Warhammer 40,000/Tactics/Dark Eldar(8E)

Why Play Dark Eldar

Dark Eldar are steeped in ancient and unnatural evil. They have chosen this path for themselves, and revel in their own cruelty, drawing physical sustenance from the infliction of pain. They inhabit a realm known as Commorragh, the Dark City, an impossibly vast stronghold from which they launch piratical raids across the length and breadth of the galaxy. The Dark Eldar live to inflict misery and death; what happens to the captives they bring back to Commorragh is best left undescribed. They are vain, devious and utterly self-serving, with no respect for any living creatures except themselves, though each individual Dark Eldar typically views every other member of their race with uncaring contempt.

Because of this the Dark Eldar have a diabolical appeal. They are the evil kings and super-villains of the 41st Millennium, and they have all the right tools for the job. The Dark Eldar are very fast-moving, have lots of firepower, and boast some of the most lethal close combat units in the game. However, because they conduct their raids at lightning speed, the Dark Eldar lack any real heavy armor and are hence quite fragile - it takes guile and cunning to use them well. If you possess the skill, though, your Dark Eldar army can run rings around its opponents, leaving them shell-shocked, terrified and utterly defeated. Best of all, the models in the Dark Eldar range are truly jaw-dropping examples of the sculptor's craft. In just about every way, the Dark Eldar are an army for the true connoisseur!

Massively improved from 7th, these bad boys do look really good on paper going into 8th edition. And that's just looking at their index. Not the full codex, so expect these guys to get even better in the future.

Pros

• Blisteringly fast army with massive firepower. We're fragile but we have the means to destroy the enemy before they can attack us. The best defense is overwhelming offense.
• Our unique Power From Pain ability grants cumulative buffs to the army as the game progresses.
• Combat Drugs can now be chosen which makes them infinitely more useful.
• In 8th Edition, all units received a movement value. Our slowest units move 7 inches a turn and it only gets better from there.
• Top tier army even without a Codex.
• Gorgeous, highly detailed models that are all but begging for awesome conversions. Many kits fit well with Dark Elf kits little to no need for Green Stuff.
• Almost everything you need to start out as Dark Eldar can be found in the following boxes: Kabalite Warriors, Wyches, Scourges. Two of which are the best value boxes GW sells. You will have no shortage of bits for your bits box. The Start Collecting set (if you can get hold of one) is also actually a good starter set as well.
• You can now viably take standalone Covens, Cult, or Kabal armies... or a mix of the three.
• You share the AELDARI keyword with Craftworlders, Harlequins and Ynnari, meaning you get to cherry pick the best toys from your kin without having to take an extra detachment (unless Ynnari) and still remain Battle-Forged!
• Plenty of ways of getting around your baseline S3 for Combat units.
• Almost everything has FLY, or can be shoved inside something that can fly making the Drukhari one of the most mobile armies in the game.
• Mandrakes are awesome now meaning we finally get our one great infiltration unit!
• Scourges can deep strike 4 Darklight Weapons exactly where you want them, when you want them.
• Wyches are good again! (Well...eh..."good" is a stretch)
• Dark Eldar vehicles count all heavy weapons as assault weapons
• Chapter Approved 2017 has finally given us a decent HQ choice in Lelith!

Cons

• Your biggest weakness is hordes. Dark Eldar have no reliable way of dealing with hordes. (Frankly, everyone's biggest weakness right now is dealing with hordes).
• No native access to Psykers so we miss out on an entire turn phase. Thankfully, the Power From Pain bonuses do a little to mitigate our lack of psychic buffs.
• Your army is extremely frail and has trouble surviving against even the humble lasgun. Usually not a problem since you're meant to kill everything before it can kill you, but if your strategy goes down the drain, your army usually follows.
• While you can steal the best toys from any AELDARI army, the change to transport rules means that D-Scythes and Banshees in Raiders is a thing of the past. That said, all transports are Assault Transports now, and Wave Serpents and Starweavers are hilariously overpowered, so it's not as huge a con as it sounds.
• Almost everything has FLY and your transports are all flying, so the Drukhari are extremely vulnerable to units with bonuses against units with the FLY tag.
• Special Characters are effective, but stupidly overcosted for what they do, especially compared to that your your pansy cousins can take.
• Haywire lost its famed reliability. (Sort of - it's still great at dishing out mortal wounds, but it's going to take a lot longer to kill anything with 8th's general increase to wounds pools.)
• While there is no outright bad unit or gun in the Index, there are some units or weapons that have a very specific role or niche so won't see much use in a "Take all comers" list.
• No native Lord of War units. (Though given how much Eldar LoW units cost now, this isn't a bad thing.)
• You have 3 mediocre generic units for HQ units, and your best HQ choice by far is a Farseer Skyrunner spamming Doom, Executioner and Smite, or Warlock Skyrunner Conclave spamming Jinx, Reveal and Smite.
• Characters in Transports are kind of a pain due to capacity being 5, 10 or 16 given you have to either buy a Venom just for the character, put multiple characters into a Venom or take an under-strength unit.
• You WILL be finding Kabalite, Wych, Scourge and Venom boxes literally everywhere around the house once you start collecting.

To Ynnari or not Ynnari

23/07/2017 FAQ: You must have Yvraine, The Visarch or The Yncarne as your Warlord to be able to give any Aeldari units in your army the "Ynnari" keyword. Yvraine and The Yncarne are your only access to the Revenant Discipline and the same FAQ finally gave The Visarch a 4++ Invulnerable save. It's a Tax, but all three characters are in a good spot now. GW has to sell that box set I guess. Remember that you still need to to take the following units in a separate Detathment should you wish to use them: Dhrazar, Mandrakes, Urien Rakarth, Coven units and The Avatar of Khaine.

17/11/2017 FAQ: In Matched Play games, Soulburst can now only trigger on your turn, and only one of each Soulburst action can be used per turn. In competitive play, this basically means you are better off taking a small Ynnari detachment abusing the hell out of the soulburst potential of any combination of the following: Shining Spears (Move, Shoot, Charge), Harlequins (Move, Shoot, Charge), Swooping Hawks (Move, Shoot), Dark Reapers (Shoot), with all your other points spent on your Dark Eldar. Ynnari are still top tier and winning tournaments, they just aren't overpowered anymore.

The bonuses from Power from Pain are lost if you decide to go Ynnari for that Detachment, so it's a tossup as to if you think potential extra movement/shooting/fighting from Strength from Death is worth losing those very powerful bonuses as well as easy access to Drazhar, Mandrakes and <Coven> units. You will have to take them in a different detachment due to the Ynnari restrictions. They also can't under any circumstances, have the Ynnari Keyword.

In 7th Edition it was a complete no brainer for the Dark Eldar as going Ynnari let you get Strength from Death as well as cherry pick the best Craftworld and Harlequin units, and you could still take Coven units via Formations anyway so all you really lost were Mandrakes (which were outdone by Striking Scorpions anyway). There was literally no downside for doing so.

However, now in 8th Edition we have a shared Keyword in Aeldari, meaning we get to cherry pick anyway; that and Soulbursting Wraithknights and D-Scythes in Raiders are a thing of the past, so a lot of the cheese has been toned down. Power from Pain is very strong in 8th as it protects you from Mortal Wounds, substantially boosts your mobility and eliminates losses from failed Leadership tests as the fight goes on. Strength from Death will also only apply to Infantry and Bikers meaning a number of units that would benefit from it (like Beast units and Monsters) can't.

Also, keep in mind that Drukhari, being extremely fragile and extremely destructive, are the perfect units to exploit the high risk/high reward system that is Strength from Death. Take Multiple Small Units and throw them at the enemy. They kill something? You gain extra turns. It is also worth noting that Yvraine and the Yncarne are both very powerful characters able to cast Word of the Phoenix onto valuable units. Yvraine near your Trueborn with 4 Blasters or Scourges with 4 Dark Lances become nightmares if you get Word of the Phoenix off on then, functionally doubling the number of shots they make. Another plus is Yvraine allowing your Incubi or Wyches an extra round of swings though Word of the Phoenix. The latter is extremely powerful and very fluffy.

Either way, due to the restrictions, the ability to freely cherry pick the best stuff from the Craftworld and Harlequin Indexes, and a lot of cheese being toned down, taking an Ynnari detachment is now more of a sidegrade than definite upgrade as you have many units that benefit from the Power from Pain bonuses, and the Drukhari seem to be balanced with this in mind, and have the most to lose from taking this very powerful sidegrade.

TL;DR: If you have the minis to pick a mix from all Aeldari factions, go Ynnari, they are still top tier. If you play a pure Drukhari list, stick to Power from Pain.

Faction Keywords

The overall keyword is DRUKHARI. You share the AELDARI keyword with Craftworlders, Harlequins and Corsairs, meaning you can combine them within any detachment. In addition, the FAQ states that "If your army is Battle-forged, Ynnari units can only be included in Detachments in which all units have the Ynnari keyword." So you can't mix within the same detachment and stay Battle-Forged, but you can add a separate Ynnari detachment to your army in addition your Drukhari/Aeldari Detachment. This allows you to keep things like Power From Pain or Rising Crescendo and doesn't lock you out out of the <COVEN> units, Mandrakes or Drahzar. Just remember that only the units actually in the Ynnari detachment can actually benefit from Strength From Death.

The main keywords you have to keep track of are <KABAL> for all your vampire space elf pirates, <WYCH CULT> for all your crazy gladiator ladies and <COVEN> for your Haemonculi Coven freakish genetic experiments. Note that Incubi, Mandrakes, and Scourges have none of these Keywords and as such do not profit from buffs for these factions. The split here means that even in a "pure" Dark Eldar list you're still going to have HQ auras that are focused more on a single unit or two rather than supporting the larger force.

Special Rules

Power from Pain

Thanks to your army consisting of a bunch of sado-masochist freaks, you gain bonuses according to the turn number. Note that these bonuses are cumulative

• Turn 1: Inured to Suffering - Any time a model loses a Wound or Mortal Wound, you roll a D6. On 6, the Wound or Mortal Wound is ignored. Adds a slight bit more survivability to everything, turns Wych Cult units into viable Tarpits and makes Coven units (and due to a loophole, their transports hilariously enough) obscenely tough. This is great, and the fact it starts on Turn 1 AND with Instant Death being a thing of the past, your troops are actually going to be able to take this roll. Even though you have to roll for multiple damage now, Drukhari foot soldiers are gonna love this.
• Turn 2: Eager to Flay - You can reroll dice when Advancing or Charging. Helps you get stuck in faster. Nice -- gives us back the Fleet USR we enjoyed for basically everything in the prior edition, without sacrificing our newfound Movement speed, which increased by 1" minimum to sometimes 4" on a straight move.
• Turn 3: Flensing Fury - +1 To Hit rolls in the Fight Phase. Combined with the very high WS most Drukhari units enjoy, this should make sure most of your army hits on 2+. It's amazing for Coven units, gives your Kabal units some close combat bite and frees up a drug choice for your Wych Cult units.
• Turn 4: Emboldened by Bloodshed - Immunity to Morale tests. Not too great given your fantastic Leadership scores and tendency towards MSU, but it's better than nothing. Note that this means that you will not have to spend CP on auto-passing morale tests which is the main benefit of this bonus.
• Turn 5: Mantle of Agony - You lower the Leadership of enemies close to you by 1. Helps you clear out the last few pockets of resistance. Stacks with your Phantasm Grenade launchers to make up for your lack of native access to smite. Also forces your opponent into wasting the last of thier CP to auto-pass morale tests, instead of on more useful stratagems that actually threaten you. Forcing your opponent to throw away CP this late in the game is never a bad though.

