Patch 2.5 (WIP)

[Laplace's Demon]

Rant warning: be advised.

Dropping that cloaked melta squad in fog of war is basically a gen farm wipe in t2, in my mind. Delays an ig nuke but hits enemy economy, t2 performance and delays access to t3, all at once...

Related, does this mean the warp spider exarch gets to deep strike his warp spider global in fog of war too? Group teleport has a max range, so its a valid question... and one we all know the answer to. Queue laughter. Xenos don't get that kind of love, they're xenos!

Hell, why not let drop pods come into fog of war? Or some ork stormboys. That might be nice, and neither of those are cloaked, so you can actually see them on the map when they come in!

*goes to cry in a corner

[Laplace's Demon]

That cheap Eldar T1 :/ 270 req for Dire Avengers is under priced imo.

Gotta make up for the bleed insanity somehow...

[DandyFrontline]

Ummm, why the change to the HWT? Haven't we already learned with Catachans that more members = more bleed and with a squad that has a special unit (the one at the main gun) that it causes issues with its performance? It already has the highest number of members for a setup team, why two more?

And is there any way to have the Stormtrooper Call-In within a certain radius of the HQ so it's not too strong?

I think each model reinforce cost will be adjusted to squad size (divided by 6 instead of 4). And total HP boost is pretty good. HWT is not the same to catachans - you cant just shoot them frontal and bleed models, the only way is to outflank or jump on them.

[ChrisNihilus]

* Kasrkin Melta Guns upgrade removed

I can see why you remove it, but Kasrkins don't feel right without a third option.
They are suppose to be weapons specialists.

Maybe adding some other special weapon?

[Dark Riku]

I have some concerns too about the storm trooper call-in too. Being able to call them down in the FoW seems a bit OTT.

That cheap Eldar T1 :/ 270 req for Dire Avengers is under priced imo.

Gotta make up for the bleed insanity somehow...

Micro is the answer here.

[Laplace's Demon]

I have some concerns too about the storm trooper call-in too. Being able to call them down in the FoW seems a bit OTT.

That cheap Eldar T1 :/ 270 req for Dire Avengers is under priced imo.

Gotta make up for the bleed insanity somehow...

Micro is the answer here.

I agree, micro is the answer.... if you're wearing power armor. In practice, when it comes to low health light infantry, your choices are a) bleed or b) concede ground. Given how important holding ground is in Dow 2 (gens at minimum), you choose to bleed.

But, I claim no monopoly on wisdom. Please post a game where you can show how you play eldar without bleed. I will be the first to change how I play eldar if you can...

[Asmon]

There's bleed and there's heavy bleed. Obviously playing Eldar while maintaining a low enough level of bleed is possible, it merely requires more micro than usual.

[Interdiction]

I like that Kasrkins are getting an armor change, maybe more people will use them now. Although, I was also hoping to see the Acolyte squad implemented for GK somehow. Looks like a great patch all around though, can't wait to see what changes Orks are getting!

[Crewfinity]

That cheap Eldar T1 :/ 270 req for Dire Avengers is under priced imo.

I agree completely with this.

From the perspective of the ork vs eldar matchup, DA are now strictly better than shoota boyz for the same cost:
Dire Avengers have 42.5 piercing dps versus shoota's 35, the same health, and .5 more speed at 270 req. in early engagements that is going to be absolutely punishing.

banshees also wipe the floor with sluggas, having 150 more health, 10 more melee skill, 134 power melee dps compared to the sluggas 150 melee dps (better vs HI, SHI, and commanders), and .5 more speed.
now granted, banshees are 350 req compared to slugga's 270, but overall with the recent health buffs the eldar T1 has gotten a lot more resilient, and if DA's are going back to 270 req i think shees could probably also be reverted back to 400 req. I know their chase potential isn't as good these days, but with the rest of the changes to eldar T1 they seem more suited in a counter-initiation role to protect shuricans/rangers, which isn't as affected by that nerf.

