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MarkoftheRings wrote:+ 1 to above

-1 to above.

I think Timmah's criticism is more than fair, and I think that if the majority of posters here would stop leg-humping the winners, and if the 'Ard Boyz participants would maybe talk a little shop about what choices they made, it would easily explain why the list was so powerful and maybe why they won, or what tactics they used, kind of like an after action report. Then everybody benefits, because some of us can go to our local clubs and try some of this stuff out, or maybe just learn and become better players ourselves, and maybe catch a glimpse as to what makes a high caliber tournament player and dispel some of the rumors about "Net Decks".

I think we could all gain from such a discussion, much more than just posting, "Well he won, so it's magic!"

Of course he was a winner, that's the whole point, but what value is there in saying, "Well, DarthDiggler's list is really the best it can ever be, so there's no need to discuss it, dissect it, or even play it anymore, because it will never get any better or worse, and if you can't see that then you're dumb."

whitedragon wrote:

MarkoftheRings wrote:+ 1 to above

-1 to above.

I think Timmah's criticism is more than fair, and I think that if the majority of posters here would stop leg-humping the winners, and if the 'Ard Boyz participants would maybe talk a little shop about what choices they made, it would easily explain why the list was so powerful and maybe why they won, or what tactics they used, kind of like an after action report. Then everybody benefits, because some of us can go to our local clubs and try some of this stuff out, or maybe just learn and become better players ourselves, and maybe catch a glimpse as to what makes a high caliber tournament player and dispel some of the rumors about "Net Decks".

I think we could all gain from such a discussion, much more than just posting, "Well he won, so it's magic!"

Of course he was a winner, that's the whole point, but what value is there in saying, "Well, DarthDiggler's list is really the best it can ever be, so there's no need to discuss it, dissect it, or even play it anymore, because it will never get any better or worse, and if you can't see that then you're dumb."

Exactly. In 40k it really seems like people do this a lot. Saying, well he won, it must be good.

In hobbies like MTG that doesn't happen at all. People want to know why it won, and if its really good or just a good meta game call. Analyzing a list in MTG is never really saw as disrespect because its kinda assumed if the player got that high in a tournament that they are very good.

That being said, I do understand why people got a little angry over my discussion because it is a bit odd for this hobby at the moment. But that doesn't mean I am going to stop doing it.

I'm not at all angry about your discussion, Timmah. I just think that your critique was wrong.

That's not saying Darth's list is perfect. It is saying that the changes you proposed do not make it a better list, they make it a worse list.

Maybe they make it a better list for an unskilled player to use, as there is more repetition. Your list certainly takes less skill to play (oh, push the crusaders and assault terminators forwards...).

But to say it is a better list is wrong. And I've gone into why. You want to pack more of the same stuff into the list; stuff that is strong in many situations, but weak in some. And at an all-comers tournament, being weak against something invites the risk that you pull that opponent and go home with nothing.

This isn't MtG. In MtG you can predict what 90% of the field will be playing at any given tournament. You can even predict what sorts of decks you'll see in a draft tournament. You don't have that luxury in 40k. Therefore, loading up on stuff that's good against the top armies means that when (and I mean when, not if) you hit the weaker armies, you're left without the tools to deal with them.

Case-in-point - analyze what would have happened if you took your list, instead of Darth's, against Gardeth's Dark Eldar. You have less long-range shooting, so you don't get the early jump on him. You have more targets that are vulnerable to his dark lances. Gardeth is also an excellent player, he's going to take advantage of these things.

You could say, "well, that's just a bad draw" - but that's scrub mentality. Saying, 'I would have won if only I didn't have to play Dark Eldar' is blaming luck, instead of your own decisions, for not doing well. Darth has chosen not to do that. He's got a list that doesn't have a specifically bad matchup. And that's a strength too, one that you seem to be discounting.

I'm not going to say it's a perfect list. Maybe it can be improved. But it has synergy. It has resiliency. And, it doesn't fall apart when it has to face an army that's not known as top-tier. Perhaps improvements can be made - but for all this talk of post-game analysis, no one has yet made a suggestion that actually improves it...

That's not leg-humping. I'm not saying it's good cause he won. It's good because it has varied tools in it to deal with whatever army he may end up facing. Any improvements have to keep that in mind.

