A severe lack of Eldar

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**DarknessEternal**

MechaEmperor7000 wrote:The Eldar codex is really showing it's age

It was garbage from day 1. Just because it's gotten worse since then doesn't imply there was ever a time it was competitive.

**Monster Rain**

I must be in a strange place because everywhere I go I see Eldar. Southern California is lousy with 'em.

**SagesStone**

I see what you did there MR.

There are only two Eldar players in my area, myself and another who started fairly recently. There is a third, but he has been collecting Blood Angels for a while now (before the current codex was announced by maybe a year).

**Emperors Faithful**

Strange, seeing as Eldar players here are very common. And of those that collect Eldar, most of them us Eldar as their primary army, while only dabbling in other races.

**Mannahnin**

In the two tournaments I played the last two weekends I faced:

IG
Eldar
Eldar
Daemons
Tyranids
Blood Angels

The Eldar codex has a fair number of crap units at this point, and basically every Aspect unit except Fire Dragons is presently overpriced. Our vehicles are also more expensive than they should be compared to 5th ed codices. It's like IG; before their codex update Chimerae were 70-80pts+, and sort-of-okay, but the army really wasn't strong. 55pt Chimerae, OTOH, and cheaper infantry, plus new special rules, and IG are suddenly nasty.

If you want tactics and army builds for Eldar which currently work, I'd recomment reading Flavius_Infernus' five battle reports from the Conflict GT last month, and Blackmoor's battle reports from last year, and their posts in the Tactics forum. Flavius ran mech Eldar with a ton of S6 shooting, and Blackmoor runs what is nicknamed "footdar".

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/recentTopics/showTopicsByUser/527.page

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/recentTopics/showTopicsByUser/195.page

**FourCartridge**

Down here in Sarasota Eldar are pretty much the butt of alot of jokes, including:

"Friends don't let friends play Eldar."

When Orks go to battle against Eldar instead of WAAGGHH! they shout "Taste the rainbow"

And various things like that.

**SagesStone**

All the jokes that usually go with marines, but for Eldar instead.

**foofighter**

Mannahnin wrote:The Eldar codex has a fair number of crap units at this point, and basically every Aspect unit except Fire Dragons is presently overpriced.

I find myself agreeing with ya there. IMO Avengers should be about 10 points at most, I mean Kabalite Warriors are 9 pts each and their stats are amost identical bar the Avengers armour save being 1 better. Banshees and Scorpians should also be a couple of points lower, and as for Swooping Hawks being 21pts each? Ouch. I mean they are OK against armies with low armour saves but thats it really, they just get shot down as soon as they turn up (though the grenade pack can be alot of fun

)

**Puscifer**

@Mannahin...

Thanks for those links dude, they were a very interesting and entertaining read.

I have found out a couple of things about Eldar and the type of army I want to play just from those Batreps.

Definitely not going Mechdar, for two reasons.

1) Mechdar holds no interest for me whatsoever. I want to buck the Mech trend.
2) Mechdar are one of the most expensive armies thanks to the cost of it's transports. Nearly £30 for a WS is too much for me. However, the battleforce does contain base elements of a Mechdar force and is pretty cheap considering what's in the box.

So it's Footdar all the way.

From what I read in those reports is that target priority is key. Now I did this as a Tau player and I think that Eldar at thus point in time need to play like this above all else.
So basically I have to take specific units for specific tasks and make those units excell at those tasks above all else.

So I need:

Stuff to pop vehicles - Lances for heavy stuff and STR6 spam for light craft.
Stuff to cover key troops - Guardian meat shields.
Stuff to kill MEQ - Reapers are my choice here.
Stuff to kill hordes - Str6 spam, Avengers, Spiders.
Stuff to kill in CC - With either SS, HB or Harlies to choose from, it's a tough decision.
Army support - Avatar, Farseers, Autarch???
Stuff I would like to have in - Maugan Ra.

Time to make a list. This looks like its going to be a tough list to build. What is a tourney staple points level - 1750???

**SilverMK2**

I have Eldar, though I have not played with them yet (or painted a lot of them :(). Will get round to it eventually

If you are still interested in Orks, I live in Stoke and am looking to sell my Ork army

**Emperors Faithful**

FourCartridge wrote:
When Orks go to battle against Eldar instead of WAAGGHH! they shout "Taste the rainbow"

Hehehe. Nice.

**Puscifer**

Pm sent Silver.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
I have an issue ATM with fitting everything in. There is so much to think about with this army.