Coupled with this is the change to the DA exarch in the last patch, having access to him in T1 really changes the matchup a lot.
the DA exarch has 275 health, 24.3 melee dps, 12.89 piercing dps, and detects in radius 15(?) for only 85/15
shoota nob has 285 health, 15.4 melee dps, 16 piercing dps, and detects in radius 30 for 75/25.
In my opinion the exarch could go up to 20 power. he adds a good chunk of piercing dps and durability as well as a lot of melee utility versus other ranged squads.

comparing them to shootas again:
DA's with exarch have 55.39 piercing dps and 875 health for 355/15
shootas with nob have 51 piercing dps and 885 health for 345/25
especially since battle equipment makes them much better at avoiding bleed due to perfect cover and FoF, I think the DA exarch gives too much, with good stats and detection for super cheap (cheapest power detector in t1 besides sentinel)

finally, the last point i want to make is that with the new changes to rangers, 2 DA's and 2 rangers put out a huge amount of ranged damage with very little counterplay available. 2 DA's with exarchs provice 113.28 piercing dps (double fully upgraded shootas dish out 134 piercing dps for reference), and are fast and resilient. 2 rangers lets you punish ranged blobs as well as punishing any approaches with 2 kinetic pulses while the DA's unload on the enemy, and with further upgrades this build is even more punishing, with grenade spikes, perfect cover, infiltration, and ranger suppression. with the changes making eldar units more resilient and less expensive, its going to be very hard to punish eldar players at all next patch.

personally im not sure i'm a fan of rangers suppressing, it allows 2 of them to absolutely dominate the battlefield.

[Cyris]

comparing them to shootas again:
DA's with exarch have 55.39 piercing dps and 875 health for 355/15
shootas with nob have 51 piercing dps and 885 health for 345/25
especially since battle equipment makes them much better at avoiding bleed due to perfect cover and FoF, I think the DA exarch gives too much, with good stats and detection for super cheap (cheapest power detector in t1 besides sentinel)

In fairness, if you are going to bring up battle equipment when making this side by side, Big Shootas should be added in. If we do, I think it comes out to:

DA with exarch and equipment have 55.39 piercing dps and 875 health for 420/30
shootas with nob / big shootas have 78 piercing dps and 885 health for 420/45

Also worth noting that the nob has die last, while the exarch does not. There is also the exarch damage reduction in addition to Embolden, against the nob having HI armor, better detection radius and 100% fotm interestingly.


Again, I have no strong opinion on if this is good or bad, just adding some data.

[Crewfinity]

In fairness, if you are going to bring up battle equipment when making this side by side, Big Shootas should be added in. If we do, I think it comes out to:

DA with exarch and equipment have 55.39 piercing dps and 875 health for 420/30
shootas with nob / big shootas have 78 piercing dps and 885 health for 420/45

Also worth noting that the nob has die last, while the exarch does not. There is also the exarch damage reduction in addition to Embolden, against the nob having HI armor, better detection radius and 100% fotm interestingly.


Again, I have no strong opinion on if this is good or bad, just adding some data.

some incorrect data

fully upgraded shootas have 67.54 piercing dps, not 78.

shoota nobz also give a damage increase same as exarch gives damage resistance, but those both come into effect in T2 and i'm more focused on the early firepower that eldar has now. I also didnt add battle equipment into the calculations because it only gives abilities, which is much more of a luxury upgrade than the performance boosts from the exarch or shoota nob in terms of survivability and firepower. eldar can rush 2 DA's and get exarchs around the same time the ork player gets one shoota nob and enjoy their increased firepower all through t1 before getting battle equipment just before t2.

really my issue is that eldar can get way too much cheap firepower onto the field quickly these days

Shoota nob has regular infantry armor, not HI....
is this why i've seen you get plasma vs orks?

DA warlock also has the disruptive leap which can be really annoying when sneaky eldar players use it to stop my warboss charging

[Kvn]

@ Crewfinity

I'm going to have to disagree with you on that one. For starters, the Eldar T1 roster didn't get more durable. Their first-engagement force did. They still have the same maximum health values, but now they get it out of the gate rather than after they buy aspect/battle equipment. This is really nice right in those first few minutes of the game, but it doesn't affect much beyond that since you're pretty much always going to buy those upgrades very quickly anyway.

As for comparing DAs to Shootas, they really aren't able to be looked at in that kind of way. One thing you didn't touch on was the incredibly good Big Shoota upgrade, offering suppression on demand from solid range as well as a sizable dps boost that's centered on a few models, making losses less damaging to their killing potential.

