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 office_waaagh wrote:


Bikerz with a painboy should be good as well; T5 so only wounded on a 3+, with a 3+ jink/cover save if they turboboost and FNP will lose a model to every 10 shots at BS4.

I think the trouble with relying on AV is going to be that in practice bikes are maneuverable enough to hit side armour a lot of the time. I foresee scatterbikes coming in units of 3-5 zipping around, using terrain and hitting vehicles where they're vulnerable.

I would be interested seeing our bikes going against them. Benefits being, we can jink with minimal effect on our shooting and are quite happy to jump into combat with them to finish up the fight. lobbas could be effective with barrage.
Also, what about flamer buggies? I mean coming on from reserves and laying down some cover ignoring flame templates all over the bikes?

Also, the big lobba for some of the IA8 stuff? Large blast barrage could be very nasty.
The warkopta? its a skimmer, mount a flamer on it, load it with shoota boyz and zip across the battlefield, yeh they will be blown away by the scat bikes, but if you can get your boyz off close enough your going to be penning them in quickly.

 office_waaagh wrote:
One thing we've got for dealing with scatterbikes is 'ard boyz. A green tide consists of 10 separate units, so you could give only some of them 'eavy armour, no? Paying 120 pts to give your tide a 4+ save for the first 30 models might not be bad. Putting 'eavy armour on 20 boyz would be slightly cheaper than a KFF mek, and with FNP you'd save 2/3 wounds. 40 shots at s6 and BS4 is 27 hits, 23 wounds, 12 failed saves, and 8 failed FNP rolls. So losing 8 boyz in a tide to ten bikes shooting is nothing.

Bikerz with a painboy should be good as well; T5 so only wounded on a 3+, with a 3+ jink/cover save if they turboboost and FNP will lose a model to every 10 shots at BS4.

Lobbas will be handy for putting wounds on smaller units that try to hide in terrain. Kannons and KMKs could make them jink. Lootas will kill a small unit if they can see them.

I expect Eldar to generally run somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 X 6 Scat bikes. If you run a Green tide that is nothing but 'ard boyz that means 3-4 turns to kill it. Between the Eldar ability to take away your run move and the fact that most Eldar will include a Wraith Knight who can tarpit you for a turn, I think the Green tide is done in any meta that allows un-nerfed Eldar.

Bikers are far less survivable, but at least faster. They lose a model to every 10 shots if they get all of the advantages. But each bike gets 4 shots. So for every 5 bikes they lose 2 models. If they are running 36 bikes they are killing 14 bikers a turn if they have a painboy attached.

A similar problem with Lootas. The bikes will shoot them to death if not covered by a MAWB w/ Lucky stikk or inside a AV 13+ vehicle.

 office_waaagh wrote:
I think the trouble with relying on AV is going to be that in practice bikes are maneuverable enough to hit side armour a lot of the time. I foresee scatterbikes coming in units of 3-5 zipping around, using terrain and hitting vehicles where they're vulnerable.

Definitely. Transports will die. The lucky thing is that we don't need transports to live for 3 turns. 1 Round of shooting at Scat bikes jinks them which lowers their damage output, and there is a good chance that a little bit of shooting causes them to make a break test.

Don't get me wrong. Eldar are essentially playing at a 50% points bonus because GW pooped the bed so aggressively with writing the rules. So it will be an uphill battle to beat, and even the most draconian nerf's that are being discussed don't make up for the wildly imbalanced points costing of the codex. One TO group I chatted with is considering adding a 350 point required "Easy button" upgrade to anyone using the new Eldar codex. That isn't enough to balance them against Orks, but at least Orks don't really fear the D in most cases (sorry Stompa).

 office_waaagh wrote:
One thing we've got for dealing with scatterbikes is 'ard boyz. A green tide consists of 10 separate units, so you could give only some of them 'eavy armour, no? Paying 120 pts to give your tide a 4+ save for the first 30 models might not be bad. Putting 'eavy armour on 20 boyz would be slightly cheaper than a KFF mek, and with FNP you'd save 2/3 wounds. 40 shots at s6 and BS4 is 27 hits, 23 wounds, 12 failed saves, and 8 failed FNP rolls. So losing 8 boyz in a tide to ten bikes shooting is nothing.

