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Tutorial BRB Magic Banners for Lizardmen

Discussion in 'Lizardmen & Saurian Ancients Tactics' started by Scalenex, Aug 11, 2013.

  1. Scalenex
    Slann

    Scalenex Keeper of the Indexes Staff Member

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    I decided this needs a redo for the new book.

    In the tradition of the mighty user Boq and his magic item thread on the LM items and the BRB weapons, talismans, and armor (put in the Tactica Index), here is a thread where I rated BRB Magical Standards. I’m using the same star system.

    We sadly don't have a lot of options for magic banners in the new book. We can give them to Temple Guard, Slann BSBs, Skink Chief BSBs and Scar Veteran BSBs.

    The rates are - * = bad
    ** = not recommended
    *** = ok
    **** = good
    ***** = amazing

    Rampager’s Standard ** = A useful power, but it’s a little expensive in my humble opinion. The price makes it a BSB only option.

    Wailing Banner * = No thanks. Much of our army already causes fear and Temple Guard can cause Terror for half the cost by giving the Slann the Terrifying Mask of EEE!.

    Ranger’s Standard ** = Potentially useful for Cold One Cavalry if you have a lot of terrain to deal with, but that means your mounted Scar Vet BSB has no other magical items. It’ expensive though, you have to save at least two cavalry from dangerous terrain tests to pay for this. I think this has a use for people who are very brilliant at setting up terrain and planning around it. I am unfortunately not very brilliant with terrain.

    Razor Standard *** = I am fond of this when I play non-Lizardmen. It’s a good way to make soft hitting units a bit deadlier. Temple Guard do hit pretty hard and get at least -1 to enemy armor saves. It’s overkill in most situations where you aren’t fighting very low AS targets, but it’s far from useless, just a little pricey.

    War Banner *** = +1 CR has saved my tail on more than one lost combat. Having to roll one less Ld is handy with cold blooded. Sadly in the new book we can longer buy this at the discounted rate. It's still a decent choice even at 35 points though.

    Banner of Swiftness *** = If you are planning an Fast Attack army, this is a very handy standard. You can boost your Temple Guard to M5 so to better keep up with the Kroxigor, Skroxigor, Cold Ones, and Stegadons.

    Lichbone Pennant ** = Magic Resistance is less powerful than in past editions, but it applies to the whole unit. The Lichbone Pennant is fairly inexpensive. I’d take it in Storm of Magic, but I don’t see much call for this in normal games.

    Standard of Discipline ***** = Practically a must have for armies with bunkered Slann. We have the only character that can be the general and BSB. If you give this to the Slann (or your Temple Guard), it boosts the Slann’s leadership to 10. Since he is the general and is the unit, the limitation of not using the general’s leadership does not apply. Rerollable Ld 10 with coldblooded and Stubborn means your Temple Guard will almost never break. Re-rollable Ld 9 is pretty dependable for Temple Guard though, so the real benefit is that the Ld 10 applied to the rest of the army.

    Banner of Eternal Flame **** = Enough armies have regenerating or flammable units that I like to take this for all comer’s lists. It’s also good for scenarios in which you expect to be assaulting buildings. The Banner is cheap enough that if you don’t have a target that is vulnerable to fire, you are only out 10 points. Be careful if you are playing High Elves, Chaos Dwarfs or other armies that have fire resistant units though (or if the enemy blender has a Dragonbane Gem). In that case the Banner becomes a liability.

    Gleaming Pennant ** = This is cheap which is nice, but it doesn’t stack with the BSB. If you plan to have your Cold One Riders run outside of BSB range, this might be handy. If you have a very large army and/or wide deployment zone it might be handy to give to a unit you expect to put on the periphery, but that would require you to have two Temple Guard blocks to use it. That's a pretty uncommon setup.

    Scarecrow Banner * = It’s cheap, but we don’t have a lot of things we can give magic banners too. Much of our army causes Fear to things anyway. It’s a little too weak to prevent a skink or Saurus BSB from taking magic items just for this. That leaves Slann or Temple Guard. Most flyers tend to be overpowered mounts for lords (that cause Terror) or light distraction units like Terradons or Harpies. Temple Guard don’t gain much causing Fear versus light flyers. Against powerful flyers the Banner is more to avoid Terror tests and Temple Guard with Slann are immune to psychology anyway. There are better 5 point magic items for LM than this.
     
  2. chefsdad
    Saurus

    chefsdad New Member

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    Cold One Riders can't take a magic banner any more. Also Temple Guard have -2 to armour saves with their halberds.

    Can I throw in my 2 pence?

    I think the 3 most commonly used banners will be the Razor Standard, Banner of Swiftness and Banner of Discipline.


    With the huge hit to Skrox units, the best things we have for cracking armour (other than magic) are Stegs and Temple Guard. Razor standard on the temple guard gives them that extra punch to get through those 1+ saves. Combine this with banner of swiftness on the slann, and the unit's threat range increases.
     
  3. Lizardmatt
    Troglodon

    Lizardmatt New Member

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    I'm liking the idea of +1 movement on the chief BSB. M7 skirmishers to avoid combat and keep the BSB safe. Dirt Cheap.
    Razor for save -3, and discipline for the LD10.

    Flaming banner isn't needed. We get flaming shooting in specials and rares, flaming bound spells, and flaming signature spells. With how much flaming lizardmen have, I'd say that the flaming melee may be a liability.

    -Matt
     
  4. Scalenex
    Slann

    Scalenex Keeper of the Indexes Staff Member

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    Oops, I reposted this specifically to remove the references to COR with magic banners and I guess I missed one. It's fixed now.
     
  5. Smexygor
    Chameleon Skink

    Smexygor New Member

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    They screwed us on banners; Discipline, razor, flaming if you think you won't see dragon princes. The swiftness banner was useful on CoC for me, now TG can use it to keep up. War banner is needed on ethereal slann for the static +2 CR so he doesn't crumble much
     

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