A quick word on Nids

Squirt, spurt, squirt, dead.

By now, most of you know that I'm a Dark Eldar player.  In the last 3 or so years since the Codex release, I've built only a single Venom.  Just last night, I put together my second Venom out of sheer boredom because I felt like modeling while I'm home sick.  Some of you who have been following my blog for a while will also know that I like playing my Dark Eldar a certain way.  It might not be the most effective or even the most tournament worthy, but it's the way I like to play and its been working out pretty well.

For those of who don't know, I like to play Kabal heavy with no Haemonculi elements and I like Raiders over Venoms with full man squads.  Unfortunately, I get the shit kicked out of my by Ignore Cover because mech heavy Dark Eldar needs their tricks to survive.  It goes without saying that I'm not doing so well vs. optimized Taudar lists.

Just today, I played against a chap on Vassal who I know is running the new Nids.  Alright, cool, I figure why not.  Let's put my 1850 pure DE list to the test.  Keep in mind once again that my list is built for all-comers, Raider heavy, Lance heavy, and it only sports 2 Venoms.

Exact list is the following:

1850

20 kp

HQ:

Succubus (Agonizer, Haywire) = 90

TROOPS:

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

9x Wyches (Raider NS/AS, Hekatrix/VB, Haywires) = 198

ELITE:

3x Trueborn (Venom NS/SC, 3x Blaster) = 156

3x Trueborn (Venom NS/SC, 3x Blaster) = 156

HEAVY:

Ravager (NS) = 115

Ravager (NS) = 115

Voidraven (FF, 2x Shatter) = 175

The guy I played was running Swarmlord with 3 Tyrant Guard, 3x Exocrines with Regen, 2x 2x Venoms, and a unit of 3x Zoans.  The rest of the army was filled with 20x man units of Terms and I think that was it.  Regardless, he was running fodder cover, 3+ Shrouded play from the Venoms, and Exocrines because they're pretty good units overall.

After 2 turns in, he calls the game, calls me a douchebag cheater, a list tailor and leaves the game.  Now I don't know what planet he lives on, but I don't think a Raider-heavy, lance heavy list that runs 2 Venoms is anything close to tailoring lists.  If anything, this list shits on MEQ much harder than anything else out there.  He just got outplayed and outplayed hard:  I always run Night Shields on my ships and I used their range to pick apart the first Exocrine (extreme focus fire), waited until his Terms covering one unit of Venoms moved into range before focus firing and destroying them utterly.  I then focused lances into the exposed Venoms, ID'd them off and finished off a second Exocrine before the rage rant started happening.  Even after I explained to him that this is my standard list, it's not a tailored list and I pretty much play the same shit every game, he doesn't believe me and tells me off.

Gah, it's so lame man.  Get a better sense of sportsmanship please!  Even with 2x Flyrants, I don't think he would of done well.  One failed grounding test and you're done, every lance in the army will go into you, especially since Dakka Flyrants have to get close to do damage to my ships.  Once the Synapse units are dead, it's pretty much a turkey shoot.  If anything, Nid players should take from this game one important thing:  No matter what happens, enough wounds will do you in.  The 3+ cover Shroud is awesome to have, but you really need a way to hide those Venomthropes entirely.  S8 might be pretty rare these days, but there's some armies out there that are still packing them.  If they get an opportunity to hit your exposed Venomthropes, their measly cover save in the open will not be able to save them!  The name of the game is opportunity, and good players will always find an opening.

One last thing:  If you're going to bitch the second you hear Dark Eldar when you're playing Nids, you need to expand your horizons a bit more.  You're never going to become a better player if you give up before trying to out-think your opponent.  Unless he's packing a douchebagery 9-Venom/Blasterborn/3 Ravager list, you should be alright.