Defeating Dark Eldar

[Ceres]

Ahoij!

 

I'm having a game against a Dark Eldar player next monday, and I was wondering

what kind of builds I should expect from him, what can their units do, what should

I prioritize and what kind of tactics should I use with a bike list?

 

I understand that they have a lot of fragile skimmers, nasty assault oriented units,

and that the HB attack bikes are a way to victory, but what else to be precise?

 

 

Cheers,

Ceres

[Rottimus]

about 60% of my games are against Dark Eldar (my warhammer circle is small :-)

 

Generally you can always count on DE players taking a nasty close combat archon with some +3 save body guards with power weapons

 

To combat this take devastators with HB or plasma cannons. I find that vehicles get smoked quickly as DE have dark lances that eat 13 and 14 armour for breakfast.

 

Taking a lot of bodies is a good idea. i.e take as many tacticals as possible. DE are pretty fragile so if you make your army as tough as possible it ups your chances of staying ahead.

 

Take a full HB devastator and a 2 or 3 plasma cannon dev squad. That should give you the fire power to take down his Raiders and hit his archon squad pretty nicely.

 

Dreadnoughts with assault cannons can be good too... not much DE can do when they are in close combat with one

[BOBMAKENZIE]

well As I understand it from a friend Dark Eldar have 3 Key Builds:

 

1) Portal List, 2-4 Squads start on the board with 2+ Web Way portals...Maybe 1-2 Turns of Moving before they stop and open the portals. Everything else comes bursting through the portal and into your lines.

 

2) Raider List, 1-2 Units on Foot everything else is Super Fast. Lots of AV10-11 Vehicles (Transports). Watch out for the Ravager with Plasma Gun thingies. Either it fires 3 Plasma cannons or 12 Str 4 AP 3 Shots off.

 

3) Foot Slogging with Various Support. Supposedly the weaker of the options. Focus on the fast stuff and work from there.

 

All in all keep the following in mind:

-Witches are the cats meow in combat but suck at ranged, Flamers are your friends.

-Raiders go down to bolter fire....alot, Causing firey doom to thoose inside! *Insert evil laugh here*

-Ravagers can be a pain in the rear, even though they are AV11, they can also pick up some funky range decreasing protectiony field, so you may need to get in close with a melta or two.

-Warriors can be taken down in combat easy enough (Or at range).

-dont rely on vehicles, Blasters and Dark Lances make mince meat out of them.

-Grotesques are good vs. Range but not spectacular in combat.

 

 

All I can suggest Bike Wise is, (Keeping in mind I dont play a bike army);

Try and lure them into the center and speed the heck back to get another couple turns of shooting. Just watch out they are fast too.

Target Prioritize the Raiders if there are any. Or Portals if there arent.

A unit of Scout Bikes with Grenade Launchers or Some Attack Bikes with Multis would be ideal for Dealing with Ravagers/Warriors in their back field.

Speaking as a Blood Angels player here, Speed is your friend and your enemy. Both armies will be fast and you're gonna have to keep that inmind.

Finally...Dark Eldar Lords seem to like to die to No Retreat wounds in my Experience.....

[Ceres]

All sounds pretty dangerous to me, I take he isn't able to take a lot

deadly stuff in 1000pts game? (still painting the rest of my army)

 

I've heard some nasty things about their charge range, can they do

this thing I've heard of?

 

Skimmer 12", Disembark 2", Fleet 1-6" and Charge 6"

[BOBMAKENZIE]

All sounds pretty dangerous to me, I take he isn't able to take a lot

deadly stuff in 1000pts game? (still painting the rest of my army)

 

I've heard some nasty things about their charge range, can they do

this thing I've heard of?

