The other night I had the pleasure of playing against my friend and his brand new Dark Eldar list... Normally I would do a video bat-rep, but I forgot my Flip camcorder (booo!) and a lot of his stuff wasn't painted so you'll have to deal with words.
(First things first, thank you to my opponent, Shane, for writing me with his list and recap of the game, without it I would have forgot A LOT of details... Thanks bud)
Here are the lists:
Dark Eldar-
HQ:
- Succubus with Power weapon
- Haemonculus Ancient w/ agonizer
- Haemonculus w/ venom blade
Elite:
- 4x grotesques with liquefier gun
Raider with night shield and flickerfield
Troops:
- 5x wracks with liquefier gun
Venom with 2x splinter cannons, retrofire jets
- 5x wracks with liquefier gun
raider with flickerfield
- 9x wracks with liquefier gun
raider with flickerfield
- 9x wyches with hydra gauntlets, haywire grenades, Hekatrix w/ power weapon
raider with flickerfield
- 10x warriors with dark lance and blaster
Fast Attack:
- 6 Reavers w/ 2x blasters
Heavy Support:
- Ravager with nightshroud and flickerfield
- Ravager with nightshroud and flickerfield
- Chronos w/ spirit probe and spirit vortex
Blood Angels:
I used my "RAS + DEV = Spam and cheese sandwich list," it is on this blog on an earlier post so to save room IM just going to give a quick listing
- Libby w/sword and unleash rage
- 3 x RAS squads of 5 in Las/plas Razors with power weapons
- 1 9 man RAS squad in Rhino with attached Sang priest (2 power weps, infernus pistol, melta gun)
- 3 Dev squads of 5 men (3 missile, 1 lascannon)
- 2 Baal predators (Heavy Bolter sponsons)
- Typhoon
Game type: Standard deployment, Kill points.
Deployment:
I win first turn and deploy everything, I put all my devs on second floors with good lines of sight and my tanks deploy as far forward as possible with the razors behind and Baals holding the flanks.
He deploys everything as well with ravagers on the flanks, his raiders/ venoms try to hug any terrain and are on the edge of the table. His bikes deploy on a flank as well with a Ravager.
Turn 1:
I move up 6" with my razors to get LOS and move flat out on my Rhinos to form up on choke points. My Devastators and Razorbacks open up on his Raiders and ravagers, I leave the venoms alone for now. My Baals shoot at his grotesques (after their raider explodes) and his reavers. During his turn he moves the chronos as far forward as possible and assaulted one of my rhinos with the haywire grenade wyches (it then exploded and killed half the wyches). Blaster/ Dark lance warriors open up on the other rhino and missed completely. Venoms shot at Devastator squad (1).
Casualties (turn 1): only counting wholly dead units
DE:
- 1 ravager destroyed
- All reavers dead
- 3 raiders (grotesques, wyches with haywire and 10 wracks)
BA:
- Rhino
KP: 5-1
Turn 2:
I moved up with my remaining rhino and fired at the venom with meltas. Moved the Razorbacks into firing position. Moved Baal on left to get LOS on grotesques, right Baal moves back to get better LOS on warriors, only killed a few cause he made lots of saves. I shot the wyches that just blew up my rhino, but couldn't assault since I killed them all. 2 Devastator squads finished off the transports and one let fly a bunch of frag missles at the wracks. Typhoon also shot random stuff. He also unloaded all his wracks from the venoms and shot the warriors at the rhino, he exploded the rhino with the blaster/dark lance and then shot 2 liquefier guns at my assault squad. One liquefier rolled AP1 and killed 3 marines. the other liquefier did nothing (IIRC). He then charged my marines with 5 wracks and lost horribly because of no grenades. Chronos made a kill from shooting and gave a third pain token to the wyches he then assaulted my squad that lost the rhino the previous turn with some more wyches and a cronos. The killed a few BA and took a few casualties but the marines passed the morale check. Venoms both shot at my Devastator squad and took it down to one marine (las cannon)
Casualties (turn 2)
DE:
- Ravager that was immobilized last turn
- haywire wyches squad
- 5 man wrack squad
BA: - Rhino
KP: 8:2
Turn 3:
I start playing clean up and gun down the grotesques with the Baal and typhoon. I also finish off the venoms and assault the last wracks squad. I shoot the Warriors with my Baal which does almost nothing (hello cover!). In the assault I kill the las wracks and in the fight with the cronos the Librarian turns on sanguine sword and makes the cronos pasty! the wyches finish off the RAS squad but leave the libby and the priest alive. During his turn he finished off the librarian with power weapon wounds and we call the game.
