Engine of the Gods
After many games with the new Lizardmen one thing has been generally accepted, the Engine of the Gods is amazing. The question now becomes how to use it best. I thought I would go ahead and share a few pieces of wisdom I have learned over time.
The Powers
The Engines strength is its ability to use one of three powers. Each of them come into play at different times.
Easier to Cast – This ability (whose name eludes me at the time, and my army book is 2 contents away) allows you to lower the casting value of all spells in a lore by 1. This ability is not that useful in truth. If you are having trouble casting spells because you are not surpassing their basic casting value you need to reassess how you use magic. I only use it when my opponent has no shooting or magic, and I am more than 10 inches from my opponent. This is the least used ability.
Shield - The ability to create a shield for all troops within 12 inches is a godsend for an army as slow as Lizardmen. The one disadvantages of this is that you have to keep your Engine close to your other troops which as I will cover later is not that bad. This ability is usually used for the first couple turns of a game before everyone is close enough to use Burning Alignment. If you are facing an army with any shooting or magic, you will want to have the shield up if you are not going to be using burning alignment.
Burning Alignment - aka Sprinkler of Death – This ability is the most powerful part of the Engine of the Gods. The trick is to use it correctly. The most important part of using it correctly is target selection. In that regard there are 3 things to look for.
Small Units – The first thing to look for is small unit. Burning Alignment is not effective against large units. There is no point using it against a unit of 30 skaven slaves, 20 goblins, or even 15 marauders. You have to look at what units are small enough to be damaged. Ideally the unit will have to take a panic test if it loses even 2 wounds. For this reasons small units of skirmishers, elite infantry, and knights are among the best targets.
There is one exception to this rule. Look for units that are a few models short of losing their rank bonus. For example, a unit of 20 swordsmen, has 3 ranks, if you are able to kill off just one, they lose their one point of rank bonus. This takes away +1 combat resolution for them. This is the biggest way you can have an influence on later combats in the game. If there are no small targets, try and hit as many units that are close to losing ranks as possible. This is true for all shooting. In fantasy there are two ways to use shooting effectively, the first is to force panic checks, the other is to remove ranks. Keep this in mind at all times when picking targets for ranged attacks.
Armored Foes - The biggest strength of burning alignment is its ability to ignore armor. For this reason it is also best against units of knights. Their high armor is completely bypassed by the engines ability. Killing one or two Chaos Knights, Cold One Knights, or even a wound off of an armored lord will severely limit their ability in combat.
Clusters – The final thing to look for places where you can hit multiple units. The more units you can hit with the engine the more effective it is.
Tactics
The best way to use the engine is very carefully. As scary as the Stegadon is, the priest, the source of your power, is very easy to kill. A cunning opponent will send a unit of fast cav to expendably die, just to kill the priest. In games against the Engine, I have sent a unit of Marauder horsemen to kill the priest, sure they are dead, but the Engine is not effective without the priest. He may have a 2+ armor save, but an concentrated effort by an opponent will kill him. With this in mind, one of the most important things to remember is to make sure your Engine is safe!
There are several ways to do this; the most important is to play conservatively with your engine. I played one game against Valkia the Bloody where my Engine spent the first 3 turns of the game half an inch behind a unit of Saurus. This made it so Valkia could not charge my engine. The priest survived long enough to be able to do a ton of damage throughout the game. Most games I will deploy the engine between two blocks of infantry, but back 2 or 3 inches. This makes it so my opponent has to deal with my infantry first, then the engine can engage in combat on my terms.
When you are able to engage with the engine on your own terms you can do a couple of things. First, you only have to fight, fights you know you can win. Any good Warhammer general will tell you not get in a fight you are going to lose. If you know your Engine can not win a fight, don’t commit it. By keeping your engine back, any fights you can’t win can be delegated to the Saurus, and your fast Engine can escape to fight again on better terms.
The second big advantage of keeping the engine back is that it ensures that when you do send it into combat you are able to get your impact hits. These can be a major deciding factor in how a combat works out.
