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Been playing around with different allies to see what works best with my Eldar, top 3 contenders atm are Guard (volume of troops), Grey Knights (solid all-round troops + Deep Strike protection for Daemons) and Deathwing (benched for the moment till I can see how the new codex changes things). Anyway, this is the latest evolution of the Grey Knight one, would be interested in people's thoughts.

Farseer, Warding, Doom, Fortune
Avatar
10 Guardians, Cannon, Warlock
2 x 10 Guardians, Cannon
2 x 3 Jetbikes
3 x 1 Vyper with Double Cannon
3 Wraithlords with Cannon and Scatter Laser

Inquisitor, 2 Servo Skulls
2 x 10 Strike Squad, 2 Psycannons, Psybolt, Razorback with Psybolt and Searchlight
5 Interceptors with Incinerator

That one Warlock is just there to give me another psyker to avoid the Lords going stupid btw. It doesn't overly threaten fliers, but can still throw plenty of S6 and S7 (and S5 for that matter against the weaker fliers) around and has a big enough footprint to limit movement. Overall I think it matches up fairly well against the latest power lists, obviously Daemons, but it should also do pretty well against Nids (block psychic buffs then shoot them to pieces) and Wraithwing (has the volume of shots to drop Wraiths and S8+ on high T models to squash any that reach combat). It also scales down to 1850 and 1750 pretty easily which is helpful, just drop the Interceptors and then a Guardian unit.

The last 150-200pts is what I've been changing around, the Eldar component (plus or minus a Guardian squad) + the Strikes I'm fairly happy with. The last game I ran a squad of Dragons in a Serpent instead of the Interceptors, but I'm not sure I need them with all the MCs capable of dealing with the limited amounts of heavy armour that shows up now and I've never been a fan of running single units of them anyway. The Interceptors give me complete board coverage against Daemons and Pods (the Warding Seer reserves against these lists so the GKs don't kill themselves in case that wasn't obvious) rather than about 75% board coverage but could be swapped out for a range of different things (Psyrifleman, Dreadknight, 2 units of Dragons on foot etc). A could also drop a Vyper and one of the Guardian unit to squeeze in a Psyriflemen Dread.

Well, the GK ally detachment is decent. However, the Eldar list is a bit squishy. Guardians need to walk in the Avatar's fearlessness bubble, otherwise they might run away after a few casualties. I'd give the GJB's shuricannons. Otherwise, they are rather useless. Last-round objective-grabbing not always works with squishy units.

Eldar and Grey Knights make very bad allies.


one of the most powerful option for Eldar is Runes of Warding. Board wide psyker defense that deals damage is great.

One of the best things about GK is the amount of cheap and effective psykers they have, and the psy powers on their units.



Personally, I would not Ally GK and Eldar at all. You either have to give up one of the best things from either book. Either Runes of Warding from the Eldar, or all of your Psy-powers from the GK book. I am not sure what you really gain by combining these 2 armies that makes up for whatever you have to leave out of your list.




Basically you are running around 600 points of stuff, just so you can have Warp Quake against Daemon lists. I am not sure that it worth it.
Perhaps you could run an Aegis line as it has interceptor which can help against deep strikers as well as flyers.


Also I think you might want to decide if you are running a mech heavy list or not. You have the components of a Foot-dar list (Avatar+Seer, Guardians, Lords) and then some elements of a Mech heavy list (Vypers, Razorbacks)
Having just a few vehicles means that you do not have the target saturation to ensure that they stick around long enough to do much good.


You lack any aggressive units as well. your fast units are too small to exert any board control, and the remaining units are slow and not the best at close range. I feel like your list will not be able to move into the middle of the board to take and hold objectives well.

Your jetbikes help in that regard, but they are not doing anything other than taking objectives. However, it relies on you going second, as if you are going first, your jetbikes will be shot off of objectives when they try to take them. If you go second, then you are giving up first blood rather easily with your 3 single vipers. It will be difficult to hide all 3, and they are one of the least durable vehicles in the game. If you reseve them to save first blood, then you are not shooting with them every turn.



I think that a Guard+Eldar combo would work better and not require you to reserve a big force multiplier (your farseer) in some matchups.

I think this list is basically tailored to fight daemons, but will suffer in every other matchup because of it. If that if what is needed in your current meta-game, so be it. But i think that with Guard you can make a better TAC list, that still has a good chance against daemons as well.

