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Okay so before I start this some of you might be thinking "hey your that dude that posted that poorly worded and somewhat offensive topic on them before!" Now I understand many of you will be upset but before I continue I would like to start by saying my friend Travis had got into my account and I had left it up on my comp and before long yeah bad things happened.

The only real defense I have is that anyone who has read anyother topics I have will probably notice a difference between them and that one, also I would like to personally apologise to anyone who was offended or annoyed by my friend (To get back at him I tied him to his bed and piled chairs and whatnot on him in his sleep) I really am sorry about that and I for the most part hold myself responsible for my careless mistake of leaving my dakka account on and unattended.

Now onto the breakdown of the Dark Eldar in my opinion. I had started Dark Eldar ooh I'd say before the new blood angels codex? And after having read the changes for the dark eldar from my booklet (which I had pre-ordered) I have to say for me it will be a struggle at first to adapt but I'm still happy with the new changes. We have fairly solid infantry whom specialise in certain things very well and can adapt but ultimately their speed can allow them to effectively control the battle.

With out special heroes I'm not too sure what to think right now, they seem very situational but extremely good when those situations arise, for example lady malys her ability is if I recall correctly was she and any unit she joins is immune to psycic powers. Now that is situational but imagine going against eldar and putting her in a high value killy unit? I'm sure not being affected by doom, mindwar, eldricstorm, ect. will very likely ruin an eldar players day. On the other hand our special heroes also allow us to play our armies differently my example being the duke sliscus and the baron. One allows you to do an entire deepstrike army which is very cool, and the other makes hellions troop, and personally I always loved the idea of the hellions

Now with our regular lords things changed alot and at the same time not really, archon is still 60pts but he now has the court of the archon. Personally I have not tried the court of the archon yet I keep it (traditional archon+5incubi) however the court of the archon seems very interesting to me and I will try them when I get a better hold of the new Dark Eldar.
Our haemonclius went up in points alittlebit (I think it was 45pts now? Not sure it's late and I'm tired) but with a free pain token and wracks being troop, also being able to take devastating weapons and arcane wargear it's well worth the cost.

Our troop choices normally are warriors and wyches but can be expanded upon taking certain heroes. warriors went up to 9pts but now their guns are poisoned 4+ Well worth 1 extra point really. Dark Lances went up from 10 to 25 points that is a very big change but that dosent mean you cant take some dark lances anymore, just means you need to rethink things or try new weapons. Wyches went down from 12 to 10pts it might not seem like much but for close combat killing machines that is huge (to me atleast) and with new weapons they just got better at murdering enemy infantry or you could just take lelith with a squad of wyches and watch your opponent get pretty mad

Our elites just became something people really should fear, for me I have a hard time choseing between Incubi, Mandrakes, and Grotesques. Mostly I just take 1 squad of 5 incubi and put them with archon, and 2 squads of 15 mandrakes. The mandrakes might not seem all that good seeing how they need a pain token not just for the feel no pain but for the shooting too however have them outflank and they might do wonders or atleast buy you time to reposition or something like that. I have yet to try the grotesques but I will wait on that too. As for the Kabalite trueborn or the hecatrix bloodbrides personally I do not like them but thats just me. Also the harlequins I really want to try them but I feel they are just no, hope to be proven wrong on that aspect.

Our fast attack consisting of jetbikers, hellions, and I believe scourges now? Yeah. Well the jetbikers had serverd me well in the previous codex as either speedbumb suicide units or hero hunter (sometimes both) and sometimes they would just decimate guys, and personally I'm happy with the changes I think it suits them (and makes the deadlier) with hellions I hear they are much more viable and it looks like it too also I absolutely love the concept of them soo I definately would like to bring them into my kabal/cult hybrid. Scourges well before I hated them they took a heavy choice and were outragouesly expensive, luckily they seem better now though I still might not try them. Also I belive beastmasters are either fast or elite I forgot but I feel other units could play a better role.

