7th Edition 40K - New Dark Eldar Codex Review - Troops

With Baron gone and haemonculi no longer unlocking Wracks, we're left with just the standard two choices for Troops in the Dark Eldar army. Warriors saw a lot more action that wyches in 6th edition for me, I wonder if the new book will redress that balance?

Firstly, and somewhat irritatingly, the Warrior/Trueborn and Wych/Bloodbride entries have been merged into a single page each. It makes it pretty awkward to figure out the price and options of each unit and it seems simply to be an IP protection move since there are no trueborn or bride models. That or they were saving paper?

Kabalite Warriors

Effectively the same as they were in the old book but 1pt cheaper. Splinter cannons are now 5pts more expensive though which cancels out some of the reduction in unit cost and Salvo means you can't fire them and assault. Shredders now have, Shred (seems obvious) but as ever they're a small blast so a blaster is probably a better choice. You can also take two blasters or shredders in a 20-man unit now.

What this basically means is the standard unit of 5 warriors with blaster in a venom is 5pts cheaper. I doubt many people will be taking a Sybarite just like before so it comes down to a choice between five warriors in a venom, ten in a raider or upto 20 on foot. I'd be tempted to stick 20 of them with two cannons with a webway portal toting character and pile 44 poisoned shots into an enemy unit without them being able to stop you! Of course you might not survive very long after arriving but it's still very tempting, especially when you consider that with a little luck you could down a wraithknight!

More likely I'll be running the standard 5-man venoms with a couple of packed out raiders and possible splinter racks.

Wyches
The headline for wyches is that you can no longer give all of them haywire grenades and basically that sounds the death knell for them. They suffered a lot in 6th edition with FNP being reduced to 5+, vehicle explosions causing S4 hits and overwatch. You were lucky if any survived long enough to make it into combat! You'd still consider taking them though because haywires could often succeed where all your dark light weaponry had inexplicably failed. With that option taken away I can't see me using them very much at all.

Let's assume you could get them into combat alive though. The special weapons now offer either re-rolls to hit, re-rolls to wound or re-rolls 1s for both. Not too bad for 5pts a pop but perhaps not as good as before. It's worth noting you can take 3 of them in a 10+ strong unit without upgrading to brides. Combat Drugs will help out a lot if you can get a good roll too. That 4+ save and turn 3+ FNP will make them a great tarpit unit (especially turn 5 on when they're Fearless) but I just can't see much to make me spend 2pts more on them instead of a warrior.

Conclusion
I'd be very surprised to see wyches in many competitive lists. They were becoming less common already and the loss of haywires is hardly going to help them. The decision is how you run your warriors rather than whether to take them over wyches. It's a shame as I used to love fielding wyches and they've achieved some amazing feats over the years I've played Dark Eldar. I'm not saying I'll never run them again in friendly games but it's too easy a decision for competitive play. They're basically a case of bringing a knife to a gunfight!

The problem with kabalites is that against vehicles they're pretty limited. Poisoned shooting does nothing and with S3 and no grenades they won't be doing much in combat (until they get Furious Charge). That means you'll need some anti-tank elsewhere in the list or perhaps blasters in your kabalite units.

That was pretty straightforward then. Onto Elites!

7th Edition 40K - New Dark Eldar Codex Review - HQ

Normally I break the HQ section up into generic and special character posts. With the loss of a whopping FIVE special characters (Vect, Malys, Duke, Kheradruakh and Baron) there's a lot less choice though so I reckon a single post is sufficient. I can't really let that go without a comment either. Sure we won't really miss Kheradruakh or perhaps Lady Malys but I'll miss Duke Sliscus and I'm hugely disappointed we aren't seeing a new Vect and Dais model. Baron will mostly be missed by Eldar players but I'm kind of glad that little avenue for cheese has been closed off. It does have a dramatic effect on Hellions though but more on that later.

As I say, I'll be missing Duke the most as he featured in pretty much all my DE lists in the old book. Mind you I can't run the trueborn unit I used to put him with any more either! As I feel myself saying a lot recently, there's a lot of flavour that goes with these deletions and limiting options is rarely good in my opinion. It's not like in the Ork book where there was a little give and take either. The new succubus model is lovely but that archon is just plain awful and has no options at all. The voidraven was rumoured to have been done years ago (and that's believable) and the wracks are effectively recasts so it seems GW have barely created any new models for DE in the last 3 years. It's frustrating when Necrons got all of their SCs covered within a few months. Anyway, rant over, onto what we're left with. Must. Stay. Positive.

