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It's almost universally accepted that a single Nightspinner is better than a single Fire Prism, although the outcome of 2 Prisms vs 2 Spinners isn't as widely known.

I've got 2 Prisms that I plan to run beside a Falcon, and i'm not completely sure about reccommendations to swap them to Nightspinners. There isn't much LoS blocking terrain that isn't part of area terrain on our tables, so the fact that it's a barrage is almost meaningless apart from being able to fire indirectly. There's also the fact that combining Spinner shots with Doom for more rends isn't as desirable, since units will get a 4+ cover save almost every time, and i'd settle for simply wounding them. I'd much prefer to be able to cover more with a Prism marker and use Doom to re-roll those failed wounds, purely because i'd force more saves (especially if the enemy squad is spaced to mitigate damage done by small blasts).

Rending is nice, but if everything gets a cover save against it, is it really worth it?

There's also the Dangerous Terrain it forces; if a unit is in terrain, it's either sitting on an objective, or acting as a fire bunker, and so it won't move anyway. Anything in terrain that does want to move is usually able to shrug off a failed DT test (Scarabs, for example, won't miss a wound or two on one of their many bases, especially since an Eldar army usually IDs them thanks to mass S6; and due to Stealth and being in area terrain, the chances of the Spinner shot itself doing damage is relatively low if they're spaced out). Vehicles might suffer a bit more, but is it reasonable to rely on a 1/6 chance of causing it to immobilise itself?

With a Prism, I don't get the rends, but I do get large blasts at a similar strength, and with two, I get the same strength and the fact it's twin-linked (sure, a Spinner gets the TL without having to buy two, but it's not amazing if your shots don't do much to start with). I don't get the DT either, but with my Fragons chasing down heavier tanks, my S6 taking down lighter tanks, and the Prism blasts able to cover enough to force multiple saves, I doubt i'm going to miss it. I also have the versatility of choosing 2 S5 AP4 shots against hordes, 1 S6 AP3 shot against marines or large numbers of T3 (such as Scarabs, where I can cover enough to almost ensure bases die), 2 S9 AP2 templates, so I don't have to rely on rending to cause damage to terminators or similar units, and 1 S10 AP1 template, which in all honesty, isn't that effective, but nice for any T5 multi-wound models (although I can't think of many off the top of my head).

So if we tally up a few pros and cons (according to my circumstances):

Nightspinner Pros:
Barrage.
Twin-Linked as standard.
Strength 6.
Rending.
Causes units hit to move as in DT on their first move in their next turn.
Widely unknown, and with a weapon that doesn't sound impressive at face value, lending it defense through ignorance (although usually only in its first game or so).

Nightspinner Cons:
Lots of area terrain and little intervening terrain makes 'Barrage' less impressive.
Models spaced out to avoid blasts can reduce effectiveness easily.
Area terrain reduces the impressiveness of Rending.
Most units that are moving will be in transports or have the capacity to ignore wounds caused by DT.
Vehicles don't care about DT 83% of the time.

Fire Prism Pros:
Versatile firing.
Can move 12" and still fire the Prism Cannon, allowing it to position itself to avoid unwanted return fire.
Can join beams (the exception to the rule of crossing beams).
Large kill potential.

Fire Prism Cons:
Requires at least two Prisms to become optimal.
Moving 12" still doesn't provide complete defence against enemy fire.
Unreliable AV potential.
A known threat, and will be high on the enemy 'To Kill' list. (Potentially a Pro, I know it has been before.)

Now, i'm by no means a master of Eldar, nor even an Eldar veteran (although strangely enough they are my most successful army to date, despite only being started in November of 2011, whereas both my Tau and Chaos are around 3 and 4 years old respectively) - I wouldn't even class myself as anything more than an experienced 40k player. I'm probably missing some huge link, or ignoring something I deem unimportant when it's actually quite the contrary, but I can't see how the 2 Prisms vs 2 Spinners debate is, at least for my circumstances, as definitive as some people believe it to be.

Is there anything i've missed that can convince me to spin the night instead of prisming fire? Or is it truly a personal preference, and both choices have pros and cons that would be difficult to balance? If I didn't like my Falcon so much, i'd probably take dual prisms and a spinner, but that's not an option right now, nor is a large amount of War Walkers (I only have 3, and enough of the same weapons for 2).

So, based on my current circumstances - large amounts of 4+ cover area terrain - what is the best for me?

