Hello again! I’m back with another battle against the powerful Adeptus Custodes. This time I’m fielding the Aeldari, newly-debuffed after a terrifying first few weeks of tournament results. These two factions are widely considered to be right near the top of the meta, so this should be an interesting game!
Aeldari
Autarch Wayleaper 80
Farseer 65
Avatar 295
Death Jester with Fate’s Messenger 85
2 Lynxes 310
2 D-Cannons 210
1 War Walker with bright lances 95
3 Hornets with bright lances 240
2 Warlocks on foot 60
Vyper with bright lance 75
3 x 3 Shroudrunners 240
3 x 5 Shadow Spectres 240
1995 points
This list has cut all the Wraithknights and Fire Prisms in
favour of trying a few things differently. To that end it’s leaning heavily
into the concept of distributed firepower, with lots of small units
running around to snipe with bright lances or gun down light infantry. I’m also
trying out the Lynxes as an alternative to Fire Prisms. They’re almost exactly
the same price as the Prisms now, and while they give up some noticeable things
(the blast profile, Linked Fire and extra rerolls being the main ones) they get
twice as many big shots, are dramatically tougher and can move 23” a turn with
no penalty. Even with new Fly that’s still an insane amount of mobility, so I
think they’re worth trying out.
Oh, and there’s an Avatar as well. I don’t yet know whether
he’s quite as good as the two Fire Prisms I could swap him for, but he is
extremely cool and that counts for a lot.
Adeptus Custodes
Shield-Captain 120
Blade Champion 100
10 Custodians 450
6 Wardens 300
3 Wardens 150
2 x Caladii 430
2 x 2 Allarus 260
4 Prosecutors 40
2 x 5 Exaction squad 70
Eversor 75
1995 points
The edition is still very new, but this is already looking
like ‘standard Custodes stuff’ to me. Big bricks to claim the centre, smaller
squads of Allarus and Wardens to skirmish on the flanks, two Caladii to
threaten tanks at range and cheap chaff for objectives and Secondaries. Scary
stuff, although not much that wants to tangle with an Avatar. That is true of
most lists, admittedly.
Mission, Deployment and Secondaries
For today’s game we rolled into Mission G, which combines
Hammer and Anvil with Chilling Rain and Sites of Power. Hammer and Anvil makes
it harder for me to play around a Custodes brick marching straight up the
middle, while Sites of Power gives bonus points for having characters on
objectives. Looks like I’m going to need to focus heavily on one flank to try
and hold its objective with characters.
Deployment was relatively conservative for both of us, with
the Custodes staying quite hidden and the Aeldari respecting the threat of the
Calladii. The Eversor and War Walker were both poised forwards, ready to score
early objectives or (in the Eversor’s case) go on a suicide run to punk an
exposed character. Most of the Custodes chaff units and two Shadow Spectre
squads were in reserve, ready to hunt points later in the game.
For Secondaries, we both ended up picking Tactical. Neither
of us really gave up enough killing Secondaries to bother, and the Aeldari in
particular were confident in their speed letting them pick up easy points on
Tactical cards. Also, the risk of something like Engage or Behind Enemy Lines
being screened out all game was a real consideration.
On this deployment, either first or second turn would probably
be okay. I was happy enough to fling chaff forward to try and lure Custodes
bricks out into the open if I went first, or to hunker down and score my 15 at
the end if going second.
Custodes Turn 1
The Custodes drew a mixed set of cards this turn. Defend
Strongholds is the perfect first turn card — or rather, it would be if you were
allowed to use it on the first turn. We totally forgot this, so just chalk
another mistake up to the ‘early edition’ tally. In any case, the second Custodes
Secondary was Engage, which would basically require the Custodes to either
Golden Light an Allarus squad behind my lines or go sprinting forward with the
Assassin. They picked the latter, hoping it could at least take out my nearest
Shroudrunner squad on the way out. Unfortunately Phantasm exists and the Aeldari
don’t make any claims to be a fair or balanced faction, so I merrily zipped 7” further
back and watched the Eversor botch its charge. It could have moved closer to
the squad, but that would have taken it within 12” of my D-Cannon and risked an
auto-6 Overwatch. Because, again, fair and balanced faction.
Phantasm politely declines the Eversor's invitation to close combat
Otherwise, the central Custodes block rolled a 1 to advance,
so held relatively static behind their terrain piece, while the Wardens with
Blade Champion moved up one ruin to hold the left objective and threaten a deep
advance/charge into my lines. With no good targets in the open, the Calladii stayed
hidden.
