Shining Spears
SWORD: what Shining Spears kills
Damage for its points
per 100 pts spent
Its 100 pts kill ~114 pts in one activation.Typical melee unit: 55 per 100
Best against heavy vehicles and monsters, weakest against hordes
Into each enemy type
Units near it by SWORD
Across the game· melee units
SHIELD: how hard Shining Spears is to kill for its points
Toughness for its points
per 100 pts spent
Its 100 pts take ~214 pts of enemy units to kill.Typical melee unit: 307 per 100
Units near it by SHIELD
Across the game· melee units
What reviewers say
5 reviewers- Fast trade pieces that clear the midboard 3 of 5
- Work in many detachments 1 of 5
- Reliable positioning for the charge 1 of 5
- Punch into vehicles and monsters 1 of 5
- Fragile once caught in the open 1 of 5
- Swingy on few attacks 1 of 5
Compare
| Unit | Letter | SWORD | SHIELD | Lists |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shining Spears100 pts | A | Top 1% | Bottom 11% | 34of 112 |
| Skyweavers90 pts | C | Top 27% | Bottom 31% | 7of 112 |
| Dragon Knights85 pts | A | Top 3% | Top 43% | 16of 112 |
How we got these numbers
What we ran
Shining Spears, 3 models, 100 pts, with 2 Laser Lance, 2 Laser Lance (melee), 1 Shuriken Cannon, 1 Star Lance, 1 Star Lance (melee), 2 Twin Shuriken Catapult, in Aspect Host (Path of the Warrior: Re-roll hit 1s). On its own: no leader, no stratagems, no other units' auras. Counted as dice: the detachment's rule.
SWORD
Enemy points it kills in one activation, per 100 pts of its own, against a mix of targets weighted like top tournament lists.
100 pts → kills ~114 pts → 114 per 100SHIELD
Enemy points it takes to kill it, per 100 pts of its own: the points of the cheapest units from top lists that kill it 80% of the time. It's per point, so a costly unit has to be much tougher to score the same.
~214 pts → 214 per 100Top and bottom %
Where each number ranks among the game's 572 melee units. How we score.
The letter
The average of 7 reviewers' newest Aeldari tier lists: Proxy Hammer (post-dataslate unit tier list) (8 Oct), CraftworldEldar (meta watch of the best lists, dataslate review, starter guide) (17 Oct), Goonhammer / tabletopbattles.com (Competitive Innovations: 9 winning lists and 10 summaries, and the September balance review) (17 Oct), Battleborn 40k (dataslate points review with the channel's Aeldari player) (4 Oct), 6 Plus Plus Gaming (detachment tier list) (29 Oct), Night Geist Gaming (five of his own lists, run through a damage tool) (27 Oct), 1d6chan (community 11th-edition tactics wiki) (2 Oct). A reviewer who would rather not be counted: tell us.
Lists
112 public Aeldari tournament lists, September – November 2026, from grimstat-corpus (CC BY 4.0). Also from Listhammer. Organisers and players: ask us and we'll take a list or an event down. Numbers run 2 Nov.