Exarch doesn't really change all that much of T1 given that he's almost never worth the cost. Eldar are very dependent on power early on, with so many upgrades that they need to buy to make their units worthwhile (especially in T2). He offers a modest dps boost, but DAs aren't designed to stand and fight in the early game. It's only in T2, when he gets his damage resistance aura and embolden ability, that they become a viable front line unit. Plus, as mentioned by Cyris, he isn't a die-last model the way the Shoota Nob is, nor does his 15 range detection offer any kind of real utility against infiltrating units besides mines and IEDs.

One important thing to note is that Shootas compliment a vastly different army composition than DAs. Orks are much more aggressive, capable of fielding things like Storm Boyz, the Pain Boy, and getting high-dps weapons on all of their commanders. Eldar by comparison favor a more mobile, less bashy style, with higher speed, harassment/buff centered commanders (aside from the Warp Spider's trolling heavy gauge + advanced targeters build), and a defensive line to fall back on in the form of the Guardian Weapons Team, which is one of the best setup teams. Since the armies aren't the same, even if the units themselves are similar, you can't really directly compare them with just numbers. There's a lot of contextual information that's lost in doing that.

2x Rangers is actually a really bad build most of the time. It's a huge power-sink in T1 with no scaling potential once vehicles and tougher infantry hit the field. As for their suppression, they can only keep one squad down at a time, where as a GWT can suppress an entire army for roughly half the cost.

[Cyris]

some incorrect data

Ah, I was running the numbers in T2, and you were talking about T1. 67 is fine, which lets us ignore Embolden and the DA damage reduction too. This still leaves shootas with better damage for the exact same req cost (and 15 more power). That doesn't seem to follow with your complaint that they deal too much damage for cheap? If we are talking stright out of the box, un-upgraded DA's do better dps then shootas, but once you want to consider battle equipment you have to let the shootas spend comparable amounts, and then it swaps: shootas have better dps and survivability (die last model and less dps loss from bleed) but worse abilities. Seems reasonable?

In any case, I do still think that if DA's needed a buff, bring down the cost of battle equipment instead of the unit price. I just like the flavor better of "don't bleed" and "use abilities".

EDIT: Oh whops, I totally did think all Nobs had HI!

[terpterp]

The IG changes look awesome, I think the kasrkin changes in particular are very good. Being able to call storm troopers into the fog means I'll probably use the ability now, that's the perfect buff it needed. In regards to people saying its an easy gen bash though, not really. You could already sneak storm troopers behind enemy lines to gen bash, that's easy enough already. Even if you call them in you still have to wait for the melta guns upgrade to go through. And after you bash the gens, you're left with a unit that's only useful in niche situations, but that's a whole other topic.

I don't know about the base turret killing, but that doesn't seem feasible. There are already ways to be a dickhead in the game- base nukes, dropping other certain globals on an army at base (noxious cloud, hellfury ect). Killing the turrets and walking your army up there would be about as effective as driving a vehicle into their base. Its a dick move, and it can be effective, but usually isn't. A hero with group teleport can essentially already do this.

[Thibix Magnus]

Several posts have been asking for a cost increase to banshees, I first thought it was meant to restore their charge alongside but it seems not (please correct me if I misunderstood). This now really looks like "DA's cost 270 so banshees should cost 400", which I fail to understand. I mean, I'm not an expert at all about T1 economics and subtle stuff but but but... I would have thought the cost of a squad should be a bit more related to... like... the squad itself ?
For me it is very clear the previous cost decrease was fully deserved if they lose their absolutely cornerstone role that was to milk the maximum return on carefully set-up engagements and combos, with their squad wipes. The are now as balanced as before, but a more enjoyable balance for non-eldar players. More oriented to perform in battle than for a devastating aftermath, where you can't do anything but look at them running after your squads through the entire map (I had no problem with that but I somewhat understood the change).

@Crewfinity,
The supposed role of a given squad is kind of my obsession in this forum I personally don't like to keep banshees as babysitters for shuris, I love to charge with them if said charge is carefully set up. I also enjoy 2 banshees even if it is not the most efficient build, and now it might be a bit more viable (though I can't play a lot right now). I'm always afraid that if we assume a single main, optimal use for a unit to make balance statements it could affect other uses and lead to reduce the creativity potential of the game.

