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Author Topic: 1500 Competetive - Fiery Rapier  (Read 4165 times)

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Offline Kaminari

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1500 Competetive - Fiery Rapier
« on: April 18, 2010, 04:59:10 PM »
In preparation for a big highly competitive tourney here I was running through about 30 possible Eldar lists for weeks and finally chose that one (and then found out that it was just a tightened version of my last 2000 points tourney list). The tourney is setup strictly to the rulebook, with victory points for the tie break. The list recognizes local meta (lots of mech-spam-lists, almost no heavy tanks, Termi-Walls on the rise, etc.)

I did not want to use a Farseer this time with all that anti-psyker-tech and Space Wolf love around. At 1500 points with Eldar specialists you have to neglect a combat aspect. I opted against close combat and took a shooty reserve list. It required lots of cover ignoring weapons therefore to and I wanted anti-tank over various ranges, e.g. to silence Hydras while approaching for the kill. This is the result. What do you think of it?

Yriel
7 Firedragons, including Exarch with Dragon's Breath Flamer, Crackshot
   in Serpent with synch. Shurikencannon and Shurikencannon
7 Firedragons, including Exarch with Dragon's Breath Flamer, Crackshot
   in Serpent with synch. Shurikencannon and Shurikencannon

10 Storm Guardians with 2 Flamers, Warlock with Destructor
   In Serpent with synch Eldar Missile Launcher and Spirit Stones
10 Guardian Defenders with Scatterlaser
5 Dire Avengers

1 Falcon with Holofields, Spirit Stones and Eldar Missile Launcher
1 Fire Prism with Holofields and Spirit Stones
1 Fire Prism
« Last Edit: April 20, 2010, 09:26:11 AM by Kaminari »

Offline naiatoc

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #1 on: April 18, 2010, 05:45:41 PM »
That actually looks like a great list at the 1500 point level! One I would love to field myself sometime!

My only concern is the Guardian Defenders on foot. You could drop some upgrades (holofields and spirit stones from the Prism, the second Shuriken Cannons on the Serpents) and maybe a Dragon or two for a Serpent for them to ride in.

Offline SeekingOne

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #2 on: April 18, 2010, 08:20:30 PM »
I'm going to criticise your list heavily :) And in doing so I might look stupid to you because, since you mentioned that this list is a tightened version of your own 2k army, you probably know more about this list's mechanics than I. So, if you have some solid counter-arguments to the points that I'm going to make, please by all means share them, as I'd really like to hear some alternative experience.
Also please note that all my comments are made from a strictly competitive standpoint.
On to the points...

1. In my experience no Eldar army can be truly viable on a competitive level without Eldrad Ulthran. For the last couple of months I've been preparing for a heavily competitive tourney where all named characters are banned; so I tested multiple 1750 lists (mech mostly) with just generic Farseers and Autarchs, and the performance of those lists is... sad, to say the least. The only exceptions are lists based around jetbike Council...
The anti-psy stuff available to the other armies only widens the performance gap between Eldrad and a generic farseer: even when a hood or a rune weapon is present, Eldrad's chances of getting off a critical power at the critical moment is much higher. Thus I believe that while the abundance of anti-psy stuff might be a reason to leave generic Farseers at home, it only gives you more reasons to take Eldrad. I'm saying this because ultimately most Eldar units (all of them except Dragons in fact) cannot compete without psychic support; they are simply outclassed way too often.

2. Yriel on his own (i.e. without a supporting Doom/Fortune-seer) is quite pathetic to be honest. Even his eye-bomb is only really cool when it can take out a whole unit at once, and that is hardly possible without Doom. And in regular combat he usually falls faster than you can say "ouch".

3. I'm not sure I understand the purpose of having 10 guardians on foot in an otherwise fully mechanised list. I doubt that it's possible to properly support that unit in order for it to accomplish anything.

4. A naked Prism is so weak in all respects that I really don't think it's worth taking at all. Not at a competitive level at least.

5. Last but not the least, I have problems picturing for myself how this list will win games. It has no melee element to speak of and its firepower is very far from being ultimate enough to decisively kill units by itself, especially seeing that dragons in that loadout are rarely going to fire more than once.

Perhaps you could share your ideas about the list's intended tactics as well as your likely opponents?
I fight against Chaos and for Order, because it means fighting for Life against Death. There is no other battle truly worth fighting.

"If it's not for a tournament then play whatever it is that you like. Without the pressure of having to utterly destroy your opponent it opens up alot more opportunity to have fun." - Lazarus

Offline Kaminari

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #3 on: April 19, 2010, 03:05:12 AM »
Environment: heavy competition, 1500 points, no limitations. Opponents:

8 Space Wolves
6 Orks
5 (Vanilla) Space Marines
3 Eldar
4 Tau
4 Imps
3 Tyras
2 Dark Eldar
2 Black Templars
1 Chaosdaemos
1 Dark Angels
1 Blood Angels
and 3 unknown by me;
Total: 46

Missions unknown, strictly by rulebook
Win: 30 points     Tie: 10 points     Loss: 1 point     Conceeding: 0 points
Victory Points achieved per rulebook for the tie breaker; swiss system.

