Foreword:This is basically me typing up my thought process since I got the Dark Eldar book out in front of me, had a good read through, and decided to make a list. Now, this has a few little tangents and a fair few personal thoughts, so just remember what this is, a look into how I build a list, rather than a tactics article. You may be asking why I put it up here? Because I think the list's alright, and I want help, of course! (:
I've always loved Skimmers, and the Dark Eldar ones are absolutely beautiful. However, I'm a competitive WAAC ******** so I have to make the army good. Looking at Dark Eldar, they're written by Phil Kelly, who knows his way around an Eldar army, yeah. Doesn't he!
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Erm, does he? Could've fooled me. Looking at the book, and the commentary in it, it seems he's one of these people who thinks Eldar are some army that require an absolute tactical genius to play correctly, and anyone else wont be able to do it. That's probably because you've made them sub par, and it would indeed require an absolute tactical genius to make it work correctly. Gah, it just annoys me that they've made them this "elite" army that can't afford to take losses, and given them almost no way to mitigate them. Also, deciding that 18" is a good threat range for an army of T3 5+ or AV10 open topped units is not good. In addition, they pay for stats they're barely going to use. How often are Warriors really going to NEED WS4 and I5. At least, they should not be paying full points for them. And what the hell is with the costing on their AP2 weaponry? Oh, Kelly didn't get the memo that 3+4E were over. Fuck.
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So, looking at the DE army and trying to make it work for me, ok. Well, I had a look through the various unit choices, and, if you don't mind, I'll do my own little mini review. If I didn't mention a unit, well, I'm sure you can work out why.
*Should note, these opinions are v. much from the perspective of running a particular style of list. MSU mech that deploys on the table, and brings an assault counterpunch. Some units listed (or not) may/do have uses in other builds, and, as with me and GKSS, opinions change (:*
SCs: Get out my book, except Sliscus and Vect, you two might have a use.
Archons: Yes in games of 2500, otherwise no. Mostly because of the court, make of that what you will.
Haemonculi: Yes, you bring wracks, are cheap, and the shattershard could be pretty cool.
Incubi, Grotesques, Harlies and Bloodbrides: You get better, more effective assault elsewhere in the book.
Trueborn: Cheap lances. Fragile and overcosted infantry. Well, these are getting minmaxed.
Warriors: 9pts?! NINE!? 7 or 8 maybe. But jesus hell, not 9. And the cost of their weaponry!? Jesus, imo these guys are only really good if you really want a backfield lance, or are deep striking them down.
Wyches: No. "These guys can hold up units in melee for ages, and can really be a potent assault threat. To that I say "learn to play against wyches", and "to what, guard?". Ugh.
Wracks: These will have to do. At least they're cheap and "survivable."
Scourges and Reavers: Heat lances are nice, sadly this is where beastmasters are.
Beastmasters: "Yes."
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| THIS! Is a Ravager. |
Cronos: Is not a Ravager
Razorwing: Is not a Ravager
Creed: Is inside a Ravager, wait, this must....
Voidraven: Is not a Ravager (Ok, the 2 fliers aren't "bad" but you need to build for them, and I'd probably only really advise them at 2500)
Ravager: Ok, 105pts? Ok, you're not a Vendetta. You're the ugly, pimply ginger redhead stepsister of a Vendetta. You'll have to do.
Ok, so now that that's out the way, lets make a list out of it.
The first thing I thought is "the thing I love about DE is the skimmers, lets have some of those." This necessitates units, sadly, so, lets see what I can cook up.
Well, I need an HQ, get on board Haemy. Then I'll take 3 Ravagers. Then, for raiders, I'll take 3x3 Trueborn with 2 lances, in raiders. Then I need some kind of troop I guess. Well, as I don't rate warriors that start on the board, I guess it's 18 wracks in raiders. 1343. Hrm. Well, I'll throw in some beasts. Seeing as I don't have enough for 3x8 Razor flocks, guess we're doing 6. That costs a grand total of 198, if we run 4 Beastmasters, our 6 Razorwings, and then 5 Khymerae. Awesome, lets plug in 3 of those.
1937. Ok, now then, lets see. Looking at the list, I want Tank Shock. Why? Well, ask Mechdar. Tank shocking is awesome with skimmers. So, lets get cracking. We'll have shock prows on all our troop raiders. 1967. Then, we'll have Flickerfields on the 3 Trueborn raiders. Why? Because they're gonna be empty, and I'm probably goign to have to use them to give cover at some point.
1997. Still not happy with this. I really want to try Torment Grenade Launchers on my raiders. I'll see how it tests, if I don't like it, I'll drop them. So we'll drop a Khymerae, and get 2 Torment Grenade Launchers and another Shock Prow. If the nade launchers test well, it'll be 3 TGLaunchers. If not, I may put in the Khymerae, or get more prows, or something. Maybe even drop a raider and get more guys, I dunno, testing awaits.
So, the final list? Here you go:
Haemonculus
50
Elites
3 Trueborn
2 Dark Lances
Raider
Flickerfield
156
3 Trueborn
2 Dark Lances
Raider
Flickerfield
156
3 Trueborn
2 Dark Lances
Raider
Flickerfield
Shock Prow
161
Troops
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
Torment Grenade Launchers
100
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
Torment Grenade Launchers
100
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
95
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
95
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
95
3 Wracks
Raider
Shock Prow
95
Fast Attack
4 Beastmasters
4 Khymerae
6 Razorwing Flocks
186
4 Beastmasters
5 Khymerae
6 Razorwing Flocks
198
4 Beastmasters
5 Khymerae
6 Razorwing Flocks
198
Heavy Support
Ravager
105
Ravager
105
Ravager
105
What do we think?
-Hope you guys enjoyed reading this (:
