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Magnetizing weapon/command options
Topic Started: 30th October 2012 - 05:56 AM (479 Views)
Zipline
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Is it wise to magnetize certain units to have different command and weapon options? For example, Stormvermin magnetized to have the standard bearer and musician be able to become regular SV, or Clanrats able to swap between HW and spear. For the life of me I could not find a topic about this in all of the UnderEmpire.
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snowblizz
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Frankly with Skaven you are talking such numbers it's really not feasible. That's true for most normal units in WHFB, though equally true is that quite often there's no point to this flexibility. There pretty much no gain for the effort. People are also relatively flexible, especially in armies that are less organised like Skaven to people mixing the weaponry in units and then visually representing the choice de jour with the front ranks.

I don't see what benefit you have with swapping Stormvermin away from being command. You'll always need that one command group for your decently sized unit.
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SkavenDan
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weapon options are more a 40k dreddnaught thing.
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Little Wolf
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I wouldn't magnetize your R&F troops, simply for having so many of them. You will usually use your command group anyway, and if not and you really need that exact number of units, just put them in the back rank and have them be the first to remove as casualties.

However, I have recently magnetized my Lizardmen Stegadon. It is an expensive model (about 40 Euro's GW price). I never field more than 1 at a time, and it has several configurations ('normal' steg with bows or with blowpipes, or 'mount' for a Skink Chief (with bows or blowpipes) or for a Skink Priest (with an Engine of the Gods). I don't expect to ever buy another one of these and I did want to be able to field all configurations, so I magnetized that. I also wanted to be able to actually remove the crew members so they could be their own wound counters.

I can imagine you might want to magnetize the Screaming Bell (I understand that's the same model as the Plague Furnace? (Still new to Skaven)), or a similar model. It also depends on the build of the model though (how easy it is).
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SkavenDan
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Actually if you look hard enough I think you will find someone has done it in the hobby section. The monks & top of the furance come of and replace with seer + bell + ogre how long it will hold up is another thing.
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hannanibal
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It would be so much of a mess on that you might as well just paint up the extra models.
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Nurglitch IX
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Pretty much what others have said. Mag-build / Dual-Build for Skaven really on pays out for the Bell/Furnace kit or the WLC/PCC kit.

When you combine the reduced WYSIWYG rules for Fantasy with the fact that the situations in which we'd want any of those options are all really SuperSpecialized, it just really isn't worth it.

Now as always YMMV (Your Meta May Vary). One of the semi-local clubs enforces 40K level WYSIWYG for their bi-monthly tourneys. They also have a Hard 3-color (primer is not a color) paint to play requirement. Things like that break our general advise, but generally speaking, I'd not bother.
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Zipline
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Wow, thank you all for the prompt responses. This is a great forum.

Snowblizz
 
Frankly with Skaven you are talking such numbers it's really not feasible. That's true for most normal units in WHFB, though equally true is that quite often there's no point to this flexibility. There pretty much no gain for the effort. People are also relatively flexible, especially in armies that are less organised like Skaven to people mixing the weaponry in units and then visually representing the choice de jour with the front ranks.

I don't see what benefit you have with swapping Stormvermin away from being command. You'll always need that one command group for your decently sized unit.

I guess I'm still stuck in the 40k mindset in a lot of ways. It bugs me to not field exactly what is required, but you're right, I need to get over that for a lot of reasons. Excellent tip on using the front rank like that, too. I hadn't thought of that. And maybe Stormvermin were a poor example, but the situation that brought this to my mind is that I have two boxes of 20 SV to be assembled. I plan to run a block of 30 and a block of 10 for the Stormbanner. If I want to run a single block of 40, though, I'd have two command groups in one unit. And that just don't seem right, son.

Little Wolf
 
I wouldn't magnetize your R&F troops, simply for having so many of them. You will usually use your command group anyway, and if not and you really need that exact number of units, just put them in the back rank and have them be the first to remove as casualties.

Does placing them at the back work? I'm picturing in my head a unit with two drummers, standard bearers and champions and it looks weird.

SkavenDan
 
Actually if you look hard enough I think you will find someone has done it in the hobby section. The monks & top of the furance come of and replace with seer + bell + ogre how long it will hold up is another thing.

Is that not a durable conversion? I haven't read any threads about it but it's basically just magnetizing the arch, right?
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Nurglitch IX
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Zipline
30th October 2012 - 07:38 PM
Little Wolf
 
I wouldn't magnetize your R&F troops, simply for having so many of them. You will usually use your command group anyway, and if not and you really need that exact number of units, just put them in the back rank and have them be the first to remove as casualties.

Does placing them at the back work? I'm picturing in my head a unit with two drummers, standard bearers and champions and it looks weird.
Folks don't normally complain, since a) command is always at the front, so it's obviously not command if it's not in front, and 2) with Rank and File (unlike with 40K squads) you can't really SEE the models in the back. A champion and a drummer will just blend in. There's actually a pretty cool tutorial I ran across that uses StormVermin for the front rank and the left and right flanks, and Clanrats with Spears in the center. You need to really stare at it to realize it's not all SV. The Banner of course will stick up, but first wound you take he's gone, since you pull casualties form teh back row.
Zipline
30th October 2012 - 07:38 PM
SkavenDan
 
Actually if you look hard enough I think you will find someone has done it in the hobby section. The monks & top of the furance come of and replace with seer + bell + ogre how long it will hold up is another thing.

Is that not a durable conversion? I haven't read any threads about it but it's basically just magnetizing the arch, right?

There are 3 unique points on the Bell/Furnace kit that need to be swapped (top of the arch, front plate dressing, rear plate flips OVER and dressing, and the Grey Seer mangnatized seperately if you want him to work without the bell. All in all it's a fairly easy conversion, I've seen 4 different ways one of which didn't even use magnets. The WLC/PCC dual build is a bot more complex, and the few I can recall didn't wow me, but they work and look ok. PCCs are not well loved, and the bits for it are excellent conversion fodder.

Edited by Nurglitch IX, 30th October 2012 - 08:27 PM.
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Mutator
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Zipline
30th October 2012 - 07:38 PM
...the situation that brought this to my mind is that I have two boxes of 20 SV to be assembled. I plan to run a block of 30 and a block of 10 for the Stormbanner. If I want to run a single block of 40, though, I'd have two command groups in one unit. And that just don't seem right, son.
Easiest solution here (with stormvermin) is to just make the one command group, and then use special models* (chieftain/warlords for champions, BSB for standard bearer etc) on the larger/more impressive second unit when necessary. Works well with SV as they are relatively armoured up and special looking anyway, so the more elaborate command models wouldnt look out of place. Not such a good option on clanrats (except here you just use SV command) or slaves (you'd use clanrat command).

In all cases, makes the front rank more impressive without being (too) over the top.


*when your collection is large enough, you always end up with more character models than you actually need to field on any given day...
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