IntrAspection: Prelude

Hi guys,

Listening to the show where my fellow casters first talked about the new Codex Eldar was interesting, but slightly frustrating, given my tendency to want to interrupt people.  I had formed various opinions on the dex and the units within, but the main point that caught my interest in discussion was the insistence that there was a lack of development for the Aspect Warriors.  Far be it from me to slight my fellow hosts by calling them wrong, but, dammit, I feel they’re mistaken on this one!

I think I’ve put forward my case for the Aspects fairly well on the most recent show, and was actually slightly surprised by my own enthusiasm on the topic.  However, whilst I disagreed with their original stance on the warriors, it’s entirely understandable that you wouldn’t see the improvements unless you really knew the old codex, especially seeing as there were very few aspect players in 5th.  You saw two aspects for the most part: Dire Avengers for cheap scoring upgrades for Wave Serpents and Fire Dragons for some suicide tank-overkill.  Playing against elder in 5th would not have acquainted you with them enough to see the alterations, especially seeing as the improvements to Wraiths, (including the new constructs) and the Guardians (plus all the vehicles) were very clear in statline and equipment.

By way of contrast the Aspect Warriors seemed hard done by.  Their stats were the same, their equipment and weapons were the same, their points were… well who actually remembers the Aspect Warrior point values without access to the previous codex or weapons-grade Asperger’s?  But to those who played Eldar enough to know what the old warriors were like and looked into the dex (old and new), changes have been plentiful and far-reaching.  So, by way of expanding on my part of the elder chatter in the last episode, I present my new miniseries: IntrAspection, where I’ll go through the various aspects, note what I like/don’t like and how they’ve changed.  Maybe talk a little hypothetical tactics (again, my caveat here is that it’s all paper and theory so far, so take that as you will).  I’ll also be using the blogspace to talk about some of my favourite characters in the universe and on the tabletop: the Phoenix Lords.  I’ve talked about them before as part of the Short Shrift segment on the illustrious 11th company, but this new iteration of them is more than enough reason to hash over old ground!

I don’t know quite how long this series will last.  I doubt it will be as long as the Dark Eldar update review, but if it is, that’s no bad thing!

As ever, if you have any questions or differing viewpoints to air, my comments section is always open.