I'd be interested in hearing your summary and reading the other lists.

Played against this list the other day. I think HB with infiltrate is a big improvement - at least we got to see HB do what they,re supposed to do before getting shot up - I think the 2+ CC to hit puts them on a par with warp spiders better armour, range and ability to contribute more in a firefight.

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Alrighty then,

Castle Assault 2014 we saw 2 eldar list.

Beil-Tan v4.1

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Aspect Warrior Warhost (575)
1 Autarch
4 Howling Banshees
4 Dire Avengers
4 Wave serpents

Guardian Warhost (200)
1 Farseer
7 Guardian Units
3 Suport Weapons Platforms


Ranger Troupe (100)
4 Rangers

Windrider Troupe (200)
5 Jetbikes
1 Vyper

Windrider Troupe (200)
5 Jetbikes
1 Vyper

Swords Of Vaul Troupe (300)
4 Fire Prims
2 Fire Storms

Swords Of Vaul Troupe (300)
4 Fire Prims
2 Fire Storms

Night Spinner Troupe (175)
3 Nigh Spinners

Revanant Titans (650)
2 Revenant Titans

Nightwings (300)
3 Night wing Fighters



Fir Iolarion Eldar Titan Clan

Phantasm Titan (750)
1 Phantasm Titan
1 Distortion Cannons
1 Pulsar

Revenant Titan (375)
1 Revenant Titan
Bone Singer
2 Pulse Lasers

Revenant Titan (325)
1 Revenant Titan
2 Pulse Lasers

Revenant Titan (325)
1 Revenant Titan
2 Pulse Lasers

Revenant Titan (325)
1 Revenant Titan
2 Pulse Lasers

Nightwings (300)
3 Night wing Fighters

Eldar Knights (300)
3 Towering Destroyers

Ranger Troupe (150)
6 Rangers

Gate of Vaul (150)

The tournie was 5 games over two days and we had 16 players.
JimXII took out the tournie with the BT list, and Robs Titan clan come in at ninth.
CA 15 is shaping up to be even bigger with 36 players to play and we are still 6 months out! I am confident we will see more eldar lists run this year that will provide some great testing and stats.
I'll do up my Cancon summary next.

Cheers

Mic

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this, but why do Howling Banshees gain First Strike from equipment rather than having it innate to the unit, like with Warp Spiders?
Background wise, I understand that the mask is an item that has always boosted Banshees in close combat, not shooting, but Warp Spiders have no reason to have first strike- especially not in close combat (going by 40k rules and background).

The question has come up for me because I want to follow a theme, but feel like I'm being handicapped by it. Specifically, I'd like to run a few Storm Serpents and have Aspect Formations of 8 Howling Banshees come out of them- this fits my army theme (Iybraesil), and also sees the most use of the new Infiltrate ability, but the fact that attached Autarchs and Exarchs don't strike first really hurts them. Assuming I can get all Banshees into base contact, I'd make 8 First Strike attacks and my opponent can remove casualties from base contact with the Exarchs and Autarch first. The Exarch and Autarch are then reduced to firefighting only, losing the benefit of the Macro Weapon and going from 2's to hit to 5's.
It's better for me to add something like Dark Reapers, so that the Exarchs can make FF3+ shots. That then slows the formation down, however, and doesn't help the Autarch much. At this point I find it hard to justify Banshees over Striking Scorpions, who have better armour and cause more hits in combat (average of 1, vs average of 5/6ths) and who can get the full benefit of an Exarch or Autarch as well.

I haven't played very many games of EA yet, so this is mostly a question of 'why', not a suggestion to change anything.

Cancon 2015 (Australian Championships) was sensational, and Cal did a great job running it.
It was 6 games over two days with 22 players. There is also a third day to the event which is dedicated to a big bash and some side games which is a hoot!

Ok before I give my game summaries keep in mind the tournament was nearly a month ago so opponents may need to correct a detail or two.

