Fixing FW Eldar (Dark included)

[eldargal]

Firstly, this isn't about the issue with holofields and whatnot, there is a thread on the main Eldar superheavies already. But there are a lot of Eldar units that are generally considered quite underpowered, so I thought why not compile a list of things that might help.

Dark Eldar:

Tantalus: This often gets cited as an underpowered choice, personally I quite like it but I'd appreciate other opinions.

Raven: This has been buffed to have Vector Dancer in the last day or so, so with two dark lances and a heavy ten splinter cannon I actually think it's probably worth it, pity it is in Heavy Support though.

Reaper: Seems fine, storm vortex projector hits on 3+, has a one in three chance of stripping 3 hull points off a vehicle.

Eldar:

Nightwing: AV10, two bright lances and two shuriken cannons, two hull points. Slightly better with vector dancer, still incredibly fragile and has no chance at taking down an enemy flyer in one turn of shooting. In contrast other flyers will not struggle to destroy it. So much for Eldar air superiority.

My thoughts: Give its bright lances Heavy 2, 3 HP and titan holofields (5++ in addition to shrouded). This way at least it has a shot at taking down an enemy flyer in a turn of shooting before it gets blowed up by mased BS bolter fire.:rolleyes:

Shadow Spectres: Up the base range by 6", drop the AP by 1 give Ghostlight lance or Melta or Heavy 2. Otherwise more expensive, more mobile Dark Reapers.

Firestorm: Hugely expensive for 12 S6 shots, drop price by 33%. Addition of hull points does help it somewhat.

Vampire Raider/Hunter: Urgh, where to begin? Give it AV11/11/10, drop its points a lot. Give the Hunter it Hover so its troops can actually disembark.

That's all the underpowered FW Eldar units I can think of at present. Opinions?

[DrWobbles]

Firestorm: Hugely expensive for 12 S6 shots, drop price by 33%. Addition of hull points does help it somewhat.

That would be lovely if the firestorm had twelve shots, but alas... it is only six.

Disagree about the nightwings ability to shoot down fliers. Firing on armor 10 (which shouldn't be too difficult with vector dancer) should be able to knock out 3 hull points with no problem. 5++ would be convienant though.

[eldargal]

Bah, you're right, I knew it was odd it didn't seem as terrible as I remembered it.:rolleyes: Misread twin linked.

Well, against AV10 (Dakkajets, Razorwing, Ravens & a few others)

2 BS4 S8 bright lances: 1.32 hits/.99 glance-penetrating hits/-.66 HPs with 5+ jink save
6 BS4 S6 shuriken cannons: 4 hits/2 glance-penetrating hits/-1.33 HPs with 5+ jink save

Not bad, pity every flyer bar the Lightning, Barracuda, Hell blade and Attak jet has 3 HPS.:p

But compare to a vendetta with two heavy bolter sponsons, five points less than the Nightwing and lacks vector dancer but is going to get at least one auto-glance from the lascannons with the re-roll and will average two more glances from the heavy bolters. Edit: Oops, forgot saves for the Nightwing, it reduces the amount of HP lost quite a bit but still doesn't make the Nighting any better at killing flyers. It is AV12 as well so for a Nightwing it is:

2 BS4 S8 bright lances: 1.32 hits/.66 glance-penetrating hits/-.44HPs with 5+ jink save
6 BS4 S6 shuriken cannons: 4 hits/.66 glance-penetrating hits/-.44HPs with 5+ jink save.

So if a vendetta gets a shot with its weapons it will almost certainly destroy the nightwing (even if it just gets one sponson in LOS it has a fair chance of doing this. In contrast a Nightwing will probably only take one hull point from the vendetta.

Another thing to remember is that we can take one Nightwing per FA slot, the IG can take three.

The vendetta is a gunship transport, the Nightwing is an anti-air fighter. This is just wrong.:p

[Yarlen Fireblade]

Remember thanks to GW AV12 ex-skimmers policy, all the flyers that matter are AV12, not 10. Supposed best air superiority fighter is incapable of downing not so nimble, not made for dogfighting mere transports.