Casualties:
DE: - Grotesques with attachment
- Both Venoms
- Cronos
BA: - Librarian
- RAS
KP: 13: 4
Game over: Result- Victory Blood Angels
Thoughts:
(My opponent wrote this for me) go first or RESERVE EVERYTHING. Wyches w/ haywire grenades probably not worth it, since they all die if tank blows up and they get shot down by whatever gets out of tank. Liquifier guns did well, but need to plan subsequent assault better. Liquifiers not enough on their own, mostly for softening up for assault. Wracks in Venoms maybe not worth it, squad too small for effective assault. Maybe use small squads of Warriors in Venoms instead, with blaster to shoot at vehicles? Chronos did well, but should avoid assault. Spirit probe therefore not worth the 10 pts. Reavers disappointing, very vulnerable. Probably should reserve them in all circumstances. (CRAP. Just realized I forgot to roll for combat drugs entirely. Meh.) Wish Reavers could outflank or Deep Strike. Grotesques soaked up impressive amount of firepower. Wyches should probably ignore weapon options except for shardnet/impaler. They are mostly a tarpit, and those fit that. Maybe take Razorflails for the rerolls To Wound. Hydra gauntlets not worth it, they have boatloads of attacks, a few more won't make much difference. Flickerfields on Raiders prolly not worth it. Night shrounds good, specially on Ravagers, just bad army matchup for them (missile and lascannon). Can't comment much on overall strategy since got shot up so bad first round. Seems like the first round for Dark Eldar really determines whether they win or lose. Gotta grab momentum and keep it.
BA: The list I developed is extremely efficient against DE. I didn't realize how tarpit-ish the wyches are, I thought they would roll my RAS, but I was wrong... Also, don't assault into them.. shoot them (or have your rhino explode on them, lol)! I agree 100% with my opponents assessment of the first turn for DE. All in all I feel I played well, but it would have been a different game if he went first.
What are your experiences with Dark Eldar? Post comments please because I wrote a helluva lot for no comments!
Duke
"go first or RESERVE EVERYTHING."
ReplyDelete1) Dark Eldar should never, ever, ever Reserve everything.
2) What you did was fall for the meta game. Dark Eldar is a Horde army, and as such, you CANNOT play the Mech game like Marines can. You need to take advantage of the fact that you can field 20 man units which anti tank will not be able to touch.
"Wyches w/ haywire grenades probably not worth it, since they all die if tank blows up and they get shot down by whatever gets out of tank."
Exactly. Don't bother with Haywire, and instead spend the extra 5 points and get a Blast Pistol for the Hekatrix if you are hurting for ant-tank.
"Liquifiers not enough on their own, mostly for softening up for assault. Wracks in Venoms maybe not worth it, squad too small for effective assault."
Liquifiers ARE good on teir own. You just need to take larger squads. You are not playing marines, you cannot play this "5 man" unit game. Your Wych/Grot/Wrack units need to be 10 models or 0. These units do not have the armor/survivability to run around with only 5 models.
The only unit that should EVER be smaller than 10 is the Trueborn. Thats because they are a one trick pony, and cheap.
"Maybe use small squads of Warriors in Venoms instead, with blaster to shoot at vehicles?"
The only unit that should ever set foot inside a Venom is Trueborn, and then, ONLY if they are going anti horde. If you are going the 4x Blaster route, get a Raider w/ Flickerfield. Spend the extra 15 points.
"Chronos did well, but should avoid assault. Spirit probe therefore not worth the 10 pts."
100% Correct.
"Reavers disappointing, very vulnerable."
Once again, because you used a small unit. Either go 9 or 10 or don't use them at all.
"(CRAP. Just realized I forgot to roll for combat drugs entirely. Meh.)"
Happened to me multiple times :)
"Grotesques soaked up impressive amount of firepower."
Yup, and when you have 10 of them, unless your opponent is fielding a Dred, he'll never kill them or tie them up.
"Wyches should probably ignore weapon options except for shardnet/impaler. They are mostly a tarpit, and those fit that. Maybe take Razorflails for the rerolls To Wound."
You are 100% correct on your assumptions on Wyches. They are NOT an attacking unit. They are a subtle unit that ties up enemy elite units until the elite unit dies. Just take Shardnets.
