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Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Smitty, you offer the least constructive advice I've seen.

Holy gak man, how many wave serpents do you have? I just looked at your gallery.

I can't tell if you're being serious or making fun of the usual arguments defending serpents.

There's a law that describes this I think...

Notice the bragging about wins with Eldar in his sig. Not hard to see why one would be touchy about Wave Serpents losing their status with such an attachement to win rates with Eldar like that shown so prominently. I'm sure Wave Serpents are a rather large factor in that

Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

Anahilation Barges have the same firepower....are armor 13 ...and have tesla. Why not complain about that as well as its better.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
Notice the bragging about wins with Eldar in his sig. Not hard to see why one would be touchy about Wave Serpents losing their status with such an attachement to win rates with Eldar like that shown so prominently. I'm sure Wave Serpents are a rather large factor in that

That was during 5th when Eldar were basically a dead codex.

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

I challenge you to replicate that firepower with Dark Eldar.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

People do complain about the Annihilation Barge. That said, while Necrons are certainly powerful and have a couple units, like Annihilation Barges, that could use some toning down, Annihilation Barge spam isn't routinely landing top place at major events the way Serpent Spam armies are.

Additionally, the AB can't be taken in the same numbers as a Wave Serpent, has a *far* shorter range (24" compared with 60" on the Serpent Shield and 36" on Scatterlasers), doesn't ignore cover, can't be super scoring, and can't be made a practically unstoppable delivery system. A lot of S7 spam units in other armies have also gotten toned down of late. Rifleman dreads certainly aren't as solid as they were a couple of years ago in 5E, and the poor Hydra has been hammered into practical uselessness.

 vipoid wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

I challenge you to replicate that firepower with Dark Eldar.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

You can bring two venoms with double splinters for the price of a serpent. Venoms are a little less effective against low toughness infamtry....but much more effective at high t units like knights and nids.

Your anti infantry tool is assaults which eldar have a hard time doing with their one dimensional codex.

 Smitty0305 wrote:

You can bring two venoms with double splinters for the price of a serpent. Venoms are a little less effective against low toughness infamtry....but much more effective at high t units like knights and nids.

And can't hurt vehicles. At all.

Also, when you say that the WS guns are less effective against MCs, are you taking into account that they're TL? Or, that some of your weapons have pseudo-rending?

Regardless, you said that all armies could field units that put out 7 S6/7 shots for the same cost as a Wave Serpent.

I ask again, how do you do this with DE?

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

I challenge you to replicate that firepower with Dark Eldar.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

You can bring two venoms with double splinters for the price of a serpent. Venoms are a little less effective against low toughness infamtry....but much more effective at high t units like knights and nids.

With nowhere near the survivability even put together.

They're also not going to do anything to a Knight given that is has no T value, those S1 Posion 4+ cannons aren't going to hurt AV13.

The Wave Serpent will at least potentially be able to hurt a Knight, and be outstandingly effective at engaging lighter vehicles, and still not bad at engaging a many high T infantry units, only falling behind *two* dual-cannon vencoms by about 33% against a T6 MC while being more capable against most infantry and vehicles.

Yeah, every army has "their unit" that is powerful as well as efficient, but most of the time, there's usually a phase of the game said unit doesn't perform well in, OR, it pays through the nose to be as good as it is. The wave serpent, with its maneuverability, long range firepower, decent armor rating, shield option, jink option, and easy to pay cost, basically has no weakness. There's nothing in the game that it doesn't have going for it, and THAT'S why people find them to be obnoxious.

Comparing it to the annihilation barge, btw, is rediculous. The barge wishes it had the range, speed, and transport capacity of the wave serpent, and it would gladly pay the handful of points that make up the difference between the two models.

I think my favorite comparison for the WS is the Autocannon Dreadnought. Look at the difference between the two; one is a dedicated long range light AV popping unit and the other is that AND...

1. A transport
2. More shots (Though half are snapshots)
3. 12 inch longer range
4. Ignore Cover
5. Cheaper
6. Faster
7. Better
8. Daft Punk
9. More durable
10. Obj Secured

Vipoid kind of a makes sense. Every army can ally in wave serpents ergo every army has access to multi shot str 7 weapons on super durable skimer platforms. He aint lying .

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

morgoth wrote:
The biggest problem with the Wave Serpent is that you can take 6+ in a standard CAD + Allied format.

Interestingly enough, the biggest weakness of Orks is that you can't take 20 units of boyz with truks in a standard CAD + Allied format.

In other words, the real problem right now is the very reductive meta focused on CAD+Allied which favors a few select builds: IK (yes, they win more than Eldar), WS Spam, Broadside Spam, Screamerstar, CenturionStar, Bakery, AV13 spam and then a few odd things.

