The Lost Glade News

All discussion on how to beat Dark Elves is to be posted in this thread. The best tactics will be amalgamated into this post.

My main opponent for over a year now has been dark elfs. My friend and i play the games round his house on his bedroom floor which is rather bigger than your average tabletop size. We have little terrain and only 2 woods, 2 buildings and some walls. So maybe my experience has been different and so my tactics would be different. Nevertheless i am willing to try my best for a little tactica. Here we go.

Note: all units and stuff are from memory so maybe wrong here and there. Also i don't know about harpies he has never taken them nor black guard.

Right lets start off looking at their core.
Spearelfs or at least what i call them. These are the runt of the litter and will often bare the main battle line. They are cheap i think for an elven unit. They are your usual rank and file unit that is lightly armoured. So usual tactics of negating the ranks or shooting those ranks away is basically all you need. But due to our high movement and the usual placing of this unit in the middle we can 'ignore' this unit and go for the others. I found that even glade riders and dryads hitting flank and front can easily take them down. I used glade riders once (5 with muso) on their flank and actually did enough damage to break them! Luck did play here but like all rank and files their ranks are their only strength. Best unit against these? a tag team of either treeman (anvil) and wild riders or cheaper a tag team of dryads and wild riders.

Repeater Crossbowelfs to me are useless. They have done well in combat once or twice but their shooting is to say they are elfs not very accurate. They are shorter range then us and most of the time they will use their 2x shots. A screen of dryads can easily be used to protect your more vital units liek glade guard as they shoot his own spearelfs. Put the pressure on his missles by advancing your dryads to them. Wild riders do suffer from those shots so only charge his front if your close enough to not stand and shoot or out of his line of sight. Best unit against these? dryads.

Corsairs. The bane of our glade guard. To me one of the most threatening units a dark elf force would have. Their sea dragon cloak protects them better then the spearelfs to shooting. Also with two hand weapons they can dish some damage to our low T and low armour save troops. Their weakness to me is combat though. They have only a 5+ save in combat and they don't have spears or the such (so kill the front 5 and they can't use all those attacks). Best unit against these? wardancers and/or dryads.

Dark riders. Well they are fast cav and so you will find them scooting down the flanks to threaten and control them. They do fall rather nicely against missles. So i tend to place my Glade Guard on the flanks to advance and protect as my own wild riders attempt to take his flanks. A often mistake is that he forgets that sometimes he gets too close to treeman and even he thinks his safe you can move your treeman closer and then strangle root. Usually one strangle root of 6 hits would do. Best unit against these? Glade Guard.

Right on to the Specials.
Cold one knights. Owwww...2+ save! BUT! stupid and only 14" range. Ok they are ld9 so stupid can't to be relied upon but when it does fail its nice. usually used as a flanking force for the anvils (spearelfs). They cause fear! not that it matters much to us really with so many of our own ITP and fear causers. I find my opponent likes to have a warbanner in with these. Or their is a magic banner (can't remember name) that gives every model +1 attack for the first round of combat. So with WS5 and lances thats alot of hurt! One of the hardest units to take down but a treeman will do wonders at lets say "you shall not pass" (anvil). Use his lower movement against him, multi charge them where possible. Wardancers with killing blow is a risky tactic but can pay off rather well. I have found that a treeman holding with stubborn and killing 1-2 a turn will slowly but surely take them out. Best unit against these? Treeman and/or wardancers.

Cold one chariot. Stupid thing literally. I tend to try to lure him to charge my dryads. Ok they would probably die...or would they? that 5+ ward can come in handy and T4 makes sure you get some kind of attack back. The reason why i let my dryads get charged is becuase if i survive and hold i would most likely be breaking him next turn. If he kills me and overruns thats where your positioning comes in handy. Let him kill those 96pts of dryads so he runs into the woods! Use the woods to your advantage here more than usual. Or if not this tactic may i suggest wild riders? Even just 5 with no command (ofc musician) can take it down. Like all chariots its only good if it charges so use its 14" charge range against it. Hide in forests if need be. With our Wild riders 18" and some good guessing of ranges you can pull these down big time. Usually not worth it though at lower then 100pts each. But at least it can't kill you. Best unit against this? Wild riders and/or drayds.

Witch elfs! Rather the same as our wardancers but they have no protection. Where ours skirmish theres rank up. But there is a rather huge weakness to these. Frenzy. This makes them unreliable to the general. Making them charge anything in range. You could in theory give them a run around with glade riders. And yes this would work lovely if your opponent didn't keep them safe which he/she should. With no protection and T3 this makes rather nice targets for any missles. Hail of doom arrow? Glade Guard? even Glade Riders. Shoot these to peices! If it comes to it and they come close so combat is rather your only choice then take them on with dryads or wardancers. They have poisoned attacks so thats why i don't say treekin but they are still a viable choice. Usually small numbers of say 10-15 and their champions can be rather deadly. So hit their flanks whenever you can but make sure you are charging! you don't wont these striking before you. Best units against these? Glade Guard, Glade riders, Wardancers.

To the rare slots now.

Repeater bolt throwers. Nasty things these are. Ripping through our wild riders and protecting the flanks with ease against our low armoured cav. Huge range (48"). So what to do with them? Never let it get line of sight at your fast cav (though the wards of wild riders may help if lucky). I have found though like the crossbowelfs that a screen of dryads will do wonders to protect your more vital troops. If they move then they can't fire! So maybe some treesinging could block their line of sight? Don't worry too much the S6 shot as we have no armour safes against its 6 S4 barded shots anyway. Juicy target for victory points 100pts. Best unit against these? screen of dryads or glade guard (shoot it and pray you hit the crew and kill them, takes awhile (like 2 turns of shooting) but it can happen).