As said with Cyris in the DA discussion, I'm not defending the DA cost decrease though. If people thought they were under-performing I would personally prefer better tools to avoid losses when needed rather than cost efficiency, by faction design... but please, no moar abilities, just better ones

(this could be moved to a thread ?)

[Crewfinity]

@ Crewfinity

I'm going to have to disagree with you on that one. For starters, the Eldar T1 roster didn't get more durable. Their first-engagement force did. They still have the same maximum health values, but now they get it out of the gate rather than after they buy aspect/battle equipment. This is really nice right in those first few minutes of the game, but it doesn't affect much beyond that since you're pretty much always going to buy those upgrades very quickly anyway.

i think it's more far-reaching than that. they're harder to bleed early on , and small differences in very early game can snowball very quickly with unit timings. couple that with reduced reinforcement costs and you can be a lot more aggressive with eldar than you used to. in t1 eldar has always been a glass cannon race, but now they're getting more durability and reinforcement costs while still being a more high dps unit. additionally, the upgrades aren't as mandatory now that the performance increases they give are smaller, you can be more selective about what you purchase.

Exarch doesn't really change all that much of T1 given that he's almost never worth the cost. Eldar are very dependent on power early on, with so many upgrades that they need to buy to make their units worthwhile (especially in T2). He offers a modest dps boost, but DAs aren't designed to stand and fight in the early game. It's only in T2, when he gets his damage resistance aura and embolden ability, that they become a viable front line unit. Plus, as mentioned by Cyris, he isn't a die-last model the way the Shoota Nob is, nor does his 15 range detection offer any kind of real utility against infiltrating units besides mines and IEDs.

in my opinion with the lastest changes DA's are a much more viable frontline unit than they used to be. the only durability increase they get from T2 is a 20% damage reduction, which is hardly game-changing when T2 units are hitting the field. having exarchs in T1 at 15 power lets DA's be much more aggressive, with 2 squads and 2 exarchs as your first power purchases you have a really good firebase for very cheap and very early on in the game. you dont even need to get battle equipment in this case since you have DA's as your primary damage dealers, you can save for shuries or rangers. I think it's a matter of efficiency, eldar's early game has gotten a lot of buffs and i'm not sure the tradeoffs have been enough. 15 detection range is still enough to be able to spot the LA or infiltrating melee units and react, as well as avoiding mines, further increasing performance and durability.

2x Rangers is actually a really bad build most of the time. It's a huge power-sink in T1 with no scaling potential once vehicles and tougher infantry hit the field. As for their suppression, they can only keep one squad down at a time, where as a GWT can suppress an entire army for roughly half the cost.

fire dragons solve most of these problems
i agree that shuricans are amazing but rangers in pairs scale really well with their abilities and suppression on demand. kinetic pulse is amazing at all stages of the game as well.

[Kvn]

i think it's more far-reaching than that. they're harder to bleed early on , and small differences in very early game can snowball very quickly with unit timings. couple that with reduced reinforcement costs and you can be a lot more aggressive with eldar than you used to. in t1 eldar has always been a glass cannon race, but now they're getting more durability and reinforcement costs while still being a more high dps unit. additionally, the upgrades aren't as mandatory now that the performance increases they give are smaller, you can be more selective about what you purchase.

Except that Eldar really can't be that aggressive. Certainly not nearly to the point that Orks can. They have no jump troops for fast counters to entrenched positions, nor do they have any units that are good at genbashing. Banshees and DAs can do a job of it en-mass, but you need to dedicate your whole army where as Orks can just send a squad of burna-equipped Sluggas. Their durability isn't as much as you might think (DAs get an extra 20 hp per model out of the gate, 1/5 of a Guardsman each) and they still bleed quite heavily. With the recent nerfs to Eldar killing potential, it's rather difficult to justify keeping them as such a high-cost race due to the fact that they have far fewer ways of compensating for it.

in my opinion with the lastest changes DA's are a much more viable frontline unit than they used to be. the only durability increase they get from T2 is a 20% damage reduction, which is hardly game-changing when T2 units are hitting the field. having exarchs in T1 at 15 power lets DA's be much more aggressive, with 2 squads and 2 exarchs as your first power purchases you have a really good firebase for very cheap and very early on in the game. you dont even need to get battle equipment in this case since you have DA's as your primary damage dealers, you can save for shuries or rangers. I think it's a matter of efficiency, eldar's early game has gotten a lot of buffs and i'm not sure the tradeoffs have been enough.

