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This isn't meant to be a complaint or anything; it's more out of curiosity. I've been having a hard time against Dark Eldar with my Tyranids (big surprise). I know this is a notoriously bad match-up for my Nids, but it also got me thinking. Do Dark Eldar have any kind of exploitable weaknesses at all?

They have all the elite killing power in the world (lances, disintegrator cannons, cheap poison weapons everywhere). Thanks to lances and blasters everywhere, they can easily deal with lots of armor, even AV 14. They can effectively deal with hordes (splinter cannons and extremely cheap BS 4 troops). They're among the best in the game at grabbing or contesting objectives (super cheap troops choices, and every vehicle is a fast skimmer). They have cheap tarpit units. They have army wide night vision, fleet, and power from pain. Again, not complaining - they just seem to be good at nearly everything.

I know their vehicles are like paper, but they're also pretty cheap and come with a 5+ invulnerable save. Likewise, their troops are easy to kill...but they're so cheap that it hardly matters. Plus, they rarely have to get out of their vehicles.

Are there any armies out there that give DE a hard time? Or any types of lists, even? Just for reference, I'm usually up against a bunch of warriors in raiders and venoms, plus a few ravagers.

DE are a hard matchup for nids' due to the number of poisoned shots the DE bring.

Normally I tell people the weakness of DE is they are a paper tiger and use sailboats instead of tanks.

DE played right are a tough build, but they're still AV10 transports with elves inside. High volume, medium strength shooting is their big weakness. The one thing that nids don't have at all, unfortunately.

Low toughness is a big weakness, if you can take out a raider full of Warriors and Wyches, the explosion is also going to kill half the squad.

Dark Eldar tend to either destroy you or get wiped off the table, their absolutely deadly against Tyranids though so you will need more than a little luck to take them on.

I feel your pain as 'Nids against Dark Eldar.

Siphen wrote:
They have all the elite killing power in the world (lances, disintegrator cannons, cheap poison weapons everywhere). Thanks to lances and blasters everywhere, they can easily deal with lots of armor, even AV 14.

This is where you're wrong. DE can deal with AV14, but they don't deal all that well with lots of armor. Think about it. 3 Ravagers: 9 S8 shots. 3 Long Fangs packs: 15 S8 shots, can split fire. 3 Psyfledreads: 12 twin-linked S8 shots, can ignore suppression. Of the three, the Ravager is by far the least durable. Imperials get meltaguns, Dark Eldar don't. It all combines to make it a little bit difficult for DE to deal wtih light mech spam. They have to rely on shaken and stunned results to keep things out of the fight.

Are there any armies out there that give DE a hard time? Or any types of lists, even? Just for reference, I'm usually up against a bunch of warriors in raiders and venoms, plus a few ravagers.

Grey Knights can ignore shaken and stunned. IG can spam AV12 and long-ranged S6/S7. So can mech Eldar. All are troublesome for Dark Eldar (mech Eldar less so, obviously).

WhiteZombie wrote:Low toughness is a big weakness, if you can take out a raider full of Warriors and Wyches, the explosion is also going to kill half the squad.

Nope. Don't forget that OT vehicles have their explosion dropped to str3, so roughly only half the squad will be wounded in the first place. Most competitive wyche combos have a Heamonculus attached from the start, so they will get 6+ and FNP.
Kabalites will suffer more but 5+ isn't exactly dreadful.

On topic; the nids have a pain catching the vehicles to begin with, before they can chomp away at the contents. Poison and Darklight tends to drop MCs pretty easily if you leave them in the wrong position, and your tides will do nothing until you get the elves off the boats.

I'm not a nid player, so take my advice with a grain of salt. I think maybe you should fight 'fire with fire': Venom cannon spam and warp lances from the Zoanthropes. Even warrior VCs have a chance to take out a DE vehicle. Because they are all open topped you don't suffer the -1 on damage result.

