Animus Vitae

Yes, I know this wargear is not good. It's quite expensive, hard to activate, and even it consumes the position for other relics. I sometimes wanna use it well and make a game fun though.

So the question is: any good way to use Animus Vitae well?

To Hit roll will not a big problem IMO, as a character wielding Animus Vitae has good BS anyway. It's also AP2. Thus the failure comes from To Wound and Cover/Invuln save rolls. How do you deal with these? In my opinion, the former can be enhanced by Doom (from CWE kins) while the latter by WWP. Isn't there any better tactics?

Seems like throwing good points after bad. If you REALLY want to use it, I'd have it on an HQ in a Grotbomb or some such DS unit, and use it against the lowest toughness unit on the board.

personally i view it like a risky investment, high payoff for like 20pts,kinda better than having nightshields on ravagers.

I'd say take it like a one dollar bet

I'm always trying to find a way to use it but have a hard time giving up Armor of Misery. I typically take one Archon and often a WWP on him.

I remember a single game where I did take it and was in perfect position to use it. Rolled a 2 to wound. (womp womp womp...)

Ideally you want low toughness and a poor (read: no cover/invuln) save. That's very difficult to accomplish against a lot of armies. Then you've also got what is likely to be one of your killiest units attacking an otherwise squishy target. That's when you get into effectiveness problems.

This means to me you throw caution to the wind, burn the points on it, and just use it when you see fit. It's a high risk/medium reward on its own but can stack nicely with other modifiers if applied early enough.

If you're feeling particularly lucky, I say slap it onto a cc HQ build, put them with your favorite group of cc machines, stick them in your preferred transport with a WWP, come in, disembark ASAP, pop the vitae, pray for a success. In this methodology, you'll be on the board at the earliest turn 2 with an assault turn 3 and your vitae makes it a turn 4 PfP giving some help on the charge with that unit (or any others.)

If you're playing pod Marines, wait for some dudes to come out and hope you roll a 4 to wound and that you're close enough turn 1. That's about it.

At S4, any measures to increase the chance of getting it to work more reliably are probably going to cost more than they are worth. Since there aren't any native ways for Dark Eldar to improve a ranged wound roll, you are left with taking allies, and of course those allies are not going to get any benefit from a successful animus.

So, if you are planning an aggressive list anyway, and have a relic slot and 20 pts free, by all means take it and lob it at someone just before you charge them. On the few occasions it works you'll be fully entitled to villainous laughter, and when it doesn't work it doesn't upset your strategy. But I think it would be a mistake to build an army around it.

Creeping Darkness wrote:

At S4, any measures to increase the chance of getting it to work more reliably are probably going to cost more than they are worth. Since there aren't any native ways for Dark Eldar to improve a ranged wound roll, you are left with taking allies, and of course those allies are not going to get any benefit from a successful animus.

So, if you are planning an aggressive list anyway, and have a relic slot and 20 pts free, by all means take it and lob it at someone just before you charge them. On the few occasions it works you'll be fully entitled to villainous laughter, and when it doesn't work it doesn't upset your strategy. But I think it would be a mistake to build an army around it.

I agree with this take on it. I wouldn't plan on it to work but rather like a fun risk to take. At 20 points it's not overpriced but don't expect it to work.

Ideally I would like to see this in a Wych Cult (if they ever get an expansion) as it makes the charge an CC one turn earlier more effective.

So no, don't try to think out a way to improve the reliability of Animus, it is by design a gamble, so treat it like it.