Skink
draccan
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Played a 2500 points battle yesterday against Empire with my new Lizardmen army. I have played O&G, Empire (and for a short while Skaven) since 2nd ed. WFB. This was my first Lizardmen and first 8th ed battle
Gallery:
http://www.imagebam.com/gallery/qvmp1lcfq76vqxppjymgqcgx9ldrbim2/
____________________________________________
My army:
Slann Mage-Priest (BSB) with Cupped Hands of the Old Ones, Huanchi's Blessed Totem, Focus of Mystery, The Becalming Cogitation, The Focused Rumination
& 16 Temple Guard, full command, Sun Standard of Chotec
& Saurus Scar-Veteran, Great Weapon, Gambler's Armour, War Drum of Xahutec
20 Saurus Warriors (Mus, st.b., HW, shield)
21 Saurus Warriors (Mus, st.b., Spears; Shield)
20 Skinks, 2 Kroxigors, javelins, full command
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
10 Skink Skirmishers, Blowpipe, brave
Salamander, 4 Skink Handlers
Salamander, 4 Skink Handlers
Ancient Stegadon
Full Army list: http://www.lustria-online.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5095&p=39732#p39732
____________________________________________
Opponnent fielded this:
1 level 2 wizard, Light, Rod of Power (store dispel / power dices)
1 Warrior Priest, horse, potion of strength, enchanted shield (5+ armour save), sword of battle (+1 a)
1 Warrior Priest, foot, Armour of Meteoric Iron
1 Arch Lector on War Altar, Van Horstman's Speculum, + sword of swift slaying (strike first)
2 Cannons
2 Mortars
35 Halbardiers, full cmd #1
2 x 10 detachment of handgunners
36 Halbardiers, full cmd #2
2 x 10 detachment of handgunners
2 x 10 Handgunners with a Hochland Long Rifle in each
10 Huntsmen
11 Knights, incl. full command
5 Pistoliers, incl. 1 Outrider
____________________________________________
Scenario and setup:
I have a Citadel Gameboard, so we first rolled a dice to decide how to assemble it. There is eight variations and luckily for me I rolled the only option where it assembles as a large hill, plateau in the middle, left of the board. We rolled for other terrain and deducted 2 from the roll due to the Gameboard hill. We got two forests, some different arcane stuff, a river, a watchtower etc.
We got the Watchtower scenario. I got the tower. With the very large plateau to the left of the table, two watch towers around middle, middle right, and other stuff as well, it meant plenty of dead angles and hiding places for my lizzies.
We started deploying units. I pretended to put things in the middle, even measured to my right where there wasn't a plateau. And my opponent put one of the huge Halbardier units to my right, very end of table. In all fairness he had so much need of frontpage with war machines and handgunners, that his mistake was understandably, though not thought through.
I kept adding towards middle and then finally put my main force behind the plateau. Aim at this point was to take the plateau, run his army to the ground there and at the same time control the tower in the middle. The watchtower was in effect my forward right most outer position.
So my blocks of Saurus x 2, Skrox unit, Templeguard with Hero and Slann were all placed with the two salamanders middle and left in front of the plateau and tower, with the stegadon placed the furthest to the right. I rolled highest to place a unit of Scouts first and took the plateau immediately with one of three chameleon units. He then placed his to my empty right flank.
I then placed one unit to protect my right flank facing his Scouts, next to my stegadon.
Finally I placed one more unit of chameleons on the plateau.
By the way, I occupied the tower with my 10 Skink Skirmishers.
Observation: Could be nice to have a 20 man skirmish unit in the future in case I roll the Watchtower scenario again.
____________________________________________
Battle report (light!)
Empire had the first turn, he started moving his fatally misplaced halbardiers and shots detachments from the far right, but not much as they had to cross a river. Most of his army didn't move much. Knights moved a little forward around his middle close to the watchtower. Knights were flanked by a Mortar and a cannon that could just about start on the plateau with a good point of view, also his War Alter and Wizard was out there behind the warmachines. Next to those units, to the left, also in front of my army was his other halbardiers and an extra handgunner detachment.
