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Today I played a 2k battle against a joint Blood Angel and Guard army. Third game with my Dark Eldar. Here's my list:

Archon + 4 Incubi in Venom
Lelith + 9 wyches in raider
2 x 4 blasterborn in Venoms
2 x 10 Kabalites in raider [1splinter cannon in each] raider with splinter racks
5 scourges
3 reaver jetbikes
ravager
2 x voidraven bombers

Guard were infantry heavy [1 hydra was all the mech] with aegis, and BAs were 3 tactical squads footslogging, librarian, priest and stormraven

Mission was Scourge [6 random objectives] and I rolled the trait that enforced nightfighting for archon, combat drugs were bonus pain token.

My tactic was to overload the left side where the marines were, getting stuck in with the incubi and the wyches, take out the hydra and stormraven with my flyers/revaers/scourges deep striking then roll up to the guard lines with pain tokens and take them out. Guard blobbed behind aegis, marines were on my left flank.

First turn I moved everything as far as I could, using the big ruins in the middle as cover. Wyches raider got blown up killing 7 wyches and pinning the survivors. reavers got taken out by hydra and aoutocannons from guard once illuminated. One raider with Kabs shot at marines killing none after poor rolling + fnps, other parked up next to ruins.

Turn 2 I unloaded Kab squad into ruins [who then killed a few marines] and charged with incubi + archon who made marines run off board. At end of turn 2 raider with kabs was blown up [killing 5] incubi squad was killed from shooting [archon died turn 3], lelith and survivors of wyches squad died, all from guard shooting. Game was pretty much over but I carried on to turn 5.

I only killed the hyrdra, about 20 marines and 2 guardsmen. Fluffed my shot on the stormtalon after getting the drop on it with my voidraven.

I accept I was comprehensively beaten but would appreciate some constructive criticism s I want to make it more of a game next time...

1. Should I have hung back for turn 1 and used nightfighting more to my advantage rather than moving everything close?
2. Should I have focused on the guard behind the aegis first rather than the marines?
3. List was quite anti-mech based. Any glaring problems with the list? [list is limited by what I could get for cheap from ebay]
4. Did I thorw the scourges away by deepstriking them? [they took out the hydra]
5. Lost loads of troops to exploding transports. Any way of mitigating this?
6. Any other glaring errors?

Thanks in advance.

Ouch. Tough sledding for you it seems. Dark Eldar are tough to play and victory does not come cheap. A big thing with Dark Eldar is playing to their advantages, Nightfighting is huge this edition and DE benefit from it greatly, Move your ravager a fraction of inch get your 5+ jink, stacked with shrouded and now you have a 3+ cover. Target priority is huge, analyze the other persons army and decide what needs to absolutely get destroyed. i.e. Hydra flak tank or other things that would cripple your army like a Long Fangs, Dev, Squads, etc...

List wise, I think lelith is good, but not worth her points, you might be better of with another Archon. The Duke is also a good choice. Maybe changing the voidraven for a Razorwing w/ Dissies would be a stronger move. Also dropping a Voidraven for another DL Ravager would help you deal with Mech and the like.

Just some initial thoughts

It is a very though matchup. The worst matchup for dark eldar. Dark Eldar relly one rule breaking. Better Range, Better mobilaty, cheaper troops, lance rule and 4+ poison rule.

However, it does not really work vs IG. They can put out a lott of high s shots, even in 3T troops. Poison 4+ is not so good vs T3. There are of course ways around it. I just do not know how. All I can tell you is that from a rules perspective the gameplay is against you. (The same rules that make it easier for you in other matchups.)

Cheers for the feedback chaps, will bear that all in mind next time and hopefully make it at least competitive!

you had too many points sunk into combat characters that arent going to do much against guard, even with SM allies.

haemoculi are the HQ of choice. getting FNP to start means you are losing less models when your cardboard boxes blow up.

10 warriros in a raider is too many. better to take 2X5+blaster in a venoms and then a big unit of 20+2splintercannons with a haemi. Hug cover and either absorb shots or decimate infantry.

i would swap out a voidraven for a razorwing. the missiles would have been helpful.

Bikes bikes and more bikes. Bikes are awesome, use more.

I disagree with the above. I've found the 10 kabalites + splinter cannon + raider + splinter racks incredibly effective for their price.

Generally the only effective tactic with DE is to fight part of the enemy with your whole army. This means that you want everything to be moving at the same speed (all mounted; the only way to achieve this is to win at mobility). It also means that reserves can be detrimental when they don't come in a timely manner.

Specifically against IG I find it often best to murder infantry and play the "deny shooting" game with the rest, and then win on held objectives. You won't win a sustained fire fight; that's playing to their strength, not yours.

Thanks again, will definitely try out the haemonculus with a unit of 20 footslogging kabs - I was probably too light on troops.

Was difficult to stay out of LoS as there was only one LoS blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the board - will probably insist on more big stuff next time I play.

Having said that I made a few silly mistakes - should have kept the reavers out of 36 inch range on the first turn - was relying on the 2+ with turboboost & nightfighting but didn't realise the Hydra had a targeting system? Think we realised afterwards that it should have been rolling 6s to hit ground targets - my opponents let me put back a bike later but they were illuminated for the rest of that shooting phase.

Also I should have kept my archon with the shadowfield at the front of my incubi squad when charging to soak up overwatch and reforming to face fire after routing the marines. More practice needed!

