Heres A Great Question that can also benefit others : Is it a good idea to subsitute Dark Eldar's AT for Eldar AT?

Ok ive been thinking of switching out our AT for like Prism Cannons, Distort Weaponry, Meltas, etc..... And the Dark Eldar just bring nothing but AI ( one of the best AI ive ever seen)

Heres a sample list 1000

Archon with shadowfield and venom blade

Kabalite Splinter rack boarding party ( with a raider and 9 guys also with night shields)
Same as above
Same as above

Eldar allies ------ Farseer
Windrider Jetbikes
Fire Prism
Fire dragons in a wave serpent

I know im off by points but you get my point Let the Dark Eldar handle with Infantry and the Eldar with Tanks. If used this tactic and actually works. Btw it doesnt have to be AI ( although 18 shots twin-linked poisoned 4+ is almost perfect AI) Eldar also has pretty good AI like the Fire Prism, and Shadowweavers. Please leave some feedback on what you think . Happy Wargaming.

At 1000 points I see that being mean. What about venoms? I think you can fit 4 double splinter venom teams

Well, I suppose it is true that CWE have access to better Anti Tank, and I see no problem in having all Dark Eldar focus on the other while they do the rest.
You are bringing a lot of raiders, too, and you would still have 4 dark lances
Switching a few raider-warrior squads to venoms-warriors could always help, and you could also try adding splinter cannons to at least one of the raider ones.
Also, the archon is equipped for close combat, but there are no assault units in this list. You could switch for a cheapper haemmy.

i personally would say its a terrible idea. CWE's antitank platforms are expensive and unreliable without twinlinking psychic powers. the prism is a one shot s9 lance, its not that impressive. what it brings is versatility. popping heavy infantry or hordes is a viable option for it. ravager outperforms it easily as an AT platform.
fire dragons are an expensive suicide unit that is overkill against the majority of tanks. they are dependent on a very expensive transport to get them where they need to be, they are not tough enough to survive the retribution they get for popping a landraider or equivalent. save these guys for titans and surperheavies. 5man wraithguard are more viable as they are much tougher and can be troops as well.

I actually think the CWE have better AI options than DE and that DE anti tank is better too.
3 ravagers with nightshields and flicker fields are vastly more lance power than CWE can pump out on a realistic basis,(yes you could field 9 warwalkers with dual bright lances, but you're not going to, its over 600pts) given that our transports are also armed with lances, and our troops can take short ranged assault-lances too.

Eldar options such as massed shuriken catapults+cannons/scatter lasers/monofilament are "better" AI options in that they rend and have good strength (6/7) in many cases.
poison is better against MC, but i'd rather have shuriken against guard/tau/eldar/DE/marines, either for the S4 or for S4 + rending.
the sheer volume of fire that a full scatter laser war walker squadron puts out will even fell terminators easily (they've got to roll a 1 if you force enough saves on them), and dire avengers are a cracking option for heavy infantry given their pseudo-rend capabilities. warpspiders evaporate infantry and light-medium armour.

personally mate, stick with DE for anti tank, plentiful + cheap lances abound.
use CWE for AI + light armour popping.

csjarrat wrote:

3 ravagers with nightshields and flicker fields are vastly more lance power than CWE can pump out on a realistic basis,(yes you could field 9 warwalkers with dual bright lances, but you're not going to, its over 600pts)

Why would you field 9?

3 ravagers, 315 points, 9 lances.

5 war walkers, 350 points, 10 lances.

Point for point, dual lance walkers cost the same per lance as ravagers (2 ravagers, 6 lances 210 points VS 6 walkers, 6 lances, 210 points).

Ravagers have AV11, 12" movement and can shoot more separate targets going for them. Walkers have scout, fleet/battle focus, a built in invulnerable save, and more lances benefit from a casting of guide/prescience going for them.

So how are the ravagers vastly more lance power than CWE can field when walkers are the same cost per lance?

