Demoralized WFB Player

[Erik Setzer]

I would like some "community advice" on how to deal with an issue that threatens to lead me to burnout with Warhammer before 9th edition even comes out.

Lately the armies on the table have had a big shift. It's happened in 40K and WFB, but it seems worse with WFB, probably because of army structure. Armies are getting designed to be more "beatstick." And the games are facilitating this big time.

I find myself unable to deal with those kind of armies. A couple army styles that have been the worst to deal with are Chaos Warriors with everything having Mark of Nurgle (for the -1 to hit), and combined Elf armies. (One player has an Elf army with a big block of Phoenix Guard escorting a Cauldron of Blood, with a Mage packed in the unit to try to boost their save to 3+, and with the Core Units being Wood Elf archers with magic arrows, plus a few assorted odds and ends.)

Saturday was the latest match in dealing with one of these style armies. It was 2500 points, Chaos Warriors versus Skaven.

His force was (IIRC):

2 Chimeras
2 Chariots, MoN
3 Bloodcrushers
~25-30 Warriors, MoN
Two Chaos Sorcerors, Chaos Lord on Palanquin with all kinds of boosts
All the characters were in the unit, which was five-wide, so with the 2x2 Palanquin and a command, it meant the Sorcerors were in the second rank, and weren't in immediate danger, but could cast spells outward.

My army was (trying to use some of the new ET stuff):

Verminlord Warpseer
Grey Seer
40 Clanrats with spear and shield, mortar
25 Stormvermin with shield, flamethrower (all I have right now)
6 Rat Ogres with 2 Packmasters
3 Stormfiends with ratling guns
3 Stormfiends with shock fists (no armor save)
Warp Lightning Cannon
3 Rat Swarms

Now, granted, some of my dice rolls weren't great, but it was just morale-shattering when I'd do something like, say, fire 37 shots at the Bloodcrushers to see only two wounds get through their armor. The Chariots just crushed the Stormfiends with impact hits, and I couldn't hit back well because of Mark of Nurgle, and he threw in a Chimera with each Chariot hitting the Stormfiends. Sniped my Grey Seer with a spell. Easily crushed my infantry because even my "elite" Core Units are a joke next to Chaos Warriors, much less Bloodcrushers.

I think I killed one Bloodcrusher, wounded both chariots and one of the Chimeras, and killed maybe five Warriors. He did more kills when one Wizard miscast and blew up. My entire army was wiped out in three turns. Three turns. That's it. Just hammering everything I have out there, to no effect, while everything hitting back just blew through my army.

That's what a lot of WFB games are turning into. I think a large part of the problem is the disparity in Core Units, where some armies have amazing Core Units but others are weak and feel like 25% being spent on filler units that might slow down a unit for a turn or two before being wiped out, leaving you just 75% to spend on stuff that could be effective. You need ridiculous counters for some of this stuff, like major top-of-their-lore spells to get past the 3+ ward save that Phoenix Guard end up with. Death star units just mow through stuff even worse than Thunderwolf Cavalry.

I actually like the individuals who play these armies, but I can't keep playing these games like that, and I think they'll get offended if I ask them to stop bringing the pain all the time (plus there's always excuses). I don't like building that kind of army, and anything else I send against them just gets ground up in a one-sided match that feels awful to play through. So what can I do, other than just resigning myself to only playing one or two people, or just giving up on WFB like some other people have?

[Khastarax]

Are wizards allowed to cast from 2nd rank? Not so at home in 8th rules, but that would be ridiculous imho.

But yeah, power creep, trying to keep making the hardest armys is something of all times. For me, in a game that s to big to really balance, it comes down to the player(s). The game should bring fun for two, you know that with certain army's it will be fun for one. Losing to a better player is fine, bad dice day? fine as well, but playing against these power armys is not something I do for fun... These army's belong in a tournament/ tournament meta imho. I would rather not play an army like that, but rather spend my precious hobby time playing someone more like-minded as myself..., where all the participants can have fun.

Playing these powerhouses is perfectly ok as long as you expect it and agree to play with army's like that. Don't see what's wrong in having an understanding in gaming society so that two metas can coexist by checking before the battle what the intentions are and to which camp each player belongs to, if it doesn't match, then no biggy and find each a different opponent. Tabling people in turn 3 is can only be fun for a winning player too...

[vonDietdrich]

This is pretty much what 40k and Fantasy have become since they opened the floodgates to list-building 'whatever you want', unfortunately. It hit 40k first, so I kept playing Fantasy a bit, but as the End Times winds down it's thoroughly changed Fantasy as well. Having to say 'hey, can you not do that, it's ridiculous' is getting less acceptable since it's clearly written in the core rules that players can now build armies how 'you want to', without being restricted by things like politeness or sanity.

Skaven, Empire, O&G and other armies that traditionally rely on weight of infantry are really lambasted by the sudden focus on a few big models, because they've never played that way. Other factions (Chaos, Elves, Undead) already focused on this playstyle, and the changes have really favored them because they get to pick the best of all possible options for their faction in each category. Combinations that would be manageable by themselves are suddenly ridiculous because the writers never really envisioned them all being thrown together (or if they did, they're irresponsible).

As far as your list goes, it seems like your Skaven are tailored to killing large numbers of weak infantry. Your list is /really/ small for a Skaven army, although I don't blame you. I wouldn't want to assemble or cart around hundreds of dudes either. That does put a limitation on the more traditional super-swarm Skaven tactics, though. You're not going to match the 'small, elite' armies model for model, so you want to outnumber them 3:1 or better if at all possible.

You've got a huge amount of options when dealing with a horde of enemies, but the game is getting away from big blocks of infantry and more towards smaller groups of superelite models. You don't have any unit-crackers, or dedicated flankers. In that regard, you don't have either component of a successful elite-killing list... the hammer or the anvil (at least not for a 2500 point game). The other big problem with the new list-building is that it's turned large games totally on their heads. Whereas you used to be able to scale a core force from 1000 points all the way up to 2000+ by just adding support units and upgrading characters, you now pretty much have to sit down with 2500 points fresh and design a list totally from the ground up.

Skaven are also pretty screwed because they didn't get a merger with any other factions.. which is unfortunate.

So what to do? Double or triple your list's model count, drop some of the expensive dudes for more infantry. The key here is 'weight of wounds', he took 3 turns to blow through your 80 models. If you've got 250 models, as obnoxious as that is, he's not going to kill them all in the space of a game. You don't really need the gatling Stormfiends, though the powerfists are cool for flanking into models with good saves. Unfortunately you're probably going to have to buy a whole new army's worth of models (assuming that your listed army is the majority of your collection). The second step is putting together some serious firepower from the options available to you. I'm not familiar with Skaven, but combing through their artifact selection for really good items and loading up a few characters as 'hero killers' is probably a good idea.

Finally, your list has a bit of everything, which is fine when not faced with super-concentrated 'powergaming' combos, but it doesn't work against the stuff you've mentioned. The name of the game is redundancy: not only do you need a swarm of screaming meat shields to field charges and tie up blocks that covers up the board, you need several large units of beaters to whap your opponents on the flanks until they die. For Rat Ogres, at least 9, preferably 12 or more. If you could swing 24, that'd be fantastic (I'm not familiar with the points per model but that sounds do-able). The basic plan would be to run your bricks of expendable clanrats into the dude, tie him down indefinitely in melee, then attack his flanks and rear while he's busy with smaller and more maneuverable flankers.

I quit, when faced with that situation, though. Not about to drop money for a brand new core book and an entire army to go with it because an edition change is totally altering how lists are built. I got ET: Nagash hardcover on the sheer novelty of WFB plot advancement and being a Vampire Counts player, but as I've seen the ET play out I've gotten steadily less excited and more irritated with it.

Maybe if the rules come full circle in an edition or two I'll start playing again. We'll see.

[Erik Setzer]

Some notes on my Skaven list:

First point, a good chunk of my Skaven were in a plastic case I'd left in a vehicle with my brother, who hasn't yet responded to my text message to him pointing that out so he could hopefully come by and drop them off. That limited what I could do.

