Hello fellow wargamers,
I'm a longtime Blood Angels player who has decided to start dark eldar. I've been reading the codex so I have a fair idea oofwhats good and bad, relatively. I need help though, what should I buy? I know I Want to build an army based off the battle force. I also know I want a shooty army based off venom or raider spam with true born blaster squads and wych assault support. So, suggestions ?
Buy as many of the battle forces as you can reasonable afford, then check on ebay for the extra guns you need. I found some fairly cheap shredders and blast pistols being sold by an established seller, with the intent of combining the two to make blasters (turns out shaving some of the bits off the blaster makes a good enough representation, least in my neck of the woods). Pick up an extra raider for each battle force you pick up, as you'll likely want both the warrior squads and wych squads meched up. As for the bikes...either use them, sell them on ebay, trade with friends...or give them to me
Your other big purchase is Ravagers, since 2-3 of them should be in most list builds, as well as a Haemonculus and/or an Archon.
Archon of the Ravenous Void Kabal.
You've basically answered it yourself.Originally Posted by Mephiston69
Wyches in Raiders
Warriors/Trueborn in Venoms
Ravagers
The DE cookie cutter list is pretty easy to put together as you are spamming identical units. Ravagers all have dark lances and flickerfields. Venoms all have two splinter cannons. Warriors and Trueborn always have as many Blasters as possible. Raider has a flickerfield and often Enhanced Aethersails to move quicker or Shock Prows to dislodge units from objectives (or both). Wyches should always have Haywire Grenades and 99.9% of the time a Hekatrix with an Agoniser.
In terms of the order to buy it in, at 1000 points you should have your heavy maxed out with Ravagers as they are your primary anti-tank. Throw in 3 Warrior squads with a Blaster (no need for Trueborn at this level and you need Troops) and a squad of Wyches with a Haemonculus and you're sorted.
Haemonculus (Shattershard) = 65
9x Wyches (Haywire Grenades, Hekatrix with Agoniser) + Raider (Enhanced Aethersails, Flickerfield) = 213 points
5x Warriors (Blaster) + Venom (2x Splinter Cannons) = 125 points
5x Warriors (Blaster) + Venom (2x Splinter Cannons) = 125 points
5x Warriors (Blaster) + Venom (2x Splinter Cannons) = 125 points
Ravager (Flickerfield) = 115 points
Ravager (Flickerfield) = 115 points
Ravager (Flickerfield) = 115 points
Total = 998 points
And then add trueborn and another unit of Wyches at 1500 points, etc.
Thanks for all the great input and advice. I'm used to playing Blood Angels so this is quite a change :P
thanks for the list Sami but I have a question, what are the pros and cons of taking an archon vs a haemonculus?
The Archon is your ultra-killy choice, the Haemonculus is your squad support choice.
The Archon is a powerful force multiplyer in any assault and you can kit him out to taste. His downside is that he gets expensive very fast. The first synergy you should know about is the Archon with the Phantasm Grenade Launcher (PGL for short) in a squad of 4 Incubi. This unit set-up kills marines fast as it gives the Incubi assault grenades, which they lack standard. But putting him in with Trueborn works too. Also note he can take a Blaster and the Shadowfield is a lovely piece of kit if you have good dice rolls (I don't, which is why I take the Haemonculus usually).
If you're strapped for points, the Succubus with Agonizer is the cheap but not as good alternative to the Archon. If you want cheap, though, DE has other options.
The Haemonculus makes any squad you put him in with better thanks to his pain token. He also makes Wracks troops if you ever want to branch out from Wyches and Warriors. He can also take a Liquifier, which is one of the best anti-infantry weapons in the game and the Shattershard, which can kill even Thunderhammer/Storm Shield Assault Terminators reliably. The real skill with this guy is learning what units to throw him in with and when to split him off and send him to hide in a transport or use him to siphon pain tokens from one unit to another or a million other uses, you could write a huge tactica guide on the Haemonculus. The liquifier gives a Wych unit a bit more punch but the Wyches lose their fleet if he's in with them, so there are trade-offs which is where the whole idea of switching him between units comes from as well as Webway deployment shenannigans.
