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Hello, so I am a band wagon hopper when it comes to the dark eldar. I've been wanting to play them for a long while now and this gives me the push to jump in. Only downside is I've NEVER played with, or against dark eldar. I don't think I've ever seen a dark eldar army in person! Only 40k experience I have, is running mech assault orks, playing them for 2 1/2 years. So I can use any help possible, I'll post the army I am thinking up, and comments next to each unit. I was hoping to keep this fairly cheap, but it's not looking good as I have 7 vehicles on the list.

The List:

HQ:
Haemonculus - liquifier, dark gate, flesh gauntlet - 105
Archon -huskblade, shadowfield, phantasm grenade launcher, ghostplate - 135

This is where I am completely lost, the ork player in me does not want to take expensive characters, so I kept them cheap and to the point. I changed the archon to make him incubi leader friendly.


Elite:

Incubus x5 - raider, flickerfield, disintegrator - 180
Trueborn x4 - blaster x4, raider, flickerfield, nightshield - 188

Changed some things, made the incubus more economically friendly, same goes for the trueborn. Both should be a bit more streamlined now.

Troops:

Warriors x10 - raider, flickerfield, splinter racks - 170
Warriors x10 - raider, flickerfield, splinter racks - 170
Wracks x9 - Liquifier, acothyst, flesh gauntlet, raider, flickerfield - 200

This would be the next area I am rather unsure about, the synergy with the splinter racks and the warriors makes me atleast want to try it out. The only downside is the rapid fire weapons, having to be so close to an opponent, could spell bad things in the future. I really like the concept behind the wracks, and with a haemi in them, they start out with a minimum of FNP and FC. With 2 poison attacks each? Awesome. Plus I'll get to see if I can convert anything! As I won't wait for the GW models.


Heavy:

Cronos - spirit vortex - 100
Ravager - flickerfield, nightshield - 125
Ravager - flickerfield, nightshield - 125

Total: 1498
Nothing more than a very mobile 6 dark lances, and if the enemy shoots at them, they aren't shooting at my other units! The cronos seems like it can be a great model floating around. The S5 2 attacks is kind of lame, but T7 with 3 wounds means your opponent has to put some serious firepower on it, which takes it away from the rest of your army! Oh, one thing, the file I'm looking at says per model killed it spreads a pain token, isn't it per unit killed?


Anyway, I'm sure this list is not even close to decent, since I have no experience with their glass cannon play style, I'm used to just rushing more orks forward, trying to keep them alive just long enough to get my klaws into the frey. I've been having fun with dark elves in fantasy, and was looking to try out their futuristic version!

Anyway, thanks in advance.

its is hard to tell which units will perform how since no one has any real experience, so the advice given is purely based on asumptions.
that said i would swap the trueborn for another ravager, less points better in killing off tanks and stuff.
use the remaining points for more incubi and 2 splinter cannons in your warrior squads, gives you a little more poisonous killing power

btw: shame on you you band wagon hopper!!!!

I know no has experience with the new one, but any help from people who've played the last codex for the past 12 years would be helpful

I kind of like the trueborn idea, if you need something popped, 4 blasters + 3 dark lances can make short work of it. Though freeing up 137 points leaves the options for something else, like 5 more incubi!

And I know, shame on me.

I'd say drop the dark lances on the trueborn as you will need to be stationary to use them sacrificing mobility = bad!,
Give your HQ's power weapons or agonisers of some descritpion with the points.
The trooper warriors could do with having blasters or something to make them a bit more flexible. But 3 scoring units is clever.

Also where are you getting your pts values from?

Can't link it, a guy posted a summary of all the units w/ points on a website, I'm going off of that. I looked at the book at my FLGS and it seems to be pretty accurate, I'll be taking this list over there tomorrow just to verify.

Yeah, I was thinking of dropping the two dark lances, for the reason you listed. Giving me 74 points to spend elsewhere! Blasters on the warrior units, plus an huskblade for the archon and power weapon for the haemi could do it.

spend the extra 75 points on your archon, itll be worth it,

WYTCHES-really good troops

Hi there. I've played DE for awhile now and I'm really excited about the new codex. I think I've seen the same thing you have, although I haven't playtested it yet.

