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A BS6 meltagun, with 4/5 attacks on the charge @ WS6 I7, with grenades, for 100 or so points is a pretty good deal.

If an autarch were S4 base, and wasn't competing with Yriel, the avatar, and Eldrad, he'd be on the table much more often for me.

The biggest problem with the autarch is that no matter how you build him, he is either A) designed to exist with a not-very-effective-unit (swooping hawks, shining spears) B) unavoidably unimpressive in CC (T3, combined with S3, means he can't exist in CC without help, as he needs to not take ANY S6+ wounds, and needs doom to wound T4 reliably) C) simply too expensive to be a ranged combat model

This means that he is taken for his reserves ability and kept as cheap as possible, if taken at all.

Customizability is good. retaining eldar achilles heel (T3) is good, not stepping on exarch's toes is good. But if an HQ choice desperately needs the assistance of a 2nd HQ choice to be effective against the vast majority of opponents, thats really not good.

My solution - keep most of his options the same - I feel he should be customizable, as he is, to fit with any squad the eldar can field. He does need some changes:

-- 3+ armor, 3++ invuln. Eldar technology should be good enough to make those force shields a 3++. Yes, it lends itself to possible abuse with fortune, but, priced correctly, it should be possible to make exploiting that synergy inefficient points wise.

-- S4. This runs somewhat contrary to conventional codex design, by giving what is an essentially run of the mill eldar a different statline - this is highly uncommon, but it can be justified in fluff by simply emphasizing throughout the codex that an eldar's strength in combat is directly related to the strength of the individual's mind. "The autarch is a highly experienced warrior and combat commander veteran of countless ...." etc etc. His inherent psychic ability is sufficiently strong enough to increase his strength one point. Now, he is a better threat against marines.

-- permanent Doom. GW has been adding this to codexes in different forms. For example, I believe the upgrade in the Tyranid codex is scything talons, which allows tyranids to reroll 1's (to wound or hit, not sure) in CC. The "power sword" for the autarch should become a dire sword should change from the current craptacular incarnation to always rerolling to wound rolls in combat.

Now, the autarch is a CC threat against pretty much anything T5 and under. He wounds T4 on 4+s, and rerolls failures, meaning he is going to be good for 2-4 wounds per combat round. He has a 3++ invuln, which attenuates his vulnerability to S6+ wounds (S6+ is going to be even more of a threat with GK, hammerhand and psycannons). Increase his cost by about 25/30 points and it isn't too unbalanced.

Autarch with:
fusion gun
mandiblaster
warp spider pack
dire sword
shuripistol
frag grenades

comes in around 155/160 and packs 6 S4 WS 6 I7 attacks on the charge. This, my favorite form of the autarch, as a nice buff to a warp spider mayhem-causing unit, is a mobile, good cc model with an accurate melta gun.

As we're going back to HQ's quickly I had an idea for Farseers/Eldrad.

Leave farseers basically as they are now, maybe changing Eldritch storm to make it useful, and changing Mind War (or giving it to Warlocks). Possibly removing the basic farseer's option to take Warlocks?

Then make the Ulthwe HQ "The Seer Council of Ulthwe". If it includes Eldrad, 2 farseers and 5 Warlocks (possibly allow them to upgrade to 10) but takes up 2 HQ slots. This will stop Eldrad appearing in every damn eldar list and make him be used as he should.

If you take the seer council it could allow the Warocks in the army to take some special powers only available to Ulthwe? It would encourage loads of guardians (cheapest way to ge another warlock on the board). It might look a bit death stary, but its how Ulthwe should be...almost entirely dependant on their psykers to guide them to victory.

Any thoughts?

Gorechild wrote:As we're going back to HQ's quickly I had an idea for Farseers/Eldrad.

Leave farseers basically as they are now, maybe changing Eldritch storm to make it useful, and changing Mind War (or giving it to Warlocks). Possibly removing the option to take Warlocks?

Then make the Ulthwe HQ "The Seer Council of Ulthwe". If it includes Eldrad, 2 farseers and 5 Warlocks (possibly allow them to upgrade to 10) but takes up 2 HQ slots. This will stop Eldrad appearing in every damn eldar list and make him be used as he should.

If you take the seer council it could allow the Warocks in the army to take some special powers only available to Ulthwe? It would encourage loads of guardians (cheapest way to ge another warlock on the board). It might look a bit death stary, but its how Ulthwe should be...almost entirely dependant on their psykers to guide them to victory.

