Email In: Dark Elf 2k List Advice

Tom writes:

"Hey Nike, 

I've been reading your blog for a little while now ever since I got back into Warhammer, and I was wondering if you could give me some tips on my Dark Elves, and probably at a later time my Space Marines too haha. 

This is what my Army list looks like at the moment:

Lords: 

Supreme Sorceress 315pts

- Lvl 4

- Life Taker

- Sacrificial Dagger

- Shadow

- Power of Darkness

Heroes

Sorceress 125pts

- Dispell Scroll 

- Fire

- Power of Darkness

Death Hag 250pts

- Cauldron of Blood 

- Rune of Khaine

- Manbane

Core

20 Dark Elf Warriors 155pts

- Shields

- Full Command

20 Dark Elf Warriors 155pts

- Shields

- Full Command

20 Dark Elf Crossbowmen 205pts

- Musician 

Special 

10 Cold One Knights 335pts

- Full Command

- Banner of Murder

20 Black Guard 267pts

- Musician 

Rare

War Hydra 175pts

SO what's the go with what… 

One Sorceress goes with one of the blocks of Spearmen, the other Sorceress goes with the other block. 

Cauldron lingers behind moving up, so it can buff a unit. The Cold One Knights can get in close and personal, or provide a flank bonus, with the Black Guard being a main target too. 

The Blocks of Warriors can be really buffed up by shadow, or have their enemies buffed down, and I kept the musician's in with the Crossbowmen and the Black Guard just for leadership purposes, with the reasoning behind no standard bearer being that hopefully I won't need the extra point in combat res. 

I have 15pts left over to spend, so am thinking of adding a Standard of Discipline onto one of the Spearmen units, or adding in a Standard to the Black Guard. 

What do you think? I haven't played a game with this army and still need to purchase some of the models such as the Hydra etc., so any criticisms or suggestions for models to buy is all good, because I don't want to waste money on things I won't use. 

Thanks, 

Tom"

What?  No dragons?!"

Reply:

So there are some issues, both major and minor, with this list that I want to address.  I’ll start with the minor ones, and then address the major ones.

Minor issues:

• I don’t understand the Fire Sorceress.  Random Fire magic spells are pretty lame, I guess your plan is Fireball spam?  Seems weak to me.  Also, you need to look at the price of the magic bunker when taking into account her cost.  This is a fantastically expensive unit that is not at all scary at magic or combat.  I would make her Shadow Magic, and probably lose the bunker.
• I don’t get the close combat upgrades on the Cauldron.  The Cauldron shouldn’t often be in close combat, and if it is in close combat things are going very wrong.  Also, it’s no slouch in CC.  Anything in close combat with it that actually threatens it isn’t going to be phased by those upgrades, so they seem a waste of points.
• Full Command on your magic bunkers is bad.  You don’t need the Lordling.  He doesn’t add leadership, just one extra piddly attack.  Those points would be better spent on banners that assist with Leadership or giving the unit Flaming attacks.
• Banner of Murder belongs on the Blackguard, since the armor piercing actually matters.  The COK need Haeg Graef for ASF.  Also, you want full command on the BG.  Not having a magic item on the officer is throwing away free value.
• Break the Repeater Crossbowmen into MSU.  You want to be able to target multiple units per turn, and reduce your vulnerability to AOE magic and warmachines.

Major Issues:

• You don’t have enough threats.  Before buying the COK or BG I would make sure you have a second Hydra.  You need to present your opponent with more threats than he has answers. 
• The threats you do have are have all different speeds.  This is crucial.  Your opponent can focus fire on your units from fastest to slowest and destroy you bit by bit.  By making target priority so easy, you are essentially making your fewer threats significantly less scary.

