Mechdar

So I am moving to Perth, and it looks like the new points level is 2000pts.

What have I learned in my 4 games, and various discussion - that winning means being good at one thing rather than being balanced. Eldar's strengths - manoevreability and firepower. So, here goes, my third attempt at a mechdar list, the one I am most happy with. Happy enough with that I have ordered 1 jetarch, 2 prisms and 3 vypers for my Christmas pressie to myself.

Hi brains trust,

I have decided to go for a shooty manoevreable mechdar list which is capable of various strategies - reserve, refused flank, hammer & anvil. It is characterised by the lack of assault dedicated troops, which is a foreign concept to me, as I previoulsy played only as orks.

I see it as having two elements - the long ranged and the mid ranged. I felt it necessary to have high strength attacks, and have struggled in the past to open transports, which I prefer to do from a distance, and before emptying wave serpents of avengers. Hence I have included 2 prisms and some walkers with EML. I have my prism models on order, and am hoping that they won't disappoint on the table.

The strengths of eldar are massed mid-strength fire and manoeverability. I hope to use the jetbikes and the vypers in concert to provide both of these - aiming the mid strength at the sides and rear of transports, and using turbo boosting jbikes to provide a cover save for the vypers




HQ
Farseer, Doom, Guide, Spirit Stones, Runes of Warding (war walkers and vypers most likely targets for guide) (135)

Autarch, Jetbike, Mandiblasters, Laser lance, Fusion Gun (140)

ELITE
6 Fire Dragons (96)
Wave serpent, Spirit Stones, TL Shuricannon (110)

TROOPS
10 Dire Avengers, inc exarch, power weapon, shimmer shield, bladestorm, defend (177)
Wave serpent, Spirit Stones, TL Shuricannon (110) (farseer rides here)

10 Dire Avengers (120)
Wave Serpent, spirit stones, TL Shuricannon (110)

6 (7) Jetbikes, 2 shuricannon, Warlock, destructor, singing spear (210) (Autarch rides here)

6 Jetbikes, 2 shuricannon (152)

FAST ATTACK
3 Vypers, scatter lasers (180)

HEAVY SUPPORT
3 War Walkers, 2 EML on all (210)
Fire Prism (115)
Fire Prism (115)

The war walkers are the one unit that cannot move 12" and shoot. For this reason, and also because I don't want chimera spam or dreadnaught spam to laugh at me, I have gone for the long ranged weapon, the EML. I acknowledge that it is not as effective as scatters, and is more expensive, but I feel that it makes up for a hole otherwise lacking (high strength) and the range is useful in ensuring they have an impact. I anticipate that they will only have the assistance of guide for one turn.

The autarch has a fusion gun, as I feel it is good to have a second melta weapon in the list somewhere - land raiders will be watching my dragons carefully, maybe not so much my autarch.

Some difficult decisions - is the cost of guide plus spirit stones worth its impact? Could the same points be better spent putting spirit stones on fire prisms? or underslung shuricannons on the prisms? A warlock for the jetbikes?

I also played with the idea of dropping autarch and the jetlock for a 4 strong unit of shining spears, to fulfill the same purpose - finishing off weakened units. However, I decided against it, so i could take the autarch's fusion gun and master strategist skill to open up the reserve game.

I have found it difficult to drop my scorpions - whom I have had in each of my 4 games so far. They are great - they wipe out what they assault, generally over two turns (which is betetr than one as they don't get shot up) and i haven't found it as hard as I thought assaulting from a serpent. However, where they assault, I am kind of pinned and bogged down as I need to support them. Hence I have gone for the ranged fire based army.

I also look forward to experimenting with night spinners rather than fire prisms, and am looking forward to the modelling challenge of using magnets to make the tanks interchangeable.
I decided for 10 avengers rather than tri-template stormies because avengers can be effective outside rapid fire and assault range, meaning that they can survive long enough to get a second turn of shooting off (which also explains lack of exarch & bladestorm)

- I decided on destructor rather than embolden as this unit can use the autarch's leadership. Also, it is my 'mop up' unit, and with the autarch carrying a laser lance, it is designed to assault (weakened targets) hence, I wanted to maximise short range damage on this unit.

-Fortune would probably be a better choice than guide, but I need to find a few points from somewhere to include it. The avengers do have the autarch who can come help out if they are struggling, but this the max powered avengers have served well, when combined with doom, at removing tac squads and termis.

- I consider holofields to be a poor choice for upgrade on the prism. Any rolls on the vehicle damage table remove its usefulness, at least for a turn, so choosing between two of them seems kind of pointless, especially when for the same points as holofields I could get spirit stones and the underslung cannon, which both seem to add to it's utility.

3 Games, what lessons have I learned?

So I have had three games with my eldar. I have lost two and drawn one. I am now beginning to understand what others have said - it takes a fair bit of experience to get the finesse with them. Also, elites and heavy support are what make the army.

