I really want to start lizardmen but I dont want to do take saurus warriors. Instead i wanted to take kroxigor in skink units but really, every time i look at them they look terrible, truly terrible. On paper i just cant see the point of them, the skinks are there to provide ranks vs hordes...but kroxigor are S7 so supposed to be fighting high Armour/Toughness units not fighting T3 skaven. But the high toughness/armour units will just focus their attacks on the T4 3W 4+Save model. I mean, skull crushers, chaos knights, mourfang, demi-gryphs etc will just go to town on these guys. But maybe in practice these guys are half decent, maybe there are some tricks to them. So i was wondering from your experience how these guys are preforming, just please please please dont say the trick with these guys is to flank an enemy unit.
I played vs Lizardmen last night and we both had a SKrox unit. My unit took a charge from a steg and the impact hits randomized to the Krox killing 1.5 of them which sucked, and then I took a big stomp but at least with ranks I was steadfast. On the upside with both kept forgetting to target attacks at the Kroxigors, so that might help your advantage. Also since your WS with the skinks is so low hitting on 5's isn't uncommon paying the 2 points for poison seems to be pretty worth it. Another thing I've tried in the past is to swift reform extremely wide move up and 20 short range javelins, then with quick to fire you get another 20 which can do some damage. During the reform you an move the Krox out wider so they receive less hits. You have to be choosy with this though since your likely not going to be steadfast. But honestly will all that being said, point for point, 32 Saurus vs 30 skinks/3 Skrox. The Saurus are going to more work. You only other choice for core is to try the skink cloud, if your a damn good player I hear that can work wonders of annoying.
24 skinks, 3 krox, full command = 300 points. Gives me 6 ranks and 9 S7 attacks. It's fast enough to flank and get the charge, decent leadership (7), and causes fear. Like most units, if something is better than you, don't walk up and hit it in the face; redirect with your other core and flank.
In 7th ed, you could run a steg with the unit for stubborn and the skinks and rules protected the Krox from being targetted by shooting and in combat and made the unit very effective and somewhat points efficient both in protecting the steg and the unit. They took away the ability to run the skrox unit with the steg and then took away the ability to protect the Krox from being targetted in combat such that, even given the Krox +1S and giving skinks +1AS it is harder to justify now. The initial post kind of hit the nail on the head. The ability to target the Krox means opponents will choose how to optimatlly attack the unit for max effectiveness. They will go for skinks to max combat resolution (ACR) and cut down ranks (SCR) but will go after Krox first to reduce the attacks back when heavily armoured or high T and fearing little from skinks. Thus, your opponent gets to choose how to target in combat the models in your unit. That being said, remember that the base contact rule reads such that supporting attacks on the opposing unit cannot target the Krox and that should allow some Krox to survive to hit back in most cases. On a wounds basis, the allocating of shooting type attacks to Krox is slightly disproportionate to the Korx unit in that you have 8 wounds of skinks for each 3 wounds of Krox and the allocation is based on 8 to skinks and 4 to krox. I think of Krox like maneasters in the Ogres army; they can hit really hard but at T4 and 4+ AS they are just not quite tough enough and armoured enough to justify the premium points cost for the +1S and great weapon options except in certain battles, like against high Armour save or high T units but that have lower WS, attacks or S units or that strike last. (Maneasters are actually even less points efficient adue to their poorer armour save and greater effective points cost, even when one can customize models in the unit to max the great weapon attacks back.) Basically, Krox have +1S and +1AS relative to Ironguts and better effective LD than ironguts and cost a bit more as a result, but don't have the Ogre charge and magic banner options of ironguts, nor are core options without taking skinks. Thus, with the lower points costs per Krox and +1S they got in the new army book, Krox are fairly costed relative to Ogres given their +1S and LD7 cold blooded but probably better now as a special unit used for flanking. flank protection, and dealing with really tough and high armour save units where enough survive getting hit and wounded first to hit back really hard. One role for skrox that I think is under-rated is that of using a single Krox with 10 skinks in a 6 wide unit (6 skinks in front and 1 Krox and 4 skinks in second rank) or even 2 Krox with 16 skinks. The reduction of the LD of skinks is an issue if units flee through each other or have to take panic tests outside of the range of the general and BSB and for purposes of rallying. The benefit of the LD7 cold blooded (over LD5 cold blooded) really enhances the ability of this unit to avoid failing terror checks, fear checks and panic tests when away from the general and BSB and it increases the likelihood that, when charged, the unit will survive and remain steadfast for a turn against things like WoC chariots and monsters (if they don't get off a breath weapon). Also, have to split attacks means often over-targetting the Krox which allows more skinks to survive. Splashing one or two of these units in an army and running those units out wide to cover and protect flanks and act as a flanking unit can be quite effective. Plus