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Not that I've seen many new O&G lists around, but I've definitely seen none with any skulkers in them. Is this just because they're for common goblins, and nobody in their right mind would run those over the night gob brethren? I'm actually fairly paranoid of KB myself, so thought having 1-3 wee assassins per unit would be a cool thing ... In addition to being not-NG, are their stats just junk? Or overcosted, vs buying goblin big bosses with great weapons?

Clearly I should just go read the book at my LGS, but I am curious why I've never even heard them mentioned on The Internets.

- Salvage, who is secretly thinking about 1000 points of common goblins ...

I've had the same thought Boss. I think they'd be kinda nifty. Certainly would make me sweat if I was sending characters into a goblin unit.

And if you want to take them out, you have to direct attacks at them. So you either swing at them once, and hope you don't miss, or swing at them multiple times and waste attacks instead of trying to grind through the rest of the horde. Not sure why I'm not seeing them in lists either...

I eagerly DON'T await the day when every evil army has Assassins.

Definitely take them. And definitely take them over a big boss.

The boss is almost always going to die before he strikes, unless he's fighting something like clan rats, in which case who cares about his GW attacks anyway. He also gives up points if he dies where as the skulkers only give up points if the unit dies (where you'd give up points for the boss anyway)

The skulkers are there for a really cheap gamble at killing a very expensive character. 30 points to maybe KB a BSB or fighty hero is usually worth it. Also, because the enemy has to allocate attacks to the skulker, they might allocate too few / too many and either fail to kill or save you some combat res.


I'm not convinced common goblins are better than NG, but IF you're taking common goblins, 3x skulkers is definitely worth it. 1 unit of common goblins always has a place with that KB benefit. After that I'd probably say NG are almost always better.

I think its a matter of many people not having models to field big common goblin blocks.
Or just plain force of habit making them take fanatics.

I certainly see them as useful, but I won't run any because:

A)I only have NG models...
B)NG are still better than commons(IMHO)
C)Fanatics are better(IMHO) because they have the chance to kill some things latter. Skulkers are only KB when they are revealed and they must be revealed in the first round of combat. "Surprise! HAHAHA! Killing Blow against your.... five warhounds..... damn."

Tzeenchling nailed it. They are pretty situational, and it's just as likely that your opponent is going to dictate the situation.

IF you have regular goblins in your unit, there's no reason not to take them. Trust me, if you're running a goblin-heavy force, you're going to have points left over. But to date, GW's really pushed Night Goblin models hard. I can't tell you the last time I saw a goblin regiment box at my LGS. Chariots and wolf riders, sure, but the regular goblin box? Never.

Fanatics retain their danger (and hilarity) after being revealed. As for the skulkers, if they don't kill a character in the round that they're revealed, they revert to being 10 point goblins with an extra attack.

To be fair, they are 10 point goblins with two extra attacks (extra hand weapon), ASF, and Armor Piercing. Sure, you buy them for the first round Killing Blow, but they aren't quite as bad as baseline goblins after that goes off.

As for the argument that your opponent can control when they come out with cheap troops: this is 100% correct, but it doesn't mean much. We're not talking about 75 points of fanatics, here that can cause a problem to your own stuff if they release at the wrong time. This is 30 points. What bait unit costs less than 30 points? Why is it being wasted by hitting a goblin block?

Their greatest strength is probably against characters on monsters. In this case you can either fish for killing blows by refusing a challenge, or you can challenge yourself and cause all the breath/attacks/thunderstomp to be directed at a single goblin. That block will keep the enemy occupied all game.

Biophysical wrote:What bait unit costs less than 30 points?

A screen of 5-7 Giant Rats + Packmaster(23-29 points).

Additionally, I think Common Goblins do have a place over night goblins. They get shields for only 0.5 points per model, giving them a 5+/6++, which is far tougher than a model of that points cost has a right to be. They can provide rank support to hammer units, and not give up as many casualties (and therefor combat resolution) as night goblins would.

