Slowest we've ever been?

I'd tend to wager we get WWP in some iteration once we get a codex - but that's more in wishlisting territory than this discussion.

Another factor is our lack of force multipliers for speed.

Both Space Marines and Chaos get access to powers that make them more mobile, allowing them a second movement phase. I believe Guard get orders that allow them to advance and shoot in the same turn. 'Nids get powers that allow them to shoot heavy weapons while on the move at no penalty, and some nasty and spammable heavy weapons. Chaos can decide to go mobile shooting with their Black Legion, making rapid fire weapons become assault if they advance, or mobile assault by making their force Renegade and getting that sweet sweet assault after advancing.

Our fast units also tend to be somewhat lacking on the ability to capitalize fully on their speed. Chaos Bikes of Slaanesh can output a truly staggering amount of firepower from a minimum sized squad, since they can fire twice with the right stratagem (3 bikes. 2 flamers, 1 combi-flamer. Shooting: 12 3+ boltgun shots, 2 4+ boltgun shots, 3d6 flamer hits. Average of 24 shots, 10 of which auto-hit. Can fire twice for a total of 48 shots on average, 20 of which are auto-hits. from 3 bikes. We get 4 splinter and 1 special weapon, for a similar price (I believe Chaos pays 125 ish for that loadout to our 100+ ish))

Or windriders, who can take squad-wide heavy weapons.

We've got one of those nice rules you speak of....
Our best AT weapon, a Dark Lance changes from a Heavy to an Assault weapon when mounted on a vehicle, and it's at no additional cost.

And of you want spammable, I highly doubt any other army can spam as good of a AT option as we can

merse24 wrote:

And of you want spammable, I highly doubt any other army can spam as good of a AT option as we can

Greetings from the Imperial Guard, did someone order 3 Lascannons for 72pts? Or 2 deep-striking Plasmaguns and a Plasma Pistol for 66pts?

I saw somewhere that Multi-Meltas have become assault. Was that correct or a mistake?

FuelDrop wrote:

I saw somewhere that Multi-Meltas have become assault. Was that correct or a mistake?

As far as I'm aware, they're still Heavy.

The Shredder wrote:

FuelDrop wrote:

I saw somewhere that Multi-Meltas have become assault. Was that correct or a mistake?

As far as I'm aware, they're still Heavy.

Good to know. If it was, we'd be seriously outclassed.

FuelDrop wrote:

Another factor is our lack of force multipliers for speed.

Both Space Marines and Chaos get access to powers that make them more mobile, allowing them a second movement phase. I believe Guard get orders that allow them to advance and shoot in the same turn. 'Nids get powers that allow them to shoot heavy weapons while on the move at no penalty, and some nasty and spammable heavy weapons. Chaos can decide to go mobile shooting with their Black Legion, making rapid fire weapons become assault if they advance, or mobile assault by making their force Renegade and getting that sweet sweet assault after advancing.

Pretty sure we basically get the bolded thanks to our Ravagers and Raiders.
You're also forgetting Sisters and Ynarri that also have the ability of potential double move (though maybe a RAW squint for Sisters).
I don't agree that makes a number of those armies faster than us.

FuelDrop wrote:

Our fast units also tend to be somewhat lacking on the ability to capitalize fully on their speed. Chaos Bikes of Slaanesh can output a truly staggering amount of firepower from a minimum sized squad, since they can fire twice with the right stratagem (3 bikes. 2 flamers, 1 combi-flamer. Shooting: 12 3+ boltgun shots, 2 4+ boltgun shots, 3d6 flamer hits. Average of 24 shots, 10 of which auto-hit. Can fire twice for a total of 48 shots on average, 20 of which are auto-hits. from 3 bikes. We get 4 splinter and 1 special weapon, for a similar price (I believe Chaos pays 125 ish for that loadout to our 100+ ish))

I agree that we lack army specific strategems that enhance our speed - I'd be happy to make a wager with you about whether we'll get some or not.
I'd also note it appears the above is a discussion of firepower, not speed. I'll agree that we are not the army with the most affordable and powerful firepower. Though I do think it would be a fair argument to claim we are probably better than 50% of the armies out there currently on that metric, and I'm okay with that.

