Dark Eldar Treat

So while I took my sweet time to get back into the 40k grove a friend of mine has been slaving away building a Dark Eldar army.  Its the same guy whose IG army I've played against so many times.  Check out these photo's I think his painting has really been taken to the next level.

Refined 500 point Eldar Ally list.

Having some fun thinking up small ally detachments.  It's a great way to get motivated to finish up some old projects.  Going through my piccasa album I found this photo.  It was a 500 point army for an escalation league I never finished.  I think I might still give it a shot.


HQ:
- Autarch: Spider Pack, Death Spinner, Chain Sword, Mandiblaster


Elite:
-7 Scorpions + 1 Exarch: Claw, Shadow Strike, Stalker


Troop:
-5 Pathfinders


Fast Attack:
-5 Spiders


Total Points: 500


I figure the benefit to this list is that it allows me a chance to try out the new outflanking moves.  Have not read much recently but apparently I might be able to co-ordinate their deepstrike/outflank move.  Not a bad list really, as there are no bad lists on the eve of 6th edition.  Hopefully the Eldar and Tearers can have a strong enough alliance that the + 1 reserve roll is army wide.

Work on the Tearers continues

Trying new blogger app on phone to to puplish a post.  At any rate got the shoulder pads of the assault squad painted. 

Edit:

Got a bit of work in on the assault squad and painted the bases.

Blood Angel and Eldar Allies are In

Man, was reading yes the truth hurts and saw this link.  So its official, my flesh tearers and eldar can ally.  When I get my army back from frontline gaming, I will have a solid 1500 point army painted for the table top.  I'm thinking that I want to use my remaining 500 points to buy an Autarch for the +1 to reserve roll. I also figure with flyers coming into the game from reserve always that a reserve roll boast for the tearers could come in handy.  Keeping in mind my previous 1500 point list for the tearers I figure the following 500 point Eldar list would be a fun ally to include.


HQ:
Autarch - spider pack, fusion gun, powersword, mandiblaster


Troop:
5 Rangers


Elite:
5 Scorpions + 1 Exarch - claw, stalker, shadow strike


Fast:
6 Warp Spiders


I suspect that Rangers will be a good troop choice in 6th.  They can always scout onto an objective off the hop for extra points.  All I really care about is my +1 reserve roll.  Though there is a good chance that the flesh tearers and eldar might not be able to share abilities between the two detachments.  I have not read anywhere what the different tiers of cooperation allows the different armies to do.  If this is the case then I likely will plan out a 500 point list using a farseer.

Flight of the Swooping Hawk

Reading through the new white dwarf and various blogs, I take it glancing hits will strip away hull points in 6th edition.  I wonder if this might encourage the use of swooping hawks.  5 for 110 points you get 5 models with jump packs and haywire grenades.  If the additional rumor is true that vehicles will have WS values of 1 or 0 depending on movement, that's a lot of guaranteed glancing hits produced by the swooping hawks.  Just a random thought though.  What little of the rules I've gleaned are woefully out of context.  Still it is a fun exercise to dream up new uses for little seen units.

500 point Eldar Ally

In anticipation for my first game of 6th edition I think I will try and take along 500 points of an Eldar ally.  Sounds like a lot of fun.  If this proposed new rule is true then I get the ability to field some of my painted Eldar units along with my Flesh Tearers.  Only restriction that I saw from what I've seen of the leaked WD issue is that ally's might be restricted to large point games of 2.5k.  I hope that is not the case and that you can take them at 2k points.  At any rate if the rumors are true then I've come up with a 2k list that I suspect I will play my first game of 6th edition with.


Eldar:


Farseer - RoW, Spirit Stones, Mind War, Guide (cheapest powers to save points after taking new powers)


10 Avengers - Wave Serpent, Shuriken Cannons x2, Exarch, Dire Sword


1 Fire Prism


Flesh Tearers:


Librarian (try out all new powers)


10 man Tac Squad - Missile, Fist, Melta Gun, Rhino
10 man Assault Squad - Fist, 2x Melta Gun's, Rhino
5 man Assault Squad - Flamer, Rhino, Melta Bomb
5 man Death Company Squad
1 Death Company Dread


2 Baal Preds - Assault Cannons, Heavy Bolters


1 Storm Raven - Plasma Cannon, Multi-Melta


Should roughly come out to 2k points.  I think it would be a blast to play and take advantage of as many possible changes that might come out with the new rule set.