Am I missing something?

because for an allied detachment you only have limited slots (1 HS iirc)? so the max you could take in an allied detachment would be x3 walkers with dual lances, capping out at 6 lances. these can be taken down by bolters and terrain, let alone anything more dangerous like heavy bolters, autocannons and upwards.

in a 2v2 game, yes you can take more war walkers but as CWE, all the options you want to take are in HS, its a very competitive slot. putting over 600pts into high-threat but only AV10 vehicles isnt very clever. they'll go down quickly. If you want artillery, wraithknight (dunno why you would), wraithlord, prism, falcon etc then your walkers are getting dropped.
given DE can get 9 lances that are impervious to small arms fire and have speed +mobility to ignore terrain and quickly reposition, plus lances on transports for free, plus lances in troops squads for cheap, i'd rather use DE for AT and use massed S6 (+/- rending) from CWE for AI.
i've seen too many volleys of splinter-fire miss a 1/3, fail to wound with 1/2 remaining and then the few that get through get saved. yes, you can get quite a few splinter cannons on the board, but you absolutely need to spam them if you want to kill more than 2 marines per turn.
At least wounding on 2's with chances of rending (shuriken cannons, or longer range + more shots for scat lasers, no rend) massively ups the kill ratio against armoured stuff, and absolutely murders light armoured stuff.
War walkers with scatter lasers evaporate green tide orks and guard blob squads better thanks to wounding on 2's with high ROF, whilst maintaining the option to hurt side/rear armour and strip hull points off av12. the higher ROF is good for dealing with light flyers too. AI options for DE just can't do this (i guess dissies can hurt AV10, but again a SC or SL is strictly better for that role.)
anyways, thats the build for war walkers i would take if i was using CWE allies, not AT.

for clarity, i'm not saying that CWE AT is bad per se, just that i'd rather use allies for AI while my DE concentrate on the armour. DE=more lances + more haywire. CWE=more S6/7 + rending

csjarrat wrote:

putting over 600pts into high-threat but only AV10 vehicles isnt very clever. they'll go down quickly. If you want artillery, wraithknight (dunno why you would), wraithlord, prism, falcon etc then your walkers are getting dropped.
given DE can get 9 lances that are impervious to small arms fire and have speed +mobility to ignore terrain and quickly reposition

Your argument that putting 600 points into walkers isn't clever makes no sense. Where are you getting 600 points of walkers from might I ask?

You don't need to invest 600pts in walkers to get the same fire power as 3 ravagers. So arguing that 600 points of walkers isn't clever, is irrelevant as no one is suggesting that you take 600 points of walkers.

Personally I find warwalkers just as versatile a platform as ravagers, especially with the option to outflank and "jump shoot jump" out of line of sight.

I do agree that lances are not something DE lack, I would take Eldar allies to sure up our lack of light-medium AT (S6-7), volume S6-7 shouting is far more effective at taking out things like chimera/rhinos than our lances. Not to mention this is something Eldar bring in abundance.

Mushkilla wrote:

csjarrat wrote:

putting over 600pts into high-threat but only AV10 vehicles isnt very clever. they'll go down quickly. If you want artillery, wraithknight (dunno why you would), wraithlord, prism, falcon etc then your walkers are getting dropped.
given DE can get 9 lances that are impervious to small arms fire and have speed +mobility to ignore terrain and quickly reposition

Your argument that putting 600 points into walkers isn't clever makes no sense. Where are you getting 600 points of walkers from might I ask?

You don't need to invest 600pts in walkers to get the same fire power as 3 ravagers. So arguing that 600 points of walkers isn't clever, is irrelevant as no one is suggesting that you take 600 points of walkers.

Personally I find warwalkers just as versatile a platform as ravagers, especially with the option to outflank and "jump shoot jump" out of line of sight.