Note: His Pistoliers moved towards my flank from the right.
In the shooting phase I got lucky as two of his war machines misfired. Cannon on the plateau right in front of me couldn't be used for next turn. And his mortar on the far right exploded. His one mortar on the plateau killed five out of 8 chameleons. The other 8 chameleons were unscathed. His far right cannon shot at the tower and took some skirmishers with him.
As mentioned his deployment was sub-optimal and he had no dedicated units that could take the tower. Generally he would shoot at and depleet my unit in the tower and get it down to one skink skirmisher.
Not much happened in the magic phase though he made the horde unit of halbards unbreakable with a prayer.
When it was my turn I moved my chameleons close to his archers, so they could shoot at him from close on my right flank, I later succeeded that and they fled only to rally next turn and then the same thing happened until they fled again by end of turn four.
But in my first turn I started moving up on the plateau. I advanced with the skrox unit and the saurus units to my far left and in the middle I moved the Temple Guard forward on the plateau as well. Due to my skirmishers, which were moved to the right of the plateau I couldn't advance my right unit of saurus' much as the chameleons blocked line of sight.
Generally I was out-dispelled in the magic phases. I don't remember sequence of all events, but I got a dweller spell out with irresistible force, used cupped hands of the old ones to direct the miscast to his wizard which was taken to the Realm of Chaos for tea. One giant mistake was that I directed the dweller spell towards his Arch Lector. I knew he only had a 1/3 chance of dying, but I was hopeful. Didn't happen though. In hindsight I should have gone for his knights and the game would have been won by me much easier. If half his knights would have died, what happened next wouldn't have happened.
He tried moving his horde halbards from the far right towards the action, but they would never play a role in the battle or even get anywhere near the action. His large unit of halbards on the middle of the plateau with shot detachments were charged by two of my units. I rolled really low for my far left unit of saurus who failed their charge and suddenly I had pitched a squishy unit of Skrox against a halbard unit, horde, with a warrior priest in it, that gave them hatred.
Naturally my Skrox unit was half destroyed, it ran away and was run down. He then ran into my Saurus unit.
On the right of the plateau he had charged my two units of chameleons. I ran with both units. One unit ran from his knights, and they landed behind my lines (the unit that still had 8 in it). The three chamleons landed right in front of my saurus units to the right. This unit was blocked from charging his knight. Here I made my largest mistake. Having heard so much about the awesomesauceness of Temple Guards I pitched my Slann and Temple Guards against his knights, I mean I moved them close and allowed him to charge next turn. He did take up on that invitation but also pitched the War Altar to my flank to my dismay. With the right saurus unit next to my templeguards blocked by three chameleons, I couldn't charge in turn three or four, as the chameleons were rallying in turn three and moved away in turn four, finally clearing way for a turn five that never came.
So the War Altar and Knights had charge my Slann unit. He took down like 12 temple guards incl. the champion. His Arch Lector with the Horstmans Speculum had challenged me, and I accepted with my champion as I had guessed the evil ploy. Furthermore he had a spell in play with +1 A to the first rank. With his knights having hatred from a warrior priest and the arch lector and horses and what not, he really dished out some serious hurt. I only barely stayed there and thank god to cold blooded, and re-roll from BSB.
In turn four the combat ensued but since I had gotten rid of a few knights, I charged with his War Altar with a salamander unit in desperation to save my Slann.
He actually managed to survive one more round as his knights were depleted and no longer had the benefit of lances and the +1 attack spell for first rank of knights.
On the left flank on the plateau I had my saurus unit valiantly defeating his horde unit of halbards AND running them down and reforming to be ready to take out a handgunner unit.
By the end of turn four I had my Slann still engaged with his knights and War Altar. The Salamander had lost two handlers but were engaged as well. There were three templeguards left and a scar veteran. He had lost one unit of halbards and three out of four war machines. I still held the tower as I had occupied it with three chameleons as the last model in the unit of skin skirmishers had run away or something.
