Finally giving in to my darkest desires...

Hello, guys and gals. I'm oneIprimate -- and I've finally decided to give in and join the ranks of the Eldar's superior dark cousins. I've been playing Warhammer 40,000 on and off since about 2006. Ever since I was introduced to the hobby and its fluff, I've found myself drawn to the army that we all know and love, yet never took the plunge and started a DE collection. I didn't know anyone in my area who played them, and the GW employees who I asked strongly encouraged me to pay more attention to the various Space Marine armies, rather than try my hand at the 'extremely unforgiving' play-style of the Dark Eldar.

Well, years have passed since I bought my first Warhammer miniatures, and since then, I've played Grey Knights (Daemonhunters back then), Space Marines, Orks, Blood Angels (the White Dwarf version), and Necrons. Somehow, after all those years, I still found myself somewhat intimidated by the Dark Eldar. I had built them up in my mind as an army that I could never play successfully -- they were shrouded in mystery for me, mainly because I've not only never played with them -- I've never even seen them played.

That's right, folks. I've never even played against Dark Eldar. Sure, I live in Memphis -- home of the largest GW store in North America (I think... the Battle Bunker is pretty huge), but I play mostly with friends on our own tables, or at independent hobby stores -- and Dark Eldar aren't exactly the most popular army.

That brings us to now. I've been growing my Necron army bit by bit over the past 3 months or so, and while I do very much enjoy the play-style of the robotic menace, the models leave so much to be desired for my taste. I find myself longing for the days where I was truly excited to sit down and put paint on some minis -- days that I haven't really had since I stopped playing my WHFB Wood Elves several years ago. Once I realized that all I really wanted was an army that I was inspired to put together, customize, and paint, I got out of bed and rushed down to the hobby shop. It was about 30 minutes after closing, but I knew there would still be some guys up there playing. Thankfully, I was barely able to get in and buy myself the newest codex, a box of Wyches, and a Raider box. It seemed fate had led me to this point.

I've been going through the codex the past few days, and I've got to say, it's like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders. I feel like I've finally cast aside the stupid preconceptions I had about how painful games with Dark Eldar would be. I don't care if I get curb-stomped, to be honest -- I really like this army. The aesthetics. The fluff. The torture, and the drugs. It's all great, and I know I'm going to be having fun playing with these guys, no matter what's actually happening to them on the board.

Well, I believe I've been way too long-winded for a brief introduction. If you've read this far, let me simply say that I'm glad to be a part of this community, and that it brings me a lot of joy to see that there are finally other people who I can talk to about this army -- people who I hope to learn from when it comes to in-game tactics and strategy, as well as people who I can bounce ideas off of for painting and fluff ideas.

I'm oneIprimate. Nice to meet you all.

Is this a...bad time to mention...DE are very unforgiving?

Hehe. Nooooo, really?

Yeah, I've kind of come to grips with that. I took beating after beating with Wood Elves back when I played fantasy, but I never really got bent out of shape with the losses, because my army always looked great while getting slaughtered by my opponent's very poorly painted Bretonnians. They died a lot, but damn they looked good doing it.

Right now I'm bouncing around paint schemes in my head, and I think I'd like to go for something that features purple heavily. The Wych with blue hair on pg 72 of the codex looks amazing to me -- along with the 'Helliarch of the Sky Devils' model at the bottom of pg 75. I always hated the Dark Eldar models because they had too much hair waving around -- but I think that's just because I dislike the bright red hair that GW used on many of their showcase models back in the day. The blue hair actually makes me like un-helmeted versus helmeted minis, which is something that I never imagined I would say.

From my experience not so unforgiving but still a bit unforgiving. Just gotta use the right units and use them in a specific order and manuever and let the damage unfold trust me i was in the same postion as you. When i used Reavers that changed big time. Wink Wink

Yeah i am pretty new to playing DE too and i find them quite unforgiving too......what, no armour save against bolters!........ They are a very fun army to play however and i have not looked back. Look forward to your project log of your army.