8th Ed. 2500 pt Tournament List

[livewaaaaagh]

Hi all!
An exciting 2500pt tournament is upon us and I'm sharing today my list for your review and feedback.

Likely opponents include: Skaven, Ogres, Empire, Dwarfs, High Elves and Chaos - to my knowledge.

Slann - w/ Wandering deliberations, harmonic convergance & reservoir of eldirtch energy
+ standard of discipline + channeling staff.
Thoughts: Love this load out. I've always brought wandering deliberations for all-comer tournaments. Should I bring Light instead? Unsure...

Saurus Scar vet on Cold One - w/GW, Light Armour & Scared Stegadon Helm + luckstone.
Thoughts: A load out I've had a lot of success with. 1+ with 1 rerollable save and a lot of damage.

Skink Priest lvl 2 - Heavens. with dispel scroll.
Thoughts: big fan of lvl 2 heavens caddy. You can get access to nice damage spells that wadnering deliberations doesn't provide. Even a nice comet for Dwarfs

CORE
30 Saurus Warriors with HW/S, FC.
Thoughts: Nice block of saurus. Nothing more.

4x
10 Skinks w/ javelins and shields.
Thoughts: Lot of shooting, lot re-directs for those White Lions, Savage Orcs, etc, etc.

SPECIAL:
5x Chameleon Skinks -
Thoughts: These have never disappointed.

5x Cold One Riders
Thoughts: A hard hitting bus for the Scar Vet.

Bastiladon w/ Solar Engine
Thoughts: One of my questions for this list. I like the Batiladon - the bound spell can be powerful and always draws dice out. a 2+ means you could park him across S3/S4 enemies and laugh as they fail to do much. But a cannon will take him out easily and he moves a whopping 4.
Alternative would be to drop him and bring the almighty TROGLODON. for the channel, vassal + roar.

24x Temple Guard W/FC + Champ gets Sword of Battle (+1A) + Jaguar Standard.
Thoughts: I'm debating whether to go Swiftstride with Jaguar or Eternal Flame for any sort of ethereal/regeneration. Thoughts? with the Sword of Battle, I'm trying to "Create" a cheap scar vet that can dish out some additional pew pew. 4 attacks is nothing to sneeze at with PF and potential buffs from wandering deliberations.

RARE:
1x Ancient Stegadon w/Engine of the Gods.
Thoughts: I'm personally not a fan of the double blow pipe. I'd rather go baby steg with the big bow and hope for the best, or Engine of the Gods. Here, I'm opting for the latter. Why? Well, I don't have a salamander/razordon, so I don't have anything for the 90-100 points loeftover if I opt for the smaller steg, and b) the S6/T6 + the bound spell could come in handy if I have a lot of power dice, which the loadout I'm bringing tends to do on a good day.

Alternative models I own:
More Temple Guard
More Saurus Warriors
More Cold One Riders
Troglodon
Tetto'eko (though that'll mean a reduction in skink skirmishers)
Caronsaur.

My fear of cannons keep the carnosaur home. I'm a fan of the Troglodon, but I'd need to drop either the Steg or the Bastilodon for it.
Tetto - while I love him, I don't want to field less and less skinks for re-directing and shooting purposes

 

[airjamy]

Slann - w/ Wandering deliberations, harmonic convergance & reservoir of eldirtch energy
+ standard of discipline + channeling staff.
Thoughts: Love this load out. I've always brought wandering deliberations for all-comer tournaments. Should I bring Light instead? Unsure... Do really like deliberations for all comers. I have however been quite a fan of Soul of Stone instead of Eldritch Energy, mitigating misscasts really has some value.

Saurus Scar vet on Cold One - w/GW, Light Armour & Scared Stegadon Helm + luckstone.
Thoughts: A load out I've had a lot of success with. 1+ with 1 rerollable save and a lot of damage. Still more a fan of the standard GW, Gamblers Armor, Dawnstone build for full rerollables, but this also looks fine. I feel that the impact hits often do little.