As a general rule, don’t charge your Engine into combat unless you are confident that you will win the combat in one turn. You have the impact hits, unit strength 10 terror causing, burning alignment, and have some attacks on top of that. If used well you will even have support units. With all of these things together you should be able to break most units in one turn. If that is not the case, it is usually better to keep the engine out of combat, move it around to the flank or rear, and simply use burning alignment. There is no reason to risk getting your engine bogged down.
When you do finally engage the enemy with the engine, there is one more trick, challenging. For example, if you were to charge a unit of 6 chaos knights, with a champion, it is usually a good idea to challenge. The champion, with no ranks left to hide behind, must accept. You lose out on 4 skink attacks, which really is not loss, while he now only has 3 attacks directed towards your priest rather than the 9 you were likely to see in the first place. If you are lucky, your Steggy’s attacks will even kill the champion, making it so you now have no attacks coming back, the best possible situation. Even if he can, and does decline, you can force a character, even if it is just his champion to the back of the unit. This is one less attack that you now have to deal with. Usually it is a win-win situation.
One final note about the engine. The Stegadon causes terror. This is, once again another reason to keep you engine out of combat. Moving your stegadon around in causing as many terror checks as possible can be an effective tactic. Look for some low LD targets that you have a good chance of failing a terror check. Then place your Engine so that if they flee, they will have to flee through as many enemy units as possible, forcing even more panic checks.
Upgrades
I have a couple of things to say about how to deck out your priest. The only really important item in my eyes is the one use only, 2+ ward save. (Once again, I can’t remember the name, and the whole 2 continents away thing) This basically gives your priest another wound. Yes, you will roll a 1, yes, it will feel like it happens all the time, but it makes it so your priest can take a cannon in the face and live. There are a lot of multi-wound weapons out there that will kill your priest quickly, but this will save them, for a little while at least.
The second thing is that it is a waste not to upgrade your priest to a level 2. You end up generating 1 more power dice, one more dispel dice, and get another spell. For what the upgrade costs, it is stupid not to take it.
Combos
The biggest combo that you can run with the engine is to combine it with a Slann. Magic in warhammer, as it stands, is all or nothing. Every player brings a certain amount of magic defense. You either need to ignore magic and just bring minimum defense, or you need to bring enough magic to be able to overwhelm someone else’s defenses. One mage on their own will not be able to overpower anyone’s magic defenses. If you are going to invest points into magic, make sure you have enough to successfully cast spells. For this reason, if you want to cast any spells with your priest, you basically have to have a Slann in order to help cross this threshold.
Other players run the engine on its own, with no Slann. I have very little experience with this so I will not discuss this.
Magic
Using a skink priest you have very few choices when it comes to what spells you will know. You only have the lore of heavens, which while not the most powerful, is still a very potent lore. The reason for this is the number one spell.
One quick thing about magic in general before I get more specific. If you are going to try and cast a spell, make sure you cast it. You can cast a spell that needs an 8+ on two dice, it doesn’t mean you should. If you are going to try and cast a spell, make sure you get it off. Always, always, always make sure you can beat the basic casting value of the spell. The reason for this is any dice that are spent casting spells that fail to go off are a complete waste. If you have more dice than you need, it makes it harder for an opponent to dispel, or it pulls a scroll, but always make sure you beat the basic casting value of a spell.
One trick about using the lore of Heavens. The first spell lets you re-roll 1’s on to hit, and to wound. Most players don’t bother using this spell for the first couple of turns, there is no hitting and wounding, but they forget one thing, you can cast it on your Slann and re-roll all the 1’s he rolls to wound! Sure it doesn’t work on miscasts, but it is still very powerful.
Conclusions
The Engine of the Gods is a powerful weapon, it is even more powerful once you learn how to keep it alive and use it most effectively.
**Deep Breath**
If anyone has any questions, comments, or complaints, go ahead and post them below.
