Epic Fail VS Dark Eldar this weekend!

[I am Legion]

This weekend I had a partnered game with my 2 best friends. It was a 4000 point game on one side, and me and my friend had 2 2000 point armies.

The Alliance was me with 2000 points of Blood Angels, and my friend with Grey Knights VS Dark Eldar.

We usually play to table the opponent, and we gauge winners by how many points they have left on the table.

The dark eldar player took as many venoms full of the cheapest units possible placing blasters where he can.

The Alliance's list consisted of a sturdy mechanized army.

 

155--Reclusiarch--JP

125--Furioso--Blood Talons

125--Furioso--Blood Talons

235--10xRAS--2xMG, PF

435--10xRAS--FLM, MG, PF, Land Raider Redeemer

145--Baal--HB

145--Baa--HB

145--Baal--HB

200--SR

200--SR

90--Whirl Wind

2000

 

25--Inquisitor

145--Vindicare Assassin

145--Vindicare Assassin

145--Calidus Assassin

460--5xTERM--Insinerator, Land Raider

470--5xTERM--Psycannon, Land Raider Redeemer

610--8xTERM--Psycannon, Land Raider Crusader with MM

2000

 

I can't remember the Dark eldar list exactly, but I'll try to get my friend to send it to me. All I know is that he had 4 FOCs. And having so many individual units, makes it hard to pick targets, because you can only fire at one unit at a time. I'm really glad we had vehicles with POTMS, it made a huge differance!

 

So we were spread out across the table, with us getting first turn. We rushed everything forward with guns blazing doing alot of damage to the reaver jetbikes, eliminating just about all of them in the first turn.

Nothing deployed. The vindicare assassins just kept taking out the ravagers which was awesome!!! Man I love those guys.

The counterstrike was about 50 seperate units firing back at us, tearing apart 2 land raiders, and a handful of marines. Luckily for us the terminators soaked up so much firepower!

The second turn we deployed the terminators and furioso dreadnoughts. The furiosos we figured dont get the extra attacks if they damage a vehicle so we had them deal with the various wracks and kabalite warriors that popped out. The terminators and assault marines charged as many multiple units as possible, doing heavy damage. But there was just too many units. It was unreal! This continued on until about the 4th turn at which point the Dark eldar player simply ran out of units with blasters. this was our time to just pick him off one by one. Unfortunetly there wernt enough turns or units firing left for us to finish him off. The other big advantage was that he took all his injured vehicles and just hid them behind cover. We being a land based army, could not catch up in time.

By the end, the result wasn't too far off but it wasnt too close either. The Dark Eldar player beat us by about 350 points.

 

So the question is. How can we deal with such an army. Keep in mind if we wernt hidden in vehicles our marines would have been overwhelmed by mass firepower.

[vharing]

I think letting your opponent have 4 FOCs might have been a bit much. I have played a few games like that and my friend had 4k points of Eldar vs my Blood Angels and my friends Dark Angels. We let of the Eldar player use two FOCs since we had two armies.

[I am Legion]

Well to be fair, it's part of the rules, I thought. Once you fill out one FOC you can begin a new one, right?

[kollar]

We usually play to table the opponent, and we gauge winners by how many points they have left on the table.

The dark eldar player took as many venoms full of the cheapest units possible placing blasters where he can.

 

I'd say your problem is this. You are manipulating the victory conditions massively in his favor. You are essentially playing "Kill Points" only without the drawbacks for his army. If he is using -four- FOC's, he would have had an insane amount of killpoints, especially if everyone of those units are in a transport. Recalulate if you would have won using killpoints, and I'm sure the win would have been in your favour. Also... Four FoC? No one needs that at 4k points.

[I am Legion]

Hahahaha I totally agree, under normal conditions the DE player would never use that list. But we try to test out just how tough various armies can be. We do this also because we enjoy this variation a bit more. The three of us are a "Peace Through Power" (C&C Rulez!) type players.

But above and beyond that the Dark Eldar had 30+ transports, and about half or more of those had blasters, and a handful were Ravagers with Lances. So the army made me think about just how strong GW made them. Not to say I've never beaten them before, but they can produce just so much bloody firepower.

 

I have to admit, they're also a really fun army to look at from a hobby point of view.

[AbusePuppy]

1. Filling a FoC does not allow you to take another one; that's not an uncommon way to play, but it's not part of the rules, either.

