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Rough 2000 points dark elf army list.

Master – 80 (total 135) – price cost wise
–War Gear–
The Guiding eye – 25pts
A Pair of repeater Hand bows -16pts
Halberd – 4pts
Heavy armor – 4pts
Shield – 2pts
Sea Dragon Cloak – 4pts



Sorceress – 100 (total 197)
–War Gear–
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Tome of Furion – 15pts
Armor of Eternal Servitude – 35pts
Dark Steed – 12pts

Sorceress #2 – 100 (total 160)
–War Gear–
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Sacrificial Dagger – 25pts


Sorceress #3 (total 155)
–War Gear–
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Power Stone – 20pts


Core -

12 Dark Elf Warriors ( sorceress #2 ) - (total 93)
Banner – 6pts
Musician – 3pts
Shields x 12 – 12pts


12 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – 144
–War Gear–
Shields x12 – 12pts


20 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – 220




20 Black Arc Corsairs – 228
–War Gear–
Banner – 10pts
Musician – 5pts
Reaver – 10pts
Handbows x20 – Free
A Pair of Handbows for Reaver – 3pts


5 Cold One Knights – 175
–War Gear–
Dread Knight – 16pts
Musician – 8pts
Banner – 16pts


5 Cold One Knights – 175
–War Gear–
Dread Knight – 16pts
Musician – 8pts
Banner – 16pts

War Hydra – 175

War Hydra #2 – 175

This army list needs a lot of help, not sure where to start. But I guess if I must, drop the armor from the sorcerer, its illegal that way.

Way too many points spent on low reward upgrades. Don't know how the army is supposed to play other than try to make 3 level 2s go all the way, and abuse how good hydras are. Most of the other stuff is poorly configured. Like 12xbowmen with shields, or 20 xbow men in one unit. min sized cold one units don't want expensive unit upgrades. Never tried bow corsairs, but I suspect they will be very iffy just like the extra hand weapon ones. The warriors dont need command other than MAYBE a champ, the reason being is that they are essentially just a pool of extra power dice. Don't waste points on a unit that won't survive contact. For your magic 1 level 4 and a level 2 is much more effective than 3 level 2s. Your master will probably get to shoot 1 time all game with that dinky ranged weapon, I'm assuming he goes in a corsairs unit? What is the halberd for? If he gets in combat in a corsair unit the unit will lose, and he will be unlikely to do enough damage. Stand and shoot isn't all that great, your ranged units should be fleeing!

Don't mean to come off harsh. DE, like most books, have traps for newer players to spend points on. To many inefficient war gear that sound cool, end up too narrow/overcosted. Another trap for a lot of players is giving command to all the units. Avoid doing this, all units have roles in the battle. Don't give a unit that's supposed to doing one thing, gear so they can do another. They end up being not good enough at the secondary role, and give the opponent more points than he deserves for killing it. Also it's nice to have shaved off enough points to buy a whole other unit.

Hey hey thanks for the advice, if you dont mind going over my resized list I would very much appreciate it.

Supreme Sorceress - (350)
Level 4 – 35pts
Sacrificial Dagger – 25pts
Black Staff – 55pts
Tome of Furion – 15pts

Sorceress – (147)
–War Gear–
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Dark Steed – 12pts

Sorceress #3 (total 155) -
–War Gear–
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Power Stone – 20pts

Core -

24 (or two squads of 12?) Dark Elf Warriors - (total 183)
–War Gear–
Shields x24
Full command

10 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – (100)

10 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – (100)

20 Black Arc Corsairs ( Supreme sorceress ) – (200)


Special -

10 Black guard of Naggarond - (261)
–War Gear–
Musician – 7pts
Banner – 14pts
Kouran of the Black guard – 75pts
Standard of Hag Greaf – 35pts

10 Cold One Knights – (310)
–War Gear–
Dread Knight – 16pts
Musician – 8pts
Banner – 16pts


War Hydra – (175)

Total 1981

Aside from Dispell Scrolls and Power Stones, you can onlynhave one Arcane item; your Supreme Sorceress has 3.

