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One idea might be doing the whole debuff angle with fate based psychic powers. I know they already have those things, but I mean making those more powerful. Like giving negative re-rolls to enemy units so they are forced to re-reoll their successes, cancelling enemy auras. It's just the idea that the Eldar mess with fate so the enemy is cursed with phenomenal "bad luck" and sub-par performance despite their training. Maybe can borrow the SoB miracle dice mechanic for granting of good fortune to units. However the problem is this would place even more weighting on the Farseers while the rest of the Eldar army is still effectively dysfunctional.

 Hellebore wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

 Hellebore wrote:

But if we expect that Eldar will stay t3 w1, even a 3+ means nothing. Something else must come into play.

SoB work just fine with that. Scions and Tau work with T3, Sv4+.

But they cost less. Sisters are the closest thing to a power armour horde army. And they don't do just fine with that anyway because they have their special rules that give them invulnerable saves etc.

There's a reason no one takes eldar aspects and it's because
they're too fragile to do anything before they die.

That's a core rule problems though and why IGOUGO makes it stupid for glass Cannon armies to exist.

T3 1W troop based armies (aforementioned tau, Guardians, etc) was all well and good until GW decided that some units should kick out 72 +6D6 S4 (AP-1 in 2 turns) shots from 6 dudes. This massive fire output (can also subin Cents if you wish too) just makes such units unusable. I also don't see that changing even though the game now centers around holding objectives through an enemy shooting phase. Eldar wraith units are fine (but not obsec), and fast armies with vehicles will be able to saturate objectives, but forget Guardian units (especially since the minimum sized one with weapons platform receives full on Blast rules), unless it's just the wave serpent that survives to hold the objective.
So the game for these armies now is Transport heavy...knowing the occupants cannot hold an objective through a shooting phase, but might be still alive after they escape a destroyed transport. GWs answer to this...buff the heck out of AT weapons (multi shot Meltas) which will now chew through these transports faster, so that they can get to those juicy occupants.

Going to be really interested in seeing how new Eldar operate in this new environment, but I'm thinking Wave Serpents and Falcons will be everywhere.

endlesswaltz123 wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

 Hellebore wrote:

But if we expect that Eldar will stay t3 w1, even a 3+ means nothing. Something else must come into play.

SoB work just fine with that. Scions and Tau work with T3, Sv4+.

Wasnt the main army build for Tau in 8th mostly built around commanders and riptides, rather than infantry?

Fire warriors had a role, not a main one but a role.

The role they had was 3 minimum units for CP that's not a role that's just a straight up tax choice for the CP.

Most of the game's issues have to do with stat inflation. Strength, toughness, wounds, rate of fire...all of these have increased tremendously over the last couple years.

GW's solution to this problem appears to be doubling down and inflaing stats even more. This is very unlikely to address the problem, but if they really want to do it this way, they are going to have to inflate defensive stats as well one way or another for other races, even ones like eldar that are supposed to be squishy.

T3 1W 3+ save used to be a relatively reasonably resilient profile. Now it's a joke. So you have to do something about that, you can't just keep jacking up lethality and acting like the T3 1W is sacred when nothing else is.

T3 1W +3 has never been resilient. A couple of bad rolls and a ton of points go to the waste. It was only with a bunch of FNP's and psychic powers and special rules and character-tanking that you could make any kind of resilience from something like that.

Single wound models that cost more than 13-14 points have nearly always been a joke without some kind of extremely protective capability or with the hability to punch a ton of damage without any hope for retaliation, and then dying after doing their job.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Most of the game's issues have to do with stat inflation. Strength, toughness, wounds, rate of fire...all of these have increased tremendously over the last couple years.

Except rate of fire, no they have not. Statlines have been absurdly static since the Great Ork Adjustment. Most have been sacred cows since RT marines became toughness 4 in a WD article (and forevermore from 2nd edition on).

Too many shots has been the only real problem.

 Galas wrote:
T3 1W +3 has never been resilient.

Sure it is, if most stuff is shooting 1 or 2 S3 or S4 AP0 shots. It was never tough - hence why Eldar have always been considered fragile - but the resilience of a T3 3+ profile has greatly, massively diminished over the years as stat inflation has made the average shooting profile much, much deadlier than it used to be.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Voss wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Most of the game's issues have to do with stat inflation. Strength, toughness, wounds, rate of fire...all of these have increased tremendously over the last couple years.

