Do Eldar Suck?

[feebianac]

I love my Eldar! They don't suck, they're just a more demanding army to play. With many specialized units, they can be hard to play at first. I'm sorry if this had been said a couple of times, but it's true.

[mrcr0wley]

gimlet said:

Hes only 12

There maybe the problem

you cant generalise with age as everybody matures diferently and comes to understand certain concepts diferently. Each race is pretty much equal and it is up to the player to maek the army successful. A good player will win with any army given to him while a bad player will struggle even if they focus on the one army for however long, its all in the army lsit taken and the tactics used by the player.

you gota get him to go through the list, have someone at gw ake him through stratergies for eldar or get him to go to a forum like this but for eldar

ps my brother played high elves(warhammer evuivalent of eldar) and he sucked and blamed it on the elves, if we swapped over and he gotorcs or chaos i woudl still win because i played with stratergy and he just used his same tactics with a dif army)

Help him out with a list and show him stratergy

[mrcr0wley]

ps: Eldar are a complex race to play and require the player to use tacics to the strengths of the race, your friend might not be aware of his races strengths and weaknesses

[cenpjas]

No eldar do not sux (as many posts say), your pals tactics or lack there of do. eldar are an effective mobile assault army. They do 'ok' trying to do an imperial guard defence, but there not as good and it wastes most of there advantages.

I presume this chap more or less only has the battle box, which is not a good indication of the 'Eldar way of war' IMO. Although the new eldar is better than the old one and does not require you to specalise, you do still need a game plan and the units to carry it out.

I would say the new eldar are better than the old eldar, I have certainly found them more challenging with my nids.

I would disagree with lowlygaunt about nids being forgiving, in my experience there only forgiving if your opponent allows you to recover from a blunder... mine don't.

Others might disagree with me, but I have found for my nid army, that Dire Avengers are often my biggest issue, and I put a lot if care into nailing them before they become an issue. My army is very ravaner heavy, with I5 and rending they are nails against most units, but the I5 and re-rolling inv save often fatally stalls my assault for 1-2 turns.

To be honest I am glad I have not had to deal with 3 full units of Eldar Harlequins yet, as they will slaughter all , I6, rending and 4+ inv, move like ravaners and almost imposible to shoot.

-cen

[sephiroth00055]

Whoa, what you just decribed is death to all. THat seems way broken and very cheesy. I knew harlequins were good but I didnt know they were that good!!

[hivefleetsurt]

They only have a 5+ inv save.

[coredump]

And they move like stealers... except they also ignore dif terrain

Of course, gargoyles trash them...

[lowlygaunt]

You stop Harlequins by shooting them. if they are in a vehicle, stop the vehicle. In CC you stop them be sacrificing a unit more than 6" from the rest of your units, then gunning them down. They are expensive for a unit with a 5+ save. In CC deadly, out, not so deadly.
Units that are good against harlequins:
Ogryns (lots of wounds per, good Toughness so lots of swing backs, hopefully)
Any SoB's: Invulnerable save on a faith point.
Genestealers: Swing at same Initiative, better armor save for non-rending hits, possibly more attacks.
Chaos troops: Any with an invulnerable save has a chance, harlequins are fragile against counterblows.
Anyone armed with a flamer who gets to use it.
Howling banshees: Masks (I cannot remember if the Harlequins grenades work against the mask? or do they just negate cover and frag grenades and make everyone swing at Initiative?)
Dark Eldar Wytches: Invul save, lots of attacks.
Anyone who gets to shoot at them.
Any tyranid unit under the catalyst power. (If you play tyranids and face Eldar routinely take the bonesword or this power.)
I must confess I have destroyed my friends 2 harlequin units by playing the right army against them, SoB's. Harlequins charge me, I use my scroll for an auto invulnerble save with faith (41 attacks is 6.4 rending hits, I save 2/3, so lose 2.2, the other 22 hits wound 11 times, I save 2/3 or 8, I lose 5 models), then I use a second faith point for the +2 strength/swing last move, and my return blows are usualy worthwhile (say 4 normal swings and 3 from superior, thats 3.5 hits, 3.3 wounds). Celestians expecially, who hit on a 3+. Or I charge with my cannoness' Seraphim unit, use the invulnerable save (2+ with the cannoness) and strength, and get most of the unit (cannoness with 5 attacks, re-rolling a miss, at strength 5, sister superior with 4 attacks at strength 5, etc. Same numbers as above, I Lose fewer because I take 2 on my cannoness and make one more rending save, so I swing back with 4 or 5 seraphim, 12-15 attacks, plus sister superior's 4, 16, 8 hit, 7 wounds, cannoness adds 3 more wounds, thats 7 dead clowns). With other armies my results have been mixed.
With my guard, I hope for turn one, fire everything at the vehicles carrying them (obviousely if I can), any penetrating hit puts them out for shooting. if I lose the first turn i do everything I can to stun/immobilize etc their vehicle, get them out. In both cases I save my hellhound for last so I can burn the little clowns down. I move units into a staggered formation so they cannot consolidate into anyone when they do charge.
With Nurgle I pray for toughness to work and try to whittle them if shooting fails me. Sadly, rending causes lots of pain, so no feel No PAin.
With Eldar it is shooting and Banshees and a farseer mind waring their psyker guy.
With Space Marines it is shooting, or a unit with a librarian or a chaplain and their Invuln save and lots of attacks. A librarian with the "time" power who re-rolls saves is very usefull. Tough guy to kill even with rending, especially in a unit where he is not the only target.
Tough unit, but the game is all about match-ups.

