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 bullyboy wrote:
hmmm, adding a harlequin themed knight ....I like that

however, you have underpointed your wraithknight...

Knight 402
2 shuricannons 24
Titanic ghostglaive 65
Scattershield 20

511pts

So I did! I did the points cost for the regular glaive and not the extra large one haha. Thanks for pointing this out! If i drop the Shuris it leaves me with 112 so I can fit in a Void like Robin5t mentioned, or the Skyrunner Autarch with lance and fusion pistol for an even 2k. thoughts?

One thing that keeps frustrating me when I'm list-building is that I keep forgetting our basic close combat weapons cost 1 point instead of being free.

I'm currently building my harlequins, and I have a basic question for you veterans out there;

When building your troupe members, do you mix close combat options with the pistol upgrades? What I mean is, do you ever equip a troupe member with both upgraded CCWs and upgraded pistols, like a harlequin kiss and a fusion pistol?

That seems like a lot of points to have on one model, so I am hesitant to put both on one. So far all of my fusion pistol models are only carrying harlequin blades as their CCWs.

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance

I tend to go for pistols or weapons. Since pistols were overcosted and useless in 7th edition (usually max 1 shoot the whole game for 15 points) I never bothered with them. Now, in 8th though, I'm thinking of going for Fusion Pistol clown cars. They're like the new Blasterborn in Venoms or something

Somebody explain to me please why people are so excited for the Voidweaver?
I understand the Prismatic Cannon was buffed, but it still only hits on a 4+ after moving. That's very unreliable and bad for the single shot mode.

 Mayk0l wrote:
I tend to go for pistols or weapons. Since pistols were overcosted and useless in 7th edition (usually max 1 shoot the whole game for 15 points) I never bothered with them. Now, in 8th though, I'm thinking of going for Fusion Pistol clown cars. They're like the new Blasterborn in Venoms or something

Somebody explain to me please why people are so excited for the Voidweaver?
I understand the Prismatic Cannon was buffed, but it still only hits on a 4+ after moving. That's very unreliable and bad for the single shot mode.

For me, I compare it to everyone elses' vehicles, and see that we've got a light skimmer with the firepower of a medium tank and potentially the durability to match thanks to the to-hit penalty and 4++, all while being the joint-fastest vehicle in the game and not being shabby in melee. All for 108 points.

Can anyone name another vehicle in the game that seems to give you so much for so little? Because I've been looking and I'm not sure I can.

Ah fair points. Maybe I am focusing too much on the 4+ to hit. It just looks ugly as an Eldar player

What's the general opinion on mechanised versus walking clowns? Mechanised looks stronger but feels kind of wasteful for the Shadowseers awesome powers.

You're gonna lose transports though, so shadows will protect the infantry when they dismount.

I'm very, very excited about Harlequins. But painting them nice yellow and purple with all those fancy diamonds has killed it for me in the past. They look awesome, but 'they' are just 10 guys.

Might go Frozen Stars just to get all that plastic painted, also Frozen Stars fit my White/Gold CWE pretty nicely.
Might even do my unpainted DE (or: Drukhari) in those colours.


Could do Aeldari and go for all the rules, or Ynnari with SFD. So much options with my model range, haven't been excited about 40k like this in a long time.

Just wanted to put that out here
Even painted up my Wraithkinght. No problem taking it as an auxiliary LOW detachment. Does it blow now? Apparently, but list building has never been this awesome.

We get amazing HQ's now, 4++, penalties to hit us, everything makes us look really promising.

I can't decide whether to go Harlequins, or Aeldari and take all the rules wherever I feel like it, or go Ynnari (but Rising Crescendo looks so amazing).


How do you like the new sky weavers? With their 4++, penalties to hit they look pretty durable and they're crazy fast, but I'm not sure what role they fill. Their shooting isn't amazing and they are, if I am not mistaken, completely lacklustre in CC unless they've got a Zephyr Glaive.
How are you equipping them? Are you fielding them in units of 2 or bigger?

