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 Araenion wrote:
1st being the Wave Serpent?

Has the Spinner always(or almost always) paid his points back for you? I'm going OT, I know, but I'd like to know this, as I've only tested him out against a few armies and he did alright, but nothing spectacular.

Yeah, but I regularly face Necron Wraiths, Broadsides, and some IG parking lots. Being able to shoot without LoS is huge...run it without upgrades or just holo...and keep it far back. If you feel like being tricksy...look into the Matrix.



The 1st being the Bane Wolf...for sheer fun...and the 3rd being the Godhammer.

Wow. People need to give GW more credit on how well they balanced the Eldar Codex. Over time, the community has shown that nearly every unit is viable (If they FAQ Banshees like they did with Incubi for AP2, they could have a use). I mean, that‘s pretty awesome.

 AdeptSister wrote:
Wow. People need to give GW more credit on how well they balanced the Eldar Codex. .

This is why, while Eldar is much stronger than Tau in-game...people hate it much less than Tau.

 ductvader wrote:
Yeah, but I regularly face Necron Wraiths, Broadsides, and some IG parking lots. Being able to shoot without LoS is huge...run it without upgrades or just holo...and keep it far back. If you feel like being tricksy...look into the Matrix.

I've never faced IG in my entire gaming career. No one here plays them in any respect. Mostly, I play MEQ, but I don't have a lot of problems with them. I do have problems with Necrons and Tau, which Night Spinner should be great against, like you say.

Eldar are an amazing codex. I honestly think it's the best codex they've done since the start of 5th, with the exception of the Serpent Shield.

 Araenion wrote:
Eldar are an amazing codex. I honestly think it's the best codex they've done since the start of 5th, with the exception of the Serpent Shield.

The serpent shield is fairly balanced...other people just don't think it is because they only take S6 and S7 to the game.

It should however, not ignore cover. That's my only problem with it.

My only problem is 60" range. If it was 24" or 18", I'd be perfectly fine with the rest of the profile as is.

 Araenion wrote:
My only problem is 60" range. If it was 24" or 18", I'd be perfectly fine with the rest of the profile as is.

You don't like that you can shoot anywhere on the board in any turn?

The spinner's weakness is a lack of AP. Monofilament is nice, but needs a 6 to get AP1.
A couple of barrage-sniper kills is good, but it can only kill a fraction of the target unit, very unlikely to ever be the whole thing. Add the shuriken cannon, and you might mop up the final few models.

Either target the model you want dead, or a large dense unit, or vehicles.

The spinner is actually really good at covering the weakness of Mechdar...antihorde.

After facing a few blob squads, cultist and ork armies...I added the Nightspinner, Swooping Hawks, and Storm Guardians to my army...and never looked back.

 ductvader wrote:
You don't like that you can shoot anywhere on the board in any turn?

Sure I do. My opponent's don't. Serpent Shield and Baleflamer are two most unfair heavy weapons in the game, discounting the Escalation/Stronghold Assault and whatnot. Because you can't hide from them, can't outmaneuver them, can't use tactics against them(apart from hiding behind LOS, but then again, both the Serpent and the Heldrake have the mobility to get around that), you just point at a unit anywhere on the board, roll some dice, and your opponent removes models. Of course there are exceptions to that, but both of those weapons leave a bad taste in your opponent's mouth.

Anyways, thank you both for giving pointers on the Spinner, appreciate it.

 Araenion wrote:

 ductvader wrote:
You don't like that you can shoot anywhere on the board in any turn?

Sure I do. My opponent's don't. Serpent Shield and Baleflamer are two most unfair heavy weapons in the game, discounting the Escalation/Stronghold Assault and whatnot. Because you can't hide from them, can't outmaneuver them, can't use tactics against them(apart from hiding behind LOS, but then again, both the Serpent and the Heldrake have the mobility to get around that), you just point at a unit anywhere on the board, roll some dice, and your opponent removes models. Of course there are exceptions to that, but both of those weapons leave a bad taste in your opponent's mouth.

Anyways, thank you both for giving pointers on the Spinner, appreciate it.

Yup, weapons that invalidate tactics have a tendency to make people mad.

I think the key to winning as eldar is wave serpents, which obviously is not an aspect

I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

blaktoof wrote:
I think the key to winning as eldar is wave serpents, which obviously is not an aspect

I was going to say...most players take serpents cause they're better-er in most respects than a lot of other units...not because that's the only way to win.

Spinners have always paid themselves off for me, my meta has a lot of tau and the S8 blast/flamer that is ID and possible AP1 is fantastic in addition that the flamer ignores cover.

 Araenion wrote:
I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

Exalted for truth. The WS puts the Eldar over the top; but they have many awesome units besides this one.

Martel732 wrote:

 Araenion wrote:
I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

Exalted for truth. The WS puts the Eldar over the top; but they have many awesome units besides this one.

You can build an army without serpents or aspect warriors and still dish out some pain...but you will need to rely on fortifications for you're AA at that point.

Here's the lineup for available units: it's quite viable for any listbuilding.

