The challenge : Dark Footdar.

So here's the thing : I am participating in a league (going from 500 to 1750 pts) and each of the player received a challenge. My challenge : make a Dark Footdar army and play it throught till the end. So, this is of course one monumental and hard task. I was wondering if anyone here had suggestions. I'm going to draft a 500 pts list and post it soon. Think about it till then.

I would be fascinated to see the other challenges to see if they are remotely as damaging to the armies. I could think of assault based Tau - but after that I can't think of a derp challenge that hurts a codex more than footdar with DE. There's a reason why basically every single unit in the dex has a dedicated transport option.

I'd say go Coven heavy and pray they somehow figured out a way to remotely bone the other players as much.

LOL. Yeah, I get what you mean. We have a Tau player who cannot use Battlesuits and a Dark Angels player who cannot use any Wings'

Covens as a 'creeping death' style list works fantastically.

It is a harsh limiter for us, but I'm curious to hear more details. Are there deployment restrictions? Can you use Webway portal? Fortifications? What missions can you expect? (Maelstrom? Eternal War? Custom?) Are you free to use all the list-building tools at your disposal (any number of detachments, formations, etc)? What about bikes? Allies?

Well, Dark Artisans, lots of Reavers come to mind.

THats more of a collecting and painting challenge if you ask me. Most of DE players have vehicles based collections with infantry that arent suited to foot role.

Quote :

We have a Tau player who cannot use Battlesuits and a Dark Angels player who cannot use any Wings'

They are still playabe after that. Very playable. I can well imagine a playable Greenwing with Azrael, and a skimmer based Tau lists with little effort.

That is hard. Coven list would be suitable I guess. But if you wanted to go Kabal I would suggest thinking like a guard player. Trueborn heavy weapons, basically splinter cannons to sit behind cover and suppress. Then just spam as many kabalites with blasters I guess. For 500 points you could theoretically have a lot of warriors, lots of little squads to limit what can shoot back I guess!

Reavers would be a good idea. Also WWP spam, and from the sounds of things there's stuff you could do with the coven supplement. Are you allowed non-transport vehicles?

Covens. All Coven. Lots and lots of Talos.

How about beastmasters? Are they allowed? Their beasts do have feet...

Yeah I should have been more specific. By footslog I meant no transport vehicule . Apart from that, everything else is allowed. For the missions, classic mission in the RB and tactical cards.
But your ideas are a good starting point !

(Caveat: My 40K stuff is still in boxes since I moved to Houston a week before the new 'dex came out, and we're still unpacking.) It's sub-optimal, but it seems to me like you have a couple options here and/or combine them.

First, you can look for your mobility to the units that, at least previously, didn't use transports: Reavers, Scourges, Beasts, Mandrakes, & Hellions. From what I've read, Scourges and Reavers seem to have improved and Hellions got worse, at least in comparison to other units that typically fill the same roll.

Second, you can look at the designs for various WWP armies that used portals to put forces right on top of the enemy.


I think this limitation imposes two particularly significant problems on you.

First, you have your troops. I don't think any of the stuff with built in mobility are troops so getting those guys where you need them to be is a particular problem for you. One option is to try for saturation and simply hoof it. Another option is to go for wracks and try to up your toughness. I think Mushkilla had a thread in the last 'dex where he played with using our tough units over our fast units.

Second, I think it is a significant problem to lose the lances (and to a lesser extent AI shooting) those vehicles represented. Any solution you come up with has to account for that loss of fire power. On the flip side, unless your foes know in advance that they are facing you, if you are not mounting many vehicles than chances are your foe will bring more AT weapons than they need to deal with you. It may be that they overpay for all that heavy shooting stuff.

Can you use allies and can they have transports? Can you buy Venoms as pure fast attack options and then embark troops?

Well from what I understand Ravagers are allowed, so are scourges and reavers. So mobile AT is still available.

Right, but it now is pretty much dedicated to that role whereas a transport which packed a lance served two functions: mobility and supplemental anti-tank.

Those are all great advices ! As for allies, I'll inform myself.

If you can use the coven supplement, do that.

For troops I'd probably suggest 2 20 man squads of Kabalites with 2 Lances. Deploy them in cover. If they can last until turn 3 they might actually survive the whole game. I wouldn't try to hoof our troops anywhere.

For an HQ I'd probably have to suggest a Haemonculus. A succubus can't take a WWP and has no save outside of close combat. I see an archon as too juicy a price to be walking around the table. If he rolls a 1 he's toast and that'll nab me Slay the Warlord.

Cronos' with spirit probes could prove vital. Our raiders act as our armor as far as I'm concerned. Using them to either protect units by being inside or providing LOS blocking cover. This handicap is like telling space marines they can't use drop pods or power armor. The spirit probe will net some of your units a 5+/4+ feel no pain, which can mitigate the loss somewhat, the problem will be positioning it in the right places at the right moment.

Said HQ haemie with a webway portal and a bucket of grots would be ideal too. You can apply pressure where you need to and maybe shift the focus of your opponent away from some of the units that need a couple of turns for FnP.

Were it me in your shoes, I would just glue plastic toy feet to the bottom of my raiders and venoms. Voila! Footdar!

