Opinions on the rangers vs DA vs detection in T1 eldar paradox

[Torpid]

The question at hand is not wether 210/20 is too expensive or not but what we want Rangers to do. In my most humble opinion they are supposed to detect but also inflict those crucial model losses that Eldar needed to stay on field somewhat. The problem with this is that Dire Avengers are now so strong that staying on the field and keeping map presence is not really an issue any longer. We can however all agree that this is not what we want/expect from Dire Avengers. I believe that the Eldar design does indeed need to be reverted to a state before T1 Exarchs but with the neccessary fine-tuning of the damage values for Rangers and pricing for Dire Avengers. I would really like to see more viable builds with Eldar again instead of just:

• DA - Shees - DA - Shuriken - 2x Exarchs - Banshee Aspect - T2
• 3x DA - Shuriken - Exarchs - (Shuriken) - T2

It is just boring and turns Eldar into an a-move race which they just should not be.

You're right.

So what is it forum? Do we want the older variant of rangers akin to retail wherein they have quite high sunk costs and don't synergise well with triple DA builds, but themselves are actually able to bleed enemies and in a realistic amount of team force of SUTs themselves, or an even weaker one than that at present that is cheaper in sunk costs and upkeep but has far less actual raw combat prowess and thus is mainly a support unit?

Or keep DA exarchs in T1?

[Cyris]

I'll just bring this over.

DA Exarch in T1 is a red herring (something, especially a clue, that is or is intended to be misleading or distracting.) I for one rarely get the upgrade before T2 (when it's powers kick in), as it goes against the strength of this squad: disproportionately high stats for cost in it's vanilla form.

The problem that I have with DA is that their straight out of the box stats are better then any other T1 ranged unit for cost. This happened over the course of multiple small upgrades to them that were alright individually, but culminated in an over powered unit. Compare their un-upgraded stats to other ranged squads, and you'll see they are straight up better in nearly every way. DA's do the highest damage, while also having above average speed, high health and repair. This would all be almost ok, except that their upgrades are also both awesome, and scale well into T2.

IMO their base stats need to be reduced. Since I like the hit and run Eldar archetype, I'd say reduce health from 120 to 100 and call it a day. MAYBE give the health boost back to battle equipment, but I don't think it's necessary. Their base damage could go down too, and maybe give the Exarch Embolden in T1 to compensate with investment. I'd prefer health though - DA should bleed if you don't rely on their speed/battle equipment to win firefights. As they exist now, they outshoot every ranged squad except tacs/csm (which they will do a number to in pairs and/or in cover) and then have strong upgrades on top.

In short: As a former Eldar player, I think DA base stats are too high for cost. If DA Exarch moved to T2, it would not effect my play in a meaningful way, nor would it make DA any more reasonable for their cost.

if I had my magic wand, DA's would go from 120 to 100 health per model, and Rangers would get a small cost reduction (like to 280/30, with Pathfinder going down to 50/15). See how that plays out before cutting deeper.

Old Snipers should stay dead. Rangers need a little love to compete with the less expensive, better scaling Shuri. DA's are OP BEFORE upgrades, and that's the real problem. Slightly tweak those two and the problems might go away overnight.

The consistency of the Rangers suppression would be what I'd want to hit next. I tried them out for a while, and they just didn't deliver. All too often they'd fire 2+ times at a target, and not have it end up Suppressed. This happens constantly with setup teams since they get a courage damage reduction from cover, but also even from a melee squad approaching, cause some random model was behind yellow cover for a second, just enough to make 2 shots not enough:
Change sniper_hi courage multipliers against cover from .75 / .5 to 1 / 1
Bump up courage damage from 75 to 85 (still takes 2 shots, but will happen more consistently)

I personally quite like Rangers suppression instead of damage, but as mentioned it doesn't work so well unless you have 2, which gets very expensive and scales poorly.

[boss]

people wont get rangers over shurican if thay don't bleed. rangers are not suppression tool setup teams are aka shurican when you need 2 rangers to suppression 1 thing and spend time to micro them more now you might as well just get 2 setup teams which can give you av come t2 when rangers just become a throw away come t2 making them cheaper wont help I say that we should try old rangers with more cost so people don't spam them if it become stupid as before we can always change them again over da leader in t1 thats what I think

[Kvn]

For what my opinion is worth, I agree that lowering the cost isn't the way to go. Quite frankly, any amount of money would still be a waste when buying Rangers in their current state. The lack of damage is a killer for them given that they're supposed to counter setup teams as well as bleed lighter enemy models. In their current state, they don't do either. The only real reliable way for them to mess with setups is to knock them over with Kinetic Pulse, but using them that way just makes them a worse version of Spotters.