I knew the army I'd be facing, so I was trying to go for stuff that could hurt it. The Verminlord isn't shabby in combat and I could throw the 13th spell at him and snuff out a bunch of those Warriors if I got a solid roll. At worst, I could throw Warp Lightning. The Grey Seer would use Plague spells to buff my units to make it easier to wound his guys, or throw plague spells at the enemy, as they often ignore armor. The Ratling Gun Stormfiends should have done a solid job against just about anything with all those shots at a good strength and -3 to armor, but my opponent rolled ridiculously well. In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have wasted them shooting at the Bloodcrushers but rather just rained death on the Warriors, who wouldn't have much save left. The ones with shockfists are S6 with no armor save allowed in combat, so they should have also done a solid job against the Warriors... instead they got hit by a Chariot that did an insane number of impact hits. The Rat Ogres were meant to hit the Bloodcrushers with the Stormvermin, in theory could have been enough to do some damage. The Warpfire Thrower team would have hit a Chimera to remove its regen save for a phase, but blew up right off the bat, taking nine Stormvermin with it. The mortar was also meant to be useful for hitting heavily armored infantry, as it ignores armor. Warp Lightning Cannon also ignores armor. Basically, I had a lot of stuff that ignored armor, or seriously downgraded it... and then I had Core Units that, regardless of number, were just sacrificial rats in the face of Chaos Warriors, especially with the Mark of Nurgle making me hit on 5's at best while they were hitting on 3's. Having to hit on 5's, wound on 5's, then see a 3+ armor save... It's ridiculous. You lose combat, break, get overrun. Rinse and repeat.

Rat Ogres are 40 points each, so 24 is 960 points... not to mention monetary cost. Stormfiends are better at dealing out actual damage, so I needed some of those. In retrospect, I might have taken the mortars (small blast, no armor saves, wound on 4+) instead of the Ratling Guns. The point there was to try to take stuff that could actually get through their Toughness and armor. Heck, I dropped over $400 on upgrades for my Skaven army to be better capable of dealing with Chaos Warriors, but it seems like that's still not really happening. And the concept of tying them up with massive units just doesn't work when they can slaughter a LOT of rats before you even get to strike, and, as noted above, you're hitting on 5's at best, wound on 5's, they get 3+ or 4+ armor. Reality is you'll lose combat, and probably not have enough ranks left to get the best combat res.

[Kaptain Badrukk]

Morning Eric,
Thought I'd throw my hat in the ring.
I've been playing a lot of End Times with Skaven lately (just expanding to 4K atm actually) and I hate to see a fellow rat-man suffer!
1: Model Count.
VonDeitrich has already mentioned this but I'll talk about it anyway. Thematically Skaven are all about numbers, and my experience over the last decade or so of WFB (and to an extent 40k) has been that when you play an army "to type" it functions pretty well. Thusly I take a minimum of 2 units (normally hordes) of 50 Clan Rats and at least 1 Horde of Storm Vermin (also normally 50) at 2000pts.
2: Tar-Pits
Skaven are ALL ABOUT disposable minions. Fat Blocks of slaves (nice and deep, save 5 wide ten-15 deep) can tie up a death-star for multiple turns, allowing you to get into the flanks, or just shoot the tar outta it (since who cares about slaves).
3: Fire Support.
Skaven aren't much chops in combat. It's mostly about tying up the enemy and winning on static combat res. Hordes of Stormvermin led by Lords, plague monk hordes, and Rat-ogres with Skweel Gnawtooth aside.
Nurgle doesn't help much against shooting. A 4/3+ Ward save is scary, but less so than a 5+ save followed by a 4/3+ save.
And as good as a death-star is, it'll still lose the game with no support.
So take some guns! 1x Warp Lightening cannon good, 3x Warp Lightening cannon GREAT! Plus the look of sheer terror on an opponents face when you put three down is priceless. A couple of high strength, d6 wound, no armour save blasts will be GOOD! Also don't discount the plague claw or the humble plague wind mortar. Both are capable of messing up a unit.
4: Weapon Teams
The warpfire thrower is a beast. Decent strength, great armour pen, and stand and shoot. I use mine as charge re-directors, or as speed bumps for charging cavalry, whittling down a powerhouse with a sheet of warp-flame before they hit me.
5: Force multiplication.
Grey seers, and verminlords are all well and good. They certainly pack magical punch. But where the Skaven excel is cheap characters. 50pt lvl 1 wizards, cheap LD buffs from heros and Lords that cost peanuts tooled up (comparatively). A BSB is a must. But also consider things like a cheap hero with Crown of Command and Ironcurse who avoids challenges and makes a nice big block of infantry stubborn.
6. Core Detachments
Ok, so we didn't get mixed-lists, but we did get two of these. The Queek one's pretty good, but if you want to use End Times stuff I recommend Thaquol's Uprising. The 6" Unbreakable bubble from Thanquol plus the whole thing filling your core is pretty neat, and being able to cast a D6+14 Warp Lightening blast is AMAZING!
In Conclusion
While a lot of this may seem a touch unhelpful, especially if you're looking for ways to win with the models in your collection, but it's what I've got.
The truth of the matter is that the current edition does make writing powerful lists moderately easier than last time, but it's not that much easier. The real issue is that it tempts us to invest too many points in big-cost characters. Too many points invested in characters at 2k can really hurt any player, especially Skaven. But as an aging player it's ALWAYS been easy to do ridiculous things with an army list. However in WFB if you know your list well, and play it to design, the list writing stage of the game need not be the winning point. That said, make sub-optimal choices for competitive play and tournaments and you're going to suffer.

[Chronowraith]

I'm going to sound like a broken record but the Skaven list needs Slaves. Take a big block of slaves, use them to block enemy units and then fire into combat against the slaves with whatever you have (Warpfire Throwers, Plague Mortars, and Warp Lightning Cannons work best). Clanrats aren't much better than slaves. Use them to go after weak units where they might win through static combat resolution or to tie up middling units where slaves would melt away too quickly to be useful.

If no one quoted the "rule" for skaven, your goal should be roughly 1 model per 10 points. So in a 2500 point list you are aiming for 250 models. Now, this isn't hard and fast but I've rarely seen a successful Skaven army that drops below 1 model for every 20 points. Your list is 1 per 30 points. Even if you break down into wounds you are around 1:20.

Don't take rat swarms. Take minimum units of giant rats and rank them up 2x3. They make far better redirect units and march/charge blockers since they cost a whopping 24 points. I had them tie up a landship for 2 turns once.

Keep in mind true line of sight. If he has palanquins up front and sorcerors in the back, it might be hard for him to draw LoS. Chances are he can target his own unit or the palanquin characters but not much else. Admittedly several classes of spells don't require strict LoS but there is a reason people don't typically do this and the restrictions it places on casting are certainly in the mix.

I disagree that you need Storm Vermin. They are a flavor unit. use them if you like them. Storm Vermin won't hold up in combat as well as other elite or hard infantry choices. Keep in mind a storm vermin costs about as much as an Empire Swordsman and they are just as squishy. Against a big block of Chaos Warriors they will die. Not as quickly as slaves or clanrats but they will and unlike slaves you can't fire into a combat with stormvermin.

I mentioned it above and others mentioned it as well but Warpfire Throwers are your friend. Everyone sees "move or fire" in the description and they glaze over with the, "these aren't the droids your looking for" face but the point of these units is to lock a unit in combat with slaves and then pummel the unit with warpfire from the flanks. Just remember to protect them as weapon teams are not durable or reliable in the leadership department.

Your list seems to have too many flashy units. I haven't played with Storm Fiends yet but I can't imagine that you really need 6 of them AND 6 Rat Ogres. Either go with the 6 Rat Ogres or go with a few Storm Fiends. Or, don't take the Verminlord and take a Warlord instead with a couple engineers and beef up your ranked units. Just think, those 13 models comprise almost half your points. Again, the idea with Skaven is an attrition army. You trade your lower point value unit to tie up/destroy a higher point value unit.

[Erik Setzer]

It's worth repeating that a good chunk of my Skaven wasn't with me.

Also, the "disposable units" thing doesn't particularly work so well. It relies on still having more models than the other side (or at least ranks) and then making a Ld test, and if you fail the test, all those models run. It's atrociously boring to see units get thrown at the enemy knowing they have zero chance to do any harm to the other side's CORE Units. "Hold them up" isn't a good strategy.

I got the Stormfiends because they seem like they should be good against elite troops. For them to fail hardcore is not fun. If the opposing list wasn't gimmicked up, I think they could do fine.

To deploy more WLCs, I'd need to buy more. Ditto for any Plague Furnaces. And Slaves, because I might have some somewhere, but I don't recall, because "tar pitting" is just admitting you can't deal with a unit and praying it gets that unit bogged down. The idea of just holding a unit so you can fire at it? That's... depressing. And goes back to the core point of it being so lacking in fun that I might as well not play. But a lot of these ideas are along the lines of "buy even more models than you already have." And I just dropped over $400 adding a Verminlord, 9 Stormfiends, Thanquol, a Hellpit Abomination, and 20 Clanrats (to add to 20 from the core game box for a unit of 40). If I'm going to throw out hundreds more dollars, I can also get a tiny army of Warriors to just chew through other armies. Or just boost my Elves some. If you throw 40 models at a unit and you can't realistically expect it to do anything more than act as a speedbump possibly, that's a problem. (Oh, and given that all it took to break that unit, that had better Ld and fighting ability than Slaves, was a couple Chimeras and a Chariot, I'm not sure buying, assembling, and painting 100 Slaves is going to help much. That $150 or so and all that time would go better toward a bar tab.)

