6th Ed Lovin' - Dark Eldar Edition

by Anonymous Foodie

Everyone needs a hobby outside of work, amirite??

After a breeze or two through the rulebook, it's time to take a look at how our armies are being effected.  Since the True Kin are the heralds of time immemorial and the rightful owners of all things to come, I thought I'd go first.

Night Fight is back, and it's back with a vengeance.

It's the only smart thing to do

Night Fight is basically standard for all missions now.  It's similar in practice to the Dusk til Dawn mission from 5th, except that this time around people are less likely to forget about it every time since it affects all of the missions.

Unlike previous incarnations where the chance was miniscule (if there was chance involved), it's a simple 50/50 on turn one.  If that roll is failed, you start rolling again on turn 5 (and every turn thereafter).  Same 50/50, but it lasts til the end of the game.

Now what Night Fighting does has changed drastically, and I'll let you check page 124 yourselves for the actual rule.  Night Vision (which is finally different from Acute Senses) allows you to see normally while these rules are in effect.

So what's this mean?  As an army with Night Vision on... well... everything, it's great to finally have these rules happen more than once in a blue moon.  At this point I see myself hoping for Night Fight during the first turn rather than later in the game to add some early survivability.  As an added bonus, you roll to see if Night Fight is in effect *before* rolling to see who deploys/goes first, so you can plan accordingly.

Feel No Pain changes

Tis only a scratch!

 So this one isn't necessarily a "Woohoo!" moment, so much as a lateral shift in effectiveness.  The standard Feel No Pain is downgraded to a 5+ (with room for special characters or powers to change the roll).  However, the only thing that ignores it is wounds that would cause insta-death.  Power weapons?  Meh.  AP1?  Who cares.  It's not like that stuff actually leaves a mark, right?  I'm sure you could mathhammer the actual effectiveness out to the thousandths, but I'm gonna just call this one a wash.

Vehicle changes

It's AV8 with only 1 HP, but the mileage is great!

 First and foremost, I want to say that I find the Hull Point system extremely intriguing.  I am entirely too excited to see how this plays on the table, and I think that it will play very well.  But how, you ask, does this influence Dark Eldar specifically?

Dark Lances, for starters, just became meaner.  The basic anti-tank weapon of the army has a 33% chance to cause a glancing hit.  Glances mean something - really mean something.  It's not just a chance to keep you from shooting back, it's real, stacking damage.  Also note that 22% of the above is the chance for a Pen, which adds even more fun (and carnage) to the mix.  Add to that AP2 guns now get +1 to the damage table, and start practicing your evil grin.

When a Glance becomes a set amount of (reasonable) damage, a weapon that can reliably glance poses a real threat.

I glance on a 2+?  Pew Pew!!

Skimmers in general get a couple of fun bonuses to boot, these being an extra 6" to the Flat Out move, and a 5+ Jink save if you move at all, or ye olde 4+ if you move Flat Out.

The extra movement mitigates the reduction to 6" of move-and-disembark (or embark, for that matter), in addition to leading to more overall movement for the purposes of actual transport and maintaining superior firing lanes.

Some DE players will have the kneejerk reaction that this new Jink save makes Flickerfields worthless, and perhaps invalidates Venoms.  They, however, are wrong.

Keep in mind that the Flickerfield is an Invulnerable save, which is dirty useful for close combat (which, as it turns out, is deadlier to vehicles of all sorts).
Further, now that the 'field is not a "mandatory" upgrade (though still useful) those same points may be spent on a Night Shield if you prefer, which combined with the new Night Fight rules, is a more viable option.

I think it's worth noting that I actually approve of the move of the Venom to "light Skimmer", in that it only has 2 Hull Points.  In truth, two glances were likely to crash one of our skimmers anyway... now the first one gets ignored completely.  Also, it goes another step to re-validating the Raider.  A shift occurred where min-sized warrior squads toting a Blaster took the place of any hope of seeing a full sized squad in a Raider.  The firepower of the twin Splinter Cannons with the still-viable anti-tank work of the Blaster out-shined the larger craft in about all respects. 

A number of things make the full-sized squad in a Raider more of an option.  Rapid Fire weapons can fire at full range on the move - given that the 36" range of the Cannons were one of the biggest boons, the Raider-Squad's 30" effective range.  To take this point even further, you can still fire if the transport Cruised, though at a handicapped BS.  Luckily, Splinter Racks let you re-roll to hit, giving you an effective BS of 2.5 (ish).  It's not amazing, but it's better than not being able to fire at all.  And, of course, the extra Hull Point can come in handy (though being open-topped still adds a +1 to the damage chart).

Jetbikes

This guy came up on google images.  I'm famous now.

So Eldar Jebikes (Dark included) can move 48" now?  Cool.
Oh, Reavers completely ignore dangerous terrain instead of just getting a re-roll?  Nice.
What's that?  Bikes of all sorts get the Hammer of Wrath attack in CC?  Lovely.
Come again?  Reavers have a 4+ jink if they move at all, and a 3+ after a turbo?  Aww yeeeaaah.

Yeah... I'm excited.