Ideas for the next Eldar Codices - MkII

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**Mahtamori**

If Craftworld orientation is opted for, I'd rather see this in either codex-wide special rules (such as in Codex: Space Marines) or in named characters (such as with Codex: Tau Federation). It wouldn't make sense having a basic commander make this orientation.

Additionally, a serious analysis of merit and drawback need to be done. If you do not have a drawback that is in any way deliberating to the army list you choose, then there is no trade-off.
Or, put it this way: I wasn't planning on using Guardians anyway!

I'd rather see there be a benefit to using each choice in their own right, and I think the Autarch specializations we're discussing do that just fine.

**Saintspirit**

Mahtamori wrote:If Craftworld orientation is opted for, I'd rather see this in either codex-wide special rules (such as in Codex: Space Marines) or in named characters (such as with Codex: Tau Federation). It wouldn't make sense having a basic commander make this orientation.

I suppose so. I was mainly giving rules to the options dayve put up, but I guess craftworld orientation my be an army option just as well.

Additionally, a serious analysis of merit and drawback need to be done. If you do not have a drawback that is in any way deliberating to the army list you choose, then there is no trade-off.
Or, put it this way: I wasn't planning on using Guardians anyway!

Since I didn't put up any point values, they could probably be the drawbacks in addition to the limitation of troops choices. How would you say the drawbacks should be?

I'd rather see there be a benefit to using each choice in their own right, and I think the Autarch specializations we're discussing do that just fine.

Not sure what you mean here. Are you talking about getting a bonus for whatever units you use, or are you talking about what benefits the stratagems should give?

**Mahtamori**

I'm talking about stratagems and what not, yes. I'm not certain about drawbacks at all, we've been over it and never got a good conclusion.

**Gorechild**

Saintspirit wrote:
Gorechild wrote:I completely agree that there isnt really a reason to take an Autarch now, but I think linking them to craftworld style rules would make them a must have (which personally I'd like to avoid).
Its good to make all options viable and competitive to use, but making it so that you really have to have one will...

Isn't that kind of how the Farseers are now?

Yeah currently a farseer pretty much is a must have, it doesn't mean I think that's a good thing though

Anyway, backtracking a couple of days I said I'd have a look at a revised Avatar set up that's around the same point worth as a Keeper of Secrets. Things have been mad since then so this is the first chance I've had to sit down with my Chaos Daemons codex, here goes.......

With all the bells and whistles a KoS comes in at 290 points, but reasonably set up you're looking at about 260.

Avatar of Khaine - 260 points

--WS--BS--S--T--W--I--A--Ld--Sv--
--10---4---6--6---4--6--5--10--2+--

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Unit Type: Monstrous Creature, Unique

War gear: Wailing Doom

Special Rules: Eternal Warrior, The Bloody-Handed God, Molten Body, Inspiring.

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Wailing Doom - Close combat weapon that ignores armour saves, in addition, Wailing Doom can fire in the shooting phase with the following profile R12" S8 AP1 Assault 1

The Bloody-Handed God - The Avatar is the manifestation of the Eldar god of war and is truly terrifying to behold in battle, It has a 5+ Invulnerable save and any enemy units within 12" suffer a -2 penalty to their Leadership value.

Molten Body - The Avatar's body is made of molten metal and burns with the flames of war, it cannot be effected by flamers, heavy flamers, flamestorm cannons, incinerators and any weapon with the type "melta".

Inspiring - The presence of one of their deities in the field of battle rallies all Eldar to spectacular acts of bravery. Any friendly unit that can draw Line of sight to the Avatar has the Stubborn special rule. If they are within 12" of the Avatar they may re-roll failed leadership tests

So that's +2WS -4I -1A -1S and a 2+ instead of a 4++

Is that reasonable?

**rivers64**

"Molten Body - The Avatar's body is made of molten metal and burns with the flames of war, it cannot be effected by flamers, heavy flamers, flamestorm cannons, incinerators and any weapon with the type "melta".

