Hey guys! I'm gonna keep this brief for reasons which'll soon become obvious. Also I deleted some of my best pictures which was a terrible mistake on my part because there were some great ones.... Anyway lets jump in!
So this was my 2nd test run of the new book and it was a doozy. In this game we played 1855-ish (my bro and I are a little flexible on these things) and a standard 5 objective game. Here are the lists:
Autarch: Fusion Gun, Fire Sword, Banshee Mask
Wraithblades x5
Wave Serpent: Scatter Lasers, Shuriken Cannon
Avengers x8
Wave Serpent: Scatter Lasers, Shuriken Cannon
Windriders x6- x6 Scatter Lasers
Swooping Hawks x8
Hornets x3- x6 Pulse Lasers
Nightwing
Wraithknight: Wraithcannons, 1x Scatter Laser
My Brother's List (as best I can remember it)
Pask in a Punisher (Warlord)
Plasmacutioner
Leman Russ Battle Tank
Platoon Command: Vox
Infantry Squad: Vox
Infantry Squad: Vox
Heavy Weapons Team: Autocannons
Veterans x3 Plasma
Chimera: Double Heavy Flamers
Vendetta
Manticore
In my opinion... NOT his best list. Why he forewent his usual 4 squads of Veterans with Plasma, the Vulture, Imperial Knight etc I don't know... but he is re-modelling everything right now to differentiate between Vets, and Infantry men and wanted to get a feel for things with his new look IG. But that aside lets jump in.
Unfortunately I deleted the set-up photo of the board but is a collage to set the scene:
Eldar Turn 1
So I got turn 1 for the first time in forever and lets just say it started off with a bang. As you can see I set up evenly across the board (which I usually do when I go first) and then swung everything up the right flank using turbo-boosts to get into position... thus getting out of range of both Pask and the Plasmacutioner. I bust the Wraithknight just within 36" of the manticore, let rip with his Heavy Distortion Cannon, miss with the first gun, nail him with the second and roll a 6. He just got D'd. I felt bad as this was the model's first appearance on the board and my brother had spent a long time painting him... but alas it was not meant to be. On top of that I was already in his deployment zone with all my Serpents meaning my Autarch the Wraithblades and 16 Avengers were ready to rock. Very intimidating stuff!
IG Turn 1
The loss of the Manticore hurt and Pask and his buddies were out of position. My brother decided to bunker down and hope the remaining tanks could do some work. So the Basilisks let rip on the Wraithknight both his, both wound and I pass both Feel No Pains. Scary! Both of us could feel the power of the Wraithknight. Then the Plasmacutioner and Leman Russ moveout, the Plasmacutioner hits the Wave Serpent all 5 times and the Russ hits with its battle-cannon and Lascannon as well. I jink all but 1 hit and downgrade the pen to a glance. This is getting ugly quick! My brother's frustration is growing and I can feel the hatred of the internet filling the room! The Autocannon Team fires at the Wraithknight in desperation to wrack up at least a wound and they achieve that... but only that! Only a hullpoint and a single wound dealt out and the IG's turn ends. Not good!
Eldar Turn 2
Everything moves deeper into the IG deployment zone. A squad of Avengers disembarks, the Wraithblades disembark all using the LOS blocking terrain to hide from the remaining tank and infantry squad on the otherside of the big ruin. Everything also arrives out of reserves. Hawks come down (there blast scatters away harmlessly), the bikes come in, the Nightwing arrives and so do the Hornets. This is the picture I REALLY wish I had... but just try and picture it in your minds... and with a little help from these pix.
So during deployment my brother set up his bassies as far away from my Wraithknight as possible. But there was one 5-6" gap between the cave/hill terrain he was hiding behind and the board edge... just enough for my Wind Riders, Nightwing to unload on the Basilisk side armor and thats what I'm gunning for. Also having moved his Tanks out there rear armor was exposed to an outflanking manuever by my Hornets whose Acute Senses rule allowed me to get them exactly into position. I had an excellent picture of the entire cluster of Corsair outflankers but I deleted it! The IG photo doesn't reflect the movement of the Russ' but shows the position of the Baslisks. Anyway Here's the best photos that remain to try and illustrate the scene
So the bikes let rip into the Basilisk and shred the poor tank. The Nightwing does the same with its double shuriken-cannons finishing off the squadron. It was a brutal move on my part but it had to be done. The Hornets then pummel the Leman Russ squadron and even facing a lot side armor 13 on the Russ' destroy 2 of them with help from the Wraithknight. I just ripped the heart out of the IG... and to add insult to injury split-fire from the Wraithknight into the infantry squad in the ruin allows me to assault into their firebase... and like a scene from Evangelion the beast goes on a rampage with stomp decimating the IG foothold.
This maneuver ended the turn and needless to say there was some serious shock and awe tactics going here for the Eldar. Yet my brother had a few cards left to play.
IG Turn 2
So my brother rolls reserves and the bad-bird itself the Vendetta arrives while the Vets in their Chimera remain off the board. He turns Pask around and blows away two of the remaining Hornets the other survives via a couple lucky jink rolls with a lone hull-point remaining. The recently arrived Vendetta unloads on the Wraithblades and my Autarch and knocks out two of the Wraithguard. Those suckers can really take a pounding and they protect my Autarch very well. Yet with so little left the turn ends and Lions of Asuryan remain on the rampage.