Skink Priest lvl 2 - Heavens. with dispel scroll.
Thoughts: big fan of lvl 2 heavens caddy. You can get access to nice damage spells that wadnering deliberations doesn't provide. Even a nice comet for Dwarfs . Sounds good! I would take Beasts if you do not take Deliberations though, Wyssans is just so strong.

CORE
30 Saurus Warriors with HW/S, FC.
Thoughts: Nice block of saurus. Nothing more. Why take the champion if you do not have a character in the unit? You are paying 10 points for one extra attack, one point more and you have a whole other Saurus with 2 more attacks and one more wound in the unit.

4x
10 Skinks w/ javelins and shields.
Thoughts: Lot of shooting, lot re-directs for those White Lions, Savage Orcs, etc, etc. Sounds good. Skinks are so strong.

SPECIAL:
5x Chameleon Skinks -
Thoughts: These have never disappointed. Agree

5x Cold One Riders
Thoughts: A hard hitting bus for the Scar Vet. It is nice to have a buss, but depending on your local meta, you do not even need a buss. Especially multiple bolt throwers can be harsh to a solo Scarvet, so with the meta you listed it might be a good idea to have a unit with him. The biggest downside of having a 5 guy buss is that when you lose one model, people can already target your scarvet, so it is hardly that much safer to put him out in the open with a unit than without. I have found that you can often hide a single Scarvet behind a single rock or something like that, and alone, he has a lot more freedom of movement. Something to consider.

Bastiladon w/ Solar Engine
Thoughts: One of my questions for this list. I like the Batiladon - the bound spell can be powerful and always draws dice out. a 2+ means you could park him across S3/S4 enemies and laugh as they fail to do much. But a cannon will take him out easily and he moves a whopping 4.
Alternative would be to drop him and bring the almighty TROGLODON. for the channel, vassal + roar. Troglodon is IMHO terrible, and should never be considered for tournaments. You do have a lot of outlets for your power dice already in your Slann and Skink Priest, so i dont feel as if the Bastiladon is at his strongest here. You say you fear cannons, but you would rather have them shooting the Bastiladon that the Engine of the Gods steggie. I do like him to secure your flanks, and Bastiladons are just nice and cheap.

24x Temple Guard W/FC + Champ gets Sword of Battle (+1A) + Jaguar Standard.
Thoughts: I'm debating whether to go Swiftstride with Jaguar or Eternal Flame for any sort of ethereal/regeneration. Thoughts? with the Sword of Battle, I'm trying to "Create" a cheap scar vet that can dish out some additional pew pew. 4 attacks is nothing to sneeze at with PF and potential buffs from wandering deliberations. I would not invest that much extra in this unit. Your opponent is already shooting everything here to get to your Toad. Eternal Flame is fine (especialyl in the Watchtower scenario), but it can really backfire. Points are often better spent on just more Temple Guards, you need the bodies to mitigate the damage the y will take. I dislike the Sword of Battle for this reason as well, a smart opponent might target your Revered Guardian with 2-3 attacks each combat, it will hurt when he dies early, and he just has one wound and the same save as any other TG. So TLDR: less trinkets, more boots on the ground is my advice.

RARE:
1x Ancient Stegadon w/Engine of the Gods.
Thoughts: I'm personally not a fan of the double blow pipe. I'd rather go baby steg with the big bow and hope for the best, or Engine of the Gods. Here, I'm opting for the latter. Why? Well, I don't have a salamander/razordon, so I don't have anything for the 90-100 points loeftover if I opt for the smaller steg, and b) the S6/T6 + the bound spell could come in handy if I have a lot of power dice, which the loadout I'm bringing tends to do on a good day. I have no experience with the Engine, but it sounds pretty good. A Salamander would be (IMHO, a lot) better, but hey, if you dont have the models, that is sadly not possible.

Alternative models I own:
More Temple Guard. I would just fill the gaps with more TG and Sauri, especially more TG.
More Saurus Warriors
More Cold One Riders
Troglodon
Tetto'eko (though that'll mean a reduction in skink skirmishers)
Caronsaur.

