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 Homeskillet wrote:
Great writeup, well done!

Thanks!

What do you guys think of the new Eldar Guardians? Have you used them the way I've described? Have they proven more useful than their old codex counterparts?

Nice writeup. Here are a few insights from many games regarding certain units.

Rangers are good but for a similar price, jetbikes are better. Pathfinders are never worth it.

Illic is best used with Dark Reapers behind an Ageis Line. Why? The Aegis will provide 4+ cover, Illic's shrouded will bring it to 2+. Your Reapers now have a 2+ cover AND their 3+ will help soak the hits to protect Illic who only has a 5+. On top of that, Illic can fire at a different target. Reaper exarch can man the Lascannon for obvious giggles.

Regarding Warlocks, Dire Avengers cannot get 3+ from Protect as Warlocks cannot join with DAs. A Spiritseer could but not a warlock. While I agree that range can be an issue for many powers, the best warlocks are deployed in mini-council. 3-4 tops for a variety of powers and you should be able to make the most of it.

Horrify is VERY useful when combined with a Hemlock or is a Farseer gets Terrify. Lower leadership then remove fearless and force an immediate Ld roll. Either the unit flees or breaks from combat and gets sweeped. (Worked wonders on a unit of Wraiths.)

Horrify is also cumulative. If two Warlocks have it you can lower LD by 6...

Which brings me to the Hemlock. Yes it is expensive and kinda sucks. BUT it is a guranteed Terrify and not easy to get rid of. A Hemlock is best deployed with a Jetseer Council.

For Eldars and Warlocks it is all about synergy and how to maximize another unit's potential.

Jinx will make Terminators 3+ which is bait for Banshees? Sure but it's alot more bait for Reapers who will cut down Terminators from 48" away.

While the Fire Prism is one of the big winners because of it's versatility it is still one shot which can miss.

Dark Reapers get to ignore Jinx which makes the a Reaper exarch with fast on a Lascannon one deadly anti-air combo.
2 x S9 AP2 shots with no chances to evade? Yes please.
Like you mentionned they will go through bikes like nobody's business.

The Starshot upgrade while costly makes them great versus Tau. With night vision you can gun their transports or key units on turn 1 just like they can. Only better if you go first.

So basically every unit got buffed and then given a points reduction, whilst the eldar as a whole got special rules shovelled on them... and they wonder why they suddenly became the most powerful dex... (I hadn't been aware of all those points reductions).
Btw absolutely fantastic in depth article!

Poly Ranger wrote:
So basically every unit got buffed and then given a points reduction, whilst the eldar as a whole got special rules shovelled on them... and they wonder why they suddenly became the most powerful dex... (I hadn't been aware of all those points reductions).
Btw absolutely fantastic in depth article!

To be fair, they needed it from the last codex thanks to the creep that was happening.

The 'power' comes from off the wall things like the re-introduction of the Serpent bow wave, which no one saw coming.

Also, models became more expensive too as they became better, like Fire Dragons, Dire Avengers, Scorpions, Guardians, War Walkers, Wraithlords, Falcons, Fire Prisms, Warlocks, some Phoenix Lords.

Units that were improved and cheapened were ones that really needed it, like Shining Spears, Hawks and Reapers, who were rarely seen before but now are very viable choices.

And the Hawks and Spears still aren't that usable except for meta-listing against certain armies....they don't have TAC value.

At least they finally made Reapers a viable option, although the heavy slots are SO hard to choose.

Hawks are very competitive. The only reason you don't see more of them is because Warp Spiders are the "obvious" FA choice. Shining Spears aren't that competitive, but with proper support, they can be worth it.

Thanks for your useful input, Erik_Morkai. I updated the Dark Reaper and Warlock sections to accommodate your tips.

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
And the Hawks and Spears still aren't that usable except for meta-listing against certain armies....they don't have TAC value.

At least they finally made Reapers a viable option, although the heavy slots are SO hard to choose.

