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So, I have a pretty big rivalry going on with my friend. I play DG, he plays Tau and I always win. Winning is fun but always winning isn't, I enjoy an uphill batlle and a challenge. Hes recently bought a a ton of Dark Eldar and has played everyone in our play group but me and has absolutly rick rolled them ( kinda like I always do to him ).

Now I'm hearing that one of his best match ups is against my codex and specifically my build. I understand he has like 20 dark lances in a 2000 point build plus 2 ravagers with 3 devastators. I'm building a World Eaters army but thats a few months away so its my Death Guard that will face him. Heres my list of models and the way I field them.

HQ:

Prince, wings, MoN

Typhus

Terminator Lord, MoN, Daemon Weapon

Greater Daemon of Nurgle

Elites:

9 Terminators,

usualy as champs with one chain fist and combi meltas, in big battle all 9 with Typhus or a lord with one squad DS and one in a LR.

Troops:

35 x Plague Marines 10 armed with plasma guns.

3 x Rhinos

20 x lesser demons of Nurgle

in rhinos squads of 7, 2 x PG

Heavy Support:

4 x Obliterators

2 x Defilers

Land Raider

If you are running that list my only advice is to try and get the first turn....


If he gets the first turn it will look something like this:

Move all raiders / ravagers 6-24" to the weakest side of the board.

Fire Dark lances until your LR is dead, then pick off all the rhinos in the same manner with the remaining lances. Next fire 6 plasma cannons at your really expensive group of Terms and your HQ, anything left goes into the oblits or defilers. Now that you are over 1000pts down in one shooting phase the rest is mopping up.

If he goes second it will happen the same way except you will most likely have 3-4 less dark lances coming at you.


If you have models to modify it a bit I would. First drop most all of the terminators. Second plasma guns wont do dick to dark eldar since we don't have saves anyway. Swap it out for flamers or HB. With the extra points I would grab some Jump troops or bikers you need to be fast to counter a DE gunline.

And the last piece of advice I will leave you with is, Don't underestimate his HQ at 157 points he is a monster in Close combat. (7-8WS, 6 Str, 3W, 7I, 5-6A, and power weapon, rerolls misses, and has a 2+ invuln)

Yeah all my plasma gunners are made in a way so I can switch out with flamers or meltas. I was just listing what I usually play. I forgot to list my squad of havocs, which after reading your post I think will be the most effective, I have 4 missles and 4 HB. With some ablative wounds they could be damaging. I have raptors and bikers but there being modeled to my future World Eaters army.

It seems like unless I stray from my attempt at being as close to a traditional Death Guard army I won't have a chance. I am hoping I can out wit and "tactic" him.

Field everything in reserve!

That is how I beat Eldar/Dark Eldar tricky bastards.

For some potential advice I will offer a totally (shameless) reasonable (self)plug of the Dark Eldar Tactica here on this site (link in my sig) I include a fair amount of discussion on what various DE units have as far as weaknesses.

I will echo Cthomps suggestion to switch out the plasma guns. I would recommend you go with Heavy Bolters over flamers, as the HB will also allow you to pop a Raider fairly effectively and will let you fight the range advantage the DE might work for. Also, if a DE unit is in charge range you're probably better off just blasting it with rapid fire then flaming it in any case.

You don't *need* to drop your Termies - but be aware that Termies and MCs are where Disentigrators and Dark Lances really can shine. At the very least expect if you field them for them to be turned into minced chutney in fairly short order. Below I shall offer some very generalized advice for dealing with DE gunline with (ye gawds) Death Guard.

Firstly, your friends are correct - your army does not match up well versus the DE. You're slow and tough and he's fast and hits hard. Your toughness will be lessened by the power of the DE heavy and special weapons and his speed should allow him to evade a lot of the punishment you'll want to dish out on him.

Do not underestimate your basic bolters! If he's fielding a lot of Raiders (and it sounds like he is) you want to be able to unleash hails of Str 4 shots at them if you can. Yes, a squad of Marines with bolters firing at a Raider will probably equal dead Raider. De-mechanizing DE is very important, as without our gunboats we are soft and squishy.

If he has Wyches or a DE Lord in a Raider - make those Raiders your top priority to pop. Wyches or a DE Lord running around on foot are *very* susceptible to a round or two of bolter fire from a tac squad. Shoot these units, do not engage them. Do not buy Assault Marines and think you can engage them. Shoot the DE Lord and only engage Wyches with tarpit style units or throwaway Tac squads. Keep your close combat specialists away from the Wytches - those things are built to kill CC specialist units. Keep everything away from CC with the Lord, with his initiative and damage output he can practically kill a full squad in one turn by himself - you shoot DE Lords. A round of rapid fire can do wonders that a squad of Assault Marines could never dream of.

The only thing about as scary as the Lord is the Ravagers - those are what will kill your troops. Lances are great, but Lances kill MCs and vehicles. Dissies kill MEQ infantry (even Death Guard) Depending what sort of long range firepower you can muster these should be your top priority targets. He'll have too many Lances to stop, but he's made an error only fielding two Ravagers - make him pay for that. Each Ravager is basically armed with three plasma cannons - you want to get rid of those. If you do he'll have a harder time murdering your troops quickly once he pops your transports. At only 11/11/10 armor the Ravager is still a pretty easy vehicle to blast from the sky - it should be a high priority unless you have a DE Lord about to slam into your lines.

Don't spread out your deployment line! Don't do it, just don't. If you deploy on a long table edge then just pretend you're only getting half of that, pick the half and stick to it. The DE are too fast for you so you have to make sure you'll always have your other units nearby to support you when they begin their attack.