[2000] - Dark Eldar - Combined Arms - Ravagers

After a LOT of research, amazing advice/support from the Dark Eldar community, a fair amount of time spent converting based on suggestions, and a plethora of time re-working my Air Force list...I bring to you my second themed list based on using my 3 ravagers. One of which I thought had DL turns out they are all disintegrators. Unlike the air force which I felt needed a lot of tweaking I dare say I've learned a lot from all of you Dark Eldar players and that this Ravager list is damn near perfect for the task of showcasing the ravagers...

2000 Pts - Codex: Dark Eldar Roster - 2000 - CAD - Ravager

: Combined Arms Detachment (68#, 2000 pts)
1 Archon, 145 pts (Plasma Grenades; Blaster)
1 Venom (Splinter Cannon; Chain-snares)

1 Archon, 145 pts (Plasma Grenades; Blaster; Warlord)
1 Venom (Splinter Cannon; Chain-snares)

5 Kabalite Trueborn, 185 pts (Close Combat Weapon; Blaster x4)
1 Venom (Splinter Cannon; Chain-snares)

5 Kabalite Trueborn, 185 pts (Close Combat Weapon; Blaster x4)
1 Venom (Splinter Cannon; Chain-snares)

5 Kabalite Trueborn, 185 pts (Close Combat Weapon; Blaster x4)
1 Venom (Splinter Cannon; Chain-snares)

10 Kabalite Warriors, 170 pts (Close Combat Weapon)
1 Raider (Dark Lance x1; Night Shields; Splinter Racks; Stealth)

10 Kabalite Warriors, 170 pts (Close Combat Weapon)
1 Raider (Dark Lance x1; Night Shields; Splinter Racks; Stealth)

10 Kabalite Warriors, 170 pts (Close Combat Weapon)
1 Raider (Dark Lance x1; Night Shields; Splinter Racks; Stealth)

5 Scourges, 120 pts (Fleet; Close Combat Weapon; Haywire Blaster x4)

5 Scourges, 120 pts (Fleet; Close Combat Weapon; Haywire Blaster x4)

1 Ravager, 125 pts (Deep Strike; Night Shields; Stealth)

1 Ravager, 140 pts (Deep Strike; Dark Lance x3; Night Shields; Stealth)

1 Ravager, 140 pts (Deep Strike; Dark Lance x3; Night Shields; Stealth)

Total Roster Cost: 2000


Design Notes:
I picked Combined Arms because i received a lot of feedback suggesting that it was a far superior option than Raiders of Realspace Detachment. I started with the ravagers and worked my way around the list from there. I wanted to try the 10 man warrior units in raiders since my airforce already had venom spam warriors, and I wanted a strong anti infantry punch. Next I added the scourges becuase ravagers may struggle against certain vehicles and I hear that scourges with haywire are the ultimate DE anti-vehicle. Next up I wanted to try out my newly converted Blaster Born en masse...riding venoms so yeah surprisingly enough that also fit into the list giving me more anti tank and anti infantry power. The HQ choice was my last thing to address the Lhamaean option was going to be my goto since i figured the blasterborn would take up a lot more points, but alas it did not so I wanted to include Archons in venom to be like mini blaster born riding around. Ultimately I ended up with a list that fit what i initially wanted, and included very strong options against both infantry and vehicles. Anti Flyer would be the only drawback i think


Any thoughts? Suggestions?

If you really want to try your blasterborn out first, I encourage you to do so! Experience is always valuable, and you already have the models!

That said, you already have almost everything necessary to make this list 2 CADs, only needing to add a single squad of warriors to do so. This means that if you dropped all the blasterborn and added a warrior squad + dual cannon venom, you'd have 435 points left. That's enough for 3 more dark lance ravagers and a dark lance raider, or 3 razorwing jetfighters w/dark lances and a blaster on the warrior squad in the venom.

I'm personally of the opinion that blasterborn aren't very points efficient at 180 point for them and their transport.

I like the list for the most part, but I'd consider some changes for sure.

With only a single shot, I don't think your Archons emulate Blasterborn very efficiently, and Blasterborn aren't super duper good to begin with even then.

Put it in perspective, a unit of 5 Kabalites with a Blaster is only a little less accurate, but has more bodies, 4 splinter rifles, gives their venom (and themselves) objective secured because they're troops (this applies if you compare them with trueborn too), end up also costing 25 points less than him, and can't give up Warlord kill like he can either.

Drop both Archons for el'cheapo Lhameans and spamming more things elsewhere - as BetrayTheWorld suggests simply taking another CAD with more firepower - or drop just one Archon and using the points to give the other Archon some combat gear and a retinue of a few Sslyth.

Archons aren't incredibly strong in combat, but with t5 bodyguards and 2++ your warlord is less likely to die this way and with an Agoniser he's reasonably stabby against most non assault units.

I would generally agree with getting rid of a blaster archon to exchange for a Lhamean, so long as your local meta allows that. Some don't, so I don't normally suggest it unless someone says the tournament format they're using.

But if they DO, you get 65 points back that you can spend on something else to add to the 435 I mentioned above, for a total of 500 points free. You can do a lot with that many points. If you dropped 1 chain snare too, for 505 points, you could add 3 more tri-lance ravagers and a razorwing jetfighter to your list.

Got my first game with Dark Eldar and it was an interesting game, I used this list for my first game as I felt it was more stable than the flyer spam for a first game entry.

Game was vs Tau
Things I felt i did wrong....

