My new friend , the Hornet

 Heya all and welcome back!

It is tough being a Human Resource Executive, as it feels like you are playing the role of a bard in the corporate world and I have lesser time in playing my 40k. Nonetheless it is this that makes each one of my games that much sweeter now. Unfortunately this also means that I tend to forget to take pictures of my games, and thus I am unable to make any battle reports of some extremely good games that I have during this lull in the blog.

During this time, I have found a particular unit that I am really fond of using these past few weeks, and that is the Forgeworld Hornet. These things are so good thanks to the new rules in the IA Apoc that I can't resist it. Not to mention that they are now 40k legal........

Anyhow let me jump into the things that make them such an excellent unit.

The first point that I must make is the fact that their firepower is utterly insane! Each Hornet can carry two weapons, and dear god their firepower matches the War Walkers, and in some cases surpass that unit. Their weapons are comparatively cheap and you can tailor them to whatever your list lacks, and all of them are good (except that damn missile launcher, which is still a lame duck in my opinion). In my case, I wanted a weapon that can dish out a lot of shots at high strength and thus my eyes are on the pulse lasers. With the cheap-as-chips pulse lasers, each hornet can dish out 4 str 8 ap2 shots at BS4!

The fact that they could be taken in squadrons is utterly insane, and multiply the pulse-laser armed Hornet by three and you can see that this unit is just utterly brutal.

Secondly, the unit are really flexible in their usage. This is because it has two rules going for it; Scout and Skimmer Assault. Now most of you are no stranger to the first rule, as Scouting means that I can actually push my advantage early on using the Scouts or I can reserve them to both protect them from alpha strikes and then harass them later on using Outflanking rules.The second rule Skimmer Assault is also very juicy, as it allows the Hornets to snap fire even if they turboboosted. This helps in keeping the tempo for the offense and increasing their defense as well and having such thorns in my opponent's side is just precious.

Last but not least, maneuverability. These things are fast skimmers which is a godsend. I can never stress how amazing fast skimmers are to some people but for anyone worth their salt seeing such a high firepower, high versatility unit having such speed as well is just utterly godlike. Screw the fact that they have two hull points and AV11 on both their front and side (which is amazing in the eyes of a Dark Eldar player, but not to everyone else), as that speed is the thing that will make those shots count when they need to. Side armour, rear armour, moving around an annoying terrain to prevent cover for the clowns that made the annoying terrain their temporary home.....all is possible.

Last but not least, the point cost for them. Dear god......they are just affordable. 80 points per model for that firepower is too much of a bargain. I will take a squadron please (if I were a true Eldar player, I would take 3 squadrons of 3, and not have any friends).

Now that I have talked about the delicious reasons for taking them, I will now proceed on the synergy it provides to my army.

For one, they complete a portion that my list so desperately need. Sometimes I find it hard to kill transports that are of a certain caliber (AV12, I am looking at you) and the Hornets solves that problem for me. In addition they also aid in the elite infantry killing which my list may or may not struggle against from time to time. Lastly these guys can also act as my anti-flyer defense and are definitely more effective than my ravagers in this capacity.

Secondly, the Scout rules on them makes my personal choice for Traits (Strategic) so much more useful and I do not have to care anymore about 'dud' results in the form of rerolling outflanking results. The scout rules also helps me in better positioning them for the kill or make a feint which throws my opponent's off balanced.

In my case it is more like hide behind metal boxes......

Thirdly, if I am forced to, their AV 11 can act as a temporary shield for my other forces. However this is definitely a waste of their potential, and I would prefer to let them live so that I can shoot. Nonetheless it is important to open my thoughts to any sacrifices for the long-term wining strategy of the game.

Lastly and perhaps more importantly, they fit with my philosophy.

I believe that to win without a fight is the best course of action, but I would not mind a victory that is so thorough that the opponent are unable to retaliate against me. When the opponent is pressured enough, they will do mistakes, and when they do I will exploit it. As this weakness is exploited, I like to plan more attacks to exploit any more weaknesses created by the opponent and keep on doing so until the other side surrendered or I literally ran out of gas. Thus I believe in a multi-layered overwhelminng rushdown offensive to make my opponent blunder or freeze up. For that the Hornets fit into this mindset very well, as they give me options to play around the table to fit said belief.

Some people say that Allies are lame, but for me they actually kept the hobby alive for me. Not to mention that Forgeworld is always a cool bastard. As of this moment I am currently profiting from this particular build;

Duke Sliscus
10 Kabalite Warriors in a Raider with Splinter Racks and Nightshields
9 Kabalite Warriors in a Raider with Splinter Racks and Nightshields

5 Wyches with Haywire Grenades in Venom with second Splinter Cannon and Nightshields

5 Wyches with Haywire Grenades in Venom with second Splinter Cannon and Nightshields

5 Wyches with Haywire Grenades in Venom with second Splinter Cannon and Nightshields

Ravager with three Dark Lances and Nightshields

Ravager with three Dark Lances and Nightshields

Voidraven Bomber with 2 Void Lances, 2 Shatterfield Missiles, 1 Void Bomb and Flickerfield

Eldar Allied Detachment

Farseer with Mantle of the Laughing God on Jetbike
3 Guardian Jetbikers
1 squadron of 3 Hornets with 2 Pulse Lasers

This list works very well against all sorts of opponents and I honestly am liking the synergy of this list a lot. It sure hit like a ton of bricks when it needs to, and it is very versatile.  So far, I am unable to test this out against IG as a result of the resident IG player being a mechanical engineer whose expertise is in high demand.

Only sad panda part as of this moment is that I do not have the real models for the Hornets. Nonetheless, I believe that I will be making some of my own hornets so that it will fit with the Dark Eldar theme.

See all of you next time!