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Dunno, it’s like being disappointed at McDonald’s attempt at a Whopper, and declaring therefore Burger King’s Whopper must be dreadful.

The initial disappointment isn’t without foundation. But the extension isn’t.

Fly measures the distance though the air. So you can move on the diagonal, but still need to cover the distance. If flip belts let you just ignore vertical distances, you could just move your M stat horizontally and not worry about the ups and downs.

I’d have to go find the leak with the exact wording. Might need a FAQ. Or maybe you can just leap over a 10” wall like it’s not even there…

 Nevelon wrote:
Fly measures the distance though the air. So you can move on the diagonal, but still need to cover the distance. If flip belts let you just ignore vertical distances, you could just move your M stat horizontally and not worry about the ups and downs.

I’d have to go find the leak with the exact wording. Might need a FAQ. Or maybe you can just leap over a 10” wall like it’s not even there…

Not just the Harlequin's flip belts, but the Shining Spears and Jain Zar too.

The flip belts rule is literally just ignore vertical terrain.


Also as a random thing, wraithlords increase their BS/ws by 1 from a nearby psyker rather than gaining+1 to hit.

Which means they can be given +1 to hit from something else, allowing them to hit on 2+.

 Insularum wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
Fly measures the distance though the air. So you can move on the diagonal, but still need to cover the distance. If flip belts let you just ignore vertical distances, you could just move your M stat horizontally and not worry about the ups and downs.

I’d have to go find the leak with the exact wording. Might need a FAQ. Or maybe you can just leap over a 10” wall like it’s not even there…

Not just the Harlequin's flip belts, but the Shining Spears and Jain Zar too.

Parkour elves move faster then flying ones when things are in the way.

The simulationist in me wants to call BS, but let’s just chalk this one up to Rule of Cool and walk away.

Or bounce off the walls if you are in a hurry.

Shining Spears also ignore vertical distances when determining how far they moved.

So, how are Fire Dragons looking in the leaks? Squad of five decent enough at Tank Hunting, or would you want more bods?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
So, how are Fire Dragons looking in the leaks? Squad of five decent enough at Tank Hunting, or would you want more bods?

(Still on my first cup of coffee trying to mathhammer; take with salt)

Your fusion blaster is Assault and Melta 3, 1 shot hitting on a 3+, S9 AP-4, d6 Dam. Not bad.
Exarch gets options for either better gun, or flexing to cover other roles

If you are shooting a vehicle or a monster you get full re-rolls on to hit, to wound, and damage.

So their ability got buffed from RR1s on W/D to everything. Now we can’t talks 40k, especially Eldar, without thinking about buffs. What detachment? Attaching a character?

And what are you hunting?

Below T9 light vehicles should just be molten slag.
Even T9 are probably toast.
Tougher stuff? Even with full rerolls, needing 5+ to wound is about half. Assuming we didn’t drop any hits (which is a bad assuptions, 3+ w/ RRs is great, but not perfect) but also ignoring the exarch and any buffs we are still getting 2ish shots to land. -4 AP is god, but still allows a save on 2+ armor, and invulns exist. But at D6 dam a pop, plus the melta bonus, with the re-roll? Ouch. Probably snuff a Pred, but not a Land Raider.

And that’s just the lads in the squad. But should probably be able to kill all but the biggest tanks. Assuming they are at full strength. Which is the rub. A squad of 5 hopping out of a falcon/WS/webway/reserves and getting the alpha strike should probably kill or mangle their target. But they are still soft little elves. How many tanks does your opponent have? They should not be the only AV arrow in the quiver. They should get the job done; they are real good at that. They are also a high value target and glass hammers.

I would still have some other AV in a list. But they are going to be one of the main sources.

Edit
OK, re-reading the question is more about squad size. I think a 5 man squad should work against most stuff. If you attach a character, you can probably afford to have the exarch diversify. Without a character, I’d keep the exarch with a firepike/exarch’s fusion gun. Unless you are going titan hunting, a 10 man squad is crazy overkill. And with points in blocks these days, it’s either 5 or 10.

