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kk so some over points about Eldar in general and specifically Mech Eldar. This is probably ioverkill and I'll have 3 people respond before I do, but meh who care

Welcome to the wonderful world of Eldar. Everyone despises us, some think our tricks are over powered, some people downright hate playing us, and damn it a true Eldar player loves it... minus the Gay Eldar jokes that were overplayed 10 years ago.

We are a slowly dieing codex that loses another chunk of viability with every codex that comes along. As other have said there is a pretty large chasm in competitive play between our really good units and the other stuff. The one this that has constantly been untouched thus far has been our Wave Serpents, making them a rather focal point of the accepted best Eldar lists: Mechdar. Every passing codex another chunk of our armor becomes uncompetitive from the recent fall of out Wraithlord to the DE codex (regular warriors treat you Wraithlord like a standard space marine) to the upcomming Grey Knight turning foot Warlocks and our beloved Eldrad into fodder via psycannons. All of our units can do good things in standard games, yes all of them, but in the competitive environment the lackluster units go from meh to liability.

The #1 rule of Eldar, every unit has a clear purpose. It can have more then one, as long as it does not impede on it's first responsibility.
- IE warwalkers stated above. Their goal is to overwhelming fire down a transport via side armor if you plan to outflank them. EMLs give the benefit of raping clumped enemies, BUT they impede their primary goal by limiting your typical 24 shots to 6.

#2 rule, which goes for most armies, synergy. We have to rely on synergy hard to get us where we are going and typically this comes in the form of our Farseer powers. Guideseer + Falcon/Warwalkers/Prism/etc. Doom + Destructor/Harlie kisses/Nightspinner/Bladestorm. Fortune + Fullout/Seercouncil/Eldrad . These are just a few example of how to use the powers with synergy, but our units have it as well. Fire Dragons + Banshees, Melta their face and tempt the idiot to get out to gun you down or assault you then next round eat his face.

Now a breakdown for mechdar in no particular order within the tiers because that is based on the synergy.

Tier 1:
Serpents
DA
Fire Dragons
Fire Prisms
Night Spinner
Guardian Jetbikes
Seer Council on Bikes
Eldrad
Farseer
War Walkers

Tier 2:
Autauch (sorry ol buddy. Too many points, eats an HQ slot, just doesn't fill a role.)
Howling Banshees (no assault out of moving vehicles really cripples them and coupled with their point cost it hurts bad)
Defender or Flamer spam guardians (Cheap bodies are great, but their range cripples them)
Vypers (Someone please punch the person that made them ope topped)
Warp Spiders (Pricey and while fast other things can get the job done cheaper and better)
Wraithlord (We had some good times buddy, but newer codex just make ya a liability)
Falcon (Lots of points for things that can get the job done better :/ )

Tier 3:
Well... everything else since I'm only doing 3 tiers. I'll list a few that may need explanation for people though.
Scorpions: Good philosophy gone bad. Lots of attacks, but no power weapons and no fleet. This means they aren't viable to an assault-vehicle-less fast army since you need that fleet to make contact and in a world of FNP and 2+/3+ armor dripping all over the place they just aren't going to make the cut.
Warlock Council on foot: You get out, you make a mess of a vehicle, you spend the next 3 turns running around like an idoit. 4+ invul for 25pts isn't cost effective either since even with fortune you die 25% of the time and with T3 that isn't a pretty combo.
Yriel: Yes, you are capt badass, but without a viable means of getting you into combat... sorry guy.
Harlies: 5+ invul with T3 and you can't take a dedicated transport... moving right along....
Shining spears: T3 3+ armor for 35pts... please see line above...
Reapers: You have no place in a fast world.

Hopefully this gives you a little more guidance, and to answer your question of who to bring farseer wise, if you have two falcons then hands down Eldrad since you get the two powers you need, plus a third, plus piles of perks. If one falcon or Bladestorm/Tri-Flamer then Doomseer w/ both runes.

@Dagger: Thanks again man! Even more useful information. Thank you for taking your time. Your blog primarily Eldar stuff? *bookmarks*

One last question that has been bugging me ever since I started shifting thoughts over to farseer or eldrad was how do you survive T1 shooting...Reserving you will come on piece meal so your force isn't as strong without the Autarchs. I am probably going to be running guideseers so if my opponent let's say is a gunline like IG or ML spammer like SW's and they have significant fire power do you guys usually just reserve everything? I don't see many of our guys surviving T1 shooting. At least our vehicles without Holos...

Any strategies or advice on what to do with a Mechdar list without Autarchs (Guideseer or Doomseer as HQ) vs shooty lists when your going 2nd? Only thing I can see with my limited experience is reserve and deal with stuff coming in piece meal.

Well this comes down to quite a few scenarios so I'll try my best to cover the biggies for ya. After a while you get a few for the situation throw at you.