Tactical Squad Done

Calling this unit done and moving on to the next.  10 assault marines in the background are next on the painting que.  The mojo is flowing.

Eldar changes to look forward to

With what I hope is a June 30th release I've been thinking all sorts of 40k thoughts lately.  I will have the tearers ready willing and able to go when the new rule set drops but as always my mind turns to the Eldar.  Realistically a 6th edition codex is at least a year away.  That being said however, I'm positive changes to the core rule system will shake up the 4th edition codex.  Ultimately lending itself to seeing a shake up on what limited builds are available to the Eldar in the twilight of 5th.

First and foremost there is the Farseer.  At first I was fairly negative to the proposed changes to the psychic system with respect to the Eldar.  As it stands the Eldar require a list to be built around specific force multipliers found in their Farseer powers.  I thought that any change to these powers would make an already difficult army to play be all the more challenging.  After giving it some thought though, I hope the Eldar powers are revamped in the new rule set.  On its face, the most positive aspect of these changes will be opening a window to potential changes coming down the pipe for the Eldar.  That aside, I'm hopeful the new power system might open up new combo's for the old codex allowing the Eldar to take advantage of whatever new rules may be present prior to a new codex.  For example lets say the shooting phase and assault phase swap places in any given game turn.  Without equipping the Eldar with the tools to take advantage of this new playing field they would likely slip further into obscurity.  As I see it there are only 2 ways that this might be alleviated: 1) a new codex 2) change the way Eldar force multipliers work.  This is all conjecture, but I do remain hopeful that the new rule set will breath new life into the antiquated Eldar codex.  I don't expect 6th edition to make the Eldar a top tier army but I do suspect it will shake up the cookie cutter builds and inject some new life into the ancient space fairing elves.

Absent the Farseer, I remain hopeful that there will be multiple universal rule changes that might encourage new builds to be played.  Examples of USR rules that I will be paying particular attention to are: Fleet, Sniper Rifles, Wound Allocation, Fast Vehicles, Infiltrate, Stealth.  I'm hoping that we might see universal changes that would buff certain unused Eldar units.  Namely: Rangers, Scorpions and though often used the Wave Serpent.  I list the Wave Serpent because our bread and butter transport stands to gain massive improvements based on some of the rumours floating around.  Rangers and Scorpions are some of my favorite models in the entire Eldar range so anything that might encourage there use I strongly look forward to.

So with all that being said the only concrete thing to say is that time will tell.  The excitement for a new rule set is reaching epic levels.  I really look forward to starting fresh with the entire community to digest the new rule set.  I came in mid stream with 5th and the only time I've ever started a rule set fresh was when Rogue Trader switched to 2nd (and I played the bejesus out of 2nd edition).  In closing, I've attached a few photo's of Eldar models that I've started but never completed.  I'm hoping that 6th edition will inspire me to paint Eldar again rather than waiting for a new codex.

I'm all verklempt

Oh I cannot wait.  The eve of 6th edition.  I've my flesh tearers bought and paid for.  A painted army ready to play.  But the Eldar are calling.  My main squeeze.  Let the rumor mongers sling about all the potential changes.  I don't care.  I'll play the flesh tearers (in a 5th edition style list until the Eldar are released).  No big changes for me.  However, once the Eldar hit the horizon, my wallet will be spent.

To recap my experience with 40k, I came back into the game from 2nd edition into 5th, the Eldar have always been (and I suspect always will be) my army.  Now that 6th edition is on the horizon I can breath a big sigh of relief.  No tail end codex for my space elves.  I can take comfort in the fact that a proper (hope hard cover) codex is waiting for me in a years time.  In the mean time I will be content to hash out games with my marines.  But I give fair warning to all the opponents I've ever played against.  Once the Eldar hit the shelves, no mercy!  I plan to build the most broken list possible and relish the results.

