How do you feel about the current state of Dark Eldar?

Soulless Samurai wrote:

Whoops. It seems I've been having fun wrong again.

If you'll excuse me, I'll go check myself into my nearest GW Re-education Centre.

Lol, was not in any way responding to you, not sure how you thought I was.

The question asked was "How do you feel about the current state of Dark eldar", not "How does Souless Samurai play the game"?

I feel we are fine. You took that as a personal insult somehow.

I have to ask... due to your writing style, demeanor and thoughts on Dark Eldar I think you are an prior member that rage quit late march, 2018. the very first response to you I made was just after you joined April 4, 2018. I replied:

Quote :

I know SHomeone else REally Doesn't Disagree eithER.

Note the caps in the words.
This was in reference to "Shredder", the guy (or girl) who quit the boards, who had a samurai avatar as well. A few days later, you appear complaining about the exact same issue Shredder had..
the lack of wings/bikes for our characters.

So... Are you Shredder? Cause if i had to bet, i would say this is too many coincidences (same avatar, same complaints, same writing style, you joining two days after he quit, etc...) for you NOT to be.

In either case, I may not agree with all you (and shredder) say, but I would say we are on the same page 80%.
And... this is in no way an attack, I just am wondering.

Oh i forgot about him, and there was that other guy too. I'll have some negatives just like everyone, but there gets to a point its just ranting and spinning wheels. A topic like this is a good way to take about it without being whining or toxic.

I don't think any codex has ever been 100% perfect for any army, there's always some element players complain about, some unit we want or something we want fixed. Our current codex is no different, I think most players can agree our characters are a bit lacking this edition, they could use both a slight buff in some respects, and more flavor.

That being said I think the overall attitude of DE players is we're in pretty good shape, and this poll certainly seems to be indicating that. Compared to my poor chaos space marines I certainly feel like DE have little to complain about.

Lord Asvaldir wrote:

I don't think any codex has ever been 100% perfect for any army, there's always some element players complain about, some unit we want or something we want fixed. Our current codex is no different, I think most players can agree our characters are a bit lacking this edition, they could use both a slight buff in some respects, and more flavor.

That being said I think the overall attitude of DE players is we're in pretty good shape, and this poll certainly seems to be indicating that. Compared to my poor chaos space marines I certainly feel like DE have little to complain about.

7th Corsairs IMO was one of the best codex's if you remove the formations (they are an optional play rule anyways), i never played with them. And it was not to strong, extremely fun, lots of play styles, and my opponents even when they lose had fun b.c it was a very tactical army. If any of the 30+ codex's i have played over the years was the most well balanced one, i'd say them for sure.

Yes you will have many say "It was OP" well.... thats b.c they used the formations, just like Tau/Dar was, but as soon as the formations were gone, you didnt have that problem. The Adepticon rules only let you have 1 formation and 1 D-weapon, so our local played it that way (40+ players).

I honestly miss it so much that it hurts, i'm working on a 30k army of them and working out the rules to play with them (there is a known house rule that if you are 7th and dont have a army book, you can still play 30k but you play at 3k where they play at 2k and it is pretty balanced for how balanced 30k can be).

Skulnbonz wrote:

Lol, was not in any way responding to you, not sure how you thought I was.

My sincere apologies then. I'd thought you were responding to what I said earlier in the thread but it seems not.

(Though I'd maintain that a codex shouldn't *just* be judged on its tournament performance.)

Skulnbonz wrote:

I have to ask... due to your writing style, demeanor and thoughts on Dark Eldar I think you are an prior member that rage quit late march, 2018. the very first response to you I made was just after you joined April 4, 2018. I replied:

Quote :

I know SHomeone else REally Doesn't Disagree eithER.

 Note the caps in the words.
This was in reference to "Shredder", the guy (or girl) who quit the boards, who had a samurai avatar as well. A few days later, you appear complaining about the exact same issue Shredder had..
the lack of wings/bikes for our characters.

So... Are you Shredder? Cause if i had to bet, i would say this is too many coincidences (same avatar, same complaints, same writing style, you joining two days after he quit, etc...) for you NOT to be.