@cenjpas: yeah Dire avengers are brutal, hailstorm for 30 shots at a charging unit, then what you said. i think your Nid army is less forgiving than mine because you have specialised into reveners, I run a mixed army. No single set of units are critical to my plan in any way, and i can lose a third of my army and still have my plan completely intact, in fact my army is built around losing a third of it on the way across the board.


The rest of this is of course purely my opinion based on my own experience and listening to the other players on this site. And certainly not aimed at anyone 9noy you Cenjpas, which i hope it doesn't seem like it is.)
I am not in any way claiming I am the greatest player, I have played for a long time so know tactics well and unit match-ups. I have played my tyranid army for almost 2 years now, against my own game group of 16 players, against opponents at 3 different GW stores, as well as 3 non-GW stores. It has lost three times in more than 100 games. look at Striogi's record with them, and there are a dozen other players on this board who have stated similiar results to me. One of the recent Gamesday's had something like 7 of the top 10 armies be tyranids. A brilliant general will win a majority of their games, but not in the 80-90+% range. There will be games where you roll bad, or the scenario is against you, etc. my nids overcome this most of the time, and that is a factor of the Codex. thus I feel they are a forgiving army.

[coredump]

Genestealers: Swing at same Initiative, better armor save for non-rending hits, possibly more attacks.

Careful with that. They move 'faster' that stealers, and if they get the charge they get a higher I. And since both of them get most kills from rending, that invuln save is a big help. (and the stealer save is only better with EC)

Personally, I like using gargoyles for Harlis; They move faster, and attack first in CC. And the Eldar tend to discount them the first time.

[yoritomo]

Actually, if you take a step back and look at them you'll find that you should deal with harliquens the same way as genestealers.

The two keys to the harliquen's (and genestealer's) success is their high Int and rending. All you need to do is find a way to counter one of those advantages and you can knock them out with ease.

If the enemy gets a good chance to strike back harliquens will die quickly.

[cenpjas]

trolls said:

@cenjpas: yeah Dire avengers are brutal, hailstorm for 30 shots at a charging unit, then what you said. i think your Nid army is less forgiving than mine because you have specialised into reveners, I run a mixed army. No single set of units are critical to my plan in any way, and i can lose a third of my army and still have my plan completely intact, in fact my army is built around losing a third of it on the way across the board.

My army is tactically flexible (by the very nature of ravaner), but is not massively forgiving. Providing I keep a weather eye out for combat losses my army is oober. I was however forced to make some changes after the new eldar dex came out, and I have now improved my army's performance over all. The change from a combat fex to two gunnery fexes, dropping broodlord and lictors and reinforced carapace for stealers where the biggest changes. It is not the killing of the Eldar that causes me issues, it is mealy the delay, as its much like taking combat losses as you lose momentum which can often be critical with a canny pointy eared player. (happily I knew few, and many with the ability to steal defeat from the jaws of victory).

As to the million ways to stop Harq's, they do kick stealer's if they get the charge, and I do not have it to had but they move like ravaners do they not?, and there harder to spot than night fight. There Inv save and speed make them a tricky target for indirrect fire which is always my preference for dealing with fast unpredictable targets. I had not I admit though of using gargs on 'em, however gargs are not cheap and I would expect to lose the unit, its a little of a one trick pony, and presumes there is only 1 unit of harq's, that there not being used as a counter attack and that they will not mug your units first or be shot out of the sky as a threat to the eldar players plans. Did I mention how expensive it is to buy a unit of gargs!! in $ or £ rather than points? I may have spend £36 per squad of 6 ravaners, but there flexable and do not need remodled , not so with gargs.

The problem other shooty units have is getting close enough (unable to use fleet as you do want to shoot) with out getting killed. I mean the 'best' unit for killing them would be say a deep stiking squad of guard stuffed full of flamers where you try to land <6" from the haq squad.... which is often going to go wrong and cost you a unit of guard.

See I do not think of Haq on there own, I think in multiple units and fully supported, and they adjust there attack pattern depending on the opponent. Ie somtimes they run forward and cause havoc, other times they hold back and counter charge.

I do not think there imposible to deal with, and there not a bargen basement price, but its a nasty thing to suddenly have to deal with, if for example in my army you do not consider anything expendable. (which is of course a weakness of my army).

-cen

[xenobiohazard]

I love eldar..and even when I lose at least I lose in style.

[ZergLord]

xenobiohazard said:

I love eldar..and even when I lose at least I lose in style.

QFT

When I fight Eldar, I use mixed force with allota Gaunts.