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Just posting this here for anyone interested, especially if you actually looked at my total rewrite of the Blood Angel codex. Personally, it's my 'thing' to make custom books so that 40k is more playable and fun for my home campaigns with friends. Having finished my Biel Tan rewrite awhile ago I decided to polish it up and make a codex out of it (similar in format to the BA one). Luckily Eldar were in much less need of help and this is more of a thematic book in either case. However, there are still glaring (and pretty stupid) problems with the main book and since Biel Tan are very similar I figured I'd fix some of the common issues on the way.

The goals of this book is to (1) PROMOTE use of Aspect Warriors over non-aspect warriors, to (2) keep with Biel Tan fluff, (3) resolve severe unit weaknesses or thematic inconsistencies. As with my other books I tend to first evaluate the problems with GW books. In the Eldar case we have 2 major issues that limit all other fixes and that is the Wave Serpent and scatter lasers. These are both altered as to provide still useful benefits but again promote a more varied selection of weapons and units.

What is Biel Tan supposed to do? They are a fast and hard hitting aspect warrior strike force that utilizes transports to deliver troops into combat. Unfortunately they've been pretty awful at it for many editions.. Here are some rationals for why changes were made. Put frankly, assault armies that need transports are useless in 6th and need to be made viable for Biel Tan to even function at all. One of the main Biel Tan rules is that ALL infantry based aspect warriors treat transports as assault vehicles. Right now they are the joke of the Eldar book and I don't believe in having useless units. Thanks for reading! (or not reading)

Eldar Supplement: Biel Tan

Some of the key changes

Laser Lock: Simply put, this now allows one unit to expend a laser lock marker (if this gun hits) to ignore the night fighting rules. Twin linking everything was stupid and a huge crutch.

Falcon: This was changed to a dedicated transport and given and Tank Hunters rule. Reason, no one takes it in heavy and I wanted it to be taken as a true alternative to serpents. With Tank Hunters it can fulfill a much more specific role which is that of destroying AV 13 vehicles or transports so its cargo can attack the models inside. Currently it's simply a bad tank.

Wave Serpent: The shield was reduced to 12" for fairly obvious reasons, it's supposed to be a defensive weapon. Along with the change to scatter lasers I envision this tank will be used to transport large aspect units or defensively used with shooting units.

Avatar: Currently useless due to speed and durability. He has option to take FnP now instead of Night Vision (??) and if he is near an Exarch he moves 12" and has a 4+ invul.

Autarch: Added Disciplines which make him a real choice over a Farseer

Howling Banshees: Yeah.. worst unit in the game. First change was giving them plasma grenades and changing acrobatic to let them run + charge. Coupled with changes to the transports they are actually scary again.

Striking Scorpions: I didn't like how they're basically just foot based assault marines with no real "personality". Taking inspiration from the apoc formation with Karandras I wrote up a rule called Strike from the Shadows which basically lets them use terrain to create surprise assaults. Mandiblaster is also treated as a pistol so they can fire both in a single turn, this gives them firepower to kill lots of lightly armored troops which is what they should be doing.

Harlequins: Again, a unit with no personality and very hindered by the DE book requiring the same unit. My theme for them is a fast moving ground unit that is difficult to catch, to that end I reduced their overall point costs, gave them Shrouded via Holo-suits and Scouts and made it so the shadowseer can cast Veil of Tears during deployment. I figure they will be used to scout into terrain and then move up a flank. Remember, they cant take transports.

Hemlock Wraithfighter and Crimson Hunter: Large point reductions primarily, these two units are basically never used and that's why. Perhaps they can compete with the other FA choices now.

Wraithknight: Functionally unchanged but fixed GW's bonehead point costing. It comes BASE at 200pts for sword + shield, then you can make it the current 240 by buying the heavy wraith cannons.

NEW UNITS

Bonesinger: This guy is just something Ive used for awhile and think should be a part of the Eldar book since it (1) has a model and (2) is in Dawn of War series. Basically it's a techmarine and a debuffer of vehicles.

Warlock Kindred: Biel Tan has no access to spirit seers so this guy is a more fighting version of the spirit seer with his kinetic gauntlets.

Court of the Young King: A defining unit for Biel Tan, it lets you take a unit of 8 exarchs if you also include an Avatar.

