Against DE

[Scumgrief]

Seems that when I go against them they out shoot and out combat me, so far I have tried termies, dreads and stacking up on RAS but they seem to just pop vehicles too easy and wyches with the inv save makes them a pain to kill and the fact they can pretty much first turn charge is a pain.

[JamesI]

Seems that when I go against them they out shoot and out combat me, so far I have tried termies, dreads and stacking up on RAS but they seem to just pop vehicles too easy and wyches with the inv save makes them a pain to kill and the fact they can pretty much first turn charge is a pain.

I've been having the same issue, though my games against DE are very limited (a few combat patrols and one regular game where nothing I had worked)

 

For me the difficulty was entirely getting them out of the transports. Of course, my opponent made every invul save on his vehicles.

 

The vehicles armor is weak, I've been considering adding a plasma or melta HG to deal with it and add a librarian to make sure my army has at least a 5+ cover (plus I don't want to add units that are useless against other enemies, and both of these should stil be useful in other games)

[Scumgrief]

I had the same problem all my opponents stuff was kept in vehicles with the double shield they have they are rather annoying to take out. My opponent tried out a list that has all his squads have 2 agonisers as well as 2 squads with four Liquefiers and that was rather brutal when they actually had to get out.

[undeadfilth]

wow i did not have this issue. Everything that we have just makes them cry. I used a balanced list and the DE player rage quit on the 3rd turn. just as easy to kill as they used to me in my opinion

[Son of Rawl]

You should be more worried about the player imo, if they know what they are doing then DE can run rings around you and laugh while wiping out units in one turn.

 

I would load up on Priests and look to surviving the assault that will happen to your units, the tactic I have been seeing is to survive the assault then counter it with your own. DE may hit hard but they do go squish rather easily

[undeadfilth]

or just shoot the tar out of them then assault:P seriously you can look at them funny and they will die en masse. that and against most of their squads they can't do -_- in close combat against a dreadnought, so use a stormraven to get em up there and tear em to shreds in a turn or two. yeah, they just don't trouble me ever no matter who's running them.

[d503]

If I know I am going up against DE or elder I take a rifleman dread and put it in cover. It's a reliable and cheap way to make them walk.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Unfortunately DE are faster than our army which I think is their greatest asset when we play them. So far I have not fought them with the new codex. I would try to use cover and assault en masse.

 

G :P

[Lanfear]

what have found useful is the following:

 

Razorbacks with LasPlas - cheap and very good range

Rifleman-Dreadnaught - 4 shots, sync.

Trikes - fast, Multimelter

Predator 135p

Landspeeder with Typhoon and Heavy Flamer

 

i try to make them walk, so i target their transports. Dark Eldar are squishy, but strong and fast.

[BOBMAKENZIE]

I had the same problem all my opponents stuff was kept in vehicles with the double shield they have they are rather annoying to take out. My opponent tried out a list that has all his squads have 2 agonisers as well as 2 squads with four Liquefiers and that was rather brutal when they actually had to get out.

 

This doesnt entirely add up. Is the guy taking like 6 Haemonculous with Liquifiers and Agonizers? So hes taking a wrack heavy list then?

 

If I know I am going up against DE or elder I take a rifleman dread and put it in cover. It's a reliable and cheap way to make them walk.

 

This is the right idea. Rapid Fire weapons are definitely not the way to go. Because your 12" range becomes 6" which isnt terribly useful.

 

 

Units which can be helpful:

-Baal Preds

-regular preds

-Deads with long range guns

-Land Raiders

-Any sort of marine. Praticularly with FNP.

 

Units you should avoid the assault from:

-Incubi

-Harlequins

-Vect

-2+ Squads of Wyches, Hellions (Especially when they have the Infernal Pre Igniter) at once

 

Units which you should avoid the shooting of:

-Ravagers with dark lances

-True Born,

-The two planes,

 

 

Basic tactics-

lure them in. Give them an easy looking Combat Squad or two. It WILL hurt but so long as you know that you'll be fine. What you want to do is get their squads in and out of the transports or at least near enough to yours for you to boost up and blast em down.

 

be conservative. The Night Fields subtract 6" of range from your weapons so take a minute and move on to a closer target if you think the range is a close one. Every shot is important so dont bother risking the ranged shot on the off chance. Crippling a DE army is easier then it seems all their units need to be working together. See below for more info on shooting.

