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Hey all!
As I am looking to start a new army, I'm trying to find an army that is more difficult to play, try and take a break from all the marines and other such nonsense!
I am looking for an army with a mix between melee and shooting, that is not really that common and more difficult to play, It may sound strange but...Yeah I am just looking for opinions!
Thanks all

-TKG

Eldar

Dark Eldar if you go any route other than Venom/Ravager/Flyer spam. Melee-focused if you want maximum challenge.

Dark Eldar - a steep learning curve with good ranged and melle options. Breaks all the "rules" in the game, I think you will like them.

Tyranids - Shoot open transports and charge in. Good luck. Hope you do not meet flyers.

Necrons can also be melee and ranged but they are not so hard to play.

Eldars - expensive options that are all specialised but they have a problem getting into CC after 6th edition.

Orks might also be an option. A lott of shooting but not that good shooting.

 Sephyr wrote:
Dark Eldar if you go any route other than Venom/Ravager/Flyer spam. Melee-focused if you want maximum challenge.

/shrug

You can make every army difficult if you go against the grain. Blood Angels DC-army without the ability to score? Space Wolves only-Wolves as troops?

But by and large, Dark Eldar are one of the easiest and brainless armies to play... mainly because you can run most key functions off your (spam-priced) troops/transports.

A lobotomized monkey can play Dark Elder.

De. Low durability, royally kicked in the nads at 6th. Eldar requires better management and synergy than most armies.

A lobotomized monkey can play dark eldar?They are by far the most difficult army on tabletop with plenty of bad match-ups.Try playing de vs mech ig or aircrons where even speed is against u.Spam-priced troops/transports?Kabalites and venoms are freaking overpriced compared to all imperial armies and actually they are the reason why de are not a tier 1 army.

OK, let's slow down here.

1: DE are not the best army, but they're certainly not the worst. Dark Angels, Daemons, Tau and Black Templars are the candidates for that one.

2: Dark Eldar are quite cheap. Consider what you get on a Raider vs a Rhino. DE is not a teir 1 army because of fragile troops, not Over priced transports. A venom with twin Splinter cannons is ridiculously cheap and effective.

3: Yes, other armies have powerful builds that are hard for DE to go against, DE Harliebomb is pretty effective, and remember the aircrons have relatively little to score with, so in 5/6ths of game types, you'll have an advantage. Mech vets are piss easy for DE to pop with dark/void lances every where. Trust me, I know.

archonisthebesthqever wrote:
Try playing de vs mech ig or aircrons where even speed is against u.Spam-priced troops/transports?

Try playing Tau against Mech IG or aircrons instead.

Hey, I am not saying DE are 1st tier. But the basic logic/mechanics of how you use DE is dead simple. You pack cheap-for-what-they-do-troops into fast transports and just play with them to every scenario. There may be bad match-ups and good match-ups, but that is largely a result of the entire Codex being extremely poorly written and lacking in true variety. There are no internal choices you could make to adapt or alleviate good/bad match-ups.

Not so books like Tau or the old Eldar. With those, your scoring units are near-dead weight in points you tack along "only" for scoring, while you also have to rely on specialized units (Fire Dragons, Broadsides) that are severely limited in numbers no-matter what point level you play to get key jobs done.

It's simply not a problem you have with "easy" armies like Space Marines or .. as it is .. Dark Eldar, where you can just stick ... for example ... Melta weapons or Template weapons into your regular, usually units to either use them for whatever comes up without the need to actually think about it beforehand. Add the mobility of DE to redeploy (compare with, for example, Tyranids) and/or the low-costs of their basic troops/utility units, they are probably even easier to play than Space Marines (also not a 1st tier army).

If they literally changed NOTHING with the current Craftworld Eldar EXCEPT letting Guardians take some Melta or Flamer-weapons and boat around in open transports, the army in itself would be 100% easier to play right than and there. Don't even need to shave off point costs or buff their BS.

It's not about how powerful a given army is. It's about how many grey cells you need to make a given army work. DE are very much one of the easiest armies to get playing.

I will repeat myself de troops are pretty bad(and i believe venom to be overpriced too when you compare it with the psyback or chimera).DE army is also build on specialized units more than eldar m8(which i actually find them an easy to play army with their new deathstars and defensive gameplay,last turn denial).DE are the most difficult army exactly because if you dont play ultra aggresive you just lose and they are the most fragile too.Furthermore, i think 6 ed is a pretty handy for dark eldar with all this infantry going around,although their assault is dead.DE are definately an AI army and not AT.Also,you should check out the de/eldar army that was placed 6th on nova 2012 where it didnt have a single venom, just cause i heard that de are an extreme poorly written codex that lacks true variety ;P.

Looks like someone's pawning off their opinion as fact.

And did you seriously just say Chimeras are OP? LOL.

I am pretty sure i said venom is overpriced compare to chimares or psybacks.The prob with the little guy ,except dying from boltgun and paying 10 pts for the useless nowdays fickerfield,is the fact that against some armies it is competely useless.

