I love their look and style but I'm a little worried that they might be just a little too good. I don't ever like being the one playing the steamroller. Are they OP or balanced, compared with the rest of the armies?
Their lack of true warm machines, long range shooting, and low initiative tends to balance out their good aspects (Magic, coldblooded and poison).
I "Just" started. I haven't even played a game with my own minis. I have noticed the following: 1. Seems that there are an abundance of whiners who loose. I imagine this is not heard only when playing against Lizards.. 2. Lizards rock if an inferior race is played stupidly. Someone who knows stategy and tactics will rock a table with the Lizards. 3. I would personally take any "unfair advantage" as a challenge. There is no glory in winning against a weaker or player who has enforced limits. Besides, why would GW make an "all powerful" race? it would limit their sales dramatically. 4. This one is confusing to me : in friendly games it's ok to ramp up your armies, but in tournament play you shouldn't utilize your race's best weapons? Did I get that right? Ok, no flames please - it is too easy for me to have misinterpreted things. Remember - I am very new. That being said; Help a brother understand My two Cents, Kaax Taat
I wouldnt say Lizards are OP. They have few hard builds, but they aint OP. Helfs w/ BoH are OP, Power scroll is OP. Mortars are OP.
For anyone who says that my lizards are OP, I remind them that my slann has blown up (rolled a 1 on cupped hands) 4 times in the last 6 games that I have played. As stated above, low Initiative and lack of good ranged weapons evens out our army. The only thing in our army that is slightly OP (and that is argueable) is the salamander. Your opponent need only watch as 3 of 4 salamanders eat their crew to see that even that is not that OP.
The lizards are a solid army that will always do what you want them too. They are well disciplined and have very solid, if slow troops. (Saurus). In a shield formation it is very difficult to punch a hole in the line. That said our light troops are crap. The Skink is absolutly craptastic for the points as a CC troop due to WS2 T2 AS6. They are expensive and you need buckets to carry the dead off the table. We do have good support troops like the Sally. They, if played correctly, will do a lot of damage to the enemy. Our magic is very good with the additional dice the Slann can take. Played well, a Lizardman army is very tough. However, I can think of several armies that have superior overall troops. The Empire is one. Motors, Rockets, (especially rockets with pie plate STR 5 hits) will obliterate any infantry unit we have. Their WP are good in combat and provide additional dispel dice and prayers. Their fast cavalry is the best (outriders) with 3 shots each in 2 ranks will mow down anyone in front of them while scampering away and shooting again if charged. Their HC is 1+ AS and cheap. State troops (hals) in horde formation are dirt cheap and will stand and fight an equal points of Saurus and grind them down. Their troops are very inexpensive and they will outnumber the LM by a significant number. Lizards are a solid army, but far from a "Top Tier" nasty tournament army that the deamons were last edition. Skaven and WOC armies are 2 more examples of armies a lot more forgiving and easier to win with then the Lizards.
if anythings over powered it high elves not lizardmen there pretty balanced because saurus are initiative 1 same as zombie!!!!!!!!
lizardmen are overpowered when you play againts crappy foes. Why lizardmen win more turneys, because we have only few good builds that is slann + salamanders + saurus. thats it. other races have more varaity that makes for new players harder to find them and play them thats why they lose most of the time because they want to take everything but thats not good. IMHO we have an army with smallest ability for varaity. stegs are out of question, razordons too, carno also (cryes) than we have to take slann, than saurus for core because skinks suck in cc, COC are too expensive (but i still play them in deathstarr and that works prity fine, until oponent finds a way how to deal with it), than youu chose for left points chams or teradons...
Why are stegs out of the question? I thought Stegs were considered a viable option still for lizards being stubborn is good against big ranks bonuses and steadfast.
Warmachines are so good nowadays that Stegas arent that great anymore. But if you run slann with Life they are a good option
Are Lizardmen overpowered??? Good question. I'd say no, but then again ETC comp tends to think otherwise. We have the best magic users in the game points wise with the Slaans. We have some of the best CC Core units with the Saurus. But our army is far from overpowered. If anything, Lizardmen do have some balance in them. Rock solid but very slow troops. No long real long range shooting but good short range shooting. Strong war beasts (even the razordons) but that can blow up just the same as a good ol'canon. If one thing, I think Lizzies are one of the few really good armies that can't really make a REAL CHEESE army. Being limited to 2 salamander units makes it hard for us to get more then 4 since more then 2 in a unit is a waste. The way I see it right now, is that people need to stop complaining about X and Y armies being overpowered and theirs being underpowered. Right now, now army even has it's 8th edition book. We are playing with army books released for a previous edition and 8th edition brought MANY changes to the game. To the people trying to balance it all for tournament environment, just keep playing with 7th edition rules until new books are out, since you are trying to make some kind of 8th edition that looks like the previous one. Until most armies have their new book, it'll be very hard to judge GW's work with 8th. Sorry for the long post, but in the end, you should play an army because you like the models, the fluff, the feel of the army. You shouldn't really bother about if they are overpowered or not. @ N810: I don't know if the pun was intended, but I loled at : ''the lack of trur WARM machines''.
