Need tips for Dark Elf frontline and holding (in campaign)

[Gryphonheart]

So, I noticed DE are super frail and sort of bad at holding the lines for long. First time playing as them and I'm having a pretty rough time dealing with other armies, even against other dark elves.

I have all DLC units, just unsure as to how to use my army properly. Any tips would be appreciated.

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Daaaaaaarkshards

Bleakswords & Dreadspears can't kill for peanuts: that's what your Darkshards are for.

Black Ark Corsairs will kill things, they're much better at that, but not very armor-piercing.
Witch Elves & Sisters of Slaughter aren't neccessary for quite some time: the building's better spent on the standard barracks.

The Reaper Bolt Thrower is your counter to enemy Darkshards w/ Shields. Bring two or three of them. Plus, they allow you to fight sieges.

[yuzhonglu]

All spears in front and dread shards behind. Don't bother with the shields. Just get the standard ones.

As Hellebron, once you get to Sisters of Slaughter (which can be built from standard barracks), just mass those and crush everyone.

Then, later, hydras. And Darkshards. Don't need anything else. Hellebron should run slaughter comp the whole game.

[Gryphonheart]

Originally posted by yuzhonglu:

All spears in front and dread shards behind. Don't bother with the shields. Just get the standard ones.

As Hellebron, once you get to Sisters of Slaughter (which can be built from standard barracks), just mass those and crush everyone.

Then, later, hydras. And Darkshards. Don't need anything else. Hellebron should run slaughter comp the whole game.

What about Bleakswords? Do they have any use?

[yuzhonglu]

No.

[Andrewbh2003]

Originally posted by Gryphonheart:

Originally posted by yuzhonglu:

All spears in front and dread shards behind. Don't bother with the shields. Just get the standard ones.

As Hellebron, once you get to Sisters of Slaughter (which can be built from standard barracks), just mass those and crush everyone.

Then, later, hydras. And Darkshards. Don't need anything else. Hellebron should run slaughter comp the whole game.

What about Bleakswords? Do they have any use?

yes cannon fodder

[yuzhonglu]

Spears are better.

[Gryphonheart]

Ok, thanks a lot for the tips, noticed Darkshards would be pretty important considering its armour piercing. I'm playing as Malekith atm on Legendary. 4 spears to screen another 4 black guards would make for a nice frontline?

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Gryphonheart:

Ok, thanks a lot for the tips, noticed Darkshards would be pretty important considering its armour piercing. I'm playing as Malekith atm on Legendary. 4 spears to screen another 4 black guards would make for a nice frontline?

I mean, if you have Black Guard to spare, just go full Black Guard and ignore the spears...

... How lategame are you?

[Gryphonheart]

Originally posted by aidenpons:

Originally posted by Gryphonheart:

Ok, thanks a lot for the tips, noticed Darkshards would be pretty important considering its armour piercing. I'm playing as Malekith atm on Legendary. 4 spears to screen another 4 black guards would make for a nice frontline?

I mean, if you have Black Guard to spare, just go full Black Guard and ignore the spears...

... How lategame are you?

Turn 57. But since Malekith has a trait that reduces upkeep from Blackguards by 50% and got the waymark building in Naggarond its a bit easier to mantain them. Got a few levels on him and went for a few traits in the blue skill line (campaign traits) to reduce it further

[Ben Argo]

The only downside to the black guard is that they don’t have shields, so they can get wrecked by archers if you’re careless.

I generally use Spears exclusively as my frontline with a couple elites on the wings to swing around and rear charge. They’re actually ok if you support them with a lord and magic. Soul blight is an awesome equalizer vs the enemy frontline and gives your mediocre spears a sizable advantage.

[Hollywood]

For a more detailed description, and hopefully to give you a better understanding of the faction, Dark Elves are the "focus fire" faction. By that, I mean that they excel at killing threats quickly and efficiently using combined attacks. Your primary goal in battles (campaign and multiplayer) with them is to find the most threatening units and destroy them quickly. Of course this is the ultimate goal of many factions and battles in general, it's more easily accomplished with Dark Elves.