Combat Drugs

A lot of your <WYCH CULT> units have access to drugs. You can either choose which drugs you spread around your army or you can roll randomly. If you choose, you have to give out a different drug to each unit and can only take multiples once you've allocated each drug at least once. If you roll randomly, you get what you get and that's that. However, ask yourself this: Do you really want to risk gaining something weak like Hypex on a unit in a transport or Splintermind on a lone Character?

1. Adrenalight: +1 Attack. Put on a big flock of Wyches or Helions, and send them after the biggest model the opponent has. See that Wraithknight? Now you don't. (Seriously, let's not get carried away, you're wounding the WK on a 6 and it still gets a 3+ save...) But this IS the best drug for your dedicated assault units.
2. Grave Lotus: +1 Strength. Now that you can pick a unit to take this, you could make something absolutely terrifying out of it. Putting it on a blob of Wyches, Bloodbrides or Hellions can make something truly nasty. Reavers are always hitting at S4 so consider something else for them. Second-best drug for a dedicated assault unit.
3. Hypex: +2" Movement. Makes Wyches and the like obscenely fast, but since you'll never not put those in transports, consider this for Hellions or Reavers. You may also consider dumping this on your Succubus/Lelith -- since your characters are running solo this could help them keep up with the faster units.
4. Painbringer: +1 Toughness. Could end up creating an amazing tarpit. Great on Reavers: T5, 2W bikes with 4+ save and 16" Move? Oh my my. Pretty nice on Wyches as well since in close combat it makes them T4 6+/4++ with thier 6+ to ignore unsaved Wounds or Mortal Wounds on top of that.
5. Serpentin: Your WS is 1 better. This will make pretty much anything affected hit on 2+. Nice. But since you get +1 WS on turn 3, it's not the best in the world. It does have some niche uses for Ynnari detachments (who lose Power from Pain). This is currently only useful if you think you've got a plan to Alpha Strike and charge Turn 1, so you can get 2 turns of hitting on 2+ before PfP kicks in. Candidates for that are Reavers and Hellions, as Wyches/Bloodbrides and Succubi in transports have to exit their boats at the start of the movement phase.
6. Splintermind: +2 Leadership. Good for Beastmasters on Beast Unit lists, decent on a blob of Wyches, but there are better picks as from from Turn 4 onward your units with Power From Pain gain Fearless. Still, has it's niche uses for Ynnari detachments, especially if you didn't take the Yncarne.

Strength from Death (Ynnari)

This amazingly powerful ability allows one <Ynnari Infantry> or <Ynnari Biker> unit from a Ynnari Detachment one immediate action (either moving, firing, charging or using a psychic power) whenever any unit (friend or foe) is completely destroyed within 7" of it (units destroyed due to any Morale phase do not trigger it). This allows you to either immediately get more mileage of a unit that diced its way through an enemy or take an action out of sequence when one of your units bites the dust to fuck up your opponent's sequence and plans. While this ability costs Craftworld, Harlequin, and Dark Eldar their signature abilities in Ancient Doom, Battle Focus, Rising Crescendo and Power from Pain; the sheer devastation that can be unleashed by two rapid salvos from units like Scourges or Trueborn or Incubi charging and tearing through a second enemy unit immediately after the first more than make up for any lost mobility (which in the case of Wraithblades and Wraithguard, who don't have thier signiture Battle Focus, is a complete non-factor). While no unit can benefit from more than one Soulburst during a given turn, a bit of careful placement will let you cascade this from unit to unit, allowing the majority of your army to act twice. Oh, and Yvraine/The Yncarne can trigger that as a psychic power if really necessary without anybody having to die/death happening too far away thanks to "Word of the Phoenix". Enjoy!

Note: There are a number of caveats and errata to the Strength from Death ability. A link to the FAQ, with the most recent changes in magenta can be found here

Stratagems

Chapter Approved has added the following Stratagems to tide us over until the Codex drops.

• Webway Portal (1 or 3 CP): When deploying, you can set up either 1 (for 1 CP) or 2 (for 3 CP) Drukhari Infantry, Biker, or Beast unit(s) in the Webway, which can deep strike at any time in the game following the usual rules for deep striking.

Psychic Powers

Dark Eldar do not have native access to psychic powers but can include Ynnari or Craftworld psykers to fill the gap. Until the Dark Eldar codex is released, there is no downside to including psykers from other Eldar armies. A Farseer Skyrunner is sadly the better HQ choice the Dark Eldar can bring by far given how terrible our HQ choices are right now. That said unless you have a mixed list only Doom, Executioner, Mind War and the debuff portions of the Runes of Battlepowers are worth it. Oh and Smite. Just remember not to stick an Haemonculus next to a Psyker unless you like explosions (or a hilariously Dark Eldar way to trigger Soulburst). See the Craftworld Eldar Tactica for more information on the Psychic powers Craftworlds units have.

Revenant Discipline (Ynnari)

Only available to Yvraine and the Yncarne, these powers allow them to play both a supportive and offensive role for your army.

1. Gaze of Ynnead: Essentially Smite on crack, this power deals damage based on a D6; A roll of 1 results in 1 Mortal Wound, 2-5 causes D3 Mortal Wounds, and a 6 Results in D6 Mortal Wounds on the target. This is perfect for either softening up a hardy unit or vehicle, or dispatching whatever battle-worn foes that didn't quite bite it last turn.
2. Ancestor's Grace: This power allows the targeted friendly unit to reroll whatever To-Hit rolls of 1 they may have cast during the shooting phase. A nice supplemental power, but it might be better to simply utilize an Autarch who will benefit multiple units automatically with his aura (so long as you're using primarily <Craftworld> eldar in your Ynnari detachment).
3. Word of the Phoenix: This. This is why the Ynnari are so damn good. At only a warp charge of 6, this power allows one allied Ynnari unit one immediate Soulburst action (if they have not triggered Soulburst that turn already). Firing off two salvos from Scourges or Kabalites at range, or melting everything up close with Incubi or Trueborn, this power can all but guarantee the death of at least one enemy unit, possibly even two. What's better is that with proper positioning, you could unleash a domino effect and trigger multiple instances of SfD as long as your units can keep killing your targets. Kill em all and let Ynnead sort em out!

Warlord Traits

While the Codex is still nowhere to be seen, Chapter Approved has given out three WTs for the Dark Eldar to use in the meantime, one for each of their subtypes.

Kabals

• Hatred Eternal: Re-roll hit and wound rolls of 1 in the Fight phase.

Haemonculus Covens

• Master Regenesist: Heal d3 wounds at the start of your turn.

Wych Cults

• Blood Dancer: When rolling a 6 to hit in the fight phase, that attack counts as 3 hits instead of 1. Due to Power From Pain, this can trigger on 5+ from turn three. Keep in mind, however, that a Succubus using an Archite Glaive cannot trigger the trait until then, unless you opt for an Agoniser. Or bring Lelith.