Any thoughts?

Avatar should be able to be taken as a troops choice for every guardian squad you take, like a tervigon.

I actually think the idea is rather intriguing.
Especially because Eldrad is about the most badass psyker in the game (at least he should be. I mean... the guy's truly insane compared to other Eldar psykers and
those guys are the greatest psykers in the galaxy - maybe except for the Emperor. ).
And yeah: Encouraging a guardian/psyker based army for Ulthwé could be awesome, but doesn't that take us back to special rules based on Craftworld?
Then I propose the following should be the aim of the special rules:
Ulthwé: Pretty obvious, make a Guardian/Warlock army - very few Aspect Warriors whatsoever. Remember though, that Ulthwé DOES have Aspect Warriors, just not that many. But I don't think you should make something that takes up two HQ choices when thinking about that Eldrad has worked together with for example Maugan Ra in the past (battle of Haran).
Saim-Hann: Pretty damn obvious too, Saim-Hann should be all about speed. Make every Saim-Hann army focus on being Mechdar and jetbike and then solely focussing on their manouverability and speed. Saim-Hann jetbikes might be as fast as DE reavers and whatnot.
Biel-Tan: Aspect Warrior mania. As I see it, they are the most generic Eldar Craftworld there is. Perhaps make the Avatar very attractive to them? To illustrate that they are the most agressive of the Craftworlds.
Alaitoc: Rangers... Rangers... Rangers. All I have to say. Make Rangers attractive to Alaitoc. Would also be interesting to see a very Sniper-based army (and to see if it could work ).
Iyanden: Well.. once again, pretty obvious: Focus on making Wraithguard and Wraithlords attractive. At the same time I think there should be some attractive Corsair units in the codex that Iyanden may draw on (because of Yriel, of course). Come to think of it, that would also fit Alaitoc (Corsairs are outcasts too after all).

Wooly wrote:I actually think the idea is rather intriguing.

Not bad, is it?

Except the Avatar is a Special Character. XD

Wooly wrote:Except the Avatar is a Special Character. XD

Yeah lol, I wasn't being serious anyway, trying to add humour to all of these long posts that give me such a headache when i read them

Yeah, I figured. Hence my "XD"

Wooly wrote:I actually think the idea is rather intriguing.
Especially because Eldrad is about the most badass psyker in the game *snip* Encouraging a guardian/psyker based army for Ulthwé could be awesome, but doesn't that take us back to special rules based on Craftworld?

Well if each craftworlds rules are linked to a SC (this appears to be the norm this edition), then It shouldn't be hard at all.

Wooly wrote: Then I propose the following should be the aim of the special rules:
Ulthwé: Pretty obvious, make a Guardian/Warlock army - very few Aspect Warriors whatsoever. Remember though, that Ulthwé DOES have Aspect Warriors, just not that many. But I don't think you should make something that takes up two HQ choices when thinking about that Eldrad has worked together with for example Maugan Ra in the past (battle of Haran).

The only reason I was saying it should take both HQ slots is that you are effectively getting 3 Farseers + a butt load of Warlocks, I suppose it wouldn't be a problem if thet were given an appropriate point cost though (although I can see that being ~600 points ). The point is that I wanted it to encourage you to build an army entirey around the council, which is what you'd have to do. Another (probably more sensable) option would be for the Council to inculde just Eldrad and 5-10 Warlocks (Warlocks are compulsory), this would stop him turning up on his own in every list under the sun.

I like the idea of the über-costy council that might even take up two HQ slots. But couldn't the same be made for each craftworld:
For example, give Iyanden a version of Yriel with his Eldritch Raiders.

Gorechild wrote:As we're going back to HQ's quickly I had an idea for Farseers/Eldrad.

Leave farseers basically as they are now, maybe changing Eldritch storm to make it useful, and changing Mind War (or giving it to Warlocks). Possibly removing the basic farseer's option to take Warlocks?

Then make the Ulthwe HQ "The Seer Council of Ulthwe". If it includes Eldrad, 2 farseers and 5 Warlocks (possibly allow them to upgrade to 10) but takes up 2 HQ slots. This will stop Eldrad appearing in every damn eldar list and make him be used as he should.

If you take the seer council it could allow the Warocks in the army to take some special powers only available to Ulthwe? It would encourage loads of guardians (cheapest way to ge another warlock on the board). It might look a bit death stary, but its how Ulthwe should be...almost entirely dependant on their psykers to guide them to victory.

