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I see them as scoring MC killers. Should the squad be maxed to 10?

10*(2/3)*(1/2)=3.333...

Not a lot of wounds, especially given that a few of them will have armour saves. When I see a 10-strong squad of pathfinders on the board, I think "Oh, boy! There's 240 points worth of enemies that I can ignore!" Honestly, unless your opponent is playing bugs, and he runs more than four monstrous creatures, and you're short on models and need to fill out your force for a bigger game, there's much better stuff out there.

regular rangers are stupid. They score, but that's the only thing they have over guard ratlings, which are also stupid.

Pathfinders, on the other hand are cruel. Not only are they basically immune to shooting attacks, but they rend 1/3rd of the time. I've seen unkind things done to terminators with pathfinders in the past.

I don't know if they'd ever be my first choice when racking up the troops, but they seem to have a place.

@ Ailaros
I was thinking of having only one unit of them.

Ailaros wrote:Pathfinders, on the other hand are cruel. Not only are they basically immune to shooting attacks, but they rend 1/3rd of the time.

Here's the really funny thing: you can roll a 5+ to hit for AP1, then miss the 4+ to wound and fail to do anything.

Pathfinders supported by a Farseer are good, but I suppose anything supported by a Farseer is good...

They really shine when firing against targets afflicted with Doom. I'd say try 'em out, see how they do, and go from there. I like them from a fluff and aesthetic perspective. Gaming wise they're not overpowered, but I wouldn't say that they are underpowered either.

A 6 man squad of Pathfinders firing at a Doomed squad will get 4 hits, 2 of which will be AP1. Then of those 4 hits, 3 will wound, 2 of which will ignore armor. Honestly, that isn't bad output given that their primary goal is to sit on objectives. Cast Doom to help other squads, and let the Pathfinders piggy-back off that squad.

Do pathfinders not get rending?

They do. The Eldar Long Rifle makes their shot AP1 on a 6 to hit, and Pathfinders do it on a 5. Then they can Rend on the roll to wound. Why do you ask?

I find them useful to objective camp, the rest of my army is usually in someones face so they often get away alive, any unit looking to take them out get taken out en route, and if they get taken out by DS,ers... i have fire prisms which just LOVE units DS,ing in tight formations.

Always upgrade to pathfinders, the 2+ cover save is too good ignore, keeping them elevated buys them a turn or two, depending on how elevated they are and enemy terrain tests to get at them.

I generally only run 5, they are simply there to hold an objective for me, and throw out pinning tests, i do not rely on them to actually do anything killing wise. However, Pinning is great, most people do not worry about it due to the high Ld on most units nowadays but it's great when it happens. Plus those 1 or 2 wounds they can throw out can REALLY help finish off a squad with only 1 guy left in it when you've run out of things to shoot at it.

You'll hear most people talk about protecting unit, i for one, do not bother. If the enemy wants to send a unit after them, so be it... The Eldars greatest strength is an opponents ability to split up his forces and let you take them on bit by bit.

Pathfinder upgrade is a waste of 25 points when you can go to ground and get 2+ cover anyway.

Rangers are there to score, and attempt hail-mary results for pinning, AV10, wounding MCs, and that's it. 5 points each for the AP1 on a roll to hit of 5 is also a stupid waste.

The #1 problem with both units is their infiltrate just tends to get them into trouble. They die if just about anything gets in cc with them, and infiltrate allows bad players to deploy them too close to the enemy's line. Such opperator error causes rangers and pathfinders to frequently suffer catastrophic failure causing them to be a complete waste of points.

In my own group, they tend to be useless, since vehicles are the watchword in my group (apparently tournaments too), which is a shame because they are the best dedicated snipers in the game.

With fortune and doom cast, they can really throw down some havoc. But then so can Dire Avengers with Bladestorm. If you enjoy the long range and the needs to stay away from assault, they can be great. I personally use Wave Serpents, so moving 24" to the objective in my backfield isn't really difficult for me.

As always, it's all situational. I can see them in the right list.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:Pathfinder upgrade is a waste of 25 points when you can go to ground and get 2+ cover anyway.

Rangers are there to score, and attempt hail-mary results for pinning, AV10, wounding MCs, and that's it. 5 points each for the AP1 on a roll to hit of 5 is also a stupid waste.

If your going to ground you loose the ability to do anything other than survive.
So those 25 points are allowing to not have to go to ground for a 2+ cover, enabling you shoot more often, even causing 1 wound on any MC has make those 25 points back and then some.

schadenfreude wrote:The #1 problem with both units is their infiltrate just tends to get them into trouble. They die if just about anything gets in cc with them, and infiltrate allows bad players to deploy them too close to the enemy's line. Such opperator error causes rangers and pathfinders to frequently suffer catastrophic failure causing them to be a complete waste of points.

Infiltrate them in your own deployment zone, if you set up first, declare they will infiltrate and wait to see where the opponents units go, then place your pathfinders accordingly.
As for opperator errer, surely that applies to every unit in the game? Mess something up and youv'e wasted your points, its the same for all models.

dayve110 wrote:

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:Pathfinder upgrade is a waste of 25 points when you can go to ground and get 2+ cover anyway.