Hawks are cheap enough to be pretty useful in a TAC list. Their large blast ignoring cover grenade pack is fantastic against a few of the nastier armies out there (Eldar, Tau, Necrons, Demons). Then you get to get a chance to blind them with the Sunrifle? Yes please. Or maybe you want to test your luck and chuck a haywire grenade instead? You have a chance to explode a land raider with your dirt cheap hawks.

I'm not saying their FANTASTIC, but they are definitely useful and appropriately costed.


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 Sir Arun wrote:

 Homeskillet wrote:
Great writeup, well done!

Thanks!

What do you guys think of the new Eldar Guardians? Have you used them the way I've described? Have they proven more useful than their old codex counterparts?

Guardians look fine to me, I just happen to love Aspect Warriors and so I tend to run my lists with lots of Dire Avengers.

Good write up, my respects to anyone that can do this.
My biggest nitpick is the dropping Falcons out of hand. I love the Falcon for the sheer volume of fire it can bring. My usual load out is a scatter laser and underslung Shuricannon. This gives 4 S6 bs4 shots, meaning most likely 3 will hit, giving all the other weapons twin-linked. That usually means 2 S8 shots and most likely one other S6 shot (being snap fired). That volley with tear up any AV12 transport or kill many infantry.

Transport capacity is perfect for fire dragons or a small squad of storm guardians. You don't want to put many points into these units, since they are most likely suicidal attacks anyway. I almost always have a x2 melta storm squad with a warlock with a spear, or a x2 flamer squad with a destructor warlock in it and the units work fine for their points and the falcon works wonderfully as a delivery vehicle.

I don't worry about comparing falcons to wave serpents because they don't conflict in FOC choices.
Compared to a fire prism, you trade a single versatile shot with a volume of shots and transport capacity.

I tend to use one of each and a support battery for my 3 heavy picks and have yet to be let down.

you cant take less than 10 storm guardians, mate.

 Sir Arun wrote:
you cant take less than 10 storm guardians, mate.

Ah yes.. you are right. I just got back to 40k after a few versions and still mix up things now and then.

Anybody still fielding Warwalkers? What setup do you recommend? I've ruled out the Shuriken Cannons (unless I plan on outflanking), but cant decide for all out Scatterlasers or all out Brightlances.

Nice write-up, some interesting ideas posed too.

 Sir Arun wrote:
Anybody still fielding Warwalkers? What setup do you recommend? I've ruled out the Shuriken Cannons (unless I plan on outflanking), but cant decide for all out Scatterlasers or all out Brightlances.

I wouldn't recommend anything other than 2 x Scatter Lasers. Don't get me wrong, the other load-outs aren't particularly bad per se, however when combined with Wave Serpents, Bright Lances are usually unnecessary.

Besides, with Guide being 24" now, it allows the War Walkers a greater degree of mobility than ever before - stopping one of their main issues last edition (proximity to Farseer requirement). Added with Battle Focus, you probably have one of the most irritating ways in the game to shut down an enemy unit.

Iranna.

Iranna wrote:Nice write-up, some interesting ideas posed too.

 Sir Arun wrote:
Anybody still fielding Warwalkers? What setup do you recommend? I've ruled out the Shuriken Cannons (unless I plan on outflanking), but cant decide for all out Scatterlasers or all out Brightlances.

I wouldn't recommend anything other than 2 x Scatter Lasers. Don't get me wrong, the other load-outs aren't particularly bad per se, however when combined with Wave Serpents, Bright Lances are usually unnecessary.

Besides, with Guide being 24" now, it allows the War Walkers a greater degree of mobility than ever before - stopping one of their main issues last edition (proximity to Farseer requirement). Added with Battle Focus, you probably have one of the most irritating ways in the game to shut down an enemy unit.

Iranna.

I would disagree. What is wave serpents biggest weakness? av 13-14. How do you combat that? s8 lance. specifically in the form of 6 shots form a war walker squad.