My stegadon had been shooting at his pistoliers where only two of them were left. His archers were still fleeing from my chameleons.
If there had been a turn five I could have charged a complete unit of Saurus'es into his knights flank. Even if in his phases he would have destroyed the Slann I could have taken the knights out. With the other saurus unit I would have taken out his handgunners and turned to face any opposition left for a potential turn six.
His other horde halbards would have never arrived no matter how many turns the combat would have continued. They were too far away.
So at the end of turn four I rolled a dice to see if the game ended and I got a 6, the only roll that would mean the game ended right there. Game over. I had the watch tower and won the game.
Even if we had continued I would have had a good chance to win. Though lots of points were lost with the Slann so he could have won by that if that was a criteria.
Great day for the Lizardmen.
Final thoughts: If I hadn't rolled the plateau, watch tower scenario too and if three of his warmachines hadn't started to exploded from the beginning. And if his setup hadn't been so terrible, I really don't see how I could have won. If he had utilised his gunline to the max I would have evaporated. Only sheer luck got me a good victory.
____________________________________________
Observations about Lizardmen:
1. Skrox units are really squishy. Not really worth their points as I see it.
2. Templeguard units need a larger frontage than five. The Slann takes up valuable space so more frontage is needed to have enough counterattacks.
3. Don't move your Slann forward without support. Doh!
4. Truly think when deploying chameleons. If the plan is to move them in front of your main battleline as I did, think about your planned charge reactions. If you flee you can stop your units from advancing. It can be a bloody mess.
____________________________________________
Observations about Empire:
1. Warrior Priests with hatred and dispel dices are truly powerful. They can rule the magic phases with those dices.
2. THe Arch Lector is a force to be reckoned with. Since he knows all light spells, but can only cast one, and never miscasts he can be fearsome. Add in the horstman's speculum and he can dish out serious hurt.
3. Subjectively I can say Empire is probably one of the best armies of 8th. ed. - mind you I am an Empire player as well.
____________________________________________
Observations about 8th. ed.:
1. It is adviceable to have a 20 man unit for watch tower scenarios
2. Close combat is brutal
____________________________________________
Conumdrums and questions:
1. Is a skirmishing unit still skirmishers when holding a tower? I am not sure. One point is that they are split out the same way as other units. Other point of view is that you paid the point cost for that ability.
2. Is it true that when charging a mixed unit of skinks and Kroxigors that the enemy can choose to just hit the squishy skinks?
3. Does poison work on war machines?
____________________________________________
Pictures, ordered chronologically. Please note we used some stand in models for the two large halbard blocks. One was spear men and another of the horde halbards were a mix of things.
Also we used two horse with a rider and a part of a griffon as a war altar.
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5197ab99273241
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5a3d7399273243
http://www.imagebam.com/image/cfac1a99273245
http://www.imagebam.com/image/128ab999273247
http://www.imagebam.com/image/35898f99273249
http://www.imagebam.com/image/400a5899273250
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6773cd99273251
http://www.imagebam.com/image/0686aa99273254
http://www.imagebam.com/image/05119a99273258
http://www.imagebam.com/image/57781799273262
http://www.imagebam.com/image/2104e099273265
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6e2b3c99273269
http://www.imagebam.com/image/ca6f8d99273273
http://www.imagebam.com/image/8f179299273276
http://www.imagebam.com/image/df2f1899273278
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6ab82e99273286
http://www.imagebam.com/image/350bab99273289
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5f13bc99273294
http://www.imagebam.com/image/7eaca299273300
http://www.imagebam.com/image/dc445599273303
http://www.imagebam.com/image/b6684e99273308
http://www.imagebam.com/image/2fa92899273311
http://www.imagebam.com/image/57bd9d99273314
Gameboard is new, just finished painting and flocking it myself. Still missing terrain pieces though!
