Agis Design idea summary for the Exodites

Since the second 40K Eldar codex I was very interested in the Eldar Exodites. I noticed a home made codex on the net by a guy named Philip Bowles. He has done IMO a very good job in fleshing out the Exodite background from the second edition codex a bit more. He is also a very vocal guy on the newsgroups about what GW is doing right and wrong. Mostly what GW is doing wrong. ;-)

So I approached him if he is interested in doing a codex proposal for GW instead of just making bad comments about the official codexes. To my amazement he agreed. So we started work on his ideas.

Based on Phil’s codex version we agreed about some basic ideas of the codex.

• No projectile weapons (to expensive to produce, lower tech level as Craftworlds, no green feeling)
• The ability to field an all cavalry army
• Scout tables ala Alaitoc
• Psychic powers that focus on spiritual nature of the Exodites
• Different saurus mounts with different rules and tactical roles that can be modelled with existing Citadel minis

The foundation of the codex was build by Phil. The main problem with his basic version was that some of the units has no existing Citadel miniature (even with heavy conversion work). So the first step was to focus on units that can be represented with citadel miniatures. After that we had long discussions about rule ideas, point values, units and the codex at all.

After some weeks and some hefty discussion we had produced a rough play test version. In the meantime I started work on the mini conversion and paintings. I also started to make the layout of the codex look like a GW codex and produced some computer enhanced artwork and sketches. (see Download section)

The codex was then playtested by me against the following armies / players:

2* Dark Angels (Carsten Belz, Fabian Stiller)
1* Chaos Marines (Carsten Belz)
1* Orks (Stephan Hess)
1* Ultramarines (Marco Schulze)
1* Imperial Guard (Holger ‘Hugo’ Hotop)
3* Sisters of Battle (Tom Weiss)

Throughout these games proposals were made and discarded, tried again and fine tuned etc.

Most of the games were ties or close victories. All seems to be balanced so far.

Phil and I are quite confident that the existing version of the codex is balanced and working. Of course we would be more then happy if more play testing would be done. So - any comments welcome.

OK, here are the thoughts behind the units in the codex:

HQ

The Baron. Basically a mean fighting machine like the Dark Eldar lord. The ability to choose a mount (from 3 choices) gives plenty of opportunity to customise the main character too your style of play. If you want a really fast character give him the Raptor mount, more sturdy – go for the dragon with wraithbone helmet. Together with the Visionary he is the only character in the army, that is fully customisable. Only these two got access to all the wargear in the armoury.

The Visionary. The equivalent to the Farseer of the craftworlds. By choosing the fitting mount you can make him more a fighter then his craftworld cousin. We also developed 3 new psychic powers for him. Based on the extensive background Phil created, we focused more on spiritual powers that are effecting mostly the Visionary himself. Improve is like a weaker but longer lasting version of the Dark Eldar combat drugs. Heal is pretty straightforward the ability to heal a wound. To do this he cannot wield other powers and is risking even more damage. Executioner is the return of an old 40K 2nd edition classic. Not as powerful as the old version but still annoying.

Elite

Dragoons. The idea was to have 1 really good, tough all around unit. The best the Exodites can offer. (OK, they only have the normal cavalry move)

Lethosaur Knights: fluffwise, they are very highly skilled professional scouts and knights, capable of controlling potentially flighty mounts and skilled in both hit-and-run tactics and evading attackers, not conscripted herdsmen (drafted troops don't have the specialised training to handle mounts other than dragons, and certainly not lethosaurs). They're elites because they are the best at what they do; not necessarily the most brilliant soldiers, but expert cavalrymen. A real sneaky, tricky to use unit. The idea was, to have a harassing unit that can pin other squads or attack weak units in HtH. The unit is still a bit of a problem. (Modelwise and rulewise) The web carbine can be quite powerful, because of that we limit the number in the squad. The leader can take the Neuro-Disruptor. The idea was that the Lethosaur Knights are more specialised hunters / herdsmen in peacetime. The web carbines are used to capture animals and the neuro-disruptor is used to stun big megasaurs.

