Dark Elf Thoughts #1

Well, the new Dark Elf book is out now, and although there has already been lots of discussion on various forums and podcasts, I wanted to take a look at what I thought were the major changes in the book, as well as my though process as I begin to design my army list for the Alamo GT. Here we go!

The biggest changes to the book, of course, are the army wide special rules. First, Dark Elves no longer have Hatred. Rather, they only have Hatred: High Elves. This is a fairly big change as the Dark Elves won't get re-rolls in the first round of combat against all enemies. To make up for this, the Dark Elves, like High Elves, have gotten the Always Strikes First rule. This allows the Dark Elves to strike first, but as most elite troops have similar initiative to the basic elves, most units won't always be getting re-rolls in combat. This hurts the efficiency of certain units, particularly the Executioners who are only initiative 5 with great weapons. I will explore my reasoning on this later, when I get to unit specific changes and army thoughts.

Second, the Dark Elves have the Murderous Prowess special rule. This gives all models with this rule the ability To Wound rolls of "1" in close combat. I would have also liked this rule to cover shooting attacks made by repeater crossbows (though I will admit that would have been a pretty broken rule). This rule makes certain units with lots of attacks, like Witch Elves, Blackguard, and Spearmen, much more effective in close combat as you will be re-rolling 16% of your To Wound Rolls. Combine that with a unit that will re-roll in combat every round - like Witch Elves and Blackguard (do you see a pattern in my initial army thoughts) - and you should be causing a significant number of wounds to your target.

There are also some additional army special rules, but they apply to specific unit types and so will be discussed with those units. Now let's move on to the first stand out of the book: the Witch Elves.

Witch Elves are now a Core unit! Witch Elves used to be a Special choice, which meant that they were constantly fighting for points space with other special units and you still had to take a core unit to meet your minimum core requirements. Now, you get exactly what you want with the Witch Elves, a high number of attack unit in the core slot. I think this unit has taken the place of the prior Corsair build (especially with the loss of certain magic items).

The Stat-line of the Witches hasn't changed any, although their point cost has increased to 11 points a model (from 10) and the cost of the musician has gone up to 10 points (from 5). They are still only Weapon Skill 4 so they are hitting most enemy units on "4s". However, their high Initiative of 6, combined with the Always Strikes First rule means that they will be getting re-rolls against all but the most elite of enemy units. The unit is still Frenzied and has Poisoned Attacks. All of these rules combined means that a horde of Witches puts out 50, strength 3, weapon skill 4, poisoned attacks that will almost always re-roll to hit in every round of combat against almost all opponents. That is one dangerous unit!

The next stand-out unit for me is the Death Hag mounted on the Cauldron of Blood. The Death Hag is the Hero-level character version of the Witch Elves and has the same special rules for an improved hero-level stat-line. The Initiative level of the Death Hag has dropped from 8 to 7, but the Death Hag should still re-roll all her attacks against all but the greatest foes. The Death Hag has also dropped from 90 to 85 points! Further, the Death Hag can still be the Battle Standard Bearer, if you so choose.

Although the Death Hag has lost the older Gifts of Khaine, she can take a single magic item up to 50 points, plus one of the new Gifts of Khaine: Cry of War; Rune of Khaine; and Witchbrew.

• Cry of War (my favorite) grants the model the Fear special rule and makes any enemy unit test for Fear at -3 Leadership meaning that there is a much greater chance of causing the enemy to fail and be at Weapon Skill 1 for the round of combat (allowing your Witches to hit on "3s"). 
• Rune of Khaine grants the model +D3 attacks each round of combat.
• Witchbrew grants the model and unit super-Frenzy where each model gets +2 attacks, but the unit suffers a -3 Leadership to Frenzy charge tests (so the unit tests on a "6" instead of a "9"). 

Finally, the model may be mounted on the new Cauldron of Blood. The Cauldron is now a chariot model, rather than a warmachine which means it no longer auto fails all those pesky characteristic tests from spells like Purple Sun and The Dwellers Below (my prior favorite way to kill the Cauldron when I played against it with Wood Elves). The Cauldron has increased from 110 to 190 points (that's a whopping 80 point increase) and has gotten a lot of new rules. 

