The new Codex: Eldar

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-24 09:23pm

Dark Hellion wrote:No, because in order to fire link, you have to maintain LOS to both target, and another Fire Prism. Thus, to JSJ and shoot with all three they must either be in very close proximity (thus given them only 1 firelane) or must set up a chain of LOS between themselves and enemies. With another piece of terrain, this chain is nearly impossible to maintain.
The falcons work independently of one another, and as such can utilize three seperate fire lanes.

Ah, now it all becomes clear: you were talking about the beam-crossed combined shot.

At this point, I was just thinking about the individual Fire-Prisms. They are still a lot more flexible as individual tanks than before due to the BS increase and large blast option. The linked shot is a cool bonus, but not essential for them to be useful.

SAMAS · Post by **SAMAS** » 2006-10-24 09:46pm

Dark Hellion wrote:No, because in order to fire link, you have to maintain LOS to both target, and another Fire Prism. Thus, to JSJ and shoot with all three they must either be in very close proximity (thus given them only 1 firelane) or must set up a chain of LOS between themselves and enemies. With another piece of terrain, this chain is nearly impossible to maintain.
The falcons work independently of one another, and as such can utilize three seperate fire lanes.

Fire Prisms are still nasty on their own though(Looks like someone took a lesson from Dawn of War), as they're S9 AP2 \ S5 AP 4 On their own with a BS of 4.

They really only need the linked shot when dealing with large amounts of Marines and Necrons. (OUT, damned Monolith!)

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2006-10-24 10:25pm

and getting an LOS on a monolith shouldn't be that difficult.

Lancer · Post by **Lancer** » 2006-10-25 09:51am

Hellion, do you regularly use lascannons to target GEQ units? If not, why would you ever use bank-shot against the same target (or even Firewarriors, Stormtroopers, and Aspect Warriors)? S5 means that you already wound on a 2+, and AP4 means that they already get no armor save. Bumping your pieplate up to S6 AP3 means that your getting almost no additional benefit against your target, and furthermore your losing that second (or third) pieplate which is perfectly capable of breaking yet another GEQ-squad.

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2006-10-25 10:51am

purhaps he's expecting a tidal wave oof extended carapac nids or NOBs

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2006-10-25 11:38am

Good point on the GeQ thing matt, but insert MeQ (say Necrons) into their, and my point stays.
Frankly, I think the only problem with the fire prism is that you must take 2 for a take all comers list, and this overlaps with the falcon. If any other army could take the prism, it would be a must have, but with the falcon's better performance against Drop Pods and Nids, it should always be taken first.

Lancer · Post by **Lancer** » 2006-10-25 11:58am

The Yosemite Bear wrote:purhaps he's expecting a tidal wave oof extended carapac nids or NOBs

Unless your facing a godzilla list, extended-carpace nids still won't be able to make their armor save, and the extra 16.7% chance (83.3% vs 66.7%)of causing wounds on T4 isn't worth sacrificing your second pieplate.

edit: Though NOBs was referring to Necron Monoliths rather than Nobz for some weird reason. Removed second half, as Fire Prisms vs Nobs is the same as extended-carpace nids.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-25 12:23pm

Dark Hellion wrote:Good point on the GeQ thing matt, but insert MeQ (say Necrons) into their, and my point stays.
Frankly, I think the only problem with the fire prism is that you must take 2 for a take all comers list, and this overlaps with the falcon. If any other army could take the prism, it would be a must have, but with the falcon's better performance against Drop Pods and Nids, it should always be taken first.

Well, the focused blank-shot is likely to pick off as many Necrons or Marines as the Pulse Laser, particularly with BS:4. Lots more if the opponent is dumb and places them all together in a knot. Its viability against power armour thus assured, its more the lack of a secondary weapon that is an issue.

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2006-10-25 03:02pm

It won't kill more than a falcon though, baring opponents stupidity or mathematical improbability, and the Falcon maximizes the improbability angle more by firing shear assloads of high strength shots. Combined with the Fireddragons in the Falcon, there is much more firepower in a similarly unkillable package.
Simply put, the new blast rules make blast weapons at best equivilent to an X 2 weapon, which means that the Pulse laser and the strong Fire prism shot are pretty much a wash. Thus all the other aspects of the falcon (transport, secondary weapon and shurikan cannon) come against the secondary aspects of the Fire Prism (linked shot). The linked shot has the aforementioned LOS restriction problems, and thus is far less important.

The Fireprism is massively inferior against Godzilla, is worse against pods, and is worse against demonbomb than the Falcon. It is marginally worse against Necrons and horde guard. Thus it is worse against 90% of the armies you will ever face in a tournament, and signifigantly worse against the top tier of those armies. Thus it is not a good tournament choice.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-25 03:17pm

Dark Hellion wrote:Simply put, the new blast rules make blast weapons at best equivilent to an X 2 weapon, which means that the Pulse laser and the strong Fire prism shot are pretty much a wash. Thus all the other aspects of the falcon (transport, secondary weapon and shurikan cannon) come against the secondary aspects of the Fire Prism (linked shot).

I pretty much said as much in the previous post. The Fire Prism could use a secondary weapon option.

Dark Hellion wrote:The Fireprism is massively inferior against Godzilla, is worse against pods, and is worse against demonbomb than the Falcon. It is marginally worse against Necrons and horde guard. Thus it is worse against 90% of the armies you will ever face in a tournament, and signifigantly worse against the top tier of those armies. Thus it is not a good tournament choice.

Oh, if you are going to carry on about tournament lists again, fuck you then.

