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 Rypher wrote:
Hosting a Mini tournament on Wednesday. 750 points, single codex/faction, battle forged only. Some other restrictions such as max total armor value of 33, no 2+ multi-wound models or units, etc.

Heroes' Path
Death Jester
Shadowseer - Level 2, Mask of Secrets
Solitaire - Cegorach's Rose

Cegorach's Jest
Troupe - 3 kisses, 2 Embrace. Haywire on Master. Starweaver
Skyweavers - 2x bolas, 1x glaive. 3x shuriken cannons
Void weaver - 1 weaver, Prismatic cannon


Never used the prismatic on the voidweaver, but it should help out with some more anti-tank punch. Normally I'm happy with the haywire blast, but with most things being av 11 or lower, the skyweavers and jester usually get the job done.

You play in the tournaments you host? Isn't that a conflict of interest?

Not at all. When it's 10 of us playing fast, fun games with first place being maybe a paint pot, it's not that big of a deal, haha.

I'm not sold on the hero's path. Your characters cannot join other units and so are pretty much stuck to using terrain pieces to have any sense of survivability. Am I missing something? I'd much rather have my characters in units.

I use my death jesters in singles any way for extreme msu, especially when running the masque detachment. All the jester needs is one wound to go through and his work has started, so doubling g them up in a unit may be wasted shots.

The shadowseer in the heroes path I run uses ml2 mask of secrets, and rolls on telepathy. Starting out of sight it makes the enemy think twice about their movement phase.

The solitaire gaining stealth and shrouded give him similar survivability to the formation allowing him to reroll ones, and give me more flexibility with options in my army.

I roll.on light table to grab the redeploy or grant infiltrate to a couple units to get more of my jesters into range. It has worked on chaos, spacewolves, sisters, and nids.

bullyboy wrote:
I'm not sold on the hero's path. Your characters cannot join other units and so are pretty much stuck to using terrain pieces to have any sense of survivability. Am I missing something? I'd much rather have my characters in units.

In a Freakshow list, they are amazing! Putting them in Venoms courtesy of a Realspace Raiders detachment adds a lot to the formation. The Shadowseer and the Death Jester gain Deep Strike, and they all gain mobility they otherwise would have lacked, plus two hull points (on a vehicle which shares their 4+ cover and 5+ invul save!), not to mention the 36 poisoned shots.

Looking forward to a ''40K in 40 Mins'' Tourney which is doubles 600pt games (300pts per player, 600pts for team) playing unbound in 40 minutes per round.

I really have my heart set on using the Heroes Path, using just 3 models seems exactly what the TO had in mind for short games. My Partner would either play Skitari or Tau, to sure up my weakness in AV.

I was thinking Naked Death Jester, level 1 Seer with Mask and the Solitaire with Rose (We play Kiss and Embrace working, and Shred conferring onto embrace attacks) and Haywire grenades. 300pts on the dot, although i'm considering dropping Rose and Mask for level 2 Seer. But then again, the only power he needs is Psy-Shriek and if i throw all dice at it then it'll probably go off.

With that in mind, what kind of things would my partner have to take to sure up my Weaknesses? I don't expect people to be to horrible (E.G I don't expect a Wraithknight or Imperial Knight) but I'd like to be able to handle one if they popped up. Luckily the Solitaire is reasonably good at both.

There is almost nothing the Solitaire can't handle once he reaches CC. I personally wouldn't take the Haywire grenades on him, but that's a personal preference issue.

 Jimsolo wrote:
There is almost nothing the Solitaire can't handle once he reaches CC. I personally wouldn't take the Haywire grenades on him, but that's a personal preference issue.

Had 5 points left and i thought the Solitaire would make better use of them then the Shadowseer, because she has pinning grenades she'll always want to fire + the Solitaire has a higher Ballistic Skill so he seemed like the best place to put it.

I didn't even think about throwing them.

Carry on, soldier.

Well, chucking a grenade is nice, but I also like giving the Jester a grenade instead. Surprise haywire in the backfield when a tank gets near the jester is always hilarious.