One thing i find funny about Harlequins is that they completely ignore terrain. That would be perfect to jump from cover to cover. But they also will never get any bonus from cover. The 4++ is always better. So they basicly just run around in the open, charging stuff.

Weidekuh wrote:
One thing i find funny about Harlequins is that they completely ignore terrain. That would be perfect to jump from cover to cover. But they also will never get any bonus from cover. The 4++ is always better. So they basicly just run around in the open, charging stuff.

Yes. Cover is useless, LoS blocking terrain is pretty good, but with no-scatter DS and the fact that you need to see a single guy to kill a unit, it's much harder to keep guys out of LoS.
Although I think mechanized harlequins are much better than footslogging ones.

I haven't had a chance to look at all of the rules, but does overwatch hit on 6's or does it give the attackers BS6+? If it is the latter then most of our units cannot be hit by overwatch.

I'm also excited for the Voidweaver as I now have 2x Shuriken cannons on it that can shoot at everything. No more reverse fire mode only!

Someone mentioned earlier a Starweaver packed with Death Jesters. That seems expensive but pretty powerful. That would be a drive-by assassination squad forcing morale checks and killing the heavy weapon / unit leaders. I may have to try it out.

Death jesters cannot target heavy weapon models, or any models in a unit specifically. He can target characters that are their own unit.
Overwatch is 6 to hit and does not use modifiers.

I think he means he targets heavy weapons with his fall back rule

Correct Mayk0I, the fall back rule the death jester has would be very useful for drive by assassinations, assuming you can get them to fail their morale checks.

@bullyboy Thanks for the info on overwatch. We still have our 4+ invul save so we are still tough. 50% of the time we block a wound every time!

Not only does Flip Belt let you ignore Terrain, you ignore other models when moving.

Use the Shadowseer's Twilight Pathways, along with Rising Crescendo to get a Troupe Unit behind the "screening" group to get to the characters that do the aura buffing. Remember that Advancing is not two separate moves, it is base move plus the d6" in one move.

Which is also really good for the Solitaire going after something with his Rising Crescendo and Blitz/Twilight Pathways from behind his screening Player Troupe.

Also, note that Shadowseer's Gernade launcher is "assault" and can be used after Advancing, downside of that though is only 3+ to hit instead of 2+...

Anyone think a Hemlock instead of two voidweavers might be a decent option?

So, what are people's ideas on how to tackle hordes?

The only ideas I can come up with involve either dedicating far too many points to destroying them or trying to use our mobility to ignore them entirely, and I don't know how feasible that's likely to be.

 Robin5t wrote:
So, what are people's ideas on how to tackle hordes?

The only ideas I can come up with involve either dedicating far too many points to destroying them or trying to use our mobility to ignore them entirely, and I don't know how feasible that's likely to be.

I don't really know. It's always been a problem for harlies, and it's now way worse than in 7th, because of the loss of sweeping advance and Ld-based attacks.
On the bright side, we can now charge with vehicles, which take a lot less damages from overwatch than our poor players do.

If a player wounds on 3s rerolling and ignores armor (so against GEQ when carrying a melee weapon), he/she will deal an average of 0.59 wound/attack. So 5 players with melee weapons would kill ~12 GEQ in combat. If these GEQ are not immune to morale, they would loose an additional 9 guys in the morale phase (assuming Ld 6). It's not too bad, but most blobs of GEQ have ways to mitigate morale checks, so it's hard to count on that. And against big blobs, the players are likely to suffer a lot from the returning hits, and make the total endeavor a loss for the harlequin player.

I don't see how pure harlequins could manage hordes.
With allies, I suppose the razorwing flocks are a decent option. 7pts for 8 attacks and 4W is about as hordy as it gets (and what's better to fight a horde than another horde?). Sure they will be hitting on 5s (rerolling if you take an expensive beastmaster) and wounding on 5s or 6s, but even if they don't kill much, they're a good tarpit.

Maybe footslogging troupes with more players?

Morale mitigation is a big problem, though. Against Guard, I'd say to try and take out the Commissar with the Solitaire then have a larger troupe of 8-10 players hit the blob. Similar with Nids - we've got fairly effective means of ignoring the chaff and going straight after the Synapse creatures, I mean it won't always work, but we at least have something resembling a workable plan.