#1 rule for everything is rather obvious, cover range cover range cover range. Use your tanks to protect each other along with any terrain you can. If you are starting out with a 4+ cover on you most vital Serpents then something is going wrong.

Annihilation
You will want to go first to try to get shots off as best you can, thus you'll be deploying out. Remember, you have massive range and speed, so hide behind anything you can including yourself and stay back as far as you can. That way if initiative is stolen then you at least have cover.

Objectives
Here you obviously want to go second for the infamous Eldar last minute grab. Look carefully at what you are up against when deciding on what to reserve because it will depend on how much you are going to be hurting if you don't kill/slow down those vital units. If they are the typical rhinos with piles of meltas and 2-3 long range shots then you can pretty much weather the storm with your killy stuff but once again stay as far back and hidden as you can... if you can get th theme here.

Going first or Going 2nd
Sometimes you just don't have the luxury of deciding, if it's objectives and you are stuck going first them make them pay for it. You 90% know they won't wanna steal the initiative, so get ready to hammer them like it was annihilation.

Spearhead
This one you may want to think a bit harder about additional reserves. Remember you get you whole long edge to come in from and thanks to our speed that can lead to some pretty nasty backfield fire dragons etc.

Dawn of War
Welp, pretty much ain't going to get shot anyhoo so no point is reserve much outside of GJB if it's objectives.

Too little terrain
Hate Tournies that dont' have the 25% with mix of vertical etc etc. Use your lesser threat tanks to cover your higher. Non-objectives:, DA cover Dragons, Objectives: Dragons cover DA, all the time: Protect the hell out of the heavies because people know them and fear them.

Proper Terrain
Hide cover hide cover hide cover

NEED those Farseer powers
Sometimes you have plans that just require those farseer powers asap an d banking on reserves for powers round 2 is a fools bet. Plan well and weather the storm best you can

IG Lascannon line, SW Longfangs, DE Lance Spam, or equiv
Yep, we have all seen it and fear it. In this siutation if there isn't enough to hide behind then full reserve it if going 2nd. Piecemeal is better better then dog kibble.

Some math for ya, remember anything that is hitting you turn one for the most part has abysmal chances of hurting you.. First they have to have range which if you listened to the above, will be a hand full of things. Next they have to hit, this varies from weapon to weapon but even a BS4 is 66%. Good ol eff you melta, S9+, and other ordinance type rolls from mister energy field means you got 50% or less to be dmged here. Finally, if you were smart and made them take the hard targets a 50% cover save. Lucky rolls happen to the best of us, but breathe well knowing statistics are heavily in your favor.

Oh on my blog it's all 40k but majority Eldar, I've been slacking lately with everything going on lol

Bluedagger's list is really quite good at determining whats hot and whats not. There are however, some things I disagree with somewhat.

Autarch's for all their problems should probably be t1 at this point. After the Guard, Space Wolf and now DE codex, playing from reserve to avoid eating a turn of unprotected shooting can really help you out. The Autarch increases your ability to do this, and that can be a valuable asset in itself, while he may not be an OMG WTF awesome unit, he has a growing niche in many people's lists. I know Wuestenflux for one has started useing one to some effect in larger point games, and having +1 to reserves is a great comfort. The problem with 2 is that they suffer from diminishing returns. You really need Runes of Warding for a good all comers list, and doom is just too good a psychic power to pass up.

Second I think that 3 flamer storm guardians are a bit under rated. While they aren't as strictly competitive as 5 man DAVU squad which make a wave serpent scoring, they are in many ways better then a 10 man bladestorming Dire Avenger squad. They only cost about 127 points and are very solid at knocking things out of cover. Having pistol +ccw also makes them better in close combat than any non cc aspect warrior. They still suck at cc, cause they are guardians, but it does increase their ability to assault things off of an objective. Long story short, storm guardians operate on an entirely different level then their defending brothers, I would put them as being about as competitive as Guardian Jetbikes honestly.

Aside from those, I agree with almost all of what bluedagger is saying in his analysis.

BlueDagger wrote:Lucky rolls happen to the best of us, but breathe well knowing statistics are heavily in your favor.

Thanks again man! This quote up there is probably my fav. I didn't know that math for it and now that it's placed like that I feel a lot safer and can "breathe easier." Was overly worried about losing half my stuff turn 1, but knowing that eases my worry since I am better equipped and knowledgeable on how to deal with it. Thanks!

How do I want it to play? One thing I'm still cross on is this. I love the idea on double Autarchs. I like the idea of the enemy not getting shots 1st and me (most of the time) getting the Alpha Strike. However after a few people here have mentioned is that 17% extra really worth it and that I should drop 1 Autarch for a Farseer/ Eldrad. The thing I'm unsure about (I'm honestly new to Eldar and don't have enough experience to figure this out YET myself) is if I do take a farseer what abilities best serve to make a Mechdar list better? Which Transport to put him in? I'm thinking the DAVU Falcon. Should I give him stones/runes so he can cast 2/hurt enemy psykers? At that point shouldn't i just take Eldrad...

