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Going to Ard boyz for the first time, please help with any advice


HQ: 699
Eldrad-210
10 warlocks 250
x5 destructor power 50
x1 Embolden power 5
x1 enhance power 15
x3 singing spears 9
x1 wave serpent TL SL 115
Star Engines 15
Total: 699

Elites: 452
2x 6 Fire Dragons 192
2xWave serpent TL SL+ Star engines 260

Troops

10 Pathfinders 240

2x 10 Dire Avengers 240
2x exarch 24
2x PW Bladestorm 60
2x Wave Serpents TL BL 270

Heavy Support: 515
2x Fire Prism 230
2x Holo Fields 70
2x Spirit Stones 20
3x War Walkers 90
3x EML 60
3x SL 45



In this list I would like to keep the heavy support and seer council, and i've written it so if I go last then i can come on from reserves easily against a shooty army.

Alright, given that you say you are going to Ard Boyz, I'm going to be as critical as I can to put this list into the highest tier of competitive play I can for you.

We'll take each FoC seperately -
HQ -
I understand that you want to run a seer council, and that's fine. However, running Eldrad with ten locks in a serpent is a complete and utter waste of points. These units are strongest doing three things: 1) Assaulting 2) soaking blows for the rest of your army and 3) Using their Psychic powers to bolster your forces.
By taking them as they are, you are not accomplishing any of those very well. Foot councils are not near as large a threat as you might think. Their mobility is very limited (As they can only assault out of the back 6" + d6" of your serpent) which frankly, isn't that reliable. As for soaking blows, even with Eldrad present, you are still rocking a majority of 4++ saves. Even with re-rolls you are looking at losing warlocks quickly for every turn they are not protected (And they will be focused, so they will be vulnerable against any competent opponent). As for using their psychic powers, Eldrad is king of bolstering forces, however, you have over 250 points of fat holding him back on that in just the warlocks (Not counting the serpent or their upgrades). Eldrad is best just attached to a normal squad more than anything else.
With these points in mind, I strongly suggest you drop the foot council and Eldrad, replacing it with a jetseer council. The reasons are plain - High mobility while not in a transport - 3+ 4++ with rerolls makes them more durable - Equivalent points in the end. However, if you truly want to maximize this list, drop the council, and just take a farseer with one of your other squads.

As a side note, you will also want to bring an Autarch, as you are taking reserves into consideration with the list.

Elites -
Looks great, mostly. Drop the two extra fire dragons. They are just overkill. Also, downgrade the SL on the wave serpent to a SC. This saves you 30 points between the two upgrades. Thirdly, ditch the star engines. Eldar tanks already move 24" a turn. No reason to spend so many points on upgrades that aren't needed.

Troops -
Pathfinders are not competitive. If you want to be, leave them on the shelf. They are very expensive points wise, and with their low RoF, will not easily earn their points back. On top of that, they are not mobile, so anything that gets close to them is likely to kill them, especially with the abundance of cover ignoring weapons out there. Switch them out for another DAVU squad in a serpent. Also, you might want to try and pick up a fourth troop choice, so that capturing objectives is less of a task for you.
As a final note on troops -Bright lances are overly expensive. Instead, take scatter lasers, as they are statistically more effective against light tanks, and you have fire dragons for AV 14. Also, again, drop star engines, they are not worth the points.

Heavy Support -
Looks great for the most part. The only thing I would suggest against are the warwalkers. These dudes really aren't all that effective above 1500, as they are overly vulnerable to small arms fire, let alone a medium power weapon (Such as an autocannon, missile launcher, scatter laser) and as such are really a weakness in this list. The only possible use I could see for them, is to outflank and kamakaze them.
I would advise against that personally, and instead take a falcon fully kitted out, stick a 5 man avenger squad in it to make the thing scoring. Gives you one of the most durable objective holders the Eldar have, and an additional 3 S8 shots a turn to assist with tank busting.

I am sorry to have suggested alterations be made to the two things you wish not to alter, however, you are going to Ard Boyz... competition will be tough. You will need to weed out any point variance in your list to better strengthen the overall power you bring to the table. This means cutting any fat off your units, and leaving behind anything that won't hold it's weight.

I hope this helps you out, and I hope you do well at your upcoming tournament!

I agree in most of the comments.
I dont think you need to change THAT much though. Id say you CAN keep your HQ + Heavy section.

What i think you need to do is lose a lot of upgrades. Lose all star engines imo, lose destructors down to 1-2x, imo if you wanna use the council for destructor spamming use a jet council, the serpent council is to be a major CC factor. Id also lose BLs down to scatters as already suggested.
Lose Pathfinder for 5 naked avengers in serpent with tl Scatters. Id drop power weapons for the exarchs.

