Eldar VS Farsight-Shadowsun Bomb

[Chmmr_X]

Hi all. I'm having real difficulty in dealing with the Farsight-Shadowsun bomb effectively with a pure Eldar list. Would like some input. Problem with the Farsight bomb is that it has an abundance of AP2 weapons, melta, stealth, shrouded,twin-linked, ignores cover, tank hunter, monster hunter, and can choose between deep strike without scatter or infiltrating with 3D6 Jump Assault move. I cannot think of any effective counter as an Eldar since we rely so heavily on cover saves to survive and their weaponry bypasses all defences that Eldar has.

Some have suggested Wraithguards with D-Scythes but this solution has several problems, all dealing with delivery:
a) Expensive unit
b) Enemy can deep strike far away from said unit
c) If enemy deep strike close by, they'll destroy the Wave Serpent (6 - 8 Melta shots not within melta range with twinlinked, tank hunters and ignore cover will guarantee its destruction) and just jump pack away into cover. With this, the Wraithguard will never get into range and next round will eat multitudes of plasma shots from same unit

Another plausible counter is the Reveal Psychic power from the Warlocks but this presents a whole host of other problems:
a) the spell is only 18" with a LD 8, meaning it can quite possibly fail its test
b) The squad(s) can be blasted to oblivion by the bomb before they even get to do anything
c) The bombs can deepstrike further away but still enough to deal significant damage, away from 18" range. With their mobility, they can just avoid the Warlocks (even if they are on Jetbikes) indefinitely or just blast them out of the sky the next turn


The only thing which I believe would have a slight chance would be a Serpent Spam but on a personal principle note, I choose rather not to use something like that. Shooting them to death by other means will not be effective due to big squad and 2+ cover saves. Furthermore, it leaves the rest of his army free reign.

You guys have any insights? I have no solutions to this whatsoever...

[Aramel]

Wraithknight with a sun cannon in reserve would be your best bet. Take an Autarch and you have a decent chance to make sure that he arrives after Farsight. The sun cannon will lay waste to them at good range, and he is jump, which means that he will definatelly catch them in 1-2 turns. Warp spiders would also work very well, as you can hide them out of LIOS and then teleport in his face with 3 AP1 shots (spinaret rifle) and 8 str 7 shots with chance of ignoring armour. A jet council would work too. Although Fortune would be preferable, you only need 5-6 to survive into combat in order to tie up Farsight for the rest of the game. Jetbikes are much faster and will certainly catch him.

If your opponent put that many points in suits, he must not have that many markerlights, so focus on wping out his pathfinders/marker drones and his cover removing shenanigans will be over. The Serpent shield is great for this. We don't really have much interceptor, but consider an Icarus las cannon. It's str 9, so stick any exarch with fast shot and you have a real good chance of killing 2 suits as soon as they show up (unless he has a ton of drones I suppose). I'd recommed reapers, as they can rip suits appart pretty reliably.

The bottom line is that the Farsight bomb will almost definately wipe out 1-2 units. Then again, once it is dead, you pretty much won the game. So accept those losses and make sure that you have enough firepower nearby to take care of them even after those 1-2 units are dead. Oh and Crimson hunters would really do the trick, being able to kill 4 suits a turn...pretty damn good if you ask me.

[Tyrendian]

Wraithknight with a sun cannon in reserve would be your best bet. Take an Autarch and you have a decent chance to make sure that he arrives after Farsight. The sun cannon will lay waste to them at good range, and he is jump, which means that he will definatelly catch them in 1-2 turns. Warp spiders would also work very well, as you can hide them out of LIOS and then teleport in his face with 3 AP1 shots (spinaret rifle) and 8 str 7 shots with chance of ignoring armour. A jet council would work too. Although Fortune would be preferable, you only need 5-6 to survive into combat in order to tie up Farsight for the rest of the game. Jetbikes are much faster and will certainly catch him.

If your opponent put that many points in suits, he must not have that many markerlights, so focus on wping out his pathfinders/marker drones and his cover removing shenanigans will be over. The Serpent shield is great for this. We don't really have much interceptor, but consider an Icarus las cannon. It's str 9, so stick any exarch with fast shot and you have a real good chance of killing 2 suits as soon as they show up (unless he has a ton of drones I suppose). I'd recommed reapers, as they can rip suits appart pretty reliably.

The bottom line is that the Farsight bomb will almost definately wipe out 1-2 units. Then again, once it is dead, you pretty much won the game. So accept those losses and make sure that you have enough firepower nearby to take care of them even after those 1-2 units are dead. Oh and Crimson hunters would really do the trick, being able to kill 4 suits a turn...pretty damn good if you ask me.

you forget one thing: the whole unit is very likely to have a 2+ cover save. So good luck killing anything even with a full unit of Spiders or a Suncannon... On the other hand, how about a Night Spinner or two (in reserves obviously...)? They do stand a least a chance of killing Shadowsun (no EW, amirite?), and once that happens the bunch is far more managable... still lethal but at least not impossible to kill...

[G00dySmiley]

if wraithknight is there just assault them watching them fold like a deck of cards.

[Chmmr_X]

Aramel: The problem with your counter is that he has 2+ cover saves. At most you can only take out maybe 2 suits, or if your opponent rolls very horribly, 4? Sun Cannon and anything that is AP 2 is useless unless they are AP 2/3 AND ignores cover. Frankly speaking with his kind of army, he really doesn't need marker lights. What gives the bomb ignores cover ISN'T the marker lights. It's the special issue wargear that gives the WHOLE squad ignores cover without any tests whatsoever, as long as the suit having the wargear doesn't shoot.