Aeldari Turn 1
The Aeldari picked up a fairly easy set of first Secondaries
in Extend Battle Lines and Cleanse. Basically I just had to hold the centre
objective and my safe one and I’d get a free 10 points. Awesome.
The centre was cleansed by a unit of Shroudrunners zipping up, while the leftmost squad move-blocked the Wardens to prevent them charging anything important next turn. My War Walker and one Lynx hung out with the Wayleaper on the right objective, while the other Lynx swooped forward to line up the Warden blob with its 23” advance. It melted one after the Custodes opted to hold off on their 4+++ for this turn, before zooming back behind cover with Fire and Fade. The D-Cannon did two more wounds to the squad, but both were saved. Curses.
The Eversor was facing about a million Aeldari guns, and
died to the very first (a single Vyper bright lance). 75 points for 3 VPs is at
least a decent trade for the Custodes.
I scored both my Secondaries, while the Custodes picked up Defend
Stronghold as well. Yeah, I can see why that card isn’t meant to be scoreable
Turn 1.
Custodes Turn 2
Drawing Teleport Homers and secure No Man’s Land, the
Custodes had a dilemma on their hands. Both Secondaries would require units to
be exposed to score them, but the question was how much additional power to put
forward into advanced positions.
Starting with the easy stuff, one Allarus squad used Golden Light to teleport into my backfield to score Teleport Homers.
Next, the big Custodian
Guard squad stomped forward onto the centre to threaten big charges next turn.
Both Calladii came out, one to line up the right Lynx and the other to hunt my
move-blocking Shroudrunners on the left.
Of course, being a sneaky Aeldari git, I Phantasmed the Lynx back behind cover, so the left Calladius had no better targets than the lone War Walker. Even then, I was able to burn a Fate Die to scrape by on a single wound, taking advantage of my 4++ and -1 to wound.
On the other flank, the second
Calladius killed only a single Shroudrunner after some flubbed rolling, before
the Custodian Guard squad opened up. They blasted the central Shroudrunners to
pieces, before double-shooting to kill another Shroudrunner on the left, leaving
me with a single 1-wound bike.
The Custodes scored both their Secondaries, and were poised
menacingly in the centre. Time to see what the Aeldari guns can do without
Wraithknights to lean on!
Aeldari Turn 2
My Secondaries this turn were excellent, drawing Teleport
Homers and Bring it Down. Given that I was aiming to shoot Calladii this turn
anyway, that works for me.
Teleport Homers was fairly easily scored, with my one
surviving Shroudrunner on the left using an auto-6 Fate Die from the Farseer to
advance into the Custodes deployment zone and complete it for 5VP. The Wardens
contemplated Overwatching, but realised that the Custodian brick was going to
need all the CP they could get to survive the coming storm. Plus, I could
always just drop down a Shadow Spectre unit in a corner to score it if need be.
Given that a lot of my guns were going to go to the big
tanks on either flank, I realised I needed another plan for the Custodes brick
in the centre. So forward went the Avatar, ready to show what he can do. Either
that or die instantly, as he does in every Black Library novel. One of the two.
Elsewhere, I used the Hornet fly-by ability to badly wound one Allarus in my backfield, while lining up a Lynx, War Walker and one Hornet on the right Calladius.
The other one was facing just a Hornet and a Lynx, so I
planned to burn a Fate Die there if need be. In the centre, I dropped in a
Shadow Spectre squad and lined them up with basically every other available gun
to go into the Custodian Guard squad. With this much firepower ready to fire, I
was feeling pretty good about things.
And then the Emperor supervened.
First, the Lynx and Hornet on the left got three failed
saves through onto the Calladius, only to roll triple 1’s for damage. I
contemplated spending a Fate Die on the third one before realising that this
tank was living no matter what. Boo.
Next, I rolled two more 1’s on damage dice against the other Calladius, having to panic-fire another Hornet and force through the kill with a Fate Die to bring it down (and score Bring it Down).
Then the Allarus decided
they didn’t feel like failing saves, with the last one laughing off a D-Cannon
and two bright lances to the face. I unleashed a firestorm from the Avatar,
Vyper, Shadow Spectres, Shroud Runners and Death Jester into the central
Guardians, and killed exactly two models. It was a bleak shooting phase, with
the surviving Allarus being particularly galling.
