AoS 2 - Aelves Discussion

[Thiagoma]

Since the Aelf Factions are so fragmented, i decided to make a topic to talk about the fragmented factions such as Order Draconis, Darkling Covens and so on.

 

With no Battletome in the Horizon, how are you guys fielding your Elves? How are you guys holding up?

Edited April 8, 2019 by Thiagoma

[Thiagoma]

In my local meta, i usually play 1250 pts, my results are mixed. Usually i can hold my own on tournaments and such, finishing on the upper half of the results.

 

My last list was :

GA Order

Frosthearth Phoenix (General, Legendary Defense, Ignax Scale)

Archmage on Horse

 

Battlelines

Reavers x 5

Reavers x 5

 

Units

Sisters of the Thorn x5

Phoenix Guard x 30

 

Fought 3 fights, Won against Skaven (pre BT), Minor Victory Vs Legion of Nagash (Tie on objectives, i managed to kill a little bit more units) and i was stomped by Seraphon on a 6 objective game, where my enemy just summoned/teleported skinks to the goal.

[Thiagoma]

For my 2k List i am going with:

Frosthearth Phoenix (General, Legendary Defense)

Flamespyre Phoenix

Archmage on Dragon (book, Ignax Scale)

Loremaster

 

Battlelines

Glade Guard x 10

Highborn Spearmen x 10

Highborn Spearmen x 10

 

Units

Swordmaster x 20

Phoenix Guard x 20

 

Not a extremely competitive list but i felt like taking the Swordmasters and Fire Phoenix for a spin. Battlelines are completly tax payment and will be disposable objective holders.

 

[Lightbox]

@Azamar this sounds like a good thread for you to give some input in.

[Azamar]

1 hour ago, Lightbox said:

@Azamar this sounds like a good thread for you to give some input in.

Definitely  up my street! 

I actually haven’t used a mixed aelf army for some time as I’ve mostly been splitting them out into Darkling covens and Phoenix Temple, but I’ll attach the only list I still have saved on warscroll builder. 

I’ve generally gotten on pretty well with aelves in AOS 2, albeit not in a cutting edge competitive environment which does skew things somewhat. There’s a definite lack of punch, with not much tend available and mortal wounds being fairly thin on the ground. But there’s definitely a few heavy hitters around and all our units are decently quick.

 I don’t generally expect to outpunch battletome armies, but can generally still tackle them by focusing on the objectives and trying to bog down or outdistance the strongest enemy units. 

My main gripe is the lack of battleline choices- I’ve based my army around a fire theme and couldn’t think of a way to fit reavers into that, so didn’t take any, meaning I always have to take the same three units of darkling infantry regardless of what type of army I wanted to do. But otherwise, there’s a great selection of units to choose from to fit any battlefield role. 

Besides the obvious frostheart phoenix, there’s a fair few gems:

Hands down the unit that has won me the most games are doomfire warlocks. They sometimes attract more attention than they can handle, but more frequently they’ll skulk around the back of the army half heartedly casting mystic shield, waiting for a double turn and the chance to jump a minimum 30” across the table and pinch an objective my opponent thought was safe. Even without a double turn, save a command point for them and you’re guaranteed a 20” move to put them somewhere inconvenient. 

Phoenix guard remain the best 1 wound infantry in the game for their points, and the best way for you to fend off the nasty stuff newer armies throw at you. 

I’ve also been really impressed with black guard since I started Darklings- great bravery, built in rerolls to hit and precious, precious rend make them much harder hitters than Phoenix guard, just make sure they get the first swing in. 

The loremaster is still amazing even with the heavy price tag. Paired up with a dragonlord in particular, but really any monster will work.

the nomad prince is a surprisingly heavy hitter for an 80 point hero, and decently tough to boot. 

There’s also some great anti magic tools- the spellweaver’s once a game auto unbind springs to mind, but the archmage on a dragon is also pretty handy against armies that rely on magic. The archmage on foot is also theoretically very good, if you can roll more than a 5 on 2d6 with any regularity. I, however, cannot. 