My fear of cannons keep the carnosaur home. I'm a fan of the Troglodon, but I'd need to drop either the Steg or the Bastilodon for it. Why are you a fan of the Troglodon? I have found it to be utterly terrible, easily the worst of our units in the entire book. The roar does hardly anything, so does the channel, and it has poor stats for a high pointcost.
Tetto - while I love him, I don't want to field less and less skinks for re-directing and shooting purposes. I like this reasoning, more skinks are more better.

Hope you do well in your tournament, let us know how it went! Where are you at that they are still organizing 8th tournaments, i would be very interested in participating myself if 8th tournaments would still be organized to this day here.

 

[Scalenex]

I pretty much agree with everything Arjamy said.

Slann - w/ Wandering deliberations, harmonic convergance & reservoir of eldirtch energy
+ standard of discipline + channeling staff.
Thoughts: Love this load out. I've always brought wandering deliberations for all-comer tournaments. Should I bring Light instead? Unsure...

I would rather have Soul of Stone than Resevoir of Eldritch Energy. I will add that if you drop the Wandering Deliberations you free up 30 points you can spend on other things (by other things I mean more Temple Guard). If you take one lore, you can get a little bit more mileage out of your Engine of the Gods because of the casting bonus. I think your existing list would do well with Life, Light, or Shadow though I wouldn't fault you for keeping with Wandering Deliberations, that is a solid choice.

Maybe take the Iron Curse Icon if you can spare the points.

Why take the champion if you do not have a character in the unit? You are paying 10 points for one extra attack, one point more and you have a whole other Saurus with 2 more attacks and one more wound in the unit.

I don't have a problem with taking the champion but I don't have a problem with you not taking one either. But if you are already above 25% Core, you can trim the champion and a few rank and file Saurus to buy more Temple Guard with.

4x
10 Skinks w/ javelins and shields.
Thoughts: Lot of shooting, lot re-directs for those White Lions, Savage Orcs, etc, etc. Sounds good. Skinks are so strong.

I concur. This also gives you four dummy drops to "win" deployment.

SPECIAL:
5x Chameleon Skinks -
Thoughts: These have never disappointed. Agree

Agreed.

Bastiladon w/ Solar Engine
Thoughts: One of my questions for this list. I like the Batiladon - the bound spell can be powerful and always draws dice out. a 2+ means you could park him across S3/S4 enemies and laugh as they fail to do much. But a cannon will take him out easily and he moves a whopping 4.
Alternative would be to drop him and bring the almighty TROGLODON. for the channel, vassal + roar. Troglodon is IMHO terrible, and should never be considered for tournaments.

Agreed. Troglodons are fun units but they are not competitive and should not be considered for tournaments. Note, if you keep a Bastiladon this means that means that a Wandering Deliberation Slann is not as valuable considering that most of the spells as WD have fill the same niche as the Solar Engine's bound spell.

Saurus Scar vet on Cold One - w/GW, Light Armour & Scared Stegadon Helm + luckstone.
Thoughts: A load out I've had a lot of success with. 1+ with 1 rerollable save and a lot of damage. Still more a fan of the standard GW, Gamblers Armor, Dawnstone build for full rerollables, but this also looks fine. I feel that the impact hits often do little.

Agreed, Arjamy's build is slightly better but it's not overwhelmingly better. You do do you. If anything I like to root for unorthodox builds.

Skink Priest lvl 2 - Heavens. with dispel scroll.
Thoughts: big fan of lvl 2 heavens caddy. You can get access to nice damage spells that wadnering deliberations doesn't provide. Even a nice comet for Dwarfs . Sounds good! I would take Beasts if you do not take Deliberations though, Wyssans is just so strong.

Agreed. If you take a WD Slann, stick with Heavens. If you take a mono-lore Slann, switch your Skink to Beasts.

Actually you may able to get away with a level one caster since the only spells that really count are Iceshard Blizzard or Comet and Wyssans. This could free up points to buy more Temple Guard.

SPECIAL:
5x Chameleon Skinks -
Thoughts: These have never disappointed. Agree

I like to take ten Chameleon Skinks in my all comers list, but since I don't usually take 40 Skink Skirmishers you can get by with five.

