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 Kaughnor wrote:
Crimson Hunter: It's cheaper, faster and arguably just as durable as a predator with four lascannons. With crystal targeting matrix it hits on a 2+ on the move with 4 solid strength 8 guns is great.

Crimson hunters can't take crystal targeting matrices. That's only for vehicles on a wave serpent chasis.

With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

 TheNewBlood wrote:
With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

I'd still take the wave serpent because of the serpent shield.

 Kaughnor wrote:
I'm not too impressed with the aspect warriors over all with the new codex. Especially where in the case of fire dragon and scorpion exarch's their special ability is cancelled out by their special war-gear. The scorpion claw is -1 to hit so no sustained attacks on 6's. The fire dragon exarch ability to reroll 1's to hit is useless when equipped with heavy flamer.

Or you could take Chainsabres and Firepikes. Where they work.

pm713 wrote:

 Kaughnor wrote:
I'm not too impressed with the aspect warriors over all with the new codex. Especially where in the case of fire dragon and scorpion exarch's their special ability is cancelled out by their special war-gear. The scorpion claw is -1 to hit so no sustained attacks on 6's. The fire dragon exarch ability to reroll 1's to hit is useless when equipped with heavy flamer.

Or you could take Chainsabres and Firepikes. Where they work.

Biting Blade is also potentially tasty with Sustained Assault. I guess for Striking Scorpions the rule was semi-intentional to make the weaker weapons more attractive.

Boogles wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:
With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

I'd still take the wave serpent because of the serpent shield.

I was wondering the same thing. Is there any reason to take a falcon instead of a wave serpent? It's far more expensive and far less durable than the serpent with half the transport capacity. The pulse laser is nice (I consider it a twin bright lance), but the extra firepower is not nearly strong enough to compensate for the durability loss and point increase.

Am I missing something here? I hope so, falcons are cool!

 TheNewBlood wrote:
With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

I don't actually see any reason to ever take a Falcon over a Serpent, it's just an objectively worse tank in every way that costs more for some reason. Unless I'm missing something literally the only thing the Falcon has going for it is the Pulse Laser (which is admittedly a very solid heavy weapon) and I guess technically it can fill a Heavy detachment slot (if you actually need that). Otherwise they have the same statline except the Serpent has one more wound (I guess its slightly larger?), the Serpent has double the transport capacity and the powerful Serpent Shield ability. If you look at something like a Pulse Laser/Missile Launcher loadout Falcon vs a Twin Missile Serpent you are paying 40 points for 1 more STR8 shot (which is about double what it should cost if you look at the price of EML or Bright Lances) and just straight up losing abilities. The points differential kinda matches up for an old Serpent (with standard loadout) vs an old Falcon with Holos, except now you just don't get any defensive abilities on the Falcon for the same cost. There are plenty of example of this floating around that people have pointed out for other armies, but either the Serpent is undercosted (remains to be seen) or the Falcon is seriously overcosted (by around 40 points it not more).

I think it's a combination of the Falcon being overpriced and the Waveserpent being underpriced.

The Falcon going down ~20 pts in cost while the Serpent going up ~20 pts in cost would probably be fitting.

I'd argue that the Pulselaser is a better weapon than the Twin-EML (I'll take AP-3 Damage 3 over AP-2 Damage D6 any day), but that the +1W, Serpent Shield and extra transport capacity is slightly better than one EML-shot, especially for a transport.

Rangers are nice but trying to take them as your core troops choice seems like a mistake.

We have alot of armies this edition with the capability to assault turn 1, turn 2 at the latest, and not just with ten or twenty fast models but entire hordes of infantry- like 40 to 60 models in your deployment zone by the end of turn 1. Having chaff units that can slow those units down is going to be paramount.

Another thing to consider is objectives. We no longer live in a world where min-squads of ObSec windriders can swoop onto an objective and contest or claim it right under the enemy's nose. The owner of an objective is determined by whomever has the most models on it, so short of tabling the opponent we're going to have a really hard time holding onto objectives with MSU.

1st blood is still a thing also, and now that the person who finished deploying all their units first can choose to go first, MSU armies will likely be going second most of the time.

It's true that you need to build a list around the Avatar in order to get the most out of him, but I think he's going to be a must-take for most competitive Eldar lists -his fearless bubble is just too key in this edition. I'm imagining something like at least 2 units of 20 storm guardians with the Avatar between them. That'll form a strong anchor that you can use to keep the enemy at arm's length while your more killy and fragile units do their thing.