 

 

[Thiagoma]

Love the "Blob" army name 🤣

 

How this list works?

I never used Doomfires outisde of a DoK army, and in there wasnt really impressed, but is a good idea to keep it in mind.

I dont like the nomad prince that much but the Waywatcher is a beast with his  6 attacks Rend 1 or His 3 Dmg 2 (with possible rend 2).

 

I also dislike Reavers. If the had 3+ to hit /3+ wound they would be worthy their points, but 140 on 4+/4+ is really meh

 

[Azamar]

Hah! Blob seems to be just what appears in the browser bar when you convert a warscroll builder list to pdf, but I might have to start calling my armies that! 

My aelves really are just a cluster of units I picked as I thought they’d look cool in the colour scheme, so I’m slight guilty of looking at the shelf and thinking “hey, haven’t used you in a while” rather than having a set plan for how a list worked. 

That particular list was for a game against beasts of chaos, with a player who (whilst not a newbie) was experimenting with a new army. I’d normally try and fit in a monster or two otherwise. 

As it was the list worked well enough in a knife to the heart battleplan. The wanderers units make a nice defensive force which left the rest of the army free to push forwards. Anything that wasn’t Phoenix guard died alarmingly quickly once they were in range of the herdstone mind you, but the guard did manage to tag the second objective and win through. 

I don’t have any other lists I’ve used saved, but I’ve put together one I might consider more typical for me. I tend to like several small units of Phoenix guard to spread their influence and try and control objectives across the board, but one could combine them into a single unit of 30 to free up points elsewhere. 

[FiskSteel]

I was thinking about running this set up

 

Ok have a look tell me what you think

+ Leader +

Dragonlord lord or Noble on steed (General)

Obstinate Blade,
Legendary Fighter, 
Aelven War Horn, 
Dragon Blade, 

+ Battleline +

10 x Dragon Blades, Hornblower, Standard Bearer

10 x Dragon Blades, Hornblower, Standard Bearer

Spellweaver

20 x Eternal Guard, Horn Blower, Standard Bearer

20 x Eternal Guard, Horn Blower, Standard Bearer

20 x Glade Guard, Pennant Bearer

20 x Glade Guard, Pennant Bearer

 (Eldritch Council)

Archmage 

Archmage

Around the 2000 points mark

Comments welcome.

Edited April 10, 2019 by FiskSteel

[EMMachine]

@FiskSteel

You don't have enough battleline in the list.

The Dragonblades are only Battleline if you have Order Draconis Allegiance (this isn't possible because of to many allies)

The Eternal Guard is only Battleline if you have Wanderer Allegiance (this isn't possible because of to many allies)

So your only battlelines are the two units of Glade Guard, but you need 3 units of Battleline for 2000 Points

 

[FiskSteel]

But can I not use them as GA : Order to make the list valid.

This is why we need a new battletome with all aelf in it.

[Thiagoma]

2 hours ago, FiskSteel said:

But can I not use them as GA : Order to make the list valid.

This is why we need a new battletome with all aelf in it.

Note if they are "battleline if".

An easy solution to your idea is take 1 unite of 20 glade guard and 2 of 10.

They would be your 3 battlelines.

Also im am not sure about 2 archmage, unless you intend to have 1 on horse to support the dragon Blades and 1 to stay with the other units.

Maybe you could exchange one for a Dragon Noble.

[Thiagoma]

Anyone had good results with the Hydra? Looks kinda good on paper!

[Azamar]

52 minutes ago, Thiagoma said:

Anyone had good results with the Hydra? Looks kinda good on paper!

It’s pretty solid. I found it more useful in the early days of AOS, as the last few tunes I’ve used it I’ve had opponents take it down in one round. But if that happens, the speed it can regenerate makes it great as a one model tarpit. I find it’s damage output a little swingy though.

