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Made in nz
Regular Dakkanaut






I picked up my White Dwarf yesterday and sat down last night to read Phil Kelly’s Designer Notes for the upcoming Eldar codex. I also had the chance to look at codex at GW.

First of all I want to preface these comments with the caveat that they are in no way concerned with the army’s effectiveness. I think that they have done a good job with the various changes to weapons and troop stats – the starcannon is no longer a no-brainer.

My comments are directed towards what they have done to diversity. As a result of the new codex we are left effectively with Craftworld: Eldar with no real differentiation between the various army types.

With the new Codex none of the Craftworld GW have developed since Codex: Craftworld Eldar in 2000 have distinctive units or organisations unique to that army. Instead the only thing that identifies as belonging to a particular Craftworld is its paintjob. I think this is the most disappointing aspect (no pun intended) of the new codex. If the various lists were being abused then put constraints around them e.g. limit the size of a Seer Council, the number of disruption rolls etc. But don’t throw out everything that differentiates an Ulthwe army from an Iyanden for example. Instead they should have taken things even further – by limiting the choices of particular craftworlds – but please keep the character.

Imagine if this had been done to Space Marines or even Chaos Space Marines. After years of building up the imagery of the chapters/legions they threw that all out and made a single Space Marine codex. So the only thing that differentiated Space Wolves, Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Ultramarines etc was their paintjob. No special characteristics, no special units, no nothing…

I really am struggling to understand why GW have taken this route after doing all the groundwork to “create” the various unique craftworlds.

Dying race? You betcha.

plc

40k Combat Calculator

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Made in us
Dakka Veteran





You pretty much hit upon my exact feelings on the codex. There were so many ways that this book could have been inclusive to the old craftworlds while maintaining balance. Whats sad is that they even had a template to follow, in the form of doctrines from the SM and IG codexes. But all this book does is pidgeon hole the list if you want to be competitive, just like the Thorpian abomination that was the 3rd ed vanilla codex did.

Brushing aside game balance concerns, for the moment, there were a couple simple things that they could have done to make armies much more diverse and better retain the craftworlds.

1) Auratauch gets an Aspect Retinue. That Aspect now counts as a troops choice. This would solve the issue that the Auratauch is somehow the only man-sized HQ choince since 4th to not have a dedicated retinue, and still let Beil Tan players have their lists. While you are at it, Clowns need to be a 0-1 because they so massively outclass all other elite choices at present, to the point of making them obsolete.

2) 5 Wraithguard as troops. Spirit Seers mandatory. Honestly, no one is going to field a 400 point squad with 12" range that can be destroyed by one power fist squad. Further, Fire Dragons outclass them in every way that matters at half the price in the same slot, currently.

3) War Walkers as Fast Attack. Sentinals are FA, Dreads are Elites, Tornadoes are FA, but the fragile scouty Walker has to compete with the likes of Prisms and Falcons.

Honorable mention goes to Dark Reapers, who really have no good place to be in the codex.  They are not tank hunters, stack up abysmally against all other HS choices, elites are wall to wall as it is, and their weapons are too good to be core troops.  They are the Shining Spears of this codex, and its not like they were very good before either.  Aside from giving them all EMLs (SM Devs with MLs are still cheaper than curent Dires anyhow, with better stat line) I have no idea how you would go about fixing them.

There are other issues with the codex beyond the sudden non-exitance of the craft worlds, like how ridiculously good clowns are compared to aspect warriors, but this one is central screwing a lot of veteran Eldar players out of being able to table their existing armies, which makes it the first 4th edition era codex to do this. Yes the Ultwe Infinate council and disruption rolls were abominations in their day, though the disruption table ceased to matter in the era of the pod. Simple fixes like the above would have accomadated a lot of people without altering game balance to a large degree.

   
Made in us
[DCM]
Longtime Dakkanaut






In da Mekshop

The changes to the Eldar codex don't really bother me overmuch when it comes to organization like this. Yes, it's different, but it is a lot easier for people to understand what they are facing and they won't need to understand 7 different possible eldar lists - there's only 1, but with many different incarnations.

You're right, there are no more special Force Org charts. I think that's okay though. You can still generally field the types of armies that you want from the Craftworlds by making the right choices. You can even do a bit of tweaking and 'counts as' to get certain units that you had in the past, like Black Guardians repped with Dire Avenger rules.

And I'm stupid enough to field the 10 strong Wraithguard squad. Hell, I can even do it 3 times. But I'm crazy. I like the Ghost Warrior army idea and I want to use it. Most won't but that's fine.

I think that this is going to be the way of the future, with the new Ork codex next. There are some things to lament, but overall I don't find it that distressing. You can still make the craftworlds by making certain choices.

-GrimTeef-
Proud mod of The-Waaagh forum and Vice-President of the Brian Nelson is a Sculpting God Club 
   
Made in us
RogueSangre





The Cockatrice Malediction

If this is a sign of things to come then Iron Warriors players had better get ready to lose their basilisks and obliterators.
   
Made in us
Hunter with Harpoon Laucher




Castle Clarkenstein

I actually like the codex, and the way they arranged it. Yes, no rules telling you how to build your craftworld army. Instead, they took a lot of the things from the craftworld lists and made it possible to build them with the new book. It's up to the person building the army to make it flavorful, and fit the theme of the craftworld. No, you can't do 'exactly' the armies that you could in the CW codex, but you can get pretty close.

I got very tired of seeing people use the CW special rules, and then cheeseball the lists so they got the special rules, but didn't follow through with the theme of the army. The oh so stealthy 'ranger' army, that took the maximum number of units, but with the minimum number of models in them. Max out the disruption rolls, then take vipers, and 3 wraithlords, or whatever else it took for the win.

I'm excited about playing Eldar for the first time in 10 years, and actually having an army, not just a bag of tricks.


....and lo!.....The Age of Sigmar came to an end when Saint Veetock and his hamster legions smote the false Sigmar and destroyed the bubbleverse and lead the true believers back to the Old World.
 
   
 
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