Dark Eldar News

Here is the latest Ive heard.

It looks like we might be looking at a sept/oct release date. Lots of goodies. Follow the link provided. http://bloodofkittens.com/?p=3481&cpage=1#comment-3001

Ard Boyz- leaf blower

Well, the rumors have come in. Apparently people considered my list to be a leafblower list. In truth I wish it was, becuase I believe my list lacks that first round leafblower alpha strike that is so powerful in those lists. Its just one of those things I kind of laugh at, and move on. Do I have a lot of firepower? Yes. What I lack is the first round punch that those lists have. I wont go into the details of my lists yet. However what I lack is the manticores and meduseas. I also lack the platoon elements that allow you to maximize your firepower, and lack valkyries. Also no powerfists in my command squads, nor medics. So without two medusas, a manticore, or valkries........ hmmm. No str 10 pie plates in my army......

My armies are based on short range firepower, meched up. I have long range elements for support, but by no means am I based on an alpha strike capability. Call it what you will, but my army is not cheap scoring units that allow for a massive alpha strike pie plate hit round one. I will later post what an alpha striking leaf blower lists is all about.

I guess this is just becuase people don't yet understand what my list brings to the table. I mean my last opponent was suprised when all his dreadnaughts that got close to me died horribly, As was the tyranid player that got close with all his carnifexes and other monstrous creatures and lost them all in one round. My list is designed to one thing, punish people that get in close with close range firepower.

I was at one point trying to get more efficient long range alpha strike firepower into my lists. Then I recalled how weak I consider leaf blower lists to be. Good against some armies, but over-all not against anything really meched up, or really resilient. So I gave up my alpha strike potential. If you opponents really analyzed what our games that we had in the pre-lims, youd remember you didnt lose everything round one. It was when you closed in on me, that your armies went bye-bye.

Storm Raven?

This ones for you. We've been talking about storm ravens and what they might actually look like. Here is a pic. Let me know what you think about this one.

The bottom picture is the one I was talking about, and the model is just a cool pic someone posted online

Ard Boyz - Preliminary

Well, its done. In the end I did OK. The first two players I faced were rather standard players youll find anywhere. I was slightly impressed with the last player I faced. Also the one I lost to.

In the end, my generalship cost me, as it often does. Mistakes about getting into the field of battle quickly, and remaining mobile cost me. (lets not forget the mission 3)

Here is what i faced in mission 3. Blood Angels list with 7 dreadnaughts, two Bhaals, Mephiston, Sang Priests, 20 assault marines, and a 15 man death company on foot. 30 total kps in total, compared to my possible 49 in this mission. He ended up beating me 30-26. Game end, I had Basilisks, 4 chimeras, 3 Hydras, and misc units left on the field. He had 2 Dreads (1 gunslinger, 1 immoblized furioso), and about 12 of his death company. It was a bloody game, the most Ive had probably ever. In the end, my tactics needed to be slightly better, as well as a poor mission for my army. Victory points, we didnt figure out becuase it didnt matter. I looked it up and looks like I had 1950 vps, and he got 1310 vps. Also note that normal kps, he would of gotten 13, I would of had 12.

The previous game, game 2. It was game on. A standard marine player with the usual stuff. Victory point score was 2209 to 493.

Game 1 was a tyranid force. The terrain was overall very heavy at the tournament. In this game, i was pinned down quickly by a massive tyranid monsterous creature heavy army. The spawning gaunts were covering the backfields, while the rest of the army was moving in for the kill. Being heavily stuck in a corner becuase of terrain was annoying. I did however pull out a minor victory, 2 gaunts short of a major. Overall I scored 2220 victory points here, while my opponent got 427.

Well, thats all there was. Some minor adjustments to my list for the semi-s, and Im ready.

Obscurement. Much to your demise.

One of the leading dumb internet rules interpretations is how vehicles deal with cover. Yes I said dumb, let me expand on that. Dumb, ignorant, R-trded, and even silly enough to laugh people out of the store.

Six months or so ago, I would fall into that category. So I dont falt people that listen to some of these silly internet rulings. I read them too. Some of them are quite good, others are complete crap. How do we filter through these? Simply. We read the f'n rulebook carefully. Here is the arguement. You MUST be obscured for your vehicle to get a cover save.

Lets break it down. Please go to page 62. It says. If a vehicle is obscured, and it takes a glancing or penetrating hit, the vehicle may take a cover save. And since vehicles dont recieve cover saves the same way as other units, this makes sense. To further the arguement.... A vehicle that is in area terrain recieves a cover save, however, you are not permitted to take that save becuase of the previous line (if you are obscured you may take a cover save). Make sense?

What this says is that vehicles must be obscured in order to actually take their cover save.

These are the reasons you will read elsewhere, and now to deal with that kind of silliness, lets look at some of the basics of the rules. Lets look back at page 62 and read a little more carefully for the slow people out there. (i was there too, so dont get all huffy like I normally hear or see when this rule comes up).

Page 62. The title of the section. Vehicles and Cover-obscurement. That says alot already. Then it goes on to say that vehicles do deal with cover the same way as other models. Now we starting to understand if we are reading carefully. The whole section here is talking specifically about cover, and how vehicles deal with it. Vehicles can only be in cover if they are obscured, as it describes there on page 62 of the rules. The problem is that this isnt talking about cover saves. although it gives you permission to take one if you are obscured. Obscurement is only the means by which vehicles deal with cover, not the end all of how they can recieve cover saves (although if you are obscured you can take a cover save). There is no obscurement save. No where does it say that you must be obscured to recieve a cover save.