Still, I had an audacious plan for the centre. After
tallying OC, I worked out that by bringing one squad of Shadow Spectres forward
onto the objective with their after-shooting move, I could potentially flip the
centre off the Custodes. So the Avatar went charging in, using the universal
strat to gain Precision and absolutely eviscerate the Shield-Captain in spite
of the Custodes using the -1D strat again. With careful placement of my model,
I was able to ensure that the Custodes couldn’t pile enough models onto the
objective to prevent me claiming it, although they did do 5 wounds back to the
Avatar through Fortune and his half-damage special rule.
It was a somewhat disappointing turn, but I was still in a
decent position and scoring well. I just needed to kill a few more Custodes!
Custodes Turn 3
Scoring another 9 on Primary, the Custodes drew Tempting
Target and Capture Enemy Outpost. Both would be quite hard for them to achieve,
although neither was impossible. I obviously nominated my right objective as
Tempting; these Custodes were going to have to work for their points!
Things started off with the irritatingly-still-alive Allarus in my backfield moving up to try and charge onto my objective, hoping to flip it with his OC2. Doing so allowed me to Overwatch with my D-Cannon though, which scored a terrifying 3 hits thanks to a Fate Die and some jammy rolling. But the Emperor’s grace continued to protect the Allarus and he strode undaunted through the warp rift to threaten a huge swing of points.
Thankfully, the
Aeldari have plans within plans, so I Phantasmed back a squad of Shadow
Spectres onto my objective to prevent him scoring Capture Enemy Outpost.
Foiled, the Allarus charged a Hornet and Lynx nearby to do a little damage and tie
them up.
The central brick was locked in against the Avatar, and the Wardens
rolled too low on their advance (with a free reroll!) to get anywhere useful, but
the Custodes brought in their reserves. The Prosecutors and remaining Exaction
squad popped up behind cover to take over objective-guarding duties for next turn,
while the Wardens teleported in to try and make the 9” charge onto the Tempting
Target. They failed, even with the reroll, and I could but thank the fates for
my deliverance.
I had a little more luck on the right, where the damaged
Calladius continued to duel my Lynx. It unleashed a fusillade that would have
shredded a Fire Prism, but the sturdy Lynx survived on 7 wounds. Maybe the Prism
isn’t an auto-take now!
Finally, in combat the Avatar got to strike first, and the
Wailing Doom sung (wailed) as it carved through the Custodes. Four of the
Emperor’s Chosen were scythed down, before the remaining three swarmed around it
and brought it down to a single wound. Naturally, I saved it with Fate Dice,
because why roll dice when you could instead just dictate their outcome.
This turn didn’t go nearly as well as the Custodes needed it
to, and they scored neither of their Secondaries. A big swing for me, and one I
sorely needed.
Aeldari Turn 3
I began my turn by scoring a 15 on Primary thanks to the
Avatar’s brave survival in the centre, before drawing Capture Enemy Outpost and
Extend Battle Lines. The latter would require literally no effort from me, but the
former would demand a little more sneakiness. Thankfully, Aeldari are great at
sneakiness, so I dropped my last Shadow Spectre unit into the Custodes
backfield. They had obviously screened their objective, but not from a unit
that can move 6” after Deep Strike and shooting. I melted the unfortunate
Prosecutors and darted in to flip the objective from the Allarus for 8VP.
Shadow Spectres are super strong, you guys.
In the centre, my Avatar managed to fail Battleshock, despite
being quite literally an avatar of destruction. I guess even the god of war
gets spooked by scary golden men sometimes. As such, I was treated to the nervewracking
experience of falling back and needing a 3+ to keep my 295-point model alive. Actually
having to roll the die felt like an afront to Aeldari players everywhere, but
it came up with a 3 and my Avatar got to survive the turn. Otherwise, I lined
up 10 Shadow Spectres, a Lynx and several other units and absolutely deleted
the surviving Custodian Guards.
My good luck continued, with a Hornet in my backfield finally bringing down the Allarus and the Lynx on the left bringing the Calladius down to a couple of wounds. The last Hornet lined it up and it detonated, killing an Arbite nearby.
A Warden from the squad that dropped in last
turn got blasted despite its 4+++, and his two buddies were moveblocked by
Shroudrunners for next turn. These bikes can’t really do damage in this
matchup, but they’re still easily earning their place.
Finally, my dice decided I was due some excitement after
last turn’s debacles. The D-Cannon targeted the large Warden squad and managed
to score two Devastating Wounds after Fate Dice, before the Custodes absolutely
flunked their 4+++ rolls to lose the entire Warden squad! The Blade Champion
survived, but it was still a devastating blow. And to add insult to injury, it
turns out he can’t even advance and charge unless he’s attached to a unit.
Brutal.