Changes:

• Add the second Hydra. 
• Break the RXB into two units of 10 with banner and musician. 
• Lose the second magic bunker unit.  Make the first one 30 strong, add banner of Leadership.  Use the left over points to buy more units of RXB.  Do not exceed 500 points on Core.
• Lose either the BG or the COK.  I recommend losing the COK.  Buy a second unit of BG.  Use the points savings to properly equip them with full command and offensive magic items.  Any extra points will go towards the Hydra.
• Lose the offensive upgrades on the Hag.
• Lose the L1 Sorceress.  Her contribution will be trivial, and her points will go a long way towards the second Hydra.

The results will be you now have 4 seriously scary units, your magic isn’t significantly worse, and you have significantly more and better scoring units.

Thoughts?  Comments?  Questions?

Email In: Dark Elf 2,000pt List Advice

Underworld writes,

“Hello Nike,

After stumbling across your blog as i debate getting back into WFB with a dark elf army, having not played properly since 6th, i have been impressed and amused with your articles and unit break downs and was wondering if you could possibly provide some input on my sketched out list for a 2000pt army.

While i dont really play at competitive events, falling more into the beer and pretzels category, my regular opponents and i all have a competitive edge amongst ourselves and the prospects of a campaign and tournament are being discussed so a an unfocused list is likely to get stomped without much more than a whimper.

Play style wise while i like the imagery of your chariot lists i have always been more an elite infantry man (also, chariots appear to be increasingly hard to get a hold of) although adding mounted sections to my armies when i was playing 6th was one of the things i kept debating on. I also have a tendency to be hesitant in sinking a lot of points into characters as i tend to prefer more elite boots on the ground.

I will be buying from scratch with a reasonably large budget so i have the advantage of being able to focus build from the start. That said the flexibility to field more generic lists would be welcome for when we are just having a fun game.

My current list looks like this on paper.

Supreme Sorceress @ lvl 3 w/ sacrifical dagger + lifetaker 280
Sorceress @ lvl 2 w/ tome of furion 150
Master w/ halberd, armour of eternal servitude shield and sea dragon cloak, dragonbane gem 155

28 spear men w/shields and full command 211

20 Repeater Crossbow w/shields and musician 225

6 Harpies 66

20 Blackguard w full command and banner of murder 320

6 shades w/ additional hand weapon 102

8 Cold one knights 216

War hydra 175

Repeater bolt thrower 100

Over your articles ive seen you really hammering the points home on the hydra and i was debating fitting another into the list, probably at the expense of the knights with the left over points snagging a ward save for the supreme sorceress or bumping her to level 4 or adding a few models to the shades/harpies. Like wise i have been debating the efficency and usefullness of the bolt thrower which i fear is 100 points 'could be spent elsewhere, namely towards a hydra'.

The general idea is to anchor my line with the black guard who, again i stress my time out from the game, on paper look capable of holding their own against most other infantry outside of the real heavy weights. They can move forward aggressively should i need to close distance against gun-line armies (where my shades and harpies will hopefully deal with the most devastating war-machines at the earliest opportunity should they be present, although im sadly awear that there will probably be a lot of dead elves either way) if im facing an army that will be coming towards me they can form the anvil to take the charge while my crossbow rounds and magic whittle numbers down.

In either case my knights and hydra have a tag team combo smash as the armies hammer units.

Magically i was thinking shadows and metal/fire as my lores depending on what i get stuck against across the board. The big spear man unit is a bunker for one or both of the sorceresses, certainly the supreme with the dagger, the other can go with the black guard/crossbows if i deem putting all my magical eggs in 1 basket a terrible idea (looking at the miscast table it certainly appears that way...)

Any input or criticism would be much appreciated if you could spare the time.

Underworld.”

Reply: It’s not a horrible base, but it’s a bit battle-forcey.  Luckily, there are some very simple tweaks we can do to get it competitive.

First, Lords and Heroes.  You need to make your Level 3 into a Level 4.  Would you pay 35 points for a magic item that gave you an extra spell and added +1 to all casting and dispel rolls?  Ofcourse, so it’s a not brainer here.  Also, drop the Level 2.  It’s not going to be that great at 2k.  Also drop Lifetaker from the SS and add an Iron Curse Icon.

