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Made in ca
Tough Tyrant Guard





Vancouver, BC, Canada

With Dark Eldar currently off shelves and my Tau nearing completion, I've pretty much decided to go for Eldar as my next army. I've played against them a fair number of times, but not since 4th ed. I have no knowledge of much of the army, but I do know what I'm going for:

1) Not mech Eldar (too similar to my Tau army)
2) Close combat oriented

Other than that, I'm clueless as to where to begin. My other thread's convinced me of taking a squad each of Banshees, Scorpions, and Shining Spears. Looking for more of a fun/collecting 1000 pt army to start with...

- What troops should I go for besides Spears? Rangers or Avengers as a firebase?
- Are Fire Dragons reliable as Anti-tank or should I invest in more long range weapons? Reapers more for infantry?-
- Should I invest in an Autarch or Farseer?
- I'm probably going to have to invest in a tank, even though I want to avoid the 'everything in a wave serpent'...Falcon or Fire Prism....or War Walkers to keep in my foot slogging theme?
- Any units that are just flat out bad?

I'm taking a look at the Eldar tactica articles here.
Appreciate any advice coming my way! I'm probably picking up the codex today + a squad of some form of aspect warriors.


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Made in us
Wicked Warp Spider





South Carolina

A CC oriented Eldar army is an interesting concept.

Here are my suggestions...(not an eldar player just fight them too often)

Troops - 1 or 2 squads of Pathfinders, DA for the rest of your troops (guardians only if you need more brightlances).
HQ - Farseer, Avatar (to fit your CC walking idea)
Eliets - Scorpians, Banshees, Fire Dragons
FA - Spears, Hawks (potentially but seem to underproform against me)
Hvy - Depends, cant go wrong with 1 full Warwalker squad (to outflank), Wraithlord or 2 (run w/avatar and 1 should make it to CC)

For anti-tank Dragons usually make their points up for my firends armies. Wrathlord's and Walkers can have a variety of wepons. My friends usually run Bright lances and sword on the lords, Walkers are kitted with anti infantry/light vehicle guns.

The only issue with the Eliets is that if you footslog them is that they will get shot to pieces. Banshees are fleet which helps and Scorps can infiltrate. But usually you need a wave serpent to get the job done for them (Including fire dragons)

"I suppose if we couldn't laugh at things that don't make sence, we couldn't react to a lot of life." - Calvin and Hobbes

DukeRustfield - There's nothing wrong with beer and pretzels. I'm pretty sure they are the most important members of the food group. 
   
Made in za
Dakka Veteran






Cape Town, South Africa

This is my 1500 list, im also new to eldar
this list is currently in a thread for reviewing aswell
it contains a lot of what you are looking for...

HQ - Avatar -155

HQ - Farseer - Doom,Fortune, Spirit Stones - 130 (i will be attaching him to the Bashees)

Elites - Striking Scorpions -8-exarch, scorpion's claw, salker, shadowstrike - 180

Elites - Harlequins -8- shadowseer, 7harlequins kisses - 202

Elites - Howling Banshees -8- exarch, execuitioner - 150
- Waveserpent Transport - shuriken cannons, star engines, spirit stones - 125

Troops - Dire Avengers -10- exarch, 2 shuriken catapults, bladestorm - 152

Troops - Rangers -5- Pathfinders - 120

Troops - Gaurdians -10- scatter laser - 95

Heavy - Wraithlord - 2 flamers, wraithsword - 100

Heavy - War Warlker - 2 brightlances - 90

2500 pts | 1500 pts | 1000 pts | 1000 pts

 
   
Made in gb
Towering Hierophant Bio-Titan



UK

Shinning Spears are a fast-attack option.

Guardain jetbikers are troops, IF you combine them with an autarch with a lance and mandi-blasters - you can get a good amount of str 6 power attacks, + the rest of the guardains @ I5 & ws4 with a enhanced warlock arent too shabby. + shuriken cannons.

