Warhammer/Tactics/8th Edition/Wood Elves

Why Play Wood Elves

Wood Elves are getting redone and almost completely rewritten. Everything has been turned on it's head and old Wood Elf players have adapt to the new changes. However they have recently not only reclaimed the title of being the fastest army but being arguably the best shooting army too. Wood Elves appear to be of equal parts of light and dark aswell having magic arrows which are keyed to wounding forces of order and destruction respectively and with their best wizards access to high and dark magic. Wood Elves still have access to their old free wood and can now also choose what kind it is.

Wood Elves are an army almost completely made up of trees, bowmen, or fast cavalry. In fact you will not find any model with a save better than a 3+ without magic items and those are the Treemen and their elders. They rely on speed, shooting and picking their fights. Wood elves still lack war machines but have in exchange a megaton of poisoned weaponry, and the twin sisters Naestra Arahan who sport a bowlike bolt thrower that supposedly deals d6 wounds anda bowlike storm of poison shots.

Their slowest units have movement 5, and most move much much faster. The name of their game is speed and maneuverability. By the end of turn 2 you can be behind the enemy lines, ready to unleash deadly co-ordinated flank charges, and against slower armies you can quite simply run circles around your enemies.

Though regarded as some of the best archers in the game, due to their armour piercing and magic arrow shots, the wood elves' possible greatest strength is not in their shooting. They are formidable in combat but lack staying power. You will need to use your maneuverability to ensure that you win the first combat resolution. If the elves get bogged down, their low toughness means they will be hacked to pieces.

Lastly, their magic is not the most powerful in the game since they lack any spellcaster named hero or way to access loremaster, but they have the widest variety of spells to chose from and gain +1 to cast in forests. Despite this newly found choice , most players wold do best to stay with life, however others may be useful as well.

The Wood Elves require perhaps the most skill and nuance to play well, but this directly translates into them also being one of the most rewarding armies to play. Be warned that they aren't a good starter army

Plus they're bad ass vengeful guardians of the forest, so that's pretty cool too.

Unit Analysis

Lords & Heroes

Named Characters

Note: Under the current edition, named characters tend to be overpriced; you can pretty easily emulate most named characters from scratch and save yourself some points. That said, a few named characters do have abilities and wargear or wargear combos unique to them, so if you absolutely need to have them, go ahead. Just make sure you're really getting your points worth.

• Orion, The King of the Woods: Orion is what in general is refered to as a Glass Cannon: Incredibly expensive, requires a massive tax on your resources, can be incredibly powerful and yet is very fragile. Orion costs 600 points. He can also beat in almost anyone's face (9,8,8,6,5,5,9,5,10), comes with a Bolt Thrower and machine gun and a is Unbreakable and Frenzy, regains a wound on a 6 . Here's the downside: He's only T5 with a 5+ Mundane Ward and MR 2, making him significantly less durable than a Treeman (who is T6 with a 3+ Armor and 5+ Mundane Ward). He will drop like a fly to high volume S4 and above attacks and god help you if it's Magical Attacks. He also has Always Strikes First but will have trouble winning combats against large units (he'll probably tie or grab a minor win on round 1 and then start losing from then on). Not great but has potential.

• Drycha: Orion is fighty, the Twins are shooty, Drycha is weird. She's cheap, at 355 points, but she doesn't come with nearly enough stuff to justify even this low entry point. For starters, she's only a Level 2 caster (most Lords get laughed out of the room if they're not at least level 3) and only has access to Lore of Athel Loren. She also fucks your unit options right up (if you're not a Forest Spirit, GTFO) and while she's reasonably fighty, T4, 3 wounds and only a 5+ Mundane Ward means she's easy to drop. And while her kinda ganky Deep Strike ability seems fun, you're only guaranteed 1 Wood (IE the one you brought, sitting in your deployment zone) it's probably easier to just have them join her from the front. Don't bother.

