Help me kill Eldar (they always kick my butt)

[Grey Mage]

I play an eldar player quite often, and he's a Harlequin fan... mechanized up quite a bit, and quite annoying.

 

Eldrad with some warlocks

2 squads of Dire avengers in a wave serpent

1 squad of fire dragons in a Falcon

2 squads of Harlequins in wave serpents

2 fire prisms

 

Against this, I field the following:

....

Your opponents list is Illegal, if your naming everythying correctly. You cant take Waveserpents for Harlequins, its simply not an option in the codex.

 

He might have been able to take one for the Fire Dragons and another for the Warlocks, but if hes not having the harlequins embark in them after deployment he needs to be corrected.

[minigun762]

Very important- Autocannons and Missile Launchers will make your break you against mounted Eldar. Rhion Squads might as well hand over their transports KPs at the start unless the eldar player is a moron.

 

How much is enough then? Will a single squad of Oblits or Havocs cover my firebase needs or am I really going to have to loadup on the big guns?

[Grey Mage]

Very important- Autocannons and Missile Launchers will make your break you against mounted Eldar. Rhion Squads might as well hand over their transports KPs at the start unless the eldar player is a moron.

 

How much is enough then? Will a single squad of Oblits or Havocs cover my firebase needs or am I really going to have to loadup on the big guns?

As is always the case in a game with as many variables as 40k, it depends.

 

Is your opponent Mounted? If the answer is yes, then your looking at about 1 squad for every 325pts on average, with support elements ranging from 100pts-160pts on average, figuring no more than one support unit per squad, or 1 unit per 240pts. Of those, in a mounted force 90% are going to be vehicles.

 

Thus, if you want to keep your enemies transports, battle tanks, and vypers under control your going to need about one AT style weapon for every 250pts in the match that can fire at a seperate target. Every time you skimp on this you have to start making harder decisions about what to shoot at and run a higher risk of not making enough effect to get the job done. Some units, like combat squaded Devastators or Long Fangs can do double duty. Discount any AT weapon with less than a 24" range- plasmarifles yes, meltaguns no. Wich isnt to say meltaguns cant be useful, but against a mounted eldar force they shouldnt be considered in your primary antitank weaponry.

 

So... for instance in a CSM army at 1000pts:

 

2x Obliterators.

10 CSMs- 2x PRs.

5 Havocs- 4x Autocannon.

7 PMs- 2x PRs.

 

Would have you covered against a mounted eldar force, wich likely at this point value would have 3 mounted squads, one heavy support element, and a cheap HQ in most builds.

 

If hes footslogging? Then we have a second question:

Is this a Ghost Army or Standard?

 

If its a ghost army then every time you bring an AT gun youll get its points back. Every time. If its a standard eldar footslogging army- wether full of aspect warriors or nothing but gaurdians, AT fire is less needed, though its always going to be useful for killing wraithlords, shelling enemy positions, and ignoring armor saves. A level of AT firepower that you would bring against a balanced C:SM list should have you well covered in general.

 

Jetbikes? Especially those armies centered around the "flying circus"? Theres a really, really easy solution for them. Its significantly cheaper too- biker command squad. Why?

 

Jetbiking Seer Councils have the following issues:

- low number of base attacks

- no way of ignoring armor

- expensive *a full unit of ten is around 550pts, with no warlock powers at all!*

 

Wich are further exploited by a command squad because:

- FNP means that they are incredibly survivable, handily negating the advantage of wounding on a 2+.

- PWs force the lesser invulnerable save to be used, powerfists/relic blades can instant kill farseers *remember, its not a retinue*

- Good Leadership value means even if you flubb, your likely still stuck in combat.

- Cheap *a command squad with captain runs around 400pts.

 

Gaurdian Jetbikes on the other hand while not horrid, are certainly nothing to write home about- and again, just plain suck at CC. A good plasma/autocannon firebase to take out vypers, and some vangaurd/scouts to finish the job means that an experianced SM player should have nothing less than an even playing field against a bike based eldar army.

 

Why then all the complaints about jetbikes? Because its something different. Theres literally no other army with scoring jetbikes, and certainly no biker unit thats more durable then a tooled Seer Council... save maybe nob bikerz. People arent used to dealing with this kind of thing, so they complain- just like everyone used to scream about the cheese of a pair of wraithlords, when frankly theyve never been that hard to take down if you hit them with the proper weaponry for the job.

[spartan249]

Your opponents list is Illegal, if your naming everythying correctly. You cant take Waveserpents for Harlequins, its simply not an option in the codex.