Guard does fairly well against daemons.
They have large expendable units to cover the board and prevent deep strikes in prime locations and flyovers from screamers.
Guard masses low to medium STR and AP firpower, which is what you want against the massed 5++ INV of a daemon list.

The Guard self buffing system (Orders) is not effected the way the GK one is (Psy-powers)
You can easily add in flyer defense with Vendettas, Hydras and good units to put behind an Aegis Defense Line.


I thnk that you could focus on a foot based list, combining guard and eldar and have a much more effective combination of forces, rather than a list that has elements fighting the other elements of your own list.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, the GK ally detachment is decent. However, the Eldar list is a bit squishy. Guardians need to walk in the Avatar's fearlessness bubble, otherwise they might run away after a few casualties. I'd give the GJB's shuricannons. Otherwise, they are rather useless. Last-round objective-grabbing not always works with squishy units.

Is there any way to make Eldar non squishy though? Serpents are massively overpriced and all the infantry save Wraithguard (who are way too expensive to build a list around) will always be squishy, that's half the reason to ally in some Marines. From my practice games I've found that the Grey Knights tend to get focused first as most people can't deal with all the MCs reliably at range, which leaves me with the more mobile Eldar alive towards the end of the game to grab objectives. I would also like to get Cannons on the Bikes, but I need 20 points from somewhere and there isn't much room to work with unless I dump an entire unit (Guardians or Interceptors).

@svendrex. If I was using a large number of psykers or was relying on them heavily to produce huge damage (Purifiers or Paladin units being the obvious ones) then yes sure, taking GK with a Warding Seer is a bad move. The thing is that I don't consider the psychic powers the most powerful part of the GK book, the Strikes and Razors are primarily shooting units with Psycannons and Psybolt and really don't need their psychic powers, particularly when there is a bunch of MCs running around to squash heavy hitters. I don't see how I am being forced into leaving anything out of my list, nothing on the Eldar side cares about the GKs being around, and any of the GK units I would add still function perfectly fine without psychic powers (Dread, more Interceptors). Its really only the dedicated assault units and some of the characters that need the psychic powers that badly, for the rest they are nice buffs, but they aren't really required most of the time. Strangely enough with the way that this MSU list works, attempting to cast is usually a win/win anyway (assuming you got charge by something nasty rather than the GKs charging something they know they can deal with), if you pass then you do more damage before you probably die, and if you Perils then you lose combat faster and means you don't get locked in combat.

Its hardly 600pts just to deal with Daemons, its also a huge number of S5 shots, a bunch of S7 rending shots (which both work nicely with Doom) and then they still have power weapons so are an assault threat to non dedicated assault units. Of the top of my head, some of the common power lists atm; Wraithwing (volume of fire to wound Wraiths, some S8+ to squash them), Nid Psychic Choir (gets crushed by this, Psychic powers get shut down and everything gets shot to pieces), Tzeentch Daemons (obvious this can deal with them) and IG Blob + SW (shut down psychic powers again and then should mow through the infantry).
First off, an Aegis line/Quad Gun is really not that good against fliers. I'm in a competitive environment with good players so if they are worried about their fliers dying then they will just kill the Quad Gun turn 1, its really not that hard. If I ended up with 50 points spare I might try put a Defence Line in to give my army cover, but I'm not convinced on the extra 50 for the gun. After experimenting with a S6 spam list I've decided that Eldar are much better off building to ignore fliers rather than shoot the hell out of them, without being twin linked S6 spam isn't even reliably enough to handle AV11 fliers (and the only way to get large amounts of twin linked S6 is fragile War Walkers and overpriced Serpents) and has no chance against the AV12 ones. By bringing plenty of units, having a large footprint and pushing forward I should just be able to limit fliers to 1-2 turns of shooting a game, which I think I can deal with. I can also swap to Divination if I'm playing a pure flier list and I don't need more anti infantry or care about my Avatar.

Its pretty damn obvious that this isn't a mech heavy list, all the vehicles are light vehicles and I have no transports. However functionally (even more so than in 5th) the MCs function like vehicles (are as tough to kill etc), which does draw fire off the Vypers. If people are shooting the Vypers and Razors early game then they get 4 unwounded MCs and 20 Marines in their face, and all my scoring units are untouched which I'm perfectly happy with. In any case I'm not sure what else you expect to add, the only elements of the classic Footdar list that is missing is Dragons (not really needed anymore), Harlies (don't stand up in competitive environments + require the list built around them) and possibly Wraithguard (way too expensive). Those elements have been replaced by Grey Knights, who bring deep strike defence, a heap of shooting and a passable assault threat.

