The Lizardmen

[Traitor Jacknife]

I have never used all the characers in one battle. And I am not rolling in money. Saurus temple guard are expensive and thats why I am using the Rare Saurus instead. My saurus cavalry has never failed a stupid test as they roll 3D6 intead of two as they are cold blooded. The character thing I ususlly take the two sarus and mabye the slann. Also I have another unit off saurus that are in need of a paint job as they are unfinished. If people read the footnote it says that I am getting Krokigor. I don't like terradons and am possiblety getting some chameleon skinks. As I only started this army a while ago, and have worked out a never fail tactic,
I am quite pleased with it.  

[Vecna the Maimed]

Traitor Jacknife

I have never used all the characers in one battle. And I am not rolling in money. Saurus temple guard are expensive and thats why I am using the Rare Saurus instead. My saurus cavalry has never failed a stupid test as they roll 3D6 intead of two as they are cold blooded. The character thing I ususlly take the two sarus and mabye the slann. Also I have another unit off saurus that are in need of a paint job as they are unfinished. If people read the footnote it says that I am getting Krokigor. I don't like terradons and am possiblety getting some chameleon skinks. As I only started this army a while ago, and have worked out a never fail tactic,
I am quite pleased with it.

ussually when people say "this is my army they mean this is what i play with". i thought that was what you used in a game. and im not rolling in the money either, it just takes us longer to build an army a little longer.  

[greqrg]

Traitor Jacknife

I have never used all the characers in one battle. And I am not rolling in money. Saurus temple guard are expensive and thats why I am using the Rare Saurus instead. My saurus cavalry has never failed a stupid test as they roll 3D6 intead of two as they are cold blooded. The character thing I ususlly take the two sarus and mabye the slann. Also I have another unit off saurus that are in need of a paint job as they are unfinished. If people read the footnote it says that I am getting Krokigor. I don't like terradons and am possiblety getting some chameleon skinks. As I only started this army a while ago, and have worked out a never fail tactic,
I am quite pleased with it.

well what i did for my temple gaurd was use normal saurus, but painted them differently and better than my other saurus. and they should rarely fail a leadership test anyways because of numbers, being hard to kill, the ability to use the slann's leadership, and a reroll from a battle standard (you should have a standard in 3000 points), at least i think lizardmen get the reroll. definitely add in the other unit of saurus when its done. and i know you said you were getting kroxigors (not krokigors), i was just telling you to use them.  

[Jerhien]

Alright I just typed this and the internet ate it so I'm going to give you the broken down version of it.

Don't use blowguns, they suck.
Reasoning; long range penalties, repeating penalties, move and fire penalties, stand and shoot penalties.

Why you ask? Well, if you move forward to fir on your enemy you've already inflicted a minus 1 on your shooting (-2 if you repeat). Assuming you're within half range you'll be taking 20 shots with 5's needed to hit (6's if you're repeating on 40 shots) which equals out to about 3 poisoned shots and 4 hits (20 shot) assuming you're firing on a t-3 target with a 5+ save you're scoring 4 or 5 wounds. If you repeat you're getting 6 poisoned shots which equals 4 wounds as well on the same t-3 5+ save model. Then you're getting charged and mowed down, unless you choose to flee because if you read your stand and shoot reaction section in the rolebook you'll see that if you're withing half range you cant stand and shoot.