Orks are my biggest concern, honestly. I haven't got a clue how to deal with a proper green tide. Maybe have Voidweavers thin them out with dispersed mode + shuriken fire first?

Hordes tend to have lots of low BS, low S shooting in high volumes. This used to always be the bane of Harlies. Footslogging seems vulnerable to that.
My guess would be charge a mob with the transport first, soak overwatch, then run two or three squads in at the same time. We're fast so start on one flank and ignore a part of their army maybe?
Hope they forget about their strategem to strike first. That strategem looks really strong.


Edit: considering some small units of wyches. Might tie Guard up so they can't just fall back and shoot you

So In terms of troupe/master loadouts what is everyone thinking for 8th.

I really still like the caress, being str 5 base, wounding most infantry/models on 3s will be huge especially now wounding on 2s is tougher. And you still have a -2 which is great.

Think for me possibly Starweaver transport with 5 players all with caress and shuriken pistols , master with fusion.

Something I noticed about the solitaire is he doesn't have the masque faction keyword. So the shadowseer and troupe master auras don't effect him and he can't ride in a starweaver. Thankfully he is beastly on his own!

My greyknights will murder Harlequins. Too much storm bolters for you.

 Xenomancers wrote:
My greyknights will murder Harlequins. Too much storm bolters for you.

I played against grey knights.
DS storm bolters were indeed very nasty for my footslogging players, but the ones in starweavers didn't care, and when I drove my starweaver full of fusion player close to paladins they just vanished.

I don't think grey knights are a good counter to harlequins. They indeed can bring quite a lot of low S shots, which is the bane of footslogging harlequins (but it's less effective against Starweavers than in 7th), but they are also what harlequins excel at killing (T4, good armor).

Shinzra wrote:
So In terms of troupe/master loadouts what is everyone thinking for 8th.

I really still like the caress, being str 5 base, wounding most infantry/models on 3s will be huge especially now wounding on 2s is tougher. And you still have a -2 which is great.

Think for me possibly Starweaver transport with 5 players all with caress and shuriken pistols , master with fusion.

I like embraces now at 2/3 the points of a caress. Now that T6 and T7 is wounded on a 5+, which is rerolled with a Troupe Master, that extra -1 AP is going to make up for it on a lot of units. Yes, you get to wound marines on a 3+ with the caress, but they save on a 5+. Wounding on a 4+ with the caress, they save on a 6+. You can reroll failed wounds, but not passed armor saves.

I think they overpriced multiple damage weapons, the kiss is far too expensive for only being S4, -1 AP. Sure, D3 damage is nice, but you need to get past that armor save first.

fresus wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
My greyknights will murder Harlequins. Too much storm bolters for you.

I played against grey knights.
DS storm bolters were indeed very nasty for my footslogging players, but the ones in starweavers didn't care, and when I drove my starweaver full of fusion player close to paladins they just vanished.

I don't think grey knights are a good counter to harlequins. They indeed can bring quite a lot of low S shots, which is the bane of footslogging harlequins (but it's less effective against Starweavers than in 7th), but they are also what harlequins excel at killing (T4, good armor).

My Greyknight list is mainly Strike squad marines / Razors with TL AC / and dreads with Autocannons and las cannons. Pretty good anti infantry and anti tank. Pretty much I feel this list will be unbeatable without some sort of massive CC alpha strike (which after reading all the index) isn't actually much of a threat. Harlies are indeed scary (4++ save as standard is a little crazy + all the - to hit and wound from character buffs.) However - the ability to surgical strike half my units for free is also insane. I expect harlies and GK will be top tier competitive armies.

Wyldcarde wrote:
Something I noticed about the solitaire is he doesn't have the masque faction keyword. So the shadowseer and troupe master auras don't effect him and he can't ride in a starweaver. Thankfully he is beastly on his own!

