Archon Khirareq

So I've been writing some background on my Archon, following on from her losing her hand in the second edition codex. Since that incident she has gotten hold of some interesting artifacts and become far more cunning, having betrayed the Bloodied Claw Kabal to build her own. Was interested to hear some feedback on the rules I came up with.

Archon Khirareq 155pts.

Basic Archon stats with a clone field

Ws 7
Bs 7
S 3
T 3
W 3
I 7
A 4
Ld 10
Sv 5+/4++

Equipment:
Quaesitor
Khirareq's signature weapon a cruel double-ended blade stolen from the armoury of the Bloodied Claw Kabal. Capable of slicing through the thickest of armour and able to separate below the hilt to forming a dirk and short-sword

as one - str +1 Ap 2 specialist weapon
when divided - str user Ap3 +1 attack

The Eyes of Malice
A belt of shadowy gems retrieved from a crone world, ice cold to the touch and black as the abyss. Allows the user to dissolve into icy shadow and emerge from the dark recesses of the waking world This artifact confers the shrouded, stealth and infiltrate special rules. In addition when a model bearing the Eyes suffers an unsaved wound they can be placed immediately into on-going reserves, any addition wounds cannot be allocated to the model.

Warlord Trait; Ambush Tactics
All Dark Eldar units with the infiltrate rule held in reserves or on-going reserves may be placed into area cover without scattering when arriving, following all other rules for units entering from reserves.

That warlord trait makes mandrakes pretty good. I'm withholding judgement till I see the points breakdown. How did you come up with the points for this character?

Aye the purpose was to make mandrakes more true to their fluff in terms of their ability. I consulted the local mathhammer/balance nut as to what he would play against and hashed out the following point break down:

Basic Archon 60pts

Clone field 20pts

Quaesitor 20pts (Using points for archite glaive as the resulting attack options are the same)

The Eyes of Malice 35pts - This was taken from an imperial guard Displacer Matrix (30pts) with a similar redeployment ability, however I removed its 3++ in order to gain the shrouded stealth and infiltrator rules that lets her act in cohesion with the mandrakes. I also altered the deepstrike redeployment rule it gives and used it to make her warlord trait. I also increased the point cost to make it similar to the shadow field in expense.

Warlord Trait 20pts I agonised a bit over this costing due to its implications of placement of mandrakes, but with the limitations of mandrakes as they currently are I didn't see this as too under-costed. It allows them to be placed down and hunker down in cover for a turn before charging out so it seemed reasonably balanced, basically a delayed infiltration.

For something wityh a decent save ad a decent number of wpounds, I think the "one wound and off board" rule on the Eyes is a little much to be honest. Its an auto0get out for most situations, and could be viewed as a tad overpowered. Lets not forget that the Displacer Matrix isn't from Guard, its from the Solar Auxilia, a Horus Heresy List. HH lists are NOT 40k balanced (not that anythging 40k is balanced.....).

I would also say that the Warlord Trait could also be really overpowered. That rule as written could be used to drop Mandrakes, or any other unit that gains Infiltrate somehow, to appear right in the middle of the enemy deployment zone, in terrain the enemy are also within.
Can I make a suggestion? Drop the non-scatter rule.
Make it that units with Infiltrate can Deep Strike as normal, anywhere they want, but don't suffer from Dangerous Terrain tests. That way they still scatter, there's still a rsik to deploying too close to an enemy unit, but it also frees it up for the unit to deploy anywhere.

Thanks for the feedback, my thoughts for the archon were to make her a fairly slippery character but limited in combat abilities. Whilst engaged in melee using the extra attacks will deal 2/3 of a wound per turn against a standard marine squad or 8/6 wounds if using the bonus strength. With no anti-tank or >T6 harming potential.

With T3 and all the one shotting potential that brings I thought it would be more fun to have an archon limited to a 50;50 save who could disappear when outclassed, instead of the generic shadowfield set up.

The codex as it currently stands constrains the warlord trait to only the archon and mandrakes which was the purpose. The intention was to create almost a reverse deepstrike only allowing the mandrakes to emerge in terrain rather than anywhere on the battlefield. Thematically turning where the lesser races consider most safe into the mandrakes hunting ground.

They can always be denied by opponents model positioning due to the deployment distance having to be 2" away from an opposing model. Maybe increasing the exclusion zone around enemy models would make it more balanced. From my understanding the genestealer cults have a better ambush ability with the potential to assault out of reserves, though I might need to check up on that.

My kneejerk reaction was that the same 2 things Squid said were overpowered, but I thought about it a bit before responding the first time and I don't think they are. Here's why:

Against much shooting, Archons will be instakilled in a failed save anyhow, so the rule won't apply then. And when it DOES apply, it doesn't allow him to take his unit with him, so it's really only useful to keep your opponent from getting slay the warlord, since this archon doesn't really have any useful shooting weapon, so it's not like he could come back on the board and kill something without waiting a turn. Because of this, most people would opt to just use "look out sir" against wounds that aren't going to kill the archon so that they can keep him on the board. Which means that the only real time that the character is likely to both WANT to use the power and be ABLE to use the power is in a challenge where he is outclassed by something that isn't going to instakill him, but rather deliver death by a thousand cuts. Since Archons have a pretty impressive statline for a fight against non-instant death, there aren't many models that would fit this description. Something like fighting Lelith Hesparax or a Pheonix Lord. Again, a rare occurance.

As for the buff to mandrakes: They're widely considered to be a bad unit. It's almost never suggested to take more than 1 unit of them, and even then you only take the 1 unit because they're cheap and you can't find another way to spend the points. Giving them a buff that does nothing except guarantee them 1 round of shooting(assuming there are ruins on the table, since ruins are the only area terrain now), isn't that huge of a buff. One of the problems with mandrakes is that they're a melee-flavored unit that is absolutely attrocious in melee because they have no saves whatsoever(they used to have 5++). So if they infiltrate, IG can charge them, and equal points of IG will beat them in melee. This buff gives them at least a round of shooting before they get eaten alive by whatever wants to charge them. It makes them at least somewhat useful.

All that said, I would play against this in a friendly game because it's friendly and it doesn't seem unbalanced. But I wouldn't allow it in a tournament, obviously.