Hi! New guy to these forums, have been eyeing Seraphon for a while and am thinking that this might be the time to take the dive! Diverging from what seem to be the current power builds, I am looking into Saurus-based lists. The standard Saurus does get some incredible bonuses from numbers, and we also have rather excellent buffs to put on them. In addition, the massive regiments point reduction is simply great. Offensively, a units of 40 Saurus Warriors with spears will put out around 50 wounds per combat phase when in the vicinity of a planted Astrolith banner and buffed by a Scar-Vet on Carno (before taking into account the bite attacks). This is not a staggeringly high number - however, if we run the Sunclaw Starhost, giving all of those wounds rend -1, it becomes incredibly fierce. In addition, with the extra Jaws attack from the formation and the inherent +1 to hit from numbers, they become an excellent receiver of the Serpent Staff buff. Defensively, the number of wounds per point paid is quite high (as with all Massive Regiments). The 5+ save that ignores rend -1 is nice, and becomes even nicer with Mystic Shield, Summon Starlight and Celestial Rites. This yields a 4+ rerollable save that ignores rend -1, and enemies attacking them get -1 to hit. We also get the ability to put Inspiring Presence on them together with Saurian Savagery with the new Saurus Command Trait. Put together, this gives us the ability to make a unit very durable. In my experience playing with large units, the main issue holding them back is their lack of mobility, making them very cumbersome to use. With the Lords of Space and Time ability, we can now circumvent this. We end up with large, heavy-hitting and durable units that are also incredibly mobile. From what I hear, several scenarios in GH2 will also be rewarding the usage of larger units. An example list could look something like this: Saurus Scar-Veteran on Carnousaur, general 240 Saurus Sunblood 120 Saurus Astrolith Bearer 160 40 Saurus Warriors 360 40 Saurus Warriors 360 10 Saurus Warriors 100 Sunclaw Starhost 130 Skink Starpriest 80 Skink Priest 80 10 Skinks 60 Knight Heraldor 120 3 Vanguard-Raptors with Longstrike 180 Did anyone else look into this type of Seraphon army? What are your thoughts?
Ok after looking at it a bit so am not sure how you plan to use the Astrolith Bearer. It cannot buff those SCE and the Suarus will be moving so they will probably move out of its range. You could teleport it around but since you don't have a Slann you can teleport only one unit, which is a Warrior unit I assume. It still doesn't look bad. Could work. I'll think about it, Maybe I have one or two more suggestions. I admit I am a bit rusty with Saurus, I rarely use them except Knights.
If you want to go with allies I think I would replace the vanguard raptors with a Knight-Venator for early sniping. The heraldor feels a bit out of place, are you bringing him for D3 MW in the hero phase? I would remove the SCE units and put in a Slann, so you can use the double-teleport trait.
I think I agree. Don't get me wrong, all SCE units are great, and those guys definitely pack a punch in shooting, but with the GHB2017 we have so much new awesome stuff ourselves, I think we can use those points even better. ...although the Knight-Venator is a brilliant sniper.... ...talking about SCE units though: IMO the Knight-Azyros sounds cool as an ally for our more shooty lists. A good save, not too shabby in combat either, good move, and it basically gives the same bonus as a Shadowstrike (reroll 1s to hit), but against multiple units that are near it. Not bad at all for a mere 80 points!
You can definetly squeeze in an Knight-Azyros in a game where heroes cap objectives. Considering his low wounds and how close he has to be to the enemy to give the +1 hit aura I would leave him out of the list in most other cases.
The purpose of the SCE units is to get some decent rend and mortal wound output in the list, which is crucial in a competitive environment. If a list has no method of handling 2+ rerollable treelords and similar, it won't end up on the podium. It seems our main way of getting lots of mortal wounds out is to use Kroak and a Balewind, which is a large investment. That's why I'm considering SCE as allies. Ideally, I'd get two Heraldors, but I'm already at the hero cap. The astrolith can run or be teleported into position, and the large blocks can leave a trail behind to stay in range if necessary. I don't think this will be a problem. I am not sure about the Slann, it just doesn't look very good to me. Especially considering I want to use the command ability of the Scar-Vet to boost my Saurus, I can't get the double teleport. What's your experience? I'm also starting to think that putting at least 40 Skinks into any given list will be more or less mandatory. These guys are just so incredibly cheap now, and teleporting ranged units is always awesome because they are guaranteed to unload immediately!
I just realised I interpreted Sunclaw as Bloodclaw. Then the scar-vet wouldn't have to be general to use his command ability.