Any thoughts?

I like the idea of the Ulthwe council and making Eldrad part of the package. However I disagree with the leaving farseers as they are now. Fluff they are supposed to be the most bada$$, they pale in comparison to a standard epistolary librarian- they too can cast two spells a turn and there is a night and day difference between the effectiveness of SM/SW/BA spells and those wielded by farseers. Admittedly doom and fortune are still the best spells in the game but they are indirect.

I will raise - in simplicity - an idea discussed before for pschers. Warlock - retinue - LD 8 1 passive psychic ability. Warlock leaders - those attached to squads- LD9 1 active and 1 passive. Farseer Ld10 2 active abilities. This was discussed way before but I think psykers need a boost to reduce the Eldrad dependency.

Well, yeah, but I actually think the army-built-around-Eldrad-and-his-seer-council idea is interesting and good.
While the Eldar psykers might need some general lifts, the council suggestion actually broadens the scoop of Eldar armies you can create.
As it is now, we have roughly three kinds of lists: Jetbike lists (while most people would just work jetbikes into other lists), mechdar and footdar. So this would allow us to create the alternative Psyker list.

DAaddict wrote:

Gorechild wrote:As we're going back to HQ's quickly I had an idea for Farseers/Eldrad.

Leave farseers basically as they are now, maybe changing Eldritch storm to make it useful, and changing Mind War (or giving it to Warlocks). Possibly removing the basic farseer's option to take Warlocks?

Then make the Ulthwe HQ "The Seer Council of Ulthwe". If it includes Eldrad, 2 farseers and 5 Warlocks (possibly allow them to upgrade to 10) but takes up 2 HQ slots. This will stop Eldrad appearing in every damn eldar list and make him be used as he should.

If you take the seer council it could allow the Warocks in the army to take some special powers only available to Ulthwe? It would encourage loads of guardians (cheapest way to ge another warlock on the board). It might look a bit death stary, but its how Ulthwe should be...almost entirely dependant on their psykers to guide them to victory.

Any thoughts?

I like the idea of the Ulthwe council and making Eldrad part of the package. However I disagree with the leaving farseers as they are now. Fluff they are supposed to be the most bada$$, they pale in comparison to a standard epistolary librarian- they too can cast two spells a turn and there is a night and day difference between the effectiveness of SM/SW/BA spells and those wielded by farseers. Admittedly doom and fortune are still the best spells in the game but they are indirect.

I'll just clarify, by "basically as they are now" I meant, keeping them as single independant characters that cast a couple of powers per turn. Tweaking their powers and/or runes to make them better than SM psykers would be included in that. This is opposed to the suggestion I made a few (probably a lot by now) pages back in which the basic Farseer's were basically taken as a seer council, with different models with powers to boost the farseers range, or be used to defend him in assaults.

If the Seer Council of Ulthwe consists of Eldrad and a 5 'Lock retinue (possibly give an option to add 2 more farseers and 5 more locks for big games), and the army had access to one or two extra warlock powers, it would make Ulthwe very characterful. Things along the line of:
"Amplify - If a model has the Amplify power, the range of every farseer psychic power is increased by 6" as long as the Warlock is alive. The effect of this power is cumulative."
"Distort - If a model has the Distort power, the range of all enemy shooting units that are fired at their unit is reduced by 6", In addition, when an enemy unit assaults a distorted unit they may only assault D6"."

Perhaps a Farseer can take a 'Warlock Council' as an honor guard, which numbers 5-10 Warlocks, and Eldrad can do the same, plus upgrade 0-2 Warlocks to Farseers as well?

Thus, any Farseer can get a small number of Warlocks, but Eldrad could get a Farseer or two riding shotgun for him, because, well, that's how he rolls.

(Incidently, what are the six-ish lists that the Eldar should have?

Beil-Tia as the 'vanilla Eldar'

Alaitoc, which could take Rangers as troops (Assuming that Rangers will be Elite while Dire Avengers and GUardians are the two Troops options)

Iyanden, which takes Wraithguard as troops (But likely has tight limits elsewhere)

Saim-Hann (Jetbikes!)

Ulthwe (Upgraded Guardians in some way.)

There should probably be a couple others, but care has to be taken since moving, say, Howling Banshees or Dark Reapers to troops can get overwhelming. Mind you, I'd love to see an 'Aerie' option, where Swooping Hawks were troop selections, but, not likely to happen.)

