Semi-competitive list 1850 DE Standalone

Dear fellas,

I introduce you what I think will be my semi-competitive list for non-casual games, any help sharpening it will be deeply appreciated

PURGE COTERIE FORMATION

- Archon with clone field and Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons 145
- Lhamean and Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons 75
- 5 x Trueborn with 4 Blasters and Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons 180
- 6 x Reavers 2 of them with Heat Lances 116
- Raider with Disintegrator Cannon 55

FORMATION CORPSETHIEF CLAW

- 5 x Talos with Chain Flails and Splinter Cannons 625

COMBINED ARMS DETACHMENT

- Lhamean 10 (goes with Grotesques in a Raider)
- 3 x Grotesques, one of them an Aberration with Scissorhands 125
- 2 x 5 Kabalite Warriors and Venoms with 2 Splinter Cannons each 210
- 3 x Reaver with 1 Cluster Caltrop 63
- 5 x Scourges with 4 Haywire Blasters 120
- Cronos with Spirit Probe 125

So that's it, a strong front line formed by Talos, Chronos and Grotesques where I will place my three objectives.
Some dakka with Purge Coterie formation which can switch from antitank to anti infantry.
It is my first list "with some sort of aspiration to be competitive" so please, competitive players, I need all your help.

Lhamaens are not characters. The Archon goes with the grotesques and the Lhamean buys a venom instead of the Archon. I'd find a way to afford cluster caltrops on my PE Reavers. I think your going to play spoiler and get absolutely wrecked by armies that have too much of any something you can't handle: 3-5 Knights, Seerstar, Wraithhost, War Convocation come to mind. I think you'll do fine with some luck versus the Flying Circus, KDK, Battle Company, and Scatbikes but it really will all come down to luck even if you do everything right.

Central premise looks fine but reevaluate where you are allocating points as you're ignoring some large vulnerabilities. Everything is far more fragile than you seem to acknowledge and in a competitive setting that fragility is exposed far more quickly.

Hi amorrowlyday!
I'm not sure if taking the Archon with grotesques would be a good idea, as if he dies, half of my list loses the benefits of preferred enemy.
Getting wrecked is something that can easily happen as I'm not playing allies and my strong unit can be wiped with many things but I cannot think on something stronger...
Would you switch the strong unit for MSU? Maybe then I could get some more reavers to take objectives and other things the list lacks but those units will be easily wiped also...
I'm also considering some Mandrakes to avoid White Scars exploration moves or even a null deploymeny list.
The most important question would be, how do you handle IK's, wraithknights and "Gods on bike"?
Thank you!!

The archon has to go with te Grots for a few reasons. One his PE rule, if I'm not mistaken, he needs to be on foot to use it. Second, the Grots, since they are not grotquesuire, the are not fearless turn 2. So that leadership 4 unit needs a babysitter, and since its been pointed out, Lhameans are not ICs.

The reavers would benifit more from the 2x Claptrops over the heat lances in my opinion.

I would remove chain flails from the talos and give them 3 ichor injectors. That's how you deal with wraithknights. The talos should be able to take out imperial knights as well with smash attacks. I think your missing A trick here by not taking Dark artisan. The buffs of the unit would make the talos much stronger as well as protecting the chronos.

Msu is something dark eldar can do quite well, unless your playing eldar win bikes, and if your opponent is taking out 63-73 point units, he's not shooting at that 650 CTC or DA.

Don't worry about objectives until late game, DE do not hold objectives, so don't take any until the late game. Reavers can move an insane distance so there's no worry about where the objectives are situated. So leave them until turn 5 to take when you can be sure you actually can hold them.

Archon Vitcus wrote:

Don't worry about objectives until late game, DE do not hold objectives, so don't take any until the late game. Reavers can move an insane distance so there's no worry about where the objectives are situated. So leave them until turn 5 to take when you can be sure you actually can hold them.

Hello.

Wouldn't that depend on the type of mission ? Given the fact that DE often have mobility on their side, wouldn't racking up malstrom point as fast as possible, from the start be one if not the pathway to victory ?

Yes. They are presuming you are playing an Eternal War variant. For Maelstrom purposes consider them to be saying: Don't storm objectives in anticipation of a certain card; only play for what is immediately doable as we may have a mobility advantage against many armies but our frailty makes hanging around a death sentence.

Yes, the list is supposed to be played on Maelstrom, that's why I would assign my three objectives very close, as 50% of the times I draw a card to capture an objective I will already own it with the Talos formation.
The rest of the list would capture other objectives I need to take or accomplish any other mission I'm asked to do.
When my three new talos arrive home, I will test it!

I'm trying to do something similar, I ended up going with a unit of 8 mandrakes for the Archon to hang out with and the Archon has a shadowfield instead of the clone field. You lose some of the benefits the mandrakes have but you gain very valuable cover saves on that Archon. Ignore cover hurts, but then your opponent is wasting good shooting to kill fairly cheap mandrakes. So far it's been pretty mixed, the blaster born are still overpriced and even higher target priority so I've been considering just running a normal warrior squad not sure