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I'm getting skaven as my first army in fantasy, simply because of their mass numbers, and I think they look amazing. I'm going to get the island of blood and the battalion, but I don't really know what makes a Skaven army, what i should get, or what each of the troops are like. So what I wan't to know from you guys is

What Skaven should I get to make a powerful army. I'm already getting a battalion and the island of blood, but what do the models that come with them do to help you on the battlefield, as well as the ones that don't, but are recomended for whatever reason.

Please help! It would be much appreciated guys!

With those boxes, you´ll start great.
Just add some more wonder weapons and maybe weapon teams, and you´ll be fine.
Im sure the others will be able to explain you how they play (Im not good at explaining that xD)

You need at least 1 hellpit abomination. Those things are RUDE!

Rivet wrote:You need at least 1 hellpit abomination. Those things are RUDE!

true.
But thats a wonder weapon too, see!

I see what you did there. (Wonder Weapon?)

Rivet wrote:I see what you did there. (Wonder Weapon?)

Wonder weapons, yeah.
What do you think that is.
All the awsome machines and big beasties, duh!

thanks for the help guys, but a bit more detail as to what each of the skaven troops do maybe? Just so I can get an idea

Slaves: cheap, expendable, expected to die and used to bog down enemies
Clanrats: Better then slaves, main fighters, but not that great
Stormvermin, plaguemonks: Stronger then clanrats, heavy hitters
Night runners/gutter runners: elite units used to destroy small units and warmachines
giant rats, ratswarms: same as slaves, may be more killy
rat ogres: heavy hitters, perfect when flank charging. Deff killy too.
Plague censer bearers: awsome elite skirmish unit. Able to bog down heavy foes to.
Hell Pit Abonemination: heaviest thing in your army, quite random
Doomwheel: quite same as hellpit ab, but cheaper, shooty, and weaker (and even more random)
Warp Lightning Cannon/Plagueclaw Catapult: Excellent warmachines

Each of the troops? They die, they die in droves. However, they are so cheap, you do not care and they thin your opponents ranks. You are like Vietnamese during Vietnam. You may never win an actual combat, you will lose more troops than your opponent, but you will still win the war.

"The Oriental [Skaven] doesn't put the same high price on life as the Westerner. Life is plentiful, life is cheap in the Orient [Skaven Society], and as the philosophy of the Orient [Skaven] expresses it, life is not important."

- General William Westmoreland [Kurt Helborg], interviewed for the documentary Hearts and Minds, 1974

"You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win."
--Ho Chi Minh to the French [Queek Headtaker] , late 1940s

I'd just grab more isle of bloods for core troops. Skaven need all the rats they can get and IOB is a cheap source of em. It'll also help you get the number of a couple weapons teams up too.

Will 80 clan-rats be enough? They all will have weapon teams for digging


Automatically Appended Next Post:
4 squads of 20 by the way

OrkzCrazy wrote:Will 80 clan-rats be enough? They all will have weapon teams for digging


Automatically Appended Next Post:
4 squads of 20 by the way

At what point level? 1000 or even 1500? That should be enough. at 2500, I would think you will need/want more. My wife has 160 clanrats/slaves. (4 Island of Blood skaven sets)

well I donlt know how many points it will be, but i'll change it if I have to. Also, what's the right amount of rat ogres will I need? For a decent army?

OrkzCrazy wrote:Will 80 clan-rats be enough? They all will have weapon teams for digging


Automatically Appended Next Post:
4 squads of 20 by the way

Nowhere near enough. I wouldn't run skaven under 200 models at 2500 points.

Not to mention units of 20 are terrible. Your gonna want to do units of 40-50. And units of like 50 slaves for 100 points to just throw away at the enemy.

so 4 units of 50 will be enough then?

Most of what you need for regular rats can be had in IoB. Just paint them/assemble them to best match what you want to use them for.... for now, don't paint them, just play a few games and see what you like better.

I prefer Slaves and Stormvermin, but clanrats are good for pushing a bell.

Two sets of IoB and a Battalion gives you enough regular stuff.

What I'd add from there is:

2 Warp lightning cannons
1 Hellpit abomination
Screaming Bell

Then you'd have a ton of options for up to a 3k point battle, easy.

O.K. I might add some weapon teams so the squads of rats can get into close combat without getting shot. Does that sound good?

IoB comes with two weapon teams iirc. So if had two sets of that, you'd have 4, which is plenty for starters. And the two it has are the best two (warpfire thrower better in general, but wind mortar a bit more flexible and better against cav).

The Cannon are a lot more useful are providing some cover. I often use mine to take out opposing stone throwers.

Oh - and depending on your conversion skills with the battalion/iob rats, you'll definitely want some gutter runners at some point. They are great at taking out ranged guys in opposing backfields.

OrkzCrazy wrote:so 4 units of 50 will be enough then?

Do 5 units of 40.
And get hard hitters.

IoB comes with two weapon teams iirc. So if had two sets of that, you'd have 4, which is plenty for starters. And the two it has are the best two (warpfire thrower better in general, but wind mortar a bit more flexible and better against cav). With the weapon teams,I meant getting extra ones which dig

OrkzCrazy wrote:IoB comes with two weapon teams iirc. So if had two sets of that, you'd have 4, which is plenty for starters. And the two it has are the best two (warpfire thrower better in general, but wind mortar a bit more flexible and better against cav). With the weapon teams,I meant getting extra ones which dig

Which dig?

Warp Grinder?

Ah. Haven't found it to be that great, esp. compared to mortar and warpfire.

oh. Because I thought it would be good to get my rats into the battle without getting shot. I'll look at them in the Skaven book when I get it

In my experience, opposing shooting armies haven't been too much of a problem. You have way more bodies than them and pretty good shooting.

Here's what you need to fight opposing shooting:
1. Storm banner! A must have.
2. Gutter runners
3. Warp lightning cannons

I played against an empire gunline the other day in a tournament. He got first turn, so I popped storm banner and his shooting took down one of my cannons and a few stormvermin. On my turn, my rats moved up and my cannon killed one of his volley guns. On his turn he killed a unit of stormvermin. Then on my turn, 2 gutter runners came out and wlc took out most of 2 cannons.

Doomrocket then hit his big horde and killed about 20 and my rats were on him.

The great thing about the tools I listed is that they are great against non-shooting armies too. Say I was up against WoC. I still want cannons obv. Gutter runners are great for redirecting, etc. (Deploy as scout rather than infiltrate). And storm banner helps ground his discs.

Skaven are one of the few armies that really be solid at both h2h and shooting. The key is to take units that are flexible enough to reward you on both fronts.