In either case, I may not agree with all you (and shredder) say, but I would say we are on the same page 80%.
And... this is in no way an attack, I just am wondering.

Oh wait . . . wrong confession.

I am NOT very pleased with the way GW has messed up the Dark Eldar/ Drukhari--- seems like EVERY TIME they 'do an update' it is a NERF in more ways .. maybe I am an old and salty Archon BUT they NEED to fix the following--

Add or BRING BACK Elites like Trueborn and Blood Brides(GW being TOO LAZY to simply MOVE the upgrades to their own Elites choice slots and maybe add weapons choices to make them stand apart)is incredulous, rotten taste and complete BS.

Wyches- let them have the individual Haywires again OR AT LEAST MAKE THEIR CC WEAPONS POISONED like in the fluff and stories. Make them more survivable somehow or tune the weapons options-- I have wyches that I may as well light on fire since I never use them....

Archons- FIX THE DAMN SHADOWFIELD, BRING BACK THE CLONE FIELD and make the husk blade how it used to be.... really in my opinion our HQ choices really are sucky especially now... HQ needs some kind of psychic resistance to spells better armor or retool the weapon options again..

Court of the Archon--could GW have KILLED a unit anymore than just dropping them like they love to do?!- I used to run a 14 Court unit with my Archon and now i can only have what....3 or ? because EACH one IS A UNIT and takes up an Elites choice!?! What the proverbial F.... and have no other Elites if i do!?

Poisoned needs a redo.... lower the poisoned vs vehicles to a 5 or even 4 since there is no minus to saves, just make them roll dice or make a 6 -add minus 1 to save....something... because nowadays if I go up against vehicle heavy list, 1st thing they do is nail my heavies and then I am stuck trying to take down vehicles with syringe darts....

**I am redoing my list and going to sprinkle in a couple Eldar heavies to try to mitigate....and add Spearhead consisting of 3x Voidravens and an HQ**

Which brings me to- Void Mine - for a 1x use I think it is a bit weak against vehicles with only a max possible of 3 mortal wounds...adding dice for each additional mini in a unit up to 10 is ok in most cases but still think it needs tweaking a bit.... needs to be D6 wounds per dice rolled and not roll a D6 and every roll of 3 and up causes 1 mortal wound...

Bring Back HQ Choices--- Yvraine figure IS Lady Malys... Make another mini for one or the other and bring her back----love that evil beauty as an HQ Fluff Bring back all the other characters also-- DE REALLY lost a bunch of 'fun to play' lists when they did that PURGE..

Arcane wargear needs the Orb,Shattershard and Casket brought back as options .

Vehicle gear options are weak and a joke....

Those are my gripes------ with all the new stuff marines have been getting -specially the Primaris- something needs to be done.... Oh and let me know how your first game goes against a Primaris list goes when they run snipers that dont need LOS to hit and kill your character, no cover save mod, run the 30" Bolter rule, minus 2 to your save, Aggressor units with 3 wounds EACh AND a 6 man squad can toss over 100 shots at you if did not move....oh let us not forget miss re rolls and hit rolls of 6 get another auto hit yea... faced it twice... once with chaos and once with DE.... I did not even bother taking my TURN 2! THAT IS ABOUT HOW BAD IT CAN GET....

Archon Rievect wrote:

Court of the Archon--could GW have KILLED a unit anymore than just dropping them like they love to do?!- I used to run a 14 Court unit with my Archon and now i can only have what....3 or ? because EACH one IS A UNIT and takes up an Elites choice!?! What the proverbial F.... and have no other Elites if i do!?

Minor point - Court of the Archon models don't actually use Elite slots at all...

...you're just artificially limited to 4 Court models per detachment (regardless of how many Archons are in said detachment.)

I know it's not much better. Just thought it was worth mentioning.

You are correct in that they take up no slot per se... hell I remember not long ago you could even run a Court AS an HQ....... And that limit is garbage if you want 2 or more Archons you should also be able to have a court per...

I guess run a bunch of small detachments and an archon in each.....screw it!

