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If you are running your WW spam army, gets first turn.. then Eldrads ability to redeploy units will rock the socks out of your opponent. You will still wanna guide them 2x also, hands down the best thing you can bring to the table.

Kallbrand wrote:If you are running your WW spam army, gets first turn.. then Eldrads ability to redeploy units will rock the socks out of your opponent. You will still wanna guide them 2x also, hands down the best thing you can bring to the table.

good points... and a valid reason to take Eldrad.

Eldrad is 210 points the double guide gives you roughly 24 free scatter shots. well a third warwalker unit is 180. Same shots, cheaper. But you probably have them already and getting those scatter shots on vypers is 360 points.

But then again, 2x farseers with guide are 150. And the warwalkers can use their scout move to make adjustments to their deployment, although not nearly as powerful as divination.

if you want 2x guides, you have to figure out if the 60 point cost of the additional farseer power and divination is worth it. Not to mention the reliance on keeping eldrad within 6" of two separate war walker units, with the added responsibility of keeping him alive.

But then again, if your compulsory HQ has been filled, you have to make sure you want the guides... in a spam army, points need to spent on guns first, then on survivability and tricks.

Eldrad is a pretty good choice for a scatter laser army. But, he is not the only choice. And that is what this thread is about.

I'm sticking with my "take him if you want... but you don't have to take him to have a competitive army" stance.

deadlygopher wrote:GW killed the bulk of the craftworld fluff. You can't blame someone for not following non-existant themes. If a random person were to start playing Eldar today and read the 'dex cover to cover, they'd be perfectly justified in thinking they could slap Eldrad in whatever vanilla list they were building. It's not their fault, don't knock them for theme. Theme is only as good as what the company puts out. So Eldrad appears a lot more often in somewhat strange builds for his craftworld... Well, that's what the game has become.

thats exactally the boat im in, i used to play a little back when i was a kid but not enough to fully understand all the rules and fluff, well fast forward 10+ years and here you have it i seen a really good deal on an eldar army on craigslist, i decided iw anted to start playing again, so i bought it and started making lists from there.

Eldrad is pretty much auto-included in Eldar infantry lists, but a much more iffy choice in Mech.

Having a jetbike seer that's able to Spear the rear or side armor of tanks after Fortuning something important is really, really nice. The bike seer also isn't that expensive, given his utility. This make him a nice bait unit when neccessary: "Hey you overexcited Orks, assault my shiny bike, not the objective!" That said, I think I'm going to field Eldrad in my mech setup in the 'Ard Boyz, just for divination (and to keep my hands in the cheese bowl) and double-Fortune on transports.

This raises a question: has there been an official ruling about non-shooting psyker powers from models embaraked on vehicles? I read the YMTC thread, but found no specific citation there. I'm going the way the thread did (Yes to non-shooting powers from inside vehicles, emanate/measure from the hull), but I need a solid ground to argue from if there's a dispute. Has anything definitive come out recently?

Eldrad? I just use him as teclis in 40k =/.

Eldrad is not a Farseer, hes a crutch.

DonkeyCannon wrote:Eldrad is not a Farseer, hes a crutch.

haha and i have a broken leg so imma use him.

DonkeyCannon wrote:Eldrad is not a Farseer, hes a crutch.

You might as well call all the new SM characters crutches. The idea that seems to be taking hold in codex design, as others have noted, is having special characters essentially serve as a template for top-level heroes in any army.

I repeat my earlier question: Does anyone know of a ruling on how non-shooting psyker powers work when the user is embarked? Anything new that has been issued (or used at a tourney, or whatever) in the recent past?

Eldrad should be 250 points. He is undercosted.

There are some things he cannot do though. He cannot fleet. He cannot use a spear. He cannot take a Jet Bike. The old Perils rules used to instant kill Farseers, now it causes an automatic wound. His toughness 4 was a leg up on that, now it makes little difference. With the way deployment works now his Divination rule is not as effective. The 5th edition rules nerfed him in many subtle ways. He is still a bargain though. I think a simple fix for him would be an amendment like this.

Any Eldar army using Eldrad must take 1+ Squads of Eldar Guardians.

Most Eldar armies won't even acknowledge Guardians existence.

I run 2 Eldar armies. A fluffy Ulthwe using Eldrad, Vypers, Guardians, Storm Guardians, Weapon Platforms, a Wraithlord, War Walkers, Pathfinders, Jetbikes, Dark Reapers and occasionally Swooping Hawks. Some times an Avatar or Maugan Ra. Lets face it though, if you play a guardian army you need Eldrad.

