Lots of cool stuff here. I always like reading your eldar suggestions. Before I share some thoughts, a disclaimer: Despite being primarily an aeldari player, I've never paid much attention to wraith knights. I don't have a strong grasp of where they currently stand or what their issues are.
Hellebore wrote:
Deathshroud cannon
When you attack with this weapon, choose one of the following profiles:
Focussed18" Heavy
3D6 7 0 1 This weapon automatically hits its target. Wound rolls of 5+ for this weapon are resolved at
AP -4 instead of
AP 0. Targets gain no bonus for being in cover
Dispersed 60" Heavy
2D6 8 -2 D3 Wound rolls of 5+ for this weapon are resolved at
AP -4 instead of
AP -2. Targets gain no bonus for being in cover
Nitpick: I'm pretty sure you've swapped around the "Focused" and "Dispersed" names here. It might be a good idea to specifically call out which cover rules these ignore; i.e. "ignores light cover." I note that this weapon's profile and special rules depart somewhat from death spinners, night spinners, and shadow weavers, but I assume that's intentional.
Scattershield Range 18" 3D6 S5 AP0 D1 targets that suffer wounds from this weapon suffer -1 to hit during their next turn
The unit’s distortion fields become 4+ against ranged attacks and it gains a 5+ invulnerable save against melee attacks.
The invuln boost is good. The shooting profile feels kind of random to me. You described wanting to treat the shield a bit like a serpent shield, but 10.5 (average) shots that wound a plague marine on a 4+ for 1 damage with no
AP seems really underwhelming. Especially for something taking the same slot as one of the big guns. I also don't love the -1 to hit effect if only because we kind of have a lot of that in the craftworlders book as is. Making it only work if the thing you shoot it at gets hit, wounded, and fails a save also means that it's not terribly reliable if used against one of your opponent's more valuable units; (I'm thinking tanks and such).
This is probably too complicated to be a good idea, but if you want to make it more like the serpent shield, maybe try something like...
Scattershield: A unit with a scattershield has a 4+ invulnerable save against ranged attacks and a 5+ invulnerable save against melee attacks. Once per game, this model may permanently lose its invulnerable save to deal X mortal wounds to the nearest enemy unit within 18" and line of sight. X = the number of unmodified saves of 6 the wielder has made during the game.
Being one-use and needing to "charge up" means that it won't overlap with the actual guns for ranged offensive output. Giving up your invuln and doing mortal wounds will make it feel like a more dramatic and impactful weapon. It will also make your opponent reconsider throwing quite so many shots into the wraithknight; they won't want to toss random bolter or assault cannon shots your way if they're more likely to charge up your shield than to do meaningful damage.
Vibrolance Range 48” Heavy 3 S8 AP-2 D3 For each successful hit by this weapon, roll to hit the target again.
Infinitely? Or just once? The former would probably be too much given how reliable the shooting of a Guided WK is.
Skathach: Upgrade to Skathach Knight with warpshunt generator and spirit Stones for +50pts
Are spirits stones really not an option (or mandatory part of) all wraith knights? Seems weird that they aren't baked into all knights. And if they are only available to the skathatch, what's up with that lore-wise? Huh.
Bright Stallion
Swift and deadly equine knight, making breathtaking charges across the battlefield.
M20" WS3+ BS3+ S8 T8 W20 A4 Ld9 Sv3+
Choose one ranged weapon from the wraithknight entry and one of the melee weapons below:
Fractal Charge: 5+ Invulnerable save against ranged attacks 4+ in melee
Leaping Charge: When moving, advancing or charging, the bright stallion can ignore infantry.
Pulsar lance Range 48” Heavy 4 S9 AP -3 D4
melee S+4 Ap-4 D1D6 when charging roll 3 hit rolls for each attack.
light sabre melee S user Ap -4 D3 re-roll failed to hit and wound rolls and increase Attacks characteristic by +2
The Bright Stallion has a shuriken rack mounted on its shoulders:
shuriken rack range 24” assault 8 S5 AP0 D1
Points cost and Power Level? It feels weird that leaping charge only works against infantry (meaning that ripper swarms and beasts can block it while aggressors can't), but I"m guessing that's just to keep it consistent with the Unstoppable Revenant rule. Would it be reasonable to change it to, "can ignore enemy units other than monsters and vehicles," ?
The +4 strength on the pulsar lance feels oddly specific to me. +1 strength would mean that you wound T8 on 3+ instead of 4+. +2 strength would mean the same and also lets you wound T5 on 2+ instead of 3+. But the only difference between +2 and +4 is that you can also wound T6 on a 2+. Is that intentional, or were you just kind of eyeballing the strength?