Archon

The Archon has remained the same cost and retains the same statline. His options are mostly the same too and similar cost. He can no longer take ghostplate armour, a venom blade or whip though and has finally listened to Mr. Garrison about taking drugs (mmmkay). Since the guy himself is pretty much the same it's more about the wargear he has access to.

The Huskblade is now significantly cheaper and still causes Instant Death. It's the same price as an agoniser (which is now poisoned (4+)) but ID is too tempting for me. Even at S3 it's worth the risk of an enemy character failing his invulnerable save and against units with multiple wounds it'll pay dividends. The agoniser is better against high toughness though as the archon can't hurt a wraithknight without it but with it he can cause some real problems (assuming he keeps passing his saves). The blast pistol is a little too pricey if you're taking a huskblade and I find the 6" range too restrictive most of the time. Haywires are a good choice though if you've got the points to spare.

I'd be tempted to throw in a soul trap with my huskblade/agoniser as it might make all the difference in the second round of a challenge or for combats later in the game and it's better than it used to be. The phantasm launcher is a massive disappointment even if it is much cheaper. It's hugely situational and I'd much rather have my grenades back so I can use my high initiative thanks.

It's a choice between shadow and clone fields as ever, the shadow field now lasts until the end of the phase if you fail which might just keep you alive but it's double the cost of the clone field. For such a flimsy model I personally think the shadow field is the way to go to help him be viable.

We have to talk about the webway now. Frankly I'm gutted I don't get to use my template any more but to be honest I haven't since 6th edition stopped assaults from it anyway. The new webway has HUGE potential for both DE and Eldar allies. It won't be long before people are coming up with dirty combos. I imagine most will take a plain archon and webway for just under 100pts to give another unit a non-scattering deep strike. D-scythe wraithguard would be fun for example (if expensive).

As I said in the first post the Kiss is a good choice if you've got the points but we're already making the guy expensive with a huskblade, soul trap and shadow field so don't bother with anything else from the artefacts unless you fancy the Helm. Finally, don't forget you can give him his own venom if you like but I'd personally want a meatshield riding with him!

Court of the Archon

I can't remember ever seeing one of these on the tabletop (except for the models as proxies for something else). That was probably because you had to have at least one of each. That's not the case anymore as you can take any combination. Hopefully we'll see more of them now since they're probably some of the nicest models in the range. Interestingly you don't need to take an Archon to unlock them now (although he does stop them using a slot).

Sslyths are interesting with two T5 wounds, a decent number of shots and plenty of attacks. With their reduced cost they'd be a good meatshield for an Archon and push his effective toughness up. Ur-ghuls now cause Fear (as much use as that is) but without a save (except FNP) they're a waste of time still. The Lhamaean no longer boosts the Archon's poisoned attacks which is a shame since the agoniser is now a poisoned weapon. Her weapon is still tasty though with poisoned (2+) and 6s to insta-kill, just a shame it has no AP. She's the cheapest option but I'm still not convinced. Finally, the medusae was the one everyone wished they could take in the old book. They've gotten significantly more expensive in the new book though. The template is now fixed at S4 AP3 which is probably the average of what you would've gotten. The cost is prohibitive for me and they'll die too easily.

It's all about the Sslyth then, unless I'm missing something. Even just two in a unit will be enough to make your Archon effectively T5. You could take a third and then throw one of the others in a venom with them for flavour if you wanted but avoid the Ur-Ghul.

Succubus

Now more expensive but with a stunning new model and newly found access to a webway portal. The stats stay the same meaning you need her to be in combat to have a hope of surviving long. Still, give her an agoniser or the new archite glaive and she can be pretty potent in combat with 6 attacks on the charge. She becomes even better once she's received Furious Charge from PfP and benefits from pretty much every drug result. It's just tricky to decide where to put her. She's going to need a transport and is probably most at home with a unit of wyches but I'm not sure they're all that great nowadays.

She's a bit flimsy to be your Warlord but makes a decent secondary HQ choice I reckon.