Hmmm- 3 Spearheads with 3 heavies in each and an Archon HQ in a raider or venom with 4 Court and a squad of warriors(if using a raider)...... hmmmm total BS list but could be fun just to see what would happen.... 3x Void Ravens, 3 x Ravagers and an Eldar Nightspinner, Warp hunter and ?? so 9 heavies, 3 HQ, 3 Squads..... seems legit...

I get it, just GW being the Tools and Douches they have turned into.

Archon Rievect wrote:

You are correct in that they take up no slot per se... hell I remember not long ago you could even run a Court AS an HQ.......  And that limit is garbage if you want 2 or more Archons you should also be able to have a court per...

The current Court is weird.

- They were characters in the Index (though aren't anymore), but only their Wound stat actually resembles that of a character. Everything else (weapons, wargear, rules, other stats) is just that of a standard trooper. It seems akin to giving Incubi 2 extra wounds apiece and making them individual models.

- The fact that it's 4 Court models per detachment rather than per Archon seems completely counter-intuitive.

- The fact that they don't take up Elite slots makes it even more awkward to make a Brigade or to fill a Vanguard. We're not exactly overflowing with Elites to begin with, especially with the only competing Kabal elite having been removed from the codex.

- They're also awkward when it comes to Stratagems. As a single Stratagem can only affect 1 Court model but (as above) that would be like only being able to affect a single Incubi in a unit.

- No exception was given to them to the Rule of 3, so you can't even have a full court of, say, Lhamaeans.

- The intent seems to be that you take one of each model, yet the models serve contradictory roles. All of them want to be near the Archon for rerolls (not from his aura though, that would be more synergy than DE could handle), but the Lhamaean and Ur-Ghul want to be in melee whilst the Mesusa wants to be nowhere near it.

- In fact, the Medusae is just bizarre in general. Her range is far too short for her to realistically avoid combat (and her weapon too pitiful for a 'kill them before they kill you' approach), yet she has no actual protection from being assaulted by whatever she just fired at. Her weapon isn't even a flamer (so no automatic overwatch hits). What's more, if you try using a vehicle for a fly-by attack then she won't be able to get rerolls from an Archon. Seems like it would have made more sense to at least make her weapon a pistol, so that she isn't completely screwed if she gets charged.

- There's also the Sslyth - a dedicated bodyguard for one of the least important HQs in the entire game.

I mean, none of the Court models are awful. I doubt 3 Ur-Ghuls will cripple anyone's list and I've had some fun with Lhamaeans in a Poison Tongue list. There are just so many baffling design choices.

Oh well, one positive I will give this codex is that because it isn't weak I feel a bit more free when it comes to experimenting.

Look you can say you don't like the current state of DE thematically these days, that's completely valid. There are also several units as you pointed out that need help (court models, poison could work differently), but to say the latest codex update is a "nerf" is just wrong. Competitively speaking, DE are still in an excellent spot. Our best units are universally pretty cheap and function as they should. You also might not like poison but boy does it work en mass. Wyches also do not need help, you can absolutely make them work in their current state. 8pts/m is a pretty reasonable price for what you get.

Also on the new ultramarines list of lots of aggressors, eliminators, g-man etc. yes it's strong no doubt, as it should be. It's absolutely beatable though, sure it's a tough matchup but you wipe those aggressors and any other heavy hitters the list has, and it collapses real fast. Yes marine now have rerolls and lots of shots all over the place, but power armored marines still die just as easily as they use to. Poison spam and dissie cannons still does the trick.

Souless Samurai-I once ALMOST took down a Wraithknight with my Lhamaens when they had the instant death rule.... They are pricey for what they could do, more so now BUT if you read the rules, TECHNICALLY they at least wound a vehicle on a 4 instead of a 6 due to the 'add 2' to the wound roll statement...

The Medusae USED to be pretty good with the old eyeburst stats,now suck as you mentioned... I would take like 3 Meds,2 sslyth, and the rest Lams for my Archon... the meds and sslyth shoot ,try to soften up the target ,absorb the overwatch then the group rushes in and I hope my dice roll well....

