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When I read the 6th edition rules as they were being leaked and finally released I realized that guardians became highly outclassed by rapid fire (on top of their pitiful range). I then read enough "guardians are crap!" comments that I started to believe them. So I stopped taking them in 6th. I played in 5th but as I was only starting and learning the rules then Most games were only 750 pt skirmishes. And guardians worked fine in them for me. But in bigger games and with 6th edition rules, it seems the consensus is in that "they suck".

In all honesty, they do suck. Pretty much 3's across the stat board with only 12" range guns. But I had to look beyond that to really get them to mean something to me. If I hav ebeen noticing anything, its that all the choices for eldar troops just fall apart. Bikes only last so long and are really only good at contesting a far away objective. Rangers disappear in close combat the turn after a drop pod lands near them to deliver any kind of space marine. Dire avengers used to make awesome troop choices out of falcons but now they have to be outside to capture. Putting them in a falcon is proving to just be an easy 2-for-1 kill for my enemy.

We just lack troops that can stay on the board until turn 5 or more. This is when I started to look into taking blobs of 20 guardians. 20 with a SC and a conceal-warlock costs 205pts. Or if you know they will always be in cover you can drop the Lock and its only 165pts for 20 and a SC. That is dirt cheap for 20(21) bodies. The weapon platform is just a bonus really.

If you have wraithguard in your list, guardians work great for a meat wall that prevents units from charging your wraithguard and tying them up. Fortning a 5+ cover save from conceal on the guardians can really improve their stay as well.

In my game today, emperors will, I decided to keep them in ruins with my objective and 10 rangers. If shot at, I just had the guardians go to ground giving them marine armour (3+) on a cover save. Its difficult to shoot 20 of them out of the ruins with those saves. Also keeping some out of LOS but still in the ruins helps keep them alive. If someone did come in their effective range (move 6+ shoot 12" =18") I would open fire with close to 40 shots.

Maybe it was just a lucky game or a fluke, but I saw my guardians do what nother troops havent for me. Hold an objective. Granted I had a 10 man wraithguard troop marching towards their objective so alot of fire was diverted to them which helped my guardians. But I still beleive they did their job for their mere 205 pts.

This is good to here, but also a viable tatic in 5th.

I see your main point though. I think it is about pre measuring.

now you know when a unit is within the (potential) 18 inch threat range.

A unit of 10 for 85 points is extremely useful as well. Not sure where you've seen all the "guardians suck" comments. I haven't really seen to many of those. Guardians are fine in 6E.

-Myst

You are discounting the very essence of what gaurdians bring to the table. They have heavy weapons platforms. in my tourny/all around list I run 3 squads of 10 with scatter lasers. Thats 30 infantry...I know what you are thinking "yeah but they die easy".. True statement, they do die easily... when played like marines. I put my gaurds in cover and shoot transport with them, Heck in my last tourny i popped a transport with my gaurdians.. I was shocked but happy they did something fun. Gaurdians are weak compared to everything else except IG. You just can run them into a fight, cause they will get munched.My opinion I keep them back for fire support. and objective holding.. Remember in 6th edition ruins give you 4++ cover save. Going to ground is viable option with gaurdians..... The thing is Gaurdians aren't there to win games, they are there to hold objectives and long range fire support.. That is how I use them.

I see the guardians suck and get killed so fast comments all over the place. I just wanted to have a topic giving them a little assurance and talking about good tactical use of them. As I am sure I could play better with them, just need to learn how.

The heavy platforms are nice, but with BS3 I have tried to learn not to count on them and just be happy when the work lol.

I could start trying to take them in 10 man groups but I always want to have a warlock on any guardian unit that is in the open. And those cost an extra 40 pts per unit.

With the 50% chance of night fighting, you can get even more out of those cover saves too.

Guardians don't suck, they just aren't as useful as the other troop options in the Eldar Codex. Yes they can take heavy weapons platforms but you will get much more use and better objective holding abilities out of Rangers, even non-Pathfinder Rangers will still give you a really nice 3+ cover save with rending, though I prefer the Pathfinders because of the 2+ cover save and double rending.