 

2. Your friend's GK list is illegal; you can only have one of each of the assassins.

 

3. Playing "just kill the other guys as much as you can" loses a lot of the more interesting strategic aspects of the game. I would strongly suggest using the normal missions when you play.

 

4. 4000pts per side is a huge game; that's Apocalypse-scale right there. How big of a table were you using?

 

5. Your own list is... middling at best. Blood Talons aren't nearly as great as people give them credit for (you're murdering most things with a WS6 A4 Dreadnought already) and against DE they are even less ideal. You aren't delivering useful squads with the Stormravens (they contain... half an Assault Squad each?) and throwing the Land Raider into the mix only confuses things even further.

 

All of that aside, you're basically doing exactly what the DE player wants- the GK are a slow, foot-only force that he can spam wounds onto and each failed save earns him a lot; I mean, if a Venom kills two Terminators, that's already more points worth of guys than it cost him to get it. Your own force places tons and tons of eggs into a couple very mediocre baskets; once those Assault Marines arrive at his lines you... kill a unit and then get shot to death? The Baals are pretty good, but they'll be the first targets for all his Lances. And the Whirlwind... well, Whirlwinds are kinda bad. They can do some damage to light infantry like him, but that's really not your problem- your problem is de-meching him.

 

 

You need to figure out what your half of the list is intended to do- is it a fast assault list (with the Ravens/Raiders) or not? If it is, get some real assault units in there. If it isn't, get some more shooting going. The GK player... well, he's got too many points sunk into Terminators, it means his shooting is extremely mediocre. I think he really needs to diversify his units a bit more- Psyflemen, Heavy Bolter Razorbacks, Purifiers, GKSS, Inquisitorial Henchmen, all of them could add a lot of good support to his list.

 

(If you're putting his Terminators in your SRs that's a different matter, but in that case you need to get rid of that Land Raider and get some shooting support to lend him a hand.)

[Morollan]

It's already been said but allowing your opponent to have 4 FOC's at 4000 points is pretty ridiculous. Are they seriously saying that they can't make more than 1000 points out of a FOC? I think 2 would have been more than adequate.

[BOBMAKENZIE]

It also takes closer to 1200 pts to fill out a FOC if DE are putting units in venoms.

 

2x Haemonculus 100

 

3x 3 Trueborn, Venom 237

 

6x 3 Wracks Venom 510

 

3x 1 Beastmaster 36

 

3x Chronos 240

=1123

 

 

It sounds however like hes doing something more like this..

2x Haemonculus 100

 

3x 3 Trueborn, Blaster Venom 282

 

6x 5 Warriors, Blaster Venom 690

 

3x 3 Reavers 198

 

3x Chronos 315

Total: 1585

 

So you're really looking at more like 2-3 FOCs of that but its pretty easy to confuse when you realize thats ~25 nearly Identical transports and 9 Gunboats puttering about the board.

[Brother_Byhlli]

It's already been said but allowing your opponent to have 4 FOC's at 4000 points is pretty ridiculous. Are they seriously saying that they can't make more than 1000 points out of a FOC? I think 2 would have been more than adequate.

 

This.

[Enzephalon]

Why on earth is a loss by around 300 points in a 4000 points game an epic fail by any means?

[Atlantic]

I don't think you should have tried to tank rush him either.

 

You would be better served to make him come toward you and shoot the crap out of his transports and then drive your tank wedge forward.

[I am Legion]

Actually, non of us told eachother which army we would be fielding. That includes my partner. We honestly thought we'd be dealing with tyranids.

 

Morollan - What ended up happening is that the DE player used a previous 2000 point army he had made, and simply doubled it.

 

BobMackenzie - I am waiting for my friend to send me his DE army, and you are making me think twice about it. I wouldn't say I'd be angry at him for manipulating a handful of points, but honestly each army (2 seperate FOC per army - he had two armies) came out to 1988. That's all I remember.

 

Atlantic - The issue was that we were so outnumbered that we wanted to get our terminators and furiosos to charge as quick as possible to take down 2-3 transports at a time. By the end of the game we nearly took out all his infantry. BTW it was just a handful of injured venoms, and one Ravager left.

