What can a new player expect from Skorne?

[kommander_redfinger]

Hello all!

I am a fairly new WM player, currently I play Khador, which I like. I have tried my hand at Cryx a little but not to fond of their play style. I have been wanting to try a little Hordes as well, and I think my interest is for Skorne, both fluff and modeling wise.

I have read the sticky here in the forums and have gotten a somewhat better idea of casters, warbeasts, and support. I have read though various reports and posts concerning how competative Skorne is. I am not trying to start "that" type of thread, I guess I am just looking for some input as to what I no player might expereince with Hordes and specifically Skorne....how do they play? Are they attrition based, assasination, going toe to toe, ect...

Thanks for any input!

Ashton

[jettzypher]

well, ive been playing them for a couple months now and to me they are a very up close and personal type faction. we have very few shooty units and theyre not that great. we have some awesome melee infantry (both single and multi-wound), some badass cav, good solos, and really solid heavy warbeasts (they can take a beating, dish out a lot of damage, and have some of the highest threat ranges). i think the majority of the casters skorne has are designed to buff their troops and beasts and focus less on debuffing your stuff (which isnt to say they dont have any debuffs, they just arent as common as other factions).

[Talamare]

Skorne is pretty similar to Khador, but lower their survivability slightly for more punching and mobility

[theHman]

Welcome to the faction Kommander.

The beauty with Skorne is that you can field just about any type of army style you could want.
Want to run beast heavy, we can do that in spades. And man is it fun to smash your opponent's face in with a wall of titans.
Want infantry spam - ooh boy can we do that!
Want sneaky shenanigans that will have your opponent cry "OP!" and "BS!" - we do that extremely well.

Now most will tell you that our range game is weak.
But it's all in how you construct your list.
I personally wouldn't go all shooty, but then again, I wouldn't go all shooty with any army.
Venators with UA are pretty good.
Cannoneer - while disliked by most skorne players is one of my favorites assault beasts.
And the new raider gives us an extra 4" in range - extremely awesome coupled with the Cannoneer.

In short, Skorne is an extremely versatile faction that offers something to everyone.
We have a lot of support solo's and beasts that allow us to pull off some ridiculous plays.
Plus we have the best beasts of any hordes faction (of course, I'm biased as a Skorne player).

Good luck to ya!

[Bully Bully Mahu]

Skorne is awesome, because we are probably one of the more diverse factions.

Our ranged game is mediocre (similar to Khador), but we make up for that in a lot of offensive spell potential. We still have ranged and decent ranged to.

We have crazy trick casters, we have melee beatstick, we can run beast heavy, infantry heavy, you name it.

We trade a little attrition for just straight threat. And if you want beasts that are damage gods, you can to the right place. Skorne does have one of the harder learning curves. Nothing is really straight forward. But it is a very rewarding faction to play in the long haul.

[kommander_redfinger]

Cool thanks for all the input, I appreciate it. I enjoy painting and modeling too, so when I start working on it I will make sure and post pics.

Ashton

[Mifsuud]

Pain!

The best fluff in game. Very large model variety.

Diverse options after adding a Titan Gladiator. Sheer pleasure in both the death of your enemy and your own troops in glorious battle.

[Darque]

We do seem to love our beasts and melee heavy armies with this faction. But let's not neglect the ranged options that do seem to work, Venators +UA and the Flayer Cannon (Rat: 7 & d3 shots).

Venators + UA will generally run you 7-11 points. Flayers you can max out at 4 points. Throw in a cannoneer and an Extoller and you have a nice little fire support team.

[Mr.chair]

You picked the right faction. That is all.

[kommander_redfinger]

You picked the right faction. That is all.

Actually thinking about it a bit more, and doing a bit more research, I am not sure I have, not because I dont like the faction/fluff, but rather I am not sure I want to play a faction that is "like Khador" The whole idea here is variety.

So any of you Skorne players out there play Khador as well? I would love to hear some similarities and differences between the two factions.

Ashton

[Joasht]

So any of you Skorne players out there play Khador as well? I would love to hear some similarities and differences between the two factions.

I played both Skorne and Khador in Mk.I, and ditched Skorne to stay with Khador. Nowadays my Khador is in cold storage, so I'm greatly considering getting back with them.

