Rork
June 29th, 2007, 21:55
I thought I'd give a quick overview of one of the important elements an Eldar general needs to consider - controlling the table. Controlling the table isn't just about holding the right pieces of terrain or minimising enemy fire power while maximising your own.
It's also about geometry and angles.
Raw firepower alone won't always win the game, particularly against enemy vehicles whose armour is often difficult to crack with the average Eldar heavy weapon (being S6), usually meaning your decent AT weapons are few in number. While I'll be looking at fire prisms here, much of the general advice extends to missile launchers, bright lances and pulse lasers also.
In my experience, refusing a flank is the way to play the new, fast Eldar. Straight, fair fights on a wide frontage will almost always suit the enemy army more than it does the Eldar. Never play fair, play dirty.
Today I'll be looking at an abstracted example of how to use the enemy's weaknesses against them while maximising your own strengths - primarily those of speed and manoeuvrability.
Consider the setup below:
The green triangles are tooled up fire prisms, the red rectangles are lascannon/heavy bolter predators and the red square is a tactical squad with a lascannon.
Both sides are playing cagey. Both players know that a prism cannon or lascannon is going to knock out a significant amount of their firepower, so are hiding as a result. Typically the Eldar are outnumbered and outgunned.
(If this were a "live" game, one fire prism would be back up by most of the Eldar army, the other backed up with 1-2 small units at most)
But the Eldar are lucky, and go first.
The fire prism on the left would always be dangerously exposed if it had crossed the building in front of it. In the worst case scenario, it's likely that all three lascannons could have been bearing down on it. Not good. But in a six turn game with a 24" move, does it matter? Course not. In a flanking strategy, the waiting game is usually necessary before you can control one side of the battlefield.
You'll have to expose one prism, so it's up to the right hand side one to stick its neck out. The linked shot has a reroll to hit and penetrates a predator on 3+. It really doesn't stand much of a chance vs that sort of firepower, so gets taken out by a focused shot. When it comes to prisms, those angles I mentioned are important. The 60" range and the ability to combine shots means you've got to be able to use terrain to support your own tanks as shown above. Having a shot effectively travel 120" as it bounces from one prism to another won't be unusual!
The Imperials, of course, aren't going to let the Eldar have it their own way. The remaining predator could move to the right, but then it's severely out on a limb vs a fast and long ranged opponent. Moving right would likely mean the left hand fire prism will be able to stay out of lascannon range.
So left it has to be. Sensibly, the Imperial player is hugging the wood to present his front armour to the prisms. The lascannon unit opens up on the right-hand prism and shakes it (Love those holo-fields :D). If the predator is lucky, it might manage the same feat on the left hand prism.
Six turns and a 24" move? Hide. You've collapsed one space marine flank, so now is the time to use it. The left prism gets over the table while the shaken one hides. The left-hand prism is safe, and the right hand one can't be seen. In your average game, the imperial units would try to engage other units. That's where support units (particularly for the left hand prism) can come in.
Remember that prisms and falcons (as well as units like shining spears or warlocks) are your "king pins". Give your opponent something to shoot at that would be to his advantage to destroy (such as a vyper) but not necessarily important to you winning the game.
With the predator in a decent firing position, there would be little need to move it (Something I will revisit soon). Of course, the Eldar have had to deal with the first predator the hard way. But why should it be hard? High speed and high strength weapons makes many of your units a huge threat to side armour values.
Which brings me back to the angles. Very few vehicles are square. Most are rectangular, and have a lower side armour than front armour. This means their front 'arc' is quite narrow while their side 'arc' is quite large. And importantly means you really don't need to be square on to the side armour to lay on the pain.
The fire prism on the left dives out from behind that wood, while the one on the right hops straight over the building it was lurking behind (Love those skimmers). Once again, you've controlled your own angles so the prisms can see each other, but the predator would have difficulty getting at the right hand prism if it lives (the enemy might be tempted to split their firepower).
So boosting up the right hand prism gives you a near-guaranteed penetrating hit on the side armour of that predator thanks to the usage of angles. You're in the side arc just enough to get at the weaker armour and avoiding the tougher front armour.
Bang! Another predator.
Of course, the Marine player had the option to move his predator. The beauty of crushing one flank is that your opponent will have side armour shots in mind (the angles may not be so oblique), usually meaning he ends up twiddling his vehicles in an attempt to present the best facing.
What could he do? If he turns to face the prism on the left, the Eldar could have reversed the manoeuvre and shot it in the side with the other fire prism. Moving away from the wood would have likely resulted in the same thing. Reversing would work, but would play into the hands of the Eldar player since its role in the battle would be reduced (and suit the superior range of the prism cannon).
The imperial player has a major threat in his flank, but also has to deal with the bulk of the Eldar force coming from the other direction. The result is that both your opponent and his army are under pressure, which can result in mistakes that suit your strategy.
As a footnote, I don't intend to say that fire prisms should always work together. Sometimes two S9 (/S5) shots can be a better idea than the one big shot of doom. And remember those oblique angles can be achieved with falcons, vypers and even jetbike shuriken cannons. The fire prisms are something I use, and show how it can be important for mutual support between units.