 

Skimmer 12", Disembark 2", Fleet 1-6" and Charge 6"

 

They can have up to a 12" Charge.. So yes! ^_^

 

In 1000pts...I Would expect to see:

 

1 Tooled up Lord

1-2 Squads of Witches in a Raider

 

2-3 Warrior Squads some in Raider

 

1-2 Ravagers

 

But then my Buddy likes to play mech for his..Used to do Web Way gate but hes found Mech works better for him. (The Problem with Web Way Portal is if you Drive into a hard attack like 2nd turn you can sometimes kill off the portals before they open. Its like Trying to shove you're arm down a shark's throat to rip out its stomach....some times you'll kill it...some times it bites your arm off.

[Gargantuan]

Generally you can always count on DE players taking a nasty close combat archon with some +3 save body guards with power weapons

 

To combat this take devastators with HB or plasma cannons.

 

This won't usually work (at least for me) My friend who plays DE almost always gets a charge as soon as the Archon and bodyguards in the skimmer comes out of the portal.

 

The Problem with Web Way Portal is if you Drive into a hard attack like 2nd turn you can sometimes kill off the portals before they open. Its like Trying to shove you're arm down a shark's throat to rip out its stomach....some times you'll kill it...some times it bites your arm off.

 

You can't destroy the portal right? As soon as it's placed it indestructible or is my friend cheating? Do you mean killing the unit carrying the portal before it's placed?

[werewolf_nr]

Do note that (IIRC) their transports only hold 6 or 8 models.

[BOBMAKENZIE]

The Problem with Web Way Portal is if you Drive into a hard attack like 2nd turn you can sometimes kill off the portals before they open. Its like Trying to shove you're arm down a shark's throat to rip out its stomach....some times you'll kill it...some times it bites your arm off.

 

You can't destroy the portal right? As soon as it's placed it indestructible or is my friend cheating? Do you mean killing the unit carrying the portal before it's placed?

You cant destory the portal itself but if you're chillin on top of it then you can actually block it off. Though I was referring to kill the unit before the portal is down. Though skimmers and the like can still jump out over you.

 

Do note that (IIRC) their transports only hold 6 or 8 models.

 

Raiders can carry 10.

[Slick Jimmy]

My friend would run as many raiders as possible with a tooled up commander on a jetbike and his favorite tactic was to fly up, turn sideways, disembark on the opposite side, and rapid fire. That backed by some incubi, a ravager, and his 3+ invuln, high iniative, commander on a bike was deadly in 1000 pt games. Highly mobile with weight of fire for one good turn. It sucked for my squads of less than 10 men as a few would die and the rest couldn't get around the raider to assault. I used assault marines to assault after his shooty turn and in squad heavies were more than enough to bring down raider, although a long range dread or two can't hurt as their armor isn't affected by dark lances and makes em choose between dreads and tacs. That's my experience with em, hope it helps.

[Thaelion Hexis]

I play Dark Eldar myself, the most successful force is the raider rush. 1000pts is very tough for Dark Eldar, 1500 is where you can start getting the good stuff.

 

Off the top of my head I would probably use a lord with 5 incubi, 2 raider squads, 2 ravagers, maybe a talos, points permitting. Against that sort of force, avoid starting near the front of your deployment zone, stay back a little, take cover. Opponents of mine have made the mistake of starting on the front line and moving forward, especially risky in Dawn of War since it gives the DE a free run at your lines. Heavy bolters are your friends.

[chillin]

Used to play with and also many games against DE. DE usually either win big or loose big, rarely is there a close game. Like the others have said, DE have about 3 builds, It sounds like you already know that your opponent is taking a biker build. It's pretty hard to keep that list from getting the charge in. Shoot as many as you can first, HB's or ass. cannons are great for this. The key to surviving the charge is keeping the #'s high. Don't count on an uber unit with storm shields or something, DE are very mobile and are pretty good at avoiding units they don't want to be in hth with until the can overwhelm them w/ wyches or something.

[chillin]

Dreadnoughts with assault cannons can be good too... not much DE can do when they are in close combat with one

-

can't imagine a dread living long enough to get into CC w/DE.

Not saying the ass. connons won't be useful, just don't expect a dread to make it into CC.

