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I've played and lost 4 times against a friend who plays Eldar with either my IG and SM.

His most devastating tactic is to load up a Falcon Transport with a squad of Striking Scorpions, aiding with spirit stones, fleet of foot, and what not, and on his first turn skims over to my side board, and tears up my units in close combat from left to right. With a special Eldar perk, he gets extra re-rolls on armor saves. I've tried screening units with infantry squads, and he just buzzes right over them.

What can I do to counter this? I really love my IG army, but they just get mowned down so easily in CC.

my eldar knowledge might be a bit out of date, but:

Striking Scorpions don't have fleet of foot, he can't charge out of a falcon that has moved, the rerolling armour save requires a farseer to be near by and to cast fortune every turn. IG do have some counter cc units, rough riders and ogryns. Sentinels also make fantastic tar pit units for slowing down assaulting units, even if he's got a power fist in the squad (remember that walkers with a WS take cc hits against their front armour, not rear).

also consider gearing up some command squads for cc, power weapons etc - if you can ignore his save then the reroll does nothing.

A third option is to sacrifice a squad to the scorpions, move them forwards and let them get charged, try to make sure they all die in that first round of combat. This then leaves the squad of scorpions sitting in front of all of your guns, from which no amount of rerolls should save them.



alternatively try to kill the falcon early on, autocannons are good for this having a long range, a decent rate of fire and enough strength to damage a falcon regularly - lascannons miss too often to be reliable.

Wow and with as much as people complain that Eldar suck it's kinda good to hear that they are doing pretty good with a non-internet style list. Anywho I've never played against Eldar myself, but I have played against Khorne Bezerkers and BA rushes. It really depends on your list and the mission.

I would deploy maybe 3 infantry squads, 1 on the left, 1 on right and 1 in middle. Make sure the infantry squad is spread out so they can't just run around you. Then Put a PCS or SWS with max flamers behind them (maybe 1 demo charge on the SWS if you have extra points). The idea is to block areas of the board and eventually get charged. After the charge move up with PCS/SWS and flame them or shoot them with battle cannons etc. etc. Rough riders might be good here too!



Another thing you can do if you don't have the manpower to use human shields is to concentrate on blowing up his transports before they get to you and then bomb them while they walk to you. Hydras, manticores, vanquisher with pask, suicide melta storm troopers, melta vets.

With the scorpians a blob squad isn't the best option with their large number of attacks they'll mow through you too quick.

haha darn ninja'd

I don't think that's legal... But I don't play Eldar.

Wait a week and then watch the scorpions die due to Overwatch in 6th ed....As mentioned they are one of the few eldar units that don't have fleet, Eldar can't assault out of any vehicles. Falcons can only move 12" and still allow the unit to disembark. The only way I see getting in to CC first turn legally is to infiltrate, move, assault.

Striking scorpoins? Really? They barely edge out a tac squad in close combat. Throw any kind of power armored assault squad at them and they're dead. A squad in terminator armor will laugh them off the table.

Kevlar wrote:Striking scorpoins? Really? They barely edge out a tac squad in close combat. Throw any kind of power armored assault squad at them and they're dead. A squad in terminator armor will laugh them off the table.

We're talking about IG. Not spezz mehreenz.

Scorpions can't fleet.

Nothing can Assault out of a WS or Falcon that's moved.

Farseer casting Fortune has to be within 6" of target unit.

When I think about it, my opponent hasn't been using fleet nor assaulting after disembarking.

BUT intentionally or ignorantly, he has been moving his Falcon 24" and then disembarking. So I'll bring that rule up to stop the first turn rush. I'll also make sure that his Far-seer is in range to cast fortune on the Scorps.

Thanks for all the info.

He also can't target them with Fortune if they are in the Falcon unless the Farseer is joined with them.

He can't go 24" (unless he's on a road). Flat out max is 18".

Anyway, I'm surprised he disembarks to end his turn (legally or not). The Scorps are much more protected in the transport and they can't do anything anyway (if he moved 12"). They can get out at the beginning of the next turn and move, shoot, assault as normal (so long as the transport doesn't move first).

all Eldar Tanks are Fast Skimmers... they can definitely move 24"

"A fast vehicle going flat out moves more than 12" and up to 18". This represents the fast vehicle moving at top speed, without firing its guns and is treated in all respects exactly the same as moving at cruising sped for a vehicle that is not fast (except where noted otherwise). For example, a fast vehicle moving flat out on a road may move up to 24". (pg 70, MRB)

EDIT: Now I found the Moving Skimmers page: "A skimmer that is also fast and is moving flat out can move up to 24". (pg 71, MRB)

Eldar jet bikes can turbo-boost at least 18" and up to 24" (pg 76, MRB).

It can flat-out 24", but can't embark or disembark the turn that it moves flat out. Also receives the 4+ cover save for obscured.

mars2024 wrote:Scorpions can't fleet.

Nothing can Assault out of a WS or Falcon that's moved.

Farseer casting Fortune has to be within 6" of target unit.

This.

Scorpions are a pain in the butt for infantry guard, but a lot of things have to go right for him to be able to wipe you off the table like this. Throw a wrench in anything, and it will fall apart.

For example, falcons are pretty tough to take down, but your opponent can't assault out of them unless the falcon ended its movement 12" away the previous turn. This means one of two things. Firstly, if he's that close, he's close enough to be in melta range of squad meltaguns. Secondly, you can always just walk your troops backwards a few inches, and force him to repeat his previous maneuver, giving you even more time to shoot at him with things like lascannons. If you don't have either lascannons or meltaguns, that's something you should fix.

All of this means that your opponent should always have a turn stuck out in the open before he gets to charge you. In this case, just be really good about focusing fire. 40 flashlights with FRF will utterly destroy any scorpion squad. If you use speed bumps properly (as in, in a way he can't just fly over them or multiassault), then those scorpions are going to spend ANOTHER turn out in the open, just waiting to get shot at again. I'd also like to plug plasma stormies here, as scorpions are only S3, and only Sv3, which means that stormies can deepstrike right in next to them and cause a LOT of damage.

If they make it into close combat, that does kind of stink, but there are a couple of things you can do. The first is to take larger blobs, and make sure that they're power blobs. Infantry squads will get wiped out, but a bunch of power weapon wielding stubborn Ld9 rerollable morale lunatics are another. They may cause a lot of damage on the charge, but you can still beat them with attrition (note that fortune only lets them reroll armor saves, which they don't get against power weapons). That or let them break a la a speed bump. Also, as mentioned, the farseer likely has to be close, and despite their pure awesomeness, they ARE a little fragile. Counterattack the farseer for added goodness.

Also, as mentioned, counterattacking works pretty well. They charge your infantry, you charge them back with ogryn or rough riders fresh from reserves. The only thing scorpions really have going for them is their unusually good armor saves for an eldar model. They're still just as fragile and expensive.