The Aeldari are a proud race, facing their inevitable doom with tenacity and determination. They are like a sudden storm in battle – striking quickly and furiously, and retreating before their enemies can begin to respond.
They deploy a combination of powerful psykers who read the skeins of fate to predict the outcome of combat, soldiers who have walked martial paths that grant them skills beyond human ken, hardy walking constructs piloted by the souls of long-dead warriors, and lightning-fast anti-gravity bikes and tanks.
With a wide variety of iconic units, the Aeldari have a feast of options for new players. It can be a little hard to know where to start – so we’ve prepared a comprehensive guide to all things Aeldari for prospective fans to get stuck in. This covers everything, including their history and their heroes, where to start with collecting an army, how to paint your models, and much more besides.
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The Aeldari are an ancient and once-proud race whose hubris caused their demise. As their civilisation reached new heights of technology and culture, and they came to dominate the galaxy around them, they began to seek stranger and darker pleasures.
A psychic species, their activities began to leave a shadow in the immaterial realm of the Warp, and eventually they reached such collective heights of indulgence that their revels birthed Slaanesh, a new Chaos god of excess. The resulting psychic shockwave reverberated through Aeldari space, killing untold millions and leaving their empire in ruins.
A few forward-thinking groups of Aeldari managed to avoid the Fall, building vast spaceships called Craftworlds and escaping their increasingly debased kin. Known as the Asuryani, these refugees have lived a precarious existence in the millennia since the coming of Slaanesh, preserving a more austere way of life and guarding against another calamity.
Other groups of Aeldari cling to existence, including the Harlequins – who travel the Webway (an ancient network of safe* tunnels through the warp) acting as diplomats, performers, and mercenaries, and the Ynnari – who worship the half-reborn god of death as a means to finally thwart Slaanesh and recapture the Aeldari souls it ate during the Fall.
There’s a rich vein of fiction to explain the Aeldari in more detail. Gav Thorpe’s landmark omnibus, Path of the Eldar, covers many aspects of the Aeldari, while Ghost Warrior explores the newly formed Ynnari faction, and The Masque of Vyle focuses on the Harlequins.
On the tabletop, the Aeldari are a force to be reckoned with. They command incredible psychic powers thanks to the all-powerful Farseers and the conclaves of Warlocks that support them. These potent heroes work together to devastate their opponents while buffing their army’s core of swift infantry.
Speed and precision are the name of the game, as most Aeldari units – from Aspect Warriors to Fire Prisms – can move fast and hit hard, but can’t weather much return fire. Aeldari armies are highly mobile, a specialised scalpel that can bring down a much more powerful opponent by careful application of incredible force.
There are many elite units which excel at one battlefield role, rewarding an observant commander who can be flexible on the fly. Harlequins must be used with even more precision – they’re faster and deadlier yet as they caper across the warzone, but their only real armour is surprise.
The Codex is the most crucial thing for any Aeldari player to own, and the latest edition is the most comprehensive ever – a 200-page tome covering every aspect of the faction. You’ll find pages of history and background, displays of gorgeous miniatures and painting tips, and all the rules you need.
It contains all the datasheets for dozens of heroes, vehicles, units, monsters, and more – as well as specialised wargear, stratagems, psychic powers, and other tricks you need to get the most out of the Aeldari. There are special rules for many of the most famous Craftworlds and Harlequin Troupes, each of which has their own strengths and quirks.
On top of that, you’ll get all you need to run more diverse armies than ever before, with combined hosts of Asuryani, Ynnari, and Harlequins. The Aeldari have always been a multifaceted race, but now they’re bringing their full strength to bear and you can demonstrate that on the tabletop like never before.
Then there’s the Crusade section, which is a cool way to grow and develop your army as you play games, as units earn experience and gain new skills and armaments. Tell epic stories of conflict and triumph as you blood a force of fresh troops and mould them into hardened veterans armed with legendary relics of war.
There’s plenty of guidance on how to paint your chosen subfaction, as well as fascinating lore on their histories, victories, and defeats.
When you create an army, you begin by choosing one of three main subfactions in the Aeldari books – Asuryani, Ynnari, or Harlequins.