Special Characters: My own units I use in custom games that have a long history to them. Biel Tan has no access to craftworld specific characters.

I'm not sure about Assault Vehicle from Wave Serpents and Falcons, it's an all-or-nothing thing, it's hard to justify giving Wave Serpents an assault ramp and not putting one on Rhinos (for instance).

Autarchs: One thing they really need is the ability to take some Exarch weapons; something like a Diresword is fine and dandy but if it's on a one-Wound Exarch with no Invulnerable save it's not going to survive long enough to kill very much. A rational fluffwise workaround would be to put the rumored Xentarchs into HQ; stats similar to an Autarch but they can't get the Disciplines and their gear is limited to stuff from their own Aspect; this lets you put some of the cool weapons into HQ in a sensible fashion.

Special Characters: I don't like the Mastery 4 mutant Farseer/Warlock crossover person, the Eldar are specialists and this guy is too good at too many things. Confused about the other guy, is he supposed to be the Warp Spiders' Phoenix Lord?

Court of the Young King: These are supposed to be Exarchs, they probably shouldn't be listed at WS/BS6.

Banshees: Fantastic revision, I may actually dig my old ones out and see how this actually works.

Scorpions: I thought they had plenty of character in the 6e Codex; they're the sneaky buggers. The revised rule makes it a bit too easy to get into close combat with them, I'd suggest making it a really expensive Exarch Power instead of an automatic everyone-has-this thing and permitting Overwatch.

Bonesingers: Wraithbone is used for more things than just Wraithguard/Wraithblades/Wraithlords/Wraithknights, I'd suggest giving them the power to roll to restore lost Hull Points to vehicles/fix damage results or to restore lost Wounds to Wraithlords/Wraithknights, as-is it's sort of bizarre.

Shining Spears: The Laser Lance should get AP2 on the charge, I think.

Planes: The points drop is pretty excessive; I agree 160/180 is a bit much but not that much. 150/165 would have been great, 140/140 is too far.

Overall interesting, but you spend a lot of time correcting for problems that don't exist with drastic solutions. Dial the crazy rules back a bit.

Personally I like the idea of eldar having assault vehicles, but to stop the cries of cheese, have it be an upgrade for the vehicle rather than units getting it for free.

As for justifying the eldar vehicles getting it and not rhinos, double or triple the rhino cost and then they can have it too. I would love for my csm to have assault rhinos, but they and sm at least have land raiders to do that, which can be taken as dedicated transports.

I also like the fact the falcon is now a dedicated transport, GW seriously dropped the ball leaving it as a HS choice IMO.

I agree with Rake about the farseer character. He seems too good to me (better than Eldrad even) and a super psyker doesn't fit with the martial Biel Tan to me (your Autarch character is a much better fit).

Court of the young king: lower them to exarch stats and they are fine.

I think some of the warlord traits are a bit OTT, especially legendary mobility.

That could be used to bring a hell of a lot of outflanking aspects on in your opponent's face, using their new assault vehicles to get into combat. Perhaps make it the warlord and his unit?

For the Bonesinger, maybe make them level 2 psykers who only know the renewer power and can cast it on wraith units and vehicles within 12"?

It would be a boosted version of the power using 2 warp charges that affect all units in range (either that or he can cast it twice in a turn).

For some reason your drop box link isn't working, I can't seem to download the PDF.

EDIT - Nevermind I got it to download.

I love a lot of different aspects of this. Very well done.

However - too much of this is a re-balance of the Eldar Codex, and not enough of it is an actual Biel Tan supplement. I'm not going to argue that doing something to fix Howling Banshees would be most welcome, but that's what you've done here. You haven't done anything to make them more Biel Tan, you've just fixed them. The same thing with your re-balance of the Serpent Shield, and re-costing of certain units. I can see making Falcons Dedicated Transports for Biel Tan, but then giving Biel Tan Falcons "Tank Hunter" seems again like more of an attempt to fix the Eldar codex. Same thing with your Fire Prism change, change to Howling Banshees, and Striking Scorpions.

Your warlord powers are good, but they're too good. For example, No Mercy Even in Death would be really strong if it simply gave a -1 Ld to everyone in 12". With all the additional things it does on top of that, it's way overpowered.

