Warhammer 40K Tabletop Thread XXXVIII: toy soldiers r srs bsns

[LansXero]

Ok, then my opinion will be based entirely on their points costs. Still surprised I have heard nothing of them until now.

The model didnt exist yet

[Drasius]

To be fair, SM 'domination' is pretty recent, there have been years to avoid that. And Eldar dont dominate so much as dont get dominated either. You'll see on every flux of the meta a bunch of the new hotness, with 1 - 2 eldar lists peppered in between. So they dont flood top positions like Iron Hands just did (or Orks at their time, etc.) but dont dissappear either.

Eldar aren't guard to be fair, but IIRC, there was enough DR spam lists placing top eight in many tournies that there wasn't much difference. And if you don't count Eldar placing top eight regardless of what the new hotness is, then I don't think I'm going to be able to explain just how much depth the 'dex has that no matter how the meta changes, that Eldar seem to have an answer.

Anywhere between 4 and 12 :v. I used to run Shining Spears, and I think I've tried to make work everything in the codex sans banshees (yes, even swooping hawks, sue me). Its just that my most common opponents are:
- Imperial Knights
- Custodes + Tank Guard
- Tank Guard + Scions
- 1k Sons + Nurgle

So its a very odd skew on how much anti-tank I need and how much craftworld melee gets stuck unable to break through T8 / DR.

I do play another list with Wraithblades and Fire Prisms, but not for 2k games. It does well enough, but Wraithblades are iffy, too much hangs on making a single charge roll. Still, its not like they'll die if they miss, so its not all bad.

So, not quite spamming DR's, but room for more still. Surprised you aren't running Fragons (+/- a serpent) if you're facing that much heavy armour.

As for no bad units, I'd say Banshees qualify (even with their 'buffs'), the one time I tried fire dragons I was thoroughly underwhelmed, I really dont like the Eldar mortars (and they feel pillowfisted considering how expensive they are).

So, by your own admission, there's like, 2 units out of the 40 or so in the dex that are bad, and while I'd agree with Banshees whole heartedly (they're what I had in mind when I said "very few" instead of "none"), if you mean Night Spinners are pillow fisted, you should see what other armies pay for for 2d6 autocannon shots on a 12W T7 platform.

You dont know this, but I started 8th playing Index Sisters. Then moved on to playing Dark Angels, and only started playing Eldar due to a friend who complained about how lame and underpowered they were. Then Dark Angels fell by the wayside in a massively more hordes meta, Sisters got their stupid beta codex to break them, and only my Eldar lists could keep up with the influx of Guard / Knights. Not sure if those count as weak armies or not, but I dont see myself as WAAC either. I happen to like the playstyle of my current list a lot, and if you see recent army lists for top placements you'll see it doesnt really play like them; Reapers havent been in the meta for a while now, neither have hemlocks.

Index sisters were very strong and DA are the plasma marines in the plasma edition. You might not have been playing loyal 32/Smash Captain/Castellan, but you're listing top end of the meta armies for the times you were playing them. Doesn't make you WAAC, but it does nothing to disprove my "Eldar players don't play weak armies" theory.

As for DR and Hemlocks not being meta, maybe you and I have different definitions of meta as I still see them recommended a bunch and if we look at the winning Harvester of Souls list:

Spoiler

Show

++ Battalion Detachment +5CP (Aeldari - Craftworlds) [43 PL, 782pts] ++
Autarch Skyrunner [6 PL, 119pts]: Banshee Mask, Fusion Gun, Laser Lance, Twin Shuriken Catapult, Shimmerplume of Achillrial
Autarch Skyrunner [6 PL, 127pts]: 5: Mark of the Incomparable Hunter, Banshee Mask, Craftworlds Warlord, Laser Lance, Reaper Launcher, Twin Shuriken Catapult
Rangers [3 PL, 60pts]: 5x Ranger
Rangers [3 PL, 60pts]: 5x Ranger
Rangers [3 PL, 60pts]: 5x Ranger
Dark Reapers [13 PL, 209pts]5x Dark Reaper: 5x Reaper Launcher, Dark Reaper Exarch: Tempest Launcher
Wave Serpent [9 PL, 147pts]: Shuriken Cannon, Twin Shuriken Cannon

++ Air Wing Detachment +1CP (Aeldari - Craftworlds) [38 PL, 742pts] ++
Crimson Hunter Exarch [9 PL, 161pts]: Two Starcannons
Crimson Hunter Exarch [9 PL, 161pts]: Two Starcannons
Hemlock Wraithfighter [10 PL, 210pts]: Spirit Stones
Hemlock Wraithfighter [10 PL, 210pts]: Spirit Stones

++ Outrider Detachment +1CP (Aeldari - Craftworlds) [25 PL, 475pts] ++
Farseer Skyrunner [7 PL, 132pts]: Shuriken Pistol, Twin Shuriken Catapult, Witchblade
Swooping Hawks [3 PL, 68pts]4x Swooping Hawk: 4x Lasblaster Swooping Hawk Exarch: Hawk's Talon
Swooping Hawks [3 PL, 68pts]4x Swooping Hawk: 4x Lasblaster Swooping Hawk Exarch: Hawk's Talon
Windriders [12 PL, 207pts]9x Windrider - Scatter Laser: 9x Scatter Laser

They've got both, and that was about a month ago.

[Blackhawk748]

The model didnt exist yet

I'm aware that its brand new, im just saying that Im surprised that I havent heard much talk about it as far as new stuff goes.

[LansXero]

Eldar aren't guard to be fair, but IIRC, there was enough DR spam lists placing top eight in many tournies that there wasn't much difference. And if you don't count Eldar placing top eight regardless of what the new hotness is, then I don't think I'm going to be able to explain just how much depth the 'dex has that no matter how the meta changes, that Eldar seem to have an answer.

They are top of the ladder, no argument there. But 'domination' to me means something like the recent IH placements, or end-of-7th eldar / marines. And current Craftworlds arent there at the moment. The Soulburst nerf came before I started playing the army :D.

So, not quite spamming DR's, but room for more still. Surprised you aren't running Fragons (+/- a serpent) if you're facing that much heavy armour.

I have the ****tiest luck with transports, even the best of them. I never seem to be able to get out in time, and keep rolling 1s for the explode disembark. This is why I so dearly want Repressors to become mainline GW if Im ever to play Sisters again, because when you can shoot from inside, everything is better.