Armory

Ranged Weapons

• Bale Blast: Exclusive to Mandrakes and damn good. 2 shots with 18" and AP-1 that each have a chance to deal mortal wounds in addition to the normal damage.
• Blast Pistol: Tiny range, massive stopping power. Since you can fire Pistols in melee now, these might actually be worth taking for a change.
• Blaster: Same profile of the pistol but Assault and with three times the range. The S8 AP-4 combination will plow through most tanks and D3 damage for every wound will add up fast. D3 damage doesn't look like much until you see how cheap they are for S8, AP 4- and just how many of these things you can spam in combination with your Splinter Weapons in most lists. Generally will be your Workhorse as far as Special Weapon options go.
• Dark Lance: Same as above but Heavy and twice the range. Oh, and D6 damage instead of D3. Also interesting is that it becomes an Assault weapon when mounted on a vehicle, most likely so you don't have to compromise their accuracy when mounting them on paper boats. Infantry that use them still class them as Heavy though, so keep that in mind if taking one for a squad in a Raider. Like the more portable Blaster, this will be your Workhorse Heavy Weapon for your Kabalite units and generally your default choice.
• Dark Scythe: With small blasts gaining D3 shots, the Dark Scythe is actually a pretty scary vehicle killer, being D3 Blasters with 6" more range. Voidraven exclusive.
• Darklight Grenade: Frag grenades with S4 and AP-1. Fun when softening infantry up before a charge, but little else. Remember to toss one out for Overwatch if your opponent is charging from 6" away.
• Disintegrator Cannon: A frankly terrifying statline of Assault 3, S5, AP -3, Damage 2, so it has lower base than the Dark Lance but with a high enough rate of fire that it's still decently effective against light vehicles while also scaring the living hell out of all kinds of infantry. Extremely expensive (10 points more than a Dark Lance), and you are usually trading away a Dark Lance to take one so make absolutely sure that you have enough Anti-Vehicle weapons before taking one as nothing is more expensive than regret. A Dark Lance will score 1.55 Wounds against T7, 4+ vs 1.33 per Dissie so Dissies can still do work against Tanks from the sheer volume of fire.
• Eyeburst: Oddly not a Flamer anymore, the Eyeburst of the Medusae has 4 shots S4 with AP-2. Burns through armour well enough, but keep an Archon close for those rerolls to Hit because this thing does NOT hit automatically.
• Haywire Blaster: This was once the most reliable anti-tank gun in the game, but now it took a big hit with the nerf bat. In theory, a single shot from the Haywire Blaster can now inflict four times its original damage but it lost most of its fabled reliability for this chance. The new FAQ confirms that Mortal Wounds are treated as individual "hits" so you can't roll off against Mortal Wounds inflicted by these, giving them a very powerful niche against things like Quantum Shielding and Serpent Shields.
  • 23/07/2017 FAQ Update: FAQ confirms that a roll of 4+ is a guaranteed Mortal Wound regardless of if that 4 failed to wound. These are now very reliable at stripping wounds from vehicles that have invulnerable saves.
• Heat Lance: Strength of "only" 6, but with a massive -5 AP and usual Melta rules of "on half range, roll 2D6 and pick the highest for damage". The main problem of the Heat Lance is its prohibitively high cost of 25 points a pop. Yes, this means a Talos pays 50 points for a pair of these babies.
• Hexrifle: A bog-standard Sniper Rifle now. Can shoot at characters and has a tiny chance of inflicting a mortal wound in addition to normal damage. The fact that both the Acothyst and the Haemonculus want to get stuck in melee and not stand back and fire Heavy weapons further hurts it.
• Liquifier Gun: D6 auto-hits with AP-D3. Nice. Even the worst roll for the AP still screws with armour and that 33% chance of turning power armour into a 6+ save is fantastic. Shame about the strength of 3.
  • Twin Liquifier Gun: Shockingly, this is the same as above but with 2D6 shots.
• Ossefactor: A single shot with AP-3 that always wounds on 2+ (or 6+ if shooting at a vehicle) is already great at sniping the odd wound off the opponent but the chance to toss in a mortal wound as a chaser if the first shot kills something makes it even better.
• Phantasm Grenade Launcher: D3 shots at a piss-poor Strength of 1, but it's not meant to kill things (although it totally can). It simply lowers enemy Leadership if they're hit by it. Stupidly cheap at 3 points a pop, and it can be taken by Sybarites, Hekatrices, Dracons, Syrens, and Archons. Best on the Archon, as with his BS of 2+, he is pretty likely to hit something with it. Could also potentially force your opponent into burning CP on morale tests as well. There is nothing more hilarious than an S1 weapon killing a model in a squad of 3 Leadership 7 models and your opponent then rolling a 6 with 0CP...
• Razorwing Missiles: The Jetfighter is equipped with all types of missiles by default, which is awesome. Even more awesome is the fact that they don't go away after being fired once. Rather, you choose one type of missiles in a shooting phase and use their profile.
  • Monoscythe Missile: Strength 6 and no AP value but Damage 2. Force 'em armour saves, the enemy will hurt when they fail them. Better than shatterfield against multi-wound models with lower toughness and lower saves (break even at T5, 4+, 2W, for example)
  • Necrotoxin Missile: D6 shots that wound non-Vehicles on a 2+. Solid missile option against non-vehicle units with T8 or higher.
  • Shatterfield Missile: S7, AP-1, re-rolling to wound. Edges out the Razorwing missiles against most vehicles, and all 1-wound models.
• Shredder: While they no longer mulch hordes like that did in 7th, D3 shots S6, AP 0 that reroll To Wound against INFANTRY is nothing to sneeze at. The fact that they wound T3 on 2+ and T4/5 on +3, and the re-roll is far more likely to force a save than a Splinter Rifle will. They can also threaten Light vehicles too though that's not thier primary role. They are also a very effective answer to -1 To Wound bubbles like the bubble on the Shadowseer, something that cripples Splinter Weapons. Their main drawback is the range is only 12" which means you need to expose the unit (or its transport) to Rapid Fire range, and potentially charges or even Melta fire. This places them firmly into the "Sidegrade" status. They are by no means a bad weapon by any stretch of the imagination, it is just they are largely limited to the situations where having a Strength score on your gun is more important than always wounding on a 4+. Sadly in the Drukhari list this often means the only real niche of the gun is for dealing with -1 to Wound Auras which are currently extremely rare.
• Splinter Weaponry: All of the following weapons do not have a Strength score. Instead, they always wound non-vehicles on 4+, and vehicles on 6+, so if you're desperate, you can still unleash a torrent of poisoned shots at that Land Raider and hope something sticks. Since they don't have a Strength score, they inherently ignore abilities that trigger on strength values, like the Krieg abilities that make some of their models more resistant to attacks of Strength 4 or less.
  • Splinter Pistol: Pistol with 1 shot and 12" range. Don't forget to use it in melee.
  • Splinter Rifle: Rapid Fire 1 with 24" range. Stock on Warriors and Trueborn. You know it. You love it.
  • Twin Splinter Rifle: Shockingly twice the above at Rapid Fire 2.
  • Splinter Pods: Assault 2 18" range so your Hellions can shoot something.
  • Shardcarbine: Assault 3 as a stock gun for Scourges and Sslyth.
  • Splinter Cannon: The big'un. 36", Rapid Fire 3. This is technically a nerf since you only get your 6 shots at half range now. On the upside, your Infantry can now move and still fire 6 shots. Synergises pretty well with Blasters actually as if you can shoot the Blaster in the unit, the Splinter Cannon on the Venom/Unit the unit can Rapid Fire that target as well.
• Spirit Syphon: D6 auto-hits with nice AP and a chance of doing extra damage. Only S3 though so keep that in mind.
• Spirit Vortex: Exchanges the auto-hitting of the Spirit Syphon for 10 more inches of range. Still only S3 so keep that in mind.
• Stinger Pistol: Buffed up Splinter Pistol wounding INFANTRY on a 2+, and VEHICLES on a 6+. It also only costs 7 points!
• Stinger Pod: 2D6 S5 shots. Would be far better if the Talos had a better BS. Like the Shredder, it has a niche in those situations where the Strength score on your gun matters.
• Void Lance: Lascannon with -4 AP but less range. Given you get two stock on a Voidraven, the range doesn't matter. Voidraven exclusive.
• Voidraven Missiles: You can equip the bomber with missiles for 25 pts. Like in RJW's case, they don't go away after using them once anymore. Simply choose one type per shooting phase and fire away.
  • Implosion Missile: Exclusive to Voidraven, D3 shots at S6 and AP-3.
  • Shatterfield Missile: Same as the Razorwing's. Strong, but you better roll good with that D6.

Melee Weapons

• Agoniser: Wounds everything but VEHICLES on 4+ and has AP-2. Good stuff. Better for the Archon than a Huskblade now. Only costs 4 points so there's rarely a good reason not to take one on a dedicated assault unit.
• Archite Glaive: S+2, AP-3. Sounds like a dream right? Nope, you also take a -1 penalty to your Hit rolls and only have Damage 1 for your troubles. That said, your Succubus has a WS of 2+ anyway so don't worry about the penalty too much, and she can functionally ignore the penalty entirely from Turn 3 onwards.
• Beastmaster's Scourge: Normal weapon with an additional point of Strength. Better than nothing.
• Bladevanes: These come stock on your transports and force them to strike at S4 in melee (Per the BRB FAQ, every model also has a stock Melee Weapon, S:User AP:0 D:1, so your hoverboxes can use their better Strength now!). However they also strike with AP-1 so it's not all bad. Reavers get these by default allowing them to strike at S4, Ap-1. Awesome.
• Bludgeoning Fists: AP-1 and 2 Damage on each swing. Your Clawed Fiends are horrifying thanks to these.
• Chain-Flails: Rerolls To Wound. Probably the worst weapon you can give your Talos.
• Claws and Talons: Standard close combat weapon with no bonuses on Ur-Ghuls. They do make 2 bonus attacks on the charge, though.
• Demi-Klaives: You can choose between either S+1 and AP-3 or AP-2 and two additional attacks. With the way Wounding works now, use the dual blade profile for the T8 or higher enemies.
• Electrocorrosive Whip: An Agoniser but with damage 2. This, right here, turns Haemonculi from weak and helpless into fantastic character killers.
• Flesh Gauntlet: Come stock on Grotesques but Haemonculi like them, too. Wound non-vehicles on 4+ and against those same non-vehicles, Wound-rolls of 6+ also deal a mortal wound. For when those Thundershield-Terminators get too comfortable with their saves.
• Glimmersteel Blades: Mandrake chainswords.
• Haemonculus Tools: The quintessential poisoned weapons from which all others here are offshoots. Wounds on 4+ (6+ if you target a VEHICLE).
• Hekatarii Blade: Grant an additional attack. Makes your Wyches scary, and Bloodbrides even scarier.
• Hellglaive: S+1 and Damage 2. Oh dear lord, send those Hellions at multi-wound models and watch the opponent devote all his shooting to killing them.
• Huskblade: AP-2 and D3 Damage, what's the catch? Strength: User, that's what. Yes, you go through armour well and inflict great damage, but your Archon will usually ping off the enemy's Toughness alone. Thankfully it's very easy to convert the Venom Blade from the Scourge box to an Agoniser if you really wanted to keep a sword on your Archon model.
• Hydra Gauntlets: AP-1, an additional attack AND it lets you reroll To Wound. Take as many on your Wyches as you can.
• Ichor Injector: Only one attack can be made with this weapon. Strength User (so either 6 for the Talos or 3 for Urien) and rerolls To Wound. If you roll a 6+ To Wound, you deal D3 mortal wounds in addition to the normal damage, which can potentially kill 4 models in one strike but don't bet on that happening with only one attack.
• Impaler: AP-1 and Damage 2. For when Lelith goes character hunting.
• Klaive: Strength +1, AP-3. The basic tool for your Incubi.
• Macro-Scalpel: AP-1 and Damage 2. Also, if you have 1, you make one additional attack with it and if you have 2, you make two additional attacks with it. Cheap and effective. Come stock on the Talos and should stay there.
• Mindphase Gauntlet: Bog-standard weapon, except with Damage 2. Since damage doesn't spread between models, this is worthless against 1 Wound models and with Strength: User and no AP it won't help much against anything else, either.
• Monstrous Cleaver: Stock on Grotesques and damn good. AP-1 and lets you make an additional attack with it. Use when your Strength is higher than the opponent's Toughness. If it isn't, use the Flesh Gauntlet.
• Power Lance: Basically the same as a Power Axe now. S+2, AP-1. Nice, but kinda wasted on the Solarite.
• Power Sword: S:User, AP-3 can opener. Shame about your awful Strength stats.
• Razorflails: Like Hydra Gauntlets, AP-1 and +1 attack. As before, allows re-rolls to hit for Wyches, who will probably be hitting on 2+ re-rolling 1's with a Succubus nearby. In other words, useless. Take the Gauntlets.
• Scissorhand: Haemonculus Tolls with AP-1 and an additional attack. Great on an Acothyst, but a Haemonculus can use the Electrocorrosive Whip better.
• Shaimeshi Blade: Haemonculus Tools that Wound on 2+. Exclusive to Lhamaeans.
• Shardnet and Impaler: Precisely the same as the Impaler on its own. Yay?
• Spirit-Leech Tentacles: S:User, AP-1, 1 DMG that does D3 damage on a wound roll of 6+. Available to the Cronos.
• Sslyth Battle-Blade: AP-1, just in case a Sslyth's melee didn't look intimidating enough already.
• Stunclaw: Like the Hellglaive, it is S+1, but only does one damage. However, 6+ to wound with this weapon does a mortal wound in addition to other damage... it is 3 points more than a Agoniser, though...
• Venom Blade: Haemonculus Tools that wound on 2+. Exclusive to the Covens and the Solarite.

Vehicle Wargear

• Enhanced Aethersails: Tantalus exclusive. Instead of rolling a die, Tantalus simply doubles its movement value when it Advances. A movement value of 16", by the way.

• Flickerfield: Venom exclusive. Your opponent must subtract 1 from all hit rolls that target the vehicle in the shooting phase. Stacks with Night Shields.

• Night Shield: All Dark Eldar Vehicles are equipped with those, which grant them 5+ invulnerable save against all ranged weapons. Jink is gone, but there's that to compensate.

• Sharpened Prow Blade: The Reaper's scythe, works the same as the Shock Prow below but at Damage 2. Make sure to paint some blood on it.

• Shock Prow: Lets you make one attack at your Vehicle's actual Strength stat and gets stronger on a charge. It's only 1 point, so knock yourself out. Available to Raiders and Ravagers. Accidentally made obsolete by the recent FAQ. Apparently Vehicles can carry CCW's now.

Relics

Just the one for now, thanks to Chapter Approved.

• The Parasite's Kiss: Replaces a splinter pistol. 12", Pistol 2, S1 AP-2 2 D, not like the Strength matters since it still wounds non-Vehicles on a 2+. When it kills an enemy model, the bearer gains a wound back.

