New to fantasy and skaven

I have been playing a lot of 40k recently but have decided to give fantasy a try as well with a skaven army. Is there anyone here who plays them that wouldn't mind showing me the ropes.Thanks

JC!!!I choose you!!!

Yay ... or ahem...... HUzzaaaah !!!!!
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A new fantasy player !!

Both Luis and JC play Skaven.

What exactly do you want to know?

thanks, just tryng to get a grasp on what works and what doesn't, having no fantasy experience makes it difficult to know whats the right way to approach such a big army

The Council of 13 welcomes you brother/hated enemy, I am Grey Seer Ratsputin of the Cuban/Ruso clan.

Skaven are pretty cool, and a strong army, new codex is rumored to come out on July 2009 so we should see some nice upgrades/nerfs then.

As they stand right now here is a quick rough breakdown of our stuff.

First, our special rules
1- we can shoot into combat ! life is cheap is great, we got a unit of Slaves engaged in comabt with something ? pour lead and magic into the combat, they get randomized..but who care if slaves die ?
2-Lead from the rear - Skaven characters are the only ones that can lead a unit from the last rank, keeps them safe, but out of the action, great place for a Battlestandard.
3-Strength in numbers- Skaven add their rank bonus to their Leadership, so a unit of clanrats LD 5 with 3 ranks are now LD 8, untill they start loosing ranks, this also works when they are close to the general, General has ld of 7 +3 ranks now is LD 10 to those arround him.
4- Skaven also flee +1 inch when they run away, good for saving their sory tails

UNITS!
Grey Seer - magic supreme master, our only lvl 4 caster and can be tooled up to be a monster on magic, skaven magic is VERy distructive, this is our only other Lord choice

Warlord - even though he's a rat he can be tooled up to be very nasty in hand to hand, higher LD makes him a good asset, i dont use him, i rather go super magic heavy. Other lord choice, can give LD 10 to those arround him.

Chieftain - i use him as my Battle Standard Bearer, dont really see him used as anything else.

Warlock Engis - our only other casters, they get the warpligthing spell and can do some nasty dmg.

Plague Priest - combat moster, can add some serious punch to the army.

Clanrats-our mainstay core unit, they have mediocre stats but are cheap,numerous and can get a good save at 4+. The rule so far is that you can only get as many other types of units as you have clanrat units. hand weapon and shield is the way to go.

Stormvermin- our 'elite' soldiers, as they stand now this guys suck, they are much more expensive than clanrats and all they get is a +1 to strength and armor saves, plus they all come as metal ..so very expensive to build.

Slaves - CHEAP ! i always take at least 3 units of 20, they are great for setting up charges, misdericting, table quarters, and at 2 points each, you aint gonna find any cheaper. Nobody cares if slaves die, so no panic tests if a unit gets destroyed or they run through your own units.

Giant rats- they are ok for making flank charges cause they are very fast, other than that i dont use them much.

Swarms- to expensive for what they do. Ok for tying up terror causers and what not cause they are immune to psychology.

Rat Ogres - they cause fear, but right now they suck bad, dont bother with this guys cause they are extremely weak for what they do and to expensive, is like handing free victory points to your oponent. I only take them when i dont have anything else i can fit and got some spare points.

Night Runners- aspiring assasins, cheap and skirmishers, can be used to haras warmachines or screen other more expensive units.

Gutter runners- assasins in training, dotn like them much, they are a bit expensive and can die fast, skirmichers.

Gutter runner tunneling teams- THESE guys are good, you set up a marker at the end of deployment and then on turn 2 they can pop up on a 4+ like deepstrike, cept they can charge the turn they come in, great for taking out warmachines.

Posion wind globadiers- they are good in that you can take a unit of 1 and use them to draw out oponent deployments, very short range, btu a unit of 5 or so can rape a knight unit since their globes allow no armor saves.

Jessails- our long rifles, this guys are awsone, in groups of 6 they can rain death on anything heavely armored, they have a chance to blow themselves up like all the other skaven weapons, very expensive money wise at 12 bucks a model.

Ratling guns- man, i love this guys, auto hits, armor piercing, shots count as magic. the way they work is you roll a die and thats how many shots u get, then u can keep on rolling dies untill u roll a douoble..then something bad happens.

Warpfire thrower - is ok also, expensive, flame template that shoots foward, d3 wounds, strght 5, causes panic tests if a wound is taken, the bane of all horde armies.

Screaming Bell - awsone item, our only chariot, has great effects, if you wanna go magic uber go with this you can get arround 13 power dice ! VERY expensive upgrade, points wise, but worth it in most cases.

Warpligthing cannon - i love this thing, random strght to a max of 10, 8d6 range, and can shot through terrain, cept rocks, you can hide him behind a forest and he has line of sight through it ! comes with a nice 4+ ward save, careful though, if it gets charged it HAS to flee.

Plague sencer bearers - our heavy hitting infantry, this guys can munch through much of evrything, the bane of anything ehavely armored since the gases go before any attacks are struck and they ignore armor saves, tough bastards, never leave home without them !

Plague monks- monsters in hand to hand, give them 2 hand to hand weapons and they can dish out a huge number of attacks, i always bring at least 1 unit of them, or 2 small ones.

I think i covered evrything about them, feel free to ask anything else.

Glory to the Great Red Horned One !!!!

Wow Luis, nice write-up!

Troublesome Skaven Units IMO

Jessails-
Ratling guns-
Screaming Bell -
Warpligtning cannon -
Plague Censor bearers -
Plague monks-

ShadowMaster wrote:Troublesome Skaven Units IMO

Jessails-
Ratling guns-
Screaming Bell -
Warpligtning cannon -
Plague Censor bearers -
Plague monks-

Jezzails and Plague Censer Bearers are very troublesome, very effective hitting that wrecks up heavily armed units and the such, Jezzails are the least erratic of the skryre inventions too, so they're not a bad investment of points. Censer Bearers have very stark pro's and con's in the fact that they are frenzied skirmishers (-1 penalty to shoot at them and +1 attacks, but they also have to charge what they are in range up in their arc of sight and their LoS extends 360 around them, so they're relatively easy to bait if you don't ensure baiting elements are kept out of sight and range of them).

Plague Monks are good because they are prerequisites for censer bearers (haha!) Also, they're a good rank/file unit (decent cost means you can get a good block of 25 in mosts lists) and with 2 hand weapons and that banner adding hatred you have hitting power that will (with good rolling) keep you on par with heavy hitters and reliably counter other armies light/mid infantry blocks present in large numbers.

Warp-lightning cannon is cool, but keep in mind that you don't get much say in what it does except for the direction it fires in. It's only 100 points but if it turns and fries your jezzails and they turn tail and run as a result you lost a reliable (as reliable as skaven stuff can get) unit.

I'm too tired to post about the Screaming Bell, but here's a definite theme and mindset you need to have when you play Skaven (something I've learned from playing O&G as well, as both armies are rife with irregularities): You need to be ready & able to crack a few eggs to make an omelet.

I disagree on the Screaming Bell being a MUST have for a Skaven army, yes it is cool, yes it has some very nice abilities, makes the unit immune to psychology and counts as a chariot and makes yoru grey seer have 360 line of sight and counts as a large target.
BUT !! is arround 740 points tied up in a unit, your Grey seer can be easely killed, he CANT leave the Bell, and the unit is so big that it becomes cumbersome to manuever. My favorite spell in the Skaven list is 'Skitterleap' this has save my Grey seer bunch of times as i can move him anywhere i want, if he's on the Bell, hes stuck there, cant go anywhere.