I'd agree with the above. Tbh the main issue will be keeping Dragons alive so they get to shoot rather than their efficiency. As a result I'd probably go with 5 man squads for higher redundancy. Although Fuegan+10 Fire Dragons and slightly above average rolls might tear through an IG Tank force.

----

Anyway I thought I'd give very brief superficial thoughts on the detachments. Very TL/DR and I'm sure you can get better analysis elsewhere. Might be interesting to prompt a discussion.

Spoilers - I don't think they are that hot. Certainly compared with the Index rules. Which might be good for balance - but is kind of weird in some cases.

Warhost. I actually think this is pretty bad - maybe even the worst one. Someone should - rightly - run in screaming "Movement wins games. Movement wins game. Movement wins games". This is true. But I'm not sure moving "some units" 1-2 inches extra per turn is that hot. Sure there will be some times when you can tag an objective or make a charge where previously you'd have been off by an inch. But Eldar are not a slow army - and that goes double with Battle Focus. If it was rerolling the D6 agile abilities rather than giving +1 it would be a lot more powerful. If you get unlucky by rolling a bunch of 1s and 2s I'm not sure adding +1 to them is really helping.

Windrider Host. I think it may well be good because the biker units in the codex look very good (and you double down on the above comment of Eldar not being a slow army). Making Windriders Battleline is interesting because I think lots of small units potentially has a scoring purpose due to their speed - even if you might also want some big units to buff up. But turning up from reserves turn 1 feels kind of marginal - given how far you'd be able to go from deployment anyway. I guess its the trade off of nullifying being shot turn 1 versus kind of limping onto the board. Being able to whisk 2 units off the table and back into reserve is the real draw. You kind of do need to have some bodies on objectives though. But maybe that's less of an issue if you just bomb around killing everything in certain areas of the table.

Spirit Conclave. Kind of non-plussed here. I feel part of the draw here is that basic Wraith units are Battleline - so you could bring up to 6 units of Wraithguard and/or Wraithblades. But I mean... do you want to? The stratagems maybe make up for it a bit - but you only have so many CP. Maybe I'm biased by playing MSU - but +1 to hit and wound against the unit that's killed a Psyker just seems kind of niche even if you are liberal with Spirit Seers and Warlocks. I guess the question is how powerful agile manoeuvres are on Wrath units. From a very superficial standpoint it feels a bit "remember when..." rather than "yeah so I went 5-0." Basically if its good its because Wraths are good.

Seer Council likewise is odd. Over the course of the game you should be able to use 6 "free" stratagems, depending on the dice you roll - and any modifiers. The stratagems should be useful - but it feels like it would be hard to build around this. You need some psykers scattered throughout your army to activate the abilities - but this feels a bit like the Warhost in being very generic. Its not really boosting your psykers.

Guardian Battlehost. Maybe I'm biased - but I kind of want this to be good, because I feel "Guardian Carpet" has been a meme since at least 3rd. (I.E. Move 20 guardians to some Marines, fluff the shooting phase, watch the Marines charge next turn, win the combat, wipe the whole squad. Cry on the internet about how Shuriken catapults should never have had 12" range.)

+1 to hit if you are on an objective - or you target an enemy on an objective should come up fairly frequently. Are Guardians/Support Weapons/Dire Avengers and/or War Walkers good? I think at least maybe? I mean people said the Chaos Cultist detachment would never work - although they are about half the price compared with Guardians. I think Storm Guardians might need some Banshees or Harlequins to help out in the counter-assault role.

Aspect Host. I was initially going to say this one was the real draw - but I don't know really. a 7/6 damage buff to Aspect Warriors and the Avatar is undoubtedly good - but I don't know whether its any better than the old index. Its annoying in some ways that you have to pick - you know if you go hits you'll roll no 1s, only to then roll a fist full on wounds.

