just a friendly game.

They kind of suck. I tried them out last night, and they couldn't even kill a havoc squad in assult.

I run a ten-man squad every time I play. I've used them extensively for all manner of things on the battlefield, and I have to say...

They suck horribly. The only reason I take them is because I love their concept, and I really only field units I like the concept of. And that's the thing; they have an amazing concept. They pop out from the very shadows, dragging their victims screaming into the depths of whatever nightmare dimensions they populate! They are the very incarnation of fear and darkness, and even the Dark Eldar have nightmares about them!

...So it's really too bad that they can't even reliably take out a tactical squad in close combat. Tactically, they should be our answer to genestealers; our own infiltration unit that can strike from where you least expect it and wreck face for relatively cheap. Instead, we've got a unit of close combat specialists who fail spectacularly at close combat, due mostly to their abysmal toughness, awful save (invulnerable though it may be), and lack of any sort of attacks or upgrades that ignore armor saves. The only thing that could make them somewhat effective (a pain token) is almost impossible to get given their awful stats, unless you assault the tattered remnants of an already beleagured squad. Even then, though, they fail miserably at what they're meant to do: assault.

Even their special rules don't make any sense for what they do! Stealth is kind of handy for surviving as you approach the enemy. I'll give them that. Move Through Cover, though, is useless for them. They have no grenades, so if you're going to be moving through cover, odds are you'll also be assaulting through cover. Have fun with Initiative 1! Then they've got their Baleblast, which is admittedly a cool concept and could turn them into a decent shooting unit. Too bad they have to kill something to get it.

In the end, it comes down to just a few things: They are a close combat unit that can't kill in close combat. They need to have either a lot more survivability, or they need to be able to hit hard and fast. (Preferably the latter, as it fits their fluff.) Currently they can do neither, and that's just sad.

Okay, rant over. Sorry about that. I feel strongly on the subject...

I picked up the DE codex last week as I'm looking to start collecting and painting next month.

After seeing the models I really wanted to pick some of these guys up but omg Why would they do that to suck cool looking models? arrgh...

For me it all came down to needing that first paintoken, why?

Dashofpepper wrote:I'd love to come in here and post a lengthy explanation of why Mandrakes aren't worth their cost, but it seems that the forum lately is full of people eager to defend units I consider bad.

I hope that means I'll be seeing more bad lists in tournaments being played against me! =D

Come on Dash, you know you want to. Let's derail another DE thread just because people want to argue with you even if all the facts prove you're right.


I will assert this now MANDRAKES ARE THE WORST THING IN THE DARK ELDAR CODEX!!! Can anyone really refute this?

Vrakk wrote:
Come on Dash, you know you want to. Let's derail another DE thread just because people want to argue with you even if all the facts prove you're right.
I will assert this now MANDRAKES ARE THE WORST THING IN THE DARK ELDAR CODEX!!! Can anyone really refute this?

I think grotesques give Mandrakes a run for their money!


But yes seriously they suck. Their only use is against n00bs who will leave things for infiltrators to attack or maybe as a "scouts" defense. A unit of 3 can effectively prevent something with scouts from getting too close in an alpha strike.

I will argue at length that grotesques are far better than mandrakes.

On a all raider list, a 4 grot squad with hammy can put a hurting on vehicles and tie up horde units for ever. Str 6 in the charge is nothing to laugh at - its far better than Str 4.

Vrakk wrote:


I will assert this now MANDRAKES ARE THE WORST THING IN THE DARK ELDAR CODEX!!! Can anyone really refute this?

Harlequins. At least Mandeakes can make it to close combat without a 30 point sink.

Tbh honest mandrakes might do well in a 500 point objectives game. throw them in cover=4+ cover save +stealth=3+ save. should they get shot by heavy fire, they go to groundand get a 2+ cover save (unless some rule stops them?). Just at the 5th turn they should run towards the objectives so they can contest. sound good?

Blitza da warboy wrote:

Vrakk wrote:


I will assert this now MANDRAKES ARE THE WORST THING IN THE DARK ELDAR CODEX!!! Can anyone really refute this?

