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After having played somewhere around 10-12 games with my Mech Ulthwe Eldar in 5th ed., this is where my list is heading towards at the moment.
It is meant to be a competitive army vs. all-comers (in competitive home tourneys without any comp. rules, we play standard missions from the Rulebook).

So i would like any advice, suggestions, critique etc... so i can make this list really competitive!
I have got plenty of everything, so feel free to suggest (though im not intent on running more than one jetbike council)

HQ
1 Jetbike Farseer w/ Fortune, Doom, Spirit Stones
8 Jetbike Warlocks, 3 Destructor, 1 Enhance, 1 Embolden

TROOPS
10 Storm Guardians w/ 2 Flamers, Warlock w/ Destructor, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance

ELITE
5 Fire Dragons, Exarch w/ Heavy Flamer, Crackshot, Serpent w/ Stones, Shuriken Cannon, TL Bright Lance

HEAVY
1 Fire Prism w/ Stones
1 Fire Prism w/ Stones
1 Fire Prism w/ Stones

Edit: I forgot i also have paid for a shuriken cannon on the Dragon Serpent... which at least gives another 10pts to toy around with...?

Nice list! My one wish would be for some close combat to support the warlocks. Their are certain things that will bog them down for a long time, like 2+ saves and FNP. They do a lot of wounds, but their inability to ignore armor can turn tough units into an eternal tarpit. And your shooting won't do much against such units, either...

You might consider running a jetbike autarch with your warlocks, even though that's a bit many eggs in one basket, it will be a total beast of a unit. Shining Spears (with out without Autarch buddy) would also help, especially because they can use hit & run to repeatedly wham the enemy with laser lances, even if they don't go down after the first charge.

I also think that you have too many brightlances. GW nerfed brightlances by making them totally overcosted in 4th ed. And now that tanks are harder to destoy, they're worse than ever. The bright lance only matters against AV13+, and even then, there's a pretty miserable chance to pen -- .75 to hit * .33 to pen = 25% chance. So if your dice rolled totally average, you'd expect all 160 points of twin brightlances to achieve one penetrating hit on AV12+. I would go with missiles and gain some versatility while retaining most of my AT effectiveness. Missiles are just as good against lighter tanks, and the only suffer against AV13+. But because you have three fire prisms, fire dragons, and 9 bikers with witchblades, heavy armor should not be a problem. You might even want to bust all those guns down to shuriken cannons, you'd pretty much save enough points to have a bike autarch right there...

But other than my nitpicking, it's a dead hard Eldar list.

Like Ixe has already said, the Seer Council could potentially be tarpitted for a long time by squads like Terminators or Plague Marines (which are both encountered pretty often). You don't have a whole lot of weapons that are capable of killing these unit types (with a 2+ Sv or FNP). I don't agree with him that a Jetbike Autarch would be the answer to this though. He can't Hit & Run without the Shining Spears so this leaves him usefull only on the turn you charge. After that he is just some S3 IC waiting to get a Powerfist or something similar thrown at him (which will cause ID).

Eldar, at this point, just aren't very good against these types of models. The days of the Starcannon are long gone and no other ranged weapon has the ability to cover up for it. Harlequins are pretty good at killing those annoying FNP units though. Their disadvantage is that they aren't able to take a Wave Serpent. This means one of your other units will need to give them their Wave Serpent, or they will not be able to keep up with the rest of your army. That unit could be a small Dire Avenger unit, which could be mounted in a Falcon (with Holo-Fields) for a very survivable scoring unit.

Your army list would then be looking something like this:

Seer Council
Farseer + 10 Harlequins in Wave Serpent
2x 10 Dire Avengers (or Storm Guardians) in Wave Serpent
5 Dire Avengers in Falcon
2x Fire Prism

I don't know if it would be any better than the army list you have right now. It would probably do better against the more elite armies (like Lash, Oblit and Plague Marines), though I don't know if it would be able to stand up to Land Raider spam or Horde Orks.

Edit: I do not agree with Ixe on the Bright Lance point though, Bright Lances are a great tool for an otherwise pretty weak anti-vehicle army like Eldar. The only other weapons we have that are capable of consistently destroying tanks are Fusion Guns (Fire Dragons) and Witch Blades (Seer Councils).

For this list specifically, I might save points by swapping the brightlances for EMLs. Brightlances are only more useful against 2+ saves and AV13+, but you have fire dragons and witchblades which can deal with heavy armor easily. The only reason you'd have Lances is if people play 2+ save nidzilla or spam Land Raiders, otherwise EMLs are just as good. And since you have other anti-tank in the list, I'd consider changing at least a few down to EMLs - plus that gives you a bit more anti-infantry just in case.

Well Nidzilla and Land Raider spam seem to be good lists, and LR spam/2+ save is getting popular. I'd probably keep the Bright Lances for that reason. Yes they're more expensive, but it is a metagame call based on what the popular armies seem to be.

