Skaven clan skrye, any help on how to beat?

Delita · Post by **Delita** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 3:35 am

One of my friends has recently started playing Skaven and after seeing what they have, he is overjoyed at using a heavy tech clan skrye army. This army make up normally has a warp lightning cannon or two depending on games point limit, a unit of jezzails (either one 10 man or two 5 mans, depends on point value of game), a couple clan rats with rattling guns and a warplock engineer as his general.

I've tried thinking of ways around it but I'm nto having much luck because everything he has ignores all our armor saves and our low toughness is an almost guarantee that if the attack lands, it's going to wound.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Darluith · Post by **Darluith** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 3:46 am

I've played against a clan skrye army and I can give you these pointers. Take out the jezzals as fast as you can. They have a 4+ armour save at best. warp lightning cannons can be a real pain, and have a ward save, so my best suggestion is to try to avoid them (thogh anyone else with a better suggestion on the Warp lightning cannons are free to post it). As far as any of the other technolical vices they have (i.e. ratlin guns...) take those out too as they are game turners for the skaven. Other than that, they have minimal save troops with low WS so try and capitalize on that.

Delita · Post by **Delita** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 3:50 am

jezzails are a pain but yeah, they can drop quick. rattling guns are just the hardest because the stand and shoot response he has can mince batalions on the charge to the point of uselessness. Possibly snipe them with rxb/rbt's asap?

Alectro · Post by **Alectro** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:06 am

Remember jezzails are his real strength but they have no ranks so no + to LD

Also use ring of hotek as skaven always roll 3 dice to get their 13 irresistible and most of their spells being close to 8 casting value

Delita · Post by **Delita** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 5:15 am

Thats got me thinking which is a feat in and of itself. Lets say ring of hotek in a unit moving up the middle shielding everything around it from the warplock, my own spellcaster behind it all trying to chillwind rattlings leaving them vulnerable to charges and have couple rbt's or some other hard hitting unit try and hit the jezzails? I'll admit now that I'm not the best DE player out there though it probably doesnt help all my friends are either skaven, high elves, bretonnia or dwarves lol

The adept · Post by **The adept** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 5:49 am

If you chillwind a rattling, you'll likely kill it - it's only got one wound! They used to be hard to fight, as you couldn't pick it out, but now they're really vulnerable; they have US2, so you don't get -1 to hit them, they can be targeted providing you have LOS, and they have 1 wound at T3, with a 6+ save.

I'd go with a mage or two, plenty of dark riders with crossbows, a couple of units of harpies (perfect for taking out the WLCs, as they have to flee from combat), maybe a hydra (to tear apart block units). Stay away from things that'll be easy points for his shooting (like CoK, CoC), and keep everything manouverable so you can take out his firebase double-quick time, and then deal with whatever's left with combined charges.

Moridin_nae'blis · Post by **Moridin_nae'blis** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 5:58 am

I'd go with something like adept said. All you need to do is charge his WLC once before there is a good chance it will flee; and with harpies you can do that on turn two.

Second, a unit of Dark riders will probably eat jezzails, especially if you hit them in the flank. And if he has to focus on killing a unit of dark riders with them that just means all the more things you'll have free to wreck his army. Plus you'll probably have another unit or two of them (or should IMO)

Third, deal with his rattling guns with mages; a simple chillwind to kill it should suffice. It might seem wasteful but it really isn't; it's the easiest way to kill it unless you really need to stop something else from shooting

Finally, like others said, the ring of hotek and a hydra (obviously seperately xD) would work great as well. Ring for miscasts + hyrda for eating units. Just be sure to make the harpies prioty that cannon so that your hydra doesn't die.

Other than that i can't think of anything else...hopefully i helped instead of just regurgitating old suggestions!

Alectro · Post by **Alectro** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 6:14 am

jezzails will most likely stand and shoot , they have no flank being skirmishers and all your best bet is send them something scary their way (i used a noble on dark steed with the terror causing mask-screened by harpies

or just hit them with some magic or shooting!

remember its only a small unit and the panic from 25% casualties should be just 1-2 models

and once you make them test on the leadership 6...well as the skaven say... he who runs away lives to fight another day(that is off the table

Tenoshii · Post by **Tenoshii** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 7:58 am

Harpies for the Warp Lightning Cannon. If it's charged it has to run away.

Delita · Post by **Delita** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:13 pm

Thanks all for the advise. I think this should be a great basis for dismantling an army of this type.

Thomus darkblade · Post by **Thomus darkblade** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 9:56 pm

Shoot the Jezzails with RBTs They're us2 and therefore easy enough to hit. and they're whoppingly expensive, so they normally come in units of 5 or 6, which are very easy to panic with RBT fire

Ratling guns are downright bad against DE in this edition, Dark riders with crossbows can move to target them and easily kill them.

Just about anything can kill a Warp lightning cannon, just don't delay. Get up in it's face with 2 units, then charge it!

The engineers can be tricky to deal with. Harpies should be able to eat one , and theres always that item that makes an enemy wizard pass a ld test on 3d6 or forget one random spell (ie warp lighting)

The trick when facing SAD skaven is not to delay. Once you neutralize the scary bits the game is won, but until you do so, the clock is ticking. Every time warp lightning goes off, a unit of yours will vanish. So get there quick and kill those wizards!

Zavratatar · Post by **Zavratatar** » Tue Jul 29, 2008 9:58 pm

Repeater bolt throwers eat jezzails like there's no tomorrow. Hit on 4+ from across the table, kill on 3+, 6+ save.. Kill 3 and you've made a 10-strong unit run off the table. Harpies can also cause these guys lots of trouble, charging skirmishers vs bs 3 means 1-2 hits... They can also as mentioned kill the cannon. And charge & kill skaven mages in round 2...

Dark Riders are the kings of the game vs skaven, move 18" to get a sight at a ratling gun and shoot it down. If a Darkrider unit hits a clanrat pile in the side, you win.

So take:

2 bolters,
2-3 units of darkriders with xbows.
3-4 units of harpies in varying sizes (6-9)
2 sorceresses for chillwinds and pure damage.

The hydra is also warmly recommended, place it far away from the skaven general and let it have fun with the poor LD of skaven without a babysitter.

Joyfulcheese · Post by **Joyfulcheese** » Wed Jul 30, 2008 8:03 am

Shadowblade's useful against units of jezzails, pop him into them asap and with their weapon skill he'll have them cut and running in no time.

Having a sorceress on a dragon (points allowing) and lots of harpies can get you into close range fairly quickly to take out the lightning cannon and scare off a lot of their more troublesome stuff.

Delita · Post by **Delita** » Wed Jul 30, 2008 5:04 pm

Sorry about the delayed response. Thanks again for the tips, I'll be sure to implement these the next time I face him and I'll be sure to post how I fair this time around

Krystalice2020 · Post by **Krystalice2020** » Wed Jul 30, 2008 5:21 pm

Harpies, Shades, assassins, Hags, Witches, Corsairs, sorceresses

Shaddowblade · Post by **Shaddowblade** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 3:21 pm

If the Warp lightning cannons are a problem get shaddowblade in them and reveal him when most of his skaven units have moved (2nd turn is ideal)