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Greetings programs...

Been lurking for a few weeks - love this place!
I put the basic questions of playing Lizardmen up front, and the background/fluff at the end - cause I know I don't always read long posts, and search for the meat of them...

***THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT***

(For context - I've been playing WHFB for about 3 weeks - but have alot of 40k experience.)

So overall, my impressions of the Lizardmen (from a new player perspective) are...
No ranged - aside from skinks - coupled with a low movement, make things very rough.
When fighting against undead, the Cold Blooded trait tends to not make much difference - if they get beaten, they flee from the fear - no test - and ultimately, cut down in the pursuit phase.

I'm definitely new to WHFB - and the Lizardmen are still very interesting. I know I'm not going to ONLY play against Vampire Counts - but the majority of my games will be against them. That, and the room mate has been playing for 14 years - although not VC the entire time.

I've taken a peek at the Dark Elves, and they seem VERY flexible, and quite interesting and fun... Chaos looks great - but they have a distinct lack of Ballistics as well, but their flexibility and magic are decent.
Skaven seem interesting, but I don't know if they're really my style... that and the sub-average Leadership may be prone to folding the flanks.
I've also thrown an eye to Tomb Kings - and they look REAL interesting, and fun... against a Vampire Counts army, I can imagine a very interesting battle...

So, I'm not sure if I want to keep playing Lizardmen, and invest in an army... I'd love to try out Dark Elves, and perhaps Tomb Kings; but the Dark Elves have definitely caught my eye - they just seem more tactically and strategically flexible. They also seem to have a good mix of Melee, Ranged, and Magic... and they have alot of Core choices, instead of the base 3 (4 with Teample Gaurd) choices for Lizardmen.


FLUFF AND DETAILS....

Been reading these forums for a few weeks now, and they've been most informative, and entertaining.

About a month ago, I moved in with a friend, and started playing 40k again. Nothing major there - I've been playing that for about 10 years now.... WH Fantasy, however, now that's something else.

So, he gave me the basic overview, and we played a tiny 500 point game to get me used to the slight variations of WHFB vs 40k. Over the next few weeks, we gradually increased the points... now, we generally play 2000 point games, and I've got a solid understanding of the rules, and am now working on army/tactic development.

After reading through some of the army books, I decided upon Lizardmen. They look real nice, and have an interesting back story. Normally I play Marines or Tau in 40k, so I wanted to veer away form the norm in WHFB... I didn't want to play Humans/good guys, and wanted something either savage, or evil... plus, they look like they're fun to paint

My room mate plays Vampire Counts... so far, I'm 0 and 8 against these guys. The best I did was in a 2000 point game against the Ogre Kingdoms - my Skinks won the day - poisoned blowguns all the way

So, I've tried almost everything against VC - and I come up short every time. The magic phase is dominated constantly by the VC (rightfully so I figure), and the fact that every unit inspires fear or such has lead to countless units automatically fleeing combat and being summarily executed during pursuit. My last game, I put a Slaan on the field - to get an understanding of how they worked. He was a second gen, with 16 temple gaurd.
I have him two plaques, and a diadem of power. I took Lore of shadows, which worked surprisingly well.

Ultimately tho, this game went like all the others... almost all units were forced to flee as a result of being beaten in HtH by undead. The big killers were the ethereal/ghost models... the ones generated by Winds of Undeath (cast in two successive magic phases - both times with boxcars - irresistible force :( = bad luck), and then there were some purchased as troops.... nothing in my army could hit them - except for the Slaan, and skink priest. No magic weapons = no chance of beating them... they ate my cavalry and skinks in 3 turns.

These things destroyed my army, and by the end of the game, there were 3 units of them. No terrain penalties, high movement, fear, need magic weapons to hit them. My toad couldn't hurt them - he had loaded up on dispel scrolls, and had a dispel pool of about 9 to 14 dice.
That, and I still had to contend with WS 7 skeletons and zombies... which hemmed up my foot troops. Ultimately, the battle ended when the Toad and his Temple Gaurd were charged by 2 units of the ghosts, 24 WS7 Skeletons, and a unit of Ghouls - with characters in the mix... Lost one combat, and automatically fled... destroyed in the pursuit phase.

What a mess - my first attempt at using a Slaan, and it is one of my worst defeats.
Over the course of my intro to Lizardmen and WHFB I've covered almost the whole of the Lizardman book. I've tried Kroxigor - but the unit of 4 fled after losing a combat to the fear inducing undead (or they failed their Leadership test) - huge waste of points - again, summarily executed in the pursuit.
Salamanders get charged by ghosts/ethereal or WS7 Skellies - and they end up shooting at the Zombies placed 3 inches in front of them during the magic pahse - so they don't damage anything, really...

It seems that the only thing that ever does well are the Skinks... they consistently get a few kills (for some reason, undead are not immune to poison attacks), and if they flee - no big loss. Although vs the Vampire Counts, they aren't so good. They can't really charge to flank someone, because they have to make the Fear/Terror test - and that never succeeds for some reason.

I've had equally poor performance against Empire.
The huge amount of ballistics that were fielded really hemmed up my troops before they got into close combat... Artillery, handgunners, riflemen - all big problems. Of course, I didn't have a Slaan on the field during that game.

