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I recently started playing Eldar and it seems like there are Flyers all over the place. My usual Chaos Space Marines opponent brings the Helldrake and I played against an Ork player who used two Dakkajets. I figure mass shooting with Prescience/Guide Guardians and Wave Serpents could work, but it seems like a lot of luck to do much damage to the Flyer. Usually, before I have a chance to retaliate versus the Flyer, I've lost a good amount of one or more of my units that might have been able to deal with them. How do you handle these situations?

Twin linked serpent shields. Or a crimson hunter. Or ignore them.

Serpents are pretty good. TL scatter lasers+serpent shield. A crimson hunter should take out a dakkajet fairly easily, and threaten a helldrake(just make sure it comes on after the enemy flier). Guided walkers with scatter lasers or lances will also serve as good AA.

Eldar have an effective method of making everything TL'd due to their absurd amount of Psykers and Mastery levels on said Psykers.

As stated above, TL Serpent Shields and Scatter Lasers will threaten anything that isn't some unsightly AV13 flyer. And if you can get into the back ark of most, AV10 is paper.

Crimson Hunter, but you'll require Scriers Gaze, a Comms, or an Autarch.

Otherwise 2-3 Serpents do well against AV10 and 11

Thanks, everyone. I guess I just didn't figure the odds of getting enough successful Snap Fire shots from my Wave Serpents was all that great.

Against the drake you still need 5's and 6's to hurt the thing, but you have good odds to at least hit it. Once you hit the dakkajet, you need 3's and 4's, making your odds pretty good of doing damage. Neither flier is overly effective against wave serpents. Dakkajets damage on a 6, but with jink saves you should be ok. Helldrakes can pen with a vector strike and flame the rear armor, denying jink and damaging a bit easier, but once you can get rear armor it will probably drop.

4 twin linked scatter laser gets one hit, which TLs everything else. 3 shuiken cannon shots nets another hit. serpent sheild averages 1-2 hits at S7. so one serpents yuoll have about 2 s6 hits and a few s7 hits. Multiply this times however many serpents you have and walah, dead flier

 ninjafiredragon wrote:
4 twin linked scatter laser gets one hit, which TLs everything else. 3 shuiken cannon shots nets another hit. serpent sheild averages 1-2 hits at S7. so one serpents yuoll have about 2 s6 hits and a few s7 hits. Multiply this times however many serpents you have and walah, dead flier

Side note: Who takes Shuriken Cannons and on which vehicles?

I take shuiken cannons on wave serpents and thats it

 ninjafiredragon wrote:
I take shuiken cannons on wave serpents and thats it

I got sick of running triple Scatter Serpents (got a little dull, and wanted to tone my list back a bit to make it more casual, so I run dual shuriken cannons on my Storm Guardian Serpent only.

Everyone has the preferences. For me wave serpents get dull when i get into the 4-5 mark.

I will say, having a crimson hunter and generally more bright lances was a godsend for me when facing new IG all weekend...we're definitely going to see more Russes.

my triple crimson hunter double serpent list seems overkill now.

 pizzaguardian wrote:
my triple crimson hunter double serpent list seems overkill now.

Well 12 BS4 S8 AP2 shots on fliers is nothing to scoff at.

Better hope they dont have hydras xD

Against Helldrakes, Serpents are not quite as effective. You need to have some pretty hot dice, and then contend with it actually getting a save.

Crimson hunters excel against Helldrakes, for everything else, there's Serpents.

That said, using careful positioning and planning, you can largely ignore a helldrake.

 ninjafiredragon wrote:
Better hope they dont have hydras xD

With the loss of ignores jink, no interceptor, and the new problem of being open topped, crimson hunters should be able to pop Hydras with impunity.

 Kain wrote:

 ninjafiredragon wrote:
Better hope they dont have hydras xD

With the loss of ignores jink, no interceptor, and the new problem of being open topped, crimson hunters should be able to pop Hydras with impunity.