• Naestra and Arahan, The Sisters of Twilight: Anyone who makes a 'Twins are hot' joke gets kicked out of Athel Loren. As for the girls, they can be hilarious. You don't take them to win, you take them to troll. They cost upwards of 500 points when you take them with the Dragon (never, EVER take them with the Eagle take them, only with the eagle! Now is immortal!), but one Sister comes with a bow that hits with a Small Blast and the other comes with a bow that causes the hit unit to have to take a Strength test or not move the next turn. Oh and a minor thing? If either of them are alive at the end of any given PHASE (IE Movement, Magic, Shooting, Combat) then both of them get restored to full wounds. IE you have to kill them both in one phase, or they're both fine. This can get hilarious very quickly. That said, they're not exactly competitive; They're expensive and at T3 and 2 wounds, they die very easily. But if you can pull it off, bouncing them both on and off their feet is a great way to troll. And what're you gonna do, you're playing Wood Elves, not like you're in this to win to begin with.

Generic Characters

Note: While named characters are judged against their generic counterparts, generic characters are examined based on their role in your army.

• Highborn: Generic combat lord, reasonably fighty but you'll pale in comparison to most other Lords. He does however make Eternal Guard core and can be kitted out in a variety of ways to be more fighty. Plus an LD10 bubble is always a good thing. Should not be your first Lord choice, but far from a bad one.

• Spellweaver: This should be your first Lord choice. Level 4 at 250 points, a variety of magic items to make her better, and most importantly, access to Lore of Life and Lore of Beasts (both of which knock Lore of Athel Loren right the fuck out of the park). Plus she has a Longbow, which means that while she's hanging in the back with your Glade Guard, she can ping off the odd casualty herself, which is hilarious by the by. If you want a Lord choice, this is the one you should go for in almost every situation.

• Treeman Ancient: While Treemen are easily one of the best choices available, Treemen Ancients fail for a variety of reasons. First off, they're 330 points, don't get sprites, are lvl 2 life wizards only, have a 3+ 6++ can buy magic levels, can tree whack and have the kind of melee stats that make cherubs cry. Plus, Treemen are in the barely used Rare points and better value for, whereas Ancients are in the highly contested Lord choices. Don't bother with Ancients.

• Noble: Blah blah blah generic combat hero blah. Blah blah blah want a Battle Standard Bearer blah. In all seriousness, the highly mobile and fluid nature of a Wood Elf army, means that you're gonna get less mileage out of a BSB than most armies, but they're still an effective use of points. Also, having one sitting in your Eternal Guard makes them Stubborn, which is always worth it's weight. And finally, if you have a lot (and I mean a lot) of points left on the table and you're worried about War Machines/Small Shooting Units, there is an amusing way to use Nobles: Load them up with Alter Kindred, Helm of the Hunt, Shield and Sword of Might. The resulting Noble will be the most effective War Machine/Small Unit hunter you will ever see. Not precisely competitive, but fun.

• Shadow Dancer: Your Wardancer character. Worth consideration. For 100pts you get a ws8 s4 I8 a3 Always Strike Firsts combat character, with the amazing new wardancer dances. You have a 25 points magic weapon allowance and for 60pts become a lore of shadow wizard. I would keep this hero as plain as possible so that he can swap with your spellcasters if they have the lore of shadow. I would try to avoid making him a wizard. Sadly he doesn't have a way of moving any more quickly, without switching him across the battlefield and also doesn't have a better save than a 6++, unless you use one of the dances to give you a 3++ for 1 turn. Hit hard, hit fast.

• Waystalker: Is a hero version of the waywatchers. He has bs 7, a bow and a 25pts weapons allowance, Don't bother taking the bow of loren on this hero. He has 1 attack and thus would only be able to fire 2 shots which he can do anyway. He also has the sniper rule and the choice wether to fire multiple shots or ignore armour, which appears to work with the Hail of the Doom Arrow, meaning he can almost instantly kill almost anything but a high toughness, high wardsave foe. For this he is one the best priced heroes in the game.

• Spellsinger: One word. Amazing, when compared to the old wizards. 80pts for a normal lvl 1 wizard, +35 for a level 2, and 5 points for a bow. Now has access to all battle rule book lores but not to the Wood Elf specific lores. You will take a dispel scroll and the lore of shadow or fire on this hero since their spells are the most effective.