The units that have done well for me:
Wave serpents - these are expensive, but they are tough. Playing orks, AV12 is something I just never had. Now AV12 turbo boosting to get a cover save, that is pretty cool. I am often surprised how short 12" is though, and really miss the open topped trukks, which can be assaulted out of. Fortuned turbo boosting - win win. Attracts fire, gets someplace it wants to be and survives. In three games only one wave serpent has been wrecked.
They don't put out much damage though.

On that - tonnes of S6 - that is what eldar have. Scatter lasers everywhere. I can't make it work for me it seems. S6 means that I get few pens on anything.

I put EMLs on my war walkers - as was my first instinct, after 2 games with scatters. I found it much nicer to be rolling to pen with S8.

Doom - it's great, especially when combined with bladestorm. Totally awesome then. But I have used my avengers like that twice in 2 games. Is doom really that great. I think guide, especially with the war walkers may be better.

Warp spiders - they are good. they can take out high toughness troopies well, I'm looking at you scout bikers. Also they took out 2 vehicles in my last game. They don't like getting shot at much though, so they can't be on their own too much.


Striking Scorpions. Yep they are good. I roll so many dice when i assault, I feel like I am playing as orks. Move through cover works wonderfully with them, makes up for their lack of fleet a little bit - I have used it twice to get into crucial combats.


What has not worked so well -

Jetbikes, warwalkers, guardian squads.

Jetbikes just can't kill anything it seems. Maybe I am not aggressive enough with them. It feels good to be rolling 6 dice to hit with a S6 weapon. But refer to what I said above, I can't seem to make S6 make a big enough dent in anything. Thinking of doing 4 Jbikes plus warlock, embolden as a tank hunting unit. Could also take out a dreaddy with relative ease.

the learning will continue

Fire Dragons - WIP

So my fire dragons are coming along okay. I wish I had the self-discipline to just paint one and learn the lessons from that one. Would save me so much time in the long run.

Anyway, apologies for dodgy blurry photos, I don't have my camera atm and had to use my phone.

Wave Serpent

Again not quite finished, but this guy took ages - next one won't take so long as i learned many lessons on the way.

Like don't glue it before painting it, and that the best bone takes undercoat of dheneb stone and 2 layers of watered down bleached bone. And shading / blending requires watered down paint, and not much on the brush.

These are the lessons we learn.

I need to touch up the EMLs and the base.

Jet Bikes

Well I am nearing completion of my jetbikes - the fast wing of my army. I still need to do the warlock. The colour scheme of my army is becoming more defined now, around the blue.

These guys are turning out pretty well, even if they do consume a lot of parts (I used normal guardian torsos and heads as the models out of the box are in dire need of an upgrade.

I still need to do the bases and touch up the blending on the 'wings' and someone has pointed out that the bone coloured bits may need cleaning up too.

Without further ado

Tactical musings

So no pics, as no finished projects.

But when they come, they'll come in a flurry: serpent, jetbikes and rangers.

In the mean time, I have had some ideas.

n the ork board, there is a strategy called the BWagon rush. Not exactly the work of Sun Tzu, but effectively applies the principal of eliminating the usefulness of half the opponents army, with only the front of BWagons to aim at for the first few turns.

In the metagame, it seems that armour is ubiquitous. Hence every list is tailored to contain a large amount of anti-armour, in often very expensive options. I am wondering if we can make these expensive choices obsolete by making a list with no high T or AV targets.

The challenge with this is the extant need to include our own anti-armour elements. No vehicles / monstrous creatures (MC) means no mobile dragons, no EML, no BL. So our answer to armour comes in S6 shots, which we have plenty of, witchblades and star lance(s).

I am unsure whether such a list is necessarily mobile, as it may lack in firepower, or whether a fairly resilient 'anvil' would work. My personal philosophy with list writing is that all lists are 'all-comers', and I try to break the boredom of typical 'net-lists'.

So a list, applying the above might look a little like: (@ 1750)

Anvil
Farseer, doom, RoWarding
10 Avengers, exarch, defend, Pweapon & shimmer
10 guardians, Scatter laser
10 guardians, scatter laser
10 scorpions, exarch, claw, stalker

Hammer
Autarch, swooping hawk wings, fusion gun
6 Hawks inc exarch, talon, skyleap, intercept
5 Spears, star lance, skilled rider, withdraw
9 spiders, inc exarch, dual spinners
6 JBikes, 2 shuricannon
6 Jbikes, 2 shuricannon, warlock, spear, embolden

There are 5 scoring units, and heaps of opportunity to contest and claim objectives. It is quite a mobile force, but I am reliant on the spiders for ranged anti-horde and as my answer to MC's. The composition of the avengers I am uncertain about. Would bladestorm and dual cats be a better option?

