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Am I the only one who hate Shadow Spectres for a bunch of reasons?
First, they feel tacked on into CWE. They are an unimaginative mish-mash of Dark Reapers, Warp Spiders and Wraiths. Then they behave nothing like their background says: they are supposed to be masters of long range anti-tank, but in-game they are flying heavy flamers with a cute "starcannon" on top.
Why do they even carry mini Prism weapons? Wouldn't bright lances make more sense?
On top of that the models are (imho) nothing special foro their high price. And Forge World screwed up by making them a no-brainer with their point cost. It's ridiculuous how much better they are over Spiders for just a little more.

If they are what it takes to play competitive Eldar, I will stay narrative.

I am of the entire opposite opinion. I love Shadow Spectres. I think they're awesome looking models with decent fluff and the idea of a unit using a prism like gun is pretty fun.

I'm glad they're finally extremely point efficient!

To each their own.

Definitely not required for eldar to be competitive. Just think they are under appreciated and in their current form in the current format they are really quite good.

But yeah they don't seem to get too much of a mention in eldar lists to justify any tableflipping and swearing off competitive.

 DanielFM wrote:
Am I the only one who hate Shadow Spectres for a bunch of reasons?
First, they feel tacked on into CWE. They are an unimaginative mish-mash of Dark Reapers, Warp Spiders and Wraiths. Then they behave nothing like their background says: they are supposed to be masters of long range anti-tank, but in-game they are flying heavy flamers with a cute "starcannon" on top.
Why do they even carry mini Prism weapons? Wouldn't bright lances make more sense?
On top of that the models are (imho) nothing special foro their high price. And Forge World screwed up by making them a no-brainer with their point cost. It's ridiculuous how much better they are over Spiders for just a little more.

If they are what it takes to play competitive Eldar, I will stay narrative.

This is what makes our hobby awesome.. There is something for everyone, and if you don't like one faction/model there are so many other choices.

Personally I really like the models. One of my favorites. I think the main shooting profile is extremely fluffy in its "beam" like effect. If you hit you get to get more hits.. like the beam is intensifying on its target. Super cinematic to me

So I am arming up my Cloud dancers and not sure what weapon to go with. I know the -1 to hit with scatters has pushed people to shuriken cannons, but I am concerned for the range. At that range, the enemies can shoot back. While I might hit less with SL, I can shoot from safety. How about dissonance, splinter cannons, or lances? Just like to hear to peoples opinions.

 Bonachinonin wrote:
So I am arming up my Cloud dancers and not sure what weapon to go with. I know the -1 to hit with scatters has pushed people to shuriken cannons, but I am concerned for the range. At that range, the enemies can shoot back. While I might hit less with SL, I can shoot from safety. How about dissonance, splinter cannons, or lances? Just like to hear to peoples opinions.

So.. if you are going to go with scatters.. and sit back.. save pionts and run them on windriders. You are paying for that special morale bonus with corsairs so being closer actually allows you to use it. Even if it means being more vulnerable.

I have looked at running splinter rifles for mass fire (6 shots at 18" ea.) and still keeping decent range. I have also considered running dark lances as a mobile AT firebase, that doesn't move unless it needs too, and at that point can reposition pretty far.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Bonachinonin wrote:
So I am arming up my Cloud dancers and not sure what weapon to go with. I know the -1 to hit with scatters has pushed people to shuriken cannons, but I am concerned for the range. At that range, the enemies can shoot back. While I might hit less with SL, I can shoot from safety. How about dissonance, splinter cannons, or lances? Just like to hear to peoples opinions.

So.. if you are going to go with scatters.. and sit back.. save pionts and run them on windriders. You are paying for that special morale bonus with corsairs so being closer actually allows you to use it. Even if it means being more vulnerable.

I have looked at running splinter rifles for mass fire (6 shots at 18" ea.) and still keeping decent range. I have also considered running dark lances as a mobile AT firebase, that doesn't move unless it needs too, and at that point can reposition pretty far.

The dark lances aren't a bad choice but I feel we typically have a decent chunk of anti tank. I personally really like splinter cannons 6 shots in 18 and 3 at 36 a piece is pretty good, but vs a lot of targets it doesn't seem like 30 points to change from shuriken cannon Windriders is worth it, kind of on the edge about it. Though you should never run cloud dancers with the stock weapons they pay way to much for their weaker profile and worse special rules and 0 synergy rules to not take the unique weapon options.

I am going to stick with cloud dancers in hope that the corsairs get their list back. I suppose the smartest thing I can do is magnetize the weapons.

From a points PoV, am I anywhere near the ballpark in terms of the Eldar Unit Tier list?

