First post! Yeah, I am new to Warhammer and have chosen lizards for my army. I'm wondering if it would be possible (and competitive) to do a skink army. I dont have the army book yet, but i mean a light, hunting party army. No stegadons or sarus, led by a priest or MAYBE a oldblood on carnosaur. Would this list work? I already have a theme, colour scheme and basing set out. I was thinking several units of blowpipe skinks, chamoleon skinks, 2/3 priests, salamanders or those spine creatures, and terradons and those special skink cavalry. (2000 points) If this list wouldnt have enough power, i would include a carnosaur and a unit of CO cavalry. Thanks in advance
Welcome to the forum! Skink armies certainly are viable and can be competative. I think that a stegadon would suit it more than an old blood on carnosaur though, the old blood is a saurus while the steg is being ridden by skinks and is basically a skink mount. A kroxigor or two won't hurt either, and definitely some terradons and a alamander or two. On a purely model and gaming perspective though, if you prefer the idea of a carnosaur to a steg then definitely take that instead. Probably will work out more powerful since it isn't a large target.
Skinks don't have their own cavalry any more....................... But I think it could be competitive, like a skaven list, just overwhelm with sheer numbers!
Lots of very competitive All skink builds. If you plan on going this route, please don't take the Oldblood for LD. Here's my favourite set up for the special rare slots in an all skink army. - 4 terradons - 4 terradons - 5 chameleons - 1 stegadon - 1 slaamander - 1 salamander Will in the rest of your points with core skinks and skink characters. Should give you a fast hard hitting army. Time of Madness
for core choices in an all skink army it is a must to have skink cohorts with kroxigor in them, they are after all the best core close combat unit available to skinks armies. use their superior speed to out maneuver enemies to charge the flank, with the skink's poison you can weaken the front rank and have the kroxigors finish them off. words of the wise though, you want to get the charge so you can cause feasr, and use the skink's poison, and weaken the line first. if you do find yourself in the situation of being charged, you'll have fear on your side, but if that doesn't work always take the stand and shoot reaction even if you don't have poison, because you might get lucky, and even one casualty makes a difference. also, avoid big blocks of spears with your skink and kroxigor units since you'll have your work cut out for you having to take out two ranks, always strike first units too. this is where you skirmishers with blowpipes come in, try to stay out of the line of sight of enemy units near by and pepper the with poison darts slowly crippling them, and if your lucky send their big expensive units into panic. skink skirmishers should make up a large portion of your core. i find that skink skirmishers with javelins, and just plain skink cohorts, aren't very useful units, but that can be different for you, since it all comes down to your playing style. with special and rare units terradons are great tactical units for march blocking and picking off lone characters and war machine crews, chameleons are great for putting on the scouting flank to take out mosters early on, or do what i like to call the toll both tactic where you put your chameleons in a hard to reach place, like a forest where they can bail quickly if things turn sour, near a high traffic are that many enemy units will pass and just pepper them with poison darts. kroxigor in my opinion are better as core units with skinks due to the fact that the skinks offer extra protection, and even when charging don't have to strike last because of the great weapon. i don't find the bolt thrower on the stegadon special choice very useful, but it makes up for that in its close combat abilities. there is a big debate between salamanders and razordons on which is better, in my opinion their pros and cons when put side by side say that in their own ways they are both equal, though i do prefer razordons because they look really cool. finally, ancient stegadons, as mounts for skink chief, and priests i find the highly effective. as for units sizes for all these troops it is up to you, but i generally like to have many small flexible units. camo-skink ps. sorry for the text wall.
Camo has some good ideas if you want to run an all skink list. I wasn't sure from reading your post there, Camo about what you were trying to say with poison. It sounded to me like you were saying that skinks have poisoned attacks in close combat. Perhaps I was mistaken but in case, I'll clarify that the poisoned rule only applies to ranged weapons. Like I said, I could be misreading your post as well Camo. For all skink lists, I like Stegadons. Skink priests on engines can handle the magic department adequately against all but the heavier magic lists. You can also utilize a Oldblood + Carnosaur combination for some extra hitting power. Despite the fact that Kroxigors can join skink units, their hitting power isn't what it used to be. Therefore, you'll want to make sure you have some hammers that can break stuff. Carnosaurs and stegadons are great for that. In a skink hunting party I can see all the special and rare choices being used up with things like Terradons, slamanders and perhaps razordons if you're list/opponent combinations warrant it. I'd also make sure to take a few big blocks of skink cohorts to try and tarpit enemy units you want to flank with your hammers. You'll find skirmishers very usefull here as well, and despite the usefullness of cohorts, skirmishers will be a major thorn if you can use them effectively. Last but not least, don't forget to toss a few small cohort units out there (10 cohorts a piece). These are great, throw away and redirect units that can help setup charges for your hammers. I think if you can use these units effectively you'll find them invaluable considering that you'll have a hard time finding a decent and reliable 'anvil' unit. This army type favors movement, avoidance and shooting so you'll have to adjust your playstyle accordingly. Those are just a few comments that rose to the surface in my mind when considering your idea. I know that there's a lot of good advice here to sift through so use what you need. May the Old Ones bless you in your quest for victory.
