Topic: Warp Spiders? Really?

[Thalion]

I keep seeing people posting statements to the effect of "Warp Spiders are excellent, you should use them!" but never seem to see an explanation of this assertion.

They are, conceptually, my favorite aspect warriors, and I would love to convert up some new ones. However, both the numbers and my play experience with them so far seems to suggest that I might as well not bother. Can anyone shed any light on this?

[Dinendal]

They have the speed

They have the firepower

They can deepstrike

They can withdraw

They have a smurf save

[flipONE]

They have the speed

They have the firepower

They can deepstrike

They can withdraw

They have a smurf save

For the short hand Dinendal covered it.

My 2 cents:

"They have the Speed": [See: Codex Eldar]. Warp Spiders really can cover the battlefield a lot faster than expected. Utilizing the 2nd jump can position you out of range of return fire and counter charges.

"They Have the Firepower": [See: Codex Eldar], is nothing to scoff at. While lacking an AP value, the idea behind Death Spinners is to cause an abundance of wounds, with the opponent eventually failing enough to be damaging. I personally like the Spinnerete Rifle as it's [See: Codex Eldar], ensuring at least 1 casualty. While the range on their weapons is generally short "They have the Speed" so they can cover ground fast enough to get in range, as early as turn 2 (depending on deployment and 2nd jumps of course).

"They can Deepstrike": Everybody love deep strike!

"They can withdraw": Withdraw = Hit and Run. The Warp Spider Exarch gets Powerblades, and on the charge doles out a decent amount of Power Weapon attacks, the rest of the Squad is in MEQ armor, making them hardier than most Eldar Troops in assault. During an opponents turn, run from the squad so on your following turn, you're free to shoot and assault again.

DIRTY TRICK: Have a Jetbike Autarch w/ Lance join the squad, since he also moves [roughly the same speed], he can keep up with the unit, add a crapload of STR[X] power weapon attacks, AND hit and run with the squad. This nearly massacre's most units in the game.

"They have a SMurf Save":[See: Codex Eldar]. Fortune them, and only the strongest firepower can take Warp Spiders down.

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[Itheria]

They are really good. With their high strength and high rate of fire, they are able to hurt anything that comes in their way.

Before they really shined against tanks side armour (which they easily reach with their good movement) but now they will have a harder time as they don't have any AP. But they will probably still be able to at least stop a tank from shooting back.

They are also very good when combined with a farseer (preferably a mobile farseer) as both guide and fortune makes them much better.

But what makes so good are their ability to jump back in the assault phase. This protects them more often than not from enemy fire and assaults. Sometimes it don't work but then you should have the rest of the army in such a position that it can destroy anything that went for your warp spiders.

Use them in a couple of games and soon your opponents will learn to fear them.

/Emomia

[Sapphon]

Versatility.  The only thing they're bad at is terminators and land raiders.

[srintuar]

Hrm...


If you are having trouble with warp spiders I must wonder what you are doing wrong.

They are so good that my opponents universally groan when fielding against them.

If you have an experienced eldar opponent in your area, play against him and you too will soon learn to hate warpspiders. (when an opponent uses them on you)

[Tar Palantir]

I would like to make two questions:

1.- I've read many times that warp spiders work very well combined with harlequins. What tactics do you use to make the sum of them perform better than individually?

2.- I like fielding squads with full number of members, so my warp spider squads are of 10 men. What number of spider does your squads have?

Many thanks in advance

[syth773]

in response to the original post, i love warp spiders for all the above mentioned reasons, they are awsome at taking out just about any infantry except stuff with 2+ saves.  (yes they can work against 3+ saves, i have slaughtered necron destroyer and flayed one squads with my warp spiders).  i love the spinneret rifle as
a. it's AP1 meaning on those small squads of really tough models (terminators) you are pretty much guarenteed at least 1 kill, 2+ to hit, 2+ to wound (in most cases) and no regular armor save).  it can also be a bonus suprise when using it on light vehicles (just armor 10 ones usually since it's only 1 shot) but that AP1 has helped several times.
b. it has pinning, and since you only need to cause 1 wound to get a pinning check and you pretty much always get 1 wound with this thing it's perfect in that respect.

the twin deathspinners are more useful if you think you are going to be shooting hoard armies.  4 shots that are S6 can cause quite a bit more damage than than just 1 AP1 shot if used against low armor units.  but usually i take spinneret rifle just in case.

I would like to make two questions:

1.- I've read many times that warp spiders work very well combined with harlequins. What tactics do you use to make the sum of them perform better than individually?

2.- I like fielding squads with full number of members, so my warp spider squads are of 10 men. What number of spider does your squads have?

