HELP! Which list for Throne of Skulls this weekend?

@Void Stalker: Oh yeah, the comment about Reavers wasn't directed at you per se. But at the posts that I saw exchanging unit X by unit Y without considering synergy.

1) Oohh... I see the mistake I made. You mean you take out the model that is manning the Quad Gun with the SC's on the Venom. Yeah ok, with 48" range that is quite possible.

2) Ah ok, yeah that is what I often do with my skimmers too. Gotcha.

3) Cheeky blue fishman! Did the centre midfield have enough terrain then? 'Cause else the Tau's 1st turn shooting can be quite devastating.

4) Yeah, sounds logical. And I used to be more aggresive with my DE, utilising the techniques you described. But my dice are failing me so hard lately (fail all my 5++ flickerfield saves and even my 2++ shadowfield saves) that I've become very carefull. But playing too carefull with DE can also lose you games, as I've come to experience. :s

Yeah, the summary is quite clear. Most of it has been discussed and is well known in the shadowy twisted lanes of our Dark City. It seems you can seperate the good players from the mediocre players by the descisions they make in-game. I seem to occasionatly make poor judgement calls.

@tlronin - no mate, I mean I destroy the quad gun. We always wound it on 4+ and it only has a couple of wounds with a 3+ save. 2 venoms easily destroy it every time...

@Void Stalker - Looked up the rules and it has a Toughness value Always thought it had an Armour value. Yeah, now I see how you got that quadgun with Venoms.

it has 2 wounds iirc.

Void Stalker wrote:

3 Vendettas
3 Vet squads with double melta (in the vendettas)
1 infantry platoon. (various heavy weapons)
1 commissar HQ (if I recall correctly)
3 Battle Tanks (sometimes switched or mixed with Demoloisher tanks) - all with camo netting.
1 Aegis Defence Line with comms relay for reserves.

This isnt a mech guard army at all... infact its a blob squad (as Im guessing he takes the platton and slames them together with the commisar for a stubborn huge squad of troops) with air support. The battle tanks are made to dish out long range AT until the vens come in to mop up the rest. Mech guard is EVERYTHING is in a chimera and sporting AV12 front. This is Mech Guard (list taken from one of Mush's opponents. I wouldnt play it but you get the idea)

Spoiler:

You list just couldnt handle all that AV12. Add in their tanks and plas pop our tanks easily, and their heavy flamers on all the chimeras would fry any wyches that get there. Add in some AA (personally I wouldnt run the griffions and run Vendettas instead) and you got yourself a potent army that is your average guard player's force.

Edit: It was pointed out that the list already has vens... what I get for copy/pasting and NOT looking at it I still dont like the griffons... something else would be better in my oppinion...

Void stalker- do you feel the 3 flyers performed significantly better than 3 ravagers would have in the same circumstances or would the results have likely been the same in your opinion? Would the VRB have been better still?

I think many players play on boards with a lot less terrain then I do, especially LoS blocking terrain, for whatever reason. do you guys find flyers to be more essential with less terrain?

@Brom it's tough to say - what I can say is that in all the turns that I went second, most of my opponents would have downed 2 Ravagers. I think the Razorwings and the Void Raven perform better overall because they are a lot harder for the majority of opponents to deal with - especially when I always target their air defences (quad gun or the rip tide I faced for example) first. That means that once my flyers come on, they have little to retaliate effectively with.

I think the Void Raven would do my anti air/anti tank role more effectively then my razorwings, not to mention that it is harder to destroy. But there are times when the stock missiles on a Razorwing make them golden. I consider the Razorwing a jack of all trades so to speak - but since I can already reliably deal with infantry, the void raven fits my anti air/tank role better in my army.

Overall opinion - would I ever take Ravagers over one of our flyers? No. Personally I wouldn't in the current meta. There are still too many armies out there that don't have a good anti air strategy other then a quad gun - so once my flyers come in - I can really dominate the game - not to mention deal with other armies that also use the same strategy.

Just my opinion of course, but where most Dark Eldar players wouldn't start a list without 3 Ravagers, I wouldn't start a list without 3 Flyers...

I do agree with the fliers...after doing some math on combat heresey the lances on the bomber are as potent if not more, added the extra armor and mine, the way fliers work, they seem to be better but more costly then ravagers.

Void Stalker wrote:

My friend's guard list changes slightly every now and then but here is the list he has been running:

3 Vendettas
3 Vet squads with double melta (in the vendettas)
1 infantry platoon. (various heavy weapons)
1 commissar HQ (if I recall correctly)
3 Battle Tanks (sometimes switched or mixed with Demoloisher tanks) - all with camo netting.
1 Aegis Defence Line with comms relay for reserves.

As Shadow pointed out that isn't mechanised imperial guard. It doens't even have a single chimera!

What most people mean by Mechanised is every infantry unit starts in a transport presenting only armoured targets for the first few turns of the game.

That's why your friends list hasn't caused you any problems. Cause it's not mech.

@Shadows and Mushkilla - Just to point out that is the current list he runs, but as stated below the list - he also swaps the blob platoon for more vets and puts them all in chimeras. So I have played full mech as you put it...

I think what would really cement this list in is if, void, you played your friend, and did a battle rep on it. Nothing extravagant, but, like Mush he uses Vassal. And then you can go step by step and show us. As an update, Wanderingblade played your list, slightly different, with good success against his enemy. I'm not sure about the specifics on what happened though as it was in chat...

But anyway, a battle-report would be fantastic.

Korazell wrote:

I do agree with the fliers...after doing some math on combat heresey the lances on the bomber are as potent if not more, added the extra armor and mine, the way fliers work, they seem to be better but more costly then ravagers.

how is this??? Ravagers are far surperior AT...