[eldargal]

Hm let's see:

Vendetta shooting at Nightwing:
3 BS3 S9 twin-linked lascannons:
1 hit+re-roll=1.66 hits/c1.4 glance-penetrating hits/-.46HP w 3+ jink save (5+ + Shrouded)
6 BS3 heavy bolter shots:
2 hits/1 glance-penetrating hit/-.33HP w 3+ jink save (5+ + Shrouded)

Total -.79HP per turn of shooting in response to -.88 from the Nightwing. So not quite as bad as I thought, but still a long way from great. We could have at most 3 Nightwings in our army, IG could have 9 Vendettas. It would take a Nightwing 3.4 turns to down a vendetta and the vendetta 2.5 turns to down a nightwing (of course vector dancer means the Nightwing has a higher chance of actually getting consecutive shots against the vendetta than vice versa)

[DrWobbles]

Bah, you're right, I knew it was odd it didn't seem as terrible as I remembered it.:rolleyes: Misread twin linked.

Well, against AV10 (Dakkajets, Razorwing, Ravens & a few others)

2 BS4 S8 bright lances: 1.32 hits/.99 glance-penetrating hits/-.66 HPs with 5+ jink save
6 BS4 S6 shuriken cannons: 4 hits/2 glance-penetrating hits/-1.33 HPs with 5+ jink save

Not bad, pity every flyer bar the Lightning, Barracuda, Hell blade and Attak jet has 3 HPS.:p

But compare to a vendetta with two heavy bolter sponsons, five points less than the Nightwing and lacks vector dancer but is going to get at least one auto-glance from the lascannons with the re-roll and will average two more glances from the heavy bolters. Edit: Oops, forgot saves for the Nightwing, it reduces the amount of HP lost quite a bit but still doesn't make the Nighting any better at killing flyers. It is AV12 as well so for a Nightwing it is:

2 BS4 S8 bright lances: 1.32 hits/.66 glance-penetrating hits/-.44HPs with 5+ jink save
6 BS4 S6 shuriken cannons: 4 hits/.66 glance-penetrating hits/-.44HPs with 5+ jink save.

So if a vendetta gets a shot with its weapons it will almost certainly destroy the nightwing (even if it just gets one sponson in LOS it has a fair chance of doing this. In contrast a Nightwing will probably only take one hull point from the vendetta.

The 5+ jink save isn't automatic. If a flier were to take that save they would be forced to snapfire the next turn, greatly reducing the effect of a vendetta. also a flier may only fire 4 weapons so 3 twin-linked lascannons and 2 heavy bolter sponsons is unrealistic.
The nightwing, on the other hand, always gets the 5+ save and if it decides to jink will then benefit from a 3+ cover save (2+ if moving flat out). Also remember a fliers minimum movement is 18", this forces enemies to move up the board exposing its rear to a greater audience, vector dancer will be very handy for this reason.

And yes, i know a vendetta can go 'hover mode' and and still receive the jink save without the cons of being a flier, but at that point your nightwing should ignore the vendetta and let your war walkers have their way with it.

Your example is very 'stand and shoot' but that is simply not the way eldar work.


*edit* well looks like you already covered what i was trying to say

[eldargal]

It isn't an example at all, it is the average amount of damage they can do to each other. Obviously it is more complicated on the tabletop but the fact remains our best anti-air fighter struggles to deal with gunships, even without the jink save the Nightwing strips 1.32HPs on average which means two turns to take out a vendetta that is cheaper than it. It can still evade one turn, hover the next and unload its troops and unless you've got lucky you will have failed to destroy it before delivering its payload.

During that two turns it is also exposed to a lot more potential damage due to its vulnerability to S4+ weapons opposed to the vendettas S6+.

So, no the Nightwing isn't terrible. But it still isn't that good either.

[DrWobbles]

well i think every one can agree how important it is for a flier to come on the board after its enemy has arrived. in the case of the fragile nightwing coming on first, i would suggest going flat out to recieve the 2+ and skirt the enemy deplyment edge waiting for juicy targets to arrive.

[eldargal]

There is also the problem the squadron rule brings into it. Two vendettas, even if being tailed by an ideally positioned Nightwing, could potentially leapfrog to force the Nightwing to shoot at one or the other and not rack up enugh HPs on one to destroy it.

However, enough about the Nightwing.:p

[DrWobbles]

However, enough about the Nightwing.:p

Shenanigans.

I'll keep two in my Corsairs list.