[Lightbox]

So I'm thinking of putting together a mixed aelf army with the theme of 'sea aelves' so mermaids, blue palette and skin etc.

Does anyone have any experience on how the deepkin units function outside of their book? I'm wanting to have some for the nautical theme but don't think I want to go whole hog into them (though the option to do deepkin or mixed could be cool)

My set in stone idea is taking a medusa and converting her into a mermaid which would be a really cool hero.

Because of the more undersea theme I'd ideally like to stay away from some of the pheonix guard or heavily armoured looking models. Though is this shooting myself in the foot too much?

[Azamar]

1 hour ago, Lightbox said:

So I'm thinking of putting together a mixed aelf army with the theme of 'sea aelves' so mermaids, blue palette and skin etc.

Does anyone have any experience on how the deepkin units function outside of their book? I'm wanting to have some for the nautical theme but don't think I want to go whole hog into them (though the option to do deepkin or mixed could be cool)

My set in stone idea is taking a medusa and converting her into a mermaid which would be a really cool hero.

Because of the more undersea theme I'd ideally like to stay away from some of the pheonix guard or heavily armoured looking models. Though is this shooting myself in the foot too much?

I haven’t tried them outside a deepkin force, but most akhelian units benefit so much from the tides that they might underwhelm in a mixed army- the king in particular can only use his command ability at high tide, and morrsarr (spear eels) need to be kept on the charge, so I told see them being less impressive or at least much harder to get the best out of them, in a mixed army. The shield eels would be ok I think- they also like to be on the charge but unlike many other idoneth they don’t differ as much if they’re caught out, or get stuck in a longer fight. 

The leviadon would get on much the same without the tides.

I would have thought the eidolon of the storm would be better than the eidolon of the sea. I’m not sure about thralls- the tides obviously help with their fragility a great deal but a lot of their unique bonuses are either built in, or can come from cheap heroes (the soul render in particular) so the difference might be less obvious. 

[Thiagoma]

2 hours ago, Lightbox said:

So I'm thinking of putting together a mixed aelf army with the theme of 'sea aelves' so mermaids, blue palette and skin etc.

Does anyone have any experience on how the deepkin units function outside of their book? I'm wanting to have some for the nautical theme but don't think I want to go whole hog into them (though the option to do deepkin or mixed could be cool)

My set in stone idea is taking a medusa and converting her into a mermaid which would be a really cool hero.

Because of the more undersea theme I'd ideally like to stay away from some of the pheonix guard or heavily armoured looking models. Though is this shooting myself in the foot too much?

Maybe go for Idoneth army with a Medusa ally for example?

Tree revenants heads in namarti heads look pretty cool.  Possibly gona work on the eel riders, but i am not sure.

If you wanna go with more females, a Sorceress is a easy model to convert into any other caster on foot. Probably can find Witch Elves head/hair bits on ebay too.

I seen Akhelian kings torso and up swapped by a sister of the thorn. Looked pretty cool.

 

That said i would try to stick to the rules so your pretty army is also competitive.

[Lightbox]

6 minutes ago, Thiagoma said:

Maybe go for Idoneth army with a Medusa ally for example?

Tree revenants heads in namarti heads look pretty cool.  Possibly gona work on the eel riders, but i am not sure.

If you wanna go with more females, a Sorceress is a easy model to convert into any other caster on foot. Probably can find Witch Elves head/hair bits on ebay too.

I seen Akhelian kings torso and up swapped by a sister of the thorn. Looked pretty cool.

 

That said i would try to stick to the rules so your pretty army is also competitive.

Cheers both of you and yeah I am definitely thinking going idoneth with medusa ally for a lot of proper games but it would be nice to go mixed aelves sometimes too for fun more casual games. I'll check out the idoneth thread too for that side of things and keep an eye on this one for more mixed stuff.

 

Will try and give updates sometime on how I find units play too.

[Thiagoma]

Dont forget to fill the Survey on warhammer comunity website and mention our pointed ears!