Rangers (at 1000pts, you cant diversify too much) are good at anti-troop but definetly invest in pathfinder rangers. That scout move, +1 to cover AND 5-6 (not just 6) to get AP1 on a to-hit roll, Is well worth it. Get 1x5man pathfinders compared to 1x10/2x5man rangers.

Dark reapers - dont get rangers, but yeah, cool. Static. Strong. Get an EML over a tempest. Tempest=awesome but crippingly shortened range compared to the rest of your squads 48''. Also with fast-shot (crack shot be awesome too) you can get a heavy 2 krak missile @ bs5.

Fire dragons just need a wave serpent to a: get close to get to either 6'' or 12'' min. and b: to survive with that 4+ sv.

FIRE PRISMS. the focoused blast is just awesome. Think of all those small 5man combat squads. Really wanna annhilate those tau units, unfocoused.

Really want to kane those large 10man sternguard, just get two and link up. str 6 ap 3 large blast, RE-ROLL to scatter (re-roll both the scatter dice arrow and the scatter range dice -see FAQ).


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Friend of mine just sent me this:

"The Tyranid Codex, where I learned the truth about despair, as will you. There's a reason why this codex is the worst hell on earth... Hope. ."
Too be fair.. it's all worked out quite well!

Heh.  
   
Made in gb
Mekboy Hammerin' Somethin'





Spreading the word of the Turtle Pie

Tempest launcher has its benefits, especially combined with Crack Shot. With my Orks I played against Eldar once. First turn: "Exarch will fire". Places first template... cover 9 of my coverhugging ork. Doesn't scatter. Same for the 2nd. "Right then, 4s to wound... with a re-roll" 13 wounds on a 20 boy mob. I'm not particularly happy with this, but I'm thinking "At least I have my cover saves" Opponents sees me reaching for dice to make saves and says "Oh, by the way, it ignores cover." Ork mob flees the table. 1 Model kills a unit of orks... I hate eldar...

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2009/01/14 19:07:30


   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut



Beaver Dam, WI

As a starter...

2 units of DA.
1 unit of pathfinders.

Meets your troop requirement and provides great firepower base against hoards and a good survivable unit to take on high toughness units.

1 Farseer with doom. (Fortune and guide are awesome in situations but doom is what makes eldar work.)
1 Avatar... (Hmmm demon, FnP, immune to flame and melta... makes everyone fearless... I think so.)

On foot...

I would look at Scorpions, warlock retinues and then harlequins rather than banshees. Banshees are cost effective except they will die to fire too easy marching on foot. Same applies to fire dragons on foot. Scorpions are not amazing but 30 S4 attacks (40 on the charge) will make them a good all-around unit ... better on low Ac armies but I have had Scorpions beat termie squads. Banshees really need the Doom on their target as the majority are attacking at S3. Warlock retinues are great for survival with a fortune on them. It doesn't hurt that they wound on 2+ and are S9 versus armor. Their limitation is the cost. Wraithlords are much the same... if you have an enhance warlock leading them we are talking 10 S5 WS5 attacks and their T6 makes them hard for non-fists to beatj

Suggestions for AT work... warlocks, spiders and wraithguard are good on foot to one degree or another. Another option is the small dark reaper with an exarch with EML and fast shot. Two S8 shots with a BS 5 pretty well means 2 S8 hits each turn. Not good on raiders and monoliths but good at cutting down enemy troop hoards and fairly effective at light to medium vehicles.

Wraithlords and wraithguard are good but you have to have enough psychers floating around or they go dumb. Not good when you are talking 350 points or 155 for AT "dead" units to have them do nothing for a turn.

I cannot speak to walkers but they don't really fit your CC concept. I would rather see you fielding another wraithlord to put pressure on in HTH rather than a firepower oriented choice.

Debatables would be the fast attacks... Spiders put out a volume of fire but 22 base plus exarch will push this easily to a 150+ unit.

Yriel and Eldrad might be great adds for you but that depends on style you want to play. The phoenix lords, well in general overpriced but great fluff adds to your army if you have the points to burn.