That 20% makes a decent bit of difference for mid-ranged skirmishes between two squads on relatively even footing previously. It won't tip the scales in a large engagement, but it buys a bit of leeway and makes the Exarch valuable as it reduces bleed. That, mixed with the brief damage spike given by embolden, are really the main reasons for buying the Exarch to begin with. His damage isn't all that inspiring, and his health pool, while respectable, isn't to the point of some of the other squad leaders in the game. Playing super-aggro Eldar in the early game will set you up for failure as they have far fewer ways on capitalizing. They can cap the map, sure, but they could do that anyway without sacrificing models to force off the opponent when they didn't need to. As stated above, their gen-bash potential is meh, and with the nerf to Banshees, retreat killing has become far more difficult, meaning they can't bleed a smart opponent nearly as effectively.

15 detection range is still enough to be able to spot the LA or infiltrating melee units and react, as well as avoiding mines, further increasing performance and durability.

In theory yes, but generally speaking the LA or infiltrated melee units want to go after something besides the DA. That 15 range won't really catch them (being the same as the range on the Sentinel after all) as they can almost always just skirt around it. I know that I tried using it a fair bit early on, but quickly went back to just relying on farsight for detection. Far more reliable so long as you know who you're up against.

fire dragons solve most of these problems

Since I've gone over my feelings on Fire Dragons quite thoroughly in the past, I'll just leave it at this one thing. Dragons can't do anything on their own. They need another source of av/vehicle control in order to effectively kill things (usually a Brightlance since Warp Spiders are so expensive). Relying on them alone to stop a vehicle isn't a good strategy.

i agree that shuricans are amazing but rangers in pairs scale really well with their abilities and suppression on demand. kinetic pulse is amazing at all stages of the game as well.

They don't though. Past T1, their killing potential is pretty much nil, and kinetic pulse loses a lot of potency when armies start getting bigger. Their suppression isn't nearly as effective as that of a GWT, nor do they have any way of surviving a jump. Banshees babysitting them won't be able to stop them getting wiped out since they have the lowest maximum health of any infantry squad in the game, and no melee resist to save them. If the enemy has a jump troop, and you don't have a GWT to distract them, it generally ends up as a retreat-or-die scenario for the Rangers.

[Crewfinity]

Good arguments. I'll concede to your Eldar knowledge, since I'm pretty awful with them, but it seems like we've had pretty different experiences

I don't think it's a huge problem but I do think it will be a valid concern come next patch... time will tell I suppose.

Darkhero has been experimenting with a more aggressive Eldar playstyle with quick DA Exarchs and it's really annoying to play against -_-
15 power is so cheap for a squad leader

[Kvn]

I'll admit that most of my experience regarding Orks comes from facing off against them, so I'm not entirely certain on some of their finer points (such as eco, etc.) but, purely from a theoretical standpoint, I would expect that aggro-Eldar would lose out to them pretty badly just due to the more aggressive capabilities of the Ork army. If you're having trouble though, I might be mistaken. Out of curiosity, do you tend to build a Painboy when facing off against that strategy?

I'm not sure honestly how to look at the situation at the moment since I've never really delved into that kind of play style. I would test it out to see what I could find, but I'm currently away at university so no gaming computer for me.

The power cost might be light, but there are so many upgrades that are essentially mandatory for Eldar squads that putting it higher would be a massive nerf to the unit. Essentially, Eldar infantry tend to act as death by a thousand cuts to your eco due to needing a lot of smaller investments for them to function.

[xXKageAsashinXx]

Everyone going on about the DA and shees, and then there's me walkin here with a question like "Why do normal gk termies get retreat, but the paladin call-in doesn't?"

#topic change, but if I read that first post correctly, Paladins now are a red-costing call-in global that are still limited to 1 apiece. It's a little weird for the normal termies, which are not hard-lined restricted and buildable at base, to get retreat and the paladins with all their special chains wrapped around them not to.

Anybody else even bothered to think on that?