My list again, BT v4.1
ASPECT WARRIOR WARHOST [400]
8 Shining Spear, Autarch, Exarch

ASPECT WARRIOR WARHOST [325]
8 Shining Spear, Exarch

GUARDIAN WARHOST [150]
Farseer, 6 Guardians, Heavy Weapon Platform

RANGER TROUPE [100]
4 Ranger

RANGER TROUPE [100]
4 Ranger

SWORDS OF VAUL TROUPE [250]
3 Falcon, 2 Fire Storm

SWORDS OF VAUL TROUPE [250]
3 Falcon, 2 Fire Storm

NIGHT SPINNER TROUPE [175]
3 Night Spinners

ENGINE OF VAUL TROUPE [250]
Scorpion

ENGINE OF VAUL TROUPE [250]
Void Spinner

AVATAR [0]

PHANTOM TITAN [750]

Game 1
Vs Fatdex's EUK Nids

1. NORMAL ASSAULT SWARM [400]
Tyranid Warrior, 4 Termagant, 2 Carnifex, Zoanthrope, Hive Tyrant, 4 Hormaguant

2. NORMAL ASSAULT SWARM [350]
Tyranid Warrior, 4 Termagant, Zoanthrope, Carnifex, Hive Tyrant, 4 Hormaguant

3. NORMAL ASSAULT SWARM [350]
Tyranid Warrior, 4 Termagant, Zoanthrope, Carnifex, Hive Tyrant, 4 Hormaguant

4. NORMAL ASSAULT SWARM [350]
Tyranid Warrior, 4 Termagant, Zoanthrope, Carnifex, Hive Tyrant, 4 Hormaguant

5. BRUTE SWARM [225]
1 Hive Tyrant, 3 Exocrines

6. BRUTE SWARM [225]
1 Hive Tyrant, 3 Exocrines

7. GENESTEALER SWARM [150]
6 Genestealer

8. GENESTEALER SWARM [150]
6 Genestealer

9. GENESTEALER SWARM [150]
6 Genestealer

10. HARASSMENT SWARM [225]
1 Harridan and 0-4 Gargoyles

11. HARASSMENT SWARM [225]
1 Harridan and 0-4 Gargoyles

12. LICTOR SWARM [200]
4 Lictors

Table- Mixed ruins and forest table with few hills.
Deployment- eldar called diagonal and the objectives were staggered down the centre line with Blitz's in the corners. Both forces were fair evenly spread throughout their deployment zones.

Largely this game went the eldars favour early on. The nids failed several swarms activations which meant the nids were coming up piece meal. The eldar were able to deal with the Genestealer swarms before taking on the larger swarms. The phantom took out the brute swarms in the first two turns. The nids did have a big assault lined up with a swarm and the lictors on the phantom but lucked out on the 3 turn strategy roll.

The game ended 3 turn 3-0 to the eldar.

Game 2
Vs Dobbsy's Space Wolves

1. Great Company 500
2 x Grey Hunters
Hunter
2 x Blood Claws
5 x Rhinos

2. Great Company 425
2 x Grey Hunters
Wolf Lord

3. Warlord Titan 825

4. Predators 325
Hunter

5. Long Fangs 350
2 x Razorbacks

6. Swift Claws 200

7. Land Speeders 200

8. Thunderbolts 175

Table- desert waste land with rock spires, ruins, dead forests
Deployment- SW called normal deployment with both blitz fair central and the objectives were paired on either flank. We both set up fairly centrally within our deployments.

The SW aggressively moved hard up onto eldars right flank where they were set up for turn 2 assaults, with the Warlord hold the centre of the pitch. The annhilators messed up a SOV formation pretty bad. The eldar responded by setting up screens of scouts with the guardians behind to try and deal the massed SW assault force, the bulk of the eldar armour and WE fire on the Warlord where they could and managed to strip the shields and do 3 DC in turn 1.
Turn 2 the Warlord marshalled and annihilated the other SOV formation. The Guardians Engaged a destroyed the annhilators. The scouts, guardians, and avatar were then either engaging or being engaged by several of the SW formations. Fortunately for the eldar was that there was a forest in the area which prevented the SW from getting to many numbers in. Again the remaining eldar armour and WE fired at the warlord which reduced it to one DC however a crit was rolled and the roll was a further DC. With the warlord gone the eldar were able to sure up the defences and drive the SW back.