Skorne is a little bit like a hybrid of Khador and Menoth. While Khador is just axe-to-face all the way (well, to be fair nowadays its kinda more like blunderbuss to face) and Menoth is all about buffs, Skorne has both; the main force wants to liberally apply sharp pointy weapons to your face, but unlike Khador, you actually need to spend points on support models that can't quite fight themselves, but make everything else you have fight better, like Menoth. I'd say the "tradeoff" for it is Skorne's comparatively poor shooting; Khador has a good amount of shooting (Snipers, AoEs, and the WG deathstar come to mind), and Menoth isn't nearly half bad either with their their jacks throwing AoEs (some with auto-Fire) and well, Errants (to be fair Errants aren't the greatest ranged attackers in the world, but when you have a weaponmaster tarpit unit with guns that are useful in almost every list, thats still a bunch of anti-infantry shots in every list).

[gaminguy]

I haven't played Khador since Mk I Primal came out, but I play against them a lot and I'll second the above; Khador has a much better ranged game and their peices are generally a lot more self-sufficient.

[kommander_redfinger]

Thanks for the insight guys...

Ashton

[Armides]

So when I read all the answers I come to the Conclusion that Skorne is almost completely different to Menoth.
As a Menothplayer wanting to start a sec faction, I have to decide Skorne or Trolls. I don't want a sec Faction that plays "exact" like Menoth most times. So i hope i can go with Skorne or Trolls, and don't have to go Circle. Legion I don't want. Too many playing Legion in my meta.

[Mr.chair]

Honestly Ashton, I think you will find that trolls are going to play more like any of the four war machine factions than Skorne, simply because they generally rely on playing infantrymachine, rather than beast heavy. Sure, their are a few similarities between Khador and Skorne, but I'd say the greatest of them is the color of the armor I see the Skorne Khador comparison made a lot, and frankly I don't really agree with it. Whata re the similarities supposed to be, exactly? Khador actually has a lot of viable shooting, where as Skorne has only recently developed any ranged game at all. Khador has much better and more prevalent small based infantry. Skorne's infantry is ok, but it's mainly there to be in the way until it's time for your bronze back to stomp something big in to tiny pieces. Skorne has far FAR more movement shenanigans. Just to name a few: Sides step (very common), Beat back (common in so far as we all love our bronzebacks), overtake (common), Rush (in just about every list), Abuse, admonition, Leash, Savagery, Countercharge, Hyper aggressive. Skorne thrives on non-traditional movement buffing. I think we can hit from more angles than any other factions besides circle, and the best part is that very few opponents see it coming when they look at our beasts and see that pathetic speed of 4. I really think if you go with trolls you'll find them to be much more similar to Khador than Skorne is, but, of course, good luck to you in either case.

[kommander_redfinger]

Honestly Ashton, I think you will find that trolls are going to play more like any of the four war machine factions than Skorne, simply because they generally rely on playing infantrymachine, rather than beast heavy. Sure, their are a few similarities between Khador and Skorne, but I'd say the greatest of them is the color of the armor I see the Skorne Khador comparison made a lot, and frankly I don't really agree with it. Whata re the similarities supposed to be, exactly? Khador actually has a lot of viable shooting, where as Skorne has only recently developed any ranged game at all. Khador has much better and more prevalent small based infantry. Skorne's infantry is ok, but it's mainly there to be in the way until it's time for your bronze back to stomp something big in to tiny pieces. Skorne has far FAR more movement shenanigans. Just to name a few: Sides step (very common), Beat back (common in so far as we all love our bronzebacks), overtake (common), Rush (in just about every list), Abuse, admonition, Leash, Savagery, Countercharge, Hyper aggressive. Skorne thrives on non-traditional movement buffing. I think we can hit from more angles than any other factions besides circle, and the best part is that very few opponents see it coming when they look at our beasts and see that pathetic speed of 4. I really think if you go with trolls you'll find them to be much more similar to Khador than Skorne is, but, of course, good luck to you in either case.

That is some good description there, thanks for that. I think I may at the least buy the Skorne battle box this week, then I can get a few games in with them. Is the battlebox pretty indicative of Skorne play style and mechanics? I realize that the forum meta disregards the 2 cyclops in the box....but at least is gives me a place to start.

