1500 Dark Eldar list

Hi, i am a new comer to 40k and Dark Eldar. I recently picked up a small collection which brought me into the game. Most of the people at my locals play 1500 points. so i was trying to make a list that would be decent against all lists i came up against. Anyway after alot of research this is the list i came up with all/any help would be appreciated.

HQ - Succubus - Archite glave, Heyware Grenades, Armour of misery (don't own)

Elites -  5x Incubi, Klaivex with demiklaves; raider w/ darklance, enhanced aethersails, night shields (have raider not the troops)

3x Trueborn, 3x Trueborn w/ blaster, 2x Trueborn w/darklance; raider w/ darklance, nightshields (have all)

Troops - 10x K- Warriors; raider w/ Nightshields, splinter racks (have all)
10x K- Warriors; raider w/ Nightshields, splinter racks (don't own)
7x wyches (have all)

Fast attack - 6x Reavers, 2x cluster caltrops (have all)
6x Reavers, 2x cluster caltrops (have 3)
5x scourges, 4x Heywire blaster (don't own)

Heavy support - Ravager 3x dark lance, night shields (don't own)

total comes to 1500 even
Was going to run the succubus with the Incubi.
Not sure what i should deep strike or not either.
Thx for any help

Split the reavers in to 4 3 man squads, msu works really well for DE

Trueborn, kept them with all blasters and maybe a venom at some point. People have different opinions on how to field them so it's really what works best for you. I prefer not giving dark lances to infantry since it'll mostly be snap firing if they move.

Gunboat warriors I've not used in a long time, so I can't really say if they're any good with the current rules. Used to be amazing though and are still handy against FMC I suppose.

Incubi don't have assault grenades so bear that in mind if your assaulting with them.

Ravagers...if they hit they can be amazing but I've found them lacking lately for me, most likely my bad dice rolling. Scourges will attract a lot of fire though so having the ravager as back up or to take some of the shooting is pretty reasonable. Don't bother with night shields, if it's jinking, it's useless. Best thing about our skimmers is their profile. They can be angled around terrian with their profile, to obscure them for a cover save. Not ideal but better than snap shooting.

You've got a good start to the best looking army,

Edit: Actually do night shields give +1 cover save? Or +1 to jink?

thanks for your input Archon Vitcus. I was trying to find a way to se my points and money most efficiently. For some reason i love diving into combat against things i figured the incubi could help with that and i really love the flavor and playability of the reavers. I was planing on keeping the trueborn in the raider and firing from with in as an anti- tank unit. using the jink cover save for the guys inside. same with the Gunboat warriors. im not sure if venoms would just be better? wyches could prolly go i would assume just ddint know what else to do with the points?
anyway thx for your input

Nightshields grant stealth. So all cover saves.

Some notes.

Succubus really doesn't bring anything to the table for the incubi, she'd really do much better in a unit of grotesques, sslyths or clawed fiends so she'd benefit from t5 and they'd benefit from ap2.

Drop the dark lances on everything but the ravagers. you don't have near enough anti-marine equivalent (MEQ) and since you already have the raiders no point in retooling for venoms, Disintegrator cannons are very good.

According to what you explicitly wrote you have too many elite choices. You're bringing 1 CAD which only has 3 Elite slots and what you wrote takes 4, unless that's a single unit of 8 Trueborn in which case you're grossly misspending points. Cut it back to 5 or six. Either way 4 blasters not 3, if 5 Dracon with haywire grenade, if 6 no Dracon, 2 splinter cannons. Someone might come in and disgree with me here but the splinter cannon upgrade in this manner amounts to paying 5 points premiums on 4 kabalites in order to triple their 2-shot range. That is worth it.

You're spending points on a Klaivex. The only benefit this gives you is Rampage. You're putting this in a 6 person unit and intend to add a 7th. This is an absolute waste of that benefit. Instead take 2 units of 3 incubi each with a Klaivex. Same price point for what you're describing better utilization since the rampage will actually come in to effect against combat-squad'd units.

At BS4 your spending 15pts to twinlink the shots is not mathematically worthwhile. You only have an 38% chance of missing and are paying 15pts to halve that. That amounts to .79pts for every percentage point you're increasing your likelyhood to hit by which is not a good return, especially when you consider the fact that our problem isn't hitting it's actually wounding which twinlink does nothing for. I'd much rather spend those 15 pt on blasters in the  squads instead even though I routinely criticize that move.

