8th Ed. Questions from a newbie :D

[rantapanda]

Hello. ive just recently decided to get back on gaming with lizardmen after 10 year hiatus, since a whole group of my friends returned to the hobby as well : )

loving the lizardmen so far.. yesterday had 3 games and won 3.

first game against orcs.. oldblood and scarvet cowboys just ripped through everything

second game allied with ogre kingdoms against highelves and empire..
tettoekko vanguarded an ogre deathstar and one salamander. ogres managed to kill a ton of thingies and a single salamander killed 9 halberdiers on the first turn and the rest 41 halberdies AND a mage failed their panic test and fleed of tha battlefield

third game was with high elves against ogre kingdoms and orcs. chamos and skinks payed more than their monies worth by poisonkilling ogres. ancient steg double blowpipe gattling guns got lots of kills as well. everything was finished of by HE cavalry charges. also orcs took a giant in for fun which was gunned down in two turns by six chamos

now heres my question.. was experimenting with the redirecting strats with the skinks.. how is it supposed to be done ? park the skinks in front of melee units in a way that they kinda must charge them and when tehy do they wheel themselves in weird arc and/or if the skinks flee, they run them down in a way that they expose their flanks?
how i did it was like this: parked them in front of the melee units, enemies charged, i hold (stand and shoot), they wheel (and thus expose flanks as intended)... now, my skinks were obliterated every time. complete wipeout i dont know what i was expecting. and through wipeout the enemies got free reform and faced our cavalries again at that moment i was thinking that i did something wrong. help plzzz how do you guys do this in most cases?

also we had an argument with skink skirmishers tightening ranks. a third person who we appointed as a judge declared that they have to tighten ranks and then it is determined are the chargers going to meet them up on front or a flank (or rear). the debate went on for a while and the opposition was adamant so i gave up but i still think how we did it was wrong. how it went was like this. group of enemies declare charge, now they are clearly on my front arc, after my skirmishers tighten up the enemy melee group is clearly on the flank arc. thusly in the game they charged into my flank.
the wording is like this in the rulebook
"A charging unit's position when the charge is declared declared determines whether it charges into the front, flank or rear of the enemy. if the charging unit is in the targets frontal zone when the charge is declared then it charges into the front." (p.21)
and
"charge reaction is declared - immediately tighten loose formation into a normal formation before the charge distance is rolled" (p.77)
so id say they first declare a charge, then it is decided if the charge is shot up to front, rear or flank, Then "immediately" skins tighten up. Not like we did it.
What do you guys think?!? Have i missed something.

also i didnt have the change to charge with my ancient steg but im still curious, if i charge into a group of W1 orcs and have sharpened horns with Multiple Wounds (D3) on Impact hits. Say I manage to make 5 unsaved wounds with Impact hits, then say I roll five D3 and get 3 with each one. Does the whole unit now get 15 wounds in total or just the 5 ones?? Im not sure about this one. As I understand it from the rulebook, it would indeed mount up to 15 wounds, but it would indeed make more sense imo in real life that it would only make 5 wounds still..... so how do you guys think this goes??

Thanks in advance for all who reply. The games we had yesterday were quite fun ^^ but we did have our bouts with the rules, i guess its normal.

 

[pgarfunkle]

For the redirection I think that instead of performing a stand and shoot the skinks need to flee, this means that if the charging unit pursues they are then hopefully pulled out of the battle line and you are able to line up a flank charge.

The multi wound will only increase the number of wounds against units of models with more than 1 wound on their profile. So in the example you have mentioned you would only do the 5 wounds, if however you charged a unit of treekin for instance you would then roll for the effect of the multi wound and do the total wounds to the unit.

The charge one requires a reading of the rulebook which I do not have with me just now but I would have thought that you would determine what arc the charging unit is in before you make the charge reaction. At this point I think the skirmishers "rank/scrunch up" if they have decided to take the charge.

 

[arcabis]

well if iam correct i think if the skirmisher's take the charge from the front - flank - rear the skinks go base to base in all conditions

 

[Qupakoco]

now heres my question.. was experimenting with the redirecting strats with the skinks.. how is it supposed to be done ? park the skinks in front of melee units in a way that they kinda must charge them and when tehy do they wheel themselves in weird arc and/or if the skinks flee, they run them down in a way that they expose their flanks?
how i did it was like this: parked them in front of the melee units, enemies charged, i hold (stand and shoot), they wheel (and thus expose flanks as intended)... now, my skinks were obliterated every time. complete wipeout i dont know what i was expecting. and through wipeout the enemies got free reform and faced our cavalries again at that moment i was thinking that i did something wrong. help plzzz how do you guys do this in most cases?

