8th Ed. Cowboy delivery

[Mr Phat]

There has and will always be a lot of talk on how to kit out the cowboys, but Ive come to wonder how people actually play them.

I started wondering about placement opportunities after I had the epiphany of realizing that a character joining skirmishers also gains the rule (I used to think the unit lost it).

So now I usually put my boys on the side of Jav'n'shield skirmisher unit, and put them on the middle-flank area.

The skirmishers gives the cowboy skirmish, protecting him from shooting.
The cowboy makes the unit stupid, making the unit immune to psychology.

as both units wants to get across the table and get on the side of things, they synergize quite well.
It is also quite nice to have enemy chaff or flankers think again before going in.

I usually play em like this:

Go with the skink units and when an interesting target gets close he charges out and have the skinks go fire on something else.

If its hard to get him in the right position I use what I have named the "Stepping Stones" tactic:
I you like me usually have skinks all over the board, and if you plan correctly in you movement phase you can actually get the cowboy to move a couple of extra inches using the width of the skirmishers.




...................................................I--------Enemy block---------I





I-------Skinks1------I...........................I-----Skinks2------IOScar-Vet..................I-------Skinks3--------I

If you move Skinks1 up and turns its left side into a more vertical position like this



O Scar-vet New position
. -
...\
....\
.....\
......Skinks1......................................I--------Enemy block---------I

.......\
........\
.........\
......... - ........................I-----Skinks2------IO Scar-Vet old position...............I-------Skinks3--------I

and makes sure that Skinks1 right side is within the scar-vets movement, you can legally make him leave Skinks2 and join Skinks1 and then place him on the far left side, as placement in the unit dosnt count for movement.
You just got your cowboy to move a skinks-units width for free, possible setting up for a flank or rear charge.

also the obvious way to use stepping stones is also to keep your cowboy in skirmish cover while moving across the board, and what Ive found out is that when your opponent realizes that your skinks can potentially become a scar-vet-threat they start being pressured to deal with them even more than they did before.


how do you guys do?

- put em in saurus
- 5 COR for deliverance
- run solo as target saturation

..any neat tricks?

 

[hdctambien]

The skirmishers gives the cowboy skirmish, protecting him from shooting.
The cowboy makes the unit stupid, making the unit immune to psychology.

Unfortunately, You can't put a "Cowboy" in a unit of skirmishers. BRB Pg 77: "A character on a mount cannot join a unit of Skirmishers" You could put an unmounted Svar Vet in a unit of Skinks, but I don't think there's much of an advantage to that.

I put my Cowboys inside a unit of Saurus or Temple Guard if my opponent has nasty shooting or magic, otherwise I run them on their own and mix them in with my Skink Jav units swarming up a flank.

I tried using CoC for a bit. I had a unit of 8 Cold Ones with a Scar Vet BSB and Old Blood general in it against the new Dark Elves. After my opponents Shooting Phase (RBTs of doom) that unit was reduced to the Scar Vet, Old Blood and a Champion....

 

[Mr Phat]

Unfortunately, You can't put a "Cowboy" in a unit of skirmishers. BRB Pg 77: "A character on a mount cannot join a unit of Skirmishers" You could put an unmounted Svar Vet in a unit of Skinks, but I don't think there's much of an advantage to that.

BLAST!
the very!
last!
line!

oh well, wipe the board and adapt.....
I will try the same stated tactic with regular cohorts, but unless I get the same for the same points I guess its back to putting them into Saurus blocks -.-
it just works so much better getting them ahead of the battle-line to hold up stuff long before the Saurus / combat blocks arrive.

Used to use CoR too (Have 13 DE Cold-one converts)
Sadly I have the same experience as you.
There need to be more attractive targets for them to connect as the should.

 

[hdctambien]

I've found that the more flexible my battle plan is, the better I end up doing.

If I put 2 Cowboys, a Stegadon, a Bastiladon, and some Chameleons on the table I know that some of them are going to be obliterated before I get a change to attack with them... but not all of them.

Sometimes my Cowboy package gets delivered ... sometimes my Stegadon comes a knockin' on their door. I like to give my opponents a lot of choices so that I maximize the chance that they will make a poor one.

I've been having some success with a naked level 1 Heavens priest in a unit of Skink Javs bum rushing a flank (especially if I roll Thunderbolt or even Wind Blast) and it's only 135 points that can take a lot of attention away from the more important pieces of my plan.