[Brother SRM]

1. Heavy bolters

2. Heavy bolters

3. Heavy bolters

 

Alternately, take a predator with heavy bolters. Maybe a Whirlwind, but I think I'd rather take more heavy bolters.

[Hellios]

Dreadnoughts with assault cannons can be good too... not much DE can do when they are in close combat with one

-

can't imagine a dread living long enough to get into CC w/DE.

Not saying the ass. connons won't be useful, just don't expect a dread to make it into CC.

 

You can expect dreads to die as this guy says the exception to this is if you have some really good terrain.

 

Don't know what chapter you play but if you are going to take vehicles Leman Russ Exterminators (Space Wolves), Baal Preators (Blood Angels) and Blessed Land Raiders (Black Templars) are all good against DE (although the first two can have trouble surviving)

 

I would say your biggest issue is combat because if you take enough heavy weapons(LS lots of shots) you can gun those skimmers down they really are made of paper and the Ravager gets cardboard upgrades.

 

Also unless he is using a portal army don't worry to much about a Talos as it will be slow... I personally take Wyches out because they are a pain once they reach your line but at least they can't consolidate into you now, shoot them over charging them if you think you will be bringing their transport down have something ready to shoot the occupants.

 

Warriors should be beaten model for model at range and in CC in large number they could be an issue.

 

Incubi + lord can be a problem if their transport goes down they will be slower compared to the rest of the army (just) but with 3+ they can live and its best to avoid getting into combat with them if the lord has a 2+ invulnerable save just pepper him with small arms fire.

 

If you have one deepstrike a Deathstorm drop pod into him on turn one and if you can hit a few of his raiders (or anything on foot) you have a very good chance of making its points back.

[I AM THE AWESOME]

If you have one deepstrike a Deathstorm drop pod into him on turn one and if you can hit a few of his raiders (or anything on foot) you have a very good chance of making its points back.

 

 

Deathwind Drop Pods can't fire when they DS.

[Ceres]

We'll, I'll be playing a full-bike list as I'm a 'diu' Ravenwing player, so my 1000

pts list would have 3 squads of 5 bikes with double plasmas and 6 attack bikes,

all with heavy bolters, and Khan.

 

I was thinking that I should put the attack bike to the front, as if they are changed

I can shoot by bolters and the charging unit as they can't consolidate to me when

they destroy the attack bikes.

 

I should target the skimmers first with the attack bikes, but I can't prevent the

portal assault right? Also, are the ravaners those jumppack troops with lances?

Should I start in full-outflank, or deploy to the far end of my deployment zone?

[Tiger Raja]

I play DE as well as SMs. Let me give you some tips here:

 

I should target the skimmers first with the attack bikes

 

Yes. The DE's greatest strength is their mobility. Kill it or negate most of it and he loses a lot of his power. You know that myth about sharks having to keep moving or they die? That's DE.

 

but I can't prevent the portal assault right?

 

If you kill the guy (a Sybarite or a Haemonculus or some other character) who has the portal before he can open it, then, yes, you can prevent the portal assault. If the portal is open, you can surround it or move a vehicle over it to block anyone from coming out. Pulling off any of those isn't easy, but I've had it happen to me a couple times (not many). If you can't do that, though, then just stay far, far away from portals and shoot whatever comes out of them. The worst thing you can do is go near an open portal. You will *not* like whatever pops out.

 

Also, are the ravaners those jumppack troops with lances?

 

DE with jump packs and heavy weapons are Scourges (Raveners are a Tyranid Fast Attack unit). Scourges can Deep Strike and either have dark lances or splinter cannons. Scourges are hideously expensive and if they have dark lances, they can't move and shoot, which limits their usefulness. Scourges with splinter cannons (Assault 4, S4, AP 5 IIRC) could be a pain in the butt for you, with your limited number of bikes.

 

Should I start in full-outflank, or deploy to the far end of my deployment zone?

