Imacts of patch 1.2 on Eldar

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General Changes

Thermo Plasma Generators require Tier 2
If you couldn't tell just by reading, this hurts Eldar very badly. One of Eldar's strengths was their ability to nab the Slag with Bonesinger teleport and build a very fast big gen to race to a strong and fast T2, and that was why Fallen City and Meeting of Minds were considered strong Eldar maps. This change all but removes the possibility of that strat ever happening, balancing the game on big gen maps and preventing overwhelming Eldar starts.

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Turrets require Aspect Portal
Turret rushing as a strategy isn't exactly used much competitively besides Necron games, so this isn't as big an impact as it may seem. 99% of Eldar strats start with an Aspect anyway, so offensively building turrets is still very much an option.


Unit Changes

Bonesingers:
-Now spawn with the teleport ability half charged
The final nail in the fast big gen strat coffin, now even if the big gen didn't require Tier 2, Eldar can't just port a singer to nab the Slag with no resistance anymore. Applies similarly to forward turret strats.

Another trouble with this is that the handy Bonesinger scout opening is harder to use now. Eldar used to have the best scouting hands down with an opening of Bonesinger --> enemy base to see their entire base layout, and most importantly their first building to determine their strat (and maybe whack on some already-dying Heretics). It's not entirely impssible now, as Bonesingers are very cheap and build really fast still, so you can still send your first on a walk in very small maps (basically Blood River), but it will be less effective and more demanding of your attention.

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Guardians:
-Farseer Veteran and Farseer Hero research now increase Guardian Warlock health by 150 each
Guardians themselves are not changed, but their leader Warlocks are. This is a small benefit in that Warlocks can actually somewhat scale, add the Mysticism and Plasma Grenade upgrades and a good player can take Guardians well into T2 and still keep them useful. However, the Farseer upgrades themselves are not commonly researched, so I don't foresee this having a big impact at the moment. Perhaps if Guardian/Farseer and T2 Harlequin strategies became more successful, but Eldar T1 now is very much Ranger/Reaper heaven.

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Rangers:

Increased the cost of Rangers from 40r/0p to 40r/5p
Well, everyone whined about Rangers, so one could see this coming. In reality, it isn't THAT big a problem. Rangers costing power will slightly lower Eldar's economy in T1, but this just means no gen strats aren't a good option anymore. Now Eldars are doing Aspect --> Ranger squad and gen/2 gen builds, since Rangers are still very much an excellent troop choice.

Slightly decreased Ranger damage vs. Commander Armor.
To be honest, I can't see too much of a difference. They'll still do their job of breaking Commanders well. Maybe an extra volley, but probably not even that as long as you have the full squad.

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Dark Reapers:

Enhanced Optics upgrade now gives more damage and range to Dark Reapers.
This can only be a good thing, improving Dark Reaper scaling so that they can be useful into T2, lowering emphasis on Warp Spiders. Combined with the general nerf on Tau Fire Warriors, the Dark Reaper is now a very strong choice for T1 ranged, especially with proper FoF use. This improvement means that upon hitting T2, an Eldar player should generally go for the Enhanced Optics upgrade ASAP (been this way pre-patch, but even more important now), and perhaps opt for Fire Dragons for a more diverse unit mix and base harass force as opposed to rushing to WS like in 1.11.

Dark Reaper knife penetration to Infantry Medium reduced from 45 to 27.
Feels like some random change actually. Just for information, the only units with Infantry Medium armor are:
-Cultist Squad
-Guardian Squad/Guardian Warlock
-Guardsmen Squad
-Heavy Weapons Team
-Pathfinder Team
-Scout Marine Squad
-XV15 Stealth Team/Stealthsuit Shas'vre

So your Reapers will do less in melee versus these guys. Shouldn't matter too much, as your Reapers should always be either firing, or dancing with FoF to get into position to fire again. Unless you absolutely need to tie up a squad, and you absolutely do not have other troop choices nearby (hell, use a Bonesinger biggrin.gif ), don't let Reapers do melee.

Santiago brings up an interesting point:

"If you look at that list again you'll notice that 4 of those units are tier 0 units which the reaper previously seldom HAD to dance since they would kill them in CC, also the Fire Dragon has the same CC weapon as the reapers and was also affected making it harder for them to kill off weak tie-up units in CC as well. This change does mean quite a lot in some matchups, most of all for chaos/SM since cults with charge and scouts with speed 20 and no movement penalty in cover can often keep up with reapers. This also means that guardians can be used to tie up reapers effectively in mirror games which combined with a ranger opener makes for a good counter to reaper spam. IG guardsmen will also have an easier time but lack of speed and charge will make it hard to really benifit from it."