Dark Eldar are a very tough match for 'Nids. To summarize why:

-Poison/always wound on a 4+ kills MC's
-High speed allows us to run circles around footsloggers
-AP2 on a lot of our heavy weapons allows us to bypass FNP
-Wyches are I6, striking simul to genestealers, and before pretty much anything else.

This allows a DE player to make surgical strikes against gribblies, hat will probably kill what they aim for. As 'Nids are very reliant on pinning their enemy in place, DE's ability to redeploy to the other side of the board in a single turn, ignoring intervening models, is brutal.

DE do have weaknesses, however.
-T3
-AV 10
-Large numbers of easy KP. The above mentioned "competitive Wyche Squad" and its transport are 3 KP.

What you need:

-Quantity. When it comes to fighting DE, this trumps quality. Sure, a warplance hit wrecks the enemy vehicle on a 3+, but the DE will always get a 5+ save. You need to be able to inflict enough hits to overwhelm this. Thus, Hive guard are better.
-Speed/range. You need to either be fast, sneaky, or long-ranged to catch the DE, assuming they don't Leroy you. If they just charge in, you shouldn't have problems, but they shouldn't just be charging in. You have to catch them.

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:Thus, Hive guard are better.

lol I forgot all about the impaler cannon. Just squat your hive guard behind some cover and smack the boats around.
What I forgot to mention about the VC earlier is that they are also quite effective against the elves once they touch the ground. Even the basic version at Str6-AP4 will peel DE armour and negate FnP.

I love fighting my buddies Dark eldar, Were evenly matched now. (when he plays space wolves i dominate and end the game on turn 3 or 4 easy) So im glad he got an army to match his play style. YES dark eldar have a weakness to nids, Many in fact. once their vehicles are gone... we destroy them easy.

They are a paper tiger army.
A lot of str 8 ap2 cheap weapons with range
some good mass kill weapons like splinter cannons and the large blast templates....

aside from all of that.. they kinda get blown up....
Use better cover, go against the fluff of run in and devour use terrain stay in it, wait for them to come to you pop out and destroy.

Also im sorry to say your gonna have to make a list suited to better deal with a Dark eldar army if you come across one. They have range speed and strength on their side but 0 in terms of defense.. I push tyranofex a lot and its because i play against deldar often and its always hilarious to see me drop his big hitters on the first or second turn (also funny when tactics fail and you see your 265 point beast die due to demon dice)

Tfex- yes points costly but a beast in many regards a 48" str 10 weapon.. auto pens deldar vehicles always aim to drop his ravagers and other heavy support you have range and str superior to the deldar give him the cluster spines and either the 2+ larvae or the one with ap5 and hes good and smashing troops too.

Always field multi use models. genes are useless so are hormagaunts I love horms... but... a single purpose model doesnt work they will just die and do nothing... no use in having only hard hitting single target weapons when all or most of the vehicles are gone and you now have a brick of pissed off shipless pirates running at you?

Personally I love trygon primes, termagaunts with devs and tyranofex, I always put armor on my tyrant with parox and leech I try to fit in the Heavy venom (great vs deldar vehicles and thats about it) or the stranglethorn cannon. lash and bone for good cc option and cheap points.

Hive guard are a must even though they suffer dramatically due to night shields making their already short distance even shorter.. sometimes best to run them as a suicide squad hide them in cover till last second and have em pop out and hopefully destroy a vehicle before dying.

In the end what im saying is you need to field hard hitting troops with range and def (in deldar case... not really an option but tfex has 6 wounds so he can soak up some lances) try to get some big terrain to hide MCs in or at least provide cover (remember they need at least 50% covered to get a save, dont get saves from troops and can be picked out of groups) and remember all vehicle dropping rules, open top get a plus 1 to damage charts making them fall from the sky on a 4+ vs 5+ and if they moved flat out an immobilize drops them as well.

My experience with Hive Gaurd against Dark Eldar has been almost uniformly bad. Their saves aren't good enough and they don't have enough wounds, so they just get gunned down by all of the Venoms on Turn 1. Not needing LOS is situationally helpful, but if there isn't BLOS terrain exactly where you need it you're up the creek.