[eldargal]

Not shenanigans, just five other units in a worse position than the Nightwing that deserve some attention.;)

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I'd like Shuriken weaponry to have a longer range.

[Mr.Pickelz]

Aren't all the Eldar transports suppose to fly between worlds and Craftworlds? like go in and out of orbit regularly? I've always seen pictures of Waves of transports (not sure which ones, Falcons i think) Flyin down into orbit to quickly engage the enemy.

[Archon Charybdis]

Aren't all the Eldar transports suppose to fly between worlds and Craftworlds? like go in and out of orbit regularly? I've always seen pictures of Waves of transports (not sure which ones, Falcons i think) Flyin down into orbit to quickly engage the enemy.

Most Eldar vehicles pop out of arterial Webway portals or are deployed from Vampires, but I've never read or seen anything depicting Serpents and Falcons being space-worthy. There is the picture in the 5th ed BRB of a Wave Serpent zipping around a Craftworld.

[Defenestratus]

I actually just got off the phone with FW in regards to another issue I had with an order - but the chap on the phone was quite eager and willing to hear what I had to say about the holofields. He said that they're still talking about it around the office and that there's still debate going on about it over there and he asked me what I thought about them.

He claimed that since roughly 50% of the time games are fought in nightfight conditions, the rules overall give a more resilient unit.

I tend to disagree with him on that - especially in regards to the titans. The 4++ inv save against Str D was the only thing keeping my titans alive - and since its been nerfed, I expect my resin collection will last a much shorter time on the board.

[Defenestratus]

Most Eldar vehicles pop out of arterial Webway portals or are deployed from Vampires, but I've never read or seen anything depicting Serpents and Falcons being space-worthy. There is the picture in the 5th ed BRB of a Wave Serpent zipping around a Craftworld.

Actually in the codex (or in a past codex) I believe it says that they're void-flight capable.

[Luke Licens]

Actually in the codex (or in a past codex) I believe it says that they're void-flight capable.

I was always thought that that was what the 'Star Engines' upgrade was all about. Engines for traveling the stars. :p

[AnEnemy]

The Tantulus used to be a piece of crap. Did that suddenly change recently?

[Mr.Pickelz]

One fix to Eldar would be to give them 2nd ed. stats for some of their stuff. D6+8+D3+D20 Armor pen. for the Maugetar in CC? yes plz! :D:D

[Aramel]

I would not be surprised if they changed Star Engines to allow the tank to become a flyer. Since all our wargear is made out of wraithbone we should definately have some ability to regenerate hull damage too. Bring back the bonesingers! :P

[lattd]

I could see that actually, with most codices, having a way of repairing vehicles i could see this happening, of the codices that don't have an engineer unit, only dark eldar and tyranid's make sense not having one. Eldar and tau could both reasonably have one.

[Freelancer]

Firstly, this isn't about the issue with holofields and whatnot, there is a thread on the main Eldar superheavies already. But there are a lot of Eldar units that are generally considered quite underpowered, so I thought why not compile a list of things that might help.

Dark Eldar:

Tantalus: This often gets cited as an underpowered choice, personally I quite like it but I'd appreciate other opinions.

Raven: This has been buffed to have Vector Dancer in the last day or so, so with two dark lances and a heavy ten splinter cannon I actually think it's probably worth it, pity it is in Heavy Support though.

Reaper: Seems fine, storm vortex projector hits on 3+, has a one in three chance of stripping 3 hull points off a vehicle.

Eldar:

Nightwing: AV10, two bright lances and two shuriken cannons, two hull points. Slightly better with vector dancer, still incredibly fragile and has no chance at taking down an enemy flyer in one turn of shooting. In contrast other flyers will not struggle to destroy it. So much for Eldar air superiority.

My thoughts: Give its bright lances Heavy 2, 3 HP and titan holofields (5++ in addition to shrouded). This way at least it has a shot at taking down an enemy flyer in a turn of shooting before it gets blowed up by mased BS bolter fire.:rolleyes:

Shadow Spectres: Up the base range by 6", drop the AP by 1 give Ghostlight lance or Melta or Heavy 2. Otherwise more expensive, more mobile Dark Reapers.

Firestorm: Hugely expensive for 12 S6 shots, drop price by 33%. Addition of hull points does help it somewhat.