After many games with the new Lizardmen one thing has been generally accepted, the Engine of the Gods is amazing. The question now becomes how to use it best. I thought I would go ahead and share a few pieces of wisdom I have learned over time.
The Powers
The Engines strength is its ability to use one of three powers. Each of them come into play at different times.
Easier to Cast – This ability (whose name eludes me at the time, and my army book is 2 contents away) allows you to lower the casting value of all spells in a lore by 1. This ability is not that useful in truth. If you are having trouble casting spells because you are not surpassing their basic casting value you need to reassess how you use magic. I only use it when my opponent has no shooting or magic, and I am more than 10 inches from my opponent. This is the least used ability.
Shield - The ability to create a shield for all troops within 12 inches is a godsend for an army as slow as Lizardmen. The one disadvantages of this is that you have to keep your Engine close to your other troops which as I will cover later is not that bad. This ability is usually used for the first couple turns of a game before everyone is close enough to use Burning Alignment. If you are facing an army with any shooting or magic, you will want to have the shield up if you are not going to be using burning alignment.
Burning Alignment - aka Sprinkler of Death – This ability is the most powerful part of the Engine of the Gods. The trick is to use it correctly. The most important part of using it correctly is target selection. In that regard there are 3 things to look for.
Small Units – The first thing to look for is small unit. Burning Alignment is not effective against large units. There is no point using it against a unit of 30 skaven slaves, 20 goblins, or even 15 marauders. You have to look at what units are small enough to be damaged. Ideally the unit will have to take a panic test if it loses even 2 wounds. For this reasons small units of skirmishers, elite infantry, and knights are among the best targets.
There is one exception to this rule. Look for units that are a few models short of losing their rank bonus. For example, a unit of 20 swordsmen, has 3 ranks, if you are able to kill off just one, they lose their one point of rank bonus. This takes away +1 combat resolution for them. This is the biggest way you can have an influence on later combats in the game. If there are no small targets, try and hit as many units that are close to losing ranks as possible. This is true for all shooting. In fantasy there are two ways to use shooting effectively, the first is to force panic checks, the other is to remove ranks. Keep this in mind at all times when picking targets for ranged attacks.
Armored Foes - The biggest strength of burning alignment is its ability to ignore armor. For this reason it is also best against units of knights. Their high armor is completely bypassed by the engines ability. Killing one or two Chaos Knights, Cold One Knights, or even a wound off of an armored lord will severely limit their ability in combat.
Clusters – The final thing to look for places where you can hit multiple units. The more units you can hit with the engine the more effective it is.
Tactics
The best way to use the engine is very carefully. As scary as the Stegadon is, the priest, the source of your power, is very easy to kill. A cunning opponent will send a unit of fast cav to expendably die, just to kill the priest. In games against the Engine, I have sent a unit of Marauder horsemen to kill the priest, sure they are dead, but the Engine is not effective without the priest. He may have a 2+ armor save, but an concentrated effort by an opponent will kill him. With this in mind, one of the most important things to remember is to make sure your Engine is safe!
There are several ways to do this; the most important is to play conservatively with your engine. I played one game against Valkia the Bloody where my Engine spent the first 3 turns of the game half an inch behind a unit of Saurus. This made it so Valkia could not charge my engine. The priest survived long enough to be able to do a ton of damage throughout the game. Most games I will deploy the engine between two blocks of infantry, but back 2 or 3 inches. This makes it so my opponent has to deal with my infantry first, then the engine can engage in combat on my terms.
When you are able to engage with the engine on your own terms you can do a couple of things. First, you only have to fight, fights you know you can win. Any good Warhammer general will tell you not get in a fight you are going to lose. If you know your Engine can not win a fight, don’t commit it. By keeping your engine back, any fights you can’t win can be delegated to the Saurus, and your fast Engine can escape to fight again on better terms.
The second big advantage of keeping the engine back is that it ensures that when you do send it into combat you are able to get your impact hits. These can be a major deciding factor in how a combat works out.
