It's official: 5th Edition makes all armies tougher!

[IBBoard]

Okay, so GW aren't going to say "yes, we're sorry, the new rules don't actually benefit you if you play race X", but the White Dwarf article that is an intro to each race (in UK issue 343) is a bit odd.

In summary:

• Imperial Guard are tougher because vehicles are "harder to destroy", the troops are cheap so you get lots of points left over for non-Troop units after you've taken enough Troop choices to easily capture objectives, and the stop to consolidating in to another combat you get an extra round of shooting
• Tyranids are tougher because their troops come back on to the board after they're destroyed and Troops are now the game focus, close assault will be more effective for them against vehicles, and the deep strike will be more effective
• Space Marines have tough core troops, benefit from the deep strike (especially Terminators and Assault Marines) and their tough transporters can now run backwards and forwards to ferry different troops
• Chaos Marines now get Chaos god worshipping troops as core Troops, plus everything that applies to Space Marines
• Chaos Daemons benefit from the deep-strike rules and the "run instead of shooting" option lets the nasty beasties close with the enemy much faster
• Necrons now have even more powerful troops (they are the only units that can capture things and they regenerate) plus the Monolith's all-round armour of 14 means it doesn't suffer under the new "assaulting a vehicle" rules
• Eldar gain from the cover saves as well as having "hardier vehicles", improved sniping and the "allowance for more attacks to be rolled in combat...[aids]...the Eldar way of fighting"
• Dark Eldar also gain from the cover saves and can now more easily use the saves with their vehicles
• Orks gain from the running in the assault phase (more time fightin'!) and the extra pile-in move before combat (more boyz fightin'!). They also gain from not having to bail from a penetrated vehicle, as well as (apparently) having slightly tougher vehicles with the new tables. Ramming other vehicles should be fun and characterful, if potentially self-destructive!
• The Tau railguns are now more effective against vehicles, the run move helps them position/evade better, and the lack of consolidating in to combat gives them more pulse rifle shots

The reason I quoted sections about harder vehicles is because as I understand it they might be tougher against shooting with the modified vehicle hit table (there's no longer glance and penetrate) but an armour 13 fronted Guard tank is going to be worse off in combat as it'll now be armour 11 instead.

Overall, GW say every race gains. That's quite an achievement for a rule set!

I can see some of the benefits - like better/more Troops in a more Troops focused edition - but I'm not so sure about combat being better for the Eldar. Yes, the full unit of specialists (including the Striking Scorpion exarch with power fist) get to fight no matter how the casualties are removed. How, though, are the Eldar not going to get pummelled for being lightly armoured and having the enemy get a 6" pile-in move?