The Friends Your Mother Warned You About: Playing Ynnari in 9th Ed 40K

Who are the Ynnari?

Those of you who are very new to 9th edition 40k may not already know that the Ynnari are a band of Aeldari doomsday cultists. Their raison d’etre is to awaken the Aeldari god of death, whom they believe will one day kill Slaanesh and free all previously lost eldar souls from the torments of the Warp. In theory, this would restore Aeldari reincarnation and eventually enable space elves to once again dominate the galaxy as they did before The Fall.

On the 9th edition tabletop, the Ynnari technically count as a Craftworld with access to the same two faction bonuses, the relics, and the stratagems that benefit all Asuryani, plus their own custom subfaction bonuses: the ability to fight first in melee, and +1 to hit for any unit that is below its starting strength. In addition, Ynnari detachments can also include Harlequins and certain Drukhari units so long as there are at least as many Craftworlds units with the same battlefield role as those being pulled in from the other two factions; however, in a Ynnari army, Harlequins do not have access to Luck of the Laughing God and cannot take Pivotal Roles, while Drukhari do not benefit from Power From Pain and cannot access upgrades like “chosen retinue.”

Lastly, although Ynnari detachments cannot include Asuryani characters, like Phoenix Lords, they do have access to the three Ynnari named characters: Yvraine aka “Cat lady,” The Yncarne aka “the avatar of the god of death,” and The Visarch aka “probably just Casey Jones from the Ninja Turtles in a different helmet.”

What Makes Ynnari Effective on the Table?

Now, back in March when I reviewed the recently released Aeldari codex, I declared that Ynnari had been firmly relegated to casual play. A mediocre combination of sub-faction bonuses compared to what was available to other Craftworlds lists along with limitations on how players could soup-in Drukhari and Harlequins, lead me to conclude that while the Yncarne is fabulous, there was no good reason for a competitive player to select Ynnari over several other Craftworld options or perhaps Harlequins. I was wrong.

Over the past few months, a number of Ynnari lists have put in impressive performances at GTs both in Europe in the US, in some cases landing on the winner’s podium. For at least a couple of weeks, Ynnari were the most statistically high-performing Craftworld after Hail of Doom. (To be fair to me there have been some nerfs to Harlequins and Hail of Doom since my initial review.) Nevertheless, what I overlooked, and what Utah-based Ynnari player Chase Chapelle did not, is the absolutely brutal Alpha-Strike potential of death elves if we stop being distracted by how they were clearly meant to be played thematically, and focus instead on some curious synergies made possible with very select unit-souping and psychic powers. Although Chase Chapelle is not the only one winning with Ynnari at the moment, it is easy to see his influence in the other death-elf lists that have been performing well.

The fundamental concept behind these builds is to maximize alpha strike mortal wound output in order to leave opponents scrambling to recover from an initial nose-breaking face jab, while a host of the pointy eared doomsayers merrily dominates the midboard and sweeps the objective game that is often so challenging for Craftworlds.

In this article I will consider why these lists are so successful and how to build your own unique variant that will enable you to dust off your Yncarne and brutalize the tables at your friendly local game store for the first time since Soul Burst made Dark Reapers the most hated unit in all of 40k.

Building an Alpha-Strike Ynnari List

Death elf prophet Chase Chapelle has been through a number of builds since Warzone Nephilim and various rules updates have altered the playing field and the meta, but there are certain units that appear pretty consistently both in his lists and the winning rosters of those Chapellean disciples who have followed in his footsteps. These are:
-The Yncarne
-A Hemlock Wraithfighter with “Storm of Whispers”
-A Drukhari Voidraven Bomber
-At least one Falcon

-Also included are: 2 Farseers or one plus a Shadowseer, a Warlock Conclave, a unit of Striking Scorpions with Crushing Blows, at least one unit of Howling Banshees with Piercing Strike and the Crone Scream, and the standard troops package: two units of Rangers to play the midfield and one unit of cheap Kabalites to hide on a home objective. In addition, just about all of these lists seem to include 3 D-Cannons.