I can throw Clanrats into mixed units of different colors and call them Slaves and then just let my opponent destroy models so I can put them back up as fast as I got them out while I shoot into combat and hope I do some damage. Or I can just do something more interesting, like... go home and play a game on my Xbox.

At this point, my only hope is that 9th edition once again gets away from percentages. I have a similar problem with Undead, where all the Skeletons, Zombies, and even Ghouls that I have just hit Warriors or Elves and end up being mauled much faster than you'd think. Seeing 50 Skeletons evaporate in a couple of turns, at best, isn't fun, especially as that's still a nice chunk of the army doing nothing more than trying to be a speedbump and wasting points you could put toward effective units. And if I bother to play my Empire, at this point I'm resigned to just throwing all my Knights on the table, along with some extra stuff I'll need to buy. I've left my Orcs at the side because I've seen Chaos Warriors chew up 50 Savage Orcs like they're nothing. (I did, however, grab some Ogres, so I can mix those with the Orcs once Grimgor's army comes along, in the hopes that'll give me more options. I figure a core of Ogres with great weapons, backed by some Ogre tricks and Orc Boarboyz, artillery, Chariots, maybe Black Orcs, stuff like that, at least I'll feel like the Core Units are doing something.)

[Chronowraith]

Well, that's how Skaven operate. You can go and check the Underempire forum and they will tell you the same thing.

Skaven CAN'T deal with most other armies core units in a core versus core fashion. When you are pitting 4pt clanrats against Chaos Warriors the Chaos Warriors will always win unless you use the Skaven mantra - sneaky tricks. Tarpitting is completely in fitting with the Skaven background. The leaders send countless numbers in to die and while the foe is distracted, something goes BOOM!

Don't forget Steadfast and Skaven rely on keeping the army tightly clustered so everyone benefits from teh generals leadership. That's the only reason Screaming Bells are as common as they are. Having Slaves in 10 ranks with a base leadership of 7 (from the general) is amazing. They keep leadership 10 for 2-3 rounds of combat easily... plenty of time to sneak in with a flank charge or use your sneaky tricks to actually do some damage. Can you fail leadership? Yup. It happens. Just like people roll snake eyes on charges or irresistible force when using 2 magic dice. Luck happens. You can't plan for it, only make decisions that try and minimize the luck factor.

Wasting points? A unit of 50 slaves is 100 points. Let that sink in. A unit of 30 chaos warriors is considerably more (roughly 450 if memory serves). You could lose 200 slaves to those Chaos Warriors and they still won't have killed an equal amount of points. Skaven will not win by brute force. Period. They just aren't that type of army. If you want brute force that is what Orcs, Ogres, and Chaos are for.

As for money... clanrats/slaves from Isle of Blood are dirt cheap on eBay. I've seen them as low as 10 dollars for 20.

[Path Walker]

Your opponent was playing to the strengths of his army, you ignored the strengths of yours, skateboard have access to cheap huge units that's can hold up pretty much anything in the game for several turns, it's not ideal for how you want to play, but that's the game as it is right now and has been for the last few editions, people take huge units, 40 isn't a big unit for clan rats.

For 2500 you've got far too many toys and not enough core, skaven rely on core to hold the enemy in place to bring the sneaky stuff to bear. I'll repeat what every other poster has said: More rats.

[Houghten]

skateboard

Damn you, autocorrect!

https://33.media.tumblr.com/2f83b74470505d538d8dc3e7162bb51c/tumblr_nd8yw7JTLW1qjnvkbo1_500.gif

[Path Walker]

Damnit.

[Mr Mystery]

Yep.

Plenty of Hammer, shame about the Anvil.

Tarpit is such a loose term I feel, as it depends upon the strengths of the army as to what your tarpit is meant to do.

Undead? Attrition. Get them bogged down good and proper, stripping them of any impetus, then throw in a couple of judicious spells to boost up your otherwise lacklustre troops, and send the enemy packing.

Skaven? Clanrats and Slaves are an Anvil. Tarpit the enemy to hold him in place, and then wallop his flanks with your big hitters. In enough numbers, Clanrats and Slaves will bring the ranks needed to break steadfast, whilst the filth in your army goes to town with the proper kicking.

Example? Skaven Slaves teamed with Censer Bearers. Slaves kill two thirds of fifty percent of nowt, but are stupendously cheap troops. Have a character in there for good measure, and their Ld goes right up. This is your anvil. Censer Bearers are quite the opposite of the Slaves. Expensive, little staying power on their own, but mess stuff right up in combat. Combine the two units and there is precious little that can stand up to them.

Skaven need their Anvil units. It doesn't matter that Clanrats and Slaves die in absolute droves - that's what they're there for. You just need a big enough unit to look at least slightly dangerous, and reliably hold it's ground for a round, maybe two in combat, until you can pile in the filth elsewhere in your army.

As my first comment, right now you've got a lot of hammer, not enough anvil.

[Erik Setzer]

Well, I'm definitely not buying more models (and no way I can paint 100 more models), so my only bet would be to throw a bunch of models with different styles and paint jobs into one unit and just offer it up as a sacrificial lamb... assuming I can deploy the rest of my army in such a way that my opponent *must* go after the big block (which I'd rather just deploy a base and some dice so I don't spend the game removing models I put effort into painting and deploying, which will only depress me further). It's not just over-the-top beatstick lists, most of the time they actually know what can actually help them. Oh, and they also know that you can remove rank bonus if you can get a side charge as well, so that tarpit just disappears.

It's particularly rough as it was only two editions ago *at most* that units of 30 Clanrats were viable. That's why the army is what it is, I took on my dad's Skaven army (granted, I assembled and painted it for him, so had an attachment to it), and it was perfectly viable to use units of 30 Clanrats, or 25 Stormvermin or Plague Monks, and that was no further back than 6th edition at worst. Their support was actually useful, the side guns were nice but now they just blow up like crazy. Which might just be my incredibly poor luck whenever I play Skaven.

I don't expect to win fights 1-on-1. I'd just like to cause some wounds before I remove my huge block. Seems they can't even do that. And just throwing more money at units that are only expected to pray they can absorb a hit long enough for useful stuff to come in... yeah, I'm sorry, that's a horribly game, especially with the cost of the models. It might sound "fluffy" but, then, with the fluff, those guys should be the initial wave that dies before the real fighting begins. By the time the Skaven really got into serious combat with Belegar's defending forces, it was elite Stormvermin, Hell Pit Abominations, Rat Ogres, Jezzails, Stormfiends, etc. that were actually fighting, the Slaves and even Clanrats pretty much died soaking up bullets and just exhausting the enemy.

And all of this is to say nothing about things like seeing sniping spells used to take out the general so there's no Ld10 (Ld-based spells are disgustingly brutal to Skaven), or spells that hit a hole unit with, say, a Toughness test, or a template, so a large number of models get wiped out and you have to hope they pass the Panic test. And those things are surprisingly commonplace in the current game.

I guess it's good I got the Ogres to go with my Orcs. I know they can't quite compete with some of the stuff I'm seeing, but I can at least do some damage with every army. And there's not many to build and paint, and it'll take some work to remove each one, so I won't feel like I'm throwing money and time into a delaying action.

[Mr Mystery]

Two editions ago Skaven wonder weapons were exceptionally beardy.

As for sniping spells? Welcome to Warhammer. Everyone has to deal with those.

None of the stuff you are listing is actual cause for complaint. They've been in the game since it started. Not fond of them? Warhammer is not the game for you.

[Path Walker]

If your complaints are with the way Skaven work, as yours are, then they're not really valid, sadly for many, units of 30 just aren't viable for cheap troops any more, no army that works on numbers, Scaven, Goblins etc, can get away with small units, the only way around it is to adapt or impose house rules/limits with the people you play with, or drop the points value to 1200.

[Morgrim]

The overall gist seems to be that skaven are currently not the playstyle for you. It happens. Try your orcs and ogres for a bit and see if you have more fun?

[Mr Mystery]

To go into what Pathwalker said, he does have a point.

Prior to the current edition, cheap infantry didn't do much in the game. They'd just get slaughtered one way or another.

But, Fight In Ranks and Steadfast have dramatically changed the impact even the weediest infantryman can have on the battle. Before, Clanrats were essentially little more than a Weapons Team tax. They were that pointless in combat. But now? Now they can pretty much carry the battle for you if you can get that red hot Anvil action down.

Slaves are perhaps preferable for what you have in your army, as you can get them to pin someone down in a protracted combat, and chuck in loads of dakka whilst your at it.

