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Just as a follow up:

Just got home, and had a pretty good time at the tournament. First of the new season so that was exciting.

I was able to go 2-1. My loss was to the guy who took second place, and he went undefeated so it was a pretty good time. He seized on me (happeend twice today, which was a super big bummer, and it really mattered in both games, but what can ya do?).

He brought the new Celestine which was REALLY interesting. Essentially impossible to kill. Good damage output for the price, easy to wound, harder to get through her armor and extra wounds. She made all the difference. I was able to smash most everything I wanted to smash (and that VoidRaven Bomber did work, as always!), but Celesine bound up one of my Grotesquerie units right before I was going to deliver the really damaging stroke and shut his Centurion Star down. An immobilized Raider was the keystone for his victory in the end, not Celestine. I got stranded with one of the Grotesquerie units entirely without his help, thanks to that silly 1 coming up on the die. Disallowed the second unit from getting way up field in round 2 where I needed it. Still, the devastation was pretty impressive. We didnt get to finish out game which didnt help. In fact I didn't even get the bottom of my turn because they called time which also cost me secondary points. It was a bit disappointing way to end a game.

Things I learned today: Incubi, while not infinitely good, have always been a part of the list. i dropped them because this tournament was at 1500 instead of 1850, but having an answer to 2+ armor would have been nice. In one of the games I won, a singular biker with 2+ armor and 2 wounds (I forget what he was) kept an important unit tied up FAR too long and the Incubi would have been ideal. You just need that scalpel, even if it's just like 4-5 of them in a unit. I didnt have the points so they were a casualty of that fact but I might have played around with points to try and get that in there looking back. It's a vital function for any list to have anyways and it would have been a perfect scalpel again in the game I lost. INcubi have a definite role to play in my particular list!

Below is how I might have modified it to include them. It's not major changes but it would get the Incubi back in there. Strongly recommend a Night Shield for the Fighter but that's a trade off and I havent had time to really think about what I'd give up for it.

Total Roster Cost: 1500
: Combined Arms Detachment (37#, 970 pts)
Razorwing Jetfighter (Dual Disintegrators, Splinter Cannon, Choice of Monscythe or Necrotoxin Missiles)

3 Incubi
+1 Klaivex+ Demiklaives
1 Raider + Dark Lance x1 + Enhanced Aethersails

5 Kabalite Warrior
1 Venom + Splinter Cannon

5 Kabalite Warrior
1 Venom + Splinter Cannon

Court of the Archon:
1 Lhamaean
2 Medusae
5 Sslyth
1 Raider + Dark Lance x1 + Enhanced Aethersails

Beastmasters:
1 Beastmaster
3 Khymerae
2 Razorwing Flocks
4 Clawed Fiends

Formation: Grotesquerie (12#, 530 pts)
1 Haemonculus+ Stinger Pistol

3 Grotesques
+1 Aberration w/ Scissorhand
1 Raider + Enhanced Aethersails

3 Grotesques
+1 Aberration + Agoniser
1 Raider + Enhanced Aethersails

Coven Power From Pain*:
2: Fearless 3: Fear, Fearless
4: Fear, Fearless, It Will not Die
5: Fear, It will not Die, Zealot
6: Eternal Warrior, Fear, It will not Die, Zealot

Grotesquerie Abilities:
1: +1 STR 2: +1 T
3: Fleet 4: Shred
5: Rage 6: Fnp (4+)

Dark Eldar Power From Pain***:
2: FnP 6+ 3: FnP
4: FnP, Furious Charge
5: FnP, Furious Charge, Fearless
6: FnP, Furious Charge, Fearless, Rage

I usually take a succubus with archite glaive to join the grotedquerie without the haemonculus to get some AP2.

You play the beasts, which are nice, I use to take 15 reavers in 5 min units.

Incubi never worked for me but I love the models and I'll surely give them some other chance in the future.

Why the aberration with agoniser instead of scissor hands?

Hes a total finisher against most units. No points for another HQ and he does wooooooork. 5 attacks, up to 8 w Rampage and re rolling due to poison on a lot of targets. He can throw 9 on the charge that way, 10 if you end up w Rage on the Grotesuerie table. Hes a blender.

Edit: forgot to add that he also makes multicharging easy to justify.

