Im after a hard hitting force to match up against WE (mainly Driads and gladeguards) and HE's (swordmasters) I was thinking .. Slann (maybe life/light lore?) what equipment/items? 2x 30 saurus 3-4 salamanders ? 10 temple guard (to hide slaan in) behind the saurus units cham skinks 6? scar vet tooled up to kill (stick in one of the saurus units) All advice apreciated
I shall post to you the list I used to utterly trounce Ogre Kingdoms and O&G this weekend. Slaan w/ Lore of Life Focused Rumination Becalming Cogitation Plaque of Tepok BSB Saurus Scar-Vet Great Weapon Light Armor Saurus Warriors: 25 Full Command Temple Guard: 18 Musician and Standard Skinks: 19 - Kroxigor: 2 Standard Skink Skirmishers: 10 Skink Skirmishers: 10 Chameleon Skins: 6 Points: 1500 Put the Scar Vet in with the Temple guard to answer challenges so that the slaan can stay in second rank and avoid getting torn apart. Lore of life makes your already hard to kill units almost unstoppable by supplying +4 toughness, 4+ regen saves, and the ability to bring back fallen models. If you roll with some luck you could ALSO get dwellers below and force an entire unit to make a strength test on each model or be slain outright.. NASTY against all HE and scary against WE. Plaque of Tepok is there to offset bad rolling bu tossing in a 5th spell.. not only does this enhance the chance of you rolling the number you want it also means you're likely to roll doubles, always good when selecting spells. Send the Chamo Skinks after war machines or high toughnes and low armor targets. I have yet to play a game where two 10 skirmisher units didn't pay for themselves by A) poison attack wounds, B) harassing and redirecting, and C) enemies never thinking you'll actually charge with them then nailing them in the rear for combat resolution.
Sounds great, just a few questions if i can ask... 1, If the temple guard is engaged in combat, can the slann still cast spells such as dwellers etc? (as he's not actually engaged in combat...)? 2 . so the temple guard unit is the main (hammer) unit to go against dryads/swordmasters etc? THanks
1. The Slaan is still in the unit that is in close combat.. however, close combat doesn't prevent the casting of magic it simply impedes the use of SOME spells. Namely any spell type that cannot cast into combat. You can, however, still cast on legal units within range for spells not requiring line of sight. Also, hexes and augments can both be cast into combat so you can throw those into the fight the Slaan is in. 2. I don't usually use the temple guard as a hammer unit, I use it as a bunker. It stays CLOSE to the fighting, but not in it. This way if combat resolution is turning against you you CAN get involved, but it is safer not to and to just influence the fight with spells. The only exception to this is when facing warmachine/ranged heavy armies (dwarves and some ogres lists). At that point close combat actually becomes a shield against their ranged and your temple guard perform VERY well with s:5, t:4, 4+ armor.
Thanks, great advice, just a few more questions hehe sorry ... 1. Why so large temple guard unit if it's just a bunker for the slann? 2. isn't it a waste having your fighter character (scar vet) in the bunker when he could be better used in one of the fighting units? 3. No salamanders? as my friends will not be using war machines, i feel reduce some of the skink skirmishers and add a few?
