Twin Autarchs

[Veldrik]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm coming up against a player (friend) who, when he plays against me, he carries an army consisting of

2x Autarchs

2x Warp Spider units (each with one of the autarchs, 7 warp spiders, and 1 other squad leader type)

2x war walker units (3 each)

2x jet bike units (4 each)

 

Basically when he can he decks out with shurikan lasers and star fire lasers, and then some rockets.

 

His strategy is usually to keep everything in reserve

 

IF opponent deploys first:

turn 1 - Opponent: moves or drop pod assaults etc

turn 1 - Eldar: stay in reserves

turn 2 - Opponent: still do nothing except maybe land a few deep strikers

turn 2 - Eldar: appear and then shoot everything they have and take out as much as possible

 

IF opponent deploys second:

turn 1 - Eldar: stay in reserves

turn 1 - Opponent: moves or drop pod assaults etc

turn 2 - Eldar: stay in reserves

turn 2 - Opponent: still do nothing except maybe land a few deep strikers

turn 3 - Eldar: appear and then shoot everything they have and take out as much as possible

 

He uses the two autarchs to shift his reserve roll by +2 so that he can hold back for as long as possible before deploying.

 

When he lands, he can take out a fair bit. Last game he managed to blow up/splatter 1 Rune priest in terminator armour, 3 long fangs and about 9 wolf guard - terminator armour.

 

The last time I played "vanilla" space marines against him, he took out in the first turn he landed, 1 venerable dreadnaught, and around 15 (3 squads) of infantry and one termi.

 

This is all from shooting in the turn that he arrives.

 

Has anyone come acros a similar army to this, where they are able to land and shoot the crap out of you before you can do much? If so any tips would be great.

 

 

BTW - with the last game using space wolves, even though he destroyed around 700 points in his first turn (which incidently was my 3rd turn) my remaining 800 pts (wolf guard, a few long fangs, grimnar with 1 wound, and 3 lone wolves) took out nearly everything he had.

Long fangs do pretty well in combat, and wolf guard are brilliant (MoW is fun).

Lone wolves are great at locking up war walkers too, and killing stuff to boot.

[Bonham1963]

Sounds like your friend is playing the reserve rolls wrong. Turn 2 he rolls 4+ and the unit arrives. Two autarchs means he may add +1, +2 or no bonus to the die roll, as per the FAQ. Autarchs don't delay arrival, if anything they speed it up.

 

One strategy you may try is putting your stuff in reserve. Makes for a more boring game for both of you, imho. Possibly he will at least get the hint, that the game is boring when you both only get 2-3 turns of game play, which is sad, when it is so hard to schedule games.

[Veldrik]

I'll look that up - thankyou so much (his Autarch rules).

 

Last game I held everything except 3 lone wolves in drop pods, however I still beat him to the table as half had to arrive first turn, and the rest rolled onto the table immediately :) but the drop pods made great cover at the end and kept my last unit of WG and grimnar alive so they could make mince meat out of 4 jetbikes and 3 war walkers :)

[Grey Mage]

How much cover do you use? Because he cant kill what he cant see... and while Warp Spiders are S 6 and rapid fire they have no AP value, and frankly are still just T 3... you should be able to return the favor as well as they hurt.

 

Missile Launchers will rip this army apart, And Tactical Squads and Devastators will outrange them.

 

Its all 3+ armor saves, low model counts, and light armor. No templates, and nothing over 36" range. Looks like its 1k?

 

If your playing Space Wolves your first buy needs to be a Rune Priest with master of the runes, stormcaller, and tempests Wrath. Long Fangs with Missile Launchers, five strong unit is 115pts, and will devastate those warwalkers- Id take two. And three units of Grey Hunters with plasmarifles and powerfists.

 

So that would be.... 935pts. That 65pts could be put to a variety of uses, like giving some of those long fangs plasmacannons, or getting yourself a trio of BP+CCW wolf gaurd to put in your squads to soak up wounds on the long fangs and give a unit of GHs LD 9.

 

Make sure your casting Tempests Wrath every turn, and watch as his army slows to a crawl and dies as it tries to come in range- remember that if he moves in the assault phase thats a second dangerous terrain test for his warp spiders and bikes.

 

Also remember that not only are warwalkers squadroned, and thus dead on an immobilized result they also are open topped- wich means a penetrating hit destroys them on a 3+.

[LPetersson]

Also remember that not only are warwalkers squadroned, and thus dead on an immobilized result they also are open topped- wich means a penetrating hit destroys them on a 3+.

 

Where do you see that they're open topped?

I can't find it in Codex: Eldar...

[Koremu]

I play regularly against an Eldar player who use War Walker spam arriving from Reserve or Flank March. While the alpha strike is nasty, it is eminently beatable.

 

Firstly, use Rhinos, not Drop Pods. The Drop Pod Assault rule means that, as you've experienced, you'll just get shot to hell and back. Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10). In addition, the Vindicator will draw any AT fire away from your Rhinos, increasing their survivability.