And yes, it can be difficult to make sure you tarpit a worthy unit. But then this is a game of manouvres, and nobody said it would be a doddle!

[Erik Setzer]

I don't feel like "tarpitting" is a unit actually doing something other than getting slaughtered and hoping it takes long enough for them to get slaughtered/break that you can get effective units into combat... which still means the basic problem exists that one army's Core Units act as nothing more than a speedbump (at best) for another army's Core Units, which is a serious balance issue, because you have to throw points *and* money at that speedbump.

And I've seen the "tarpit" used against these Chaos lists. It fairs about as well. It just collapses and crumbles. I've seen a guy who is darned good with Skaven go against some of these Elf and Chaos lists and just not be able to come out on top, and this is a guy who's also been around for a while and actually played in the more competitive tournaments (like the soul-sucking 'Ard Boyz).

It seems my best choice is to join them... I could easily do that with Elves, just grab a Cauldron and maybe another box of Phoenix Guard, possibly a phoenix, that'd go with what I have to present a nasty combo list. Or get some Chaos Warriors, add them to my Daemons, and go that route.

Second-best is probably finishing the Ogres. Once I convert some characters to save a couple hundred dollars and finish assembling units, I should have about 3000 points worth, before magic items. Here's what I've got for them:

6 Ogre Bulls
12 Ogre Ironguts (if you're I2 anyway, why not go with great weapons?)
4 Mournfang Cavalry with great weapons (see above)
8 Leadbelchers
1 Stonehorn (with Hunter, but can be used either way)
1 Ironblaster
1 Tyrant
1 Bruiser BSB
1 Slaughtermaster/Butcher
1 Firebelly
1 Hunter on foot
1 TBD Character
1 Giant

The Giant's really just from my Orcs & Goblins, he might not be that effective, but if I need to chew points, he's not bad as filler. The rest of it basically revolves around hitting really hard and using their natural resilience to protect them. Great weapons, monstrous cavalry, monster, and some nasty shooting. Slaughtermaster/Butcher will use spells to buff units to make them even better in combat.

I'm just worried that more of the same beatstick lists will make me want to put them aside, too. I think my biggest problem is that the town I play in had been majorly against that kind of army for a long, long time, even the tournaments would put emphasis on not building over the top lists, so I got used to that. And I also got used to Warhammer back when 25-30 was a solid sized infantry block, and 50 was considered something massive that you might try with Goblins for giggles (per a Rick Priestley article). Even at the GW store, people were against the beatstick lists, and even talked down a guy who ran them (but the guy goes around playing in big tournaments when he can and enjoys those mostly, so I get his mindset), but now they've adapted that playstyle of "find the cheesiest combos you can to beat your opponent." And I could do that, but I'd have to buy a few kits and it feels like I'd have to play against my nature. Maybe it's time for the nature to change? Though... I did go that route with one of the players in 40K, bringing a Knight Errant and a unit of TWC against him in a 1000 point match, which he hasn't stopped complaining about since (even as he does similar shenanigans in every game).

9th edition could be a blessing in disguise. I'd hate to set aside a lot of models I've paid money for, but if it makes games less one-sided, that'd be better for the game in general, and more enjoyable.

[Wildeybeast]

I don't feel like "tarpitting" is a unit actually doing something other than getting slaughtered and hoping it takes long enough for them to get slaughtered/break that you can get effective units into combat... which still means the basic problem exists that one army's Core Units act as nothing more than a speedbump (at best) for another army's Core Units, which is a serious balance issue, because you have to throw points *and* money at that speedbump.

It's not a problem, it's a deliberate design choice. Skavenslaves have lives measured in minutes when they get into combat in the background whilst Chaos warriors are the fightiest of the fighty pimped up by Chaos gods. Skavenslaves are supposed to get slaughtered, it's what the non-slaves want. So the game reflects that. Core units are not meant to be balanced against each other, overall armies are.

Tbh, from what you are describing, it sounds like the problem is who you are playing against, not the game. I have a mate who plays a similar warrior heavy army to the one you face and he regularly slaughters my newish O&G army. That sort of WoC list is tough, especially against certian armies, but it is beatable. I could beat him easily with my Empire army (cannons+lore of metal), but I don't want to do that. I keep working on my Orcs, refining and improving my list so I can beat him with it. I take the view that every army can beat every other one, you just need to work out how.

[HERO]

I would definitely looking into playing something with restrictions instead.

ETC is a good format and I've been enjoying that a lot lately. I just can't go back to normal WHFB untamed anymore.

[Erik Setzer]

For Skaven, in a style I'd enjoy, it'd likely be to shift to multiple smallish Clanrat units with weapon teams, then replace some Stormfiends with a Hell Pit Abomination, swap out Verminlord for some Jezzails and other goodness, maybe some Warlock Engineers who can Warp Lightning like crazy and channel to add more power dice. It's possible, at least. That's with the models I have, anyway.

I'll probably try the Ogres this weekend. But first I've been challenged to a 2v2 40K match where I know I'll be facing Murderface McMurderpants, a Stormfang, Thunderwolf Cavalry, the psychic power Endurance, Death Company in a Land Raider, and Dante, just as a starting point. (No points for guessing those two are also the two Chaos Warriors players who won't stop putting MoN on everything even after being told it automatically makes an army a "beatstick" army. Best part was when one of them used such an army against a guy trying to learn how to play, and that guy was using Bretonnians.)

[HERO]

I don't think that will be good personally. MSU does not really work with Skaven as you need solid combat blocks to slow and chaff the enemy. You really need at least 2 blocks of 50+ slaves to pin them there while your rare choices work out the rest.

[Chronowraith]

As Hero stated, MSU Skaven doesn't work. They rely on rank bonus too heavily to run small units of anything. If they don't have rank bonus, they crumble. Additionally, a unit of 30 clanrats versus a block of 30 Chaos Warriors will simply be wiped off the block too fast to be of use. The supporting attacks rule is just too punishing on skaven infantry to take them in small blocks.

Additionally, slaves are typically better as they allow you to fire into the combat to support them. You can't do that with clanrats.

Dropping the Verminlord for different toys may help to some degree but without more infantry blocks you will simply be out-maneuvered and, personally, I'd never build a strategy around magic. It's too unreliable and direct damage spells like warp lightning are even more unreliable (you have to roll to cast, then make it through a dispel attempt, then roll to see how many hits, then roll to wound, etc... too many chances to roll poorly considering you max out at 7-8 wounds max.

Try your Ogres. From the sound of it, they will likely fit your playstyle better (and as someone with 500 points of fully painted skaven, I completely understand not wanting to invest the time to paint 200+ models).

[marful]

Stormfiends + Skaven Slaves = Instant Win.

Engage target unit with Skaven Slaves, then shoot with Dakka Stormfiends. Any to hit roll of 1 auto hits closest friendly unit (skaven slaves). Skaven slaves rule allows you to shoot at any unit they are engaged in CC with also any hits on the skaven slaves are randomized between enemy unit and theirs, effectively netting Dakka Stormfiends a 4+ ballistic skill. 18d6 S5, magical, armor piercing and re-roll to wound hits will destroy any unit chaos has.

Average on 18D6 = 63 shots. Hitting on a 4+ (31.5), 1 in 6 shots hit skaven slaves (10.5) of which 1/2 hit enemy unit (5.25), netting (36.75) hits on the Chaos Warriors. T4 Chaos Warriors vs S5 with re-rolls to wound nets (32.67 wounds). Chaos Warriors in 3+ armor then save on a 6+, resulting in (27.225 Wounds after Saves).

In the case of Nurgle Chaos Warriors with -1 to hit, that drops to (21 hits), of which 1 in 6 hit skaven saves (10.5), of which 1/2 hit enemy unit (5.25), netting (26.25) hits on the Nurgle Chaos Warriors. T4 vs S5 + rerolls nets (23.3 wounds). 5/6 fail armor save resulting in 19.417 dead Chaos Warriors.

Assuming a 30 strong block of Nugle Warriors, they now have 10.583 models left to attack back at that 54.75 (60-5.25) strong slave unit.


6 Skaven Stormfiends = I win button.

*edit: Math fail! 18D6 average is 63 shots, not 81!*

[Chronowraith]

Skaven slaves rule allows you to shoot at any unit they are engaged in CC with also any hits on the skaven slaves are randomized between enemy unit and theirs

Just FYI, the randomization between Slaves and the enemy they are fighting was removed via the FAQ awhile ago. Check out the FAQ (http://www.blacklibrary.com/Downloads/Product/PDF/Warhammer/Skaven.pdf)on page 4 where it says to delete the last two sentences from "Expendable". Those sentences cover randomizing hits between combatants.