Top: Wave Serpents, Hemlocks,
High: Eldrad, Farseers, Avatar of Khaine, Fire Dragons, Wraithguard, Wraithblades, Crimson Hunter, Dark Reapers, Night Spinner,
Mid: Autarch, Spiritseer, Warlock, Phoenix Lords, Guardian Defenders, Rangers, Shining Spears, Vypers, Windriders, War Walkers, Wraithlord,
Low: Illic Nightspear, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees, Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, Vaul Support Battery, Falcon, Wraithknight.
Bottom: Yriel, Dire Avengers, Fire Prism,

I would move the avatar to mid. Reason. Sure he is tough and helps out a footdar army but he wont kill his points most games or just barely. So a mid tier

I would swap out Banshees and Wraith lords. Both are good to insert into the enemy hth units. They wont fall back and the banshees can keep up during their fight phase. WL are great to tie up opponents HTH especially nids. As a shooting unit it is way overcosted.

The Banshees have some use vs shooting armies even if they die in 1 round or 2 as (everyone but guard) don't have fallback orders yet. So they at least tie the hands of a unit for a round +

I keep finding Guardians to be at least the third best unit in the index after Serpents and Hemlocks. Their damage output is absurd, and you've got to have something to put in the Serpents anyway. You're presumably playing Ynnari, and they're also an easy thing to have within 7" of enemy units when they die. Shuriken catapults are also the ideal weapon for using with Doom, and Doom-assisted Guardians make almost all of their points back in a single round of shooting at a bunch of hard targets.

I agree with most of the rest of it.

I'm surprised you've put Yriel so low -- he seems fine. He's an Autarch with a funky pistol and a melee weapon which is better than a Laser Lance. His only real drawback is that you can't give him a bike or wings, but a cheap Autarch to throw in a Serpent is perfectly fine. His curse is not a big issue (note that he has an extra wound over a regular Autarch anyway). I would strongly consider him over a regular Autarch if I don't otherwise have anything that can charge in and do some damage in CC.

Dire Avengers should be on their own at the very bottom in the Dire Avenger tier.

Edit: Oh, and I would say that Support Batteries are at least as bad as Prisms and I would swap Warp Spiders and Windriders.

Dionysodorus wrote:

I'm surprised you've put Yriel so low -- he seems fine. He's an Autarch with a funky pistol and a melee weapon which is better than a Laser Lance. His only real drawback is that you can't give him a bike or wings, but a cheap Autarch to throw in a Serpent is perfectly fine. His curse is not a big issue (note that he has an extra wound over a regular Autarch anyway). I would strongly consider him over a regular Autarch if I don't otherwise have anything that can charge in and do some damage in CC.

Yriel's autarch aura only affects Iyanden units. This is why I put him so low. If for some reason you want to run anything other than Iyanden, then he just becomes a melee-monster with no aura.

 Kouzuki wrote:

Dionysodorus wrote:

I'm surprised you've put Yriel so low -- he seems fine. He's an Autarch with a funky pistol and a melee weapon which is better than a Laser Lance. His only real drawback is that you can't give him a bike or wings, but a cheap Autarch to throw in a Serpent is perfectly fine. His curse is not a big issue (note that he has an extra wound over a regular Autarch anyway). I would strongly consider him over a regular Autarch if I don't otherwise have anything that can charge in and do some damage in CC.

Yriel's autarch aura only affects Iyanden units. This is why I put him so low. If for some reason you want to run anything other than Iyanden, then he just becomes a melee-monster with no aura.

Why would you want to run anything else? It makes literally no difference what <Craftworld> you pick and won't until we get a codex, at which point all of this changes anyway. He doesn't even clash with Eldrad since you can just bring Eldrad in an otherwise-Iyanden army and all you lose out on is re-rolling Eldrad's 1s.

I would move farseer and eldrad to top. Doom is too good to not take. It just makes every unit in your army better.

I would move guardians to high and warp spiders mid. Rangers would be low or even bottom as their cost to output is just garbage.

I would also drop falcon to bottom. The wave serpent is just better in all ways and cheaper. The only reason to take a falcon is if you need a heavy support slot to fill out a detachment.

 Kouzuki wrote:
From a points PoV, am I anywhere near the ballpark in terms of the Eldar Unit Tier list?

