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Dissallusioned with how the changes have affected the Seer-Council, i've theory hammered the Shining Spear Star. Which has a much catchier name than other Deathstars, so i'm certain it'll catch on.

It's cheaper, hits harder, but has a few weaknesses in the lack of a couple of key things.

Basically, the idea is to replace the Warlocks and Baron of the council with Shining Spears.

Benefits include; Much better CC ability, at least on the first round of combat.
Cheaper.
No allies tax in taking DE units.
The whole unit can turbo-boost.
Monster Hunter
Skilled Rider

You loose Grenades, 2++ saves, ++ saves on Warlocks, and some attacks. The idea is you roll 1-2 Farseers on telepathy, hope for invisibility, and/or shrouding. Roll a Seer on Runes of Fate, hoping for Fortune, then potentially roll the third seer on Divination, for Forewarning, Prescience or whatever. I 'think' it relies on taking a 2nd Eldar Detachment, to ensure you get the right powers. Even with a 3rd farseer, it still clocks in cheaper than my previous Seer Council.

Here's the list;

Farseer - Bike, Runes of Witnessing (maybe add the Shard)
Farseer - Bike, Spear, Runes of Witnessing
Farseer - Bike, Spear, Runes of Witnessing

Warlock - Bike, Spear
Warlock - Bike, Spear

6 Jetbikes, 2 cannons
6 Jetbikes, 2 cannons

5 Avengers, Wave Serpent TLSL, Shuricannon, holofield
5 Avengers, Wave Serpent TLSL, Shuricannon, holofield

Wraithknight
Wraithknight

6 Shining Spears, Exarch, H&R, Monster Hunter, Star Lance.

Bikelocks go with the jetbikes to keep them alive, and give a couple of extra warp charges. Farseers can alternatively be placed here should the game dictate.

It's fast, punchy and resilient.

The Spears SHOULD be able to kill anything they like in CC, at least, on the charge. They don't care much about jinking, due to their TL catapults, and their shooting is largely bad.
3 Farseers in that mobile, resilient squad can throw out a bunch of maledictions and witchfires each turn. 11+d6 warp charges means you should have quite a few left after casting Invisbility or Fortune. Should the spears go down, just jump the Farseers over to the Jetbike squads and enjoy their 2+ jink.

Any thoughts?

I'd love to find points for the spiritstone or the Shard to make them fearless and easier to cast key powers. Perhaps a wraithknight can be dropped, for those and some swooping hawks or something?

I would drop the Warlocks and cannons from the Jetbike units and split them. Then you've got 6 OS units that can grab any objective on the table not controlled by an OS unit. This frees up 125 points. Enough for a Shard, a Spirit stone and yet another jetbike unit. Though the Stone is only really worth it if you're planning on rolling on Malefic.

The biggest concern I have is that you're low on Warp Charge for what is essentially a psychically charged deathstar. That is the biggest down side compared to the Warlock council against GKs your Daemons you could be staring down at 20-40 dice and find that you never get your important spells through. So ask yourself is that Deathstar good enough with no spells on it. If the answer is no then rethink the list.

To be honest - given the recent release of 7th, there's been reactions about the way in which GK and Daemon armies will be constructed. I think that given 1-2 months, things will level out, and nobody is a big enough ass to actually bring a Summoning Factory to a tournament. If they did, i'd just score objectives for 2-3 turns while the timer ticks down as they place their BAJILLION models.

With 2-3 powers that give the unit survivability, fortune, shrouding, invisibility, I am confident I could pass at least one per turn against Daemons. That said, your issue with facing high warp charge armies is not so much one that directly impacts this list, but any psychic deathstar around.

And against Daemons, shooting is much less of a worry, I think I can simply play the positioning game, and dictate things on my terms.

