8th Ed. All-Comers 2500 Tournament

[livewaaaaagh]

Hello all!

Looking at playing my first tournament with the lizardmen after spending most of 8th with Dwarfs. Here's a potential list. Looking for feedback.

Note: Since Lizardmen are somewhat new to me, I'm limited with models. I don't have Salamanders or Razordons yet, and the 24 skinks I have now are all I have.

List
1x Slaan w/ BSB (Banner of Eternal Flame), Harmonic, Reservoir, Soul of Stone, Wandering Del. + Channeling Staff.

1x Scar-Vet on Cold One. Dawnstone, enchanted shield, sword of striking
1x Scar-Vet on foot, Talis. of PReservation, GW, LA
1x Skink Priest, Lvl 2 of Heavens, Dispel Scroll

39x Saurus Warriors, HW/S, FC
12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)
12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)

1x Bastiladon, with Solar Engine
5x Chameleon Skinks
5x Cold One riders w/spears, FC
1x Stegadon w/Sharpened Horns
23x Temple Guard w/FC

2499pts.

Feedback is welcomed. Additional models include Carnosaur, Troglodon, Oldblood/Scar-vet on foot, and Stegadon can act as Ancient as well.

 

[Scalenex]

Solid balanced list. No glaring flaws, but I think a couple tweaks can make it slightly better.

12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)
12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)

If you are truly limited to 24 Skinks, I would recommend cutting your 2 x 12 Skinks to 2 x 10 Skinks. Though I see dropping 4 Skinks would cut you down to below the required 625 points spent on Core. That's a toughy. 2 x 12 is not bad, I just think 2 x 13 or 3 x 10 would be better. You could also take Patrol Leaders, mainly to protect a Skink priest with them or to pad your points expenditure on Core to 25%

13 Skinks is a magic number of Skinks. You need to lose 4 Skinks in one go in order for your opponent to force a panic test. 10 to 12 you need to lose 3 Skinks. That makes a bigger difference than you think.

The extra bodies for moving from 10 to 12 don't really add much.

1x Scar-Vet on Cold One. Dawnstone, enchanted shield, sword of striking
1x Scar-Vet on foot, Talis. of PReservation, GW, LA

The only way Lizardmen can get heavy armor is to buy magic heavy armor.

Gambler's Armor in lieu of the Talisman of Preservation and Light armor will get you the same ward save and a better armor save and save you a point.

Lets say you give Gambler's Armor to the Saurus Scar Veteran on foot.

If you say gave the Armor of Fortune (or Armor of Destiny) to your mounted Scar Veteran, you can get your Saurus a 1+ armor save and free up a hand to take a great weapon which will serve you better than a Sword of Striking against every army except Vampire Counts (who have a number of irksome units that can only be harmed by magical attacks).

1x Slaan w/ BSB (Banner of Eternal Flame), Harmonic, Reservoir, Soul of Stone, Wandering Del. + Channeling Staff.

Slann is spelled with one "a" two "n"s.

Reservoir of Eldritch Energy is nice to have but is not necessary. if you are hard pressed for points, I would ditch this. I believe Becalming Cognition is much more powerful, so if you can free up 5 points, I'd take that intead.

23x Temple Guard w/FC

If you have the models, boost it to 30 or as close to 30 as you can afford, points wise without sacrificing something big.

If you can free up the points, take the Standard of Discipline either for the Slann or the Temple Guard (the Banner of Eternal Flame is still a good idea give one to the Slann and one to the Temple Guard). The Standard of Discipline will boost your Slann's Ld to 10.

Sharpened Horns are nice to have, but are not required. I would rather have more Temple Guard, or the Standard of Discipline instead.

 

[livewaaaaagh]

Thank you for the feedback!

re: Skinks - Unfortunately, that's all I have (for now!)
Re: Armour for the Suaurs, I like you ideas, I'm going to try that out and see where I am with points.
Re: Slann - A good idea - might make that switch.
Re: Temple Guard: Unfortunately, I'm limited. I have 30 Temple guards and 32 Suarus, and I'm even having to put some TG as Saurus to reach the 2500.

Might remove the Sharpened Horns for the Standard at least. - thanks for that idea!

 

[Karnus]

I agree with most of the above points ^ the only exception is the sharpened horns.

And I would upgrade it to an ancient if you can get the points from somewhere. Reason being is sometimes you’ll need something to deal with monstrous infantry/cavalry. Those instant hitting, str6, d3 wounds are too good to pass up.