I do agree that lances are not something DE lack, I would take Eldar allies to sure up our lack of light-medium AT (S6-7), volume S6-7 shouting is far more effective at taking out things like chimera/rhinos than our lances. Not to mention this is something Eldar bring in abundance.

i was talking in my earlier post about realism. Yes you could get more lances on the board with CWE, in theory making them the "better" AT choice (only in a 2v2 game), but realistically you're not going to. Max War-walkers with twin lances are the best platform for this, so you could in theory get 18 lances on the board via 3x3 war walker squadrons, but you wouldn't which is why i specifically italicised the "realistically" part of that sentence.
i also highlighted the fact that you are capped at one war walker squadron for an allied detachment, giving you a total cap of 6 lances, which is definitely less than 9 lances from x3 ravagers. add to the fact that ravagers are also impervious to small arms fire and have options like nightshields, they are the clear winner.
You could pack in a vyper squadron with lances, but you pay vastly more for 3 lances than a ravager, and thay are only av10, though you do get a few more hull points to play with.
chucking in a transport or two with lances is another minimum 120pt spend on each tansport, and you also have to buy a unit to get access to it. which isnt necessarily cheap!

if going with more=better approach to anti tank, then DE primary needs to be bringing the AT.
CWE can augment this with S6/7 mass fire which both me and you are in agreement on

csjarrat wrote:

i also highlighted the fact that you are capped at one war walker squadron for an allied detachment, giving you a total cap of 6 lances, which is definitely less than 9 lances from x3 ravagers.

Ahh, but that just illustrates that the original posters concept of making one detachment focus on a specific roll is flawed.

Nothing stops you taking both ravagers and warwalkers.

csjarrat wrote:

add to the fact that ravagers are also impervious to small arms fire and have options like nightshields, they are the clear winner.

I do think you are selling war walkers short. A few key advantages of war walkers over ravagers. Lets assume a comparison of three war-walkers against 2 ravagers.

1) Scout. This gives them a greater threat range than ravagers when going first 6" redeploy, 6" move and d6" (re-roll-able run), that run gives you an extra d6 range over the ravager on that first turn. This can make all the difference.

2) Outflank. A lot of games ravagers will get annihilated first turn when going second, so reserving them tends to be the more sensible option. The same can be said for walkers, however outflank lets then come on targeting side armour, which can boost the damage output of those lances considerably.

3) Battle Focus with fleet. This gives you a reliable reposition move after shooting, this can be massive. You can jump shoot jump behind line of sight blocking terrain, making you impervious to fire.

4) Battle focus also doubles up as a "free" poor man's night shield giving you a d6 re-roll-able move after shooting to put more distance between you and your target. To give two ravagers night shields sets you back 20pts.

5) A built in 5++ for free. That unlike the ravagers jink save does not require them to move, and cannot be ignored by cover. To give two ravagers flicker fields sets you back 20pts.

6) Double the number of lances affected by powers like guide, prescience, doom, etc.

I don't think the winner is as "clear" as you make it out to be. Warwalkers are lance platform that offers us some new options that are simply not possible with ravagers. That alone makes them worth considering in my opinion.

i'm not selling them short, they're brilliant. i just wouldn't use them for AT. with lances they become a massive "shoot me" target but don't have the durability to withstand punishment.
outflank is nice, scout is nice. so is the ability to turbo huge distances and ignore terrain. they're both good options. i'd take av11 over ten though, fleet re-roll is good but its far from guaranteed.
i've lost a lot of units from failed jsj mechanics because i rolled low. i wouldn't depend on it now.

yes the 5++ is nice, but as we all know as DE players, a 5++ doesn't make you invincible, especially on an AV10 platform. i'd take the av11 option personally as it removes the threat from most line troopers basic weaponry.

you're right, the original poster said to have one detachment do one thing, while the allied detach does the other.

csjarrat wrote:

i personally would say its a terrible idea

that is what i said.
the rest of my argument was comparing DE anti-tank to CWE anti tank, where i said repeatedly that primary detach of DE should go for AT and CWE for AI if you are building it that way, not "dude totally go and do it but use the detachments the other way around".
apologies if that is how you read it.