Is your issue that we're not currently the most powerful codex? It;s starting to sound like it. I feel like the goal posts keep shifting a bit here and that you're handwaving issues that actually speak to your raised points in favor of making the points.

I certainly agree we're not the most powerful codex, but that's a situation that, on average, most dexes don't get to claim

Though I generally agree with Thor, I think damage output on the move IS pertinent to a discussion of speed.

If we could move 50 inches but not shoot or 6 inches and shoot, realistically we would be doing the latter much more often than the former, thus it would be disingenuous to claim 50 inches as our regular movement speed.

Speed is meaningless if it is your only asset. I want our fast units, which are noticably less durable than other similar units of comparable role and points cost, to have offensive capacities at least on par with the competition.

In the Chaos bike example we are giving up 1 point of toughness, and 1 point of armour. in melee (assuming chainswords and no legion bonus) they have the same number of attacks at the same strength and damage, with only a -1 AP in our favor. And as demonstrated above they seriously outclass us at shooting, even without stratagems. And they can be kitted out with various loadouts, as appropriate for the mission.

We are 2" faster than them.

And as I said, ballpark we are talking very similar unit costs.

So I just want to know why our units are so much less hard hitting and flexible at range, very similar in melee, much frailer, and only a tiny bit faster. It seems that we should either be significantly cheaper, or closer to their level offensively.

I don't want to be the best codex. I don't want there to be a "best" codex. The game is far better when everyone is on a level playing field and the only factor is skill and the whims of the dice. I want a fun codex with no tax choices, lots of glass cannon units that hit hard and move fast but die the moment they are out of position, rules that encourage a fluffy aggressive playstyle rather than waiting around.

I want DE to have legitimate choices in loadouts, rather than having a single good choice and a bunch of mediocre or bad ones like our wych weapons and squad weapons. I want Wyches to be dangerous melee hyperspecialists, rather than our current sad offering.

Most of all, I want the army as a whole to feel seriously fast, rather than just being "We're able to edge out some mid-speed armies by a few inches!"

Gunboats are one thing they got right this edition compared to our truly sluggish 7th edition offering, but with poison getting more lackluster with each edition and the loss of our big force multiplier (splinter racks), even they feel hollow.

Our army, with the exception of covens, gives up most of our conventional defense for speed and offense. And frankly, it really doesn't feel like it. Our boats are too durable, and are the slowest eldar vehicles behind even dedicated artillery tanks. Our HQs have the least options, and have baffling choices like the Succubus having less attacks than the Haemie, along with having a less good weapon (Electrocorrosive Whip is awesome).

Our rules rarely synergize within our army, many of our benefits or weapons becoming quickly redundant due to other rules giving the same effect automatically (Razorflails giving wyches rerolls to hit when by turn 3 we're hitting on 2+ and the succubus already gives rerolls of 1's in melee, or +1 to hit combat drugs or auras when, again, we get that on turn three automatically anyway, models that give bonuses to hit with abilities that trigger when rolling to wound), we have objectively the worst force multipliers in the game (all of our HQ abilities only affect a fraction of the army, and many of said auras are objectively worse than other similar ones in other armies or in at least two cases are made completely redundant by power from pain after a few turns, and we have no native psykers and precious few ways to counter enemy psykers).

So no Thor665. I do not want the best codex. I want a codex that feels like it was not a rush job put together by someone completely indifferent. I want a codex that does not have any must take units, nor any display cabinet units. I want a codex where, when I look at another army, I am not going "Why do they get better stuff than us for the same cost, or close to."

FuelDrop wrote:

Speed is meaningless if it is your only asset. I want our fast units, which are noticably less durable than other similar units of comparable role and points cost, to have offensive capacities at least on par with the competition.

I would suggest our Troops do this easily, and with solid panache over most competition.
I could certainly note singular exceptions to this - but singular exceptions, by definition, will eventually create an overall winning unit. Is the goal to have a codex that overall represents speed and shooting/assault power or to have the singular best unit at a given task?
I'll happily agree that we don;t have the latter in many instances - I would also note that this doesn't bother me.