 

shoot em down. prioritize your targets something roughly like this should be best observed to give you an edge though of course this depends on your opponent's deployment and army! Incubi transports, Trueborn transports, ravagers/the planes, other transports, Cronos & Talos, anything else.

 

stop and mop. Dont leave little bits and pieces because most of the strongest elements to the DE are the little bits and pieces. Most of their squads are just caddies for one or two key weapons (Incubi and Harlies are a notable exception) or require multiple elements moving together to do the same thing; so take the time to take off the last little bits that will be left from various squads.

 

castle up. Just like the dark eldar want all their units working together you want the same thing (and most of the time this should be your goal no matter the army!) so keep your units close. However one main caveat applies watch out for double assaults when facing Incubi or Harlies. The last thing you want is for 20 marines to get caught up with 7 incubi and to lose 16 marines in one go.

[Highborn Mergula]

Auto C Las C predators, Umh vindicators, MEPHISTON!

the key with mephiston is too keep him close to a ras with corbulo or anyother priest keep them in a las plas razorback and just stay cloose to the razorback with mephi using wings of sanguinus.

also 3scout bikers with cluster mines 3 asartes g launcher thats a mad killing 110p unit.

and a unit for 580p is 10man DC 1TH 1Power F jp's and lemartes thats a real meat for them.

out shoot the wyches cause they own i cc then take objectives it's simple and a pain for them.

The key against DE is having a jp for all cc squads or a transport also transports for other units so they can take objectives.

 

If I know I am going up against DE or elder I take a rifleman dread and put it in cover. It's a reliable and cheap way to make them walk.

What is a rifleman dread btw?

Everyone uses them but i never asked what it is. ^_^

[knife&fork]

What is a rifleman dread btw?

Everyone uses them but i never asked what it is. ^_^

 

A regular dreadnought with twinlinked autocannons for both arms. Supposedly called rifleman because it looks like something from Battletech.

[Grizzly Adams]

I play against them on a pretty regular basis. The key to killin em is makin em walk. Raiders/venoms need to go down and quick, otherwise, like everyone has said, they will speed all around you. I have found 4ML dev squads work really well, as they are not affected by lance and need only a 2 to glance most anything. Baal Preds aren't a bad deal either. If he is running Archon/Vect/anything with a shadowfield, take a Blood Talon dread and throw him into assault with em. Best tarpit ever, cause a rampant archon/vect is a very scary thing indeed.

 

Sanguinor + S. Priest + 20-30 RAS is a pretty raucous combo, and can take out most things in assault with ease. I had 10 RAS + Priest get assaulted by a full squad hydragauntlet wyches. Sanguinor was within 6" and i won the combat after 2 phases.

 

Basically, if you can take away their mobility, you win. But that is a lot easier said than done.

[Tabgoi]

DE have always been a finese army. Everyone here has some great tips against them, and I thuroughly second the plan of killing their transports first. Restrict their mobility as quickly as you can and they become MUCH easier to deal with. That said, in the hands of a skilled player DE are just devistating. Luckily while I have faced them several times, I have never faced a play who was truely good at using them to their strengths. With this dex Mephy is a great counter to a lot of things if used properly, but Baal's are our greatest asset. Against DE there is nothing in their army that a Baal is not a death sentence to. A furiouso is going to be quite exposed against their dark lances, but if you can get one with blood talons into CC you can watch their squads just disappear.

[Sabadin]

A furioso with frag launcher/heavy flamer in a pod is a good way to ruin their day. Anything that actually gets an armor save against that likely can't punch through AV13 in CC after.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

If you are having problems pack some flamers in your assault squads... they are the bane of dark eldar.

 

G :D

[Vilicate]

As a DE player, I can safely say that the following things give me headaches, and are on a need to kill first list:

 

In order:

 

Baal Preds (Almost as fast as my stuff, plus lots of shots that make for dead tanks)

Riflemen Dreads (Long range, lots of high strength shots, armor 12 is non a real disadvantage)

Dev Squads (lots of heavies, not good for getting across the board alive. Also, good range)

 

Things that I like to laugh about:

Any type of marine unit. Basically, anything that gets closer to me is now in either in rapid-fire poison distance or ready to get assaulted. Also, since the meta-game is so heavily melta-gun oriented, I can be sure my stuff isn't going to take a TON of damage before I get to get out and lay some smack down.

Land Raiders. Amusing that I take these down just as fast as pretty much any other vehicle. If it's BT, and has blessed hull, that's another story altogether. But mostly, yeah, they're a waste of points.