Now we take the Javelin which is a thrown weapon and poisoned as well. Thrown weapons suffer no penalties for long range or moveing before firing meaning that a group of 20 skinks firing on that same unit of t-3 5+ save humans would, if it moves into range, be hitting on 4+'s, and score poisoned shots on rolls of 6's.
3 poisoned shots, 8 hits vs t-3 = 7 wounds total, the enemy saves 2 and you've dealt a solid 5 wounds base. Now comes the cool part.
Javelins are ranged weapons and can't be used in close combat, so what does your Javelin and shield wielding skink pull out? A hand weapon, which every model in the game is assumed to be carrying regardless of wether or not it's stated.
So the humans rush in with hand weapons drawn to slaughter the t-2 skinks and what do they find? a 4+ armor save staring them down from cold, reptilian eyes. (6+ scaly, 5+ shield, 4+ hand weapon shield).
Makes them a little more impressive as a speed bump doesn't it? Escpecially when you consider that an average engagement with a unit of swordsmen (empire) brings 6 attacks to bear and hits with 4, wounds with 3 and you save 2. the skinks then strike back with 6 attacks (remember how skirmisher rank up in combat? one more on each side then the enemies frontage) hit with three and and wound with two, the swordsman player saves one and you've both killed one enemy.
Now remembering that the enemy has a standard and three ranks, and you MIGHT outnumber the total combat resolution ends up with the enemy up by three. If you're leader is anyway nearby your leadership will probably be three dice (keep two) against a 5 or a 6 respectively which is ultimately, a achievable roll.
Now what does this mean for your army? The possibility of a two combat phase freeze on an enemy unit should allow you to bring one of your forces striking units to bear, and the unfortunate unit your skinks has been pestering is in for a nasty surprise.

Forgive the rant, I'm just sick of seeing skinks misused.

That said, you should really be playing with 20 lizard blocks of saurus (I'm sure you're getting sick of hearing this smile ) but try it out and if you like it go with it, if not ditch it and play the way you want. My first lizardman army was two stegadons, a Saurus Lord ona Carnosaur and a bunch of Kroxigors and I did alright (granted a heavy infantry or saurus cav based army is much more effective). So really play with what you want to play with, but I would suggest using bigger blocks of saurus.  

[Traitor Jacknife]

Jerhien

So the humans rush in with hand weapons drawn to slaughter the t-2 skinks and what do they find? a 4+ armor save staring them down from cold, reptilian eyes. (6+ scaly, 5+ shield, 4+ hand weapon shield).
quote]Skinks don't have scaly skin saves

 

[Jerhien]

LOL D'oh!!!!

Sorry, been playing too much mordheim lately! Anyway even with a 5+ save they perfrom better on the battlefield with javelins and shields...

*embarassed* can't belive I didn't check that!  

[Drachyench]

Blowguns are good, but only when used in large numbers, if there is 18 skinks in a unit, they all rapid fire, thats 6 poison wounds.  

[Jerhien]

Again that's only depending on the circumstances.
On the battlefield chances are that you're having to move to get the range you need on the unit. The reason I advocate Javelins is pretty simple, take a look at the weapons characteristics;

Blow guns range 12" x2 shots, poisoned
-1 for long range
-1 for moving and firing
-1 for repeating
-1 for stand and shoot.

Javelins 8" range, throwing weapon (no long range or move and fire penalties) poisoned.

Optimal condition Standing within half range and double firing

Blowgun
-1 for double firing
40 shots at 5+ to hit 6 poisoned shots 6 hits
This situation will almost NEVER occur.

Javelin (can only single fire)
20 shots that hit on a 4+ 3 poisoned and 7 hits
The only situation in which the blow gun will outperform the javelin.

Assuming we're moving into firing range and firing once

Blowguns
-1 for moving into range
-1 for long range
20 shots at 6+ to hit 3 poisoned shots
much more likely situation on the battlefield

-1 if we choose to double fire (7's to hit, no poison) means that we're rolling 5 6's (3 7's) after which we need to roll to wound (assuming t-3 we wound twice and he gets whatever save he's entitled to)

Javelin
20 shots that hit on a 4+ 3 poisoned and 7 hits
(assuming t-3 and a 5+ armor save we end up with 5 wounds)

If we're standing and shooting

Blowgun
-1 to hit from long range penalty (stand and shoot reactions are taken from the maximum range of the weapon)
-1 firing at a charging enemy
20 shots at 6+ to hit 3 poisoned shots

If we double fire it's 40 shots that need 7's to hit again which ends up being the same as moving into range and double firinf (I.E. two wounds before saves)

Javelin
20 shots that hit on a 5+ (-1 for standing and shooting) 3 poisoned and 4 hits
(assuming t-3 and a 5+ armor save we end up with 4 wounds)

What we can draw from these situations is that given given any normally occurring battlefield condition (I.E. not sitting within 6 " of an enemy unit through your enemies turn and then getting to double fire your blowguns) is that the javelin is indeed a better weapon for skinks to carry, pound for pound. The 5+ ( I mistakenly said 4+ earlier) save is also a vast improvement over not havinng a save at all.
I don't really see any evidence pointing in the other direction, so I'll have to say that the javeline is a better weapon hands down to the blowgun for our beloved skinks!  