Because, frankly, Skulkers aren't that great. Armor Piercing, great - you can get that from pretty much any Goblin Shaman, and for the whole unit to boot. Three attacks with it, and ASD? Nice, but they're only WS2, S3, I2 to boot - they hit on 4's or 5's, wound on 4's or 5's, and get no re-rolls on their "To Hit" because pretty much no-one besides very few units have I2 or I1 models (and most that do have I2 or I1 either have a high toughness, multiple wounds, or both).

Killing Blow + Three of 'Em on the first round is pretty much their only draw, which is situational insofar as being no real use if fighting someone like Empire Swordsmen or the like, and against stuff like Chaos Warriors or Characters Night Gobbos do much better at the game (since for five points less, they can instead force 'em to take 1-2D6 S5 AP hits that'll probably cause a bit more injury).

Skulkers are a classic GW case of "Great models, blah rules". "Go for da squishy bitz!" or some other title for a rule that gives them Hatred (or, at least, consistent re-rolls either to hit or to wound) would make 'em worthwhile. Right now, besides the "One in a long-shot versus character or Chaos Warrior" bit, your only advantage is they're not too far off per point compared to a Goblin Boss, and a Goblin Boss is inferior to a Skulker.

Take skulker and boss.
Put the boss in the 2nd rank.

1)Skulkers goes first (ASF) and do their thing.
2)Then the enemy unit attacks, skulker(s) die, and the boss moves to the front with the step up rule.
3) Boss swings with his ASL great weapon, still alive because he was in the 2nd rank when the opponent took his swings.

It's Awesome Sauce! Dirt cheap for killing blow, and lets you hide your characters!

-Matt

Holy *@#$ Matt that sounds like a great tactic.

Doesn't the Boss have to go in the front rank? Unit command has priority for front-rank placement, characters don't (which is what Skulkers are).

EDIT: Ah, you meant Big Boss / Warboss, not "Boss" (the unit champion level of Goblin).

HawaiiMatt wrote:Take skulker and boss.
Put the boss in the 2nd rank.

1)Skulkers goes first (ASF) and do their thing.
2)Then the enemy unit attacks, skulker(s) die, and the boss moves to the front with the step up rule.
3) Boss swings with his ASL great weapon, still alive because he was in the 2nd rank when the opponent took his swings.

It's Awesome Sauce! Dirt cheap for killing blow, and lets you hide your characters!

-Matt

Great except thats not the actual rule

"Step up" was part of the original rumors and how people envision it working in their head. The actual rule says "Remove all casualties from the rear like shooting".. then it goes onto explain it can be explained by troops stepping up to take the place of dead people. However, thats not how it works in the game. Everything is done from back rank to front rank

The problem with Skulkers is that if you take command models then they have to deploy in odd locations. You probably wont be able to get all 3 on a character because your own command are in the way.

Look at them as an alternative to command, then. Standard, Musician, and 3 Skulkers is all 5 slots in the front rank. You can't tell me that a Skulker isn't more worth it than a boss. They're all the same points. I think you can probably get away without a standard, though. You won't be winning combat, and if you're not Steadfast, you're a goner anyway. Musician might be worth it for the movement abilities, but I could see waiving that option also to make Skulker placement easier.

Kirasu wrote:

Great except thats not the actual rule

"Step up" was part of the original rumors and how people envision it working in their head. The actual rule says "Remove all casualties from the rear like shooting".. then it goes onto explain it can be explained by troops stepping up to take the place of dead people. However, thats not how it works in the game. Everything is done from back rank to front rank

The problem with Skulkers is that if you take command models then they have to deploy in odd locations. You probably wont be able to get all 3 on a character because your own command are in the way.

Step up tells you to remove from the rear when RANK AND FILE are killed. If I kill your chaos lord, you don't leave him in place and remove 1 marauder.
So the rules that do apply are:
1) Characters must be in the front rank if possible, being displaced to the 2nd rank if the front rank is full of command or other characters. (page 97)
2) If a character in the front rank is killed, he is removed.
3) Page 5 days we must have the same number of models in each rank, except for the last which can have less.
So, if characters have to go up front when allowed, and your opponent creates an open spot, how do you fill it?


