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Seeing as the new codex will be here in a few days, I have decided to play Eldar mainly because none of my friends play it and I wanted to play an army that would be both exotic and challenging to play between my friends who play (CSM + CD and/or IG and some bits and bobs of some other armies) and (Tau and/ or BA).

Now seeing the title of this thread. I decided to add some allies to strengthen up them or just play them as a separate force if need be:
My ideas are:
Grey Knights - Love the models and also low model count
Tau - can have a riptide with my wraithkinght
or Dark Eldar - they are quite good
Space Wolves - cool models good armour saves

I dont care that the GKs and SWsare not battle brothers since they are a force to be reckoned with in their own right.

What do you guys think?
What should I pick?
Thanks

Deldar. Because S&M. Oh, and jetbikes!

Corsairs. Corsair prince+ fire dragons, shadowfield on the corsair prince, better troop jetbikes, great MSU, nightwings and warp hunters.

 zephoid wrote:
Corsairs. Corsair prince+ fire dragons, shadowfield on the corsair prince, better troop jetbikes, great MSU, nightwings and warp hunters.

Yo dawg I heard you like fusion guns so I put fusion gun units in your fusion gun list so you can melt tanks while you melt tanks.

Corsair prince allows up to 3 units that dont have deepstrike gain the ability. I heard deepstriking fire dragons were good. 80 point suicide squad that kills tanks. Plus, corsair prince can use his S9 AP2 ordinance lance large blast strike at bs5 in case a unit gets particularly annoying.

I'm currently leaning towards tau and dark eldar now...

Hmm i'm stuck and cant really decide. What are the pros and cons of both dark eldar and tau as a stand alone force and allies for eldar?

DE are more mobile and have psn.

Tau are more gunline and can either give you markerlights (take away cover/ improve BS) or make them anti tank and just have the Eldar attachment go around killing infantry and the like.

Both armies can go with mech Eldar ( the rail gun tanks and devilfish, while DE are obvious). It really depends on what your Eldar army list is like.

Obviously its hard to make this decision without seeing the codex, but you can get some rough guidelines based on what we know so far and the fact that Eldar will always be Eldar (i.e same basic themes, fast, hard hitting, hard to hit but fragile if you manage to connect). Its probably a reasonable bet that the biggest flaw with the codex will be the same as the current one, fragile infantry, in particular fragile scoring infantry. This means anyone who can bring durable or numerous scoring units are where you look first for allies.

With the current codex the only reason you brought Dark Eldar with Eldar was to make use of one of the various Deathstar type builds (Fortuned 2++ etc). Those builds are already getting run over by Tau and I expect Fortune to be changed to Eldar only, so those builds are dead in the water. The other area that Eldar will likely need help is durability, but Dark Eldar scoring units are worse than Eldar ones already which really doesn't leave much in the DE codex that would help at all.

Space Wolves are NOT a good ally for Eldar at the moment, and I don't see that changing. The best SW HQ is the Rune Priest (followed by Logan for specialised builds i.e not as an ally) and his abilities clash badly with Eldar. Atm Runes of Warding makes him a waste of time (which may well change), but more importantly because you aren't Battle Brothers his 4+ to cancel also effects all Eldar units within 24" (and its compulsory, you can't choose not to block them). With Eldar getting more psychic powers and more psychic users you definitely don't want him in an Eldar army.

Grey Knights currently work pretty well with Eldar, and if Warding gets nerfed they become even better. I run 20 Strikes with my Eldar list atm who are mostly there to provide massed firepower on relatively durable scoring models. The fact they get effected by Warding doesn't matter since they very rarely cast powers anyway (you can see Pod and other Deep Strike heavy lists coming and reserve the Seer if you need to so you can cast Quake).

@GTKA666. Markerlights only work for Tau, allies can't use them. In general if you build Tau as an ally you make them as standalone (i.e not relying on Markers) as possible, you get diminishing returns from Markerlights when you only have a couple of units to make use of them. In any case Tau will quite possibly be a decent ally depending on how the Eldar troops options look, if Serpents are under 100pts then you can use Dragons to kill heavy stuff and use them to buff your torrent ability.

dark eldar

I think the Tau will bring more items to the list that you'll need, but as others have stated...hard to tell without more comprehensive rules available for the upcoming Codex.

