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So, I was thinking about mech eldar lists..... I was also thinking about how they are supposed to be among the top lists in the tournie setting. The others being zilla/choir nids, podding marines and perhaps mech tau....

Well, I was wondering how to beat the mech eldar.... and it struck me... what about swooping hawks? A unit of 6 with exarch and skyleap/intercept with run about 160 points.... With a 19" charge range (IF they can fleet) they can pose a very significant threat with their haywire grenades.

Do you think these giys wouls be useful...as in making their points back/ effecting your opponents choices...? Would the ye have a use versus other lists as well?

Let me know

ender502

Absolutely. I like Swooping Hawks -- they can mow down cheap troops or pounce on tanks. You just have to be VERY careful to keep them away from AP4 guns, which shred them to bits -- and since they are twice the price of most other 4+ aspect warriors, this is a major loss. When dealing with grav tanks, this is a problem, since they tend to mount shuricannons. Also, Swooping Hawks get nastily slaughtered in assault -- so be careful of those disembarking harlies or banshees (make sure hawks assaulting vehicles swarm the back hatch).

If you just want a simpler, less finesse-laden way to knock down speeder tanks, vibrocannons are nice (autoglance!), but scatter lasers and/or pulse lasers rule the day at long range, as do Reapers exarchs and autarchs. Lots of shots at STR6 or STR7 is golden.

-Adso

6 hawks = 3 glances = a shaken falcon. Next turn everything moves to shoot the hawks, overwhelms their 4+ saves, and they die giving up 160 VPs.

So far for some reason the toughest Eldar opponents I've faced with my Eldar are the ones who have more massed str6 firepower than I do.

Flavius-

Alas I think you are correct. I was most concerned withe cargo hopping out and sooting me or asaulting......

I like the vibrocannon idea, there are cerainly some possibilities there. Though i would hate to lose a HS slot.

And who has more s6 firepower than the eldar? Zilla nids?

-ender502

So far for some reason the toughest Eldar opponents I've faced with my Eldar are the ones who have more massed str6 firepower than I do.

Warp Spiders can be very useful for this. Average squad of 8 with exarch will cause a couple of glances I think (mine always seem to manage more though), but they're much more useful elsewhere, unlike the mono-tasked Hawks who are pretty useless vs. much else IMO (aside from hordes). Yes, I am a Spider fanboy. 

Vibros are v. useful for at least stopping them shooting, saving your other AT to do something else if needs be. Aside from this, you can always bait traps to try and pound rear armour using your own Grav tanks to max your glances if you're desperate.

Other Eldar armies with more vypers, massed warwalkers, and like that.

It's just anecdotal so far and just a couple of games. And it's not logical because str6 is not statistically the best versus falcons, so it may be some kind of perceptual fluke. But everytime I come up against an Eldar army with a lot of str 6 shooting versus my assaulty mech Eldar, I have a really hard time.

Str 7 is better, obviously, but lots of str6 is better than a little str7, and I think that may be the issue. I am not overly familiar with all the codexes; but it seems easier to get 'mass fire' str6 than anything higher.

I have been playing more games lately, and am convinced about Vibrocannons being a staple part of my eldar list.

I use 2 squads of three warwalkers as a default, with a wraithlord for AT. I have found that replacing the wraithlord with the vibrocannons to be a better AT unit choice initially in the first few rounds of the game due to lack of recourse by the opponent against the vibrocannon.

These three elements form a very functional hammer to allow the rest of the army to aggregate the remainder of the mission objectives while still being functional to respond elsewhere as needed.

But then again, I run a Saim Hann flavored list that doesnt use vehicles other than vypers and warwalkers.

I had a great vibrocannon moment the other day when I caught the master of the ravenwing with a vibrocannon shot. He was 35.5" away and behind cover, so he forgot he wasn't safe. I picked up the die to roll the damage for the autoglance and I realized the vibrocannon completely negates all his advantages (AR14? I don't care!) and I had at that moment a 1/3 chance of killing the master of the ravenwing's super speeder because he'd been moving fast.

I rolled a 1, but it was a cool moment.