A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

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Ember of the Hidden Paths
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A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Ember of the Hidden Paths »

After a long stretch of 40k I am returning to fantasy, to face my four friends, all of whom have just bought up large amounts of Skaven. Yay....
Thus, i expect to be facing large amounts very soon, although probably no more than 2000pts at a time.
I have a few ideas on what potentially to do in facing them, but any advice from people with experience would be great.

My current ideas are to run glass cannon Highborns and nobles and try and fly over his frontline to hit the warmachines, then turn to face the hoards with the multi-charges. Thoughts on this strategy? Is there anything that is really effective? I feel as though magic will be exceptionally useful, even if it is a bit unreliable. Furthermore I expected to face their Vermin-lord, who i understand is difficult to kill, not least of all because on average it takes 108 shots hitting on a 4+ to take him down at range, and in combat he'll likely annihilate our non-ASF models.The whole wizard thing is also annoying.

I also have a few questions
1) Lore of life or beasts? I have personally in the past been inclined to use beasts because of amber spear and wissans. Furthermore i feel as though due to the sheer amount of shooting they will have I won't be able to run my mage forward with dwellers with life.
2) What spells are priority to dispell from skaven lores?
3) How do dryads hold up against hordes of plebs
4) Treekin? Usually i say yes, the more the better, but i fear for their survival against things such as doom wheels.
5) Does that trick of parking a great eagle next to a Hellpit Abom still work to stop it from doing anything other than going straight ahead? If so would it be possible for someone to offer a justification of this, as i expect to have to argue it multiple times if I indeed do use it as a tactic, which i feel might.
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Ember of the Hidden Paths
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Ember of the Hidden Paths »

Has no-one anything to say on the matter?
One does not simply take a Wild Rider charge...
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by hutobega »

Well dryads will not hold up against units of rats. they just have too many ranks. combo charges work nice so if you had treekin and or a block of eternal guard then you could flank with dryads for some nice attacks. life could decimate half a unit or so of skaven a turn if you get it off. Beasts may not help you so much due to his shear amount of models. It's like waves of rats just engulfing your army. I have no idea about helpits sadly never had to face one..yet BUT I have seen another person use amber spear "if you want to use beasts" take out a doom wheel in one turn and then used it to take out any other war machines and monsters :)
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Mollesvinet »

My main suggestion would be to try and kill his general and bsb, as soon as one or both fall the army is easy to take apart. I never played against the vermin lord, so can't help you much there. Amber spear seems like a good idea against him, where as dwellers is good against a big unit with his grey seer inside. Flock of doom is very nice against warp-lightning cannons.

Flying characters can be good to threaten his characters. However, the skaven have both a spell and also a magic banner which can disable flying so be careful with that.

Have a flaming banner on a unit of glade guard in case he has a hellpit abomination. The doomwheel is also high priority to deal with, either combo charge it to make it flee or amber spear it.

Spells to dispel are: Dreaded 13th, plague, warpgale (if you are dependent on flying movement) and possibly wither on important combat troops

Dryads will not flee easily to a horde of lowly rats, but they will however be slowly grinded down if not supported.

Treekin are treekin, some people love them and some including me can't stand them. Sure they can do some damage against S3/T3 rats, but it will take forever and he will spend less points on that than you.

You can still park an eagle next to random movement, unless you play with some comp pack or house rule which changes this.
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Sidewinder »

Wow, four Skaven players, I think in 4-6 months you will be the go-to expert for WE dealing with Skaven.

