All those Fancy Arrows... What to do?

[billr]

What are your thoughts on all of the fancy arrow types?

I like the Hagbane arrows and Sunfire Shafts primarily on Glade Guard, as well as the Waywatcher "no armor save" ability. I also think there's plenty of room for "no upgraded" on GG too, as points will become an issue.

I think, in general, Wood Elf shooting is going to suffer more from issues with wounding and armor rather than hitting. Although possibly, hitting will become an issue now that the M&S penalty applies to them. Hard to say given that you might want to build a list that camps around the woods now.

I like the Hagbane arrows because they're cheap. They will be good at whacking high toughness things with low/no armor. e.g. War Machines.

I like the Sunfire Shafts. Flaming and +1 to wound plague beasts/bearers, abombs and chimera.

I like the no-upgrade option too. I think points are going to become an issue quickly with this list.

Way watchers are great. Heavily armored opponents, no problem. Lots of scrubs w/o armor? Got them covered too.

What are your thoughts?

[RedPanda]

My personal fav is the no-neg modifier arrows, being no cover saves, no range, no magic, no magic items, no skirmishers,no charging modifiers and the best no movement affect your to hit. Perfect for avoidance lists.

Other arrows serve other purposes.
Too bad they did not make a rare special unit which allows a switch up of different arrow types every round.

[billr]

Very true.

I was just thinking a bit more about the sunfire shafts. Now you're wounding T3 bad guys on a 3, and never worse than a 5 with them. The fancy arrows are all magical too, so ethereal units can just go home.

[Pigey]

Go and have a look here: http://www.asrai.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=26273

[billr]

Thank you! Sorry I missed that.

[SpanielBear]

Poison is a good all-rounder, and being one of the cheapest I'd say that is your best bet in general. Math hammer around the internet seems to bear this out; on average you will do more wounds with these babies than any of the others- except in specific situations.

Multi-shot I reckon could work on big units of Glade Guard you can cast Hand of Glory on for a BS boost.

Armour-bane is really expensive, pushing Glade Guard all the way up to 17 points a pop! Worth it on small units if you play chaos warriors all the time, otherwise let Waywatchers do the work- they do it better, and for not much more points.

Accuracy is good if you want to play the movement game once more, and you are mostly facing T3 or below. Against higher toughness though, poison still wins out. You hit less, but the hits you do are more likely to stick.

Moonfire arrows. Are you being over-run by frost-phoenixes? Dwarf Ironbreakers an issue? Unless the answer to either of these questions is a firm yes, leave these behind. I like that they are included as a fluff choice though, if nothing else. Keeps the balance.

Starfire arrows. Let's face it, regenerating monsters are mostly on the evil side of the fence, so these have more utility. Even against order units, they still give flaming. Still 4 points per model for that effect though, so...

There's still a case to be made for Glade Guard with no upgrades and our old favourite, the banner of eternal flame. You get the flaming effect for only 10 points no matter the unit size, whereas the star and moon arrows cost 40 points as an upgrade for a unit of 10 elves, and just keeps getting more expensive as you go. The arrows are still armour piercing, thus mitigating scaly skin to a certain extent. Yes you lose the wound bonus, but honestly you only need one for the fire to do its work, whereupon the hagbane arrows can do the rest.

So yeah. That's my thoughts. Not especially original, but take them for what they're worth.

[Rogue Sun]

I think it's too early to declare poison as the clear winners here. The math only took into account a few factors when determining number of wounds. Long range and moving was the worst modifier it was put up against, but I would be interested to see the math on no modifier arrows vs poison when factoring in soft and hard cover (meaning you actually have terrain on the table, shock and awe). Remember, we are not always going to get clean LOS to our opponents and terrain or other models will change how many hits occur. Additionally there are factors like magic and skirmishing to consider. Poison seems like the no brainer in math hammer but I really think no modifier arrows are going to be more universally applicable.

[gingersmali]

I think one thing people have been forgetting also. Is that 95% of list will be coming towards you. If you plan on playing defensively you will get turn/s when they are at short range, so this is important to remember.

Also you need to think about synergies with your chosen magic law.