For the record, my list actually had more long range shooting in it. In my list (cause I added wrong because again, threw it together in 15 mins) with 2 predators with lascannon sponsons you get.

4 lascannon shots
12 missile shots (2 each from typhoons)
4 autocannon shots (8 more if you switch to rifleman dreads, which I would, but I didn't want to change his list too much)

vs

4 lascannon shots
6 missile shots
2 autocannon shots

How are you getting that it has more long range shooting again?

Again, I don't want to get into who's list is better. Mine was thrown together in 15 mins to show that I feel redundancy is good. So I really don't want to get into a discussion on which is better. I would much rather discuss the points I tried to bring up.

Especially since in a vacuum he made a couple of choices that most 40k players would say is wrong. (like only taking 1 land raider. Generally considered a bad idea)


Btw, Darklance shooting at AV 10 in cover has about a 10% chance of doing something.

Also, what if he came up against an army with a ton of anti infantry firepower. Obviously he is going to be more weak against that.

Timmah wrote:For the record, my list actually had more long range shooting in it.

Well skin me and run me up the mountain! Your list has more long range shooting?! Then clearly it is the best list! What an incredible list writing philosophy you have pioneered--take as much long-range shooting as possible.

Yes more shots, but at fewer targets, and, as I can personally attest to, its HARD to get skimmers into cover....

Looking back at that game, the only thing I could have really done different that might have given me a chance would have been to hold the majority of my army in reserve. That way as it came on I would have been closer to part of his fire base. But even, half of his army would have been beyond my reach and free to take my objective. My army is never going to beat Darth's in the shooting game but rather in hand to hand, which of course means I have to get rid of the dreads and transports rather quickly....and the damned Null Zone librarian so my wyches don't just die in cc... Dammit Darth....

@Timmah and whitedragon: There is a difference between leg-humping and acknowledging that DarthDiggler's list has some very nice points.

And there is a difference between criticizing a list with "X might work better" and "Y could give you advantages against Z, which might have been a problem before" and "for mission D, some F units would be nice" ...

...and saying "This list could be improved, here, I show you how it's done, this is better because I and internet theoryhammer say so."

Just to underline my point, no hard feelings.

olympia wrote:

Timmah wrote:For the record, my list actually had more long range shooting in it.

Well skin me and run me up the mountain! Your list has more long range shooting?! Then clearly it is the best list! What an incredible list writing philosophy you have pioneered--take as much long-range shooting as possible.

Thanks for coming into the thread, reading the last post and making a comment that doesn't really mean anything.

Timmah -

When I consider long range firepower I don't count the number of weapons, I count the number of units that can fire those wepons. It is better, IMO, to have 9 different units with lascannons that 3 units with 3. That way I can shoot at 9 different targets and it mitigates my opponents ability to block LOS to the anti-tank weapons since there are more of them.

By turn 2-3 the dreads, LR, razorbacks and attack bikes are now threatening tanks at range with MM's and assault cannons. This increases the anti-tank firepower from 8 different units to 14. The number of anti-tank weapons doesn't matter as much as the number of units which can employ them.

Take your list. I don't mean to single it out because you put it together quickly, but I've seen those typhoon configurations before. 3 enemy units with multiple shots, say Oblits, Dev's Warwalkers, etc.. Just 3 of them could cripple the Typhoon squadrons in one volley of fire. 3 enemy units could eliminate 12 missile shots and 60% of your long range anti-tank fire. I prefer to the peace of mind knowing that losing 3 units in my list will not cripple my anti-tank firepower. That is a huge advantage built into the list.

I also subscribe to the 40k tenant that anti-tank should be in troops (dev's to) and anti-troop should be on tanks. Anti-tank in troops help keep the armor killing weapons alive long enough to take down their targets. Anti-troop weapons on tanks give me the mobility to keep out of range of assaults as I pepper the troops with weapons. This is not a hard fast rule, but just something to consider.

As for an enemy army with lots of anti-troop shooting, I do have 6 vehicles (not counting the one speeder) which can shield or act with impunity if that is the case. I imagine you are talking about a list with lots of sonic weapons or Eldar with Dire Avengers + Warp Spiders.