Bikerz with a painboy should be good as well; T5 so only wounded on a 3+, with a 3+ jink/cover save if they turboboost and FNP will lose a model to every 10 shots at BS4.

Lobbas will be handy for putting wounds on smaller units that try to hide in terrain. Kannons and KMKs could make them jink. Lootas will kill a small unit if they can see them.

I think the trouble with relying on AV is going to be that in practice bikes are maneuverable enough to hit side armour a lot of the time. I foresee scatterbikes coming in units of 3-5 zipping around, using terrain and hitting vehicles where they're vulnerable.

CMIIW but aren't Scatter Lasers AP 4 thus negating the Heavy Armor?

IIRC scatter lasers are AP6 heavy 4 and shuriken cannon are AP4 heavy 3.

haven't seen new dex but last edition scatter lasers were ap - so even boys get a save.

6x6 scatter lasers is a lot of points.

without any characters added in that's I believe 972 points in bikes from what I can recall. Which is more than half of an 1850pt list.

I think the key to fighting elder like that is to shoot each unit you can to the point they need to take a break test, then shoot another unit. If they jink from any shooting, they are going from an average of 24 shots with 16 hits, to an average of 24 shots with 6 hits. If they break and run back fire at a different unit, unless you are going for first blood which if you can take from elder would be a good thing because they do not have a hard time getting it. Point being, if you make them jink or break, shoot a different unit after unless you are going for first blood.

The key to fighting elder like this are to spread out the orky assets. If you have a bunch of assault stuff in one big unit and maybe 1-2 shooting threats in a big unit, the elder are going to MSU you to death. They can avoid you then feed a sacrificial unit to your boys blobs/green tide and keep whittling you down- probably scoring objectives while you are tied up or focused on chasing them down.

The Scatter Laser is AP6 now.

tag8833 wrote:
I expect Eldar to generally run somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 X 6 Scat bikes. If you run a Green tide that is nothing but 'ard boyz that means 3-4 turns to kill it. Between the Eldar ability to take away your run move and the fact that most Eldar will include a Wraith Knight who can tarpit you for a turn, I think the Green tide is done in any meta that allows un-nerfed Eldar.

Bikers are far less survivable, but at least faster. They lose a model to every 10 shots if they get all of the advantages. But each bike gets 4 shots. So for every 5 bikes they lose 2 models. If they are running 36 bikes they are killing 14 bikers a turn if they have a painboy attached. A similar problem with Lootas. The bikes will shoot them to death if not covered by a MAWB w/ Lucky stikk or inside a AV 13+ vehicle.

Transports will die. The lucky thing is that we don't need transports to live for 3 turns. 1 Round of shooting at Scat bikes jinks them which lowers their damage output, and there is a good chance that a little bit of shooting causes them to make a break test.

Don't get me wrong. Eldar are essentially playing at a 50% points bonus because GW pooped the bed so aggressively with writing the rules. So it will be an uphill battle to beat, and even the most draconian nerf's that are being discussed don't make up for the wildly imbalanced points costing of the codex. One TO group I chatted with is considering adding a 350 point required "Easy button" upgrade to anyone using the new Eldar codex. That isn't enough to balance them against Orks, but at least Orks don't really fear the D in most cases (sorry Stompa).

We'll have to wait and see not just how Eldar armies change in response to the new codex, but how other armies change as well.

Obviously, in a world where 1,000 points of bikes line up opposite a ~800 pt Tide on an empty table, the bikes will win. But that's not what's likely to happen, and you can basically cross the board in the time it'll take them to kill you. I expect to see smaller units of bikes trying to use cover and JSJ; larger units won't be able to hide and will take casualties to enemy shooting. Likewise, the more units there are the harder it will be to keep them out of LOS. They're not that durable, they're as easy to kill as Marines, and every one you drop reduces their firepower considerably. Kill 4 and you've dropped your opponent by over 100 pts. Lobbas will work well against small units trying to hide in your shooting phase, I think. Tankbustas could make them jink since their rokkits are AP3, and making them jink is the next best thing to killing them.

