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Makumba wrote:
2 out of 4 people I play the most use eldar. Both of them use bikers. It may not be much different on the lose front for me, as I was losing to their armies, before. But at least I get to shot at stuff. Now they will just out range most of my stuff. In fact the games are probably going to be the same as against GK. Two or three turns of grabing objectives coupled with an alfa strike that kills 50% of my army.

Dude, I'm going to get murdered, my DREADKNIGHT is afraid of this gak.

Zen117 wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:
What could we actually be missing that makes this unit worse than it looks? We have all the information about this one unit, and that's all that's needed to show they clearly haven't balanced the codex properly, if they've already taken one good unit and buffed it to stupidity. What else could we be missing that will balance this unit?

I'll give you one:

Army Special Rules -Battle Focus: Models with this special rule that are members of a Warhost can either Shoot and then Run or Run and then Shoot, in the same Shooting Phase. Must Complete....

Or how about this? What if the last two words were removed from the existing "Battle Focus" special rules, "... unless Relentless".

That would remove JSJ for any model with Heavy... like scatter lasers.

Have jetbikes ever even had Battle Focus?

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:

Zen117 wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:
What could we actually be missing that makes this unit worse than it looks? We have all the information about this one unit, and that's all that's needed to show they clearly haven't balanced the codex properly, if they've already taken one good unit and buffed it to stupidity. What else could we be missing that will balance this unit?

I'll give you one:

Army Special Rules -Battle Focus: Models with this special rule that are members of a Warhost can either Shoot and then Run or Run and then Shoot, in the same Shooting Phase. Must Complete....

Or how about this? What if the last two words were removed from the existing "Battle Focus" special rules, "... unless Relentless".

That would remove JSJ for any model with Heavy... like scatter lasers.

Have jetbikes ever even had Battle Focus?

Of course. How do you think they have jump shoot jump right now?

Also: If they didn't have battle focus and relentless, they could not JSJ scatter lasers now.

@Makumba - the range is exactly the same buddy. The only difference is, they can upgrade any number of units, where as before only 1 of 3 could get scatter lasers. Keep in mind, they lose laser lock, and getting a scatter laser costs 10 points and they give up bladestorm.

They couldn't take scatterlasers at all before. Also, bladestorm has never kept anyone from ever taking a Scatterlaser over a Shuriken cannon. The extra shot and additional range usually matter a whole lot more.

 Talys wrote:

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:

Zen117 wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:
What could we actually be missing that makes this unit worse than it looks? We have all the information about this one unit, and that's all that's needed to show they clearly haven't balanced the codex properly, if they've already taken one good unit and buffed it to stupidity. What else could we be missing that will balance this unit?

I'll give you one:

Army Special Rules -Battle Focus: Models with this special rule that are members of a Warhost can either Shoot and then Run or Run and then Shoot, in the same Shooting Phase. Must Complete....

Or how about this? What if the last two words were removed from the existing "Battle Focus" special rules, "... unless Relentless".

That would remove JSJ for any model with Heavy... like scatter lasers.

Have jetbikes ever even had Battle Focus?

Of course. How do you think they have jump shoot jump right now?

Because they are Eldar Jetbikes which comes with it from Rulebook entry. Battle Focus lets you run+shoot Jetbikes don't run. It is a pointless rule on them.

 Talys wrote:

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:

Have jetbikes ever even had Battle Focus?

Of course. How do you think they have jump shoot jump right now?

Also: If they didn't have battle focus and relentless, they could not JSJ scatter lasers now.

@Makumba - the range is exactly the same buddy. The only difference is, they can upgrade any number of units, where as before only 1 of 3 could get scatter lasers. Keep in mind, they lose laser lock, and getting a scatter laser costs 10 points and they give up bladestorm.

They have JSJ through the rules for Eldar and Dark Eldar Jetbikes in the core rulebook. Windrider Jetbikes have Battle Focus but gain no benefit from it because jetbikes can't make run moves and models that can't run gain no benefit from Battle Focus.

edit: Yeah like Eldarain said.

 Quickjager wrote:

Makumba wrote:
2 out of 4 people I play the most use eldar. Both of them use bikers. It may not be much different on the lose front for me, as I was losing to their armies, before. But at least I get to shot at stuff. Now they will just out range most of my stuff. In fact the games are probably going to be the same as against GK. Two or three turns of grabing objectives coupled with an alfa strike that kills 50% of my army.

Dude, I'm going to get murdered, my DREADKNIGHT is afraid of this gak.

Your Dreadknight is boned.

" Instead why not discuss ways to try and deal with this and potential counters (because they DO exist) so we can face the oncoming storm somewhat better. "

Because there are non-terrible games I can go play.

Also, the loss of laser lock would have had no effect on Jetbikes anyways.

Laser lock removal was because of WK gaining ranged D weapons. Does anyone really want to see twin linked ranged D attacks? I'm a WAACtastic cheese spamming eldar player and even I think that would be broken.

 Toofast wrote:
Laser lock removal was because of WK gaining ranged D weapons. Does anyone really want to see twin linked ranged D attacks? I'm a WAACtastic cheese spamming eldar player and even I think that would be broken.

Well...there's always the Scorpion

 gmaleron wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Even then we have no idea what the point costs of the other units are, for all we know they all went up in points. We do not have a complete picture of what the army is going to look like and to make assumptions or already willing to throw out your army over a small piece of the overall puzzle is silly. Do you really need to know other point values though? This is easily a minimum for an army, and either:
A. Eldar AT would have to be ludicrously expensive.
B. They ally in easy AT since it's not expensive.
This defense you're putting up is completely unreasonable.

And claiming that the Eldar Codex is going to be overpowered because of a single unit is a reasonable defense? Are you serious?

Why is it not? One unit can break a codex.

Sure if that unit could handle everything in the game by themselves but the Jetbikes cant which is what makes that argument much more unreasonable.

So because they can only handle eighty percent if the things they aren't?

 Orock wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Even then we have no idea what the point costs of the other units are, for all we know they all went up in points. We do not have a complete picture of what the army is going to look like and to make assumptions or already willing to throw out your army over a small piece of the overall puzzle is silly. Do you really need to know other point values though? This is easily a minimum for an army, and either:
A. Eldar AT would have to be ludicrously expensive.
B. They ally in easy AT since it's not expensive.
This defense you're putting up is completely unreasonable.

And claiming that the Eldar Codex is going to be overpowered because of a single unit is a reasonable defense? Are you serious?

Why is it not? One unit can break a codex.

Sure if that unit could handle everything in the game by themselves but the Jetbikes cant which is what makes that argument much more unreasonable.

So because they can only handle eighty percent if the things they aren't?

Bikes can handle everything exept heavy armour. Literally everything. Swarms to elite infantry, light vehicles to flyers. None of these an stand up to the amount of cheap str 6 shots coming their way.

The fact they can fill up a compulsory troop choice makes matters worse.

Add fire dragons, wraithguard or a wraithknight and you are good to go.

So I agree with ImAGeek, one unit can unbalance a codex, especially if it is a compulsory choice with no additional costs or requirements that is horribly fast, with a long range and fires a bucket worth of dice per turn that can deal with almost all of an opposing army.

@Makumba & Eldarain -- Of course, you're right. I've been posting on this silly topic (and the one in News) so long that my brain is scrambled. I am getting rules confused. Also, I actually haven't played my Eldar since 5e -- mostly because of a lack of new models.

Wayyyy back, when this topic first started (a whole TWO days ago?)... I was saying that because the Windrider has such great mobility, I think the Shuriken Cannon is a smarter weapon than the Scatter Laser, but perhaps that's because of the units in our meta. You give up 12" and 1 shot, gain AP5 (instead of 6) and bladestorm.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Toofast wrote:
Laser lock removal was because of WK gaining ranged D weapons. Does anyone really want to see twin linked ranged D attacks? I'm a WAACtastic cheese spamming eldar player and even I think that would be broken.