Kind of end up thinking its not transforming anything. Much like various detachments - it might be good because Aspect Wariors/Phoenix Lords/Avatar of Khaine might well be good.

Ghosts of the Webway. Can't really comment. I mean its the "I wanna spam Harlequins" detachment. And you can. But being able to charge through enemy models? Seems like its situationally useful rather than game defining. I mean first time playing against it you might think "I can just screen like this" - but then they run through you. But then you'll go "okay, I'll screen differently, i.e. old-school bubblewrap" and then?

A bit like a lot of these choices it seems like the power is "would you like 6 units of Harlequins and 3 of the characters". If yes, great. If no... well, this is a thing.

Which perhaps brings us to the last and possibly least of "this is a thing" in Ynnari.

You have to bring Yvraine or the Yncarne. Well, if you were running Ynnari why not?

You can bring Dark Eldar... but why bother? I guess that's a bit harsh - and it might be worth exploring a curated DE list with Battle Focus and these stratagems rather than what the DE get themselves. But idk. I'm not really a fan of pain tokens but I feel they are necessary to get any kind of punch. Wyches look very insipid. Also not really sure you'd take Incubi over the new Banshees - although potentially with Yvraine or an Archon giving you wound rerolls they aren't that far apart. Outside this detachment you could buff up the Banshees with Jain Zar though. The issue I feel with attachments is you are making quite an expensive unit that has to really hit something to have an impact rather than a relatively cheap throw-away missile.

But then we get onto the abilities - and I'm afraid the issues are obvious. They don't really scale.

I.E.
If your opponent kills something in their shooting phase, then at the end you can select one unit (no Wraith Knights) and make a normal move. See Warhost for "movement wins games" - but... eh?

When being shot you'd normally be able to select one unit that was hit and make a Fade back agile manoeuvre. Which lets you move D6+1 (or D6+2 in a Warhost). With Ynnari you can move that unit into engagement range of the enemy who shot you. Basically... what? If some chaff unit would tickle you then you can move into combat with it. But... presumably opponents just won't shoot that unit in that case. Or they will because they expect to delete the unit.

Finally, in the fight phase you can select one unit which isn't at full strength and give it fight first. Clearly there are some scenarios where this is quite nice - but it feels like your opponent will see it from a mile away.

So it all adds up to being kind of poor. Again - maybe I'm biased because of my MSU hat - but buffing one unit when you start with say 15~ on the table just doesn't feel useful. The fact its the same buff at 1000 points and 3000 points also feels strange given how much they've tweaked it for other detachments.

I think it might be "okay" just because across the breadth of options you can probably get enough "good datasheets" to make an army. But that's not so exciting. Arguably it goes for all the detachments.

There's almost certainly a 11/10 Eldar list waiting to break the game (as per... almost every edition 40k has ever had) - but its not as obvious. Which is probably a good thing.

How does the Dark Eldar /Harlequin "Wager" Grotmas list stand up to using Harlequins and Dark Eldar in the new Aeldari codex?

One thing I'd like to check is the unit size for Troupes. In the Index it's...

1 Lead Player
4-11 Players

...but wondering if thats been changed to...

1 Lead Player
5-11 Players

...for the codex. Its a very minor detail but it would be nice to know if anyone has an advanced copy of the codex.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
How does the Dark Eldar /Harlequin "Wager" Grotmas list stand up to using Harlequins and Dark Eldar in the new Aeldari codex?

Cynically its probably better if you are going to strictly stay to DE/Harlequin units.

Not played it myself - but on paper I can see why people are playing the Grotmas detachment with no Harlequins. Use the Conductor and viola, your whole army gets reroll 1s to hit and wound until you kill something. And then in your next command phase discard a pain token to set it up again.
Against certain MSU lists its not going to be that hot as you very quickly lose the bonus (playing without a bonus? That's so Realspace Raiders) - but its something. You could also add in some Harlequin units as its not as if they are that bad.

