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macluvin wrote:
Tech are you ready to answer the next question?

Are you asking me how to win that game?

TL;DR: There's no silver bullet to make the Drukhari list win, probably not fair to ask me how to make it happen. My feeling is this was an experimental list, it's frail and had some big, obvious holes. There is a way the Drukhari player could have won, but the combined odds of the specific sequence of actions necessary for it to work were slim. In practice, this list depended on good dice rolls and opponents not recognizing what was about to happen. That's demonstrated in the game.

Caveat: I can't read minds and don't have a copy of the Drukhari player's list. Making some assumptions about what the Drukhari player was thinking.

It looks like his list consisted of 8 Venoms, an Archon, a Court of the Archon, a ton of Witches, and an assortment of Kabbalites / Succubi / Wracks and Mandrakes. There looks to be 2 detachments, I'm guessing the purple ones are Cult of Strife. The green ones, I'm not sure about.

While I'm sure I'm ignoring a lot of nuance, here's what the Drukhari player probably saw as the value in this list.

- Speed matters. The list's strength is getting across the table fast to deliver troops.

- Melee matters. He cares about getting into combat with units that do a lot of damage in a single round.

- Everything is fragile, even for a Drukhari list. I think the Venoms are the toughest models with 6 wounds each.

- Positioning is vital to success. He's either going to charge turn 1 or hide everything until he can pull off charges. So placement of models matters more than it would in most lists.

- There is no Plan B. If charges don't work out, he's not going to win a shooting match against anything but Infantry.

- Flyers get a pass from this list. Maybe the characters have plasma pistols or something, but splinter cannons are not really going to do anything against armor.

So the list is fast, frail, packs a wallop in melee and absolutely depends on being in range for charges. I'm assuming there's some Eldar trickery allowing him to advance and charge, since those Venoms can't get across the board without such a mechanic.

The Drukhari player is quite skilled and I'm betting he took this list thinking it was his best hope to beat Orks and AdMech. He wanted to get into combat before he could get shot up, ignoring aircraft because they can't hold objectives. Melee was his cover. When the most durable unit is a Venom with T5 W6 Sv4+ and native -1 to hit, it's clear the player is committed to one style of play.

So let's recognize something that's going on here. The Drukhari list is fundamentally high risk / high reward and depends on sequences of outcomes happening in a certain order to succeed. At a minimum, the following needs to happen once per game:

- 8 Venoms have to be positioned for a charge.

- 8 Venoms have to move and probably advance to close the gap.

- 8 Venoms actually need to make a charge.

So, move 12", advance d6, charge 2d6, plus maybe some Eldar trickery and you're talking about a 15" - 32" effective threat range. That's a huge variance with a simple, obvious counter - deploy such that Drukhari cannot charge and shoot them up. Which the Ork player appears to have done.

Despite previous successes in the tournament, there's a point where the Drukhari player's luck is going to run out. Sure, you could say the Venoms are open topped and there's a shooting aspect that should not be ignored. My point is that's not where the list's strength is and it's definitely not the answer against AdMech, Orks, Imperial Knights, Death Guard, a mechanized Guard list, and some others I can think of. This list only works well against the meta it's designed to beat, and only if a lot of dice rolls go your way. And, obviously, it has the potential to fail spectacularly.

So on to the game. The video is here, for those who want to follow along:

https://youtu.be/5SD2OVJbcKg?t=10641

Each player deploys in their own corners, behind LOS blocking cover. The Ork player leaves some Mek Guns exposed for the charge, and the Drukhari player redeploys to take him up on it. The Drukhari player goes through the charge sequence explained above, and - to his credit - he does get the Venoms into combat. Then the Ork player withdraws his Mek Guns from combat and proceeds to shoot up the Drukhari list, which is entirely exposed and outside cover. The -1 to hit on the Venoms means very little and the Drukhari player is tabled in one turn.

What could have been done differently that might have lead to a win? I'm not going to defend this list, some Voidraven Bombers would have made this a different game. But maybe that would have been suboptimal against AdMech, who would have shot them down the moment they arrived on the board. Dunno, but it's relevant to why he took this list in particular.

