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So, I am perusing my new eldar dex. I was rather surprised to see the 10 figure limit on harlies. My question for you is this... Are 10 harlies enough to run down the board, tak esome casualties and still win a HTH when supported by a farseer?

I have my doubts. 20? Sure! 15? Sure! 12? I guess so? 10? Not so sure.

let me know what you think. If 10 halies in a squad won't do it then I jusy won't use them. Fire dragons would seem a bit better...escpecially if supported by a  jetbike autarch.

ender502 

i play tested them the other week and i found that 10 is enough if you get the in combat fast enough with out getting shot up to much. For that you just need a shadowseer.

Haven't played them yet, but the TheoryHammer is clear... They're extremely hard to shoot at before they assault.

The spotting distance is 2D6x2. On average, that's 14". Also on average, the Harlequins will move, fleet and assault a total of 15.5". The average result is that they're able to assault a unit before it can even see them to shoot.

Now, granted, your opponent might roll boxcars, and shoot them at 24"... But if he's willing to take a 1 in 36 gamble that he wastes a squad's shooting, then you're probably not giving that squad enough other targets to think about. The fact is, it's a tough call to shoot at them. You have to guess the range, and even if you are confident in your guess, you still have to decide if it's worth the risk of wasting the squad's shooting to do it.

They are a fragile unit. A 5+ invulnerable save with T3 is pretty weak. If 10 Marines Rapid-Fire their bolters at them, that's about 6 of them dead, and that hurts.

The key, I think, is to either keep them out of LOS until they assault, or only show them to your enemy at about 14" away. Keeping them out of LOS will be tricky, but since nothing can shoot them beyond 24" no matter what it rolls, they don't have to worry about lurking Heavy Bolters and such.

Perhaps another question is if 10 Harlequins is too many. With 6 you can mount them in a Falcon, possibly with Star Engines. In that situation, you might even dispense with the Shadowseer and save a chunk of points, although the lack of Plasma Grenades would be a serious loss.

The problem is that their shooting protection doesn't do much for them when you need them.

If you're sitting 15.5" away from an enemy you'd like to assault, they move up and rapid fire you from 9.5" away, where the stealth isn't likely to protect you.

In the games I've tested against them, it seems rather easy to set up at least one turn of shooting on them, and then they just melt.

One thing I do like about them is that you can use them in a shooty army as countercharge, keeping them completely out of LOS, and they don't have to worry about enemy indirect taking pot shots at them.

 

What about having fortune cast on them? Also having a farseer with the unit seems to be a very safeway to get doom cast on something.

6 rapid firing marines can kill what? 3 harlies if they are fortuned? That's pretty harsh.

As counter charge? But what will you counter charge against? The new eldar builds are so heay on vehicles I think it would be difficult to set a situation where the harlies are where you need them to be when you need them to be there. Perhaps the above wqas correct about 6 in a falcon and us ethem as an assault of opprtunity/VP denial system?

What kind of battle line are you envisioning the harlies to be the counter charge for? The warwalkers you posted a while back would make sense.

ender502

Yes, the 9 warwalker/guardian army would be an example. I'm torn between harlies, scorpions, and banshees. Right now I think banshees are the best choice, because doom makes them so nasty against so many things. 8 banshees+doom means nearly 7 dead Meqs on the charge. Not bad at all. Even nasty chaos lords will fear getting near them.

Of course harlies are about as nasty, point for point. So that might be a better option. I'm still thinking about it. But the harlies depend on getting rending 6's, so are much more dice dependant than the banshees.

Unless you were really strapped for points I'd say go for the set of Harlies w/ Shadowseer. With the Viel of Tears you can safely put them near any other unit you were worried about protecting without having to worry about having terrain near by for cover. Plus you could always Fortune the Harlies to increase your chances of Rending.

Plus with Hit and Run you can always get them out of a bad situation or move them to deal with another threat which is nice.

Fortune doesn't help rend. Neither does guide (it only works in the shooting phase).

But hit and run puts it over the top for me. Now it's time to scrounge some harlies. To Ebay!

This is true, especially when there's no benefit to the defenders to remain in cover (the Shadowseer will just Plasma Grenade them).

On the other hand, this is an issue for all Eldar units trying to get into assault on foot, and pretty much any assault unit, period. Even a squad of Assault Marines, which can move and assault 18", is vulnerable to having the defending unit moving 6" and Rapid-Firing 12".

I see your point, I'm just a bit confused as to why this has never been a factor for me in game. I'm basing my view of Harlequins on how my Assault Marines play, and while I might be going against bad players, and I might be getting a lot of mileage out of hopping over terrain, I don't think I've ever had a Jump Infantry unit get shot in the way you're describing.

It's somewhat hard to reconcile the fact you bring up with the anecdotal evidence I have in game. It may simply be an issue of the defender underestimating the speed of the assaulting unit, in which case it's not as much of an option against a very experienced player.