Troops

Fusiliers. Like Guardians the basic infantry of the Exodites. We changed the weapons (no projectile weapons!) and allowed them to take heavy weapons without platforms (to push a platform through dense jungle seems odd). The option to take a Shaman (SM medic) makes the unit a bit tougher.

Warriors. Like Storm Guardians. Just to give some more modelling options (Wardancer conversions) and a bit of variety.

Dragon Knights. THE typical Exodite cavalry unit. Not as good as Dragoons, but reasonable tough. Laser Lances as the Shining Spears.

Both Warriors and Dragon Knights can take psychic blaster / carbines. The idea came from the very old Andy Chambers article (WD 126) about Epic Knights. The psychic lance was established there. I wanted a flame template weapon that is not a flamer. Nature loving guys like the Exodite would not burn there precious maiden world, or?

Rangers. Fitting from the background. Fitting because of the models. Very straightforward.

Fast

Pterosaur Knights. A bit like Swooping Hawks. Similar idea as the Lethosaur Knights. Also possible to be equipped with the web carbine / character with neuro-disruptor. (See above.)

Raptor Knights. Very ferocious, fast and light / fragile cavalry, lots of attacks. Because of the cameleoline and dispersed formation special rules a bit more survivable.

Heavy

Megadon. We wanted to represent with the rules a huge lumbering very tough and stupid animal. The lumbering movement from the Tyranid design rules came just in perfectly. Tactical role as walkers.

Scout Walker. Very simple. Only one weapon, no energy field and weaker rear armour, otherwise a normal walker.

Exo-Suit. The Exo-Suit is an attempt to represent the Epic Knights from WD 126 in WH 40K without using the vehicle design rules. In the 1st draft the Exo-Suit was a piece of wargear for the characters. Abuse would be too simple, so we limited it to one suit per army. It is basically a very fast and hard (not so tough) Dreadnought variant. Also a nice centrepiece for the army.

Phils Exodite Design Notes

Like Agis, my interest in the Exodites stems from the 2nd Editon Codex: Eldar; I don’t go back as far as WD 126 and while I had heard of Eldar Knights my knowledge of the pre-2nd Edition Exodites was limited. Their reinvention in the hallowed tome, sparsely detailed as it was, provided the reader with an opportunity to explore the culture of these Eldar, and looking at a variety of army list and background ideas on the internet revealed quite a range of different ideas about what the Exodites should be. When I eventually came to create extensive background of my own for the Exodite Eldar when I started work on my 3rd Edition army list, the feedback I received told me that people were drawn to the potential diversity of Exodite cultures and I was keen to allow a lot of room for interpretation while at the same time providing firm details about Exodite societies in general. At the same time I wanted to provide the reader with something new – Wood Elves in space and American Indians in space, the most common perceptions of these communities, had already been explored fairly exhaustively, and neither fit the image of a puritanical religious sect fleeing the depravity and persecution of their homes that had been established – the Codex piece told us where the Exodites had come from and a little of who they are now, but was silent about how they developed from the one into the other.

Because of these aims, very little of the background focused on warfare or the armies of the Exodites, and so did not constrain what I could put into the army list, although I wrote many of the sidebars and wargear pieces which further added to this background. From the start I had wanted an army based, not on an Aspect Warrior profile like the Craftworlders or Dark Eldar, or on a Harlequin profile, but on the humble Guardian and, of course, the Dragons. I wanted a variety of different cavalry mounts in the army, representing a variety of dinosaurs. The idea of adding characteristics to a model to represent its mount’s abilities was drawn from the Chaos Codex, and fits the army well. The latest edition’s movement rules, treating different troop types completely differently as they do rather than simply having a higher or lower move characteristics, were something I wanted to tinker with as well. The Raptor, whose running rule is among my favourite touches in the list and which, with its numerous low-strength attacks provides an obvious counterpart to the hard-hitting Dragon Knights, became the second cavalry mount in the army. Needing more troops than just Dragons and the obvious addition of Rangers, I created the unit that became the Exodite Fusiliers. Originally, these were armed like Guardian Defenders and could include a type of dragon which could be used as a heavy weapons mount. Stemming from this idea came the jump pack close combat equivalent, the Pterosaur Knights. However, I soon decided that the resource-scarcity of the Exodite planets could best be represented by making these Eldar reliant on rechargeable weapons with renewable energy sources – laser and plasma replaced shuriken and missiles.

