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Hey guys,

After reading hundreds of various Eldar lists, tactica and theory threads I have come to this conclusion: Guardian Defenders suck. Bad. Which, for me, is saddening. My own Eldar fluff is completely centric around Guardians as the idea of normal citizens of the Eldar race fighting for their own, and their race's, survival paints the Eldar as the "sacrificial heroes" of 40k, a role I think encapsulates them wholly.

So I began to ask myself, 'How can I play these Guardians and not auto-lose?" and these are my conclusions which I present to you now to scrutinise and ponder over.

Let's start with a review of their stats;

WS & BS 3: Ahh. Slightly below the 'Average' in 40k (4), however it's workable, their definitely not close combat units so the WS 3 isn't too much of a bother and the BS 3 is tolerable when you avoid one/two shot weapons.

S & T 3: Eldar typicalness. Can't complain.

W 1: As to be expected.

I 4: On the fence with this; I think I5 would make them much more attractive, however, that's Aspect Warrior territory and the Aspect Warriors are only I5 because they train for years and years. So I4 suffices.

A 1: Again, to be expected.

Ld 8: Not too shabby.

Sv 5+: Wth? No me gusta nada. A 5+ save is not so good, it means that they have to hug cover (not too hard in 5th) and limits their mobility quite a bit.

So overall, I feel that a 4+ save would make guardians much more viable and much more mobile as they would not need to hug cover as much. Otherwise, I feel their stats are fair for 8pts.


Right, let's look at that weapon platform, a necessity in any Guardian Squad;

Straight from the bat you have to decide their role; Brightlance for tank and character sniping? Eldar Missile Launcher for horde control? Before we decide anything, we have to realise the place where Guardians can do good: babysitting.

Yup, Guardians are perfect for sitting on objectives in cover, they're cheap(as far as Eldar go), can provide fire support and allow the rest of your army to stay on the offensive. In this instance, the shuriken cannon is a no. 24" range is not going to cut it I'm afraid. My view is that there is one weapon you should choose: Brightlance.

Now before you all scream "hypocrite!" and throw the virtual tomatoes over the brightlance I will add this: make them all (as in, every weapon platform) a brightlance. So now you have 2 (or like me, 4) brightlances targetting those pesky rhinos and and other transports, and in today's mechanised environment, you need all the shots you can get. And here is my secret strategy that I shall share with you all:

They suck. And it is because they suck, that they are so effective. An opponent will take one look at them and almost cripple himself with laughter and most likely, ignore them. This allows you to pop his transports and get his precious units on foot where they are lambs for the slaughter (dark no?).


This is my experience with them, and as always YMMV.

Any additions for this little "mini-tactica" can be suggested as well as any comments or criticisms!

Thanks!

Iranna.

I still use 2 in my typical army.

2 x 10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon = 85 pts each

Currently, I'm playing a mechanized army and they truthfully only come out in one of 2 ways:

1. Their transport is destroyed and they get stranded.
2. They jump out to throw down additional small arms fire that will work in my favor.

For 85 points, I've got 18 S4 shots and 3 S6 shots. Alone, they do very little, but I plan for them to support Dire Avengers, Fire Dragons and/or other Guardians. Weight of fire is what I'm looking for in those situations.

Positioning them with Wave Serpents is also very key. They only have a 5+ armor save, but you can easily set up Wave Serpents to provide a 4+ cover save to them and with 2 Wave Serpents, can reasonably protect them from a counterassault.

After lots of trial and error, this is the combo I'm fairly comfortable with. If I feel real generous, I'll switch out the Shuriken Cannon for a Scatterlaser for a 95 pt unit. However, that combo usually tempts me to have thet unit jump out just to shoot the Scatterlaser, which haven't served me well. The biggest thing is to get in close to supplement other units small arms fire. An 85 point unit putting out 21 shots is not a bad deal, IMO.

Hope you find this useful.

As much as I hate the idea of taking average citizens into a warzone. I do use them a lot. They do a perfectly fine job babysitting objectives in cover.

And the longer range fire support weapon on the platforms are best. 36" minimum.

People laugh at you, until you are winning.

Sarigar wrote:I still use 2 in my typical army.

