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You know what I think? I think even though 6th Ed. is one of the better editions of 40K I've ever played, it's still got some balance problems. I know, you're probably thinking no shit, but things got very complicated this edition with allies, fortifications and flyers. Most of these problems are not because of the actual edition (some parts is), but the fact that certain army books benefits too much from the rules. For example, Dark Eldar gain Jink on all of their vehicles and love the hell out of Night Fighting, but there's a lot of horrible nerfs to the army as well just from the general rules.
Let's see how many armies there are for 40K:
Blood Angels - Buffs
Chaos Daemons - Buffs
Chaos Space Marines - Nurgle buffs up the ass
Dark Eldar - About even
Eldar - About even
Grey Knights - Buffs
Imperial Guard - Buffs
Necrons - Unbelievably good
Orks - Buffs
Sisters of Battle - Buffs
Space Marines - Buffs
Space Wolves - Even, the lack of anti-Flyers is pretty sad
Tau Empire - Buffs
Tyranids - About even
You know what I think is going to happen next 40K Major?
The top armies will be:
- Necrons - Just out of control right now.
- Imperial Guard - Still a force to be reckoned with, and access to the best Flyer (Vendetta).
- Grey Knights - The best MEQ force with a lot more options.
How does Dark Eldar fair against these armies? If you roll Night Fighting, you might have a +10 point advantage except for Necrons.
- Imperial Guard - 80-20 them. Once a bad matchup, always a bad matchup. Hydra changes make Flyers useless, still has the cheap, cost-effective and deadly units they had in the past, S10 large blasts all over the place, HP changes doesn't really matter because Guard is still plentiful and equally effective vs. our higher cost units. Plentiful S6+ shooting vs. our nerfed FNP.
- Necrons - 70-30 them. Necrons just dominate right now with the new rules: Fantastic shooting options, Flyers all over the place that are dedicated transports for troops, AV13 Fast Skimmer troop transports with 4 HP, destroys vehicles like they weren't even there due to Gauss.
- Grey Knights - 60-40 them. Still the best MEQ force with lots of options: Paladins are very unique and they count as characters, has access to the Stormraven, 2+ armor saves up the ass, and powerful anti-tank options.
- Eldar - 60-40 them. Plentiful S6 shooting that gets through FNP and access to better BRB psychic lores. Jink now gives their vehicles a free Flickerfield. Mechdar will be serious problems for us, but other builds such as Footdar will be better managed. Although, they can now take DE allies which makes Shadow Field allocation with Fortune really fucked up. We still get our Flyers and better manipulation of Night Fighting, but that's pretty much it.
- Orks - 50-50 even. Their new Flyers are incredible and there's a lot of buffs that benefits them this edition. The best army to Overwatch with, Lootas are amazing and their Shootas are fantastic. Our poisoned shooting is still very effective against them.
- MEQ - 50-50 even. This includes pretty much every MEQ army that's worth mentioning (BA, SW, Vanilla), there's no doubt that they got buffed. Krak is now S6 in combat, Rapid Fire is now easy mode, Stormraven is just fantastic. SW don't get Flyers, but they still have their Long Fangs who can now Snap Fire on the move and have access to the Aegis Defense Line. If I was to rank them, it would be BA > SW > Vanilla.
- Tau - 50-50 even. This depends entirely on terrain and how much Lances you carry in your army. One of the better cat and mouse games that depends on good generalship and player skill to win.
- CSM - 60-40 us. I predict good results against the like of CSM even though some of their shit got ridiculous. As DE, you shouldn't really worry about anything except for Nurgle lists with Epidermis. True T5 on Typhus and PMs that can't be Power Weaponed, and T6 on their Bikers and DPs can be troublesome, but DE still have the answers for it. I predict a 50-50 matchup if that's the case.
- Tyranids - 70-30 us. Last edition, I would of given this a laughable 80-20 because the matchup was so bad, but now with their 6th Ed. buffs, I'd say the MU is a little easier. Fearless got a lot better, they can now hit our vehicles on a 3+ no matter how far we moved, they lost their 4+ cascading cover but they gained more than they've lost. Definitely a better edition for them.
- Sisters - 70-30 us. Weaker marines with less options. Not much more to say here.
Keep in mind that this is a highly-opinionated piece. Let the riot begin.
4 comments:
I disagree on Necrons dominating DE. I think we match up pretty damn well with them. Yeah they take off HPs like no other, but when I play, I count on my vehicles dying since a stiff breeze knocks them out of the sky.
Their flyers will hurt yes. But I look at it like this. If all of their troops are mounted in flyers, and since half of your army has to be on the board, you just blast off all those 5 man Warrior squads. They cant have a lot on the board if they have a bunch of Scythes running around. Flyers dont score or contest.
We dominate Wraiths with all of our Str. 8. Praetorians and Lychguard are another joke. Scarab farms could be trouble, but not really. You can torrent Spiders and ID the Scarabs. Any other vehicles they have besides their Night Scythes and Doom Scythes die from our Lances reliably.