Merry Christmas (early?)

[Lord Manton]

With regards to your up coming 40k battle just take all the wave serpents and two wraith Knights and get your buddy to take tau with two of those big suits and a bunch of other cheesy nonsense, crush them under your xenos foot flip them the bird and tell them where they can stick their bullsh*t net lists.
If they won't respect that you don't want to play against that crap, don't play them. They sound like douchebags.

[Mr Mystery]

I need to go check my rulebook, but I have a sneaking suspicion your opponent is pulling a fast one with the Sorcerors in the second rank.

Could be Edition Confusion, but I'm pretty sure characters displace command in the front rank?

[Path Walker]

Its possible with some preforming shennanigans using RAW nonsense, but no, characters joining a unit always go in the front rank.

[Mr Mystery]

That's what I'm getting at.

If you have a frontage of five models, full command and two sorcerors, it's not the sorcerors that head to the second rank?

Will double check when I'm home - really not certain on this one.

[Path Walker]

I think command have to be at the front as a priority, then if there is room characters, if not, second rank, but then the rules don't mention moving them to the front if there is room once they're in the second. So you can set up a very thin unit then reform to be wide and keep the characters in the second rank but thats pretty cheesey

[Erik Setzer]

That's what I'm getting at.

If you have a frontage of five models, full command and two sorcerors, it's not the sorcerors that head to the second rank?

Will double check when I'm home - really not certain on this one.


I checked on it. The Palanquin takes up two slots, which leaves three slots, and the command *always* has to be in the front rank. That allows him to push the Sorceror(s) to the second rank. However, in combat, they always "make way" to the front rank. And since a second rank can see most of the time with missile weapons, and magic missiles are the only spell class that needs LOS, that means there's not much of a downside to putting them in the back rank.

Having a deeper unit also means they have more ranks, which means they might negate your Steadfast bonus, unless you're doing 5 by 10 with the Skavenslaves, which isn't really a very easy unit to maneuver (heck, deploying it isn't that easy). It also allows fewer models to get into contact with the unit, meaning fewer attacks back. The arrangement of such a unit is perfectly designed to smash through "tarpits," and I hate to admit that I'm just now realizing quite why the "tourney master" player runs his Phoenix Guard like that (small front, deep unit, multiple characters which leaves the spellcasters in the second rank). Bonus, if you somehow get flank charged, you actually have a lot of bodies fighting on the side.

So yeah, say I spend a LOT on buying some Slaves, and then all the time to paint them... They won't have Steadfast against a unit with seven ranks (well, until the Sorceror blew up a lot of them with a miscast) that they can't hurt while it munches them up. I'm not sure Skaven have a counter to something that's designed to take away the "tactic" people seem to believe is most useful with them.

Also, though I do have Eldar, I actually don't have any Wave Serpents. I might get some as I build a new force to mesh with the Harlequins, but I didn't like them (ditto for Heldrakes) because people called them a "must-take" and I dislike taking units that are "must-take." It's a sign of some serious balance issues with the army (which, in those two cases, is quite true). The armies I have available are Space Marines (designed to be shooty, mostly infantry, no Centurions yet because they look goofy and aren't cheap), Orks, Space Wolves (albeit unpainted, which does bug me a bit), Chaos Marines (Iron Warriors, so lots of shooty guys and Oblits), and some mixed Imperial Guard and a kind of random assortment of Blood Angels. Oh, and Dark Eldar, but pretty much all Warriors and Raiders (because it was my dad's army and that's what he used). I seem to have a lot of armies without having the new "must-have" toys that make the armies powerful enough to take on other armies' "must-haves," with the exception of Thunderwolf Cavalry (still no Stormfang or new CC Dreadnoughts).

[Mr Mystery]

Sounds like a highly dubious reading to me.

- - - Updated - - -

Warpfire Throwers are your friend against Chaos Warriors aiming for Steadfast levels of ranks. Big casualties from even a glancing hit, and a near guaranteed panic test.

[Erik Setzer]

Sounds like a highly dubious reading to me.

Warpfire Throwers are your friend against Chaos Warriors aiming for Steadfast levels of ranks. Big casualties from even a glancing hit, and a near guaranteed panic test.

I actually read the rulebook myself, trying to figure out if it was legal or not. I'm not using his arguments, I'm going with what I found in the book. I was trying to find some way to nix that trick in the future, but by the strict wording of the rules, it's legit.

I did actually bring a Warpfire Thrower... it promptly misfired on the first turn and blew a good chunk of my Stormvermin away.

I should add this note with my recent history with Skaven: If someone can go wrong, count on it. In two 500-point matches for an Escalation league, I had a Warp Lightning Cannon and a Warlock Engineer. In both games, the WLC blew up, and the Engineer miscasted while casting Warp Lightning, proceeded to roll a 1 for number of hits (hitting himself in the process), and then lost two magic levels, meaning he literally zapped himself so hard he forgot how to be a wizard. In one game, I finally accused my opponent of bribing my army, at which point he tossed some change at one of my weapon teams, and then the remaining teams either blew up or shot my own guys, with only one not having a spectacular failure (but it still failed). So I'm wondering if maybe the universe is telling me that, as cool as I think Skaven are and as much as I love the Skryre stuff (and I have an awesome army base I made for my dad, which needs a bit of touch-up thanks to a tumble it took... cats getting up in the closet, /sigh), maybe I just shouldn't play them.

Oh, and in that last game, my Rat Ogres twice rolled double 1's for charging, and my Stormvermin rolled 1 and 3 on a charge they only needed a 5 to make (the Rat Ogres only needed a 4 for that charge, too... if successful, they could have ganged up on the Bloodcrushers and done some damage). So, yeah, luck had something to do with it, I suppose.

[Lord Manton]

Ooooh, Iron Warriors! Nice!
Lucky for you in 40k shooty is the way to go these days. If they're bringing murderfang and TWC as well as Dante and DC, it sounds like it's going to be a very aggressive list. Expect MF to come down turn 1 in a drop pod and proceed to mulch through your troops. He's S8(?) on the charge I believe, so he can take pretty much anything you've got. The TWC (from what you say of these guys) will no doubt be packing thunder hammers and storm shields and something else. So weight of fire and high initiative are your friends.
Basically you'll want to either castle up and try and blast them to hell before they get to you or play a super aggressive counter-attacking army to negate their charges. In fact, if you can, charge murderfang with a unit with hammers/fists or something like that.

One thing that no one has mentioned yet regarding skaven is unit fillers! It sounds like the main reason you don't want to horde up slaves is because you don't have the models and don't want to paint them. Why not make a nice little centre piece of a pile of rats, using swarm bases and all the rats you get on skaven sprues. Make it three or five wide and deep, put some actual clan rats/slaves scurrying on top and slap it in the middle of the unit for a free 9/25 models that are nice and easy to remove. Also rank bases. GW used to make them, other companies still do, you put 4 or 5 rats on one base that makes a rank so when they die in droves, you're not removing individual rats.
Also, storm wolves are a pain in the a$$ so take some anti-air!!!

[Chronowraith]

I actually read the rulebook myself, trying to figure out if it was legal or not. I'm not using his arguments, I'm going with what I found in the book. I was trying to find some way to nix that trick in the future, but by the strict wording of the rules, it's legit.


As you discovered the trick is completely legal. Goblins use this tactic to great effect to make a real killy unit where an opponent has to target individual models while the unit can bash heads in (and goblin characters are dirt cheap). The thing to consider is that characters don't count for the purpose of determining ranks for steadfast or rank bonuses. So 30 chaos warriors should only ever have 6 ranks, not 7. Seems like a small change but that's easily the difference between slaves surviving an extra round of close combat with rank bonus intact.

If it really bothers you, take a cheap warlock engineer with no magic levels, give him the death orb, run up to directly in front of the enemy (without charging) and toss the orb. Laugh maniacally as he loses an entire rank and possibly takes wounds on his characters with no armor saves. Or you can use the brass orb but Chaos has high enough Initiative that he won't take too many casualties from that (although it does kill outright so even his characters have a 1 in 6 chance of dying outright with no saves).

With Skaven technology, the key is redundancy. If you need a warpfire thrower, don't take one. Take at least two. The one thing you can rely on Skaven technology is that it will fail... disastrously. That's the reason why you see so many Skaven lists with two doomwheels or two WLCs, or multiple weapon teams. It's necessary (and one reason I don't like the ETC format as it severely limits redundancy).

Sounds like you need new dice. :-) Or perhaps another Skaven lord is trying to claim your clan for his own dark purposes.

[Mr Mystery]

At 500 points, you'll struggle to include redundancy.