[Crewfinity]

I'll admit that most of my experience regarding Orks comes from facing off against them, so I'm not entirely certain on some of their finer points (such as eco, etc.) but, purely from a theoretical standpoint, I would expect that aggro-Eldar would lose out to them pretty badly just due to the more aggressive capabilities of the Ork army. If you're having trouble though, I might be mistaken. Out of curiosity, do you tend to build a Painboy when facing off against that strategy?

The power cost might be light, but there are so many upgrades that are essentially mandatory for Eldar squads that putting it higher would be a massive nerf to the unit. Essentially, Eldar infantry tend to act as death by a thousand cuts to your eco due to needing a lot of smaller investments for them to function.

I almost never get painboys vs eldar, since that's 30 power spent that does nothing to contest shuricans or rangers. as an ork player my main priority is getting ready for shuricans, and trying to get a bash in before they hit the field. the latter has gotten a lot harder to do since cheaper starting squads lets the shurican hit the field earlier, so its harder to punish 2 gen purchases in early t1. the painboy doesnt help counter shuricans, healing sluggas isnt usually that useful since they're on their ass from banshee specials instead of chopping them up, and healing shootas is meh since they're shit without upgrades. I usually prioritize getting stormboyz and then shoota upgrades, but now that DA's have their exarch in T1 and higher health its gotten a lot harder to gain an economy advantage by bleeding them off, and their increased firepower before i can afford shoota nobz really helps put a dent in my economy. shuricans can lock down so much of the map against orks, and with rangers now suppressing its even harder for sluggas to go around and flank them. stormboyz can be good but they bleed just as hard as banshees. even going full shoota upgrades isnt as effective as it used to be, since you're spending 90 power and the eldar player can invest in multiple shurican or ranger squads which give more map presence than upgrades. The matchup is particularly bad against the WSE since he can hard counter melee units with entangling web into grenades. I played a WSE yesterday who got 2 DA's with exarchs into 2 rangers, and it completely shut down my 2 fully upgraded shootas with chained kinetic pulses while the DA's focus fired them down.

[Kvn]

I almost never get painboys vs eldar, since that's 30 power spent that does nothing to contest shuricans or rangers. as an ork player my main priority is getting ready for shuricans, and trying to get a bash in before they hit the field. the latter has gotten a lot harder to do since cheaper starting squads lets the shurican hit the field earlier, so its harder to punish 2 gen purchases in early t1. the painboy doesnt help counter shuricans, healing sluggas isnt usually that useful since they're on their ass from banshee specials instead of chopping them up, and healing shootas is meh since they're shit without upgrades. I usually prioritize getting stormboyz and then shoota upgrades, but now that DA's have their exarch in T1 and higher health its gotten a lot harder to gain an economy advantage by bleeding them off, and their increased firepower before i can afford shoota nobz really helps put a dent in my economy. shuricans can lock down so much of the map against orks, and with rangers now suppressing its even harder for sluggas to go around and flank them. stormboyz can be good but they bleed just as hard as banshees. even going full shoota upgrades isnt as effective as it used to be, since you're spending 90 power and the eldar player can invest in multiple shurican or ranger squads which give more map presence than upgrades. The matchup is particularly bad against the WSE since he can hard counter melee units with entangling web into grenades. I played a WSE yesterday who got 2 DA's with exarchs into 2 rangers, and it completely shut down my 2 fully upgraded shootas with chained kinetic pulses while the DA's focus fired them down.

For me, the thing which counters my Guardian Weapons Teams the most effectively is when the opponent uses their commander well. Mek and Kommando can shut down my setup teams quite effectively at times with teleport-melee and stun/stikkbombs respectively. That also leaves me with the trouble of deciding whether to run my Banshees back to force them off, or charge them forwards to stop the encroaching Sluggas before they roll over my Dire Avengers. If the Sluggas have Painboy support, they become a real pain (no pun intended) to fight since they can outlast Banshees quite effectively so long as RNGesus isn't giving me a bunch of specials in a row. Assuming no chain-knockdown, it will usually come down to who has the better support, though the bleed that the Sluggas inflict on the Banshees might make it a won engagement economically even if they don't force them off.

The Warboss on the other hand, I can see where the difficulty would come from. Honestly, to me at least, he feels rather underwhelming in 1v1. I'm not sure what to advise for him seeing as he's not very good at being anti-setup on his own (he has a charge, but no suppression immunity means it can be a suicide run if not done carefully) and would make Stormboyz pretty vital if you were looking for a hard counter. If he's the commander you play, I'm afraid I don't know what advice to give there.