I could also possibly drop 2 of the shining spears if I wanted them as a purely anti-tank role, but I figured that there is a severe shortage of power weapons in the list...

Painting update

I have two half-finished projects.

A wave serpent I took to uni with me, and it needs some work. Some rangers who are nearly done.

In other news, maelstrom delivered 4 jetbikes and a farseer today. Very excited about painting the farseer. A bit disappointed that there are still a few jetbikes that I am waiting on arriving.

Craftworld

Perhaps it is a by-product of the long time since I have played 40K, but I am spending an inordinate amount of time musing over different lists.

My attraction to eldar was for guerilla tactics - the old hit and run. My favourite models are rangers / pathfinders and the scorpions. I also like the farseer models. With this in mind, alaitoc seems a clear choice for my craftworld. My colours of choice also fit - blue, grey and bone.

Where it doesn't fit so well, is I can't picture an eldar warhost without jetbikes. What can be more hit and run than jetbikes? I also consider it likely that forward scouting rangers would call on the fast moving jetbikes for reinforcements. I even consider the possibility of painting the jetbikes in ranger colours (camoflauge) and calling them ranger jetbikes. Pity they couldn't have the BS4?

Tactically inspired by the writing of Fritz40K, jetbikes need to be accompanied by wave serpents.

So my list is shaping to include all of the above:
HQ - Farseer, stones, runes of warding, fortune, guide.

Troops -
5 Rangers
6 Pathfinders
6 Jetbikes, 2 shuricannon, warlock with destructor, singing spear
10 Dire avengers including exarch, defend, power weapon, shimmershield
wave serpent, underslung shuricannon, stones, twin linked bright lance

Elites
10 scorpions, with exarch, both powers, scorpions claw
5 fire dragons inc exarch with dragons breath flamer, crackshot

FA
6 Spiders, inc exarch with additional spinner

Heavy
2 War walkers, both with 2 x EML

Falcon, EML, stones, holofields

A few points left over. But only a few.

The dragons don't really fit in theme, neither does the falcon, except that it is the ride of the farseer. But they are needed for their AP1 and melta tankmelting capability.
I'm also not sure that both avengers and warp spiders are both needed, but they happen to be the only models I have painted so far. Doing the mathhammer a third warwalker could be useful for those targets that must be immobilised.

Warp spiders: taste the rainbow

Well my plan was to use dull greens and blues, but it was the first time i have used a white base-coat. So they came out a bit bright.

I like my colour scheme much more than the GW ones. These guys also look a fair bit neater than the avengers, which is good as they took ages and ages to paint.

Still intend to brighten up the gems with some 'ardcoat and paint a design on their backs. In time, in time.

More pics of the walker

Praetorian Dragons

A brain flash yesterday - I could convert som avengers into the dragons, with the paint work I talked about the other day (pic below).

All of the big gems on the avenger body will look awesome as big red gems.


Now... to find some storm guardian meltaguns...

My tactical musings...

So I was reading on WAU yesterday about an eldar list oriented around the turn two alpha strike.
It consisted of a fast moving and mechanised force shielded by two 'fortuned' wave serpents. The serpents provide a fast moving shield to the rest of the army, which positions itself to engage a vulnerable flank. In turn 2, the avengers inside the serpents disembark, and the whole warhost sends maximum firepower against this vulnerable target.

The weakness, as pointed out by another forum subscriber, was that an experienced general may set up a subtle counter-attack, and the fast moving eldar units are quite fragile.

Leads me to have some thoughts - small sacrificial units to weather the worst of the counter attack (3 x jetbikes - brave guardian souls), and / or a strong deterrent to the counter strike. Shining spears, or the threat of still embarked firedragons (or both).

The 3strong jetbike squad suddenly seems to  have a purpose other than turn 5 objective stealing. Fire dragons need not be sacrificial (or even fire - if the threat is deterrant  enough).


Hmmm, is this a new list I feel under contemplation?

Avengers, first attempt

So, my concept for the avengers was that they were meant to be black. I think they look really good black. However, at some stage while I was painting my exarch, blue crept into the mix.

I am not sure I particularly like these models.

I had an 'aha' moment, just as I was finishing them - they would look awesome if painted to resemble roman praetorians - with brassy armour and red detailing. It's not like I expect I will stick to the colours for any other of my aspect warriors...

Searching the web, I found someone had done what I was thinking of...   [grizzles with discontent]

The first walker...

The first model in my eldar army is the warwalker. Why? Because that is the backbone of my concept. The war walker - a long ranging scout, identifying the enemy, engaging from a distance, before fading back into the background.

Mine is in a camoflauge pattern - which will match my rangers when I include them.

Together, these will form the stationary element of my warhost - engaging the enemy waiting for the swift reinforcements of wave serpents and jetbikes.

So it begins, the first war walker...