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Hi

I'm currently toying with starting a Dark Eldar army.
Most of my choices are based on the models I like, and fluff-wise I want to keep to the whole Raider sky-ship aesthetic because I want a kind of nautical theme - think a train-wreck of Coleridge's 'Ancient Mariner', Melville's 'Moby Dick', a bit of Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' and other such stuff.
While I'm not dead-set on being corpse-thief-claw tier competitive, I'd like to be able to hold my own against armies that aren't devout adherents of whatever flavor-of-the-month formations are top of the pile atm.

Here's what I'm thinking of as like a core of my army:
2x Raiders
a Ravager
at least 2 10 man squads of kabalites
an archon (not entirely sure on the loadout) with a squad of incubi to keep him company (maybe stick 'em all in their own raider)
2x squads of scourges w. haywire blasters
2x 3 man squads of reavers, probs assaulty

I've also been toying with a few add-ons:
I really like the models for Hellions and Wytches, and am fairly keen to use them, despite them being notoriously not very good - if there's any way of making them moderately worthwhile, I'd be happy to hear it!

I've also been toying with some Eldar allies, though perhaps the least competitive Eldar allies that ever were, mostly to play off my fluff - just rangers for troops, maybe Illic Nightspear with them, if only the model as just another ranger, with Wraithgaurd and maybe even a Wraithlord.

I'd really appreciate any advice anyone has for me, and I apologize prematurely for any pig-headed rejection of anything due to my fluff. I will pay for it in further humiliating losses to Trephines' Mech Guard.
Cheers for looking!

Well I mean, you do have the general idea right for doing straight up Dark Eldar. Although Venoms with smaller teams of warriors and/or BlasterBorn are going to be stronger overall than Raiders. You just get more shots and more mobile scoring units. Although the FAQ really hit DE shooting from transports (their only real shenanigan if you can even call it that) right in the jimmies. Ravagers are good mobile gun platforms for pointing Lance shots at things that need to pop. Scourges and Reavers are good, period. Probably the best two units in the standard codex.

If you love a raider/ship/skypirate/nautical thing...have you ever thought of going Corsairs instead? Or in addition? Most Dark Eldar kits can double as Corsair units anyway. And Corsairs are the stronger list overall, with everything good about both Eldar factions plus a little extra special sauce to make it fun. Plus you can kitbash the hell out of them. No need to buy the weird FW resin dealies. Just a thought.

Corsairs plus a Grotesquerie can be amazing. (Corsairs lack a good, solid melee unit.)

Speaking of, I highly recommend picking up some Grotesques.

It looks like you've got a solid beginning. (Warriors and Venom, Warriors and Raider, plus Reavers and an optional Ravager/Scourge squad, rinse, repeat until broke.)

If you want to stick your toe in the covens waters, Taloi and Grotesques are both great (grots might be our best unit).

Alas, there is no way to make wyches or hellions good. Actually, there is. Convert the wyches into harlequins and the hellions into corsair reavers. :( (Either option looks GREAT, though, if you're down with allies.)

You've got a good start with the warriors, raiders and reavers. Incubi are fun and a good counter assault unit but I can't get myself to like the Archon, the lack of AP 2 or high strength weaponry is such a shut down for me when we compare him to a Succubus.

Scourges are some of the best buys in the codex, great anti-vehicle. Considering you like the air ship theme I would suggest another Ravager, and that you don't underestimate the power of a disintegrator ravager against certain meta units. They force Jetbikes to jink just by looking at them, shred Deathwatch and are efficient necron killers as you'll find in the DE book at ranged.

I'd also suggest to bring the Reavers up to 6 man squads wth 2 Cluster Caltrops each. Maybe put the Incubi and Archon inside a Venom (easier to hide) and if your up for it look into Harlequin or Corsair allies. There is a quite good Harlequin formation made of 2 jetbikes and 1 venom chasis tank that is good and will easily slip in alongside your airborn assault force.

