Stubborn Treekin

[Polycotton]

I've been running Treekin in various ways since the new book came out and have always found them pretty unimpressive. They easily lose combats and break, they don't really dish out much damage, some below average rolling can ruin your day, they are expensive and clunky to use etc. However, awhile back I put a Treemen Ancient in a unit of 7 of them. Once they have stubborn, along with the odd bit of help from some Life Magic they can be quite troublesome for your opponent to get rid of. Outside of loads of flaming attacks or S6 Ironguts they are fairly resilient.

I found them especially useful vs a mate who plays High Elves. He doesn't have any monsters at present and he had no real way to dish out enough damage in a turn of combat to put them out of action. Like most elves; his White Lions predictably got ground down badly over two rounds of combat. Fighting against infantry, they also got some stamps in. Against well armoured opponents their damage would be limited but they still make a fine anvil with which you can slam some Wild Riders.

I had Fiery Convocation cast on them and it only did a couple of wounds, T5 with a follow up 5+ and 6+ is super handy vs this spell along with a lot of generic flaming magic missiles. The main risks from fire would seem to be high strength attacks from units rocking a flaming banner. I've only been playing friendly games with mates and I always try and mix up my army lists so no one can tailor their own list against me too much. If I ran them every game I'm sure my opponents would find ways to take advantage of their flammable nature.

I'm curious if anyone has found a niche for them in their army?

[Mollesvinet]

Sorry mate, but treeman ancient is a monster and can't join units. You could do something similar though by adding a spellweaver on a unicorn or a combat character on stag (make sure you get crown of command for stubborn).

The treekin were already lacking last book, and the drop of strength didn't help. They did get a lot cheaper, and I would like to try a horde of them one day if I just had the models.

[Polycotton]

Dangus. I've read the rulebook numerous times and didn't notice. I thought being a character he can do as he pleases. Oh well, the only build I've found a use for Treekin with, has been scuppered.

If I was running a Mage on a unicorn I'm not sure I really want to wang her in a unit of Treekin.

[Avian]

It may however, be a place that a fighty hero on a stag and crown of command could go...

[Hyarion]

If I was running a Mage on a unicorn I'm not sure I really want to wang her in a unit of Treekin.

I've been hanging around Naggie too long but I digress....

Somethings Treekin will do great against, somethings will roll up Treekin like a wet pre-paper mill napkin. Which category your opponent of the moment falls into is not really going to change because the TK are now stubborn or not. So I would just keep using them as they are and run a Lifeweaver nearby to help with spells if you feel you need the support.

[Blackcat]

I have found they are great as chaff or redirectors, or extra drops when you deploy. I sometimes take a unit of 3 and occassionally two units of 3. They do very well against chaff units and I generally just run them up the flanks to harass archer units etc. They are nowhere near as good as they used to be even with the drop in points. There is almost no reason to run a unit of 6 anymore unless you have a unicorn weaver with crown of command and lore of beasts to increase the damage output. But if you are doing that you are using a lot of points and your army needs to be built around it. They are still really tough against str3 so they can be great against certain armies, empire, elves, goblins and skaven. I had a particularly good game where I had two units of 3 and both units engaged a unit of HE 25 spearmen each. Both treekin units won combat and both ran down the elves. Needless to say my opponent lost his **** and forfeited the game.

Cool models, good in the right application but useless otherwise. You really need to built around them and even then it will be sub optimal.

[Aezeal]

In units of 3 I think warhawks are better, at least much more flexible.

[Mirage8112]

In my experience the few times I've run them, they are like one of those star-shaped screw drivers from your toolbox. Useless for some things, but the perfect solution to other problems.

I've had great success running them in a list with drycha, as her ability to drop them in any facing in any forest on the board in the first turn, can really, really ruin an opponents carefully laid plans.

It's important to remember that a unit's usefulness is not simply measured in stats, or the "points they make back" on the table. Treekin are plenty mobile (especially with forest ambush), reasonably tough (something valuable in a T3 army) and have a native armor and ward save. They're prime candidates for characters with magic resistance items (unicorn weaver giving the unit a 4++ vs magic), a good target for glittering scales (2+ armor save). They certainly aren't warlocks or waywatchers, and won't fare well vs anything S6+, but work plenty well otherwise.

[Aezeal]

Those screwdrivers are useless MOST of the time.. thus your analogy is spot on. But... that still means they are useless most of the time

[tomrobo23]

nah they suck, i've tried them several times on different scales and they really are just lackluster, putting a combat character in there only heaps points into a poor unit and our combat characters are made of paper anyway.

Also glittering scales doesn't work on them. Two different scaly skin saves you just pick the best, they don't stack.

[Aezeal]

Combat characters suck even worse than treekin probably

[sunstrider]

As much as I would like to argue the contrary, Tree Kin are pretty useless on their own. The one time I had an extremely positive experience with them was when I ran them as 9 with a BSB. I also had a beastweaver in the army buffing my other units, so I put wildform on them, not really expecting too much, but even with average rolls, that extra point of strength and toughness made all the difference against those saurus warriors. Wounding on 3s and the warriors wounding on 6s meant they couldn't do any damage to me and I broke them and run them down in one turn of combat. So I feel that Tree Kin depend a lot more on support magic than other units in our book, but can utilize those bonuses far more than other units in our book.