24 hours gaming news - your one stop for all gaming news: harlequins

Ipinapakita ang mga post na may etiketa na harlequins. Ipakita ang lahat ng mga post

Martes, Marso 10, 2015

DE: Trying out the Solatire

I'm just too cool for school.

Even though the Solitare is not the most cost-effective unit in the codex, he's by far the coolest. Let's take a look at his stats really quick and see what he has to offer to the battle.

First thing's first, the guy is 145 points so he's not really cheap nor expendable. For the same amount of points, you can buy yourself 2x Starweavers which is 4 HP worth of AV10 that comes with 12 S6 Shuriken Cannon shots. That's probably the best direct comparison because you'll see in the list below, that's exactly where I'm cutting points from.

The second thing to note is his beastly ass combat stats, minus the fact he's still a T3 3W model with only a 3++ save. He's WS9 S3/4 on the charge due to Furious Charge, I10 and 6 attacks base. Since he's packing both Caress and Kiss, he technically has 8 attacks on the charge. Once a game, he can Blitz for 12 attacks on the charge and move D6xTurn Number worth of movement. This might not seem like much, but he can potentially move up to 24" on Turn 4 to punch someone off an objective, or he can move 4" because you rolled like ass. Personally, I'm not banking on the movement too much since his 12" natural move is enough to get the job done in most cases. Most of the time, you really want to Blitz for the extra attacks since Harlequin's Caress can do some serious work if you roll enough 6s.

For those folks that don't know what caress and kiss does, it's really quite simple. Caress is basically old school Rending where if you roll a 6 to Hit, you automatically wound at AP2 and against vehicles, causes a Glancing Hit. Kiss is a separate attack made by the Harlequin in which it's automatically resolved at S6 AP2 with a chance for Instant Death on a 6 to Wound, but first you gotta hit. Overall not all that bad, but the crux of the problem here is that he's going to be very dice dependent if he really wants to take down 2+ armor save targets. That's why you probably shouldn't throw him into anything too tough, especially since if the opponent rolls hot and forces enough wounds onto you, you're going to die. I would stick to killing Lictors or making Devastator teams cry.

As for upgrades, I would keep this dude dirt cheap, either stock or running with a solo Haywire Grenade. Ideally, he never wants to engage vehicles and would rather hunt smaller prey, but occasionally you might need to force that extra hull point damage through and the Solitare can do that if he has Haywires. This brings him to an even 150, still a little expensive for what he can do on the table but I'll take it anyway.

So how do you run him exactly? I would definitely consider the standard Masque detachment or The Heroes' Path formation. Masque's Rising Crescendo makes it so you can Run and Charge in the same turn, which increases the overall threat range of your assault by a significant margin (especially when you have Fleet re-rolls). The Heroes' Path formation gives your Solitare Infiltrate (important), Stealth and Shrouded, but the downside is that you have to take the Shadowseer and Deathjester as well, essentially paying 120 tax if you only want the Solitare. You can view this as either an offensive buff for your solo assassin, or a defensive buff for more survivability. Either way, if he gets caught in the open, he's going to die to any decent shooting so it doesn't really matter.

I would play him very, very carefully and use him primarily as a defensive striker. Use every single line of sight blocker as you can and keep him out of sight until he's ready to strike. Since he can ignore all forms of terrain, you really have to use that to your advantage since he's a man-sized model and incredibly easy to hide. He also has Deep Strike so it might be worth keeping him in reserve and running out of line of sight the turn he comes down, but that's also really risky. Play with his 22.5" threat range under Rising Crescendo and punish anything that gets too close as a melee threat. Hopefully whatever you assault will be WS4 or under, thus needing 5s to hit your dude and drastically reduce the amount of wounds he'll be taking in return. The less saves he has to roll the better the chances he's going to live and fight another day.

They see my rollin', they hatin'..