I personally would like them returned to the damage they had, but since a lot of people disagree with that, and the Eldar lineup has changed considerably since then, I would suggest reworking them to make them a better setup counter while offering detection, so on and so forth. I'm not entirely sure how to go about that though, so that could be an issue.

Alternatively, maybe they could be replaced by another unit that would fill a similar role, and not have the design issues that come with sniper units like Striking Scorpions (maybe a bad suggestion since invis melee is asking for trouble) or Swooping Hawks. Just something for consideration, not a demand or serious suggestion.

DA Exarch I would agree should be moved back to T2. Maybe keep his mini detection, maybe not, but he was never really meant to function in T1.

[Tex]

I strongly disagree with returning rangers to their former selves. In fact, I find it unthinkable that anyone wants to go back to that. That is absolute cancer.

Its bad enough in 1v1 when you get bled to a fucking pulp and your only hope is to get a transport with a detector inside or a quick gen bash and do something meaningful before the inevitable falcon comes out.

Its absolutely absurd in 2v2 where rangers are EASILY the best auto buy unit in this game mode. All you need to do is cover a bit of AV into T2 and mass these guys. When I still played 2v2, that was my team strategy. I don't ever remember losing with this strategy.

I don't really play 3v3, but I can only imagine that a lot of the same would apply here as well.

***PLEASE CONSIDER THIS SIMPLE FACT***

High burst damage coming out of cloak has always been complained about in this game. Just take a look at what we have now: Scout grenades coming out of cloaking to endlessly wipe havoc squads and what not. Fun stuff right?

My suggestions are as follows:
-Increase ranger attack range to normal value, no longer requires upgrade for full range
-Lower ranger cost and base damage a fair bit
-Lower ranger keen sight radius
-Lower the cooldown and damage on kinetic pulse
-pathfinder wargear (with appropriate cost) now: (see below)
1) increases keen sight radius to normal value
2) increases damage done by kinetic pulse to current value
3) increases energy regeneration marginally

Explanation:
I think a lower costing ranger squad will offset the loss of T1 detection via the DA warlock leader. Having low damage but high utility will open up playstyles, build orders, and options to counter certain situations. Having an increased energy regeneration rate will encourage more ability usage and will increase the skill ceiling on this unit (which is so very Eldar).

Tag along balance changes would be as follows:
-Shrui move speed reduced to 5
-Shuri rotation speed reduced to barely above normal value
-DA exarch retains detection but is moved back to T2
-DA hp reduced to 110 per model, damage reduced by 7.5%
-Dark Reapers get a 5% damage and health increase

Explanation:

The Shuri is easily the best platform in the game. Reducing its speed and rotation only allow for the fair chance of flanking. It changes nothing else.
The DA exarch retaining detection in T2 I think is fair, seeing as how every other race has 2 detectors other than chaos, and in the case of chaos, you should never be without heretics, so its a passable (even if undesirable) situation.
As Cyris said, DA hp is too high vanilla. As well, their level of pew pew is by all accounts, too formidable. Taking some strength away from DA's will lend toward using other methods to get damage done. Again, I feel like this lends very heavily toward what Eldar playstyle is supposed to be: ability usage and high skill ceiling. For DA's hp can be effectively increased against ranged fire by using holofield or energy shields. Ranged damage can be increased in a more subtle way: rangers will be able to fire off kinetic shots more frequently.
I think I can justify the small buff to dark reapers for these reasons: Heavy armor races will have an easier time in T1 against an Eldar due to the weaker DA's, and, being that 3 DA builds will be less attractive and effective, (especially in the case against Heavy armor races) I think an effective and lethal elite anti-HI ranged squad becomes less of a luxury and more of a necessity.

Just my thoughts.... I could be out of touch?

[Kvn]

***PLEASE CONSIDER THIS SIMPLE FACT***

High burst damage coming out of cloak has always been complained about in this game. Just take a look at what we have now: Scout grenades coming out of cloaking to endlessly wipe havoc squads and what not. Fun stuff right?