Eldar Turn 3
With the Vendetta on the board I decide its time for my Nightwing to flee and hope for a better angle of firing either on his counter-part or Pask. My jetbikes move out to claim objectives and the rest of the Warhost surges on. The Wraithblades and Autarch continue to move up, while my Dire Avengers fire on the remaining Infantrymen inside the ruin and move in to assault. The Wave Serpents move into position to fire on the Platoon Command and grab objectives. Then the Swooping Hawks which had gone ignored intercept the Vendetta wracking up to HP's but fail to bring it down! Meanwhile the Wraithknight finishes off the last of Autocannon team and remains covered in the ruins. With shooting done my Avengers roll well and make it into combat with the Infantrymen and slay them in glorious combat. I use my consolidation roll to get out of line-of-sight inside the ruin and await a final desperate charge from the IG. A less spectacular turn but its almost mopping up duty at this point. Yet my brother has one last card to play.
IG Turn 4
Reserves are rolled and the Chimera with Plasma vets arrive. This is my brothers last chance and he smartly pulls in right behind the Swooping Hawks and my Autarch and Wraithblades. Pask moves back behind the ruins forcing the Wraithknight to come to him (and to protect warlord). The Chimera flames the Hawks and they break morale and run. The Vets unload on my Wraithblades but shockingly only 1 goes down. Those 4+ invuln saves are not to be taken lightly. The Vendetta goes into hover mode moves back 12" and fires on the Wraithknight knocking up two more wounds. This was a very disappointing turn for my brother. He needed those Vets to get the job done and it didn't happen. The Eldar are poised for another big turn to close out the game.
Eldar Turn 5
The Eldar rampage was about to commence again. My Hawks rallied, intercepted the Vendetta and brought it down. The Wraithknight turned around and destroyed the Chimera, as did my Corsair Prince and his Wraithblades to deal with the backstabbing Vets. The Avengers lined-up inside the ruins to prevent the Infantry men in the ruin next door from being able to Move, Move, Move inside the ruin in a last charge. Meanwhile the Serpents moved into position on a number of objectives as did the Jetbikes. The Nightwing also returned to the board and shot at Pask ineffectually. With shooting out of the way my Corsair Prince and Wraithblades charged the Vets and killed 4 of them (not the best rolling) but they held tying up my Prince in combat. It was another very effective turn for the Eldar and the IG knew the day was lost.
IG Turn 5 End of the Game
We decided to call it at this point. We played the turn out but nothing much happened. The Vets broke, and my Prince failed to catch them while, the remaining infantry men set-up a shoot and charge for next turn against the Avengers inside the ruin. While Pask, the Platoon Command and an Infantry unit remained the game was effectivley over. The Corsairs were all over the objectives, the Wraithknight was in position to go after Pask and the Platoon Command and all my Avengers were intact as well as the potential bombing run from the recently rallied Hawks. The Lions of Asuryan had crushed the IG and were poised to eradicate every last one of them if the game had continued.
Concluding Thoughts:
Wow. This games was an eye-opener. The Wraithknight was on an absolute tear and seemed all but unstoppable. The ability to split-fire, stomp, and feel-no-pain all came into enormous effect and really changed the way I look at the unit. The Wave Serpents were as effective as ever, the Wraithblades continued to be an average unit in terms of offense, but very useful in its ability to take units out of the shooting phase and grind them down. The Hornets were nasty as ever, and the Jetbikes got a chance to shine. This was a text-book Eldar victory... they were hitting my brother's IG from all sides with devastating force and in the end it just overwhelmed the out-gunned IG.
So... where to go from here. I'm definitely changing the way I construct my list. The Wraithknight is going to be reserved for no-holds barred games. I've got a game coming up this saturday against my new friend Amar who brings absolutely brutal lists. For everyone else I'm going to have "the conversation" about what type of game they want to play. Lords of War/No Lords of War, Ranged-D/No-Ranged D. The Wraithknight is truly one of the most dominating units in the game and if you do not have an answer to him, I'm not bringing him.
Replacements are going to come in the form of Corsair Fire Dragons, True Born with Blasters (WWP Raid) and Scourges with Haywire Blasters. In a way I'm happy with changes to the Wraithknight and Wraithguard because I truly have an excellent core of Apocalypse units, as well as excellent choices for no-holds-barred games. On the other hand I'm bummed because I was really looking forward to great knightly duels between my Wraithknight and the Imperial Knight. Sadly the Imperial Knight is drastically outclassed unless the Melta-Cannon becomes a Destroyer Weapon. Either way I look at it as an opportunity to rock a far fluffier list one centered around lightning fast raids... with my Wraith units (heirloom units drawn from the dead of my Corsair Prince's family) become units only used in special games or no-holds-barred like I've mentioned.
Anyway a lot of modelling to come in the future. More of my jetbikes will be finished this week and I'm going to begin modelling up reinforcements in the form of Corsair Dragons towards the end of this week or next week. So on to my closing notes....
Special Announcement! Anyway! I'm returning to the Splintermind Podcast to discuss.... you guessed it... the New Eldar Codex! I'll be chatting with Thor and Evil Space Elves from the Dark City about the changes to the new Dex and the impact it'll have on the game and the Dark Kin. The Dark City is one of my favorite forums and the DE purists are just hardcore about the Dark Eldar as some of the Eldar Online vets here at 40k Online. While 40k online was down it became one of my favorite forums and is a great resource for anyone playing DE. So if you are interested make sure you check it out!
Splintermind: The Dark Eldar PodcastAnyways guys I've got a game coming up this week and a bunch of models ready in the works so stay tuned for some updates in the near future. So thanks for stopping by and I'll talk to you guys all soon!