Maneuver will be important to make the eldar player choose between concentrating his firepower and leaving himself exposed to return fire or trying to stay hidden and spreading his fire around targets of opportunity. MSU armies will suffer far more than we will from this, I would expect, though I'll confess again that I've not played the new eldar yet. Having enough bodies to physically deny the bikes room to move will help too; they can hop over our units, but they can't land in amongst them.

I think buggies, koptas, and kans, to the extent that they were ever really used, are going to be the big losers to scatterbikes. Trukks will melt, but they do that anyway and they can at least dump a unit close enough to be a threat (hopefully).

 office_waaagh wrote:
IIRC scatter lasers are AP6 heavy 4 and shuriken cannon are AP4 heavy 3.

Thank you very much! My Bikers will appreciate not having to Jink. Ard Boyz with a PainBoy will lose 0.75 boys per bike in the open. They'll Surive one to two turns depending on cover and the number of opponents bikes. If they were Shootas, each bike would kill 8pts of Boyz whereas each Boy, assuming they're in range, could kill 3 Pts of bikes. Lootas would average 5 Pts per turn at much father range.

 office_waaagh wrote:
Obviously, in a world where 1,000 points of bikes line up opposite a ~800 pt Tide on an empty table, the bikes will win.

36 Scat bikes is 972 points.
A green tide with no power claws or Nobs, so basically 100 boys + 1 Warboss all with 'Eavy Armor + 1 pain boy. We are looking at 1,114 points. And an army that will lose to that 972 points of Jetbikes 100% of the time.

bikes are absolutely devastating to green tide. I won't even bother fielding it. even with a painboy you are looking at losing the entire tide in 2 turns given an even point value of scat bikes, and with the stupid mobility and 36" shooting you are not ever going to get into melee with them.

The unfortunate part is our shooting isn't a whole lot better against them. Their 3+ gives them armor against almost everything but tankbustas, kill kannons and some mek guns so you're unlikely to ever make them jink.

tag8833 wrote:

 office_waaagh wrote:
Obviously, in a world where 1,000 points of bikes line up opposite a ~800 pt Tide on an empty table, the bikes will win.

36 Scat bikes is 972 points.
A green tide with no power claws or Nobs, so basically 100 boys + 1 Warboss all with 'Eavy Armor + 1 pain boy. We are looking at 1,114 points. And an army that will lose to that 972 points of Jetbikes 100% of the time.

Why would you take all 'eavy armour? On 100 boyz? That's a major pointsink, at most you would have a couple of squads upgraded in the front to soak up the frontal damage and force them to aim at the sides which would involve having to get better vantage points and potentially exposing themselves to your forces. Looking at this in a vacuum is silly, scatter bikes might be a significant threat but they can do little to prevent the board control that green tide provides.

they can do little to prevent the board control that green tide provides.

Other than simply killing them? 900 points of jetbikes deals about 72 wounds before saves to green tide. Even in a perfect world with a 5+ cover or 5++ inv plus FNP for every single boy you are looking at having about 3 turns before your green tide is gone.

Yeah, one of the things that makes Scatter Lasers good is volume of shots. As a result, they'll destroy anything that relies on numbers, such as the Green Tide. With the Bikes' range and mobility, there's not a matchup the Green Tide can win without extremely good luck.

You need to look at stuff like armour, ignores cover fire (someone mentioned Flamer Buggies, or ally something in) or volume of shots back.

Yes, Lootas are vulnerable to Scatter Bikes on their own, but not if you bunker them somewhere. Lootas also out-range Scatter Bikes by 12", so even with the assault jump - favourable terrain aside - they can't get away from return fire. Bearing in mind that you'll be hiding the Lootas right at the back of your deployment zone, chances are the Jetbikes are likely to be close enough for something also fairly quick (like Bikers, Boyz in a Wagon or Flamer Buggies) to close in.

pickled_heretic wrote:

they can do little to prevent the board control that green tide provides.