Farseer Faenyin wrote: At least they finally made Reapers a viable option, although the heavy slots are SO hard to choose.

imo reapers were much better last codex, now there meh

 ninjafiredragon wrote:


I would disagree. What is wave serpents biggest weakness? av 13-14. How do you combat that? s8 lance. specifically in the form of 6 shots form a war walker squad.

How many competitive lists do you see out there rocking AV13-14 vehicles? Very few.

Iranna.

While a decent article, it does not go into ANY viability discussion. Its essentially doing the same thing as reading the stat line and abilities to a player.

-Rangers are bad. You compare them to fire warriors and brightlances, but remove the context. Fire warriors are 4+ armor, have a MUCH better gun, and have rapid fire. Rangers have a sniper weapon, which is just plain bad against almost every target in the game. Brightlances are ~35 points each on war walkers, where you needed 9 rangers to eek out over that single brightlance. Also, AP2 on brightlance

-Crimson Hunter is bad.One of the best fliers in the game? Seriously? AV10, to start, so ANYTHING designed to hurt more than basic infantry can hurt it. Anything with skyfire blows it out of the sky faster than you can blink. No defensive equipment at all, not even the option for holofields. Then match it against its competitors in that category: Stormraven, Vendetta, Helldrake. Crimson hunter might kill one of those on the entry. On the other hand, ANY of those WILL be able to destroy or shake/stun a CH. Remember, the CH doesnt have TL, where both the vendetta and the stormraven do, giving them the advantage in a shaking war. Also, have fun if they have a quad gun on the field, as you wont even get to shoot unless you try to maintain out of range of a 48" gun. CH is a gimmick that only works in a VERY few situations. All of its competitors are dual or tri modal vehicles that can hunt vehicles, infantry, and MCs.

Yriel is not a mini-avatar. Hes a overcosted autarch (literally, his stats were reduced to an autarchs) with no real abilities. While his spear still wounds on a 2+ (you had stated he had problems with high toughness?), he is AP3, meaning he wont win challenges anymore. His Eye of Wrath also no longer has the silly ability to turn challenges into auto-win (he used to be able to only allocate wounds to the person in the challenge, meaning ~10 wounds on his challenger) though he can now sit in a challenge and use it to kill the nme squad and make them break. However, this is a problem as he will probably never see melee. He gets insta-gibbed even more now and suffers from all the 6th assault nerfs. No reason to ever take him over an autarch since the autarchs got much better.

Vaul's Support Platforms are pretty darn insane. Either 90 points for 3 S6 barrage small blasts that wreck ICs (especially T3 ICs), or grabbing vibro cannons with a nearby farseer for 3x lascannon shots for cheap. T7 changed the entire game, as they cannot be killed by most anti-inf weapons and will shrug off hits by AT weapons as they have so many wounds (5 wounds to the squad before the first cannon goes down,then 3 more for each gun).

Also, nothing on swooping hawks actual abilities outside their blast? One of the HUGE gains was the exarch's sunrifle gaining blind. VS crons, tau, and nids, this is HUGE. Its essentially a much more reliable pinning weapon. Along with the actual pinning on the blast template from their drop. The precision deepstrike is huge also, as they can drop in, shoot, then run behind cover with 100% reliability. With 3 6 man squads you can remove the ability for large portions of the enemy army to fight for a turn.

 Iranna wrote:

 ninjafiredragon wrote:


I would disagree. What is wave serpents biggest weakness? av 13-14. How do you combat that? s8 lance. specifically in the form of 6 shots form a war walker squad.

How many competitive lists do you see out there rocking AV13-14 vehicles? Very few.

Iranna.

Well my meta has quite a few necrons tank spam players, and blood angels/marine track spam to

 zephoid wrote:
While a decent article, it does not go into ANY viability discussion. Its essentially doing the same thing as reading the stat line and abilities to a player.

