Tutorial 8th edition magic weapons for lizardmen

[Boq]

Ok, i will list every common magic weapon and rate it and explain why i have rated it:

The rates are - * = bad
** = not recommended
*** = ok
**** = good
***** = amazing


Giant blade ** - As this can only be given to oldbloods (str5), it isn't worth the 20pt upgrade from the ogre blade as you will be wounding on 2s against anything short of a treeman and there aren't many situations when s8 is better than s7. Suppose it could be useful for a lone monster-hunting oldblood but 60pts is just too much for what it does.

Sword of bloodshed **** - nice, simple weapon if you just want to carve through that large horde of infantry

Obsidian blade * - This weapon is way overpriced and is much less useful than +2 strength (ogre blade) and is more expensive, only really useful against brettonians or chaos warriors.

Ogre blade **** - good weapon for a reasonable price that can be fitted onto a scar-vet to give your saurus that little boost in cc.

Sword of strife **** - much the same use as the ogre blade but is preferable against elves and other T3 foes as you will be wounding on 2s anyway.

Fencer's blades *** - meh, works well but bit overpriced

Sword of anti heroes ** - very situational especially in 8th as the rules benefit large blocks of infantry more than overloading with characters, quite useful against goblins as they often spam shamans or big bosses.

Spellthieving Sword ** - for 25 points this is way too much, chances are most wizards will not survive an encounter with an oldblood/scar-vet anyway.

Sword of swift slaying *** - good for lizardmen but the main benefit of asf (re-rolling misses) won't come into play against skaven/elves etc. Against any army with an average iniative of 3 or less this becomes a viable and effective choice.

Sword of battle **** - reliable and cheap; a safe option for almost any situation

Berserker Sword **** - much the same as the sword of battle with the addition of being immune to psychology

Sword of might ** - Basically a 20pt halberd, generally a waste of magic item allowance.

Gold sigil sword *** - Not good on skinks but works fine on saurus as well as being cheap

Sword of striking ***** - amazing for the price as you will be hitting most units on 2s for only 15pts!

Biting blade * - halberd?????????????

Relic sword * - we are str 5 lizards! not elves! wounding on 5+ is bad anyways

Shrieking blade * - Fear has been nerfed in 8th ed and is almost never used when you can just use a better, mundane weapon

Tormentor sword ** - situational, but for 5 pts it might just be useful purely because its magical

Warrior bane *** - ok for 5 pts, I personally wouldn't use it though as I would probably just forget about it in the heat of the battle

Hope this was useful and any feedback would be appreciated

 

[Agrem]

Reasonable explains on most of them. I might rate few a bit differently with +/- one star. But the thing that I disagree most and would say is worth atleast one or even two stars higher is biting blade. I think it has it's uses. If you want to run multiple scar-veterans in tournament environment I see this one quite good option. Ofcourse first of my choices would be burning blade and great weapon with venom. But after that if you want to equip scar-veteran with magical weapon in order to punch through ethereal I would choose either this or sword of might. Depending on the points what i have left on the build. Also the reason behind taking this instead of for example the halberd you mentioned is to max out armour save with shield and give the vet more durability.

BR
Agrem

 

[HoverBoy]

I agree on everything but these two:

Ogre blade **** - good weapon for a reasonable price that can be fitted onto a scar-vet to give your saurus that little boost in cc.

Oh yea points well spent, it's not like we can do this with a mundane weapon that will nerf our amazing intiative. I'd give it one less * but it still is good just because you can use a shield with it.

Berserker Sword **** - much the same as the sword of battle with the addition of being immune to psychology

Do not ever use that against a player who knows what he's doing, he will send every redirector in his army to send that vet and his unit on a tour of the countryside.

 

[Boq]

Do not ever use that against a player who knows what he's doing, he will send every redirector in his army to send that vet and his unit on a tour of the countryside.

Agreed, but now you just need to pass a leadership test to act normal which is likely for a cold blooded scar-vet

 

[asrodrig]

Nice list - it sure would have been helpful when I wrote up my first few 8th ed lists. I used to think that the Sword of Anti-Heroes was probably the best item ever!
Think you'll delve deeper into the other categories of Magic Items?

 

[HoverBoy]

Do not ever use that against a player who knows what he's doing, he will send every redirector in his army to send that vet and his unit on a tour of the countryside.

Agreed, but now you just need to pass a leadership test to act normal which is likely for a cold blooded scar-vet

Step 1: Place warhounds/sabertusk/harpyes 1" infront of the scar vet and co, face in a way that you'r back is facing the table edge.
Step 2: Don't care if he passes his berserker test.

 

[Dogfisc]

Sword of striking ***** - amazing for the price as you will be hitting most units on 2s for only 15pts!

If only....too bad we still pay 25 points for it. I do still like the Glittering Scales/Sword of Striking combo though.

I've also had good luck with Warrior Bane (really just took it to get a cheap magic weapon to deal with ethereals). It came in very handy in a challenge against a Tomb King.

 

[Boq]

Nice list - it sure would have been helpful when I wrote up my first few 8th ed lists. I used to think that the Sword of Anti-Heroes was probably the best item ever!
Think you'll delve deeper into the other categories of Magic Items?

I am working on a similar article for the other categories of magic items

 

[wbarobinson]

Biting Blade is pretty good... cheap item allows for magical attacks, a shield and often the missing str that would come from the halberd... Halberd means 1 less armor and ethereals who eat your face...

 

[Lord Tsunami]

you could use a normal weapon (a great weapon for example) with the venom of the firefly frog instead...

 

[wbarobinson]

lose the valuable enchanted item slot and the armor save in combat... plus, STR 7 does not need poison.

 

[n810]

It's not the poison it's the magical attacks,
that the reason people take the venom with the great weapon.

 

[wbarobinson]

you still get magic with the biting blade...

 

[n810]

yea but you don't get ST7 attacks with it.

 

[Lord Tsunami]

if you do the maths for poison, you will find that even if you wound on 2+ it still helps quite a bit.

-1 AS is still better (if you compare it with poison on a normal hand weapon) if your opponent has a save of at least 4+, which is fairly uncommon, and the opponent has T3 or lower. if the AS is 5+ or worse (which is standard for pretty much all infantry) or if you have T4+ (which is not too uncommon) the poison wins out. and that is if you put it on a normal hand weapon. you can even keep the parry save from hand weapon and shield if you use the poison.

if you do sacrifice that armour save (usually because you have a cold one, and get 1+ save even without a shield) the greatweapon wrecks biting blade in punching capacity against everything, even stuff with low save or low toughness.

Biting blade is not worthless, but if you take it pretty much only for the magical attacks, it might be better to take the venom. A scar vet with the venom, dragon helm, light armour and shields has a 2+/6++ save and 4 magical and poisonous attacks. he might be just what you need to fight those new VCs, and he costs "only" 113 points. Switch the venom for the biting blade and he gets a 2+ save with basically the same offence, for the same price.

 

[Scalenex]

We can pay the lower price for Sword of Striking now, huzzah.