Dark Eldar Raid Porvoo

Since my Blood Angels Jumper army is doing Hakkapeliitta thing in Poland ESC I had a chance to go to a small local tournament with my DE for the first time. The drive there was a good 30 minutes of listening Blind Guardian very loud to clear everything out of my mind.

My list was focused on shooty MSU type of play while still having big beast star to screw enemy objective campers and target priority.

Heamonculus
10 Warriors, Raider, Splinter racks
5 Warriors, Blaster, Raider
5 Warriors, Blaster, dual Splinter cannon Venom
3 Wracks, Splinter cannon Venom
3 Wracks, Splinter cannon Venom
3 Beats masters, 4 Khymera, 4 Razorwing flock
Ravager
Ravager

My first game (Purge the alien) was against Mikko a new player with Codex Marines. Even though I had bad luck with the dice I was able to clear his whole army of the board with my shooting and beast masters.

Second game (Crusade 4 obj.) was much tighter spot: experienced player with Necron list that included 6 Wraiths with a lord, 5 immortals, 2 sets of 5 warriors in a Night scythe and a Doom Scythe. Last time I played Against Roni we were both playing BA and he took a narrow win. I had nothing really to counter the flyers except my mobility. He won the roll off and got to go first and I failed to seize. Wraiths deployed on the very front and came at me very fast. Then I got lucky on my turn and managed to kill the lord and weaken the wraith enough that I could charge them with the beast and negate as much as possible the effect of whip coils. It worked and by his T2 my beasts had killed the whole wraith unit.



As a wet towel to his face his Doom scythe stayed in reserves until T4 and I had majority of my skimmers maneuvered to negate the damage it can do. While I was not able to kill destroy his scythes except one tesla from a Night scythe I was able to kill all his troops while they tried to crab the objectives. The game ended me holding 1 objective to his none. I had the “first blood” and “line breaker” while we both had the “slay the warlord”. 15-5 for me and a place for the top table in the final round.

And my opponent in a Scourging mission game was Mika with his Chaos marines including Two princes, 1 squad of plague marines, 1 squad of Berserkers in a rhino, 1 squad of chaos marines in a rhino and 2 Obliterators. So, it’s not that scary list to my Dark Eldar.



My dice were on fire for the whole game. First shot with Ravager to his Rhino holding 10 Chaos marines managed to explode the tank and killing 5 marines who the broke and ran of the board. I also wrecked the second Rhino and killed some plague marines. At the end of the T3 he had single berserker left while I had lost the best masters to “Lash trick” and lost one hull point on Venom. Mika won the best painted army which he clearly deserved.

So my first tournament victory even though the competition was not that hard core this time. Good that the ETC was at the same time. I got to collect a reward of 60€ to spend on some new minis. All in all it was easy for me to like the event even though tables had somewhat limited LOS blocking terrain.

I don't know how I missed this! I know it's a bit late but I have to say fantastic report and great pictures! Good to see DE doing well in tournaments.

Did you learn anything from these games? Any advice for other DE players?

Thanks for sharing the pain.

Better late than never Thanks for the comments.

I also did two tournametns afterwards with DE and placed 3rd in the second tournament due to losing a game to orks that had "Conqueror of the Cities" as warlor trate in a very dense ruin city. The Third tournament was a a very competetive event where I was only able to win against "5th edition" mechlists in a non kill point games. Others gave me a serious beating. My luck with the dice was also so bad that even my opponents agreed that it effected the game quite a lot.

I usually start the all the games with empty transports on board and troops in reserve. It helps to negate damage done by exploding vehicles to my troops.

Still not sure about the beasts. In Easy games they make the match even more easy but in difficult games they have not performed that well. I'll try the Reavers next as a distraction unit(s). Although the beast have a very large foot print which helps against flyers and deep strike lists.

Vasara wrote:

My luck with the dice was also so bad that even my opponents agreed that it effected the game quite a lot.

There's not much you can do about bad dice.

Vasara wrote:

I usually start the all the games with empty transports on board and troops in reserve. It helps to negate damage done by exploding vehicles to my troops.

Yeah, I have started running my warriors out of their raiders, and trying to minimise the number of turns they spend in those death traps. It actually works out well, people tend to ignore empty raiders, which means they are more likely to be around for a last turn objective grab (warriors jumping in on turn 4 and flying flat out to an objective).

Vasara wrote:

Still not sure about the beasts. In Easy games they make the match even more easy but in difficult games they have not performed that well. I'll try the Reavers next as a distraction unit(s). Although the beast have a very large foot print which helps against flyers and deep strike lists.