• Branchwraith: The Branchwraith has 2 advantages: 1, she's fairly effective (WS6, S4, T4, I8, A3, 5+ Mundane Ward). 2, she's cheap. She's not gonna break 120 points unless you make her a Wizard (which you should never do, Level 1 might as well not exist). She's a cheap way of beefing up a Dryad unit, so if you're taking one you should probably stick it in a Dryad unit that's gonna end up somewhere important. It is also of note that if you're taking beasts, and you're running branchwraith(s) so why aren't you, you can use things like the impenitrable pelt or horros and beef her up a ton. Add AoN and you've got a character who can not only take the hurt, but can dish it out too, and for less than 150 pts!

ALTERNATE OPPINION: Do not buy a branchwraith for her combat abilities. If you want to beef up a dryad unit, buy more dryads. However, buying one for a cluster of radiants is not a bad idea and feel free to toss in an annoyance of netlings if you're worried about combat lords (but still keep her away from anything that stomps on her).

• Mounts:

• • Elven Steed: You know it, you love it. M9 Forest Strider, 20pts for most heroes and allow you to keep pace with all your cavalry. Take it for your mages to hide with your cavalry.

• • Great Stag: Really, why aren't you taking it? Better stats than it's closest cousin (IE the Eagle), you can still join units, you get a monstrous mount. One of the better mounts. [The reason not to take it, is that you don't get look-out-sir when joining units (because no units you can join are MC)]

• • Great Eagle: Worth taking to make your models more mobile for 50 pts. I wouldn't take it on every hero but on a lvl 1 mage without the scroll or the bsb it should be worth some consideration.

• • Unicorn: Unicorns are weird. They seem to be designed to deliver a Hero/Lord directly into combat, but it's only available to Casters and all it really does for them is make them a tiny bit more durable. It gives you movement 10 and still can skewer some models but is outshone by the elven steed easily.

• • Forest Dragon: It's a Dragon, what do you want? If it is a model that will be an amazing mount for your combat lord, with no points limit then it is good. Otherwise it is awful since the Glade lord, the only model that can mount it, is a rubbish combat character.

Core Units

• Glade Guard: Glade Guard are fairly overpriced for their ability, but they're one of the mainstay units of your army. Since your free Wood has to go in your deployment zone (yeah it does, read the FAQ), they can hang in there. You can probably rule the shooting phase against a good portion of opponents with a bunch of 10 man units, with maybe a 20 man unit with the Banner of Eternal Flame to deal with Regenerating units. You need Glade Guard.
  • Scouts: Just what Glade Guard need, to cost more (up at 17 points) and do less. The only thing this accomplishes for you is getting them close to the enemy and giving them Skirmisher status. This could be alright, if they didn't lose S4 shooting at close range with it. Do not bother with Scouts.

• Glade Riders: Ugh. Overpriced (24 points) and unreliable are the key words for this unit. A unit of 5 with a Musician will run you nearly 130 points and those points are almost certainly better spent elsewhere, especially if you don't need them to fill out your Core requirements (as the only jobs they do are done better in the Special choices). You should probably avoid these.

• Dryads: Dryads are cheap and effective combat troops that are let down by the new limitations put on Skirmishers in 8th edition. The inability to break ranks really hurts. But they make effective small unit hunters, they're highly mobile and can be pretty brutal in close combat. You're gonna wanna multiple minimum sized units, to help rule the movement phase. Just be careful, 1 Magic Missile can end the entire party.

• Eternal Guard: The anchor around which the rest of your army moves. They're reasonably fighty (3 ranks of 5 have 20 attacks, which is always welcome, plus WS5 and I5) and they go with the Razor Standard like cheese and crackers. Best of all, if you can drop a Noble or Highborn in them, they become Stubborn, which can make them impossible to move. Beware, they will suffer against high Toughness or Armor Save targets, so best to let your Tree Spirits deal with them. Unfortunately they've not aged well as a unit, and require high volume (20-30 man) units to use effectively and even then they'll still die pretty easily. If you have a very specific use for them (usually involving rank and flank with Tree Kin) then the can be useful, but most times you're probably better off taking more Dryads or Glade Guard.