A player who wants to include all of those units has about 275 points left to play with. Variants of this list usually spend those points on some combination Shining Spears, Shroud Runners, Swooping Hawks, and in one curious instance, Baharroth. (Bizarrely, it is possible to sneak a Phoenix Lord into a Ynnari force by adding one as the only unit in an Auxiliary Support Detachment. Because the Aeldari codex states that all Ynnari detachments count as “Asuryani” where detachment keywords are concerned, this is technically legal even though Phoenix Lords are specifically prohibited from being included in a Ynnari detachment.)

PHASE I: The Alpha Strike

The basic plan for Alpha Strike Ynnari lists works like this:

-On turn 1, both aircraft rocket into your opponent’s backfield.
 
-The Voidraven Bomber drops its once-per-game Void Mine on a cluster of enemy units to do D6 mortal wounds to each on a 4+. It can then either stick around to fire its Void Lances and missiles, or use the aircraft role to disappear into reserves. In many cases, it is best to keep it on the board and enjoy the added firepower because your opponent will already be overwhelmed with viable targets when her turn rolls around.

-The Hemlock positions itself in the middle of a large number of enemies and capitalizes on its large base to subject enemy units within 9” to a mortal wound on a 4+. In the shooting phase it wreaks Havoc with its D-Scythes, and the Mind Shock Pod probably takes a couple more enemy models in the moral phase.

-The Falcon drops in with some Banshees who make a turn 1 charge using a Strands of Fate die and GHOSTWALK to guarantee success; the Crone Scream does D3+1 mortal wounds on the charge, and then the real pain begins in the melee phase. Although we all know that the Mirror Swords have become the typical loadout for the Banshee Exarch because they are objectively hotter than a Commorraghn tanning bed, in one early iteration of this list Chase Chapelle gave the Exarch the glaive because with piercing strike it does flat three damage. In a meta rife with terminators and tyranid warriors there is a lot to be said for flat 3, although the 10 attacks on the flat two damage blender-build is hard to pass up.

-The Falcon also contributes some decent firepower. The Pulse Laser in combination with the weapons on the aircraft can pop a pretty tough enemy vehicle or monster.

-The Striking Scorpions, which deployed 9” from the enemy backfield, move 7” and then bring the pain, including a few more mortal wounds with their Mandiblasters. Crushing Blows and the Biting Blade together can inflict real damage to a high toughness target, especially if the warlocks JINX it first to mitigate the mediocre AP on the chainswords.

-If the board allows, the D-Cannons push up and do some damage. They don’t need to worry about exposure to a single firing lane given the amount of other dangerous units the opponent needs to deal with on turn 1. Also, if a platform does die, the others just get +1 to hit because of the Ynnari subfaction bonus.

-If the initial attack is going well, when a unit dies in the shooting phase the Yncarne takes its place and then blast everything within 6” with Swirling Soul energy, which hits automatically at Assault D6, S7, -2AP, 1 damage. Alternatively, if between the bombs and STORM OF WHISPERS a unit dies in the psychic phase, the Yncarne can teleport in then to cast GAZE OF YNNEAD and SMITE for even more mortal wounds before making the shooting attack I just described.

-Lastly, if you have the CP, there may also be a rare opportunity here to make the “Eldrtich Storm” stratagem work for you despite the nerfs. Dropping another D3 mortals on two or three enemy units might be what it takes to really clean things up and make sure that the Mind Shock Pod on the Hemlock chases off any survivors.

In the event that you DON’T get first turn, just use “Phantasm” to pick up the Scorpions and either put them into reserve or position them as counter punchers. What else you pick up will depend on the board state and your opponent’s army, but be aware that lots of lists just won’t have the long rage firepower to threaten those aircraft on turn 1 if you position them at the very back of your deployment zone. If you find yourself staring down 12 Ballistari Lascannons, you might want to pick them up, otherwise you are probably better off repositioning the DCannons and a unit of Rangers.