Other than simply killing them? 900 points of jetbikes deals about 72 wounds before saves to green tide. Even in a perfect world with a 5+ cover or 5++ inv plus FNP for every single boy you are looking at having about 3 turns before your green tide is gone.

Well every unit out there has something it will do great against. rock-paper-scissors expanded.

But as for countering bikes, I'd like to see some Nob bikers or even just reg bikers, go against them. Turbo boost on the first turn for 3+ jink, hope for nightfighting to get a 2+ jink. have a painboy or two in there and a number of powerclaws for FNP and ap2. Then move 12" and charge.

Sure the points will be higher per model on the nob bikers, and the eldar bikers will be faster, but realistically even if they keep getting away from you, ork biker shooting is actually pretty impressive. pure volume of fire will wear down their saves.

I was going to mention the Void shield generator. However, as the Scatter Lasers are Str 6, they'll glance the 3 shields off on 3x 6's.

Lootas in cover it's the same as boys out of cover... Or did Eldar lose the ability to pull off the divination psychic powers when I wasn't looking?

how does ignores cover for anything help if you don't have at least ap3? you aren't going to make them jink even if you don't have ignores cover. they won't have a reason to.

furthermore most ork armor does not perform well to volumes of str 6 shooting. battlewagons even have a huge side arc and will be glanced to death on average by 8-9 scatterbikes' single shooting attack.

and lootas... lootas. we are literally looking at a 3:1 shooting cost efficiency of bikers vs lootas, in favor of the bikes. even cover does not help that equation much.

a lot of it has to do with that silly 3+ armor save. our best shooting often comes at ap4 so 3+ really gimps us badly.

Ork ap3 or better shooting is either Rokkit Launchas, kustom mega gunz, or a supa kannon.

I think a watrakk with a supa kannon is a great addition to the army. But you can also go full KMK artillery line. t7 unit launching high str ap2 blasts around seems like a clear winner.

yes, as discussed earlier here and a few other places, the rokkits are not really practical in this MU because of their relative short range.

kmks at least force a jink, but an artillery unit with a 36" range facing off against a bike squad that can move 12", shoot 36" and jetpack 2d6. Look at it from the eldar player's perspective, and you can see that it's a much more flexible, more dangerous unit, that, depending on the situation, will not actually take a single casualty from the KMK unless it misplays or is forced to from outside situations.

pickled_heretic wrote:
yes, as discussed earlier here and a few other places, the rokkits are not really practical in this MU because of their relative short range.

kmks at least force a jink, but an artillery unit with a 36" range facing off against a bike squad that can move 12", shoot 36" and jetpack 2d6. Look at it from the eldar player's perspective, and you can see that it's a much more flexible, more dangerous unit, that, depending on the situation, will not actually take a single casualty from the KMK unless it misplays or is forced to from outside situations.

Are most tables even big enough to exploit that advantage ?

pickled_heretic wrote:
yes, as discussed earlier here and a few other places, the rokkits are not really practical in this MU because of their relative short range.

kmks at least force a jink, but an artillery unit with a 36" range facing off against a bike squad that can move 12", shoot 36" and jetpack 2d6. Look at it from the eldar player's perspective, and you can see that it's a much more flexible, more dangerous unit, that, depending on the situation, will not actually take a single casualty from the KMK unless it misplays or is forced to from outside situations.

It's not so much about finding a single unit that can counter scatterbikes as it is some combination that will overwhelm them. I suggest something like Green Tide for board control to limit their mobility options, Lootas and artillery to keep them hiding or jinking or pick them off when they expose themselves, lobbas to barrage them if they try to hide out of LOS, and bikes to go hunt them down. Basically use the Tide to cut the amount of board they have available in half, shoot anyone that sticks their heads out, and send the bikes to go dig them out of their holes.

Sure, their bikes are good. We still get T5, 4+, and 3 TL S5 shots for 9 points per model less. And then we get 4 attacks with furious charge and HoW. They're better. But all is not lost.