As for the heroes' path, it's super strong. I regularly take it in my normal tournament lists, if only for the solitaire. He shores up my combat defense and handles certain things that a wraithknight used to fight. The jester & mask seer are icing on the cake, with the seer throwing up shrieks and the jester doing work at -2 or -4 leadership always. As Jimsolo said, they exemplify MSU while also contributing to the game significantly.

One thing I find is the seer should jump to ml2 if possible. Roll once on telepathy & once on phantasmancy, usually just taking veil & shriek. The seer is fantastic in maelstrom or holding backfield objectives with both stealth & shrouded as well as 2d6x2 spotting distance.

Lastly, with all of the characters having infiltrate, I tend to outflank the seer or jester occasionally to pick off enemies backfield or cause disruption. Again, who wants to shoot at a 60 to 100 point single unit with (hopefully) a 2+ cover and 2 wounds?

Normally I run mine midfield to start, then turbo boost everything else to one side. Itnleavs most other armies on the wrong foot, with very little in the way of viable targets.

Added benefit is with this strategy i can actually use my small units for viable board control. It usually allows me to claim 3-4 objectives without throwing away units in maelstrom.

I'd like to ask if anybody could give me some advise about what i can reasonably run my ''Heroes'' into and expect to come out on top?

My Solitaire is better then most peoples, because our store plays that Both Kiss, Caress, Master-Crafted and Shred all bounce across the Solitaires weapon (House rules of the TO's own Harlie army) meaning he can handle more then most. I can expect him to squish 5 Orks a turn without Blitzing. But could i throw him into a 20 man Blob and expect him to grind them down, or would he drown in bodies? I imagine he can beat most Walkers? Would he do 2-3 hull points worth of damage (including grenade throw)?

Similarly can i use the Shadowseer to fight anything more then 5 man scout squads? Can i expect a kill a turn from the Death Jester against MEQ's? I've never just used 3 models in a game before, and especially when they are as fragile as they are, i'd like to know what sort of situations i can put them in and expect good results.

The Solitaire can handle Monstrous Creatures pretty well. He also excels at small elite groups. Big blobs are more the Death Jester's forte.

Psychic Shriek plus the mask of secrets means the Shadowseer can do lots of damage to infantry groups, too.

Death is Not Enough makes the Death Jester hell in a skimmer to board hungers, jump units, or bikes. Especially if your masked Shadowseer is standing nearby...

At this low points level, your Shadowseer can't do much against vehicles, which means your Solitaire is going to take point on beefy vehicles. The Jester Can pick up the slack on light armor, though.

I hope this helps.

I just wanted to say that... My Solitaire one-shotted a Tervigon tonight and then took another one down with caresses while 9 Gaunts were struggling to defend it. The Solitaire only took one wound in the process. A Shadowseer one-shotted a Malanthrope with Mirror of the Minds.... Peal of Discord concussing Genestealers was *perfect* because they hurt Harlies... Fun match and a good win with a Cegorach's Revenge formation.

I'm really impressed with Shadowseer powers, the only one I don't really like is Veil of Tears, I find it useless.

Anyone still playing Harlequins? Winning anything? FLGS tournaments?

Played mono-harlequins not long ago. 1500 game, tried out Cegorarch's revenge.



Played against an ultramarine player with a squad of 3 demolishers, a formation of 2 wirlwinds with a techmarine, calgar+grav cents in a pod, Telion and a bunch of marines.

I got 1-st turn and the opponent placed his forces in a way i couldn't get to the tanks with haywire blasts from skyweavers. He also decided to reserve all his tactical marines. As he said afterwards, he felt that i had too many shuricannons on board for tactical marines. And probably, he wanted to get rid of death jesters first.

Personally, i see it as a tactical error cause he just did some minor damage with an apoc s10 ap1 blast - stunned a voidweaver and missed everything else. And got basically everything destroyed before his tactical marines had a chance to arrive turn 2. He gave up turn 3.