Very true Darth. Good points in there.

I guess I just don't like how marines do anti tank in infantry. Its usually more expensive that way. 90 points for 1 lascannon isn't all that good when I can get a twin linked lascannon on a pred for the same price.

Yes vehicles can and sometimes do get unlucky and your opponent just rolls way too good.

My ideas obviously use movement to deny cover instead of mass of units in different areas to deny cover from some shots.

I also still have a lot of the close range fire, albeit not in assault cannons. But in marines with MM's, typhoons still have HB's. The lone landraider. And the dreads.

I still have a solid amount of shooting options. 5 options and each one should at least do something to its target. Yes, with each of your anti tank weapons all firing independently, you can get lucky and get to fire more into a different unit. But in all reality how many times does that happen?

My guess would be that you end up shooting 2-3 of those squads at the same thing anyways.

Timmah wrote:
Yes, with each of your anti tank weapons all firing independently, you can get lucky and get to fire more into a different unit. But in all reality how many times does that happen?

1 too many times for my liking.....

Timmah wrote:
I guess I just don't like how marines do anti tank in infantry. Its usually more expensive that way. 90 points for 1 lascannon isn't all that good when I can get a twin linked lascannon on a pred for the same price.

But it's not 90 points for 1 lascannon. It's 90 points for a 5 man scoring unit that happen to have a lascannon with them, but that also have 5 wounds and 4 bolters, and that, in KP missions, can be rolled together with another 5 man unit to deny opponents a KP.

The whole concept of the tactical squad is that they're given the equipment to handle all sorts of situations. Those predators you're buying don't help you a great deal against an ork mob. They can give up an easy KP to anything with an anti-tank gun.

I think that synergy and tactical flexibility are ignored, far too often, in discussions like this, in favour of raw number crunching that looks at each element separately. And maybe that's because the average player derives little benefit from them. Far too often I've seen average players combat-squad guys in KP missions, or not combat-squad them in objective missions. I've seen people hang back with a full squad of 10 men to get a lascannon shot on a tank when they could have advanced and used their bolters to devastate a unit that is going to assault them the next turn, because the player locks into the mindset of 'I have a lascannon, I should fire it at something'.

Yes, with each of your anti tank weapons all firing independently, you can get lucky and get to fire more into a different unit. But in all reality how many times does that happen?

My guess would be that you end up shooting 2-3 of those squads at the same thing anyways.

A good general puts himself in position to get lucky. It's like the old joke, where the guy asks god to let him win the lottery week after week, until finally God says, 'help me out a little, at least buy a ticket'. If you're not giving yourself the opportunity to have things go your way, then they never will.

Well if you consider the marines will only get a lascannon shot off first turn, single shots next turn and rapid fire shots on the 3rd turn against and ork horde. They actually do less damage to said horde than a predator with autocannon and lascannon x2.

Now, if we get a dakka pred or dakka pred w/TL auto cannon. We now have a unit that functions better against both.

They both have their advantages/weaknesses against certain units obviously. And with new wound allocation rules, if your squad takes 5 wounds from shooting, easy enough to do, you have a 33% chance of losing your lascannon.

Yes, your squad can score, but in 1 mission its actually bad to combat squad, and in 1 its not really all that necessary.

I also feel the order you take your shots is very important. This goes hand in hand with having as mant different units to shoot with as possible. I always try to shoot with units that have only one shot or only one target to shoot at. I don't want to blow up that tank and have a unit not be able to shoot anything so I pick the units that have one shot first. Sometimes I don't need to blow something up, sometimes just stunning it or immobilising it is good enough for that turn. If I can have as many units as possible to fire with I can then spread out the damage over more of my enemy. I might not want to do that every time though as a squadron wold suffer more if one unit with multiple weapons were to shoot at it than 4 units with one weapon. The 4-missile Dev's and the MM attack bikes give me that option.

I also agree with Redbeard. I don't look at it as 90pts for one lascannon. There are some games were the Lascannon won't do anything and for those games I have bolters, krak grenades and close combat attacks. I'm not always looking for the best possible unit to do the job, I'm looking for the unit(s) that can do the most jobs. Just give me a chance vs. anything. That's what I want my units to be able to do, give me a chance vs. anything. I don't need something that is superior in one aspect of the game, but can't do anything else. Jack of all trades, master of none. That's the key to victory in the long term, IMO.