Dire Avengers are a little bit more survivable and have the unique and very awesome ability to Bladestorm. You take them in a transport and give the Exarch the dual Shuriken Cannon and you have upwards of 30 Str 4 Ap 5 shots and now that you can pre measure in 6th you can make sure during the movement phase that all your guardians are in range and your Farseer is in range to cast Guide on them and Doom on the enemy. Terminators would be hard pressed to survive that many shots.

Guardian Jetbikes are the best use of Guardians I have found because they make for fast survivable objective grabbers especially when held in reserve. As for regular foot troop Guardians, I have never used them and I probably never will for the reasons I stated above.

Dire avengers are no longer a stand out. Most of the time, if you have a very precious farseer (maybe even your warlord) in a wave serpent with a group of dire avengers, your opponent will be very happy. He can shoot at one target and really mangle 3 separate units. That wave serpent would be blown up wit 3 glances before you could even drop your troops off.

That little combo costs 150ish for the DA's, 100 minimum for te serpent, and the farseer is 120 minimum. Thats at least 375 pts all bundled up in one little package to shoot at that will only have a 5+ jink save (and that is only if you go first!). Every krak missle and las cannon shot would shoot at it and wipe it off the board. Honestly, you dont even need all of that. 3 glances and its gone.

Most of the time the serpent has to flat out turn 1 to get in range. Take a round of shooting and survive, then disembark and shoot. Thats counting on a lot to happen i think.

Also, when they go pull those shenanigans, they arent doing what troops need to do in 5/6's of the games. Hold objectives. So DA's sit the bench for me ever since DAVU is gone.

Rangers are good. 10 come at 190 pts. But if you have a smart opponent, they will make sure their flamers can get there. Or veteran sternguard with ignore cover bolts. Or just a plain assault for anything and the rangers go down.

Im not saying that I dont take them, becuase I do, I just dont tink you can plop them on an objective and count on them being there till turn 5.

Guardian jetbikes are great, but run off the board really fast unless you take a unit of 6 and usually even a warlock with embolden. Even they, jetbikes are best at contesting, not really sitting and controlling.

So I disagree with what you were saying

In comes guardians. They sit. And shoot their platfrom. The only real attention they attract is the fact that they control an objective. But if people shoot at them, they have 20 models to take out. If they loose 5 models they will have to take a leadership test though, that is a downfall. But if you dont want a conceal warlock, you can give him embolden instead.

When they are in multi-level ruins, try to equally space them out across all the floors to minimize the damage of blasts. Try to protect and surround your platform firing guys. If they are on the outside of the group and get shot down, no more heavy weapon.

Guardians are awesome when paired with the avatar making therm fearless is huge, especially now in 6th. My bro fields 10 wraithguard and 60 guardians with 2 units of fire dragons and the avatar and a fortune seer. Now you just pay 50pts for an Aegis defense line and you have a terrifying lump of fearless bodies for your enemy to face. Get too close and WG and FD burn you, not to mention the potential 120 st 4 shots lol. add war walkers and wraith lords and you have an awesome footdar army. I think guardians are great personally you just need to use them with other units, they aren't space marines so you have to really think when you use them.

In my list I play, I do 3 squads of 10 with scatts.. One with a warlock with embolden, this unit is the unit i put my farseer in sometimes for the rerolls... But, I do like gaurdians, I think they are the most underrated unit the Eldar have. Just my opinion of course, but I have been playing gaurdians as a troop staple for a long while.

Now don't take this wrong but guardians are a weak choice in and of themselves. The 3s across the board coupled with 12" range weapons makes them a weak choice. The other problem is the 8 Leadership. 25% casualties and you have a unit that runs about 30% of the time.

Now this can all be mitigated but it costs alot.
1. 12" from an avatar and they are fearless.
2. An embolden warlock reduces the run chance to about 15%.
3. A guide and you go from 50% hit to 75% hit.
4. T3 and 5 AC makes for bolter fodder especially when bolters can now get the 24" shot.

