| Skaven versus Skaven; help me please! | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: 10th August 2004 - 09:17 PM (276 Views) | |
| Chieftain Skittar | 10th August 2004 - 09:17 PM Post #1 |
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Battle Chief of Clan Skirrit
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Hey guys, Ok i,ve gone and done it, i,ve accepted a challenge game from our local reigning champ. Yep he plays Skaven. He uses, 2 units of 7 Jezzails 2 units of 20 slaves 2 units of 30 Clanrats with Ratlings 1 unit of 25 Clanrats 1 unit of 25ish Stormvermin 1 chieftain 2 engineer's 1 Grey Seer riding a Big Bell ![]() Stormvermin push the bell, Chieftain leads from the back of this unit with a Battle Standard (the 1 that gives a ward save aganst Shooting). Any ideas as to what to field? Chieftain Skittar |
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| Verminous Fang | 10th August 2004 - 09:25 PM Post #2 |
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Well, first off, how big is this list? Second, remember that the biggest skaven problem is leadership. Take warpfire. Rattling guns aren't as useful against ranked hordes (he'd have to push it to cause a panic check, meaning a greater chance of misfires). Remember that the unit pushing the bell is immune to panic and gets magic resistance. Take a page from all of my opponents when I field the bell and hit it in the flank (good-bye bell even if you don't catch it). Jezzails are pretty useless against skaven unless you take rat ogres. Actually, taking rat ogres might be a good idea against skaven as a flanking force, just screen them with giant rats or night runners (-1 to hit with BS weapons like jezzails). Keep him moving the weapons teams, so that they won't be able to shot. That's all I can think of for now, Good Luck! |
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Go forth my brethren, that we shall nibble at the roots of the old world! We are the rats in the shadows. We hold the blades of corruption, aimed at the very heart of the Old World. We are The Council of Thirteen. Second place in the UnderEmpire painting competition! | |
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| Chieftain Skittar | 10th August 2004 - 09:37 PM Post #3 |
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Battle Chief of Clan Skirrit
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Thx for the input, I was thinking of fielding Rat Ogres but i was concerned that i'd lose them to mass Jezzail fire. Strangely i like the warpfire thrower more than the Ratling. But i'm most worried about his magic i don't like using a Seer and 2 engineer's but i'm worried that if i don't bad things will happen. Any ideas on nullifying his Magic. Chieftain Skittar |
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| Lord Skrule | 10th August 2004 - 09:52 PM Post #4 |
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The Dark King
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Try taking a Plague Priest or do with Liber Bubonicus and Plague Censers; they won't do much, but that extra dispel dice will help, and they should rock in combat (as usual). An Engineer or two as scroll caddies will be benificial too. Backed by a seer of your own (and maybe riding a bell if you want to risk it), and I think you'll be fine in magic, just keep him in check, don't worry if your own magic doesn't fare too well, as long as he's not too successful with it. As for his army, the key would seem to be (as mentioned) leadership. Try getting some night runners or, better yet, gutter runners into the flanks of his units (hiding an assassin in it would be fun too). Coupled with a Rat Ogre charge from the front (or even better, opposite flank), and they're running. Try to get your Rat Ogres behind or flanking the seer and his clanrats. I think your best plan is to coodinate charges as well as you can, get around him whenever possible, and kill that bell! When it goes (and hopefully taking the seer and his regiment with it), you're on the home stretch. Best of luck. |
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| Verminous Fang | 10th August 2004 - 09:54 PM Post #5 |
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Grey Seer plus 2 warlocks is my standard. Eye of the horned rat (if he takes it - I'm sure he will) and the bell gives him 13 power dice. That's the bad news. The good news (for you) is that when the more spells you try to cast per turn, the more likely taht you'll miscast. Expect at least one miscast from him, but an average of 2-3 (I had 4 in a recent game). Now the bad news. If you don't do something to stop his magic, he could pound you. Don't worry too much about pestilent breath (despite the fact that I've had some success with it, it's all against cav). Skitterleap can suck away dispell dice (otherwise he can get a warlock behind your screens) and you should properly fear warplightning. One really good way to beat him is with a bigger horde. Let him destroy your slaves, by the time he hurts your main units, you can (and should) charge, hopefully in the flanks. I'd like to help more, but my last skaven vs skaven game was fought almost completely in the magic phase. |