Who isn't? Two things impress me about the Eldar Codex. One is the huge number of units it has. The other is how well balanced they are. Harlequins, Banshees and Scorpions, are very different from one another, and very comparable in power for points. Harlequins are a high risk, high reward unit that can be tricky to use. Banshees are more straightforward. Scorpions are tough, can infiltrate, and their Exarch is by far the strongest.

Honestly, I don't think you can go wrong with any of them. It's just a matter of using the ones you've got in the best way. For now I'm going with 6-man Scorpion and Banshee squads, and seeing which work for me. That has more to do with how I feel about the models than anything.

I think there to pricey personally and beware podding marine armies they will do a number on Harlies.

Phryxis:

The reason you don't see it with your assault marines is the 12" movement and the limited ROI on shooting marines with basic guns. With just about any basic trooper, harlies 15" away are a juicy target.

The harlie is the same price as an assault marine, slower, and dies twice as fast. So perhaps it's a bit of an apples to oranges comparison.

 

 

Posted By mauleed on 12/06/2006 10:28 AM

Fortune doesn't help rend. Neither does guide (it only works in the shooting phase).

But hit and run puts it over the top for me. Now it's time to scrounge some harlies. To Ebay!

Got my Eldar powers screwed up, stupid Panzee's...

Thought I didn't know that Fortune was only for the Shooting phase, I really need to break down and pick up their new codex for my own self instead of just looking at my friends when our gaming group is meeting.

You may want to check out some of the numbers I ran on the Harlies with Veil of Tears and their potential threats from shooting:  www.dakkadakka.com/Forums/tabid/56/forumid/18/tpage/2/view/Topic/postid/115854/Default.aspx

Assuming you're 11-12" away from the Harlies they will still fail to see you at least 25% of the time, which is pretty good odds considering what it'd be like if someone was able to get close enough to see/threaten your banshees with shooting.

The thing with them is that if you can predict when they're going to possibly be threatened by shooting you can cast Fortune on them (hey I got the power right this time).  With that, it can have a pretty good effect on reducing casualties if you do manage to get shot at. 

I think the only thing that the Harlies are afraid of is a Drop Podding Dread with a Heavy Flamer and an Assault Cannon, which is even more brutal on Banshees anyway. 

I think the only thing that the Harlies are afraid of is a Drop Podding Dread with a Heavy Flamer and an Assault Cannon, which is even more brutal on Banshees anyway. 

Agreed, but the Banshees are a lot cheaper, and with Doom they become ungodly.

I think that harlies have a bit of an advantage because they are not so vehicle dependent as the banshees. The 5+ invulnerable and a reroll is also pretty nifty when facing anything that is AP4.

So, using my rudimetary math skills... 10 banshees v marines... 30 rolls, 15 hits and 5 dead marines.... doom makes that an 8 or 9 instead.

Same thing for harlies....40 rolls...6 rends...and 11 hits.... 3 or 4 wounds... 2 or 3 unsaved wounds... 8 or 9 totals wounds.....

Throw in the furious assault and the harlies blow the banshees out of the water. They also gain some crazy utility from fusion pistols.

Hmmmmm.... So will it be 1 squad of 10 harlies or two?

ender502

 

The two shots from the plasma pistols certainly help, especially when your oponent moves in to shoot. I actually think the game is pretty balanced with the ranges, it isn't often that any unit can charge you from beyond your shooting range (except of course for flyrants...., or for that matter, swooping hawks). Maybe that is the secret. Pick the nasty shooty unit of your choice, charge it with your swooping hawks, to keep it from shooting, and then get your banshees, or harlies or even dragons or WG into range, if the swoopies can survive two rounds of assault, then they fly away at the beggining ofyour next movement phase, and you are good to go.

Pity that their exarch lost his exploding powersword... (I think I got 18 hits with him in one _round_)

[broken record]
As Mauleed pointed out, all the assumptions about survivability of harlequins using veil of tears on foot assume that your opponents will stand still and wait for them to charge. Any reasonably skilled opponent will close with the harlequins and be making a much shorter sighting roll.
[/broken record]

Marine assault troops are different because they bridge the magic numbers of the differences between movement and rapid-fire ranges. Assault troops can always make a 12" move and a 6" assault, so they can start 17.9" away and be sure of getting into combat (barring terrain). If the target unit is 17" away, it's not worthwhile for them to step up and shoot because (1) assault marines will take insignificant casualties against rapid-firing weapons anyway and (2) at that extreme limit, usually a whole unit will not be able to get into rapid-fire range (some guys at the back of the unit will wind up 13-14" away).

But a harlequin unit that ends its turn 17.9" away only has a 1 in 6 chance of making it into assault in the next turn (move 6, fleet 6, assault 6). In order to be reasonably sure of getting into assault, harlequins need to end their movement about 14-13" away from the target unit. If the target unit stood still, yes they'd have a difficult spotting roll ahead of them. But if the target unit moves up 6", the whole unit is easily within rapid-fire range and they only need a 4 or 5 on 2d6 to make the spotting roll--about a 70% likelyhood. If they happen to have a flamer, so much the better.

