I've been readoing about Warhammer Fantasy/40K for a few years now and I've wanted to play for awhile. Some friends of mine have settled on trying out a 1000 point fantasy army and I'm going to take this opportunity to build my own and play with them. Lizardmen is honestly the only army that appeals to me, astethically and lore wise. My issue is I don't entirely know what units I should use. I've built a few amry lists based off other ones I've seen here but they don't seem right and I'm not sure the tactics Lizardmen Armies usually employ. I would prefer some sort of heavy Skink/Krox army with Sallies but I'm not sure what units to use as the straight up fighting unit once the armies meet. My friends are building Vampire Counts, Ogre Kingdom, and Daemons of Chaos armies. Any advice would be great.
You need saurus. Especially if just starting out, build the core of your army around Saurus. Skinks can be useful but it takes some finesse to employ them against an opponent (especially a skink heavy army). Saurus are good fighters and can give you more leeway in case you make mistakes. For a 1000 pt army, get 2 blocks of Saurus (at least 20 each with hand weapons), at least one unit of chameleon skinks, a unit of skink skirmishers, 1 unit of 2 sallies and get a scar vet general and priest for magic. Anchor your line center with the two saurus (put your general in one of those units), screen with the skirmishers (priest goes here so keep them out of combat), and run your sallies up one flank to flame their biggest unit. Your chameleons go after any lone characters or warmachines (or just march block and harass the enemy as they advance). That should get you started.
Get your friends to pool money together for a license for Army Builder. It will make your gaming life so much easier. It also really helps with starting and planning a new army. What I did when starting was punch in the units you get from a battle box, then add in the units that I wanted to play because they looked cool and were the reason I started having interest in the game (slann and stegadon) then add whatever you need to for ArmyBuilder to say your army list is legal. In my case it was one addition unit of troops. This is the fastest and most economic way to jump into the game with both the units you want and the points you want with minimal waste. If the program is intimidating, which it is, there are a few "how to use" videos on youtube that breakdown really how easy the program is.
On a side-note about Army Builder - the license is good for one year and you can request a second key "free" to install the program on another computer. Also, the program does updates constantly (even from official White Dwarf rules) AND perhaps best of all... it's not just for Warhammer. They have rules to download for pretty much most of the Table Top War Gaming from all over... and different editions. Personally.. I love it and helps create lists quickly. Most of the special rules are printed with the unit/magic item yet should still be used as reference.. always check the official army books (and BRB) for detailed rules. - Lord Cedric