I never have this issue with any of the others.

**mister robouteo**

That's a shame. I liked the Eldar models the guy who showed me this game has, and I don't have my hair parted over the side of my face either. It seems like all the armies just keep getting better, so what the older ones used to be good at just gets the bar put up another notch by a new one until the old one isn't good at it by comparison any more. Why would they let a whole figure range go out of style though? I would have thought that Dark Eldar would be a less common sub-set of regular Eldar aren't they? All they would have to do is give them more modern rules if that's what scares people away from playing with them.

**Samus_aran115**

Because they're not forgiving enough. probably the least forgiving of any army right now. Even DE are more forgiving.

That, or because a lot of the basic units are metal. the swooping hawks are ugly too ;D

**Scott-S6**

Puscifer wrote:This is the thing I hate with 40K atm.

No Tau, Eldar or Daemons.

I simply don't want to play an army that I see everyone playing.

You hate that no-one plays those armies but you don't play them?

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Puscifer wrote:2) Mechdar are one of the most expensive armies thanks to the cost of it's transports. Nearly £30 for a WS is too much for me. However, the battleforce does contain base elements of a Mechdar force and is pretty cheap considering what's in the box.

I think this is one of the biggest problems with Eldar. A lot of the infantry is expensive (metal aspect warriors) and the vehicles are expensive as well.

**Puscifer**

Scott-S6 wrote:
Puscifer wrote:This is the thing I hate with 40K atm.

No Tau, Eldar or Daemons.

I simply don't want to play an army that I see everyone playing.

You hate that no-one plays those armies but you don't play them?

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Puscifer wrote:2) Mechdar are one of the most expensive armies thanks to the cost of it's transports. Nearly £30 for a WS is too much for me. However, the battleforce does contain base elements of a Mechdar force and is pretty cheap considering what's in the box.

I think this is one of the biggest problems with Eldar. A lot of the infantry is expensive (metal aspect warriors) and the vehicles are expensive as well.

Oh don't get me wrong it is my intention to start one of these armies or one that has a very small following in my meta. Downside is after tonight I can safely agree with an above post...

Dark Eldar are more resilient than Craftworld Eldar.

I lost to Necrons, Dark Eldar and Marines.

**Mannahnin**

Footdar armies using Avatar, Eldrad, guardian units using cover, Wraithlords and optionally Wraithguard are a lot more durable than most DE armies. They're challenging to use but tough to do serious damage to.

**Puscifer**

Hmmm.

The build I was using was Footdar, but it was not an enjoyable experience.

I got tabled every game. Turn 3 by the marine army.

I just couldn't kill enough or hold objectives long enough. Each general knew exactly how to make my units inefficient.

Too many vehicles too. Even the Necron player had two Monolith.

Tonight was a total disaster.

Back to the drawing board.

**Ail-Shan**

For the "DE are more resilient than Eldar," I agree except for vehicles. Of course with the cost of Eldar vehicles (points) that doesn't mean much since we lose a lot with each vehicle. Eldar have better armor by a bit (+1 or 2 to the save). But everyone tends to have cover anyway, so the save is about the same. But then DE have the FNP option, which now doubles their resilience, and puts them far beyond Craftworld Eldar.

@Mannahin: On the one hand, with fortune, yes you are a lot more resilient than DE. On the other hand, you have very little killing power because you are slow, short ranged and don't have a lot of attacks/shots. In addition, the poisoned weapons that DE have negate the biggest advantage of wraithguard and wraithlords, and now they die about as easy as marines. Cover also reduces the damage they do by a lot (and is what is keeping me off star cannons right now, which I'd otherwise use a lot more. Scatter lasers are statistically better and less expensive).

The issue is that without vehicles or jet bikes Eldar are not mobile enough. Combine that with their already lack of hitting power, especially at range, and they are really behind.

And Samus, I think hawks look amazing. Not a big fan of the helmet but when they are painted well I think they look great (obviously could use an update, but I think they're one of the best looking aspects). However I don't think being unforgiving is really a problem. Combined with lacking power it is. We hit with the offensive power of a marine, for the same points, and are far less resilient nor can be upgraded to deal with vehicles.

**Puscifer**

Well I have only one question now...

Where do I go from here???

I've now played every single army except for one and thats Orks.

So do I go with the trend of the meta and forget about the underdog armies or go with the only army I've never played.

