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Greetings.

I have been playing Necrons since 8th dropped just to learn the rules basically. I had a plan that I would play Drukhari in the long run (god I love the models). I started to read about them and they seem to be...strong? What makes them hot? And where should I start? All hints and tips would be greatly appreciated!

Drukhari are one of the top armies. They’re all pretty cheap, have amazing troops in Kaballites and Wyches, they’ve got the best stratagem in the game with Agents of Vect, lots of good stratagems and units, and there’s tons of speed and variety in weapons and assault. They also have the best allies in the game thanks to being Aeldari.

meleti wrote:
Drukhari are one of the top armies. They’re all pretty cheap, have amazing troops in Kaballites and Wyches, they’ve got the best stratagem in the game with Agents of Vect, lots of good stratagems and units, and there’s tons of speed and variety in weapons and assault. They also have the best allies in the game thanks to being Aeldari.

Thank you for the reply. That sounds like a great start. I noticed that they lack a Kabalite focused start collecting box. So where do I start? The goal is 1750-2000 points.

There used to be s Kaballite box, you might still be able to find it online but I’m not sure.

I don’t play DE myself, but I’d start with a battalion of kaballites, Wyches, or both, with some transports like Venoms or Raiders. The army has good stratagems so having CP helps a lot.

I just started dark elfs (in spaaace) I got my flags to order in 2 of the old archon getting started boxes and bought one new one (succubus) off the shelf. That took me up to 1000 points.

I would highly recommend that.

I think a big part of the reason they are good is becuase they have a moving phase, a shooting phase and an assult phase. Lots of armies seem to only shoot or assault, and some don't bother moving. But we do all 3 every turn.

I'd start by figuring out what type of drukhari you want to play. Fortunately, our troops are all pretty solid right now, so you don't have to feel bad for buying the "mandatory" parts of your army. However, one of the quirks of our army is that it's effectively broken up into 3 sections: kabals, cults, and covens. If you want to get lots of command points these days, you probably want at least one batallion in your army, but taking a mix of troop types (like taking both warriors and wyches) in a single detachment will cause you to lose our chapter tactic equivalents.

So with that in mind, you're probably better off focusing on one kabal, cult, or coven when you're first building the army. That way, you can play with a decent number of command points and still get your chapter tactics. A kabal is probably the easiest of those 3 to play. Lots of good shooting including the Ravager (one of our best units), and you can still take some of our pretty good Elite slot melee units.

Whatever you start with, you'll probably want some transports. Outside of really gimmicky builds, dark eldar are all about their transports. Personally, I'm leaning towards raiders over venoms as poison in general is less powerful than it used to be (the new to-wound system makes it a little less impressive in general, and most things with high toughness have more wounds than before). In addition to giving you good anti-tank (dark lance) and good all-rounder (disintegrator) guns, the raider will also be easier on your wallet. Two raiders can carry a batallion's worth of dark eldar troops along with the HQs to lead them.

Once you're ready to start expanding, you can pretty much flavor to taste. Other than the court of the archon (which I love), we don't have a lot of "bad" options. Coven stuff tends to be relatively durable. What they're actually good at kind of depends on what you take. Wych cult stuff is (finally) reasonably stabby. The wyches themselves are nice for tying down infantry units that you can't kill right now but want to keep tied up for a while. Red Grief reavers are golden if you want to assault something turn 1, but not as worth it if your opponent has something in their deployment zone ready to wreck them. Kabal stuff is basically all about shooting.

Scourges can work but are fragile and usually not as good at a given job as a ravager or a batch of troops. Mandrakes are probably a little too expensive for what you get, and I don't like them as objective holders, but they're pretty good at enough different things to make them usable. Incubi aren't as good as wyches, but they get the job done and can fit into a kabal detachment.

The whole codex is something like 15-20% under-costed compared to some of the mid-bottom tier armies in the game, and they really don't have any of the weaknesses of 8th edition that can't be filled by adding in a few Craftworld or Harlequin units (the eldar psychic powers are especially amazing).

They are very good, but i'd also expect some nerfs to come along at some point so it's always the best idea to just play what you like rather than just chase the current hotness.

jcd386 wrote:
The whole codex is something like 15-20% under-costed compared to some of the mid-bottom tier armies in the game, and they really don't have any of the weaknesses of 8th edition that can't be filled by adding in a few Craftworld or Harlequin units (the eldar psychic powers are especially amazing).

