Cover Art is “Stealth” by Hector Becantur

Apologies for the delays to this final write up on Wood Elf core units. I’ve been busy getting the play test version of a roleplaying game finished (if you’re interested, it’s called The 23rd Letter and you can join the play test / Discord over on LateGaming.com), and now that’s out of the way I can compose my thoughts on what I think is probably the #1 choice for Wood Elf core, the Deepwood Scouts. For core, Scouts are restricted to one unit per 1,000 points, but don’t be afraid to make it a big unit if you only have one!

The statline for Scouts is identical to Glade Guard, but they cost an extra two points each. For those two points, Scouts lose Open Order but gain a bunch of extra Special Rules. Let’s start with Skirmishers, which is only upside for the role you want for these archers. Most of the downside for Skirmishers comes when you put them into combat, but you really don’t want your Scouts in combat anyways. As Skirmishers they get a 360° firing arc, and are at -1 to be hit by your enemy shooting–when dealing with unarmoured T3 Elves, you want every bit of advantage you can get in this regard!

Speaking of not being shot at, they also gain Evasive. Combined with the awesome range of the Asrai Longbow (32″ in case you’d forgotten), this means you’re able to shoot at enemies more or less with impunity. If you’re at long range, you can set yourself up at ENEMY_RANGE + 1″ away and shoot at the enemy unit. On the next turn, they are forced to move if they want to shoot at you (-1 for moving, -1 for long range), you’re skirmishers (-1 to hit) and with Evasive, you get to Fall Back in Good Order if they declare a shot on you, which most likely would take you out of range anyways! That means most troops (BS3) are hitting the Scouts on 7s. Now to be clear, you really don’t want to be at long range, but the same principle applies for being at short range. If you’re at 15-16″ away, you’re at long range for most other missile troops. So the enemy commander has to decide if they want to try to move into short range when most likely you’ll skip away and keep them at long range anyways. And if you have a forest at your back (and thankfully, Wood Elves get to bring one along) then you can flee into the forest and get an additional -1 for the cover.

If someone does sneak (or most likely, fly) into range for a charge, you’ll get to Fire & Flee, which is almost always the right thing to do because you’re not likely to beat too many things in combat and will end up fleeing anyways. Sadly this is not Feigned Flight (that’s a Waywatcher talent), meaning you’ll need to rally with a Leadership roll, so I think you need to keep an eye out for those pesky fliers and shoot them down if they come too close.

Finally, and obviously, they also get the Scouts special rule. My suggestion is to put them into a forest, which may sound obvious but I’m always shocked by people not doing the obvious thing. Place your Woodland Ambush forest in your opponent’s half and put scouts in it. In fact, you can probably put all your scouts in it if you have more than one unit. Obviously this depends on scenario, opponents deployment, etc. etc. but it’s a good rule of thumb!

That then leads us to the question, what role are the Scouts playing in your army? I think their number one use is to eliminate enemy warmachines. It’s hard to hide a warmachine from Scouts and still have it be effective in the battle. And of course, the ultimate arrow for taking down warmachines are those tipped with sap from the Hagbane, for some excellent Poisoned Attacks for an extra 2 points per model. Some quick Mathhammer will show that 16 shots at short range, or 18 at long range, will do 3 wounds on average to T7 warmachine with no armour (yes, Dwarfs are a little tougher needing 18 and 21 respectively because of their light armour). Would I take 18 Deepwood Scouts in my army? Absolutely (in fact, I’ll likely take two units of 15-20 depending on points). They’ll easily fit within the free Wood Elf forest, and they’ll use up more than half your Core allowance doing it.

Scouts: Woodland Ambush

Here’s a quick screenshot from Herald (my battle reporter) showing a 12″ x 8″ forest with 30 scouts skirmishing in it. These are 1/2″ apart. You can fit more in obviously, and likely these couldn’t all see the enemy without first moving, but that’s fine. They’re safe in turn 1!

For command options, Scouts are limited to a champion only*, who can take a magic item up to 25 points. The only option that might be worth taking is Asyendi’s Bane, to give a re-roll to hit (with a nasty downside if you miss again) but the cost of that is 16 points (6 for the champion and 10 for the magic item) at which point I think I’d rather just have another Scout.