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Go forth my brethren, that we shall nibble at the roots of the old world! We are the rats in the shadows. We hold the blades of corruption, aimed at the very heart of the Old World. We are The Council of Thirteen. Second place in the UnderEmpire painting competition! | |
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| Kraven Tailblade | 10th August 2004 - 10:23 PM Post #6 |
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Loyal servant of the Great Horned One
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I love a civil war! Skaven vs. Skaven. Let us know how it turns out in the "battle report" section. |
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Warlord Kraven Tailblade " Life is cheap. Yours is worthless. " May the Great Horned One bless you!! | |
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| Nilax | 10th August 2004 - 10:32 PM Post #7 |
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Nurglitch II
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I would be weary of draning all my dispel dice/scrolls against a magic heavy skaven army when fighting them with other skaven. The warpscroll is a simply devestating scroll when used vs. other skaven. If you use any large units be weary of their distance from magic users who might potentially have that item...try to see what items he has on who by what he uses. |
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| Skaskrit Venomclaw | 10th August 2004 - 10:55 PM Post #8 |
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Ex-Councilrat
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In my experience, the way to defeat your fellow Skaven is to field a bigger, tougher horde than he does. Jezzails are nasty, but do you care if he kills 4 stormvermin with them? Does it matter if warplightning cuts through a dozen clanrats if you field 150 of them? Just what is he going to shoot those ratling guns at? Numbers, Slave screens, the Stormbanner together render shooting and magic damage virtually useless against your army. Just make sure to carry a few dispel scrolls to stop Plague, the only Skaven spell capable of decimating your big units. (Vermintide can be nasty too.) The screaming bell could be nasty, though, and destroying it should be priority one. However, even though your opponent is spending hundreds and hundreds of points on magic and shooting which will not accomplish all that much, being Skaven he can still field a bucketload of rats. You may have more, but outnumbering does little good if you cannot bring those numbers to bear. It will not be easy to ouflank a properly fielded Skaven army, and you can be sure he knows all the tricks in the book concerning slaves and drawing out units. Therefore, you may want to create some hard-hitting close combat units to make a hole in the enemy lines. True, you have few tough combat units, but your opponent has equally few, and no fighting characters at all. A warlord with a stormverming bodyguard and a plague priest with plenty of monks can take on anything in that army. You'll be able to field plenty of clanrats, slaves and giant rats to engage the enemy diversionary units (slaves) without exposing your tough blokes to dangerous counterattacks. So, in practice, I would use as little shooting and magic as possible. Some Warpfire throwers to panick the enemy, some dispel scrolls and dice to stop plagues and such. I would eliminate vulnerable units from my army. Ratogres, censer bearers, etc. are all too easily killed by warplightning. I would then field some powerful close combat units led by tough characters. (You won't need many magic items, though. Liber Bubonicus and Ring of Darkness can be nice.) Protect the tough units with slaves and clanrats, take out the enemy screens with expendable troops, and score big victory points by killing the seer and jezzail units. Liberal use of Gutter Runners is recommended, they can stay out of sight from shooting and magic, and they'll cause loads of disruption, blocking marches, killing jezzails and the odd unwary warlock. Anyway, good luck, and remember: history is written by the victors. If you prevail, you'll get praised as the hero who defeated the dangerous traitors to the council. If you fail, you will be remembered only as a failed rebel. Such is life in the Underempire. |
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"I have a post-Armageddon vision. We and all other large animals are gone. Rodents emerge as the ultimate post-human scavengers. They gnaw their way through New York, London and Tokyo... within 5 million years, a whole range of new species replace the ones we know. Herds of giant grazing rats are stalked by sabre-toothed predatory rats. Given enough time, will a species of intelligent, cultivated rats emerge?" Richard Dawkins, The Ancestor's Tale | |
