Iyanden weapon loadouts

[Emurian]

Greetings,

I recently picked up 4 of the CWE starter boxes together with 2 wave serpents, 2 spiritseers and a wraithknight.The army was not really planned in advance but more bought on impuls due to a sudden cash overflow by selling off some Magic  cards.

I always adored Iyanden as a kid back in 3th/4th edition. Sadly back then a squad of 10 wraithguard costed you around 120 euro's, which was just to much for me to cough up at that age. I did a little bit of reading on CWE in general. I understand that a thematic Iyanden list is far from competitive. That said I just want a fluffwise army on the table. 

My question is what the most common loadouts are for the Wraithlords and wraithguard? The standard weapon and ghost axes seem to jump out over the other 2 options (though I really, REALLY like the double swords as in the rule of cool) I wil start out with 20 wraithguard, might expand to 40 over time.

I notice quite some people taking shuriken cannons on wraithlords. As a 3th/4th edition player I remember that wraithlords nearly always had bright lances as their BS 3+ sortoff forced you to place your AT on your Wraithlord or vehichles. Scouring through some lists this no longer seems to be the case. Can anyone enlighten me what caused this shift? Where do the lances go nowadays, or AT in general?

Maybe something that might influence the weapon choice is that I made up my mind that I will never run guardians as this breaks the fluff in my eyes. So my troops will be rangers (again fluff wise choice) 

Does anyone also have a tip regarding magnetizing the weapons on the wraithlord ? the connection point seems so friggin thin that I am doubting if its worth the bother to magnetize them.

Thank you in advance for your time replying to this rambling =).

[Xenith]

Love an Iyanden army. It'll look stunning on the table.

 

As long as you;re not worried about competitiveness, then just make the models as you see fit. To be honest, any answer given now will be irrelvant in 6-12 months when hr next eldar codex comes out.

 

If you want to chase the meta, the only way to future-proof is to magnetise. If you make the models in the way you find most pleasing, you'll always be happy with them.

 

4x 5 wraithguard does seem to lend itself well to one unit of each loadout, though. I think melee wg might be more viable this edition due to smaller table sizes. The flame ones will be great on an objective, however if the opponent can shut down your overwatch youre in trouble. 

 

The big change happened when all eldar became base BS4, now BS3+. Formerly guardians only hit on 4+ making wraithlords your best bet for anti tank. I think this changed in the...6th edition codex? That's around when I stopped playing eldar as they were too powerful and games were boring. 

 

For the narrow connectors on things like the wraithlord and support platforms, I used pins instead of magnets. 

[Greywing]

I magnetized all my Wraithlord's weapon options and I'm mostly all thumbs, so it's definitely doable. It was a while ago, but I don't remember it being a particularly difficult model to work with. Just be careful and deliberate. In places where you don't have much margin for error, be especially careful with placement of your pilot hole before you drill the actual magnet hole, and you'll be fine.

 

Edit: Pics, or it didn't happen.

 

So, looking at my model, I remember a couple of tips. Fill in the slots on the forearms with green stuff before drilling. Also, I think you might have to shave the shoulder mounts down a bit to get a nice level surface. In any case though, it's certainly achievable and well worth while, in my opinion.

 

 

 

Edited October 7, 2020 by Greywing

[Emurian]

Hmm I have been tinkering around a bit with the models and yes it seems I can magnetize it. Though as you said the connection point of the gun, on the shoulderpad thingie is very very thin. Chances are very big I will F the shoulder. Seems I will have to fill up the connection point with putty, then shave off the extension under the gun to have a flat area to magnetize and even then its as thin as filigree. I just hope this isn't the case with wave serpents as I would like to swap out weapon options on those later on.

So just considered whats wisdom, and I know this sounds retarded but eh, if I want 40 wraithguard anyway thats 8 boxes of the starterset, I am to much of a hoarder to sell off duplicates and tbh I dont care if I have 8 wraithlords. I think it might actually look really cool in a display case ^^. 

So I will just end up getting multiple wraithlords.

