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Took out my army for the first time to our monthly tournament.

Here's my list:

Archon + agonizer, blaster, shadow field, haywire grenades
Haemonculi x2 + agonizers x2, webway portals x2
Grotesques x10 + aberration, liquifier
Trueborn x3 + blasters x3
Trueborn x3 + blasters x3, venom w/2 splinter cannons
Wyches x6 + agonizer, shardnet, haywire grenades
Warriors x5 + blaster
Warriors x5 + blaster
Beastmasters x3 + 5 khymera, 2 razorwings, 1 clawed fiend
Scourges x5 + blasters x2
Scourges x5 + heat lances x2
Talos + chain flails, tl heat lance
Talos + chain flails, tl heat lance

Game #1 vs mech BA can be found here: http://synaps3.blogspot.com/2012/03/march-rtt-game-1-dark-eldar-vs-blood.html

Game #2 vs Necrons can be found here: http://synaps3.blogspot.com/2012/03/march-rtt-game-2-dark-eldar-vs-necrons.html

Game #3 vs Daemons w/ Fateweaver can be found here: http://synaps3.blogspot.com/2012/03/march-rtt-game-3-dark-eldar-vs-daemons.html

Thanks for reading!

Long time reader of your bat reps. Gotta say they are really well done. Thanks so much for doing them. Sincere awesomeness every time. Keep up the great work.

Glad you decided to write a report for these games, I wanted to make this tournament but with the wife's due date 1 week out....I had a strong suggestion that it was a poor idea...

I really love the list, it is where I am heading with my Daemons overall in terms of composition and setup - it presents a diverse set of multi-faceted threats

Well played on the first game, moving into range of those WWP's definitely cost your opponent on this one.

Love your blog sir!

Very well done sir ! And here I was thinking dark eldar were done... Silly me.

hmm.

I commend you for making a very interesting and very non cookie cutter list. You can think for yourself and its refreshing.

Your list seems interesting.

The only problem I have, is that it doesnt have alot of mobility after the webways are down, and it doesnt have alot of long range fire power. People who are smart will sit back, and shoot your squishy units in the open, and compleatly avoid the hemuncs and talos.

Regardless of how I would play against you, beautiful army and nice playstyle!

interesting list indeeed..... i'd find room for a parasite engine to toss more FnP around

Thanks all.

@ Smitty ~ Agreed. However, if you read the theory article linked in the batrep, this list works by reacting to any faults in my opponent's formation and hopefully creates new dilemmas that they cannot handle. Very few people have played against an all foot WPP list, so this works to my advantage.

In this case, the BA firepower consisted of 3 tl assault cannons, 6 hvy bolters, 2 autocannons, and 6 lascannons. Not much compared to my multi-wound, diversified deathstars if he holds back at max range and I come in cover. Regardless if he held back or came forward, the furioso was the only thing that could stop my grotesques. He literally didn't have enough shooting or turns in the game to kill them. Once they hit the middle of the table, they could contest any objective as I went second.

In regards to range, don't forget I can come in from either webway or table edge. Webways are almost always deployed ~12" up. Blaster scourges coming out 12" can strike up to 42". Tureborn on foot can hit up to 36". Trueborn on the venom can fly up, disembark, and shoot about 32". Wyches and beasts have a huge assault range out of webway portals also.

To totally out range me, my opponent would need to avoid those threat ranges from both webways and my table edge. Only tau, IG, and a few GK lists have the range to do that. It was my first event with this list and I didn't have to face any of those armies, but I have a few more tricks up my sleeve!

Always a big fan of your reports man, really unique army list too which means really interesting reports.

Congrats on the 1st win and gorgeous looking army man, look forward to the rest!

Love that list. Very original and looks really cool to both play and play against. Your army also looks good

Awesome army mate! Love your take on a foot dark eldar army, I have dabbled around with some lists but haven't considered the WWP for them until now. My route was taking larger warrior units.

My only gripe with the list is that death star. Thats only because GK and guard are every where and nemesis force weapons and manticore fire will rape that unit. Of those two I think guard is the tougher opponent. But you are clever, just need to outplay them

Indeed.

There was 1 IG player with 1 manticore and 3 GK players at this event and I dodged all those pairings (24 players total).

The thing about a manticore is I can use max coherency and cover to mitigate some of the damage.

GK's can be a lot scarier, especially with a stormraven loaded with an assault unit. The nature of my list means when my blasters arrive, the raven will almost always have a cover save and it's mostly immune to heat lances so I need to be extra cunning against them.

