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so this post is about what will be the new hot tactic for the skaven in the last set its been sad (shooting army of death or doom) but what will be the new tactic that most people will go with?

Probably 30 jezzails to make up for the nerfed rattling gun -_-

Shooty Gunline of Death V.2.

If I'm correct, then they'll have a crapload of template weapons.

i hope so im planning on going with maby 2 plague furnaces 1 screaming bell with 2 doom wheels
then maby the special character that makes plague monks core units.

Ya I was planning on 1 doom wheeler 1 Plague catapult (which is a beast), warp fire throwers and globe launchers out the ass. The globe launchers are insane.

LunaHound wrote:
Probably 30 jezzails to make up for the nerfed rattling gun -_-

Ratling guns are still fine. Like all Skryre devices, there's just that element of risk to them. They can still mow down infantry like there's no tomorrow.

I personally am going to go with the Skryre build, with Doomwheels, Warpfire Cannons, lots of weapon teams, Poison Wind Globadiers, maxed out on Warlock Engineers and led by Ikit Claw.

What's the best use for slaves? Speed Bump or Tar Pit?

Speed Bump = A smaller unit whose sole purpose is to slow down an enemy unit that would otherwise be able to charge your main regiments.

Tar Pit = A large unit which takes an enemy unit a couple of turns to wipe out, thereby stopping it from engaging some of your more valuable units.

Tarpit. They're 2 fething points per model! It's crazy!

Cool, I like that some of the new Clanrats look a little downtrodden, so aiming to field at least one unit of them.

Will have to play around with unit size and see what works.

Clanrats and Slaves still have a minimum unit size of 20 as well. Still can't believe that shields/spears individually are 1/2 a point.

The clanrats I'm trying to get painted are going to be 6 wide adn 5 deep. Slaves, I'll leave at 5x4. They only have one purpose...

ZF-

Slaves cannot tarpit. they suck to much to succeed. They are there to block charges, redirect, bait, and generally be annoying.

In terms of shooting the skaven got nerfed.

People will probably start off with taking all of the big gribbies and getting creamed (1k points in two aboms and a verminlord just don't cut it). Eventually they will go back to the hoard army with some cool toys to deal with the enemy's toys.

cypher wrote:Slaves cannot tarpit. they suck to much to succeed. They are there to block charges, redirect, bait, and generally be annoying.

In terms of shooting the skaven got nerfed.

People will probably start off with taking all of the big gribbies and getting creamed (1k points in two aboms and a verminlord just don't cut it). Eventually they will go back to the hoard army with some cool toys to deal with the enemy's toys.

I agree , thats also how i use my slaves.
Enough in numbers they wont flee right away , and in comes the ratling guns ( no doubt killing the slaves and what ever they tarpitted )

What about SAT as the new skaven acronym? Shooty Army of Templates, nearly all of which ignore armor saves. I wonder if the new no-partials rule for skaven templates is the precursor to a general change in 7.5 next year that removes partials from all templates ... Poor 20mm infantry

Anyway, I'm curious to see how things shake down, with so so so many options. The doomwheel in particular, though people erupted into a chorus of taking multiples ftw, I don't see myself running, because it really is quite a random thing. And would probably lightning my own guys due to low moves and failed leadership tests

- Salvage

Ya the doom wheel has me underwhelmed I'm deciding whether it or another Plague catapult is better. And I hate the new warp lightning cannons. itll be so gay to guess with. you'll have to guess like 6 inches short for it to do anything effective and the only time it hits with 10 it'll be ineffective cuz it just zoomed over the unit. I don't like it at all precious.

And slaves became horrible for tarpiting seeing as they all die as soon as the lose combat O YAY!!!! use the for being annoying but thats about it.

I like the idea of the mortar army of gassy death centered around Plague Furnaces.

Yea those plague mortors are amazing.

I'm seeing slaves being a good thing to take against low T armies like elves. That cornered rule where they do more hits when they break is going to be a great way to soften up swordmasters and black guard before they meet the rest of the army. I'm gonna have a few 20-strong units go in front to soak missile fire and then basically explode in their faces. I'm thinking about modelling some slaves wearing bomb vests...Got some vets of Afghanistan that play around here though, don't know how they'd like that.

I don't think the new book is gonna change my mindset while I play my skaven. When I play these guys, I don't care about any of them. At all. If they die, whatever. Just take some of my enemy with them on the way and I'm fine with it. I usually put ratling guns in FRONT of my clanrats just to get the stand 'n shoot!

Im looking foward to playing against them. I think lots of machines and shooting are going to be the way to go.

has anyone thought about the rat swarms? good unit to tie stuff up and steal flanks. i personaly like them. also what about the rat ogres are they still the horrible brutes as they were in the last codex?

