Dark Elder advice needed.

[Gareth]

In the interest of fairness, to all game systems, before I slate 40k, I really should try 6th. That and the fact I have a fair amount of stuff, sat waiting to be assembled and painted, across many systems (40k, WFB, Relics, Dark Age, SAGA, FoW and probably others,) I am looking to clear some of the back log.

So I am looking at starting to assemble my Dark Elder. Now I have had a handfull of games in 4th, two 500 point in 6th, but the majority of my experience has come in 2nd-4th.

So what little tidbits of advice can folks give me, when it comes to force assembly. I'm not after, "In a DE army take X and Y," but more generic importances across all forces, which then help me build a force.

Example being would CCW and Pistol be better than a Rapid Fire weapon, even in a non-assault unit?
Does every unit require an Armour (Tank/Dread) damaging weapon?
With changes to Power Weapons, are they as effective, or are they now a waste of points.

Thanks in advance,
G.

[Embolden]

6th has moved 40k mainly towards hordes of infantry and shooting and flyers, just look at the armies around the club, Vince has his horde of guard backed by flyers, Chris has his horde of Dark Angels or Necron flyer army backed by hordes of infantry, JJ has moved towards infantry, I'm moving towards infantry, just to name but a few, but if you look at the armies around the club infantry is VERY prevalent.

This is all stuff that Dark Eldar excel at killing, well flyers are tough still due to all the single shot weapons, but DE have answers.

Now moving on towards your points:
1: totally depends on the unit, in general you're better off with a rapid fire weapon because of the move towards shootyness
2: before it would of been a certain YES, now it's a NO, you're better off with a diverse range of weapons in the whole army, like 2xTruborn 4 with blasters in a Venom with extra splinter cannons, this gives you 8 anti tank shots and 24 anti-infantry shots, plus redundancy of having 2 units.
3: power weapons are still handy, you kill terminators the same way they have always been killed, by throwing lots of small arms fire into them and look for the 1's, then move in to combat if a few stragglers survive . Unless you're facing Chris's deathwing.

Going back to a point, DE deal with flyers by using flyers of there own

As for other tidbits, you want a force that is strong in all aspects of the game, IE movement, shooting and combat, this can be covered by a single unit IE things like Incubi and Wyches are great in combat while mass warriors and truborn do the damage in the shooting phase, while the units embarked on the Raiders/Venoms, Flyers and Jetbikes handle the mobility side of things.

What sort of list are you looking to play?

[Nick]

Hmm, i would say that you would want splinter rifles over CCW's prefereably, except on assault units, as they should have a 24" range even when moving. You'd be suprised how fast all those poison weapon shots can shred things. And about Anti-tank stuff, i guess it depends on how you build your force. When i played my DE i was very transport heavy, normally taking at least 4 Raider transports. Thats 4 extra heavy weapons, normally Lances. If you spread out a few lances accross your warrior squads, or take a Razorwing or some Ravagers, it will give you a large amount of Lance shots spread out accross your force, so hopefully they won't all get killed before having chance to shoot. Not sure about power weapons, apart from the odd Agoniser my force didn't really use them in 5th, the exception being Incubi. Incubi, and the Archon's Huskblade, are still AP2, meaning you can still use those units if you think Terminators or other mega heavy infantry will be an issue. A lot of this will be down to playstyle, in 5th my list was split pretty evenly between shooting and assault, but i don't know how it would fair in 6th as it is, probably needs serious tweaking. And from what i've tanks are far easier to kill nowadays, so i doubt EVERY unit needs a Lance/Blaster/Blast Pistol, Flyers are where it's at

[Gareth]

What sort of list are you looking to play?

One that consists of one of the following models/units.

Archon
Succubus
Incubi
Warriors
Wyches
Hellions
Raider
Ravaged
Razorwing

I.E. what I have sat at home awaiting assembly and a lick of paint.

[Embolden]

What sort of list are you looking to play?

One that consists of one of the following models/units.

Archon
Succubus
Incubi
Warriors
Wyches
Hellions
Raider
Ravaged
Razorwing

I.E. what I have sat at home awaiting assembly and a lick of paint.

Looks like a solid base for a list, you have a good mix of units to try until you figure out what you like and what works etc

[Nick]

If you run Hellions i recommend putting Baron Sathonyx in with them. For 105 points he makes Hellions troops, and gives them Stealth and rerolls to dangerous terrain tests. Plus against lightly armoured stuff he hits like a runaway icecream truck, 5 Strength 6 hits on the charge i think, not bad when he throws out 2 poisoned shots in the shooting phase aswell. No power weapon though, but you can't have everything i suppose I took Baron most games i used Hellions, simply because no matter how carefull i am with them, or how much i hug cover, they seem to be total bullet magnets, so he gives them a bit more survivability.

[jaqenhgar]

I don't really have a clue about Dark Eldar, since I have only played them once, however these are a few of the things I think about when making a list (based on 1500-2000pts):

at least 4 troop choices; some mobility in the list (at least two units, not a prob for Dark Eldar), the more the better; long range high Str weapons against vehicles, monstrous creatures; ranged ap1/2 for terminators/Paladins; at least one CC threat (unless you are Tau or IG, although I like the idea of Rough Riders...); some template weapons for hordes; something that can kill that really annoying unit like long Fangs or doomsday Arks that sit in the enemies backfield shooting you. Also would your list be able to deal with three Land raiders? - with your Dark lances this shouldn't be a problem.

In a non-assault unit I would go for rapid fire weapons, they got a big boost being able to move and still fire one shot if over half range. Power weapons are still good, not everyone takes terminators and if they do the best way to kill them is shoot them with rapid fire weapons. You can challenge and kill the powerfist wielding sergeant before he hits you. I think fully mechanised armies are weaker now and will not be seen as much, so i wouldn't bother having every unit having a way of taking them out.

I think in general you also need to be careful about over-upgrading things - often you can save enough points by cutting some of the flashy stuff from a list to buy another unit, which gives you more options in the game.

Hope some of this is of help

Chris

[Gareth]

OK yesterday I sat an assembled a box of Hellions, and today I thought I would work on my test scheme. Light from my lamp is a bit cruddy, but this is one off the to do list.