**Eldrad**

I dont think that you realy understand eldar well anough to right them off just yet. Every one has told about how hard they are to use or how bad (no offence) they are, but no one has told you how to play them besides maybw the link i haven't tried it yet. I would love to get the list you were running so i could give you some tips.so send me some and tell me the armies you will be fighting i can help you with anything besides necrons. Monoliths scare me and the lance affect doesn't work on them. Im sure that you will find that with some proper structuring and a better tactic you will be crusing on by everyone. Mainly on your first turn cripple your opponent with a night sppinner long range lobing fun plus all thier special rules makes them cheese tastic.

**Vaktathi**

I've never felt Eldar to be particularly rare. They were and always have been a common army to me. The only armies I've ever seen as outright more popular are Chaos and Space Marine, with everything else being about the same or far less popular.

I see them all the time.

Granted, they aren't as ubiquitous as they were in 4th ed, but there's probably a fair few reasons for that.

**Farseer Jenkins**

Ail-Shan wrote:
Eldar are an armie about falling into place at the right time with the right peice

The issue is that isn't really possible. Between the range and increasing mobility of other armies, Eldar's capabilities are dwindling. They don't hit hard anymore, and short of serpents and falcons they still don't survive being shot at.

As an example, take a unit of banshees. Charging a full unit of grey hunters, arguably their chosen target, they kill 5, and lose 2 banshees to return swings (if the grey hunters aren't upgraded with any cc options, which is unlikely). Banshees should kill the rest of the unit in the next phase if they are lucky, and if they aren't will probably kill them in your turn, leaving you open to being shot. And this is for a unit that is more expensive and doesn't have the shooting capability of grey hunters.

Now let's look at variants where the Eldar army is working together. If you shoot the grey hunters up before the charge you not only risk them running away leaving your banshees open but also risk killing them in 1 phase, again leaving your banshees open.

In any case, Eldar are spending far more points on specialists to kill a generalist unit, but our assault specialist is crippled in the process. By the way, I do love banshees. Power swords are awesome. The issue is, they don't hit very hard anymore and are both out assaulted and out shot by anything other than a basic tactical marine squad. And with true line of sight and the range of most weapons they are easy to shoot at after an assault. And since there are few mass fire AP4- weapons, the cover save is near worthless.

I do love Eldar, but the concept of mobility is being taken by other armies, and Eldar don't have the hitting power they need to offset their fragility. And while 2ish units can be used to wipe out part of an enemy force in one turn, it can't kill enough for it to make that big of an impact, especially considering how long that takes (1 turn to move up, 2 turns to get in exact position, 3 turns to attack, 4 turns to get back in the vehicle, 5 turns to get back in position, all assuming none of your vehicles are shot down). Arguably though, the issue isn't so much with the Eldar codex as it is with the main rules. There is no longer enough differentiation between the speeds of different armies. Dark Eldar I don't think got a large enough mobility boost to allow Eldar to be comparatively as fast as they used to.

As of now, I'm on a break from my Eldar to play Tau (and Nids once I start painting and get money). I grew tired of feeling like I couldn't build an effective army. I probably could, and likely just need more practice, but I couldn't stand to watch my assault specialist be out assaulted by a shooty opponent, or my shooty specialists fail to do significant shooting damage.

I played Eldar exclusively for 18 yrs, and including the codex being next to garbage, not the main rules just the Dex (not one troop choice worth a crap either because too expensive or to weak to hold objectives) the rest of this post is quoted in truth. I mean they dumb down the Starcannon and then give Dark eldar a million weapons that are better than that,and that is just the new army,not to mention all the armies before that having weapons that were better, seriously. Maybe I will pick them back up with a new Dex, but my orks are fun so maybe not....

**Vaktathi**

Lets not kid ourselves, when the book was written and released in 2006, it was *THE* power standard for the remaining two years of 4th Edition. It was a fine book when it was designed for the metagame it was released into.

It wasn't until 5E's redo of the vehicle, SMF and LoS rules in 2008, along with armies better able to tackle the tough Wave Serpents and Falcons that were redone in 2009 that Eldar started to really sink. They still aren't a terrible army.

Is the Eldar codex showing its age? Sure. Is it anywhere near the worst book out there or as bad as many armies were in 4th? Nope.

**Puscifer**

I'll put the base list I used, it's gone 4am and i'm dog tired atm.

Will post complete list tomorrow...

Doomseer - Fortune, Doom, Runes of Warding, Stones.

Avatar.