Some things of note:
-Cegorarch's revenge is a great formation. I think it's the way to go if you're running Harlequins in 1500+ games. Run after charge and rerolling 1-s on invuls + it basically contains all the stuff you'd need anywayz. Well, star and voidweavers aren't really worth their points but they're still functional and not all that bad. Haywire blasts are fine. Shuricannons are fine. 4++ with rerolling of 1-s is fine. Still too costly but not horribly so. Other stuff is plain good.

-Shadowseers are an all-star and a moving force of harlequins. Can't do stuff without them, basically. Never enough WC in a mono list.

-Solitaire is a mixed bag. Yes, it's fast and can bring pain to the backlines but he's really not all that killy and durable. In this game, he didn't manage to kill a techmarine in one go. His statline is deceptive. You can get carried away with cool numbers but than you get 1 rend and that's it for 150 pts. Than you got to make a bunch of 3++ cause he inevitebly gets to make a bunch of saves with his t3.

-Didn't get any benefits of starmist raiment cause got charged before having an opportunity to run. I think it might be a good thing to tank some wounds in challenges.

-Prismatic cannon is garbage. I'll stick with basic haywire blast next time. On the other hand, too many haywire blasts can be not good cause you could end up playing vs stuff without vehicles. I'll probably wtill run a voidweaver with a haywire blast but the 2-d squad of starweavers with shuricannons. Never enough shuricannons.

-Transports are paper-thin but 2 shuricannons are nice. 4++ with rerolling ones is also quite good. So, they don't go down as easilly as ork trukks and can perform some decent shooting. Need to be used very carefully cause their full potential is not just delivery.

I tend to prefer masque+Heroes Path to Cegorach's revenge, having played both. The reroll to 5++ save units is really negligible, the big boost is to the Solitaure, and the path gives him a 2+ cover save anyway. I find granting one Shadowseer, death jester and solitaire 2+ saves kind of offsets the reroll 1s when you factor in the board control you get from infiltration and not having to take 3 DJs.

I think 1 DJ with infiltrate to get him exactly where he needs to be to hit a scary enemy unit, who then doesn't have to split the focus of the squad he's in is worth 3 that have to guess where the enemy will be and who die to a stiff breeze.

I still run a Heroes Path in my main eldar list. Usually outflank the shadowseer and the jester, deep strike the solitaire or infiltrate as needed.

As stated, 2+ cover goes a long way. Only a level 1 seer, but having an outflanking shriek with -2 leadership is great.

I still stick with the rose on my solitaire. We already pay a hefty price for him, so a few more points to ensure his kiss is effective is worth it in my books.


In all honesty, if harlequins had an HQ unit, most of their problems would be solved by being able to take a CAD instead of the horrible masque detachment or very restrictive formations for shadowseers, jesters, and the solitaire.

And what's in a main detachment doing all the killing

Farseer, 6 units of spiders, warp hunters, and an inferno wraithknight. Heroes add a huge distraction and annoying presence on the field.

Oh, that's eldar core. I was referring to playing harlequins.

Yeah I was really REALLY hoping the clowns would get something, anything for their heavy slots with the new IA11 book but, alas. Just more toys for the spoilt child of the Eldar triplets, and none for the rejects.

the_scotsman wrote:
Yeah I was really REALLY hoping the clowns would get something, anything for their heavy slots with the new IA11 book but, alas. Just more toys for the spoilt child of the Eldar triplets, and none for the rejects.

Did you just call Harlequins the rejects? The mind boggles...

Harlequins and DE.

As opposed to CWE, who already have dozens of options and best-in-game options at that? How hard would it have been to give either of them access to the shiny FW stuff for the corsairs that CWE just get by default?

mercury14 wrote:
Anyone still playing Harlequins? Winning anything? FLGS tournaments?

I'm actually in the middle of a protracted ITC tournament sponsored by our FLGS. There were 18 participants in it who all submitted 1850pt lists. We had two-week periods to get our matchups completed before advancing to the next round. Everyone played three games at minimum. Top eight advance to the single elimination playoffs.