All those Armoured battlegroups that turn up, And are prefect for any lance weapons to eat, sure. No, the venom is not overpriced compared to Chimeras. For a similar value, the Chimera has +2 Av on the front. The venom can put out double the shots at a higher BS, has a natural 5++, as well as the same or better if it moves, and a far higher threat range.

The chimera can carry more dudes and is slightly more durable. The Venom is more killy vs infantry and is far faster. In fact, with its speed and INV/ cover saves, you could argue the Venom is just as, if not more durable in the right hands.

TL;DR: Stop whining, Chimeras are not broken.

Chimera 55 pts for 3 bs 3 str 6 shots and a heavy flamer or heavy bolter, front armor 12 , capacity 12 models,smoke launchers and searchlight, 3 hull points

Psyback 50pts for 3 bs 4 twin linked str 6 shots , front side armor 11 , capacity 6 but no fire points , smoke launchers, 3 hull points

Venom 65pts for 12 4+ poison shots at bs 4 , armor 10 open topped , 5++ save , capacity of 5 models

So,the venom is faster and has a 6 inch higher threat range.It decimates MCs but cant hurt vehicles.It also dies from boltguns but unlike psyback it has fire points.Problem?You are paying 15/10 points more for an armor 10 open topped 2 hull points vehicles that now it cant even last turn capture objectives.

I would like also to add that you are overestimating DE shooting,i guess you have not ever played againsts 9+ armor 12 vehicles were 18 dark lances(and ofc by no means a dark eldar army can pick up so many) will only neutralise 1 chimera.

Again i am pointing out that chimeras are not broken and i do not find them to be the best dedicated transport of the game(aka night scythes) .I just think that de vehicles are a bit too pricey for what they offer.Sorry to the OP for disrupting his thread.

Eldar/Dark Eldar are both quite difficult to play well; building an army against the traditional grain can also be an interesting way to achieve a challenge. Try playing a Grey Knights army built around lesser-used units (Purgators, Strike squads) for an interesting challenge.

archonisthebesthqever wrote:
Implying I don't know what I'm talking about.

Clearly, you were unlucky for 18 Dark lances to do not much against quite a few chimeras. Exception =/= common rules. I am not overestimating De shooting by saying BS4 is better than BS3.

I think the main problem here is that you've had a bad game vs some mech guard and are now crying about it on the internet. The Chimera wasn't called "cheese" upon its release; the same cannot be said for the Dual SC Venom.

Venomspam is probably DEs only viable tourney build, aside from possibly coven builds.

To the OP: I stand by DE as a choice for this, as well as CWE. YMMV with different builds.

 TKG Painting wrote:

I am looking for an army with a mix between melee and shooting, that is not really that common and more difficult to play, It may sound strange but...Yeah I am just looking for opinions!
Thanks all

-TKG

I know you said you wanted to get away from Marines, but Black Templars currently fit the bill. Lots of shooting and Terminators doing the heavy melee lifting.


Still not a good army, though.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 TKG Painting wrote:

I am looking for an army with a mix between melee and shooting, that is not really that common and more difficult to play, It may sound strange but...Yeah I am just looking for opinions!
Thanks all

-TKG

I know you said you wanted to get away from Marines, but Black Templars currently fit the bill. Lots of shooting and Terminators doing the heavy melee lifting.


Still not a good army, though.

...Pardon me if I'm talking out my ass here, but I always thought Black Templars were all about assault...? There isn't a lot of space for shooting units given their Codex and their special rules...

archonisthebesthqever wrote:
I will repeat myself de troops are pretty bad(and i believe venom to be overpriced too. . .

Eh? I would gladly pay and EXTRA 1 POINT for my Eldar guardians to have double the average weapon range with better BS, WS and I. I would also enjoy being able to equip more than 1 BL to the squad (which are DE dark lances but cost and extra 5 points).

Your complaining about your wythes? I would rather enjoy being able to take Banshees at a cost of 10 points and with proper wargear options.

Ask any Eldar player, they would also like a transport that doesn't cost a minimum of 100 points.

Lets not forget your Hellion and Wrack troop options and combat drugs.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 TKG Painting wrote:

I am looking for an army with a mix between melee and shooting, that is not really that common and more difficult to play, It may sound strange but...Yeah I am just looking for opinions!
Thanks all

-TKG

I know you said you wanted to get away from Marines, but Black Templars currently fit the bill. Lots of shooting and Terminators doing the heavy melee lifting.


Still not a good army, though.

...Pardon me if I'm talking out my ass here, but I always thought Black Templars were all about assault...? There isn't a lot of space for shooting units given their Codex and their special rules...

