7th Ed. lizardmen in 8ed, what do you think?

[Dan Heelan]

Played my first game last night with Lizards in 8th..... twas all over by about turn 3 in real terms although mainly because I really misjudged how the new charging rules allow units with swifstrider to charge stupid distances and without terrian to slow them I got flanked up real nice!

I ran:

Slann, BSB, lore, etheral, +1 dice, cupped hands
priest on foot, scroll
2 foot vets, one with ASF enchanted shield, one with I10 sword, PoStrength, Dragonhelm (2+ward against Flaming) and luckstone (reroll one armour save)

15 saurus, full command
16 saurus, full command
(both 6 wide with loose at the back - figured same principle as now, attacks rather than CR, loose to soak up damage from the fact we almost never strike first...)
3x 10 blowpipe

3 Terradons
6 Krox (!)

Ancient Steg
Salamander
Salamander

2250

So I threw some things together I thought would be useful. As I said, hard to say how good it could of been because one of my saurus blocks got fronted and flanked thanks to my misjudgement of the new charges and lost the steg turn 2 to a khorne herald charging 18".....

Salas look very good, my opponent had a block of 44 horrors with +1 to cast and I got lucky and killed 13 with one breath

Never really got to test the ancient.
Terradons are a bit limited in use it seems now, not really sure on their role as redirecting is almost pointless/very hard to do well.

Saurus were ok, never felt I needed spears, the units need to be 18/20 to warrant that I think.
New skirmish rules make skinks harder to use but being able to march and shoot is very cool.
The slann being unable to hide behing stuff (needs to be in a unit now, although can join skirmishers...) causes more issues than I imgained in terms of being a target for the opponents magic, with against magic heavy armies is very nasty!
Life magic was good, main synergy with the 6 krox - regrowth/lifebloom and being self buffed/T8 at times makes that krox unit pretty good - problem I had was mine got so wrecked by magic there were 2 left by the time I got there!

The main issue I see is that the inability to redirect is going to be hard work as somethings just ARE better than saurus and lizard troops and the main strength of the lizard army was that it could avoid the things it couldnt fight..... going to be interesting.

Playing Skaven tonight so will see how that goes as hopefully I wont get caught out!

D

 

[msinosic]

Try running the Slann with Ethereal and MR3 outside of the unit if you really don't want him inside a unit.

Or keep him in the unit as is. How many times did you miscast and damage things around you? Once a game is probably worth it, the benefits of the protection he gets from being in the unit outweighs those few casualties.

 

[Kuro Ryu]

My first game in 8th ed went really well, 1000 points against a dude with empire and the help of a GW staff member to get the rules right.

I basically fielded the boxed battleforce with one of the saurus cavalry as a scar vet and an added skink chief. although i must say the only unit that actually did any fighting was my 10 man temple guard unit and they pretty much waded through the entire enemy army and took about 3 casualties. I have no idea how it worked but it did.
I think i got lucky when my opponent failed in his stand and shoot when the guard charged some cavalry with big guns (i know little about empire so i dont know the names) also everything they touched died cos nobody had armour and because of that after about 2 rounds of combat and the enemy regiment was either dead or running away. Until he put a large regiment of swordsmen in the way and even then they dropped like flies, it just took longer to get them all cos they wouldnt run away (outnumbering me helped with that but i forget exactly how). From this battle i took away the knowledge that in 8th ed... my 10 man temple guard regiment are fudging awesome, probably cos you get the extra 5 attacks from the back rank so 16 S5 attacks (with halberds) hurts a lot.

 

[Dan Heelan]

Try running the Slann with Ethereal and MR3 outside of the unit if you really don't want him inside a unit.

Or keep him in the unit as is. How many times did you miscast and damage things around you? Once a game is probably worth it, the benefits of the protection he gets from being in the unit outweighs those few casualties.

He wasnt in a unit at any point in that game.

Played another last night 2250 again:

Slann BSB, etheral, lore, rumination, cupped, stubborn crown
Engine, L1, scroll

2x12 saurus, hw/sh, muso
1x18 saurus, spears, full command (slann sat here for a bit)
24 skink, full command, 3 krox
3x10 pipe
Ancient Steg
1 Sala
1 Sala

Worked much better, although I played skaven with is probably not a bad match up for this list.