The only advantage is the weapon platform but that again suffers from the 50% hitting. That is usually mitigated by taking a scatter laser or EML.

So let's assume we are going to go 10 guardians with an EML and an embolden warlock. So without a book I am guestimating the cost at 140.

Now for 137 I can have 10 dire avengers with an exarch with bladestorm and 2 cats. For 124 I can have 4 bikes with an embolden warlock and a cannon bike. For 120 I can have 5 Pathfinders....


So take your 4 choices and let's assume 24" separation from 10 marines with just bolters.

Turn 1: 4 dead guardians... 30% chance they run. 50/50 1 dead marine from the eml krak shot or perhaps go for luck with a plasma template.

Turn 2: 4 more dead guardian ... 30% run... 1 catapult hit and again 50/50 krak kill.


Now a commitment to guardians with an avatar maybe but otherwise they are dead meat. The other is to field the 20-man guardian squad with the embolden warlock.

Personnally, I am hoping 1 or more changes happen to guardians...

1. Increase range of catapults.
2. Increase armor save to 4+
3. Reduce cost of guardians.
4. Allow squads of 5 plus platform or 1 platform per 5 guardians.

As of now, I will sadly do the saim hann bikers or mass dire avengers.

The one problem I see with current rules is the nerf of eldar vehicles. Rhinos or razorbacks are fine with the vehicle nerf since they cost 35 to 75 points... wave serpents going for 100+ points and being easily downed through glances just means problems...

That is probably the best reason to take guardians now in 6th edition.

I love my guardians in 6th edition. 10 guards with a scatter laser cost the same as 5 rangers. I almost always run 2 squads of ten with scatters, I also have them near my avatar most of the time as well. Yeah, they fold like wet cardboard under fire, but 5 rangers in cover will still die to fire. Dire avengers are 4points more, and even with +1 armor save they fall to fire just as easy. Avengers are slightly less likely to run, but offer no anti armor ability. Bladestorm is cool, but they die to dakka all the same. Bikes are great, but are almost exclusively there to score and can still die to concentrated fire all the same.

Just today, I had a squad of ten guardians wipe a 125 pt scout squad, and 3 tac terminators(120 pts) before dying.

The only thing better than guardians are dark eldar allies and running kabbie warriors. For 1 point more they get a +1 boost to most stats, have better guns(and support guns) and can get FNP. I run a squad of 10 of these as well in my ally detatchment.

The only thing better than guardians are dark eldar allies and running kabbie warriors. For 1 point more they get a +1 boost to most stats, have better guns(and support guns) and can get FNP. I run a squad of 10 of these as well in my ally detatchment.

Indeed, DE Warriors are the better choice.

I'd stay away from Guardians if you can. Unless there is an Avatar close enough, they eventually fall back after facing some casualties.

wuestenfux wrote:

The only thing better than guardians are dark eldar allies and running kabbie warriors. For 1 point more they get a +1 boost to most stats, have better guns(and support guns) and can get FNP. I run a squad of 10 of these as well in my ally detatchment.

Indeed, DE Warriors are the better choice.

I'd stay away from Guardians if you can. Unless there is an Avatar close enough, they eventually fall back after facing some casualties.

I do agree, DE allies seem to be nice. I thought about mixing in some kabolites behind a wall of guardians so they kabolites get that 5+ cover. Since their armour will be punched by any shot. But I dont really want to take dark eldar. I would rather challenge myself and stick to just eldar.

I do run the avatar, So I keep them close. If I have them on the front line its just to soak up shots or cover board space and move towards an enemy objective. A fortuned 5+ conceal works fairly well.

But when they are sitting back in ruins they are hard to budge with fire. Unless the entire enemy army is in range and shooting them. But that means no one is shooting at the rest of my army who are much more dangerous.