Honorable mention to special characters: You might Like Duke Sliscus since you're going with the standard Wyches and Trueborn arrangement. Sliscus is nasty himself but he also lets you re-roll your drugs roll at the begining of the game, which is very powerful. Also, having a squad of Trueborn with 3+ poison on their guns is godlike against infantry if you take advantage of it. Since you're going with Wyches and Trueborn anyway, he's a good investment.
Also, Baron Sathonyx. He's cheap, he can join a unit and give them Stealth, is quite fast and killy and gives you a + on the roll for first turn. Best of all, he's CHEAP for what he does.
Archon of the Ravenous Void Kabal.
Deviant covered it pretty much perfectly. As to why I put him in that list, it is simply to give the Wyches their first pain token. Having a 4+ invul and FnP in close combat makes them a nightmare to dislodge and helps you win on combat resolution. While they don't kill much in general (that's the job of the Hekatrix with the Agoniser), 3 attacks on the charge still has a chance of putting wounds on models. If you roll a 6 for combat drugs (a pain token), combined with the one from the Haemonculus it means they start the game with both Feel No Pain and Furious Charge. Suddenly you now have 3 S4 attacks on the charge and a higher I than Grey Knights with Halberds.
That, and the Shattershard is probably the most destructive weapon in our arsenal (also why it can only be used twice). It's a flame template weapon so doesn't need to roll to hit, models can't take any saves at if they fail the test, and because it doesn't cause wounds (models are removed if they fail a characteristic test) it means the enemy player can't allocate the failed tests. He must test for each individual model under the template, and if it fails the test the model is removed. Lets you snipe out special weapons, sergeants, ICs, the works.
Liquifier gun is a close second - you've got a 50% chance of denying marines armour saves (33% chance for terminators) and as its a flame weapon it ignores cover saves. It can also be used in each of your shooting phases. The drawback is that you still need to roll to wound, the opponent can allocate the wounds onto less vital models, and generally Haemonculi don't last past 1 turn of shooting anyway, especially if they roll well with the Shattershard or Liquifier Gun. Nuking half a squad off the table with one weapon is a sure fire way of getting it killed in the following shooting phase.
My advice is to buy more blood angels. They are better. Sadly. ;_;
Btw i don't like sathonyx because he doesn't have a power weapon or at least rending. I don't know, stealth is good and the +1 on the first turn roll is even better, but beside this what he brings is really far inferior than an archon. Really far.
He lets beastmasters walk across the table with a 3+ cover save, has a Phantasm Grenade Launcher and is S6 on the charge (S7 with FC). While he lacks a power weapon, on the turn he charges he will be wounding most things on 2s, and glances rear Av10 on a 4, a 2+ invulnerable save (until you fail the first save), buffs the hell out of Hellions by dramatically improving their hit and run. On top of which he gives you +1 when rolling for the first turn and costs a measly 105 points.
Yes but the lack of a power weapon in a MEQ meta where you'll face purifiers and blood angels with FNP... you are basically screwed.
BUT Sathonyx in a wwp list, i think it's great.
In all honesty BA jumpers aren't too bad - Wyches tie them up and while it takes ages for anything to die, the Hekatrix slowly grinds down the squad with the Agoniser. Dark Lance shots also tear through BA jumper squads - it's pretty much one dead marine for each lance that hits. We have far worse match-ups. As for Purifiers, again one of the best counter units are Wyches. Cleansing Flame bounces straight off them, they strike at the same I if the GK have Halberds, and the power weapons aren't so useful when you're dealing with a 4+ invul save (yes I know you won't get FnP). In the current meta which consists of spamming as many vehicles as possible, most of them with rear Av10, having a model who can leap over the battlefield and throw 5 S6 attacks at them is more attractive. DE have plenty of things that kill infantry as it is.
But then again, I just take a Haemonculus who almost never fails to make his points back when the Liquifier or Shattershard go off.
