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Okay, so I picked up pretty much a brand new assembled Beastmen Battalion and Army Book.

Now, I like the models, and their fluff is pretty awesome too.

But, how good is the actual Beastmen army?

Umm... considered one of the weaker races following 8th Edition.

They do ok with lots of bray-shamans though. Lore of Beasts is particularly handy as the casting value is one less when used on beastmen units.

They'll do all right if you leave the suboptimal rares at home and spam a lot of level 1 beast casters with wildform. That's a LOT of s4 attacks that almost always have hatred (given BSB rerolls). Like all heavily combat-oriented armies, you'll struggle with gunlines, although a Chalice of Dark Rain can help with this a bit.

Well I suppose a better question is... can Beastmen be competitive?

The_Savior wrote:Well I suppose a better question is... can Beastmen be competitive?

It's definitely a situational thing. Against shooty armies they fare alot worse due to basically most models dieing if they get wounded because of no armour save. That said though they can be brutal in combat when they hit enemy units with enough numbers. Primal fury and their hero and lord characters makes for a hard hitting combination. Definitely agree if you like a heavy magic based alternative to Chaos mortals they can be very fun. Just some matchups will be sorely in your opponents failure. The Ghorgon and Jabberslythe are fun units to base an army around as well. Lots of character and entertainment to be had from beastmen if you enjoy their background and models.

So, Beastmen don't like being shot at.

Got it.

They can be competative.

BUT:
You really do have to optimise your unit selections.

Almost all the rare choices are 20-30 points overpriced for 8th ed, the ghorgor is probably the only one priced appropriately.

Minotaurs hit like a brick but they are very expensive and taking them in sufficient numbers to hammer the enemy after wading through missile fire leaves a huge chunk of point gone.

Chariot spam is currently a favorite, but is too 'point and click' for me.

Chariot spam you say?

Must read up on them.

The_Savior wrote:Well I suppose a better question is... can Beastmen be competitive?

In my opinion, if you are new to the game, most of the games you win or lose as you start will be more determined by how much you've learned of the rules than strength of Army book. This is only magnified if your gaming partners are new too.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:the ghorgor

I may have to start calling the thing a ghorgor from now on...

Look into Ambush.

Few players enjoy fighting Hordes, let alone Hordes of cheapo troops with a fair chance of coming on from their rear table edge....

Mr Mystery wrote:Look into Ambush.

Few players enjoy fighting Hordes, let alone Hordes of cheapo troops with a fair chance of coming on from their rear table edge....

1/6 is a fair chance?

Plus you'd need a duplicate horde in your army list that was deployed normally. Ambush is a pain in the arse to work into your army IMO, you never seem to have enough ambushing units of a decent size.

What I have gathered from others is that the Beastmen are a tricky army to play well with, but those that do have fun with them. I do like the look of the gor models though. I think I would go with lots of gors, chariots (would go with a plastic alternative), maybe a unit of minos, and shamans. Not sure what the best general or BSB would be though. Any thoughts?

boogeyman wrote:What I have gathered from others is that the Beastmen are a tricky army to play well with, but those that do have fun with them. I do like the look of the gor models though. I think I would go with lots of gors, chariots (would go with a plastic alternative), maybe a unit of minos, and shamans. Not sure what the best general or BSB would be though. Any thoughts?

Gors with a few chariots is solid. The wargor is a great hero for a BSB for his cost and you can give him gnarled hide and a magic banner ( Doesnt count as a magic item ). Though if you want the most durable BSB you can get a minotaur hero in a block of minotaurs is a good option also. If you put him in a normal gor block he wont get a loot out sir! roll and likely get cannonballed in the face.

I have no chariots though D:

Right now my beastmen look more like... extra marauders and troll/ogre conversions

I'd argue that Dwarfs have better ambush rules than Beastmen. You can quite comfortably fit 3 decent sized mining units into a 2000pt force and still have special points left over for a couple of cannons.

So anyways... if I don't have chariots, what's the next best option you can pull off with the Battalion?

1 battalion likely will limit you. If you want more options I would get a second battalion when you can afford it as beastmen definitely need numbers. Then you can field some healthy numbers of gors, ungors and bestigors. Get or convert a Bray shaman or two and a BSB. Possibly a combat hero/lord and you'll have most of what you need to play small games. Using the bray shaman to either boost stats with lore of beasts or one of the other lores for extra damage/hexes. With the all important BSB to reroll primal fury and other leadership tests.

-Looks at his wallet, then looks at his Beastmen.- Yay, more Marauders!

Yeah, I think I know what I'm going to do with these guys.

Beastmen aren't a cheap army to build...trust me.

Flashman wrote:

Mr Mystery wrote:Look into Ambush.

Few players enjoy fighting Hordes, let alone Hordes of cheapo troops with a fair chance of coming on from their rear table edge....

1/6 is a fair chance?

Plus you'd need a duplicate horde in your army list that was deployed normally. Ambush is a pain in the arse to work into your army IMO, you never seem to have enough ambushing units of a decent size.

Yet Beasties are cheap enough to do it. Hordes of Ungors if you feel especially tight on points. One from the front, and one coming on elsewhere....lovely.

And as I don't have my beastybook to hand, double check the one in six. Fairly sure there's a result where you get to choose. And helll, a Horde suddenly appearing on either flank can be nasty enough.

Its like

1 opponent places
2-3 they dont come on
4 right flank
5 left flank
6 your choice

One of my all time favorite races (just because the how despicably evil the Ungors are) but sadly, the army is not that good..

The_Savior wrote:So anyways... if I don't have chariots, what's the next best option you can pull off with the Battalion?

Bestigors. They are quite expensive (moneywise) but damn, they are good! Just make sure you have enough of them to make sure they can strike a lot when they come into CC.
Also, buying them in the battallion is a tad cheaper than buying them separately, by the way.

Saintspirit wrote:

The_Savior wrote:So anyways... if I don't have chariots, what's the next best option you can pull off with the Battalion?

Bestigors. They are quite expensive (moneywise) but damn, they are good! Just make sure you have enough of them to make sure they can strike a lot when they come into CC.
Also, buying them in the battallion is a tad cheaper than buying them separately, by the way.

Quite a bit if you price up what you get individually. As all the units have their uses in the battalion.

Well, until I get a lot more money the Beastmen will be more Marauders and conversions for the WoC

The_Savior wrote:Well, until I get a lot more money the Beastmen will be more Marauders and conversions for the WoC

Understandable. Nice idea on using them actually. They'd fit in quite well. The warriors sending their half mutated marauder shock troops into the fray to wear the enemy down.

Would that be a bad form of WYSIWYG or do you think people shouldn't mind?

As long as the opponent knows what they represent I really don't see it being an issue most if not all the time. Besides it would look good I'd say as I don't particularly like the marauder models.

I mean I can see the Flails clearly as a WYSIWYG, but I can just run them as hand weapons or more things and just field them as hordes.

I play Beastmen as my primary army but I also play WoC, and I use the gors as marauders all the time (both because I dislike the marauder models, and because I am a bit lazy). Some puritans sometimes turn up their noses, but usually it is not a problem... Some of the gors have morning stars after all, just put them in the front ranks if you use flails...