I should start by saying I'm a complete warhammer newbie. So should I start out with a few boxes of saurus warriors or skinks? I see that saurus warriors have much better stats so why should I even consider skinks? Also, if I do consider skinks, which should I get? Combat ones or skirmishers? Finally, should I take kroxigors with either of those skinks if I decide on them? Sorry for all questions, but I want to pick the right boxes to buy since I don't have a lot of money to spend yet.
Wow you really are new. Welcome to Lustria! Yeah saurus one on one are better than skinks in every possible way aside from the fact they can shoot. The game of warhammer is played to a points value to help make the armies balanced, typically 2000-3000 points. This will generally see armies of around 80-200 models a side facing each other. You will notice that while the saurus are better than the skinks, they cost a lot more points. So you can field twice the number of skinks as you can saurus, thus the numbers make the skinks equal to the saurus. In theory anyway. A couple of boxes of saurus and skinks is indeed a good way to start. The battalion is ok, but in the current rules Cold Ones aren't really worth taking and Temple Guard are a bit iffy, so if you are in the hobby mostly for the gaming and having a force you can use don't bother. If you also want to build a big impressive looking army for the sake of it, its probably a good place to start since it will leave you with lots of spare parts to mess around with and you can easily convert some of the models into characters. Kroxigors mixed with skinks (commonly called skrox units) are indeed good, and both types of skinks are worth taking.
Buying the LM codex first will help a lot as you can choose what you want out of the book rather than buying and then finding out you wasted £20 on something you'll never use.
Personally, I went the other way around. It so happened that I could buy a smallish (1000 pts) Lizardmen army second hand and I have build from there by adding a battalion box, more templeguard and some niceties. What you will need is some Saurus (say, one box) and some Skinks. You will need the Skinks because LM are vulnerable to fire (arrows, gunpowder weapons). Shielding you Saurus blocks with Skinks is a must. No only can they catch a bullit meant for your Saurii, but at least they can shoot back. After that really is your onw choice. If you like Slann of a magic heavy army, the TG are a logical choice. Bear in mind though that I have only started with LM.
Hi Dinosaur, "Everybody" I know uses 5 wide and 3 or 4 deep. The reason is that it takes row of 5 width (or more) to claim a rankbonus.
I just started a LM army myself and I bought i slann but with hindsight that wasnt such a good idea. Any reccomendations for what to buy next would be much appreciated.
Skinks are always a good buy. I think most every lizardmen player will find use for two boxes of 24 skinks. That way you can make a couple units of 10 skirmishers with blowpipes and the rest rank and file with possibly some converted command models.
Okay, 5 wide sounds good. I guess I should try skinks (blowpipes) too. I'll try a box of those after I get 2 boxes of saurus. What are some good special units to buy? Temple Guard seem cool and pretty strong, but at 16ea it seems like saurus would do a lot better for being 5pts cheaper.
There are a lot of little differences that make TG a bit better. They will be hitting at strength 5, weapon skill 4. They can also take a magic banner. But really TG are best when run with a Slann, as they then also get Stubborn and Immune to Psychology. Saurus will be a good start until you get to bigger games with a Slann.