What I can say is the odds of winning went to about 0% when the Drukhari player redeployed to charge the Mek Guns. The Venoms were either going to fail the charge and be exposed, or the Mek Guns were going to withdraw from combat and leave the Venoms exposed. Had the Mek Guns not been able to withdraw from combat, the Ork player had the option of simply repositioning his entire army outside the charge distance of the Drukhari and forcing them to make the charge all over again. Eventually, the Drukhari player's luck would run out and everything would be exposed.

To have odds of winning > 0%, the Drukhari player ABSOLUTELY had to toss out the original plan and do something different. Ork BS is not great and Venoms are -1 to hit. The board was covered with trees, parking them in cover would guarantee the Orks are shooting at a disadvantage. That's a way to mitigate the coming onslaught, but probably not the only way. Another way would be to keep troops on the board and only embark when the Venoms are ready to move. That would have increased the number of targets for the Ork player and allowed more Venoms to survive. The Venoms - not necessarily the payload - were key to disrupting the Orks. 

The point here is: the Ork offense is centered on shooting. Making the Ork player work for it is demonstrably better than making it easy. If a unit has a BS 4 naturally, -1 to hit is 33% better. If we're talking about BS 5, -1 to hit is 50% better. That's not to say the Drukhari are going to shrug off the shots that get through, it is to say they will deal with a lower volume and have a chance to survive (even against Dakkajets and whatnot.) 

Also, with regard to reserves - I thought Drukhari (or Cult of Strife) had some Stratagem that allowed them to put more than 50% of their army into reserves. One question I had was whether it was better to redeploy and make the charge first turn or set up on their opponent's side turn 2 and make a 9" charge. The odds of making it might be higher, but also the targets might be better. The Ork buggies were clumped together, it might have been hard for them to get out of combat. Even if the Drukhari player was limited to the normal 50% restriction, charging from 2 flanks on 2 different turns would have at least put the Ork player off-balance. 

Whether any of this would have increased the odds of winning to 1%, 5%, 20% or something else is debatable. But it's better than 0%, which is what happened once the Drukhari player committed to charging the Mek Guns. 

But, seriously - never make it easier for your opponent to destroy your army. That's what I mean when I say the Drukhari player played too aggressively. If your offense comes at the expense of defense, the odds better be on your side. For the Drukhari player, I can't see how they were.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

Tyel wrote:
If Nayden had parked his entirely army in the corner it might have taken 3 turns to die - but you've completely abandoned winning the game. So... yeah, unsurprisingly not the way forward.

It sounds like you think the Drukhari player deserved a chance to win the game. What, specifically, makes you think that?

Because in a good wargame, your fate shouldn't be determined entirely by what models you bring-you should ALWAYS have a chance.

If you bring a skew list and face a counterskew list, sure, it should be an uphill battle. But not a set-in-stone one.

Ideally, yes, this should be the case.

But if you choose a list that depends on long shot tactics, and everything in your army is frail - you are committing to a high risk / high reward scenario with obvious downsides.

The risk with this list is HUGE. The outcome reflects that.

Spoletta wrote:
It wasn't a meme list, but it was also one of the most glassy lists you can build in this game.

85/90 point venoms. Those things may have a -1 to be hit but are T5 6W. Even a basic intercessor has a 75% return against them! And they even kill additional models exploding.

Not to be overly pedantic, but do you mean 25%?

Because as I see it into an 85 point venom, with lets say 3 shots in tactical doctrine.
1.5 hits. 0.5 wounds. 0.33 damage. On 85/90 points/6 that's 4.72/4.95 points worth of damage, or rounding up about a 25% return.
As compared with Incubi - 2 hits, 4/3 wounds, lets say tactical doctrine for 2/3 go through, 2/3*16=10.66, on 20 points a 52% return like you say.

Without checking I agree on your other numbers - I think its fair to say once you crack the vehicles open the guys inside die quickly. Really this applies to most DE lists you can conceive of beyond Cronos spam - and that win rate wouldn't suggest you don't need to be especially skilled to have success with such lists.
Venoms in most circumstances are not especially fragile - and certainly not enough to my mind justify "eh, glass cannon list, 1800 points worth of stuff dying is to be expected."