My list is pretty gimmicky though and was designed first and foremost as a fun hobby army to try some new paint and conversion techniques. My GK army placed 4th out of ~100 in appearance at our local GT (DaBoyz) only because I lacked conversions and freehand, so this year I'm going for the top. Success on the table would be a welcome bonus

I played against a foot WWP DE list before. It really takes you by surprise if you are not prepared for it. If not for a few crucial dice rolls, I'd probably have lost.

Looking forwards to the rest of your reports.

Yup, unpredictability and huge threat bubbles make the list surprising to many and also a lot of fun to play.

Game #2 is up!

Wow epic win my friend! Very close though. You were insanely lucky that he couldn't use Ever Living do to sweeps, but hey, that's how you gotta get those pests.

I am from Maine, what part of NY do you play in? I may have to road trip in the future


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Also, have you considered wracks? I find them to be one of if not the most underrated units in the game. I just played a game and had 4 in a venom win a 4 turn combat with a 10 man tac squad! I had an acothyst with agonizer and a liquifier and thats it!

I live in Rochester, NY. Basically on Lake Ontario between Syracuse and Buffalo. We have several great shops and a strong hobby community. The RTT's regularly bring in 20+ and our GT - DaBoyz brough in over 100 just for the 40k side last year. A road trip is definitely worth it!

I have tried wracks. The problem is my list needs anti- tank and invulns the most since I'm usually playing with a very small force for the first few turns. Hitting power and tarpitting are key that's why I chose wyches and warriors for now.

As Aaron's Necron opponent I have to say this was a good game in which I made a couple dubious choices which really cost me.

The most Glaring was the Overlord led squad that I deep struck near the board edge to get turn one shots against the Grotesques. That play was fine, but I intended to deep strike them away on my turn two before your reserves arrived I just forgot which was really unfortunate lol as they were in range of anything that you got from reserves walking on.

The second mistake I made was the deep strike with the Deathmarks they definitely should have been placed on the other side of the Grots with the rest of my army to at least keep you near me for counter charges.

Additionally, the reason I didn't charge your Talos that was eating scarabs wasn't because I was scared of the thing, though I do have a new found respect for it, but because nothing I could charge it with had even a 50% chance of killing it before you killed 3-5 scarab bases and I get dragged down by 9-15 no retreat saves.

Beastmasters are easily the best unit you have against Necrons as they just have too many wounds, are very mobile, and never seem to win or lose a combat on the DE turn. At least thats the unit that always gives me headaches when playing DE.

I really enjoyed playing your list, its nice to not play venom/raider spam once in awhile.

Thanks Dean, you nailed it. My list relies on vulnerable units to cripple when my reserves arrive. Your list definitely has the mobility and hitting power to defeat mine. Great game mate.

Necrons are tough. I can't imagine how much worse they would be if they had somethine like a WWP in their army. First turn, CCB moves forwards and drop it off. Next turn, 3 units of wraiths come out. *shudders*

Great batreps! I've played WWP DE before, but always felt like it needed more umph, I think Grots make this one great. I thought they would be too many points, but it seems if you position everything well and throw in some wound allocation it can work.

Fingers crossed vs daemons!

When I saw the Necron player move up with Veil and the CCB I figured this one was over.

With the amount of shooting power pouring out of the Necron army I am surprised they did not stay at range and wait for the DE to arrive - when the shooting units do arrive drop a pulse to help mitigate some shooting (I know night vision) and keep the vehicles at max range to preserve them.

Naturally it is easier said than done and I understand wanting to move in for the kill, but getting close to the DE portals just removes their major weakness - lack of mobility once deployed.

That Fateweaver Daemon army sounds like Chris's army. Who did the Daemon player payoff not to get a GK matchup?

Yup, definitely wanna play defensively against the WWPs. The problem with necrons is this whole army shoots 24" so 30" threat range. Since he went first, he could sit and do absolutely nothing for two turns if he wants to wait patiently out of range, but I have a couple counters to that also like only dropping one portal and pushing the second one even deeper.

Yup the daemon army was Chris's. Somehow GK and GK fight each other and I get him, and wait till you see the TO's special rules for daemons in the final round...

I truthfully dont remember the DE shooting really doing anything. I think they shot down the CCB which was expected as I was going to put him in combat anyway. And the last turn of the game he took the main gun off the annihilation barge. Looking at the list his shooting is a non issue.

That being said you could argue I should have stayed back, but then a full strength Grot squad with 3 IC's would be moving on me and I get the feeling that could only end one way.

