Eldar vs Chaos Demons and Dark Eldar - Prematch thoughts

Finally, the epic 2000pt battle that Ruben and I scheduled a couple of weeks ago is upon us.

Going into the game, I'm looking at the performance of my smaller army against those Chaos Demons for inspiration. My initial thought was that the nastiest unit in Ruben's army has to be the Skull Cannon - it killed my Rangers and took a bite out of my Harlequins. But thinking about it a bit more, the Pink Horrors killed a War Walker, all my Swooping Hawks and four Dire Avengers - arguably a scarier unit. Luckily they only have a 24" range. How to combat them then?

Taking a leaf out of Alex's book, I decided that Scatter Lasers are a good addition. This is especially true when my Vyper with a missile launcher did nothing with the single shot - I was hoping that the additional 3 shots per Vyper (I'm taking 2) will prove more useful. People will argue that Walkers are a better option but I like to challenge myself and popular opinion.

Another addition to my army is Dark Reapers - I love them and Ruben hates them (from our last Eldar vs. Space Marine game). If Skarbrand appears in range, he will be their main target. Another benefit of Dark Reapers is the Exarch's Crack Shot power which ignores cover saves and allows re-rolls to wound - both of these are especially important if the girly Pink Horrors decide to go-to-ground like they did in the last game. That and the Tempest Launcher is a S4 Heavy 2 blast weapon - good against T3 targets.

My Harlequin's have been benched in favour of Howling Banshees and Striking Scorpions - the Howling Banshees have War Shout which will be fun against the Khorne Demons (a failed Leadership test means the enemy has WS1) while Scorpions can appear out of nowhere, have S4 and an extra attack. I'm not looking at getting into too much close combat after Eldrad's fate but it's good to have the option there if needed.

The Swooping Hawks are back and joined by the Warp Spiders for both anti-tank and anti-infantry deep-strike options. They will be joined by my Autarch with Swooping Hawk wings and a Death Spinner. I'm still undecided as to which unit he will join.

With the addition of Jetbikes, I will hopefully be able to grab a point for line-breaker and steal any objectives if the opportunity arises (and I haven't stupidly rushed them forwards to die a very fast death).

Finally, a Wraithlord will be Eldrad's personal bodyguard. The scatter laser is a good ranged option and if Skarbrand makes an appearance without suffering a deep-strike mishap (unlikely but possible) it will hopefully remove a few wounds alongside the dual flamers.

I'm sure Ruben will have his own thoughts and tactics so I'll leave the mess that is Chaos Demons and Dark Eldar for him to clean up.