The stuff you mention is what I find completely baffling about GW, I DO NOT think they actually think their process through OR they truly are lazy and just pull stuff out of their a.. over a pint...if they are old enough to drink.... or they decide stuff while being drunk or something....

They are getting a mean letter from me.......


Lord... Like I said ,maybe I am salty.... I just think dropping the Bloodbrides and Trueborn because they 'dont have models' or 'dont have a separate entry' is complete garbage on the part of GW.
I stand by my opinion in that the army ,while still 'competitive' has become so hamstrung in many ways. I LIKE poison for the most part except for the vehicle thing--make that a 5 at the least,not a 6.... Wyches... NOPE they need to have CC poisoned weapons.. they did way back when... a plain jane st3 with NO mods for a CC specialized unit is wrong.... otherwise give them a special rule thet they can double tap their splinter pistols when in CC in the shooting phase..so either they need an upgrade, my dice rolls suck hard or you must roll like a demon because to me they NEVER seem to earn their points cost... usually get pasted in CC... I have no luck.. Chain flails and Hydra gauntlets still have their uses and CAN be good but still......

Guess being a chaos,DE and SOB player I am a 'bit' cynical regarding GW methods and intelligence on the part of the various people they give such projects to..... so I vent...

BUT like I said earlier or in another thread, I will be taking a couple eldar heavies that dont need LOS and see if they can do what I need them to do..... and try out 3 voidravens in the army...

Archon Rievect wrote:

Souless Samurai-I once ALMOST took down a Wraithknight with my Lhamaens when they had the instant death rule.... They are pricey for what they could do, more so now BUT if you read the rules, TECHNICALLY they at least wound a vehicle on a 4 instead of a 6 due to the 'add 2' to the wound roll statement...

I hate to burst your bubble but Lhamaeans only get +2 to wound against non-vehicles.

DAMMIT---correct.....

Wyches absolutely do not need a buff. They're an 8 point troop unit that can easily be running around with S4 or 5, 4 or 5 attacks and a 4++ in combat - that's really solid before you take into account the pure utility of No Escape.

As is a common strategy, 10-20 Cult of Strife Wyches dropping down on Turn 3 will shred just about anything on the table.100 attacks hitting on 2's? With the possibility of fighting twice if that somehow doesn't do the job?

Wyches are some of the best CC troops in the game if you play them right. You just really can't spam them like Kabalites

TheBaconPope wrote:

As is a common strategy, 10-20 Cult of Strife Wyches dropping down on Turn 3 will shred just about anything on the table.100 attacks hitting on 2's? With the possibility of fighting twice if that somehow doesn't do the job?

Wyches are some of the best CC troops in the game if you play them right. You just really can't spam them like Kabalites

Please enlighten me because I must be messing up with deployment, movement or something because I dont get those results.... I am serious.... 'stacking things' to get the needed results has not been one of my super strong suits...

Archon Rievect wrote:

dropping the Bloodbrides and Trueborn because they 'dont have models' or 'dont have a separate entry'  is complete garbage on the part of GW.

We don't know their reasons. Don't attack them for what you imagine their thoughts are.

Archon Rievect wrote:

I LIKE poison for the most part except for the vehicle thing--make that a 5 at the least,not a 6....

I actually really like that poison only wounds vehicles on 6's. Most Drukhari units are very specialized, and I like that our poison has limited use. Makes the game more tactical (and harder). It's also suiting fluff-wise.
Besides, our Kabalite darts shouldn't wound Knights better than Space Marine explosive bolts.

Archon Rievect wrote:

Wyches... NOPE they need to have CC poisoned weapons.. they did way back when... a plain jane st3 with NO mods for a CC specialized unit is wrong....

Wyches attack so lovingly many times that I still love them.
Firstly, I think poisoned close combat weapons belong with Wracks. I like that they have their own thing in that.
Secondly, if Wych weapons were poisoned, giving them bonus from strength wouldn't make them stronger - and that would be an irritating limitation in drugs and obsession choices.
Thirdly, I think the wyches are powerful troops. They're difficult to use, and when they fail, they fail big time! When they work, they really work; imagine 10 Cult of Strife Wyches with strength drugs doubled with Hyperstimm Backlash charging Ork Boyz on turn 3: With a Succubus nearby, that's 22 dead Boyz on average.
Also, they have decent defense in their 4++ save. Dreadnoughts, characters, and elite close combat units hate attacking them.