"Flickerfields on Raiders prolly not worth it."
They are worth it. Play more games with them. The times they DO work far outweigh the times they don't.
"Night shrounds good, specially on Ravagers, just bad army matchup for them (missile and lascannon)."
Flickerfield should be standard on Ravagers, just FOR anti-tank. Nightshield is NOT for anti-tank, it is for short range weapons like melta, Heavy Bolters, etc...
Just keep practicing, and you'll do Commorragh proud!
Just imagining 10 grotesques makes me cringe... I had such a hard time killing the few that he had. I do think that if he had used reserves a little better the first round would not have been so devestating... Maybe Ill let him have another go at it in a week or two.
ReplyDeleteDuke
Hey, thanks a bunch for the advice! I appreciate it.
ReplyDeleteSo if I see what you're saying, DE shouldn't be an exclusively fast assault army mounted in vehicles, since that doesn't allow them to take full advantage of their unit sizes.
So instead, they should try to field enough shooty to make your opponent come to you, but have enough assault power to hit him hard once he gets there.
So, perhaps a couple units of 20 Warriors with a couple dark lances hanging out on my side of the board, a big unit of grotesques to sit there and defend them with their big nasty unkillableness, some Ravagers for more antitank, Wyches in Raiders to tarpit things until the Grotesques can get to them, plus whatever else I can fit in. Is that more the kind of army you think DE should go for?
In that case, how do you think DE should use Reserves? Is it better to reserve things like Reavers and Wych squads that you likely won't need for a couple turns, just to keep them safe? Or should you have them on the board early so they can contribute firepower?
Thanks again for the advice, it's always helpful when trying out a new army.
-Shane
Reserves should be used in conjuction with webway portal or in the case of outflanking Mandrakes.
ReplyDeleteYou should also try and use the small front of the raiders to your advantage.
If you can park the front in LOS blocking cover and the enemy can only see the side, then you get a 3+ cover save even if the vehicle ain't obscured.
I still haven't found a viable tactic with web way portals. I know they sound like awesome sauce, but really the just seem Ike they are Wally situational. For example, Shane in this last battle could have used a web way portal because I was in his deployment zone for most of the game.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the 3+ save thing is a great idea, but my angels are very maneuverable so could get side shots fairly easily...
Duke
PS: I have another battle rep coming up soon that my friend is writing up
I can't figure out a good way to use webway portals either.
ReplyDeleteYou need to have them down by 2nd turn, or risk your reserves missing the boat, so to speak, and having to come on from the table edge. You can't use em with vehicles, so anything you would have wanted to come through one will be stuck in slow mode if it misses the portal. And since you can't drop them when you're in a vehicle, you can only get them 12-18" forward first turn, and doing that puts an HQ unit in a very exposed position, seems like.
If you drop the portal 2nd turn you're in better shape, but DE don't have any reserves rerolls or whatnot they can use to delay their stuff. Can't quite figure a way to make the things really useful.
I feel like if you were to take a Haemi with a WWP and a unit of 9 Wracks, he could start as close as possible and then move 12", disembark 2" and drop the WWP for 3 more inches, giving you the option of coming on from reserves 17" away from the edge of your deployment zone. The FnP should help the wracks survive a bit of fire and as long as you only reserved the stuff that you wanted to come through the WWP, they probably will have to many targets to simply focus fire a squad of wracks down. Especially if you were fortunate enough to be able to disembark them into cover as well as getting the WWP as far as possible across the board.
ReplyDeleteThough I think that is the most viable tactic with portals I still don't know that it will work against most armies. Since everyone is mech these days it is easy to avoid one portal and shoot you when the guys come out with nothing to assault.
ReplyDeleteI think you either have to use multiple portals to mitigate this "get away from it" response from your opponents or use the against stand and shoot armies (gun lines, horde orks) that can't avoid the portals by running away.
I really really want to Ike the web way portals, but i'm just not seeing it...
Duke
rE wwp
ReplyDeletehaemoc +4 Wracks in venom x2
deploy forward go 12", deploy 2" drop portal (preferrably with squad in 50% cover
cross your fingers that 4+ and FNP lets the 'monculus survive.
'monc will probs be on his own by turn 2 when stuff starts rocking up, have him join whatevers arriving for FNP - as ppl say, more than likely they'll have a turn of shooting to weather before reaching assault. chronos FNP distibution engine helpful.
i dunno seems fairly fail to me as well