Many thanks in advance

well i dont own harlaquins and after the rending change and no consolidating into enemies rules (big hurt on harlies there) i'm probably not going to get them.  i dont know what other people may have been using them for, but what i could see is that maybe there is a very shooty unit that harlies want to assault, there is a good chance that it would chew up the harlies just before they charge so you take your warp spiders, assault them the turn before and move the harlies up, during your next turn charge your harlies in and jump the warp spiders out, saves the harlies from being shot.

that's just a guess, as again i dont run them

for question #2, i actually rarely field full squads.  i tend to like using squads of 8 (7 normal + 1 exarch) when using my aspect warriors.  8 lets me save a few points (which i can use to buy something else but usually go into outfitting the exarch of that squad so i end up spending about as much as on a squad of 10 that is unupgraded) and also i've found that 8 banshees/scorpions/warspiders (those are the ones i use the most) do pretty much as good a job as a full squad of 10.  sure you'll be missing a few attacks/shots but i've rarely been in a situation where i think "man, if i only had 1 or 2 more aspect warriors i could have won that".  i usually either steamroll the enemy or get steamrolled, a couple more attacks either way wouldnt make that big a difference.

[Mr Draken]

Not really a tactic question, but how are people modeling thier exarchs with rifles? id love to see some conversions as it would give me an idea of how i can do mine.

[nil]

Re: Harlequins and WS:

WS make a nice unit to tie up other units in assault while taking few casualties.  They move faster than harlequins, and will assault, in general, a turn before your harlequins.  They won't cause a lot of casualties, but they won't take a lot either, and the close combat they create blocks LOS to the harlies, allowing the harlies to advance safely and finish off the squad.  Between shooting and CC, charging WS can take on equal numbers of space marines.

Meanwhile, the WS get to hit and run, firing on and assaulting the next squad in the chain, locking another unit, and again blocking LOS in case the harlies finish off the squad too early, preparing the way for the next turn's harlie assault.

So between a unit of harlies and WS, you have a combo that can roll through units defending against sweeping advances through dispersion (although sweeping advance is no longer an issue).  It's an expensive combo, and can't really take on a seriously tooled up squad, but it can chew through units of tac/dev marines.  It should still be reliable in 5th, but a farseer with doom/fortune really adds a lot.

[Blaze182]

As everyone has mentioned... I'd just like to add that, against hordes their firepower can decimate sqauds, such as orks & nids. They're ability to jump means CC lovers need to run faster, so its not a one stop SHOOT & charge affair. Withdraw ensures this also... aka, they shoot up great & can do it again & again =]

With harlequins... I've never tried them in sync, so I cant say.

[Killing Time]

They make an excellent bodyguard squad for an Autarch.
Someone already mentioned the jetbike trick earlier, but you can be more conventional than that and simply take:
Autarch/mandiblasters/powerweapon/fusion gun/warp generator

If you give the Spider exarch power weapons and the spinerette rifle as well then you have a squad that can dish out two AP1 shots and then follow in with eleven power weapon attacks at WS5+6.
When you factor in the death spinner shots and regular attacks, combined with a SMurf save to limit incoming damage...and then think about hit and running out of combat...
This is actually a very serious assault squad, capable of taking out small elite squads in a single round. Termies included.
As with most things Eldar: use with Doom for added kill.

Dizzy

[Shinrathir]

Question for you Dizz,

Is that combo still possilbe in 5th ed.?  Hit in Run is one of the "*'d" universal abilities in the rule book which means that if an independant character without that rule joins the unit... the unit looses that ability.  I'd love to know if that applies to Autarch's or not because this is a combo I was considering fielding.

[Killing Time]

Well if we go by the "Codex trumps Main Rules" maxim then this is still perfectly possible.
Why?
Because Spiders don't have hit and run USR. They have the "Withdraw" exarch power, which just happens to bestow the h&r USR upon the whole squad, including any attached Autarchs.
Eldar codex p21? off the top of my head.

Dizzy

[Mr Draken]

No it doesnt effect autarchs, they can still hit and run. The autarch rules say that he can be effected by exarch powers, as this is using withdraw he can still use it. The only exarch power that does not effect an autarch is shadowstrike.

[Gutstikk]

Think of it like this. The Exarch power withdraw affects the Exarch and any attached Autarchs. If the Autarch joins the squad, he benefits from the Withdraw power. Any Eldar model with the withdraw power gains the Hit and Run USR. So now, the Autarch has the Hit and Run USR, as does the unit, and so everyone can use hit and run together.

[Shinrathir]

Thanks all for the clarification!

[Thalion]

Running back to my original question for a bit. I would like to take a look at Dinendal's assertions and see if my questions make sense to you fine folks.

