8th Edition Drukhari

I was mainly just wondering how everybody has been finding 8th edition for the Drukhari/Dark Eldar in their various gaming groups. I play in a relatively small group at a university, so our games are more casual than competitive, and so far my games have gone fairly well for me, but my opponents can sometimes get very frustrated with army and it's damage output (particularly our primaris player). So how have your opponents reacted to the army? Have you ever seen a need to time down lists slightly for those in more casual environments? And do you still feel that the army is actually fun to use?

It is way better and more fun than in 7th edition. More options are viable (see eg. RWJF, Mandrakes, Incubi...). Customization options were lost, unfortunately, but some interesting ones exist e.g. PGL or not. The army has worked out well and because 7e taught me to play hard, I win with it far more than lose, even vs good armies. This has changed from 7e where it always felt desperate with mono DE going vs serious lists. I play with a group of friends, most have played since 3rd and 5th edition and play "competitive" lists e.g. Guilliman + an unkindness of Storm Ravens is acceptable. We discuss how competitive we want to be and what is allowed before games, this has not been an issue and DE feels evenly balanced. Although vs IG I feel genuinely underpowered.

It is frustrating to read all the negative commentary here when things are so much better. Can't wait for the codex though, let's hope for more options like we wanted in our letter

I've been enjoying 8th edition a lot, even if I've not been having much luck in winning games. I chalk most of that up to my local meta (I've been exclusively playing against hordes of Guard, Orks and Tyranids) and my general terribleness as a player, so I've been feeling like the Dark Eldar as a whole are in a mostly okay spot.

I love 8th.

Everyone fears my lances. I play wyches and mandrakes which is really fun. I’ve also found rwf to still be worth taking as screens and for taking on guard.

I don’t win a lot, but I placed well at that one tourny due to good pairings. Poison is still really great vs big monsters even if it isn’t as good as 7th

Been playing mainly versus one opponent (space wolves) and I won most games, with roughly half games I slaughtered them, the other rather tied.

Played with either kab warriors and wyches (wich I found decent this edition) and beasts and mandrakes.

I got almost all DE units (even if in small quantities) and they are really fun to play.
Hit hard, die fast (even if I had some happy surprise with 6+++) and 8th edition is really more fluent.

I'm testing lots of combinaison and they are really fun ^^

Well... They've been doing pretty well for me, though not reliably. I'm seeing a lot of GT lists. They're very difficult for Drukhari to deal with. Mainly because of the synergy other armies have, eg. auras and such. I haven't been able to handle the dark lances simply missing or not wounding while my opponent rerolls practically everything. I also almost always go second. People have lists with like 3-5 drops at 2000 points. With half of them in reserve. Ugh.

I've been trying wych cult and coven. They're not working so well though. Just not enough damage output. Kabal is fairing much better.

New militarum armoured lists are rough! Yeah, I have like 20 lances. But when the leman russ outnumber my vehicles 2 to 1 I have an issue lol. They have too much firepower and they get to drop first because of the tank squads.

1/4 to 1/2 of my army is destroyed first turn in most games against GT lists. Against more fun non-GT no LoW lists I have a lot more success. Including with the Coven lists. The Zombie Jamborie is a lot of fun!

I find poison somewhat useful against Mortarion, except that it's difficult to get it close enough in enough volume and then survive more than 1 turn.

Smite wrecks.

I miss 5th ed

So far, I've won the majority of the 8th edition games that I've played.

Of the few that I've lost, the only one that was heavily in my opponent's favor from beginning to end was vs. an Alpha Legion + Horror Spam list, and that one could have gone my way if I had gotten the first turn (the tourney was using the upcoming CA first turn rules, so there was a roll-off; if we were sticking with current rules, then I would have gotten 1st turn)... granted, any meta where there are games that are won/lost pretty much entirely based on who gets first turn *is* a bit problematic. Though, really, it came down to my opponent's access to Alpha Legion stratagems. Presumably, when the DE codex comes out, we'll have similar tricks.

8th is really fun in general, i love 8th (tho no games are going to be as fun as my 7th Corsairs... and no i didnt take OP lists, i took move>shoot>move>dsing wwp's style lists).