Kouran is not worth his cost. He's still a T3 elf with a 5+ save. A regular unit champion is much more cost-effective.

Personally, I hesitate to make Cold One Knight units that large - they're expensive models, and the five guys in the back rank only get to sit around adding +1 to combat (until one of them dies, then the other four are just spectators).

The first thing you need to do is decide if you're going to be defensive or aggressive; with Dark Elves, it's hard to both at once, and that's what your list is trying to do.

If you want to be defensive, I'd drop the Knights altogether. Get Reapers. Split the Warriors into two units. Consider a unit of Dark Riders to slow down and harass the enemy. Use your volume of fire and magic to whittle down the enemy, then counter-charge with the Black Guard, Corsairs, and War Hydra. (Oh, and if you DO take the Sacrificial Dagger, put her with Warriors - you don't want her killing the expensive guys).

If you want to be aggressive, then you a whole new list - I personally don't usually field infantry in my army AT ALL. Dark Riders, Harpies, Cold One Knights, Chariots, and Hydras.

I agree with Manfred for the most part, so I'll just make addendum points -

There is no point in putting a sorceress/supreme sorceress with the sacrificial dagger anywhere but a unit of DE Warriors - you DO NOT want to use the dagger on anything but the cheapest fodder out there. Also, if you're putting the sorceress in a block of Warriors, make the unit moderately big (18 or 20ish) and minimize costs on them - buy the champion, though, it'll help protect the sorceress a little bit. They're gonna be there to be sacrificed, not to get in fights.

While the Corsair models are appealing, you're really better off not using them - they're really just not effective enough at what they do for the points.

If you can find the points (dropping Kouran will help a lot) - bump up the numbers for these guys if you can. They're nasty in close combatl, but they still are only T3, 5+ Save infantry.

10 COKs in a single unit is a bit too much. If you fail a Stupidity check, that's almost 1/6th of your army that isn't doing anything for a turn. I would say if you plan on running a unit of Cold One Knights to have them at 6 models and with the Banner of Cold One (I think is what it's called).

CoKs dont need upgrades at all, unless you go with full bore with the standard of slaughter, the hydra banner BSB, cauldron, and combat character in it. (as in 3 s6 attacks and 2 s4 attacks per model) You can make a very good hammer unit out of them. If you are just needing some cav to threaten armor and flanks with, no upgrade and 5-6 wide is all you need. The banner that give cold blood isn't needed, ld 9 is fine on a cheap unit of cold ones.

Ok here is a revamped list, let me know what you guys think please! Thanks for all your advice above.

Heroes ––––

Sorceress – 160 total.
-War Gear-
Sacrificial Dagger – 25pts
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts

Master – 140 total.
-War Gear-
Heavy Armor – 4pts
Shield – 2pts
Sea Dragon Cloak – 4pts
Chill Blade – 50pts

Sorceress – 172 total.
-War Gear-
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Dark Steed – 12pts
Dark Star Cloak, or Focus familiar – (25pts either way)


Core ––––

14 Dark Elf Warriors – 84 total.
-War Gear-
Shields x14 – 14pts

5 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – 50 total

5 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen #2 – 50 total

5 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen #3 – 50 total

5 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen #3 – 50 total


10 Black Arch Corsairs – 113 total.
-War Gear-
Reaver – 10pts
(+ a pair of handbows) – 3pts
Handbows x 10 – Free

10 Black Arch Corsairs – 113 total.
-War Gear-
Reaver – 10pts
(+ a pair of handbows) – 3pts
Handbows x 10 – Free

5 Dark Riders – 124 total.
-War Gear-
Herald – 14pts
Handbows x5 – 25pts

5 Dark Riders – 124 total.
-War Gear-
Herald – 14pts
handbows x5 – 25pts

Dark Elf Assassin – 141 total.
-War Gear-
Black Lotus – 20pts
Rune of Khain – 25pts
Extra close combat weapon (toxins) – 6pts

Dark Elf Assassin – 160 total.
-War Gear-
Rune of Khain – 25pts
Black Lotus – 20pts
Manbane – 25pts

16 Black Guard of Naggarond – 278 total.
-War Gear-
Musician – 14pts
Bearer – 7pts
Magic banner Hag Graef – 35pts
Tower Master – 14pts

War Hydra – 175 total.

Ok, so the basic idea here is that,

Sorceress #1 with Dagger goes in the warrior squad chills back and shoots magic. Sacking the warriors.

Master will be in the black guard squad, staying behind the corsairs, using them as meat shields/riddling the other army with bow fire.

The first squad of dark riders, with the sorceress #2 rides around picking out targets for magic/shooting.

The second squad hits soft targets, casters, bolt throwers, lone heroes ect.

One dark elf assassin will be in the warrior block to save the sorceress should it be hit by a squad with a hero in it.

The other assassin will be in the black guard squad to take out pesky heroes.

The black guard is going to be the hammer in the army, going up the field, smashing into troop and special blocks.

and the war hydra will either be support for the black guard, or to draw fire because people are scared of it!

Let me know what you guys think.

couple things I dont like about your newest list. Number one is you cant have squads of 5 repeater crossbowmen so instead of 4 squads of 5 how about 2 squads of 10? And I personally don't like hand bows on my corsairs, mainly because you will probably only use them once a game considering hand bows are 8 inch range. Plus your corsairs will loose effectiveness in cc because they will only have one attack rather then two. I personally set up my warriors in bricks of 20 considering you will be sacrificing them, you still want enough warriors in that squad to get you static res.
A good strategy for your assassins is to give them rending stars and manbane a powerful strategy for taking out heroes.
Besides that everything else looks alright.

Heroes ––––

Sorceress – 160 total.
-War Gear-
Sacrificial Dagger – 25pts
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts

Master – 140 total.
-War Gear-
Heavy Armor – 4pts
Shield – 2pts
Sea Dragon Cloak – 4pts
Chill Blade – 50pts

Sorceress – 172 total.
-War Gear-
Level 2 Wizard – 35pts
Dark Steed – 12pts
Dark Star Cloak, or Focus familiar – (25pts either way)


Core ––––

20 Dark Elf Warriors – 120 total.

10 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen – 100 total

10 Dark Elf Repeater Crossbowmen #2 – 100 total


10 Black Arch Corsairs – 113 total.
-War Gear-
Reaver – 10pts
(+ a pair of handbows) – 3pts


10 Black Arch Corsairs – 113 total.
-War Gear-
Reaver – 10pts
(+ a pair of handbows) – 3pts


5 Dark Riders – 124 total.
-War Gear-
Herald – 14pts
Handbows x5 – 25pts

5 Dark Riders – 124 total.
-War Gear-
Herald – 14pts
handbows x5 – 25pts

Dark Elf Assassin – 141 total.
-War Gear-
Black Lotus – 20pts
Rune of Khain – 25pts
Extra close combat weapon (toxins) – 6pts

Dark Elf Assassin – 160 total.
-War Gear-
Rune of Khain – 25pts
Black Lotus – 20pts
Manbane – 25pts

16 Black Guard of Naggarond – 278 total.
-War Gear-
Musician – 14pts
Bearer – 7pts
Magic banner Hag Graef – 35pts
Tower Master – 14pts

War Hydra – 175 total.

How does that look?
Going on a scale 1-10 for competitiveness how would you guys rank it?
ill do some posts as the army comes along, planing on doing some conversion work, and step by step painting.
Thanks for all the advice!

I would say a 6/10. If you want to get extremely competitive drop the corsairs all together. Personally I don't leave home with out cold ones if I wanna be competitive.