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Has anyone had any particular look with units army lists in 8th edition? If so what are they? also what are the major stumbling blocks that they face? After playing beastmen and nurgle daemons I want a new challenge
Cheers

Wood elves dont fair very well in 8th Edition. They dont hold up very well against any other army. You have to be very skilled to win with them!

However they do have some nice units, wardancers can cause problems and dryads can be nasty. One of the problems you get now though is flaming attacks are quite common meaning your decent combat units get anhiliated.

Ive played against a couple of shooting wood elf army which was a pain in the backside to deal with my empire.

I have been beaten once by wood elves by a drycha, tree army so this might be an option to look at!

The best Wood Elf list in my opinion is the Mark Borland style mass shooting avoidance list. At 2K you're looking at something like:

Beasts Level 4

BSB

5x10 gg with musicians

14-18 gg with musician and flaming banner

3x8 dryads

Couple of eagles

Couple of units of Waywatchers


It's not the easiest list to use, but I think it's about the best list you can make for Wood Elves. I've had some reasonable success with this style (check out my battle report thread in my signature for details), and I completely disagree that Wood Elves have only bad match-ups- both the other Elf armies are fantastic match-ups for Wood Elves, as are Daemons without a Greater Daemon. I've had some good results against Ogres.

There's also an impression that in the current edition, ballistic skill shooting doesn't do very much, which is quite frankly incorrect.

Wood Elves are certainly not the strongest army in this edition, but they're not as terrible as every says, you just have to be really good to do well with them.

tmarichards wrote:The best Wood Elf list in my opinion is the Mark Borland style mass shooting avoidance list. At 2K you're looking at something like:

Beasts Level 4

BSB

5x10 gg with musicians

14-18 gg with musician and flaming banner

3x8 dryads

Couple of eagles

Couple of units of Waywatchers


It's not the easiest list to use, but I think it's about the best list you can make for Wood Elves. I've had some reasonable success with this style (check out my battle report thread in my signature for details), and I completely disagree that Wood Elves has bad match-ups- both the other Elf armies are fantastic match-ups for Wood Elves, as are Daemons without a Greater Daemon. I've had some good results against Ogres.

There's also an impression that in the current edition, ballistic skill shooting doesn't do very much, which is quite frankly incorrect.

Wood Elves are certainly not the strongest army in this edition, but they're not as terrible as every says, you just have to be really good to do well with them.

The bSB goes with the flaming banner unit right? and you give hail of doom arrows and asyendi's bane is it? your wizard obviously goes with another glade guard unit? how do warhawk riders and wild riders do? just curious I like the models and idea of them


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Also what would you bulk up with for say 2.5

I usually try to keep the characters as spread out as possible, and more often than not they jump into a different unit each turn, or else bail out of a unit and hide- main reason is that because everything is so expensive, I don't like combining them.

The BSB also doesn't need to go in the flaming unit, they'll usually nick a wound off the hydra or abomb (12 in theory takes a wound off an abomb at long range, but I go usually have 18 in the unit to be safe against the hydra's armour save). he also won't benefit from the flaming himself, as he has the magic weapon (I do indeed go with Asyendi's Bane and HoDA, and I like to have the Dragonhelm on him as well as it means he can bail out of his unit and be fairly safe against the more common magic missiles).

I've not tried Warhawk riders so I can't comment with any real authority, but I just don't see their role- they're quite expensive, and I already have Eagles and Dryads for redirecting or war machines hunting, and Waywatchers can also do the peripheral stuff if they're not needed elsewhere.