Great find, didn't notice that before. Still, it suits his lone assassin role. He's quite a billy no mates character!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Oaka wrote:

Shinzra wrote:
So In terms of troupe/master loadouts what is everyone thinking for 8th.

I really still like the caress, being str 5 base, wounding most infantry/models on 3s will be huge especially now wounding on 2s is tougher. And you still have a -2 which is great.

Think for me possibly Starweaver transport with 5 players all with caress and shuriken pistols , master with fusion.

I like embraces now at 2/3 the points of a caress. Now that T6 and T7 is wounded on a 5+, which is rerolled with a Troupe Master, that extra -1 AP is going to make up for it on a lot of units. Yes, you get to wound marines on a 3+ with the caress, but they save on a 5+. Wounding on a 4+ with the caress, they save on a 6+. You can reroll failed wounds, but not passed armor saves.

I think they overpriced multiple damage weapons, the kiss is far too expensive for only being S4, -1 AP. Sure, D3 damage is nice, but you need to get past that armor save first.

I think the caress will be useful for taking on the T8 monsters/vehicles out there (the ones the fusions didn't finish). Wounding on 5's instead of 6 is a big deal. My troupes will mostly embrace with an odd caress and I'm keeping caresses on TMs. I'm just disappointed that the kiss is too overpriced to be useful, although I will still have 1 in a troupe just because. My biggest issue right now is that they address the neuro disruptor in the FAQ as it's currently pointless and will ce used as a fusion on all the models that I have with it currently.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRs5p6OpaDs

Miniwargaming battle report with Harlequins vs Genestealer Cult

It got me thinking about the army composition (which in the battle report breaks down as follows)

1 DeathJester
1 Solitare
6 Skyweavers (w/glaive)

3 Starweavers
3 Troupe Masters
3X 5 Troupers with equipment (perhaps all had melta... Can't remember)

Obviously this list isn't optimal (not does it claim to be) as I think you would you be better cutting some of the characters in order to purchase a 4th troupe + transport into the list.
But, this train of thought got me thinking... How do we see the the troupe masters in this list, AND, in general?
Anyone care to crunch the numbers on the 'worth' of the Master's value compared to the points invested? How much extra damage output does he provide the squad vs the equivalent points in troupers? Obviously you have HIS wounds + attacks against that of the troupers BUT is all this moot when you do have to account for the transports small capacity and the need to maximise damage for the 6 slots provided.

I'm really just rambling here but does he offer enough?

Played 10 games with Harlequins 8th so far.

A few fast notes

Dont play them as Ynnari..... just dont

Shadowseers are GOD, take 2

Troupe Masters help, but dont spend to much, take 1

From my experience and from loads of math one of the better combos of gear on a 5man Troupe is
2 Caress, 3 Embrace, 1 Fusion Pistol
*note Embrace is better with TM re-rolls, Caress is better without

Death Jests are over costed, take them for fun

Skyweavers are more of a Support unit now, fly around shooting for a few turns and melee for back up (Star bolas are not good the upgrade to glaive is better) dont over do it with these guys, i wouldnt take more than 6 until you hit 2500pts at least

Starweavers are still great you can Foot slug but i've had much better games with MSU of 5 mans in Starweaves.

Solitaire is a must, just always take him.


Some Tactics

Yes you can turn 1 and turn 2 charge, but its not always best to, being in Starweavers, with bikes and voidweavers as back up shooting you do much more damage than you think you would. 18 Shuriken Cannons and 2 Prismatic Cannons will get you 1st blood and able to kill multi units most times. Try to shoot your self some safe spots for charging later. Also use your large movements to insure you stay out of LoS of heavy shooting units, especially ones you cant kill with 1 round of shooting.

Harlequins is all about timing and positioning, as soon as you get these 2 things down you will the master of the table!

I've won 8 of my games tho i dont really count them TBH b.c the edition is so new my opponents dont have their armies down well yet!

Ive played again BA's x2, Nids x2, SM x2, Daemons x4. Lost to Daemons and Nids.

Troupe masters are solid. Refilling wounds is so important for elite armies. I'm only taking jesters to get a cheap command point for Vanguard detachment.