Hellions unfortunately suck, as do Wyches. Perhaps convert Hellions into beast masters? Medium sized beast packs are quite cheap and can bully ranged units with their immense speed.

If you're dead set on using raider warriors, giving a squad a splinter cannon, and the raider splinter racks and night shield, and sticking it behind some cover can do somewhat decently, although not as good as venom's.
Reavers are great. Give then CC and a blaster or head lance (both special things on the same guy to make it easier to keep safe) and you have a solid cheap unit with a 3+ jink.
Scourges are great. haywire is generally viewed as the best, but heat lances are also decent if they get in melta range. While not as good as the other two, I do enjoy blaster scourges myself.
The Archon is sadly not very good. The only time I use on is in a Purge Cotiere as the tax unit. A fully kitted out Succubus is cheaper than a kitted out Archon and does more damage, so I'd stick with one of them if you want a stabby HQ.
The only way I know of for Wyches to be at all useful is a barebones squad as meat shields for a Succubus, but even then she's better with Grotesques or Incubi.
I'll second what others have said and suggest a Grotesquerie in a couple Raiders. They are amazing, and you can make some awesome conversions. I made mine out of Talos/Cronos pieces and Crypt Horrors.

 Jimsolo wrote:
Corsairs plus a Grotesquerie can be amazing. (Corsairs lack a good, solid melee unit.)

I don't disagree with you in principle, and Grotesques are wonderful, but for the points Malevolents will do a lot of the same things and give you more bodies and some shooting. If that's a thing you want.

105pts 3-man Grotesques: S5(6 from turn 4 onward), T5, 9W, 6+ armor, ID on a 6 in combat, Rampage, 15 attacks on the charge, No Shooting, Ld 3/4, Fearless (turn 5 onward)

105pts 7-Man Malevolents: S3(4 on charge), T3, 14W, 5+ armor, Fleet, Rage, Shoot+Move, 14 Shuriken or Poison shots at 12", 21 attacks on the charge, Ld 8, Fearless

And upgrading beyond that point cost...Grotesques get a slightly more fighty Character and weird S3 APd6 flamers. And they can take a Raider as a DT. Two Malevolents can pick power weapons or venom blades (2+ poison) or melta bombs per 5 men. They can also take 4+ armor or jetpacks (which also give 4+ so might as well be these for DS). Also Malevolents weird out their Eldar brethren so all Eldar units take -1 to Ld if they are within 12". So you can keep them away from your main force and get them real close to your opponents Space Elves.

The real glaring difference is T5 v T3 as I see it. But the Malevolents have 5 more wounds, that are behind a base 5+ and possible 4+. Everything else kind just depends how you like to play. Grots seem like they go up against MCs and vehicles better. Malevolents will eat infantry for lunch. Unless that infantry has insane overwatch. I dunno. I felt this was worth a thought anyhow...

T3 doesn't just mean more wounds, though. It also makes the Malevolents more likely to be doubled out, which means their extra wound isn't even coming in to play.

Grotesques also have It Will Not Die. (I'm assuming you take your Grots from the Covens supplement, which is much better for them, and gives you Fearless from T2.)

Right, I mean that was kinda the point I was trying to make when I said "the real glaring difference is T5 v T3." But even doubled out by say Scat Lasers, a very common threat on the tabletop right now, that's 7W at 105 points...behind a 5+ (possible 4+ for a few more points), which is not that far off from 9 behind FnP.

Anyway, I am not advocating taking Malevolents to fill the same role as Grotesques, this was just a thought experiment in reaction to what you said about no good melee. Grots are more durable and often times much more destructive, but I was simply pointing out that for the price of a base Grot unit, Malevolents are a fine melee unit (with some very decent shooting as well) within the Corsairs codex. Plus I bet, just like Grots, they would be super fun to convert/paint. And Poser could even use those Wych or Hellion models he likes, since Malevolents are supposed to be void-touched and scarier than other Corsairs. The good news about playing DE/Corsairs is that you can use many models counts-as.