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Made in us
Executing Exarch






Odenton, MD

How much do you like to stick to fluff?

you could try an Ulthwe Strike Force

1 avatar
Farseer counsel on jetbikes
3 x units of Harlies w/ shadow seer (march in front of main force to give +4 cover, then when within 15" let them fall behind to gain a cover save from the storm guardians)
2-4 x units of Storm guardians (warlock enchance)
2 x units of guardians w/ scatter
1 x unit dark reaper
2 x Wrath lord w/ BL and EML
   
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Towering Hierophant Bio-Titan



UK

That tempest launcher is a G36'' weapon, which i think , means it scatters when you dont have TLOS the full amount reguardless of BS. Which is a bit rubbish with BS5 exarch. When your using shadow weavers with BS3 guardains, fine.

Crack shot is good.. combine it with the str 4 ap 4 blast (its not blast 2 nor AP3) but when against marines, why bother being slowed down by terrain neways when your armor save is better than the best (unmodded) cover save? AP4 on the other hand is brillaint, as armor 4+ will stick to cover as there are ap 4 blast weapons out there. ap4 blast weps that ignore cover are a great to combat this.

Basically you loose 1 blast template, the G' (ordenance ability?) type and -12'' for the tempest.

With the Eldar missile launcher you gain a krak missile (complements the reaper launcher) for good anti-tank, esp with fast shot & against covered bodies, a str 4 ap 4 plasma missle with crack shot. You retain your 48'' death dealing radius (and stay out of range of all but the longest (and generally anti-tank dedicated) ranged weapons.

Also, a 48'' str 8 missile, that ignores cover saves will laugh at disruption pods. Granted str 8 vs AV13 isnt amazing but it still allows for non-covered tanks in general, reguardless of AV.

With that farseer counsel Clthomps, your gonna need a farseer HQ (as a second HQ choice, to double check) but otherwise looks like a solid list. Perhaps get small squads of harlies all with shadowseers and jesters - to compliment your dakka.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Friend of mine just sent me this:

"The Tyranid Codex, where I learned the truth about despair, as will you. There's a reason why this codex is the worst hell on earth... Hope. ."
Too be fair.. it's all worked out quite well!

Heh.  
   
Made in us
Executing Exarch





Los Angeles

To really figure out what you want to do, I think you will have to give us a bit more direction (or ask more specific questions about units or combinations there of). There are lots of ways to work an eldar army and many of them work (even if some are unconventional). Do you want an army that focuses on hand to hand or just one that focuses on short ranged firepower? Do you want an army that advances en mass or do you just want a fair number of forward hand to hand units? When you say you don't want to do mech, do you want to have just a few skimmers or do you want to avoid them all together?

Some units you will want to consider...
1) The avatar. This guy not only does a lot of damage if he gets into hand to hand, but he also scares most other players into devoting way too much fire power into trying to kill him. As a side bonus, he makes sure your lines don't break from shooting or hand to hand casualties.
2) A farseer. Dooming enemy targets and fortuning your units are both very very useful. If you can afford it, putting 5 or so warlocks with the farseer gives you a very tough unit (assuming you are running fortune on them) that does fairly well in hand to hand.
3) Scorpions. These guys sound like they will make up the bulk of your hand to hand units since they function well without a transport and are tough enough to survive protracted combat.
4) Harlequins. They hit hard and don't require a transport. Just make sure they have backup or they'll get bogged down and killed.
5) Wraithguard. They are expensive but very tough and work well with a short ranged army. As a bonus, if you take 10 with a spirit seer, they count as troops.
6) Guardians. These guys would end up lagging behind your hand to hand units but they provide useful fire support and are cheep troop options for holding rear objectives.
7) Pathfinders. They are great for providing some long range fire support and holding rear objectives.
8) Shining spears. As much as I generally dislike this uint, if you are going to be focusing on hand to hand in a non-mech way, you'll need the mobility these guys provide to plug gaps in your lines when they show up. Just make sure not to get them into the fight first or they'll just get killed.
9) Dreadnaughts. If you are going with a charging force, you can equip them with swords and nothing else. Then they can just run forward every turn to get into hand to hand as fast as possible
10) Flacons + Fire dragons. I mention these together because there isn't much point in one without the other (although you could use a wave serpent instead of the falcon if you like). Your army is lacking in anti tank power and these guys do a wonderful job of it. The only issue is getting close. Once your hand to hand units start to make a mess of things, it shouldn't be any problem getting these guys in to do their job.
11) Jetbikes. The point of these units in your army would only for objective grabbing purposes. You can keep these guys mostly hidden in your back field for most of the game and then just zoom them out in the last couple of turns to start grabbing (or contesting) objectives.