Like the Wraithguard, the Fire Prism is good for a "themed" army now. Whereas previously it was shit even in that capacity, regardless of how you slice it.

Whatever. Either way I'm still sticking with Wave Serpents and an extra heavy weapon slot. Holofield or no holofield.

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2006-10-25 10:15pm

I only get to pull out my toys for tournaments, so there is no way I am going to spend money on anything that isn't just plain killer.
Its all on how you play the game really. I spend low budget percentage and I don't play many friendly games. Any game i play is playtesting or a local tournament.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-26 01:20pm

I re-read the list just now, and saw a few things I missed earlier. One thing of import that I misremembered from before:

THE CRYSTAL TARGETING MATRIX IS NO MORE!

This means no shoot and scoot manouvers, which means that you need to keep both Fire Prisms in line of sight to the enemy rather than just one of them if you're going for the combined shot.

I'm fixing the main list now, will update here in a few tics.

ALL DONE! Edits are in red. Some other posts in the threads have been modified too; but in all cases in red font so you can see the boo-boos as well as the corrections.

Lancer · Post by **Lancer** » 2006-10-26 02:18pm

I dunno, the Prism seems to be the superior choice against horde-guard simply because they can kill much more of them from much farther away.

Your right that Falcons are better at killing MEQ's (2/1.61 Star Falcon/Scat Falcon vs 1.11 Prism), and they also kill light vehicles better, but Eldar have units that already fill in those roles quite nicely. However, Prisms are solid anti-horde/heavy vehicle units (Prisms are superior against infantry models until you hit either T5 or 3+ save models and become superior against vehicles at AV 13).

If I got my math wrong, please correct me, but here's something I threw together in excel:

Code: Select all

Assumptions/notes:
Blast marker covers 2 infantry models / 1 vehicle model
Large blast marker covers 5 infantry models
No bank shot
Range to target is between 12" to 36" for the Falcon, 12" to 60" for the Prism
Star Falc = Starcannon Falcon
Scat Falc = Scatter Laser Falcon
Prism = Fire Prism (focused shot)
Disp = Fire Prism (dispersed shot)


Avg failed saves (armor & inv only) & unsavable wounds
T	Sv	(++) Star Falc | Guide | Scat Falc | Guide  |  Prism | Guide | Disp | Guide
3	5		0	2.00		 3.00	  2.39		 3.58		1.11	 1.48	 2.78	3.70
3	4		0	2.00		 3.00	  2.00		 3.00		1.11	 1.48	 2.78	3.70
3	3		0	2.00		 3.00	  1.61		 2.42		1.11	 1.48	 0.93	1.23
4	5		0	2.00		 3.00	  2.39		 3.58		1.11	 1.48	 2.22	2.96
4	4		0	2.00		 3.00	  2.00		 3.00		1.11	 1.48	 2.22	2.96
4	3		0	2.00		 3.00	  1.61		 2.42		1.11	 1.48	 0.74	0.99
4	2		5	1.33		 2.00	  0.94		 1.42		0.74	 0.99	 0.25	0.33
5	2		0	1.83		 2.75	  1.06		 1.58		1.11	 1.48	 0.28	0.37
6	3		0	1.67		 2.50	  1.28		 1.92		0.89	 1.19	 0.37	0.49
6	2		0	1.67		 2.50	  0.89		 1.33		0.89	 1.19	 0.19	0.25
7	2		0	1.50		 2.25	  0.72		 1.08		0.67	 0.89	 0.09	0.12
8	2		0	1.33		 2.00	  0.56		 0.83		0.44	 0.59	 0.09	0.12


Avg # Penetrating & Glancing Hits (no Guide):
			Star Falcon		Scat Falcon		Prism	
		AV	Pen	 Glan	Pen	 Glan	Pen	 Glan
		10	1.00	0.50	1.33	0.83	0.56	0.11
		11	0.67	0.50	0.83	0.83	0.44	0.11
		12	0.33	0.50	0.33	0.83	0.33	0.11
		13	0.17	0.17	0.17	0.17	0.22	0.11
		14	0.00	0.17	0.00	0.17	0.11	0.11

As for their transport role, the only time a Falcon would be more useful than a Serpent is if your transporting Harlequins, since the change to Spirit Stones means that you can pretty much write off any Eldar transport's shooting capabilities if you're actually planning on using them to transport a unit.

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2006-10-26 03:16pm

What is the change to the SS that makes it such a way. SS works the same as ExArmour correct? (I don't own the book, so I can't look through it)
For the math, you should make large blast only 4, because a line of units will only allow for 3 models to get hit (actually only 2+ partial if fully spaced) so you should only use 4 for sake of conservativeness (which is why ordinance blasts generally blow against anyone who deploys carefully).
And while the prism is better against heavy vehicles and GeQ, those are the things that are needed least in Eldar. Harlequin shit all over GeQ, as do jetbikes, and FireDragon, Harlequins, Singing Spears and Bright lances wreck heavy vehicles.
As I keep repeating, FOR TOURNAMENT PLAY. the prism fails because it does jobs that other models do, but it does them less efficiently, and in a more easily targetted package.

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2006-10-26 07:43pm

oh SHIT harlies have rending now...

which means they do tend to kill vehicles...

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-26 09:30pm

The Yosemite Bear wrote:oh SHIT harlies have rending now...

which means they do tend to kill vehicles...

Heh, you're noticing that now? Try them against a Carnifex for extra shit and giggles. Then laugh evilly.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-28 01:51pm

More edits in orange.