Except rate of fire, no they have not. Statlines have been absurdly static since the Great Ork Adjustment. Most have been sacred cows since RT marines became toughness 4 in a WD article (and forevermore from 2nd edition on).

Too many shots has been the only real problem.

Rate of fire is the biggest culprit, but hardly the only one. The average space marine has gone from shooting 1 or 2 24" S4 AP 0 shots to more often than not firing 2 30" S4 AP-1 or frequently AP -2 shots. Often with full rerolls, and with lots of potential to increase those values further with stratagems. All that makes a tremendous difference in the basic math of the game.

Inflation in the deadliness of basic, run-of-the-mill shooting has vastly exceeded inflation in the defensive stats of almost all basic troop choices in the game.

Voss wrote:
Yeah. Space elves definitely need a buff, but throwing toughness and wounds at everything is just bad game design.

Eldar need a design space of their own. Whether that's simply being so bloody amazing everyone always has -1 to hit them that can't be mitigated by any means, or something more subtle, they need a change.

Part of that change needs to be undoing the nerf to their basic weapons. Yes, shuriken catapults were obscene in 1st and 2nd edition. That does not matter in the 9th edition world of firepower++. Putting your citizen militia at point blank range makes no sense whatsoever.

Poison also needs some design work. 4+ minimum, +1 to wound vs 5+ (or worse) armor saves, or something. More poison getting to lightly armored units. Or +1 to wound on a 6 to hit, getting an extra dose through a chink in the armor.

Currently the basic eldar units are worse (and more expensive) guardsmen, and that's an utterly ridiculous starting point for an army.

I think they have some space to make Aeldari have thematic defense within the current rules frame work. A -1 to Hit modifier for all fast Aeldari infantry (so not Constructs and the tough Coven units) would play right into the background. Imagine something like:

Craftworld Infantry: -1 to Hit, plus descent armor
CW Constructs: High Toughness and Wounds
Drukari Kabal Infantry: -1 to Hit, poor armor, and poor FNP
Drukari Coven Infantry: Better Toughness and FNP
Drukari Cult Infantry: -1 to Hit, bad armor, variable Invulnerable Saves (I would give them 6++ all the time along with the 4++ in melee), poor FNP
Harlequin Infantry: -1 to Hit, good Invulnerable Saves

Suddenly Aeldari are hard to kill, but not because they soak damage like a Space Marine or Death Guard, but because you have a hard time getting a decent smack on them.

Only if they let the -1 bypass their own modifier cap they just brought in, otherwise it's practically meaningless in a world where 50% of people play a faction that has base BS3+ and full rerolls as often as not, and where they'll have a -1 to hit anyway plenty of the time from cover.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Galas wrote:
T3 1W +3 has never been resilient.

Sure it is, if most stuff is shooting 1 or 2 S3 or S4 AP0 shots. It was never tough - hence why Eldar have always been considered fragile - but the resilience of a T3 3+ profile has greatly, massively diminished over the years as stat inflation has made the average shooting profile much, much deadlier than it used to be.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Voss wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Most of the game's issues have to do with stat inflation. Strength, toughness, wounds, rate of fire...all of these have increased tremendously over the last couple years.

Except rate of fire, no they have not. Statlines have been absurdly static since the Great Ork Adjustment. Most have been sacred cows since RT marines became toughness 4 in a WD article (and forevermore from 2nd edition on).

Too many shots has been the only real problem.

Rate of fire is the biggest culprit, but hardly the only one. The average space marine has gone from shooting 1 or 2 24" S4 AP 0 shots to more often than not firing 2 30" S4 AP-1 or frequently AP -2 shots. Often with full rerolls, and with lots of potential to increase those values further with stratagems. All that makes a tremendous difference in the basic math of the game.

Inflation in the deadliness of basic, run-of-the-mill shooting has vastly exceeded inflation in the defensive stats of almost all basic troop choices in the game.

Yeah, that isn't what you said. No Strength or Toughness inflation happened. The wound change is about to happen. The only change to statlines has been number of shots, and those are mostly in new weapons. (Beyond a 3rd edition to what 'rapid fire' means)
A bolter is still the same. Its statline hadn't changed a bit. It arguably got worse going from AP5 in the 3rd-7th system to AP0 in the 8th/9th system.

Rerolls and doctrines aren't part of the statline, so aren't evidence of statline inflation. The only real change in the space marine bolter in 20+ years is that they can now (thanks to a special rule) shoot twice at 12-24". And that's still not a statline change.

