Email in: Dark Eldar 1750 list

"Hi kirby,

I'm a recent convert to your blog and have enjoyed reading your articles and advice. At the moment I'm working on two 40k forces, one is a post FAQ Black Templar army and the other is Dark Eldar. I'm a huge fan of the new DE model range but I'm having trouble actually gaming with them, so far I've been nearly wiped off the board every game between 1500 and 1750 points against less experienced opponents. Now my dice rolling has been atrocious but still I don't think the lists I'm making or how I'm playing them is doing me any favours.

So anyway with the Venom model announced I've been trying to make a worthy competitive list at 1750, some Feedback would be great, I've come up with this:


Haemonculus-Agoniser-70

2 units of Kabalite Truebornx4-Blasters and Venoms with extra splinter cannon-346

2 units of Kabalite Warriorsx5-Blaster Venoms with extra splinter cannon-250

2 units of Kabalite Warriorsx10-Blaster, dark lance and Raider-380

Wychesx9-Shardnetx1, Heatrix with Agoniser and Raider-190

Reaversx6-2 heat lances- 156

Ravagerx2- 210

Razorwing jetfighter -145

total 1747

So I have 27 Lance weapons, lots of posioned shots aswell as the razorwings missiles, 10 skimmers and plenty of infantry and scoring units.The Big warrior squads gunboat it back with the Ravagers and since I only have a single razorwing I may well choose to deep strike it so it will have infantry targets to hit with the missiles when it comes down. Originally I ran 2 squads of Reavers but they always seem to get mauled as soon as they try and shoot anything and often fluff their melta shots, 1 unit still gives me the 3+ cover and some ap 1 but isn't the big investment of 2 squads. But yeah thanks for reading and let me know what you think.

Gary"

Don't give up on the army and maybe look at how you are playing it if you are losing! The list is pretty solid overall but I don't like the single Wych squad. There are a couple of options available to you when you drop that squad. We can maintain the Haemonculus and look for two cheap Wrack squads in Raiders to sit back on the objectives but that makes the Raider Warriors a bit obsolete. You could also run the Duke as an HQ which is going to benefit the Reavers and give you some deployment options by allowing everyone to deep-strike. If we did this though we'd want a 2nd Reaver squad which is going to be tight on points. I'd want that 2nd Reaver squad regardless as it gives you that bit of redundancy you need and is more capable of disrupting your opponent. They'll be a huge target for your opponent but being able to get good cover saves with turbo-boosting + skilled rider, they should at least take quite a bit of firepower to drop.

So what I'd do is look to get the Duke and a 2nd unit of Reavers in there (6 strong). Drop the Wyches and Haemonculus (obviously) and then you'll need to probably cut the Trueborn back to three strong each or dropping the Blasters from the Raider Warriors to fit them in. If not