Well...there's always the Scorpion

The scorpion is 650 points without any upgrades, you'll probably be able to take 2 WK (maybe 1.5) for that which are just as killy at range, better in close combat, more maneuverable, tougher to take down and can fire at more targets.

Has anyone considered the physical cost of buying so many jet bikes?

Buying 40 bikes from new is ridiculous in terms of monetary costs. Buying second hand will be cheaper but still costly as the second hand price will go up with the demand. And you have to buy the weapons to get them up to scratch which again will increase in price due to demand.

Here in Australia - I don't think anyone but the most WAAC (and loaded!) dedicated player would invest that much cash in this army. Adding warlocks makes it even crazier!

Personally, I am not expecting more than 10-15 of these bikes in any but the most crazy force.

 Massaen wrote:
Has anyone considered the physical cost of buying so many jet bikes?

Buying 40 bikes from new is ridiculous in terms of monetary costs. Buying second hand will be cheaper but still costly as the second hand price will go up with the demand. And you have to buy the weapons to get them up to scratch which again will increase in price due to demand.

Here in Australia - I don't think anyone but the most WAAC (and loaded!) dedicated player would invest that much cash in this army. Adding warlocks makes it even crazier!

Personally, I am not expecting more than 10-15 of these bikes in any but the most crazy force.

Australia is a special case

Granted, not cheap, but there are people who do such things all the time.

You needn't even go for 40. Hell, even just 10 bikes are putting out more raw long range firepower than my Imperial Guard army

How much more expensive is a jetbike army?

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Massaen wrote:
Has anyone considered the physical cost of buying so many jet bikes?

Buying 40 bikes from new is ridiculous in terms of monetary costs. Buying second hand will be cheaper but still costly as the second hand price will go up with the demand. And you have to buy the weapons to get them up to scratch which again will increase in price due to demand.

Here in Australia - I don't think anyone but the most WAAC (and loaded!) dedicated player would invest that much cash in this army. Adding warlocks makes it even crazier!

Personally, I am not expecting more than 10-15 of these bikes in any but the most crazy force.

Australia is a special case

Granted, not cheap, but there are people who do such things all the time.

You needn't even go for 40. Hell, even just 10 bikes are putting out more raw long range firepower than my Imperial Guard army

In hindsight, I am guilty of dropping cash on models I want to use (see the 3 dune crawlers, 6 iron striders and so on coming to me now!)

I still think the physical cost and time to build the max bike CAD will limit how often we see it - you are more likely to see 3 knights than 40 bikes IMO.

40 bikes (new) will be $850 or so here in Australia - add 4 warlocks adds another $200+! that's only just over 1200 points as well - this army would easily break $1500 retail I would expect here in Aus.

 Accolade wrote:
How much more expensive is a jetbike army?

Exactly as expensive as Games Workshop wants it to be. Or to be more on point: $410.00 MSRP for thirty of them.

 Massaen wrote:
Has anyone considered the physical cost of buying so many jet bikes?

Buying 40 bikes from new is ridiculous in terms of monetary costs. Buying second hand will be cheaper but still costly as the second hand price will go up with the demand. And you have to buy the weapons to get them up to scratch which again will increase in price due to demand.

Here in Australia - I don't think anyone but the most WAAC (and loaded!) dedicated player would invest that much cash in this army. Adding warlocks makes it even crazier!

Personally, I am not expecting more than 10-15 of these bikes in any but the most crazy force.

That didn't stop 120 metal hormagaunt guy in 2nd ed.

Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

 Ferros wrote:
Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

I like this guy. Maybe you can convince my friends that Necrons aren't as bad as they all think.

 Ferros wrote:
Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

BA. BA can't even touch the current codex. Not with a 20-foot pole.