 

Really now? How interesting... In any case, makes it easier for me then XD

[Ineedabettername]

I play an eldar player quite often, and he's a Harlequin fan... mechanized up quite a bit, and quite annoying.

 

Eldrad with some warlocks

2 squads of Dire avengers in a wave serpent

1 squad of fire dragons in a Falcon

2 squads of Harlequins in wave serpents

2 fire prisms

 

Against this, I field the following:

....

Your opponents list is Illegal, if your naming everythying correctly. You cant take Waveserpents for Harlequins, its simply not an option in the codex.

 

He might have been able to take one for the Fire Dragons and another for the Warlocks, but if hes not having the harlequins embark in them after deployment he needs to be corrected.

 

I heard that although Harlequins cannot take a wave serpent, that does not stop them from embarking on another one later in the game. I.e. They may not field a wave serpent at the start as part of the unit, however they may jump onto another wave serpent later in the game.

 

I am sure I have seen this discussed by eldar players on the 40k forum.

[Grey Mage]

Youll note, I said as much in my post- he might be able to do it, but only if he embarks them later... if not, he needs to be corrected.

[thade]

Another game, this time only a very near loss on my part (it was capture and control and I was one turn/6" away from contesting his point, he was barely contesting mine).

 

He fielded the same list; I went with the following:

 

Tac Squad x10, Plasma Gun, Plasma Cannon, PF

Tac Squad x10, Plasma Gun, Plasma Cannon, Meltas

MotF

Whirlwind

Whirlwind

Vindicator

MM Venerable Dread

Sniper Scouts in a Rhino (wait for it), Telion, ML

Sternguard in a Rhino, x6 (2 ML and 4 vanilla)...they're equipped this way because I only have so many marines and wanted as many troops as possible

5 Terminators with CML

Librarian in TDA, MotA and Null Zone

 

Why were the scouts in the Rhino you ask? Because it was DoW and I decided to bolster a single building and use it as my Porcupine home. I filled it with the tac squads, and they sat there pretty with their 3+ cover save for almost the entire game, keeping a very clear region mid field (he has learned to fear bolters since I chewed him up last time). Had it not been DoW (indeed, anything else) the Sternguard and Snipers would have started in the fire base with one tac squad, and I'd have mounted the other to contest his point (with the second Rhino as back up). As it was I rolled them in on turn one as described, the whirlwinds behind my firebase, and the vindicator up the right (he had put his capture point in the corner behind a building with Eldar snipers to cover it).

 

Way too late for me to echo the details well, but here's a rough summary. I am first to deploy and go.

- First turn, his bikes turbo boost towards the vindicator, which is by itself in a ruin; bikes include an exarch and the autarch...Shining Spears I think they are called.

- Second turn, I unleash *everything* I have at the bikes. Vindicator, both Whirlwinds, Plasma Cannons at long range, and 5 krak missiles (included the CML) across the breadth of the table (from my now stationary Rhinos). Killed all four but I had to make them take a LOT of saves. Bottom of second he outflanks his Striking Scorps and cripples (but does not Wreck) my Vindicator, with an Immobilize (over by itself it's lost points).

- Third turn I charge the Dread in and try to pop the transport with his Farseer and Dire Avengers in it; fire a few missiles too. Holofields and whatever else makes me roll two dice and take the sucky one and only roll one die with my Melta leaves it Shaken but otherwise completely unscathed. He unloads Fire Dragons and with only 3 in range toasts the Venerable, which is in cover, and his rerolls result in ALL 6s.

- Lance on the Wraithlord pops the Sternguard Rhino and the Dark Reaper Exarch kills them all with that freakin double template that rerolls scatter, rerolls to wound, and denies armor AND coversave. Srsly what the hell is with THAT crap?! I *hate* that guy.

- Fourth Turn I shell the crap out of his Scorpions, killing half of them; they pass their morale check. Tac squads fire a few stray plasma cannons shots at Reapers, killing one. Transports still unhurt, I begin to move my sniper transport towards his objectve, behind a LOT of cover, to contest it.

- He turbo boosts the Dire Avenger tank into my firebase, making Dangerous Terrain and crashing in on top of my point (which I should've put on top of the freakin building, apparently). I am happy to say that my Librarian completely shut down his psychic powers, turned on MotA, and charged in with five Terminators to tear the hull apart. ...Of course, he did Turbo Boost in, so at 6+ all of my attacks failed. The MotF charged in too and failed (servo harness).