**** Phoenix ****

Threads should be like skirts: long enough to cover what's important but short enough to keep it interesting. 
   
Made in nz
Fresh-Faced New User




Hi Guys,

Since this is a general tips thread, thought id ask a few Q's. Hope you dont mind orchewer.
Could we get some mounted mech tips form the experienced pointy ear players please!

My competitive mech marine 1500 list (2 LR 1x AT + vindie) is complete and performing well. Im interested in putting together a 1500 mech Eldar list.
Mech MEQ focused, what i cant really decide on is a counter charge unit. LR's caring SS AT's is what im looking to shutdown.

Plenty of TL-BL's (possibly too many, full list below). Harlies seem to be a good choice due to the number of attacks, TM with power sword over shadowseer.
Banshees would be slightly cheaper and, doomed power weapons are possibly more versatile and CA can help if caught with your pants down. Very fragile unit tho, fortune may help with the saves.
Im a big fan of the seer council and its durability , witch blades seem better against high toughness rather than armor though.
Scorp's are cool, but they lack lethality for the intended role


Any opinions on the above

Current list as below
Lacks decent anti-horde beyond the single 10 man G squad with SL. Could go SC's on the FD's and Harlies WS and run bare bones DA's to squeeze in a single FP. 4 TL-BL's are no joke, where as 2 doesn't seem terribly threatening to a AV13/14 list.

Farseeer
doom
fortune
both runes
SS
155

10 DA PW SS BS 162 - Serpent BL SS 145
10 DA PW SS BS 162 - Serpent BL SS 145
10 Guardians scatter laser - 95

10 Harlies troopm pw 9 kisses 236 - Serpent BL SS 145
6 Fire Dragons 96 - Serpent BL SS 145


Thanks in advance


edit: spelling

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2009/01/15 00:22:22


Being a fresh faced new user, take anything i say with a large helping of salt. 
   
Made in ca
Tough Tyrant Guard





Vancouver, BC, Canada

Phoenix wrote:To really figure out what you want to do, I think you will have to give us a bit more direction (or ask more specific questions about units or combinations there of). There are lots of ways to work an eldar army and many of them work (even if some are unconventional). Do you want an army that focuses on hand to hand or just one that focuses on short ranged firepower? Do you want an army that advances en mass or do you just want a fair number of forward hand to hand units? When you say you don't want to do mech, do you want to have just a few skimmers or do you want to avoid them all together?


I want an army that gets in assault as fast as possible without relying on Wave Serpents or Falcons. At this point I'm thinking a combination of Banshees, Scorpions, and Shining Spears with Rangers, Dire Avengers as fire support with Fire Dragons thrown in for anti-tank. Other than that I don't really know where to head for an HQ or other Heavy Support (if I need).

Thanks

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Made in us
Infiltrating Oniwaban






@orchewar:

An Eldar infantry close-combat army can be done in several interesting ways, but only in a couple of really competitive ways. Your army will largely be advancing on foot frontally, with a portion devoted to outflanking.

The main advance of such a force is well bolstered by an Avatar-Farseer combo. Far and away the best Farseer is Eldrad, who is particularly useful for casting Fortune twice while you run into the teeth of the enemy guns. The Avatar bolsters your line's morale and draws fire. If the Avatar and one other unit are receiving the Fortunes, they are likely to live to hit the enemy against anything other than an IG gunline.

The outflanking element would be Scorpions. Not only is outflanking a lot more fun than a single frontally-rushing mass of fighty warriors, they are really neccessary for capturing far-off objectives when your whole army is on foot. Try playing with two units: they really help in 5-objective games.

