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I am not sure this is the appropriate forum for this... it IS technically a list, but I've not included points, as I am more interested in what units to buy to have a well balanced army, will min-max later.

So I am considering starting an eldar army soonish, but I want to stay as far away from mech as possible, simply cause I already have mech CSM.
Ofcourse, I realise that some mech is needed, so I was considering short of a hybrid list. Keep in mind that this list is heavily influnced by which models look good, so it's propably not that optimized, I've not really studied the codex in dept yet.
But I am interested in your tactical advice, and will revise as needed. I have not added points, I am aiming at a 1500 force, so I will add remove some troops as needed. I am just looking for a balanced force to collect.

HQ
Avatar
Farseer (with bike)

Troops
10 Dire Avengers + Serpent
15-20 Guardians with ScatterLaser(I like the idea of a cheap foot slogging home objective grabber)
5 bikes (with the Farseer?), for last turn objective grabbing, doom, etc..

Fast Attack
10 Warp Spiders!

Elites
10 Scorpions (Infiltrating...I LOVE those Predetor wannabes)
8 Harelquins (I hear they are great footsloggers)
6 Firedragons + Serpent?

HS
2 Prisms
3 War walkers

Suggestions? Things that dont quite work with the rest of the army? Do I just NEED more Waves?

List Edited according to feedback.

First off, welcome to Eldar. Secondly, forget everything you have learned from CSM lol.

If you are going for a "buy what looks good" then remember that CC oriented Eldar are a full squad or nothing kinda thing. You MUST slaughter your opponent before they get to swing back.
- 10 Scorpions w/ Exarch, Biting Blade, Infilrate
- 10 Harlies w/ Shadowseer, 10 Harlie Kisses.

On the other stuff...

Farseer- Always have a roll for this guy. Take the runes and stones with a max of 2 powers that he will use to support the unit he is attached to (or nearby unit). If you only need one power then drop the stones and the 2nd power to keep him more cost effective. A bike is only goo if he is traveling with other bikers.

Guardians - At BS3 single shot weapons become really hit or miss (literally) so a Scatter Laser is typically advise to give you the distance and # of shots that will be most effective.

Fire Dragons + Falcon - An eternal newbie mistake. Falcon should be kept at far range to keep from getting shaken. Fire Dragons need to be in the enemy's face.

Prisms - Never take a single prism. You lose their benefit of linking with another.



If you are trying to make a competitive build, then honestly yes you need to have 4-5 Wave Serpents, unless you are going for the Footdar style, but those are very specialized and arguably much less competitive.

The eldar codex is old, and like other old codex's the number of competitive builds is very small per codex.
At this time, there really is only one competitive build for Eldar -- the Mech'Dar build. The standard build includes the following
* Fire Dragon squads in Serpents
* Dire Avenger squads in Serpents
* Fire Prisms
* NightSpinners
* Seer Councils
* Jetbikes
* WarWalkers
Most competitive builds alternate percentages of those units defined above.

If your not looking for a competitive build, then you can go with a foot'dar or hybrid list. In those lists, you take advantage of the synergy between Eldrad and an Avatar. A fortuned avatar can take down nearly any doomed enemy model. With a 75% save and Eldrads runes of warding, I would even give him decent odds on killing Mephiston. (As Mephison gives himself a wound 33% of the time he uses a psychic power, he can burn himself out quickly trying to gear up to kill the avatar)

I traded for a lot of foot'dar models and I have played a few games with them. When playing non-competitive builds, they do very well and are a lot of fun. I would not bring that list to a tourney and expect it to do well, but for playing around the FLGS its great. In this foot'dar list I use the Avatar,Eldrad combo with a seer council, guardians with BL platforms, dark reapers, warp spiders, and 3 squads of fire dragons. Its not a power build, but its fun.

The above two posts have all the information you'll need to understand the Eldar predicament. Anyone who says foot'dar is competitive is misinformed or lying. If you want to have a fun second army for FLGS games and lots of colour, Eldar are fun because aspect warriors look cool and come in every colour under the rainbow, and their units are fluffy. If you want a tournament second army, time to get a reality check and drop all those shiny things.

I run a successful 2000 point list with only 1 serpent - it has dragons in it. All troops are jetbikes, 1 squad of DAs rides in a falcon, and jetbike seer council and dual prisms make up for the lack in anti-armor from a second or third dragon squad. But as labmouse42 said, all lists consist of those exact units in different quantities, and how good a list is comes down to the synergy between the units you bring. I have units 1, 3, 5 and 6 in mine, with a splash of 2, and it works for me.

If you make a list, any list, that includes scorpions, harlequins, The Avatar, banshees, pathfinders, warp spiders or wraithguard, it is NOT a tournament level list and unless you alone have found the amazing combination of those units that the rest of the world hasn't found in the past few years combined, don't expect it to perform like one.

If this doesn't appeal to you, well, we've had an influx of ForgeWorld models and Imperial Armor entries recently, so they're either gearing up for a new Eldar codex (somewhere in the next 4 years) or we're getting more options. What I'm saying is, if you would rather wait for the new codex and models before starting, nobody would hold it against you.

I wouldn't worry too much about overly competitive, I will not be going into any tourney with those. I am not a big fan of tourneys, simply because the lists mostly seem to consist of spams of 2 units, not very fun to paint. I'll just use my Kan Wall or CSM in those.

What I want is a nice army that is resonably powerful in FLGS matches, and fun.

So, going from the above, I guess I might as well drop the falcon, get another wave for the dragons, and go for 2 prisms. Then look into maxing the scorpions and propably 8 harlies.

I guess I should drop the pathfinders? I worry that if I switch them for bikes I wont have enough troops to defend objectives. Then again, I guess a squad of bikers with an attached Farseer would do the job pretty well? What would be a good number for those?

So do people use the Prism Twin Linking capabilities? I can see how it could be useful combined with the Large Blast.

Edited list according to feedback...

The list you've given in the op is essentially the same I wanted to play, but after subjecting it to the scrutiny of dakka I was given very similar advice. The question you need to ask yourself is, how much do nice models matter to you vs having a strong list competitively?

I actually would not be adverse to running a list based on jetbikes, it would certainly be interesting, but I gotta have that Avatar in there somewhere, I love that guy.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
After looking at it further, I am seeing the worth of war walkers over wraithlord, especially since I already have a lot of CC units. Updating the list..