Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Sorry for spamming the boards all of the sudden, but I had an idea for Eldar and I'd like to get it reviewed in addition to my Tyranids. I don't believe in close combat through transports, and I don't believe in Fire Prisms. I think the former is simply too gimped to even try and the latter tanks too easy to keep shaken. I do believe in mobility though and without doing any maths I also feel that Storm Guardians will always outperform Dire Avengers in a mounted role. I might be wrong in assuming this army can somehow manage to take down for example a Necron army, but that's where you Eldar players step in. The list is built on the simple assumption that Falcons and Fire Dragons rule, and that even with BS3 you can hit if you got tons of templates, and that anything dies once it's Doomed. A lot of counter-assaults can be prevented by using the Fish of Fury tactic well. Naturally the Eldar have a lot more problems with everything than say, Tyranids, but that's not the issue here.

Eldar 1750p

HQ:

Farseer: Spear, RoW, Doom, Bike

Elites:

6x Fire Dragon: Exarch, Dragon's Breath, Crack Shot

6x Fire Dragon: Exarch, Dragon's Breath, Crack Shot

6x Fire Dragon: Exarch, Dragon's Breath, Crack Shot

Troops:

12x Storm Guardians: 2x Flamer

Wave Serpent: TL SCannon, SCannon, Vectored Engines, Spirit Stones

12x Storm Guardians: 2x Flamer

Wave Serpent: TL SCannon, SCannon, Vectored Engines, Spirit Stones

3x Guardian Jetbike: SCannon

3x Guardian Jetbike: SCannon

Fast Attack:

1x Vyper: SCannon

Heavy Support:

Falcon: 2x SCannon, Vectored Engines, Holo-Field, Spirit Stones

Falcon: 2x SCannon, Vectored Engines, Holo-Field, Spirit Stones

Falcon: 2x SCannon, Vectored Engines, Holo-Field, Spirit Stones

To be truthful this one requires more skill than the Zilla nids list you posted.  I applaud you for using flamers, and taking the road less traveled in that reguard.

Eldar bikes rock with moving back after shooting, so you have lots of support in that case.  I would like to see some countercharge unit, because you are going to get hurt in assault.  You are shooty, so with that in mind, and the skill to pull this off, you could do well.  I think many armies will not be able to deal with this mech list.  If you neutralize the speed advantage, then that is your achilles heal.  However, we all know how friggin impossible it is to kill an Eldar "tank".

Like I said, I would like to see some assault, or counterassault.  Heck, nearly any aspect could do the job.  But, that gets expensive.  Since you like nids, try Harlies with the standard layout if you want good assault units.

I can't say much more other than, its alot of the same thing, but if you could care less about comp, then two thumbs up again

Thing is, what kind of targets require me to have assault units? The only thing I can imagine is a huge block of Necron Warriors, but if I Doom it and throw an insane amount of saves on them they will all go away. The Dragon Exarches got Heavy Flamers that re-roll to wound rolls even without the Doom (and with S5 this is brutal as almost everything will always wound), and in many cases that type of weapon will cause more casualties than a dedicated assault unit altogether. I can see that some units need to be tied into combat to prevent them from shooting, but I can always sacrifice those Jetbikes if needed. Obliterators will die to Meltaguns, and so will shooty and small SM squads.

Shining Spears are supposedly an 'assault unit' that would fit this list, but they are so expensive and I would just be providing a good target instead of all those tanks. I just can't think of anything else in the entire army book that would be very effective, and that's why the list looks like this. I love flamers because they always hit and even partials always hit so you can force a lot of saving throws on everything regardless of your BS. The army has something like 13 Shuriken Cannons, 15 Meltaguns, 3 Heavy Flamers, 3 Pulse Lasers, 4 Flamers, and one Singing Spear.