Advancing foot Eldar armies often lack anti-tank, as Phoenix points out. 2 Wraithlords with Brightlance and Eldar Missile Launcher will help with this. [By the way, swords-only is definitely _not_ the way to field Wraithlords IMO, as they are mediocre CC troops but good shooters). Plus, the Wraithlords may drag some shots off of your Avatar, allowing him to keep your infantry Fearless. Of course, the best Eldar anti-tank force is Dragons in a tank, but you said infantry only.

You'll need Troops, too. If you're low on points after populating your Aspect Warrior slots, 3 units of Guardians with scatter lasers make a respectable close-range firebase and a great meatshield. 2 units of Dire Avengers and 1 unit of Guardians would be best IMO, with PW/SS and Defend on the DAs to allow them to help out in CC without becoming a huge liability to your other eilte troops.

Finally, you need a few nasty power-weapon units. Harlies work well, as their Veil and speed can keep them alive on the march in, especially if your opponent fears the rest of your army too much to close and rapid-fire them. At least one unit of 10 or two units of 8 will make your line scary.

As for what not to take: Banshees are a bit too fragile on the run in, Wraithguard are too slow and low in CC attacks, and a foot Seer Council costs too much in 1850 or below to field alongside the 3+ units of Scorpions, Harlies etc. you will need to trounce your foes. Shining Spears will either have to hang back a lot or will get outnumbered easily. An Autarch or Phoenix Lord isn't as good as either the Avatar or a Farseer.

Playing this force will require lots of practice, as you lack the speed that usually take out enemies before they can cut down your infantry. It will, however, probably be a whole lot of fun to play thanks to it's unconventional (in 5th ed., RIP Biel-Tan!) style.

Infinity: Way, way better than 40K and more affordable to boot!

"If you gather 250 consecutive issues of White Dwarf, and burn them atop a pyre of Citadel spray guns, legend has it Gwar will appear and answer a single rules-related question. " -Ouze 
   
Made in ca
Tough Tyrant Guard





Vancouver, BC, Canada

Would I be shooting myself in the foot if I was inherently against taking an Avatar or special characters for fluff reasons?

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Made in gb
Towering Hierophant Bio-Titan



UK

No. The avatar is awesome but he isnt another farseer with fortune/doom. If you get two seers, you just gotta go for mindwar.. being able to snipe off those pain boyz, lascannon or powerfist marines, weapon platform guardains (BUT AHA! Theres two of the buggers to gun the weapon ) or go crazy and try your luck against necron lords, C'tans, HQs, carnifexes etc.

If your taking a shinning spears squad (Dont, use a jetbike squad instead for the following dude) take an autarch as he can add so many (more) str 6 power attacks. Basically hes worth about 3 nacked SS and only a few points more (So him and a eldar jetbike squad will be nearly as deadly, cheaper, more versitile & scoring.)

Whats wrong with prisms here? @ Tranquil - not the best weapon against landraider/monolith (although with two, its quite a good call concidering the twin-linked scatterness) Termies will cry against the focoused blast. Also.. autarch on a jetbikes (as mentioned above) has tasty haywire grenades!

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Friend of mine just sent me this:

"The Tyranid Codex, where I learned the truth about despair, as will you. There's a reason why this codex is the worst hell on earth... Hope. ."
Too be fair.. it's all worked out quite well!

Heh.  
   
Made in us
Executing Exarch





Los Angeles

orchewer wrote:I want an army that gets in assault as fast as possible without relying on Wave Serpents or Falcons. At this point I'm thinking a combination of Banshees, Scorpions, and Shining Spears with Rangers, Dire Avengers as fire support with Fire Dragons thrown in for anti-tank. Other than that I don't really know where to head for an HQ or other Heavy Support (if I need).


Ok, so no skimmers at all. That is something that can be done, but it limits your options. For one thing, it makes banshees more or less impossible to field. They are simply too frail to live though the shooting they will take on the way to the enemy. It also means you can't field fire dragons or the same reason, they just won't live though the trip to the enemy (not to mention that any tank can just move 6" backwards and stay out of the dragon's range for ever). So you'll have to work with what you have left.