First of all, the only thing compulsory is 1 HQ which unlocks up to 60 jetbikes. I personally think the magic number is 30 jetbikes. I don't know of an eldar player that doesn't already own some bikes and scatter lasers can be purchased on ebay. The average eldar player will buy probably 20 jetbikes, and maybe a farseer and a couple warlocks on bikes if they haven't already converted them. People are acting like a jetbike army will cost twice as much money as any other eldar build. In reality, it might be $200 more to build jetbike spam from the ground up than any other competitive eldar build. They're insanely quick and easy to build/paint also. Model cost and build time is not going to stop anyone from having a 30 jetbike army painted and ready to go within a month or two of the codex being released.

120 shots is not substantially weaker than 160 shots. It's hard to deal with 50-60 right now.

Yeah, jet seer is what? 115? Add 30-40 jetbikes, a wk and some fire dragons in WSs. Profit.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I know at least two guys around here with 40 jetbikes already. They're good to go.

Martel732 wrote:

 Ferros wrote:
Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

BA. BA can't even touch the current codex. Not with a 20-foot pole.

Martel, I agree with a lot of your posts, but your bashing on BA is not one of them. BA are a decent dex with good formations and I've had plently of success with them vs my meta. Get off the whine ban wagon. (Local meta being everything but eldar) with pretty decent lists all around.

 Ferros wrote:
Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

It's not 1,500pts with 'compulsory units' because all you need is a HQ. We don't even know the bonuses for the formations yet, they might get even more bonkers with them, but atm you don't even need to run them in formation.

 raiden wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Ferros wrote:
Take AV 13/14 or AV12 w/ save vehicles of your choice. Preferably one is HQ or transport for HQ.

Bubble wrap with your best toughness/save-per-point units.

Voila.

People keep running these scenarios with 1k points of JB that are nearly 1,500 with compulsory units. They want to do that, then you have to kill all of one or two other units and you can clean up the rest of the game with heavy firepower.

I think there is a not only a lot of fear mongering, and still curious to see if there is a caveat. I wouldn't put it past a company to put out something like this to intentionally stir the pot and perhaps get some early sales before the rest of the picture is clear.

Even if you're from "GW JUST WANTS $$$ LAWL" standpoint, if the only things selling are Jetbikes and the compulsory, you're taking A LOT of losses on everything else, so that makes no sense.

Yes you might have to tailor some, and that's unpleasant and hurts builds (which is annoying and I agree, stupid) but unstoppable? Pffffft.

Really, give me an army and I can suggest a counter.

BA. BA can't even touch the current codex. Not with a 20-foot pole.

Martel, I agree with a lot of your posts, but your bashing on BA is not one of them. BA are a decent dex with good formations and I've had plently of success with them vs my meta. Get off the whine ban wagon. (Local meta being everything but eldar) with pretty decent lists all around.

Let's just keep this to a challenge for the other poster, okay? We can make another thread about why I think the BA codex is actually quite poor, and why I think the formations fall very short of making it even an average codex.

Here's an idea for a counter: Drop pods and Flyers. I'll be using Blood Angels for this, but regular marines can do much the same. Pardon my ignorance, as I'm not fully versed in the fine details of either.

Step 1: Aim for null deployment. Everything that isn't in a pod is inside a Stormraven. Your can't be alpha-striked if you have nothing on the board!
If this isn't possible, hide some scouts with camo cloaks in area terrain or ruins. GTG for a 2+ cover save.

Step 2: Drop in, using the half-rounded-up trick to get as many pods as close as possible.
Pods should contain: (Wave 1)
Dreadnoughts with assault cannons and flamers. Alternatively, a Fragioso or Shooty DC dread. AV12 is considerably harder to hurt with S6.
Cheap Librarian rolling on Telepathy. Psychic Shriek the jetbikes to death before you get wiped out
Honor Guard/Sternguard or Command Squad with plasma. These go with the Librarian.

(Wave 2)
Tac squads with melta and plasma. Alternatively, melta and heavy flamer. These guys go on the objectives the jetbikes took.

Step 3: Stormraven comes in blasting. Use POTMS to force as many jinks as possible on the remaining jetbikes.
Dump out the contents: Assault marines+Librarian or Chaplain/Dreadnought and more Sternguard. Alternatively, Death Company.

Step 4: ???

Step 5: Profit!

(I couldn't resist)