-Rangers are bad. You compare them to fire warriors and brightlances, but remove the context. Fire warriors are 4+ armor, have a MUCH better gun, and have rapid fire. Rangers have a sniper weapon, which is just plain bad against almost every target in the game. Brightlances are ~35 points each on war walkers, where you needed 9 rangers to eek out over that single brightlance. Also, AP2 on brightlance

I wasnt comparing the cost of a ranger squad with the cost of a brightlance, but rather the alternative of fielding a 10 man Guardian squad with a scatterlaser, Starcannon or Brightlance platform, demonstrating how the rangers can do just as good, if not better than either of those three options, given that Guardian Defenders dont get to fire their shuricats most of the time.

 zephoid wrote:
-Crimson Hunter is bad.One of the best fliers in the game? Seriously? AV10, to start, so ANYTHING designed to hurt more than basic infantry can hurt it. Anything with skyfire blows it out of the sky faster than you can blink. No defensive equipment at all, not even the option for holofields. Then match it against its competitors in that category: Stormraven, Vendetta, Helldrake. Crimson hunter might kill one of those on the entry. On the other hand, ANY of those WILL be able to destroy or shake/stun a CH. Remember, the CH doesnt have TL, where both the vendetta and the stormraven do, giving them the advantage in a shaking war. Also, have fun if they have a quad gun on the field, as you wont even get to shoot unless you try to maintain out of range of a 48" gun. CH is a gimmick that only works in a VERY few situations. All of its competitors are dual or tri modal vehicles that can hunt vehicles, infantry, and MCs.

I said Flyer-hunters in the game, not Flyers. I also emphasize on how you have to make sure it gets to shoot first. And arguably you'll have your Eldar ground troops take care of the single quadgun before the flyers arrive.

 zephoid wrote:
Yriel is not a mini-avatar. Hes a overcosted autarch (literally, his stats were reduced to an autarchs) with no real abilities. While his spear still wounds on a 2+ (you had stated he had problems with high toughness?), he is AP3, meaning he wont win challenges anymore. His Eye of Wrath also no longer has the silly ability to turn challenges into auto-win (he used to be able to only allocate wounds to the person in the challenge, meaning ~10 wounds on his challenger) though he can now sit in a challenge and use it to kill the nme squad and make them break. However, this is a problem as he will probably never see melee. He gets insta-gibbed even more now and suffers from all the 6th assault nerfs. No reason to ever take him over an autarch since the autarchs got much better.

No I stated the Avatar has problems with high toughness opponents while Yriel does not. Also, no Elar HQ except the Avatar and some PLs have AP2 in melee, so an Autarch wont do any better. I'm not a big fan of Yriel anymore, but he still is amazing striking at initiative, wounding on 2+ and giving you the reserve buffs of an autarch while his eye of wrath can serve as a last ditch defense blast.

 zephoid wrote:
Also, nothing on swooping hawks actual abilities outside their blast? One of the HUGE gains was the exarch's sunrifle gaining blind. VS crons, tau, and nids, this is HUGE. Its essentially a much more reliable pinning weapon. Along with the actual pinning on the blast template from their drop. The precision deepstrike is huge also, as they can drop in, shoot, then run behind cover with 100% reliability. With 3 6 man squads you can remove the ability for large portions of the enemy army to fight for a turn.

Thanks, will add to the article and give you credit.

I disagree with your Hemlock analysis.

While I certainly understand that it is a hybrid unit, I have found 2+ armour extremely influential in 40K and the potential to hit 4 people at a time with any one weapon is notably good, especially an AP 2 weapon. Few weapons can really do that. poo poo'ing its str 4 isn't going to bring the dead back to life!

But i find the Hemlocks Psychological warfare attacks ARE the real gem. I have built an air force featuring a Crimson hunter and two hemlocks spearheaded by my JetCouncil and my Jetaurch. When the dust settles, those hemlocks are sending units screaming at the start of the turn, then forcing them to run again in the shooting phase! Those Hemlocks can force a unit to run 4D6 inches a turn. that assumes you don't also tank shock them.

