Dark Eldar Discussion

[Tves]

Now a while back I made a DE fleet from Reaver Jetbikes and Helions. And over the course of a few weeks played 6 games with them using the Battlefleet Gothic Revisded Edition rules.

What I found was that DE are tactically boring. With Mimic Engine + speed I'd get into alpha strike position without the enemy being able to do much about it. Then wiped the target from space and hoped I'd survive what ever came my way. (Enemies were Necron (no mimic engine against them), Imperials and Demiurg/Rogue Traders). There were 4 of us and we each played 2 games against each of the others.

With Slave Taking, alpha strike damage and disengages most of the games were won with a comfortable margin. And at the end of the short campaign I was sick and bored with the DE which I was greatly saddened by since I loved modeling them and loved the models.

So I wonder if perhaps its worth trying to change them a bit, but maintaining the core concepts of the Dark Eldar as a race

[Xca|iber]

What particularly did you have in mind?

I can agree that the mimic engine rule has always been a little wonky (personally I thought it was simpler as a "Scout Move" in the original Armada rules, but this was changed to be more thematic for BFG:R). I think one of the main issues is how the mimic engines interact with different scenario setups. For some battles, 2 turns of pacifism is fine since hardly anyone is shooting on Turn 1 anyway. For other things though, 2 turns of free safety seems like it might be almost too much.

I'm not sure what else there really is in terms of DE to develop however (besides adding more unique stuff arbitrarily, or reverting things like shadowfields). They were never well fleshed out in the lore in terms of space combat, so it's hard to say off the top of the head what could be added.

[AJCHVY]

We could work out a fix to minim engines because I feel the same way. The few times I've ran a DE fleet, especially against non Eldar, Nids, or Necrons, the enemy simply can't maneuver fast enough. Crippling enemy cruisers on turn 2 before they even have a chance to do anything about it seems to powerful.

[horizon]

Thanks for the feedback.

Removing the mimic engine would remove character. Going back to the old rules plainly means spending extra points to  get the same effect.

So the solution should/could be to change how Mimic Engines work and what they do in the game.

What springs to mind : mimic = copy enemy ship. What if mimic engines emit signature that DE appear as friendly vessels. One may not shoot at friendly vessels.
When active Dark Eldar ship may not attack. Enemy may try to attack Dark Eldar ship with Mimic Engines active on a leadership test with four...three... (?) dice.

Other ideas are welcome.

[Tves]

Now I know what comes after this could be considered heresy and would require at least copious amounts of playtesting to get right. Its a two step sollution that came to mind around the same time as I posted the thread, but since then has been fleshed out a bit.

Step 1: Change mimic engine to give a "scout move" that is a full movement phase before the begining of the game. Still debating with myself if it should be with or without special order options. - The reason for this is of course the rather muddled spirit of the original rule. Opposing players attempt to circumnavigate the ruling by flying attack craft in the way of the ships, some even tried recon by nova cannon since its not "shooting". This leads to debates/arguments and then resentment. Its also boring for the non DE player not being able to do a dammed thing for the first two turn except be a lamb on the way to the slaughter

Step 2: Power from Pain
When performing a Hit and run attack, or Impailer module hit and run attack, the Dark Eldar player can capture slaves instead of causing critical hits. This must be announched before the dice are rolled. These capture missions work identically to hit and run attacks. Except if they succeed the Dark Eldar fleet gains a Slave Token. An successful impailer module attack gathers d6 slave tokens for the fleet.

At the begining of his turn the Dark Eldar player may cull one or more of his tokens in ritual slaughter for certain benefits for his ships. The benefits gained from the tokens vary between the various cabals, some persist the entire game, others only offer a short bonus.

The Number before the bonus is the number of Tokens the bonus costs per ship.

Wych Cults
3 - Gleeful abandon - For one Turn the ship can make 1 hit and run attack against every enemy ship it moves into b2b contact with during the movement phase. But it may not take boarding actions in the same turn that it uses this benefit.
2 - Ferocious attacks - +1 bonus to boarding as well as hit and run attacks (total +2) for a single turn
2 - Slaughter drunk - The ship doubles its hits when determining boarding value for a single boarding action.
1- Frenzied killing - The Wych cult can reroll their dice once for boarding attacks. Lasts until used.
1 - Speed  Demons - Attack craft gain +5cm speed. Lasts for the remainder of the game, for this ship only.
1 - Death Craze - The ship does not need to check leadership to ram enemy vessels or when going on all full ahead special orders, this bonus is only active for the turn it is selected on.