What I am getting at is you cant take guardians and use them the same way as a normal unit. You have to be smart. Pedro and a veteran sternguard unit drop podded in to take my objective. I had a 3 story ruins where my 20 man guardian unit, and 10 man ranger unit were in. The sternguard had to get to floor 3 to contest so good objective placement lured them in. I essentially lured the sternguard close enough to the building, kept my rangers on the objective then moved the guardians out 6" and opened fire with my "crappy 12" range guns" forcing tons of wounds on the sternguard and crippling them. I then assaulted with guardians, yes assaulted, and finished them off.

Now Im not saying that guardians are good at assaulting, but In that case I used them very well. You just have to play smart wit them. They are a good cheap wall, or a cheap defending unit. Quite simple.

What I am getting at is you cant take guardians and use them the same way as a normal unit. You have to be smart. Pedro and a veteran sternguard unit drop podded in to take my objective. I had a 3 story ruins where my 20 man guardian unit, and 10 man ranger unit were in. The sternguard had to get to floor 3 to contest so good objective placement lured them in. I essentially lured the sternguard close enough to the building, kept my rangers on the objective then moved the guardians out 6" and opened fire with my "crappy 12" range guns" forcing tons of wounds on the sternguard and crippling them. I then assaulted with guardians, yes assaulted, and finished them off.

Smart move. Well, Guardians can get the job done, but its very situational.

I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

Guardians are odd victim of anti synergy. Cost per model they have good short ranged firepower with the catapults, and decent long ranged firepower with the heavy weapon, but the 2 weapons just don't have synergy. They are too fragile to move up field to size objectives, and their leadership isn't solid enough to make them good backfield objective campers.

I can see the need eldar have for bodies, but cannon fodder is a role best suited by other races or kabalite warriors.

Guardians fill an odd roll and are not user friendly. I can see the use of a squad or 2 in an army, but I would no recommend attempting to seize hotly contested objectives with them. They don't have the brute force of a full squad of troops wraithguard, and they don't have the speed & finesse of jetbikes. Guardians can be useful, just treat them like citizen soldiers not conscripted cannon fodder.

Nologik wrote:I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

What illustration above are you referring to? Hopefully not mine.

Nologik wrote:I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

You are right... The Dire Avengers should cost 152. The point is for the price of 4 guardians with 4 scatter lasers and an avatar to keep them there, I can field 4 dire avenger squads.
4 scatter lasers give me better range but armies tend to be 24" apart not 36" or in the case of EMLs 48" apart.

The point of my comparison was to face the generic most prevalent troop choice. If a troop choice doesn't have a prayer against an opponent's troops, it means it is weak and will lose without support. To say it is an objective holder is fine but it is not going to compare to 5 rangers for effecting the game or an ork gretchin unit for cost effective flag sitters.

DAaddict wrote:

Nologik wrote:I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

You are right... The Dire Avengers should cost 152. The point is for the price of 4 guardians with 4 scatter lasers and an avatar to keep them there, I can field 4 dire avenger squads.
4 scatter lasers give me better range but armies tend to be 24" apart not 36" or in the case of EMLs 48" apart.

The point of my comparison was to face the generic most prevalent troop choice. If a troop choice doesn't have a prayer against an opponent's troops, it means it is weak and will lose without support. To say it is an objective holder is fine but it is not going to compare to 5 rangers for effecting the game or an ork gretchin unit for cost effective flag sitters.

Not going to compare to 5 rangers?! Do you have any idea how little 5 rangers actually does?? You cant count on 5 rangers to do anything at all. Unless supported by a doom AND a guide. They will most like kill a few random models. Much of this is discussed in another forum here....
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/90/464961.page#4618955
The benefit of rangers comes when you take 10 of them. And even then, unless supported by 2 psychic powers, they are slightly mediocre. 190 pts gets you 10 rangers, 205 pts gets you 20 guardians a warlock with conceal and a shuriken cannon. I could sit here all day and argue over which I should pick. But in the end, TAKE BOTH. I love my rangers on the top floor. It makes them harder to get to and gives their 36" a good view. Then you can babysit them with guardians. Anyone who comes close has to deal with 40 S. catapult shots. Then you have the heavy gun firing too. In an objective game (5/6) of the game types, this holds nicely.