Did bit of theorycrafting, my expectation is that the glaive upgrade for the WL kinda makes you want to advance with him asap, so shuriken cannons with the glaive seems a logical combination. BL WL's shouldn't need a glaive as they can stand back on an objective while providing AT. Not to sure what to think of the starcannons. These things where soooo good in 4th edition. They look ok, but they feel weaker compared to the older edition.

I am going to aim to finish the following list first painting wise


Heavy support detachment (spearhead?)
Spiritseer quicken
2x 5 wraithblades w/ghostaxes
2x5 Rangers
Wraithlord shuriken cannons glaive
Wraithlord bright lances
War walker Shuriken cannons
War walker Shuriken cannons.

1000 pts total

Tried using as many units from the start collecting box. Added some rangers to hold objectives in the backline with the BL WL, rest moves forward. Might not be the greatest list but it feels fluffy while at the same time it feels I make decent use of the Iyanden craftworld rules with the WW and WL's.
 

Edited October 8, 2020 by Emurian

[Xenith]

if I want 40 wraithguard anyway thats 8 boxes of the starterset,

 

Wraithguard are available outside the starter set also! I know the SC! Eldar is a great deal on paper, but only worth it if you can use the units. 

 

That said, 6 war walkers are pretty decent if you want to commit to that strategy, and 8 farseer models can be converted to an on-foot seer council. 

[Karhedron]

There are 2 main ways to run Wraithlords.

 

1. Fire support unit with counter-charge potential

2. Close support and melee

 

The fire support version works best when you have other slow moving firepower units like Dark Reapers, Support weapon platforms etc, possibly bubbled around an Autarch for rerolls. You simply give the Wraithlord 2 heavy weapons of your favourite choice and let him blaze away with the rest. If any enemy get close, he packs a decent punch in melee to protect his living comrades.

 

The close support build works well if you are building a mobile army with your infantry mounted in Falcons/Wave Serpents. Here you put he heavy weapons on the Serpents. The Wraithlords get 2 Shuricannons and a Glaive (flamers are pretty good now with 12" range if you have the points available to upgrade them). This build is mobile as he can Advance and still fire and is pretty fast when doing so. The idea is that your infantry disembark and toast some target units. The next turn, your Wraithlord arrives to deal with any heavy opposition or bail them out of close combat. The Glaive is useful here as going from S7 to S9 really improves his effectiveness against T7 and T8 targets. A pair of Wraithlords with Glaives can even do serious damage to Imperial Knights in melee.

 

The other advantage of the close support build is that it means on T1, your opponent is faced with a wall of T7 vehicles and T8 Wraithlords meaning much of their anti-infantry weaponry will be of minimal value.

[Karhedron]

My question is what the most common loadouts are for the Wraithlords and wraithguard? The standard weapon and ghost axes seem to jump out over the other 2 options (though I really, REALLY like the double swords as in the rule of cool) I wil start out with 20 wraithguard, might expand to 40 over time.

For shooting Wraithguard, both guns have their uses but I lean in favour of D-scythes. The ability to Advance and still fire at full effect mitigates the short range and they have a fearsome overwatch. If you are getting 2 shooty squads than Wraithcannons are definitely good against large targets and can deploy via Webway stratagem to get close. I would take D-scythes as my first priority but consider Wraithcannons for a second squad.

 

Maybe something that might influence the weapon choice is that I made up my mind that I will never run guardians as this breaks the fluff in my eyes. So my troops will be rangers (again fluff wise choice)

Troops are a difficult issue for Eldar in 9th edition as taking an holding Objectives normally makes up 50% of your total victory points. Tough Troops units are a real premium, unfortunately ours have all the resilience of fine china. However playing a single unit of 20 Guardians can be viable, particularly for Iyanden if you are willing to combine a couple of stratagems on them.

 

The first thing to remember is that the Iyanden trait means you will never lose more than 1 model to a failed morale test. That is a huge buff on large squads. Normally if an enemy kills 10 Guardians out of 20, most of the rest will simply evaporate in the Morale phase but not Iyanden! Put a unit of 20 with 2 heavy weapon platforms in the Webway and save them until Turn 2 or 3. When they appear, deploy them as close as possible to an Objective held by an enemy unit and open fire. 40 Shurican catapult shots and 2 heavy weapons will wipe out all but the toughest of Infantry squads and endanger vehicles too. If facing a tough target, add psychic support with Guide, Doom and/or Jinx.

