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Blackmoor wrote:

sabote wrote:I had the Eldar army that finished the hightest at the ard boyz. Probably would have finished higher but due to the time problem that happened(see other topics on ard boyz) I was not able to finish off my opponent after killing 90 orks. If we had the last turn like we were suppose to have I would have probably had a massacre.

But back to the question. I ran the jetbike configuration that was mentioned above. With seer council and squads I had around 29 jetbikes. Than add 3 prisms, and banshees and fire dragons. With Yriel and farseer on a jetbike.

With the exception of some Eldar armies and Dark Eldar I have not had much of a problem beating other armies with this build. Great for demon/orks and marines.

I have a similar build for lower point totals. I have seen the WS army and its not bad either.

- the problem I have with naked Fire Prisms is that its easy points you are giving up in KP missions.
- Two Autarch in theory is nice but you just need tha farseer to much. For doom, guide or ruins of warding for all those lash armies.

Lazer I would look at the WS build for now until you get used to the army. I think the jetbike army is the way to go but as someone mentioned above it takes a bit of practice.

I did not play in the GT because I had to be back for a meeting on saturday morning.

I think I played you in the first round (I had the purple Witchhunters). I made a lot of mistakes, and you were able to beat me.

#1. I forgot to move your jetbikes with "word in your ear" so I could shoot them turn #1.
#2. When my assasin came on I for got to shoot and assault with her give you an easy kill (She would have taken out a jetbike squad).
#3. I wasted 2 turns shooting at your vehicles. I should have just blown your jetbikes off of the table and killed all of your scoring units, but I started that strategy too late.

1-2 maybe yes maybe no. I knew you had "word in your ear" plus first round of shooting thats why I set up so far back. With a 6 inch move you can only do so much.

The assasin may have killed alot or wiffed. Needing 4s to wound meant you would only get 50%. I have seen no kills just as many as alot of kills with that one. But yea forgetting did not help you much.

Now not shooting at the troops until to late, there was the mistake. I had some lucky roles with vehicles. You has some very lucky roles with Deep strike. I am still not sure how you managed to drop the assasin and gray knights in without a misshap. I would have remembered to shoot the assasin just because of that.

Ether way I enjoyed our game. Its been a while since I saw a WH army. YOu rolled alot better in my box. I was starting to think my box was two timing me

Eldars are still very competative, even if they lost abit of their overpoweredness.

Seer councils are pretty badass these days for example.

A Seer Council seems to be a must-have in a competitive list, either on jetbikes or foot slogging mounted in a Serpent. An Autarch is a nice add, Yriel on foot or an Autarch with lance on jetbike.

Although I often use a Seer Council these days, I still question whether an equivalent points-value of Banshees and just Eldrad might not be more effective against nastiness like Nob Bikes, Plague Spam, etc. The resilience of the Council is nice, but it only goes so far, and still leaves you needing a decent Hammer unit to complete the setup.

And if you're ever fielding close-combat bikes, yeah, the Autarch really helps. At some point you will have to charge someone in cover (dangerous, but sometimes can't be helped) and the grenades will really come in handy.

The resilience of the Council is nice, but it only goes so far, and still leaves you needing a decent Hammer unit to complete the setup.

Right, the Council is one of the best anvil units in the game. The Autarch provides the hammer; Yriel and Eldrad are even better (with 8 attacks on the charge, hit on 3+ and wound on 2+, no armor saves).

wuestenfux wrote:

The resilience of the Council is nice, but it only goes so far, and still leaves you needing a decent Hammer unit to complete the setup.

Right, the Council is one of the best anvil units in the game. The Autarch provides the hammer; Yriel and Eldrad are even better (with 8 attacks on the charge, hit on 3+ and wound on 2+, no armor saves).

Panzy heroes get eight super attacks on the charge? I've got to watch out for those characters then!

Savnock wrote:Although I often use a Seer Council these days, I still question whether an equivalent points-value of Banshees and just Eldrad might not be more effective against nastiness like Nob Bikes, Plague Spam, etc. The resilience of the Council is nice, but it only goes so far, and still leaves you needing a decent Hammer unit to complete the setup.

And if you're ever fielding close-combat bikes, yeah, the Autarch really helps. At some point you will have to charge someone in cover (dangerous, but sometimes can't be helped) and the grenades will really come in handy.

I agree with you on the seer council. I have the same question on wether I am getting the points out of them. A squad of 6 seems to last till the end of the game and certainly has done well for me but I still question them. Than they go out and do some amazing things. Last tourney my council cut down 2 demon princes a greater demon and held up a nurgle squad for turns(this helped alot). Game after they did squat nothing. Funniest thing is I had an Ork player charge 20 plus boyz against my squad of 6 enhanced warlocks and 1 farseer. He was in shock after I killed 10 and he only killed 1 because of fortune. I feel I need them in tournaments to face off against demons armies and orks. A seer council(destructors/witch blades) on jet bikes held in reserve will cause merry havoc on a demon army. In regular games I rarely take it.

I still say holofields for Prisms. Why give up two victory points so easy by running them naked. The very least they are around to contest at the end of a game.

I have been off the tournament circuit for the last year, but I plan to hit at least 2 major events next year. I want to share my thoughts on the GT circuit metagame and get your thoughts.

First off, the emphasis on troops has created some real problems for eldar. Not that Our troop selections are awful, but they are fragile and expensive for what you get. More importantly, every "tool" you need to deal with every problem you will encounter is NOT a troop choice. Many armies have the luxury of filling their troop selections and still having the tools they need. Big point values (like Ard Boys at 2500)mitigate this, but under 2000 points finding a good balance of HTH/antitank/antihorde while keeping enough troops to contest objectives is EXTREMELY challenging. Of those functions the only one that our troppss can do WELL is the antihorde. So the question becomes how do we maximise the antitank and HTH abilities of our non-troop units while keeping the cost down so we don't deplete our troop selections. I have run a smallish seer bike council with great effect in the past to great effect. I think it's a great unit for hard boys, but at the typical GT 1850 I think you are cutting too deeply into your points for troops.

The present dominance of hth armies creates some real problems. Orcs with guaranteed 2nd (if not 1st) turn charge are a major problem. So let's talk orcs first.

The reserve/denial build offers some srategic advantages here, but the reality is that assaults are going to happen, and they are going to go badly for every troop choice in the eldar army. Backing them up with hth units is crucial, but multiple combats are a potential disaster.

Imagine 30 orcs charging 20 guardians and a wraithlord. The power claw is going to pull less than a wound per round of combat on the wraithlord, but the guardians are going to be wiped out and the wraithlord is going to take a dozen or so wounds due to being fearless. Good luck making a dozen 3+ saves.

The 3 major orc builds are the footslogging horde, battlewagon spam, and the biker horde with big nob biker hammers. I think that the speed advantages of the mech list are enough to allow us to compete well with the footsloggers so I'm not going to discuss those.

The battlewagon list: The wagons aren't fast, but they are open topped. So with Thrakka's waagh, you're looking at a 12" move, 2" deployment(plus 1" for the width of the base), 6" fleet, plus 6" assault. So their effective range is 27". So don't think you are going to beat this list with mobility.

This is the build that I think dictates a reserve/denial list from us. You really need him to advance before you come on, so you can take a flank and get the advantage of some side shots in your first round.

Shoot the battlewagons? Sure that's a great idea. Except that he'll have 4 or 5 and they will ALL have a 4+ save from the mek's force field. You MAY get one per turn at range. All the effective tools for dealing with them need to be within 6-12 inches and at that range you have bigger fish to fry. I'm sure someboby is going to try to argue the value of the bright lance. To which I say: do the math. Prisms could work, but you can't take enough prisms. You can assume they will all hit something that big, but only 1/3 penetrate, 2/3 of those destroy or immobilze, and 1/2 of tose are ignored so you need 9 shots on average to stop one battle wagon. Slightly less since I didn't count the glancing hits.

We benefit some in the last month against this list in that GW seems to be ruling against the deff rolla hurting vehicles when it rams.

What can we do to combat it? I think you can try staying in the waveserpents and manuevering for side shots on the wagons. The problem with that strategy is that it is going to divide your force and he's going to take you piecemeal. My plan is to use reserves to hopefully draw him across the board and out of his wagons. Then to deploy a wall of wave serpents followed by guardians, dire avengers, and assault units with each unit enveloping the next so he can't assault muliple units.