Amplify sounds like it could be heavily abused.
As it is now, Doom and Guide are awesome, epic and brutally fearsome psychic powers.
If you can extend the range of the Farseer's psychic ability then, let's hypothetically say that first of all, Mind War is changed to ignore cover saves. Now we assume that we have 10 warlocks with amplify.
Now we have an 84" Doom, a 78" Mind War, a 66" Guide and a 66" Fortune. 78" Mind War isn't that great, I must admit, because the Farseer would need line of sight, but just to emphasies: You can Doom ANYTHING on the board (what's not within 84 inches?), you can certainly guide ANYTHING on your side of the board and along with that, Fortune ANYTHING on your side of the board.
That is, if you ask me, slightly OP. Let's say the seer council has Eldrad, two farseers and ten warlocks. That's a total of seven psychic powers at ENORMOUS range. Sure, it might cost 1000 pts for ONE unit, but I don't really think that's a problem. You can basically very accurately bombard your opponent from turn one. You can even do this WITH your council hiding out of LoS, because your Farseers could not care less.
So, optimal use would be 4 guides and 3 Dooms, maybe exchange some of them with some fortune, but still... I wouldn't want to face that.

It'll cost you some 300 points to increase doom range that much, though, and it's still only one unit on the board.

Yeah, but no one would take 10 amplifies, 5 would be more than enough, because your units don't stray off that much and Doom has fine range as it is. You might not even buy more than two or three. My point is that you will have Doomed and Guided shooting on turn one and you don't even have to care where your units are placed. As it is now you at least need to think of placing your Farseer within 6" of whatever you need to Guide.

why don't we just change fortune/guide to 12" and doom to 24", and sidestep the entire problem?

Gwyidion wrote:why don't we just change fortune/guide to 12" and doom to 24", and sidestep the entire problem?

Not bad.. I do like the idea of doubling the range of mind war and eldritch storm. Also an amplify where the farseer can take a +1 to the Ld roll of a mindwar or +1 Str to an eldritch storm. Talk about indirect power of a warlock. 5 amplifys and we are talking mindwar at Ld 15 and Eldritch storm at Str 8. I don't really care if he is getting a cover save if I have a built in +5. This would be a major commitment of a council though and at the expense of enhance and embolden so go for it.

That seems like an ok change - just for those two powers, and they shouldn't have absurd range, but honestly, if you want to invest that large of a points block into being able to snipe a single model, i have no problem with it.

The really cool and fluffy one would be a council-fied eldritch storm.

It could be sort-of-living lightning:

The seer council takes a test using the highest Ld in the unit (10, 99.9% of the time).

The eldar player selects a point on the tabletop. This point scatters as normal for a blast attack. After determining the final location of the point, all units within 6" of this point are suffer 2d3 hits with the following profile: S4 AP4. For each farseer present in the seer council, add +2S. Foreach warlock present in the seer council, add +1 inch to the radius determining units hit.


I believe we already had a discussion of seer councils....

I was scanning this huge assed post and I was wondering about the Autarch. Specificially his 1 handed and 2 handed weapons choices. Cause right now he's getting weapon choices from the aspect basic troops choices (ie Avenger Catapults, Scorpion Chainswords, Power Weapons (Banshees), Single Deathspinners, etc.

These choices kind of just make the Autarch like an extra roaming troop of a various aspect. Certainly he's more mobile with his travel options, and just a little more advanced in hand to hand. But he doesn't pop. For me, who sometimes swings into a "I don't wanna HQ this game" mode the autarch is the way to go - because he's cheap and he doesn't do a whole lot. Now yes, we all put a fusion gun onto him and see how long he lasts....but onto my idea.

I had two ideas.

One - Instead of basic aspect weapons give the guy access to the exarch armory as they appear in the current codex. Mirrorswords, Triskele, Executioner, Spinneret Rifle, Dual Deathspinners, Sun Rifle, etc etc. My reasoning is that they make the Autarch way more diverse. Much more of a threat to higher toughness assaults by way of more attacks (ie Mirrorswords) or higher strength (Executioner, Biting Blade). In shooting, he would fill a number of roles and become a very diverse HQ.

I was also thinking that this would be a good time for a plastic Autarch box set, like what they did for the SM Commander. IMO we need Exarch weapons to kitbash with. I'd love to see a Sun Rifle, Spinneret Rifle, Webs of Skulls, etc for my Exarchs without having to do some extensive kitbashing. Rules like this for the Autarch could lead to a kit like this. It could be a win win.

