I've been thinking of running the lifestar temple guard unit with chakax, jaguar bsb slann and a wailing banner at 3000 points is this overkill or should i just buy more temple guard/saurus.
Hai Wolfmage, Sorry I cannot help much, as the LIfestar idee is beyond me. As for your question, I personally dislike sinking significant amounts of points in one unit, even if it is a rock-hard Slann/Templeguard combination.
Chakax is overkill, at least until they re-word his special rule on striking first in a challenge. For his points, you could add 20 more Temple Guard, and be able to bring them back to life with your Rebirth spell. Heroes can be healed when you cast a spell, but when they're dead, they're dead, and Chakax is just a 2 wound model. Stick with a regular scar veteran, if you ask me. Personally, I like the Razor standard; -3 to armor with your halberds is hard to say no to. Causing terror is all right, but there's so many immune to psychology enemies out there I wouldn't pay 50 points for it. You're immune to psychology yourself, anyway. Pursuing farther is nice, but it can lead to problems for this unit. If you rush out too far and get away from your support units, the enemy may get an advantage worth more than the troops you just ran down. If you've got points to blow on the unit standard, consider the +1 War Banner, or the Sun Standard if you fear shooting.
Another banner to consider is the flaming attacks banner. That way any hydras, abominations, treekin, etc won't get too cocky about attacking the unit, and you can steamroll right over em.
Very true, and great on Nurgle demons too. The only thing that concerns me is enemies like Tyrion and his dragon men, a couple of the new book items, and certain Dwarf runes, all of which are immune to flaming attacks and can wreck your day. If you know who you're facing and they likely won't have immunity, go for it.
Just so you know my GW agrees that chkax rule means they literally go last as for every other part of the faq they added special rule.
well, all you have to remember or think about is that if you put a rock hard unit like that on the table, do you really think a DE player will just charge you with 1 hydra? or if you play a chaos army do you think you can handle all the charges that will be coming at you? or even if you play another Lizardmen army for fun, i would basically be charging 2 A. stegadons and a block of saurus warriors into that unit. the impact hits alone would probably take out half of that unit and then there is thunderstomp and with my block of saurus, i have ranks to help me. on top of that, i never pay for a champion so Chakax isn't challenging anyone. so is it really worth it anymore? if you say yes then go for it and let us know how it turns out, but just remember that although temple guard my be stubborn, they are still killable and will be killed by other elite units. just food for thought.
If you just mindlessly stick the expensive TG/Slann out there and wait for every enemy unit to smash into it, of course it's going to die. If you base the rest of your army around the fact that you're running a Lifestar and properly support it, you will in many cases succeed. You have awesome augment spells, you have the Slann's abilities like Becalming to help shut down spellcasters, and you have every other model in your list waiting to help you. Yes, they can hit it with stegadons/chariots/Bloodthirsters/ whatever else en mass, and depending on what buff spells are in effect, some, many, or most temple guard will die. (That's why I take 26 of them, minimum). But, in most cases, it won't be enough to destroy them all, and then the enemy is stuck in one of the single best tar pit units out there. And, presumably if you're running this unit in the first place, you now have saurus, skrox, or perhaps the odd stegadon of your own waiting to blitz them in the side. A champion is a must have for this unit. He can deflect a lot of damage from the rest of the guard, he can have a neat item, and you get to resurrect him when you cast Rebirth on your unit- there's not a lot of downside. Again, Chakax is probably points better spent elsewhere, unless you're playing in an absolutely massive game, or you plan on facing WoC a lot. The Lifestar does have weaknesses, as all gigantic battle stations do, and if someone specifically tunes their list to beat it you may have tough times. But, in a tournament situation, most folks are running blind 'all comers' lists, and your temple guard should do reasonably well. It's not for everyone, but it's worked well above my expectations in the games I've played so far.
I had a statement, but after some more reading it's rather a question. The 8th ed BRB states that a character is challengable even if he is not in contact with the enemy, it is sufficient that he is in the unit. This would in theory make the slann vulerable to challenges. But, under the slann rule "Guardians" it says that the "slann is ALWAYS placed in the second rank of TG. Would this mean that the opponent could challenge him, but since he cannot move past the second rank, he isn't an eligible target? And, if the TG unit is charged in the flank, would this allow the slann to be part of a challenge (since he doesn't move frome the second rank, but rather sidesteps). And if this happens, the slann is in a challenge to the flank, and then you reform your unit to face the attackers, is the challenge cancelled, since the slann is forced into the "new" second rank? What do you guys think? The rules for challenging is on p 102 BRB.
going back to the chakax character, couldn he represent a saurus old blood aswell,if you want to add him in because of his looks then i think GW would allow it.
Yeah RaW i think the slann is now perfectly legal for a challenge, which kind of sucks... Theres a reason why my TG unit runs an old blood and champion in it now... A tooled up oldblood wont lose challenges to very many characters...
The enemy cannot choose which character to challenge which is why i have both chakax and a champiion in the unit so they are the ones who accept the challenge or decline-if chakax is dead- letting the slann keep out of combat as long as he needs and with the recover spell and life attribute the champions will last a very long time. Also on the point of everything charging your lifestar that means they are loosing a good chunk of army to take out your unit and the temple guard should last long enough for backup to arrive in the form of about 30 saurus. I'm planning to take about 100 scattered into 3-4 units