To get up to 2.4K, I've been bolting on a unit of 6 Treekin, who are pretty good. They're not worth 65pts each, but they do give me a nice combat alternative. Also, with Wildform, they ruin a whole load of things. The problem I have with them is that they get hard-countered by a LOT of very common things- flaming S4 shooting or combat, Lore of Fire/Light/Shadow/Death/Metal or even war machines. That said, I've tried a few other alternatives (war dancers, wild riders, the LorenLord) and I'm pretty happy with how my Treekin have performed so far. For 2.5K, I'd probably add in another unit of Dryads.

tmarichards wrote:I usually try to keep the characters as spread out as possible, and more often than not they jump into a different unit each turn, or else bail out of a unit and hide- main reason is that because everything is so expensive, I don't like combining them.

The BSB also doesn't need to go in the flaming unit, they'll usually nick a wound off the hydra or abomb (12 in theory takes a wound off an abomb at long range, but I go usually have 18 in the unit to be safe against the hydra's armour save). he also won't benefit from the flaming himself, as he has the magic weapon (I do indeed go with Asyendi's Bane and HoDA, and I like to have the Dragonhelm on him as well as it means he can bail out of his unit and be fairly safe against the more common magic missiles).

I've not tried Warhawk riders so I can't comment with any real authority, but I just don't see their role- they're quite expensive, and I already have Eagles and Dryads for redirecting or war machines hunting, and Waywatchers can also do the peripheral stuff if they're not needed elsewhere.

To get up to 2.4K, I've been bolting on a unit of 6 Treekin, who are pretty good. They're not worth 65pts each, but they do give me a nice combat alternative. Also, with Wildform, they ruin a whole load of things. The problem I have with them is that they get hard-countered by a LOT of very common things- flaming S4 shooting or combat, Lore of Fire/Life/Shadow/Death/Metal or even war machines. That said, I've tried a few other alternatives (war dancers, wild riders, the LorenLord) and I'm pretty happy with how my Treekin have performed so far. For 2.5K, I'd probably add in another unit of Dryads.

Thanks a lot for your help with this, I think I'll get started on something very similar, my local players use lizards, woc,, dwarfs, vamps and orcs and gobbos as well as some of the other elf breeds, have you played any of them? if so what tactics worked?

Cheers for all this


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I can't get on youtube with the work computer which is why I ask rather than watch

Those are some of the armies I've played against the least with Wood Elves, other than O&G :/

With O&G, my thinking is that the Savage bus is really hard to bring down even with Glade Guard, so I need to deal with it in combat. Keep the eagles alive, and use one to redirect the bus so that you can get the Treekin into the flank and grind him out.

Against Lizards, I think the best option is to kill the chaff really quickly and pick up some points that way, then redirect the blocks and deal with them once you get the Glade Guard up to S4.

Against the other Elves you should be alright, the fit right into the category of stuff that GG are awesome against- that is, expensive T3 models with little to no armour. Concentrating fire is the big thing I find, and use the eagles and dryads to redirect him and bleed him dry (Dryads make Dark Elves have kittens...).

I only asked them because you had mentioned HE and DE which are my brothers armies so reckoned I could handle those, have you tried treemen? also whats a loren lord?

I've played HE and DE a fair bit, they're pretty good match-ups for WE.

The LorenLord is the highborn with Bow of Loren and Arcane Bodkins, I prefer lorenlord but some people call him the machine gun lord as well.

I've tried a Treeman, and he does add a nice doorstop, but I think he's just a bit too easy to kill. The Treekin units will take a bit of a kicking from war machines or magic missiles or initiative spells, but there'll stil be some left afterwards,. whereas the Treeman can get one-shotted by a lot of things. I think you need to either take 2 of them, or take none.

tmarichards wrote:I've played HE and DE a fair bit, they're pretty good match-ups for WE.

The LorenLord is the highborn with Bow of Loren and Arcane Bodkins, I prefer lorenlord but some people call him the machine gun lord as well.

I've tried a Treeman, and he does add a nice doorstop, but I think he's just a bit too easy to kill. The Treekin units will take a bit of a kicking from war machines or magic missiles or initiative spells, but there'll stil be some left afterwards,. whereas the Treeman can get one-shotted by a lot of things. I think you need to either take 2 of them, or take none.