If I were in your situation I would write two to four different army lists, such as Three-Treemen, Eternal Guard, Glass Nuke, standard template, etc. I would choose one player that I would only use the Treemen list against, one for the Eternal Guard list, etc. If I don't have enough models for four lists then I would write two lists. One to be played only against the same two players and the other list to be played only against the other two. The reasons for doing it this way is
1.) To reduce the amount of variables so that I can find faster the list that will work for me
2.) To prevent the appearance that I'm floundering and simply jumping from one list to another without any real thought to what I'm doing
3.) To decide which is better for me, Life or Beast. I can do this by having Life in half the lists and Best in the other half.
After each game I would decide what needs adjusting in the list that I just played.
I believe that eventually I would get it down to one or two lists that I could use against any of my Skaven opponents.
...run glass cannon Highborns and nobles and try and fly over his frontline to hit the warmachines...
No need to use a glass cannon highborn or noble, use the standard noble on eagle and two Great Eagles. The downside is that your friends will probably quickly catch onto using the Storm Banner (or whatever it is called) to ground your flyers. That banner is also very effective against shooting attacks.
Furthermore I expected to face their Vermin-lord...
At first, try to stay away from it until you learn how to deal with it. Don't shoot at it either unless you know it's in a unit that has a reasonable chance of breaking from shooting or magic attacks. Use your arrows and magic on units that you know you can hurt.
If the eagle noble rider and two great eagles are not enough to get the warmachines then add in two units of six Waywatchers. This gives you twelve WS5 attacks on gun crews if one unit of six WW gets to a war machine. You should easily take out a Lightning Cannon in one round of combat, two if you are rolling poorly. After destroying the war machines, use the Waywatchers to harass the rear.
Treekin? Usually i say yes, the more the better, but i fear for their survival against things such as doom wheels.
Treekin tend to get deployed in the center, Doom Wheels tend to get deployed on the flanks by novice Skaven players. You should be all right at first using your Treekin.
... parking a great eagle next to a Hellpit Abom ...If so would it be possible for someone to offer a justification of this,
Wood Elf armies are primarily combat troops with the Forest Spirit rule (Your better combat troops have the Forest Spirit rule.) and archers.
All Skaven hand guns and war machines use warpstone which negates the Forest Spirit ward save. The Skaven Storm Banner hurts WE shooting attacks.
WE do not have war machines, heavy cavalry, monstrous cavalry, nor cheap units. We have to expend considerable points for a chance to have decent spells in the magic phase.
I think that is justification enough for us to use Great Eagles to railroad Doomwheels. Besides, it is a legal tactic that anyone can use, even non-WE players.
Also, simply shoot at the Doomwheel. If it gets a wound in the shooting phase it has to move in a random direction. Hopefully that random direction will take it into Skaven units.
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by godswearhats »

Some additional observations:

In general, a Treeman can take out a Doomwheel and survive. Get into close combat with it as quickly as possible. You will likely beat and break the Doomwheel in one round of combat, and kill it in two.

Crack's Call is a nasty spell against Treemen/kin, but generally useless against everything else in the army. One tactic that you'll occasionally see is for a Grey Seer to Skitterleap somewhere behind your line and Crack's Call your Treeman / men if he can get them in a straight line that is close enough. Dispelling Skitterleap can often be a high priority as a result.

The Curse of the Horned Rat (Dreaded Thirteenth) is even more powerful than Dwellers Below, because once cast it just turns your unit into rats. If you're running MSU, spread your characters out among the units to make less tasty targets for this spell.

Two Wild Riders can break a Warp Lightning Cannon in one round, so don't be afraid to charge into it head on with a unit of 5 - you can afford to lose a few, take out the cannon and then retreat to relative safety.

Avoid slave units unless they are outside the General's Ld bubble (at which point they drop to Ld 5), in which case you can usually break them in a single round of combat with a Treeman, Treekin or even a unit of Dryads. Usually it's not worth the effort.
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Git »

I've never played against Skaven, but I they are my newest army so I do know a little about what makes me lose.

If my character bunker gets in close combat I don't feel safe. Even though the Grey Seer has some tricks spells can be dispelled or fail to cast. If my hammer units are engaged with resilient, but sub-par opponents I can't win enough points.

With Asrai I guess I'd try and shoot off things in this order: Hell Pit Abomination > Doomwheel > Warp Lightning Cannon > Weapon teams (Warpfire Thrower) > plague monks / Storm vermin / character bunker > other units.

If you can't bring all your firepower to bear on one target (HPA) it may be useful to pick off Rat Darts early. They can be annoying and hinder one of the Asrai's strong sides (mobility).
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by Mollesvinet »

Just be careful to keep your treemen near the doomwheel. In the shooting phase it shoots three bolts of lightning at the nearest target, at the strength value of an artillery die. Each wound is with no armor save and deals d6 wounds, could easily fry a treeman or several treekin if he rolls high on the strength.
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Re: A return to fighting Skaven. Yay....

Post by godswearhats »

Mollesvinet is right - you are playing a bit of Russian roulette with your Treeman ... unless you put an Eagle (or better yet some Dryads) just ahead of him.
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