I am dead serious saying this - I would ask the event organizer for some advice on building a list, especially if he says Coven supplement is out.

He is out of his gourd if he thinks 'no battle suits' for Tau is even in the same ballpark as 'no transports' for DE.

There aren't that many armies in the *game* capable of working with 'no transports' as a concept - and DE are hardly in the top ten when I bother to think of that.

Unless he's telling Grey Knights 'no anti-tank' and Space Marines 'no anti-infantry' this thing is pretty silly and I'd like to see him work his own head around the idea. Footdar would be a decent challenge for Eldar, who actually can sort of do it because they're actually still pretty mobile.

If you can't use the Coven book...wow, I dunno. I guess the big blobs with Lances are a thing, they are sadly about the best option, so I agree with that. I guess the entire FA section becomes pretty important to at least get some mobility back on the board. You're going to be hardcore boned for anti-tank also, as 3x Ravagers isn't even remotely near enough lance support, and the rest of your stuff will be immobile or hard to get in range. Yeah, big foot squads, some Reavers and Scourges, max Ravagers, lots of praying.

if you can use Coven it gets marginally better, though not by a lot, though at least you could start DSing Dark Artisan for a lark.

I'd be really tempted to use this as an opportunity to test out our DS potential. I'd probably shoot for a CAD with autarch preferably in a fortification with some AA and mabye coms + min obsec windriders, then go to formations, a dark artisan or two combined with the scouting taloi seems really threatening and could provide some great board control, but it could also be hard to fit if your point scaling is additive (ie. Week 2 list adds points, but you still have to take everything from week one).

Also, really what that's doing, is showcasing that the DE codex is a great force multiplier to the Eldar codex, which I think everyone knew already

Yeah it sounds like a major challenge, if they say no covens its straight up unfair. You might as well say screw it and field 100 wyches and take the moral high ground for being clearly put so far on the back foot that your only going to win with a miracle!

2 5 strong Kabalites and maxed out FA?

No?

@False Son, if only I had the bikes, that'd be the way I'd always play.

EDIT: Who needs to win? I have bikes!!! ZOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thats a real tough challenge! If you can't use Coven, I'd aim for something like the following:

2 archons, with WWP deepstriking in 2 bombs. Maybe a Grot bomb, and a Court bomb with a few medusae and sllyth. I'd probably back them up with a strong beast unit which can move up quick for support.

The rest is mostly just filler...

Scourges/reavers for AT, don't even bother with Ravagers/ If you can't have any vehicles except ravagers, they'll just be dead T2 anyways as they eat all the AT firepower, deny the opponent their AT weapons at least.

Min warrior units for troops, if you can fit bigger lance squads in at higher points then do it.

The idea is, once the two big bombs come in, it doesn't really matter what else you have running up the field, the opponent should be distracted enough dealing with your bombs. As the points escalate, just introduce more big nasty distractions, talos units etc.

-Fioater

I wonder what footdar means.  Can you use bikes or have flyers?

Trying to get in the spirit without complete understanding of constraints, I would look at how do I hold objectives that may be spaced across the board, how do I destroy heavy armor, how can I stay alive.

My thoughts are -- infilitrate, DS, fire dragons(?), reavers, cover.  

1 Infilitrate --- I like the thought of two 10 man squads of mandrakes.  It would be ideal if they could find cover within 18 inches of the enemy and, and perhaps have a phoenix lord like Fuegan stuck in with them.  That would be 40 shots of s4, ap4, soul blaze at 18 inches with a 2+ cover save.  Fuegan would have 2 split fire melta shots and offer some cc protection.  If only DE, then perhaps Urien or Drazhar.  So your enemy begins with twenty of the enemy over the midline and already threatening something.  He is going to regret every round heading down range that don't ignore cover and discovers a 2+ cover save opponent.  

2.  DS -- deep strike in the anti-armor, fire dragons, scourges and or true born.  If reavers are allowed I like the mobility and mix of anti-armor they can bring.  Throw in a WWP and let them arrive shoot and bounce 2 d6 in the assault phase.  What about wave serpents?  If you can bring CWE dark reapers, they ignore jink.  A sudden str 8 shot to rear 10 with no jink could be effective.  

3.  Fortification -- An imperial bunker is cheap or a slightly more expensive bastion.  Both could give you an AA gun but the surprise might be an escape hatch.  For a few points you can disembark 12" from your fortication which effectively gives you an 18" move.  The two  fortifications I've listed can hold and disembark 20 men.  Finally, the fortifications can also claim objectives even if empty, if the enemy fails to enter them and make them his claimed buildings.  So consider the benefits of deploying them next to an objective.  

I think its a good challenge and something DE can win at.  So instead of a venom or raider with night shield we have units of mandrakes infiltrating exactly where we want them, maybe bringing some nasty ICs with them and giving them move through cover, stealth and shroud.  Then the DS units and bikes hit the strong or weak points.  The fortification may hold the backfield and spring forward a strike element via the escape hatch.  If you can go unbound-- maybe 3 bunkers with the grotesqurie detachment as part of their security element.  If you can use flyers and/or CWE for anti-armor I would think you can field a pretty competitive list.  If not, I suspect heavy armor is going to be a challenge but we still have a chance.  

I look forward to learning how you are doing.  Good Luck!