An extreme example, but I would point out that Rangers never one-shot squads without warning, unless the opponent went for 3+, in which case it was just a quick transport and GG.

That aside

My suggestions are as follows:
-Increase ranger attack range to normal value, no longer requires upgrade for full range
-Lower ranger cost and base damage a fair bit
-Lower ranger keen sight radius
-Lower the cooldown and damage on kinetic pulse
-pathfinder wargear (with appropriate cost) now: (see below)
1) increases keen sight radius to normal value
2) increases damage done by kinetic pulse to current value
3) increases energy regeneration marginally

I can respect what you're trying to do, but I really don't think this is the right way to do it. Like I said above, if you just get Rangers for their abilities, they're simply a worse version of spotters. Less abilities to use for disruption, a less durable army to hide behind, and MUCH less scaling into the later tiers. Again, it really doesn't matter how much their price goes down, as they simply wouldn't be worth it, especially if their piddly damage gets nerfed even more. Maybe it could work if they got some new abilities to fit the role, but as they are now, they're just not worth it.

Explanation:
I think a lower costing ranger squad will offset the loss of T1 detection via the DA warlock leader. Having low damage but high utility will open up playstyles, build orders, and options to counter certain situations. Having an increased energy regeneration rate will encourage more ability usage and will increase the skill ceiling on this unit (which is so very Eldar).

They need abilities that are worth the effort for this I think. Kinetic shot is ok long range disruption. Nothing flashy, but it works for the most part. Decent, but certainly not worth investing in a squad for specifically. Holo fields are incredibly situational, and rely on your opponent not hearing the Rangers announcing their intentions, and the standard infiltration won't really do anything if the Rangers have no damage output.

Tag along balance changes would be as follows:
-Shrui move speed reduced to 5
-Shuri rotation speed reduced to barely above normal value
-DA exarch retains detection but is moved back to T2
-DA hp reduced to 110 per model, damage reduced by 7.5%
-Dark Reapers get a 5% damage and health increase

Explanation:

The Shuri is easily the best platform in the game. Reducing its speed and rotation only allow for the fair chance of flanking. It changes nothing else.
The DA exarch retaining detection in T2 I think is fair, seeing as how every other race has 2 detectors other than chaos, and in the case of chaos, you should never be without heretics, so its a passable (even if undesirable) situation.
As Cyris said, DA hp is too high vanilla. As well, their level of pew pew is by all accounts, too formidable. Taking some strength away from DA's will lend toward using other methods to get damage done. Again, I feel like this lends very heavily toward what Eldar playstyle is supposed to be: ability usage and high skill ceiling. For DA's hp can be effectively increased against ranged fire by using holofield or energy shields. Ranged damage can be increased in a more subtle way: rangers will be able to fire off kinetic shots more frequently.
I think I can justify the small buff to dark reapers for these reasons: Heavy armor races will have an easier time in T1 against an Eldar due to the weaker DA's, and, being that 3 DA builds will be less attractive and effective, (especially in the case against Heavy armor races) I think an effective and lethal elite anti-HI ranged squad becomes less of a luxury and more of a necessity.

This I really don't agree with here. GWT is one of the best setup teams for a reason, namely the fact that Eldar have limited options in T1 thanks to Rangers being so very bad. Given that I can only see the previously mentioned changes as nerfs to Rangers' already lackluster ability, I really don't think nerfing the Shuri is the way to go.

DA Exarch I agree with, but the nerfs to their combat ability seems unnecessary. Despite what people may claim about their durability, they only have 20 hp more than a Guardsman model, so they die very quickly, which in turn significantly lessens their damage output. Given that moving their leader back to T2 would already impact their combat ability by removing the meatshield from the squad, I think that it might be best to leave them as is and see if it balances out. Could always be changed later if they remained too strong.

Dark Reapers I have mixed feelings on. I've used them quite frequently to great effect myself, but I know that other people consider them sub-par. Personally, I would be against a damage buff to them as their dps is already quite high. A boost might just push them over the edge, even if it is a modest one.

Now, I know I'm not a top-level player like some of the people around the forums are, so this could just be a case of "scrub talks like he knows what he's on about" but I hope that it at least made some kind of sense.

[Aguxyz]

spotters don't cloak your army

[Kvn]

spotters don't cloak your army

Like I said. Holo Fields are incredibly situational and rely on your opponent not hearing the Rangers announcing their intentions.

