Ever since I heard that Eldar were going to be redone with a new codex and a bunch of new models I new I had to start an army of them. I had wanted to do one before, but the old Wraithlord and War Walkers didn’t do much for me, and with other projects on the go, it was something that I was happy to wait for,

As soon as the Army deal was available, I ordered one plus an Eldar Battleforce, and along with a few extra boxed sets I set about thinking of an army list ready to do battle in the 41^st Millennium.

Having decided to paint them in the style of the Iyanden Craftworld (a colour I’ve always liked, plus it was a Tempus Fugitive idea to do an entire Craftworld in the scheme for Darkstars 2007) I set about deciding on my “must haves”.

Not really basing on stats or anything that a tournament player would consider above all else, I thought about the style of play I wanted from the force, and which models looked the nicest. So the first decisions were easy. A squadron of walkers was a must. The new models being really nice plastic kits to work with, look far better than the old metals, and are generally far cooler. Next on the list was the fluff aspect behind the Iyanden. So that meant at least one Wraithlord – again the new kit was too tempting not to – and a unit of Wraithguard. Ok the Wraithguard are not redone from the old variety (A trick I think GW should have addressed in my opinion) but fit into the theme. Reading the codex and seeing the wraithsight rules, a Warlock was required to guarantee them not playing silly devils when I needed them most. The same went for the Wraithlord, so I thought the easiest way to help him out was to add a Warlock in a Guardian squad and keep them together when playing. Adding the obligatory StarCannon platform of course as its rude not to, even with one less shot that the old rules.

So where next? With the basic core units chosen with the new plastic kits and fluff based units, it was time to flesh out the army. The new Dire Avengers had to be checked out. So digging them out of the Army Deal and checking their new rules, they had to be included! Bladestorm is such an awesome Exarch power, I set about making a unit to offer me some serious mid range assault fire power. A full unit of 10 with Bladestorm was assembled and added to the army roster.

Time to think of the HQ choice was next on the list. Knowing this was going to be part of a greater task force element of 7 players, we had previously decided that the task force commander would be the only one taking a super character type HQ. As this was not me, it meant I avoided the Avatar and Yriel of Iyanden, but would be open to take a “lesser” character in the form of an Autarch or a Farseer. Thinking of how my army would kind of work as a whole, I decided on going for psychic support rather than anything else, meaning a Farseer was the choice with Spirit Stones, Doom and Guide. I would plan to use Doom in a more defensive roll for any enemy unit that infiltrated too close in deployment, or anything horrible deepstriking early on. I could then really make sure that that unit was a one hit wonder before getting “doomed”. Guide would also be useful for BS3 Walkers with the scatter lasers I had chosen. And to use both, I needed spirit stones.

I still had many points to play with which meant some more Codex scrutinising, and looking at the models I had bought. The next decision was a full unit of Striking Scorpions. Not only do they look really nice, it would help break up the yellow painting that would dominate the army, and provide a nice hard combat unit that so far I was lacking. So a max strength unit was created and I went for the “biting blade” and infiltrate rules for the Exarch. Ok the enemy would get a lot of saves, but it also meant that the Exarch hit at his base initiative of 6 and could potentially pick on tougher units.

My final choice was some Shining Spears. This unit was picked for two reasons. The first being mobility. Jet bike moves are really good, and can make a difference in objective based games, but also this time I did look at the stats too. S6 power weapons on the charge was hard to ignore and would be an ideal unit to pick on exposed small units of Marines, and even vehicles with the Star Lance Exarch weapon. Star lances being able to inflict instant death on T4 characters as well as deal with Dreadnoughts and other such nasties.

Finally to fulfil my last remaining points, I decided on a second Wraithlord. The model was just so nice to work with the first time, I needed a second!

At this point I think I received the preliminary rules pack about the changes to the force organisation chart and the structure required to fit the army together with.

This was a minor problem. We were being given the Force Org chart for “Breakthough Attackers” which meant a limit to two Elites choices. The biggest problem was the breakdown of points allocation. A force of 1000 points conforming to the Attacker Breakthrough, with a top up 500 point force that had to also fit with the same force org when added together. Finally a 400 point combat patrol fitting to the usual restraints in the rule book for that kind of force.

