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8th Ed. Tactical Advice aganst Ogres, Skaven and Tomb Kings

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Skubzilla

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So my buddies, and myself are starting to battle at least once a week now. I had my first batte on Sunday and I won!! However I was teamed up with the exact army I was hoping to team up with; the Ogres! (they make me nervous with thier epic size) So, how my friends and I play is; we roll die for teams and such, and ya we always have a partner, and we play with the rule we can use spells on our friendlies. We also play 2000 points each team, so it's essentially a 4000 point battle on a 6 foot by 4 foot game board.

Anyways I have an army list drawn up and I intend to rewrite it to match the forum's expectations of how an army list should look, but I haven't gotten around to doing this yet. I know if I posted it right now it's probably far to busy looking and such. So I'm going to summarize the units I'm using right now. I have a slann in a temple guard unit of 10. I have a huge block of 30 saurus. An ancient Steg with Engine, 2 Sallies, 5 chameleons (all I have) and 3 groups of 10 skinks.

So what I'm wondering is if anybody could give me some advice on how to approach battling against these armies. Also how I should strategize with the given armies when I'm on thier teams, that would be great!

So for example on Sunday I more or less hid behind the huge ogres as we advanced until I got in close and I kept buffing the ogres to be able to withstand my buddies TK unit of 60 archers and such. So I found that worked really well, but I have no idea what to do when I'm paired up with Skaven. (which also makes NO sense lol) Another question is what lores would be great with what armies, considering I can buff friendlies and such. Currently I'm running Life in my list, but perhaps some lores may be better for the team or the given situations.

All I can say is on Sunday I found out how badass Skinks are. My unit of chameleons and a single unit of skinks took down my buddy's Warsphinx in one turn. He didn't even get to use his breath weapon yet, soo ya Ogres and Lizardmen makes a mean combo I found. We didn't just win, we destroyed. With the exception of the skinks who were wiped out by games end, I only lost maybe ten models or so. Also my stegadon seemed to be invincible when it came to artillery as everything missed, but I was lucky with the scatter dice.

Anyways thanks for taking the time and for any help you may be able to offer!! If you have any questions which could help me in regards to what they're using I'll be more then happy to answer, but ya I'm trying to tweak my list and I want to know what I should buy next and such. I'm really liking the idea of having Terradons so I might buy a couple of those sexy flying bastards.

We are all inexperiened in whfb, as this was all our first battle on Sunday, with the exception of the Skaven player whos been battling for years. Luckily he seemed to do more damage to himself then he did to us Lizardmen and Ogres, but I know that won't necessarily always happen as he was just having horrible rolls all game.

Thanks again for the time and effort!

Lastly let me just say... Sweet Jesus, Skinks are awesome on so many levels. :smug:
 
Ogres are a tough bunch, best I can say about ogres is make sure you have either a slann that has lore of Light or Shadow. Decrease their toughness or up your innitiative. Also; poisoned attacks, take lots and lots of small groups of skinks. on a cost-to-loss ratio skinks are fantastic against low-armoured high-toughness ogres. Use terrain, make them take all sorts of tests on the terrain as your skinks run about. I had an Ogre Deathstar mired in one of those angry punchy forests once, and he didn't like that.
Hide behind walls is also a good idea because that takes away the impact hits he dishes out with his Ogre-charge. Be carefull with his mages, Ogres can throw purple bowling-balls of death.(purple sun) so take a dispell-scroll or cube of darkness, for safety measure.

Against skaven? ... if he's fielding hordes casually take a Slann with Lore of Life and cast some dwellers on that, that'll break them up; Sallies also do very well against them, their spout flames attack really wrecks havoc on their units.
also: Take up terrain that he can't use his numbers in; try to funnel him into some passes which do not support 10 wide ranks so he loses his horde-bonus. (remember the movie 300? or the battle of thermopoly?)
Also, carefull with those flame-artillery-thingies, you might want to send your cham-skinks after those... Lore of Life complements the TG wonderfully, and in a good turn can make each of them harder than a dragon, and more resilient also. plus the fact that your numbers are in essence far further up due to ressurrecting them is also a good thing ^_^

Against tomb kings.. I can't really say much, I've never fought them ^_^;;
so that's my two cents, I hope it's been helpfull.
 
With Tomb Kings, poison is your friend. Just do what you did in your last game and poison those pesky Sphinxes into oblivion. With TK Infantry, flanking is golden. Good Static combat resolution combined with hard hitting units will make Tomb Kings' servants turn to dust faster than Vampires on Sunny Beach... You'd also always want to kill the characters, especially Tomb Kings/Princes and Necrotects to deny the boosted Weapon Skill and Hatred. Kings are rather tough characters if kitted properly, so this might not be so easy, but once it's done, skeletons are WS 3 and even elite are WS 4, so getting rid of them is much easier.