I run Guardians to get a spiritseer to babysit my Wraith units. Yes, they are very fragile dying to a stiff breeze and the change in cover saves didn't help. But what I've found is that most people just don't shoot at them. They'll assault them in later turns, but most of my opponents' shooting goes at other targets. In one game in a tournament in May I had an opponent who shot at my Guardians first. It was a little alarming because I thought he had figured it out. Kill my Guardians and I'm looking at a draw at best. Fortunately for me he turned his attention to the Avatar and Wraithlords quickly. I think most people look at Guardians and think, I'll clear them out on turn 5, but they never get around to it.

Arschbombe wrote:I run Guardians to get a spiritseer to babysit my Wraith units. Yes, they are very fragile dying to a stiff breeze and the change in cover saves didn't help. But what I've found is that most people just don't shoot at them. They'll assault them in later turns, but most of my opponents' shooting goes at other targets. In one game in a tournament in May I had an opponent who shot at my Guardians first. It was a little alarming because I thought he had figured it out. Kill my Guardians and I'm looking at a draw at best. Fortunately for me he turned his attention to the Avatar and Wraithlords quickly. I think most people look at Guardians and think, I'll clear them out on turn 5, but they never get around to it.

This is a very true statement. People dont see guardians as threats. They dont get shot by focused fire. Just leftover shots that have no where else to go. Guardians dont really threaten anything on the board so they dont get a lot of attention. When you have a wraithlord or 2 (or 3 :-P) standing bye along with the avatar, all shots are directed at them. If you play things right, by the time your opponent has cleared out your large threats (if he does), there will be so little leftof your opponent to shoot at the guardians that they cant kill the in one swoop or cant kill them all in the assault.

You make a really good point

Arschbombe wrote:I run Guardians to get a spiritseer to babysit my Wraith units. Yes, they are very fragile dying to a stiff breeze and the change in cover saves didn't help. But what I've found is that most people just don't shoot at them. They'll assault them in later turns, but most of my opponents' shooting goes at other targets. In one game in a tournament in May I had an opponent who shot at my Guardians first. It was a little alarming because I thought he had figured it out. Kill my Guardians and I'm looking at a draw at best. Fortunately for me he turned his attention to the Avatar and Wraithlords quickly. I think most people look at Guardians and think, I'll clear them out on turn 5, but they never get around to it.

Exactly, as they are unreliable shots, they become little more than targets of opportunity or targets of dedicated anti horde units. I find my guardians get a lot of incoming small arms, but when my opponent can't even hurt my wraithlords with bolter fire, only wounds the fortuned avatar on a 6, and the fortuned harliestar just laughs at incoming fire they tend to be the only viable target on the board.


If you even play your cards right, you can get marines into single shot range, then get into your 12" catapult range and wipe them out.

Razgriz22 wrote:

DAaddict wrote:

Nologik wrote:I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

You are right... The Dire Avengers should cost 152. The point is for the price of 4 guardians with 4 scatter lasers and an avatar to keep them there, I can field 4 dire avenger squads.
4 scatter lasers give me better range but armies tend to be 24" apart not 36" or in the case of EMLs 48" apart.

The point of my comparison was to face the generic most prevalent troop choice. If a troop choice doesn't have a prayer against an opponent's troops, it means it is weak and will lose without support. To say it is an objective holder is fine but it is not going to compare to 5 rangers for effecting the game or an ork gretchin unit for cost effective flag sitters.

Not going to compare to 5 rangers?! Do you have any idea how little 5 rangers actually does?? You cant count on 5 rangers to do anything at all. Unless supported by a doom AND a guide. They will most like kill a few random models. Much of this is discussed in another forum here....
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/90/464961.page#4618955
The benefit of rangers comes when you take 10 of them. And even then, unless supported by 2 psychic powers, they are slightly mediocre. 190 pts gets you 10 rangers, 205 pts gets you 20 guardians a warlock with conceal and a shuriken cannon. I could sit here all day and argue over which I should pick. But in the end, TAKE BOTH. I love my rangers on the top floor. It makes them harder to get to and gives their 36" a good view. Then you can babysit them with guardians. Anyone who comes close has to deal with 40 S. catapult shots. Then you have the heavy gun firing too. In an objective game (5/6) of the game types, this holds nicely.

