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I'm looking at starting a Skaven army, already bought rulebook I have zero experience with Warhammer fantasy but from reading posts on here, looking at the models I like and watching batreps on youtube this is my first list;

Warlord 101pts
+ Halbard
+ Shield
+ Rat Hound Bodyguard

Warlock Engineer 115pts
+ Lvl 1 Wizard
+ Doomrocket
+ Warp-Energy Condenser

Chieftain 105pts
+BSB
+Armour of Fortune (Heavy Armour & 5+ Ward Save)

Clanrats(40 Rats) 192pts
+ Musician
+Standard Bearer
+Shield

Clanrats (40 Rats) 192pts
+ Musician
+Standard Bearer
+Shield

Rat Ogres (2 Ogres) 113pts
+Master Moulder

Warp Lightening Cannon 90pts

Warp Lightening Cannon 90pts

998pts

Any help would be greatly appreciated, plan is to go Beginners Club and get a feel for the fantasy system.

Hey man!

First-off, welcome to both WHFB and Skaven!

I'll give you a few pointers to nudge you in the right direction.

Generally, a Warlord isn't suggested. The only Lord that is really worth its weight in gold is the Grey Seer. Take a Chieftan with Battle-Standard Bearer, as Skaven NEED that reroll for Ld checks.

Your Warlock Engineer would serve you better like this: Doom Rocket + Warp Energy Condenser. Makes sure he's at least Level 1, too.

Your Clanrat blocks are a good size, but you want to make sure both of them have musicians and standard bearers. Don't expect them to really do much in combat, by the way.

Rat Ogres, while amazing in combat, are REALLY expensive so are generally not suggested.

WLC are fantastic and I can guarantee everyone will always suggest you bring them.

The best advice is to just play some games. You'll learn exactly why Skaven NEED to have steady Ld checks

Good luck!

Hello and welcome to the wondrous cheese (ha!) that is Skaven, and WHFB in general. No joke, this is one of the most entertaining game systems out there, I think you'll find loads of laughs and enjoyment in the future.

To start with, a little bit about Skaven to set the mood from what I'll advise on: if you approach each of your games expecting things to go according to plan and win, you will not enjoy Skaven in the long run. If you approach each game and DO expect things to go haywire, lose control, and you still end up winning, then Skaven will be enjoyable for you. Finally, accept the fact that you will be setting up many, many, many...MANY little rats. This is ok though, because you will also be losing many, many, many rats throughout your games. All that being said, on to your list!

It would appear you have the Island of Blood box set, Skaven side of course, and have decided to augment that with 40 additional rats and two warp lightning cannons. Those are both excellent choices, because quite frankly you will always need more rats for either slaves or clanrats, and there are plenty of games where you'll want to have two cannons.

For your core loadouts at this point, two decent sized blocks of clanrats work out just fine. I would not recommend spears on either of them, because you'll rarely find 5 extra attacks to be worth the increased price. Shields, however, I love taking. An extra armor save and a parry save will keep you in the fight for a good long while. Musician and standard bearer to round out each unit. If you want some extra cheap bodies, slaves are wonderful for just chucking rats at an enemy to stall them for a while and kill a couple in the process. No items required for the little expendables, just give them a musician and they're good to go.

If you plan on taking a warlord, keep him cheap. His greatest asset is his leadership 7, thus giving you (most often) leadership 10 on all your units with 3 ranks within range. Combine this with a chieftan BSB, and you'll find it's VERY rare for your rats to run. The chieftan you would need to make fairly survivable, so give him a decent armor save and at least a 5+ ward save. The warlord, something simple like heavy armor and a halberd will do the trick. You can easily go overboard with him, but at this point level that can turn into a costly mistake.

The warlock engineer is a very decent grab bag of options. As said previously, a warp energy condenser on a lvl 1 allows you to have warp lightning as your default spell, and makes it even more powerful. Slightly better chance to channel extra power dice too, which always a nice bonus. The doomrocket might as well be included in his wargear; I never hit the battlefield without one. Just remember to count your averages (every two dice you roll is most likely to give you a 7+) and you will rarely miss entirely.

Rat ogres have a lot going for them, but they are quite a point sink. You're looking at about 10% of your armies points in a 3 model, 7 wound unit. Not exactly ideal. If you're going to use them, then place them on your flank, and get them into combat fast, hitting your enemy in the flank if at all possible. They don't get an armor save, so 7 wounds inflicted and they're gone; believe me, it's not a hard thing to do.

All in all, the list will do pretty well as it sits. Make a couple alterations, and you should see some increases.

Thank you for your feedback guys I have made some changes to the list.

I removed the warfire team from the clan rats and the spears from both teams.

Added the BSB and Musician to the 2nd clanrats unit.

Changed the engineer to a lvl 1 instead of lvl 2 and took the Doomrocket and the war-energy condenser.

Added the Chieftain with a BSB and Armour of Fortune.

I had 13 points left so gave the Warlord, Shield, Halbard and a Bodyguard.