Vampire Raider/Hunter: Urgh, where to begin? Give it AV11/11/10, drop its points a lot. Give the Hunter it Hover so its troops can actually disembark.

That's all the underpowered FW Eldar units I can think of at present. Opinions?

Think your wrong about the nightwing it has performed really wel. Flyer rules are just too good now. l think it now outperforms the fire prism for its points...the trick is to put them on 25" flying bases right outside the range of bolter and gauss fire : ) Run them in pairs. Honestly no plane would fly that low to get hit by simple ordnance like a bolter. You can easily get side armor on any vehicle more than likely...and they have the power to threaten av 14. I got a game in with my warp hunter.....problem is i only have 1 lol....its a HUGE fire magnet that gun just screams shoot me!...it didn't last past turn 2. I did ace a squad of 8 tactical with plasma so about broke even in points.. but still .... Eldar need to have energy shields that negate glancing hits taking hull points off...glancing and rending is just to strong now and really has broken the game as we know it. I think they should have kept the old rules for vehicles, and kept the new rules for how to hit them. would have balanced out.....but GW wants to sell more necrons and flyer kits so its just how it goes.....hoping for that GW nightwing plastic kit.

[eldargal]

Ok so a few observations about FW Eldar from my last few games:

40k units:

Shadow Spectres: These are actually very good now. Improvements to blast have made them considerably more killy. A full squad with exarch and/or Irillyth can spurt out a S10 AP2 blast and with their move in the assault phase I used them to rather neatly kite a squad of TH/SS terminators. If taking Irillyth I chose not to contribute his weapon to the Ghostlight, which gave a S10 AP2 blast and 3 S7 AP2 shots. 4++ against attacks from further than 12" is also nice, now that they are actually a threat to things.

Nightwing: I've gone into more detail in the Nightwing topic, but I still have mixed feelings about these. My first half dozen games they performed terribly, in the last one they did very well. I still think they need a point decrease, increase in firepower or the ability to be taken in squadrons.

Phoenix Bombers: These are just great. Strafing Run with a pulse laser and 6 S5 AP shots is fun.

Warp Hunter: Still great.

Firestorm: What the hell were FW thinking? This was overpriced rubbish before and it is overpriced rubbish now. The firestorm has a .5 chance of glancing AV12 if it doesn't evade. The hyperion whirldwind has a roughly similar chance to damage a flyer and it is half the price so you can double the volume of fire at a flyer. For a dedicated anti-air platform at the price they are asking it is nothing short of ridiculous.

Am I missing any 40k units?

Apocalypse units:

Lynx: It was great before it is better now. the ability to fly for a given length of time is very helpful. I use the extra protection from fire to get them in a good position to fire two AP2 Destroyer large blasts at whatever I want to die.

Vampire Raider/Hunter: I actually found these to be quite good. 4SP makes them a very durable flyer. They now have hover so the one with transport capacity can actually deliver more than just jump pack troops. Still probably overpriced, particularly the transporter. But not by several hundred points like they used to be.

Revenant Titan: Don't bother 5+/5++ save is just terrible it dies so fat it is depressing.

Phantom Titan: Still good, but it used to be excellent. Upsetting.

[imperialpower]

Recent bad luck has forced me back into 40K and I was thinking of updating my Eldar army with some FW models so, has anyone used the Wraithseer (seems too much points for what it is) in place of the farseers, warlocks ect you have to keep around your standard wraithlords/wraithguard

Also I was thinking of getting Hornets instead of Vypers as a fast attack option, anyones gameing experience would be helpfull

[Archon Charybdis]

has anyone used the Wraithseer (seems too much points for what it is) in place of the farseers, warlocks ect you have to keep around your standard wraithlords/wraithguard

I love my Wraithseer, though I don't see him as an out and out replacement for a Farseer--you definitely still want Fortune backing up an expensive 10 man Wraithguard squad. The Wraithseer is a pretty beefy CC unit in his own right, but he's also a force multiplier in Wraith heavy armies by being able to grant FNP (4+) and reduce cover saves against shots from nearby Wraith units.