Taking a look at their roster, your high tier infantry are all designed to be killers, not defensive. Sisters of Slaughter and Witch Elves apply major debuffs to enemy units making them more susceptible to your armor piercing missiles, while themselves having the killing power of a truck. SoS have an insanely high melee defense which makes them able to go toe to toe with most any unit in the game negating their poor armor, they also have shields which allow them to take ~30% less damage from missiles. Witch Elves have frenzy, they are designed to be hurt and then deal back massive damage when their HP is lower. Executioners and Guards are essentially the same as most other factions with any decent infantry, just high tier brawlers who can hold a line and win, or even take down large targets, with the lack of shield making them a poor choice for mass stacking as a frontline.

DE archers are cut and dry, excluding a few specialized options, they are Armor Piercing with short range. They can kill anything that doesn't have a shield in mere seconds, and coupled with SoS/Witch Elf debuffs, they can kill things with shields just as fast.

As for your cavalry, Dark Riders are terrible, the only 2 good forms of cav units they have are Doomfire Warlocks and Cold Ones. Doomfire Warlocks gain a free spell cast good for single units, as well as basically being SoS on horseback without the shield. Their killing potential and survivability is reduced because of their speed and their utility. Cold Ones are tanks, they get in the fight and kill things, usually losing control of them for half the fight as with anything that has Rampage, but they are definitely good at getting kills.

Artillery is terrible, maybe it's because I play too much MP, but I don't use Reaper Bolt Throwers in my armies at all. They don't pay off for themselves in MP, and in general in battles they are so innacurate they tend to not do well at all, and I'd rather use that slot for something like a monster or cav unit.

Monsters, DE has two forms of Hydras, one for tanking large monsters and cav, and one for tanking infantry. The hydra flame attack melts undead and lightly armored foes alike. The dragon is my favorite dragon next to a Terrorgheist, good breath attack, and just a dragon so you know, it flies in and kills a unit on its own. Feral Manticore sucks, don't use it, it will just get itself killed because of it's rampage (unless of course it's a summoned one). Last but not least, the RoR flying missile unit is actually pretty good, just flying darkshards.

Ok so now that you have a rundown on Dark Elf units, you should be seeing a pattern here. Debuffs, debuffs, debuffs. As DE you shouldn't be concerned with holding a line, as instead you are basically an assassination faction. Pick a target, apply the debuff, filled them with arrows, watch them die. Something gets close to your darkshards? Cold Ones and Hydras are there to help or keep the enemy away completely. Ranged units causing problems? Doomfire Warlocks are in and out in a flash, quickly chain routing the entire backline. Got a pesky unit that isn't in the frontline and/or is a cav unit that can run away from your darkshards? Doomfire warlocks and RoR flying darkshards can take it down together. Instead of worrying about holding a line, just kill things, that's about it for DE.

[Gryphonheart]

Originally posted by hollywoodkik:

For a more detailed description, and hopefully to give you a better understanding of the faction, Dark Elves are the "focus fire" faction. By that, I mean that they excel at killing threats quickly and efficiently using combined attacks. Your primary goal in battles (campaign and multiplayer) with them is to find the most threatening units and destroy them quickly. Of course this is the ultimate goal of many factions and battles in general, it's more easily accomplished with Dark Elves.

Taking a look at their roster, your high tier infantry are all designed to be killers, not defensive. Sisters of Slaughter and Witch Elves apply major debuffs to enemy units making them more susceptible to your armor piercing missiles, while themselves having the killing power of a truck. SoS have an insanely high melee defense which makes them able to go toe to toe with most any unit in the game negating their poor armor, they also have shields which allow them to take ~30% less damage from missiles. Witch Elves have frenzy, they are designed to be hurt and then deal back massive damage when their HP is lower. Executioners and Guards are essentially the same as most other factions with any decent infantry, just high tier brawlers who can hold a line and win, or even take down large targets, with the lack of shield making them a poor choice for mass stacking as a frontline.

