6th Ed. First Impressions

Pen and paper, keeping it old school.

I played a 1500 point game today against my friends Blood Angels and here's what I learned.  Once again, this will be done in bullet points, so it's easier to follow.

Dark Eldar was the army I used and here is the army list:

1500

14 VP

HQ:

Archon (Huskblade, BP, ST, SF, Drugs) = 160

TROOP:

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

10x Warriors (Raider, NS, Blaster, SC) = 185

9x Wyches (Raider NS, Hekatrix/Agonizer/BP, Haywires) = 225

10x Wyches (Raider NS, Hekatrix/Agonizer/BP, Haywires) = 235

HEAVY:

Ravager (NS) = 115

Ravager (NS) = 115

Voidraven (NS/FF, 4x SF) = 205

Here are the changes I made to my Dark Eldar:

• Dropped Flickerfields on transports.
• Added Haywires to the Wyches because they're amazing.
• Dropped my normal 2 unit of Wyches for more Lances because Wyches are more utility now.
• Added a Voidraven with Flickerfield because then he doesn't need to take any Jink saves.  The 4x Shatterfield Missiles are there because they're awesome.
• Switched the Archon to my Huskblade setup because I wanted to play with him this game.

Here is what I learned from playing my first game of 6th Ed:

• We played a mission where Night Fighting was active and my Night Vision was an amazing advantage.
• Warlord Traits are fucking amazing.  He had Move Through Cover on every unit with 12" of his Libby (amazing for Blood Angels) and I had the trait that made his reserves come in 1 late.  I will probably always take the Strategic traits because they're fluffy and powerful for Dark Eldar.
• Capturing relics as objectives is pretty fun, especially when they can be really good.  I got one that gave a capturing unit Skyfire so that was super exciting.  Even though I had a small group of guys, I got out to claim the objective just because my 18" Blaster now had the ability to shoot in the air.
• Reserves that come in on 3+ is really awesome.  My Voidraven came in on Turn 2 and kicked the living shit out of his Death Company.  It did 1 Void Lance wound and 14 normal wounds.
• Speaking of wounds, I told him to do the 14 normal wounds first and then the Void Lance wound.  The Sergeant made the LoS!, but the option to force different wounds in a specific order is really good.
• My Voidraven also came in from a direction that targeted the Death Company with the most power weapons first.  I wanted to kill those first by wound allocation so I flew in from that angle.  It's really amazing that direction matters now for shooting, and I love that.
• Sadly, my Voidraven got shot out of the sky by his Stormraven on his third turn.  It failed to come in the second turn because of my Warlord's trait.  This gives me the impression that dogfighting will be super important when other Flyers are on the table.
• What I should of done with my Voidraven was shoot at his dudes on Turn 2, and then immediately turn 90 degrees and fly off the board on Turn 3 after his ship failed to fly on.  This would mean that if his Flyer came on Turn 3, my Voidraven will be ready for him automatically on Turn 4.  Top Gun, I gotta watch it again.
• Snapfiring my Splinter Cannon and Blasters was a fun experience, even though I didn't hit anything.  The option to do so is still important though, as a lucky Blaster hit can translate to big damage.
• I glanced the crap out of his Rifleman Dread with my Dark Lances.  Took a while because of 25% 5+ cover  saves, but I managed to do it.  Even though I didn't penetrate once, the hull point damage was enough.
• Jinking is awesome on Fast Skimmers.  Jink with Shroud and Stealth because of Night Fighting is amazing.  It saved a lot of my vehicles from his Rifleman Dread.
• Focus Fire is amazing and has a lot of valuable uses.  There was a time one of my Ravagers had clear line of sight to 3 of his models and the other ones were behind cover.  That's fine, because I can only inflict 3 max wounds so I focus fired onto those 3 models.  I rolled 3 hits, 3 wounds and 3 of his models died, including 1 meltagun.
• My other Raiders also shot at his unit with the diminished squad and since I peeled away 3 dudes from the back, his Sergeant was exposed and I shot him with a Dark Lance.  He failed his LoS! and the Sergeant died with the Power Fist with him.  Directional damage is amazing.
• Wyches with Haywires just shit on Dreads now.  I shot my Blast Pistol, threw a Haywire and then charged in with Haywires up the ying yang.  Dead Dread, just like that.
• Agonizers are great, but not against Terminators.  I threw 2 squads of Wyches into a unit of Assault Terminators and they just didn't give a fuck.  If I threw those Wyches into normal marines, things could of been much better (especially since I had re-roll wounds), but TDA with FNP is definitely a hard nut to crack with my power weapons being AP3.
• Challenges are great; it keeps my Archon safe, pins one of his models with my Huskblade and it forces his Sergeant to fight or do nothing.  This is great for me because it means less attacks will go into my Archon and I can constantly keep him safe provided there's characters in a unit.  It also keeps those Fists and other high priority threats locked in 1v1 combat.
• His Librarian had the Hallucination psychic power so I was super worried about that.  I didn't get to see what it did, or how Psychic Charges worked or anything because I just focus fired his squad with Lances until they died horribly.
• Speaking of which, did you guys notice that the LoS! rule applies to wounds and unsaved wounds?  That means I can take a invulnerable save, fail it and then pass that wound onto some random dude.  That's how LeMartes survived the first Lance, it was either him or some random guy from LoS! but my opponent just rolled a 4+.  He passed the Invul so he didn't even need to LoS! (?? need to re-read this)
• I think I'm going to drop the Huskblade Archon until they FAQ that to be AP2 or something.  Agonizers are still great because of the AP3 and you'll be going first vs. most things anyway, and the 4+ to wound is just fantastic.  The Huskblade is definitely not worth the points now, as I think even a normal Venom Blade is better.  Even the Succubus is starting to look really good considering how one with Haywires and a Venom Blade is 75 points.  She comes with Combat Drugs and if she rolls +1 WS, you're looking at a WS9 model with I8 and 5 attacks on the charge.  That's one hell of a bargain.
• Oh, and I had to get out and capture my VPs.  I felt very unsafe, but it was for the best.

That's it for now folks.  Hope you learn as much from this as I did.