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So I'm going to be getting an Eldar army ready soon but not sure how effective some things are as I havnt played any under the current edition of the rules.

I want tanks I know because I've always thought the Eldar tanks looked awesome.
I can afford to get 4 tanks but not sure which. I know I want some wave serpents and falcons, fire prism maybe.
Thinking two of each? Or do you need three wave serpents?
Eldar players if you could get four tanks what would you pick?

If I could get 4 tanks I would get 2 Wave Serpents and 2 Fire Prisms, or 3 Wave Serpents and 1 Night Spinner.

Wave Serpents are usually vital, Eldar infantry outside of transports really can't stand up to fire. Also, if you want to field Fire Prisms, field two or none at all. One Night Spinner will always out-perform one Fire Prism.

One wave serpent with a unit of fire dragons is almost a requirement.

For the other tanks its going to depend a bit on how large of an army you are getting, and what else is going to be in your army. It also depends on what you ecxpect to be facing, do you usually play against certain armies or are you going to see a wide variety of opponents? Are you going to use 1-2 units of walkers or wraithlord(s)? The eldar heavy slot choices offer by far the best variety in the army list.

Three wave serpents and one night spinner can form the core of a fine eldar army. As can two serpents and two prisms. A falcon or two can be made to work...but they to make htem work properly they eat up a large chunk of points so probably arent a good pick to start with.

Even three wave serpents and one prism can work, altho a single spiiner is probably better.

Sliggoth

No love for falcons? They seem to have the most firepower
A night spinner might be cool. They are used mostly to slow down enemy infantry I think?

Falcons are more of a stand off weapon and really need a guide seer to be effective. If you are only going to have 4 vehicles, I could see doing 3 serpents and 1 falcon.

1 farseer: guide and doom

5 DA
this goes in the falcon and can control objectives for you. Mind you that a falcon is going to cost your around 200 pts when fully outfitted but it is hard to kill due to holofields. I like EML as this gives you the option of moving fast and still firing everything - 1 plasma missle, TL catapults and Pulse laser OR good anti-tank with 1 krak missile and 2 pulse laser shots.

To get minimum effectiveness, I would look at 1 unit of fire dragons and 2 units of DA to go into your 3 wave serpents. Outfit them to your liking. As you expand your force, you will identify what you are lacking in your army and be able to add it.



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I don't play but have heard night spinners can be effective. Very iffy but the ability to impose dangerous terrain tests and slow your opponent down sounds all good. The fire prism looks good on paper but personnally I find it very underwhelming. Sure it has BS 4 but you are dropping templates so 1/3 hit and 2/3 scatter then add to that 16% of still being on target and about 16% chance of being withing 1 or 2 inches of your target means it is only about 50% chance to hit. Two fire prisms can combine for 1 TL shot at +1 S and AP -1. Sounds good until your figure that to get that you are dealing with using 200+ points to yield one shot that is going to boost it up to being on target about 70% of the time. I would rather stick the extra points into the falcon and get 3 S8 AP2 or AP3 hits instead of one small blast template and get S9 AP2.

If you get either Falcons or Fire-prisms, invest in Holofields. 35 points is a hefty chunk, but it instantly doubles the vehicle's survivability.

Either 3 serpents and a falcon, or 3 serpents and a nightspinner.

You could look at the Imperial Armour 11th Edition, some really neat stuff in there for both Corsairs and Craftworld Eldar.

Hornets, for example, are essentially sex coated in chocolate.

jedi76 wrote:So I'm going to be getting an Eldar army ready soon but not sure how effective some things are as I havnt played any under the current edition of the rules.

I want tanks I know because I've always thought the Eldar tanks looked awesome.
I can afford to get 4 tanks but not sure which. I know I want some wave serpents and falcons, fire prism maybe.
Thinking two of each? Or do you need three wave serpents?
Eldar players if you could get four tanks what would you pick?

Well a standard Eldar list for typical tournament points levels is going to have 7+ vehicles (not counting Vypers and War Walkers), so actually 4 isn't that many. As you build your army up you are going to need 2 Serpents minimum to transport Fire Dragons, but the rest isn't as obvious. Prisms generally need to be run in pairs, but that would leave you with no vehicles to put scoring units in, so that probably isn't viable. A single Nightspinner is viable though. Personally I would get 2 Serpents (for 2 x 5 Dragons), a Falcon (put 5 Avengers inside and camp objectives) and a Nightspinner.