Deployed that way, I think I can annihilate a unit of boys per turn. More if have enough flamers/blast markers. Problem is you need something that can operate outside the phalanx and can deal with both the wagons and the boys. I think you have 2 options. The Avatar and Wraithlords. I ruled out everything else in the list on the basis of their inability to survive a charge from orks. HQ slots are limited and at least one autarch is needed for a reserve list, so IMO wraithlords are essential to a tournament list. They are harder for the boys to kill than the avatar, and offer the additional benefit of flamer templates. I think 2 is a minimum, and 3 would be preferable. Also because they are going to be needed in this role I think the wraithsword is indispensible. I see the appeal of prisms, but at this point value you need some effective durable hth units, and both prisms and wraithlords are best in multiples. So it's really an either/or situation. One wraithlord will often draw combat due to a unit's powerfist, and he loses a battle of attrition. 2 or more wraithlords will reliably break almost any unit. If you have the points for a seer council they could fill this role.

The Nob biker build doesn't need discussion as an army so much as it does how to cope with that one(or 2) unit(s). T5, 2W, 4+ invulnerable, plus Feel No Pain. In shooting you have 2 of those things you can eliminate. Instakill can take care of the 2W part, and AP1 or 2 can take care of the FNP. So what helps here? Firedragons, brightlance, prism cannon, and krak missile are the only shooting weapons that deal with both. (I know I left out d-cannons but I'm only considering things you MIGHT actually take in a competitive tournament list) Mind war doesn't eliminate the 2W, but it does ignore the save, and they are LD7 so it's worthwile, especially since it can pull the squad's teeth by taking out the powerclaw(s), or even better wax the pain boy and eliminate the FNP for everyone.

In HTH the invulnerable save is gone, so we only have the 2W and FNP to deal with. Banshees? Even with doom the T5 and 2W is too much to ask of the girls. They'll kill maybe one biker on the charge. Scorpions? They don't fare better than the banshees. Even the exarch's powerfist doesn't help with the 2 wounds. Harlequins? MAY fare slightly better. They still don't instakill anything. Avatar? Fares better than any of the other options so far, but alone he is going to lose a battle of attrition. Best option? Wraithlords. 3 with wraithswords are cheaper than the nob bikers and will kill 5 bikes on the charge. That's 10 wounds. Nobs break and get run down.

So the ideal tactic for the nob biker build is to shoot with firedragons and assault with wraithlords.

My conclusion from all this reasonong is that any army that hopes to be competitive in the tournament scene will contain 2-3 wraithlords. There just aren't any other cost effective options to deal with some of the threats posed by these ork builds.

Another problem you need to be prepared for in any ork army despite it's other features is Snikrot. His ability to bring 15 orks in from any board edge can create major problems if you forget about him. He's not such a big deal if you plan for him, though.

Well, against MEQ armies if the battle involves to occupy mission objectives then its better to keep the troops (DA, Storm Guardians) in Serpents.

Orks: You forgot the Killa Kanz armies led by Big Mek w/ KFF. These armies are quite nasty as Dreadz and Kanz are quite resilient thanks to the new armor penetration table.

I haven't heard of any ork players bringing killa kan heavy lists to tournies. At least I haven't heard of the list winning any major events. The Mek is the linch pin in a lot of ork builds, and he needs to die early when you fight them. Once he's gone the large number of S6 shots in an eldar list should make short work of the kans.

The second build you need to be prepared for is the dual lash chaos space marine army with 9 obliterators.

The lash is partially mitigated if you have lots of stuff in serpents. Another instance in which the mechanized reserve/denial build is advantageous. However the most important tool against the lash is runes of warding. Not only will more than half the attempts at casting fail, but the wounds incurred by the princes will often prompt the opponent to stop casting altogether. The implication here is that a farseer is important to have in the army. I understand the argument for 2 autarchs in a reserve list. But having 2 means losing doom, fortune and the runes of warding, and that is too high a price IMO.

Mechanized reserves also help deal with the obliterators. Denying them the opportunity to shoot for a turn or two, and providing us an opportunity to shoot or assault them before they get cranked up. It’s hard to deal with them in shooting alone. I think the best tools for them are hth units. Harlequins or banshees are ideal. (I favor banshees in the mech reserve build.) Shining spears could work well, as would a bike council. Since you are going to take an autarch in a reserve/denial list one option I like is placing him in a guardian bike squad with a laser lance. Add a warlock to the unit and you have a sort of cheap knock off on the seer bike council. The warlock and autarch keep the killing power up, and the guardians make it a scoring unit while they keep the cost down.

TROY CLIFTON wrote:I haven't heard of any ork players bringing killa kan heavy lists to tournies. At least I haven't heard of the list winning any major events. The Mek is the linch pin in a lot of ork builds, and he needs to die early when you fight them. Once he's gone the large number of S6 shots in an eldar list should make short work of the kans.

