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Way back when, Dark Eldar Splinter Weaponry used to be the best way to force a lot of saves on a unit and competitively people feared the long ranged Firepower of the Venom. It does, statistically, 4 wounds per turn. Then GW ushered in an age of Tesla, Missile Pods and Goddam Scatter Lasers and Splinter Weaponry was left in the dust. Ignore cover is rife, high rate of fire medium strength shooting are the new bolters and survivability in all the new books have thus increased, either through price drops or save increases. Ravenwing and Tau can easily find themselves 2+ cover saves (some of it re-rollable) and Necron resilience is at an all time high, it takes 18 splinter shots to kill a single Decurion Immortal.

Simply put, Dark Eldar weaponry doesn't compete. It just doesn't. So, assuming we actually get a new book rather then that silly little re-hash Tau got how would you suggest we improve the Dark Eldar armoury to allow them to keep the title of Fast, Fragile Glass Hammer.

We need an effective Ignore Cover weaponry, Ravenwing can have a 2+ re-rollable Cover Save and there isn't a thing in hell DE can do about it. We'd lose in combat, we'd lose in shooting. I'd suggest either making a new weapon, or give the Shredder Ignore Cover and Monofiliment (wounds vs Initiative, 6's are AP1). Finally Shredders would have a role in our army.

We need more effective anti-tank, or better platforms for them. Currently our only effective AT are Haywire Blasters, which are pretty bad vs Skimmers due to Jink they will only cause 1/2 hull points and Scourges aren't the kind of unit to weather return fire. Dark Lances are shockingly ineffective when you think about it, compare it to a Las-Cannon (Not considered a great weapon itself) the Dark Lance preforms worse or the same at all armour values save AV 14 but at -12'' range. Either Dark Light weaponry need a special rule to buff them (or at LEAST increase range to 48) or they need to be drastically reduced in price. A Trueborn with a Blaster is pitiful compared to a Fire Dragon, who is cheaper and more effective and they have more special weapons, and the increased range of the Blaster matters less due to the fact both units will evaporate after shooting anyhow, at least the Fire Dragons get their target. We won't even talk about the Void Raven, costing as much as a Land Raider decked out yet more Fragile then a Wave Serpent, and lets be honest of all the things in the game that deserve Strength D the Void Mine is one of them.

Splinter Weaponry needs a buff of some sort. Splinter Weaponry used to be feared as one of the best ways to handle Monstrous Creatures. Now it's rare to see a Monstrous Creature without a 2+ Sv, Wings or is a Gargantuan and is all but immune to poison anyhow. It takes 72 Splintershots to down a Riptide (with FnP) reliably, that 6 double cannon not jinking venoms firing at the same thing. It takes about 20 Grav shots, less due to easy access to re-rolls to hit and to wound not to mention high natural rate of fire. Splinterfire just isn't a notable weapon for inflicting large amounts of wounds, so that needs some kind of buff, perhaps we could take a leave out of Fantasies book and say 6's to hit auto wound. The only notable thing we have at inflicting wounds is the horribly fragile Jet fighter firing off 4 missiles on the turn it arrives, however this is very reliant on the opponent having juicy targets, and even direct hits wont force enough wounds to dent Necrons.

So what do you think? Improve our current weaponry, add more weaponry or simply languish in unplayability and content myself with being a Taxi service for well paying Autarchs

Here's a smattering of the changes I'd make:

Splinter Rifle: 18" S2 AP5 Assault 2, Poisoned
Splinter Cannon: Becomes Assault 6
Shredder: Gains Monofilament and Ignores Cover
Blasters, Dark Lances: S9 AP2 Lance. Dark Lances mounted on Raiders, Ravagers and Razorwings become Primary Weapon 1.
Void Lance: S10 AP2 Lance Primary Weapon 1.
Void Mine: either of the following - StrD AP1 Large Blast, or S10 AP1 Large Blast, Fleshbane, Armourbane, Ignores Cover, Pinning, Concussive, Strikedown.
Huskblade becomes: S user AP3, Master-Crafted, Fleshbane, Rending, Shred
Agonizers gain Concussive
Liquifier Gun: gain Poisoned (4+)