Good information regarding tying-up of Reapers with T0 units, and a little tip in the mirror. Thanks Santi biggrin.gif

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Howling Banshees:
Morale regeneration rate set to 15 per second.
Increased Banshee Tier 1 health by 10%.
Increased Banshee Exarch Tier 1 health by 10%

This is a general buff to Howling Banshees in Tier 1, and a very welcome one at that. The power of CoWshees in Tier 2 isn't really up for dispute, since they're really really strong. But Tier 1 Banshees have been very underwhelming in the previous patches, with weak health/power but a high cost. These buffs increase Banshee durability in Tier 1 so that they can do a better job of tying troops up (like they are supposed to, but they won't really be making kill records yet). The Morale change is not as apparent, but Banshees are now very difficult to break, as they start with 400 max morale, have a very high 15/s morale regenaration rate (higher than most other Tier 1 infantry choices of any race), and most importantly, regroup at 50. What this will generally mean is that it is now a possibility to build Banshees in Tier 1 for a more diverse force with tying-up and your Reapers or Guardians as ranged support, whereas Banshee strats in Tier 1 used to be pretty much pointless in 1.11.

Modified Call of War research to account for the Banshee Tier 1 health upgrades (Tier 2 Banshees still have the same health).
Nothing much to say here, CoW was modified so that CoWshees remain at their 1.11 strength after CoW research (basically means slight decrease in health bonus of CoW, but the health is already reflected in the Banshee T1 health buff).

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Harlequins:

Decreased their population cap from 2 to 1.
Harlequins can now detect infiltrated units.
Its stealth detection radius was changed to 35.

Some great improvement here, one major gripe with Harlequins was that the cost of 125/125/2 was ridiculous and quickly clunked up the Eldar population cap. Another gripe with Eldar in general was their weak T2 detection, as Warlocks fold quickly to Infiltrated Chaos Marine bolters and their next detector is T3 at Seer Councils. By dropping Harlequin pop count to 1 and giving them detection, 2 problems are essentially solved making the Harlequin a nice investment for your T2 force, if just for the detection.

Farseer Hero research and Farseer Veteran research now increases Harlequin health by 150 each

An undocumented but welcome change, now the problem of Harlequins not scaling is fixed as well. Fully upgraded Harlequins will enjoy 925 HP of Commander armor, which combined with their deadly abilities and detection, isn't too bad a deal.

Harlequins Kiss damage is now capped at 4000.

No instant Krootox kills here, but 4000 to a target and 200 to everything around it is still going to hurt some horrible things. Whatever gets targetted by this probably won't live. I'm actually not sure if this is supposed to be a buff or a nerf, since I've heard that Kiss did 1000 OR 10000 damage before, which is a small (haha) difference of a zero frusty.gif Input on this would be welcome.

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Fire Dragons:
Fire Dragons now correctly fire at targets within range.
This isn't a buff, just a bug fix. But really, I'm sure we all had our moments of "wtf why isn't it shooting", so props for fixing the bug I suppose. It was really annoying.

Fire Dragons now require 2 slots in a transport.
And Falcons get 2 slots now. Basically means no difference, unless you dreamed of dropping 2 FD squads into an unsuspecting base.

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Falcon Grav Tanks:
Decreased the morale damage done by the Grav Tank Star Cannon by 15%
While I mourn this change, Falcons probably had this coming for quite a while. The Star Cannon damage, both in standard terms and in morale, are pretty strong, but the morale damage bordered on ridiculous. Star-Cannon enabled Falcons broke troops crazy fast, so this is a good balance call. Star Cannons are still good upgrades for your Falcon since the damage isn't reduced, so it's still a good idea to make these on your Falcons wherever possible.

Increased squad hold capacity of Falcon Grav Tanks from 1 to 2.
The most common use of the Falcon transport ability was the Fire Dragon drop, but Fire Dragon squads take up 2 slots now so there is no change in that department. This does make the Falcon that much more cost-effective as a transport, since you can still bring 2 squads of Reapers in and out of combat, or 2 squads of Banshees in the middle of enemy ranged troops, or even as another teleport for 2 Warp Spider squads. Very nice change that definitely improves the Falcon's cost effectiveness (and it was pretty effective before!).

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Vypers:

Increased the disruption radius of Vypers from 4 to 6.
Increased the range of the Vyper Missile vertical traverse.
A great buff to Vypers. Really, in 1.11 they were next to worthless because they missed 9 shots out of 8, their turrets turned slower than a Squiggoth and they even needed an Aspect Stone. Falcons didn't need stones, and they outclassed Vypers in every possible department. Now their turreting/accuracy bugs have been fixed, and the disruption potential is increased so that Vyper strike teams to knock down LPs quickly, or Vyper support against enemy ranged troops is a very good possibility now. Consider experimenting with Vypers more, because they're looking pretty good.