2 x 10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon = 85 pts each

Currently, I'm playing a mechanized army and they truthfully only come out in one of 2 ways:

1. Their transport is destroyed and they get stranded.
2. They jump out to throw down additional small arms fire that will work in my favor.

For 85 points, I've got 18 S4 shots and 3 S6 shots. Alone, they do very little, but I plan for them to support Dire Avengers, Fire Dragons and/or other Guardians. Weight of fire is what I'm looking for in those situations.

Positioning them with Wave Serpents is also very key. They only have a 5+ armor save, but you can easily set up Wave Serpents to provide a 4+ cover save to them and with 2 Wave Serpents, can reasonably protect them from a counterassault.

After lots of trial and error, this is the combo I'm fairly comfortable with. If I feel real generous, I'll switch out the Shuriken Cannon for a Scatterlaser for a 95 pt unit. However, that combo usually tempts me to have thet unit jump out just to shoot the Scatterlaser, which haven't served me well. The biggest thing is to get in close to supplement other units small arms fire. An 85 point unit putting out 21 shots is not a bad deal, IMO.

Hope you find this useful.

That was my first thought, but I don't like the idea of having to buy a very expensive transport to zoom them about the board. Not with 5+ armour anyway!

Shadowseer_Kim wrote:As much as I hate the idea of taking average citizens into a warzone. I do use them a lot. They do a perfectly fine job babysitting objectives in cover.

And the longer range fire support weapon on the platforms are best. 36" minimum.

People laugh at you, until you are winning.

This is the idea I was going for

Thanks guys,

Iranna.

How many Guardian squads are you looking at running? I guess I'm missing a lot of the tactics behind running Guardians as I don't see any lists formed around Guardians. I think paying over a 100 points for a single shot BS3 Brightlance is a very good expenditure of points, especially with the current rules edition and current Eldar codex.

Well, at 1250pts. I'm running 2 squads of 10 with brightlances and an emboldenlock.

Usually I run around 3-4 in an 1850 game but I don't think I'd go past 4 squads.

Iranna.

Ok. 1250 pts is not something I really can address as I don't play.

1850 is more around what I play at. If I understand this correctly, I'm seeing the following:

3 x 10 Guardians, Brightlance, Warlock, Embolden: roughly 450 points of your army for 3 BS3 shots.

Let me prefice this; I'm a big fan of Guardians. I have around 60 painted with various weapon Platforms. However, it seems to me that you've created a target priority for your opponent to easily exploit.

Unless the guy is running lots of expensive armor 13/14 tanks, who cares about the 3 BL shots? There has to be better targets to deal with at range. The way to kill the Guardians will be to assault them in the latter parts of the game.

450+ points to get 3 BS3 shots with a BL? What are you effectively stopping in a game? I've played nearly any fashion of Eldar that is out there, and this has never been an overly viable option.

Well, you could run them in the Avatar's fearless bubble.
Give the Warlock enhance and they will hit Marines first and on 3+.

Well, Land Raiders are generally the norm in my gaming club, as are Leman russes and battle wagons so I needed a way to get "Cheap" brightlances that wouldn't draw too much fire and guardians were what sprung to mind.

Besides, they are quite central to my fluff and I use them 'cause I love them

Iranna.

Defenders ... no ... you want storm guardians 2 flamers and a destructor warlock.

Tri wrote:Defenders ... no ... you want storm guardians 2 flamers and a destructor warlock.

Truth be told, I hate Storm Guardians. I don't know why but I do, I think guardians should be only available as the ranged king with at least an 18" range in the next Eldar codex.


Iranna.

They just need a quirky, yet useful rule that fits their character and makes them work e.g. the ability to make an immediate fall back move after firing if they didn't move in the movement phase or buffs for nearby Aspect Warriors who will fight doubly hard to protect the civilians/future of the craftworld.

Currently, I can see no real use for them beyond a cheap unit that sits on an objective marker and fires the occasional useful shot with a support weapon.

Iranna wrote:
They suck. And it is because they suck, that they are so effective. An opponent will take one look at them and almost cripple himself with laughter and most likely, ignore them. This allows you to pop his transports and get his precious units on foot where they are lambs for the slaughter (dark no?).