So I had to fiddle the army I had got around a fair amount to make things fit.

The main 1000 consisted of the Farseer, WraithGuard, Warlock, Scorpions, Dire Avengers, Wraithlord and Warwalker Squadron. Topped with the 500 point force of Guardians, Shining Spears and Wraithlord number 2. Finally the combat patrol. This would have my second unit of Avengers, with a combat exarch with shimmershield and power weapon, and a single War Walker with brightlances for anti armour duties. I also had acquired a unit of Rangers which would fit nicely into the combat patrol theme. That would give a nice pinning unit hiding in cover getting plenty of nice saves, a mid range shooting force with slight combat ability and anti armour from the walker.

With the army done on the picking front, it was time to paint.

I used Vallejo paints all the way through this project (sorry GW they are just nicer to use!) Clearly much of the force was yellow, so I set about painting the unit of Guardians to get the feel of the armour plating that was common though out much of the Eldar range and also a good practice for painting yellow full stop. All units that would be yellow were primed white, then painted with multiple layers of yellow highlighting up by blending more white and more sunburst into the base golden coats. For shading, I used a 50/50 mix of orange and light brown watered slightly and lined into the recesses. The heads were sprayed black separately before gluing on and painted night blue highlighting by adding lighter blues. About 4 layers were used for the Guardians plus lining. I then moved onto the Wraithlord and painted in the same style as the Guardians. Just a bigger version really, but added an extra 2 layers of yellow blend over the larger areas. I also picked out random gems on the Wraithlord too to break up the large patches of yellow.

By now, painting yellow was hurting my eyes, so I switched to the first 10 Avengers. Same style of painting was used as per the Guardians, just in Blue over a black prime. This time I picked all the gems out to break up the blue a bit. The heads were primed white and instead of codex aspect colours, I painted the plumes in yellow to tie in to the rest of the force.

Next on the hit list was the Scorpions. I batch painted these in 2 lots of 5 after trialling a single model first for a method of painting. I wanted these as a centre piece unit as the green would really stick out. Vallejo paints are really vibrant in the green colours, and the yellow stripes really stand out on the finished models. I used about 5 layers of green on these guys and am really chuffed the way they came out.

In between the 2 lots of 5 Scorpions, I painted a further 5 Avengers before going back again and then finally back to the last 5 Avengers. It was a way to break the painting colour up.

The WarWalkers were next on the hitlist and this time I decided to basecoat them using an airbrush. The application was far quicker and smoother, and then I painted over the top layered highlights like the Wraithlord. Lining the joints with the 50/50 orange and brown mix gave them instant depth.

After starting the second Wraithlord I had a chance to playtest the army in a Breakout Mission against a mechanised Guard army. It was only using the 1000 point list and I discovered 2 vital things. A single Brightlance even on a BS4 Wraithlord cannot be trusted, and secondly Wraithguard who walk, never get to do anything. So a decision was made to drop the Wraithlord in the 1000 point list and take a WaveSerpent with TL Brightlances. This plugged both of those immediate holes. I still got the heavy weapon with a slight increased chance to hit, but also a delivery platform for the Wraithguard. I had inadvertently started painting the WaveSerpent that came in the Battleforce which was useful!

The final few models were painted including the Rangers and Warlocks and also the Farseer. I chose yellow armour and a big blue cloak and a bone helm for the Farseer, and a slight reverse for the Warlocks with their cloaks in yellow with blue heads with bone facings. All three were mounted on 40mm bases (as were the Wraithguard for stability and a meaner presence). The last unit to be completed was the combat patrol walker and the turret of the serpent.

The whole project was very rewarding to do and without a single conversion involved. As much as I do like chopping models up and making them into more interesting combinations quite often it is lost on people how much effort it requires and they just see the paint work. I converted much of my Spacewolves for the Age of Apostasy, yet nobody noticed! They even missed the fact that not a single Wolf is wearing a helmet! Anyway, 1900 points of Iyanden were finally completed with the project taking approximately 4.5 months with a finish date of the 1st May with 18 days to go till the Darkstars campaign weekend.