8th Ed. Dark Elves are giving me nightmares...

[Toelobe]

A few friends and I recently started playing warhammer. And it seems like more times than not, I end up playing my buddy that plays dark elves. So far I havn't fared too well, so i'm asking for help. This is normally how it goes.

Im taking,

Slann

35 Saurus warriors full command

20 temple guard

2x 12 skink skirmishers

10 chameleons

salamander

scar vet that goes in the saurus unit

He is taking,

Level 4 witch

About 15 spearmen (the witch goes with them for sac dagger)

2x 18 repeater crossbows

10 or so cold one cav

a few corsairs

cauldron of blood

He said he wont use lore of shadow if I dont use lore of life so I have been feeling out light or fire or metal. His crossbows easily take care of my skinks on the sides of the map but it draws some of the fire from my bigger units. I try to use most of my magic to attack the unit of spearmen with his mage to take control of the magic phase. In close hand combat his mage has some pendant or something that gives him a better ward save the higher my strength(I think thats right?)

But last time we played, he gave +1 attack to his cold one cav from his cauldron of blood, +1 attack to the cold one cav from a banner and charged my temple guard unit. It wasn't pretty.They have 6 strength on the charge and if I even have a chance to hit back, they have a 1+ armor save. After he took out that unit, all thats left on the board is my saurus block, and he turns around and hits them in the flank.

What is a good way to deal with units that are that fast and that strong? What kind of general tactics should I be using to protect myself better? Are there any changes I should make to my lineup?

I'm pretty new to warhammer so any help is greatly appreciated! I will try to answer any questions you may have. Thanks.

 

[Stonecutter]

Dark elves are a very mobile and lethal army but they do have a couple weaknesses: 1) They are elves and hence very squishy; and 2) low armour saves. Working with your present list, you appear to have all the tools necessary to deal with the opposing dark elves although some tweaking would make it easier. Here are a few observations and recommendations:

General Observations:

1) Since it sounds like both your and your friend are fairly new to warhammer, one of the first things to check is to make sure the rules are understood and applied correctly. It seems very surprising that the RXBs are taking out your skinks. RXBs that move and shoot need 6s to hit at long range (any distance from 12-24") and 7's (6s followed by 4s) to hit skirmish skinks (penalties for shooting at -1 long range, -1 multiple shot, -1 moved & -1 skirmish). If you put the skinks in any type of cover, hitting them becomes even more difficult. As it is, even a unit of 18 RXBs should only be killing 2 skinks in a round of shooting on average and I suspect anything more than that is likely the result of an error in calculating to hit penalties.

2) CoKs - the set up required means that the dark elf player has a mounted BSB in the unit since the hydra banner is too expensive for the unit itself to take on its own. Consequently, if you kill the BSB then the banner likewise dies. However, CoKs do hit hard and with hatred they are deadly on the charge and even more so when buffed by the CoB. Again, a couple rules to check are a) only the front rank of riders get the extra attacks - 2nd rank is limited to 1 support attack each even if they have "3" from magic/CoB and no mount attacks are permissible at all 2) the mounts do not get the extra attack from the CoB since they cannot be affected by the blessing. Lastly, CoKs must check for stupidity every turn they are not in combat.

Tweaks to list:

I would recommend going with light magic since it has excellent buffs and hexes along with a couple magic missiles to kill the RXBs/spears. The slaan should be the BSB and have rumination and mystery for disciplines along with cogitation & ruby ring of ruin if points allow it. Although not necessary, I would recommend putting the scar vet in cowboy mode - i.e. on a cold one with dawnstone & armour for 1+ re-rollable and a magic weapon of some sort (blade of might will do). On foot, he is too slow to earn his points IMHO and the points would be far better spent on more skinks, TG & other stuff. A 2nd sallie would also be very useful.

Tactics:

Chameleons - with scouting, place them where they cannot be charged and send them after the CoB. They can march and shoot, giving an effective range of 24". With 20 poison shots per turn, they should be able to kill the CoB by turn 3 or 4 unless your opponent gets really lucky with the ward saves. This is also likely to force him to dedicate a unit to protect the CoB or go after the chameleons, thus disrupting his lines. Don't forget that chameleons are an additional -2 to shoot at due to the skirmish and own chameleon rule. Toss in the multi-shot and moving penalties and again the RXBs are unlikely to get too many casualties in on them.

Skirmish screen and LD/Magic bubble - placing the skirmishers in front of the two infantry blocks and advance toward the druchii lines. With a slaan BSB, they will not panic and will provide hard cover for the units behind them. Pha's protection from the lore of light offers an excellent 12" bubble of protection to reduce the effectiveness of shooting if dice are left over. Priority casting would be the two magic missiles (against RXBs and use the unboosted version to save PD), followed by net of amyntok on the spears. The latter spell is highly effective since it will force a test in the next turn every time the caster or unit wants to do anything (i.e for every casting). A failure means no casting/movement and the unit takes d6 S4 hits.