On a side note, what are you guys' opinion on the Wraithlord? Is he still too generic at everything to have a real niche? ~100 points for a model with two flamers and decent survivability seems pretty nice as a counter-assault unit.

I just noticed that the Hemlock can use Conceal to give things firing at it a total -2 penalty to hit rolls.

I also was also comparing the Hemlock and the Crimson Hunter against a variety of targets. The Hemlock is actually at least marginally better against everything if you count Smite, and far better against things with less than 3 wounds. Its only real disadvantage is its range. Things can actually evade it by moving right up next to it since its guns don't reach as far as its minimum move, which is bad for dogfights. Jump infantry are of course a lot more dangerous to it just because it has to get in charge range of them to do anything.

Conceal only affects infantry and bikes, so the hemlock doesn't benefit from it. But our flyers look great. 2 tricks I can't wait to try out with them is move blocking foot infantry, and character sniping. Move them, 1 inch away from infantry so they have to move around the model, and if there is a character within 12 inch of the flyer, snipe them out as well
Some other tricks, tactics and combos that might come useful:
- Rangers are going to be great at "pushing" away those 1st turn deep-strikers from your main force. War walkers can work as well. Hell, if you get first turn, you can use Scorpions and hawks too.
- Banshees + drain + sunrifle = -3 to hit on the turn you charge (-2 on their turn). Charge someting with 4+ WS, and they can't even hit you
- Scorpions can be used to silence backfield artillery and shooty units. I think they are overpriced (they pay to much for their deployment trick), but it's a use. Also Scorpions+Karandras+Enhance=generating extra attacks on a 5+
- Wave serpents are going to be crucial, and really strong. They will protect your infantry form shooting and charges. You can cause most enemy units to practically skip a turn by charging them. And after you fall back you can still block enemy units, forcing them to move around, and potentially fail charges. I would give them the spirit stones instead of the star engines for that 6+++. Oh, and the shield can be useful to cause some mortal wounds to finish of that IK. And if you go MSU, you can use them to reduce the number of drops you have at deployment. You can load 2 min squads and 2 characters in 1 Serpent.
- Fire dragons: I would always take the flamer on the exarch. It will come in handy against hordes, and you can throw his meltabomb if you need the damage against monsters/vehicles.

Ok, that's it so far. Any other tricks, combos and tactics you guys found?

gery81 wrote:
Conceal only affects infantry and bikes, so the hemlock doesn't benefit from it. But our flyers look great. 2 tricks I can't wait to try out with them is move blocking foot infantry, and character sniping. Move them, 1 inch away from infantry so they have to move around the model, and if there is a character within 12 inch of the flyer, snipe them out as well
Some other tricks, tactics and combos that might come useful:
- Rangers are going to be great at "pushing" away those 1st turn deep-strikers from your main force. War walkers can work as well. Hell, if you get first turn, you can use Scorpions and hawks too.
- Banshees + drain + sunrifle = -3 to hit on the turn you charge (-2 on their turn). Charge someting with 4+ WS, and they can't even hit you
- Scorpions can be used to silence backfield artillery and shooty units. I think they are overpriced (they pay to much for their deployment trick), but it's a use. Also Scorpions+Karandras+Enhance=generating extra attacks on a 5+
- Wave serpents are going to be crucial, and really strong. They will protect your infantry form shooting and charges. You can cause most enemy units to practically skip a turn by charging them. And after you fall back you can still block enemy units, forcing them to move around, and potentially fail charges. I would give them the spirit stones instead of the star engines for that 6+++. Oh, and the shield can be useful to cause some mortal wounds to finish of that IK. And if you go MSU, you can use them to reduce the number of drops you have at deployment. You can load 2 min squads and 2 characters in 1 Serpent.

Ok, that's it so far. Any other tricks, combos and tactics you guys found?

No, Conceal affects the psyker and nearby infantry and bikes.

