Dakka? I Got Yor Dakka Right Here!: Ulthwe vs the Green Tide.

In the quest to make an Eldar list for Adepticon I decided not to do the typical Eldar tournament list.  I wanted to avoid the usual  suspects you find in lists that contaminate the forums.  This of course includes lots of dire avengers, duel Seers, Warp Spiders and lots of wave serpents. They lack originality, especially when you have seen them so many times. Then the cliche of the dead horse and beating it comes to mind.  They are a major crutch.  People min max them and tweak them to such a degree it borders on silliness. They also lack any theme.  Themed lists can be very strong.  They also really bring a kind of synergy to the table.  They also challenge you as a player.  Easy wins are no fun if you ask me.  Speaking of wins that are not so easy.

I recently played a 1500 point game against an Ork army. A green tide to be exact. 180 orks on the table that were mostly sluga boys. There was a unit of Flash Gitz and a Big Mek as well.  Despite being outnumbered very badly, my theme list held up and won in a Kill Point game.  Thats Right a theme list.  I have decided to go strait up theme.  I am going to have fun and I am going to make Ulthanash Shelwes Black Guardians strike fear into the Imperium once again.

SO what ended up laying waste to the green tide? What left one Flash Git running from the board at the end?

HQ: Eldrad Ulthran w/ 10 Warlocks, Enhance, Embolden, 3x destructor in a Wave Serpent w/ BL

HQ : The Avatar of Khaine.

Troop: 16 Guardians w/ Shuriken Cannon and Warlock with Embolden

Troop: 16Guardians w/ Shuriken Cannon and Warlock With Embolden

Heavy: Night Spinner

Heavy: 3x War walkers Bright lance, 3x Scatter laser, 2x missile launchers

So I was very out numbered. I really slowed down the rush though thanks to the Night Spinner. Also thanks to massed shuriken catapult fire , the prowess of the Avatar and Eldrad and his Warlocks in close combat I wiped out the horde. I have added a couple things to get the list up to 1850. It is Aspect Warrior free say for a unit of Dark Reapers. This is totally in line with the fluff of the Craftworld of Ulthwe as its heavy on Guardians and lacking Aspects. Dark Reapers are the most common Aspect on Ulthwe according to fluff, even if it is written by C.S. Gotto.  I also have the Single Seer council.  I like the Avatar in the list, but I may opt for Maugan Ra Instead to go total theme as an Ulthwe Strike Force.

I am interested to see how it does against Guard and space marine lists.  I know I am setting myself up for some major fail, but I am sick of all the min maxed net lists.  Its time to put some fluff back into the hobby.

So my road to Adepticon continues. I am officially registered for the GT and I have declared Eldar to be my army for the tournament. I will be using the Dark Eldar in the Team tourney. So I guess I have a list to hammer out and possibly some Models to paint.

Next time I have a bit of a rant about Bases. Also I am going to start really delving into the new Dark Eldar Codex. I started with the Leader of my pirates, now I ma going to detail the fleets backbone. Kabalite Warriors. Once I find an opponent for it I also have a Swooping hawk heavy list with Bahharoth for a battle report.

So until next time....

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Phoenix Court of Khaine pt 7: The Avatar of Khaine

He is the fury of the Eldar psyche unleashed. He is the embodiment of war and death. He is the Avatar of Kaela Mensha Khaine the bloody handed god of the Eldar. The Avatar is a bestial engine of destruction. He inspires all Eldar around him with thoughts of bloodshed and compels them to new heights of heroism and resolve.

The Avatar is my second favorite HQ. Actually for one reason, he makes units fearless. This may seem like a small thing compared to his relatively low points cost, Ability to lay waste to units and vehicles alike either shooting or in close combat and his nigh unto indestructibility, thanks to Fortune and an invulnerably save. Making units fearless is no small thing though, especially when you run lots of guardians, as I often do.

The Avatar can be a literal lynch pin in holding objectives and holding back the tide of the enemy. Large units of Guardians can be very hard to wipe out when they are fearless and preferably in cover, although a conceal will do in a pinch. I like to put the Avatar between two units of Guardians and form a wall that protects the rest of my foot advancing units. The mobile units can then do hit and run attacks on priority targets. You can't ignore 30 to 40 Guardians advancing with the Avatar between them. In scenario set ups that allow you to get close quick, massed shuriken catapult fire can be very devastating, especially if the units have been guided and or the target units have been doomed. Guardian storm units can be very devastating too when the Warlock with them has Enhance. They are then quicker and on even footing with most units. Throw the Avatar into the mix and you have a close combat that is not enjoyable for your opponent.