The nice thing with beasts is that they draw fire from turn 1. Reavers won't do that, and if they do they won't last long. They are more of a back field harassment unit that can reliably contest and get line breaker (at least in my experience). Their biggest strength is their mobility.

You mentioned you played Blood Angels at tournaments, how do DE play as a tournament army in comparison? Did you notice anything in particular?

Thanks for sharing you experience.

I Still haven't found a build for BA that is able to compete with the best lists. They took a very big hit when edition changed even though they have one of the best flyers in game. Compared to De they are not shooty enough nor have they access to good enouhg assault units. Trying to mass the board with assault marines does not work eather because many list bring so much shooting that the nerfed fnp is not enough to keep them in fight. Its easy to lose 20 asm on T1 before you can make it into cc. And assault marines in non assault vehicles is now a lost cause.

I also find that DE being relatively rare in tournaments nobody designs their lists to beet them compared to power armour. And their capabilities are not known that much wich makes target priorities against DE quite difficult to some of the opponents. Altough if opponent knows what hes doing the games with DE are also quite difficult.

I play regulary against guys who are in the ETC team or trying to get in it so have no lack of capable opponents.

Vasara wrote:

I Still haven't found a build for BA that is able to compete with the best lists. They took a very big hit when edition changed even though they have one of the best flyers in game. Compared to De they are not shooty enough nor have they access to good enouhg assault units. Trying to mass the board with assault marines does not work eather because many list bring so much shooting that the nerfed fnp is not enough to keep them in fight. Its easy to lose 20 asm on T1 before you can make it into cc. And assault marines in non assault vehicles is now a lost cause.

Maybe running a armoured contingent on the board (4-6 preds, 1-2 razors) and running all the jumpers in reserve? Gives you all the advantages of being a mech army against shooting on the first turn or two (no infantry targets), and you get to make the most out of decent of angels deepstriking meltaguns and flamers? Similar to how I run my reavers in reserve and start with only raiders and ravagers on the board, it's been working really well so far. I think reserves are really important this edition, especially now that they come on on a 3+ (not to mention re-roll-able with decent of angels).

Vasara wrote:

I also find that DE being relatively rare in tournaments nobody designs their lists to beet them compared to power armour. And their capabilities are not known that much wich makes target priorities against DE quite difficult to some of the opponents. Altough if opponent knows what hes doing the games with DE are also quite difficult.

The amount of times people have shot my reavers when they should have been shooting my transports or shot my troops when they should have been shooting my reavers is hilarious. That being said DE have always been good at forcing target saturation, as most of our stuff is pretty deadly if left alone.

Vasara wrote:

I play regulary against guys who are in the ETC team or trying to get in it so have no lack of capable opponents.

That good to hear, it makes your advice even more valuable.

Hey, nice to meet a fellow fin here!
Good looking army as well. Havent thought of getting beastmasters, are they any good?

Mushkilla wrote:

Vasara wrote:

I play regulary against guys who are in the ETC team or trying to get in it so have no lack of capable opponents.

That good to hear, it makes your advice even more valuable.

But does it make me a good player? Anyway thanks for the BA list idea. Have to try that one also.

Mngwa wrote:

Hey, nice to meet a fellow fin here! Very Happy
Good looking army as well. Havent thought of getting beastmasters, are they any good?

Hello,
Yeah, the beasts are good. Competing for the top spot in fast slot with reavers.

Vasara wrote:

But does it make me a good player?

Better than me at any rate.

Thanks Mushkilla for resurrecting the thread. I can't believe it got past me.

Vasara kiitos raportista, on piristävää nähdä vähän paikallista toimintaa. Motivoi sitä omien figujen edustus kuntoon laittamista.

Nice! A local battlereport. Haven't played yet in a single 40k tournament, only fantasy. Must look up some tournament and have it as a deadline to get my army fully painted.

What are the most popular armies here locally? GK, IG and Crons?

Good battle report and good colour scheme. I like the neatral grey colour to draw atension to the red. I think you pulled it of nicely. :-)

Here in Helsinki area I have played agains every army, evan a fully painted sisters. Tau are in short suply. Most popular in my gaming group must be GK nowadays. There is only one real IG and several necron and chaos marines and deamons. A good spread of the other armies also.

And we have a good amount of tournaments but most of them are full two days after the advertisment comes to the finnish forums.

Thanks Niiai for the comments. Now I'm aiming for much darker look with my new additions to the army. You'll see it in a new tournament report perhaps next week since I'm going to go to the "Gentlemens tournament" next Sunday. Though I don't expect much success from that tournament looking at the list of participants.

Vasara wrote:

You'll see it in a new tournament report perhaps next week since I'm going to go to the "Gentlemens tournament" next Sunday.

Look forward to it.