I kind of feel the Ynnari detachment is basically "Codex Yncarne". If the Yncarne can carry you, its worth it. If it can't? Its probably a bad detachment. In any case I'm not sure you'd want to take many DE choices at all versus the Eldar options.

I think Vipoid's gone through it in the news bit of the forum but to echo.
What do you get with DE?
Kabalites are okay I guess. You can do the usual "shooty models in a venom/basic guys screen a home objective." play. Or I guess take the whole squad in a Raider. So far so average. You lose power from pain which hurts the Dark Light bus concept.
Wyches are woeful and the Succubus is a 45 (presumably - I guess she could go down to about 20) point joke. Inexplicably one of the Ynnari relics is 30 points to give her rerolls to wound. I mean... presumably that will get updated with the new points (or later) but how much acid are they on? I wondered if the Datasheet snuck in devastating wounds or something while I wasn't looking (on 1 damage attacks who'd care) but no. She's significantly less dangerous than a Howling Banshee Exarch with an Executioner or Mirror Swords into anything but the weakest of chaff.
Reavers are cheap and cheerful so might have a place. But - and I guess its moving up a weight class - are you going to bother when you can take Skyweavers and especially perhaps Shining Spears? Who can actually punch stuff rather than providing an unreliable sprinkling of mortal wounds and maybe tickling some guardsmen to death. Its not as if Eldar are suffering for "objective scoring units". Take basic Windriders and have some actual shooting.

Which basically leaves Incubi. Who are probably "fine". But Banshees are probably at least as good, if not better now. Yvraine+Incubi in a transport maybe has a bit of legs (reroll wounds helping that ever more obsolete S4), but its not exactly setting the world on fire. A blob of 10 Incubi+Yvraine+Visarch would have to walk across the table, because there ain't no Eldar transport big enough to handle this level of power. Troupes are also potentially a good assault unit - although the fact they don't get the Ynnari keyword messes up some rules interactions.

I guess my slight cynical view is all this could be "fun" in a relatively fluffy, not all that serious game. But if you are focusing on hard crunch, there's better stuff out there.

Tyel wrote: There's almost certainly a 11/10 Eldar list waiting to break the game (as per... almost every edition 40k has ever had) - but its not as obvious. Which is probably a good thing.

It’s certainly been a genuine curse upon Eldar players.

Want an effective army, where all the units interact well? 3rd-7th (when I last regularly played, more or less) you can do that. But it’s this one specific build, with three or four more or less required units. Because the internal balance of the Codex is right on the wonk. But it is super powerful, to the point some opponents just won’t stand a chance.

And it was never the same list edition to edition. And lead to an incorrect perspective that Eldar were just cheesy.

Were there powergamer Eldar players? Yes. Of course there were. But there were also just…Eldar Players, forced to playing one particular list, as otherwise they’d get their arse kicked.

For 8th and 9th perspective on that, you’ll need to find someone better informed than I on those editions. Which to be honest, shouldn’t be all that hard, as I know pretty much nowt. 10th the jury is out, as I’ve still time to get with the programme there.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:So, how are Fire Dragons looking in the leaks? Squad of five decent enough at Tank Hunting, or would you want more bods?

If you can get them into melta range, 5 guys can be expected to kill a predator sized tank, or get a land raider sized tank down to it's last 2-3 wounds. With Fuegan along anything smaller than a super heavy is likely toast. Not too keen on an Autarch leader for them, not much cheaper than just adding more bodies. Jumping out of an agile manoeuvred Wave Serpent then jumping back in again via a strat seems like a handy way to go tank hunting. Don't expect much if you're shooting at longer ranges.

SamusDrake wrote:One thing I'd like to check is the unit size for Troupes. In the Index it's...

1 Lead Player
4-11 Players

...but wondering if thats been changed to...

1 Lead Player
5-11 Players

...for the codex. Its a very minor detail but it would be nice to know if anyone has an advanced copy of the codex.

