Current state of Craftworld Aeldari

[Questionable]

What're the thoughts? Are they in a good spot or have they been overnerfed. I feel like the way webway gates work has reached the point where its far too inflexible as a faction mechanic. Especially with the HP nerfs to Webway gates there should be a way for Eldar to replace lost gateways.
The reduction in the cost of creating redoubts helps a bit in securing them but reaching a point where the whole webway mechanic is entirely moot feels a bit bum.
Perhaps there could be added a way for Eldar to create minor webway gates just to make use of the webway mechanic?

[archelonian]

I think the Aeldari are fine as they are. Webways are not meant to be a strong fortress unless made into a city. If you are losing them then you are likely expanding too quickly/being too aggressive. Don't take a webway unless you can defend it, and try to keep its location hidden (they really should not be taking damage period). You should easily be able to get at least 1-2 nearby webways close to your starting base to expand, so you will have enough to get 3 cities. Late game, there are usually areas of the map where the webways are untouched (in a large free for all game the center is usually avoided since factions spawn on the edges). Unit wise they are fine as well guardians are amazing for their cost but require different tactics (until you get wave serpents they are best used as ambushers). Once they get wave serpents and wraith blades they get a very solid front line and late game wraith knights are very powerful and very tanky.

[Smiling Jack]

Gameplay has definitely taken a hit for pvp and coop on harder difficulties, but still very worthwhile. Solo play hasn't changed much imo, a lot can be worked out with custom settings.

Its much harder to keep a handful of gates intact for hit and run or surprise attacks which was core to Eldar tactics, and pulling it off successfully takes a heavy commitment with high risk, and its hard to fit this in with the faction"s pacing now. Being forced to turn any activated gates into cities is pretty lame, might as well take them out completely if that's the intention.

Really if the neutrals would tone down their fetish for the webway gates, or at least not zerg-spawn directly on them, that would solve the issue

[Sir Travelot]

I think they're enjoyable, but I'd like to see a more elegant solution to webway gates. The HP nerf made me realise that they did have too many HP before, but now I feel like they're just a fraction too hard to keep alive now.

Maybe a tech to grant active ones a damage reduction buff, like the SM got for their Fortresses of Redemption? Or perhaps they leave a ruin when destroyed that a Spirit Seer could heal, and once it reaches full HP again it can be reactivated?

I don't know. One thing I do love about the current implementation is how I feel like a dying race when playing Aeldari. Each webway that goes dark is another possibility for my faction gone forever. It's an incredible piece of design to elicit those kinds of feelings from the player. The people making this game sure know what they're doing!

[KDubya]

I think having some way to heal or repair a gate would be great.

Maybe a tech which gives you an ability to cloak an activated gate to help keep it safe from being destroyed so quickly by the wildlife once it is activated.

If I activate a gate far away in order to use as a gateway it will be killed in two turns max by the mob of neutrals that surround it. If I send troops through the gate to defend they arrive without any actions available. That gives the wildlife free hits on squishy Aeldari troops unless you are in the mid to late game and can send wave serpents, fire prisms and wraith blades.

Even then the wildlife might decide to just kill the gate instead, leaving your troops stranded. I've never been able to pull this off, at best my main force might clear the area around a gate which I then can activate for easier troop resupply.

I routinely have wildlife set to max on a huge FFA map with one of each race. If someone spawns close you might be hard pressed to get two gates before they all get destroyed.

Another issue is that if you activate and turn into a city, the city attack is the weakest in the game and can't fight off anything. This makes the loss of your new city a real possibility unless you can send your army to defend.

Overall I failed my last two or three games on very hard with Aeldari. I don't know if the addition of Adaptus Mechanicus filled the map up such that one of each race now leads to much closer spawns and much faster eradication of the gates.

Flavor wise it feels like a dying race but if you get some bad land you have a real handicap without the ability to fix.

Once you get a tricked out Avatar of Khaine, some wave Serpents full of Fire Dragons, some wraith blades and fire prisms you can hold your own but it is challenging to get your economy humming to where you can afford all that. Late game wraith knights, war walkers, scorpions and their great air force can make short work of anything.

[Sir Travelot]

I can see how those settings would make securing webways especially difficult, and it does make the Aeldari game harder when you've no webways to move quickly around the map.

I'm going to start a game with those settings and see how I go, you know, for 'research purposes'. :D

I'm thinking reconnaissance is going to be very important - if you know what neutrals are around, and how far a given webway is from other players, you'll have a much better chance of sending the right units through at the right time to quickly overwhelm the enemies around it. But you'll want to pick your moment, and combine the assault with some troops that have got there on foot, like jetbikes or a farseer or whatever. That's my theory, anyway.