Add skorchas or burnas

**Gorechild**

Good catch

I can see this resulting in a long list of "burny weapons" that were missed out

**Araenion**

I still like the option of him re-rolling failed to-hit or to-wound rolls. And that 5+ invulnerable instead of 4+ he has now really hurts him in CC against PF and the like. And I mean really, really hurts.

**Saintspirit**

Agreed, the avatar should have a good invosave (Gorechilds current version doesn't have one at all)
Also, you forgot to add Melta to the Wailing dooom. And TWD doesn't need to ignore armour saves since the avatar is a MC.

**Mahtamori**

The list of all types of fire based weapons will be long if you name them specifically. I'd say "it cannot be affected by template or melta weapons with the exception of ***"
I can only think of one non-fire based weapon that uses a template profile and that is the stranglethingymajig the Tyranids never use that targets strength value.
If that's not a good idea, add Dragon's Breath and Destructor to the list as well.

You also removed melta from Wailing Doom and he's still just about as good at hitting stuff as a base-line humie vet

**Saintspirit**

Mahtamori wrote:I can only think of one non-fire based weapon that uses a template profile and that is the stranglethingymajig the Tyranids never use that targets strength value.

Don't forget the destructor (both Eldar and DE).

**AlmightyWalrus**

Saintspirit wrote:
Mahtamori wrote:I can only think of one non-fire based weapon that uses a template profile and that is the stranglethingymajig the Tyranids never use that targets strength value.

Don't forget the destructor (both Eldar and DE).

Or the Bane Wolf.

**Mahtamori**

Saintspirit wrote:
Mahtamori wrote:I can only think of one non-fire based weapon that uses a template profile and that is the stranglethingymajig the Tyranids never use that targets strength value.

Don't forget the destructor (both Eldar and DE).

I was under the impression that Destructor (no I didn't forget) was the Warlock's molten fury. But point stand, the list of non-fire templates is significantly shorter than fire templates, and you run less risk of running into situations where you have fluff-inconsistency.

**dayve110**

Stealing Gorechilds set-up.
I dropped the attacks back to 4, but made him more skilled in combat (with the god of war rule, not a change unless your fighting anything WS5+)
Also i made the wailing doom a melta attack and gave him deamon and Fleet.
The 5++ was replaced with a 4++ and i threw in the anti-fortune rule and edited the molten body wording.

All in all... if a KoS is 290... and the avatar has -4I -2A -1S, but +4WS and a 2+ save, it could balance nicely. The I and WS +/- will cancel each other out, the save should cancel out the -2A and the -1S should be cancelled out by the extra funky rules.

Also the KoS deepstrikes, where as the avatar has to slog it across the entire board. I think i more conservative points cost should be applied, as currently his stats are largely unchanged, there pretty fitting already. The only benefits are slight changes to his rules and the -2 to enemy Ld values. (more or less)

Avatar of Khaine - 205 points

--WS--BS--S--T--W--I--A--Ld--Sv--
--10---5---6--6---4--6--4--10--2+--

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Unit Type: Monstrous Creature, Unique

War gear: Wailing Doom

Special Rules: Fleet, Deamon, God of War, The Bloody-Handed God, Molten Body, Inspiring.

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Wailing Doom - The Wailing Doom can fire in the shooting phase with the following profile R12" S8 AP1 Assault 1, melta

Deamon - The Avatar is in all respects treated as a Deamon. He has a 4+ invulnerable save, Eternal Warrior, and will be affected by any abilities/weapons/powers that affect deamons.

God of War - The Avatar will always hit on a 3+ in close combat, also he will only be hit on a 5+ in close combat.

The Bloody-Handed God - The Avatar is the manifestation of the Eldar god of war and is truly terrifying to behold in battle, any enemy units within 12" suffer a -2 penalty to their Leadership value. In Addition, Farseer powers (such as Fortune) have no effect on The Avatar.

