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I recently played at a Feast of Blades qualifier event and my Battle Reports of each game can be found below:
http://yriel.blogspot.com/2013/07/1850-feast-of-blades-qualifier.html

Another great outing for Eldar. I am not surprised at all. Eldar, Tau and Taudar/Eldau are top-notch armies.

But can they dethrone the crons?

If you can beat my necrons, then your army will have what it takes to win the Golden Throne.

Good luck!

Well, perhaps we can get a game in between your Necrons and my Eldar/Tau sometime this weekend and see what happens!? I will be driving up Thursday and will be free for a game later on Friday =).

Sounds good. I can do Friday. I'll PM you.

It seems like the dark reapers + tau commander make a pretty deadly combo (especially with the psychic buffs). Have opponents picked up on its potential, or do you get a couple of rounds of shooting in before they realise (to their peril). Also any suggestions to countering it?

 CaptainJay wrote:
It seems like the dark reapers + tau commander make a pretty deadly combo (especially with the psychic buffs). Have opponents picked up on its potential, or do you get a couple of rounds of shooting in before they realise (to their peril). Also any suggestions to countering it?

It seems like a lot of opponents go "ok Tau Commander does all that cool stuff...Dark reapers meh..." and it seems like they assume the Tau Commander is going with the Broadsides, especially when I start the game with the Commander joined to the Broadsides...

Then I move the Commander to the Dark Reapers and basically wipe something off the board and they go "really, those rules can affect Eldar?" when it's pretty clear cut that they do. So yeah, once they realize the firepower of that unit they either try to kill it but are frustrated by Tau Commander tanking shots or the fact that they can Hit & Run out of combat so eventually they try tohide from it.

To counter it, I dunno...One reason I keep my unit in a Serpent when I deploy is so that first turn anyone with a similar combo can't kill the Reapers without taking out their Serpent first so I hope to get the jump on that combo myself... Otherwise, 2+ armor can withstand that unit pretty well or anything with a decent Invul.

Thanks for sharing. While I really like the Eldar/Tau ally, I'm finding it hard to take things out of my list. I really like the Dark Reaper shooting and the fact the Tau Commander also has Night Vision, thus transferring to the Reapers. This didn't come up in your games, but it can be a nasty surprise for folks who think they are starting the game out of range of the Reapers.

Great report and nice terrain at that particular store. Lucky players.

 mortetvie wrote:

 CaptainJay wrote:
It seems like the dark reapers + tau commander make a pretty deadly combo (especially with the psychic buffs). Have opponents picked up on its potential, or do you get a couple of rounds of shooting in before they realise (to their peril). Also any suggestions to countering it?

It seems like a lot of opponents go "ok Tau Commander does all that cool stuff...Dark reapers meh..." and it seems like they assume the Tau Commander is going with the Broadsides, especially when I start the game with the Commander joined to the Broadsides...

Then I move the Commander to the Dark Reapers and basically wipe something off the board and they go "really, those rules can affect Eldar?" when it's pretty clear cut that they do. So yeah, once they realize the firepower of that unit they either try to kill it but are frustrated by Tau Commander tanking shots or the fact that they can Hit & Run out of combat so eventually they try to hide from it.

To counter it, I dunno...One reason I keep my unit in a Serpent when I deploy is so that first turn anyone with a similar combo can't kill the Reapers without taking out their Serpent first so I hope to get the jump on that combo myself... Otherwise, 2+ armor can withstand that unit pretty well or anything with a decent Invul.

HnR is from vectored retro-thrusters right? Is it testing on the Commanders intiative or the squads? I feel I need to get a tau book/brush up on their special tricks before my next tournament :-P

I guess stunning/shaking the wave serpent so the DR are snap firing could work (though would be very tricky with the serpent shield). I also assume you have the Tau commander at the front to tank the saves? I was thinking ignores cover (specifically the TFC) might do alright on forcing lots of wounds on the DRs but that 4W 2+ save might be a problem :-P

I guess you can hope you roll badly to wound, or just aim to get something into combat to kill the DRs asap (the commander isn't as scary if they aren't around). The only other thing I've thought off is to hide out of LOS but that's not exactly a great strategy :-P

Yes, N & R is from vectored retro-thrusters and I think it's a great upgrade to toss around any Eldar unit.

Stunning/shaking a Serpent would be good, except there is the whole getting through AV12/Cover and the Serpent Shield so that is not the most reliable. They are very likely to get the first turn jump on anything from their Serpent IMO.

Barrage weapons such as the Warp Hunter scare me (and there will be a few of those at the Golden Throne GT I am going to this weekend) but hopefully I can take those out asap and they don't do too much damage...I guess just stick the Reapers in Area Terrain and enjoy a 3+ cover from Conceal.

All in all, there are ways to deal with it (the Reaper unit), it just takes a lot of effort IMO.

 CaptainJay wrote:

HnR is from vectored retro-thrusters right? Is it testing on the Commanders intiative or the squads? I feel I need to get a tau book/brush up on their special tricks before my next tournament :-P

I guess stunning/shaking the wave serpent so the DR are snap firing could work (though would be very tricky with the serpent shield). I also assume you have the Tau commander at the front to tank the saves? I was thinking ignores cover (specifically the TFC) might do alright on forcing lots of wounds on the DRs but that 4W 2+ save might be a problem :-P

I guess you can hope you roll badly to wound, or just aim to get something into combat to kill the DRs asap (the commander isn't as scary if they aren't around). The only other thing I've thought off is to hide out of LOS but that's not exactly a great strategy :-P

H&R is testing on the model with the highest Init in the unit.

Frankly, I would normally just ignore the DR and go for the rest of the army. If you don't have anything that can kill them efficiently, then don't bother. There are plenty of other units in the army - spiders, walkers, wave serpents, troops - worth killing.

 jy2 wrote:

H&R is testing on the model with the highest Init in the unit.

Frankly, I would normally just ignore the DR and go for the rest of the army. If you don't have anything that can kill them efficiently, then don't bother. There are plenty of other units in the army - spiders, walkers, wave serpents, troops - worth killing.

This. Been using a similar combo lately, and recently had a Guard player fire 800+ points at the unit 2 turns in a row, and all that got him was the commander at 1W and both shield drones dead to tanking STR 10 shots.


Unless you have a lot of Str 10 barrage, just plan on loosing a unit a turn to the reapers and move on. Kill everything else and be in position to take objectives, because the units biggest weakness is mobility and cost (350+ points is a sizable portion of an army). If you get big guns.......sorry.

Yeah, that is one reason I have a Wave Serpent for them, incase I need to relocate them or something. But otherwise, I love it when people focus on the unit to their detriment.