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Howdy all, I'm curious as to the collective experience here with the aforementioned units. I'm particularly interested in the prospect of footslogging them up the board. Is either effective?

Axes:
- Only one attack. It's simply too few, even with charge.
- More effective against TEQ.

Blades:
- 3 S6 attacks with AP3 will wreck most units (unless 2+ armor),
and even without charge the 10 hits from minimum squad will be great.
- However, plasma kills these very effectively.

My choice is always the blades for 2 reasons:
1) Who cares about better survivability if your squad can't do the thing they're made for: killing stuff in CC.
2) When you're in CC with Terminators, something critical has already gone wrong.
Just shoot them, Eldar has tons of options for this.

(and the Initiative also helps the swords)

If footslogging wraiths I would highly recommend using the Iyanden supplement as this gives your wraith units access to battle focus.

But to answer your question - Wraithblades CANNOT take ghostglaives. Only Wraithlords and Wraithknights carry those. The two options for Wraithblades are Twin swords or axe/forceshield. So the obvious answer here is that axes are better for wraithblades

But between the swords and the Axes, I'm a fan of axes. With initiative 4 the Wraithblades don't often get to attack first anyways, so the unwieldy and one attack is a small price to pay for 2 additional strength, ap2, and a 4+ Invuln. In addition, this allows you to take voice of twilight rather than conceal, giving your wraith units battle focus. And if you roll a 4 for your second power, oh boy. Watch out. 2+4++ toughness 6 tank ball with battle focus. Delicious.

Swords.

First, if you have a spiritseer, you have many different powers which are good for swords, but not necessarily axes (+1S, +1I, -1 opposing AS), etc.

Second, you should not under any circumstances be dealing with 2+ armor saves in combat. nearly everything in the codex has, or can get, AP2.

Third, the biggest threat to Eldar units which will be engaging in CC (Wraithknights, Wraithlords, wraithguard) is not 2+ armor saves (see the second point) - it is horde, or large medium-quality enemies such as bog-standard MEQs with hidden powerfists.

I see I am in the minority here..... I should clarify. I use sword wraiths. But I also use wave serpents so that my sword wraiths have safe access to the entire field and can assault whatever they want (which is obviously, NOT 2+ save models). He is talking about footslogging across the field, which means a counter deployment can mean 3 turns of shooting (or more, khaine forbid) at your wraiths before he gets into assault with his intended target, and that's if the enemy doesn't assault you first with a more mobile unit, teleporting termies, etc. With footslogging wraiths the 4+ Invuln is pretty much invaluable to you, as is battle focus from an iyanden spiritseer.

@Bojazz

I can't say that it's a "small price" to give up half of your attacks...

And about the Initiative. The biggest threat (in CC) for the Wraithblades is obviously PF and you WILL want to get rid of that before it wipes out 2-3 of your 32p models. Of course, one could make an argument that the 4++ saves you from some of those losses, but it's still their toughness is their best defense, which fist will ignore anyway.

Edit: (my computer updated your latest post just now).
Footslogging point is a good one, I agree.
Also, I realised that by doing so it's more difficult to choose your targets so I believe it's good to be prepared for anything.

When walking across the board, the Axes have an important advanages.
I still think that I1 is a major setback and thus choose to take the Swords whenever possible

wait, axes and shields get a 4++ and not a 5++??

deathmagiks wrote:
wait, axes and shields get a 4++ and not a 5++??

That is so. I believe 50/50 chance of saving against plasma is better than none

Deathmagiks - you're thinking of shimmershields. They give 5+. Wraithlbades get forceshields, which are 4+.

Soomemafia - You hit the nail on the head. I was saying the 4++ saves help negate the power fists, which is very possible to be fighting against with footslogging wraiths, since you don't always get to fight what you want when footslogging. the 4++ also helps negate all the shooting you'll no doubt be taking. Its just a personal preference, really. I much prefer sword wraiths in serpents for the same reasons as everyone above. more attacks, earlier initiative, killing off scary things like power fists. But for footsloggers I would DEFINITELY take the invuln.

I... So many wraith blades that didn't need to die... so many...

Not to mention with the Iyanden and Voice of Twilight you also get Furious Charge. What is so good about that is tank hunting.....S9, AP2, 2attacks against AV - is going to be nice. I used these guys to take down two Maulerfiends

where do you get str 9 from?

Furious charge adds +1 str right? I think it used to add one attack or something.

Wraithguard/blades are only strength 5. So the +2 from axes and +1 from furious charge is only strength 8. Still not sure where you're getting S9 from. Unless you're also hoping for your spiritseer to roll a 6 as his second power so whenever he successfully casts Empower he and the blades he's with get an additional +1 strength?