Alright, now here's the list I plan on messing around with:

1850
Darkquin Duck

DE CAD*
HQ:
Llama = 10

TROOP:
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider, Lance = 115
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider, Lance = 115
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider, Lance = 115
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider, Lance = 115

FAST:
Razorwing, Lances = 140
Razorwing, Lances = 140

HEAVY:
Ravager, Lances = 125
Ravager, Lances = 125
Ravager, Lances = 125

Masque Detachment*
TROOP:
5x Troupe, Starweaver = 165
5x Troupe = 95
5x Troupe = 95

FAST:
Starweaver = 70
Starweaver = 70

ELITE:
Solitare, Haywire = 150

HEAVY:
Voidreaver, Prismatic = 80

I start off the game by throwing lances, but now I understand that my overall firepower is less because I have the Solitare in the army. No worries, I still win based on style points and I have great confidence that I'm going to caress and kiss my opponent's army to death.

Read More No comments

Lunes, Marso 9, 2015

DE: Solving the Harlequin problem

I bet that stings a little.

For the last couple of days, I've been thinking pretty hard on how to best capitalize the Harlequin book. If you guys read my last review, you'll know that I don't think the Harlequin book is good enough to be super competitive. Don't get me wrong when I say super competitive, I just don't think it can hang out on top with the rest of the crap we're seeing in the tournament scene right now. What lists are those specifically? Let's take a quick gander..

Adamantium Lance - Trio Imperial Knights
Tyranid FMC - 5x Dakka Flyrants
Chaos Flying Circus - Flying Demon Princes with Biomancy
Mechdar - Wave Serpent spam with or without Wraithknights
IG Leafblowers - Standard IG carpark with or without allies
Tau Leafblowers - Riptides, Broadsides behind ADL
Deathstars - Draigo with Centurians, WWP Fortune Wraithguard
Tyranid Assassins - Built to overwhelm Serpent spam
Eldar Lynx - Designed to destroy Invisibility Deathstars with Pulsars (ITC ruling)
Necron Decurion - They don't die, you die instead

That pretty much sums up the super competitive meta right now, and let's just say that poor Dark Eldar and Harlequins will not be joining those ranks any time soon. Harlies might be able to add a few things to the Eldar Deathstar with their Shadowseer, but I don't think they have anything to make a big impact meta-wise in terms of raw combat effectiveness. The big daddy of the codex is definitely the Solatire, and he's just a T3 3W model that's completely dependent on CC to make his points back. While the Starweaver is a pretty solid buy at 70 points, the 24" Shuriken Cannon is just not reliable enough to keep a AV10 open-top vehicle safe throughout the course of a competitive game. I mean, if the Venom can't survive on the table for more than a couple of turns dodging through buildings and shooting from cover thanks to its 36" cannons, what makes you think a shorter-range clown mobile is going to fare better?

The only thing we can do right now is maximize on what the Harlequin codex does well, and that's spamming a ton of S6 shooting. When we look at the Starweaver, it's only 5 points more than the Venom but adds a ton more battlefield application despite its rather subpar range. Keep in mind what I said before about the competitiveness that is Dark Eldar and Harlequins in general. At best, I see these armies fighting in the competitive mid-tier because the army itself does not have the sustain needed to carry through a longer game. So what does that mean exactly? It means that if you're playing an optimized DE list and you're a seasoned general yourself, you will do well as long as you're not being matched up with top-tier tourney lists. Everything else should be fair game as long as you're facing powerful elements, but in moderation.

Looking at the Dark Eldar/Harlequin mix, you can clearly see one major flaw here: You're complementing your glass hammer tactics with even more glass hammer. So I guess in that sense, you've upgraded yourself from wine glasses to stained glass. The major shift in playstyle for the experienced Dark Eldar player will be this: S6 over Poison, 24" and not 36". You trade a much more powerful shooting solution for less range, which directly means that you're going to be more exposed when you shoot. This also means that battlefield terrain needs to be favorable, or else its going to be a bigger turkey shoot than what you're normally used to.