Special Units

• Wardancer Troupe: Wardancers are a reasonably good unit let down by a few flaws and a fairly high cost of entry. They cost 18 points a pop and with T3 and a 6+ Ward, they're about as hard as tissue paper, but that's par for the course with Wood Elves and Skirmishers in general. What lets these guys down is the fact that because they're not Scouts, they have to start in your deployment zone, and M5 does not let them cross the board very quickly. Don't get me wrong, if they hit they can cause some serious damage, but you could very easily have a 200 points plus unit do precisely zip. So while they're not bad, they're easily the least reliable of the 3 Special Choices.

• Warhawk Riders: You think your Fast Cavalry is fast? Bitch please. These guys are troubleshooters, as they can bring down War Machines like they're not there, punch out shooting units, ping wounds off lightly armored units and even help out in large combats (this is only for emergencies though). Remember, Flying Cavalry is Fast Cavalry and Fast Cavalry can fire on the march and you don't get negatives for moving and shooting. Their Hit-And-Run ability is funny but only useful when they're combining charges with someone and things have gone tits up (and that's really not their job). Also, don't forget, you're Monstrous Cavalry and thus get Stomp. 3 of them are 120 point with 6 wound, 6 attack (3 the rider and 3 the hawk) +3 stomp or 3 bow, but only if you survive the fight, and have a base too large to contact with all of them on an enemy unit flank, with only a 6+ Armour. So, 120 point to 3 bow while the glade rider for the same point have 5 bow? Glade Riders are slower, more vulnerable to shooting (Skirmisher=-1 to hit), don't hit as hard, don't have as many wounds and can't skip over enemy units to attack War Machines and the like. Yes, they have fewer Longbow shots, but that doesn't really matter, shooting things isn't this unit's job, it's just a 'Might as well, since there's no downside,' option.

• Wild Riders of Kurnous: These are one of the guys who make Wardancers look bad. They're more durable (6+ Ward, 5+ Mundane Ward, 5+ Armor), move faster and can generally accomplish more. They also have a pretty damned solid statline (WS5, S4, I5, LD9) and a few amusing special rules. They can be useful in the right circumstances, but keep them out of combat with big units and heavily armored enemies, and make sure you know what you're getting.

• Treekin: Treekin are the younger brother of Treemen and should only be avoided if you have some crippling fear of winning. No I'm not kidding, these are easily one of your most reliable units. S5, T5, 3 wounds, 3 attacks, Stomp, 4+ armor, 5+ Mundane Ward. If they were Stubborn, they'd be broken. Beware they are vulnerable to Great Weapons and high volumes of S4 attacks and have trouble overcoming large amounts of static combat res, so be careful to not send them into battles they can't win.

Rare Units

• Waywatchers: I'm of two minds about Waywatchers. On the one hand they have killer BS, Killing Blow at short range and the ability to get reallllllly close to the enemy nope FAQ nerfed it to just scouts. But they are still FUCKING expensive (24 points a pop) and extremely fragile. They can be competent War Machine hunters and if you can get enough of them together they can be one of your only ways to deal with Heavy Cavalry without getting a Treeman involved. If you need some help with heavy armor or war machines, then they can be worth the investment but otherwise, skip 'em.
  • An Alternate Opinion: Look at in reverse every enemy hates them they can turn up practically anywhere at the start of the game and be a big pain in the ass nope just scouts now. For example your opponent has a fanatic type unit ooops they are all released before turn 1 did that really happen? The enemy either ignores them completely leaving you to ruin his battle line with them or stop his war machines from firing. Or the enemy has to setup his entire army based on you having way watchers. So 150ish points mean your enemy deployment has been ruined and you have a chance to snipe enemy characters, cavalry and warmachines a no brainer after the treeman in my army. Remember a battle can be won in the deployment phase and if you have a fast army yes you do you have wood elves then they could have just won you the battle before a blow is struck. I advise you to use them to max out your rare points but you have to be a good general for them to have the most effectiveness and they are mostly a sacrifice unit.