As a general rule, don’t charge your Engine into combat unless you are confident that you will win the combat in one turn. You have the impact hits, unit strength 10 terror causing, burning alignment, and have some attacks on top of that. If used well you will even have support units. With all of these things together you should be able to break most units in one turn. If that is not the case, it is usually better to keep the engine out of combat, move it around to the flank or rear, and simply use burning alignment. There is no reason to risk getting your engine bogged down.
When you do finally engage the enemy with the engine, there is one more trick, challenging. For example, if you were to charge a unit of 6 chaos knights, with a champion, it is usually a good idea to challenge. The champion, with no ranks left to hide behind, must accept. You lose out on 4 skink attacks, which really is not loss, while he now only has 3 attacks directed towards your priest rather than the 9 you were likely to see in the first place. If you are lucky, your Steggy’s attacks will even kill the champion, making it so you now have no attacks coming back, the best possible situation. Even if he can, and does decline, you can force a character, even if it is just his champion to the back of the unit. This is one less attack that you now have to deal with. Usually it is a win-win situation.
One final note about the engine. The Stegadon causes terror. This is, once again another reason to keep you engine out of combat. Moving your stegadon around in causing as many terror checks as possible can be an effective tactic. Look for some low LD targets that you have a good chance of failing a terror check. Then place your Engine so that if they flee, they will have to flee through as many enemy units as possible, forcing even more panic checks.
Upgrades
I have a couple of things to say about how to deck out your priest. The only really important item in my eyes is the one use only, 2+ ward save. (Once again, I can’t remember the name, and the whole 2 continents away thing) This basically gives your priest another wound. Yes, you will roll a 1, yes, it will feel like it happens all the time, but it makes it so your priest can take a cannon in the face and live. There are a lot of multi-wound weapons out there that will kill your priest quickly, but this will save them, for a little while at least.
The second thing is that it is a waste not to upgrade your priest to a level 2. You end up generating 1 more power dice, one more dispel dice, and get another spell. For what the upgrade costs, it is stupid not to take it.
Combos
The biggest combo that you can run with the engine is to combine it with a Slann. Magic in warhammer, as it stands, is all or nothing. Every player brings a certain amount of magic defense. You either need to ignore magic and just bring minimum defense, or you need to bring enough magic to be able to overwhelm someone else’s defenses. One mage on their own will not be able to overpower anyone’s magic defenses. If you are going to invest points into magic, make sure you have enough to successfully cast spells. For this reason, if you want to cast any spells with your priest, you basically have to have a Slann in order to help cross this threshold.
Other players run the engine on its own, with no Slann. I have very little experience with this so I will not discuss this.
Magic
Using a skink priest you have very few choices when it comes to what spells you will know. You only have the lore of heavens, which while not the most powerful, is still a very potent lore. The reason for this is the number one spell.
One quick thing about magic in general before I get more specific. If you are going to try and cast a spell, make sure you cast it. You can cast a spell that needs an 8+ on two dice, it doesn’t mean you should. If you are going to try and cast a spell, make sure you get it off. Always, always, always make sure you can beat the basic casting value of the spell. The reason for this is any dice that are spent casting spells that fail to go off are a complete waste. If you have more dice than you need, it makes it harder for an opponent to dispel, or it pulls a scroll, but always make sure you beat the basic casting value of a spell.
One trick about using the lore of Heavens. The first spell lets you re-roll 1’s on to hit, and to wound. Most players don’t bother using this spell for the first couple of turns, there is no hitting and wounding, but they forget one thing, you can cast it on your Slann and re-roll all the 1’s he rolls to wound! Sure it doesn’t work on miscasts, but it is still very powerful.
Conclusions
The Engine of the Gods is a powerful weapon, it is even more powerful once you learn how to keep it alive and use it most effectively.
**Deep Breath**
If anyone has any questions, comments, or complaints, go ahead and post them below.
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