But that's how Skaven roll. When your wonder weapons all work out as intended, your opponent won't get a look in. If anyone reading is predominantly a 40k player, then you may not realise just how much damage even a small blast, or glancing hit from the flame template can do to ranked infantry in Warhammer. It's not pretty! But as often as everything goes Millhouse, they'll also go completely Pete Tong, and instead massacre your own infantry.

All part and parcel of expanding the glorious Underempire!

I'd still have my Skaven if some goit hadn't stolen them.

[Erik Setzer]

One thing that no one has mentioned yet regarding skaven is unit fillers! It sounds like the main reason you don't want to horde up slaves is because you don't have the models and don't want to paint them. Why not make a nice little centre piece of a pile of rats, using swarm bases and all the rats you get on skaven sprues. Make it three or five wide and deep, put some actual clan rats/slaves scurrying on top and slap it in the middle of the unit for a free 9/25 models that are nice and easy to remove. Also rank bases. GW used to make them, other companies still do, you put 4 or 5 rats on one base that makes a rank so when they die in droves, you're not removing individual rats.
Also, storm wolves are a pain in the a$$ so take some anti-air!!!

Yeah, I use unit fillers for Zombies, because seriously, screw assembling and painting that many zombies.

I'm actually using all those spare rats to make actual rat swarms. I especially love the ones made of Plague Monk mini-rats. Just need four more to have three bases, which is a basic unit.

I've got plenty of the 4-wide bases, both 20mm and 25mm. I believe they still sell them, just not in the stores. They've been handy for ranking up all kinds of units, and most of the Clanrats are using them (but, being the old Clanrat models, those tails are still a PITA for ranking). Actually, yep, they still have the 20mm bases:
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/20mm-x-80mm-Regiment-Bases

And the last time I faced a Stormfang, I bought an Aegis line finally, went home, built and painted it that week.

- - - Updated - - -


At 500 points, you'll struggle to include redundancy.

But that's how Skaven roll. When your wonder weapons all work out as intended, your opponent won't get a look in. If anyone reading is predominantly a 40k player, then you may not realise just how much damage even a small blast, or glancing hit from the flame template can do to ranked infantry in Warhammer. It's not pretty! But as often as everything goes Millhouse, they'll also go completely Pete Tong, and instead massacre your own infantry.

All part and parcel of expanding the glorious Underempire!

I'd still have my Skaven if some goit hadn't stolen them.


Small blast is bad enough (if centered in a unit of 20mm bases, it can hit 21 models), but the warpfire thrower blowing up uses the large base... ow.

The crazy stuff is what draws me to Skaven, it reminds me of Orks, but for some reason I have a much worse track record with Skaven's insane stuff than with Orks' insane stuff. Something about my dice and Skaven...

Back in 6th edition (or maybe early 7th?), a guy was prepping for the 'Ard Boyz tournament and built a Daemons list with combos and stuff that was so nasty it actually got a guy who was a huge WFB fan to just straight quit WFB. He argued it wasn't that bad (actually, it was pretty bad), and challenged people to face it, so I took an army of Skaven with weapon teams, Warlock Engineers galore, Screaming Bell, some other goodness... Since it was the time that your caster levels determined dice, plus bonuses, with no max, I had over 20 dice per magic phase. I fought him to a close loss, but my dice rolls were abysmal, and if they hadn't caused so many shenanigans, I probably would have turned that Daemon army into warp paste. Feeling like I had a chance was nice, though. But armies and even the game itself seem to have changed a lot since then. I know the Ratling Gun was toned down, you can't opt for 2D6 Warp Lightning blasts now, and power dice are limited (plus you don't get Irresistible on a natural roll of 13 with Skaven now). It's just so odd using a style of army that not that long ago was able to hold its own well and even smash some armies in the face, and now it's considered a weak army that isn't viable.

(It's also, incidentally, a reminder of how old I am. Kind of like when I can literally tell half my opponents that most of the dice in my main dice bag are older than they are.)

[Mr Mystery]

It's far from a weak army. It's kind of suffering from 'Chaos 3.5 Syndrome' where it's predecessor book was so absurdly hard, the replacement is always going to feel underpowered.

Skaven Wonder Weapons still do what they need to! The IF on a 13 was extra beardy, as it was a common roll for 3D6, meaning IF came off far more often for Skaven, with little associated downside.

[Erik Setzer]

It's far from a weak army. It's kind of suffering from 'Chaos 3.5 Syndrome' where it's predecessor book was so absurdly hard, the replacement is always going to feel underpowered.

Skaven Wonder Weapons still do what they need to! The IF on a 13 was extra beardy, as it was a common roll for 3D6, meaning IF came off far more often for Skaven, with little associated downside.


I meant not Skaven in general, but that particular build. I have units of 30 Clanrats because that used to be a viable unit, just 30 rats with a gun. Now people say that's a terrible idea, 30 is too small. What have we come to in WFB when a unit of 30 is "too small?" Yeah, that might indicate one of the game's current problems...

Also, 13 is not really common on 3D6. You might be thinking 4D6. The average of 3D6 is 10.5; the average of 4D6 is 14. But heck, back then, irresistible force didn't automatically cause a miscast, rolling double 1's did, and Skaven had the same potential for that. It was also similarly frustrating to get two 6's and a 2, which would IF for anyone else, but not for Skaven.

On a side note regarding dice averages, one trick shared by the tourney player: When casting spells, determine what you need to roll on the dice, divide by three (rounding up), roll that many dice. Basically, assume the dice will all be 3's. That's just on the bottom of the "average" (3.5), so if you roll average or just below, you're good to go. Of course, this doesn't always work, i.e. with The Dread 13th Spell where you'd need to roll 21 on the dice, and you can't roll seven dice unless you have a Warpstone Token to throw in there.

[Mr Mystery]

13 across three dice has far more combinations than double sixes across three dice.

And yeah, the game has changed, at larger points.

MSU is a dead concept, and right enough. It took away the general advantage chaff infantry were meant to have. Now, chaff infantry are properly dangerous in large numbers. Pre-8th Edition, Gobbos and Skaven barely did owt in a fight. They were little more than Fanatic and Weapon Team delivery services respectively.

But now, as I said, there are real advantages to fielding cheap infantry in large blocks. More attacks, making up for their low quality, and the option to go for Steadfast and tarpit. You can even do both with a single unit - just reform appropriately. And if it's large enough, no need to choose - you can be a Steadfast Horde, the pinnacle of 'yes they're crap but there's so bloody many of them'

30 strong units in smaller games should be enough. Even if you lose the unit, it's not too many points. But your Chaos opponent? Deathstars are very easily dealt with. They're a single very large, very points intensive unit. They can be unwieldy. A large part of their potency is in the opponent panicking over how they're going to deal with. Couple of Skaven Weapons teams can soon put a real dent in such a unit. And if you're tonking them with Warpfire, try to have a unit which can pursue them should they fail to rally in your opponents turn.

[Erik Setzer]

Eh... Skaven didn't seem that bad before. Remember, they're on par with Empire state troops, but with better Initiative. Their only real weakness in the grand scheme of things was Leadership.

And I'm not sure units of 30 are "MSU," and looking at it that way, again, shows how seriously flawed WFB's become for getting in new players. Who wants to think of having to buy, paint, and maneuver units of 100 models, and their only effectiveness is to try to hold up a unit for a turn or two, which might not be possible?

To get more ranks, I'd have to either deploy less than 10 wide, or have 70-80 models in the unit, MINIMUM. That's unweildy as heck (and, again, a pain to model and paint). Let's assume that's a unit, though. Let's make it better: Clanrats with spears. Against a five-wide Chaos unit, that's seven models per rank striking. Let's say 29 attacks. Of those, only 1/3 will hit, thanks to Mark of Nurgle, so let's round up to 10. Only 1/3 of those will wound T4, so now we're at 3. One might get through Chaos armor and shield (3+ save).

So, yeah, that is NOT a fun way to play the game. Even if I used that tactic and won, it would be a horrendously boring way to play, as I watch a unit do nothing but die and pray they don't die too fast. And even just against basic Chaos Warriors, that's something like... hmm... I think 21 attacks, 14 hit, about 12 wound, probably 10 go through, there's a rank gone, and that's without major characters in the unit. So either I better stack 100 models in a unit - blech - or accept that I might kill ONE model and then watch my unit break and be overrun. At that point, it feels better to just break apart, present more threats than he can handle, and accept small units being lost as inevitable casualties while I maneuver to hit hard with my nastiest stuff.

Have to admit, I really miss 4th and 5th edition now.

[Mr Mystery]

Then Warhammer is not the game for you.

[Path Walker]

It sucks, yes, Warhammer does work with smaller Units but if one player brings a big unit, it will outplay others easily. You either accept it or house rule a maximum unit size you think it acceptable.