#1 - Moved everything 12" up and tried to get passengers to shoot at stuff too, trying to maximize damage output. But instead they all had to snap fire and basically kept getting like maybe 1 or 2 wounds. The venoms were only landing about 4 wounds per volley all game.

#2 - I think I shot way too many shots at the Tau Hammerheads Squadron. They were in a formation with some nasty rules, I threw scourges and ravagers at those hammerheads but those jink saves were hard to get through, i had no luck killing them in 1 turn...or 2..or 3...I went after them all game and did not kill the last hammerhead until i finally assaulted it on turn 5 with trueborn that failed to kill it with blasters....

#3 - Speaking of blasters, the trueborn didnt really do much all game. It was honestly a bit of a waste, after their venom got blown up they really got taken out of the game for the most part.

#4 - I forgot Power From Pain until end of turn 3. I did remember to go to ground on turn 4. But then I kind of wish i wasn't fearless when getting shot at on turn 5 and being unable to take extra cover



Things I thinK I learned:

#1 - COMBAT SPEED! COMBAT SPEED! and DO NOT EXCEED COMBAT SPEED! On turn 1 i went cruising speed on everything and i basically did no damage, then i started only moving at combat speed and started killing stuff somewhat reliably.

#2 - Venoms have a 48" threat range! Holy cow...if I just hold off on the urge to have the passengers shoot, i should be able to safely shoot at infantry from a comfortable distance.

#3 - Warriors in Raiders with splinter racks do pretty solid damage within rapid fire range.

#4 - Raiders die horribly to ignores cover. Night Shields are not worth it

#5 - Scourges cannot easily kill vehicles with Jink saves.



So i deployed my entire force in this game and had first turn. Do you guys recommend that I deep strike instead when going first? Or how do i better maximize my damage output. I felt like i did very little damage the entire game felt like Dark Eldar were underwhelming when it came to removing models off the table

A couple things it seems like your opponent probably didn't know, if he made you fire snapshots after moving 12 inches:

1. Fast vehicles(of which all DE vehicles ARE) can move 12 inches and fire up to 2 weapons at full ballistic skill - not snap shots. So it shouldn't effect your venoms or raiders at all, and only causes 1 lance to snapfire per ravager. Passengers, however, have to snapfire when moving beyond combat speed.

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2. Sometimes you DO want to go faster than combat speed, such as when you want to get assault troops somewhere fast. Remember that you can move 12 inches, then flat out another 18 inches in the shooting phase with a fast skimmer for a total of 30 inches of movement in 1 turn. This allows you to be in the enemy's face turn 1, threatening a charge on turn 2.

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3. Warriors DO do solid damage in rapid fire range with splinter racks. But by the time you pay for all that, you could have had venoms that do nearly as much damage at longer ranges(so you're not in danger of losing them as easily).

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4. Night shields are worth it if you have high value passengers, or possibly on a higher value chassis, like a ravager. But mostly just for slow, high value passengers that you HAVE to get into combat ASAP, like grots.

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5. There aren't really a lot of units that reliably kill other vehicles in 1 turn from 24+ inches away. You should realize that it isn't a 1 point killed for 1 point spent in 1 round situation. You may have to use 300 points worth of models to kill 100 points worth of transports in 1 round. Scourges kill vehicles with jink saves in 1 round just fine. You just need more of them to do so.

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You have to focus fire with DE to take out threats, and it sounds like you hurt your first turn alpha strike potential with too much movement and too little focus fire. 40k is very much a game of momentum, and with a flimsy army like DE, having a turn 1 completely flop because of not knowing the rules can spell your doom and make the rest of your decisions meaningless for that game.

I also wouldn't be so quick to jump ship on a list. 1 bad showing when it was clear you made a tactical error shouldn't condemn a list to retirement. I'd come up with a list you like and use it several times, getting a good feel for how all the units in our army work, THEN start thinking about more interesting ways to combine and use them once you're just a touch more experienced.

Grats on getting your first game in, and good luck in the future games!

(Not sure if this is relavent to Tau, they may ignore this) Once a tank jinks, you can pritty much ignore them. Since they will be snap-firing, your a lot less likely to take damage from them next turn.

After the squadron of tanks jinks, focus on the next threat.

The opponent didnt make me snap fire the vehicles. When i refered to snap firing i meant the passengers which I was in a hurry to get into threat range on turn 1. Trueborn snap firing...no good at all as I noticed, and the warriors i wanted to get in range to rapid fire against some kroot in woods and did almost no damage with snap firing.

Thanks for the tip on where to place night shields!!! That makes plenty sense and i will apply that.

I thought scourges would do a lot better since everyone seems to unanimously love scourges in the same way that everyone seems to hate wyches lol

I don't hate the list I just have many more lists I want to try out and see how it works out

fisheyes I learned that after turn 3 but by then i had already got into bullrage mode and wanted those hammerhead dead as a personal objective. But completely agree force them to jink and let them be

Yeah, people love them because they pretty reliably do 2 hullpoints of damage to a vehicle every round. For the vast majority of vehicles, that doesn't equal a dead vehicle, but people love them because of reliability. With 2 units of them, you're pretty reliably able to take off 4 hullpoints a turn, which DOES reliably kill the vast majority of vehicles in the game.

You just have to understand that focus firing is important, and the idea of tabling someone in the first turn or 2 of the game isn't really something that can be done by any army without your opponent making really questionable deployment decisions. 40k vehicle killing is sort of grindy and slow moving. Fishing for explosions is unreliable and expensive in most cases.