FuelDrop wrote:

In the Chaos bike example we are giving up 1 point of toughness, and 1 point of armour. in melee (assuming chainswords and no legion bonus) they have the same number of attacks at the same strength and damage, with only a -1 AP in our favor. And as demonstrated above they seriously outclass us at shooting, even without stratagems. And they can be kitted out with various loadouts, as appropriate for the mission.

We are 2" faster than them.

We also have hit and run tech, which they lack. We also have drugs, that alter the combat results, we also have the -1 AP which is actually a pretty solid in game effect.

FuelDrop wrote:

So no Thor665. I do not want the best codex. I want a codex that feels like it was not a rush job put together by someone completely indifferent. I want a codex that does not have any must take units, nor any display cabinet units. I want a codex where, when I look at another army, I am not going "Why do they get better stuff than us for the same cost, or close to."

It was obviously a rush job though, they all were, and to a certain extent they all continue to be.
I'll agree with you that the game doesn't have solid balance, but then again, would suggest that basically no game does. Even the supposed frontrunner of chess has issues which is why they lay multiple games flipping white and black.

So with an awareness that absolute balance is not possible, the rest of your issues seem to stem down to having some generalized issues with the playstyle in the game - though you seem to agree with the playstyle the devs went for, you just want it to be more extreme than it is. I could guardedly get behind that as an idea, but I think taking that idea too far trends the game back towards 7th which is not a path I care to walk down again if given the choice.

I think our current army build does represent fast pirate raiders.
I would love to have a few things cleaned up, and agree with you about how there are sloppy redundancies in our current ruleset.
I think it's not accurate to suggest that we're slower than we ever have been taken within the context of the overall game distance moves across all dexes.
I don't think our codex has any must take units beyond what it has ever had, and would happily and strongly argue that this dex and this edition has the *least* amount of must takes the DE has ever been lucky enough to be blessed with, and think that is objectively provable.
If you want to start a thread on some of that, I'd be happy to participate.

Ravagers and razorwings are must takes. Every list needs several

[quote] I would suggest our Troops do this easily, and with solid panache over most competition. [/qoute]
We do this? faster, then other troops yes (compared to a guardsmen)
But our troops, (like all troops) are slow in the game as a whole (where vehicles and bikes etc go (nearly) twice as fast. Thus that we are faster then standard infantry barely matters. Where it does matter is for things like coven and wyches, so let's compare them to other melee troop options, orks, which are a lot slower (except when it truly matters, during the charge they are more random but on average half an inch faster since they can advance and charge), have higher t higher str and more attacks and we cost 50% more? Genestealers, we are 25% cheaper, but they are faster thougher have more attacks and higher str (mmh I am starting to see a pattern). Let's compare them to wracks then (who are much slower have similar thoughness, but less attacks no ap and arguably worse str)
We do compare reasonably well to some options (like acolytes) which are also considered to be not very good but their special options might make them workable sometimes.
But our troops are not really that fast, since most of the game is faster.

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Trends the game back towards 7th which is not a path I care to walk down again if given the choice.

I whole heartedly agree (we should not have to be faster, the rest has to be slower)

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I think it's not accurate to suggest that we're slower than we ever have been taken within the context of the overall game distance moves across all dexes.

Here I disagree, I think that while our troops are quite fast, every other army that has to rely on getting units into combat, has gained a similar or better speed during the charge. Yes outside of charge movement we are still one of the faster armies. The problem is nearly everyone I play against that uses cc units has a similar or bigger charge range then I do. (orks, marines, tyranids all ad their advance move during the charge). This makes a charge more risky but they are all also thougher, and deal more damage, ad to that that our fast options (bikes and jumb troops (hellions) are squishy, and while having a move 2 more, the lose of the d6 means we often won't get the charge on similar units.
All of this means that we are not significanly faster in assault then other armies, but we pay points for it as if we were, which is an issue. Most of our shooting units are reasonably priced. Most of our "elite not super fast (incubi/mandrakes) are correctly priced. Most of our fast light melee units (hellions, wyches, reavers, possibly wracks (I don't play coven) are all slightly overpriced. I am not saying they need to be faster neccesarily, but they need something, either more punch (so if they make it they deal so much damage that it does not matter if you had to sacrifice stuff you kill him when you get there with half your army, more speed so we get there faster and maybe more importantly strike first or more guys on the field (point reduction leads to more survivability and more damage because of extra models).