 

Basically, you just want to stay away from them and shoot, shoot, shoot--unless they're packing a bunch of disintegrators, in which case, you'll want to get stuck in or you'll suck down AP3 shots all day. DO NOT split your forces. As a DE player, I am so happy when an opponent presents his army to me in bite-sized chunks, because my guys are fast and mobile enough to throw literally all of my army against a piece of his, quickly chewing it up before moving on to the rest.

 

Good luck. If your opponent knows what he's doing, you're in for a tough, vicious fight. If he doesn't know what he's doing, you'll win easily. DE are hard to use, but once someone knows what they're doing, they're hard to beat.

[Mutt-Man!]

They have a "Plasma Cannon" that has a different firing mode that shoots multiple high ap medium strength shots. (Cant share stats here) Its on their vehicles only, and the darklances can pick terminators off and instant kill toughness 4 easily while being a good anti vehicle weapon but its only 36" range heavy1. This weapon is their other vehicle weapon.

 

Their regular guns arent frightening, slightly better then lasguns. Dont under-estimate their "devistators with wings", if he is wise and used the multi-shot guns (near a heavy bolter in most uses but he can move and shoot with it) they need to die early. Because they die easy, and its a headache you want gone fast.

 

Their regular melee outside of HQ's arent all that bad. Its a bunch of "guardsmen" protecting a power weapon leader usually. Running a bigger unit here and there can normally sack them before they do any real damage in melee.

 

Dark eldar against marines often have to win by shooting. If he gets his real good melee (HQ's and retinues) into melee then try to get out of it. Those Incubi with halberd things are super banshees. Shoot them, they are his highest marine killer units. Other then that, charge him in melee all you like. The talos is not that bad, be sure to have some powerfists and lighten it up with shooting. Its no wraithlord, and its no carnifex but it can take down a dreadnought, so treat it like one.

 

Incubi+Talos(scorpion thing) are the only melee you worry about. You shoot his vehicles first no matter what, they all pack weapons you wont like. Charge into melee at your hearts content after shooting those two things out of the game.

[battle captain corpus]

Heavy multi shot weapons is what I would rely on.

 

Your standard heavy bolters, assault cannons and plasma guns/cannons will punch most things from the sky and shred infantry.

 

Expect to be in combat at some point, take a counter assault unit of jump pack troops or even a tooled up vets squad to charge in at weak points in the line.

 

Corpus :D

[Tiger Raja]

Incubi+Talos(scorpion thing) are the only melee you worry about

 

Don't forget about DE Lord + shadowfield (2+ Invulnerable Save) + combat drugs + agonizer (power weapon, wounds everything on 4+). And Wyches, especially Wych succubi + agonizer. I've torn up plenty of Space Wolves with them. :D

[Marshal Serion]

Couple of points on Dark Eldar:

 

Overall:

 

They will strike first vs. Marines.

HQs are usually I6 or 7.

Wyches, Hellions, and Jetbikes are I6

Warriors are I5

Talosi are I4

 

 

HQs:

 

2+ invulnerable (that still allows Fleet and Sweeping Advance) that goes away the first time he rolls a 1 for a save (then he's 5+ or so)

Agonisers or Poisoned Blades will wound on a 4+ or 2+, respectively. You get a save with the Poisoned Blades, only invulnerable saved with the Agoniser.

 

Wyches:

Wych Weapons: If your unmodified STR is less than 6, you will halve your WS when you attack a unit of Wyches. Relic Blades are an example of modified STR that will halve WS. Also, you never get to count extra CCW weapons' extra attacks.

Wyches have a 4+ invulnerable while in close combat, so shoot them before they get to you. They have a 5+ armor save, so bolters do well.

Wych succubus will usually have an Agoniser (listed above), so be warned.