Dionysodorus wrote:

gery81 wrote:
Conceal only affects infantry and bikes, so the hemlock doesn't benefit from it. But our flyers look great. 2 tricks I can't wait to try out with them is move blocking foot infantry, and character sniping. Move them, 1 inch away from infantry so they have to move around the model, and if there is a character within 12 inch of the flyer, snipe them out as well
Some other tricks, tactics and combos that might come useful:
- Rangers are going to be great at "pushing" away those 1st turn deep-strikers from your main force. War walkers can work as well. Hell, if you get first turn, you can use Scorpions and hawks too.
- Banshees + drain + sunrifle = -3 to hit on the turn you charge (-2 on their turn). Charge someting with 4+ WS, and they can't even hit you
- Scorpions can be used to silence backfield artillery and shooty units. I think they are overpriced (they pay to much for their deployment trick), but it's a use. Also Scorpions+Karandras+Enhance=generating extra attacks on a 5+
- Wave serpents are going to be crucial, and really strong. They will protect your infantry form shooting and charges. You can cause most enemy units to practically skip a turn by charging them. And after you fall back you can still block enemy units, forcing them to move around, and potentially fail charges. I would give them the spirit stones instead of the star engines for that 6+++. Oh, and the shield can be useful to cause some mortal wounds to finish of that IK. And if you go MSU, you can use them to reduce the number of drops you have at deployment. You can load 2 min squads and 2 characters in 1 Serpent.

Ok, that's it so far. Any other tricks, combos and tactics you guys found?

No, Conceal affects the psyker and nearby infantry and bikes.

I stand corrected, I missed that. Hemlock looks even better

shortymcnostrill wrote:

Boogles wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:
With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

I'd still take the wave serpent because of the serpent shield.

I was wondering the same thing. Is there any reason to take a falcon instead of a wave serpent? It's far more expensive and far less durable than the serpent with half the transport capacity. The pulse laser is nice (I consider it a twin bright lance), but the extra firepower is not nearly strong enough to compensate for the durability loss and point increase.

Am I missing something here? I hope so, falcons are cool!

Did I miss something or did Falcons move to Heavy support choices? Is that only if they are taken on their own or does that count vs our Heavy slot for detachments?

 Uriels_Flame wrote:

shortymcnostrill wrote:

Boogles wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:
With a greater focus toward MSU with Eldar in this edition, do you think Falcons will be worth it? They seems to be very pricy compared to Wave Serpents, but the 6-model capacity might be just what is called for in certain squads.

I'd still take the wave serpent because of the serpent shield.

I was wondering the same thing. Is there any reason to take a falcon instead of a wave serpent? It's far more expensive and far less durable than the serpent with half the transport capacity. The pulse laser is nice (I consider it a twin bright lance), but the extra firepower is not nearly strong enough to compensate for the durability loss and point increase.

Am I missing something here? I hope so, falcons are cool!

Did I miss something or did Falcons move to Heavy support choices? Is that only if they are taken on their own or does that count vs our Heavy slot for detachments?

They've been heavy since at least 6th...

Thought they were transport option like razorbacks...

 Uriels_Flame wrote:
Thought they were transport option like razorbacks...

They have a transport capacity but aren't dedicated transports.

 MinscS2 wrote:
As someone who has played (Craftworld) Eldar since 3d. Ed. and who shelved them for the majority of 6th and pretty much the entirety of 7th due to how powerful (read: so-good-they're-boring ) they where, I welcome alot of complaints about us being "weaker" in 8th.

Ofcouse we're weaker, it was unavoidable.
Perhaps now I can finally get some joy out of playing with my first 40k-army again!

(+7ppm for Dire Avenger Catapults must be a typo though. I welcome us being weaker, but I'll always be against bad internal balance.)

If the new rules will cause some 6th and 7th Codeci-bandwagoners to jump ship, well...so much better for the rest of us.

Likewise, my Elder where shelved during 6th/7th. Looking forward to trying out a Iyanden Wraithguard / Wave Seprent list in 8th. They seem pretty balanced.

Thank you for the explanation.

Does anyone else think the Fire Prism is a good jack-of-all trades with the 3 different modes of shooting?

I am liking what I see there for flexibility and cost.

Did I miss something or did Falcons move to Heavy support choices? Is that only if they are taken on their own or does that count vs our Heavy slot for detachments?

No, they've always been Heavy support since the concept of Heavy Support (and the Force Org chart itself) was invented back in 3rd edition.


I played an 8th ed game with my Eldar vs Harlequins. Swooping Hawks are now forced to be MUCH closer to the enemy than before, to take advante of Rapid Fire 2 - but WOW they can pour out a TON of shots! Dark Reapers always hitting on 3+ is very handy since there are so many ways to modify to-hit.

Being able to re-roll ANY of the two dice for a psychic test (not just all the dice) is really handy. Roll a 5 and a 1? Reroll only the 1.

Hemlock outperformed the Crimson Hunter easily. Autohitting D23 shots always did more damage than the 2 bright lances and 2 pulse lasers. I didn't take the CH Exarch because... is re-rolling 1's worth some 50 points????