If 5 rangers shoot at whatever target is doomed they should dump about 3 wounds/turn killing 1 meq/turn. As far as damage goes that's good enough for government work. On occasion they might pick off a heavy weapon or cause a pin test that their target fails, if not ow well. Rangers are there to win the game, not wreck face. It takes about 30 regular wounds to flush rangers from cover. Eldar are actually in decent shape now for troops. They have cheap guardians, 2+ cover rangers, t6 wraithguard, flexible dire avengers, and ultra fast jet bikes. I would diversity myself to gain multiple options.

schadenfreude wrote:

Razgriz22 wrote:

DAaddict wrote:

Nologik wrote:I love playing my gaurdians, but like any other Eldar unit they have to be supported by other units to work. Eldar are like a fine oiled machine, when everything is working properly we don't lose. But when something is wrong, the whole machine seizes up and BOOM.
You just can compare gaurdians v marines. Cause they dont stand a chance...

With the illistration above. He forgot to say that the Gaurdians had a scatter laser and killed 3 marines b4 the marines got close enough to fire. But hey, if you wanna duel with a bunch of cracked up marines.. Be my guest..

DAAddict, I think your math on your Dire avengers is off, Should be a little bit higher.

You are right... The Dire Avengers should cost 152. The point is for the price of 4 guardians with 4 scatter lasers and an avatar to keep them there, I can field 4 dire avenger squads.
4 scatter lasers give me better range but armies tend to be 24" apart not 36" or in the case of EMLs 48" apart.

The point of my comparison was to face the generic most prevalent troop choice. If a troop choice doesn't have a prayer against an opponent's troops, it means it is weak and will lose without support. To say it is an objective holder is fine but it is not going to compare to 5 rangers for effecting the game or an ork gretchin unit for cost effective flag sitters.

Not going to compare to 5 rangers?! Do you have any idea how little 5 rangers actually does?? You cant count on 5 rangers to do anything at all. Unless supported by a doom AND a guide. They will most like kill a few random models. Much of this is discussed in another forum here....
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/90/464961.page#4618955
The benefit of rangers comes when you take 10 of them. And even then, unless supported by 2 psychic powers, they are slightly mediocre. 190 pts gets you 10 rangers, 205 pts gets you 20 guardians a warlock with conceal and a shuriken cannon. I could sit here all day and argue over which I should pick. But in the end, TAKE BOTH. I love my rangers on the top floor. It makes them harder to get to and gives their 36" a good view. Then you can babysit them with guardians. Anyone who comes close has to deal with 40 S. catapult shots. Then you have the heavy gun firing too. In an objective game (5/6) of the game types, this holds nicely.

If 5 rangers shoot at whatever target is doomed they should dump about 3 wounds/turn killing 1 meq/turn. As far as damage goes that's good enough for government work. On occasion they might pick off a heavy weapon or cause a pin test that their target fails, if not ow well. Rangers are there to win the game, not wreck face. It takes about 30 regular wounds to flush rangers from cover. Eldar are actually in decent shape now for troops. They have cheap guardians, 2+ cover rangers, t6 wraithguard, flexible dire avengers, and ultra fast jet bikes. I would diversity myself to gain multiple options.

First off, Your "for government work" comment made me laugh really hard . In a good way.

Maybe im dumb for not doing it, But I mostly dont use doom. With Eldrad, I usually always cast fortune, fortune, guide. So maybe Im the one making the mistake. IDK.

