8th Ed. Skink cohort.. What? They don't come with 2A, PF S/T4...

[Lawot]

Anyone know of a battle report in which we could see a big cohort like this in action?

 

[Lizardmatt]

liz spell that I cant for the life of me remember its name. does a S4 hit per model. 30 models would have 9 models left after this casting.

stone throwers, gyro copters or sallies would have a field day vs T2 horde units. T4 saurus on the other hand will take the hit and be ok.

As for supporting stegs with cohorts for the rank and std I would be extremely wary of doing this. A smart player will put all possible attacks on the skinks to generate CR. Imagine a VC blender lord in contact with skinks...could turn a solo steg win into a loss.

Fiery Convocation. What's interesting, is hitting 30 skinks with hit, kills ~105 points of models.
Hitting 30 saurus with it kills 110 points of models; pretty close to exactly the same.
Yeah, it's 19 kills vs 10 kills; but it's also 5 points a model vs 11 points each.

Yeah, stone throwers, sallies do have a "field day" against skinks. Great! Maybe I can convince my opponent to fire is best shooting at my cheapest units. Yeah, fire the S9 D6 wound stone thrower at the 5 point models please.

The Blender Vampire lord is going to do that same thing to anything short of a monster in the Lizards book. He's going to be hitting on 3's with re-rolls, killing on 2's with no armor save, and making more attacks.
Skinks are actually one of the best vampire speed bumps, because they die all the same, but cost a lot less.
If you are going to be getting massacred, do you want to give up a 5 point skinks or a 14 point temple guard? Since TG can't parry, skinks are actually more durable vs the blender.
As far as challenging the blender goes, good luck. He'll be in a unit with a champ, and the champ is the first one back with invocation. I usually see blenders with a back up hero as well (like a 60 point wraith).

7 wide ghouls vs 6 wide temple guard (because it's how I form up both units).
Ghouls + blender kill 10.6 TG (6.5 from vamp, rest from ghouls)
TG kills 9.4 Ghouls
Winner will depend on charge and ranks, though TG have lost ~140+ points, where Ghouls are down 90, which can come back. Within a turn or two, You'll have given up a huge chunk of points.

Against Skinks:
Ghouls + blender kill 13.3 (5 from vamp, rest from ghouls)
Skinks kill 2.5
That's 65 points of lizards vs 20 points of undead.

Why this matters is that the margin of defeat is less with skinks. Either way you're losing, but you've cut your losses with skinks.


That's the entire job of skinks. Skirmishers redirect to cut your losses. Cohorts die cheaper than anything else to cut your losses.

-Matt

 

[RipperDerek]

Well, dying cheaply isn't their entire job, it's just one of the things that makes Skinks one of our best units. Off the top of my head, skinks do all of the below:

- Gun down monsters with high toughness
- Hunt down lone wizards / support characters
- Shoot down artillery
- Spring surprises like fanatics safely
- Plilnk away at lightly armored infantry
- Secure objectives / table corners
- Hold buildings
- Give you the advantage in deployment
- March block/reform block
- Tarpit killy things
- Redirect large enemy blocks
- Bait frenzy charges safely
- Bunker skink priests

Plus, Cohorts with a banner make you much more resistant to scenarios like blood and glory, while cohorts with a musician can swift reform and shoot, and rally more after a redirect fleeing. Cohorts with both are much less likely to break when fighting opposing chaff.

Reading back through this topic, and seeing how many people don't appreciate the power of the skink, makes me feel like we need a tactica for this...

 

[Putzfrau]

Playing against tons of skinks isnt very fun for most people.

Every "good" lizardmen army is built around skinks, but skink cloud armies have never been fun to play against.

Even dan heelan has said he leaves his lizardmen army at home for club games because skink cloud armies are generally considered "antifun"

Dunno about several large blocks of cohorts. Never seen it used except for with krox in 7th and alongside 60 skirmishers.

Regardless I dunno how many are honestly arguing that skinks are bad, just they would rather use saurus in some situations.

I mean to say skinks are bad is just wrong.. theres a reasom the competitive lists are built with lots of them