Thanks again for taking time to respond, hopefully I'll do better against the mon-keighs next time.

One idea i've been using in my army lists, is running the Baron. He offers ALOT for his points. The way i run him is with a 20man kabalite squad. I roll personal traits and hope for some good stuff. I deploy them on an objective in Area terrain 4+cover save. Then the Baron makes them magical. Grants the squad stealth, 3+ cover save, Assault and defensive grenades. Can potentially start them with a pain token (Drugs). Grants the squad Hit and Run, and provides a character that has a 2+ invul and on the assault can pack a punch. They are a pain to shoot down and a huge frie magnet, at least against people i play against :-P

1-) Whatever can shoot on Turn 1 (except possibly assault boats) should shoot, as long as there is something to shoot at. He can't shoot you back very effectively, so abuse it the best way you can.
2-) Guard behind defence lines are designed to make you shoot at them, so probably I'd have gone for what you did. Except sending some assault squad to kill them.
3-) Lelith is too expensive and while she can get 10+ attacks and ignores armor, she simply has problems wounding stuff. Assault Wyches in general aren't looking very good right now. I also tend to find Voidravens too expensive for what they do, and stick to Ravagers and Razorwings. 3 Reavers can't do much except die, so I think getting some more or dropping them would be a wise move.
4-) 5 Scourges are a lot more expensive than a Hydra, so they don't seem to have performed spectacularly. The problem with deep striking Scourges is that they hurt something and then they die, but are too expensive to be suicide units. I would have kept them with the main army. If you're hot on deepstriking, Duke Sliscus starts looking good.
5-) One of the biggest problems we have in 6th is that even open topped transports cause a S4 hit when they explode, and with our tissue paper armor, we're invariably going to lose more than a half of our unit. The best way to mitigate this is to keep units as small as possible and saturate the field with separate targets. Don't gear anything so that it can fight after the transport is gone, because they can't.
6-) While not a glaring error, I'd proxy Lelith as a Wych and get 2 squads of 5 w/HG in Dakka Venoms for AT. Venoms are quick and easy to assemble and paint, so it shouldn't be a big problem.
Hope it helps.

HQ: probably would get a haemie and or the baron, your not really going to need anything crazy good.

Troops: probably would try to get at least a couple 10 man squads of wracks with liquifier guns and fly them up in raiders as fast as you can, plus wracks wont get wiped out once their paper airplanes are gone, and their cc is good enough to deal with IG.

Elites: I think your fine here blasterborn are the ideal way to go, if you decide to field the duke I would get a raider filled with trueborn kitted out wth shardcarbines and SC's and put it in reserve, then when it comes in you can place it right next to the blob of guads

Fast attack: I'd ditch the scourges and pick up more reavers, scourges have always been meh in my oppinion and reavers have only gotten better since the new edition. Also i think beasts would be a viable option especially with the baron.

Heavy support: I would probably just get 3 ravagers with NS, maybe a razorwing but it would probably just get gunned down

I would deffinately try to get at least one beast squad probably two, overall i think you'll have more success going more cc. Good Luck ol chum!

 tyrannosaurus wrote:
Thanks again, will definitely try out the haemonculus with a unit of 20 footslogging kabs - I was probably too light on troops.

Was difficult to stay out of LoS as there was only one LoS blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the board - will probably insist on more big stuff next time I play.

Having said that I made a few silly mistakes - should have kept the reavers out of 36 inch range on the first turn - was relying on the 2+ with turboboost & nightfighting but didn't realise the Hydra had a targeting system? Think we realised afterwards that it should have been rolling 6s to hit ground targets - my opponents let me put back a bike later but they were illuminated for the rest of that shooting phase.

Also I should have kept my archon with the shadowfield at the front of my incubi squad when charging to soak up overwatch and reforming to face fire after routing the marines. More practice needed!

Thanks again for taking time to respond, hopefully I'll do better against the mon-keighs next time.

With Skyfire the Hydra can shoot at the Jetbikes normally IIRC.

My wife tends to run 2 x 10m Warrior squads in a raider + splinter racks and does quite a bit of damage with them. 5m squads tend to get melted too easily and venoms are extremely soft now. Also the splinter cannon is cool, just remember it doesn't benefit from the splinter racks.

Dropping lilith to pick up some other goodies would help out. I believe someone else already mentioned how awesome a hammy or two can be intermixed into objective holding squads.

Ravagers are also pretty sweet, if you run one with D-cannons you can melt any squad out in the open.

Again, really appreciate all of the replies, got a rematch in a couple of weeks and this has given me plenty of filth, uh things, to try out.

Think Lelith is gonna have to go [love the model though, will jut use her as a wych I spose as suggested] and will try out The Baron and a couple of haemonculi with my Kab squads. Think I'll maybe split the wyches into two and put them in venoms for anti-tank although I'm feeling that might mean a lack of punch. Will drop a voidraven and get some more ravagers.

Scourges will probably go too for more bikes.

Thinking back on it I think more and more the lack of cover was a big issue [excuses excuses!] - if I hadn't DS'd the scourges there was nowhere to put them where they wouldn't have been shot anyway. I find putting cover out to be a pretty awkward process as you don't want to tilt things in your favour and come across as overly competitive but you also don't want to gimp yourself. Again definitely more LoS blocking stuff in the middle to be insisted on next time.

Will let you know how I get on!

Be happy it took him 5 turns to table you. That sounds like progress for DE as a race.