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Why is every eldar player taking eldrad ulthran in an eldar army? yes hes arguably the best psycher in the game but he has just died (yay, im happy if you use his profile for his "successer" but why him?) and he belongs to the craftworld ulthwe, yes im sure he helps out where ever it needs it up but still, hes not be all end all, a farseer is still a great choice

I was wondering that too

Just like Elvis sightings; Eldrad Sightings are on the rise since his 'death'

I have never actually used Eldrad in my eldar army.

My army started out as the RT "Yriel's Eldritch Raiders" and even through 2nd ed, it didn't use Eldrad as a leader. I had pirates and exodites and harlequins, but I didn't even have a phoenix lord yet. I used a major psyker lord, but not eldrad.

I don't even use the Yriel model or his statline for my army these days. I prefer to use my own Autarch and farseers (even if they were all instakilled by perils in 4th ed).

Some players see only the uber and are incapable of exercising the necessary discipline and/or imagination.

Eldrad is too good to not use in an Eldar army. I almost always use him. If I could take 2 Eldrads in an army I would.

... why couldn't GW have said call him a Master Psycher and mention eldrad as being one of the most note worthy ... could have still been a per army, as psycher of this level are rare

...edit ...

... but normaly i just use a Maugan Ra as my HQ ... he's pricey (195p but worth it) but since he can igoner cover and has a 36" S:6 Ap:5 assualt 4, pinning & rending gun (which also is a +2S powerweapon) i just can't find another unit which can damgage like he can

Eldrad? I don't use Eldrad. Oh you must mean his brother Deldrad...

In my normal uthlwe' army I use a jetbike farseer and autarch pair

In apoc games he is mandated with the seer council datafex, but I use model converted from eldrad despite the fact I play uthlwe'.

Why? Because he is the most cost effective psyker eldar players have access to thats why. Change that and you wont see eldrad so often.

he's all kinds of savage, most people i know use eldrad's rules for their "custom" craftworlds, after all with each passing day Jervis is forcing us to use his special character rules with our armies. (see every codex released since the eldar one)

Im not saying that hes good, but what happened to themed and personal armies? hes an ulthwe farseer! why do i see him in aloitoc army?

He isn't an ulthwe farseer. There is no ulthwe anymore. Just color schemes to play around with.

There is your themed and personal army.

Its right there under the Counts as clause.

Love it or hate it, but most definitely going to have to deal with it.

Internet nerd rage is so 1997.

The simplest way to explain why any eldar can take him is simple fairness: with no dedicated rules for Craftworlds, having one character (two if you count yriel) that can only be taken if you paint your army a certain way and call it Uthwe is a not only silly, but unfair. "Well, you can paint your Eldar one of the five offical craftworlds, or create your own! But keep in mind, you only get access to the best psyker if you're black, or the best autarch if you're yellow."

When there were rules for craftworlds, it made more sense as a balance.

Additionally, as others have pointed out, Eldrad, while clearly more powerful than a normal farseer, is not the unrelenting master of the psychic realm that he is portrayed in the fluff. He's a damn good psyker, but there was no sense in creating a "Senior Farseer" that could cast three powers including a double with T4, and then also have Eldrad with a power weapon and Divination.

GW could have made it clearer, and they are doing better with it now, but the days of incredibly fluffly special characters that can only be used in one color scheme but are overcosted and lame anyway are over, thank Goodness! Special Characters are now what they should be: heroic Arch types. Senior Farseer, Master Autarch, Waagh Overlord, Berserker Prince.... These are all characters that add flavor and dimension to armies, but can be defined relatively narrowly and restricted to one per army. To make them interesting, they have a name and a backstory.

GW has decided to go down the Dark Path of Special Sharacters (TM), making them so legal that they're putting them in the HQ section so that you'll take them without thinking and hopefully buy a $10-$15 man-sized model in the process.

They're making them vastly superior to the regular HQs, so they're going to get taken. They know that. To make them more accessible, they give us these "counts as" rules so we can take them in whatever army we want. And we will. I've played 2 games of 40k in 2 years; I took Eldrad twice. He's just too good. 3 powers per turn? One can be a duplicate? A better Ghosthelm, and every other piece of gear standard? Higher T? A better Invulnerable Save? Every psychic power? Oh, and then Divination, which by itself is sufficient reason to take Eldrad.

Do you want me to go on? There isn't even a question. It's a landslide almost as nasty as the 1984 Presidential Election. GW has given us the green light to use Eldrad anywhere we want and made him the army's best HQ choice--perhaps even the best selection in the entire Codex. That's why everyone's doing it. And, as has been pointed out, no one feels bad about doing it because now Craftworld-specific rules do not exist. He can only be used in an Ulthwe army--wait a minute, what's an Ulthwe army?

Welcome to GW's version of streamlining: everything is simpler, even deciding on how to equip your HQ--you don't even need to make a choice!

Regular Farseers are cheaper, they can fleet and two powers in one slot is often enough. But Eldrad is still awesome, and he makes shooty forces first rate. It is easy to build an army around him. Dark Reapers in cover, Pathfinders in cover, an Avatar, 5th ed War Walkers in cover ... all + Eldrad is pure win.

After a short absence, Character Hammer is back. At least in 5th edition he can't use the "Independent Character can't be targeted behind Harlequins you can't mathematically hit" rule anymore.

RecklesssFable wrote:After a short absence, Character Hammer is back. At least in 5th edition he can't use the "Independent Character can't be targeted behind Harlequins you can't mathematically hit" rule anymore.