It's also about geometry and angles.
Raw firepower alone won't always win the game, particularly against enemy vehicles whose armour is often difficult to crack with the average Eldar heavy weapon (being S6), usually meaning your decent AT weapons are few in number. While I'll be looking at fire prisms here, much of the general advice extends to missile launchers, bright lances and pulse lasers also.
In my experience, refusing a flank is the way to play the new, fast Eldar. Straight, fair fights on a wide frontage will almost always suit the enemy army more than it does the Eldar. Never play fair, play dirty.
Today I'll be looking at an abstracted example of how to use the enemy's weaknesses against them while maximising your own strengths - primarily those of speed and manoeuvrability.
Consider the setup below:
The green triangles are tooled up fire prisms, the red rectangles are lascannon/heavy bolter predators and the red square is a tactical squad with a lascannon.
Both sides are playing cagey. Both players know that a prism cannon or lascannon is going to knock out a significant amount of their firepower, so are hiding as a result. Typically the Eldar are outnumbered and outgunned.
(If this were a "live" game, one fire prism would be back up by most of the Eldar army, the other backed up with 1-2 small units at most)
But the Eldar are lucky, and go first.
The fire prism on the left would always be dangerously exposed if it had crossed the building in front of it. In the worst case scenario, it's likely that all three lascannons could have been bearing down on it. Not good. But in a six turn game with a 24" move, does it matter? Course not. In a flanking strategy, the waiting game is usually necessary before you can control one side of the battlefield.
You'll have to expose one prism, so it's up to the right hand side one to stick its neck out. The linked shot has a reroll to hit and penetrates a predator on 3+. It really doesn't stand much of a chance vs that sort of firepower, so gets taken out by a focused shot. When it comes to prisms, those angles I mentioned are important. The 60" range and the ability to combine shots means you've got to be able to use terrain to support your own tanks as shown above. Having a shot effectively travel 120" as it bounces from one prism to another won't be unusual!
The Imperials, of course, aren't going to let the Eldar have it their own way. The remaining predator could move to the right, but then it's severely out on a limb vs a fast and long ranged opponent. Moving right would likely mean the left hand fire prism will be able to stay out of lascannon range.
So left it has to be. Sensibly, the Imperial player is hugging the wood to present his front armour to the prisms. The lascannon unit opens up on the right-hand prism and shakes it (Love those holo-fields :D). If the predator is lucky, it might manage the same feat on the left hand prism.
Six turns and a 24" move? Hide. You've collapsed one space marine flank, so now is the time to use it. The left prism gets over the table while the shaken one hides. The left-hand prism is safe, and the right hand one can't be seen. In your average game, the imperial units would try to engage other units. That's where support units (particularly for the left hand prism) can come in.
Remember that prisms and falcons (as well as units like shining spears or warlocks) are your "king pins". Give your opponent something to shoot at that would be to his advantage to destroy (such as a vyper) but not necessarily important to you winning the game.
With the predator in a decent firing position, there would be little need to move it (Something I will revisit soon). Of course, the Eldar have had to deal with the first predator the hard way. But why should it be hard? High speed and high strength weapons makes many of your units a huge threat to side armour values.
Which brings me back to the angles. Very few vehicles are square. Most are rectangular, and have a lower side armour than front armour. This means their front 'arc' is quite narrow while their side 'arc' is quite large. And importantly means you really don't need to be square on to the side armour to lay on the pain.
The fire prism on the left dives out from behind that wood, while the one on the right hops straight over the building it was lurking behind (Love those skimmers). Once again, you've controlled your own angles so the prisms can see each other, but the predator would have difficulty getting at the right hand prism if it lives (the enemy might be tempted to split their firepower).
So boosting up the right hand prism gives you a near-guaranteed penetrating hit on the side armour of that predator thanks to the usage of angles. You're in the side arc just enough to get at the weaker armour and avoiding the tougher front armour.
Bang! Another predator.
Of course, the Marine player had the option to move his predator. The beauty of crushing one flank is that your opponent will have side armour shots in mind (the angles may not be so oblique), usually meaning he ends up twiddling his vehicles in an attempt to present the best facing.
What could he do? If he turns to face the prism on the left, the Eldar could have reversed the manoeuvre and shot it in the side with the other fire prism. Moving away from the wood would have likely resulted in the same thing. Reversing would work, but would play into the hands of the Eldar player since its role in the battle would be reduced (and suit the superior range of the prism cannon).
The imperial player has a major threat in his flank, but also has to deal with the bulk of the Eldar force coming from the other direction. The result is that both your opponent and his army are under pressure, which can result in mistakes that suit your strategy.
As a footnote, I don't intend to say that fire prisms should always work together. Sometimes two S9 (/S5) shots can be a better idea than the one big shot of doom. And remember those oblique angles can be achieved with falcons, vypers and even jetbike shuriken cannons. The fire prisms are something I use, and show how it can be important for mutual support between units.