3th Edition Tournament armies?

[Glenn87]

I used to play WH40K in 3th edition, and when reading the top lists and armies now, I can't help to wonder wich armies were top back then.

Does anyone (the older players perhaps) know wich armies/lists were top armies back then (comparable to GK's and SW's, or archetypes such as Long-Fangs or Purifiers).

[Vaktathi]

3.5E Chaos Space Marines, Craftworld Eldar, Tau and Necrons were all very powerful at the end of 3E and to an extent through 4E.

[Glenn87]

3.5E Chaos Space Marines, Craftworld Eldar, Tau and Necrons were all very powerful at the end of 3E and to an extent through 4E.

yeah, I heard about Eldar once.
Were there any archetype lists??

[Mozzamanx]

Chaos Marines had a few actually.

Iron Warriors- Small squads of Marines to carry heavy weapons, multiple squads of Obliterators as Elites and then 4 Ordnance weapons in Heavy Support. Rounded off by the obligatory Daemon Prince.
Daemonbomb- Generally a small army to deploy, either mounted on Bikes or using a Slaanesh Prince who couldn't be shot from a Psychic Power. This would rush you and unleash hundreds of Bloodletters and super-Rending Daemonettes on everything.
Alpha Legion- Infiltrate on everything + Daemonic Speed = 2 super-charged HQ units getting turn 1 charges.

Eldar had the old Alaitoc Ranger list where your opponent would lose any deployment options and a fair few models thanks to their 'Disruption table'.
There was also the old Ulthwe list which spammed as many BS4 Starcannons as you could fit on the table, which were S6/Assault 3/AP2.

Necrons had the Phalanx I believe? Essentially spamming Warriors and Monoliths, and simply walking up the table.

[Vaktathi]

Tau were fairly typical in having 9 pod/plasma suits quite often, CSM's had several different rather abuseable builds (you could do a lot of silly stuff, I remember my Chaos lord that got 7 S8 powerweapon attacks at I6 on a charge with T5 and W4 in Terminator armor), you'd see Iron Warriors armies with 9 obliterators (Elites back then) and 4 Heavy Support units, armies with 3 "elite" Noise Marine havoc squads and 3 normal havoc squads all with Tank Hunters, etc. Necrons routinely fielded 3 monoliths which were much more potent back then, and Eldar had invincible skimmers and all sorts of silly things like the Alaitoc disruption tables.

[Glenn87]

Chaos Marines had a few actually.

Iron Warriors- Small squads of Marines to carry heavy weapons, multiple squads of Obliterators as Elites and then 4 Ordnance weapons in Heavy Support. Rounded off by the obligatory Daemon Prince.
Daemonbomb- Generally a small army to deploy, either mounted on Bikes or using a Slaanesh Prince who couldn't be shot from a Psychic Power. This would rush you and unleash hundreds of Bloodletters and super-Rending Daemonettes on everything.
Alpha Legion- Infiltrate on everything + Daemonic Speed = 2 super-charged HQ units getting turn 1 charges.

Eldar had the old Alaitoc Ranger list where your opponent would lose any deployment options and a fair few models thanks to their 'Disruption table'.
There was also the old Ulthwe list which spammed as many BS4 Starcannons as you could fit on the table, which were S6/Assault 3/AP2.

Necrons had the Phalanx I believe? Essentially spamming Warriors and Monoliths, and simply walking up the table.

Damn, that Iron Warrior list seems awesome!!!

would any of those lists be able to compete in today's meta? (if you could still use those rules)?

[Vaktathi]

Some would compete, some wouldn't. Necrons, Tau and most Eldar likely not, due to some core rules changes primarily due to LoS and vehicles, though some of the CSM lists likely would be, although probably not quite as hideously broken as they once seemed.