- Fifth turn my Rhino is not close enough for my Snipers to pile out and risk a run...I need ONE more turn to get them there to contest. The Rhino takes no damage from Wraithlord Fire. My Whirlwinds pound a Guardian Squad (which came out of reserves on turn four, footslogging) back off of the board. He succeeds in popping the Vindicator, which I'm glad he did...because he left his Scorpions out of the central fight to pop that thing (who knows why). My guys all try to crack the tranpsort inside and STILL fail...and there is no turn 6, so he wins.

 

It was a very fun game, and I thought a LOT about how I failed to place my Sternguard and even my Snipers effectively. I do much better with more ranged fire power, all holed up in a bolstered fire base. All in all it was a very fun list. I'm getting better, but no victory yet.

[minigun762]

MotF

Sternguard in a Rhino, x6 (2 ML and 4 vanilla)...they're equipped this way because I only have so many marines and wanted as many troops as possible

5 Terminators with CML

Librarian in TDA, MotA and Null Zone

 

These seem like odd choices to me.

What is the MotF really going to offer? Since you loaded up on Sternguard I figure that Pedro would be a better choice to make them scoring. Also what about a Biker Captain? Having a fast unit that doesn't rely on transports seems like a good idea.

 

It looks like alot of Sternguard that aren't scoring when the exact same thing could be accomplished using more Tac Terminators with CMLs.

 

With no Land Raider, have you thought about the GoI for the Librarian/Terminator combo?

[Br.Pat]

My advice is to use flamers and heavy flamers against a fortune reliant army. Heavy flamers have ap 4 and ignore cover. He can't re-roll saves that he can't roll in the first place.

 

A librarian would also be handy.

[thade]

These seem like odd choices to me.

The sternguard allowed me to field both MLs instead of zero (as a tac squad) or one (as a dev squad) and gave me special ammo which was pretty effective VS Eldar in a previous game. I have no biker captain, nor do I have a Pedro.

 

What is the MotF really going to offer?

He's not much more than a techmarine pricewise, having 2 wounds to balance out the lack of invuln. He gives me Bolster (which is very nice) and keeps my whirlwinds in working order (also very nice).

 

It looks like alot of Sternguard that aren't scoring when the exact same thing could be accomplished using more Tac Terminators with CMLs.

I only had six Sternguard. Not six UNITS. Six MODELS. ;) Hardly a lot. I'd love more terminators, but again, all I had in Termies was on the table.

 

With no Land Raider, have you thought about the GoI for the Librarian/Terminator combo?

I have a Land Raider, but it dies very quickly to his turbo-boosting firedragon boat... Actually it dies pretty much within two turns in any serious game I'm in. I have used GoI before but with little luck; now that the librarian is in TDA (a new development) it might not be a bad thing to try again. He'll be Relentless, so I could Epistolary him and Vortex right after the drop.

[bystrom]

I suppose you rolled in with the rhino, then jump in with the scouts (as units can't start in dedicated transports that aren't dedicated to them when in reserve)? It seems a bit strange though, that you chose to keep the marines on the board instead of the scout snipers, instead of trying to get a rapid-fire with one tactical squad in a rhino. You really don't need the scouts in the rhino to contest anyways, just the rhino.

 

When you're talking about your dreadnought trying to pop a transport, holofield makes you take two dice and always choose the lower. The other, where you're talking about only one die from melta, was it out of melta range or was it something that the transport had? AFAIK, the standard transport (wave serpent) can't take holofield, but has another shield (which I can't remember the name of) with the ability to amongst other things ignore the melta rule (though not from the rear). The other transport/tank is the falcon, which can take holofields but doesn't have the ability to ignore the melta rule. More generally, the wave serpent (the Real, Dedicated Transport) can't take holofields, instead has some nifty other shield. The rest of the Eldar vehicles can take holofields.

 

How did the reaper exarch re-roll scatter? farseer? Also, did you remember that you can attack vehicles in CC in the opponent's turn if you're in base-contact (I'm not 100% sure on this one, its just something I seem to remember)

[averykess]

Against this, I field the following:

 

Troops

Tactical Squad: 10 marines, Mgun, Lascannon, Razorback - 225 pts

Tactical Squad: 10 marines, Mgun, Lascannon, Razorback - 225 pts

Tactical Squad: 10 marines, Mgun, Lascannon, Razorback - 225 pts

 

Are you breaking these into combat squads and only mounting half or not mounting up at all?