Dark Eldar Rumor Roundup

[Bowser]

1: $$$
2: stupid spam list
3: why skyfire when they die to Bolters?
4: you get tabled turn 1 with no units on the table as 90% of your army is flyers

Or ally with something durable like...I dunno...60 grots/orks with a pain boy behind a defence line?
It's extremely sad that I'm thinking of ridiculous things like that when pondering possibilities of the new codex.

[eldargal]

You don't even need that. Just ignore Charon, he is invested in being as utterly negative as possible.

1: So?
2: It's lore friendly, who cares
3) 6s to hit 6s to equal the AV, it's like a 0.5% chance to knock off a HP per rapid firing tactical squad
4) I said flyer heavy, not flyer exclusive.

[Charon]

You don't even need that. Just ignore Charon, he is invested in being as utterly negative as possible.

1: So?
2: It's lore friendly, who cares
3) 6s to hit 6s to equal the AV, it's like a 0.5% chance to knock off a HP per rapid firing tactical squad
4) I said flyer heavy, not flyer exclusive.

If you dont plan on 3000 points, its pretty much flyers exclusive.
Serpent spam is also fluffy (just see the path books or valedor. Everything comes in small squads in serpents) and obviously not well received.
You might want to redo your math, its a 50% chance.

[AirHorse]

Why bother with skyfire when you can use six tactical squads instead....

[40kGamer]

Or ally with something durable like...I dunno...60 grots/orks with a pain boy behind a defence line?
It's extremely sad that I'm thinking of ridiculous things like that when pondering possibilities of the new codex.

You can go Dark Eldar air force without needing to go outside the Eldar race. Some guardians or dire avengers in Wave Serpents are quite durable. You can also plop some Fire Dragons in a venom for some deep striking madness... Their are a lot of opportunities to mix/match with Eldar but unless there is a big surprise in the codex, I'm not seeing Dark Eldar doing well on their own in the current meta.

[clever handle]

"notable downsides"
Not sure if joking, trolling or just lack of game knowledge...

Ok then lets see the "notable downsides" of the succubus:

has difficulty with hordes, can get surrounded and taken out through attrition, oh, hai here's my CC elites. They seem to have killed all your dudes. Oh lolz im a cybot.
Her notable downside is beeing a melee unit without any survivability and any kill potential. She cant fight elites, hordes or monsters. Yes she can beat up an imperial guard squad or tau fire warriors... but EVERYONE can do this... to a far cheaper price. Hell even a banshee exarch comes pretty close to her killing potential and even outlives her in challenges.

lets look at how your armies fair against dark eldar in general and then determine if the succubus is even required:
1) Bikestar: ok, be fast and have all the T5, 3+ you want.... I"ll just be over here with a boatload of S8 AP2 & poison to ignore your toughness...
2) Imperial Knights: Against an army full of antitank weaponry mounted on fast skimmers? I've yet to see a knight titan survive a single round of dark eldar lance fire - of course the loss of haywire in CC is a bummer, but I bet we're still looking at packing a minimum of 12-15 darklight weapons at 1500 points
3) Centironstar - eat darklances from 24.1" away? Even with a 4++ you're going down the turn you hit the table.
4) no details provided=(

for each of these, the dark eldar army hasn't engaged in combat, so no matter what HQ you've taken.... its probably a waste=)

[Arkalid]

So how about some shifts in the fluff of the Dark Eldar?

So it seems that GW thought that Dark Eldar were doing a little too well in the last Codex. I mean it was impossible to threaten them as long as they stayed in Commorragh. So now the new plot hook is that there's a hidden gate in the lower reaches of Commorragh, that leads straight to Warp. Vect, who is strongly mentioned in the fluff, has his mind mostly set on keeping that gate, called Khaine's Gate, locked and hidden from the public eye. During the last few years the Gate is starting to crack open, with Daemonic whispers echoing from the other side. Many of the gate keepers, most of who are Incubi, have been reported writing a certain phrase all around the gate. The phrase is simple: "Let us in." Also it seems that someone, or something, is banging the gate ceaselessly.

Now Lady Malys, who's also strongly mentioned in the fluff, thinks that Vect is trying to end Commorragh by opening the Khaine's Gate, and has made moves to stop the Overlord of Commorragh from opening it. Vect, on the other hand, thinks that Malys is trying to open the gate to seize power with it, and has moved his forces against her, so the entire Commorragh is entangled in brutal battle, while at the same time the chains of the gate are snapping and the banging on the Gate quickens...

Fluff shifts:
So many of the former characters are no longer mentioned in the fluff. The Duke and Sathonyx are nowhere to be found, and Kheradhruak is little more than a side note. However the Dark Eldar book series gives us new names, namely Kraillach and Yllithian, who are the most important characters from those books. Vect and Malys are in the center of almost everything, although their rivalry is not focused on that much, as far as exposition goes.