Alright thanks not fully up to scratch on all WE terms yet

ah that's a pity I liked the idea of him.

Do you advocate only two characters even at 2.5?

I do, I just don't think there's anything you can take that adds to enough to be worth taking over another unit, especially as another character becomes another model that you have to babysit.

How do you usually deploy? Well spread out or flank denial?

A bit of both, I don't like stacking glade guard units. Having one flank anchored against the board edge makes it a bit easier to form a shooting crescent most of the time.

Thanks a lot for this bro your pretty much after guiding my whole WE army last time i bother you (for a while) how do you set up the treekin? as a strong centrepiece or what?

As a general rule, the Treekin go down opposite whatever I think I need to hit in combat and can't shoot very effectively. It's also pretty important to keep the BSB nearby for re-rolls if they lose any combats, and they also love being tag-teamed with eagles or dryads- if you can pull something out of position and flank it then all the better, and as tough as they are they don't really like impact hits or lances...

As a general rule if you were playing against a deathstar unit would you throw the treekin into them to hold them up for a while or would you just hit and run?

If I thought the Treekin could take it, then yeah- Treekin with Wildform are pretty hard to shift... however, if it's a massive unit I think the best bet is to give it eagles and Dryads and keep it away from your points while you take off the rest of the army- you don't always have to beat the Deathstar to beat the army. If the Deathstar is frenzied, then Treekin going in the flank will often work nicely.

Cheers man you've been a savage help, when I win my first tournament with them I'll send you over a beer

No worries, glad to help

It is worth remembering though that I am by no means the authority on Wood Elves, this is all just based on my experiences of playing with them so don't take it as gospel...

That said, even if nobody has chimed in to back me up at least nobody has been aggrieved by any of my suggestions, so hopefully it's not all nonsense

tmarichards wrote:No worries, glad to help

It is worth remembering though that I am by no means the authority on Wood Elves, this is all just based on my experiences of playing with them so don't take it as gospel...

That said, even if nobody has chimed in to back me up at least nobody has been aggrieved by any of my suggestions, so hopefully it's not all nonsense

Not doing bad at all man, I run my WE's very much the same way with a few differences. I have moved away from Dryads and more towards more Wardancers, Glade Guard and Treekin as "Hordes" are the name of the game at my store and skirmishing dryads even after multitudes of attacks and whittling down opponent with shooting just dont have the staying power in my experience. At least with wardancers (with noble with moonstone) I can outflank easily and raise some hell! With the list I run I had some success with it (just some bad luck recently what with a tournament coming up so Teclis and other characters are making an appearance ). A few tips from me If I may chime in from my experience:

-Treekin over Treeman anyday, for the cost of one Treeman you can get 4 treekin with a champion (if you really wanted to) which in this edition is huge. 4 Treekin can get 12 strength 5 attacks off and have 12 wounds which is double the amount a treeman has and each gets a stomp attack so it matches up well with the average roll for a thunderstomp attack made by a treeman. Treeman are good (not saying they arent) but there are alot of things that can take down a big creature like that with ease (cannons, bolt throwers, doomwheels ect.). Besides giving you a nasty rank and file unit Treekin will outlast a Treeman.

-Against Lizards they are tough army to face especially when fighting the saurus horde spam with a big nasty horde of temple guard with slann in it. Best luck I have had against Lizards is playing keep away and moving around his big clumsy hordes while as tmarichards mentioned "picking off the chaff" to get some victory points. Other then that focus fire/ magic one of the horde units to death to try and get VP before match ends.

-As mentioned above an MSU (Multiple Small Units) or "catch me if can" list with Wood Elves in small points especially is very effective. Your opponents will be calling you ever dirty name in the book while our fast units run circles around them picking them off slowly (only time I have ever been told that Wood Elves are OP from a WoC player ). However @ the same time that is our weakness as with a list like that we generally lack alot of offensive output which is why its also known as the "draw army". Only tried it out once in a large point game (2500pts.) and I got...well a draw.