DE frankly don't have units which aren't - beyond Cronos. Talos hold up better versus Dakkajets when buffed to T7, before that its not all that much better. Ravagers are just as fragile.

In this case it would be easier to activate Freebooters by killing one than popping a raider - and you get more value out of grot gunners as it mitigates the -1 to hit so you are still getting the Freebooter bonus.

But if you could kill 8 venoms at 690 points, I think you'd have expected to kill 5-6 raiders at 475-570 points. And you'll then be able to mangle the guys inside in much the same way.

A Freebootered Dakkajet for instance expects to deal 33% more damage on a Venom to a Raider - although interestingly without (or before its activated) Freebooters its approaching a wash.

Spoletta wrote:
It wasn't a meme list, but it was also one of the most glassy lists you can build in this game.
...
So again, I don't see an issue with this list taking 1800 points of damage when left fully exposed. ANY list would have been able to inflict AT THE VERY LEAST 1200 points of damage to it.

Before you say that, imagine what a mirror match would look like.

Low casualty affair, Drukhari shooting at each other from inside Venoms while contesting the center point. Whoever left their transport would be gunned down with poison weapons.

500 points lost max on each side.

Tyel wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It wasn't a meme list, but it was also one of the most glassy lists you can build in this game.

85/90 point venoms. Those things may have a -1 to be hit but are T5 6W. Even a basic intercessor has a 75% return against them! And they even kill additional models exploding.

Not to be overly pedantic, but do you mean 25%?

Because as I see it into an 85 point venom, with lets say 3 shots in tactical doctrine.
1.5 hits. 0.5 wounds. 0.33 damage. On 85/90 points/6 that's 4.72/4.95 points worth of damage, or rounding up about a 25% return.
As compared with Incubi - 2 hits, 4/3 wounds, lets say tactical doctrine for 2/3 go through, 2/3*16=10.66, on 20 points a 52% return like you say.

Without checking I agree on your other numbers - I think its fair to say once you crack the vehicles open the guys inside die quickly. Really this applies to most DE lists you can conceive of beyond Cronos spam - and that win rate wouldn't suggest you don't need to be especially skilled to have success with such lists.
Venoms in most circumstances are not especially fragile - and certainly not enough to my mind justify "eh, glass cannon list, 1800 points worth of stuff dying is to be expected."

Yeah, it's weird, all Eldar and more elite GEQ infantry in the game like fire warriors/scions/etc seem to just get absolutely shoveled off the table in droves and everything has a 50-60% points return against them... and before they got their 2nd wounds, marine infantry was exactly the same way.

its almost like too many weapons gak out a billion D1/D2 shots with good AP and if you dont have like Sv2+ 4++ and T4 you just die. A lot. And no durability buffs you can put on yourself or cover protection you can claim really makes any difference, so those kinds of units just get used as like deep strike glass cannon type suicide units or they dont get used at all.

It's pretty telling that drukhari have like the most bonkers dex in the entire world...but you still cant run their light infantry on foot without getting completely hosed down in one single turn.

Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Not to my knowledge, though I will point out that (for example) Eldar infantry is typically intended to play in a mostly footslogging fashion and also isn't usable at all right now.

Though - why arent we counting wracks? Wracks on foot for sure arent usable. calling them 'durable' is basically laughable at this point, they're T4 6++ 5+FNP 1W infantry for 10pts, you can point any anti-infantry weapon you'd like at them and just zoop a squad off the board.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also worth noting that Dark Eldar have spent about as much time as 'just the worst army in the game' as they have existing in general. One tiny moment in 5th just after their dex dropped and now, and that's the only times DE have been good.

 the_scotsman wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Not to my knowledge, though I will point out that (for example) Eldar infantry is typically intended to play in a mostly footslogging fashion and also isn't usable at all right now.

I think this is a sign of Warhammer having serious long term issues representing the hardiness of infantry (I don't want to spin off into another topic, but it is probably the byproduct of making Space Marines the standard statline, then going from there).