What I've found to work the best are Tyrannofexes. You have to make sure and get them a cover save (do this by putting Warriors / Hive Guard / Zoanthropes in front of them). If you do that, they can weather shooting from Venoms due to their 2+, and Ravagers aren't going to be able to put enough shots into them to take them down.

It's still an uphill battle, but at least I've still got anti-tank shooting on turn 3, when my Hive Guard would usually all be dead.

Dark eldar are primarily, incredibly good at dropping anything with a Toughness value, they excell at taking down infantry of all kinds, they actually struggle with high numbers of vehicles.

Conversly, everything is paperthin, T3 with 5+ and 6+ saves everywhere, pretty much solely relying on FnP if it has it,
AV10 on most facings, only Ravagers and Voidravens have better and even then that's only AV11 and with everything bar the aircraft opentopped you can glance them to death (wrecked on a 6), so all S4+ shooting is a threat, and anything that pens is going to be killing them on 4+.

Your problem as nids is that everything has a toughness, and most things have a low enough save that pretty much every DE weapon negates their saves.

Again, on the other side - bring as much Str 4+, AP5+ shooting as possible to take care of any DE infantry and as much Str 6-8 shooting as you can to reliably deal with the vehicles, using cover as best you can to defend against shooting.

It's one of the hardest matchups you can have, and when I've previously faced nids they've had a real struggle to cope but I'm certain it's doable.

I can only offer advice from a DE standpoint, here it is: don't bother with MCs, Venoms love those. There are actually two things DE struggle with:

- loads of AV, especially cheap values of 12 or lower. Suddenly, Dark Lances are naught but overpriced MLs.
- craptons of fast, low-T fodder.

Nids have the latter in abundance. So the best advice I could give to counter DE with Nids is to load up on 'Gaunts and Dakka Warriors, and stay away from 'Fexes.

The major weakness with Dark Eldar is killpoints. Most of this stuff has been said by others. Dark Eldar aren't that good against hordes. They excell mopping up MEQs, but a real horde army will most likely make it to the other side of the table with some good play.

Psykers as well. Sure, a hammie has a lot of awesome tricks, but SW Living Lightning tends to swat the sailboats out of the sky.

See, it's curious - so many people seem to think DE have a problem with horde - yet I've swept through hordes (specifically guard and nids) with my wracks / grotesques.

Things such as high numbers of shots, razorwings, and high attack models in general seem to do alright vs any tide of flesh.

And while 150+ gaunts will be fun, you're probably going to lose at least 20-30 of those a turn to shooting alone. I know that I made 40-50 gaunts (horm and term) dissapear in a single turn of shooting + assault.

I dont play 'nids but one thing ive noticed about DE is the are all about putting you in tough situations. If you can make them have to shoot at un-important stuff just to stay alive you can play a aggressive game, which is what nids are all about.

Ovion wrote:See, it's curious - so many people seem to think DE have a problem with horde - yet I've swept through hordes (specifically guard and nids) with my wracks / grotesques.

Things such as high numbers of shots, razorwings, and high attack models in general seem to do alright vs any tide of flesh.

And while 150+ gaunts will be fun, you're probably going to lose at least 20-30 of those a turn to shooting alone. I know that I made 40-50 gaunts (horm and term) dissapear in a single turn of shooting + assault.

I playtested Horde 'Nids (no MCs) against Venom Spam DE, and it did not go well at all. To all the 'Nid players, save yourself the trouble; it doesn't work that well.

I have found DevilGaunts in Pods quite effective. Hell sometimes your lucky and the pod destroys the boat, then the gaunts can shoot up what was inside. I do groups of 10 d-gaunts and a base pod to keep it cheap.

DE are weak vs shooting. Toss enough str 4 their way and everything dies.

Stop spamming monsterous creatures or force your opponent to split fire and use more hordes.