Now heavy choices is where (aside for HQ) I believe the Dark Eldar can truly shine and man we have some nasty new toys. My personal favorite (and a classic oldie in our army) is the ravager! It's cheap, it's very killy, it has better armor than our transports, combine that with the flicker field and you have a very deadly unit speeding around picking your forces off or soaking up more firepower than they should be allowed to. Also we have razorwing fighter and the voidraven bomber, now these are alittle more expensive however they still have some nasty surprises for the enemy (my personal favorite between the two is definately the void raven) We also have the talos, now the talos was an oddity before mostly hit and miss sometimes it did wonders, sometimes not so much. This however has been changed with it's update, now it is cheaper and has some sweat new gear for it to take but I'm more interested in its counterpart the chronos parasite engine. This thing is well for its points a steal if it does well on the battlefield it can really rackup some paintokens for the army and give you the extra boost you might need, I really suggest giving this guy a fair shot.

Well that is my rundown sorry it is alot to read but I had to go indeph (to an extent) without ruining too much for anyone who hasnt gotten their codex yet. Now I do realise I probably made mistakes or left out key things and its either because it would take much longer than needed or because of spoilers or because I outright forgot I'm tired and havent really memorised or took the time to really visually ingest the codex as much as I would have liked to so I apologise for any mistake I have made. Also the only thing I dislike about the new Dark Eldar is that I cant put my archon on a jetbike or a hellion board anymore but I'll manage

Good Post.

Moonscar14 wrote:Lol I remember that but hey you forgot to give credit where credit is due I helped too! Good post though, long but still good.

Sorry about forgetting to mention you on getting back at Travis I knew I forgot somethin anyway I wish I could have made it shorter but meh I couldnt resist going into detail to an extent

Definitely agree on the Reavers. Great models and like the new rules. With cluster caltrops and heat lances they can harass infantry whilst manoeuvring to shoot at the side and rear of armour to get a sneaky kill-shot in. Wracks as a troop choice will be great. Even 1 squad with a haemonculi will be a serious objective holder/contester that has a lot of survivability.

Yeah I always had a soft spot for reavers too, havent tried the heatlance yet mostly because I was confused until recently when I realised it's a melta and a lance! I think all my friends who play SM are going to be crying very soon Well now knowing that I definately intend to give wracks with a haemonculi a try. And with heavies I'm still stuck on ravager I can just move up or back 12 inches and keep shooting my target and 9 times out of 10 they cant fire back at me, nightfield definately worth its points that 6inches they cant shoot really does hurt them when it matters most add that with flicker field and well people get angry

And dont forget. Haemonculi with 9 wracks means you start with 2 pain tokens for the squad. So they're feel no pain and furious charging from turn one! With the Acothyst upgrade and whatever fun toys you give the haemonculi you get a very cost effective squad that can take on elite infantry, monstrous creatures and hordes with equal ability. Great for a scoring unit.

Lexx wrote:And dont forget. Haemonculi with 9 wracks means you start with 2 pain tokens for the squad. So they're feel no pain and furious charging from turn one! With the Acothyst upgrade and whatever fun toys you give the haemonculi you get a very cost effective squad that can take on elite infantry, monstrous creatures and hordes with equal ability.

Now that I never took into consideration and it is also a very good point and sounds like something very mean to do lol personally with arcane wargear I usually take I think it was called dark gate and orb of despair? Mostly for the shooting thingy and the S10 blast weapon. So I'm likely only gonna do 1 squads of wracks for testing purposes so should I take normal haemonculis or should I go big with the ancient?

Both haemconuli are worth it. It all depends on how much points you have spare. Even the old stinger pistol and venom blade combo seems to be good. Though you could give him a husk blade or flesh gauntlet for some instant death on anything he wounds. Dark gate has be one of the most funny ( in my mind ) weapons in the codex. Effectively opening up a portal to hell for a giant hand /tentacle to grab a unit of men/a tank and suck it back into its own realm. Liquifiers are also well worth it. The AP D6 is amazing on a flamer template. Im tempted to try the mindphase gauntlet to deny enemy characters their attacks. Highly likely because they have to take two separate characteristic tests.

Isnt it great to have sooo many more options than before? I think I'll go ancient cause I usually play 2000-2500pt games and why not I think the extra killy power will definately have them make their points back ifnot more. I might go lelith and ancient for the ultimate CC carnage maybe three sqauds of 10-15 mandrakes to flank while the jetbikes go dread hunting seeing how someone I know plays BA and I think he likes dreads and pods

Best of luck. Im not so sold on the mandrakes current rules personally. But am willing to proven wrong if others can pull off using them. More of a fan of the Incubi as an elite. When you absolutely need something killed. Send them in! Yes its very nice to have a selection. Most of them actually looking pretty viable as well. I like the look of Khymerae + Clawed Fiend beastmaster units. Move 6 charge 12 with great stats.