*as you can see in the comments, I just read this completely wrongly! I don’t think I would take a Standard on the unit, mostly because it makes the Scouts even more of a target for a combat unit to come take them out, for no real bonus (it can’t be magical, and I think that’s what confused me). I would probably take a musician, for the +1 to Ld when Rallying, given that you have Fire & Flee.

Deepwood Scouts are only 3 points cheaper than Waywatchers, but Waywatchers are just hard to fit into the army because you have to pay for a Waystalker first (85 points base) and then you are competing with points in the Rare section – Treemen and Great Eagles, both of whom are good choices. Compare with Scouts, who are Core, this is a no-brainer for me. Sadly the only character who also gets the Scouts rule is the Waystalker, so these brave Elves are out on their own!

This is my last article on the Core choices, as I’ve now covered them all. Having played more games and learned more about the rules, I think my original choices still stand in terms of ranking, and I’ll list them out here for good measure.

1. Deepwood Scouts
2. Glade Riders
3. Glade Guard
4. Dryads
5. Eternal Guard

That’s not to say you can’t or shouldn’t take models at the bottom of the list! It’s more to say that from a pure numbers standpoint, I think the models at the top are more likely to perform well for their point cost than those at the bottom. Thanks for reading! If you’ve got ideas for other articles you’d like to see, let me know!

Originally written for rankandflank.com.

The penultimate unit in Wood Elf Core is Glade Riders. They are the only non-Infantry core choice, and have the same stat line as a Glade Guard but, being mounted, are M9 and have an extra attack at WS 3 for only 7 points more.

They are Light Cavalry, with the Fast Cavalry special rule, and the choice of being used in Skirmisher or Open Order formation. They also have the Fire & Flee special rule built in (which costs an extra point for Glade Guard, so really the pony is only costing you 6 points).

Like the Glade Guard, they can take all the different types of arrows for an Asrai Longbow. I think here the choice is much more meaningful, depending on the role you intend the unit to play. I think there are a lot of potential roles for Glade Riders, as they are very good, cheap, fast cavalry. The obvious examples are as chaff/chaff removal, and war machine hunting. A unit of 5 is only 90 points, which, while not the cheapest chaff in the army, is still not bad. You can forego any magic arrow if they are just playing a chaff role, although Trueflight probably would make sense for just an extra point per model, thus giving you a much better chance of picking off a couple of wounds before charging the opponent’s chaff unit. For war machine hunting, I think you need more models, or perhaps two units, and give them Hagbane tips for the Poisoned Attacks.

Some units in the army can also be given Ambushers (this seems like a bad choice, given how unpredictable the rule is), Drilled or Reserve Move. Both of these latter two seem like they would be better on a larger unit, rather than a 5-model chaff unit, but they come with the caveat that this unit is T3 and has no armour saves, and so any kind of points spent here are also easily lost if you don’t protect them well.

Drilled is not something you’d take if you’re going to run them as Skirmishers, but that got me to think about what way it might work. Perhaps in a block of 12, so you could have a 3×4 marching column, march 27″ on turn 1 (yes, 27″, with as many wheels as you like and remembering that they get no penalties for moving through cover*) and pivot at the end of the march (thanks Fast Cavalry!). Then on your next turn, you declare a charge into squishy things (like War Machines) in the back line, Redress the Ranks to put 7 in your front rank, and 5 in the rear and get your full (+1 for Light Cav/Open Order) rank bonus. However, while this seems like it’s very fun in theory, I think the reality is that this unit will die to whatever shooting or magic missiles your opponent has, and that a unit of 12 with Drilled will cost you 240 points which you’d probably rather spend elsewhere.

Reserve Move seems like a decent rule for a unit that wants to perform flank / harrying role in the army, and I think this is probably one of the better roles for this unit. Being able to skirmish forward, shoot, and then move out of charge range/arc is going to be very annoying for your enemy. It also allows them to be positioned for a supporting / flank charge to help out your other units–remember Wood Elves more than any other army want to be charging with multiple units into the same target. However, I’ve a feeling they can perform this role pretty well without spending the extra +2 per model it costs to give them Reserve Move. It was pointed out to me that this special rule is only +1 point, so I think it’s likely auto-take on most units, so that you can shoot and still move 18″.

And the final role I see for them, and the one I think they’ll be used for a lot, is as a screen. Running a unit of Glade Riders in front of your Wild Riders not only prevents the Wild Riders from being directly targeted by enemy missile fire, it also stops the Wild Riders from making disadvantageous charges due to their Frenzy special rule.