You can't do what Archon Victus recommends without taking more CAD's. That's going to require totally retooling your troop and HQ slots. 6 reavers are thing, I'd even put an Arena Champion in their and make them your Warlord since Reavers benefit from a wider variety of warlord traits we have access to then any other squad in our army.  I'd probably cut one and replace with an identical second Scourge squad tho. A 9 body Reaver squad is also an excellent fire magnet and would open up a slot for that second unit of scourges, No arena champion in that variant tho.

Best

first off thnk you for your help amorrowlyday

okay, well my reasoning was to have the trueborns 8 in total be like heavy support. I had most of the ships with dark lances because i was told that they were needed from the you tube videos and such to tke down heavier armored models. as for the hq i wasn't sure what should use. i have an archon but i thought for the point value the succubus would be better. I am not sure what a CAD is?

What if the list became more like this

HQ - Succubus - Archite glave, Heyware Grenades, Armour of misery (don't own) (115 pts)

Elites - 3x Incubi, Klaivex with demiklaves; raider w/ night shields (have raider not the troops) (175 pts)
3x Incubi, Klaivex with demiklaves; venom (dont own) (160 pts)


Troops - 10x K- Warriors; raider w/ Nightshields (have all) (142 pts)
9x K- Warriors; raider w/ Nightshield, (have all) (142 pts)


Fast attack - 7x Reavers, 2x cluster caltrops, 2 blasters (have all) (162 pts)
6x scourges, solarite w/ blast pistol, 4x Heywire blaster (don't own) (161 pts)
Razorwing jetfigher w/ nightshields, dark lances, monoscythe missles (dont own)(155)

Heavy support - Ravager 3x dark lance, night shields (don't own) (140 pts)
Ravager 3x dark lance, night shields (don't own) (140 pts)

thought being ravengers and scourges tank/ vehicle killers
reavers and jet fighter multi purpose

incubi's and sucubus troop slayers/higher armored things

the remaining ships and k-warriors troop slayers/ infantry slayers

this could be completely off as i have no idea really what i am doing just trying to make a balanced list that i could play till i amassed a better collection

A CAD is the old school "1HQ and 2 Troops" that is now a "Formation". Everything are Formations now a days.

I actually liked your first list a little more than your current list. Some comments on this latest one

-Succubi has grenades (if I recall correctly), so she is good in an assault unit. The thing to worry about is making your assault squad cost way too many points, putting a "kill me" sign on their back while sitting in an AV10 vehicle. She really likes running with Grotesques, who can keep her alive with their T5 3W.

-Demi klaves are actually WORSE than the regular klave. I would recomend against the Klavex all togeather, and get more bodies.

-You need to know the difference between a Raider and a Venom. A Venom is a gunboat, good at sitting back and shooting at range and can also transport stuff. A Raider is a "heavy" transport who can also shoot OK. Put assault units in Raiders, put light shooting units in Venoms (looking at your Incubi)

-Reavers should be in multiples of 3 so you can maximize the amount of Cluster Caltrops (which are their best upgrade and whole point of the unit). If you cant get to 9, keep them at 6 and put points elsewhere

-Scourges should ONLY be used for their special weapons. Max out your weapon of choice (blaster, heat lance or HWB x4) and NO OTHER UPGRADES. Anything else spent on them is a waste, since they are so flimsy. Drop them down to 5 men and drop the Solarite for more bodies elsewhere.

-General DE note: Our guys are really weak, and our upgrades are really expensive. Generally you want to maximize/minimize the amount of bodies in your units, and go skimpy on unit upgrades (except for special weapons, which you should generally max out if possible). We dont have the survivability to make most unit upgrades worthwile, which is why we go MSU tactics (Multiple Small Units).

I would really recommend playing some 1k games before you get too far into your 1500 list. Also try out the Grotesquery formation and the Dark Artesian formation. They are some of the best units we can field (and I wouldent leave home without them)

My response is going to be in a numerical list because it seems like the clearest way to keep these notes separate. Unlike the last set I don't think they benefit from informing each other, but they very much appear that they do.