sorry for poorly interpreting my idea, but yes i did mean have the skinks fire one turn then charge the next, and when saying weakening front line meaning whiddleing down the ranks depleting their rank bonus. generally for the hammer and anvil i use two units of skinks and kroxigor. sorry for the hasted text again, camo-skink
I dare to disagree with running the skink+krox units. I find them completely useless, and the oposite (skink cohorts alone, with kroxigors alone) being much more versatile. Think of it this way, in combat any intelligent player will direct all of his attacks on the T2, 6+ save skinks getting easy CR. Against a ranked unit its only a matter of one, maybe two combats, until you loose and probably break. Maybe thats just me, but I see hitting anything hard that the krox should hit being suicide unless your getting a flank charge on a unit already in combat. Now if you split the two... 10 skink cohorts (no upgrades) and 3-4 kroxigor in a unit alone behind them, you have some real potential there. The 10 skinks can screen your kroxigor since they aren't large targets. And you can redirect an enemy charge so the kroxigor behind can get the flank charge anyway. If you need the cohorts elsewhere, run the kroxigor behind/to the side of a unit of saurus, and you have a flanking unit that can provide some heavy duty backup, while your skinks redirect elsewhere. But in an all skink list you can use the first plan. I think a skink hunting list should include two stegadon, one EoTG for sure, one ancient with chief and warspear, double EoTG or one Vanilla Steg. Alot of Skirmishers, and/or cohort units of 10 with no upgrades. I'd get a pack of two Salamander and a pack of 3 razordons for variety. Chameleon skinks and two units of 3-4 terradons. If you need points to field your unit of 4 kroxigor or two units of 3 or whatever, drop the salamanders first, and drop all 3 razordons if you must...1-2 razordons are useless. You'll be playing the game to win in the movement phase, and after ALOT of poison shooting you'll have to hope double EoTG or the ancient steg charge can finsih them off. Protect your stegadons with razordon triple pack and/or kroxigor's with cohort distractions. It actually sounds like a neat list, I'd be tempted to make one though I don't have enough skinks yet. It would be entertaining though. I imagine skinks make funny noises when they die in large numbers. Well... Good Luck.
I think an important point to note which wasn't mentioned by SlannofItza is that a mixed unit can help shield from shooting. Kroxigors have a tendancy to be picked out with high strength shooting for elimination because of the threat they pose in close combat. Surrounding them with a few skinks gives the unit some shooting options, at the sacrifice of a little manueverability. It also helps absorb some of the wounds that would have originally been dealt to the Kroxigor unit. This is a solid advantage that can be used to deliver the Kroxigors safely into close combat. I know that this point has been made in other discussions, but I felt it was worth noting.
I actually did note that you need to screen the kroxigors with skinks, because your correct in that any smart player would shoot at them. But like I said, screen em like you would any other unit with your skink skirmishers/cohorts. The only shooting I suppose being alone doesn't help for is a well placed stone thrower shot, or a cannonball bounce through your skink screen. I hadn't really considered that, but if your not already ontop of cannons and such with your chameleons/terradons/magic your in trouble anyway as your big blocks of saurus race to try and get to the other side of the board. Once again though, this being an all skink list, you have no saurus to worry about, though a well aimed cannon or bolt thrower can still kill your precious stegadons who are kinda the only hammer in your army. I guess you also have kroxigor, and salamanders to tally up the kills, but you get my point, If you can't take care of the war machines that could hit kroxigors walking alone, your in trouble anyway...
i was just thinking i like the idea of a ranked skink unit with krox with a unit of krox flanking that would be a lot of damage for a unit to absorb and i think that is the way to use them cause if ever a unit needed supporting it would be ranked skinks also how do you guys like my avatar i finally decided to get one up here and that really is me jumping took forever for me to get it down to the right size
awesome photo! and you right that flanking with a skink kroxigor unit is normally what i do and that most of the time breaks the enemy unit, if i can't do that i generally flank charge with my terradons. also i have two quick questions, last game i played i had flown over the left flank dropping rocks then charging the right, and flew over a unit and charged the rear, my opponent said he thinks i couldn't do that, so i just went with it and only charged the left and front. just wondering was what i was trying to do legal? camo-skink
If your talking about dropping rocks on the same turn you charge, so long as you passed over a unit (not the one your charging) the FAQ says you can still drop the rocks. So you could have charged and dropped rocks in the same turn...
if you flew over the the front of the unit then you could not charge the rear in the same turn as well you can't drop rocks on the same unit your charging as you need to fly over it to drop rocks and if you fly over it you then can't charge it that turn it says something like charging is in a straight line along those lines in the rule book you can wheel but not turn
Yeah you pretty much got it Lupercal. You can't fly over something, turn around and charge the other side/rear, in the same turn (without magic). But if you fly over something, to charge something else in the flank/rear, you can drop drops on a unit you passed over in the charge, but you can't drop on the unit your charging into. Anyway... Good Luck.
but since terradons move as skirmishers being flying cavalry they don't turn or wheel, they simply move. so why would it not be allowed?
It has to do with line of sight, if you fly over a unit you can't spin all the way back around and charge the rear/flank opposite where you came from, because its not in your line of sight. The same that a unit of skirmishers can't declare a charge while looking at the front of a unit, but run to the side, and then come back for a flank charge. They didn't have line of sight with that flank at the declaration of the charge. You can't charge anything you can't see at the start of the charge. Even with 360 LoS you can't see the rear of a unit, or a flank on the complete opposite of yourself...
Also, because of the freedom of movement afforded by skirmishers they must take a direct line to the target from where they are. This can take them over another unit whom they are not charging. The charge is legal provided the Terradons have LOS to their charge target and pass over the rock dropping target in a direct path to their charge target.