Homonculai Coven
3 - Welcome the Pain - The ship can always save against damage as if they were braced, This effect lasts from the turn it is purchased on and until the start of the Dark Eldars next turn. (possible to save vs damage suffered during own turn as well as enemy).
2 - Release the Grotesques - The ships boarding parties are made up of horrid grotesques. Any successful hit and run attack demoralises the target causing a -1 leadership “critical” that can be repaired as normal.
2 - Slaughter drunk - The ship doubles its hits when determining boarding value for a single boarding action.
1 - Death Craze - The ship does not need to check leadership to ram enemy vessels or when going on all full ahead special orders, this bonus is only active for the turn it is selected on.
1 - Choir of Ecstacy - For one turn the ship causes enemy vessels within 15cm to suffer -1 Leadership.
1 - Killer Load - The ships attack craft are loaded with virulent gases and poisons. They may re-roll any dice to determine how many hits their bombers cause on attack runs.

Warrior Cabal
3 - Devious killers - The ship may at any point of the turn change its special order die from one result to another without making a leadership check.
2 - Red Craze - The ship needs to move 5cm less before turning. This bonus lasts for the remainder of the game.
2 - Slaughter drunk - The ship doubles its hits when determining boarding value for a single boarding action.
1 - Death Craze - The ship does not need to check leadership to ram enemy vessels or when going on all full ahead special orders, this bonus is only active for the turn it is selected on.
1 - Thrill of the Hunt - The ship gains a re-roll that only it can use.
1 - Swift Death - The ship may either automatically succeed the check to go on all full ahead or gain 2d6 extra speed from the roll. Can only be used once.
 We determined the tediousness stemmed from the fact that Dark Eldar pretty much had a single play, move in alphastrike something, generate as much VP via impailers/hit and run before disengaging in turn 2-3. So I wanted to give them some flexibility without starting to meddle with their ship designs or creating new ships. This was the most Dark Eldar-esque thing I could think off. Slave taking felt a bit flat in the original rules. Sure made sense but felt like a good idea falling flat.

[AJCHVY]

I like this idea but I can see it leading to lots of bookkeeping. Which ship has how many tokens and which buffs. The slave taking rule I think is there as an added benefit. You might be able to improve upon it by making it more of an incentive other than 10 victory points per slave. I suggest some kind of generic ability where the number of slaves you have taken give your ship a permanent bonus. That way you are incentivized to take slaves but there wont be as much bookkeeping to worry about.

I feel the big issue is mimic engines, they should maybe be a save of some kind and last until the ship is crippled of maybe a critical effect can turn them off.

Might be able to take the shadowfield back to its old save and let the DE have their pre-game move. Or maybe even make it so you can't target them if they are more than 45cm away.

Making the shadowfield better than the Eldar version seems thematic to me. In 40k, the shadowfield gives you a 2+ invulnerable save until you fail it. Eldar have nothing that comes even close to a save that good.

I want to try and test the old rules again and see how they compare to now. Maybe even giving all DE ships a 3+ save vs all and then taking away their shields.

[Seahawk]

I think mimic engines should be simple and fluffy, and not completely cock-blocking to the opponent as it is now.

What about:

- If an enemy ship wants to shoot at a Dark Eldar ship equipped with a Mimic Engine, they must take a Leadership Test with a -4 modifier. If they pass, they have seen through the ruse and may fire as normal. If they fail, they are still unsure who the ship is and cannot shoot any weapons at all at any target, though they may still launch attack craft to 'investigate'. The mimic engine effect is lost if the Dark Eldar ship shoots, launches ordnance, or comes within 30cm of an enemy ship. The effect is also lost if a ship passes its test to see through the ruse, as the information gets transmitted to the rest of the fleet.


I decided on a -4 modifier because it represents the effect well. Experienced shipmasters (aka Ld 10, aka Eldar and SM) will more often see through the effect, having come across it before. Lesser captains will have a hard time with it, as it should be, while not being a completely boring blocker.

This also keeps the effect going throughout the entire game, should you want to have a sneaky flanker skirting the enemy effectively, as I feel DE should be able to do.

[Xca|iber]

It seems like everyone is in agreement about mimic engines being a problem, the core issue of which is the way they offer almost zero interactivity from the other player (i.e. "you just sit there and do nothing until I alpha strike you").

I like the ideas going around of just making it a Ld test with a penalty (either take the test on 3D6 like horizon suggested, or with reduced Ld like Seahawk suggested). My thought was something along these lines:

When a Dark Eldar vessel is deployed or moves onto the table, mark it as mimicking (using a token or other note). Whenever an enemy vessel wishes to fire at a mimicking ship (including torpedoes and nova cannon, if the initial path/placement of the attack will not overlap a revealed target), it must first take a leadership test [with a penalty TBD]. If the test is passed, the attack is resolved normally. Otherwise, the enemy vessel may not fire its weapons or launch any ordnance except attack craft.

Mimicking vessels are treated as friendly vessels by any ordnance with automatic targeting (such as mines, minefields, seeking torpedoes, etc.).

A Dark Eldar vessel is revealed immediately after it shoots, launches ordnance, moves within 30cm of an enemy ship (at any point during either player's turn), or defends against enemy attack craft or boarding torpedoes.

A Dark Eldar vessel may re-establish its mimicking state by feinting. To do this, the vessel must end its move more than 30cm from any enemy ship and attempt to disengage. If the leadership test is passed on a score of X or less [TBD], you may mark the vessel as mimicking once again, instead of removing it from the board.