-"Cresent Moon" strategy works really well. Love watching an opponent place the majority of his army on one flank while I place it opposite and force him to march into my killing zone (small units of x10 GG are great for making your opponent think your deploying on a certain flank). Usually will start with one to two units of x10 GG on a flank and based on what my opponent does try to counter it effectively, if he continues to build up that one flank I will place a unit more towards the middle of my "battle line" to keep it neutral. This usually sucks him in completely and with 3-4 of his units on one flank a good chunk of his army will be hard pressed to get to the real fighting (and VP's)! Won alot of my games this way since as he tries to maneuver over to my "strong flank" he is getting peppered by arrows and ambushed by wardancers to finally getting punched in the mouth by treekin. Best part is if you lose a unit or two of x10 GG you still have another 4 to 5 waiting to be killed!

Hope this helps man and if you have any more questions feel free to ask

How do you use your war dancers and tree kin? Size wise? Also what characters,I like the bsb and beasts level 4 idea but I'm a rookie with wood elves

Cheers bro

To be honest when it comes to what Lore to take I build it around the rest of my army. If your army is very character heavy or I would recommend lore of beasts to give them some added power in CC (Savage Beasts on wardancer nobles is insanely good) however I for the most part run life as throne of vines and regrowth really makes a difference in keeping my small archer blocks and treekin units alive. Now wardancers a little tricky to use but I have had success running them like this:

@ 3000pts.

-Wardancer Noble
*w/ Blades of Loec

-Wardancer Noble
*w/ Moonstone

-Wardancer Noble*
*w/ Crown of Command

-(x3) x8-x11 wardancers with FC

With this setup you have one unit with a noble with a magic weapon (re-rolls to wound I believe) another wardancer noble that can teleport a whole squad of wardancers from one forest to another and a third wardancer noble that is stubborn meaning they can fight units outside of forest terrain (if you didnt know all skirmishers are stubborn in woods). With this build in combination with lore of beasts you have the chance to lay some serious hurt on anyone they charge into combat with.

Are wardancers with character better than waywatchers with character? just curious since I like both the models

Depends what you are going for with your army list as these guys are sort of on the opposite ends of the spectrum. Waywatchers (@ least iMO ) got nerfed with the new FAQ but are still good to take, just alot less versatile. Way Waywatchers used to be able to appear anywhere on the table with no restrictions but the FAQ made them regular scouts. They are not bad at all with a permanent -2 to hit so against most shooting (except organ guns, doomwheels, TK archers, ect.) your opponent will be hard pressed to hit them. The big difference between Waywatchers and Wardancers is that Waywatchers are much more specialized in their role where Wardancers can be much more universal. Waywatchers are great at taking down small-mid units of Cavalry or heavily armored/tough foes thanks to killing blow but at the same time it is all they are good for. Wardancers with their dances can do well against a # of foes especially on the charge.

Now in regards with characters joining the unit they are both good as in both instances they can be a good support and give some extra punch to the unit and @ the same time get "wounds" from the rest of the unit. However there is a trick with the character with the waywatchers, do NOT take the waywatcher kindred. Instead take the much cheaper scout kindred (hence what waywatchers basically do now) with either a highborn or noble. With the waywatchers you could give him the briar sheath armor (now he is also -2 to hit) and the two best builds I have used are the "machine gun" highborn (with scout kindred he will have only 4 shots instead of 5 but you get wounds for it) or a noble with either the Hail of Doom arrow or ruby ring of ruin (surprised a skaven player by chucking a fireball at his jezzails and wiping them all out! ). Also however realize you are putting points into a unit that is scouting is dangerous and could backfire on you if your not careful.