Lelith Hesperax

A good deal cheaper than before but still suffers from the same problems namely S3 and T3. League Apart now gives re-rolls to hit and wound in challenges which could be useful and with I9 and ignoring armour saves she's got potential. Furious Charge late in the game will be a great help but even with a potential 10 attacks she won't be causing many wounds outside of a challenge. Her low toughness means she's unlikely to get a second chance against most things in combat even with 3++ as S6 and above simply vapourises her if she fails an invulnerable save. She's also lost her Shardnet to help protect her. Her Warlord Trait makes her WS10 but that's rarely more use than WS9.

She doesn't offer much in excess of the much cheaper Succubus and that, for me at least, is the deciding factor. By no means terrible but still not going to see action despite being one of the few combat answers to 2+ saves.

Haemonculus

In the old book there used to be an option to upgrade to an Ancient. That's been rolled into the standard Haemonculus now who has the old Ancient's statline for a slightly lower cost. What it does mean though is you're paying more for the PfP benefits and you can no longer take three per HQ slot. There's quite a long list of things that've gone missing as options for the haemy, namely: venom blade, power weapon, electrocorrosive whip, huskblade, casket of flensing, soul trap, vexator mask, shattershard, dark gate and orb. The only one I'll actually miss is the shattershard though.

Onto what's left then. The Hexrifle stands out as a solid choice. The liquifier gun is now fixed at S3 but still has a random AP. Could be good but mostly sub-par. The agoniser is always good but expensive now which makes me tempted to just go for a scissorhand.

Personally I'd just keep him cheap and use him as a means of manipulating the PfP turn number. Perhaps an Animus would be useful in that regard. He's another chance to get a webway portal in too.

Urien Rakarth

He's been given a huge discount in points cost whilst retaining the same statline. With T5, 4++ and FNP 4+ he's probably the most survivable DE model going and IWND doesn't hurt either although Meld the Flesh used to be better. He's no slouch in combat with I5 and 3 attacks which wound on 2+ and can cause ID. His Casket of Flensing might be fixed at S3 AP3 now but get a decent roll and he could be killing a lot of MEQ with it.

The key to Urien is that he gives Master of Pain to every unit within 12" which means FNP 5+ on turn two for a good chunk of your army. His warlord trait isn't much use the majority of the time but I still think he'd make a good choice as warlord just because he's durable. He may be pricey but he actually offers a viable option I reckon.

Drazhar
As I've mentioned before Drazhar doesn't get a fixed Warlord Trait like Urien and Lelith. He remains the only Eternal Warrior in the book and is pretty durable with 2+ armour. He's a little on the expensive side despite a hefty price drop. With Rampage and his Demiklaives he can rack up a serious number of attacks that result in a pile of wounds even outside a challenge unlike Lelith. He's pretty lethal even on his own!

He can only join Incubi units though making him no use to anyone who doesn't want to field them. I actually think they're a reasonable choice but Drazhar's cost is prohibitive. He's pretty powerful though so I'd like to try him at least once before I make my mind up. Fearless, WS6 Incubi are tempting that's for sure.

Conclusion
With a lot less options and some regular choices going from the book, Dark Eldar players will be forced to look again at the HQ section. I'm finding it pretty difficult to call actually. Archons, Succubi and Haemos all have their merits. Lelith is unlikely to see much action but Drazhar and Urien are reasonable choices if you can stomach the points cost.

I expect to see more courts simply because there are less options available and people will want to try out the nice models. I'm seriously considering an Archon with a court full of Sslyth as a meatshield to get him into combat.

It's certainly given me a lot to think about. I'm sure one option will emerge as the go-to for DE players but I think it's far from obvious at this point. Perhaps once I've looked at the other units it'll be clear. What is clear is that the rumours of bikes or boards for the HQs were false! Onto the Troops....

New 7th Edition Dark Eldar Codex Review - First Impressions & General Rules

We're onto the fourth of these new style 7th edition codexes and there's now just a couple of armies who don't have a hardback codex. I can't imagine it will be long before they're updated either so I best get cracking with my review of the new Dark Eldar book. It's safe to say that the rumours of the rules in this book received a mixed response from the internet community. Hopefully I can talk through things in sufficient detail for you to make your own mind up about it. This was always going to be a dangerous update for some of the Dark Eldar units as a lot of the characters don't have models meaning the trend that started with Tyranids was likely to continue. My hopes for this book are that several different competitive builds will emerge for pure Dark Eldar without them relying on Eldar or else proving a gimmicky ally for their goody two-shoes cousins.