So what does an optimized list look like? Well, I'm hoping it looks something like this:

1850
Dark Harlequins

DE CAD*

HQ:
Llama = 10

TROOP:
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider/AS, Lance = 120
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider/AS, Lance = 120
5x Warriors, Blaster, Raider/AS, Lance = 120
5x Warriors, Blaster (in Starweaver) = 55
5x Warriors, Blaster (in Starweaver) = 55

FAST:
Razorwing, Lances = 140
Razorwing, Lances = 140

HEAVY:
Ravager, Lances = 125
Ravager, Lances = 125
Ravager, Lances = 125

Masque Detachment*

TROOP:
5x Troupe, Starweaver = 165
5x Troupe, Starweaver = 165
5x Troupe, Starweaver = 165

FAST:
Starweaver = 70
Starweaver = 70

HEAVY:
Voidreaver, Prismatic = 80

The idea behind this list is to shoot a lot of S6 while keeping as many lances in the army as possible. Just like the rest of my DE lists, I focus on shooting and rely heavily on range band and firepower analysis. Study the range of your weapons, look at the power that each of those weapons put out, and they lay it all on paper so you can see just how much firepower you truly have.

A typical analysis looks like this:
At full strength, the opening volley looks like 12 Dark Lances from 36" and 33 S6 Shuriken Cannon shots from 24". If you extend (move forward), the maximum threat range is 48" and 36" respectfully. Should the enemy not close, and you don't want to expose your Starweavers, you're basically playing with 12 lances. If you close with the enemy, you will add +5 Blasters at 18" from the Starweavers and Raiders, and if both of your Razorwings fly in, you will potentially have +4 more lances. Throughout all of this, the Voidreaver will be putting out 3 S6 shots and more likely a S7 AP2 lance as well, but once again, the range will be limited to 24". As your units die, so does the maximum firepower that your army can produce, so you'll see your max lance count drop from 21 to god knows how many depending on what is killed. It's important you make a mental note of exactly how many lances you lose and from what range so you can better prepare battlefield tactics and make changes on the fly. Each Starweaver killed for example, will cost you 6 S6 shots, so this is super important you know what kind of condition your army will be in as you move past the turns.

When you compare this to a similar DE list running Venoms, the biggest difference is obviously the the range and the Poison. Vs. T4 and greater, you're going to be forcing a consistent ~4 wounds from much greater range. This is one of the strongest attributes that Venoms have, especially when you consider the fact that they're dirt cheap, even with 5 guys inside totting a Blaster. Unfortunately, the Venom is also a very polarizing unit: It does absolutely nothing vs. vehicles so they're completely dead points if things are armored. This is where the Starweaver comes in, especially against the AV11 range. AV12 is still very much a stretch and AV13 is out of the question of course. When you look at the matchups from the top-tier competitive lists, you'll see that Starweavers over Venoms will do better vs. all mech-related matchups minus 3x Imperial Knights, but will be slightly weaker vs. FMC spam. The math here points in favor of the Venom for the raw amount of wounds it can inflict, but lucky 6s for AP2 can seriously hamper a Flyrant's plans in a hurry. After you study the matchups a little more closely, you'll see that you'll do better vs. some armies, but a lot worse vs. others (such as range problems vs. Tau, and T8 Wraithknights).

While I don't think the power will change too drastically for DE/Harlies, I know that it will change the playstyle and dynamic of the army. You will suddenly be able to threaten vehicles you normally wouldn't be able to hurt, and inflict AP2 wounds out of the blue, the latter being rare and thus, unpredictable. At least you can sleep at night knowing that the Solatire finally has a use, and that's to punch Deathleaper and his Lictors in the face.

Read More No comments

Sabado, Marso 7, 2015

Codex Review: Harlequins

Beauty and death.

Alright guys, it's finally here. Sorry it took so long for me to get my hands on the codex and by now, most of you have read your reviews from somewhere else. No worries, hopefully this post will give you guys another perspective from a more competitive point of view.

Before I start, I just wanted to say that this is my favorite codex to date in terms of art. It's absolutely beautiful, and most of the art in here I have never seen before. If you're a fan of Eldar or Harlequins or maybe even art in general, I would pick this up just to keep it on the shelf. While the fluff is pretty cool as well, there's nothing to date that matches the level of art presented in this book. It's really just that cool.