So, by your own admission, there's like, 2 units out of the 40 or so in the dex that are bad, and while I'd agree with Banshees whole heartedly (they're what I had in mind when I said "very few" instead of "none"), if you mean Night Spinners are pillow fisted, you should see what other armies pay for for 2d6 autocannon shots on a 12W T7 platform.

AP0 (even with condicional bonus) sucks, because even if you wound they'll make their save more often than not, so Eldar vehicles and their assortment of bladestorm weaponry tend to feel underwhelming. That and since everyone is loaded for Knights, T7 no Inv. is nothing, most of us can blow up Leman Russes without much issue on the first turns, because if we couldnt then Crusaders would rip us a new one, so thats another point against skimmers.

Index sisters were very strong and DA are the plasma marines in the plasma edition. You might not have been playing loyal 32/Smash Captain/Castellan, but you're listing top end of the meta armies for the times you were playing them. Doesn't make you WAAC, but it does nothing to disprove my "Eldar players don't play weak armies" theory.

You'd die if you saw what the old ones play, even when they played since 5th. For me its more "store owners who have to read up on a ton of game theory to pass down to customers dont play bad armies / decks" because why would we, when we want to make the customer trust in our position as experts.

As for DR and Hemlocks not being meta, maybe you and I have different definitions of meta as I still see them recommended a bunch and if we look at the winning Harvester of Souls list:

Thats surprising to me, you know? Last I'd seen it was all Voidraven / Phoenixes instead of Hemlocks and Wave Serpents / Seer Councils / Night Spinners instead of Dark Reapers. Im not saying they're suddenly bad, just that they seemed to have fallen out of favor, at least from the lists I'd been reading.

[Cheesegear]

I remember something vaguely about the Space Marine FAQ ruling that additional generated hits count as having rolled the number of the die that generated them only counting for Space Marines?

You remember correctly.
However, that ruling was a disaster and GW has walked it back so that said rule no longer exists.
Basically, GW can rule however they want - even overrule previous bad rulings - relatively quickly. Why don't they do that all the time?

[LansXero]

You remember correctly.
However, that ruling was a disaster and GW has walked it back so that said rule no longer exists.
Basically, GW can rule however they want - even overrule previous bad rulings - relatively quickly. Why don't they do that all the time?

because casuals are slow and there is only so much change they can handle before sobbing and quitting, or flat out ignoring rules because they are not on their book.

[Squark]

I'm aware that its brand new, im just saying that Im surprised that I havent heard much talk about it as far as new stuff goes.

Witthout a pre-existing chassis to proxy it with, I don't think many people did much testing, and unlike, say, Mycetic Spores or Night Scythes, we knew they were coming relatively soon. Might as well wait to get a sense of them for when we have the official model. To be honest, until the preview article this week, I didn't know it was open topped, having not seen the codex.

Compared to a rhino with the same number of storm bolters, you get 1 additional hull, flying, 2 additional inches of movement, the ability to drop off passengers after you move if they don't charge, and some additional upgrade options, but lose 4 passenger slots. Not a bad deal for 10 points. But since it can't carry Gravis models, Hellblasters are the only real payload at the moment.

[Cheesegear]

But since it can't carry Gravis models, Hellblasters are the only real payload at the moment.

Infiltrators are Objective Secured.

[LansXero]

Infiltrators are Objective Secured.

They also have concealed positions, why are they on transports? (Now, if it was like Vanguard move, where its handed to the transport... then they'd be in Repulsors xD)

[Squark]

Infiltrators are Objective Secured.

They also have concealed positions, why are they on transports? (Now, if it was like Vanguard move, where its handed to the transport... then they'd be in Repulsors xD)

Pretty much this. I suppose there's some merit to putting troops in Impulsors, but since Infiltrators and Incursors have concealed positions, its a pretty niche case.

Speaking of Primaris troops, Cheese, I've been meaning to ask; Why do you (and presumably, other competitive players you talk with) feel that the new vanguard troops are such an upgrade to scouts and Intercessors? It seems like you lose firepower to both, and you're more expensive than the Intercessors, so you lose out on the relative durability. Is it the combination of concealed positions and 2 wounds behind a 3+ save? Or is the omni-scrambler that important in the competitive scene?

[Cheesegear]

Is it the combination of concealed positions and 2 wounds behind a 3+ save? Or is the omni-scrambler that important in the competitive scene?

Concealed Positions is one of the strongest abilities in the game; Turn-based scoring of VPs has ratcheted up the value of the early game. That means that long-range, killy units, that can shoot from DZ-to-DZ and have a reliable chance of killing something (e.g; Dark Reapers), are some of the most valuable units in the game.

As I mentioned earlier with Iron Hands, the other way to win the game (not so much in WD!Maelstrom, but certainly in Book!Maelstrom and ITC) is mobility and board control. The best mobility in the game, is to start the game wherever you want. Specifically, it's the ability to start the game holding mid-field Objectives, which starts racking points starting from Turn 1. If you play ITC, you have a skewed version of how the game is actually played, and holding mid-field Objectives actually isn't that important. But for the rest of us...

Infiltrators; Adding in the Omni-Scrambler is so ****ing good. Again, it's quite literally board control. Because units aren't points on the board, units have footprints. A decent spread of your Infiltrators is a huge zone of control, and effectively removes Deep Striking Melee units out of the game (which is probably the point...When Shadowspear came out, Blood Angel Captains were ruining the meta, after all), because you can't declare a Charge against something over 12" away...Even if you roll 3d6, like Blood Angels and Eversors...Unless you're Howling Banshees, because Craftworlds' players are allowed to ignore rules. Infiltrators also remove Scions from the meta, unless said Scions are in Valkyries, but that's a whole different kettle of fish 'cause Valkyries suck and is good Storm Troopers even worth having terrible Valkyries?

Incursors; They're much less esoteric. They make near-guaranteed Turn 1 Charges. What else do you want?


Basically, making the end-of-game meaningless (this started in 7th Ed., it's not an 8th Ed. thing), it frontloads the point-scoring to the early game. That's why White Scars' Assault Doctrine+ on Turn 3 is not a win condition. It's a winmore condition after the game is already basically decided. If White Scars are not already in Melee by the start of Turn 3, then they've already lost.

[Squark]

Okay, you've made a good case for why Infiltrators replace intercessors. But is an omni-scrambler and a 3+ save worth losing almost half your shots and the bigger footprint offered by bringing 2 scouts for every Infiltrator?