Your comment about lacking aggressive units and not having board control makes me think that you have no clue how this army plays. Its pretty much nothing BUT midfield/board control, the entire army will be moving forward forcing the opponent to deal with 4 MCs and it excels in sub 24" range fire-fights. Its pretty much the opposite of the standard 5th edition Eldar lists, which stayed out of the midfield completely. I have 9 scoring units and can afford to lose a few.

There is no point commenting on the stuff about Jetbikes, that's an intrinsic part of the game, going first has that problem no matter what the unit is. I've actually found they are surprisingly durable though, 3+/4++ with T4 does still take a reasonable amount of firepower to remove and late game hopefully you have removed a reasonable chunk of it. Quite often they have been zooming back to take my rear objectives while my infantry grabs the midfield ones.
I don't consider First Blood to be a huge issue for a number of reasons. First off I know know how to premeasure and deploy properly, if I'm going second my opponent won't be getting off much fire unless he is spamming 48" range guns, and I can easily deploy out of LOS or at least behind a Wraithlord to get cover (or indeed in reserve, but I can't ever see myself doing that just to avoid First Blood). Secondly a good chunk of games have Night Fight, which makes this even easier. Perhaps most importantly, the majority of tournaments won't be using the terrible rulebook missions without seriously reworking them. Of the mission packs I have seen, the majority are still using the rulebook secondaries, but they are usually being used as actual secondaries or bonus points (i.e primary worth 7 points, secondaries worth 3 etc) and can't be used to sneak a full point victory like the rulebook missions can.

All that said, Guard + Eldar does have potential and it is something I want to try. However they offer a much bigger range of builds (Chimera wall with an AV12 spam list, infantry with a Footdar list) and I'm not sure which one is best + they require way more models which I can't proxy properly which makes testing them much harder.

I guess I see things a bit differently being a GK player, rather than being an eldar player.


On GK psykers:
To me it was not your Troops units but your Inquisitor I was thinking about. Having a re-roll to hit from the Divination lore for 30 points is a very powerful option for Inquisitors that you have to leave out because of the Runes of Warding on your Farseer.

I have found that the re-roll to hit is very useful in 6th edition as it makes snap firing against flyers about twice as effective. With A strike Squad that has a lot of S5 shots that can glance most flyers, having one unit with a re-roll to hit can help to take out flyers. In addition, the biggest issue with Strike Squads in close combat is a low number of attacks. With a re-roll to hit, they become a more competent close combat threat as well.



To me, I do not see what the Eldar list is adding to the Grey Knight part, that could not be replaced by similar GK units, and then you would not have to deal with runes of warding issues on your GK half.


Vipers could be GK Razorbacks (different yes, but fill the same role of cheap vehicles that put out S6 shots)

Avatar and Lords could be Dread knights (big MC's with shooting and assault power. Though the GK ones can be faster and are more independent, their shooting has less range. Durability is similar, though Knight are more vulnerable to Plasma, the Lords are more vulnerable to missiles and Poison)

Jetbikes could be Interceptors or Knights with Grand Strategy (you have scoring units with a big movement range to grab objectives, though the Jetbikes are more MSU based and very cheap, the GK ones are more durable and will deal some damage during the game as well)

Guardians could be either Henchmen or Strike Squads (Henchmen if you want a cheap backfield unit to hold an objective with some long range firepower, or a Strike squad as more midfield pressure)


As a GK player, I see and Eldar/GK combination as not having any synergy. The eldar do not really add much that the GK could not replicate with their own units. The few truly unique options that Eldar bring to the table (Runes of Warding mostly) are not really helpful to Grey Knights.

=======


All that being said, I am not an Eldar player and do not know their book super well. As such I am looking at the Eldar/GK Combination mostly from the GK side.

Also, the metagame, type of mission, and even the average terrain setup you play on do make a big difference as well.


I am curious to see what your Eldar+Guard list looks like, as I think it might be better than the Eldar+GK one.

I kinda have to agree with the above. I am a Eldar player and not a GK player, but I can tell just by looking at your list that you put more effort into your allies than the Eldar themselves. Why not Pathfinders if your camping or EML or BL platforms so you can actually hit something in thier deployment zone? If the Wraithlords are that important to you, why not Spirit Seers and have a Warlock in every Squad to make sure they are covered where ever they go or for redundancy's sake? If your planning on advancing with your Guardians, why not take Conceal for when you leave the line? Eldrad allows you to cast Fortune twice or Guide twice (for each Lord), thus he is a better choice for the HQ IMO. If the Lords are gun support, why not EMLs and BLs for the range?