OK, now that the sappy stuff is out of the way, let's talk about the book and what it offers. First and foremost, I will say immediately that the book is not really competitive. It has some strong, competitive options, but the formations and detachments presented limits the book's capability by a lot. Let's explore this further.

Units

Troupe - These guys are expensive no matter how you slice it. They're close combat experts and sport a healthy number of attacks on the charge with Furious Charge, but they're still T3 5++. By now, we've accepted the fact that stats like those get you nowhere in a competitive environment. This is further compounded by the fact that if you want to take some of the fancier toys like Neuro Disruptors or Fusion Pistols, you're going to adding a ton of points to an already expensive unit. Math puts these guys at roughly 19ppm for the 4 players and the Troupe Master, while every additional CC option makes them even more expensive. Unfortunately, this is the crux of the problem with the codex; you're spending 95 points for a min squad of these guys and they're pretty much mandatory all around. When you consider that they're 95 points for 6 wounds, it almost makes me want to take a full unit of Wyches. At least then I'll know that not all of them will die to a blown-up transport. The only plus side is that they can take Starweavers are dedicated transports, but more on that later.

Death Jester - For 60 points, you get an IC that acts as another Shuriken Cannon at BS5. On top of that, they have Precision Shots and a special rule that allows them to kill a model, force a Morale check at -2, and have the poor guys run towards anywhere you like. While this is really cool, you're still banking on a leadership test for the cool results. The main reason I would take this guy is for the BS5 Shuriken Cannon, that is really important because you can buy multiples of these guys, attach them to the 5-man units of Troupes, and have them ride in a Starweaver because their capacity is 6. This makes the unit really shooty, but also really expensive. Just know that this guy dies to a swift breeze and even in cover, he's still going to die to Ignore Cover. For perspective sakes, the Starweaver is an AV10 vehicle that shoots double the amount of S6 and costs 10 points more.

Shadowseer - Next on the list is the Shadowseer. You're pretty much only taking these guys for two reasons: If you're comfortable being out of a transport (WWP Wraithguard deathstar anyone?) to cast most of his spells, or if you're looking to do some leadership shenanigans with Dark Eldar/Eldar. I won't get into it too much here, but by now you guys have probably seen all kinds of posts on the interwebs about their perceived power. Let me tell you one thing: This is a trap. You first need the Shadowseer, and then buy an extra level to bring him up to Mastery Level 2, and then need to roll the right powers, and then bring him close enough to the enemy, and then pass the psychic test..etc, you get the point. This is what I like to call the "stars align" scenario and that's just way too many variables to plan a strategy around. There is a lot of points being invested here and I think that's a huge trap for a lot of players. If you want to maximize on the codex, you will do better ignoring these guys entirely and just go for more shooting. After all, Eldar should be shooting from their vehicles because that's what they're good at.

Solitare - The big daddy of the codex and you can only take one in the army because he's unique. What you truly need to understand here is that he's 145 points for a T3 model with 3 wounds. Sure, he has Eternal Warrior and a 3++ save, but I really want the 145 points, T3, 3 wounds thing to sink in real deep. He has some pretty cool rules such as his 12" move without giving a shit, 8 attacks on the charge and Blitz, but he's really just a dedicated CC unit that cannot join units and can be lit up by shooting. This is a really shooty-heavy edition and everything on the battlefield poses a threat for a Solitare. My best advice to you is that if you want a cool unit to play with, take this guy and use every line of sight blocker you can to navigate the battlefield until you have a good target to charge. While the caress and kiss might sound cool, just know that you're still looking for hot dice to get any real damage out of him because he's still S3 base/4 on the charge. That's just not impressive at all.