As for melee... Scouts with bolt pistols and CC weapons pay 4.125 points/hit the turn they charge (3 melee attacks+1 bolt pistol). Incursors pay... call it 4.957 points/hit. That's before we factor in chapter tactics, of course, but that's still a not insignificant loss in attacking power compared to scouts.


Just trying to follow your reasoning, here.

[Cheesegear]

Okay, you've made a good case for why Infiltrators replace intercessors. But is an omni-scrambler and a 3+ save worth losing almost half your shots and the bigger footprint offered by bringing 2 scouts for every Infiltrator?

What? If you're running two Battalions, you should have one unit of Infiltrators, three units of Scouts-with-Boltguns, and two units of Scouts-with-Rifles.

I fail to see how taking 5-10 Infiltrators will stop you from taking 25 Scouts.

As for melee... Scouts with bolt pistols and CC weapons pay 4.125 points/hit the turn they charge (3 melee attacks+1 bolt pistol). Incursors pay... call it 4.957 points/hit. That's before we factor in chapter tactics, of course, but that's still a not insignificant loss in attacking power compared to scouts.

Gene-Wrought Might is a Stratagem, so it can only be used once per turn. Same as before, you only need one unit (unless you're Blood Angels* or Space Wolves).

10 Incursors, isn't taken instead of 25 Scouts. As well as.

Just trying to follow your reasoning, here.

Use 'AND', not 'OR'.


*Blood Angels Incursors are insane.

[Squark]

What? If you're running two Battalions, you should have one unit of Infiltrators, three units of Scouts-with-Boltguns, and two units of Scouts-with-Rifles.

I fail to see how taking 5-10 Infiltrators will stop you from taking 25 Scouts.



Gene-Wrought Might is a Stratagem, so it can only be used once per turn. Same as before.

10 Incursors, isn't taken instead of 25 Scouts. As well as.



Use 'AND', not 'OR'.

Ah. I misunderstood your intent when you aaid something to the effect that Astartes greatezt weakness was their troops, and the new release cancelled that.

Now if inly Space Wolves Incursors got to use Hunters Unleashed with their Knives...

[Cheesegear]

Ah. I misunderstood your intent when you aaid something to the effect that Astartes greatezt weakness was their troops, and the new release cancelled that.

It did not.
That being said, Infiltrators' significance to the game flatlines after Turn 2 (then again, so does a lot of things).
Incursors are irrelevant after Turn 1...Unless Blood Angels, Space Wolves or White Scars (kind of).

If your opponent has no Reserves, then Infiltrators are meaningless.
If your opponent has massive tarpits like Poxwalkers, Plaguebearers or Tzaangors, then Incursors don't work (unless they're White Scars).

Infiltrators and Incursors offer silver bullets to the current meta - especially the chess-clock meta. However, they're expensive, so you're unlikely to have more than one or two units at most. But you do need them because they offer solutions to problems that exist. 'Cheaper is better, especially for Troops units' still applies though. Which means that Astartes lists have a neccessary, albeit expensive, unit in the Troops slot. ****. That being said, having am 'auto-include' unit in a Mandatory Role slot is actually the best outcome you can hope for. Auto-includes that help you build Battalions are generally good things.

...How 'bout taking no Troops at all; Triple Repulsor, triple Stormhawk, triple Vicky Warsuit, and we can all just play Iron Hands.

EDIT

"Hey Drasius, come play 8th, it's soo much better than 7th!"
*Eldar and SM domination*
At least IH devs don't have a 36"move I guess...

Hey Drasius, Iron Hands Devastators are in Drop Pods that come down on Turn 1, can't be interrupted (GW walked back how 8th.Intercept works against units in Drop Pods - it doesn't), don't take -1 to hit for moving out of the Drop Pod, and re-roll 1s to hit without a Captain to babysit!
Did I mention one unit of Grav-Cannons per turn can re-roll to wound and re-roll Damage?

Infiltrators don't even counter them 'cause Grav-Cannons have a 24" range, and did I mention that Intercept Stratagems don't work?
AP-4 even cancels out a 3+ save!

...Sorry.

EDIT II
Wait. I forgot. GW nerfed The Ironstone, so Iron Hands are fair now.

[Drasius]

They are top of the ladder, no argument there. But 'domination' to me means something like the recent IH placements, or end-of-7th eldar / marines. And current Craftworlds arent there at the moment. The Soulburst nerf came before I started playing the army :D.

Dunno man, feels like pretty solid domination to me (though admittedly a large portion of that was due to DR and Ynnari shenanigans). Put the two together and it's just the same old thing. Who is top tier at the moment? SM, Eldar, Daemons and Guard. Not that much differrent from 7th there, it's just IG and 'crons switching spots with the real changes happening in the best-of-the-rest mid-tier dexes that's different.

I have the ****tiest luck with transports, even the best of them. I never seem to be able to get out in time, and keep rolling 1s for the explode disembark. This is why I so dearly want Repressors to become mainline GW if Im ever to play Sisters again, because when you can shoot from inside, everything is better.

We had this discussion just today at lunch and I still doubt that GW will do it as the adoption of FW stuff is already very rare, but open topped is severely limited this edition. I'd live to be wrong, but I just don't see it happening.

AP0 (even with condicional bonus) sucks, because even if you wound they'll make their save more often than not, so Eldar vehicles and their assortment of bladestorm weaponry tend to feel underwhelming. That and since everyone is loaded for Knights, T7 no Inv. is nothing, most of us can blow up Leman Russes without much issue on the first turns, because if we couldnt then Crusaders would rip us a new one, so thats another point against skimmers.

Given the invulnerable saves going around, the lack of AP compared to the volume of shots really shouldn't be too big of a burden. Drowning targets in mid-high strength high RoF shots is what wins games IMHO, especially with stuff like Doom available.

Compare the Night spinner to a dakka pred. Preds are 145, have 2d3 shots at str 7, -1 AP, 3 damage plus 6 heavy bolter shots and has 11 T7 wounds with a 12" move in the top bracket. The Spinner has 2d6 shots at str7, an average of -1 AP, 2 damage plus the 3 shuri cannon shots and has 12 T7 wounds and can Fly 16" in the top bracket. The Spinner is the better deal by a long, long way, having more damage output, more wounds, more movement and can Fly, all for ~80% of the cost. Yeah, they're not going to stand up to dedicated anti-tank in an anti-knight meta, but they're not meant to, that's why they're 120 points each.

Once again, all I'm hearing is complaints that Eldar stuff isn't the absolute best thing in the game.

