2000 Competitive, first try at 5th ed

[dwalker18]

So its been about 6 months since I've played a game, and probably over a year since I've played with DE. Most recently I've been playing as chaos, and have been fairly successful. But they just dont give me the same satisfaction as DE. So, after a long break, I ask for your help in creating a competitive, fun, and unique (as DE goes) list.

Here is my concept thus far:

Archon 192
Jetbike
Punisher
Combat Drugs
Shadow Field
Plasma Grenades
Tormentor Helm
Animus Vitae


Drachon 62
Agonizer
Plasma
Trophy Rack
Retinue 205
Incubi x4
Warriors x5
Blasters x2
Raider


Reavers x3 95
Blasters x2


Wyches x9 225
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider


Wyches x9 225
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider


Mandrakes x10 150

Raider Squad 110
Warriors x5
Bright Lance
Raider
Disentegrator


Raider Squad 110
Warriors x5
Bright Lance
Raider
Disentegrator


Warriors x10 120
Splinter Cannon x2
Shredder x2


Warriors x10 120
Splinter Cannon x2
Shredder x2


Ravager x2 210
Dark Lance x3


Scourge x5 160
Splinter Cannon x4


TOTAL: 1984 (I dont have my dex with me, so some of the points are probably wrong)


Basic plan is to send Archon, reavers, and scourge up one flank, the scourge suppressing any troops that pose a threat to the reavers until they are in range to pop some tanks and the archon to start taking heads. The 5 man raider squads start disembarked, while the 10 man warrior squads take their transports and fly around shooting, supporting whatever assualt element needs them. The Drachon, and Wyches will assualt the opposite flank as the Archon. The mandrakes are intended to confuse the oppoonent and give him something to worry about in the hope he makes mistakes.

Some of my big concerns are upgrades and weapons for the Ravagers and the usefulness of the mandrakes.

Thanks for your advice!

[Lord Ramon]

DE - 2000 Competitive, first try at 5th ed

Archon 192
Jetbike
Punisher
Combat Drugs
Shadow Field
Plasma Grenades
Tormentor Helm
Animus Vitae

Nice

Drachon 62
Agonizer
Plasma
Trophy Rack
Retinue 205
Incubi x4
Warriors x5
Blasters x2
Raider

My worry with Warriors in a retinue is that because they die too easily. In this instance if you really want the Blasters, just take two Warriors, and one extra Incubi (or maybe Combat Drugs). Raider must have a Night Shield.

Reavers x3 95
Blasters x2

I really think you need at least one more bike for this unit. Then your opponent needs to kill 3. Unit even better with Succubus with Punisher and T-Helm, especially if Assaulting with the Archon.

Wyches x9 225
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider

Fine. Could be an 8 girl unit. Night Shields would be nice.

Wyches x9 225
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider

Fine. Could be an 8 girl unit. Night Shields would be nice.

Mandrakes x10 150

Lose these guys completely.

Raider Squad 110
Warriors x5
Bright Lance
Raider
Disentegrator – stick with DL. Night Shields would be nice.

Raider Squad 110
Warriors x5
Bright Lance
Raider
Disentegrator – stick with DL. Night Shields would be nice.

Warriors x10 120
Splinter Cannon x2
Shredder x2

If you have points left give them a Sybarite with Agoniser. Night Shields would be nice.

Warriors x10 120
Splinter Cannon x2
Shredder x2

If you have points left give them a Sybarite with Agoniser. Night Shields would be nice.

Ravager x2 210
Dark Lance x3

Give at least one of these Disintegrators, preferably both. They desperately need Night Shields.

Scourge x5 160
Splinter Cannon x4

You need a few more bodies to remove as casualties, and prevent you from going below 50% too quickly.

Hope this helps.

I too play Chaos, and the newest codex is poor. It's just boring, and underpowered when compared to SMurfs, Orks, 'n' IGs

[KwiKwag]

My opinion is going to be a little different – forgive me for being blunt in some instances.