If your saving points to make your allies better, then maybe you want GKs with Eldar Allies.

If your considering IG, try this out for size...
CCS - 150pts
2x Plasma guns, LC, Camo Cloaks, Master of Ordnance

Vets - 165pts
3x Plasma, LC, Sentries

Vendetta Squadron - 260pts
2x Vendettas

575pts
Your CCS has 2 Orders per turn, so one for it and one for the Vets. Gives you 5-10 BS 4 plasma shots and two BS 4 LC shots a turn to deal with DSers and a 3+ cover save (behind the line) and a pie plate to toss out every turn to make hoards cry. You might even kill something with it now and then.

@BlkTom. The list was all built at the same time and tweaked around to make things fit, I'm certainly not trying to force two armies I have built separately together. Its worth pointing out that all your suggestions cost points (i.e they aren't swap x for y), and there isn't a whole heap of stuff which can be easily cut to make them work. The HQ slots are more or less set save some tweaking with the Seer, Heavy is set (any tweaks require more points not less), as a minimum I would be taking 2 units of Guardians and 2 units of Jetbikes in troops, which doesn't leave much room anywhere in the list aside from maybe the Vypers to remove.

I don't take Pathfinders because they are terrible; static, pathetic damage output and their durability doesn't save them from flamers, fast assault units, the ever popular Heldrake, or even a determined opponent (2+ saves do fail, that's how Terminators die). I don't think I have mentioned anywhere that the Guardians will be camping, they will be wandering forward with the Avatar, providing a nice screening bubble which can cause some target priority issues since everything tends to be in the same range band (shoot the troops, or shoot the damage dealers).
I would like to upgrade the platforms slightly, certainly not to EML or BL though as BS3 single shot weapons are terrible, but Scatters on them would be helpful, its just a points issue (Cannons are so much cheaper for a unit that never does huge amounts of damage anyway). If I was going to add EML or BL it would be to the Lords, but that's 35 points per Lord which adds up.
Why do I need to cover the entire board with psykers? It's only a 1/6 chance of failing Wraithsight, and two maybe three psykers is more than enough to cover them anyway. One of the biggest strengths of this list imo is that pretty much everything is expendable in order for me to win the mission, the Strikes combat squad down and its easy to throw away 5 Marines, the Guardians and Jetbikes are under 90pts, the Vypers are only 60, the Lords only 120 and its really only the Avatar (who tends to get Fortuned) at 155pts that can hurt if he dies early.
Not arguing against Conceal being a good idea, its probably the main thing I want to squeeze in somehow (at least on one unit, the other can go behind it to get cover anyway).
Eldrad would be nice, but he is a big chunk of points more than the Farseer. He is something I will consider taking though, generally I prefer having more actual army to support and not over spending on buffs from Seers but he does offer another passable assault threat/tarpit and is one of the many things I could fit in if I dropped a Guardian squad and a Vyper (the other being a Psyriflemen, which gives me a good long range threat). Remember that if I am facing a pure flier list I can easily just swap to Divination so I can Guide things anyway.
The Lords are allrounders really, they are fire support but they won't just be camping at the back, they will wander forward with the Avatar to put more pressure on my opponent. Being characters now makes them much more attractive in assault, since you can pick out/remove the Fists etc and slowly grind people down, and being S10 means that even quite a few characters won't want to fight them (some can hurt them, but very few can take S10 hits to the face). Being able to glance things to death makes the S6 more attractive and imo provides a more rounded threat to infantry and vehicles for significantly less points.

If I was going to run Guard allies it sure as hell wouldn't look like that though. I consider Grey Knights good allies for Eldar because they provide solid scoring units, which is the biggest weakness of the Eldar codex. Guard are good allies as well, because they can provide much the same thing, just with quantity rather than quality due to the amazing flexibility of the standard Infantry Platoon. Two small squads of T3 5+ infantry without transports (yes they have Stealth, but they still die way faster than Marines) is precisely what this list doesn't need, the firepower is nice but its way too concentrated and easy to remove. For this list I would more likely be looking at a blob (or two) of some description, with a Vendetta delivering some concentrated firepower (CCS, PCS, Vets, SWS etc). For a more mech based Eldar list I still think Infantry Platoons are the way to go, you can bring 5 Chimera hulls + the Vendetta to go with 3 Serpents and 3 Falcons to saturate the board in AV12.