Though - why arent we counting wracks? Wracks on foot for sure arent usable. calling them 'durable' is basically laughable at this point, they're T4 6++ 5+FNP 1W infantry for 10pts, you can point any anti-infantry weapon you'd like at them and just zoop a squad off the board.

I didn't count Wracks since GW (at least in 5th), presented them as being medium infantry, rather than light. The 5th ed Codex tries to present them as ultra-durable (because GW writers don't know how their own games work). Of course this is a bit silly, as you point out. It was also because I was extending the question to the entire history of Warriors and Wyches.

Also worth noting that Dark Eldar have spent about as much time as 'just the worst army in the game' as they have existing in general. One tiny moment in 5th just after their dex dropped and now, and that's the only times DE have been good.

Well, I do think this kinda reveals the problem of "light infantry" in 40k for not just this edition - but many others. Since there's no scouting or reccee stuff (and units moving has no impact on your ability to hit them, like in many other games), things which light infantry might excell in just ... don't exist - so there's nothing they really can do except get into firefights with medium infantry and in turn be shredded.

Even with t5 and a 2+ meganobz get hosed off. Standard saves just mean nothing anymore lol.

Tyel wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It wasn't a meme list, but it was also one of the most glassy lists you can build in this game.

85/90 point venoms. Those things may have a -1 to be hit but are T5 6W. Even a basic intercessor has a 75% return against them! And they even kill additional models exploding.

Not to be overly pedantic, but do you mean 25%?

Because as I see it into an 85 point venom, with lets say 3 shots in tactical doctrine.
1.5 hits. 0.5 wounds. 0.33 damage. On 85/90 points/6 that's 4.72/4.95 points worth of damage, or rounding up about a 25% return.
As compared with Incubi - 2 hits, 4/3 wounds, lets say tactical doctrine for 2/3 go through, 2/3*16=10.66, on 20 points a 52% return like you say.

Without checking I agree on your other numbers - I think its fair to say once you crack the vehicles open the guys inside die quickly. Really this applies to most DE lists you can conceive of beyond Cronos spam - and that win rate wouldn't suggest you don't need to be especially skilled to have success with such lists.
Venoms in most circumstances are not especially fragile - and certainly not enough to my mind justify "eh, glass cannon list, 1800 points worth of stuff dying is to be expected."

DE frankly don't have units which aren't - beyond Cronos. Talos hold up better versus Dakkajets when buffed to T7, before that its not all that much better. Ravagers are just as fragile.

In this case it would be easier to activate Freebooters by killing one than popping a raider - and you get more value out of grot gunners as it mitigates the -1 to hit so you are still getting the Freebooter bonus.

But if you could kill 8 venoms at 690 points, I think you'd have expected to kill 5-6 raiders at 475-570 points. And you'll then be able to mangle the guys inside in much the same way.

A Freebootered Dakkajet for instance expects to deal 33% more damage on a Venom to a Raider - although interestingly without (or before its activated) Freebooters its approaching a wash.

Hmm, yeah I seem to have multiplied twice for the number of shots on the venoms.

One of the things I put in the survey was the ridiculous number of shots/dice rolling in game. There should never be a reason to be throwing more than 30 dice to achieve an effect, and while they do, no light infantry can survive.
The dakkajet for example, 120ish points and is throwing out 40 shots? Assault intercessors throwing out 60 shots after a 2CP strat to fire again. Plenty of others, but I feel there needs to be a cap.
Same with melee too.

 bullyboy wrote:
One of the things I put in the survey was the ridiculous number of shots/dice rolling in game. There should never be a reason to be throwing more than 30 dice to achieve an effect, and while they do, no light infantry can survive.
The dakkajet for example, 120ish points and is throwing out 40 shots? Assault intercessors throwing out 60 shots after a 2CP strat to fire again. Plenty of others, but I feel there needs to be a cap.
Same with melee too.

Orks kinda just throw out dice with shooting, it’s their thing. The space marine thing I don’t get, they’ve always kinda supposed to have been the low but good shots guys, but with Bolger discipline and hyper turbo mega bolters it seems kinda negated.
Then again, might just be me grumbling after losing 2.5 max blobs of boyz.

