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 Kirasu wrote:
If you're going to use warwalkers as anti air with EML.. Just take allied broadsides instead imo.

I'm finding the same thing.

The WW are just not tough enough or effective enough to take our Flyers for their points.

I'm finding that the best Heavy unit is the Fire Prism... just for THAT gun.

 Gangrel767 wrote:
The serpent shield says ignore cover, but usually the cover is worse than the 3+ save it has anyway.

Like anything that ignores cover, it is excellent for Stealthers and Shrouders (like Scouts, Rangers, Pathfinders, jinking vehicles, etc). In my last game of Eldar vs Eldar, the Serpent Shield is an easy way to clear out Rangers from defense lines or towers (which can otherwise be impossible to bust out, less you assault them or bring flamers, both of which require you to be a lot closer than 60").

I'm really excited to see how well that extra serpent shield performs on the table.

I played a 3000 point game against blood angels last night. My first game with the new codex. Nice big game, got to try most of the new toys out. Here are some thoughts.

Iilic was my warlord. I outflanked him along with a unit of 5 Dark Reapers with star shot missiles and an exarch with fast shot, EML and flakk missiles. This unit worked well, Ilic imparting shrouded to the reapers and the reapers giving slow and purposeful to Illic. It did come in handy a few times when I had to reposition them to maintain their cover and they all got to shoot. Also brought 2x6 Pathfinders to come in close to Ilic and the Reapers. That is 4 different potential pinning checks, up to three on one squad. Starshot missiles, 2 pathfinder squads and Illic's split fire.
Illic is pretty cool and the ability to bring in the rangers is great. 140 points to shoot once per round and only wound on a 4+? Ap2 is cool and once per game you should see a 6 to wound for instant death. Giving shrouded to things like warwalkers or dark reapers is cool as well....but 140 points and an HQ slot. I think there is better value in other choices.

I outflanked my squad of 3 warwalkers. I chose scatter lasers and missile launchers with the flakk upgrade, knowing that my friend would be fielding a storm raven. This loadout for the WW is pretty versatile. 4 str 6 shots at bs4 and a twin linked starshot or plasma (reroll scatter dice), is a decent threat to hords, most common armour values and fliers. If your lucky enough to get Jinx for one of your warlocks then plasma missiles with that rerolling the scatter then marines will go down pretty hard.

The combined fire of the walkers and my Reaper exarch took the first two hull points of his gunship and then a warp spider snap shot did the rest on turn two.

A fun unit that I will play again is the Jetbike mounted Autarch with reaper launcher, banshee mask, laser lance and Mantle of the Laughing God. 180 points is a lot but he was an hq that could contribute all game long due to 48" range heavy 2 at BS6 and when needed he can get a powerful charge in, likely killing the model he was in base contact in, no return swing. Everyone piles in. Autarch gets a few str 3 attacks then has to survive any retaliation. Not tooo risky with his 3+ and 4++, then leave at the end of the enemy's assault phase via the Mantle and wreak havoc elsewhere. In my game he suffered no wounds, killed several marines with his reaper launcher and finished off Memphiston's last two wounds on a charge. And now with the improvement to reserves control offered by the Autarch and how many good options eldar have for outflanking and deepstriking units its hard not to take one.

Another great combo ended up being Wave Serpent with 5 dscythe wraithgaurd in it. I knew my opponent had a lot of things in reserve so it was handy to have those dscythes in the waveserpent hanging out in my back field, blasting things with the scatter laser serpent shield combo. Sure enough an assault squad arrived in a nicely clustered formation, shot a bit but was then vaporized by the dcythes. Wraithgaurd pile back in and wait. A second squad arrived in turn 4, he unluckily scattered closer then he wanted to my wave serpent. He used his shooting phase to run out of such a clustered formation but it was futile. They should have just shot their bolt pistols at the nearbye shadow weaver battery for all the good it'd do. The scythe templates killed over half of them and harlequins killed the rest on the charge before any could strike back.

I had a Spirit Seer (dual FOC, both sides used it) so my plan was to turbo boost with my concealed bikes and flat out with the Wave Serpent on turn 4 to my opponents backfield. Positioning so that on turn 5 the wraithgaurd come out and advance on that objective, the bikes just behind them. Bikes still get to shoot and the wraithgaurd get d3 free hits per model as overwatch. Kill what you need to while moving towards the objective, in the assault phase the bikes can move forward to contest/claim the objective. Two tough scoring units, both will sustain some losses getting into position but it is a nifty backfield crashing combo. No cover, ap2. Imagine this on a Doomed squad. To bad doom isn't as easy to get.

hm, what else. Battle focus is amazing. Like the pop up attacks of old. I had a 20 man gaurdian squad on an objective behind a hill that blocked line of sight to most of the board. Using battle focus they creeped up the hill, shot their bright lance and star cannon at bs4, and then slinked away. This unit immobilised a land raider, took two wounds off Memphiston, killed several death company and never took return fire.