I fielded an all-Harlequin Masque Detachment. I would normally do Cegorach's Revenge, but knowing there would be lots of heavy hitting lists out there I decided to try something new for me: two Shadowseers instead of three and a max unit of Skyweavers w/ 4x Zephyrglaives and Shuriken Cannons so i can have a little more range in my list than I normally would.

My first matchup was against Dark Angels w/ Space Wolves allies. I managed to pull out the victory in Turn 6, 5-1. My second matchup was against an all-Dark Angels list with several Ravenwing Knights units and a Deathwing Knight unit that was 11 strong (counting the Librarian added to it), plus the Land Speeder formation that allowed it to make Overwatch shots against a unit charging one of its friendly units within 24". I wound up winning that one 11-0 after Turn 6. With a record of 2-0, I went up against a 2-0 Necron Decurion list with a Reclamation Legion, a Royal Court and a Living Tomb w/ just an Obelisk in it. Had the game ended on Turn 5 I would've won 10-2. Had it ended on Turn 6 there was a chance it could've ended in a draw. It went to Turn 7 and I lost 11-0. In the end I made the playoffs as the #6 seed. My next matchup is against a Grey Knights first strike list with Flesh Tearers allies and a Culexus Assassin (the opponent went 2-0-1 for the #3 seed).

All in all, I'm pleased with how the mono-Harlequins list is performing. I went in thinking I would be fortunate to get one win and suffer a couple hard luck losses. As it turned out it's gone much better.

That's awesome! Do you find melee jetbikes without grenades any good? Are you running troupes in transports?

Sounds like the clowns did good. Can you tell us your list and a bit more details about the battles?

 koooaei wrote:
That's awesome! Do you find melee jetbikes without grenades any good? Are you running troupes in transports?

I used to always arm my Skyweavers with Haywire Cannons but needed to shed points if I wanted to field a full unit of 6. As I still wanted to have some Haywire Cannons, I shifted the burden to the Voidweavers, which I had always previously equipped with Prismatic Cannons. This shift actually paid off handsomely and allowed more flexibility by the Skyweavers from a defensive standpoint. Before I was reluctant to lose Blast shots by Jinking. With Shuriken Cannons I could feel more comfortable about Jinking to improve longevity as I still had a chance--albeit small--to get some shots in on targets of interest.

I only run one Troupe in a Starweaver, which is not dedicated and fills out the second Fast Attack slot of the Masque Detachment FOC. The other two Troupes are on foot.

MrFlutterPie wrote:Sounds like the clowns did good. Can you tell us your list and a bit more details about the battles?

Here's the list I used, all part of one Masque Detachment:

TROOPS
Troupe (10) w/ 9x Embrace/SP
- Troupe Master w/ Starmist Raiment, Caress, SP, Haywire Grenades [WARLORD]

Troupe (10) w/ 9x Kiss/SP
- Troupe Master w/ Cegorach's Rose, SP, Haywire Grenades

Troupe (6) w/ 5x Caress/Neuro Disruptor
- Troupe Master w/ Storied Sword, ND, Haywire Grenades

FAST ATTACK
Starweaver
Skyweavers (6) w/ 4x Zephyrglaive/ShurCan, 2x Star Bolas/ShurCan

HEAVY SUPPORT
Voidweavers (3) w/ 3x Haywire Cannon

ELITE
2x Death Jester w/ Haywire Grenades
Shadowseer w/ ML2, SP, Miststave, HGL, Mask of Secrets
Shadowseer w/ ML2, SP, Miststave, HGL, The Laughing God's Eye


GAME #1
This was against a DA/SW list that had a Deathstar composed of Ravenwing Command Squad, a Librarian on a Bike (warlord) and two Wolf Lords on Thunderwolves. It also had a second Librarian in Terminator armor w/ 5 Deathwing Knights, a Nephilim Jetfighter, a Devastator Squad w/ 4 Lascannons, 2 basic Blood Claw squads and two basic Tac Squads. This game was a lot of me shuffling around taking out targets of opportunity (all the Tac Squads and Blood Claws) rather quickly as they were completely wiped out by the end of my Turn 3 (I went first). It took until Turn 4 to get rid of the Terminator squad. In the end his Psychic Phase caused all manner of problems for the Skyweavers as they got hit with the power that forced them to make a Ld check to move, shoot, run, assault, etc., so I couldn't beat feet as quickly as I wanted to. We both tied on the Primary objective but I wound up winning on the secondary. The only models he had left were the Jetfighter, one Wolf Lord (split off for Linebreaker), his Warlord, the Apothecary on the bike and one other bike. I had a Starweaver, the Mask of Secrets Shadowseer, and 5 Players from the Embrace unit along with my Warlord.

