1850 Battalion

Hey people, currently building my dark eldar army so thought I'd give an update for what I was thinking of for 8th edition and get some feedback.

Battalion detachment

HQ

Archon, agonier and blast pistol 68pts

Succubus, blast pitol 82pts (Grave lotus)

Troops

5 kalabite warriors, sybarite w phantasm frenade launcher 38pts

5 kalabite warriors, sybarite w phantasm grenade launcher 38pts

10 kalabite warriors, splinter cannon, sybarite w phantasm grenade launcher 88pts

10 kalabite warriors, splinter cannon, sybarite w phantasm grenade launcher 88pts

elites

5 incubi inc klaivex 90pts

Fast attack

6 reavers, 2x grav talon, arena champion w agoniser 194 (Adrenalight)

5 scourges 4x dark lance inc solarite 150pts

5 scourges 4x blasters inc solarite 130pts

Heavy support

Ravager, 3x dark lance 155pts

Flyer

Voidraven 160pts

Dedicated Transport

Raider, disintegrator cannon and shock prow 126pts

Raider, disintegrator cannon and shock prow 126pts

Raider, disintegrator cannon and shock prow 126pts

Venom, 2x Splinter cannon 95

Venom, 2x Splinter cannon 95

Total 1849

Oopse just noticed I made a mistake the voidraven is 169 points not 160 so drop one of the disentegrator cannons for a dark lance on one of the raiders

I like the list but I feel like you're a little bit light on anti tank. This list screams that it wants to get within 12" early to get the gunboats doing as much damage as possible, so I would drop the splinter cannons on the 10 man's and the cannons on the Venoms and add blasters to all your warrior squads. At 12" you're only losing 2 shots over all on the Venom and 6 shots on the bigger boats. That 6 shots might sound like a lot, but it's about 1.3 wounds lost against GEQ on average and 2/3 of a wound lost against MEQ. As split fire is a thing now having those extra blasters are going to help a lot, especially considering the fact that you can wound wrap them with impunity now as well.

The only thing I will say about the 10 man squad is that moral hurts now. Whilst the leadership buff from the Archon can help to mitigate it, it can still be quite painful. Not saying to drop them or anything, I still feel 10 man squads have their place and the added dakka they provide is certainly nice, but if you took the kabalites this way to pick up the cannon it's something to keep in mind.

Another thing to consider would be dropping the disintegrator cannons on the raiders, as on average against t7 3+ and T8 3+ the lance wins out. This will change if the vehicles you're fighting have an invulnerable save, where the dissies should win out through weight of fire on average. The other side of that though, is that you can use your rerolls on the damage for the dark lances to increase your odds of doing better. Unless you see a lot of TEQ or primaris in your meta, in which case it may well be worth keeping them.

I would also drop the lance Scourges for a Ravager if you access to one. Whilst the extra lance the unit has on the Ravager and the ability to deepstrike is nice, they are much less survivable and when moving or deepstriking they have the same damage output as a Ravager due to the heavy weapons penalty. They're a nice add on IMO and good with Ynnari, but I wouldn't pick them over a Ravager.

To get the 5 points for the ravager from the scourge sqaud I would drop the Agoniser from the reaver squad. Might sound insane, but you're already strength 4 because of bladevanes, which means the Agoniser is losing you wounds over all against GEQ and conscripts and not gaining you much against other targets. These guys shouldn't be assaulting t5 where the Agoniser is best anyway, you should be mowing it off the table with the 80+ splinter shots you have.

With the 20 points saved from the dissies (should you choose to drop them) you could go one of three ways;

1. Buy Agonisers for the warrior's and a PGL for the Archon. This list is going to be up close and personal, if your gunboats get assaulted the men inside can't shoot if the Raider falls back, which means the best way for you to hurt them is going to be in Close combat. The Archon is the best place for a PGL because he hits on 2s.

2. Find 5 points and change out the Blaster Scourges for another Ravager. Similar reasoning to the lance Scourges and their survivability. This isn't a 100% drop them as Blaster scourge seem quite effective, but it's something to keep in mind.

3. Find 5 points and add missiles to the Voidraven. Generally after you hit your target with the bomb (especially the right kind of target, like big Harlequin troupes, 10 man MEQ or TEQ) the Voidraven will be hit with an absolutely ungodly and unwarranted amount of firepower, but if your opponent is smart enough to realise it can only do that once and not give in to the need to retaliate missiles can be a nice bonus that keeps it's fairly effective.

