simple question on harlequins

is there a reason we dont use harlequins? theyre pretty much rending termies with hit and run? (when in terrain) nmot sure if there is something im missing

It's probably because Incubi/Beasts do the same job plus they are taking the spot of Trueborn.

They are better from the Eldar Codex because they can benefit from Eldar Psychic abilities, where they can't benefit from Power From Pain.

Also they only move 6", which is pretty slow for us but consider fast by Eldar Players because they don't know any better

I tried to get this discussion going on 40ko, but without much luck. I've stuck my draft analysis of them below (for eventual inclusion in a later edition of my unit guide). As the topic's been raised, would anyone care to comment on my thoughts?

HARLEQUINS
Strengths: High WS, access to rending weapons, ignore difficult terrain, can hit and run.
Weaknesses: Expensive, fragile, have to pay extra for grenades, no transport, don’t get power from pain.
Upgrades:

• Harlequin’s Kiss. For a few points, you can make your attacks rending. This is well worth it against almost all opponents, but makes your Harlie cost as much as an Incubus.
  
• Fusion Pistol. Like the Blast Pistol, you have to get very close to use this, so you’re unlikely to make a good return on your points investment.
  
• Shadowseer. Expensive, but almost essential. Stealth and shrouded (from the Veil of Tears, see FAQ v1.1, page 2, left column) do a lot to mitigate for your fragility as long as you’re in cover. And the Hallucinogen Grenades allow you to assault through difficult terrain without being hacked apart before you can strike. (Although Harlequins ignore difficult terrain, they still strike at I1 if they charge through it without grenades. See FAQ v1a, page 3, right column.)
  
• Death Jester. Carries a shuriken cannon which pins, but sacrifices his extra cc attack (from 2 weapons) to do so. Not essential, but can deliver a useful effect.
  
• Troupe Master. Standard character buff. You probably don’t need the extra A and Ld, but a power weapon in the squad could come in handy, particularly if you give him a power lance to use during his furious charge.

How to use: The following table compares Harlequins to a couple of our other cc specialists. These stats are worked out for individual models on the charge. Harlequins do significantly worse in subsequent rounds, because they lose the advantage of their furious charge.

Model	vs MEQ	vs TEQ	vs GEQ	vs MC
Harlequin	0.444	0.222	1.185	0.111
Harlequin with Kiss	0.741	0.444	1.333	0.333
Incubus	1.000	0.667	1.333	0.250
Bloodbride (no drugs)	0.222	0.111	0.889	-
Wrack	0.250	0.125	1.000	0.250

The problem with Harlequins is that, without a kiss, they lack bite against armoured opponents. With kisses, they are not as good as Incubi (if your opponent is wearing any armour), but cost the same. The one (almost unique) thing that really sets them apart in the DE list is the ability to hit-and-run. This should always be used if you are in combat at the end of the opponent’s turn: there is no disadvantage to failing the initiative test, and if you pass you can move on to another target or go back in for your previous opponent ... with another Furious Charge!
The next problem is, how to deploy them. They cannot buy a Dedicated Transport, so if you want them to ride you need to buy a static unit and do a transport swap in turn 1. They can deploy from a WWP, but suffer the same problem as everyone else – they can’t charge the turn they arrive. Nevertheless, if you buy a Shadowseer they should be able to run into cover and get a great save while they wait.
Where Harlequins do excel is on tables with very dense terrain (Cities of Death themed, for example). Here their flip-belts let them move freely whilst a Shadowseer buffs their cover save to awesome levels. If you want to use Harlequins, try this build: 6 Harlequins with Kisses +Shadowseer [180].

Harlequins have a place in the Dark Edlar Codex. I think where people go wrong is comparing them to incubi, and seeing the fact that they do not having a transport as a disadvantage.

