How can the Dark Eldar become competitive??

I have to agree that they can solve most of the issues by formations. Give us a series of data slates similar to the nids that include alternative, more powerful PFP tables, and bonuses to terrible units, like wyches and Hellions.
Maybe we will get a Dark eldar civil war campaign book?? Kabal of the poison tongue +harlies vs vect? I'd buy it!!!!!

Such formations would be awesome!

I found that the means that DE and CWE and coven provide add up to a multitool that is still viable. I played grotesquerie, a cronos, a talos, three raider with warrior and hwg, an eldar spirit/farseer and some eldar and DE jetbikes with Urien as a buffer. You have some durable, some fast, some shooty and some buffing combos. Although luck was involved and it was close sometimes, I did win my last four games against necorons, sm-rgino rush with the old book and two of those new formations, eldar. But you kind of have to ally and combine and it is not easy of course...

A local did win some tourneys with a kabal list and khorne dogs..

Using another army does not really make DE better...

The sad truth is: we don't have all tools we need but most and also unique ones..

We just need more damage on all units across the board. That would be enough.
Glass Hammer need to have Hammer part.

Power is all fine and well, but from what i gather even if we HAD that power, we lack the staying power to use it.
What good is it to be the fastest army when most armies have weapons that can shoot across the board.
What use is power when most armies are equipped with weapons that ignore cover.

I think the basics of the DE is fine lightning fast speed, hard hitting weapons at the expense armor saves and perhaps toughness, is great that is the theme of DE and we shouldn´t deviate from it.

So maybe remove Nightshields as an "option" and just include them automatically on every vehicle, find a way to resist or ignore weapons that ignore cover.
Plus find a way to resist Overwatch, i don´t think we should be able to ignore it completely, as said before Tau sucks in close combat their shooting is the only way they have a fighting chance at winning a fight.
So for an army to say sorry but your overwatch..yeah it just got canceled removes one of the armies strengths that prevents it from being crushed in close combat.

With regard to Night Shields being included automatically, would it help if they also went back to their old effect?

We'd lose 3+ jink, but we'd at least have a defence that Ignores Cover couldn't ignore.


With regard to dealing more damage, one idea I was contemplating was something like this:

Find the Gap - Dark Eldar can always find and exploit even the smallest chink in their enemies' armour. All melee attacks made by Dark Eldar models have the Rending special rule. If they already have the Rending special rule, the effect triggers on a to-wound roll of 5+.

I also think having the option of putting all the normal HQs on either a Skyboard or Jetbike might help a lot on mobility.
It would fit the lore the DE are a raid force in and out before anyone can do much about it.
So the more speed the better.

Mandrakes have become a joke, I think should work like an assassin unit, one guy on Bell of lost souls suggested something like this:
'pulled into the shadows' in lieu of normal attacks you may elect to attempt to pull an enemy into the shadows. For each mandrake in the unit your opponent must make a toughness test. For each failed test one enemy model is removed from play (with no saves allowed) with one mandrake also removed. The mandrake may attempt to come back by passing an initiative test.

This rule would work on monsterus and gargantuan creatures, but it would have to be something several units needed to work otherwise you would end up with a single lucky mandrake being able to pull a Wratihknight into the shadows..

Erikjust wrote:

I also think having the option of putting all the normal HQs on either a Skyboard or Jetbike might help a lot on mobility.
It would fit the lore the DE are a raid force in and out before anyone can do much about it.
So the more speed the better.

Agreed, though I'd also add wings.

There's also a Warlord Trait in the DA book that really seems like something we should have. It's along the lines of the Warlord and his unit being able to add 3" to all run, charge and flat-out moves.

Erikjust wrote:

Mandrakes have become a joke, I think should work like an assassin unit, one guy on Bell of lost souls suggested something like this:
'pulled into the shadows' in lieu of normal attacks you may elect to attempt to pull an enemy into the shadows. For each mandrake in the unit your opponent must make a toughness test. For each failed test one enemy model is removed from play (with no saves allowed) with one mandrake also removed. The mandrake may attempt to come back by passing an initiative test.

This rule would work on monsterus and gargantuan creatures, but it would have to be something several units needed to work  otherwise you would end up with a single lucky mandrake being able to pull a Wratihknight into the shadows..

Hah, that's evil.

Recently, I was messing around with what a Mandrake character might look like.