Lastly, the rules for mimic engines replace the normal rules for target priority when firing at Dark Eldar ships. Note that this means an enemy may always choose to shoot at any revealed Dark Eldar vessel without restriction, regardless of whether or not it is the closest target.

Necrons & Tyranids still ignore the rules for mimic engines, and will use the normal rules for target priority.

[Seahawk]

Not sure how I feel about remimimimimicccing. Once the jig is up, the captains will know it's an enemy, no matter what. It's not like Star Trek cloaking, after all.

[Xca|iber]

Not sure how I feel about remimimimimicccing. Once the jig is up, the captains will know it's an enemy, no matter what. It's not like Star Trek cloaking, after all.

Fluff-wise I was thinking more that the ship sorta leaves then comes back, having "cycled" its mimic profile so that even though the enemy can suspect it's an enemy, they might not know for certain. Mechanically I was just thinking of it as a way to keep the rule relevant through the game. Either way it's not crucial that it's in there. Makes it simpler without it in any case.

This brings us to the issue though of how the Dark Eldar should play after the mimic engines are gone. At the moment, they're basically just big escorts with the slave-taking ability (which seems like it's also not very fun, maybe?), so do we want them to having something else beyond that?

While the whole concept of "fly-in unopposed, alpha strike, board/use impalers, then disengage" is a very Dark Eldar theme, it seems like that's not very enjoyable for the opponent, and ends up being a sort-of binary succeed-or-fail type of game. Fixing mimic engines to effectively last longer but with the possibility of being defeated only deals with the first couple of steps in the above strategy.

So I'm thinking that there needs to be something else (like people have stated, maybe something with Slave Taking) to give both players more engagement in the game, without totally removing the "hit & run raiders" feeling from the Dark Eldar playstyle.

[Seahawk]

Maybe Dark Eldar gain more points for hulks than other races?

This would represent them taking their time enjoying the spoils, picking over the best slaves and whatnot, so to that end they gain 2x or 3x as many victory points for hulks.

To do this, they'd have to stay in the game, making it more, y'know, a game. They have reason to stay (gambling for more points, very DE!).

[Xca|iber]

Maybe Dark Eldar gain more points for hulks than other races?

This would represent them taking their time enjoying the spoils, picking over the best slaves and whatnot, so to that end they gain 2x or 3x as many victory points for hulks.

To do this, they'd have to stay in the game, making it more, y'know, a game. They have reason to stay (gambling for more points, very DE!).

I like this suggestion a lot. I'm thinking that along with this the Slave-Taking rules could be updated similar to Tves' suggestion (though pared down somewhat, for less book-keeping). Perhaps something that provides only a small generic bonus (along the lines of the VP bonus for Bridge Smashed), with the major effect being to incrementally debuff the target's boarding defense. That would tie in with the incentive to board (since that's the most consistent way to ensure drifting hulks). In a sense, DE would be a "boarding race" but without the native bonuses to boarding that other races have, so they'd need to do hit-&-runs to whittle down a target's resistance before scoring the kill and leaving it as a hulk.

So with this we'd have:

Mimic Engines as a strong defense (but not a complete block on the opponent)
Slave-Taking as a way to nullify boarding defenses (and other minor VP bonuses)
"Spoils of War" (i.e. double or triple hulk points) as a DE endgame goal to keep them engaged in the battle.

[horizon]

Eh, not to many new things at once.

Changing the mimic engine plus hulk idea will be good enough.

[Xca|iber]

Eh, not to many new things at once.

Changing the mimic engine plus hulk idea will be good enough.

Hmm, but even if Slavetaking isn't functionally changed, something needs to be done about the VP earnings or there still won't be any incentive to make use of the hulk idea. Perhaps having only work once per enemy ship? (i.e. all the obvious spoils are taken in the first hit&run, so if you want more you'll need to hulk the ship and take the time to pick over the remains).

[Tves]

Well the Upgraded slave taking stuff I mentioned has hardly more book keeping than the fleet does already. Tokens Generated are fleetwide, so no need to track which ship has what as some interpreted it earlier. (This is identical to the book keeping for the VP generated by Slave taking currently). All but 3 of the buffs last for single turn, that is you purchase them before starting special orders (first thing in a turn), and they last until you finish. The ones that last longer are the Psudo brace (lasts enemy turn as well), the ship specific reroll the warriors can buy, and the +5cm speed on attack craft.

The point of this exercise was to give the Dark Eldar some tactical flexibility without shattering their flavor. For they are frankly a one trick pony. The bonus can be quite good, but I had thought this to replace VP generation and the rebalance of the Mimic engine to a "scout move" post deployment/pre first turn.

I plan on playtesting this within the local group to see how things turn out. Might do other stuff as well as lifting the 3 escort minimum per capital ship (If people want more variety in their fleets, the escorts are far more dangerous anyway).