Most definitely. Hydras are now just a pricey way to get a couple of twin-linked autocannons that shoot up instead of down.

and walah, dead flier

I never thought I'd see it spelt like that, but 'voila' is just that bit too French

As for Eldar AA, I use Crimson Hunter with Autarch support, and Warp Spiders.
The CH is an interceptor, built for AA. It can pick off infantry too, but its main role is air superiority.
WS are fast enough to get in range, and throw enough S6 in the sky to hurt most fliers.
War Walkers with SL/SL throw enough S6 up for most situations, but BL/BL should get a hit or two to down it. [edit: It's S7 against vehicles]
If you can buff Dark Reapers, they ignore Jink, and if upgraded can have S8 shots. Not ideal, but an option.

My preferred anti air is squads of 7 deep striking warp spiders. 14 str7 shots to rear armor even snap shorting usually accomplishes the goal fairly well.

As i just got my first Autarch and crimson hunter a month or so ago i found this little combo very effective.

Maugan Ra with either a quad gun or icarus lascannon. he automatically adds an addition shot to a weapon he fires.

I get very lucky with Mr Ra so YMMV especially if te cannon gets targeted

Mali wrote:
As i just got my first Autarch and crimson hunter a month or so ago i found this little combo very effective.

I generally run mine as the solitaire and they actually tend to tag team the same targets a lot of the team...or at the very least they fire in the same vicinity so the solitaire can cut through something if the hunter failed or vice versa.

where are the rules for the solitaire? i love my Harlies and have heard mention of the Solitaire before

Mali wrote:
where are the rules for the solitaire? i love my Harlies and have heard mention of the Solitaire before

There are like 3 variations or so.

Autarch + Mantle of the Laughing God + Jetbike + Laser Lance + Fusion Gun



Then you can add the Shard of Anaris and/or Banshee Mask and/or Scorpion Chainsword for your own flavor. Some don't take the Laser Lance either.



On occasion I run mine with the Fire Sabre.



Other names:
Solitarch

Farseer Version:
Mantleseer

Belly wrote:

 Kain wrote:

 ninjafiredragon wrote:
Better hope they dont have hydras xD

With the loss of ignores jink, no interceptor, and the new problem of being open topped, crimson hunters should be able to pop Hydras with impunity.

Most definitely. Hydras are now just a pricey way to get a couple of twin-linked autocannons that shoot up instead of down.

Huh didnt know they got nerfed that bad, I guess I figured with the new models they might even get better...but no

My two ways of dealing with flyers.

Either bring one of your own. Crimson Hunter or Nightwing.

Or

Dark Reapers with Aegis Line and Lascannon.
The exarch has BS5 and with fast shot can put two lascannon shots into a flyer and the flyer is not allowed to jink because of the Reaper rangefinder. Unless multiple flyers come in the same turn they are likely to take a beating on the way in.

 Erik_Morkai wrote:
My two ways of dealing with flyers.

Either bring one of your own. Crimson Hunter or Nightwing.

Or

Dark Reapers with Aegis Line and Lascannon.
The exarch has BS5 and with fast shot can put two lascannon shots into a flyer and the flyer is not allowed to jink because of the Reaper rangefinder. Unless multiple flyers come in the same turn they are likely to take a beating on the way in.

Of course option 2 has no place in competitive meta. I would replace that with 3 wave serpents

The reaper exarch is as close to the Fire Dragon Exarch on a quad combo from the old codex. But is really to expensive.

The dragon exarch was awesome, 5 dragons inc exarch was cheap, and you got 4 Twin-linked shots at Bs5, with re-rolls to pen due to tank hunters, and ignore cover.

He would reliably take down any flyer by himself in a single volley.

I've been tempted to put my Avatar on a Icarus w/ Fast shot. He'd provide a fearless bubble, and give me two BS10 lascannon shots. Similarly expensive, but i'm just looking for a way to take the Avatar to a tournament.

 ninjafiredragon wrote:

 Erik_Morkai wrote:
My two ways of dealing with flyers.

Either bring one of your own. Crimson Hunter or Nightwing.

Or

Dark Reapers with Aegis Line and Lascannon.
The exarch has BS5 and with fast shot can put two lascannon shots into a flyer and the flyer is not allowed to jink because of the Reaper rangefinder. Unless multiple flyers come in the same turn they are likely to take a beating on the way in.

Of course option 2 has no place in competitive meta. I would replace that with 3 wave serpents

Competitive meta can kiss my shiny metal you know what.

I always play outside the box. Sides Reapers are still plenty useful against plenty of stuff.

Sides there is no way I would lower myself to spamming 5 Wave Serpents.