[knife&fork]

If you are having problems pack some flamers in your assault squads... they are the bane of dark eldar.

 

G :)

 

Just one of the many reasons I'd rather take one flamer and one melta instead of two meltas in a RAS.

[Marshal Wilhelm]

Surely LRAT in the form of Rifleman Dreads, ML Devs, Autolas Preds and even HB Baals get them out of the Raiders?

 

bs4 s8 against AV10 open topped:

 

4/6 to hit

1/6 to glance -> 1/6 to destroy

&

4/6 to pen -> 3/6 to destroy

 

= 4/216 + 48/216 ~ 52/216 or 24.07%

 

or 16.05% with a 5+ save

 

bs4 s8 against AV11

 

4/6

3/6 to pen

2/6 to destroy

24/216 or 11.1%

 

so if you can tackle Rhinos.... you can tackle Raiders, right? :eek

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

If you are having problems pack some flamers in your assault squads... they are the bane of dark eldar.

 

G :lol:

 

Just one of the many reasons I'd rather take one flamer and one melta instead of two meltas in a RAS.

 

If your tailoring your list to fight dark eldar I think hand flamers are pretty darn good and you'd still be able to take two meltaguns... Not that you'd need them versus dark eldar though.

 

G ^_^

[d503]

I have never used it, but wouldn't a regular dread with an assault cannon be good in a drop pod against de? Drop the pod in behind a raider and let rip, getting the squad out to walk. In the next few turns, the squad can either assault the walker and get beaten up or run away and probably not get out of the range of the assault cannon and storm bolter before they die. Or would the twin linked auto cannon be better?

 

Pure theory and guesswork, pull it apart if you like. But I think this would be good against DE and not be too much of a liability in an all-comers list or be a waste of money to buy in the long run. Plus, almost everyone has this combo already :lol:

[Lanfear]

Droping a Dread into their lines will give them free fire with their lances, i have found this not a good idea in any case. i dont even field the Furioso with a drop pod because usualy its part of the terrain giving cover after turn 1.

 

Using any sort of LandRaider isnt a good idea either as the lance rule puts him down to AV12. So there is no reason to field a landraider as long as you own a stormraven you can put on the board instead. its faster, has the same assault vehilce rule, great weapon loadout and is faster than a landraider for a lower point value.

 

 

 

what i want to give a try is a whirlwind. this thing could be a good choice. Did anyone of you field one or two whirlwinds vs. Dark Eldar?

[BAJake]

After reading all your posts my advice might sound lame but I play againts my buddy's :D ing DE alot. I like to counter evil with craziness. A 15 man death company with a power weapon or two alongside a chap or reclusiarch is pretty deadly and survivable.. inside a LRC (with a 10 pt Multimelta to help pop transports) also greatly increases the chances of assaulting on your terms, throw in a death co. dread or two, and (personal favorite) a 5 man assault squad with a pwr weapon and priests inside a Razorback helps even things up on transported assault units. It can tend to feel like your always playing Kill points againts DE anyways so imo its worth a shot

[knife&fork]

Do we really want to focus so much on short ranged fire power when the DE are so quick and have those pesky shadow fields? 18" Assault cannons don't feel like anything I would want to base my army around when almost everything has fleet and vehicles that can move 36".

[BOBMAKENZIE]

Using any sort of LandRaider isnt a good idea either as the lance rule puts him down to AV12. So there is no reason to field a landraider as long as you own a stormraven you can put on the board instead. its faster, has the same assault vehilce rule, great weapon loadout and is faster than a landraider for a lower point value.

 

I've seen a few people bash the LR but theres a few things it brings which I think are worth while.

 

1 its low to the ground. It might be hard to get a Cover Save on a raider but its even harder to get one whilst firing with a storm raven.

2 its a big target. Doesnt matter what you put in it you're going to draw fire on it. Even if it isnt always the biggest threat on the board.

3 its survivable. any given Dark Lance shot still only has about 2/27 chance of downing the raider (without cover. Thats about 13 lance shots to do it) Melta is what Raiders really fear.

4 its generally useful. Doesnt matter if you're facing DE or not the raider is never a totally useless option.

 

 

Do any of these mean that its the best option ever against DE? No but it is definitely a far more viable choice against them then people seem to think. I've played about 4 games of 2K against DE using 4 Land Raiders and I've lost 1 (Maybe 2, depends if you call immobed with just a hurricane bolter dead or not).