Unit size options on the points list are 5/6/11/12 models, looks like you are still expected to steal a model from the kit to make the Troupe Master.

There’s probably a reason why, so forgive me in advance, but those commenting on my Fire Dragon question have, pretty understandably, focussed on their tank hunting prowess. And fair enough, as that’s their forte. And of course I didn’t include this thought in the original question.

But, in an age of multiple wound Marines, CSM and Tau Battlesuits? Do they have a greater ubiquity for slagging small squads of say, Terminators and Gravis?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But, in an age of multiple wound Marines, CSM and Tau Battlesuits? Do they have a greater ubiquity for slagging small squads of say, Terminators and Gravis?

I think your opponent will certainly get nervous in case you get good dice - but its not great as you don't get all the rerolls. (There are things you can do but lets assume this in isolation).

So for example 5 shots into Terminators.

5*2/3*2/3*1/2=an average of 1.11 attacks goes through. If you are in Melta range (6") that's a dead terminator. If you are not you need a 3+ to kill a terminator.

Against say Aggressors its twice as good as they have no invul and only a 3+ save. But outside of melta range again the Aggresors get a "kinda" 5+++ because you need to roll a 3 to get a kill. So if only 2 attacks go through its quite easy for you to end up just killing 1. Which still isn't really a bad return on your shooting - but now your fire dragons are out and probably asking to be deleted relatively cheaply next turn.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There’s probably a reason why, so forgive me in advance, but those commenting on my Fire Dragon question have, pretty understandably, focussed on their tank hunting prowess. And fair enough, as that’s their forte. And of course I didn’t include this thought in the original question.

But, in an age of multiple wound Marines, CSM and Tau Battlesuits? Do they have a greater ubiquity for slagging small squads of say, Terminators and Gravis?

Dark Reapers are strength 10/damage 3 now, kill those units from 4x the range.

 Insularum wrote:

Unit size options on the points list are 5/6/11/12 models, looks like you are still expected to steal a model from the kit to make the Troupe Master.

And thats the point list in the new book? Alright, cheers for checking.

Tyel wrote:

What do you get with DE?
Kabalites are okay I guess. You can do the usual "shooty models in a venom/basic guys screen a home objective." play. Or I guess take the whole squad in a Raider. So far so average. You lose power from pain which hurts the Dark Light bus concept.
Wyches are woeful and the Succubus is a 45 (presumably - I guess she could go down to about 20) point joke. Inexplicably one of the Ynnari relics is 30 points to give her rerolls to wound. I mean... presumably that will get updated with the new points (or later) but how much acid are they on? I wondered if the Datasheet snuck in devastating wounds or something while I wasn't looking (on 1 damage attacks who'd care) but no. She's significantly less dangerous than a Howling Banshee Exarch with an Executioner or Mirror Swords into anything but the weakest of chaff.
Reavers are cheap and cheerful so might have a place. But - and I guess its moving up a weight class - are you going to bother when you can take Skyweavers and especially perhaps Shining Spears? Who can actually punch stuff rather than providing an unreliable sprinkling of mortal wounds and maybe tickling some guardsmen to death. Its not as if Eldar are suffering for "objective scoring units". Take basic Windriders and have some actual shooting.

Which basically leaves Incubi. Who are probably "fine". But Banshees are probably at least as good, if not better now. Yvraine+Incubi in a transport maybe has a bit of legs (reroll wounds helping that ever more obsolete S4), but its not exactly setting the world on fire. A blob of 10 Incubi+Yvraine+Visarch would have to walk across the table, because there ain't no Eldar transport big enough to handle this level of power. Troupes are also potentially a good assault unit - although the fact they don't get the Ynnari keyword messes up some rules interactions.

I guess my slight cynical view is all this could be "fun" in a relatively fluffy, not all that serious game. But if you are focusing on hard crunch, there's better stuff out there.