You'd die if you saw what the old ones play, even when they played since 5th. For me its more "store owners who have to read up on a ton of game theory to pass down to customers dont play bad armies / decks" because why would we, when we want to make the customer trust in our position as experts.

I doubt it, just in the last few pages the conclusion was drawn that if people played like the people at GW think they do, then a large amount of the issues we face would disappear overnight. I think that playing in a meta where you can bring what you like and not have to worry about being on the bleeding edge or face a stomping would be a very pleasant change.

Thats surprising to me, you know? Last I'd seen it was all Voidraven / Phoenixes instead of Hemlocks and Wave Serpents / Seer Councils / Night Spinners instead of Dark Reapers. Im not saying they're suddenly bad, just that they seemed to have fallen out of favor, at least from the lists I'd been reading.

Depends on your local meta I guess. Eldar have lots of choice in what they bring. I've seen almost every entry in the book be a part of winning lists in the last few months. Some had DR's, many didn't. Some had Hemlocks, many didn't. Again, this points to how competative the Eldar book is when you can play pretty much anything you want and make a GT winning list out of it. Want a list with 8(!) fliers? Sure, that's the london GT winner (and second place also, just slightly different lists). The aforemention HoS winner only has a pair of Crimson Hunter Exarch's and a jetbike farseer in common, other than those 3, there's not a single common model betwen 2 large GT winning lists.

Hey Drasius, Iron Hands Devastators are in Drop Pods that come down on Turn 1, can't be interrupted (GW walked back how 8th.Intercept works against units in Drop Pods - it doesn't), don't take -1 to hit for moving out of the Drop Pod, and re-roll 1s to hit without a Captain to babysit!
Did I mention one unit of Grav-Cannons per turn can re-roll to wound and re-roll Damage?

Infiltrators don't even counter them 'cause Grav-Cannons have a 24" range, and did I mention that Intercept Stratagems don't work?
AP-4 even cancels out a 3+ save!

...Sorry.

EDIT II
Wait. I forgot. GW nerfed The Ironstone, so Iron Hands are fair now.

1) At least pods cost points.

2) I still have my Skyhammer marines from 7th, nothing stopping my unpainted marines from suddenly finding out they're actually IH. If everyone else is going to be a 'dex hopping cheesemonger, nobody can complain if I do the same.

3) I strongly suspect you're not sorry at all.

[Forum Explorer]

Dunno man, feels like pretty solid domination to me (though admittedly a large portion of that was due to DR and Ynnari shenanigans). Put the two together and it's just the same old thing. Who is top tier at the moment? SM, Eldar, Daemons and Guard. Not that much differrent from 7th there, it's just IG and 'crons switching spots with the real changes happening in the best-of-the-rest mid-tier dexes that's different.

I wouldn't say Eldar are dominating in 8th. They are consistently able to hit the top, but there is usually other factions right up there with them. Tyranids ruled the roost for a while, Tau have a really annoying build, Orks and Genestealer Cults can both rock the socks off of most opponents. Chaos Space Marines have been a big winner too. Even straight Thousand Sons have been a dominate force for a while. Dark Eldar are actually often considered to be better than Eldar. Pretty much the only faction that hasn't been able to be a top team is Necrons, and even they can at least challenge for the top spots.

But as nerfs get laid down and new stuff gets buffed, so who is at the top keeps changing. Like you said, Eldar have a lot of strong units, so they can always build some sort of counter to the current meta in order to stay relevant. Well that and for a long time Ynnari were just broken.

The big difference is that these days so many armies can actually compete at the same level. Like take LansXero list. It really looks like a reaction to his meta which apparently contains a lot of vehicles and knights. I mean Knights-Tank Guard with Custodes (guess Supreme command of Jetbike Captains)-Tank Guard with Scions-1000 Sons with Nurgle (which sounds like Mario Brothers to me, but could be 60 Plaguebearers guarded a half-dozen psykers.) He's really geared up to kill vehicles and snipe characters.

But my cousin's current Genestealer Cult list would likely table him by turn 3. (Well it wouldn't kill the planes, but they'd kill everything else on the ground which counts as tabling him.) A horde of Orks with a bunch of Tractor Cannons would be devastating for him. Really, it looks like fast moving melee armies and hordes (or both) give his list the most problems.

[Cheesegear]

Dunno man, feels like pretty solid domination to me (though admittedly a large portion of that was due to DR and Ynnari shenanigans). Put the two together and it's just the same old thing. Who is top tier at the moment? SM, Eldar, Daemons and Guard. Not that much differrent from 7th there, it's just IG and 'crons switching spots with the real changes happening in the best-of-the-rest mid-tier dexes that's different.

S Tier; Iron Hands, Chaos Daemons
A; Guard, Craftworlds, Drukhari, Orks, Chaos Knights
B; Death Guard, Tyranids, Blood Angels, Thousand Sons, T'au, Deathwatch, Imperial Knights, Genestealers, Chaos Marines.2, Space Marines (non-Iron Hands)
C; Dark Angels, Custodes, Harlequins
D; AdMech, Space Wolves
Struggle City; Grey Knights, Necrons

Given the amount of stuff in B-Tier, it's no wonder the game feels like it's in a good place to casuals where people generally just play what they want. If you're in a decent meta, anything below B-Tier can plug the holes in their Codex with Allies (except Necrons ). In a non-toxic meta, most people wont even notice that the game is inherently broken, because everyone is playing reasonable armies.

Unfortunately, GW stopped forcing us to play 'reasonable' armies back in...6th Ed.? With each edition slowly eroding the restrictions on what you can and can't take during army building.

Once again, all I'm hearing is complaints that Eldar stuff isn't the absolute best thing in the game.

Joke's on you. The worst stuff in the Eldar book is still better than the best stuff in the AdMech book (not including Robots).

I doubt it, just in the last few pages the conclusion was drawn that if people played like the people at GW think they do, then a large amount of the issues we face would disappear overnight.

Again, see 'Lack of play-testing'. I've heard several reasons for why the play-testing results are the way they are, and the most common one is that they're not alpha/beta testers. They're funhavers. Rules are already written. The game doesn't have to be balanced, it has to be fun. Roll more dice. A unit can't just do something good. It can only do something good by rolling unrealistic dice. Because chance = fun. If we can convince Timmy he can win games by just rolling 6s, he'll think the game is balanced because he can win, if only the dice will go his way. He doesn't need to have a good/competitive list. He just has to 'be good at rolling dice'.

The other reason I keep hearing is that the play-testers are limited by the studio armies. That is, you can't play-test an army of three Repulsors and three Stormhawks if you the studio doesn't have three Repulsors and three Stormhawks.