Dark Eldar are now much more about lightning fast raids and quick tactical manouvers, rather than terror tactics and long lasting orgies of carnage, as they were in the last edition. I think this is represented in the rules as well, since the playstyle seems to favour aggressive and quick movements, while retaining your firepower. Melee combat is something you really need to gather resources from around your army, but even your lowly Kabalites are about as strong as Striking Scorpions by turn 6. The fluff definitely focuses more on the genius of Dark Eldar, although their sadistic nature is ever present.

There are a few new stories or segments of fluff. There's a nice story where an Archon wanted sturdier slaves and decided to go and capture some Orks for that job. What he was going to build? A huge statue of himself, of course. There's also a story where the Alpha Legion makes a fool out of Vect, and what Vect did to correct that issue.

Since this is BoLS, I won't bore you with more fluff. Here are some other confirmations I think might interest you.

-Klaivex has Rampage as well, so it's not a totally worthless use of points to get him.
-Raiders and Venoms are dedicated Transports AND Fast Attack choices, so you can buy them empty as well.
-Raider, Venom and Ravager have Deep Strike.
-Voidraven has the option of not taking any missiles as well, so you can run him fairly cheap.
-Every single Grotesque in the unit automatically has CCW and flesh gauntlet for the same price they were before, so free flesh gauntlet now!! Yay! Every Grotesque can also swap its CCW for a Liquifier gun for 15 points. Grotesgoostar anyone? They still have flesh gauntlet as well, so for one attack you get a S3 ApD6 Template weapon, and you still have Poisoned (4+), with a chance to Instant Death in melee. Not too bad. And they have Rampage.

That's pretty much it. There are some thing that haven't been mentioned, but they're pretty minor in the grand scale of things.

I think the book gives you a lot of tools for many different army compositions. The Codex seems to favour fast, vehicle-based lists and/or durable Haemonculi lists. Deep Striking transports give you a lot of new ways to play. Wych Cults seem to be a bit lackluster unfortunately, although you could try to run the Succubus as some form of Archon bodyguard or force multiplier for the Incubi. She's surprisingly tough with some Artefacts and some game turns behind her, although Lelith beats her in everything.

Anyways, I can't wait to get my own copy of the Codex. The book seems to have an okay inner balance, with a lot of options for solobuild army, or some combo goodness with their Craftworld cousins.

[Charon]

From [URL="http://www.thedarkcity.net/t10034-confirmed-covens-supplement-details"]The Dark City[/URL]

From a 100% reliable source wishing to remain anonymous (confirmed by pics):
COVEN Supplement

Power from pain - by turn number.
1 – nothing
2 – Fearless
3 – Fear, Fearless
4 – Fear, Fearless, it will not die
5 – Fear, It will not die, zealot
6+ - Eternal Warrior, fear, it will not die, zealot

This is a straight copy from the book - yes some of the powers are omitted on purpose as they are not listed in the chart every turn

Warlord chart
1 – talos & chronos reroll FNP rolls of 1 within 12”of warlord
2 – warlord plus any grotesques he joins gain it will not die
3 – add or subtract 1 from reserve rolls
4 – If your warlord is slain by an attack/weapon with AP 1 or 2 or with the ID rule, gain D3 VP
5 – Warlord plus wracks he joins gain FNP4+
6 – Warlord gains preferred enemy

Artifacts
10pts – pick one of the following at the start of your turn which lasts until your next turn – IWND, fleet, poisoned 4+, rampage (used each turn)
10pts – fighting in a challenge – opponent suffers -5 to initiative
25pts – 8”range, S1, AP2, assault 1, blast, instant death, no effect on vehicles (used as a grenade in shooting phase)
10pts – Additional D6 attacks at S3, AP- at initiative 10, grant an additional pile in move at this step, no bonus applicable for furious charge, rending etc
20pts – IWND 4+, only wounded by poisons special rule on 6
35pts - +1 to FNP rolls, negate first wound suffered if it has the ID rule but when this happens, the item is lost

Coven Detachment
Required – 2HQ, 2 Elite
Optional – 4HQ, 6 Elite, 4 Heavy Support
Units that are available in the detachment – Urien, Haemonculus, Raider (DT only), Venom (DT only), Wracks, grotesques, talos, chronos
Benefits – if this is the primary detachment you can reroll warlord chart from this book. All enemy units within 12”of 1 or more models from this detachment suffer -1LD

7(!!!) formations as well!

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

Bore us with fluff? well I for one have no interest in the rules, I'd love to hear more of the fluff tidbits

[40kGamer]

Hmmm.... Coven supplement seems interesting.