So my Tomb King friend is going to try a risky build consisting of 3 Warsphinx in a 1500 points game. It is 210 per model so there goes 630 points of Special out of 1500 points lol I told him I will probably go with my last list which I used in a newbie tournament : (we are both newbie and have had less than 10 games in total) Life Slann in TG Bunker 24 Saurus with Scar Vet 2 Salamanders 2 x 20 Skinks (which I will split into 4 x 10 unit of Skink) 2 x 6 Chameleon Skinks I warned him with 24 poison shots on the first round I only need to be slightly lucky to take out one of his 3 all-so-important Warphinx. He said he won't deploy in a way that I can do that, and it also depends on who gets the first move. I am just not too sure about what he means? Come on Skinks free reform march 12 inches and shoot 12 inches, as long as I did not deploy my Cham in a silly way that it can get charged and destroyed the first turn, I am going to have quite an easy time sneaking through gaps and staying out of LoS of the Warsphinx and shoot them down. The Warsphinx only move 6", can't march, how is he going to protect those from my poison shooting if he is hoping to win the game by charging the 3 of them into my Saurus? Say the 3 Warsphinx made it near my Saurus or TG, with 4 units of 10 Skinks, 2 units of Salamander, I have so many chances to setup speed bump so that his Warsphinx cannot advance or at least make sure he didn't get the impact hits on my Saurus/TG. I just don't see how this will work out for him. The way I see it is, if he wants CC, he will have to come at me (and he is SLOW), and the moment he moves out my Chameleon will run circles around the Warsphinx and at least take ONE down. With the amount of cheap speed bumps I have, even if he kills everything, thats about 500 victory points. Since he spent 630 points on Special units that will simply be held back or killed by Skinks, I am expecting to crush his remaining 870 points worth of army with my Saurus and TG units. If he was sloppy enough to let me get Throne of Vines and Flesh to Stone off, a unit of 10 Tough 6 Skinks make an excellent speed bump. If his Warsphinx reaches me, tough 6 or tough 8 Saurus will give him a hard battle and I can expect to wear him down with combat resolution, too. Plain Saurus up against 3 Warsphinx isn't going to end pretty, I guess. However Flesh to Stone can easily turn the tide, and it also happends that my Scar Vet took Venom of the Firefly Frog with extra hand weapon so I will be throwing 5 poison attacks each round to give some edge against high tough targets. Am I underestimating the Warsphinx? If I setup the speed bumps right, he will almost never be able to pull of his impact hits on my Saurus, right?
Are they definitely all war sphinx not any necrosphinx? As they can fly What else is he taking? If he take 40 archers then he will just wipe your skink units off the board because they always hit on a 5+ and ignore skirmishers rule. If a sphinx gets into combat with a saurus or TG block, they are there for the rest if the game or are getting killed, you will be wounding him on 6s and he will be getting attacks back followed by a thunderstomp. Although a VotFF scar vet is a good idea, negate his toughness, he will have killing blow so can easily wipe you out with no armour saves allowed, I try to avoid having my scar vets go into killing blow TK units Also he will have magic that allows him to move again (basically net overall march) and a spell that allows him to shoot again, wiping out another unit of skinks! To stop you shooting at him with camos he might castle for a turn or two, But overall i reckon lizardmen show beat that list just don't be over confident and get caught out by the war sphinx, though first turn could be important, he could shoot your camos off the board turn one because they always hit on a 5+ so ignore chameleons camouflage.
Say he has 40 archers in two units of 20. 20 arrows will average 4.44 wounds against Skinks (tough 2) so having two units of 20 is his best bet of wiping out both of my Chameleon Skinks units. However I have so many options: (1) Approach with 2 Salamander and force him to choose between shooting Cham or Sally, and we all know Salamanders attract a hell lot of attention, to a point where in most of my games people are so afraid of them they focus so much on the salamanders they forgot to balance it with other risks. (2) Cast flesh to stone on the Skink before Throne of Vines, he may let it go because he would want to save his dispell dice for Throne. +2 and +4 tough against 20 Str 3 shooting is really between 2.22 wounds and 1.11 wounds. If I can sneak it, great, if not, now he has fewer dice for dispelling my Throne. (3) To wipe out all 6 Chameleon at once, that on average takes 27 shots. I can cast Regrowth just to keep the headache around his Warsphinx, or make it harder for him to choose between targets.
You are right and definitely have the right idea on how to combat his tactics but 40 archers will get rid of both chameleons if he gets turn one, Turn one Magic phase give them the multiple shots rule spell Turn One shooting phase unit 1: 40 shots, 13.3 hit, 8.88 wounds remove one unit unit 2: 40 shots, 13.3 hit, 8.88 wounds remove second unit alternatively, if they go for the sallie unit 1: 40 shots, 13.3 hits, 4.4 wounds, 2.96 after armour, 1.97 after skink save undead sallie, he should not shoot at a sallie, rather take it on in combat either with a sphinx (can thunderstomp Sallies) or some thing with killing blow (tomb scorpion? does chariots have KB?) as you can KB a sallie too so if he makes the tactical error by going for the sallie with archers then you should be excited
Interestingly, he told me he will be fielding: High Priest Tomb Prince 78 Skeleton Warrior 2 "elephants" (I think that's the nickname he gave Warsphinx) Bone Giant Casket With no shooting..... he will only have the Casket taking out my Chameleon Skinks. 78 Skeletons with Prince is nothing..... my Slann TG bunker should cut through them, my 24 Saurus with Scar Vet will also cut through them like hot knife in butter. With WS 5, they will get more hits, but to S3 against T4, and with our 4+ AS, his damage will be very limited. He can cast double attack that is not a huge plus against T4 and 4+AS. I am however worried about Thundercrush from his Warsphinx since he can target my Scar Vet easily. He gets to choose how to position the template, right? So he has an overall of 41% chance of inflicting D3 wounds on my Scar Vet...... not good.
That is a one weird list. I think you'll have a field day. As others have said, if he had taken multiple Archer units and got the Smiting spell (+1 A and shots) through, your Skinks would have been in trouble. But with that list... You just harass the "elephants" (maybe he's using some Mammoth skeletons as Warsphinx replacements, have seen those in Tomb Kings forums, look quite cool and fill the role nicely), and possibly the Bone Giant too, to death and wait for him to come to you to be combo charged. Burn his giant block with Salamanders as long as you can (he'll probably try to use the Casket's Light of Death to them) and let the remnants try to reach your position. Dwellers Below on that huge Skeleton block will reduce their amount nicely. If he gets the Sphinxes and the Bone Giant into combat with your blocks, it will get ugly. To stop this from happening should be your first and most important goal. The Thundercrush attack of the Sphinx is not your biggest worry, though. It requires to get a hit against the highest WS in the unit, so Sphinx's 3 against Scar-Vet's 5. And even if he manages to do that, he has to position his Sphinx carefully to be able to hit your Scar-Vet with the center hole of the template, as it cannot touch the Sphinx's base. So if the Sphinx and your Scar-Vet are in base contact, he's safe from that attack. Oh, and as a side note, Chariots don't initially have the Killing Blow rule, but the Nehekharan magic can give any unit one, and I think this applies to Impact Hits, too. Anyway, basically any unit can have the Killing Blow, but of course it doesn't apply to Archers' arrows... All in all, if the dice gods don't turn your back on you completely, I'm betting my money on your rather easy victory. So, good luck!