For all that they're powerful at shooting, they're weak and die easy. The only thing they can do is try to stay out of range, which will limit their mobility. They might outrange our KMK, and one or two units will be able to just avoid them, but 36 scatter bikes? In units of 6? They're big models, no way all of them will fit behind LOS blocking terrain, and no way they can all stay out of range of all of our guns. So let them waste time shooting at a Green Tide. By the time they kill it, we'll have them cornered and then we'll eat them. They can't shoot everything.

The tabletop is finite. They can't stay out of range forever. They'll run out of real estate eventually. A trukk moves 24" in one turn. Even rokkits will reach the back of the enemy deployment zone after one turn of movement. Their survivability rests on their mobility, so we take that away from them. And then we kill them. And if they bring 36 scatterbikes, they'll do a pretty good job of taking it away from themselves since they'll get in each other's way.

Am I being optimistic or unrealistic? Maybe. Maybe I am. But I'd rather have one bad but actionable plan than all the complaining in the world.

Anyone else Happy to see wave serpents go?

Time to get the 5 Battlewagon formaton back out.

Adding to that: does anyone see blitz brigade with Killkannons being good against the new Eldar bikes? It basically has to kill one bike to make its points back, and seems like it would be a good investment against the bikes.

Mathhammer (Assume 2.5 hits from large blast):
2.5 hits, 2.08 wounds, 1.04 deaths if they jink.

It has the potential to be really devastating, and makes for good area denial as they will want to space their units out. I just saw that the bikes were 3+ armor so I thought Killkannons might have a use after all.

Also, does anyone think MANZ are a good counter to Eldar Bikes? It takes the firepower of 5 and a half bikes to kill 1 Meganob. If you can avoid the Strength D flamers on the Wraiths, MANZ (especially Bully Boyz) inside of Battlewagons could be a nice counter.

I'm considering Two Wagonz with Troops, two with Tankbustas, and one with an assaulty unit (until I decide I really need some Flash Gitz in their). Assaulty unit might be Nobz and Warboss so I could have one Kill Kannon on that. If I wanted to trim the size of boyz in the Boyz Wagonz I could run Kill Kannon on that to (Maybe make the boyz 'ard since the Painboyz will be with Tankbustas?). It'd have to be the formation from the Main codex with 3HQ's so I would need a squad of grots running around. If I had any points left I'd almost certainly want Lootas.

What are people's thoughts on the Tellyport Blasta? Do you ever use them?

Battlewagons will certainly give bikes a headache, but I'm concerned about all the D that eldar will be able to throw around. A WK can pretty reliably pop a BW per turn. I think Meganobz will suffer for lack of mobility even more against jetbikes and be vulnerable to getting cut off and surrounded. Dscythes and fire dragons will turn them into so much molten metal. But a blitz brigade might be able to present too many targets to stop everything before they do some damage. It would only take five or six dead scatter bikes for the wagon to make back its points.

Against scatter bikes alone, wagons are probably a solid choice, but considering all the other stuff that'll be coming our way, all the Fire Dragons and D weapons...maybe too early to tell whether this will work out.

Blitz Brigate might be a solution. A wraith Knight can kill almost 1 Battle Wagon a turn. And Jetbikes can kill them if they choose to. If you get 1st turn, you might do OK. At LVO I played a pretty good Blitz Brigade list. It looked something like this:


Mad Dok isn't probably worth his points in that list. And I'm dubious about the Eavy Armor. But it is a decent list none-the-less and if played well could give a mid range Eldar list a challenge.


This is the sort of list I'm expecting for a higher end Eldar list:


And I'm not sure Blitz brigade can hang with that.

Hopefully people smarter than me will fix Eldar so that it is playable against the rest of the field.

 Grimskul wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

 office_waaagh wrote:
Obviously, in a world where 1,000 points of bikes line up opposite a ~800 pt Tide on an empty table, the bikes will win.

36 Scat bikes is 972 points.
A green tide with no power claws or Nobs, so basically 100 boys + 1 Warboss all with 'Eavy Armor + 1 pain boy. We are looking at 1,114 points. And an army that will lose to that 972 points of Jetbikes 100% of the time.