Increases in deadliness from rerolls and stratagems are obviously stat inflation as well, and the idea that doctrines aren't is truly silly, but I've got no interest in having a pointless argument over definitions.

The point is that offensive output has inflated dramatically, meaning that what used to be standard, acceptable defensive profiles no longer have the same resilience they used to.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Increases in deadliness from rerolls and stratagems are obviously stat inflation as well, and the idea that doctrines aren't is truly silly, but I've got no interest in having a pointless argument over definitions.

The point is that offensive output has inflated dramatically, meaning that what used to be standard, acceptable defensive profiles no longer have the same resilience they used to.

Ok, now that I've whittled you down to an actually reasonably accurate 'point', where are you going with it?

Is this new defensive buff a good thing? Or are you heading somewhere else with this line of thought?

Voss wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Increases in deadliness from rerolls and stratagems are obviously stat inflation as well, and the idea that doctrines aren't is truly silly, but I've got no interest in having a pointless argument over definitions.

The point is that offensive output has inflated dramatically, meaning that what used to be standard, acceptable defensive profiles no longer have the same resilience they used to.

Ok, now that I've whittled you down to an actually reasonably accurate 'point', where are you going with it?

Is this new defensive buff a good thing? Or are you heading somewhere else with this line of thought?

Mate, you seem very preoccupied on arguing, when if you just read what was written, it'd have answered your question. I explicitly stated what my point was in the first post. Here it is again, please read it this time:

yukishiro1 wrote:


GW's solution to this problem appears to be doubling down and inflating stats even more. This is very unlikely to address the problem, but if they really want to do it this way, they are going to have to inflate defensive stats as well one way or another for other races, even ones like eldar that are supposed to be squishy.

T3 1W 3+ save used to be a relatively reasonably resilient profile. Now it's a joke. So you have to do something about that, you can't just keep jacking up lethality and acting like the T3 1W is sacred when nothing else is.

 alextroy wrote:


Craftworld Infantry: -1 to Hit, plus descent armor

-1 to hit is now a useless ability to have. All it does, at best, is allow for the enemy space marines to both advance, AND fire both profiles on their combi-weapons, without any penalty whatsoever (in the past it would have given a -3 to be hit).

CW Constructs: High Toughness and Wounds

Mostly it's fairly average toughness, apart from wraithlords. But without the invulnerable saves that other (marine) equivalents have in abundance, they still work out more fragile. Wounds are average at best too, for the points.

Drukari Kabal Infantry: -1 to Hit, poor armor, and poor FNP
Drukari Coven Infantry: Better Toughness and FNP
Drukari Cult Infantry: -1 to Hit, bad armor, variable Invulnerable Saves (I would give them 6++ all the time along with the 4++ in melee), poor FNP
Harlequin Infantry: -1 to Hit, good Invulnerable Saves

Harlequins already waste half their points on their ability to have -1 to be hit, multiple times. They can still get to -3 to be hit just with native abilities and powers. It's completely useless. 95% of the time in a game, you already have a -1 to be hit from cover anyway, and so does the enemy. But the enemy got it for free, while you spent actual points on it.

Suddenly Aeldari are hard to kill, but not because they soak damage like a Space Marine or Death Guard, but because you have a hard time getting a decent smack on them.

Suddenly, Aeldari are exactly as hard to kill after your changes, as they are right now. Which is very easy. The only difference would be they'd probably cost more.

Your solution is how Eldar worked in 8th. And it worked well. And it balanced the Marines full-rerolls meta fairly well (which is part of the problem - Marine players expect to steamroll opponents or the game isn't 'balanced'). Problem is, it only balanced Marines, the other armies like Tau and Orks were screwed over. This was fixed with the 6's always hit change, but then Eldar still got nerfed into the ground.

And so here we are with 15pt models with guardsman statlines.

The solution for 9th will have to be from saves, unless they remove the cap on modifiers for Eldar in some way. Maybe give all units an invulnerable save, for their 'reflexes', like what Harlequins have.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Increases in deadliness from rerolls and stratagems are obviously stat inflation as well

Hmm... thats like... absolutely incorrect.

Stat inflation is stat inflation. You can see it with marines going to two wounds. People is so used to stats being fixed on stone than when they change, people see them as much a bigger deal than for example, space marines losing Doctrines, or gaining/losing subfaction traits from one codex to the next.