Also, being stronger in melee than in shooting is fine but has me curious what you're going for with that decision. "Lance" makes me think of laser and star lances that have the same strength regardless of what phase you're using them in, but you've chosen not to do that here. Getting stronger as you get closer is a thing we see with tau breachers, but not having a gradiation between 48" and 0.5" makes me think that's not what you're going for. Nothing really wrong with what you've got here, but I"m curious as to how you came to those particular stats.
Also also, I kind of worry about the 20" movement. I get that this thing is fast, and it makes sense for it to be that fast compared to a normal WK. But this thing can functionally reach just about anywhere on the table on turn 1. I worry that speed like that on a heavy hitter like this might not be a good fit for the scale of a
40k game. Feels more like something from
apoc.
Triple also, I'm curious about the shuriken racks. Its strength differs from other shuriken weapons, yet it seems like it also comes very close to basically being three shuriken cannons. Nothing wrong with that, but I'm curious about your thought process there.
Fire Gale
Wreathed in smoke and ash, the fire gale is fuelled by the rage of its pilot, psychically converting this to a palpable shield of heat and spewing incandescent death at the enemy.
M16" WS3+ BS3+ S7 T8 W20 A5 Ld9 Sv3+
Choose one of the following ranged weapons:
Dragonfire Roar range 18” Assault 4D6 S6 AP-2 D2 auto hit
Bale eye lance Range 36” Assault 3 S8 AP-5 D4 if the target is within half range, double the damage
Choose one of the following melee weapons
Burning Gauntlet (ranged): 18” Assault 2D6 S5 AP-1 D1 auto hit
Burning Gauntlet Sx2 AP-4 D4. For each 6 rolled to wound, the target received an additional mortal wound
Smouldering Axe (ranged): 12” Assault 4 S7 AP-4 D3
Smouldering Axe S+3 AP-3 D3, increase attacks characteristic by +2
Inferno shield 5+ invulnerable save. For each 6+ rolled, the attacking unit receives a mortal wound.
Price? The burning gauntlets' mortal wound rule feels weird to me. You're wounding T7 and less on a 2+. You're denying armor saves to almost everything. You're doing a flat 4 damage per unsaved wound. You're possibly shooting a bale eye lance at your target before swinging the fists. Doing 1 mortal wound here and there doesn't seem like it's likely to matter against big targets, nor does it seem like it turns the gauntlets into melee crowd clearers. Maybe just drop the special rule? Or make it do something more significant and price it accordingly?
S+3 on the axe feels weird for the same reason S+4 felt weird above. I guess it lets you wound T5 on 2+?
Destroyer
The heaviest and most powerful of eldar knights, the destroyer’s four arms are equipped with a variety of different weapons to deal death.
M12" WS3+ BS3+ S9 T8 W28 A5 Ld9 Sv3+
Choose two weapon options from the Wraithknight weapon list above.
In addition, Destroyers have two Destruction gauntlets:
melee Sx2 AP-5 D6 enemy units that suffer casualties from this weapon are immobilised during their next turn and cannot fire on overwatch
range 12” Assault 2D6 S3 AP0 D1
The Destroyer mounts stormstrike launchers on its shoulders:
Shoulder stormstrike launchers range 48” Heavy 2D6 S6 AP-1 D1 any unit damaged by this weapon is at -1 to BS in their next turn.
Distortion field: 5+ invulnerable save against ranged attacks
Price? I have a few questions about the gauntlets:
* Cannot fire overwatch for how long? They wouldn't normally fire overwatch during "their next turn" unless they fell back, which the first part of this rule generally prevents.
* What's the fluff on immobilizing a unit? What makes a destruction gauntlet better at preventing Fall Back than a thunderstrike gauntlet or a reaper chainsword?
* Probably ought to clarify what "immobilized" means. Can my warp spiders use an exarch power to teleport away, for instance?
* Immobilizing a unit that takes casualties seems really rough on something like harlequins that are generally really good at falling back while being less of a big deal for something like termagaunts, and that feels odd to me.
* What does the ranged profile of the gaunltets shoot exactly? The random number of shots makes me thing they'r emeant to be some sort of flamer, but they don't autohit, and the strength doesn't really match any aeldari guns that I can think of other than lasblasters.
I'm kind of iffy on the stormstrike launchers imposing a -1 to hit for the same reasons I was iffy about the scattershield doing it, but it is easier for me to picture a missile barrage disrupting enemy fire for some reason. I'm curious as to your thought process on this statline. It doesn't seem to match any other aeldari tech. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Overall, nothing really seems unreasonable (except maybe the stallion's speed) provided it's costed correctly. Thanks for sharing!