Necropolis Knights (the once who ride those big snakes) can be problematic, since they are rather fast, hard hitting and have an amazing (for TK) AS of 3+ which gives them rather good protection against poison. But they too don't like to be flanked. Sepulchral Stalkers can be a real pain if the dice gods are not totally against the TK player. They pop up where ever they want, reduce low-initiative lizards into fine grained sand and then even dish out some damage on close combat. The meanest part is that they can move AND shoot on the turn they emerge. Skrox units are probably good against these, but they have to be in a right place at the right time, which can is hard.

The Lore of Nehekhara gives TKs some really mean augments and debuffs similar to Death and Shadow. The vortex spell, Skullstorm can do something against Skinks, but most TK players switch that to the Signature spell that gives extra movement.

I have no experience on Ushabti or the two giants, so cannot really say much about them, but I'm guessing poison will help here too.

Hope that helps!
 
Actual regular TK have WS of 2 and elites have WS of 3. Not 3 and 4. The downside of using poison is wiht the arrows of aseph power TK archers get, they can hit skirmishers and even chano skinks without suffering penalties on their shooting rolls. They have access toa spell which doubles their shooting phase too.
 
Ooops, well this is embarrassing... Yeah, you are right, Scalenex, I must have been thinking Charioteers and Necropolis Knights... but that just enforces my point. Kill the King, cripple the army. Or at least the unit he's in. Archers in Tomb King army never take any penalties or bonuses on anything, so they are perfect against skirmishers and chameleons. Still, hitting on 5s and wounding on 5s against Saurus (3s against Skinks... ouch) is not astonishing statistically as you have your unmodified armor on top of that.

Oh, one thing I forgot was chariots. They are glass cannons, so if you don't let them charge, they go down rather easily. Still, spells like Righteous Smiting give one extra attack to the both riders AND both steeds, so one chariot gets four attacks more. They are not powerful (WS3 and S3, S4 if they charged as they have spears), but can effectively add to their staying power.
 
I find that Death Slann works very well against both TK and OK Armies. Is good for snipping out Grey Seers as well.

Watched part of a game last week where player Purple Sunned for max range (30") right down TK line, ended up decimating his front line and collected another 10+ or Power Dice in the process. Found out later he still ended up losing but that was not the point of the story. :)

Point is Purple Sun has a field day with low I units, as all LM players know very well. Slann is able to snipe out Characters.

Edited this out because I am on drugs and was thinking of Magic Missles: "and you can channel your Direct Damage spells though you Skink Priests. Therefore, you do not have to get your Slann right in the thick of it."
 
UMmmmm you can only channel magic missles.
 
Thank you very much for the replies! I'm hapyy to say in my two battles so far I've won both times. This is also considering, for myself, almost everything that could have gone wrong on sunday, went horrribly, horribly wrong. Started the game with a miscast on throne of vines, and rolled a 1 on cupped hands. Proceeded by blowing up most of my temple guard. Next turn I miscast again and rolled a 1 on the miscast save for thrown of vines. This was right after I regrew my temple guard, and I completely again blew most of them up. So turn 3 I regrew them back again and for the next two turns kicked ass. My salamander single handedly wiped out a unit of 30 storm vermin by roasting 18 with a perfect shot to the flank, and the rest failed thier leader ship test and ended up fleeing off the board. This same salamander the turn before ate all but one handler on a miscast, and yet he proved himself ten fold. I guess he needed a snack before he'd kickass at my will. But then turn 5 the worst thing in the world happened. My buddy was aiming his warp stone cannon at my saurus block and miscast, in the biggest fluke in the world, it scattered to directly over my slann, failed all of the saves, and of course he rolled a 6 on the warp stone cannon to cause 6 wounds. Yes we checked the scatter dice, and I agreed it was aimed freakishly perfectly at my slann, and then roll matched up the perfect distance to place the small template directly over my poor unlucky frog's head. By bye slann :(... sooo I wasn't stoked (my misforutne was quite hilarious though) Basically, soo much for my toughness 8 saurus, and my lovely dwellers spell, not to mention my level 4 wizard for dispelling. Luckily I was teamed up with my buddies Tombking, and he was decimating the ogres. I ended up holding my own against what was left of the skaven and we defeated the ogres down to absolotuely nothing, and the skaven were down to one unit by the end of turn 6. What an epic battle, and I still have no idea how I didn't lose. I guess considering, how bad of luck I had on some of the rolls, there were other rolls where I had godlike luck. I rolled 7 6's when I moved a unit of 10 skirmishers within close range of a doom wheel and killed it. 7!!!!! Out of 10 dice, I rolled 7 6's. I don't even know how that happened. So I was EXTREMELY lucky, whilst also being EXTREMELY unlucky. What an odd game this warhammer is lol. :rage:

Next week we have a new buddy coming out who's using a High Elf army but he only has 1000 points. So I'm going to team up with my skaven player, who is instead going to be using a wood elf army.