GAME #2
This was against an all-DA army that had an Interrogator Chaplain on a bike, 2 5-strong Scout Squads, a 6-strong Ravenwing Command Squad w/ the Company Banner and Apothecary, a 5-strong Ravenwing Knights squad, a Fire Raptor Gunship, The Ravenwing Support Squadron w/ 3 Land Speeders and a Darkshroud, and a Deathwing Strike Force w/ a Librarian and 10 Deathwing Knights w/ the Perfidious Relic of the Unforgiven. My opponent is a very strong player, so the first round was quite interesting. I went first, advanced my Skyweavers forward and did a EJB Assault move back towards my board edge but still within striking distance from his Warlord unit. I did have a number of other Troupes deliberately nearby in the event he charged. He recognized it and didn't take the bait. Rather, he advanced enough to get shots in on my Skyweavers and that was about it. But there were two units he inched too far forward: one Scout Squad and his Ravenwing Knights. My Kiss unit takes out the Knights while the Solitaire darts from the middle of the board to the NE to take out the Scout Squad. The turning point of the game took place when he went after my Solitaire, which was claiming an objective he needed to secure this turn for Maelstrom points. The Solitaire had one wound on it and only two of his bikes had LoS to shoot at it, so he took pot shots... and killed the Solitaire. Unable to charge anything, his Warlord unit was stranded in the open for a multi-charge by my Caress and Warlord units. His other Librarian with the Deathwing Knights arrived on Turn 2, but his dice betrayed him severely as the Kiss unit took out 7 of them on the charge in Turn 2. The rest of the game was clean-up, though his Fire Raptor did its share of pain infliction before he conceded on Turn 5.

GAME #3
This was against the Necrons w/ the Royal Court (1 Overlord, 1 Lord and 1 Cryptek), an Obelisk and a Reclamation Legion w/ three Warrior units (one in a Ghost Ark), 10 Immortals in a Night Scythe, 10 Lychguard and 3 Ghostblades. As the game proceeded I got off a dual charge on his LychStar with my Warlord's Embrace unit and the Kiss unit on Turn 2, though the Charge roll for the Embrace unit was poor as only three d3s were rolled. He stuck in the game longer than I wanted him to, so on Turn 3 my Caress Troupe swapped places with the Kiss unit to do a joint charge with the Embrace Troupe and the Solitaire. Meanwhile, the Obelisk made quick work of the Voidweavers on Turn 2 and redirected its attention to the rest of my force to the W of it. My Skyweavers, which had been turbo-boosted to the extreme NW corner of the board on Turn 1, and Kiss unit took out his two foot Warrior units while the trio of Solitaire, Caress Troupe and Embrace Troupe reduce the Lychguard to just the Overlord. I made the mistake of not going after the Obelisk then with the Caress Troupe and Solitaire after Hit & Running out of combat, deciding instead to have the Caress unit recharge the Overlord and the Solitaire charge the Immortals in the SE quadrant of the board (Solitaire wiped them out in one turn, by the by). That was the extent of my good fortune as the Obelisk, Ghost Ark and Warriors embarked on it took out the rest of my army bit by bit. By the end of Turn 7 I had just a Death Jester left on the board. Had it ended on Turn 5 I would've had both Primary and Secondary Objectives. Had it ended on Turn 6 I would've had the Secondary Objective and Linebreaker with a good chance to tie it up. Instead, I lost 11-0.


