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Hello dakka, I've given up on playing shenanigans and decided to just play melee elves, I'm not sure if it's competetive, do you think much should be changed up?

*Corsair raiding fleet detachment*
Command:
Corsair Prince, Cloud Dancer, Reaper of the Outer dark, Void Sabre, Shadowfield
2x Wasp Walkers with double scatter

Coterie: (Head Hunters or Hate Bringers)
Baron, Jetback, Void sabre, Shadowfield
Ghostwalker Band, Brace of pistols and close combat weapon, jetpacks (with Baron)
Voidstorm Band, 5 Venom Blades, Pistol braces, Corsair Venom

*Aspect Host* (+1 WS)
6 Howling Banshees, Exarch with executioner (in DE Raider)
6 Striking Scorpions, Exarch with Claw
4 Shining Spears, Exarch with Star Lance (with Prince)

*Allied Detachment* (Dark Eldar)
Lilith
5 Wyches, Hydra Gauntlets, Hekatrix with Agoniser
3 Incubi, Klaivex
Raider, Dark lance, Night shields
Raider, Dark lance, Night Shields (dedicated transport)
Raider, Dark lance, Night Shields (dedicated transport)

I think I'm lacking anti-tank, though I've got a lot of fast units and two infiltrated units, what do you guys think?

The new GW FAQ won't let you put your Howling Banshees in the DE Raider, sadly.

I don't think its VERY competitive. But I quite like the Shining Spears, for what its worth.

 Kholzerino wrote:
The new GW FAQ won't let you put your Howling Banshees in the DE Raider, sadly.

I don't think its VERY competitive. But I quite like the Shining Spears, for what its worth.

I believe as long as I don't start embarked I can embark during my first turn though right?
When you say you don't think it's "VERY competitive" do you mean it's competitive but not OTT or it's not very competitive at all?

Not very competitive at all I'm afraid.

I don't buy into the idea that you can't play assault armies in 40k at all. I really think some of the armies that are topic the meta, certainly in theUK are assault armies. But you have to explain how your army will cross the table and get into combat. Basically you have to realistically be able to survive multiple turns of shooting. So highly buffable Deathstars work. Black Knight spam could maybe work against a lot of opponents.

But generally speaking you have to say: how do I do against modest scatter laser jetbike spam. It's prevalent everywhere. The answer in your case is probably that it shoots you off the table. You will lose so many models turn one, that it won't be possible to recover.

 Kholzerino wrote:
Not very competitive at all I'm afraid.

I don't buy into the idea that you can't play assault armies in 40k at all. I really think some of the armies that are topic the meta, certainly in theUK are assault armies. But you have to explain how your army will cross the table and get into combat. Basically you have to realistically be able to survive multiple turns of shooting. So highly buffable Deathstars work. Black Knight spam could maybe work against a lot of opponents.

But generally speaking you have to say: how do I do against modest scatter laser jetbike spam. It's prevalent everywhere. The answer in your case is probably that it shoots you off the table. You will lose so many models turn one, that it won't be possible to recover.

Well yeah I probably would lose to scatter laser bike spam, but so do a lot of armies that are considered competetive. I'll rephrase then, is it a mid level army considering everything can be in assault turn 2, and if there was infiltrated units or scouts it can make it to assault turn 1.

My scorpions have a 2+ cover, my jinking Raiders and spears have a 3+(2+ for night fighting) and the venom is small enough to hide. The ghost walkers have a 3+ with the baron having a 2++. My wasps are definitely susceptible to shooting however.

You can't charge when you infiltrate OR scout, you won't be assaulting turn one. And weight of fire gets through a 3+ save or even a 2+ with no reroll or FNP pretty quick. A Gladious will hurt as much as an Eldar shooting army or Tau or grav bikes or drop grav.

 Kholzerino wrote:
You can't charge when you infiltrate OR scout, you won't be assaulting turn one. And weight of fire gets through a 3+ save or even a 2+ with no reroll or FNP pretty quick. A Gladious will hurt as much as an Eldar shooting army or Tau or grav bikes or drop grav.

Sorry I phrased that badly, if I face something such as white scars or 10th company who scout bikes, infiltrate scouts and such I'll assault them turn 1. Yeah Tau will hurt, I guess I give up, I'll never be king of the Pirates of the grand line.

 hiveof_chimera wrote:

 Kholzerino wrote:
You can't charge when you infiltrate OR scout, you won't be assaulting turn one. And weight of fire gets through a 3+ save or even a 2+ with no reroll or FNP pretty quick. A Gladious will hurt as much as an Eldar shooting army or Tau or grav bikes or drop grav.

Sorry I phrased that badly, if I face something such as white scars or 10th company who scout bikes, infiltrate scouts and such I'll assault them turn 1. Yeah Tau will hurt, I guess I give up, I'll never be king of the Pirates of the grand line.