(Also I do only have the core DE codex, so yeah that was my reference point. IWND is no doubt pretty great. I should look into the Covens dex...)

For me, my go to warlord is succubus with glaive in the Armor of Misery.
She goes with 3 sslith in a raider. Majority T5 helps a lot.

Blasterborn in venom and the 5 kabalite with 1 blaster in venom are the main damage dealers.

2x Haywire scourges for more anti-tank, anti-IK.

Some small reavers for objective grabbing (but they usually flee at the first dead)

And I'm using the ravager without upgrades, for 9 S5 Ap2 shots to mow down MEQ or TEQ.

If your local players don't use the flyer expansion yet, Razorwing are your artillery against mobs, and FMC protection.


Wyches or incubi rarely survive a turn out in the open. :(

exliontamer wrote:

 Jimsolo wrote:
Corsairs plus a Grotesquerie can be amazing. (Corsairs lack a good, solid melee unit.)

I don't disagree with you in principle, and Grotesques are wonderful, but for the points Malevolents will do a lot of the same things and give you more bodies and some shooting. If that's a thing you want.

105pts 3-man Grotesques: S5(6 from turn 4 onward), T5, 9W, 6+ armor, ID on a 6 in combat, Rampage, 15 attacks on the charge, No Shooting, Ld 3/4, Fearless (turn 5 onward)

105pts 7-Man Malevolents: S3(4 on charge), T3, 14W, 5+ armor, Fleet, Rage, Shoot+Move, 14 Shuriken or Poison shots at 12", 21 attacks on the charge, Ld 8, Fearless

And upgrading beyond that point cost...Grotesques get a slightly more fighty Character and weird S3 APd6 flamers. And they can take a Raider as a DT. Two Malevolents can pick power weapons or venom blades (2+ poison) or melta bombs per 5 men. They can also take 4+ armor or jetpacks (which also give 4+ so might as well be these for DS). Also Malevolents weird out their Eldar brethren so all Eldar units take -1 to Ld if they are within 12". So you can keep them away from your main force and get them real close to your opponents Space Elves.

The real glaring difference is T5 v T3 as I see it. But the Malevolents have 5 more wounds, that are behind a base 5+ and possible 4+. Everything else kind just depends how you like to play. Grots seem like they go up against MCs and vehicles better. Malevolents will eat infantry for lunch. Unless that infantry has insane overwatch. I dunno. I felt this was worth a thought anyhow...

You missed that Grotesques have Poisoned 4+ from the Flesh Gauntlets as well as the ID on 6's, with S5 base that means they get re-rolls to wound against most infantry and are excellent at dealing with MC's as well. With up to 24 attacks on the charge they can do an horrific amount of damage for just 3 models, though you really need to chuck in an Aberation with Agoniser so that they don't get bogged down fighting Marines. I've found with Malevalents that they're more a case of 3 meatshields per 2 special weapons and their damage output is anoyingly low, if you can't deal a serious number of casualties on the turn you charge you're likely to get stuck in combat for several turns. They will destroy GEQ units quite handily though. It's a real shame because a Corsair Prince with Shadowfield, Reaper of the Outer Dark and a Void Sabre is a pretty handy close combat character but has no real squad capable of running with him in the Corsairs list.

Not to mention, a Grotesquerie formation is just plain awesome.
With the coven PfP chart, they will have Fearless turn 2 onwards, followed by fear, IWND, zealot, and eventually eternal warrior.
As their formation, any models within 12" of a model is at -1 leadership, too.

All of this, plus a d6 roll where they can get:
+1 str, +1 toughness, shred, rage, fleet, or fnp 4+.

Malevolents versus Grots in a Grotesquerie doesn't seem like much of a comparison. You'll get two units of grots plus a haemonculus which can buff them further via a webway portal, rending, and increasing their PfP chart by a turn.
So yes. Get grots and use them.