[Torpid]

spotters don't cloak your army

Like I said. Holo Fields are incredibly situational and rely on your opponent not hearing the Rangers announcing their intentions.

I suppose holyhammer must be deaf then to allow me to kill his falcon with a holo-fielding brightlance wraithlord in a series worth 100 euros.

On a less rhetorical note I do disagree with the notion that 'rangers are just a worse spotter'.

Spotters do not detect. You don't buy rangers to counter suppression, obviously, you just drop an energy shield alongside ashuri to do that. You get rangers for their obvious purpose in the eldar t1 under this meta. DETECTION!!!

But they would have just enough utility to make them not some horrible sunk cost like for example scout sergeants were before they were die last. Lower pop cost would help there too as it means a lot less upkeep.

Rangers atm and under this idea would actually be better in T2 than in T1 where holo-field is far more useful for wipes and vehicle escapes and where the amazing natural sight range of the ranger squad can come into play with regards to predicting vehicle and set up team positioning.

[Torpid]

people wont get rangers over shurican if thay don't bleed. rangers are not suppression tool setup teams are aka shurican when you need 2 rangers to suppression 1 thing and spend time to micro them more now you might as well just get 2 setup teams which can give you av come t2 when rangers just become a throw away come t2 making them cheaper wont help I say that we should try old rangers with more cost so people don't spam them if it become stupid as before we can always change them again over da leader in t1 thats what I think

My intention is not to cause a ranger spam meta over the shuriken one. Really what I want is to just get rid of the crappy DA exarchs in T1 while also not leaving eldar with terrible terrible t1 detection issues and even t2 detection issues really! If someone would only get rangers when they needed detection and otherwise always go shuri I would be happy with that if it meant people would struggle to find success a-moving DA blobs in T1 as I feel it is just not how eldar ought to be played aesthetically and really lowers the potential value of the race to play as or against.

[Kvn]

I suppose holyhammer must be deaf then to allow me to kill his falcon with a holo-fielding brightlance wraithlord in a series worth 100 euros.

Please don't put words in my mouth in an attempt to make it sound like I'm insulting people.

But in response, if he didn't catch it, and you took advantage of that, all the more power to you. However, that doesn't mean it's automatically going to work like that reliably in other matches. Sometimes people will miss the verbal cue, or just not react properly to it, but in most cases they can fairly easily counteract a would-be ambush thanks to the announcement.

On a less rhetorical note I do disagree with the notion that 'rangers are just a worse spotter'.

Spotters do not detect. You don't buy rangers to counter suppression, obviously, you just drop an energy shield alongside ashuri to do that. You get rangers for their obvious purpose in the eldar t1 under this meta. DETECTION!!!

But they would have just enough utility to make them not some horrible sunk cost like for example scout sergeants were before they were die last. Lower pop cost would help there too as it means a lot less upkeep.

Rangers atm and under this idea would actually be better in T2 than in T1 where holo-field is far more useful for wipes and vehicle escapes and where the amazing natural sight range of the ranger squad can come into play with regards to predicting vehicle and set up team positioning.

You can't drop a shield in combat, or while a Shuri is firing. Trying to use it to counter suppression isn't going to work since you need to be in range of it to start shooting back. That's where the snipers were meant to come in initially as a means to push against entrenched suppression teams among other things.

Buying Rangers for detection, and ONLY detection, is a very bad design principle. There is no other unit in the game that functions purely as a detector. It either comes on squads which already have a use (Catachans, Warriors, Kommandos) or it comes as a multi-faceted upgrade (Scout Sarge w/grenade and die last, Shoota Nob with durability and dps, Aspiring Champion with buffs, etc.) As it stands, Rangers in their current state have very low damage output, and a few moderately to not-so useful abilities.

I mean, if you're playing as Farseer, you have a 35 red global that does their job better, from any distance, and can be cast anywhere on the map regardless of LoS. Warlock and WSE don't have such easy access, but it's very rare that you'll find a game where detection is so important as to warrant setting yourself back by purchasing a Rangers for the sole purpose of catching stealth units.

I don't see how pushing them back a tier would help anything. They're bad in T1, so it seems counterintuitive to drop them in T2. Making their abilities slightly more spammable isn't going to really change that since those abilities aren't strong enough to make a large impact most of the time anyway. Not to mention dropping them back a tier still wouldn't solve the issue of Eldar early game detection.