2 Prisms, 2 Spinners, or personal preference?

I like the ability of the fireprisms to be either s6 ap3 or s10 ap1, with twin linked. Like you said, the nightspinner is always twin linked and s6, but against vehicles it suffers greatly, and against infantry the Fireprisms force marines to hide in terrain, which is kind of forcing a difficult terrain check anyway.

So while the nightspinner is nice, the boosting ability of the fireprism is better when you have 2 of them. If you can take 3 vehicles, 1 night spinner and 2 fire prisms.

You know the spinner is large blast right? Your talking about wounding lots of targets, and I don't see how a large prism blast gets more than a large spinner blast.

The real question is this -- is it better to drop a large AP3 template on MEQ in cover, where they are getting 4+ saves, or to drop 2 templates on them forcing 3+ saves.

For the non-twin firm prism blasts, the prism wins hands down vs infantry. It hits targets more often (being inherently twin-linked) and your forcing the same number of MEQ saves. (and you get a few rends, which lower MEQ saves to 4+)

If your facing lots of large AV12 vehicles (stormchikens and vendettas) then the prisms are better as its hard to deviate off those birds. A long range STR 9 hit can be a lifesaver in those situations.

labmouse42 wrote:You know the spinner is large blast right?

Since when? I've got the rules PDF up here and it says 'Blast', not 'Large Blast'. I remember reading something about one type of blast weapon always being Large Blast (might not even be any weapon of the sort, but it doesn't matter if I don't know the type in the first place), but i've read and re-read the Barrage rules and can't find anything like that in them.

EDIT: Bloody Games Workshop, found where it says "Large" at the other end of the weapon profile. It would've rendered a lot of my post moot if they could've corrected it, because the rules currently say "Heavy 1, Barrage, Blast, Rending, Monofilament Web" if you read them as you would any other profile.

Yea, their rat bastages for not formatting it correctly.

Yup... Spinners are great!

I suppose it could come up in a game against a particularly stubborn rules lawyer, who insists that since the word 'large' is not part of the collection of special rules, and that a range of '12"-72" Large' doesn't currently mean anything, it only uses the small marker.

Where could one find this Pdf? I looked for it at the GW site but could not find it.

Personally, I love the setup of 2 Prisms, plus 1 Spinner. I know you said that you plan on running them beside your falcon, but with the advent of the Spinner, I no longer feel compelled to run a Falcon, and simply stick to WS for transports. 2 Prisms and 1 Spinner truely is as fantastic setup taht covers all of your bases in a very cost effecient manner.

As for your initial question about 2 Prisms or Spinners, I never feel the need to have more than one Spinner, since Eldar have access to soooo much S6 already. I have a hard time parting with the option for 2 S9 shots, or a single TL S10, if there is heavy armor that really needs to die.

Nivoglibina wrote:Where could one find this Pdf? I looked for it at the GW site but could not find it.

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1640390a_NightSpinner_Rules.pdf


http://lmgtfy.com/?q=night+spinner+rules

I find Prisms to be the suck. Small blast scatters off target often. Played them recently and they just annoy me with their ineffectiveness.

I really like the Spinners. The rending is great for killing MEQ and the DT is a bonus. The barrage doesn't require LOS. If you are shooting at units in cover, it's not spinners fault they get cover. Players decide that.

Math hammer hits only

2 Prisms combined shot on a MEQ target
66.6% per hit in the open result in a kill
33.3% per hit with cover from terrain or intervening terrain cause a kill

1 Night spinner, double the numbers if you want to compare to 2 fire prisms.
Against MEQ not in area terrain 16.6% chance per hit causing a death by rend +22.2% chance from a regular wound=38.8% result in a kill.
Cover from intervening units/terrain can be ignored with indirect fire
Against MEQ inside of area terrain 8.3% chance per hit causing a death by rend +22.2% chance from a regular wound=30.5% result in a kill.

So in summary

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target in the open is 11% less deadly than a pair of hits from 2 night spinners against an equal number of targets.

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target behind cover but not inside of it is 5.5% less deadly than that of a single night spinner

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target inside of area terrain is 2.8% more deadly than that of a single night spinner.

Seeing as how the night spinner also slows down enemy units, forces dangerous terrain, does better against lightly armored opponents, and it's twin linked BS3 is way more accurate than BS4 of the prism it's safe to say the night spinner is deadlier against any non vehicle target.