Leaving aside the lance war walker vs ravager debate, I think Cjserrat is right. We don't need lance weapons from them (want might be a different matter) but can source all manner of other useful things from them such as high strength weaponry, pseudo-rending and pie-plates, all of which can make give them a distinct AI edge.

To be honest, I'd say both Eldar and Dark Eldar have underwhelming AT capability outside of a few specialised units (eg, Wyches for DE, Fire Dragons for Eldar).

A Wraithknight is a useful tool however as 2 S10, AP2 shots with the Distort rule can be very intimidating and even if you don't do significant damage with them, the model will attract a lot of firepower that would otherwise be going into your more fragile DE units.

Out of curiousity - what are you looking for in non-underwhelming AT Adhemar and where do you think Dark Eldar fall down?

wanderingblade wrote:

Out of curiousity - what are you looking for in non-underwhelming AT Adhemar and where do you think Dark Eldar fall down?

Something with longer range, higher strength or a greater rate of fire would be nice. Not all of the above but one or two of those would be nice. I just feel that the (Dark) Lance should not be the pinnacle of Eldar AT technology.

[quote="Count Adhemar"]

wanderingblade wrote:

. I just feel that the (Dark) Lance should not be the pinnacle of Eldar AT technology.

I'm fine with the Dark lance as the best AT weapon from a fluff perspective. Black hole guns are freakin' sweet  
I do feel that they would be better (or at least as cool as the fluff implies) if they had 2 shots or maybe a "line-of-affect" rule like the doomsythe or like some psychic powers (each hit after the previous one is -1 strength)

Back on topic   I think that a mix of DE AT and CWE AT would be best the same as AI as DE can get the number of lances to deal with most vehicles whereas CWE can get loads of STR 6/7 as has been mentioned before. I don't think that Fire Prisms should be discounted so quickly, to me they seem like one of the best all-round units in the game whilst not paying a premium for its generalization like other units do. A STR 9 lance is nothing to so casually discount even though it needs prescience/ guide to be reliable- but you are bringing a Farseer right?

Having not used them personally but having played against/ seen them used I don't find that Wraithknights with the heavy wraithcannons that great as 120 points per shot isn't that great and if you come up against a horde its pretty useless.

Supersonicbanana wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

wanderingblade wrote:

but you are bringing a Farseer right?

Having not used them personally but having played against/ seen them used I don't find that Wraithknights with the heavy wraithcannons that great as 120 points per shot isn't that great and if you come up against a horde its pretty useless.

-Farseer; no i'm not actually (in a dedicated CWE list). the restrictions on casting out of a transport mean that they don't work very well in a mech list (which is what i tend to play most). they are fantastic on a jetbike though, and if i take CWE as allies, that's the way i do it. I have to say i'd rather be twinlinking ravagers though as they put out x3 shots, giving you triple the potential to be rolling on a damage table (i'd rather have 3 chances of rolling damage on a 4 than one on a 3).
You also have to weigh up the extra cost of a HQ choice just sitting around risking perils to buff a one shot lance. Is that really a great use of a HQ slot and a good chunk of points? i'm not saying you're right or wrong here, changing circumstances on the field of battle will make that decision easy or difficult for you.

Tbh mate, after using the prism for 5 years under this and the previous editions, they're versatile but just not very good at AT. they were passable under the old rules as you could stunlock vehicles reliably, stopping a whirlind immolating your guardians was almost as good as popping it. now you just cause a hull point, so you need more shots to get more pens to actually kill a tank.
With one shot weapons, you're entirely dependent on good dice. too often have i lined up a shot and missed, or fail to pen, or failed to do a decent result on the damage table.
its a fine choice if it isnt your primary AT option and you know that there'll be hordes/2+ saves to use the alternate fire modes on, but for inclusion into an allied detachment, i'd rather take something else

-Wraithknights, totally agree. far to expensive and vulnerable to poison. I've had sternguard take out a wraithlord in one turn enough to know that a high toughness stat is nothing to rely on in this game!
lack of an invul save on the ranged version and a weak invul on the combat version is also a killer for the very high asking price (both monetarily and in-game points).