Although the order of operations I have just described is more or less the standard operating procedure for all of the alpha strike Ynnari lists that have been doing well, each one has variants that add a little extra special sauce. One of Chase Chapelle’s more recent iterations includes a Shadowseer that can rush forward on turn 1 and cast MIRROR MINDS on an enemy unit for another 1-6 mortal wounds, as well as a unit of Shroud Runners that- because of its pregame move- can be in the opponent’s backfield turn 1. The three Scatter Lasers pick up light infantry and objective holders, while the sniper fire can make use of Strands of Fate dice to auto-kill a character that only barely survived the Void Mine and the Storm of Whispers. At the beginning of your opponent’s movement phase the Shroud Runners contribute to the overall mortal wound count by spending a CP on the “Wire Weave” grenades stratagem to do another D3 mortal wounds and impose some movement penalties on the target for extra flavor.

The overall picture here should be becoming clear. Even if the dice behave poorly, you should be able to put about 15 mortal wounds into the enemy, plus an avalanche of powerful shooting and melee attacks. If the dice are a little more accommodating, it will be more like 20-25 mortal wounds, and if it turns out Isha really loves you, your initial strike will plow more than 30 mortal wounds into the enemy army. The goal here is to leave your opponent with a smoking hole in her lines and some significant backfield threats she has to be deal with but without the resources to do so efficiently.

Consider also that a couple of durability boosts on your strike force can really help to dull your opponent’s counter punch. If possible, you should throw SHIELD OF YNNEAD on the Hemlock  for a 4++ invulnerable save. Combined with its native -1 to hit and damage reduction, this will make the Wraithfighter resource-intensive for your opponent to eliminate, especially if you can shrug a really hard hit with an auto-save on a Strands of Fate die. You might also throw PROTECT on an infantry unit in cover and set aside a CP for “Lightening Fast Reactions” to make something -1 to hit.

If the list is working effectively, it will be enormously difficult for your opponent to hit you with a counter attack that levels the playing field again. Maybe she manages to bring down the Hemlock and pick up the Banshees; perhaps a couple of Scorpions die to volume of fire even with that 1+ save they have in cover with PROTECT, but you will be controlling the battlefield, dictating the circumstances of engagement, and pulling ahead in the trading game.

PHASE II: Enter the Yncarne

I don’t want to say the Yncarne is the reason to play Ynnari, but this big bad elf-demon is kind of the reason to play Ynnari. She is a potent melee threat that knows every Revenant psychic power and has nasty close-range area-effect shooting. If she doesn’t enter the fray turn 1, she definitely wants in turn 2. The Yncarne can take the place of any unit belonging to either player at the moment that unit is killed, but cannot charge on the turn that she does so. Veteran players know that an opponent’s melee phase is therefore ideal because replacing one of your own units that dies in close combat is guaranteed to position the Yncarne within in striking distance of the enemy while leaving your opponent no way to deal with it before you get your turn.

Let’s say for example that your opponent charges a unit of Rangers hidden in ruin on turn 1. When those brave elven scouts give up their lives for the cause, you can replace them with the Yncarne to counter attack next turn and obliterate just about anything with a maelstrom of psychic attacks, shooting attacks, and a nasty melee profile that can shut down invulnerable saves.

The Yncarne is a high skill-cap unit that will seriously reward tactical play and thinking ahead. At some point, I may do a unit focus video dedicated exclusively to how to use her to best effect, but until then here are a few suggestions:

1) Sometimes the Yncarne can brutalize an enemy in melee and then teleport away before your opponent can hit back. If you have multiple units fighting first, you can trigger her to cut something with her gigantic death sword and then, if you actually wipe out an enemy unit with your next melee activation elsewhere on the board, she can *BAMF* *BAMF* away like Nightcrawler before her hapless victim has a chance to swing back.