I think the idea with them is they are your outflankers - as you have no other choice in the DE codex.

Surely you want some Rending in those beast units? Remember Fleet as well

I'm not so sold on the Razorwings. As they'll easily get instant death. I would rather the Khymerae for their invulnerable save and the clawed fiends for their multiple wounds and getting more attacks if they lose a few wounds.

so far my experience with mandrakes has been very good, I simply use them to outflank and tie up heroes and killy units to buy my army some nice time. Needless to say I still have much for the incubi they dont let me down either However my last game against my friends black templar my mandrakes did better than I expected Turn 2 they came in one squad on each side, and killed my friends Marshall.

The second squad charged his sword breatheren assault termies with TH/SS and they had an emperors champion (I think he had abhor the witch, destroy the witch) And those mandrakes killed the champion and three termies not half bad I'd say, then the squad that killed the marshall shot at and then charged his shooty squad that had I think like 2 plasma cannons? And the mandrakes tied them for the rest of the game.

Of course my jetbikers had the other shooty squad tied as well, and the archon with 5 incubi just sat in cover and waited for anything stupid enough to try and get through my choke point

Lexx wrote:I'm not so sold on the Razorwings. As they'll easily get instant death. I would rather the Khymerae for their invulnerable save and the clawed fiends for their multiple wounds and getting more attacks if they lose a few wounds.

Thats true of almost the entire army though. Even the Archon or any of the special or independent characters that are toughness 3 (which is most of them) can die to a stray assault cannon round. One failed save for those with an invulnerable save and "poof".

Yeah their low toughness does hinder them but hey look at it this way the more exploitable your weakness is the better it feels when you win, right?

andrewm9 wrote:

Lexx wrote:I'm not so sold on the Razorwings. As they'll easily get instant death. I would rather the Khymerae for their invulnerable save and the clawed fiends for their multiple wounds and getting more attacks if they lose a few wounds.

Thats true of almost the entire army though. Even the Archon or any of the special or independent characters that are toughness 3 (which is most of them) can die to a stray assault cannon round. One failed save for those with an invulnerable save and "poof".

But razorwings dont have invulnerable saves. Wheras an archon does.

I dont have my codex on hand right now (too lazy to go get it from the upstairs) but cant you give razorwings flickerfield? Cause if so then it can have a 5++ and the archon has not ++ per se unless you give him ghostplate for 6++ or shadowfield for 2++ and think of it this way its very likely that if the archon loses the shadowfield (which is an absolute must have IMO) hes likely dead if he failed it or about to die

ShadowZetki wrote:I dont have my codex on hand right now (too lazy to go get it from the upstairs) but cant you give razorwings flickerfield? Cause if so then it can have a 5++ and the archon has not ++ per se unless you give him ghostplate for 6++ or shadowfield for 2++ and think of it this way its very likely that if the archon loses the shadowfield (which is an absolute must have IMO) hes likely dead if he failed it or about to die

Just to clarify I meant razorwing flocks as beast units for beastmasters. But yes with the shadowfield thats Dark Eldar. High risk is their thing! Sorry it can be confusing when there is a jet fighter of the same name.

ooh okay then now I know where we are, umm why not use something just as fast like bikers or hellions to provide a buffer for them so they atleast get cover? Hell does it matter if they have a ++ or not? The enemy will clearly feel threatend by those guys and will likely aim at them anyway (which is IMO a bonus considering that is less firepower aimed at the rest of your army)

Also if you happen to survive getting shot at (or not getting shot at) then you can wreak some havoc pretty quickly risky unit if you ask me but if things go well they could easily make their points back with interest

Beasts should probably be coming out of a webway - one turn and theyre in combat. Then they just need to worry about powerfists, however tehre isnt that much S6 in combat that isnt an MC - and as you control wound allocation you should be able to avoid putting ID wounds on the unit. Thats what the high T guys are for!

nosferatu1001 wrote:Beasts should probably be coming out of a webway - one turn and theyre in combat. Then they just need to worry about powerfists, however tehre isnt that much S6 in combat that isnt an MC - and as you control wound allocation you should be able to avoid putting ID wounds on the unit. Thats what the high T guys are for!