With all due respect, this sounds like wishful thinking to me. It might work on newbies, but a competent opponent will know exactly what guardian defenders are and are not capable of--and also exactly which weapons and how much firepower are best for dealing with them, and where they fall on the list of target priorities in your army. Depending on an opponent to not know something only works once at the most.

IMO the biggest weakness of guardian defenders is that they cost so much for a unit with little firepower overall and no staying power. 100+ points for a single-shot BS3 weapon in a Ld8 unit is just too much. For about 60% of the cost, they'd be worth taking.

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Iranna wrote:
They suck. And it is because they suck, that they are so effective. An opponent will take one look at them and almost cripple himself with laughter and most likely, ignore them. This allows you to pop his transports and get his precious units on foot where they are lambs for the slaughter (dark no?).

With all due respect, this sounds like wishful thinking to me. It might work on newbies, but a competent opponent will know exactly what guardian defenders are and are not capable of--and also exactly which weapons and how much firepower are best for dealing with them, and where they fall on the list of target priorities in your army. Depending on an opponent to not know something only works once at the most.

IMO the biggest weakness of guardian defenders is that they cost so much for a unit with little firepower overall and no staying power. 100+ points for a single-shot BS3 weapon in a Ld8 unit is just too much. For about 60% of the cost, they'd be worth taking.

Obviously there's an element of psychological warfare to them, as with many sub-par choices in different armies. Also, in my experience I'm the only Eldar player in my area. (Deplorable I know) generally I find that the Eldar are becoming ever rarer on the scene and most people who play Eldar competitively go for the Mech Eldar with Eldrad and Fire Dragons MSU etc etc. And I find that people are in the know about those units, but plonk some guardians down with jetbikes and vypers and many people just don't have the experience with them to know how to counter them.

Just my experience with those units,

Iranna.

Iranna wrote:

Tri wrote:Defenders ... no ... you want storm guardians 2 flamers and a destructor warlock.

Truth be told, I hate Storm Guardians. I don't know why but I do, I think guardians should be only available as the ranged king with at least an 18" range in the next Eldar codex.


Iranna.

Not sure why you don't like them but they're better then defenders. Defenders have always been a rubbish choice. Back in 3-4th they were use able, not down to any special rule merely you could take 5 and a heavy weapon; people spammed 6 units and all was good. Now we must have at least 10 and thats 80pts of fail.

If you must take them then ether a missile launcher or a scatter laser; Missile launcher can be fired as a blast and scatter laser has 4 shots ... ether way you're not too hampered by BS3.

Frankly, I stay away from Guardian Defenders.
But I do use Storm Guardians, 10 of them with 2 flamers and (when I have the points) 1 Warlock with destructor, in a Serpents.

If you use them for fluff reasons, fair enough. I was under the impression it was a tactica for Guardian Defenders. This is where I think I misinterpreted the intent.

Based on your output, you run 3 squads equalling roughly 450 points for 3 BS3 BL shots. You indicate you face your fair share of armor 13/14.

If you have first turn and set up great firelanes, the counter would be for your opponent to set up things like Rhinos/Razorbacks to afford his Land Raider a cover save (or Chimeras to protect Leman Russ tanks).

With that said, you have a 50% chance to hit, then a 50% chance to glance/penetrate (armor 14), then your opponent gets a 50% chance to negate anything that gets through. Then, you need a 4,5 or 6 to stop something like a Land Raider from being effective (delivering a payload of hard as nails assault troops is typical).

If they get first turn (in the case of a Land Raider), he moves forward 12" and then utilizes smoke launchers, so it's the same odds as above, but they are now closer. If it was a Leman Russ, I'd be shocked if it was the only scary tank you have to deal with regarding long range return fire.

I'm not great at math, but I don't like the odds of utilizing 450+ points for what appears to be a very minimal chance to get utility from your Guardian setup. This is why folks won't mess with the Guardians as they will simply go after your more effective units first.

Are you supplementing with Fire Dragons and/or Autarchs w/ Fusion Guns?