Because single CAD + Allied is so limited (at 1850 points), there can only be so many good builds and anything that's free from the CAD shackles, like Wave Serpents, formations, alternate detachments or Imperial Knights (effectively multiple LoW in a single army) will create a problem.

Of course some of them don't, because they're not good enough formations or alternate detachments, but some of them clearly hurt.

I don't think Wave Serpents can dominate in unbound and I would be surprised if the screamerstar wouldn't be surrounded by counters in that environment.


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 ionusx wrote:
One use only on serpent shield as a weapon, if used shield loses defensive buffs, drop to 48" range from 60".

However nerfing the ws is irrelevant when the rest of the codex is powerful enough to ignore the change anyway. If it was gone tomorrow their would be some tears but right behind it would be new flavor of the month spams. The eldar codex needs a whole rewriting whole pages worth of things would need to be changed to mitigate their strength in any considerable way. And even then at this point Its a bit too little too late. They've already had their fun in the sun.

What I would do with eldar is price jack everything, relics units, vehicles, mc's, hq's the shebang and start reworking their vehicles an unit rules. Such as say remove shrunken catapults entirely on infantry, move Jetbikes to fast, make the wraithknight a Lord or war. Really break their army down and rebuild it fundamentally from its bare roots. Make the army fee more elite and make their biggest and fanciest toys feel actually special instead of in every army this side of the equator. And get rid if obsolete items as independent options; like making vypers and upgrade the Jetbike teams as an add-on like marine attack bikes.

I'd also get rid of some other units due to their volatile nature to the slots they inhabit like the spiritseer as an example.

The eldar as a codex don't need a fix here and there they need hardcore open heart surgery

Is there a traumatic event in your childhood involving Eldar that you would like to share with us ?

Here, have a blanket and warm coco, you're safe now.


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 Smitty0305 wrote:
Wave Serpents are fine....you hear complaints of low caliber players. You can assault them and kill them with almost anything. People who complain are bad and have 1850 lists with like two anti tank guns.

Centurions have split fire...re rollable...grav cannons las cannons or missile launchers....and powerfists in close combat....a 2+ save and invul save and tank hunter. If you want to complain complain about that.

Necrons also have very comperable shooting with AV13...

Its not an issue people are just bad at this game.


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 Lobukia wrote:
Either remove its ability to shoot, or shooting it removes the shield.

I'd be behind either of those.

Thats currently how it works rofl

Indeed, if Eldar have trouble getting more than 54% win rate, i.e. the same as Tau, Necron and Daemons, then maybe - just maybe - Wave Serpents don't just auto win the game even if you leave them in reserve and let your little sister play.

not at all but the fact is some armies have no answers at all for eldar that's being totally blunt orks come to mind as an army that can't cope with them. They have no answers to anything they field at all really. The tempestus also have the same problem, and the dark angels and chaos marines are also incapable of dealing with them, or they struggle a lot more than other armies would. And that'a not because of player skill it's because the books are actually that bad.

and regardless of what you want to argue their book is loaded with things that are too easily abused. It's also fact that the codex is devoid of bad units. The worst thing you can say about the worst eldar units is that their "situational" or "sub optimal". And they can literally assemble even basic lists and expect to do reasons ably well against well though out lists regardless of the player experience levels at the table that day. I dont pretend to play meta-game netlists I'm a dark angel my codex couldnt tango in a competitive environment if its existence depended on it. And frankly I don't care about that but even I see the bad units in my codex. I wish I could field an lsv without throwing away 200 points, or therminators (see what I did there cause their terminators but they burn up like thermite an ahhhahaha eheehehe I'll show myself out), or other units in my codex without them literally getting nothing meaningful accomplished before they die regardless of the nature of environment I play them in. I have friends who play other at armies who would love to dust off models that never see table time for many a good reason just like me such as warbuggies and ravenors and a host of others. And something must be done to bring them down to our level because it's a heck of a lot easier to change them than rewrite the rules for what is at least two dozen cases of garbadge rules for nice models scattered across many codecies.

The eldar need a new codex and they need to have a lot more restrain when writing it than they showed writing their current codex and then we can all have terrible books togeather. Because then at least you can say the army books are consistently terrible.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

Your wrong spelling of logical and lack of facts as well is amusing.

WS is OP.

That said, Harlies have a long way to go before they can match even Banshees. CW Eldar do have some bad units.

These threads always retread the same thoughts.

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

Your wrong spelling of logical and lack of facts as well is amusing.

Except...he pegged your post pretty accurately, it was almost literally just "L2P". If all you've got to retort with is spelling issues, your argument is pretty thin.