Ashton

[Talamare]

That is some good description there, thanks for that. I think I may at the least buy the Skorne battle box this week, then I can get a few games in with them. Is the battlebox pretty indicative of Skorne play style and mechanics? I realize that the forum meta disregards the 2 cyclops in the box....but at least is gives me a place to start.

Ashton

proxy/buy Molik Karn and Pain Givers Beast Handlers and that should give you a shenanigan filled 15pt movement game

[Darque]

The big difference between the battle box and real faction play is the lack of infantry.

Skorne infantry is such a big part of who the Skorne are and how the faction plays that to base initial opinions on just the Battle Box alone would be a mistake. Perhaps by proxying a unit of Nihlators in the game you'd get the feel for it.

After all the Battle box works out to be only 11 points. You have plenty of wiggle room.

[Demonster]

That is some good description there, thanks for that. I think I may at the least buy the Skorne battle box this week, then I can get a few games in with them. Is the battlebox pretty indicative of Skorne play style and mechanics? I realize that the forum meta disregards the 2 cyclops in the box....but at least is gives me a place to start.

Ashton

I've actually been using the Skorne Battlebox for a journeyman league at my FLGS, and it isn't horrible. It doesn't play the way most people enjoy playing their Skorne armies, but it's enough to get most people to say '***, you can do that?' or 'Seriously, you're cheating at this point....' I never liked the Cyclops when I first play-tested them, so I ditched them for about 5-6 months. Fully playing them for 5 weeks now, I have a newfound respect and can make things really stupid. The Gladiator is one of the heart and souls of the army - go crazy and experiment with it. Also, slam as often as you can, cuz almost nothing survives that impact on average rolls of most opponents saying '....I need to learn to do power attacks....' Morghoul is definately not one of my best casters to use in this learning experience, but he is very good and sort of plays an interesting role in the army IMO. He provides absolutely no support for infantry, so bring the best of what you like that don't need support. His low FURY bites, but his support for warbeasts is moderately stupid powerful, with his FEAT shutting down most opponents if they haven't used theirs yet. So yeah, have fun!

[kommander_redfinger]

Just wanted to say thanks again for all the feed back guys, it has really helped alot. I know these come up like twice a day, kudos to those who chimed in, and the those who didnt, may the last thing you see be the heel of a Bronzeback coming down on you!!!

Seriously thanks guys. I am going to buy a few models this week and probably start playing stuff next week. I will chime in then to let you know how it goes.

Ashton

[Revamp]

Late to the party but i'll say my piece:

I'm Khador player who picked up skorne. As far as the comparison goes the main similarity is that, at face values, they seem slow and tough. They take a spear/axe/etc and shove it through your skull. The biggest difference, to my mind, are two things: 1. Khador is much slower than skorne. Skorne has movement buffs that khador can't come close to. Khador's stuff is like +4 movment on a feat, or an upkeep for +2 speed on a jack within an area or even Move your stuff foward x inches for each focus spent up to three inches. Skorne, on the other hand, has stuff like savagry, road to war, abuse, etc. stuff that makes you ungodly fast. I would annihilate armies with one caster having savagery. Anyway, the second things is 2: Skorne hits way harder than Khador. Sure, khador has ps 19 threashers with reach and giant homicidal maniac casters that wield the strongest weapons int he game, but we don't have the sheer damage output that skorne does. Not when you factor in how far you can really push the armies. On the other hand, khador lives longer. In a non death clock game, Khador will out live, outlast, and out do every other faction pretty much by its pure ability to keep one guy alive that has the full ability to wreck faces. Given all the damage boxes, damage output, and speed they have, the two have synergies. but the aren't the same by a long stretch. In a word, i would sum Khador as Phalanx and i'd classify skorne as a Cannonball. both will kill large swaths of enemys, but the phalanx will live longer while the cannon ball will take out the enemies and roll right on through.

[swirly]

I have picked up skorne recently after playing Khador for quite a while. I have no idea where the comparisons come from. Khador have lots of similar options as far as model stats go, but that's where it stops. Absolutely everything else is way, way different, minis, spells, playstyle, top few powerful list builds. Way different. Pick up skorne as a second faction to Khador. You won't regret it.