One idea I had was that, in a challenge, he could make his strength equal to his opponent's modified strength. The idea was that he gets his enemy's own shadow to attack them.

Mandrakes should have a 4 up invul and hit and run. Their weapons could be upgraded....

Honestly, with their Baleblast as an auto-on now, I think Mandrakes would be fine if they just got their 5++ back. If they had that, I'd take them.

Their baleblast should be a template. I would take a few then.

I actually like the cover save bonuses of the mandrake better than a 5++. That way I can have a 2+ cover save.

And die to any flamer...

Count Adhemar wrote:

And die to any flamer...

And any melee attack.


On a different point entirely, I was actually thinking recently - what exactly makes us a fast army?

I used to think it was our thing, but on reflection I'm genuinely struggling to even see our speed.

Are we fast because our vehicles have 'Fast'? Blood Angel vehicles also have that, but are allowed armour to go with them. Same goes for Eldar vehicles, and even Orks ones.

Are we fast because we have bikes, beasts and Jump Infantry? If so, how exactly do those make us any faster than the myriad of other armies with those things? Of those 3, only our bikes are actually any faster than any other race's bike. So, are we fast because we have one biker unit that is slightly faster than the bike units of other races?

Are we fast because all our units can move 12"? Nope. Most of our stuff - including HQs, both our troops, both our MCs and our entire Elites slot is stuck moving 6". In fact several of our units don't even have Fleet.

So, what exactly is it that supposedly makes us fast? I get that we have some fast units, but so does virtually every other army in the game.

we need a special rule that puts the fast back in dark eldar. a way to turbo/flat out and shoot or run/shoot something along those lines

I like that idea (along with the option of bikes and wings for our HQs).

My main concern, however, is that GW would immediately think "You know, this is a great rule. We'd better also give it to Eldar, Dark Angels, Blood Angels etc." And we're right back to square one.

The Shredder wrote:

I like that idea (along with the option of bikes and wings for our HQs).

My main concern, however, is that GW would immediately think "You know, this is a great rule. We'd better also give it to Eldar, Dark Angels, Blood Angels etc." And we're right back to square one.

yup we were the first with fleet, now everyone has fleet and so on

In terms of being fast and hitting hard, look no further than the Harlequin book. That's the best Dark Eldar "codex" that GW is likely to produce anytime soon. It's a just a shame they gave it to the wrong Eldar faction.

doriii wrote:

yup we were the first with fleet, now everyone has fleet and so on

In fact, many other races now have Fleet +1. Like Eldar being able to both run and shoot, or the various units that add extra distance to their run move.

I was comparing the codex to a friends and I noticed something odd. Dark Eldar are kind of a crossroads we have horde army stats and elite army prices with none of the benefits of either.

I agree with some variation of Battle Focus maybe one that activates after the Dark Eldar Kill a unit? So that they move, shoot/stab, move again into cover.

IIRC, back in 5th we were actually pretty cheap, compared to stuff like Marines.

We paid a bit more than the horde armies (mainly because of BS4 and Poison), but markedly less than the elite ones.

However, for some reason, that seemed to almost reverse. A couple of our units received tiny price cuts (1-2pts), but many others went up in price. The same goes for much of our wargear.

e.g. let's look at our troops. Kabalite Warriors went down from 9pts to 8pts, and Wyches stayed the same. The former remained otherwise unchanged, whilst wyches got worse.

Compare that to tactical marines, who went from about 18pts for a tactical marine to 13pts, *and* gained a significant bonus in the form of 'Chapter Tactics'.

The same can be said of our HQs. Our Haemonculi effectively went up from 50pts minimum to 70pts base, whilst marine Librarians saw 35pts shaved off their cost. So, in this case, the librarian is actually cheaper than our crappy haemonculi. Our Succubi also went up in price by 10pts for no discernible reason.

Put simply, the discount we receive for being fragile is no longer enough to offset that fragility and, in several cases, no longer exists at all.

Wow, ok, so we lost any options for our HQ's mobility and got some meaningless point reductions and mostly point hikes thanks geedubs.

I would like to make a suggestion for a single option that would help everything.

Make Webway Portals an optional upgrade for EVERY unit. Don;t limit it anymore, and allow ANY unit to take it. This would cover the speed issue quite neatly I think.

Also, a Reaver Jetbike Detachment or Formation that allow them to Outflank in turn one.