I'm reminded of 7th edition when DE and Eldar could be allies.

Initially, many DE players thought 'Hey, this kinda cool, I could include a couple of Eldar units in my DE army.'

Then the thought gradually turned to 'Hang on, why am I using all these DE units when Eldar units do the same thing but vastly better?'

And so, armies that had started as 'Dark Eldar army with a few Eldar units' quickly became 'Eldar armies with a few DE units.'

I mention it because the Eldar codex gives very similar vibes.

Not that it was much different in the Index era of 10th. But I think having Eldar and DE units in the same book has inadvertently highlighted just how anaemic and feeble the latter really are in this edition.

First experiment at painting Altansar.

Needs finer details picking out, but that’s a job for tomorrow. I’d more now, but I wanted to get the basing goop down, as the bright base was wonking out the other colours.

I’m pretty happy with it.

Sarigar wrote:
I utilized a tactic in 9th with 10 Reapers jumping out of a Wave Serpent, then get back in. Reapers are back to 3 damage shots, can have 10 again, and there are at least 2 detachments that allow this tactic. Add in an Autarch with a Reaper Launcher and -1 CP (like a SM Captain) and it appears quite efficient.

Also, things like War Walkers adding AP or Ranger bikes giving Ignore Cover seems to give a lot of fun synergy.

Can't wait to get my hands on new models to replace all the aged metal models or 3rd party minis.

They are recylcing quite a bit of the SM Codex for Aeldari it would appear. Adding AP and Ignore Cover are a couple of the Storm Speeders.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
So, how are Fire Dragons looking in the leaks? Squad of five decent enough at Tank Hunting, or would you want more bods?

Fire Dragons have always been my favorite Aspect. And, unless they've become Battleline, I'm limited to 3 squads of them. So yeah, I'm taking 3 full 10x units. Just like I've been doing these past few editions.
If I could take them as BL? I'd run 6 units of them. Maybe x5 strong, maybe x10 strong, maybe some combo of x5/x10....

"Emerges from the web-way after almost 2 years, eager too prove his worth too the craft worlds once more."

Well that codex release took awhile! Just started dusting off my models after maybe playing 10-20 games with the naked data cards? Just spent 4 hours rating, reviewing and going over the printed changes. I will make a later post after the dust has settled. I still have a huge Shelf of shame that I fully intend too chip away at after I build 1 or 2 what I consider "good" lists.

For now I will not talk about Ynnari they will require an entirely different post.

Lets be honest.... after looking everything over, Craft Worlds Eldar got hit hard!
Some of our best combos were either de-buffed, or completely removed! Several "prominent" stratagems are now locked behind detachments with seemingly no rhyme or reason for it. I hate comparing past editions, but in 9th our bread and butter was fire and fade, 3 linking fire prisms, and Baharroth with10 swooping hawks jumping out right "After" shooting. We lost 2 phoenix lords, feelnopain on fugen, 1 toughness on our wraith units, BOTH our 3+ inv save units! Wraith guard nerffed too 5 man squads! My gosh darn warp gate!!!

"deep breath"

I'm not here too talk about the losers. I'm here too talk about the winners, the units we can not live without. regardless of what detachment your playing. ill throw my hat into the ring 1st sense i just went over all the data cards. I do know about the Major point adjustments coming with the codex and the printed point amounts im getting in my codex will not be correct.

Here is what stood out in my mind after 4 hours.

Harlequins all having devastating wounds is insane, 2 wave serpents or, 2 star weavers full of troupe with some HQs? I cant even imagine the damage from just 1 or 2 charges.

Wave serpents are actually a little beefy now? i might need to dust mine off, iv been using falcons and star weavers for so long.

Fugen with 5-10 fire dragons running around in a falcon/wave serpent also stood out to me, the reroll on Everything vs vehicle/monster cant be ignored. and his range buff just makes popping melta off that much easier! Also his new model is insane! and with the right detachment you can pop them in and out of a transport!