Custodes Turn 4
With their home-field objective flipped, the Custodes only
scored 6 points on Primary this turn (although we messed up and gave them 9
anyway). Their Secondaries were some improvement, with Extend Battlelines just
requiring them to retake their backfield objective and Tempting Target still
possible despite my move-blocking.
Things started well for the Custodes, with the Allarus in the backfield effortlessly shredding my Shadow Spectres to reclaim the Custodes objective.
The Wardens moved to try and charge the War Walker to flip my right
objective, but I Phantasmed away to safety. That strat truly is so insane. The frustrated
Wardens gunned down a Shroudrunner, but failed their big charge onto the
Autarch, foiling that plan.
Finally, the Blade Champion went heroically charging forward
into the Avatar. Using Slayer of Nightmares to cancel out Fortune, he finally
dealt the damage to bring the monster crashing to the ground. It was probably
too late to impact the game much, but it was An Extremely Cool Moment. The
Custode could join the storied ranks of approximately half the galaxy in having
killed an Avatar of Khaine.
He then chose to consolidate into the nearby Shadow Spectres
to try and tie them up, only for their pile-in and consolidation moves to bring
enough of them onto the objective to flip it back to the Aeldari. We decided
not to bother rolling their strikes back.
Aeldari Turn 4
Going into Turn 4, I scored a 12 on Primary and drew Engage and Secure No Man’s Land. Both were very doable, and I started my turn by flinging the central Shadow Spectres and one Lynx forward to max Engage.
Nearly the whole rest of my army followed them up, bringing all guns to bear on the surviving Custodes.
The Wardens, Blade Champion and Allarus were all blasted to
pieces by massed lance/pulsar fire, but the FNP rolls of the Exaction squads
were insane. The medic on one squad managed to laugh off a hit from a Lynx
pulsar (showing the impressive capabilities of 40k medicine!), and in the end
one squad of Arbites managed to survive the deluge untouched.
Still, with all the Custodes combat pieces gone we agreed to call it a day. We talked out the last turn and drew the last few Secondaries, determining the final score of 100:60 in favour of the Aeldari!
Strategy Analysis
Overall, I think my strategy going into the game was correct. I needed to play a
cautious few turns in order to secure a materiel edge, while keeping my safe
midfield objective secure in order to avoid falling too far behind on Primary.
Various things went sideways in the middle there, but that was the right way to approach the game.
Similarly, the Custodes needed to push me hard on Turn 2 in order to prevent me
playing a slow trading game, because I had way too many cheap fast units to
contest on that front.
An interesting question we discussed after the game is
whether my opponent should have brought out the Wardens on the second turn.
There wasn’t much for them to do (literally just kill the unit of Shroudrunners
I’d blocked them with), but it might have put them in a better position to
pressure me on the next turn. On the other hand, maybe I would have just
move-blocked them with Shadow Spectres and they would have been stuck in the
open against my guns. Clearly what ended up happening with the D-Cannon makes
the current play worse in hindsight, but it’s also hard to overstate how much
the threat they posed from behind that building dictated and constrained my
movement.
For my part, I think there were a few errors I could have
tightened up. There wasn’t really any need for the War Walker to be in the
Calladius’ line of sight on Turn 2: I had it positioned back a bit in order to
make a charge by the Alalrus harder, but ultimately my opponent was never going
to bring that unit forward to try for a 10” charge anyway. After all, they could
just teleport and go for the 9” one somewhere else. Failing to screen my
backfield on Turn 2 was also a needless error, albeit one that shouldn’t have cost
me as much as it did.
List Analysis
Starting with the Custodes, this list felt very solid. Those
two big bricks are each extremely scary in their own ways, and the two
characters feel like the best two options. Trajann is obviously an absolute
beatstick, but I don’t think he compares to getting free -1D or Fights First
from the Shield-Captain, or advance/charge from the Blade Champion. The chaff
is chaff, and the Calladii do give the list a lot of scary long-ranged punch. When
I play against pure-infantry Custodes my tanks get to be extremely
disrespectful with their movement, but the presence of those two big guns meant
I was forced into paying attention to terrain. Boo.
The Eversor didn’t really accomplish much, but I still think
he pulled his weight here. Ultimately, something was going to have to go
forward for Engage on Turn 1, and the only real alternatives Custodes can
access for those early mobility Secondaries are the Allarus (who cost almost
twice as much) or Bikes (who cost even more!). If he wasn’t up against Aeldari
then he’d probably have traded for a screening unit and some VPs, which is
better than a Vindicare could have done here.