Idea Two - A retinue for the Autarch. I was really impressed by the Court of the Young King in the Craftworld Eldar codex. I'd like to use that pretty directly to create a potent HQ unit out of the Autarch. This idea is about as detailed as it needs to be - you get the idea.

What do you think? Either 1 or 2, or both at the same time. Would having the Autarch be a little powered up through use of Exarch weaponry be too much to ask. Your thoughts?

-MightyG

Autarch was just covered.
While nothing finished came out of it, we could all agree that the Autarch should not have Exarch weapons, for lore reasons.
Autarchs have fought as multiple aspects, hence why they can choose every aspect's gear, but they have never been lost on one path and never been lost as one aspect - e.g. they've never been Exarchs. Therefore they do not have access to the ritual weaponry of the Exarchs.
We did, however, agree that the Exarch needs some sweeter gear.
Giving him a retinue sounds interesting enough, though.

Wooly wrote:Autarch was just covered.
We did, however, agree that the Exarch needs some sweeter gear.

Did you mean Autarch or Exarch up there?

Whoops, Autarch. Bottom line: Autarchs can't have Exarch gear for lore reasons.

I see there's nothing really been mentioned for Striking Scorpions or Swooping Hawks? If you don't mind I'd like to suggest a few ideas which.. I guess will mostly be ripped off from other codexes but whatever:

Scorpions: Give them Stealth either basic or Exarch upgrade. Possibly a special Stealth that gives +2 to the cover save but only takes effect if the unit is in cover (so no 5+ save for standing in the open). Could also have an Exarch power that allows them to come on from reserve in a piece of Terrain like the Ymgarl Genestealers. Both options make sense lore wise since Scorpions are meant to be the masters of the hidden ambush. Finally they should have Fleet. If incubi can do it so can they.

Hawks: Easiest option would be to give them Haywire Grenade Launchers or Haywire Blasters... just a way to let them use Haywire Grenades from range. Let them move faster, or make them more survivable, either with an invulnerable save or cover save. Lower the cost too I think. Skyleap is a good way to escape combat but maybe it should work like Hit and Run, in that they could skyleap away at the end of any combat phase, but remove the Grenade packs, or make it that if they skyleap in the opponents combat phase then they need an unmodifiable 4+ to come back on the Eldar turn, to represent the fact that sudden swift changes aren't always easy.

Swooping Hawks have almost literally just been covered. XD
We suggested making them anti-tank and giving the Exarch the haywire ranged weapon already. ^^
As far as Striking Scorpions go, an Exarch power has been settled for that increases any cover save they recieve by +2 like Pathfinders. Also, people have spoken about giving them a Lictor like deployment.
I agree that they should have the option to deploy in some sort of ambush. I am not compeletely aware of the rules for Ymgarl Genestealers, but I would propose that after deployment, you placed your Scorps in reserve and wrote down a piece of terrain on a piece of paper (I'm not sure this is the perfect solution, but it might work). When you then get your Scorps from reserves, you show what piece of terrain you wrote down.
Perhaps you could even twist this even more and further illustrate Eldrad's awesome farseer potential by saying that his replacement move (all of it, the whole D3+1 unit would be spent on this) would be to let you choose where the Scorpions were hiding when you they arrive from reserves.
I tried to limit the usefulness of this by making it Eldrad's replacement move, but I still smell an awful game breaker if this was to be taken seriously.
"Yo dawg, I heard you like playing Tau. So I exploited your hideous need for cover by using Eldrad in my army and have my Scorpions jump at those nasty Broadsides of yours. Lolol, problem?" (Sheepish smile).
But I'm sure the mechanic of ambush could be used in some way.

I think we're moving fast onwards to a mark 3. Now that'll be a huge amount of work, partly since a lot of the consensus needs to go in one section and all the other suggestions in the other.

Well... then we better get to work, no?

@zonino - we've been through almost all of the things you have suggested already, I think the general consensus has been theat they are decent ideas. I REALLY like the Ymgarl-like idea for scorps though, thats something we hadn't considered.

@Mahtamori - I will go back and collect the newest version of each unit that I can find through this thread and put it into one post. If there are any little changes we can sort them out, and then I'll copy/paste it into a PDF, then we can open MKIII. Sound like a plan?

Yer, if Scorps have Infiltrate as innate ability (this should stick their points to about 15-16 with their current statline anyway) and then allow the Exarch to upgrade it... I like.