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Having trouble designing a list able to deal with these. Obviously fire dragons can do quite well up close, but it seems like tank heavy gun lines would cause problems. Are lance serpents or double prisms the way to go here?

Lances, I would think. Since they are strength 8 and treat armor higher than 12 as 12 (except monoliths), then you have the same chances of dealing with AV 14 armor as Tau railguns.

Kroot Loops wrote:Lances, I would think. Since they are strength 8 and treat armor higher than 12 as 12 (except monoliths), then you have the same chances of dealing with AV 14 armor as Tau railguns.

Except they're not AP 1 And have half the range.

Use Fire Dragons, Lances and if your really desperate and actually run them then Swooping Hawks with Haywire Grenades might work at a pinch.

It's insanely hard to kill an AR14 vehicle at long range with anything. Eldar brightlances only have a slight advantage--and that in the penetration roll only since they are nearly always on a BS3 chassis.

Typically you're looking at a 50/50 chance of hitting the vehicle, then a 50/50 chance of damaging it, then often a 50/50 cover save (that's about 12%) and then you need a 5 or 6 to destroy it (less than 4%). Twinlinking, mounting lances on wraithlords, and casting guide help on the roll to hit, but still have the same problems with actually doing damage.

Fire dragons are really the only reliable way to kill AR14.

Other then fire dragons, Warlocks are your best friend against AV14. On a jet bike they can quickly zoom over with their guardians and charge them. On the charge each warlock will get 3 str9 hits against the rear armour (ok that's still 14 for monoliths and LR but hay better then nothing)

Well, long range anti tank weapons are not as good as in the previous edition.
First, vehicles often get a cover save.
Second, the armor penetration table makes it harde for non-melta weapons to destroy a vehicle. Meltas are your best friend.

Hmmm, also I was thinking later that another possibility would be to ram with a grav tank.

If you get a run of at least 18 inches, that's a str9 hit--or str 10 for a 21" run. Even though a monolith is a skimmer, it can't dodge because you're a skimmer too.

Of course, you would take a hit at str 2 or 3 points higher than the one you inflict, and for a wave serpent or fire prism you might consider that a decent trade.

But this is one place where the best tank for the job really is a falcon with holofield, since the holofield works any time a roll happens on the damage table (including ramming by inference). So you'd most likely just be shaken, and able to move away or ram something else next turn.

Hmmm, also I was thinking later that another possibility would be to ram with a grav tank.

Ramming could work.
Last year, in the GT final, one of my Serpents was ramming a Monolith destroying it.
This guy had 3 of these d*** things.

My 1850 Eldar list has 6 serpents with lances and 3 prisms. I would be happy to see raider spam or 13+AV across the table.

Lances. Sure they are half the range of a Tau Railgun but a Railgun is 72". 72" is almost diagonally across the board. 36" is more than enough to hit things across the board especially when located on wave serpents.

And if you are playing Tau you have lost automatically anyway...

Lances are my choice! Sure it's BS3 but hey, that's why you have Guide (which in C for me is the fun of playing Eldar!)

PanamaG wrote:And if you are playing Tau you have lost automatically anyway...

Tell that to the Tyranids I've tabled, the Imperial Guard with Grey Knights I tabled, the Eldar I left with 4 models left of the table but lost a minor victory because of kill points but had a moral victory with Victory Points, and the Space Marines I tabled in my last 4 games.

Also, With twinlinked Bright Lances and a BS of 3 you have a 75% chance of hitting. The same exact percentage as a Broadside. Both need a 4 for glancing and a 5+ for penetrating. Only difference I believe is the AP of 1 on the Twinlinked Railguns.

Wow you tabled Grey Knights, the most overcosted army in the game.

Otherwise sounds like noobs.

Ontopic: Lance, Firedragon, witchblade, and anything with 'fusion' in the name should be somewhat useful. AV14 is just hard to kill, no way around that, just hit it with lances, or charge it with someone. Witchblade should be able to kill it, if you have a seer council throw that at them.

@PanamaG: I think you missed the part when he said they were attached Grey Knights....oh right, they were attached to IG and you belive they are bunk Edit: nothing against you though, everyone is entitled to an opinion.

edit2: took some sting out of this because his reply seriously made me lol, while making sense

Its cool if you are good with an army vs other casual players, but whether you tabled whatever you played or not an army that statistically sucks still sucks. You dont have to come on forums and defend the race like you yourself are a Tau and I dishonored your ancestors.......

Wraithcannon are also very good against AV14.

Also unlike melta still are good against Monoliths.

However they do cost alot to get them in decent numbers.

Yeah, not a fan of wraithguard. Too expensive for what they do in my opinion. I'll find some way to fit dragons in the list

Fire Dragons and ramming with S10 are my first options.
Brightlances are also good but lost an edge
since tanks get cover saves (obscured, hull down or launching smoke)
and the armor penetration table allows to destroy tanks only at 5+.

Wuestenfux I disagree eldar have the easiest time menouvering to negate cover saves.

GMMStudios wrote:Wuestenfux I disagree eldar have the easiest time menouvering to negate cover saves.