It's going to work out to; I am gonna have a 1500 point army, and each elf army is going to be 1000 points. And then we're facing the Tomb Kings and Ogres at 1750 points each. Anybody have any suggestions on how I should run my list considering I'm with two elf armies that I know VERY LITTLE about? I've heard High elves are awesome at magic?? As well I'm thinking maybe the wood elves might be able to lighten the load of my skinks as far as war machine hunting goes?? Hmm either way any advice is always welcome!!! :smug:
 
On your Throne of Vines miscast, you could have used the throne of vines save first, then used the cupped hands. This is because the spell effect happens first, before you roll the miscast. If you fail that, then you roll the miscast and use cupped hands.

Good luck in future games.
 
As an experienced Skaven player allow me to toss in my two cents.

funneling doesn't work. Most skaven players don't play hordes as they benefit VERY little from it. We get power by having additional ranks. Our leadership improves and we get steadfast easily for out tarpits. I once threw a 5x6 skavenslave block at a unit of six ogre ironguts (yes, ironguts) and locked them down utterly for two full turns (four rounds of combat) just by accepting losses and passing leadership rolls. Had a warpfire thrower amble up beside the fight and unleash fiery death upon the ogres. By the time he actually widdled down the slaves I had a counter charge prepped and he was screwed.

For combating Skaven I strongly agree with lore of life and snagging dwellers below.. nearly the entire army has a strength of 3 so that is a 50/50 chance of death on most models.. excellent chances. also, the most dangerous spell you might face with Skaven is the dreaded 13th spell (aka curse of the horned one). Becalming Cogitation is your friend.. with a casting value of 25+ the eliminating of 6's stops IF and greatly reduces the chances of success without it.

On a side note, Throne of vines empowered Flesh to Stone = Toughness 8 on Saurus warriors... against skaven that is basically laughing off even their strongest units. I've witnesses an HPA plow into a unit of Saurus warriors and take not a single wound.. even on the thunder stomp.. now thats crazy.
 
funny, my skaven opponent always fields his units in hordes, so I funnel him into a corner, and have my saurus be all badass and stand firm without any need for help, and my sallies torch the skaven backsides for a nice and crispy meal. His horde formation is also good for me, since it allows for much more margin in my Sallies.

I haven't had much trouble dispelling the 13th spell, for some reason he can't seem to get it off, as much as he tries. He also has terrible luck with any weapon supplied by Clan Scrier(or how that is spelled) xD. I've litterally seen him lose 2/3d of his army in the first turn... before I even lifted a finger aside from dispelling, simply by pure unadulterated bad luck.
After that he decided never to ask Clan Scrier for help, and he became a cultist Skaven player with a pirates-theme xD.
 
Then, I hate to say it, but your friend isn't playing skaven to their strengths. In 8th edition my skaven are 10 wins, 0 losses, and I even have an Ogre Kingdoms player that looks irritated every time I bring my little rodent bastards. If you want to help your friend just show him these reasons for when to field a skaven horde, and when not to.

First, and foremost, steadfast. As long as your unit has more ranks than your enemy you effectively have stubborn.. meaning even on a round of heavy losses you still roll on full leadership. Slap a BSB nearby and you get to reroll failed tests. Any skaven player that doesn't bring a BSB isn't playin the army with 8th edition rules in mine.

Second, leadership. Skaven have a lovely little rule that makes all bonus ranks = a bonus to leadership. So, a Skaven warlord in a unit of 5x4 clanrats/stormvermin = an L 10 bubble for the army. Couple that with the above mentioned BSB and you have units that break as often as ours do.

Thirdly, logistic. WS3, S3, T3 on nearly every model in the army. These are not models that are going to chew through the enemy at all. Putting them in a horde to try and milk extra piss weak attacks is fruitless against most units. Also, unless you run into a horde you won't be making full base contact anyway.. so your ten wide unit is only touching with ~7 models.. so an extra 7 attacks = 3-4 hits, 1-2 wounds, that can be saved with full AS.. uselss.

Skaven are the kings of tarpits. He needs to field his army in solid deep ranks and make liberal use of slaves to be fully effective. Once they are locked in place you send in rat ogres, warpfire throwers, doomwheels, Hellpit Abominations, ect. to do the killing.