Examining the weaknesses of the army provided me with a number of new units once this core had been established, as well as wargear for characters. The powers of the psyker then known as the Spirit Seer were more troublesome, but inspiration struck in the form of Doom and Executioner, powers from previous editions of the game which seemed perfectly designed for the shamanistic character I envisaged. I supplemented these with two new powers I was never happy with, both of which eventually followed Doom into oblivion. An added difficulty was that at this point the Seer’s background was sketchy in my mind, providing little inspiration.

The army remained largely unchanged from then on; a few pieces of wargear were added and the original concept for scouting units introduced, allowing Lethosaurs, Raptors and Hyrosaurs (a heavy support unit which faced insurmountable conversion difficulties and so went the way of, er, the dinosaur). Then Agis Neugebauer e-mailed me asking whether I would be interested in collaborating on a revised list for submission to the Citadel Journal (Note: Unfortunately GW did not take the Codex proposal for CJ. - Agis).
Having never had any serious plans to convert the models or playtest the list myself, I accepted readily. Since Agis was the authority on what could and could not be converted at reasonable cost from existing models, I let him take the lead when it came to selecting which units would remain in the army and which would leave. The Hyrosaurs, being hard to convert, were out, as was the webcannon I’d designed to replace the shuriken cannon. The Fusilers’ heavy weapon dragons would just have been too expensive to convert from Salamanders. Lastly for the first round of changes to the original list, the creature which became the Megadon was too weak to warrant the cost of a Stegadon, so its rules were changed to turn it into a monster rather than an improved cavalry mount, though the basic statistics remained much the same. At this stage, Agis proposed a number of his own units. Jungle swarms I didn’t like as they were, but after a poor attempt to represent Maiden World creatures in the scout table, I accepted the Salamander which replaced them. I was a little wary of both Warriors (since I felt that the Exodites should rely on cavalry for close combat) and Scout Walkers (since I didn’t like the idea of vehicles in Exodite armies). In the end, these units remained as did a restriction on the number of Rangers units available Agis had suggested. Pathfinders, which Agis included to add an extra Elite because he felt the idea of a disruption table was in theme for the Exodites, were out but the table remained, though I altered it to better represent the abilities of the Scout units and changed the way it was used to further distinguish it from the Alaitoc rule.

While Agis was converting the models, playtesting the list and working on the layout, the army remained much the same – other than minor doubts about the odd unit or piece of wargear, I was concerned mainly with the workability of the scout table and the Seer’s powers. During this period, Agis contributed several new powers for the renamed Exodite Visionary and added the Shamans. This gave me the opportunity to develop the background on these significant figures in more detail. The next incarnation of the list, following a degree of playtesting, made a number of changes. Several weapons and pieces of wargear were removed and the Visionary’s powers (minus Doom and another early power I’d called Spirit Sight) were fixed in their current form. The options for both squads and unit leaders had changed and the web carbine replaced the original armaments and options for Pterosaur and Lethosaur Knights. The biggest change was the exo-suit. This is the piloted machine used for both herding and jousting which is represented by the old Epic Knights. Originally it was a character upgrade; I liked the idea of being able to customise a model’s statline with different cavalry mounts and the exo-suit, which provided the wearer with S7 and T7 and had built-in weapons, was the extreme form of this. This of course allowed BS5 characters to obtain both heavy weaponry and high survivability, which was not ideal. Agis’s changes turned it into a more conventional unit, with an extra ranged weapon as befits a model of this sort and an improved movement rate.

I was concerned about the complexity of the web carbine while Agis’s group wasn’t happy with the automatic pinning effect of the weapon. After some discussion, we restricted the webber’s availability and restored the close combat armament of the Pterosaur Knights, which had been behind their creation in the first place.

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