Top: Wave Serpents, Hemlocks,
High: Eldrad, Farseers, Avatar of Khaine, Fire Dragons, Wraithguard, Wraithblades, Crimson Hunter, Dark Reapers, Night Spinner,
Mid: Autarch, Spiritseer, Warlock, Phoenix Lords, Guardian Defenders, Rangers, Shining Spears, Vypers, Windriders, War Walkers, Wraithlord,
Low: Illic Nightspear, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees, Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, Vaul Support Battery, Falcon, Wraithknight.
Bottom: Yriel, Dire Avengers, Fire Prism,

I think this is close, but it looks almost like you wanted to balance the numbers in your middle 3 options there? No need to grade on a curve, let's go ahead and give out the failing grades as needed lol. I'd move half your "high" into "mid", half your "mid" into "low", and then re-name "low" into "situational."

Situational units could be taken if you know exactly what army you're facing, or if you build your army to really take advantage of certain things (I've been playing around with stacking T7+ armies and the WK does pretty good with that).

Oh yeah, then I would drop Vaul Support batteries and falcons into "bottom." Because support batteries are awful for the points, and falcon is 100% worse than wave serpent but costs more points.

So my personal list right now:

Top: Wave Serpents, Hemlocks,
High: Eldrad, Farseers, Fire Dragons, Wraithguard, Wraithblades, Dark Reapers
Mid: Autarch, Warlock, Guardian Defenders, Windriders, Night Spinner, Crimson Hunter,
Low/Situational: Illic Nightspear, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees, Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, Wraithknight, Avatar of Khaine, Spiritseer, Phoenix Lords, Rangers, Shining Spears, Vypers, War Walkers, Wraithlord
Bottom/Never: Yriel, Dire Avengers, Fire Prism, Vaul Support Battery, Falcon

Avatar is actually bad, not even acceptable.

He simply costs far too much for what he does.

 Deathypoo wrote:

I think this is close, but it looks almost like you wanted to balance the numbers in your middle 3 options there? No need to grade on a curve, let's go ahead and give out the failing grades as needed lol. I'd move half your "high" into "mid", half your "mid" into "low", and then re-name "low" into "situational."

Situational units could be taken if you know exactly what army you're facing, or if you build your army to really take advantage of certain things (I've been playing around with stacking T7+ armies and the WK does pretty good with that).

Oh yeah, then I would drop Vaul Support batteries and falcons into "bottom." Because support batteries are awful for the points, and falcon is 100% worse than wave serpent but costs more points.

So my personal list right now:

Top: Wave Serpents, Hemlocks,
High: Eldrad, Farseers, Fire Dragons, Wraithguard, Wraithblades, Dark Reapers
Mid: Autarch, Warlock, Guardian Defenders, Windriders, Night Spinner, Crimson Hunter,
Low/Situational: Illic Nightspear, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees, Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, Wraithknight, Avatar of Khaine, Spiritseer, Phoenix Lords, Rangers, Shining Spears, Vypers, War Walkers, Wraithlord
Bottom/Never: Yriel, Dire Avengers, Fire Prism, Vaul Support Battery, Falcon

I wasn't really thinking of any curve when I put that tier list together. Just went through the units in the codex one by one, and just threw them in where I felt they should it. They just came out like that I guess.

One thing I guess would be that I am looking at how each of the units compare to other units in the Eldar codex (internally) while you're probably looking at how they compare with other armies.

For good measure, perhaps we can throw one together for Ynnari, and Forgeworld units as well. I'm looking at something like the following, although admittedly I am not familiar with some of the FW units.


Top: Scorpion
High: Avatar of Ynnead, Yvraine, Shadow Spectres,
Mid: Wasp Assault Walker, Irillyth,
Low: Visarch, Wraithseer Skathach Wraithknight, Corsair Cloud Dancer Band, Corsair Reaver Band, Corsair Skyreaver Band
Bottom: Warp Hunter

dunno: Cobra, Hornet, Lynx, Nightwing, Phoenix, Vampire Raider, Vampire Hunter, Revenant Titan, Phantom Titan,

Why do people rate Night Spinner so highly? There are literally no units which it's effective against.

Well, maybe our own windriders, heh.

 Shadenuat wrote:
Why do people rate Night Spinner so highly? There are literally no units which it's effective against.

Well, maybe our own windriders, heh.

My only guess is that it somehow manages to be better than the Fire Prism. There is no reason to take a Fire Prism in 8e. Even if you like them, ther'tr just taking up space in your carrycases that could be used for something more competent. Like a Falcon. Or a Wave Serpent. Or Ynnead.

I think shining spears are better than situational. The new ruleset benefits them. Especially in ynnari.

The night spinner has pretty decent numbers against a wide variety of targets. It is a good all round tank. With 2d6 shots and 2 damage it can add up fast.

It doesn't shine against any one target but in a TAC list it is a solid option and doesn't break the bank.

And generally doesn't draw much attention so is around at end game to cap some objectives.