Also I was thinking of getting Hornets instead of Vypers as a fast attack option, anyones gameing experience would be helpfull

Yeah, it's absolutely the right call. Hornets are FW saying "Man, Vypers have really really sucked for 5 years, let's make our own!" Vypers are just way too expensive, even with the advantageous changes to fast skimmers in 6th ed. For not a whole lot more a Hornet gets you better armor, better BS, Star Engines and Scout. I personally like to keep mine on the cheap end with two Shuricannons or Scatter lasers because they are still fragile, but they can bring a lot of moderately priced fire power that can really move.

[imperialpower]

@Archon Charybdis

Perfect thanks for the help, now I can get some shiny new FW models to go with the rest of my dust ridden Eldar

[Anggul]

Yeah, it's absolutely the right call. Hornets are FW saying "Man, Vypers have really really sucked for 5 years, let's make our own!" Vypers are just way too expensive, even with the advantageous changes to fast skimmers in 6th ed. For not a whole lot more a Hornet gets you better armor, better BS, Star Engines and Scout. I personally like to keep mine on the cheap end with two Shuricannons or Scatter lasers because they are still fragile, but they can bring a lot of moderately priced fire power that can really move.

Now this is something I really, really don't understand. Why not just write better rules for the Vyper? What's the point in making a whole new unit? It makes no sense that the Eldar would even invent the Hornet when the Vyper already exists and performs exactly the same role. I will never buy Hornets for this reason, their very existence is pointless. I'd rather they just updated the Vyper rules to those of the Hornet.

[eldargal]

FW and GW have seperate design studios. FW wanted to make a nifty small eldar vehicle, they did so. It is upt to GW to make the vyper worth taking, not FW.

[DrLove42]

Hornets are great i always run at least 2. massed scatter fire is great against things. Give them a guide and they can even threaten aircraft.

Wraithseers are even better under 6th than 5th, simply because he is one of the only units that still gets 4+ FNP and he now gets that FNP against AP1 and 2 hits. Means thpse lascannons and melta guns still give me a 5++ then a 4+ FNP (the 4+ FNP is in the FAQ)

But dont take a 10man wraithguard unit. Even with FNP they are very expensive and will rarely get their points back with such a short range. Although the group of 3 i take are very good against aircraft it seems.

[eldargal]

Getting back to one of the things I posted originally, what do people think is wrong wit hthe DE Tantalus and how would you fix it? I quite like them myself, lots of disintegrator shots.

[Archon Charybdis]

Admittedly I've never actually played with the Tantalus, but my thoughts when I first saw it were that by trying to be both a transport and a gunboat (and still having DE armor values) it was just too many eggs in one basket, especially by the time you figure in the cost of any 16 man unit you put in there. It screams "Shoot me first! I'm almost as expensive as a Landraider with only AV12, and have a 15 man squad of Wyches with HQ inside!"

I think it could either use a small reduction in price, AV13, or an improved Flicker Field that gives it a 4++. Otherwise it's as if they looked at the Dais of Destruction and thought "This is clearly a balanced, useful basis for price comparison"

[Xenith]

I actually just got off the phone with FW in regards to another issue I had with an order - but the chap on the phone was quite eager and willing to hear what I had to say about the holofields. He said that they're still talking about it around the office and that there's still debate going on about it over there and he asked me what I thought about them.

He claimed that since roughly 50% of the time games are fought in nightfight conditions, the rules overall give a more resilient unit.

I tend to disagree with him on that - especially in regards to the titans. The 4++ inv save against Str D was the only thing keeping my titans alive - and since its been nerfed, I expect my resin collection will last a much shorter time on the board.

FW dont seem to have a grip on the rules. The new holofields give shrouding, right, for a +2 to cover saves.

The night fight rules give shrouding also. You cannot have it twice, meaning eldar flyers are no better off at night.

[eldargal]

Not to mention that a 5+ save is all the titans get 'cos they can't jink. It's quite pathetic, my Revenants are lucky to survive to to turn 3 now.

[thecactusman17]

FW dont seem to have a grip on the rules. The new holofields give shrouding, right, for a +2 to cover saves.

The night fight rules give shrouding also. You cannot have it twice, meaning eldar flyers are no better off at night.

[b]edit-- I realized that this was talking about an Eldar flyer, and the below is in regards to the Tantalus skimmer

Holofields give shrouding? On a fast skimmer?

Isn't that a 3+ cover save after moving, even only an inch?