For the Shoota issue, it sounds a bit like they're being blobbed up too much if Rangers can knock them both down with a single kinetic pulse. Splitting them up could help that quite a bit. AWD can be used to help even the field by suppressing the Dire Avengers, and from there the natural DPS of Shootas should help tip the odds. That said, against that build, I'd suggest playing to get to T2 as quickly as possible. 2x Rangers will set the opponent back in tech, especially if he's getting pathfinder equipment on both of them as well as Exarchs on his DAs. He won't have too much genbash potential (really only the 2 DAs since Rangers are pretty much useless vs gens) so there shouldn't be massive amounts of pressure on your farms. That's not to say they should be left defenseless, but he won't be able to wipe them in short order by any means. A quick trukk with Sluggas that have their Nob and burnas will punish the Rangers hard, while also being difficult to counter with any of the cheap, 'quick response' av units that Eldar have access to.

At least, this is the general idea I've grown to understand from playing against Orks. I'm going to apologize right now if this contradicts something you, as a more experienced greenskin player, already know to be true. I'm not familiar with their general strategies, so I can only speak for what's worked effectively against me in the past.

[Crewfinity]

oh yeah haha all of this has been from the perspective of a warboss player. i've been trying to make the kustom shoota work since it got that last buff but DA's and rangers can focus him down a lot faster than they used to. the matchup against the WSE feels borderline impossible now that he has entangling web in T1 though.

you're right all the rest of that (and i was definitely blobbing my shootas too much), but i'm still not convinced that 270 req is the right pricing for DA's current out of the gate performance. they can really be quite oppressive in the early game when used well with exarchs. that's been my experience anyway, exarch DA's have been way more difficult to deal with than older versions of the unit.

[Kvn]

oh yeah haha all of this has been from the perspective of a warboss player. i've been trying to make the kustom shoota work since it got that last buff but DA's and rangers can focus him down a lot faster than they used to. the matchup against the WSE feels borderline impossible now that he has entangling web in T1 though.

you're right all the rest of that (and i was definitely blobbing my shootas too much), but i'm still not convinced that 270 req is the right pricing for DA's current out of the gate performance. they can really be quite oppressive in the early game when used well with exarchs. that's been my experience anyway, exarch DA's have been way more difficult to deal with than older versions of the unit.

Ah, in that case I'm afraid I'm not sure how best to go about it. I know that the Warboss has awesome buffs, but he himself doesn't add as much as the other two (in the early game at least). Warpspider, I believe, is probably one of the nastiest 1v1 commanders to face just due to his either crowd control in the form of entangling web, or single-target removal from heavy gauge + advanced targeters. I've heard that 2x Sluggas is starting to become more popular of a build, and I can see it having *some* merit against that shooty Eldar army with Warboss if able to get some good flanks just because of overwhelming the available CC, but I'm not sure about how it would actually work out. Sorry as I can't be of much help on this one.

If he's getting Exarchs, it might be worth it to invest more heavily in upgrades for your own troops since he's going to be slower in going to T2. Other than that, I think it comes down to teching up in time to punish his build order if you can't match him in combat early on. Afraid that's all I have on the topic at the moment as I don't have the game with me to do more testing, and my head's turning off for the night.

[Cyris]

Will you two stop having such a civil discussion? It's making me sick.

[Tex]

warboss vs eldar

first purchase is angry bitz

second purchase is gun

third purchase is spiky armor

next 5 minutes is spent laughing as eldar has no reasonable way to control your warboss as he can literally control a full third of the map by himself.

you then play outside of firing arcs with your shootas and cap or flank with sluggas.

Orks > Eldar

[Crewfinity]

warboss vs eldar

first purchase is angry bitz

second purchase is gun

third purchase is spiky armor

next 5 minutes is spent laughing as eldar has no reasonable way to control your warboss as he can literally control a full third of the map by himself.

you then play outside of firing arcs with your shootas and cap or flank with sluggas.

