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How do you beat a Skaven army? It seems impossible to me. They take blocks of 40 clanrats, and you can't win combat against them. I charged one of these 40 block clanrat regiments with my high elf swordmasters, inflicted wounds while he inflicted none, and still lost combat, and actually ran away and was caught, and wiped out. On the charge. Against clanrats. What the hell? Is this supposed to happen? Or is this just the way 8th runs now? If I don't have full squads of 40 in every regiment, am I going to lose every combat? It sure seems that way. What am I supposed to do about this? I'm not the only one either - I saw an orc player go against the same Skaven army. His black orcs, his BLACK ORCS, lost combat to the dumbass 40 clanrat regiment, ran, and was caught, all because of outnumbering and rank bonuses. Seriously...what to do about this? Please help?


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I'm not trolling btw...seriously need some advice here before I cry because I lost to rat men again...

Well... how big are your units? I mean, I really don't see how that could happen unless the unit was like, what, 15 models?

What's wrong with a unit of 15 swordmasters? Or 15 black orcs? I felt that was a good size, considering you get them in boxes of 10 for over $30.


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We were only playing about 1000 or 1500 points, as we're just kinda starting fantasy...so large units of expensive troops wasn't something I figured would be a good thing...

give us some details on how your unit of swordmasters was setup.
how many wounds did you cause?

I didn't write everything down or keep a log book or anything, so you'll have to bear with my terrible memory on this...

But it was a 10 or 15 man unit of swordmasters, full command and everything. He had a block of 40 clanrats, at full strength (I was focusing my shooting on the big nasty 3 wound rat ogres), they charged my swordmasters, I think I did 2 or 3 wounds, and I still lost combat due to his ridiculous rank bonus, on top of outnumbering me, while he did no wounds at all. I have a habit of rolling very high on dice (good for most things, but sucks for Ld tests) and what can I say? I ran and got caught, and was a little upset that what was supposed to be my elite infantry got run down by clanrats. On a side note, I don't think I'll ever take Ellryian Reavers again, at least not in the squad of 5 I did that game. The 5 bow shots weren't really worth it...


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The worst part? I had a Blademaster in the squad with the 25 point magical armor that gives a 2+ armor save...not that it mattered, he didn't cause any wounds!

Perhaps it was just bad luck... but I do think the new Skaven are a bit too powerful ( or maybe that's just me missing the Skaven being the ''underdogs'' of fantasy)..

In fairness to your opponent, you only did 2 or 3 wounds with 16(?) attacks? That seems like awful rolling on your part.

You just made me realize why I lost. While playing, I completely didn't notice blademasters have 2 attacks base. Damn guys. Damn. Still doesn't explain the Black Orc incident...especially considering it was a 20 man squad with full command...

Let me try math hammer...

15 SM i assume 5x3 ranks.
15 attacks , hitting on 3+ , , 10 hitts , 5 rerolls , 13hits.

str 5 on T3 , wounding on 2s, at -2 AS ,

Almost 11 wounds , assuming they had parry saves , still 10 dead rats.

The only way the can win reliably is with stead fast + a skaven general baby sitting near by.

ridiculous rank bonus? your capping it at +3 right?

I won combat against 2 units of clanrats with a warlord with fell blade AND deathmaster snitch, with mere pheonix guard.

That and Vauls unmaking....*laughs evilly* Easy way to avoid them. Don't get charged!

+3 IS ridiculous, especially when you've already killed some of them.

Ok, there are some units in a Skaven army that can be quite annoying and are very strong.

Single units of Clanrats? Not among them.

They can be a tarpit, especially in bigger numbers with Steadfast, but they´re not exactly a unit that actually wins combat. Unless you have terrible dice luck, that is.

With a unit of 15 Swordmasters you SHOULD have killed 10 Rats, as LunaHound so kindly calculated. On average rolls that would have meant you won the combat easily.

Only 2 or 3 dead rats is very, veeery bad luck with the dice when you consider the "ASF + higher Ini" reroll (at least I think Swordmasters have higher Ini than Clanrats) with a better WS and the Strength advantage.

Bad luck happens. I killed or ran over some very hart hitting units with bunch of Gnoblars (2 pts each and their stats show why) on occasion.

If everything else fails, a flank charge gets rid of the rank bonus.

LunaHound wrote:The only way the can win reliably is with stead fast + a skaven general baby sitting near by.

Thats not winning its surviving.

You should remember that your Elves have ASF, and should be re-rolling cc missed because of it. This, combined with remembering your swordmasters have 2 attacks, should help you clean up some rats.

Skaven are, by far, the best army in this edition.

High elves are honestly middle of the pack...