[Jerhien]

Hey guys I'm goofing around withthe sacred host list for tepok, tell me what you think about this;

Saurus Oldblood
Light armor, shield, Mark of the Old Ones, Mark of Tepok, Mark of Quetzl, Blade of revered Tzunki, Aura of Quetzl.

Saurus Scar Veteran
Great Weapon, light Armor, Mark of Tepok, Mark of Quetzl, Venom of the Firefly frog, Charm of the Jaguar Warrior

Saurus Scar Veteran
Battle Standard Bearer, light Armor, Mark of Tepok, Mark of Quetzl
Gleaming Pendant of Chotec

Saurus Scar Veteran
Light Armor, Mark of Tepok, Mark of Quetzl, Enchanted Shield, Burning Blade of Chotec

20 Saurus with hand weapon/shield (core)
Full command, mark of tepok.

20 Saurus with hand weapon/shield (core)
Full command, mark of tepok.

20 Saurus with hand weapon/shield (core)
Full command, mark of tepok.

3 Salamanders

16 Skinks
Mark of Tepok (magic resistance 1) Javelins and shields

1997

Power Dice : 2
Dispel Dice : 9

The Idea is to have the three heavy blocks of Saurus Roll across the battlefiel (one character in each block, the center block housing the Lord and battle standard bearer) The skinks are for screening and the salamanders..(well I just like salamanders) and they'll take up one of the flanks to prevent flank charges. The nice thing is as this is a sacred spawning of tepok all of my saurus units can take the spawning and remain core, and I've always wanted to try an army with nothing but saurus Characters.
I'm working on an alternate list that uses two groups of Salamanders for the flanks and two squads of skinks for screening/flank support. Unfortunately I'd only have two blocks of saurus in that army, but I'd also have two skink priests wielding light magic (another Tepok specail rule)
Just thought I'd post this here for scrutiny, any advice is welcome!  

[greqrg]

i still go with blowguns, because i like to be 12in away and harass the enemy while they charge towards my army. the only thing blowguns are good for is killing unarmored foes. ive taken down giants and chaos spawns on the first turn.
once i was playing bretonians, and on the first turn his pegasus knights charged my skinks. so i stand and shoot, kill a knight, they failed they're morale check, and on the next turn they ran off the table.
but dont get me wrong, shields and javelins are good too, but usually only if you plan on going into combat. for instance, i use two units of skinks with javelins and shields to charge a unit on the flank, so that my saurus can charge instead of being charged, and so i get better combat results.
its all a matter of preference.  

[Sepoko]

Does games-workshop still sell the old saurus and skink miniatures? I liked the look of them better than the new ones, but I can't find the old minis on the games-workshop site.  

[nadescaflowne]

If you do a search on the online store for either Saurus or Skink you'll find them listed amongst the new stuffs o.O Just need to sift through it. For those who have White Dwarf 303, what do you think of the new Cold Ones? o.o;  

[Jerhien]

I like them actually!

as for the blow gun things, you'll actually be better at harassing if you use javelins as on average you shooot better with them (that was really the point...they're better per shot as ranged weapons than blowguns) Anyhow, cool cool.  

[Traitor Jacknife]

Yeah I really like the new cold ones so I'm gonna update the unit I've got into the new ones. (Proabley). Does anyone else prefer the old kroxigor models to the new ones?  

[Jerhien]

I prefer the new kroxigors, but I like a lot of the old skinks better.