To me, in the same game, wyches can be a tarpit and a horde killer. Pretty good troop unit.

I always run my wyches in transports. I keep them inside until they can strike the right enemy at the right time. 5 wyches can be good, but I wouldn't run them into 6 aggressors. I'd weaken the aggressors with some shooting, and then run the wyches into 2-3 of them. They're specialized, and they work wonders on the right targets.
I usually use the transport to eat the overwatch. Raiders are good at that.

I run a red strife battalion with 3 msu wych squads. Their job is to get into combat and tie things up. They do this very well with the advance and charge obsession and No Escape.

They are not killers. Even when I run them into basic troops, Skitarii or vanilla marines, things that are not good in close combat, it's not until a succubus or archon jumps into the fight that enemies start to die.

The 4++, 6+++ keeps them alive longer then my opponents expect and the No Escape keeps the enemy stuck in with them, but the S3 0ap doesn't kill many models even with the number of attacks I get. The special weapon in the squad maybe nets a kill each attack but that's it. Sometimes I kill more in my shooting phase with their pistols then I do in close combat swings I get in both my turn and my opponents turn.

They do what I need them to and that's what I want from my troop choices.

Archon Rievect wrote:

Lord... Like I said ,maybe I am salty.... I just think dropping the Bloodbrides and Trueborn because they 'dont have models' or 'dont have a separate entry'  is complete garbage on the part of GW.
I stand by my opinion  in that the army ,while still 'competitive' has become so hamstrung in many ways. I LIKE poison for the most part except for the vehicle thing--make that a 5 at the least,not a 6.... Wyches... NOPE they need to have CC poisoned weapons.. they did way back when... a plain jane st3 with NO mods for a CC specialized unit is wrong.... otherwise give them a special rule thet they can double tap their splinter pistols when in CC in the shooting phase..so either they need an upgrade, my dice rolls suck hard or you must roll like a demon because to me they NEVER seem to earn their points cost... usually get pasted in CC... I have no luck.. Chain flails and Hydra gauntlets still have their uses and CAN be good but still......

Guess being a chaos,DE and SOB player I am a 'bit' cynical regarding GW methods and intelligence on the part of the various people they give such projects to..... so I vent...

BUT like I said earlier or in another thread, I will be taking a couple eldar heavies that dont need LOS and see if they can do what I need them to do..... and try out 3 voidravens in the army...

Did you actually ever use bloodbrides? I always wonder when people bring those up, I never used them nor had interest in them, and they are pretty irrelevant now that wyches are good in melee as they should be.

The army is not hamstrung, simple as that. Just look at how successful people are in competitive settings with pure Drukhari.

Makes no sense at all for poison to have a better wound value against vehicles. How is a poisoned dart supposed to hurt an armored tank? A +6 is better than you could ask for. We have loads of good anti-tank weapons, dissie cannons, blasters, haywire. Just need to make good use of them.

Thing is, wyches are not just a 's3 unit with no mods'. You have combat drugs and obsessions, an easy way to make them s4 or even 5, with a boatload of attacks. As others have already pointed out wyches can pack a punch, and are well worth it just for their utility to force infantry to remain in melee.

You don't need loS ignoring eldar vehicles and 3 voidravens to do well with Drukhari. Just take a look at the army lists section, plenty of people posting good army lists there for a competitive setting.

Lord Asvaldir wrote:

Thing is, wyches are not just a 's3 unit with no mods'. You have combat drugs and obsessions, an easy way to make them s4 or even 5, with a boatload of attacks. As others have already pointed out wyches can pack a punch, and are well worth it just for their utility to force infantry to remain in melee.

The trouble with Wyches specifically, as mentioned before, is that they suffer from diminishing returns thanks to the Combat Drugs rule.  You can't assign the same drug until you have gone through the whole chart of sub optimal drugs.  You can tailor your list so that you can assign the right drugs to the right units so that you can get the most out of the rules, but this is the tail wagging the dog.

