Just finished a nice battle vs High Elves. Our lists (roughly) SV on CO, LA, Sh, Dawnstone, sword of striking Skink priest, feedback scroll 24 SW, Spears, Mu, St 10 skinks 10 skinks 6 chameleons 3 terradons 1 Sala + handler HE list: 1 HE mage, lvl 2, +1 PD and some fail..err..wardsave 1 Noble, BSB. Stuff. 18 HE spearmen 10 lothern sea guard 10 swordmasters 2 RBT's Our battlefield was 48" by 48". With 4 peaces of terrain, 1 building (never came into play) a hill (to hide my priest all day long) and 2 forests about 12" from his DZ. Very usefull for cover. And since we didn't feel like it: none had special rules. Deployment, my point of view, from left to right. RBT, Swordmasters, Seaguard+mage, RBT, spears+noble. Skinks in front of Saurii (with general), hill with priest behind, skinks, sala, terradons. Chameleons scouted near a forest. HE turn 1: Guns ablazing he starts pretty spectacular: 2 terradons bite the dust. After that moment of clarity: 1 skink stumbles over a rock, hits his head and passes out. (He failed miserably) Lizardmen turn 1: Advance. Chameleon skinks take out a spearmen. HE turn 2: shuffles around a bit, magic: Big scary S10 Amber spear is fired at my saurii, who catch is and turn it into a longspear (1 to wound). His spears try to charge my chameleons, I S&S taking out 2: he failed the charge. Barely budging out of his original position . Shooting doesn't do much, takes out a few skinks and saurii. Nothing fancy. Lizardmen turn 2: Again, a general advance. Skinks get into good positions, terradon lands smack in the middle of his army: right in front of a RBT. Which meant he pretty much had to shoot it down, which was fine by me -> he wouldn't shoot anything else that way! Chameleons and skinks take out 3 spears. My chameleons are now behind his spears , I love that.... HE turn 3: More shuffling, his swordmasters stand a bit before his seaguard: ready for my spears (or so he thought!). Magic: A spectacular fail by his wizard. Long story short: large template S10: killing 7 sea guard and panicking the unit. His ward save wasn't online yet.... My lone terradon watched in fear as the explosion barely missed him! Shooting: *static*, "We have Terradon 1 down, repeat: we have terradon 1 down" *static*. He shot my last and lonely terradon to tiny bits. The other manages to take out quite a few saurii. Lizardmen turn 3: Both my skink units fire at the swordmasters, and with some nice dice: 7 die, leaving the last 3 standing vs a very big and scary unit of saurii! Chameleons pick of a few spears again. And my salamander decides it's time for a snack. HE turn 4: His left flank consists of: RBT, 3 Swordmasters, a now rallied unit of 4 seaguard with mage. He is facing 2x10 skinks and my saurii there. His spears are still pretty far away. His swordmasters charge a unit of skinks, who flee and get away. His flank is now very exposed to my very big unit! (This was his only option, which failed) All his ranged stuff kills a few here and there, again: nothing to exciting. Lizardmen turn 4: Charge his RBT with my (now 4) chameleons, his swordmasters with my saurii. My skinks fail to rally and continue to the priest! In an epic struggle: his RBT crew kills 2 chameleons, but the last 2 strike back: killing 1! His swordmaster(s) are still getting their hair done right, as the blood makes it sticky and all that... They then get slaughtered by my, not so pretty, scar-vet. I overrun into his spears. HE turn 5: His seaguard charge some random skinks (I love hand to hand skinks!), his spears get utterly crushed by my saurii. With only his champion remaining! He decides a whole unit is a tad too much for him, and flees. My guys chop him down, easily. In the true epic battle: his last remaining crewmember hits a chameleon, but does not have the strenght to kill it's frail body. The 2 chameleons then get rid of him, showing their muscles to the other RBT crew! Lizardmen turn 5: Reform my saurii facing the action again, all 7 elves...2 RBT crew, 4 seaguard and a mage. My skinks manage to rally and join the priest behind the hill. THe salamander and sneak up on the mage! HE turn 6: He turns and awaits his doom. Which shall come, swiftly! Lizardmen turn 6: My 2 chameleon skinks charge his mage, while my saurii charge his 3 seaguard. The seaguard battle isn't an actual battle...so we'll skip that part . In the Red corner: A HE mage, 472 years of age, weighing in at a whopping 140 pounds. With 7 wins and 200 losses....iiiiiiit's Aluar!!! In the blue corner: Twin skinks! Spawned just out of the box, a combined weight of 120 pounds, with 15 wins and 0 losses...iiiiiiiit's CHrtripi and Njuatyl!!! First round: The mage lunges out a few times, but the nimble skinks simply dive away. A good uppercut by a skink dazes the elf for a moment. The elf goes for a hard right, but only hits a tail! This round is all about the shuffling, neither side managing to get a good position. Second round! : The skinks come out in FURY! The elf responds with good defensive actions. 1 of the skinks blends in with his surroundings, while the other dances in front of the mage! Our poor mage has no idea what just happened, and CHrtripi quickly ends the fight with a simply but deadly dagger punch. Result: WIN! Army result: With only 1 RBT facing my: nearly full saurrii, 9 skink skirmishers, 3 skink skirmishers, the priest, a salamander and CHrtripi and Njuatyl....you do the math (He only destroyed my terradons!) It was a fun battle, with my chameleons being the MVP's. Dodging bolts, arrows and insults all day long! The Hunted
Seems like you ended up having tons of fun!!! Great work with the Skinks dancing around his units and messing up his battle plan!!! Seems like you managed to avoid heavy loses to the RBT/Sea Guard shooting.
Well, his target priority wasn't really thát good. But his rolling was even worse! That opponent particulary HATES skinks, and especially when they get in behind his units. Which is what I love to do . So he will spend quite some time trying to destroy my skinks, while it was probably better to go after my saurii. This also explaines my love for chameleon skinks , they can get behind his units in the blink of an eye AND are pretty safe vs RBT fire. My skinks tend to do well in combats I set up, and generally getting in the way of things. This time: they also did a great job at shooting the elves. And then, in turn 4-6, they usually flee/panic and stop being very usefull ! The Hunted
Targeting skinks isn't such a bad idea. In fact, if it ends up working, it's a very good strategy. At 1k points, Saurus warriors are very good and looking at your opponents list, I doubt there was much he could have done. You, on the other hand, took advantage of your enemy's strategy, which is really good!
I think you should only target skinks if you can beat my Saurus warriors head on. Which pretty much means you have better infantry, and I need my support units to give me an advantage. In this case, the only unit I was worried about was his swordmasters. But after depleting them to 3, there was nothing he could do. Still, if he would have targeted my saurus warriors from turn 1, with both bolt throwers and his mage. I would have been quite reluctant to fully advance towards his swordmasters and even his spears. Therefore I think his target priority was off. But, since I know my opponent very well, I also knew he would go after the skinks. Which is no problem to me, ofcourse. Finally, I think you need to make a choice: go after the skinks orgo after the saurii. Make a focused battle plan, or else you just end up with a bit of this and a bit of that. Which, in this case, leaves both types (SW and skinks) pretty intact and usefull. Analysis complete , just the tactics; not the list. The Hunted
I agree with your current analysis, he should have gone all out on your skinks considering that your saurus warriors are much slower. Then he would've had a fighting chance. Granted, with 3 units of skinks and one unit of terradons, he had his hands full, especially considering his army selection (I know, I know, no army list analysis!!!). You seemed to have a good battle plan and his wasn't as well defined as yours. You identified the threats to your army and quickly dealed with it, which is all to your honor!