I really like some of your thinking on this army.  Eldar may become my next army, and as I look through both the codex and online lists, I really would wanna do something different myself.  My biggest goal is to NOT have a cookie cutter army.  So much applause to you for going flamers and fire dragons!
Aztralwolf

I'll try to offer some helpful advice.

1) Fire Dragon Exarchs with the Flamer - You're losing a Meltashot, and if the firedragons shoot at a tank, he's useless, and they probably wont live long enough to use the exarch's flamer the next turn anyway. Plus, you are wasting his BS5 with the flamer, and flamers ignore cover saves anyway, so only half of crackshot works. Re-rolling to wound is important though, but you'll be re-rolling with Doom anyway. I would try running the Dragons with no exarch. Six Meltas is nothing to sneeze at, and probably should always be shooting at hard targets.

2) The lone vyper on his own isn't really doing anything. Why not try dropping it. With the points of the vyper, plus the points saved from downgrading the Fire Dragon Exarchs, you would almost have enough points for another farseer (obviously a good thing for Dooming) or even an autarch which would help you out in an Escalation game.

- Alternatively, the extra points can give you a couple Spearlock's in your jetbike squads or Concealock's in your guardian squads.

3) The last thing to consider is how many times will the fire dragons be stuck without a transport because of escalation. I don't really know a good fix for that, but I guess they can at least fleet.

4) The dire avengers have more shots then the storm guardians, and better armor. (since you're not running Concealocks) Do the 2 Flamers make up for the 8 extra shots the Dire Avengers have, at BS4? I don't know. Plus, the Aspect Warriors have the higher Initiative, and with Defend can be a real pain in CC if you must.

Hope this was semi-helpful.

The list contains five valuable skimmers. One problem is to hide them all at the beginning of the game. This is hardly possible.

Fire Dragons are a one-hit wonder unit. Once they disembarked and vaporized their target, they die from return fire.

Not sure if this list is competitive. It is competitive if your skimmers survive. But if not, well, the passengers (Guardians) will not survive long.

A squad of Shining Spears would be a nice add-on providing some cc punch. But they should be led by an Autarch on bike with laser lance.

Your Guardians are wasting huge points with the Wave Serpants. Drop them and pick up another squad. Put Warlocks in each one, all with Enhance.

Wait till your Tanks and Dragons pop their tanks, then you let the 36 I5 charging guardians do their work on doomed units.

Take the other guys suggestion. Drop the Vyper, and the Exarchs. Pick up another Farseer with Doom.

To free up more points, I'd probably drop the Vectored Engines on the Falcons. There a cheap tank with a short range that probably won't help you out if forced to land anyways. With the holofields, chances of getting immobilized are very small already, so why spend all those points on that?

At the moment I play a 3 Falcons list. Leave the vectored engines as then the changes are 3 times less to detroy it with one volley.

The tactical advice of Djones is good. As you lack cc units you need enhance if you send the Guardians against a doomed (!) unit.

If you decide to drop one or more fire dragon exarchs, adding destructor warlocks to the bike squads is a way to get those heavy flamer shots back.

Having used both flamer storm guardians and dire avengers, I can tell you that there's no question that the DA's kill much more of everything in the first round of shooting. Also they don't evaporate in the round they're charged (they can hold out for a looong time with the exarch's defend power) and they aren't vaporized by a single volley of bolter fire.

Seriously, upgrading a Fire Dragon Meltagun to an Immolator Heavy Flamer costs 17 points and you guys call the flexibility it gives to the squad a waste of points. I disagree totally. And how exactly do DA's kill much more of everything than Guardians? You get 9 DA's for the price of 12 Storm Guardians with 2 Flamers. Against MEQ 9 DA kill 2 models while the 12 Storm Guardians kill 1,7 guys with pistols and atleast 1,3 guys with Flamers. They got close combat weapons meaning more attacks in CC, and their inferior armour save is replaced by 3 extra wounds. Noone can claim that point by point DA are somehow superior when it's most likely the opposite. The Guardians will take cover saves from their own vehicle when they disembark meaning they only lose 16,6% more models to bolter fire than Dire Avengers.