My intention was to stay at near max range to avoid being charged out of reserves and minus the two flubs I previously mentioned I feel I did that fairly well. Unfortunately the two flubs were really inexcusable and game changing.

Also the TO's rules for the third round were absurd for everyone, but a near auto-win set up for daemons.

It was not so much the shooting I would worry about (as you noted the DE did not have a lot to deal with your AV 13 super effectively), it was more the assaults that were brutal. I understand what you were trying to do though, I think throwing away the Deathmarks early on is a waste. The Grots are a huge brick of wounds to break through and were well deployed.

Even letting the Grots come to you, you have the perfect counter with the Herald to them (since it is majority ld and you get to wound on 2's with ID) and they need to be careful. Letting them assault a unit, pile in 6" and then their consolidation leaves them more grouped up and ready to be flamed. The remnants are (hopefully) tied up with some Scarabs until the game ends.

I enjoyed the battle reports. Its nice to see you run a Dark Eldar list that has some creativity besides the Ravangers x 3 and venoms x 9. Army lists like yours really go a long way in making the tourney scene better IMO...people dont get burned out fighting the same lists over and over. Looks like the list was fun to play, and play against.

I also enjoyed the bat reps immensely.

I play wwp lists but not nearly as frequently or as competitive as you so thank you for proving that these kinds of lists can win.

Some notes on tactics that you are really surprising me on is the deployment of the Grotesques. Are they usually always starting on the board? Do you ever put them in or consider the possibility of putting them in at all?

I use my grotesques on raiders so I do not put them in either. On foot, however, you find they can get into assault the majority of the time?

On the WWP Talos, I have evolved from the chain flails to the twin-linked liquefier - how much do you like the chain-flails?

And last but not least, the agonisers on the Haemys - are you completely sold on those agonisers? I know they provide the power weapon kills the Grotesques lack but I still find them under performing for their points.

Never mind the 3rd heavy slot, I can't believe you are not only playing with only 2 heavy slots but both are Talos!

All I can think of is if you lost any of the games how the forum would have fallen on you like a ton of bricks, for not playing a venom spam list.

Thank you for not playing a venom spam list.

Thanks for the kind words and wow, what telling comments. It's a sad state of the tournament scene when we have to thank people for not spamming. What if we thanked every opponent we played for not spamming? What if we all played lists that are fun to play with and against without spam? I bet at the end of the day, the people who actually enjoy playing a spam list, who really get warm and fuzzy inside when thinking about their 12 skimmer list, are a vast minority. It's sad, but a lot of people build spam lists because they feel they need it to be competitive. Anyways, that's a can of worms for another day and another thread.

@ kwi - I have tried using harlequins to deliver the portals and bring the grots out from reserves, but this causes big problems. Harlequins by themselves are very vulnerable to getting rushed and shot off the table, which means losing the haemonculi also. Grots absolutely must be fearless or they will fail you which means adding 2 haemis or Urien. My best results have been deploying the full unit with 2 haemis for portals and fearless. This also allows me 2 elite spots for trueborn for anti-mech.

Hey hyv3mynd... what do you think of Lady Malys in a WWP list?

Her redeploy ability has worked wonders for me and as an added bonus, I throw her in a wych squad that renders the unit immune to psykers. That ability was epic vs a GK and IG army I played recently.

whembly wrote:Hey hyv3mynd... what do you think of Lady Malys in a WWP list?

Her redeploy ability has worked wonders for me and as an added bonus, I throw her in a wych squad that renders the unit immune to psykers. That ability was epic vs a GK and IG army I played recently.

This is actually a great idea if room can be found.

@Hyv3mind- have you tried haywire blasters on your talos or scourges? stun locking tanks is pretty awesome, though I know you already lack actual AT and probably run the talos most turns. More curious on your take of them in general.

She was my ogirinal HQ. Then FAQs/TOs started saying her immunity wouldn't save them from GK force weapons since NFWs don't target the unit like normal force weapons.

2 haemie's make the unit fearless and immune to weaken resolve. Once malys's gimmick is used , she kinda sucks. No shooting and only 4+ invul. I still like the vanilla archon with shadow field, agonizer, blaster, and agonizer better for the same cost.


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Haywire blasters are fun for stun locking, but not opening transports. I woulda been in big trouble against the 12 vehicle BA army if I had haywires instead. Plus, they're useless if you face another foot list.

Using blasters and heat lances encourages scourges to jump close to the enemy, which draws more fire off my 3 scoring units. The extra range on haywire blasters does the opposite and decreases the survivability of my scoring units.