Man - another good catch.

I like the idea of Autarch on bike and Reaper....

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:
[...]Using battle focus they creeped up the hill, shot their bright lance and star cannon at bs4[...]

Umm you can't fire heavy weapons with Battle Focus unless they have Relentless, not even snap shots (which they would have been. Move and fire Heavy Weapons at full BS? Who do they think they are, Maugan Ra?)

S.K.Ren wrote:

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:
[...]Using battle focus they creeped up the hill, shot their bright lance and star cannon at bs4[...]

Umm you can't fire heavy weapons with Battle Focus unless they have Relentless, not even snap shots (which they would have been. Move and fire Heavy Weapons at full BS? Who do they think they are, Maugan Ra?)

My new eldar codex says that the gun and its wielder have relentless. So yes, eldar can do this, and it's awesome.

Page 66. First line of the heavy weapon platform entry.

And 20 gaurdians with 2 heavy weapons are cheaper and better than Maugen Ra.

Oh really?! Holy crap I missed that
Wow, Guardians got even better.

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:

S.K.Ren wrote:

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:
[...]Using battle focus they creeped up the hill, shot their bright lance and star cannon at bs4[...]

Umm you can't fire heavy weapons with Battle Focus unless they have Relentless, not even snap shots (which they would have been. Move and fire Heavy Weapons at full BS? Who do they think they are, Maugan Ra?)

My new eldar codex says that the gun and its wielder have relentless. So yes, eldar can do this, and it's awesome.

Page 66. First line of the heavy weapon platform entry.

And 20 gaurdians with 2 heavy weapons are cheaper and better than Maugen Ra.

Holy Nutballs!!!

I just read that.

Question is... Which heavy weapons do you go for?

Puscifer wrote:

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:

S.K.Ren wrote:

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:
[...]Using battle focus they creeped up the hill, shot their bright lance and star cannon at bs4[...]

Umm you can't fire heavy weapons with Battle Focus unless they have Relentless, not even snap shots (which they would have been. Move and fire Heavy Weapons at full BS? Who do they think they are, Maugan Ra?)

My new eldar codex says that the gun and its wielder have relentless. So yes, eldar can do this, and it's awesome.

Page 66. First line of the heavy weapon platform entry.

And 20 gaurdians with 2 heavy weapons are cheaper and better than Maugen Ra.

Holy Nutballs!!!

I just read that.

Question is... Which heavy weapons do you go for?

Tough choice but for the gaurdians I think I'll stick with bright lance and star cannon. You can hurt anything in the game at a distance, popping out from behind something, shooting, moving back, and if something comes over there to get you there should be a decent chance that you can mitigate this further with Battle Focus, either letting them close the distance and then double moving towards it on your turn to get off firsts with a full strength squad dealing out 36 shuriken shots, 1str 8 ap2 and 2 str 6 ap2 shots from the platforms, or you use battle focus to play keep away, shooting the platforms as you go.

For my game next week I will take as many missile launchers in as many different squads as possible. Our version of krak missiles cause pinning now and I want to experiment with a list that tries to take advantage of the high prevalence of pinning weapons in our new codex. My flier arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. It was supposed to be a crimson hunter but it is a hemlock. Was mad at first but I think I will keep it. If I have multiple gaurdian squads, ranger squads, a reaper squad, Illic, shadow weaver battery all causing seperate pinning checks, combined with the mind shock pod, you can really mess up your opponents plans. I will take 5 warlocks and hope for horrify. I laugh imagining multiple squads of my friends blood angels pinned or running while I gun down the units that are functional or send in some dscythe wielders to torch them where they huddle. The hemlock can be shot down fairly easily but for the disruption it causes for those two turns it might be worth it.

Has the possibility of an Eldar air superiority force been discussed? I'm not thinking it will be super competitive WAAC or anything, but here's the idea.

