Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So let me explain. Normally when an enemy shoots at you with almost anything your vehicles need to jink as dark eldar. I will admit some vehicles are fairly cheap but when combined with the infantry inside can be rather expensive. Now i won't know off venoms but ravagers even with a nicer armor 11 on front and side can still take a lot of hits and get hurt badly. I will say our vehicles are prone to exploding what with open topped making it more likely which is even worse when you're carrying lightly armored low toughness guys inside.

Here's what i propose. Instead of taking various AT units take 20 warrior models if you have to take the detachment anyway. With 20 warriors you can take 2 heavy weapons (preferably dark lance in my case). Now on first turn the detachment gives you 5+ cover save for troops and if you roll for night fighting you can give them stealth for a 4+ cover save. The point of this is it causes the opponent to dedicate a lot more fire to wipe out an AT unit. This may be needed as even with just 5 scourge with blasters or similar they tend not to make their points back and each death is usually a needed squad member (extra models beyond 5 in a squad gets expensive). I'd still probably use heat lance scourge and reavers with cluster caltrops and heat lances as it'd help.

So right now i'm curious if i should go lots of MSU which i'm sort of already doing or perhaps go for a significant amount of more survivability. I am unsure if this is even a good idea but i kind of want to try it to find out. Might give the warriors a few turns of life and considering all the saves most get vs ap 5 poisoned shots (cover and armor) i wouldn't really think lacking some venoms is such a big deal either.

Given that ignores cover is a large part of the game right now and warriors die to bolter fire, I very much doubt that taking a 20 man block of warriors is going to net you better results than stuffing min sized squads into double splinter cannon venoms and trying not to explode, especially now that you can jink without causing the units inside to snap fire.

{i]Maybe[/i] you could justify a larger squad in a raider with splinter racks, but more often than not the answer is another MSU unit in a venom or raider, simply because of target dilution and the ability to not only come in from different angles, threaten more units and losing less models when your transports inevitably explode, pinning or causing the remaining survivors to flee.

If you don't believe me, think about what a single thinderfire cannon or whirlwind will do to a 20 man blob of warriors? Not only that, now your anti tank is not only pinned to the spot if you don't want to have to snap shoot, but you're also wasting points on 18 warriors if you're shooting a tank. At the end of the day, your anti tank is coming from ravagers w/Lances, CTC or scourges with haywire or maybe some allied eldar and a WWP delivery system, with the odd lance shot from raiders or maybe a razorwing, definately not a bunch of easy to kill warriors.

If you want to go gunline DE, I think the Skyshield would be welcome. That said, a blob of 20 is 200pts for 2 lances - other AT options are simply cheaper.

Ally in eldar mages and anything can work.