[Aelven supremacy]

So I run two lists, one mixed Aelves with some Idoneth and one pure Idoneth.   My Aelves list is:

Dragonlord with thermal rider cloak, lance and shield and legendary attacker

Frostheart

Archmage on horse

3 x 10 Bleakswords

30 Phoenix guard

9 Morrsarr eels

5 Khinerai heartrenders

Prismatic palisade

 

Really the list functions as sending the eels and dragonlord up, holding the Phoenix back and using the bleakswords as screens and objective grabbers.  The Khinerai add a bit more pressure on objectives and have won me a few games themselves.

I started off with dragon blades rather than Morrsarr but found they did absolutely nothing.  The -2 rend for Morrsarr is sorely sorely needed for Aelves plus the mortal wound output they provide.   The tides from Idoneth obviously help them but even without the tides they fill a role that is otherwise unfilled for the Aelves

[Bufkin]

Ive played a lot with mixed order with a healthy portion of aelves and my favorite units are:

Reavers: amazing unit that snatch so many objectives. It’s the unit that probably singlehandedly won me the most games. I always tell my opponent how fast they are before the game, but they still quite often get surprised.

White Lions: Undercosted 2hander with a 25mm base, one of the games best units.

Dragonlords: They are not just for Order Draconis. Since I wont play for the alphastrike as you would with draconis I give them all shields, no horns, and just leverage reroll armor saves as much as possible. They are fairly flexible, really intimidating and if you bring more than one (I use three) even unreliable abilities like breath weapons becomes very usable.

[Thiagoma]

1 hour ago, Bufkin said:

Ive played a lot with mixed order with a healthy portion of aelves and my favorite units are:

Reavers: amazing unit that snatch so many objectives. It’s the unit that probably singlehandedly won me the most games. I always tell my opponent how fast they are before the game, but they still quite often get surprised.

White Lions: Undercosted 2hander with a 25mm base, one of the games best units.

Dragonlords: They are not just for Order Draconis. Since I wont play for the alphastrike as you would with draconis I give them all shields, no horns, and just leverage reroll armor saves as much as possible. They are fairly flexible, really intimidating and if you bring more than one (I use three) even unreliable abilities like breath weapons becomes very usable.

Never considered White Lions. Maybe should give then a try.

Dont really love reavers, but i love Dragon Blades. Hope they get upgraded when the BT arrive, they are my favorite models.

[Lightbox]

1 hour ago, Bufkin said:

Ive played a lot with mixed order with a healthy portion of aelves and my favorite units are:

Reavers: amazing unit that snatch so many objectives. It’s the unit that probably singlehandedly won me the most games. I always tell my opponent how fast they are before the game, but they still quite often get surprised.

White Lions: Undercosted 2hander with a 25mm base, one of the games best units.

Dragonlords: They are not just for Order Draconis. Since I wont play for the alphastrike as you would with draconis I give them all shields, no horns, and just leverage reroll armor saves as much as possible. They are fairly flexible, really intimidating and if you bring more than one (I use three) even unreliable abilities like breath weapons becomes very usable.

I'd been considering looking into white lions. Maybe I should sometime.

[ColsBols]

11 hours ago, Bufkin said:

Ive played a lot with mixed order with a healthy portion of aelves and my favorite units are:

Reavers: amazing unit that snatch so many objectives. It’s the unit that probably singlehandedly won me the most games. I always tell my opponent how fast they are before the game, but they still quite often get surprised.

White Lions: Undercosted 2hander with a 25mm base, one of the games best units.

Dragonlords: They are not just for Order Draconis. Since I wont play for the alphastrike as you would with draconis I give them all shields, no horns, and just leverage reroll armor saves as much as possible. They are fairly flexible, really intimidating and if you bring more than one (I use three) even unreliable abilities like breath weapons becomes very usable.

What list do you use, if you don’t mind? I just got a whole bunch of elves in a lot and trying to figure out how to build with them. 