1. How does taking extra bodies who provide no extra offensive capabilities, and cost more then wyches for less survivability contribute to your heavy support?

2. The theoretical framework those videos are based on is rooted in the presumption that your anti-infantry is in the form of large quantities of poison which you do not have. 45 poison shots is not a lot. And you didn't have any real redundancy.

3. Demiklaives are a waste of points. They're S3, aren't going to live to turn 4, and the only reason to take a klaivex is for rampage, so the +1 attack is devalued.

4. If you are going to buy a venom put kabalites in it and give their raider to the incubi. It wants to be 30+ away from it's target. 40pts of obsec kabalites sitting around is fine, 70pts of incubi who need to be in CC to earn their premium back doing so isn't so much.

5. Why 9? These folks may be good candidates for crew reduction and placing in the venom though.

6. Moreover, why did you cut the trueborn?

7. Reavers should always be taken in multiples of 3 to maximize quantity of cluster caltrops. I think you own 9 though so I'm more saying stick your spare points here rather than cut the 7th body.

8. The blast pistol on the solarite and the solarite in this case, are wasted points that do not jive with the focus of the rest of the unit. The 6th body also necessitates a whole second box of scourges and strays from that goal as well.

9. Razorwing is actually excellent anti-infantry and should probably be downgraded to dissies as well.

10. I don't do ravagers so looks good as far as I can tell!

11. Incubi are really heavy troop slayers large blobs of meq or geq will eventually just kill them under weight of fire, hence the need for large quantities of additional anti-infantry.

12. Troops and their transports should be used to secure objective points first and foremost.

Cheers.

@fisheyes these are a couple points I think are important:

Grenades negating initiative reduction is on a model per model basis in 7th so the succubus only protects herself in a unit without grenades.

Klaivex provides more attacks cheaper than more bodies does. 1 body provides 2 additional attacks due klaives being 2-handed. Klaivex upgrade provides at least 2 extra attacks for 5 less points since a 3-body squad will always be out numbered at the start of the fight against it's appropriate target. More bodies is a trap if you have the FOC slots for more squads.

thank you for the input amorrowlyday and fisheyes
i was trying to maximize the points figured some scourge and bikes would die eventually thats why the wired numbers also only 9 k- warriors cause thats the way the points worked out. i have 3 raiders and no venom's thats why i was trying to use em i envisioned them being a jinking nightmare while the crew obliterates the opponents troops. then gettting off and holing an objective while the ship speeds off to another objective around turn 3-4.

i dont understand why demi-klaves are worse? +1 str and ap 2 weapon or +1 attack and ap3 attack they seem insane to me. killing anything in sight. the plan was to deep strike them in and wreck something that was giving me trouble.

I seen the post about Grotesques but i dont get the hype. they ware week have terrible saves, slow bad leadership, expensive, low initiative. i mean 3 wounds and str5 and toughness 5 is nice. but if they die before they hit anything whats the point at least the incubi will wreck face before most thing fight back and have a decent save.

i cut the trueborn because i thought they were too expensive with the upgrades they needed i thought the "paper air" plane would do better.

so if i cut the one incubi unit and reeduced the other unit to 3(2 and 1 klaivex) inside a raider with aether sails
and added the grotesque (2 and an aberation with a scissorhand) in a raider with enhanced sails

then cutting the bikes down to 6 and adding a second squad of 6 with caltrops and cutting the fighter
i get 1412 points.
in one of my lists i had mandrakes are those good? Beastmatsers i uess was a thing before 7th or so i read? would i beenifit from them? i would like to try the Dark Artesian formation but its stupid expensive and if it dies i will prolly lose the match also what slot does it take up? heavy/hq?

A dark artisan doesn't take up slots. It is a formation it is it's own whole macro-level army unit like a CAD.

Beastmasters have different uses in seventh because they changed how you build the pack. Beastpacks are very alright, you don't have an FOC-slot for them tho.

I think with the slots you have available, and the points you have to spend a unit of mandrakes would be a very reasonable addition to that army as it will also provide you access to infiltrate-based null deployment which will open up your tactical options. They're also light on points.

amorrowlyday would you add the fighter back with night shields in for the one set of reavers? and how many Grotesques is enoghf 3 or 4?