2) Don’t forget that the Yncarne can teleport multiple times per turn. If you kill an enemy unit with a psychic attack or bombing run, she could appear in the middle of an opposing force to cast STORM OF WHISPERS and GAZE OF YNNEAD as well auto hit everything within 6” with a shooting attack, and teleport away to safety as long as you kill something somewhere else in shooting or melee.

3) Consider that the Yncarne is a powerful tool for objective control. If you kill an enemy unit that is alone on a far away objective, she can take its place, perhaps causing an 8 point swing in primary scoring. The same is true if one of your objective holders is killed at range; she can teleport in and prevent you from losing the point.

PHASE III: Keeping up the Pressure
In order to make this list perform well in competitive play, you need to keep your opponent on her heels after the initial smack-down, and you have lots of tools to make sure that you do.

For example, if your DCannons moved up turn 1 and you move them again turn 2, they can probably target just about anything on the field. Ideally, you want to establish line-of-sight to avoid the ballistic skill penalty and armor bonus for your opponent, but don’t forget that you can use the “Resonator Shard” stratagem to let your cannons reroll hit rolls against units within 12” of your Rangers, so sometimes indirect fire is totally worth it.

Anything from your initial strike force that survived will probably be well positioned to hit something else next turn, and you may also have a fast target elimination unit like Shining Spears that could not get into the fray on turn one, but was able to position itself to hit something turn 2, and so on.

That said, keeping up the pressure, does not necessarily mean going straight for the remainder of your opponent’s army with everything you have. If you boxed the enemy army into a single quadrant of the board turn 1 with no way to make favorable trades, you might want to keep it pinned with threats while you score the crap out of primary and secondary objectives. Obviously you kill anything foolish enough to poke its head out of line-of-sight blocking terrain.

Just to reiterate: pressure does not always mean killing. One of the biggest mistakes new players make is to prioritize bloodthirst over scoring. And I totally get it. When you see your opponent’s line break turn one, and Kela Mensha Khaine leans over and whispers “get ‘em Ray,” in your ear, it can be hard to rein in those ecstatic murder elves. But you need to remember that Khaine is not renowned for his brilliant tactics, but rather for his unrestrained savagery and ineffective handwashing techniques.

 In order to win, you need to be an Autarch not and Exarch.

What About Scoring?
“But Brent!” you may be saying. “Sure, your quippy little aphorism might sound cool, but literally the only thing you have talked about is how to kill and threaten your opponent’s list. How do these Ynnari rosters actually score points??”

I’m glad you asked that, imaginary hyper-critical future reader.

Some competitive lists are designed to score points primarily by crippling the opponent out of the gate and keeping them so heavily on the defensive that they can’t score, while your own units are at their leisure to wrack up the points.

This list is designed to be conservative on primaries during turn 2 and then score big when your opponent’s units are depleted and unable to escape the throwdown happening in their own backfield. It’s still important to know when to box your opponent in rather than making additional suicidal unit trades, but aggression IS the primary tool for scoring when playing alpha strike Ynnari. Even the secondaries you select should be rooted in the assumption that your list can keep the opponent on the defensive.

You will need to be flexible depending on the map and the opposing list, but I suggest:

-Behind Enemy Lines
-Scout the Enemy
-Raise Banners
-Hidden Path
-Any killy secondary
-Any Warpcraft secondary

“Scout the Enemy” and “Behind Enemy Lines” have obvious synergy in alpha strike lists simply because those rosters are so aggressive that you are likely to have multiple units on your opponent’s side of the board for most of the game. Banners and Hidden Path are good because they capitalize on how the list is already playing the primary objective game, which is to put so much pressure on the opponent’s backfield that she struggles to contest more than a single point in the midfield. Killy secondaries are good simply because the list is good at killing, while Warpcraft picks are a solid fallback in circumstances where one of these others isn’t viable or your opponent has little to no psychic denial.

