Welcome! I am Zak Ludick and this is Warhammer 40,000 the tabletop boardgame.
10th Edition is being launched on the 24th of June and I have till then to get through the rest of my faction reviews! Although even MORE info is pumping out of GW sources.
I have another... 13 factions to do after this one. Onwards.
Who are the Aeldari? Well... basically... they are Space Elves.
They are generally faster and better than most humans and in the Craftworld Eldar armies or Asuryani, they have specialists who are at time the best at whatever warfare they as good at, such as fast assault troops or tank busters.
They also have some really annoying technology that makes them very powerful
Onwards to the preview review!
Eye Candy
The Big guy is an Avatar of Khaine, the Bloody Handed God of War. This is a shard of their war God, brought to life for a limited amount of time by the sacrifice made by one of their elite soldiers.
Around this are Guardians, to the right is Maugan Ra and some Dark Reapers, on the left are some Jetbikes and Rangers. In the background I can see Shining Spears, Eldar aircraft and a Wraith Knight.
Yes. Know the alien... but suffer not the alien to live!
So let me analyse my prey below!
Army Rule - Strands of Fate
Strands of Fate works similarly to how Sisters of Battle have Miracle Dice. You use these dice to substitute a dice roll prior to rolling the dice. You use whatever you rolled on the Fate dice instead.
In the case of the Aeldari you roll 12 dice. If you don't like the results, you can re-roll all dice, but now with only 11 dice. You can keep rerolling with one less dice till there is only one dice left. Whatever you accept is your Fate Dice.
This is far more sure than the Miracle Dice, but Aeldari can't gain more dice like this like the Sisters can.
Regardless, this is a great ability.
Detachment Rule - Battle Host
Another strong rule. Each unit in a Battle Host can re-roll one Hit and can re-roll one Wound roll.
Example:
Guardian squad of 5 and a Heavy Weapon Platform shoots at Space Marines. 10 Shots with Shuriken catapults and two shots with the Star Cannon. Now, they all hit on a 3+ but should one of the Star Cannon shots miss, you would re-roll this more crucial shot. However, if both Starcannon shots hit then you would re-roll one of the missed Shuriken Catapult shots.
You would also want the Star Cannon to cause the wounds as it is a D2 weapon and can kill a Space Marine with an failed saving throw so if I fail to Wound with the Star Cannon I would re-roll this.... if I was an Aeldari.
But I am not about to guide and explain this to an Eldar player. lol
Unit Spotlight - Farseer
The Farseer boosts your Strands of Fate ability and with a Farseer, you will not need to re-roll the Fate dice and most of the time keep what you rolled. The Farseer can change a Fate dice to a 6 before you use it (like a Fate Dice on a 1 or a 2) and the unit that takes this modified dice roll needs to be within 12" of the Farseer.
The Farseer also makes units tougher around him. He puts out a decent amount of damage but I feel he is not very tough.
Unit Spotlight - Guardians
Eldar Guardians. They are the standard Battleline troops the the Aeldari forces. They come with some standard stats and standard gear that don't make them that special.
They come with two decent abilities:
The wargear option to take a floating Heavy Weapon Platform with a big gun.
And the ability to generate additional Fate Dice should this unit hold an objective. Every command phase, when there is one or more of these units on an objective, they can roll a dice and add that result to the Fate Dice pool. You can gain a dice for each objective marker you control this way!
Most certainly this would mean that one or two of these unit will sit on the home objective while another squad or two is running forward, just behind supporting troops to take hold of other objective marker on the field.
I notice that the Guardians and the Farseer is also M7" instead of the usual M6" most infantry have.
Weapon Spotlight - Prism Canon
A Powerful gun that can either 2D6 (2-12 shots) Blast at S6 AP-1 and Damage 2 (Still a Marine killer) or two anti-big things shots at S18, AP-4, and D6 flat.
Additionally, the focused shot has the Linked Fire rule. The rule reads that when selecting targets, you can measure range and visibility from another friendly Fire Prism that is visible to the bearer. This is absolutely great in competitive play as you can hit around corners with one gun with a Focused shot with one Fire Prism while using the Blast shot on other targets as you need.
Stratagem Spotlight - Fire and Fade
Simply, you use this Stratagem to move after shooting. You cannot charge after doing this so it is not for getting close to the enemy and will not help if you use units like that.
It can be used on infantry and tanks however so I am sure there are some sneaky things that can help you take control of the board or avoid damage from their enemies with this rule.
And that's it! That's what we know about these tight-pants-pointy-eared aliens.
Thank you for reading!
Thank you for the giveaway!
Count me in!