Adrenal glands on hormagaunts or gaunts with that weapon that shoots 3 times are your two best horde options.

Imperial Guard is a seriously bad match up for DE. AV 12 all over the place for cheap, can't fire any of their poisoned weapons until they break the humans out of those AV 12 shells, and those AV 12 transports sweat long range, med strength shots (3 str. 5, 3 str. 6, and generally 2 str 7 from the rear hatch). Rocket launchers that indirect multiple Str 10 Ordnance Blasts into skimmer formations. Heck, they've even got a tank that is actually designed to shoot down planes.

As bad as you feel when fighting DE, know that another army out there has a Rock for his Scissors, and thus your Paper won't go unavenged.

Yeah,PanzerBOY is right. I used to play IG and one of my good friends played DE. The IG are really good against DE. Any bonus gained from having poisoned weapons is worthless because of toughness 3. You also might want to consider having as many str 6 or above as possible. The only thing that is proven good against DE is getting them to chase units that are shootie. If you have hormaguants you can force the CQC units after them. then have your termiguants go after their kabalite worriors.

Simple.... high volume of fire (of anything) is the DE's weakness...

Remember... they're squishy space elves surfing on av10 paper flyers...

Drop Shooty Nids has an advantage over all other builds cause they deny mobility and have chance to stike first.

Venom Cannons seems aslo allright, cause our open-topped isnt actually helping even against AP-.

Devourer Gaunts on Spore will just mulch any of our tranport they fire to.

FnP is also your friend, cause our anti infantry is torrent in nature. I once saw FnP termagant that has gone to ground being fired by terrible amounts of venoms, most survived.

Hive Guards is premiere against DE , guess you should know it by now.

Gargoyles and Shrikes is also the way to go.

The best thing you have to dropping his vehicles is a Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon. Its basically a guaranteed damage result per turn from basically anywhere on the table (he would have to come closer to get range which is good for you) and the 2+ save means torrenting it to death with Splinter weaponry is pretty tough, and if you sit it behind something to give it cover you can live through Dark Lance barrages.

Obviously Hive Guard are the next best, but they need FNP otherwise they melt to Splinter Cannon fire, usually before they can close to range. This usually means you need 3 Tervigons, which is a big chunk of points gone. Basically Nids struggle against DE because they don't have many options to kill vehicles from range, and they don't have any of their own vehicles to protect themselves from Poison (they are now the only completely infantry/MC based force since Necrons got vehicles).

Anyway to answer the OPs original question; Yes there are plenty of armies which give DE trouble. Anything with a decent amount of medium/long range shooting tends to have a decent chance if they have the first turn (DE really rely on alpha strikes to drop return damage) and plenty of these can happily go second as well as they have the durability/redundancy to handle being hit first. In particular DE don't like massed S6-7 shooting from mech opponents, which means Guard, Eldar and various Marine Razorspam type builds do pretty well.

Powerguy wrote:The best thing you have to dropping his vehicles is a Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon. Its basically a guaranteed damage result per turn from basically anywhere on the table (he would have to come closer to get range which is good for you) and the 2+ save means torrenting it to death with Splinter weaponry is pretty tough, and if you sit it behind something to give it cover you can live through Dark Lance barrages.

Obviously Hive Guard are the next best, but they need FNP otherwise they melt to Splinter Cannon fire, usually before they can close to range. This usually means you need 3 Tervigons, which is a big chunk of points gone. Basically Nids struggle against DE because they don't have many options to kill vehicles from range, and they don't have any of their own vehicles to protect themselves from Poison (they are now the only completely infantry/MC based force since Necrons got vehicles).

Anyway to answer the OPs original question; Yes there are plenty of armies which give DE trouble. Anything with a decent amount of medium/long range shooting tends to have a decent chance if they have the first turn (DE really rely on alpha strikes to drop return damage) and plenty of these can happily go second as well as they have the durability/redundancy to handle being hit first. In particular DE don't like massed S6-7 shooting from mech opponents, which means Guard, Eldar and various Marine Razorspam type builds do pretty well.