Unit Analysis

HQ

Note: Characters in Transports are kind of a pain due to capacity being 5, 10 or 16 while many other armies have an odd number for their transports so you can fit in a character. Because only Yvraine and The Visarch (and technically The Yncarne but yeah...) ignore keyword rules with transports, you have to either buy a Venom just for the character (inefficient use of points), put multiple characters into a Venom (Puts so many eggs into one basket it will draw fire from the Empire vs Dwarfs game from the Warhammer Fantasy table) or put them with a 9-Elf unit in a Raider (gimps a unit, but is the most viable option). Just keep this in mind if you are taking multiple HQ units.

• Archon: The very customizable leader for your <KABAL> army. He projects his Leadership within 6", which is nice but not terribly (at all) impressive. He comes stock with a Huskblade, which you should immediately switch out for an Agoniser (though the Power Sword is situationally good as well). Also, give him a Phantasm Grenade Launcher and maybe a Blaster. No reason not to splurge, really, since all his upgrades are useful. The Blaster will probably get more work done than anything he'll do in melee, and is a very worthy purchase. If you do wanna get in melee, then by all means get a Blast Pistol because you can fire it into close combat.
  • Archon has an in-built 2++ (that is not rerollable by any means), which is lost after first failed save roll, meaning Mortal Wounds do not affect that, and are flat out ignored on a 6+ anyway. Cool, huh?
  • An Alternate Take: Keep the Huskblade. Even though it's only Strength 3, in most cases you only need to score 1 or 2 wounds to kill some of the tougher things with the d3 damage, and since he's wounding T4 and 5 on a 5+ why not send him after something with T5? The Shadowfield should protect him for long enough to rip enough wounds off something scary and a blast pistol would very much help in combat. Also a squad of Incubi wouldn't hurt either.
  • Another Take: Dump the Huskblade. It's expensive and will never perform the way you hope. Taking a Blaster is the best use for an Archon you can get. Hitting on 2's, S8 AP-4 D3 Dmg at 18" away will get far more work done over the course of a game. Since the Archon's aura is "useless" (I mean it has a purpose but is lousy compared to virtually every other single faction's HQ's) he doesn't need to be on the tabletop, meaning he can ride around in a transport popping expensive infantry or stripping wounds off vehicles. Archons are not really "competitive," but at least one with a Blaster can do stuff.
  • Mathhammer: The problem is is that the Agoniser and Power Sword are both more likely to cause Unsaved Wounds in the first place, with the Agoniser being best against T4 units of of all save combinations, with the Power Sword staying surprisingly competitive, all being level against T3, with the Sword taking the edge at 3+ and 4+ saves (So Aspect Warriors and Sisters of Battle) and the Agoniser staying ahead at T5 up, pulling ahead of the power Sword from T6 onwards. The Power Sword is always better against Vehicles but at that point you might as well give the Archon a Blast Pistol if you're having him tarpit vehicles (which he is surprisingly good at, especially with a Sslyth or Wyches around). Hopefully the Huskblade will be looked at when our Codex drops as +1S, -3Ap or an extra swing would make it much more competitive. Thankfully the fluff stats that Agonizers look like just about anything ( if you need to ask why whips are most common you are playing the wrong army), so a quick kit bash with the Venom Blade from the Scourge kit and liberal use of Warpstone Glow and Moot Green paint will give you an Agoniser for your sword wielding Archons. You can even take the cutlass from the Harlequin Troupe kit and paint it up looking like it's dripping with poison for that Pirate look as well!.
• Succubus: Buff Vector for your <WYCH CULT> units. She lets them reroll 1s To Hit in melee, which, for her and from turn 3 on for everything will probably mean they will be hitting on 2+ rerollable (yay!). The Succubus herself comes stock with an Archite Glaive, which lowers her Hit rolls to 3+, but since you can't get rid of the thing, you probably won't want to add an Agoniser (the Glaive will usually outperform it anyhow, even against infantry). Then again, the Agoniser is only 4 points, so why the hell not? Her 4++ Dodge Save (that works outside of close combat now! Double yay!) will also keep her safe that much longer and don't ever forget about her drugs.
  • As of Chapter Approved 2017, assuming she is your Warlord and favourable rolls:
    • Pre Turn 3, Agoniser and Adrenalight = 3 Dead Tactical Marines or 5 Dead Guardsmen.
    • Post Turn 3, Agoniser and Adrenalight = 4 Dead Tactical marines or 7 Dead Guardsmen.
    • Pre Turn 3, Glaive and Adrenalight = 1 Dead Tactical Marine or 2 Dead Guardsmen.
    • Post Turn 3, Glaive and Adrenalight = 5 Dead Tactical Marines or 8 Dead Guardsmen.
    • Pre Turn 3, Glaive and Grave Lotus = 1 Dead Tactical Marine or 2 Dead Guardsmen.
    • Post Turn 3, Glaive and Grave Lotus (And rolls heavily stacked in favour of the Succubus) = 5 Dead Tactical Marines or 8 Dead Guardsmen.
  • tl;dr: Still meh, use Lelith instead unless you are starved for points.
  • The crux of the issue: The Succubus (supposedly our dedicated CC HQ) has only four close combat attacks on her base statline, whereas the Archon (supposedly our generic command HQ) has five, same as most other CC HQ choices for other armies. An Archon with a Huskblade can potentially do more than TRIPLE the amount of damage in CC than a Succubus whilst being cheaper and more survivable, and this is weird as balls! In order to make the Succubus even remotely able to do what she is supposed to do (duel characters and/or slaughter small squads of infantry) then you must take the Blood Dancer warlord trait, and either Adrenalight for +1 attack to boost the number of dice you get to throw to a reasonable amount, or Serpentin for +1 WS and pray you roll a 6 or two (5s on Turn 3 and above). Even then, this only makes the Succubus "okay" in CC rather than the badass she is supposed to be, and that is very sad indeed.

• Haemonculus: A nasty little Character for your <COVEN> army. On the one hand, he's a buff vector that flat increases your <COVEN>'s Toughness by 1 within 6". This makes Grotesques all but immune to small arms fire and is generally nice. However, the Haemonculus is now actually an impressive combat character. Like all <COVEN> units he comes stock with a 5++ Invulnerable save, so combined with his 5 Wounds and effective Toughness of 5 and the PFP save he can survive quite a bit. But he also has 5 attacks and access to all the nasty poisoned weapons you could want. Give him an Electrocorrosive Whip and go Character-hunting or take a Scissorhand or Venomblade and kill scores of light infantry. Just, don't send him after Vehicles. Can also take a Crucible of Malediction, which is a nasty anti-Psyker tool and since it is apparently free, you should always take one along, just in case you find yourself surrounded by Grey Knights.
  • Going by RAW, the Aura can buff the toughness of Raiders and Venoms that have the <Haemonculus Coven> tag. Remember that you need to be actually standing outside the Vehicle for it to have an effect. Outside meaning in an easy target for Deep Strikers, Snipers and Bikers.

Special Characters

• Drazhar: Your favourite (and only) Incubi special character has just got good again! He's dropped 60 whole points and gained a 5+ invulnerable save! All the while keeping his amazing stat line as well as his buff to Incubi which allows them to add 1 to their hit rolls. Although surprisingly he doesn't have the Klaivex' +2 damage ability.
  • Alternative Take: While he does have a Phoenix Lord like statline, he is very expensive at 140 points and only buffs a single type of unit (that you probably only have one of due to how expensive Incubi were in 7th) with an Aura that is redundant by Turn 3. If you are running a Pure Dark Eldar list then you will be better off just bringing more Incubi. If you're running Aeldari or Pure Ynnari then Yvraine is cheaper, has Ancestor's Grace and Word of the Phoenix, and sticks around for longer. A Farseer is also cheaper, packs Smite and Doom and a Singing Spear, both units also benefit your entire army and not just one unit type. Hopefully he will get his cost adjusted if we ever get a Codex.
  • Alternative Take: Just take another squad of incubi, a Klaivex does almost as well as Drazhar for 1/7 the price, plus you get another 6 incubi on top of that. Only take Drazhar in fluffy games of if you have particular hard-on for the Executioner.

• Lelith Hesperax: Now does drugs, On the less fluff-rapey side, her 3++ special Dodge now works outside of combat, and she still has bucketloads of attacks that will never miss. She re-rolls to wound against other Characters meaning she does an average of about 3 wounds on T4-T5 characters at AP-4, 1 damage each. Then her hair gets 2 more attacks (yep!) to put maybe another wound. Anything with a Stormshield will laugh at her. In fact most characters with Power Fists would laugh at her, if it weren't for her fantastic Dodge save.
  • Chapter Approved 2017 has massively buffed her with the Wych Cult Warlord trait. Assuming you roll the statistically likely 6's on your Penetrating Blade swings, with Grave Lotus you are looking at 8 dead Marines or 13 dead Guardsmen per charge before Turn 3, and 11 Dead Marines or 15 Dead Guardsmen post Turn 3. Adrenalight will get your marginally less kills but with the sheer number of swings Lelith gets, you want to always up the quality of her attacks. And we haven't even started with what she can do to characters (even SMASHFUCKER needs to be wary of her due to Re-rolls to Wound). If you take her alongside Yvraine, her soulburst is ridiculous and does make up for the loss of exploding attacks. Very solid choice and probably our best HQ choice now. Vect must be furious. While she can also bully Monsters, TEQs and Bikes with the sheer number of S4, AP-4 attacks she can put out (Exploding Flavour or Soulburst Flavour), she is still a poor choice against anything a Storm Shield or equivalent (which is why you take a Jetbike Warlock spamming Jinx), you have been warned.

• Urien Rakarth:Dead hard and awesome in all the ways a Haemy is awesome. T6 due to his own buff, and re-rollable 4++ invul save against attacks at S8 or less. Can't take the Crucible, but this dude will take a lot of firepower to bring down. However, being equipped with only a meh Ichor Injector and some bog-standard Haemonculus Tools, he is none too scary in melee.

• Yvraine (Ynnari): The linchpin of any Ynnari detachment, Yvraine costs 132 points and is exclusively armed with Kah-vir, the Sword of Sorrows (basically a Force Axe stat-wise). While her statline itself might seem like a sub-standard Phoenix Lord at S3 T3 with 5 Wounds and only an invuln of 4+, her psychic powers can cause unyielding destruction upon your foes should they be unfortunate enough to be near her. Her pet Gyrinx adds 1 to her Psychic and DtW rolls. In addition to her impressive powers, Yvraine also has several abilities that make her surprisingly survivable. Whenever any Aeldari model (model, not unit) dies within 7" of her, Yvraine regains a lost wound on a 4+ roll. In addition, if that model happened to be a Psyker, it allows her to immediately generate another power from the Revenant discipline (you have been bringing those absurdly cheap Warlocks to accompany her, right?).

