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 Furyou Miko wrote:
How about changing the ability to ignore all incoming fire on a 2+ into just reducing the strength score of incoming fire to a maximum of 7?

This is the issue with a wave serpent. No one cares about the fact that they get a shooting attack they care that they have to pour fire on them to kill one because they pretty much have to kill them through HP depletion.

My experience has been the exact opposite. Nobody cared about the possible durability (and it's not unreasonable for its price), they've cared about the absurd shooting and alpha capability.

The ridiculous range of a Wave Serpent's shield shockwave and other weapons means that they can easily sit far away enough to never have to worry about losing the shield's durability buff.

The durability buff isn't really that bad; HP stripping an AV12 skimmer to death isn't that hard even with the holofield jink save buff.

The problem is that what should logically be a short ranged shockwave is instead a long ranged automatic tank cannon.

Changing it to a template (probably not even a torrent) would do much to keep it more in line with the description of the weapon, force them to get close, and prevent it from being used as an anti-air vehicle.

The problems with the Wave Serpent are many and varied:

It a very powerful and Etremely long rnaged gun platform
its fast and agile
its very durable shield and jink and holof fields...
Its almost always able to deliver its troops without them suffering penalties or not being able to fire.
There is no other option in the DT slot.

Bharring wrote:
I respectfully (it's a good idea) disagree. Part of the problem with Eldar and Tau atm is their long range firepower decimating armies first turn. Limiting it to one shot does help balance the Serpent, but it retains the artillery style Alpha, whereas nerfing the range helps mitigate it while retaining the Serpent's resilient feeling.

(I usually ran them with 10 Avengers with Exarch in each, and two Far seers with one of the units, but I currently get complaints with even one of those now).

Except that if you make the shield too short range it nerfs the durability because at 12" range I'll just assault the serpent at which point it gets no durability. The issue right now is that it puts out tons of shots per turn, not wiping people out turn 1. I actually think the best fix is removal of the scatter laser (or disallow it Twin linking the shield). Non twin linked the shield is far less scarey. But just limiting its range either is ineffective (at 24" range or more) or too effective 6-12" range or less.

Well that or just change it to a Falcon shield and leave it in heavy support not Dedicated.

At current state if you make a WS cost +30 pts it'd still be point-effective. But at least will cost more appropriate.

More cost-appropriate for a MBT, but even less appropriate for an APC. You'd think a civilization based on their vehicles carrying their people would have at least *one* viable transport.

Simply bumping the price makes it even harder to do a well rounded Eldar army.

Agreed the problem is two fold - the Wave Serpent is hugely OP but the Eldar have no other choice as a DT..........

I look at it compared to the falcon, which is 10 points more expensive. Loses the shield, 5 slots for passengers, and twin linking on the turret gun, for a pulse laser. It also pays more for non-twin linked gun upgrades than the serpent does for twin liked upgrades (about twice as much.)

SO as I said remove the shield from the serpent and put it on the falcon (which due to not having a TL Scatter laser option is a bit more balanced.).

Then maybe drop the serpent down 15 points and I think it would work out well.

Other than the fact that the serpent is losing its defense, if thats the case just give me a bloody devil fish.

and why does a standard Dedicated transport need a 2+ change pen to glance, it can still take holofields for cover, is fast which a devilfish is not etc.

Just comparing to most other dedicated transports. Most are not skimmers, most are not fast, most don't have AV12, most don't have 2 useful guns etc. So it is priced right at ~100 points without any shield.

Fast only matters if you have enough weapons, without the shield fast is not as good, A devil fish would have more fire power with one less av on the sides and cost less, not to mention they are considered crappy. (they can also take battle systems). Most armies Hull point tanks anyway, and the holofields are not as good as disruption pods, and tau have 2 useful guns on their skimmer. At 100 points without a shield you are getting a crappier crappy devilish.

 Slayer222 wrote:
Fast only matters if you have enough weapons, without the shield fast is not as good, A devil fish would have more fire power with one less av on the sides and cost less, not to mention they are considered crappy. (they can also take battle systems). Most armies Hull point tanks anyway, and the holofields are not as good as disruption pods, and tau have 2 useful guns on their skimmer. At 100 points without a shield you are getting a crappier crappy devilish.

... forgot to mention the lack of access points on a WS... at least you can drop troops out the side of a Fish...

One of those "Two useful guns" is a range 12 s4 gun... That one, unupgraded, is quite weak. The other is 24" s6 assault 3 ap5 ap2 on 6s, which isn't bad, bit we're talking 100 points for that even with the reduction. You're vastly overestimating it.

The other thing to recall is that they're usually transporting SM-costed models with only t3 and often 4+. That means, on explosions for a DA squad, you're losing 1/3 of the unit, then taking two LD tests (pinning and breaking) with no ATSKNF.

Complaining that Eldar transports are more durable than basic SM transports is, fluffwise, complaining about the average North Korean vehicle being less safe than the average American vehicle.