8th Ed. Hellion Nox' Lizardmen

So following my introduction. I'll post an army list I've thus far created for a 2000 point Lizardmen 8th ed. End Times army.

My usual opponents take either some or most of the following:
- Chaos Dwarves: Magma Cannon, K'dai Destroyer, big block of Infernal Guard with Castellan BSB and a Sorcerer Prophet on carpet
- High Elves: Usually big block of Reavers, BotWD on BSB, Mage or Teclis, Phoenix Guard, Anointed on Flamespyre, Frostheart..
- Skaven: Big blocks of slaves, Seer on Bell, HPA, Warplightning Cannon and Doomwheel

2000 Points (8th Ed. End Times)
-----------------------
Slann Mage-Priest
- Wizard Level 4 (High)
- BSB: Standard of Discipline
- Becalming Cogitation, Focus of Mystery, Harmonic Convergence
- Channeling Staff, Ironcurse Icon

Saurus Scar-Veteran
- Cold One
- GW, LA, Shield
- Dawnstone, Dragonhelm, OTS

30 Saurus Warriors (6 wide)
- Spears
- Full Command

10 Skinks Skirmishers
- Javelins & Shields

10 Skinks Skirmishers
- Javelins & Shields

22 Temple Guard
- Full Command

Ancient Stegadon
- Giant Blowpipes
- Sharpened Horns

Leaving me with 298 points to spare.

There are lots of options left to take, though as a new player I'm not sure if these will help me out vs my regular opponents. So any recommendations/changes/help is greatly appreciated.

 

I'd bulk up those Saurus Warriors to around 40 with your left over points and then maybe get a priest if there is enough left..

 

@n810

Thank you for your suggestion.

If I would add a Skink Priest, Lvl 1 Heavens + Dispell Scroll and 10 more Saurus Warriors I'd still have about 98 points left.

I was considering adding either a group of Chameleon Skinks or a Salamander.
Wished I had the points left for a solar engine

 

I suppose you could swap the priest for a solar engine, maybe a couple points left for a skink or a unit upgrade.

 

Shifting around some points got me to the following list.

2000 Points (8th Ed. End Times)
-----------------------
Slann Mage-Priest
- Wizard Level 4 (High)
- BSB: Standard of Discipline
- Becalming Cogitation, Focus of Mystery, Harmonic Convergence
- Channeling Staff, Ironcurse Icon

Saurus Scar-Veteran
- Cold One
- GW, LA, Shield
- Dawnstone, Dragonhelm, OTS

Skink Priest
- Wizard Level 1 (Heavens)
- Dispell Scroll

36 Saurus Warriors (6 wide)
- Spears
- Command: Musician & Banner

10 Skinks Skirmishers
- Javelins & Shields

10 Skinks Skirmishers
- Javelins & Shields

22 Temple Guard
- Full Command

Bastiladon
- Solar Engine

Ancient Stegadon
- Giant Blowpipes
- Sharpened Horns

Total : 1998 / 2000

*Added 6 Saurus Warriors but removed the champion.
*Added a Skink Priest
*Added a Bastiladon (Solar Engine)

 

Looks great, got luck with your match.

 

trogladon with diving rod and keep your slann back and channel through the trogladon, once saurus are in combat use your roar and eat face

thats what i would do anyway, and has work more often than people think.

I can post up what i usually run for 2k points if you like?

 

Looks really strong, you should be able to beat most people with this list. I really dislike the Trog though, he is way to expensive for what he brings to the table in my experiences. That +1 on predatory is not really that big a deal, that one extra channel dice is meh, the whole monster is meh, he has nothing that is strong in any way. Compare it to the really strong impact hits on our Steggies for example!

 

It is this point of view that hurts the the troglodon the most in my opinion, I have fielded it as often as i can and i do not see this point of view that everyone has of it, get a fuck ton of extra attacks on a 5+ instead of a 6 is just too good to pass up, d3 multiple instant wounds on a 6 from your ranged attack is beyond helpful and extra channels without having to worry about keeping a another spell caster alive is just amazing. plus an extra big beastie for target saturation is handy as fuck as well.

The first time i fielded my troglodon my opponent laughed in my face when i set it on the table, i got a lucky roll for my d3 vanguard with tetto'eko and vanguard my troglodon, my carnosaur and my bastiladon w/ solar engine straight into his face but outside of charging distance, first shooting phase my troglodon 1 shot his only spell caster (yes he didn't have it in a squad as he believed his range would murder all my good things before i could get to combat) getting me an extra phase advantage over my opponent and by turn 2 all my saurus were in combat and i got loads of bonus attacks from the roar and watch his puny elves leave the battle in pieces. Yes i am aware that it is all done to luck of the dice rolls and 90% of my lucky rolls are when I'm attacking but this is countered by the fact i never get any important save rolls when i need them so this has lead me to field aggressive beefy saurus lists with maybe one or 2 spell casters loads of big beasts and few range nd so far it has been working sweet for me and i will continue to use a troglodon in my army as it is always a huge advantage for me.