Overall wardancers I believe in the long run benefit more from a character in the unit in my personal experience, especially when taking lore of beasts. It is scary for any opponent to have to take 4 strength 7 attacks (8 if i get of wildform and savage beasts on the same unit) thanks to the noble in the unit being backed up by the rest of the squad.

I wouldn't go with characters in Waywatchers, they're already really expensive and putting a character in there just makes them even more so.

tmarichards wrote: even if nobody has chimed in to back me up at least nobody has been aggrieved by any of my suggestions,

Sorry for not adding my comments earlier but have had an issue with my net lately, I am glad Wood Elves are still getting a following, tmarichards and gmaleron has given some great advice on building and playing with them and Toms batreps I found very educational,

I have yet to try characters in my wardancer or waywatcher units as they are more for support than used to actually form a battle plan around, I have seen some nice ideas of a stubborn Lord been put into a wardancer Unit (thanks to crownof Command) or a Scout Noble in with the waywatchers (either with the horn that make people charge or a min Lorenlord with scout instead of alter)

For what its worth my experiences with wood elves started out with what everyone seems to think is the only competitive build, that includes a Lifeweaver as much Treekin as points will allow and core filled up with Glade Guard.

Recently though I have started to field an all Elf list and have been having tons of fun, my build differes from tmarichards in that it is built around a large unit of Eternal Guard with a highborn and the harp for the 5+ ward save. This unit is backed up by a unit of wardancers, waywatchers and a Beastweaver, i have now won two games and narrowly lost 2 with this list and it is so much more fun than what I started out with.

people naysay Wood Elves all the time, I say to these people to try out the army themselves as although the learning curve is steep it is very much worthwhile, there are many different builds that wood elves can play and although they may still need tweaking to fit into 8th they are no where near as underpowered as people think.

WombleJim wrote:

tmarichards wrote: even if nobody has chimed in to back me up at least nobody has been aggrieved by any of my suggestions,

Sorry for not adding my comments earlier but have had an issue with my net lately, I am glad Wood Elves are still getting a following, tmarichards and gmaleron has given some great advice on building and playing with them and Toms batreps I found very educational,

I have yet to try characters in my wardancer or waywatcher units as they are more for support than used to actually form a battle plan around, I have seen some nice ideas of a stubborn Lord been put into a wardancer Unit (thanks to crownof Command) or a Scout Noble in with the waywatchers (either with the horn that make people charge or a min Lorenlord with scout instead of alter)

For what its worth my experiences with wood elves started out with what everyone seems to think is the only competitive build, that includes a Lifeweaver as much Treekin as points will allow and core filled up with Glade Guard.

Recently though I have started to field an all Elf list and have been having tons of fun, my build differes from tmarichards in that it is built around a large unit of Eternal Guard with a highborn and the harp for the 5+ ward save. This unit is backed up by a unit of wardancers, waywatchers and a Beastweaver, i have now won two games and narrowly lost 2 with this list and it is so much more fun than what I started out with.

people naysay Wood Elves all the time, I say to these people to try out the army themselves as although the learning curve is steep it is very much worthwhile, there are many different builds that wood elves can play and although they may still need tweaking to fit into 8th they are no where near as underpowered as people think.

Something like beasts level 3/4 with harp plus bsb to make them stunnron in say a thirty man unit, you effectively have daemonettes minus the herald


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So waywatchers are now just expensive scouts with lethal BS?

Tiarna Fuilteach wrote: So waywatchers are now just expensive scouts with lethal BS?

Remember they are more survivable as well as when they get shot at opponents are at -2 to hit them before you factor in long range (skirmishing and forest stalker )

also Waywatchers are better for warmachine hunting as they have AHW meaning they will be putting out 10 attacks against warmachine crew.

Waywatchers are also pretty much the only thing stopping things like Scar-Vets or Dark Elf Pegasus characters single-handedly rolling over our entire army :(

Hmm seems like its time to put my beasts and daemons on the bench

Cheers guys