Do people mindlessly load up on grav? Why do people stagger into assault range? You don't assault my BA rhinos unless they are immobilized or I decide you can. They're literally faster than every melee unit I know of. For god's sakes, use a tape measure people.

The last DE tourney list I faced got burned up pretty bad with frag cannons and heavy flamers. On and very angry BA scouts vs DE assault units. But I guess white scars grav spam doesn't have any frag cannons or heavy flamers. They could have dual heavy flamer ironclads, though.

I just don't understand how top tier lists lose to BA, Orks, DE. The math is staggeringly in their favor. Just use the math. To my knowledge, there's not a single DE unit that can't be ripped apart by scatterlasers. They can even overpower the 3+ jink readily. I just don't get it. Shoot down the raiders with the scary stuff, strand them on foot, and then wipe them up. Who cares about regular DE units? Not Eldar, I can assure you. Maybe they cared back before the WK became magically immune to poison.

Martel732 wrote:
Do people mindlessly load up on grav?

As Grav weapons are one of the best weapons there are in 40K, yes. They do. However they are wiser to mix in some plasma or melta to go with it. In the case of my loss, he took Grav Centurions with Hurricane Bolters and the combination was quite the blizzard of accurate shots. It worked well for him, and although I was not AS susceptible to it, it was still very impactful with Ignored Cover to go with it.




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Martel732 wrote:
Why do people stagger into assault range? You don't assault my BA rhinos unless they are immobilized or I decide you can. They're literally faster than every melee unit I know of. For god's sakes, use a tape measure people.

This was an odd comment. In the case of Dark Eldar, ranges presents no problems. They simply can be wherever on the board they need to be (or nearly so). So it isn't a matter of stumbling into anything really. it's just a matter of th Raider being 1" from your rhino, whether you like it or not. =)


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Martel732 wrote:

The last DE tourney list I faced got burned up pretty bad with frag cannons and heavy flamers. On and very angry BA scouts vs DE assault units. But I guess white scars grav spam doesn't have any frag cannons or heavy flamers. They could have dual heavy flamer ironclads, though.
.

Ironclads arent found in competitive lists any longer. Frag Cannons do though now that Deathwatch is a thing. They are quite an excellent choice for an army to employ, and Heavy Flamers always are. The trouble is, you don't know in tournament play who you will or wont face, so you must work on the assumption that you will require a bevy of differing weapons for the various opponent types and that leaves you with choices.

Dark Eldar would naturally attempt to strand or kill the units that most threaten them, as the enemy has and will do to the Dark Eldar. Unless you can dedicate the army to those weapons, as Deathwatch can...but then you'd HAVE to be playing DeathWatch I suppose for it to matter... then while it may be TRUE that taking some of those would be a good idea, the real question is: Will the Dark Eldar let you get close enough more than say...once? Even then there are dice to be rolled so there's that too.

Point is, while certain weapons are "ideal" against my army, what will all those Heavy Flamers an Fragiosos do in round two when they face Imperial Knights? I'm sure you see the conundrum.




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Martel732 wrote:


I just don't understand how top tier lists lose to BA, Orks, DE. .

Don't...or won't?

Martel732 wrote:

I just don't understand how top tier lists lose to BA, Orks, DE.

Because players skills still matter a lot. And also luck is involved in a 40k game. Not to mention that top tier lists are more powerful of course but not extremely more powerful.

Armies that are considered low tiers in the hands of a skilled player (which also means a competitive list, not a fluffy one with wyches, hellions, 200 points archons, flash gitz, gork/morkanauts...) can win games against the cheesiest armies.


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Martel732 wrote:

The math is staggeringly in their favor. Just use the math.

Have you seen the latest Clint Eastwood's movie, Sully? You don't take the human factor into account, just like the people who tried to blame the captain for the crash into the river.

Eldar typically destroy every model i have by turn 4. Don't tell me there's nit a gulf. Eldar are virtually fool proof vs ba. Luck is not a factor because they roll so many dice.

So a human can't take advantage of math? That's absurd.


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You still are limited to a 6" move in order to disembark. In this way, the raider is no faster than a land raider on the assault turn. It's pretty easy for a ba rhino to get out of effective assault range.