Take 3 flyers, probably 3 hunters, maybe 2 hunters and a hemlock. Take an autarch to try and manipulate reserves rolls, a farseer to try to and get the divination power that lets you roll 3d6 and pick what you want (scrier's gaze?). Take rangers to try and snipe or remove opponents ground AA, nightspinners for the torrent template to get rid of AA in cover. Once you have established air dominance, they should have a tough time dealing with 3 flyers, meanwhile they are taking out a high-priority target every turn. I would try this out myself, but I don't have the models or money for the hunters atm.

j.d.hart wrote:
Has the possibility of an Eldar air superiority force been discussed? I'm not thinking it will be super competitive WAAC or anything, but here's the idea.

Take 3 flyers, probably 3 hunters, maybe 2 hunters and a hemlock. Take an autarch to try and manipulate reserves rolls, a farseer to try to and get the divination power that lets you roll 3d6 and pick what you want (scrier's gaze?). Take rangers to try and snipe or remove opponents ground AA, nightspinners for the torrent template to get rid of AA in cover. Once you have established air dominance, they should have a tough time dealing with 3 flyers, meanwhile they are taking out a high-priority target every turn. I would try this out myself, but I don't have the models or money for the hunters atm.

If you want to go completely over the top, ally in some Dark Eldar for the Voidraven in the HS slot... get some large blast horde-killing missiles in the bargain.

j.d.hart wrote:
Has the possibility of an Eldar air superiority force been discussed? I'm not thinking it will be super competitive WAAC or anything, but here's the idea.

Take 3 flyers, probably 3 hunters, maybe 2 hunters and a hemlock. Take an autarch to try and manipulate reserves rolls, a farseer to try to and get the divination power that lets you roll 3d6 and pick what you want (scrier's gaze?). Take rangers to try and snipe or remove opponents ground AA, nightspinners for the torrent template to get rid of AA in cover. Once you have established air dominance, they should have a tough time dealing with 3 flyers, meanwhile they are taking out a high-priority target every turn. I would try this out myself, but I don't have the models or money for the hunters atm.

Only issue i really see is not being able to count on anything. I dont want to try and do anything. I want to just do. Pew pew pew!


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PsycicSpaceElf wrote:

My flier arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. It was supposed to be a crimson hunter but it is a hemlock. Was mad at first but I think I will keep it.

Isnt it a dual kit?

 Uriels_Flame wrote:

j.d.hart wrote:
Has the possibility of an Eldar air superiority force been discussed? I'm not thinking it will be super competitive WAAC or anything, but here's the idea.

Take 3 flyers, probably 3 hunters, maybe 2 hunters and a hemlock. Take an autarch to try and manipulate reserves rolls, a farseer to try to and get the divination power that lets you roll 3d6 and pick what you want (scrier's gaze?). Take rangers to try and snipe or remove opponents ground AA, nightspinners for the torrent template to get rid of AA in cover. Once you have established air dominance, they should have a tough time dealing with 3 flyers, meanwhile they are taking out a high-priority target every turn. I would try this out myself, but I don't have the models or money for the hunters atm.

Only issue i really see is not being able to count on anything. I dont want to try and do anything. I want to just do. Pew pew pew!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:

My flier arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. It was supposed to be a crimson hunter but it is a hemlock. Was mad at first but I think I will keep it.

Isnt it a dual kit?

I haven't opened the box yet but only the Hemlock is named and pictured on the box. I will check it out.

Edit: well so it is. hmmmmmm.. lol I still wanna try a bit of hemlock shennanigans but the crimson hunter will be more useful to me overall.

Oh how I wish Doom were the primaris power in Runes of Fate. This power remains the best force magnifier for the army, and its even better now that it can affect vehicles.

Think of all the weapons in our codex that have special rules associated with the wound roll. Rending on sniper rifles, blade storm, monofilament rule, distort rule. And of course there's that pesky str 3 thing.

Ya just gotsta have doom.


It'd be pretty frustrating to try to get Doom and end up with Guide, Eldritch Storm and Death Mission though.

I'm debating the value of a spiritseer over a farseer when we have the WRJ (Windrider Jetbikes). Sure the WG are more durable but with reserves and turbo boosting the troops are 300pts for 6x 3 man sqauds as opposed to 1x 5 man squad with WS. My plan was to run Harlies, put Eldrad in there, and the second HQ. The spiritseer has merit with RoBattle, and making the few WG units I have scoring, but the Farseer seems to have so much more going for it. So I guess I'm wondering: is taking the spiritseer a sentence to spamming max amounts of Wraith_____? Do the RoBattle mean enough?

For reference my list was something like
Eldrad
Spiritseer
3x WRJ
3x WRJ
3x WRJ
5x WG with WS
5x WG with WS
1x C. Hunter
10x Harlies, all da trimmin's
2x Fire Prism
1x Nightspinner

Is it better to have those WG scoring or drop them for more WRJ and a Farseer?