The only advantage the fire prism has is it's anti tank firepower, which it competes against fire dragons, bright lances, scatter lasers, and eldar missile launchers.

In addition to the Night Spinner beeing twin-linked, can a Farseer Guide it?

Quoted from the PDF rules, "The next time these units move (for whatever reason) they count as being in both difficult and dangerous terrain". This indicats that this rule is in effect even over player turns, if the unit doesnt move. Or am I reading that wrong?

I view the 3 heavy vehicle choices Falcon, Prism, Spinner as each filling a niche need:

Falcon - (Depending on weapon choice) Good AT, troop carrier. Most costly (by the time you add all the upgrades)

Spinner - Good anti-personnel with a benefit to anti-tank (dangerous terrain)

Prism - Best mixed purpose.

Thinking I am going to have wave serpents, I view it as falcons or spinners over prisms.
Prisms fill a role if you are not going to take fire dragons. Otherwise spinners will affect an on foot army more effectively. (killing as well as slowing down)
A falcon - when properly outfitted can provide equal anti-tank except against AV 14 and for those few threats, I have fire dragons.

Gravity wrote:In addition to the Night Spinner beeing twin-linked, can a Farseer Guide it?

Quoted from the PDF rules, "The next time these units move (for whatever reason) they count as being in both difficult and dangerous terrain". This indicats that this rule is in effect even over player turns, if the unit doesnt move. Or am I reading that wrong?

This is an interesting point. If taken strictly RAW, this means it's capable of essentially pinning a unit indefinitely (until it moves and thus activates the dangerous test) increasing the effectiveness of the Spinner dramatically.

Gavin Thorne wrote:

Gravity wrote:In addition to the Night Spinner beeing twin-linked, can a Farseer Guide it?

Quoted from the PDF rules, "The next time these units move (for whatever reason) they count as being in both difficult and dangerous terrain". This indicats that this rule is in effect even over player turns, if the unit doesnt move. Or am I reading that wrong?

This is an interesting point. If taken strictly RAW, this means it's capable of essentially pinning a unit indefinitely (until it moves and thus activates the dangerous test) increasing the effectiveness of the Spinner dramatically.

Why wouldnt it be that way?
As for guide+Twin linked; you can never reroll a reroll

schadenfreude wrote:Math hammer hits only

2 Prisms combined shot on a MEQ target
66.6% per hit in the open result in a kill
33.3% per hit with cover from terrain or intervening terrain cause a kill

1 Night spinner, double the numbers if you want to compare to 2 fire prisms.
Against MEQ not in area terrain 16.6% chance per hit causing a death by rend +22.2% chance from a regular wound=38.8% result in a kill.
Cover from intervening units/terrain can be ignored with indirect fire
Against MEQ inside of area terrain 8.3% chance per hit causing a death by rend +22.2% chance from a regular wound=30.5% result in a kill.

So in summary

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target in the open is 11% less deadly than a pair of hits from 2 night spinners against an equal number of targets.

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target behind cover but not inside of it is 5.5% less deadly than that of a single night spinner

The combined shots of 2 fire prisms against a MEQ target inside of area terrain is 2.8% more deadly than that of a single night spinner.

Seeing as how the night spinner also slows down enemy units, forces dangerous terrain, does better against lightly armored opponents, and it's twin linked BS3 is way more accurate than BS4 of the prism it's safe to say the night spinner is deadlier against any non vehicle target.

The only advantage the fire prism has is it's anti tank firepower, which it competes against fire dragons, bright lances, scatter lasers, and eldar missile launchers.

While I agree with most of your points, the fireprism doesn't actually directly compete against fire dragons or specific weapons unless you are considering taking war walkers or for some reason wraith lords. You can get plenty of those weapons in FA, some on wave serpents, and fire dragons are elite.

I prefer the fire prism over the night spinner because it can handle anything. The nightspinner is really only effective against infantry. When I have played against them, they usually hit units I have no intention of moving (troops in cover and in range of targets or have strong fire lanes), or are moving towards an objective so i have no trouble just taking the 1/6 chance of losing a model. Of course not everyone is so cavalier about their guys, but I have no trouble purposefully derp striking infantry into difficult terrain, so that 1/6 doesn't really bother me.

Since I won't own any eldar until they get a new book, its largely academic for me, as I only play them when somebody lends me theirs (for play testing or variety sake).