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Author Topic: Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points  (Read 499 times)

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Offline Wyldhunt

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Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points
« on: August 5, 2010, 04:39:26 PM »
Hello guys. First of all, this obviously isn't a super-competitive list, but a similar list has served me well in the past.  This is my newest revision of it, and I am hoping it will serve me as well as its predecessors if not better.  Baharroth was the first model I ever bought and Swooping Hawks are some of my favorite aspects.  Maugan Ra is the moon to Baharroth's sun, so I figured I'd have the two guys hang out.  Maugan Ra will, however, be hanging out with the Harlequins in this list since he and his Death Jester buddy get along so well.

200ish- Baharroth:
200ish- Maugan Ra:
(Note: I am not sure if I can post the actual points or phoenix lords or not, thus the "ish"es)

96- Fire Dragons X 6
125- Wave Serpent: Scatter Lasers, Spirit Stones

232- Harlequins X 7: All have kisses except the Death Jester, 2 X Fusion Pistols, Death Jester, Shadow Seer

167- Dire Avengers X 10
-Exarch: Blade Storm, Defend, Dual-Shuripults
125-Wave Serpent: Scatter Lasers, Spirit Stones

92- Storm Guardians X 10: 2 X Fusion Guns
43- Warlock: Singing Spear, Enhance
125- Wave Serpent: Scatter Lasers, Spirit Stones

85-Guardians X 10: Shuriken Cannon

174- Swooping Hawks X 7
-Exarch: Hawk's Talon, Intercept

207- Dark Reapers X 5
-Exarch: Crack Shot, Eldar Missile Launcher
125- Wave Serpent: Shuriken Cannon, Star Engines, Spirit Stones
Note: Wave Serpent will be hijacked first turn by the harlequins and Maugan Ra

TOTAL: 1991

While this may look ineffective, it should be able to do fairly well against certain enemies.  Maugan Ra will be joining the Harlequins and stealing the Dark Reapers' Wave Serpent which can be shielded from attack by other serpents moving flatout if necesarry.  The Fire Dragons and Storm Guardians are on Dire anti-tank duty.  Dire Avengers and Harlequins + Maugan Ra will be trying to take out the juicy infantry that comes out.  Dark Reapers can target lightly-armored vehicles, monstrous creatures, or meq's as needed.  Guardian Defenders are mostly just there to give me a third scoring unit. They'll be sitting back on an objective and taking potshots at monstrous creatures or lightly armored transports.

Against horde armies, I can swap out the Storm Guardians' fusion guns for flamers and give the warlock a Destructor instead of Enhance.  With the spare points, I can then give my Swooping Hawks Exarch a Sunrifle or give the Dark Reaper Exarch Fast Shot or a Tempest Launcher. 

I feel like I have some decent anti-tank between all my strength six shots, the fire dragons, the fusion pistols on the harlies, the Maugetar and the fusion guns and singing spear on the storm guardians.  The Dire Avengers and harlies will be nasty against infantry.  Dark Reapers will be sort of a trouble shooter unit (if there's trouble, they shoot it.) Swooping Hawks will be there to annoy whatever needs annoyed at the right times.  They can shoot low toughness infantry or haywire vehicles.  Baharroth's Hit and Run will help them get out of trouble when they need to.

Thoughts? 

Offline naiatoc

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Re: Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points
« Reply #1 on: August 5, 2010, 05:10:19 PM »
You're right, this doesn't look like a super-competitive list, but I think it will work well in casual games.

One concern I have is the harlequin squad. It seems to me you have enough anti tank in your list already, so you might want to save some points and drop the fusion pistols. Just give them all kisses.

Also, I'm not sure how it will work having a death jester and maugan ra. They won't be running in the turns they're shooting. And I like using fleet of foot.

As for the dark reapers, I like crack shot and tempest launcher. Admittedly I've never tried anything else, but I've listened to the arguments from people on this forum and I'm sold. Tempest launcher is the way to go.

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Re: Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points
« Reply #2 on: August 7, 2010, 10:36:42 AM »
From the perspective of background, it's simply not pleasing to look at I'm afraid to say, as there are implausible unit combinations (Harlequins are never commanded by non-Harlequin characters, and do not use craftworld transports, for example), and the presence of two Phoenix Lords in anything calling itself a regular Eldar army list (and that's what this is, since this is not a list for a narrative campaign, or an Apocalypse battle) is exceptionally unlikely.  Of course, if this does not bother you, then feel free to ignore this, but as you are someone who has taken an interest in background in the past, I just thought that I would draw this to your attention  :).

In terms of effectiveness, I am also very unconvinced about the balance of the army list, because you have skewed the army too far in favour of the mechanised component at the expense of the infantry section, which is just too small, and too poorly protected to withstand any sort of attack in my view.

The Guardians are effectively a filler unit, which is always a bad idea in Eldar armies in my opinion, while Dark Reapers work much better when attached to substantial fire bases in my experience, as if left alone, they are too easily neutralised by units which can outflank or deep strike.  I thus recommend that you invest more points in the infantry section, or drop it completely, and field a fully mechanised list.

Taking Harlequins in this list is a bad idea all round in my view.  Not only does the background look questionable, but also not being able to move flat out in the first turn, due to not being able to start on board the Wave Serpent, makes them a tactically unsound choice in my view, as they cannot keep up with the rest of the mechanised wing, meaning that your attack ends up being somewhat fragmented.