You're right about a lot of those points.

But you see where I'm going with this. Every change you make is a trade-off. And, none of the units Darth took were trash - they all did something specific. I mean, it's not like we're saying he should cut his vanguard, right? Trading out attack bikes for typhoons cuts out the opportunity to assault with an attack bike.

Your list has 10 less scoring models than Darth's. That's a trade-off. You may believe that 30 marines are enough scoring models in 2500 point army - but if that change prevents you from getting a massacre (because a mission requires you to hold two more objectives than your opponent, or something), then that trade-off was not wise.

Each change needs to be justified - and before long, you've made so many changes that it no long even remotely looks like the original, as you're constantly tweaking something else to address the deficiency introduced by the last tweak.




BTW: The list you posted (which, by your own admission was a quickly thrown-together one) was 25 points over, and didn't include lascannon sponsons, so you need to cut something else from that list to get those four lascannons in it. Again, another trade-off.

Timmah wrote:
Yes, your squad can score, but in 1 mission its actually bad to combat squad, and in 1 its not really all that necessary.

Ahhh.. this is a regional thing. Around Chicago we have been playing the 3-tiered objectives for battle points for a long time. We even add in 2-4 battle point modifiers with it. These objectives can be all sorts of things and you must be prepared for lot of stuff to happen. I will admit this has always been a strong influence on list making. Anyone familiar with Adepticon scenarios will know about the 3-tiers objective scoring system with BP modifiers.

Well the thing is with even 30 marines. That should still be enough to claim objectives because you can still combat squad if necessary.

I just feel that marines (as well as most troops) not in transports get shot up really really fast. I would be interested to see how well your list would do against a min/maxed IG list. I think the way you have built your list, you do really have good matchups against stuff like armies that function like DE. Armies that need to get their armies close in using transports.

I would guess you would also have a good shot against any elite style army like most Lash chaos lists or any list build specifically against mech.

Where I think you would have trouble would be against any very balanced mech list, that can either throw out a ton of anti tank or anti infantry. Also, I am not going to jump to conclusions, but I am guessing you would have trouble with a lot of orks lists as well.

Timmah wrote:but I am guessing you would have trouble with a lot of orks lists as well.

I'm looking over his list trying to figure this out, and I'm imagining the quantity of assault cannons in there...

Granted, rending is a little wasted on ork boyz, however, 4 shots from each razorback, 4 more shots from the land raider (these are all twin linked) four frag missiles, and then the predator, and I haven't even added in the thunderfire cannon yet!

IIRC, the TFC can make a unit move as if through difficult terrain, so that's great for slowing down horde orks or the infamous nob biker gang. (and for nob bikers, there's enough lascannons in there to make any nob cringe. Edit: oh right, and krak missiles )

Timmah wrote:In hobbies like MTG that doesn't happen at all. People want to know why it won, and if its really good or just a good meta game call. Analyzing a list in MTG is never really saw as disrespect because its kinda assumed if the player got that high in a tournament that they are very good.

That being said, I do understand why people got a little angry over my discussion because it is a bit odd for this hobby at the moment. But that doesn't mean I am going to stop doing it.

Although this comment is a bit late in the thread (since I have not been actively reading this week) I will mention what I feel is the key difference between tournament play in something like Magic and most, if not all, Miniature games. I will note, I used to be a tournament MTG player ages ago, and have followed the game, but not actively played up through M10 because frankly, I prefer spending my money on my minis!

Now in both games (lets speak specifically of 40K vs MTG here) you have several decks/lists which you can expect and will see at any major tournament. They are well known builds which have circulated via the lovely tool of the internet. Sure, I will admit 40K has a bit more variance rather than 8 clones of the same deck in one tourney, but think a bit more broad reaching for now. Here is the key: MTG is essentially a game of a win condition. "If I draw combo X by turn Y I will win." Most tournament decks work in this fashion, there is not much jockeying for that last minute contest or kill, most games come down to which deck gets it's appropriate win condition first. Great examples are the age old Channel/Fireball, Juzam Djinn and similar well known or more recent, practically legendary tournament decks.