If you want to drop the Lances for sure, then consider a few ('d play 3) Singing Spears in the council.

First thing is first, drop the bright lances from the fire dragon's wave serpent. Even if you keep the others, putting anti tank weapons on the transport full of anti tank unit is just not the way to go. If you manage to bust something with the lances you could very well leave the dragons out in the open with nothing to do (you disembark before the shooting phase). In their place you can do one of a couple of things. You could just keep the shuriken cannons to save the maximum amount of points (which you could spend on more dragons). You could switch over to a scatter laser to do some extra damage to any infantry units that might threaten your dragons once they get out. Or you could go for maximum fire support and buy both an eldar missile launcher and an under slung shuriken cannon (you can fire both if you move 12" or less and shoot the missile lanucher in frag mode).

Other than that, you might or might not want to drop the other bright lances to save points for other expendatures (more fire dragons, blade storm exarchs for the avengers, or upgrades for the fire prisms). In general, I would favor the idea of beefing up the fire dragons. By doing this you not only ensure that you'll kill whatever tank you point them at, but they begin to be an effective force for killing heavy infantry (terminators, plague marines, etc.). Just make sure that they get screened by either your jetbikes zooming over their heads in the assault phase (to keep them from getting assaulted) or by having some avengers run past them after they shoot.

One other thing to keep in mind (which is more of an on the field advice than army creation) is that the anti tank power of a combined prism shot is more effective than that of 2 individaul blasts. 2 concentrated prism hits (I don't want to try to work out the chance of hitting here) have a 21% chance of destroying an AV13 vehicle while 1 hit from 2 combined prisms has a 28% chance. Combine this with the fact that the combined shot is more likely to hit than the two individual shots and you have a real winner.

First, i would like to say thanks alot for all your very valuable suggestions and comments!

I dont really want to let the bright lances go... cause in generel i face ALOT of AV14 and AV13 vehicles in my gaming group (land raider spam, battle wagon spam) PLUS alot of 2+ save termies and tyranid MCs. (and actually my 5th ed. list started out with lots of EML serpents and has gradually moved towards BLs instead corresponding to the ever increasing amount of AV13+ and 2+ saves i have encountered)

In trying to incorporate some of your suggestions, I have chosen to add the Jetbike Autarch to the Council to bolster their charge with 6 str6 power weapon attacks (only on the charge, alas...). I will have to test it out. Besides i agree that the dragons can do with more numbers and also that their serpent should have non-BL weapon.

Here is the new list with the changes:


HQ
1 Jetbike Autarch w/ Laser Lance, Mandiblasters
1 Jetbike Farseer w/ Fortune, Doom, Spirit Stones
8 Jetbike Warlocks, 4 Destructor, 1 Enhance, 1 Embolden

TROOPS
10 Storm Guardians w/ 2 Flamers, Warlock w/ Destructor, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance

ELITE
8 Fire Dragons, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Shuriken Cannon

HEAVY
1 Fire Prism w/ Stones
1 Fire Prism w/ Stones

---
What do you think about it? Will it be more effective than the first list?
(Basically its down to the choice between the third fire prism or the Jetbike Autarch)

The autarch will grease those 2+/3+ saving troops, when theres quite a few of them.. he generally adds a nice bunch of power attacks in & allows for awesome greandeyness.. 1+ to reserve rolls could always helps.. a third prism, str 7 ap 2 large blast (if the whim ever took you) or just lots more blasts kicking around.

Id say the prism would do more damage but would die alot quicker than an autarch ever would. The prism could possibly be more useful in your tanky list. The autarch would compliement the council well.

Phoenix wrote:One other thing to keep in mind (which is more of an on the field advice than army creation) is that the anti tank power of a combined prism shot is more effective than that of 2 individaul blasts. 2 concentrated prism hits (I don't want to try to work out the chance of hitting here) have a 21% chance of destroying an AV13 vehicle while 1 hit from 2 combined prisms has a 28% chance. Combine this with the fact that the combined shot is more likely to hit than the two individual shots and you have a real winner.

How so do the Fire Prisims when fired in pairs count as twin linked?

Yes when making a combined shot the fire prism counts as twin-linked

And i agree that the TL str 10 ap1 blast is the best AT shot the eldar has got.
I have had good success with that vs. land raiders. It even better than a bright lance shot (even though they have the same 5+ chance of penetraing), since the ap1 gives +1 on the damage table!

DBM : P43 of the eldar dex.. "...shot counts as twin-linked for that turn..."

Unless its against raiders/monoliths though, generally two str 9 ap 2 blasts are generally better.

Oh awesome.. bring in mutliple eldar allies, 4 prisms other thier two FOC... str 8 ap 1 large blast! Such a waste (4x str 9 ap2 would be better.) but its still a very fun idea as the description simply mentions other prism tanks without mentioning 'players' ownership.

