The (Not So New) Eldar Codex Review: How does it affect my army?

The biggest hit delivered by the new Eldar codex to my Craftworld was the number of Fire Dragons that I'm allowed to take. That however, was the only drawback to my army, as others relatively remained the same.

Sticking to The (self-made) Fluff

One of the direct repercussions of the Great Fall was that there are only three Aspect Shrines remaining in Craftworld Ilfirin; Fire Dragons, Dire Avengers and Warp Spiders, with Fire Dragons being the most numerous Aspect of all. There are two aspects that intrigued me in the new codex, which are the Dark Reapers and the Swooping Hawks. After thinking this through, I've decided to be consistent with my original fluff.

Craftworld Ilfirin is blessed by Cegorach, represented by the Harlequins. This explains my wild and erratic colour scheme; bright orange, dark blue, and 'midnight' stars. The Craftworld was also among the lucky ones to have a lot of Bonesingers. This concept is represented by Guardians operating various vehicles to war. If you've seen my army, War/Wasp Walkers and various skimmers dominate the table. Eldar is a dying race but they are also more technologically advanced as compared to the monkeighs. This was one of the reasons for the mechanised approach rather than going the compact and elite path.

Being blessed by Cegorach also means that my army will have very minimal 'Walking Dead' and absolutely no Avatars of Khaine. This means Wraithguards/blades, Wraithlords, Wraithknights, and Hemlock Wraithfighter are at the bottom of my consideration during army building. I do have a Wraithlord though, but it's more of a centrepiece rather than gaming purposes. And Eldrad, is simply out of the question since he is an Ulthwe. Has never played him and will never play him as a 'counts as', despite what people say.

The New Stuff

The Crimson Hunter was immediately out of the question since it's considered an Aspect, not even considering it as a centrepiece. As for the Wraithknight, I may paint one in the future since by fluff (adapted from the old Revenant Titan fluff), the construct has a Guardian pilot inside despite it also having his/her twin ghost in its circuit. This will be a future centrepiece project, but shall never be considered for gaming purposes.

Playing to My Strengths

The strengths of War Walkers and Wasp Assault Walkers are quite obvious. I do not need to elaborate on the rate of fire they bring to the table. My army's hidden strength that has been boosted by the new codex are actually the Guardian Jetbikes (also now known as the Windriders) and the Vypers. The 6th Edition rules gave them Jink and high mobility, while the new codex greatly blessed them with BS4. The latter changed my army dynamics by a huge margin.

Double Guide-seers were the backbone of my army in the old codex, and I can now field a single Farseer with Guide and Prescience instead. BUT, by having army-wide BS4 as a default, I am now less reliant on my Farseer as the rest of my army are more capable than before. The farseer's psychic abilities can be viewed as sharpening a samurai blade.

Glaring Weaknesses Observed

With the crazy torrent of lasers/shurikens in my army, flyers are not a big concern as I have glanced a number of them to death. The Wave Serpents' shield also contributed to the cause. My Achilles heel is AV14, especially when fielded in bunches. This was previously not a problem since the Fire Dragons were cheaper (and I used to play with 24 of them). As I said before, Wraithguards are not in my consideration. I've found Brightlance Vypers to be unreliable for this role. My other current options are to switch the Wave Serpents' turrets to Brightlances, or change my sole Fire Prism to a Falcon instead. I haven't decided yet, and will look through the codex again in case I missed anything.

That's all for now. I'm not going to bore you with more words, and I'm pretty sure not many enjoy this aspect of the game. My next posts after this will be all about the Warriors of Tzeentch, as I'm entering them for Legio Malaysia's 2nd Army Throwdown. A total of 15 participants have pledged to take part in this installment. The challenge for me would be figuring out on how to showcase my army and make it 'pop' since there are four Warriors of Chaos armies (including mine) participating in the event.