Quote :

I don't think our codex has any must take units beyond what it has ever had, and would happily and strongly argue that this dex and this edition has the *least* amount of must takes the DE has ever been lucky enough to be blessed with, and think that is objectively provable.

I agree somewhat, we have multiple different options, but we still have some clear losers.
Stormboys cost 8 points, They lose shooting, and lose 2 speed, pfp and only deal 1 wound. They gain 1 of the folowing,+1 attack +1 thoughness and can also (reroll) charge and advance, use ld of nearby units (which can go up to 30) and get much better support practically everything on our pfp table, 6+fnp, already have reroll on charge, +1 to hit, ld problems (they still lose some models though), although they give no -1 on ld, they can get a 5++ against shooting. No way these guys are only half as good as we are.
So effectively they lose dealing 2 wounds,and shooting but gain a t and better ld and must pay extra for everything they want from our power from pain table. But they cost less then half our unit in points. No way we are correctly priced compared to them. Should we be more expensive then them, yes, but no way we should be more then twice their cost, or be considered much faster (we got 2 inch of movement but they can charge and advance). We got shooting though, I guess they priced us considering our splinter pods were twin linked, thus having 4 shots each.

I agree with your points to a degree, but note that you're comparing us either to Orks while ignoring our shooting advantage or to Nids while ignoring our Transport advantage, neither of which leaves us looking good in comparison, but I feel they're not truly legit compares. I also kind of felt like you may have handwaved our charge reroll ability on Turn 2+ which, in addition to our 2" better movement, does translate to an advantage at least similar to being able to advance and charge.

A wych costs 2 hormagaunts. That doesn't sound very favorable to me

Quote :

Stormboys cost 8 points, They lose shooting, and lose 2 speed, pfp and only deal 1 wound. They gain 1 of the folowing,+1 attack +1 thoughness and can also (reroll) charge and advance, use ld of nearby units (which can go up to 30) and get much better support practically everything on our pfp table, 6+fnp, already have reroll on charge, +1 to hit, ld problems (they still lose some models though), although they give no -1 on ld, they can get a 5++ against shooting. No way these guys are only half as good as we are.

They lose : 2 mvt, shooting, inured to pain, 1 WS, immunity to moral, -1 armour save, D2, hit and run.
They gain : 1 T OR 1 A OR -1S (you never consider drugs when comparing), can charge and advance (but they kill themselves doing so).

So Hellions are a little faster (and don't kill themselves when they charge...), they got a shooting attack that will wreck Stormies, they have access to the same offensive profile but with D2, or to the same defensive profile, with 5+/6+. And they have hit and run.

Maybe, maybe, Hellions could be 1 or 2 points cheaper. But they are, as they should be, miles better than stormies.
What makes the Hellions look bad is comparing them with Jump-marines

Edit : most of your "pro storm boyz" arguments are actually a matter of better HQ rooster. Which is totally valid, but IMO doesn't make the Hellions a bad (or overpriced) unit. But yeah, we need better HQs.

Leninade wrote:

A wych costs 2 hormagaunts. That doesn't sound very favorable to me

This is starting to get really far away from the speed discussion because when I said they stacked up favorably I was specifically talking about their speed and not their unit cost, making this a straw man.

But, if we wish to discuss the cost of a unit versus another unit, I would suggest that the cost of a Wych is reasonably justified as compared tot he cost of a Hormogaunt. That is not a statement based on simply their ability to, say, deal with two Hormagaunt's in assault, but rather an overall assessment of a number of their advantages/disadvantages as compared to the Gaunts.

However, I'll agree with you that if a Wych cost half as much I would consider them an even more powerful and useful unit.