Brief game plan:
Getting rid of liabilities wherever possible. No vital psychic abilities to be cancelled, no loosing the game by roll for first turn. Option to use first turn against armies with few long range weapons or fragile units. Against all the rest go into reserves to give the opponent only 3-5 turns with chances to kill my vehicles, gain alpha strike yourself instead and maintain that advantage during the rest of the game (e.g. shaken vehicles don't shoot back at you). This puts pressure onto your opponent, by not knowing your approach route, getting shot at first, limiting his return fire and having less turns to react on your actions. The mobility and resilience of the Eldar tanks should then enable you to claim/contest objectives. Objective Placement to gain advantages for the own fast army, then block approach routes with your tanks and stop fast vehicles/dangerous units with the Fire Dragons/Prisms.
Relying on shooting allows for a quicker relocation and support of units than with close combat units.

Turn 1-2: unit placement and silencing long-range guns. Turn 3-4: fighting the opponent at the vital areas of the game. Turn 5: objective securing Turn 6-7: Tank Shuffling and blocking access to objectives.

Falcon to be held back until unable to shoot, then boost forward towards objectives.
Guardians start in reserves and approach mission objectives behind tanks/cover for the objective closer to your side. By going to ground they should weather some fire. Depending on the armylist and approach routes.
Yriel is being deployed with Guardians, Storm Guardians, Dire Avengers or the aggressive Fire Dragons and is doing the cleanup work.
The naked Prism stays in the backfield, while the Holofield one is going the aggressive route late game for objective denial.
Fire Dragons with DBF chosen to circumvent the lack of Doom: lots of high strength weapons to get around FNP and armour saves and rerollable heavy Flamer for the optional additional wounds. FDs and Storm Guardians to roast units close together in cover or just having attacked my tanks. Herding units by tankshocks to gain maximum results on templates. Dragons used as throw away unit if I have to cripple a certain enemy unit now or to lure the opponent directing ressources towards them. Getting pulled out by Yriel often and 2 Fire Dragons are still sufficient to get rid of a small vehicle in the end game.
S6 weapons to prevent lightly armoured vehicles to fire upon me.

edit:
more detailed explanations
« Last Edit: April 20, 2010, 09:21:15 AM by Kaminari »

Offline Atnas

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #4 on: April 19, 2010, 03:25:55 AM »
Wont placing Yriel with the Guardians or Dire Avengers get him shot to bits real, real quick? Especielly the Dire Avengers =) Not to mention you can't use the eye without butchering all of them alone!

Offline Kaminari

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #5 on: April 19, 2010, 04:33:42 AM »
The Eye is only used in solo-missions. For example the Falcon gets charged while on an objective and I don't have resources available for tank shuffle. I then get out with Yriel alone and bomb the attackers if I identify them as dagerous for the vehicle. A surviving powerfist has to direct it's attacks againt Yriel or will be killed next phase. The Avengers will survive and secure the objective.

In the (Storm-)Guardians he makes sure they don't run that fast and adds his valuable PW-attacks to the combat result.

In the Fire Dragons he (counter-)attacks those would-be fire Dragon killers, often the passengers of a transport just roasted, if the other weapons on the board could not damage that vehicle sufficiently and the barbecue-party got delayed therefore.

Offline moc065

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #6 on: April 19, 2010, 06:29:58 AM »
Reserved for moc-score


(155) Yriel
(129) 7 Firedragons, inclduning Exarch with Dragon's Breath Flamer, Crackshot
   (110) in Serpent with synch. Shurikencannon and Shurikencannon
(129) 7 Firedragons, inclduning Exarch with Dragon's Breath Flamer, Crackshot
   (110) in Serpent with synch. Shurikencannon and Shurikencannon

(127) 10 Storm Guardians with 2 Flamers, Warlock with Destructor
   (130) In Serpent with synch Eldar Missile Launcher and Spirit Stones
(95) 10 Guardian Defenders with Scatterlaser
(60) 5 Dire Avengers

(180) 1 Falcon with Holofields, Spirit Stones and Eldar Missile Launcher
(160) 1 Fire Prism with Holofields and Spirit Stones
(115) 1 Fire Prism