Gallery:
http://www.imagebam.com/gallery/qvmp1lcfq76vqxppjymgqcgx9ldrbim2/
____________________________________________
My army:
Slann Mage-Priest (BSB) with Cupped Hands of the Old Ones, Huanchi's Blessed Totem, Focus of Mystery, The Becalming Cogitation, The Focused Rumination
& 16 Temple Guard, full command, Sun Standard of Chotec
& Saurus Scar-Veteran, Great Weapon, Gambler's Armour, War Drum of Xahutec
20 Saurus Warriors (Mus, st.b., HW, shield)
21 Saurus Warriors (Mus, st.b., Spears; Shield)
20 Skinks, 2 Kroxigors, javelins, full command
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
8 Chameleon Skinks incl. Stalker
10 Skink Skirmishers, Blowpipe, brave
Salamander, 4 Skink Handlers
Salamander, 4 Skink Handlers
Ancient Stegadon
Full Army list: http://www.lustria-online.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5095&p=39732#p39732
____________________________________________
Opponnent fielded this:
1 level 2 wizard, Light, Rod of Power (store dispel / power dices)
1 Warrior Priest, horse, potion of strength, enchanted shield (5+ armour save), sword of battle (+1 a)
1 Warrior Priest, foot, Armour of Meteoric Iron
1 Arch Lector on War Altar, Van Horstman's Speculum, + sword of swift slaying (strike first)
2 Cannons
2 Mortars
35 Halbardiers, full cmd #1
2 x 10 detachment of handgunners
36 Halbardiers, full cmd #2
2 x 10 detachment of handgunners
2 x 10 Handgunners with a Hochland Long Rifle in each
10 Huntsmen
11 Knights, incl. full command
5 Pistoliers, incl. 1 Outrider
____________________________________________
Scenario and setup:
I have a Citadel Gameboard, so we first rolled a dice to decide how to assemble it. There is eight variations and luckily for me I rolled the only option where it assembles as a large hill, plateau in the middle, left of the board. We rolled for other terrain and deducted 2 from the roll due to the Gameboard hill. We got two forests, some different arcane stuff, a river, a watchtower etc.
We got the Watchtower scenario. I got the tower. With the very large plateau to the left of the table, two watch towers around middle, middle right, and other stuff as well, it meant plenty of dead angles and hiding places for my lizzies.
We started deploying units. I pretended to put things in the middle, even measured to my right where there wasn't a plateau. And my opponent put one of the huge Halbardier units to my right, very end of table. In all fairness he had so much need of frontpage with war machines and handgunners, that his mistake was understandably, though not thought through.
I kept adding towards middle and then finally put my main force behind the plateau. Aim at this point was to take the plateau, run his army to the ground there and at the same time control the tower in the middle. The watchtower was in effect my forward right most outer position.
So my blocks of Saurus x 2, Skrox unit, Templeguard with Hero and Slann were all placed with the two salamanders middle and left in front of the plateau and tower, with the stegadon placed the furthest to the right. I rolled highest to place a unit of Scouts first and took the plateau immediately with one of three chameleon units. He then placed his to my empty right flank.
I then placed one unit to protect my right flank facing his Scouts, next to my stegadon.
Finally I placed one more unit of chameleons on the plateau.
By the way, I occupied the tower with my 10 Skink Skirmishers.
Observation: Could be nice to have a 20 man skirmish unit in the future in case I roll the Watchtower scenario again.
____________________________________________
Battle report (light!)
Empire had the first turn, he started moving his fatally misplaced halbardiers and shots detachments from the far right, but not much as they had to cross a river. Most of his army didn't move much. Knights moved a little forward around his middle close to the watchtower. Knights were flanked by a Mortar and a cannon that could just about start on the plateau with a good point of view, also his War Alter and Wizard was out there behind the warmachines. Next to those units, to the left, also in front of my army was his other halbardiers and an extra handgunner detachment.
Note: His Pistoliers moved towards my flank from the right.
