So to sum it up, solid support for Nightwings and Vampires. Phoenix Bombers probably slightly overpriced at 400 points. Sounds like it's time to shake up some meta game around here.

(The complaints have mostly been about Nightwings and Phoenix Bombers to be honest)

I love the Phoenix Bombers. Great utility and they can take a beating, breaching most flak screens without much of a chance of loss.

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

While that is true you can get an awful lot of other troops for 400 points. Add 50 points and you can have two Void spinners or Scorpions, or you can have a full complement of aspects with exarchs and have 50 points to spare.

Yeah, but nothing quite does the trick of reaching out and touching your opponent like Phoenix Bombers, especially with a disrupt template. I find aircraft tend to do a lot of sniping in Epic. Phoenix bombers are spearheads, laying down sizable punishment against armored companies and big mobs and artillery companies. Great armor and they can do double duty as interceptors in a pinch.

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

Nobody doubts the strength of Phoneix bombers.

At 400 however, it seems you (Moscovian) are the only one to pick any in a 3k lineup.

In all the years of the debate on Phoenixes, I have never seen anyone else hold your stance on Phoenix bombers.

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"War is not about who is right, but about who is left". - B. Russell

Seems everyone is missing out then.

There are gems in the Eldar list that -for one reason or another- players feel uncomfortable trying. War Walkers, double-Cobras, Phoenix bombers... I am not flawless in my play, but very few people beat me when I am playing Eldar. Perhaps more will come around now that we're talking about them.

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

The latest Eldar Codex has War walkers as not open-topped and their shield as a simple 5+ invulnerable save. Perhaps keeping them at their current point cost, but giving them 5+ armour and invulnerable save would make them a better game option and see them fielded.

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"War is not about who is right, but about who is left". - B. Russell

The rules change more or less every four years in 40K, so I don't think that it's a good idea to change Epic rules just because a change has been made in 40K. If there's a genuine issue with War Walkers, then I'm sure that we could come up with our own solution, but I remain unconvinced that they need fixing.

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I'm also unconvinced of the need for a change here, if for slightly different reasons than Irisado. Mainly, that this change would increase survivability by 50% (ish) against non-MW.

War Walkers are already remarkably cheap - for a third more points than a Sentinel you get better (and Reinforced) armor and an AT Lance weapon. Rangers just happen to be less expensive and slightly more versatile, though less powerful. They're also significantly easier to come by. I don't think the WW can be balanced much better then they currently are.

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SG

Ghost's Paint Blog, where everything goes that isn't something else.

I'd rather leave War Walkers and Rangers as they are.

I would like to see a points reductions for Phoenix Bombers, 400 is much too expensive (Epic-UK cost them at 300 these days).

I'm in favour of the special rule that gives Howling Banshees a MW against infantry targets only, do leave that in! It really should have been a general special rule in the rulebook and even if it's not going to be so now the same special rule could be re-used for units in other armies which all have power weapons (but no capability against vehicles) e.g. SM Honour Guard, CSM Warp Talons, ect.

Cobras should be fixed by giving the main gun the ability to ignore void/power shields, like it has in 40k and the background. It's a very distinctive feature and I don't understand why we don't represent it in the epic version when it would be easy and appropriate to do so.

I would recommend bumping Void Spinners up to 275 points like Epic-UK have too. It has always been distinctly the best of the EoV.

I'm really not a fan of the inf-MW howling banshees, bump them to CC2+ and give the exarchs first strike on their extra attack and they become a perfectly competetive choice, they could even have infiltrator to give them a nice speed boost......no extra fiddly situational rules to keep track of that way

apologies if it's already been debated at length

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LoL, It has been debated, at *extreme* length in the Howling Banshee discussion and more recently as part of my suggestion for the "Assassin" special rule

There are essentially three positions in increasing order of strength :-

1. Make them CC2+, with Exarch and Autarch getting EA+1,
2. Leave them at CC3+ and give them "Assassin", conferring -1 to the target armour save when in CC,
3. Leave them at CC3+ and give them Inf-MW.

Personally I think #1 does not make any appreciable difference to the combat, and option #3 gives them auto-kills against most infantry while not having the correct effect against RA targets, which seems both OTT and inappropriate.
So my preference is #2. This would require a new rule, though one that is already needed elsewhere (eg for GlynG examples above).

And I still hanker after a 4th option of increasing their armour to 4+, though the community does not seem inclined to consider this. It would make them tougher against shooting which is deemed undesirable, while giving them 4+ for assaults to reflect their mobilitiy would be a special rule exclusive to the Banshees and equally undesirable.

yeah I've read those discussions and was a participant IIRC, I meant mainly in the context of this thread and the adding of the inf-MW rule to this version of the list....

I think it got to a point where it became largely theoretical and very much a moot point, especially when CC aspects are typically a poor choice vs FF ones anyway....

typically when threads become cyclical with people repeating their arguments over and over, never moving towards any kind of consensus or compromise I tend to get a bit fed up and go and paint something instead

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LoL

Hence my attempt to get "Assassin" accepted and created. If this rule existed, I am confident it would be swiftly adopted for the Banshees, and probably for other units.

I am not sure I totally agree with you on the CC and FF Aspects. FF units do provide better support over wider areas, but are usually less resilient so tend to have fewer units over time. In the case of SS, their EA+1 and armour 4+ makes up for the fact that they are CC specialists, which is why the traditional Aspect combo is 4x DA and 4x SS to provide slightly better resilience and FF support capabilities.

yes I understand that, it's a nice idea, but I'm very strongly opposed to creating new special rules (however fluffy) full stop, and in an eldar list which already has a fistful of special rules of its own it's just more book keeping and potential rules issues arising that people hadn't considered

buffing them to CC2+, giving the exarch's EA first strike, and giving them infiltrator, allowing them to BTB more stands on the charge is plenty, using only existing rules.... now I simply don't have the time to play well documented games most weeks as I usually have about 2 hours to play through a game, I just don't have enough time to stop and make notes and take pictures very often, however I can say I've faced EUK howling banshees in Dave T's ulthwe list on about a dozen occasions using both steel legion and codex marines and they have well and truly torn me a new one every time..... but as we all know, Dave is a superlative player, in the same vein I refer to the discussion on Russ companies, people were arguing that they mostly turn up in unsuccessful lists, but then RichardL comes along and drives all before him, making heavy use of the tank company.... again Richard is a *very good* player

Could it be that the percieved weakness is actually just that people haven't really figured out how to "do" banshees right yet and all this rules tinkering is really never going to cure the problem?

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Just some guy

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Army Forge List Co-ordinator