The only way a vehicle can be in cover (or hull down) is to be obscured, and there are some wargear or abilities that do give you cover=obscurement (smoke, fast skimmers going flat out). There are also things that give all units a cover save. These abilities dont give you cover, they simply give you a cover save. Meaning you can be out in the open and not behind something and still recieve your cover save. Cover is defined as being in area terrain or being behind other units. Let me repeat though..... There is no such thing as having a cover save, and not having permission to take it. I mean holy crap of silliness, r-trdness. Vehicles dont even have a save while in cover, unless they are obscured. It says that. Again, holy wow.

There you have it. Yes the shield of sanguinus gives all units a cover save within 6". As do all other abilities that work on all units.

Pew, Pew, Pew and the Fluffy Player.

Pew Pew Pew. We all know the player or players in our local circles that fall into this category. First off, why play with dice if all we are here for, is to have fun. If you really dont want to make a game out of it (if its a game it infers that there is a winner and a loser), then why even bring dice.

Instead I have this to offer. Lets not bring any dice for your just for fun table top experience. Instead lets just do what any good 5 year old will do, and just move our stuff on the board and say "pew pew pew", and knock over a couple dead soldiers. You could even take turns doing this, but taking a turn would once again infer this might be a game, and thus a winner and a loser. This is where the creativity could really begin for your non-competitive fluff player that just wants to have fun, making explosion and dying sound effects.

So all you fluff players, either grow up or become real fluffers. I mean really. There really is lots of room for you in this hobby, however, going around smack talking better players than yourself by claiming "if I spent that much on my army", or "I only play for fun" is really r-trded. I know you only want to play people you know you can beat reliably, so the excuses are really just that, excuses.

Please please, just give up your weak lame excuses, and next time on the table..... just say pew pew pew, and put those dice away.

Ard Boyz - The Missions.

Whoa, did we get a shocker today. First things first.

The Internet if full of bad whiners, bad lists, and bad rules interpretations. Emphasis on Bad Rules interpretations, you forum trash hounds. More on that later. So everyone and their little girl sister is complaining about the missions, number 3 mostly. Did they F mech armies? Probably a little. Do the other two missions favor mech armies. Not really. Our first instinct on these missions is to complain and whine, and don't get me wrong, my list will have a real hard time with that last mission. What I really feel sorry for is jump pack army types, or bike lists.

For those that don't know, mission 3 is a kill point mission. 3 kps for any unit that can move over 6" in a single phase, 2kps for HQ, and 1kp for everything else. That means a mech army, say one like mine, is going to be worth a lot of kps. Now here is the kicker that no one is really discussing, and is the real reason this mission is bad. To get a massacre you only have to win by 7kps. Whoa. That means kill them two rhinos, one extra unit, and you win big.

Is this a bad mission. Yes. Do I really care, No. It will be hard mission for me personally, as I will be fielding 49kps. Does that mean its an instant loss. No. I even tried the mission against my buddies list who had less than half the kps available. I still took the game 21kps to 1kp, in 3 rounds.

Stop your whining. Things that can break armor, just have a higher target priority than normal in this mission if you field armor. Deal with it, don't change your game, and just win it. Tell GW that in order for you to lose a mission like this, they had better make your armor worth 5kps.

One last thing. This is really the only part of the mission that does bug me. Drop pods.... Do we really have to make them this good. Worth only 1 kp, they are now the best thing to put your troops into. Go Drop Pod Armies.

A quickie on Target Priority

Something that seems to boggle most players is target priorities. Yes there are units you just must destroy, and sometimes these are hard to get rid of. However if it takes your whole army to take out this one unit, have you really done yourself a favor that round?

Throughout most of the game, you have a lot of decisions to make. The most important, is what should I kill this round, and how do I go about trying to do it.

First off. Lets get efficient about this. What targets can I get rid of now. What will I statistically kill this round, and what should I wait for. I prefer killing something dead. I decide it needs to die, and I kill it. I dont want to be shooting at the same unit next round.

If you have a havoc squad for instance, and you are firing it into a 10 man squad of plague marines, this is a bad option. You will not kill enough of them. Its even a worse option if you have rhino targets still moving around out there. Chances are you will kill your target if you shoot at the rhino, and you will probably, if you are lucky kill a single plague marine. This is what I mean by being efficient at killing your target. In late game, you are often forced into taking low chance shots, but you should never do this early on. You will pay for it in the long run.

Our units should have certain roles on the battlefield. Keep them in this role, and you will be much happier with how your army is working.

Playing the freaking Mission!!!

With ard boyz coming around, its time to say once again. Play the freakin mission. Yes, it seems simple. I myself, am the worst at this. I generally play 1-3 rounds of kill my opponent before I even think of the mission. This is a mistake. Play the mission from round 1.

You should be playing the mission first. Everything else is secondary. Ive played many games of 40k, where Ive literally decimated the enemy, and yet either come away with a minor victory, or even a draw. Its important from the start of round 1 to have the objectives very clear in your mind.

Here is what I suggest. At the start of each round. Take a 1 minute pause. Take one step back from the table. Look at the table. Remember the objective of the game. Take your turn. If you do this, you will know exactly what you are doing, and the round should make up for that one minute pause.

Annihilation missions. What can I destroy this round to get a kill point. If the mission gives more kill points for troops or hq's as in last years ard boyz missions, figure out where these are and how to kill them. Each round you should be getting points. Make it happen. Target priority are efficient and complete kills every round.

Objective missions. How can I reach the objectives. How can I stop my opponent from doing the same. Ask yourself those two things every round. Knocking out mobility of troop units in an opposing army if vital in these missions. In fact, all other enemy units that are not troops should be thought of only as obstacles; they are the things that need to be dealt with that will prevent you from claiming your objectives. So target priorities are enemy objective claiming units (troops), anything mobile that can contest an objective, and things that can or will prevent you from claiming and holding the objective.