In the shooting phase I got lucky as two of his war machines misfired. Cannon on the plateau right in front of me couldn't be used for next turn. And his mortar on the far right exploded. His one mortar on the plateau killed five out of 8 chameleons. The other 8 chameleons were unscathed. His far right cannon shot at the tower and took some skirmishers with him.
As mentioned his deployment was sub-optimal and he had no dedicated units that could take the tower. Generally he would shoot at and depleet my unit in the tower and get it down to one skink skirmisher.
Not much happened in the magic phase though he made the horde unit of halbards unbreakable with a prayer.
When it was my turn I moved my chameleons close to his archers, so they could shoot at him from close on my right flank, I later succeeded that and they fled only to rally next turn and then the same thing happened until they fled again by end of turn four.
But in my first turn I started moving up on the plateau. I advanced with the skrox unit and the saurus units to my far left and in the middle I moved the Temple Guard forward on the plateau as well. Due to my skirmishers, which were moved to the right of the plateau I couldn't advance my right unit of saurus' much as the chameleons blocked line of sight.
Generally I was out-dispelled in the magic phases. I don't remember sequence of all events, but I got a dweller spell out with irresistible force, used cupped hands of the old ones to direct the miscast to his wizard which was taken to the Realm of Chaos for tea. One giant mistake was that I directed the dweller spell towards his Arch Lector. I knew he only had a 1/3 chance of dying, but I was hopeful. Didn't happen though. In hindsight I should have gone for his knights and the game would have been won by me much easier. If half his knights would have died, what happened next wouldn't have happened.
He tried moving his horde halbards from the far right towards the action, but they would never play a role in the battle or even get anywhere near the action. His large unit of halbards on the middle of the plateau with shot detachments were charged by two of my units. I rolled really low for my far left unit of saurus who failed their charge and suddenly I had pitched a squishy unit of Skrox against a halbard unit, horde, with a warrior priest in it, that gave them hatred.
Naturally my Skrox unit was half destroyed, it ran away and was run down. He then ran into my Saurus unit.
On the right of the plateau he had charged my two units of chameleons. I ran with both units. One unit ran from his knights, and they landed behind my lines (the unit that still had 8 in it). The three chamleons landed right in front of my saurus units to the right. This unit was blocked from charging his knight. Here I made my largest mistake. Having heard so much about the awesomesauceness of Temple Guards I pitched my Slann and Temple Guards against his knights, I mean I moved them close and allowed him to charge next turn. He did take up on that invitation but also pitched the War Altar to my flank to my dismay. With the right saurus unit next to my templeguards blocked by three chameleons, I couldn't charge in turn three or four, as the chameleons were rallying in turn three and moved away in turn four, finally clearing way for a turn five that never came.
So the War Altar and Knights had charge my Slann unit. He took down like 12 temple guards incl. the champion. His Arch Lector with the Horstmans Speculum had challenged me, and I accepted with my champion as I had guessed the evil ploy. Furthermore he had a spell in play with +1 A to the first rank. With his knights having hatred from a warrior priest and the arch lector and horses and what not, he really dished out some serious hurt. I only barely stayed there and thank god to cold blooded, and re-roll from BSB.
In turn four the combat ensued but since I had gotten rid of a few knights, I charged with his War Altar with a salamander unit in desperation to save my Slann.
He actually managed to survive one more round as his knights were depleted and no longer had the benefit of lances and the +1 attack spell for first rank of knights.
On the left flank on the plateau I had my saurus unit valiantly defeating his horde unit of halbards AND running them down and reforming to be ready to take out a handgunner unit.
By the end of turn four I had my Slann still engaged with his knights and War Altar. The Salamander had lost two handlers but were engaged as well. There were three templeguards left and a scar veteran. He had lost one unit of halbards and three out of four war machines. I still held the tower as I had occupied it with three chameleons as the last model in the unit of skin skirmishers had run away or something.
My stegadon had been shooting at his pistoliers where only two of them were left. His archers were still fleeing from my chameleons.