I'm happy with the changes and your right it is based of the island of blood kit with added bits, seemed like a good place to start with the army I wanted to do plus you get the smaller rulebook

 Aipoch wrote:
If you plan on taking a warlord, keep him cheap. His greatest asset is his leadership 7, thus giving you (most often) leadership 10 on all your units with 3 ranks within range.

A grey seer is also LD 7. And much more useful.

I am kind of new to skaven have a huge army but have played few games. I just want to echo a former post. Have a plan and excpect it to go haywire that is half the fun of playing skaven. When there weaopons work the are amazing when they go bad they are amazing in a fun but bad way:}

Solid list. As you go up in points, add weapon teams for the clan rats and add Grey Seer (swap out warlord if needed). Finally, add another beat stick to the army so you can actually kill things in combat (more rat ogres, abomination, or monks with plague furnace).

-Matt

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 Aipoch wrote:
If you plan on taking a warlord, keep him cheap. His greatest asset is his leadership 7, thus giving you (most often) leadership 10 on all your units with 3 ranks within range.

A grey seer is also LD 7. And much more useful.

And an additional 150 points. No arguing that a seer is useful, but in a list like he's describing, and at such a low point value, I think a grey seer is an incredibly risky proposition in a 1000 point game. His max for the slot would be 250 points, meaning he will be limited to a 10 point item for any extra gear. It would be a very large "Go big or go home" proposition.

As I scale up to 2500points, I'm looking to include the following in my list;

Grey Seer with screaming bell
Hellpit Abomination
Doomwheel

Which is most effective to add first as I go up in army size?

Grey Seer. No Bell. You want him ASAP. The moment you can get a Seer with a 4+ ward, and a scroll. Do so. Magic is one of your best tools to deal with deathstars

Going to agree with Aipoch. At 1,000 points, a Grey Seer is simply not really a safe choice. He'll have no saves beyond LoS! and anything that can target him, will. Because once he's gone (assuming he doesn't miscast himself to death) your army is done.

A Warlord, otoh, is much cheaper, has options, and at 1,000 point is actually a REALLY kill general. Keep him cheap though, because Skaven don't really run super-characters like other armies can.

For heroes, the BSB is a must! Keep him cheap, but also give him the best protection you can. He's almost more important than the general, honestly, for his reroll abilities. A Warlock Engineer with the doom rocket will rarely be a failure. Even if he does die without doing anything, you're out 45 points. You can go whole-hog and make him a caster with the Warp Energy Condensor (I recommend doing so) and he'll be a warp lightning machine. Just make sure to fire the doom rocket before he kills himself. (You might notice a running theme here...)

For Core, you could use some of your clan rats as skavenslaves if you wanted, but I generally run with clan rats at 1,000 points. They stick around longer than slaves and make a better bunker for your characters (warlord, bsb, etc) to hide in.

For special, Rat Ogres aren't a horrible choice, although as pointed out they're relatively fragile. T4 and no armor save means they won't stick around forever, but they should do some damage before they go. Keep them on a flank when possible, to reduce the number of attacks coming back at them.

Rare choices: WLC is your go to. With 2 in 1,000 points you might get some dirty looks, but WLCs are where the bulk of your killing power lies. You'll learn to aim and place the template real quick.


Couple other thoughts:

1. Poisoned Wind Globadiers. Ordinarily, these guys aren't all that great. However, at low point game they have several distinct advantages that tend to disappear as units get bigger:

A. They can shoot (well, throw) into any combat. So your Clan Rats can lock into combat with something, and then your PWGs come up along side and throw some "No armor saves, always wound on 4+" balls of death into the combat. Sure, you might kill a few of your own clan rats, but you'll kill some of the enemy too, and that Clawleader had to go anyway! Doubly awesome for those 2+ rerollable enemies like Dwarves or Brettonians.

B. Fast skirmishers. They can get into a flank or rear of an enemy unit for a multi-charge faster than some other units, mostly because of their ability to change facing almost at will. Granted, they don't get rank bonuses, so they won't disrupt, but you'll still get the flank/rear charge bonus.

C. They can take a Poisoned Wind Mortar. Normally Weapons teams aren't all that great, but the PWM is probably the best of the bunch. Move and Fire means it just edges out the Warpfire Thrower, which is kinda awesome as it is. Still, when you run out of core options, your first unit of PWGs can take a PWM weapon team.


2. Giant Rats. Now they don't count as core, so you have to fill up on Clan Rats or Skavenslaves first, but if you find yourself with a few spare points consider a "Rat Dart". A Rat Dart is a minimal sized unit of giant rats, usually 6 rats and 1 pack master. Weighs in at 26 points. Gets 7 attacks and has M6 for getting around to those pesky warmachines in the back of your enemy's lines. Also makes a great filler drop; a unit you place wherever just to make your opponent place his better stuff so you can reactively place. They'll usually do some damage before they die and if they don't, you're only out 26 whole points.