Kari Christensen © 2006 Games Workshop http://karichristensen.com

As we all know the Avatar is immune to flame and melta weapons, including inferno cannons. This works to your advantage in a couple of different ways. First it makes placement of units with these weapons predictable. Why have your vet or chosen unit loaded with melta go after the big guy immune to the weapons? This allows you to plan your deployment to cover tanks and such with troops that will have no issue taking these units out. This also lets you lure these melta units in with a tempting target so you can wipe them out. Eldar strategy, to me anyways, is always a one two punch with a little bit of a psych out. Its a set up and knock down with a feint worked in just to keep your opponent guessing. The second advantage, kind of, is that the Avatar will take fire from the other big guns, such as battle cannons, manticores demolishers, lascannons and of course the Plasma guns that those Imperials love so much. So it is important to make sure you have a seer close at hand to fortune the big guy. This keeps these weapons from hitting the rest of your army. Smart players will see thru the ruse, although they will still try and take the Avatar and Guardian units out as he really can't ignore them.

The ultimate power of the Avatar is unleashed when you use him in an Apocalypse game. Although expensive the Phoenix Court of Khaine formation is awesome. All 6 Phoenix Lords with the Avatar. His aura and melta blast shooting attack double in range, he becomes immune to that nasty plasma and he gets an additional attack for every Phoenix Lord within 6 inches. Its is a very brightly colored Death star.

I field the Avatar quite a bit. He is a nice alternative to a Phoenix lord or second seer as he contributes to the army. He can kill his points in enemy troops without issue. He also enhances your units without any rolling required.

In my battle report coming later in the week I will detail the Avatar and his performance against the Green tide army I fought. He killed his points in ork boyz and them some. Also I will detail my Adepticon List development. I am bound and determined to use Swooping hawks although Baharoth may be left out in favor of the Avatar. It is a toss up.

So until next time.......

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lets Kill some MOn'keigh: Duke Sliscus

Duke Sliscus is a mad man. He is a Pirate who is about as unpredictable as they come. He left the dark city because he was tired of the petty and lethal politicking. He ply’s the stars raiding and slaughtering with is Pirate band the Sky Serpents and has done so for thousands of years. He is a hero to many Dark Eldar and a thorn in the side of others, especially the 3 Archons he stole his ships from.

I really like the Duke. I am basing my Dark Eldar force on him and his Sky Serpents. The two things that really endeared The Duke to me were two of his special rules. He allows all Venoms, Raiders and Ravagers to Deep strike as he prefers orbital insertion. Second he also rolls two dice for combat drugs and chooses the highest. Add in the fact he can nominate on warrior or Trueborn unit and allow their splinter weapons to wound on a 3+ and his twin venomed blades which wound on a 2+ ignore armor on a wound roll of 5 or 6 you have a very nice character. He is a bargain at 150 points. The Duke is armed with a blast pistol, his venom blades, carries plasma grenades, combat drugs, a shadow field and ghost plate armor.

He also has a nice stat line that will ensure he strikes first and hard. The Duke must start the game joined to a Kabalite warrior squad or Kabalite Trueborn squad. This is really not an issue as he is not an Archon and cannot take a retinue. This means you want him in a unit so he is not by himself and an easy Target.

I have centered my Dark Eldar strategy on the Duke. My current army lists have been using him and 3 haemonculi along with 3 Kabalite Warrior units on Raiders as the core. I have been toying with the other units. The latest version saw action against Vogrin this past Saturday and did not do so well, mostly because of dumb luck. As previously stated this codex is unforgiving and mistakes are disastrous.