Molten Body - The Avatar's body is made of molten metal and burns with the flames of war, it cannot be effected by any weapon with the type "melta" or any template weapon with the exception of ... (list of non-fire templates)

Inspiring - The presence of one of their deities in the field of battle rallies all Eldar to spectacular acts of bravery. Any friendly unit that can draw Line of sight to the Avatar has the Stubborn special rule. If they are within 12" of the Avatar they may re-roll failed leadership tests

**Araenion**

Call me persistent, but I'd much rather I get to reroll to-hit than always hit something on 3+ or that they hit me on 5+

**dayve110**

i think a 2/3 chance to hit is pretty impressive, granted 99% of the time your hitting on a 3+ anyway (but i really don't think and WS lowering abilities should effect the avatar, so hence, always 3+)

with a re-roll your going to be hitting 8/9 times. which is pretty nasty, you'll almost never miss, and with wounding most things on a 2+ and ignoring saves, a re-roll to hit seems a little OP IMO.

**Araenion**

It's hardly OP, a lot of stuff in 40k has that. Besides, I'm not going to be hitting 8/9 of the time. Believe me, you're still going to miss a lot more than that leads you to believe and with just 4 attacks(even with 5) even 1 miss can really hurt, especially if you're fighting something with T5 and above.

**dayve110**

Statistically... yes you will hit 8/9 times. sometimes you'll roll badly and miss, but you shouldn't need re-rolls to compensate for bad rolling.
And other things do have it, but those other things arn't 2+/4++ S6 T6 MC with fleet W4 and A4
The most common re-roll to his is generated by Chaplains, and thats ONLY on the turn they charge

IMO re-rolls to hit on the Avatar, would need his points to go up even higher... and i don't want to make his points Apoc level... it'd still be nice to use him in regular 40k without crippling the rest of my army because he costs so much.

**rivers64**

Just wondering, what's wrong with the Avatar exactly the way he is now? In the right list he can be killer and even OP for his points cost. He's better than pretty much every other MC that's the same points as him.

**Araenion**

He's definitely OP for his point cost IF you have Fortune around. Without it, he's very slow and not very threatening.

Dayve110, I'd rather if his point cost goes up that he's more killy himself than that he has some fluffy army-wide special rules.

**rivers64**

Araenion wrote:He's definitely OP for his point cost IF you have Fortune around. Without it, he's very slow and not very threatening.

Dayve110, I'd rather if his point cost goes up that he's more killy himself than that he has some fluffy army-wide special rules.

It's true that fortune does boost him tenfold. However even without fortune other MCs are less powerful than him for equal points and he still does amazingly in the right list.

**dayve110**

Araenion wrote:Dayve110, I'd rather if his point cost goes up that he's more killy himself than that he has some fluffy army-wide special rules.

The Eldar arn't exactly all about taking one unit/model and setting it loose to win you the game.
There is a synergy that needs to be achieved in your list, good Eldar lists (and more often nowadays, other armies) need to activly work together to be effective, use of force multipliers achieve this to a greater extent.

I don't think the avatar should be that much more killy, he does fine as he is now. After all the Eldar are not a brute force army, in any prolonged combat or firefight the Eldar should loose. Carefull positioning and proper target priority should be key aspects to an Eldar victory rather than throwing an Avatar at all your problems.

**Araenion**

Hang on, he'd hardly be the new Nightbringer with my improvements.

And while it's true he's worth his 155 points, I think he's not quite as powerful as some of you make it out to be. Yes, with fortune he's worth double his points, but on its own, he's just 4 S6 power-weapons attacks(5 on the charge, which he very rarely manages to pull off) at a (relatively) high I and a peak WS. That peak WS is the only thing he really has going for him, wouldn't you agree? And he's still hit with anything above WS4 just as easily as any other model out there.

Every Greater Daemon is quite fast, if I'm not mistaken. That fastness is worth so much on a close combat monster. Just look at Nightbringer - when have you last been afraid of him? He can't catch a slow-moving Rhino, much less anything faster than that.

So either give Avatar a place as a slow-moving fortress that buffs the armies around him like you and Gorechild want, or buff his CC skill and give him a way to actually charge something that doesn't want to be charged and make him a real threat to any unit on the board, like I'd prefer. I think both options are quite valid, it's just a matter of preference.

**DarknessEternal**

Araenion wrote:
Every Greater Daemon is quite fast, if I'm not mistaken.

You're mistaken. Of the 5 Greater Daemons, 2 can jump, 1 has fleet, and 2 are the same speed as the Avatar.