They are very good, but i'd also expect some nerfs to come along at some point so it's always the best idea to just play what you like rather than just chase the current hotness.

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted. They have one highly broken weapon (disintegrator, which is probably ~8 points undercosted at 15) and a couple of really good units (Grotesques, Kabalites, Venoms, Talos)

If you build a Drukhari army without chasing the meta list, nerfs are going to effect you in seriously minor ways if at all.

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Sunny Side Up wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Congratulations, you have just proved you know nothing about this army. Hellions are pretty poor (12ppm for T3, 1W 5+Sv, thats an expensive unit that dies to a stiff breeze), the Cronos is an 85pt buff monster that doesn't actually buff anything, Wracks are decent but if you think a T4 infantry unit with only 2 poison 4+ close combat attacks and no AP at 9ppm and a squad size that maxes out at 10 is undercosted then you clearly have no idea about the game.

The biggest strength of the Drukhari codex is that it's probably got the best internal balance in the entire game, sure Disintegrators and Grotesques might need a 5pt increase and Kabalites could do with going back to 7ppm (though that wouldn't make a huge difference, the way this army runs means you don't tend to run huge hordes of troops the same way you do with Guardsmen and Cultists) but nothing else really needs such point adjustments.

Just because other codecies have laughably bad units that really make you wander what the writers were thinking doesn't mean half our codex should be nerfed into oblivion, I'd much prefer all other codecies were brought up to scratch instead.

Sunny Side Up wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Except, you can say that, and then you can actually look at the things you're declaring them to be "undercosted" against, and compare them.

Hellion: M14 WS3+ BS3+ S3 T3 W1 A2 Ld7 Sv5+ For 12PPM

Assault 2 S1 AP- Poison 4+ 18" gun
Weapon that makes them S4 D2 AP- in melee
Combat Drugs (+1 to a chosen melee stat essentially), Fly

Vs Vespid: M14 WS4+ BS4+ S3 T4 W1 A2 LD5 Sv4+ for 14PPM

Assault 2 S5 AP-2 D1 18" gun
Fly, basic deep strike.

You just have to step into one of the "Space Marines Are Teh Sux" threads for five seconds to get yourself ripped apart for suggesting that melee capabilities are somehow equivalent in point value to shooting and defensive stats. So how can you assert that this unit that trades both significant durability T3 5+ vs T4 4+ and significant shooting (Poison 4+ vs S5 AP-2, even with +1BS on the hellion the vespid does significantly more against every possible target) for some seriously dubious melee stats?

You can perform this same kind of fact-check for any of the subpar drukhari units I mention, and surprisingly, nobody seems to have an answer as to why they consider a low-strength power armored melee unit hopelessly unviable when its called an Assault Marine but when it's called an Incubi and it shares a codex with other things you don't like suddenly you have to claim it's undercosted because "the whole codex is op".

I wouldn' t say that I'm chasing the current hotness. I was just curious about what makes them good. I am interested in a good start, 1000 points would be a great.

So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

The next purchases are fine. Go for it.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

The next purchases are fine. Go for it.

Thank you

 Imateria wrote:

Sunny Side Up wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Congratulations, you have just proved you know nothing about this army. Hellions are pretty poor (12ppm for T3, 1W 5+Sv, thats an expensive unit that dies to a stiff breeze), the Cronos is an 85pt buff monster that doesn't actually buff anything, Wracks are decent but if you think a T4 infantry unit with only 2 poison 4+ close combat attacks and no AP at 9ppm and a squad size that maxes out at 10 is undercosted then you clearly have no idea about the game.

The biggest strength of the Drukhari codex is that it's probably got the best internal balance in the entire game, sure Disintegrators and Grotesques might need a 5pt increase and Kabalites could do with going back to 7ppm (though that wouldn't make a huge difference, the way this army runs means you don't tend to run huge hordes of troops the same way you do with Guardsmen and Cultists) but nothing else really needs such point adjustments.

Just because other codecies have laughably bad units that really make you wander what the writers were thinking doesn't mean half our codex should be nerfed into oblivion, I'd much prefer all other codecies were brought up to scratch instead.