Fluff-wise (and I dare say intention-wise) you'd be absolutely correct. Rules-wise, however, the only two non-IC units in the Codex that's actually good at CC are Terminators and Terminators. Between Land Speeder Typhoons on the cheap, double-weapon Tank Hunter Terminators, cheap(-ish now that CSM got it better) Trilas-Predators and minmax lasplas-squads, however, you get quite a nice pick of shooty units.

archonisthebesthqever wrote:
Chimera 55 pts for 3 bs 3 str 6 shots and a heavy flamer or heavy bolter, front armor 12 , capacity 12 models,smoke launchers and searchlight, 3 hull points

Psyback 50pts for 3 bs 4 twin linked str 6 shots , front side armor 11 , capacity 6 but no fire points , smoke launchers, 3 hull points

Venom 65pts for 12 4+ poison shots at bs 4 , armor 10 open topped , 5++ save , capacity of 5 models

So,the venom is faster and has a 6 inch higher threat range.It decimates MCs but cant hurt vehicles.It also dies from boltguns but unlike psyback it has fire points.Problem?You are paying 15/10 points more for an armor 10 open topped 2 hull points vehicles that now it cant even last turn capture objectives.

I would like also to add that you are overestimating DE shooting,i guess you have not ever played againsts 9+ armor 12 vehicles were 18 dark lances(and ofc by no means a dark eldar army can pick up so many) will only neutralise 1 chimera.

Again i am pointing out that chimeras are not broken and i do not find them to be the best dedicated transport of the game(aka night scythes) .I just think that de vehicles are a bit too pricey for what they offer.Sorry to the OP for disrupting his thread.

Chimeras are still very decent in that many rival armies will sweat at faving an AV12+ wall. Even Auticannons can be mostly laughed off as they approach, and by the time they pop, your guys inside will be already in melta/rapid-fire plasma/lasgun salvo range.

DE vehicles are fast, but they pop ridiculously easy now and tend to have horrid effects on their passengers. The fact that everyone now can flat-out their vehicles also makes DE speed edge shrink a lot.

I've had my entire DE army pretty much wiped off the board in 2 turns almost entirely by Chimera-mounted heavy bolters and multilasers.

So far I've found my tyranids to be a good mix of shooting and melee. You NEED to take the shooting, because softened targets die better in CC. So far in 6th I havent had to face too many fliers, but when I did my flyrant took care of them fairly easily... also didnt hurt that my hive guard were on a skyfire nexus objective They aren't a finesse army like eldar, in which each unit is very good at one thing, buy gets murdered if it tries to do something it's not supposed to generally. The real issue is that you cannot rely on any one unit to win the battle for you... which is difficult considering there are two reasonable ranged anti-tank units in the army, and that the few MC you have on the board are going to be shot at alot. Oh, and regeneration is amazing. even if it is a 1 in 6 chance, getting a wound or to back is a great moral boost for you, and a "crap, i have to put two more wounds on that bugger now..." for your opponent. The bugs also have good access to psychic powers. Tyrants, tervigons and broodlords always trade powers out, zoeys only do so if you arent facing space marines/lots of AV13+. Last but not least at all TAKE HORMAGAUNTS. the end

I disagree with many of you people saying that DE CC is improbable, now that Klaivex is AP 2 Drazhar has become my #1 HQ choice leading 9 incubi in a Raider. Of course it has night and flicker fields and when it drops my boys off next to some SM I drop the AP3 template killing off a good number of them (hopefully not all) before I charge to reduce the effect of Overwatch . I lead with Drazhar taking those bolter rounds like a pro and statistically each incubi kills 1 marine each(grape grape grape) as I am now with a pain Token or two is there was an Hq in there and I probably just made up half the points for that unit in 1 turn, even more if I charged Termies. Swag


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also fighter and bombers seem like really good anti air or anti tank now, especially the bomber's void mine

So, I'm sensing Dark Eldar. For the reasons of them being quite squishy and not alot of "Power" units so to speak..
Well thank you for all of your fast replies, any more opinions please keep them coming! =)

Eldar are significantly harder to play than Dark Eldar, but with DE are still difficult to play well, the new edition severly limited the options of both armies however. Eldar with DE allies, or vice versa is also an option and a challenging but potentially very powerful build.

Eldar require some finer tactics then other armies due to the lower toughness and lower body counts, same goes for their DE brethren to lesser degree.

Tau, while straight forward(ish) require alot of planning/denial planning to get the most out of them, but them as allies are a good call for some uses.

Tyranids, I feel in the right hands and build they can still be a terror on a battlefield but it is again about bringing the right synergistic units to the table. However, they can loose steam quickly if not managed right.

Orks - always awesome but require some brutal cunning to win consistently.

Nercrons-MEQs-Deamons are all pretty potent right now and while still requiring knowledge, have greater degrees of error that can be made.

Well I would probably say DE or Eldar. I think Eldar edge out DE on being difficult to play.

Both armies I think require a combination of shooting and melee to be decently effective.

Yeah, as I have already played eldar I'm looking at Dark eldar

Eldar are more difficult to play due to the fact that their codex is now 2 editions old and their units are generally over costed. They also suffer from having pretty bad troops choices.

Eldar are more durable than DE due to sturdier vehicles, psyker support, good morale and slightly harder armor. But DE tend to be killier, which means they often get to win games that plain Eldar would tie.