Your list doesn't seem to have enough long range FP.

Personally, I would drop Eldrad and the EJB or WRJ as you call them in favour of more wraith or Scatter Laser and Shuriken Cannon Wave Serpents.

Those things have become brutal and will bring more to your army.

I might drop the Nightspinner too. It doesn't do enough for me.

Great to see someone using multiple Fire Prism. Point for point it seems to be the best tank in the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
On the subject of weapon platforms in Guardian Squads, I'm testing dual SL and 1 SL and STC builds.

The other weapons have merit, but these two builds look like they will be better.

Puscifer wrote:
STC

STC?

Starcannon? (odd abbreviation though..) Took me a while to work out what FP was! People use far too many acronyms on here, even the built in thing doesn't have them.

Sorry, yeah... Starcannon.

 warpspider89 wrote:

STC?

I'm guessing it means Starcannon.

This is what I've been running at 1500pts:

1. Farseer – 130pts.
w/ Runes of Witnessing, Spirit Stone of Anath’lan.

2. Spiritseer – 100pts.
w/ Faolchú’s Wing.

3. Wraithguard Squad – 320pts.
w/ 10 x Members, Wraithcannons.

4. Guardian Defender Squad – 90pts.
w/ 10 x Members.

• Wave Serpent – 145pts.
w/ TL – Scatter Lasers, Shuriken Cannon, Holo-fields.

5. Windrider Jetbike Squad – 51pts.
w/ 3 x Members.

6. Warp Spider Squad – 105pts.
w/ 5 x Members, Exarch.

7. Crimson Hunter – 190pts.
w/ Crimson Hunter Exarch, Marksman’s Eye.

8. Dark Reaper Squad – 141pts.
w/ 3 x Members, Starshot Missiles, Exarch; Fast Shot, Night Vision.

9. Baron Sathonyx – 105pts.

10. Kabalite Warrior Squad – 45pts.
w/ 5 x Members.

• Venom – 75pts.
w/ 2 x Splinter Cannons, Nightshield.

Total = 1497pts.

This list has performed very well in the few times that I've used it. Of course, I'm reliant on getting Fortune and/or Protect on the Spiritseer however, even without Fortune this list has performed well.

The idea is that the Wraithguard and co. move-up to control the centre-field whilst drawing fire from the other units. This usually gives me about 3 turns before my opponent realises that it's not worth his time to shoot the Wraithguard and concentrates on my smaller squads but by then, it's usually too late.

Control the centre, control the game - that's my mantra

Iranna.

PsycicSpaceElf wrote:

I haven't opened the box yet but only the Hemlock is named and pictured on the box. I will check it out.

Edit: well so it is. hmmmmmm.. lol I still wanna try a bit of hemlock shennanigans but the crimson hunter will be more useful to me overall.

Magnetise for both.
I'll be working to get the tail and wing ridges, and the back-of-the-cockpit sections magnetised, along with the guns.
Painting them that way would be a pain, though.

Swooping Hawks...

Now, this is a unit that is much maligned in Eldar armies.

Some say too expensive... Too fragile... Too weak... I think otherwise.

This unit is more of a scalpel in an army of sledgehammers and there are ways to make this unit über.

Here's what I think could work...

1) Go big or go home. Six Hawks minimum. You get that great cover ignoring pie plate on a DS and then you can shoot the living bejesus out of what you've bombed.

2) Go crazy... Take more than one squad. Two squads will pretty much destroy a hordesque unit of stuff with the pies and sixty plus shots. Then you run the squads into cover and if they're around the next turn... See below for ways to make them survive... You can either repeat the process again next turn or go after a vehicle. Ten Haywire Grenades in assault will destroy any ground based vehicle.

3) Ways of making them survive... Trickery. Eldar have great distraction units. Wraithknights in particular are great for this, as are large defender squads and other prime dmg dealing targets. Present your enemy with a "better" target and watch as your Hawks either blast the bejesus out of another unit or tank or bugger off next turn to do it all over again.

I think they can be made to work with big results.

Well i don't know. I think i need to buy some Swooping Hawks of my own and try them out. Give the Exarch a Sunrifle or Hawks talon and it makes the squad something the enemy just cant ignore. I dont think you'll be killing too much with them unless your also fighting a majority toughness 3 army, then they will go to town.

I agree that they are a very precise unit with no scatter off the Deep strike, and cleaver use of battle focus and range 24 can mitigate some of the "jump down, shoot something and just die". Further play testing will be required.