Martel732 wrote:
Eldar typically destroy every model i have by turn 4. Don't tell me there's nit a gulf. Eldar are virtually fool proof vs ba. Luck is not a factor because they roll so many dice.

So a human can't take advantage of math? That's absurd.


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You still are limited to a 6" move in order to disembark. In this way, the raider is no faster than a land raider on the assault turn. It's pretty easy for a ba rhino to get out of effective assault range.

Who, what, where , when, why. Critical thought requires answers to it all, right?

Who you play matters, what the ybring matters, where they deploy and where they ARE when the time comes TO roll dice matters , when they decide to be a target and when they decide to strike matters and of course why you take certain things matters because there is always the problem of poor matchups (such as Grav vs. my Grotesques who laughed heartily on the matter).

As I think I've said to you before: Figures don't lie...but liers can figure. If soemone wants the math to look real bad, they can make it look real bad. Ignores cover with a Servo Skull and a Basilisk? Seems legit, eh? seems uber legit if you're a blood angel who just deep struck in. Bad math for the Blood Angel eh? Sure is. How is it that with that Bad math, IG dont wipe every BA? Well theres a lot of reasons but the MATH alone could lead you to a bad conclusion.

Same goes for Dark Eldar, my frustrated friend. Though you may think of them or Sisters of Battle or Orks as inferior in every mathematical way, I enjoy a very good winning percentage with all of them (well...not Blood Angels obviously since i only rarely ever played them). COULD I win more using Eldar? I think its fair to say that I could... But then I credit myself somewhat for that. But heres a more interesting question: how MUCH more often? If the answer is "a little bit" then I suppose that hardly seems worthy of the hyperbole you've heaped upon them. If I say "a lot" then alright, you might have a point.

No...before you go on about it...No. This isnt me saying Eldar "arent that broken". Im not telling you that so please dont go down that road or suggest I said as much. I didn't. What I am trying CONSTANTLY to convey is that the ARMY does not win all these games. The army may make you change everything about how you play Blood Angels and how you build them. Blood Angels have gooten some capable answers recently as you and I have discussed and no, Blood Angels will never be confused with the same power level as Eldar. But it doesnt have to be at the same power level for you to win. You GOTTA stop defeating yourself before you arrive at the table! THATS all I'm saying to you. If your passion is in fact Blood Angels (and I feel confident based on your many posts of angst about them that it is) then gosh darn it, focus in on what you DO well, accept that you will have some shopping to do, ally in a little bit of what you need if you feel its necessary and get in the ring.

Dark Eldar aren't my TRUE passion, Tau Empire is, and it shows in my tournament winnings. I was winning tournaments in 4th Edition with Tau Empire and anyone who remembers all that knows that its saying something. I had a passion for an army that was nothing but ridiculed and many a forum was filled with people telling me how much of a JERK i was for filling peoples heads with hope about winning with them. I told them the same thing then I'll tell you now: You can't win if you're not in the ring and focused in on what your army DOES do. Any fool can tell me what they DONT do. But that isnt helpful now is it?

You are definitely leading people astray Jancoran and that's not cool.

Nobody serious about winning plays Celestine, and outside of ITC all the grav guns have been replaced by electro displacement.

It's one thing to like playing against the current meta and getting random wins against some average builds, based mostly on years of competitive 40k in that exact mindset.

It's another entirely to sell that as an experience that fits more than people who want an uphill struggle and don't care about maximising their chances to win a serious tournament.

morgoth wrote:
You are definitely leading people astray Jancoran and that's not cool.

Nobody serious about winning plays Celestine, and outside of ITC all the grav guns have been replaced by electro displacement.

It's one thing to like playing against the current meta and getting random wins against some average builds, based mostly on years of competitive 40k in that exact mindset.

It's another entirely to sell that as an experience that fits more than people who want an uphill struggle and don't care about maximising their chances to win a serious tournament.

You're wrong. That simple.

EDIT: Also, the person who played Celestine went undefeated. Just saying. I think your lack of imagination leads you to doubt far more than you should.

The new celestine is one the most overpowered things right now, simply impossible to kill.

How can someone say that's she doesn't fit a competitive army? Just watch a couple of games, that lady is extremely powerful.

There aren't only riptites, grav centurions, scatter bikes, stormsurges and WK in the game.