Fact is, Wave Serpent spam lists are taking top tables routinely, the Nova Open being a prime example.

Hell, I've got 5 Wave Serpents myself and I think they could use some notable toning down.

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

Your wrong spelling of logical and lack of facts as well is amusing.

You lack of inteligent argument is annoying so I assume you are just trolling - no other explanation for your apparent stupidity

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

I challenge you to replicate that firepower with Dark Eldar.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

You can bring two venoms with double splinters for the price of a serpent. Venoms are a little less effective against low toughness infamtry....but much more effective at high t units like knights and nids.

Your anti infantry tool is assaults which eldar have a hard time doing with their one dimensional codex.

I'm still waiting for how any other Codex gets 4.5 S7 shots, 4 S6 shots, and 3 S6 pseudo-Rending shots (all BS4 twin-linked) on a light tank platform that moves like a Fast Skimmer and has 3+ jink for under 150pts as a Dedicated Transport.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(The closest thing to the firepower and the pricepoint I can find is the Sicarian, but that's a Heavy Support choice and isn't as fast or transport capable)

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

Your wrong spelling of logical and lack of facts as well is amusing.

You lack of inteligent argument is annoying so I assume you are just trolling - no other explanation for your apparent stupidity

You misspelled Intelligent , as well as Logical. The irony of calling someone stupid while misspelling those words is paramount.

 Smitty0305 wrote:

You misspelled Intelligent , as well as Logical. The irony of calling someone stupid while misspelling those words is paramount.

Ironic or not, his point is still valid.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Complaining about 7 str6/7 shots is laughable especially considering every army in the game can replicate the firepower for the same points in some slot.

I challenge you to replicate that firepower with Dark Eldar.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

You can bring two venoms with double splinters for the price of a serpent. Venoms are a little less effective against low toughness infamtry....but much more effective at high t units like knights and nids.

Your anti infantry tool is assaults which eldar have a hard time doing with their one dimensional codex.

I'm still waiting for how any other Codex gets 4.5 S7 shots, 4 S6 shots, and 3 S6 pseudo-Rending shots (all BS4 twin-linked) on a light tank platform that moves like a Fast Skimmer and has 3+ jink for under 150pts as a Dedicated Transport.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(The closest thing to the firepower and the pricepoint I can find is the Sicarian, but that's a Heavy Support choice and isn't as fast or transport capable)

I've always been a huge fan of the DE codex, as well as DE players. Hopefully one day I can get my DE units painted and on a table.

Your twisting my words a little bit. I didn't say "Same Amount of Same Shots", I said "Replicate the Fire Power".

The main thing Dark Eldar does is to bring mass Str8 Dark Lance Shooting, and either kill the troops that fall out with mass Splinter Fire from Venoms, or through assaulting units.

The main thing I would do is look at a 5 Wave Serpent 2 WraithKnight 1850 Eldar Army, Compared to a 6 Venom 3 Raider 3 Ravager 1850 Dark Eldar Army. Compare the amount of shots, Compare the effectiveness of those shots on MEQ T4 Units, and compare how many Rhinos each list can kill in a player turn. From doing the math previously the two armies have very similar shot effectiveness output.

I can literally do the Math later today, but right now Im watching NFL and typing during commercials.

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:
Every army in the game can replicate 7 mid strength shots with multiple units. People who complain about serpents are bad low tier players who play static bad army lists.

Stop being bad....open ur codex....and learn to play your army.

The biggest weakness is close combat. Any squad with anything can kill them in close combat. If you force them to move 12+ they stop shooting and problem solved.

Simply lies and misinformation

As is usual with Wave Serpent appologist he is unable to put forward any kind of logcal argument apart for L2P or soon to eb heard - just ally in Eldar and "cheese it up like me"

Your wrong spelling of logical and lack of facts as well is amusing.

You lack of inteligent argument is annoying so I assume you are just trolling - no other explanation for your apparent stupidity

You misspelled Intelligent , as well as Logical. The irony of calling someone stupid while misspelling those words is paramount.

I can learn to spell or use a spell check - can you become intelligent or do more than spout meaningless drivel like L2P ?

Oh and remember oh super awesome player that you apparently are - I play Eldar as well - whereas you are vaguely thinking about playing something else - have you any actual experience in facing Wave Serpents with non eldar forces?

 Smitty0305 wrote:

 AnomanderRake wrote:
<LONG>

I've always been a huge fan of the DE codex, as well as DE players. Hopefully one day I can get my DE units painted and on a table.

Your twisting my words a little bit. I didn't say "Same Amount of Same Shots", I said "Replicate the Fire Power".