Overall the list i think we'll see abused most will be mass wave serpent. in 1850 i managed to squeeze in 8 wave serpents, and 2 fire prisms, 6 squads of 5 man dire avengers, and two 5 man squads of fire dragons. Half the wave werpents had brightlance, the other half scatter laser (though all scatter is probably the better choice). and then a cheapo Spiritseer to lead the army lol. there was even enough points to get holofields/spiritstones on the fire prisms, and a couple holofields for the fire dragon wave serpents. And really all you have to do is drop a squad of dire avengers and a wave serpent to free enough points to really go to town on vehicle upgrades if you like.

I will never play this list as it is way too cheeseballer, but i think they did make the serpent shield a little too good this edition....

The wave serpent army should do pretty well, especially when they are capable of dumping out 7 twinlinked S6 shots and 2 to 7 twin linked S7 shots that ignore cover. Toss in the 4+ save and you're fine.

As for Swooping hawks, I figure on average you'll do about 10 kills vs GEQ and 3 kills vs MEQ and that is including the pie plate. Spiders however will do 9 kills ( ap - but it is instant death) against GEQs and 5 kills vs MEQ. 30 more points but you get a 3+ save and a superior move.

GTKA666 wrote:

Shamanlord1961 wrote:
Don't know if it has been said, but I didn't see it mentioned. I played a couple games this week and I found a pretty easy tactic to keep my Crimson Hunters alive. I brought an empty wave serpent (just deployed the unit ahead) with a SL upgrade. First turn I moved to get LoS on the quad gun, hit it with the scatter, then let the fired the shield at ignoring cover. Killed it both games like this and still had a useful serpent afterwards, just not shielded.

shield ignores jink, not cover.

Incorrect. The Reaper Rangefinder ignores Jink. The Serpent Shield weapon ignores cover. Of course its a AP- attack and so not so useful against models with good armor saves.

 Deadlytoaster wrote:
Well i don't know. I think i need to buy some Swooping Hawks of my own and try them out. Give the Exarch a Sunrifle or Hawks talon and it makes the squad something the enemy just cant ignore. I dont think you'll be killing too much with them unless your also fighting a majority toughness 3 army, then they will go to town.

Reminds me a lot of Zaggstruck for the Orks. He's a beast on the charge, but if you get stuck with something you don't kill you become fodder.


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 Ravenous D wrote:
As for Swooping hawks, I figure on average you'll do about 10 kills vs GEQ and 3 kills vs MEQ and that is including the pie plate. Spiders however will do 9 kills ( ap - but it is instant death) against GEQs and 5 kills vs MEQ. 30 more points but you get a 3+ save and a superior move.

+1

I'm a spider fan and feel like they do the job better and have more utility. Swooping hawks did graduate from <DUNCE> to middle school (Banshees currently wear that hat now).

Maybe they'll release a supplement that allows me to take spiders as troops - then I'll take Hawks for my fast slot

Saturation fire, on average its getting 2 to 7 shots that will probably be twin linked from a scatter laser, that is usually enough to take down good saves. It will be wounding most things on 2s.

It can easily pump out 10 wounds, that's 3-4 marines dead, or 1 or 2 terminators. Not to mention the rest of the army can easily spam ap2 to deal with terminators easily.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Uriels_Flame wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ravenous D wrote:
As for Swooping hawks, I figure on average you'll do about 10 kills vs GEQ and 3 kills vs MEQ and that is including the pie plate. Spiders however will do 9 kills ( ap - but it is instant death) against GEQs and 5 kills vs MEQ. 30 more points but you get a 3+ save and a superior move.

+1

I'm a spider fan and feel like they do the job better and have more utility. Swooping hawks did graduate from <DUNCE> to middle school (Banshees currently wear that hat now).

Maybe they're release a supplement that allows me to take spiders as troops - then I'll take Hawks for my fast slot

Spiders are my favourite aspect, always have been, too bad they wrote Kaelor out of the new book.

I am guessing experiences differ. I find that fireprisms might survive the whole game but are just not reliable enough to do a lot of damage. Against jinking vehicles with jsut one BS4 shot ... meh. I actually prefer the cheaper nightspinner ...

I also love the autarch .. but with fusion, lance, mask, bike and mantle ... expensive ... 150 points but pretty brutal.

The fast attack slot is just too crowded. Warp Spiders seem a must to me. They do everything ... AA, AT, AI ... And I have had good luck withe Hunter ... yes it is weaksauce but using a little reserve manipulation it can shine.