But, if I am wrong...
Skulkers are still awesome if the boss doesn't set up. That means you can put a Goblin wizard in the 2nd rank, and leave him there the whole game, never moving up, even after all the skulkers are dead. Would you pay 30 points to be immune to close combat attacks? I would.


You can't have it both ways, either the characters move up and fight, or they get to hide. Both possibilities are worth the 30 points.
-Matt

You don't get immunity to close-combat attacks on your front rank, unless you forego command entirely and take at least two Heroes / Lords (or, possibly, one and a Boss - I think that if you're only in BtB with a Champion you can only kill them, from one of the FAQ questions on what happens when you hit the flank and a Champion's the only model in base-to-base). If you have a Musician or Standard, they can still attack the basic Goblins (Albeit with only a 40-120mm frontage, depending on where you place the one / two).

I can see that being helpful for a single-round damage-soak, but it won't last any longer. First round you have a Boss, Big Boss, and nothing else in the front rank until the Skulkers release. Enemy can deal a maximum of 6 wounds, and they most probably will (or, at least, cause five wounds - three attacks / frontage at WS3 or better and S3 or better will on average kill a Skulker and boss each, so something with spears or additional hand weapons can kill all but the Big Boss in the first round). That helps insofar as buying an additional round with steadfast, but... er... that right there's 21-31 (depending on how much wargear you bought) additional Common Goblins for the same price, and I think that can buy you more rounds than them.

If they hit more often, or could re-roll wounds, or were more durable, I'd consider them worth their points. As they are? They're a common Gobbo with ASF, Killing Blow one round of the game, and two extra attacks. That's it. Empire / Bretonnian Knights and regular Dwarf Warriors are the only two units I think that they can make their points up against in a reliable manner.

Minsc, you are missing the point of skulkers. Their value comes in a 30 point "gamble" at assassinating a character. You should be deploying them and moving them to achieve this goal where appropriate. If you take skulkers, that should be how you aim to use them. If you want to take them to kill a few extra RNF guys, then you would be better served by taking 10 extra goblins. Their benefit is also to make a 180 point or so unit of goblins a threat to these characters, as your warboss can't be everywhere to crack 1+ saves.

I also think this whole boss idea is bad. They are way too easy to kill and give up instant points, even if it's 30-40. The point of 8th is to (IN GENERAL) take larger units that are harder to get points off of.

Minsc wrote:Three attacks with it, and ASD? Nice, but they're only WS2, S3, I2 to boot ...

Crap on a stick, I was hoping their stats were a little better than their fellow gobs I still like them, for all of the shenanigans that ya'll are pointing out - flooding the front rank, kicking characters out, mobbing up on a single character for some lucky dice, having cool models - and I don't think they're necessarily overpriced (maybe 5 points too high). But I do agree that lack of a real reroll is a bummer, meaning a 30 point dice game - vs like fanatics, which cost less (right?) and do nastier things (admittedly to units, not necessarily characters) with less dice involved ...

- Salvage

Leenus wrote:Minsc, you are missing the point of skulkers. Their value comes in a 30 point "gamble" at assassinating a character. You should be deploying them and moving them to achieve this goal where appropriate. If you take skulkers, that should be how you aim to use them. If you want to take them to kill a few extra RNF guys, then you would be better served by taking 10 extra goblins. Their benefit is also to make a 180 point or so unit of goblins a threat to these characters, as your warboss can't be everywhere to crack 1+ saves.

The thing is, their character-killing potential is heavily limited as well. For instance, compare them to Skaven Assassins and Dark Elf Assassins.

Dark Elves start with a high initiative, ASF (maybe only the turn they're revealed? Not sure here), get re-rolls to hit from Hatred, and - very often - get 4+ attacks that are high-WS with a "Wound on 3's" poison (that also, usually, means at least a -2 to enemy armor saves). A Skaven Assassin gets their four poisoned attacks, has a natural 4+ Ward, WS6, decent initiative mixed with ASF, can choose to replace their poisoned weapon with something like a D3 wound Weeping Blade, etcetera.