[Chronowraith]

I meant not Skaven in general, but that particular build. I have units of 30 Clanrats because that used to be a viable unit, just 30 rats with a gun. Now people say that's a terrible idea, 30 is too small. What have we come to in WFB when a unit of 30 is "too small?" Yeah, that might indicate one of the game's current problems...

Also, 13 is not really common on 3D6. You might be thinking 4D6. The average of 3D6 is 10.5; the average of 4D6 is 14. But heck, back then, irresistible force didn't automatically cause a miscast, rolling double 1's did, and Skaven had the same potential for that. It was also similarly frustrating to get two 6's and a 2, which would IF for anyone else, but not for Skaven.

On a side note regarding dice averages, one trick shared by the tourney player: When casting spells, determine what you need to roll on the dice, divide by three (rounding up), roll that many dice. Basically, assume the dice will all be 3's. That's just on the bottom of the "average" (3.5), so if you roll average or just below, you're good to go. Of course, this doesn't always work, i.e. with The Dread 13th Spell where you'd need to roll 21 on the dice, and you can't roll seven dice unless you have a Warpstone Token to throw in there.

To be fair, the unit size thing has been that way since 8th edition dropped back in 2010. 5 years old is hardly a "new" paradigm.

To me the issue isn't the current book, it was the book you knew in the past (the 6th edition book). That book emphasized toys over troops and it was not uncommon to play against Skaven who fielded minimum core and then ranked up a ton of ratling guns, jezzails, and WLCs or even censer bearers. Skaven, even in the fluff, have always been about hordes. The only army that might out be able to outhorde Skaven would be goblins but I'd challenge even that (just look at End Times... who has hordes throughout the world?)

I love my Skaven toys but I've always chosen to play Skaven because of the hordes.

[Erik Setzer]

I always felt like Orcs were more about hordes. But even then, I'm not used to the idea of having to field 100 models in a unit.

Also, I missed a couple years, and only started back playing again about 18 months ago, so for me it's "new."

I'll try the Ogres this weekend. They don't have as much chance for dice to be a PITA, and I don't feel like any unit will exist just for me to scoop it back into the case. There's a couple other things I could do with Skaven, like break out the HPA, but since I have to paint Undead for the End Times big bash, it'd just feel weird to keep forcing it with models that are no longer all painted (which was probably actually my favorite thing about Skaven, they had a lot of neat models that I could paint up to look nice without worrying too much that my eyes and hands aren't what they used to be).

And I'll keep holding out hope for 9th. Hate having to put aside all those infantry, but maybe that's for the best. Smaller, more focused armies will help get rid of the feeling of having a unit that can be smashed through way too easily with no real ability to serve return damage.

[Chronowraith]

Skaven don't need 100 models in a unit. Slaves work fine in units of 50. A unit of 100 is almost unwieldy on the tabletop.

Again, I stress that some units are there to just be throwaway units. In most armies you can get away without taking them but in Skaven, you can't.

On the topic of MSU, one reason they don't work with Skaven is because of the one item you mention as Skaven lacking when compared to humans... leadership. For most armies, panic is an irritation. Skaven are one of two armies where panic is actually a big deal and can lead to early routes. MSU only makes the army more susceptible to that as your army will be forced to make more leadership tests and will be closer together than a few larger units (since Skaven usually don't use horde formation).

[Erik Setzer]

Okay, so I'm going to just shift away from the Skaven thing for now...

The same Chaos player (we'll use letters for names, so I'll say "N"), after smashing a Beastman army (played by "A") with his Chaos Warriors with very little in the way of losses, decided to show that it "wasn't so bad" by swapping armies with A for a game. Unsurprisingly, the Warriors just destroyed the opposing army with very little in the way of losses. And N actually changed up the Beastmen some to tailor them more against his Warriors list, but it didn't help overall.

I think the core problem is that a tournament list mentality crept in, and I'd have to significantly change how I play *and* buy a bunch of new stuff to compete in such a setting. For all the talk that people didn't want to start playing like the local tourney player (who competes in as many national tourneys as he can, and does pretty good in them), that seems to be gone. Warhammer feels like it's being dominated by elite armies with gimmicky death star units, and either I work really hard to convince people not to play the army that way (which isn't easy, as the excuse for doing so with N is "I only play that kind of list against experienced players," disregarding that we might not want to play that kind of game), or I just go without a game for the day. Not even remotely shocked I couldn't get a game in yesterday. (There was one player I enjoy playing, but he left his army at home so he'd have an excuse not to play those type of games.)

It's certainly extended to 40K some as well. I "jumped on a live grenade" and agreed to play the Space Wolf player. 2500 points. He whined and moaned about me including a Knight Errant, with the rest of my army being a typical Space Marine shooty army: couple Tactical Squads, couple Dev Squads, couple Terminator Squads, Land Raider Crusader, Predator Annihilator, couple Land Speeders. His list had both flyers, a Skyshield platform to start the one flyer on the board, Thunderwolf Cavalry with a Lord with Morkai's Claws and an Iron Priest (and every model except the characters has a storm shield), two Drop Pods with squads (one with two meltas and bolters, one with two flamers and assault weapons0, another Drop Pod with Murderface McMurderpants, a Venerable Dreadnought with axe and shield, and a unit of Terminators with Njal in Terminator armor and Arjac Rockfist, and hey, what do you know, Njal ends up with Endurance. Yeah, I blew up one flyer and the Ven. Dread on the first turn. He drops two units in, they kill some guys, I mop them up. The TWC meanwhile rip through my Terminators like nothing, I throw my Knight at them (after it takes four HP of damage from lucky hits from meltaguns dropped in just right to put one in each of two arcs), the Knight does nothing because I don't roll a 6 and they consequently get invulnerable saves, and even when it blew up in the middle of the unit it did a single wound to a couple models. Murderface comes in, withstands some shooting, proceeds to tear a squad apart before I immobilize him an inch away from another. The Terminators, with Endurance, shrug off pretty much everything, mulch what's left of my Assault Terminators (after his Stormfang shoots them up before I shot it down), and then assaulted my army. All vehicles get wrecked in assaults, he gets past my Aegis, proceeds to destroy what's left of my army. After whining the first couple hours of the game about how bad he was going to lose. I threw everything I could at the TWC and Terminators, and it couldn't stop them.

Now I'm feeling like in order to have a chance at a game that doesn't become three hours of suck, I have to look up tournament builds and how to make a beatstick list. Or decline playing a lot of people.

So let's swing this in another direction. Let's assume it's a "culture problem." How would you recommend getting people to stop playing both games with an eye on building beat-your-face-in lists?

[Cap'nSmurfs]

You could try a narrative campaign or an escalation league or something like that. Put some structure into your play which guides army list selection and playstyle towards something not focused just on winning single discrete games but on a wider experience. If what you play is tournament games or games leading up to tournaments, then you're focusing on developing lists and playstyles to break face. Which is fine! But there's other aspects of the game you can foreground, too.

If you want to put it into a "competitive" framework: add different layers of competition. Campaign objectives, story goals, etc.

[Chronowraith]

So a note on armies real quick. Beastmen are a horribly underpowered book. I wouldn't put too much weight on them losing to Warriors of Chaos as Warriors have an incredibly powerful book. They are on complete opposites of the power spectrum. Beasts were underpowered when they were released at the tail of 7th and have only slid further down the hill. It doesn't help that the previous book drastically altered how they played on the tabletop too. So players ended up with an army that was underpowered AND played completely different. It didn't give much impetus to learning how to play the book which is why Beastmen are one of the most under-represented books out there.

To answer the question you asked, how to break the culture of "beat-your-face-in tourney lists the answer is pretty simple. Give them something they have to accomplish in the game that doesn't rely on beating the face of the enemy. Use scenario play to your advantage and have objectives that have nothing to do with killing the opponent. This could be anything from units burning down buildings, ranked units ending up in the enemy deployment zone by the end of the game, etc.

The people apt to play beat-your-face lists won't like the scenario as it causes them to think beyond sheer violence while the more laid back gamers will shift back to their beer and pretzel lists from yesteryear. Other games use this format surprisingly well, GW just hasn't been great at it outside of their specific scenario books.

[Erik Setzer]

You could try a narrative campaign or an escalation league or something like that. Put some structure into your play which guides army list selection and playstyle towards something not focused just on winning single discrete games but on a wider experience. If what you play is tournament games or games leading up to tournaments, then you're focusing on developing lists and playstyles to break face. Which is fine! But there's other aspects of the game you can foreground, too.

If you want to put it into a "competitive" framework: add different layers of competition. Campaign objectives, story goals, etc.