Here's my thoughts:

1. Your archon (if you want to use one) needs to be both better protected and have some chopping power. Ghostlplate is fine for scourges, but your archon deserves better. He's one of the primier CC HQs in the game, but that loadout is shortchanging him. For not wanting to kit out your archon, you're sure spending a lot of points on that klavex... Do you 'really' need demiklaves for those points? And the bloodstone?! GW gave incubi FLEET as an early Christmas present and you want to give that up to shoot marines with a S3 flamer? All your HTH attacks are ignoring their armor anyway, and you're getting more of them with the onslaught power. [EDIT: Now that I think about it, I'm not even sure you need/want a klavex. Onslaught is ok, but one of the "problems" with incubi is that they hit *too* hard, wipe out a unit on the charge, leaving you exposed. You want to win on your opponent's turn. Also, one of the main reasons for taking a klavex, +1 ld, isn't needed when lead by an archon. You could replace the entire klavex shebang for one more incubi, get mostly what you want (extra attacks), save points, and really sacrafice nothing.] I would seriously, seriously, seriously think about removing some of those points and giving your archon:

1. Shadowfield (or clone field, but... not sure how i feel about that yet)
2. Drugs (maybe)
3. Phantasm launcher (I don't think the incubi even have plasma grenades, so this is a must for an archon leading incubi IMO)
4. Agonizer (or at least some kind of power weapon, as there are other legit options now). A word on the huskblade/soultrap combo... I think it's both expensive and difficult to pull off. Also, chances are that by the time you kill your first IC, you probably won't need to kill a second one, especially at 1500. Yes you'll be S6, but the instant death is not likely to be needed again... how about soultrap & power weapon? Saves 25 pts and works nearly as good.

Shooting weapons such as a blast pistol should be secondary if taken at all on an archon. You're going to want to fleet when you have to, leaving only the assaults that aren't a close call (distance wise) that will give you a chance to shoot. Even when you know you can get the charge for sure, *positioning* can still be improved with fleet, especially since the archon is not going to be invisible in the squad anymore.

Heamy: I assume you're taking the heamy mostly to get wracks as troops. Keeping him simple is good, and the dark gate looks like fun. Just remember it scatters, is a big blast, and is short distance... you could end up hurting yourself with it. That said, you're only taking one unit of wracks and you don't need the elite slot. The heamy makes them scoring, but it seems to me you should try to leverage this a little more if that's your plan... If you can't make more out of it, why not just drop the heamy and the wracks. Just a thought. One other thing to remember about his free pain point... if you're going to have him join the wracks, that second pain point isn't going to help them that much because they're using poisoned cc weapons, negating the more important part of furious charge.

Troops: As a more old school DE player, I have to say taking only 3 troops, even at 1500, scares me. I think you're going to find that even with the splinter racks, you aren't going to want to be using warriors as an in your face kind of troop. Both the raider and the troops inside are too fragile. I see a 10 man sqaud with one splinter cannon, in cover, with 1 pain token (FNP) being *excellent* defenders of objectives. The raider squad could work though. If you do, I'd at least think about dropping the night shields. These units are going to be close in, so there's little chance you're going to avoid getting shot at. You might avoid a second die on a melta, or avoid rapid fire, but truthfully the fact that the raider has a dark lance always makes it worth bringing down, and I'm not sure the nightshields are going to be worth it. The anti-assualt vehicle upgrade might be worth is, as might the -1 ld upgrade in this kind of unit, and you could have both for the price of the NS. I'm not totally aginst nightshields, but you should consider the ranges you're going to be fighting at with this kind of unit.

Also, I have to say that wyches as troops are another christmas present that you haven't opened yet. They're nearly as good as they were as elites in the old codex, and now they score. Score!

Fast attack: This and heavy are where all the sexy is at in our new codex. Every single entry is worth looking at in both force org types. I'm a little surprised you don't have anything from fast....

On the elites, I'd agree you should drop *either* the darklances *or* the blasters on the trueborn. Although they have the similar stats, they're just fundamentally different weapons. Blasters are really meant to be used by moving troops. 4 blasters in a raider give you an effective 30" with those guns, which is sweet, and almost as good as a DL. Also, consider a 10 man scourge unit with 4 blasters for a very similar points cost. The shard carbines the regular scourges get make such a unit very, very deadly against troops as well as vehicles (even with 4 blasters, you're still putting out 22 shots at an effective 30"). They also have tougher armor and an invuln. save, although no raider, obviously.