Black Guard. Though i have never been against these they sound rather nice. Halberd weilding stubborn troops? Ok their armour is poor and they may be expensive but they are stubborn and we all know how well a stubborn anvil does. But in theory shooting and fear causers (we got aplenty of both) can be their bane. Best units against these? i cannot say but if i had to guess Glade guard and dryads.

Now onto characters.
Their nobles the combat worthy ones can be out fitted rather nicely with a nice armour save and even some magic weapon. Though i don't find them too much of a worry but their assasins is a different story. We can't be sure where they are and the many attacks of high WS can slaughter many of the asrai and even forest spirit alike. Be careful but not to worry too much if you got annoyance of netlings.
Sorceresses. Lovely offensive spell casters with good damaging lores to choose from and +1 to cast. These will make mince meat out of your dryads with any 2D6 S4 hits spells or better. Hard to dispell with their +1 to cast. But thats where our magic resistance comes in. I can assure you that if up against dark elfs 8/10 it will have magic. The least i play against is 2 level 2s. So magic defense is needed. My opponent underestimates the lore of athel loren and maybe others do too? Due to the lack of offense. Make them pay heavily for this by blocking his/hers line of sight with forests (alot of spells that are magic missles). Mage hunters obviously good choice.

I hope that was helpful.
SDETT

Very, thanks, fighting DE next week with my WE for first time, good tips..

Thanks for the comment. Glad to see some use is comming out of this. I wish you good luck in your game! If your opponent is anything like mine was then you should be able to dance rings round him. Be careful of magic and bolt throwers they did most of the damage against me.

SDETT

G'day,
I have been a Druchii General for a couple of years, but I never used Witche Elves or the Executioners or Black Guard. I thought about Harpies but never used them (usually only played up to 2,000 point battles). Harpies can be nasty, fly and a couple of attacks, I can't remember if they got a rank bonus (I am pretty sure most flyers don't get a rank bonus). War Hydras, very nasty, breathe weapon, terror, M6, but also large target and needs two handlers with only light armour. Shoot the Handlers and maybe the Hydra will do nothing for the rest of the battle, never used it much. Typically I had a tooled up Lvl 2 Sorcerer (she had an extra spell and an extra power dice, mounted on Dark Steed - about 170 points of raw killing power - just awesome), a couple of Repeater Boltthrowers, a unit of Shades (these are excellent Scouts, armed with Repeating Crossbows, kill them off with Dryads or if they are in woods, let a tree Singing spell finish them off), chariot, 20 odd spear armed Druchii and at least one unit of 10 Repeater Crossbow armed Druchii, Dark Riders (excellent Fast Cavalry who can be armed with Repeater Crossbows, fill these full of arrows quickly so they don't impede on your own ability to manouvre ). My tactis were to shoot the enemy so that he would have to advance to me were I would counter attack with the chariot and maybe the spears. Rely on Wood Elf strengths, terrain, manouvreability and Tree Singing. Dark Elf magic can be very nasty, the first spell 'Chillwind' will stop your archers from firing if they suffer a wound (as they are frozen). Heroes can be armed very offensively, but T3 and generally low armour can keep them a bit fragile though.

Hope some of this helps.

Regards,

Lycandal the Fading

Has anyone faced the new dark elves? With the new army book out I think they are going to be the new army of choice for a lot of the players in my league and I'd like to know what I'm up against. I've only played a few games against Dark Elves in the past so I really don't have any experience agianst them.

That said, I do have a game against them on Sunday. My opponent is new to warhammer (returning to the hobby after 7 or so years not playing) so I'm not too concerned, I just don't want to underestimate them.

On the whole the army is quite balanced (none of the power creep that VC, Daemons have) but the lists I have faced in GT practise games have been quite nasty... Look out for double Hydra lists, with a Lord on a dragon with inverse ward save, Regen and Lance, nasty.

They now have lots of shooting and cold ones are better than ever, magic is quite nasty with mages being able to use as many PD as they like regardless of level, plsu they can sacrifice troops to add more PD after they have rolled their spell, plus they dont even need LOS if they take this familiar...


However against WE's and LM, hatred will work against them due to the fact they will always have to overrun, so our speed will work. Plus they are still T3 so do what we do best, Shoot them....

Hydras however will take some beating.....

Thanks for the information. What is this "inverse ward save" you speak of?

One of the DE magic items gives them a wardsave which I think is equal to the strength of the attack that hits them, but they have to roll under this to make the save (6 always fails).
Ie. Vs a strength 3 hit the DE player rolls a dice- 1,2 or 3 saves the wound, 4, 5 or 6 fails the save.
It's a damn good item...

ye, it's basically a strengh test save, so anything like a cannon they get a 2+ ward save against....horrible.

(And VC are hard now? I've seen many games in my GW, vampires are an army with many strenghs but far more weaknesses, and there are so many VC players at my store that everyone knows them as well as their own army)

For some reason I tend to find myself fighting against Dark Elves the new book makes them very daunting but not not unbeatable. My large block of EG works wonders against them as do treekin and a treeman or two.

Agreed, the only things that give me trouble are the hydras. Well that and the reverse ward save item that every dark elf lord seems to have along with a 2+ armour save. Worst. item. ever.

Just this weekend I played against this list:

Lord on Dragon
Hero BSB on Manticore
6 cold one knights
6 cold one knights
6 dark riders
6 dark riders
10 crossbowmen
cold one chariot
cold one chariot
bolt thrower
bolt thrower
hydra

It sucked.

I thought you could only have one of each magic item? Or have I been playing Warhammer wrong

What he means is that anytime he plays against dark elves, the lord (in 2k) has the pendant of kaelath.