Vs. Dark Eldar v6.1

[yoritomo]

With a new tyranid codex come a new versus thread for Dark Eldar. The purpose of this thread is to discuss how our new codex can deal with this army in general. This is not a place to post army lists for review. This is a place to discuss what units work against the Dark Eldar, what units we should watch out for, tactics and army builds we expect to see when playing Dark Eldar, allies they usually take, and questions you might have before or after fighting a Dark Eldar opponent.

Fair warning, the versus threads will stay on topic at all times. The moderating staff reserves the right to move or delete any post they deem off topic, incoherent, flat out wrong, or confusing to read (i.e. out of context due to previous posts being removed). This is a serious discussion geared towards people who want to play better against the Dark Eldar, so let's act like it.

[saxif]

First post!

I had a couple games against them last dex and had no idea what I was going to face, it was awful and due to that they are my bogeyman!

So, I guess no MC but tyrannofex? Poison across the board outright sucks ... For us.

Primes or tyrants?

I would prolly spam a huge army of shrikes, warriors, gants, gaunts and gargoyles, zoanthropes and maybe a few min size Genestealers squads for broodlords?

Do people think this will work?

I don't have any Venomthropes yet but they'll work we'll I guess.

[liberame]

I played a game as dark eldar venom spam vs tyranid flying circus 2500pts. I would force a grounding test with the venom occupants, and then blow away the MC's. Opponent had 4 flyrants, and 4 Crones. By the end of turn 2 opponent only had 1 Flyrant and 1 Crone. His hormagaunts were closing in and I was staying out of range of his 2 exocrines w/zoas & venom support on skyshield.

It really is a tough fight for nids, probably would have gone better for my opponent if I wasn't passing so many flickerfield saves, negating most of my opponents haywire missiles. And although this particular match up sucks for nids, any tau or eldar would smash my army since I was running pure Dark eldar without allies.

[gigasnail]

venom spam is tough for us, it's high volume shooting and we lost the pods to deal with them. skyshield won't help with the splinter weapons, but i see a lot of eldar/DE shooting team ups with lances and missiles everywhere, so if you start seeing this it's a good option.

[saxif]

So basically it is hard to deal with no matter what we field?

From my experience they have lots of poison attacks and AP 2 weapons as well, hence my thoughts on running gribblies.

[tylertt]

Flyrants and Crones are two of our best utilities in dealing with DE. Tyrannofexes as a MC choice are solid as well as their +2 sv helps battle the high volume of wounds from Poison.

Swarm armies also work well against them as their poison is not so great against a large number of bodies. With DE you just need to plan ahead with how you are going to combat them. A swarm force will work well, but you need a plan on how to pop their transports. Use cover as much as you can to combat their excessive AP2 that can be fielded. Biovores are another good tool to easily dispose of exposed troops when the transports go pop, or to even just deal with those Reaver Jetbike squads.

If you run a full MC list, expect to have some issues. You need to really play the mission and hold objectives and try and pop as many transports as you possibly can. DE infantry are terrible without protection. Extremely squishy and their squads are only up to 10 strong (I think?)

[thewarsmith]

tylertt has a very good post. I've played four games against them with the new book and won all four. The FMCs are your best friend, because the Dark Eldar don't really have a good way to fight against them. Plus, the Vector Strikes and the Drool Cannon are EXCELLENT for killing them.

Swarms are brutally efficient; even the cheap vanilla Hormagaunt is pretty nasty in cc against their Troops. His Cover point is also crucial; stick units in ruins near Venomthropes and you will be very hard to budge.

[hannibal]

Hive Guard work well against their low av 2Hp venomns,
Biovores can pin beastpack as they have quite low leadership if you snipe out the beasthandlers,
Dakkafexes have weight of shots to take down their vehicles,
Dark elder don't have a lot of skyfire but volume of splinter fire will force lots of grounding tests, still worth taking the FMCs though,
Going second works well as he has to get out of his vehicles to grab objectives giving you the chance to shoot him or assault him.
Ultimately they have enough poison and lance weapons to fire down a couple of MCs a turn so you need to use cover to your best advantage or force him to split his fire by presenting multiple targets,

[DukeMantis]

How do you guys think double or triple mawloc would fair against say a 5x Venom army?

Im thinking of trying 2-3 mawlocs and an artillery node.

[tylertt]

Personally I can't see Mawlocs being too effective. Being that you need to roll a 5 or a 6 to pen the venom, plus the fact you can scatter, or even not have Mawlocs show up.

It just would not be practical I don't think, when compared to the rest of our heavy options that can gun down Venoms. It could very well work though, but IMO points could be better spent on other units.

[hannibal]

If you want to take out venoms there are many better choices than Mawlocs, Dakkafexes, Exocrines, Hive Guard, Zoanthropes with Warp blast, Crones, Devilgants, Dakka Flyrants shooty warriors. The main problems are when they have the upgrades of -6 to your range and 5++ save.
A Mawloc is literally too hit and miss to be reliable.

[gigasnail]

Except they out range everything but flyrants, crones, and harpies. Mawlock not a terrible choice to hit venoms at all. All of these units are already in many lists, all are good choices to deal with venoms and DE in general.