Dual Ravens for 6th Edition

I picked up a second Storm Raven gambling that flyers will become more viable in 6th edition.  After sleuthing around the inter-webs with a mind to researching the viability of a dual raven list the general consensus I've found is that including 2 ravens is not the most competitive build going for 5th.  There are sentiments as well that flyers will not be improved under a 6th edition rule set.  Myself I cannot say one way or the other whether running two ravens will become more viable with any certainty, but I have a gut feeling this will be the case.  With this in mind I've played around with army builder to come up with a list that I think could perform well under 5th but realistically having 6th edition foremost in focus.  I've also included flamers (normal and heavy) where I could considering some of the rumors that have been flowing lately in their increased tactical use.  Here we go:

HQ:
Librarian - Unleash Rage, Shield

Elite:
2 Priests
Furioso Dread - Frag Cannon, Drop Pod

Troops:
2x 10 man Assault Squads - Melta Gun, Flamer, Power Fist, Rhino
10 Tac Squad - Melta Gun, Missile Launcher, Power Fist
5 man Assault Squad - Melta Gun, Heavy Flamer Razorback
5 Death Company
1 Death Company Dread

Fast Attack:
1 Attack Bike - Multi-Melta

Heavy:
2 Storm Ravens - Plasma Cannons, Multi Melta's, Extra Armour
Dreadnought - Multi-Melta, Heavy Flamer

Total Points: 2000

So the Librarian, Priest and a 10 man Assault Squad will jump in a Storm Raven along with the basic Dread.  The unused Rhino then goes to the Tac Squad to bunker down and camp an objective.  Joining the Storm Raven will be the second Storm Raven carrying the Death Company.  I figure this Storm Raven will draw most of the early game fire power simply because of the black paint job.  I've kept the death company then to a min only to unlock the dread.  I figure at 100 points the small infantry squad should be able to earn their points back.  Ultimately they are in the list to die.  That leaves me with two Assault Squads and an Attack Bike to form an attack formation supporting each other.

The way I envision the list working (assuming I go first) is dropping the Furioso Dread next to a juicy armoured target to get a melta gun and frag cannon shot off.  The two Storm Ravens then move flat out to support the lone dread and use the machine spirit to get off two multi-melta shots.  The Tac Squad jumps into their newly acquired rhino and camps an objective.  The reaming Assault Squads along with the second Priest and Attack Bike rush forward to support the main thrust of my army for turn two.  I suspect they will draw little fire due to the threat of the ravens and three dreads on the opponents doorstep turn one.  Not sure what my plan is if I go second (reserve the ravens or not).

Models Away

My models are now en-route to the States to be completed.  This leaves me with the above to get painted/finished in anticipation for 6th edition.  In order to remove all clutter from my work space and mind, I've put away every other model in my collection so as not to be tempted to stray from my plan of attack.  I want to first finish the tac squad (its oh so close).  From there finish my full 10 man assault squad then the two smaller squads.  I want to leave my independent characters till last (I enjoy painting them the most).  So there you have it, while some might say I took the easy way out, I do not care.  I'm looking at having a completely painted 2000 point army for 6th edition.  Booya!

Prepping for 6th edition.

Man I'm completely stoked for 6th edition to drop.  Fantasy is put away and I've pulled out the flesh tearers to start working on again.  In order to facilitate having a completely painted army for 6th I've gone and outsourced the painting on my tanks and death company to Frontline Gaming.  I first started following their blog when they posted a few video's using the rumored 6th edition rule set and have enjoyed reading their content since.  With the crew down in California painting up a large portion of my army, all I have left to do is finish the infantry.  This is something by all rights I should be able to complete for July.  Essentially I've to finish painting up two full squads of marines and start fresh on another 10.  I've the models mostly built and primed so I should be off the the races for 6th edition.  The following will be my list.

HQ:
Seth
Librarian - Lance, Shield

Elite:
Chaplain
2 Priests

Troops:
5 man assault squad - melta gun, rhino
5 man assault squad - flamer, rhino
10 man assault squad - 2 melta guns, power fist, rhino
10 man tac squad - melta gun, missile launcher, power fist, rhino
10 man death company - power fist
1 death company dread

Fast:
2 Baal Preds - assault cannons

Heavy:
Storm Raven - plasma cannon, multi-melta, extra armour

Total Points:  2000

This list gives me 45 feel no pain marines on the table top (or 50 feel no pain wounds on the table).  No support fire, no 4+2, 6+6, or other competitive frameworks to build a list around.  Just a lot of angry fast marines that like to chop stuff up.  I've played the list and it is a lot of fun on the table.

With a painted army complete, I can then take my time and work on the eldar at a more pleasurable pace.  I'm tempted to start fresh though with the Eldar.  I want to try my hand at air brushing an army using a unique colour scheme.  Greens, browns and yellows is something that I've been tossing around in my head.  Anyway, the 5th edition malaise that I had succumbed to has been replaced with an excited anticipation for 6th to drop.  Can't wait.