I'm not sure on the autarch model/skyrunner at the moment.... on paper it looks really good, free stratagems/enhancements on any aspect warrior squad combo....I need more time with this one but it shows promise.

Probably the biggest stand out to me were the buffs too Eldrad Ulthran. He is, 100% hands down, our go to competitive warlord now. +1 cp per turn, AND an auto working doom?! I'm leaning towards a storm guardian bodyguard for sticky obj. However, the new buffs too warlock conclaves give the squad -1 too wound! add in the singing spear shots, you got some crazy damage out of 5 models. I hope the warlocks get a point drop though. maybe 35 each?

my personal favorite change was the heal ability on spirit seers. Now it can heal the wraith unit D3 if no unit is dead, or attached too a lord/knight. You know im gona be rocking 3 of those bad boys! especially with all wraith units wanting "psychic guidance" now.

D-sythes are flamers again!! but only at a strength of 7? oh boy, i like it, but I don't love it. However! they can fallback and shoot again, so throwing them into combat too keep them safe and tie up a squad is an option again without spending CP. lets all have a moment of silence for the runes of fate 10 block reactive fire death blob that 10 wraith guard with a spirit seer. YOU WILL BE MISSED!

Wraith guard smack a bit harder with 2D, but again only 5 man squads now, im really leaning towards the classic transport wave serpent with these guys, pop a spirit seer on them, throw in some fire dragon transports. get the melta and flamers right up in there face! a new stratagem allows a wraith squad to get sticky obj, 100% i will use this almost every other turn. giving wraith units the Storm guardians ability is absolutely broken.

my go to deep strike screening units were either some weapon platforms in the back, or some ranger squads, and long range bright lance esc shooters in the back, anyone else seeing some cheaper screening units? rangers are 55, warlocks are 45? lets hope we see some point drops!!

We did not get our alpha strike falcons! But 3 of them deep striking turn 2 with who knows what sounds very good, throw in some other speedy squads, maybe the Avatar of war? and you have a pretty good turn 2 charge. it might get wiped out the following turn, but still could be epic!

again I'm just commenting on things that popped out at me, I have no played every list Eldar has too offer, but i do like chasing Meta lists for each detachment.

Thanks for reading! <3 "steps back into the warp portal"

That reminds me of the classic Eldar curse: horrific internal balance. Obviously we will need to wait for the day one FAQ/points adjustment, as we know they are coming. But it’s always a roller coaster of who’s on top for what edition. We can normally put some meta-crushing tournament list down, but is it scatbikes? Wraithknights? Serpent spam? Warp Spiders? What’s the hotness going to be with this one? What goes back on the shelf?

--

I’ve always put my Fire Dragons in a Falcon. For a few reasons. One, I love the Falcon and want to get it to the table, and two, I never fielded a squad of FDs big enough to need the serpent. I guess 3, cloudstrike when you could use them like drop pods, but not sure if I actually did that when it was a thing. With FDs getting full re-rolls against vehicles and monsters, the boost the Falcon gives to disembarking infantry is a little redundant. But not completely. If you are using them to hunt elite infantry, the RR on the wounds will mitigate one point of failure on the path of turning them into pairs of smoking boots. And there are a lot of units out there that could use a fusion gun to the face.

Horrible internal balance sounds like normal GW balancing issues for any army

 Overread wrote:
Horrible internal balance sounds like normal GW balancing issues for any army

You are not wrong, but it feels like Eldar get hit worse then others. We have wild pendulum swings where units go from broken to dumpster fire with no warning. We can always take top tables at tournaments, but what gets us there is very mercurial.

For example, the Falcon has played second fiddle to the Wave Serpent for huge chunks of history. Compare it outside of the codex, it wasn’t bad. But internally? WSs were tougher, held more, didn’t take a FoC slot, hit harder, etc. And the point difference didn’t remotely reflect that. Poor internal balance.

