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I'm seriously looking into a ranger heavy army. Has anyone had success with rangers or pathfinders can I count on them to hold down my troop section or should I keep looking

Rangers/Pathfinders are great as a single unit. Beyond that you are running up against diminishing returns because unless they have Farseer support, you are only going to get a few wounds per round of fire.

Lets look at it this way:

Pros:
2+/3+ save in good cover - Hard to shoot down
BS4 on a troop choice
Easier to get AP1 shots vs standard snipers

Cons:
Expensive - can be twice as expensive as a DA or 3 times a Guardian or a few points more then a EJB
Low Volume of fire
Static
Dies to CC
Dies to Flamers
Dies to anything that ignores cover

So in short, take one squad. Let your FS buff as needed then good luck.

juggernaut979 wrote:
I'm seriously looking into a ranger heavy army. Has anyone had success with rangers or pathfinders can I count on them to hold down my troop section or should I keep looking

If the Craftworld Alaitoc had access to the disruption table, a Ranger-heavy army would be decent. But now its not.

I have 30+ painted rangers and loved my Alaitoc army, but i have come to the conclusion they are simply unplayable competitively in 5th and even worse in 6th. Almost no damage output (1 wound a turn?), expensive, 3+ cover save from area terrain, no CC potential, and cant really move.

Without the disruption table, it seems to be unplayable. It was very competitive in the 3rd ed. Man, the disruption table was really annoying.

Rangers are priced for when snipers always hit on a 2+.
Their cost has not been re-adjusted for the newer worse sniper rifle.

I find scout snipers at 13 points marginal, and ratlings at 10 points good. I think eldar snipers just cost you too much for what you get (though that could be said about a lot of the army).

-Matt

I use a couple squads. I back them up with other troops like bikes and Guardian Defenders, though. They do all right if I can either keep the enemy busy with other units or if I can kill them fast enough that flamers and cc units don't get close. I'd leave them home though if I saw a lot of whirlwinds, tf cannons or Sternguard. They just fold to anything that ignores cover and they don't do enough offensively against anything but MCs and maybe av10 vehicles.

I say use a few if you like them but unless you just HAVE to have them for fluff reasons I'd not take more than 2 minimum sized squads. They don't contribute to offense at all really, so aside from holding objectives they're kinda dead weight.

I use just one squad and target the plasma and meltas and squad leaders with the precision shot. Idk how a bunch of them would do, but It would take a lot to kill whole units. Squads of 10 are very expensive, but I think as long as you can protect them and correctly move them it might work. Will not work in a WAAC setting but, semi-comp. it might actually work with some good dice

I have good success with one squad of five but extending the rangers section of your army past that could be a mistake. They work well to pick off tough or dangerous units like meltas or Powerfists and I find that they pose a nice psychological threat to your opponent.

Eldar rangers are quite nice, but I drag along whirlwinds just for units like them.

I run two full units of DA and two units of Pathfinders five strong with a Guide and Doomseer around the two units. With the extra save and the better chance for ap1 and the ignore difficult terrain, they can be hard to dig out add fortune and 2++ with rerolling failed saves....most people don't waste the shooting. Pathfinders yes....rangers no, it's so with the extra points. Just my two.

Isn't their actual armor 5+ though? What you just wrote is why I'm an "ignore cover save" whore.