Grots are weak?? If you think that then you should really take a look at the Coven supplement to see why there hype about grots. They are the Best close combat unit we have and they provide a much better baby sitter for HQ units.

Dark artisan is around 290pt? At its base. It's main use is to buff units around it give he Talos a heat lance and a wwp to the heami, make him your warlord and he's pretty hard to bring down.

The razorwing is an amazing unit for taking out ground troops, keep it stick with diss cannons and don't bother with missiles, it gets expensive and can provide a good support with he base missiles it comes with.

There is some good advice in here, plus some stuff I don't agree with.

The advice on the Reavers, Razorwing, Scourges and Dark Artisan I agree with, but disagree with a bit of the other stuff.

The bits I disagree with:

1) Night Shields on Ravagers are really good. With your Ravagers you are looking for a piece of terrain where you will get a cover save from as many feasible locations as possible. Provided you have 25% concealed, you can get a cover save without jink, and then the Night Shields can improve that. Also remember Night Shields are a 6+ cover save in the open.

2) Incubi and a Klaivex with Rampage. Mathematically, the Klaivex is a fantastic deal. However, a 3 man Incubi unit is incredibly fragile. Charging a 10 man Tactical Squad (as rare as those are) with Plasma and Heavy Weapon, you would typically lose 1-2 to overwatch, and a pretty good chance of the whole squad dying despite the Incubi charging. I think Incubi need to be a larger unit, say 6 or 7 to be effective, and then the Klaivex becomes a much more optional upgrade. In any case, Grotesques are a much better option, due to the high toughness and multiple wounds, and similar destructive ability.

3) Splinter Racks are actually pretty good, provided you have a full Raider. They improve the Splinter hit rate by 1/3 (6/9 hit normally, and 8/9 with twin linked) for the cost of just under two Warriors. Compare the two following units:

5 Kabalite Warriors in Venom with dual Splinter Cannons (105 points)
Usually needs to hide at long range due to fragility, so Warriors get to fire only some of the time. Splinter output 12 shots from vehicle and 5 from the Warriors say 50% of the time - output 14.5 shots (7.2 points per shot).

10 Kabalite Warriors in Raider with Night Shields and Splinter Racks (165 points)
Can afford to get closer due to 3+ jink save. If you expect to finish off a unit, can get within 12", but often will be in the 12-24" range. Say 50% at each range interval, so average of 15 shots, with twin linking making that the equivalent to 20 shots (8.3 points per Splinter shot). The Raider has a Disintegrator Cannon, but due to jink it is likely to be less effective.

Basically either option provides a similar output, but the Raiders are much more resilient, unless you are facing lots of Ignore Cover weapons.

Kantalla wrote:

Basically either option provides a similar output, but the Raiders are much more resilient, unless you are facing lots of Ignore Cover weapons.

I strongly disagree.

You may have 1 hp more and 3+ cover save, but by being forced to stand 12" away of the enemy to shoot properly, you expose yourself to a lot more weapons that the venom that srands 36" away from the enemy, plus, you get into standard assault range of any unit in the game, what means something as silly as a tactical squad can bring the raider down, as it has no flickerfield like the venom.

Sadly, gunboats just doesnt hold up to venoms in any shape or form. And this is not theoryhammer, I tested them thoroughly when the codex dropped and never gave me good results.

thanks for your help guys. i have 3 raiders so i will try to work them into my list atm. i guess i dont understand how good strength 5 toughness 5 is. Everything i have read about them says they are good though. As of yesterday i didn't even know formations were a thing. one that intrigued me was the storm of blades. allowing me more fast attack options and anti-flyers what everyone thoughts on adding it? was thinking of

Army composition 1500/1500
HQ - Succubus w/ Haywire grenades, Armor of misery (don’t have)
Elites – 3x Grotesques (Aberration w/ scissorhand, 2x Grotesque); Raider w/ Aethersails, Night Shields (don’t have)
Troops – 2x (10x K – Warriors; Raider w/ Splinter racks, Night Shields) (have)
Fast Attack – 6x Reavers w/ 2x cluster caltrops (have)
Heavy Support – Ravager w/ 3 Dark Lance, Nightshields (don’t have)
Formation - Storm of blades
Archon w/ Blaster (have)
9x K – Trueborn, 4x w/ blasters, 2x w/ Dark lances; Raider w/ Aethersails, Night Shields (have)
2x (5x Scourges, 4 w/ Haywire Blasters) (don’t have)

Archon was going to join the trueborn
And the succubus was going to join the grotesques

My few cents:

I do not like Night Shields. Take notes how many times did they actually save anything and you will find they are simply not worth it as most shooting that kills our vehicles is either not enough to kill them even without NS or its an overkill that kills them anyway. AND for it to be of any help you have to roll the 1 point out of 6 they actually added to your save. Not worth it at all IMO.