1. They have the speed: So do Guardian Jetbikes, Shining Spears, Swooping Hawks, and all our skimmers. What makes spiders superior to these other choices? Particularly given their relatively high points cost. Certainly they are more effective than Hawks and Jetbikes against MEQ. But I would think that deepstriking hawks would put some serious hurt on horde armies.

They have the firepower: They do? I mean really? Enough so to warrant their price tag?

10 Spiders = 220 points
10 marines with plasma gun and heavy bolter = 165 points

I'm having trouble seeing how that squad of spiders is pulling it's weight against marines. 22 shots hitting on 3's is 14.5 hits, is 12 wounds, is 4 dead marines on average. which means that on average your taking 3 turns to kill a squad of marines. Given an exarch with spinerret rifle, powerblades and withdraw the squad's potential certainly goes up. But at 250pts its costing you about a sixth of the combat potential of your army.

They can deepstrike:
This allows them to come onto the board and begin shooting without taking any casualties, but that seems to be the best of it. Besides which Hawks can also deepstrike, to better effect.

They can withdraw:
Which allows them to escape middling bad combats I suppose. I.e. those fights where they are not wiped out by whatever is assaulting them.


They have a smurf save:
Have tide-of-plasma lists fallen out of use elsewhere? My standard opponents are
2 Imperial Guard
2 Chaos Space Marine
1 Space Marine and
2 Ork
1 Necron
1 Tyranid
players, and the first four are running 6-8 plasma guns at 1000pts, and more as you go up. The couple of times I've tried them my spiders have gotten fragged pretty quickly and havent brought me back enough dead bodies to really be worth it. In most anti personnel situations that I have found so far dire avengers seem to do almost as well due to superior volume of fire (bladestorm ho )

Now I will admit, I'm a rank novice with eldar. A bunch of games in 3rd using Biel Tann, a few in 4th using the new codex, and none in 5th. But I'm a veteran 40k player, and I'm used to playing Suit Tau so the notion of deep striking, high firepower, meq save units that move in the assault phase is not foreign to me. However, I am having trouble seeing the 'spiders make themselves worth it.

I have thought of the idea of trying an autarch with them, but adding 100pts to the unit to up its effectiveness from "meh" to "good" seems like it might be a waste of points to me.

Thoughts?

[Derikari]

1. They have the speed: So do Guardian Jetbikes, Shining Spears, Swooping Hawks, and all our skimmers. What makes spiders superior to these other choices?

They’re faster than the ones you didn’t mention.

10 Spiders = 220 points
10 marines with plasma gun and heavy bolter = 165 points

Can said Marine squad move and fire all weapons? Move up to 12” + 3d6”? Fire, charge in and deny shooting, then jump back out to fire again? There’s also the fact that those 4 casualties can include both the plasma and heavy bolter gunners under the new wound allocation system, and with 14.5 hits on average with the squad you mentioned, that’s more than enough to wrap around. The shooting punch of Warp Spiders also does not lie in only one or 2 models, as your Marine squad example, making their punch more durable under the new rules.

You're also comparing units from 2 different codecies. Armies are balanced on a per army basis.

They can withdraw:
Which allows them to escape middling bad combats I suppose. I.e. those fights where they are not wiped out by whatever is assaulting them.

They can also be the assaulters. Simple way to silence guns.

[Thalion]

They’re faster than the ones you didn’t mention.

Yes, but they are competing (tactically) with those units which I did list, since my points can only be spread so far and some the slower units do seem necessary.

They are also competing for points with all the other units in the army, and once the autarch is added in with any unit + a waveserpent to carry it in.

Assault + withdraw does seem to be an excellent answer to shooting units that would otherwise ruin ones day, and the new wound allocation rules are an excellent point. The spiders then have a greatly increased capacity to limit my opponent's combat effectiveness, making them into a denial unit rather than a "killy" one?

How does this tactic stand up against the fact that after the first squad you kill you are left standing around getting shot at? I suppose the Meq save is meant to allow for survivability?

You are certainly working towards convincing me that they are good. The question then becomes whether they are better than some of my other options, and how that fare in some matchups.

You have, I think, proved that they can/will be pretty effective against "shooty" armies and units. How effective can they be v.s. close combat units with high damage output? Assault Marines, Nobs, Khorne Berzerkers, and the like?  Clearly they will annihilate Genestealers, and any other lightly armored, comparatively low toughness unit (which are essentially their optimum target). But it seems that one almost has to be charged by jump pack troops at some point if one is using their guns and that they will get pretty comprehensively pasted.

Feel free to continue proving me wrong. Your increasing the likelyhood that one of the unpainted guardian squads I have at home is going to be turned into warp spiders