Reach down two selves and buy some lizardmen

the poisoned wind mortars are pretty good, only ranged weapon team worth taking anymore. model under center of small template takes wound on 4+ with no saves and everyone else under it takes a wound on 5+ with no saves

I'd imagine people relying on these templates are going to be sad pandas when the Beasts of Chaos book gets redone...

I'm bit uncertain why the discussion in this thread is diverted to the guns. The Skaven army doesn't seem shooty at all anymore. If anything the signs are there that it's going to be just another monster army.

fuegan17 wrote:the poisoned wind mortars are pretty good, only ranged weapon team worth taking anymore. model under center of small template takes wound on 4+ with no saves and everyone else under it takes a wound on 5+ with no saves

Ratling guns are still a frightening prospect to face for RnF infantry, and Warpfire throwers look good for dealing with CC armies.

I had a questions for those of you who have read the book. The Doom wheel says it shots 3 bolts of warp lighting is it the D6 S5 shots per bolt or is it one S5 shot that makes a big dif for me whether I like the doom wheel lol.

Ratling guns are half as good as they were a month ago when they were worth 20 pts.
Warp fire throwers are now twice as good and still as hard to actually hit something with (and of margional use against knights).
Jezzales lost a lot.
WLC is dam near useless now (half the time its great against infantry, half the time against monsters but you never know which).

Its gonna come down to ranked units harassing and flanking with the hellpit abom trying to crush things. Shooting will be there maily to deny areas to large flyer.

Its kinda sad. The skaven use to be the army that large flyers and such hated. O well, new strategies must be adopted.

I actually dont see it becoming a monster army. I see one abomination being prety much manditory. The other rare could be either another abomination or a doomwheel. The vermin lord is to easy to shoot down. He is good at certain armies but bad against others.

First post on Dakka - woohoo!
To answer the doomwheel question - you get 3 shots. Roll the artillery dice - thats the strength of all 3 shots. Each shot is just 1, but does D6 wounds per unsaved wound. Soooo - if you get it near a big nasty monster and roll good for the strength - you can kill it easy. Run it up around ranked up cheap troops - your looking at 3 dead spearmen.
Okay tactics (which probably revolves more around how I've seen the new ones play so far):

1. Hellpit abomination. Incredible for the points and can walk through most units. Besides the attack table and great stats, alot of folks are missing it has a 360 charge! Well not techically a charge, but 3d6 movement in any direction and if it hits, it charges. Add in impact hits, rank negating US - just 1 walked through most of my Orcs&Goblins, ate it's way through a WoC army - it's nasty. 2 or more though I see most tournaments (at least in the US) disallowing the list or giving you an incredibly bad comp score.

2. Storm banner. Cheap on points, it will shut down enemy shooting. Figure your going to shoot that abomination with cannons - guess again. Dark elf repeating crossbow army - done. For what it costs, I see it almost being mandatory. Only drawback - won't affect dwarf artillery with runes and Tomb Kings. Oh well.

3. LD10 slaves/suicide slaves. Until it gets FAQd, alot of folks are talking about the 1 wide, 20 deep skaven suicide slaves. Run it into combat, almost certainly lose = 20d6 Str 3 hits on all units within 6". Wow.

4. Template weapons. Okay yes they can misfire and hurt your own guys, but the poisoned globe mortars are incredible for their points. Add in all the other templates which only need to touch = many dead things.

5. Plague Censer bearers - just plain nasty - now with an extra attack and don't have to have plague monks to take them. Oh and the plague monks can add their LD if their close. LD10 hatred, frenzy, skirmishing, magic weapon flail armed guys with 3 attacks each. Plus add in the wounds from the censers count towards combat res - ouch.

6. Jury is still out on the Plague Furnance and Screaming Bell. The screaming bell can be amazing if you roll right, but I haven't seen the plague furnace in action yet.

Just a couple of things I've noticed, but I definately think the skaven are going to be a power army, right up there with demons, VC and dark elves. Where I think they are hurting can be in the magic defense side, as well as most of their magic items are pretty bad/and or one use.
Folks who use the bloodthirster as a proving point for how strong an army is - you can only take 1 in a normal game. You can't get the warlord who run back to the back of the unit to stay out of combat - already your going to be at a static 5. Unless you roll pretty well for your BT and have dark insanity special rule, your not going to win combats against large skaven units. Plus they have enough stuff to flank you, shoot you, etc. etc. (also remember you can't fly with the storm banner going off - 16" charge sure but it will prevent you from flying around to get an advantageous flank), it will be tough.

Yup, the storm banner is pretty awesome. I give it a 50/50 chance of being errata'ed to one use only. They left the dark elf ring o no magic in so they might leave the banner o no shooting in.

Suicide slaves are only ld 2, 7 if near the general. Not to hard to break from range. O, and its D3+20 not 20D6 hits.

What do people reckon about the 13th Spell. Is it worth spending the whole game trying to cast it?