opponents will sometimes devote excess resources on that unit to the benefit of more important winning units in the army. The other role is as a very deep and ranked skrox unit to protect the special character Tetto, especially when run without a slann to give the unit some defensive punch and increase the steadast staying power of the unit. With Tetto, you can usually get off heavens spells to reduce the hit rate on Krox and increase their effectiveness in combat. In certain battles, one might face things like steam tanks and terrorgheists and heavy core cav (like empire and Bretts) where the extra movement and range and hitting power of the Krox can be quite effective, especially in the flank. Steam tanks are eseentially big roadblocks and semi-mobile cannons. Charging one with a couple of Krox in a skrox unit means a good chance of getting a couple of wounds or more on the thing the first round (also avoids impact hits from the thing) and both Krox will survive to the second round of combat and likely survive whatever the steam tank can do to hit the tank against and put more wounds on it. Getting even a couple of wounds on a steam tank reduces the effectiveness of the tank (increases the probability of steam mishap roll and the tank not being able to do something or do as much as the empire player would like and prevents it from moving and changing position for a turn to shoort a steg or something.) by reducing the number of steam points the player can risk and increasing the chance of a steam mishap resulting in a loss of ability to do something planned. The scar vet on cold one with great weapon is often more effective and survives a lot longer in combat. but is more ulnerable to being killed outright by empire cannons and the grinding attacks from a steam tank directly hit and can kill a scar vet more easily than the Krox in the second rank (with most hits on the skinks). Saw the post above, there is a place for a modest investment in a skrox unit instead of saurus and then invest the remaing points in a lot of skink chaff units given that saurus core are probably a point overcosted right now due to their low linitiative making them vulnerable to certain spells.
I have found that Skrox make for an excellent flank force. They can crush almost any unit if they avoid a frontal charge and pack more then enough punch to take on monsters that are packing 5 of less attacks. However, they're not too great at the grind game. If you want an army without saurus I might recommend large blocks of just skink cohorts to tie up enemy units then you can use Skrox to slam into their flanks and rip them apart. Personally I love Skrox, also because if there's a water feature on the board they can often lure a foe into it and forget that we can claim rank bonuses and be steadfast while they can't. That's how my unit of only 16 skinks and 2 krox took on a unit of 30+ nurgle warriors and held them long enough for me to prepare a death-dealing flank and rear combo charge. -Overlord of Serpents
Supporting attacks not being able to hit the kroxigor is a big deal against some armies, High Elves, in particular. So much of their damage comes from deep ranks of support that your krox will usually live long enough to strike- though the S7 is kind of wasted on elves (Until they get Flesh to Stone up). I don't think they're as bad as some people make them out to be, but I also don't know I'd base my army's core around them like I used to.
I didn't realise that supporting attacks couldn't target the Kroxigor. That's actually a pretty big swing in their favour, as things like Chaos Warriors rely on the additional supporting attacks to account for their lack of re-rolls.
I wouldn't say chaos warriors count on supporting attacks... They are 2 attacks base high ws and usually high Str if you are usually hitting on 3s you don't really need rerolls
Whilst that's true, they definitely benefit from having more dice to roll as, without reliable re-rolls, they are at the mercy of Rubber Dice Syndrome.
I'm experimenting with a 48 model Skink Cohort with 1 Kroxigor and Poison attacks. I don't really consider this a "Skrox" unit since the Kroxigor is really only included for his Ld7 and Fear. My first game with them, they panicked off the table in turn 2 when skink cohort was destroyed next to them ... (and my BSB Slann fell down a hole in my first magic phase...) I'm expecting that 48 Skinks will last longer in combat than the 36 Saurus that they replaced in my army (technically they replaced 36 Saurus AND 1 unit of 10 Jav Skinks) I've had some success with regular Saurus in the past, but usually i'm just hoping that I pass enough parry saves so that they "last 1 more round". I'd like the 14 extra skinks to buy me that extra round and possibly one more after that. As far as damage dealing: 48 Skinks in horde get me 18 Poison Stand and Shoot attacks (at any range), then 26 Poison attacks at Init 4 which should give me 5 wounds + 5 more S3 hits (1 - 3 more wounds) and then the Kroxigor's 3 S7 attacks (if he lives that long) 36 Saurus give me 40 S4 attacks (+ 3 or 4 from PF) which will probably lead to 22 hits and 11 to 15 wounds with -1 to the save. However, I usually run my regular Saurus 6 wide (for extra ranks, and to reduce the number of incoming attacks from hordes) which only gets me 18 attacks, 9 hits, and 4 to 6 wounds. So, as I usually run them 36 Saurus 6 wide deal about the same amount of damage as a horde of Skinks with poison, but the skinks will last longer (assuming the opponent is stronger than an elf). Also, the Skinks are 50% faster than Saurus, so they can cover a lot of ground quickly. I run mine in tandem with 30 Temple Guard. WS4 makes all the difference in the world when it comes to Saurus.