In 40K there is rarely the true "win condition." Most well balanced, truly upper tier tournament armies are amazing, but can and will be beat if the player does not also execute sound strategy. Aside from being really dumb like not untapping lands or some such, its hard to truly see that in MTG, but in 40K its far more common to make mistakes which can/will cost you a game. I've made plenty of them in the 14 years I played this game, I am sure everyone has.

Now, this being an aside, what you do not see in MTG, but you will see far more often in 40K and similar mini games is the use of a list which on the outside may not seem amazing, but is still solid, up until you see the player actually run said list. Many players find their appropriate synergy with a list and play style that makes a list which may be less known, far more effective as it fits them.

I agree with Timmah to a point that finding the tactica behind many tournament successful lists is intriguing as it improves the play of many people across the world that play 40K. Regardless, kudos to Darth for his win, its a shame GW dropped the prize support ball this year, but heavy congratulations are in order for making the far less expected army to win 'Ard Boyz pull it off. I frankly had my money on one of the DE builds as I have seen their power and the WA state semi-final winner has been playing them for ages. He was the guy who got hosed on table 1, 3rd round of last year's 'Ard Boyz because of that whole Chaos Demons being deployed fiasco.

My two centavos there, take it how you like and keep rolling dice folks.

Bentley wrote:
Although this comment is a bit late in the thread (since I have not been actively reading this week) I will mention what I feel is the key difference between tournament play in something like Magic and most, if not all, Miniature games. I will note, I used to be a tournament MTG player ages ago, and have followed the game, but not actively played up through M10 because frankly, I prefer spending my money on my minis!

Now in both games (lets speak specifically of 40K vs MTG here) you have several decks/lists which you can expect and will see at any major tournament. They are well known builds which have circulated via the lovely tool of the internet. Sure, I will admit 40K has a bit more variance rather than 8 clones of the same deck in one tourney, but think a bit more broad reaching for now. Here is the key: MTG is essentially a game of a win condition. "If I draw combo X by turn Y I will win." Most tournament decks work in this fashion, there is not much jockeying for that last minute contest or kill, most games come down to which deck gets it's appropriate win condition first. Great examples are the age old Channel/Fireball, Juzam Djinn and similar well known or more recent, practically legendary tournament decks.

In 40K there is rarely the true "win condition." Most well balanced, truly upper tier tournament armies are amazing, but can and will be beat if the player does not also execute sound strategy. Aside from being really dumb like not untapping lands or some such, its hard to truly see that in MTG, but in 40K its far more common to make mistakes which can/will cost you a game. I've made plenty of them in the 14 years I played this game, I am sure everyone has.

Now, this being an aside, what you do not see in MTG, but you will see far more often in 40K and similar mini games is the use of a list which on the outside may not seem amazing, but is still solid, up until you see the player actually run said list. Many players find their appropriate synergy with a list and play style that makes a list which may be less known, far more effective as it fits them.

Sorry but I have to disagree with most of it. In MTG there is a ton of jockeying for position especially in the late game. You don't just find a card that says "I win" and play it. The game has evolved a lot since you have played I would guess and it is a lot different than the old channel/fireball tactics of old.

There are also a ton of mistakes that you can make in MTG, it isn't just draw my cards, play my spells anymore. Much like 40k, mistakes usually aren't very evident. Which is why the community breaks things down after the fact. So that you do see what you did wrong and how to improve. Most of the time, when you lose at any game, it always involves mistakes. Many of these might be very subtle but they are there. (obviously somethings are beyond your control, like terrible draws, matchups, your opponents rolling 6's 90% of the time)

MTG is the same way as 40k. You find a deck/army list that fits your playstyle and play the heck out of it. I should know, I played, what was considered, a barely passable tier 3 deck that pretty much never showed up at tournaments. I knew it was a bad decklist, but I knew it inside and out and knew what I needed to do to win against any other deck. And because it fit my playstyle I was able to do very well with it, winning/placing high in a large amount of events.

At least Timmah has provoked several posts about the why of units in listbuilding, and some about actual in-game tactics. Normally a newbie like me doesn't get to see so much usefull info, all in one thread.

