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So, before I go in to any in depth articles, thoughts, whatever, I'm going to post up these two skaven lists I use (or use some variation of). They're both 2000 points, but both play pretty differently. Mainly, one is a lot shootier.
So, here's the first list.
Skaven 2000 Point Monster Mash
Lord
Verminlord
500
Heroes
Warlock Engineer
Level 1 Wizard (Ruin)
Doomrocket
Warp-Energy Condenser
115
Chieftan
Shield
47
Chieftan
BSB
Storm Banner
120
Core
55 Slaves
Musician
112
55 Slaves
Musician
112
55 Slaves
Musician
112
20 Slaves
Slings
Musician
52
20 Slaves
Slings
Musician
52
30 Slaves
Musician
62
Special
4 Jezzails
80
4 Jezzails
80
4 Jezzails
80
Rare
Hellpit Abomination
235
Hellpit Abomination
235
Ok, so this is list one. It basically plays on target priority. It's very difficult to down a Verminlord and 2 Hellpits. I originally ran more troops, 2 hellpits and a grey seer, but the Verminlord actually fits in here really well. This list is pretty much push em up, with all the interesting plays coming from the Verminlord. He plays like a Daemon Prince. But if you roll things like Pestilient Breath and Vermintide, he's actually a really good (and nasty) unit. Very fragile though. However the storm banner is here to help! Rest should be pretty self explanitory. The Jezzails are only there because nothing else in the list can really deal with things like Chaos Knights/other good save units well. Same goes for big killy monsters. The slave slingers are being tested at the moment. If I don't like them I'm going to take 6 warlock engineers, or maybe 4 units of giant rats and 4 engineers. Something like that anyway. Small redirection/annoyance unit. I am also very easy to take out in Blood and Glory, but I want to test that scenario, as I reckon it'd be difficult to get to my characters if they're bunkered up. Depends whether or not they can assassinate me with magic. One Power Scrolled Fate of Bjuna and I could lose right there. Playtesting on that required, otherwise i'm going to throw in some cheap standards.
On to the second list. This one I'm still not so sure about, but I have a feeling I'm going to enjoy testing it.
Lord
Grey Seer
Power Scroll
275
Heroes
Warlock Engineer
Level 1 Wizard
Doomrocket
Warp-Energy Condenser
115
Chieftan
BSB
70
Core
20 Slaves
Slings
50
20 Slaves
Slings
Musician
52
20 Slaves
Slings
Musician
52
50 Slaves
Musician
102
50 Slaves
Musician
102
50 Slaves
Musician
102
10 Stormvermin
Standard
Poisoned Wind Mortar
145
10 Stormvermin
Standard
Poisoned Wind Mortar
145
Special
5 Poisoned Wind Globadiers
Poisoned Wind Mortar
115
5 Gutter Runners
Slings
65
5 Gutter Runners
Slings
65
5 Gutter Runners
Slings
65
Rare
Warp Lightning Cannon
90
Warp Lightning Cannon
90
Doomwheel
150
Doomwheel
150
2000
This list is pretty damn shooty. All told. It's again fairly self explanatory, but my playstyle prefers the first list. Although I do love (and I mean absolutely love) the Warp Lightning Cannons. They are amazing. Fantastic, easily one of the best skaven units this edition. Still, I can tell this list is rough, and playtesting will definitely sand out a fair few edges with it.
So there we go. I'm going to be tailoring and working on list #1 first of all. It just suits me more.
180 models? No thanks I'd have to sell my house to field that
ReplyDeleteThe top list has a lot of problems. It looks like fun, but you have immediate problems in Battle for the Pass and as you mentioned, Blood and Glory. You can probably handle the Watchtower, but only with your HPAs and then you have to hope that you can hold it with a Slave unit that is Ld6 with a re-roll. Not exactly great.
ReplyDeleteI would definitely look into putting some Gutter Runners into that list to take out enemy shooting or at least delay it a bit. Nothing will ruin your day quicker than 30 DE RxBs and Shades killing the Vermin Lord T1 and a HPA every turn after that.
Your second list is much better. I have not tried PWGs in this edition, so I can't comment there, but I suspect you would be happier with another unit of Gutter Runners, or bumping up the size of your existing units.
I have tried dual wheels in 8th edition with a similar list, and have not had much success. The wheels charge forward, while you want to stand back and shoot, which leaves the wheels exposed.
Stelek on YTTH posted several very sneaky Skaven armies - among them there is one made solely of figures from 4 Island of Blood boxes (buy two boxes and trade High Elves for Skaven models) - there were 8 units of 10 stormvermin (clanrats with spears) with weapon teams attached, two times 40 clanrats (or one bigass 80 clanrats unit), two times 4 rat ogres with 2 packmasters - that lot gives circa 1900pts, and you have 4 engineers, 4 warlocks models which can be converted to anything from grey seers to assasins, bringing it to 2500pts.
ReplyDeleteFor VERY cheap :)
You can upgrade it with rare machines or hellpit abominations etc. as it pleases you.
@ GSMN. Yeah I feel your pain. I'm going to buy a tonne of Skaven Battleforces and just convert it all in to slaves.
ReplyDelete@ jollyboy42. You're very correct, it does have a lot of problems. However, currently I'm trying to actually get more people in my local to play scenarios, so I don't have those problems yet. I've only played Blood and Glory once, and it was when I was playing a MSU build (like the 2nd one but with no slaves or BSB, and more units). I'm actually going to put up another post tonight updating the Verminlord list, as this thread was mostly just to give me a leg in the door, and evoke some discussion. Which it has done, so mission accomplished! If I had to bet though, my money would be on list 2.