Then you add the fact that Haemonculi give Wracks +1 Toughness, the 4++ from Prophets of Flesh (and relative abusable stratagems) and on top of that a chart of free stackable Buffs each turn (starting with an additional 6++ which increases durability for practically no cost), all for the mighty cost of 9ppm...yes they are undercosted sorry

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

Do you need them now?

I'm asking this because while your first purchases were spot on and the core of any DE army, some items on that list of next purchases are in serious risk of significant point hikes, Ravagers in particular.
If you want to be (relatively) safe, you should wait until the September FAQ.

That said, if you aren't buying 3x ravages because of theyr performance on the table, but due to the fact that they are indeed nice models, then go forth.

Spoletta wrote:

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

Do you need them now?

I'm asking this because while your first purchases were spot on and the core of any DE army, some items on that list of next purchases are in serious risk of significant point hikes, Ravagers in particular.
If you want to be (relatively) safe, you should wait until the September FAQ.

That said, if you aren't buying 3x ravages because of theyr performance on the table, but due to the fact that they are indeed nice models, then go forth.

I don't "need" them now but I would like to make atleast a 1000p army because my friends don't play smaller than that

 Irubius wrote:

Spoletta wrote:

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

Do you need them now?

I'm asking this because while your first purchases were spot on and the core of any DE army, some items on that list of next purchases are in serious risk of significant point hikes, Ravagers in particular.
If you want to be (relatively) safe, you should wait until the September FAQ.

That said, if you aren't buying 3x ravages because of theyr performance on the table, but due to the fact that they are indeed nice models, then go forth.

I don't "need" them now but I would like to make atleast a 1000p army because my friends don't play smaller than that

3 ravagers in 1k will soon make sure you don't have friends though ;-) Maybe get some more variety instead. Drop 1 ravager and get something else. At least it will be more interesting list to face in 1k for the friends. Or are your friends lists also super-competive only the best units spammed to max type of lists too? In which case fair play.

tneva82 wrote:

 Irubius wrote:

Spoletta wrote:

 Irubius wrote:
So, it took me exactly one month since my last post but I have now bought my first Drukhari. 2 Archons, 2 Venoms, 1 Raider, 5 Scourges and 20 Warriors is what I have. I'm thinking Black heart or Flayed skull. Then try to figure out what stratagems to use.

My next purchase will be 3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwing jetfighters, another Venom and maybe an extra box of Scourges. What do you think?

Do you need them now?

I'm asking this because while your first purchases were spot on and the core of any DE army, some items on that list of next purchases are in serious risk of significant point hikes, Ravagers in particular.
If you want to be (relatively) safe, you should wait until the September FAQ.

That said, if you aren't buying 3x ravages because of theyr performance on the table, but due to the fact that they are indeed nice models, then go forth.

I don't "need" them now but I would like to make atleast a 1000p army because my friends don't play smaller than that

3 ravagers in 1k will soon make sure you don't have friends though ;-) Maybe get some more variety instead. Drop 1 ravager and get something else. At least it will be more interesting list to face in 1k for the friends. Or are your friends lists also super-competive only the best units spammed to max type of lists too? In which case fair play.

Haha 3 Ravagers are for 2k games for 1000p I would like a nice allround mix who are fun to play and somewhat competitive.

KurtAngle2 wrote:

 Imateria wrote:

Sunny Side Up wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Congratulations, you have just proved you know nothing about this army. Hellions are pretty poor (12ppm for T3, 1W 5+Sv, thats an expensive unit that dies to a stiff breeze), the Cronos is an 85pt buff monster that doesn't actually buff anything, Wracks are decent but if you think a T4 infantry unit with only 2 poison 4+ close combat attacks and no AP at 9ppm and a squad size that maxes out at 10 is undercosted then you clearly have no idea about the game.

The biggest strength of the Drukhari codex is that it's probably got the best internal balance in the entire game, sure Disintegrators and Grotesques might need a 5pt increase and Kabalites could do with going back to 7ppm (though that wouldn't make a huge difference, the way this army runs means you don't tend to run huge hordes of troops the same way you do with Guardsmen and Cultists) but nothing else really needs such point adjustments.

Just because other codecies have laughably bad units that really make you wander what the writers were thinking doesn't mean half our codex should be nerfed into oblivion, I'd much prefer all other codecies were brought up to scratch instead.

