Topic: How do you run your Wraithlords?

[Blazinghand]

How do you run your Wraithlords? I have a couple that I am in the process of painting and assembling, and have been considering their heavy weapons, assault weapons, and ghostglaive/no ghostglaive. Some thoughts:

Ghostglaive: It seems like Wraithlords have pretty solid assault with their Wraithbone Fists. Good strength, AP, and Damage. Ghostglaives are slightly better on all accounts, though the jump in Strength is the biggest, especially against Dreadnoughts, Rhinos, and most tanks. It also helps against Space Marine statlines a small amount. How often will they see assault against targets that are significantly weaker against Ghostglaives compared to Wraithbone Fists? Seems inexpensive but potentially only situationally useful. However: highly cool-looking!

Assault Weapons: It seems to me that Flamers are potentially not price performant given the price jump over Shuriken Catapults. Getting 7 auto-hits vs 2.7 hits on average is nice, but no rending and the high price make it seem not worth it to me.

Heavy Weapons: So you can run without these entirely and just have a Wraithlord with a Ghostglaive running down the field. That sounds pretty cool (and would be relatively cheap). Also, you don't have to worry about heavy weapon movement penalties if you have no heavy weapons! Seems like Shuriken Cannons might potentially be good in such a situation as well. I've been considering 2x BL Wraithlord these days and wondering if one of those just sitting around shooting BLs would be useful. However, if you're paying all these points for a Wraithlord frame, it might not be efficient to sit in the back and shoot. And moving loses some firepower.

Some loadouts that might be cool:

Wraithlord with 2x Shuriken Catapult, 1x Ghostglaive: cheap, has a Ghostglaive, probably looks pretty cool. Not sure if actually good.

Wraithlord with 2x Shuriken Catapult, 2x Bright Lance: For providing Bright Lances and maybe helping out as counter-assault in an anvil or firebase part of the army.

What have you tried? What do you think will be good?

[The Mattler]

The way GW prices upgrades (poorly), adding more guns is pretty much always a better idea than running "naked" Wraithlords, Wraithknights with swords, etc.  You'll probably want to start with all of the shuriken weaponry, plus the Ghost Glaive, as your default Wraithlord, then ask yourself if you really need anything more expensive.  While the Flamers are more efficient against most infantry, the Wraithlord isn't quite fast enough to use them effectively.  More importantly, the shuriken weapons all scale up nicely against the targets that the Wraithlord is probably hunting in the first place, and never suffering to-hit penalties is always nice. The Ghost Glaive is an auto-include even if you just want to trample on MEQs all day; 2+ to wound and no save is much better than 3+ to wound and a 6+, even if the extra wounds inflicted are "wasted".  If you want a model that sits back as a heavy weapons platform, something like a War Walker would be a more efficient choice.  Get those Wraithlords stuck in to make sure they're using as many of their weapons as possible!

[magenb]

Wraithlord suck as a gun platform, for whatever reason our Dreadnought degrades with Wounds, a single Lasconnon shot can effective cripple it as a heavy weapons platform.

Being a large target it is also not difficult to strip wounds down before it gets into CC, so in assault its usefulness dwindles.

It suffers even more because it doesn't have an invul save. It's size means its hard to get a cover saves and it gets hit by heavy weapons, so tends to have a crappy save if at all.

I'm having similar issues with SM dreads as well, they work slightly better, but just tend to get nuked before they can be useful.


Basically if you are running a WraithLord make sure you have something else that is a bigger threat or its just going to get smashed.

[haunt]

I run wraithlords with ghostglaives if there are spare points, otherwise they'll use their fists. I run 2 - 3 of them along with wraithknight and avatar that way they can go and pick their poison on how to die.

This is the way I equipped them before 8th:

Wraithlord [] Flamers x2, BL or EML x2, Glaive

[Tweedz]

I typically run either 2x BL and have them stay back or go 2x SC and a Glaive. I am leaning more and more on SC/Glaive and letting something else handle the ranged AT for reasons around what magenb mentioned. Sometimes, points willing, I will throw in flamers.