For the points saved id (for sure!!!) add Yriel. He makes the council MONSTER in cc. And he an important +1 to reserves. In my mind there is no reason to run the foot/serpent council WITHOUT Yriel, as its too easy to tarpit the council and keep them bogged down without Yriel.

i DO think your list would be improved if you had a more min/max list with more tanks in it. I'll post my own current 2500pts list if you wanna check it out.

list isnt bad but its not optomized.

To put it bluntly this list is going to get taken apart if you take it to 'Ard Boyz. I'm not sure it adds up to 2500pts btw. From the top though;

Eldrad is always solid, Foot Council (its in a Serpent, but its still a Foot Council) not so much. For starters its not hard to take down that Serpent (you can't hide it, and at 2500pts there is enough firepower around to drop you even through Fortuned Flat Out saves). More importantly that unit won't kill much and can't tarpit very effectively, it folds to many of the powerhouse units you will see even with Fortune up. If someone blocks Fortune then you lose 500pts, and even with it up on your unit its not that hard to just torrent that unit away (T3 4++ with re-rolls is easier to kill than a Marine, and its not hard for a half decent list to kill 10 Marines in a single shooting phase). I like the 5 Destructors, but in this unit your chances of using them without shooting yourself out of assault is almost non existent. In short if you want what passes for an assault unit for Eldar then drop this unit and take a JetCouncil (it still has issues though). Alternatively drop all the extra stuff and keep 3 Warlocks with Destructor + a Serpent, its the cheapest way to get a Serpent and you can run around with a cheap suicide anti infantry unit to burn things to death.

Star Engines are a waste of points (24" is seriously not enough for you?) and as mentioned previously an Autarch would definitely be helpful.

The Fire Dragons are solid, the 6th guy if you a safety margin against most vehicles (it pushes the average number of wrecked or exploded results above 1). You should have a 3rd unit though, they would be the first things into my list at this level. Most 2000pt lists have 3 units of Dragons, and at this points level you need the firepower even more. Any Serpent carrying units which will get up close should have Spirit Stones, as mentioned before drop the Star Engines asap.

Those Pathfinders are just waiting to die. They won't do any meaningful damage (at this level even if you pin a unit and no one cares because there are so many of them) and as soon as a flamer or an assault unit gets near them they die. Its not like they can move and fire to prolong their shooting either. Leave them on the shelf.

That leaves two units of Avengers as your only scoring units, which is a multitude of problems. For starters Avengers aren't really that killy (Tri Flamer Guardians are better in that regard), so relying on them for clearing away infantry is going to end badly. The bigger problem is that you are seriously short on scoring units, even with the Pathfinders. At 2500pts I would be taking at least 4 scoring units (assuming they are all in transport to keep them alive, if not you need more than that).

Prisms are solid, you can save a heap of points by removing the Holos though (that's free Vyper lol). Because of their massive range they can often dodge a big chunk of anti tank fire simply by being out of range, which is also why you don't need Spirit Stones (because being stunned for a turn shouldn't result in being charged).

I would be very wary of using War Walkers at this points level, AV10 units won't last very long. However mixing weapons is a big no-no at any points level, always go 2 x EML or 2 x Scatters to keep them focused/not wasting firepower.

Thanks for all the advice, so then what should i do for troops now without taking storm guardians


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Updated List
HQ: 684
Eldrad-210
8 Warlocks 200
x5 destructor power 50
x1 Embolden power 5
x1 enhance power 15
x3 singing spears 9
x1 wave serpent TL SL 115

The Seer council is mainly a big bullet sponge who can be survivable 75% of the time, cast guide on my flanking war walkers, and doom the things my fire prisms combine beams on so im effectively taking out a tactical squad out of cover a turn

Autarch with fuision gun: 80
Stays back with an ignorable unit in KP, but otherwise with some fire dragons

Elites: 422
2x 6 Fire Dragons 192
2xWave serpent TL SL 230

Fire Dragons are sort of a one shot thing where the hopefully pop a raider and tie the unit inside up for a turn before dying, or just a ta squad out of cover

Troops 784

10 Rangers 190
going to groun to capture objectives

2x 10 Dire Avengers 240
2x exarch 24
2x PW Bladestorm 60
2x Wave Serpents TL BL 270
Last minute objective shenanigans

Heavy Support: 515
2x Fire Prism 230
2x Holo Fields 70
2x Spirit Stones 20
Blowing up stuff, yet holo fields making it durable enough so although it may be crippled, still not a KP

3x War Walkers 90
3x EML 60
3x SL 45
outflanking and assaulting into a unit of long fangs

Total: 2405
I have 95 point toplay around with, please feel free to give me any suggestions
Thanks

What do you do when you don't get Fortune off? I would figure there will be a good amount of SW, BA and GK plyers who typically run Librarians. It is a huge point sink in your army and a bad turn can really hinder your army. This was the biggest reason I went away from Seer Councils, but your mileage may vary.

So far I havent had to much trouble with psychic hoods, but ive had to cast it 2-3 times