General Thoughts
As before this book follows the new datacard layout with a huge chunk of fluff at the start of the book and the unit entries/army list now somewhat condensed. Whereas with the wolves codex I was lamenting the loss of a lot of wonderful artwork the thought barely crosses my mind here as there's some stunning new (or at least re-coloured) stuff. The two-page spread on pages 4-5 is a particularly jaw-dropping example. I'm starting to get used to the rules layout with pretty much everything in the appendix at the back. It's still a bit frustrating at times but will end up being quicker once you've figured out what's changed and simply need to use it as reference every once in a while.

The 'Eavy Metal section (or whatever you want to call it now) is nice and varied with several different Kabal colour schemes on show. The spread on pages 56-57 (roughly) is a little disappointing though with the flyers in particular looking a little rushed. Assuming it's the same ones on the next pages though it might just be poor lighting though.

Once again there's clear evidence of GW's desire to ensure maximum protection for their intellectual property. For example, trueborn and bloodbrides are somewhat awkwardly merged onto the same page as warriors and wyches respectively to avoid having to show models which strictly speaking don't exist. There's been one hell of a cull in the HQ section too (more on that later) with several named characters vanishing into the night. The most notable of course is Vect and I'm sure you've read plenty of comments about his absence. Frankly I never used him but I was still hoping to with a new book and a lovely new model for him and his dais.

This is the first, and likely only, book that doesn't feature a Lord of War choice. There's been much talk about this already so I don't want to go over it again but suffice to say it's frustrating for most DE players.

Army Wide Rules
Pretty much everything has retained Night Vision which means you'll be wanting to roll for Night Fighting as much as possible and probably still rolling on the Strategic warlord traits for an extra chance too. Combat Drugs are still present but they now offer slightly different bonuses. Gone are the re-rolls with every type of drug offering +1 to a different stat. They only apply to Wyches, Hellions and Reavers though unless I'm missing something. Your Archon can no longer take them and with Duke gone there's no way of manipulating this roll. It ultimately depends on whether those units are worth taking as to whether drugs will be any use but I'll get to that in good time.

Power from Pain in the old codex was crucial for helping your units survive the first couple of turns. Now all units that benefit get the same bonus whether they've killed anything or not. It doesn't really become much use until turn 3 onwards though when a lot of your stuff has probably already died. Not much of a difference from before in some ways (as you'd often not killed any infantry etc. yet) but for those units that relied on it like Wracks and those that used a Haemo for a free token it's a big deal. On the plus side towards the end of the game your units will be getting Furious Charge (which was often difficult with the old rules) and Turn 5 onwards you're Fearless which is huge. That, as far as I'm concerned at least, will even rally units that were running at the end of turn 4. Should you make it to turn 6, Rage might help an otherwise average combat unit like Kabalites become that bit better at shifting hordes of guard, guants, etc. There is one definite benefit though, no pain token tracking and no need for me to finally get round to making some markers!

Whilst in the old book vehicles had the option to Deep Strike in the form of Retrofire Jets, in the new book they get it for free. Couple that with the webway and you can start to come up with some pretty disgusting combos. Those of you who like allies (I personally don't) will be salivating at the prospect of deep striking Eldar units too. This gives you the option for a null deployment army (i.e. one that doesn't deploy anything at the start of the game) but I'm not 100% sure that's a good idea with Dark Eldar. Having flimsy vehicles arriving by Deep Strike in dribs and drabs seems dangerous to me. At least with the changes to Deep Striking vehicles (in that they count as moving Combat Speed) you can fire all your weapons from a transport. It's a mechanic that's worth exploring though.