Well... You're using them as speed bumps. Against things that are slightly above par, like say Ogres, it won't really work that well. That sort of tactic would work against Clan Rats, Orcs, Goblins, etc... Stuff that's pretty average offensively. Particularly if you have your General + BSB close by. Swarms are a lot better at this I think.

Re-directing is sort of like Frenzy-baiting. Yes, you should get close enough to tempt them to charge you. Yes you should park the Skinks at some odd angle to hopefully expose an enemy flank. But once they charge you ought to flee. Assuming they fail to re-direct their charge against some other target, you will have pulled them out of position. This tactic works well with 2 units of Skinks working in tandem, but it takes up a bit of your points and is fairly risky with them being LD 5.

Terradons are even better at this due to the Feigned Flight rule. But again, LD 5.

also we had an argument with skink skirmishers tightening ranks. a third person who we appointed as a judge declared that they have to tighten ranks and then it is determined are the chargers going to meet them up on front or a flank (or rear).

Yep. Charge is declared, ranks are tightened, the rest is as normal. The declaration of a charge is independent of which flank is being hit.

 

[Wizgamer]

second game allied with ogre kingdoms against highelves and empire..
tettoekko vanguarded an ogre deathstar and one salamander. ogres managed to kill a ton of thingies and a single salamander killed 9 halberdiers on the first turn and the rest 41 halberdies AND a mage failed their panic test and fleed of tha battlefield

Curious.... why panic test? Unit lost less than 25%.....

 

[Qupakoco]

^^ Rules for a Fire Thrower say any casualty forces a Panic test. Salamanders use the rules of a Fire Thrower with a different stat line.

 

[olderplayer]

With the lower leadership now, skinks are often better standing and shooting than fleeing in some instances. With stand and shoot, you want to get in their face to reduce the range (increase the hit rate and ensure you have poison hits on 6). But, with blowpipes, you need to be far enough away that you can stand and shoot, which can mean shooting at long range. You should choose targets that you really want to shoot (high T monsters with poor armour saves and high value per wound) and avoid targets that will just run you over and suffer very little in terms of wounds; otherwise, be far enough away to ensure you can bait and successfully flee. When using the skinks to bait and flee and to force a failed charge or expose a flank, you need to be close enough to be charged but far enough away to get away and to not allow them to successfully redirect the charge to something else.

I agree that RAW says determine front arc, flank, rear, before tightening formation, then tighten formation and they roll charge distance.

The issues faced by skink skirmishers often favor using some ranked skink units, instead of skirmishers. They are cheaper and have a shield and 5+ armour save. That means a parry save and an armour save against most S3 and S4 attacks. With those saves, they can often hold up with a rank remaining and pass the break test for a turn (with steadfast) against unranked units or at least they can end combat a single or a few models remaining when they flee instead of being blown away (which is common with skirmiishers). Furthermore, because skink cohorts have thrown weapons with quick to fire, they do not suffer a move and shoot penalty which increases their hit rate at long range shooting in your turn or can march up close (cannot march and shoot with ranked skinks) and block a unit more effectively and, yet, still get to stand and shoot on charges in the front arc. That allows them to get up closer to the opposing unit you want to block and redirect and ensure that something else cannot charge them in the flank or jump over and charge in some cases (such as flying units on 40mm bases). When you block up close, the enemy unit is put in the position of getting off only a very small forward movement and then either choosing to pursue (pulling the unit out of position or exposing a flank) in a direction you chose or restrain and reform (in which case the enemy unit has hardly been able to move). You can frustrate and delay a tough enemy unit and break up the enemy formations when facing an opponent that wants to march forward and get into combat. You also can control better the tactics and choose your fights with classic divide and conquer strategies. Also, you can consider adding a single Krox for hitting power (assuming he survives) and leadership boost. or consider adding poison to them. While blowpipes are multi-shot 2, skink skirmishers often end up shooting at long range after moving such that double-shooting hits on 7's and looses poison. (or hits on 8's if shooting at shirmishers). That means that the benefits of multi-shot rule on blowpipes is often lost in practice.

In 8th edition, the ability of units to redirect their charges when passing a leadership test and restrain pursuit of a fleeing unit or restraining overruns (plus the ability to turn the unit to face a threat with a and reform when restraining) limits the utility of both "bait and flee" and "stand and shoot and flee combat tactics" in terms of redirecting enemy units and forcing them to expose their flanks.