The other problem is the 10 Wych unit size.  It is nice to be able to access 3 Wych Weapons at 10, but this is a very specific number that maxes out at 10, provides no benefit to larger foot units, and only provides 1 Wych Weapon at 5-9.  Want your Succubus to ride with the Wyches she is meant to boost?  You loose out on 2 potential Wych Weapons, not one.  I dunno, playing Cult seems like an exercise in unsatisfactory choices.

SK-84 wrote:

They are not killers. Even when I run them into basic troops, Skitarii or vanilla marines, things that are not good in close combat, it's not until a succubus or archon jumps into the fight that enemies start to die.

Combat Drugs and Wych weapons go a long distance.  The problem is that you seldom want Wyches to actually kill an enemy unit on your turn.  Some times you want to use the standard CCW every unit comes with in order to kill less of the unit, lock them in combat and finish them off in your opponent's Fight Phase using their Hekatarii Blades and Wych Weapons.  It is the same number of dead enemies, and you will have to survive being attacked twice in a row before retaliation, but you are locked in combat where you are safer than being shot.

If you're taking a decent amount of wych cult units, the combat drugs rule is very easy to work around. I very rarely have to give wyches anything besides grave lotus and adrenaline which is how I like it.

I don't see that big of an issue with unit size. Big 20 man units have several advantages without needing to get extra wych weapons, like better stratagem use efficiency, which is good enough for me. Yes trying to fit characters into a raider with wyches is a pain, that's nothing new for any of our characters and room in transports, but it's something you can work around.

Wyches require good planning to use, but I still think they are solid. Maybe not the top tier competitive choice in most environments, but I will happily continue to use them often.

Lord Asvaldir wrote:

Archon Rievect wrote:

Lord... Like I said ,maybe I am salty.... I just think dropping the Bloodbrides and Trueborn because they 'dont have models' or 'dont have a separate entry'  is complete garbage on the part of GW.
I stand by my opinion  in that the army ,while still 'competitive' has become so hamstrung in many ways. I LIKE poison for the most part except for the vehicle thing--make that a 5 at the least,not a 6.... Wyches... NOPE they need to have CC poisoned weapons.. they did way back when... a plain jane st3 with NO mods for a CC specialized unit is wrong.... otherwise give them a special rule thet they can double tap their splinter pistols when in CC in the shooting phase..so either they need an upgrade, my dice rolls suck hard or you must roll like a demon because to me they NEVER seem to earn their points cost... usually get pasted in CC... I have no luck.. Chain flails and Hydra gauntlets still have their uses and CAN be good but still......

Guess being a chaos,DE and SOB player I am a 'bit' cynical regarding GW methods and intelligence on the part of the various people they give such projects to..... so I vent...

BUT like I said earlier or in another thread, I will be taking a couple eldar heavies that dont need LOS and see if they can do what I need them to do..... and try out 3 voidravens in the army...

Did you actually ever use bloodbrides? I always wonder when people bring those up, I never used them nor had interest in them, and they are pretty irrelevant now that wyches are good in melee as they should be.

I used Bloodbrides in the Index, but I don't miss them at all because the current version of Wyches are literally better than them. I wouldn't exactly complain if they got resurrected, even just as +1 A Wyches, but they're hardly necessary.

I find Wyches to be an all or nothing unit. Meaning if they can make their charge and get stuck in using their nets, they will literally win games almost singlehandedly. If they fail their charge or can’t trap something in combat then they die horribly with minimum effort from your opponent. I prefer deep striking two 20 woman Cursed Blade blobs to give me four chances to roll that all important nine on the charge.

How do 2 units of cursed blade wyches get 4 rolls at a 9" charge ... isnt red grief that gets the reroll charge?

Power from pain bud, wyches can't deep strike until turn 2 so they are guaranteed to have reroll charge rolls when they drop.

2 units of 20 is a hefty investment and a reasonable risk if they don't make the charge, but sounds like a lot of fun to use, and could tie up a lot of the enemy army.