• Treeman: The only time you should skip the Treeman is if you are playing someone who's lost a lot lately and needs a win as a pick-me-up. And they're playing Beastmen. Seriously, this is easily one of the most important units in your army. WS5, S6, T6, W6, A5, Stubborn, 3+ armor, 5+ mundane ward, Strangleroot, Thunderstomp, Tree Singing (and remember, the direct damage version of Tree Singing has no maximum range or line of sight requirements). Yeah, we know it's Flammable, but given how difficult it is to damage, that's not gonna matter as much as you think, because remember that those double wounds only apply AFTER you get through its armour, which it has shit tons of. Unless you're in 1000 points and under and therefore literally cannot legally take a Treeman, this should be one of your first choices.

A Treeman is far from an auto-include in an MSU list. He does do something most of our army does not, which is take a charge and not run away like a little girl. He is, however, only 5 points cheaper than an Arachnarok Spider, which is fucking expensive as hell. If you fill your army with units no more than 150 points, the enemy starts having target priority issues. Treemen are not survivable enough, nor beatstick enough, to warrant their massive bullseye they produce. He does make things a little bit more forgiving than the rest of the army, but if you are playing wood elves, that appeal is likely lost on you.

• Great Eagle: Can function as cheap chaff in certain army builds, but will wind up completely useless in other builds. Waywatchers are more reliable thorns in the enemy's side, Treemen are more durable and more destructive, but Eagles are cheaper and move faster, so call that comparison a wash. If you're not taking Warhawk Riders, than a Great Eagle or two wouldn't go amiss, especially if you've got points left over, but not the first choice you should take unless you've got a very specific use for it.

Building Your Army

Buying Your Army

The battalion set is good value. You can get a fairly decent army out of it.

From the Glade Guard sprues, you can build Waywatchers. If you have some spare High Elf or Dark Elf spearmen/warriors, giving them a Glade Guard head can turn them into Eternal Guard. You get a ton of heads with the Glade Guard, so you're spoilt!

The Glade Riders you can build as Wild Riders with the spears.

For your Lords/Heroes choices, you can build them out of the sprues provided. You can make a mounted Highborn and, with a bit of imagination, a Spellweaver.

Otherwise, for the Spellweaver, the Dark Elves' plastic Sorceress is a good alternative if you don't want old/metal models.

You could make a Treeman with the LotR Ent as it's cheaper, but the two have different dimentions, so be warned. It is taller, but can fit on a 50x50mm base that you can buy seperatly.(and still be cheaper than a treeman.)

Magic Items

No more spites, no more kindreds. More comming soon. Bow of Athel Loren and Hail of Doom Arrow remain.

Magic

Wood Elf Magic is hampered by the fact that all but 1 of their casters can only use the Lore of Athel Loren. As such, you should focus most of your magic into Spellweavers, giving you access to the Lore of Beasts and Lore of Life. However, both of these Lores are designed heavily for defensive and support, so don't expect to be wiping out units with them. Use them wisely however and they can win you combats you'd otherwise lose, which is really important in such a tactically difficult army.

Lore of Athel Loren however should only ever be used by Spellsingers (never make your Branchwraiths Casters, it's not worth the points), and while it has it's okay spells, you're not guaranteed to get any of them. Tree Singing is a guarantee if you took a Treeman (which you did) so that's alright, especially since the direct damage has no Max range. Apart from that, Ariel's Blessing and The Call of the Hunt are okay, but not great and Fury of the Forest can be an alright direct damage spell. Hidden path is great against a shooty army look that unit of Dyrads moving towards your shooting units cannot be shot at and block all other shooting so you basically cannot use your archers and the dyrads are going to destroy them in combat oooops sorry about that. The other spell is worthless so don't bother with that.

There are only two things the enemy hates about Wood Elves' magic:

• 1. Tree Singing: moving trees stops charging and does a lot of damage to units if not dispelled and it has a very low casting value.

• 2. Wand of Wynch: reroll all dispel attempts, damn those wood elves can dispel anything were they match my dice. Especially as the wizard using this is level 3 or 4. (duh, it has to be, the wand is 55 pts and lv 2s and 1s can only take 50 pts of gear)

Life Magic

This Lore is really good for Wood Elves as you can restore wounds on your best units (ie: Treemen and Treekin) every time you cast a spell and using Regrowth you can add up to 7 wounds back onto a unit. Everyone hates and fears Dwellers Below and Earth Blood gives a decent ward save as the signature spell. Fleshstone is elves' best friend, and will help your Glade Guard if things go not as planned. Shield of Thorns is useful for Waywatchers charging into combat. Throne of Vines is cheese, as it boosts all your spells and guarantees a 2+ save against mistcasts. Last spell is a worse version of Tree Singing, swap it for Earth Blood.