[SeekingOne]

The Mattler and magenb pretty much nailed it. The only thing I can add is that IMO flamers, despite being costly, are still good for a WL that is going to get stuck in. One thing that makes them good is that they come in pairs - when you're rolling 2d6 (or any other dice like 2d3 for that matter) for the number of hits, the sum on two dice is much more stable and predictable than the result of just 1 die. Then, as for their output, there are 2 things to consider:
1) a pair of flamers makes a considerable contribution to the volume of dice - something that is quite valuable in the current CWE army, because most of our good units tend to be good in terms of quality of their shots/attacks rather than quantity;
2) flamers ignore hit penalties, and, most importantly, do not degrade with the damage taken by the model.

Granted, flamers do lack range - but, as Mattler commented earlier, if you want to make the most out of the points invested into a WL, you have to get it stuck in anyway, so it will be in range at some point. And if you're planning to use it as a long-range platform, you'll indeed be better off with Walkers (more lances) or Serpent (same 2 lances but much more durable).

That said, the WL would've been good for its current points if it had 12 wounds. 10 wounds is about the worst possible number for a monster/vehicle.

[Blazinghand]

Yeah 10 wounds is an anti-fun territory where it might legitimately be better to have 9 wounds and therefore not suffer stat degradation. So how about a Wraithlord with:

2x Flamer, 2x Shuriken Cannon, Ghostglaive

This one would clock in around 150 pts, could basically move and advance every turn (until it is close enough you want to charge) without losing too much firepower.

[magenb]

You'll need something else in the army to act as a distraction and take the hits or in Haunts case a lots of them.

The problem is what are you trying to do with them?

If you want the Shuriken cannons, then Windriders get you more shots and limits the damage a lascannon can do to the unit.

If you want it for smashing infantry, then well, incubi/scorpions will do a better job for the points. It can't even tie up a unit in combat any more and even if some magic happens and you get 3 kills, that unit falls back and the rest of the army blows it away.

Really suck that they are no longer immune to marines, so most infantry will Wound it on 5s.

Its a unit that is going to require some serious thought into how you are going to make the best use out of it and then what other units it needs to keep it around long enough to do its thing.

[Partninja]

Yeah 10 wounds is an anti-fun territory where it might legitimately be better to have 9 wounds and therefore not suffer stat degradation. So how about a Wraithlord with:

2x Flamer, 2x Shuriken Cannon, Ghostglaive

This one would clock in around 150 pts, could basically move and advance every turn (until it is close enough you want to charge) without losing too much firepower.

This is how I would run them. Putting heavies on them and standing in the back is a waste. They should be moving up to support your other units, and get stuck in when the enemy gets close enough.

[Irisado]

I would also avoid using Wraithlords in a backfield role.  At this stage, I'm unconvinced that Brightlances on Wraithlords are worth it, which is nuisance for me, as that's how mine are assembled.  I think that they seem much more suited to advanced with other Eldar infantry units, making use of their flamers, and getting involved in assaults in this edition.  I'd rather use them for mobile anti-tank fire support, but I don't think that they're effective enough in that role at the moment.

[Cavalier]

I would run them cheap. I think they are best suited as a combat focused unit. I'd equip him to as a vehicle/dreadnought smasher with the glaive supporting other close combat units. I'd give him flamers and shuriken cannons so he rinse down infantry before charging if he doesnt run into heavier type units

I ran mine with a bright lance, flamers and scatter laser and felt a more focused purpose would have been best suited. I wanted him to do a little of everything, but the penalty to him moving and shooting hurt.

[haunt]

I run them due to my theme army, since 8th ed came out I have been using them with ShurCan x2 and Glaive. Have not been bothering with flamers nor BLs or EMLs.

Yes, cheap is the way to go and this way my opponents will have to think which pain they want, quick or slow.