Savnock wrote:The main advance of such a force is well bolstered by an Avatar-Farseer combo. Far and away the best Farseer is Eldrad, who is particularly useful for casting Fortune twice while you run into the teeth of the enemy guns. The Avatar bolsters your line's morale and draws fire. If the Avatar and one other unit are receiving the Fortunes, they are likely to live to hit the enemy against anything other than an IG gunline.

Solid advice.

The outflanking element would be Scorpions. Not only is outflanking a lot more fun than a single frontally-rushing mass of fighty warriors, they are really necessary for capturing far-off objectives when your whole army is on foot. Try playing with two units: they really help in 5-objective games.

2 units of scorpions is more or less what I figured on too. If you have them close in from outflanking positions, they become the jaws that close in on your opponent; you just have to make sure that there is enough pressure in the middle to cause the enemy to buckle there. This will probably mean running an avatar, a unit of quins, a couple of dreadnaughts and probably a seer council.

Advancing foot Eldar armies often lack anti-tank, as Phoenix points out. 2 Wraithlords with Brightlance and Eldar Missile Launcher will help with this. [By the way, swords-only is definitely _not_ the way to field Wraithlords IMO, as they are mediocre CC troops but good shooters). Plus, the Wraithlords may drag some shots off of your Avatar, allowing him to keep your infantry Fearless.

The purpose of the army (at least as I am envisioning it at the moment) is to get into hand to hand as fast as possible. You won't be able to do that with enough force if you have your dreadnaughts lagging behind everything else (by not running so they can fire heavy weapons). Now this will mean you have absolutely no ranged anti tank power. However, you can make up for that with hand to hand power. The avatar, the dreadnaughts, the seer council and the scorpions (if you give them haywire grenades) are all great at taking down armor at close range. In addition, if you get to hand to hand, the tanks will not be able to hurt you anymore anyway (they don't get attacks in hand to hand and they can't shoot into the combat) so you don't have as much to fear from them as you might think. In addition, with the new damage charts and what not, the long range fire power of the dreadnaught isn't as good as you might think. There is only an 11% chance that dreadnaught shooting will kill an AV13 vehicle and this goes down to 7% against AV14. A single fire dragon (or anything else that's BS 4 with a melta gun) has a 25% chance once they get into melta range on AV13 (down to 21% against AV14). Hand to hand attacks from monstrous creatures have essentially the same effect as melta weapons so are much more valuable in taking down a tank. The down side to them though is that they are short ranged and require you to move close first. In the end, if you are planning on advancing your whole army anyway, I would suggest giving up on most of (but not all) your ranged options in favor of focusing on hand to hand. As for dire avengers in hand to hand, it's not really a good idea. They are S3 with 1 attack each (and they don't have two hand to hand weapons) so they just don't do any damage in hand to hand. Defend and the shimmershield only make them harder to kill. Neither of those upgrades make them do more damage so I think you may want to avoid getting them into any fights that are not alreadly more or less won.

You'll need Troops, too. If you're low on points after populating your Aspect Warrior slots, 3 units of Guardians with scatter lasers make a respectable close-range firebase and a great meatshield. 2 units of Dire Avengers and 1 unit of Guardians would be best IMO, with PW/SS and Defend on the DAs to allow them to help out in CC without becoming a huge liability to your other eilte troops.

Troops are going to be a bit of an issue for you. The fact of the matter is that the eldar just don't have any troops that are any good at hand to hand. The best in over all ability would be wraithguard but their cost far outweights their hand to hand usefulness. I think the best option for you would be to get one squad of pathfinders to leave in the back field holding rear objectives and then take a couple of guardian squads to move up with the bulk of your units. The guardians will probably be ignored for the most part since there will be a whole lot of more dangerous targets to worry about. Give them the heavy weapon platform of your choice (I like scatter lasers and missile launchers) and start hoofing it. Warlocks are probably not needed since you'll have cover from units in front of you and you'll be fearless because of the avatar. If you decide to go without the avatar though, make sure the squad(s) has a warlock with embolden so you don't run away too quickly.