Harlequins. At least Mandeakes can make it to close combat without a 30 point sink.

Tbh honest mandrakes might do well in a 500 point objectives game. throw them in cover=4+ cover save +stealth=3+ save. should they get shot by heavy fire, they go to groundand get a 2+ cover save (unless some rule stops them?). Just at the 5th turn they should run towards the objectives so they can contest. sound good?

just made me think... If they were troops they might be useful, even takeable. But no they suck still.

Harlies are definitely not the worst unit in the DE codex lol. They hit infinitely harder than Mandrakes against both heavy infantry and hordes, will actually make it to combat without being shot most of the time (with a Shadowseer) and can carry Fusion Pistols to bust open vehicles. They are a great way of getting Webway Portals into position which means they would probably have a place in certain lists even if they were much much worse in assault.

The worst thing in the DE codex is almost certainly the Decapitator (who is technically a Mandrake I guess), he is one of the only complete dud units in the codex. Mandrakes are probably the runners up, but are still miles better than the Decapitator (as in they are borderline usable). Their main problem is that they are a fairly underwhelming unit in an Elites section which is packed with powerful units which are hard to pass up.

Vrakk wrote:I will argue at length that grotesques are far better than mandrakes.

On a all raider list, a 4 grot squad with hammy can put a hurting on vehicles and tie up horde units for ever. Str 6 in the charge is nothing to laugh at - its far better than Str 4.

worth an elite slot that could have been incubi, trueborn, bloodbrides.... I think not.

I'm not saying they fit in every army list but grotesques are far better than mandrakes. They can wreck vehicles and will take far more punishment than the mandrakes.

@Powerguy, good catch on decapitator. The only reason I would say he is better than normal mandrakes is at least he has a shooting attack right of the bat and can actually win a combat - but the points cost is enough to make me want to gag.

Well, they might be useful for tieing up heavy weapons teams, so really awesome assault units (wyches) aren't left to die when thier flying cardboard box gets shot by the blasted heavy weapons squad. However thier are probaly better units to do this type of job, like deep striking hellions.

Mandrakes would kick all kinds of ass if they could carry a WWP....

No joke, wyches aren't even a good assault unit. They're still WS4, which is most oftenly a 4+. Not to mention S3, T3. They're awful, IMO. Incubi are the only thing that can handle MEQ. Everything else falls short. Wyches are a waste of a troops choice, unless you camp a big unit somewhere to hold an objective. Warriors are almost always the better alternative.

I

Well, assuming you have an elite slot available (wait, you have an elite slot available? What are you doing?) they are a great 45 point wargear upgrade that gives you a 50% chance to keep your opponent from having a good infiltration location.

Uhhh also, they might help you to win a heavy comp tourney.

Or a painting contest. Because the models are cool.

You know you can start any unit with a pain token ... just add haemoculus ... for mandrakes its a bit more tricky you need to have him join them after they arrived.

Friend of mine use 3 haemoculus simply to give his units pain tokens (starting with FNP is no joke).

Shelegelah wrote:I run a ten-man squad every time I play. I've used them extensively for all manner of things on the battlefield, and I have to say...

They suck horribly. The only reason I take them is because I love their concept, and I really only field units I like the concept of. And that's the thing; they have an amazing concept. They pop out from the very shadows, dragging their victims screaming into the depths of whatever nightmare dimensions they populate! They are the very incarnation of fear and darkness, and even the Dark Eldar have nightmares about them!

...So it's really too bad that they can't even reliably take out a tactical squad in close combat. Tactically, they should be our answer to genestealers; our own infiltration unit that can strike from where you least expect it and wreck face for relatively cheap. Instead, we've got a unit of close combat specialists who fail spectacularly at close combat, due mostly to their abysmal toughness, awful save (invulnerable though it may be), and lack of any sort of attacks or upgrades that ignore armor saves. The only thing that could make them somewhat effective (a pain token) is almost impossible to get given their awful stats, unless you assault the tattered remnants of an already beleagured squad. Even then, though, they fail miserably at what they're meant to do: assault.