DE archers are cut and dry, excluding a few specialized options, they are Armor Piercing with short range. They can kill anything that doesn't have a shield in mere seconds, and coupled with SoS/Witch Elf debuffs, they can kill things with shields just as fast.

As for your cavalry, Dark Riders are terrible, the only 2 good forms of cav units they have are Doomfire Warlocks and Cold Ones. Doomfire Warlocks gain a free spell cast good for single units, as well as basically being SoS on horseback without the shield. Their killing potential and survivability is reduced because of their speed and their utility. Cold Ones are tanks, they get in the fight and kill things, usually losing control of them for half the fight as with anything that has Rampage, but they are definitely good at getting kills.

Artillery is terrible, maybe it's because I play too much MP, but I don't use Reaper Bolt Throwers in my armies at all. They don't pay off for themselves in MP, and in general in battles they are so innacurate they tend to not do well at all, and I'd rather use that slot for something like a monster or cav unit.

Monsters, DE has two forms of Hydras, one for tanking large monsters and cav, and one for tanking infantry. The hydra flame attack melts undead and lightly armored foes alike. The dragon is my favorite dragon next to a Terrorgheist, good breath attack, and just a dragon so you know, it flies in and kills a unit on its own. Feral Manticore sucks, don't use it, it will just get itself killed because of it's rampage (unless of course it's a summoned one). Last but not least, the RoR flying missile unit is actually pretty good, just flying darkshards.

Ok so now that you have a rundown on Dark Elf units, you should be seeing a pattern here. Debuffs, debuffs, debuffs. As DE you shouldn't be concerned with holding a line, as instead you are basically an assassination faction. Pick a target, apply the debuff, filled them with arrows, watch them die. Something gets close to your darkshards? Cold Ones and Hydras are there to help or keep the enemy away completely. Ranged units causing problems? Doomfire Warlocks are in and out in a flash, quickly chain routing the entire backline. Got a pesky unit that isn't in the frontline and/or is a cav unit that can run away from your darkshards? Doomfire warlocks and RoR flying darkshards can take it down together. Instead of worrying about holding a line, just kill things, that's about it for DE.

Yeah, I kinda see it but I don't truly understand it seems, im taking massive losses in every battle I play...

https://i.imgur.com/OjptXun.jpg

Its getting really frustrating because I don't truly understand how to control the army. I guess I'm just too used to playing factions that can hold a line while I flank like High Elves, Empire or even Lizardmen. Meanwhile I'm having an incredibly hard time with DE because I can't picture how an effective use of their army would be without a holding line.

Might be an issue with microing or how to set up a formation, even.

[yuzhonglu]

Oooph. Yeah. By that point you should be using Black Guard or Hydras.

You definitely need hydras. Also, your dreadshards should be focusing those sisters first. I don't understand why they have 500 kills between them. Those are the FIRST targets to focus with your ranged.

Also, why do their dreadshards have any kills? Do you see that manticore that you have? Keep that in the back until the lines meet, then fly that at the darkshards. His goal isn't to kill the darkshards, but rather to distract them (because they'll run away from it), preventing them from shooting.

I'm looking at the enemy kill counts and it's pretty obvious what you're doing wrong just from that itself.

[Hollywood]

I think I see your problem. Looks like your missile focus is off. You should definitely be microing 3 darkshards at a time on those sisters of slaughter, then the shades and black ark corsairs. The only reason you lost that is because those sisters didn't get killed and got to chew you apart.

[yuzhonglu]

Those Sisters and Dreadshards have 700 kills too many. Target the sisters with your ranged, and flank with your manticore and cavalry on their dreadshards (after the lines meet). Should have been a close or pyrrhic victory.