Quote :

You never consider drugs when comparing

(I did which is why I said they can have either 1 A or 1 T more, since we can pick one of them for our buff.
Yes we get some bonusses from our power from pain (nearly all which they can get by characters).
But let's assume we take the +1T (since it is harder to calculate)
Yes we have a ws (for part of the game) and a 6+++ and a 5+ save
The problem is, that that extra attack alone nearly means they still kill us just as fast

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So Hellions are a little faster (and don't kill themselves when they charge...)

They either kill themselves on the charge and are on average faster, or don't kill themselves on the charge but then are slower then us.

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they have access to the same offensive profile but with D2, or to the same defensive profile, with 5+/6+.

Yes we can have the same defensive profile or the same offensive profile, the problem is we must choose. Yes the 2 damage is quite nice, yes the 5+/6+++ is nice.
But having 2 times as many guys is better.
Calculate it, pick a target and do the math without multiple wounds
1 stormboy in melee is roughly equevalent to 1 of ours (we are either slightly better at defense they are better at attack, or they are better at defense and we win at the attack, depending on which drug you pick, with or without turn 3+)

Yes we are clearly better since we do deal two wounds and we do have good shooting. But we are not nearly twice as good. Remember that the shooting while nice is still less effective then their melee.

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They got a shooting attack that will wreck Stormies,  

Define wreck, both units stormies and hellions deal more damage in melee than with shooting. And once you are in shooting range you will get charged.

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Maybe, maybe, Hellions could be 1 or 2 points cheaper. But they are, as they should be, miles better than stormies.

We are not miles better, we are quite a bit better, but not nearly twice as good.

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What makes the Hellions look bad is comparing them with Jump-marines

I have only limited experience with jumb marines and don't have the codex so preferred to compare them to a unit I am more familiar with.

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Edit : most of your "pro storm boyz" arguments are actually a matter of better HQ rooster. Which is totally valid, but IMO doesn't make the Hellions a bad (or overpriced) unit. But yeah, we need better HQs.

I now compared them without their HQ and in melee they are still roughly equevalent. the support just makes actually better then our hellions in melee, but then their price also goes up a lot.
But he at least we still have our shooting.

But yes we are supposed to talk about speed.
Our speed is higher most of our units have a speed 1 or 2 higher then most non eldar equavalent units. But most armies have an additional boost to speed in those units that want to charge.
This makes our speed higher but our threat range lower but more dependable. Which means that against shooty armies we are faster, but against assault based armies we cannot (reliably) get the assault.

|Meavar wrote:

But yes we are supposed to talk about speed.
Our speed is higher most of our units have a speed 1 or 2 higher then most non eldar equavalent units. But most armies have an additional boost to speed in those units that want to charge.
This makes our speed higher but our threat range lower but more dependable. Which means that against shooty armies we are faster, but against assault based armies we cannot (reliably) get the assault.

Why not exactly?
Generally we are faster than the other assault tools out there - and though some people keep handwaving it as "only 2 inches" they then are turning around and acting like the 3.5" average of an assault move that the enemy is allowed to charge after is the be all end all of an advantage over us - while ignoring that we have re-rolls on charge turn 2+ which I'm pretty sure is worth at least the 1.5" average distance that the extra assault move gives.

I'm not really getting why one is amazing, and the other is dreck.

Thor665 wrote:

Why not exactly?
Generally we are faster than the other assault tools out there - and though some people keep handwaving it as "only 2 inches" they then are turning around and acting like the 3.5" average of an assault move that the enemy is allowed to charge after is the be all end all of an advantage over us - while ignoring that we have re-rolls on charge turn 2+ which I'm pretty sure is worth at least the 1.5" average distance that the extra assault move gives.

I'm not really getting why one is amazing, and the other is dreck.

I can't speak for Meavar, but I do have a couple of points on this:

1) Don't forget that rerolling charges is nothing unique. Orks, for example, get it on virtually every model as standard (they don't even need to wait until turn 2). So, it's hardly an advantage that we have over them.

What's more, with the introduction of Command Points, rerolls like this mean a lot less to begin with. Don't get me wrong - they're nice to have and everything. However, they're also exactly the sort of thing that CPs are great for (few dice with high rewards). Oftentimes you might want to use CPs even when you have a reroll - since this would allow you to keep a high dice and just reroll a low one.

