Which Warlord table?

Why not a husk blade and agoniser and really make him scary. The plus 1 WS to a succubus means marines hit her on 5s. Just saying.

JackKnife01 wrote:

^.
Able to give army move through cover. Infiltrate to 4 units(busted). Help yours seize and reserves.

Except the Move Through Cover is so situational it's not worth it.

The Command trait of similar bent seems so much better.

Hmmm I have to use it sometime

Tounguekutter wrote:

Well now hold on.  He's still the toughest HQ we have

Which is like being the tallest man at a midget convention.

Tounguekutter wrote:

And given a power sword or Agoniser he can take on tactical marines pretty well

Oh, fan-flippin-tastic. Because you know what squads I have real issues with? Tactical Marines. What with those 3+ saves, super speed of 6" and ability to do bugger all. I'm glad we now have an HQ who can... kill one or two of them then get dragged down. But wait - with backup he can maybe eventually kill a squad of them. Outstanding.

Do we by chance have any builds to take on Gretchin? They are almost as terrifying as the above tactical marines (and much cheaper to boot! ). Please tell me there's an Archon build that can save me from their unbridled might.

I don't care if the warlord traits give my warlord a bonus. He has to give bonuses to the rest of my army.

CptMetal wrote:

I don't care if the warlord traits give my warlord a bonus. He has to give bonuses to the rest of my army.

To be honest, this basically describes my problem with our HQs in general - they're pitiful in combat, yet have no support abilities.

The Archon is supposed to be a master tactician, right? So, where are his tactical abilities?

The Shredder wrote:

CptMetal wrote:

I don't care if the warlord traits give my warlord a bonus. He has to give bonuses to the rest of my army.

To be honest, this basically describes my problem with our HQs in general - they're pitiful in combat, yet have no support abilities.

The Archon is supposed to be a master tactician, right? So, where are his tactical abilities?

It's his ability to stay safely at home and send a Lhamaean out to do his dirty work!

I actually use them because of the Blaster and the WWP. It's fun crushing guard with that using the archangel too.

Count got it right. Unless I need a WWP / Armor of mysery caddy, I only use Lhamaens as HQ in my competitive lists. (unless I run a formation that is).

But to be fair, our HQ can do a decent job. Archon with blasters will turn a 4 blaster trueborn team from a decent to a great AT/MC hunter squad. The Succubus with a archite glaive is pretty decent in combat against elite infranty...especially if escorted with Grotesques. And the Haemonculus... the Haemonculus have cool fluff.

Count Adhemar wrote:

It's his ability to stay safely at home and send a Lhamaean out to do his dirty work!

Here are my opinions.

I have two HQ models that I use as my warlord depending on what list I am running. One is a Succubus and the other is a Haemonculus. I use the succubus in my Kabalite themed list with some incubi. She is mainly there to counter charge any units that get too close to me, then clear enemy trash units off of objectives towards the end of the game. She is not durable enough to charge up the field ahead of everything else in my army and try to get into close combat early. I only use the haemonculus as my warlord if I am running my Dark Artisan formation.

Succubus:

If I am against a balanced army or a shooting focused army I tend to roll on the Strategic Table. Pretty much every option from that table is extremely useful for Dark Eldar. Night fighting, reserve manipulation, infiltrating 3 units (this is my favorite one). The only one that is situationally useful is the stealth/move through cover ruins one. There might not be that many ruins on the table or the ruins might be in a spot where nothing is going on.

If I am against a melee focused army, I tend to roll on the Dark Eldar table. Despite being, arguably, the best melee HQ the dark eldar have, I feel like she still could benefit from a little boost against some of the other melee units and characters out there. I really like the hatred one because I give her an archite glaive. I NEED most of those attacks to hit if I have any chance to win challenges against multiwound characters since she is only strength 4 with the weapon. If I don't kill the opponent in the first round, she usually dies if I fail one invulnerable save. Power fists, thunderhammers and most monstrous creatures will double out her toughness for an instant kill and I won't even get a feel no pain. The fearless bubble one is pretty good too because she is only leadership 9 and operates in a small unit. The weapon skill one is pretty useless unless you are fighting eldar phoenix warriors or daemon princes (she will probably lose to these guys anyway). Of course the reroll reserves, nightfighting and seize one is really good but I've given up on hoping to roll that when I really need it.

With the Haemonculus, I always take his fixed warlord trait since he only operates within the Dark Artisan. The warlord trait really multiplies their effectiveness. However, since I usually deep strike him in, if he doesn't end up coming on the board until turn 3 or 4 all those points and the warlord trait are completely wasted. If this happens then the rest of my army REALLY struggles to keep up with my opponent since I have so much invested in one unit. I really need to get an autarch or something if I want to run deep strike or reserve heavy lists but I'm still drinking the kool aid and thinking that Dark Eldar are competitive without allies.

I would never random roll on the Haemonculus Coven traits. Even if I wanted to make a full Coven army list, it would certainly be made up of several formations rather than just a smattering of coven units. I would decide which unit was most important for the mission and choose that formation's haemonculus as my warlord for the fixed trait.

Strategic if I'm not taking harlequins. If I take harlequins sometimes I use theirs because their all good fun. I use the DE one on occasion too, but it only has like one good option.

A question:

If you are running a list that includes a Dark Artisan with WWP but no other reserve manipulation, do you roll on strategic for a shot at some reserve control, or do you stick with the guaranteed DA trait and trust lady luck to get the DA in on time.

For example, if I'm facing Tau, and I have the DA + Grotesquerie, when I charge my Grots forward, I want to do it with the DA WWP-ing in for threat saturation. In this circumstance, I feel like I need to roll on strategic to have a better shot at the DA coming when needed, as that delay could be critical.

Thoughts?

Always the DA Warlord Trait.

Firstly, because I prefer a known (and useful) warlord trait to a random one.

Second, because the DA trait will generally be useful throughout the game, whilst reserve manipulation will be useful once, only for a single unit, and even then will only be needed 1/3 of the time.

Finally, I'm relying on luck either way - since I've only got a 1/6 chance of getting the reserve-manipulating trait I want. So, I might as well get a fixed trait and only rely on luck for the reserve aspect.


The other aspect, of course, is which Haemonculus gets to be my walord. Most likely I'd rather have the DA one in this role, as the DA tends to be a better bunker for him. So, that alone basically guarantees that I'll be using the DA warlord trait.