As a comparison, here is what I was initially referring to. This is but a portion of the army and with all Eldar armies, you have to have a good synergy. This is where Autarchs do wonders:

-Wave Serpent, T/L Brightlance 135 points
-10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon 85 points

For roughly the same amount of points (450 vs. 420) you take with 3 Defender squads with your build, I can take 2 Wave Serpents with 2 t/l Brightlances and when the time is right, unload with 36 S4 shots and 6 S6 shots on an appropriate target. I think I have much better utility with the Wave Serpent build vs the Defender build your propose.

With Autarch(s) being utilized, you can stack the game to where you are able to alpha strike your opponent nearly every game.

If you are the only Eldar player around, then it shouldn't be any bother to play Mechdar; you still are running a unique army. There's a reason that Mechdar became popular and that reason is 5th edition.

I'm big fan of Guardian based armies; I've run them since 2nd edition. I completely concede Defenders are not very good in the latest Eldar Codex/5th edition rules. However, I don't see great utility in the way you're indicating: too many points for too little return.

Wave Serpent, T/L Brightlance 135 points
-10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon 85 points

Scatter lasers are your best bet for the Serpent and the Guardians.

wuestenfux wrote:

Wave Serpent, T/L Brightlance 135 points
-10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon 85 points

Scatter lasers are your best bet for the Serpent and the Guardians.

Agree with this. Across the board in the eldar codex, scatter lasers are worth it over shuriken cannons (mostly for the range) and EMLs are better than brightlances (because so few targets in the average army are any more vulnerable to lance weapons)

I have 40 of them guardians with two platforms I am still painting

man if I knew they sucked this much I wouldn't have stockpiled them (they were the first multi-part plastic recuts in 1997??)

painting the white on the helmets in 7 coats for 40 models is crazy

I played against IG some games ago and chose 2 guardian squads with EML. I wasn't unhappy about their performance, one EML took down a Vendetta and the other one got two good templates onto the veterans coming out of a destroyed chimera. Also the Guardians themselves got out some normal catapult shots, killing some veterans trying to steal a target in the last round. So alltogether I was kinda satisfied.

wuestenfux wrote:

Wave Serpent, T/L Brightlance 135 points
-10 Guardians, Shuriken Cannon 85 points

Scatter lasers are your best bet for the Serpent and the Guardians.

I concur. That is why I run 12 scatterlasers in my army. I posted a very small potion of my army to demonstrate a point.

Don't forget that it takes killing 10 guardians and the warlock with them, before the big gun goes silent.

Also Guardians do have normal guns, sure it is 12" range at BS3, but they each get 2 shots.

A situation where they fire the shuriken catapults comes up in a game fairly often.

Don't let anyone tell you they are worthless. Damn Naysayers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
You know, just because of all the Guardian bashing I see from people, next game at my game store, I will run no troops that are not Guardians.

Don't forget that it takes killing 10 guardians and the warlock with them, before the big gun goes silent.

Well, once in a GT, my Chaos Termies targeted 10 Guardians sitting in cover causing 3 casualties.
The Guardians failed their ld check, fell back and were gone for good.

wuestenfux wrote:

Don't forget that it takes killing 10 guardians and the warlock with them, before the big gun goes silent.

Well, once in a GT, my Chaos Termies targeted 10 Guardians sitting in cover causing 3 casualties.
The Guardians failed their ld check, fell back and were gone for good.

Hence the Embolden Warlock is an almost mandatory choice.

Iranna.

The original poster indicated he uses a Warlock with Embolden, so failing morale is less likely. But, the quickest way to kill off the Guardian squad is to assault them where Embolden will be less useful.

To each there own preferences. I keep squads very cheap and try not to expose them to return fire until I absolutely have to.

Iranna wrote:

wuestenfux wrote:

Don't forget that it takes killing 10 guardians and the warlock with them, before the big gun goes silent.

Well, once in a GT, my Chaos Termies targeted 10 Guardians sitting in cover causing 3 casualties.
The Guardians failed their ld check, fell back and were gone for good.

Hence the Embolden Warlock is an almost mandatory choice.

Iranna.

In fact, this is what my opponent, a great Eldar player, did not have.
It costs another 30 pts to augment the Guardian squad.