My other Eldar army is Beil Tan. Comprised of mostly Aspect Warriors, a couple skimmers. Its everything I don't use in my Ulthwe army. Both do well. Eldrads support powers make guardians somewhat decent. Aspect Warriors are a little more stand alone and don't require as much enhancing. I build the majority of my armies based on fluff. I have an Iron Hands army with no terminator squads or scout squads because that chapter isn't supposed to have any. In any case I still feel using Eldrad is cheesy. Even though I have 60 guardians of various forms (warwalkers, vypers, platforms) and no skimmers. The Ulthwe army ties more than it wins and I only have 2 losses in about 20 games. I can attribute that to my crutch. Eldrad Ulthwan.

His divination rule is now the bomb in 50% of the scenarios and pretty useless in the other 50%.

I have no clue why you think you must have guardians for him? He can run with almost anything in the army and works pretty sweet in a serpent or the like also, if thats you game. He actually works wonders on everything twice a round.

I'd definitely put him in a Falcon over a Wave Serpent. Guiding/Fortuning a Falcon would be fun.

Divination in 5th is so much stronger if you set up first, Divine, then go first. That is almost broken.

You do not need to put him with guardians. I often do just for the warlocks "embolden" power. Otherwise he runs with the harlies.

He is safer in a wave serpent than a falcon.

I said if he had a rule that made you take guardians fewer people would take him as they hate guardians. Its fluffy.

Polonius wrote:
Special Characters are now what they should be: heroic Arch types. Senior Farseer, Master Autarch, Waagh Overlord, Berserker Prince.... These are all characters that add flavor and dimension to armies, but can be defined relatively narrowly and restricted to one per army. To make them interesting, they have a name and a backstory.

This is exactly how I see Warmachine.

A cleancut Stormblade Warcaster would end up like Stryker.

A pistol wielding ne'er do well will end up like Caine.

Shep, DonkeyCannon, and Tacobake get cookies for being so spot on.

Eldrad is good, but not needed.

I ran him once, he bored me--the army he supports is a punching bag, and frankly I can run other better armies that can be punching bag armies but aren't stuck sitting there hoping they can kill you before you get to them.

If their opinions meet with Steleks approval then they must be right. Cookies for them!

Eldrad is the best HQ choice in the game.

Darrian13 wrote:Eldrad is the best HQ choice in the game.

hyperbole.

Since we can not compare HQs from different armies to each other, as they are not a fair comparison without taking the context of their army list into consideration, then we can only compare Eldrad to other HQ choices.

There are two solid eldar lists that come to mind that have access to Eldrad. Neither of the lists take them. One build has jetlocks, they need fortune on the move, they need a jetseer. Another build is three fire prisms, three fire dragons in serpents, and three dire avenger units in serpents. Another dead hard list that doesn't want to invest 210 points in some psychic powers that are marginally useful. In this list, most of the weaponry is already twin-linked so would not benefit from guide, the fire prisms could enjoy guide but not at the expense of keeping a baby-sitting wave serpent and its much shorter weaponry nearby. Doom loses most of its effectiveness in the almost entirely strength 6 army, the fire prisms could possibly benefit a little from the doom on their anti-infantry pie, but their preferred targets are generally the ones way on the other side of the board, out of doom range for most of the game. A second fortune could be useful, but a second farseer can bring that to the table for cheaper. Fulfilling the HQ requirement with a farseer with fortune instead of eldrad gives you 125 points. More than enough to have bought that third fire prism.

There are "Eldrad lists" out there where he is the guy to go to. Not every competitive eldar list is such a list however. Is he good? Yes... Are there lists where he is the only logical choice? Yes. Are there eldar lists where he is not wanted or needed? Absolutely.

I would think a lash prince/sorcerer would be a much more convincing "best HQ in the game" if your criteria for that choice was how significant the damage to an army is if he is not chosen as an HQ, and if we were comparing apples to oranges.

I'd tend to concur with Shep on Lash Prince as the more important guy, and I'd double down on that with the all new running Deceiver.

Running Deceiver able to Deceive while running is a whole lot of . lol

Wow Shep you basically said what I was thinking this whole time =D

Although I don't think I would end up using him all that often as I'm planning a fully jetbike army with the two Farseer/Warlock councils on bikes

But in any other Eldar build I would definitely use him to his fullest

I had no problems with Eldrad in the Tassie championships. I just steamrolled him (literally!) with a land raider.

lol hes not as tough as everyone else thinks, that why i dont run him as much anymore lol

Eldrad is best for his versatility, you get all the powers and pick three. Matching him against Guide and Fortune Mind War then as often as not Mind War again to complete the job.

Divination also helps here.

The main limitation is not agianst what other HQ can achieve, but against what other HQ can be cut down to. I dont compare Eldrad to one or two tooled up Farseers, but aginst a cut down minimum Farseer and a larger army. Even now Eldar cannot afford to burn points.

Yes Eldrad is certainly worth his weight, but so are more aspect warriors or an extra tank.

Besides I still have this reluctance to field special characters, and have always used the model (lightly converted) because for a long time it was the only decent Farseer model to buy.

Threadnomancy!!