Of course this is wasted on regular infantry blocks and your steg will Be a cannon magnet, so keep it safe

 

[livewaaaaagh]

Quick question: I read one several threads on this site that most people don't fully recommend taking a Bastilodon on a WD Slann list because you likely won't have much use for the missile, given the 8 spells you have to work with. That prompted me to think about dropping him and instead going with a Troglodon for the roar (I do have 3 different Saurus with PF blocks, if you include the Cold ones).

I know they're not the most competitive, but in this case with plenty of PF and the extra dice to potentially channel (would be channeling 3 on 5, 2 on 6) and another arcane vassal, it might be worth it...

Thoughts?

 

[Karnus]

Quick question: I read one several threads on this site that most people don't fully recommend taking a Bastilodon on a WD Slann list because you likely won't have much use for the missile, given the 8 spells you have to work with. That prompted me to think about dropping him and instead going with a Troglodon for the roar (I do have 3 different Saurus with PF blocks, if you include the Cold ones).

I know they're not the most competitive, but in this case with plenty of PF and the extra dice to potentially channel (would be channeling 3 on 5, 2 on 6) and another arcane vassal, it might be worth it...

Thoughts?

You don’t take the bastiladon for it’s bound spell.

You take the bastiladon to force a dispel dice from your opponent.

Basically - you can throw 1 dice at the bound spell which will go off 66% of the time. It has a decent chance of doing a fair bit of damage, too much for your opponent to ignore. Because a spell/dispel always fails on a result of 1 or 2, you’re opponent will never risk throwing 1 dice to dispel in case his wizard fails and then breaks concentration and cannot dispel for the rest of the phase, so he will throw 2 dice at it.

More often than not you can burn two of his dispel dice at the cost of 1 of your power dice.

I normally take at least 1 bastiladon if I can, first thing I do every magic phase is throw a single dice at the bastiladon, it won’t always go off on 1 dice, but the gamble is worth it.

 

[livewaaaaagh]

I totally see where you're coming from and trust me, as a newbie lizard player I'm of course assuming your statement as fact. Having said that though, and only to play devil's advocate here: this all assumes successful magic phases. If we have low dice to begin with, or the winds of magic are not with us, the bastiladon provides the +1 initiative vs an extra channel, plus once-a-game roar. Does the extra initiative beat those 2 items in your mind?

 

[Scalenex]

agree with most of the above points ^ the only exception is the sharpened horns.

And I would upgrade it to an ancient if you can get the points from somewhere. Reason being is sometimes you’ll need something to deal with monstrous infantry/cavalry. Those instant hitting, str6, d3 wounds are too good to pass up.

He's not wrong, but if the Stegadon is unable to get the charge, the points spent on this upgrade sting mightily. Even so, he is probably right. Most of the time it's worth taking Sharpened Horns if you are not desperate for points.

If we have low dice to begin with, or the winds of magic are not with us, the bastiladon provides the +1 initiative vs an extra channel

If the Winds of Magic are unlucky, this makes the one die gamble on the Beam of Chotec more valuable, not less valuable.

the bastiladon provides the +1 initiative vs an extra channel

This bonus almost never matters because it boosts a Saurus' Intiative from 1 to 2 and a Skink's intiative from 4 to 5. The vast majority of things we fight that do not have Always Strikes Last or Always Strikes First has Intiative 3. So the bonus is useless for Saurus because it's not enough and the bonus is usless for Skinks because it is redundant.

The only time the bonus matters is when you are fighting Orcs and Goblins or when your enemy is forching you to test on Intiative with a magic spell.


So yeah, the extra channel is worth far more than than the passive bonus to Intiative. But the extra channel is in my opinion the ONLY good thing a Troglodon does. Their shooting is underwhelming and they fight very poorly compared to every other monster in the game and they are stil a cannon magnet. I think they would have to be given a 65 point reduction in points to be viable.

My problem (besides the points cost) with Troglodons is their primevil roar is hard to pull off well. I'm a perfectionist at heart, so I tend to try to set up the perfect situation to initiate the roar and aim to have the Troglodon boost three fights simulataneously and my Troglodon normally dies before that happens. So in reality, you usually want to use your roar immediately after your Temple Guard are engaged in close combat.

