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.

Battalion

HQ
Farseer - singing spear (Doom - Guide)
Spiritseer - (Protect/Jinx)

Troops
5x Avenger - exarch 2x SC
5x Avenger - exarch 2x SC
20x Guardian - 2x brightlance platform

Dedicated Transport
Wave Serpent 3x SC

Spearhead #1
HQ
Spiritseer - (Conceal/Reveal)

Heavy Support
6x Dark Reapers
Fire Prism
Fire Prism

Spearhead #2

HQ
Autarch (warlord) - reaper launcher, star lance

Heavy Support
3x D-Cannon support weapons
3x D-Cannon support weapons
3x Warwalker - 6x Starcannon

Plan is to Webway strike the guardians in front of the artillery as they move forward the first few turns. When they drop they will get the 4++ stratagem and likely the +1 to hit stratagem and hit them with conceal and protect. War walkers and reapers will likely be getting the autarch reroll 1's buff. Dire avengers will just fill the gap and react to opponents moves. Will likely doom the target that gardians are shooting at - guide can go wherever needed - gives the autarch the freedom to move away from the reapers and walkers later in the game without losing offense. CP should be flowing in constantly also with the Ulthwe + autarch warlord trait/ability.

Edit - found I could actually get another command point out of this without changing anything.

So I've been thinking a bit on this one and the main thing that stands out is the CP usage. Starting at 7, then with Autarch & Traits you get to about 9 over the game right? Far as i can count your usage would go a bit like this:

1 CP Webway on the Guardians
2 CP on buffing the Guardians, probably for 2 turns before they drop below usefulness.
1 CP a turn on the Fire Prisms, again assume 2 turns worth before 1 goes pop

That's all 7 of your initial spent before even getting into re-rolls etc so i'm guessing you won't plan to do all of those every game but it's worth keeping in mind.

The second standout is that your webway plan for the guardians may be flawed in certain matchups. For this list setup being so heavy support dominated it's likely the opponent will ignore them making all those buffs redundant. Further to that you don't have much that you can put up-field to hold up enemy deep strikes and assaults - all it would take is your opponent getting close enough on turn 1 and those guardians won't be able to deep strike between your support platforms and the advancing forces.

With that in mind, I would be tempted to have the 20 guardians staring on the field as your screen and webway strike one of those D-cannon batteries instead. It may be worth using the Embolden warlock power on the guardians too if you face an assault heavy force to ensure they don't lose too much to morale when doing that and then keep CP ready to pull a nasty Feigned Retreat stratagem.

Lithanial wrote:
So I've been thinking a bit on this one and the main thing that stands out is the CP usage. Starting at 7, then with Autarch & Traits you get to about 9 over the game right? Far as i can count your usage would go a bit like this:

1 CP Webway on the Guardians
2 CP on buffing the Guardians, probably for 2 turns before they drop below usefulness.
1 CP a turn on the Fire Prisms, again assume 2 turns worth before 1 goes pop

That's all 7 of your initial spent before even getting into re-rolls etc so i'm guessing you won't plan to do all of those every game but it's worth keeping in mind.

The second standout is that your webway plan for the guardians may be flawed in certain matchups. For this list setup being so heavy support dominated it's likely the opponent will ignore them making all those buffs redundant. Further to that you don't have much that you can put up-field to hold up enemy deep strikes and assaults - all it would take is your opponent getting close enough on turn 1 and those guardians won't be able to deep strike between your support platforms and the advancing forces.

With that in mind, I would be tempted to have the 20 guardians staring on the field as your screen and webway strike one of those D-cannon batteries instead. It may be worth using the Embolden warlock power on the guardians too if you face an assault heavy force to ensure they don't lose too much to morale when doing that and then keep CP ready to pull a nasty Feigned Retreat stratagem.

Thanks for the reply!
Good points - you even helped me realize I can make 2 spearheads so I can start with 8 command points. You also helped me realize something pretty crucial - support weapons can deep strike! I could even deep strike all 6. So in some situations that would actually be the best choice - combined with the warwalkers natural ability to come on from any board edge - I could shift a lot of power where-ever I need it.