Warlord Traits
Before talking about the traits themselves I wanted to mention one unexpect disadvantage of losing some named HQs. In other books sometimes an SC is good simply because he gives you a guarantee of a particular trait. In DE's case that's just Lelith getting +1WS and Urien getting a 12" Fear bubble. Drazhar doesn't even have one! The traits that you'd want must be rolled for instead. Anyway here's what we're offered:

1. Ancient Evil - Fear is next to useless with most things either being Fearless or having ATSKNF.
2. Labyrinthine Cunning - by far the best trait and almost worth ignoring Strategic for and with the re-roll you've got a 1 in 3 chance of getting it (roughly). 
3. Soulthirst - again not much use and only your warlord benefits, re-roll!
4. Hatred Eternal - bit better than rolling a 3 but still meh, re-roll!
5. Blood Dancer - likely to be pretty useless (and is for Lelith 99% of the time), re-roll!
6. Towering Arrogance - Fearless bubbles are nearly always awesome these days. 

That to me makes it 50:50 between good and useless which with a re-roll is 75% chance of getting something worthwhile. Most people have come straight out and said, "roll strategic instead" but I think it's worth considering on a game-by-game basis rather than assuming strategic will always be better. I'll cover the supplement traits when I get to the book itself at the end of the codex review.

Artefacts of Cruelty

There may have been debate with the Space Wolves relics but these are almost certainly one per model and one of each per army. 

• Animus Vitae - used to give a pain token but now gives +1 to turn number for PfP if it causes a wound. Couple this with a haemonculus' Master of Pain ability and that's FNP 5+ and Furious Charge on turn 2 potentially (if unlikely). Pricey though.
• Archangel of Pain - shorter range than it used to be but now Ld test at -2 that works like Psychic Shriek. Sadly doesn't work on ATSKNF or Fearless though making it situational at best and therefore too expensive.
• Armour of Misery - ghostplate armour that causes Fear and -2 Ld. Not bad for only 5pts more than ghostplate armour used to be and it's no longer available for characters
• Djin Blade - power weapon with +2 attacks. Takes user's strength though so I'd rather have an agoniser for 5pts less and not risk wounding myself.
• Helm of Spite - again expensive but probably the best of the bunch in my opinion. Ad Will can make a massive difference in psychic defense and anything that makes perils more likely is good in my book.
• Parasite's Kiss - hard to resist for the points, shoot a guardsman, get a wound back. Could prove to be very irritating.

That stand outs for me are the Animus, Kiss and the Helm. The Kiss gets a mention because it's a great way to spend those spare 5pts you often have. The Djin blade is a waste of time (I might've been tempted if it were AP2) but Archangel and Armour could be good but suffer against the vast majority of armies which have ATSKNF or Fearless.

Formations & Detachments
The Realspace Raiders detachment uses a pretty standard FOC chart but requires a compulsory Fast Attack choice and allows a total of 6 FA units to be taken. Some people are getting excited about taking empty Venoms or fleets of Razorwings but frankly I want something in my Venoms and don't like the idea of having 6 flyers off the table at the start of the game. The Hunt from the Shadows special rule is nice especially if you successfully roll for Night Fighting or get it as your warlord trait but since I run a lot of vehicles it's only going to be a 5+ cover save at best. I'm not convinced it's worth ditching the benefits of a Combined Arms detachment for to be honest. Objective Secured is great with fast moving transports (even if they are flimsy) and don't forget the trait re-roll is only for DE traits with Realspace Raiders but any trait with a CAD.

The Kabalite Raiding Party is by no means a bad formation but I generally don't like being forced to make particular selections. It gives the same bonuses as the Realspace Raiders detachment but you also get +1 to the turn count for Power from Pain. Combine this with an Animus and Haemonculus (which isn't part of the formation) and you could get +3 to the table. Again I'm not sure it's worth it and you have to pay a Hellion tax for it.

Generally speaking I think you're better with a CAD but some may find a use for these two options. Of course there'll be more choices in the supplement but again I'll cover that after my codex run through.

Conclusion
A similar story to the other 7th edition codices. There's a lot of streamlining here with less bookkeeping and fewer complex special rules. As with the other books there's a loss of soul (pun intended) here but I think the codex is still strong and could be competitive in its own right. Perhaps not as good as their cuddlier cousins but decent nonetheless. I'm certainly excited to get stuck into the rest of the review and start to write some lists. I can already see some interesting combinations emerging and I can't wait to test the book out on Thursday against Matt.

For those of you who haven't read my reviews before I'll be covering each FOC slot in a separate post. This allows me to go into reasonable depth but that of course means pretty wordy posts. By the end of the review (in a week or so) you should hopefully know what's good or not though. Stick with me!