Lol, this from the guy who just had the giant post about protecting tanks with camo netting? How would you maneuver to negate that?

Incidentally, I agree that a brightlance mounted on a grav tank with its 12" move can maneuver to negate cover better than most. Not so much the lances on wraithlords or infantry units (if anybody actually still uses those).

I didnt say it was easy, I just said they have the easiest time

I can't say I've ever considered ramming as a viable anti-tank option. Won't ramming serpents into enemy tanks like that put you at serious risk for destroying your own transports? And how exactly would you pull off a str 10 hit? Isn't str 9 the best a serpent/falcon/prism can do for ramming?

Tortoiseer wrote:
I can't say I've ever considered ramming as a viable anti-tank option. Won't ramming serpents into enemy tanks like that put you at serious risk for destroying your own transports? And how exactly would you pull off a str 10 hit? Isn't str 9 the best a serpent/falcon/prism can do for ramming?

It's the movement in inches, divided by three, plus 2 for AR 12, and plus 1 for being a tank.

So if you move 18" that's 6+2+1= str9
21" is 7+2+1 = str10

A 24" move is effectively impossible, since you have to move the full 24" to get the extra point of str, but that's your max move.

Yes, you take a hit of str 11 or 12 moving at those speeds, so it will probably be a penetrating hit. That's why the holofield is such a huge advantage when ramming: a holofield turns 75% of penetrating hits into shaken, stunned, or weapon destroyed results.

But of course serpents can't take holofields, so for them it's probably a suicide run.

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Tortoiseer wrote:
I can't say I've ever considered ramming as a viable anti-tank option. Won't ramming serpents into enemy tanks like that put you at serious risk for destroying your own transports? And how exactly would you pull off a str 10 hit? Isn't str 9 the best a serpent/falcon/prism can do for ramming?

It's the movement in inches, divided by three, plus 2 for AR 12, and plus 1 for being a tank.

So if you move 18" that's 6+2+1= str9
21" is 7+2+1 = str10

A 24" move is effectively impossible, since you have to move the full 24" to get the extra point of str, but that's your max move.

Yes, you take a hit of str 11 or 12 moving at those speeds, so it will probably be a penetrating hit. That's why the holofield is such a huge advantage when ramming: a holofield turns 75% of penetrating hits into shaken, stunned, or weapon destroyed results.

But of course serpents can't take holofields, so for them it's probably a suicide run.

wait what? Strength 10 maximum, you can't go over.

Why can't it go over 10, Tri?

I don't see anything in the ramming rules that limits a ram attack to strength 10.

I do see on page 8 where it says "For all models *except vehicles* these characteristics are given a value on a scale of 0 to 10," and then on page 7 "Vehicles have many different rules and *their own characteristics.*" (emphasis added) Even if you wanted to argue that the strength of a ramming attack is somehow a "characteristic" of the vehicle (which is kind of a stretch), it looks to me like the rules for vehicle ramming are as "described in the Vehicles section" and the strength value of a ramming attack is not limited by the page 6 restriction on the characteristics of models.

Unless I'm totally missing something?

Bright lances are very, very overcosted, and aren't widely available enough in the Eldar list to be a reliable strategy for AV14.

I suggest 2 units of fire dragons in wave serpents, or just try to ignore AV14 and hope your opponent doesn't bring too much.

Flavius Infernus wrote:Why can't it go over 10, Tri?

I don't see anything in the ramming rules that limits a ram attack to strength 10.

I do see on page 8 where it says "For all models *except vehicles* these characteristics are given a value on a scale of 0 to 10," and then on page 7 "Vehicles have many different rules and *their own characteristics.*" (emphasis added) Even if you wanted to argue that the strength of a ramming attack is somehow a "characteristic" of the vehicle (which is kind of a stretch), it looks to me like the rules for vehicle ramming are as "described in the Vehicles section" and the strength value of a ramming attack is not limited by the page 6 restriction on the characteristics of models.

Unless I'm totally missing something?

I guess I'm just doing my normal thing of reading GW's rules as they're meant to be written. I say this simply because that's how GW have always done things ... Other wise why do we get Str-D but you never see Str15.

In the old rule book it was much clearer on this. No characteristic can above 10 and then in vehicles we get told that Armour values range from 10-14.

Now I can understand why you thing they should go over 10 but to me its just poor writing from GW.

2 units of Fire Dragons in serpents and one unit of Warlocks on bikes. Enough melta to deal with land raiders and enough S9 CC attacks versus rear armor (or even Land Raiders) to put serious hurt on any of it.

Unfortunately this army plays more like a kamikaze than it does hit-and-run but those are the most effective anti-AV14 elements in the codex.

Agreed with above.

The problem eldar face is they have some good anti armor 14 units, all of which are either suicide units or amazingly expensive. And right now you dont want to close with the enemy. I run something like this

eldrad/yriel/7 locks in serpent
2x5 dragons in serpents

3x5 avengers in serpents with bright lances

The council can deal with tanks in hand to hand, and the dragons can do some serious damage if they shoot right. The lances are hit or miss, but they tend to let me shake stuff up and do some damage.