• The Visarch (Ynnari): Now actually a better combatant than Yvraine. At 141 points and a statline that puts him on somewhere between a close combat Archon and the Phoenix Lords, The Visarch is a very nice but expensive character, especially now he has a 4++ Invulnerable save thanks to the recent FAQ. His BFS, Asu-Var, the Sword of Silent Screams is a Strength 5 Force Sword that reduces the enemy unit's Leadership by 1 allowing him to be the linchpin for Leadership Bomb setups. Very tanky as when any Aeldari model within 7" dies, on a 4+ he regains a lost wound, and gains +1 Attack (caps at 7) if it was a character (you have been sticking him near super cheap Court of the Archon Characters, right?) in addition to his standard Soulburst activation. He also acts like a bodyguard to Yvraine and if he's within 3" of her, he can take any wounds for her as a Mortal Wound on a 2+. He doesn't have his free Warlord trait anymore but I'm sure he will get something similar for Strategems and/or Command powers once the Ynnari codex is out.

• The Yncarne (Ynnari): The single most expensive HQ choice for the Aeldari, the Yncarne clocks in at a whopping 337 points to field equipped with nothing but Vilith-shar, the Sword of Souls, an awesome weapon that is S6 AP-4 and D6 Damage with re-rolls to wound. With 6 attacks, 7 with the relevant Warlord Trait, whatever it is hitting is dying. If that in itself doesn't seem like much, the Yncarne is a flying, monstrous character that can cast two of the three Revenant Discipline powers. The Yncarne is also pretty resilient, T6 with a 3+ armor and 4+ invuln that covers 9 wounds that regenerate on a 4+ for any Aeldari model killed near it. It also provides a 6" Fearless bubble any any friendly Aeldari within 6" shrugs off any Wound or Mortal wound on a 6+. While the 8" of movement it has may not seem particularly fast, the Yncarne also has the unique ability to teleport to the location where any squad (friend or foe) is killed so long as it is at least 1" away from enemy units. This makes it one of the few units able to deep strike easily within charging range to wreak some melee havoc, and can give it a terrifying threat radius. Use your Dark Reapers to nuke some squishy back-line unit, then have the Yncarne teleport behind enemy lines to hit 'em where it hurts!
  • Note: You can't charge after deep striking so you ideally want it popping up on your opponents turn so you are ready to charge on yours. You also want to be exploiting the ability to redeploy when anything dies as a mobility/escape tool. If anything else the Yncarne popping up somewhere unexpected can divert a ton of fire away from your other units though you might want to leave the DISTRACTION CARNIFEX role to something designed for it like a Succubus, Solitaire or Character in Venom.

Troops

• Kabalite Warriors: You know them, you love them. They're your cheap scoring, your anti-infantry or anti-tank, and your source of Raiders and Venoms. The big question is whether to take them in 5-man Venom or 10-man Raider squads. Now with everything being able to split their shots, there is no reason not to stick that one Blaster in a Venom squad and there's no reason not to add a Splinter Cannon to a Raider squad, especially now that Splinter Racks are gone, to increase their firepower further. Remember, never enuff dakka.
  • Your weapon choices boil down to if you need more horde killing dakka (Shredders and Splinter Cannons), or you want more tank killing dakka (Blasters and Dark Lances). Just keep in mind the needs for your army when picking weapons. Also be wary of the different weapon ranges and types you are mixing into your squads. Don't forget that you get -1 To Hit on the Dark Lance if you close in to fire the Blaster, or the different Rapid Fire ranges of Splinter Cannon and Rifles.
  • Probably worth noting: At 35 points per 5-Elf Squad, spamming multiple small units of Kabalite Warriors is the cheapest and most efficient way of getting a lot of Venoms onto the field, and filling out the Troops tax for a Brigade Detachment.
  • These guys rock: They are so cheap and so effective at what they do that when writing a list, you have to seriously ask yourself, why AREN'T I taking Warriors? They're cheap enough to throw away as screens, are killy enough against infantry and monsters, and can take Blasters (and even Dark Lances). They just rock.
• Wyches: These ladies are now finally awesome again. They can still do fuck all about tanks, but they're now a perfectly fine melee unit for your Troops slot, especially with Adrenalight. Take ten, give them as many Hydra Gauntlets as you can, give them Adrenalight and stuff them in a Raider. Then bury something in an unholy number of attacks (wait until you see what Bloodbrides can do). The other option is to go Painbringer to exploit T4 along with your 4++ invulnerable save in melee combat and the ability to shrug off unsaved wounds on a 6 from Power from Pain to make a resilient tarpit. These ladies do also have rules that make them dedicated to keeping enemies stuck in combat. With their 4++ save, they can be quite a trouble, specially tanks since if they Fall Back they can't shoot their guns for a turn. Also remember that you have Grenades! If you are charging from within 6" then always toss a grenade before charging.
  • Adrenalight is the MathHammer king and should be your default choice if no other unit needs the bonus attacks. Against MEQ A unit of 10 with 3 Hydra Gauntlets and Agoniser Mathhammers out as 1.32 Wounds in the Shooting Phase(factoring in the Darklight Grenade and Phantasm Grenade Launcher), and 6.64 in the ensuing Fight Phase totalling 7.96 dead MEQs, and the two survivors of a 10-man Squad stuck in close combat (and more than likely fleeing anyway unless your opponent wants to waste CP on keeping your Wyches in close combat for some reason).
  • An Alternate Take: Where taking 10 might be tempting for the 3 Wych Weapons, consider that an Agoniser is the same cost as a hydra gauntlet; so instead of taking 10 with agoniser and 3 hydra gauntlets, you could be taking 2 groups of 5 with an agoniser each and a hydra gauntlet each. A little more punch this way and extra safety from over watch.As an added bonus they can both be place in the same Raider you were planning to put them in anyway. Small 5-Elf groups are a nice and cheap way of paying Drugs taxes in pure Wych Cult lists too!
  • Reset your expectations:Wyches probably won't actually kill anything in the turn they charge. Their special 'No Escape' ability is somewhat unique in that the unit actually CAN pin infantry down in close combat (even infantry that can fly!). Once you stop worrying about how they generally actually suck in close combat and instead focus on their genuine ability to tarpit things, you see their value.
• Wracks: Now unconditionally Troops. The basic Wrack comes stock with two poisoned attacks and for 1 in 5 can take either a Liquifier or an Ossefactor. The squad leader, the Acothyst, has access to all the same shiny tools as the Haemonculus sans the Crucible and with his lower Attack count you might want to consider a Scissorhand. For best use, stuff into Venoms, crap the Wracks out of the Venom, charge with the Venom and soak up Overwatch, then charge with the Wracks.
  • Don't touch the Hexrifle. You want these guys as your shock troops. If you want Snipers, just take a squad of Rangers and Deep Strike them into some cover, or grab some Scourges if you want a Pure Dark Eldar list..

Elites

• Court of the Archon: If you have an Archon, you can take up to four of these without spending a slot. They also all gain rerolls To Hit if the Archon sticks with them. Keep in mind that they are all characters, and they are all single model units. This also means everything has to be rolled individually for them so keep this in mind when advancing and charging.
  • Ynnari Note: Due to the cost, these are excellent fodder for Strength from Death in any Ynnari Detachment. All but the Sslyth are cheaper than a 5-Elf Kabalite Squad, and they are all Infantry Characters so do trigger Strength from Death when they die.
    • Lhamaean: 18 Points, comes with a splinter pistol and a Poison 2+ combat weapon that does a mortal wound in addition to its normal wound on a wound roll of 6+. Remember that unlike normal damage mortal wounds do carry over to the rest of the unit. Buffed when hanging out with an Archon, and at 32 points they're a relatively cheap source of potential mortal wounds. The statline seems mediocre but she does benefit a lot from Power from Pain (Turn 3 onwards), and sticking near the Archon to make sure those measly 2 swings actually connect.
    • Medusae: 21 Points, their eyeburst is no longer an AP3 flamer but instead is Assault 4 at flamer distance, S4 AP-2. No automatic hits, but a more reliable number of shots and with an Archon nearby it's more or less like a very reliable flamer. Still pretty deadly to single wound infantry models and only cost 28 points per model.
    • Sslyth: 31 Points for a terrifying melee statline and 4 ablative wounds for your Archon. Going by RAW, the Cold-Blooded Bodyguard ability can only be activated when the Archon loses a wound (and loses his Shadowfield). However, Mortal Wounds ignore the Shadow Field, and can be directed to a nearby Sslyth on a 2+ instead. Worth considering for a close combat Archon.
      • Note: When taking saves, you can choose from all your possible saves which kind you want to make. In some circumstances, it can be worth it to have your Archon take normal armor saves instead of risking his 2++. Then, when you (most likely) fail those regular saves, you still have a 2+ to pass them off to his Sslyth buddies.
      • Tip: An Archon with 4 Sslyth in a Venom equipped with two Splinter Cannons will put out 24 Splinter shots per turn at 18 inches, +1 Blaster shot and/or Phantasm Grenade Launcher for the -1 Leadership debuff. They may not kill an entire unit by themselves but that is certainly a sizable amount of shots coming from just one unit.
    • Ur-Ghul: 20 Points and a crapload of S4 attacks for a single model, particularly on the charge. Unfortunately those attacks have no AP and only do 1 damage. It has no access to Power from Pain though. That said, 3W a unit does make them excellent Smite shields to protect a more important character.
• Kabalite Trueborn: Warriors with an additional attack and point of Leadership, and a much higher density of special and heavy weapons. Stuff 4 Blasters in a Venom, shoot some tanks, and leave the opponent wondering what the hell just happened to his favorite centerpiece. The Dracon may actually take a Blast Pistol and/or Agoniser, if you feel cocky. With 3 Attacks on the Dracon, it's not a terrible investment. Note that Splinter Cannons are better in practice than Shredders against anything you can be bothered to shoot with either weapon.
  • You should be planning your unit's loadout around the transport they'll be riding, and they should be riding a transport.
    • Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons: 2 Splinter Cannons, 2 Shredders, and aim for infantry. Alternatively, you can take one of the 2 Darklight units listed below for a Raider, but the Venom won't be able to meaningfully help the unit inside it kill anything; the benefit is that if they pop a transport, it'll typically be pretty good at shooting whatever fell out.
    • Raider with 1 Dark Lance: Take 2 units; either take 8 blasters (4 in each) if you plan on getting down and dirty, or 4 blasters and 4 dark lances if you want to primarily hang back. You can also invert the Venom, above - take 1 Darklight unit and 1 Poison unit, and use the Poison unit to hurt whatever falls out of a transport you pop. However, this is unlikely to work out particularly well; you're probably better off dividing tasks, with any given transport and all of its contents committing to killing either heavies/transports or infantry/transport contents. It's not like you lack the speed to get whatever guns you bring into position.
    • Tantalus: Depends on what what you want; you can take 3 of the MSU-style units mentioned above, and have 1 seat left over, with 3 seats occupied by Dracons, or you can go larger, with 2 units of 7 and 2 empty seats; in any case, an empty seat or seats can always be occupied by characters of your choosing, if you'd rather not bulk up a unit. The examples below are meant to be illustrative - tailor to your needs.
      • Maximum Blasters: 3 units of Dracon/4 Blasters + choice of Archon with Blaster or Trueborn with Lance (13 Blasters or 12+1 Lance, 3 Splinter Rifles).
        • Average of 5 Dead Terminators, 11 Dead Marines, 12 Dead Guardsmen.
      • Maximum Darklances: 3 units of Dracon/2 Blasters/2 Lances + choice of Archon with Blaster or Trueborn with Blaster (7 Blasters, 6 Lances, 3 Splinter Rifles).
        • Average of 7 Dead Terminators, 13 Dead Marines, 15 Dead Guardsmen. Average damage is enough to one shot a Gulliman, a Land Raider, Stormraven or Repulsor each turn. Will statistically drop a Baneblade to its bottom bracket. Will average 14 wounds per turn on a Knight.
      • Maximum Darklight: 2 units of Dracon/4 Blasters/2 Lances + 2 Archons with Blasters (10 Blasters, 4 Lances, 2 Splinter Rifles).
        • Average of 9 Dead Terminators, 15 Dead Marines, 17 Dead Guardsmen. Still enough damage to one shot Gulliman or a Land Raider. Does most damage on average against a Knight at 17 Wounds.
      • Maximum Cannons: 3 units of Dracon/2 Shredders/2 Cannons, and one unit takes an extra guy with a Shredder (7 Shredders, 6 Cannons, 3 Splinter Rifles).
        • Average of 1 Dead Terminator, 7 Dead Marines, 18 Dead Guardsmen.
      • Maximum Shredders: 2 units of Dracon/4 Shredders/2 Cannons + 2 filler Trueborn with stock rifles (8 Shredders, 4 Cannons, 4 Splinter Rifles).
        • Average of 5 Dead Terminators, 9 Dead Marines, 12 Dead Guardsmen.

tl;dr - Max out on Darklight. It's by far the best all-round even if you factor in Invulns.

