The Baron is front and center of this arrangement, or as he will be for my army, Spiritseer Sathonyx (see pics below). The Council is nothing if not resilient, however the Baron really takes this to new heights. First and most obviously, he gives them Stealth. Combine this with Conceal from one of the Warlocks and you get a 2+ cover save just for moving. This literally doubles the unit's capacity to take damage from anything that doesn't ignore cover. Next up is Hit and Run. Hit and Run on the surface is a tool seemingly for offense, however its defensive capabilities are twofold. Firstly, it means you do not get bogged down in a combat that you don't want to be in; we're fast guys, but some things out there are faster if we want to actually do things. Secondly however, it allows you a safe haven from unwanted shooting. If you believe the enemy is going to trail an unnatural amount of firepower on you next turn and you're not confident that you can take it, you charge something not very combat worthy in order to take shelter from this. Wait until his turn and then pop out ready to go again, but without having to weather a hail or fire. Grenades are next. With the Phantasm Launcher giving the whole squad Grenades, you can be sure to get the drop on most enemies, especially with a Warlock Psychic boost to Initiative. Lastly, and most subtely, is his ability to add 1 to the dice roll when determining who goes first. In my opinion Eldar nearly always want to be going second, as with flimsy Troops and deployment being so important, late game objective grabbing and knowing where your enemy is going first are two very important things to success. With a +1 on the roll, the chance of your opponent forcing you to go first is lessened to an extent. Probably nothing to write home about, but handy all the same.
The other element to my allied detachment that helps the Council out is the Venom. Now the Wyches inside are simply to threaten Land Raiders and grab objectives, but the Venom serves to boost me chances of getting up my Runes of Battle powers thanks to Grisly Trophies. These allow all friendly units within 6" to re-roll Leadership checks. Ld8 isn't great, however when you can re-roll it, your chances become much greater. It doesn't hurt that the Venom pumps out 12 poison shots and allows the Wyches to score similar ot my Jetbikes either.
So onto the modeling. I have always had allies sit uncomfortably with me since 6th edition came around. It's mostly because it just doesn't look right. As such, I like to put in the effort of making my allies look like they are part of the main force, while being distinct enough to differentiate between the two. For the Dark Eldar allies, this most meant adding Eldar bits to Dark Eldar models, adding Dark Eldar bits to Eldar models, and shaving off all manner of spikey bits. My converted Warp Spiders from a few posts back are a good reference design wise to what I was going for. As such I have converted the Baron from scratch, bits bashed the Wyches from Wych, Scourge and Guardian bits, and made the Venom from an Eldar Vyper. I finished painting all of these bad boys up yesterday, and to finish off this post, I present to you the results below. Enjoy.
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