Thanks for many suggestions on what to do, but so far the units that would be replaced are clearly superior to the new ones in my opinion. The lone Vyper is a quarter holder because the army had exactly 55 points left to spare. What I could consider is a squad of Howling Banshees in a Wave Serpent with Star Engines and I would gladly drop a Vyper and some Guardians for that, but I don't have the Elite slots for it. Dropping a unit of Fire Dragons for Howling Banshees would mean I'm not really adding anything to the list, just changing the way it fights.

Well you don't buy 9 DAs--that's pointless. You buy 10 including the exarch with dual catapults and bladestorm. Typically against T4 they score about 11-13 wounds without doom, 18 or so with. The exarch multiplies the killing power of the unit way beyond what storm guardians can do.

Point-by-point comparisons don't work with aspect squads because of the way the exarch increases the unit's capabilities exponentially.

...and this number is off. 10 shots (cause 2 guys are holding flamers), 5 hits, 2.5 wounds,  .83 dead marines.



In order to kill this many you'd need to get minimum 8 guys under the flamer with with the total of the 2 shots.  Might be possible.

But in my experience storm guardian shooting is more likely to get a total of 6-8 wounds, 1-2 dead marines.



This is not a widely-used interpretation of the rule--although if you guys are playing this way in Finland, maybe we can get the same thing going over here.

But if you disembark with the wave serpent between you and the target, how are you going to get 8 guys under the flamer template?

I not either font of using Avengers. You need to deploy them carefully. Otherwise, they will hardly withstand the return fire they surely get. Thus using Guardians kitted out for cc are not a bad alternative. I would like to playtest your list.

Not getting the logic here. Storm guardians with a 5+ save withstand return fire better than dire avengers with a 4+/3+?

Posted By Flavius Infernus on 02/15/2007 8:15 AM

they will hardly withstand the return fire they surely get

Not getting the logic here. Storm guardians with a 5+ save withstand return fire better than dire avengers with a 4+/3+?

You're right. But with return fire I mean mainly AP 4 weapons like heavy bolters. DA excell neither in shooting (bladestorm is nice but the number of killed doomed Marines still too low)  nor in cc (defend is good, but you need to fortune the unit too). In this way,  one Avenger costs about 16 pts, more than a Marine.

Wuest, maybe I'm wrong but I can't help thinking that anybody who claims that DAs excel neither in shooting nor in HtH has never actually played the unit.

The 10-model exarch squad kills *more* MEq with shooting, even without doom, than an equal points value of any other unit in the army list with the exception of a unit of fire dragons shooting at MeQ in the open (the DA's do better than dragons when the target unit is in cover). Against GEq, DA's do better with shooting regardless.

In HtH, their job is not to kill enemy models, but rather to hold up assaults until a dedicated assault unit gets there to help them. With defend power (and possibly the 5+ invulnerable from the exarch) Ld9 and WS4, they can hold out longer against a wider variety of opponents than any other shooty unit in the list, and much longer than storm guardians, who usually crumble in the first round.

And they're only 12 points.

I have to agree with Flavius here, DAs are a wonderfully flexible unit. They shred anything MEq or weaker in conjunction with Doom, and they are a great tarpit unit with Defend (and Shimmershields if you're going against save ignoring units).

Granted this might be a rarity, or maybe it won't be. What does this eldar list do against a drop pod terminator list? Are 3 6 man firedragons and 3 falcons enough?
The feel of this list is such that I have concerns about Godzilla lists, unless you manage to have decent terrain you may be shut down by the 2+ armor save MCs.
I read your original eldar list with the harlequins, why the departure from that list it seems wickedly strong.

If the argument is who is better about shooting, Storm Guardians or Dire Avengers, then there is no doubt it's DA's.