Fortune increases the successful save rate of a harlequin unit from 33% to 50%. That feels pretty significant, but the T3 of the harlequins and the BS4 of marine-toted boltguns combine to cause a lot of wounds, which offsets the benefits of fortune. The standard 7 rapid-firing boltguns, sergeant pistol shot and 2 plasma shots causes about 7.5 wounds on eldar, so you're looking at 4-6 dead harlequins without fortune, 3- 5 dead with fortune.

It looks like inevitable mathematics to me. If anybody can explain to me step-by-step how a unit of harlequins can approach a unit of space marines without needing to roll a 5 or 6 for fleeting that doesn't produce a better than 60% chance of getting rapid-fired, I'll be the first to admit that I'm wrong.

I think it was mentioned before about having the harlies covered by another unit such as swooping hawks or the loved by everyone autarch in jetbike. Combined tactics really seem to be the flavor wit this dex. 

Getting shot up will be no fun for the harlies. They seem as if they wil pretty much fall down. But use of terrain, veil of tears and fortune should see them through the worst of it.

Though if the fire prism is as effective as so many seem to think the entire conversation is academic. Why assault when you can have a S6 AP3 pie plate that is direct fired from a tough to kill skimmer?

ender502

Assuming a Rapid-Fire weapon, the target will need to be < 18" away. If the target happened to be 19" away, the moving unit would put itself well into charge range, but would not get to shoot. This is a small risk for a skilled player who guesses rages well, but still a possibility. More likely than that is the possibility that only a model or two will come into range, and numerous unsaved wounds will be wasted. That is actually quite likely, and suggests some consideration as to the formation that the Harlequins move in.

It's true, though, as Ed says, I'm too used to my T4/3+ Marines and not enough used to working with T3/5+.

Yeah, that's my point--if the harlequins are 19" away, they can't charge even with a maximum fleet roll, so the marine opponent has no reason to move forward. If they are within 18", they are in rapid fire range.

Where I play, people are pretty good at judging those key distances. So in my environment at least, betting the lives of your harlequins on your opponent's inability to judge an 18" distance is not a good bet.

Unless you are charging through cover you are just going to have to take that round of shooting. I think it will be the raririty rather than the rule that you can get all your harlies to a combat.

I'm finding difficult terrain to be a big friend to the Harlies. They can move through it freely, the enemy unit can't. That can make the difference in bypassing the rapidfire.

The 6 man squad in a falcon looks realllly nice. That makes it really really easy to force marines to make a choice between two sucky options (a: get charged, b: walk away and don't shoot heavy weapons)

And terrain is very helpful too, like Mannahnin says. 4+ rerollable cover saves are pretty nice, and standing behind terrain then advancing through it is equally cool.

Posted By mauleed on 12/06/2006 4:50 AM

One thing I do like about them is that you can use them in a shooty army as countercharge, keeping them completely out of LOS, and they don't have to worry about enemy indirect taking pot shots at them. 

 

This is the wisest comment in this thread.

Derling, what is that on your nose? LOL. No offense. Maulie has always been a great contributor to dakka tactics.

So, it seems as if harlies are winning over banshees and that 10 should be enough when combines with a shadow seer and farseer.

ender502

Sadly though my banshees are painted and I own no harlies.

Posted By mauleed on 12/07/2006 10:47 AM

Sadly though my banshees are painted and I own no harlies.

Sell the banshees to fund buying the harlies. Who wouldn't want to spend major bucks for a set of genuine 'mauleed" banshees?

The harlies seem to be selling for $40 - $50 for about 10 or 12 models on ebay. That's probably the route I will take. Anyway, it looks like the harlies are pretty much kicking the banshees butts.

I could just "buy" the new ones from GW when they come out but.... I'll vote with my dollar and give as little of my $ as I can to GW. Every lost sale effects GW's bottom line. Maybe they'll get the picture. Eventually.

ender502

Posted By ender502 on 12/07/2006 10:42 AM

Derling, what is that on your nose? LOL. No offense. Maulie has always been a great contributor to dakka tactics.

I just calls'em as I sees'em.

the way I've been using them:

Banshees are the aggressive assault unit

scorpians are the sustained assault unit.(also act as counter charge for infiltrators)

Harlequins are the counter-assault element in an otherwise shooty army .(This is the reason I don't find the deathjeaster a waste of points.)

Harlequins are the counter-assault element in an otherwise shooty army .(This is the reason I don't find the deathjeaster a waste of points.)

I don't remember, does the death jester  have rending or is that just maugun ra? If they do than they just became the best thing since internet porn.

ender502

Halequins are brutual if they hit combat.......but die like flies if you can get within 12" and shoot.

Played against them a couple times.......and when they hit, they each marine sqauds. However, get in that window with a raozback squad and a Tornado.......and they go away.

Ed shoot me a PM....I have tons if your willing to strip some.