Overall, I think running multiple small units of Glade Riders is a pretty effective way to spend your Core points. In a 2,500 point list, taking 3-4 units of 5 will eat up 3-400 points of that Core allowance, and give you some very fast moving units–they’ll die easily, but in the end, better them than something else in the army!

Of the five Core choices in the army, I rate the Glade Riders at #2 in the list. They are a pretty good choice, moving fast and forcing your opponent to deal with a minor threat with a lot of range, as long as you remember how easily they will die.

*After posting this article, it was pointed out to me that Glade Riders are the only unit in the Wood Elf army that don’t have the Move Through Cover special rule. I’m assuming this is an oversight and will get fixed in the Errata for Forces of Fantasy (I’ve also added it to the list of FAQ/Errata stuff I’m tracking). Any opponent who forces you to play without it should have their name written in the Book of Grudges–oh, crap, wrong army!

Originally written for rankandflank.com.

UPDATE

I’ve since found a good role for Eternal Guard, check out this article!

If you want to keep reading, by all means. However, my opinion is quite different since first writing this!

It’s taken me a while to figure out the role for Eternal Guard, and actually it’s only really been as I’ve tried to write this article that I think I’ve figured it out. However, I’m not convinced it makes them worth taking.

Eternal Guard are the other melee infantry Core choice for Wood Elves (after Dryads). With Light Armour and optional Shield for a point, they can have a 5+ Armour Save, which is as good as it gets for the Wood Elves (who apparently just hate the idea of living long enough to make Heavy Armour). At Weapon Skill 5, they are a little harder to hit in close combat than your average Core unit in any army, but they start at the pricy 13 points per model.

Like they Dryads, they are Stubborn and have the usual Wood Elf rules of Elven Reflexes and Move Through Cover. They are a Close Order unit, also get Martial Prowess, allowing them to make supporting attacks no matter which arc they are fighting in – a minor and situational buff. They have Asrai Spears, which are just like regular spears but with AP -1, so they are fighting at Initiative 6 when charged in the front (4 base, +1 from Spear, +1 from Elven Reflexes), meaning they’ll be simultaneous with I3 models such as Boar Boyz, Knights of the Realm, etc.

For an extra point per model, you can give them Veteran and/or Drilled, both having the restriction of only one unit per 1k points. All of this sounds great, until you remember a couple of points, and those points are Strength and Toughness 3. All of this leaves me asking: what role do they play?

They aren’t strong enough to be a hammer unit, that’s for sure (with only 1 attack each at S3 AP -1, even WS 5 isn’t really helping that much). So, are they an anvil? Spearmen often are, and being Close Order they can get some decent static combat resolution. But as soon as I start doing any of the math against common units I’d expect to take a charge from, it seems like they’ll get ripped apart pretty quickly. The one saving grace is Stubborn, so at least they will Fall Back rather than Flee. Here’s a quick peak at the math.

If I’ve 15 Eternal Guard (5×3) with full command, and no upgrades, it’ll cost me 210 points. Let’s say they take a charge from 6 Knights of the Realm (165 points, with FC). Everybody goes simultaneously, and I’ll ignore challenges for ease of math (it wouldn’t make much difference anyway). The Eternal Guard will inflict ~1.5 wounds on average (assuming the Knights have the Blessing of the Lady). The Knights will inflict ~3.5 (including 1 from the horses), giving them +2 combat resolution making the combat a draw (each have +1 for standard, +1 for close order/lance formation, and the Guard have +2 rank bonus)–except they don’t have that bonus any more because the Knights have First Charge, disrupting the unit. Oops!

And the math gets worse if you’re taking on something at WS5/I4 that’s charging you. Let’s look at a Lance of 6 Questing Knights, only 177 points with FC. The Knights attack first doing ~2.5 wounds, then horses and Eternal Guard go simultaneously, with horses doing another 1 wound and the Eternal Guard doing … wait for it … ~0.95 wounds back! There are two factors at work here – having fewer attacks back, and only hitting on 4s.

(If you’re curious, and I was, a Lance of 6 Grail Knights at 249pts with FC do ~6.1 wounds against the unit, +1 for the horses, and the EG would do a measley ~0.27 wounds back! Chaos Chosen Knights with Mark of Khorne, same price, 7.9 wounds, +2 for the horses, and ~0.16 wounds back).

