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Hi guys

I'm having trouble beating my brother's marine list with my Eldar. While I know this is rather shameful, if anyone has any suggestions plase let me know.

My army list consists of Eldrad and 9 Avengers in a BL Wave Serpent, 10 Avengers in a BL Serpent, 6 Fire Dragons in a BL Wave Serpent, 5 Pathfinders and 3 Fire Prisms.

His list consists of 3 Rhinos with Tactical squads (2 with flamer+HB, 1 with Melta+MM) 2 Razorbacks with Lascannons, 1 with 5 Sternguard with combi-flamers, 1 with a captain and command unit, and 2 Vindicators.

He generally sets up very central, with his Vindi's at the front together, his Razorbacks on the flanks and his Rhinos behind popping smokes

Thanks

Nothing shameful about it, every army built and played correctly can be very successful. You just need to either alter your army or playstyle to find the chinks in his strategy. His list doesnt seem that scary to me though. Are you having problems with anything in particular? He seems to have quite a bit of armor but your fire dragons and prisms should be able to handle some rhinos/razorbacks/vindis.

Nothing much to add what Halsfield said.
Your army is fast enough to outmaneuver a mech SM army.
I'd give the Serpents scatter lasers to pop the tanks by targetting the side armor.

I would rather think he has a problem killing your serpents...
I think that you should try to pop his lascannon razorbacks first. Then he has only his vindies and the melta squad to hurt your tanks.

Hope it helps!

It really looks like the razorbacks are the biggest immediate problem and then you can outmaneuver the vindicators easily tagging their side armor. Tac squads in rhinos are not really that scary in this case. I'd say zap his razors and vindis first and you should be fine.

The problem with wave serpents is that you only get a few of them, and 5/6 will almost always penetrate using most anti-tank weapons, so they're not invulnerable by any means.

Marines can be tough for Eldar because their army is just way more points-efficient than ours is.

I think you are having a tough time because you don;t have enough tank hunting... BLs are great but takes 5 shots on average to kill a razor back.

I would try to get a second fire dragon squad in a wavserpent.

Drop the 6 dragons to 5, drop the BL off the fire dragon waveserpent. Drop the path finders. Maybe down grade Eldrad to a standard farseer. Should be more than enough points.

This should give you enough points for an additional FD squad and another waveserpent.

I say keep the Pathfinders.....but drop a fire prism for a wraithlord with a BL and sword.

T8 means he cant shoot standard bolters at the WL, and he will waste las-cannon shots on him.

Pathfinders are great when you finaly get the SM out of the Rino, but now with rending they can pop Rinos too, if you have nothing else to shoot at.

Unless he is fielding a Landraider you should drop most of those BLs for missles or Scatterlasors.......BLs are too inaccurate, too expensive, and too few shots to be used on Marines out of a vehicle, however Missles stay functional at all time, they even stay crunchy in milk........and you can never have enough Scatterlasors.

Bright Lance/Eldar Missile Launcher Wraithlords are really good at popping light armor like Rhinos and Razorbacks, and will still do well against infantry, and will tie up tactical squads for a few turns at least. I would drop one of the fire prisms for one.

Dropping fire prisms for wraithlords in a mechanized list is a bad idea.

Try having the Fire Prisims use there Focused Beams on the Rhinos. So if you have three Fire Prisims. spread them out equally. have the third focus on the Vindictor. Thats what i would do.

I believe that you should drop a fire prism for a squad of dark reapers, I play marines and my friend has some reapers: 4 reapers, 1 exarch w/Tempest launcher if he leaves one sqaud in the open the reapers will obliterate them.

Any opinions on how this list would fare against said Marine list?

Farseer- jetbike, fortune, RoWarding, Singing Spear [133]

6 Warlocks- jetbikes, enhance, 2 embolden, 3 destructor, 2 singing spears [331]

5 Fire Dragons [80]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Shuriken Cannon [110]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, EML [130]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, EML [130]

5 Pathfinders [120]

Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

total 1499

Never take singing spears on jetbike warlock squads, as they lessen the unit's CC ability.

You don't have to change your list.

What would happen if you parked all your tanks 50" away and fired str9 templates from your prisms without allowing him to close to his range?

He can't move fast enough to get a shot at you. You can move 12" away and still shoot, he can only move 6" and shoot, and you have the longer range. Once the razors are dead, his range is even shorter at 24", giving you even more maneuver room and allowing you to close in to 35" and use your brightlance shots too (and with the lascannons dead, he won't be able to shoot back).

Even if you did nothing except stand off and plink at his transports for the whole game, you'd come out ahead at the end.

Flavius Infernus wrote:You don't have to change your list.

What would happen if you parked all your tanks 50" away and fired str9 templates from your prisms?

He can't move fast enough to get a shot at you. You can move 12" away and still shoot, he can only move 6" and shoot, and you have the longer range. Once the razors are dead, his range is even shorter at 24", giving you even more maneuver room.

Even if you did nothing except stand off and plink at his transports for the whole game, you'd come out ahead at the end.

If you were playing an annihilation scenario on an infinitely large table, this would work every time.

Edit: Bobdole, I think your second list is even better, though I'd consider dropping the pathfinders to max out that jetbike squad.

bobdole4eva wrote:
Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

Three fire prisms....shudder

You need some Banshees or something, but you need Troop too. Just keep practicing. Death to the Mon-Keigh!