I guess it comes down for what you use your troops to do. I use them to hold objectives. I want a troop I can stick on an objective and with smart play they will be there turn 5. If all i have are rangers on the objective, they always seem to get moved off. Not necessarily by fire, but by getting charged by something (usually a deep strike unit or a drop pod). Sternguard also ignoring cover saves with that one type of ammo really messes them up. I've seen a good bit of Pedro and sternguard swooping in on a drop pod to snatch up my rear objective.

So Like I said, I use both. 5-10 Rangers up top, 20 guardians(give or take) downstairs. I like how they can protect eachother. The rangers soak up the shots mostly and the guardians are there to hold off the inevitable charge from something wanting to get to the rangers.

Razgriz22 wrote:

Arschbombe wrote:I run Guardians to get a spiritseer to babysit my Wraith units. Yes, they are very fragile dying to a stiff breeze and the change in cover saves didn't help. But what I've found is that most people just don't shoot at them. They'll assault them in later turns, but most of my opponents' shooting goes at other targets. In one game in a tournament in May I had an opponent who shot at my Guardians first. It was a little alarming because I thought he had figured it out. Kill my Guardians and I'm looking at a draw at best. Fortunately for me he turned his attention to the Avatar and Wraithlords quickly. I think most people look at Guardians and think, I'll clear them out on turn 5, but they never get around to it.

This is a very true statement. People dont see guardians as threats. They dont get shot by focused fire. Just leftover shots that have no where else to go. Guardians dont really threaten anything on the board so they dont get a lot of attention. When you have a wraithlord or 2 (or 3 :-P) standing bye along with the avatar, all shots are directed at them. If you play things right, by the time your opponent has cleared out your large threats (if he does), there will be so little leftof your opponent to shoot at the guardians that they cant kill the in one swoop or cant kill them all in the assault.

You make a really good point

This is a very good point. I was going to reply to the mathhammer post above about marine bolters versus guardians and dire avengers. The whole point of the matter is that guardians will literally never take fire from a bolter-wielding squad. At the end of the day there is something to be said for a very cheap objective holder that almost never take fire.

-Myst

My drop pod dreadnoughts and fast mobile heavy flamers enjoy the presence of large guardian blobs on the field.

Arschbombe wrote:In one game in a tournament in May I had an opponent who shot at my Guardians first. It was a little alarming because I thought he had figured it out. Kill my Guardians and I'm looking at a draw at best.

Because they understand the above principle well Whilst I've always liked guardians, I gotta say heavy flamers and bolters catching them out of cover is deadly.

Well, in the GT final 2009, playing CSM, I shot the Guardian squad of my opponent once (with reaper autocannons) and they were gone for good. Thank you for 1 kill point. At the end, I won with 5 to 4 kill points.

They die just as easily as anything in the eldar range, but cost far less. A great little blob you can gamble with because of the cost, enemys expectations, and even your own expectations.

But I would not rely on them to do the troop bussiness alone. I like to take rangers and Avengers and small units of biker guards as well.
Id rather spend points on lots of troops than crappy expencive Aspects that die just as easy as guardians.

Aegis defence line for the win. Stick a unit of pathfinders and guardians with a platform behind that.

I'm hoping in the future Eldar will gain a bit more range in firing. I have come to the conclusion that without Falcon's or Wave Serpents to at least support my Dire Avengers and Guardians I'll just continue my long run of losing with the Eldar. Dark Eldar had them cut down within 3 turns, Orks managed to stay them til the 5th (just) but had my opponent not allowed me to take a wraithgate in my last game vs Tau, the Tau would have killed everything within 1-2 turns. The game was over by the 4th, merely 2 turns after just over 50% of my forces ran out of the gate. My single wave serpent blew up, scattering its explosion and killed my Farseer and Striking Scorpions in one go. I had to stick with virtually firing as soon as I could and then going into assault just to save the Eldar from dying in a hail of gunfire. Only 3 Dire Avengers, 5 guardians, their heavy weapon and my single heavy weapon battery survived. Guardians seem to be the only things I can get to survive and their heavy weapon has been a saving grace for me.

By the time Eldar slog it by foot to get into firing range, most other armies have already devastated them.