Not having and more importantly not needing a transport is their biggest advantage. Incubi might come with a raider/venom but that transport is the first thing your opponent is going to target, and it will not survive a turn of shooting. Where does this leave your incubi? Stranded and exposed. Harlequins on the other hand get a 2+ cover save for being in any form of cover, whether this is screening them with some reavers, or running through a forest. This makes them an unappealing target as considerable fire-power need to be used to take them down. Combine this with being able to re-roll their run dice (thanks to fleet) and ignoring terrain and they can cover ground quickly and reliably, easily darting from cover to cover.

The other thing people forget when doing their harlequin/incubi comparison, is that the shadow seer gives the whole unit offensive grenades, another hidden cost that incubi have.

When you take into account the cost of a transport and grenades, harlequins are considerably cheaper, sure they have to get a shadowseer, but again the seer is about a third of the price (30 vs 60+25+archon).

As for weapon options, Shadows Revenge and I did some maths-hammer in chat concerning the troop master and kisses.

5 harlequins with kisses, shadow seer - 140
5 harlequins with troop master (spear), shadow seer - 140

Against MEQ assuming they get the charge they will both do 5.18 wounds over two rounds of combat.

The advantage of the troops master, is LD10, precision strike, challenges and casualties having a lot less effect on the overall damage of the unit. So worth considering as you are likely to take casualties on the way to combat, why spend points on kisses that won't see use?

But what purpose do Harlequins serve in a Dark Eldar army?

They can give hit and run and stealth/shrouding to our characters. This makes them fantastic unit for getting your archon into combat, and hit and run means you can bounce around to wherever you are needed (and gives you huge mobility.

A perfect example of this is the Huskblade archon, once he has got his first soul, his unit is often exposed, transport-less and stranded or surrounded by chaff units. With harlequins you don't suffer this problem as firstly you have a nice cover save when you come out of combat, secondly you can use chaff units to propel you around the table with hit and run. They also have fantastic synergy with a succubus as she can tank low strength hits with a her 4++ save and FNP when she gets it, they also give her hit and run which ties in really well with a power spear.

Another great use for harlequins is as WWP vanguard, though they benefit more from being joined by an archon (with portal as they don't lose fleet and serve as an effective bodyguard).

Here some squads I would consider:

Note that in the below squads you can sprinkle kisses to taste, remember you are going to take some casualties before reaching the enemy so never max out on them.

5 harlequins with troop master (spear), shadow seer - 140

A small manoeuvrable assault/counter assault unit that despite it's size still packs a punch. Five is a nice number as it means you need to take two casualties to force a leadership test.

8 harlequins with troop master (power spear), shadow seer - 194

Perfect for accompanying any of our independent characters, here are some suggestions (meaning 9 models again good for leadership tests):

Succubus, power spear - 80
Archon, Husk, Trap, Shadow Field - 135
Archon, power spear, shadow field, WWP - 140
Archon, venom blade, shadow field, WWP - 130

The main advantage of the archon is being able to take a portal or getting the most out of the Husktrap thanks to the added mobility and survivability granted by the Harlequins.

The thing you need to watch out for in 6th is precision shot (not that much of a problem with a 2+ cover save) and precision strike (more of a problem as the shadowseer only has a 5++ in CC) as they can take out your seer. The positioning of your seer is also crucial for the squads survival.

Hope that helps.

Mushkilla wrote:

As for weapon options, Shadows Revenge and I did some maths-hammer in chat concerning the troop master and kisses.

5 harlequins with kisses, shadow seer - 140
5 harlequins with troop master (spear), shadow seer - 140

Against MEQ assuming they get the charge they will both do 5.18 wounds over two rounds of combat.

I've not done the mathhammer on it but I would guess that the majority of the second unit's wounds are caused by the Troupe Master? If so, I'd go with the first unit as it is all to easy to remove a character from the equation via challenges. Your point on not maxing out on Kisses is very well taken though. A few cheap (ish) ablative wounds is a good idea whilst still leaving the combat potential of the unit pretty much unchanged.

In the first round the troop master does 2.2 wounds to MEQ. So you will waste some potential if you roll average or above average in a challenge and are fighting a single wound model.