 Jancoran wrote:

morgoth wrote:
You are definitely leading people astray Jancoran and that's not cool.

Nobody serious about winning plays Celestine, and outside of ITC all the grav guns have been replaced by electro displacement.

It's one thing to like playing against the current meta and getting random wins against some average builds, based mostly on years of competitive 40k in that exact mindset.

It's another entirely to sell that as an experience that fits more than people who want an uphill struggle and don't care about maximising their chances to win a serious tournament.

You're wrong. That simple.

EDIT: Also, the person who played Celestine went undefeated. Just saying. I think your lack of imagination leads you to doubt far more than you should.

And what tournament was that?

As I said above, outside of ITC there is no gravstar anymore... your frame of reference is not regular 40k.

 Blackie wrote:
The new celestine is one the most overpowered things right now, simply impossible to kill.

How can someone say that's she doesn't fit a competitive army? Just watch a couple of games, that lady is extremely powerful.

There aren't only riptites, grav centurions, scatter bikes, stormsurges and WK in the game.

Can she disintegrate my 2+ armor units from 72" away? No? I think I'll manage. I've been dealing with Riptides (unsuccessfully) for some time now already. They are pretty immortal as well.

2+ armor units in SM will never be far away the enemy. You have stormravens and drop pods, not to mention that terminators can deep strike.

Celestine can soak the same firepower that is needed to take down 3-5 riptides. And in close combat is much better than tau units that can also be tarpitted quite easily. Only 200 points.

Tau are maybe the 3rd army in any ranking, and IMHO daemons, DA, SW and necrons are not inferior. Maybe even genestealer cult can be at the same level overall, at least they are an hard counter for the typical tau lists.

Riptides are overpowered, we all know about that, and lists with 3 riptides plus 2 stormsurges or 5 ripdtides and a stormsurge are very competitive, but defeating tau is far from being impossible. I'm not a BA player and I know them only as a possible opponent so maybe for BA tau are impossible to defeat, but for many armies, even mid tiers ones, they're not.

I've killed riptides and stormsurges with orks and dark eldar, also with SW but it's easier with them. Celestine simply can't be killed with her abilities. Surely you can win the game even if she survives, but if you think riptides are immortal as well that means you've never played against celestine and probably never even read her profile and special rules. Maybe 5 riptides are immortal as well but we're talking about 1000 points compared to only 200.

A single riptide can pull enough fire from an undisciplined player to lose the game. That's immortal enough.

Again, if she is that nuts, she FORCES you to ignore her. Riptides will sucker in people like you who think they can take them down with poison or some such nonsense.

Personally, I want units that tempt my opponent to make mistakes, not good decisions.

Look at this batrep, dark eldar against tau with 5 riptides and a stormsurge.

DE victory.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQOOoTt1JDI

I haven't finished it yet, but I see there's a bunch of talos in involved. A bunch of MCs vs other MCs. Guess what I can't get? MCs. You guys kill me. Either of these lists table BA with no effort.

 Blackie wrote:
Look at this batrep, dark eldar against tau with 5 riptides and a stormsurge.

DE victory.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQOOoTt1JDI

I don't think that video helps your point.

First of all it's ITC, which only nerfs the Tau and boosts the DE significantly.

Second... that game is not a good example of competitive play in my opinion.


AFAIK, in 7th 40K, you do not roll the guy who gives cover separately.
In 7th ed, if one guy sees the target as covered, all shots against that target take that cover into account.

The Tau guy was clearly unprepared and had no clue what a DE army like that does, he bunkered up for no reason and left his markers to be destroyed.

He was shooting at friggin Ravagers when the Corpsethief was still a threat.. that's just rubbish.
Even Dark Artisan would've made more sense.

The DE was lucky enough to seize or go first, whichever.
The Tau's dice were terrible compared to the DE.
Rather heavy terrain, in favor of the DE again.
What kind of strength D are they playing? is that again ITC bs?


Yes, of course the DE wins in this case.

But this is NOT 40k, this is houserule-ITC-40k.

My honest opinion, if you're considering Dark Eldar, go with Ynnari instead (introduced in Gathering Storm II). The Ynnari Reborn Warhost combines Eldar, Dark Eldar, and Harlequins into one army called Ynnari. Granted, you'd need the codices for Eldar, Dark Eldar, and Harlequins as well as the Gathering Storm II book to have all the rules to run an Ynnari army. But, I think it's one of the more fun ideas (the large overfaction with so many different vehicles and unit types to choose from) that GW has come out with in a good long while.