Tyel wrote:
Wyches are woeful

What bugs me about the wyches is that not only did they lose their special melee weapons, the unit leader lost her melee weapon too. The similar bits (whip and power sabre) have bespoke rules if equipped by kabalite or reaver leaders, but not if equipped a leader of the melee unit that would need it most! And this does not annoy me only for game balance reasons, but for modelling reasons as well. I am pretty obsessed with WYSIWYG, and it bugs me hella lot that the obviously power sword looking thing my wych leader carries does nothing special whilst exactly similar looking weapon carried by my other units does.

GW has given Tyranid warriors loads of close combat weapons over the years; even addeding them to the kit - this edition they have 1 generic "close combat" weapon profile and that's it.

GW seems to be on a huge spree in both AoS and 40K of making close combat very simple. Single profiles even if they've more than one weapon type.

I don't know fully why - my theory is by reducing options within 1 kit to a single profile it means they can create more kits with different profiles for each unit; but it feels somewhat sad to see loads of cool - still on sprue 0 choices go to 0 variation

 Overread wrote:
GW has given Tyranid warriors loads of close combat weapons over the years; even addeding them to the kit - this edition they have 1 generic "close combat" weapon profile and that's it.

GW seems to be on a huge spree in both AoS and 40K of making close combat very simple. Single profiles even if they've more than one weapon type.

I don't know fully why - my theory is by reducing options within 1 kit to a single profile it means they can create more kits with different profiles for each unit; but it feels somewhat sad to see loads of cool - still on sprue 0 choices go to 0 variation

But it is not consistent even within one army. Like in this instance the same melee weapon bit has bespoke rules for a shooty unit but not for the melee unit!

I don't really mind the "generification" of close combat, because its only really worthwhile if it gives the unit some degree of functionality it lacked before. Which usually means going up a weight class. (Chaff->MEQ->Monstrous infantry->Tanks).

But I also think there's this general recognition that assault units can't be as specialised as shooting, because getting them across the table, and making a successful charge, is harder than declaring "I shoot my lascannons at the tank, and my bolters at the guardsmen." You need - with certain caveats - to theoretically put out at least respectable damage into most targets rather than having very narrow niches. Otherwise its too easy for the unit to end up stranded. (Unless its got super speed/guaranteed charges, which brings its own balance problems.)

So I can sort of understand the Wych WYSIWYG complaints. Certainly no idea why they can't have an Agonizer when its across the rest of the codex. All my Hekatrixes are modelled with Agonizers because obviously they are.

But when (IIRC - I may be getting editions confused here) Hydra Gauntlets were rerolls to wound and I think Razorflails were rerolls to hit...you've got to feel "why bother"? I mean its still a small number of low S low AP attacks. In a Kill Team/Necromunda skirmish game where each model can forge a narrative then sure go nuts. In 40k? Its just noise lost across potentially hundreds of models and thousands of rolled dice. So I don't think it matters that much. I'm happy enough with it just being a modelling choice - much like Tyranid Warriors.

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Also to put the DE hat on, seeing Eldar players lament the power variance in their codex always feels a bit rich.
Cue 7th edition. "No you don't understand, Wraith Knights, Scatbikes, Warp Spiders, arguably still Wave Serpents are 10 or 11/10. But Storm Guardians also feature in the codex and they are 3/10".
"Okay - but I'm playing DE. My whole codex apart from maybe Reaver spam only reaches 5/10 at best. Same for Tyranids outside flying Hive Tyrant spam. Orks and Guard are in a diabolical state etc"

I mean - its not really the same issue. If you are still running around with that Footdar army you mostly put together while partying in 1999 and bitter about it's performance circa 2015, you could always go and buy some new stuff.
I guess it can be lame. Tau players can arguably complain that for about a decade any problems with the faction were answered by GW going "buy 3 Riptides. No. Seriously. Buy 3 riptides". And maybe you just don't like the model. But the option was there - and if you were complaining as the years rolled by it started to be on you.