Edit: Find 20pts more (& by taking out the autarch) give that third prism holo-fields and use it as your front-runner tank, either just the more aggresive one that lends cover-saves to the others or/and the one that moves forward to get a good LOS and be linked by the other one/two.

Razerous wrote:Unless its against raiders/monoliths though, generally two str 9 ap 2 blasts are generally better.

Stop! Math hammer time!

Ok, bad 80's refrences behind us, lets look at the numbers because I don't believe your statement here is true.

First off, lets look at accuracy. When shooting the 2 individual shots, they each hit 1/3 of the time and scatter 2d6-4 the rest of the time. Since we have to make a couple of assumptions here for the sake of making the math clean, I will assume that scattering 2" or less will also result in a hit since you'll probably place the blast in the center of your vehicular target. Uping that number to 3" has similar comparitive results so we'll just stick with the 2" for now.

So, if you roll 2d6-4 and are looking for a result of 2 or less, you'll get it 42% of the time. This means that each individual shot has a 61% chance of hitting and there is a 37% chance of both hitting (although for damage causing we will have to look at the potential for both shots individualy).

Now lets look at the combined shot option. Since it causes the weapon to be twin linked, it greatly increases the accuracy of the shot but lets see by how much. So you hit 1/3 of the time right off the bat and since you are rolling the same 2d6-4, you get the same 42% chance to still hit if you scatter. However, you get a second shot at it if you scatter and miss. So in the end the math works out to 61%+[(100%-61%)*61%] = 85% chance to hit.

So lets look at damage potential.
The single shots are S9, AP2, hit 61% of the time, and there are 2 shots every round. The chances of shots with these setups killing vehicles of various armor values is as follows. Do note, this is the combined chance of 2 shots killing 1 vehicle rather than the chance of each individual shot killing a vehicle.
AV 10 = 31%
AV 11 = 25%
AV 12 = 19%
AV 13 = 13%
AV 14 = 7%

Now lets look at the combined shot. This is a single shot at S10, AP1, that hits 85% of the time.
AV 10 = 45%
AV 11 = 38%
AV 12 = 31%
AV 13 = 24%
AV 14 = 17%

So as you can see, against targets of any armor value, you have ~10% better chance of destroying a vehicle with a single combined shot than you do with 2 individual shots. This is due not only to the increased accuracy of the shot but also due to the fact that the combined shot is AP 1 and thus gets +1 to it's rolls on the damage chart.

thanks guys lol i am a lil off still with the rules stopped playing at the end of 2nd ed. took a long time off and middle of last year got back into the tail end of 4th.

Dusted off my eldar stuff and have gone back to trying to work up viable lists. i have been reading many of everyones eldar articles and everyones posts.

I also was wonder where does it say eldritch storm can be placed or does it still scatter?

had mad debates while playing and i cannot seem to locate concrete data

I agree with a lot of the above, too much anti tank. You have dragons too.

I would also drop the stones on the prisms. They are best left bare and stationary in cover anyway. If they cant see anything just link them.

EDIT: And I am also proud you are taking NO singing spears

DemonBunnyMan wrote:I also was wonder where does it say eldritch storm can be placed or does it still scatter?

The power works exactly like it is described in the codex. I don't happent to have it with me so I'll have to defer to you on that. However, what that means is that if the codex says it scatters, then it scatters. If it says that it works like a barrage weapon or requires a roll to hit or something like that, then it will follow the standard rules for such weapons and scatter. However, if it doesn't say any of these things then it doesn't. If you are still confused, just post the text from the power here and we can hash it out.

In addition, I think I liked your list with 3 prisms better than the one with the autarch. Just use the prism to soften up units they seer council is going after and you shouldn't have any problems.

Thanks i emailed GW to lay the Eldritch Storm question to rest. They stated " eldritch storm does not scatter"
Much to my buddies woe lol. Im getting ready to play a game today with a jetseer and council for the 1st time. haha we will see how much grief i can bring them.

Thx for clarifying that

Now that you have brough this thread op from oblivion, i can add, that after much contemplation, and a few test games, this list looks as follows:


HQ
1 Jetbike Farseer w/ Fortune, Doom, Spirit Stones, Runes of Warding
8 Jetbike Warlocks, 4 Destructor, 1 Enhance, 1 Embolden

TROOPS
10 Storm Guardians w/ 2 Flamers, Warlock w/ Destructor, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Exarch w/ Bladestorm, 2xCatapults, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance
10 Dire Avengers, Exarch w/ Bladestorm, 2xCatapults, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Bright Lance

ELITE
5 Fire Dragons, Serpent w/ Stones, TL Shuriken Cannon

HEAVY
Fire Prism
Fire Prism
Fire Prism

Looks solid to me. Just make sure you hold back your serpents for a turn or so before you send them out. This will give you some time to soften up the enemy before your squishy units make it to them.