Your heavies are also fine. Ravagers with this kind of loadout are great, but they are hardly the only choice. I have two observations:
1. Your army seems light on all 3 major kinds of anti-infantry, horde, MEQ, and TEQ, although I must admit I'm more used to 2k games, so you might be ok at 1500. I know you have lots of lances, so you seem ok on vehicles, but troops are still out there and I just am not seeing the shooting in your list that's going to be able to take all comers.
2. There are some *amazing* heavy choices now, and not all of them are expensive. For 110, you can get a fully kitted out chronos, that can go around giving free pain tokens, especially that ever so valuable first one, to lots of units. The voidraven, IMHO, is going to be the new ravager. 2 voidlances, options to take necrotoxin missiles (for additional points) that can put the fear into MEQ or lighter infantry, and a void mine that can be used in the movement phase all mean that this is an entry not to be overlooked. If money is an issue, kitbash.

That's my few cents. I don't know what all is going to work yet, but I hope my rant was useful

rmeju wrote:if you're going to have him join the wracks, that second pain point isn't going to help them that much because they're using poisoned cc weapons, negating the more important part of furious charge.

Except....Wracks are str 3 base, so if you give them FC then on the charge they are str 4 and I5, therefore striking before marines and then re-rolling wounds due to poison!

Wracks+Haemmie will be tits in the new codex! I would drop the liquifier from the haemmie to get a flesh gauntlet, as well as one for the wrack champ

I may be wrong, and I don't have my "codex" in front of me, but I thought wracks use posioned ccw, which wounds on 4+ regardless of str. Do they reroll to wound? Even if they do, does their str matter when doing so? Sure the initiative is important, but when the str bump doesn't matter, the extra pain token isn't as much of a draw. You're right, however, +1 I is nothing to sneeze at, especially when it gets you to 5.

Please correct me if I've been misinformed as to the poison.

Rmeju

Poison (according the the BBB) always wounds on a 4+ regardless of strength, however if your str is equal to or greater than your opponents toughness, you can re-roll the wound roll! You must not play vs tyranids much!

@rmeju:

My "anti horde" is basically the warriors in raiders with the racks, on average it's 9 wounds a turn to guard/orks/nids per raider squad. Not a lot I know, but it's something. That's also why I don't want to let go of the liquifiers in the haemi's squad, they are kind of like my swiss army knife unit. They should be able to stand toe to toe against MEQ or horde, while the incubi are more for MEQ/TEQ. I like the idea of dropping the klavex for another incubi, I was mostly wanting to keep it at 5 so I only had to buy one box.

Hmmm....a little math about the incubi:

With klavex and onslaught, using the +2 attacks from demiklaves:
on the charge:
18 attacks - 3s to hit so 12 hits - 4s to wound so 6 wounds - 2 6s rolled so two more attacks - 1.33 hits - .667 wounds. 6.667 wounds total

without klavex:
15 attacks - 10 hits - 5 wounds

so, the klavex with demiklaves and onslaught is good for on average 1.667 more wounds worth the extra 50 points? not looking like it, could drop him and add 3 more to the squad. Though like you said, it's almost too much hitting power at that point. Against space marines though (main codex) they can still do that flee reaction and leave combat, so no matter what you're stranded (though can't you sweeping advance to keep them in combat?)

I think the sweet spot will be 5 incubi + archon w/ shadowfield, agonizer, blast pistol, and phantasm grenade launcher. (QUESTION: can agonizer get an extra attack from wielding with a pistol? or does it fall under the category of the power firsts and lightning claws?)

I'm also liking the idea of the cronos with vortex upgrade, that 5" template can be a good answer to horde, and it can shoot pain tokens around also!


The reason for no fast, and light on heavy (pun?) is there appears to be SO MUCH good stuff, fitting it all in at 1500 points is going to be hard pressed to do.

How does a unit of 10 hellions with the baron SC sound? Stealth adds to their survivability a little, and they can pack enough punch in combat, mobile, and the IC drag rule is kind of neat, can surprise that seer council!


EDIT: I changed the original list.

Your math seems solid (I didn't do any, just gave you my "gut") so I'll throw in two observations. First, try to remember that your archon/incubi unit is going to end up finding your opponent's HQ squad, and they may not want to fall back. If it's a test of inititaive, they probably aren't going to be able to cut it against you, but I'm not totally up on the combat tactics power. Second, like I said, splinter racks are certainly an interesting option, I just worry that your plan might have tactical problems (as opposed to math problems). When the raider goes down, the splinter racks go with it and so will ~3 of the squad. Then you're within 12" of whatever you were shooting at.

I'm looking forward to hearing how it works though. It certainly needs to be tried!