Consider taking Blasters or Heat Lances on the bikes. Popping a transport with HLs and charging the unit that spills out is quite easy.

Storm of Blades is Apocalypse formation. Not allowed in normal games.

Trueborn with Dark Lances will only fire snapshots (I presume you will move their raider). Very expensive snapshots. I would take unit of 5 with 3-4 blasters, Dracon with HWG if you want ultimate Anti-armour killers

2x HWG scourges is too much. You have a lot of anti-tank, but almost no anti-infantry or anti-horde. Throw one group of scourges out and get a Razorwing or some Venoms in FA slots.

This list will probably will be overrun by any Horde army (they will grossly outnumber you and you wont be able to kill them fast enough), Deepstrikers (Their Alphastrike can cripple your game since you will be jinking just to stay alive, while they will play their game easily) or Tau (they will outnumber and outshoot you).

Also you seem to be putting units together "as you like them" but try to think about what you are going to do with them. I say that best is to carefully read missions, deployment and maelstrom objectives and try to imagine how would you deploy your force and how would you achieve the objectives. It seems like now you are thinking along the line "I need to kill his vehicles before they kill mine". But I can be wrong of course and just cannot perceive your plan.

thx for the response
i was of the mind set of kill there things before mine get ripped to shreds. I understand about objectives i have played about 5 games total so far only 2 of them with objectives. I usually spend the first couple of turns destroying things that will ripp me apart and the rest trying to win the game whille still applying pressure. Most times i am always jinking with what ever gets shot at the 3+ vs 4+ save seems worth it. as for the formation i guess i will try something else then. I thought the dark lances wud still fire even if the ship moved. i wasn't aware of that.
anyway im not sure what everyones thoughts on a group of lhameans for CC is i thought they might be able do some damage with there 2+ poison.

with that in mind here is another list

Army composition 1475/1500
HQ - Succubus w/ Archite Glave, Armor of misery (don’t have)
10 x Lhameans; Raider w/ Aethersails, Night Shields (don’t have)
Elites – 3x Grotesques (Aberration w/ scissorhand, 2x Grotesque); Raider w/ Aethersails, Night Shields (don’t have)
3x Mandrakes (don’t have)
Troops – 2x (10x K – Warriors; Raider w/ Splinter racks, Night Shields) (have)
Fast Attack – 9x Reavers w/ 3x cluster caltrops, 3x Blasters (have)
5x Scourges, 4 w/ Haywire Blasters (don’t have)
Razorwing Jetfighter w/ Night Shields (don’t have)
Heavy Support – Ravager w/ 3 Dark Lance, Night shields (don’t have)
That leaves me with 25 points even this lit is even a good idea where should the last points go? Mandrakes? A power sword and an upgrade to arena champion? Some other choices for the court?
And the succubus was going to join the grotesques

Let me try to explain my reasoning regarding the NS.

If you have a NS and 3+ cover total, then whenever you roll 6, 5 or 4, your NS had no effect at all. If you have NS and 3+ cover and you still lose the raider, the NS had no effect at all. The ONLY instance when NS are effective is, when you roll that "3" (or the bonus save number NS gives you) AND it actually saves your vehicle to do its job. However our vehicles are usually targetted by an overkill of shots and the +1 does not have an effect.

At transports, you don care about anything but Stunned, Immobilized and Explodes results. At Ravager, you care, but you do not want to jink it as you want it to shoot, not to be a snapshotting paperweight. However the lower the original save is, the less bonus the NS provides and its less likely to be effective. Improvement from zero to 6+ save is only 16.7% "damage reduction", from 6+ to 5+ its 20%, from 5+ to 4+ its 25%, from 4+ to 3+ its 33%. So... you are paying about 25% of the Raider's cost for a defensive bonus that will actually help you in any reasonable way in roughly 1 game out of 2 or 3. I did the calculations some months back in fact.