TL;DR - I share your feelings on webways, I'm just thinking that their vulnerability makes for engaging choices.

[Dominosugar]

I would be stoked if destroyed webway gates left a map feature like Necron tombs that Eldar could restore for a higher command cost. And of course these ruins would not provide vision like functioning ones.

[Smiling Jack]

Conspiracy Theory:

Webway gate woes are actually clever pre-marketing for a future Harlequins dlc. They know all the cool webway tricks.

[Dominosugar]

Originally posted by Smiling Jack:

Conspiracy Theory: :spazdreaming:

Webway gate woes are actually clever pre-marketing for a future Harlequins dlc. They know all the cool webway tricks.

Drukhari first plz

[mecklenberg]

Originally posted by KDubya:

I think having some way to heal or repair a gate would be great.

Maybe a tech which gives you an ability to cloak an activated gate to help keep it safe from being destroyed so quickly by the wildlife once it is activated.

If I activate a gate far away in order to use as a gateway it will be killed in two turns max by the mob of neutrals that surround it. If I send troops through the gate to defend they arrive without any actions available. That gives the wildlife free hits on squishy Aeldari troops unless you are in the mid to late game and can send wave serpents, fire prisms and wraith blades.

Even then the wildlife might decide to just kill the gate instead, leaving your troops stranded. I've never been able to pull this off, at best my main force might clear the area around a gate which I then can activate for easier troop resupply.

I routinely have wildlife set to max on a huge FFA map with one of each race. If someone spawns close you might be hard pressed to get two gates before they all get destroyed.

Another issue is that if you activate and turn into a city, the city attack is the weakest in the game and can't fight off anything. This makes the loss of your new city a real possibility unless you can send your army to defend.

Overall I failed my last two or three games on very hard with Aeldari. I don't know if the addition of Adaptus Mechanicus filled the map up such that one of each race now leads to much closer spawns and much faster eradication of the gates.

Flavor wise it feels like a dying race but if you get some bad land you have a real handicap without the ability to fix.

Once you get a tricked out Avatar of Khaine, some wave Serpents full of Fire Dragons, some wraith blades and fire prisms you can hold your own but it is challenging to get your economy humming to where you can afford all that. Late game wraith knights, war walkers, scorpions and their great air force can make short work of anything.

Good post, and I've had very similar experiences.

Consider it in balance terms. The Eldar start with a decent advantage; a fair amount of map awareness, even without activating the gates.

Once the gates start getting destroyed though, Eldar effectively become weaker Necrons - only certain locations available for settlement, but as a diminishing asset. This can make it very difficult to get good locations for expansions.

Well, as compensation in the later game, the argument runs, they can leap across the map and launch surprise assaults. But this is unfair all around. It's unfair to the Eldar because their ability to do this is essentially random, and it's unfair to the other players too, because it's also random chance that a gate somewhere was randomly missed.

And let's be honest, it's also quite tedious to watch the gates being destroyed one after the other by NPCs for the first 20-odd turns.

The starting point for an overhaul must be to get rid of the NPC attacks; NPCs don't attack unactivated gates, but other players can, and should. Naturally, activated gates are fair game for all.

The other part of the solution is to grant the Eldar a limited number of (non-refundable) charges for activating gates, say 5 of them. So in effect the Eldar can have 2 cities and 3 gates, or 3 and 2, or whatever, and if they choose poorly, the charge is lost permanently.

[Jey]

Originally posted by mecklenberg:

This can make it very difficult to get good locations for expansions.

No.
You will never expand in the middle of the enemies, so losing those gates doesn't prevent you from expanding.

You will also be able to expand way before all gates are destroyed.

If there isn't enough gate to get good spots, you can increase the amount of gates.

their ability to do this is essentially random

I don't see how. It's completely deterministic when you make units go through a portal.

If you mean "But the location of portals is random", they are roughly spread equally.

it's also random chance that a gate somewhere was randomly missed.

They can be seen in the fog, if you don't explore your surroundings, you can hardly blame the game for being blindsided.

NPCs don't attack unactivated gates

I don't see why it would make sense. Why should AI be forced to keep time bombs near them?


I think you really underestimate the information given by gates being destroyed.
Knowing where the enemy is, the faction it is and what unit it uses (with a certain margin of error) is a tremendous advantage. Worth more than a gate located four tiles away from their city (that you'll never be able to keep any way).

[mecklenberg]

@Jey

You're welcome to disagree with me. But I do expect at least the courtesy of reading my post first!