I started DE heavily at the start of 8th and found they are basically a 1 trick pony, so i moved to Harlequins where i have a lot more tactics i can play with.

7th Corsairs were amazing. So many fluffy customization options. Can only hope we will see something like that again.

For my last game of 7th I played corsairs with 2 Fleet Raiding Companies, with 2 Corsair Princes, both with the Wielder of Profane Powers background, both specializing in Malefic Daemonology. Needless to say, both caught the eye of Slaanesh, and one had become a hostile daemon by T3... but I also had a bunch of daemons on my side. Now that was a game to remember.

RIP Corsairs. There's something genuinely bad about 8e. I wonder if they will get to be a faction in 8th at some point.

Yeah.... 7th Corsairs was the most fun i think i'll ever have in 40k every again.

My last game ( i did a small bat rep on it like a year ago on this site) was against my friend (super smart/good player).

He was White Scares (Rhino 5man Spam with Plasma and Land Speeders, movement shenanigans).

It was the most intense game every, 7hrs for 3 turns, but ever moment was the greatest moment... I'm just glad that was my last game, i will remember that game till i die.


The game basically was:
He would move > get out of rhink shoot > get back in, move some speeds around to better position.
I would move out of cover get close enough to shoot my 5man unit 2 fusion guns, then reckless back a bit, then assault move back into cover (x6 Reavers and x2 balestrikes units) then my 2 Hornets and 1 Warp hunter would do their thing.

It was this insane chess game of i move to out position, but get my self in a good spot, then he would move and out move me, and it repeat. Just so fun.

At the end of turn 3, start of 4, we both only lost about a couple units and had a few units hurt. We called it a draw and cleaned up b.c it was 2am.


When Forge World release the Index, i sent them my feelings on it (how much i loved Corsairs and how much joy they brought) and a copy of the bat rep. They sent me back "Maybe in a year or 2 we can do that"............

I've really enjoyed 8th thus far. I've won most of the games I've played at the local store and against friends at the house. Watching the CWE release has got me pumped for our codex whenever it eventually arrives.

Currently, I'm waiting on the Nids book to see how I want to expand them with the GSC I picked up last edition.

We have 4 Nid players at my local (i'm one of them) it will be a Nidfest this next few months for me lol.

Will for sure let you know, i might make some reports/stats on them when it is out if you like.

I have something like 15k points of Nids.

That would be really cool. I picked up some Nids after 8th dropped by getting rid of the marines and the DG and haven't done much with them yet as making a workable force of both nids/GSC is weird since I want to keep some mich coming in reserve. I haven't even built the second hive tyrant I have.

I've got around 2k of GSC but, I was running a calcavade last edition and leman russes, chimera, and sentinels don't really work the way they did in 7th. So I want to take out the tanks and add more space bugs.

Scout Sentinels? B.c those are good still.
But yeah i'll be going through the dex for sure. most likely post some thing about it.

8th is amazing and as a long time DE player it's a welcome change. My games are going great and I have two BR's written up recently if you ever want to check them out. I've not had anyone complain as such about how much damage I'm able to put out, though one friend is in shock of my damage output. A friend is currently building a Primaris army, though he can be a bit sour in past experiences, I have warned him about the damage DE can put out so easily.

EDIT*

The army has always been fun for me, from 5th (codex, can't remember exact edition when I started again) all the way to 8th. They've been my absolute favourite even going back to when I first started Warhammer 40K back in 2004 for 3-4 years, left for 4-5 years and re-started 2011/2012. I've played Marines, Guard, 'Nids, Tau, Necrons, Chaos, Eldar, Inquisition, Grey Knights, Scions, Corsairs. The lot basically. I've ditched every army now bar DE, starting Death Guard as I've never done them and decided to go halves on the Dark Imperium recently with aforementioned Primaris player.

Primaris is one of Drukhari's best matchups. Too many points sunk into Dark Lance targets. Especially those Repulsors. Some do only splash reserve Inceptors, and those HURT.