I like the way Powerguy thinks, I would only add try to be aggressive as possible with the T-Fex if your going to run him. He can fire all three weapons at once, don't limit him to basically and overcosted broadside. Personally I like my T-Fex fat with Regen, and I normally run him in conjunction with Catalyst and Onslaught for the first two turns. And sucks up Tervigon love but is a fancy way to get him in the thick of things quickly to start dropping templates on some evil space elves.

Powerguy wrote:
The best thing you have to dropping his vehicles is a Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon. Its basically a guaranteed damage result per turn from basically anywhere on the table (he would have to come closer to get range which is good for you) and the 2+ save means torrenting it to death with Splinter weaponry is pretty tough, and if you sit it behind something to give it cover you can live through Dark Lance barrages.

Obviously Hive Guard are the next best, but they need FNP otherwise they melt to Splinter Cannon fire, usually before they can close to range. This usually means you need 3 Tervigons, which is a big chunk of points gone. Basically Nids struggle against DE because they don't have many options to kill vehicles from range, and they don't have any of their own vehicles to protect themselves from Poison (they are now the only completely infantry/MC based force since Necrons got vehicles).

Anyway to answer the OPs original question; Yes there are plenty of armies which give DE trouble. Anything with a decent amount of medium/long range shooting tends to have a decent chance if they have the first turn (DE really rely on alpha strikes to drop return damage) and plenty of these can happily go second as well as they have the durability/redundancy to handle being hit first. In particular DE don't like massed S6-7 shooting from mech opponents, which means Guard, Eldar and various Marine Razorspam type builds do pretty well.

+2

Obviously it all depends on game size, mission, deployment and what your opponent has - But T-Fex all of a sudden becomes worth his weight in gold against a DE army.

I like the idea of running lots of HG and Stealers as well. Infiltrate 2 units of 20 stealers in cover towards the right and left of his army, and setup your HG with a more central spread. This will help get them in range earlier, and your stealers should attract plenty of splinter fire away from your HG. If you get first turn, this works even better - conga line your stealers back to your Tervies to give them FnP. Advance them on either flank towards the DE (keep in cover if at all possible) so that the DE have to either move towards one of your stealer units, stay where they are, or advance into your impaler cannons. If you manage to gain cover and FnP for your stealer units, none of this is a good outcome for the DE player. If you only manage to get FnP (not enough cover in the right places) then he will move in towards one stealer squad and try to wipe it out. This has the advantage of you now being able to 'herd' him into the corner.

Meanwhile, like Powerguy said your dropping a vehicle a turn with your T-Fex whilst he takes out a stealer unit and traps himself into a corner.

Not saying this is a rock solid strategy all the time, but if the DE get first turn it gives you a fighting chance, and if you get first turn it gives you a good chance.

All of course IMHO - but best thing to do is play them more often, try different things and find what works for you best!

Having looked at the nid codex today (and now want to make a 2 hive tyrant, 6 warrior, 2 carnivex, 2 tfex nid army), loading up on deathspitters?, venom, heavy venom and rupture cannons will serve you well, as each is capable of downing DE fliers.

On paper the tfex should survive a LOT of splinter fire at least.

try running all medium/small creatures. No Monsterous creatures. Add AG to most of them, and close assualt away.

i'd say that DE's big weakness is when they're played by inexperienced players. other than that they don't seem to do good against shooting.

As has been thoroughly mentioned, their main weakness is the fact that literally everything is open-topped, and practically everything is AV10. That and, unless they're specially tooled, they're usually pretty terrible in close combat.

Put another way, DE are strong because it's hard to put damage on them, but when you can, they fold like superman on laundry day.

This is one of those times when high volumes of mid-strength firepower and a bit of long-range firepower really does a lot. In the case of imperium units, this means taking autocannons. As such, do whatever the equivalent for tyranid is (dakkafexes?)