I am using the Dukes theme of mobility and vertical insertion, I know sounds bad, to hone the list. I am using Kabalite Trueborns on Venoms as deep striking anti tank units. I am also using Voidraven bombers to wreck utter havoc with exposed infantry and heavy armor. By using the Duke you do not have to upgrade vehicles with retrofire jets, thus saving points, and you essentially get a Dark Eldar drop pod army. You can hit hard and fast. In theory is should work great. This is proving to be a challenge though to make it work. The main thing we discovered is that there is no exceptions for fast vehicles when it comes to occupants shooting out of them when they move at cruising speed. Occupants cannot fire when the vehicle moves at cruising speed. When you deep strike you count as moving at cruising speed . This snagged my plans for the Kabalite Trueborns and the warrior units as I had splinter rack installed on the raiders and the Trueborns had 4 blasters in their small 5 man squads mounted on venom’s. I was forced to rethink the strategy after loosing a lot of troops because I had to dismount them to fire on enemy tanks. I like to blame this on the Dukes tendency to sacrifice all his troops just to get one kill. The guy is kind of crazy after all.

I like the Duke and his crazy ways. The Sky Serpents are defiantly going to be the theme for my army as I paint and collect the new models.

I will post more as I develop the list and use the Duke more. I will have my battle report with Vogrin up later this week. I will also have the last part of the Phoenix Court of Khaine. I will also have a battle report up about my Craftworlders. They fought a Green Tide ork list Saturday night and to my surprise the only survivor was a single flash git. I will post the list.

Until then.....

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

New Forgeworld Sexiness: The hornet

Looks like Forge world is begging me to not buy Dark Eldar.  They have just released a new light tank called the hornet.  It is a fast attack choice and fielded in squadrons of 1-3 tanks.  They can be armed with 2 weapons form the usual list, but the list also includes the pulse laser.  Did I mention they have scout? 
I see some very nasty things happening with a squadron of these little guys.  Granted thay are 55 points base plus weapons and vehicle upgrade so they are quite expensive.  They pack some punch though.  The weapons are not twin linked and they only have a ballistic skill of 3.  This means you will hit half the time but in a squadron armed with pulse lasers that can do some real damage. 12 strength 8 AP 2 shots would be pretty nice on a squad of marines or terminators.  Granted that squadron would be about 400 point give or take  They seem to be a Craftworld version of a Ravager but without the  low cost and nifty tricks.  I will probably break down and buy 3 though just to see how they fit into the mix.
Well I did not get a battle in with Vogrin yet, but Saturday I will be trying my new 1850 swooping hawk Ulthwe list.  Should be interesting.  I will also be finishing up the Phoenix Court of Khaine series with the big man himself.  The Avatar.

Until then.....

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Phoenix Court of Khaine pt 6: Baharroth The Cry of The Wind

Swooping Hawks are quite reviled for some reason. I blame the beardy gits on the forums for this. Baharroth is the Phoenix Lord of this much lamented aspect. I personally like Swooping Hawks quite a bit. When used properly they can wreck a lot of havoc with vehicles and light infantry. Baharroth actually fixes one big issue I have had when using swooping hawks. They are prone to assaults when they deep strike. Baharoth helps them with this issue in several ways. Firstly he makes the unit fearless so they will not run away even when massed fire is poured into them. Second besides the usual Exarch powers he also has Hit and Run. This is very Important. This allows you to disengage from an assault so you can hit your primary targets, Artillery and vehicles. Third he is armed with a power weapon and actually has a decent strength, initiative and weapon skill to use it. This helps discourage assaults by the common rabble of your opponents army. Throw a fortune on the unit and you will be able to escape from an assault while inflicting some kills and possibly routing a unit.

Baharroth is also not quite as expensive as the other Phoenix Lords. He clocks in at 200 points. A nice round number. This does take up and HQ slot so the great HQ debate continues. Most Eldar players will opt for double Seer. If you are going the no Seer route though you can have quite a power unit taking an Autarch and Baharroth in a unit of swooping hawks. An Aspect heavy force has rather specialized Fast Attack choices. You can only make one of them fearless though. Only two of them can deep strike as well. Although warp spiders are nice I prefer to go with swooping hawks as they are more flexible and reliable in their movement.

So I view Baharroth as a decent choice for an aspect heavy force or just in general as long as you are running Swooping Hawks. Again I will reiterate that I think the Phoenix lords are a tad overpriced and must have a specific purpose in a list. Otherwise you are wasting points and a valuable HQ spot.

So my two cents about the Phoenix Lords. For the last Part of our series I will cover the man himself. The center of the Phoenix Court. Khaine Himself. SO the last Installment will cover one of the only other HQ choices I ever use if not running double seer. The Avatar of Khaine. Also I am going to introduce you to one of my favorite Dark Eldar Characters. Duke Sliscus the Serpent. Hopefully I should have a Battle report with Vogrin later in the week as well.