I'm sure it's possible to play a melee Eldar army and do middlingly well. I actually played a five game tournament recently with an assault based Eldar/Dark Eldar army and won all but one of my games. I used a seer council with two extra farseers in, a corpsethief claw and a Skathach Wraithknight. I think Shining Spears might be okay. In an aspect host. Reavers jetbikes are cool and can work with cluster caltrop spam. And a shadowfield prince in with farseers for fortune/invis becomes very hard to deal with. But the footslogging aspect warriors will just die and turn out to be a waste of points.

I'm going to post a Shining Spears list I've been fooling about with shortly. Might work for what you want to do...

Sorry I've obviously conveyed it wrong, I wanted to rely on a melee army, so no invis, fortune or psykers in general, and yeah I've won a tourney with my Daemonkin but I wanted to see if elves could do melee by relying on their higher mobility, WS and I.

 hiveof_chimera wrote:
Sorry I've obviously conveyed it wrong, I wanted to rely on a melee army, so no invis, fortune or psykers in general, and yeah I've won a tourney with my Daemonkin but I wanted to see if elves could do melee by relying on their higher mobility, WS and I.

Melee armies have to have a mechanism for survival. Eldar don't create new models by dying or killing stuff. So their method of being resilient is through psychic powers generally. Having heavy dependence on psychic powers doesn't mean that your army isn't using melee to win. Its allowing you to apply the melee units without losing all your units. Using Eldar and not wanting to use psychers, when you have already decided to not use shooting, might be a restriction too far to make the army any good. But best of luck with it!

 Kholzerino wrote:

 hiveof_chimera wrote:
Sorry I've obviously conveyed it wrong, I wanted to rely on a melee army, so no invis, fortune or psykers in general, and yeah I've won a tourney with my Daemonkin but I wanted to see if elves could do melee by relying on their higher mobility, WS and I.

Melee armies have to have a mechanism for survival. Eldar don't create new models by dying or killing stuff. So their method of being resilient is through psychic powers generally. Having heavy dependence on psychic powers doesn't mean that your army isn't using melee to win. Its allowing you to apply the melee units without losing all your units. Using Eldar and not wanting to use psychers, when you have already decided to not use shooting, might be a restriction too far to make the army any good. But best of luck with it!

Yeah that's definitely true, which is unfortunate because I don't see a seer star being a strong melee unit, although with barons and a prince it probably would do pretty well, I'd just need to be wary of alpha-strikes. Which tables would you roll on for each farseer? And is there a way to get hit&run? If I added a seer council instead of the aspect host and a eldar/harlequin cad instead of a DE would that work?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Here's the Eldar melee List:


Problem is that if I don't get first turn, my council may get shot off the board, and it really seems like a list that if it loses the council, is doomed.

Well. That's a much stronger army. Much stronger. Alpha strike is an issue for Eldar. But the Autarxh allows you to null deploy and keep the council off for a 2+ reserve roll. I think you mean Exarch for each unit of Shining Spears. I guess you hope that you can deploy enough to not be shot off the table. 5++\5+ invuln on the WK makes him more likely to live. But you'd need to put some other stuff out as well to survive turn one. But that's pretty much your worst match up. And you can play against it


Automatically Appended Next Post:
You can get hit and run from Baharoth if you want to add him. I usually run the council without and roll the warlocks on Sanctic. Means you have a good chance of Gate if you need to get out of combat. And hammerhand will let you even kill Knights.

Yeah I don't think itd take it anywhere but a tourney, even then it's not that hard to remove 18 t4, 3+ wounds from a drop pod list especially if they've got drop pod centurions for the knight. And Im pretty sure tau could too, maybe skitarii. Yeah exarchs haha, I wouldn't mind autarchs though. I don't think I'll be assaulting knights though, wouldn't like stomps getting 6s.

Imho, you shouldn't bring a wraithknight at 1500 points. Or ever, for that matter.

At any rate, what's the context?

Are you playing friendly matches or tournaments? Outside of tournaments, leave the wraithknights at home.

Imho, the list of the OP strikes me as an interesting one against which I'd be willing to play.

The wraithknight one? Not so much.

Traditio wrote:
Imho, you shouldn't bring a wraithknight at 1500 points. Or ever, for that matter.

At any rate, what's the context?

Are you playing friendly matches or tournaments? Outside of tournaments, leave the wraithknights at home.

Imho, the list of the OP strikes me as an interesting one against which I'd be willing to play.

The wraithknight one? Not so much.

It something to bring to the GW store, I got complaints about my pure aspect army, though I think I may stick with my Daemonkin and just play eldar in tourney's. Yeah the one I reposted isn't one I'd ever bring outside of a tournament or a request for a competetive game.