Against AV10: Ravager= 3*.667*.833= 1.666 results
Void Raven= 2*.667= 1.334 results

Against AV11: Ravager= 3*.667*.667= 1.334 results
Void Raven= 3*.667*.833= 1.111 results

Against AV12: Ravager= 3*.667*.5*= 1 result
Void Raven= 2*.667*.667= .889 results

Now while its true that the Void Raven has a better chance of forcing a pen hit. The extra shot makes the Ravager a surperior AT platform damage wise.

Shadows, I took into account the bomb when I did my calculations. I understand the bomb is a one time use, but it can hit multiple targets. It's why I said they are comparable or even perhaps slightly better then the ravager, with the extra survivability.

@Korazell - not a bad idea on the battle report, I'll see if my mate John wants to play me with a full mech list then. Maybe able to get a game in with him next tues or wed and then report back...

I think it would really help cement this list as a viable option and allow shadows and Mush some time to look it over and really digest it.

The list is obviously viable regardless of personal opinions for or against. I think its a fresh approach to an old strategy. In fact one of the lists I'll be using this weekend will be all wych venom spam just to see how much better it is when focused on instead of splashed in like I've always done.

Void stalker- what I would like to see, if a batrep is in order, is full Mech with bubble wrapped AA and firebase. Pretty much the anathema to your list, just for fun not to prove yourself because that's been done already.

Void Stalker wrote:

@Shadows and Mushkilla - Just to point out that is the current list he runs, but as stated below the list - he also swaps the blob platoon for more vets and puts them all in chimeras. So I have played full mech as you put it...

Then how did your list do against it??? How did you deal with that many AV12 chassis when your only AT comes from either haywires at point blank range or razorwings???

Korazell wrote:

Shadows, I took into account the bomb when I did my calculations. I understand the bomb is a one time use, but it can hit multiple targets. It's why I said they are comparable or even perhaps slightly better then the ravager, with the extra survivability.

While true that the void mine can hit multiple tanks (thanks to edition rule change) its one use only, and most likely be the turn your plane flies off the board to use it (unless some lucky tank placement or when you come around for more shots) also add in that its one use on a vehicle that doesnt come in till at earliest T2... it really isnt worth adding into the math for which one is better overall.

That is also something we havent discussed. How do you deal with the plane always having to move??? A ravager has 360 degrees of freedom of movement, while the razro/void raven has a set 180 degrees of movement + 18" it must move every turn. Has that limited your options at all Void???

You know, to be fair, I didn't really take that into consideration considering I thought planes could go into hover mode and move differently...but they lose their flier rule I thought?

The void mine is potenial damage and should be ignored, in my opinion, but I can very well awknowledge the benefit of the ravager not needing to move each turn...still, If on turn two and they are mobilized ahead on the board, can you not fly in a curve and drop the bomb on them?

Korazell wrote:

You know, to be fair, I didn't really take that into consideration considering I thought planes could go into hover mode and move differently...but they lose their flier rule I thought?

Dark Eldar flyers can't go into hover mode.

D: Uh oh! Well, after shadows explained to me some basic flier rules, I can kinda see the arguement now. I'd have to see it in action before I pass more judgement on it, honestly.

Wowzers - I'm being assaulted from multiple fronts here

I don't have much time right now to go in depth but against the mech wall, it was night fight first turn and I turbo boosted everything to flank one half of the army (to receive less fire and ensured that I was able to get a 3++ due to stealth and flat out in the first turn. That nullified the majority of his shooting. Then my razors came on and between them and the Wyches I was able to steam roll the mech wall out of its emplacement.

Now as Mushkilla mentioned earlier, this is a lot easier to do against static guard armies who don't move their tanks and I admit, I can't always rely on night fight - as stated earlier, I will happily play against a guard mech wall and try and get a report down for you folks for analysis. I don't care about whether I win or lose, but rather I want to highlight the tactics that have worked for me. We'll see how it pans out hey?

As for the Ravager vs Void Raven, I've pretty much said all I can on the matter. Basically, the Void Raven does a similar job to the Ravager but in my opinion (and more importantly), it offers me anti air and is more resilient.

As for the 18" min move, I've never had a problem with this? It's no big deal keeping your flyers on the table for the majority of the game... Just move in from the left or right table edges at a tight diagonal so your edge firing arc is in view of the target and then next turn, straighten up towards the enemy going another 18" and so forth. I've never not had some target to unload on and even if I didnt, I wouldn't mind flying off the table to safety to find a new target in my next turn... But that just me.

Void Stalker wrote:

I will happily play against a guard mech wall and try and get a report down for you folks for analysis. I don't care about whether I win or lose, but rather I want to highlight the tactics that have worked for me.

That's the spirit! Can't have a decent coversation about tactics without diagrams! A picture is worth a thousand words.

Not to mention its always good to share the pain.

Here's a link to a guide for battle chronicler it's a nifty tool for creating diagrams for reports.

Hope that helps.

Ya what mush said, I don't own any flyers at the mo so I'm keen on this seemingly new approach to DE and hearing more about someone prepared to face it, win or lose. Not an assault brother, just interested in seeing the challenge play out. Diagrams even better.

Off topic are our flyers comparable in size to say dakkajets, vendettas or what?

Void Stalker wrote:

I can't always rely on night fight.

This jumped out of me every Imperial Guard vehicle comes with search lights. A mech list should have around 9 or so. Seeing as your list can't inflict any damage to vehicles on the first turn, all those search lights would have still been around on the guard player's turn. Meaning night fight woudn't have come into play much. So night fight didn't really affect your victory.

Brom wrote:

Off topic are our flyers comparable in size to say dakkajets, vendettas or what?

More dakkajet than vendetta. And then still much slicker and stealthier...