Overall in the first 3 turns I should get 1 command point back from Ulthwe warlord trait and and I should get 1 back for each 6 I use. So starting with 8 I should be between 10-11 command points over the course of the first 3 turns. I think that's about as good as I can get with this theme. I think the main idea here will be to limit command reroll's - however tempting they can be. Much better off having stratagems to burn with this list I think. So unless it's rerolling a 1 for damage on a d cannon or bright lance - I don't see myself using the reroll for much except for psychic powers.

Just played a game with this last night. Was playing against an AD mech list with lots of robots and destroyers and a knight with lots of guns. There was a central LOS blocker with the deployment type where you set up 9 inches off the center. This was perfect for my D cannons and I deployed all of them there. He siezed and chose to target my fire prisms and reapers. Reapers died easily to the robots (I deployed them to cover with intercept for his deep striking unit of close combat guys - if they got in on the cannons it would have been bad news) He killed 1 D cannon too with his knight who split fire between a prism and a single D cannon. The fire prism lived with -1 to hit stratagem and a little above average FNP with 2 wounds left.

My return fire was devastating - The warwalkers wiped a whole unit of plasma destroyers (actaully overkilled them by quite a bit probably could have killed 2 untis with these rolls).

The 5 remaining D cannons killed 1 Robot and 4 destroyers. Fire prisms we able to kill another robot and leave 1 with 1 wound (the serpent finished it off) Pretty much GG after that.

Some observations - I think I'd do better with another prism over the reapers. If I didn't get lucky and keep the other prism alive - my remaining prism would have much reduced power.

Spirit seers did not have much to do this game (their only real job is to buff the guardians) because guardians went for a flank move. Maybe finding points for a warlock biker would ad some flexibility to the army. It's quite expensive though.

All in all I was very pleased with the D cannons. I think I am going to buy 6 more and try to roll armies with the power of the D.

Reapers are probably the most powerful unit eldar can field currently. I’d suggest not dropping them, but protecting them a bit more. Just start them in the wave serpent and they can jump out first turn and start laying down fire.
Good luck

Congratulations on a successful game.

I'd say it sounds like you faced pretty much an ideal D-cannon target rich environment so don't go loading up on them just yet and give it a few more games. Sounds like the reapers was a mis-play but yes they are squishy so your extra fire prism thought isn't a bad one at all.

How did your Guardians perform?

Lithanial wrote:
Congratulations on a successful game.

I'd say it sounds like you faced pretty much an ideal D-cannon target rich environment so don't go loading up on them just yet and give it a few more games. Sounds like the reapers was a mis-play but yes they are squishy so your extra fire prism thought isn't a bad one at all.

How did your Guardians perform?

I sent them to take out one of 2 the a 10 man infantry unit of vangaurds with plasmas screening the knight. I had plenty of command points so I made them BS2+ and they wiped them out. They did end up intercepting with the vangaurds but only managed to kill the 2 bright lances (I didn't need anti tank but it would have been great to not lose the bright lance regardless) I also found out that you can only use 4++ stratagem if you are in the enemy shooting phase so - wont help you with getting intercepted. Giving them star cannons might make more sense because they are cheaper (a lot of times you will just be sacrificing them to reduce the damage the squad takes.)

You are right about being target rich - it was probably game over at the start of the game ESP with such a bad first turn for him. I never really even had to move the cannons. They are still a value even at bs4+ rerolling 1's - though. And like is pointed out in the previous posts - all 6 can be deployed by the webway. It's really a shame that the other options aren't nearly as good for the support weapons.

Wyldcarde wrote:
Reapers are probably the most powerful unit eldar can field currently. I’d suggest not dropping them, but protecting them a bit more. Just start them in the wave serpent and they can jump out first turn and start laying down fire.
Good luck

Yeah - probably better to keep them safe turn 1 then use them for intercept. Warwalkers are a little better suited to take fire than reapers.