SG

I don't see how ITC even helps BA honestly.

Martel732 wrote:
I haven't finished it yet, but I see there's a bunch of talos in involved. A bunch of MCs vs other MCs. Guess what I can't get? MCs. You guys kill me. Either of these lists table BA with no effort.

It's a legal DE list, and very similar to one of the three typical lists that I also run. DE are considered among bottom tiers, I guess very few people have played against their competitive lists. Anyway talos are MCs, correct, but with only 3 wounds, no invuln, only 4/6 TL poisoned shots as their fantastic shooting phase and 120 points each for a model that moves 6''. Far from being overpowered, and they suffer grav spam and D weapons a lot. Cronos costs 125 points and other than a wonderful S3 template it only serves one purpose, to give +1 FNP to units around it.

That was only one of the possible DE competitive lists, thare are others with no MCs at all, but a bunch of grotesques instead.


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morgoth wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
Look at this batrep, dark eldar against tau with 5 riptides and a stormsurge.

DE victory.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQOOoTt1JDI

I don't think that video helps your point.

First of all it's ITC, which only nerfs the Tau and boosts the DE significantly.

Second... that game is not a good example of competitive play in my opinion.


AFAIK, in 7th 40K, you do not roll the guy who gives cover separately.
In 7th ed, if one guy sees the target as covered, all shots against that target take that cover into account.

The Tau guy was clearly unprepared and had no clue what a DE army like that does, he bunkered up for no reason and left his markers to be destroyed.

He was shooting at friggin Ravagers when the Corpsethief was still a threat.. that's just rubbish.
Even Dark Artisan would've made more sense.

The DE was lucky enough to seize or go first, whichever.
The Tau's dice were terrible compared to the DE.
Rather heavy terrain, in favor of the DE again.
What kind of strength D are they playing? is that again ITC bs?


Yes, of course the DE wins in this case.

But this is NOT 40k, this is houserule-ITC-40k.

DE list wasn't 100% competitve to be honest, if you cut those ravagers (which are a meh unit), take only min number of venoms and surround the table with reavers jetbikes you would have a more effective list. The same player often bring a lot of bikes.

Yes, the DE player is more skilled than the tau one, but even a no brainer can win with 5 riptides and a stormsurge. And many of the power players can only face other power players and have no idea about 50%+ of the other 40k stuff. If you go to a tournament eldar, tau, SM TAC lists are thought with the effort to be hard counters for each other, no one makes a tournament list keeping in mind what DE could bring against.

Maybe outside ITC tau would have won but still that DE list is comparable to the tau one, and the tau one was really competitive. And that stormsurge should have died before in that game.

I don't record my games and posted that bat rep because I remembered it, but it's not the only game in which DE defeated competitive tau lists.

If you play armies like DE without experience and a lot of fluffy units you're going to be tabled very often, but you can defeat tournament lists with them. Maybe not an entire tournament full of competitive lists as winning 4-5 games in a row is very tough, but people that thinks DE, orks, and some other armies that are underestimated can't compete with the best ones they simply haven't seen those armies played by someone that knows how to play them and make competitive lists, Of course the top tiers are better overall, especially SM and eldar, but other mid-top tiers armies like tau are not impossible to defeat.

That guy should have novaed his shields a lot more. That's what makes the Riptide $$, not the weaponry. And no FNP? Really? 4 well defended riptides >> than 5 that die like Dreadknights.

Without access to units even as durable as Talos, I have no clue how BA stand up to that Tau list.

 Blackie wrote:
The new celestine is one the most overpowered things right now, simply impossible to kill.

How can someone say that's she doesn't fit a competitive army? Just watch a couple of games, that lady is extremely powerful.

There aren't only riptites, grav centurions, scatter bikes, stormsurges and WK in the game.

Exactly. He just doesnt know apparently.


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Martel732 wrote:
That guy should have novaed his shields a lot more. That's what makes the Riptide $$, not the weaponry. And no FNP? Really? 4 well defended riptides >> than 5 that die like Dreadknights.