Tyrendian: Your tactic can take out some suits, but there are also flaws. One is whether he would even deploy so close to your table edge that your Spinners can do their job. And even if the flamer template hits everyone, maybe 2 or 3 suits can be downed but not the most important people. What makes them horribly dangerous is actually the suit with the special issue stuff. Shadowsun just makes it worse.... and look-out sirs on a 2+ would not get rid of Shadowsun easily too. On top of that, 3+ armour saves. How many 6s can one roll? By the time the next turn arrives, the squad would have killed the Night Spinner and another squad with it.

[DarkLink]

When you cause five or six Str 8 wounds, you'll do some damage even with 3+ armor. You seem to be actively trying to convince yourself that absolutely nothing at all can work, and not even trying to think about how to make some of the options overcome possible difficulties.

You likely won't find one single easy counter. What you can get, though, is a range of tricks you can use.

Wave Serpents get Ignores Cover. It won't help you against the suits, but you can kill off any drones he takes pretty quickly with a couple of Serpents, and maybe sneak in a couple of wounds.

A Night Spinner can force a lot of saves on his suits, and every save he fails is a dead suit. I'd do this with Psyrifle Dreads all the time.

Hit him with Reveal (I don't know why you think that this is so difficult to do), then hit him with a Guided unit of War Walkers. Heck, this alone will kill 3 suits immediately on average dice, and with Battle Focus you can jump in and out of cover with them to see how he likes it.

Once he's whittled down, rush him with a Wraithknight. Its shooting has good odds of killing another suit for you, and once it gets in assault it'll kill a couple more.

[Defenestratus]

Warp hunters aether rift would ruin his day.

It ruin's everyone elses' day too.

[Chmmr_X]

Darklink: The Reveal psychic power's problem is that it only has 18" range which has to be activated in the beginning of the movement phase. Therefore the problem of applying is that when you are in range, he'll use his turn either to move away from your range, which is easy to do, or use his turn to blow them off the sky first before you can cast it in your turn. The issue is how ridiculously powerful is their defence and offense. 2+ cover saves, high maneuverability along with weapons that will literally ignore all your defences, hence my issue at the moment. Furthermore, the counter need to at least whittle down the bomb by at least 50% quickly otherwise it'll be a continuous thorn throughout the game (not even considering the rest of the army yet)

[DarkLink]

So chase him around, and/or force him to shoot at a relatively cheap, useless unit instead of your more threatening ones. He only has so much range on his guns, and there's only so much room on the table, and Eldar are really, really fast. At worse, he shoots and kills a unit of Guardians or something, at best he loses much of his cover. Assuming you're taking Warlocks or a Spiritseer, which I'm not really a fan of.

Either way, you missed my main point. You don't need one single direct counter. You need a flexible army that brings you lots of options. You can afford to shoot your entire army at this one super-unit, so use your entire army if you need to. Just because Eldar don't have one particular single specific unit that automatically removes the suits on a 2+ with no cover or armor saves allowed, doesn't mean they can't ever deal with the unit.

[Tyrendian]

Tyrendian: Your tactic can take out some suits, but there are also flaws. One is whether he would even deploy so close to your table edge that your Spinners can do their job. And even if the flamer template hits everyone, maybe 2 or 3 suits can be downed but not the most important people. What makes them horribly dangerous is actually the suit with the special issue stuff. Shadowsun just makes it worse.... and look-out sirs on a 2+ would not get rid of Shadowsun easily too. On top of that, 3+ armour saves. How many 6s can one roll? By the time the next turn arrives, the squad would have killed the Night Spinner and another squad with it.

I was referring to the regular Barrage 5" S8 rending template... while it certainly isn't guaranteed to kill Shadowsun, it probably stands the best chances of doing so, along with a Warp Hunter normal shot, since with both she takes the first wounds, and the Spinner IDs her while the Hunter ignores armour. So a couple of failed LOS rolls should do the trick... always assuming you don't scatter off her obviously, but even then you have a chance to do some damage... area terrain will spoil that fun pretty well though admittedly (Barrage doens't ignore those cover saves does it? only those from intervening terrain)...

[DarkLink]

Yes, Barrage does not ignore cover, it's just that the source of the damage is the center of the blast rather than the vehicle firing the barrage so you don't get LOS-blocking cover. But Barrage does not have the Ignore Cover rule.

[Demonus]

Yeah Warp Hunter seems like a solid choice, or maybe an Allied Hell Drake.

[Aramel]

or maybe an Allied Hell Drake.?! I suppose if it were possible it would only be just as bad as having Shadowsun and her mortal enemy in the same unit... Not sure why you are so adamant that the unit will have a 2+ cover save all the time unless you play on tables with nothing but cover. Just deploy where he can't hide and you will be fine.

The best choice now that I think about it, would be a Nightspinner, as the torrent template will instant kill suits. Just deploy it 24" away to force the bomb to pick that or your main army. Honestly there are many options to handle this.

[cebalrai]

?! I suppose if it were possible it would only be just as bad as having Shadowsun and her mortal enemy in the same unit... Not sure why you are so adamant that the unit will have a 2+ cover save all the time unless you play on tables with nothing but cover. Just deploy where he can't hide and you will be fine.

The best choice now that I think about it, would be a Nightspinner, as the torrent template will instant kill suits. Just deploy it 24" away to force the bomb to pick that or your main army. Honestly there are many options to handle this.


The answer is that there's nothing you can do to beat that magnitude of cheese with any degree of reliability. It's boring and not enjoyable at all to play against... so I don't.

[Stone Edwards]

The nightspinner idea sounds great, another option are scytheguard, just hold them back when you know you are gonna be facing that unit.