The other one is that play-testers put themselves into unrealistic scenarios; That is, units are taken in a vacuum, on a 1v1 basis, and a Melee unit might start the 'test' within 3", or already in BtB with the target, and the way to test out the combat is to simply alternate who goes first. Or, "My opponent, knowing how rules work, put every single one of his good units within my Rapid Fire range for no reason."

Problem is, all play-testers are definitely under NDAs, so reliable stories about what they do are very few and far between. But, one thing that has been very clearly established, is that whatever job they're doing, how they're doing it, is bad, and the '15 minutes of perfection' that a Codex has, is already out the window, three minutes after printing. Because the play-testers aren't thinking like the players do.

"But Cheesegear, they can't playtest everything!?"
...They don't have to. Just run sims on an Excel spreadsheet like the rest of us do.

I think that playing in a meta where you can bring what you like and not have to worry about being on the bleeding edge or face a stomping would be a very pleasant change.

The problem is, those metas are getting fewer and fewer every day.

[Drasius]

I wouldn't say Eldar are dominating in 8th. They are consistently able to hit the top, but there is usually other factions right up there with them. Tyranids ruled the roost for a while, Tau have a really annoying build, Orks and Genestealer Cults can both rock the socks off of most opponents. Chaos Space Marines have been a big winner too. Even straight Thousand Sons have been a dominate force for a while. Dark Eldar are actually often considered to be better than Eldar. Pretty much the only faction that hasn't been able to be a top team is Necrons, and even they can at least challenge for the top spots.

But as nerfs get laid down and new stuff gets buffed, so who is at the top keeps changing. Like you said, Eldar have a lot of strong units, so they can always build some sort of counter to the current meta in order to stay relevant. Well that and for a long time Ynnari were just broken.

The big difference is that these days so many armies can actually compete at the same level. Like take LansXero list. It really looks like a reaction to his meta which apparently contains a lot of vehicles and knights. I mean Knights-Tank Guard with Custodes (guess Supreme command of Jetbike Captains)-Tank Guard with Scions-1000 Sons with Nurgle (which sounds like Mario Brothers to me, but could be 60 Plaguebearers guarded a half-dozen psykers.) He's really geared up to kill vehicles and snipe characters.

But my cousin's current Genestealer Cult list would likely table him by turn 3. (Well it wouldn't kill the planes, but they'd kill everything else on the ground which counts as tabling him.) A horde of Orks with a bunch of Tractor Cannons would be devastating for him. Really, it looks like fast moving melee armies and hordes (or both) give his list the most problems.

Eldar aren't quite so dominant now, but for a large portion of 8th, they've been at the pointy and there's been lots of them up there. They're still top tier and anyone losing games with them to anything but seriously competative stuff has only themselves to blame. Point is, 3 out of the top 4 from 7th are still top 4 now and I really don't expect that to change that much. Until they start handing out "ignores all to-hit roll penalties" like candy, any 2 year old will still be able to roll face with an Alaitoc list, unless we get significantly more mortal wound spam or character targetting, IH are still going to have easy wins, unless we see a change to the base rules, 7ppm model 5++/5+++ chaff taken in insane numbers are going to continue to plop themselves onto objectives and give very few Fu...lgrims about much of anything. The power creep will have to be unreal to the point of absurdity (if it's not already with Iron Hands getting ~4 chapter tactics in one) to shuffle one of the top contenders off their perch.

Yes, sometimes you can have a bunch of people playing skew lists and you can play the counter to their counter, but it's not going to change which factions rolls face 9 times out of 10.

Unfortunately, GW stopped forcing us to play 'reasonable' armies back in...6th Ed.? With each edition slowly eroding the restrictions on what you can and can't take during army building.

I've said it before and I'll undoubtedly say it again - Allies in 6th was the slippery slope that has led us to the absolute cluster that is the current soup situation. If there are no restrictions on what you can take and almost no benefits for staying mono-dex, then every faction that can ally no longer has to stand on it's own and book and unit design can get away with being lasy because the answer always just becomes "fix the problems your book has with [unit X] from [y] dex.

Every army should be mono-dex and any ally shenanigans should be relegated to narrative where they belong. Then GW can concentrate on making every army playable on their own merits and there will be a lot fewer unintended interactions that break things.

Joke's on you. The worst stuff in the Eldar book is still better than the best stuff in the AdMech book (not including Robots).

Jokes on you, that's the same as it's been for a long time, it's just whichever factions are trash tier are what sometimes changes.

"But Cheesegear, they can't playtest everything!?"
...They don't have to. Just run sims on an Excel spreadsheet like the rest of us do.

This is my biggest gripe. It's painfully obvious to those of us who rely on excel for a living how quick and easy it is to work these things out, and yet the people who write this stuff for a living don't seem to have a clue. It's also not something they learn from either 'cause one of the most obvious examples that comes to mind is the discrepancy between certain weapon options - with the Broadside weapon "choice" being one of the more stark examples, though grav vs pretty much anything else in 7th was another lowlight.

The problem is, those metas are getting fewer and fewer every day.

I'm not sure such fairytale metas even exist to be honest.

[Turalisj]

And two of my armies are struggle city, the other two b tier....

[Cheesegear]

Eldar aren't quite so dominant now, but for a large portion of 8th, they've been at the pointy and there's been lots of them up there.

I distinctly remember an LVO where the Top 8 consisted of five Aeldari lists. Craftworlds has been strong since its release and it is still making Top 8s every major tournament two years later. No. They're no longer winning every tournament, but they do still win their fair share. Nobody, anywhere, with good faith, can say that Craftworlds isn't a strong Codex.

If you're complaining that Craftworlds aren't good in the wake of Iron Hands? So is everyone.

I've said it before and I'll undoubtedly say it again - Allies in 6th was the slippery slope that has led us to the absolute cluster that is the current soup situation.

It wasn't too long ago that the more powerful named Characters (e.g; Swarmlord) couldn't be used in games under 1500 Points, and Lords of War could only be used in 2500+. I, personally, believe the game devolved real hard with the addition of Imperial Knights and Wraithknights.

Every army should be mono-dex and any ally shenanigans should be relegated to narrative where they belong.

Strongly disagree. As we have before, and as we will again.
Of course, we all know that Iron Hands are mono-dex, and they gain significant bonuses for not taking allies.

Then GW can concentrate on making every army playable on their own merits and there will be a lot fewer unintended interactions that break things.