Without access to units even as durable as Talos, I have no clue how BA stand up to that Tau list.

A lot of players go all offensive with Riptides. The hubris they breed is real. I still have yet to throw a Riptide WING down on a table (don't need to) but Ive faced them plenty and they are super good when you go all out offense so i think that moment of decision becomes a habit that costs you at times when you kind of forget its a dice game.

Blood Angels werent a choice for the original poster though. So there's that. He wan't considering them so i dont think you need to bang on that drum too much here.




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morgoth wrote:


And what tournament was that?

As I said above, outside of ITC there is no gravstar anymore... your frame of reference is not regular 40k.

Lol. keep telling yourself that.

He went to the Annihilation 6 tournament "fist full of Annihilation"




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Martel732 wrote:


Can she disintegrate my 2+ armor units from 72" away? No? I think I'll manage. .

You say that now.


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Martel732 wrote:
I don't see how ITC even helps BA honestly.

ITC Missions include:

A limited Maelstrom mission component (roll 3 dice each round, choose the two you want and there is a menu of 6 objectives; and the person with the most Maelstrom points gets 4 points. Malestroms are only scored at the top of your turn though so that's important to note);

and a Primary Mission (from the book, the person who takes the primary gets 4 points);

and tertiaries (what you'd call secondaries normally: First Blood, Warlord, etc... only there are soem additional ones that can be on there such as First Strike which you get credit for if you kill a unit in ropund one, instead of it just being for the FIRSt to kill a unit, each one worth one point each).

You are forced to fight for three different objectives all at once, which is quite a challenge and requires you to recognize mid-game which overall objectives you are most able to get. So mobility is important. Blood angels are mobile. Thus there could be a perception that the ITC mission helps you a little? Maybe?

Other than that, the ITC is just an FAQ. Morgoth wishes it were more, but that's really what it is. It's an FAQ like every other tournament in existence uses (or in its place, the judgement of the TO which is more arbitrary and less predictable). the FAQ is voted on by players themselves, so it has the virtue of being agreed upon by the majority instead of agreed to by one person (the TO).

ALL TO's are allowed to play their tournaments EXACTLY 100% the way they want. It still grants ITC standing. Therefore, the statement that ITC somehow changes anything is absurd. Other than the fact that you wont face three WraithKnights in a game, Invisibility isnt as ridiculous and a couple other things aren't a part of the program, it's the same,

Morgoth isn't into competitive 40K, and so he poo poo's the ITC apparently but you could hold ITC events and start ranking up anywhere in the world using the bestcoastpairings.com app. I personally recommend you checking it out if you havent already.

At any rate, that talos formation is at least decent even if i think i could have done better on the tau side.

Talos are beasts. they haaaaaaate charging Dreadnought units though. True story. Lol. Dreadnoughts got so much better in close combat. 5 attacks at STR 10 on the charge? Dayam. 3 of them can do a number on Talos. Ive been on the receiving end. Now i know you wont see three running around all that frequently, but a friend of mine did it and won a tournament with a Stormlord and Dreadnoughts to guard it from assault while he laid fire downfield. My outflanking Talos were unprepared for the newfound ferocity of Dreadnoughts. Hehehe.

Martel732 wrote:
At any rate, that talos formation is at least decent even if i think i could have done better on the tau side.

I know, the tau player wasn't super experienced and the DE one is extremely skilled, the DE list could have been better though. I've seen several games from that channel and I remember also a DE victory against eldar, with a list that didn't have any talos. Talos are quite good but not an autoinclude, a single MC costs as much as 3 meganobz which are capable of more damage. Almost every DE competitive lists have one these options: grotesquerie, corpsethief claw or corpsethief claw + the dark artisan. In general they're all close combat oriented. Many people still think about DE as a shooty army with lances to crack vehicles and tons of poisoned shots to kill the crew inside.

I don't know about BA, but even orks can defeat tau lists like that one.

Some armies have certainly better odds to win than others, that's why I wish a more balanced game but if tau have 20000 victories in tournaments and DE just one it doesn't mean that armies like DE can't defeat tau, worst case scenario the odds should be around 70%-30% in favor of the tau player.

