Da Plan: Liz-Orcz

So anyone who has been following me on Twitter (or been within earshot) for the past few weeks will know that I have been just a wee bit excited about the release of the new lizardmen book. In all honesty my fervour has reached Nick Gentilly (of the Dwellers Bellow Podcast) levels of hobby ecstasy, climaxing this weekend with a prolonged high that I am still buzzing from! I am literarily #SoExcited.......

Long term blog readers will know I used to play lizardmen as my main army and wrote quite a lot on this blog about my exploits, cogitations and ruminations relating to the cold blooded reptilians (and amphibians!!). So my excitement was somewhat accentuated by my previous history and addiction to slann magic phases, the release did not disappoint... Now time to bite the bullet, in my opinion this is THE best Lustrian incarnation to date. Twitter will tell you different, warseer will wail with weeping anguish and all the while I just see so much opportunity!

Now I am probably wrong from a hard sharp end of the tournament stick point of view. Yes slann have been neutered a bit which was absolutely required, he was just silly in 8th edition warhammer, made worse by the fact you could take two of the froggy buggers at 2400pts. Anyone who says that a Loremaster death slann with rumination, becalming cogitation, bsb, leadership 10, ethereal, bane head, a 2+ ward and either the feed back scroll or cupped hands was fair or fun is frankly mental! They are still frickin' awesome however, arguably under costed and a 1+ in any standard tournament list ( I do massively approve of double old blood or carnasaur lord lists! #ManHammer , #BallsToTheWall etc etc....).

Where I am getting to is that the new list is a lot less lop sided. Combat is a genuine option with cheaper, stronger Krox units, wild formed saurus blocks (predatory fighters, 2 attacks each at Strength and toughness 5/6) and scar vet and old blood buses! Stegadons are awesome with some neat wee rules and now initiative 4 for the purposes of purple suns and pit of shades (PIH!) thanks to their new combined profile with skink riders. I'm really stoked to be honest and it is because I can now field my balanced, bit of everything, kid in a candy store list and not be an utter chump! I haven't even got started on the never ending garden of choice and strategy that is the lore of high magic but that is a story for another day along with my initial list idea. No readers, today is a day for dilemmas and head aches of a model variety....

So as you will know I recently started work on my new orc and goblin army with a fair old multitude of conversions and wackiness and as such I am a long way from being able to begin work on a lizard army. More worryingly I don't really know what paint scheme or modelling theme could be a decent successor to my orcs whom I am hoping will be my best army yet. This added to my mental strength of a toddler faced with the choice of chocolate or TOYS(!) meant that I would probably do a rush job and regret the orcs. Also with having relatively recently painted an out of the box lizardmen army and carrying an unhealthy distaste for the saurus models (seriously why can't they all be like the carnasaur rider!!!!) I really can't get a hobby "buzz" for the lizards. Finally I have already reached a bit of impasse of list creativity with the orcs having found a list that is effective but dreadfully boring and will not sustain my hunger for variety!

So my (not-so-secret-thanks-to-the-blog-title) plan is to do a combined army which fits both purposes: The Liz-Orcz! So the general principal is that I won't use any saurus, skink or lizardmen models (barring the big monsters) and instead use orcs and goblins. The idea is simple: goblins = skinks, saurus = orcs, trolls = kroxigor and so on. The "story" of the army is that a visionary orc shaman led a great and devestating waaaagh into Lustria and found/stole a long dormant palanquin which has given him vastly improved magical prowess and physic dominance over the weaker willed indigenous species of the jungle. 

Bellow is a break down of my unit cross overs and understandably there are a few orc units which will not have cold blooded partners. Notably this will be the manglers, doom divers, rock lobbas and spear chukkas. Chariots will also be a bit of a poor translation but in the short term they will be used as stegadons and bastiladons.

Slann: Wurzhag on a palanquin carried by four black orcs!

Old blood on a carnasaur: black orc on a carnasaur! This is actually a reverse and will work as a wyvern in the orc list because OMG the new carnasaur model is like sexual tyrannosaurus gold standard model goodness!

Old blood on cold one: Gorbad Ironclaw on boar!

Scar veterans: black orcs on boars

Skink priest/chieftain: goblin shaman/big boss

Saurus warriors: savage orcs

Skinks with blow pipes: night goblins with bows

Skinks with javelins: night goblins with spears

Cold one cav: boar boyz

Templeguard: black Orcz!

Stegadons: stegadon ridden by black orcs!!! (Boar chariots in the short term)

Terradons/ripperdactyles: night goblins riding the aforementioned beasts!

Bastiladons: black orcs riding a Bastiladon (pattern....)

Chameleons: hmm nasty skulkers?

Salamanders: black orcs with a flame thrower

Razrordons: black orcs with bolt throwers? 

Jungle swarms: ......jungle swarms?!.....

So the army will be pretty weird and in all honesty I'll use it as orcs at tournaments unless I get approval from the TO. I think it should be OK to be honest, I've seen/heard of much worse proxy armies lol! Thoughts peeps?!

So over the next few weeks ill do a few wee articles on the new lizards and my plans for the Liz-Orcz!