In which case you have to give each Faction its own separate win conditions. ITC tries by letting you build your army around Secondaries. But fact is, even with that system in place, some Secondaries are way easier to score than others, and some Factions can score those easy Secondaries, way easier than other Factions, on top of how easy they already are.

This is my biggest gripe. It's painfully obvious to those of us who rely on excel for a living how quick and easy it is to work these things out, and yet the people who write this stuff for a living don't seem to have a clue.

=($Model + Weapon) / (Attacks*$To Hit*To Wound*Failed Save*Damage)

Click and Drag across for multiple target types.
Click and Drag down for multiple weapons.
Remembering to factor in that if Avg.Damage>Target's Wounds, then Damage = Wounds.

Add in conditional formatting for cell backgrounds to show you which weapons are better than others, and against what targets, and you're done.

This gives you a solid Damage per Point output which shows you exactly how many points you're paying to deal 1 Damage.

Things get weird when you add in extra Damage from dice rolls (e.g; 6 to wound = 1 save + 1 Mortal Wound). But, hey. I use Excel every single day. It's not hard to work out.

A Guardsman Rapid Firing, hitting on 4s, wounding on 4s, and the target's save being 4+; Ends up being that Guardsmen pay 16 Points to deal 1 Damage to a T3/4+ model. Which is a really low benchmark to beat. If you can do 1 Damage for 16 Points (unbuffed), you're among the hardest math-hammer units in the game. I read one sheet that had 25 Points per Damage as the benchmark. But the author didn't explain how he decided that 25 Points per Damage was generated.

[Drasius]

I distinctly remember an LVO where the Top 8 consisted of five Aeldari lists. Craftworlds has been strong since its release and it is still making Top 8s every major tournament two years later. No. They're no longer winning every tournament, but they do still win their fair share. Nobody, anywhere, with good faith, can say that Craftworlds isn't a strong Codex.

If you're complaining that Craftworlds aren't good in the wake of Iron Hands? So is everyone.

This.

It wasn't too long ago that the more powerful named Characters (e.g; Swarmlord) couldn't be used in games under 1500 Points, and Lords of War could only be used in 2500+. I, personally, believe the game devolved real hard with the addition of Imperial Knights and Wraithknights.

And that's a seperate problem of its own. Either you make Characters strong enough to justify having them around, in which case they're nigh mandatory or don't and everyone whines that special snowflake [x] isn't strong enough. It's a difficult one, but again, could easily be solved by making special character narrative only, since that's a large part of what narrative is meant to be.

Strongly disagree. As we have before, and as we will again.
Of course, we all know that Iron Hands are mono-dex, and they gain significant bonuses for not taking allies.

True, but there's a line between just handing out 4+ chapter tactics at once and having useless crap nobody cares about. My suggested change would be that only CP and stratagems from your warlords Chapter/Kraftworld/Regiment/etc counted, so you can still soup if you really want to or desperately need [x] unit that you can't get in dex, but not for CP farming and you're not blasting out high power stratagems every turn unless you invest. Guard would still be a problem, but that's more an issue with the guard dex than anything else and could be easily fixed with either errata/FAQ or IG v2.0.

In which case you have to give each Faction its own separate win conditions. ITC tries by letting you build your army around Secondaries. But fact is, even with that system in place, some Secondaries are way easier to score than others, and some Factions can score those easy Secondaries, way easier than other Factions, on top of how easy they already are.

Or you write balanced dexes for a change, but you can't in the current mess for most dexes, 'cause if you have a strong imperium unit in codex [A], then codecies [B] through [W] also have access to the same strong unit. Look at something like Custard Bikes, they're incredible, but BA captains are about the same for less points (or better with more CP). If you write a balanced dex for mono dex, then cherry-picking with soup is going to be preposterously strong and if you write for soup, then monodex is going to be on life support.

=($Model + Weapon) / (Attacks*$To Hit*To Wound*Failed Save*Damage)

Click and Drag across for multiple target types.
Click and Drag down for multiple weapons.
Remembering to factor in that if Avg.Damage>Target's Wounds, then Damage = Wounds.

Add in conditional formatting for cell backgrounds to show you which weapons are better than others, and against what targets, and you're done.

This gives you a solid Damage per Point output which shows you exactly how many points you're paying to deal 1 Damage.

Things get weird when you add in extra Damage from dice rolls (e.g; 6 to wound = 1 save + 1 Mortal Wound). But, hey. I use Excel every single day. It's not hard to work out.

A Guardsman Rapid Firing, hitting on 4s, wounding on 4s, and the target's save being 4+; Ends up being that Guardsmen pay 16 Points to deal 1 Damage to a T3/4+ model. Which is a really low benchmark to beat. If you can do 1 Damage for 16 Points (unbuffed), you're among the hardest math-hammer units in the game. I read one sheet that had 25 Points per Damage as the benchmark. But the author didn't explain how he decided that 25 Points per Damage was generated.

It really is that easy for most things, hell, even easier for writing weapon comparisons in the same unit. Maybe that way we wouldn't be in the situation where flamers were better anti-tank than missiles or weapons that have no right to be similar punch out nigh identical numbers against many common targets, or why stuff like the Russ Vanquisher cannon is a total dog against tanks while also being hot garbage against pretty much everything else too.

There's a bunch of arguments to be made around range and othere less tangible benefits, as well as things like the prevalance of invulnerable saves and the preponderance of buffs available to many armies, but the basics really don't feel like things add up the way common sense says they should

[Manticoran]

Personally miss Formations. If you have Formations that are 0-1 per force, and have Formations that have the Ally tag and ones that don't. This lets you pretty easily limit Allies to limited numbers of pretty set Formations, allowing you to make them specifically to fill potential holes in allied factions, while limiting the very best and craziest stuff for "This is my main army".

If all the IH stuff was a Formation that only included a set amount of stuff and had a "bad troop unit tax" it would be fine.

It also lets you go back to doing things like letting Orkz and Chaos ally, because you don't have to worry about a green tide led by Three Cool Psychic Dudes.

Of course this would require intentional design from gw, and an understanding of what issues and holes each faction has in their armies... So it's never going to happen.

[JNAProductions]

Personally miss Formations. If you have Formations that are 0-1 per force, and have Formations that have the Ally tag and ones that don't. This lets you pretty easily limit Allies to limited numbers of pretty set Formations, allowing you to make them specifically to fill potential holes in allied factions, while limiting the very best and craziest stuff for "This is my main army".