Until Exarchs have two wounds and full armament options again, it won't be Hero Hammer again. And no, Autarchs aren't the same thing.

Now you just put Eldrad IN the squad of harlies and you cannot target him or the squad due to the veil.

Because GW is dictating you go to Herohammer or loose. It's the same with BA you either take the characters or get subpar stats with the regulars. Example you either take Mephiston to use three psychic powers/hood at leadership 10 or a regular psych with 1 power/hood at leaderhip 9?

Until Exarchs have two wounds and full armament options again, it won't be Hero Hammer again. And no, Autarchs aren't the same thing.

That's what a Phoenix lord is for or you can always take prince Yriel who is not half bad either.

Squig_herder wrote:Im not saying that hes good, but what happened to themed and personal armies? hes an ulthwe farseer! why do i see him in aloitoc army?

because themed armys died out long ago why does it matter to you anyways, to be honest i use him in my armys because i bought mine used and he was one of the only hqs i really have. So thats why. besides hes bad ass and does everything i need.

Eldrad can cast one spell twice. E.g., this can be a life saver for a Seer Council when a psychic hood blocks one fortune spell.

Squig Herder- You answered your own question in the second sentence of your first post. It's really that simple. For the points, he is a fantastic buy, plain and simple.

GW killed the bulk of the craftworld fluff. You can't blame someone for not following non-existant themes. If a random person were to start playing Eldar today and read the 'dex cover to cover, they'd be perfectly justified in thinking they could slap Eldrad in whatever vanilla list they were building. It's not their fault, don't knock them for theme. Theme is only as good as what the company puts out. So Eldrad appears a lot more often in somewhat strange builds for his craftworld... Well, that's what the game has become.

deadlygopher wrote:GW killed the bulk of the craftworld fluff. You can't blame someone for not following non-existant themes. If a random person were to start playing Eldar today and read the 'dex cover to cover, they'd be perfectly justified in thinking they could slap Eldrad in whatever vanilla list they were building. It's not their fault, don't knock them for theme. Theme is only as good as what the company puts out. So Eldrad appears a lot more often in somewhat strange builds for his craftworld... Well, that's what the game has become.

you are right, i guess i have to live with this trend, but i will remain loyal to the craftworld

If you're going to take a farseer with just enough abilities to fortune/guide, then obviously you don't want Eldrad. However, if you want a fully kitted out Farseer, the rules give you little choice but to take Eldrad. In fact, a fully loaded vanilla Farseer would only be 10 or 15 points cheaper than Eldrad, with none of the special rules. Unless fleet is absolutely necessary for how you plan to use your 'seer, then he's pretty much required.

Unfortunately, the way the rules are designed, if you want to win with Farseers, you have to take the special character. I use the Eldrad rules, but in my mind my 'seer is most certainly not Eldrad, and he is also painted with Biel-Tan colors.

Because it seems GW wants everyone to use their best special chars all the time. New SM codex is allowing all chapters special chars in any SM army also, so you will start to see Calgar leading Raven guards and such also.

But back to the topic, Eldrad is the bomb, no reason not to use him in every army you can. Using something else as "counts as" totally depends on what enviroment you play in but usually(at least here) Eldrad is Eldrad and noone else can be like him. Like Darrian said "If I could have 2 I would, totally agree with that.

RecklesssFable wrote:After a short absence, Character Hammer is back. At least in 5th edition he can't use the "Independent Character can't be targeted behind Harlequins you can't mathematically hit" rule anymore.

That's why you have him join the squad so you can't mathematically hit him. Whatever that means.

Eldrad can't do it all.

One of the most feared and devastating units in 40k is the big jetlock unit. You'll need a farseer on a bike to run with that.

Another build for eldar that is gaining popularity is the strength 6 spam armies. When firing strength 6, 'doom' is really quite an underwhelming power. In strength 6 spam armies, there aren't nearly as many fortune targets, and these armies tend to be more mobile. If you have 9 warwalkers, you may want to hold them in reserve against deep strikers, or gunlines if you lose first turn. And then i think the autarch gets very good. Guide gets pretty good with a unit of warwalkers, but spending eldrads points on more strength 6 shots is better than guide. Unless you haven't fulfilled your HQ requirement.

I'm not sitting here saying that he isn't an excellent choice...

Tacobake really nailed it, and I just wanted to illustrate that. Eldrad is easy to build an army around. Pick two things that like to get fortuned, and a unit that likes to attack things that are doomed, keep these three units bunched up together and build your entire army around that. Done, seen a million of these... Every once in a while this player gets to mind war or guide instead of the fortune/fortune/doom spam, but the core of these armies are always the same.

If you don't start your army construction with eldrad, you may find yourself with a synergistic, aggressive army that either can't use 2 fortunes and a doom, due to lack of good fortune targets (or in the case of fortune too many spammed targets... if you fortune 2 out of 6 wave serpents.... what have you really done other than help your opponent choose which wave serpents to shoot at) or too much high strength anti-infantry shooting to make doom exciting. Having 3 farseer powers might be handy, but they aren't free... and if you aren't built around a core of eldrad, I don't think he is a must-have.

Ulthwe players can take him, non-ulthwe players can take him by saying hes just visiting their craftworld on vacation, or by painting him their colors and calling him Meldred, and all players can build competitive lists without him. I think that qualifies him as a perfect special character...

I definitely don't want to go back to useless, over-costed unfieldable 3rd edition special characters...