8th Ed. Picking up Lizardmen - questions :)

Hi there!

I'm switching armies over from WoC to Lizardmen and am looking forward to joining this community. I have a couple questions for you guys as I decide to purchase my models.

First off though I am a very competitive player. I've played in a couple local tournaments and have played a bunch of games at leagues so far. So as far as picking units and stuff goes please keep in mind, with no disrespect, I do not want advice for fluffy or fun times units. Everyone I play against always brings their best lists and are very competitive minded players as well Also to note, I will be making my first purchases of my army based on the answers and advice you guys give me. Looking forward to learning a lot from experienced Lizardmen generals.

With that said here are some questions I hope you guys could answer for me:

1) Skink Priest + Ancient Stegadon + EoTG: Is this a good unit to take? I am really liking the EoTG abilities a lot. Is this a competitive choice to take? I keep reading a lot about shying away from big monsters but the EoTGs offers so much.

2) Stegadons of any kinds are my favorite models in the Lizardmen army. It would be a shame if there was no way to competitively take them in an army... Is there any way possible; stegadon, ancient stegadons, stegadons + eotgs, that I can run them competitively? What is the best and most effective way to run Stegadons of any kind? What role would they serve to the army?

3) Saurus Warriors seems really good. However I'm not sold on taking more than 1 unit since I can take a bunch of other units with the points saved. 1 of 24x so far is all I am planning to purchase. Should a competitive minded Liz army really run 2x units of 24 instead of just 1? Also...since you only usually have 1 Slann MP wouldn't one of the Saurus units not be toughened with +4 T and just be much easier to kill?

4) How do you deal with War Machines from a gunline/warmachine dwarf army? Or Skaven Warp Cannons and the like?

5) What is the best way to run a "Skrox" unit and is it a auto +1 to lizardmen armies like a Slann is? I see a lot of lists running them...

6) I'm not really 100% sure what Lizardmens "main strategy" to win is. For example for WoC (my previous army) its pretty straight forward, run forward and fight things in close combat. For Dwarves its very much shooting until they crash into your fairly strong CC dwarves. With Lizardmen, my army looks very scattered so far and doesn't seem to have any real direction into what I will be trying to do with it. It only runs 1x group of 24 Saurus Warriors and then 30x Temple Guard so far. Those are my only real CC units. Is it really all about just that 1 close combat block of Saurus Warriors and everything else in shooting and magic wittling down the enemies army until that group of Saurus Warriors (maybe TG?) gets into combat? Skinks + Salamanders flaming/ shooting things until the 1 group of Saurus Warriors gets into CC?

7) Do people usually keep the TG + Slann in the back and never move forward with it...? Is just sitting back there and running from things or moving backwards how you are suppose to use that unit to keep the Slann safer? Is this wrong? Should I be moving up with my TG + Slann to engage in combat as soon as I can?

8) Tell me about Chamaeleon skinks. I read the thread about it but not much info was given on them. Are they necessary for Warmachine hunting? What other roles do they serve?

9) Advice on which banner to take on the TG? My Slann I'm planning to let him take the Flaming Banner. Or should the TG carry that? Should I take 2x Banners in the TG? (One on Slann one on the TG) If so which ones would you guys suggest?

10) So I read Salamanders are sick and really awesome. Should I run 2 units of 2 or 2 units of 1? What have you guys found to be a good amount? I don't want to sink too many points into specific units unless they are really worthy of it.

11) Again...I really like Stegadons so any advice or strategies on them or how to run them in a competitive manner would be greatly appreciated


Thanks you guys! Hopefully after I learn more about the Liz, get my models and start playing I can begin sharing advice and experience with everyone here as well.

 

I won't be able to answer all your questions because I'm not very experienced and I haven't used all the units you have asked about but I will give it a shot

 

Wow! Thanks for the quick reply Lingbei! I appreciate that

Looking forward to more Lizardmen generals to answer the questions as well. Thanks for getting it started

 

Hello,

I try to answer the best I can here. But do remember that these are just my opinions. Some of which might be influenced by 7th or 6th editions also.

Hopefully this helps a bit.

 

Others have already answered most questions, I'll just succinctly answer a few.

-As stated, if you take stegadons, take at least 2 or 3. A solo stegadon of any variety will attract all the warmachine hate on turn 1 (and could very easily die, has happened to me). Make your opponent spread the wealth.

-Use all phases of the game, shooting, magic and close combat. Lizards are pretty decent in all phases (with a very strong magic phase ala Slann) so take advantage.

-Make your Slann the BSB and general and take the +1 leadership banner on him. Now all units within 12" are leadership 10 rerollable with cold blooded! This is why lizardmen are so tough to crack, they just don't run so you force the enemy to kill you.

-Get your Temple Guard + Slann into combat ASAP! Why would you let 800+ pts just sit in your backfield? Temple guard are immune to psych, stubborn and dish out some real pain. Tied with the Lore of Life on your Slann and they just won't die (or if they do, you can just regrow them back again!). I always try to get my TG into combat as soon as I can. Don't worry, your Slann will safer in close combat than outside of it (no missiles, magic missiles/magic attacks, or warmachines to worry about).

 

Wow thanks for the insight guys! Love the advice!

That's very sad to hear about the Stegadons. I don't want to really run more than 1 because of the other things we can take in our army.

Everything else I'm glad to hear. More insight on play style of lizardmen would be appreciated. I see how they are very good in all phases of the game.