The 24 skink/3 krox is hard to remove ranks from so made it quite good for facing off against monster unit stars like 2x6 Rat Ogres I played against, long enough to get a unit in the flank. Being T8 krox helped tho in 1 round ;-)

The smaller 12's of saurus were quite good as flee bait and not to shabby on the flanks.

Idea was having two anvil units to hold so the stegs could get involved which worked well.... but then I was playing against skaven infantry with where nowhere near as good as I thought they would be.

The list having not a lot of magic missles and not a lot of magic attacks would make dealing with wraiths very hard work. I play VC quite a bit as well and the black coach + wraiths under the new rules are pretty slick!

D

 

[Polaris3000]

For starters, the Slann becomes a potential liability. In the new rules, if a unit with the BSB breaks, the BSB automatically dies. In this case, the BSB is the general, and probably the largest point sink in the army. If the temple guard get broken, which is rare but happens, then even if they do outrun the attacking unit(s), the Slann still dies regardless. The next big issue will be the remaining point sinks in the army, most notably the EotG and the Old Blood/ Carnosaur. The EotG will be a liability because the rules for stegs mean that when the steg dies, everything on top dies except for the skink priest and they are not close combat heros at all. With the points limitations, this will likely be the only hero, possibly a scar vet without anything on it. When the steg dies, and with the new cc rules and movement it will start to die a lot, there goes a large chunk of points, without really leaving anything to replace it. Then there is the Old Blood on carnosaur. Hard to get into a 2000 point game with the 25% cap on lords(meaning 500 points) when you add in all of the magic items, but a monster if it can be done. That being said, this is another points investment that can be killed with a couple lucky shots, or with the new rules, by the terrain itself. The third point is that with cc now being initiative based, pretty much the entire army, with the exception of skinks, will be striking last. Armys that always struck first anyway (High Elves! WOOT!) will now be able to hit first with way more than they could before, except that everyone has reduced armour (that is the final point, get to that in a bit). This will mean that there will be a lot more saurus and co dying right off the bat, reducing cc abilities (step up only allows for 1 attack per model that stepped up). Against High Elves and other units with ASF AND higher initiative, those units get to re-roll attacks to hit. Now fighting against Sword Masters will mean fighting against at least 3 ranks of 6 from a unit of 30(which will make units stubborn by the way), that still hit first with their great weapons(that part of ASF hasn't changed), and re-roll their failed to hit dice, and the best saurus armorsave will be a 6+ against those attacks. The last point (because you are probably getting sick of me) is that armor saves will become completely different. Gone are the days of being able to switch between a spear and a hand weapon and shield for a 3+ armorsave. Shields now give a 6+ parry save(ward save) when used with a hand weapon. Unfortunately, units that have a spear and hand weapon only get their basic armorsave and do not get a parry save because that only applys to units with a shield and hand weapon only. This means that the saurus with spears will only every get a 5+ armor save at best. Just be glad that it is not one save to rule them all as I think we all feared.

 

[msinosic]

The giant wall of text has rendered me blind!

Units/characters failing their stupidity test will stumble forward 1 D6 inches, "Me 'Ead 'Urts".

 

[Gor-rok]

Could be wrong, but I thought ASF was going to be overruled by great weapons always strike last in this edition.

As far as the Slann dieing from his TG unit breaking- I still think it's worth the chance of failing two stubborn L9 break tests to keep the standard protected in there with him. Besides, if they break there's a 50% or better chance they're getting run down anyway.

 

[Kurlin]

Could be wrong, but I thought ASF was going to be overruled by great weapons always strike last in this edition.

As far as the Slann dieing from his TG unit breaking- I still think it's worth the chance of failing two stubborn L9 break tests to keep the standard protected in there with him. Besides, if they break there's a 50% or better chance they're getting run down anyway.

ASF and the great weapons ASL cancel each other out, so then you would fight at strictly initiative order.

 

[steam]

I have one question. Will the cornasaur be good?

 

[Caneghem]

I have one question. Will the cornasaur be good?

The carno will be pretty good for taking down heavily armored stuff, because now he will do d6 thunderstomp hits at the end of combat.

 

[msinosic]

Spears (Mounted) are only used on the change and are then swapped for normal Hand Weapons.

Great rule for our Saurus Cavalry!

 

[Caneghem]

Spears (Mounted) are only used on the change and are then swapped for normal Hand Weapons.

Great rule for our Saurus Cavalry!