Now I dont think we are an auto-win, but I think any Necron player should fear playing us. We should win 60-70% of the time against them I feel.
Against the other armies:
For MEQ: I think BA are still trouble, but not as much as before. Grey Knights are still the bane of our existence with all the hots they pour out to kill our tanks. 40% against BA and Gk 60-70% against all others.
Nids: We should win 90% of the time, period.
IG: Toughest matchup by far. I agree with your assessment. Too much armor. Too much Firepower. 20% Win ratio I think.
Orks: Is a 80% Win. Kan walls are much weaker. Trukk boyz are laughable. Horde orks could cause problems... If they get there.
CSM: They are a pretty easy win, but Nurgle will be tough. 70% win ration there.
Eldar: i find tough sometiems because Wave Serpents suck to fight against. But with HPs, we should win 60-70% of the time.
Tau: They alot liek DE in the sense that hot rolling from shooting can just roll people. They can out gun us and knock our flyers out relaibly. 50% I think.
Sorry for the long post. Just thought I'd throw my ideas in here and let you know what I thought.
I disagree with Orks being a breeze, they got some serious buffs in the form of new Flyers and 6th Ed. rules work very well in their advantage. The Dakkajet alone should worry you as a DE player. I think this MU will want some serious playtesting as they're a much different army now.
I also disagree with your assessment with Necrons. They're an army with virtually no weakness under the 6th Ed. rules, and their firepower is just amazing. Annihilation Barges, a Doom Scythe, a couple of Nightscythe transports, and Ghost Arks with Warriors should be more than enough to wear DE down. It's the attrition factor that really fights against DE, but if we draw Night Fighting in the mission, we can swing the favor more in our direction. Then again, Necrons have the ability to just turn on the lights if they want on their turn; instantly taking away your Shrouded/Stealth advantage. I can see no better than 60-40 in their favor on the norm, and 50-50 under Night Fighting and they have no Crypteks.
As a DE player and an Ork player I think you are seriously underestimating that matchup. Orks, love snap fire and they also love precision shot (half their character hits will be precision shots).
Kans are dead, and trucks are not great. I can agree with that.
However this edition will be the dakka edition. You will now see green tide(of shootas) supported by dakkajets and/or dakkaforts: A battle wagon with 4 big shootas, some extra gubbins loaded with 12 lootas and 3 meks with big shootas (who can all repair a hull point on a 4+), this beast can move 12 inches and snap fire 12-36 S7 shots and 21 S5 shots a turn. You literally just get drowned in dice. Not to mention when those 3 meks are not snap firing they can each precision shot with their big shootas.
Bikes and Nob bikers are still great now that they are T5, have wrath hits. As it stands each nob biker benefits is a character and therefore has precision shot with their twin linked Dakkaguns.
In my last DE game I played against a list with two warpheads and three Dakkajets (lol warpheads...who uses warheads!). Unfortunately my DE arrogance got the better of me and I soon found out that a 61% chance of getting Waagh! on any given turn is no joke. 4/6 of the turns those jets were giving me Waagh! from above (54 S6 AP4 Twinlinked BS3 shots). I got absolutely tabled.
Interesting ideas, and I agree with most. However I think the Eldar estimate is a bit off. I think the introduction of hull points has made Eldar vehicles worse. Lets look at how many Dark Lances it takes on average to kill a Wave Serpent. In 5th ignoring cover saves it's 67% to hit, 33% to get a pen, and 33% to get a 5 or 6 on the chance = 7.3% (roughly 14 Dark Lances shots to kill a Wave Serpent). In 6th (ignoring explodes), 67% to hit, 50% to glance, 67% failed jink save = 22.4% to remove one kill point (roughly 4.5 dark lance shots to get a hull point, 13 dark lance shots to kill it entirely) and that's excluding the 5% chance each shot has of exploding the wave serpent in one shot.
When we look at the falcon with holofields, which had a 1 in 9 chance of being destroyed in 5th edition after you got the penetration hit. Now you only have to get 3 hull points off it, it's much easier to destroy. Walkwalkers going down to 2 hull points also hurt.
I would say that a typical mechdar build will be even easier to beat in 6th edition. There may a swift to hybridar (new term :) ) with the inclusion of wraithguard troop choices backed up eldrad/farseers, and the ever popular wraithlords (who are now characters so can challenge out annoying sergeants with powerfists).
My big worry for Dark Eldar is a shift in the meta further awat from single shot high strength weapons (eg, lascannons, meltaguns) to multiple medium shot weapons (eg. autocannons, assault cannons). They give a nice duality in being good a stripping hull points from armour 10-12 vehicles and being good weight of far against troops. Such weapons shred DE vehicles better and quickler than the single shot weapons, plus get rid of out FnP.
Rathstar
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