The problem with invulns is they interact very poorly with lots of other mechanics, and you can't actually jack them up all that high without them becoming oppressive. As Asurmen shows, even putting a 4++ on aspect warriors doesn't actually make them very resilient, except to low-volume stuff like lascannons. And GW has rightly been trying to cut down on the amount of 3++s on the game, so I can't see them going that far, which is what they'd need to do if they don't want to move any of the other levers.

GW have backed themselves into a big corner with the cap on modifiers. They're going to have to either go back on that, come up with some entirely new mechanism for adding to eldar survivability, or else they're going to have to bite the bullet and admit that T3 1W profiles are out of date in 9th edition.

yukishiro1 wrote:

Voss wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Increases in deadliness from rerolls and stratagems are obviously stat inflation as well, and the idea that doctrines aren't is truly silly, but I've got no interest in having a pointless argument over definitions.

The point is that offensive output has inflated dramatically, meaning that what used to be standard, acceptable defensive profiles no longer have the same resilience they used to.

Ok, now that I've whittled you down to an actually reasonably accurate 'point', where are you going with it?

Is this new defensive buff a good thing? Or are you heading somewhere else with this line of thought?

Mate, you seem very preoccupied on arguing, when if you just read what was written, it'd have answered your question. I explicitly stated what my point was in the first post. Here it is again, please read it this time:

yukishiro1 wrote:


GW's solution to this problem appears to be doubling down and inflating stats even more. This is very unlikely to address the problem, but if they really want to do it this way, they are going to have to inflate defensive stats as well one way or another for other races, even ones like eldar that are supposed to be squishy.

T3 1W 3+ save used to be a relatively reasonably resilient profile. Now it's a joke. So you have to do something about that, you can't just keep jacking up lethality and acting like the T3 1W is sacred when nothing else is.

Well, since your initial premise was completely incorrect and so inherently flawed, it didn't seem a useful conclusion.
But ok. Since we have no idea what they're going to do to non-marine armies, we have no reason to conclude anyone is going to act like T3 1W is 'sacred.'

But... one of the real things you did bring up was in an increase in -1 AP through doctrines, we can look at a recent t3 1W 3+ army (the only post SM2.0 codex) and... oh look, they got a defensive tool to counter that. Sisters' Imagifiers. How weird.

But I still one to see some of the strength and toughness statline inflation you specifically went out of your way to mention as 'increased tremendously.'

I'm going to preface this next bit by saying I have 6 of these in my Ravenguard, 3 in Dark Angels and 3 in Deathwatch, but Aggressors need to have their double shot rule taken away. It's egregious and purely there to sell Primaris (same with the new eradicator rule). There is no reason these models should be throwing out that many dice, it's beyond ridiculous, and no real reason eradicators should fire twice...they just have a longer ranged melta, leave it at that. Or should we just make Eldar scatbikes Heavy 12 and start adjusting Xenos races accordingly with massive ROF on their platforms?
I would love to see the double shot rule removed...same with Leman Russ, executioner and Fire Prism. If you have to double the shots to make it an effective platform through an artificial method, you've got the stats wrong in the first place.

Voss wrote:


Well, since your initial premise was completely incorrect and so inherently flawed, it didn't seem a useful conclusion.
But ok. Since we have no idea what they're going to do to non-marine armies, we have no reason to conclude anyone is going to act like T3 1W is 'sacred.'

But... one of the real things you did bring up was in an increase in -1 AP through doctrines, we can look at a recent t3 1W 3+ army (the only post SM2.0 codex) and... oh look, they got a defensive tool to counter that. Sisters' Imagifiers. How weird.

But I still one to see some of the strength and toughness statline inflation you specifically went out of your way to mention as 'increased tremendously.'

Gravis armor units are one very obvious example - in this case of both toughness and wounds increasing, and doing so quite dramatically compared to prior space marine elite infantry statlines - but if it wasn't clear from the last post, I have zero interest in arguing with you about something utterly irrelevant to the overall point. If you want to argue about what "stat inflation" includes and about how it doesn't include things you don't put on the list I don't care at all. If you want to call it "inflation in offensive and defensive capabilities" instead and that makes you happier by using many more words to say the same thing, go for it. It literally doesn't matter. It's just a term. We can call it "more cauliflower" if you want.