Orks > Eldar

0_o
I need to start watching your warboss replays.
how many gens/nodes do you throw down before you start pimping out the boss? shootas and sluggas feel so weak out of the gate compared to DA's and banshees i usually feel like i have to get another squad on the field ASAP or invest in shoota upgrades, do you try to make an early push for gens while the warboss caps the rest of the map?

every time i try to get angry bitz and charge around i get disrupted by warlocks, but i guess that's just something i need to get better at playing around these days.

also this is all turning into strategy discussion so we should get back on topic soon


What does everyone else think about the trend towards elite T3 infantry having heavy armor? first flash gitz, now Kasrkin?

I quite like the change thematically, as it seems like these elite squads should be better armored and equipped than their earlier tier squads, but balance wise it seems that with the prevalence of premium damage types in T3 that regular infantry armor might actually be better for them? particularly vs melee


I also like the ogryn reinforcement cost decrease, i think that's a really good change with keeping the intial cost high but not as punishing on the economy in the longer run.
I think purifiers should get the same treatment

[linkthestink]

I'm really happy that elite mod gets regularly updated. While I'm definitely not experienced enough at playing the game to chime in on the finer notes of balance, I appreciate that there is concerns and questions.

Thank you to everyone for making me enjoy playing this game again!

[saltychipmunk]

0_o
I need to start watching your warboss replays.
how many gens/nodes do you throw down before you start pimping out the boss? shootas and sluggas feel so weak out of the gate compared to DA's and banshees i usually feel like i have to get another squad on the field ASAP or invest in shoota upgrades, do you try to make an early push for gens while the warboss caps the rest of the map?

every time i try to get angry bitz and charge around i get disrupted by warlocks, but i guess that's just something i need to get better at playing around these days.

What does everyone else think about the trend towards elite T3 infantry having heavy armor? first flash gitz, now Kasrkin?

I quite like the change thematically, as it seems like these elite squads should be better armored and equipped than their earlier tier squads, but balance wise it seems that with the prevalence of premium damage types in T3 that regular infantry armor might actually be better for them? particularly vs melee


I think purifiers should get the same treatment

if I had to guess he keeps his boys non upgraded for a good bit while he pimps his boss. You should try it some time, most of the upgrades on the boys are stupidly over priced and the act of omitting said purchases can free up a TON of options. And the 2x slug 2x shoot still has potency without upgrading them especially if you leverage the warboss well enough to keep the main heat off of the squishier ork units.

Heavy armor , only hurt flash gits because most melee units do full damage to them still and now power melee does even MORE damage to them. Their issue was their hilariously low hp pool for a t3 unit. They are the ork version of dark reapers, redundant , brittle... money sinks. And kasrkins are the ig verion of dark reapers, but at-least they have that silly grenade launcher which is the ONLY upgrade you should ever buy on them .

in short , they need hp buffs not armor changes.

So I am not entirely sure what exactly this armor change will accomplish, this is teir 3 we are talking about here, leveraging armor type kind of loses is potency once everyone has everything in their army.

[Dark Riku]

I agree, micro is the answer.... if you're wearing power armor. In practice, when it comes to low health light infantry, your choices are a) bleed or b) concede ground. Given how important holding ground is in Dow 2 (gens at minimum), you choose to bleed.

But, I claim no monopoly on wisdom. Please post a game where you can show how you play eldar without bleed. I will be the first to change how I play eldar if you can...

Or you can actually micro: position yourself properly into (perfect) cover, have your position covered by a shurycan, be infiltrated thanks to rangers/gates, etc
Please look up those games for yourself and adjust your play accordingly.

..., nor does his 15 range detection offer any kind of real utility against infiltrating units besides mines and IEDs.

I've found they work very well as well to screen your setupteams from infiltrated units that are trying to get to them if Rangers are not desirable. Not by hugging the shurycan of course.

2x Rangers is actually a really bad build most of the time. It's a huge power-sink in T1 with no scaling potential once vehicles and tougher infantry hit the field. As for their suppression, they can only keep one squad down at a time, where as a GWT can suppress an entire army for roughly half the cost.

Nevertheless, it can work, depending on the game. A weapon team can only suppress multiple units if the enemy is blobbing up, otherwise it will only suppress 1 unit as wel.

..., and kinetic pulse loses a lot of potency when armies start getting bigger. ...

Such long range kb on demand is amazing. A good disruption or combo-setup tool like that stays very relevant throughout the game.