Even their special rules don't make any sense for what they do! Stealth is kind of handy for surviving as you approach the enemy. I'll give them that. Move Through Cover, though, is useless for them. They have no grenades, so if you're going to be moving through cover, odds are you'll also be assaulting through cover. Have fun with Initiative 1! Then they've got their Baleblast, which is admittedly a cool concept and could turn them into a decent shooting unit. Too bad they have to kill something to get it.

In the end, it comes down to just a few things: They are a close combat unit that can't kill in close combat. They need to have either a lot more survivability, or they need to be able to hit hard and fast. (Preferably the latter, as it fits their fluff.) Currently they can do neither, and that's just sad.

Okay, rant over. Sorry about that. I feel strongly on the subject...

I feel like you're talking about Wraiths, on all points. Amen.

Shelegelah is pretty much spot on. You have to try very hard to make Mandrakes mediocre and compared to their other elites, there's really no place for them in a list that's actually trying to win. If they had grenades, a 4++ save, bale blast starting, some ability like rending, and/or the ability to carry a wwp, or some combo therein, they would have a point. Note that they don't have any of that and thus they suck.

Samus_aran115 wrote:No joke, wyches aren't even a good assault unit. They're still WS4, which is most oftenly a 4+. Not to mention S3, T3. They're awful, IMO. Incubi are the only thing that can handle MEQ. Everything else falls short. Wyches are a waste of a troops choice, unless you camp a big unit somewhere to hold an objective. Warriors are almost always the better alternative.

I

Wyches wreck armor with their haywire grenades, and beat out most non-melee-focused units once you factor in their upgrades. Their biggest strength is in effectively castrating nasty CC monsters with low numbers of attacks. High strength is wasted against T3, and attacks that ignore armor saves don't matter at all because of their 4++ save. Throw in shardnets and they can drop terrifying MCs down to one attack per turn, which has only about a 20% chance of actually inflicting a wound, while they chip away at it. They're really only bad against hordes, which most DE armies struggle with (very likely to change once the razorwing model comes out, since it's basically just one big "lol, what horde?" button that either maintains excellent anti-tank capabilities after burning its missiles on a horde, or can be cheaply upgraded to be an extremely effective anti-infantry gunship (which will get ignored after its missiles are spent if you're lucky, and your opponent is clever enough to realize that it can't do what it just did again, but not clever enough to realize it still has 6 poisoned 4+ AP5 and 6 S5 AP2 shots it can bring to bear)), with the exception of venom spam lists, which aren't too viable otherwise due to their overwhelming lack of antitank capability, but can lay down an obscene 108 poisoned 4+ AP5 shots at 36" (you can actually fit another 24 shots in if you were to take two archons with courts small enough to take venoms too).

I really don't believe warriors are generally a good buy. They're useless in melee, have rapidfire weapons, and cost as much as an equal amount of hellions if you factor in the cost of putting them in a raider. Throw in Sathonyx to make hellions troops, and hellions become roughly equal to wyches in utility, with only their lack of haywire grenades (and grenades in general, though at least that can be fixed with a helliarch with a phantasm grenade launcher) keeping them from winning out as the clear best troop choice.


Mandrakes and their special character are just tragically useless, however. If they'd had something better than a single normal close combat weapon, they would be a tough to use but still viable outflanker. If they'd had the same "appear anywhere" that their special character got, they'd be useful simply for scaring your opponent into focusing fire into them, buying something else more time. If Kherudruagh could assault on coming in like the callidus, it'd be an awesome unit. As it is though, they do exactly nothing competently, while costing about as much as a tac marine or the "more useful in every single way" hellion.

Samus_aran115 wrote:No joke, wyches aren't even a good assault unit. They're still WS4, which is most oftenly a 4+. Not to mention S3, T3. They're awful, IMO. Incubi are the only thing that can handle MEQ. Everything else falls short. Wyches are a waste of a troops choice, unless you camp a big unit somewhere to hold an objective. Warriors are almost always the better alternative.