That is definately a good point you make, and a much better alternative idea than what I suggested only issue is getting the webway gate where it needs to be. Deepstrike or regularly transport them up?

[Also nosferatu1001 not to go too off track but with the 40k fail topic I had forgetten to mention he was a vet sarge with can have power fist for 15pts my bad, fail much on my part for failure to specify huh? lol]

nosferatu1001 wrote:Beasts should probably be coming out of a webway - one turn and theyre in combat. Then they just need to worry about powerfists, however tehre isnt that much S6 in combat that isnt an MC - and as you control wound allocation you should be able to avoid putting ID wounds on the unit. Thats what the high T guys are for!

The wound allocation point is very valid. I shall experiment when I get adequate proxy models to try some different setups out. Though a maxed out Clawed fiend unit would be scary! And Zetki I do agree. I've always liked the psychological aspect of a Dark Eldar force. The enemy knows everything is fast and will by turn two be either shooting you to hell or beginning to get to grips with you in close combat. But very few can field enough guns to neutralize a lot of those threats at once so they have to decide if they ignore certain units with the risk of said units causing much pain later. I can see a big beastmaster unit being a sacrificial limb like this to some degree. Soak up some fire-power and if anything survives a pasting it can still get stuck in when it gets to charge.

I guess with Dark Eldar you really have to consider which units you are most willing to get shot to hell and back huh? I'd have to say with cover saves being well rather easy to get our biggest issue is our (as far as stats go) flying cardboard box we call the raider my issue with raider is 1. Easy to shoot down 2. limits the amount of men you will have and would probably have been cheaper to footslog with max unit count 3. when it goes down chances are the squad that was in there is either dead or now useless due to inevitable high casualties

On the other hand the raider is good because 1. Its pretty damn fast 2. if you are willing to spend the points for the sail it goes from pretty damn fast to a possibly 2 turn CC rush 3 It comes with a freakin dark lance thats a steal for what you get really not to mention SM players get pissed when you pop a land raider with termies inside on turn 1-2 with a raider (bonus points if the land raider explodes and kills the termies then SM players go from pissed to tears)

The raider very much seems like a double-edged sword but hey high risk right? As for venom I'm still unsure about it I like it but despise its transport capacity. I would say I have a love-hate relationship with the raider, it really depends on how I'm feeling

Yeah the raider and venom are quite balanced though I feel even with the open topped. Meaning they don't have to be completely stationary to drop their passengers off ( See normal Eldar ). Couple that up with night shields and the invulnerable save you can give them it still has a good chance of getting where it needs to go in one piece. Venoms with incubi or trueborn should be fun to see wreaking havoc across the field. The venom themselves fielding a pair of splinter cannons to give covering fire.

Very true and well put, although for the sake of correcting myself I was wrong about our greatest problem being the raider/venom downfalls. Our true weakness (not counting our paper armor and T3) is also our greatest power simply put our speed thing about it, with speed like ours we have the ability to controll the entire battle from start to finish but if you go too fast or too slow, well bad things happen to good sadist pirates it's about finding that right amount of speed to win because too much or too little and you might just do yourself in however if you fear control of your speed why not force them to come to you? Dark Eldar can turtle fairly well (and personally I beleive we have the most superior shooting for basic troops in the game)

I agree wholeheartedly. The strengths of a Dark Eldar force can also be its weaknesses if you become predictable with it. Its very fitting I must say given the armies psyche. Whilst we might not have the most destructive fire-power. We do have very precise and hard hitting for what we have. Imperial guard being like a hammer. The Dark Eldars fire-power is more surgical and precise.

Yup, and speaking of IG I'm not sure at all how I'm going to beat what people call the "leafblower" list Ive faced it a few times with the new dex recently (I think two days ago?) Dude that list is soo ANNOYING

Mainly by taking stuff that can move 36" (or aether sailed raiders at a pinch), boosting it over the top and forcing them to start splitting and turning round. You also have the speed to come oin from reserve and threaten almost anywhere, and he cant castle as effectively as you can come from anywhere on the long edge.

That is a very good idea (Im feeling our ability to deepstrike our ravagers and shoot with them will be our best assest) you sir are a life saver and as it stands with that idea quite possibly someone who has saved my sanity because my brother plays IG and he loves that list, my hat goes off to you for that