If all the IH stuff was a Formation that only included a set amount of stuff and had a "bad troop unit tax" it would be fine.

It also lets you go back to doing things like letting Orkz and Chaos ally, because you don't have to worry about a green tide led by Three Cool Psychic Dudes.

Of course this would require intentional design from gw, and an understanding of what issues and holes each faction has in their armies... So it's never going to happen.

An issue with that is that there shouldn't BE bad troop taxes.

Units should be viable in and of themselves.

[Manticoran]

An issue with that is that there shouldn't BE bad troop taxes.

Units should be viable in and of themselves.

I'm not sure I agree. Less-optimal units will happen regardless. Any unit in imperials that isn't the best unit will be considered a tax even if they're pretty ok.

I'm not saying it's a complete waste of space unit, I'm saying it's 75% efficiency to the best or something.

Also like, there are just too many options in tyranid troop choices, several of which do mostly the same thing, for some of them not to be just worse at that job. So you include those units in Formations that are good so that people still have a reason to use those models.

[Forum Explorer]

Eldar aren't quite so dominant now, but for a large portion of 8th, they've been at the pointy and there's been lots of them up there. They're still top tier and anyone losing games with them to anything but seriously competative stuff has only themselves to blame. Point is, 3 out of the top 4 from 7th are still top 4 now and I really don't expect that to change that much. Until they start handing out "ignores all to-hit roll penalties" like candy, any 2 year old will still be able to roll face with an Alaitoc list, unless we get significantly more mortal wound spam or character targetting, IH are still going to have easy wins, unless we see a change to the base rules, 7ppm model 5++/5+++ chaff taken in insane numbers are going to continue to plop themselves onto objectives and give very few Fu...lgrims about much of anything. The power creep will have to be unreal to the point of absurdity (if it's not already with Iron Hands getting ~4 chapter tactics in one) to shuffle one of the top contenders off their perch.

Yes, sometimes you can have a bunch of people playing skew lists and you can play the counter to their counter, but it's not going to change which factions rolls face 9 times out of 10.



I've said it before and I'll undoubtedly say it again - Allies in 6th was the slippery slope that has led us to the absolute cluster that is the current soup situation. If there are no restrictions on what you can take and almost no benefits for staying mono-dex, then every faction that can ally no longer has to stand on it's own and book and unit design can get away with being lasy because the answer always just becomes "fix the problems your book has with [unit X] from [y] dex.

Every army should be mono-dex and any ally shenanigans should be relegated to narrative where they belong. Then GW can concentrate on making every army playable on their own merits and there will be a lot fewer unintended interactions that break things.



I'm not sure such fairytale metas even exist to be honest.

That's because of Ynnari which took GW way to long to realize how it was broken. Being able to take multiple actions in a turn is always going to be ridiculously powerful. Being able to do that with pretty much any unit in your army is insane. There was no way for it to not be totally broken. They needed to completely throw that system out and bring in something new. What they brought in is pretty much garbage since it only works on melee units, but at least it's not broken.

But a seriously competitive Eldar list should still be able to lose to a seriously competitive list from any of the B-List armies that Cheesegear listed. It might have an advantage, after all stacking penalties to hit is pretty powerful and ridiculous, but I think that's the only thing keeping them A-List right now. If you have some way to ignore that (IE, being a melee army or smite based army) then winning should be well within your grasp.


I totally agree. Allies broke the game and balancing the game while they exist is almost impossible.


We've seen how they playtest. They write up stupid lists like the Phobos only list and then smack them against something equally as thematic and fluffy.


Sure they do. My normal meta is very much that. Even our competitive meta isn't that harsh. I mean, here's what I've been running for my competitive games.

Spoiler: Eldar 2000 points

Show

Brigade Detachment (Bein-Tan)
HQ
Warlock: 55
Warlock: 55
Asurmen: 175

Elites
5 Fire Dragons with Exarch: 120
5 Fire Dragons with Exarch: 120
5 Striking Scorpions with Exarch with Scorpions Claw: 66

Troops
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58

Fast Attack
5 Shining Spears with Exarch with Star Lance: 172
5 Shining Spears with Exarch with Star Lance: 172
1 Vyper with 1 Shuriken Cannon and 1 Twin-Shuriken Catapult: 57

Heavy Support
1 Falcon with 2 Shuriken Cannons: 130
1 Warwalker with 2 Shuriken Cannons: 60
5 Dark Reapers with Exarch with Tempest Launcher: 175

Supreme Command Detachment (Mixed)
HQ
Autoch on Jetbike, with Nova Lance and Banshee Mask: 105
Eldrad: 135
Warlock: 55


Total: 2000

[LansXero]

I wouldn't say Eldar are dominating in 8th. They are consistently able to hit the top, but there is usually other factions right up there with them. Tyranids ruled the roost for a while, Tau have a really annoying build, Orks and Genestealer Cults can both rock the socks off of most opponents. Chaos Space Marines have been a big winner too. Even straight Thousand Sons have been a dominate force for a while. Dark Eldar are actually often considered to be better than Eldar. Pretty much the only faction that hasn't been able to be a top team is Necrons, and even they can at least challenge for the top spots.

Its ok, we just all have different definitions for 'dominating'. For me, claiming that something ISNT dominating is not the same as saying its not top tier or weak; it can be strong, even the best in the format, but so long as its not so opresive to crowd out other options then its still not 'dominating'. Clearly, other people look at it another way.

But as nerfs get laid down and new stuff gets buffed, so who is at the top keeps changing. Like you said, Eldar have a lot of strong units, so they can always build some sort of counter to the current meta in order to stay relevant. Well that and for a long time Ynnari were just broken.

There is also the old 'Archons and 3 Ravagers' fix to fill up points, with Razorwings for poison and anti-hordes, so judging mono-Craftworlds based on the prevalence of Aeldari lists isnt exactly fair.

The big difference is that these days so many armies can actually compete at the same level. Like take LansXero list. It really looks like a reaction to his meta which apparently contains a lot of vehicles and knights. I mean Knights-Tank Guard with Custodes (guess Supreme command of Jetbike Captains)-Tank Guard with Scions-1000 Sons with Nurgle (which sounds like Mario Brothers to me, but could be 60 Plaguebearers guarded a half-dozen psykers.) He's really geared up to kill vehicles and snipe characters.