I actually really like the rule that Biel Tan aspect warriors treat any transport as an Assault Transport. Again, very Biel Tan.

I love the Court of the Young King. Awesome setup, and very Biel Tan.

What I'm missing here are some Force-Org setups. For example, if you take an Autarch with a Warp Jump Generator, you should be able to take a unit of Warp Spiders as Troops joined to that Autarch. I love the additional optional "disciplines" that Autarchs can take. It makes Autarchs really the focus for the detachment over the Farseer.

Kirasu, I love the listed changes you have there, seem reasonable and fair. What are your thoughts on Guardian Storm?

 AnomanderRake wrote:
I'm not sure about Assault Vehicle from Wave Serpents and Falcons, it's an all-or-nothing thing, it's hard to justify giving Wave Serpents an assault ramp and not putting one on Rhinos (for instance).

You do know that the assault ramp on Land Raiders are modelled after the disembarkation ramps that the Eldar use on their Falcons (and thus Wave Serpents), right? This is according to fluff. So the reason for Land Raiders to be Assault Vehicles are Falcons. The Rhino disembarkation method is not modelled on the same source and the reason to justify the Rhino not having it is because it's too damned cheap to have one. The thing that really screws the Rhino over isn't lack of assault vehicle, it's the silly first bloods they tend to give (which is an abomination of a rule, by the way).

I love your lv 4 psyker warrior, awesome, i want it so badly... (drool)

Wait, it's 200 points for a JMC with 6 wounds and a 5++?

And...and the Suncannon makes it 210?

Could you think about including the Harlequins dedicated transport which has been forgotten all these years? It is rather similar to the DE Venom and this is how i would imagine the revised version being.

Asp. 75pts

Front AV 11 Side AV 10 Rear AV 10. Open Topped, Transport (Capacity of 6 models)

Wargear. Top mounted Shuriken Cannon, Bottom mounted Twin-linked Shuriken Catapults. Holofields.

May take upgrades from the Eldar Vehicle upgrade list.

May swap the underslug TL shuri cats for a Shuri Cannon for 10pts.

May swap the mounted Shuri Cannon for a tanglefoot grenade launcher with the following profile for 10pts.

Rng 18'' S 2 AP - Assault 1, Blast, Rending, Pinning, Tanglefoot (units that take at least one casualty must pass an initiative test or they may not fire overwatch)

This would be available as a dedicated Transport only for Harlequins, but the Tanglefoot would also help protect your Banshees from over watch or you could let them steal it at the beginning of the game.
Alex

Am I the only one who sees this as massively unbalanced? As a Swordwind player I can't see anyone agreeing to play this more than once. It has everything I normally bring but makes it all BETTER for little/no reason. And the main "crippling" problem with the codex is supposed to be the lack of other options, but you still get a CHEAPER Wraithknight? AND Guardian manned Artillery (which is where Guardians should be... but still). Wave Serpents with Skyfire? Amazing Warlord Traits?
Yes Serpent Shield has taken a major hit, which it NEEDS, but this is the only drawback that I'm seeing.

I want to make Swordwind viable, but I do not think this is the right route at all.

Thanks for the feedback, please keep in mind that unlike GW all of my books are always under playtest revisions :p so I actually enjoy constructive feedback.

There is one thing that is being overlooked, the change to scatter lasers MASSIVELY reduces the effectiveness of wave serpent spam (and all scatter laser based lists).

Okay a new version of the supplement is uploaded. Same link as above.

The changes I made are below if interested (based on feedback that I thought worked)

Warlord traits

Changed legendary mobility to apply to a single chosen unit
Changed No Mercy even in Death to apply only to units wounded by the warlords unit during a phase

Wargear

Removed change to mandiblasters so it uses standard rules. I didn't really care for additional things to remember
Changed laser lance to AP 2. A unit that can kill 2+ save in CC was needed and gives them a specific role
Added rules for massive ghostglaive Nothing special but its something