Then you add the fact that Haemonculi give Wracks +1 Toughness, the 4++ from Prophets of Flesh (and relative abusable stratagems) and on top of that a chart of free stackable Buffs each turn (starting with an additional 6++ which increases durability for practically no cost), all for the mighty cost of 9ppm...yes they are undercosted sorry

Maybe you should try using actual logic instead of this fantasy land you live in.

The Haemonculus pays for his own +1T aura, since it's his ability and not the Wracks, Prophets of Flesh is extremely powerful but no army in game pays for their traits abilities, the stratagem only seems good until you realise that it's not being used on a 40 man horde that can be given +1 to hit and wound, and that a 10 man unit of wracks isn't that hard to shift, and Power From Pain has been a factored in part of the army for about 4 editions now. They also have zero offensive output and basically do the same job as 10 man cultist squads, sit on back field objectives and prevent deep strikers popping up in that area.

If you really think they are undercosted then you really have no clue about this game.

Now now play nice Everyone has the right to their own opinion.

Hellions are 14 points rather than 12 but in comparison to other codexes they are a long way from awful. M14, 3 S5 attacks that do 2 damage, fly, splinter pods. Perfectly respectable - even good.

Sure they die if they get shot - but there are questions of target priority. Most of the time if your opponent is shooting a hellion blob and not... almost everything else in a DE army, then you shouldn't be that broken up about it. Its a similar story to reavers.

The only explicitly bad unit in the Codex is the Cronus. Its mathematically unlikely to do any damage in a turn. Why bother? By comparison Incubi are not flat out terrible - its just that there is no reason to take them when you have clearly better alternatives. Scourges too would be good in other lists but here they don't bring anything you can't more efficiently get elsewhere.

The money choices are Ravagers, Flyers, Grots & Talos. Venoms+Kabs are a solid base too. Living Muse, Agents of Vect, Labyrinthine Cunning are all exceedingly good. Vexator mask isn't bad either.

Cynically I suspect DE are going to get nerfed in chapter approved. Disies will almost certainly go up 5 points. If they would bite the bullet and deal with the problem chapter tactics (I see you Alaitoc) I could see Prophets of Flesh being changed, because 4++ on everything for kicks is a bit stupid. I suspect this is unlikely though.

Disies will almost certainly go up 5 points.

Dont let this hear GW.
Disintegrations are too good to pass up.

 wuestenfux wrote:

Disies will almost certainly go up 5 points.

Dont let this hear GW.
Disintegrations are too good to pass up.

Too late we already have this leaked email from the same GW insider source that BOLS uses on what they want to do with the next big balance FAQ

 Imateria wrote:

KurtAngle2 wrote:

 Imateria wrote:

Sunny Side Up wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

If by "the whole codex" you mean "the best 3-5 units" then I guess you'd be correct there. You'd be hard pressed to prove to me that Hellions, Incubi, beast packs, cronos pain engines, wracks etc are undercosted.

Why not? Not hard to see that Hellions, Cronos, Wracks, etc.. are very, very good and underpointed compared to non-top pick from other Codexes too: Vespids, Slaanesh Daemon-Cavalry, Centurions, Warp Talons, whathaveyou.

Just because it doesn't appear at tournaments and is in the Top 0.1% of super-broken stuff you see there, doesn't mean it isn't still above the power-curve of the game more comprehensively with respect to all 100% of available units and combinations.

Congratulations, you have just proved you know nothing about this army. Hellions are pretty poor (12ppm for T3, 1W 5+Sv, thats an expensive unit that dies to a stiff breeze), the Cronos is an 85pt buff monster that doesn't actually buff anything, Wracks are decent but if you think a T4 infantry unit with only 2 poison 4+ close combat attacks and no AP at 9ppm and a squad size that maxes out at 10 is undercosted then you clearly have no idea about the game.

The biggest strength of the Drukhari codex is that it's probably got the best internal balance in the entire game, sure Disintegrators and Grotesques might need a 5pt increase and Kabalites could do with going back to 7ppm (though that wouldn't make a huge difference, the way this army runs means you don't tend to run huge hordes of troops the same way you do with Guardsmen and Cultists) but nothing else really needs such point adjustments.

Just because other codecies have laughably bad units that really make you wander what the writers were thinking doesn't mean half our codex should be nerfed into oblivion, I'd much prefer all other codecies were brought up to scratch instead.