My list had a number of minor changes I’d make, but overall
I absolutely loved it. I always think Aeldari play best when they’re packed
full of chaff units, because often those chaff can actually pack quite a punch
too. Here, I had 13 cheap units that I was happy to trade for points or
a good move-block, with solid-great mobility and a damage output that really
adds up. Couple that with the Lynxes for big shots from an unexpected angle (and
way more durability than you’d expect for that cost!) and the D-Cannons
for consistently-terrifying indirect, and the list has some serious teeth.
I was a little disappointed by the Vyper (ignores cover is nice,
but it’s otherwise so much worse than a Hornet), and the Death Jester
was merely ‘okay´ in a list that otherwise felt incredible. I’m not sure
exactly what I’d swap either out for though, as I can’t field any more of my
favourite 80-point Aeldari units and I don’t have the points for anything
better. Maybe I could combine both into another Lynx?
Speaking of which, I think the Lynx really is stern
competition to the Fire Prism. It has some noticeable downsides, but being so
much faster is great, and not instantly dying when looked at by guns is a real
step up. I don’t think there’s a clear right answer here, but both are clearly
so much better than most of their equivalents in other factions that it’s
almost academic. Take whichever you have and they’ll do great.
Being able to survive that first volley back from the Calladius was a big deal
Finally, the absolute star of the list was the Avatar. He
didn’t kill that much more than his points cost, but being able to charge him
in and out-brawl a whole Custodian Guard unit is an incredible asset. I went in
thinking that he was mostly just in there as a bit of a meme unit, but I am
convinced. He’s insane, and he’s going in all my lists for the next little while!
Balance Analysis
Yeah, so, Aeldari are still pretty busted.
The qualifiers first: the balance changes were huge, and I really felt them this game. I still
had about 5 Fate Dice left at the end, and quite good ones as well (I’d burned
all the bad rolls with my Farseer). In the past I could have used all those 4’s
and 5’s to make the Avatar just laugh off the Guardians, or to guarantee the
kills on the Calladii. Instead, I… couldn’t. Coupling that with the price hikes
— which were why I wasn’t running insanely-undercosted Wraithknights or Fire
Prisms — and the army has been toned down substantially.
For all those qualifiers
though, this still did not feel fair or balanced. To start with, I felt like I
had at least 2-3 more units than I should. Being able to go so incredibly wide
while still retaining punch and getting to field an Avatar as well just made
the list feel effortless to pilot. I could throw units forward to move-block or
score Secondaries with reckless abandon, all while keeping back a crazy amount
of hitting power to punish whatever my opponent retaliated with. I don’t want
to dive into the whole ‘compare this great unit to this mediocre one in another
index’ thing, but these units generally just felt too cheap for their firepower
and mobility.
Speaking of
mobility, I’m just gonna keep mentioning Phantasm until it’s changed or you all
get sick of hearing about it. That strat is genuinely just game-changing at all
points, in every single turn, in more ways than I’ve even scratched the surface
of. It lets you move-block then save the unit, it lets you make easy charges
impossible, it lets you unexpectedly flip objectives, it lets you do just about
everything you could possibly want.
To pick just one
example from a game in which I used it 4/4 turns: on Turn 2, if I hadn’t
mispositioned the War Walker, then my opponent wouldn’t have been able to bring
his Calladius out to shoot my right Lynx, because if they did then they’d have nothing
to shoot after I Phantasmed to safety. So just by having the strat I
was radically altering my opponent’s options for the turn, even without using
it. As it was I did misposition that War Walker, so Phantasm was just the
difference between my opponent shooting my medium-durability big gun or my
high-durability small gun. That’s already a huge gain, and it could have been
even better! And obviously using Phantasm to strand the Eversor and the Wardens
was great both times, and getting the Shadow Spectres back onto my homefield
objective prevented an 11-point swing against me from the Allarus. This strat
is easily the best in the game and I absolutely love it. Aeldari could be bottom-5
with only awful units and this strat would be incredible.
To sum up: Aeldari
feel much more reasonable than they did a month ago, so the ‘disaster-management’
goal of the balance patch has been achieved. They’re still extremely powerful though, and are definitely going to need further changes
going forward.
If you made it to
the end of that, then thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed! Feel free
to let me know if the comments how you’re finding the Aeldari post-nerf, and if
there are any particular matchups you’d like to see me write up. I can’t
guarantee I’ll get to them, but I’m always keen to hear whether people want the
hyper-competitive stuff or more relaxed fare.
Until next time, may your models always scrape by on just one wound!
Hello, Some of my friend want to try the "virtual" warhammer, which softare do you use? thank you
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