1500pts, 3 Scoring Units, 12Kill Points, 47 Figures


moc-score to follow

1.. Anti-tank potential 0.5; Fire Dragons have short rang AT, the vehicles have "shake" potential, the troops have almost nothing AT to speak of, Yes the Prisms can combine for some AT; but its not that relyable.... On paper it might look like the FD's will do enough; but imagine Mech IG with 8+ pieces of armour; you just can't get it taken care of fast enough with this style of Rapier List... Mech SM is about the same, etc, etc.... Thus I rate it as Below Average especially since there are easy ways to get a lot more AT potential.
2.. Anti-MEQ potential 0.5; Again the FD's will have to do a lot of work.... and they will only remove 1 Tac Squad a turn - if they gang bang them (coordiantion might be tricky) and if the MEQ are outta the Can so to speak.... Its not enough vs Mech lists, or heavily infantried Assault lists... Thus I rate it Below Average.
3.. Anti-Horde potential 0.8; Pie Plates, H-Flamers, mass shooting.... pretty well says it all, the only thing I would want is more of it; and there is fat to trim to get more.... Thus I rated it as Good
4.. Ranged Firepower potential 0.7; It has a good mix of Short, medium, and Long ranged firepower... I do wish that the vehicles were set up a little differently to get more effective shooting.....Thus I only rated it as Above Average. 
5.. Assault potential 0.4; It has some holding potential and Yriel can be incredible... but this area is obviously and intentionally left well Below Average.
6.. Scoring Units / point level 0.7; Three scoring Units at this point level is normally decent enough, I don't have issues with their usage as I understand how this lsit works for later game MO grabs... Because a couple units are within decent rides, I scored it a little Above Average.
7.. Durability or Resilience 0.7; The Serpents really should have Stones on them, but other than that the unit is actually good right until the infantry dis-embarks... then it gets soft really really fast, so stratagy is Key... I have read some tactics from the op, and due to his playstyle with the list, I rated it a little Above Average.
8.. Flexability 0.6; This is a Rapier style army and unfortunately the speed is a little bit slower than I would have liked to actually pull off the co-ordination of the tactics... Thus I only rate it as Average.
9.. Mission Capabiliy 0.7; The list is a little heavy on KP's @ this level, but it has really good MO capibilities and as I rated it a little Above Average.
10. Dynamics and/or Theme 0.6; Its tough to see any overall Synergy aside from the shooting which really could have been tweeked to be a fair bit more effective or less transparent... Playstyle will be a huge factor, and I see this list doing well vs certain enemies; but not so well vs Tournie All Comers lists.
 
Rating = 6.1/10   But please don't think that the list is Bad justt because I scored it slightly Above Average... As I mentioned the Playstyle is a huge factor with Rapier Style lists... Many would turn the Fire Dragons into 1-hit-wonders; while smart players could use them throughout a battle to such a more significant effect, etc, etc...

Suggestions.
• Get Spirit Stones on all the vehicles.
• Look at Vehicle Weapon's configuration... Some like twin Cannons, while others would prefer the range/firepower of a single Scatter so that they don't have speed issues to deal with.
• Little things like a Singing Spear to add some AT potential to the Storm Squad wouldn't hurt.

I actually feel that this list will perform at a level above my rating, as I respect Kaminari's level of skill with the Eldar... I also see this list as being very tactical, and Fun for both opponent and the player.

Cheers
« Last Edit: April 20, 2010, 06:31:42 AM by moc065 »
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Offline Kaminari

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #7 on: April 19, 2010, 06:52:08 AM »
As promised in the earlier list decision thread from Wuestenfux there will be detailed battle reports with clear pictures (already uploaded). They include plans from the beginning of the battle and changes to it during the games.
Expect the first game to be online in about 9 hours when I get back to my notes.





OK.
It's my Throne of Skulls 2010 Germany list.
Top Eldar.

:D

Offline Atnas

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #8 on: April 19, 2010, 09:46:37 AM »
Looking forward to it! =)

Offline moc065

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Wi(t)ch to burn?
« Reply #9 on: April 19, 2010, 06:27:40 PM »
Expect my analysis to be done by the morning as I am "Back to School" this week and studies are almost a foreign language to me at present; yes its been that long for me...

Cheers and I await the batreps; but I will finish the score before I read them.
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Offline Kaminari

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Fierey Rapier
« Reply #10 on: April 20, 2010, 02:58:07 AM »
Bat Reps have started here.
Changed Army title from "Wi(t)ch to burn?" to "Fiery Rapier" as Moc's description is more fitting

Offline moc065

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Fiery Rapier
« Reply #11 on: April 20, 2010, 06:33:31 AM »
Rating done above, and now I am off to read the Batrep's.... I do hope that you proved my last comment true Kaminari, as I truely respect this style of list and your level of skill.

Cheers.
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Offline Kaminari

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Re: 1500 Competetive - Fiery Rapier
« Reply #12 on: April 20, 2010, 07:31:22 AM »
I don't think you will get disappointed.

BatReps finished

Spirit Stones versus the underslung Cannon have been a thing I were not sure about for a long time. It was simply a point issue. I wanted those cannons to hamper those advancing Rhinos/Speeder type vehicles approaching at the beginning and have a gunship nearby once the Dragons have been deployed. After their first turn on the field those two tanks operate in areas where they do not need the mobility anymore. Tehy should dish out damage and block approaches. I used the cannons more often and there was a single occasion where I would have preferred Spirit Stones only.

Singing Spear I would like to add, but the double DBF/crackshot was preferred as the Dragons do the heavy duty. 
« Last Edit: April 22, 2010, 11:22:22 AM by Kaminari »

 


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