Also, there is no point to that Master as you have him built since he is a defensive tank with no offensive capability who doesn’t have any army or unit buffs.  For 25 points, make him a BSB and put him in with the Spearmen.  Remember, there will be times when you need Sac Dagger to kill a guy and killing that guy will lead to a Panic test.  You need a BSB around for that to keep your Level 4 from running off the table.  Having a BSB will also help in Blood and Glory scenarios to keep your breaking point high.

Second, Core.  Harpies do not count towards your Core requirement, so your list is illegal as written.  You need 500 points of legit Core, so dump the Harpies, add more RXB.  Next, split the 26 RXB into two units of 13 and buy them each standard bearers.  Spearmen are fine, except you need to dump the unit champ.  Waste of points, the extra attack he adds is more than worthless.

Third, Specials.  Blackguard are perfecto.   Drop the Knights.  Use the points from Knights and Level 2 to buy another unit of Black Guard with Razor Standard.  Drop the AHW from the Shades and drop them to 5 guys; you don’t want them in close combat except against warmachine crew.  The idea with them is to deploy them on the enemy back lines and shoot at warmachines or harass big units.

Lastly Rares.  Lose the Reaper.  Add a second Hydra.  If you’re lucky, the Reaper will kill 5-10 guys per game.  If you’re lucky, your Hydra will kill several whole units per game.  The only time I favor Reapers over Hydra is when your army has tons of CC ability elsewhere (Witch Elves, or triple Black Guard lists) and you need ranged ability more than you need more CC ability.

And done.  This army will be a lot more aggressive.  Two units of BG and two Hydra will pack a ton more close combat punch than you had before.  You’re lighter on magic, but you need CC ability and a BSB much more than you need a Level 2 who might cast a Metal buff a couple times per game.  You’ll want to move everything forward as quickly as possible across the board except the RXB who should defend the flanks of your magic bunker.

Remember a big thing about Dark Elves: they are Elves.  They hit hard, but aren’t usually tough.  You can’t win battles of attrition usually, therefore you’re looking for knockout blows.  Your magic phase should support that, by casting Shadow debuffs/buffs and Pits of Shades that will take out huge chunks of the enemy.  Trying to use your magic phase to help your army win battles of attrition is usually a bad move because it doesn’t compliment the goal of how you’re going to win the game.

Thoughts?  Comments?  Questions?

Email In: Picking a Fantasy Army

Feliks writes:

"Hi there, 

I've been avid reader and fan of your blog for some months now (after stumbling upon it on a random google search) and really enjoy your articles - being humorous - and hugely useful.

 I am a 40k player by definition, but reading over your Dark Elf army lists has really inspired me recently to take up Fantasy as I am intrigued by the Magic phase and other aspects of it. So I bought the rulebook, read it cover to cover etc. and have decided I'm ready to start properly. I was wondering whether you could help me to do this; I have seen your two articles on Daemons and WoC and did find them very interesting, but I think they were aimed at a more noob level? - At least that was what the comments seemed to reflect. 

Basically, I am asking for your advice/help in what to collect and what to buy for it, perhaps an army list up to 2000, with a 1000 one in between, would help? I would really appreciate it, especially if you included some basic tactics on how to play the build. I do pretty much play to win, so any army is ok and my price range is infinite (within reason). I only really ask for a couple of restrictions; no Tomb Kings and no Vampire Counts (I just detest self-rezzing armies probably stemming due to my hatred of Necrons) and I would like it to be an army capable of dominating in Magic because of my new found interest in this phase. 

One final thing is if the army could be good, competitive but not ridiculous like the one-turn win possible capable of war machine O&G armies (I think this happened at Adepticon?), anyway, I would really appreciate it.