From a practical standpoint though there is basically no reason to ever buy the Falcon kit. The Falcon is the core chassis for both the Serpent and the Prism/Spinner kit, and I know the Falcon turret comes in the Serpent kit (it might be in the Prism kit as well, it was in the old one), so assuming you magnetise you can just buy a Serpent and use/assemble them as Falcons if you want to (the same way you always should buy Razorback kits over Rhinos since it works as both and the price difference is minimal).

DAaddict@

You are right it is somewhere between 50-60% chance of getting a hit with the scatter. I say up to 60% because you can still drift and get a solid hit on a vehicle or unit if the drift is small enough or the direction in your favor.

Keep in mind that 2 Fire Prisms Allows a Large Blast that is AP3. A twin linked AP3 Large blast that is either St5 or 6 can kill a squad of marines a turn unless they are spread out. Catch a unit of Assault marines deep Striking, and you wipe them with one shot. Also the St10 AP1 small blast against a tank will normally wreck it.

I do agree you either run 2-3 Fire Prism's are you run none. Running 1 is a waste of points.

You will most likely want 2 troops and forward fire dragon squad in transports. Outside of that, it's awfully nice to have something sitting back picking at other tanks or newly exposed blobs. The falcon is not exactly best running up ahead, so that puts you very likely at 3 serpents and your choice of a heavy support choice

Prisims I hear are quite fun, but look awkward to me. I've had friends rant about how much better they like their nightspinner, but back when I had a little eldar force, I always valued the transport capacity of the falcon quite a bit. These days it acts like a backfield camper too!

I can really see what my pal means when he talks about the spinner though. A blast hitting a doom'd squad will roll rends like nobody's business and then have trouble keeping up with your skimmers.

your last option is to just have no really aggressive skimmers and be using mainly kiting and heavy support tactics, filling long ranged faclons and wave serpents with troops and filling it out with some blast tanks as need be. You will have to decide what the best use of your hvy slots are, and you miss out on all firedragons can offer.

Well I think I'm gonna get two serpents, a falcon and a nightspinner. That should be enough tanks to get a 1500 PT list going. I will probably get another wave serpent eventually. Hopefully plastic wraithguard too but that's wishful thinking.
Appreciate the info

Eldar tanks may be a bit too expensive, or at least limited in reasonably priced utility, but they are damn cool.

Good Luck Sir!

Two Wave Serpents, either two Falcons or two Fire Prisms (that's a matter of personal preference). Pick up another Wave Serpent later on if you're planning on playing bigger games, Dire Avengers always do better riding in Wave Serpents than on foot.

Just to add, one prism certainly can work by itself. Yes, two prisms can link which can be a great improvement...at times. Even when you field two prisms they will seldom link fire, only certain targets justify the increased str and ap. Usually you will be much better off firing two separate blasts rather than linking to fire one twin linked.

Before the spinner was added to the eldar list the default choice at lower points levels was often a single prism. Now of course the spinner adds a better mix of options. In either case tho, a single prism or a single spinner will probably be best used to draw fire from the wave serpents. A turn or two of shooting devoted to killing the heavy means that the elites and troops will be free to get to their targets.



Sliggoth

I would get either 4 wave serpents or 2 wave serpents and 2 fire prisms. I have only the old falcon models from third edition so if you do that then the only thing that separates each type of tank is the turret which you can proxy/make your own turrets. Its pretty easy to do. Depending on how much you model you could magnetize your turrets so you can change them out. I just have my tanks colour coated but they all have turrets. Its really hard to have all the different options on eldar tanks so people should understand if you don't have the right one.

Aiming for 1250 pts -

Eldrad 210

2 Wave Serpents - Stones, Cannon, EML 280
1 Falcons - Holo, Stones, Star Engine, EML 195
1 Falcon - Holo, Stones, EML 180
865

2 5 man dire avenger 120
1 5 man fire dragon 80
1 10 man dire avenger - Exarch w bladestorm & defend, Shield & PW 177 ;
1242

This gives you 4 vehicles that can move and fire everything. 2 TL plasma missiles, 2 Shuriken cannons, 2 plasma missiles, 4 pulse lasers and 2 TL shuriken catapults. Eldrad - if the falcons stay within 6" - can both be guided making everything 75% chance to hit. Also if you move 6" or less, you have 8 S8 shots to drop tanks. You also can use your speed to stay away as you have everything with a 48" range... The full dire avenger squad is something that you can fortune so you can fortune them, unload, bladestorm and then if the enemy charges you you take away the bonus attack due to defend and have a 5++ invulnerable save with a reroll. The fire dragons are the suicide squad for the odd landraider, monolith or MC.

Now if you are aiming for 4 vehicles at 1000 points, lose the falcons and go to two wave serpents. They are going to be alot cheaper.