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What armies do avatars do well against? I'm about to play against an AM player that takes a good mix of tanks, walkers and infantry and flyers and I thought maybe he would do well against that?

Well they certainly would do well against Sisters of Battle. And Salamanders I guess.

The Avatar is fun against any non-competitive list. It'll do fine against AM.

The Avatar is going to be great if they are spamming Melta Vets!

Oh right, that's true. It will be completely immune to Melta and Flamers. That's a hilarious and unique mechanic that is fun to surprise your opponent with.

its not what lists the avatar is good against, its what eldar lists can you fit him into that is the real question here. The answer to that question btw is footdar, and that is the only answer.

 Badablack wrote:
Well they certainly would do well against Sisters of Battle. And Salamanders I guess.

Sadly, Sisters would just pummel him down with Exorcists and bolters.

He took a double hit in 7th. Only 1 smash attack and 5+ vs 4+ invuln.

Taking him with fast shot was good for the melta sword to wreck tanks and the fearless buff was good for auto rallying jetbike fleeing back towards him or keeping guardians from running. Buying "night vision" for a guy with a 12" gun never made much sense, but for laughs you can stick him behind the Ageis line with the quad cannon/lascannon, fast shotting away on a dark and stormy night.

Disarm and crush are the challenge monster builds now, but I'd still go for fast shot over crush. An invisible Avatar would be a riot if you could pull that off of course, but he's still too slow to survive... Unless you go for master of ambush - and infiltrate/outflank him

He's good against Tyranids. None of their fighters measure up.

 DarknessEternal wrote:
He's good against Tyranids. None of their fighters measure up.

Assuming they are playing Assault Tyranids, you are probably right. If playing FMC spam or Living Artillery, he is probably pretty worthless as the opponent just won't play his game, or will tie him up with gargoyles while killing the rest of your army.

I always liked the Avatar, but I don't see much use for him outside of a themed Footdar list with lots of Jetbikes, Guardians and other stuff that needs the Fearless buff. He could be pretty fun against a list that you know is going to pack Flamers and Melta, as some other posters have mentioned. So, yeah, Salamanders...

As far as pure killing ability: unless he's rolling with other high threat units, he's probably not going to make it to close range.

You'd mainly be looking at specific lists versus overall armies that the Avatar might stand a decent chance against. He might do halfway decent against a Blood Angels Jumpers list. (Granted a lot of other armies can knock around a BA jumper list might be halfway decent too.)

More important is to consider your own list and what the benefits an Avatar is going to provide for your army.

He does exceptionally well against cryx

Not familiar with his stats completely, is he a Psyker at all? Based on the posts, I'm guessing he can't deepstrike.

He does ok mixed in with a fearless army. goes well with wraith heavy iyanden. keeps the t 6 average going, and you have plenty of other big mc's to gather other hits. he gets less use of the fearless bubble, but if you bring enough farseers with no units to attach to (like lots of wraithknights). he helps keep em around.

also. 1 avatar per detachment. so avatar, troop troop. repeat. can be amusing. shame hes so expensive now.

RAWRAIrobblerobble wrote:
Buying "night vision" for a guy with a 12" gun never made much sense, but for laughs you can stick him behind the Aegis line with the quad cannon/lascannon, fast-shotting away on a dark and stormy night.

I can just see a hulking fiery daemon squatting at the Quadgun control panel, poking away at the controls and steam rising off him as the rain pours down

The Avatar is a great counter-assault model. He's not fast, and has short range.
There's Fleet Battle Focus, for what it's worth.
But, when he hits, he hits a lot, and hits hard.
If a faster unit can lock an enemy unit in combat, the Avatar can run in and finish it off. Use Shining Spears up-front, and follow up for the kill.

I cannot see much use in the exarch powers he can take. most just make him better at stuff he's good at already.
+1S maybe,
An extra shot, sort of,
Disarming strike? Only against uber-bosses with unique weapons. It might as well just go for the kill instead.

He's not a psyker, and cannot deep-strike.

So, against most armies, the Avatar has a lot of work to do to be useful.
Against drop pods, he's a great deterrent.
Other outflankers or fast armies, it's all down to deployment.

You know how you make GK players cry? Throw an Avatar with Disarming Strike against them.

GK: Haha! GK are uber-powerful against Daemons, which the Avatar is!!!

Avatar: Yeah, but now you are armed with nought but a pointy stick.

GK: NOOOOOOO! My daemon killing weapon!!!

It's a shame his friends are still angry though.

 Shandara wrote:
It's a shame his friends are still angry though.

disarming strike only works in a challenge, the hope is to beat the chalenger enough to make the unit run away, and then catch them without even rolling with init10

Yes, but if the Avatar is alone, the other GK not in the challenge can still hit him nowadays.