The main thing Dark Eldar does is to bring mass Str8 Dark Lance Shooting, and either kill the troops that fall out with mass Splinter Fire from Venoms, or through assaulting units.

The main thing I would do is look at a 5 Wave Serpent 2 WraithKnight 1850 Eldar Army, Compared to a 6 Venom 3 Raider 3 Ravager 1850 Dark Eldar Army. Compare the amount of shots, Compare the effectiveness of those shots on MEQ T4 Units, and compare how many Rhinos each list can kill in a player turn. From doing the math previously the two armies have very similar shot effectiveness output.

I can literally do the Math later today, but right now Im watching NFL and typing during commercials.

I'm sorry, I think I'm missing something. Are you trying to say that there is one unit somewhere in the DE Codex that is comparable in firepower, durability, mobility, and general utility to the Wave Serpent at the same pricepoint? Can you tell me which one?

 Smitty0305 wrote:


Your twisting my words a little bit. I didn't say "Same Amount of Same Shots", I said "Replicate the Fire Power".

The main thing Dark Eldar does is to bring mass Str8 Dark Lance Shooting, and either kill the troops that fall out with mass Splinter Fire from Venoms, or through assaulting units.

The main thing I would do is look at a 5 Wave Serpent 2 WraithKnight 1850 Eldar Army, Compared to a 6 Venom 3 Raider 3 Ravager 1850 Dark Eldar Army. Compare the amount of shots, Compare the effectiveness of those shots on MEQ T4 Units, and compare how many Rhinos each list can kill in a player turn. From doing the math previously the two armies have very similar shot effectiveness output.

holy f#*k dude you're the biggest power player I've ever seen! 5 serps and 2 wraithknights in ONE list?! 10/10 for commitment but... ...yeesh.

'same amount of same shots' and 'replicate the firepower' mean the same thing btw.

My personal approach to toning down the wave serpent is to only bring two of them. Fixed.

SirDonlad wrote:

 Smitty0305 wrote:


Your twisting my words a little bit. I didn't say "Same Amount of Same Shots", I said "Replicate the Fire Power".

The main thing Dark Eldar does is to bring mass Str8 Dark Lance Shooting, and either kill the troops that fall out with mass Splinter Fire from Venoms, or through assaulting units.

The main thing I would do is look at a 5 Wave Serpent 2 WraithKnight 1850 Eldar Army, Compared to a 6 Venom 3 Raider 3 Ravager 1850 Dark Eldar Army. Compare the amount of shots, Compare the effectiveness of those shots on MEQ T4 Units, and compare how many Rhinos each list can kill in a player turn. From doing the math previously the two armies have very similar shot effectiveness output.

holy f#*k dude you're the biggest power player I've ever seen! 5 serps and 2 wraithknights in ONE list?! 10/10 for commitment but... ...yeesh.

'same amount of same shots' and 'replicate the firepower' mean the same thing btw.

Not exactly. A Sicarian has six shots compared to the Wave Serpent's average of 10.5, but I call them 'roughly equivalent' because they're built for the same role, have the same to-hit, are good against the same targets, and the Sicarian's putting out Rending S7 in comparison to the Wave Serpent's mix of S7 and S6.

My personal approach (without changing the rules) is just not utilize the offensive capabilities of the shield.

Lets take a minute and actually look at the Math

Wave Serpent
-Scatter Laser, 4 TL BS4 Str6 Shots.
-Shield, D6+1 Str7 Shots, Pinning, Ignore Cover
-Shuriken Cannon (24" Range which is in enemy assault range, If you move 12 it snap fires. Most times you need to move to capture maelstroms and move from threats. Alot of Eldar players do not bring this).

A scatter laser has a 66.66% Chance to hit, so you have 2.64 Shots hit. 0.66*1.46 adds around 0.891 more shots. So your going to have around 3.51 of your scatter laser shots hitting.

A Serpent Shield will average 3.5 shots per game. They will be twin linked so you will get 2.31+0.785 = 3.09 Shots.

So an average wave serpent is going to get 3.51+3.09 hits per player turn or 6.6 hits per player turn. Of this you need a 2+ to would most infantry, so your going to get 6.6 * 0.833 or 5.478 wounds. Of the those a space marine is going to save 66% of them so 1.8 Space Marine a turn will die. If you have 5 of these your going to on average kill 9 Space Marines a turn.....so your taking out around 135 Points with an Investment of 600 points.

Wave Serpent
-Total of 6.59 Shots hitting per game, causing 5.478 wounds on MEQ T4, or killing around 1.8 Marines per Turn.

I personally dont see how thats overpowered for a main battle tank.