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| Chieftain Skittar | 11th August 2004 - 08:44 AM Post #9 |
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Battle Chief of Clan Skirrit
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All good info very much apreciated, instead of being worried about what he is going to do i'll let him start to worry about me, after all he plays Skaven he knows what we can do too! Chieftain Skittar |
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| Deathmaster Mik | 11th August 2004 - 07:21 PM Post #10 |
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Claw of the Shadow
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I'd go for full-out magic against him, but without the Bell. Big blocks of clanrats (36) with warpfire-throwers and a big unit with monks with one warlock with ring of darkness. 2 WLC's and no other shooting.. why?: Skaven is all about outnumbering. He has a useless Bell wich wil cost him outnumbering versus you if you make all your units a tad larger then normal. So make you Clanrat units 6x6 and you slave units bigger then his main units (26). Don't ever use a Screaming Bell versus other Skaven armies; most result only work 'until the next skaven shooting phase' (yours!!) or effect 'Skaven units' (yours too!!). All your warmachines (the WLC's) are To6 so the Bell can't hurt them. The only thing that can hurt you.. is 13. I'd be grinning if I saw someone field a Screaming Bell against me, so I'm hoping he'll use his SAD army. Tool two warlocks and seer up with warpscrolls *wicked grin*. Add the Staff of Sorcery to your Seer and you are ready magic wise. Don't use your warpscrolls on turn one.. wait untill turn 3. Your opponent won't expect them anymore (and will use his dispel dice (prolly 7) on your Warp Lightning and the Storm Deamon. Then use all the warpscrolls in ONE turn.. and watch his big blocks being decimated and start running across the field with your clannies and slaves units in hot pursuit!! (n.b. don't use warpscroll on Bell Pushers) While your opponent is desperately hoping for a 13 with his Screaming Bell.. you will be having a LOT of Str3 hits (perfect versus Skaven) and that lovely panic test on the units of your choosing! The only slightly sensible target for his jezzails are your monks and he knows you only need to get the front rank acros the board to win every combat it engages. He won't like casting Warp Lightning at it either, casue you get 1d6+1 for every spell he casts on the unit (ring of darkness in here..and staff of sorcery +1) Shoot the WLC's at his Seer/Screaming Bell and hope for Str 8 or higher. Here's what I had in mind:
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![]() Death lurks in my cloak.................. Death dances in my footsteps;................. I am become Death. ................. Amen | |
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| tate1307 | 11th August 2004 - 09:23 PM Post #11 |
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Chieftain
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Some people (all that I know actually) say you can only take one warpscroll. The rules only say that "Dispell" Scrolls are not limited (as well as power stones and the tokens) so that might be a slight problem for Mik's strategy. Death Globes are worth a shot then, and so are some Dscrolls maybe to deal with plague if you need to. Hoard seems the way to go here, with WFT of course. |
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| Verminous Fang | 11th August 2004 - 09:46 PM Post #12 |
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If you need to convince your group, show them page 154 of the BRB, in the description on Dispel Scrolls: "As with all scrolls, Dispel scrolls are not unique items..." The only restriction (other than points) on warpscrolls is that they are a bound item, and each character can have a maximum of 1 bound item. Oh, and they are Arcane Items, so only wizards can take them. There's also the bit on page 153, saying taht a single wizard can take many scrolls, but that can be interpreted differently by different people. |
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Go forth my brethren, that we shall nibble at the roots of the old world! We are the rats in the shadows. We hold the blades of corruption, aimed at the very heart of the Old World. We are The Council of Thirteen. Second place in the UnderEmpire painting competition! | |
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| tate1307 | 11th August 2004 - 09:54 PM Post #13 |
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Chieftain
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Wow. . . possibilities are opening up to me now. . . . |
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