Speaking of the Voidraven, I would recommend using the Scythes for this list. There seems to be a general consensus that the fire power makes these out and out better than the void lances, but maneuverability is a big factor with the planes and the extra range softens this. I would still pick scythes here IMO as you lack a great surplus of anti tank. Just be careful with your positioning, work out what you want to target before you deploy and position the Voidraven carefully and preferably after your opponent puts down his juiciest target. If they're smart they'll place their drops around this, but even hitting a tank or big monster to finish it with the raven is worthwhile.

Hope this helps!

Thanks for that. There are allot of TEQ and primaris in the group I play in hence the dissies. I've already built my venoms with dual splinter cannons and I'm not confident with ripping them of.. I'll be taking most of the rest of your advice though, the only thing is I would like to keep 1 squad of the scourge (I love the models) if you were to take scourge in stoke format how would it be?

Honestly I'm the most happy with Scourges when they're stock. You aren't losing anything essential if they die and for 70 pts you get a very mobile unit that you can hold in reserve to come in on backfield objectives up to turn 3, which is definitely helpful. I actually made a small edit and said that I also do like the Blaster Scourges because I didn't think that was clear. If your group is WSYWIG orientated I understand not dropping them, but as you already have special weapons in the squads it would be easy to proxy and it's almost unnoticeable on the Venoms IMO.

if you want dakka gunboats, 5 Kabbies in a venom w/one blaster and no extra sc has 20 shots, the same as a gunboat. scourge are also good dakka, the most point efficient we have.

Keep the Blaster scourges. They have a different usage from Ravagers and who really wants to run with only 3 models x a million when we finally have some options (after like 3 editions) The Dark lance scourges though you should consider turning into a Ravager as suggested.

If you know you're facing off against lots of Teqs and Marines Mk. 2 then even consider dropping a Gunboat for a second Voidraven with Scythes.

Otherwise you've been given some good advice and it should work out well. Maybe consider +1T on the bikes over 1A and use them to tarpit. Especially if you're dropping Agonisers. T5 multi wound models are going to be a staple this edition, probably.

Finally gt the time to sit down and revise my list with all the advice you guys have given me. So here's my new list:

Battalion Detachment 1846pts

HQ
Archon Agoniser, Blast Pistol, Phantasm Grenade Launcher 71

Succubus Blast Pistol 82 [Grave lotus or adrenalight]

Troops

5 Kabalite Warrior, Sybarite w Phantasm Grenade Launcher 38

5 Kabalite Warrior, Sybarite w Phantasm Grenade Launcher 38

10 Kabalite Warrior, Blaster, Sybarite w Agoniser and Phantasm Grenade Launcher 92

10 Kabalite Warrior, Blaster, Sybarite w Agoniser and Phantasm Grenade Launcher 92

Elites

5 Incubi inc Klaivex 90

Fast Attack

6 Reavers inc Arena Champion, 2x Grav-Talon 190 [Painbringer]

5 Scourges, 4x blasters, Solarite 130

Heavy Support

Ravager, dark lances 155

Ravager, dark lances 155

Flyer

Voidraven Two dark scythes, Voidraven Missiles 185

Dedicated Transport

Raider, Disintegrator cannon, Shock Prow 126pts

Raider, Disintegrator cannon, Shock Prow 126

Raider, Dark Lance, Shock Prow 116

Venom, splinter cannon/twin splinter rifle 80

Venom, splinter cannon/twin splinter rifle 80

Now that IMO, looks a fair bit better. I put you at 5 points over however, as I believe you've forgot to add the extra 9 points for the Voidraven again. You could get this back by dropping some PGLs, possibly from the venom squads?

Another thing to keep in mind, don't shy away from giving the Reavers +1 attack. 19 attacks with bladevanes is no joke and against horde armies this can be more useful than the toughness, especially against conscript spam. The conscripts wound you on a 5+ at T4 anyway and anything else other than heavy bolters or heavy flamers was wounding you on a 3+ at t5 as well.

Otherwise I think this is good improvement. Just be wary about getting your 10 man boats assaulted as mentioned before. They want to get right up in the opponents face, but ideally you don't want to be forced in to CC with them too early, especially before our 2+ to hit kicks in. Definitely try the list out and see how it goes!

That's what I get for trusting battle scribe to have the points right and being too lazy to sit down with a book and a calculator lol. I'll amend it later :-)