Archon 192
Jetbike
Punisher
Combat Drugs
Shadow Field
Plasma Grenades
Tormentor Helm
Animus Vitae

First, the Archon is allowed 100 points of war gear, you have 107 (jet bike, drugs, shadow, grenades, t-helm & vitae). I would definitely keep the grenades so dropping the vitae is the most expendable thing. You will still be strength 5 and strength 6 with drugs – if you need to be strength 7 then you are using your Reaver Lord wrong. Remember, a 5 point blaster to the face from a 8 point warrior is much more efficient than using your 200 point lord (200 vs. 13 points).



Drachon, Agonizer, Plasma, Trophy Rack
Retinue 205
Incubi x4
Warriors x5
Blasters x2
Raider

There is no “h” in Dracon. He needs combat drugs no matter who he is with otherwise he is just a little better than a Sybarite. Drugs will be needed to strike first in some instances and when you get stuck in CC with a high toughness monster you will wish for the extra attack and re-rolling of misses.

Retinues: Warriors can not take blasters in a retinue – they can only take splinter cannons and lances (yah, dumb I know). You can, however, give everyone plasma grenades otherwise you are wasting an extremely good initiative when you charge into cover. As you have it now only the dracon will strike at initiative and you will not get to re-roll misses or get an extra attack.

Also, I really do not care for mixed retinues that have warriors. Warriors shoot well but are dead meat in CC. The Incubi CC well and really do not need to shoot at all. So you got a shooting element where you do not need it and is a risk in CC. Also you run the risk of causing the enemy to take a morale check (and if it’s a Marine squad with combat tactics they could choose to fail the check and flee out of charge range (then they rapid fire your arse next turn knowing you do not have a 12” charge!).

So there is no reason to shoot with this squad other than letting a couple t-helm shoot but that has never caused anyone to take a check. I say dump the warriors and pick up another Incubi and use them solely for close combat (so no blasters for the Incubi either!). Trust me, this incubi squad will slaughter most marine squads in CC alone and will definitely not need to shoot the enemy before the charge.

One last optional suggestion, since the incubi can not fleet they may come short on their charge. I now put a horrorfex on the raider just for that reason. Since it is cheap with good range I will use it on the intended target before I make the charge – idea being if the Incubi fail then the target maybe be pinned. Sometimes I feel a pinned target is worth more than the one death the lance may cause – even if you choose not to use the fex then you are only ignoring a low point raider option.


Reavers x3 95
Blasters x2

I call this a meat-shield for the Archon. I wouldn’t use them for CC at all so they are purely to escort the Archon unit he charges. My biggest worry is the small squad size and the chance of taking a morale check when you lose 1 bike – too fragile for me. If I run a Reaver Lord then when I make the list I build around the idea that I am going to have a close combat ready reaver squad with 5 bikes and a succubus armed to the teeth. With this squad the way you have it now I would assign it to tank hunting and consider them sacrificial and expendable.


Wyches x9 225
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider

Since you got 2 wych squads in the list I would suggest dropping them down to as low as 6 and giving them blasters. I have found that when these 2 squads work together you can focus them on any marine squad and reliably cut them down to size (but not eliminating them). I usually put more wyches in the squad when I run only 1 squad of wyches or when a lord is not assigned to them. In your case, 9 wyches with an agoniser is not enough for a reliable solo assault against a marine squad and 18 wyches with 2 agonisers is too much (almost overkill) that could leave you stranded when you decimate the marine squad.

The blasters are optional and just a matter of style. I have found the 2 blasters very flexible when you maybe facing marines, monstrous creatures, super hq’s or a dreadnaught/walker of some type. The 2 shots of the blaster are more reliable to kill a marine than the extra attacks of the wych if you had the extra attacks. In other words I am giving up 1 attack from 2 wyches (2 strength 3 attacks) for 2 dark matter shots and that is not to say the limited CC attacks from those 2 wyches are not going to do anthing.