**Araenion**

Thanks for the correction, I wasn't too far off the mark, though.

**Eldrad**

I wantt a special charectore Wraith Lord. They could have him loose wraith sight and give him a new shinny toy or 2

**Gorechild**

DarknessEternal wrote:
Araenion wrote:
Every Greater Daemon is quite fast, if I'm not mistaken.

You're mistaken. Of the 5 Greater Daemons, 2 can jump, 1 has fleet, and 2 are the same speed as the Avatar.

5 greater deamons?! There are 4 (7 if you take SC's into account)

The Lord of Change and 'Thirster have wings, KoS has fleet (would it be sensible to give the Avatar fleet?) and the unclean one is normal. Skarbrand and Fateweaver both have wings and the big Nurgle SC who's name I've forgotten is normal.

Anyhoo...back to Eldar.

@dayve110's suggestions- Your point value might be better, I was really unsure how much the Ld modifier and LOS stubborn would be worth so I thought it would be better to aim high and get it brought down than shoot too low and have people moan that its OP

**DarknessEternal**

Gorechild wrote:
5 greater deamons?! There are 4 (7 if you take SC's into account)

There are 4 Greater Daemons in Codex Chaos Daemons and 1 in Codex Chaos Space Marines.

**Gorechild**

Right, back to the Autarch. I think using the generic HQ as the key to unlocking Craftworld specific rules is a bad idea. The only problem I see is that if we introduce a new SC for each craftworld there will be LOADS, if we decided to keep Eldrad it would be like 12-15 in all! Giving each Pheonix Lord a seperate entry and 1 per craftword would be do-able, but it will give a VERY crowded HQ slot. If the individual craftworlds do need seperate rules (I'm not a fan of the idea) then I think they'd have to just be extra army wide special rules.

Does everyone sort of agree that the Dayve's final version of the Aatar is okay? If so we can crack on with the Autarch "Stratagems" (cant think of a more appropriate name, please suggest some if you can think of a better name

)

I think we've got a few solid suggestions that keep coming up with vaguely the same rules: Ambush, Vertical Assault and Logistical Espionage. As I previously said, I think (without a heafty price tag) the outflanking idea is a little too much. Any more suggestions?

**Saintspirit**

Gorechild wrote:Right, back to the Autarch. I think using the generic HQ as the key to unlocking Craftworld specific rules is a bad idea. The only problem I see is that if we introduce a new SC for each craftworld there will be LOADS, if we decided to keep Eldrad it would be like 12-15 in all! Giving each Pheonix Lord a seperate entry and 1 per craftword would be do-able, but it will give a VERY crowded HQ slot. If the individual craftworlds do need seperate rules (I'm not a fan of the idea) then I think they'd have to just be extra army wide special rules.

I agree. SC is not the answer for the eventual craftworld rules. frankly, i have thought of removing the phoenix lords all together... I find them quite boring and i'd like to add some more interesting SC:s...

Does everyone sort of agree that the Dayve's final version of the Aatar is okay?

Yes.

If so we can crack on with the Autarch "Stratagems" (cant think of a more appropriate name, please suggest some if you can think of a better name )

Tactical Actions

I think we've got a few solid suggestions that keep coming up with vaguely the same rules: Ambush, Vertical Assault and Logistical Espionage. As I previously said, I think (without a heafty price tag) the outflanking idea is a little too much. Any more suggestions?

The ambush, is that seize the initiative on 3+? I would then change it to 4+, since Vect has that special rule. Or give it a high price.
Something else? What about some kind of sabotage?

edit: On a different note, about the starcannon: I just noticed that the DE equivalent (Disintegrator) has S5 and Heavy 3. Never noticed if we were done with the starcannon or not.

**Gorechild**

An option coud be to change the Pheonix lords to upgrade characters like Telion or Captin Badrukk. Something along the lines of:
"One Fire Dragon Exarch may be upgraded to Fuegan for +X points. A unit with Fuegan becomes a scoring unit, has all the exarch powers as well as the unique exarch power...."

I dont know if that plays them down too much though, They are pretty central to the aspect warrior fluff.