8th Ed. New player (haven't played 8th ed) 1500 - focus on big guys

[Blastbeat_Pie]

Firstly a brief history: I've played fantasy extensively during 7th ed with Dwarfs and Vampire Counts.
I'm currently reading up 8th ed rules and plan on starting a new Lizardman army.

I thought 1500 would be the ideal place to start, as I've found lower points levels far too restricting whilst list building.
The focus on this list is the big gribblies, and as I love the latest Carnosaur model that is something which I'm quite keen to keep in. Everything else can be changed as you see fit. I'm thinking about just a general all comers list

Oldblood
Carnosaur
Great Weapon
Light Armour
= 375 (this is the Lord allowance reached so I can't add anything else. Originally I only planned to take a scar vet but that means no priests)

Skink Priest
Level 2
Dispel Scroll
(pretty obvious choice - trying to find 5 points to upgrade to the cube would be nice! Not sure which lore to take?)

Brave
Ripperdactyl
Egg of Quango
Spear, Light Armour
Charmed Sheild
(warmachine hunter and quango delivery sustem to protect the big beasties - not sure if trying to get a unit of Rippers in is a better idea?

Core = 385

23 Skink Cohorts
Full command
2 Korxigor
(Priest goes here - I would like to put him with the skirmishers but I believe they are better off being redirectors rather than a 'bunker'. Otherwise this unit is simply here to meet core requirements)

10 Skink Skirmishers
10 Skink Skirmishers

Bastiladon with Solar Engine
(a beastie! maybe a bit slow for the general theme of the list but with only 1 priest I figure I need the bound spell)

3 Terradons
(To accompany the mounted brave and provide extra warmachine hunting- I realise the brave can't join this unit )

Ancient Steg
sharpened horns
(a third big beatie!!!)

I don't have the book to hand but that comes to just shy of 1500.

Thanks for reading and please let me know what you think? I'm not too sure of my warmachine hunters or core choices. I 'd quite like some Saurus to accompany the Bastiladon but I don't think you can get a decent unit for the same price as the Skink Cohort + Kroxigor?

 

[Izzetmaster]

Re: New player (haven't played 8th ed) 1500 - focus on big g

I love the Carnosaur model as well, and it's good to see more people interested in running them. That being said, they're hard to use as they confer a "low" (+1 as opposed to +2 for Cold Ones) armor save to their rider. I say low because even with light armor, you only reach a 2+ armor save, and high strength attacks will be prevalent at this points level. You also have no point room to take Loping Stride, which increases the survivability and threat range of the Carnosaur by a fair bit.

Looking at your army list, I don't think it's necessary to run your Skink Priest as a level two wizard. I think it would be better to drop the extra level, upgrade to the Cube of Darkness, and run with the Lore of Beasts. This also gives the added bonus of being able to take Loping Stride, which is huge. If you get lucky and roll The Savage Beast of Horrors, that's pretty swell. Otherwise, he's just there to counter a big spell and spam Wyssan's Wildform either on your bunker (okay idea) or your monsters (slightly better, but still just an average plan).

So, since you are adamant to run him, you are relying greatly on your own skills at deploying, screening, and redirecting to keep him alive long enough to smash into the side of something juicy. High strength attacks, Multiple Wounds, AND Thunderstomps are a joyous sight to behold, even if half of them are of average WS.

The Skink Chief on a Ripperdactyl with the Egg of Quango is an awesome choice, just make sure to turn him away from units you don't want him charging into.

The Skink Cohorts look fine. If your opponent wants to throw attacks at the Kroxigor, that just leaves more Skinks to be steadfast and tar pit with.

The Bastiladon is my favorite unit in the new book. The best thing about this guy is his multitude of uses. He can be used as a high movement weapon platform, as marching 8" does not affect whether or not you can fire a Beam of Chotec. He can be used to feign charges (meaning your intention isn't to actually get into combat with the target unit), causing panic tests. If you're tired of melting things with Chotec's holy fire, run him into the side of something. Just an awesome monster.

This looks like a fun list, man. Just beware of one thing... CANNONS. Cannons will absolutely ruin your day. One good round of shooting big boy guns is all it takes to ruin an army list like this. As I mentioned earlier, deployment is key, as is running your Terradons into the war machines ASAP! Tie them up or kill them outright, it doesn't matter, just don't let them hit your freight train units.

Get out there and reclaim the land for the Old Ones!

 

[Blastbeat_Pie]

Re: New player (haven't played 8th ed) 1500 - focus on big g

Thanks for the reply - all sounds like solid advice!

Yeah it's a shame I can't add any items or upgrades to the Carnie. I'm hoping the Steg and Bastie will draw some fire before the Chief and Terradons are able to take down any cannons etc.

I was thinking about dropping the Chief for a unit of Rippers - I'm right in thinking that you don't get any blot toad markers for taking the Chief/Ripper on his own rather than a unit? I'm just a bit worried about Elves though, as I imagine a unit of Rippers will do literally nothing against them and might just be free victory points.

If I was to take a Ripper unit then I'd also drop the Terradons in favour of some Chameleons. I will likely buy both options and see which works Any arguments for and against both options are always welcome though.

 

[dustandpolos]

Re: New player (haven't played 8th ed) 1500 - focus on big g

Given that cannon are the primary threat to this list, and given that this is already a pretty high strength list I'd take Heavens over Beasts. Iceshard can lock down cannon, Wyssans cannot. Iceshard helps any unit stay alive at range or in combat, wyssans is more situational. All the other spells in Heavens are useful/scary and will draw dice away from your Solardon, while Beasts leaves the possibility of rolling Flock along with a less useful spell for your list like Pelt (T8 still dies to a cannon...)

I believe you can't get loping stride because of max lords allowance, so stick to lvl 2 priest. I personally haven't seen many situations where Cube is worth cutting points elsewhere for - I always saw it as a second dispel scroll that couldn't be put on the same wizard. Unless you're relying on IF, I think 3 spells is the minimum needed to make people think seriously about what to dispel, and draw out scrolls while still getting something through each round

I like your skrox bunker, and you would need to cut elsewhere to get enough Saurus. Other people may encourage you to take more skirmishers and go avoidance, but I don't consider it an army without at least one battle-line unit. Bear in mind it won't stay LD 7 for long as the Krox will get targeted and your Carnosaur will probably be off rampaging/dead, though the 18" bubble will help


As far a warmachine hunters is concerned, I incline more towards camo skinks as they can potentially kill off warmachines in turn 1 with, if you can scout close enough then march into range. However, you'd need 10 to kill a war machine in 1 round on average rolls which means cutting elsewhere as well as removing the terradons. You could lose the second level on the priest, but I'd try to stay dangerous in every phase of the game, which leaves the possibility of cutting the sharpened horns on the steg, brave and standard from the Skrox (and a skink if more is needed, the unit currently ranks up at 31). This is down to preference, but I don't see the Skrox unit winning combat much so why pay for an additional point of combat res, your priest should flee the unit before it is charged so you don't need a challenge magnet, and the horns are good but less necessary given that you have multi-wound carnosaur, high strength flaming magic attacks for Chimera/troll hunting and plenty of S6/7/10, multi-attack models, none of which relies on getting the charge against faster units. At the end of the day though, it is down to preference here, I think.