My chances go up substantially I must admit if Tau players aren't rocking FNP and constantly overcharging the shield with rerolls. I would never play a Tau list the way he did. He didn't have to lose 3 Riptides. He could have fielded one less and had more units and had FNP for the other 4.

Martel732 wrote:
My chances go up substantially I must admit if Tau players aren't rocking FNP and constantly overcharging the shield with rerolls. I would never play a Tau list the way he did. He didn't have to lose 3 Riptides. He could have fielded one less and had more units and had FNP for the other 4.

Had a game against Tau Empire last night. Same list as before, but 1850 so add two Ravagers to the list and Incubi.

I took pictures which I might post later. Round one I shoved Raiders to within an inch of him, failed to hurt his Broadsides with both Ravagers, and the Venom made a Pathfinder squad fall back, inflicting 4 casualties on them. So pretty much i killed 4 Pathfinders for round one. BeastPack moved up to an objective on the far right flank facing the Broadsides.

On his turn he smashed three Raiders with his shooting, plus a Venom. The Crisis Star put out impressive firepower but ironically it was his Fire Warrior Smart Missile systems that were the finishing touches on my armor. I was forced to Jink with most of my armor pretty much. He then charged the fourth Raider with his Stormsurge, exploding it The broadsides fired down on my Beastpack. I was down 5 vehicles turn one, a kabalite Warrior unit was in shambles. The Riptide would not be getting any supporting fire, so he decided since there was nowhere to run, that he would charge the Grotesques and at least steal their charge attacks, hoping his 2+ armor and 3+ invul would protect him. he had two Drones with him as well to soak wounds and of course the Ethereal to bolster him. I went first rolled to wound and got three 6's among them. I made him take the normal saves first and then the Instant Death saves. He failed one of the three instant Death saves and his riptide was destroyed. the Grotesques consolidated towards his Crisis Star which had tried to kill the Kabalite warriors they could reach but had failed the charge.

On my turn two, The Grotesques on the left charged through the rocks and annihilated the Crisis Star despite them hitting on 4's in Overwatch with their Pathfinders help. The second unit of Grotesques with the help of Incubi slew the Ghostkeel unit (again on an Instant Death result),. The Court of the Archon killed both Fire Warriors en masse and the Beast Pack backed away to an objective and so as not to tangle with the Broadsides who were trying to get to them.. The VoidRaven Bomber came in and put a wound on the Stormsurge (his Shield saved him against all but one).

He conceded on his bottom of two. He had the Stormsurge facing Grotesques, ravagers, the VoidRaven Bomber, incubi and the Court of the Archon. He had some Pathfinders facing Grotesques, an Ethereal on his lonesome and then the Broadsides facing a BeastPack. It was over.

Good times.

Being able to assault out of wrecked raiders is pretty sweet. The availibilty of instant death is pretty good too. My lack of instant death makes it almost impossible for ba to handle mass mcs. Notice how the tau were unable to stop the talos formation. MCs are where its at.

Martel732 wrote:
Being able to assault out of wrecked raiders is pretty sweet.

Yup. And that is why i don't cry and complain when people say "yeah but any competent opponent is going to kill those raiders in turn one".

My response: "So what". Lol. They can try. The Tau Empire can and did ignore cover a lot and that is why I got wrecked. Did not mean I was out of the game. Did not mean most opponents would even be able to do it.

He noted that had he gone first, he might have been able to do more. I agreed. I would then be 42.1 inches away from him as we've discussed, allowing pretty much just one of his units to hit me preemptively (the 4d6 missiles and his Large blast from the Surge, and if he wanted to use them early, the STR 8 AP 1, one shot missiles). Now this would have an impact. Missile Rack would average 1.16 damage results. His Large blast would average .25 damage results and the STR 8 AP 1 Missiles .833 damage results. he would have no Markerlight support but given those numbers, he has at least a punchers chance of doing some work. As you can see...probably not as much as he's imagining but it could have stopped the Ravagers from targetting him round 3 if he blew them up for example and that would be worth trying. In turn three, Ten lance shots before the assault would have resulted in two unsaved wounds for the Stormsurge plus the one he already had, which in turn makes him much more likely to die at the hands of the Grotesques, so some whittling there wouldn't have been a waste of time, even if just to stop them from shooting given that many damage results wouldn't stop the assault much (or he could try to halt the assault, though that .again would seem to require all of that shooting to accomplish. Probably the Grotesque Raider if it was possible, though i could as easily vacate the Incubi and continue on my merry way with the Grotesques if he did.

