Planning for the Dark Eldar

Hello faithful readers. I say faithful as the infrequent nature of my posting recently certainly means anyone who has this book marked has faith I will keep posting, and for those people I apologise for a lack of posts in recent months. I was going to blame the summer then realised that October had rolled on and I could hardly do that! A Special mention to my friendly Blood Angels player Mel who (I am told) has been commenting on my lack of posts.

With luck my posting will get back on track to around once a week minimum, the upcoming release of Dark Eldar will surely pull me back into 40k games.

So what are my plans regarding the Dark Eldar? Well not much really. My current list of IG will not be changing till I have played them a few times.

To refresh your memories (and mine), and for any new people to my Blog my current list runs to the tune of:

Company Command Squad; 4 x Grenade Launchers, Astropath

Sly Marbo

Veteran Squad, 3 Meltaguns
Veteran Squad, 3 Meltaguns
Veteran Squad, 3 Grenade Launchers
Veteran Squad, 3 Flamers

Vendetta Squadron, 2 Vendettas
Vendetta Squadron, 2 Vendettas
Vendetta

Leman Russ Demolisher
Leman Russ Demolisher
Leman Russ Vanquisher w/Multi Melta Sponsors, Pask

This list has served me ok in the last few games it has played. The Nature of it has evolved from an all Reserving Alpha strike which was pretty much reliant on one opening turn of shooting, now with the Leman Russ' starting on the table I have a good basis of Firepower that people need to worry about in addition to my flyers and Vets.

For anyone wondering I have themed it on the idea of a decimated Armoured Company needing Infantry support to Hold/Capture/Annhilate the enemy, hence the silly amount of Outflanking/Scouting Vendettas.

Against the Dark Eldar the things that currently worry me are their Dark Lances. Although having not read the book I cannot promise that is all the concerns me.

They can do a lot of Poison wounds which doesnt really fuss me too much, nor does the awesome power they have in Combat... if my Guardsmen are in Combat then it has gone a little bit Pete Tong.

The Russ's will suffer losing their armour advantages, although getting first turn could work well if I can get some nice shots off on exposed Raiders (we currently don't have lots of terrain in our gaming group).

I honestly expect that the list will change because of the Dark Eldar, most likely will be the inclusion of a Hydra or two and dropping a Vanquisher and Demolisher. I will also look at bringing back a Valkyrie for Templates of doom (well sort of).

I acutally found myself sitting and writing a brand new army list, something that I thought would do well against Dark Eldar, and pack a reason punch against the Space Marine heavy gaming group we have... my hope is that Lances will drop people from Two Land Raiders down to one. However halfway through  writing it I sat back and thought about why I was doing it...

The only answer I could come up with was as a Knee Jerk reaction to rumours (confirmed or otherwise) of a Codex I don't yet own, let alone having seen. So I supressed the urge to make panic changes.

To anyone reading this I would advise you to stick with your current lists for at least a couple of games when the Dark Eldar hit in your local area. If you have a list that has done well and you have built as an all comers list then have faith. The Vast majority of lists out there should not fair too badly against the Dark Eldar, and as you get the experience of how they play, then look at what to change in your list.

Anyway, thats me for now. Hopefully another post will be following shortly.

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