Any unit with splinter weapons may purchase one of the following: (Redundant? OP?)
Virulent Venom: All splinter weapons in this unit gain Poisoned (3+) (10 points)
Hypervelocity Splinters: All splinter weapons in this unit gain AP4 (5 points)
Shatterspine Splinters: All splinter weapons in this unit gain Shred (15 points)

Add Haywire Blasters and Heat Lances to the generally-available heavy weapons list so Kabalite Warriors and Trueborn can take them.

Trueborn get Shardcarbines instead of Splinter Rifles.
Reavers have Shardcarbines instead of Splinter Rifles.
Archons get Ghostplate Armor (always, free)
Archons get Preferred Enemy (everything)
Trueborn can buy Ghostplate Armor for 1ppm
Incubi and Kabalite Warriors gain Plasma Grenades.
Reavers get Sv 4+

Trueborn and Scourges get BS5
Hekatrices get WS5, Bloodbrides WS6, Syrens WS7
Sybarites get WS/BS5
All squad leader characters get W2 (in keeping with CWE, Harlequins)

All Wych Weapons become: S user AP5, Rending, Shred
Bloodbrides gain Poisoned (4+) on all close combat attacks.
Wyches, Bloodbrides, Succubi can use their Dodge in the Assault Phase, not just the Fight Sub-Phase.

Voidravens get 4 free Monoscythe Missiles.
Voidravens and Razorwings gain Missile Lock
Ravagers get Preferred Enemy (Vehicles and Monstrous Creatures)

Flickerfields become selectable wargear for Ravagers, Raiders, Razorwings and Voidravens.

New army-wide special rule:
Stable Suspensorlifts: All Fast Skimmers with the Dark Eldar faction may, when moving Cruising Speed, still fire their weapons as if they had moved Combat Speed. When moving Combat Speed, they may fire as if they had remained stationary. Further, any passengers may shoot or disembark from a transport that moved Cruising Speed exactly as if it had only moved at Combat Speed.

ETA: A few more things I forgot!

Possibly increase the amount of poisoned weaponry we have that wounds more easily and give us a good amount with decent AP values. In fact why not make splinter weapons wound on a 3+ instead of a 4+. I find it pitiful some of the most masterful poisoners in the galaxy aren't so great at it sometimes or at least don't go through much armor.

Give dark eldar more pinning weapons or similar as well. Possibly even give dark eldar some snipers. You mean to tell me opponents that delight in inflicting as much fear as possible wouldn't go for the sniper approach or pinning weapons. I find that hard to believe. That or at least make the hexrifle not suck. Make it so on a 6 to wound it causes instant death rather than on a 6 to hit and give options to take a few. Make our HQ's frightening opponents again. I want to see an enemy pee himself because an archon or succubus even has gone into combat with them.

That's how DE were in 5e: HQs were insane killing machines right up until the moment they died. You were always left praying you'd survive to your initiative step, because if you could land on blow you could do it. It was always scary though.

It's a good look and it should come back. Give the Succubus (That's the HQ one, right?) Smash. That'll liven things the feth up.

Smash? Well, that's slightly interesting - all her attacks would be AP2, or she could make one at S6. Not earth-shaking, though. The big problem both DE HQs have now is that they're S3 - big problems making a wound stick. The old AP2 ID Huskblade got some attention, though, when combined with the Strength-doubling Soul Trap.

That said, I'm not a massive fan of extremely swingy effects that hit like a fist through jello or else bounce off like a wren hitting a patio door. That's why I really like the version of the Huskblade I found in a fan-rebalance 'dex, which I basically duplicated above: it will wound, with good odds of successfully sticking even to strong armor.