[tain2002]

So I played a game against dark eldar today, I didn't know what army I was facing so o brought an army that allways did me well as nids,

Dakka flyrant X2

Venomthrope x2
Hive guard x3

3 Warriors w/ vc x2
Gants x20
Gaunts x20

Harpy x1

Dakkafex x2
Tfex w/ cannon x1
Trygon x1

He had as 12 x raiders / ravagers on the board turn 1,

Needles to say I called it end of turn 3 as he took out all of my army exept 2 x flyrants (one didn't come on
) and 2 x 3 warriors and half a gant squad and half a gaunt squad, I had only taken out 2 ravagers and the archons bodyguard squad.

I really do think that dark eldar are our hard counter, took out Venomthropes, then ap2 and poisoned the rest to death, also with flicker fields on most of his units bringing my range down by 6" aswell on an allready short range army. didn't even need to get out his troops.

I do struggle to think of a list that could do well. The flyrants
Were gonna cause a little trouble but he would of finished them next turn or 2 and grounding them with voloume of fire.

It was nice that we have alot of ID against his t3 which is also another threat.

I dont really wana be the guy that refuses to play but its close..



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[saxif]

I had another match up against DE recently, different player. It was a 605 point game and my friends first 40k (ever, for years?).

I got owned, I decided to go heavy swarm to try and drown him in bodies and had?

* 20 gaunts
* 20 gants (50:50) with a melee prime
* 10 gants (basic)
* 1 Hive Guard
* 2 Zoanthropes
* 1 Venomethrope

I'd say the Zoans and the gants (50:50) were the stars of the match. Although to be fair I rolled double 1 to hit one of his ships with them at one stage. He had something like:

* 2 small 2 hp ships, each caryring 5 warriors
* 1 larger pirate looking ship with a Homunculous, 8 racks and an archon

I judged my distances badly and his melee crew (racks etc) basically cut through everything I had, even when I shot them allot with my big unit he got lucky on saves and I did very little. To show my friend the game fully I challenged his Archon with with initiative 7 one shotted my Prime.

Generally though his rate of fire was simply to high, I was lucky with my Zoanthrope invuln saves.

I cannot really see a Tyranid list that would do well against DE, at least not with me at the helm!

I guess a Tyrannofex, Dakkafex, Biovores, Zoans, Flyrants and Venoms might be the best units to field. However they pore out firepower at an unbelievable rate and are out of range of most Tyranid weaponry. Well, I showed him the ropes and he whooped me, next time I'll field Eldar, should be a much better match up.

[tylertt]

Thought I'd share some of my experiences against DE, and also some things to consider with 7th ED.

DE's weakness is in FMCs and now templates…ah la Tyrannofex.

DE are still a tough match up for us though, and they should not be under estimated. Here are a few things to use to your advantage & to watch out for

+The Good+
+ FMCs are the bane of DE, and now with less grounding tests, it will be even harder for them to take them down.
+ Crones are amazing against DE now, simply because their flamer can roast on average half of a venom's onboard troops.
+ Tyrannofex is one of our best MCs for dealing with DE. His +2 sv and ability to equip two template weapons make him outstanding now, especially since one is torrent.
+ Use onslught on your FMCs. This can easily help get Flyrants in range turn 1, or even a Crone as well to roast a transport of its passengers.
+ I personally would advise the use of at least one Biovore brood consisting of 2 models. Once the transports are popped, Biovores clean up the mess flawlessly.
+ Biovores are also important by sniping out special weapons in exposed units, or Cluster Caltrop Reaver Jetbikes
+ Outflanking Devilgants can certainly help put the pressure on the DE who flank to different sides of the table to avoid your hard hitting units.
+ Try and give your opponent a hard time to choose targets. This will take pressure of key attacker units.
+ Use Gargoyles and Venomthropes for mobile +3 cover saves. I'd recommend a brood of 20, as swarm units are hard to kill for DE, and it also forces him to try and remove the +3 mobile cover Sv.
+ I'd screen the Gargoyles ahead of the T-Fex, so that way a Venomthrope can hide out of LOS behind the T-fex.
+ Keep MCs in ruins cover at all times if you can maneuver them just so. Disintegrators and Dark Lances are troublesome.
+ Analyze his army and decide what needs to be targeted with each of your units. IE:Flyrants & Template units hunt transports & Ravagers, Use Biovores to blast exposed troops & Reaver Jetbikes.
+ Hive Guard can be used, BUT it typically requires a brood of 3, plus smart tactics. I usually run these guys up the middle of the table and use onslaught to help against Nightshield vehicles ruining range. Be sure to use a nice distraction unit such as a Tfex near them to help draw fire away from them.
+ PLAY THE OBJECTIVE!!!!!! Don't let chasing down his vehicles distract you from what wins the game.


-The Bad-
- Watch for Reaver Jetbikes & their cluster Caltrops. These things can hit hard and clear important backfield units such as Biovores, or Warriors giving backfield synapse
- DE Speed. DE are super fast, but do not let that intimidate you. Watch out for Venoms getting in position to focus fire on your key units.
- Ravagers post a strong threat against out walking MCs, and even our FMCs potentially. Disintegrators can be panful if they get a solid volley in. I believe its like 15 shots (3 guns) at AP2.
- Watch out for Incubi with DE Archons, these guys are faster then almost our entire army (Intiative speaking), and can be used to hunt down Tervigons in the back/mid field.
- Nightshields. This little 5 or 10 Pt upgrade subtracts 6" off our weapons range. This makes it tough for a lot of our units to get into range before they can focus us down.
- Flickerfield gives a constant +5 inv sv. Because of this little thing, I always find that volume of fire is the best option at killing DE vehicles. Ah la TL Devs
- Since all models are scoring now, it is going to be really annoying with vehicles making turn 5 flat out moves to claim objectives.