 

Remember that Eldar weapons tend have a very short range. Tri-Las Predators or Typhoon Speeders are the most points-efficient way to out range the Eldar.

 

Really, the key to beating an Eldar army like this is to maintain mobility until he develops his assets and then respond. That's why Rhinos are better than DPs. Bikes, Speeders and Attack Bikes will also draw fire and close ground.

 

MMABs are especially threatening to him, as you really don't ned to be within 12" Melta range to hurt the walkers.

[LPetersson]

Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10).

 

Where does it say that the S5 of the Vindi isn't halved (As per BRB P60 last paragraph)?

 

But yes, Vindicators are nothing short of fantastic against Eldar...

[eyescrossed]

Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10).

 

Where does it say that the S5 of the Vindi isn't halved (As per BRB P60 last paragraph)?

What are you talking about? A Vindicator is Str10 so it's halved to 5 against vehicles not under the hole.

[Koremu]

Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10).

 

Where does it say that the S5 of the Vindi isn't halved (As per BRB P60 last paragraph)?

 

But yes, Vindicators are nothing short of fantastic against Eldar...

Err... the STR of the Vindicator *is* halved... it's normally 10 (and hence auto-penetrates any walker under the template centre).

[Frosty the Pyro]

Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10).

 

Where does it say that the S5 of the Vindi isn't halved (As per BRB P60 last paragraph)?

 

But yes, Vindicators are nothing short of fantastic against Eldar...

S5 IS the halved value, its S10 to things under the hole...

 

But yeah even at S5 you have a 30.5 % chance to pen, wich when added to the 25% chance to glance it pretty good.

[Koremu]

3 near-identical responses inside 3 minutes :)

[Veldrik]

Hello everyone,

 

Firstly, thank you all for spending the time to reply to me :)

 

regarding Grey Mage:

 

unit of 7 wolf guard, terminator armour, with a rune priest in terminator armour, all in partial cover (inside a building).

The moment his troops appeared, he shot them to peices, so by the end of his shooting phase they no longer existed. They all got wiped before I could even fire back.

 

As for the long fangs, he took out 3 long fangs (two actual long fangs and the squad leader with MM) in his shooting phase. This is before I got to shoot aswell :)

 

And warwalkers are no longer open topped :( the stupid space elves (well GW) decide to give them a glass (transparent plastic) canopy.

 

Most of my troops (all except 1 long fang) were camping cover. The drop pods all direct hit for the first turn, and scatter close to target on the second tag.

 

regarding Koremu:

I'll try replacing my drop pods and using ground assault - I might see if I can squish in land raiders, as I found the effectiveness of using a bunch of wolf guard (vs gre hunters) armed with storm bolters, with a termi or two, and a combi in there and mow etc. A vast variety of weapons helps the whole fluff thing (we are all individuals! Not me!) and I found that in close range and in close combat, they are devestating. If not I'll try and keep a few terminator free just to squish two units into rhinos and try your mechanised version. You are right about the drop pods - I'm just happy that all the drop pods I used were upside down schooner glasses (if the glass was upside down, it was a drop pod, if it was the right way up, it was for the beer) and I only have 1 drop pod model and not 4 or 6 that I had to pay for.

 

regarding LPetersson & Koremu:

S5 vs S10 strength, yup the vindicater is a base of strength 10. Koremu was giving the worst possible scenario

 

regarding Koremu:

I see the point of the vindi - and when before I was mildy considering getting one, now it's a strong option. the large s10 blast it delivers and the extra shield is fantastic.

 

Thank you all for your input so far, I really look forward to reading more :)

 

Vel

 

PS - I just realised that using the Whirlwind's Dragonrager/Castellion missiles in direct shooting (page 58 of the hardcover rule book) are defensive weapons and so can shoot them when rolling. :) I might chuck in one for fun and just roll around shooting long range week ordinance at people. I mean it's only a S4AP5 shot, but hey, it might atleast be irritating to someone else apart from me :)

[LPetersson]

Secondly, take a Vindicator. It's horribly perilous to everything in that army, and can total a whole squadron of walkers as it rolls 2D6 (pick highest) + 5 against even vehicles not under the central hole of the template (meaning it has a 55% chance for a hit of some kind against AV10).

 

Where does it say that the S5 of the Vindi isn't halved (As per BRB P60 last paragraph)?

What are you talking about? A Vindicator is Str10 so it's halved to 5 against vehicles not under the hole.

 

I'm a retard sometimes. I was thinking of Whirlwinds...

Whirlwinds are superb against eldar. Vindicators have to be a bit too close. I wouldn't fancy a Vindicators chances of survival against a half decent Eldar player.

 

Incidentally, I've gone first against a very similar with a list that had 5 pods (3000 points)

I dropped the pods very close to the his edge so that everything that came on would be in assault range from either my forwards unist or the ones in my own deployment zone.

 

Having 2 turns to maneuver my troops into fire postitions/cover + being free to walk my Long Fangs further out was actually a bit of an advantage in the end...