You could probably lose the Pathfinders. Take Exarchs and more Dragons. You can put 12 in a Serpent.

Those Fire Prisms should be raping him. That, and Vectored Engines are a great upgrade. They survive immobilized. Start tracking how often that would have saved your bacon. Spirit Stones are OK but Vectored Engines are better (imo).

If you have it Missile Launcher Warwalkers are really great against marines.

My favs for killing Marines include:

** Howling Banshees! ** on a doomed squad courtesy of your farseer.

With serpents and prisms you should be able to get some shots in on some side armor from many different angles.

I'd prob drop the pathfinders for some Banshees and throw them in a serpent instead of the Avengers.

Thanks for the advice everyone, changes for review

Farseer- jetbike, fortune, RoWarding [130]

8 Warlocks- jetbikes, enhance, embolden, 3 destructor [410]

5 Fire Dragons [80]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Scatter Laser [125]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Bright Lance [145]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Bright Lance [145]

Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

Fire Prism [115]

total 1500

bobdole4eva wrote:5 Fire Dragons [80]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Scatter Laser [125]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Bright Lance [145]

5 Dire Avengers [60]
Wave Serpent- spirit stones, Bright Lance [145

Maybe it's just me, but I don't find the fire dragons fitting as well in the list. You already have 3 fire prisms and 2 bright lances to work as AT (Anti-Tank). That will crack his razorbacks quickly. Just stay 31" away from his vanquishers and pop them when he's out of range.

Your biggest weakness IMHO with this army is that you have only 2 scoring units. In an objective based game with 5 objectives, you cannot possibly hold enough objectives. If you lose one scoring unit, then you have lost 50% of your objective holding capacity. I would suggest changing the fire dragons into Dire Avengers to give you more scoring potential. As I mentioned earlier, you really don't need the extra AT.

Aside from that one change, this a nasty 'mech list that I would hate to face down. It has a great heavy hitter squad, the army is very fast and hits like a sledgehammer. It's very eldar.

You hold one, kill as much of his army as you can, and contest the rest. Trying to play with lots of troops as Eldar, especially at low-points games, is just playing to lose.

willydstyle wrote:You hold one, kill as much of his army as you can, and contest the rest. Trying to play with lots of troops as Eldar, especially at low-points games, is just playing to lose.

If I am reading into this, please let me know.
2 troops = Just fine
3 troops = lots of troops and playing to lose

I agree with you that 6 troops is not an effective way for him to win games, I just don't think that 3 is lots.

Two scoring units can be a bit light, especially these two scoring units (Five DA does not make a very solid unit). If the waveserpents dont get cracked then the DA are fine, but lose a serpent and you pretty much have to write off the DA squad as well since even a wet sneeze will finish them off.

The plus side is that the rest of the list is incredibly nasty and your opponent may well not even try to take out the DA serpents. You may well end up going for a wipe out rather than objectives in some games. If I was playing the SM tho, all I would be doing would be going after the serpents since I would see no way to fight the rest of the list.

It should be an interesting list to play but treat the DA squads like they are a ming vase, because they are very valuable and very very fragile.


Sliggoth

Sliggoth is correct with his analysis.
I would suggest putting the entire army in reserve for this army as well. Your SM friend will likely want to go first, so will not complain if you give him the firs turn. This reduces the amount of turns you will be effectively shot at by 2, which helps to ensure that your precious scoring DA's stay alive.

If I were playing against your list I would focus on those 2 units. Once they are gone, the best you can hope for is either to table me or a draw. A 3rd DA unit gives you 50% more resistance to that tactic.

In an objective game, I would not keep the entire list in reserves, simply the two DA serpents... and possibly not even them. The fire prisms and seer council will start killing your opponents army early on. If they focus on aspects of your army that are not really doing damage to them, then you will table them, and won't have to worry about capturing objectives.

Also, I noticed one big, BIG mistake in your second list. The farseer needs runes of witnessing, even with embolden, because Fortune is vital to the survival of your jetbike council. If you don't have RoWit and your opponent brings RoWard then your chances of successfully casting Fortune are reduced significantly. I'd drop spirit stones from one of the serpents for it.

I think you should have some fast attack units atatcking from the rear and attacking the troops and keep other parts of youre army (troops mainly) away from the vindicators. Use youre Fire prisems to disable the vindactor and you will have destroyed something that really does dippend on how the game ends. With the fast attack take up anti infantry weps and attack from the rear be carefu about not getting to close to the multi meltas. If you do disable/destroy the vindicators take out the razorbacks (dont have to) and wipe out the rest. hope i could be helpful and if ive done anything wrong please feel free to tell me i guess i do need to learn a bit more. Enjoy =]

Something I find useful against tanks are Fire Prisms. They have a good BS and a high strength.

Also, once the Space marines get out of their vehicles, you can really bring the hurt with your blast markers.

Dark reapers rock vs SM , the tempest launcher is heavy 2 blast at S4 AP3, make sure you get it with Crack shot so SM's dont get a cover save and you can reroll wounds , have used this to take out devistator squads in 1-2 turns!

Fire prisms struggle against AP13/14 , would lance up to take em out , either TL Lances on the Serpents or Vyper lances ( cheap to deploy though hit less than TL Serpents ), Lances vs SM Mech makes them cry.