2x5 WG.

10 Scorpions + Exarch with claw and both powers.

2x10 Dire Avenger squads - Bladestorm load out.

3x10 Guardian squads - Scatter Laser + Warlock with conceal.

6 Pathfinders.

5 Warp Spiders plus tooled Exarch.

2x5 Dark Reapers + tooled Exarch with Tempest Launcher.

3 WW with Scatter Lasers.

Just a shade over 2500 points.

Marines were a Kantor Vets Drop Pod list with TH/SS Terminator Back Up, Necrons were a 2 Monolith strong with a ton of warriors and destroyers, DE were a classic Sliscus Dark Matter Spam list.

TBF, even though it was my first outting with Eldar, I can see the weaknesses in the army as a whole. I know I didn't take any long range anti tank, but against infantry I should be mowing them down in droves, but it never happened.
It was also my first game against a Drop Pod force.
The DE army I faced was mainly my own with a couple of additions to crank it up to 2500 and that list I use is pretty nasty. Necrons just killed me dead with those Monoliths.

**Guitardian**

I still play them, when I play any more which is rarely. It's the army I have. I don't have any delusions about getting out dexed by most everything and feeling forced towards the few viable units we have left in order to be competative. Fortunately I don't own any fire prisms or Eldrad, because if I did, I would have them in every list I write, right alongside the serpent of dragons and the bladestorm avengers and further the impression that all decent Eldar armies look the same.

Its not just that the units are overpriced and underpowered, a lot of the 5th edition shift made some of the Eldars greatest assets no longer as cool, as well as many of the newer Codex having plenty of stuff that can outdo things that Eldar specialists were supposed to be special at.

Our Farseers are no longer dominant psykers, our close combat ELITE specialists are jack gak compared to other armys (BA and SW) basic TROOP choices, our Harlequins turned traitor on us, now available in an army where they can drop and charge out of a transport instead of filing out the back of a serpent like we have to do. Phoenix Lords die way too easily and output far too little for their cost, and don't have nearly the army boosting powers of most other armies special characters. Autarchs don't hit hard, can be instakilled way too easily and are essentially just a very expensive reserves bonus, rather than the master warrior they were origionally supposed to be. Rune Priests and Sorcerors laugh at our "mighty" farseer powers compared to their own. Falcons can no longer fire both guns, but still need to keep moving to stay safe, and still cost in the Land Raider range of points. And so on and so on.

I'm not going to stop using them, but I have no illusion that they are anything more than mediocre if played perfectly compared to some of the newer codex who can excel if played perfectly, and be mediocre in the hands of a beginner. It's pretty tough when you have to be brilliant and focussed and perfect with your build and your gameplay just to be mediocre against a newer list played by anyone.

**Ail-Shan**

Is the Eldar codex showing its age? Sure. Is it anywhere near the worst book out there or as bad as many armies were in 4th? Nope

That only holds true for about 8 more months assuming the rumors are right and both Grey Knights and Necrons are updated.

**Vaktathi**

Ail-Shan wrote:
Is the Eldar codex showing its age? Sure. Is it anywhere near the worst book out there or as bad as many armies were in 4th? Nope

That only holds true for about 8 more months assuming the rumors are right and both Grey Knights and Necrons are updated.

This assumes one sees them as worse than Tau, Witch Hunters, Black Templars, Dark Angels, and CSM's, which I think is a rather difficult proposition, or as bad as say, IG or Orks were in 4th edition.

**rzsanguine**

I have noticed that with the new updated armies I lose more often then I win and I mean a lot more. I am almost done working on my Blood Angels but with new Dread and Stormraven I may have to sell some Eldar tanks for store credit to get those. At
the GW store there were four Eldar player plus me before they moved to the new store and there are only one other that I have seen and two other at another store.

**Puscifer**

I've played every army going except Orks and I own a Necron army, which is apparently the worst ATM.

I say Necrons are not the worst army going, not by a long shot. I have a good win/loss record with them, yes they are lacking, but there are ways to beat the likes of SW and BA with them and I have done so on a couple of occasions.

Tau are a very sad force ATM, but in my old meta I saw them smite Eldar with ease.

And don't get me started on BT or DA. They got a boost since the last FAQ and can hold their own against top tier forces.

If any army needs revising after Grey Knights, it certainly should be Eldar. I know I only played three games yesterday, but the general consensus of those around the board watching the game was the same... 5th ed and codex creep have killed the Eldar.