Unit changes

Reduced Yin'eths WS to 5 and changed Warrior Reborn ability. Keep in mind that virtually ALL farseers are mastery level 4 or 5 due to spirit stone relic! Yin'eth doesn't have this
Changed Scorpions' strike from shadows to allow overwatch if the unit can see them prior to movement. Made it into an expensive exarch power
Fixed Court of Young King stats.
Raised Crimson hunter points to 140. Sorry but the hemlock is a terrible flyer and needs a drastic cut in points, so it's staying at 140.
Raised base wraithknight to 220. 200 was too low, but CC version isnt worth 240.
Removed Bonesinger system disruption power. Reduced toughness and changed wraith mending. I didn't like the idea of another psychic power to remember, so I made it into a LD test with ability and a boosted AoE version with a big LD penalty.

 felixander wrote:
Wave Serpents with Skyfire? Amazing Warlord Traits?
Yes Serpent Shield has taken a major hit, which it NEEDS, but this is the only drawback that I'm seeing.

Serpents don't have skyfire, it's 1 warlord trait that gives it to 1 serpent the warlord is occupying. That's hardly out of line with what other books get. Please see change to scatter laser.

Could you think about including the Harlequins dedicated transport which has been forgotten all these years? It is rather similar to the DE Venom and this is how i would imagine the revised version being.

My original draft of this list included a transport called the "wyvern" which was basically what you just posted. I removed it because I tried to keep with units IN the current Eldar book (besides my custom characters), that have models. I may bring it back tho. However, I gave Harlequins scout + shrouded to give them a different FEEL from the rest of the units if that makes sense?

Wait, it's 200 points for a JMC with 6 wounds and a 5++?

The wraithknight has been revised to be 220 pts for basic loadout with sword + shield or suncannon and 240 for dual cannons. There is no way it can be argued that a CC based wraithknight should cost the same or more than the shooty version in 6th ed. However, 200 was too low.

Court of the young king: lower them to exarch stats and they are fine.

Stats are a misprint, it should be normal exarch stats.

I agree with Rake about the farseer character. He seems too good to me (better than Eldrad even) and a super psyker doesn't fit with the martial Biel Tan to me (your Autarch character is a much better fit).

The character is designed based on many years of a custom campaign we've done, so it fits in that context. But yeah, he is powerful I'll agree and the Autarch is probably more Biel-Tan'ish. I may reduce to mastery level 3.

I think some of the warlord traits are a bit OTT, especially legendary mobility

I'm having a look at the warlord traits, they were a product of an older draft that I didn't put as much testing into. Legendary mobility probably needs to be more restricted.

I'm not sure about Assault Vehicle from Wave Serpents and Falcons, it's an all-or-nothing thing, it's hard to justify giving Wave Serpents an assault ramp and not putting one on Rhinos (for instance).

Unfortunately without assault ramps eldar CC CANNOT work, there is no possible way for a transport based CC unit to function in 6th edition without assault ramps. It's either that orbring back assault out of stationary transports and make vectored engines work with it. There just isn't another option beyond throwing the ENTIRE premise for the army in the trash.

The goal is to make units you don't use actually playable. Right now, it's a typical phil kelly book with tons of auto-includes and while certain units did get big boosts don't underestimate the nerf to scatter lasers that is a fairly large change.

WURST ROOLZ RITING EHVURR.... Just thought I'd offer some constructive advice!

(Honestly, I don't know that it makes sense to include our house special characters in here at all, per se. They are basically meant for Apocalypse Campaigns so regular balance is right out the window on those guys. I didn't put mine in the Iron Hands book and I won't be doing that with an Ork book either, they're just not meant for public consumption, necessarily. Y'do wot'chya want, tho.)

Murrdox wrote:

However - too much of this is a re-balance of the Eldar Codex, and not enough of it is an actual Biel Tan supplement. I'm not going to argue that doing something to fix Howling Banshees would be most welcome, but that's what you've done here. You haven't done anything to make them more Biel Tan, you've just fixed them. The same thing with your re-balance of the Serpent Shield, and re-costing of certain units. I can see making Falcons Dedicated Transports for Biel Tan, but then giving Biel Tan Falcons "Tank Hunter" seems again like more of an attempt to fix the Eldar codex. Same thing with your Fire Prism change, change to Howling Banshees, and Striking Scorpions.

That is part of the point. This is an attempt at a thorough rebalancing across the book, in addition to being "Biel-Tan-centric." Bad units are bad units no matter what faction they're in, unless you make them good; if we're making new rules, why not... make new rules?