My 2 losses were to Dark Eldar, mostly due to not being able to keep removing models quick enough and getting snowballed. I handle Orks just fine, but have a hell of a time since the damn Mek came out. Tractor cannon spam would likely wreck me, but I havent found it. Not sure how I'd do against genestealers; Id guess Fire & Fade holes in them while buying turns by sacrificing rangers and guardians? QwQ

It really boils down to how T1 goes for me. If I can bait deployment ('cause they forget the 2CP strat) and place the reapers / planes properly, I can probably handle fast list, for book / WD Maelstrom. Rangers are either anti-deepstrike or objective cap in turn 2. The Autarch has to put in SO MUCH WORK. I dont think its ever lived to see the end of a game; it shoots HQs with Mark of the Incomparable Hunter, provides rerolls, removes overwatch, ties up stuff in melee, and blows up like a phoenix raining mortals on things. The Guardians surprisingly kill a lot more than they are worth in points, although often through the sacrifice of rangers as melee roadblocks :(

[Forum Explorer]

Its ok, we just all have different definitions for 'dominating'. For me, claiming that something ISNT dominating is not the same as saying its not top tier or weak; it can be strong, even the best in the format, but so long as its not so opresive to crowd out other options then its still not 'dominating'. Clearly, other people look at it another way.



There is also the old 'Archons and 3 Ravagers' fix to fill up points, with Razorwings for poison and anti-hordes, so judging mono-Craftworlds based on the prevalence of Aeldari lists isnt exactly fair.



My 2 losses were to Dark Eldar, mostly due to not being able to keep removing models quick enough and getting snowballed. I handle Orks just fine, but have a hell of a time since the damn Mek came out. Tractor cannon spam would likely wreck me, but I havent found it. Not sure how I'd do against genestealers; Id guess Fire & Fade holes in them while buying turns by sacrificing rangers and guardians? QwQ

It really boils down to how T1 goes for me. If I can bait deployment ('cause they forget the 2CP strat) and place the reapers / planes properly, I can probably handle fast list, for book / WD Maelstrom. Rangers are either anti-deepstrike or objective cap in turn 2. The Autarch has to put in SO MUCH WORK. I dont think its ever lived to see the end of a game; it shoots HQs with Mark of the Incomparable Hunter, provides rerolls, removes overwatch, ties up stuff in melee, and blows up like a phoenix raining mortals on things. The Guardians surprisingly kill a lot more than they are worth in points, although often through the sacrifice of rangers as melee roadblocks :(

For me, a dominating faction is stomping out other options, until what you see is mostly just that faction. So right now, IH are dominating because they are close to or more then 50% of the top teams.

There is that. There is basically no reason to not do that these days.

You wouldn't be able to. Genestealer Cults work kinda like this. Ally in a battalion of Tyranids, typically 20 Genestealers, and two neurothropes. I've seen 40 and the Swarmlord, but the former is better. That hides turn 1 so it can't be shot. You can't get around the terrain to shoot them, because you can't get within 9 inches of the beacons. You might be able to actually get around them with flyers, I'm not sure. End of the turn, he picks up the majority of the beacons with stratagems, or puts down a basically worthless unit. Turn 1 the genestealers charge and kill whatever screen you have.

Turn 2, you typically kill off the genestealers (unless he managed to wrap a unit. It costs like 5 CP to do it reliably, but he'll have somewhere between 18-25 CP to spend), and the rest of his army comes down. His important stuff his get to move D6 inches immediately for an easy charge. Everything else will get either a +1 or a +2 to their charge depending on faction and deployment. Everything is infantry so terrain doesn't matter. He charges in and kills pretty much everything unless he gets very unlucky with his dice.

It's a beatable list, if you have the proper tools it can be done. A good amount of 'Ignore LoS' works. Just being a massive horde works. A screen that he actually can't clear works best. So Nurgle Demons guarding Plagueburst crawlers is I think the best counter to it. Oh, and flamers work really well too. Your army in particular though would struggle a lot against it.

Though you can always cheese the terrain rules and just fill up a ruin so there is no space for his army to charge up a floor.

[lord_khaine]

I've said it before and I'll undoubtedly say it again - Allies in 6th was the slippery slope that has led us to the absolute cluster that is the current soup situation. If there are no restrictions on what you can take and almost no benefits for staying mono-dex, then every faction that can ally no longer has to stand on it's own and book and unit design can get away with being lasy because the answer always just becomes "fix the problems your book has with [unit X] from [y] dex.

Every army should be mono-dex and any ally shenanigans should be relegated to narrative where they belong. Then GW can concentrate on making every army playable on their own merits and there will be a lot fewer unintended interactions that break things.

I know i dropped out of actively playing around 6th/7th, due to different things.
But i still think this idea is the best solution.
because yeah, you should almost be actively trying to make something brokenly good,
before it can compete with something that has the two best units from 3 different books.

[Drasius]

I'm not sure such fairytale metas even exist to be honest.

Sure they do. My normal meta is very much that. Even our competitive meta isn't that harsh. I mean, here's what I've been running for my competitive games.

Spoiler: Eldar 2000 points

Show

Brigade Detachment (Bein-Tan)
HQ
Warlock: 55
Warlock: 55
Asurmen: 175

Elites
5 Fire Dragons with Exarch: 120
5 Fire Dragons with Exarch: 120
5 Striking Scorpions with Exarch with Scorpions Claw: 66

Troops
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58
5 Dire Avengers with Exarch with dual shuriken catapults: 58

Fast Attack
5 Shining Spears with Exarch with Star Lance: 172
5 Shining Spears with Exarch with Star Lance: 172
1 Vyper with 1 Shuriken Cannon and 1 Twin-Shuriken Catapult: 57

Heavy Support
1 Falcon with 2 Shuriken Cannons: 130
1 Warwalker with 2 Shuriken Cannons: 60
5 Dark Reapers with Exarch with Tempest Launcher: 175

Supreme Command Detachment (Mixed)
HQ
Autoch on Jetbike, with Nova Lance and Banshee Mask: 105
Eldrad: 135
Warlock: 55


Total: 2000

Again, the issue here is that you can take whatever you want because the Eldar book has no bad options outside of Banshees. Try doing that with pretty much any other dex outside of guard and you're royally screwed.

Even then, Warlocks, Asurmen, Eldrad, Jet Autarch, DR's, War Walkers, Shining Spears and DA's all appear in top 3 lists at big GT's this year. 1573/2000 (~80%) of your points are in units that are taken by GT winners, and of the ones that aren't GT winners, they are by no means bad at all (though I don't quite understand why you've got a Falcon instead of a Serpent). How is that not a competative army? You're proving my point that Eldar has depth beyond almost any other dex.