In my honest opinion more people need to start learning to use it to their advantage and forget what the rest of the worlds opinions are on it as it can be a huge game changer especially when the opponent thinks the same as 90% of the lizard men players (i.e. the troglodon is a waste of time). when it fact it is a beautiful unit to have and a fantastic looking model to field

The Troglodon is a tougher faster missile battery for your otherwise weak slann and should be utilised this way to as full an effect as you can make work for you, hell of a lot better than a skink priest on foot mini pfft battery imo

even funnier if you are fielded a Troglodon with Lord Kroak and having the Troglodon in the middle of a few units of your enemy and spamming his spell through the Trog 4 times in a row , every magic phase. The look on your opponents faces is absolutely priceless every single time

 

@ZeTe

I'm all ears for some unconventional lists.

The problem is that there's some many options I'd love to try. LM seem like quite the versatile army

 

yea lizard men are deffo on of the most versatile armies in my opinion so much ways to play them, and they excel in both magic and brute force our downfalls are movement and range (to a degree) but deffo worth investing in to see what works and what doesn't work for your play style. I will post a few of my 2k & 2.5k builds in this post when i get a chance. i would do it now but I'm busy

 

Ain't no hurry. I'm still browsing the web for some sweet deals on LM anyway

 

I have been playing around a litte bit more with my list. Feel free to let me know what you think of the following

*remove 2 temple guard
*add reservoir of eldritch energy to slann and remove focus of mystery

- slann could take focus of mystery & shrieking blade
- temple guard take razor standard and slann takes life magic
- temple guard take war banner & slann takes shrieking blade

 

You bring up a lot in this post, and i will try to rebunk your points one by one. So, let's get into the thick of things as i will try to explain why the Troglodon is really poor on a competitive level.

You say that the Trog gets a fuck ton of extra attacks due to predatory fighter. In a unit of 6 wide, which is the average you may expect a Saurus unit to be, you get 12 attacks, of which 2 will be a 5 on average, so it gets you 2 extra attacks on a standard unit with the Roar. In Saurus vs Saurus combat, this comes down to 2/2/2 is 0.5 extra armour saves on a 5+ per Roar, not even a wound. I call this a negligible buff, you will not even notice its effect in most combats. Now, let's imagine you have a really good Roar in a big battle, affecting something like 3 units. That would contribute to 1.5 extra saves in Saurus vs Saurus combat, or another similiar heavy CC unit. It's just one extra wound, it does not ad up to anything even if you hit the perfect timing. If it was a spell, i would reroll it 90% of the time because its impact is simply to low. You have to keep in mind that you do not get Predatory Fighter attacks from supporting attacks, if you play it in another way, i might see it's worth, but the consensus on this forum seems to be that you cannot get Predatory Fighter attacks from supporting attacks (i do not intend to start the debate on that debacle right now, btw. Plz dont ) All in all, you should not be paying 100 slaves for the roar, it gives not enough.

You mention the channeling aspect. One dice on a 6+ is well, once again, negligible. on average, this is 1 DD and one PD per game, if you manage to keep the beast alive all game, that is. It is not something worth 100 slaves. You can cast spells trough him, but mind you, you can only cast direct damage spells. If your opponent is making huge noobish errors, aka, not putting his characters in units, you can kill a character with it which is good. An opponent doing this is not worth his salt though, and you should not measure the competitive strength of units based on battles against poor opponents. If your opponent is an idiot. these rules can catch them out, but that does simply not make the unit good. Most Direct Damage spells in the game are bad, Magical Vortexes wipe out units, and Augments and Hexes can just give you that extra edge in combat that makes you win a combat so that you wipe a unit, so those are often good. In tournament games, Direct Damage spells are used to clear up chaff, which can be nice, but it is not worth 100 slaves, unless you are playing truly massive games (5K+) where every bit of range you can get out of your Slann is handy. In normal games, if you position your Slann well, he should always be able to do useful stuff, especially if you run Loremaster(High), so you do not need the boost from your Trog. I often bring extra Skink Priests for the Wyssans, but i almost never cast spells trough them i find, because well, Direct Damage spells are just quite bad. All in all, the fact that he is an Arcane Vessel is not worth 200 slaves.