 Uriels_Flame wrote:
Thank you for the explanation.

Does anyone else think the Fire Prism is a good jack-of-all trades with the 3 different modes of shooting?

I am liking what I see there for flexibility and cost.

The Focused and Lance modes are often significantly worse and are basically never better than a twin Bright Lance. The Dispersed mode is nearly as good as a twin Starcannon against single-wound models. It's not bad, but I'd be inclined to take a twin BL Serpent for 10 points less to get the extra durability and the Serpent Shield. If you use the Serpent Shield once to bolster your firepower against things you'd like to have the Dispersed Prism cannon for, the Serpent is probably going to end up killing more T4 single-wound stuff than the Prism over the course of the game and still has an extra wound and transport capacity. The main advantage of the Prism is its range, if that's a concern. I tend to find that I don't ever really have a use for more than 36".

What's everyone opinions on weapons for wraith guard? I was thinking of 5 with a spritseer in a wave serpent, but I can't decide between wraithcannons and d-scythes. The d- scythes seem really tempting for the overwatch and still being able to do a decent amount of damage against vehicles, but the wraith cannons seem more anti tank focused. Leaning towards the scythes because of the versatility.

The price hike for Aspects across the board is really frustrating considering that they have mostly been nerfed. I thought that the 7th ed codex had the best rules for Aspects since 2nd ed. They weren't OP (the Aspect Shrine was cheddar though) and every Aspect was useful in the right context. Even Banshees were OK on paper for their cost. Sad to see things go backwards because apparently GW had to punish Eldar because of D Strength idiocy and Windriders in the 7th ed codex.

Maybe GW doesn't want us to use Aspects as much as before. The lines mostly being in resin and all.

For some reason this edition is giving me a Footdar/Serpent spam vibe. Like a strange mix of 5th and 6th edition.

I've been having a lot of success with Guardians, Serpents, and flyers so far. It seems solid, but unfortunately there's not a whole lot else I feel very tempted to use.

Dionysodorus wrote:
I've been having a lot of success with Guardians, Serpents, and flyers so far. It seems solid, but unfortunately there's not a whole lot else I feel very tempted to use.

I'd maybe add Rangers to pick out heroes.

 BlaxicanX wrote:


It's true that you need to build a list around the Avatar in order to get the most out of him, but I think he's going to be a must-take for most competitive Eldar lists -his fearless bubble is just too key in this edition. I'm imagining something like at least 2 units of 20 storm guardians with the Avatar between them. That'll form a strong anchor that you can use to keep the enemy at arm's length while your more killy and fragile units do their thing.

I'm coming back this edition, so I'm a little out of practice. But I agree.

If you're going vanilla Eldar, I think the Avatar looks very strong. If you're not taking him, you may as well take Ynnari.

Eldarsif wrote:

Dionysodorus wrote:
I've been having a lot of success with Guardians, Serpents, and flyers so far. It seems solid, but unfortunately there's not a whole lot else I feel very tempted to use.

I'd maybe add Rangers to pick out heroes.

I've thought about it, but it takes a lot of points of Rangers to do anything. You need more than 7 to expect to kill something with a T3 W3 5+ statline. And if you [i]don't[i] kill the character you'll often have just wasted your time since you won't have any other way to put wounds on them. They're also pretty vulnerable if you don't go first since they have to come in before the first turn, and by including them in your list you make it less likely that you go first since their unit price is below the average. There are definitely matchups where Rangers would be useful, but there are many more where they're just not going to cut it. Most characters are either too beefy or too easy to hide, and most armies are going to have a way to reach out and smash your T3 20 ppw Rangers. In most cases -- when you're not up against lots of Conscripts and Commissars -- I think you're probably better off trying to assassinate things with the flyers even if sometimes your opponent can prevent that. I've also been intending to rely on the Yncarne to pick things out in CC if necessary, but in the games I've played so far I haven't needed him for that.

This below is the only list I have managed to put together that I might slightly like, with "some" shooting to be able to get rid of bodies, some Antitank and some mele.

Finding it incredibly hard to put something together as everything adds up quickly. We are very badly used to 81 points scatbikes or 300 WK. What worries me more is that other armies have not really had the point bump unless going full vehicle.

What are your thoughts?

I've thought about it, but it takes a lot of points of Rangers to do anything.

I'd just pick Illic for handful of points who has -AP rifle with longer range and is a character so his "rangers" 3+ in cover wouldn't mean as much.