Nivoglibina wrote:At least Timmah has provoked several posts about the why of units in listbuilding, and some about actual in-game tactics. Normally a newbie like me doesn't get to see so much usefull info, all in one thread.

Yes he does deserve credit for that. I'm not sure if that was his ultimate plan or not, but he got me to talk about my list for the first time in years. Normally I never say anything about my own top lists for national security reasons. IMO if people start taking a longer look at versatility, flexibility and synergy in their lists (which has to come from playtesting and not numbers crunching) I think there will be much better lists for the next Ard Boyz. For selfish reasons I'm not interested in seeing better lists until round 3, of course. The next Ard Boyz tournament is in springtime so it will be here before you know it.

I see the merits in Timmah's use of preds and Redbeard's use of tacticals.

I agree with Darth that it is a regional thing as I have been to Chicago and played in Adepticon 3 years and with the multi-objective missions, they force an army to balance between troops and non-troops as well as adding mobility.

But I do understand the philosophy of Timmah's list. His style is one of blast the enemy and mop up later with scoring units or go for tabling your opponent. I dont know the mission sets that Timmah has to play so I cannot comment further on his army selection.

@ Timmah, alot of posters on dakka dont usually take advice lightly from people they dont know at first and I hate to say it but winning a few GTs or placing in the top 10 in multiple national events helps in building credibility with many posters here on dakka.

Oh man, I would just like to thank Timmeh for his stirring up of useful discussion no matter what I or anyone else may think of his reasoning.

first post on DakkaDakka, this thread was worth signing up for.

MTG: Many of my good friends are top tier MTG pros at this point, we do much playtesting/drafting ect. I run a store, and events, but I have given up putting the effort into seriously traveling/buying card for magic, so I'm not on that circuit. The MTG referances are widely off base, but their core point remains valid. Magic is in no way a game about combo, there hasn't been a successful combo deck in many years (TEPS had one tournament and failed to perform for the remainder of a season...but I digress).

-Magic decks are 60 cards, they are comprised of 2 primary elements. Reducing randomness (mana base/redundancy), and having the most general power in forcing your game on your opponent. The sideboard is for targeted options. In 40k we do not play 2/3 with 500 points of list that can be swapped out.

So as competitive games go, obviously having more power, and keeping it longer is to your advantage. As is reducing randomness in a game with lots of dice. If you play a large number of games, bad things will happen, dice will go sour ect. good things will also happen, minimizing the first and maximizing the 2nd are primary elements to quality play/list building.

On these elements lets point out armor VS wounds.
10% is the stated chance to kill armor 10 in cover with a dark lance. lets math this out quickly.
Chance to hit: 66%, Chance to save 50%, chance to pen 66%, chance to glance 16.6%.
Chance to roll on the damage table = 33%, chance to pen = 21.78%, so we have a 7.19% chance to destroy the vehicle, a 3.62% chance of immobilizing. 3.62% chance of destroying a weapon and and 7.19%% chance of negating the next turn of shooting. 14.38% chance of preventing a turn of shooting out of that vehicle

that same dark lance against a 5-man tact squad has a 27.5% chance of killing a marine in cover, and 0% chance of removing the las-cannon or preventing it's shot on the next turn. this is a perfect example of minimizing randomness. while tanks maximize it (also, you lose more shots when the tank dies.)

Precurser: @timmeh, make a list, make it legal, make your changes. outline in detail all of them, I think this thread warrants the effort.
Goals in tournament lists
- Reduction of randomness
- ability to maintain your full power as long as possible.

Darth's List:
Pros: Lots of versatile weaponry, multi-targeting options (more units), more wounds.
Cons: Less armor, less total tank-busting shots, smaller units (wound allocation can be a bitch)
This list has versatility, and it's fairly difficult to remove shots from the "big guns" this is what Gardeth was having difficulties with, it's extremely difficult to take out all those marines and get rid of the las-cannons/missile launchers, basically making it nearly impossible to "get lucky" and get back in a game from a disadvantageous position buy hitting those 10% outs on a couple tanks.