 

Kardion - my friends and I consider 100 points spread a complete and utter loss. That's how competitive we are. ;)

[Brother Nathan]

using raiders against dark eldar? isnt that like pointless with all the lance weapons? and the reason why those gun boats of theirs are limited by the foc is to weaken th arm and make up for those strengths. they have good offence and weak armour to off set but allowing the opponent to maximise on the number he can take and playing an elite army which osent have enough long range anti tank to take them all out before they hit your lines...

really you shoulda just made him play the veichles as squadrons and then it would have balanced out when you opened up with your firepower... would have made it fairer imho

[Leonaides]

I think the point Bobmackenzie was making is the cheapest way to fill a Force Org chart for DE while still having as many venoms as possible... There reallly was no need to have 4 charts for him, nor is there any reason why a 2k army should need 2 charts. For reference, an entire marine battle company, plus vehicles will fit into a single FOC and clocks in around the upper reaches of 3.5-4,000pts.

 

I'd also suggest that you and your friends start working in percentages to determine win/loss if you are dead set on that way to do it - 100pts is a lot if you're playing 1k games, but in a 4k game, an equivalence would be 400pts (10%). You could go for 5% if you really think you're that good, but you're gettign into the territory of random dice rolls there - statistical anomalies will always exist, and you'd look a bit stupid denouncing an army as useless or broken based on pure chance... -_-

[I am Legion]

Brother Nathan - Like I said none of us new which army the other was going to use. and even then they need a 5+ to penetrate. That's not really easy. Besides we had a ton of vehicles so the blaster shots were spread out. I actually first expected to lose by 2nd turn. And I agree we could have bent the rules to be a bit more fair, but we play by the rules as much as possible.

 

Leonaides - Having multiple FOC for DE works well though, if he can manage it, then by all means. The percentage idea might actually work. And in kill points we would have tripled the DEs points. So I will mention it. But the way we do it now is just for fun, we just love to see massive firepower, and have tons of kills. We also usually play 2k minimum. we go up to 5k on a regular basis, so multiple FOCs works.

[Leonaides]

having multiple foc's like that, you may as well bin them entirely and just take whatever you want up to the points limit. He has twice as many elites choices available, twice as many heavy support and fast attack... It does make a big difference tactically. But if you and yours are just after kills, its not a problem, as long as you are aware that thats all you'll get.

[Elric the Silvercoat]

Wow everyone just seem to jump down the OPs throat about mulitple FOC. Really does it matter how must stuff he can field? And really in both of your lists the best thing you could have done was drive down his throat so you could do more damage with the Dreads and Terminators. And anyone that thinks Land Raiders are not good against Dark Eldar need to play Dark Eldar against Land Raiders. Land Raiders are the second hardest vehicle in normal Warhammer 40k to kill even with Lances. I think you did a good job and really that 300 points different could be credited to bad dice rolls for you and your teammate and good dice rolls for the Dark Eldar players. It was really an even match by the sounds of it.

[I am Legion]

Elric the Silvercoat - The FOC chart thing is one thing, in fact I was just thinking that 40k is very balanced.

But the idea of this thread was, how to deal with so many fast units while using an all around list. I'm not saying my list was perfect, but it can deal with any threat. If this was a 2000 point game one on one. My list wouldn't have done so poorly though.

 

But in future. Should I add more vehicles or some terminators to my list? Do I take longer range weapons? That WW is starting to look really good in my eyes. It made its points back in one shot at one point. I was very impressed, because no one fires at it. So I get a free unit technically in that itll remain safe.

[Elric the Silvercoat]

Elric the Silvercoat - The FOC chart thing is one thing, in fact I was just thinking that 40k is very balanced.

But the idea of this thread was, how to deal with so many fast units while using an all around list. I'm not saying my list was perfect, but it can deal with any threat. If this was a 2000 point game one on one. My list wouldn't have done so poorly though.

 

But in future. Should I add more vehicles or some terminators to my list? Do I take longer range weapons? That WW is starting to look really good in my eyes. It made its points back in one shot at one point. I was very impressed, because no one fires at it. So I get a free unit technically in that itll remain safe.

I think more long range weapons would have helped.

[Leonaides]

Well, if you droppe dthe 2 SR's, the Furiosos and the RAS in LRC, you could have had ~60 marines, 6 Rhinos, 6 Flamers, 6 Missile Launchers and a metric crap-ton of bolter shots per turn to make mincemeat of his army the moment it got within striking distance... DE colapse like a wet tissue against even normal tactical marines if you do 2 things - soften them up with a round of shooting (BP's and a flamer would do nicely) and get the charge. The half dozen rockets, plus the rhinos SB's, plus other vehicles ought to be able to stun or de-mech most of his army, and once they're walking they're so much dead meat. And you'd be laughin gin his face the moment he realises that you've actually got more models than him in a 2k army!