A Skulker versus a character... isn't much better. If it engages in a challenge, it gets three attacks that need 5's to hit (unless fighting a Wizard, and I can think of very few WS3 or WS4 wizards that'll declare challenges and either be vulnerable to Killing Blow or have an ace up their sleeve) and (again unless fighting mages) either 5's or 6's to wound. If outside a challenge, you get more opportunity, but are still limited insofar as having a low "To hit" and "To wound" odd without re-rolls.

Giving them WS3, giving them Hatred first-round, giving them re-roll failed to wounds when deployed, something other than just throwing on ASF, KB, and Extra Attack +2 on the model, those could increase their value. As it is, they aren't a reliable investment though: They're comparable to a Skull Wand of Kaloth. Yeah, for a fun game you might as well take 'em, chuckle as you roll for 'em and start going "Woo!" if they work right. However, predominantly you should expect them to not work right, and go "Oh, I am having brought cloak and dagger to Hero-fight" before getting smacked aside by the follow-up attacks.

Leenus wrote:I also think this whole boss idea is bad. They are way too easy to kill and give up instant points, even if it's 30-40. The point of 8th is to (IN GENERAL) take larger units that are harder to get points off of.

Personally, I've always been of the opinion "Goblin Warbosses > Goblin Big Bosses, Goblin Shamans > Goblin Great Shamans". You take your Goblins in Lord format since they get WS5 (which is very big for hand-to-hand), you take the Shamans at Hero-levels as the additional +1-+2 is much less effective for a Goblin than an Orc Shaman. I've also predominantly been of the opinion that "Goblins = Expendable Anvil", and that you should very rarely try to treat a Goblin unit as anything else: Unless you have some good spell access through a Wizarding Hat (or can hit someone in the flank / rear and use sneaky stabbin'), you shouldn't expect Goblins to win combats on their own, but instead either tie someone up or negate steadfast while some hammer smashes into the flank / rear to provide active combat resolution.

Minsc wrote:You don't get immunity to close-combat attacks on your front rank, unless you forego command entirely and take at least two Heroes / Lords (or, possibly, one and a Boss - I think that if you're only in BtB with a Champion you can only kill them, from one of the FAQ questions on what happens when you hit the flank and a Champion's the only model in base-to-base). If you have a Musician or Standard, they can still attack the basic Goblins (Albeit with only a 40-120mm frontage, depending on where you place the one / two).

First round of combat, I have 3 skulkers, a standard, and musician in the front rank. That puts my goblin shaman into the 2nd rank, where he will never step up.
OR
First round, I have 3 skulkers, a standard and musician in the front rank. That puts my big boss(es), in the 2nd rank, who step up and swing with all their attacks (ASL), after the enemy has killed two of the skulkers.

-Matt

Boss Salvage wrote: But I do agree that lack of a real reroll is a bummer, meaning a 30 point dice game - vs like fanatics, which cost less (right?) and do nastier things (admittedly to units, not necessarily characters) with less dice involved ...

*A* fanatic is slightly less expensive than three skulkers, but in my opinion you can't put a price tag on hilarity. And the only thing more entertaining than a night goblin fanatic is three night goblin fanatics.

Fanatics are good and all, but I'm a fan of hitting on 5's, and needing 6's to wound... which just happen to be killing blow.
Dude, you're lord just got taken out by a 10 point character!
6 rounds of skulker attacks = 1 killing blow against a WS5+ T5+ enemy. That should cost you ~60 points to pull off. IMO, they are worth it for their fighting ability too.

But, lets all just keep calling them crap, I don't mind being the only guy running them.


-Matt

9 attacks even if 5+ to hit have 50% chance to do kb. Damn thats nice

There's really two ways to get re-rolls also. If you're flanking with the default Little Waaagh Spell, you're looking at re-rolls to hit and wound, but it's not going to be as useful at killing characters, because they probably won't be flanking. However, if you get off "Itchy Nuisance", there's a good chance the target's initiative will be reduced to 1, so you'll get the re-rolls to hit with ASF that way.