Pinning weapons like the Eldar Missile Launcher become highly effective at their job and the catalyst to this, the JetCouncil, which would in many games be the primary target gets forgotten while the enemy tries to kill those jets.

And just to make sure the enemy has one hell offa time killing those jets, the Warwalkers bring about 24 STR 6 AP 2 shots to silence the anti-aircraft elements of the foe. that's 13.33 MEQ dead. A Broadside unit with Drones is probably dead too, it's a shock to the system.

So what you can do with hemlocks is impressive. I routinely run 4 units a round off the board starting in round 3. That's really incredible. At that rate, i can kill 12 units in turns 3-5.

Now it doesn't always go 100% perfectly to plan. But it hasn't actually LOST a game out of the 14 I've played.

Don't count Hemlocks out! You can find a write up about them here:
Eldar jets!

 ninjafiredragon wrote:


imo reapers were much better last codex, now there meh

How so? They're cheaper now, can move and fire, have the same statline and gun. Can't run, but IMO Move and Fire more than makes up for that. They even have the option for Krak missiles now, so you can widen their potential targets.

 Daba wrote:

 ninjafiredragon wrote:


imo reapers were much better last codex, now there meh

How so? They're cheaper now, can move and fire, have the same statline and gun. Can't run, but IMO Move and Fire more than makes up for that. They even have the option for Krak missiles now, so you can widen their potential targets.

Probably because now you no longer really need them if you have a Fire Prism.

Fire Prism definitely doesn't compete with Dark Reapers. Fire Prism can't compete against anything, since it tries to do everything. Eldar don't need a generalist tank. And that lance everyone keeps mentioning isn't all that impressive either. Given the choice of two Prisms or a stock WK, I'd puck the WK every time.

Dark Reapers OTOH are expensive, but if you work them carefully in your army, they can be amazing.

Even just basic 3 Reapers(inc. Exarch) all with Starshot missiles, Fast Shot and Night Vision(141 points) in a Serpent put out 4 S8 missiles per turn, at BS4/5 and are completely safe from first turn alpha strikes inside a Serpent.

Someone mentioned Illic and Dark Reapers manning your Aegis Defense Line. It's a solid tactic.

I'd just like to throw in there something you can do with that squad is kit up the Exarch to have Fast Shot and Flak Missiles. Illic can man the ADL gun. Gives you 2 more S7 shots against flyers you'd want to shoot at, which is pretty handy. Both shots should land most the time too. The way Reaper Rangefinders are worded is "enemies cannot take jink cover saves against shots fired by a unit that contains at least one model with" so Illic on the ADL quad-gun or lascannons still benefits from that. Obvious the Exarch is rocking the better weapon otherwise so Illic manning the gun puts the crazy BS value to good use. Plus, guaranteed Splitfire on the Warlord trait is just always good tidings when it comes to units with lots of potential targets for their weapons.

Also throw me in as a vote of confidence for Swooping Hawks. I like them a lot better than Warp Spiders. Warp Spiders tend to die the moment people see them, and require super good run AND assault moves in order to get back out of charge range after shooting their 12" guns. They have a lot of mobility, but the lack of range on their weapons is murder. I think the most damning thing I have against them is they want to shoot at the targets I'd already be pouring lots of fire into with War Walkers and Wave Serpents, which are much more versatile, durable units in my experiences.

Hawks have one job, and they do it well: deny enemy scoring units from doing so. Unerring deep strike + lots of fire (even if it is only strength 3) + an Ap4 Ignores Cover attack they can potentially do twice in a game that also doesn't require line of sight. All of those things are pretty cool. Also, Haywire Grenades so they can still handle vehicles should you need them to do that instead of slaughter troops. The only armies out there they aren't particularly good against are Chaos Daemon Flying Monster Party, really. I suppose they'd struggle against someone running a pure, fluffy Farsight list, too, but I mean you're still likely to find people bringing Kroot or Firewarriors as their troops so their scoring units are cheaper, and they'll still obliterate Pathfinders, so it's not like they aren't good against common Tau units.