@svendrex. As an Eldar player I am just happy to get BS4 lol, the volume of fire is still very respectable without any additional buffs, in fact its about as good as it gets for a scoring unit (i.e they outshoot plenty of units even when those units do have buffs).

Well aside from the minor issue that I don't have a large collection of Grey Knights, probably the biggest issue with the points you have raised is the Dreadknight one. Dreadknights are amazing, but they cost easily more than twice the points of my MCs. Any GK list running 3 MCs (they can't bring 4 without allies) is going to be insanely short on points for the rest of the army, where as mine are all cheap enough to be expendable (all 4 of mine cost as much as two properly loaded out Dreadknights) and leave me points for screening and support units. That's probably the main thing that this list does that a GK one couldn't.

Interceptors already cost more than twice the cost of a Jetbike unit for a minimum sized unit, and that's without factoring in the cost of a Grand Master (who is nowhere near the beatstick he was in 5th, so you pay through the nose for Grand Strategy). They can fill a similar role, but for a boatload more points. Extra bodies aside the Jetbikes will actually be more durable, since they get 4++ or 5++ saves on top of the 3+ normal.

I'm looking at things from the other side, so for me I have a core of 4 MCs, psychic support, screening units and some S6 fire support, but I really need some better scoring units. Of the options Grey Knights and Guard fit this best, irrespective of what those particular armies could do as self contained armies. I agree that Eldar don't make a good ally for Grey Knights if GK are the primary (since the more GK stuff you add the more Warding hurts you more than your opponent), but built this way around I'm really not losing that much.

I can see that from the Eldar side of things the GK are not that bad, but I just feel like you are getting as much value out of them as maybe some other MEQ allies.

However, I do know that warp quake is a very hard counter to daemons which is a very powerful list at the moment.



If you are looking for solid scoring units, have you considered space wolves? Grey Hunters are very solid scoring units, if that is what you think you need.

Here is a Space wolves allied contingent to consider. I am not sure it is better, but it is just something to think about. It is 2 points less than your current GK allies

Wolf Priest with Saga of the Hunter

Wolf Guard x10. 6x Combi-plasma, 2x Terminator Armor and CML

Grey Hunters x10. 2x Plasmaguns, Wolf Standard

Grey Hunters x10. 2x Plasmaguns, Wolf Standard

the 2 CML termies join the Grey hunter units. They will stomp around shooting stuff. In the assault phase, you have a very interesting unit. The Wolf Standard lets you re-roll All 1's including overwatch (for those get's hot on the plasmas), and armor saves. Your Terminator will have a 2+, re-rolled save for one round of the Assault phase. That should stop any AP3 or less attacks in their tracks, as you can put all of them on the terminator until he dies (a bit risky, but high reward). Then the Grey hunters will deal a bunch of Damage with 3 attacks per model and re-rolls.

The priest and the rest of the Wolf guard can outflank. This gives you some more options to put models in the enemy deployment zone as needed. Depending on the deployment type, outflanking can give your unit access to a ton of the board. The Priest gives the unit preferred enemy against 1 unit type, so all of your combi-weapons will get a re-roll to hit to help avoid overheating.


Biggest loss compared to the GK would be Warp quake for sure. Also you loose combat squads and 2 razorbacks.

Gains compared to the GK would be more assault power in your scoring units. You gain some S8 firepower with the CML's. You have a few more bodies


I am not sure if this is better, but just something to consider. I also understand that models are an issue as well.
There is only so much theory-hammer you can do. tyr to find someone who will not mind playing with proxies and playtest.

Yeah I considered Wolves, but really didn't think they gave me as many tools so to speak. The loss of combat squads is pretty big, and they really don't offer anything particularly special - you get two squads of Marines with Plasma and that's about it. The CML Terminators are nice, but you have to do really silly things to get them into a force this small, that Wolf Guard unit is a one hit wonder and not a particularly effective one at that. Unlike with GK you can't run a minimalist HQ, the Rune Priest is by far the best HQ for Wolves (and is still more than twice the cost of an Inquisitor) but doesn't work with Warding, which leaves you with the more expensive and less effective Wolf Priest. There is actually very little difference in combat punch either as the Grey Knights get power weapons, which means on the charge a full squad averages about 5.25 dead Marines (without powers obviously cause we are assuming Warding is in play), about the same as the Grey Hunters the turn they pop the Standard on the charge. Obviously the Wolves still have the edge with Counter Attack (so will count has charging more often) and general volume of attacks to handle hordes better, but its not a major difference.