 

 

Warriors:

WS4, BS4, S3, T3

Splinter Rifles are S3 AP5, 24", Rapid Fire (IG hellguns)

Splinter Cannons are S4 AP5, 24", Assault 4 (basically stormbolters with 4 shots)

Dark Lances are S8 AP2, 36", Lance, Heavy 1 (armor over 12 is counted as 12...so 50/50 shot at a Land Raider)

Blaster is S8, AP2, 12", Lance, Assault 1 (think meltagun, but with the lance attribute rather than melta attribute)

Shredder is S6, AP- 12", Blast, Assault 1 (with the ability to scatter back into the DE squad, don't expect to see this much)

 

Scourges:

Jet pack

5+ save, T3 (bolter fire will rip them apart)

Can have Splinter Cannons...which means they can move 12" and fire 24". With 4 of them in a squad, expect 16 BS4 shots at 36" range (w/ movement)

Can have Dark Lances, but not likely.

 

Talos:

Very nasty Monstrous Creature

S7, T7, 3+save, 3 wounds, D6 attacks in close combat (yeah) and a S4 AP5 Assault 6 (yeah) gun.

Wildfire: After determining how many successful shooting hits, one hit is applied to the closest enemy model, with each hit being attributed to the next closest model until all successful hits are doled out. This means that shots can go to models in different units.

Talos Claws: Not only is the Talos a Monstrous Creature (S + 2D6 for Armor Penetration), but his attacks against Vehicles are handled different. He has D6 attacks. He gets to add his (# of attacks - 1) to the strength of his Armor Penetration roll. For example, if he got 6 attacks, his Armor Penetration roll would look like this: S7 + 2D6 + (# of attacks - 1). If he rolls the average 2D6 roll of 7, he would have a S7+(7)+(5)= S19 hit on a vehicle. The good side is, he only gets ONE actual armor penetration attack against a vehicle. So, he'll get a nice big hit (assuming he hits successfully), but there'll only be one hit.

 

 

Ravager:

FA11, SA11, RA10

Can have any combination of Dark Lances or Disintegrators up to a maximum of 3 total weapons. Can Deep Strike w/ a 10pt Vehicle Upgrade.

Disentegrators have two firing modes:

S7 AP2, 36", Heavy 1 Blast (Plasma cannons)

S4 AP3, 24", Heavy 3 ...When I run my DE, I have one Dark Lance and 2 Disintegrators and Screaming Jets for deep strike. This lets me Deep Strike (cruising speed), fire one weapon (Dark Lance, fast vehicle rules), and all defensive weapons (disintegrators can be S4).

 

Raider:

FA10, SA10, RA10

Can have one of either Dark Lance or Disintegrator

Open Topped, holds 10 models

 

 

 

Speed is the key. If you can stop them from moving, you'll win. If you can't, it'll be up to the dice.

 

Plain and simple.

[Hazard]

Introduce them to a friend that plays Armored Company - lots of Russes that due to upgrade dont get "lanced" and atleast two of them with BS4... For the Emperor! Daka Dakka Dakaa!

[Brother SRM]

Introduce them to a friend that plays Armored Company - lots of Russes that due to upgrade dont get "lanced" and atleast two of them with BS4... For the Emperor! Daka Dakka Dakaa!

That reminds me, Black Templars can give "blessed hull" to their Crusaders, which also ignores the lance rule.

If you don't play Black Templars, use heavy bolters instead.

[Ceres]

Ahoij!

 

I had my game against the Dark Eldar player, it was though one, but

eventually ended in a draw.

 

It was an interesting game, which emphasized very much the speed

of both armies, the other one trying to run away from the combat and

the latter trying catch the bikes to get into combat.

 

Thanks for all the advice folks,

a battle report is on it's way!

 

 

Cheers,

Ceres

[Hellios]

If you have one deepstrike a Deathstorm drop pod into him on turn one and if you can hit a few of his raiders (or anything on foot) you have a very good chance of making its points back.

 

 

Deathwind Drop Pods can't fire when they DS.

 

I said Deathstorm not Deathwind, and Deathstorm can fire when it deepstrikes, infact I'm pretty sure it HAS to fire.