3. Doomwheel. This is rare choice, so he'd take the place of one of your WLCs. It's a fun, kinda wacky unit that usually won't see much use in higher point games where the Hellpit Abomination sees use. Still, at lower points his lightning shots can cover what the WLC would be doing, and you get the advantage of an impact hitting, wheel grinding, terror causing unit that people can't Flee! or Stand and Shoot! When it closes. Not bad at 1,000 or 1,500 point games, but anything higher and you'll probably see the HPA instead.


Good luck!

I dunno why anybody would be a fan of poisoned wind globadiers gameplay-wise. They don't cost a whole lot and could be cool as far as points go but each model is significantly expensive and they seriously need a plastic kit so they could be fielded in more numbers if at all possible. Not to mention yeah you can probably bring down a few guys but unless you're facing knights or monsters you have to be in butt-f*cking range of the enemy just to shoot (considering they are a fast unit they will probably out-manuevre you unless you have something posing a threat to knights everywhere. Not to mention if hitting wasn't hard enough even if you do stay out of melee with them and can somehow shoot at an enemy that's tied up with your fodder units you only hit the enemy unit half the time and wound half of that. Pray to god they don't have regeneration or a ward save or it'll be even harder.

So yeah in theory i'm not a fan of poisoned wind globadiers as they don't do enough in my opinion. They might not be so bad but their utility seems limited in some cases. I'd rather just tie my enemy up with large slave blocks and then fire my weapons teams and WLC's into them considering slaves can be fired into. Considering the numbers of slaves, their points and the fact some of these weapons teams will easily wound most tougher units anyway (so toughness 3 dudes with no armor is no big loss) i'd think it's a good thing to have.

Also i may not like poisoned wind globadiers but poisoned wind mortars sound really nice as knight killers even if they don't always hit. I think there's been a couple times i've hit and killed a chunk of knights with them. I just remember at least once where i killed like 5 saurus cavalry with one shot (supposedly like 35 pts or so per cavalry model). If nothing else that definitely softened a cavalry charge and allowed for less pain inflicted on my end (and more damage done to him).

Cheers guys for all your advice, I've just bought the Island of Blood set to start building this army.

Couple of more paydays and I'll get the additional units that I'll need to make it up to 1000pts.

Using what you guys have said I've started looking at scaling it up to 2000pts as soon as I hit 1000. I have a list ready if anyone interested in looking at it for me?

Here's my 2000 points army, mixture between what I would like to field and the advice from Laboeuf, Aipoch and streamdragon.

Grey Seer (465pts)
+Screaming Bell
+Dispel Scroll

Chieftain (122pts)
+ BSB
+ Magic BSB, Wailering Banner

40 Clanrats (247pts)
+ Shields
+ Musician
+ Standard Bearer
+ Doom Flayer

40 Clanrats (192pts)
+ Shields
+ Musician
+ Standard Bearer

40 Clanrats (192pts)
+ Shields
+ Musician
+ Standard Bearer

20 Stormvermin (175pts)
+ Shields
+ Musician
+ Standard Bearer

Rat Ogres (133pts)
+ 2 Ogres
+ 1 Master Moulder

Warp Lightening Cannon (90pts)

Hell Pit Abomination (250pts)
+ Warpstone Spikes

Doomwheel (150pts)

1996 Total Points

Any thoughts?

I want to like the doom flayer but i don't. In fact pretty much every skaven player realizes it's a total piece of sh*t. It's easily the worst weapon team and it always dies to everything. I've been thinking about using 2 of them to flank the same enemy unit with but this doesn't tend to work either. You have to understand it's a one wound unit that only has a +3 save in the front. Sure some think it has a potential to run down a unit but if you can't negate steadfast that won't matter. It also by being a weapon team has only initiative 3 meaning that it'll be striking simultaneously or slower than most armies. In fact almost every army except undead could easily take a hit from doom flayers if they are slower in initiative. The unit needs to have modifiers for the enemy 'to hit' and possibly the doom flayer needs to cause fear as a whirling ball of blades coming at you generally has that effect and doomwheels and hellpits cause terror.

I think your core units are way too small for skaven. In this game where steadfast is such a big deal you'll want more ranks with your core so you can be steadfast. Usually the weaker and cheaper a unit in points per model the larger you make it.

In this case with core units you should probably have 80 model clanrat units. That's what i think. This is esp. considering you only have one weapon team anyway though most weapons teams end up being finnicky.

The stormvermin units should probably be at least 40 models and maybe a little more. In an army list with little shooting on your side you probably want to throw the 'storm banner' into this unit. For 50 pts it's a fantastic banner.

I like the 2k list. I would advise on dropping the bell though. You don't have the right format for it. Plus, the small bunker of stormvermin is perfect for your seer.

Please drop the magic banner from your BSB and make him survivable. I like the 3+ armour save on him.

All your clanrats and your stormvermin need mortars or warpfire throwers. As mentioned, your stormvermin need the storm banner.