 Some_Call_Me_Tim wrote:

 bullyboy wrote:
One of the things I put in the survey was the ridiculous number of shots/dice rolling in game. There should never be a reason to be throwing more than 30 dice to achieve an effect, and while they do, no light infantry can survive.
The dakkajet for example, 120ish points and is throwing out 40 shots? Assault intercessors throwing out 60 shots after a 2CP strat to fire again. Plenty of others, but I feel there needs to be a cap.
Same with melee too.

Orks kinda just throw out dice with shooting, it’s their thing. The space marine thing I don’t get, they’ve always kinda supposed to have been the low but good shots guys, but with Bolger discipline and hyper turbo mega bolters it seems kinda negated.
Then again, might just be me grumbling after losing 2.5 max blobs of boyz.

Yes Orks throw lots of dice but its all relative. If a Marine throws 5 dice an Ork throws 10. But when you make Marines shoot 20 dice you end up with Orks throwing 40.

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Hmmm.. footslogging light infantry. It depends on what we classify as light infantry. But the only army I can think of is Daemons. The Daemons book have no transports. So, yeah, literally the entire army is expected to footslog across the battlefield. The theme of the book is about mass hordes of light infantry (in shades of blood letters, pink horrors, daemonettes and plague bearers).

Originally, the theme of the Tyranids codex was also about mass hordes of footslogging light infantry. But these days, it seems like Tyranids are a lot more about shooting, with a lot centered around hive guard stacked with lots of buffs while shooting out of line shots.


By the way, I am not sure if Sean's list is considered that glass cannon. Sure, the infantry inside the transports are glass cannons. But that's basically the entire Drukhari codex. Same goes all forms of Aeldari. Most of the list rides in 8 transports. Transports do give a hefty measure of protection to the forces inside it. Granted Venoms are flimsier than Raiders, but it all depends on what kind of guns you are using to shoot them with. Str 7 and above guns make no difference whether they are shooting at a Venom or a Raider. So against the majority of dedicated anti tank weapons, Venoms and Raiders are the same outside of Raiders having more wounds. But running 8 Venoms is like running 5 Raiders. Is a T5, 6W, 4+, 5++ transport really that flimsy?

When most of the army are all inside those 8 Venoms, you are facing army wide T5, 4+, 5++. It doesn't seem that flimsy to me.

Eldenfirefly wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Hmmm.. footslogging light infantry. It depends on what we classify as light infantry. But the only army I can think of is Daemons. The Daemons book have no transports. So, yeah, literally the entire army is expected to footslog across the battlefield. The theme of the book is about mass hordes of light infantry (in shades of blood letters, pink horrors, daemonettes and plague bearers).

Well Plague Bearers aren't exactly light - nor are Pink Horrors. Incidentally, Daemons can Deep Strike/Teleport (which as far as I know, their most effective strategies revolve around this).

Just going to throw out that DE were decent in 8th. Not top-top tier perhaps but just below - which isn't a terrible place to be. Or at least until Marines 2.0 anyway. Its always a bit skewed though because of soup. Until hard stopped, every DE list wanted to run a Farseer with doom. And then if you are running Eldar soup, why not go into Ynnari spears/dark reapers etc etc.

But very boringly - 3 ravagers, 2-3 flyers and a bunch of venoms with blasters all in a reroll 1 to hit and reroll 1 to wound bubble turn 1 and everything except the flyers (usually) turn 2 was incredible. And lets be honest, the comically undercosted (in 2018 meta terms) Dissie Ravager is probably responsible for why Marines got their utterly broken 2.0 codex.

I want to say Foot-DE was sort of viable in 3rd (Foot-Dar was in any case - and I don't think it ever would seriously be again), but I don't think it was especially good.

 blood reaper wrote:

Eldenfirefly wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Hmmm.. footslogging light infantry. It depends on what we classify as light infantry. But the only army I can think of is Daemons. The Daemons book have no transports. So, yeah, literally the entire army is expected to footslog across the battlefield. The theme of the book is about mass hordes of light infantry (in shades of blood letters, pink horrors, daemonettes and plague bearers).