Darth's list also has the double-edged sword of small units. Small units are excellent against units like dire avengers or anything with flamers, because the massive fire-power of those units is often going to be over-kill and thus "wasted" points/shots for the other army. however if 5 wounds are done to a 5-man tact squad and you fail the wrong couple saves, you have 2-3 under whelming marines that are not much of a threat by themselves.

Darth has fewer shots than some of the mathematically "better" options, his termie squad is also less resilient and less scary (shear volume of attacks is more and more powerful against fewer termies, but 2 termies aren't scary to a lot of armies, they simply don't do enough damage so that unit is much more easily weakened/negated)

maximizing advantages. we have discussed how well darth's army prevents lucky lasers from ruining him, not lets discuss what his lucky lasers are capable of. Dice get hot it happens, it's part of statistics, reduction to the mean will happen, but abnormalities WILL occur, especially over 18 turns of rolling multiple dice . Darth's list does an excellent job of having the ability to target more units in case the dice are on fire.

Timmeh's List:
Pros: Excellent redundancy, lots of weapons for the points, statistically harder to finish off his targets. Minimizes bad dice by having superior shots.
Cons: More randomness (tanks can get unluckily exploded), more focus'd fire, takes less advantage of "hot rolls"

Timmeh's list works differently, it has harder to remove/negate units (getting the KP for the tanks is harder than keeping them from shooting), a large/resilient power unit (in the 10-man termies), but suffers more from your opponent "getting lucky", or simply having enough good anti-tank shots to keep timmeh's tanks from squeezing off some big lasers.

Without more information on timmeh's list, IE it being legal I can't really go into much more detail.

Armies reduce randomness in different ways, gardeth's list simply had near infinite redundancy so he was pretty much always guaranteed to have the same options available which is important for dark eldar, because they are squishy.

I don't think that we should automatically accept a list as "good" simply because it did well, but I think we should take ourselves out of our paradigms, think about the list, consider the problems it can cause, consider options in dealing with it and probably even test it a couple games (played as and against) before declaring anything about it.

-I have played a ton of CCGs seen a ton of decklists ect.

Play the list in its original form, understand it a little before making changes, cards/units you may not like on paper may just work in that list

- Riz

Now that thats all said and done...any comments on my list??

Certainly.

Not a huge DE player so not entirely positive.

Things that strike me as odd.

No shredders.
Warrior squad on foot. (seems like you would want to max out on raiders)
No slave snares.

Maybe you could list your reasons for some of these.
Also it seems like DE don't really scale all that well to 2500. Since all you can really do is add troops to your squads, since you can max out on raiders at 2k pts.

DE scale best around 1500-1750 anything more and its extra troops and wargear.

Btw I can fit in 14-16 lance weapons in 1500

Timmah wrote:Warrior squad on foot. (seems like you would want to max out on raiders)

Just speculating, but a local player uses a warrior squad on foot because they can take more weapons, 2x Dark Lances and 2x Blasters, vice a raider squad. He then takes a 5 man raider squad with a dark lance, and sits the unit in cover with the dark lance, and then first turn has the regular warrior squad mount up in the raider.

The validity of such a tactic escapes me, since I would think you'd want everybody to start mounted, but I could be wrong.

Timmah wrote:Certainly.

Not a huge DE player so not entirely positive.

Things that strike me as odd.

No shredders.
Warrior squad on foot. (seems like you would want to max out on raiders)
No slave snares.

Maybe you could list your reasons for some of these.
Also it seems like DE don't really scale all that well to 2500. Since all you can really do is add troops to your squads, since you can max out on raiders at 2k pts.

Well I ran out of raiders :( (though they have done an amazing job of holding objectives and baiting units). But in my experience shredders are not worth their points when I have that many wyches out there, and with all my ravagers have tri-dissies I need the extra anti-armor of the blasters. Slave snares are total hookum, it forces you to put your raiders where they have not business going, instead of staying alive and perserving killpoints or threatening objectives.

And your are dead on about DE not scaling well at 2500 points I run 1 less vehicle at 1850. I really wish we had some good fast attack options. But then again, its why I love running Dark Eldar, they are a real challange to run and you have to do alot of things right to win at a competitive level.

Darth, what place were you in at the Hard Boy?

EDIT: and what was your record?