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Swords?

Shields?

Spears?

Size?

Weapons Team?

For Clanrats I would say go deep in ranks to keep 'Strength in Numbers' and 'Steadfast' alive. Give them shields but not spears. I feel their best purpose is to hold the enemy (as they do not have great potential of killing power) while your monks, censer bearers, rat ogres, doom wheels, and so on hit the flanks.

For storm vermin I say leave them with their standard equiptment - halberds and heavy armor. If you give them shields they can now only benefit from it against shooting attacks so save your points. Id prefer to take them in units of 30+ in ranks of 10 for the 'Horde' rule that way all 3 first ranks can attack. This unit can really dish out a bit of damage even to decent toughness and armor opponents. Ideally a unit of 50 would be great.

For Slaves I say the same as with Clanrats only the shield is optional. The 6+ ward save for parry in CC is nice. Ranks, ranks and more ranks. They are a tarpit/cannon fodder unit.

For weapons teams I am loving the poisoned wind mortar. Its a mini mortar that can move and fire, has a range of 24", uses the small blast template and kills the center on a 4+ and the rest on a 5+ with no armor saves. Just as good against tough units as it is against weak ones. My 2nd favorite is the warpfire thrower as ya just cant beat templates in 8th edition and the bigger the better as it uses the flame template. Only thing I don't like about the warpfire thrower is that it can not move and shoot but it has the potential of killing a LOT of troops.

The Warpfire Thrower gets a lot of bad press for its shortish range. Conversely, the Ratling Gun seems well loved. Than again, some people swear Stormvermin and Rat Ogres are both useless.

This will be my first venture into playing Skaven. I was thinking of just building a big block of Clanrats and Stormvermin and trying to get a few games in to feel them out. Thanks to fate I may soon have a moderately large block of slaves to play with, as well.

Dont have too many models so I only ran them in units of 30. they werent bad I guess. stormvermin I have 25 of. give them the razor standard, very useful. also I try to use the mortars as much as possible but I am looking into the doomflayer. it looks nice. can munch on non ward save heavy armor troops with ease

Ratling Guns are a very unique and awesome weapon team. When I get around to doing Skaven, I'm going to load up on as many as possible.

It reminds me of the MG's from the ending of "The Last Samurai"

Manchu wrote:The Warpfire Thrower gets a lot of bad press for its shortish range.

I have to say - When I was playing with Island of blood, the Warpfire Thrower did take out my entire HE Cavalry in a single shot.

But, maybe I'm just terrible at rolling. =(

Ratling guns are complete garbage. First you have to roll the dice of death, and get an average of 6-10 shots depending on how many dice you roll.

Then you have to roll a 4+ to hit with all those shots.

Then you need a 3+ or 4+ to wound depending on what your shooting at,

meaning 2-3 wounds tops per round. Assuming you dont roll a double and misfire. then they save at a -2


I have never had ratling guns make their points back.

Warpfire throwers are harder to hit with but hit at Str 5 and normally touch quite a few models.
They also do D3 wounds so are nicer in that regard. In addition to that any unit the suffers a casualty has to take a panic test...

However my favorite is still the mortar.
Small template, anything touched dies on a 5+(4+ under the hole) with no armor saves. Oh it can also move and shoot, while the two above, cannot.

I have also had a decent amount of success with the doom flayer, An in combat organ gun is fun!

ShivanAngel wrote:

However my favorite is still the mortar.
Small template, anything touched dies on a 5+(4+ under the hole) with no armor saves. Oh it can also move and shoot, while the two above, cannot.

and doent it also use the unit's LOS? hide them in the back. taking 5 of them is quite a interesting idea. especially since they are probably cheaper than most stone throwers (with less range and more risk I think)

It can use the units LoS, but it scatters double if you do.

After using storm vermin in many games I think the best use is run them in a unit of 10 with storm banner and plague mortar.. Thats less than 200 pts and useful.. unlike say the rest of the stormvermin :(

Either that or go Queek and upgrade them.. then add in shadow magnet, magic resistance, ironcurse and razor standard..

Generally tho I only use stormvermin for the storm banner

If I take storm vermin its going to be 40-50 in horde formation with storm banner and poisoned wind mortar weapons team. Very expensive unit but very powerful.

Exodus2013 wrote:If I take storm vermin its going to be 40-50 in horde formation with storm banner and poisoned wind mortar weapons team. Very expensive unit.

Fixed your post for you.

The few times i run stormvermin the only reason their points are made back is because of the Warlord i have in there. They are actually pretty pathetic fighters.

Stormvermin took a huge hit in 8th edition by having to use their halberds in CC - now they really are only benefitting from their heavy armor. When you could get a 3+ in HTH using HWS combo, they were pretty good.