Well Plague Bearers aren't exactly light - nor are Pink Horrors. Incidentally, Daemons can Deep Strike/Teleport (which as far as I know, their most effective strategies revolve around this).

They can't deep strike or teleport except with CP which gets more expensive the more PL the unit is...

... so exactly like Strategic Reserves

And the idea that plaguebearers or horrors aren't light infantry makes me LOL. Eldar Howling Banshees are about as tough except against antitank guns

 blood reaper wrote:

Eldenfirefly wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Hmmm.. footslogging light infantry. It depends on what we classify as light infantry. But the only army I can think of is Daemons. The Daemons book have no transports. So, yeah, literally the entire army is expected to footslog across the battlefield. The theme of the book is about mass hordes of light infantry (in shades of blood letters, pink horrors, daemonettes and plague bearers).

Well Plague Bearers aren't exactly light - nor are Pink Horrors. Incidentally, Daemons can Deep Strike/Teleport (which as far as I know, their most effective strategies revolve around this).

T4 5++/5+++ is less durable than Marines, against AP0 or AP-1 in cover.

And Deepstrike is a strat, not an inbuilt ability.

I mean Plague Bearers have literally always supposed to have been "tough as nails, very difficult to move infantry". I don't understand how they're viewed as light now (while what, are Space Marines medium? I thought they were heavy).

Also an ability being CP based doesn't mean it's not an ability. I'm not too sure what the relevancy of that is?

 blood reaper wrote:
I mean Plague Bearers have literally always supposed to have been "tough as nails, very difficult to move infantry". I don't understand how they're viewed as light now (while what, are Space Marines medium? I thought they were heavy).

Also an ability being CP based doesn't mean it's not an ability. I'm not too sure what the relevancy of that is?

But they’re not-they’re about as durable as a Marine, except half the wounds.

10 SoB rapid-firing into them (even if we give them -1 to-hit, while Marines get nothing) kill two Plaguebearers, but only one Marine.
If the MEQ get cover, well then, it halves casualties. Does nothing for Plaguebearers. If the Plaguebearers don’t get -1, three of them die.

Plus they’re more vulnerable to Morale. Plus they have no guns. Plus they’re slower.

AoW tier list video, specifically it talks about why Orks are one of the S-tier factions in the game currently and why the Buggy/Plane spam list is so strong and problematic (timestamped at the start of that discussion):

 Bosskelot wrote:
AoW tier list video, specifically it talks about why Orks are one of the S-tier factions in the game currently and why the Buggy/Plane spam list is so strong and problematic (timestamped at the start of that discussion):

Timestamp didn't work.

 the_scotsman wrote:
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Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also worth noting that Dark Eldar have spent about as much time as 'just the worst army in the game' as they have existing in general. One tiny moment in 5th just after their dex dropped and now, and that's the only times DE have been good.

Sorry, but that is just wrong. Dark Eldar were fantastic in 3rd edition.

100pts got you a squad with good BS, and 2 Dark Lance's. Sit them in cover and they could really give people a bad day. For an extra 10pts they could have 2 blasters... a few of them would unleash more heavy firepower than people could handle. Max out your 6 Troop choices with them and that is only 600 points, and you have already brought 12 Dark Lance's. The sheer number of Dark Lance's that Dark Eldar could bring was mental.

A Raider squad with a unit a Sybarite armed with splinter pistol, Agonised, and combat drugs could safely get to 5 attacks on the charge at WS4, needed 4+ to wound with a power weapon. That unit champion used to hit harder than some HQ choices in other factions. The rest of the squad were there just to take wounds.

Incubi were great, they would happily chew through most things, and with their power armour and speed (Raider) where good at survival.

Sure Hellions, Talos, and Mandrakes were garbage. Everything else was great.

Thank you Stonehorse for your post. I used to play Dark Eldar back in 3rd edition and +1 to everything you wrote.

Once I figured out my DE army, it was fun to play. I’d take my Archon (Lord I guess then) and scoot around on a Raider looking to fight other characters. This was back when Xenos weren’t just NPCs for Space Marines. Good times.