The last GT I went to had 11 or 12 skaven players, about 5 of them were in the top 10 iirc.

They just have answers to everything. 100 point blocks of 50 that are stubborn ld10 for a few turns at least that you can SHOOT INTO. numerous multi wound magical shooting weapons, extremely potent magic... 8th edition skaven are the daemons of 7th edition...

Yeah skaven are rock solid. Hard nut to crack sometimes.

your Swordmasters should have charged the Ratogres. they would have carved them up like a Thanksgiving turkey(hitting on 3s with rerolls, and wounding on 3s)


have Spearmen or archers take care of the Clanrats.

try and make them take panic tests. killing a nearby unit will suffice(those ratogres)


and always try and keep your BSB nearby. Even elves can use rerolls on Ld

Another idea is to use a uberspell, dwellers pit mindrazor and pit are all quite common HE counters to pretty much everything.

Miasma plus PoS

Join the dark side...

Normally i'd say yes, but Skaven bake horrible cookies and have a rotten dental plan.

Grey Templar wrote:Normally i'd say yes, but Skaven bake horrible cookies and have a rotten dental plan.

Lisa needs dental plan

Tzeench bakes the best cookies, but his Health coverage is random. lots of fine print that changes quite often.

UberhAxTHC wrote:His black orcs, his BLACK ORCS, lost combat to the dumbass 40 clanrat regiment, ran, and was caught, all because of outnumbering and rank bonuses.

There is no longer any bonus for outnumbering in 8th. However, there is a bonus for charging.

I agree with the other posters. If your opponent starts taking really nasty stuff like tons of slaves or hellpits, then it is time to grab Teclis, and 20 Phoenix Guard. The latter are expensive dollar wise, but are one of the high elves best units.

UberhAxTHC wrote: His black orcs, his BLACK ORCS, lost combat to the dumbass 40 clanrat regiment, ran, and was caught, all because of outnumbering and rank bonuses.

There has to be something else going on here, because the story just doesn't add up. Let's look at the combat res:

High Elves
+2 for Ranks (You said you had 15 Swordmasters, presumably 3 ranks of 5 wide; You later say 20, which would mean this is +3)
+1 for Banner (You said you took a FC)
+2 for Wounds (We'll go with the lower number to be on the conservative side)
-----------------------
+5 Total


Skaven
+1 for Charging
+3 for Ranks
+1 for Banner
+0 for Wounds
-----------------------
+5 Total

Assuming you both have musicians in your blocks, then combat should have been a draw. If you inflicted 3 wounds instead of 2, you would have beaten him by 1. If you had 20 Swordmasters instead of 15 and only did 2 wounds, you still won by 1. If you had 20 Swordmasters AND inflicted 3 wounds, you should have won by 2.

You may want to comb over the Close Combat rules again, because I get the feeling you're missing a few rules out. Capping rank bonuses, making sure both sides get their rank bonus, standards... I don't know, something feels off. That's not to say that a strange combat won't happen now and again. I ran down a 20 ork boy unit w/ Shaman with my slaves, simply because he rolled poorly while I rolled very well (and killed off a shaman to boot!); it happens, but it really shouldn't be a very common thing to see.

Swordmasters have great weapons though...they don't get to reroll misses, do they? I thought having a great weapon meant striking last, but because of the Always Strikes First, it goes back to Initiative order...but they don't get the reroll on hits, do they? o.0

You need to cancel their rank bonus with something fast if you're suffering, charge 2 units at them. Cant remember if they lose steadfast when you do that but if so you shouldn't have a problem breaking them.

I find skaven a little frustrating. My friend uses them and has very high rerollable leadership because of items.

This is not what skaven are about. My horde of Bloodletters kill them every time though. However Daemons are even more OTT than skaven

Oh, and apparently, this Skaven player is a TFG, as I've just learned recently...he does all kinds of things wrong to ensure he wins games. For example, saying all his Skaven units move 6, when they're supposed to be 5. Add in the fact that he doesn't wheel, he simply measures the distance from the closest base to where he's going, and moves them that far, and apparently gives himself a free point of combat resolution since outnumbering doesn't give one anymore...Yeah, so I just started playing Fantasy, after playing 40k for like 2 years, with my friends, who just started his orcs...so I can't help it if I don't understand all the rules...but some people are just pricks...I hope all fantasy players don't exploit newbs like this...

obsidianaura wrote:

This is not what skaven are about. My horde of Bloodletters kill them every time though. However Daemons are even more OTT than skaven

As someone who plays both, skaven are way, way more OTT then daemons this edition. Our infantry cost a ton of points just to get blasted by the 13th spell over and over...

Also if he is a TFG start calling him out on his cheating. Its funny watching people like that rage.