How to get without Dark Riders...

[Leonates80]

Well ... I don`t have those yet. And I won`t be getting them soon (up to summer ) since they will get much needed revamp! And so - I got 20 RXB, 20 corsair, 10 cold one knights, 16 BG, 7 WE, Hydra...and 5 VERY old harpies (the ones that look like cross between left wing politician and very upset lemur). Should I get Shades? Or is it possible to have competitve list with what I have - namely getting myself cauldron?

[Tethlis]

Shades and an Assassin are an excellent purchase, and will help you increase army the size of your army due to their considerable point cost.

Also, you might want to rethink your Dark Rider decision, or at least find a way to proxy them until the summer. Dark Riders are useful enough, I couldn't imagine playing 5 months of games without them.

[Calisson]

Proxy them with the COK?

[Bounce]

You can get around without Dark Riders. Harpies, Shades, Peggy Masters, Knights all, can make good substitutes depending on what you want them to do.

They are also easier to use, Dark Ridersrequire a lot of tactics to get the most out of them

[Tethlis]

The ability to use Dark Riders to block an incoming enemy regiment and dictate its movement is very useful, and no other unit in a Dark elf army does it as well. Dark Riders are an ideal choice for Frenzy and Hatred baiting too.

[Sulla]

Well ... I don`t have those yet. And I won`t be getting them soon (up to summer ) since they will get much needed revamp! And so - I got 20 RXB, 20 corsair, 10 cold one knights, 16 BG, 7 WE, Hydra...and 5 VERY old harpies (the ones that look like cross between left wing politician and very upset lemur). Should I get Shades? Or is it possible to have competitve list with what I have - namely getting myself cauldron?

Harpies redirect far better than dark riders although they don't have the rallying rules of the riders. Crossbowmen shoot far better than dark riders.

If you buy 5 dark riders with a musician and crossbows, you are only saving a few points from buying 10 naked crossbowmen and 5 harpies. Buying the harpies and crossbowmen seperates the roles of the multipurpose dark riders and lets you do both roles at the same time and arguably better.

Dark riders are much less important to our list than in 6th edition and you can get by without them in your list quite easily if you want.

[Umpac]

Harpies redirect far better than dark riders although they don't have the rallying rules of the riders. Crossbowmen shoot far better than dark riders.

If you buy 5 dark riders with a musician and crossbows, you are only saving a few points from buying 10 naked crossbowmen and 5 harpies. Buying the harpies and crossbowmen seperates the roles of the multipurpose dark riders and lets you do both roles at the same time and arguably better.

While I agree that the dark riders role can be filled by harpies if you play a combat army, but in shoot & avoidance list they are a must. The fast cav rule allows you to bait / redirect, flee, rally and do it all over again in the next turn, which can hold up in entire flank if done right. Harpies on the other hand flees, then has to rally on LD6 and even if they succeed they need to wait a turn to get back. Aside from being more resilient to shooting it takes 2 harpy units to fill a single dark rider unit if you play properly (and even then the harpies will often end up fleeing over the board edge). Harpies can't control the overrun/persue path either since they are skirmishers, unlike dark riders.

Dark riders cost 117 with RXBs and a muso, vs 155 pts of the harpie+rxb, which is more than a few pts (around +33% of the DR cost), and even if the pt cost was the same you can't really deploy more than 20 RXBs in an effective manner without getting blocked by other units in the army or by terrain.

If you play without Dark Riders I would recommend 2x5 harpies or more, as peg masters makes poor baiters, and shades are very slow compared to fly or M18".

A couldron could do very well in this list tho, 10 Coks, corsairs and BGs is a good foundation for a very aggressive army, where you don't need harassers to the same extent.

[Sulla]

While I agree that the dark riders role can be filled by harpies if you play a combat army, but in shoot & avoidance list they are a must.

...The units listed in the OP are very much nota shoot & avoidance list.