New player, considering the lizards and dinos

[Arcanis161]

Hello!

Been trying to get the nerve to post here as a) I'm sneaking in from another forum where I recently posted about getting into Slaves to Darkness (with a Norsca theme), and b) I don't play Lizardmen/Seraphon as of yet.

I'm a 40k Guard player mostly, but virtually everyone in my gaming group that plays 40k also plays AoS, and I want to get into AoS as it seems slightly easier to get a game of that rather than 40k.

I'm trying to decide if this is the faction for me; I think so, but I'm concerned that I am underestimating what is needed to get invested.

I had thought about getting into this faction before, but hadn't because, at the time, I was looking at playing either a horde or "classical" (ie: shielded battleline, archers, and cycle charging cavalry), and instead decided to go with the latter with the Ossiarch Bonereapers.

However, I fell into my usual trap of overcomplicating the snot out of things with them and the paint scheme I (still) want. Basically, it's a scheme I need to do actual academic research into in order to do the theme justice, which will take time.

In the meantime, I still want to play AoS. I thought about Slaves to Darkness, and even got some old hunchback Chaos Warriors, but calculating a Norsca themed army, I would have a large amount of models to paint with a somewhat complex scheme.

I've recently been playing Total War Warhammer II as one of the Lizardmen factions, and am rather enjoying it. I hear that the Seraphon faction in AoS has a good amount of summoning and a good amount of magic as well. They also seem like they're also a faction that would be relatively easy and fast to paint, and paint well, by taking advantage of the Contrast paints and just doing some highlights and detail work afterwards.

So, I guess I'll posit the question to you guys, is this the faction for me? Is it really that quick and easy to paint them to a slightly-better-than-tabletop standard? Am I missing some hidden detail in collecting and painting them?

 

[Imrahil]

Welcome along!

Armybuilding: we have got some people around with a good eye for that. (Not me)

On the painting aspect, you can go as crazy as you like. But reading your post you are kind of looking for a low effort high reward painted army.
I think contrast paints is the way to go. With those it does not realy matter whitch army you pick I guess.

You should check out the Contrast challenge, this will give you a look at what is possible with contrast and Seraphon.

Good luck desiding

Grrr, Imrahil

 

[Lizards of Renown]

Welcome to the forum!

I think what @Imrahil says above is solid advice.

I would only add that you can take a look through the painting and modelling threads to give you enough data on color schemes and then the AoS tactics threads to see if this is an army you'd like to play with.

Personally, I have never chosen an army to play based on colors, painting, modelling or even style of play. I've always looked through each armies' lore and decided whether I'd like to play it based on whether it appealed to me or not. Then I'd work out the style of play that I needed to use with the army.

Lizardmen has always been a "calling" rather than a "choice" for me

I would recommend getting two armies that have opposite styles of gameplay to give yourself some variety.

Hope to see more posts from you on the forum!

 

[Killer Angel]

First of all, welcome aboard!

I hear that the Seraphon faction in AoS has a good amount of summoning and a good amount of magic as well. They also seem like they're also a faction that would be relatively easy and fast to paint, and paint well, by taking advantage of the Contrast paints and just doing some highlights and detail work afterwards.

keep in mind that heavy summoning was true with our previous battletome (and this implied a greater amount of models that you needed to paint).
With the new battletome, summining rules have changed and so (from this pov) things are less complicated.

 

[Aginor]

Welcome to Lustria!

The other guys are spot on. We have become a tad less complex/difficult to play in some regards, and I think it is quite easy to paint Seraphon to a good tabletop standard pretty quickly.

 

[Scalenex]

I am more of a fluff and an 8th edition tactics guy. My models are very unpainted. But we do have a lot of brilliant painters here. More importantly, we have a lot of patient friendly painters who are happy to answer questions and give advice.

The thing I like best about painting Lizardmen/Seraphon is that there is no wrong way to do it. Officially, I guess they are blue, but you can paint any color scheme you choose. You can try for hyper realism using real world lizards as a baseline or you can go hyper fantasy and choose exotic or bright colors.

Most forumites here go for fairly uniform lizards, but some have veritable rainbows of diversity in their models color schemes. Both painting strategies have their proponents.

I'm a mediocre painter, but one technique I found that lets a medicore painter add some pizzaz is to mottle back scales with spot patterns.

View attachment 7390