Assassins: The Dark Elf answer to Monsterous Creatures and those on a boat???!?
That's right. This article is about those little, but expensive characters that are not quite characters... eh, you'll see what I mean.What is an assassin:
The assassin is a 90 point character that you can buy for your dark elf army that doesn't take up any points other than your overall maximum points.. They can be deployed inside of units on foot, do not have to be deployed at the start of the game or revealed even in an open list tournament (as you choose at the start of the game where the assassin is deployed in, preferably written down so your opponent doesn't question your placement.
they can be revealed at the start of any close combat phase, or at the start of any of your turns. They displace a normal rank and file (or character if your front rank consists of 2 characters and full command). They are pretty nasty in combat with ASF, ws9 and str 4 with 3 attacks base (4 attacks with an additional hand weapon). Their real strength relies on their selection of items. Each assassin can have the same item as they are gifts and not real items.
One build to rule them all???
Let's look at the most popular set up of the assassins, and ones that I'm including into my army to deal with the current meta, the RENDBANE Sins!
What a rendbane sin is, an assassin with Manbane and rending starts. Manbane is a toxin that replaces your normal poison attacks, but what it allows you to do is your str is one higher than your targets toughness to a maximum of 6. it also counts that str in terms of armor reduction, so those t5 Chocobo knights/Skullcrushers have a -3 to their 1+ armor save.
Rending stars are 12" thrown weapons that are str as user +1, meaning against say a deamon prince, or a dragon your throwing your stars at str 7, even against demis your throwing your stars at str 6/7. They are 3 shots and with a bs of 9 on the assassin, your almost always hitting on 2s and wounding on 2s on your stand and shoot reaction, or your normal shots.
now, why is this the most popular build? For one thing, other than magic, dark elves have no real way of dealing with all these Monsters that are popping up. The main threat is the daemon prince in the warriors of chaos. normally static combat rez is the answer to those lone answers charging in, but since they are unbreakable, this is impossible. What an assassin does is that it keeps these type of units honest. Even the 1+ AS nurgle deamon prince would be scared when you get 3 shots that are hitting on 2's and wounding on 2's with a -4 to his 1+ armor save, and then having an assassin that goes first, has 4 attacks (assuming AHW) that hit on re-rollable 5+ (thanks to the nurgle mark) and wound on 4's with a -3 to their armor save. Even the 4?/5? wound deamon prince would think twice about messing with an assassin.
Possible Issues with the assassin:
For one thing, they can be classified as "one trick ponies". Granted, they are excellent at their one trick, but even then with no save of any kind and relying on their WS9 to help them stay alive in a prolonged combat, they are very expensive in terms of points. the rendbane sin comes to 151 points. That's very expensive for a character.
Also, if your unit dies before you reveal the assassin, you lose him as well. so sticking him inside a rather large unit would be the safe bet.
In conclusion:
The assassin is an excellent addition in the current meta, and I'll be trying to do some reports either on youtube or on here about my experiences with them.
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