Giving the Storm Guardian squad's Warlock Enhance does not really help them that much in my experience, so I feel that you would be better off keeping them out of close combat, and giving their Warlock Destructor, so that they can fulfil a dual purpose role.

Finally, I do not recommend giving the Dark Reaper Exarch the EML should you keep the unit.  The squad excels at shooting MEQs, nothing else, and if you take the EML for shooting vehicles, you waste the firepower of a very expensive squad, which is not a good tactical move in my view, hence the Tempest Launcher is a better bet in my experience.

Overall, I understand that this is meant to be a fun list, and the mechanised wing is certainly very strong, but it is horribly skewed in terms of the infantry/mechanised balance, and has a whole bunch of points tied up in two models and expensive units, such as Harlequins and Dark Reapers, resulting in a very low model count, and an army which is a massive glass cannon, even by Eldar standards.  How the list will perform, I cannot be sure, as it really is not the sort of list I have fielded in fifth edition, but it strikes me as being more of a second edition list, which is unlikely to work all that well under the current rules.  I'm sorry if you find that to be a rather negative conclusion, but while you may find yourself doing well with it against certain lists, I envisage it faltering more often than succeeding.
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Offline Wyldhunt

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Re: Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points
« Reply #3 on: August 7, 2010, 03:25:40 PM »
@naiatoc:
The thinking behind the pistols rather than just kisses is that I can't assault the guys inside a transport if I blow said transport up in the assault phase.  With fusion pistols, I can hopefully pop it then assault its insides.  As for not running if they're shooting, I was hoping that the transport would make this less likely to happen. They should be able to reach their opponents as quickly as striking scorpions, but with some nice shooting on top of it.  They're intended to be a miniature death star unit.  Lots of rending plus Maugan Ra's power weapon attacks in close combat with the Maugetar, Shrieker Cannon, fusion pistols, and shuriken pistols coming in first.  If I can, I'll try to keep them safe from return fire on the following turn by blocking enemy line of sight with wave serpents.  That said, I could shed the pistols if I need more points.

@Irisado:
Admittedly, the harlequins aren't especially fluff-fitting in this list.  Especially inside the transport.  Still, it seemed a shame to keep Maugan Ra in the back field, I didn't want the unit to be too slow to reach combat in time, and scorpions/banshees won't let Maugan Ra join their squads, so I went with the clowns (whom I love to use in general.)  I, personally, got the impression that Maugan Ra and Baharroth working together was not terribly uncommon, and wanted this list to reflect such a team up.  It's  a bit iffy on fluff, but it's rather hard to make such a team-up work in normal 40k and I don't play apoc.

I was worried about my infantry portion not being bulky enough.  I basically just ran out of points.  I think the fire dragons will help this list a lot, but I could swap them out for some war walkers, a couple guardian squads, some pathfinders/rangers, or some more Dark Reapers.  I could even trade them for more Swooping Hawks as that would give me a unit that could still bother tanks and could also swoop in to contest an objective last minute, though the hawks aren't really a boost to my infantry force.

As mentioned above, harlies are admittedly questionable.  They do me proud when I use them though, so I'm reluctant to drop them.  Especially since that would leave Maugan Ra without protection of numbers.  I could put Maugan Ra in with the storm guardians I suppose, though he'd be more of  a counter-charge unit than an assaulter in that case.  Maybe drop the harlequins in exchange for some scorpions and use the remaining points to buff up my infantry force a bit?

If storm guardians don't get the boost they need from Enhance, I could drop the warlock's power down to Destructor as you recommend and also funnel those points into boosting the infantry force more.

The EML Exarch in the reapers has been beastly to certain targets in the past. I know enemy MC's don't appreciate such a strong hit hitting coming from something with an Exarch's BS, and the reroll to wounds from crackshot just compounds this.  Vehicles not getting their cover save has been nice as well, and things like rhinos can wind up taking an extra glance or pen from the reapers.  Still, I see your point, so I might try out the Tempest Launcher. 

What would you recommend adding to my infantry force if I can find the points?  More guardians? Maybe some sort of tank (prism/'spinner?) for the guardians to hide behind and to add to my long-range fire power?  I don't really see a full mechanized list working for this army since I really should have at least one squad of Dark Reapers, and Dark Reapers don't do well inside wave serpents, despite being able to take them. 


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Re: Sun and Moon Duel Phoenix List 2000 Points
« Reply #4 on: August 7, 2010, 04:03:51 PM »
If you could somehow double up on the Defender Guardian squads, give both units Scatter Lasers, and then replace the Harlequins with Striking Scorpions, so that the additional Wave Serpent could be dropped to free up some points, then I think that you would end up with a better fire base, which you would also have half a chance of defending from attack.

I'm not a fan of fielding Phoenix Lords in any unit other than their own Aspect for background reasons (see the discussion on Eldar Phoenix Lords in the Eldar Redux HQ thread for the discussion about this thorny issue), but if you don't like the idea of fielding Maugan Ra with the Dark Reapers, and I concur that it's problematic from a tactical perspective to say the least, then you may find it useful to attach him to the Storm Guardians if you want to use them more offensively.  You may find it better to convert them to an anti-infantry unit if you go down this route though, as Maugan Ra could not really be described as being that great against vehicles.

An alternative option would be to attach him to a Defender Guardian squad, and use him to provide additional fire support.  Combining his fire with that of a Scatter Laser works well in my opinion, since they share the same range, and both are very effective against infantry.

I hope that helps.
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