I still take them because the models are painted, they can carry the stormbanner and have a slightly better WS than regular clanrats. I'm very hesitant though to throw them in combat (having higher initiative is nice, but still squishy like alot of the models with 2 handed weapons now in 8th).

Weapons teams - torn between the mortar and the warp fire thrower. I really like the warp fire thrower due to it's template and flaming attacks, but it can be pretty vulnerable getting into position. Run one next to a horde formation of slaves though, and be ready to drop that template into combat with whoever is held up by LD10 steadfast rerollable slaves. Converted my own throwers out of stormvermin and IG flamers bits so I'll wait and see what the new mortars look like.

Yeah i liked them in 8th as a tarpit unit.

Use hand weapon and shield for a 3+, give them a war banner and banner of the under empire and use them as a pure SCR block.

Now that they are stuck with their 5+, even with WS4 they just die.

Yup... hence why I think 10 + storm banner + mortar is the way to go so your BSB can have something else

I usually put my storm banner in my plague monks.

Any one else not putting champions in their units?

I'm starting to realize I don't want champions in any unit with one of my characters in it. Mainly because smart opponents then just choose the unit champion to send to the back rank and then beat up on my characters anyways.

ShivanAngel wrote:I usually put my storm banner in my plague monks.

I didnt even know plague monks could take anything other than the plague banner :p Cant imagine not using that.. 40 attacks with no bonuses turn into 7 wounds vs T4.. but 15 or so with it! My plague monks crush through most units like that

After all you dont need the storm banner after turn 1 anyway.. I only wish other units could take magic banners

I guess you guys are a bit right about the storm vermin. They are quite more expensive then the clan rats and after I math hammered them they only are slightly more killy then the spear rats even. Do you guys prefer shield and hand weapon clan rats or spears?

Exodus2013 wrote:I guess you guys are a bit right about the storm vermin. They are quite more expensive then the clan rats and after I math hammered them they only are slightly more killy then the spear rats even. Do you guys prefer shield and hand weapon clan rats or spears?

Shield and hand weapon. They dont kill much so spears are a waste of points imo.

Slaves and clannies are there for 2 reasons.

1. to tarpit

2. to provide bunkers for your BSB, General, Grey Seer, etc.

If the kill some stuff thats a bonus.

Also they can kill champions! I put an assassin with the slaves just to kill BSBs

Yeah assassins arent amazing, but blade of corruption is very good when you reroll hits

Assassins are actually pretty good. Give them the Weeping Blade and a strength potion. Always strikes first with I8. So you will also be re-rolling hits. Strength 7 wounds with strength potion and any that get through cause D3 wounds due to the weeping blade. For 170 points total with that gear he is well worth it for slaying Lords even, especially Wizards.

You dont want weeping blade.. You want blade of corruption now

Yes you die if you roll 2 1s but you REROLL hits now so the chances of that are exceptionally low.. Unlike weeping blades you're S5 not S4 with AP. Every wound you do willl always kill a hero not just 66% of the time

On top of that you then take the other tricksters shard so if they have a ward save its 50% less effective. Potion of strength is okay I guess, but one use only and at the start of a turn

My assassin build crushes BSBs and other heros. Try it out, you'll love its consistency

I'll have to give it a try both ways in a few games and field test it.

How would small units of Stormvermin work out? thinking of running 2 units of 12 with musician and fire thrower. have a good deal of slaves to block infantry in which the fire thrower will conveniently belch at

Depends on if you are playing a small game or not. Small units die fast and are easy VP. The Only way i'd take a tiny unit of storm vermin is a unit of 10 no upgrades no command just so you can take an extra weapons and magic banner i.e. 'Storm Banner'

Kirasu wrote:You dont want weeping blade.. You want blade of corruption now

Yes you die if you roll 2 1s but you REROLL hits now so the chances of that are exceptionally low.. Unlike weeping blades you're S5 not S4 with AP. Every wound you do willl always kill a hero not just 66% of the time

On top of that you then take the other tricksters shard so if they have a ward save its 50% less effective. Potion of strength is okay I guess, but one use only and at the start of a turn

My assassin build crushes BSBs and other heros. Try it out, you'll love its consistency

While the Blade of corruption is very nice, it has one big problem. The strength of the skaven wielding it. You're wounding on 3+ or 4+ most of the time. While not bad, you're probably not going to kill most decently characters before they get to strike. And believe me, 2 wounds with a 4+ ward save won't cut it in most places. The potion of strength/weeping blade combo works only for a turn, but 1 turn is all you need. The assassin will slaughter outright enemy heroes, and severely maul lords. Sure, you will almost definately die afterwards, but in exchange for your assassin you can kill off lords costing far more than you do. The only real problem is High Elves, as you can't rely on the re-rolls to hit.