To give but one example:

'I think you really underestimate the information given by gates being destroyed.
Knowing where the enemy is, the faction it is and what unit it uses (with a certain margin of error) is a tremendous advantage. Worth more than a gate located four tiles away from their city (that you'll never be able to keep any way).'

And yet right at the beginning of my post I wrote:

'Consider it in balance terms. The Eldar start with a decent advantage; a fair amount of map awareness, even without activating the gates.'

Hilarious!

[Jey]

Originally posted by mecklenberg:

@Jey
Hilarious!

Oh sorry, I didn't notice it was a pugilat. Let me activate my battle mode.

You expect the "courtesy" of me reading your post?
Well guess what? I expect the same.

I expect it even more when you're acting haughty thinking "urr durr you didn't read the paragraph". Sadly, your basic reading skills are so trash, you can't even notice the double line separation between what corresponds to my answer to your post, and the generic answer to other people in this topic.
Yes, sorry for your ego, but I do answer to other people. Guess that's a bit hard to understand when you have the reading skills of a two years old?

But you know what, I will kindly try to put myself in your shoes and act as though I'm too dumb to understand formatting.
Assuming I answered you and only you, in what way saying that you underestimate an advantage means that I didn't read you?

If you have a tiny bit of vocabulary, you probably know that "underestimating" doesn't mean "estimating at 0". If you don't, here, you can increase your knowledge. Am I not generous?

I suppose your understanding skills are at the same level as your reading skills, so I will explain further.

You are putting against each other the advantage of having information on the enemy and the disadvantage of permanently losing webway gates.
You quite obviously believe that the disadvantage is bigger than the advantage (or do you ask for a change because you just want more power? I wouldn't be surprised, but I will assume the best for your brain, because I'm just THAT nice).

Well, I believe you underestimate the advantage of having information on the enemy.
Knowing that the enemy Necron has gone to explore his north and not his east means that maybe the east is covered by strong neutrals? Or maybe there is a good opportunity to blindside him. Taking a Webway Gate there might yield information.

"But what if they destroy in every direction? I don't have any way to blindside him!"
Then you use your brain, however difficult it seems for you, and either you try to pick a side (because guess what, cleaning the map in two directions means spreading your army in two directions (or taking twice as much time, which... allows you to attack from the first direction)) and destroy from that side.

"But he cleans very fast, the nearest gate is super far"
Oh noes, whatever will you do, you can't just rush like a blind man in his city. How terrible, needing to use a brain is awful!

Knowing that the enemy is clearing the map fast is worth the loss of gates.
That means he's spending a lot of effort on his army. Maybe you can give him a bit of field and try to rush a higher-tiered tech? Maybe you know there is no Kastelans/umbras to block the path, and you should instead focus immediately on getting more units at the cost of hurting your eco temporarily?
Maybe you can find a good forest on his path to setup an ambush?

You can't teleport your units at 4 tiles of his city? Who cares, if you crush his army, you can take all your time to walk to his city and destroy it.

Losing gates on the enemy side is a meaningless loss. (You won't ever hold them anyway)
Losing city spot definitely is a meaningless drawback (hint: When you lose a city, your fate is already pretty much determined, unless you're already able to beat him, in which case you... don't care about losing a city)
Losing potential city spots is a meaningless drawback (you have enough gates on your side to build the cities you need)
Losing an easy access to the enemy side is annoying but ultimately meaningless (hint: All other factions manage very well to walk to the enemy city) especially when considering the fact that almost all your units have 4+ movement (hint: That's 1 more than other factions).

Meanwhile, knowing part of the army composition and a lot of information about the army movement is an incredible advantage.
cF : Space Marines orbital scan radius being nerfed from 3 to 1.


tl;dr : Underestimating is undervaluing, not valuing at 0. Learn some vocabulary before acting like an ass.

[mecklenberg]

@Jey
I don't need to put up with this.

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[GreenBeanN1]

Luckily I mod so I decide what is challenging and fun. Therefore I can buy an one use popup webway gate at Jokearo's shop. A little bit expensive. But when the need is high costs are irrelevant.
If Games Workshop knew what I have done with the lore and game they would make me chief executive officer immediately.

[DasaKamov]

Originally posted by mecklenberg:

And let's be honest, it's also quite tedious to watch the gates being destroyed one after the other by NPCs for the first 20-odd turns.

The starting point for an overhaul must be to get rid of the NPC attacks; NPCs don't attack unactivated gates

These two statements are a bit contradictory. If you don't want to " watch the gates being destroyed one after the other by NPCs for the first 20-odd turns" (which you yourself stated will not happen, because NPCs don't attack dormant gates), don't activate them until you've prioritized which ones to activate and have an army ready to pass through them.