• Hekatrix Bloodbrides: Take ten, give them as many Hydra Gauntlets as you can, give them Adrenalight and stuff them in a Raider. Then bury something in an even unholier number of attacks. Just keep in mind the cost when bringing them over Wyches. Everything that has been said for Wyches is relevant to these. 5 in a Venom make an awesome MSU hunting unit. 10 in a Raider is a Tarpit that will eventually kill something due to the sheer number of attacks.
• Incubi: Edgy Aspect Warriors, armed with some immensely scary melee weapons. Not only does each Incubus make 3 attacks at S4 and AP-3, the Klaivex hits on 2's and also has a chance of dealing massively higher damage, enough to cleave a Tyranid Warrior in two in a single strike. The Klaivex can also switch between S4, AP-3 Attacks or dropping 1 AP for two extra swings!. Check your target before deciding which one to use. They hit on 2's from Turn 3 onwards turning them from scary to horrifying. Take 5 in a Venom and go hunting high value targets, a practicable choice, or take two units of 5 in a Raider and go drown a unit in an unholy number of S4, AP-3 attacks (expensive but a lot of fun).
  • Demiklaives: Single Blade vs Dual Blade: There's no reason not to buy the twin swords, ever. Assuming everything hits with the Twin Blades you can expect 3 wounds vs T3, 2 Wounds vs T4-5 and 1 Wound vs T6 up. With the Single Blade you can expect to see 2.6 Wounds vs T3, 2 Wounds vs T4, 1.3 Wounds vs T5-7 and 0.6 wounds vs T8+. This is all before saves. Factoring in the AP the Single Blade does pull ahead vs MEQ and TEQ as you would expect but we are talking fractions here.
  • Modelling Tip: Need Demiklaives? The blades on the ends of Hellion Hellglaives make awesome looking swords! If you head to your neared bits auction then grab Hellglaive F as it has has the hands already on for you so all you need to do is clip them into swords and Kit Bash straight on to one of the Incubi pointing the sword downwards, pinning as needed. If you want more slender swords, the Harlequin Troupe Box set has a big number of Right Handed sword options and most of the Dark Eldar Sprues all have left handed sword options.
• Mandrakes: Damn good now. No, really. They can pop up more than 9" away from the opponent and immediately shoot with Assault 2 S4, AP 1- attacks with a chance to do Mortal Wounds in addition to the damage on a 6+. ANY attacks targeting them at them take a -1 To Hit penalty and they have a 5++ as well as the PFP save to keep them alive and if their Baleblasts don't quite do it, their 3 S4 attacks per model should damn well make sure. Probably the unit that received the biggest buff in the new edition. Mandrakes do work now, son! Maybe taking over Comorragh was just what they needed to get their day in the (Dark) Sun.
  • The fun thing about these guys is that people either are familiar with them from past editions and grossly underestimate what they can do, or read the Unit Card and massively overestimate what they can do and divert way too much firepower thier way.
• Grotesques: Massively scary. They have an impressive statline complete with S/T5, 3 Wounds and 3 Attacks that hit on 3+. Also like all <COVEN> units they come stock with a 5++ Invulnerable, all of which makes them both tough as nails and scary enough that your opponent will still focus everything he has into them. For armament they come stock with a Flesh Gauntlet and a Monstrous Cleaver. The Cleaver does very well indeed against T4 and less while the Flesh Gauntlet does well against high Toughness and high saves. Can also take Liquifiers but why bother? To make up for the non-existent unit champion, one Grotesque can take a Weapon of Torture. Ironically enough though, their stock equipment trumps most items from that list, but stuff like a Venomblade or a Scissorhand could be worth a laugh or two.
  • An alternate take: While their most significant weakness (Instant Death) is gone they did lose much of their appeal. They are more expensive, lost the Rampage rule, lost re-rolls to wound against T4 or less and lost the amazing Grotesquerie formation (basically Grotesques on Combat Drugs). And they are by no means more survivable, as their 5+ FNP basically already was an Invulnerable Save equivalent and T6 is less significant in this edition. To make things worse, many weapons now deal D3 or D6 damage, so a Grotesque can be killed by lucky Heavy Bolter shot. Mind you, they used to be able to tank Lascannons easily. I would consider investing into a much cheaper T5 blob of Wracks.
  • That being said, there are a few things Grotesques excel at, and that is killing T4 and lower. Where Wracks are hemmed in by having poisoned weapons and only poisoned weapons, the Grotesques have an answer for situations where their Strength stat actually matters. Similarly, due to their ability to throw out Mortal Wounds via their Flesh Gauntlets, they can threaten Thunderhammer Terminators and other high-save models, which the Wracks are almost entirely powerless against. In addition, the Monstrous Cleaver with its S5 allows the Grotesques to more effectively threaten VEHICLES. In short, they aren't the end-all be-all of the Covens anymore, but they are far from useless.
• Beastmaster: Little more than a buff vector for all the beasts. If they stick close to him, they reroll To Hit and can use his Leadership. Also, considering an Agoniser is only 4 points, consider giving him one because why not. Same ranged weapon as Hellions too, just in case you wanted to fly around harassing infantry.

Dedicated Transport

NOTE: Not that it comes up often for the Drukhari outside of embarking characters, but you can mix units inside transports now.

• Raider: A big paper boat with either a Dark Lance or a Disintegrator Cannon. Can also take a Shock Prow if you're feeling lucky. Nope, no more Splinter Racks for you. The Raider is now actually decently tough and might even survive until it discharged its CC cargo, or ferrying a Kabalite squad for a few turns. Can hold 10 Infantry models (Grotesques take 2 slots each). Zoom across the table at full speed (M 14") and shower the enemy with hails of poisoned splinters unabaited. Use that to either close in to that Cultist or Scout squad on an objective, or to keep your distance from approaching CC units as you gradually wear them down. They won't appreciate that.
  • An Alternate Take:The Raider is not only more resilient due to their guaranteeed 5++ save against shooting, and having toughness/wound stats, but now they also benefit a great deal of getting into Close Combat. No, really. Raider always hit their enemies on a 4+, and the little guys inside are still protected (until it dies). It's a tactic for when your opponent has too many shooting weapons to bring your boat down, and in CC you can keep relatively safe (until a specially dedicated weapon comes to take on you, obviously), and when you Fall Back you can STILL SHOOT. Do note that while the Raider may shoot after falling back, its passengers may not.

• Venom: A small paper boat with a Splinter Cannon and either a Twin Splinter Rifle or a second Splinter Cannon. Now that the Twin Rifle is free but the second Cannon runs you another 15 points, it may not be too bad an idea to keep the Twin rifle. Just ask yourself, is the difference between 24" Rapid Fire 2 and 36" Rapid Fire 3 worth 15 points? Either way, it transports 5 and Grotesques cannot ride in it even if you took an under-strength unit. It's also now 2" faster than the Raider, so zip around and crap out a massive amount of poison.
  • Alternative Take: One thing people have missed out about the Twin Linked Splinter Rifles is that closing in to Rapid Fire the thing results in either 1) The Venom dying to Lasguns, Bolters, Melta Guns or a random Krak Grenade following a round of Rapid Firing Bolters, 2) The Venom just getting charged (6" move plus 6" Charge ain't hard to make) which loses you a turn of shooting for the passengers, assuming the Venom survived combat, 3) You not quite getting into Rapid Fire Range Turn 1 resulting in you losing the unit 4) A combination of the above. Remember that while Venoms can be spammed, they are not exactly expendable. You take the additional cannon for extra firepower at range while skirting just outside the range of weapons that can reliably threaten it. Plus it Synergises well with a Squad of Blasterborn given that if you are in range to fire the Blasters, you are in range to Rapid Fire the cannons on the same targets.

Flyer

• Note: Weapon facing does not matter anymore. You should always prioritise whatever facing will keep your flyer on the table for the longest. Also note that both of these units have the <Wych Cult> tag which proably won't be relevant until we get a Codex.
• Razorwing Jetfighter: A few changes make the Razorwing into what is probably the best flyer in the game right now. It always has access to all three types of missile (but can only fire one each turn). All Dark Eldar heavy weapons turn into assault weapons when mounted on a vehicle, so it will hit on a 3+ most of the time. Each weapon may fire at a different target on a 360° firing arc, meaning you don't need to worry about any wasted splinter shots or where the flyer's nose is pointing at. Getting out of sticky situations or into the enemy's face is no problem either with a move of 20-72". The Razorwing comes equipped with Disintegrator Cannons for ruining the day of any Bike Squad or TEQ, or can opt for Dark Lances to go after vehicles and characters. Also comes with a Twin Splinter Rifle that you can upgrade to a Splinter Cannon.
  • Razorwing Missiles No longer one use only, and you get all types by default now. You declare which missile you use when you declare the weapon to shoot with.
    • Monoscythe Missile: Assault D6, S6, 0 AP , 2 Damage. Nice for drowning a Bike Squad or TEQs in saves.
    • Necrotoxin Missile: Assault D6, Wounds on a 2+ (6+ for Vehicles). Your infantry hunting and character sniping choice. Recent FAQ changed this to Assault D6. Still good though.
    • Shatterfield Missile: Assault D6, S7, -1 AP, 1 Damage with Shred. Necrotoxin is much more consistent but this has a nice niche in burying MSU MEQ units in armour saves.

