Hey folks!
Tomorrow is going to be an interesting experience. As you probably know, I'm a big fan of efficiency. I'm a systems engineer, process engineer, industrial engineer...different parts of the military and civilian world call it different things, but it all boils down to efficiency. That includes my hobby. All my hobbies in fact. When I'm at home, I'm often playing 2-3 video games at the same time on my computer (Flash games at Kongregate type of thing), while watching a movie with my wife.
But that's tangential to this: Hulksmash and I don't always agree on everything, but we have always agreed that Dark Eldar don't belong in 2,500 points. And yet...here I sit with a 2,500 point Dark Eldar list in hand, regretting having made it, and knowing that I'm going to be miserable playing it because of it's inherent inefficiencies, but with no better alternative. I had four choices:
1. Don't go to 'Ard Boyz....well, I told my friend I would go, and I'd like to win a 2500 point army of my choice. I've got a friend I'm trying to get into 40k, and would love to be like, "Boom: Here's an army."
2. Play Necrons: My monoliths aren't painted (I know, no painting requirements), but more importantly are in various stages of disassembly and repair FOR the painting work. Without the monoliths, the army doesn't work. My warriors aren't finished either.
3. Play Orks: I've seriously considered this one, but for two major flaws. I haven't played Orks since the Nova Open last year....and I had broken them out of storage FOR the Nova Open, because I'd been playing Dark Eldar for so long. So in reality, I'm not really an Ork player anymore. On top of that, while the understanding of how to use an army or a list never dies, it *does* get rusty fairly quickly, and as I discovered at the Nova Open last year, leaves me susceptible to mistakes.
4. Pump up Dark Eldar: My least favorable option: At 2,000 points, I have a full force organization, minus two fast attack choices. That means I add 500 points and don't get anything really substantive out of it - a HUGE waste of efficiency. But with Necrons out for now, Orks having been unpackaged for a year and more, all my various space marine armies having never been played....I'm left with Dark Eldar. And with the Nova coming up, I should probably get in a bit of practice to keep from going rusty.
So....Dark Eldar it is. Prepare to feast your eyes on my 2,000 point list, with the addition of some horrendous reaver jetbikes and a bunch of....unnecessary fat and padding.
HQ: Baron Sathonyx
HQ: 3x Haemonculi with Shattershard/Liquifier, Liquifier, Liquifier
Troop: 5x Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop: 5x Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop: 5x Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop: 5x Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop: 5x Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop: 9x Wyches with a Hekatrix, Agonizer, Haywire Grenades, Shardnet and Impaler, in a Raider with a Flickerfield, Grisly Trophies, and a Torment Grenade Launcher.
Elite: 4x Trueborn with 4x Blasters in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Elite: 4x Trueborn with 4x Blasters in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Elite: 4x Trueborn with 4x Blasters in a Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Fast: 4x Beastmasters, 4x Razorwings, 10x Khymerae
Fast: 6x Reaver Jetbikes with 2x Heat Lances
Fast: 6x Reaver Jetbikes with 2x Heat Lances
Heavy: Ravager with triple Dark Lances, Flickerfield, Nightshields
Heavy: Ravager with triple Dark Lances, Flickerfield, Nightshields
Heavy: Ravager with triple Dark Lances, Flickerfield, Nightshields
And that's it. My 2,000 point list got reavers, two haemonculi, 5 more beasts....and a hell of a lot of pork. If this was a budget it would be pork. If it was a diet, I'd be eating chocolate cake. Stale chocolate cake because this list doesn't taste good. In fact, this list would be the dietary equivalent of stale chocolate cake made with unsweetened chocolate and rancid eggs...when I don't even LIKE chocolate, and eating it would mean that I'm not allowed to have yellow cake ever again, but I don't have anything else to eat, and eating is mandatory.
And so I scarf down the rancid and stale chocolate cake army list even though I know how awful and wasteful it is because I don't have any other option except to starve. Fuck you 'Ard Boyz. It's one thing to succeed with an uncompetitive codex like Necrons....and to achieve in the face of adversity. It's quite another to bring an ugly and inefficient bulbous waste to the table and show it to people.
I'm quite ashamed of what I've got here, and can honestly say that neither winning or losing will emotionally affect me this weekend. If I lose, I was expecting to because it was literally a 2500 vs 2000 game, and I knew all along (and know right now) that this isn't very scary to most 2500 armies that Dark Eldar find challenging. And if I win, I'll know that it wasn't because of me overcoming adversity with an underdog army....but simply because the other armies there and the generals there weren't good enough to overcome this crap heap.
Anyway, rant off. Comment away. And as always, thanks for clicking our ads! Hulksmash says that our ad revenue is getting us shirts, which we'll have for the Nova Open, and that if I'm a good Dark Elf, he'll get me a torture device for Christmas.