SO until then.......

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!

The Phoenix Court Of Khaine pt 5: Karandras

Of all the Phoenix Lords there is one that will live in infamy. Arhra was the father of scorpions. He betrayed the Asurya and destroyed the original temple shrine where Asurman First tempered the Eldar's passions into the path of the warrior. Arhras' most gifted student took his place as the Phoenix Lord of the Striking Scorpions. He tempered the murderous nature of Arhra with the patience and cunning of a hunter. He now fights his mentor when he shows himself, although he goes by the name Drazhar now.

Karandras is a hunter. With Mandiblaster and chain sword he cuts down his prey with precision. He also carries the deadly Scorpions Claw which cuts though vehicles and power armor with ease.

Besides the stat line and normal Phoenix Lord rules why is Karandras my favorite? He is a strait up marine killer. He is strength 8 when he uses the Scorpions Claw. He also has 7 attacks on the charge thanks to his Mandiblaster providing +2 attacks instead of the normal 1. He also does not suffer from the one thing I don't like about Striking Scorpions. He is Fleet. Granted if he is in a squad, which he should be, he losses this ability. He does however boost up the kill power of the squad by a lot. As I often do I run an Exarch in the squad despite having the Phoenix lord. In this case the Exarch will not have any powers as Karandras already has them all. So you can infiltrate or outflank and have move through cover. In addition you get stealth. This comes in handy especially when you infiltrate and are faced with high strength weapons hitting the squad. You should always start your scorpions in cover when they infiltrate anyways. The Exarch gives you a second power claw. Granted he only hits at strength 6 but you still wound toughness 4 stuff on 2's. This means you have 9 Scorpions that deal 36 attacks to thin out the ranks of the enemy squad. Basically the only things going before them would be character, Dark Eldar wychs and Genestealers. So you get 11 powered attacks to concentrate on a smaller number of models. All of these will usually be hitting on 3's. Not to shabby.

I almost always infiltrate my Striking Scorpions these days. Outflanking has not been kind and unless you are setup in table corners you get no real advantage. Karandras gives you options and a lot of punch in a unit of scorpions. He gives you the stealth and all the Exarch powers so there is no real reason to not infiltrate

Is he a deal at 215 points? Not really, but that has always been my main complaint about the Phoenix Lords. It is also y complaint on my second favorite Dark Eldar character.

So how does he stack up to Drazhar? Well Drazhar is 230 points to already more expensive. He has the same stat line and he is also an eternal warrior. Drazhar can possibly have more attacks it depends on if he is going 2 handed or double power weapons. He does strike first though and he gains the preferred enemy against IC's as well as gaining more attacks on rolls of 6.

Vogrin and I actually did the math and it comes out almost dead even and it is completely up to the dice as to how it turns out. If Drazhar fails to kill Karandras in the first go Karandras could kill Drazhar. Second round Karandras would die though unless the dice are completely against you.

Well we have one more Phoenix Lord to go and in my opinion one of the better ones. Baharoth will be our last installment of the Phoenix Court of Khaine series.

Also I have some opinions on White Dwarf I want to share. This is mostly because of the Battle report in the latest issue. Dark Eldar versus a non mechanized Imperial Guard army. Think about it for a second. The only question is.....really?

So that and some battle reports later in the week. One will be versus Vogrin on Wednesday. We will be trying out our Adepticon lists on each other and see if the Dark Eldar are as good against a Guard army with some armor. So far not so much.

Until then........

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Halloween Mon-keigh!

I would like to wish everybody a happy Halloween.  Old SeerK is taking it easy this weekend as we had a nice party last night and had a little too much.  I also remembered I had to run a Rogue Trader game tonight.  So I will return before Wednesday with a Battle report versus the Tau with the new Dark Eldar codex.  Also We will continue the Phoenix Court of Khaine series with Karandras. 
I am all registered for Adepticon as well.  I have to register this coming week for my events.  I will be playing in the GT though.  I will be representing the Craftworlds in the GT and The Dark kin in the Team tournament.  I will be teaming up with Old School Terminator, CSVinton and The Judge for said team tourney.  We have to come up with a team name though.  Any suggestions?  Well off I go my Rogue Trader group has gotten into a tangle with a Tau Fleet.  We will see if they survive.

Until then......


Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!