• Voidraven Bomber: Behold, one of the most durable and powerful models in the army! 12 Wounds at T6 combined with the new Flyer rules and a built-in 5++ mean that for Dark Eldar standards, this is one tough son of a bitch to bring down. But that's not the end. The Voidraven is equipped with two Void Lances, which are +1S compared to the Dark Lances. You can switch these out for Dark Scythes which are Assault D3, S8, AP-4, D3 damage. Both options are awesome. For 25 points you can equip the Voidraven with pretty mean missiles that don't go away after one shooting. Also, it is a bomber, and a bomb it has. Once per battle you can drop a tactical nuke on a single unit the Voidraven has moved over. Then, you roll 3D6 for each Monster or Vehicle, or a D6 for each model in the unit up to a whopping 10D6. For each roll of 3+, the unit suffers a mortal wound. Very, very nasty. (To put the power of the bomb into perspective, when nuking a squad of 10 2+Sv Marines, you can expect 6 of them to be vaporized away from the board).
  • Voidraven Missiles No longer one use only, and you get all types by default now. You declare which missile you use when you declare the weapon to shoot with.
    • Shatterfield Missile: Assault D6, S7, -1 AP, 1 Damage with Shred. Has a nice niche in burying MSU MEQ units in armour saves.
    • Implosion Missile: Assault D3, S6, -3 AP, 1 Damage. Sadly nerfed from 7th Edition. Can still reliably threaten a lot of units. Still not a bad choice.

Fast Attack

• Clawed Fiends: Horrifying. Lots of Wounds, high Toughness and lots of attacks at high strength and with damage 2. Its only weakness, the 4+ WS, is remedied by the Beastmaster granting it rerolls.
• Khymerae: Decent harassers with a 5++. Not much more to say, really.
• Razorwing Flocks: Horrible Strength and Toughness of 2, but with Instant Death being a thing of the past, all you can see are the 4 wounds per flock and the 8 (Eight) attacks per flock. For best results, throw them at big stuff like Wraithknights. You'll wound most things on 6+ anyway so might as well make those 6s count. 48 wounds for a maxed out unit and 96 attacks for a measly 84 points (if I'm mathing right and not totally retarded) is great for a throwaway unit. These will either be ignored or shots will be dedicated to stopping them. Plus how badass would you feel if your Archon could just summon murders of murder birds to the field? With the faq these are now double the points so you can essentially half the above info
• Reavers: For Dark Eldar standards, Reavers are indestructible juggernauts with T4 2W and a 4+ save. They combine decent shooting (Splinter Rifle and Splinter Pistol) with decent melee (S4 AP-1 Bladevanes). They can also take either a heat lance or a blaster for every three models in the unit and for god's sake take the Blaster as it's 10 points cheaper while being more reliable. Finally they can take either Cluster Caltrops or a Grav Talon. The difference is, the former can deal Mortal Wounds when the Reavers Fall Back while the latter can deal Mortal Wounds when the Reavers charge. Your choice. These guys are REALLY expensive at 30 points per model... You have been warned
  • Given that it turns these guys into T5, 2W models with a 4+ save, Reavers are the best candidate for Painbringer, and it should really be your default Drug of choice. A big group of these with Grav Talons is one of the best tarpits in the army that your opponent really doesn't want to fall back from.
• Hellions: For some reason each little Hellion gets a damage 2 melee weapon on top of their Splinter Pods, which makes them both better at shooting and scarier in melee than Reavers. However, they are far more fragile than Reavers, too. These guys are horde sweepers. They fly around blasting suckas with a bunch of poison shots, then charge in. With no AP on their weapons and striking at S4 (maybe S5 if you gave them that Combat Drug), their attacks will bounce off big and tough things with a decent save. That 2 damage is there for one reason only: making sure infantry with FNP-type saves (a la Ork Boyz with a Painboy) have to roll boxcars or 5+ TWICE to stay alive. They could maybe harass some light vehicles (oddly enough they'd be extremely effective against enemy Dark Eldar vehicles) but will in no way, shape or form charge in and take out the enemy's centerpiece model. They are, however, a nasty, hard counter to horde-style armies. Give them +1A Combat Drug and send them in against a 30 man Ork Boy or conscript squad and let the bodies hit the floor. The 2 damage attacks also make them somewhat interesting against multiwound infantry like Crisis or Stealth Suits, Wraithguard, Nobz or Tyranid Warriors/Raveners/Shrikes.
  • Note: The new FAQ confirms that Helions can't be taken in Raiders or Venoms.
  • Alternate Take: Take 14 with Adrenalight and a Succubus for those Re-Rolls of 1's and shove them all into a Tantalus (the wording of the FAQ does not mention Tantali are illegal transports for Hellions). Watch your opponent weep at the Alpha Strike.
• Scourges: Heavy weapon squads with wings. Their stock weapon is a Shardcarbine, which is already a very nice gun, but let's be real here, you take Scourges for the clusterfuck of heavy weaponry they can shlep with them. With how expensive Heat Lances are and how specialised Haywire Blasters have become, Blasters and Dark Lances may be your best bet for general use against vehicles. Keep your paws off those Splinter Cannons as well. A Scourge is 14 points, the Splinter Cannon is 15 and since the Cannon adds pretty much the same shooting as another Shardcarbine, it's literally cheaper to just get more bodies as the Shardcarbine is free. Also don't be afraid to mix weapons as you can split your fire.
  • Note: The new FAQ confirms that Scourges can't be taken in Raiders or Venoms. The Tantalus is legal. 3 Squads of 5 with Carbines, Blasters or Dark Lances, or a mix of the three? Congrats, you just became That Guy.
  • Melee Note: If you do want to take a Melee weapon on the Solarite, all the weapons perform about the same given the number of Attacks the unit has with the Lance being best due to it basically being a Power Axe and you should always expect to have to fight MEQ. If you want to abuse Shoot, Charge, Fallback, Shoot shenanigans to stop an enemy unit from shooting for a turn, then there are other units that do it better, however your Scourges mobility does let them easily support the Reavers or Helions with a follow up charge. If you are going to do this, however in Matched Play its best to keep the unit as cheap as possible. In Open/Narrative Play you're probably having a Casual/Fluffy game anyway so go nuts.
  • Scourge Weapon Analysis - Short Version:
    • Shardcarbines: The best anti-infantry weapon choice the unit can take, full stop.
    • Blasters, Dark Lances, Haywire Blasters, and Heat Lances: The weapons for fighting Vehicles and Heavies. Dark Lances are the best in the most circumstances, followed by Heat Lances in melta range, followed by Blasters, followed by Haywire Blasters (which you really want against Quantum Shielding, Invuln Saves, and other defences where the best bypass is mortal wounds). Pick according to the needs of your Army List.
    • Shredders and Splinter Cannons: Do not take, at they are either too expensive or too niche compared to just taking more Scourges instead.
  • Scourge Weapon Analysis - Individual Breakdown: (Due to everyone getting Split Fire, you can feel free to mix and match weapons however you like; that said, it's still a good idea to use weapons with similar ranges in case you need to focus your shots on a single unit.)
    • Blaster: Overall a fantastic choice combined with Scourges' high mobility as Jump Infantry (32"-38" effective threat range), and the Winged Strike ability letting you drop them exactly where you want them, when you want them. S8, AP -4 and D3 Damage will certainly threaten most vehicles and Monsters as well as make TEQs cry. At 15 points each, it’s hard not to say: “Why am I taking X instead of more Blasters?” when picking Scourge weapons. Particularly worthwhile against Necron Vehicles with Quantum Shielding because the opponent is much less likely to deny their D3 Damage than the D6 of Dark or Heat Lances, but in general, anything you want to shoot with a Blaster, you'll do more damage per point with a Dark Lance, provided you stand still, which is a pretty big "provided".
    • Dark Lance: Pay 5 extra points for a Blaster with twice the range and D6 damage? Awesome. They give your Scourges an absurd effective threat range of 50" (and the look on your opponent's face when they realise this is priceless). Their main drawback is the fact they are Heavy, so they have a -1 to Hit penalty if they move. Remember that deploying via Winged Strike also means you count as having already moved. Then again, with such a range you may not have to move that often, and you can drop into some good sniping position just to make sure you are safe (+1 cover is a blessing for these fellas). In comparison to a Ravager, they trade greater durability and accuracy on the move for 1 more Dark Lance shot, Winged Strike and PFP benefits. They are a perfectly viable choice - the decision is yours. If you do stand still, more damage per point than a Blaster against everything with lots of wounds, which are the only things worth shooting with these guns anyway. If you toss them in a Tantalus which can legally transport Scourges then you have a hilariously powerful gunboat.
    • Haywire Blaster: Has lost a lot of the fabled reliability that made it such a terror in 7th Edition after Haywire and Grav Weapons took a hit with the nerf bat. It will always Mortal Wound a vehicle on a 4+ and on a 6 it deals D3 Mortal wounds along with the one saveable wound. This gives the weapon a reliable niche in stripping wounds from vehicles with Invun saves or countering Quantum Shielding or Serpent Shields. It is the cheapest of the “Heavy” options for Scourges (12 Points per unit) and it has a 38"-44" effective threat range so does have that going for it. But Blasters are only 3 points more, making them more points efficient in every case that does not involve invuln saves; if you're shooting a vehicle with invuln saves or other even more exotic defences, like Quantum Shielding or Serpent Shields, Haywire Blasters have their niche.
    • Heat Lance: S6 at first glance looks unappealing, especially as Blasters and Dark Lances are S8 and cheaper. However, the new wound system makes this less of an issue. Plus, at half range, the combination of AP-5 and D6 damage (rolling twice, discarding lowest damage) is going to destroy any vehicle, monster or TEQ you point them at. Outside of half range, Blasters and Dark Lances start to pull ahead, and Haywire is still superior against Invuln saves and Quantum Shielding. Overall these are fantastic guns (and are borderline OP for any Ynnari Detachment you may have with Doom provided from a Farseer) however, at 25 points each, you won’t be taking them in large numbers any time soon.
    • Shredder: These would be awesome against T3 hordes if they had an AP value. But even the Guardsmen/Fire Warrior/Gaunt blobs these are awesome against on paper will still get their saves. Shardcarbines are more reliable against T4 up though. Still they are the cheapest “special” weapon option available to Scourges at 8 Points each, and D3 S6 hits with Shred (against Infantry) is nothing to sneeze at. Their niche is the odd situation where having a Strength score on the gun actually matters compared to a Splinter Weapon, though with thier tiny range, the Scourges shouldn't be using them anyway as Trueborn and Kabalites get to shoot them from the safety of their transport.
    • Splinter Cannon: They cost 15 points each. An extra Scourge costs 14 Points. You can probably see the issue here. That said, a full 10-Elf squad with 4 Splinter Cannons can put out a hilarious number of shots in Rapid Fire range. A total of 42 shots otherwise known as a metric FUCKTON of dakka. That is going to put a dent in any squad it shoots at as well as your points budget. While it is true that you can buy another Scourge for 1 point less than taking a splinter cannon, the reason they are so valuable is because of their range. Splinter cannons allow your Scourges to safely pour fire onto the enemy from a long distance away where usually only dedicated anti-vehicle weaponry can reach and at that point an opponent typically cannot afford to waste those precious shots targeting infantry.