2) Regardless, I'm not a fan of using rerolls to make risky charges. Sure, if you need to make a risky charge, you'll want all the reroll options that you can get. However, I don't want to have to rely on those rerolls. e.g. even with rerolls, I'd still want to aim for charges of ~6-8" and have a much better chance of succeeding (thereby diminishing the random aspect as much as possible). I don't want to be trying to make a 10" charge that's as risky as an 8" charge without rerolls, if you see what I mean.

To put it another way, I don't count rerolls as increasing charge distance. To me they are all about increasing the reliability of a charge - not extending charge range.

The Shredder wrote:

To put it another way, I don't count rerolls as increasing charge distance. To me they are all about increasing the reliability of a charge - not extending charge range.

You can choose not to look at them that way, but extending charge ranges is exactly what they do.

Unfortunately, all charges carry an inherent unreliability since random distances became a thing.

Jimsolo wrote:

The Shredder wrote:

To put it another way, I don't count rerolls as increasing charge distance. To me they are all about increasing the reliability of a charge - not extending charge range.

You can choose not to look at them that way, but extending charge ranges is exactly what they do.  

Well, technically they don't. Without rerolls you have a maximum charge distance of 12".
With rerolls you have a maximum charge distance of 12".

Yes, you have better odds of making a longer charge, but your charge range hasn't actually been extended by them.

Jimsolo wrote:

Unfortunately, all charges carry an inherent unreliability since random distances became a thing.

It's a little annoying that neither Charges nor Advancing use the model's movement stat (alright, I know Advancing technically does, but the point is that whether your movement speed is 5" or 14" you still only get +1d6" to it).

Thor665 wrote:

|Meavar wrote:

But yes we are supposed to talk about speed.
Our speed is higher most of our units have a speed 1 or 2 higher then most non eldar equavalent units. But most armies have an additional boost to speed in those units that want to charge.
This makes our speed higher but our threat range lower but more dependable. Which means that against shooty armies we are faster, but against assault based armies we cannot (reliably) get the assault.

Why not exactly?
Generally we are faster than the other assault tools out there - and though some people keep handwaving it as "only 2 inches" they then are turning around and acting like the 3.5" average of an assault move that the enemy is allowed to charge after is the be all end all of an advantage over us - while ignoring that we have re-rolls on charge turn 2+ which I'm pretty sure is worth at least the 1.5" average distance that the extra assault move gives.

I'm not really getting why one is amazing, and the other is dreck.

Now don't get me wrong, I never said we are slow.
The reroll actually means that the average charge distance only increases about an inch (roughly as much chance to make an 8" charge as making a 7" without rerolls. And as shredder mentioned we are not alone in that either.
But yes the biggest problem is our charge range is not increased, we are squishy, if we fail a charge we will die next turn. Thus taking risks is not something I prefer to do. Most other armies either are though enough to withstand a turn of shooting without dying completely (space marines t4 and 3+, lot's of options, reroll charge distance or advance and charge, and even if they don't they often get another bonus that helps them, like always strike first, penalties to shoot at them, charge from combat etc) or have the numbers (orks, advance 5+d6 charge 2d6 reroll), or have an actual speed advantage (genestealers advance 8+d6 charge 2d6).
So are we actually fast, yes I do not deny it, but other armies that rely on the charge have similar speed and/or a bonus to make sure they can take the risky approach and hope for that risky charge. Which leaves us with slightly below even odds to charge against a lot of the melee based armies.
Another big issue is that all those people who can advance and charge, they can roll the d6 for advance and then decide wether to charge or not, no need to try a failed charge if you roll low on you advance, just walk another direction and keep out of our charge range.

If my average charge range without Special Rule is X, and my average charge range with Special Rule is X+1.5, then Special Rule does increase my charge range. (On the whole.)

You are both correct, of course.

No, it does not increase your threat radius.

Yes, it does increase your average charge distance.

But indeed, in a game of rerolls and CP, rerolling charge distance is far from amazing, since pretty much everyone has access to it. So we're not faster, we're just less consumptive of CP when charging ^^