The game ended turn 3, 3-0 to the eldar.

Game 3
Vs Matt Shadowlord's DKOK

1. Regimental HQ 525
Death Korps Supreme Commander, 19 Death Korps Infantry units,
Gorgon Siege Transporters (2 Gorgons)

2. Infantry Coy 425
Death Korps Commander, 19 Death Korps Infantry units,
Gorgon Siege Transporters (2 Gorgons)

3. Heavy Support Battery 125
3 Hydra or Heavy Anti-Aircraft Platform, 3 Trojans

4. Deathstrike Silo 250
Death Korps Deathstrike Missile Silo

5. Warhound Titan 275

6. Thunderbolt Sqn 150

7. Super Heavy Tank Pl 200
Shadowsword

8. Super Heavy Tank Pl 200
Shadowsword

9. Warhound Titan 275

10. Death Rider Pl 150
6 Death Korps Rough Rider units (with 'scout' ability)

11. Infantry Coy 425
Death Korps Commander, 19 Death Korps Infantry units,
Gorgon Siege Transporters (2 Gorgons)

Table- was a ruined city with nothing other than...ruins
Deployment- blitz objectives were across from each other on the eldars right flank with both DKOK objectives in between and the pair of eldar objectives on other flank.

Eldar one the stratgey roll and the void spinner tried to put some blast markers on the silo. Failed to activate, SC reroll pass for 1 BM on the silo. The phantom retained hunting a shadows word across from it but failed to activate. The warhounds moved up and one shredded the night spinners the shot up one the shinning spear formations. A shadow sword popped the Scorpion and the silo left the void spinner on 1 DC. The eldar shifted everything they could to try and deal with the Gorgons and waves of infantry. Turn 2 saw the phantom fail to activate again but it managed to destroy a gorgon with about 8/9 stands that were in it. The shinning a spears engaged the remaining gorgon from that formation trapping 9 stands inside and destroyed it which destroyed the formation. They used their consolidation move to set up a crossfire on the next gorgon unit. The eldar then threw everything they had left at trying to destroy the Gorgons in crossfire but for little success. The void spinner failed another activation. In the end the eldar bleed formations to quick and were unable to stop the advance of the gorgon formations.

The game ended turn 3, 2-0 to the DKOK

Day 2 shortly

Geep

I believe the Warp Spiders First Strike ability derives from the unit's ability to warp small distances appearing suddenly in an assault position, while the HB mask is supposed to paralyse making it a weapon ability.

The exarch problem is a long-standing conundrum. Whilst the aspects themselves are fairly well balanced, no matter what you do there will always be some exarchs that are slightly better than others (e.g. dire avenger vs dark reaper). However, in NetEA this is exacerbated by the fact that the exarchs have one of only two weapons (i.e. +1 FF or CC). In the Epic UK list the banshee exarch gets first strike and the fire dragon exarch has MW. Of course, that just means that in EpicUK the best exarch is clearly the fire dragon

IMO the allocation problem you describe is a very annoying issue. It affects mixed formations too (e.g. banshees + scorpions), but at least you can mitigate this by using banshees in pure formations. You can't do anything about the exarch, which is a shame as it is fixable by giving the extra attack first strike. Not for fluff reasons (exarchs don't have two banshee masks...) but purely for gaming reasons.

Still, think of it this way: Inspiring is still worth 25 points

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Oh and by the way, I am in the minority but IMO the rules as written should mean the banshee mask gives first strike to all CC attacks (including the extra attack from the exarch). This is because the banshee mask is not itself an extra attack:



Edit to add: So a literal reading of the above would mean that a banshee autarch would have an extra first strike MW 2+ attack.

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That's how I read the rule above.

We always played that way -exarch gets the special ability of his unit! The exarch is a CH, not an INF type of unit, so the part of a formation/unit, with the same abilities +some extras (with the special rules of the original unit). So literally it's a Howling Banshee exarch, a Fire Dragon exarch, etc..

Although that's how I'd prefer to play the rules, it is very unclear if that is intended. As per FAQ answer 2.0:

My interpretation of this is that the First Strike of Warp Spiders is on the unit, so applies to all of their attacks. The First Strike of Howling Banshees, however, is due to a weapon ability, and so is not applied to any extra attacks (and obviously not to firefight).