I also remember a game against an IG force, where my force was almost wiped out on turn 1. It was 75% of the force that I lost.

 blood reaper wrote:
Serious question here - have Dark Eldar on foot (not counting Wracks, but more Kabalites and Wyches) *ever* been viable (especially in a competitive sense) in an edition of the game? I know GW is eager to get as much money out of its players as possible and so has always promoted Kabalites (and practically all Dark Eldar troops) being mounted in Raiders, but was there ever a point in the armies history in which footslogging light infantry was a legitimate way to play?

Back with their first codex during 3rd and 4th edition, the basic DE squad was able to field 2 Dark Lances in each squad, minimum 10 models, iirc. 60 Dark Eldar Warriors with 12 Dark Lances between them was a really wicked amount of firepower in relatively cheap Troops choices in those days, and list would still have plenty of points left over for other choices. Iirc, Wytches used well could be pretty irritating in those days too.

Edit: Posted without seeing stonehorses post, but everything said there rings true. I didn't play DE then, but I played against them all the time and they could be dangerous AF.

I remember the Talos being a pain, but that might have been when brought through a warp gate or something? Hard to remember.

Talos depended on the edition. When you could snipe out the powerfist guy when removing casualties, they were a horror. When you couldn't, they were fairly punchable.

First day of the Coventry GT, Mani's Ork list deleted 5 Raiders and all of their contents in turn 1. All Ruud, a WTC vet and good player btw, had left were 10 Trueborn.

Nothing to see here folks. Move along. Game state is fine.

 Ordana wrote:

Yes Orks throw lots of dice but its all relative. If a Marine throws 5 dice an Ork throws 10. But when you make Marines shoot 20 dice you end up with Orks throwing 40.

The fun aspect is that current marines throw a comparable amount of dice than orks, definitely not just 50%, and with higher BS, same WS, but also with way more tools to enhance those rolls.

A single Aggressor has 6+D6 shots, which become 12 shots against units of 11+ models, other than 3A with power fists. That's the firepower of an infantry model, no infantry ork throw those numbers. 6 dudes are 270 points. The same amount of points invested in Flash Gitz or Lootas, the ork infantry units with the highest rate of fire, gives the ork player 30 shots from Flash Gitz and 48-32 from Lootas. Now those ork units have higher S and higher AP but also worse BS, worse save and no melee abilties; I don't want to compare the units in terms of efficiency, just show that SM models can throw the same dice than orks, if not even more. There only infantry ork unit that can fire that many dice for 270 points is shoota boyz, a unit of 30 models which is doomed the moment it gets deployed.

Repulsor and Repulsor Ex roll the same dice than a Gorkanaut.

In combat the comparison is even easier: take any SM melee specialist and compare it to the ork counterpart, SM will throw the same dice, if not more. Works for lighter and heavier infantries and of course characters.


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 Consul Scipio wrote:


I also remember a game against an IG force, where my force was almost wiped out on turn 1. It was 75% of the force that I lost.

My orks have been tabled or almost tabled in turn 1 in multiple occasions and multiple editions against IG.

 Bosskelot wrote:
First day of the Coventry GT, Mani's Ork list deleted 5 Raiders and all of their contents in turn 1. All Ruud, a WTC vet and good player btw, had left were 10 Trueborn.

Nothing to see here folks. Move along. Game state is fine.

No, no, no. That doesn't count for...reasons. We need more data. Must have been a tactical mistake that my genius-level playing could have prevented. /s

Did I hit all the excuses? It does seem DE are a bit more susceptible to the specifics of the Ork shooting than some other lists but it's pretty clear the damage potential is way, way too high if this is happening regularly. Going back to the original point of this thread it's still bizarre to me that anyone will defend even the possibility of such high damage output as being OK.

 Bosskelot wrote:
First day of the Coventry GT, Mani's Ork list deleted 5 Raiders and all of their contents in turn 1. All Ruud, a WTC vet and good player btw, had left were 10 Trueborn.

Nothing to see here folks. Move along. Game state is fine.

Was it streamed?

So now it pretty much comes down to a case of when will GW adjust rather than if.

First turn seems to decide games vs Freebooterz/buggy orks.