Then you add the fact that Haemonculi give Wracks +1 Toughness, the 4++ from Prophets of Flesh (and relative abusable stratagems) and on top of that a chart of free stackable Buffs each turn (starting with an additional 6++ which increases durability for practically no cost), all for the mighty cost of 9ppm...yes they are undercosted sorry

Maybe you should try using actual logic instead of this fantasy land you live in.

The Haemonculus pays for his own +1T aura, since it's his ability and not the Wracks, Prophets of Flesh is extremely powerful but no army in game pays for their traits abilities, the stratagem only seems good until you realise that it's not being used on a 40 man horde that can be given +1 to hit and wound, and that a 10 man unit of wracks isn't that hard to shift, and Power From Pain has been a factored in part of the army for about 4 editions now. They also have zero offensive output and basically do the same job as 10 man cultist squads, sit on back field objectives and prevent deep strikers popping up in that area.

If you really think they are undercosted then you really have no clue about this game.

1) Haemonculus is still MANDATORY if you play Wracks, so you have to keep his buff in mind since both units cannon exist without each other. This means they're only T4 on paper but T5 for all in-game purposes.
2) "Extremely powerful" or maybe "OP as feth"? There's a reason why everyone picks this Trait (hint: it makes units stupidly durable for free).
3) Those 40man cultists need Abaddon + 2 CP Stratagem (one use only) + Veterans of the Long War to work, the points/CP cost is extreme and it makes up a good percentage of your army (whilst Wracks + Haemonculus is brutally inexpensive.
4) No, Power from Pain is effectively NOT been factored at all as part of your army this edition. That single 6++ is generally given by other Characters or Chapter Tactics (Iron Hands) in other armies, all of which represent opportunity costs since they are paying points for such a FNP whereas they could just invest them into something else (or discarding another Chapter Tactic); in a DE army you do not only literally get it for free, it also adds stackable buffs as long as the game progresses (notably reroll charges/run moves which Marines PAY A CHAPTER TACTIC for such privilege, +1 to hit in CQC and Morale immunity).

Wracks have no guns, and pretty weak melee while dying perfectly reasonably against competitive S3/S4/S5 shooting.

They are probably 20% too cheap in a world balanced around Tactical Marines - but then so are most things these days.

Tyel wrote:
Wracks have no guns, and pretty weak melee while dying perfectly reasonably against competitive S3/S4/S5 shooting.

They are probably 20% too cheap in a world balanced around Tactical Marines - but then so are most things these days.

I'm not sure what you mean by that last statement, Tactical Marines are arguably the worst troops choice in the game so the world is clearly not balanced around them but designed to kill them really easily.

KurtAngle2 wrote:

1) Haemonculus is still MANDATORY if you play Wracks, so you have to keep his buff in mind since both units cannon exist without each other. This means they're only T4 on paper but T5 for all in-game purposes. 'Mandatory' isn't the same as 'free'.
2) "Extremely powerful" or maybe "OP as feth"? There's a reason why everyone picks this Trait (hint: it makes units stupidly durable for free). Sure, but being durable is Coven's whole shtick. And, whilst this does make them more durable, it doesn't help them actually kill things. And Wracks in particular are terrible in terms of damage. At least Warriors can fire their crappy poison guns from atop a transport - Wracks don't even have that luxury.
I've ignored #3 as I didn't draw that comparison with cultists and have no idea what they do.
4) No, Power from Pain is effectively NOT been factored at all as part of your army this edition. That single 6++ is generally given by other Characters or Chapter Tactics (Iron Hands) in other armies, all of which represent opportunity costs since they are paying points for such a FNP whereas they could just invest them into something else (or discarding another Chapter Tactic); in a DE army you do not only literally get it for free, it also adds stackable buffs as long as the game progresses (notably reroll charges/run moves which Marines PAY A CHAPTER TACTIC for such privilege, +1 to hit in CQC and Morale immunity). I'm seeing a lot of winging but no actual evidence being presented to justify your claim. The fact that other armies pay opportunity costs to get 6+++ saves does not mean that it hasn't been factored into the cost of an army that gets it automatically.

Could this work at 1000 points?

Archon
Archon

5 Warriors: Sybarite, Blaster
5 Warriors: Sybarite, Blaster
5 Warriors: Sybarite, Blaster
5 Warriors: Sybarite, Blaster

Venom
Venom
Venom
Raider

5 Scourges
1 Razorwing
1 Ravager