 

if you must run 1, the EotG is the 1 to run. he stands the most chance of surviving (5+ ranged ward). competative steggies is another story all together. it really depends on your local meta, but 8 steggies is pretty hard to stop and you just don't see it coming (max at 3k).

as stated, there are many many different ways to play lizards. you can go shooty, with lots of skinks skirmishers and some steggies. you can go CC, with some gnarly scar vets and a TG brick. you can go points denial (my favorite) with a big ole block of saurus and plenty of magic. i think your "highlight" units are slann, salamanders, chameleons. those are the current game changes imo. 1 good round of magic can leave an army devastated from your slann, a good deployment can see your chameleons in the backfield dominating support units, 1 good round of artillery dice can see a whole flank gone from sally fire.

i think as a basis, these are good units to build a lizzy army around. im not saying its the only way to win or play the army (18k+ of lizzy means i get creative with my lists ), but these units are pretty close to auto take, especially for starters and those in a competative environment. using these 3 as your starting units lets you figure out what else you need in your army to support what they do best: burn, magic and poison!

 

I disagree with EotG being the best choice... Too many points in heroes/magic, especially if you already have a Slann in the list. Certainly they were very good choices in 7th ed, but 8th they aren't really so good to fit into a list. I'd just take an ancient steg with no hero.

 

Thanks you guys!

Some awesome advice. Thanks for answering a bunch of my questions guys!

It kind of opened a can of new questions now...

1. Is a slann alone enough for the magic phase? I understand he is very powerful.
1b. Do you need a skink priest to carry tye dispel scroll also? I take it this is mandatory to protect vs non ifd I tests.
2. Are skrox units good? Based off of what vic said its maybe better to take a second unit of 30 saurus warriors instead? As far as cmpetitiveness goes...

Appreciate you guys help.

 

IMO a single slann should be enough.
Because with only 2 spells i can easily use 7 dice, 1 on throne of vines 6 on dwellers,
or 2 on throne, 1 on regen, 2 on +4 T 2 on healing.
And even if you start with 12 dice 3 on throne, (rumination counts as an extra dice and you cant get above 12) 1 on regen, 2 on +4 T, 6 on dwellers. So basicly if you have lore master there is no problem having 1 slann however it does rely on your TG to protect him and the cost of two slanns is just much bigger. And 2 slanns just does not add enough for their points. Because 2 slanns will take 735 at least unless both of them wants life and with a single slann with cogitation wich basically makes your enemy lvl 4 unable to irrestible force you as far as the scroll goes you can have a life slann carry it and 110 points for 3,5 dice is way overpriced as WC pay 25 to get one extra per turn it is more spread out but paying 110 is just too much.
IMO a slann should look like this and should be sitting in TG to do the standard life stuff

Slann, bsb,
standard of dicipline, scroll,
bacalming cogitation, focus of mystery, focused rumination (life). he can do the same as a bsb and 2 lvl 4s with a bunch of equipment.
a skink priest does not really add much as a slann gets +7,5 (3,5 for focus + 4 for wizard level)
while a skink gets +2.....
and if you do want the forbidden rod take it on a slann as he cant die by using it and hee can heal it back

as for the skrox well im not a good enough player to use them. I geuss you could use swarms to be points effective.... but i think against an enemy with more units than you you need all power on the front line IMO.
and as for their hammer efectiveness im doubting their awesomeness, they make (on average) 7,5 hits, while an ancient stegadon makes (on average) 8,5 hits the Astegadon is roughly 60 points cheaper, and is stubborn and does not grant the enemy 5-10 extra wounds (which skrox do wich is why they aint a that good hammer). but the skrox count towards core stegadons dont..... But skrox are only IMO good hammer vs weak units but what aint! also stegadons can be used as not only hammers but they are one of the best anvils as well being T 6 they have a a 3+ AS, while skinks might have more wounds but are T 2, and 6+ AS 6+ WS, also the stegs are waaay better at shooting (but still pretty lousy....)

(sorry...)

 

Hmm...what would you say is our good hammer units then to guard the flanks and such of our anvils? Saurus dont seem very killy unless we take spears or buff them with light but I am planning on taking a life slann. What should I take to hammer our units/ and guard flanks?

Which leads me to another question...should you take spears or handweapon/shield with Saurus Warriors? What is the best way to kit them out?

 

Vict0988 could you please use some punctuation marks in your text? It could just be me but it's annoyingly difficult to read..

 

agreed . i go for spears on my saurus but i typically run a block of 60. most of the time im taking the charge to allow me to get that 4th rank in. 10 attacks should net 1 or 2 kills average, which offsets the 1 point for charging. id rather have the extra turns of magic with my slann.

 

Hmm..ya for a non-horde group is 30 Saurus warriors (the way I plan to run them) maybe HW/S is better?

I'm having a hard time picking out our "hammer" and "flank protection" units...or do we not have them and we just anvil most things?

 

try a kroxigor horde it depends on what your hammering really. for the most part, we can grind with the best of them. our stout troop choice DOES have 2 s4 attacks, which isn't too shabby. and TG have 2 s5. the key is to do a little buffing to erase that aweful I value. HW/S isn't a bad choice, i just prefer the attacks more than the 6+ parry. normaly i run 1 life slann and 1 random slann, so they tend to have regen on them anyway. as far as flank protection goes...sallys. always sallys. they burn, burn and burn some more

 

Hmm..on the Skrox units...T2 skink fodder...seems like any CC oriented unit will be ripping through it super fast. It get's quite expensive too..

What about groups of 24-30 Saurus with Spears for the hammer unit? Anything else viable as a hammer unit? Seems a lot of our stuff is mostly for the grind

 

stegadons, either normal or ancient, for added effectiveness try stegadon spear. (you might not allways want to go with it, but try) they can do 8,5 hits at strengt 6/5 they dont let the enemy have easy combat res.