I'm wondering how people have been fairing specifically against resilient armies in numbers. Like Deathguard and Necrons. Or against armies with large amounts of reserves. Like nine Tallarn leman russ coming in behind you. Or Elysian/Tempestus. I don't even seem to have a chance to hurt those armies.

I've also been having trouble against a marine heavy Raven Guard army.

Guard have been no issue so far for me, only game I lost against them was with a Talos army for fun. I've written a better list for him, shall be playing him later. Catachan spearhead for his Russ' and Cadian for his troops then plus a Stormlord.

URIEN wrote:

8th is amazing and as a long time DE player it's a welcome change. My games are going great and I have two BR's written up recently if you ever want to check them out. I've not had anyone complain as such about how much damage I'm able to put out, though one friend is in shock of my damage output. A friend is currently building a Primaris army, though he can be a bit sour in past experiences, I have warned him about the damage DE can put out so easily.

EDIT*

The army has always been fun for me, from 5th (codex, can't remember exact edition when I started again) all the way to 8th. They've been my absolute favourite even going back to when I first started Warhammer 40K back in 2004 for 3-4 years, left for 4-5 years and re-started 2011/2012. I've played Marines, Guard, 'Nids, Tau, Necrons, Chaos, Eldar, Inquisition, Grey Knights, Scions, Corsairs. The lot basically. I've ditched every army now bar DE, starting Death Guard as I've never done them and decided to go halves on the Dark Imperium recently with aforementioned Primaris player.

I love 5th ed de codex, i still look at the book and dream of what future codex's could have had if not for chapter house

3rd & 5th codexes are my favorite, 3rd for fluff & characters, 5th for everything else ^^

amishprn86 wrote:

URIEN wrote:

8th is amazing and as a long time DE player it's a welcome change. My games are going great and I have two BR's written up recently if you ever want to check them out. I've not had anyone complain as such about how much damage I'm able to put out, though one friend is in shock of my damage output. A friend is currently building a Primaris army, though he can be a bit sour in past experiences, I have warned him about the damage DE can put out so easily.

EDIT*

The army has always been fun for me, from 5th (codex, can't remember exact edition when I started again) all the way to 8th. They've been my absolute favourite even going back to when I first started Warhammer 40K back in 2004 for 3-4 years, left for 4-5 years and re-started 2011/2012. I've played Marines, Guard, 'Nids, Tau, Necrons, Chaos, Eldar, Inquisition, Grey Knights, Scions, Corsairs. The lot basically. I've ditched every army now bar DE, starting Death Guard as I've never done them and decided to go halves on the Dark Imperium recently with aforementioned Primaris player.

I love 5th ed de codex, i still look at the book and dream of what future codex's could have had if not for chapter house

The 5th and 7th codex were great for me, 5th being my favourite. The lore in the two was great whereas some things in the 3rd, like Mandrakes, I'm glad have changed. The 3rd ed' had some amazingly cool rules, such as Grotesques not being hurt by any shooting unless it's double their toughness. Granted if I wanted that now it'd have to go off their current toughness instead of double, considering their toughness is 2 even 3 higher with a Haem' around.

It really annoys me that there is a dispute over Vect, especially since GW did have a model for him in the past...

@Urien : yup, and also the better rules for beasts & archon court.

I miss Clawed fiends gaining an attack per wound lost, and RWF rending..

Ahh yes I remember that one, never ran a beast pack though it's something I will do one day.

when 6th came out and you could play 5th ed codex with 6th ed Eldar (allies) you could have a insane Beastpack army with the Baron, Corsair Prince and Farseer.

Was the best Beastpacks EVER!

Didn't play CWE at that time, but never a combination I thought of. Though I wanted to run pure DE and prove I didn't need no CWE help

amishprn86 wrote:

when 6th came out and you could play 5th ed codex with 6th ed Eldar (allies) you could have a insane Beastpack army with the Baron, Corsair Prince and Farseer.

Was the best Beastpacks EVER!

Yep, I used Baron, a Jetseer with Shard of Anaris (for Fearless), some Beastmasters to absorb challenges and a bunch of Khymerae and Razorwing Flocks. They were absolutely awesome for damage dealing, tanking and board control. My absolute favourite Deathstar ever!