Also, from the FAQ 2.2.3 answer:

This provides a clear-cut case for the opposite scenario, where only extra attacks gain the benefit of the weapon giving those extra attacks, but this then creates a fairly strong precedent for assuming that extra attacks from weapons do not benefit from the special abilities of another weapon in that unit.

If it is intended that Exarchs (and, by extension I would assume Autarchs) benefit from the weapons in their aspect stand can this be clearly stated somewhere on the army list?

I agree that it's appropriate for Exarchs to gain the special weapons and unit abilities of their stand. As stated by Pati, an Exarch with Howling Banshees is a Howling Banshee Exarch, and Autarchs also use the equipment of the Aspects they are associated with. Currently, though, it's a pretty loose argument either way for how the rules should be applied.

Edit:
Thanks for the reports Mic Fair!

I'm with Geep on this one. The Exarch doesnt have fusion guns they have "Exarch Ranged Weapons". I would also like them to have the same weapons as the rest so please make this clear in an FAQ or similar

This has been raised many times in the past. The general principle is that,

• Unit abilities apply to the unit, including the character and his weapons, so a Warp Spider Exarch gains First strike to his EA.
• Weapon abilities only apply to the unit carrying them, so the HB Exarch does not gain First Strike which is the weapon ability of the unit not the character. (To gain First Strike, the HB exarch stat sheet would need to be amended to include it).

Fire Dragons are the only really contentious unit, because their unit abilities state that the weapon gains MW in Firefight. The ERC interpreted this note to be refering to the unit *weapon*, thus denying the FD Exarch from a MW Extra attack, though in the past, E-UK interpreted this as a *Unit ability*, permitting the FD Exarch to have MW on the EA. To clarify the whole area of Exarch weaponry in the E-UK lists, the Eldar Exarch stats have been revised to reflect the weapons they have in 40K, so the E-UK list includes the following

Eldar Exarch Inspiring

• Dire Avengers have a Diresword. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (base contact). . . Assault Wpns, MW, EA (+1)
• Fire Dragons have a Firepike . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .(15cm) . . . . . . . Small Arms, MW, EA (+1)
• Howling Banshees have an Executioner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (base contact) . . Assault Wpns, EA (+1), First Str
• Shining Spears have a Starlance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (base contact) . . Assault Wpns, EA (+1), Lance
• Striking Scorpions have an Exarch Close Combat Weapon . (base contact) . . Assault Wpns, EA (+1)
• Swooping Hawk, Warp Spider
  & Dark Reapers have Exarch Ranged Weapons. . . . . . . . . (15cm) . . . . . . . Small Arms, EA (+1)

Geep, the second FAQ relates to the weapon ability of the unit, and specifically to those noted as having an EA. The FAQ is stating that it is the "EA" that has the special abilities, not the weapon itself (and thus not the assault capabilities unless otherwise noted).

The problem is, you and the FAQ are missing the third category. We are not talking about the distinction between a unit special ability and a weapon ability, but between a weapon ability and an extra attack weapon ability. In my view he rules are quite clear and the FAQ fails to see the distinction. So, the three types:
1. Unit special abilities (eg warp spiders) apply to all relevant attacks, in the case of first strike those being CC and FF
2. Weapon special abilities (eg banshee masks) apply to all attacks of that type, in the case of first strike either CC or FF but not both.
3. Weapon special abilities with extra attacks (e.g. Autarch CC weapon) apply only to attacks from that weapon's extra attacks.

The second of those is what we are discussing here, and the FAQ does not address it directly but somehow it gets lumped in with the "extra attack" camp..

Note that the extra complication is a confusion about what the scope of a rule is, which comes into play when you start giving unit abilities to units with different types of attacks, like sniper. Sniper is written as a shooting ability and it was clearly not the intention of the rules for sniper units to get sniper on their CC attacks yet people want to put sniper on CC so have adopted a fourth category which doesn't fit in anywhere: ie units given Sniper in their unit notes don't get sniper in CC, but those with it on a CC weapon do... Because it wasn't complicated enough.

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