Finally, you need a few nasty power-weapon units. Harlies work well, as their Veil and speed can keep them alive on the march in, especially if your opponent fears the rest of your army too much to close and rapid-fire them. At least one unit of 10 or two units of 8 will make your line scary.

Quins make a great front liner till the enemy gets close. The enemy can't shoot at them from long range and they give cover saves to the units behind them. Just make sure nothing gets too close to them and opens fire because they can't deal with being damaged. I would stick to only one unit of them though since they compete with scorpions for elite slots.

Wraithguard are too slow and low in CC attacks, and a foot Seer Council costs too much in 1850 or below to field alongside the 3+ units of Scorpions, Harlies etc. you will need to trounce your foes. Shining Spears will either have to hang back a lot or will get outnumbered easily. An Autarch or Phoenix Lord isn't as good as either the Avatar or a Farseer.

First off, you need to get the idea of wraithguard being slow out of your head. They move at exactly the same speed as every other unit on foot, 6" +1d6 run if they want to take it. The only units that sort of move faster are harlequins and pathfinders and that's only if you count them as faster because they ignore difficult terrain. In the end though, everything moves 6-12 inches depending on if you chose to run and what you roll if you do. Now, on the other hand, both wraithguard and the seer council are expensive. A 10 man wraithguard squad is about 400ish points and a 6 man seer council is about 250ish. You can certainly get away without taking wraithguard, but without the seer council, I think you will lack too much hand to hand power in your forward units (assuming the scorpions are outflanking). If you take shining spears, they will have to hang back for the first turn or so till your other units close in. However with basically the whole army advancing, there should be plenty of places to hide them. Or you could just skip them...your choice.

orchewer wrote:Would I be shooting myself in the foot if I was inherently against taking an Avatar or special characters for fluff reasons?

Taking the avatar or not does change the dynamics of the army quite a bit. Special characters...not so much. I, myself, personally, never take Eldrad because I feel it is lame to take special characters. I don't see the Avatar as special so I don't have the same problem with him (although with the way my army works, he doesn't really have a place in it). If you don't want to use them, it's not the end of the world, it's just less optimal. Without the avatar, you can take a second farseer (or an autarch). The second farseer can be given fortune and doom (just like the first one) and either join the seer council or another unit, which ever looks like it will work out the best on the field (and remember, the second farseer can leave the council at any time since the warlocks were not bought as his bodyguard). This will really give your center units both more protection and make them pack a stronger punch (since two enemy units will be doomed). The other option would be to get an autarch. You can outfit him to go with the striking scorpions and add some extra punch to their unit. He will also give you +1 to your reserve rolls and help get those scorpions onto the board faster. Both are good investments for your army.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2009/01/16 16:30:11


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Executing Exarch





Los Angeles

Razerous wrote:No. The avatar is awesome but he isnt another farseer with fortune/doom. If you get two seers, you just gotta go for mindwar..

While you don't have to go with mindwar, it isn't a bad idea. If your second seer had fortune/mind war (and was in a unit that wasn't planning on running every turn) then he could do a decent job of picking off incomming powerfists which do pose a very large threat to your units.

If your taking a shinning spears squad (Dont, use a jetbike squad instead for the following dude) take an autarch as he can add so many (more) str 6 power attacks. Basically hes worth about 3 nacked SS and only a few points more (So him and a eldar jetbike squad will be nearly as deadly, cheaper, more versitile & scoring.)
Also.. autarch on a jetbikes (as mentioned above) has tasty haywire grenades!

If you do have shining spears, that unit is in fact a good place for the autarch. However in the absence of a shining spear squad, the jetbike is more likely to get your artarch into trouble than keep him out of it (at least in my opinion). The haywire grenades are a nice option, but there are probably much better targets for the autarch than vehciles.

Whats wrong with prisms here?

The original poster specified that he didn't want skimmers in his army so we are avoiding discussion of them.