I think i will wait until i get to grips with the new codex as it might be quite good on its own

I play DE, but I think Tau are slightly stronger as allies.

Eldar can already do high volume shooting, and their "rending-lite" ability helps them hurt high toughness MCs running around. Yeah, DE wound them more, but the Eldar will actually cause wounds.

I feel like DE and Eldar are strong, but they kinda step on each others' toes.

Tau offer more high power shooting as allies than DE do. The Shadowsun star is nasty, and the new fortune appears just to work on Friendly targets. Fortune on that is really scary. As scary as the baron beast pack is, I think all the split fire from the Shadowsun unit makes it more of an immediate threat.

So basically, I think Tau offer more high powered/low AP shooting as allies than DE too. DE have high volume of poison shooting and some very good assault units.

Corsairs sound good too, but I know nothing about them and it depends how accepting your group/store is about FW stuff.

Well, DE or Tau as battle brothers are the best choices.
DE offers Ravager, Beastmaster Pack, Archon incl. Baron, and some scoring units like Warriors.
Tau's best pick are a Riptide and a HS tank.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, DE or Tau as battle brothers are the best choices.
DE offers Ravager, Beastmaster Pack, Archon incl. Baron, and some scoring units like Warriors.
Tau's best pick are a Riptide and a HS tank.

A single Ravager kinda stands out in an Eldar army, its just so easy to drop and a Prism or Night Spinner is only a couple more points. The Baron is almost certainly the best reason to bring Dark Eldar with Eldar now, Hit and Run Wraithguard with D Scythes is just silly. You can also do the 2++ rerollable much more easily now.

I need to check if the Tau Commander support systems (Puretide etc) work on allies. If they do then 10 Dark Reapers will be a seriously powerful ranged Deathstar (move and shoot 10 Krak Missiles with re-roll and ignore cover, or 20 S5 AP3 shots with re-rolls and ignore cover). Otherwise the anti air options are what you want from Tau now imo, Eldar have almost no anti air options aside from the paper thin flier (which will happily take out almost any flier in the game in a single pass, but is screwed if your opponent ever gets to shoot back with another flier for example).

Dark reapers don't get krak missiles (edit: they dont get them standard, for 38 ppm they can get them however) only the exarch can upgrade for them. Broadsides with your allied commander are a much better bet for anti air.

Allies for eldar are a tough question as eldar's big weaknesses are their lack of durable anti air, psychic defense, and cheap close combat. Tau can provide anti air, wolves can give psychic defense but it hurts your psykers too, dark eldar beasts have close combat, ect. I see a daemon flying monster army with lots of psykers giving eldar fits. Maybe orks ironically, with lootas and fearless boys for anti air and half way decent combat.

DEldar or Tau.

One thing for sure: Eldar is the best allies for Tau.

Not with the new book they aren't.

I might look at either Grey Knights or SW for allies for my Eldar, especially as they both have good psykers and won't blow their own heads up with Runes of Warding anymore!!

DevianID wrote:
Not with the new book they aren't.

Moreso with the new book. Jetbike Guardians got stronger and cheaper. What other codex can give Tau exactly what they need the most - linebreaking / objective grabbing units. On the flipside, I think Tau as ally for Eldar is strong as well for the exact same reason (Jetbikes getting stronger). Eldar side focuses on Jetbike troops, mobile with more survivability than a Marine. Tau side focuses on gunline w/ 30" range that can put models on the table. Bonus points: the updated Eldar powers aren't codex unit restricted.

Well, I'd hesitate to take allies in an Eldar army. At this moment its better to explore the effectiveness and synergy of the new Eldar. It appears that the new Eldar can rely on decent fire power to keep the enemy at arm's length and on mobility to outmaneuver him. I think that in the first place, the notorious weakness of durability could be counteracted with an allied detachment.

The biggest factor that I would consider (never having played Eldar or Tau but having played many games against them) is what you get being Battle Brothers with another army; with IG for instance, being Battle Brothers doesn't mean a whole lot because there's not much synergy except for having units that can do things differently. The IG can't very well "buff" a unit of KB's for instance, though you'd certainly benefit in having some KB's in an IG army if used right... But what I'm getting at is with Farseers and the great powers Eldar get, not only do you get other units to fill positions the Eldar don't have but you can make them better than they'd be on their own.