I wasn't just thinking a Daemon Factory list. I was thinking for instance of my Draigostar with 20+ Warp Charge and an entire army with OS and a Gravstar with GKs that ran at 18 warp charge again basically everything was OS (in both cases the Deathstar was which gives terrific board control). Any one running Daemons is going to sit around 20-30 Warp Charge particularly as summoning is probably their only trick now as Screamerstar doesn't work anymore and Flying Circus can no longer focus on assault. A Seer Council likewise is likely to run nearer 20 or more Warp Charge.

The issue you have is what powers you roll. You roll Invisibility and Fortune sure you'll probably get Fortune through. However you roll one of those with shrouding and its only shrouding you're getting through unless you're rolling 8+ dice at invisibility and accepting the perils risk. As I say you need to consider if you feel that deathstar is viable with no powers on it as there will be turns where you get nothing up and games where you'll struggle to cast anything good.

No, Shining Spears are not good enough, too expensive and too vulnerable without inv. save.
I second FlingitNow - this deathstar is not viable without powers.

I have seen this debate before, in the end warlocks win out, they just do more.

I believe the Spears still strike at Init 1 if charging through difficult terrain. With ADLs aplenty, I just feel Spears are harder to get into a good charge position.

So if you are not assaulting, having the Spears wargear would becmoe excessive.

 Arbiter wrote:
I have seen this debate before, in the end warlocks win out, they just do more.

Such as what exactly?
They get an additional fleshbane/armourbane attack, instead of 1/2 S6 Ap2 attacks. As someone who ran the Council last edition, I always felt it was lacking in actual punching weight.

If you're referring to the warlock powers, you're now really limited in what you can cast, being a single attempt at any one power they have. No more +1 my armour, -1 your armour shenanigans.

Saying that the deathstar is not viable without powers is kinda a moot point. Most of them are not viable without them. The council without fortune/invisibility is just an expensive liability. A Gravstar without Gate, Perfect timing etc, is just a slow bubble of death.

Milkboy - yes, spears would be at Init 1 in that scenario. They're also likely to be buffed with fortune and/or invisibility, meaning they are not going to take much damage. Ontop of that, most units hiding behind Aegis are not a threat to anyone. Then there's the big change to area terrain, so that's no longer an issue.

I do think that it can be viable without powers. On the off chance (12.5%) that I don't get ANY of the useful powers, I can stick the Farseers with jetbikes and play a 'normal' list. Perils is a non-issue. Ghosthelms. So throwing 8+ dice at a power isn't a bad choice. I assume that even if I Perils on two 6's, the power still goes off?

Why is perils not an issue just due to ghosthelm? The risk is getting sucked into the warp and taking d6 S6 ap1 hits that ignore cover on the unit.

Plus I wasn't talking about you not getting the useful powers I was talking about those powers being shut down. Is the deathstar useful when it has no powers cast on it? That is what you have to ask yourself.

 FlingitNow wrote:
The risk is getting sucked into the warp and taking d6 S6 ap1 hits that ignore cover on the unit.

If a farseer suffers perils, there is a 2.78% chance of taking those d6 hits. Being 1/6 to roll a '1' on the perils chart, and 16.7% chance to fail the Ld10 test.

That depends on opponent.

I've been using the Shining Star for the latter half of 6th and they're much better than people give them credit. That said, I wouldn't drop the DE detachment and keep the Baron. He gives them Stealth (2+ Jink cover save every turn, no psychic powers needed), grenades and H&R, which frees up 15 points from your Exarch. With Fortune, his usefulness as a tank is self explanatory.

I also take a Farseer and the Autarch. The catch here is that the star itself is about 2/3 of the cost of the Council, while punching much harder and being a lot deadlier to vehicles, due to 3 S8 AP2, Lance attacks from the Exarch. There's really no required powers, but I like rolling everything on Divination or just taking 3 Primaris powers.

This squad will take a lot of punishment and because of Defensive grenades don't even need to charge to survive. Most often charging them just gives them a slingshot deeper into your deployment zone. And the final charm is that even if the enemy kills off every single Spear, that's just 125-200 points. If the Autarch and Exarch are alive, the squad remains a threat to almost anything.