[Bufkin]

Well its a mixed order list so its not just aelves and we also normaly don’t play with legacy models where I live… but this current list:

Dragonlord, lance+shield, strategic genius, ethereal amulet
Dragonlord, lance+shield
Dragonlord, lance+shield
Skink Starpriest

10 Arkanuats
10 Arkanuats
5 Reavers

20 White Lions
10 Skinks
10 Skinks
5 Khinerai

Then if we play with realm spells I add another Skink starpriest otherwise I usally have 2 salamanders.

The list started a lot more aelves in AoS 1, but things change over time but Ive tried to keep some aelven style for it by using small dragons for salamanders and using old aelven models as champs in the dwarven units. The champs have bags and chests of gold with them to remind the dwarfs what they are fighting for, the skinks are more trustworthy then dwarfs so they can be payed in advance so the Starpriest already have some loot on the bases and I use small baby dragon models for the salamanders.

[dekay]

As my army is nearing a playable number of painted models, I tried to make something out of it.

2000 pts.

Order, Swifthawk Agents (Tempest's Eye)

Realm of Origin: Ghur

Leaders:

High Warden (220) gryph feather charm

High Warden (220) quicksilver potion

High Warden (220)

Skywarden (160) swifthawk pennant, general, strategic genius

Skywarden (160) swifthawk pennant

Archmage (100) steed

Battleline:

30 Spireguard (300) banner, musician

10 Reavers (280)

5 Reavers (140)

Other:

10 Swordmasters (160) banner, musician

Battalions:

Guardians of the Dawnspire (40)

 

 

Firstly, because apparently it's a controversial subject in some circles: GW says Guardians battalion is tournament legal so I'm using it. It's not like the faction is in any way too strong, both with it and without it ; ) For those with no access to its printed rules: it gives one archmage and one swordmaster unit a Swifthawk keyword and allows one unit within 16 of battalion's high warden to either move or shoot in hero phase.

The idea is to eliminate as many enemy support units, buffers, heroes and such on the first turn capitalising on insane speed of combat heroes, shooting potential of all the units and then just hope that it reduces enemy units' killing power enough that mine are able to hold. If I go first - a lot of what I have has threat ranges of way above 30 inches, so first turn alpha strike seems very much viable. Then 1st turn bonus to saves gives some hope of surviving the counterstrike.

If I don't start: it's potentially even better. +1 to saves makes most crucial units durable enough, other can stay hidden and my speed allows me to deploy at the far edge of the battlefield and still hope to achieve something.

I lack in mortal wounds departament but that can't really be remedied and seems to be a general problem with legacy factions, however two stacking +1 to wound auras make regular bows deal a lot of wounds. Something WILL fail their saves.

High Wardens with their 20 move, access to skills for run + charge (with potential re-roll) and pile-in jump above whatever it reaches towards the valuable targets can be, I think, counted on reaching whatever they want. In this case: whatever generates troop boosting auras.

Sky Wardens, being neither warmachines nor behemoths despite their nature and size seem to make use of look out sir, which combined with 3+ re-rollable save against shooting on 1st turn can be a very solid bullet traps if enemy is determined to get rid of their extremely strong aura fast. They can, also, keep up with griffons with their aura, while being safely screened by reavers.

Reavers have access to both double move and extra dash in shooting phase (32+2d6 on 1st round) and 16 range can, while near skywardens, also be counted on as a reliable damage dealers able to hit basically anything on the table. Sadly, they can't be 15 man horde due to battleline requirements...

Spireguard are meant to survive, screen and and be killy if allowed.

Archmage is here to boost my survivability a bit  and try to unbind anything important.

Swordmasters are here because of batalion requirements, but they're reliably durable against shooting and if ignored and in aura range can do terrible things. Plus their banner boosts spireguard's bravery a bit, too.

[edited for list legality purposes ; )]

 

So, people with more Aelf-knowlege than me, could this work and be any fun at all against modern armies?

Edited April 19, 2019 by dekay