Also, talking about tweaking your list to face the top tiers once instance and then giving any sort of praise towards WWP lists is a bit hypocritical
If you don't have power weapons, spam attacks. Sathonyx is utility first, though, no doubt about that.
I get great success off the Liquifier Haemonculus by jumping him between squads and in and out of transports alone as needed. It helps that he gets underestimated alot, even by people who have seen me work with him before, other things just get higher target priority. And sometimes they'll even forget he can shoot out of the Raider he's in (particularly if only the tip of the ram is poking around a corner). Same dirty tricks apply to the Shattershard too, of course.
Archon of the Ravenous Void Kabal.
Well wwp imho is undervalued right now, i need to try out something like grotesques + hamie wwp + malys, i've heard a lot of people having success with this.Also, talking about tweaking your list to face the top tiers once instance and then giving any sort of praise towards WWP lists is a bit hypocritical
WWP lists (and by this I mean when the entire list is built around stuff coming out of the WWP, not one or two units) are too unreliable for tourneys. With no control over your reserves, there's a good chance your infantry killers come out before your vehicle killers leaving you with a bunch of dudes running around flailing poorly against metal boxes and/or going to ground each round until something arrives that can crack open the cargo.
Unless you're taking over-sized squads too big for a Raider, pretty much anything that can be delivered through a WWP can also be delivered via a fast moving Raider which is far more reliable. One of the best units for WWP use is of course Beastmasters due to their 24" threat range (although in reality this is closer to 16-17" taking in to account running and assaulting through terrain) but they have other issues of their own (lack of grenades if they want to go for a long charge without Baron attached, reliance on Rending for kills, etc).
The other big issue with WWP lists is that chances are you will only have a couple of units on the table at the start of the game. If you don't get first turn, you either need to hide the vehicles that will be holding the WWP carriers which will more than likely mean deploying them further away from the middle of the table which will mean the units that arrive through the WWP will have to travel further to get in to range. The other option is to deploy aggressively but risk having your WWP carrier either de-transported (meaning you can't place the portal very far) or killed completely (forcing the entire list to arrive via your long table edge).
Lets not forget that if you have a WWP your opponent can surround it and kill your troops as they try to enter play.
For how many points do you tend to play games?
Personally i started out with a battleforce, an extra box of warriors, a venom and a ravager.
This is enough to have 1 unit of Trueborn in your venom. ( i am sure someone else mentioned how to make more blasters out of the warrior kit )
One raider filled with wytches and your HQ
one troop of warriors on foot to place somewhere in cover
and the ravager as a nice AT gunboat.
This is in my opinion a balanced start of your DE force.
My Warhammer Photo's http://www.flickr.com/photos/velzen/
Which is why every WWP list needs at least two WWPs and some support fire from ravages etc to clear enemies from around them if that happens.
Personally I don't like a WWP strategy because my army is built around transports, and it's certainly not the best way to play, but there are ways to make it work reasonably well. Usually a pair of haemonculi with a squad of wyches/wracks in a raider or venom. Do 12" on the fist turn, disembark and deploy the portals on opposite flanks.
It's also about the only way to make pain engines actually viable, slogging them from the baseline is never going to work well.
any argument to say that they're thinking of us by turning metal to resin is as convincing as a frenzied Khorne worshipper covered in blood, still chomping on a victim, with a Khorne sigil tattooed to his forhead pleading a case of mistaken identity when questioned about a murder.
whoever said that BA are better than DE is a tool. he is also wrong. they are actually pretty much on the same tier just DE is harder to play
he who fights but runs away lives to fight another day and run away
cs pro blackout montage for the ages
Webway portals are always optional. If you surround one, it's entirely possible for the Dark Eldar to simply appear from their board edge as normal. (If you manage to block that, too, they deserve their pitiful fate!)
Hey guys, so I went ahead and ordered Sami's list from the warstore, still waiting on it to come in.
And I don't want to get into this, but BA aren't better or worse than DE. I llove my Blood Angels but neither army is necessarily inherently better than one. As for all this web way portal talk, now I'm lost, can someone explain?
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