Rangers are there to score, and attempt hail-mary results for pinning, AV10, wounding MCs, and that's it. 5 points each for the AP1 on a roll to hit of 5 is also a stupid waste.

If your going to ground you loose the ability to do anything other than survive.
So those 25 points are allowing to not have to go to ground for a 2+ cover, enabling you shoot more often, even causing 1 wound on any MC has make those 25 points back and then some.

schadenfreude wrote:The #1 problem with both units is their infiltrate just tends to get them into trouble. They die if just about anything gets in cc with them, and infiltrate allows bad players to deploy them too close to the enemy's line. Such opperator error causes rangers and pathfinders to frequently suffer catastrophic failure causing them to be a complete waste of points.

Infiltrate them in your own deployment zone, if you set up first, declare they will infiltrate and wait to see where the opponents units go, then place your pathfinders accordingly.
As for opperator errer, surely that applies to every unit in the game? Mess something up and youv'e wasted your points, its the same for all models.

What you described is how they should be played. The problem is good firing positions are in short supply for footdar, so players often get greedy and deploy them too far forward. Frequent opperator error causes some units or armies to get an undeserved bad rep, which is why so many players perceive them as terrible units.

dayve110 wrote:

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:Pathfinder upgrade is a waste of 25 points when you can go to ground and get 2+ cover anyway.

Rangers are there to score, and attempt hail-mary results for pinning, AV10, wounding MCs, and that's it. 5 points each for the AP1 on a roll to hit of 5 is also a stupid waste.

If your going to ground you loose the ability to do anything other than survive.
So those 25 points are allowing to not have to go to ground for a 2+ cover, enabling you shoot more often, even causing 1 wound on any MC has make those 25 points back and then some.

You only make your rangers go to ground if they're shot at, and even then it has to be something that's doing a reasonable amount of wounds. If your opponent is using their shooting on your snipers and not the actual business end of your force then they're probably suffering from 'operator error' (thanks schadenfredue).

Whether rangers shoot once or 5 times a game is by-the-by. They sit on your home objective(s), sometimes they sit in a skimmer, sometimes they sit in reserve. They're a scoring unit first and last. Their shooting, survivability vs templates, morale, and survivability in CC is poor for their points cost and increasing their cost by 25% is what's called 'throwing good money after bad'.

So the rending 5+ for pathfinders is still on the hit not the wound roll? I always presumed as the rending roll changed to the wound roll with 5th edition, a roll of 5+ to wound with pathfinders will rend? Sorry to go off topic slightly ;-)

For everyone that disagrees on Rangers/Pathfinders, due to better options for their points, i'd very much like to see examples on where to put the points instead.

So if the rending rule was to hit in 4th edition, does that mean if you take the pathfinder upgrade its to wound on 5's, or do you use the old rule as stated in the codex?

You use the old rule in the codex.
Also I don't think it's like 4th ed rending to begin with, as I thought that also auto-wounded in addition to ignoring armour saves.

Pathfinders were a staple in Eldar lists.
But now there are two main issues fielding them:
mechanized lists and blast weapons that ignore cover saves (Whirlwind, Thundercannon).

Take 10, set them up in your backfield, add a two-power Farseer, guide and fortune them. 2+ re-rollable cover save, re-rolls to hit. Not great against Mech, obviously, but on pure volume of rending hits, I've managed to take out transports a few times.

Correct me if im wrong, but I'm pretty sure a rending wound does auto wound and is ap2 in 5th edition. So with pathfinders that rending wound roll increases to a 5+? Also how can you have rending on both the hit and wound rolls, surely its one or the other? On topic pathfinders were good at base objective camping and pot shots at terminators, but my opponent always taking a whirlwind has made me drop them.

Ranger long rifle's rule is that if you roll x to hit it counts as ap1, in addtion, it's sniper rifle so have rending.

Best is to set up an example, 9 pathfinders fire at a unit:

Rolling to hit.
3 roll 1-2 and miss.
3 roll 3-4 and hit normally.
3 roll 5-6 and those hits count as ap1.

Rolling to wound.
3 missed.
3 hit normally and wound on 4+, any rolls of 6's ignore armour saves.
3 rolled 5-6 and wound on 4+, as it counts as ap1 any wound ignore armour saves. But they can still roll a 6 and rend against vehicles.

Edit: In 4th I believe that any TO HIT roll of a 6 autowounded (i.e, no roll to wound) aswell as ignored armour saves.

I use a ten man pathfinder unit with a guide and doom farseer. My friends has made them top prioty after one fateful game.
V ery effective against MCs

Oscarius wrote:Edit: In 4th I believe that any TO HIT roll of a 6 autowounded (i.e, no roll to wound) aswell as ignored armour saves.

No they didn't.

To hit rolls of 6 only auto wounded and ignored armour if the model/weapon had the rending rule.

I know they are target priority no1 for my Hellhound otherwise they become a nuissance all game long. Lately my opponent has taken to deploy them way back, so i think hellhound terror tactics have worked.

I like them. I use a 5 man pathfinder squad as a backup troop choice ONCE I have my other troops.

Sure, they may seem a waste of points fir some, but if I have 120 points and they fit into my army, I take them.

As said above somewhere, these guys can take down terminator and such units. I once sniped down a Space Wolves Rune Priest in termy armour with them. I think that's worth 120 points.