Skyweaver - At 50ppm and comes standard in a unit of 2, these guys are not bad. They still have Eldar Jetbike movement and have a natural armor of 4+ and 2W a piece, but the fact that they come with Shuriken Cannons is what you take them for. You threaten 36" a turn and a unit of 3 (which is the number I recommend) puts out 9 S6 shots a turn with a possibility of AP2. Ideally, you can pop out of cover, deliver a hail of fire and then get back into cover. Hopefully with Mirage Launchers, you can keep some of these guys alive long enough to do some damage on the battlefield. With regular Harlequin stats, you can also give them Zephyrglaives for close combat, but I would keep them with Star Bolas because 12" S6 AP2 Blast is a very scary tool against some armies. Sure, you can only use them once, but you'll see a lot of dead MEQ if you use these properly.

Starweaver - My favorite thing in the entire book. They're basically the same thing as a Venom except they come with 2 Shuriken Cannons and Mirage Launchers. The Open-topped and 6-model capacity is huge because this allows Death Jesters to join them for another BS5 Shuriken Cannon, potentially putting out 9 S6 shots a turn from a single firing platform. Keep in mind that you can take these guys by themselves, and for 70 points, they're simply great to have in your list because multiple S6 shots gives you a lot of battlefield application. Best of all, both of its guns are forward-facing.

Voidweaver - Not my cup of tea mainly because it looks utterly stupid. I would immediately drop the Haywire and look at the Prismatic Cannon because I think it has greater battlefield application. S7 AP2 Lance is not all that bad, but the S5 AP3 Blast a very attractive option at punishing clumped MEQ. Even the S3 AP4 Large Blast can be pretty good too against GEQ mainly because of the AP4, and at 80 points with the suggested loadout, I can't say it's a bad unit. The aft Shuriken Cannon can shoot at another target, but I really feel like it's wasted because of the positioning. To make matters even more complex, you can take these guys in squadrons of 3, but I wouldn't buy more than 1 because of the negatives I pointed out above. It has no transport capacity either.

Alright, so I said the units overall weren't so bad, so what am I complaining about exactly? Well, for one, I see the mandatory Troupes as a tax for the rest of the good stuff. At 95 per unit, they're not exactly cheap, especially when you consider Dire Avengers are only 65. Skyweavers jetbikes are Fast Attack and so are the Starweavers which poses a big problem for me because I needed them to be troops. The typical detachment wants 3 Troops, 2 Fast and 1 Heavy which means you have to spend at least 285 points on Troupes which I would rather not. However, you can buy Starweavers as dedicated transports for the chaff Troupes so you have 165 points for 5 T3 5++ dudes inside a S6 shooting solution with 2 HP. For perspective sakes, a unit of 5 Warriors with a Blaster inside a dual Splinter Cannon Venom is 120 points. Different strokes for different folks, but I want you guys to realize what you're paying for here.

In terms of raw competitiveness, I see the Starweaver, Skyweaver and Deathjester as the winners of this book. Everything else falls behind sadly with the Shadowseer and Troupe tax in dead last.

Style and grace.

Formations

The biggest limitation in this book is its creative freedom when it comes to list building. Since you're forced to either take the fixed Masque detachment or some of the multiple formations in this book, you're basically shit out of luck when it comes to building a competitive list. While you can do something like Unbound, I think most competitive lists want the flexibility of having Objsec for more tactical use. The lack of an HQ also means that you cannot take these guys as allies since they don't follow the regular allies chart, and you're looking at a hefty points investment if you follow even the most simplistic of formations. In fact, I wouldn't even look at bulking up the detachment and immediately focus on the formations because they provide some decent options out there.

Out of all the formations here, a few of them caught my eye. The default Masque detachment is not bad, but the mandatory troop choices are what really kills it for me. Ideally, I would want 3x Troupes inside Starweavers, 2 additional Starweavers, and a mandatory stupid Voidweaver. That brings me up to 715 points for the lot, and I have 7 additional Elite slots to buy Deathjesters for all of them if I want. Let's pretend I'm insane and buy Deathjesters for every Starweaver, and all of a sudden I have 1015 points of Harlequins on the field. What does this do? Well, it puts out 48 S6 shots a turn, 15 of which are BS5 and can shoot at separate targets that can potentially force an exposed army to run out of cover and into the Voidweaver's S5 AP3 blast. Pretty exciting right? Yes and no. Yes in the fact that the firepower is respectable, but for the same amount of points spent at 715, you can take the same amount of points in Wave Serpents with an Autarch. Are the two really comparable? Absolutely, because this is a game about points and that's the one variable you can truly control (list design).