I was responding to people reacting with horror to the idea of eldar getting added toughness or wounds, and simply pointed out that something will have to give on that front as long as GW insists on continuing down this path of inflating the numbers of the game. More shots, more deadly shots, more rerolls, more stratagems, buffed weapons, more ...these all lead one place, and they're going to have to inflate defense for non-marine races as well in some manner or another. With caps on modifiers, and a de-facto rule that 3++s shouldn't come standard, there's not really anywhere else to go besides T and W characteristics unless they want to come up with something totally new.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 bullyboy wrote:
I'm going to preface this next bit by saying I have 6 of these in my Ravenguard, 3 in Dark Angels and 3 in Deathwatch, but Aggressors need to have their double shot rule taken away. It's egregious and purely there to sell Primaris (same with the new eradicator rule). There is no reason these models should be throwing out that many dice, it's beyond ridiculous, and no real reason eradicators should fire twice...they just have a longer ranged melta, leave it at that. Or should we just make Eldar scatbikes Heavy 12 and start adjusting Xenos races accordingly with massive ROF on their platforms?
I would love to see the double shot rule removed...same with Leman Russ, executioner and Fire Prism. If you have to double the shots to make it an effective platform through an artificial method, you've got the stats wrong in the first place.

It is, but we're so far down that road now that turning back seems extremely unlikely. This was my original point re: how inflation doesn't lead good places.

The best solution to all these problems was not further inflation, it was using 9th to DEFLATE lethality in order to get out of the vicious spiral. But GW has adopted precisely the opposite approach, trying to inflate their way out of the problem instead by continuing to increase everything - more lethality, more defense, more more more. I don't think it'll work, but they seem committed to it, so it'll require reconsidering a lot of sacred cows.

There seems to be a lot of push back on the idea of having any T3 veteran units given 2 wounds.

I get that they are aren't supposed to be as tough as Marines, but thats why they are T3 rather than T4.

I think the only way of continuing to have the likes of Aspect Warriors, Incubi, Mandrakes, Celestians, Genestealers etc stand toe to toe with the 2W Marines is to increase the power of their own weapons and also up their wound count to 2W.

It's all well and good trying to come up with unique niche ways to represent a difficulty in killing veteran units from non-space marine factions but will these other methods be more valuable than simply giving them an extra Wound?

And are Sicarans (T3/2W models) standing toe-to-toe with Space Marines these days?

 AnomanderRake wrote:
And are Sicarans (T3/2W models) standing toe-to-toe with Space Marines these days?

Never seen them in action personally but after a quick glance at their datasheet their Strength 4 power swords and 3 attacks will fare far better than a 1W Eldar Banshee hitting with Strength 3 power swords and 2 attacks.

My point is that plenty of units that used to be able to stand toe to toe/annihilate Space Marines are now no longer able to do so and with Marines going to 2W models the gap will increase further.

The likes of Aspect Warriors, Incubi, Genestealers (or any number of other units that should really be capable of standing toe to toe with Marines) should be scary and i hope that they will also get appropriate treatments (whatever that may be) to make a unit of them capable of bringing down a unit of 2W marines.

Not Online!!! wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

 Crusaderobr wrote:
Aspect warriors have always had special armor that is extremely durable in the fluff. They need to keep them at 1 wound but give them all a 2+ save. The superior technology of Eldar aspect armor needs to be updated.

... you're joking right?

2+ is steep but for a technologically supposed advanced race a 3+ should be in it imo, especially when the speed as defence thing got curbed to the side...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

stratigo wrote:
Two plus saves have very little value in the game currently TBH, they're never worth the points premium GW puts on them

Are you sure about that? Considering terminators, especially the chaos brand, exist and do very well?

Entirely sure. The only unit that has a two plus save that is generally worth it is custodes terminators based on the value of the strategem that allows them to ignor ap 1 and 2.

Terminators have the benefit of being buffed almost every points update since 8th dropped with them almost unplayable. But their value is not in a two plus save that so many armies ignore. It's either the ability to stack invulns, or, for chaos, alpha strike with combi weapons from DS. Their save rarely matters.

Terminators are pretty good in 9th, they finally deflated their points enough to be points efficient.

You're right though that 2+ saves themselves are rarely that great.

When it comes to Eldar infantry I think that they need more movement on basic infantry. Add 1 to all their movement characteristics. Up the shuriken Catapult to 18 inch assault 3, and the aspect version to 24 inch assault 4. Dark Eldar splinter rifles should get 24 inch range, assault 2.