[Tinibombini]

I suppose holyhammer must be deaf then to allow me to kill his falcon with a holo-fielding brightlance wraithlord in a series worth 100 euros.

Come now Torpid, you are better than making a disingenuous argument like this. Who cares about what happened in one game as a measure of whether infiltrated units announcing things from infiltration impacts their utility. Would you post this kind of stuff in the scouts "See but do not be seen" thread?

[Ace of Swords]

The question at hand is not wether 210/20 is too expensive or not but what we want Rangers to do. In my most humble opinion they are supposed to detect but also inflict those crucial model losses that Eldar needed to stay on field somewhat. The problem with this is that Dire Avengers are now so strong that staying on the field and keeping map presence is not really an issue any longer. We can however all agree that this is not what we want/expect from Dire Avengers. I believe that the Eldar design does indeed need to be reverted to a state before T1 Exarchs but with the neccessary fine-tuning of the damage values for Rangers and pricing for Dire Avengers. I would really like to see more viable builds with Eldar again instead of just:

• DA - Shees - DA - Shuriken - 2x Exarchs - Banshee Aspect - T2
• 3x DA - Shuriken - Exarchs - (Shuriken) - T2

It is just boring and turns Eldar into an a-move race which they just should not be.

You're right.

So what is it forum? Do we want the older variant of rangers akin to retail wherein they have quite high sunk costs and don't synergise well with triple DA builds, but themselves are actually able to bleed enemies and in a realistic amount of team force of SUTs themselves, or an even weaker one than that at present that is cheaper in sunk costs and upkeep but has far less actual raw combat prowess and thus is mainly a support unit?

Or keep DA exarchs in T1?

I'd rather see the old snipers, except this time around the do the same damage and have the same fire rate that way the eldar don't straight up rape the sm in the MU as it would become a proper micro war with the snipers.

[Oddnerd]

I like the idea of making vanilla rangers poor in combat but cheap. You could make it easy for Eldar players to field them for their detection + kinetic shot, then throttle their spam potential by making the pathfinder upgrade necessary for them to be a strong combat unit, but expensive enough to punish spam.

[Asmon]

I've thought of a better work-around for rangers to be a relevant unit. Ofc we should not revert them to their old form where they would OS expensive models, but we need to remind that a high damage per burst doesn't necessaruly imply model loss. Atm rangers only shine thanks to their abilities, which are very distinctive from what a shuriken platform does and indicate us the way to go.

Here is my suggestion: rangers have 2 kind of fire patterns, switch-able at will similar to Sternguard ammo. One is a high damage shot, with bonus against commander and super_heavy_infantry armor. About what we see atm, perhaps with lesser damage against any other form of armor. Then rangers will still be the single entity damage dealer they ought to be, against the right targets.

The second fire pattern consists in low damage shots with AoE. And that's what will make all the difference. Even though it might conflict with the idea everyone has in mind when it comes to snipers, the thing is we need rangers to be better vs high model squad in order to use them instead of shurikens, for quite a different playstyle. The main idea is no more to bleed those squads, whose models are cheap, but to weaken them so much than they will need to retreat.

Hence the resurgence of old hide&seek strategies, less frustrating for the opponent who will not lose so many models in unpredictable bursts from the shadows, but still see his squad health pools decrease meaningfully and be forced to react, whereas atm he can just a-move towards the Eldar genfarm and bash it if there's no shuriken to defend, losing 3 shootaboyz in the process under 2 ranger squad's shots.

And that's it. Rangers become a squad whose role is to lower the enemy health pool at a distance, in 2 different manners depending on what the threat is (and therefore requiring the usual Eldar micro with the extra ammo switch), always relevant, especially for detection, efficient in their own unique way.

I'd gladly discuss new cost for the squad, tweaks for damage and abilities once we've agreed this is a good idea.

[mh1039]

wwcbd

ahem

huh?

let me explain:
At the end of the day there is a tendency to take an initiative as eldar players and you really can a-move situationally with mooost... And with eldar isn't it a bit, umm... how do you say .. pre-emptive,i think. To say nerf this or that is a brave move so the suggestions put up are worth considering especially with patterns and stuff but if you try to base it off anything but Cyris' staats thing it's dubious?