Its better on Ravager as its only little more than 15% of its cost, but it has the same problem with the probability of being actually effective.

As for your next iteration of the list - I like it more. But I would rather take Wyches for countercharge and Objective Contesting late game instead of Lhamaeans if you want such CC unit.
Mandrakes... CAN be useful, but can be totally useless. I like them actually, but not in shooty lists. Save points on NSs, mandrakes and put in Trueborn with Venom and 3-4 blasters to DS them into the back of his armour.

but what about the night shields on the raiders with the splinter racks and 10 troops i mean you protecting the troops along with the raider 15/165 seems like it would be worth it right? i looked at the wyches but it seems like the Lhamaeans would do a better job against things with a higher toughness and the save is 5 vs 6 but you lose the invunrable save i guess you lose combat drugs too. what about incubi or sslyth would they be better? or just go with the wyches?

You have a lot of shooting against higher toughness and it has AP too.
In all honesty, trying to make Wyches, Incubi or Sslyth or even Lhamaean work out of the blue is a tough task. They are not easy to handle and most people do not take them and see them as inferior. You might want to add more Reavers instead. They are fast, they shoot, they are tough compared to the rest of the army and they can kill both Tanks and Infantry and even kill hordes reasonably well.

As for the NS protecting the SR warriors. Dunno. Its way too many points in a single unit and its output is not exactly great. You also made a 55pts raider into a 85pts raider... Its not my style, but heey, try it out if you like it.

So after revaluating what aurynn said I switched it up and just added another unit of grotesques and more troops. I guess they have to focus on something and then that gives me other things to do work with.  maybe the troops should just be venoms with 5 guys each. And maybe 2 large hq’s is wrong? I just really like the succubus and I didn’t want my grotesques just losing a guy and running off the board.

Army composition 1496/1500
HQ - Succubus w/ Archite Glave, Armor of misery, Haywire grenade (don’t have)
Troops – 3x (10x K – Warriors; Raider w/ Splinter racks) (have)
Fast Attack – 6x Reavers w/ 2x cluster caltrops, 2x Blasters (have)
5x Scourges, 4 w/ Haywire Blasters (don’t have)
Razorwing Jetfighter (don’t have)
Heavy Support – Ravager w/ 3 Dark Lance (don’t have)
Formation - Grotesquerie
-Haemonculus w/ flesh gauntlet (don’t have)
-2x (3x Grotesques; Raider w/ Aethersails) (don’t have)

the succubus was going to join the one of the grotesques and the Haemonculus with the other

I think it looks like a good army to start playing with. It will first seem like a mess as it has very varied elements.

Only one thing remains - The Haemi and Grots should go in a Grotesquerie formation. Its great.

yea that was the idea since i added the other set of the Grotesques and we lack cc options that are good. is it wise to have only 1496 of 1500 points used? i feel like i am wasting points

That changes the structure tho. They shouldn't be listed as HQ and Elite options for the CAD the . They should be a separate line item called Grotesquerie just like your last attempt.

As for the price. It's the nature of the beast. When unit size and cost aren't multiples of 5 this happens. Scatbike lists that don't also take warp spiders or certain numbers have the same problem.

fixed the layout

BizarreShowbiz wrote:

You may have 1 hp more and 3+ cover save, but by being forced to stand 12" away of the enemy to shoot properly, you expose yourself to a lot more weapons that the venom that srands 36" away from the enemy, plus, you get into standard assault range of any unit in the game, what means something as silly as a tactical squad can bring the raider down, as it has no flickerfield like the venom.

Sadly, gunboats just doesnt hold up to venoms in any shape or form. And this is not theoryhammer, I tested them thoroughly when the codex dropped and never gave me good results.

My experience was obviously a bit different to yours.

I don't recommend sitting at 12" regularly. I would suggest aiming for 18-24" generally, and if you can destroy the target completely (including with other units) moving into rapid fire range. I would say I found maybe half the time, I was happy to be within 12" and the rest of the time, I was sitting back further.

It worked well for me, but your mileage may vary. I had worse experiences with Venoms and drop pod based lists, and losing way too much due to the inherent fragility of Venoms.