Nearing contact - the skirmish skinks can be used to deflect the CoKs away by sacrificing them. Simply march up to the unit and align them so any overrun is away from the main blocks. This will buy 1-2 turns to deal with the rest of the army or can be used to get into a counter charge position. The counter charge can be set up by putting your blocks ~10" away from the skinks. If the CoKs are within charge range, then magic should be used to buff your own units. Tossing a couple magic missiles downrange to draw out dispel dice should leave enough left over to get off the key spell, speed of light, so that your blocks are WS10 & I10 and thus will strike 1st. Pha's protection would also help by making them -1 to be hit in CC. The same spells are also highly useful once in combat.

Steadfast - Your saurus unit can be used as an anvil even if the CoKs get the charge on them. If the unit has more ranks than the opponent, it makes its break check without any leadership modifiers. This means if only 15 saurus are left in 3 ranks, they are still steadfast and will check on the slaan's LD9 on 3 dice with the re-roll from the slaan BSB. Even with full blessings & banner, it is highly unlikely that the CoKs will be able to do 21 wounds to the unit on the charge. By pushing the saurus a few inches ahead of the TG, you can pin the CoKs in the first round when they charge and then flank charge them with the TG on the following (your turn) when the CoKs are only S4. As mentioned above, giving the saurus speed of light and/or pha's protection will really help make sure they can hold and set up the counter charge.

Flankers - every effort should be made to get the sallie(s) into the flank of the dark elf lines, using a covered approach and avoiding the CoKs. Sallies can march and shoot so turn 2 should see them on the edge of the dark elf lines and flaming across the RXB and/or spear units. The flame template is deadly to dark elves and even one round of shooting can completely gut a unit by 50% or more. This can be combined with regular and chameleon skink shooting to completely wipe out a unit in a single round, especially if it has taken a few magic missile casualties earlier.

Scar Vet cowboy - With 14" move, the cowboy can be used to go after the CoB, to tie up a unit of RXBs all on his own. At T5 and with a 1+ re-roll save, he will be able to grind the RXBs with relative impunity unless the COB gave that unit the KB blessing, at which point they still need to get lucky and the CoKs will not be able to benefit.

Well, that is a fair amount to digest so I will stop before completely overwhelming you with details. Good luck and I hope this helps.

 

[david l]

And Cold One Knights only have a 2+ armour save, not 1+.

Metal should kill the knights before they charge. Light should ensure their charge does a LOT less damage.

 

[Toelobe]

That really was a lot to take in! Thanks for all the great information. I like the idea of using my skinks as a shield, but I am having trouble picturing one thing. How do I position my skinks and/or my blocks of infantry to prevent an overrun and have one of my blocks charged into?

And another general question about the blocks of infantry, do you commonly use full command or use the points elsewhere?

Thanks for the great pointers. I can't wait to try it out!

 

[Stonecutter]

Toelobe,
Just learned how to use Battle Chronicler so hopefully this will help clarify a few things for you.

PS - Many thanks to asrodig for the tutorial on how to post images on the site as I would never have figured this out on my own!!



Here is the deployment with the skink screen (S1) providing hard cover to the Saurus (S2) and Temple Guard infantry blocks.



The cold one knights advance.



The skink screen has advanced and reformed into two ranks to re-direct the COKs. At the same time, both blocks have advanced slightly so they are in a position to counter charge after the skinks are crushed in combat. The skinks are effectively preventing the COKs from any movement other than charging the skinks since there is no way the COKs can charge either infantry block. The key is to ensure that the TG are not too close along the potential overrun path to reduce the chance of a COK overrun into the TG (i.e. ~10" from the skinks).



The COKs charge and destroy the skinks but opt not to overrun and instead reform.



Both the Saurus and TG charge in and engage the COKs.

Hope this helps.

 

[skillfull_dan]

Stonecutter for the win.

That series of pictures should be given to everyone who starts playing warhammer

 

[skillfull_dan]

First off, stonecutters suggestions are spot on, I second everything he said.

Additionally I will touch on unit selection. Warhammer is a game of rock paper scissors, everything has a counter, and everything has something that it counters well. Lizardmen are more specialized than most in my opinion.

It sounds like you are running into trouble with highly mobile cavalry, our best answer for elites like this are deep skrox units of 3 krox and as many skinks as you can fit. As you pointed out, cold one riders are S6 on the charge, so skinks and saurus both are wounded on 2+ and 6++ ward, so you might as well use the unit with 5 point skinks that have S6 krox's punching through the cold one hides. Just make sure that the unit is deep enough to keep steadfast.

You have a unit of 10 chameleons, split that into two units of 5 for greater mobility, and if you need a sacrificial unit 5 chameleons is a small price to pay to block a charge.

Salamander, these are solid gold, make sure to take the extra skink handler if you only have a unit of 1 salamander.

Also I find stegadons and Scar vets on Cold ones to be effective against dark elves, doubly so if they cannot take shadow.

Finally, I think that you are getting the short end of the stick not taking life. Temple guard are a strong unit, but only if they have the buffs to grind out a combat and they dont get erased first. In my experience taking lore of life and becalming cogitation are incredibly strong against dark elves to keep your units alive into the second round of combat where dark elves dont get hatred anymore.

If you do choose to allow shadow and life, just make sure to dispel mindrazor, mindrazor is the spell that will lose you the game and the reason you take becalming cogitation/dispel scroll.