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Wraithlords:
No change.

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Warp Spiders:

Reduced the Warp Spider’s damage to vehicles.
Reinforced Armor Upgrade health bonus for Warp Spiders decreased from 25% to 15%.
Enhanced Reinforced Armor Upgrade health bonus for Warp Spiders decreased from 40% to 25%.
Another one we could all see coming. Warp Spiders were simply too powerful in 1.11, with great stats in all departments and enough damage to function as a one-unit army against all unit types. Now their vehicle damage is reduced to encourage use of Fire Dragons as AV as they should be, and to prevent said one-unit army cases from happening. Their durability got quite badly hit, so they are no longer the dominating force in T3 as they used to be. You should still be making an army based on these guys in T2/early T3, since their stellar offensive capabilities against infantry are unchanged, but you should look into supplementing them with the new T3 Grav Platforms which are supposed to fill in for Eldar's now rather empty T3.

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Grav Platforms:
Moved from Tier 2 to Tier 3
Acceleration and turning speeds have been adjusted.
No longer affected by cover.
No longer attach to squads.
Turbo Boost ability was removed.
Armor type has been changed to Vehicle Low
Each Grav Platform type has a squad limit of 3

One of the major "eh?" points of Eldar in 1.2, the underperforming, underpowered, underpants and underused platforms got a complete overhaul. They got moved up to T3, became vehicles with vehicle armor, lost their Gravitic Booster ability, can't be attached to squads anymore, and generally got some nice weapon boosts. The general idea is supposedly that these Platforms will be Eldar's force in Tier 3, since their previous incredibly strong Tier 3 of fully upgraded Warp Spiders + Seer Council both got nerfed by the patch. Unfortunately I have not really seen their power yet, Eldar still seems to do fine with what they had. I'm sure it won't hurt to experiment with these, though. A combination of each with proper micro sounds really good on paper.

I just have to express a personal gripe with removing Gravitic Booster sad.gif Now that they aren't attachable, there is no problem of messing up squad pathing, so the lack of a boost option really feels weird as an Eldar unit. Not an important point though, personal gripe as mentioned.

Shuriken Cannon Platforms:

Now does area of effect damage.
Any unit being damaged by the Shuriken Cannon now suffers from a movement speed penalty.
Their anti-infantry damage is decent, but nothing stellar for a Tier 3 unit. The key thing here is the area of effect, and the suppression fire effect which helps the rest of your army chase down escaping troops, or to slow down melee unit advances. The AOE probably makes the DPS a lot higher than it looks, and snaring groups of units (or multiple squads) is always a bonus. Build time is really long (although Webgates are generally spammed), and survivability is low, but great speed somewhat makes up for it. More testing and time would be needed to tell if this can fill in as Eldar Tier 3's offensive option.

Brightlance Platforms:

Any unit being damaged by the Bright Lance takes 75% more damage.
Their damage increase debuff no longer stacks.
Setup time was changed to 2 seconds.
The Bright Lance itself now does moderate damage to vehicles.
The Eldar markerlight, Brightlances lost a good amount of damage (not that they were ever used much for serious AV), especially against buildings, but the markerlight effect makes them work excellently in tandem with your troops, especially since the markerlight ability comes with every single shot of the Brightlance, so good targetting micro is essential in making the most out of the damage increase. Their range is pretty good as well, so you can keep them near the back of your army since they are very fragile. More testing and time would be needed to tell if this is a good Eldar T3 option, but from what I see, a combination of both platforms and efficient micro can make your army that much stronger.

Seer Council:
Reduced Seer Council damage against building and vehicles.
They were ridiculous before, so I guess you would call this more of "balance" than an actual "nerf". There is still no reason to skip these guys once you hit Tier 3, and Brightlance markerlight ability supposedly compensates for the damage decrease.

Tech Changes

Soul Shrine requisition cost has been reduced by 50.
200/200 now, just like the Tau Path to Enlightenment. Eldar teched somewhat slowly before, so why not.

Mobilized for War Research moved from the Soul Shrine to the HQ.
Really nice. Now, with a good economy backup, you can tech to T3 on time withOUT losing research time on your valuable and important infantry upgrades. Now that the Farseer Veteran upgrades affect Warlocks and Harlequins, maybe those, too. Just make sure you don't lose your builders too badly during the period of tiering up.