How to Build a More Personalized Alpha Strike Ynnari List
Longtime fans of my channel or blog will may know how hesitant I usually am to share or recommend particular lists. A big part of the fun of 40k is list-writing, and I think when we run lists that we did not write ourselves we might miss out on part of the fun of the hobby; furthermore, there is high probability that we won’t play other people’s lists particularly well because don’t understand them. Getting better at 40k isn’t about getting a “better” list, it is about developing the skills necessary to write more effective lists and learn to pilot them successfully.

That said, you can learn a great deal from practicing with lists that are very unlike the ones you might gravitate towards instinctively or lists that deprive you of favorite units that might prevent you from learning new ways to play. Some of you may want to look up Chase Chapelle’s most recent Alpha Strike list on Best Coast Pairings or Goonhammer and play it more or less unchanged; if so, great!

On the other hand, others of you might be borderline allergic to playing a net list, which I totally understand; (that is my natural tendency too.) If you want to improvise with more than just 250 points, I think you can strip the list down to its bare bones this way:
-The Yncarne
-A Farseer
-A Warlock Conclave
-A Voidraven
-A Hemlock

The Yncarne is an auto-include in every single Ynnari list as is at least one Farseer and some Warlocks. I think the aircraft are non-negotiable simply because they provide the foundation for the mortal wound spam that is the heart of the Alpha Strike Ynnari list. This gives you a little over 1000 points to customize completely.

I mentioned some of the units that have appeared in variants earlier in this article, but in addition to those I think that there is a great argument for experimenting with melee-oriented Sky Weavers that can make a 22” ride the wind move, and still charge the enemy on turn 1. An Autarch Skyrunner on the Sunstorm could also be an interesting include, not only for his combat prowess but also for ability to enhance the alpha-strike potential of units like Banshees, Scorpions, and even Shroud Runners. Giving him “Ambush of Blades” could help offset the mediocre AP of Striking Scorpions, and so on.

There are lots of options to experiment with. Just be sure and ask yourself the following questions when auditing the roster:
-DOES this list do enough turn 1 damage to seriously bloody the nose of any opposing list?
-DOES my strategy rely on consistently good roles or poor screening by my opponent?

If that answers are not favorable, you might need to do some tinkering.

But what about the rest of the Triumvirate?

Whenever I play Ynnari, I find myself desperately wanting to put the whole Triumvirate on the table simply because the models are so freaking gorgeous. Don’t let me stop you; both Yvraine and the Visarch have pretty solid datasheets.

The fact that the other two named Ynnari characters have not appeared in well-performing GT lists is not indicative of them being bad, but it probably is indicative of them not quite being optimal at least in this type of build. Yvraine is 50% more expensive than a foot farseer, which is a lot given that she has the same number of casts and can’t access Runes of Fortune. Theoretically this is offset by her durability bonus and free rerolls as well as a pretty solid melee profile, but problem here is that most players want access to Ghostwalk, Focus Will, and maybe even Crushing Orb with the Farseer that Yvraine would replace- and the Yncarne and Hemlock already have the Revenant Discipline covered. As for her durability and melee output? They are good, but unlikely to see much use on the table as she isn’t a front line fighter, and paying more for an asset you rarely use generally isn’t good list design.

The Visarch is a decent combat character for his points, but he is slow and doesn’t bring enough utility to justify the expense when for a few more points you could get an entire squad of Banshees or Shining Spears.

If you really want to use the Triumvirate in an Alpha Strike list, however, you might consider sticking Yvraine and the Visarch in a Falcon with four foot Warlocks and sending them in with your initial team to really mess things up. The new 2” engagement range in ruins makes the charge from deepstrike a little easier, and if you have a reroll in your back pocket you should be able to deliver at least one of the characters into the fray first turn. This way you are making use of their melee potential as well as Yvraine’s psychic powers, which can be especially useful if the Yncarne is keeping its head down on the first turn.