Heavy Support

• Ravager: Even more survivable than the new-and-improved Raider, the Ravager is somewhat sturdier with T6. Similarly, built-in Night Shields provide a 5++ save against all ranged weapons. Because Dark Lances count as Assault when equipped on Vehicles it has got an effective threat range of 50" at full accuracy. That, and their ability to deal D6 Damage at S8 AP-4 means the enemy won't escape and will die when you shoot them. Use their mobility to dictate the terms of battle and stay away from enemy charges. Disintegrators are a good choice if you want to erase enemy TEQ or Bikers from existence, although they are rather costly so there's that to consider.
• Cronos: The support Engine. The Cronos comes stock with a flamer with high AP and a chance to do massive damage with each hit and can take a second weapon that does nearly the same but without the auto-hits. It also, more interestingly, lets DRUKHARI units within 6" reroll 1s To Wound in melee, which makes your Taloses and Grotesques even scarier. It also has a chance of healing friendly models if it kills something in melee but its melee stats are so lacking that this will rarely happen.
• Talos: The killy Engine. The Talos comes stock with two Macro-scalpels and considering your options, you're best off to stay with those. The Chain-flails and the Ichor Injector aren't as useful as the scalpels by a long shot and the Twin Liquifier, while strong, is extremely expensive. It can also get guns on the tail, with the Twin Heat Lances being the honeytrap: They look really good but you pay 50 points for them knowing full well that half of their two shots will statistically miss. In a pure <COVEN> list, you should probably take Haywire Blasters as they're decently cheap. Otherwise, stick to either the Stinger Pod or the Splinter Cannons.
• Reaper (Forge World): The One Big Gun alternative to the Ravager. Comparable points cost to the Dark Lance variant with +2 Wounds for greater survivability. The weapon has got two firing modes: the first is 24" range blast with 2D6 shots at S6 to drown the enemy in saves, the second is 36" range beam with D6 Dark Lance shots to vaporise a tank or a monster. Should the enemy unit endure this, both modes prevent the survivors from Advancing if any models have been slain. Unfortunately, the weapon is Heavy so its accuracy is reduced on the move. That shouldn't be too much of a problem with proper deployment, though. Moreover, the Reaper is no slouch in CC thanks to 5 attacks one of which is done at S6 AP-1 D2. Overall, a tactically flexible skimmer with great potential.
  • 23/07/2017 FAQ Update: Because of a hilariously badly worded FAQ giving every single model a Close Combat Weapon,even models that physically can't carry one, you can make all of its attacks at S6. You know what that means? RAMMING SPEED, STEERSMAN! I WANT THAT MON'KEIGH COMMANDER'S HAT FOR MY COLLECTION!
• Tantalus (Forge World): Drukhari Superheavy. No, really. 18 Wounds at T7 and 3+ armour is insane for the faction's standards. Two pulse disintegrators fire a total of 12 shots at 36" range, with S8 AP-3 D2. In close combat, it's got 6 S8 AP-2 attacks which hit at 4+, and on the charge it inflicts D3 mortal wounds on a 4+ roll to any enemy units within 1". When the Tantalus Advances, you simply double its movement value. Combine that with Open-topped transport capacity of 16 (works the same as a Raider's) and the ability to grant the embarked Warlord's Leadership to all friendly LoS units (except for those in cover, for some reason) to complete the most powerful model in the army. The price for that is your wallet, your soul, and a points cost slightly lower than two 2 Disintegrator Ravagers. Chapter Approved spiked the price up to 400 points.
  • The PARTY BUS: three units of Trueborn carrying whichever gun you want (preferably Blasters), with one spot left to put a character in (and use the Chariot of Tortured Souls ability). Not as good as the Sslyth-based party bus of the previous edition as you can no longer deep strike using a webway portal, but still a terrifying basket filled with terrifying eggs.
  • The FAQ that banned Scourges and Hellions from transports only mentions Raiders and Venoms. This awesome boat can still transport your Scourges and Hellions and protect them from fire, and give your Scourges a second deployment option to boot. 15 Dark Lances plus the 12 total Shots from the main gun is about as Dark Eldar as you're going to get. And with that volume of fire, you stop caring about the -1 to hit if you have to move too.

Army Building and Tactics

Army Building

• Overall: The Dark Eldar have the potential to make some extremely potent Alpha Strikes. Their absurd firepower coupled with high mobility coupled with smart positioning makes them extremely viable as of the beginning of 8th Edition. The Meta is bound to shift as more Codexes come out but as of right now your access to lots of very good Anti-Infantry and Anti-Vehicle weapons is allowing the Dark Eldar to stay competitive.
• How Many Drops? Recent changes to the rules to determine who goes first means an interesting meta for your list building. You now roll off to determine who goes first, but whoever finishes first gets a +1. So you can pick between finishing first to get that +1 and potentially not have to burn a CP to re-roll seize the initiative, or you can use Chaff units (Venoms, Kabalites, Wyches and Court of the Archon usits are excellent at this) to get more information on your opponents deployment.
• Unit Spamming: Formations are gone yet spam is still legal to a silly degree. Venoms are among the best units for spamming as they are absurd mobility, high durability (for a Dark Eldar unit), no damage chart, and can combine strong anti-armour (Kabalite units inside with 1-4 Darklight weapons, Wych unit leaders with Blast Pistols, Blaster Archons etc), anti-infantry (Double Splinter Cannons), and Fly in one point efficient model cheap enough to may a role as chaff for deployment.
• Keep your Allies Lesser Kin you aren't currently scheming against close...: Remember you aren't just a Drukhari army, you are an Aeldari army. You can cherry pick the best units from the Craftworlds, Ynnari, Harlequins and Corsairs lists. While you do have a Mirror to most Craftworld units, there are some things that cover what you lack:
  • The most notable and fluffy unit you can bring are Rangers, which provide something that you sorely lack: access to a good sniper unit.
  • An allied Farseer sounds odd given it can only Buff Asuryanni units, but Doom can be cast on anything, and it makes your already strong melee and ranged damage potential even more powerful. It also gives you an answer to enemy Psykers as spamming Haemonculi is not efficient.
  • Warlocks are another cheap source of Deny the Witch and reliable debuffs. Remember that Drain and Reveal work on anything!
  • Harlequin Troupes are another fluffy pick. They are much more offensively oriented than Wyches, plus Shadowseers bring along more Smite and Deny the Witch.
  • Of course Wraith units are a very powerful addition to any Dark Eldar force. Heck, you could even paint them in Kabal colours and say your Archon captured a bunch. Plus your only Lord of War options are in the Craftworld List. Though just how your Archon managed to get their hands on a Wraithknight is another thing entirely...
  • Corsairs are one last Fluffy option. For 82 Points you can get a unit of 5 Pirates with Shardcarbines and Jet Packs! Plus one of them can swap out their gun for one of several heavy or special weapons including Flamers, Fusion Guns, Shredders, Shuriken Cannons, Dark Lances, Blasters, and even Aeldari Missile Launchers!
• Darklight & Poison: It's pretty well known but For 1982 Points you can take a Brigade Battalion Detachment with 2 Archons with Blaster, Grenade Launcher and Agoniser in a Double Cannon Venom, 5 Units of 5 Kabalite Warriors with Blaster each, Sybarites packing Agonisers and Grenade Launchers all in a Double Cannon Venom each, and 3 Ravagers along with an Air Wing Detachment with 3 Razorwings with Double Dark Lances and Splinter Cannon each.
  • So that is a total of: 7 Command Points, 12 Drops, 2 Leadership Auras you won't use, 7 Blasters, 15 Dark Lances, 16 Splinter Rifles, 15 Splinter Cannons, 7 Agonisers and 7 Grenade Launchers. It's not hard to switch an Archon for a Succubus, Haemonculus or even switch the Archon's Blaster for a pistol if you want more close combat bite. Dropping the Agonisers and Grenade Launchers from the Sybarites frees up enough points to take a Sslyth to guard the Archons so there is that too. Each Venom is packing 7-14 Splinter Shots and 1 Blaster shot. In one round of shooting you can put out 35-70 Splinter Shots from the Venoms alone! Add in the Razorwings and you have 44-88 Splinter Shots and add in the Darklight Weapons from the Ravagers and Razorwings and that is 44-88 Splinter Shots and 23 S8 AP -4 Shots. Totalling 111 Shots. You can play leadership Shenanigans with the cheap Grenade Launchers and if you have to charge something or get charged, the Agonisers on every infantry unit let you do work in the Fight Phase. You ARE punching on 2's and rerolling Charges from Turn 3 onwards after all so you might as well use those stupidly cheap Agonisers for something if the Venom explodes.

Tactics

• Raiders and You: AKA "How to love your Paper Boats" The Dark Eldar are in a nice spot where all of our Infantry are viable (your local meta may or may not affect this), giving us a surprising number of different units we can field. While Venoms are very hard to pass up, Raiders are pretty cheap compared to most transports and can bring a lot of units into "Fuck you" range of the enemy. And they can lower the number of drops you have for MSU lists too! Aside from the classic Gunboat setups by filling it up with Kabalite Warriors, there are now a surprising number of options:
  • Trueborn: You can get 2 units of Trueborn into one Raider so that's 8 Blasters, 4 Splinter Cannons or 5 Dark Lances flying up the board.
  • Incubi: Two units of Incubi with Demi-Klaives is going to ruin the day of any MEQs you drop them near. One fun thing to do is combine a Unit of 5 Incubi with 5 Kabalite Warriors in a Raider. You get a terrifying melee unit supported by a versatile unit that can shoot, bubble wrap and generally support. It's like the Banshee+Dire Avenger+Warlocks team that the Craftworlders can pull, except it's actually good.
  • Wych Cult Units: 2 units of Wyches/Bloodbrides in a raider will give your opponent a hell of a time thanks to No Escape and the Pile-In rules. They can take an Agnoniser and Hydra Gauntlet in each unit and Wyches themselves can be resilient now with their 4++ in close combat and Power from Pain. While they are best used as an Anvil for your Incubi or Coven units, or act as a good pinning unit while your characters dismantle an enemy unit, with the sheer number of attacks they can potentially have, they're got a good chance at killing a unit themselves.
  • Grotesques: You can take 5 Grotesques or take 4 plus have room for a Character or two. Makes a pretty effective Hammer to your Wych Anvil. Their statlines are frankly terrifying and with Strength 5 and 4-5 attacks (depending on Weapon) each, they can threaten anything they charge. Having them in a Raider negates thier one weakness which is the huge target they have painted on thier backs by anything using Blasters, Heavy Bolters, Assault Cannons or Autocannons (or thier equivalents).
  • Wracks: 2 units of 5 or a blob of 10. Either way you can bring Ossefactors and Liquifier guns. They're a versatile unit that do work in melee as a hammer or anvil.
  • Sslyth Party Bus: 2 Archons and 8 Sslyth. Still works if you have more than one Detachment. Heck, you can fill the whole thing with Sslyth if you have 3 Detachments but at that point you might as well go all in and shove them all in a Tantalus. Still awesome, still hilarious. Just remember that each model is an independent character now so wait until you can re-roll charges before getting into melee. You will thank me later.
• Also remember that the Raider model is huge compared to the Venom. You can disembark from any point of the model which can give you a ton of options. It also makes it very difficult for an opponent to pull a Quirk and attempt to surround the transport with infantry so the unit inside a destroyed transport can't be placed within 3" and are removed from play due to having no legal deployment options. You have a pretty big paper boat so your opponent will have to dedicate a pretty huge unit to do that. Venoms on the other hand can be very easily surrounded by any opponent willing to pull that shit on you.