The second build you need to be prepared for is the dual lash chaos space marine army with 9 obliterators.

The lash is partially mitigated if you have lots of stuff in serpents. Another instance in which the mechanized reserve/denial build is advantageous. However the most important tool against the lash is runes of warding. Not only will more than half the attempts at casting fail, but the wounds incurred by the princes will often prompt the opponent to stop casting altogether. The implication here is that a farseer is important to have in the army. I understand the argument for 2 autarchs in a reserve list. But having 2 means losing doom, fortune and the runes of warding, and that is too high a price IMO.

Mechanized reserves also help deal with the obliterators. Denying them the opportunity to shoot for a turn or two, and providing us an opportunity to shoot or assault them before they get cranked up. It’s hard to deal with them in shooting alone. I think the best tools for them are hth units. Harlequins or banshees are ideal. (I favor banshees in the mech reserve build.) Shining spears could work well, as would a bike council. Since you are going to take an autarch in a reserve/denial list one option I like is placing him in a guardian bike squad with a laser lance. Add a warlock to the unit and you have a sort of cheap knock off on the seer bike council. The warlock and autarch keep the killing power up, and the guardians make it a scoring unit while they keep the cost down.

Troy- yeah for the most part agree with alot of your logic and came to much the same conclusions. But still decided to go a slightly different way. Wraithlords are not a bad option but you need to take multiple. Now with the new marine list they will get mowed down by sternguard and assualt marines. Shinning spears not bad. But with the new shooting rules its to easy for the exarch to get picked off and than that squad is useless. I still lean towards the warlock council. It kind of sucks that you are now limited to the autarch and farseer IMO if you want to be competitve for the reason you listed above. 1st round of ard boyz i took a phoenix lord and autarch and hoped I did not run into the chaos lash army. I lucked out and did not. But the 2nd and 3rd round were full of them and luckily I had my farseer than. Waveserpents are nice. But orks still will be able to charge them and get quite alot of hits on the rear with furious charge. Its a bit iffy so you need blocking waveserpents if you are going that route. I still lean towards jetbikes but thats more because of what I am used too. The MeQ dire avenger/ fire dragon list is a good list also. But I believe it really comes down to HTH in the end. So you need to exploit what advantages you can get from that.

I haven't heard of any ork players bringing killa kan heavy lists to tournies. At least I haven't heard of the list winning any major events. The Mek is the linch pin in a lot of ork builds, and he needs to die early when you fight them. Once he's gone the large number of S6 shots in an eldar list should make short work of the kans.

Not true, a Killa Kanz heavy list won the German GT in October.

@SABOTE: Nice to know somebody thinks I'm not far off. Congratulations on faring so well at 'Ard Boys. I think dropping from 2500 points to 1850 really changes the dynamics of the list for eldar more than any other army. At 2500 you have room to flush out all your troops and still be able to afford things like a big seer council. I was looking seriously at including a small one in my 1850 list. I just couldn't squeeze it in without dropping to 2 or 3 troops, or cutting transports. There is no doubt the council is superior to the wraithlords in every way. Faster, more attacks, harder to kill, better flamers, etc, etc. They are just so much more expensive.

@wuestenfux: Sorry. I hadn't seen the German results. I'll be interested to see if that list starts to crop up in the US. I think just playing a mechanised list will provide enough mobility and firepower to be competitive against them. I think the trick is going to be identifying and eliminating the Mek and his force field.

Another major problem I see emerging is huge units of terminators with storm shields. I see 2 major means of dealing with them. The preferred method, I believe, will be to avoid them and eliminate the rest of his army. IF you can outmanuever them and keep them out of HTH altogether He has wasted a lot of points. If deployment or scenario makes that impossible, then I think you have to dedicate everything you have to eliminating them. Doom plus 2 bladestorming Avengers will force 30 saves. Even at 2+ he should lose 5. Mind war could pick one off. Not sure I'd use firedragons on them. (I take units of 6 so even with doom I'm probably not going to kill more tham 1 more.) A charge of banshees, 2 wraiithlords and a laser lance toting autarch should take down the 4 remaining if I've done my math correctly.

Don't nickel and dime him, throwing units away one at a time. If you have to engage them make sure they die quickly. It's a huge investment of resources. Basically you have to dedicate everything in your army for a turn, but if you don't I think that one unit has the ability to destroy everything in your army 1 or 2 units at a time. I also think you have to be VERY wary of him assaulting multiple units with them. HE could wipe one unit and force 2 more to take break checks at -10.