My friend pointed out something interesting the other day: the points value of Saurus. This, I think, is what makes them unfair. Dwarf warriors cost three less points than Saurus (without spears). For only those three points more you get cold blooded, better strength, better movement and an extra attack while you only sacrifice a single point of initiative. I have a feeling that the Lizards have been accidentally made fantastic by the new rules, like the Necrons have been in 5th edition 40k (though no one plays Necrons anyway so we're alright). Reading what you chaps have said does make me feel more comfortable about the fact Lizardmen aren't a "we can do everything" army, but I do think the Saurus warriors are sold a bit below market price. (Also, very impressed by the above posters synopsis about why people should pick their armies. It's what I've been telling the statistics nerds at the local GW for ages!)
Stepping up in 8th probably helps Saurus more than most, since they will still get all their attacks even though they likely strike last. But fighting in 2 ranks actually makes Saurus relatively weaker, at least spear Saurus. 2 ranks doesn't hurt spear Saurus, but it helps every other infantry more which somewhat levels the playing field. All in all, I think Lizardmen are a powerful army, but I can't call them overpowered without any long range shooting or war machines. I love skinks, but having to be within 6" for short range shots is a serious limitation (which is why I'm saving for a few more chamos). Without long range shooting, Lizardmen will always be vulnerable to gun lines and fast moving ranged armies which keeps them from being OP overall.
@MI Tiger Could you be so kind as to post an example of how the Saurus spear units are less effective now in Ed 8? I only have the latest rules. Thanks, Kaax Taat
If you ask anyone at my local game shop here in San Diego, they would say "Lizardmen using the Lore of Life are beyond broken." That being said they also say the Lore of Life in general is broken. In fact there is outcry from some players to "Nerf" the Lizardmen and the Lore of Life in the next league. lame. especially considering that a Beastmen player and an Orc and Goblins player were the ones playing in the finals; with the Beastmen player eventually taking the over all league win.
Spear Saurus aren't less effective, but everyone else is more effective; therefore spear Saurus are relatively worse. For example, consider a 5x4 block of Saurus with spears, and a 5x4 block of Empire Swordsmen. (Note that I'm not saying these are equal units at all - I'm just using them as examples) Under 7th, the Saurus would have 20 attacks, 10 from each of the first 2 ranks. The swordsmen would have 5 attacks. Under 8th, all infantry can attack in 2 ranks but ranks after the first are limited to 1 per model. So the Saurus would still have 20 attacks, but it would now require 3 ranks (10 for the first rank, 5 supporting attacks from the 2nd rank, and 5 supporting attacks from the spears in the 3rd). The Swordsmen now have 10 attacks (5 from ranks 1 and 2). So between 7th and 8th, Spear Saurus kept the same number of attacks, but require an additional rank to get them. All other infantry (including Saurus with Hand Weapons) increased their attacks. I hope that's clear. And please understand I'm not complaining or saying Saurus were badly nerfed. In fact, because of stepping up, I think Saurus are probably more powerful in 8th, spears or not.
While Lizardmen can be considered overpowered when comparing stat v stat, they pay for this by being very expensive while still having some army wide shortcomings. (Speed and ranged attack) The only model currently cheap for its abilities is the salamander. The changes in 8th with bigger targets and partial hits counting as full hits have moved this from slightly expensive to cheap. Skaven HPA and DE hydras are still probably cheaper in comparison (think about what you would take if you had all three choices in a DE or Skaven army). The changes to magic have helped certain builds of slann, but slann are still incredibly expensive and a single point of failure for the whole army. Slann cannot be considered cheap. With almost everything else the changes in 8th have tended to help others more than they have helped Lizardmen. While Lizardmen are still competitive in general, most other armies have become relatively more competitive (apart from the 2 most broken in 7th that have moved back into the pack). The amount of luck in WHFB means that you should be getting a significant number of wins if you are employing appropriate tactics for your list v opponents list. If you are getting worse than 25%/25%/50% win/draw/loss then it is most likely some combination of your tactics with your own list choices that are the problem.
Am I reading this right??? As someone who plays Necrons in 5th Ed 40K I can tell you that far from making them fantastic 5th Ed 40K almost crippled them. 8E did lizards some big favours, if you'd told me back in 2008 I would able to field a Slann that can do the kind of things my slann can do now for less than 450pts my 600pt 2nd Gen and I would have laughed in your face. The 7th Ed AB coupled with the 8E lore of Life catapulted us into the realms of insane over-powered magicalness. Using any of the other BRB lores makes LM reasonably competitive but not OP'd. As a favour to my regular opponents I usually use the lore of light, which synergises beautifully with the LM list, mitigating all our core infantry's weaknesses. I reserve the lore of life only for when I come up against Delf/skaven skryre cheesemongers and the like.
Just try to play without slann and you will see how 'overpowered' LM are ;_; It is really, really hard . I am now trying to make some sick armies just to have a little chance of carno surviving first turn of enemy shooting/magic ( at my local shop I am playing mainly with two HE, three Dwarves, O&G and two DE ). Dwarves war machines are insane.