If there had been a turn five I could have charged a complete unit of Saurus'es into his knights flank. Even if in his phases he would have destroyed the Slann I could have taken the knights out. With the other saurus unit I would have taken out his handgunners and turned to face any opposition left for a potential turn six.
His other horde halbards would have never arrived no matter how many turns the combat would have continued. They were too far away.
So at the end of turn four I rolled a dice to see if the game ended and I got a 6, the only roll that would mean the game ended right there. Game over. I had the watch tower and won the game.
Even if we had continued I would have had a good chance to win. Though lots of points were lost with the Slann so he could have won by that if that was a criteria.
Great day for the Lizardmen.
Final thoughts: If I hadn't rolled the plateau, watch tower scenario too and if three of his warmachines hadn't started to exploded from the beginning. And if his setup hadn't been so terrible, I really don't see how I could have won. If he had utilised his gunline to the max I would have evaporated. Only sheer luck got me a good victory.
____________________________________________
Observations about Lizardmen:
1. Skrox units are really squishy. Not really worth their points as I see it.
2. Templeguard units need a larger frontage than five. The Slann takes up valuable space so more frontage is needed to have enough counterattacks.
3. Don't move your Slann forward without support. Doh!
4. Truly think when deploying chameleons. If the plan is to move them in front of your main battleline as I did, think about your planned charge reactions. If you flee you can stop your units from advancing. It can be a bloody mess.
____________________________________________
Observations about Empire:
1. Warrior Priests with hatred and dispel dices are truly powerful. They can rule the magic phases with those dices.
2. THe Arch Lector is a force to be reckoned with. Since he knows all light spells, but can only cast one, and never miscasts he can be fearsome. Add in the horstman's speculum and he can dish out serious hurt.
3. Subjectively I can say Empire is probably one of the best armies of 8th. ed. - mind you I am an Empire player as well.
____________________________________________
Observations about 8th. ed.:
1. It is adviceable to have a 20 man unit for watch tower scenarios
2. Close combat is brutal
____________________________________________
Conumdrums and questions:
1. Is a skirmishing unit still skirmishers when holding a tower? I am not sure. One point is that they are split out the same way as other units. Other point of view is that you paid the point cost for that ability.
2. Is it true that when charging a mixed unit of skinks and Kroxigors that the enemy can choose to just hit the squishy skinks?
3. Does poison work on war machines?
____________________________________________
Pictures, ordered chronologically. Please note we used some stand in models for the two large halbard blocks. One was spear men and another of the horde halbards were a mix of things.
Also we used two horse with a rider and a part of a griffon as a war altar.
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5197ab99273241
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5a3d7399273243
http://www.imagebam.com/image/cfac1a99273245
http://www.imagebam.com/image/128ab999273247
http://www.imagebam.com/image/35898f99273249
http://www.imagebam.com/image/400a5899273250
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6773cd99273251
http://www.imagebam.com/image/0686aa99273254
http://www.imagebam.com/image/05119a99273258
http://www.imagebam.com/image/57781799273262
http://www.imagebam.com/image/2104e099273265
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6e2b3c99273269
http://www.imagebam.com/image/ca6f8d99273273
http://www.imagebam.com/image/8f179299273276
http://www.imagebam.com/image/df2f1899273278
http://www.imagebam.com/image/6ab82e99273286
http://www.imagebam.com/image/350bab99273289
http://www.imagebam.com/image/5f13bc99273294
http://www.imagebam.com/image/7eaca299273300
http://www.imagebam.com/image/dc445599273303
http://www.imagebam.com/image/b6684e99273308
http://www.imagebam.com/image/2fa92899273311
http://www.imagebam.com/image/57bd9d99273314
Gameboard is new, just finished painting and flocking it myself. Still missing terrain pieces though!
you can also cast spells on units in buildings as normal
. Ghoulkin movement, normal movement and magical movement ( pretty much every vamp and necro in army knows Dance) + Book of Arkaon
but it is well possible