I'd consider a Doomseer mounting her into a Serpents that operates closer to the front ranks.
So if she casts doom, you are able to get an idea how far some enemy units are away from your units;
depends on how good you are judging distances.

akaean wrote:Autarch's for all their problems should probably be t1 at this point. After the Guard, Space Wolf and now DE codex, playing from reserve to avoid eating a turn of unprotected shooting can really help you out. The Autarch increases your ability to do this, and that can be a valuable asset in itself, while he may not be an OMG WTF awesome unit, he has a growing niche in many people's lists. I know Wuestenflux for one has started useing one to some effect in larger point games, and having +1 to reserves is a great comfort. The problem with 2 is that they suffer from diminishing returns. You really need Runes of Warding for a good all comers list, and doom is just too good a psychic power to pass up.

IMO he still doesn't make up for his cost, lack of role, and risk of another KP. +1 to reserves still means that you have a 66% on turn 2.. not fantastic and if that farseer doesn't come in till turn 3 you aren't casting till turn 4. I'd almost rather lose a Serpent and have a stunned prism then take those odds. Once again it falls on the situation though, because with a crap board and a longfang opponent I'm going all reserves. The other problem is the rising trend of fast armies, it's one thing to reserves against rhino marines that you know you have some time... it's another agaisnt FNP Jetpack blood angels that you need all the shooting you can to down them.

akaean wrote:Second I think that 3 flamer storm guardians are a bit under rated. While they aren't as strictly competitive as 5 man DAVU squad which make a wave serpent scoring, they are in many ways better then a 10 man bladestorming Dire Avenger squad. They only cost about 127 points and are very solid at knocking things out of cover. Having pistol +ccw also makes them better in close combat than any non cc aspect warrior. They still suck at cc, cause they are guardians, but it does increase their ability to assault things off of an objective. Long story short, storm guardians operate on an entirely different level then their defending brothers, I would put them as being about as competitive as Guardian Jetbikes honestly..

I know they are near and dear to your heart and a few others, but in my mind they are in the same boat as bladestomers. You have to get in close, you have to clump up within 2" of your door, and you have to spray n pray. They are still guardians, crap in CC and since you don't have embolden they are susceptible to running away. Clumped + 5 armor + T3 + super short range + ballsflappin in the wind = dead. I commonly run defender guardians in my lists since with embolden since they are bodies that stick around, then can swarm fire too, and drop them off in safe cover an additional scatter laser. I even put Eldrad in with them to take his low chance of power failure and make it almost impossible. However it still does't push either guardians up to T1 when there is Jetbikes and 5 man DA to fill the roll. Bladestormers are VERY borderline T2.

Bladestorm is deep T2 for me, not because its bad per se, but because of the opportunity cost - if you turn all your 10 man exarch squads into 5 man vanilla DAs, you can probably bring an extra serpent.

I'd say Harlies are T2 only because of the shadowseer. Without veil they are deep T3, but they do have a role to play in footy lists, and they're way better than Scorps.

As far as deploying vs Alpha Strike, I run with a jetbike/skimmer army and almost always use the same plan - hide the big things like the seer council, and use the jetbikes as a living screen. If my opponent wants to take out a few guardians on hovercars with his lascannons, fair enough, but if he wants my prisms he's going to need to risk the cover save.

Of course, depending on terrain, objectives, opponent's list etc, it varies a lot and yes, I do reserve my whole army (sans seer council) often enough to make mention. Not having your farseer out will cost you fortune on the turn you come in, and Runes of Warding. So you might as well just put him out there turn 1 and hide his ass behind the biggest building in your deployment zone.

On Autarchs - they just don't have a job. Fusion Gun, put them with the dragons? 5 Dragons can shoot anything sufficiently, thanks. Shove him in with DAs? If its 5 DAs, they won't have enough shooty or bodies to protect him, and if its a full squad, they won't fit in the same transport.

The only way I can see Autarchs being remotely useful is on a bike, with a Fusion Gun and Power Weapon, chilling with a GJB squad and using fusion gun + spear on vehicles. And even then, yeah, he's just a free KP and makes your precious troops a bigger target. Is it worth it for +1 reserve rolls? Unless your list is focussed on reserves, not a chance.

Just to clarify, that list was for Mech Eldar. Ratings change wilding based on anything other then Mech Eldar. In mech Eldar Harlies are heavily top T3 but still T3, taking Banshees over harlies in a Competitve Mechdar list should never be a question.

You do realize that Runes of Warding is always in play right? It's a piece of gear that is always in effect and has no range and not restriction of wear being "in play". Now if the farseer goes down that is a diff story.

Aww Blue..

Does this mean the Wraithhawk thingie will stop gracing the tabletops?