So, you have to assume that any charge you take you’re going to lose the combat, and then Fall Back. Note that this only counts for the first combat, due to how Stubborn works. If you want to survive a charge from the big boys (like those Chosen Knights), you need to have more than 10 models, so that block of 15 is really the minimum you need.

However, now that you know what will happen, you can start to use this to your tactical advantage. A block of T3 Elves with a 6+ Armour Save are a very juicy target for your opponent, so if I were to use them, it would be in a way to try to encourage a charge from a unit that I want to then counter charge in the flank with (presumably) Wild Riders.

(Again, I got math curious – Wild Riders will kill ~3.5-4.9, depending on whether the Knights have a 2+ or a 3+ armour save).

So, it’s not the traditional sort of Anvil, where you can just stay put because you’re so dang tough, but it is a very Wood Elven Anvil, where you can run away and come back again because you’re so disciplined. However, it’s an expensive unit for so few wounds, and it’ll also die very easily to shooting due to how easy it is to wound and how poor the armour save. I think the army roster has better options for an Anvil unit.

Therefore, and it pains me a little to say it, I think Eternal Guard are the worst choice Wood Elves have in Core, and the only reason to run them is if you already have the models and want to see them on the battlefield. Rank 5th of 5 for Core Choice.

Originally written for rankandflank.com.

Continuing on my thoughts on Asrai core units, next up are the Dryads.

Profile

Dryads have the same profile as a Glade Guard, but with two important improvements: an extra points of Toughness for T4, and an extra Attack. In fact, they are one of the very few core units in the game that come with 2 Attacks base. Minimum of 5 in the unit, and base sizes are increased from last edition to 30mm, although they still count as Regular Infantry, not Heavy. For 13 points, they come with Light Armour and a 6+ Regeneration save that gets canceled out by Flaming Attacks, on account of them being Flammable. They aren’t as durable as they were in prior editions, that’s for sure. The extra attack is nice, but it’s still only S3 no AP, and we don’t have Wyssan’s Wildform or similar Strength buffing spells to rely on. So, don’t expect Dryads to do a lot of heavy lifting in combat.

Special Rules

Aside from the ones already mentioned, Dryads still cause Fear, have Magical Attacks and are Immune to Psychology. This makes them excellent against Undead and Daemons, canceling out many of the inbuilt advantages of those troops. As you would expect, they also have Move Through Cover, something most of the Asrai units have. They’re also (obviously) Tree Spirits, which in this edition means that only Branchwraith characters can join the unit, and that they can’t use an Elf’s leadership (i.e. if your general is an Elf), so it’s mostly just a bunch of limitations with no benefits. The one benefit is that they can use a Tree Spirit character’s leadership if within command range, so if you have a Treeman Ancient or Branchwraith, it’ll buff their Ld a bit. Meh.

They can choose to be in either Skirmish or Open Order formation, but given the lack of Command options, it seems kinda pointless to run them as Open Order unless you need to be disrupting someone, so I expect Skirmish to be the default. Lastly, they also have the Stubborn special rule (something they got before by being Skirmishers in a Forest, but that rule is now gone). Stubborn now just grants you a free ‘Fall Back in Good Order’ on your first break test, which is not bad but no longer the meta dominating rule it used to be.

Command

Sadly, you are limited to one option, which is a Champion (Nymph) for an extra 5 points. I’d only take this if I had a spare 5 points to make up at the end of building my army list. The champion can take Forest Spites up to 25 points, but frankly I think this unit will struggle to conserve points (in other words, I expect Dryad units will get wiped out before battle’s end) so I wouldn’t bother. Given that you only get each Spite once per army, any that are worth taking would be better spent on another model.

Army Role

So, in 2,500 point lists, how will I play them? I have 15 or so Dryads, plus an old Drycha model (shown above) that suits a Branchwraith or Nymph. Most likely I’ll take these in skirmishing units of 5 or 6 and use them in a chaff role. They can probably kill most other chaff, what with having 2 attacks base, but they definitely need to be advanced through cover, and ideally want to charge out of a forest and into something small then disappear into cover again (this will be an ongoing theme for many of our units!). I’m probably not running more than two units, and even then I’d probably only run them if I really needed to make up core points. I’d probably rank them 4th out of the 5 core choices for Wood Elves, but take that with a grain of salt because I still haven’t got any games in yet!

Originally written for rankandflank.com.