On a side note; my local gauntlet seems to be a lot of Lizardmen, followed by mediocre amounts of Wood Elves, High Elves, Warriors of Chaos, Dark Elves, a little Orcs and Goblins and a fair amount of Tomb Kings coupled with a small amount of Vampire Counts.

Many thanks and I would reeally appreciate it, even if just a brief email back to me :)

Feliks"

Reply:  


Thanks for the kind words Feliks.  If you want to dominate the Magic phase, but still be able to throw down in close combat you have a few choices.  High Elves, Dark Elves, Lizardmen, Daemons, and Vampire Counts.  


Vampire Counts is out since you don't want undead.


High Elves are pretty good.  The army is relatively cheap to build, and their magic (with Teclis) is among the best in the game, especially with a Phoenix Guard bunker.  Sword Masters are also among the best fighting units in the game.  The upside to this army is you can build them a bunch of different ways and still be competitive.

Dark Elves are probably better than High Elves at magic, unless the HE have Teclis, in which case it will probably be edge HE.  Dark Elves' good combat units are among the most cost efficient in the game.  Unlike High Elves, the Dark Elves have a lot more dead entries in their army book.  I should also add that High Elves beat Dark Elves in head to head fights usually.  So if your local meta is heavy High Elves (thanks IoB!) you might want to avoid the DE.  However, if your locality is is a mixed bag like yours sounds, DE are pretty great.  This is a bit biased for me, but I'd say that DE have a much cooler aesthetic than High Elves.  Evil Elves with a dark color scheme are a lot cooler in my opinion than your stock High Elves.

Lizards are fairly insane in the magic phase but less so in combat.  Honestly, they aren't so much better than High Elves or Dark Elves at magic to make up for their lesser combat abilities.  That said, they have a cool aesthetic imo, and a list with skinks, temple guard, salamanders and Slann etc is pretty competitive.  Personally, I would only favor these over High Elves if you prefer the Lizards' aesthetic more.  I would say HE are near the top to Tier 1 armies, and Lizards are near the bottom of Tier 1.  They are both tops, but HE are a pip or two better.

Daemons are pretty sweet, unfortunately they are a bit of a monobuild.  You add a big unit of Horrors, Tzeentch wizard with Master of Sorcery (or two) to give them a 4++ and Skulltaker to keep people from trying to CC them to death.  A unit of Bloodletters with a cheap Khorne Herald is your beater unit, and you spice it with Flamers of Tzeentch and/or Flesh Hounds.  It's a competitive build for sure, but its a fairly linear strategy and you might get bored of it.  And unfortunately the Nurgle and Slaanesh stuff is pretty much uniformly unplayable.  If you enjoy the Chaos aesthetic, and don't mind a mono-build these guys are more than capable of taking down a tournament.

Lastly, Skaven.  I know I didn't mention them before.  Mostly because they can't dominate the magic phase.  Don't get me wrong, they have really good magic, but their magic can't really compete with the above armies.  They make up for being tier 2 magic with awesome warmachine shooting, and very cost effective horde units with excellent leadership.  I sounds like a broken record, but if the rat horde backed up by warp lightning warmachines blowing holes in the enemy sounds like a cool look, go for 'em.

In conclusion, the above mentioned armies are all capable of putting in a very strong magic phase, and also throw down in combat.  Which is why they are tier 1 armies, in my opinion.  I would pick the army from that list which you are most visually attracted to, because you have a lot to paint and you might as well enjoy painting them.  You won't go wrong with any of them.

One last thing I want to mention is that warmachine armies (Empire, OnG, Dwarves) tend to have weaker magic phases to balance out their epic shooting phases.  If you want to play a 'balanced' army that might be slightly weaker at magic but can shoot cannons and fight close combat, Empire and OnG are fun.  Personally, shooting cannons doesn't appeal to me as much as dominating the magic phase, so I don't go for these, but you may.

After you pick an army write me back and I'll give you some places to start with purchasing units and building a list.