1. It has its own stat-line now which includes D6+1 strength 5 impact hits. It is also Toughness 6 with 5 Wounds! This makes the Cauldron much, much harder to kill than in the previous edition of the book. 
2. It has two Witch Elf crew who have the same stat-line as normal witches (meaning they have 6 attacks between the two of them).
3. The model itself has a 4+ ward save (on its 5 wounds) and grants a 5+ ward save to the Death Had riding it, as well as to the unit, if any, that it is with. Hm, a unit of Witches with a 5+ ward save? Count me in.
4. It has magic resistance 1 which extends to the unit it is in, giving it a 3+ and the unit 4+ ward save against spells. 
5. It causes Terror! 
6. It has the Fury of Khaine special rule. This is an innate bound spell (power level 3) which targets a single unit with 12" and gives then Frenzy. If the unit already has Frenzy, they gain +2 attacks instead of the normal +1. Note, this is not cumulative with Witchbrew so don't pay the points for Witchbrew on the Death Hag if you are also going to mount her on the Cauldron as you will most likely always be using this ability. 
7. It has the Strength of Khaine special rule. All friendly models with the Murderous Prowess special rule within 6" of the cauldron re-roll all, I repeat, all failed to wound rolls! This is huge, especially with Strength 3 Witches!
8. Finally, the Cauldron has the Will of the Gods special rule. This means that the model may join a unit like a character, so long as it it placed in the center of the front rank.

Looking at all of its rules, I find the new Cauldron to just be outstanding. Although the Cauldron with Hag is not 75 points more than it used to be, it is still absolutely amazing. It makes a with unit absolutely devastating in combat, and gives the witches a chance to really stay around for several rounds of combat against heavily armored enemies. The unit will be putting out so many attacks that no matter how heavily armored, your opponent should be loosing troops in droves. This is one model I definitely want to include in my army list.

Army List Thoughts:

Although there is a lot of new changes to the book, my initial reaction is that I want to take a unit of Witches with the Cauldron of Blood. I don't quite know yet whether the Cauldron will be treated like the Screaming Bell or Plague Furnace in terms of counting as models for purposes of a horde, but either way I think you want the horde of witches to gain the extra 10 poisoned attacks. The large frontage will be worth it. That being said, here is the unit as I devise it:

• 30 Witch Elves with Musician and Champion (340 points) (I am also looking at a unit that also has a standard bearer with the Banner of Swiftness for 25 more points, especially if I am having a hard time making my core requirement - I was also looking at the Banner of Eternal Flame, but I am worried about a unit of Dragon Princes or a few characters with the Dragon Bane Gem or Dragonhelm holding up that unit for the entire game). This unit puts out 51 attacks and has a champion to accept a challenge from something that could kill the Death Hag and Cauldron.
• Death Hag (85) with Cry of War (15 points), the Sword of Anti-Heroes (30), and mounted on the Cauldron of Blood (190 points) (320 points total). Because the cost of the model is so great, and there is the possibility that it can be targeted with a cannon or other crazy weapon and not get any type of special rule other than its 4+ ward save, I don't want to make the Death Hag the BSB (for another 25 points) even though the Cauldron is a large target. I have already stated that I like the Cry of War for the -3 leadership test on the fear check and I like the Sword of Anti-Heroes because most units that the witches will go into will have at least 1 character, if not more, so the Hag becomes Strength 5, re-rolling wounds. I may drop this though, if points are needed in the Hero category for a Master to be the BSB. 

Combined, this is a roughly 660 point unit (maybe a little higher or lower as changes are made) but provides a great, hard hitting unit that will also be fairly difficult to destroy outright without the unit having a chance to really do some damage. Also, as the Cauldron is a chariot and becomes a mount for the Hag, your opponent has to kill both to get the points for the model, which is a nice little bonus if they can't kill both.

There we have my Dark Elf Thoughts Part 1 of what I sure will be several. We also have the first part of my ongoing army list that I will be updating constantly, as we progress to the October 24th turn in date.