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Tough Tyrant Guard





Vancouver, BC, Canada

Thanks for all that, will take some time to chew through

On a modeling note...how the gak do you get the Striking Scorpion models to fit their slotta bases....

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Executing Exarch





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Green stuff does wonders. If you can't get a hold of it easily, rubber cement, spackle and chewing gum are all subsitiutes that I've used in the past with some sucess.

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Wicked Warp Spider





South Carolina

orchewer wrote:

On a modeling note...how the gak do you get the Striking Scorpion models to fit their slotta bases....


If they are too large, use a vice or something to squish the metal bases to make them thiner. Otherwise see above.

Phoenix basically sums everything you need to know about eldar really really good. However If the second farseer dooms another unit (assume he is with the council and other farseer) would he not have to assult it? Or does that only effect shooting powers?

Also I would not put an Autarch with the scorpions, as they would loose their ability to infultrate and therefore outflank.

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Executing Exarch





Los Angeles

Casper wrote: However If the second farseer dooms another unit (assume he is with the council and other farseer) would he not have to assault it? Or does that only effect shooting powers?


If you shoot in the shooting phase, any charges you declare in the assault phase must be against the unit you shot at. To this end, powers like doom that go off before the movement phase are definitely not shots from the shooting phase and thus have no affect on which units you can charge. Now if you mind war (or eldrich storm) something, you would have to charge that unit. Don't forget though, that you can always charge multiple units (assuming you can reach both with a legal charge move) so you could shoot one unit and then charge 2 (or 3 or more) units so long as your primary charge target was the unit you shot at.

Also I would not put an Autarch with the scorpions, as they would loose their ability to infultrate and therefore outflank.

Hummm, that is a possibility that I didn't consider. I'd have to look over the rules again to confirm or deny that, but there's a good chance you are right about that Casper. Good looking out.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2009/01/16 21:14:35


**** Phoenix ****

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Made in ca
Tough Tyrant Guard





Vancouver, BC, Canada

Well I posted a combat patrol list as my starting force for now. Thanks for all the help here...this is the most advice I've ever received on dakka all these years.

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If it matters the Avatar is not a Special Character, and every craftworld (yes even home-brew) have one.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2009/01/17 07:22:55




The Eldar, more than any other army, should not only look at the output of each unit individually, but the synergy of multiple units together and their role in the force as a whole. - Fable 
   
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Towering Hierophant Bio-Titan



UK

He op mentioned he didnt want mechdar (so not alotta vypders/wave serpents etc) but he also mentioned the possible need to get a tank. Prisms are just glorious and will sort out your anti tank (take two) pretty well so you wont have to worry about using your lords as weapon platforms. Id suggest spending 10 points to get that shuriken cannon - hes got the hardpoint and its quite likely that he could run too far ahead on those D6 rolls so itll always be useful to slow him down and fire that str 6 ap 5 heavy 3 weapon while the baby-sitting psykers catch up.

A farseer with fortune/doom/mindwar (bear with me) and stones in a guardain squad could be a good call, you may decide that your avatar needs fortuning (rather than himself and his squad or that squad of seer-concil you may or may not take) depending on how much the other play decides to focous on you. Mindwar is just such a useful utilitarian power. Its only another 20pts or so but in smaller games it may not be worth it. Doom & fortune are a must. Doom somthing & it will just die.

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Made in au
Longtime Dakkanaut






Springhurst, VIC, Australia

I would like to draw your attention to 2 atricles for eldar which may help

over all eldar:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Eldar_Tactica

Aspect Warriors [im currently still working on it, most done though]:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Eldar_Aspect_Temples

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Devastating Dark Reaper






Squig_herder wrote:I would like to draw your attention to 2 atricles for eldar which may help

over all eldar:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Eldar_Tactica

Aspect Warriors [im currently still working on it, most done though]:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Eldar_Aspect_Temples


I was going to suggest my thread but that first link just looks good. Mine is a mish mash of typing and poor formating /cry



The Eldar, more than any other army, should not only look at the output of each unit individually, but the synergy of multiple units together and their role in the force as a whole. - Fable 
   
 
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