I haven't used a Night Spinner because Guardians are too good to justify giving up a Serpent's transport capacity, but it outshoots a triple cannon Serpent against many things. It's slightly worse against MEQs but of course about twice as good against anything with multiple wounds. It's as good as 10 Guardians against T7 3+, but from 48", and Guardians are actually really good against this stuff. Put another way, it shoots T7 3+ as if it's armed with a twin lascannon, and then it's a lot better against armies without vehicles.

Yeah Night Spinners are good for being able to have a go at anything. They do still have Ideal targets though, being best against bikes and light vehicles, and other units that don't need LoS like artillery. They are a god send vs Tyranid Hive Guard, who are a pain for eldar.

Hemlock is good but I dont think that it deserves the Top spot. Definitely 'High'. I would also move the Crimson hunter up to High. I am unsure how this guy is skipped. 183 pts for potentially 18D ... with bonuses to units with the FLY keyword and bs2 base which basically helps with the heavy weapon issue. This guy is a monster for the cost.

The rest i agree with. It is kind of a shame how lack luster some of the staple Eldar units are. Like Dire Avengers shouldn't be top teir.. but they deserve better than Below the bottom lol.

The one issue with grading units like this is your local meta. For some WKs might rule the day because no one brings shadowswords to any games. But for others quite the opposite... so consider what your meta is before picking units based off these lists!

Agreed with moving the crimson hunter up to high but I think the hemlock is deserving of top tier.

Besides, if we remove hemlock from top tier we are just left with wave serpents in there

Wyldcarde wrote:
Agreed with moving the crimson hunter up to high but I think the hemlock is deserving of top tier.

Besides, if we remove hemlock from top tier we are just left with wave serpents in there

That is fair

Why is WK ranked so low?

I have so far played a tournament where I came 4th with him and another 4'games where he has performed great.

Yes he is not the OP he used to be, but he is still great with wraith cannons. People keep on going for suncsnnons, but due to now cover works, and new S table, HWC are way better, and in combat you can melt units with your 12 S8 attacks

kaintxu wrote:
Why is WK ranked so low?

I have so far played a tournament where I came 4th with him and another 4'games where he has performed great.

Yes he is not the OP he used to be, but he is still great with wraith cannons. People keep on going for suncsnnons, but due to now cover works, and new S table, HWC are way better, and in combat you can melt units with your 12 S8 attacks

I've had the opposite experience. It's 526 points and shoots like 160 points of Wraithguard. Obviously it's doing it from farther away, but this is really not much more impressive than any number of ~200 point quad-lascannon platforms. It's paying 22 points per wound and lascannons don't see it as being any harder to hurt than a Rhino -- if you can kill two Razorbacks you don't need much more to kill a Wraithknight. Typical lascannon platforms expect to make back something like 3/4 of their points when shooting at it. The feet are nice, but it's probably not going to survive long enough to do a whole lot in combat, and its first turn in CC is likely going to be against a cheap screener. My standard Ynnari list has a good chance of dropping it on the first turn. My standard Sisters/Guard list doesn't care very much about its shooting and can easily handle it if it decides to get close. I've run up against WKs I think three times since 8th launched. Two of those were with Necrons, who have a notably hard time with anti-tank this edition. I've seen it get to CC once, and it's never been worth its points.

Imperial Knights are not only better in a straight comparison, they also function better in the context of Imperium armies. When you take an Imperial Knight in an army you're bringing it for counter-assault and somewhat-inefficient shooting on a platform that you can't just casually remove before charging in. Eldar don't need counter-assault. Practically everything in the army wants to be in your face and most of it moves really fast and flies. Outside of maybe Ravagers or Crimson Hunters they really have nothing resembling a durable long-range firebase, and those things aren't very worried about getting trapped by CC units.

It's true that the WK synergizes particularly well with a Farseer. The more tempting of a target you are the more you benefit from Fortune, and the more guns you have the more you benefit from Guide. Of course, you can't do both of these with a regular Farseer without forgoing Doom, which is the best power. Guide ends up working just about as well on a Crimson Hunter, though, and of course it's better on a unit of Fire Dragons or Wraithguard once they're in range. Fortune is definitely nice, and it's the main reason why I think WKs are still playable. But only in about the same way that Warp Spiders and Striking Scorpions and War Walkers and Vypers are playable.

 Kouzuki wrote:

 Deathypoo wrote:

I think this is close, but it looks almost like you wanted to balance the numbers in your middle 3 options there? No need to grade on a curve, let's go ahead and give out the failing grades as needed lol. I'd move half your "high" into "mid", half your "mid" into "low", and then re-name "low" into "situational."