I

Bit off topic here, but going to have to disagree with you.

Wyches are an extremely potent assault unit. They are WS4, and STR3, T3. With combat drugs, you're probably going to boost one of those. I start my wyches with a haemonculi, so they start the game with feel no pain, or a 4+ rerollable save in close combat. They have haywire grenades because my primary goal for them is to deal with vehicles that my darklight weapons can't (Monoliths and blessed hull) - but I don't see those very often, so they find a way to be useful.

I won't go into details of any particular game, but a 9 member wych unit with feel no pain that's WS5, or has +1 attack, or gets a free pain token to start with (furious charge from the get go) is worthwhile. I don't even have a power weapon in there and they hold out for long periods of time. I really should add an agonizer instead of a razorflail.

i personally love wyches
A squad of 1 chaos lord with about 7 plague marines fell to 4 wyches and my archon.
the only surviving model was my hekatrix.

But mandrakes could be good harrasment unit if something gave them a pain token.
Thier are however much better ways to fill an elite slot.

Mandrakes are god-awful.

Having tried them a lot for the sake of the beautiful models, and being constantly biased in their favour because of the aforementioned models, I still couldn't avoid that conclusion.

The one way to make them a teeny weeny bit usable is to set them to outflank in a WWP list; this means they are almost guaranteed to assault something, with 18" bubbles from either side of the board edge, plus the WWP, they at least have a purpose; the soul outflankers in the DE list.

Whether they can win said assault or not is a different matter entirely... plus they complete with dark eldar sternguard (trueborn).

Samus_aran115 wrote:No joke, wyches aren't even a good assault unit. They're still WS4, which is most oftenly a 4+. Not to mention S3, T3. They're awful, IMO. Incubi are the only thing that can handle MEQ. Everything else falls short. Wyches are a waste of a troops choice, unless you camp a big unit somewhere to hold an objective. Warriors are almost always the better alternative.

I

I have been running Wyches sinec roughly 2001, when the DE had thier codex update that gave Wyches their 4++ save. They have always been a great CC unit.

In the current codex, Wyches are cheaper than before, and has better CC abilities than before. My Wyches LOVE to run up to Thunderhammer Termies and beat them down into the ground.

Wyches are basically great against any non-horde unit. If you want to assault a 30 Boy mob, you better double up on it. Other than that, send wyches up against just about anything, and they'll win.

Mandrakes are a decent unit. They are not useless at all. They just suffer from the 'better elite choices available' syndrome. Deploy Mandrakes Infiltrating in a conga line towards your opponents deployment zone, attached to a Heamie. Turn 1 just move the Mandrakes, and bam, they are in your opponent's face, usually in cover, with a Pain Token. Every opponent I have faced HAD to deal with this unit, otherwise their Broadside/Long Fang unit would be charged on turn 2 and either killed or tied up.

You want a dead unit? Succubus. Horrible. Almost as bad as the Decapitator....

Has anyone used Mandrakes in a Cronos list?

I haven't had the chance to make a list with a Cronos yet, but (in theory) that's where their strength is. The Dark Eldar codex is basically one cheat after another, and one of the key things they have is PfP and the ability to give units special abilities that they don't even have to pay for. The units are cheap already, and become even more so when they get a few pain tokens.

Mandrakes have an even further ability of putting out a lot of 18" shots (from cover) in order to cause some annoyance. People say that the problem is getting them a token, which either requires A) a Haemy, which doesn't utilize their Infiltrate to its fullest one way or another, B) them to kill a unit, which they can only do in assault if they don't have a token already, or C) having a Cronos kill a single model 18" away.

Which of these is the smart choice? C. Which have I never heard anyone talk about? C.

Once they get their first token, the number of shots they can put out + assault could bring them a second one after a little bit of work.

I'm not saying it works (because I haven't had the time to get a Cronos built or tool a list to take advantage of one) but I AM saying that it's the best chance Mandrakes probably have.