Again, though, I think the critics are being too harsh. It's a 30 point upgrade for 3. It's not so good that you have to take it, but it's costing you much. You're just adding a gamble of a threat for very little risk invested.

Minsc I want to play an army where I8(Skaven Assassin) is a "decent" Initiative.

They only get Killing Blow the round they're revealed, to my understanding. So you're not going to get multiple rounds to try unless you can either release one at a time (not sure if they can or not with current ruling, book isn't bought yet), or you get all them attacking the character at once.

There's three spells that provide re-rolls, unless "Bash 'Em" is Orc-only still. Bash 'Em, if close enough to the Goblin unit, Sneaky Stabbin', and the Itchy Nuisance.

Bash 'Em is risky mostly insofar as you're sticking a unit that can roll "1,1" next to a unit with a Shaman in it. Otherwise, it's the most consistent mean of re-rolls for the Night Goblins (again, assuming it was changed to "All Friendly Units" in the bubble). You get the spell off? Yes? Congrats, you have re-rolls!

Sneaky Stabbin' is one of the easiest to apply, since it has an 83% chance to go off on a 50pt character (who, also, has only a single level) that has a 100% chance to get the spell [if they choose to], and only need one Power Die for that 83% chance. However, it also has no effect on a Skulker unless you're in a unit's flank or rear: Armor Piercing does not stack, so you need the Flank / Rear.

Now, in that case, Skulkers can be worthwhile. 9 KB attacks re-rolling failed "To Hit" and "To Wound" rolls? On average, against a WS5+ T4 character, you went from three hits one wound with a 50-50 for killing blow (statistically), to five hits that will have a much higher shot at killing blow. The main issue with this is that, if you're taking such a unit, you've probably consigned it to a Flank and with small numbers (or, essentially, intended to hit someone in the Flank / Flank-run instead of going head on).

This is a problem as your unit lacks functionality in a battle-type where running the flanks isn't quite possible (Since you rarely run a unit 40-large along a flank, if only for basing reasons), and that it works better for hunting Heavy Infantry (note: That's not necessarily a bad thing) than character hunting (since Character Hunting is impossible for a rear charge, and nigh-impossible from a Flank). As such, this combination works much better for hunting small (Less than +3 rank bonus) units of medium / heavy infantry than it does overall character hunting.

Finally, there's Itchy Nuisance. The main advantage of a successfully cast Itchy Nuisance is that you're letting your unit strike first (if you roll high enough), and - if you have Skulkers - are rerolling your attacks for the KB models. It is also, to my recollection, not that difficult to cast (Even a non-NG Level 2 shouldn't be that hard pressed to cast it on 2-3 dice). The main disadvantage is that it's only somewhat more reliable than Sneaky Stabbin', and is predominantly only boosting the Skulkers (since if you're in a position wherein you're getting more Goblin attacks by going first than going second, your Goblin unit is most probably about to die).

I may be a bit biased here (on Skulkers), though. I'm just a bit too use to Orcs & Goblins getting "Why don't you pay 30pts here, and maybe one day, if you're really lucky , you might watch it do something amazing." It fits with the standard GW practice of Orcs, but I'd just one-day like to see OnG get one of the other armies' tried and true "Here's a reliable good unit, have at it."


EDIT: I8 was "decent" insofar as "Highly likely to buy a Skaven Assassin re-rolls." Not decent as in "Okay, the initiative isn't bad" decent.

Minsc wrote:EDIT: I8 was "decent" insofar as "Highly likely to buy a Skaven Assassin re-rolls." Not decent as in "Okay, the initiative isn't bad" decent.

I think Skulkers suffer a little from the balancing game of GW trying to keep them cheap unit additions within the additional (arguably arbitrarily costed) points granted to hidden models.

Minor nitpick, if I'm reading the rules correctly. You can never get better than 67% chance to cast on 1 die, as a 1 or 2 always fails. I believe that the Mushroom die is explicitly stated to not be a power die, so a 1 or 2 on the power die would still cause a failure to cast. I'm not sure of this, but that is the conservative way I'd read it.