You mention its shooting capability. You will want to hunt monsters with it, that is what the D3 wounds eludes to. On average, with the low range, you will be shooting at long range. You will do an average of 1x0.33x0.33x0.833x2=0.181 wounds. Yeah, its really nice if you roll that lucky hit, that lucky wound, he fails his save and you get a three, but you will need so many good rolls, that the effect is once again, negligible in games. Its nice that its quick to fire, but it's impact is really low. Never depend on single shot weapons is something that rings true in WH40K, and you can see that as well in this example.

Then onto its stats. It has to compete with the Stegadon, the Steg is only 15 points more expensive, and the same kind of unit. Compared to the baby Stegadon, it has +1 movement, same ws, same bs, same s, -1 t, same wounds, -1a, same leadership. I take +1 t and +1 a over 1+m every day of the week. It gets even worse if you compare them in CC, the D6+1 impact hits is something that mauls units and wins you combats, especially if you take the Sharpened Horns upgrade. Instead of the 1 attack from the Oracle you get 4 attacks from the Skink Crew from the Stegadon, so it is lagging behind in that regard as well. It is, quite simply, a lot worse then the Stegadon in every aspect in stats, bar the +1 M. It should also be mentioned that the Trog is a rare choice and the Stegadon a special choice, so it is worse in that aspect as well.

The one ok tactic i can find for it is the balls to the walls Kroakbombing list. I have written a template for such a list some months ago on this site, and i concluded that using Skinks with items that give them flying works a lot better, you can easily get 2 skinks with flying into the enemy lines. You will only get 2 turns without combat where you can Kroakbomb the enemy in earnest, so you do not need more then 2 turns of an Arcane Vessel. After that, Kroak will be in the thick of it himself. It is something that can be used as a bad alternative of the good old flying skink priest in one very specific list, i might give you that, but it is even worse in most aspects when compared to the flying skink priest.

As a tournament player, i can really only conclude that it is a gorgeous model with really poor rules from a competitive standpoint. Against a decent opponent, it should never get it's points worth or do anything useful, this is also why it was buffed greatly in both 9th age (going from 100 slaves cost to a mere 55 slaves cost) While it is much much cheaper in 9th, it got better stats, and better shooting attacks (even though you have to buy that separately now for 15 slaves). It was also buffed greatly in AoS. I like new and different lists, and you are ofcourse more then free to play with whichever model you please, but it is simply not true that it is a competitively ruled model. It is not even a contest when compared to other units, is as they call it, terribad. I would like to meet you on the table to settle our differences there, maybe a player with a lot of experience can show you it's bad sides.

I am sorry if i seem a bit harsh in this post, i often go overboard when i berate models and lists, and nothing i said was meant as a personal slight. If you live in Holland, i would love to play a game to decide the matter of to Trog or not to Trog . Have a good one.

 

Back to topic:

I think that if you take High Magic, taking the Focus of Mystery is a really good idea, the toolbox nature of High Magic is really amplified by having all the spells of the lore. I personally feel that Eldritch Energy is not that good, it is outshone by the Channeling Combo, if you want more dice, that is the way to go. The Shrieking Blade is often not worth it's points, we have so many monsters, if you want Fear causing effects, you can get it elsewhere. If you just take the list as posted a few posts earlier, you should do really well against most enemies, it is really an all comers list.

 

I actually do live in holland atm but all my lizard men are back home in ireland, but i will deffo be up for having a match in the future when i get my army over. i will deffo throw a troglodon in any list to prove their worth

 

I often take the Channeling combo and the channeling stuff from the rules book. It´s a great combination: 3 dice on a 5+ to both channel and dispel

 

Thanks alot for your input guys, I'm really liking it.

Should you ever play that fight, let me know. I might even make it out to come and see.

 

Well, send me a PM when you are in Holland with your army! I am a student, so i travel for free and i can easily pack my army for a game, so i would gladly throw out the glove (claw? paw? dont know how the lizard analogy works here but whatever) to see who can deliver on the table . Sorry @Hellion Nox that we totally buccaneered this thread over some Troglodon grudgematch, it's as if we are a bunch of dwarves, but i gladly meet anybody from this forum if i would get the chance. Maybe we could write a Battle Report on it if it happens? Just tell me, i can easily miss a day of classes for a good game.

 

@airjamy

You both were just going over the possibilities if the Trog would be a good or bad addition to this list and sharing your own experiences. By no means did I see it as the thread being buccaneered

Having a battle report on it would certainly be nice!