From my understanding, it really doesn't matter if someone tries to challenge the Slann, he is already in the second row, I don't even think they can challenge him. You can't move him to the front line anyways, the Temple Guard won't let him. .... Anyone know this? Anyways a Temple Guard Champion can take challenges. Having a Scar-Vet in the Temple Guard block in a 1500 Point Game Seems silly. Stick the Scar-Vet in a Block of your Saurus. You would want atleast 12 Temple Guard to Wrap around the Slann. It would look silly otherwise. I've been using 16. So i do them in a 5x4 Formation. For the Slann I would probably say Life is the safest bet. Using Two Disciplines(Loremaster and Focused Rumination) Puts you at 325 Points. You could pick up the Plaque of Divine Protection or a Third discipline Ethereal if you want more protection. But that would put you on or near Max Points for Lord. And use some Salamanders. =P
1. Two reasons actually. First if something DOES manage to break past your lines and head straight for your Slaan they will have one hell of a fight on their hands as well as being able to function as a fall back hammer unit incase things go really wrong (template attack wipes out your skrox, fliers/infiltrators/diggers come at your from your flank, ect.). Secondly, and this is an odd one, incase of miscasting. Though it is rare to have a miscast effect a fully geared Slaan it is not impossible. I once had an Ogres players use his power dice to dispell my throne of vines from lore of life then upon my attempt to recast I rolled the double 6's. Sadly, the miscast roll result was a 7, Detonation.. all models in base contact with the mage take a strength 10 hit. I lost 9 temple guard to that miscast BUT since I started with 18 I was still fighting fit. if I had gone with only 10 I would have been a sitting duck. Also, bear in mind, there are armies that can force a miscast on you (Ogres, being the one I face regularly, have the Hellheart for instance.) so the fact our Slaan have such a huge base can work against us. 2. This is why I field the scar vet minimally with light armor and great weapon. His sole purpose in my list is to keep the Slaan in the fight in the case of a necessary charge. Allow me to explain, lets say you're taking Orcs and Goblins and a unit of Orc Boar Boyz with an Orc Warboss gets past your front line and charges your Temple Guard. You hold since the threat of over run is too great and he declares a challenge. If you have a TG champion then he could answer the challenge but he will be dead by the end of the first combat most likely. This buys you one turn of 3 strength 6 attacks against his boars to try and take combat resolution (since that means -3 to armor saves it turns their 2+ into a pitiful 5+). Next turn, if he doesn't break, the Warboss can issue another challenge which you can answer with your scar vet. This tangle could take a while due to comparable stat lines and might come down to luck of the rolls.. but even then this buys you a whole extra turn or two. The point is that if your Slaan answers a CC challenge it is gonna die FAST... if it refuses the challenge it moves to the back rank and now cannot support your army with it's leadership. Edit: The rule actually says it has to "move the model so it is in a rank that is not in base contact with enemy" so he can stay happily settled in his second rank bunker.. though the inability to share leadership still applies. 3. I chose to not use salamanders due to the fact I was fighting ogres in 2 out of my 3 fights. You can never go wrong with salamanders they are just rather unreliable specifically against ogres. They should perform wonderfully against WE due to small bases, small number of wounds, and being flammable on some of the models. Actually, Maazie, nowhere in the challenges rules does it say the a characters must be on front rank to be involved in a challenge, you target the unit. If you have a character in the unit and you refuse the challenge they are taken out of the fight. TG champions will buy you one CC, maybe two if your opponent is having bad luck with rolls. Besides, if you really want a scar vet in your unit of saurus then I'd suggest an entirely different build. I usually roll my saurus warriors as an anvil I'm prepared to sacrifice if things go sour.. their sole purpose is to tarpit strong enemies and roll through weaker. Also, side note, earlier I stated something incorrectly. Specifically under the Slaan rules it states that he CAN fire magic missles into whatever combat the TG are in as long as he is in the second row. Lore of Death just got a lot more interesting...
That's not Right about the Magic Missles. It just states that you can cast them if the Temple Guard Unit is engaged in Close Combat (Which normally you cannot cast magic missles AT ALL if you Wizard's Unit is engaged). You still need to follow normal targeting rules and choose a target that is not in Combat. Also the Lore of Death is direct damage spells not Magic Missles.
Nah, he's fine. In WHFB you can have 25% in Lords AND 25% in Heroes. Half of your army can be characters if you want. So you could probably get 3 more of those Scar-vets if you worked the points out right. That'd be fun.
Ah, ok. I should really read my rule book before I go questioning all of this. I'm still stuck in the mindset of not being allowed lords in a under 2000 point game still. Thanks, - McCoy