Tactically speaking the specialization of Troupes with one of each Melee weapon purchase is ideal and has some redundancy between the three so you're not completely screwed against all match-ups:

Embraces: I always pick my Warlord from this Troupe because there's no point not running and having the Warlord with the Starmist Raiment is tremendously useful. This unit always goes against weaker armor units or low front and side AV vehicles for quick wreckages I can then use as cover before advancing to the next target. It's also tremendously strong against units that have abilities that make it hard to hit the target such as units with Invisibility or perhaps the Culexus Assassin that requires 5+ To Hit due to the automatic setting of WS to 1. The Warlord's Caress and Haywire Grenades provides support against vehicles and 2+ armor, as well.

Kisses: Great against 2+ armor and high T targets, but also very useful against vehicles with low to mid rear AV values. The Troupe Master's Cegorach's Kiss improves the chance of doing damage while his Haywire Grenades offer assistance against high AV vehicles if forced to deal with that.

Caresses: This is the specialist Troupe against elite targets like Terminators and MCs. I usually want this unit to get its shots off so it's the one that embarks on the Starweaver. Fleshbane is great against Gargantuans and high T targets should I encounter any. Caresses are great against 2+ armor, high T and vehicles of any kind, so it's the one most likely to go after Super Heavies. Equipping the Troupe Master with the Storied Sword offers greater potency against 3+ armor targets and more saving throws thanks to the +1S coupled with Furious Charge. That he also has the Haywire Grenades improves the chances of getting an additional HP off the charged vehicle.

Volume fire from the Skyweavers with high S shots are just great in general and an all-purpose weapon against most targets. The Voidweavers' primary role is to attract fire and survive long enough for the rest of the army to engage. I improve its ability to survive by making it a full squadron of three, something I know is unpopular but really comes in handy. You have to treat the Voidweavers as a lost unit, so lose it in the best possible way for the rest of the army.

Thanks for the detailed and great write up

Tropic Thunder wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
That's awesome! Do you find melee jetbikes without grenades any good? Are you running troupes in transports?

Tactically speaking the specialization of Troupes with one of each Melee weapon purchase is ideal and has some redundancy between the three so you're not completely screwed against all match-ups:

Embraces: I always pick my Warlord from this Troupe because there's no point not running and having the Warlord with the Starmist Raiment is tremendously useful. This unit always goes against weaker armor units or low front and side AV vehicles for quick wreckages I can then use as cover before advancing to the next target. It's also tremendously strong against units that have abilities that make it hard to hit the target such as units with Invisibility or perhaps the Culexus Assassin that requires 5+ To Hit due to the automatic setting of WS to 1. The Warlord's Caress and Haywire Grenades provides support against vehicles and 2+ armor, as well.

Kisses: Great against 2+ armor and high T targets, but also very useful against vehicles with low to mid rear AV values. The Troupe Master's Cegorach's Kiss improves the chance of doing damage while his Haywire Grenades offer assistance against high AV vehicles if forced to deal with that.

Caresses: This is the specialist Troupe against elite targets like Terminators and MCs. I usually want this unit to get its shots off so it's the one that embarks on the Starweaver. Fleshbane is great against Gargantuans and high T targets should I encounter any. Caresses are great against 2+ armor, high T and vehicles of any kind, so it's the one most likely to go after Super Heavies. Equipping the Troupe Master with the Storied Sword offers greater potency against 3+ armor targets and more saving throws thanks to the +1S coupled with Furious Charge. That he also has the Haywire Grenades improves the chances of getting an additional HP off the charged vehicle.

I've looked at the numbers on the three weapons and the caress always just seems to be the most versatile and worth the 30pts extra for 10 men. The fact that all of the caresses power comes from 6s-to-hit makes it seem just as good against 'hard to hit' targets and auto glancing on a six makes it good against tanks as the other two. It's then a great deal better than the others against MC and 2+ targets.

http://twotimestwohobbytime.blogspot.com.au/2015/03/harlequin-weapon-math-anti-tank-and.html
http://twotimestwohobbytime.blogspot.com.au/2015/03/further-harlequin-weapon-math-best.html