Mandrakes x10 150

Not a bad choice but this unit is a finesse squad and I would not recommend it to anyone who is not familiar with the game or the dark eldar. I use them a lot myself and I can find ways to make them worth their points but it takes a lot of care and a solid understanding of what they can do and how they can help the list. So if you are going to take them, take them in a squad of 10 as you have it.


Raider Squad 110
Warriors x5
Bright Lance
Raider
Disentegrator

Bright Lance? Grrr!

So you are doing a “super gunboat” squad eh? I do not care for this raider squad to be min/max but the downside is now punishing enough with such a fragile kill point wandering the board its about even. I used a super gunboat squad last night that had 2 blasters and 2 cannons with a lance on the raider and it I was able to get 3 good turns of shooting out of them – fantastic! Give the sybarite a xenospasm and have fun!

I usually only run 1 squad of them while the other 3 raider squads are full with an agoniser sybarite. Good luck to this.


Warriors x10 120
Splinter Cannon x2
Shredder x2

Not a big fan of the shredders as I often wished I had blasters when I did try them. What I do not like is the weakness against marines and against armor in general. I tend to get 1 dead marine out of the blast and that’s the same for blaster. When I need to pop armor then the “AP-“ really hurts especially when you “glance” (-3, ouch!).


Ravager x2 210
Dark Lance x3

I definitely endorse this setup. I need all 3 lance dice in order to get a single “pen” and for some reason 2 dice from a sniper squad always seem to fail me. I know some say that the 3 desintegrator ravager is just too good to pass up but to me any dedicated CC squad competes for the same targets as a 3 dissy ravager. So sure, if I got a 3 ravager it will most likely be a 3 dissy setup but when you face a lot of land raiders at your gaming club the 3 dissy ravager just doesn’t cut it to take more than 1 of them. Just my opinion.


Scourge x5 160
Splinter Cannon x4

Hmmm, I will be honest and say I have never used them in a game before so I can only guess at their effectiveness. If you think they are cool and you got to have them in the list then go for it. If you got no clue or decide to drop them then I would either pick up another ravager or use the points to bolster some of the troop choices with sybarirtes and agonisers.


Basic plan is to send Archon, reavers, and scourge up one flank, the scourge suppressing any troops that pose a threat to the reavers until they are in range to pop some tanks and the archon to start taking heads.

I would be turbo-charging the bikes whenever possible and that would leave the scourges in the dust so to speak. I can’t imagine not getting that wonderful turbo charging cover save when you are not in range to do anything anyways. Still, an interesting plan that I haven’t seen before and perhaps you can mold this into something that might work.


The 5 man raider squads start disembarked, while the 10 man warrior squads take their transports and fly around shooting, supporting whatever assualt element needs them.

You can get a 12” move out of them so I am wondering what side are they going to be used? Archon, bikes and scourge is your weak side and will probably fold in one round of shooting. Another idea, with this plan in mind is dropping the Scourges for more bikes, either another bike squad or beefing up the existing one with a succubus. Then you got yourself a squad that moves the same and now has a some CC capability.


The Drachon, and Wyches will assualt the opposite flank as the Archon.

The Dracon/Incubi and 2 wych squads is your strong side and most likely draw the most fire. What I do not like about the wyches exposing themselves early in the game is that they are allergic to exploding raiders. The incubi also may just shrug off the explosion but then they become pedestrians too soon in the game. It may work but I can tell you that priority for your opponent on the first turn is to stop the incubi and wyches.


The mandrakes are intended to confuse the oppoonent and give him something to worry about in the hope he makes mistakes.

Mandrakes I noticed worry the opponent during setup and when the 3rd turn comes around. During 1st and 2nd turn the opponent will usually ignore the mandrakes when bikes, a lord on a bike, incubi, 2 wyches and 2 or 3 super gunboats are coming at them. In this list I would first use them first to counter any infiltration, scouting, outflanking, etc., threats and for keeping your “scoring” min/max 5 man squads from getting assaulted.