 

Hopefully this should delete your target. Then play the "Fire and Fade" stratagem which allows you to move your squad after firing. Move them straight onto the Objective that you have just wiped the enemy off. Of course the enemy will probably try and take the Objective back which is why you have the "Celestial Shield" stratagem. If the opponent tries to shoot you off the Objective, give the squad a 4+ Invulnerable save to minimise casualties and apply wounds to the Heavy Weapon platforms first. This makes the unit surprisingly difficult to chew through and your opponent will not take more than one additional model off the in Morale phase. If the enemy tries to assault them they will risk incurring the wraith of any Wraithlords in the vicinity. For a couple of hundred points and a few cheap stratagems, you have a jack-in-the-box unit that can kick almost anything short of Terminators off an Objective and then hop onto it and hold it. All the while making it annoyingly difficult for the enemy to retake it.

 

Now they are only Guardians and not indestructible but with a few key stratagems and support, you have a unit that your opponent will have to either concede an Objective to or use a lot of effort to remove, effort that is then not being directed at the rest of your army. If your opponent focuses on the Guardians, he kills one squad and the rest of your army has a turn with a lot less pressure. If he ignores the bait and leave the Guardians, you have just claimed an Objective to help rack up those VPs. Best case, your opponent splits his attention and fails to inflict critical casualties on anything. A key part of the game is presenting your opponents with difficult choices. The more pressure you pile on, the greater risk they will make mistakes.

[Emurian]

 

if I want 40 wraithguard anyway thats 8 boxes of the starterset,

 

Wraithguard are available outside the starter set also! I know the SC! Eldar is a great deal on paper, but only worth it if you can use the units. 

 

That said, 6 war walkers are pretty decent if you want to commit to that strategy, and 8 farseer models can be converted to an on-foot seer council. 

 

Well a box of wraithguard is 28E, a starter box is 48E. So for 20 euro you get the warwalker, wraithlord and farseer to boot which is a steal imo. Im not to worried about cash, the whole reason I picked up this army was due to the overflow of selling of MtG cards.

 

@Karhedon: I will simply have to through a trial and error phase. I will give the D scythes some games to show what they can do. Under 1k I lean more towards the Axes and shields as the boards are relatively small and I think that I can get them quite consistently in combat. (So far my blade guard veterans have been footslogging multiple games and they had no problem whatsoever reaching combat in every game.)

 

The guardians is more a fluff thing, I have some old dark eldar models lying around so I can proxy the squad to test it out some games. I just dont see Iyanden employing guardian squads. The craftworld should be so low on Eldar that I expect them to take better care of them then other craftworlds and not employ them IG style.

 

As I stated before I dont care if this army is not competitive. I have space marines, necrons and custodians which I can opt to gear more towards competitive. My group in general plays far more casual. (Last 2x2 1k pts game on average each list had 40% invested in troop spam) We are still finding a balance but so far the group as a whole likes the casual lists were putting down. Some of us (including me) used to be very competitive and went to tournaments in the past. Around half the group didn't play back then. Me and said friends that did run tournaments are wary to prevent a min/max mentality developing in the group. Tournaments are somewhat fun, but lets be honest, in most cases its a rock scissor paper match where you can point out before you begin which army is going to most likely win. We are striving for 50/50 battles. We show our lists to eachother beforehand and allow others to request changes to be made for the sake of balancing out. I therefor think that the Iyanden won't be that steamrolled as in competitive mindset groups.

[Karhedron]

@Karhedon: I will simply have to through a trial and error phase. I will give the D scythes some games to show what they can do. Under 1k I lean more towards the Axes and shields as the boards are relatively small and I think that I can get them quite consistently in combat. (So far my blade guard veterans have been footslogging multiple games and they had no problem whatsoever reaching combat in every game.)

You are right, I concentrated solely on shooty Wraithguard and forgot to mention Wraithblades. My bad.

 

I think you are right to go for Axe/Shield. Durability is a premium in 9th due to Objective scoring so the Invulnerable save will definitely help to keep them alive and fighting for a bit longer.