Beast Magic

The Lore of Beast lets you run train on things that you normally would not be able to run train on. Arguably, it has the best signature spell of the 4 base Lores. +1 Strength and Toughness make even glade guard dangerous in hand to hand. They are still fucked, but they may hurt someone. If applied to Treekin, they will each have Dragon-like stats, and go from being 'good' to 'retarded' super fast. It really shines on dryads and wardancers, though, since it takes them from squishy, to survivable, and from dangerous to just death. High initiative Strength 5 will scare anything.

You also gain access to something that Wood Elves often die without. A bolt thrower. This lets you remove one of our biggest weaknesses, in the form of big scary monsters. The amber spear can seriously ruin a big monster in 1 turn, possibly 1 shot killing most of them.

The Curse of Anraheir can also troll a unit to death. If the unit marches, charges, flees, pursues or overruns, it will lose 1/3rd of its models and gets -1 to hit. It is super easy to cast, and has a range longer than your bows. This will save your life. Do notice that the target can still move normally and reform without taking dangerous terrain tests, as long as it doesn't march.

Pann's Pelt makes a character able to do something that they normally can not, which is to take a hit to the face and not die like a bitch. +3 Toughness can be good, but the range is terrible, so the character needing it is often out of range. Not super reliable, but worth throwing dice into if you have a highborn/noble/branchwraith that is facing down a great weapon. But you should still almost always choose wildform over this.

Savage Beast of Horros will give your characters retard strength and nerd rage, both at the same time. This spell is a great spell for alter kindred, since they are usually used to spank characters in units. You can even make your wizard a be able to surprise the douche bags charging your wizard, but not as much as...

Transformation of Kadon. Your wizard is suddenly a dragon. or a chimera. Definitely take the Mountain Chimera. It has 4d6 attacks. That averages 14. Otherwise, the Black Hydra is probably the way to go if cast in the inferior form. It is the most survivable of them all. One could go into them all, but you will likely never cast this spell, because your opponent WILL dispell it, as a remains in play spell. If you have already taken out their lvl 4, it will be hard for them to roll dice high enough to dispell it afterward, but it is a gamble. Dont charge as a dragon, and then find yourself as an elf once the combat phase hits.

If you ever cast Flock of Doom, you may or may not deserve a swift kick in the balls. It exists on the spell list to have something on there worth swapping for Wildform. It can help you with ethereal critters, but you already have like 20 dryads, don't you?

Tactics

Build your tactics around your army. Basically Wood Elves need to ambush, pick their fights carefully, and throw multiple units into every combat they fight if they want to win. One unit on its own is not going anywhere unless it's Treekin in numbers or it's charging on flanks or rear.

I cannot see any successful Wood Elves army without:

• 1. A Treeman;
• 2. A Spellweaver.

Here some options you could use:

• A) Shooty army.
  • Either you are going to run circles around your enemy and shoot his soldiers to bits like horse-archer tactics with one big unit of archers moving protected by a Treeman and some other disruption or holding units. Focus on the units trying yo get to your archers, then, when your shooters are safe, move your defenders.

• B) Fast combat army.
  • You could take an entire horse army. Very hard to use and limited options. Never tried, but it's a specialist army. It would be hard to beat block infantry armies though.

• C) Infantry army.
  • Units of 5 or 6 Treekin have high Strength and Toughness, multiple wounds, good weapons skill and nearly 20 attacks per turn. Spearmen unit is expensive but good for holding characters and with a Noble/Highborn is stubborn. The enemy will need to kill everyone, so they are not going anywhere for some turns.

A level 2 wizard with Tree Singing is the only reason no one uses trees in scenery anymore. Combine this with any army above.

A Friendly Reminder

Ahem.

You are not only guaranteed 1 wood which is in your (side of the) deployment zone and the rest isn't left up to the fickle terrain table anymore. Buy the Acorn of Eternity to get more now!

Thank you for listening.