Other than baby-sitting the min/max squads that are wandering around the mandrakes are almost not needed so perhaps dropping them and adding more bikes or another bike squad to the list would distract and confuse more effectively. Understand that my opinions are based around facing a marine (MEQ) equivalent lists as that is what I face mostly where I play. A random ork or eldar player do squeek in but my bias in my suggestions are for facing marines.

If I had this list I would probably not split my army during the actual advance as it tends to make us weaker. Focus your advance by outmaneuvering your opponent and overload one side (his weaker side). I would probably line up the warriors and raider squads in the center while the Archon, bikes and scourges sit on the outside flank. Incubi and wyches can take the opposite side but they will not advance, they will go flat-out to the Archon side while the super gunboats maintain their postion and almost abandon the flank where the incubi and wyches were. The idea being that the enemy will bulk up on the same side as the incubi and wyches leaving the opposite flank weaker. This will usually strand the enemies best shooting units to one side while the other side advances more freely. Many times when I have done this I have left the opponent scrambling to get across the board and you can totally cripple them by knocking out their transports early with your troop choices and watching the enemy walk across the board slowly. Of course, I am talking about marine type opponents and it doesn’t work out so pretty when you are facing the eldar or orks.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

[buckero0]

First, the Archon ... You will still be strength 5 and strength 6 with drugs – if you need to be strength 7 then you are using your Reaver Lord wrong.

There is no “h” in Dracon. He needs combat drugs no matter who he is with otherwise he is just a little better than a Sybarite. Drugs will be needed to strike first in some instances and when you get stuck in CC with a high toughness monster you will wish for the extra attack and re-rolling of misses.

I was going to ask you about these two statements. You have to roll a die to find out what drugs you get on your character before the game starts, where does it say you can pick what effect you get? Also how do you get your Lord to be Str 5,6, or 7? He startes out as 3 with the Punisher he'd be 4, with drugs (if you rolled a 3 then 5) According to the jet bike rules, the archon can't even use a punisher while on his bike (only single handed weapons, one at a time), so he'd just be str3. Can you explain a little bit or help me understand your critique? am I missing something? Is there a FAQ that states you can choose which combat drug you can take?

[KwiKwag]

I was going to ask you about these two statements. You have to roll a die to find out what drugs you get on your character before the game starts, where does it say you can pick what effect you get?

There are 2 kinds of combat drugs - one that wyches, hellions and reavers get that you do not buy as they are included in the purchase of the unit. This drug is as you stated rolled at the beginning of the game for the rest of the game.

The other that gets confused with the one I just mentioned is a combat drug dispenser that a character can buy in the wargear section. The dispenser description is located in the wargear section of the codex. Simply, if you buy this dispenser you get to take whatever drug affect you want for that assault phase. You can take more than one effect (+1 strength is one of them) to better fight your opponent. Of course, the downside is that you might take a wound from overdosing or possibly die outright. Read the codex description and it will tell about the 6 different effects (same as the wych squad combat drugs listed in wych description of the codex.

I typically take 2 to 3 drugs for my Lords depending on what weapon I am using. The two drugs I always choose is "re-roll misses" and "+1 attack". If I have a punisher Lord then I might take the +1 strength effect but not always - sometimes I have to take the 12" charge drug or the always strike first drug.

So its not in the FAQ - it is in the Codex and has not changed in both editions of it.


Also how do you get your Lord to be Str 5,6, or 7? He startes out as 3 with the Punisher he'd be 4, with drugs (if you rolled a 3 then 5) According to the jet bike rules, the archon can't even use a punisher while on his bike (only single handed weapons, one at a time), so he'd just be str3. Can you explain a little bit or help me understand your critique? am I missing something?

Sure, lets start from the beginning. Go to the GW website and download the 5th edition Dark Eldar FAQ. The FAQ says to replace the reaver jetbike entry with the new one that is on the FAQ. If you replace the entire entry in the codex then the part about only using 1 handed weapons is gone, deleted and thus there is nothing restricting us from using 2 handed weapons on a reaver jet (which brings us in line with all the other armies as they all got to use 2 handed weapons a long time ago).

