I've read that Saurus Warriors equipped with spears get to choose whether they are fighting with spears & shields, or hand weapons & shields. I understand the difference between both and think that this is awesome. What I don't get it when I can make this choice. I've read it can be at the beginning of every round of combat, but then recently I found this in other forums: "If you have a choice of which weapon to use, you pick at the beginning of each combat. So if you saurus charge some men at arms, before the dice start rolling, pick which weapon you are using. Then if you get into another combat latter, pick which you will use in that combat. You pick and the beginning of each combat, and are stuck with that choice for the duration of that combat." This wasn't backed up by any reference to the rules, but I think it's just one of those many vague and unanswered things. Does anyone have a more definitive answer?
Page 54 of the BRB, under 'Weapons and Units' it says 'At the start of the first turn of a combat, units can choose which of their weapons to use ... must then be used for the entire combat'. And yes, spears are very good for saurus. They have two attacks each, this is a huge amount of attacks at good strength!
Thanks Strewart, that also answers my question about characters in units chosing weapons. It's not just me, the layout of the BRB and the LM armybook is horrible for reference right?
At least the BRB has a fairly comprehensive contents page at the start, an index would have been nice though. Once you've read the LM book a few times you can usually get away with just looking at the back page. Just to make sure, characters don't have to choose the same weapons as the unit they are in.
so if I am interpreting that right. I charge seeing as I don't get to fight in ranks I choose hand weapons and shields for defense. then the opponents turn his combat phase comes up I choose spears so I can get the full attacks?
No, its not by combat phase, its by combat...Combat only begins when you charge, or get charged, and only ends when you or the enemy break, or you or the enemy lose all models as casualties... So in your example if a unit of saurus charged a block of enemies and chose to use hand weapons, you'd be stuck using hand weapons every round of combat until the entire combat is over...
So even when you charge it is often better to take spears, so in that subsequent round you boost your attack significantly. Or just move your units up to be in the face of the opponent and make them charge you, thats what my HE spears do. But you need to have some kind of advantage to make them want to charge, such as superior shooting (or magic as the more likely case for LM) or superior manouvrability so you are basically sitting in front of him setting up a flank charge as well, and he has to either try to break through or wait and get smashed in the flanks. This is what my HE's do. Of course the main use of saurus is combat so if it looks like he won't charge, then you might as well.
It's probably best to just figure out the few times HW+SH is better to use, and use spears the rest of the time. Times to use HW+SH 1. You are flank charging with the intent to break the enemy, or hold them up. Basically if you are only hoping to make the combat last 1 round and you are charging, use HW+SH. 2. You are charged by something with a lot of armor, 1+ seems to be the key point. Against chaos knights, for example, you are better off with HW+SH if they charge the front of your saurus. 3. You are charged by something with a narrow frontage, but is very tough to wound. Say the thing that charges you is only touching 4 models in your saurus block. You are losing fewer attacks from the HW+SH setup, so it might be better to go HW+SH. As the general rule of thumb, you just have to evaluate how you will most likely win the combat... killing the enemy or not dying?
It depends on how much damage said 1+ save enemies can do to you. In the case of Chaos Knights or something similar, you are better off with shields on average, if your sole objective is to win the combat. Spears are worse on average in this case, but you do have the potential to kill more with some unlucky armor save rolls on the knights' part.
The only other thing Id like to bring up is that monsters with High Toughness or Knights on the charge can generally negate most/ all of your save, so I normally go for spears regardless, 4 dead with 8 to strike back (16 attacks) beats 3 dead with 3 to strike back (6 attacks) in my book. This is my personal preference though, I just think that If the enemies throwing out enough hurt to render your 12 rear rank attacks meaningless, then +1 AS isn't likely to help.