While different Aeldari armies might choose to focus on specific aspects of the combat arts, they have a host of iconic units at their disposal. These are likely to be some of your mainstays.
Farseer
It is rare to see an Aeldari warhost without a Farseer present to guide it. These immensely powerful psykers lead the armies of their craftworld, scrying the tendrils of the future with the help of arcane runes and psychic mastery. They maximise the natural skills and power of the Aeldari, and they hinder their foes with stupefying magics and eldritch storms.
Guardian Hosts
Every Aeldari is ready to lay down their life to fight for the survival of their people, picking up a shuriken cannon to fight as Guardian Defenders, or close-combat weapons as Storm Guardians. These are versatile warriors, gifted with the natural grace and speed of the Aeldari, and aided by support platforms that carry heavy weapons or defensive shields into battle.
Aspect Warriors
As a means of calming their tempestuous emotions and keeping their ancient enemy at bay, most Aeldari devote themselves to specialised Paths, on which they hone one skill, sometimes to the point of obsession. Aspect Warriors are the Aeldari who walk the martial paths. Each Aspect Shrine is built around the teachings of a Phoenix Lord, legendary figures inspired by the various ways the Aeldari god of War, Khaela Mensa Khaine, engaged in battle.
Among the scariest of the Aspect Warriors are the Howling Banshees. These elite combatants use quicksilver swordplay and terrifying banshee masks – arcane wargear that amplifies their battlecries into a psychosonic weapon, incapacitating anyone within earshot.
Avatar of Khaine
Aeldari warriors emulate the various warlike aspects of Khaela Mensha Khaine in battle, but each Craftworld holds a terrible secret in its heart. There is a chamber which contains an Avatar of Khaine, a molten metal statue which contains a still-living shard of the defeated warrior god. In times of war, this shard is awakened and set aflame. This colossus of battle bestrides the battlefield, a living god that scythes down its foes by the score.
Wraithlord
The Aeldari are a long-lived race, but in the aftermath of the Fall, they faced a slow demise, and a horrifying afterlife – for Slaanesh has staked its claim on each Aeldari soul in death. In response, the Asuryani bound themselves to soulstones, which capture their souls at their deaths to prevent Slaanesh from taking them. In times of great need, these soulstones are embedded in wraithbone constructs, so that the dead can bolster the armies of the living. There are many such constructs, including the mighty Wraithlord, the towering Wraithknight, and beyond.
Fire Prism
Even Aeldari engines of war are swift and agile, including tanks like the Fire Prism, which uses an intricate crystalline matrix to focus energy into either destructive pinpoint spears of light that can pierce the most formidable armour or deadly blasts that can obliterate hordes of armoured infantry.
Harlequins
Some Aeldari choose to relinquish the shackles of Craftworlds, finding themselves drawn to the whimsical ways of the Harlequin. Followers of Cegorach, the Aeldari god of deception, art, and trickery, Harlequins are warrior-artists, each obfuscating step in a battle part of a deadly dance.
Your Warhammer army is your chance to create a work of art, and the Aeldari are perfect candidates for a tour de force of painting. The five primary Craftworlds are represented by iconic colour schemes such as the green-and-white thorn motif of Biel-tan, to the morbid black-and-bone of Ulthwe, a craftworld that sits on the precipice of the Eye of Terror.
The Ynnari prefer a regal blood-red-and-black livery, and the Harlequins present some of the most fabulous canvases in Warhammer 40,000, both for patterning and freehand.
No matter how you prefer to paint, Warhammer has a whole host of guides to specific colour schemes, as well as general advice and instructions on all sorts of techniques, so that you can learn to paint your miniatures to Battle Ready or Parade Ready standard. Check out the Citadel Colour site for a list of relevant guides.
For those who want to up their painting game to the top levels, there are lots of cool, specific videos on Warhammer+. The expert painters on Citadel Colour Masterclass show you how to paint things like the crystalline power blades wielded by Farseers and Autarchs, the glossy soulstones that all Asuryani wear, or the textured leather preferred by the Rangers.
There’s plenty more to learn about the ancient race of the Aeldari beyond this. Get started with a copy of Codex: Aeldari and you can help a doomed civilisation fight against their seemingly inevitable fate.
* Well, safe-ish.