I am not advocating for this as the best competitive move, but I will say that in his first iteration of this list Chase Chapelle had a Farseer and team of Warlocks do exactly what I just suggested with considerable success. I plan to at least experiment with this build in pseudo competitive play.

Are the unique Ynnari relic and warlord trait any good? What about the stratagem?

The Warlord Trait “Warden of Souls” enables the recipient to regain one wound in your Command Phase, and gives the Warlord +1 attacks and +1 Strength while within engagement range of an enemy unit below full strength. This would be good if you could give it to the Yncarne, but like the Avatar of Khaine, the Yncarne cannot have relics or Warlord Traits. If you are running a combat character like and Autarch or even a Troop Master, this isn’t a bad pick, but now that you have to pay a CP for the first Warlord trait it probably isn’t worth it in most lists.

The Relic, The Lost Shroud, is a bit better. It reduces incoming damage by one and gives +1 to armor saves made against attacks with an unmodified damage profile of 1. The problem here is whom to give it to. If you are taking a combat Autarch Skyrunner you are better off selecting the Aegis of Eldanesh which provides the same damage reduction and provides +1 to the armor save against all attacks regardless of the damage profile. If you are running the Visarch or Yvraine as a frontline combat character this is viable although you will generally rely on killing anything they engage with a first strike. The shroud could be a decent pick for a Troupe Master of Succubus, but you may find you need the CP elsewhere, and it may not increase the survivability of those relatively fragile characters to really be worth it. Never say never though; I can at least imagine this being a solid addition to the right list.

The unique Ynnari stratagem, “Inevitable Fate,” costs 1CP and provides +1 to wound for a specific unit attacking and enemy squad that is below half strength. When it’s possible to use this and the annihilation of what remains of the enemy unit is not already a forgone conclusion, and you aren’t attacking with Banshees or DCannons that already wound most infantry on a 2+, this is good. It can be especially good against large units of CSM terminators dominating the center of the board, but if I am honest, it’s so situational that I struggle to remember to use it.

What if I just want to play Ynnari casually?
Then you should do exactly that! The purpose of this video is not to try an persuade you to play death elves competitively, only to provide some information and commentary on what has been working for skilled players in tournament settings.

If you are an exclusively casual player, you might consider cherry-picking one or two ideas from this article to improve the combat readiness of your otherwise highly narrative Ynnari force.

I will say that trying to lean into the +1 to hit bonus for units below starting strength by running large squads is a total trap. With the possible exception of wraith infantry, War Walkers, and perhaps Voidweavers, this bonus rarely comes up and when it does, its usually only good for another 1 or 2 hits. A big unit of Dire Avengers emerging from a destroyed Wave Serpent might be able to use this to capitalize big on their shoot twice stratagem if one of them doesn’t survive, but that is not something you should be trying to make happen. The +1 is nice to have when you have it, but not something to build around.

Instead, if you want to emphasize the Ynnari lore and special rules in your list, consider running multiple patrols so that you can soup in Drukhari Reavers and Hellions alongside Banshees, Shinning Spears, Harlequin Troops, and Skyweavers. This will give you a fast, hard-hitting, unit-trading oriented force well balanced for casual play that also tells a clear story on the table. Bonus points if you build your models using the unhelmeted heads included in some new Asuryani kits, as surviving the battle is not a priority for the space else death cult.

Obviously you should also consider bringing the whole Triumverate if you are playing casually; their mere presence on the table tells a great story.

Wrap Up

So that’s it!

If you are interested in learning more about Chase Chapelle’s Ynnari lists, you can hear an interview he did on the Swedish Ynnari podcast, “The Reborn:” https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-reborn/id1548480702?i=1000575741354

If you are interested in talking Ynnari with fans of my blog and channel, you might consider following the link on my main page to become a Patron. You will earn access to my Discord channel and enjoy early access to videos on Youtube.

Best wishes in all your creepy death-elf exploits,

Brent