So are you saying that cav units will be able to get the parry bonus? I thought that would be for infantry units only like in 7th..

 

[Xlcontiqu]

Cavalry units do not get a Parry save, and neither do Frenzied warriors. The Parry Save cannot be used against impact hits or Stomp attacks either.

 

[Polaris3000]

Spears (Mounted) are only used on the change and are then swapped for normal Hand Weapons.

Great rule for our Saurus Cavalry!

Not quite mate. The way it works from what I have seen and heard is that a unit cannot swap between their weapons. Eg, no more saurus with a handweapon, shield, and spears. Likely only spear with a better armour save. Also, only foot infantry get the shield parry. I may be wrong, and I certainly hope that I am in this case, but everything I have seen points to this being true. Part of the new horde style they are doing. It would make the games dull when you could only kill a few guys on each side every turn when there are units of 30+ running around the table.

 

[msinosic]

Spears (Mounted) are only used on the change and are then swapped for normal Hand Weapons.

Great rule for our Saurus Cavalry!

Not quite mate. The way it works from what I have seen and heard is that a unit cannot swap between their weapons. Eg, no more saurus with a handweapon, shield, and spears. Likely only spear with a better armour save. Also, only foot infantry get the shield parry. I may be wrong, and I certainly hope that I am in this case, but everything I have seen points to this being true. Part of the new horde style they are doing. It would make the games dull when you could only kill a few guys on each side every turn when there are units of 30+ running around the table.

Actually ... No. I read the book today and checked up on exactly that rule. Right in the Spears (Mounted) rules section it has a little asterisk that when you read below it states that Cavalry swap spears for hand weapons after the charging round.

Yes I know you can not swap between Special weapons (ones that are not hand weapons). This seems to be an exception for cavalry.

Actually it does serve us no benefit at all swapping to hand weapons on saurus cavalry in the second and subsequent rounds? Its not like we cant use the shield in the first round with the spear.... and we dont get the parry bonus...

 

[Polaris3000]

Spears (Mounted) are only used on the change and are then swapped for normal Hand Weapons.

Great rule for our Saurus Cavalry!

Not quite mate. The way it works from what I have seen and heard is that a unit cannot swap between their weapons. Eg, no more saurus with a handweapon, shield, and spears. Likely only spear with a better armour save. Also, only foot infantry get the shield parry. I may be wrong, and I certainly hope that I am in this case, but everything I have seen points to this being true. Part of the new horde style they are doing. It would make the games dull when you could only kill a few guys on each side every turn when there are units of 30+ running around the table.

Actually ... No. I read the book today and checked up on exactly that rule. Right in the Spears (Mounted) rules section it has a little asterisk that when you read below it states that Cavalry swap spears for hand weapons after the charging round.

Yes I know you can not swap between Special weapons (ones that are not hand weapons). This seems to be an exception for cavalry.

Actually it does serve us no benefit at all swapping to hand weapons on saurus cavalry in the second and subsequent rounds? Its not like we cant use the shield in the first round with the spear.... and we dont get the parry bonus...

Fair enough. I'm just going by info that I have come across in bits and peices over the last week and a bit. Since I live in Canada, I dont get the rule book that I ordered until next saturday,(shipping bastards) so feel free to correct me whenever I say something that is wrong as you would know better than I would.

 

[Polaris3000]

Dammit. Correction to above. *pieces* Highest english mark in my grade and I can't spell pieces for heaven's sake.

 

[DonkeyHotep]

It does make a difference. If a boar riding orc boss using Pokos pigstikka charges a unit, he uses his spear, which is magical. Would he then switch to his non-magical hand weapon, thus not using a magic weapon?

 

[Caneghem]

It does make a difference. If a boar riding orc boss using Pokos pigstikka charges a unit, he uses his spear, which is magical. Would he then switch to his non-magical hand weapon, thus not using a magic weapon?

Maybe the rule that says you "always have to use the magic weapon" overrides the "swap spear for handweapon"?

Anyone with book access feel free to correct our speculations.

 

[Polaris3000]

What I want to know it what happens when two of the same weapon are used by the cavalry lord/hero/model/thingy. Since shields on cavalry are going to become essentially useless from what I understand, it might be cool to be able to give them an additional hand weapon. Or two lances/spears. Or two magic weapons(if the rules allow, which they probably dont).