But you don't bring Storm Guardians to a gun fight. You bring them to knife fights.

They can hit like a hammer when their the ones who charge. And with Enhance, they usually hit like a hammer to most units that may charge them as well. Have a Space Marine assualt squad charge them. They still go first, and by the time the Marines get to attack, a real good portion of them will be gone.

You have plenty of other shooting aspects in this army. Let the Guardians do what they are for. Kill things in Close Combat.

Some nice comments now. I have to say that awfully many of you are bringing Doom into the picture when you're describing how awesome Dire Avengers are. This is stupidity since every unit in the game benefits from having a Farseer nearby. Secondly, using Bladestorm as an example of Dire Avenger firepower is equally stupid. That Exarch power is only situationally useful and in the long run it only weakens the unit's damage output unless you consider the Avengers a drop and get killed instantly type of unit, and since all of you talk about the resilience of Dire Avengers clearly you don't expect them to die instantly to return fire.

Excuse me for my maths I assumed the 10 Storm Guardians each shot twice which was incorrect. I would be prepared to replace them all with Avengers, but isn't that still minor detail? Noone of you has tried to explore this army's capability in general. Can 5 grav tanks supported with a couple bikers win games on a competitive level? Really, can it? And how important is close combat in an Eldar army like this or should we just max out on the effective firepower units like I have done with Fire Dragons and could also do with Dire Avengers?

I actually liked your army alot, my comments were more from a "trim the fat" issue. I definetely think that you'd benefit from having a second farseer, (more dooming) or an autarch to stave off crappy reserve rolls. And the DA's would probably stay around longer than the Storm Guardians.

Aside from that, its similar to the list I was thinking of making.

10+guardians+shuriken cannon+warlock with destructor=120 Pts, 12 pts more than your current guardian sqauds, way more dakka and you get a heavy flamer as well.

Apart from that i think the list could work quite well, thugh i found that 1-2 squads of harlequins with kisses and a shadowseer in a falcon does wonders when it comes to clearing up shooty squads. But try this out and see if you can manage without, would be interesting to read about.

I played DA against a Gozilla list. The DA squad  mowed down a brood of Gaunt but got decimated from 10 to 5 in the return fire by a Carnifex. They failed the moral check and regrouped two rounds later... I'm not convinced if you take them against MEQ armies.
But I admit that they would be better then Storm Guardians in the above list as this army is geared towards speed and firepower. If you can manage to hold the enemy at arm's length then you will do fine. It will do fine vs. Terminator heavy list due to all these Fire Dragons, and assault cannons can hardly take down Eldar skimmers. I tried it.

How do you play this list against nids? I see enough firepower to down 1 elite choice carnifex perturn, kill off 600pts of troops in 2 turns and do nothing to the rest of the list because you can't hurt the 2+ MC's unless you plan to suicide the firedragons.

Btw the storm guardians with 2x flamers are about as effective as the direavengers on a points/effectivness basis, just a little harder to use as you have to get that much closer. If you were planning to play kill all the infantry and then poke off a few big ones at range then you'd be ok, but I'm not sensing massacre. Is massacreing important?

Well, I had no pathfinders but a squad of Spiders in the list, the best unit in this game. The Harlies charged the HT with two Guards and wiped them out in two rounds of combat. The Dragons stayed in the Falcon until round 5 and then vaporized a Carnifex (no return fire here). He ended up with 2 Genstealer squads in a buildung whle I had still my Falcons (one immobilized), Spiders, Dragons.

Therion-
I have the same question as Sazzlefrats: why deviate from your original build? The harlequin list (fortuned) is wickedly strong and seems more able to deal with the Godzilla Tyranid list than this one.

Also, given that you're using your vehicles to transport the "shooty" units - how do save VP (without sacrificing units) and get enough points for a Massacre?

Think Therion was testing us to see if this list recieved answers or not. lol, I'm a sucka. Anyhow lack of AP and durability says to me not viable.