The ONLY time I do think running skaven in a horde is ok is when they are pushing a screaming bell or plague furnace. The furnace and bell displace so many rank and file models it is easy to form them into a horde. The plague furnace it is a matter of opinion, the bell sometimes makes the models pushing it into little frenzied blenders so optimizing base contact can be good.

I know this is a Lizardmen forum and i just did a full write up about skaven.. but you need to know what the army is truly capable of should your friend start playing them competatively.
 
Good information in the post. No worries on the posting a pro-skaven write up. I do have a question, is the leadership gained by the extra ranks cut-off at 4 ranks? Also, the leadership 10 does not apply for any unit within 12 inches of the generals unit, does it? As an example, a unit that only has 2 extra ranks is within the general's 12 inspiring presence. That unit gets the generals base leadership plus the 2 ranks, correct?

Thanks
 
true, I will hand over these tips and tricks you wrote down as soon as I see him again. I think it's also important, despite this being a Lizardmen Forum, to help your opponents, because let's face it; "without a good hunt, the food will taste stale." <old Aztec saying> And this also gives a good persoective of where the skaven strengths lie.
I'd like to add one more little detail to your instructions; lessened effectivity of spells like Dwellers... I mean, 20 kills in a horde after 1 dwellers is quiet different to 10 kills in a normal-sized regiment...

And as far as I know, it doesn't go over the 10 leadership maximum. so as far as I am aware you are correct(though I am by far no expect on skaven, I just usually send my Lizards to eat them. xD
 
Well spotted on my brainfart in that post. Yes, you would only be using the generals raw leadership and augmenting it by the number of ranks in said unit. BUT, the only limit posted in book/errata is that it cannot exceed a total of 10 leadership.

Also, us crafty skaven veterans might catch you with a rat dart conga line.. so beware. Those of you not in the know a rat dart is a minimum sized giant rat pack (5 rats, 1 packmaster) and set up so that are all in a straight line. At most you will make base contact with 2 saurus warriors due to base size differences so that means maximum of 4 rats gone every turn. AND, due to the mixed units rule you would have to assign different attacks to the rats and the packmaster due to varied stat lines. What this equals is a minimum of 2 full rounds of combat where your unit is being locked in place by a unit only costing 23 points..

When you see a rat dart, no matter the shape, pick up the nearest hammer and make them take a real break test. You either waste shooting on a crap unit or they lock you up with utter cheese.
 
Well hopefully my buddy never stumbles upon these forums lol. He only ever runs hoards of skaven, and I've yet to run into a rat dart, or a battle plan in which you describe. I'll toss him some ideas next battle if I win again.

I am, as well, pleased to announce that for the third game in a row I've won! This time my skaven friend was using his Wood elves, as we all agreed Skaven and Lizardmen should not be on a team together. My High elf and Wood elf counter parts got their asses handed to them to save me a beating whilst I dished out an equally devestating beating to the ogres and especially, the tombkings. It was an odd game as there were 5 players and we had to make a few house rules as we went to make this work. If you were wondering I ran a 1500 point army with two fellow 1000 point armies, versus two armies of 1750. Once again, with a bunch of lucky rolls I won!!

This was done through magic and sweet, sweet, suculant, salamanders. (say that 10 times fast) Oh sweet jesus do I love salamanders. My buddy behind the tombkings thought he had a fool proof plan with an 80 skeleton block of thier standard warriors (with light armor) and haha my salamanders burnt them to a crisp. It was wonderful. I then got lucky with a dwellers spell, cast with only 3 dice! (+1 for rumination so 4 total) and even though it had 6 dice thrown at it on the dispel, he didn't catch my casting. Dwellers nearly killed a third of his unit, after the salamanders went to town. We ended up winning by only a few hundred points or so due to my team mates getting decimated by the ogres.

I also used Tetto'eko, and my friends agreed his doubles rolls don't cause miscasts. With this in play, I almost feel as though I should never use Tetto'eko again. It wasn't even fair, there were comets everywhere, and I never miscasted, so ya, Tetto'eko owned. However I did forget about one of my extra powerful comets once and charged right into a spot where one of the comets were. With 6 markers (3 turns) on this spot it cost me 11 of 25 of my saurus, (strength 10 hits) yet it cost my oppenent a War Shinx and a bunch of skeletons so, all in all, fair trade. Not to mention I regrew back some saurus next turn :D So, this brings me to 3 for 3 in wins, and I'm the only person in my group of friends who hasn't lost yet.

So I can definitely wish you all many thanks as this tactical help has helped a bunch, and I do believe I'm always going to field Salamanders in 8th edition. It's not even fair. :bored: It should also be noted that we all play for fun, (I am competitve by nature however :smug: ) and we're very far from experts. Only my Skaven friend has battled before, so for the rest of us this was all our third battle, or first battle for the High Elf Player.
 
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