 

[Karnus]

He's not wrong, but if the Stegadon is unable to get the charge, the points spent on this upgrade sting mightily. Even so, he is probably right. Most of the time it's worth taking Sharpened Horns if you are not desperate for points.



If the Winds of Magic are unlucky, this makes the one die gamble on the Beam of Chotec more valuable, not less valuable.



This bonus almost never matters because it boosts a Saurus' Intiative from 1 to 2 and a Skink's intiative from 4 to 5. The vast majority of things we fight that do not have Always Strikes Last or Always Strikes First has Intiative 3. So the bonus is useless for Saurus because it's not enough and the bonus is usless for Skinks because it is redundant.

The only time the bonus matters is when you are fighting Orcs and Goblins or when your enemy is forching you to test on Intiative with a magic spell.


So yeah, the extra channel is worth far more than than the passive bonus to Intiative. But the extra channel is in my opinion the ONLY good thing a Troglodon does. Their shooting is underwhelming and they fight very poorly compared to every other monster in the game and they are stil a cannon magnet. I think they would have to be given a 65 point reduction in points to be viable.

My problem (besides the points cost) with Troglodons is their primevil roar is hard to pull off well. I'm a perfectionist at heart, so I tend to try to set up the perfect situation to initiate the roar and aim to have the Troglodon boost three fights simulataneously and my Troglodon normally dies before that happens. So in reality, you usually want to use your roar immediately after your Temple Guard are engaged in close combat.

I agree with all of the above ^

 

[livewaaaaagh]

fine... fine! I'll take the Bastilodon and report back after the tournament. hehe.

 

[airjamy]

Hello all!

Looking at playing my first tournament with the lizardmen after spending most of 8th with Dwarfs. Here's a potential list. Looking for feedback.

Note: Since Lizardmen are somewhat new to me, I'm limited with models. I don't have Salamanders or Razordons yet, and the 24 skinks I have now are all I have.

List
1x Slaan w/ BSB (Banner of Eternal Flame), Harmonic, Reservoir, Soul of Stone, Wandering Del. + Channeling Staff.

1x Scar-Vet on Cold One. Dawnstone, enchanted shield, sword of striking
1x Scar-Vet on foot, Talis. of PReservation, GW, LA
1x Skink Priest, Lvl 2 of Heavens, Dispel Scroll

39x Saurus Warriors, HW/S, FC
12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)
12x Skink Skirmishers (Javelins, shield)

1x Bastiladon, with Solar Engine
5x Chameleon Skinks
5x Cold One riders w/spears, FC
1x Stegadon w/Sharpened Horns
23x Temple Guard w/FC

2499pts.

Feedback is welcomed. Additional models include Carnosaur, Troglodon, Oldblood/Scar-vet on foot, and Stegadon can act as Ancient as well.

Seems decent, even though you have opted for some off-beat builds. Scar Vets on Cold ones should imho have a Great Weapon for S7 and a Dawnstone, Gamblers Armor and a Dragonhelmet for 1+ rerollable armor save, 6++. If he has that, he can often run alone, it isn't that hard to hide him from cannons/bolt throwers, and most magic and missile attacks will be nearly inconsequential. Same for your slann, i really like having the Banner of Discipline on him for LD10 rerolalble. Also, do you think you need the secondary skink next to your Slann? I think you already are in control of the magic phase.

Lastly, i dislike running full command unless you do it for challenging purposes. For 10 points you get one extra attack, for just one more you have an extra body which is an extra wound and an additional attack. Perhaps you could squeeze some points to get to 3 units of 10 skink skirmishers? Skinks are just great. And, Salamanders are awesome, i would recommend those as a next purchase. There is nothing like flaming a unit of Swordmasters .

Also, where are you at that you still have warhammer 8th tournaments going on? Sounds great!

 

[livewaaaaagh]

Thank you for the feedback!

So for the Scar Vet on Cold One - I wanted to try out the Steg helm and it worked nicely actually. It made him hard to kill and with the GW, he still did some major damage + the impact hits. He did have a luckstone.

The Scar Vet on foot - I want to see about changing his kit. I played him once with the Sword of Striking for +1 to hit and it worked nicely because most of what I face is T3, so S5 is 2s anyway.

The Slann DID have the banner of discipline. I forgot to include above and in the recap.

The skink was more for the comet really. There was a Dwarf player that plays very castle-y and I wanted to have a plan for him with the 3 different damage spells from Heavens.

Tournament was in the Northeast USA - I'm from NYC.