5x Cold One Riders
Thoughts: A hard hitting bus for the Scar Vet. It is nice to have a buss, but depending on your local meta, you do not even need a buss. Especially multiple bolt throwers can be harsh to a solo Scarvet, so with the meta you listed it might be a good idea to have a unit with him. The biggest downside of having a 5 guy buss is that when you lose one model, people can already target your scarvet, so it is hardly that much safer to put him out in the open with a unit than without. I have found that you can often hide a single Scarvet behind a single rock or something like that, and alone, he has a lot more freedom of movement. Something to consider.

What he said. In my opinion you want zero Cold One Riders or nine Cold One Riders. Five is a bit awkward.

24x Temple Guard W/FC + Champ gets Sword of Battle (+1A) + Jaguar Standard.
Thoughts: I'm debating whether to go Swiftstride with Jaguar or Eternal Flame for any sort of ethereal/regeneration. Thoughts? with the Sword of Battle, I'm trying to "Create" a cheap scar vet that can dish out some additional pew pew. 4 attacks is nothing to sneeze at with PF and potential buffs from wandering deliberations.

I would not invest in a magic weapon for your Temple Guard champion apart from the Warrior Bane which is nice and cheap. Do not forget that if you give your Revered Guardian a magic weapon 1) he loses the +1 Strength from his halberd and 2) he effectively gain +1 armor save from having the shield in cc.

As I mentioned several times before, 24 Temple Guard is not enough. I feel exposed if I don't have at least 26, but more is better.

Your next expansion to your model collection should be Salamanders

 

[airjamy]

I concur. This also gives you four dummy drops to "win" deployment.

Wow, it seems that my ideas have taken root even by the great Scalanex, haha .

Your next expansion to your model collection should be Salamanders

This and this again. And once again, let us know how stuff went!

 

[livewaaaaagh]

Thank you all! Addressing a few items at a time and sorry - i'm not entirely sure how to do mutiple quotes.

Re: Slann - I'm thinking Wandering Deliberations is just too good.
Re: Skinks - I need to finish assembling the last 20! Timing is short!
Re: Salamanders - One thing at a time. The overwhelming feedback here was to get more skinks. I did! Next up, Salamanders.
Re: Big Dinos - While this is a tournament, it's not a GT, or anything liek that. So if I field something not 100% meta, I'm not too concerned. I fielded a similar list last time with the Bastilodon and Baby Steg, and the Bastilodn did okay, the steggy didn't.
Re: Cold Ones - let me see if I can add more bodies.
ditto same with Temple Guards.

I'm going to debate whether to bring the mighty Troglodon or keep it more similar to my last list with the Bastilodon and Baby steg. I don't know if the Engine of the Gods will do as much, since Wandering Deliberations doesn't really work with the casting buff.

We're in the Northeast USA (NY, NJ, PA) in case anyone wants to come by!

 

[airjamy]

Thank you all! Addressing a few items at a time and sorry - i'm not entirely sure how to do mutiple quotes.

Re: Slann - I'm thinking Wandering Deliberations is just too good.
Re: Skinks - I need to finish assembling the last 20! Timing is short!
Re: Salamanders - One thing at a time. The overwhelming feedback here was to get more skinks. I did! Next up, Salamanders.
Re: Big Dinos - While this is a tournament, it's not a GT, or anything liek that. So if I field something not 100% meta, I'm not too concerned. I fielded a similar list last time with the Bastilodon and Baby Steg, and the Bastilodn did okay, the steggy didn't.
Re: Cold Ones - let me see if I can add more bodies.
ditto same with Temple Guards.

I'm going to debate whether to bring the mighty Troglodon or keep it more similar to my last list with the Bastilodon and Baby steg. I don't know if the Engine of the Gods will do as much, since Wandering Deliberations doesn't really work with the casting buff.

We're in the Northeast USA (NY, NJ, PA) in case anyone wants to come by!

Sounds good! I sadly live in the Netherlands, so NY is not around the corner exactly. Too bad!