Situational units could be taken if you know exactly what army you're facing, or if you build your army to really take advantage of certain things (I've been playing around with stacking T7+ armies and the WK does pretty good with that).

Oh yeah, then I would drop Vaul Support batteries and falcons into "bottom." Because support batteries are awful for the points, and falcon is 100% worse than wave serpent but costs more points.

So my personal list right now:

Top: Wave Serpents, Hemlocks,
High: Eldrad, Farseers, Fire Dragons, Wraithguard, Wraithblades, Dark Reapers
Mid: Autarch, Warlock, Guardian Defenders, Windriders, Night Spinner, Crimson Hunter,
Low/Situational: Illic Nightspear, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees, Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, Wraithknight, Avatar of Khaine, Spiritseer, Phoenix Lords, Rangers, Shining Spears, Vypers, War Walkers, Wraithlord
Bottom/Never: Yriel, Dire Avengers, Fire Prism, Vaul Support Battery, Falcon

I wasn't really thinking of any curve when I put that tier list together. Just went through the units in the codex one by one, and just threw them in where I felt they should it. They just came out like that I guess.

One thing I guess would be that I am looking at how each of the units compare to other units in the Eldar codex (internally) while you're probably looking at how they compare with other armies.

For good measure, perhaps we can throw one together for Ynnari, and Forgeworld units as well. I'm looking at something like the following, although admittedly I am not familiar with some of the FW units.


Top: Scorpion
High: Avatar of Ynnead, Yvraine, Shadow Spectres,
Mid: Wasp Assault Walker, Irillyth,
Low: Visarch, Wraithseer Skathach Wraithknight, Corsair Cloud Dancer Band, Corsair Reaver Band, Corsair Skyreaver Band
Bottom: Warp Hunter

dunno: Cobra, Hornet, Lynx, Nightwing, Phoenix, Vampire Raider, Vampire Hunter, Revenant Titan, Phantom Titan,

Top: SCORPION (it's good butnthe recent faq did nerf it), SHADOW SPECTRES (they just look so good better than most of our other aspect warriors minus reapers)
High: PHEONIX (16 wounds! And decent firepower), VAMPIRE HUNTER (pulsars are so juicy and this platform is hard as he'll to kill only downside it's half your army)
Mid: HORNET ( pricey but the pulsars are now better than starcannons) NIGHTWING (most mobile unit and the 5++ is quite nice it's also very cheap) IRILYTH (pretty tame overall better than most pheonix lords and the aspect he buffs is a really good one but otherwise he's not that strong) WASP ASSAULT WALKERS (better but more expensive war walkers if you have the extra points upgrade them to this badboy)
Low: REVENANT (no save if you don't have first turn just say bye) PHANTOM (same issue as the little guy expect it to be dead), WRAITHSEER (okay buffs high cost and can be picked off due to high wound count) CORSAIR CLOUD DANCER (costs a lot more than Windriders and honestly doesn't add much for a 1.3× price increase) LYNX (don't take the pulsar it's awful but the sonic doom gun is not bad though quite pricey) SKATACH WRAITHKNIGHT (better than a normal night but more costly it cam bring a decent amount of pain but for 700 you ask yourself why didn't I bring a real big toy and not a jump knight), CORSAIR REAVER BAND (with no army synergy you might as well just take wave serpent guardians they aren't free either), CORSAIR SKYREAVER BAND (less useful swooping hawks at least they are troops I guess but where is the special rule synergy)
Garbage: WARP HUNTER (like a fire prism it just costs to much), VAMPIRE RAIDER (lol wut 50 points less to swap the pulsars for transport 3 wave serpents is less than 50% the cost more survivable and equivalent fire power) COBRA (this is some garbage tier here way worse than a scorpion vs literally everything)

I think I got all the gw stuff for the ynnari
Yvraine is a high or even top choice so cheap so good just for word of the pheonix
Yncarne is a mid tier or high his use is situational cause of wonky deployment
Visarch absolute garbage spend your points on anything else instead

Got a link for the FAQ nerfing the scorpion?

kaintxu wrote:
Why is WK ranked so low?

Beats me. On 1500 pts it's really hard to take down and he can take down 2 enemy units a turn. Mine brought it's points back so far but I had to shoot and charge every turn. Too bad Starcannons got nerfed, but I'm still thinking running it with either 2 WC + 2 StC or Suncannon & 2 StC, simply for the lack of other options with good AP. The later option is overpriced as hell but there's no reason running sword to get invul since leg attacks are usually better and without guns it's not really possible to make points back (unless you manage to charge super heavy or somethin).