Dread Elves 2.b: The mighty Corsairs!

Ah the Corsairs are a neat unit in the Dread Elves army.  Aside from having a pretty good looking model (those sea drake cloaks are well done Gee Dubs) they are a nice unit to have overall.  In my particular case I will be usually bringing 30 of them in a 6x5 formation to help maximize the number of troops I can bring in combat while still maintaining a small footprint.  With my 50 model block of Legionnaires I need to be careful with my footprints to avoid running over my own forces.

Model-wise these guys were pretty easy to assemble.  The only complaint I was able to have is that in some cases with the weapon arms the swords/punch-daggers/hooks would cause them not to rank up as easily as some of the other choices.  I took the lazy way out and just clipped them off until they fit.  Might not look as awesome with a smaller sword but if it means the difference between being able to rank up or not then...well...snip snip.

Ranked up so far so good

In this rendition of the Dread Elves the Corsairs had a slight tweaking that changed the way I wanted to originally use them.  At first I was going to go with the hand repeater crossbows but in this edition I think I might forego that for an additional hand weapon.  Mostly because they lost the shorter ranged crossbows and are given thrown weapons instead.  It's not a bad option to take with Multiple Shots (2) and Quick to Fire, but they lose out on the Armor Piercing (1) that repeater crossbows get.  In a smaller unit I could see myself taking this option as a flank harasser with ranged but that's not how I will primarily use them,

Corsairs share the same stat-line as the Legionnaires so there aren't any surprises there.  Standard upgrades for the command group.  If you have a Prince or Captain with the Fleet Commander upgrade then you can upgrade the Corsairs to get the Vangaurd special rule (a 12" inch move before the game starts after all deployment is made).  I rather like the idea of having a unit being able to move that far before the game starts, only downside is that you cannot charge if you also go first in the turn.  With some careful planning, and if you go second, you can charge right on in a unit that is easily affected by multiple attacks.  Anything with hardcore armor or multiple wounds might not be a good idea however.

30 Corsairs all ranked up just fine

One thing that Corsairs do have is a solid +4 armor save.  Their cloaks no longer give them a bonus to just ranged attacks but now to ALL attacks.  A +5 Innate Defense combined with Light Armor gives a nice solid armor save for most light attacks.  This makes them a little more survivable than Legionnaires (w/o Heavy Armor) with the option of more attacks.

I like these cloaks, very well done.

Unless given the BSB Corsairs do not have an option to take a special banner.  Bummer.  Still I think this is a great flanking unit that fills up a core choice.  I would consider taking them as a Horde unit of 50 as they cost about the same as Legionnaires (I think 1 more pt/model) and fill a similar role.  I think they could take a normal hit and still be effective at throwing out a lot of attack die.

That about sums up my tactical thoughts on the Corsairs, tune in next time for more tactica and unit discussion!  Good luck!