Unit Profile: Doom Reavers

This is a very interesting unit, interesting both in their background and what they are capable of in terms of table top performance. Doom Reavers can either devestate an opponent's army or be taken apart piece by piece before even reaching the opponent's army.

Statswise Doom Reavers have the same speed as most regular infantry, good MAT, giving a relatively good chance to hit most models, however the DEF, ARM and CMD are somewhat on the low side meaning that the unit tends to be fiarly easy to hit and kill as well as limiting their ability to spread too far, which can be something of a liability once you look at their abilities.



Firstly the Reavers are Fearless, which is great considering their ability Abomination (causing friendly and enemy models within the same distance as the width of a Bombard shot), this works well given their ability to Advance Deploy, meaning they will deloy ahead of the main body of your army meaning that this ability will probably be more of a worry for your opponent than you. A very useful ability that aids the unit in surviving to get across the board is Spell Ward, effectively making it impossible to effect Doom Reavers with spells (it is still possible to hit them with any spell not specifically targetting them (deviating AoE spells or CTRL spells for example), this also means you can't buff them outside of feats making them a good choice to field with either Butcher. The best and worst ability of the Doom Reavers ability is Beserk, when a model (Beasts and Jacks included) is destroyed the model immediatly makes an additonal melee attack at another model in melee range. If you get into melee with your Reavers, ensure they're at outside of reach range of each other otherwise you could find yourself running out of enemies and start chopping your own men to pieces, (unless you take the UA or Fenris as both grant Silence).

Each Reaver comes with a Fellblade which comes with Reach and Magical Weapon (very nice as a counter to Cryxian Wraiths and other Incorporeal models) as well as Weapon Master, which makes Doom Reavers even more devastsating against most models unlucky to find themselves on the sharp end of the sword, given that on the charge Reavers get 4d6 of damage, causing on average 7 damage to a regular Khadoran Jack which opens up the option of taking a unit that can mince most infantry (even shield walled infantry to some extent) as well as wrecking warjacks or half wrecking a collossal.

In terms of tactics, one idea is to use eIrusk with a line of Shield walled Man O War Shocktroopers as a screen for the Doom Reavers, as they can then charge through the Man O Wars due to Martial Discipline. Alternatively you could field a unit (with a UA to grant Tough if you want to increase the chances of the Reavers getting to where they are going) and have a model putting down smoke in front of the unit (Torch, Gorman Di Wulfe or Greylord Ternions to name a few), or fielding two units sticking close to Fenris to ensure that Beserk only happens when you want it to. Ultimately Doom Reavers can be a great intimidation tool if you are willing to pay for them be that, alternatively if you wish to use them as a front line unit it is highly recommended that you find a way to shield them and deliver them to the frontline using another unit to soak up the damage. Overall a risky unit, but well worth the points if they can get to the opponent.