I think a race-wide "always fights first" rule would also help.

So I just had a thought. These new wounds and weapon profiles are in the new starter boxes ? So a new player getting into 40k will put together an army with starter boxes, point to his data sheets inside those starter box and expect to play 2W marines and 3W terminators. And then what are we supposed to tell that player? Opps, all these don't come into play until the proper codexes comes out in October?

This is confusing. And imagine knowing your old marines are going up to 2W and lots of weapons are all getting more devastating in October. Why would you even want to play your army now? Speaking as a CSM player... Its like, why would I want to play my hilariously bad 1W CSM models now when I know they are due for an upgrade by October.

Well, they'll still be hilariously bad with 2W if nothing else changes, so there's that I guess. They might even be worse, as they'll be even more anemic offensively for their points.

Remember how meh intercessors were before doctrines and superdoctrines and relic and reroll bubbles all that jazz to stack on top of their base profiles? CSM will be like that...but even worse, because they won't even have the extra attack and better gun. If all that happens is they get another W, that is.

 cuda1179 wrote:
...I think a race-wide "always fights first" rule would also help.

Would Howling Banshees get Firstest Strike?

Niiru wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
Craftworld Infantry: -1 to Hit, plus descent armor

-1 to hit is now a useless ability to have. All it does, at best, is allow for the enemy space marines to both advance, AND fire both profiles on their combi-weapons, without any penalty whatsoever (in the past it would have given a -3 to be hit).

Useless? We went through a whole edition where -1 to Hit was the king of subfaction traits and now the ability is useless? I think your analysis has a strong bias in it.

CW Constructs: High Toughness and Wounds

Mostly it's fairly average toughness, apart from wraithlords. But without the invulnerable saves that other (marine) equivalents have in abundance, they still work out more fragile. Wounds are average at best too, for the points.

T5 is a fairly average Toughness? I don't know what factions you have been playing, but T5 is not that common in most factions I'm aware of.

Drukari Kabal Infantry: -1 to Hit, poor armor, and poor FNP
Drukari Coven Infantry: Better Toughness and FNP
Drukari Cult Infantry: -1 to Hit, bad armor, variable Invulnerable Saves (I would give them 6++ all the time along with the 4++ in melee), poor FNP
Harlequin Infantry: -1 to Hit, good Invulnerable Saves

Harlequins already waste half their points on their ability to have -1 to be hit, multiple times. They can still get to -3 to be hit just with native abilities and powers. It's completely useless. 95% of the time in a game, you already have a -1 to be hit from cover anyway, and so does the enemy. But the enemy got it for free, while you spent actual points on it.

Half their points? More hyperbole I see. And do you think that GW won't cook up some alternate bonuses for all Aeldari if -1 to be Hit becomes part of their core defense?

Suddenly Aeldari are hard to kill, but not because they soak damage like a Space Marine or Death Guard, but because you have a hard time getting a decent smack on them.

Suddenly, Aeldari are exactly as hard to kill after your changes, as they are right now. Which is very easy. The only difference would be they'd probably cost more.

Really? Every Aeldari has -1 to Hit all the time? I'm finding your analysis to be quite flawed by unhappiness about Space Marines.

Your solution is how Eldar worked in 8th. And it worked well. And it balanced the Marines full-rerolls meta fairly well (which is part of the problem - Marine players expect to steamroll opponents or the game isn't 'balanced'). Problem is, it only balanced Marines, the other armies like Tau and Orks were screwed over. This was fixed with the 6's always hit change, but then Eldar still got nerfed into the ground.

And so here we are with 15pt models with guardsman statlines.

The solution for 9th will have to be from saves, unless they remove the cap on modifiers for Eldar in some way. Maybe give all units an invulnerable save, for their 'reflexes', like what Harlequins have.

15 Point Models with Guardsman Statlines? What unit is that? I'm pretty sure there aren't any Aeldari unit with 6 3+ 3+ 3 3 1 1 6 5+ statline. Or are you talking about the fact that a few Aeldari units are T3 Sv5+?

You seem to be distracted by something other than how to make Aeldari seem Aeldari in the rules and a solid defensive ability because Space Marines. I'm not saying it is the best idea in the world, but it certainly isn't trash tier defense. I'm pretty sure there are worst (like a 2+/6++ or a cover save bonus when you are 7+/5++).