16 models inside an open-topped vehicle sounds like a great option considering the amazing changes to shooting units in open topped vehicles. Does it only have Disintegrators? Can you give it Lances, or even better Haywire launchers? Load it up with a squad of DE warriors and Sliscus and you've got a nasty, nasty shooting unit that can cover a large chunk of the board in death. Even if it only has the disintegrators, they are going to be great options vs. light vehicles and terminators.

[eldargal]

Titan holofields give shrouding, not the regular sort. I'm hoping GW FAQ regulr holofields to do so which would make them fantastic but I'm not getting my hopes up.

Unfortunately the tantalus can only have its disintegrators, but they are heavy 6 so it is a lot of shots.:) It has 4HP too which is nice.

[DrLove42]

My problem with the Tantalus is its size.

It should be a small superheavy. But its not. Therefore its a normal, fragile vehicle that is fething huge. Sure 25% cover and a 5+ jink are easier now, but its just so big, and that makes it a target.

And yes its got a flyover attack, but now vehicles always get hit on a 3+ that can be very dangerous for little reward.

It got to be taken either as a heavy (an already VERY difficult choice between Fliers, MC and Ravagers) or a ded transport for a unit that no one really uses much. And then as a ded transport no one else can start in it.

I just think the rules are very underwhelming for such a nice model. Sure its got a lot of Dissie shots but its only 3 or so less than a Ravager with 3, for a significant;y larger investment

[Defenestratus]

FW dont seem to have a grip on the rules. The new holofields give shrouding, right, for a +2 to cover saves.

The night fight rules give shrouding also. You cannot have it twice, meaning eldar flyers are no better off at night.

Except that cover saves stack.

two instances of shrouding == 3+

Its quite clearly laid out in the rulebook under the "Shrouded" USR

[Malogharst]

No because you cannot benefit from the same USR more than once.

[Defenestratus]

I have a specific reference in the USRs that says that cover saves from the USRs Shrouded and Stealth are cumulative to a maximum of 2+. Multiple instances of shrouded clearly stack.

I don't know how you can interpret the note at the end of the Shrouded and Stealth USR any other way.

[Anggul]

I have a specific reference in the USRs that says that cover saves from the USRs Shrouded and Stealth are cumulative to a maximum of 2+. Multiple instances of shrouded clearly stack.

I don't know how you can interpret the note at the end of the Shrouded and Stealth USR any other way.

Very easily, I think it's saying that Shrouded and Stealth are cumulative, as in, you can have both of those rules to get +3 to your cover.

[eldargal]

What do people think about the idea of making the tantalus a flyer? Obviously FW would never do it but given the size of the kit it sort of seems logical, it would make it that much more durable without being ridiculously OP for the price.

Also with haywire reigning supreme for anti-tank, what are peoples thoughts on the Reaper? The blast does a S7 hit and glances on a 2-4 or penetrated on a 5-6. Beam does an S7 hit and D3 haywire hits and has a 1 in 3 chance (5+) of instant killing any non-vehicle model you fire it at.

[Archon Charybdis]

Not so sure about a flyer. It could work and would be way more useful, but I don't see the logic in making it a flyer over all the regular DE vehicles that use the exact technology but are simply smaller. I could definitely see it as a small super-heavy though, maybe with only 2 Structure Points and either a minor or no point increase.

[eldargal]

Well it's so big that as a fast skimmer it is hard to hide, making it a flyer would help negate that. I'd rather not see it having SP because then it woudl be Apoc only.:(

[DrLove42]

The Tantalus is a tricky one.

Its an awesome model, but feel its let down a lot by weak rules. It just doesn't have a place in the game. Its too big to be a normal skimmer, and is probably a little underwhelming to be a light superheavy

Maybe it could have an option like the Lynx does. Can become a flier for a turn. But as AC above you said, its hard to justify one skimmer flying and not the rest.

As for the Reaper, haywire is king. That thing is likely to kill most vehicles easily. However if you roll badly (miss with the shot (33%) or roll unsufficient to glance to death (realistically the S7 does 1 so you need 3+ to get that other 2 hull points so another 33%) its going to die horribly.

I'll admit my DE haven't been out the case in 6th yet, been too busy having fun with craftworlders. But I think it might find a place in an army soon...or maybe an allied detachment....new ideas!