Thanks for sticking through the long-winded post... Any suggestions, comments, or anything?
I know I can't expect to win every time as a new player... but it gets frustrating, just not being able to really do anything but kill expendable/regenerating zombies and skeletons.
I'd like to at least make some progress in my games - not just find new ways to get defeated...although, even in defeat, there is something to be learned.

Side note - Pit of Shades tends to work quite well against Undead...but the models sucked in just get replaced in the next VC Magic phase generally.

I'm about to make the leap into WH Fantasy as well (long time 40k player). All the Fantasy players I've talked to tell me to expect to lose quite a bit at first playing against people that have been playing awhile, and even more against the tougher army lists (VC)

Tomb Kings, from everyone I've talked to, are not a beginners army. I was steered away from them as well. I think I may want to eventually build it though...I really like the look of the models.

So yeah, this post is from someone that is a Fantasy beginner as well. Basically I'm saying, don't give up, you're going to get your butt kicked. Maybe ask your roommate to play his VC models as a counts-as army of something else, so that you're both "learning" something new? It'll help you as you get to experience different army builds. It'll help him as he'll learn how other armies work. Win-Win situation

lizardmen are one of the more flexible armies out there. you can go from a skirmish army running all skinks, to a hard nosed combat force using Saurus and Kroxigors. I think your best bet against VC is to go with a bunch of skinks and salamanders. avoid combat as long as possible pelting them with darts and flames. and for combat go with terradons. you will almost always get the charge which means you can use the hit and run tactic. if you lose they can't pursue and if you win you can get out of there and go again next round. or you could go with kroxigors and a stegadon, and just smash them to bits, and you don't have to worry about fear as I think kroxigors cause fear and i know the steg causes terror.

No shooting except for skinks?

Take a look at the salamander profile, take 3 in a unit and watch your opponent quake (I know mine do)

Everyone struggles against etherals unless you have lots of ranked units.

You have a slaan.

Try:
4th gen slaan, items for +1 power and +1 dispel dice, +1 spell, Diadem of power. BSB
Skink priest: x2 dispel scrolls
Saurus scar vet- Mark old ones, mark sotek, magic weapon (as you want to kill the etherals), charm jag warrior.
10 saurus
10 saurus
x2-3 units skinks (scout preferable)
3 salamanders
1 stegadon
x2 units 3 kroxigor

(you may have to drop a kroxigor unit at 2000 points)

Thats my standard tourney set up for all comers and it can hold its own vs most armies.

Lizardmen have several things going for them.
1: Cold blooded. Whilst not immune to psych you can potentially stick around a very long time and pass many more psych tests than you would with only 2d6 rolls for ld. Also you can still flee, setting up flank charges by other units.

2: Flexibility. From the best generic magic users in the game to an old blood and 3 scar vet combat kill team. Best skirmishers in the game and great monster infantry (kroxigors), to the stegadon, one of the best chariots in the game (whils a monster I use it as a chariot in terms of tactics).

3: Few weaknesses.
Buy a 2nd gen slaan = little else in rest of army.
Saurus are 1-2 points too expensive each for their role.
Saurus cav are 5-6 points too expensive each for their role.


Its all about working out the role of each unit and getting it to do it.
For example my salamanders now stick close to a slaan in a forest- When enemy in range I pop my head out and shoot (still stay in edge of forest)- enemy finds it harder to shoot me due to cover so usually don't, if they charge I flee (will invariably rally thanks to the Ld9 general nearby) leaving the enemy either tied up in the forest for the rest of the game or out of position for a flank charge by a supporting unit.
If they don't charge them I just keep shooting....

Well, after a few more games with the Scalies, I learned some more, and had some thoughts...

The Salamanders worked well, they're a great unit. The skinks - as always - are fantastic...
I read through some of the other army books and finally settled on Dark Elves.

The Dark Elves have a fantastic selection of core troops - which is definately a must for my play style. I felt too reigned in by the lizardmen, with only a handful of core troops to choose from.

I like the Lizardmen - they appeal to me, and I have some experience with them now... but primarily, I'm going to play dark elves, and probably bounce between the two armies.



Thanks for the responses and tips! Good stuff!

well, having more than one army is probably a good thing. I have three armies myself having just started lizardmen a few months ago. it's nice to have another army to mix things up when you get a little bored playing the same style all the time. it's also nice to be able to match up better against other armies. I love my hig elves, but for some reason i can't beat brets or empire with them, so against those two armies I use my dwarfs, or I use my dwarfs when want to shut down magic. if I want to match spell for spell in a smaller game, i use elves, if it's a big game i'll use lizards with a slann. so two armies are nice, and you might want to start a third some time down the road, just don't be picking armies with the same play style.

Don't forget you can take a sacred host and have all your saurus become immune to psychology. VCs will find things much more difficult if they cannot rely on fear to break you.

The other thing to remember about lizards vs VC is that you really have the potential to dominate one of the most important phases to the VC - Magic. Slaan are horrendously powerful in the magic phase, and with careful positioning of skinks you can dominate movement as well - march blocking etc.

The key thing to remember about WHFB vs 40K is that shooting is only 1/4 of the battle. Movement is probably the most important phase, and lizards have the potential to do better there, and in magic. And with salamanders you can have a nasty shooting phase too.