As to the RxBs killing my dudes, I have the Storm Banner in that list. And the Verminlord is tiny. But lets see how they like hitting on 7s anyway.
PWGs aren't very good. They're not bad... they're just not good. They're a good redirector, and they bring my the cheapest PWM in the whole army, which is the main reason they're there.
What I've been trying lately is moving them at acute angles diagonally, so they don't move very far forward turn 1. Alternatively, you can deploy them 6" from the board edge. Whichever works best in your current situation.
@ lehcyfer. I saw that list, I was already running something pretty similar beforehand. But honestly, while I respect Stelek as a good player, I don't see why that's really relevant, other than bringing up the list, and in which case why not just post it?
In short, I don't get what point you're trying to make. :S
Anyway, list 1 and 2 are both getting work done to them currently, tonight I'm going to do a MSU army, but I can't decide if I want a close combat one or a shooting one. I genuinely think close combat is the way to go though, especially if I'm bringing along the storm banner. I know it usually (almost) only costs me a turn. But if it's turn 2 shooting, that can be a fucking devastating loss.
So it's probably going to be the combat list. Keep your eyes peeled!
All relevant info is on Stelek's blog, but what I posted is enough to start twiddling on the list. And Stelek himself didn't post an entire list but sketched roughly possible directions from the basic template.
ReplyDeleteI've brought up the 4IoB army as an example of monetary cheap but powerful skaven army (almost 200 models for the price of two IoB boxes). It was a reaction to GMSN comment that to field 180 models he would have to sell house :D
That army gets doubly interesting with the addition of Storm Banner which doesn't stop you from firing magical no BS weapons - namely the 4 warpfire throwers and 4 plague mortars that it fields. With some help of grey seers' skitterleaps they can wreak havoc from the turn one.
And please forgive me my zealotry as I'm just starting that army and my tail twitches in anticipation of the carnage it can unleash on its foes and itself :)
(ah those neophytes :P )
Ahhh ok, point taken. Well some quick feedback before I leave for work.
ReplyDeleteI played a list with 7x10 stormvermin + 8 Poisoned Wind Mortars, as well as 2WLC/2 Doomwheels etc, which is the skaven list I was referring to. It wasn't that great. Mortars are really only good against units of around 15 or more.
Also, the storm banner does hurt your no BS shooting, I refer you to the Skaven FAQ:
FAQ:http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1310260a_FAQ_Skaven_2010_v11.pdf
Ruling:Page 111 – Storm Banner
Add “One use only”. Change the start of the third sentence to
“All shooting attacks that don’t use BS [...]”.
So half of your stuff will be rolling 4+s to work =/ It's still worth taking as there's only a 50% chance it'll cost you a turn, and it almost never costs you two turns. Admittedly I've had it run all game, but still, that'll never happen again.
Oops they did cut it down in FAQ. Nevertheless with 8 weapon teams this theoretically gives you four shots which is still a lot.
ReplyDeleteWhat are your feelings about warpfire throwers then? Did you field only mortars because you don't like them? It seems to me that they are good deterrent from charging your units as they can stand and shoot as charge reaction.
And there's the skitterleap I've mentioned about earlier...
Sidenote: Oops I've read it carefully now and it says about transferring a single infantry character, so two models' weapon team, which is not a character, can't be moved... That shows the depth of my skaven knowledge :)
Oh and the Howling warpgale is something to think about as it doesn't influence Skaven shooting
ReplyDeleteHonestly though, if you are running that much shooting, the Storm Banner is not a good idea. I have been having good luck without the stormbanner and decent amounts of shooting.
ReplyDelete@lehcyfer - WFTs are about the same as they were in 7th edition. About 1/3 of the games they are the MVPs. The other 2/3 they do little for me, but the 1/3 makes them worth it. As far as Stand and Shoot with WFTs, that never works out.
Skitterleap, to my knowledge, only works on infantry characters, so you cannot skitterleap weapon teams. You can skitterleap an Engineer with the Doomrocket though.
I field WFTs every now and then. Lately I've been fielding one, because of what jollyboy said.
ReplyDeleteWarpgale isn't that potent, and isn't very reliable either (need to roll and cast it successfully).
Jolly, you are correct. In the shooting list the stormbanner "may" feature just cause of what it does to flyers. But it most probably wont.
Skitterleap only works on models on foot, that're one guy, pretty much. So no weapon teams.
Warpgale is useful for shutting down fliers though, but if someone wants to stop it, they probabaly can. I agree Warpgale is not useful for stopping shooting though.
ReplyDeleteTrue, but the only flyers I see around here with any regularity is a Manticore (meaning warpgale is getting stopped) and a hierophant with cloak of the dunes (which grounding wont do much to, and if it's important, he'll dispel it).
ReplyDeleteIt's definitely my least favourite spell in ruin.
Your first list is how I like to play. Im glad to finally hear of someone else that runs a vermin lord. If games are over 2000pts I never run without one. They do so much damage with both spells and melee. kill dragons before they get a chance to strike back. make big blocks of orcs run of table. or support my horde unit of storm vermin. which is the one thing that first list need I think. I Usually take a warp lightning cannon. a doom wheel 6x jezzails a hpa and a big block of 40/50 storm vermin. and then mainly all slave units. the jezzails always seem to make there points back. having one of every big nasty seems to balance out the nastys. its just a lot for an opponent to deal with. the few times the vermin lords gone down. then my big blocks of rats have ruined the opponents day.
ReplyDelete