1850 dark eldar airborne

[thecactusman17]

Getting playtesting with this fun DE list. I am really impressed with how will I stop armor walls between tons of S9 lances and haywire and obviously it does some heavy denting in CC.

Baron

Archon w/ agonizer, phantasm grenades and clone field
Hq total 230

Incubi in raider with night shields
Elite total 180

20 hellions, and a helliarch with agonizer

2x wych squads with 10 models each. Hekatrix with agonizer, 2 hydra gauntlets, and haywire grenades in a raider with night shields.

Troop total 825

3 void raven bombers with 4 monoscythe missiles, nightshields, flickerfields
Heavy total 615

The first turn is a punch in the mouth with the raiders rushing forward and the bombers prioritizing transports and template weapon vehicles, then artillery vehicles. They also drop super horde units down to something manageable for my smaller units
.

[Cheese]

It looks alright. I'd drop the Haywire Grenades because they rarely wreck vehicles. All they're really good for is cleaning up almost wrecked vehicles for that extra kill point, but I don't think it's worth 40 points overall. The whole wych squads are really a little too much. They should sit in CC and stay there, so the best build is really 2 Shardnet and Impalers and an Hekatrix with a Venom Blade. With that amount of attacks and the Agoniser, you'll likely make units run on the charge, which is not what you want.

[BlindGunn]

I know why you choose the Raven, but for an 1850 point list, if you want to save a few points, you could try downgrading one or two Voidravens to Razorwings, get the 4 missiles for free and still get two Dark Lance shots. Maybe get a squad of Reavers with a Heat Lance to help go vehicle Hunting and pop transports so you can fire missiles at the passengers with the Razorwing's missiles?

Maybe even replace 1 Raven with a Ravager?

(I'm worried you won't be able to pop-open a transport in the first turn and shoot the passengers with a missile or two fro the aircraft.)

Let us know what works and what doesn't!

[TheRise]

I love a unit of 10 Scourges. though they are expensive so perhaps drop down to 5.
But 10 with a Solarite with no upgrades, and 2 Heat Lances and 2 Haywire Blasters is great for anti-tank and great for anti-infantry with athe shardcarbines. they are jump infantry so moving 12" each turn, thats why I don't like Dark lances on them.
The Solarite also gives an extra leadership. But I do liek the cronos as well put it in somesort of cover. Then put a unit of 20 Kabalite warriors on an objective while the cronos is dishing out pain tokens to it so it is immovable.

[thecactusman17]

I know why you choose the Raven, but for an 1850 point list, if you want to save a few points, you could try downgrading one or two Voidravens to Razorwings, get the 4 missiles for free and still get two Dark Lance shots. Maybe get a squad of Reavers with a Heat Lance to help go vehicle Hunting and pop transports so you can fire missiles at the passengers with the Razorwing's missiles?

Maybe even replace 1 Raven with a Ravager?

(I'm worried you won't be able to pop-open a transport in the first turn and shoot the passengers with a missile or two fro the aircraft.)

Let us know what works and what doesn't!

I can answer this one up front with lots of playtesting and math to back me up.

Dark Eldar vehicles are BS4. They hit 2/3 of the time. Every three shots, they hit with two.

Against AV12+ (the primary target of lance weapons), you penetrate 1/3 of the time with S8 and get a vehicle destroyed result 1/3 of the time. But you get a penetrate 1/2 of the time with S9.

Thus, against AV12+, your chances of getting a destroyed result with S8 are a little better than 1/9 and at S9, are a little better than 1/6. The little extra is adding in a few variables like immobilizing a Flat Out, or hitting an open-topped vehicle. This is before taking saves, which can reduce it even further. So Void Lances are AT LEAST 33% more likely to kill an enemy vehicle outright than a normal dark lance.

There are two ways to deal with it: spam LOTS of Dark Lances (very expensive and can over-focus your army towards anti-mech) or take weapons that punch through the same armor easier. I chose the latter, though I've also tried the former. The latter works for more reliably opening up AV12 and really puts the hurt on AV10/11, the former just doesn't work as well as one might think it should.

I combine this with haywire grenades on the Wyches so that I can proceed to kill immobilized or stunned tanks in the assault phase.

[TheRise]

Or just use Scourges with Heat Lances, (Haywire Blasters are not my favourite it has to be said). Turns out cheaper, and works a lot better. Lance makign it AV 12 then Melta meaning +2D6 armour penetration.
I do like some Dark Lances, but if I were, to say, take a unit of 5 Kabalite Trueborn, I would always take 2 Dark Lances and 3 Blasters if I was trying for mainly anti-tank, as you can move the unit, and still fire 3 S8 Ap2 Lance weapons, though they are only 18" range. Put these in a Raider if you want more anti tank (only 5 points extra usualy) or a Venom, if you still want some more anti-infantry (always give your Venom an extra Splinter Cannon).