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Me and my girlfriend have recently started playing W40K. I'm a total noob, I've played 4-5 games and watched acouple of others. We chose our first army going solely by the looks, and went for Chaos Daemons.
I now understand that the Daemonic Assault deployment is quite unique to Daemons and makes for a non-usual 40K game experience, in a sense that the friends we play with cannot actually get a feel of what a 'normal' 40k game is like. Furthermore, I dislike the randomness of Deep Striking your entire army.
I still want like to play CHaos Daemios more, but it's good to have an alternative, anyway my girlfriend playes too. We need 2 armies. I just ordered some more CD stuff.

I've thought long about what army to take. Several options are out as these are armies that our friends play: Tau, Orks, IG and CSM.
Reading up a bit more about other armies, and looking at the models at GW my current choice would be Eldar. I hate the looks of them (Snorkels, anyone?) but I think they would suit my gaming preference for an elite force, do very good at what you're specialised for, and be able to move around quickly if you would make a list for that. You can specialise units either for CC or for shooting. You can make lists that are failry balanced, able to do well against any opponent if you play well enough. To me it looks like there's more variety in Eldar than many other armies. Am I correct?

Here's where you guys come in, what unit's would you buy to let us start to learn Eldar and be reasonably competitive. I want to be able to field at least a 1000 point army to start out. Can I go wrong with buying models based solely on their looks? Probably yes.

Some random comments:
-The Battleforce seem's an obvious choice, as I would need the codex as well.
-I hate the looks of those jetbikes, do I need these? Please say no.
-I lke the looks of Swooping Hawks aspects/Warp Spider aspect warriors, Howling Banshes looks is ok too.
-Wave Serpents, I'd probably want these, playing CD taught me that I probably want transports. How many do I need if I want to transport most/all of my units?
-Anything in the HQ list on the GW site has ok-ish looks to me, what are good options here?
-Harlequin stuff: I dont have the painting skills for these, neither do I like the looks.
-Falcons/Fire Prisms: These models look alike: can you build a Falcon using a Fire Prism kit? Do I actually want Fire Prisms? I'm not really into tanks especially. (Why do I play 40k I hear you say ^^)

What units would you buy, and how many?

I've enjoyed reading up on 40k on this forum so far. THe only 'knowledge' I have from Eldar I've picked up here, while looking mostly for Chaos Daemons information.
Thank you for your time.

Eldar are quite a strange army to play, they can be highly competative when needed, but the slightest mistake leaves them regretting it for the rest of the fight.

Battleforce - Not really essential, most people will take dire avengers as a troop choice instead of guardians.

Jetbikes - They do look ugly, but are not needed.

Swooping hawks look good, but arent very good atall, Spiders are just great, banshees are amazing and one of the best assault units in the army.

If your going for a mobile army then serpents will help you to no end, take 3 or so units of troops in these to ensure you have high mobility, also, firedragons in a serpent work great.

Farseers are good, run them with a council and they arent too bad, people tend to run a farseer with warlocks all on jetbikes, they are pretty hard to kill and tend to screw over most units.
Phoenix lords - some people rather take these instead, they are pretty good in most aspects, allthough they differ highly in abilities.
avatar - Eldars only giant monster thing, just as it looks, its pretty much solid, hard to kill and somewhat mazing in combat.

Harlies - not needed as units like scorpions or banshees are assault troops aswell, and also, your right, they look gak.

fire prisms are a single kit i believe, allthough you can make a falcon with them.
Fire prisms are amazing, offering an amazing ammount of support fire mixed with high mobility, overall, i would take 2 or so in an army.

My last couple outings have fielded Farseers / Harlies / Banshees / Avengers / Spiders / Wraithlords, and I did OK. YMMV

Thank you for the help, comments about the units like these are very welcome.

Havn't played as Eldar, but I know one or two basic things about them(which is kind of important, since I'm building one...). It's obviously not the best advice, but it could help.

-Avatars are freaking scary. They make great meatshields since they draw in enemy fire from miles, and he's hella durable to boot. Use him to distract your enemies while you move forward, or as a support unit if you use Guardians.

-Farseers are awesome, safe psykers. Use'em and abuse'em, great support with powers like Guide and Doom, which reward inter-unit synergy and planning.

-Dire avengers are versatile infantry with great weaponry. They can hold objectives, act as a defensive CC tarpit, or create a mobile wall of small-arms fire.

-Pathfinders(always pathfinders, never rangers!) kill big scary stuff and can be pretty durable while they do it so long as you keep them in cover. They don't like fire at all though. The intimidation factor alone that a sniper nest gives you can help to control or divert enemy movements.

-Banshees dominate MEQs, Scorpions are for hordes. Scorpions are more durable and mobile, which allows them to maneuver into and stay in prolonged combat against weaker, larger units, while Banshees work best as a counter to anything MEQ due to their high initiative and power weaponry.

-Fire Dragons(anti tank) and Banshees should have wave serpents to move them around. It also could work to have a minimal unit of dire avengers in a WS to sit on an objective, depending on your list and the mission objective.

-Eldar Battleforce sucks unless you really plan on using guardians.

Thank you!

The battleforce looks less interesting now, I don't see people mentioning playing heavy weapons teams, war walkers or guardians.
Pathfinders is just another name to call Rangers?

Pathfinders are a Ranger Upgrade.. uses the same models, but need to be differentiated somehow if you have both types in your list.

I love the IDEA of an Mech Eldar list, but Wave Serpents are easily the most overpriced transports in the game. They try to be a tank AND a transport and cost about the same as both added togeather.

You WILL need them, though.. so they are a neccessary point sink.

Also, Fire Prisms, as mentioned.. rock. Get one, then get a second. They work far better in multiples for redundancy and you can "chain" them togeather to kill something huge.

Warwalkers are a FUN unit if you say, can get 6 of them armed with scatter lasers, you will wipe Horde armies with volume of fire. BUT since they are crewed by Guardians, only have a BS of 3... 50% miss chance.

One thing you haven't seemed to adress is the big honking Wraithlord.. a lot of folks (not me though) love them to death. I don't run them cause I am using an "all Aspect" style of army.. but if I was starting again, I would grab em early.

-P

Thanks, I will include a Wraithguard in my order then
I just picked up the codex from a local store, happy they had one, I didnt count on that.

Get a Farseer or Eldrad as your HQ. Guide and doom are great spells (reroll hits and wounds). And fortune is amazing as it allows you to rerol failed saving throws.

The Eldar codex is full of grat stuff and it's possible to make many different competitive armies.
I personally would rock dire avengers in wave serpeants. A couple fire prism's. Maybe some fire dragons in falcons. Farseers/eldrad.

And of course there is the seer council. When on jetbikes with fortune they are maybe the hardest unit in the game to kill. And they are close combat monsters. They pop tanks like it ain't no thang too.

I think I could include most advice in my to-get list, apart from ordering Jetbikes. I could not bring myself to buy these, based on how they look. ForgeWorld asked me to mention 1 model for them to make when I ordered stuff there, I picked the snowmobile.

Thanks again all, I'm happily waiting for the arrival of my purchases now