Eldrad
Avatar
Yriel
Farseers
Spiritseers
Warlocks
Illic
Guardian Defenders
Storm Guardians
Guardian Jetbikes
Rangers
Vypers
Hemlock Wraithfighter
War Walkers
Vaul's Wrath
Falcons
NightSpinners
Fire Prisms

And you can take Wraith if it suits you
Wraithguard/Blades
Wraithlord
Wraithknight

Martel732 wrote:
Exalted for truth. The WS puts the Eldar over the top; but they have many awesome units besides this one.

Haha, cheers!

And yes, exactly. There really are no outright bad choices in the codex(yes, even the Banshees and Hemlock are usable, they're just the worst of the best). But anything you can do with Scorpions, Harlequins, Nightspinners, Falcons, Banshees, Hawks, Spears, pretty much anything in the codex, you can do better and cheaper with a WS, and since it doesn't take up a FOC slot, you can literally build a whole army with just the Wave Serpents. Problem with that approach is that it's just math, efficiency and predictability. Half of this game lies in psychological warfare. How exactly do you mess up your opponent's target priority if you just have Serpents on the board? The game becomes a race of will I be able to focus down enough Serpents one by one, before they kill my army. I think that's also a part of the reason why people don't like playing against Serpent spam, as it accentuates the feeling that this is just a dice game and whoever rolls more and higher, wins.

I agree the main reason its hated is because it turns/reveals the game as a luck game, roll a d6 who ever gets higher wins the game, save yourself a couple of hours.

 Araenion wrote:
I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

If I ran 2, I'd expect to win 160% of my games.

I've yet to field a ws, but I will do sometime, just to see!

With just 1 or 2, WS are still manageable because most lists can cause enough AV 12 glances to HP them out. But 5-7 WS are just doing too much damage from too far.

Also, without WS, I'm not sure how well Eldar stack up to Tau.

even with serpents against tau its a hard fight.

How so? You can alpha strike them with impunity from 60" out. Tau have to scramble to even get within range. And that charging jetseer council is going to make a mess of the whole army. Even Tau can't shoot jetseers enough to stop them.

Seers is not a problem if you decide not to attack the front, any tactical maneuvering can bring an end to them easily, also the powers they get are random and its usually a lot of points taken away from the rest of the army.

60" is a long range, but how often are you on a board where the serpents are actually that far away from anything?
Most of the time some pathfinders are close enough to take jink away, than a riptide/broadside lights them up and boom, no more jink. Tau can usually kill 1-3 serpents a turn, and even without marker lights they get a good amount if they have even a little bit of luck.

(ps i play mechdar(not serpent spam)-4ws, 2fp, 1 night spinner, 2 night wings.) And tau pathfinders are my first target because of how much they can handicap my jinks(especially on Night wings).

Just be happy you get the jinks. For the rest of us, the markerlights go into BS.

If the Tau have ion accelerators for their TAC list, they are not killing many WS.

Martel732 wrote:

 Araenion wrote:
I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

Exalted for truth. The WS puts the Eldar over the top; but they have many awesome units besides this one.

I use NO Wave serpents and haven't lost with my Air force list. Only lost twice with my older list which is a Warp Spider list.

Wave Serpents are awesome... But not the only tool in the shed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Martel732 wrote:
Just be happy you get the jinks. For the rest of us, the markerlights go into BS.

If the Tau have ion accelerators for their TAC list, they are not killing many WS.

Riptides can smash Wave Serpents just fine, and are fast enough to do it. If the enemy wants to jump out...goood...

 ductvader wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Araenion wrote:
I use 1 Wave Serpent in my army and I win about 80% of my games.

Exalted for truth. The WS puts the Eldar over the top; but they have many awesome units besides this one.

You can build an army without serpents or aspect warriors and still dish out some pain...but you will need to rely on fortifications for you're AA at that point.

Here's the lineup for available units: it's quite viable for any listbuilding.

Eldrad
Avatar
Yriel
Farseers
Spiritseers
Warlocks
Illic
Guardian Defenders
Storm Guardians
Guardian Jetbikes
Rangers
Vypers
Hemlock Wraithfighter
War Walkers
Vaul's Wrath
Falcons
NightSpinners
Fire Prisms

And you can take Wraith if it suits you
Wraithguard/Blades
Wraithlord
Wraithknight

did you just list every unit?
Because i would quite disagree with all units being a good addition to an army.
Biggest concerns being Hemlock, Illic, and....... I wont say it but i think you know what i mean.....

Vypers are definitely terrible.

I listed available units that weren't aspect warriors and said that he list made for a viable army.

Are Vypers bad? Thinking either going all Wraith (except Spiritseer) or a balanced list with Guardians and some Aspects as I had the idea to paint them with their armor in the Craftworld colors and the helmet in the Aspect colors to tie them in but still make them stand out.

So Fire Dragons and Warp Spiders are good, Banshees and maybe Shining Spears bad, Scorpions good? Never been a fan of Dark Reapers and while I like Dire Avengers they are priced absolutely ridiculous.

On other notes what about the following units:

Guardian Jetbikes (Wind riders or something now?)
War Walkers
Fire Prism/Nightspinner
Falcon
Guardian heavy weapons (Engine of Vaul?)