Actually, the GW store ran an escalation league for 40K and Fantasy recently, starting at 500, then 750, then 1000, with no Lords of War, no Relics in 40K, no named characters in either (including stuff like Murderface, Nightbringer, Deceiver), no magic items in WFB, no level 4 wizards in WFB. People would just skip playing those games to play large matches with no restrictions. It was hard to get in league games and I gave up on trying to move up that ladder.

A campaign might do better, but for it to work well for people, I think I'll have to run it and also abstain from it (unless people really trust me, and they might). The last one was sort of map-based, with a central "tile" that gave ridiculous bonuses to anyone controlling it, and you had to buy back any units lost from a pool of resources that frankly wasn't enough (unless you sat on that middle spot). The guy controlling that spot just happened to be the guy making (and changing) the rules for the campaign. I quit that campaign after I utterly crushed two players' chances of doing anything in it (by wiping out their armies to a point they pretty much couldn't afford the points to field an army) and realized I had no chance to win and the rules of the campaign were making me play like a jerk against people I liked. A narrative campaign could be good, though. I've done 40K campaigns in the past and even did newsletters for them to add to the fun, and social media makes it even easier. WFB would be nice, too, to run something End Times if there was enough time, but for that I'd probably just wait until 9th edition and see what the new fluff and rules are like and use that to kick off a "let's try 9th!" campaign (which would double as a push for people to buy 9th and thus support their local GW store, win-win for everyone).

- - - Updated - - -


So a note on armies real quick. Beastmen are a horribly underpowered book. I wouldn't put too much weight on them losing to Warriors of Chaos as Warriors have an incredibly powerful book. They are on complete opposites of the power spectrum. Beasts were underpowered when they were released at the tail of 7th and have only slid further down the hill. It doesn't help that the previous book drastically altered how they played on the tabletop too. So players ended up with an army that was underpowered AND played completely different. It didn't give much impetus to learning how to play the book which is why Beastmen are one of the most under-represented books out there.

To answer the question you asked, how to break the culture of "beat-your-face-in tourney lists the answer is pretty simple. Give them something they have to accomplish in the game that doesn't rely on beating the face of the enemy. Use scenario play to your advantage and have objectives that have nothing to do with killing the opponent. This could be anything from units burning down buildings, ranked units ending up in the enemy deployment zone by the end of the game, etc.

The people apt to play beat-your-face lists won't like the scenario as it causes them to think beyond sheer violence while the more laid back gamers will shift back to their beer and pretzel lists from yesteryear. Other games use this format surprisingly well, GW just hasn't been great at it outside of their specific scenario books.

It wasn't straight Beastmen, it was "Legions of Chaos" so they were marked Beastmen (obviously with Nurgle, because "LOL"), and even had some Tzeentch Daemons thrown in for more magical support. But I'm pretty sure this Chaos build could take on a lot of stuff, short of other cracked-out Chaos Warriors or Elves. He's convinced Dwarfs could be nasty, but I can't try that hypothesis because I'm pretty sure my Dwarfs wouldn't make the right kind of build... if they were even assembled.

I like playing scenarios, but people just want to play "kill points" or whatever... basically just line up and kill the other guy. So either I play that, or I don't play. They don't seem willing to try out some fun stuff, because God forbid random chance gets in the way, or they might have to do something like claim objectives and think more tactically than "aim the deathstar unit(s) at the enemy and crush them all." I forgot WFB even had scenarios until one day a guy asked me if I wanted to try one. I've played a couple of them against him, they were good fun, even the one that randomly sets where you can deploy your army (which actually did a nice job of evenly splitting his army on both flanks, with just his artillery in the middle, while my army was centralized, and I only barely pulled off a win because he insisted I use Nagash and I was able to summon Mannfred at the right time to turn the tide, which I could only do because he loaned me his Mannfred as well)... but he also likes Tactical Objectives in 40K, and builds fluff-based lists, even if it's something new he made up (like Imperial "separatists").

[Lord Manton]

Ugh, your LGS sounds like hell. No scenarios? WTF?? If you have access to the 3rd ed 40k book, I highly recommend it. It's got something like 15 missions in it, they each have different Force Org Charts and weird objectives and deployment restrictions.
I think you are just another in a long line of people who are suffering from the culture of GW gaming. It all seems to be about trying to table your opponent. The problem is, it doesn't matter how many different objectives you have, if they table you, it's game over. (well, one of the problems...) The only solution would be to find a couple of cool peeps who like to play the way you do and just stick to them. If it gets boring, you can always change it up with different missions, campaign supplements and all that jazz.

[Erik Setzer]

It's not an "LGS," it's the local GW store. And that way of playing the game seems to be spreading.

I tried to explain why I don't want to play a game like that to one guy, and he thought I just couldn't write a nasty list. I *can,* in theory, though, as he discovered when he went ahead and tried to do one for me, I'd have to buy some stuff to make a proper beatstick list. My bigger problem is actually that I will seriously not enjoy playing it, and in order to win such a game, I have to go into "competitive mode," where I stop joking around with my opponent and having fun, and instead just concentrate on winning the game and crushing his army, and that results in a bad experience for my opponent (me as well, but I'm more concerned about making a gaming experience bad for someone else). I guess if they're okay with that, I could do that... but I have to work on getting more of the right models.

He also was trying to make a list for me to use in our End Times bash, which wasn't a good idea both because he's going to be on the other side (likely leading them), and I'm also going to confer with my co-generals before I finalize a list, as I want to try to have some synergy with them. I'm thinking direct every bit of shooting into the Chaos Warrior blocks (Mark of Nurgle does NOTHING to shooting), and then throw Skeletons into them to hold what's left in place once they're not much threat. Scream at Chariots with Terrorgheists and stuff (those buggers can be nasty), direct artillery at monsters, hit Skaven, Marauders, and Beastmen with our other basic and elite units. Alter plan as necessary for what's available, who deploys where, and what happens in the game. (Like me summoning more with Nagash.)

I don't have a print copy of the 3rd edition book at the moment (sadly, all the print books my dad had, that I'd have gotten, were either destroyed or ruined in my family's house fire), but I do have an electronic copy, and that was actually something I was considering pull out for some fun. I remember playing some of those scenarios and they were awesome, even if they could be brutal at times. I think older WFB books also have such scenarios, and I *do* have print copies of the BRB for 6th and 7th edition (someone wanted to get rid of their books and was just giving them away). I'll look into them.

[Cap'nSmurfs]

It does sound like a lot of the problem is a mismatch in aims with your local regulars. Have you spoken to people to see if there's other more like-minded folks around, in a game club or a wider casual circuit? You probably have, but it really feels to me like this is the nub of the problem.

[Erik Setzer]

Part of it is really a location issue. In Jacksonville, we still have some FLGS's that carry various miniatures games including GW games and even have active communities for GW games as well. The problem is, Jacksonville is a VERY large city landmass-wise (one of the largest in the world, IIRC), so getting to stores that aren't close is a bit of a hassle, especially for someone like me who doesn't drive (medical reasons) and given that the public transit isn't nearly as good as you'd expect for a city its size. The local club tends to stay mostly at a store on the opposite side of town from me, which is a bummer, as I really like a lot of those guys. I actually like some of the people who play beatstick-style when I'm not having to play against them.

It feels weird trying to talk someone into playing a different kind of game than they want to play. I'm not sure it's really possible. I'm hoping to see more of the WFB players more often, a lot of them don't seem to want to do nasty lists, and in some cases they have crazy ideas just for S&G's. One guy is building a Vampire Counts army called the "Bloodmobile army" with a lot of Coven Thrones (which he's even converting for various vampire bloodlines). He's also wanting to do a "Khemri Diplomat army" with most of its points in Tomb Princes (and a Tomb King, I think), which will then hit people with curses all over the place when Princes are killed. They might be effective in game, might not, but they're designed to be fun and have a theme, not just to win games. If I get smacked around by an army like that, I think I can have more fun.

Archaon's list might drag me to the "Dark Side," though. I may get tempted to just deploy an army with Chaos Warriors as Core Units, and then throw in stuff like Stormfiends, maybe a Hell Pit Abomination, and maybe even some Daemon or Warrior monstrous cavalry (though, like the Warriors, I'd have to buy those... not too expensive, thankfully). But I'd be so tempted to make it fit the fluff still, so I'd want to throw in a Grey Seer to represent the Grey Seers helping Chaos just to get their position of power back. As the kind of guy who finds it deplorable to mix Tzeentch & Nurgle or Khorne & Slaanesh, I kind of handicap myself a bit at times.

(Holy smokes, I write a lot, too. I don't know how people get through all this without wanting to stab my typing fingers.)

[Patrick Ryan O'Leary]

As a side note on this thread that seems pretty quiet, if you get the opportunity to pick up the General's Compendium, I find it to be almost invaliable in the amount of variety it can bring to the game. I found a copy on eBay for $20-25. Just food for thought.