I think my point is still good, which is that the Tau Empire does not have a monopoly on being scary and effective. My list is nothing like the Talos list and yet it worked fine against Tau empire. We haven't even talked about objectives or how good it is at taking them. we just talked about straight up sluaghter here.

You cannot win every game but Dark Eldar are quite good and very aesthetically pleasing!


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morgoth wrote:

AFAIK, in 7th 40K, you do not roll the guy who gives cover separately.

This was an error. when anyone in the shooting unit provides cover to the MODEL being shot...it gets cover...this is on a model by model basis so you would not roll separately for that. You're right. I dont think it affected the outcome in the grand scheme. this is a throwback to the way it used to be done and people who have played for a long time have echoes of the rules i ntheir heads which does rquire some effort to abolish.

Like people who think Celestine isn't awesome.


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morgoth wrote:

The Tau's dice were terrible compared to the DE.
Rather heavy terrain, in favor of the DE again.
What kind of strength D are they playing? is that again ITC bs?


Yes, of course the DE wins in this case.

But this is NOT 40k, this is houserule-ITC-40k.

STR D in ITC is nerf'd. No one likes playing against normal D. So one of the few, but significant changes in the ITC is that it, like Invisibility, is nerf'd. Many TO's already were doing both of those things and the ITC just picked up on it and made it their way of doing things. If you like getting hit with D weapons the way the book is written, I am sure we can make that happen for you in any games we ever play together.

The health of this game REQUIRED some sanity be restored. D weapons as well as Invisibility are two of the most popular changes there are and two of the things that made games simply not fun. You may require a history lesson on Games Workshop and the damage 6E did to the games player base, but i do not. I had to resurrect 40K from the ashes after the Blood Angels and later Grey Knights caused people at end of 5th to really start questioning them and then of course the 6th Edition Pandoras box REALLY did damage.

7th fixed a ton that was errant and players were still slow to come back. The numbers i nthe ITC paricipation in just ONE YEAR tell you all you need to know: the ITC resurrected interest like no other force in 40K. And really most of it was prompted by the failure of GW to answer our questions. The answers i nthe ITC FAQ aren't universally perfect but they certainly are closer than anything like it has ever been.

I was an outspoken opponent of the ITC originally, before it became more transparent and they were more willing to actually ask the player base their opinion. You and i can now vote for or against interpretations and the majority agreement has been moooooostly in agreement with GW's new FAQ. Mostly. Grenades are one big surprise from GW and so we adjust. But you cannot now claim it lacks legitimacy because the majority have ruled o nthese things, It isnt some dude in a tower making decisions like it once was. It is thousands of votes being cast for or against the interpretation.

Skies of Death was ridiculous. ITC simply doesnt use it. TO's are allowed to put anything they want into their tournaments however and in two ITC events i was allowed to use the Tau Empire Gonfort, for example. So even if its an ITC event, as long as both players are playing by the same set of rules, the game is fair and the realities of that are known ahead of time. No advantage for anyone unless they just refuse to know the FAQ. but thats just laziness.

I have come around on the ITC but I understand your position. I held that position at one point. What I hjave come to realize and perhaps you will too, is that this game has a social contract attached that cannot simply be ignored in favor of a couple bad rules that ruin the fun. If you wanted to play purely by the rules, you'd find half as many players competing ebcause its just not fun to play against the way Invisibility was written (for example). it's simply too powerful. The same goes for triple Wraith Knights. the same thing goes for the D chart. D weapons are STILL heinously good, Invisibility is still heinously good. a singular WraithKnight is still as heinously good as its always been.

perhaps more importantly a very large number of ITC and ETC players are here and i am guessing that those who play in competitive play like I do understand this principle truth: playing by the same set of interpretations and minor restrictions creates a better community and a more fair playing field to determine results. With the ITC your standing and what it means is clear. Without it, you both have no way to track it nor any way to consistently be playing the same game. All competition, professional and amateur relies on the idea that the rules are the same for everyone and everyone had the same chance to react to the rules appropriately.

Get in the league or dont. makes no difference to my win percentage, at all.