Why would you take all 'eavy armour? On 100 boyz? That's a major pointsink, at most you would have a couple of squads upgraded in the front to soak up the frontal damage and force them to aim at the sides which would involve having to get better vantage points and potentially exposing themselves to your forces. Looking at this in a vacuum is silly, scatter bikes might be a significant threat but they can do little to prevent the board control that green tide provides.

It was suggested as a solution to Eldar Scatbikes. I agree. It isn't a good use of points, but more importantly, I wanted to underline that it isn't an effective solution either.

tag8833 wrote:
This is the sort of list I'm expecting for a higher end Eldar list:
Eldar CAD
Autarch (Jetbike)

6 X 6 Scat Bikes.

Wraith Knight.

Crimson Death:
Crimson Hunter(exarch)
Crimson Hunter
Crimson Hunter

And I'm not sure Blitz brigade can hang with that.

I'm more worried about Dscythe wraithguard appearing out of WWPs or deep-striking Falcons, which I would expect to become a common gambit. Open-topped on the wagons means that with template weapons they'll blow up the transport and kill the unit inside in one go pretty handily. It'd likely be a suicide play, but well worth it to take out a ~120 pt wagon and ~150 pts of tankbustas, 'ard boyz, or meganobz inside.

Don't think that blitz brigade will work against d-scythes. With no-escape d6 s hits nothing inside will survive and BW will reliably get killed. One ~200 pt squad of d-scythe guards will be able to reliably eliminate one wagon with insides per turn. Or two if you don't spread out.

office_waaagh wrote:I'm more worried about Dscythe wraithguard appearing out of WWPs or deep-striking Falcons, which I would expect to become a common gambit. Open-topped on the wagons means that with template weapons they'll blow up the transport and kill the unit inside in one go pretty handily. It'd likely be a suicide play, but well worth it to take out a ~120 pt wagon and ~150 pts of tankbustas, 'ard boyz, or meganobz inside.

koooaei wrote:Don't think that blitz brigade will work against d-scythes. With no-escape d6 s hits nothing inside will survive and BW will reliably get killed. One ~200 pt squad of d-scythe guards will be able to reliably eliminate one wagon with insides per turn. Or two if you don't spread out.

Hmm, I agree, but also disagree, if you were running blitz brigade;

5 Scouting BW's with killkannons, loaded with busta's and boyz and whatever else takes your fancy.
Turn 1 you are going to be right in their face, laying down pie plates and disembarking (you disembark because you KNOW there are D-scythes incoming. You don't sit in your vehicle and wait
Turn 2 they arrive, they kill off some things, but you certainly don't let your wagons eat Dtemplates with boyz inside.

Turn 3 you re-embark with whats left (because if he Dsythes empty vehicles then more fool him) and play catch me if you can.
If he has popped your vehicles and you want to charge, you take a small unit; kopta or a couple boyz who are left are Dmadness, and multi-assault - if they have multiple wraith units, doesn't matter if you don't make it they only get 1 overwatch and you eat that. Then you tarpit them and kill them with your boyz.

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Not saying its a guaranteed victory, but just because they can pinpoint DS or can potentially kill wagons and units in one go doesn't mean you should let them They are coming in turn 2 or 3, with scouting vehicles your already prepared and in his face turn 1. heck if hes got wraithguard in 3 falcons (as you need 3 right for the DS option) off board that's quite a few points. you've got a good chance of neutering him before they arrive. They are a suicide gambit, quite an expensive one at that and what use is a suicide gambit if its all that's left of your list?
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In the past couple days I've begun to think that i'm still not quite out of the boyz before toyz mentality and that its a bad thing. I am now really considering toyz toyz toyz! Got some fliers in the post ready to build up the 5 flyer formation, I want to be running atleast 2-3 units of Mek gunz. Im also looking at bringing more weirdboyz (now I know they ain't all that, but the idea of having a dude in every mob who spues out AP2 templates, SAG shots and killbeams is just toooooo good to miss). Secondly it gives me plenty more dice to deny crucial powers with.