The next ones that stick out to me is The Serpent's Brood and The Heroes' Path. When I look at Serpent's Brood, I see everything that I think is competitive lumped up onto one formation. You have the mandatory Troupe tax, but you have 3 Starweavers, a Voidweaver and 2 units of Skyweavers. If you take 3x Jetbikes, you're looking at 875 with the suggested config and a Prismatic Cannon. Not the cheapest of the lot, but you get the Skyweavers for additional shots and Eldar Jetbike movement. Frankly, I would still go with the Starweaver spam in the Masque detachment as long as you keep things cheap.

Lastly, we have the Heroes' Path. So you have the Death Jester, Shadowseer and Solitaire, but they can't join units, cannot join other characters, but gain Infiltrate, Shrouded and Stealth. This is what you take on top of the Masque detachment, giving you a Solitare with Infiltrate, Shrouded and Stealth to increase his survivability while he makes his way to exposed enemy units. The Deathjester needs to go into one of the empty Starweavers before he dies from Ignore Cover, and the poor Shadowseer needs to be kept back, kept cheap, and hopefully you can roll something good on Telepathy. Why Telepathy? You will at least be able to Witchfire from a Starweaver instead of having a useless Primaris because he can't join units. Plus, Telepathy just has better support spells since the ones you really want (Shrouding, Invis) are both Blessings. Remember, stay away from the leadership bombing bullshit. It's a points trap, especially when you consider that the formation itself is already 265 points at its base.

Just for perspective, you know what I think 265 points for 3 guys can buy you instead? Maybe +4 Venoms/Raiders in a RSR detachment, 2 Ravagers, 2 Razorwings, another full stock gunboat + more with blasters, 2 half-stock gunboats with blasters, a gunboat plus a WWP Archon, a Wraithknight, a unit of Fire Dragons in a WS, an almost full squad of Dire Avengers in WS, the list goes on and on. While some of you might be getting irritated by my constant comparisons, I think it's much needed when it comes to competitive choices.

Poise and precision.

Conclusion

When it comes to synergy, you have to consider the points investment that you're going to commit to the army. If you take the suggested Masque detachment, you're paying 715 points (3 Troupes in Starweavers, 2 empty Starweavers, 1 Voidweaver) for 33 S6 Shrukien Cannon shots from 6 AV10 Open-top vehicles with 2 HP a piece. The Harlequins themselves are not really going to do anything except for hiding in cover, out of line of sight and play the scoring game. Not being a normal force org means you can't load up on Starweavers and you're limited with how many you can take for Troop and Fast choices.

Like I said previously, the lack of list flexiblity is what's limiting this codex, not the actual units themselves. Well, the Troupe tax is frustrating, but 165 points for 6 S6 shots is not bad. It's just not as good as a unit of Dire Avengers in a Wave Serpent with Scatter Laser for 185. If both units inside are considered tax, you're still spending money on a more accurate shooting platform, with greater damage, much more durability, and tactical flexibility due to Ignore Cover. Before you commit to this codex, and especially if you're looking to pair either Harlequins or Eldar to your Dark Eldar, I think the choice for better allies is painfully obvious.

So that's what I mean when I say the book is not really competitive. There are just better options out there with all things considered, especially if you're looking to ally Harlequins with Eldar or Dark Eldar. Dark Eldar would rather have Eldar allies because of reliable psychic and shooting, and Eldar would rather have more of its own units because it has the capacity to do so. That makes the Harlequin codex the red-headed stepchild of the 3 Eldar choices sadly.

Play for the fluff, stay for the art, but keep these guys away from the tournament scene because there's better options out there.

Read More No comments