On the other hand the troop master gets precision strike so you can use that to snipe special and heavy weapons. This can works really well with something else I forgot to mention. Because harlequins have such good cover saves, it can often be worth using hit and run on your own turn.

Say there's a squad of marines near by you can jump in a kill a Sargent, a sepcial weapon or an icon bearer and then use hit and run to propel up to 3d6" away, as long as you can get them into terrain they should be fine (remember hit an run lets you move up to the rolled distance and ignores difficult terrain so you have reasonable control of where you will end up).

and remember you can do swap turn 1 to get them in to a transport and to the enemies side of things

The "problem" with DE Harlies is that once you see what an allied eldar unit with a farseer can do, it really just feels like a waste to run them without one. For 100 points they go from "kind of annoying" to a "WTF do I do about this unit?" and you get some pretty awesome psy-defense to go with it (and for another 45 you can doom something at the same time to boost the damage output of all your poison shots). Though you do lose the ability to steal DE transports.

Plus you get access to probably the most strategically useful troops in the game.

Rauky wrote:

and remember you can do swap turn 1 to get them in to a transport and to the enemies side of things

The thing is if you put them in transport they don't get a cover save against the vehicle explosion so it would be very risky.

Judging them for what they are they seem like a utility melee unit for us. They have rending for termiies/marines, fusion for tanks, more attacks than incubi for bigger units. They arguably have the best survivability of the army with the ss as well. Also they have an invuln making them more valuable than incubi for power weapons attacking back. A squad of 6 is golden.

Think of it this way: the cost of losing them always is worth the firepower the enemy wastes to kill them. I choose them over incubi quite a bit actually!

i think that i will need to look at the eldar codex befor i make a list around them but i like the idea of them

I remember that there was some discussion a while ago, maby not on this forum but some other place, abut the transport of them... That we could have them in the Dias with vect?

I'm pretty sure they cannot take a transport of any kind. Eldar or DE

Well not sure, they just cant take a dedicated transport... but DoD says it needs to take 9 models... Now I dont got the book infront of me tho so cant confirm that I am 100% correct on this, but if so then they should be able...

DE harleis can certainly start in the Dais, but it's of pretty limited used (unless you know many opponents that will move forward into assault range of Vect and 9 harlies on their T1).

Just steal another transport on your first turn and move/sails/flat-out 32-42"

the Dias just says he needs to start in there with 9 models, it doesnt say which models (so yes, harlies can hop a ride with the original P.I.M.P.)

As for how to field harlies, I think both the DE and CWE have their pros and cons. CWE gets access to great psy powers, while DE can actually all get kisses (Im looking at you CWE Death Jester) And have access to open topped transports (although why you would ever want to put harlies in a transport is beyond me... they are allergic to explosions)

the problem is that most tables don't have alot of cover

Rauky wrote:

the problem is that most tables don't have alot of cover

Why? The rules for deploying terrain mean there should be at least 1-3 pieces of terrain per 2"x2" square. Each of these pieces should be what the rule book describes as "substantial".

Quote :

Each 'piece' of terrain should be a single substantial element (such as a building, forest or
ruin) or a cluster of up to three smaller pieces of terrain (such asbatdefield debris). - BRB page 120

As for tournaments you might not always get LoS blocking terrain but you will still get a 1-2 pieces of area terrain in each quarter and a central terrain feature of some kind.

So there is no reason why terrain should be a problem.

Shadows Revenge wrote:

while DE can actually all get kisses (Im looking at you CWE Death Jester)

They actually fixed that in the latest DE FAQ. It's in the Amendments section I think, now nobody's Death Jesters get Kisses.

Would a Unit harlequins with the Archon lose it's ignore tarrain movement?

I believe so or at least he would not gain the benefits of the rule.

So he would "walk" 2 D6 choose the highest and the rest of the unit 6" inside terrain? Is that ok with the rules? Or do they all have to move 2 D6 choose the highest?

would a squad of 6 Harlies (Seer and Troupe Master) be a cost-effective method for butchering all comers?

Harlequins really do need a Farseer for Fortune and Doom to be really effective.