Dark Elves 2500

Okay, in getting ready to try to put together an army for an upcoming tournament, I've put together the following list for my Dark Elves:

560 - Dreadlord - Pendant of Khaeleth, Armour of Darkness, Crimson Death, The Other Trickster's Shard, Black Dragon
180 - Sorceress - Lvl.2 (Dark Magic), Sceptre of Stability, Seal of Ghrond
165 - Master - BSB, Ring of Darkness, Shrieking Blade, Heavy Armour, Sea Dragon Cloak, Shield
317 - 41 Dark Elf Warriors - Shields, Lordling, Musician, Standard Bearer - Standard of Discipline
125 - 10 Dark Elf Crossbowmen - Shields, Musician, Standard Bearer
125 - 10 Dark Elf Crossbowmen - Shields, Musician, Standard Bearer
55 - 5 Harpies
55 - 5 Harpies
235 - 5 Cold One Knights - Dread Knight - Ring of Hotek; Musician; Standard Bearer - Standard of Slaughter
330 - 20 Black Guard - Tower Master- Ironcurse Icon, Dragonbane Gem; Standard Bearer- Banner of Murder; Musician
350 - 2 x Hydra
Total = 2497

I know only having the Lvl 2 keeps me weak magically, but she is there mainly for magic defense. The Seal of Ghrond gives her +1 dispel dice and the sceptre gives me one time use of adding an additional dispel die, so I should hopefully be able to hold out against a few spells.

I've been hesitant about giving the Knights the Ring of Hotek since the new addition change to it, but it just gives me that little bit more of magic defense to run with, especially if I march them up quickly to get within 12" of a spellcaster.

The BSB with the ring runs with the BG who, with their champion's Ironcurse Icon, will hopefully have enough of a decent defense against shooting (opponents are at 1/2 BS against them thanks to master and they get a 6+ ward vs. war machines because of the champion) to make people not want to bother to try, and then they hopefully can knock most folks around in close combat. But they also cause fear because of the BSB's weapon, so they'll have an even better chance of that. Also, with their champion having the dragonbane gem, I can throw him into challenges vs. fire-wielding opponents (such as certain daemons) and stand a pretty good chance of surviving.

Upping the spears to 40 gives me more options for set up (4x10 (horde!), 5x8 or 8x5) and makes the sorceress a little more survivable. With the standard they become Ld 9 for when I'm not within the 18" range of the Dreadlord to make their steadfast even better.

With three monsters on the board, that's a lot of draw to take the focus off of the other units for a turn or two. Hopefully it will give those units a chance to get in to close combat until the hydras can join (the dragon will probably already be there!).

What does everyone think?? I'm looking for any and all suggestions to make this competitive and still allow me to keep the dragon.

I thought Harpies didn't fill core requirement. If so,you don't have enough points in core.

-Matt

I would drop the knights and a unit of crossbowmen replacing them with a big horde unit of corsairs with the frenzy banner and full command.

Also, can your sorceress have both of those items?
I'm pretty sure she's limited to just 50pts worth of magic items. Not sure if you're over or not.
Also, forget about dark magic, take shadow as it allows you to mess with your opponents units as well as buff your own.

For example, if you get Okkam's Mindrazor, your Corsairs now hit with S8. With 3 attacks on the front rank, and 2 extra attacks from ranks 2 & 3 plus re-roll to hit on first turn from Hatred, you can put the hurt down on anything in the game.

If you haven't read the lore of Shadow, I strongly recommend you do so. It's fantastic.

Good luck with the tourny. If you don't mind, I'd love to hear how your games went.

HawaiiMatt - They fulfill core, they just cannot cause panic to friendly units or be affected by a cauldron. Assassins are the ones who don't fill any spots with their points.

theHman - I'll definitely post after the tourny. I love the shadow lore as well, so I might run that. I wasn't 100% on the type of magic I was running, so thanks for the tips. The sorceress can have both, they combine to be 45.

I like the corsairs as well. My biggest concern if I did that would be outside of the monsters, I would have nothing that could really take a hit or dish one out to a high toughness unit. Everything would be a 5+ save without the knights and highest strength would be 4 (not counting the lord, of course). I've got a few weeks until the tournament though, so I'll give it a test run and see how it works. Thanks for the help!

Any updates?

Only level 2 at 2500? That is a huge flaw. I don't want to be super blunt, but it ruins the rest of the list.

Our tournament got cancelled, so I've just run the list in a few regular games against the guys in my club. It worked pretty well considering I only had the one sorceress. Having the extra dispel dice was nice and really, that was her main job - defense. I played one game against dwarves, so the magic didn't really didn't matter. Having the three monsters was great because even though he had 2 cannons, an organ gun and a bolt thrower I still managed to get the dragon in to combat. Sadly, both hydras fell before making it there, but he spent two turns shooting at them and by my 2nd turn I was able to charge my harpies into two of his war machines, my knights into a third and he lost his 4th when it blew up. Even down the two Hydras I was still able to get the win thanks to the dragon/lord and my black guard.

My second game with them was against ogres. He had two magic users, but with the extra dispel dice I was able to cancel out the spells that made me worry, and his gut-magic ended up destroying one of his own spellcasters. I again ended up winning thanks to my harpies and knights getting great flank moves to take out his war machine and some big looking monster, as well as the dragon/lord holding up a whole unit of ogres for 3 turns while my BG, Hydras and others whittled down the rest.

For a third game I tried dropping the lord to riding a dark pegasus, dropping a unit of crossbows and picking up some corsairs and a 2nd level 2 sorceress. I ended up using this list against hight elves with a star dragon. It was a pretty even game thanks to bad dice on both our parts and a stupid move on mine (stand and shot the star dragon with my corsairs... did one wound, lost the whole unit to combat), and we unfortunately didn't get far enough in to it to really determine a winner before we had to call it quits (though my hydras were just starting to eat there way through his lines). Having the two sorceresses was nice, but in all honesty I think I preferred the dragon. Having that many big beasties on the board is just a daunting task for any opponent in my opinion. I want to try to get one more game in with this list, but I think I like the other better. Depending on the next game with it, I may try dropping the xbows all together to replace them with corsairs with hand xbows and frenzy.

theHman - Tried shadow, and shadow w/dark with the 2 sorceresses. You're right, I think I prefer just shadow. I didn't get mindrazor, but reducing his toughness and ws was almost as helpful!

Nikephoros - How does only the one level 2 ruin the rest of the list if you don't mind me asking? I'm always looking for improvements, so I'm open to any suggestions on how to modify the list to improve it. I don't own any witch elves, so they're the one improvement I can't add in.

If you play against a strong magic list, like Teclis, or a Slann you'll see that you need a level 4 for magic defense. Secondly, one of the best things Dark Elves have going for them is magic, so not using a Supreme Sorceress would be like a Dwarf player not using cannons. Third, Witch Elves are garbage, so that wouldn't improve your list anyway, so don't sweat it.