Look at it this way: a Long Fang squad in your list would be great at doing its thing but it would only do as good as a Long Fang would normally do. Take some Pathfinders or Battlesuits (not sure if this is viable for spells but you get the point) and Fortune/Guide them up or otherwise buff them with the copious Eldar powers and they do BETTER than Pathfinders or Battlesuits would normally do, and they can still fill the gaps in power the Eldar don't have.

So there's my two bitz. I don't have any suggestions on a single army, but never simply disregard the benefits of Battle Brothers that you get with the Eldar.

Looking at the new codex - what do you guys think about allies for eldar?

After a careful reading i found what is most missing from Eldar codex. Anti air. This is true except for list built around crimson hunter. I'll assume you don't want to play a list based on playing 2-3 crimson hunter, reserves trick (autarch, comunication relays). If that is the case you can easily avoid allies and you'd get everything you need from Eldar codex.

Of the armies you suggested I think that only 2 offer a good and synergic way to deal with flyers: Dark Eldar and Tau.

Dark Eldar are good in two ways. Poison weapon can reliably kill every interceptor gun or artillery your opponent has (i'm looking at you quad-gun). They provide a good flyer which is more durable and as much reliable as a crimson hunter, and cheaper! They have a lot of good units as pointed out previously by others.

Tau provide anti air en masse. Broadside will tear apart most flyers in the same turn they came in. I think that Tau and Eldar fill each other weaknesses. Eldar are now really fast and can reliably grab mid-field objectives and linebreaker. We have now a lot of good cc units (scorpions, wraithblades, even dire avengers in a way). Eldar powes (should I say Eldrad powers?) now affect battle brothers. If you want you can for sure get guide and prescience, givin 2 of your units rerolls. Tau on their own will bring a lot of static fire power and good objective holder. They can even supply poisoned weapons (sniper kroots).

In the end I think that Tau amongst everyone else is the best option.

Space Marines should not ally with Xenos, that's just wrong.

Everyone and their dog are bringing Tau allies for AA, so that is kinda boring option.

So Dark Eldar.

Runes of Battle is a good Lore.

3 Jetbikes and a Jetbike Warlock is 101 points. Spam dem Warlocks!

But. Oh noes, Warlocks are only Ld8.

Not to worry, Dark Eldar can bring 70 point Venoms with dual splinter cannons that let Warlocks reroll failed Ld tests when they hang out with them.

Yay Dark Eldar Allies, you win.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
Runes of Battle is a good Lore.

3 Jetbikes and a Jetbike Warlock is 101 points. Spam dem Warlocks!

But. Oh noes, Warlocks are only Ld8.

Not to worry, Dark Eldar can bring 70 point Venoms with dual splinter cannons that let Warlocks reroll failed Ld tests when they hang out with them.

Yay Dark Eldar Allies, you win.

FAQ on Grisly Trophies in 5... 4... 3... 2... 1...

I have always had good reason to recommend Tau and Eldar for 40K doubles. Nothing has changed.

 zephoid wrote:
Corsairs. Corsair prince+ fire dragons, shadowfield on the corsair prince, better troop jetbikes, great MSU, nightwings and warp hunters.

I agree here. I love the corsair methodology paired with craftworld execution. Deepstriking Wraithguard or a flamer/glaive/scatterlaser Wraithlord within sight of the enemy line or backfield objective is pretty ugly. If you get lucky with Seer of the Shifting Vector on a jetbike autarch, you'll be set up for a heavy alpha strike. Even without the lucky warlord trait, you're putting enough distraction behind enemy lines to give your own backline a free turn or two to dish it out.

By the way, IA11 indicates that Nightwings, Warp Hunters, and Wasp Walkers (which are sub-par compared to C:E walkers, now) are all Codex entries. They use the older weapon stats and prices, but the Nightwing is a nice alternative to the codex flyers at 145 points a pop. The Warp Hunter has lost a little bang, though, compared to a Fire Prism. Used to be a pair of one was roughly equivalent to a pair of the other, but now... I'm thinking Prisms are king again.