So now you can take a punisher and a tormentor helm and thus give you not only +1 strength but an extra attack thanks to the helm. So lets figure this out!

First, the bike itself gives the rider two bonuses, +1 strength and +1 toughness. So an Archon will now be strength 4 and toughness 4.

Now add a punisher and you get another +1 to your strength. You are now Strength 5.

Now add the combat drug effect of "+1 strength" to the Archon and now you're Strength 6.

Now if you really crazy, you can take the Animus Vitae. If you activate it by taking a prisoner then you get another +1 to strength making you Strength 7 if you keep taking combat drug effect of +1 strength. Voila!

So an Archon on a bike with a punisher is strength 5 all the time and will be wounding marines on "3's". If you really want to kill marines better then take the +1 strength to boost you to strength 6 and now kill marines on "2's".

That is why I said you do not really need to go to strength 7 as you are already wounding just about everyone on "2's" anyway with strength 6. If you need strength 7 then just use a blaster.

So download the new FAQ and read the codex.

[buckero0]

you're right, sorry, I read the old FAQ and had read the bike and wych CD so many times that I kept skimming over the CD dispenser.

Sorry to hijack the thread

[dwalker18]

Hey Guys, thanks for the input. I've done a bit of a reworking to the list after playing a couple games with it and reading your suggestions. Here it goes:

Archon
Jetbike
Punisher
Combat Drugs
Shadow Field
Plasma Grenades
Tormentor Helm

Dracon
Agonizer
Plasma
Splinter Pistol
Retinue
Incubi x5
Raider
Night Shield
Horrorfex

Wyches x7
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider
Night Shield
Horrorfex

Wyches x7
Plasma
Wyche Weapons
Succubus
Agonizer
Raider
Night Shield
Horrorfex

Warriors x10
Dark Lance

Reavers x4
Blasters x2
Succubus
Punisher
Plasma
Tormentor Helm

Raider Squad
Warriors x7
Dark Lance
Raider
Horrorfex
Disentegrator

Raider Squad
Warriors x7
Dark Lance
Raider
Horrorfex
Disentegrator

Warriors x10
Splinter Cannon x2
Blaster x2

Warriors x10
Splinter Cannon x2
Blaster x2

Ravager
Night Shields

Ravager
Night Shelds

Ravager
Night Shields

I dropped the wyches down to 8 per squad, changed shredders to blasters, and added night shields and horrorfexs. The Dracon's retinue is now solely incubi. I plan on using this as Kwi suggested earlier, hopefully using those horrorfexs and really frustrating my opponent.

I know i have a lot of dark lances, but recently I dont seem to have enough since i can never actually kill a tank with them. If my luck turns and i dont need so many, i plan on giving the warrior squads splinter cannons instead of dark lances.

Let me know what you think. Thanks.

[KwiKwag]

I'd be curious of what happened in those games you played - any chance of filling us in?

As for the list, much, much better than before - very little to fix. If I have an idea of how you are using your list we could probably make it even more efficient to your play style.

[dwalker18]

Sadly i dont remember too much of what happened because it was so long ago. I played against guard once and tzeentch once. In both games i had trouble taking out tanks. My archon did great as usual, and the super gunboats also prooved to be very useful. The scourge got destroyed rather quickly and the mandrakes didnt do too much. I lost both games but im not to upset by that since they were mostly just to get myself familiar with DE and 5th ed rules since its been so long since i last played.

My plan for this is to set up heavy on one flank, forcing my opponent to set up heavy to block me. Then i will use my superior speed to move to his weak flank and begin systematically picking him apart. I will use my dark lances to take out any armor, especially transports and use the horrorfexes to slow down my opponent's attempt to reinforce his flank even further. The gunoats will try to destroy and at least soften any CC squads coming my way. Wyches will engage anything thats left. Bikes will move with the archon and shield him.